sometimes there just aren't enough mosques

Let me start by saying, really? I don't know who raised the media's threshold for complete idiocy this week, but dayum. It's exceptionally hard to understand how we got this far into a non-debate that is so overtly intolerant and prejudicial it's embarrassing. So I'll just say it plainly: everyone, it's time to shut the hell up about this "Ground Zero Mosque" business. Seriously. You are making us look terrible.

My state of agitation all started when an old high school classmate of mine posted a glaringly uniformed and hateful comment on Facebook expressing disdain for the decision to "spit in the face" of all the families of those we lost on 9/11 by constructing a mosque two blocks from ground zero [see also, terrible infographic above]. I heard some rumblings of the "controversy" weeks ago and chalked it up to slow news cycles, crazies, and stupid people, assuring myself that this argument had no legitimacy and would simply go away. There was also this moving speech from Mayor Michael Bloomberg, which should have made everyone with any semblance of reason wise up. He nobly defended the right of all people to worship as they choose and urged us to respect the differences of faith that make New York, and the country, an inspiring place to live, saying:

"Muslims are as much a part of our city and our country as the people of any faith. And they are as welcome to worship in lower Manhattan as any other group. In fact, they have been worshipping at the site for better, the better part of a year, as is their right. The local community board in lower Manhattan voted overwhelmingly to support the proposal. And if it moves forward, expect the community center and mosque will add to the life and vitality of the neighborhood and the entire city. Political controversies come and go, but our values and our traditions endure, and there is no neighborhood in this city that is off-limits to God's love and mercy..."


If that's not enough to make you patriotic, I don't know what is. It is also a plain statement of the basic freedoms guaranteed to all citizens of this country. In other words, it's a no-brainer...yes? Well, no. Somehow, somewhere, people were saying no. In some dungeon lair of retarded logic, people were still willing to perpetuate the "argument" that Islam = terrorism, especially within a half-mile radius of ground zero. But as Jon Stewart, beacon of light in the filthy recesses of absurdity, aptly, and sadly, showed us, this hackneyed fear-mongering is neither foreign practice, nor exclusive to New York City.

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Now that Obama has used his brainy super powers of rhetorical circumlocution to make a (non) comment on the "controversy," no one will shut up about it, and conservatives jumped at the chance to link our president to terrorism and anti-american sentiment, setting ablaze the ignorant fervor of the hateful masses. It's vile, and it's getting far too much attention. Letting people feel OK about having their elected leaders speak out on television, look us in the eye, and equate peaceful, religious Muslim people with hatred and violence is the ultimate insult to our intelligence and our constitution- which doesn't seem to mean much to republicans these days (read: proposed 14th amendment massacre). But, more importantly, it is also an insult to everyone who died on that "hallowed ground" in downtown Manhattan, and no, I'm not talking about where the Burlington Coat Factory used to be. My guess is that they would have wanted us to right the wrongs of ignorance and intolerance that led to such immense and horrifying devastation, not encourage them.

There are too many stones being thrown in this wacky glass house of American media and politics, and no one seems to be saying anything about it. The media is juggling this unfortunate story line as if it had two legitimate sides. We are allowing far too many people to slander American citizens, and an entire religion, because of a terribly incorrect syllogism that blindly fuses 'Muslim' with 'extremism.' It's just plain wrong. And continuing to let the mad-as-hell crowd try to make Islam a dirty word without stopping them in their tracks is the true disgrace here. So to be entirely redundant; really people? This is bad, even for us.

is HBO screwing with me?

So I've been pretty busy lately. That's the shorthand version of saying I've had a lot of opportunities to imbibe cocktails over the past 2 weeks, and I took them all. All of 'em! So maybe it's all the beer and wine chipping away at my brain cells, but I get the distinct feeling that HBO is legitimately screwing with me.

Sex and the City, the Sopranos, Entourage, True Blood, and even Big Love: after all the hours of dedicated watching I can't seem to shake this feeling that I've been had. After all the awards and stellar reviews and inevitable Monday morning discussion sessions, I just have to admit that I've been sucker-punched into believing I'm watching must see TV, while it's invariably beautifully packaged nothingness.

I think we've all been there before. Remember when the Soprano's got so cerebral you wondered if you simply forgot how to speak English and that's why all the scant dialogue sounded like confused groaning? Remember when SATC was so far removed from any semblance of reality that you actually thought walk-in closets existed in New York studio apartments? Remember THE GREENS?!

Any thinking, breathing person will admit that nothing ever happens in an episode of Entourage. How to Make it in America was so aimless I often forgot what I was watching (that movie where Uma Therman is a major cougar?). I still saw the whole damn season. And now, I find myself dragged into the rapidly withering cohesiveness of True Blood. I stayed with them through the debacle of the Maryanne plot last season (drawn-out, distracting inanity) hoping for some kind of payoff. But I'm back here again, torn between giving up on an HBO series or continuing to shill away my Sunday evenings for fear of missing out on something that's actually good.

This is the conundrum and the paradox of HBO: it's the best hope for innovative programming and the most likely to leave you entirely disappointed. One could argue I'm expecting too much, but I've been taught to do so--I'm looking at you, Emmy's (and every entertainment publication, ever). Premium cable is the last frontier of television, where any amount of absurdity, profanity, nudity, and insanity is possible, with a sickeningly exorbitant budget to match. Why shouldn't the most provocative television come from them?

So we root for it and look forward to it, we religiously watch (on Sundays, no less), and then we complain when we find ourselves feeling deflated--and shortchanged of nearly a quarter of the programming time. We feel stupid and robbed of precious dollars and cents. If you're a regular viewer, I'm sure you've thought about spilling the beans that the emperor has no clothes; that most HBO series are eventually, in fact, a colossal mind fuck. But if we walk away now, we're out of the conversation, even if that conversation revolves around how a show has really gone down-hill...I mean egregiously bad. For realz! Right now True Blood has too many characters and subplots that take away the focus on its clever socio-political subtext. I'm so tried of the Sookie and Bill teeter-totter. This season really needs to deliver or I'm just not even going to...

Dammit.