The Stupidest Thing of 2012 So Far

Wow. It is only January 2nd and I have already read the stupidest thing I've read all year. And it's quite possible that it's going to win out as the stupidest thing that I read all year. The thing is that I really can't tell where the stupidity arises from. I don't know if it's from the person who wrote the article (please note my omission of the word 'journalist) or if the article was written in such a way as to appeal to the sort of soft headed moron that might be reading it. Whatever it is, there is so much wrong with it that it's hard to know where to begin. But let's see what I can do.

According to the huffy folks over yonder at The Huffington Post, President Barry has signed the defense bill "despite serious reservations". Now while that may sound idiotic, I'm guessing that the reason that he ended up signing the thing is because, like all other bills, there was a whole bunch of crap in there that had nothing to do with defense that needed to be pushed through. And actually, that part of how bills are drawn up in Washington is completely asinine. Why there is stuff in a defense bill that has to do with unemployment benefits is beyond me. But as ridiculous as all of this is, that's not the stupidest part yet.

No, that honor goes to this part of the article: "Indefinite military detention of Americans became the law of the land Saturday, as President Barack Obama signed a defense bill that codified that authority, even as he said he would not use it."

::: blink ::: ::: blink :::

You have GOT to be kidding me. President Barry just signed a bill that allows for the government to detain American citizens as long as they want to for whatever reason they want (or don't want) to have and I'm supposed to feel better because he said that he isn't going to do that?! Please, someone, anyone, tell me that the last part was not actually uttered and included in his justification for signing this thing as a way to make anyone feel better. Do these people realize that Barack Obama is not our king? Do they realize that eventually, whether it be this year or four years from now, someone else will be President of the United States? Do they realize that any and all future Presidents can use that authority regardless as to whether President Barry says that he will or will not? Do they realize that if that law is on the books (and it is) that someone will one day use it?! Why am I the only one flipping out over this?!

See, this isn't one of those things where the brain dead argument of "If I'm not doing anything wrong then I don't have anything to worry about" doesn't come into play at all. That's the exact problem with this law! You don't have to be doing anything wrong to have something to worry about. All you need to have is some overzealous a-hole in a position to detain you and that's it. You're screwed. You're indefinitely screwed. If that doesn't chill you to your very core then might I suggest moving somewhere a bit more oppressive than the United States? North Korea, perhaps? You'll love it there.

I cannot believe that President Barry went ahead and signed that bill with that new law in it. What good is our Constitution if there can be federal laws enacted that will essentially strip away all of our rights that are guaranteed to us under said Constitution? And while I'm mad at President Barry, I'm absolutely appalled at Congress, as voted something like 94-6 in favor of this provision. All of those people who voted for this need to be thrown out of their office on their ass as soon as possible. For God's sake, please do not vote in November to re-elect any of these jokers that are currently in office and making decisions like this. Lord only knows what they'll come up with next time.

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Nine Percent And Dropping

The approval rating of Congress is at an all time low. And I mean low. According to something called the Inquisitr, the people that approve of the job that Congress is doing is at a whopping nine percent. Nine. My only question at this time is who are those nine people and what, exactly, are their standards? I'm guessing that they have relatives in Congress or they're lobbyists. Because I can't think of any other reason why their approval rating would be as high as nine percent.

And what have people approved of more than Congress? Plenty of things. And a lot of them might surprise you. For example, apparently, a Rasmussen poll in 2011 had an 11% approval rating of the United States going Communist. Now, I don't think that being a Communist nation is all that great of an idea, but more people thought it was a better idea than approved of Congress.



Remember the atrocious BP oil spill? Right in the middle of that, 16% of people approved of BP. That was a complete disaster and yet more people approved of that than they did of Congress.



Even Richard Nixon amidst Watergate had better numbers than Congress does now. 24% of people approved of Nixon when it became obvious that he was a liar (and contrary to what he said, probably a crook). That's over two and a half times as many people (as a percentage) than those who currently approve of Congress.



Banks in 2011 are not exactly on anyone's Christmas card list. But for some reason, 23% of people approve of those. So banks are on a par with Richard Nixon and both were rated over twice as high as Congress. If you haven't caught on by now that people really think that Congress sucks, I don't think that there's much I can do for you at this point.

