Caterwauling

Rejected headline: One nation, in denial. …

I don’t get it.

Seriously, the whole federal battle over the Pledge of Allegiance, particularly whether the “under g-d” line, is taking place in the wrong arena. Then again, what the hell do I know?

As a longtime nonsectarian, I used to fall silent during our morningly Pledge when I was a wee lass, particularly at the “under g-d” part. Even now, the Pledge is more of a tradition (and a PITA, as far as I used to be concerned) than a battle cry. I excelled at skipping homeroom, so I don’t know that I said it even once when I was in high school.

What I’m not getting is whether the atheist activist in charge of this brouhaha wants the Pledge to be banned or whether he wants to get rid of the “under g-d” part. Anyone who’s seen a news report that I haven’t seen, please feel free to enlighten me. (For the record, I’ve been an atheist and, most recently, an agnostic. And I still don’t get this guy’s point.)

I mean, with what would we replace that particular phrase? One nation … in purgatory? In hell? Under fear of terrorists? Under economic distress? Not under much of an ozone layer? Under a dominatrix? Over a couch cushion? In a hole? In denial? The list goes on.

I revere our flag. I salute it when necessary. I get mad when people burn our flag. I am careful to never let the cloth touch the ground. I am frequently reminded of what that symbol meant so long ago and what it means today. And while, on one hand, I don’t need a mantra in my head about it, the Pledge did come in useful for teaching me how to tell my right side from my left.

I’d sooner, though, pledge allegiance to our fags. I mean, come on, at least they wouldn’t have put red, white and blue together on the same piece of fabric, right? And horizontal stripes make anything look fat — I am certain they would have done a nice print or at least some vertical stripes. Now THAT, my friends, I would salute!!!

I swear, some of the people who contribute to my newspaper should all form an Ice Capades team … and the ice should crack under the sheer weight of their stupidity alone.

One chick wrote in at great length on how devastated the country became after Sept. 11, 2002. Um, did I miss something on that day? Or is she that discombobulated that she forgets what year our world fell apart? (She’s running for agency president, BTW.) The same chick sent in four photos of herself and told us to pick which one we wanted to use, but then to send it to her for approval of our choice. Um, why the hell, then, would she send four photos if she wasn’t OK with all of them?!?!

That’s not even going to touch today’s e-mail battle about our Problem Child division president who keeps sending in photos of herself every month and writing 1,000-word cutlines that are libelous on a good day and just plain false on other days. A group of 11 former presidents have launched a flame campaign, directed partly toward the newspaper, about how we need to discredit the Problem Child. I loathe the woman just as much as the next person, but when a leader sends me information, all I do is cut it to fit (and to have the photo run as small as possible) — I don’t exactly call and verify that someone with power over me is blowing smoke out of her ass (and up everyone else’s, apparently). That would cost me my job, duh.

My final complaint is the fact that these yo-yos need to go back and watch them some “Sesame Street” so they can learn how to count. I do not understand how, when given a word limit of 200, 300, 500 or 1,000 words, how these moonbats can write 2,000 words and wonder why we get mad at them. One dildo in particular — I gave her a limit of 500 words — she turned in 1,500. I sent it back to her and told her that she should be the one to cut it (it was a courtesy on my part). So she sends it back at 1,200 words and asked if she cut enough. *scream* So I sliced out the next 700 words myself, and she had the audacity to tell me to e-mail what I did to her boss so she could approve it. (Um, don’t think so.)

I think I have a bruise on my forehead in the shape of my space bar key. 🙂