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President Barry gave a speech on the budget yesterday. He started yammering on at 1:05pm EST. Isn't that a weird time to give a speech that people might want to hear? Maybe not if you don't really have anything to say and you don't want a lot of people to hear you say nothing firsthand. Can I take this moment to mention that I'm tired of everything being done on East Coast time? One in the afternoon there was ten in the morning for me. I'm in no mood to listen to any President at ten in the morning. I'm barely awake. And I'm not the only one.

Below we have video of Vice President Joe Biden at President Barry's speech. (If for some reason you can't view the video here, you can check it out over at Real Clear Politics.) Poor ol' Joe can barely keep his eyes open for at least a good thirty seconds there. Look, I know it's boring. It's boring as hell. I get that. But come on, man! You're the Vice President of the freaking United States! Can't you at least pretend to pay attention? He didn't talk for very long. He couldn't have held it together until he was done? Did he have a big lunch or something? It's not like that would excuse it or anything, but I'm just saying. If he tends to fall asleep after a large meal, perhaps only stick to a salad on speech day. I'm trying to be sensible and offer ideas here. For once.

Joe Biden's Great Big Effing Deal

What is wrong with Joe Biden? Seriously. I'm not sure if this guy could find his ass using both hands and even if he did manage that feat, I'm not sure that he'd know the difference between it and a hole in the ground. I was expecting him to be a little more wackier and little less moronic. It's unfortunate. Not that I'm not thrilled to have something to mock, that's not it. I'm just disappointed at what I see as the squandering of perfectly good potential.

Let's go back a week or so to when VP Joe was hosting St. Patrick's Day at the White House and had over, among others, Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen. According to the New York Daily News,"Biden asked for God's blessing for the late mother" by giving the ol' sorry-she's-dead intro of "God rest her soul" and then doing a bit of a double take. "Wait a minute. You're mother. She's still....that's right. God bless her soul. I've gotta get this right." For cryin' out loud.

Why do people say that anyways? "God bless his/her soul". Since when are we the ones giving the orders as far as God goes? What if they were an absolutely horrible individual and everyone knows that they're burning in hell? Do you still say that? I guess they do because I've never heard anyone say, "Yeah, good luck with the whole eternal damnation thing" or anything to that effect.

Then there was the day before the "historic" health care reform vote. (If I hear it called "historic" in all seriousness one more time, I'm going to lose it. "Historic" doesn't necessarily mean "good". And I'm not comparing President Barry's administration to Hitler or anything, but Hitler did a lot of things that were "historic" as well. Hitler's just a easy go-to for situations like this.) On Monday, President Barry was giving some speech about the House of Representatives' final passage of health care legislation. For some reason, Biden was right there kind of at his side. But his purpose was unclear. He just stood about a foot away from President Barry and looked at him with this dorky grin on his face. Why was he there? It was like it was Take Your Vice President To Work Day. Very strange.

But the kicker was yesterday. Yesterday, that health care reform bill was signed by President Barry. I guess he felt like he needed to let ol' Joe say a few words before he signed it, so Biden got up there and said whatever it was that he said. Then, he turned the spotlight over to President Barry. In doing so, he shakes his hand and then leans in to him to say something. (When did that trend start? The whole "We're-in-front-of-a-gazillion-people-but-I-feel-the-need-to-say-something-to-you-that's-just-between-the-two-of-us" gesture? I'm not a fan of it. Y'all feel better now that you've got a little secret? Knock it off.) Only this time, the something was barely caught on tape. (Tape? I know there isn't really tape anymore, but what else am I supposed to call it? I can't call it "video". That's just the pictures. Tape. Caught on tape. Tape that isn't really there. Someone's going to have to work on that one.)

There are a lot of things that Joe Biden could have said to President Barry. Lots of them. I can think of many brief congratulatory phrases that he could have said during that "historic" moment. "Congratulations, Mr. President." "Nice job, sir." Lots of them. Lots and lots. But Biden decided to go off the cuff with this one. And what did he say, exactly? Why, he said, "You did it. This is a big f***ing deal." Wait. What now?

Yes! Yes, it is a "big f***ing deal", Mr. Vice President. It's not only a "big f***ing deal", it's a freaking huge, M-effer of a deal. Yes! I believe it's the largest piece of legislation since Social Security was introduced. And there was Joe Biden, smiling ear to ear like he had just gotten a little doggie treat. (I'm sure he could barely contain his little tail from wagging side to side.) And that's what he says. "By the way, Mr. President, I thought I'd just take this opportunity to let you know that this is a big f***ing deal. You also might care to know that I like pie." Seriously, what is wrong with him? Did he expect President Barry to stop dead in his tracks and say, "What's that, Joe? What's a big f***ing deal? This little thing?! Really? In what way?"

The tape (and audio...whatever that's called) is below. You're going to want to turn your speakers up because while he does say it, there's all of the mindless, congratulatory clapping that can drown out his F-bomb if you let it. And look, I don't expect much out of our Vice Presidents. (I do expect them to wear different ties of different days, however. Biden seemed to be fond of sporting the blue star spangled necktie for both the passage and the signing of the bill. Doesn't he have a wife to dress him?) Heck, I don't think that I expect anything out of our Vice Presidents. But I think I do expect them to not state the obvious laced with an expletive whilst passing legislation in front of the entire world. That I'd kind of appreciate. Other than making himself look like a doddering oldster whose brain has been riddled by latter stages of syphilis, it's not a big f***ing deal.

