the best protest EVAR

We are thinking of having a support drive. Having our french VPAR handing out miniskirts for the cause. VIVENT LA REVOLUTION! XD

French youth across the country are rebelling against various new school dress codes that ban low-slung trousers, short garments and piercings, and even holes in trousers and garments above the knee.

At Lycee Geoffroy-Saint-Hilaire in Essonne, south of Paris, 300 of the 2,100 students came to school wearing short shorts or mini-skirts. And at Lycee Condorcet d'Arcachon in Gironde, 200 students protested in the streets. One student said, "We're at school, we don't want to feel like we are in a prison," according to the Independent UK.

Lycee Saint-Jean-Hulst in Versailles, has taken a different approach in dealing with sartorial rebels. Girls wearing short skirts are given overalls to change into, and boys sporting saggy pants are lent a pair of suspenders.

Op-Ed: Not to mention the disposable income. XD

update: (lets just be clear this is no way means that VPAR are against children. Have all you like. They're cool. Its an op-ed so stop emailing.)

I feel the need to relay a large point I made earlier.

Anyone having kids today does so out of pure selfishness. I was then asked to consider the joy and happiness a child can bring.

That's right. YOUR joy. YOUR Happiness. What about theirs? And there-in lies the many problems.

Kids today are bombarded with way more information than they can process. Between 24 hour non-stop, on-demand whatever they want on TV and the internet, their forcefully raised way too quick. Even if you work to keep them shielded from something, their friends are seeing it so the effort is futile.

Not to mention the effect it has on their egos. Kids today play little league games with no winners, play soccer games where everyone's a "hero." Because god forbid a child learns how to properly deal with loss. Then between their 800 facebook friends, their 5000 myspace friends and their 300 followers on twitter their psyches are built to think people give a crap about the mundane shit they do. Now more than ever the illusion of the "american dream" of fame and fortune is perceived to be reachable because they've seen no talent nothings "achieve". Bathroom mirrors and digital cameras are two of the biggest culprits for your kids inflated sense of self.

There's no more social conscience. Even adults today spend hours trying to find the right ringtone or laptop color that will tell the world who they REALLY are. Kids are so self involved and cold in this century of electronic detachment that they'd eat each other alive for a chance to meet a member of the Twilight cast.

And so how do we handle it when the little starlets can't cope? Well its a product of a chemical blah blah, their midichlorian level is too high, A.D.D. this, Autism that, and so here's some pills, this will fix it aaaannd BOOM, nothing is their fault.


But SOMEONE has to be to blame and between Tyra Banks and every "DR" with a book, everything always ends up being the parents fault. You'll never win. You miss a soccer game because you had to work and before you know it your daughter has daddy issues and is dating a guy twice her age and your son is in therapy 5 times a week and can't get a hard-on.

But NONE of that even matters because with the current state of global warming and the little were actually doing about it, kids born today will spend the second half of their life in fucking Waterworld. And Kevin Costner's hot-air balloon wont fit everybody.

So no, I don't want kids.

well NO SHIT

A New Poll taken this week shows that a large majority of americans would reject a health care reform bill that has neither the public option or Medicare expansion but STILL has a buy-in mandate. NO DUH. Why is the mandate SO unpopular? Well right now Senate leaders are all over Washington trying to spin that they finally have a healthcare reform bill they can pass, as long as they remove the public option and the Medicare expansion because, After all, they say that even without them, the bill still "covers" 30 million more Americans.

What they are talking about is that "individual mandate." That's a section of the bill that requires every single American buy health insurance or break the law and face penalties and fines. So, the bill doesn't actually "cover" 30 million more Americans -- instead it makes them criminals if they don't buy insurance from the same companies that got us into this mess."

Will Obama next make us ship packages only with Fedex and not the post office? Will we have to call blackwater when we hear a burglar, instead of the police? What ELSE do we have to do that will just rip us off while lining the pockets of private industry?

We've reported in the past that we were always skeptical of Obama given the remark made by his college professor that while at Harvard everyone thought Obama was a republican. Now it seems those inklings bore fruit as he has proven that while campaigning for the little guy, he really intended to work for the big corporations.

This bill as it stands isn't popular with too many people outside of the healthcare industry and their whores. Howard Dean has taken quite a bit of shit for commenting that the bill in its current version should be killed. Despite being ridiculed by the same White House that championed him just a year ago, he refuses to stop his criticism and we appreciate that. Here's an excerpt from his most recent op-ed piece.

The truth is that health care reform was probably doomed to be deeply imperfect. As Ezra Klein pointed out a few weeks ago, we're basically in a hostage situation: progressives really, really want to cover the uninsured, while centrists whose votes are needed can take it or leave it. So the centrists have a lot of power -- which in the case of Joe Lieberman means the power to double-cross and indulge his pettiness.

