Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

Second rate reporter says what?

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

After roe, women are no longer free.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Come on, man.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

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

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Excellent Links / Saturday Morning Open Thread: Isn’t It Pretty to Think So?

Saturday Morning Open Thread: Isn’t It Pretty to Think So?

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At Grantland, Rembert Browne interviews Chris Rock and proves the futility of this daydream:

… There’s a point in the movie[Top Five] when your character, Andre Allen, keeps saying to the journalist, “Can we talk about the film, can we talk about the film?” when he’s asked about personal things. When you are going through this press process, do you ever get to a point where you’re like, “I want to talk about literally anything else but the film”?

No. I mean, I’m selling a movie. And I don’t do press unless I’ve got a movie coming out. Like literally, why would I do press? People always want you to do press. You never see me on Letterman or something unless I have a movie coming out. Your time in front of the camera is finite. It’s not definite. People interviewing you, it’s all finite. You should definitely use it to better yourself…

One thing that came through that you’ve discussed in other press you’ve done is how the film gives a glimpse of what it’s like to be black and famous.

A little bit.

Even being black and having a platform of any kind. This idea that with black fame comes certain responsibilities that other folks don’t have to deal with. Things other white actors don’t have to think about. Was that a conscious thing you wanted to come through the film?

I definitely made a point to tell Leslie to tell me to “Stay black” in one scene. No one tells Brad Pitt to “Stay white.” “Ben Affleck, stay white.” What the fuck are you talking about, “stay white”? I just tried to do a movie in a realistic tone. People always think, What were you trying to say? I’m not trying to say nothing, I’m just trying to entertain people, trying to make things that don’t bore me. Trying to make things that feel authentic. Trying to make a movie that I haven’t seen. In a tone I haven’t seen. That’s what I’m trying to do…

How do you feel, at this stage of your career, about being asked to be a role model?

Be a role model to your kids. You just are. Your kids watch you every day. They kind of do what you do. But the whole “Be a role model to people” [idea] is kind of racist when you think about it. It’s not like, “Get on the back of the bus, n​-​-​-​-” racist. It suggests that my behavior is not natural. It’s like, “Hey I don’t beat my wife because I don’t beat my wife, not because I’m trying to help the race out.” Know what I mean? I read because I want to read. It’s like, you have a negative image of your people as a whole if you’re putting all of your eggs in my basket. Or a basket of my behavior. Really? I don’t smoke crack because I don’t want to smoke crack, not because I’m trying to help out. So you’re saying if I wasn’t famous, I’d just be in jail and cracked up if no one was watching me? No…

Reader Interactions

85Comments

  2. 2.

    OzarkHillbilly

    MIZZOU!! MIZZOU!! MIZZOU!! MIZZOU!!

    Oh, wait a minute, roll tide.

    And yeah, I am so tired of this “Be a role model” BS, it’s hard enough just being me. You be a role model for the world.

  4. 4.

    raven

    @OzarkHillbilly: Speaking of role models, I just started Rick Bragg’s book about Jerry Lee. Goddamn! When I was at the beach I met with the author of a book I read. We were shootin the shit if the coffee shop and another guy mentioned Bragg. “I hate him, he’s such a brilliant writer”!

  5. 5.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @raven: The big cat’s dead, glass eyes glared up from the floor.

    “That’s Jane,” the rock-and-roll singer said from his comfortable chair.

    The cat, a mountain lion, had been reduced to a tawny rug on the floor of the den, and now snarled, silently, from beneath the big black grand piano. The rock-and-roll singer had named it—the rug, not the piano—for his second wife, a hellish woman who was hard on a windshield, who went at him and his vehicles with Coke bottles, and claw hammers, and flying Santa Claus figurines.

    “Knocked me down the stairs one time,” he said.

    He thought on that a while.

    But then, a lot of women did.

    “One time, this woman hit me right in the forehead with the pointy heel…Atlanta…I believe it was the seventies…Blood went ever’where…Had to stitch me up…”

    I asked him if he deserved it.

    He tried to recall, but it was lost, somewhere.

    “I’m sure I did…for somethin’…somebody…”

    He nodded at the dead eyes of the lion.

