From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Final Republican appeals
Iowa senate candidate Joni Ernst: I promise a hog castration device in every garage and a line-by-line Koch brothers rewrite of any legislation I propose. For our children. And our children's children.
Georgia Senate candidate David Perdue: I promise to keep sending your jobs overseas. That's my America!
Massachusetts governor candidate Charlie Baker: Screw you, Perdue, I promise to send even more jobs overseas because I was voted Outsourcer of the Year. USA! USA!
Rep. Louie Gohmert: I promise to stop ancient-Greek male-on-male massages in the military. It just makes sense.
Rep. Steve King (R-IA): I promise to make sure that gays are goin' to hell. For a brighter tomorrow.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker: I promise to stop lying about my bald spot and focus on lying about the issues you care about most. Because you don’t change horses in mid-lie.
New Hampshire Senate candidate Scott Brown: I promise to figure out which state I'm representing by the end of my first term. I'm told that's a good thing to know.
Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts: I promise to continue working hard for the people in my principal-residence state of Virginia. Because people are what this race is all about.
Michigan senate candidate Terri Lynn Land: [Staring at wristwatch] Not now, I'm still proving my point that I'm a woman. Come back later.
Rep. Darrell Issa: I promise to continue whipping up fear about the Eboli while simultaneously having no idea where it's infecting people. Because Benghazi.
Maine Gov. Paul LePage: I promise to continue not knowing what I don’t know. That's how we'll move Maine forward.
With surefire platforms like those, no wonder the races are so tight.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, November 3, 2014
Note: Hey, Republicans! There's gonna be too many voters out tomorrow, so you'll be voting on Wednesday instead! Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!!! That one never gets old.
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6 days!!!
By the Numbers:
Days 'til the midterm elections:
1
Days 'til
Palm Springs Pride:
6
Factor by which black teens are more likely to be shot dead by the police than white teens:
21x
(Source: ProPublica.org)
Number of law firms, out of two, hired by John Boehner to sue President Obama that have quit:
2
(Source:
Vox)
Number of all-news radio stations in Houston, Texas now that News 92 FM has gone to an
all-Beyonce format :
0
Rank of "running out of money" among top fears of people under 50:
#1
Rank of "snakes" among top fears of people over 50:
#1
(University of Texas at Austin poll)
Totally Random NFL Score
New England Patriots 43 Denver Broncos 21
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Your Monday Robin Williams Moment
"You’ll notice that Bush never speaks when Cheney is drinking water."
"The Russians love Brooke Shields because her eyebrows remind them of Leonid Brezhnev."
"When I was growing up they used to say, "Robin, drugs can kill you." Now that I'm 58 my doctor's telling me, "Robin, you need drugs to live." I realize now that my doctor is also my dealer."
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Puppy Pic of the Day (via Kossack brokensnowshoe): Hawk---friend of the court.
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November 27: "Splot!!!"
CHEERS to November! Thirty days of madcap madness: Veterans' Day, Election Day, Guy Fawkes' Day, Dag van de Dynastie, Dia de la Revolucion Mexicana, the end of Daylight Saving Time (you turned your clocks back, right?), St. Andrew's Day, Buss und Bettag (50% off strudel all day), the moon is full on the 6th, open enrollment starts for the 2015 Obamacare year on the 15th,
The Hunger Games resume (both in theatres and in Congress), and both Howard Dean and Guru Nanak celebrate another birthday. Oh, and more states will get gay married, but probably not before President Obama makes good on his immigration executive orders. Busy month! Pass the Red Bull---and then someone tell me where the hell August went.
CHEERS to Judge Zen Coolhead. Maine District Court Judge Charles LaVerdiere ruled Friday that nurse-not-suffering-from-ebola-or-Ebola-like-symptoms Kaci Hickox did not have to follow fearmonger Governor Paul LePage's orders and quarantine herself. And he added a little personal opinion as well:
Judge LaVerdiere
[T]he judge said…everyone owes Hickox, and other health care workers like her who travel to Ebola-ravaged countries, “a debt of gratitude.”
But LaVerdiere also acknowledged the broader theme of fear that has dogged Hickox’s return to the United States, from her quarantine in a tent outside a New Jersey hospital to her well-documented homecoming in Aroostook County. "(Hickox) should understand that the court is fully aware of the misconceptions, misinformation, bad science and bad information being spread from shore to shore in our country with respect to Ebola,” the judge wrote. “The court is fully aware that people are acting out of fear and that this fear is not entirely rational.
