Nothing has Anything to do with Everything
Wow. I woke up this morning and realized there are certain people I'm sick to death of already and I'm only halfway through my life.
What am I going to do?!
Man, Richard Branson, eh? I mean, take off already. Figuratively. There's boyish super rich wunderkind, and then there's ubiquitous dumbassed fuckface. (And by the way, if you google "Wunderkind" for the correct spelling, 4 items down you get this link: RabbitEars. I have no idea what it's about - I just thought I'd pass that little tidbit along to prop up my developing theory that nothing has anything to do with everything.)
Yes, indeed. I am so totally sick of watching Richard Branson live his life, that I've even stopped wishing the hot air balloon, or whatever the latest "around the world" conveyance is this week, would just pop a slow but deadly leak because I don't think I could take the inevitable retrospective:
"Oh yes. He was such an unusual billionaire in that he made so much money and yet did all sorts of self-indulgent things with it. One never knew, for instance, whether he would try to break the world record for circumnavigating the world by air - or by land - or by sea. He was like a fantastical voyageur of mystery."
"Please, Gawd of Mean Wish Granting. Let Richard Branson get an inner life. Yours in Bile. Sooey."
Next on my list is Conrad Black - and I'm placing him second on purpose. It's my extra mean streak what does it. The bigger the crook, the more likely I'll put you second on my list of people who annoy me greatly. Because it's not even enough that he's a crook, is it, and got away with it in his country of birth and ripoffery, all the while dissing us as second-rate Brits and third-rate Americans until finally he could very publicly take no more of our ilk: "Revoke my citizenship, please, for I can no longer abide these no account Canadian savages". He has to be pompous and blowhardy about it, and then, when he FINALLY gets caught by his beloved Yankee Overlords - we end up feeling sorry for him! I mean, haven't you noticed how, even though he's treated people like us (and there's a great book by Dominick Dunne - who I think Mark Steyn was attempting to emulate in his scribblings from the front, except from the defence side as opposed to the prosecution side - which would, at least, have had some merit: "I glanced up from my notes to make discreet eye contact with Barbara. She has the most expressive of eyebrows. Once, at a party at their lavish home in Palm Beach I saw her disembowell a caterer with just the slightest cock. We laugh about it now but at the time I remember putting my hand protectively in front of my trousers" - called "People Like Us" that should be on every high school curriculum reading list) with the most studied disdain imaginable - we, like, well - FEEL SORRY FOR HIM NOW!
Yup. I gotta admit - I feel sorry for him and wish that, rather than doing time of any significance in an American prison, he would be re-patriated to Canada and paroled after a couple of months at Montebello (in the off season) or somesuch resort that would be hard enough for any of our rich citizens to endure (unless they're at a paid for by taxpayers summit with lots of international rich citizens to mitigate the circumstances), but which would leave a lasting, yet harmless, scar on Lord Black of Crossharbour.
Number three, natch, is the old golddigging ball and chain, Babs Amiel. I mean, c'mon. That poppycock about looking for a place near the likely prison he's sentenced to is about as likely a story as her adopting a baby from Africa.
Although, her adopting a baby from Monaco isn't such a stretch. Especially if its last name was Grimaldi and it had been left outside the palace gates with a gold gilt sign around its neck: "Free to Golddigger at Loose Ends". And I suppose it would be just like her to re-invent herself with a campaign to end reverse discrimination against wealthy white westerners with teary commercials paid for by the National Review: "Ordinary, average, inconsequential people need to understand that it was for their own good that we spent shareholder riches lavishly. They didn't deserve it, indeed - they weren't even aware of it - and yet, we shared with them out of a spirit of benevolence and charity. Maids, chauffeurs, pilots, flower arrangers, wardrobe managers - all of these people benefitted from our largesse. If mistakes were made, they were made in the interests of the lower orders - those same vermin who would gladly see us stripped of even our home in Palm Beach as if they weren't the reason we bought it in the first place."
Fourth on my list are all the "Support the Troopers" who seem to think that Stephen Harper's choice of Gordon O'Connor as Minister of Defence means something other than that he doesn't really give much of a rat's ass about the troops himself. Actually, just leave it at "Support the Troopers". They can all go blow it out their asses, as far as I'm concerned. Yesterday, I saw one of those bright yellow ribbons on the back of a big black SUV containing a party of one small middle-aged woman. Those are some bright yellow ribbons, I'll tell you. At least, they're hard to miss when you're stuck on the road behind one of those wide-assed black SUVs you can't see around to pass in your little rented cobalt that's surprisingly good on gas. So you get to stare at them for hours and think about how huge the disconnect between "Support the Troopers" and Afghanistan really is and after a while you get to thinking that, while those people get the government they deserve, the rest of us are being penalized by their existence on earth and pretty soon you're in a place you shouldn't be and you have to pull back and repeat "Serenity now, serenity now, serenity now" until you get home and turn on the evening news to find out that the last king of Afghanistan is dead at 92 and you think "Wow. The kings of Afghanistan have really long lifespans compared to the Roadside Bombers, Warlords, and Poppy Farmers of Afghanistan."
And fifth is that nutso facto group of Israel firsters ("Let's Party Like It's Still 1948 - Because For Us, It'll ALWAYS be 1948!") who seem to think the rest of us have to send {{HUGS}} to Israel to make up for a bunch of despotic Arab theocracies that want to wipe it off the map. Sorry, eh. But I don't have to compare Israel to Iran to say I don't care for how it practices diplomacy. I don't care for Israeli diplomacy all on its own. I think its rightwing government blows chunks, too. So if y'all love Israel so much, buy Israel bonds. Move there. Join the army. Whatever. Hey - in fact, lots of Sudanese are moving there right now. Go join them. In fact, Israel's Foreign Minister was just on CBC saying the government there is going to have to come up with some sort of policy for dealing with refugees because, of course, Israel has no experience of dealing with an influx of refugees on account of, well, uh, like, um - refugees are usually white - aren't they? So yeah - you could probably emigrate - no problem. Fast track it right past the special prison the Israeli government is housing the Sudanese refugees in while it works on a refugee policy.
Okay, okay. Israel's Foreign Minister didn't exactly say that about refugees to Israel usually being whiter'n Sudanese. But he said something. And then he split without allowing any questions because even he could smell his own bullshit, I'm pretty sure. He had that "I smell a turd" look on his face, anyways.
Oops:
{{HUGS}} And, "I wuv u, Israel!"
Oh -and, also:
"Support the Troops!"
