I was on my old friend Douglas Rushkoff’s Team Human podcast. We taped this just before news of George Floyd’s murder became widely known, and talked for over four hours over the course of two long calls. The edited version is just under an hour. It’s always fun to have a conversation with him.

Playing for Team Human today, counterculture icon and Editor of Dangerous Minds, Richard Metzger. Metzger envisions what life might look like on the dole and what that means for the future of the counterculture.

Rushkoff and Metzger consider whether the ideals of yesterday’s counterculture were so successful that they’ve become the new over culture? And if so, who really are the new revolutionaries? They also consider the effect Covid-19 will have on a new generation’s financial prospects, and whether the underlying flaws in capitalism will finally be laid bare.

In his monologue, Rushkoff looks at the way our policing problems can only be solved if we fund and utilize other kinds of civil servants instead of just ones with weapons.

Read “Good Cops Don’t Need Grenade Launchers” by Douglas Rushkoff from Medium’s GEN.

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A portrait of our current president by Chest Strongwell.
 
I present to you a few of the best photoshop jobs I have seen in quite a while which also just so happen to poke fun at members of our current administration and other fascistic enablers and foul miscreants. Not all photoshopped images are created equal—and these images set the bar a bit higher if you ask me.

I don’t know much about Chest Strongwell outside of the fact that Strongwell is probably not really his real name (duh), he is a professional, left-leaning Internet troll, and a stay-at-home Dad claiming to have one thousand balls. I also know Chest has some sharp photoshop skills, and Republicans hate him, which I’m sure is just fine by Chest. At any rate, ole’ Chest has recently upped his online taunting directed at right-wing politicians with a few beautifully executed photoshopped images of 45’s “grab ‘em by the pussy” posse in the style of old-school KMart and JC Penny Portrait Studio photos from the 70s and 80s. Repulsive individuals such as Kellyanne Conway, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, and Vice President Mike Pence have never looked BETTER if you ask me.

So since I know we could all use a good laugh, please enjoy some of the best shopped-up images of some of the worst people in the world. God bless America, and god bless Chest Strongwell. Whoever you are.
 

Former mayor of New York City now acting as an attorney for Trump, Rudy Giuliani.
 

Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell.
 

White House Press Secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
 

 
A 2012 South American television interview with KISS has recently surfaced in which the band demands an embarrassed journalist to remove his Iron Maiden t-shirt before interviewing them.

We’ve come to expect such extreme assholism from Gene, but Paul actually starts this one off by refusing to answer the first question, but instead chastising the interviewer, “KISS is spelled K-I-S-S, (points at interviewer’s Iron Maiden shirt) this does not spell KISS, Gustavo. You made a big mistake.”

The interviewer defends his sartorial choice, saying “I picked this shirt to interview you guys… it’s not cool to wear a KISS shirt to a KISS interview.”

The band disagrees, with Gene chiming in “I don’t want him wearing an Iron Maiden t-shirt,” and then demands that the interviewer wear the shirt inside-out.

The members of KISS seem to be so far up their own asses with their branding, that they treat the interviewer as if he had worn a Burger King t-shirt to an interview with the CEO of McDonald’s. The fake Peter Criss, who believes bands are like sports teams, later adds: “If you went to a Raider’s game, you wouldn’t wear the other team’s uniform.”

The members of KISS apparently have missed the difference between fandom and corporate sponsorship. One could argue that the band is playing around here, but they come off as quite serious and the interviewer is obviously embarrassed about the situation, though he tried to remain professional and play it off. They are literally telling other people what they can or cannot wear JUST TO SPEAK TO THEM.

Paul condescendingly chides the interviewer: “Gustavo is very smaaart. ‘How I get a KISS t-shirt for free?’ You show up with the wrong t-shirt.” 

Gene says “He don’t understand,” with the interviewer replying “I do, I do,” to which Gene retorts insultingly, “you’re twelve, you’re new.”

Paul tells the journalist that “you’re in our house” and that he “doesn’t show respect.”