Good for him for adding this kind of meat to his ruling's bones. Later in the day, Governor LePage---whom we're trying to boot from office tomorrow and replace with Democrat Mike Michaud---also got clobbered by a
Portland Press Herald Ebola factchecker, and then stuck his foot in his mouth again by blaming the spread of infectious disease in America
on illegal immigrants. Next time you pass through Maine, look for the governor's new sign at the border:
Maine: The Way Life Should Be: Fear, Hate and Paranoia Fueled by the Absolute certainty That Everyone Has it Better Than You Because They're Mooching Off Your Tax Dollars. And Lobster!
On yesterday's date in 1948:
Dewey defeated Truman. Heh.
CHEERS to a very bad day for the GOP. Seventy-eight years ago today, on November 3rd, 1936, FDR was re-elected in a landslide over Alf Landon by---get this---523 electoral votes to 8. Twenty eight years later Lyndon Johnson beat Barry Goldwater 486-52. And 28 years after that Bill Clinton dispatched George H.W. Bush by a less-substantial but still impressive 370-168 margin. Grand total: 1379 to 128. Takeaway message: revenge is a dish best served lopsided.
CHEERS and JEERS to moolah matters. I know what you're saying. You're saying, "Hey! Billy starts with a B, and Business starts with a B, so Billy must be an expert at business!" Ummm...no. So here's a quick roundup of business headlines we've collected over the last few days by them's who knows. As usual, there are some green shoots, some brown weeds, and plenty of champagne for Big Bidness:
> Consumer confidence highest since 2007
Also: the 'Despicable Me 2' Fart
Blaster is on sale for only $14.99!
> Gas prices tumble below $3
> Economy adds momentum in third quarter
> Younger adults choosing to rent, not own
> Dow up 10,650 points since Obama became president
> Americans pay more for slow internet
> Russia's central bank raises main interest rate to 9.5 percent
> For-profit colleges face limits on student debt
> Financial 'experts' no better at finance than normal humans
> No need to worry about inflation
Also: Americans are
terrible at using their vacation time. I think I know why. You're all a bunch of slackers.
CHEERS to very slow reversals. It says here that giant tortoises are making a comeback, thanks to "a rare example of how biologists and managers can collaborate to recover a species from the brink of extinction." The good news: they've risen in number from 15 to 1,000. The bad news: they all plan to vote for Mitch McConnell.
JEERS to little green footballs. On November 3, 1952, Clarence Birdseye first marketed frozen peas. We hate 'em---they're stinky, pungent and squishy---and anyone who thinks otherwise must be a socialist Marxist commie. But we'll say this: if you're packin' a spoon, they make awesome catapult ammo at the Thanksgiving dinner table. (If you hit Gramps on his upper lip his dentures fall out.)
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Five years ago in C&J: November 3, 2009
JEERS to mad medicine. The Republicans unveiled a "health care reform plan" from their camp in the wilderness yesterday. Once she deciphered the words scrawled on the slab of tree bark, Darcy Burner wasted no time summarizing its contents, with an assist from Congressman Alan Grayson. This is actually close to the truth:
1. Don't get sick.
2. If you do get sick...
3. Die quickly!
Although, in fairness, the GOP would go beyond the Democrats' plan by offering every American a free tube of heel-softening cream. Great idea, Boehner!
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And just one more…
CHEERS to this thing you Earthlings call...politics. As the last grains of sand slip from the top of the 2014 election hourglass to the bottom, a few words of wisdom from a few wise wordsmiths:
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary."
---H.L. Mencken
"A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul."
---George Bernard Shaw
"There is no more independence in politics than there is in jail."
---Will Rogers
"Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and campaign funds from the rich by promising to protect each from the other"
---Oscar Ameringer
"In politics, stupidity is not a handicap."
---Napoleon
"The word 'politics' is derived from the word 'poly', meaning 'many', and the word 'ticks', meaning 'blood sucking parasites'."
---Larry Hardiman
Unfortunately, the political kind of tick is harder to get rid of and ten times as ugly.
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:
Bill in Portland Maine is hipper than you think
---CNN
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