And for some reason, 40% of people approved of the IRS in 2009. I don't know why that's so high, but when you compare it to the 9% approval rating that Congress received, it's astronomically high. No one likes the IRS. How did they get 40% of folks to approve of them? Maybe they could give Congress some tips.


And here's the most amazing part of all of this: Even with a 9% approval rating, it seems that whenever elections roll around, the majority of these bozos end up getting re-elected. I'm not sure if that means that polls like these are meaningless or if the average American voter is a dumbass. What I'm afraid of is that it means both. In which case, we're totally scroomed.

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Nice Ad

Want a good way to not get elected to a public office that you're running for? Try the Dan Fanelli approach, as seen below. Go with a bunch of stereotypes. That's a good start to not getting elected. Then make sure that you only focus your ad on things that you probably aren't going to have a lot of say in, like how the TSA operates, for example. But I will commend you on finding people to play the parts of the stereotypical terrorists in this commercial. That's pretty impressive. Everything else, though? Yeah, you might want to rethink some of that if you're kind of serious about getting elected. To anything.

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You Don't Say?

So, just a couple of ridiculous and not so shocking things that I ran across today. (And don't worry. My "vacation" is almost over. Expect daily posts to resume shortly.)

According to Huffington Post, Jesse James and Kat Von D have broken up. Shocking, I know. Who would have thought that the guy who would be so freaking stupid as to cheat on the extremely lovely Sandra Bullock would be unable to have a committed relationship. I'm not saying that it was his fault. I'm saying that he's a jackass.

Also in the news, the lawyer for lunatic Norwegian shooter Anders Behring Breivik says that his client is possibly insane. Possibly? Really? A guy starts shooting anyone and everyone that he can find in an attack that he planned for at least nine years because he sees himself as some sort of a warrior and some sort of Western world savior and he's only possibly insane? Jesus, what do you have to do over there in order to be probably insane?!
And by the way, you're not going to pretend that when you first heard of this horrific ordeal and when you first saw a picture of the obviously insane lunatic that you didn't think that Julian Assange had gone off the deep end, are you? Behold!




Yeah, they're the same. Maybe not Val Kilmer/Chaz Bono the same, but still the same. And finally, I had been doing some reading about all of the human-animal hybrids that are being created in labs all over. First thing I thought of was this guy. Behold!

But then I realized that it was former Congressman David Wu (Oregon, D-umbass) who has just resigned because of some sex scandal. Word on the street is that he had sex with an 18-year old. She seems to be implying that it was not all that consensual, whereas he (of course) is insisting that it was. Right. Because if I were an 18-year old girl and I saw Simba there, I would naturally want to hit that immediately. Uh, yeah, I don't think so.

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It Gets Raised All The Time

OK, let's talk about the debt ceiling. Everyone else seems to be. But they seem to be talking about it in terms of gloom and doom. Shocking, I know. And that's really not quite the case. I mean, it's doom-y and it's gloom-y, but that's nothing that's all that new.

The debt ceiling is supposed to be just what it says that it is. It's like a cap on how much debt the country can be in. See, the United States doesn't take in enough money to pay all of its bills. Yeah, that's a problem. So, the US has to borrow a boatload of money all of the time in order to pay for everything. And by "everything" I mean things like Social Security, the military, stuff like that. Stuff that (mostly) needs to be paid for. And if we don't raise the debt ceiling, then come August 3rd, things won't get paid. The country won't be able to borrow the money that it needs to pay its bills. And while that's bad, you would think that this would be a good opportunity to open up some discussion on the matter of what to do about all of that debt that we have. You would think.

I'm not trying to make this a Republican vs. Democrat issue. President Barry wants the debt ceiling raised. According to USA Today, they want to "...to cut spending and raise taxes while raising the debt limit by the Aug. 2 deadline". OK. President Barry doesn't want to raise taxes. He says that "...the White House could reach $1.7 trillion in spending cuts over 10 years without new revenues". OK. Now, I have no idea if that $1.7 trillion is accurate. I have no idea if it's even close to being true. But there are some things that I do know.

I know that all of this posturing over whether or not one side or the other is going to agree to raise the debt ceiling is just for show. It will get raised. How do I know this? Mainly, I speculate a lot. But I do so based on things that I see. See, people that are in Congress want to get re-elected. If this thing doesn't get raised and a bunch of people don't get paid and it becomes the Republicans "fault", that's not going to go over well come election time. It's also not going to go over well if taxes get raised when our tax dollars are being pissed away right and left with wasteful spending. That won't help that whole re-election cycle that they all drool over.

