SPACE OPERA

“Hang on, my dear. We seem to have been jigsawed.”

A CULTURAL STATISTIC

THE WOLVES STILL NEED US

Apparently the Obama administration have not done enough to reverse the disastrous wildlife policies of the Bush administration. Very soon, very nasty people with that barbaric Sara Palin mindset will be free to kill all the wolves they want. The Natural Resources Defense Council writes…

“In just a few weeks, the mass killing of wolves could begin in Idaho and Montana -- and not even newborn wolf pups and their nursing mothers will be spared. We cannot stand by while this slaughter unfolds. On May 4, the wolf's federal protection will be lifted, and government agents will be free to open fire. After that, the states will launch public hunts, targeting wolves. That's why NRDC is launching The Big Howl campaign to mobilize Americans everywhere to protect wolves in the Northern Rockies from the crossfire. This is absolutely the wrong time to rip away federal protections from these struggling wolves. Over the past year, the wolf population in Yellowstone National Park has declined by 27 percent, with more than 70 percent of wolf pups succumbing to disease. One pack alone lost all 24 of its pups. If the federal protections are lifted on May 4 as planned, newborn wolf pups and their nursing mothers traveling outside national parks will be in the line of fire. That's why NRDC and our partners are filing suit in federal court to block this disastrous policy. But we must do more: we must raise a nationwide outcry that the Obama Administration cannot ignore.” Click here to outcry and also hear the wolf howl.

The secret word is Carnage

The secret message is 53746f702074686520626173746172647320696e
20746865697220747261636b732120

WHY DOES THIS IMAGE MAKE ME EXCEEDINGLY UNEASY?

And why, I wonder, do the words “zombie cannibalism” creep into my mind?

BUT MERCIFUL RELIEF IS NEVER FAR AWAY…

(It's a joke, okay?)

THE OBAMA TYRANNY

While Republicans become certifiably insane with their hair-tearing fantasies of Obama taking their guns and tossing their children in reeducation camps, I start to fear that one extreme right headcase will take this crap seriously, do a Tim McVeigh and start blowing up buildings full of people. (Click here for the “Gathering Storm” TV commercial, the latest bit of fascist homophobia.) I was going to write at some length about this, but I have a bunch of work to do right now and Jon Stewart pretty much said it all last night on The Daily Show. Click here to see it.

The secret word is Kneejerk

The secret message is 4d616b6520746865207374757069642070656f70
6c65207368757420757021

(see March 20th for decoding instructions)

S. CLAY WILSON NEEDS OUR HELP

Roldo has sent us a heads up that S. Clay Wilson the highly respected, veteran underground cartoonist – the creator of Captain Pissgums and The Checkered Demon – needs our help. Click here to find out why and what you can do.

OFFICIAL -- OBAMA IS THE ANTICHRIST (Pleased to meet you, now you guessed my name)

Okay, so I guess that proves it. If you play Barack Obama’s campaign slogan “Yes we can” backwards, it becomes “Thank you Satan.” Look no further. We are under the cloven hoof of the Antichrist and fucking doomed. No question. We’re toast. (But why do these holy rolling paranoids insist on playing everything backwards?) Click here for the damning proof and here for even more insanity.

The secret word is Lucifer

DUDE...

And while we’re on the subject of hidden secrets, Leonardo’s lost drawing of the Big Lebowski contains more hidden secrets than you can shake a stick at. Remember you read it here first.

416c6c206861696c204265656c7a6562756220
(see March 20th for decoding instructions)

OUR WHACKY UNCLE BILL

Uncle Bill lands on the moon. He intends use his Geiger counter in the search for Loretta Lynn’s deadly secret.

Meanwhile, since it’s Sunday, here are two videos by William Burroughs -- Click for Ah Pook the Destroyer and The Western Lands. (Ah Pook was sent by Valerie and the image by HCB.)

The secret word is Crater

MO' EGO

Below is a glowing commentary of Darklost, the second novel of the Renquist Quartet. I don’t know if any movie directors visit Doc40, but if they do, I would draw their attention to the second paragraph. (But do movie people still read, or do they just look at the pictures? I’d be happy talking with an artist who was looking to do a graphic novel.)

"The second novel of vampire Victor Renquist, now shifted to LA where there is a rich and mad cult planning to raise Chthulhu, plus a woman who was halfway turned before the vampire concerned died (she is termed a darklost), plus a squadron of violent off-the-books cops, a rock band, a feral Mexican vampire, some armadillos (don't ask me) and Marlon Brando. It's highly compressed - almost 500 pages, nearly all of it covering a couple of days of beautifully orchestrated action, full of exciting set-pieces, with the overall megathreat never occluded at all.

