Early Morning Open Thread
Things could always be worse…
Besides, it’s Friday, Spring officially starts this Saturday, and The Damned Bill is due to be voted on Sunday.
Also, we still have some great political cartoonists…
(If only Scalia possessed even the vestigal sense of shame that helped bring down Simple J. Malarkey.)
March 19, 2010 3:37 am
Posted in: Assholes, Open Thread
36 Comments
36 Responses
GeeYourHairSmellsTerrific - March 19, 2010 | 3:41 am · Link
After obsessively listening to The Replacement’s Alex Chilton for 24 hours straight, I can say that the guitar tone on that song is just about perfect.
Maude - March 19, 2010 | 3:43 am · Link
I thought I was the only one awake.
Get your egg ready to stand on end at the moment of spring.
daryljfontaine - March 19, 2010 | 3:48 am · Link
Helsinki Complaints Choir has been in my Favorites for a few years now—I go and watch when I need a pick-me-up. So much more musical than the English-language version.
D
The Main Gauche of Mild Reason - March 19, 2010 | 3:58 am · Link
Need more west coast bloggers. It’s lonely being an insomniac out here on the west coast :-/
Comrade Kevin - March 19, 2010 | 4:21 am · Link
@GeeYourHairSmellsTerrific: Who the fuck was this Chilton guy, and why the hell are so many hipster douchebags pretending to know about him?
Halffasthero - March 19, 2010 | 4:45 am · Link
Hey, is it just me or did the Huffington Post just disappear? It forwards me to USA Today.
Bryan - March 19, 2010 | 4:54 am · Link
I’m on the east coast and haven’t gone to bed.
I think I’m depressed.
HuffPo working fine for me. But I kind of hate that site.
Bryan +4
Comrade Kevin - March 19, 2010 | 4:57 am · Link
@Halffasthero: must be just you, it works for me.
Halffasthero - March 19, 2010 | 4:59 am · Link
That is bizarre. I really can’t get there.
GeeYourHairSmellsTerrific - March 19, 2010 | 5:20 am · Link
@Comrade Kevin:
Well at 38, I hardly think I’m a hipser…i’m too fucking old
Alex Chilton was the lead singer for a 60’s band call the BoxTops. You’ve heard their song “The Letter”, it’s a staple on radio.
In the 70’s Big Star, was his next band, while never huge, influenced band such as The Replacements, REM, Radiohead and tons of other bands. He was “indie” before “indie” existed.
If you have an appreciation of pop music, and I’m not talking like Ke$ha or other throw away top 40 shit, I’m talking well crafted pop tunes, you’ll love him. If not, well, that’s fine too, but I promise he influenced someone you listen too.
GeeYourHairSmellsTerrific - March 19, 2010 | 5:23 am · Link
@The Main Gauche of Mild Reason:
Well technically, you’re not blogging, you’re commenting.
Just sayin’....
Also there is always /b/
Maude - March 19, 2010 | 6:32 am · Link
I am pretty much apartment bound as I get over pneumonia.
Saw on Wired that the House proceedings will be carried on C-SPAN.
You can’t really live blog it.
Are we going to have open threads to comment?
Those who watch can tell we who don’t have or want tv what is going on.
SiubhanDuinne - March 19, 2010 | 6:34 am · Link
@Comrade Kevin: I honest-to-FSM never heard of Alex Chilton in my life until this blog announced his death the other day. But then I’m 67. Fess Parker, now .. . . .
On a totally unrelated topic (CAUTION: Rant Alert!), Bobo today misuses the word “decimate” not once, not twice, but three damn times in his column. I realize I’m very much in the minority in wanting to reserve “decimate” for its original meaning of “destroying one in ten” instead of the nearly opposite meaning it has taken on of “total destruction.” But I’m kind of a prick about this. I know (and love the fact) that language evolves—but we have words that mean “to destroy totally,” including the near-homophone “devastate.” However, we don’t have other words that convey the idea of killing or removing one-tenth of a group, and there are occasions when that kind of precision in writing is desirable.
