Happy Birthday!

Here at the Patio, we have a long-standing tradition of celebrating a customer’s 21st birthday with a free beer (in German, aufshaus). You’d be surprised how few beers we buy on account of a 21st birthday. Anyway, that’s all I want to say about birthdays, so the title is misleading.

We have just witnessed the gaudy sentimentality of the fifth anniversary of 9/11. I resent and reject that as pure schmaltz, and as a crass attempt to subvert deeper issues like whether we are safer, what have we done to build bridges rather than bomb them, and who does President Andrew Jackass think he is, anyway! I can comment freely on the last item.

President Andrew Jackass thinks he’s sumpin’. He’s awright, boy. He’s slicker’n snot. He’s cool as an Eskimo pie. He’s an Arab-stompin’ patriot and a regaler ‘Merican hero. He’s a god-fearin’ bible-totin’, librarian-marryin’, Harvard and Yale attendin’ good ol’ boy, like Tommy Lee Jones, except he ain’t no democrat and can’t ride the shit out of a horse. Yes, if these words are the sort you use in your regular speech, you might think Bush and company don’t lie, cheat, or steal, or at least not any more than your average republican.

Bill, our resident conspiracy theorist, can’t imagine why I don’t believe in all the 9/11 theories (building couldn’t have collapsed that way; finding a conspirator’s passport in the rubble; war games just like the attack, etc) since he knows I’m no fan of Bush. I don’t know why I have to believe in hysterical nonsense just because I think Bush is lying to me daily. The problem with American men is that they think if they can engineer a dam or fix a Chevy, they can also speculate on the whys and wherefores of their government, especially when the government is attempting to cover things up. I’m satisfied to know that Bush, Rove, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rice are trying to fuck up the world (for Jesus or for American hubris) every single day. That’s why I don’t mind when Bush disappears for a month at a time. Hell, Cheney’s always disappearing. Do you know where he is right now? See!