Nothing to say really, just snapped this picture as I was walking into the living room and thought it was funny:
That is all.
by John Cole| 87 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
Nothing to say really, just snapped this picture as I was walking into the living room and thought it was funny:
That is all.
by Dennis G.| 41 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads, Assholes, Our Failed Media Experiment
The Daily Beast/Newsweek mash-up is an odd entity. It is overly needy, self-important and a bit dull. It is the latest media effort to try and capture “clicks” to capture ad revenue. How one gets the clicks is not nearly as important as getting them and this click mania is well on the way to destroying any integrity left in our modern media (USA Today is even investigating paying writers a “click” bonus). There are other new media and old media efforts playing the same game and trying to “win” using the same business model in one way or another. Perhaps one of them will sort it all out and move us more quickly to complete Idiocracy.
Like all the rest, the DB/N hybrid has assembled their own gaggle of “stars” to be their voice on the political issues of the day. The range of that list moves between the predictable and the boring and features “stars” as varied as Jonathan Alter, Howard Kurtz, Tina Brown and some other folks who seem to be Tina’s cocktail party pals (like the DC consultant taking time away from her website claiming to be “The Modern Girls Guide to Leaders of the Free World” to Mad Lib her own word string version of the always repetitive “how Obama failed Liberals this week” column). And of course we all know by now that this media borg want-a-be is the new home of Andrew Sullivan.
The DB/N Borg Lite also gives space to the concern trolling of Mark McKinnon, the co-inventor of George W. Bush and the man who still markets Bush and his policies to America. In his latest re-invention, McKinnon presents himself as the last reasonable guy still standing up as a trusted voice for sanity in American politics. To that end he is a “Founding Leader” of the deceptive and pro-wingnutopia “No Labels” bamboozlement. And so naturally Mark is shocked, just shocked that President Obama said mean things about Paul Ryan’s plan to end Medicaid, Medicare and dismantle any social safety net (while transferring even more money to the top 1%).
In the pursuit of clicks (which you can give her by clicking here), Tina gives McKinnon space to express his sadness. Mark tells us how Ryan is brave and Obama is just playing politics–concerned only with the next election and ways to win by demagoguing the courageous Republicans into submission. Not surprisingly McKinnon’s main point is that saying mean things about Republicans will hurt America and as proof the Ad Man offers this bit of revisionist history:
The previous occupant of the Oval Office was willing to lead with bold new ideas for Social Security reform. He knew it wouldn’t be popular. He knew it would be demagogued by his opponents. But he also understood the moral compact we have made as nation—for the welfare of our parents and for our future grandchildren as well. President Bush knew it was the right thing to do regardless of the political consequences. Thanks to the distortion of the debate, I doubt that 10 percent of Americans actually understood that the program proposed by Bush was entirely voluntary. Let me repeat, if anyone didn’t want to control and invest in their own accounts rather than have the government do it for them, they could maintain their Social Security accounts exactly as they had been. So, if you didn’t like the idea of “privatizing” your Social Security—meaning investing some of your own money rather letting the government do it for you, you didn’t have to.
With Mark McKinnon the marketing of old lies never ends. Not since Lee Atwater has there been an image maker leaving so much slime on American politics. McKinnon will always be an ass and a liar regardless of what radical Galtian nonsense he is selling and whatever “reasonable” flavor of candy coating he chooses to wrap around his latest turdball of wisdom.
With my mini-rant done, let’s have this be an Open Thread.
Cheers
Open Thread: Another liar finds his media borg…Post + Comments (41)
This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Open Threads, Republican Stupidity, Assholes, Good News For Conservatives
New York has added a new consumer-assistance feature, “This Week in Fake Presidential Candidates“:
Hey, did you hear who’s maybe running for president? Everyone. At least that’s what seemingly each and every Republican politician wants us to think these days. And why not? Just say you’re “thinking about it” or “keeping your options open,” and the media will suddenly lavish attention on you as if you really matter. But not everybody does. Each Friday until the primaries truly begin, we’ll look at which of these prospective candidates are more likely or less likely to actually enter the race, along with a prediction of the likelihood that they throw their hat into the ring. Excluded from this rigorous scientific analysis: any candidate we’re pretty sure is definitely going to run — guys like Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, and libertarian former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson, who will reportedly announce next week…
NYMag found no fewer than 15 — fifteen! — attention-seekers nodding & flashing ankles, or other body parts, for the delight of the Media Village courtiers. David Plouffe sleeps soundly this weekend.
For the delight of the rest of us cynics, TPM reports that one of those fifteen, Rick ‘Obscene Neologism’ Santorum, has already had to back hastily away from a campaign slogan stolen ‘inadvertently copied by an anonymous low-level staffer‘ from a pro-union poem by famous gay African-American socialist poet Langston Hughes. (Which was also used by John Kerry during his presidential campaign, for added cluelessness.)