Let Me Point Something Out

This whole ordeal with the Christmas Crotchfire Bomber is really starting to bug me. Aside from the fact that it seems as if no one is going to lose their job, the rhetoric that President Barry is throwing around is laughable. He says that he doesn't want any finger pointing, but yet that he wants people to be held accountable. I don't know how you're going to be able to hold someone accountable if you don't at least point a little bit in their direction. A point. A head nod. Maybe you shuffle one of your feet in their direction like you're Mr. Ed with some sort of nervous twitch or something. I don't know. But I do know that you're going to have to single out who or what it was that failed the system that was in place and you're not going to be able to do that without a little pointing of one form or another.

But President Barry is adamant that there will be no finger pointing. Um, yeah, good luck with that. First of all, from what I can tell, President Barry does plenty of finger pointing himself. Here's the President and his finger now! Oh! And what are they doing?! That's right! Pointing! Behold!

And look, here he is pointing again!

And again!

And again!

He's even got his wife doing it (sort of)!

Man, for someone who doesn't want there to be any finger pointing, he sure is coming off looking like the guy who invented it or something. And it's not just him. I didn't realize how much finger pointing there was in politics until I started looking around after hearing the "no finger pointing" rule that has apparently been implemented whenever there is a such a major screw up that there shouldn't be anything other than finger pointing. Let me just tell you this: There are a lot of fingers being pointed all over Washington, DC. As you saw above, President Barry? Quite a prolific finger pointer. His Vice President? Ol' What's His Name? Jim? John? Joe! (Dammit! I'm going to get that on the first try one of these days! Joe!) He points! Behold!

Nancy Pelosi, third in line for the Presidency of the United States if something extremely tragic happens (mostly tragic because something would have happened to the first two guys and not to her, as I see her as desirably expendable). A pointer!

What about Hillary Clinton? A pointer? I think so! Behold!

And if Hill's a pointer, what about Bill? I think he might be! Let's find out!

Oh. Unfortunate. Got anything else? Anything post the Lewinsky era?

Oh. Yeah, that does seem post that whole affair-while-in-office incident. Still not quite was I was looking for (but I'm guessing he sported that pose a lot). One more try.

All right! All right! That's enough. Look, he points, all right?! My point is he points! Bill Clinton points! For cryin' out loud....

We've got other folks that made it closer to the White House than Hillary did that are pointers. Old Man McCain. He points!

Well, he tries to point. The point is that he's trying! And his running mate, the former barely half term Governor of Alaska, Mrs. Sarah Palin. She points.

God bless Tina Fey. That Russia joke just never gets old, does it?

There's pointing (sort of) from President Barry's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel.

Robert Gibbs, Press Secretary, a notorious pointer.

Barney Frank, that Senator from Massachusetts who looks and talks like a cartoon dog. (What kind of a dog? Probably a pointer, yes, that would be funny.)

Even ol' G.W. was known to point from time to time.

The point is (pun probably intended, but I'm not proud of it or anything) that for a guy (President Barry) who doesn't want to do any finger pointing, there sure is an awful lot of it going on. Maybe it's because they're all just pointing the fingers at themselves that he's not very fond of it. Whatever the reason, please get over it and please start firing people. And President Barry, if you need me to get in touch with a reasonable substitute for Mr. Ed that can lift a hoof in the general direction of who needs to be fired, let me know. Just point in my direction and I'll get right on that.

The Lie Of The Year Winner Is....

Apparently, there's a new award that's being awarded (duh) this year. Just be thankful that it won't involve Lady Gaga or Mister GooGoo or anyone like that. No, this is an award that seems to have been dreamed up by the fact-y folks over there at PolitiFact.com. The award is Lie of the Year and according to an article written by a one Johanna Neuman over there in a blog at the LA Times, there was online polling and one lie came out far ahead of the rest (as determined by those who voted in the online poll which PolitiFact just made up, that is correct). Let's see if this sounds familiar, shall we?

"The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil." Sound familiar? Of course it does. And it was uttered by none other than the one, the only (thank God), former half term Governor from the state of Alaska, Sarah Palin.

Now, I'm not so sure if that's really more of a statement about Sarah Palin or if that's more of a statement about everyone who believed it. Actually, it's probably a statement about both, now that I think about it. And thinking about it would have really behooved some of those who believed it and ran with it before trying to determine if there was any sort of validity to it what so ever (which there wasn't, by the way). But there's no time for thinking when there's a ruckus to start up! Pitchforks! Torches! Everyone with me?! No? What? Good.