Now, in a hostage situation there are times when you have to just say no -- when giving in, by encouraging future hostage-takers, would be worse than letting the hostages perish. So the question has to be, is this one of those times? I don't think so, given the history: as Kevin Drum points out, health reform has come back weaker after each defeat. I'd also point out that highly imperfect insurance reforms, like Social Security and Medicare in their initial incarnations, have gotten more comprehensive over time. This suggests that the priority is to get something passed.

By all means denounce Obama for his failed bipartisan gestures. By all means criticize the administration. But don't take it out on the tens of millions of Americans who will have health insurance if this bill passes, but will be out of luck -- and, in some cases, dead -- if it doesn't.

Currently the White House is said to be FINALLY getting off their ass and trying to make the senate bill closer in form the the house bill which had a public option in it, BUT that the WH is just working to make the private plans we HAVE to buy more affordable and are happy to let the Public Option and Medicare buy in die....What an asshole...

We ask that if you are so inclined, email your house rep and make it clear you will not tolerate having to buy overpriced shitty private insurance healthcare.

Never forget, knowledge is power, and the power is YOURS! XD

tripping the light fantastic

We V.P.A.R. have always been supporters and lovers of light graffiti, now we have some like-minded individuals who feel the same. Some l.g. artists realized that light graffiti looks a little like the things we've seen in so many science fiction films and have created accordingly. Below are some highlights of the new standard.

hasidim but i dont believe 'em.

We are here today to hand out yet another prestigious honorary Vice Presidential Action Rangers Membership. We are proud to honor the guerrilla line painters of Brooklyn New York, who are letting the religious nuts know that public streets DON'T have a dress code.

Below is the story. Here's hoping the lanes keep getting repainted as long as they need to. Viva La Resistance!

The war over Williamsburg has taken yet another turn.

In response to last week's removal of the bike lanes in the traditionally Hasidic neighborhood in Brooklyn, a group of local bike riders took it upon themselves to repaint the bike lanes running down Bedford Avenue.

The Hasids had asked the city to remove the bike lanes from the neighborhood, claiming the influx of bikers posed a "safety and religious hazard."

In an interesting twist, the group of guerrilla line painters reportedly included members of the Hasidic community who are not opposed to the lanes.

Last year the religious group complained to the community board that many of the young, female cyclists who rode through the neighborhood were "hotties," who "ride in shorts and skirts," both of which are against their dress code.

According to the New York Post, "a source close to Mayor Bloomberg said removing the lanes was an effort to appease the Hasidic community just before last month's election." No word yet on if the lines will be removed again.

(Below is a video of the heroes in action.)

for all your vampire hunting needs...

Now we VPAR like to mix it up and we can't think of anything mixier? than some proof that either vampires actually exist, or at the very least suckers hundreds of years ago too.

Maybe they were advertised just like crap is today.

"If you're hunting just a couple of vampires a week, then the standard kit will do nicely but if you are a connoisseur in the trade of vampire slaying then might I recommend our premium 'bloodletter' kit. It comes in this stylish mahogany box, and numbered for authenticity. Also, If you order now, we'll throw in a second bottle of holy water! That's a 2 copper piece value, free!"

Ripleys Believe It or Not has 30 authentic kits touring there museums all over the U.S.

Rick Warren: Whaaaat a dickface.

Rick Warren, that flip flopping tub of goo who contradicted himself so blatantly before his inaugural invocation is back in the news, this time for not even coming out against a proposed law that would murder people. So fetus's, no. Homo's, yes?

Rick Warren, the pastor who delivered the invocation at President Obama's inauguration, is once again on the defensive -- this time for his work with a Ugandan pastor who would like homosexuality to be punishable by death.

Rick Warren seemed to question the fuss. "Globally last yr 146,000 Christians were put to death because of their faith. No one, except Christians, said anything," (who are these christians in question who died? where did this happen? What planet?)

Newsweek tried to get Warren's reaction to the anti-gay work of Martin Ssempa, a Ugandan pastor who has come to his Saddleback Church multiple times. (Warren has distanced himself from Ssempa in general terms, saying the Ugandan minister does not represent him or his church.) Warren wouldn't reject the idea:

But Warren won't go so far as to condemn the legislation itself. A request for a broader reaction to the proposed Ugandan anti-homosexual laws generated this response: "The fundamental dignity of every person, our right to be free, and the freedom to make moral choices are gifts endowed by God, our creator. However, it is not my personal calling as a pastor in America to comment or interfere in the political process of other nations." On Meet the Press this morning, he reiterated this neutral stance in a different context: "As a pastor, my job is to encourage, to support. I never take sides." Warren did say he believed that abortion was "a holocaust." He knows as well as anyone that in a case of great wrong, taking sides is an important thing to do.

Ssempa has also burned condoms "in the name of Jesus," helping roll back a highly successful anti-AIDS campaign in Uganda. (becaauuuse christians like aids? I don't get why he would do that...)