Art Appreciation 101
Who know that Darrell Issa is a big art fan?
An article in Pravda on the Potomac reported with giddy excitement Issa’s coming investigations of anything and everything (hot on the list is the allegation that Michelle Obama fed her family dead chickens and then used the bones for soup!). And while Issa’s efforts to use investigations as a tool of obstruction deserve some discussion, it is Issa’s choice of art that concerns us this evening.
Over his shoulder is a painting of six former Republican Presidents playing poker with GWB looking at Reagan’s cards and Ike laughing at the lot of them. Now in Issa’s Republican Party most of these former Presidents would be drummed out as Rinos—and anybody with the policy views of any of them (with the exception of Bush Jr.) would face a TeaBagger rebellion, but that is not the focus of this post.
Rather, I seek to look to the linkage between Issa’s painting and the long tradition of paintings with dogs playing poker. It seems to me that this tradition is the source of the composition of Issa’s poker playing exPresidents. To help you appreciate the artistic influences I am including two samples of dogs playing poker paintings along with Darrell’s art. Which do you think is the strongest influence, A or B:
Me, I think sample A is the stronger influence, while I admit that some of the classic black velvet dogs playing poker paintings are also strong contenders.
Issa’s painting is a fine example of the way that the dogs playing poker painting tradition is being used in new ways. Who knew he was an art buff?
Perhaps we can look forward to an investigations of the art that Sasha and Malia Obama hang on the refrigerator on the second floor of the White House. I’m pretty sure that somebody colored outside of the lines at some point.
Cheers
dengre
That painting is blasphemous. It doesn’t include Jesus.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:26 pm
Looks like somebody opened a can of Kinkade on that last one.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:27 pm
The artist left out a bunch of Repub. presidents. Where’s Hoover? Where’s Coolidge?
November 8th, 2010 at 10:28 pm
Looks like a cross between Bob Ross and Thomas Kinkade.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:29 pm
As much as I like imagery of Presidents together, I find this painting grotesque in the extreme.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:29 pm
I wanna see Lincoln tell Reagan what he thinks of the Southern Strategy while Ike brands Military-Industrial Complex on his ass. Also, Teddy beats the crap out of GWB.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:29 pm
Dennis G.:
Is that WaPo or Politico?
.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:31 pm
Somehow, I got on some Republican mailing list and got an email from Issa openly gloating about the elections from last Tuesday. He is such an asshat. It really frustrates the hell out of me that this is the face of the opposition party (and Michele Bachmann, apparently). Oh, and orange man Boehner, who also sent me an email (prior to the elections). I want to know on whose shitlist I got that I am now receiving emails from the GOP.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:32 pm
@JGabriel:
That would be Politico
November 8th, 2010 at 10:40 pm
@JGabriel: politico. which is today’s version of the Washington Times of yesteryear.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:40 pm
It’s not much, but it beats Boehner’s sad clown self portraits….
November 8th, 2010 at 10:40 pm
My earlier comment got ate, so:
Clarence Thomas has a similar Thomas Kinkade-esque velvety painting in his chambers of St. Ronnie and Mother Maggie on some balcony. Ugh.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:41 pm
There’s a version by the same artist with Democratic presidents.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:41 pm
I’ve seen that before… there’s also this one: http://www.gallery4collectors......eBlues.htm
November 8th, 2010 at 10:41 pm
Dennis G., Mike Kay: Thanks, guys.
By the way, there’s a similar painting featuring Democratic presidents. I see both of those in local print/framing shops here in NYC.
Kind of appalling that any elected federal official would voluntary choose to inflict such egregious kitsch on every taxpayer who comes to visit him.
Appalling, but, from Issa, not surprising.
.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:44 pm
@Boudica:
Lincoln, TR and Ike seem to be slumming with grifters here. A better fit would be Harding and Hoover. Or maybe Hayes or Taft or Chester A. Arthur.
More funny is that only GWB would pass the current TeaBagger litmus tests as a true conservative.
And yet here they are playing poker in a painting fashioned after dogs doing the same.
So it goes…
November 8th, 2010 at 10:44 pm
Eh, they have one of those with Democratic Presidents too showing that tastelessness transcends party politics.
