Cheers and Jeers for Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Note: Surprise! It's random drug test day. If your last name begins with A, C, F, I, K, M, P, R, S, T or Y, please pee into your CD-ROM drive. Sorry for the inconvenience, but D.A.R.E. pays me ten cents a head.
-
By the Numbers:
Days 'til Bush and Cheney leave office: 251
Days 'til National Hamburger Day: 15
Percent of Barack Obama's campaign funds raised via small donors: 45%
Percent of John McCain's campaign funds raised via small donors: 23%
(Source: USA Today)
Number of song downloads on iTunes since it opened in 2003: 4 billion
Number of iTunes customers: 50 million
(Source: BBCnews.com via The Week)
Number of versions of Marie Osmond's Paper Roses I've downloaded on iTunes: 56
-
NEW Tuesday feature!! Words of Wisdom from the Right-wing Blogosphere:
Democrats have no loyalty. Just look how quickly and completely they threw their country and the troops whose lives are at risk for it under the bus when it became politically expediant to spread sedition and subversion, treason and dishonor, hoping to undermine GWB and the Republicans.
They still have the unrelenting demands of their constituency to answer to, those who value safety above all else, those in the special caste created by LBJ, who once wronged by this country, feel that this country owes them their unlimited living and existance in perpetuity in return, and those who need the financial assistance of the state to exist with, and continue to spread their disease and lifestyle.
---"Wolfgang" at RedState
All together now: One...two...three... Classy!!!
-
Puppy Pic of the Day: "I think there's been a terrible mistake! I'm a dude! Hello??? Ow! Ow! Ow! Hello??!!"
-
CHEERS to the Maine event. Yesterday my congressman, Tom Allen, was one of four superdoopergates to endorse Barack Obama:
"Most of the primary voters across the nation have now spoken. It is time to bring a graceful end to the primary campaign. We now need to unify the Democratic Party and focus on electing Senator Obama and a working majority in the United States Senate. That is how we can change the direction of the country."
I asked the Allen Campaign's Communications Director, Carol Andrews, what the mood was like back at HQ:
As you can imagine, in a group of 17 staffers, some of us were pro-Obama, some pro-HRC and some just happy to be here with two great Dems. We are focused on the fall, when we can help Senator Obama’s team---and vice versa---deliver change for Maine and the nation.
Good behavior deserves to be rewarded, don’t you think? Oh, yes indeedy.
CHEERS to dancing around the May polls. Votin' goin' on today in West Virginia, where Hillary Clinton is projected to capture 113% of the vote to Barack Obama's negative 29%. (We have got to reform this system.) Meanwhile in Nebraska, netroots hero Scott Kleeb is gunning to be the Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate in November. And ladies, he assures me that if he wins today's primary he'll run the rest of his campaign shirtless. Vote early...vote often.
JEERS to government inaction. Flashback to the aftermath of 2000, when politicians from coast to coast ran around en masse yelling, "We must FIX our broken election system NOW or our civilization will PERISH!!!" Well, not only were things not fixed by 2004, but it appears that 2008 will bring more of the same confusing bullshit:
[I]t would seem that redesigning ballots to make them simpler should have been a high priority. But that hasn't been the case, voting experts say.
Eight years after the fiasco in Florida's Palm Beach County, confusing ballots continue to stymie voters and plague elections in this primary season. "The sad fact is, we still have not systematically addressed the need for good ballot design standards," said Lawrence Norden of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University's law school. "We've spent billions of dollars on overhauling election administration in this country, but we're still seeing the same ballot design mistakes in almost every federal election."
And, big surprise, electronic machines haven't done much but add to the confusion. Not to appear smug, but I've got an idea that I'm almost positive will reduce confusion and increase voter turnout. We all get together in a field, separate the candidates by the office they're running for, and then throw darts at 'em. Last one standing wins. It's either that or get Canada on the phone so they can come down and embarrass us by overhauling our system in one month for less than a million dollars. Cool...darts it is.
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.
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. Today the stamps are worth approximately one bazillion dollars. Or, as it's known overseas, a week's stay at a cheap European hotel.
-
-
Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda... GONG!!!
This is another edition of The One Word Answer Man. A caller on the Stephanie Miller Show asks: Do you really want a poop sandwich?
Toasted?
Now back to Cheers and Jeers.
Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda... GONG!!!
-
-
JEERS to dirty rotten scoundrels. The guy John McCain picked to run the RNC convention in Minneapolis, Doug Goodyear, has resigned because his PR firm represented the conscienceless junta generals over in Myanmar. Apparent there was concern that it might be a little embarrassing to employ a guy related to the company that came up with the campaign slogan: "A chicken in every pot and a car in every garage...if only you stinky peasants had pots or garages, now shaddap and give General Zod one of your chickens." (The bumper stickers were two feet long.)
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.
CHEERS to Republican Presidents with a conscience. One hundred 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." President Bush issued a brief statement this morning to mark the occasion: "Teddy who?"
CHEERS to ninth-inning comebacks. Success in the BiPM hospice wing as our 19 year-old Siamese cat's thyroid medicine seems to be kicking in. Vegas lost a third of her bodyweight between November and April and it was lookin' like we'd have to soon block off our street for a petrified-pootie procession. But the last few weeks she's gained a little of it back. Better yet, for the first time in a long time she's purring loud enough to be audible. It sounds like, "p...p....prglrgl... p...p...prglrgl..." I think she picked that up from Pat Buchanan.
-
Three Years Ago in C&J: May 13, 2005...
JEERS to GOP fellatio. Tom "Dick" Delay was the Creep-of-Honor last night at a soiree in DC honoring his ethics violations and strong-arm tactics. For the grand finale, they shredded the Constitution and blew it out of a confetti cannon. Now that's class.
CHEERS to getting the ax. Dennis Miller's CNBC disaster tapes its final show today. The half-hour goon show was cancelled because of low ratings. His viewer died.
-
And just one more...
JEERS to the disgrace of Ferretface. In my previous life in marketing I worked on several TV productions known in intellectual circles as "infomercials," including half a dozen which I actually hosted. There are two cardinal rules for talent: 1) Expect to flub up a fair amount when you're reading off a prompter. And 2) Do not scream at the crew. The people in wardrobe and makeup, those who light the set and run the prompter and stand behind the cameras, the directors and switchers who call the shots on the floor and in the control booth, are the proverbial "wind beneath the host's wings." Their job is to make you look good, and they tend to take it seriously. Without them, the talent is just gabbing in the dark. Which is why this video of Bill O'Reilly blowing a major on-set gasket isn’t funny. It's damned unprofessional. Watch it again. Look at how he impatiently glances down at his watch, as if the crew is making him late for supper at the yacht club. Look at how he bellows the F-word without any hesitation or restraint. Notice the total lack of remorse for acting like an out-of-control megalomaniac (and contrast it with the coolness of the floor director, whom you hear in the background). And then consider that all O'Reilly has to do is sit his ass in his cushy chair and fake sincerity as he reads words off a prompter that mean nothing to him, but for which he collects a hefty paycheck. The video may be several years old, but it still reveals the essence of Bill O'Reilly. It's all about Me Me Me Me Me. If you can't make my life a breeze, then fuck you.
No, Mr. O'Reilly. Fuck...you.
-
Now this, on the other hand, is hilarious (but NOT work-friendly). Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
-
Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"This is why I keep telling anyone younger than me, don't imagine you'll have Cheers and Jeers forever. Use it while you've got it because it'll go. It's sliding away like water down a plughole."
---Nobel Laureate Doris Lessing
-
