Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The words do not have to be perfect.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Schmidt just says fuck it, opens a tea shop.

Everybody saw this coming.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Why did Dr. Oz lose? well, according to the exit polls, it’s because Fetterman won.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

I really should read my own blog.

No one could have predicted…

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / The Great Northern Menace

The Great Northern Menace

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Canada is trying to steal the North Pole. We must Preserve Our Essence and keep their gravy-stained, poutine-grabbing paws off of Santa’s homeland. Do you think a pre-emptive strike on Mississauga and Chicoutimi is the right way to show them who’s boss? Or should we just cut to the chase by invading the tar sands of Alberta? Discuss that or anything else in this open thread.

Reader Interactions

81Comments

  2. 2.

    Villago Delenda Est

    I blame Canada. Oh, wait…you already did.

    Or those Russkies. Can’t trust them. As the people of the Ukraine should know by now…in fact, most of them do.

  12. 12.

    ranchandsyrup

    don’t sleep on Denmark, they could trump everyone.

    Also, if Russia’s claim prevails, Putin is likely to name Snowden whistleblower leaker Emperor of the North Pole.

  13. 13.

    PeakVT

    I think extending continental shelf “rights” that far is ridiculous, but I suppose I’d rather have Soviet Canuckistan claim it than Soviet Russia.

  14. 14.

    Steeplejack

    @Gin & Tonic:

    While France was never “the France” (except in French), Ukraine was “the Ukraine” until relatively recently.

    [. . .] the Ukrainian government officially requested that the article be dropped in 1993, shortly after independence.

    I will skip over “the Argentine” and “the Congo.”

  19. 19.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Gin & Tonic:

    In German, you say “The Turkey” and “The Czechoslovakia”.

    Ok, unless you’re a Mitt Romney foreign policy adviser, you don’t say the second in any case.

  21. 21.

    Mike in NC

    Americans tried to invade Canada at least three times between the 1770s and the 1870s, and it never ended well.

  22. 22.

    peach flavored shampoo

    Wait…Denmark is claiming the North Pole? Not only are they not the northiest, they’re not even in the Artic Circle. I think Poland ought to get the North Pole, just because it’s seems appropriate.

  23. 23.

    burnspbesq

    @MattF:

    You’re all just completely ignoring the civilization under the North Pole:

    Sy Hersh says Hollow Earth is real and Obama misrepresented the evidence in his public statements on the subject.

  25. 25.

    Steeplejack

    @MattF:

    Don’t know if you’re snarking, but I’ve never heard “the Lebanon” used outside the Human League song. “The Levant,” yes, but that’s an area that encompasses Lebanon, Syria and other parts of the eastern Mediterranean.

  28. 28.

    burnspbesq

    Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Whackaloonia) announced today that the House Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations will hold hearings on how the Obama Administration lost the North Pole.

  29. 29.

    scav

    I don’t know, looking at the stuff Santa’s elves can churn out, they might be able to put up a hell of a fight, albeit sometimes with nerf ammo — their lego battalions are impressive and you can’t match the speed and pin-point accuracy of their delivery systems either. No wonder the concerted global effort to drown them out first.

  30. 30.

    Punchy

    @peach flavored shampoo: Do you think Poland would go to war…saw over this claim?

    I agree that the Danes must be playing some tendentious tectonic tomfoolery if they think they have a legit claim for a land that is not only not contiguous, but not even in the same time zone or climate. Good lord.

  31. 31.

    MattF

    @Steeplejack: In fact, Robert MacNeil, back in the days of the MacNeil-Lehrer Report, always used to refer to ‘the Lebanon’. It was an affectation even at that time, but I think that back in the ’20’s and ’30’s, ‘the Lebanon’ was the standard name for the area.

  32. 32.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    @Roger Moore: Uh no. Barrow, AK is the northermost US town at 71 degrees 17 minutes north.

    Russia, Denmark (via Greenland), Canada and Norway all have inhabited settlements, let alone weather stations much further north than Barrow. Alert in the Canadian arctic is approx. 760 miles north of Barrow. Lonyearbyen in Svalbard (Norway) is approx 480 miles north of Barrow, Qaanaq (formerly Thule) in Greenland is about 410 miles north of Barrow.

  33. 33.

    DougJ

    He’d be damned if any Canucks gonna put their greasy poutine-stained hands on his boy’s birthright.

  34. 34.

    redbeardjim

    @Punchy: Yeah, it’s almost as bad as the US laying claim to some volcanic island chain in the middle of the Pacific. And then having the gall to say that people from that chain are eligible to be President!