He's also great at creating memorable visuals (my oldest friend was particularly captivated by the opening of Phaid The Gambler). At the climax of this, LA is in chaos: riots, people going crazy, strange energies flashing around, covered in a toxic fog. The vampires are coming to save the world: 1000-year-old Victor with his cursed samurai sword, Brando looking as he had in The Wild One, a little girl in Victorian schoolgirl garb, with her bald teenage sister, another who has worked for decades as an unstoppable Mafia assassin, and others. This lot come striding out of the fog, everyone instinctively getting out of their way - any movie director could make a career out of that scene."

THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN (Part bfb4948)

In which Marilyn finds herself sitting beside the Big Fat Bastard. The Big Fat Bastard has
the girth of a Dionysian, but is really something else. The Big Fat Bastard reaches for Marilyn’s knee, and she attempts to halt him with a withering look, but she knows the Big Fat Bastard is not so easily stopped. The Big Fat Bastard has the ability to affect minds. The Big Fat Bastard is able to make others think in shorter and shorter sentences. Even a Blonde Goddess cannot easily resist. She sends out a counter-though. “Get away from me. You are a big fat four-sandwich eating motherfucker.” But it doesn’t work. Marilyn finds it harder and harder. Her thoughts are too simple. Too simple. It is not good. What shall she do? The Big Fat Bastard closes. Marilyn scowls. To be. Continued?

Pic supplied by Valerie

(THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN NOW HAS IT’S OWN PAGE SO THE WHOLE THING CAN BE READ WITHOUT SCROLLING. CLICK HERE)

TOTALLY TAKEN BY CAPTAIN COMEBACK CON

When the news of a new album and a comeback tour by no less than Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band, I was, to say the least, excited. I completely believed the press release, and refused to notice how a few things didn’t seem quite right. Like a whole bunch of the other people, I wanted it to be true, and was totally taken in. But then I noticed that it was posted on April 1st. The stuff that was not quite right became harder and harder to ignore, and I realized it was a fast and bulbous hoax. (Click here to see for yourself.)

The secret word is Gullible

THIS BLOG IS STILL PROTECTED BY...

HARD TIMES AND AMERICA KILLS (Again!!!?)

I woke up this morning, flipped on MSNBC to see that the world was still there, and found that all other news had been preempted by the shooting massacre in Binghamton. Coming so hot on the heels of Wednesday’s post, it all gave me pause and the weirded feeling that maybe I shouldn’t be posting any TGIF fun and frolic before the bodies are cold. A strange Cartesian paraphrase slips into my mind. “We kill, therefore we are.” Or is it “we are, therefore we kill.?”

OH NO I DON’T BELIEVE IT

“Broken and desperate, George Bush has turned to the woman who many believe was his secret lover, insiders say. In a blockbuster world exclusive, sources reveal what the ex-President said in frantic midnight phone calls to Condoleezza Rice - and his estranged wife Laura's agony. Don't miss a single word!”

Our pal Aeswiren sent over this tabloid wonderment. Wouldn’t we all just love it to be true? Unfortunately that’s all they wrote on the web, and you’re gonna have to pick up a copy in the supermarket for the full vicarious thrill. (I also wonder what means a person like W would choose to off himself. Suggestions?)

TALK SERIOUSLY TO THE HAND

This picture was a found web object. I’m not even sure of the identity of the lady singer in blue.

The word is Showbiz

HARD TIMES AND AMERICA KILLS

This story from The Christian Science Monitor sent by MrMR attempts to forge a link between hardship and mass murder. It leads with a certain logic…

“Four Oakland, Calif., police officers shot down. An Alabama man strolling a small town with a rifle, looking for victims. Seven elderly people shot dead at a North Carolina nursing home. And on Sunday, six people, including four kids, died in an apparent murder-suicide in an upscale neighborhood in Santa Clara, Calif. The details in all these cases are still emerging. In most, the exact motive has yet to be determined – or may never be fully understood. On a broader level, however, such incidents may be happening more often because an increasing number of Americans feel desperate pressure from job losses and other economic hardship, criminologists say.”

