Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you do not.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

“Facilitate” is an active verb, not a weasel word.

We can show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

If rights aren’t universal, they are privilege, not rights.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

The republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Welcome to day five of every-bit-as-bad-as-you-thought-it-would-be.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

“A king is only a king if we bow down.” – Rev. William Barber

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

All hail the time of the bunny!

In after Baud. Damn.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

You are here: Home / Economics / Austerity Bombing / Open Thread: When You’ve Lost Orange John…

Open Thread: When You’ve Lost Orange John…

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From Matt Berman’s article:

House Speaker John Boehner went off on outside conservative groups Wednesday morning for pushing against the new budget deal.

“They’re using our members and they’re using the American people for their own goals,” he said. “This is ridiculous.”

Several key conservative groups are against the sequester relief within the new budget deal.

“Though conservatives support more spending restraint, the discretionary spending limits defined in the Budget Control Act represent a promise to the American people to marginally slow the growth of government,” reads a letter signed by the heads of Heritage Action, the Family Research Council, and the American Conservative Union. Heritage Action’s Michael Needham penned an op-ed in USA Today on Tuesday calling the deal “a step backward.” The Cato Institute called the deal a “huge Republican cave-in.”…

Of course the cynic in me says this is more kabuki for the Repub rubes — Ornj Jawn sings Pagliaci, the chorus cries for his head on a pole, and Reasonable Centrist Wonk Ryan steps out of the pit to calm the crowds with his vast charisma. But then again, Boehner never wanted anything but a quiet speakership, regular cash infusions from all the best lobby firms, and everybody off to the bar golf course by three pm. These young hustlers trying to out-purity each other can’t be much fun for an old warhorse, either.

Apart from rooting for GOP injuries, what’s on the agenda this evening?

Reader Interactions

186Comments

  1. 1.

    aimai

    I think Boehner is on his way to a crack up. And I think some of the money guys in the Republican Coalition are urging him to get this deal done and tell some other money guys to fuck off. There are more big money donors out there than just the Kochs etc… and they all have a vested interest in getting the country up and running again.

  2. 2.

    Origuy

    Boehner is going to find himself out in the cornfield if he’s not careful.

    I read that story when I was about 11. Scared me to death.

  3. 3.

    Yatsuno

    No. Moar. Damn. Paperwork. I just want to fall on the damn operating table and be unconcscious for a few hours.

  7. 7.

    ruemara

    Hmmmm. Fuck this deal. It really hoses public workers & the unemployed. Devils are in the details.

  8. 8.

    Villago Delenda Est

    I no longer root for Rethuglican injuries.

    I’m going for murder-suicides of these assholes.

  9. 9.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @Yatsuno: Could be worse, I’ve been driving the wife back and forth to the hospital 25 miles away. She broke her toe last Friday.

  10. 10.

    Villago Delenda Est

    OT, but a Noisemax flash from the Spock-with-a-beard-universe:

    Gingrich: Reagan ‘Committed’ to Ending Apartheid

    That explains the shitty grade Z movie star’s enthusiastic support for the ANC back in the 80’s.

  11. 11.

    KG

    Hopefully this is another step toward putting the Tea Party in a corner. I would think that there is a large enough group within the Republican caucus that is beholden enough to the leadership that they would go along with working with the Dems to get back to being adults. Nothing that comes of it would be anyone’s idea of a big win, or even a grand bargain ™, but it’d at least move us away from becoming a banana republic.

  17. 17.

    fuckwit

    @TheMightyTrowel: Awesome! Fantastic news. Good move Bezos.

    Holy shit, I knew she was smart, but Ph.D. from Oxford and Rhodes scholar? Wow.

    Imagine if all our media commentators were the best and brightest, smartest people around, and all had Ph.D’s. Something like heaven on earth might dawn.

  19. 19.

    Schlemizel

    This sounds more like wingnut rat fucking to me. They get more spent on defense & fuck over retirees its a wingnut wet dream. So when they start whining about how awful it is all i can hear is “Please, do whatever you want to me but don’t throw me into that briar patch”

  20. 20.

    TheMightyTrowel

    @fuckwit: (As someone with a PhD who might or might not have spent a significant time among Rhodes Scholars, let me just point out that Bobby Jindal and Tony Abbott were also Rhodes Scholars and much more characteristic of the Rhodes community than Rachel M.)

  24. 24.