    “Ain’t that right, Jane?”

    Of course, it was going to be a long, strange trip. I knew that when I picked up the phone, about three years ago.

    Dog damn you, now I have to get the book.

  12. 12.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @raven: Another about mothers:

    So we began with that, with the woman who brought him cocoa and vanilla wafers for breakfast in bed, but, when he fell hard from grace and fame, had been a steel rod driven through him and into the earth itself. He could not have lain down and died, quit, if he wanted, not with that woman standing there to remind him he was her blood, too. And so we talked about mamas, and biscuits, and sometimes the ringing, stinging flat of their hands. People said his mama was ashamed he played the devil’s music, “but that was bull,” he said, hotly. His mama sat alone as her hard-drinking husband served time for bootlegging, survived the death of a precious child, dragged a cotton sack. What would have shamed her, he said, was to accept defeat in a time when people were saying such mean things about her boy. Once we got that straight, the rest was easier. Sometimes a romantic notion is just that, a theme. It was hard to bind together a theme in his life, like trying to take a thousand lightning bugs dancing in a field, and mash them together in one beam of light. But I know he meant it, when he talked of loving her.

    Bragg doesn’t just write, he constructs a world entire and then pulls you into it.

  14. 14.

    JPL

    @Raven: It would be hilarious to see the reaction of the playoff selection committee, if both Bama and FSU lost.

    @Mustang Bobby: Crossword puzzle snob! I struggled with the ny times Tuesday puzzle, this week.

  15. 15.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Raven: I hadn’t heard of him either, but damn,

    But then his marriage to his thirteen-year-old cousin, Myra, blew up all over the newspapers, and he fell, on fire, into mean little beer joints and no-tell motels, playing some big dates, still, but not like it was. But he refused to vanish, and played and played, because if you have a talent like his you do not leave it staked down in the yard like some forgotten dog, and in the 1970s he went pure, hard country, and made more money than Standard Oil.

    Thanx for the tip but now I have to explain to my wife about the new wing on the house for the expanded library.

  18. 18.

    JGabriel

    Oh, New York Times, you are so adorably naive:

    WASHINGTON — A strikingly improving labor market, coupled with broad economic growth and a falling federal budget deficit, is improving the prospects of bipartisan cooperation next year …

    Republicans will never cooperate with Democrats until their cold dead Republican hands are buried. That’s just the way they roll.

  20. 20.

    Baud

    @JGabriel:

    Love it. When the country is in dire straights, less cooperation. When it’s improving (thanks to the unilateral actions of only one party, BTW), more bipartisanship. Makes sense to me.

  22. 22.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Raven: Huge hands and a mandolin! Ha! Ever notice how mandolin players always seem to have fat chubby fingers that dance like magic over that tiny little neck? I once spent an entire music set just trying to get a good pic of the mandolin players hands. Got one that was passable in a surreal kind of way.

  23. 23.

    JPL

    @JGabriel: This statement is delusional.

    Taken together, Jason Furman, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said on Friday, the rapidly improving environment means policy makers no longer have to focus on near-term economic responses, which had divided Washington between Democrats who accepted worsening the deficit in the short run and Republicans who pressed for immediate cuts. “At least there will be less of a philosophical debate on infrastructure, tax reforms and expanding exports,” he said. “You can have that agenda because the economy is not in free fall.”

    We all know that G.W. Bush’s policies led to the improving economy.

  24. 24.

    RK

    Never found Chris Rock funny nor particularly incisive. If you want to do a really good crossword with mucho clever clues and fill do the last Sunday’s Post Puzzler.

  25. 25.

    Baud

    @JPL:

    The economy hasn’t been in free fall since 2010. (Thanks, Obama!) It’s been steadily, albeit too slowly, improving for the last four years. But the MSM has to figure out a way to give the GOP credit for it.

  26. 26.

    Betty Cracker

    @Raven: I hope Tech kicks the crap outta the Noles, but they always seem to find a way to win. You’re right, though — they ain’t that good. I’ll put a college football thread up later if no one else beats me to it.

  27. 27.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Bragg doesn’t just write, he constructs a world entire and then pulls you into it.

