Blah blah blah. I don’t have anything to say, which is probably good, because no doubt it would be divisive and bring down the quality of the rhetoric in the blogosphere.
Open Thread
This post is in: Open Threads
This post is in: Open Threads
Blah blah blah. I don’t have anything to say, which is probably good, because no doubt it would be divisive and bring down the quality of the rhetoric in the blogosphere.
Comments are closed.
Uloborus
You’re so negative.
General Stuck
Nothing wrong with divisiveness, so long as we all do it together.
We are about to get hammered with an huge snow blizzard. 5 to 10 inches of snow with 60 mile an hour wind. Not much different than when I froze my ass off in Bozeman Mt, for two winters.
Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people)
Looks like Haley Barbour has agreed to release the Scott sisters sentenced to life in prison for their part in an $11 armed robbery that occurred when they were teenagers. On the condition that one donates her kidney to the other (she had already volunteered to do this). After his pardon and release of murderers who just happened to work in the governors mansion and his misstatements about the Citizens Council, I guess Barbour felt the need to do something positive.
J. Michael Neal
Eddie is feeling better. I think the diarrhea was caused by the clavamox. The vet said that we’ll just go without an antibiotic for the moment. I gave him a smaller water bowl, so hopefully he won’t drench his face as much.
jeffreyw
Thread needs more sammich.
Mike Kay (True Grit)
Palin’s approval rating plunges to 33% in her home state of Alaska.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_12/027293.php
Sadly, I don’t think Palin will run for the presidency.
stuckinred
My Illini are on the verge of beating Baylor in the Texas Bowl!
CircleSquared
The car died, the oven quit, and there seems to be a new wobble in part of the floor. Bad things happen in threes, so I’m good for a while, I think. Grateful to be home and dry, not flooded out.
Maude
@J. Michael Neal:
Eddie is a trooper.
I am so glad. Bring in the new year with him.
@General Stuck:
Keep it there.
Or, if you are going to send it to NJ, give me fair warning so I can Photoshop a pair of mouse ears on Gov. CHristie.
(For those who don’t know, Chrisite beat the storm Sunday by going to Disney in Florida.)
J. Michael Neal
A couple of interesting articles about people that can usually get a good argument going here.
Jeffrey Goldberg worrying about the end of Israeli democracy.
Julian Assange appears to have done major damage to the prospect of democracy in Zimbabwe when he released the diplomatic cables.
D-Chance.
It is a seriously slow day when Cole’s time-filler is to troll the Sully Sub Squad…
Meg
@J. Michael Neal
My cat also had some bad reaction to clavamox.
She was vomiting so bad that she puked bloody stuff in the end. Then right after the vet discontinued her clavamox, she became all fine.
Ross Hershberger
Good day, then bad at the end. Management leaves workers to fend for themselves for 2 days, providing their own supplies and equipment and running the project on their own. Then after many hours of labor, at the LAST MINUTE management steps in to dictate new goals and require untested methods to ‘do it right’.
Some days I don’t know why I go the extra mile for this work. If you never do anything you’ll never be told you did it wrong.
FML.
MattR
@Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people): The reason for Barbour’s decision was in the Yahoo article.
WereBear
@J. Michael Neal: Oh, dear Eddie! Poor little guy. Glad to hear.
I’ve been experimenting with eggnog. Am I going to have to separate the eggs and beat them separately, and all that? Because my homemade “quick nogs” just don’t have that taste.
Or is that taste artificial and the real thing is not going to taste that way?
Ross Hershberger
@Mike Kay (True Grit):
I’m still holding out hope for the 3rd party option. Seeing LaSarah Nadering the GOP from the right would go a long way toward making up for the 2000 fiasco.
kdaug
@General Stuck: Did a dig-out stint in Billings when I was a kid.
Never feels as cold as it is when you’re young.
stuckinred
@CircleSquared: Down to seeds and stems again too?
maye
Palin will run, and she will win the Iowa Caucuses. After that she’ll sputter and crash, but it will provide enough free media to sell two more books and three more reality show spinoffs……..
Sarah knows marketing.
Cat Lady
@maye:
fixeteth. Also, too.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@J. Michael Neal:
.
.
I don’t understand why a lying politician should bear any responsibility at all for his duplicitous statements. If only lying politicians could lie without being exposed – surely that is the One True Path to Democracy.
.
.
MissusB
@General Stuck:we must be neighbors. Your weather forecast is the same as mine. Western ‘burbs of Denver.
Ross Hershberger
I’m hoping that Sarah will see all of the attention shifting to other people as the primary campaigns ramp up, and will be too greedy for exposure to resist mounting a campaign. She’s motivated by two related things: money and exposure. I just can’t see her sitting on the sidelines while all that free press goes to lesser people.
paradox
I have been writing well, my last two essays at The Great Orange Satan were well-received. I don’t know why, really, I’m as twisted as I’ve ever been and I still puke like clockwork.
[sigh] Perhaps it is waiting and thinking more (even though I am a spit-out first draft essayist I write it in my head before I start, there are elements in slots in my head waiting to be used too). Perhaps some clicks of peace are finally ratcheting down in the great fuckin’ scheme of things, you know? Maybe.