    TaMara (BHF)

    Sooooo…Christmas came early and I’m not sure what came over me today when I went for a second visit to scope out his personality. He’s now in my bathroom, sleeping peacefully on my sweatshirt. Some space before he meets the crew:

    Meet MoJo, now JoJo. Or he who heals. <3

    ETA: He weighs 11 lbs and he’s scrawny. What the heck is he going to weigh when he fills back out??

  28. 28.

    Hill Dweller

    @Schlemizel:

    This sounds more like wingnut rat fucking to me. They get more spent on defense & fuck over retirees its a wingnut wet dream. So when they start whining about how awful it is all i can hear is “Please, do whatever you want to me but don’t throw me into that briar patch”

    I know the budget agreement forces new/future federal employees to pay more into their pensions, but does it cut existing pensions in some way?

    I’m hopeful the unemployment benefits fight will get more attention after the start of the year.

  29. 29.

    mdblanche

    Tonight’s story on The Twilight Zone is somewhat unique and calls for a different kind of introduction. This, as you may recognize, is a map of the United States, and there’s a little town there called Republicansville. On a given morning not too long ago, the rest of the world disappeared and Republicansville was left all alone. Its inhabitants were never sure whether the world was destroyed and only Republicansville left untouched or whether the village had somehow been taken away. They were, on the other hand, sure of one thing: the cause. A monster had arrived in the village. Just by using his mind, he took away the rationality, the willingness to compromise, the policies – because they displeased him – and he moved an entire community back into the dark ages – just by using his mind. Now I’d like to introduce you to some of the people in Republicansville, Ohio. This is Mr. Boehner. It’s in his House of Representatives that the monster resides. This is Mrs. Boehner. And this is Uncle Paul, who probably had more control over the monster in the beginning than almost anyone. But one day he forgot. He began to negotiate aloud. Now, the monster doesn’t like negotiating, so his mind snapped at him, turned him into the snarling, vacant thing you’re looking at now. He negotiates no more. And you’ll note that the people in Republicansville, Ohio, have to snarl. They have to think nasty thoughts and say nasty things because once displeased, the monster can wish them into a cornfield or change them into a grotesque, walking horror. This particular monster can read minds, you see. He knows every thought, he can feel every emotion. Oh yes, I did forget something, didn’t I? I forgot to introduce you to the monster. This is the monster. His name is Anthony Teaparty. He’s six years old mentally, with a cute little-boy face and blue, guileless eyes. But when those eyes look at you, you’d better start thinking nasty thoughts, because the mind behind them is absolutely in charge. This is the Twilight Zone.

  30. 30.

    Schlemizel

    @Hill Dweller: I am intentionally inartful at defining the deal. They probably can’t fuck all the working people so they have to settle for fucking the younger ones. It actually has the ‘benefit’ of increasing the hostility towards the previous generations which greases the skids for fucking more people later

  33. 33.

    Roger Moore

    @ruemara:

    Fuck this deal. It really hoses public workers & the unemployed.

    The problem is that the alternative isn’t a better deal; it’s sequestration round 2 plus additional threats of Republican hostage taking on future continuing resolutions. Vile budget crap like this was dialed in when we lost in 2010 and the Republicans were able to gerrymander a huge advantage in House elections.

  35. 35.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Schlemizel:

    “Spending on defense” in wingnut land has nothing to do with current or future compensation for the people who actually put on uniforms and bear arms.

    It has to do with enriching defense contractors. It would be preferable for every soldier to return home from whatever wonderful war we’re involved in to “protect our freedumbs” in a body bag. Less expensive long term that way, more money for merchants of death.

  37. 37.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Roger Moore:

    Unfortunately, you’re right. There won’t be a decent budget for the vast majority of Americans until the House is returned to Democratic control.

    In the meantime, Murray is eeking out what she can.

  38. 38.

    Schlemizel

    @mdblanche:

    Very nicely done! I can see the whole episode, even envision Bill Mumy in the roll. Plus it is so accurate a picture of the baggettes.

  40. 40.

    Schlemizel

    @Villago Delenda Est: Nothing there I don’t agree with or suggested otherwise. “Defense spending” is all about transferring money to the beltway bandits while using the troops as a defense against scrutiny.

  41. 41.

    KG

    @Villago Delenda Est: hell, the TP keeps flirting with isolationism and kinda sees the DoD as just another form of government bloat… at least while there’s a Democrat in the White House (not as president, just like, visiting).

  42. 42.

    mdblanche

    Didn’t the crying clown in Pagliaci finally snap and kill the people who were humiliating him? I only wish the Grim Weeper had that in him.

    @Schlemizel: Except the baggers aren’t cute and don’t have guileless eyes.

  44. 44.

