Politics and Machinery

Politics:

My post from Jan. 30th was apparently right on the money. I predicted that if Hillary Clinton had less elected delegates than Barack Obama, but still by a close margin, she'd try to get the Michigan and Florida delegates to count - y'know, the Michigan and Florida delegates that she and every other Democratic nominee agreed to screw over in or to pander to Iowa and New Hampshire primary voters. Aces!

What I did not know back then was how the whole Super Delegate thing worked. Apparently the Democratic party decided being totally retarded was totally awesome back in 1968 and set up a primary system wherein elected Democratic politicians and non-elected party activists and insiders get a vote roughly equal to x-thousand primary voters to decide, in their own "judgment," who the Democratic nominee for president would be. Not very democratic, is it?

So Hillary's people are going on TV saying that it would be totally cool and absolutely how the system is supposed to work if she were to, say, end up with less elected delegates than Obama, but convince enough Super Delegates to vote for her anyway that she "won" the nomination. This morning I woke up and turned on MSNBC and was met with Terry McAuliffe telling me that was exactly how "the system" was "supposed to work." At which point I screamed at the TV,

"NOBODY FUCKING WANTS YOU."

Terry McAuliffe is a former Bill Clinton fundraiser who ended up heading the Democratic National Committee from 2000 through 2004 - y'know, the years when Democrats did nothing but lose. So here we are, four years later, after riding what seemed like a never-ending wave of victories since 2006, definitely in part to the Republicans being themselves, but also in part thanks to the leadership of the Democratic National Committee's new chairman, 2004's insurgent presidential nomination candidate, Howard Dean. Dean implemented a 50 state strategy for the Democratic Party which allowed the Democratic Party to make big gains in Congress in the 2006 elections by competing in states and districts that the previous Democratic party establishment would have simply surrendered to the Republicans. Hence, when the Republicans screwed the pooch and voters weren't happy with them, the Democratic Party already had candidates and organizations and shit in place. Had McAuliffe been in charge, a lot of the Democratic challengers would not have had the infrastructure and support to actually compete; even when it turned out that the Republicans were harboring a pederast.

So after just two years of relative AWESOME, the old Clinton folks who failed in 2000 and 2004 are back to get on the gravy train. Here's the problem with that: They're fucked.

Hillary Clinton hasn't lost this race yet, and she may still yet win - legitimately. However, the genie is out of the bottle. She can't take back what she and her lackeys have been saying all week. Die hard Republican voters already think she's an authoritarian, now they're accusations have some merit.

What her campaign has been saying this week is this:

Even if the *voters* choose Barack Obama over me, it is still perfectly legitimate for that to be overridden by my friends and colleagues in the establishment.

That's pretty fucking authoritarian.

So-called moderates and independents will see it that way. And I suspect that young voters and minority voters will see it that way too. The former don't see John McCain as being "that bad," the latter will likely choose to not vote at all or vote for some third party candidate (Nader's already got an exploratory committee going).

Hell, even I recognize just how bad John McCain *really* is, compared to his media hype, but right now even if Hillary wins via the most elected delegates, I sure as fuck don't want to vote for her.

I would think that, especially after the 2000 Presidential election, there's a point where a rational person would say, "Well, maybe I should just hold off here a second. Essentially staging a coup of my own political party might not just be bad for me and my reputation, it might actually be bad for a political party that is the only real opposition in this country to the Republican party." But apparently Hillary and her people are not rational, and apparently they lack ethics, decency and principles. Or they're just Republicans incognito. I've suspected that at points in the past eight years, too.

My prediction - if Hillary is the nominee, whether legit or not, we will lose to John McCain. And that. Fucking. Sucks.

Machinery:

I have a GE washing machine, it's only 4 years old. Last Sunday, it broke. The "basket," where the clothes go in, is apparently no longer held into place by some doo-dad, so when it comes to spin cycle time, it's pretty much just getting thrown around inside the chasis and tossing water everywhere. I'm good with the inside of computers, I'm good with the inside of pig carcasses, but when it comes to the inside of machinery, including cars, I fucking suck and apparently that means I'm a fan of the butt sex - with men.

Instead of a phone number, it gives a website for if you need service. I have my mother go to the website, 'cuz I'm a busy man with all my pig guts and blood and shit, and she schedules an appointment. Apparently they're supposed to call and confirm the appointment. That's good, because the online appointment is for 8am to 5pm. I go to the pork plant at 10am but my mother can be here after 1pm.

Tonight I get the call. It's a fucking recording. "Press 1 to confirm the appointment, press 2 to cancel." Well, fuck, I don't want to cancel, so I press 1. "If you have pets, such as dogs and cats, please put them away (wtf?) for the service call, as they may interfere with or delay the service call." Now I'm pushing zero because I'd like to speak to someone live to narrow down the time frame to something like after 1pm. It continues about the pets, "If this is a problem please call 1-800-blah-blah-blah to cancel. Good bye. *click*"

I'm sitting there with a pen trying to jot down the number it just spit at me. No luck, I had the last four digits in my head, but not the middle three. Fuck. Caller ID gives me nothing, and I'm too stupid to think of *69.

So now I'm thinking, if he pops in at quarter to 10 tomorrow, I'm going to tell him, "Either come back after 1pm, give me a number so I can call and talk to *someone* to get an appointment in a narrower time frame, or go fuck yourself, because I'm just going to have to eat it and buy a new a washing machine and SEE TO IT THAT I NEVER BUY ANYTHING GE EVER AGAIN!!!"

The problem is this: they're making appliances shoddier nowadays to get you to buy more often. And they're making service calls harder schedule in order to get you to buy a new one instead of repair the one you have. What they don't seem to have figured out at this point is that I'M NOT GOING TO BUY A NEW APPLIANCE FROM THEM IF THIS IS HOW THEY TREAT ME.

Fuck off and die, GE. Just fuck off.