Twilight (Series)

Rating:	★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Other
Author:	Stephanie Meyer

Right. THIS WILL CONTAIN MASSIVE SPOILERS AND MAY EVEN MAKE YOU HATE THESE BOOKS.

First off the bat: I have read these books, or at least the first three.

I am not impressed; more, I am utterly mystified by the cultishness and insane, mouth-frothing fervor of Ms. Meyer's fans.

Let's review quickly, so we can be reeeeeally sure exactly why these books are so cheesy.

1. There are vampires; whoop-dee-doo, because about 65 other women also write vampire romances, some of them actually producing something close to readable. (Charlaine Harris, for example, whose books have been adapted into the HBO series True Blood. Her books are - shocking, I know - actually good.)
2. Vampires don't go out in sunlight, but not because they, you know, DIE, or anything; no, because these books are aimed squarely at grade-school girls, or at least adults with grade-school reading levels, they don't go out in the sun because they GLITTER. Because little girls like glitter.I wish I was fucking kidding.
3. Vampires drink blood, but the vampires that are the main characters in this story only drink animal blood, which they jokingly refer to as "vegetarianism," I wish I was fucking kidding because they're required to because they have a treaty with
4. Werewolves, which always always always exist in any novel with vampires written by a woman, and always always always hate vampires because White Wolf Gaming says so, and in this case are basically threatening to kill all the glittery vegan vampires if they ever bite a human.
5. This only applies to the GOOD vampires, the ones that are the female lead's FRIENDS, because bad vampires (you know, the ones that drink human blood, and stuff,) show up and do a lot of bad stuff without the werewolf cops treaty enforcers really caring, or saying anything about it.
6. The female lead is SPECIAL, of course, because she's the only human that all those cool pimp vampire powers don't work on, for some reason that was as yet unexplained by the time I was too disgusted to continue, and for some reason this makes Evil Vampire Clan # 2 I wish I was fucking kidding insanely curious to see what will happen if they convert her to vampirism, which will presumably result in her being glittery as shit too.
7. These books are emo as FUCK. I mean, "I wish my lawn was emo so it would cut itself" emo. Living in suburbia and having retarded hairstyles BY CHOICE and then expecting the sympathy of others for it emo. The kind of emo that leads to "being with me is dangerous for you - alas! I must leave you for months and go to Brazil, forget about me!" "Oh, No! I must leave empty months in my journal because I am dead inside from the loss!" I wish I was fucking kidding.

There are tons - TONS - of other writers who are writing "vampire romance" and doing it better. Seriously.

Not to mention all the writers who remember what vampires are supposed to be - soulless, bone-chillingly evil, bloodsucking walking corpses.

Seriously, are all you guys that love these books 12? Or maybe you - like all the Robert Jordan fans - never, ever read a book like this before, and thus, having no basis for comparison, assume that this is really cool?

Here's the truth. These books suck.

There is NOTHING original here; Ms. Meyer is not a particularly interesting writer, nor is she gifted with more than her share of creativity.

There are many, many writers doing the same thing only better, and most of them have been doing so for a very long time indeed.

But Twilight? Your taste is all in your mouth. I would give this no stars, but it hasn't got an option for "sucks too much to rate."

My Election Predictions for 2008

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Other

In late August of last year, I posted an article which was mainly about other things, but included a set of 9 straight-out predictions for the 2008 election, and one prediction that depended on a ballot initiative in California.

You may have read it; you may not. If you'd like to, it's here.

But how'd I do? That's the real question. How exactly did I perform as a political prognosticator?

Well, let's see.

I predicted:

1. There will be constant threats of terrorist action - they've already begun - running all the way through the election, at which time they will mysteriously vanish.
   



2. There will be sex scandals "discovered" about each and every Republican candidate.
   



3. There will be financial misdealings present in the portfolio of every single candidate with poll numbers over 1%. Don't worry, as we close on election time I will break out the hard numbers to back this one up.
   



4. EVERY SINGLE PERSON RUNNING will get "swift-boated" by some group or another.
   



5. Regardless of who is elected, regardless of party, regardless of publically announced sentiment, or position, or support - or lack thereof - for the war in Iraq; the United States will not pull out the bulk of our troops from Iraq in the next 3 years. REMEMBER I SAID THIS. Especially after the election. Watch as all the pre-election rhetoric turns into so much hot air, and vanishes.
   



6. The only two candidates running who have decent platforms will not get their party nominations. (That'd be Bill Richardson of the Dems, and Ron Paul of the GOP.)
   



7. At the end of the election, no matter who wins, or by how much, the Democrats will spawn a horde of lawsuits.
   



8. At the end of the election, no matter who wins, or by how much, there will have been overwhelming election fraud, across the board, in every major voting district. By both sides.
   



9. No matter the outcome of the election, there will be a slew of angry rants by people with tiny brains, demanding the removal of the electoral college, as though that would somehow improve things.
   

There was one more, which was that IF California passed the initiative to split their electoral votes by the percentages of the popular vote - which they didn't - the Republican candidate would win. That prediction is a moot point, as the initiative didn't pass.

So, let's look at the 9 "main" prognostications, hmmmm?

#'s 1, 3, and 4 came true almost right away, and I posted about them here.

#'s 2, 6, and 9 followed close on their heels, and I posted about them here.

#5 got a rumbling on the horizon long ago; I edited the original post to contain a link, but that link has since gone away. C'est la vie; I have another.

So, what are we missing? Well, #'s 7 and 8, of course, that there would be a horde of lawsuits, and that there would also have been massive bipartisan voter fraud.

Number 7 was flatly wrong, apparently. From my exalted vantage point in August of 2007, I didn't foresee the margin of victory for any candidate being high enough to avoid it, and I was mistaken.

Number 8, however... well, let's see? Has there been voter fraud? There certainly has on the Democratic side; there are lawsuits in 12 states about it. On the Republican side, however, it hasn't been as apparent. So, I'll call that a 50/50.

So, how'd I make out?

At the end of the election, the predictions I made a year and three months ago fall out with 7 straight-out correct; one half and half; and one that was wrong.

...It's the Republicans that are suing everyone, not the Democrats.

So, right now, I'm batting .833.

I'm gonna call that a better win-loss record than anyone you'll see on TV.

Change We Can Believe In

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Other

So, this weekend, President-Elect Obama launched "Change.gov" as a mirror of his campaign website - and then carefully sanitized it to remove all 25 of his major campaign promises.

...After all, no-one will remember what he promised if it's not still there!

They're still up on his campaign page, but no guarantees how long that'll last.