From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Maximum Absurdity?
Ain't got much above the fold today. Just something that stuck out at me over the weekend, when I noticed that Ford got a stern tut tut from the gubmint:
Ford Motor Co. reached a settlement with U.S. auto safety regulators in June over a recall of older Escapes last year and paid the maximum $17.35 million fine to resolve claims that the automaker took too long to notify its customers of a defect. … Regulators felt that the recall "may have been untimely," and thus could have justified an enforcement action, according to a settlement document with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
That's the maximum, top-shelf, oh-my-god-you-really-stepped-in-it-now penalty. That oughtta teach 'em to be slow on the pedal like that.
The Ford settlement jiggered my mind about another maximum penalty that was recently levied against a certain company you might be familiar with:
Halliburton has agreed to plead guilty to destroying evidence related to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the US department of justice said... The government said Halliburton's guilty plea was the third by a company over the spill and would require the world's second-largest oilfield services company to pay a maximum $200,000 statutory fine.
Not sure there's a moral to the story, but if I had to come up with one it would be: if you find yourself in a pickle, call Halliburton's legal team.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Note: If we catch you not using controlled substances in C&J, you will be banned through 2014. Setting a good example will not be tolerated here. ---Mgt.
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Keep yer government hands
off my mix tape!
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til the Obamacare exchanges go live:
55
Days 'til the
Great Falls Balloon Festival in Lewiston, Maine:
9
Age of the cassette tape as of this month:
50
Number of cassettes still being cranked out per day by National Audio in Springfield, Missouri:
100,000
(Source: Time)
Rank of Toyota, GM and Ford for top vehicle sales in July:
#1, #2, #3
Overall vehicle sales increase in July versus a year ago:
14%
(Source: Autodata)
Drop in cocaine use since 2006:
40%
(Source:
The Week)
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 185 (including 4 gogs and 1 cop possessed by Satan). Soul Protection Factor 30 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
P.S. Our Mid-week Rapture Index debuted seven years ago this week. Back then, the magic number stood at a low, low 158. Not to sound alarmist, but you might want to keep a duffle bag under your bed with a few changes of underwear, a toothbrush, and a wad of cash (yes, you can take it with you). And a passport---Heaven requires a passport now.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Life's all about priorities, y'know?
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CHEERS to having a bulldog in charge. I'd forgotten (bad me!) that the inimitable Senator Barbara Mikulski became the head of a very important committee after Daniel Inouye died. And it would seem she's not to be trifled with:
Not to be trifled with.
Seven months into Senator Barbara A. Mikulski’s new assignment as chairwoman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, there is already a saying among members: “We loved Byrd, we respected Inouye, we fear Barbara.” … During a March floor debate, Ms. Mikulski ordered Senator John McCain of Arizona to go back to his office and read a bill so he could properly vote on it---and Mr. McCain, chastened but cheerful, agreed. “I will now try to carry out my mission as assigned by the distinguished chairwoman,” he said. […]
Ms. Mikulski does not so much walk into places as plow through them, a 4-foot-11 fireplug swathed in brightly colored blazers, often a tad out of breath. She straddles an amusing line between a jocular informality and institutional fealty.
When one reporter called out “Madame Chairwoman” behind her as he attempted to keep up in a hallway, she cracked, without stopping, “That’s right, ‘Madame Chairwoman.’ I like it.”
Mikulski will be on the front lines trying to prevent Republicans from shutting down the government. In a gesture of good will, she promises she'll leave a few of their fingers unbroken.
CHEERS to the border state barnstormer. President Obama strapped on Jetpack One yesterday and flew to Arizona to deliver a speech on housing. (Or, as the students he was talking to called it, "those buildings our parents own that we'll be squatting in until we're 50.") Among other things, Obama says he wants to eliminate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. In related news, all of the actual living Fannie Maes and Freddie Macs spent last night frantically googling "How to survive a drone strike."
I hear prison has
excellent health care.
CHEERS to those damned annoying rules of personal civility. There are some things in life that ya just gotta do…just because. Eat your peas. Pay your taxes. Wash behind your ears. Kiss grandma even though she smells like medicine. And, yes…[sigh]…be not-sad that George W. Bush didn't die on the operating table. He had a blocked artery and
got a stent put in. The plaque was located near the heart, and aortas north, south east and west somewhat. He went into the operating room with the surgical team he had, not the surgical team he wanted or wished to have at a later time. So MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. Heh heh heh. Get well soon, you terrible person. It keeps our hope alive that one day you'll be spending the rest of your days in prison.
