Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I am pretty sure Katy Tur wasn’t always such a bootlicking sycophant.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

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

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

White supremacy is terrorism.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

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

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Oppose, oppose, oppose. Do not congratulate. This is not business as usual.

Pelosi: “He either is stupid, or he thinks the rest of us are.” Why not both?

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

Consistently wrong since 2002

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Cancel the cowardly WaPo and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

We won’t go back.

The words do not have to be perfect.

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

“Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on.”

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Excellent Links / Saturday Morning Open Thread: Happy Year of the Fire Rooster

Saturday Morning Open Thread: Happy Year of the Fire Rooster

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It’s already well underway in much of the world, but traditionally celebrations continue for a full two weeks, so…

The Telegraph [warning: autoplay] has a list of appropriate greetings:

1. 新年好 / 新年好 (Xīnnián hǎo) ‘New Year goodness!’

In Mandarin: /sshin-nyen haoww/

In Cantonese: /sen-nin haow/

2. 恭喜发财 / 恭喜發財 (Gōngxǐ fācái) ‘Happiness and prosperity!’

In Mandarin: /gong-sshee faa-tseye/

In Cantonese: Kunghei fatchoy /gong-hey faa-chwhy/

3. 步步高升 / 步步高陞 (Bùbù gāoshēng) A steady rise to high places! — “on the up and up”

In Mandarin: /boo-boo gaoww-shnng /

In Cantonese: /boh-boh goh-sshin /

Kat Chow, at NPR, has a wonderful essay on “My Menu For Lunar New Year: Guilt, Confusion, With A Side Of Angst“. It’s Saturday, you can spare the five minutes to read the whole thing.

Despite the obvious jokes, Donald Trump is not a Fire Rooster, but a Fire Dog. CNN checked in with “feted Hong Kong fortune teller Priscilla Lam”:

The characteristic of a fire dog is over confidence and a tendency to act quickly without thinking things through. The astrological sign on the day of President Trump’s birth is earth. The element of metal in the latter half of the year will destabilize the earth.

Since he was born in the year of fire, the spring and summer — when the weather is hot — will be good for Trump. It’s also his honeymoon period as US President. But the cooler months of autumn and winter will see him run into difficulties. There will be protests…

(She predicts Putin’s gonna have a great year, though!)

Reader Interactions

84Comments

  3. 3.

    Elizabelle

    If anybody’s got the Sundance channel on cable, they’re running the full last season of the Mary Tyler Moore show, starting 2 minutes ago. First scene had MTM and Betty White.

    I like how the show is unapologetically set in a city, and all the city scenes in the opening theme.

    Now Ted and Georgina are expecting a baby. Had forgotten that subplot.

    ETA: Good morning.

  4. 4.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Elizabelle:

    I always thought it was weird how they tried to make Georgia Engel a thing. They sort of dropped her character into the middle of the show and made a big deal out of her. I never got that.

    Of course, this is going on my 40-year-old memories.

    ETA: I am in mourning. Barbara Hale (Della Street) dead at 94.

  5. 5.

    Elizabelle

    @Steeplejack (phone): One of those cases of, oh, I didn’t know Barbara Hale was still alive. Liked her. Class act. RIP.

    Woke up to Loretta Lynn (and Jack White!) on American Masters. They’re going to do a show on the Highway Men (Willie Nelson et al) next season. I am glad Loretta is still with us. She had a serious respiratory illness a year or two ago, but seems to have pulled through.

  6. 6.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Today in Stupid Human Tricks:

    What started as two shoplifters sneaking out of a supermarket with a cart of soap here Friday morning escalated into an assault, high-speed chase with shots fired, and a crash that injured an innocent motorist, police said.

    Must have really needed a bath.

  8. 8.

    Elizabelle

    @amk: You are discussing the Williams sister? At first, I wondered what your sister had been doing online.

  9. 9.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @amk:

    I’m still up after watching that. Suffered through Mannix and now Ironside. Going to be worse tomorrow night, because (I think) the men’s final starts even later.

  12. 12.

    Alain the site fixer

    Happy New Year to all! Don’t handle knives or spend today cleaning otherwise you’re likely to cut yourself over the year and always be cleaning. Silly superstitions but then again, it’s a good idea to consider such patterns of behavior sometimes.

