From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Oh! More Things I Know:
The problem with the modern Republican party is it no longer knows the difference between real conservatism and just being a dick.
The Netroots Nation convention in San Jose starts in 125 days. The Forward on Climate Rally in Washington, D.C. starts in 2.
Marco Rubio's water grab is only slightly less embarrassing than the time when Richard Nixon lunged for a pastrami sandwich during his Checkers speech.
Tip for writers: save money by hiring
an editor who works for bananas.
I picked up a prescription med for our dog Molly yesterday. On the label it says: "Do not operate machinery." Poor thing. She loves her forklift.
Whenever I feel despondent, I remind myself that the CPAC convention is coming up next month. It makes me smile. Then laugh. Then cackle.
When they hold the election to pick a new pope, the black cardinals will be forced to wait in line for eight hours. The white cardinals: ten minutes.
If Obama isn't really from Kenya, then he needs to release the photos of him not really being from Kenya!
If you take every other word Glenn Beck says, and combine it with every other word Kim Jong-un says, you'll wind up with a complete transcript of a Wayne LaPierre speech.
For future blizzard preparedness, take it from me: your emergency supplies of nachos and cheese will be depleted at twice the rate you think they will.
The first alien visitors will interpret our farts as high-level trade agreements, and they'll have trouble understanding why we propose them so often.
Downton Abbey SPOILER ALERT: Austerity measures imposed on the commoners save the aristocracy at the last second. Whew!!!
Your west coast-friendly edition of Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Friday, February 15, 2013
Note: I I I I I I (If you have a Doric column, leave a Doric column. If you need a Doric column, take a Doric column.)
-
By the Numbers:
Days 'til spring: 33
Days 'til the Hawaii Chocolate Festival in Honolulu: 8
Speed at which a cough throws out saliva particles: 50mph
Speed at which a sneeze throws out saliva particles: 100mph
(Source: TIME)
Average price for an ounce of breast milk at a U.S. hospital: $4.00
(Source: Harper's Index)
Time it takes a star-nosed mole to swallow a mouthful of earthworm: 0.23 seconds
Time it takes a Dittohead to swallow a mouthful of Rush Limbaugh's bullshit: 0.22 seconds
-
Puppy Pic of the Day: Meet the truffle hunters.
-
CHEERS to Senator No-nonsense. First the banksters ignored Elizabeth Warren's prospects of winning a senate seat. Then they laughed at Elizabeth Warren's prospects of winning a senate seat. Then they viciously fought on behalf of Scott Brown to ensure that Elizabeth Warren didn’t win a Senate seat. Then Elizabeth Warren won a Senate seat. And now she's kicking federal regulators in the seat of the pants to go after the banksters:
Seat-of-pants kicker.
"Anyone else want to tell me the last time you took a Wall Street Bank to trial? I just want to note on this, there are District Attorneys and U.S. Attorneys who are out there every day squeezing ordinary citizens on sometimes very thin grounds and taking them to trial in order to make an example as they put it.
I am really concerned that Too Big to Fail has become too big for trial! That just seems wrong to me."
And now the banksters haz a sad. I do love happy endings.
JEERS to space oddities. The good news: the asteroid missed us. The bad news: the meteor didn't. By my calculation that's a 50% strike rate. And in other news, today's best-performing stock was Titanium Parasols 'Я' Us.
P.S. In other space news, the American Mars rover Curiosity spent time last Friday drilling in a rock. Dick Cheney heard "American" and "drilling in Iraq" and spent the rest the day sticking nitroglycerin tablets under his tongue.
"Gentlemen you can't fight in
here! This is the war room!"
JEERS to incivility. On this date in 1798, the House of Representatives was the site of the
first congressional brawl, when much knocking of noggins occurred after the hurling of insults followed by Rep. Matthew Lyon spitting in Roger Griswold’s face. Then…
"He in a trice struck Lyon thrice
Upon his head, enrag'd sir,
Who seiz'd the tongs to ease his wrongs,
And Griswold thus engag'd, sir."
Yes---fireplace tongs were a weapon of choice. Shortly after, the chamber voted unanimously to start calling sessions to order by just banging a gavel on a desk instead.
-
-
Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda… GONG!!!
This is another edition of The One Word Answer Man. Meteor Blades asks: Aren't 80 years of the Redskin slur enough?
Yes.
Now back to Cheers and Jeers.
Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda… GONG!!!
