the pirates of provincetown

Back when I was an undergrad, most of my friends were music majors. Several of them performed in a university production of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance. A good thing, too: else I would not now be able to appreciate the efforts of the amateur librettists who have offered some very amusing takes on the most famous song in the operetta.

Like this one, for instance, which in place of the doddering Major General offers a buff Warrior Princess with a penchant for razor-edged frisbees.

Then there is Gerard Van der Leun's timely offering.

I Am the Very Model of A Modern Kerry Democrat

Kerry :
I am the very model of a modern Kerry-Democrat,
I'm an information animal, a medal-dripping technocrat,
I know the Kennedys of Camelot, and hide my votes historical,
While my Deaniac supporters consult the Usenet Oracle;
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters matrimonial,
I understand rich heiresses, and lust for figures patrimonial,
About Republican recessions I'm steaming up my views,
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.

ALL :
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.
With many bogus facts about the bad news in the better news.

Kerry :
I'm very good at counting up my votes without an abacus;
My forehead knows the use of chemicals botoxculous:
In short, in matters bureaucrat, Eurocrat, and plutocrat,
I am the very model of a modern Kerry-Democrat.

And those are just the first stanzas.

Meanwhile, The Dissident Frogman is presently offering several Kerry campaign banners. Here's my favorite.

As Tim Blair recently observed: If consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds, John F. Kerry's mind must be freaking enormous. Over at Slate, Michael Grunwald shows why.

MORE. So does Mickey Kaus: “Kerry's positioning is often so transparently and short-sightedly self-interested that it's actually not in his long term self-interest.”

So does Marjorie Williams:

Kerry voted for so many of Bush's major initiatives that in order to disown them now he can only argue that they were wrongly or dishonestly “implemented.” This amounts to a confession that his opponent made a chump of him for the past three years.

Bear in mind that Grunwald, Kaus, and Williams are all Democrats, and you begin to see the scope of Kerry's problem.

Hey, thanks for the link. Glad you liked it.