Yes, welcome to:
Block 37
the Internet home of Peter G
warehouse worker
political maven
Trey Parker and Matt Stone fan
video gamer
movie geek
basketball fan
BASEketball fan
Linux convert
best cornbread maker in all
of Illinois
the rarest of all Pokemon
First of all, I'd just like to say
"goddammit." Hi, mom. Hi, dad. Thank you for the college
education.
"Welcome to our humble madhouse. I trust you'll find yourself right
at home."
First day of operation: 4-7-00
Last updated: 10-24-04
What's new....
* New front page ramblings (of course). In
this case, an 11th hour political statement
Next update: Let me get back to you.
How many references can you spot in this next paragraph...?
I am a traveler from the East seeking that which is lost. I like to be called Peter G (no period). Friends call me Peter, enemies call me plenty of other things. I eat food and have stuff. I am an aspiring writer about an hour south of Chicago (don't be too impressed, nothing sold yet...Money Man...why do you steal my art, leaving me naked and crucified....*ahem* Excuse me). My 9 to 5 is working in a warehouse as a trucker/material handler. That's a fancy way to say, "I pick things up and put them down again." Hobbies are watching movies till my eyes fall out of my head, playing video games to the same point, cooking, and exercising to keep off the weight I gain from movies, video games, and cooking. (And to think some people say cooking is a good way to meet women. Nothing yet. HAH!) I read both Chicago papers every day, and people at work think there is something wrong if I don't have my nose buried in some print material during my breaks. I have mastered the difficult art of reading a full page of newspaper while walking and not running into any obstacles, placed accidentally or otherwise. I'm a budding rudie, having discovered ska and loving it quite thoroughly, placing it in my music selection along with jazz and New Age (the really good stuff by Spencer Nilsen and Palomino Duck, not the excrement produced by bands like Dancing Fantasy). My favorite writer is Peter David, who writes an astonishing amount of material in comic books (Hulk, Soulsearchers And Company), novels (Star Trek-New Frontier), movies (Oblivion 1 and 2, Trancers 4 and 5), and TV (Space Cases, a couple of episodes of Babylon 5). Coming in a close second is Molly Ivins, columnist from Texas and probably the most astute observer of the political scene writing today. I do some on-line gaming, usually involving Acclaim's South Park, which helps me control my potty mouth by doing the swearing for me.
Oh, yeah. I'm a sarcastic jackass, too.
As I mentioned, I am trying to be a writer. This is incredibly difficult, and not recommended for everyone. At the moment, I am sitting on about ten movie scripts, two theatrical plays, a comic book series, two radio series, and some designs for video games. It's not that I'm spread out, I really want to do all that stuff. I'd say I want to be the next Noel Coward, who was once described as "the man who can write anything," but I have yet to find anyone who likes Noel Coward and doesn't give that nervous chuckle like, "I know better, but I can't help myself," so I try to avoid that description.
* * * * *
I forgot to put this in the last update--
Laura Branigan, rest in peace. May we all
be angels so we can hear what you never finished during life.
* * * * *
Wow. From over a year to update my web page to less than a month.
Actually, this is going to be a quick one.
If you are getting to this just now and missed the update from the start
of October, it's archived under A View From The Edge.
I don't like the idea of endorsing candidates.
From the newspapers, that's different. But me? Come on.
I'm a mope from Illinois who doesn't get much traffic. It's not like
my ideas hold that much sway.
But still, I have to get something off my chest.
This isn't an endorsement, it's more of a condemnation. I don't know
if I'll vote for Nader or for Bush. Either one has a good chance
of getting my vote.
But I can state this unequivocally and for the record:
there is NO WAY IN HELL I'm voting for John Kerry for President.
In fact, if my local government tries e-voting, I'm tempted to try cracking
the software to make sure my vote isn't "accidentally" rerouted to Kerry.
I'm that serious about keeping him from getting my support.
I will get to my reason anon. I first want
to address the most obvious assumption. Some people probably think,
"Peter read Unfit For Command by the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth."
Yes I did, but that has nothing to do with it. There are people saying
the book has been discredited. There are others saying the writers
have signed affidavits stating it's the truth.
Irrelevant.
Means nothing.
