It's not often that the death of a single man makes the world a better place, but this is one of them. The archconservative Catholic Supreme Court justice, staunch opponent of the concept of a living constitution, strived his entire career to retain the values America embraced back in the eighteenth century. Antonin Scalia is dead! Let's all raise a drink to the Ronald Reagan-appointed cocksucker! “Here's to hoping there's a hell so you can burn in it!”
 | Photo: White House archives

Politics: “Burn in hell cocksucker!”

It's not often the death of one man makes the world a better place, but this is one of them…

Antonin Scalia is dead! Let’s all raise a drink to the Ronald Reagan-appointed cocksucker!

“Here’s to hoping there’s a hell so you can burn in it!”

It’s not often that the death of a single man makes the world a better place, but this is one of them.  The archconservative Catholic Supreme Court justice, staunch opponent of the concept of a living constitution, strived his entire career to retain the values America embraced back in the eighteenth century. Like slavery, and second class status for anyone who isn’t a white property owning male.

A man who repeatedly stressed his desire to strike down Roe v Wade, helped George Bush 2 steal an election, refused to recuse himself when longtime friend Dick Cheney appeared before him. He supported the execution of minors and the mentally challenged, allowed his belief in Catholic polytheist mumbo jumbo to inform his decisions over the decades that comprised his tenure.

It’s not often that the death of a single man makes the world a better place, but this is one of them.  The archconservative Catholic Supreme Court justice, staunch opponent of the concept of a living constitution, strived his entire career to retain the values America embraced back in the eighteenth century. Like slavery, and second class status for anyone who isn’t a white property owning male.

His opinion on LGBT rights?

“But I had thought that one could consider certain conduct reprehensible—murder, for example, or polygamy, or cruelty to animals—and could exhibit even ‘animus’ toward such conduct. Surely that is the only sort of ‘animus’ at issue here: moral disapproval of homosexual conduct[.]” 

How about people “detained” by the American government?

“Give me a break… I had a son on that battlefield and they were shooting at my son, and I’m not about to give this man who was captured in a war a full jury trial. I mean it’s crazy.” 

From my wife, who is currently in San Diego attending a convention for death penalty defense attorneys, “The speaker stopped mid-sentence and broke out in a shit eating grin.  ‘Scalia’s dead.’  The room broke out in laughter, people were clapping.”

Fuck you Scalia! I hope a pack of wild dogs exhumes your corpse and gives it a solid buggering.

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A screen shot from 7:00 am this morning, California time, 2:00 am Sydney time.
A screen shot from 7:00 am this morning, California time, 2:00 am Sydney time.

Miracle: Stab buries hatchet!

And bends the space-time continuum!

This morning I wrote about a pitiless blood feud featuring your favorite surf website aggregator, Stab, staring down the “most coveted event in big wave surfing” Titans of Mavericks!

Stab artists love nothing more than delicate repurposing. Such subtle brushstrokes harkening the great Thomas Kinkade. And yet there was zero coverage of surfing’ most exciting days. The silence belied internal rage. Some unspoken feud that boiled the blood and froze the soul. Very very hurt feelings.

A miracle! Like the Shroud of Turin! This story posted three hours ago yet it appears to be from twenty hours ago! Hallelujah!
A miracle! Like the Shroud of Turin! This story posted three hours ago yet it appears to be from twenty hours ago! Hallelujah!

But a very few hours ago the story popped up! NIC LAMB IS THE TITAN OF MAVERICKS! And, miracle of miracle, it was back dated by 20 hours! Oh the glorious wonders when one side of a blood feud recognizes its error and rectifies immediately, even bending the laws of physics to make the other side feel better.

Stab displayed a warm, beating heart this morning and crafted a tale of redemption that will live on in the hearts of our children and The Committee of Five’s children’s children.

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Blood Feud: Stab vs. The Titans!

Your favorite surf website aggregator goes quiet on the day of days!

There was a major hole in your favorite surf website aggregator’s content yesterday. Generally, no story is too small for Stab‘s skilled team of artisans to select, copy, paste. They diligently set to work, brushes in hand, adding an adverb here, an adjective there, and from the sweat of their brow arises a repurposed masterpiece. Who could forget such hits as “What Youth Vs Surfer is the Excitement you Need Today!” or the wonderful Stab Presents: Jack and Alana?

But yesterday, while The Inertia crowed “Nic Lamb Just Won the Titans of Mavericks” and Surfer sang “Titans of Mavericks Live from Half Moon Bay,” Stab simply ran a stories on Peaking in Indo with Billy Hopkins, 44 of Kelly Slater’s greatest achievements and Steph Gilmore being a marketing dream.

Hmmmm. So strange. Your third favorite beach gossip website (hello!) found the day so thrilling that five stories popped up, one after the other, each dedicated to the Titans. Saturday/Sunday is usually slow and the event was, as billed, the “Greatest show on earth” and “most coveted event in big wave surfing.” But no Stab. Hmmmm. So very curio.

Unless.

It’s a blood feud!