But then it continues…

“Social isolation is a huge factor in a country as large and transient as America, which places big emphasis on personal results. If you look at where many of these mass killings have occurred lately, they're in states that have lots of strangers, transients, and drifters, who don't have support systems to get them through tough times.” (Click here for more)

At this point the story goes off the rails for me. Great. Let’s marginalize and fear “strangers, transients, and drifters.” Let’s save the bankers and toss the autoworkers to the wolves. Let’s reject social safety nets and keep America safe from the evils of socialism. Let’s keep the people frightened and isolated because that also means they are powerless.

The secret word, once again, is Fury

WHAT WOULD JESUS DO?

And talking of Jesus, here’s more from the insane right of Congress. Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) argues that we could afford to keep increasing the levels of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, since dinosaurs got by just fine in a carbon-rich environment.
“Today we have about 388 parts per million [of carbon dioxide] in the atmosphere. I think in the age of the dinosaurs, when we had most flora and fauna, we were probably at 4,000 parts per million. There is a theological debate that this is a carbon-starved planet, not too much carbon. The earth will end only when God declares it’s time to be over. A man will not destroy this earth. This earth will not be destroyed by a flood. I appreciate having panelists here who are men of faith and we can get into the theological discourse of that position, but I do believe that God’s word is infallible. Unchanging. Perfect.”

Or you could watch this lunatic and wonder. Click here for the video.

THE CITY STOPS BEATING

LA CityBeat shut down last weekend. Its demise was hardly unexpected, but no one likes to see a magazine or newspaper go under. The explanation will doubtless be the economic chaos, but I fear the decline had started long before the housing bubble burst. Like many other alternative weeklies (and many other print entities, for that matter) LACB was mismanaged from the get-go. The suits firmly believed what someone on the Big Money website recently noted – “the magazine business is the advertiser audience delivery business.” To that end, content was treated with distain. The idea that writers might need to be paid a living wage was mocked, although the suits worn by the suits indicated they were hardly doing it for the revolution. A mythic young-consumer demographic was constantly pursued as though print could somehow woo the youth away from Twitter and My Space. Promotion was dismissed as not cost effective, and the idea that print might become the domain of people who actually like to read was dismissed out of hand. I’m pissed because I am left with no place to air even my most conventional theories. I have a killer original essay on the total ramifications of marijuana legalization, but currently it has no home. Indeed, right now the writing on the wall for the essayist and mid-list fiction author of gothic fantasy seems to be “fuck off and die.” Maybe, after 34 books and god knows how many magazine stories, I should take the advice all of those who think it’s sooo smart not to reply to my emails and do exactly that. Unless, of course, someone comes up with a cunning plan.

The secret word is Obsolete

A MESSAGE TO THOSE OBAMA BAITING REPUBLICANS

(Sent by MrMR)

DOC'S SUNDAY FUNNIES

I deeply regretted not hearing about this event in Northern California (from Adam Gorightly) until it was all over. Here at the Doc40 we prize the grilled cheese sandwich above most other foods. (Man cannot live by grilled cheese alone – but he can try!) Unfortunately the greatest proponent of the grilled cheese was also unable to attend…

…BECAUSE…

(For Elvis’ own recipe, scroll back to January 8th of this year.)

A RESONABLE EXPLANATION...

Some of you in the US may have seen this already in your Sunday paper (if you still have one) and those who didn't may have to click on the image to enlarge, but I've posted it because it's one of the best pieces of visual sci fi I've seen in many a moon, and also it makes a lot of sense.

The secret word is Species

AND FINALLY...

Rimshot!

(Send by the Hunter)

SHE MAKES PALIN SEEM SANE

I like a good revolution now and again, but the one currently being loudly and hysterically espoused by Michelle Bachmann – a Republican Congresswoman from east-central Minnesota – needs to be avoided at all costs. I’m confident that this extreme-right loony will ultimately be laughed into derisive oblivion (and I’m doing my bit here to speed that plough) but let’s make no mistake that what she proposes is nothing short of a full-blown fascist theocracy, or that she’s playing to the conspiracy nuts who have deftly switched the authorship of mass arrests and FEMA deathcamps from Dick Cheney to Barack Obama. Here are some recent sayings of crazy Bachmann…

“I want people in Minnesota armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax because we need to fight back. Thomas Jefferson told us ‘having a revolution every now and then is a good thing,’ and the people – we the people – are going to have to fight back hard if we’re not going to lose our country. And I think this has the potential of changing the dynamic of freedom forever in the United States.”
"I’m a foreign correspondent on enemy lines and I try to let everyone back here in Minnesota know exactly the nefarious activities that are taking place in Washington."
“Science is on our side on this one, and the science indicates that human activity is not the cause of all this global warming. And that in fact, nature is the cause, with solar flares, etc.”
“The U.S. will soon be moving to give up the dollar as our currency and we would just go with a One World currency. Such action would mean the U.S. as a country would be no more.”