    Baud

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    That’s my sense. If it passes, the budget will end sequester (and austerity) and provides some stability for the rest of Obama’s term (it’s a two year deal, but then we’re in a presidential election year).

  45. 45.

    newdealfarmgrrrlll

    @TaMara (BHF): I have to delurk to say congrats! What a handsome guy! It hurts so much to lose a four- legged member of our family, but I think opening our heart & home to another is the best way to honor their memory. <3

  53. 53.

    Baud

    Somewhat OT:

    The entire conservative movement is rife with tax-cheats, sexual deviants, grifters, and sociopaths who put personal gain before any societal or even social benefit.

    Booman’s rant is epic.

  54. 54.

    Anna in PDX

    @TaMara (BHF): Oh gosh that is a gorgeous cat! I am a sucker for those colors and that floof. He looks like a mini lion. Congratulations! I am still trying to talk my SO into another cat (we still have two – but we used to have three… my beloved Belle passed in August and I want to get another one).

  58. 58.

    Cervantes

    @fuckwit:

    Imagine if all our media commentators were the best and brightest, smartest people around, and all had Ph.D’s. Something like heaven on earth might dawn.

    Or not.

    Bear in mind that (just for example) Niall Ferguson has a Ph. D. from Oxford; Henry Kissinger, Bill Kristol, Alan Keyes, and Bill O’Reilly all have doctorates from Harvard; Charles Murray went to MIT; and Sarah Palin is a Rhodes Scholar.

    (Just kidding about that last one.)

  59. 59.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Baud:

    And the ironic thing is, it’s only short term personal gain. They have no clue as to how corrosive their current actions are for their own long term self interest.

  63. 63.

    ffredpalakon

    I guess this open thread might be the best place to share what I came across recently. It’s James Jaeger, a conservative film-maker, talking about the war on christmas, without code words or dog whistles, as a war between jews and christians. It really opens your eyes to what’s underneath the war on christmas talk:

    Thus the main reason Christianity is often bashed by Hollywood movies is because of the obvious: It’s the dominant religious preference in the U.S. (something the control group sees as threatening), AND the founder of Christianity, Jesus Christ, is a JEW that was attempting, through a new testament, to lead Gentiles into a new pact with God. Since the Hollywood control group is dominated by Jews who generally disavowal any recognition that one of their own was the Messiah, it adds to their disdain for Christianity. Thus we are seeing subtle and overt attacks on various aspects of religion, with particular emphasis on Christianity, funneled and amplified by the MPAA studios/distributors and large chunks of the media, which they own. Among the subtle attacks are the constant use of the term “Happy Holidays.” Almost every film, TV show and radio program put out by Hollywood or influenced by the control group, promulgates this term instead of the of the more traditional, Christian term, “Merry Christmas” — the goal being to neuter Christmas from the birthday celebration of Jesus, to a secular, commercial holiday that incorporates the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. Since Hanukkah is relevant to only 1.3% of the population and Christmas is relevant to 77% of the population, it is disrespectful for the dominating minority in the studios to attempt to dictate terms of religious celebration to the majority. But they are doing just that, using the power of film and media in the same way Adolph Hitler used it against them a half century ago.

    His rant can be found in “Hollywood’s True Agenda”. The quote is part of my larger piece on how conspiracy theories centering around a jewish cabal are employed by both flanks of the right, as well as a bunch of attempts to sell unregistered securities to fund terrible movies: “Cultural Marxism, Jewish Conspiracies, Spring Break 83, and Penny Stocks “.

  65. 65.

    TaMara (BHF)

    Thanks everyone! Harley has been gone a week and things were just not right in the house. I really debated, thinking I could spend more time with the others. They didn’t seem to think that a good plan. It was very clear that the spot needed to be filled.

    The tipping point today was I went to pet him and he just melted in my hand, I figured after that I could figure the rest out as I went along.

    p.s. I said it on an earlier thread, but it is worth repeating, you guys rock. The nice thoughts and emails you sent when I lost Harley really, really helped. More than I thought possible.

  66. 66.

    StringOnAStick

    @TaMara (BHF): Nice looking kitty ya got there. Judging from that beefy chin zone I’d say he’ll be a stout one once he gets back to his non-stressed-out in a shelter weight.

  68. 68.

    Yatsuno

    @Roger Moore: My understanding right now is future hires get hosed but current ones are protected. What I haven’t seen yet is does the 1% raise in January still kick in.

  69. 69.

