Target becomes it's own target

So I know this is old news but I said in my first post that I had a backlog of people (and/or organizations) that needed the stupid to be called on them.

In case you don't remember, Target, under the new "Citizens United" decision by the Supreme Court (we'll talk about that stupid decision in another post), donated $150,000 to MN Forward, who in turn was donating to MN Republican candidate for governor, Tom Emmer.

Sure, Tom Emmer was pro business (I didn't realize democrats were anti-business but I digress), but what Target's CEO, Gregg Steinhafel, didn't bother to vet about Mr. Emmer, was his anti-gay rights (pretty much all gay rights) agenda.

The Human Rights Campaign and other organization quickly tried to show Target it's error. Target did realize that they acted stupidly and even apologized. But when the HRC asked Target to donate an equal amount to a candidate that was for gay rights Target only said that they would be more careful in future donations.

So the HRC decided to drop Target from it's buying guide (and Best Buy, btw, but I don't shop there as much as I do at Target so that's not a big deal for me--too much temptation in Best Buy for me to blow all my savings so I stay away to protect myself).

So my wife and I decided that we would, for the first time in our life, truly boycott an organization. We have been boycotting Target since this all went down in August. I'll admit, at first, there were some slip ups. We were used to hitting Target a few times a week. Other friends that were also boycotting said it is just as easy to go to Costco, regular grocery stores, and pharmacies to get what we need. Well, it hasn't been so easy. Costco doesn't carry my toothpaste and I think I spent $6.00 for a tube a CVS.

Now, in my research on this subject and other organizations that are in my sights for future stupid calling out, I came across the American Family Association (this organization definitely deserves its own post. They epitomize the word stupid. I think Websters should have a list of this organization and many other sister organizations as examples of the word stupid. I'm thinking, to not repeat myself on future posts, I'll lump them all in one post. Once again, I digress.).

Target, ironically, has a history of being very gay friendly towards their employees. They actually offer partner benefits. Because of this simple little fact the AFA has been boycotting them long before me and the HRC came around.

So, this brings me to two conclusions:

1. Target is really stupid. They are really stupid because they have managed to pretty much piss off all sides of the gay rights issues in this country. That takes some serious talent. Target has definitely become their own victim of trying to please all of the people all of the time. Target has proved that time honored quest of being a friend to everyone is truly an impossible feat and you end up being hated by everyone. Nice job Target! I'm sure there's a Darwin award awaiting you.

2. The second conclusion is that I should stop boycotting Target. As much as I'm disgusted by the donation that Target made (The race for MN governor has the democrat in the lead but it is so close an automatic recount is taking place) I'm more disgusted by the goals of the AFA and I will only be a better person the more distance I create between myself and the people that subscribe to their hateful, ignorant, bigoted philosophies.

And, truth be told, Christmas is coming up and you can't beat Target's prices for clothes, toys, and just about everything else! I miss Target. I'm willing to forgive but not forget! ;-)

I'm Not a Witch!

Christine O'Donnell. Another person that the Tea Party seems to want continue the march to mediocrity that started with George W. Bush. Some people have even called her a "Sarah Palin mini-me." It seems like the Tea Partiers equate anti-establishment with lowest common denominator. Is there anyone out there that is smart and anti-establishment?

We could talk about how colleges are lining up to set the story straight on whether she attended them or not, or how she thinks she's on a mission from God to keep the Bush era tax cuts on the books, but what really gets my stupid goat is her thoughts on creationism that were brought up in the debate last night.

Didn't we put this to rest when GW was asked about it and most people scoffed at his "political" answer that both evolution and creationism should be taught side by side? Christine thinks the government "overreaches" by not letting schools teach creationism (aka Intelligent Design). I want to ask her in what class should they teach creationism? Because it definitely cannot be in a science class!

It is very simple. Creationism is not a science. It doesn't use the scientific method to reach its conclusions. It uses a two thousand year old book that was written when humans thought the earth was flat and the center of the universe.

If a private school wants to teach creationism and turn out a bunch of students who won't be able to make it through a college freshman course of biology then they have that right. But since our government separates church from state (much to the chagrin of many christians and I assume Christine) creationism cannot be allowed. If Christine ever gets the chance to take the oath to defend the constitution she should read the First Amendment once or twice.

I'd also like to ask Christine if creationism should be taught, and we don't want our government to endorse only one religion, than would she allow the wiccan view of how the universe began as well? And if we are willing to go that far then what about the view that I and many other pirates out there believe in, The Flying Spaghetti Monster. We all bask in his noodly appendage. Ramen!

Religious freedom for ALL, no exceptions.

