Photo avail: Scott Walker will be eating a cheesesteak like a tourist and showing off his bald spot at Geno's. https://t.co/Ma4uTY8J8y
— Bob Schooley (@Rschooley) July 28, 2015
It figures he'd go to the racist cheesesteak stand. pic.twitter.com/7P5qLjub7B
— Maggie Serota (@maggieserota) July 28, 2015
One more reason why Sock Puppet Scotty had to get into this year’s presidential scrum — that is one hell of a major ‘bald patch’ he’s got going on. Four years from now, even a Trump-style combover won’t save him from the indignity of being The Bald One!
(Explanation of the “racist” bit here.)
***********
Apart from pointing & mocking, what’s on the agenda for the afternoon?
the Conster
There are better pics that show two guys holding up signs that says Walker smells his own poop, and other sophomoric but hilarious stuff. Walker’s a complete doofus.
ERA: AL – were you and your SU at Volante’s on Sunday???
jl
I would like to know the ‘tourist’ versus ‘non-tourist’ cheese steak eating technique.
Are there complicated local traditions, like with pizza?
Kay
Pathetic and grasping Rand Paul campaign jumps on Planned Parenthood bandwagon:
Remember when he was the new flavor of Republican who wasn’t like the rest of the Party? Maybe they can seat another one of those all-male panels of religious clerics to advise Congress.
Amir Khalid
You have to give Scott Walker credit for not combing over his bald spot. Or painting it over, as I’ve heard some bald men do.
jl
Genuine Second Amendment action, just like the Founders intended: real time vigilante training drills.
Vet Allegedly Brought Gun Into Army Office To Keep Recruiters ‘On Their Toes’
‘ A 72-year-old military veteran was arrested for allegedly bringing a gun into an Army recruitment office in Conyers, Georgia last week to “keep the guys on their toes,” according to the Rockdale News. ‘
talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/harry-tracey-conyers-georgia-gun
Snarki, child of Loki
@jl: #1 for non-Tourists, you don’t go to Pat’s OR Geno’s.
Neither is as good (or as inexpensive, or as quick and convenient) as less-famous sources of philly cheesesteaks.
And #2: authentic cheesesteak vendors don’t ask you what type of cheese you want. You can ask for a particular type, and they don’t judge, but the only questions you’ll get is “ketchup?” and “fried onions?”
ETA: Walker’s eating style is fine. As long as he doesn’t do something like use a knife and fork.
Germy Shoemangler
NY fast food minimum wage is set to go up.
And for fun I checked John Gray’s blog. He’s a newscaster, and writes columns. He presents as a “sensible centrist” but occasionally the mask slips. Here he is on the minimum wage:
saratogian.com/opinion/20150722/john-gray-raising-the-wage?source=most_viewed
He starts his essay desperately needing coffee… fast. He then goes on to say
jl
@Amir Khalid: No, I do not not. And, it might just be a very bad attempt. If he cannot manage his own bald spot, how can he manage the whole world!?
Roger Moore
But is he getting it wiz wit?
David Koch
B R E A K I N G
Rex Tremendae
Ahh, so this is an authenticity thing. So now I’m compelled to feel a tiny bit of sympathy for Walker for his sins against the Locals-who-won’t-SFTU-about-the-real-way-to-do-things.
jl
@Germy Shoemangler: By that logic, we should bring back slavery (chattel and debt, we want to keep the institution flexible in order to adapt to new times, after all) and indentured servitude: anyone acts like that you can beat them, that’ll keep them on their toes at all times.
And, just my opinion, the column reads like the guy made it up, or greatly exaggerated. I don’t believe it, to be honest.
Roger Moore
@Germy Shoemangler:
He has a point that it doesn’t make sense to raise the minimum wage only for fast food workers. The other people he was mentioning should be getting a minimum of $15/hour, too.
Germy Shoemangler
Walker visiting Geno’s… is that part of the GOP outreach?
from wikipedia:
Germy Shoemangler
@Roger Moore: I agree the min. wage should go up across the board, but I found John Gray’s anecdote obnoxious.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid: The weirdest bald spot remedy I’ve ever seen (aside from Trump’s) is applying some sort of fuzz via an aerosol can. It’s probably true that advancing male pattern baldness would handicap Walker (and Rubio too) in future races. I think that’s a sign of how shallow our electorate is. There are plenty of good reasons to reject Walker and Rubio, but their hair isn’t one of them.
jl
@Snarki, child of Loki: Thank you. Noted.
Next time I am in Philadelphia, i will eat my very classy Genos cheese steak with a knife and fork. I rebel against all local food eating technique customs. I will never fold a damn pizza slice either.
Germy Shoemangler
@jl:
I agree. I think he comes from the old school “make up shit” tradition of folksy, smalltown essayists.
