E-Mail Confusion, Tautologies, and Foamy Beer: A Defense of Hillary Clinton

Want to see a bartender cringe? Show them this picture:

If you're not sure what this has to do with anything, then you've never needed five Bud Light drafts for table 403.  (Also, on behalf of the service industry, we applaud your life choices.)

See, in our industry, this is day one stuff.  What she should have done, what everyone should do, is tilt the glass. By keeping that sucker at a 45 degree angle, you aren't haphazardly slamming beer into the bottom of your drinking vessel.  This means you don't agitate the carbon dioxide in the beer, and you don't get four inches of foam like a goddamn rookie.

Don't get me wrong. Like every mistake, foam happens. But you know what you do when that happens? You keep pouring. Oh, you're wasting beer, sure, but the damage is done. Throw a beer on the spill tab, and move on. What you don't do is call it a beer, raise a glass, and take a long enough sip to snap a few photos before spitting it out.

I feel I speak for my demographic when I ask: What the shit, Hillary?

In addition to the service industry crew, the followers of the white (haired) knight Bernie Sanders can use this image, and so many others, to make a fairly serious claim:  There is, at least on some level, a recurring flaw in the Hillary election machine; namely, not being genuine (or electable, depending who you ask.)

That's the start of the Anti-Hillary camp's primer, but it sure as hell ain't the end of it.

The kind of voters who would prefer Sanders are the kind who don't really like candidates that oversimplify policies or dodge questions, and here, Hillary continues to fall on her face. What kind of person proudly exclaims that the way we're going to defeat ISIS is by... defeating ISIS? When a politician who touts the line of progress and populism gets asked about her allegiance to some of the wealthiest human beings in history, what can we imply when it only takes her a second and a half to bring up 9/11? Where's Adam West when you need him?

Don't worry, it's not over yet, because next up on deck: the emails. Oh, the goddamn emails. I swear I'll personally go back in time and murder Shiva Ayyadurai if I have to read another take about Hillary Clinton's email server.  I thought this had all dried out.  Even Sanders, her immediate political opponent, stopped caring.  But now, there are still dozens of sensationalist half-wits who think, much like the Republican Benghazi witch hunt, that federal investigators are just one little clue away from burying her.

But seriously:  Can we forget about this shit yet? Hillary was born two years after World War 2 ended. Can you cut the lady some slack when it comes to her fucking Emails? I'm 29, I've been using computers as long as I can remember, and I couldn't tell you the last thing I saw on my email account (I looked at it two hours ago.) Ever since the failure train that was the Benghazi investigation finally halted after its two year derailing, nobody has had anything reasonably suspicious to say about Hillary Clinton's email server (which gets more messages an hour than I get in a year) that wasn't immediately followed by “Wait, her server does that automatically? Never mind then.”

Being a disingenuous politician being perpetually followed around by the dipshit ghosts of scandals past isn't really going to set her apart from many other candidates. Obama had to deal with the same crap- he always had to battle accusations of playing the race card to fit the needs of his public image, and it never helped that he was always dragging around the rotting corpse of Rod Blagojevich's career.

But here, Hillary has opponents on both sides with absolutely zero political scandals.  Bernie, at least to the extent that most people think of him, is an incorruptible icon of democratic socialism.  He's been in the government for over 30 years, and the worst dirt anybody's been able to dig up on him is a really strange article he wrote in the 1970's.  On the other side of the aisle is Donald Trump, a man who has zero political scandals because he has as much governmental experience as Donald Duck.

The Drumpf camp has no room to complain when the topic of being genuine comes up, and the Sanders camp won't completely lose its shit if there's only a little, uh, (clears throat) discernment of truth, at least when it comes to a politicians image. Because up until now, everyone expected every politician (ever) to present a camera-friendly version of themselves.  And even Hillary, all things considered, doesn't seem to be that much different from the herd when it comes to presentation.  A little 9/11 here and there isn't really a make or break for anybody, especially in an election where people are interrupting debates to boast about the size of their dicks.

No, what pisses off the Sanders Supporters/anti Hillary Democrats is that when you dig a little deeper into previous statements made by Mrs. Clinton, you find that some of the things she says are, shall we say, a little contradictory.

Before now, when it came down to what lied beyond the cosmetics, what people really expected from their politicians was, at the very least, a vague understanding of their psyche, if not their priorities...