That being said, I can’t imagine any Dems being dumb enough to stand in front of one for a picture after they’d just won an election based on being political outsiders and not smoke room poker players
November 8th, 2010 at 10:44 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
Forward it to a front-pager who can share the mockity goodness with all of us.
Or, alternately, post it on your site and give us link.
.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:47 pm
ya know, compared to reagoon and shrub, I kinda like tricky dick.
its kinda like how mussolini doesn’t look so bad standing next to adolph and stalin
November 8th, 2010 at 10:50 pm
Has Eisenhower been thrown out of the Republican Party yet?
what a hippy…
November 8th, 2010 at 10:50 pm
arguingwithsignposts:
Knowing Clarence Thomas, I’m guessing it’s an upskirt view with pubic hair?
.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:50 pm
@lol:
That is not a surprise. The dogs playing poker motif is a strong one. I wouldn’t be surprised to see paintings of rock stars, movie actors, generals and saints all in similar compositions.
Now if we could get a painting of the Pets of BJ playing poker then perhaps we could raise some more funds for Charlie’s Angels. Maybe even Darrell would pick one up… or at least investigate it.
Cheers
November 8th, 2010 at 10:51 pm
I find it interesting that Lincoln’s back is to the viewer. It is either so that one cannot see the expression on his faces as he sits with the other guys (he might have found some common cause with TR, but that’s about it) or else it is so that the viewer can imagine himself to be John Wilkes Booth.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:52 pm
They need to update that painting to include shadow president palin.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:53 pm
For a split second I thought that option A was from the liner notes on Snoop Dogg’s Doggystyle.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:55 pm
Nixon was in fact a legendary poker player when he was in the Pacific. Persistent rumors that his first House campaign was paid for from his poker winnings circulate to this day.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:56 pm
@me: This. I’ve seen this silly piece of crap before, and the first thing I thought of was the fact that if all these guys got together in the same room, the result would be a hell of a fistfight. Lincoln and Roosevelt would be tag-teaming Reagan, Ike would be kicking Nixon from one side of the room to the other, and W would be trying to hide under the table with his father until Ford reached down and dragged him out to face the music.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:56 pm
FYGC! Why does Google hate America so much?
If I can’t read BG comments I have to get some work done, dammit.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:57 pm
Note that in Sample A, the only black dog is the Pullman porter. Which seems incidental only if you don’t know the history of Pullman porters and civil rights. Which casts a rather salacious light on the only female dog, also black and sporting a tidy ‘fro, in Sample B.
As far as the Issa painting:
1. Is that supposed to be Nixon on the right? Due to injuries suffered at the poker table during WWII, Nixon’s two expressions of geniality were the dead-eyed rictus and the shifty-eyed lip-stretch. Bob Dole can’t unclench his right hand; McCain can’t lift his arms up to his shoulders; Nixon couldn’t smile without looking like a grifter working a pigeon drop.
2. Ike deserves better than pleated Dockers hoisted halfway to his armpits.
3. They’re all laughing because W has just told a fart joke. You can tell because he’s lifted up one cheek as a visual aid.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:57 pm
Yep, that was the first thing I thought of when you described it, before I even scrolled down to see the images.
I agree that A seems like more of an influence, particularly because of the standing figures.
Is that actually Nixon on the right? Usually they try to pretend he didn’t exist.
Wise decision to show Lincoln from the back—it’s hard to imagine him in this scene at all, and certainly not with any expression other than disgust.
November 8th, 2010 at 10:58 pm
The Party of Lincoln is now all partying and no Lincoln.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:01 pm
And, fwiw, there is an obvious mistake in the paints, because fair-haired, lilly-white Jeebus isn’t anywhere to be found.
ETA: My theory on the lIncoln back-shot: they forgot him and had to add him at the last minute. There’s never a back-of-the-head shot in the other dog p0ker paintings.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:02 pm
Michelle Obama fed her family dead chickens and then used the bones for soup!
Wait – the chicken bones or her family’s bones?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:02 pm
@KG:
This one by the same artist is the same Republican Presidents playing pool. The painting of them playing cards hangs on the wall. This is also modeled on the tradition of dogs playing games in paintings. There is a tradition of dogs playing pool paintings. And golf.