I have a short story in my head to tap out…I dunno, I get the feeling it’s absurd lately to spend the next 40 years writing political essays, surely my soul and toolbox is not meant for that shit, even though with practice I’m pretty good at it. I dunno.
I age, but I feel precisely the same elements with the same forces I always did, my face is just more lined. It’s interesting.
Well, I have babbled long enough, I suppose I feel the need to talk. Be well, John Cole, master of pixels, arbiter of snark, comedic custodian, lover of vast prowess, may all the atoms of the universe align for your good fortune in 2011.
stuckinred
Oskeewow!
General Stuck
@MissusB:
It’s a big storm And i am quite south of you, about 100 miles west of Las Cruces, nm, called Silver City NM,
Anne Laurie
@J. Michael Neal: Good news. Clavamox is notorious for destroying the good intestinal flora — as I can attest from intimate personal experience. If Eddie feels better off it, that’s probably the most important thing for you two at this point.
Joseph Nobles
@MattR: Ah, come on, what do you expect? It’s not like Barbour had a tunnel project he could ax!
Uloborus
@maye: and @Cat Lady:
Never fall for the lie that you have to be smart to be a grifter. Palin knows how to hog the spotlight and has a sharp focus on getting the most immediate reward for the least work. After that, she has no other demonstrated skills or intelligence. Remember, she’s rich because these things were *given* to her by people who think she’s a useful stooge. Bush doesn’t have to be brilliant to be rich, either. Luck will do it quite nicely.
I really am personally hoping her wealth is going to be quite temporary. Grifters are notoriously poor at long-term investment, she’s vain as a pig from Wasilla, and her history suggests her attention span and planning skills are close to nonexistent. How long she’ll stay afloat after the wealthy conservatives don’t need her? That’s not at all clear.
stuckinred
@Anne Laurie: My doggie opthamologist stopped using it.
me
@J. Michael Neal: It may have been a mistake to release that cable but there is no doubt in my mind that if not the cable Mugabe would have found another reason to denounce Tsvangirai. That leak almost certainly changed nothing.
stuckinred
@Uloborus: Yea, Cusack was no mensa in the movie.
Anne Laurie
@Ross Hershberger: __
Self-respect is a heavy load. On the other hand, when you look at the people who’ve abandoned theirs (and there are so many of them, especially in management positions), shouldering that burden seems the lesser evil.
JGabriel
Mike Kay (True Grit):
Palin will spend the next 8-10 months maintaining her base in the far right, then she’ll start speaking more moderately late in the year as the election year spotlight increases.
It’ll work too, because people in the middle have the political attention span of a two year old.
That’s IF Palin thinks Obama is beatable. Palin is stupid, but she can read the political weather vanes, and she may decide to wait until 2016 if she thinks Obama has it locked up for 2012.
.
Linda Featheringill
@CircleSquared:
Hope this is the end of your collection of troubles.
Mnemosyne
@J. Michael Neal:
I have the same reaction to a lot of antibiotics. Sorry, was that TMI? ;-)
We just had a fun little power outage in my neighborhood, but I’m back on line now. G is going to stop at Target and finally buy that emergency lamp we’ve been talking about so we don’t have to rely on a Maglite if things drag on.
John W.
I think we can all agree that the blogosphere would be better off if Cole were dead.
Tunch, Rosie, and Lily? Not so much, I imagine.
Linda Featheringill
@Ross Hershberger:
That really seems counterproductive.
Hang in there. When I strike it rich, I’ll hire you. :-)
Cat Lady
@Uloborus:
She’s dumb but canny. Her only appeal is her sex appeal, and that window is closing and she knows it. This is her time, and after 2012, she’s going to end up like Janice Dickinson. She’ll be on Celebrity Rehab or Biggest Loser with Willow or Bristol. Also.
Anne Laurie
@stuckinred: My dentist gave it to me because I can’t take penicillin. I was forewarned (previous experience with pets), but even the acidophilous tablets didn’t help much. I had the advantage of knowing what was going on — and that it was only a five-day prescription.
Southern Beale
@CircleSquared:
Be grateful it wasn’t your HVAC. Ours conked out and that was an unexpected $4,000 down the tubes….
dr. bloor
@me:
This. That article was a tad….shall we say, overwrought? The notion that Robert Mugabe and his army were going to have a group Come to Jesus moment and agree to real reforms in the absence of that cable is a bit naive, to state it generously.
stuckinred
@Anne Laurie: I’m glad you are ok.
WereBear
@Anne Laurie: In that case, Eddie could benefit from a pinch of acidopholous (the human kind from the health food store) in his food to help his new flora.
It’s done good things for my 13 year old cat.
Linda Featheringill
@J. Michael Neal:
Zimbabwe has more problems than Assange could arrange, even if he tried. It may be true that Zimbabwe has more problems than the entire US State Department can fix.