But before I get to the real reason, I'd just like to suggest that perhaps they consider changing the name of this thing. In what way is the "debt ceiling" or the "debt limit" either a ceiling OR a limit when you can just keep changing it? It's like when you go to buy a car and there is a suggested retail price. That thing can move all over the place. (And hopefully if you're buying a car, you're haggling to get the price reduced and not raised.) It's not a firm price. And this magical number that we have for what our debt can be? That's not a firm number. And it never has been.

And that brings me to the main reason why the debt ceiling will be raised without the government shutting down. They do it ALL THE TIME. According to CNN Money, "Since March 1962, the debt ceiling has been raised 74 times, according to the Congressional Research Service. Ten of those times have occurred since 2001." Seventy four times?! SEVENTY FOUR?! Since 1962?! That's 49 years. That averages out to once every 8.1 months! Are you freaking kidding me?! That's not even a full term pregnancy! 8.1 months! Oh, for cryin' out loud. Just raise the damn thing and get over it. What the what?! This happens ALL THE TIME! Stop it with the phony posturing all ready! Geez. We're doomed. Doomed!

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Congress Can't DO That

I really don't know what to say about this one. Seriously. First of all, I didn't know that this was even possible. Second of all, how come no one is making a bigger deal of this? Just wait. I'm getting there.

I was reading this article over at the NY Times and it started off innocently enough. Here we go: "The Senate on Wednesday rejected efforts to block the Environmental Protection Agency's program to regulate greenhouse gases, defeating four bills that would have limited the agency’s attempts to address global warming." Interesting. I wonder what the House was doing while the Senate was doing that? Well...

"The Senate voted as the House was debating a measure that would also halt the regulations by repealing the agency’s scientific finding that carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases are endangering human health and the environment. That bill is expected to pass the House on Thursday." Wait. They're what?

How do you REPEAL science?! It's a scientific finding! It's right there in the name! Scientific! It's also right there in the rest of the name. Finding! It's a SCIENTIFIC FINDING! You cannot repeal a scientific finding simply because you're in Congress! My head hurts. I'm done for the day. But just to quickly review: Congress is taking way too many liberties with whatever power they think that they have. Way. Too. Many.

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The Ruler We Fear

I hope that the site that I'm going to be referencing hasn't been fixed by the time that this posts. Apparently, a woman named Jane Corwin is running for Congress. Judging from the current appearance of her website, I'd say that she needs to hire better IT staff. If it hasn't been fixed, I'm sure that you'll find it as hilarious as I do. If it has been fixed, I only wish that the power supply on my main computer hadn't blown up and that I wasn't on a different computer. If I had my regular computer, I'd cut and paste and do all sorts of little Photoshop things here. You know, like I tend to do. But for now, I'm just going to have to part with words of wisdom: Get your domain names locked down. Especially if you're running for Congress. Especially if you're running for Congress.

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Those Aren't Cuts!

Remember that budget deal that all of those weasels in Congress waited until the very last freaking minute to agree upon? Yeah, that's the one. And remember how they were all smiles afterward and acted like they had accomplished something monumental? (I know that whenever they do nothing they think it's monumental, but this time they were really pleased with their own act.) And then after it was all said and done we were told that they managed to cut about $38 billion dollars? Remember? Of course you do! It was only a couple of days ago for cryin' out loud. It turns out that the $38 billion dollars that they claim to be cutting isn't anywhere close to what they actually cut. No, in fact, the amount that they actually cut is so ridiculous that it seems damn near pointless to cut it at all. It really is a "Why bother?" scenario.

This new but not surprising information comes to us from the fine folks over there at The Washington Post. They learned from the Congressional Budget Office that "A federal budget compromise that was hailed as historic for proposing to cut about $38 billion would reduce federal spending by only $352 million this fiscal year, less than 1 percent of the bill’s advertised amount". Now look, I'm not one to be someone to claim "Oh, that's just a drop in the bucket." But, come on! $352 million?! Less than one freaking percent?! How did this happen? I'll tell you how this happened. It happened in part because "...$13 billion to $18 billion of the cuts involve money that existed only on paper and was unlikely to be tapped in the next decade." Oh, good! They're trying to fix our impending fiscal doom with accounting tricks. Next up? Fun house mirrors! And they act so freaking proud of themselves.