The secret word is Wingnut

PROLETARIAT PINUP #10

“Buy a girl a drink, and then remember the immortal words of Tom Joad. “I'll be all around in the dark - I'll be everywhere. Wherever you can look - wherever there's a fight, so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Wherever there's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there. I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad. I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry and they know supper's ready, and when the people are eatin' the stuff they raise and livin' in the houses they build - I'll be there, too.’”

OUR WHACKY UNCLE BILL

Uncle Bill is late. Mr. Tesla reads a book by the light of his coil while he waits for Uncle Bill to arrive.

DANGEROUS MACHO

Doc40, being almost as chickenshit as much of the mainstream media, usually refrains from taking sides in the conflicts between Israel and its Islamic neighbors. Any debate tends to ultimately bog down in smokescreen accusations of anti-Semitism and worse. But when the Israeli army is running around in t-shirts like this, we have to comment. Israelis of good will really have to rein in these boyos before the macho gets homicidally out of hand. Questioning the actions of the Israeli military does not make me a Nazi and, right now, there would seem to be much to question.

The secret word is Accord

AS IF WE DIDN’T HAVE ENOUGH TO WORRY ABOUT

Our pal Joly provided this grim possibility of plasma balls…

“It is midnight on 22 September 2012 and the skies above Manhattan are filled with a flickering curtain of colourful light. Few New Yorkers have seen the aurora this far south but their fascination is short-lived. Within a few seconds, electric bulbs dim and flicker, then become unusually bright for a fleeting moment. Then all the lights in the state go out. Within 90 seconds, the entire eastern half of the US is without power.
A year later and millions of Americans are dead and the nation's infrastructure lies in tatters. The World Bank declares America a developing nation. Europe, Scandinavia, China and Japan are also struggling to recover from the same fateful event - a violent storm, 150 million kilometres away on the surface of the sun.” (For the full story and a video, click here.)

A VISUAL AID

This is a trillion bucks in hundreds. The little guy on the far left is a standard human. (Sent by Doug the Bass)

“This is a big ocean-liner. It's not a speedboat. It doesn't turn around immediately. But we're in a better, better place because of the decisions that we made.” – Barack Obama

IF THIS DOESN"T PUT YOU OFF TWITTER NOTHING WILL

Another visual aid supplied by our good friend Somegirl. Click here

The secret word is Timesuck

EQUESTRIENNE

“What do you mean an erotic fantasy? How dare you. Get out of my way!”

THE ADVENTURES OF MARILYN (Part 6)

In which Marilyn finds herself apprehended and subject to interrogation. Wishing a little Garbo-time to herself, she exited via the main-brane point of the multiverse convergence that was concealed behind the mirror in the Roosevelt Hotel, but instead of gin, Nembutal, and a long sleep, she was immediately surrounded by men in suits and ties, and ugly women with pads and pencils. She was hustled to a suite on the seventh floor, and pushed down into a low armchair. The questions came so thick and fast that she faltered and stopped even trying to supply these people with answers. “What do you want?”
“We want information.”
“Whose side are you on?”
“We want information.”
“Who are you?”
“The new Number 2.”
“Who is Number 1?”
“You are Number 6.” Marilyn recognized this game. ”I am not a number, I am a blonde goddess.”

SINCERE FLATTERY?

This is a New York cat called Johnny B. I don’t know if he’s stolen my act but he’s definitely stolen my look.

THERE WILL NOW BE A SHORT INTERMISSION

Click here.

The secret word is Pause

MY NAME IS JERRY LEE LEWIS FROM LOUISIANA/GONNA PLAY A LITTLE BOOGIE ON THIS HERE PIANO...

I’m a bit late in getting to it but our pal Jon wrote a killer bit on seeing Jerry Lee in Nashville.

