I'll get you, my pretty! And your private property, too!

Last Week(s) in Weird

Berninating all the villagers

As any fule kno, beloved Vermont senator Bernie Sanders was sent down to earth by St. Karl of Trier to redeem us for the horrible sin of inequality and forgive us our transgressions and also our student loan debt. You may have heard rumors that his mission was actually to bilk gullible kids so he could buy a third house and a really expensive car, but that’s all fake news spread by Russians from Macedonia, so ignore that.

I’m sure you’re as shocked as I am to hear that a man who has literally never done anything productive in his entire life while simultaneously hectoring hard-working Americans about their "greed" and "privilege" would turn out to be a thief. In the illegal sense, even.

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I command you to go to Hell and sit on a hot coal and wait for me!

Last Week in Weird

Did I meet him? At the open house?

I don’t think I’ve ever been so jazzed to slap that foam finger on an image before.

No doubt you’re familiar with Easter. It’s the holiest day in the Christian liturgical year, celebrating, as it does, the resurrection of Christ — something of a momentous event. Indeed, the entire week leading up to Easter is quite significant — Holy Week, it’s called — and is one of the seasons in which Christian spirit is riding its highest; arguably only Christmas week is a more important, and more religious time for most Christians.

Which makes it all the funnier that the perpetually clueless Libertarian Party chose to celebrate Holy Week by running this great ad aligning itself with the Satanic Temple.

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I tried to line the thing up so it was picking the other guy's nose, but I couldn't get it to look right. So you get this.

Last Week in Weird

You have the obligation to remain silent

Ah, America. Land of the free! Home of the Barves! Where the only thing more cherished than apple pie, baseball, and motherhood is the absolute, rock-solid, George Washington-approved, First Amendment-guaranteed right to free speech. I’m sure you know it by heart:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Of course, as any fule kno, the Constitution is a "living document." What necromantic rites were involved in this black sorcery your humble narrator shudders to think, but apparently the Constitution, quite unlike every other piece of paper in the history of the world, has the power to update itself whenever the disembodied flying devil head of Uncle Sam wills it to be. And, in an astonishing turn of events, He communicates His grand design to us through the federal judiciary. Last week, the holy judiciary handed down the magical new text of the First Amendment, which has apparently been updated with a rider adding "… unless minor bureaucrats don’t like it."

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Russian hacker!

Last Week in Weird

The God That Failed

Ever noticed what a complete fraud democracy is? Let’s go right on ahead and notwithstand that even on its own terms, it’s rubbish; rather, I’d prefer to focus on the utterly phony way "democracy" is leveraged as a scare tactic; it seems as though, whatever happens, it’s a "threat to democracy" or it will "undermine democracy" or perhaps it will even be "the end of democracy." By my count, all the democracy everywhere should have ended about eleven times over since election day, yet it apparently struggles onward, facing new existential threats every day.

The latest threat to democracy, of course, is the dreaded Fake News. As any fule kno, but as only the kind of fule who works for a government school will breathlessly explain to you, the entire reason for the evil Donald Hitler’s victory over St. Hillary of Clinton is that the internet was so infested with fake news that everybody forgot how great Hillary is. I am compelled to agree with this thesis, since your humble narrator seems to have forgotten that quite thoroughly.

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Last Week in Weird

The spirit of progress

The American left continues to spiral down into madness, unable to cope with the reality of life here in the grim darkness of the far future. Everything president Trump does or says sends them into paroxysms, which is great fun for those of us whose job it is to make fun of stupid things people said last week. Particularly fun is the president’s ongoing feud with the news media, which has recently reached such a pitch of hilarity that the president has actually begun banning the mainstream press from official White House news conferences, preferring to rely on so-called "alternative" news outlets and the endless stream of comedy that is his personal Twitter account.

The mainstream media being so thoroughly demonized and disgraced is rather a new experience, though it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving bunch of worthless petty tyrants. Why do I say that? Well, here’s MSNBC’s other resident hag, Mika Brzezinski, to explain for you.

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See? All full. No room for other opinions.

Last Week in Weird

A man and his dream

The International Students For Liberty Conference has been an annual event for ten years now. The conference, organized (expectedly enough) by Students For Liberty, is a three-day event featuring a number of libertarian — and, let’s face it, libertarish — speakers on a wide range of topics. It’s open to the public; one doesn’t have to be a student to attend. Indeed, the conference web site positively encourages attendance by non-students, as it suggests that one of the primary goals is to connect young libertarians with established "professional" libertarians. Networking, I think the buzzword still is.