I guess the artist have Democratic versions of the same, but I doubt that Henry Waxman has one on his wall.
Cheers
November 8th, 2010 at 11:02 pm
@Xecky Gilchrist:
See why we need an investigation. You could be on Issa’s staff with insights like that.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:04 pm
OT: Gotta say, Obama’s speech to the Indian parliament is great:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyo.....ybe-not%29
It’s been a while since I’ve felt that way about one of his speeches…maybe he shines when not dealing with Washington’s BS?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:04 pm
Dammit, moderation!
The part of the comment that got me into purgatory:
ETA: My theory on the lIncoln back-shot: they forgot him and had to add him at the last minute. There’s never a back-of-the-head shot in the other dog p0ker paintings.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:04 pm
@Xecky Gilchrist: That is one of the things to be investigated.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:04 pm
@JGabriel: No can do. I trashed it as soon as I got it. However, I am sure I will get another one from one Republican or another sooner rather than later. I will forward any particular batshitcrazy ones to a front-pager.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:06 pm
@Omnes Omnibus: That reminds me of a pipe I saw once in a tobacconist’s. It was carved with the face of John F. Kennedy, with the unfortunate result that if you actually used it, he would have a smoking hole in the back of his head.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:07 pm
@BR: fuck obama and his intellect, people want a fighter for president! that’s why I say we primary Obama with Chuck Norris.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:08 pm
I say bring it (the investigations). I’m sure they will impress out of work formerly-middle class people who voted for these assclowns.
I just has a sad because it looks like Michele Bachmann is being shoved aside for the #4 job in the House. I wanted all-circus all-the-time.
Oh, and I love the idea that the GOP ex-presidents are jowly, back-room dogs. It’s just so, y’know, not a leap what so ever. And it’s good that they can lick themselves, avoids “zipper problems.”
November 8th, 2010 at 11:14 pm
@Redshift: Unfortunate.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:14 pm
I want an investigation into how much this trip to India cost so we can make even MORE fun of the idiots at Fox News.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:14 pm
I take comfort in the fact that neither Teddy Roosevelt or Abraham Lincoln would piss on the modern Republican party if it was on fire.
Hell, any of the people featured in that painting would be drummed out of the modern Republican part as commies, soshulists, and sissy appeasers, among other things.
‘Cept maybe Bush the younger. He was a douchebag of the first order and spineless enough to pay lip service to any crazy idea if he thought he could fool the rubes. If it was an accurate picture representing the modern Republican party, it would just be Bush Junior playing with himself. (And maybe a fetus in a jar.)
November 8th, 2010 at 11:15 pm
@Mike Kay (Team America): No, Reagan is in there. There, on the left, with the blue shirt. Clearly this is pre-Iran-Contra crucifixion.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:15 pm
So it’s p0ker that’s the problem…
Nixon was in fact a legendary p0ker player when he was in the Pacific. Persistent rumors that his first House campaign was paid for from his p0ker winnings circulate to this day.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:17 pm
As to the
investigationswitchhunt, bloggers should start to weave a narrative that weakens and makes a mockery outta Issa. For example, when Hans Blix was conducting weapons inspections in Iraq back in early 2003, the wingers would refer to him as “Inspector Clouseau” and “Mr Magoo”This is the currency of politics, not policy and rationality, but rather, mud-fighting.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:19 pm
@Mike Kay (Team America):
At least you knew Nixon was intelligent… paranoid as all get out and spiteful to the nth degree… but intelligent.
And he did inherit that spectacular shit sandwich called “Viet Nam” from LBJ… but bombing Cambodia was his idea…
Started the EPA… reached out to China…
But there will always be “Watergate” attached to his name…
November 8th, 2010 at 11:19 pm
@Mike Kay (Team America):
You know, I just realized – drudge and fox and biggoverment will probably be running “breaking news” tomorrow taking something Obama says in Hindi in that speech and turn it into “Obama speaks in Muslin language to people in funny clothes”
November 8th, 2010 at 11:20 pm
@BR:
At least they’ll have learned something. The typical Fox viewer’s first response: “India has a language? I just thought they had a funny accent, like Apu.”