    That’s because he’s also a journalist. I always loved his articles at the NYT.

  28. 28.

    Josie

    @OzarkHillbilly: I am reminded of what Charles Barkley said,

    I’m not a role model… Just because I dunk a basketball doesn’t mean I should raise your kids.

    He said parents should be the role model and not expect it from sports figures or other famous people.

  31. 31.

    Elizabelle

    @JGabriel: Perchance Republicans will “cooperate” enough to attempt to share credit for a recovery that would have come faster, had we had less Republicans?

  32. 32.

    Betty Cracker

    Does anyone know how to fix a toilet that runs? I think the problem must be that little rubber thingy that prevents the water from going into the bowl until you operate the handle. For awhile, jiggling the handle worked, but no longer. It’s on hubby’s to-do list, but he’s off on a series of errands today, and the damn toilet is driving me nuts. I’m thinking it ain’t rocket surgery. Can one easily obtain a kit at Ace Hardware and replace the tank guts without special tools? Are there different size kits, or is it a standard thing? TIA!

  33. 33.

    Elizabelle

    @OzarkHillbilly: Thank you. That is going to make some excellent reading this weekend.

    I liked Rick Bragg’s reporting. Haven’t read any of his books, although they’re recommended by folks who know good writing. On the list.

    Especially since I am following politics so much less now! And broke an already small cable TV news habit.

  34. 34.

    Elizabelle

    @raven: It might be fun to do a BJ bookclub on a book about culture. I can not bear reading anything long about politics any more.

  35. 35.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    I think the problem must be that little rubber thingy that prevents the water from going into the bowl until you operate the handle.

    If the flapper is frayed so that it’s not sealing, it needs to be replaced. For most toilets, it’s really easy to replace. You just need to make sure you buy the right-size replacement flapper.

  36. 36.

    gogol's wife

    Have any of the interviews with Chris Rock mentioned Sullivan’s Travels? The one I saw in the New Yorker said the film was an homage to Stardust Memories, but it sounds more like Sullivan’s Travels to me. I wonder if he’s even seen it. Of course Stardust Memories is ripped off from ST too, so maybe he just knows it via that.

    The New Yorker said he was lackluster on SNL. I thought he was hilarious. Nat X, and with Chris Farley going to pick up his baby mama, and in the parody of Joey Buttafuoco, which was probably the most brilliant thing ever on SNL, and I’m including the first season in that.

  38. 38.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I wonder if I can take the current flapper off and bring that with me to the hardware store to make sure I get the right one. Even if I have to break it to remove it, it’s not doing anyone any good right now. I just want to avoid the situation of accidentally causing a geyser to erupt in the tank.

  40. 40.

    Poopyman

    @Betty Cracker:

    Can one easily obtain a kit at Ace Hardware and replace the tank guts without special tools?

    Yes, there are standards kits, but

    Are there different size kits, or is it a standard thing?

    Not all toilets use the standard, old-timey float on the end of an arm. Best bet is to get a couple of good pics of the guts inside and show them to the guy at the hardware store. He should be able to know what to do from there. And while there are a variety of engineering approaches to flushing, I don’t know of any that need tools any more advanced than channel-lock and regular pliers and a screwdriver.

  41. 41.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    Unless you have a fancy set-up, the flapper should slip on and off easily. No tools required. Do you know how to shut off the water supply to your toilet? You’ll have to do that to prevent the toilet from continuously running.

    ETA: I took a look at my new toilet, and it does look like the flapper is connected by screws. So if you have a newer-ish set-up, you may need a tool to disconnect and reconnect the flapper.

  42. 42.

    MomSense

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Thanks to you and Raven I have to read that book!

    The adopted cat does not let us sleep. Between the racing in circles and attacking our feet under the covers we are all exhausted. He seems to be on rotation where he goes to each of our rooms just to wake us up all night long. If I catch him napping this afternoon, I’m going to wake him up.

  44. 44.

    raven

    @Betty Cracker: There are different kinds. Can you take a pic in the tank? Sometimes the flapper is rubber and is just connected by snapping it on the tube, if so that is easy. Also, sometimes the chain falls between the flapper and the “socket”. The have foam floats that go over the chain that pulls it upward as the tank fills and keep it out of there.