“We also have a t-shirt that says ‘I don’t understand,’ you can wear that,” adds Gene.

Gene then makes the interviewer take his shirt off and turn it inside out before the fake Peter Criss comes along with a XXXL KISS shirt that they force Guatavo to wear.

Aside from Sharon’s dancing circus bear act, Ozzy, no other band holds a candle to the grandiose legacy-pissing done by KISS.
 
Watch it, after the jump…

 
Like many of you reading this sentence, I have spent nearly 100% of my waking hours so far this year feeling like I wanted to run out into the middle of a cornfield and scream my fucking head off as loudly as possible until I passed out from exhaustion or simply got bored of this activity and decided to stop. (Never underestimate the cathartic value of DIY primal scream therapy in Donald Trump’s America. If it worked for John and Yoko and it can work for you, too.)

But yesterday and today, the Senate votes on repealing the ACA has left me feeling especially sickened, angry and utterly drained. My hatred for “them” has grown by leaps and bounds. From Donald Shit’s remarkably idiotic “Obamacare is death” rant to watching John McCain vote, not once but twice, to revoke poor people’s ability to fight back against cancer, it’s all just gotten so goddamned nauseating. So grotesque. A brain-addled billionaire bully who doesn’t even know the difference between health insurance and life insurance who wants to upend 20% of the American economy and mess with people’s lives because he hates the superior black man who preceded him in office. Trump doesn’t even know what health insurance IS. Not even in the most general sense. But it’s named after the black guy, so… Sorry sick people!
 

#donaldshit

I mean my Twitter feed zaps me of much of my will to carry on. I’m glad I don’t bother much with Facebook, I’d have given up a long time ago.

But having said all that, I read something on The Onion just now that made me LOL and smile again in my heart. I didn’t think that was possible anymore.

An item, appearing sans the byline of the satirical genius who wrote it, takes aim at West Virginia’s GOP Senator Shelley Moore Capito who only a week ago forcefully rebuked her party’s plans to repeal the ACA without a backup plan:

“As I have said before, I did not come to Washington to hurt people. For months, I have expressed reservations about the direction of the bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. My position on this issue is driven by its impact on West Virginians. With that in mind, I cannot vote to repeal Obamacare without a replacement plan that addresses my concerns and the needs of West Virginians.”

Despite this “brave” statement—some Republicans just LOVE to get brave before they cave—we all know how she actually voted. Which is why this Onion item is such a perfectly cut diamond of truly incendiary political satire served with such a heaping helping of “fuck you, lady”:

WASHINGTON—As legislators gathered Tuesday for a critical vote that would go a long way toward finally repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) was reportedly struggling to weigh the interests of her entire constituency against absolutely nothing. “Honestly, it’s a tough call—on one hand, you have opposition to the repeal from a majority of Republicans, virtually all Democrats, and the entire healthcare industry, while on the other, you have not one sound argument or credible opinion,” said Capito, admitting she was, even now, having difficulty balancing her desire to keep as many West Virginians insured as possible with there being no reason whatsoever to do otherwise. “This is an agonizing decision. Sure, there are sound justifications for voting no on ‘repeal and replace,’ but then there’s emptiness, literal emptiness, when you look for reasons to vote yes. All I know is, I have to get this right somehow.” At press time, Senator Capito had resigned herself to the fact that both sides had valid points and she would just have to go with her gut when the time came.

Standing ovation to the uncredited author of this, one of the single most impressive paragraphs ever composed in the English language, I reckon.

If you know someone from West Virginia, be sure to send this to them or post it on their Facebook wall (especially the Republicans, it will go right over their pointed lil’ heads). And if you feel like tweeting it at Shelley Moore Capito just to make triple sure that she’s seen it, have at it, her Twitter handle is @SenCapito

 
Just looking at these pictures makes me think a stock photographer’s life must sometimes be quite fun. For example, photographing strange and bizarre scenes that at first seem utterly inappropriate but once given a headline almost make perfect sense.

