Bringing on Felix Salmon* and Dennis Kelleher to discuss our we need to put some senior banksters in handcuffs was a good move:
*Unfortunately, he was not wearing his Willy Wonka suit.
Category: Video
If You Do Friday Cat Blogging, You Have to See This Vid
Cats, Anesthesia, Munchies, Hilarity
I Know Who Should Do the Next Army Recruiting Ad.
These guys:
H/t DC at the Stellar Parthenon BBS for the find.
Yes, This Does Address a Common Problem in FRPGs
I’ve never been into that whole mail bikini thing.
I am Getting Old
I was watching the video of Michelle Jenneke running the women’s 100m hurdles, it’s gone viral over the past few days, and what I notice is her hurdles form.
Her bouncing around and dancing as she gets ready for the race, but what struck me was the fact that she could have balanced a soup bowl on the top of her head and delivered it at the finish line without spilling a drop.
No wasted motion.
Quote of the Day
— Bill Maher
He is referring to the fact that 14-year old Caiden Cowger’s hate filled screed against gays:
When 14 year-old boys sound exactly like you [Rush Limbaugh] do and can produce radio shows and books and speeches that sound exactly like yours, maybe you should rethink the sh%$ that’s coming out of your mouth.
Video:
H/t Cthulhu.*
*No, not the unspeakably malevolent super-being, the contributor to the Stellar Parthenon BBS.†
†OK, I’ve never seen the two of them together, so Cthulhu might actually be the Cthulhu, but the mere fact that he is on a BBS, interacting with humans‡ would seem to mitigate against this.
‡Yes, I know, this is the internet, where no one knows if you are a dog.
Scotus Slaps Down FCC
Roll George Carlin!
I agree with the outcome of the ruling, but it’s too limited for my taste:
The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the Federal Communications Commission failed to give two television networks, FOX and ABC, advance notice of standards before punishing them for broadcasts in which outbursts of expletives and brief nudity were aired.
“The Commission failed to give Fox or ABC fair notice prior to the broadcasts in question that fleeting expletives and momentary nudity could be found actionably indecent,” said Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the unanimous court.
The ruling does not affect the FCC’s policy banning indecency in TV broadcasting.
The court said that it did need not to address the First Amendment implications of the FCC’s indecency policy nor did it need to reconsider its prior indecency ruling in a 1978 decision regarding prolonged recitation of vulgar words.
The 1978 decision was bad, and vague, and they didn’t clear it up.
They took a very narrow ruling, and invalidated the fines because the FCC was arbitrary and capricious, and did not rule on the basic underlying issue. Ruth Bader Ginsberg felt the same way, and noted so in her concurring opinion.
Brutal
Jon Stewart on the how the Senators (with 2 exceptions) sucked up to Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase when they were supposed to be grilling him.
I was going to write about it, but there weren’t enough obscenities in my vocabulary to do it justice, and Jon Stewart nails it with a PG rating.
Go figure.
Your Moment of Muppets
Note, the video is real, but some geniuses, Travis Meyer and Twigg, spliced in the new lyrics.
H/t JR at the Stellar Parthenon BBS.
It’s Been a Long Time Since I’ve Seen an NBA Star Make an Old-Fashioned Layup
Which I much prefer to the dunk.
In any case, this is NBA Rookie of the Year Kyrie Irving making layups.
It might have something to do with the fact that he’s pretending to be a 70 year old man:
Note that this video is an ad, and its presence on my blog does not constitute an endorsement on my part. I prefer Coca-Cola.
Best Memorial Day Speech Ever
Joe Biden.
There appears to be a correlation between “gaffe prone” and honest.
Eschaton: An Enormous Mustache
I really cannot add anything to it:
H/t Atrios.
They Own Us
Too hot for TED
When someone gives a TED talk suggesting that lower taxes on the very wealthy actually makes out economy worse off, because the middle class is the real engine of job growth.
The response of TED was to refuse to release the video of the talk:
TED, the nonprofit organization that organizes and promotes wonky web videos on varying issues known as “TED talks,” has reportedly decided not to publish a video on income inequality in which venture capitalist Nick Hanauer declares, “Rich businesspeople like me don’t create jobs.” TED organizers deemed the talk too “politically controversial,” and in an email obtained by the National Journal, TED curator Chris Anderson told Hanauer that “we couldn’t release it, because it would be unquestionably regarded as out and out political. We’re in the middle of an election year in the US. Your argument comes down firmly on the side of one party.
It’s the super-rich’s world, they just allow us to rent a space in their attic.
BTW, the “Curator” of TED posted his his response online. The phrase, “Whiner” comes to mind. (Be sure to read the comments, they realy cut him a new one)
Basically, this was cut because the thesis makes the moneybags who back TED feel bad. The “Masters of the Universe” really think that they are different and special.
Thus they cannot abide being described as an effect rather than a cause.
Ummm…I’m Speechless
The redneck version of Straight Outta Compton: (NSFW)
I need to do some serious drugs now.
It’s All About the Racism
I tend to see a lot more racism in American politics than most other white* people, and here we have a a case where it manifests as a primary motivation for anti gay bigotry:
Nance said he recorded a conversation with the woman, whose name is Jodie Brunstetter, on video, and that she confirmed that she used the term “Caucasian” in a discussion about the marriage amendment, but insisted that otherwise her comments had been taken out of context by other poll workers.
