Smoking medically proven to cause rudeness...

As I was driving today, I pulled up to a stop light and watched as the driver in front of me tossed a cigarette butt out of his window. Then, after a very predictable beat-and-a-half, the telltale stream of pollution billowed from the half-open driver's side window. That scene was probably being repeated in at least 10,000 other intersections in this country at that very instant. Why do those of us who do not smoke allow this to continue? Because of the constant barrage of "civil liberty" misrepresentation that we are subjected to every single day. Somehow, smokers, and their contemporaries, have fallen under the misguided assumption that their right to suicide supersedes the rights of the rest of us to actually have air to breathe. Don't get me wrong: any time a bunch of ignorant drug addicts (Yes, nicotine IS an addictive drug) want to shorten their lifespan and hopefully lessen the impact of their specific contributions to the gene pool, I am behind them 100%. However, the very concept of liberty (and the associated rights therein) is a simple one: You are free to do what you wish UNTIL IT INTERFERES WITH THE RIGHTS OF OTHERS. That being said, I have no problem with a bunch of half-wits ignoring medical proof that their habit can and will kill them. In the spirit of fairness, if my obsession with bacon cheeseburgers ever causes someone else to suffer "second-hand arteriosclerosis", I will immediately drop the meat habit.

It almost seems as if smokers have decided that since they are not worthy of self-respect, that they are not required to extend any measure of respect to those around them. What really astounds me is the apparent disdain that smokers have for non-smokers. "I'm through with this cigarette, therefore I shall litter the ground with the smoldering remains of my self-imposed destruction." Why can't they put the butt in the ASHTRAY that has been so conveniently included in their automobile? Do they toss butts out of their windows in front of their own homes? I highly doubt it.

Now that I think about it, I guess it's not really that big of a deal. I can always just start tossing my Wendy's wrappers in their front yards when I'm through with them.

After all, it is my RIGHT to enjoy that juicy, artery-clogging goodness when I am driving around.

Who is it going to hurt?

The...pain...in...my...eyes

I..wait what was I saying?

I apologize. I just reread another article about the impending release of control of 6 ports (on U.S. soil..or is it on U.S. water? Either way...it is within U.S. borders) to a company based in...wait for it...the UAE. (For those of you scoring at home, that stands for the United Arab Emirates. Yes, THOSE United Arab Emirates. The ones in the Middle East. One of them is suspected of being used as a base by the 9-11 hijackers and of having its banking system used by groups connected to al-Qaeda. A lovely part of the world where they burn American flags as a family-friendly activity and the children's lullabies may or may not contain references to the impending death of all infidels. Those Emirates. Now that you are up-to-speed, back to our story.)

This political travesty that President Bush is fully in support of, even going so far as to say that he would VETO any legislation that attempted to derail this deal, is even being condemned as a bad idea by top Republican congressmen.

The President, displaying an unusually high degree of cluelessness (or is it disdain for the rest of us?) is quoted as saying; "I really don't understand why it's OK for a British company to operate our ports, but not a company from the Middle East."

Um...I have an idea about that, Mr. President: Perhaps it is due to the fact that the Queen Mother does not regularly call for the Almighty's vengeance to wipe the former British colonies in which we live from the face of the Earth. As far as we know, Prince William and Prince Harry have not declared that they support the destruction and murder of U.S. citizens as the just retribution of a Supreme Being. Just a thought...

The deal was endorsed by the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States, a closed interagency panel chaired by Treasury Secretary John Snow. Mr. Snow was, oddly enough, chairman of a rail firm that sold its own port operations for $1.15 BILLION in 2004 to...wait for it...the same company the President is supporting in this transaction (Dubai Ports World). To recap: Mr Snow is now the Secretary of the Treasury. He sold his company to DPW in 2004.

I don't really have to spell that one out for you, do I?

As a final one-finger salute to the rest of us, last month the President nominated David Sanborn to head the U.S. Maritime Administration. Who is David Sanborn, you ask? Well, he heads DP World's European and Latin American operations. Notice the tense of the verb in that last sentence. Present tense. As in, "HE IS STILL EMPLOYED BY THE COMPANY THAT IS BEING OFFERED THIS LUDICROUS DEAL." Fortunately, White House spokesman, Trent Duffy, stated that while Mr Sanborn does, in fact, work for DPW, "we're told he had nothing to do with the transaction".

Oh. Well, that certainly makes me feel better. Honestly, at this point I'm not sure which upsets me more. The fact that disingenuous imbeciles can be elected to national public office in this great country of ours or that they actually think that the rest of us are stupid enough to believe them.

