There have been a couple of reports lately from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart that have shone a light on the practices over at Fox News that have not only caught my eye, but have also turned my stomach. This is not something new, most of the programming and ignorant commentary produced by the network generally has that effect on my stomach, but I can really take no more. I am not only in support of the Obama Administration’s decision to boycott the channel, but I think that the rest of America not only needs to share in this boycott but that we would all be the better for it!

As Jon Stewart and crew points out in the videos below, the station’s practices are beyond appalling. The station fabricates stories and spreads falsehoods to push their agendas of discrimination, hate, and fear mongering…or as we saw during the Bush Administration the agenda handed to them by the neo-conservative White House. However you slice it, their title as a news channel is not misleading to the point of hysterical but also a flat out lie. And their slogan, ‘Fair and Balanced’, would be as laughable as the idea of their news channel classification if it wasn’t so fucking sad. Sad because, not only do masses of Americans buy into the bullshit, but they seem to believe it as well. Honestly, they take themselves fucking seriously…

How Fox News Operates

Hannity Stacks the Deck

How many more instances of improper practices do we really need to suffer? Fox News should just change their names to Faux News : Fairly Imbalanced, and at least then, when the public does suffer through their hourly bile spillage they will be told up front that it is complete and utter shite! Turn the channel, people. This proverbial antagonistic peanut gallery is no longer needed. We want to move forward to a more open-minded and accepting America, and as long as these poisoned tongued misfits are paraded around and passed off to the public as legitimate news agents, that will never fucking happen! Let us take back the airwaves, people.

Here is the latest video from WHATSABUDGET Films and the Angry Hippie. Using one of my newest poems in a plea for 1 Million Mad, I cut it together with images and online headlines that hopefully have an impact.

Admittedly it’s kind of an odd feeling when you realize that your life’s purpose is to be one of anger. Though it could be that this oddness comes with any realization of purpose and was not specifically tied into the path of rage. I mean it is possible that even if I had realized that my life’s purpose was to be one of petting puppies then I am speculatively certain that an oddness (could be the same one, could be a different one) would also accompany this realization. (I will also interject that if puppy petting is a perfectly acceptable purpose in life, I may have gotten a bit ripped by getting anger, but whatever…) This digression of a realization was not one I came to while I was sitting in the coffee shop that morning listening to the kingdom ministries’ misfits talk of illegally indoctrinating foster children through their immersion mentoring programs and scripture forcing foster parents, but it was one that I felt I would mention just the same. And as it resulted from this overall experience of purpose definition, it became more relevant than I initially had thought it would be.

No, to be honest the only thing that I thought about in the coffee shop was that I needed to focus on these dogma dealing dickwits and their illicit plans to steal all these children’s souls for salvation. You see, unlike the compassionless Christ table, I was actually considering the life that these kids would be subjected to on this plane. The lives of forced servitude at the altar of the Jesus myth and his fucked up flock of brainwashing sociopaths. As I posed at the end of the first post No rest for the angry – A purpose driven rage Part 1, what if these children cannot learn to accept these force fed beliefs? You see, not only do I believe that this kind of indoctrination of children is basically abuse, but I believe that they would suffer even more abuse at the hands of their oppress…um, I mean ‘saviors’ should they resist these teachings. Anyone wanting to argue that this kind of mental manipulation of children is not abusive, see the movie Jesus Camp and then try to tell me differently!

But these pious people were not sharing in my concern for the children’s lives, for they had their greedy sights set on their souls and that always trumps the here and now in ensuring quality of life. Who needs the life to be anything but subservient, when that guarantees such a glorious afterlife. And add a dash or two of suffering, and your payoff is sure to be that much greater beyond the pearly gates. Get locked in a closet until you accept the many miracles of our savior and Lord Jesus by your adopted parents, and you get like the good cable with the premium movie channels in your afterlife townhome. Get regular beatings with old testament tools of the trade because you fail to unflinchingly accept the scripture as the infallible word of God in your foster home, and get the jacuzzi suite upgrade in your afterlife apartment to soak away the anguish that it took to get you here in the first place.

Nearing the end, but it’s still a bit away, so I am dropping it behind the cut…
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So I have been in self reflection mode and less in the angry hippie mindset as of late, but I found that the angry hippie is never resting. That mental status can be activated with the mere mention of some choice phrases. For instance, I was having coffee the other day with my friend Stephanie at a little local coffee and pastry place, and suddenly it was as if fate was pushing me towards the realization that the path I am to follow and focus on is the path of the angry hippie. What can I say, I was in self reflection mode, I may be over analyzing the situation, but I will let you all decide that.