Mike J
@Germy Shoemangler: Anybody try ordering in Italian?
Omnes Omnibus
@Rex Tremendae: I suspect that Walker puts ketchup on his brats.
Germy Shoemangler
@Betty Cracker: I remember when Milton Berle hosted SNL, one of the cast members saw him backstage with an aerosol can, spraying his bald spot.
Germy Shoemangler
@Mike J: That would have been a good experiment when the “speak english” sign was up.
Order in Italian to see what happens.
Rex Tremendae
Vento said that no one has been refused service for not speaking English, but said, “If I can’t understand you, you might not get the sandwich you thought you ordered.
So the sign was just an innocent way of ensuring they are served the right food. And they didn’t capitalize the word “please” to make it stand out against all those ALL CAPS.
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker: Well, even their hair is rejecting them. It has to mean something.
Belafon
@Germy Shoemangler: If you want to watch people work their butts off, go to the In-N-Out burger in Rockwall, TX. They bust their butts. But In-N-Out already pays their workers above minimum wage.
Even at the fast food level, you get what you pay for.
Mandalay
The story about how Cecil the lion was killed gets worse:
40 hours? And of course his lawyer drafted a statement for him that was quick to shift the blame elsewhere:
But on the bright side, the sicko’s dental practice is getting hundreds of negative reviews on Yelp.
Jeffro
@Germy Shoemangler: Walker will be speaking at the Neshoba County Fair next week, I’m sure.
Kay
@Germy Shoemangler:
The problem with the “fast food worker who is stupid” story for me is there are people who are bad at their jobs and make lots of money. Everyone has one of those stories too. I have a “local journalist who is dumb and bad at his job” story. That happened. I still think the minimum wage should be higher.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Belafon: In-N-Out is really good on labor issues and a really good burger. They don’t franchise their stores, all company owned.
If you reserved a copy of Win10, they’ve started pushing out the install files.
Roger Moore
@Germy Shoemangler:
Yeah, and it’s telling that he thinks this anecdote is an argument against raising the wage. Maybe the reason the fast food worker he talks about dealing with was blowing his job off is because the employer was treating him like a disposable part, and the solution is to pay workers enough that they want to give their work their full attention.
Mike in NC
@Betty Cracker: All of the GOP contenders aspire to mimic the Reaganesque pompadour. When the debates begin, they’ll all be wearing identical navy blue suits, white shirts, red neckties and Old Glory lapel pins.
David Koch
This is the look of someone who has Ø fucks to give
Hello, ladies
Jeffro
@Mike in NC: Nickel bet says Cruz shows up wrapped in the flag.
David Koch
They’re trying to stop him from leaving
Omnes Omnibus
@Jeffro: And carrying a Bible?
geg6
@jl:
And I’ll just say it: New York pizza, you know, the stuff you have to fold and which has some kind of orange stuff as “sauce”? It sucks. Worst pizza ever. I wouldn’t eat that shit on a bet. Gimme some Italian pizza. Made in wood fire oven with real tomatoes in the sauce (because they are red and not orange) and fresh mozzarella and basil. I get that at least once a week here in bumfucked Western PA and it is about 10,000 better than any of that shit they try to pass off as “New York” pizza in New York. And don’t even get me started on the crap they call “Chicago-style.” A total abomination. My high school boyfriend’s parents were from Italy and they taught me what good pizza was and none of it was to be found in New York or Chicago.
Roger Moore
@Jeffro:
I hope he’s wearing a bit more than that. And which flag is always a good question.
Doug R
Scott Walker needs to go full Luthor.
Jeffro
@Omnes Omnibus: Bible or cross, you betcha!
I’m looking at this list, from POLITICO yesterday:
According to POLITICO’s latest average of national polls, eight candidates are looking like a lock for the debate: Donald Trump, Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Mike Huckabee and Ben Carson. Perry and Chris Christie are in for now, but only barely. Those still with a chance to make the stage are John Kasich, Rick Santorum and Bobby Jindal. For the other candidates — Carly Fiorina, George Pataki, Lindsey Graham and Jim Gilmore — it will be very difficult to get to Cleveland.
and thinking my goodness, the things these folks are about to say in order to prove they’re the Truest of the True in RightwingLand. Lindsey Graham better hurry up and put another phone in a blender or something, too.
dmsilev
@Mike in NC: Hopefully they’ll all show up copying Trump’s hairstyle.
schrodinger's cat
@BillinGlendaleCA: How do you like Windows 10?
smintheus
Excellent interview with Bernie Sanders at Vox. It’s a pleasure to see a politician stating his positions on complex issues so lucidly and framing, and reframing, those issues intelligently.
dedc79
@Mandalay: I haven’t felt this ill since the last time I watched that movie The Bear. Nothing can bring this lion back (or save the lion’s cubs apparently) or all the other threatened/endangered species he has killed for fun, but it does bring a small amount of satisfaction to see how this is coming back to bite him where it hurts. If his practice dries up, he’ll at least have a harder time finding the funds to pay for his murder junkets to Africa.
