That P.J. O'Rourke is one pretty sharp dude. Except for not knowing the BB Gun ended production in 1960, he still sees what I do:

"We are the generation that changed everything. Of all the eras and epochs of Americans, ours is the one that made the biggest impression—on ourselves. That's an important accomplishment, because we're the generation that created the self, made the firmament of the self, divided the light of the self from the darkness of the self, and said, "Let there be self." If you were born between 1946 and 1964, you may have noticed this yourself. That's not to say we're a selfish generation. Selfish means 'too concerned with the self,' and we're not. Self isn't something we're just, you know, concerned with. We are self.

Before us, self was without form and void, like our parents in their dumpy clothes and vague ideas. Then we came along. Now the personal is the political. The personal is the socioeconomic. The personal is the religious and the secular, science and the arts. The personal is everything that creepeth upon the earth after his (and, let us hasten to add, her) kind. If the baby boom has done one thing, it's to beget a personal universe. (Our apologies for anyone who personally happens to be a jerk.)"

"We should have had a cooler name, the way the Lost Generation did. Except good luck to anybody who tries to tell us to get lost."

 "To address America's baby boom is to face big, broad problems. We number more than 75 million, and we're not only diverse but take a thorny pride in our every deviation from the norm (even though we're in therapy for it). We are all alike in that each of us thinks we're unusual.

Fortunately, we are all alike in our approach to big, broad problems too. We won't face them. There's a website for that, a support group to join, a class to take, alternative medicine, regular exercise, a book that explains it all, a celebrity on TV who's been through the same thing, or we can eliminate gluten from our diet."

That's pretty much been it - disgusting NewAge "America":

75 million dangerous, delusional, gibbering idiots.

Forever "offering" these useless choices, forced on me from birth,...

 

"Hormonal zealotry is for the birds." 

 I just made that up,...

 

Now, I ask you, serious business:

 "Is Gluten the Cause of Your Health Problems?" 

Or is it something else?

"Your choices are limited by who you are."

I love the ring of that phrase - and it's ring of truth - like a kick in the gut. So, since that seems to be the case (and since I'm *kinda safe* for the moment) excuse me as I jump in the fray, because culture is wailing on politics with a vengeance:

McAllister, running as an outsider, lined up an endorsement from "Duck Dynasty" star Phil Robertson, the patriarch in the popular reality show, and cast member Willie Robertson appeared in a commercial for the candidate. The program is shot in the northeast part of Louisiana that McAllister will represent.

Unlike McAllister, Riser had the backing of a number of prominent Republicans including U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.

Riser agreed with the governor's stance to reject the Medicaid expansion.

…The funeral home owner was the contest's early favorite with backing from the conservative Tea Party of Louisiana and the national group FreedomWorks, which is aligned with the Tea Party movement.

The Right is so out of sync now, it's pitiful. Everyday is the day before the last election - and then the "unexpected" happens. Again. GlennBoy's even already back to warning Republicans not to get cocky. Why? What are they going to do? Keep coming on like The Party That Doesn't Give A Shit? We've seen that. "Maybe get a black point-man."

"Man Has Magnetic Powers, Can Make Objects Stick To Body"

New Headline:

You Are A Fucking Idiot, Go Back To School - Retake Science

Unoriginal second thought - do we even need another metal attracting guy? Bending spoons? Wow.

Do something useful.

 Now here's a something that gets my attention:

"Since Christianity has produced a lot of dysfunctional people, suicides will more than likely increase among Christians in the very near future."

So it's a self-correcting system - cool. Kinda like this:

"Lady Gaga's 'ARTPOP' Flop Expected to Lose Label Reported $25M in Marketing Costs"

Word is people will be fired - at Christmas. Perfect. Contrast and compare with the netherworld:

 "Michael Jackson Tops List of Highest-Earning Dead Celebrities of 2013"

He's dead, and still a better entertainer than we've got now. What a wasteland. No, really, a wasteland. And nobody knows the difference, either, so far as I can tell. Everything just slips by.

"The Jamaican Maroons were runaway slaves who fought the British during the 18th century. When the British invaded Jamaica in 1655 the Spanish colonists fled leaving a large number of Africans who they had enslaved."

I'm beginning to think they're all a little insane. 

But probably not without good reason,...

“The source of the pollution is not an external contaminant such as blood or dirt, but human interaction.

  The affected person develops strong feelings of contamination that are evoked by direct contact with the violator or indirect contacts such as memories, images or reminders of the violation.”

Of course, we've been over all this before,...

 

“Women STILL do the lion's share of childcare... even when their other half wants to split the chores equally”

Are we crazy?

Why do women do this? Because trying to keep up with what you feel you should do and should be is exhausting. He’s there. He becomes a logical target, because someone has to be responsible for how bad you feel about yourself.

Wrong. Consider the possibility that it isn’t him. Try on that it’s probably your girly thoughts.

“[Kennedy obsession] now lives on mostly as a sort of repetition-compulsion disorder through which the baby boom generation,…seeks to preserve its stultifying cultural hegemony even as it slowly—finally!—begins to exit the stage of American life on a fleet of taxpayer-funded Rascal Scooters.”

Dark alleys leading down dark alleys. Turn back now:

"A person who shits on the kitchen floor because it gives them erotic pleasure and a person who shits on the kitchen floor to ward off the demons living in the cupboard are both shunted into the diagnostic category of encopresis. It’s not just that their thought-process don’t matter, it’s as if they don’t exist. The human being is a web of flesh spun over a void."

Saying it's wrong doesn't condescend or deny our humanity. 

So (again and still) fuck "you can believe what you want to believe"...

The causes of mental illness are many, but the results are the same:

  The political agenda put forth by a local organizer in Washington DC yesterday was not in alignment with our message. We feel disheartened that some would seek to hijack the narrative for political gain,...

A political group invited political people to a political event and then were surprised the political people used it for political gain.

That's like me, yesterday, having a delightful conversation with a delightful man that left me feeling pretty, well, delightful.

White guy, too - fucking weird,...