    Time to open my new shipment of tea and enjoy a fresh cup of solace. For tea lovers, check out chadotea.com. They are incredible for Indian, Sri Lankan, and such. I prefer Silk Road Teas for my Chinese and Formosa Oolongs and green teas. Have a great day all!

  13. 13.

    Zinsky

    I place about as much creedence in astrology as I do in divining the future from chicken entrails. It’s nonsense. Just like most of the garbage coming out of the Pervert-in-Chief’s mouth….

  14. 14.

    raven

    @Alain the site fixer: I got TWO sad’s from OWC and neither would format. I spent an hour with a really good dude from tech support and we tried everything with the second one. He arranged for a third to be sent but I ended up cancelling and ordered a samsung. He felt that maybe my sata cable was damaged so I have one of them coming too. I’m really good at “changing out” the hd now!

  15. 15.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    Wow – actor John Hurt has died of pancreatic cancer at age 77.

    films include:

    Midnight Express
    Alien
    The Elephant Man
    1984
    V
    Harry Potter

  21. 21.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Elizabelle:

    We went on a tent camping weekend in Eastern Kentucky last summer (I know – different for me), and took a spin to Butcher Holler to see the Lynn homestead. Her cousin and uncle led us through for $5 a head. Pretty interesting, lots of photos and memorabilia there.

    It is super remote, and more so when you realize that there wasn’t even the one and a half lane road when she was a girl – they drove the creek bed.

    Funny part – we stopped at the very cute old timey general store for an RC and a moon pie (because that IS what you do). As we get out of my hybrid, we’re walking toward the door to enter, and some old codger is walking out with a small bag. He stops, fixes us with a steely gaze, and says “ya’ll ain’t from around here, where are you from and what are you doing here?”

    Once we satisfied his demand, he peppered us with the names of every Smith, Carter and Brown that he knew who moved to Louisville to find factory work to find out if we knew them. He even gave physical descriptions to jog memories, even after we explained that neither of us work in fields which are even remotely related to “factory work” and that our clients don’t come from that demographic, and that the city is large.

    I think we disappointed him. He seemed to be the sort who never crossed the state line and never got more than a few miles west of the start of the Bert T Combs Mountain Parkway.

    They’ll

  22. 22.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Kay bait: Trump’s voter fraud expert owes US more than $100,000 in unpaid taxes

    Aged just 33, Phillips was confirmed despite an investigation into his background by state legislators finding several red flags. While Phillips reportedly said on his job application that he majored in “finance” for his degree, records from the University of Alabama showed that in fact he majored in transportation, according to multiple press reports from the time. On Friday, Phillips said: “My degree is a bachelor of science in commerce and business administration.”

    Phillips also said that he was registered to vote in Madison County, Mississippi, but he did not appear in voter rolls, according to the reports. He did not file a statement of economic interests by the deadline required in state ethics law. Having been critical of “deadbeat fathers”, Phillips was himself accused of failing to pay child support. The allegation, made by his ex-wife’s new husband in an interview with a newspaper columnist, was denied by Phillips. A Republican state senator reportedly pressured investigators to drop this issue.

    State investigators then wrote another scathing report on Phillips after he resigned from the job in 1995. Phillips had immediately taken an $84,000-a-year job with a corporation to which his department had previously awarded a state workforce training contract worth $878,000.

    The legislature’s watchdog committee said: “His actions relative to the contractual arrangement create the appearance of impropriety and could constitute a violation of state ethics laws.” No action was taken against Phillips. On Friday he said: “I was fully cleared by the MS [Mississippi] ethics commission of any wrongdoing.”

    He was so bad not even Alabama would take him on. Apparently that made him the perfect #2 for Texas’ human services department where

    he was put in charge of a drastic privatization of many services. An investigation by the Houston Chronicle in 2005 alleged that Phillips had been involved in awarding tens of millions of dollars worth of state contracts to companies with which he was personally linked.

    In only the most striking example, the newspaper found that two clients of Enterject, a lobbying, services and training company that Phillips co-founded, were given $167m in state contracts. Phillips told the newspaper he had “severed all ties” to his company when he went to work for the state. Yet the reporters found that, in fact, he remained “actively involved” with Enterject and that his wife was the company’s chief financial officer.

    Yep, perfect for Trump.

  28. 28.

    Betty Cracker

    It’s cold this morning. I don’t want to take the dogs for a walk, but they’ll be assholes later if I don’t.