    KG

    @ffredpalakon: I saw something similar on FB earlier today, in response to an atheist group putting up a billboard saying “who needs Christ in Christmas? No one.” Basically, the response was “don’t be politically correct, say merry christmas instead of happy holidays, testify as a christian, don’t recoil at all of our traditions being pagan in origin, point out that we took them over an incorporated them because our god is the best.” I really don’t get it.

  70. 70.

    Baud

    @ffredpalakon:

    Among the subtle attacks are the constant use of the term “Happy Holidays.” Almost every film, TV show and radio program put out by Hollywood or influenced by the control group, promulgates this term instead of the of the more traditional, Christian term, “Merry Christmas” — the goal being to neuter Christmas from the birthday celebration of Jesus, to a secular, commercial holiday that incorporates the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah.

    I don’t usually bother applying reason to bigots. However, it seems to me that, if you’re concerned that Christmas will be turned into a secular, commercial holiday, the last thing you should want are secular, commercial companies engaging in an overt celebration of Jesus.

    But whatev.

  73. 73.

    StringOnAStick

    Since this is an open thread, I want to celebrate that I am sitting here playing my mandolin for the first time in almost 8 months (elbow injury & bone spur, now removed). I’ve about pounded “Autumn Leaves” to death, with the able assistance of Mr. D. Grisman and Martin Taylor.

  74. 74.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @KG:

    don’t be politically correct, say merry christmas instead of happy holidays

    DO be politically correct, Jeebus wise, and say “merry christmas instead of happy holidays” is what they actually mean here.

    Only the right wing takes “political correctness” seriously, and they’re adamant about enforcing it.

  78. 78.

    The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion

    @TaMara (BHF): (Bows deeply while taking one half-step backward, bringing the left arm slowly and gracefully down along the line of the torso) “Your majesty.”

  84. 84.

    Ash Can

    As for Boehner, I call bullshit. He’s going to say all kinds of noble things, right up to the moment he blows the whole deal up, insisting he never said any of the things he said and/or pointing to some imaginary slight as a game-changer, because the Teahadis threatened to take away his gavel. Then he’ll spend three weeks crying into his double manhattans while the House tea-partiers run through the corridors of the Capitol Building setting fires in wastebaskets and giving newsies and janitors wedgies.

  86. 86.

    StringOnAStick

    @SiubhanDuinne: I was highly suspicious of Bezos and his purchase of the WaPoo, even wondering if the guy is so rich he can afford a major loss leader to push the plutocrat line. I have to say that signing on the good Dr. Maddow, even if just once a month (for now) is a sign that perhaps the reason he’s so rich is he catches changes in the weather sooner than most.

  89. 89.

    Jeffro

    @Omnes Omnibus: No, that in comparison to a right-leaning party in Europe, seeking to moderate liberal/socialist parties’ movements, the GOP in the US is all about withdrawing to a time that never was, to standards that can never be satisfied.

    It’s been discussed in countless ways here before, but something about the article really brought it into focus beyond just calling them “loonies”.

  99. 99.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @TaMara (BHF):

    For some reason I can’t see the photo, but i’ll take everybody’s word for it that he’s a gorgeous kitty! Congratulations to all!

  100. 100.

    Petorado

    Curious ‘graph at the end of Berman’s article:

    Rep. Paul Ryan also addressed his conservative critics Wednesday, calling the attacks from the right “a strange new normal.” Ryan, for his part, is doing everything he can to remind his critics that he’s a conservative.

    Attacks from the Teahadi’s is a “strange new normal?” Welcome to the rest of civilization.

  102. 102.

    CaseyL

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Holy hell, that’s how I broke my pinkie toe, back in May – just as I was recovering from some surgery on the same foot. The broken toe hurt worse than the part that had been operated on. Happily, it healed completely in about 2 months (a very long 2 months!) and now is perfectly OK.

    The only thing my foot doctor recommended was to tape it to the other toes to make sure it healed straight, instead of at an angle.

    ETA: TaMara, I will congratulate you on the new kitty, even though I don’t get to see him, as I too only get a blank page when I click on the photo link.

  103. 103.

    Elizabelle

    @TaMara (BHF):

    Congrats on the new kit.

    I can’t get photo link to work. Can you put up another?

    Harley will always be in your heart. Meanwhile, this new kit wants you to test some cat treat recipes.

  104. 104.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @CaseyL: My ex took about 6 weeks. We taped it at night, but during the day her point high heeled shoes kept it in place. She said the shoes hurt, but there is a price to be paid for beauty.

  107. 107.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    @CaseyL: They “buddy tapped” it at the hospital and the PT gave us some more tape as well as crutch lessons and a flat walking shoe.