November 8th, 2010 at 11:24 pm
@RalfW: Your sad just gave me a happy. I don’t ever want to see Michele Bachmann again. Or, more to the point, hear her speak.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:25 pm
When Agnew died I was happy those two bastards would be united to play poker in Hell until the end of time.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:25 pm
@Davis X. Machina: It won’t stick.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:25 pm
They’re playing for the souls of union members.
“I’ll bet 5 Teamsters”
“Call”
November 8th, 2010 at 11:26 pm
@BR:
Just you wait til the Prez gets to Indonesia!
November 8th, 2010 at 11:27 pm
@Dennis G.:
Definitely Harding. He and his cronies had a weekly poker game where they divvied up and doled out the nation’s assets to the highest bidder. Teapot Dome, anyone?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:28 pm
@BR:
Obama speaks in Muslin?
Uh oh… it appears things just took a turn for the worsted…
November 8th, 2010 at 11:28 pm
As to the
investigationswitchhunt, bloggers should start to weave a narrative that weakens and makes a mockery outta Issa. For example, when Hans Blix was conducting weapons inspections in Iraq back in early 2003, the wingers would refer to him as “Inspector Clouseau” and “Mr Magoo”This is the currency of politics, not policy and rationality, but rather, mud-fighting.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:29 pm
The President’s town hall with Indian students is pretty good, too. Fascinating to see him answering (good!) questions from regular people outside the US because he can move a bit away from our rhetoric, for example on “jihad.”
Also, they ask him how to balance materialism and morality. That question will come up in one of our town halls any day now, I’m sure.
http://www.ndtv.com/video/play.....bai/174198
November 8th, 2010 at 11:29 pm
@The Republic of Stupidity: That felt forced.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:30 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
I’m looking foreward to her “Constitution Classes” for the incoming teatards. I do hope there’s video.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:30 pm
So the oldest president in the Democratic “Big Dawgs Playin Poker” picture is Andrew Jackson? Whassa matta Thomas Jefferson?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:30 pm
Seems I’ve got a comment awaiting moderation…Could it be because a certain POTUS shares a name with a vacuum cleaner manufacturer?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:33 pm
@Nellcote: OK. I would watch that for the high groan/snicker factor.
@Andy K: No. If, however, you happened to mention the game depicted in the paintings above, that would do it.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:34 pm
@Omnes Omnibus:
Is an apology in order?
It is a Monday… and a slow one at that…
November 8th, 2010 at 11:34 pm
I think Ike is telling them about that crazy lady who claimed she could identify Clinton’s tally wacker if she saw it in a line up. P-p-penis is so personal.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:36 pm
@The Republic of Stupidity: It felt forced.
Get it?
Sorry.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:36 pm
@Omnes Omnibus: Get it?
Sorry.
This blog hasn’t caught up to Teh Sadly for the pun threads yet. It’ll get there, I reckon.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:39 pm
Republican Presidents having a laugh, So I said to him “Barack, I know Abe Lincoln, and you ain’t him!” Painting by Andy Thomas. Has been on a local Conservative Radio sight for a couple years. Mike Rosen-850KOA.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:40 pm
@Dennis G.:
Don’t be harshing on my man Chester Alan. The man who pushed through the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act deserves some serious props. Can you imagine trying to run a vaguely modern government on the Spoils System?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:43 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
Well, duh…I should’ve known that.
BTW, re: Your one word statement of last evening…It also made me think of John Boorman’s great film Hope & Glory. Seen it?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:44 pm
Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. Moderation
of comments relating to Eisenhower’s expression in the face of demands for investigation deserve this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmHTcR2kHfY
November 8th, 2010 at 11:45 pm
@ricky:
Needed to get away? Tired of beating up on L&P and fiver?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:48 pm
This has probably already been stated by someone above, but no way in hell does Teddy Roosevelt sit down with those pansies. C’mon!
November 8th, 2010 at 11:49 pm
@Andy K: Um. No. I looked it up on IMDB, and I hesitate to think how it’s related to my comment (and did you see my follow-up to your follow-up?). You are actually going to Godwin a sex comment, aren’t you?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:50 pm
@JAHILL10:
With Ford and Ike, maybe, and Licoln, too, but not the rest of them.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:51 pm
@Dennis G.:
His works are beyond terrible.