I’m fighting a losing battle on this one, and I know it. Still, Brooks should know better than to repeat any word three times in one column, especially a word that’s so notoriously and frequently misused. And if he doesn’t know, at least his editors should . . . oh, wait, this is the New York Times we’re talking about.
/early morning pedant
MikeJ - March 19, 2010 | 6:42 am · Link
@SiubhanDuinne: I grew up on Alex Chilton, but I’m with ya on decimate.
Myriad drives me nuts too. 10,000. That’s what it means. Not “a lot”.
This is what comes from not forcing latin and greek on kids.
Phyllis - March 19, 2010 | 6:55 am · Link
It’s Friday, it’s going to be a beautiful weekend here in the South, and I’m having lowcountry boil for supper tonight. And at some point in the evening I plan to be at least +4, if not higher. Y’all have a great day.
SiubhanDuinne - March 19, 2010 | 7:06 am · Link
@halfasthero:
Ummm . . . why would you want to?
SiubhanDuinne - March 19, 2010 | 7:19 am · Link
@MikeJ: You’re right, “myriad” is another, although it doesn’t set my teeth on edge the way “decimate” does.
The saddest part is that those of us who know what the words actually mean are reluctant to use them in writing because of the very real fear that we’ll be either misunderstood by the majority of readers, or attacked by pedants like us who assume we’re probably doing it wrong!
cleek - March 19, 2010 | 7:24 am · Link
word meanings are not eternal truths, and do not exist outside of the minds of the people who use them. if the popular usage of a word has changed, then the meaning of the word has changed.
pedantry is wasted effort.
maeby - March 19, 2010 | 7:28 am · Link
That. Song. Was. Awesome.
BethanyAnne - March 19, 2010 | 7:37 am · Link
For an evening goofing off at the compy, it’s been oddly satisfying. The Daily Show tonight rocked. Jon Stewart took on Glenn Beck again, and it was brilliant.
Then I read a really good thread over at Ta-Nahisi’s place.
http://www.theatlantic.com/nat.....wer/37557/ I love TNC’s critique of Sullivan, and the comments at his place are well worth following.
That lead me to watching Jonathan Haidt talk at TED. Then I remembered I wanted to watch Rachel Armstrong’s presentation from there as well.
Jonathan Haidt writes about moral psychology, and was talking about morals and politics and conservative and liberal morality. Really good food for thought. Rachel Armstrong was talking about living reactive architecture. One effect of her work has been to grow support structures of stone under Venice.
Good evening in my head, all in all. :)
SiubhanDuinne - March 19, 2010 | 7:47 am · Link
@Cleek: Oh, I admitted right off the bat that I was fighting a losing battle. But I’m actually quite a linguistic libertarian in some areas, and I did stipulate that I know, and love the fact, that language changes and evolves. Anyone who speaks or writes or thinks would be greatly impoverished if it were static. But the debate between prescriptionists and descriptionists has been going on for centuries, and I don’t propose to lock horns with you on this issue right now because neither of us is going to change the other’s mind, and I have to go to work.
Morbo - March 19, 2010 | 8:16 am · Link
Yay, Finland! It’s OK; you’ll always have Lordi. You ALL have Lordi!
Cole, pay special attention at around 2:00.
cleek - March 19, 2010 | 8:30 am · Link
@SiubhanDuinne:
that’s probably true. :)
me too. well, actually… it’s what i did between this and my previous comment.
General Egali Tarian Stuck - March 19, 2010 | 8:42 am · Link
Peggy Noonan has outdone herself and just entered some new dimension of epic concern into a mindless world of record breaking fatuous whining that defies gravity and sanity and I wish I’d never read it. These people are insane and so self absorbed that it makes me ashamed and highly nauseous.
She is troubled that HCR took so long and since it looks like the GOP isn’t going to derail it, the gawds must be crazy for allowing Obama to postpone his trip and embarrass Australia and for what? Only the ho-hum nonsense of providing life saving Health insurance that has already taken up too much of our well scrubbed well to do white bread time.