Anne Laurie
@Mnemosyne: __
Target sells cute little Coleman lanterns for $10 – $12. They keep a battery charge well, and are convenient to carry from room to room. We have one by each external door and one in the bedroom, for just such emergencies. (This is an old industrial town, and the power lines are susceptible to winds, rains, snowstorms, and errant racoons. On the other hand, praise goddess, living at the end of a long string of industrial parks means that power gets restored promptly!)
Mark S.
How is running 50 yards along the goal line not considered taunting?
Uloborus
@Cat Lady:
I agree with all of that. I admit I don’t usually think about her looks first in explaining anything about her, even though I should. It’s just that personally I consider her to be a leather-faced harridan I would push out of the hammock while screaming. If she’s realized her looks are failing, and she almost certainly has, she’s also going to get progressively less rational and more unnecessarily hateful, isn’t she?
General Stuck
@J. Michael Neal:
Assange made big big booboo messing with the worlds diplomatic community. He is now a man without a planet.
susan
MissusB
I’m in the Southern ‘burbs of Denver, and today we watered our lawn, trees and shrubs.
The rose bushes have been putting out new leaves.
Tomorrow snow…or so we’re told. At the moment, I am skeptical.
Cat Lady
@Uloborus:
When the starbursts are gone, what’s left? Her sparkling intellect?
Left Coast Tom
@JGabriel: “Exploring a run for President” is an excuse to raise funds from rubes – Gingrich does it in pretty much every election, I have full confidence that Palin will likewise exploit the rubes. She needs clothes that won’t buy themselves. Actually running for President is work…the only reason I hesitate to say she won’t start such a run (I’m confident she won’t successfully finish it) is because I suspect her cluelessness may extend farther than I imagine.
Ross Hershberger
@Linda Featheringill:
Thx. When you strike it rich you’ll definitely need a mainframe programmer, a machinist, a tech writer and electromechanical technician of your own. That’ll be me.
After working for a number of employers I’ve determined that most staffs break down like this:
20% look for what needs to be done and do it.
60% do what they’re told with varying degrees of success
20% avoid doing anything and are basically dead wood
I’m fine with that as long as I resist the urge to kick the dead wood out of my way when I need to get things moving.
dr. bloor
@General Stuck:
Nothing Ford Prefect can’t take care of.
Anne Laurie
@stuckinred: Nah, this was months ago, a “prophylactic” prescription after getting two new crowns, one crown replacement, and a double-sided filling replaced all in an afternoon. The damage to the credit card, now that really hurt!
Suck It Up!
Check out the bull on Wall Street. No not that bull, the other one:
http://money.cnn.com/2010/12/27/news/economy/crocheted_bull/index.htm?hpt=C2
stuckinred
@Left Coast Tom: “cluelessness may extend farther than I imagine. ”
Nah
SiubhanDuinne
@maye #19:
*Sarah knows marketing*
I dunno. The guy who’s subbing for Rachel (I don’t know who he is) interviewed someone from the Mudflats blog a little while ago, and she (the Mudflats person) told him (the Rachel sub) that her (Sarah’s) approval ratings in Alaska are down to about 33%, and that Costco is returning pallets of her (Sarah’s) new book to the publisher because it’s (the book) not selling, and that recently at a book signing the bookstore had put aside 1000 wrist bands for people who bought the book and wanted Sarah to autograph it, but they only managed to part with 300 wrist bands.
General Stuck
@dr. bloor:
The Galaxy is a big place
Chuck Butcher
@susan:
Sloppy snow fall turning ice as the sun descends. Pretty typical late Dec here. Hard to tell how much snow is actually on the ground since most of the snow fall has happened at above freezing and depth depends on how much sun got to it.
lamh32
Watching a rebroadcast of “Mythbusters” dedicated to “duct tape” myths. One of the myths involved a bridge made of duct tape, that crosses 175 ft across a “cavern” and has a 50 ft drop!!!! The main guys are walking across the bridge one at a time while attached a harness that will stop their possible 50ft drop.
Just watching it, my stomach is in knots. You’d think I was the one doing the walking!
God damn this guys and their “experiments”
Ross Hershberger
@JGabriel:
You’re assuming that she intends ever to hold office again, which I consider unproved. Being an also-ran and a celebrity is easier and pays better. Ask O’Donnell (though the FEC is looking into her campaign paying her townhouse rent).
Amir_Khalid
Brick Oven Bill made a lengthy reply to my two-sentence comment in a thread on neo-birthers. Shudder.
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: She’s still killin these dopes in Georgia, there are plenty of marks out there.
JGabriel
Cat Lady, Uloborus: I think you’re underestimating Palin’s level of self-delusion. Palin undoubtedly knows her appearance is a factor in her popularity and manipulates it to her advantage, but she also believes that it’s first and foremost her politics that people vote for.
Palin really and truly believes she’s a political and governing savant, mark my words.
.
Uloborus
@Left Coast Tom:
Let me point out that she’s FANTASTICALLY vain. It is the keystone of any Mean Girl. She really, honestly thinks she is The Shit and deserves absolutely anything she could possibly desire. I don’t think that guarantees she’ll run for president, because there’s going to be who knows what all craziness running around behind the scenes from the wealthy conservatives trying to manipulate her. But it does mean she wants to run.
