hello, pot? this is the kettle. you’re black! (no pun intended)

Which passages of scripture should guide our public policy? Should we go with Leviticus, which suggests slavery is OK and that eating shellfish is an abomination? Or we could go with Deuteronomy, which suggests stoning your child if he strays from the faith? Or should we just stick to the Sermon on the Mount?

This is from a speech Barack Obama made more than 2 years ago, before the liberal Christian group Call to Renewal. Naturally, it’s made Focus on the Family founder James Dobson mad, because no one besides Daddy Dobson and his small hand-selected group of fellow Bible beaters are allowed to interpret what God really meant when he laid down the law.

“I think he’s deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own world view, his own confused theology,” Dobson said, adding that Obama is “dragging biblical understanding through the gutter.”

Oh, this is fucking rich, y’all. Did God say anything against hypocrisy? I’m pretty sure he did, and Dobby may want to stop throwing stones at Obama before he gets struck by lightning.

“Distorting the Bible to support their own world view” is what Dobson and his fellow gay-hating assholes have been doing for years. They beat gay people and their supporters over the head with Leviticus 18:22 (Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable), when they know perfectly well that Jesus’ sacrifice fullfilled the covenant for all believers, and Leviticus no longer applies. It’s why you never hear people like him railing against the sin of, say, eating shellfish (Leviticus 11:10, And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you) or wearing blended fabrics (Leviticus 19:19, Ye shall keep my statutes. Thou shalt not let thy cattle gender with a diverse kind: thou shalt not sow thy field with mingled seed: neither shall a garment mingled of linen and woollen come upon thee).

It’s also why it’s not necessary for Christian males to be circumcized. Aren’t you glad Jesus took that bullet, guys? (Although most guys reading this probably are cut.)

See, I can quote the Bible too, Dobson. And apparently better than someone who claims to have a direct line to God.

“the picture of dorian gray” by oscar wilde

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose I know.

The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history.

I’ve never read this book before, but so much of it was familiar. And I can see why it was reviled when it was first published: although Wilde is oblique when it comes to most of Dorian’s sins, there probably weren’t enough fainting couches in all of Victorian England to accomodate the subject matter.

True to Wilde’s refusal to be pinned down morally, the book is both a cautionary tale of and a paean to hedonism. It’s known as one of the last gothic horror novels ever written; but it also sparkles with Wilde’s sharp wit, and a drawing-room comedy always seems to be about to emerge. And it was written as Wilde was on the verge of leaving his wife and children, having realized he was gay. Perhaps it was this that makes Dorian Gray so polychromatic.

Gothic writing–especially the superlative way Wilde wrote it–is a style that no one seems to be able to presently duplicate. It just comes off as florid and overdone when writers try to do it now. The whole time I was reading this book I kept thinking “Oh, so this is what Anne Rice is striving for! …fail.” (And if you like Rice, I’m happy for you; but we’re just going to have to agree to disagree, because I think she stinks worse than week-old shrimp shells.)

what the hell has karl rove been smoking?

And when did he turn into Judge Smails from Caddyshack?

“Even if you never met him [Obama], you know this guy. He’s the guy at the country club with the beautiful date, holding a martini and a cigarette that stands against the wall and makes snide comments about everyone who passes by.” 

So, Obama is such an elitist that he… makes fun of elitists? And we shouldn’t vote for him because his wife is hot??

Plus, you know any country club that Turdblossom would belong to wouldn’t even allow black people on the premises, unless they were washing dishes.