...Until this cycle. Because now there's a giant, gaping rift between Washington D.C. and the rest of the country. Previously, we've been able to ignore it. Right around up until the second Obama Presidential term, the legislative and executive branches of the federal government were at least willing to grit their teeth and pretend to work together for the sake of the common interest.

Now, candidates get so much undisclosed money from unknown sources that when they Scrooge McDuck dive into it, they barely have enough time to throw us the finger.  Take these facts at face value, and it looks like it doesn't really matter who runs- you could put the mutated offspring of Bacon and Santa Claus on a ballot anywhere and (he?) would still lose to Mitch McConnell.  As long as old turtle-face is cashing checks from Blackstone and Goldman Sachs, he's not going anywhere.

This guy has been a Senator for 30 years.

If we're going to get screwed over no matter what, doesn't it make sense to let the Donald rename 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.  to the Trump House and see how crazy things can get?  Let's get weird!

Furthermore, Trump's audience, as much as progressives don't like to admit, aren't all bat-shit crazy outliers, fascists, or idiots. They're our neighbors, the people we work with, our bosses and our friends.  They're pissed off at the process, and Trump is the only shade of red (orange?) that they connect with.  If you don't believe a single word a politician says, then the guy who says stuff that no politician would ever say is somebody you believe.

Yes, we may disagree philosophically.  That's important to emphasize. But that's kind of the point. Because now, what any of us want from politicians is irrelevant.  What both Trump and Sanders have called “the establishment” is now in the way of all of us.  The politicians are forced to pander to the powers that be, namely, rich people who have the means to use our government to make themselves richer.  This is inevitable, which is kind of like saying Hillary is inevitable.

But we need to be honest with ourselves, because there is still a difference between the people who are paid to lie to you.  There are still lying, manipulative power mongers, whom also happen to want what you want.  

There's another layer underneath Hillary- a ruthless, calculating politician who chooses to fight against the opponents of the progressive agenda. Whether or not you buy the "I'm a progressive, but I'm a progressive who likes to get things done" line, you have to admit that conservatives really don't like her.

If you want a functioning government, but you're a person who doesn't like the cut of HRC's jib:  I understand.  But here's what it's coming down to:  Hillary Clinton is almost definitely going to be the Democratic front-runner, and it's time we all realized it. Whatever your feelings about her, whether or not you think she's human garbage or the second coming, she's still better than Trump, and you still need to vote for her.  I don't want to, you don't want to, and that's OK to say, but, sadly, we still fucking have to.

For whatever reasons that reside in the scope of the presidential primary election structure, or the American political psyche, Bernie isn't going to win. I want him to win, and I want a world where people with his honesty are the only candidates taken seriously. But we need to be honest with ourselves: we might not get that world anytime soon.

I'm not going to tell you that's OK.  But what I will tell you is that, if you don't want a Trump presidency, you won't be better off if you stay home on election day or send an empty message via a meaningless third party vote.  The batshit crazy Libertarian and marijuana mogul Gary Johsnon will be too busy removing batteries from the White House smoke detectors to bother shutting down the government.

Sidebar: Gary Johnson is hilariously awesome, and I loved having him as my Governor in New Mexico. He won't ever be president, but I wish Trump voters would give him a serious look, because if you want a president who truly doesn't give a fuck, he's absolutely your guy.

Case in point: check out his official T-Shirt:

People have paid for this shirt! With money!

Long story short: I don't think Hillary Clinton is the worst alternative we have.

Look at Citizen's United.  Regardless of whether or not you're a Democrat, or a Republican, progressive, conservative, liberal, Christian fundamentalist, Satanist, or (...shudder) vegan, you probably have a problem with the status quo of campaign finance.

Whether or not you want to burn down Planned Parenthood clinics or hand out free abortion vouchers at the local Subway- unless you happen to have the kind of money that can buy political influence, then Hillary, for all of her Goldman Sachs speeches and utter inability to connect with any carbon based life-form, is still the enemy of your enemies.

I'm not saying you should feel obligated to agree with her politics.  But, on at least the very basic level of the Democratic process, she wants what you want. Disagreeing with her is fine. Awesome, in fact. Let's talk about that some other time though, because in the short term, this Presidential election, we have some important shit to do.