EDIT @JGabriel:
I don’t disagree! It’s part of the vanity. But she’s been actively using her appearance as her best weapon all her life. Whether or not she thinks she’s totally the greatest person in every other way, she’s going to start freaking out as she thinks she’s losing her looks. It’s just… how these things happen with shallow, manipulative… Mean Girls.
Anne Laurie
@Ross Hershberger: __
In my experience, the worst situation is where the “dead wood” is forced by unforeseen circumstances to attempt to do something. Some people are quite correct in assuming that their greatest possible contribution is to sit on their hands and not get in the way…
SiubhanDuinne
My transmission spewed fluid all over the driveway/parking lot this morning. Fortunately, it’s under warranty so won’t cost me anything to get it repaired (and the dealer gave me a nifty Bright! Red! Truck! as a loaner — but man, you should see the puddle of transmission fluid in front of my apartment, it looks like someone was stabbed multiple times and then dragged very incompetently across the asphalt.
Mnemosyne
@Suck It Up!:
Knitting is not crochet! The artist even says it’s crochet! STOP CALLING IT KNITTING YOU IDIOT REPORTER!! GAAAAHHHH!!
Yes, it’s a stupid pet peeve, but it drives me up the wall that people somehow think that knitting and crochet are interchangeable when the final product doesn’t even look the same.
burnspbesq
Speaking of overwrought …
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=5967015
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: Kitty litter.
sashal
quality of the blogosphere?
yep, it will go down big time, as long as you and your co-bloggers stop posting
lamh32
@lamh32:
they are gonna give me a panic attack one of these days.
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: A buddy of mine over here invented this Eco Mat for just such a situation.
Mnemosyne
@Anne Laurie:
I think those are the ones he was looking at on the Target website. We really should have at least one or two since we’re in earthquake country, but we just haven’t gotten around to it yet.
Suck It Up!
@Mnemosyne:
forgive them. its cable news after all.
JGabriel
@Ross Hershberger:
Not just any office: the Presidency. Palin wants to be president, because it offers entré to lifelong six and seven figure speaking engagements.
Sure, Palin already gets 5-6 figures for a speaking engagement now, but she knows that will diminish over time unless she burnishes her credentials with high-level office. Being a former VP nominee is usually only good for 4 years of celebrity.
.
J. Michael Neal
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
Um, yeah. Clearly, complete honesty is the proper approach for politicians who face the very real possibility of execution for publicly advocating the proper policies.
Clown.
As for everyone insisting that Mugabe would have just found another way to eliminate Tsvangirai, maybe. Maybe not. The opposition has scored some victories after the last couple of years, such as getting him into the Prime Ministership in the first place.
Further, some other method would likely have had a higher cost. The real damage of this is that it actually does discredit the opposition. For reasons that I think are perfectly understandable, the sanctions are unpopular in Zimbabwe, even though they are the right policy. Tsvangirai is now associated with them. That hurts.
Suck It Up!
didn’t you hear her tell barbara walters that she could beat obama in 2012?
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/tvblog/2010/11/sarah-palin-thinks-she-could-b.html
personally I think she said it to get the left riled up but with her ego she just might believe she can.
stuckinred
@Suck It Up!: She’s got someone telling her what to do.
cat48
Obama just recess appointed several appointees who had holds. This should ignite a sh*t storm. A Deputy AG & the rest are Diplomats who were held up for various complaints.
SiubhanDuinne
@stuckinred #64: Oh, no question, and I don’t mean to suggest that the Palin phenomenon is over — far from it. I work with people who think Sarah’s shit don’t stink and who will enthusiastically vote for her in 2012 if she makes it to Super Tuesday. But it does look as though the bloom is off the rose, at least in her home state. And that fact alone, that she’s managed to misread Alaskans (real Murricans) makes me wonder about her marketing chops.
Left Coast Tom
@Uloborus: I think Palin and Gingrich have a lot more in common than Gingrich would ever choose to admit. For one thing, I disagree with comments ascribing brilliant tactical abilities to Gingrich, certainly “shutting down the government” was tactical rather than strategic, and it was disastrous for him. For another, he’s similarly very full of himself, and in every election claims to be “exploring a run” which somehow never materializes, and yet the exploration proves lucrative. Then, 4 years later, the same thing happens, exploiting the same rubes, with the same result. Palin was a student in one of Gingrich’s so-called GOP training classes in the late 1990s. I think she may have learned something other than the oft-reported chimpanzee imitations.
sb
@General Stuck: You are in Silver City, NM? I did a double take reading that.
I used to work there 25 years ago or so. It’s rare to find someone who even knows where it is. Good luck with the storm, GS.
Mnemosyne
There’s one thing all of you keep forgetting about Sarah Palin:
She is too fucking lazy to make it through an entire campaign for president.
Even if she announces that she’s going to run, she will drop out well before Super Tuesday, and probably even before New Hampshire, because campaigning is hard work. She barely got through the 2008 campaign and (a) she was on the bottom of the ticket and (b) she only had to do it for six weeks or so.
