Since I am here at the sufferance of DougJ, I thought I would look in on one of his old friends. Fairly or unfairly, I’ve always felt like anyone who identifies as a libertarian past the age of fifteen occupies a space somewhere on the spectrum between sociopath and asshole. I don’t know if anyone even takes them seriously anymore. Anyway, our favorite gastroenteritis sufferer has just turned forty-five, gained wisdom, and is comin’ Moses-like down from the mountain to share it via a little something she likes to call…
After 45 Birthdays, Here Are ’12 Rules for Life’
1. Be kind. Mean is easy; kind is hard.
Is it? Does being mean really come so easily to you? Huh. I’ve always found that people respond quite positively to kindness and cooperation. Maybe you are some kind of asshole?
2. …If you have to choose between politics and a friendship, choose the friendship every time.
This second one is really about you being an asshole again, isn’t it?
3. If you can’t afford to order that one extra dish, then the restaurant is too expensive for your budget and you should find a cheaper one.
I guess there is a market for this kind of patronizing “financial advice,” because I see it elsewhere. It’s super irritating.
I give you permission to be good. At anything. (A cheap shot, I know. I gave myself permission.)
5. Go to the party even when you don’t want to. Nine times in 10, you’ll be bored and go home early. But the 10th time, you will have a worthy experience or meet an interesting person. That more than redeems those other wasted hours.
Hey, everyone who invited Megan to a party or talked to her at one? Only a 10% chance you weren’t wasting her time.
6. Save 25 percent of your income. No, don’t tell me how expensive your city is; I have spent basically my whole life in New York and Washington, DC. You can save if you want to…
So galling. It’s okay to never know poverty, never sniff economic hardship, to live out your life assured of your next meal and a roof over your head. I think everyone should get to live this way. But let me drop a little asymmetric info on you: Not everybody does. If you are so uncontaminated by curiosity you cannot imagine what kind of choices people who are bobbing along with their snouts just above water have to make, why should you have an economics column?
7. …Here’s a funny thing I have learned by being just a little bit internet famous: it doesn’t matter how many times you hear them, the words “You are amazing, and here’s why” never get old. They do not go out of style. You will be wearing them to your 80th birthday party, along with a dazzling smile.
Am I the only one who suspects that Megan thinks 2 x 45 = 80?
8. That thing you kinda want to do someday? Do it now. I mean, literally, pause reading this column, pick up the phone, and book that skydiving session. RIGHT NOW. I’ll wait. Pixels are patient.
Can’t, dog. My dreams cost money and I’m hanging onto that 25% of my income. Remember?
9. Somewhere around that same eighth-grade mark where we all experimented with being mean...
We did? I seem to recall experimenting with weed and getting into Pink Floyd. What is it with you and the meanness?
10. Don’t try to resolve fundamental conflicts with your spouse or roommates.
Interpersonal conflicts are something I expect you have a lot of experience with, seeing as though meanness is your default setting. Since you brought it up, I’m listening.
…You should never, ever argue with your spouse about anything that could be solved with a proper application of money or ingenuity.
11. Be grateful. “Gratitude is an alien concept to me. Let me explain it to you as though you don’t understand it either.” This is in there:
Many billionaires, however, squander most of their fortune on bitter recriminations about how unfair everything is. Many of them are right, and it really is unfair.
Since this is Bloomberg, they are editorially bound to say that the rich are right about something somewhere in every column. It’s just policy, folks.
12. …
is just some cutesy-poo foodie shit.
So what can be done about people who both lack basic empathy for others and a set of principles that guide them toward decency and mercy? I’m not sure. In the public sphere, though, it means electing folks from the party that makes an effort to help. And so I bring to you fund that’s split between all eventual
Democratic nominees in House districts currently held by Republicans.
Thoroughly Pizzled
13. Getting basic arithmetic wrong is fine if you have a stomach ache.
14. Kindergarten kids should be trained to rush active shooters.
What else are we missing?