  35. 35.

    scav

    And what about the Evangelical and Cheney-Repub (keeping it in the family) claims to the North Pole?! Valuable natural exploitable resources and clearly a part of the War on Christmas as well! Two-fer! Especially as they already control the real math (and presumably geometry which is exactly the same as geography, right?)

  41. 41.

    Punchy

    amid rumors of attack on square”:

    So the fucking ‘Kraines hate geometry, too? Wait till they lay waste to the rhombus.

  44. 44.

    ericblair

    @Thor Heyerdahl:

    And while Alert is a manned weather station, the settlement of Grise Fjord is still at 76 degrees north approx 350 miles north of Barrow.

    So, give it 50 years and a few bazillion more tons of atmospheric carbon, and we’ll have a Club Med resort with infinity pool? Might start buying up land around there now before the rush starts.

  48. 48.

    Gene108

    @Lee:

    Nice video.

    People have also liked this blog post http://www.hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/2013/05/depression-part-two.html?m=1

    My only quibble with the video and blog post is the idea that not feeling is as bad as depression gets. From my experience becoming actively psychotic is worse.

    Positive reinforcement is needed for recovery. Anytime you can think to praise someone recovering do it. Even the “simple” stuff like getting out of bed, taking a bath and getting out of the house can take a lot of will power, if the crazy voiced are kicking in.

  51. 51.

    Svensker

    @MattF:

    We know a Hollow Earther! He claims the entrance to the H.E. is via an unmarked Holiday Inn somewhere in Nevada or thereabouts. Makes perfect sense to me.

    Also, not all us Canuckistanians have gravy-stained fingers. Mine are donut-stained, if you must know.

  52. 52.

    Gene108

    @Mike in NC:

    I do not think the 1770 invasions should count, since it was part of the Revolutionary War and unlike the War of 1812, not an overt attempt at gaining territory.

    The only thing we would need to resolve is, if we do invade Canada and pay them back for torching the White House, should just settle for buildings in Ottowa or since Canada is still part of the Commonwealth and the British King/Queen is still their head of state, should we trash Buckingham Palace because the White House is not only the seat of government but also doubled as where our head of state is.

  53. 53.

    PIGL

    Invade the tarsands? You can have them. Please take Alberta with you, but leave is a free transit corridors, and make Edmonton a free city.

  54. 54.

    ericblair

    We know a Hollow Earther! He claims the entrance to the H.E. is via an unmarked Holiday Inn somewhere in Nevada or thereabouts. Makes perfect sense to me.

    The Hollow Earth hypothesis must be true. It is the only logical place where our missing socks from the laundry could be accumulating since the only alternative would be an easily detectable new moon. QED. Because science.

  57. 57.

    Spike

    All of this definite article silliness reminds me of the comic who would start his act with “Hello I’m A. Whitney Brown. Someday I hope to be The Whitney Brown.”

  58. 58.

    El Caganer

    Senator John McCain has demanded that the Administration provide weapons and supplies to the Free Elves Army, saying “No people, no matter how small and pointy-eared, deserve to live under the tyranny of socialized medicine.”

  60. 60.

    low-tech cyclist

    I say that we tell the Canadians that if they don’t behave themselves, we will give them Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, and then run and hide so they can’t give ’em back.

  61. 61.

    Cermet

    Great idea – we invade, declare we lost and surrender only if they agree to absorb us. We all get single payer health care, and best of all, get rid of congress – win/win.

  68. 68.

    Hightower

    Excellent use of funny Canadia city names. You also could have gone with Medicine Hat and Moose Jaw.

  71. 71.

    Roy G.

    “The Ukraine is weak. It’s feeble. I think it’s time to put the hurt on the Ukraine.”
    -Cosmo Kramer

  72. 72.

    jefft452

    @Gene108: “I do not think the 1770 invasions should count, since it was part of the Revolutionary War and unlike the War of 1812, not an overt attempt at gaining territory.”

    Yeah it was
    They wanted all 20 colonies, not just the 13 that they ended up with

  74. 74.

    The Very Reverend Battleaxe of Knowledge

    Leaving the article off The Ukraine just sounds so freakin’ illiterate. That and The Sudan. I guess I’ve been fatigued into compliance on The Lebanon and The Labrador and The Gambia and The Cameroons—and even the calculus—but I dig my heels in with those two.

  76. 76.

    Just One More Canuck

    I’m sure that TROC (The Rest of Canada) would be fine if Toronto were to suddenly disappear

  80. 80.

    Snarki, child of Loki

    @Mike in NC:

    Americans tried to invade Canada at least three times between the 1770s and the 1870s, and it never ended well.

    But now that there are Tim Horton’s in upstate NY, there’s no more reason to invade.

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