And the Bush comparison doesn’t work because W loved campaigning. It’s probably the only thing the man is actually good at.
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: I think she just saw greener pastures and knew that the frozen rubes were not that important in the overall scheme of her scheme. That pisses them off but doesn’t matter much.
General Stuck
@cat48:
The deputy AG recess is going to make the wingnuts head explode. He is the guy who oversees FISA warrants, I think, and the wingers witholding his confirmation was causing all sorts of headaches for Holder, who was having to do his job and the job of the vacant DAG spot. Holder was reported to be burning out fast with the situation, and could well have been the wingnut plan.
stuckinred
@General Stuck: Wait till he veto’s their health care attacks!
General Stuck
@sb:
Thanks, I pulled out my woolies, and the space heater. It will be the wind that will bite.
General Stuck
@stuckinred:
It’s going to be a wild ride, especially the next six months or so.
Ross Hershberger
@JGabriel:
I’ll allow that her greed and attention-whoring might push her that far, but it will be a while before we know.
Since she’s not a REAL GOP insider I don’t expect the powers that be to allow her an actual shot at winning. She’s always good for some extra press for the Republicans but they know a loose cannon when they see one.
She’s probably no brighter than Dubya, whose shortcomings I think we’ve exhaustively detailed. But Dubya was useful because he was too lazy to act on his own. A perfect puppet for Cheney and Rove. Sarah may just have too much of an independent streak to be useful to them in that capacity.
SiubhanDuinne
@stuckinred #71: Yeah, that’s what the tow truck guy said, too. But there’s a part of me that likes the idea of having my parking area look like a drive-by stabbing crime scene :-)
Suck It Up!
oh man, tv won’t suck tonight. three Alec Guiness movies in a row tonight
stuckinred
@Ross Hershberger: He also had a pretty strong legacy goin on. She didn’t go to no Ivy League.
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: Till you bust your ass.
stuckinred
@Suck It Up!: The Comedians?
SiubhanDuinne
@stuckinred #74: Cool invention!
General Stuck
I wouldn’t classify Sarah Palin as a mean girl, but more like carnivorous.
Ross Hershberger
@stuckinred:
I’m sure it was on her list but she burned out after only 5 schools.
Quitter.
Mark S.
@Mnemosyne:
I agree. From what I’ve read about her stint as governor, she seems to have ADD. Aides say after five minutes she’d be in la-la land, and nothing was going to get done.
General Stuck
@efgoldman:
About 70 miles from the Mexican border
SiubhanDuinne
@General Stuck #99: Are those mutually exclusive?
ETA: I can haz picture of Charlie?
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: Yea, he’s a Nam vet who was a mechanic with a shop called Honest Engine! He’s been working with Dr. Samantha B. Joye, the UGA Marine Biologist who did important work on the oil spill.
Mike Kay (True Grit)
@Mnemosyne:
That’s because a rally is like being a cheerleader. and he famously was a high school cheerleader at andover.
http://www.google.com/images?q=bush+cheerleader&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi&biw=1024&bih=578
MissusB
@Susuan#50-I think this one’s for real. Might be too cold for 10 inches of snow but I think the sub-zero temps are coming.
Uloborus
@Ross Hershberger:
Much will depend on the Teabaggers. They’ll probably quiet down, now. Maybe. But the Smoke Filled Room Boys were very, very displeased with many of the Teabag candidates. They got a fat majority in the House, but didn’t take the Senate – and by all historical measures should have swept both. They don’t vote where they’re told in primaries, and Sarah’s virtue to the old guard is that she *seems* to have *some* control over that clown car.
The Republic of Stupidity
@Ross Hershberger:
I think your numbers are off a bit…
Try these…
10% who can actually get something done
20% smart enough to follow those who know what they’re doing
70% absolutely worthless or so close to it as to be indistinguishable from the genuine article
SiubhanDuinne
@stuckinred #105: “Honest Engine,” LOL!! Very clever name.
BTW, I keep forgetting to ask: how are your pups after their expensive adventure with the chocolate-covered raisins?
Mnemosyne
I’ve been idly watching the TCM “Moguls and Movie Stars” series and, while some aspects of it bug the crap out of me (like the implication that the studios voluntarily adopted the Hays Code instead of being forced into it under threat of government censorship), there are also some bits that tell me things I didn’t know. Like the fact that James Cagney was fluent in Yiddish and would sometimes spring his ability on movie executives who thought they were having a private conversation during negotiations.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
Writer’s block, thy name is me.
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: Just fine and I got a $325 check from Bohdi’s policy today so it only cost $900.
thx
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
Oh hey, John Cole! I’ll ask you the question that DougJ tried to answer in the last Open Thread:
Question about the Amazon link:
Does Amazon throw a few pennies your way if I just click through to the site via BJ (as I did today, to get a link to a book) or only when I spend money there?
DougJ’s answer was “I think so.” But you probably know!
General Stuck
Gonna watch a new NF movie called Welcome to Sarajevo . It’s got Woody Harrelson so gotta be decent.
