A few weeks ago, the Daily Mail wrote about a low-ranking British diplomat named James Hudson who was caught on hidden camera by the FSB (formerly the KGB, formerlier the MVD, formerlierer the NKVD, formerliest the Cheka) getting it on with two Russian hookers in…

In a world without miracles, death is a miracle. A bad one. It makes no sense at all. This creature, your relative—Hell, your dog—was a constellation, a huge Venn diagram of metonymies, with a middle name and opinions and allergies…

He knows his wife knows. So he ups and leaves for five days, doesn’t leave anybody in charge of the state, in case there’s an emergency…This is almost like: I don’t give a damn! Country’s going to hell in a…

I just saw an article headlined, “Michael Jackson Dead Too Soon at 50.” Dead too soon, you sadists? The more fitting headline, if you have any heart at all, is “Michael Jackson Dead Not a Moment Too Soon”! Because if…

He may be dead now, I don’t know. He should have been dead long ago, but these early boomers, born in California, have many lives. From some angles, Alex’s life was clear proof of what spoiled, invincible brats they were,…

US Stocks Gain On Report Of Pending Home Sales . . . Pending Home Sales Rise the Most in Over Seven Years . . . Consumer Confidence Spurs Broad Gain . . . You see the same bullshit headlines churned…

Last week, Obama moved another step closer to creating the ultimate retro-70s Middelbrow-ocracy when he appointed a loathsome overachieving hamburger-head named Cass Sunstein to a little-known but highly-powerful government post: director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs—otherwise known…

(This article first appeared in TheNation.com on May 11, 2009.) The May 7 edition of the Washington Post features one of the most poorly timed op-ed commentaries in recent memory. Carrying the harmless headline “A Friend to Georgia and Russia,” it…

Listen to Ames talking about the cocaine-fueled comedy that is CNBC’s Lawrence Kudlow. This segment was aired on Los Angeles’ KPFK radio on April 21, 2008, on the show “Four O’Clock Tuesdays With Gustavo Arellano.” Why does CNBC host Lawrence…

(This post was published on Playboy.com) There’s word out this week that the governor of Texas, Rick Perry, has thrown his support behind a bill that would declare sovereignty for the state of Texas. The bill is called HCR 50, and it’s…

Most Recent Photograph of That Guy That Plath Popped Out (bottom right; circa 1962) Sylvia Plath’s son died yesterday. That’s how it was reported, even by the BBC. The dead man’s name was Nicholas Hughes, not Plath, but in death…

I got out of bed this morning and told Katherine, “Hey, I think my foot is bet-” At which point my gouty big toe slammed into the table leg. When I finished howling and bouncing around on the other leg,…

Robert Creeley: Great Poet or One-Eyed Interspecies Plagiarist? Here are two pieces of twentieth-century verse. One has been called “…the most often quoted, even the most widely known, short poem” of the 1960s; the other is from a long-forgotten collection…

“It is not their love for us but their lack of faith that prevents today’s Christians from burning us.” —Nietzsche For sheer gloating pleasure, you can’t beat the lunkheads on Free Republic trying to deal with the news that Palin’s…

CNBC’s Jim Cramer has positioned himself as yet another champion of the people against the evil government. A couple of days ago, the method-actor/ CNBC host of “Mad Money” stirred up a hullabaloo when he pretended to be angry and…

In the great debate about the stimulus package — which, underneath all the cant is really nothing more than a debate about how America’s scarce wealth should be divided –  one of the right wing’s favorite mantras was their claim…

Although it’s more fun to trash the villains and suckers who dominate our dying empire, if the rare hero appears and says something courageous and decent, then it becomes our professional duty to salute her. That hero is Ohio congresswoman…

My fellow Americans (as you like to be called), you now have the opportunity to prove that you are not passive slaves, the “sheeple” that they say you are. Over the past few months you’ve been forced to face the awful…

Has anyone noticed the ugly reality captured in the so-called “Miracle on the Hudson”? One of the first photos shows that first class passengers were offered first-class rafts to ensure that they’d survive in comfort, while the economy class passengers…

The real mystery of our age is this: why do all the media warmongers still have jobs, after the way they goaded us into the epic disaster we’ve found ourselves in? Back in 2001, when a panicked America foolishly handed…