  108. 108.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @StringOnAStick: Good point. Whatever the reason, I’m happy for Rachel and look forward to reading her columns. Hope I can do it without having to fork over $$ to WaPo, though.

  116. 116.

    Anne Laurie

    @KG:

    Basically, the response was “don’t be politically correct, say merry christmas instead of happy holidays, testify as a christian, don’t recoil at all of our traditions being pagan in origin, point out that we took them over an incorporated them because our god is the best.” I really don’t get it.

    There was an interesting article about this new ‘spin’ in either Harpers or The Atlantic about a year ago… basically, the idea is that Paul of Tarsus ‘grew’ Christianity from yet another Jewish splinter sect into an early form of a global megacorporation, by successfully turning it into a ‘mutual assistance society’ explicitly adaptable to all local customs. As long as the travelling businessman was willing to speak the Jesus-talk (and chip in on the rent), he could be assured of a string of hospitable way-stops where he wouldn’t be robbed or poisoned or just left to local accidents. Historians have assumed that the political success of this ‘Mother Church’ peaked in the Middle Ages, but there’s a new aggressive branch of modern Christian theology that doesn’t see why the best marketing methods of the Apostolic Hustler and the Coca-Cola company can’t be successfully adapted for modern hegemony…

  118. 118.

    jl

    @ffredpalakon: Interesting peek under the rug at what these good Christians really think who claim to be so worried about disrespect of a shoddy Christian make-over of pagan holiday.

    I guess soon even those pious bleats I used to hear as a youngin’ about the un-Christian commercialization of Christmas will be called Satanic by the Xtianists, since worrying about that might interfere with shopping and good Jesus capitalism.

    The Jehovah’s Witnesses disrespect Christmas, who are they working for?

    Edit: brings to mind, I had a long conversation with a Jehovah;s Witness while traveling over Thanksgiving. She didn’t start by shoving a pamphlet in my face, so I thought I would try some dialog. The JW beliefs are not nearly as weird and sketchy as those of the reactionary Xtianists. Too bad they have this weird authoritarian hangup in their church.

  120. 120.

    ffredpalakon

    @Anonymous:

    Here’s the truly insane part. Long time McArdle nemesis Bradford Delong liked it.

    As for James Jaeger’s comments regarding christmas, I’m not sure what’s worse, that in many of his essays he comes off as insane, or that that christmas piece, minus the ethnic slurs, wouldn’t be out of place as text in Bill O’Reilly’s prompter.

  122. 122.

    Anne Laurie

    @Cassidy: Dude, this is why so many ‘high prey drive’ terriers end up abandoned on the side of the road — perservation is not a universal virtue.

    Dial it back, or you’re gonna end up locked in the outdoor kennel again.

  123. 123.

    Mnemosyne

    Also, too, my figgy pudding took forever to make (why did I decide to dice dried figs to a quarter inch by hand instead of getting out the Cuisinart?!) and got slightly burned in my crappy oven, but everyone who was brave enough to try it really liked it.

  124. 124.

    jl

    Now, Easter, there is a real Christian holiday. The popular elements are still a make-over a pagan spring fertility festival, but at least it is not totally made up out of nothing.

    (edit: well, OK, some Satanist FSMist people would say the main event is made up out of nothing, but there is a bit of history, the execution, there)

    I don’t understand why The War on Easter has never caught on. I mean, Fox News gives is whirl, but it’s kind of half-hearted, and obvious no one cares. Even the senile oldsters who watch Fox.

    I guess egg laying bunny rabbits are just so cute, everyone is feeling too warm and cuddly to get outraged over anything?

  126. 126.

    ffredpalakon

    @Mnemosyne:

    I think the best way to approach these things is to forget about rationality or consistency. Always you hear Paul Ryan or Sarah Palin’s position isn’t consistent with what took place in the past as if this was of any importance. There is only the object of anger, and what is convenient to the moment now. The massive overspending of Reagan or W. is of no consequence and does not exist when being angry over Obama’s budget. I don’t think Jaeger is much of a conservative outlier in terms of many of his perspectives; it is only the xenophobic way he expresses them and the occasional obvious lurches into lunacy that make him inconvenient to people like Douthat or Brooks who might want to point to him as the voice of the heartland: his 9-11 conspiracy theories, which combines xenophobia and madness, for example.

    At the same time, my laughter catches in my throat when I realize gun policy is made to be closer to what Jaeger wants than the wants of most Newtown parents.

