From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE
Maybe this week…
…we won’t hear any stories about a child shooting another child.
…Republicans won't blow any racist dog whistles.
…the late-night hosts will undergo brain-banding surgery to spare us any more Chris Christie stomach-banding jokes.
…none of our troops will get killed in Afghanistan as they have virtually every week for the last 11 years.
...our federal, state, and local governments will hire some people.
…the Supreme Court will release early unanimous decisions on Prop. 8 and DOMA with six words: "Fuck 'em. Set the date, lovebirds."
…the Red Sox will pull out of their tailspin.
…a fine will be levied on a big bank that will actually make me go, "Whoa."
…kos will finally release the kraken.
…ellipses will make a comeback.
That'd be nice.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, May 13, 2013
Note: It's random drug test day. If your last name begins with B, D, F, J, L, N, P, R, S, X or Y, please pee onto your keypad. Then turn yourself in to the police because anyone who pees on their keypad must be high. ---Your friends at D.A.R.E.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til the start of the Memorial Day weekend: 11
Days 'til the World Championship Old Time Piano contest in Peoria: 10 (via Kossack mrpiano)
Average number of new jobs expected to be created per month according to a USA Today survey of 37 economists: 171,000
Average number that would be created without the sequester in place: 190,000
Percent of Americans who don't like their first name: 13%
Rank of "difficult to say or spell" among reasons people dislike their name: #1
(Source: Ipsos survey)
The last year America experienced so few tornadoes in a 12-month period before the May 2012 to May2013 period: 1954
(Source: national Severe Storms Laboratory)
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NEW! California Dreamin'
Brought to you by the 2013 Netroots Nation Convention in San Jose, June 20-23. Law and order---not to mention streets and sewers---in San Jose are maintained by the mighty structure known as…City Freakin' Hall.
City Hall of San Jose at 200 East Santa Clara Street is the center of the government of the city of San Jose, California. The building was designed by Richard Meier, and opened to the public on 15 October 2005, replacing the former City Hall complex civic center located on North First Street, which was used from 1958 until 2005. … The architectural style is most influenced by that of Le Corbusier. The $382 million facility has been somewhat controversial, however the building was designed to be environmentally friendly, making use of natural light, and providing shading with a "bris soleil" on the tower.
Needless to say, the tower isn't on the must-see list of Jewish baby boys.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Thug attacks!
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Today the Senate votes and
then it goes to Gov. Dayton.
CHEERS to #12. Today Minnesota's state senate
votes on the gay-marriage bill that the House approved late last week. Breathing down their neck will be Governor Mark Dayton, who plans to sign it into law before the ink is dry. Once that happens, Minnesota (pop. 5,344,861, with 5,344,862 on the way any second now…
Push! Breathe! Push!…it's a girl!!!), will join its midwestern neighbor Iowa and 10 other states in the marriage-equality Hall of Fame. C&J gives a special shoutout to the Minnesota Kossacks who helped make it happen, along with your elected representatives who did something that unequivocally qualifies as courageous. On deck for the next round: Illinois, Oregon and maybe New Jersey…plus a couple Supreme Court rulings in about a month that'll, at minimum, restore gay-marriage rights to California. Not quite time for the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) to move to their bunker yet, but they should probably start packing their bloomers.
JEERS to The United States of Carnage. I heard about the 19 people who got shot and wounded in New Orleans yesterday. And I got to thinking: maybe we should do something about gun violence in this country. Crazy, I know.
CHEERS to justice served up with a side of booyeah! Well, at least someone knows a thing or two about closure. One year ago, one country stood up to the architects of the Iraq war and pronounced them "Guilty!"
I live for the day...
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FORMER US President George W. Bush and seven key members of his team have been found guilty of war crimes by a tribunal in Malaysia. Bush, his Vice-President Dick Cheney, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and five of their legal advisers were tried in their absence and convicted on Friday. Victims of torture told a panel of five judges in Kuala Lumpur of their suffering at the hands of US soldiers and contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Transcripts of the hearing will be sent to the chief prosecutor at the International Criminal Court, the United Nations and the Security Council.