So. Aces. It’s also worth noting that Students For Liberty has anticipated the factional squabbling among libertarians; they state unambiguously on the conference web site, in response to the goofy question "Am I ‘libertarian enough’ to attend":

Definitely. Students For Liberty prides itself on taking a "big tent" approach to promoting liberty. This means not only that pro-liberty people of all types and backgrounds are welcome to join in the fun, but also that there’s no requirement to have prior knowledge of libertarian thought, economics, or any particular approach to liberty. We’re all here to learn and ISFLC is meant to bring together many different approaches to liberty. We’d love to have yours represented!

So everybody is welcome, regardless of his ideology.

Everybody except Richard Spencer, that is.

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Chickie du chef

Last Week in Weird

First they came for my beloved puppet mascots, and I did not speak out

I gotta be honest with you guys: those terrorists are no good. I mean, sure, we were all kind of miffed back when they crashed airplanes into notable American landmarks, but fifteen years is a long time, and terrorism has become almost passé. It’s definitely gotten to the point that, whenever a terrorist does pop up to do evil deeds, we libertarians can be so blinded by the fact that the plot was actually dreamed up, funded, and executed by the FBI that we forget to be viscerally offended by the very idea of terrorism and pledge our lives and treasure to the FBI. Last week, that all changed.

A Swedish chef was reportedly assaulted by three Muslim men who punched and kicked him in the face and head, sending him to the emergency room. Writing about the assault on Facebook, he said he was attacked because he looked like Donald Trump.

What? No! Not the Swedish Chef! Terrorists, listen to me: there are some lines that are not to be crossed. When you beheaded Miss Piggy, we could look the other way. When you crashed airplanes into Rowlf, well, the American spirit is one of forgiveness. When you burned Scooter alive, I think we were all secretly pleased, to tell the truth. But the Swedish Chef? Americans will not tolerate this! All I can say is that, if you mess with Sam the Eagle, things are gonna get real.

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NEO-CONFEDERATE

Last Week in Weird

Hat speech

One of the most enduring symbols of the American liberty movement is the Gadsden Flag. Designed by Colonel Christopher Gadsden in 1775, it consists of a bold yellow field emblazoned with a coiled rattlesnake — which had been used as a symbol of the American colonies since the 1750s — and the legend "don’t tread on me." Though it was originally designed as the standard to be flown by Commodore Hopkins’ flagship in the brand-new continental navy, its striking design and powerful message made it popular with liberty-minded sorts, and it was frequently used in the revolutionary government, and has remained in use to this day among the people opposed to what that government has become.

I’m sure you’ll be startled to hear that it’s racist.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is reportedly investigating the issue surrounding the ‘Don’t Tread On Me’ snake logo after an African American employee of a federal agency complained they [sic] were racially harassed when a co-worker wore a cap showing the symbol.

The complainant said he found the cap racially offensive to African Americans because the flag was designed by Christopher Gadsden, who [sic] he described as a ‘slave trader & owner of slaves’.

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PIkachu, I mug you!

Last Week in Weird

It’s super effective!

Though this is not explicitly a gaming publication, I have no concern about my readership’s familiarity with Pokémon Go — Nintendo’s augmented-reality monster-catching phenomenon is redefining what it means to be a hit mobile game, having long since drawn a larger user base than previous efforts such as Candy Crush Saga, Twitter, and Google Maps, while bringing in so much revenue that one has to suspect the Bernank himself is giving Nintendo advice on how to print money. Indeed, Pokémon Go has been such a runaway success that New York City assemblyman Felix Ortiz has decided that the game now requires his personal oversight:

"Like any new technology, it has its advantages and disadvantages, and like any new technology, it has to be looked at very, very carefully. Everything comes down to people’s responsibility as well as corporate responsibility," Ortiz said Tuesday. "Every single one of us who might want to play this game have to be very cautious. Who’s sending what, and what is the follow up? Everyone should be cautious to make sure that no intruders will be able to tap into this and have people think they’re going to the park when in reality they’re going to a be targeted by some rapist. People could think they’re going to the bank, but in reality, someone is waiting to take their money."

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Last Week in Weird

A new low in identity politics

The big shocking news this past week was that Donald Trump, the most hateful man in America, running for president on the Hate Party ticket with the slogan "Make America Hateful Again," hatefully spoke hate speech about how much he hates the Jews. What horrible effluence of hatred emerged from the Donald’s Twitter feed this time? This hatefully anti-semitic hate picture of Hillary Clinton:

(((Hillary)))

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