So in this reflective state, I have been wondering about my purpose. Angie filled me in on my purpose as defined in a Numerological sense, which seemed to fit into place with my angry hippie goals. And then in the coffee house, I realized that perhaps the universe was trying to back that up with a few weird coincidental happenstances all landing me full on in angry hippie mode. First off, as we were at the counter ordering our coffee, I noticed a sign that said the coffee place was looking for a baker. It just so happened that Stephanie is a baker looking for a job in that field, and she did not notice the sign, I did. I pointed it out to her, and at the bottom of the notice, it stated to inquire of David.

David just happened to be sitting next to the counter and when Stephanie asked about the position, she and Dave sat down for an initial inquiry type interview. This left me all by my lonesome to pick a table. I looked around the room, and out of the many available seats I chose a small table for two against the wall across from a table of four older than me folks with pages and notebooks scattered about along the large surface. Stephanie, who I had met up with specifically so we could talk, was now otherwise engaged so I was left with no one to converse with. So my mind began to wander around the room…as did my ears. Not on purpose, I was not trying to eavesdrop on anyone, it just sort of happened that way.

…Not quite done yet, but it’s a bit lengthy so I am dropping the rest of the story behind the cut
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I got an e-mail recently from Trav that told me he had shared his vision of America with President-Elect Barack Obama’s website at Change.gov. An interesting outreach tool for sure, and Obama has already found a way to lure people into thinking that they have a direct line to the soon to be president, and that their words are being heard. Maybe I am just overly cynical after two terms of ‘Duh’bya, to actually believe that any of the things said there will go any further than some daily dumped e-mail address without being considered by anyone.

Well, here’s what I wrote to PE Obama, and I figured it was too good to waste without being read, so I copied it here to show anyone who cares, what kind of America the Angry Hippie sees when he closes his eyes.

My vision of America is simple. In theory anyway. I want an America we can be proud of again. Not run by greed and apathy, where citizens are manipulated through fear and propaganda. An America where the people’s interests are put before the interests of the corporations. Where ‘We the People’ still have our place and more importantly our voice in the American political arena.

An America where democracy is still favored, and the Republic for which it stood, is returned to protect the minority from the unconstitutional will of the majority. That’s right, you might remember the Constitution, and if you do, could we have it back please.

End the illegal discriminatory practices our government participates in willfully condemning gay Americans to a second class citizenship, due to the further breaches of Church into our State. But without the balance of systems we once rampantly checked on, that kind of corruption is to be expected.

Hey, while we’re fixing things, how about we bring back the checks and balances, that our government is based on. Let’s remove all the unconstitutional legislation the Bush regime spearheaded. While we’re at it, lets admit to our mistakes in Iraq, and bring our troops home. Also, let’s discontinue the lie/fear based manipulation of the Iran situation to appease our Israeli friends.

How about prosecution of the Bush administration for war crimes, crimes against humanity, and dereliction of duty with regards to the failure to govern according to the will of the people they were charged with representing. Also, let’s be better than our enemies, and stop with the torture, and the semantic discussion of whether or not ‘enhanced interrogation tactics’ actually fall under this heading. We all know they do, and we all know that America once stood for something better than that. We treated our enemies according to the guidelines set forth in the Geneva Convention with hopes that our soldiers would be treated the same way when/if captured. How would we expect them to be treated today?

Let’s refocus on education and healthcare for our citizens so that we can keep our public as educated and healthy as we need to be to be productive and more importantly, competitive. I know a lot of this flies in the face of the corporate interests that fund our political system, but if we look after the people, they will keep the corporations happy.

An America where people can trust that their government is not turning more and more into Big Brother. With illegal wiretapping, media manipulation and coercion, and secret detention centers. Not to mention FEMA concentration camps and CCMRF. Slipping further and further towards the dictatorial tyranny that Orwell fictionalized, once upon a time. Turning him into a unwitting prophet.

In short, I want an America, where our upcoming political change march for 1 Million Mad, wouldn’t be necessary. But maybe I am asking too much. Perhaps we have allowed ourselves to be far too broken, and we are beyond repair at this point. Maybe you could try to prove that last hypothesis wrong!