Thursday, March 30, 2006

A Lady-Version of David Cross is Released by Her Captors, and a Right-Wing Justice Flips Off the Press: This Inanity Train Keeps On Rollin'

Is it just me or does Jill Carrol, the girl who was kidnapped by insurgents in Iraq and released the other day, look like a female version of David Cross in this photo? I don't know. She does to me. In any event, I'm glad she wasn't beheaded by those guys (who, she says, treated her well), and is now free to report for the Christian Science Monitor and be alive in general. (By the way - does anyone know of anyone else who's either read or knows anyone who's read the Christian Science Monitor? I've read they're fairly non-partisan, so I figure that eliminates more than half of Christian readers in this country, so who's reading this thing?)

Anyway. In other news, the press is jumping on Antonin Scalia because he did that Sicilian gesture where you turn your palm towards yourself and scrape your bunched fingers under your chin towards the person you're insulting. You know, like the picture! This is how it went down, according to Peter Smith, an associate professor at Boston College who took the photograph:
“The judge paused for a second, then looked directly into my lens and said, ‘To my critics, I say, ‘Vaffanculo,’ ” punctuating the comment by flicking his right hand out from under his chin, Smith said.
The Italian phrase means “(expletive) you.”
I don't like Scalia's views on interpreting the Constitution, or much of anything, and I think he's a dangerous guy to have on the bench right now, but is this obscene gesture thing really worth an article? Does it really matter that he flipped off a photographer? Why is this being treated like Scalia shot a guy in the face? Maybe a slow news cycle, or maybe because Scalia got caught in a lie. Originally he was saying he hadn't made the "(expletive) you" gesture, but in the photo above, which came out later, he is, clearly, doing the gesture. I mean sure looks like an idiot, and it's not really dignified, but it's his right to gesture however he wants to, isn't it? Besides, I'm tired of dignified justices. They should all be able to say "(expletive) YOU!" whenever they feel like it. Why else have lifetime appointments?

Anyway, the March edition of the Literary Smackdown is in its final hours. Just one more day to go for judgin'. Kris Baucom joined the fray with a new entry just last night, (the 10th entry!) so check out his story and all the others and see what all the chatter's about. Or just comment on my blog. I'm out. Peace!

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Word was F@*k.

blankfist said...

"(expletive) YOU!"

You can type "fuck", dude. You can speak freely in this country without fear of their standard issue kicking in your door, if you get me. You can type "fuck", dude. You really can.

Anyhow, great article. It's nice to see someone spell a word I can only pronouce. Vaffanculo. For anyone curious, the way to pronounce it is like this: Vah-fahn-koo-low. But, said really fast like a Soprano or something.

Anonymous said...

Here's a great website to learn more:

http://www.gambino.com/curse.htm

Anonymous said...

I apologize if I'm offending any friends with this pizan background but Italians invented fascism. God, country and all that nationalistic love affair shit.

Mussolini coined the term to mean, corporatism as a way to combat Bolshevism of the period.

Then, they tried to occupy Greece and got their asses handed to them. Big time. Pussies.

A country living almost exclusively on carbohydrates can only go so far until they burn out on the exahust of their own farts.

I mean, today, the Italians complain of Silvio Burlesconi, but yet the people vote this guy into power time and again - even if he is a crook, even if he owns almost every media outlet in the country, and even though he has a coalition in parliament with Mussolini's grandaughter who is a "Neo-fascist".

Also, look at how the police "under his administration" handled protestors at the G8 summit in 2000/2001 - killing an innocent protester and beating, torturing the hell out of others. They even dressed up like anarchists and bombed shit, to use this as a pretext to beat up even more people.

Of course, all of these cops involved are now part of a huge scandal/trial in Italy, but nothing will come of it - because most of the Italians deep down inside wish they were Romans.

So, is it any surprise that Scalia would act this way?

MAMA MIA!

-- PAPA

blankfist said...

Way to kill the blog with a history lesson. Thanks, Paul.

Anonymous said...

and Fuck was the word on colbert last night. Way to catch on guys.

Anonymous said...

And the Greeks invented gayness.

But so what?

Anonymous said...

Actually, the act of sodomy has been around long before the Ancient Greeks celebrated it as the creme de le creme of lovemaking.

My point is that Scalia's actions are not surpirsing considering that a majority of Italians (Italian-Americans) lean towards a GOD, COUNTRY, CHURCH fanaticism.