Confessions of a Conservative Mind

He's got it all. A controlling interest in FOX broadcasting. Jenna Bush's cell phone number, which she gave him to use "if [he] ever gets lonely some night." A standing invite for dinner at the Vatican. A dial-up internet connection. What more could a young conservative want?

We know Ben George, the wildly successful international playboy. But how do we get to know Ben George the man? What are his secrets, fears, and desires? What made him choose Kim Carnes' "Bette Davis Eyes" as his karaoke song of choice that night? Does he hang around crazy women strictly for the stories, or is it a more serious reason, like the fact that they often make really good sandwiches? Finally, how much booty is too much booty? These are all important questions, and the answers will be revealed, as we discover the...

Confessions of a Conservative Mind

1. How did you become a conservative? Are your parents that way, or were you self-taught?

Well, yes, my parents are conservative, in a really hippy kinda way.
And most of my life I've been Libertarianish, you know, a "cool" conservative, Ayn Rand and all that.

But I actually voted for Nader in 2000.
No kidding.
Then one day (September 8th, 2001) I was perusing the magazine section of Barnes and Nobles, lamenting their lack of progressive magazines like Adbusters and Z and High Times. So I picked up this issue of the Economist: "PROLOGO? Man, don't they know? It's NOLOGO, NOLOGO dammit. These guys must be corporate fascists." I was wrong. The Economist used, like, logic and stuff. By the time I finished reading the article, I realized that 90% of my progressivism was just an excuse to be angry all the time because of...


2. Have you ever been in love? If so, what was it like, and who was she?

...CURVE. I call her Curve. I met her on Wednesday January 27th 1999. I remember the date I met her not because I memorized it but because I can't help it. I haven't seen her in 4 years. She was... I just had a dream about her last night, so, she still haunts me pretty fiercely. We didn't really date long, maybe only 6 months. I lost her because she was Indian and Hindu, and her parents didn't want her dating a whitey. After I lost her, I kinda went into a tailspin, spiritually speaking. My logic:

1. Love is the best.
2. Religion separates people, particularly me and Curve.
3. Therefore, God does not exist, Q.E.D.

My politics became pretty reactionary: In 1953 the CIA overthrew the democratically elected government of Mossadeq in Iran, if that doesn't show you how much I love her, what else can I do? Did you know that in 1973 the US dropped over 67 megatons of bombs on Cambodia, and I still can't get her to call me!? Wake up, Amerikkka!


3. What's the story (Morning Glory)? Also, what's the freakiest thing you've ever done sexually?

The story is that Oasis is some of the best modern karaoke music around. And I once choked a girl. She dug it immensely. Like, IMMENSELY. She said, and I quote, "Ugkh! Yghhhss! Fgnhk mghh! Fgnkkk mmghhhth!" It was scary. And if you want to know why I date crazy girls, it is for experiences just such as that one. And the sandwiches.


4. What is the story of the first time you knocked boots? Were you, in fact, listening to H-Town's "Knocking Da Boots"?

Junior year, I take my recently acquired Senior girlfriend on a Saturday night to eat pizza at Star Pizza. She's the kinda girl Hall & Oates warned us about, and she did in fact chew me up. She says, over dinner:

Her:"So, do you think you and I ever might have sex?"
Me:"A! O! Potrzebie?! Dhurka?"
Her:"What?"
Me: "I mean um... well, someday."
Her: "Sunday?"

We screw later that night at her apartment. (Senior highschool girl with apartment? Watch out boy, watch out watch out...) We start getting undressed on her couch, but then decide to move it into her bed. It's like twenty feet away, which is a light year when she's trying to lead me "sexy-style" with my pants around my ankles. Then we have sex, bump bump bump, boring.

So, next day I'm at Sunday mass. I still haven't taken a shower, and am convinced that everyone can smell the illicit poon all over me. But I'm not really that concerned about it. I mean, I am in love and all, so that negates the sin component, right? In the ecclesial court of my head I plea bargained the mortal charge of fornication down to venial intemperance with time off for good intentions. Later that day, as I'm standing around in the church gym during some churchy church thing, a very kind and non-man-eating girl asks me, "Hey, so what did you do this weekend?"