Mike J
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Is it a limited edition?
I’ll wait for the service pack.
schrodinger's cat
@Betty Cracker: They can go completely bald, like Picard.
gogol's wife
@jl:
When I look at that sandwich, my brain just screams, “Knife and fork!”
gogol's wife
@Germy Shoemangler:
That’s not the backstage story about Milton Berle on SNL that I remember.
rikyrah
@Kay:
THAT WAS ALWAYS BOGUS.
He’s all about Freedom, Freedom, Freedom, until it comes to my uterus.
Then, he’s all up in it, and trying to control it.
Botsplainer
Even the FReepers hate the lion-killing asshole dentist (who has released a statement “deeply regretting” killing the lion, claiming to have relied on the local guides, blah, blah, blah).
freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3317715/posts
pamelabrown53
@Amir Khalid:
Well, Amir, instead of Walker painting over his bald spot maybe he should just wear a yarmulke and run against Bibi since he’s prepared to bomb Iran on day one.
the Conster
@Botsplainer:
He’s the worst person in the world today. Hands down.
Amir Khalid
@Betty Cracker:
I remember an episode of The X-Files where Scully watches on TV as Ron Popeil demonstrates just such a hair-in-a-can product in an infomercial. I was surprised to learn, afterwards, that it was a real infomercial and not a spoof concocted by 1013 Productions.
BillinGlendaleCA
@schrodinger’s cat: I’ve been running it about 6 months or so. It’s pretty solid and fast. I like the virtual desktops. The one thing I haven’t used it on is multiple displays, we’ll see how that looks after this machine is upgraded.
@Mike J: No, it’s available to anyone that reserved a copy. You should have received a prompt on any win7 or 8.x machine to reserve an upgrade. There will be no service packs, just upgrades over time.
Bitter Scribe
I wouldn’t rag on Walker’s bald spot, except for the perfectly ridiculous explanation he gave about it. He told an interviewer that he bumped the top of his head on a cabinet door or something, it left a scar, and the hair fell out around the scar.
As another blogger said: “If we can’t trust him to be honest about such a trivial matter, how can we trust him on anything?”
dedc79
@Botsplainer: And it’s telling that his apology places so much emphasis on how he didn’t mean to kill that particular lion, as if it would’ve been ok if they’d lured a less-beloved island out of the national park to shoot it with an arrow and follow it on a 40 hour death march.
And how about the endangered rhino he shot before that? Is he suddenly sorry about that one too?
sacrablue
@Roger Moore: I spent the first 25 years of my life in Philadelphia. I ate a lot of cheesesteaks long before Geno’s or Pat’s were a thing. No one ever asked what kind of cheese I wanted. You got provolone (preferably sharp or aged) or white american, never cheese whiz. You could get fried onions, mushrooms and sauce, but never orange cheese.
NotMax
Hands down best cheesesteak ever had (this goes back over 40 years) was outside of Philly, from a hole-in-the-wall take-out place called Pinocchio’s in Media, PA.
Only question you’d be asked when ordering was about what type of peppers, “Sweet or hot?”
dedc79
@pamelabrown53: That joke sure seems like a misfire to me….
Amir Khalid
@gogol’s wife:
David Cameron was recently teased in the British media for eating a hot dog with a knife and fork.
mainmata
@Betty Cracker: Obviously, baldness has not been a handicap for Governor Batboy no matter how obnoxious he has been. But then again, Florida….
shell
Was that him? I thought that was from the hunter he hired, who might actually be facing local authorities.
If I was that dentist I would lay reeeeaaally low for a good long time.
Mandalay
@dedc79:
I feel the same. I don’t know why, but this story has really bothered me a lot. There are far worse things going on in the world but there is something about what that man did that is so base and so sick.
Maybe it’s the notion that he did it for personal pleasure that is the really depressing part?
Ridnik Chrome
@Botsplainer: Someone on Free Republic is a Ramones fan.
ETA: Or a Tod Browning fan…
schrodinger's cat
@sacrablue: Cheez whiz does not look appetizing. I like the Reading Market in Philly, it has some good places to eat.
What is with this ritual of Presidential candidates eating local foods was it always a thing with the MSM, or is it new?
shell
Finally, something bringing America together.
Tree With Water
“In the opinion informing Brady that his appeal had been denied, Commissioner Goodell emphasized important new information disclosed by Brady and his representatives in connection with the hearing”.
Oh, I see. “New” information was discovered by Roger Goodell that establishes to the satisfaction of Roger Goodell that Roger Goodell made the correct decision in the first place. Who could blame Brady if he does cut ties with the NFL?
