2002-11-20 4:22 p.m.

Three More Bricks Paving Our Collective Road to Hell

Lately the news has had at least one story that's made me want to beat my head against the wall. Today, we get three. Let's start with the one I woke up to.

Good news! declared the analyst on the radio this morning. California women are doing really, really well! In the Status of Women in the States 2002 report, California is way ahead of most other states in its wage gap between men and women. We women in California are now making -- hold onto your seats, girls -- EIGHTY ONE CENTS to a man's dollar! Wow! Will you excuse me for a moment while I fetch my smelling salts? I think I'm about to faint from the excitement of so much progress.

...

OK, I'm back now. Funny how the authors of the report, as quoted in the Washington Post, didn't seem nearly as giddy about all this as our perky public-radio analyst.

In other good news, if you can't find your own ass with both hands Iraq on a map, the anchor team/braintrust at FOXNews assure you that you "shouldn't feel bad -- you're in good company." Only 13% of American schoolkids can find Iraq on a map of the world, according to the article on their website. Or is it on a map of the Middle East, as they said on air? No matter to them I suppose, since they think America needn't trouble its pretty little head over it anyway.

Wrong! YOU SHOULD FEEL BAD ABOUT NOT KNOWING WHERE IRAQ IS. IGNORANCE IS BAD. IGNORANCE IS CURABLE. GO BUY A FUCKING MAP.

Ahem.

And the final brick on our road to hell that was in the news today was, of course, the Senate passing the Homeland Security Act 90-9. William Safire, of all people, spoke out against it, but it didn't even slow this down.

Y'know, 2002 has been a year of suck in so very many ways. Can we just call a do-over?

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