-
-
JEERS to being dead in the water. After losing power and being cast adrift, a big rudderless white behemoth became a stinky, noisy mess full of angry people. The best idea they could come up with was to let someone else save them from their own hell by literally dragging them back to civilization. But enough about the Republican party. Anyone know what happened to that carnival cruise ship?
CHEERS to the world's most famous Bug. It sucks that such an enduring icon has to be associated with a genocidal maniac, but what can ya do? It was 77 years ago today that Adolf Hitler announced the introduction of the Volkswagen (German for "Grind it 'til ya find it"). It was small and noisy, but if its battery died you could roll it down the street to get it goin' again. Or as my friends call it: me after the bars close on Saturday night.
Finally on DVD
CHEERS to home vegetation. Here’s some of the haps on the teevee this weekend, starting with tonight's edition of HBO's
Real Time, where Bill Maher gets into a heated (we presume) discussion with the brother of Trayvon Martin's killer, and also airs out the SOTU with Joel McHale, Donna Brazile, Jon Meacham, and the Daily Caller's Jamie Weinstein. New DVD releases include the James Bond mega-hit
Skyfall (Agh! Now I can't get that Adele song outta my head!) and the Frank-and-Robot bank robbing flick
Robot & Frank. Christoph Waltz hosts SNL, and all I can say is the cast better damn well make comedy hay out of Marco Rubio's desperate water lunge. On
60 Minutes: Israel's "Iron Dome" and Maggie Smith aka Britain's "Iron Dame."
On Bill Moyers & Company (link): Dan Cantor of New York’s Working Families Party and Jonathan Soros of the Roosevelt Institute on the influence of money in politics. Don’t forget to spend a few minutes with the best weekend morning shows, Up! With Chris Hayes and Melissa Harris-Perry. And here's your Sunday morning lineup. See if you can tell who the White House is rolling out for his national howdya'do:
Meet the Press: Obama's new White House chief of staff Denis McDonough; Gabby Giffords' husband Mark Kelly on guns; roundtable with Carly Fiorina, Chris Matthews, Gavin Newsom and Alex Castellanos.
Ready for his Sunday
morning close-up.
This Week: Obama's new White House chief of staff Denis McDonough; Newt Gingrich; roundtable with the usual gaggle of chronic Ben-Gay users.
Face the Nation: Obama's new White House chief of staff Denis McDonough; Cardinal Donald Wuerl on Pope-a-palooza; Haley Barbour and his performing jowls; Cory Booker yells, "Nyah Nyah Nyah! I told ya Frank Lautenberg was retiring! You can just call me Future Senator Superman Booker."
CNN's State of the Union: Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and John Barrasso (R-WY) debate why Republicans have turned into such dickheads; Sen. Jack Reed (D-RI) and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) on the next Republican-created budget crisis; roundtable with Former GOP Rep. Steven LaTourette, former Biden chief of staff Ron Klain, Jeff Zeleny (NYT) and Dana Bash (CNN).
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: A tremendously fair and balanced lineup with Senator Lindsay Graham (R-Fussyville) on why Obama sucks and Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) on why Obama sucks; plus roundtable with Karl Rove, Kimberly Strassel, Juan Williams and Bob Woodward.
Happy McDonoughing! Er, I mean…viewing.
-
Five years ago in C&J: February 15, 2008
JEERS to home-grown terrorism. Jesus, another fucking school shooting...this time at Northern Illinois University by a former student whose brain went Zzzzt! when he stopped taking his meds. Six dead, over a dozen wounded. Our thoughts go out to the families, friends, faculty and students. And a word to any right-winger who's thinking of dredging up the argument that this might not've happened if the students were allowed to carry weapons on campus: Don’t. Just... Don't.
-
And just one more…
Let's do it again (in this century)!!!
CHEERS to a sure sign of spring. Pardon my French, but fuck the groundhog. (Oops…I think I just made Rick Santorum faint.) I feel warmer already, just knowing that the full-squad workouts for the Boston Red Sox
started today:
What will [new manager John] Farrell be looking to get across? "Just setting out my expectations---our expectations as a staff," Farrell said. "Obviously some basic rules will be discussed and expectations of Spring Training. The more they can understand what we're looking for, it takes away some of that initial wondering."
And, if I understand the rules of baseball correctly, I believe what we're looking for is what's popularly known as stomping the other teams into the dirt on our way to the World Series. And to answer your question: yes, I write jokes for a living.
Have a great weekend. Keep an eye out Sunday for the big Forward on Climate Change rally in D.C.---I think it's gonna be YOOJ, baby, YOOJ! Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
-