Ross Hershberger
@efgoldman:
It must come with the promotion, this need to interfere destructively. This manager has an MBA, has been a close friend for years, generally leaves me alone and trusts my judgement. Unless I want to spend a lot of money.
I know what I have to do, but it just GALLS ME to carry a project on my own sole efforts, then hand over the results to uninvolved parties at the end. When I bust my can, I want the credit, dammit.
Speaking of credit, I think we can thank Sarah for emboldening those on the Right of lesser intellect to run for office. The quality of candidates for the GOP has been significantly diluted by the rush of low-IQ ‘real people’ like O’Donnell running for office.
The more people seek to follow her example and rise from humble beginnings into high office the less control the GOP bigwigs have. I’d call that a positive outcome of the Palin/TP phenomenon.
ETA: What Uloborus said also too.
Joey Maloney
@Uloborus: Oh man, oh man, if I could just live long enough to see one of those “where are they now” stories – like they do about once-famous boxers who squandered their wealth and ended up living in abject squalor, impoverished and anonymous and above all ignored – about Sarah Palin? If I could live long enough to see that, I could die happy.
The Republic of Stupidity
@stuckinred:
This could be one of the more entertaining circuses in American politics we’ll ever see… for the 1st 2 yrs of Obama’s presidency the Repubs were stuck playing defense, and they were tenacious… and now, for the first time, they’ve got the ball and get to go on the offensive…
This could be spectacular… or at least quite the spectacle…
stuckinred
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: Nice piece from a local blogger on choosing Amazon.
Each dollar is a vote–how will you decide?
SiubhanDuinne
@stuckinred: glad dogs are doing well. As for kittylittering the spill, I hadn’t actually thought of the safety hazard. I’ll see if this is something the apartment complex will do; if not, I’ll buy some litter or FlorSweep and sop it up. Thanks.
stuckinred
@The Republic of Stupidity: Maybe he’s been saving up his chips to make them look as bad as possible as 2012 approaches?
stuckinred
@SiubhanDuinne: At Bill and Walt’s Texaco on Roosevelt Road we used to have this stuff that looked like the material that came out of a pencil sharpener.
(in 1965)
Uloborus
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther:
Inspiration must be fed, Ella. Go forth: Watch a movie, read a book, listen to music – whatever feeds you creatively, gorge yourself on it. Preferably something fresh and new. Eat and eat and eat until you collapse in a bloated torpor watching the little lights go off in your head.
@Joey Maloney:
I’d say it’s a damn near certain bet. She’s not even predictable enough a parrot to be worth ongoing wingnut welfare. When her looks go and her base abandons her, she’s out – if she lasts that long. And then we get to see how well she can manage money. Although there’s decent odds we’ll find THAT out beforehand when she gets caught doing money laundering or cheating on taxes or something. Look, there are many ways this can end, and none of them are pleasant. The bad news is, the most likely ones require at least a decade.
cckids
@Left Coast Tom:
“Oh, I don’t know. I can imagine quite a lot.”
freelancer (itouch)
@General Stuck:
You should check out Exit through the Gift Shop. Completely fascinating stuff.
The Republic of Stupidity
@stuckinred:
If he has been doing that, he’s smarter than I would have imagined, which is always a possibility…
And if he, and we, think the attacks have been nasty up until now… Haaaaaaaah!
Perhaps once he realizes they really do want his privates mounted on a plaque, we’ll finally see just how dirty he can fight after all…
Ross Hershberger
@freelancer (itouch):
Awesome movie, and funny as hell. I’m a Banksy fan and this movie completely delivered what it promised.
cckids
@SiubhanDuinne: Agreed. She will always have her “base” of deluded souls who love her–I mean really, NEWT has those who think he is a brilliant historian & politician. But on the whole, the more America sees & gets to know her, the less people like her. The reality show, if done for further political gain, was a huge mistake. If only for financial gain, a plus for her.
General Stuck
@freelancer (itouch):
I will
thanks
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@Uloborus: I thank you for the suggestion! But it seems that just writing “Writers block thy name is me” did it. I’m now writing an entirely unsubstantial post, but at least I’m writing something. One cannot slay dragons every day.
Ross Hershberger
@Uloborus:
Well, what do over the hill politicians usually do? Lobbying? A position at a think tank? Consulting? I don’t think she’s cut out for any of that. I don’t think she’s cut out for anything. I mean, what has she succeeded at for more than 24 months in her life?
Uloborus
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther:
A random comic book character once said ‘They can’t all be gems.’ I don’t pass up wisdom wherever I find it, and that’s damn near my motto. No matter how smart you are, how smooth you are, how creative you are, how graceful you are, how skilled and practiced you are, sometimes you will open your soul and all that will come out is ‘DERP’.
freelancer (itouch)
Annoying the Holy Living Fuck out of me. She’s been tops at that task for 28 months and counting
Ross Hershberger
@freelancer (itouch):
And having babies, but I think she’s aged out of that now that she’s a granny.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@Uloborus: HA! Ain’t that the damn truth.
Derp, indeed.
JGabriel
@Left Coast Tom:
Gingrich is the former Speaker of the House, third in line to the Presidency. He’s already got a permanent place in history to market his speaking fees.