NotMax
@schrodinger’s cat
Advice from the local computer gurus is that if you have (and are satisfied with) Windows 7, wait – you have a full year to make any final decision. Windows 8 users, go ahead and take the plunge.
To anyone putting in Win10, do not under any circumstances turn off your computer while it is installing.
Seanly
@Germy Shoemangler:
My response is that maybe the workers would give a shit if they were paid better. Or that maybe they’d be in a better mood and more productive if they don’t have to work 2 full time jobs to make ends barely meet.
Germy Shoemangler
Re: Trump and the debates.
I thought the GOP had come up with a plan that tied debate eligibility with financial disclosure. They thought Trump would shy away from folks poking around in his personal money business.
Did that not work? I seem to recall him releasing his finances info. So are they working on another scheme to keep him out of the debates?
Amir Khalid
@Bitter Scribe:
Male pattern baldness is in fact quite common in all primate species, not just us humans. But I suspect that feeling shame and embarrassment about it comes from a uniquely human sense of vanity.
Betty Cracker
@shell: I’m usually not a fan of Internet pile-ons, but that son of a bitch had it coming.
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: I did not know that. I have never seen a bald monkey though, except the human kind.
schrodinger's cat
@NotMax: I am running Windows 7, Professional edition on all my computers right now.
dedc79
@Mandalay: we are reaching a point of no return for some species that I think a lot of people just assumed would be around forever. A lot of it is habitat loss for which there are no easy fixes, but poaching is something that can be stopped. And the idea that species will disappear FOREVER so that a few assholes can put animal heads up on their walls is just too much. As bad as the story about this lion is, what got me even worse was the picture of him smiling next to an endangered rhino that he killed. It’s getting quite likely that in the next few decades rhinos will exist in zoos and nowhere else. And we can thank him and his trophy hunting buddies for speeding the way toward extinction.
Botsplainer
@shell:
USA Today quoted the asshole dentist this way:
Note that he forgot to mention his little bear-hunting escapade in 2008, when he killed a bear 2 miles out of hunting area space and dragged his kill back to pretend that it was legal.
The fucker knew EXACTLY what he was doing – he couldn’t have been a hunter with that much experience and still played dumb. His interaction with his guides would have been extensive, and those guys love to talk.
Randy P
@Mike J: No but there was in fact an organized “protest” where a bunch of Spanish speakers showed up to order in Spanish. And they all got their “bistek” as ordered.
dmsilev
@Germy Shoemangler: I think at this point they’re stuck with him. He’s currently the definite front-runner, and any contrived excuse to keep him out would probably do more damage than sucking it up and letting him rant and rave on stage for an hour.
Worst case, from the GOP perspective, is that you goad him into actually making good on that third-party threat.
Amir Khalid
@schrodinger’s cat:
If you look at mug shots of adult male great apes — chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans etc. — you’ll notice quite a lot of, ahem, high foreheads. Just like humans.
Iowa Old Lady
@Jeffro: I wonder if Fox will announce the polls they used or just expect us to trust their selection and their math.
Origuy
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Jeffro
@Origuy: I saw that one and hope that the military is considering a full court media press that leads off with “thank you all for your concern but DO NOT come guard our facilities or enter w/ a gun hoping to ‘keep us on our toes’ ”
You know the brass is like, THESE are the people whose freedom we’re defending?!??
RK
Dumb
Jeffro
@Iowa Old Lady: I don’t think they care about whether we trust them or not, but I have a funny feeling they don’t want to run afoul of the tinfoil hat brigade. I’m sure they’ll publish/announce whatever they used.
Now…watching the THB parse those polls and ‘unskew’ them…that should be great fun. Especially if Perry or Christie gets bumped in favor of Kaisch (widely known as an ‘establishment’ favorite).
the Conster
@Mandalay:
If I knew how to do it, I’d hunt this dentist by drone day and night. He needs to get it.
Roger Moore
@schrodinger’s cat:
Humans are not monkeys. We’re great apes.
Tree With Water
@Origuy: I was working at the Presidio army exchange in San Francisco (i.e., a store for military personnel) right out of high school, when the store manager staged a fake stick-up of employees during a meeting before the store opened. Many were reduced to tears, and all were shaken. Did I mention it was a staged armed robbery? I remember the manager OK’d the use of a shotgun stock that some colonel had ordered, so people had believed they were looking down the barrel of a sawed off shotgun. The manager was likely fired, but the story we all heard was that he had been transferred to a PX in Turkey.
A couple of recent robberies at other PX’s in California had inspired the genius to test the employees readiness to deal with the real thing. He’s probably a House republican by now.
schrodinger's cat
@Roger Moore: Yes indeed! tailless monkeys!
NotMax
General advice for anyone who is going to switch over to Windows 10:
Before you install it, make sure that you have made back-ups of critical/important/favorite/must have files, just in case something should go kablooey.