Toddler shoots Mom with loaded .45 found in her handbag

or

Jealous wife stabs husband over dirty texts from his lover

or

Shopping Mall Santa is a Serial Sex Perv!

You get the idea.

What I want to know is there a weird stock photography office where you can apply for this job? Do they have a photographic editor who sits chomping on a cigar like J. Jonah Jameson barking out demands for pix of “Granny Shoots Mugger” or “This Baby Smokes a Pack a Day Just like Daddy!” or “Evil Babysitters let Kid snort cocaine!”

These pictures all scream National Enquirer, if not the Daily Mail. Not enough aliens or Elvis to be of much use to the Weekly World News.

Andy Kelly is a video games journalist who, quite understandably, finds this kind of stock photography hilarious. One day while browsing through the “perfect, smiling models eating salad, high-fiving each other, and pointing at flipcharts in boardrooms” Kelly came across the image of an obese man by a Christmas tree cradling a bottle of booze and pressing the barrel of pistol against his head. The photo was intended to represent some very serious issue like say, seasonal affective disorder or maybe the rise in suicides at Christmastime. But, as Andy noted, the image was “presented so bluntly, in such an absurdly literal manner that it accidentally became funny.”

So was born Kelly’s Dark Stock Photos—“Extremely fucked up stock photography.”

Kelly started his Twitter feed last month. It already has a healthy following around 81k. Kelly’s careful as to which photographs he shares as many are just waaaay too depressing and a “disproportionate number” feature violence against women—which sadly reflects the kind of world we live in.

Yet, the darkly comic photographs Kelly does share raise plenty of questions like who buys this stuff? Why do they exist? and is there really a place where I can apply to get this dream job?

If this tickles your funny bone (and why wouldn’t it?) and you want to see more then follow Dark Stock Photos.
 

 

 
More weird stock photo pix, after the jump…

The front cover of ‘Memorial Day 2000’
 

“Memorial Day 2000 is the finest find in the history of found stuff.”—Davy Rothbart, founder of Found Magazine, as quoted on the back of the Memorial Day 2000 VHS cover

Memorial Day 2000 was “discovered” by noise musicians Twig Harper and Carly Ptak of Nautical Almanac at a Michigan yard sale. It’s the low-fi record of a massive hillbilly bender that took place on a campground in Silver Lake State Park, Michigan on Memorial Day weekend of 2000. There’s fire jumping, lots of driving around in the mud, plenty of peeing and puking, (and chanted group puke encouragement), wrasslin’ and even a really severe… er… sewage issue.
 

 
Drop what you are doing and watch this video right now. Grab yourself a tallboy or two of Steel Reserve High Gravity Lager, a Manwich—well maybe not a Manwich, and definitely not sausage—and indulge in the luxuries of this repulsive but FUCKING HILARIOUS fly-on-the-wall experience, as you encounter everyday midwestern white trash indulging in unadulterated racism, misogyny, and booze-fueled debauchery. And of course, there are plenty of candidly soused interviews with the participants. This is Heavy Metal Parking Lot without the glamor of Judas Priest. American Juggalo without the face paint and Faygo. Yep, this is Lord of the Flies on Lake Michigan. What joy-filled mirth awaits you!

Many people discovered this video via Nautical Almanac’s merch table and over the years its legend has grown. Compulsively watchable, in fact, you could say that Memorial Day 2000 is “the fuckin whip shit of all fuckin shitter bongers.” (This will make a little bit more sense after you’ve watched it.) To deem the mighty MD2K NSFW is a laughable understatement. It’s not safe for anything or anyone at any time. Got that?

As you watch, ponder what percentage of these idiot Memorial Day 2000 revelers probably voted for Donald Trump.

Watch—if you dare—after the jump…

 
This clip hardly needs any setting up as apparently the entire world watched in hilarious horror as Trump administration spokesman Sean Spicer stepped on his own dick (repeatedly) yesterday with his spectacular “Hitler didn’t gas his own people” gaffe and subsequent humiliating abject apology tour.

