Introducing our 2012 Slimeball Hall of Fame.

If you were taking odds that I wouldn’t write a post today, YOU LOSE. While I sit here figuring out what I want for dinner I thought I’d share the latest crapola from Howdygram headquarters.

Before I forget, since nobody successfully identified the two classic movie stars from my post on December 27 I’ll reveal their names for you below.

Because there was no winner I’ll just have to keep the BIG VALUABLE PRIZE for myself. No hard feelings and better luck next time, okay?

And now I’m pleased to present the Howdygram’s 2012 Slimeball Hall of Fame, featuring eight sickening hotshots who made me want stab myself in the head with an ice pick at various times throughout the past year.

These sickening hotshots are listed in no particular order whatsoever ...

• Todd Akin. The GOP’s gift to late-night comedy claimed during his campaign for a Senate seat in Missouri that in the case of “legitimate rape” a woman’s body had ways to prevent pregnancy, concluding that abortion even for rape victims should denied because they’re obviously lying. Akin’s hard-core, logic-defying, anti-abortion rhetoric guaranteed a comfortable win by Democratic incumbent Claire McCaskill and inflicted huge damage to the Republican Party for being anti-woman. (Thank you, Todd.)
• Rod “Hairdo” Blagojevich. In March the former governor of Illinois began serving a juicy 14-year sentence at the Federal Correctional Institute in Englewood, Colorado, for conspiracy, racketeering and fraud, still insisting he was targeted by the FBI for “fighting the crooks in a crooked system.” To his credit, however, as governor Blagojevich gave free bus rides to senior citizens.
• Donald Trump. America’s most obnoxious racist blowhard promised to up-end the presidential election with an “October surprise,” dropping frequent hints that he had photocopies of the Obamas’ fictional divorce papers from an earlier decade. In reality, Trump’s surprise was to challenge the President with a $5 million gift to the charity of his choice if he produced his passport application and college transcripts, which seemed to the press and general public that Trump’s ultimate goal was blackmail or extortion. If that wasn’t bad enough, when President Obama won re-election on November 6 Trump fired off a series of grotesquely racist Tweets that claimed the election was a sham, a disaster for democracy and a disgusting injustice (see my earlier post). Talk about a sore loser!
• David Petraeus. Former military god and five-star general who got himself involved with an extramarital affair, social-climbing party girls in Tampa, Florida, and all kinds of convoluted email intrigue. Check out an earlier post with educational graphics.
• Jerry Sandusky. The child molester from Penn State will rot in hell after he serves 60 years in prison for abusing more than 15 million boys. (I might be exaggerating, but not by much.)
• Lance Armstrong. Disgraced Tour de France cycling champion was kicked to the curb and convicted of a career-long doping conspiracy. In one day, Lance Armstrong: 1) was erased from the record books; 2) stripped of his medals and awards; 3) lost all of his lucrative endorsement deals; and 4) was forced out of the cancer charity founded in his name. He’s not even allowed to ride a bike to the grocery store.
• Mitt Romney. Although I’m sure everything has already been said about the GOP’s human gaffe machine, I offer the following Romney quotes in case you need a reminder. To a heckler in Iowa who suggested that corporations should pay higher taxes: “Corporations are people, my friend. Everything corporations earn ultimately goes to the people.” At a Beverly Hills fundraiser, wondering why you can’t crack a window at 35,000 feet: “When you have a fire in an aircraft, there’s no place to go because the windows don’t open. I don’t know why they don’t do that. It’s a real problem.” During a GOP primary debate: “I’m not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there.” And ... “I believe in an America where millions of Americans believe in an America that’s the America millions of Americans believe in. That’s the America I love.” Plus the ultimate gaffe ... Romney’s secretly-recorded remarks at a donor banquet: “There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what ... who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. My job is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.” HOLY CRAP. Did America dodge a bullet, or what?
• Rick Santorum. The GOP’s scariest presidential candidate, bar none. Santorum is a homophobic misogynist whose platform was based on his belief that TOO MUCH BIRTH CONTROL is the number one problem facing Americans today.

And now I’d better find something speedy to eat for dinner before I conk out! Thanks for stopping by.

Social-climbing sex maniacs on the diplomatic circuit.