But when I compare that statement to the others that were in the running, I find it interesting that it was the Sarah Palin statement that "won". It makes me wonder if that's a reflection of how many people out there are really not buying into the whole charade that Sarah Palin is supposed to be the unnamed savior of this country. (She's not, by the way. She seems like a nice lady and she has a lot of great ideas and does a lot of things is a swell manner, but I don't think I want her as the President of this country. It takes more than being nice to...oh. Wait a minute. Isn't that kind of how President Barry got elected? Yeah, never mind. She'd win. Carry on.) I'm hoping that this "award" will grow some legs and be reported somewhere besides blogs. (Because we all know how blogger can be. Sheesh!)

So who were the runners-up, you ask? Well, I asked! In no particular order, other than the fact that they're all lies told by liars, we have "Glenn Beck's claim that Obama science advisor John Holdren favored forced abortions." Hmmm. Forced abortions, eh? Gotta tell ya, I've met some folks in my time who have reproduced and...well....it's never going to happen and it's a pretty horrible concept, but having met some of the folks that I have, it's not a completely unwarranted thought. (Oh, lay off! You're thinking the same thing! What about that dumbass neighbor of yours with the kid that got your brand new screwdriver stuck in nose? Sometimes the gene pool is just so shallow, it almost makes more sense to just drain it than it does to keep skimming the bottom and hoping for something good to come up.)

Another of the also rans was "Orange County dentist Orly Taitz's claim that Obama was born in Kenya, which helped spark the birther movement." Tell me something. How did this one not win?! That is the most ridiculous thing that anyone has ever come up with and it didn't win?! It's more outrageous than the death panel claim, if you're asking me! It actually scares me that this one did not win because I'm worried that it really grew legs to the point where it couldn't have won (you know, due to all of the people who are still questioning it). Wake up, folks! He's not a Kenyan! And he's not a Muslim! (I always like to throw that last part in there whenever I get the chance. And since it wasn't one of the runners-up in this story, I like to think that I've really been doing some good by always harping on that FACT.)

Finally we have "Vice President Joe Biden's claim that swine flu spread because “when one person sneezes, it goes all the way through the aircraft.” :::: sigh :::: Are we the land of the wacky Vice President now? It used to be just the wacky Presidential sibling and/or child. Billy Carter. Roger Clinton. Patty Reagan. Granted, we had Dan Quayle there for a while. But he wasn't as much wacky as he was just a doughhead, really. Biden misspeaks and says cuckoo bird things almost as much as GW did. (Almost as much. No one can top GW in terms hilarity for what came out of his mouth. Every day that man gave people around the globe new material to work with. I kinda miss that. Don't get me wrong, I don't miss GW. I just miss having instantaneous blog fodder whenever he opened his mouth.)

I'm pretty sure that the Biden quote shouldn't have won for Lie of the Year, mainly because I don't think that he was lying. I think that's what he actually thought. I think that Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin and that nutjob dentist chick all know that they're not being honest. Glenn Beck especially. That guy has taken what he does (heighten panic through inducing fear) to an art form. (I don't watch his show very often, but I have to ask this: Does he cry on every episode? Every time I catch his act, his eyes are all red and his face is all damp.)

But the Biden misspeaks at least give us the damage control patrol done by Robert Gibbs, the Press Secretary. I don't know who that guy thinks he's kidding some of the time, but the answer is no one. Gibbsey is an interesting act, but he can't put quite the spin that he wants to on certain things. His response/explanation to what Veep-y Joe said was "I think that what the Vice President meant to say was again, the same thing that many members have said in the last few days and that is if you feel sick, if you are exhibiting symptoms, flu-like symptoms, coughing, sneezing, uh, runny nose, uh, that you should take precautions, that you should, uh, limit your travel, and I think, uh, what he said and what he meant to say." When pressed by the extremely awesome Jake Tapper of ABC News, Gibbsey replied, "Jake, I understand what he said and I'm telling you what he meant to say." That was met with a fair amount of laughter from the press corp there that day. And how could they not have laughed? That's hilarious.

But back to the Lie of the Year...Former half term Governor Palin has responded to her "winning" the dubious distinction by taking to scribing on her Facebook page. (My God, people! Get off of Facebook! Knock it off! I am so sick of hearing the word Facebook! Stop it!) She wrote, in part, "Though Nancy Pelosi and friends have tried to call “death panels” the “lie of the year,” this type of rationing – what the CBO calls “reduc[ed] access to care” and “diminish[ed] quality of care” – is precisely what I meant when I used that metaphor."

Um, Nancy Pelosi doesn't work at PolitiFact.com. I mean, she didn't the last time I checked. No, last time I checked she was ridiculously close to being successor to the position of President of the United States, a scenario which scares the holy S out of me. But here's the thing, Mrs. Palin. You can't use a metaphor unless it is clear that is what you are doing. You can't use a metaphor and totally act like you haven't used a metaphor. You can't use a metaphor and then continue to drive that same metaphor into the ground without clarifying what it is that you were trying to say. You can't just take the one thing that (softheaded) people are really afraid of and then throw it out there in pretty simple terms (so that their soft, soft craniums can absorb it more easily) and not expect it to be taken literally. You just can't. But you did. And that's why you're winning the Lie of the Year award from PolitiFact.com.

And actually, that "taken aback" attitude that you seem to have over your dubious honors might just earn you one of the runners-up award as well! Congratulations!