"PRESIDENT OBAMA was too busy to attend the celebrations in Germany this week marking the fall of the Berlin Wall 20 years ago."

This was not a lack of manners, this was a calculated snub. This country no longer revolves around Europe and their precious Geneva and their precious ICC and their precious "world opinion" as if they are the whole world. Fuck their celebrations.

The Cold War and the end of it and the Wall coming down were a big deal to me personally - three tours in Germany staring across at the Soviets. But that's just me. That's not the US in 2009.

Fuck the Germans with a rusty chainsaw.

This country no longer revolves around Europe ... Fuck the Germans with a rusty chainsaw

I agree with the sentiment, but no way do I accept that Obama is moving us away from Europe. All his policies argue otherwise.

"Its bad enough to experience these willful brats at 8; it's for sure not going to be fun to be around them at 25 or 35."

Yeah, I've been kind of wondering about that myself. Then again, I think I was born programmed with "Youkidsgetoffmylawn" version 2.0.

Really, I think most of them will probably be okay.

What a pompous fuckin asshole. I don't dislike him because of his color, I dislike him because of his overinflated sense of entitlement and delusions of granduer. And the dumbfuckery that he's trying to put over on the American public. I hope he chokes. Shithead.

I, too, dislike the coarseness which defines our current popular culture and use of language. Even in this blog, expletives and invective are so common as to mimic high school "toughs" lurking outside the local 7-11.
Perhaps if we led by example, our words would carry more weight.

Yeah, and where are all the right-wingers when it comes to Commie China, a nation going backwards on human rights, according to Winston Lord.
Oh, I guess if you are a cheap and slave-labor manufacturing platform for US businesses, then human rights violations are okay.
Yeah, yeah blah, blah, blah about human rights--we just established two of the most corrupt and Islamic governments in the world, Iraq and Afghanie. Go live there, you sniveling weaklings!
Blah, blah, blah. The right-wing is devoid of substance anymore. Just hot air out of the south hole.

Nearly every time BO opens his mouth, I cringe. He is such an.....embarrassment....to this country. The fact that he represents the United States of America is more than I can handle sometimes.

It's his arrogance, his complete lack of touch with the American people, thin skinned, snake oil smooth (although not nearly as eloquent as many claim) style that I cannot abide.

I could care less about his skin color too, honestly. It seems as if he is working as hard as he can to destroy America as we know it and warp it into something else.

Barry has a bad habit of referring to himself as a part of world history when discussing historical milestones.

I, too, dislike the coarseness which defines our current popular culture and use of language. Even in this blog....

That's pretty funny coming from a guy who used to (and may still) call himself "Butthole of the Universe" and compares people who disagree with him to Terry Schiavo.

And, i-hole, calling yourself Lavender Snodgrass in the very next post isn't fooling anyone.

Yeah, and where are all the right-wingers when it comes to Commie China, a nation going backwards on human rights....

The right-wingers you demonize are about the only folks still speaking and writing about China's abysmal human rights record.

Barry should also have pointed out the irony that, two decades after the fall of communism in Germany, a socialist American president was on-hand to lament it.

"I agree with the sentiment, but no way do I accept that Obama is moving us away from Europe. All his policies argue otherwise."

An aircraft carrier has a really long turning radius. This country has been sucking up to Europe in one way or another for 230 years; you can't change that in a year or an admistration. Look at the stupid mistakes we made one after the other after WWII - all because we were trying to put Europe's various empires back together for them. We should have turned Vietnam into another Philippines, but no, we had to take care of our "allies" - all lies.

I must gently confess that I am also concerned about the coarseness of language and hateful language at this blog.
And you criticize snotty kids? At least they have the callousness of youth to explain it. I assume you are older than teenagers, but perhaps I fancy wrong.
For myself, I admire parents who raise children. Childlessness is vapidity squared.
Are the charms of "cafe society" so great? Is not the glory of social recognition fleeting?
And when the bells stop ringing? And management kicks you out for the last time for bothering other customers with your imagined slights? And you are left in the gutter, besmirched in excrement, eating from dumpsters--what say you then?

I have thought about it, and I agree with Conan.

i find it funny that you talk shit about obama for his little moment of self appreciation... and then on the SAME DAY in the SAME POST you shamelessly plug your book.
three times in a row.
just found it interesting.

huh, interesting set of comments. Especially when trying to explain recent history to my kids, I really set out to show how different things look after some years go by. Thanks to Jim and an astonishing number of others in our armed forces some things were held in check. I wasn't in the Army, just a kid on a highschool group tour, but I got a firsthand look at the Deutsche Demokratische Republik [East Germany, sportsfans] in 1983, including a face to face with a Soviet column in a tourbus. Funilly enough the West Germans loved Carter and hated Reagan, but it wasn't Carter that challenged anyone.