Botsplainer
@the Conster:
More from Free Republic:
Wonder if the good dentist has had enough death threats yet to warrant a cry of concern to the Bloomington MN PD, and if the attitude of the PD was something along the lines of
catclub
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Is that the first Windows to have those? Been on Linux Xwindows since forever.
Fred
It has been reported that Walker ordered his cheese steak with swiss instead of whiz. I must admit I think he made the right choice. It may be the only thing I could agree with the man about.
Well actually I would (and have) go for provolone but swiss is way better than that crappy goo that passes for cheese. So I don’t really agree with Walker after all. That is such a relief.
catclub
@dedc79: I am amazed that those large mammals have lasted as long as they have. If you compare California and their farmers, with Zimbabwe, and started out with as many elephants in both places, I would bet that Zimbabwe would have far more surviving elephants. They do a LOT of damage to farms. And US farmers don’t stand for that.
Hungry Joe
@Roger Moore: More specifically, we’re chimpanzees — “The third chimpanzee” (the others being chimps and bonobos), according to Jared Diamond. Splitters disagree, of course, and put us a little ways off by ourselves. But genetically, chimps are closer to humans than to gorillas.
As for baldness, we bald people live in a Golden Age: Shaving your head is actually cool. Who gets called “baldy” or “chrome dome” anymore?
pamelabrown53
@dedc79:
Misfired joke: won’t be the first time.
Germy Shoemangler
Now and then I like to wander over to MediaMatters. But something I just noticed: There is zero mention of Bernie Sanders over there. I even did a word search for “Sanders” on the front page, and came up with nothing. Why?
catclub
@NotMax: Near Swarthmore! I bet we ordered from there.
Not quite 40 years ago, but getting close to that.
Germy Shoemangler
@Hungry Joe:
From what I understand, chimps are Ted Noogent fans, while bonobos prefer Jerry Garcia.
Betty Cracker
@Botsplainer:
LMAO!
BillinGlendaleCA
@catclub: Yes, virtual desktops are new for windows. I have Linux Mint on my 10 yo laptop/tablet, the implementation of virtual desktop is really slick there.
askew
@Germy Shoemangler:
Because David Brooks and Media Matters are acting as an arm of the Hillary campaign. Brooks was on the board of Ready for Hillary PAC and resigned to go back to MM right before Hillary announced. They threw their credibility away to become Hillary cheerleaders.
Major Major Major Major
@BillinGlendaleCA: I LOVE MINT
end of comment
Mike E
@Fred: Mozzarella on the pizza-steak, yum.
/Phila region native, eats whiz on a cheesesteak any chance I can get.
Major Major Major Major
@askew: Uh… source?
jannydarling
Yes, he has a Friar Tuck now, but I see a full Sidney Fields in his future.
Tree With Water
@Fred: If Walker campaigns in the Bay Area, I guarantee you he will be served whiz of one sort or another, each and every time he dines in a restaurant without an open kitchen (just like Donald Rumsfeld). Or so I like to think, taking regional pride into account.
Mike J
@Major Major Major Major: Mint rocks. WIn 7 on my game computer, Mint for work.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I wonder if this might become an general election issue
Not for Christie, who I think will be lucky to get a convention spot by this time next year.
Mike J
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Colorado is a potentially swing state. I don’t think Christie is doing the Republican party any favors. I don’t see his stance picking up any new states for them, and it guarantees a loss in CO.
gbear
@Botsplainer: Yep. Big Game Hunter’s excuse isn’t going to fly for even a second here in the Twin Cities after the Mpls. paper made sure to mention his exploits with the illegally-taken bear. If he still has any customers at all, they’re assholes like him.
Just a month ago, a weekly alternative paper called The City Pages ran a story about how much the hunter’s home town Eden Prairie sucks. It does.
Major Major Major Major
@Mike J: The pot law is polling unfavorably there, oddly enough. But Christie’s not going anywhere so whatever.
FlipYrWhig
@Fred:
Maureen Dowd (of course) has repeatedly made a huge hairy deal about John Kerry doing this in 2004.
2014: “When John Kerry ordered Swiss cheese on his Philly cheesesteak in 2003, it buoyed Republican efforts to paint him as a Frenchie, fromage-loving surrender monkey.”
2008, re: Obama: “He hasn’t pulled a John Kerry and asked for a Philly cheese steak with Swiss yet”
2007: “John Kerry sank himself by windsurfing in spandex and ordering a cheese steak in Philly with Swiss instead of Cheez Whiz”
Surely she’ll rant and rave about Scott Walker doing the same thing!
Steeplejack
@Germy Shoemangler:
Yes, because paying less can only guarantee that you get more qualified, motivated workers. Wanker.