There are a lot of people out there coming to stupid conclusions about the issue of an Islamic community center maybe being built 2 blocks away from Ground Zero. Newt Gingrich, in an obvious move to keep himself in the news and relevant, has become their champion.

On his own site Newt writes about his reasons for opposing the building of this community center. He thinks that radical Islam is trying to take over America. He has to dig so deep to reference a Marie Claire article for his proof. One article from Marie Claire magazine (isn't that a fashion magazine that helped create the show Project Runway? I love that show! Everyone knows that, "in fashion, one day you're in and the next day you're out." But I digress) does not proof make.

Now, I'd like to explain to Newt about our first amendment and religious liberty but he shows in his essay that he understands this. He stays, "in these and other instances, sharia is explicitly at odds with core American and Western Values. It is an explicit repudiation of freedom of conscience and religious liberty as well as the premise that citizens are equal under the law.

Sharia is the Islamic law that a lot of Islamic theocratic governments subscribe to. Yes, sharia is at odds with our constitution as it would be, at its simplest, endorsing one religion. Our first amendment forbids that so anything short of a violent Islamic revolution that overthrows our government and army there is no possibility that sharia law would ever become our law no matter how many mosques are built in this country.

To tell you the truth, I'm more concerned about a violent Christian revolution by American citizens who wrongly attribute our constitution and Declaration of Independence were formed by Judeo-Christians and think we need to go back to the way things were. Our forefathers were deists and the "creator" they speak of is no more from the Old or New Testaments than he is from the Koran. But that is for another post...

I also want to ask Newt about his belief that "citizens are all equal under the law." Does this mean Newt thinks gays should have the right to marry? I know he talks about being pro "traditional" marriage but to him the word "traditional" means that you can marry as many times as you want and cheat on said wives whenever you feel like.

At the end of Newt's essay he says Islamists are trying to confuse people. I think really either one of two things are happening. Either Newt is confused or he is the one doing his best to try and confuse American citizens.

In the end, the real reason Newt has injected himself into this and many other national conversations is his thinly veiled ramp up to running for president.

Well, a man that doesn't even understand the constitution that he might have to swear to defend one day (again) does not make a good president. Newt should take some time for some meditation or something and try to figure out what his values are. Not what he thinks Americans want his values to be or what the GOP machine wants his values to be, but what it really means to be an American and defend our constitution. Because if you swear to defend it you have to defend the rights of every American and not just the one's you agree with. Anything less would be, well, stupid.

Palinese

Oh, you knew she was going to end up here sooner or later. You could say she definitely had a part in the spark of inspiration to create this site.

But, let's remember our credo that most people aren't stupid but do and say stupid things. Sarah is definitely one of those people. What is weird is that she seems to do it on purpose a lot of the time. Let me just say that you don't get to capture the nation's attention just by being an idiot. I'm sure she's had help along the way and, at the risk of sounding sexist, her looks (she was a beauty queen) definitley haven't hurt her career.

Well, I won't delve into the past because she's definitely the gift that will keep on giving. So I'll start with her latest stupidness.

Just over a week ago she decided to use an oldie but goodie. She referred to President Obama buy using his full name. Now this isn't so much stupid as calculated and also showing complete desperation. In trying to defend Delaware Senate Candidate Christine O'Donnell (she's on my list but Bill Maher has been a great job so maybe I'll leave it to the professionals for now) she threw out his name, which in her mind, is a slur. Her and McCain's own campaign of 2008 denounced people when they would use Obama's full name in obvious attempt to disparage him and remind people that his dad was an African muslim (like that is necessarily a bad thing anyway?).

But Sarah is the queen of the lowest common denominator. She uses tactics that 6 year olds on a playground use like calling the MSM the "lamestream" media. It takes all my will power to not follow her to the lowest common denominator and yell at the t.v. and say, "I know you are but what am I?!"

We'll have to start a Palin count on this page or something. But I'll only ask Sarah this--how low can you go?

Hate and Stalking go hand in hand

My wife warned against using Photoshop because it is kind of a cop out but unless I get sponsored or Jon Stewart hires me I'm not sure how to fight all the stupid out there. I'll do my best to go where I can but in the meantime I can use the digital universe and the internet to "place" myself wherever I see stupid.

Today's project is Michigan Assistant Attorney General Andrew Shrivel--a'hem, I mean--Shirvell, who has made it his mission in life to try and bring down the University of Michigan's student body president, Chris Armstrong. He says it is not because Chris is a homosexual but because Chris is trying to advance the "homosexual agenda." I'm not sure what the "homosexual agenda" is other than trying to obtain equal rights with the rest of their fellow Americans so obviously I must be missing something.

