Since I don’t have cable, I always find out about the Really Good Rants a few days late. Gotta love Mr. Maher’s “the rich are like pinatas” riff starting at 3:27… although no doubt it has already been decried as uncivil.
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What other Significant News and/or Excellent Snark have we missed recently?
Reader Interactions
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Loneoak
Lol, HBO has already killed the link.
jeffreyw
The video seems to have been pulled. Here is a bowl of gumbo instead.
MikeJ
“Pinatas of Benevolence” should be the name of a Cake album.
Mark S.
Well, better put up that Friday video again.
Anne Laurie
So, you’ll have to click through to Gawker. I promise it’s worth the effort, or your money back!
Ooparts
@jeffreyw: I dunno, I like my gumbo a bit more soup-like and with seafood.
Mark S.
Isn’t that already a show on CNBC?
MikeJ
@Anne Laurie: Gawker doesn’t work on my blinkenlights. If they can’t be arsed to make a usable web site, I can’t be arsed to turn on javascript.
cathyx
Hey Anne Laurie–
If you have a pc, you can make the squiggle over the n by pressing ALT and 164 at the same time. Which you would want to do if you want to spell pinata correctly.
stuckinred
@jeffreyw: Laissez les bons temps rouler
Comrade Mary
@MikeJ: The world should be a Cake album. Here’s some Teenage Pregnancy for y’all.
Oh, and a rant? How about some Rick Mercer?
D. Mason
Here’s a crazy ass video, maybe already posted. Not political.
cathyx
I just figured out how to do it on a mac. piñata
Southern Beale
Labor Backers Arrested At Tenn. Capitol Protest
The local CBS affiliate said 1,000 people showed up at the capitol today (I couldn’t make it), not hundreds.
jeffreyw
@Ooparts: Hmm, I don’t have any seafood gumbo pics. This may do it for you, though.
Bill Section 147
@MikeJ: Good on the Cake. Thanks. Motorcade of Generosity in 3…2…
WaterGirl
@cathyx: I was just wondering about what key to use to do that on a mac. Will you share?
Edit: The Google is my friend: piñata
cathyx
@WaterGirl: Certainly. Press option + n then press the letter n. If you want to do accents on a vowel, press option + e then press the vowel you want the accent over.
stuckinred
And in more news from idiot-ville
scav
Not as ranty as the best of David Mitchell but there are a few solid bits in David Cameron has even less grasp of how government works than I’d thought. He’s essentially going off about David Cameron calling the civil service the “enemies of enterprise” in an speech to the Conservatives’ spring conference last weekend. Actually, it’s the logic he (David M) points out that puddle -jumps to apply to our local situation.
Evolved Deep Southerner
@stuckinred: Yo. I’ve lived in three states, and the least crazy was far Western North Carolina, where it was all transplants and hillbillies. And the hillbillies were crazier than the rednecks I’ve lived around here in Seneca or in Toccoa. They were sure a lot more interesting.
I wonder sometimes how I ended up like I did after being born right in the heart of it all and never really leaving. I have come to hate the South a lot more than I love it, and that’s a hard thing to say, you know?
Steeplejack
@cathyx:
So why didn’t you spell piñata correctly, hmm? Talk about a double standard.
Steeplejack
@cathyx:
I see you have regularized yourself. Bueno.
Southern Beale
@scav:
Heads they win, tails we lose.
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: Huh, that’s funny. I like to say “I’m not from Georgia but I got here as soon as I could”. I guess all that state/region stuff doesn’t fly for me. I was in LA when Watts went down and my family was in Chicago, the most segregated city in the world, for a good part of my life. There’s good and bad everywhere.
Shoemaker-Levy 9
This UNC-Ashville/Ark-Little Rock game is better than sex.
cathyx
@Steeplejack: Because I posted that before I googled how to do it on a mac.
stuckinred
@Shoemaker-Levy 9: Old UGA assistant is UNCA coach.
Mike in NC
This moran got fired:
What the fuck is it about Republicans and Janet Reno jokes — a decade after she left Washington? (Of course: Al Gore is fat still slays them!) What are the odds that a good number of these hilarious jokes circulating among the Boss Hogg gang make prolific use of the N-word?
Francis
And now for something completely different:
I am very glad to be alive. I woke up last Wednesday with a strange feeling in my chest. It turned out to be atrial fibrillation. I stayed in a. fib. for 12 and 1/2 hours before the cardiologist found the right meds to reset the heartbeat.
The nice people at Long Beach Memorial Hospital, ER and Cardiac units saved my life. That makes me happy. So, what are you happy about?
stuckinred
@Francis: March Madness is on and I’m happy to hear of your situation.
cathyx
Estoy muy feliz ayudarlos con los accentos de español.
Evolved Deep Southerner
@stuckinred: I’m sure you’re right. But why do we have to fucking celebrate it so much? I have no doubt that other places are worse, but at least they keep it in the damn neighborhood. That evangelical thing makes us born proseletysers, I reckon.