(. . . Okay, this hit a nerve, because I started this comment on my phone and had to move over to the computer to unleash the power of Das Keyboard.)
1. Why is it that when CEOs and MotUs fuck up you never hear these pundits whining about “Why the hell did we pay that guy $10 million a year?! Let’s get someone in here for $5 million who’s really hungry for the job!” No, it’s always: “We have to pay more to attract the best and brightest and
motivatecompensate them adequately to do their best.” So this new guy at $15 million a year will be perfect.2. This specific situation (low-level service jobs) reminds me of something I was thinking about the other day. One of the background tropes on some fictional TV shows set in New York—okay, Law and Order—is the regular appearance of minor characters (as witnesses, bystanders, interviewees, etc.) who apparently have held the same low-level job—bartender, waitress, store clerk, building super—for years.
I know it’s a lazy dramatic convenience, but it got me wondering whether, if the minimum wage were high enough that you could actually support yourself (albeit at a low level) and you could look forward to a semi-decent retirement—say Social Security at twice the current level—there would be a lot of people who would gravitate to those jobs, and do them well, for any number of reasons: they just don’t want the hassle of a “high-power” career; they’re taking an extended break from the rat race; they have an arts/sports/whatever thing going on the side; the location or hours are particularly good for them; they’re a “people person,” etc. Or, God forbid, they actually like working in customer service or the food industry—if it’s not a Sisyphean hellhole.
3. Maybe one of the reasons service has gotten worse over the years—if it has—is because we have moved away from locally owned or “mom and pop” operations to corporate chains and franchise operations. The employees have less “skin in the game” and less of a feeling of ownership and control. Workplace studies repeatedly show that people care more about autonomy, control and “making a difference” than about money in their jobs, so why wouldn’t enhancing those things work at the bottom of the food chain just like it (supposedly) works at the top? If I’m the owner/manager of a McDonald’s, who am I going to trust more—and get more productivity out of—a line/shift manager who’s been with me for five years and seems genuinely happy or an endless parade of miserable, underpaid nobodies who leave after three months because they aren’t motivated to do the job or jump at the first chance to do something—anything—different?
different-church-lady
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: In other words, Christie thinks the path to 270 does not run through Colorado.
boatboy_srq
@Botsplainer:
Any time anyone feels a need to state this on the record as part of ANY larger statement, you can bet the only real part of it is the “love”. Orin Scrivello would be proud.
catclub
@Steeplejack:
Because for CEO’s there is a compensation committee made up of… other CEO’s. When there is a regular employee, the compensation committee (ha) is made up of … CFO’s.
Steeplejack
@schrodinger’s cat:
Re Windows 10: I have a technie colleague who is a pretty good bellwether on Microsoft issues—he is in one of their partner programs—and he is really positive about Win10, which he has been using for a while.
I signed up to get the free upgrade (from Windows 7) on my laptop.
Mandalay
@Botsplainer:
Yep, apparently so…
I hope that evil fucker’s life is totally ruined for what he has done.
Randy P
@NotMax: Pinocchio’s is still there, but I’ve never been, in the roughly 15 years I’ve been here. There’s a diner across the street, Court Street, that I’ll bet was here when you were as well. I suspect some of the waitresses, along with most of the regulars, go back at least that far.
Cheesesteaks are not really on my radar right now, much as I love them. In theory, I’m on a diet.
There’s a place near us that always has a giant can of cheese whiz bubbling on the stove, for use in their various gourmet offerings. While I’ve eaten “wiz” in the past and worse (such as Slim Jim), I try to steer toward food that is actually made out of food these days.
boatboy_srq
@Mandalay: Endangered species. Lured from sanctuary to someplace it could be killed. by people paid a lot of money to do it. Killed. Badly. Slowly. By an entitled schmuck. With a weapon well suited for poaching. For his personal enjoyment. Because he could. Because he could run home afterward to a place unlikely to extradite him back to face charges. From where he could post photos bragging about it. And because (from his own comments) he thinks what he does is “responsible and legal”, which shows he has zero respect for any law, and less for laws of other countries where he’s just a visitor.
That’s quite enough for the story to stick in one’s craw.
Thoughtcrime
@gbear:
Sounds like he needs to get away for a while…perhaps a luxury cruise?
bemused
@Mandalay:
The reactions have been remarkably swift even in our rapid response social media and devastating.
Palmer had to know exactly what he was doing when he chose those people to hire for the hunt. Palmer has a history of finding people that ignore laws for money. The illegal bear kill in WI for one and he didn’t learn a thing after getting into big trouble for that. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more incidents.
different-church-lady
What I’m loving* about the wording of this statement is the implication that “Had I lured a regular old shitheel lion that nobody loved or cared about out of the park, then this apology would not be necessary.”