There’s a Where’s Waldo thing going on in the Obama painting, and is central to the theme of the dead rock ‘n rollers as pirates. The problem I think is, even for celebrity goof art, the caricatures are so horribly bad…
November 8th, 2010 at 11:54 pm
I actually like the painting for the simple reason that it looks like all the other Presidents are playing against Lincoln.
The historical accuracy would be further enhanced if it depicted Ike stabbing Nixon in the face with a combat knife, and TR standing on the table, guns waving in the air, and doing his best Yosemite Sam impression.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:55 pm
@asiangrrlMN:
Heehee….No.
There’s a scene in there when 10-year old Boorman is adventuring through the bomb site in his neighborhood and runs into a ‘gang’ of kids his age. To join the gang he has to repeat the swears he knows. When he says “Fuck” the reaction from the other boys is just awesome, as if he’d uttered the single most powerful word in the world.
It’s a great film. See it if you get a chance.
And, yes, saw and replied to it. Your husband isn’t going to kill me, is he?
November 8th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
@Andy K:
Even a true cynic averts his eyes when he sees a grown up REAL progressive cry when he thinks Rachel Maddow has crossed over to the Dark Side.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:58 pm
@Andy K:
Seconded.
November 8th, 2010 at 11:59 pm
@Mike Kay (Team America):
You can track Issa’s movements here:
http://twitter.com/DarrellIssaGOP
November 9th, 2010 at 12:00 am
I guess I’m a cheeseball, because now I want the one with all the Dem presidents.
You’ve probably all seen the print of Edward Hopper’s “Nighthawks” with Marilyn, Elvis, and James Dean at the counter, but this diner in Tucson had a faded print of “Luncheon of The Boating Party” where all the people were pop-cult icons.
My mom and I had just gone to see the Phillips Collection here in Nashville, and we were squeeing. Mom went to American University and used to study at the Phillips. I think my love for that painting is genetic.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:00 am
Damn. I didn’t realize the Wings played tonight. I should have watched that.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:02 am
@Andy K: Ha! OK. Got it. Whew. I thought you were going to ruin one of my favorite activities for me.
Ooooh! The movie is streamable from Netflix. I will make a note of it.
@J. Michael Neal: I knew that. Hm. Maybe I should have told you? They played Phoenix, I believe.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:03 am
@ricky:
Okay, I missed something somewhere along the line, and I don’t think I want to go through the archives there to view the car wreck.
I seem to remember a time before that site was overrun by REAL progressives. I tend to shy away from linking this site over there for fear they’ll make me pull my hair out here, too.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:06 am
@josefina:
That was the style back then. Dockers are a slightly updated throwback—that’s the entire point.—I notice that in the Dem painting, Andrew Jackson (I suppose) also is painted with his back turned to the viewer. Is this some sort of reverential gesture? Does seating them that way make the paintings more esthetically consistent?
November 9th, 2010 at 12:07 am
@MattR:
Whenever I’m channel surfing and see it, I stop everything, say “Thank you, Adolph!” and watch it again.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:10 am
Well y’know there’s irreverence and then there’s irreverence. But mine is more educational. Neener.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:12 am
@Yutsano: You are a very strange man. It’s one reason I fake-married you! How you be, hon?
November 9th, 2010 at 12:14 am
@Yutsano: My brain hurts after watching that. I did not know that US forces played a leading role on the Somme.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:22 am
@asiangrrlMN: I still r all about our childrens learning and stuff. Turns out there’s a few Animaniacs sequences still used by instructors. The kids enjoy them and the info sticks, so I say go with it.
Monday is over, only working four days this week because of a wonderful quirk of being a Fed: I haz Thursday off. Don’t bother, you’re already overthinking it.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:23 am
@Andy K: I had my “Thank you Adolph” moment in 8th grade when I arrived at school one morning to find out that a fire had ravaged a good portion of the building.
For some reason, the fishing scene is always the first thing that pops into my head when I think of this movie.
@Yutsano: So it’s not for Veteran’s day?
November 9th, 2010 at 12:24 am
Lincoln just said something about white people soon becoming a minority. Everybody laughed and laughed and laughed. Lincoln’s so funny.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:26 am
@hamletta:
Cheeseball is a choice.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:27 am
@Roger Moore:
No, but Dubya (and Nixon, Reagan, Poppy… ) sure the heck could. Along with, unfortunately, Chief Justice Roberts.