  127. 127.

    handsmile

    @Cervantes:

    I’m so very glad that you corrected (#64) that claim (#58) that Loofah-lovin’ Bill had a Harvard Ph.D, because once that rumor starts streaming through the intertubes…

    After shouting “WTF!” quite loudly, I checked the Encyclopedia Wikipedia to learn that Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government has been indelibly stained by granting him a Master’s in Public Administration.

    Kristol and Keyes (and wouldn’t they make a swell vaudeville act!) did earn Harvard doctorates in government at the knee of Harvey Mansfield, one of the reigning gurus of contemporary Movement Conservatism. As a matter of fact, last weekend I listened to Mansfield hold forth at a Columbia symposium on Machiavelli. Would it surprise you to know he’s a big fan?

  128. 128.

    mdblanche

    @Petorado: The Teahadis are Ryan & cos. monster; the Teahadis are supposed to attack targets of their choosing, not turn around and attack them.

  129. 129.

    Mike in NC

    To paraphrase “It’s A Wonderful Life”, every time someone says Happy Holidays, Bill O’Reilly wets his pants.

  130. 130.

    jl

    @handsmile:

    ” Would it surprise you to know he’s a big fan? ”

    It would surprise me if Mansfield had a good understanding of all of what Machiavelli wrote.

    What did Mansfield talk about, mostly Cliff Note The Prince? Do you have a link or description?

  133. 133.

    ? Martin

    @ruemara:

    Hmmmm. Fuck this deal. It really hoses public workers & the unemployed. Devils are in the details.

    The Tea Party disagrees with you. It only metaphorically hoses them, rather than literally hosing them as they demand.

  134. 134.

    fuckwit

    @Cervantes: Yeah, I was gonna say… no way that idiot has a PHd. Maybe MBA. Hell, Shrub had a Harvard MBA, and after watching Harvard MBA’s fuck over American businesses from the inside, throughout the 1980s, that isn’t too surprising.

    I know, there have been and still are plenty of educated evil fucks around, and Kissinger is a great example. But I’d be much happier with a media landscape of educated evil fucks and educated kind-hearted people, than a media landscape of fucking moronic clueless shills, and not much else.

    In short, the thing I’m most consistenly embarassed and annoyed by in the American mindset is its anti-intellectualism— the FREE DUMB!

    So, Maddow is a breath of fresh air, and I hope she enjoys her new WaPo gig.

  136. 136.

    Amir Khalid

    @Mnemosyne:
    I saw Frozen on your recommendation, and really liked it. Gorgeous 3D animation, characters who feel like real people, and it’s not all about getting to a wedding at the end. Dropping that rule has done the Disney princess-movie genre a world of good.

  139. 139.

    handsmile

    @jl:

    I’m on the thin ice of my competence here, but within the hallowed groves of Academe, Mansfield is regarded as quite an authority on the subject.

    Here’s the requested link to the symposium, “Liberty and Conflict: Machiavelli on Politics and Power”:

    http://www.italianacademy.columbia.edu/events/2013-2014/Machiavelli/machiavelli.html

    I attended largely to hear Quentin Skinner, one of the world’s biggest brains on the history and philosophy of Early Modern Europe. I’d never had the pleasure before. And it was.

  141. 141.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @handsmile: The whole symposium looks fascinating. To me, Machiavelli seems to be where somewhat “modern” ideas on politics and government first appeared.

  142. 142.

    Cassidy

    @Omnes Omnibus: If you don’t like the comment, don’t read it. Don’t be a hall monitor. No one likes that kid.

    @raven: Dude, I’ve been here since Jane was calling Jay and John idiots and Acidman was stealing oxygen from the rest of us. I think you might be confusing me with someone else. Personally, I’m enjoying myself. The majority of our front pagers have dived into the dumbass and I like making fun of them. What with that war we’re fighting in Syria and the Stasi NSA disappearing people off the street, you got to get your kicks somewhere.

    @Anne Laurie: This would be comment number 3 for the day. There is nothing to dial back and I’ll say what I feel like, thank you. I know you and mix like to do the forum administrator thing, but this is a) not a forum and b) not your blog.

  143. 143.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    @Amir Khalid:

    Glad you liked it! It had very weird (though successful) marketing here in the US, but I’m guessing you guys got marketing more like they did in France or Japan than the American “no princesses, no music” marketing.

    Apparently my work friend’s 4-year-old daughter has been leading “Let It Go” singalongs at her preschool every morning. Gotta get ’em while they’re young!