The Adventures of General Petraeus have risen to a new level of hysteria, now focusing on professional partier Jill Kelley’s twin Natalie Khawam, who’s a bankrupt Florida lawyer and social-climbing sex maniac — technically, I think Gawker.com used the term “flirt” — and a regular fixture on the diplomatic party circuit. Since I don’t want to waste any additional Howdygram space tonight rehashing the juicy details, I’ll just post a convenient flowchart to help you figure out who’s who. Enjoy.

It’s past midnight and I haven’t heard a peep from Sam since he left for work at 2:15 yesterday afternoon. I can only assume he’s having a seriously lousy time at the office or else he’d find five minutes to call and say hi. Those clients from yesterday are still in-house and will probably stay all night again. If they do, Sam will, too, although I’m positive he’d rather be home eating a muffin. As for me, I plan to hit the sack as soon as I finish this post. Please shut the light when you’re done and try not to make any noise, okay?

One more thing. An article on the Huffington Post’s website tonight referred me to an online petition where we can all support an effort urging Macy’s to end its affiliation with pukey Donald Trump, the self-absorbed, anti-American hate-monger, pictured below, who continues to race-bait the president of the United States.

Apparently Macy’s sells Donald Trump’s clothing line and fragrance — who the hell wants to smell like Donald Trump? — and uses his likeness in ads celebrating “the magic of Macy’s.” Holy crap, people! Grab this chance to tell Macy’s what you think! Click here to sign the petition!

I just ran out of exclamation points. Thank you for reading this.

This convoluted scandal is draining my neurons.

Okay, I think I got confused last night. This convoluted General Petraeus scandal is draining my neurons. In another twist to the same story, apparently those “30,000 pages of email” were transmitted between Marine Corps General John Allen — Commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan — and Jill Kelley, a married millionaire social climber in Tampa who blows her husband’s money hosting black-tie shindigs for military brass at MacDill Air Force Base. The Wall Street Journal reports that when Kelley began receiving anonymous meanacing emails earlier this year she contacted a pal in the FBI who linked the emails to General Petraeus’ jealous girlfriend and biographer, Paula Broadwell. Just for fun the aforementioned FBI agent emailed Jill Kelley photos of himself shirtless.

Holy crap. Would this be an amazing HBO mini-series, or what? Even though this story has started to give me cramps, the cast of characters appears below for your possible interest. Apparently Jill Kelley and her twin (see bottom photo) both suffer from the same serious neck injury.

It’s definitely fall in north Texas and we had our first official freeze this morning. Even though I don’t go out very often — just on weekends for Chinese food or Senior Scrambled Eggs at Denny’s — I still manage to keep track of the changing seasons because: 1) I visit Weather.com at least once a week; 2) Costco is already advertising their Christmas specials; and 3) my feet are cold. Although a nice pair of socks would have been cheaper, to alleviate item 3 I just ordered a comforter set from Wal-Mart. Stop laughing, people. Wal-Mart’s Hometrends brand bedding is BEAUTIFUL and their king-size comforters are larger than practically anybody’s, including the ritzy and overpriced designer crap at Bed Bath and Beyond.

The set comes with two king pillow shams and a bed skirt. I didn’t have to buy the matching throw pillows because they’re already on a shelf in my armoire. No kidding.

I usually don’t gloat (not much, anyway) but thought you might enjoy some real-time misery on DisappearingRomney.com, a website that’s tracking Mitt Romney’s diminishing Facebook popularity as it actually happens. Now in frightening decline, Mitt has been losing approximately 847 friends every hour.

And on that cheerful note I think I’ll go make a nice pot of chicken barley soup. Thank you for reading this!

I’m officially fed up with General Petraeus.

I was ready to go to bed about half an hour ago but decided to squeeze in one more quick Howdygram post. Mostly I feel compelled to announce that I’m officially fed up with General Petraeus, General Petraeus’ name, General Petraeus’ chicks and bimbos, General Petraeus’ sneaky little trysts, General Petraeus’ lousy judgment and all of the accompanying General Petraeus horseshit that’s been leaking into the headlines on an hourly basis. I am particularly fascinated by mistress number one, Paula Broadwell, sending 30,000 pages of “menacing email” to mistress number two, a person named Jill Kelley, who wears a lot of makeup and looks like she probably deserved it.

Come on. THIRTY THOUSAND PAGES OF EMAIL? Who the hell has time to write that much email? Somebody should give these women a REAL job!

I forgot to include a graphic in my previous post that goes along with the Texas secession paragraph. Here’s a Texan’s map of the United States, offering a reasonably accurate representation of how important we think we are.

Thank you for reading this. I have to get some sleep now.