As others have said, Nixon had a reputation as a poker shark, and so did Mr. Lincoln. I’m sure TR thought he was a fine player, but keeping his thoughts to himself was not among the gifts of Mr. “Hasten quickly over her, fellows!” Ditto Jerry, Ronny and Daddy Bush… the biggest marks are the guys who think they’re too crafty for the table, yes?
But the real problem with this portrait is that Ike would no more sit down for a “friendly game” with the Veep he despised than I would parade nekkid down Commonwealth Avenue in midwinter. Nor can I see the Bushes I and II sharing a table for more than one hand without a fistfight breaking out.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:28 am
@Yutsano: Veteran’s Day?
@wasabi gasp: I laughed and laughed and laughed at your comment. YOU are so funny.
@MattR: Damn. Beat me to it.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:31 am
@MattR: Coulda been. I’m not entirely certain of the exact air date, though it’s hard to imagine them being reverent about, well, anything.
@J. Michael Neal: The Somme was in 1915 I think, so no. It’s more just the idea of World War I. Wilson didn’t take us into it in 1913 either, so there is some poetic license there.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:33 am
@Yutsano:
Rarely is the question asked: is our children learning?
November 9th, 2010 at 12:34 am
@MattR:
There are so many scenes that come to mind when i think of that film: The German pilot, the runaway barrage balloon, drawing the stocking lines, the Googly, the jam….Everything in it is just so understated that I can understand why it isn’t as popular as it should be, but it’s truly a classic film. In that it’s it’s not as popular as it should be, it reminds me of Performance and The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:34 am
@Anne Laurie: Now that reminds me of the old adage about the game whose name moderation prevents me from speaking: “There’s a sucker at every table. If you can’t tell who it is, it’s you.”
In this group, I have no doubt it would be W.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:35 am
@MattR: Yes, indeed. Truly wonderful, and I can easily remember every scene that’s been mentioned.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:36 am
@Anne Laurie:
I don’t think so; they weren’t interested in running a vaguely modern government. The whole Conservative Movement is about dismantling modern government.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:37 am
What
A parlor painting without Dusty and the Duke……pfftttt…
November 9th, 2010 at 12:38 am
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well dang…
That one run right by me… :)
I hope that patches things up…
November 9th, 2010 at 12:42 am
@asiangrrlMN: Curtsies to you, m’dear.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:45 am
Reagan was a serial tax raiser, despite what the hagiographies say. Teddy Roosevelt was a progressive. Lincoln might have been gay, plus he
ended slaveryum, trampled on states rights, so he’d be out. The teatards never liked Daddy Bush or Ford, and they probably have good thoughts about Nixon but that’s because none of them know he created the EPA and expanded funding for the NEA. Yeah, whoever said the teahadi version of this painting would be GW playing with himself was right.November 9th, 2010 at 12:47 am
@Anne Laurie:
In my experience (having played full time for a while), not really. The biggest marks tend to be the guys who like to gamble and ignore the odds. They are the ones who love the action.
As for what would happen if these people were all actually in the room together… I’d guess the lot of them would spend most of their time picking on GWB, particularly Nixon for getting him off the hook as worst president ever.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:47 am
@fasteddie9318: nah, it’d be Bush playing heads up with Hoover.
November 9th, 2010 at 12:49 am
@fasteddie9318:
I was under the impression Nixon also dallied w/ the idea of a national healthcare system…
And as for Lincoln… he was a RAILROAD lawyer in the 1850’s and very much for the transcontinental railroad… and Abe apparently didn’t have much trouble w/ the fact that the US was gonna clip the Indians of everything they had once that railroad went coast to coast…
November 9th, 2010 at 12:58 am
@The Republic of Stupidity:
Which made him Wall Street, not Main Street, so no teahadi he.
Unless, of course, he claimed to be Main Street. Then he would be. Because he said so.
November 9th, 2010 at 1:02 am
Now that the election is over, all that is left is to argue about trash collection and discuss tacky art? This blog is going to hell.
November 9th, 2010 at 1:06 am
@Church Lady: 2012 election won’t start in earnest until January. Everybody needs a month or two off.