Here's the best part. Even though those $352 million in cuts will happen, for some reason, no one felt like factoring in "emergency" money for military action. You know. Like if we end up in Libya or something like that. (Yeah, like that's really going to happen. Wait. Didn't we....? Yeah. We did. Hmm. Disregard that statement.) Now, I don't know why they wouldn't factor those things in. If I'm doing a household budget and I have emergency money that I have spent or am spending, I'm going to have to factor in that it's going to get used. There's no way around that. You can call it whatever you want, but you still have to count it. But I'm guessing that the reason that they didn't want to count it when they were forming the budget out of snake oil is because if they did then "...the overall spending for this fiscal year may actually increase, by more than $3 billion." Oh, for cryin' out loud!

Their little accounting tricks don't end there. "A Washington Post analysis of the 459-page budget revealed at least 98 cases in which Congress took back unused IOUs and called it a cut." HOW is that a cut? Don't answer that. There's more. "When the Capitol Visitor Center was under construction, lawmakers allotted $621 million to pay for it. The project wound up costing less than $600 million. In the compromise budget, lawmakers took back $15 million of the unused budget authority." Well, I should hope that they took it back! They didn't USE IT!

I'm making myself crazy here. This is insane. Instead of saving any money at all, Congress has very well (and probably very likely) passed a budget that is going to be costing the country MORE money. And people wonder why folks get so up in arms about spending! It's because it is out of control. President Barry said the other day that the greatest threat to our national security was our debt. And if he truly believes that and he ends up signing this budget, then we are so scroomed that there's not even any point. If both sides of Congress are going to flat out lie to us, it's over. And both sides, by saying that this budget cuts $38 billion dollars, are lying to us. Thus, it's over. We're scroomed. Goodbye, sweet America.

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Toads On Craigslist

Yesterday, we had what might have been the shortest "sex scandal" in Congress ever. Seriously, the only way that you knew that anything had even happened is because suddenly the guy resigned. And it was only 3-1/2 hours after the whole thing came out! Then when you hear something like that, that's when you get to hear why he resigned. It's all just very odd. And I really don't think that it's much to resign about. But then again, at least we won't have to hear about it for weeks on end. I hope.

Here's the deal: There's a New York Representative named Chris Lee. Now, Mr. Lee is a married bloke and he wanted to have an affair. From what I can tell, he did not have an affair...this time. But then again, when you're caught doing something, you're rarely caught on your first time out. Whether or not he had affairs before trying to have this one is beyond me. (Translation: He's been cheating on his wife for a while now. Pig.)

See, he was trolling Craigslist looking for a hookup and ended up being enticed by "...a 34-year-old single woman of "black/Irish" descent, who had advertised online for a "financially & emotionally secure" man" according to the NY Post. (Black/Irish descent? Begorrah, M-F-ers! Yeah, that joke really works best if you use an Irish accent. It's pretty good without it, but the accent really hits it home.) She apparently had written: "Will Someone Prove To Me Not All CL [Craigslist] Men Look Like Toads". Oh. I see. So, you're too good for Craigslist, and yet you're on Craigslist. This woman is bothering me already.

Representative Einstein replied to said ad with: "Hi, Hope I'm not a toad. :)". I can only assume that is when he sent the following picture of himself. Behold!

Good Lord, sir. What is that look on your face? Were you recently anesthetized before taking that pictures? And seriously, when are people going to learn how to take pictures with their phone without actually having to point the phone IN the mirror?! What the what?! I really have no answers. He apparently also included in his reply (along with that sexy, sexy photo): "I'm a very fit fun classy guy. Live in Cap Hill area. 6ft 190 lbs blond blue. 39. Lobbyist. I promise not to disappoint." Oh. Sure. Yeah, you seem classy. Because nothing says "classy" like a married member of Congress taking a shirtless picture of himself in his bathroom. Oh, yeah. It reeks of class. Reeks. And I guess that "promise not to disappoint" means...can get an erection? I'm a little unclear on that part, so I'm really just surmising at this point. I can't think of much else, though.br>

Of course, we all know now that he is not 39 and he is not a lobbyist. He is 46 and he was a Representative for the state of New York. He was also married at the time. Whether or not that plays out for very long after this fiasco, we'll just have to wait and see. Then again, if I was his wife, it wouldn't be so much about the affairs as it would be about his way of going about them. "Here I am in my bathroom without my shirt. Am I a toad?" Ugh. What a tool.