This decision isn't easy.  Even if I've convinced you that Hillary isn't Trump with a vagina, you still have the right to despise the way she communicates.  Her public persona is absolutely grating.  Sometimes, when I watch her speak publicly it's like watching a replicant that's been programmed by Hillary instead of a real, breathing human being. 

If you've read this far and, like me, you can't stand the way she communicates her message, or that when she gets asked tough questions she'd rather discuss the worst attack on American soil than admit she represented people on Wall Street, I completely understand. BUT.  I have an idea!

First, watch a little bit of this. This video from Hillary's web site talks about how Citizens United, the vehicle through which politicians are flushed with a borderline hilarious amount of corporate money, was actually created as a result of an attempt to attack Hillary Clinton. 

If you're like me, by the time you get almost halfway into it, you'll want to pull out your eardrums, because it sounds like your least favorite elementary school teacher (played by what Maggie Gyllenhaal will look like twenty years from now) is smugly explaining that you'll never be smart enough to understand why sex is now illegal.

Now, for a much needed break, watch this clip of Kyle Kinane explaining why he likes to drink in the shower.

Hear me out on this: If Hillary hired Kyle Kinane to be her communications director, her video would be completely different.  It would sound like you're getting a decent story from your favorite bartender, instead of your significant other telling you why it's your fault that they slept with three of your friends. 

All I'm asking is that you give it a try: if you don't like Hillary's delivery, just pretend it's not her voice, but the official voice of Comedy Central. Even the 9/11 sound byte is forgivable- as long as it sounds more like your weed dealer hesitating to answer a question about his prices and less like somebody who doesn't like your tone and wants to speak to the manager RIGHT NOW.

No matter how you feel about the issues, I think we're all completely OK with examining the money in politics. But it's an uphill battle: When you argue against campaign financing, you're not just arguing with people who have enough money to influence the government you're trying to petition, but the actual government itself.

And, unfortunately, in this situation, we need somebody who knows how to fistfight. We probably won't get Captain America, but we can settle for the Punisher, right? We need somebody who can play the game. Bernie Sanders can sell an ideal situation, but Hillary, when she talks straight, sells the means to make it happen.  And if that means she has to get really, really dirty, and piss a lot of people off in the process, we can count on her to do it.

But please, for the love of God, somebody teach her how to pour a fucking beer. This isn't amateur hour,  Clinton.  Step your goddamn game up.

Sam Wellborn lives in Austin, TX, and knows nothing- NOTHING- about draft beers or marijuana. Follow him on Twitter, and send him hate mail at swellbo@gmail.com.

Thanks for reading.  

Sam Tries Fantasy Baseball, Stupidity Ensues

And... it just now hit me. Football season is over.

I was playing Terraria, and had this overwhelming urge to check my phone, because I needed to know if any of my players were going to be on Thursday Night Football.

Then I realized- NFL's not here. It won't be here for a long time. Not until we know who the NCAA champion is, not until we know who the NHL champion is, not until the Warriors beat the Spurs in a great series, and then demolish whoever the Eastern Champions are.

It all just came rushing at me. My debit card will expire before I watch the Broncos play again. I'll already have an opinion about Captain America: Civil War. I'll be wondering about the recently released trailer for Doctor Strange. We'll be watching Hillary and Drumpf compare dick sizes in national debates.

FUCK.

What makes this worse is that I know that it will never be as good as last season. Not only did my team win the big game, but Peyton Manning probablydidn't sexually assault a person! Von Miller attempted to sodomize Tom Brady! Cam Newton cried! A lot! And if that wasn't awesome enough, I played in four fantasy football leagues, won two, and placed in another.

And as I realized this, It hit me: I need a fix. I need something to dilute the anguish. American football is like my heroin- except people who sell heroin tend to be less two-faced. I'm sick. I need methadone.

Enter baseball.

I've talked plenty of shit about baseball before, but if I search my heart, I don't actually have anything against the game, except for the same dipshit arguments that every other baseball hater's ever had.

Yes, the games are too long, just like the season is too long. Yes, there's a whole bunch of bullshit when it comes to performance enhancing drugs. Yes, A-Rod hasn't been tied to a train track yet.

But really, it's an amazing game. It's like watching soccer- not a lot happens in the interim. You'll get the typical shit- your pop fly here, your beaned batter there. Somebody might drive a double every now and again. This isn't awesome in a vacuum, certainly. It's like a balloon that fills, and fills, and just looks like it's only going to get bigger and stretch thinner.