These people make me want to move to Costa Rica, if Rush Limbaugh doesn’t buy it first for his epic galt to escape the black commie tyrant, who has the audacity of Hope and temerity to do something that should have been done long ago.
The Nooner
Just shoot me now, to end my suffering of these entitled jerkwads.
Can’t read any more of this drek. Galt till the vote.
Paul in KY - March 19, 2010 | 8:58 am · Link
Great song. Really spoke to me. Thank’s for putting it up.
Sarcastro - March 19, 2010 | 9:15 am · Link
Things have really gone to pot in Finland since that Lemminkäinen dude gave their sampo to the witch of Pohjola.
But really, losing in hockey to Sweden? The Fins make up for that by whipping the snot out of the Swedes in rally racing.
General Egali Tarian Stuck - March 19, 2010 | 9:17 am · Link
on health care stuff, except for pestering my rep.
Ash Can - March 19, 2010 | 9:18 am · Link
Gotta love those Finns.
In other news, note to Sean Hannity: When Debbie Schlussel—yes, Debbie Fucking Schlussel—exposes you as the predatory racketeer and fraud that you are, you probably
should have cut her in on the actionhave a problem on your hands.General Egali Tarian Stuck - March 19, 2010 | 9:20 am · Link
@Ash Can:
My world is officially upside down
kay - March 19, 2010 | 9:20 am · Link
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
It’s a good sign, Stuck. They’re moving on to the next whine-fest.
Foreign policy! It’s a strength for them, don’t you know.
General Egali Tarian Stuck - March 19, 2010 | 9:21 am · Link
@kay: You could be right, but still.
pattonbt - March 19, 2010 | 9:28 am · Link
I am beginning to think that the Brown win in MA will end up being the key to HCR being passed. As with many, I prefer the house bill over the senate bill and want more than what is in the house bill. I also wish the process hadnt sucked as much and I would have loved more bully pulpit from Obama. But I get why they went the way they did and if HCR passes, holding the course like they did will add to the narrative of “cool under pressure and in control”.
But I believe that had Brown not won (leaving the Dems only one choice to move forward and pass something) we would still be sitting in the back and forth squabbling between the senate and the house. And that squabbling would have lead to more and more delays delays, more weak knees among those who were lukewarm to begin with and more opportunities for the weak kneed to bail on the process and “start over”. It would have also kept the media narrative negative towards reform and the Dems. I hate that the house got rolled into having to do the right thing or be seen as the villain, but maybe having no other choice was what was necessary.
For the first time, I am cautiously optimistic.
And I have been calling and writing my rep (Degette) with thanks often.
kay - March 19, 2010 | 9:29 am · Link
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
I can see the Noonan column had health care failed. Shit, I can write it.
It would be about how the center-right country wisely rejected the Democrat’s attempt at progress, and about how the majority always, always, prefers to maintain the status quo. It would be insufferably smug, yet laced with certain words that might indicate “humility” to the uninitiated.
General Egali Tarian Stuck - March 19, 2010 | 9:30 am · Link
@kay:
LOL, yup, you have Peggy down to a tee.
slightly_peeved - March 19, 2010 | 10:24 am · Link
Uhhh… not to act as spokesman for the political viewpoint of my country (that’s TattooSydney’s job), but just to start with the issues here, why would we be embarrassed?
Many politically-aware Australians know how important the health care legislation is, and how it is an important step towards a system like the one we’ve got. Besides that, most Australians would expect the President of the US to look after his own people before us. You elected him, we didn’t (we tend to elect more left-leaning people, but then our Left gets shit done, rather than just hoping for ponies). Many politically unaware Australians probably don’t give two shits whether he visits or not.
Batocchio - March 19, 2010 | 1:44 pm · Link
Anne Laurie, you get major style points for mentioning Simple J. Malarkey. My dad gave me and my brothers Pogo compilations to read as kids, and when Good Night and Good Luck came out, I felt compelled to blog on Simple J. Malarkey… Walt Kelly was the man,