Did the Committee of Five not find Stab in top peak physical condition? Did Stab not understand that participation in Mavericks is a privilege and not a right? Were there back room fisticuffs, once, up Santa Cruz way? Angry emails punched out, sent back and forth assigning blame for the Super Bowl and Jaws being better and such? Did the C5 feel that Stab was overtly Team Twiggy? Team Condor?

Or did the blood feud originate in Australia? Whatever the case, yesterday’s silence was deafening. The kind of hushed disdain that arises only from the most hurt of feelings.

Flight of the Conchords – Hurt Feelings – HD from cricobs on Vimeo.

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Just in: Nic Lamb is the Titan*!

Mavericks has a winner and I am “absolutely polarized by it!”

How much of the day did you watch? Did your spirt soar? Crash? Soar again? Did you think about upgrading your quiver? Did you think about buying more rubber? Will you also buy a puffy jacket? Will you pair it with a beanie?

The Titans of Mavericks has officially wrapped after a long Friday of very many big waves washed through the metaphorical, and also very real, rocks and we have a champion! A man worthy to carry the triton! (quick question…the Titans of Mavericks logo is the triton. Did titans use tritons? Was it simple linguistic confusion or an issue of close enough?)

Nic Lamb! Nic Lamb is your man!

Congratulations to him!

I heard from our source on the water:

“This event is so disappointing”

“Everyone is seasick”

“So many seasick athlete’s lady friends.”

But then!

“It’s actually fun now that the waves are big and fucked up”

And if that don’t sum it all up I don’t know what does.

*CAskyjumper rightly points out that Twiggy was kicked out of the contest so….

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Tom Dosland wipeout

Opinion: Pe’ahi has ruined us all!

Do you think having a contest at Jaws ruined Titans of Mavericks?

Sal Masekela surfs fairly well (Click here). Not by pro surfer standards, of course, but that’s a bit much to ask. His ability is pretty typical for surf media types, not counting those who started as pros and transitioned when the paychecks stopped coming.

It makes sense, we all wanted to surf for a living but one day realized the talent wasn’t there, and hard work only takes you so far. Maybe I’m projecting, but I remember the day it dawned on me that all those lost NSSA heats didn’t bode well for my career. Better to move behind the scenes and spend my days employing envy to tear people down.

Sal Masekela talks very well. Straight man commentator, not incapable of humor or cleverness, but he excels at using the other guys to provide context. Slow moment? Why make an inane observation when you can ask the talented fellow sitting next to you a question? Provide prompts, help them articulate all that awesome knowledge they’ve spent years acquiring but never really learned to express. Crucial for a solid broadcast. Laugh-a-minute goons are a dime-a-dozen, but the straight man carries the weight, keeps it flowing, does his damnedest to eliminate dead air.

I missed the early heats of Mav’s Tits. Burdened with a neurotic trashcan dog for the next four days. “Oh, don’t worry about him, he’s crate trained.” Code for pissing everywhere and yapping all night. Finally got to sleep around five am Hawaii time, now running on four hours and watching what’s left.

I ain’t impressed. Pe’ahi has ruined us all, the swell ain’t nothin’ special, and the back room bullshit that built the event soured me before things even began. I do adore the Committee of Five. Not its existence, just the term. Sounds like something you’d find in a fascist thesaurus, a synonym for the guys who deposed Mussolini.

The WSL is supposed to be all about promoting surfing. Building the sport, evolving performance. Get us in the Olympics, earn those dollars for the industry.

But Red Bull is all about using spectacle to sell addiction, and I love them for it. Have you ever watched the Red Bull Rampage, where they pay mountain bike psychos to flip off sheer cliffs? It’s beautiful, superbly produced, everything I want to see. Always makes me think, “I should buy a mountain bike!” Then the wife reminds me I’ll end up in the ER immediately. And she’s right, I never learned to fall off a bike safely, and 35 is way too old to start. Busted my collar bone spearfishing year before last, shit hurts, not an occurrence I’m looking to repeat.

But, good gravy, could you imagine the spectacle Red Bull could produce if they dumped the big wave angle? Run a whip-at shore pound air contest, drag some B-level kids to a bone dry barrel and let ’em have at it? Red Bull’s a big dog, the type of company that laughs at the surf industry’s combined gross. The surf world is nothing but medium sized fish in a tiny fucking pool, Red Bull could kick all the small minded fuckers to the curb and bring us something amazing. Employ their Escobarian reach to making magic.

But maybe they don’t need to dump the big waves, just shift the paradigm. That’s marketing speak.

Run a non-competition event at Pe’ahi, logistics be damned. Film from the water on an epic swell, come-one-come-all, kick down cash to the best performers of the day. No politics, not heat scores, just a clever way of snatching exposure while paying out much needed cash to dudes who do it for the love. Can the talking heads, broadcast raw. Stop partnering with low level night club promoters to bring us an endless barrage of tedious cold water slop.

After all the hype, the in-fighting, the lawsuits, the politically motivated blackballing of worthy competitors, we’re headed into the finals, with only one thing that stands out.

Chris Cote, tearing down pictures of competitors, wadding them up, throwing them away. This guy’s garbage, this guy’s garbage, that guy’s garbage. During all the effort that went into getting this event run, I can’t believe no one stopped and said, “Hey guys, that’s a bit on the nose, huh?”

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