  146. 146.

    jl

    @handsmile: Thanks for the link. IMHO, Machiavelli is not totally the cyncial Straussian, neocon wet dream many people think of after a quick read of the The Prince. You get a very different impression from his Discourses on Livy

    I’ll have to check out what Mansfield has to say. The blurb on his talk, sounds grandiose to point of being nutty, though.

    The Skinner talk looks more sane to me. I’ll save the link to see if I can find some of he material online someplace.

  147. 147.

    fuckwit

    @Cassidy:

    What with that war we’re fighting in Syria and the Stasi NSA disappearing people off the street

    Objection, assumes facts not in evidence. Citation needed.

  149. 149.

    Cassidy

    @fuckwit: Well, that’s exactly what some of us said when our esteemed front pagers made similar claims*.

    *The Stasi claims and likening our society to East Germany was not a FPer, but some dipshit commenters. Although, the pants pissing over a bunch of analysts and tech geeks is funny.

  154. 154.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Cassidy: How will I know if I don’t like if I don’t read it? A couple of people who generally have friendly interactions with you pointed something out. Take it for what it is worth. Or don’t.

  155. 155.

    Karen in GA

    @mdblanche: Well done.

    I remember watching that episode a few years ago and saying to my husband, in an MST-3K sort of way, “Christmas Eve with the Bush family!” “We like the war, W! It’s a wonderful war!”

  157. 157.

    Yatsuno

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): Note to self: play on YouTube when I get home. I saw the “Let It Go” sequence and oh did Idina chew that up! I kinda wish I wasn’t going to be hospitalised for the next three weeks, I’d love to go see it on the big screen since I’ve heard tell the imagery is fantastic.

    Never knew Kristen had pipes.

  158. 158.

    Poopyman

    @Mnemosyne: My long-gone mother always burned the figgy pudding, and your post brought back that distinctive aroma.

    Weirdly enough, I think you may have finally kicked me into the holiday spirit with this. Thanks.

  159. 159.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    @Yatsuno:

    Hmm. Now I’m worried that the song won’t make as much sense if you haven’t seen the movie. Within the film, it’s devastating, but I’m not sure it will have the same effect as a standalone.

    Kristen’s really big number is “For the First Time in Forever,” so that may give you a better idea of how well she can sing. Let’s just say, she holds her own with Idina Menzel.

  160. 160.

    mdblanche

    @? Martin: “Citizens, we have reason to fear that the Revolution, like Saturn, will successively devour all its children, and finally produce despotism, with the calamities that accompany it.”

  162. 162.

    jl

    @Poopyman: One of my grandmas used to make figgy pudding, and it was always great. Or maybe it was the 190 proof hard sauce she ladled over it. Not sure, but who cares, it always came as a package deal.

  164. 164.

    Suffern ACE

    @Amir Khalid: yeah, but they are running out of family members for girls to develop positive relationships with. Brave was about mother daughter. The Croods was Father Daughter. Frozen is sister love. I wonder if the next one will be about aunts and nieces.

  166. 166.

    jl

    @Suffern ACE: They managed to remake the princess / prince charming schtick a million times, until most people were sick of it, so there should be some mileage left in the new paradigm.

    Edit: Didn’t catch Omnes Omnibus’ idea. There you go. Plenty of scenarios left.

  167. 167.

    Schlemizel

    @mdblanche: Personally I always thought Mumy was odd and not the least attractive. I also assume that a tru-bagger thinks guile is the thing gay men walk down to get hitched so they want the whole country to be guileless.

  169. 169.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I haven’t worn shoes with any kind of heel for months, literally (obligatory h/t Joe Biden), LITERALLY I say, until this past Monday when I donned a pair of low-heeled, modest, conservative shoes. Do not ask me why I did that, I cannot come up with a good reason. Anyhow, end of the day, I could scarcely hobble. Next day (yesterday) I was in agony with every step I took althou I reverted back to flats (would have reverted to bunny slippers if I hadn’t had a major event to oversee.) Somewhat better today, but I can tell the foot pain is creating merry havoc with my hip. That can’t be good.

  170. 170.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @TaMara (BHF): What a beauty! Thanks for putting up the new pic. He is already completely at home. You can just tell from that photo. Congratulations again, you are a lucky filly.

  172. 172.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @SiubhanDuinne: The ex is about 5′ and wore size fives with 4 inch heels to work and when going out. Basically it was like she walked on her toes all the time.