He did send along an explanation of the photo that he sent, saying: "I just took this one . . . I'm relaxing at home." You're just relaxing at home? Who the hell relaxes at home like that? In their bathroom, still wearing their dress slacks and (probably) their loafers and completely shirtless? Apparently, he wants someone to believe that he does. The woman who had originally posted the ad had similar questions to mine, asking him: "So do you always send shirtless pics to women from cl?" Lady, you're trolling for dudes on Craigslist! You can knock off the little coy act. You're no saint yourself, you know. And while that question was pretty bad, his answer is even worse.

The dude answers her and explains: "Sorry. It's all I had." It's all you had?! You took a picture with your cell phone! What, you cell phone doesn't work any more? The days of those sort of excuses are gone. Long gone. There is NO excuse for not sending someone a current picture of yourself. There's also NO excuse for not sending someone a picture of yourself where you are be-shirted. You could have taken a picture of yourself while your shirt was still on! Does he not get this sort of logic? He apparently did not! Even if you put the cell phone part aside, why would the ONLY picture that you would have of yourself be one where you don't have on your shirt?! Maybe he's just routinely shirtless. "I don't even know where to find a shirt. It's been so long. I haven't worn a shirt in years!" What a maroon.

And that's that. Once word of him and his shirtless stupidity got out (when the chick figured out who he was because he was dumb enough to use his real name, she went running to Gawker.com and I'm guessing sold them her story just like you'd expect a gem like her to do), he resigned. It's over. But there is one little side note I'd like to leave you with. Back in 2009, "...shortly after he helped pass the Student Internet Safety Act" (you read that right), he "...wrote an op-ed piece warning kids about the dangers of the Internet." He wrote: "Responding to what may seem like a friendly e-mail . . . can have serious consequences...Private information and images can so easily be transmitted to friends and strangers alike." That's good advice, son. Good ad-vice.

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Rangel's Wrangles

Longtime crook, Charlie Rangel, was finally "held accountable" after it was voted upon and found that he should be censured for a number of violations. It seems Mr. Rangel, who was responsible for crafting a LOT of the current tax laws and rules, felt that those rules didn't apply to him and his little villa he owns in the Dominican Republic. Shocking, I know. And Mr. Rangel really seems to enjoy that villa of his. Why, here's a photo of him enjoying himself now!

It doesn't get much easier for political cartoonists than that. But back to the crooked congressman. He was found guilty of eleven different violations. Naturally, there were ethics violations in there as well as his not paying taxes (which seems like it maybe should have warranted a criminal investigation, but because this is Congress, I guess they do things however they want). And since he has been found guilty, there is now a punishment. Can you guess what his punishment is? I would have thought that if you're found guilty of stuff like that that they just boot you out. Corrupt politicians in Congress are not what we need. Ever. But that's not what they do. No, they voted to censure him. Wait. What now?

That's right. Censure him. If you're wondering what a censure consists of, so was I. I was really hoping that there were going to be lions involved, but sadly, there will be no lions. Maybe if Siegfried and Roy were making the rules we'd get some lions, but unfortunately, they're not. According to Wikipedia (so take it for what it's worth), "After a motion to censure is passed, the chair (or the vice-president, if the presiding officer is being censured) addresses the censured member by name. He may say something to the effect of, "Brother F, you have been censured by vote of the assembly. A censure indicates the assembly's resentment of your conduct at meetings. A censure is a warning. It is the warning voice of suspension or expulsion. Please take due notice thereof and govern yourself accordingly." Wait. That's it?

That's it. Mr. Rangel will stand in the well of the Senate and they will read the charges that he has been found guilty of and then they will say that he has been censured. I'm pretty sure that he gets to say something, but I'm not sure if it's required, nor am I sure if he is required to apologize. (If it is a requirement that they apologize, that's a pretty stupid requirement, as it's not like the person would actually mean it or anything.) Then he can go back to whatever it is that he does. That's it. That seems like a slap on the wrist if you're asking me. They could have voted for expulsion. Now that I could have gotten behind.

