WTF Wednesday: A great week to be a misanthrope

I am having a hard time with this post: I cannot decide which WTF moment to lead with. Too many blazing instances of human stupidity, greed and bigotry circulating the Interweb and I am at a loss. But forge on I must since if I don’t write a WTF Wednesday post this week, it would be like Tiger Woods missing the opportunity to play his 18 holes after being appointed the chaperon for the Miss America Pageant.

WTF Moment #0: BP Oil Spill. ‘Nuff said.

WTF Moment #1: BP’s liability is, as of now, limited to $75 million due to a law passed 20 years ago.

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httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kk4n0SvG0-Y

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WTF Moment #2: BP made $5 billion in profits in the last quarter. That’s PROFITS, peeps, not REVENUE. And it is last QUARTER, not last YEAR.

WTF Moment #3: BP CEO said they will take responsibility for the RESPONSE but NOT the Accident. Since the drilling platform was outsourced to another, much smaller company, BP is, as implied by Tony Hayward, not at fault. In the same vein, DOD is not responsible for what happened in Iraq since much of that has been outsourced to Blackwater, and I am not responsible for my children since much of their education has been outsourced to the public school education system.

WTF Moment #4: Soon after the explosion and the resulting spill, BP reps went around coastal communities, offering residents, including fishermen whose livelihood depends sorely on the ocean, Wait for it! A whopping $5000 if they agreed to not sue. Please see #2.

WTF Moment #5: Is it just me? Was anybody else disgusted by BP’s move to create an environmental friendly, greener, image with their new green sunburst logo? They spent millions of dollars on that rebranding campaign. It would be tragically ironical if they end up paying LESS in liability for the largest environmental disaster to ever happen to this country than what they have paid in that marketing campaign.

WTF Moment #6: “Rush Limbaugh suggests environmentalists planned oil spill.” Please say something to this while my jaw is on the floor and I cannot talk.

Earth to Rush: Hey! This is Glenn Beck. I don’t believe that Obama blew up the oil rig!

WTF Moment #7: If you are shocked by #6, you are going to love this…  According to Rush, “The ocean will take care of this on its own if it was left alone and was left out there.” And, there’s more!

“It’s natural. It’s as natural as the ocean water is.”

My favorite comeback came from Keith Olbermann: “You know what else is natural, according to Rush? Hemorrhoids.” GOLD!

WTF Moment #8: (This is personal whining…) We have planned a mini vacation to St. Pete Beach, Florida, this week specifically just so we could revisit Fort De Soto Park, one of the best beaches, and most under-hyped, in the US. It’s not just me saying it, it was selected as America’s Best Beach in 2005 by Dr. Beach. From what I have read so far, there is a chance that these beaches will luck out and escape the tragic fate of being affected by the oil spill. At least for now. But some scientists are not as optimistic and have predicted a not-so-sunny future for the Florida coasts, and ergo, economy. Upon learning this, I am becoming grateful that, by coincidence, this may be the last time we have a chance to see the beaches in their pristine, gorgeous state before the looming disaster hits.

WTF Moment #9: Another disaster was not receiving the deserved attention due to the oil spill and other shenanigans (that will be reported later in this post): the flooding in Tennessee and Kentucky which has reportedly claimed 29 lives and put more than 1,000 people in emergency shelters.

WTF Moment #10: The bomb used in the Time Square Bomb Scare was made with no more than items found in random hardware stores or beauty supply shops based on instructions found easily on the Internet. New York Times published a lengthy article describing the contraption, complete with a shopping list for any wannabe copycat out there. But of course, nobody in this country would be crazy enough to want to copy this. So we are good.

WTF Moment #11: The Time Square Bomber “suspect” Faisal Shahzad had been put on the “Do Not Fly” list but still managed to board the Emirates flight.  Authorities are blaming Emirates Airlines for working with an outdated Do-Not-Fly list.

WTF Moment #12: Arizona. Where should I begin? Ugh.

On April 23, 2010, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed a bill that enacted the toughest and most stringent immigration law this country has ever seen in modern days. You know, after the Immigration Act of 1924 which included the National Origins Act and Asian Exclusion Act and most of what’s covered in the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 were abolished by the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. So yeah, we effectively walked backwards 45 years…

This law would make it a crime for immigrants to fail to carry immigration documents on them and give the police the authority to detain anyone they suspect to be in the country illegally.

Note to Self: When in Arizona, remember to NOT dressed like an FOB. And of course, to remember to carry my U.S. passport with me at all times.

WTF Moment #13: Arizona. I cannot even make this shit up. According to The Wall Street Journal, “The Arizona Department of Education recently began telling school districts that teachers whose spoken English it deems to be heavily accented or ungrammatical must be removed from classes for students still learning English.”

Ok. I agree that teachers without a command of correct grammars should not be teaching English. But how many people you know that are native English speakers ignore grammars when they speak? How often do you see native English speakers with higher education commit the “sudden death” (imo) mistake of using IT’S when they meant ITS?

And how about those accents sported by other native “English” speakers from the other parts of the world? The Irish. The Scottish. The Australian. Hack, I have a hard time understanding the British accent.