Palin, who isn’t even the first female VP nominee, has much less basis to justify her fees long-term. But, even if she loses, being The First Female Candidate for President from a Major Party would justify her speaking fees for the rest of her life.
By her standards, Palin needs that.
.
JBerardi
@cckids:
Rule #1 of life: everything happens for a financial reason.
If that rule EVER fails you, I’ll tell you the second one. I doubt that’ll happen, though.
Ross Hershberger
@JGabriel:
I think her viability as a candidate depends a lot on whether the Tea Parties hang together for the next 2 years or not. It’s a new ‘movement’ and could easily fade back into the GOP mainstream, taking her electoral chances with it.
I can’t believe this thread has gone on so long without a picture of a cat.
Here’s one from my favorite tech blog, with instructions on how to make a feline TRON outfit.
JGabriel
@Ross Hershberger:
Hell, I think even Dubya has about 10-25 IQ points over Palin. Palin might have cannier political instincts, though. After all, Palin didn’t have the kind of family wealth and connections to fall back on that Dubya enjoyed.
.
Suck It Up!
@stuckinred:
Man In the White Suit, The Lady Killers and Kind Hearts and Coronets.
Montysano
@Southern Beale:
Ours is likely to be on its last legs. My goal for next winter: when someone says “Crank up the heat”, it will mean carrying more firewood into the house. I’ve had it with complexity; it’s killing me/us.
JGabriel
Ross Hershberger:
Perhaps. I think they’ll still be there, whether or not they’re still calling themselves the Tea Party or the Silent Majority. Palin will still know how to appeal to their petty resentments and bigotry, and motivate them to vote for her.
Palin is Nixon with tits for brains.
.
Left Coast Tom
@JGabriel: Dennis Hastert has the same ‘place in history’ as Newtie, yet nobody wants to hear him speak…it’s possible the ‘place in history’ is a necessary but not sufficient condition for such marketing, but then Palin’s 15 minutes of fame don’t seem set to expire anytime soon (they should have expired sometime in the second week of November, 2008). I’m not entirely clear what justifies these fees in either case.
Ross Hershberger
@JGabriel:
When people talked about Dubya’s intelligence they’d start out with “Well, there are different kinds of intelligence…”
Meaning “Yeah, he’s stupid, but…”
There may be different kinds of intelligence but there’s one kind of dumb and he was it.
Reagan was no Einstein either, but he was an insider, which counts or counted for a lot in the GOP.
SiubhanDuinne
@cckids: You had asked the other day about “The King’s Speech.” Count me among those who thinks it’s an extraordinarily well-done, moving film. I would, and will, cheerfully see it again. It was surprisingly funny in places, but never EVER made fun at the expense of the very real challenge of a painful speech impediment. The humour was more aimed at the rigid class and caste distinctions of the place and era.
I don’t know your son’s particular circumstances, obviously. One thing I do know is that the screenwriter himself suffered from a debilitating stammer as a child, and found personal inspiration in George VI’s story. It is not a “cure” per se, but it is a way of coping and coming to terms with stammering/stuttering, and of using the martial arts trick of turning perceived weaknesses into strengths, such as using stammers — where the words simply can’t be forced out — and turning them into dramatic pauses that work as rhetorical effects.
The acting is superb, from the three main stars to the brilliant supporting players to the most minor roles. Michael Gambon as George V. Anthony Andrews (remember him as Sebastian Flyte?) as PM Stanley Baldwin. Claire Bloom as Queen Mary. Derek Jacobi as the Archbishop of Canterbury. And on and on. Every part just wonderfully cast.
If you have concerns as to how your son would react, you could do worse than see it on your own and then make the call. Personally I think it would be fine, but I’m certainly not going to prescribe for someone I don’t know. The early stammering scenes are not easy to watch for anyone — you’re just curdled with sympathy and vicarious anguish — but I would hope your son would find the inspiring parts particularly motivating.
fasteddie9318
Happy New Year to everyone, and fuck Tucker Carlson for making me like Michael Vick just a little bit:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/video/item/tucker-carlson-says-michael-vick-should-be-executed
SiubhanDuinne
@Ross Hershberger #131: Hahahahahahahaha!! You said “think tank” in a post about Sarah Palin!! ROFLMAO!!
Fax Paladin
@efgoldman: 5 to 10 inches makes it relatively minor in terms of snowfall, but I think 60 mph winds qualify it for “blizzard.”
SiubhanDuinne
@Thread: On a somewhat serious (but not at all sombre) note, may I ask anyone who feels so inclined to spare a kind thought for my brother, who’s having bladder cancer surgery first thing tomorrow morning. He’s feeling very upbeat and optimistic, but I always figure a few additional doses of white light couldn’t hurt. There’s a lot of good news: they caught it early, and it seems the tumour has not penetrated the bladder wall, so excision should be straightforward.
Thanks, Juicers.