UFC is just a way for consumers to bug Kerry
by supporting something and the support being reported in other media,
just like how Farenheit 9/11 is a way for consumers to bug Bush
by supporting something and the support being reported in other media.
Truth isn't what moves the merchandise, just tweaking somebody the purchaser
doesn't like. As such, it does not factor into my decision.
When I discuss the swift boats, it will be public record stuff, not anything
mined from the book.
The reason for my collosal hatred of Kerry can be
described with a memory. During the 2000 Democratic Convention when
Al Gore got the nomination for his party and before he tried to destroy
the Constitution with his recount strategy, Gore was overheard telling
someone, "I'll do anything to win." Kerry has demonstrated that he
has the same mentality. Only Kerry isn't using dicey recount strategies
(although I suppose I shouldn't give him any ideas), he's using everything
else he can.
Let's start with him constantly bringing up Vietnam.
It used to be something people didn't talk about. Kerry has been
trying to turn his swift boat service into his own PT109. He claims
he felt Vietnam was a wrong war. And yet, he wanted swift boat duty.
For the unfamiliar, a swift boat is a small boat with a rapid fire gun.
You cruise along the riverbanks and if something moves, you shoot it.
For someone who talks about wrong war and such, he picked one of the most
violent assignments. That doesn't square with me.
He says he wants the rich to pay their fair share.
And yet, he's married to one of the richest women in America, who got her
money from one of the biggest companies in America. How much change
is he really going to make?
He tells people Bush has banned stem cell research.
Bullshit. The stem cells in at a federal lab. You walk in,
fill out the paper work, and you get to play God. The only stem cells
unavailable are the embryonic cells, which haven't produced any results
in research, so why bother? But the rest? Their fair game.
What ban?
He claims Iraq, a war he voted for, is a disaster,
and yet in the press, he said basically the same thing Bush was saying.
In fact, Kerry was using an anti-war stance early in the nomination campaign
until the party ganged up to defeat Howard Dean. The war is nothing
more than another toy for his playbox. (I've said it before and I'll
say it again--Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. We're the ones
who sold them, for Chrissakes! What do people think happened?
He put them in a drawer with the extra car keys and forgot where he put
them? Here's a hint: check Syria out.)
Kerry says the UN should have a larger input in
American action instead of us going it alone in Iraq. The UN did
nothing to enforce 17 seperate resolutions telling Hussein to cough up
his weapons and did nothing about the widespread murder of Iraqi citizens.
Currently, in Sudan, there are leaders committing genocide. The citizens
are screaming for the UN to do something. The UN has drafted a resolution
to determine if what is happening in Sudan actually qualifies as genocide.
By the way, Sudan is on the Human Rights Commission for the UN, so that
stops a lot of action right there. Between that and the rampant corruption
in the UN Oil For Food program that helped Hussein continue to live well,
the UN doesn't deserve to exist anymore. Anyone who places their
faith in its authority is an idiot.
Kerry criticized Bush for taking unilateral action
on Iraq instead of multinational. He's also criticizing Bush for
allowing multinational action on North Korea instead of acting unilaterally.
Which is it?
Kerry says we let Osama bin Laden get away by letting
Afghan warlords try to capture him. Kerry was one of the people who
voted to allow that to happen, saying it would keep our troops out of harm's
way.
We tried being nice and peaceful for eight years
under Clinton, and the terror attacks spiked. The bombing of the
World Trade Center in 1993, the near sinking of the US Cole, numerous bases
and barracks attacked. Why in the world would we want to go back
to how things were before Bush?
Kerry says Bush has cut funding to Veterans Administration.
Only parts were cut (which every President does), but overall Bush has
increased spending on the VA every year.
Kerry says jobs are being lost in the US.
Actually, jobs are increasing, and there are more today than there were
when Bush took office. Besides, the economy is readjusting after
the anything goes days from the tech boom. Anyone who couldn't make
the economy work during that time would have to be brain dead, so Clinton
didn't do that slick a job.
Kerry tried to show he was a common man by going
goose hunting in Ohio. A guy who can't wait to vote for gun control
laws in the Senate. Must be getting desperate. Anyway, lest
you think he's been hunting for a while, one of the photos had him holding
a gun, aiming it at chest level with his finger on the trigger, while looking
towards the camera and smiling. That's a no-no in hunting.
