Coming Soon: The Blue Collar Comedy Tour 2005, Featuring George W. Bush as "George The President Guy"

Stand-up Guy: George W. Bush, captured by Reuters' Jason Reed, April 29, 2005.

Related: Blue Collar TV.

If History's Any Guide, This Trip Will Change His Name, Expand His Definition of Brotherhood, Give His Biopic Its Final Act, And Lead to His Well Deserved Immortality

Above, Vladimir Putin, Cairo April 27, 2005 (via Reuters); Below, Malcolm X, 1964 (by John Launois/Black Star)

Brothers in Arms

Good news, Jeff Gannon! According to today's New York Times' report, Pentagon Considers Changing the Legal Definition of Sodomy, by John Files:

The office of the general counsel at the Pentagon has proposed decriminalizing consensual sodomy among adults, a change to its 55-year-old policy on sodomy that would bring the military legal code more in line with laws that govern civilians, according to a memorandum sent to Congress.
[...]
The changes proposed by the Pentagon's lawyers would narrow the definition to prohibit acts of sodomy with a person under age 16 or acts "committed by force." Their memorandum says this would "conform more closely to other federal laws and regulations."

Recruitment will surely go up—or, at least, recruits will go down—now.

Related: Anyone else enjoying Sundance Channel's The Staircase, which also features a plot twist involving a military M4M escort? This documentary series is so good and so suspensefully constructed, it makes every iteration of Law & Order look like The Stick Figure Players Do Bad Twist Ending Theater.

Cynicism Aside, We Hail The New Pope and Pray for World Unity

Heil, Mary: Achtung, Ratzy!
New Pope Appears, Asks World for Prayers, Reuters, April 19, 2005.

We salute war heroes, but draft dodgers? We just shake their hands.

Up top, "Blake Sanford, 6, son of South Carolina governor Mark Sanford, waits his turn to shake hands with President Bush, far right, as he arrives in Columbia, S.C. to deliver a speech on Social Security reform Monday April 18, 2005. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)" and at the bottom, well, that famous JFK, Jr. pose at his father's funeral.

Big business, bigger humanity...which means we're the biggest motherfuckers around

Yesterday, as Adobe Systems announced the acquisition of Macromedia, the primary reason for the merger of these onetime-rival multimedia software titans soon became clear: terrorism. Yes, terrorterrorterrorterroreconomyterror.

News reports clarified this stance:

"After 9/11, we both realized that being enemies didn't make sense," Adobe CEO Bruce Chizen said in a conference call on Monday, referring to his discussions with Macromedia's then-CEO Rob Burgess. "We were no longer competing."

And in other coverage of the merger/acqusition, Chizen continued with his moving paean to an American tragedy, but this one a bit more "economic" in nature:

He acknowledged that combining the companies will lead to some lost jobs, but would not provide details.

"There will be some areas of redundancies, and that's where there will be some layoffs," Chizen said. "It will be difficult to quantify that until we get in and look at the integration."

A loss of lives, a loss of jobs...what's the big deal? We're all good people here. Working to overcome tyranny by making web-safe graphics. Annihilating the enemies of freedom by distributing American propaganda as Flash-based short films.

And your pink slips? Now available in the ever-popular PDF document format.

Unintentionally Hilarious Photo of the Moment, Vol. 52

Jenna Bush and the oh-so-delicate return of the Associated Press' "unidentifiable male friend"

Via the Associated Press: "President Bush, lower left, sits in the Presidential Box with members of his family and guests at RFK for the home opener Washington Nationals and the Arizona Diamondbacks Thursday, April 14, 2005 in Washington. Also sitting with Bush are Sue Selig wife of Commissioner of Major League Baseball Bud Selig, Tony Tavares, President, Washington Nationals, center, first lady Laura Bush, lower right, and daughter Jenna Bush, top right, leaning her head on the shoulders of an unidentifiable male friend. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)"

EARLIER: Young Love, Republican Style

And this metaphor might as well be a fucking Daewoo

As French citizens prepare to vote in their May 29th referendum on whether or not to approve the European Union's new constitutional charter, President Jacques Chirac took to the populace yesterday to stake his claim that it was imperative for the measure to pass. His driving point, effectively, being that for Europe to be unified and powerful (when translated from his native leftist French, this reads as "able to exist as a counterbalance to Bush's United States of Imperialism"), it was vital for France to support this burgeoning European Union, lest one of its biggest players be seen as stepping away from the table, thereby leaving a weak and disconnected shell of a coalition in its wake.

So, if that doesn't make sense, try this metaphor put forth by the French Interior Minister:

French Interior Minister Dominique de Villepin said Europe would end up being driven by a "tricycle" rather than a "hot rod" if the French vote the treaty down.

"With a 'no', there won't be anything left in the garage... At best, there will be a tricycle," de Villepin said. "With a 'yes', there will be a hot rod... It has to be admitted that it's better to get around with that."

The Renault sitting in my garage, by the way, has a meager 40 horsepower, for what it's worth.

"Two Years Ago, This Country Had One Microphone. Last Year, It Had Three. Are We Making Progress? I Would Say So."

Donald Rumsfeld and Ibrahim al-Jaafari, Tuesday, April 12, 2005. [via Reuters/NYT]