Here’s my proposal: Anybody that does not speak AMERICAN should not be allowed to teach in our schools. Period.

Oh. You say you don’t know how to define “the American accent”? You say you cannot understand the Bayou accent even though it is technically VERY AMERICAN?

Well. Fuck me.

I wish Arizona have simply come clean from the beginning and said what they have had on their mind all along, “Whose spoken English it deems to be heavily accented or ungrammatical and WHO HAPPENED TO BE BROWN.”

You know what? I am pretty darn sure they have no problem with Elin nee Nordegren Woods’ accent even if she sounded like the Swedish Chef.

WTF Moment #14: Arizone. Again. Triple win. Seriously. Give the other states a chance. South Carolina called. They are not too happy with the spotlight you have been getting lately. They want their hard-earned “Worst State” title awarded by Jon Stewart back!

The attack on ethnic studies.

According to a proposed bill, school will lose state funding if they have classes that “promote the overthrow of the U.S. government, promote resentment of a particular race or class of people, are designed primarily for students of a particular ethnic group or advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.”

Have you read the Classic English Literature Canon used in English 101? Leaf through it and let me know when you come across an author whose works have been included in Classic Lit that is was (well, according to the DEAD White male rule, they are all dead so the past tense is a given) NOT white. Go on. I’ll wait.

soundboard.com

Oh. What? You cannot find any. So one could argue that Classic English Lit canon can be construed as “designed primarily for students of a particular ethnic group”?

I guess I shouldn’t have behaved like an ungrateful immigrant. We really should be grateful that within the proposed bill, the teaching of the Holocaust or other cases of genocide will still be allowed. Oh my god. This is huge. Thank you so much! Until some closeted Holocaust denier becomes the next superintendent, that is.  So teach them while you still can, teachers!

16 thoughts on “WTF Wednesday: A great week to be a misanthrope

    1. Absence Alternatives Post author

      LOL. Thank you so much! That’s kind of why I put up the section “You have been forewarned” on my sidebar. I do talk about politics and I don’t want people to be caught off guard and then feel cheated… 😉 I am definitely not neutral on many things. 🙂

      Reply
  1. Linda at Bar Mitzvahzilla

    Well, you can imagine how embarassed a Liberal Democrat like me feels to be an Arizonan right now. And you forgot to mention the other crap going on around here, like the fact that now people can carry concealed weapons without a license. Would there even be this “problem” if the illegal immigrants they were so concerned about were Canadians?

    I believe racism is at the heart of this and at the heart of so much other right-winged nonsense in this country.
    .-= Linda at Bar Mitzvahzilla´s last blog…Human Garbage Can =-.

    Reply
  2. A Vapid Blonde

    I never watch the news, read the news, listen to the news….except when I wake up in the morning and NPR is my alarm. And if you could do this on a weekly basis I would be the most informed person.

    I can not…repeat CAN NOT stand when people say that Mexicans are stealing our citizens jobs. I have worked with so many Mexicans and they are the hardest working people who get paid for shit and do the shittiest jobs on the planet seven fucking days a week 15+ hours a day. Do you know how many people I see on unemployment, disability…what ever because they are too lazy and feel entitled?

    There really is no end to my comment here….seething!

    The oil spill….it is still spewing oil right? Why???
    .-= A Vapid Blonde´s last blog…Wooden Owls, Flying Rabbits and My Acid Vagina =-.

    Reply
  3. Justine

    Love this post!

    Has someone put the logo of BP and the map of Arizona on failblog yet? If not, we should.

    A dead white male’s “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times” still resonates today. No wonder it’s a classic.

    Reply
  4. Vintage Christine

    If you would videotape yourself doing this rant, it would out-John Goodman’s “Treme” rant BIG TIME! My husband works offshore so first we started getting phone calls from friends and relatives hoping he hadn’t been killed on the rig fire (nope, he works on a dive barge not a rig) and now we’re getting calls from friends and family wondering how the oil spill is affecting us. Well, considering the fact that we’re a little over a week away from closing on a condo in Florida, hmmm, let me think about that . . .

    Reply
  5. pattypunker

    you’re so right, these days it’s hard to decide who should take the fucktard crown. epic fails.
    hope you have a fab trip to st pete’s beach and let’s hope it’s not the last.
    .-= pattypunker´s last blog…motherfucking oprah =-.

    Reply
  6. Wicked Shawn

    Okay, first off, where is Rush broadcasting from these days? Because I distinctly recall he pledged to leave our fair country if HCR passed. It passed. Why in the hell is he even still here??!!

    BP is an abomination. A-B-O-M-I-N-A-T-I-O-N!!! All I can even bring myself to say about it. As for anyone who wants to talk to me about how they fund wind power research or any of that other nonsense, well, Phillip Morris Tobacco Co. also runs anti-smoking campaigns, shall we discuss how hard they are really trying??

    Arizona- I have a solution. I am going to sell it to Mexico. We need the money and they need to learn a fucking lesson. Sorry for the foul language on your site but they deserve it.

    Hugs!
    .-= Wicked Shawn´s last blog…Open Letter To Rielle Hunter =-.

    Reply

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