I hope to God the gun was unloaded, or everyone outside the photo's frame
would be diving for cover.
But the worst is injecting Mary Cheney into everything.
She is the daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney, she's a lesbian, and
out and proud about it. Dick invited her to the Republican convention,
and used his speech as a springboard to discuss the party being more openminded
about homosexuality. For a party as mired in sin and punishment as
the R's, this was revolutionary. That people in the party even gave
it consideration is huge step forward. But it was her choice to go.
Kerry dragged her into the third Presidential debate with no preamble as
if to say, "How can you oppose homosexuals when your running mate acknowledges
his own daughter is one?" (Kerry's running mate John Edwards also
drug her into his debate.)
In fact, Kerry doesn't seem to respect boundaries
at all. It's an unwritten rule that during the conventions, the other
party keeps quiet for about a week and lets them have their fun.
The R's kept their mouths shut during the D's convention. But within
an hour of Bush's speech at the R's convention, Kerry held an impromptu
press conference. The acting head of the Iraqi government came to
the US to testify that progress was being made and to thank the US.
Kerry immediately held a press conference saying that Iraq was worse than
that and the acting leader was living in fantasyland. The audacity
of that is just sickening. (The press is no better, asking Bush questions
about the Iraqi leader's statements when the guy was standing right next
to him.) Even Kerry's wife has judgement problems, saying Laura Bush
has never had a real job when she was actually a schoolteacher and librarian
for ten years. The important thing is to lash out and be heard, regardless
of facts, timing, or tact. In many ways, it's a microcosm of the
current spate of news talk shows and Internet chat groups.
So no, Kerry doesn't get my vote. I'm divided
between the principles of Ralph Nader and the determination of Bush.
Sure, Bush's domestic policies need work, but Kerry's aren't any better.
Bush's budget will cause a $1.3 tril deficit, but Kerry's plan will cause
a $1.27 tril deficit. Kerry spent the debates addressing and provoking
Bush rather than addressing either the questions or the audience.
No dice.
* * * * *
And now, a plug: my friend Mornblade is the biggest egotistical megalomaniac who has a T-shirt proclaiming such. I guess that's why we're pals. His site is known as Midsummer Night's Dreams. Unfortunately, the Tipper Gore Pick Of The Month has gone the way of Tippy herself.
Among my many interests (with corresponding pages):
A View From The Edge (title stolen from one of my favorite CD's): Think you might have missed an update and want to see what I rambled about on my front page? Back issues are archived for your convenience. To check them out, click here.
Keeping It Reel: movie reviews from my somewhat unique perspective. For a peek at what I'm competing against with my writing, click here.
Basketball: I love basketball. The original game. You know, the one that was a celebration of skill over brute strength. The current NBA has mutated it slightly, but I still enjoy it. For random thoughts and comments, click here.
BASEketball: Wondering what I'm talking about in my introduction at the top of the page? Here you go. For a real challenge, try BASEketball. For the history, rules, and such, click here.
Some Assembly Required: For some reviews of video games that I've just gotten (either brand new or that have been out and I only just now got to them), click here.
The Sega 32X Memorial: There is a soft spot in my video game heart for the Sega 32X, a "What were they thinking?" project that has become a sort of quest for me. For the ONLY comprehensive overview of 32X games on the Web, click here.
That's My Bush!: Dedicated to the sitcom parody by Trey Parker and Matt Stone running on Comedy Central. Yeah, lots of people got South Park pages, but this? For a full episode guide, trivia, and other fun stuff, click here.
Mysteries And Imponderables: Here's some stuff I think about while I'm stuck in traffic. Click here.
The 50 Cent Tour: This is where I shout-out to my peeps in the house ("And all the girlies say I'm pretty fly for a white guy"). For some links around the Web for friends and others, click here.
You can e-mail me here.
The contents of this site are copyright and trademark by me, Peter G,
except for those that are blatantly obvious are not mine, like images from
South Park, Pokemon, BASEketball, and the 32X images. Those belong
to their respective owners. All these opinions
are just that--opinions. They are mine and mine alone. All
facts are as accurate as a guy who doesn't have his own fact checking staff
can make them. Any errors and omissions may be pointed out and made
fun of, but are strictly unintentional, so forget about lawsuits.
Hey, it works for TV news.
Stay well, and God bless. G