Not one of LBJ's finer moments.
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JEERS to America the Gullible. Fool us once: On August 7, 1964, Congress passed the
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, giving President Johnson a big fat stick to wield in dealing with reported North Vietnamese attacks on U.S. forces. It was all crap---the attacks never happened but we bought it anyway. Fool us twice: Years later George W. Bush did virtually the same thing by ginning up bullshit documents and other phony evidence to concoct a bogus case for invading Iraq, but we bought it anyway. So now it's my turn to try:
Hey America! Send me all your gold and diamonds or our Mad Zombie Clown Defense Shield will be penetrated by proton-eating devil wombat dogs in Boston Whalers!!! (What the hell...it's worth a shot. Last year I tried it and got a brooch and one of Rifalca's dressage tiaras.)
JEERS to Max'ing out. The sun's magnetic field is about to flip its poles, a process that's part of something called "solar maximum." And this time there seems to be a bit of weirdness going on. But for the love of god, DO…NOT…PANIC!!!! At least not until I'm safely locked away in my flare-proof bunker:
"Solar maximum" is also when the
sun is most vulnerable to attacks
by giant galactic jellyfish.
Scientists have recorded these "flips" for decades, but the process is still not fully understood. This particular "flip" has already puzzled scientists---with one magnetic pole of the sun appearing to flip "too early" last year. "Right now, there's an imbalance between the north and the south poles," Jonathan Cirtain, a space scientist at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center said last year. "The north is already in transition, well ahead of the south pole, and we don't understand why."
Nothing to be worried about, they say. Scientists insist this happens roughly once a decade like clockwork. To put that into perspective for us political junkies: think of it as the solar version of gerrymandering.
CHEERS to honoring our casualties. On August 7, 1782, George Washington created the Purple Heart, a decoration to bestow honor on soldiers wounded during their service to our country. The recipient, said Washington, "has given of his blood in the defense of his homeland and shall forever be revered by his fellow countrymen." It only took Republicans 222 years to dishonor, tarnish and abuse it at the 2004 Republican convention as a way to mock John Kerry's own Purple Hearts:
Kerry is now our globe-trotting Secretary of State, the most distinguished member of the president's cabinet. The people who wore those Purple Heart band-aids are now walking billboards for Absorbine Jr and Life Alert bracelets. Karma. Ouch.
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Five years ago in C&J: August 7, 2008
JEERS to the last straw. This is getting ridiculous! Now we discover, via Pulitzer-winning journalist Ron Suskind's new book The Way of the World that, in addition to lying about aluminum tubes and the origin of the anthrax attacks and smoking guns and mushroom clouds, President Bush ordered the CIA to write a fake memo linking Saddam Hussein to 9/11 attacker Mohammed Atta. It was one of the lynchpins to his successful bid to panic America into approving war with Iraq. Which now means that absolutely everything the administration told us about the run-up to war was a bald-faced fucking lie. In response, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid took decisive action---by buying up every single copy of Suskind's book and burning it, then kidnapping him and throwing him in the prison underneath the House chamber. Because impeachment might muss up their hair.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to that lovable liberal Garrison Keillor. And happy 71st birthday to the iconic American humorist and still host of A Prairie Home Companion. There was regular chatter over the years that he was going to hang up his microphone and plant himself in a rocking chair. Happy to say the rumors of his departure were premature:
“I had this vision, you know, that people would lay bouquets on my grave and look at my youthful work and think what a tragedy this was that he never had a chance to realize his talent and so forth,” said Keillor. “And then before you know it you turn 40 and that’s too late to die young. And then something odd happens, at least happened to me, in your 60s you start to get the hang of it. And you think, you know this could be, this could turn out to be pretty good.”
His 39th season kicks off in St. Paul on
September 14th. Sponsored once again by the fine folks down at Bebopareebop rhubarb pie:
Have a nice Wendesday, however you choose to spell it. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
Hey Bill in Portland Maine, am I forgetting something or didn't I fire you for serial inaccuracy?
---Tina Brown
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