FlipYrWhig
What about Palin vs. Lisa Murkowski, mano a mano, in 6 years? Or Palin vs. Begich? Senators don’t seem to have to do much. At least not the Republicans. I mean, how long has Mike Crapo been a Senator, or Mike Enzi, or Thad Cochran, without ever having done jack squat? Jim Bunning and Jim Inhofe… they’re just crazy people with weird pet causes. Palin could do that easily.
suzanne
@SiubhanDuinne: You and your brother are in my thoughts. I’m sure all will be well.
@J. Michael Neal: Good to hear about Eddie! He sounds tough.
Mark S.
@SiubhanDuinne:
Best of luck for your brother.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@Uloborus: Ok! I’ve written something. Such as it is: http://emilylhauserinmyhead.wordpress.com/2010/12/29/the-assistants-i-need/
Me complaining that I don’t have someone to tell me where my groceries are in the pantry. And like that.
It ain’t rocket science, or Front Page material (thanks again, mistermix!), today kids.
de stijl
@SiubhanDuinne:
May the universe be as indifferent to your brother as it is to the rest of us weird little apes cavorting about on an insignificant rock in a third-rate galaxy.
Bon chance!
de stijl
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther:
Writer’s block, thy name is … awww, crap!
J. Michael Neal
@SiubhanDuinne: I’m wishing him luck.
cay
There’s a reason I visit this blog daily, and it’s not b/c you blah blah blah; that is what Sullivan and his minions do (even though I read it and find their opinions fascinating and strange). I like reading Balloon Juice b/c it rings true. Not to get into conserv/lib/whatev views. In short, Sullivan is afraid of death and you are not. J-C FTW!
Mnemosyne
Welp, I’m probably done for the night here because the power has gone out twice more since G got home. Fortunately he stopped at Target on the way home and got us a lantern, but we’re probably just going to go to bed and hope it’s all done by morning.
I think it’s high winds knocking the power out, because I can hear all kinds of things rattling around. Not good after we just had a bunch of rain.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@J. Michael Kneel:
.
.
Um, yeah. It’s balloonbaggers like you, who wish to be lied to – and who actually advocate that anyone and everyone be lied to as a matter of expedient political policy – who are actively undermining democracy both in the U.S. and everywhere else. You are part of the problem.
Clown. (Oooh, did that hurt your feelings? So cutting, wasn’t it?)
As an advocate of lying, I can’t trust what you say, but as an advocate of honesty you can be sure I’m not lying to you.
.
.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@de stijl: Ha! I didn’t so much LOL as actually snorted.
THE
@SiubhanDuinne:
Times like these remind us how dependent we are on the power of science and reason, to protect us in an often-hostile universe.
My hope then is for the skill of the surgeons, and the efficacy of the technology that will sustain your brother.
May the path that leads us to enlightenment also lead to your brother’s fullest recovery.
Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther
@SiubhanDuinne: Oh, honey. Good luck to him, and I hope you sleep well tonight in anticipation!
J. Michael Neal
@Uncle Clarence Thomas: Okay, you’re in favor of getting democracy advocates in tyrannical regimes executed. Good for you. I’m going to dissent on that one. It’s one thing to demand that US politicians always be honest. It’s a completely different thing to demand the same thing of those in Zimbabwe, Burma, or a number of other countries. In those countries, they really are under the threat of death.
Personally, I’m opposed to the idea of making it easier for dictators to control their populations, but I guess your mileage varies.
Faith
@J. Michael Neal:
Clavamox is hard on their stomachs.
Faith
@SiubhanDuinne: Sending healing energy to your brother and your entire family.
Anne Laurie
@SiubhanDuinne: Good news is good news! I’ll keep your brother, and his family, in my positive thoughts.
asiangrrlMN
@Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: So you gave it to ME? Thanks. Thanks a lot.
@SiubhanDuinne: Good luck to your brother, SiubhanDuinne. Many positive thoughts whizzing his way.
Yutsano
@SiubhanDuinne: Pacem a tei. I bet he does just fine. The news sounds positive though.
@asiangrrlMN: Hi hon. Kinda got in late cause had to take care of a few things. Thinking I might bag the trip home and be a hermit for three days. Or go out for New Years with my lesbyterian co-worker and her fiancee.
asiangrrlMN
@Yutsano: Both sound like good ideas. Me, I’m moping.
@Yutsano: Cool. You should go. That would be fun. And, yes. Yes. Ugh.
Yutsano
@asiangrrlMN: Did I mention she’s also a lawyer who used to be in the Air Force? And obsessed with Krispy Kreme doughnuts.
‘If the mope is for the reasons I speculate, then I should just let you get on with it. Believe it or not it’s part of the process.
SiubhanDuinne
Thanks to everyone for their god wishes for my brother. I’m grateful. (Sorry, I fell sound asleep right after hitting “send” and just woke up!)
bago
@Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people): Pound of flesh indeed.
Uloborus
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
No. Actually, we can’t. The one person you can trust least is the guy who tells you he’s completely honest. Often he even believes it’s true, which is the sad part!
JPL
@SiubhanDuinne: Your brother is in my thoughts. I’m glad they caught it early and hopefully he’ll be up and about soon.
WereBear
@SiubhanDuinne: It sounds like there is good cause for optimism. White light on its way to him.