I don't get this censure thing. And I can't imagine that it's going to have any effect on the man at this point. He's been a congressman for 20 terms. TWENTY. That's unbelievable. That's also forty years, which is also unbelievable. He represents the area in and around Harlem and I'm just guessing that, based on what he has been able to do for the community, they aren't really going to care about some censure. After all, all of these charges had already been brought against him when he went up for re-election just a couple of weeks ago and he won with something like 80% of the vote. His constituents don't care about censure. And while he acts like he cares, he doesn't.

I started wondering about this censure thing and why it doesn't happen more often, given how crooked I think a lot of the politicians in Congress actually are. I know it takes a ridiculous amount of time to look into these things, but I don't know why. I didn't find the answer to that and I perused the Innerwebs looking for answers, but I did find a fairly interesting statistic regarding censure. There have only been 22 other representatives who have been censured. Um, that's not very many if you take into account how long we've actually had a Congress.

Several folks were censured for "unparliamentary language". Now, I don't know what that consists of, but whatever it is, it sounds great! Very engaging! I sure would like to see a little bit more of it on C-SPAN. Those hearings are awfully boring. They need a little unparliamentary language to liven them up a little bit. (Hell, the Taiwanese lawmakers get into fisticuffs with each other all of the time!) A couple of folks assaulted some other lawmakers. The first guy censured was a one William Stanbery who, in 1932, "...was censured for insulting the Speaker of the House." I really want to know what he said. I also really want to know what he would have had to say about Nancy Pelosi. (I'm guessing that Botox would be a theme in his thoughts, should he have been able to share them.)

But here's the other thing I learned: A guy was censured in 1921 for the unparliamentary language. It wasn't until 1979 that the next guy was censured (only this guy apparently partook in mail and payroll fraud). Not only do I find it absolutely unbelievable that there have only been 23 (counting Mr. Rangel) members of Congress that have ever been censured, I find it incredible that they could go for almost sixty years in between. Between the 1832 and that guy in 1921, there were 19 censured congressmen. Since 1921? FOUR. The last one was in 1983!

You cannot possibly tell me that there hasn't been a single crooked politician since 1983! And mind you, the two most recent censures were for "...sexual misconduct with a House page." You're telling me that everyone else has played by the rules this entire time?! Oh, please! Is anyone surprised that politicians are on the take? Is anyone surprised that they do the crooked stuff that we all know that they do? If there aren't any penalties for them other than being told in front of their peers that they've been caught and then they get sent back to work, why would they follow the rules when there is so much money to be made and power to be had?!

We need more censures. Who's up next? A one Maxine Waters looks to be on the docket for being investigated or charged or something along those lines next. Maybe we'll know how that one turns out in another sixty years or so. That would be about right, given the history of these sorts of things. I'd be willing to bet that Charlie Rangel not only runs for re-election next time, but that he wins as well. People never learn. And those that do are the ones who are getting away with stuff like Charlie Rangel did and does and probably will continue to in the future. We're so doomed.

::: Insert unparliamentary language here:::

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While perusing the Innerwebs today, I ran across this over at something called Washington Scene - The Hill:

Oh, please. Are you freaking kidding me? A reception to honor your accomplishments? Is that necessary, you twit? First question, who is paying for this wing ding? It certainly had better not be taxpayers and if it is, I want to go. I'd feel a lot better about how my tax dollars were spent if I actually felt like I got to use the things that they were spent on once in a while. (And don't tell me that the roads I drive on are paid for by some sort of tax dollars. The roads I drive on are crap, at best.)

Seriously, how out of touch is she (and the rest of them)? They need to throw themselves a little wing-ding so that the entire self-congratulatory bunch of them can stand around and reinforce how great they think they are? That doesn't sound all that necessary to me. You know, y'all haven't exactly turned this country around all the way quite yet. What say you hold off on your narcissistic tea party until the unemployment rate is at least at a manageable level again, OK? Is that too much to ask? Apparently so. Sadly, apparently so.

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Mr. Colbert Goes To Washington

Every time that I think it isn't possible for Congress to disappoint me any more than they already have, they turn right around and do something that just zaps my ol' WTL (Will To Live) right out of me. And while I'm a big fan of comedy, I don't know that I necessarily need it on the floor of some sort of House subcommittee hearing on immigration today in the form of Stephen Colbert.