  29. 29.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Raven: I remember Iggy in it, but Hurt not at all. As good a reason as any other to watch it again. We actually own it. Got it out of the throwaway bin at WalMart. “Hey, a Johnny Depp movie for $2.50? Deal!”

  30. 30.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    My youngest daughter as she waves the socialist flag during an anti Trump demonstration?.

    She’s a total Berniebot and pretty much equates me to a Trump voter, but she is impassioned, and manages to do it even though they’ve got an armed stalker that shows up a couple times a week, hours each time trying to intimidate left oriented students. He’s always heavily loaded – assault-style rifle on a sling, a couple of glocks in holsters, bandoliers. He tries to approach people (including my daughter) to “engage” with them on their political topics. She tells him she’s not talking to him as long as he’s visibly strapped (she wouldn’t have a problem with him carrying concealed, which she has no problem with).

    Ohio is nuts on gun rights, and the campus cops are really skittish about actually doing anything about him. I’ve eaten so much ass on this that I’m full, but they’re still gutless about even mildly discouraging his presence. Short of me coming up with a good litigation theory (already reached out to a Cincy juicer on theories and a Pro Hac), my only other alternative is to anticipate his next presence and stand toe to toe, unarmed, silently breathing in his face and staring at his eyes.

  34. 34.

    Betty Cracker

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: It’s so insane that people like the “armed stalker” can show up to bully and intimidate students like that. I’d be absolutely livid. Best of luck in getting the law to intervene, or, failing that, staring the bastard down. He’ll probably turn tail and run if you do. Virtually all of these ammosexuals are really self-loathing cowards at heart, which is why they spend so much time fantasizing about power, trying to frighten others and stroking their own muzzles.

  36. 36.

    debbie

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    You can’t sling weapons like that on campus at Ohio State, so for some stupid reason, UC must look at this differently. I know legislators are trying to pass something to legalize carrying anything with bullets anywhere, but I’m surprised cops are letting this guy do that.

  37. 37.

    NotMax

    CNN checked in with “feted Hong Kong fortune teller”

    Oy. Spare us. The stupid, it hurts. What’s next, the week-long expose “Electricity: The work of demons?”

  39. 39.

    OzarkHillbilly

    The U.S. Justice Department said it has “no comment” on whether its Office of Legal Counsel has reviewed any of President Trump’s executive orders, which have met with criticism this week because of vague language and possible conflicts with legal precedents.

    The department’s own website says:
    “All executive orders and proclamations proposed to be issued by the President are reviewed by the Office of Legal Counsel for form and legality, as are various other matters that require the President’s formal approval.”

    The OLC, a small but powerful unit within Justice, advises the executive branch on constitutional questions and the limits of executive power. It is frequently called upon to decide complex problems, especially when two different agencies are in conflict.

    I am shocked, shocked I tell you!

  41. 41.

    Betty Cracker

    @satby: I thank the teenage BBros for helping my impressionable 18-year-old avoid that; they were so relentlessly irritating that she skipped that phase and went directly into neo-liberal-sellout-dom. For now, anyway. :)

  42. 42.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Betty Cracker:

    Here’s our hero.

    He shows up a couple of times a week, as many as 10 hours at a time.

    She says he’s escalating his presence, promised to show up at a socialist student’s meeting indoors (he disrupted somebody’s planning meeting in a Covington library in November), and that he actually entered the Student Union after I was told by the watch commander that he isn’t allowed indoors with the weapons(he is neither a student or an employee).

    She says the UC cops are actually chummy with him, talking details of weapons and chortling over student demonstrations when they’re closer to them, but stay mostly far away (watch commander said 50 feet, which I advised was too far to stop anything, and asked about range time accuracy at 50 feet and confronting a rifle with pistols).

  43. 43.

    Tynan

    Don’t forget this isn’t just a Chinese holiday, it’s also Tết in Vietnam!

    Chúc mừng năm mới!
    ( Happy new year! )

  44. 44.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @debbie:

    Here in the People’s Democratic Soc!alist Kenyan Sharia Republic of Louisville, the police do have a long memory about the Standard Gravure workplace shooting, body shadow open carry loons, implore them to stow their shit and would err on the side of tasers and beatings prior to arrest.

    I’m aware of multiple people legally enjoined from entering campus grounds (not just buildings) merely for disruption, and which have been arrested when spotted here.

