Hey dudes and dudettes, Vinnie the Christ here.  Just wanted to take some time out of my busy day chasing broads and slugging down Wild Turkey Rye to let my brothers and sisters know about an important cause.  As y'all know, the East Coast got pounded by a bitch named Sandy a few weeks back and there's still people struggling with recovery.  There's lots of organizations out there that can help, including the American Red Cross and others.

Since joining the Twitsophere, Vinnie came across Theo Rossi's Twitter feed, @TheoRossi.  Theo's a real cool brother who plays Juice on Sons of Anarchy and he's also from Staten Island, which got pummeled by the storm.  Not content to just sit back while his neighbors were struggling, Theo started coordinating efforts to help people out and eventually started a charity to raise money to aid in those efforts. 

You can check out his website at StatenStrong.  You can donate directly and/or buy some pretty cool swag to help the cause.  I just plunked down 25 bones to get a kickass t-shirt to help spread the word.  If you want to volunteer or if you're in need of assistance, there are links on this site to help you out.  If you've got some extra cashola and want to donate to a good cause where the money will end up right in the hands of the people making a difference, then go check this site out.  StatenStrong is also on Facebook and they have their own Twitter feed, @StatenStrong.  I know we're all struggling to a degree, but help out if you can.

Big love to all my East Coast dudes & dudettes!  Stay strong!  If there's any other organizations helping out, Vinnie'll be happy to give them a shout out.  You can e-mail me at vinniethechrist@gmail.com or send me a tweet at @VinnieTheChrist.

Trumping the Trump Challenge

Secret Musliming Around

I've been thinking about the Trump thing.  Much as I hate to see the President lower himself to deal with a slimewad like Trump, I think he should give Trump what he wants . . .and then some.  I think not only should he send over his college/law school/passport info, but everything back to preschool.  If his grandparents saved any of his finger paintings or crayon drawings, send copies of those too. 

I have to say, I really enjoy the idea of the Donald and his team of dipshit "investigators" sifting through the detritus of Obama's schooldays.  They can discuss the Islamic imagery in the aforementioned fingerpaintings, crow over ever bad mark the President accrued in deportment, dissect his first tortured efforts at cursive, and lambast him for every math mistake.  After all, shouldn't America know if the President once struggled with fractions?  How can he right the economy if once upon a time he couldn't solve for x?  All of this matters, right? 

The fact of the matter is there's nothing the President can do to satisfy the fringe elements like Donald Trump.  Hell, Trump himself may not believe any of this crap, but it gets his name in the news.  I know Obama is too classy to ever give in to Trump's ridiculous challenge, but there's a small part of me that wishes he would and do it in the snarkiest, most humorous way possible.       

Welcome to Mitt Romney's America

It's 2015, almost three years into President Romney's term.  You're Joe Average American, scuttling home from work to your crackerbox apartment in a medium sized city in America.  You don't drive because gas is $8.00 a gallon and all that "Drill Baby Drill" oil is exported to other countries.  You lost your house in the suburbs after your job was outsourced to India.  All you can get is a manual labor job, just enough to pay the rent and buy bread.  You can't afford milk or meat because the government no longer has a food stamp program.  You've got a pain in the right side of your chest, but you can't afford a doctor and you don't get health insurance. 

On the way home, you pass a couple of teenage hoodlums mugging a man.  You don't bother calling the cops because the depleted police force doesn't come to your neighborhood.  Unless someone is dead and they need to collect the body.  Across town, in the gated community, there's a private police force, ambulance service, and a hospital.  Here in your neighborhood, there isn't even a trash collector.  The hoods beating up your neighbor might have learned respect, education, and job skills in a school but there aren't enough teachers and dropout rates have skyrocketed.  And college?  Fucking forget about college.  No student loans for these kids.  On the other side of town is the nice private school and the charter school for people with means.  Those kids get to go to college.  Someone has to take over the family business or practice when Dad retires after all.

When you get home, the building next to yours is on fire and you pray that it doesn't spread because you can't afford to pay the fire brigade to come put it out.  You trudge up the stairs past the posters that remind you that you're not poor because you have a TV and a refrigerator in your apartment.  Sure the TV is a ten year old model you fished out of a dumpster and the refrigerator came with the apartment and is usually empty, but hey, you're living large.  No right to complain for you.  

Next door, you hear the cries and shrieks of the six kids next door.  There would be seven, but the 20 year old woman who lives there had an illegal abortion in  a back alley.  She hasn't looked so good lately.  Boy, those kids are awful loud.

There's a message on your phone.  Your boss needs you to work a 12 hour shift tomorrow even though you just came off a stretch of 20 straight 12 hour days.  You can't say no because there are no more work week limits.  There's also no minimum wage, so if you complain, the boss can cut your pay.  The sad thing is, there are five people out there who would kill to have your job.  Unions are the stuff of legends.  

You watch some grainy TV, eat some bread, and wash it down with some water that has God knows what in it.  You collapse into bed with your Bible.  You don't have a gun because you can't afford the license fees.  Only rich folks have guns.  Hey, the Bible is still free, even if you know you're on God's bad side.  After all, if you were a good Christian, you'd be rich.