The walls rush in at me. The ceiling zooms into the sky.

I hear myself say, "Um, nothing much."

But.

I had sex.

I had sex.


5. What's your favorite album to get into an argument with a crazy female to? If you have no preference to this question, please answer "Anything by Gloria Gaynor."

Well, did Gloria Gaynor do that accursed "Total Eclipse of the Heart" song? Hearing that song immediately makes the world go all flat in front of me. The girl, though only two feet away, suddenly feels a million miles away, as if I were talking to a mountain range. I cannot fully express to you the distress that song causes me to even think about it. I can feel every letter of every word crowding around me like a swarm of bees. Each note of each measure exerts a tiny but cumulatively immense force upon my skin, up my neck, pressing down my throat, my ears, my nostrils, and up, under my eyelids. KKccuuff...


6. How much booty is too much booty?

What like, too much booty in the pants? As much as you can get in there without droopage or cellulite, booty away!

Or do you mean, THE Number? Like how many is too many?
As a Catholic, I am obliged to say that any number greater than one is too many. As my young-guy self.. well, I have to agree with my Catholic self. I can't say that I really got anything real out of sleeping with all the girls I've slept with. It's mostly been pain for me, pain for them, or just plain wasted time. Great memories of erotic asphyxiation aside, there's the combined weight of the pregnancy scares, the STD scares, the waiting by the phone, the avoiding phone calls, the cold nostalgia of loneliness, the claustrobic non-erotic suffocation of togetherness, the old emails, and the new emails that sound too much like the old emails. And the shitty birthday shirts. Please, ladies, STOP BUYING ME SHIRTS.


7. Do the Academy Awards mean anything, or are they really just a bunch of crap?

Hollywood is retarded, and it's not just because they're liberal.
It's because they have mental disabilities.


8. Once when I was a kid, I saw that Simpsons episode where Bart write the fake love letter to Ms. Krabapple, and thought it was pretty clever. I decided to do the same thing to my cousin, who was about my age at the time (thirteen or so). She was living with us, so I thought it would be funny for her to try and figure out who was writing her love letters! Instead, her mom, my aunt, got freaked out and suspected that the swim coach was a child molester and tried to have him arrested. It was funny, but not funny ha-ha. Bearing this in mind, what was your favorite video game as a kid, and did you ever beat it?

Well Woodrow, I'm glad you asked. For Christmas one year I desperately wanted Super Mario Brothers 2. I had worn out my copy of Nintendo Power: Issue 1 wherein they discussed the amazing marketing breakthroughs and almost unlimited growth potential of Nintendo Inc, and also how if you go to world 1-3 and find a potion and find the vase next to the brick building all the way to the right side of the level, you can then drop the potion and go into Sub-Space and then warp into the vase (stand on top of it and press down), resulting in your having warped to World 4!

But I had almost given up hope, realizing even at that young age the cruelties of the supply-demand curve. The game was the hottest game of the year, no way could anyone find it.

Anyone except my grandma, Gammy. She appearently had connections with toy-futures speculators in the Yakuza, and had had a copy for nearly a week.

I unwrapped it and saw those blue and white clouds..
The game? The game. ¡THE GAME!
A small scale Armageddon began in my groin, worked its way up through my intestines, my heart, rest stop in my throat... I barely managed to get to the bathroom before a torrent of semi-liquid honey ham and candied sweet potatoes came blasting out from between my clenched teeth.

I personally never beat it, and that bothers me to this day.

The best game for 5th grade male-bonding was Contra. Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Select Start.


9. Who is your favorite muppet? (Note: If you answer Kermit, that means you're gay.)

Bork bork bork! Swedish Chef broogen hoogen flurflur! But also those two old cranky guys at the beginning.


10. What's the farthest you've ever traveled to get some booty?

Well, back when me and Curve were together, when I lived in Austin and she in Houston, I would get home from work at 9pm, drive to Houston, stay at her apartment, and then drive back to Austin for my 8am morning class...

Everynight.

I was a drivin' fool.

I hope one day to drive like that again.