  174. 174.

    fuckwit

    @Villago Delenda Est: Ding, you win. We’re all waiting for the USA to cross the California Event Horizon. Or, to make a Friedman-esque metaphor ghoulash: where the Rethug party shrinks itself to the point where it slips in the bathtub and drowns itself. In its own puke. Politics here in the Golden State has been much, MUCH more pleasant since that happened to our legislature, and when our Moonbeam returned to the governor’s office triumphantly too. Hell, maybe we’ll even have money for the schools again, eventually, so our kids can spend their days learning instead of making bake-sale items just to try to raise enough cash to keep the lights on.

  175. 175.

    gwangung

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): Pretty much. I’ve always known she has chops (like I’ve heard some unlikely folks like Jeri Ryan has ’em), so it wasnt a surprise to me.

    I like the flick the first time through; I think it bears up on repeated viewing (which I cant say for a lot of films)

  177. 177.

    Yatsuno

    @gwangung:

    like I’ve heard some unlikely folks like Jeri Ryan has ‘em

    Every time in Voyager Seven of Nine sang that was her voice. I don’t think she’s stage trained though. Her voice is quite lovely, if she does get a little pitchy.

  178. 178.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    @gwangung:

    We’re all pretty proud if it, even those of us (like me) who are in the same division but had nothing to do with the actual production. Sadly, we’re also convinced that we’re going to lose the Oscar again, because Miyazaki announced that “The Wind Rises” will be his last film. We’ll just have to comfort ourselves with Best Song for “Let It Go.”

    I knew Kristen Bell could sing because the first thing I saw her in was the HBO version of “Reefer Madness: The Musical.”

  179. 179.

    Yatsuno

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone): I actually want that to win Best Foreign Film, but I think you’re right. Miyazaki has been in semi-retirement for years though, and his son was much more involved in the production of The Wind Rises than in the past, so the torch has been passed. You can actually tell there is a slight shift in the drawing style.

  182. 182.

    Cervantes

    @handsmile:

    I’m so very glad that you corrected (#64) that claim (#58) that Loofah-lovin’ Bill had a Harvard Ph.D, because once that rumor starts streaming through the intertubes…

    He’d never live it down?

    After shouting “WTF!” quite loudly, I checked the Encyclopedia Wikipedia to learn that Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government has been indelibly stained by granting him a Master’s in Public Administration.

    That’s the one.

    Kristol and Keyes (and wouldn’t they make a swell vaudeville act!) did earn Harvard doctorates in government at the knee of Harvey Mansfield, one of the reigning gurus of contemporary Movement Conservatism.

    Reviewing one of Harvey’s books, Martha Nussbaum asked:

    How did someone whose every paragraph is a stake in Socrates’s heart come to be an exemplar of philosophical seriousness?

    How, indeed.

    As a matter of fact, last weekend I listened to Mansfield hold forth at a Columbia symposium on Machiavelli. Would it surprise you to know he’s a big fan?

    He’s a big fan of his own interpretation. His Machiavelli proposes tyranny (or evil) as a sure path to political success. In fact, only with tyranny can we have good government. Whereas as Jeremy Waldron has written:

    Instead, [Machiavelli’s] position seems to have been this. Most political leaders are sometimes going to have to act in ways that ordinary morality has good reason to regard as brutal and ignoble. Moreover, to succeed in politics, one will have to cultivate the sort of character that can act in this way whenever it is necessary, without hesitation or compunction. But anyone with such a character who is put in charge of the affairs of a city will find themselves walking an awfully fine line between statesmanship and tyranny. For it will not always be clear when violence, deceit and cruelty are necessary, and a miscalculation is likely to imperil either one’s life or one’s city … or [on the other hand] one’s reputation (or even one’s soul).

  183. 183.

    Cervantes

    @fuckwit:

    But I’d be much happier with a media landscape of educated evil fucks and educated kind-hearted people, than a media landscape of fucking moronic clueless shills

    Yes, I see what you mean — it is a true dilemma — but I think you over-estimate your own tolerance for “educated evil fucks.” (You certainly over-estimate mine.)

  184. 184.

    Cervantes

    @jl:

    IMHO, Machiavelli is not totally the cyncial Straussian, neocon wet dream many people think of after a quick read of the The Prince. You get a very different impression from his Discourses on Livy.

    This is exactly right.

  186. 186.

    evodevo

    Yes. Throughout history, the purity patrol has always gone further and further out, to the point where the former leaders are thought of as sellouts. Just ask the original instigators of the French Revolution what they thought while standing in line at the guillotine; Karl Marx (“I am NOT a Marxist!); the groups who overthrew the Czar; the founders of whatever religious sect you can remember; etc. etc.
    Fanatics are NEVER satisfied. You either control them closely from the inception, or get ready to be run over.

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