Brian Glucroft, who has an excellent blog with pictures and comment on his travels in China and Southeast Asia, sends this gem (click to embiggen). For some reason, he was inspired to send it by my rant yesterday, but I’ll let the art critics in the audience explain that further. Here’s an open thread, properly spaced or not.
dmsilev
Yikes. From the “what could have been” files, this would have been epic:
Higgs Boson's Mate
Fans of Arrested Development will be happy to hear that Netflix is shooting fourteen new episodes of the show.
the Conster
@dmsilev:
Epic FAIL.
dmsilev
@the Conster: It’s a pity, really. That alliance would have gone down in history as the Comedian Full Employment Act of 2012.
sharl
That is a good photo, but for a man-bites-dog perspective, have a human couple engaged in coitus, while a pair of monkeys sit together nearby, contemplating the horizon.
[yeah I know, porn industry has probably already been there & done that…]
schrodinger's cat
@sharl: Those monkeys can be aggressive, they will steal your food, right from under your nose.
PeakVT
@dmsilev: One, giant, unified asshole ticket.
Our shitty media would have loved it.
mikej(droid)
@dmsilev: Republicans really don’t understand working together for the common good, even for their own bizzare idea of the common good, do they? “We must work together to defeat this evil! And by ‘together’ I mean you should let me be president.”
JPL
@dmsilev: Next we’ll find out that they were going to announce their intentions on April 1st.
also, too.. I heard Santorum wanted Newt to wear sweater vests and he said no.
Suffern ACE
@mikej(droid): I’m actually shocked. Gringrich gave no indication during the campaign that he actually wanted to be president.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@dmsilev:
The media’s attempts to make the utterances of that pair seem Whitehouse-worthy would have been hilarious.
Redshirt
Free love has consequences, monkeys!
kindness
No doubt those monkeys are protesting for Gay Marriage.
You go monkeys!
sherparick
A couple of interesting blogs. One reason why I don’t give to the DCCC, but rather to Act Blue or directly to progressive candidates is because Steve Israel has made asshole and Goldman Sachs alum Jimmie Hines head of fundraising. Why is this bad? See Barry Rithholz’s defenestration of what Himes is trying to do on financial regulation (or rather deregulation with full “Bail-out support” for the banksters. http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2013/03/congress-is-about-to-make-financial-system-even-worse/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TheBigPicture+%28The+Big+Picture%29
Meanwhile, No More Mister Nice Blog points out why we are dealing with a nutcase Congress, zero progress on our crazy gun laws (by the way, the head of the Colorado Prision System was apparently killed by Freeper/Felon/Aryan Nation type as a response to Colorado’s state gun reforms), and liberal ideas are treated like dirt. Responding to the good Dr. Charlie Pierce he writes:
“…Ahhh, but right-wingers haven’t divorced politics from policy. That’s obvious if you pay any attention whatsoever to conservative media. Right-wingers aren’t obsessed with who’s-up-who’s-down to the exclusion of all else. Right-wingers don’t look at every bad situation and think, “Both sides do it.” When bad things occur, Fox and talk radio tell their shared audience that one side “does it.” Fox and talk radio get their audience riled up about policy all the time. Right-wingers have highly developed views on guns and immigration and taxes and gay marriage and Iran and just about any other issue you can name….”
http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2013/03/when-one-tribe-goes-to-war-theres-no.html#links
The biggest accomplishment of the right wing and corporate America these last 40 years was the demolishing of the labor unions. We will have to rebuild that infrastructure from scratch if we are to have a chance.
Todd
@schrodinger’s cat:
When I was on a beach on the Pacific coast of Costa Rica, I watched a Capuchin monkey hop down to the backpack of a sleeping (and very attractive) young woman. He quickly unzipped it, grabbed a bag of chips and ran back up a tree faster than you could imagine. He then screamed at everybody to stay away from him and “his” bag of chips, ripped it open and started munching away.
It was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen.
dmsilev
@mikej(droid): It’s sort of the inevitable result of a party that has spent the last few decades firmly pushing the “ends justify the means” approach to political strategy.
Also, too, the description of the face-to-face meeting is LOL:
We all can envision Gingrich in his know-it-all mode preaching about some random obscure historical precedent (and probably skewing it beyond recognition), and then the camera switches to Santorum, who responds by saying that God has called him to this challenge.
mikej(droid)
@Suffern ACE: He didn’t want to do anything plebian like run for it. He expects us to try and put the laurel on him three times first.