Open Thread: An Embarrassment of RichiesPost + Comments (46)
This post is in: C.R.E.A.M., Food, Decline and Fall, Ever Get The Feeling You've Been Cheated?
Remember the story earlier this week about Big Agribusiness trying to make it a crime “to produce, distribute or possess photos and video taken without permission at an agricultural facility”? Another manure-caked workboot just dropped (into the industrial hamburger grinder):
Half the meat and poultry sold in the supermarket may be tainted with the staph germ, a new report suggests. The new estimate is based on just 136 samples of beef, chicken, pork and turkey purchased from grocery stores in Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., Flagstaff, Ariz. and Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
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Proper cooking kills the germs, and federal health officials estimate staph accounts for less than 3 percent of foodborne illnesses, far less than more common bugs like salmonella and E. coli.
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The new study found more than half the samples contained Staphylococcus aureus, a bacteria that can make people sick. Worse, half of those contaminated samples had a form of staph that’s resistant to at least three kinds of antibiotics.
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“This study shows that much of our meat and poultry is contaminated with multidrug-resistant staph,” Paul Keim, one of the study’s authors, said in a statement. “Now we need to determine what this means in terms of risk to the consumer.”
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Keim and his co-authors work at the nonprofit Translational Genomics Research Institute in Arizona. Their study is to be published in the journal Clinical infectious Diseases, an institute spokesman said.
Hope that wasn’t a rare burger you just ate, folks…
Staphylococcus aureus: It’s What’s for Dinner!Post + Comments (81)
This post is in: Open Threads
No matter how shitty my day is, I have found that spending fifteen minutes under the comforter with the pooches makes things better. Provided Rosie will stop moving long enough to let me relax.
It has been raining all day, which means it has been an ordeal to get Lily to go outside. Rosie is raring to go, but I have to pick Lily up and throw her in the wet grass, and even then she looks like she is being abused.
Was reading an article earlier, I forget what, and it had the word “hermeneutics.” Here is a brief list of words which, every time I read them, my eyes glaze over:
hermeneutics
dialectical
fiduciary
patriarchy
post-structuralism
I’m sure there are more, and you might have some, as well, but these were ones I thought of right now.
This post is in: Post-racial America, Assholes, Teabagger Stupidity
The Weekly has obtained a copy of an email sent to fellow conservatives this week by Marilyn Davenport, a Southern California Tea Party activist and member of the central committee of the Orange County Republican Party.
Under the words, “Now you know why no birth certificate,” there’s an Obama family portrait showing them as apes.
(Donald Trump must be elated to finally have an explanation about Obama’s true birth circumstances.)
Here’s the image attached to the email:
Reached by telephone and asked if she thought the email was appropriate, Davenport said, “Oh, come on! Everybody who knows me knows that I am not a racist. It was a joke. I have friends who are black. Besides, I only sent it to a few people–mostly people I didn’t think would be upset by it.”
Really, I think I said it best with “asshole.” This must be part of that whole affirmative action baby/black privilege Mickey Kaus was talking about.
I’m Not a Racist, I Just Send Racist EmailsPost + Comments (172)
This post is in: Bleg, Music, Open Threads, WTF?
Update: If folks would post links to online versions of their suggestions as available, we’d have a pretty good afternoon concert going, don’t you think?
Bleg first…gotta sing for your supper, folks, more or less literally.
Here’s the story: I received a note from my younger brother today, another one of my siblings with all the musical talent I lack.* His mid-life crisis is manifesting itself:
I’ve just started playing keyboard with a rock band through Bandworks (they put together bands, help them practice for 8 weeks and set up a chance to perform for friends).
All well and good. But there is already trouble in paradise:
<div align=”center”><iframe title=”YouTube video player” width=”480″ height=”390″ src=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/Xlf5ucFanpY” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe></div>
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The coordinator for our group had already selected several songs with good guitar and percussion but not great keyboard parts (at least not in their original version), and, they also all seem to have uninteresting melodies– designed for people with a vocal range of about three notes.
My bro voiced his desire for something a little meatier in the keyboard department than “When the Weight Comes Down,” and maybe with a tune a former SF Boys Chorister would enjoy singing.
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My first idea was an old, old favorite, from the irreplaceable and much missed Warren Zevon:
<div align=”center”><iframe title=”YouTube video player” width=”480″ height=”390″ src=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/44Rwu5yPUrc” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe></div>
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But then I thought, what are the intertubes for?
So what say you: give me your poor, your lonely, your rock or rock-ish tunes, good piano/keyboard part, something happening in the melody, yearning to be covered by middle aged guys in Berkeley, CA.
But, “Hey!” I hear you say. What about that reward?