Steeplejack
@stuckinred:
Just wanted to say I’m still chuckling over “Don’t try to dig what we all say.” Excellent.
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: I’m down
MikeJ
@Shoemaker-Levy 9:
u r doin it rong.
stuckinred
@Steeplejack: I have an “issue” with song lyrics, they pop into my head just like THAT!
freelancer
Jefe? Can we get sticks and beat a plethora of these piñatas?
trollhattan
@Mike in NC:
Srsly. They still having butthurt over Ruby Ridge? Not to mention, no Republican joke will ever top the excellent Janet Reno Dance Party.
Steeplejack
@Shoemaker-Levy 9:
Anybody got a link to a page with a comprehensive TV game schedule for lazy ol’ me? I’m off work tomrrow, and I’d love to see two third-tier schools butt heads before one of them gets crushed by a No. 1 seed later this week.
Shoemaker-Levy 9
And speaking of pinatas, one of our local stores stocks Elmo and Dora pinatas. Somebody correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the idea of beating the shit out of Elmo and Dora a bit sick?
stuckinred
@Steeplejack: axe
Steeplejack
@Francis:
Congratulations! Life looks pretty good from that perspective, doesn’t it?
trollhattan
@Shoemaker-Levy 9:
Elmo yes, Dora…I’m there. That kid shouted at me for about three years while mesmerizing my toddler. Enuf.
Shoemaker-Levy 9
@MikeJ:
How should I be watching television?
Evolved Deep Southerner
@stuckinred: I’ve been doing one of those touchy-feely diversity/social justice things all good university administrators are supposed to do over the last eight weeks, and we recently had to write about one of our “social identities.” I wrote about my ethnicity, and I defined my ethnicity as “Southern.” But, you know, just as a black man or an Asian man can begin to dislike what he is, “his people,” so can a Southern man.
Comrade Mary
@Francis: Nice to know you;re stil with us! (Is staying in fib that long something like being in labour?)
Steeplejack
@stuckinred:
Cool McCool. Thanks.
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: a self-hating ridge-runner!
you’ve got the rest of the nation
to help you along
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: We have a self-paced online ethics course that all University System employees have to take. It’s REALLY hard!
trollhattan
@Francis:
Equal parts horrifying/wonderful. Hooray for being here, hope you have your snarkifying mojo back soon.
cathyx
If you want to do accents on the vowels with a pc, press
alt + 160 for an á
alt + 130 for an é
alt + 161 for an í
alt + 162 for an ó
alt + 163 for a ú
alt + 168 for a ¿
alt +173 for a ¡
gene108
There was a thread earlier today about people with more than a $1 mil in investments not feeling rich. I don’t know why people get surprised by this.
You don’t get a $1 mil. by being content with what you have. This goes more so for billionaires.
At some level on the way to a million dollars, you’ll pass several income levels, where many people feel they are financially comfortable and don’t push to make more money.
The reason people get a million dollars or a billion dollars is because they never feel comfortable with what they have; they keep wanting more money. For some, I guess, this translates to “not feeling rich”.
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: Trouble Every Day, Zappa
The Populist
Whoever his tea bagger guest was, she decried that very thing if you listen when he sits down to speak with his guests.
LOL. I found it funny.
MikeJ
@cathyx: Or just use the international keyboard. ‘ + vowel = accented letter. ` + vowel, etc.
á à ñ ç
Next week: What does AltGr mean?
stuckinred
Arguably the first rap song
Trouble
Barb (formerly Gex)
It’s just fascinating seeing the various political debates my FB friends get into with their other friends. It’s surprising how many people just buy into the Galtian Overlords’ bullshit. They know not that some people pay capital gains taxes for their work instead of income and payroll taxes. They don’t realize that non-payroll people often get to report their income to the government, unlike payroll folks. Why is that important? Well, if you are like one Republican in my life, it is because you are only reporting 1/3 of your earnings. And then bitching about the amount of taxes you pay on that resulting in ever more tax cuts for you.
trollhattan
What fresh hell is this?
Are they about to have a six-pack of failed, venting reactors?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/03/16/3164949.htm
Evolved Deep Southerner
@stuckinred: Maybe not so much a self-hating ridgerunner than one that’s just terminally frustrated with all the otherwise smart and pleasant people who buy into and perpetuate all the most primitive, stupid superstitions that are holding us back. We’re better than we’re acting like. That’s why I like Dennis’s stuff here so well. He’s getting closer to the diagnosis than anyone else I’ve read. Flagpole magazine kicked serious ass when he was over it.
stuckinred
@trollhattan: rachel is on it right now
MikeJ
@trollhattan: Don’t worry citizen, noting can possiblie go wrong.
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: I was just foolin around. Pete does a decent job, I sat with him and his bride at a wedding a couple of weeks back and enjoyed him greatly. He is a bit genteel compared to DG.