That's right. Stephen Colbert. For reasons that are completely unclear to me, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-umbass) from California, who is the chairwoman of this subcommittee, invited Colbert to testify as some sort of "expert witness" about all of the migrant farm workers and their plights. Or something like that. As I've previously stated, none of this makes any sense to me. But that doesn't mean it wasn't funny.

I guess that Colbert spent a day in the fields with some migrant workers and picked his share of fruits and/or vegetables. That's what makes him an expert? A day? I've done plenty of things for A day. It hardly make me feel like an expert. And usually, it just makes me glad that the day is over and I don't have to do it any more.

I guess that Rep. Lofgren doesn't quite get that Mr. Colbert plays a character on TV. Oh, sure, it's him and all, but he's in character. See, TV isn't always real! I'm serious. Not always real. Granted, the times when it is real, we most often wish that it wasn't (ie, Kate Gosselin). I'll give you that. But it's not like this is the first time that a fictional character has testified before Congress. Oh, no! There was one other. Would you care to guess who it was? Of course you wouldn't. You're not going to want to know, either, when I tell you that it was Elmo. Oh, for cryin' out loud.

It appeared as if even Mr. Colbert was confuddled as to why he was there and, according to The Huffington Post, said that he was happy and honored to be there, "...to share his "vast experience" of working on a farm for one day, and hopes his fame will get this show bumped up to "C-SPAN ONE"." That's pretty funny. I'd be laughing harder if it wasn't before freaking Congress, but it's a good bit.

And several more good bits followed that one. Sadly, some of the good bits were from the representatives themselves. And they would have been funnier if I wasn't so irritated that they were asking stupidly amusing questions at a Congressional hearing. Questions like those from a one Lamar Smith, a Republican from Texas, who asked Colbert if the work on the farm was hard? Answer: "It's certainly harder than this." He then asked if it was harder for Colbert to do his comedy show? Answer: "Much harder than punditry." Are you serious, Mr. Smith? That question reinforces my belief that a large number of representatives are completely out of touch. Has this man never worked on a farm? Has he never seen farm work being done? Do we need to show him an episode of "Green Acres"?

For some reason, a one Judy Chu (D-umbass, CA) compared Colbert's appearance "...to that time Loretta Swit testified before Congress about "crush videos"." I don't know that comparing Stephen Colbert to Loretta Swit in any capacity is a good comparison. Yes, I'm sure that there are lots of celebrities that have testified before Congress (for some reason). I get that. But I don't think that Loretta Swit and her "crush videos" crusade has a lot in common with Stephen Colbert joking that even though the day he worked in the fields he was a corn packer, that he "...understands it is a term for a "gay Iowan, and meant no offense"." Yeah, they're clearly different. (I'd like to know how all of that "crush video" testimony given by Ms. Swit (in 1999, by the way) turned out as far as Congress goes. What did they do about it? Anything? Anything? Anyone? Hello? Oh, I see. Nothing, eh? Moving along!)

Some of his best lines seemed lost on the representatives. Barely getting them to crack their stone-faced gazes was this zinger: "This is America. I don't want a tomato picked by a Mexican. I want it picked by an American, then sliced by a Guatemalan, then served by a Venezuelan, in a spa where a Chilean gives me a Brazilian." Does Congress know what a Brazilian is? Of course they do! I'm sure that they require that most of their potential pages have one as a prerequisite to an internship.

I think my personal favorite was this one: "I’m not a fan of the government doing anything. But I’ve got to ask: Why isn’t the government doing anything? Maybe this Add Jobs Bill would help. I don’t know. Like most members of Congress, I haven’t read it.” Excellent point, Mr. Colbert. I, too, would prefer that the government stay out of most matters. But when there are matters that it seems like they should get involved in, they don't seem to exactly be Johnny on the spot. Granted, Mr. Colbert and I have different opinions on these migrant workers (mine being that if they're here illegally, they need to go), but it doesn't change the fact that no one is doing anything other than having pointless hearings with a bunch of people that haven't read the very bill that they're talking about.

Is it November yet? How many of these yo-yos need to go? I'm guessing anyone who considers a person with one day of "experience" to be an "expert" who is worthy of testifying before Congress. Why don't these damn representatives go out and work a day in the damn fields themselves if they want to know what it's like? I don't know what in the world that would actually do, but then again, I don't know what in the world Stephen Colbert was doing testifying before Congress, so it probably couldn't hurt.

We are so doomed. And screwed. We're so scroomed.

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