(*by which I mean not loving)
Tree With Water
“Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer on Monday night condemned former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s (R) “outrageous comments” comparing the Iran nuclear deal to the Holocaust and said that Huckabee’s statements reminded him of the “incitement” that led to the assassination of former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin”. [TPM.com].
Good for Kurtzer. As one who shudders to recall the “golden age of assassinations” (culminating in Moscone-Milk killings), I’ve been reticent to even mention the potential for just such a tragedy. It certainly has crossed my mind. Kurzer is absolutely spot on in his remarks, and it needed to be said.
different-church-lady
@boatboy_srq: And the guy won’t even write a good novel as a result.
boatboy_srq
@Mandalay: The more I read about this the worse it gets.
Translation: I paid a couple guys some money to hunt a lion. I’m not obligated to factor in that what I paid them was four times what the average annual salary is there, and that doing so might encourage them to skirt the law a bit.
Roger Moore
@Steeplejack:
Anecdotal experience here in California says “yes”. Specifically, we don’t have a separate tipped and untipped minimum wage. That means people like waitresses who can command at least minimum wage plus tips can actually earn a decent living. Because of that, many of them do stick with the same job for year after year. I have a favorite local restaurant that has the same crew that was working there when I moved to the neighborhood 5 years ago, and none of them were in the typical just-out-of-high-school demographic you expect to see in short term jobs. Lo and behold, they’re excellent at what they do. They know their regular customers, including their personal preferences, and they know their restaurant back to front. The professional service is worth the extra dollar or two it adds to the price of an entree.
boatboy_srq
@different-church-lady: With any luck, he’ll have plenty of free time to write one, good or bad. Getting writing materials where he’d be spending that time would be tough, though.
Roger Moore
@different-church-lady:
FTFY.
boatboy_srq
@Germy Shoemangler: Typically wanky take on a fairly ordinary phenomenon. Pity he doesn’t factor in all the people who took fast-food jobs (that weren’t teenagers learning about the working world) in the last downturn are now – finally – getting back to doing what they used to do. He’s completely missing that people who are good at CAD/CAM/marketing/whatever but not-so-good at brewing coffee by the barrel can get back to what they’re good at, and he can then complain (just as bitterly) about having to pay people who don’t speak a language he knows to make his extra-special java and hand it to him out the drive-thru window.
mtiffany
@BillinGlendaleCA:
Just waiting for MicroSoft to spring a monthly subscription fee on us…
boatboy_srq
@Germy Shoemangler: It just dawned on me… (follow the progression here):
Emphasis added.
So, he’s p!ssed that he’s wasting time he’s actually paid to do something else with and he’s p!ssed that the time spent is waiting for someone else to do their (totally-unrelated-to-his-occupation) job. I really can’t tell whether he’s angry at the coffee guy for wasting his precious time, or terrified that someone equivalently far over his head will think something similar of him (“Hmmm…. it took you twenty extra minutes to write this particular item,… and I see you took a paid break here…. to get coffee?”). That’s pretty much what insecurity looks like – and he’s bought into it hook line and sinker.
Germy Shoemangler
@boatboy_srq: Good point.
Germy Shoemangler
@Steeplejack: Not everyone wants to be an Entrepreneur. We should pay a fair wage to people who do the important work but who aren’t appreciated by people like John Gray.
I don’t know, his essay just rubbed me the wrong way.
Steeplejack
@Germy Shoemangler:
Yeah, I’m with you on that.
After working for quite a while at Barnes & Noble, I now find it almost impossible to get angry in “delay” situations like the (trivial) one that John Gray experienced. Because now I realize that there’s a 90 percent chance it’s not the fault of the person who’s in front of me. What’s more likely is that the place is short-handed either because the manager deliberately understaffed or because someone “called out” for logistical problems or just because the sucko job doesn’t motivate perfect attendance. Or the people working haven’t been adequately trained. Or they haven’t worked there long enough to learn the little tricks, e.g., “always check the coffee machine right before the midmorning rush,” or whatever.
And of course Gray is conveniently forgetting the 99 times out of a hundred that he got his coffee in 60 seconds flat, boom, no problems, like clockwork.
different-church-lady
@Steeplejack: He’s probably also forgetting the 99 times he himself has wasted 10 minutes of someone else’s life.
SiubhanDuinne
@askew:
I think you mean David Brock.
Germy Shoemangler
@different-church-lady: He wastes my time every time I see one of his stories on TV.
The other thing that bugs me is the shaming of employees over calling in sick. “You only call in sick if you’re on the way to the hospital or on your deathbed” or some shit like that.
I had a waiter tell me his boss forbade anyone from taking a sick day during their busy season. I made a mental note never to return to that restaurant; I can imagine people sneezing on my food in the kitchen.
People who work around food or care for the sick and elderly should not be dragging themselves in to work when they’re unwell.