Evolved Deep Southerner
@stuckinred: Oh, no, now, don’t get me wrong, Pete McCommons kicks ass in his own way. Yes, it’s more genteel than Dennis was, but in terms of influence, that’s probably way more effective. Do you remember Ort? Does anyone remember Ort?
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: Oh yea, I’m on his facebook but I had to hide him. I really gave up on downtown, I haven’t had a drink in 17 years and I found it less and less appealing. That’s just my way of saying I don’t see him much. Did you know John Seawright?
stuckinred
ORT
trollhattan
@Evolved Deep Southerner:
No, but I remember the cloud.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oort_cloud
Evolved Deep Southerner
Holy fucking shit! Yes! I worked for a time as a security guard for UGA’s libraries. I spent most of my watch at the big library and about a quarter of it at the science library.
John Seawright would come in the library every night – I mean every night – and spend two to four hours downstairs, with the old books, the primary-source history stuff. We never talked. I was in awe of him after having seen “Athens Ga. Inside/Out” and never worked up the courage to speak to him.
“Tell Lil, Jill and Tina stay away from my house
I’ve broke my saw, and I cannot come out …”
I actually have an Ort story from the science library, though it doesn’t involve Ort himself. It involves some Ort graffiti in the downstairs men’s room there. In the grout, someone had written a paean to Ort:
“Ort CARES about you,
Ort BARES his soul
Ort SHARES his knowledge
Ort ERRS, rarely.”
And underneath, in pencil, someone had written “Ort is an asshole and a crashing bore.”
I laughed my ass off.
stuckinred
@Evolved Deep Southerner: I would sit in the Globe and just listen when other people asked John a question. When I went to Tech I learned that he grew up in Home Park and had tons of stories about the Atlanta Steel works, Buckhead the way it was and other great shit. I mentioned I officiated at Sam Elbert Academy and got a detailed history of Elberton. It was so tragic when he finally found someone and, like a flash, she was gone.
tofubo
if only i had “(4) was incorporated on July 20, 1981…
i couldda been classified as a non-profit
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode26/usc_sec_26_00000501—-000-notes.html
stuckinred
Here’s a very nice piece on John.
“We have been missing John’s astonishing conversation for eight years now. We miss his resonant deep voice and, Lord, his tickled laugh. Thing about whittling. Sometimes you get to the end, and you have nothing to show, just some little bit to throw in the fire. I love that.”
Coleman Barks
trollhattan
@stuckinred:
NHK is showing live heli footage of smoke rising from Unit 4. One can hope it’s from the burning building and not from nuclear material.
http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/r/movie/
stuckinred
@trollhattan: I’m really struggling to figure out what is “live” and what isn’t. I think the networks fudge with “today” to make things that happened 20 hours ago seem like they are ongoing. Thanks for the immediate linky.
MikeJ
@stuckinred: Particularly tricky when they put the word “recorded” over the feed, as that one had when I checked it.
srv
@trollhattan: What is it with this anchorwoman endlessly repeating the helicopter view of the smoke? I kept thinking my player was stuck in a loop. Am I missing some cultural thing?
trollhattan
@stuckinred:
You’re welcome. Feel free to curse me later (this quake/tsunami/nuke pr0n is perversely addictive).
trollhattan
@srv:
I haven’t figured them out very well. The Engrish service is surely a bastard stepchild with a high degree of randomness, and sometimes they’re saying “live” when it’s labeled “recorded.” But it’s mo bettah than any other service I’ve found for real time info. ABC and BBC seem to have the best western coverage. While the BBC video is a loop the text is updated every few minutes.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12307698
Evolved Deep Southerner
@stuckinred: That is a very good remembrance of John. Like I said, I never spoke to him, I just saw him every night. I had actually written Pete to see if “I Broke My Saw” was in print anywhere, and it apparently is not.
He said that Ort was haunting some microbrewery there now, something with “Copper” in the name, if memory serves. Kind of a shame that his writing is not in some digital niche-shrine somewhere, though for a different reason from John.
When I think of John, I think of this wonderful, lyrical piece that probably no one else remembers about maypops, as in the weed/flower. It was so wonderful.
As for Ort, I just remember he was punctilious about including every little place’s ZIP code.
Chris Grrr™
This is my favorite article title of late, despite some great competition.
pinatasofbenevolence.com is still available.
My registrar can’t handle the ‘ñ’.
Jess
That’s fucking funny. I still love the rant Maher did about Bush after Katrina. Thing of beauty. Sadly, I can’t find it on YouTube now.
Jess
@Jess:
Found it: George of the Bungle
Anne Laurie
@Francis: Perspective, u haz it… and u shares!
Congratulations on being here to do so!
burnspbesq
Kyrie practiced with the team today, and is expected to play limited minutes this weekend.
Just when you thought it was safe to be a Duke-hater…
trollhattan
Dear lord. How do you explain to dogs?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nexofSW4u7Y&feature=player_embedded
Donut
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