“It was immediately apparent that Jerry Lee was completely out of his mind. A bunch of indignant looking family men with dependents in tow walked out when The Killer started raving about the size of Muddy Water's dick. I think the rest of us were slack jawed with astonishment at the depraved spectacle as it unfolded. The bass player was so drunk that he kept falling flat on his face with accompanying noises when his bass hit the floor. The "band" would then stop playing to rush over and prop him up. Finally they raised the curtain behind the stage so he could lean on the cinder block wall. Classy. Once he managed to stay upright it became apparent that he was not paying attention to anything that Jerry Lee was doing.” (Click here for the full wonder.)

I’d like to think the picture (lifted from Siblingshot) is the mugshot taken after Jerry Lee rammed the gates of Graceland with his car, blind drunk and screaming that Elvis should come out and face him, but maybe he was arrested in Memphis more than just that one time.

THOSE VICIOUS BLOODY CHRISTIANS AGAIN (and it is Sunday)

The Westboro Baptist Church, known for its many "God hates fags" protests at the funerals of gay men, is taking advantage of the death of actress Natasha Richardson for more hate propaganda promotion. The church intends to protest at Richardson's funeral because she supported research for treatment and cure of AIDS.

THE FAT CAT IS HAPPY

The fat cat is happy
The fat cat has money
The fat cat need not worry
But the fat cat cannot read
He doesn’t know they are bundles of singles.

The secret word is 436174617374726f70686520 (For decoding instructions see last Friday)

WAY PAST TIME TO WISE UP

From Salon…
"In 2001, Portugal became the only EU-member state to decriminalize drugs, a distinction which continues through to the present. Last year, working with the Cato Institute, I went to that country in order to research the effects of the decriminalization law (which applies to all substances, including cocaine and heroin) and to interview both Portuguese and EU drug policy officials and analysts (the central EU drug policy monitoring agency is, by coincidence, based in Lisbon). Evaluating the policy strictly from an empirical perspective, decriminalization has been an unquestionable success, leading to improvements in virtually every relevant category and enabling Portugal to manage drug-related problems (and drug usage rates) far better than most Western nations that continue to treat adult drug consumption as a criminal offense."

Even with Obama bringing a measure of sanity to the power structure, so much arrant nonsense is still being talked about drug policy that I feel my head starting to explode. Everyone seems to forget that the vast profits in drug trafficking, that fund so much global mayhem, are created the very illegality of the product. Make it legal and they vanish. Drug legalization in the USA and Europe could be a domestic tax bonanza, and even, as an instrument of foreign policy, could stabilize both Afghanistan and Mexico. I have so much to write about all this that my other head wants to explode. But whether it will ever be published in this time of media crisis is a whole other matter.

The secret word is 4261747368697421

OR YOU COULD THROW TOMATOES AT AIG

There’s even a touch of Jackson Pollack creativity about it. (Click here)

OH NO NOT BONO

Dave Marsh has posted a searing attack on Bono on Counterpunch, which I’m linking, because I’ve never quite bought the idea of St. Bono, Savior of the Huddled Masses...

“Bono is no man of peace--he has yet to speak out against any war. Bono is part owner of Pandemic/Bioware, producers of Mercenaries 2, a video game which simulates an invasion of Venezuela. Last year Bono met with US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to discuss plans to set up a new U.S. military command for Africa. Forbes, the magazine Bono co-owns, constantly beats the drums for war (Bono says he was attracted to the magazine because it has a “consistent philosophy”).” (Click here for the whole tirade.)

WARNING!

“We have you on radar. Identify yourself or we scramble our fighters.”

A FRIDAY PICTURE SHOW

It’s Friday (TGIF) and here’s a special program of stunning videos for your amusement. We have…

EXTREME SHEEP LED ART (Send by Noudela) Click here

SHORT WITH BETTIE PAGE Click here

INTERMISSION (Don’t miss this!) Click here

THE CAT HOUSE ON THE KING (Send by Aeswiren) Click here

And all this reminds me that one day I swear I will bring Doctube up to speed.

AND TALKING OF THINGS I HAVEN’T DONE

Regular readers will know that I have always dreamed of creating a Doc40 secret decoder ring. I once got as far as getting a quote from a manufacturer, but the minimum order was beyond our means. Now we have a this damned economy, the dream retreats further. We do, however, still have the virtual secret decoder ring with which to amuse ourselves. And here’s the secret message…

546f206563686f2054686520477261746566756c
20446561642c20224f6e6520776179206f722061
6e6f746865722e2054686973207374617276696e
67277320676f7420746f20676976652e22

(All you have to do is copy the message, click on the site, clear the box, paste the message into the box, and hit “decode.”)

The secret word is 44656d656e746961