Apparently, it will be much easier to capture Osama bin Laden if we hand him the keys to the city of Miami, Philadelphia, New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, and New Orleans and wait for him to show up.

So, we're going to sell control of 6 major ports to a company with possibly questionable ties to al-Qaeda. Great. Now if we could only find a way to convince another country to offer to buy our top elected official...oh, wait, I think that may have already happened. My bad.

2008 cannot get here soon enough.

Bad TV: Harder to get rid of than crabgrass

Ok, let me get this straight: Cupid, SportsNight, and now, Love Monkey. Anytime a new television show (with any degree of intelligent humor that does not appeal to the most basic, crude instincts in mankind) debuts, it will invariably be cancelled before the first commercial break. Yet, pure garbage like American Idle, Joey and the Donald Trump Ego Hour have a longer shelf life than those Twinkies I bought in 1998. Pretty soon you will all be watching the latest version of the police precedural CSI: My House.

The most disturbing thing about the herd mentality of the networks, is not the immense ego that must convince them that they actually know what they're doing. The real shock is that they are so consistently wrong. They should actually get one right occasionally, shouldn't they? I mean, even a broken clock is right 5 or 6 times a day.

Now before you start in with all the mandatory "freedom to choose" arguments, allow me to clarify my position. I have, through years of intense study, meditation, and deep introspection discovered the perfect way to counteract the constant barrage of unimaginative, septic refuse that occupies prime time.
It is amazingly effective.

OK, gotta go, Conan is almost on and he has that "Grandma Luge" on tonight. I cannot wait to be fascinated by her story again. I may have missed something the first 37 times they showed her profile on the Today show this week.

The greatest moneymaking idea in the history of...this week

So, some lazy British student cons, err, convinces several hundred people/companies to pay him for the right to place an ad on his somewhat transparently-named website (that I will NOT be promoting here) and the world goes crazy over what a genius he is. Pardon me, but that was not "genius". That was mere ignorance on the part of everyone that bought space on the site. I am still stunned that we, as a species, have fallen into such a state of mental disrepair that we feel compelled to give money to someone who is not providing us with any tangible service whatsoever.

In a tribute to that generous spirit, I am officially opening up my very own space for guest web loggers, or "Gloggers", as I call them.

For the mere "donation" of $1 ( $1.78 Canadian), you can have your own post on the Mental Whirpool. You will have the opportunity to present your own observations about this world in which we live. On the internet. Where tens of people can actually read something you probably already told them in person this morning in the hallway at work.

Please send all "donations" to: spamfree4me@gmail.com

By the way, if something is foolproof, it is merely proof that there are fools that need to be protected from themselves.

Betting with myself: A losing proposition

Blogging has taken the internet by storm. I guess. Since I'm what they call a "late-enough-to-be-called-deceased adopter", I guess it is about time that I start to try to get some of this noise out of my mind and onto "paper". (Which, in and of itself, seems ridiculous to me. Thoughts are simply electrical impulses travelling along a network of fibers in my head. Now they will be electrical impulses traveling a network...of fibers...eventually transmitting themselves to yet another network of fibers in someone else's head. Just... like... yours. Sorry about that.) I have also placed a friendly little wager with myself on whether or not anyone will actually read this page. The winner gets to choose what we have for lunch for a week.

Just in case anyone ever actually reads this, allow me to make a few statements right up front:

1. I am not disgruntled former government employee taking a patriotic stand against the unwieldy, ethically-starved political machine that resides in Washington, D.C.

2. I am not an angry, withdrawn loner seizing upon an opportunity to "express my inner demons" to the world.

3. I am not Jerry Seinfeld. (There will be no "What's the deal with that?" on this page.)


This will be a collection of frequent ( read: whenever I get a spare minute and a somewhat perplexing thought in my head) musings, rants and/or comments on the world around me. The same world that happens to be around you. I just happen to have the spare time to think about it from a more specific point of view.

Anything you read here will not be the opinion of anyone else associated with NBC, Disney, Oprah, ESPN, Starbucks, McDonald's, or anyone else who might take offense to the fact that they appear not-so-smart on this page. (The blame will be all mine.) If you are one of these companies (Yes, OPRAH is now a company), please take your ego and "wounded" civic pride somewhere else. To quote someone I once knew: I can't get involved with all that.

Stay tuned. There's no telling how unimportant this will get.

By the way, I will not be using any cute acronyms to save myself keystrokes i.e., ROFL, L8R, or TINSTAAFL. I figure that if you've taken the time to read this this, I should actually take the time to WRITE it.