November 9th, 2010 at 1:09 am
@Andy K:
I’ve been reading “Nothing Like It In the World”, by S Ambrose… and it would seem that next to no one back then had any qualms whatsoever about the way the natives were being treated as the US reached out to grasp its manifest destiny… I guess you could say the endlessly rapacious behavior we see on Wall Street these days is just in the nation’s genes…
November 9th, 2010 at 1:12 am
I only wrote about half of today’s NaNo quota, but I kept nodding off at the keyboard. Stupid time change. I hate it very muchly.
November 9th, 2010 at 1:15 am
@Mnemosyne: Hey. You still have more than when you started, amirite?
November 9th, 2010 at 1:21 am
@The Republic of Stupidity:
Well of course they didn’t…Seriously.
That’s the way every non-agricultural, tribal society has been treated by agriculturists since the late neolithic age. Up until the 20th Century, that is. Agricultural society is like the Borg: Resistance is futile.
November 9th, 2010 at 1:22 am
@Andy K: Aha! So that’s why the farm belt states hate “rootless cosmopolitans.”
November 9th, 2010 at 1:27 am
@MikeJ:
Haha….No.
You don’t have urban industrial society as we know it without agriculture. Someone’s gotta feeds the city-folk.
November 9th, 2010 at 1:30 am
@MikeJ:
Daniel Quinn’s Ishmael
November 9th, 2010 at 1:42 am
@asiangrrlMN:
Methinks my spousalhood is rubbing off on you more than I thought. Since when have you been such a bloody optimist?
November 9th, 2010 at 1:53 am
Watching the Daily Show… Rick Perry has been on the show for thirty seconds, I already can’t fucking stand him.
November 9th, 2010 at 2:17 am
@KG:
But THAT hair…
(The Republican version of Blago…)
November 9th, 2010 at 2:24 am
Why does the painting not have the ghostly form of the World Trade Center towers in the background out the window, with an eagle circling over it, preferably crying?
November 9th, 2010 at 2:28 am
Also, Fuck off & die, Arizona!
Better dead than red, though in the red is okay. And I guess you sick and old shits best save up whatever money in the couch you can scrounge so that you can make it until your care provider has a sale, ‘cause ain’t no hand-tying government gonna help you out.
Vote the wind, get the fucking whirlwind, mother fuckers. Making it so the AHCCCS is his intention, not some unintended consequence.*
*”Unintended consequence” is one of phrases used to described the logical outcomes of some powerful figure’s decisions in such a way as to prevent any thought that that powerful person could, in any way, have had any ill on his or her mind. No, whatever harm occurred had to be unintentional, because there’s no videotape yet of him swearing on a Satanic bible into a videocamera that yes, indeed, conscious evil was intended.
November 9th, 2010 at 2:36 am
@El Cid: Um, your link comes right back to this comment thread.
November 9th, 2010 at 2:49 am
@Amir_Khalid: We call that link no work. He fix.
November 9th, 2010 at 2:53 am
O/T, but I just saw this over at HuffPo…
WTF?
‘Drawing up an incentive package?’
What is this… free agency?
If the GOOPers throw in a couple of hot call girls, some cowhide luggage, and a new Cadillac, will they have a deal?
Sweet Hay-zuz… ANYTHING for control… absolutely NO frickin’ idea how to straighten out the horrific mess they created, but foamin’-at-the-mouth rabid to be back in control…
November 9th, 2010 at 2:54 am
@Amir_Khalid: A-HA! You fell for my clever trap.
Opposing Health Funding For A Million Arizonans, Pearce Compares Health Care To High-Priced Fashion Items
November 9th, 2010 at 2:59 am
@El Cid:
So what’s the over/under on white child/white grandparent deaths before Arizonans storm the government with recall petitions and pitchforks?
November 9th, 2010 at 3:05 am
@Andy K: Angry whites would commence immediate organizing to kill Mexicans and scream at Democratic politicians to stop all the soshullized Obamacare which they were told was at fault.
Remember, the real killer of our children is the deficit, which is why it’s never a good time to let taxes on the super-rich go back up to normal.