But then, there's that play. When Babe called the shot, when Reggie hit three homers, when Randy Johnson destroyed a bird, and Steve Bartman's entire life past 2003.

I remember when I was a kid, my folks took me to see a Texas Rangers game. I got to watch Frank Thomas play, although he was getting on in his career. I think the White Sox were up. That's when Pudge Rodriguez went yack on a fastball, a three-run homer.

The balloon popped. He did it again that game, and the Rangers won. People went apeshit.

I have a Texas Rangers shirt my dad bought me, Cinco de Mayo, 2006. It says “Los Rangers” on the front. The armpits are brown, verging on Green. I love that shirt, and I'll be devastated when somebody finally burns it for the safety of everyone who lives within a mile of it.

When I was in the hospital, I kept score by hand while watching the Rangers play in the world series against the Cardinals. I remember screaming at a TV by myself when Texas got within a pitch of winning the whole thing, and blew it.

So, hopefully, this sport can maybe Spackle over the hole in my soul that develops between the beginning of February and the end of September.

But here's the problem: I know nothing about baseball. I could name maybe five current players. If I'm going to properly appreciate another soulless cash grab of a sport, I need to know the game, if for no other reason, to find out who I hate and who I can blame for it. And if I'm going to do that, I need to do it the same way I've learned basically anything else- the routine of staring at my phone to see if I'll owe my friends money. Good thing there's already a game just like that- fantasy baseball.

For the person who is unfamiliar with fantasy sports, the basic gist is this: through one system or another, you “draft” a set of players, and they get assigned scores that correspond with how they do in their games. You compete against a bunch of people who have teams, and the winner usually gets bragging rights, and the grand prize, which more often than not is spending months trying to get the money that's rightfully yours back from the person who spent it on rent within a month of everyone finally paying up.

Since I'm in no way trying to document my shittiness and lose money in the process, I'm just going to participate in a free ESPN league.

What's the worst that can happen?

This is a rotisserie league (I've spent 10 minutes reading about scoring systems and I'm still not sure what that is) twelve teams, and I have no idea what the hell I'm doing. (Prepare yourselves: these are actual thoughts I had during the draft, meaning that there will be, from here on, gratuitous usage of the word “fuck.”)

1. Who the fuck are all of these people?

2. These statistics make no fucking sense. WHIP? SLG? IBB? HBP? Are these statistics or stock symbols?

3. Walked batters and hits per inning pitched seem like they should be integers- how the fuck is it somewhere between 0.9 and 1.1?

4. ESPN shows a picture of every player you can draft, but they're tiny and completely useless. Why in the entire fuck are these people wearing hats? Would they do this shit with football player helmets? Is it racist to say I'm having a hard time telling these Latin baseball players apart because of the minuscule pictures and I can't see their hairlines?

5. I'm feeling good about my first two picks: Carlos Correa and Edwin Encarnacion. I'm wondering if I can make a team that only has double initials? CC and EE- good start. What could I call this team? The default is Team Wellborn, but I refuse to bring my family's name into the middle of this. How about the Awesome Alliteration Alliance? (Look who's playing Triple-A ball! I bet if nothing else, I'll come up with the best team slogan in the draft and oh shit it's my turn to draft again.)

6. If I'm just worried about alliteration, would Corey Kluber count? I feel like Carlos Gomez is a stretch.

7. Should I have drafted a pitcher by now?

8. Had to draft Carlos Gomez, because some awful little shit I'm playing against drafted Manny Machado. OK, fine. Only players whose names either contain some vague alliteration and/or Adams Family members. There has to be a baseball player named Wednesday or Pugsley, right?

9. I could be searching for tips on drafting fantasy baseball teams. Instead, I'm trying to see if anyone in baseball is named Lurch.

10. Really? Nobody in baseball has a name that starts with “It” or “Fester?”

11. Goddammit, there's a Freddy Freeman right at the top of the list, but I already have a first base player. Besides, he looks like a Nickleback fan.

12. I drafted Prince Fielder because I like his smile. Totally not gay, right? Besides, I'm good on pitchers, but I need a catcher. Preferably somebody who's good with the stick and doesn't have any problems getting to third base.