The points about Viet are good too, but again with the years to ruminate over what it means. After WWII, did ANYONE in the US realize that Uncle Ho was a nationalist that was trying to adopt an American style constitution? What was important was paying back and ally in the form of France, even if it was a colonial thing. At the time, did anyone see it?

At this time now, what is going on with our prez and can we see where it is going? He walks tall when he shouldn't and bows when he shouldn't, and can't seem to figure the difference. If W had done so, he would have been considered stupid, so what do we consider O? There are protocols for this, and for the precise amount of deference you allow to a foreign ruler under a given situation, and what situations you treat them no different. I'm sure that the WH has a group of people to tell him that. But you would have to accept that you, as the current prez, have to follow those rules. Dunno that this guy has figured that out yet. I sincerely hope he does, because the only thing he is currently doing is making himself weak.

There were plenty of reasons that the iron curtain was pulled down, and many of them were about how people in those coiuntries were willing to stand up. It certainly didn't hurt that there was a buncha foreigners that wanted to stand up and help them, and that there was a prez in office that told them he'd back them up. At the time, they thought he meant it.

What do they think now?

Obama is a late-term baby boomer. He, like many in the generation he represents, is completely self-absorbed. Out of a misguided sense of protectiveness, and in an effort to not subject their kids to any of the privation that they themselves went through, the parents of the boomers made their kids the center of the universe. What would you expect out of that but a bunch of grown-up kids who think they're the center of the universe 24/7?

The same generation (now 45-63 years old) now make much of the policy in business and government. It is this same narcissism that leads to the attitude "fuck the customers and our employees, it's my career that has to be saved" or "fuck the country and its people, my re-election is the only thing that's important", and leads to the policy we're now seeing attempted.

I really don't blame the boomers' parents, who tried their best. That includes my parents, as I myself am squarely in the boomer generation. But they might have done things a bit differently if they could have foreseen the effects their decisions would have on the boomers, the most affluent and bratty generation in the history of the world.

Even worse, based on what I see, the next generations are being raised even more self-centeredly -- to the point that the social disapproval and learned propriety that, in the past, tended to blunt a person's most narcissistic tendencies, are now largely a thing of the past, and the brats of today are basically unfettered by any shame or inhibition on their behavior. Except, that is, in families where parents still teach the concepts. And I'm afraid there may not be enough of them to go around.

no, wait... you're a writer Amy? :devil:

Like it matters.

Again I'm willing to ban the little shit

I could care less about his comments the jumping monikers is getting old though

Hey butt plug if the anal verse, it doesnt matter what you call yourself you writting style never changes and thats what identifiyes you, not your name

I think "excrement" gave him away....

One question for you, i-hole, BOTU, Lavendar Snodgress, et. al

What has the late Terry Schiavo ever done to you? Seriously. Why do you feel the need to mock a poor dead woman who was utterly helpless and disabled to the fullest extent of the word? It is despicable to treat a stranger who has never harmed you in any way thus.

And your attack on Amy's promotion of her book is bizarre. This is her website, and she can promote anything that strikes her fancy.

We are all GUESTS here, and as such, ought to conduct ourselves accordingly. Tell me, do you ever get invited to someone's home for dinner and then sit there and criticize your hostess, the food, the furnishings, etc? Perhaps you need to buy Amy's book. I have a feeling that you would recognize yourself in many of the pages...

I don't think he would, the other Beth. I-hole wouldn't recognize himself in Amy's or any other book that would call him (or anyone like him) out on his bad behavior. He's too narcissistic to believe that anyone would actually mean what they say about him. He's more than likely to tell his hostess that she didn't add enough sour cream to the stroganoff, that the wine she served with it was all wrong, and to shake his head at her choice of silverware. People like i-hole, even if they do recognize themselves being criticized, will rarely, if ever, admit it.

Amy, I just finished your book, and it was amazing, I loved it! What a great read, I was sad to see it end. When't the next one coming out?? o.O

When'S, that is.

I think Lavendar Snodgrass makes an excellent contribution to this forum, and certainly doesn't use the potty-mouth patois so common--and I do mean common-- in this forum.
As for the other guests, who attack each with the invective and expletive one might find in a urban prison, I find their manners atrocious!
Even Ms. Alkon could wash her panties a bit, before parading around in public, if you get my drift.

i-hole, you mis-spelled your own pseudonym. It's Lavender, not Lavendar.

I think "excrement" gave him away....

Feebie

And the word "invective" Let's not forget that one.