    I don’t know why southwest Ohio coddles these cowards and bullies.

  45. 45.

    Betty Cracker

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: A middle-aged dickless wonder! I expected a younger dude. It’s outrageous that the cops are letting him get away with these obvious intimidation tactics. Does he have a job? Sounds like he has plenty of time to stalk kids. What a piece of shit. I hope y’all can end his stalking activities peacefully.

  46. 46.

    Dog Mom

    @OzarkHillbilly: We need different language for these ‘Executive Orders’ – I think something like Extremist Objectives or Bannon’s Extremist Objectives (BEOs) making sure that these are illegitimate bs pulled out of his enormous backside so that the reality star has paper to sign for another scene in his show. I am open to other suggestions.

  52. 52.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    NEW YORK (AP) — A Massachusetts man is accused of attacking a Muslim airline employee at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, allegedly kicking and shouting obscenities at the woman and telling her that President Donald Trump “will get rid of all of you,” authorities said.

    The Queens District Attorney’s Office said Robin Rhodes, of Worcester, had arrived from Aruba and was awaiting a connecting flight to Massachusetts Wednesday night when he approached Delta employee Rabeeya Khan, who wears a hijab, while she was sitting in her office.

    Queens District Attorney Richard A. Brown said Rhodes came up to the door and went on a profanity-laced tirade, asking the woman if she was praying. Rhodes then allegedly punched the door, which hit the back of Khan’s chair. Khan asked Rhodes what she had done to him and Rhodes replied, “You did nothing.” He then cursed at her and kicked her in the leg, Brown said.

    When another person tried to calm him down, Brown said Rhodes moved away from the door and Khan ran out of the office. Rhodes followed her, got down on his knees and began to bow down in imitation of a Muslim praying, shouted obscenities and said “Trump is here now. He will get rid of all of you. You can ask Germany, Belgium and France about these kind of people. You see what happens,” Brown said.

    Pivot

  53. 53.

    ThresherK

    @debbie:

    (Ohio State U has) an armed stalker that shows up a couple times a week, hours each time trying to intimidate left oriented students

    Forget “refugee cities”. The real crisis are the nutjobs trying to create a refugee country for guns.

  54. 54.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @efgoldman: She might be able to get a restraining order, but I doubt it. Being afraid seems to be sufficient justification for shooting somebody (especially if one is a cop)(even more so if the one who is being shot is black) but probably insufficient for a restraining order. Of course, she could always lie and say he called her a “dirty rotten commie c*nt” while strutting about with his guns in a threatening manner and then it would be a “he said-she said” matter and a judge might just decide screw it and order him to stay away because he just doesn’t want to deal with it, but I wouldn’t recommend it. Perjury is generally frowned upon in courts.

  56. 56.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @efgoldman:

    Public university, which is the stated reason why the police are so useless.

    As I informed university counsel:

    Wow. I anticipated this sort of response but find that it is still incredibly disappointing. Completely mismanaged, from start to finish – it does not speak well to the Administration team.

    To recap, you’re more solicitous of the keening whines of an unstable individual on an escalating crusade than you are of the concerns of your paying parents and students.

    Good to know from a PR standpoint. Way to look out for your customers.

    Contact the university’s carrier and let them know that you’ve been put on notice that a deranged individual who is neither a student nor an employee is being consciously allowed (or as some would say, encouraged) to roam your campus with multiple weapons while intimidating students with impunity, and that you intend to do nothing about it beyond mouthing platitudes. See what happens to your premiums.

    I’m truly embarrassed for the lot of you.

  57. 57.

    cosima

    @Alain the site fixer: When we lived in Calgary I bought all of my teas (online) from mightyleaftea — they have some really fabulous teas. I’d also frequently wander a couple of blocks to The Naked Leaf — they have the most fabulous canisters with amazing artwork on the labels. I’ve kept a few of them (for tea storage) but given many away as gifts.

    When we first moved back to the UK, while Mr Cosima was on a business trip to London he stopped at Harrods to get some tea for me (which was very nice of him). We were definitely out of practise with weights, as he came home with enormous bags of a few different types of tea (500g of tea is a LOT of tea) — they ask ‘how much do you want’ and he says ‘I don’t know, 500g?’ and then was too embarrassed to say ‘maybe not that much.’ I gave away large ziplocs of tea to friends for ages.