Clearly the man is a bungling fool, and in way over his head, but that could be said of many if not most of the people working in the White House. Say what you want about Spicer, he may be an idiot—and he should certainly be dismissed from his duties pronto—but at least he’s (probably) not a Russian operative. Have some perspective. It’s 2017.

Below, a genius Veep-Spicer mash-up that was noticed and tweeted by Veep star Julia Louis-Dreyfus who remarked that the clip “feels like an Emmy-winning episode to me.”
 

Photo by Austin Young. Styling by Squeaky Blonde. Make-up by MAC

This is a guest post from Ann Magnuson.

Initially, “Open Letter to an Open Letter” was written as a Facebook post, a goofy riff on the somewhat futile nature of ranting on the Internet. I wrote it after reading Sinead O’Connor’s “Open Letter to Miley Cyrus” where the former was chastising the latter for slutty twerking on the 2013 Grammys. I thought well, she makes some valid points but is this really helping anything? Then I thought, you know the real culprit is the Beast that feeds on all our infighting; the clickbait monster that every media site has turned into which has transformed the whole system into “a vortex that can never be filled”!

When I started recording my recent album Dream Girl I decided to include “Open Letter,” but then it didn’t really fit on the finished product so I decided to release it later as a separate track. I wanted to bring the “Open Letter” words to musical life and create an epic track that was in the spirit of “Folk Song” (initially written for one of my one-woman shows, and then ended up on the Bongwater album The Power of Pussy).

For the recording, I was partly inspired by Gil Scott-Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” as well as by Ken Nordine and a host of other spoken word pieces from the psychedelic past. I recorded the whole thing in one take and then added embellishments later, mostly with my engineer Mark Wheaton at the Echo Park studio CATASONIC. My drummer Joe Berardi provided percussion and various sound effects and The Millionaire (Michael Cudahy) from Combustible Edison did the orchestrations and guitar work.

In the three years since the piece was written the mad chatter on the Internet has become so voluminous, so unhinged, so ugly and combative that there can be no doubt that we really are in the midst of a Civil War. And that battlefield is getting really bloody. The longer it goes on and the crazier it gets the vast void everyone is screaming into feels vaster than ever. While there are so many great things about the Internet (baby goat videos for example) it’s brought out the worst aspects of humanity. So much so that we’ve elected an Internet troll as our President!

Every time I look at the news I start singing the “Open Letter” chorus: “Seriously WTF?!” Has that become the new E Pluribus Unum? #sad

I just may have to agree with blogger Mark Manson who says, “Everything is Fucked and I’m Pretty Sure It’s the Internet’s Fault”

I do think the Internet has changed our brain chemistry and not for the best. There is no denying the Internet has changed the zeitgeist. It IS the zeitgeist.

The way “Folk Song” (and a lot of the Bongwater stuff) riffed on the zeitgeist of the Reagan/Bush years, “Open Letter” riffs on today. Particularly as it relates to women - though the current madness is gender-neutral, and bi-partisan to boot!

If there is one thing that everyone can agree on it’s “SERIOUSLY WTF?!”

Love,

Ann

Hear “Open Letter to an Open Letter” after the jump…

 
Once again Vic Berger comes through with the goods. Here’s his latest supercut of the most recent Trump/HRC face-off. I was shrieking with laughter throughout it.

The master’s “artist statement” follows:

After the release of those scandalous tapes, the pressure was on for Donald Trump at the second debate. But the presidential nominee proved he doesn’t need the support of his party, or women, or pretty much anyone else – so long as he believes in himself.

Press play. Do it now.
 

 
After the jump, watch Vic Berger’s take on the first one, ‘Trump Has A Total Meltdown At The First Presidential Debate’

 

 
Hey America! Here’s a wild Donald Trump-inspired playlist that all the hip kids are tuning into! I did an expanded version of this on my Intoxica radio show on Luxuriamusic.com. This should keep you in “the mood” until the debate!

And here we go!
 

 
More Trump-inspired music for all you hepcats and pussycats after the jump…