Schlemizel
@dmsilev:
But it probably would have meant a much larger win for Obama so it really was a missed opportunity.
Omnes Omnibus
@dmsilev: Gingrich-Santorum? Sounds like an incurable and degenerative brain disease.
Schlemizel
@Omnes Omnibus:
caused by the frothy mix of lube and fecal matter
Redshirt
@Omnes Omnibus: I was thinking something more colon related.
Omnes Omnibus
@Redshirt:
And where are their heads?
jeffreyw
Dad? Is it true that you named me for the first thing you saw out the window when I was born?
Why do you ask, TwoMonkeysFucking?
J.W. Hamner
“Monkey sex” can be the new term for hard working front pagers getting pissed about criticism from layabout commentors!
geg6
@Omnes Omnibus:
Fixt.
Eric U.
the ticket would obviously be Gingrich/Santorum, I don’t know why Santorum would think otherwise. Except that he could see that Gingrich couldn’t win and didn’t see that he couldn’t win. But let’s suppose that they could win, Santorum is still young enough to be VP and then Preznit. Of course, by the time that 16 year nightmare was over the earth would be off of its orbit.
Schlemizel
@J.W. Hamner:
I think we can all agree this thread was started either much to soon or not soon enough. Mixmaster only tossed in the monkey hump to distract us from noticing!
schrodinger's cat
@Todd: This was in India, in Matheran, a little hill resort, few hours from Bombay. My brother was little, about 7 or 8. We had gone hiking, on the way back we stopped to a little road side cart, selling piping hot batata wadas (spiced mashed potatoes, dipped in a chick pea batter), under a huge banyan tree. We were all sitting under the tree and eating. When all of a sudden a rhesus monkey came down from the tree, grabbed the plate my brother was eating in, went up the tree, threw the plate and munched on the potato thingies. Brother was terrified and started crying, everyone else was in stitches.
ETA: My brother is a big guy now but he is still deathly afraid of monkeys.
Linda Featheringill
I had a break and finally got to see the video of Obama’s speech. What I found extraordinary was the reaction to the speech, to the enthusiastic support for ideas that might actually lead to peace.
He was selling hope. He’s good at that. “Brothers and sisters, I have seen the promised land and the way there is Hope and Hard Work.” [my take, not a quote]
Or, like Obama used to say in 2008, “We are the people we have been waiting for.”
gogol's wife
People who actually sleep at night like I do should make sure to read the whole Cole-foster-child thread. It gets really hilarious toward the end, as Corner Stone, BGinCHI, and JSF imagine what the scene in the house will be. It’s a classic.
catclub
Speaking of strange customs. Giving to charity that benefits poor people.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/04/why-the-rich-dont-give/309254/
Some observant comments (“the rich are way more likely to prioritize their own self-interests above the interests of other people.” They are, he continued, “more likely to exhibit characteristics that we would stereotypically associate with, say, assholes.”).
This is actually an ‘obviously’ observation.
Most major donations are to institutions that benefit rich people.
Only exception I know of? Bill Gates has an actual interest in malaria.
JCJ
@schrodinger’s cat:
“ETA: My brother is a big guy now but he is still deathly afraid of monkeys.”
My daughter was drinking soda from a plastic bag in Thailand one time and monkeys came out of the trees to steal it. She ended up with scratches on her arm. She loathes monkeys to this day. We were on a bus tour in Japan one time going up to Mount Fuji. Some other tourist was excited to see monkeys along the road side. The tour guide said, “Don’t smile at the monkeys. They are mean!”
klokanek
“Ignore the fuckers.” I’m no art critic, but that’s my read. I deal with a bunch of whiny students, so that might be informing my interpretation. :)
dance around in your bones
Re: monkeys grabbing stuff – I remember being in Kathmandu on a small mountain called (interestingly enough) Monkey Hill. There were all these women going up to the Swayambhunath Temple (also called the Monkey Temple) on top with incredibly elaborate offerings carried on platters on their heads – fruit, flowers, rice, all arranged in beautiful patterns. Those monkeys were brutal in stealing those offerings. Just mean little motherfuckers.
We also stayed in a small hotel in Kathmandu where monkeys would climb up to our windows, get into our room and open jars of honey, eat it all up, and then screw the lids back on. I kid you not.
We used to keep the little clay jars that they sold yogurt in to throw at those damn monkeys.