T S
Why would I be friends with someone who wants public policy that hurts real people?
F that person.
JPL
I’m going to give myself permission to be bad, and dump a friend who’s a trumpette.
WaterGirl
Where do I submit the formal protest at your having a Megan McGargle link without letting us know where we are going. Ugh.
Not really made at you, just disgusted at having clicked the link.
schrodingers_cat
Who cares what McMegan says?
Corner Stone
Then why are we the ones that have to suffer for it?
Yutsano
I see the gastritis is still affecting her calculator.
Corner Stone
@schrodingers_cat: I just saw that John Kelly clip you referenced last thread. What an amazing individual we have for CoS.
Corner Stone
@T S: Or with someone who is / supports closet racism through policy if not outright invective?
catclub
@Corner Stone: we are the suffer aunts
laura
Oh the insufferable gall of that idiot, and a pox on those who continue to offer a well paid soap box.
If there was one piece of advice I could offer her and her ilk it’s “don’t use your own life as a measuring stick for the lives of others.” As if she and her ilk were open to opinion or constructive criticism, so I’ll leave to the oft-quoted EFGoldman – Fuck em!
JPL
https://twitter.com/kaitlancollins
NotMax
Someone’s been snorting lines of pink Himalayan salt.
Corner Stone
@JPL: Somewhere an angel gets its wings.
Arky Vaughan
Pablo Picasso is one of my favorite songs of all times. Love Jonathan Richman (the original author) and the Modern Lovers version but I think John Cale’s is probably my favorite. Managing to rhyme Picasso with the current White House resident was pretty clever.
dnfree
I couldn’t save 25% of my salary when I had three kids living at home, all of whom needed braces and glasses, sometimes got sick, and wanted to participate in activities at school. What is Megan’s experience with the expense of raising children? Oh, wait–I think I know the answer.
WaterGirl
@WaterGirl: FYWP won’t let me edit my comment. Jewish Steel, I appreciate your commentary on the awful drivel she posted. I am not always the person I want to be, but not once – not once – have I experimented with being mean.
She is the perfect example of how it is that sociopaths show up as sociopaths on personality inventories. I always laughed and thought, who would chose e, the equivalent of “I’d thrown them down to the ground and crush their neck with my boot” as the answer to what you do when someone cuts in front of you in line.
Megan McGargle has no idea of what an awful person she is.
Corner Stone
@JPL:
Last I heard the D memo was 10 pages.
Yutsano
@Corner Stone: I’m assuming this has some relationship to the CR that needs to pass by midnight Thursday. Cause I’m not seeing anything come about it otherwise.
WaterGirl
@JPL: The person who briefs Trump on the contents of the memo controls the outcome. Trump is not functioning as the President. It seems that Kelly and others are really the shadow president.
I want to scream every time I read something that says Trump’s attorneys and his high level advisors don’t want him to testify because he can’t help but lie. That is the definition of unfit to be President. Please let this nightmare be over soon.
WaterGirl
@Yutsano: Right isn’t Feb 8 the big day? :: crickets ::
It’s not like we didn’t know that their word is worth less than shit, but really. Just opening going back on their word – publicly – without a second thought.
The Moar You Know
I have always known this woman was an awful human being.
Seems she may have been more awful than I gave her credit for.
DougJ
That thing was the worst.
glory b
@T S: I know, right?
I don’t understand why you’d want to be friends with someone who has revealed themselves to be a terrible person. Even if they’re not bad to you, they’ll get around to it eventually.
Duncan Watson
@WaterGirl: I hovered over the link rather than visited, saw where it went and didn’t click.
===
The 25% of your income saved thing is a rich person’s conceit. I have seen it before
Mnemosyne
@Arky Vaughan:
I was introduced to the song via the soundtrack for Repo Man and I’ve had it on every music device ever since.