November 9th, 2010 at 3:23 am
@El Cid:
Since we’re talking about the super-rich here, let’s put some numbers w/ that, for clarity’s sake…
• The top 400 U.S. individual taxpayers got 1.59% of the nation’s household income in 2007 — 3X the p% they got in the 1990s.
• The top 400 paid 2.05% of all individual income taxes in 2007.
• Only 220 of the top 400 were in the top marginal tax bracket.
• Average tax rate of the 400 = 16.6% — the lowest since the IRS began tracking the 400 in 1992.
• Minimum annual income to make the top 400 = $138.8 million.
• Top 400 reported $137.9 billion in income; they paid $22.9 billion in federal income taxes.
• 81.3% of income was from capital gains, dividends or interest. Salaries and wages? Just 6.5%.
• The top 400 list changes from year to year: 1992-2007, it contained 3,472 different taxpayers (out of a maximum 6400).
One thing not mentioned in that list… the top 400 AVERAGED $345MM in 2007…
It’s always good to make sure folks really know what you’re getting at…
November 9th, 2010 at 3:35 am
@Church Lady:
What, you’re afraid of being reassigned to some dreary interweb hellhold like FreeRepublikaaner if there’s no potentially subversive material being front-paged here? Don’t they teach you guys anything about provocateuring anymore ? Be proactive! Find some ridiculous bit of security theatre or globalist paranoia for us to mock, if you want to be secure in your current sinecure!
November 9th, 2010 at 3:38 am
@The Republic of Stupidity: Those points do help us understand the suffering of the extremely rich by a predacious government intent on punishing them for their success. How can a billionaire survive if it’s occasionally necessary to pay several tens of thousands of dollars in taxes? Especially when your own President criticizes you just for using your financial know-how to gamble your way into a multi-trillion dollar collapse of the American economy? Life is truly unfair.
November 9th, 2010 at 3:46 am
@El Cid: This is why I fake-married you! (That and the unlimited supply of Ommunis™ ).
@Yutsano: When I am rooting on others to succeed. Then I can be an optimist with the best of them.
@Anne Laurie: AL, I think I love you. This comment of yours is awesome sauce—especially the inclusion of the word ‘sinecure’.
November 9th, 2010 at 4:26 am
Aw, damn. I hit the dreaded dead zone. Phooey.
November 9th, 2010 at 4:35 am
Hello?
November 9th, 2010 at 5:26 am
I saw this image awhile back, and decided to modify it to better represent the actual relationship between the modern Republican party and its roots: http://doctorpsycho1960.blogsp.....aying.html
November 9th, 2010 at 7:30 am
@The Republic of Stupidity:
One should treat headlines from HufPo with caution and not buy into any story there until it is verified by credible sources.
Of course the folks in the Republican Party are trying to find some Dems to flip. It has always been so since Strom Thurmond led the Dixiecrats out of one party and into the other.
November 9th, 2010 at 7:41 am
Don’t you love to eat dead chickens on a Sunday afternoon?
Corhusker Refugee , Austin Lounge Lizards
November 9th, 2010 at 8:05 am
Ah, more Republican overreach. If I knew how to set up a Web site, I’d start a counting meter of instances of Republican overreach, like the St. Petersburg Times did with Obama’s campaign promises. In just one week, they’re off to a flying start.
However, this may, at long last, prove to be the end of Issa. (Am I correct in remembering his public tearing up, in the tradition of Boehner?)
November 9th, 2010 at 8:34 am
I know Teddy Roosevelt was a politician but I have a hard time believing he would sit down at a table with Ronald Reagen and GW Bush and not ending up beating them up.
November 9th, 2010 at 8:49 am
@Michael:
Ha! Instead of happy little trees, it’s happy little Republicans.
November 9th, 2010 at 8:57 am
My great aunt had pictures of Reagan and GWB prominently featured on her living room walls, along with a picture of Jesus. She was an uber-Baptist, so my dad asked her one time if she was concerned that elevating mere men to the same status as Jesus might be considered idolatry, a ‘sin’ for sure. She got a little flustered, but then decided it was okay because she only prayed to one of them (we didn’t ask which one).
November 9th, 2010 at 10:56 am
@JGabriel: In heaven, FDR isn’t confined to a wheelchair. Almost made me
weepgag.November 9th, 2010 at 12:03 pm