  58. 58.

    Alain the site fixer

    @raven: them’s good skills to have. These days the pcs last much longer so a new SSD and some more RAM and presto, new pc with all your stuff working and ready to go!

  59. 59.

    Alain the site fixer

    @Tynan: thanks Tynan. I think of today as Tet because a good friend was half Vietnamese and so it’s personal.

  60. 60.

    Alain the site fixer

    @cosima: I order a lot at a time and have 1-2 years’ worth now. Which is good because I expect it to go up a lot as the dollar reaches the trump ideal of weakness. Only one America tea plantation I am aware of so it will have to be imported.

  62. 62.

    Elizabelle

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Kind of a sweet story about the old codger in Butcher Holler. No idea of the scale of cities, perhaps?

    The one about the ammosexual campus harasser? Not so much.

    The camera might be mightier than the gun. Could your daughter and others photograph him and put it online? Or just keep the photos to document the stalking?

    The gun nut is intimidating the students. That is wrong.

    Maybe the students could photoshop little pussyhats onto his weapons?

    ETA: And write a letter to the editor of the campus paper, or an op ed? Point out how the campus police are being neutered by the state legislators? Who probably don’t allow guns in their capitol and offices?

  63. 63.

    MomSense

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    Sue the university. You have legitimate reason to be concerned. Let a judge decide if the suit has merit. In the meantime, press releases and press conference in front of the courthouse and university with other parents is very bad for the university. Ask your daughter for the names of the other parents. Send them the photos.

    Also too have you contacted the university office of risk management?

  65. 65.

    Alain the site fixer

    @Alain the site fixer: oh yeah, I don’t drink coffee so I live on tea from morning to bed so having a pound or two of isn’t so weird. And yes, mostly tea. Not tisannes or other non-tea. My mother was an Anglophile and so it was always tea in the morning and afternoon tea but without the snacks, just a fresh pot.

  66. 66.

    Elizabelle

    @MomSense: Probably wiser.

    This is the type of antisocial emboldened behavior we need to try to push back into the bottle. Or off our campuses.

  67. 67.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @MomSense:

    I contacted the president (who is interim), general counsel (who is interim), safety director, police chief and watch commander, and forwarded the communication string to the reporter for the Enquirer who did a long story on it (other media in Cincinnati have picked it up, too).

    I’m following up Monday with a record request to identify their liability carrier and policy contact person to advise of the university inaction and the threat, as well as to have somebody on tap for me to file suit.

  70. 70.

    Ohio Mom

    @debbie: is he the guy who was featured in a Cincinnati Enquirer article the other day? Supposedly crusading for second amendment rights? If so, as I remember, the paper left out the intimidating other students on a regular basis part.

    Which just supports my theory, you’re worse informed after you read The Enquirer than before you started.

  71. 71.

    Tynan

    @Raven: Right? My only reference for Tết before living here was the offensive, but it’s the Christmas of Vietnam, all family, all celebrating, for days and days. It’s taken a while to adjust.

  72. 72.

    Brachiator

    @Steeplejack (phone):

    ETA: I am in mourning. Barbara Hale (Della Street) dead at 94.

    Very good actress. Interesting how her character and the detective Paul Drake were so essential to the team on Perry Mason, even though their’s could be seen as small, subordinate roles.

    I had forgotten that her son is William Matt, of Greatest American Hero tv fame.

  74. 74.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    On the late night thread there was a link to Steve Bell’s cartoon about the “special relationship” between the US and the UK. It is an homage to another great satirist James Gillray.

    For another somewhat NSFW cartoon about Elizabeth May’s visit check out this one by Martin Rowson. The little details are hilarious.

  75. 75.

    Ohio Mom

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: This nutcase is a mere mortal, he does not teleport himself to campus, he walks through city streets. How about contacting City Councilmember David Mann? He lives in the neighborhood and is a good egg. Maybe there is a way to get the City’s police department involved.

  78. 78.

    Ohio Mom

    @debbie: Apparently not.

    Would you want either of them in the next cubicle? They are unemployed/unemployable for a good reason.

  81. 81.

    lol chikinburd

    Determined here to make the self-declared Year of the Chikinburd auspicious if for no other reason than spite, so welcome to it y’all. Being positive because the positive is perverse and the perverse is necessary. (actually mostly just vidja games and food but w/e)

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