Mr. Shrivell has even gone to the lengths of creating a blog called Chris-Armstrong-Watch and he pretty much follows this guy around and posts about all the "crazy" things this student body president is doing. Now, most people would call that a simple love crazed stalker but Mr. Shrivell uses his photoshop skills as well and puts swastikas all over pictures of Chris because Nazis loved homosexuals. I was going to provide a link to the picture I'm referring to but it looks like the enormous interest from Anderson Cooper's interview has caused his blog to be "only for invited readers" now. That was not the case this morning. This might be the first smart thing Mr. Shrivell has done in the past 6 months.

Anyway, there's really only one thing I want to point out about this situation. Yes, Mr. Shrivell has the right to do whatever he wants when he's not "on the clock" with the State Attorney General's office. Yes he has the same First Amendment rights as everyone else. So, in essence he's not doing anything illegal. But that is like your little brother holding his finger one inch in front of your face and saying, "I'm not touching you! I'm not touching you!" He's right. He's not touching you but it doesn't mean you are not going to smack him in about 10 seconds. A pretty stupid thing to do for a younger brother.

And to start a blog, protest outside this kid's house, and basically use all his spare time to go after that kid does pretty much scream stalker (and maybe jilted lover? I'm just sayin'...).

It looks like Chris and the University of Michigan felt the same way and Mr. Shrivell is banned from being on campus or being anywhere near Chris Armstrong.

I think it will be just a matter of time before the Attorney General help to rid his office of stupidness and fires Mr. Shrivell. He can go work for the AFA. I'm building my list on them right now and they'll soon be guests of my blog.

My Hometown

First off, I want to explain what this blog will be about. There are a lot of stupid people in this world that, for fear of being politically incorrect, or trying to be sensitive, or show some false respect for our fellow human beings, we actually fail them by not calling them out.

To be fair I will try to show some of that respect to my fellow human beings so, as my parents used to tell me, I'm not calling said subject of the day stupid, I'm saying what they are doing is stupid. We have to have some hope that maybe if we call the stupidness to their attention that maybe they will take some time to reflect and change their stupid ways and try to be helpful in this world rather than hurtful.

This blog will obviously deal with many political issues because, lets face it, that is where most of the stupid ideas come from, but I will tackle any stupidness that I see out there and do my part to help rid the world of it. Feel free to let me know about any stupidness that I may have missed and we can tackle it together. I also will not shy away from pointing the arrow towards me if it is justified. Sometimes the lowest common denominator is like an undertow. Venturing into the world of stupidness it might be hard to not get trapped so I look to you to help me by commenting whether you agree or disagree.

Now, onto my first post referring to the picture you see (I will try to stay more current in the future but there are some recent things that have happened that I feel I must address). My old state, Arizona. I'm sure you've heard of a little law called SB1070. I won't go into details because, unless you're stupid, you know all about it. It was supposed to go into full effect at the end of July but Judge Susan Bolton, in her effort to fight stupidness, blocked the key provisions that one can definitely argue are unconstitutional.

Now, they're not unconstitutional because, let's face it, it would implore state police to racially profile and cause actual citizens to have to carry around their "papers" like Jews had to do in Nazi Germany. The provisions are unconstitutional because it is the Federal Government's responsibility to carry out immigration enforcement. If Sen. Pearce and Gov. Jan Brewer were really fed up with the Feds (Fed up with the Feds - nice catchphrase) there were much less stupid ways to get the Feds involved in what they saw as a problem with illegal immigration. To try and dance around the constitution is really just a power struggle between a state and their central government.

There's a reason the Feds deal with immigration. That way there are centralized and uniformed laws dealing with the issue. Every state can't have different laws dealing with foreign policy. It just ain't prudent.

And it is hard to forget that Gov. Jan Brewer is directly linked with AZ private prisons that would directly profit from this law. When asked about this connection she just stares at the cameras with a blank face.

Now, why didn't I try to catch a picture with Jan Brewer or Sen. Pearce? Well, other than the obvious reasons of probably getting arrested for accosting them Jan Brewer is leading her opponent by 20%! Even after this performance during a televised debate earlier this month! Shame on you AZ. Seriously? You want that woman as your leader? Even if you agree with SB1070 (and if you do, I'd love to get a picture with you!) how can you take that woman seriously?! Now, I know this is a state that voted for Evan Mecham but you eventually learned your lesson and impeached him!

Please, vote for anyone other than Jan Brewer. I implore you to think for just a minute and I'm sure you'll come to the same conclusion that she shouldn't be the head of anything especially the beautiful state of Arizona.

[Click on the picture to get the full effect]