  45. 45.

    Betty Cracker

    @raven: Maybe it is the chain that gets in the way. I just flushed it again by manually pulling the chain up and put some food coloring in there to see if it’s the flap. But the toilet doesn’t sound leaky like it did before — maybe because I had the tank open and pulled the chain up myself. Hmmm. Wonder if I could use a fishing bobber on that chain?

  48. 48.

    Tommy

    @OzarkHillbilly: As a LSU guy clearly I got no love for the “Tide.” But I think they win by 20+. Now with that said I am happy how fast MO has gotten good in the SEC. Their first year in conference, three years ago they had one win. The last two years won the Western Conference. My gut is their coach, Gary Pinkel, is going to be getting a lot of phone calls in the not to distant future to coach a big-time program.

  52. 52.

    Tommy

    Question. Who buys a $750 pen?

    I like mechanical pencils. They run around $28. Drafting quality. The last one I had lasted 12 years. And since I use it on a legal pad daily, I make lists to remind myself to make lists, money well spent. I ordered one the other day and I guess I am now on the firm’s mailing list. Sent me a catalog in the mail. I looked at it today and there are $750 pens. Ink refills can be upwards of $50.

    I guess I am just thinking outloud but who the heck buys a $750 pen? I like “nice” things but that seems extreme on levels I can’t compute. Maybe the 1% is as out of control as I thought.

  56. 56.

    PurpleGirl

    @Tommy: Is it a fountain pen? I’ve seen fountain pens that sell for thousands of dollars. They have special finishes and nips and all sorts of stuff. I used to get the Art Brown catalogue and salivate over the really beautiful pens. But I have Waterman foundation pen I paid something like $50 for. The nip is 18K gold. I like the feel of writing with a fountain pen.

  57. 57.

    Tommy

    @MomSense: I’ve been waking up my cat, not a kitten, all morning. I am messing with her on purpose. She is a wonderful cat. But wants/needs attention close to 24/7. She has started this new thing, she paws me on the forehead when I am asleep, wanting to be petted. I love my cat needs and/or wants attention. It is nice. But I have pretty bad insomnia and the rare times I am sound asleep, I don’t like to be woken up. I’d close my bedroom door, but alas that might make things worse. She’d just scratch at the door and howl. She doesn’t have to always be in my lap, but it is rare she doesn’t want to be in the same room as me. When she isn’t or I close a door she freaks out.

  58. 58.

    ruemara

    @MomSense: he’s a happy kitty. Still wake him up, it’ll help him get more on your clock.

    Chris Rock was never a fave comedian, but he’s been surprisingly thought-provoking in certain areas like his documentary, “Good Hair”. He’s not wrong. I’ve been told since I was little that I was insufficiently black. I’m black enough to get shot.

  59. 59.

    Tommy

    @catclub: Whoops. You are correct. I just used geography in my comment, my bad :). Outside of maybe Texas A&M isn’t MO the most Western school in the SEC?

  60. 60.

    Tommy

    @PurpleGirl: Yes it is a fountain pen. I can almost understand that. Others are $250+ for a freaking pen. I am a prolific note-taker. There are rare times when a legal pad or Moleskine isn’t either directly in my pocket or a few feet from me. I am pretty darn anal about my notebooks and pencils (I like pencils, lets me erase stupid stuff I write). I just don’t know who buys a $750 pen.

  61. 61.

    Betty Cracker

    @Tommy: I can’t imagine shelling out that much for a pen. I am picky about the cheap pens I use, however. My favorite is blue medium Paper-Mate ballpoints, and I buy them by the 60-count box so I don’t have to resort to some other shitty pen when they inevitably walk out of my office.

  67. 67.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Tommy: Other people enjoy different things than you do. That makes the world go round. People will spend $700 for a baseball signed by Derek Jeter. At least you can write with a $750 pen; you can’t play baseball with a $700 ball.

  69. 69.