Sadly, no one has been able to lure any of them to Malaysia so they can be arrested. If we can get 'em to hold still long enough, I recommend we dismantle their cellular structure and send it to a 3D printer in a 4-by-8 cell in Kuala Lumpur. Get on it, MIT!
CHEERS to knowing your 1-2-3s. Congratulations are in order this morning for eight-grader Alec Sun of Jonas Clarke Middle School in Lexington Massachusetts, won the National Math Competition by…
…answering in less than 45 seconds what the greatest integer is that must be a factor of the sum of any four consecutive positive odd integers. He correctly answered eight. Sun won an $8,000 college scholarship and a trip to U.S. Space Camp in Huntsville, Alabama.
To this day, if you ever want to see me pass out cold, just walk up behind me and yell, "SHOW YOUR WORK!!!" The neighborhood kids call it 'Billy tipping.'
CHEERS to the Holy Grail of philately. On May 13, 1918, the first 24-cent stamps featuring the Curtiss Jenny biplane---the aircraft chosen to inaugurate the U.S.'s new air mail service---reached post offices. Collectors heard that some of the stamps could be rare "inverts," so they fanned out to find them. Some were successful in locating one of these:
Today the stamps are worth approximately one bazillion dollars. Or, put another way, slightly less than a year of Goldman Sachs bonuses.
JEERS to taxation with oversnoopification. The IRS Commissioner's term is six years, so President Obama was stuck with Douglas Shulman for his entire first term until last November. Now that the IRS is under investigation for allegedly singling out tea party-affiliated groups for scrutiny, it's worth reminding ourselves that IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman was a George W. Bush appointee. Might come in handy as we try to answer the question: was he that devious…or that dumb?
CHEERS to Republican Presidents with a conscience. 105 years ago today, Teddy Roosevelt spoke at the Governor's Conference on the Conservation of Natural Resources: "The natural resources of our country are in danger of exhaustion if we permit the old wasteful methods of exploiting them longer to continue." The president of ExxonMobil issued a brief statement this morning to mark the occasion: "Teddy who?"
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Five years ago in C&J: May 13, 2008
JEERS to an awful sichuatiuan. Humanity has really been pissing God off lately. Following close on the heels of the cyclone in Myanmar (the aftermath dealt with cruelly and inhumanly by the junta), an earthquake measuring 7.9 on the Andy Richter scale shook central China over the weekend. The death toll is estimated at 10,000, but you know it'll go far north of that. (Just before posting I saw a headline that said 12,000.) Meanwhile, closer to home we're dealing with wildfires in Florida and tornadoes in the heartland. If the International Space Station posts a classified ad for a cabana boy, I call dibs.
JEERS to missing persons. Attention America! Attention America! If you know the whereabouts of Congressman Vito Fossella (R-NY)---the guy whom we just found out has two families, one in New York and one in Virginia---please bring him to the customer service counter. We'll see that he gets back in time to lose his re-election bid to a Democrat. Also, candied yams are now on sale in aisle five. Thank you and have a nice day.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to green thumbery. This was the first garden-worthy weekend here, and it was a good time to remind ourselves of some important rules of green thumbery:
"Out, demon weed! Er...oops."
• Clean up dog poop before using the weed whacker.
• If the neighbors have some new flowers in their garden that would look great in yours, take just enough so that they don’t notice and call the cops.
• Do not expect your cat to come to you when you say "Here, Kitty Kitty" and you're holding a shovel.
• The sight of bees may warm your heart, but do not try to kiss them.
• If you pull a weed, but it turns out to not be a weed on account of it's actually an expensive stargazer lily planted by your significant other, replace it with a dandelion and speak no more of it.
Trust me on that last one. Unless you really enjoy sleeping under the stars.
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
“A 7-year-old is going to be a 7-year-old. But Bill in Portland Maine acting like a 7-year-old is more stressful, because he should know better."
---Dena Fleno
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