13. Everyone in baseball has a name that's either vaguely Italian or could be co-opted by a Drag Queen. Especially if that one guy's name is pronounced “You-is Familia.”

14. I needed a second baseman, and I actually know who Ian Kinsler is. Boom. Plus, it looks like his head's gotten three times larger since the last time I saw him. If he's on my team, he better be doing the “effective but undetectable” kind of PED's. Or, at least, the “totally obvious but untestable” kind.

15. I got a team name: “Performance-Enhancing Drags.”

16. I was busy trying to find John Fogerty's “Centerfield” when I realized what I actually wanted to listen to was “Centerfold” by the J Geils Band. While that happened, I auto-drafted Jacoby Ellisbury, an outfielder, when I'm pretty sure I need a third base player.

17. I had to double check this, because I wasn't sure, based on the information we get on the ESPN draft application. It turns out this statistic is completely true: Trevor Rosenthal looks like a fucking pedophile.

18. In his player photo, Jeff Samardzija looks livid, like he's on the verge of going super-saiyan and destroying Earth. He's staring straight into my goddamn soul. I wonder if it's because he knows I have no idea what I'm doing, or that I don't know how to pronounce his name.

19. Daniel Murphy apparently plays for Washington, but ESPN has his picture in a Mets uniform. It's like they've just said “Dude, you're on your own, because we can't keep track of this shit either.”

20. Smyly? Is that seriously your last name? I bet your favorite movie is “The Pursuit of Happyness.”

21. Is it racist that I haven't drafted a Japanese player yet? Wait, isn't Shin-Soo Choo Korean?

22. Nevermind. The guy who drafted him hasn't drafted anybody but white people. Yeah, way to be inclusive, dickhead.

23. I drafted Jung Ho Kang because I thought I needed a third baseman/short stop, and then realized I wasn't looking at my team, but the guy who drafted Shin-Soo Choo a second ago. I bet Jeff Samardzija isn't very happy.

Nope.

24. Michael Pineda is wearing his hat sideways, and... struck out 171 people last year? Get the fuck on my team, Michael. Welcome to the Performance Enhancing Drags. Welcome, and I'm sorry.

25. Have you seen Justin Turner smile? I just got scared into drafting him, whom I didn't need, because I thought he might eat my soul from my computer screen. Seriously. He should be a character model for a Five Nights at Freddy's sequel.

26. So after a quick Google search, it would seem that I'm about four pitchers behind how many I should have at this point. I bet at this point, Samardzija isn't even mad anymore- just disappointed. Just yell at me, Jeff. Don't hold it over my head.

Why can't you be more like your sister?

27. ESPN is really, REALLY trying to get me to draft Carlos Santana. I want to draft a player named Zakk Wylde out of spite. Don't try and tell me how to ruin my fantasy team OR my rock band, ESPN.

28. Wait, there's a pitcher named motherfucking RODON? AND YOU'RE JUST TELLING ME THIS NOW? WHAT THE SHIT, ESPN?

29. I once went to a triple-A game in Albuquerque where a girl got hit in the head by a bee-line foul ball. I knew the ball boy, so he threw me that ball when it rolled back into the field. I feel like this will be a perfect analogy of my fantasy baseball experience- I'll get smacked out of nowhere by some asshole and whatever minuscule consolation I may have gotten will get tossed to some jackass because he was more familiar with the game than I was.

30. I passed on Luis Severino because I needed another outfielder. Probably a good thing. I'm sure my girlfriend would murder me after the 10^th time I said “Heidely ho, Severino!”

31. I love names like “Wellington Castillo.” I imagine he likes eating tacos, followed by a whole mess of English muffins. I didn't put him on the bench intentionally, mind you. I hope there's a baseball player named “Sir Chadingshire Castanados” I can throw on the team- who else is Wellington going to eat flan with during tea time?

32. Man, not to harp on this, but baseball players have some crazy-ass names. Should I draft Cory Spangenberg, Brad Boxberger, or Kevin Quackenbush? I wonder if professional team scouts give you extra points if you have a name that Gary Busey would give a pet turtle.

Wow, am I glad that's over.

Here's the full roster, in all of its mediocrity:

God help me.

Sam lives in Austin, TX, and isn't a racist, he swears.  Harass him on Twitter, or tell him how to fix his disgrace of a team at swellbo@gmail.com.