Steeplejack
@different-church-lady:
LOL, you hit another nerve. I was going to put in my previous comment that the times now that I do get mad in line delays are because of some nitwit customer ahead of me. E.g., they wait until they get to the front of the line before thinking about what they want and then start poring over the menu as if they’ve never been in a fast-food place before in their life. Or they wait until the whole order has been rung up (at a grocery or regular store) before they start rummaging for their checkbook.
One of my few regrets about Barnes & Noble is that I never summoned the nerve to ask one of the check people why they didn’t have a debit card. (And that’s excusing the oldsters for whom a check was probably a big step up from keeping their cash in the mattress.)
Steeplejack
@Germy Shoemangler:
Another thing I used to see at Barnes & Noble: people coming in sick because they couldn’t afford to take (unpaid) time off, and then of course the flu, crud or whatever would ripple through the whole staff over the ensuing weeks. I can’t even imagine what it would be like in a place where food is involved.
Actually, that is one of the few things that I was thankful for at B&N: no matter how bad it was, at least food wasn’t involved. As crazy as some of our customers were, I can’t even imagine how bad it would be to deal with them in a situation involving something as intimate as feeding them. Ugh.
different-church-lady
@Steeplejack:
I frequently think in idle moments, “At least when I fuck up on the job, nobody dies.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Germy Shoemangler: I know your highbrow nit-pickers like to say that “anecdote is not data”, but by gum! John Gray’s bad experience with one guy at a coffee shop has changed my mind. One never encounters incompetent lawyers, doctors, professors, senators, generals or– need it be said?– smug glibertarian newspaper columnists
different-church-lady
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: We should pay John Gray $10 an hour and see how long it takes before he stops giving a shit about spelling and correct syntax.
Tree With Water
“The Commissioner’s decision and discipline has no precedent in all of NFL history. His decision alters the competitive balance of the upcoming season. The decision is wrong and has no basis, and it diminishes the integrity of the game.”
So said Tom Brady’s spokesman. Damn straight.
J R in WV
@Major Major Major Major:
I tried Mint, and went back to plain Ubuntu the next time I loaded a new version onto my most used machine.
Ubuntu is pretty sweet at this point. Improvements in usability have come along with each release. I’m running 14.04 long term support version now, and have been for a year or more.
Tree With Water
What a wicked web GW weaved, when he chose war and then deceived. A headline at Informed Comment.com reads:
“Turkish Tanks Shell Syrian Kurds who expelled ISIL from Zur Maghar”
Another Holocene Human
@geg6: That’s because the good pizza is in New Jersey. Bump that New York street greasepit nonsense. You want good cheap ethnic food in New York, I have a tip for you, take the subway to Flushing, which is also Koreatown. Oh, hope you like BBQ buns. :)
Another Holocene Human
@sacrablue: Boston, but I worked in food, for a Sicilian, good cheesesteaks. Peppersteak was a popular order as well. We offered grilled green pepper, onion, and/or mushroom. Meat was good quality (if it’s not good meat–fuggedaboudit!). American (white) cheese was standard but many customers requested Provolone. Occasional weird person wanted mozzarella off the pizza line, like it was a meatball sub or somethin’. (Our meatballs were lame. I used to get meatball subs at this place in Cleveland Circle with a crazy Vegas/vintage midcentury style sign with the blinking lightbulbs.)
When I first heard about that cheese whiz thing, I nearly fell out of my chair. What a waste of perfectly good submarine bread and steak.
Matt McIrvin
There’s a McDonald’s in my town where I have literally never had an order filled correctly, but I always assumed that that is simply what you get for rock-bottom wages.
Ryan
2 wiz with?
Ryan
@Fred: IOKIYAR, remember Kerry getting made fun of in 2004 because he ordered swiss at Geno’s?
Paul in KY
@Amir Khalid: He’s definitely rocking it.
Paul in KY
@jl: You should not go to Genos at all. Go to another place & eat it with a knife & fork. Or buy one there & smuggle it into Genos & then eat with a knife & fork.
Paul in KY
@Mandalay: What a piece of scum. For one thing, unless you get the perfect shot, you are not going to kill an adult lion (quickly) with a fucking bow & arrow. Why not just hunt it with a zip gun?!
The poor thing was in terrible pain for those 40 hours.
Paul in KY
@dedc79: Hear, hear!!!!
Paul in KY
@Botsplainer: Jesus Christ!!! When you’ve lost the Freepers, you have no one left but Satan, and I think even he would think you were a pathetic wanker.
Paul in KY
@Tree With Water: Brady is a cheating POS. He’s your cheating POS. Looks like he learned the ole cell phone destroying bit from his bud Aaron.
Paul in KY
@different-church-lady: Boy, I would love to see that!
Paul in KY
@Tree With Water: Stop fucking whining! Y’all got caught cheating (again). Take your punishment like a grown up.