…Nance paraphrased the remarks, as told to him by those who were present: “During the conversation, Ms. Brunstetter said her husband was the architect of Amendment 1, and one of the reasons he wrote it was to protect the Caucasian race. She said Caucasians or whites created this country. We wrote the Constitution. This is about protecting the Constitution. There already is a law on the books against same-sex marriage, but this protects the Constitution from activist judges.”
Nance said he recruited a friend, who works for the Coalition to Protect All North Carolina Families, to witness his interview with Jodie Brunstetter. He said Brunstetter reluctantly acknowledged that she had used the term “Caucasian” and then repeated the statement previously attributed to her, but substituted the pronoun “we” for “Caucasian. Nance said Brunstetter insisted there was nothing racial about her remarks, but could not explain why she used the term “Caucasian.”
When you look at many of the motivations on many of the hot button issues of “social conservative”,† you find either racial animus or racial paranoia at its core.
First, we amp up gun regulations in order to take guns from the Black Panthers, and then the NRA goes insane because they want to have guns to protect themselves from black people.
It’s like 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon, only instead of Kevin Bacon, it’s racism.
*Nominally white. I’m Jewish, and my brother suggested that, while we are European pale, we aren’t any more white than an Irish immigrant was in 1880.
†For example, the right wing jihad against the courts, started with Brown v. Board of Ed, and Roe v. Wade didn’t become a cause celebre for the right wing until it became a proxy for Runyon v. McCrary, which held that private schools can be denied tax deductible status for being segregated.
Jon Stewart Nails It
In reviewing the Republican faux outrage over Obama noting that he whacked Osama bin Laden, Stewart shows us what Rove would have put out if Bush had managed to do so.
Brutal.
The Silly Season is Upon Us
The Cookie Monster? Seriously?
The general election campaign is on, and really, really stupid
The Democratic Party of Pennsylvania has decided to make an issue of Mitt’s characterizing cookies from a beloved Pittsburgh bakery as 7-11 cookies.
Seriously?
Seriously?
Mitt is a guy who has signed onto of the right wing’s war on women, and you break out the f%$#ing cookie monster?
Gawd, their heads are so far up their asses that they resemble a Klein Bottle.
Bad Day at the Office
Thankfully, there were no serious injuries.
Hotdogging at high altitude in a helo is not a good idea.
Stating the Obvious
Eliot Spitzer notes that Barack Obama was on Wall Street’s side from Day One:
That being said, I think that Spitzer is wrong on the finer points here. He thinks that the tepid (largely phony) moves toward regulation have turned Wall Street against Obama, not his occasional speeches about “fat cat bankers.”
I think that it is these words. These are very rich men, who spend their lives surrounded by toadies and sycophants who validate their self worth, because of they have a pathetic need for affirmation.
People simply don’t tell them that they might not be the most valuable people in the world in their world, so when Obama offers the most tepid of critiques, while doing their bidding, they freak out.
I just wonder how small these guy’s penises are.
My Conclusion is that Obama is Homophobic
I don’t mean that he is personally homophobic, there is no evidence that I know of about that, but that he is is politically homophobic, and so is unwilling to do anything for gay rights unless absolutely forced to.
Writing an executive order mandating that federal contractors don’t discriminate is literally the least that he could do, but for Mr. Hopey Changey, it’s a bridge too far:
A surprising new rift opened between the White House and the gay rights movement after White House officials revealed Wednesday that President Obama would not sign an executive order sought by activists to prohibit federal contractors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.
Community advocates learned of the news during a closed-door meeting with two top Obama aides, Valerie Jarrett and Cecilia Munoz, who told the group that the White House would instead lead a multi-pronged effort to urge companies, federal agencies and others to oppose discrimination.
The Center for American Progress, which is Obama’s bitch among the think tanks called this “Disappointing”, and the HRC, another member of the Obama knee pad set was similarly pissed off.
It appears that Obama does not remember the, “Don’t ask, Don’t Give,” efforts, but my guess is that he will:
And, just to confirm that it’s not going to go away, we got this via press release;
Within hours of the White House announcement, the “We Can’t Wait!” campaign received a $100,000 cash infusion from liberal donor Jonathan Lewis, the son of major Democratic philanthropist Peter Lewis.
Quotes from Jonathan Lewis:
“This isn’t a broken promise President Obama can blame on Congress. He has not been able to provide a single valid reason for why he is now refusing to sign the executive order protecting LGBT workers. It has become increasingly clear that this decision is based on cowardice rather than principled leadership.”
“Over the past several years the LGBT advocacy groups have jumped through hoops for this administration, conducting extensive research and polling — more than has been done for any similar executive order — and now the only impediment is President Obama.”
“This is nothing short of craven election-year politics, a game Obama told us he would not play.”
Jonathan Lewis and his father, Peter, are major contributors to progressive causes. And, by major, I mean they give millions.
Another reason to give to specific candidates, particularly in the primary, as opposed to OFA, the DNC, the DCCC, or the DSCC.
But hey, a wing of the Talibaptists at the Focus on the Family liked that he dissed the LBGT community.
Below, you can see Jay Carney saying that “more study is needed”. I guess that the unspoken assumption here is that gays are just too icky to have equal rights unless we can make bigots feel better about themselves.
Seriously, Andrew Breitbart was better on gay inclusion that Barack Obama is:
Seriously, how about not being a coward on this issue. Not being a coward gets you votes.