    MomSense

    Well my old Maine Coon just put the new guy in his place. He went nuts and did his kitty parkour and climbed the curtains and then jumped down too close to where the old guy was sleeping. Even though my 14 year old coon cat is so arthritic he can no longer jump, he fluffed himself up about 10x his regular size and made a sound I hope never to hear again. New cat ran to the front door, went outside, ran around the house in deep snow to the back door, came in and walked a huge loop to avoid old cat. He is now lying down under a chair looking very sheepish.

    @WereBear:
    I’m not sure if he is completely alpha or just so relieved to be in a house with people who like him. I think he was very unhappy in his old house and they really didn’t seem to want him as they pretty much told us we could have him as much as we like when we tried to bring him home. They had gone on vacation for two weeks and somehow blocked his cat door so he couldn’t get inside.
    @ruemara:
    Thank you for making me feel better about wanting to be a jerk to him.
    @Tommy:
    I think we have similar cats. He does the same thing to my forehead and then he purrs and gives me kisses when I wake up.

  70. 70.

    beth

    @Tommy: Those antique pens were new at one time too. Why do people buy a Rolex instead of a Timex? Different strokes, that’s all.

  74. 74.

    WereBear

    @MomSense: They had gone on vacation for two weeks and somehow blocked his cat door so he couldn’t get inside.

    Good Heavens! I think he is very happy, then.

    Though that may not wear off for a long time :)

    Congrats! Really. I love Alphas, but in our tiny apartment I could never choose one on purpose. So it was delightful — though challenging — when we fostered a three week old, who we kept, who turned out Alpha.

  75. 75.

    Mnemosyne

    @gogol’s wife:

    I’m guessing that Rock probably has seen Sullivan’s Travels, because he’s a huge film fan. His 2007 film, I Think I Love My Wife, is a remake of Eric Rohmer’s Chloe in the Afternoon because Rock loves French films. But you kind of have to pick one or two influences to talk about in an interview, because otherwise a film nerd can go on all. day. long. about the 20 different films that influenced the one you just watched.

    Rock’s not my favorite comedian, but I admire the hell out of him. He doesn’t quite have the chops to back up his artistic ambitions just yet, but I would not be at all surprised if he wins an Academy Award for writing and/or directing one of these days.

  77. 77.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @JGabriel: If this had happened somewhere between 2001 and 2009, the praise for the occupant of the White House would have been deafening.

    The hosannas for the occupant’s “leadership” could be heard on Vulcan or Qo’noS.

    Now…crickets.

  78. 78.

    MomSense

    @Mnemosyne:

    I know what I am getting new kitty for Christmas!

    @WereBear:

    Kitty belongs/ed to step daughter who moved and couldn’t take kitty. Step mom has a cat who is dominant. There was one night after they got home from vacation when kitty went out and I assumed he went home but I discovered the next morning that he had curled up in some leaves behind our house all night. Now we make sure he is in at night.

  79. 79.

    gogol's wife

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    You should have heard me screaming this morning when I brought in the Times. Oh, the ‘FECKLESS’ Obama has actually accomplished something? But now let’s give it to the Republicans to screw up again.

  82. 82.

    Cckids

    @Mnemosyne: I got one of those for our cats; they love it when I use the little laser pointer. With the auto one, though, they just stare at it, then slowly tuck their paws under their bodies so the demon light can’t get them. If I keep it on, they leave the room. I gave it to a shelter for the kittens to enjoy.

  84. 84.

    Mnemosyne

    @Cckids:

    Charlotte adores it. Now that she’s five years old and entering middle age, she’s more likely to sit and watch it go, but she will definitely pounce if it gets close enough. It was a lifesaver when she was a super energetic kitten who was driving us all crazy.

    @WereBear:

    Well, I never claimed that Charlotte was our brightest cat. ;-) She’s not like Keaton, who figured out where the light was coming from the very first time I used a laser pointer and grabbed it out of my hand.

    ETA: She’s our stubbornest by far, but not our brightest.

  85. 85.

    rikyrah

    Betty Cracker,

    I’m late for the toilet thing, but this happened to me. Had to buy a whole new kit. Warning, I went and got the most expensive one – with the name brand that is always in those home decorating magazines, and it didn’t fit. So, I went back, got almost the cheapest one, and I’ve had no more problems. No more running water.

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