Lyrebird
@Thoroughly Pizzled:
15. If making a basic white sauce escapes you, you can throw another pot of money at buying the most expensive blender thingamajig and have nice white sauce without ever touching a whisk.
ETA: sauce Béchamel is white sauce
ETA: I have been mean plenty of times, including in this comment, but how I spent middle school was being ostracized and bullied by people apparently just like her.
Haydnseek
Really? Don’t try to resolve interpersonal conflict with a spouse or roommate? There will always be conflict, but resolving it is sort of the basis for almost all succesful and satisfying human relationships. What do you do, Megan? Just let the resentment fester until it breaks out into outright hatred? “I did not use all of the pink Himalayan salt.” Did too! Did too! If you didn’t, then where is it?”
“Well, you’ve got me. I traded it in for a few more “I just can’t even’s. So fuckin’ sue me……”
TenguPhule
@WaterGirl:
Speed doesn’t necessarily reflect a positive outcome.
Perhaps a better thought out wish?
Like: “Can we execute Trump’s convicted ass for treason yet?”
Corner Stone
@Yutsano: I am afraid I have missed the connection between Trump not reading the D’s House Intel memo and the CR deadline?
TenguPhule
@DougJ:
Things tend to do that.
cope
Thanks for taking one for the team. I have seen several links to that article scattered across the intertoobs. Glad I never clicked and sorry for you that you did.
The fuck does she mean by “…if you can’t afford to order that one extra dish…”? Appetizer but no meal? App and meal but no dessert? Christ on a crutch, I had forgotten how vapid she is.
MisterForkbeard
The thing is, in some ways this isn’t terrible advice! It’s horrendously stated because McArdle is a fucking terrible writer, but she’s onto something here. There are times when a sincere difference of opinion can be sidestepped and no one has to “win”. Short example: The wife hates the way I do dishes. Viscerally. I honestly can’t figure out how what I’m doing is different than what she’s doing. Resolution: She handles all the dishes, I handle all the pet cleaning and feeding. Problem solved.
Longer example: My brother, when his son was 2 years old. His wife had originally wanted to have her child and go back to work, but had basically decided not to do it. She’d also wanted to put him in daycare, but was too attached to him to do so. She also insisted on being the ‘perfect mom’ and always doing activities. Needless to say, she was exhausted by the time my brother came home from work… who was also exhausted, because he had to pick up extra hours because his wife wasn’t working, and because he had to help put the kiddo to be every night and only got a couple hours of sleep.
She believed he needed to be more engaged and take over childcare when he came home from work. He believed she needed to understand that he was tired all the time and couldn’t full-time parent without at least an hour or two of rest when he came home. This actually almost ended their marriage due to the exhaustion and unwillingness to back down, but they eventually resolved it by… sending their son to daycare a few times a week, which gave my sister-in-law enough rest time that my brother could rest a bit when HE came home, and the entire issues was resolved without anyone actually admitting fault or getting angry about the solution.
Given all this, McArdle is once again showing her biases by assuming you can buy your way out of all conflicts, but the core meaning here actually isn’t wrong. McArdle remains an utter and complete idiot, however.
Al Z.
Self-centered twit probably thinks her age at any given moment is the definite age. Am I wrong to think that 45 is most certainly not somehow a very definite year?
TenguPhule
@Corner Stone:
11 pages too many for Donald Trump.
Butch
Most of the comments there take her seriously, even praising her wisdom. I need a drink. Several.
MisterForkbeard
@Corner Stone: Look, more than 6 bullet points has always been too much for trump.
Maybe it can be summarized for him appropriately: “Nunes lied about everything and we’ve got proof.”
@glory b: I have some acquaintances who are republicans and/or who think Trump isn’t that bad. In most cases, they’re actually completely unaware of his actual policies or most of the events that’ve happened recently. They just assume he’s doing an okay job because he hasn’t directly and obviously hurt them, and the economy is sort of doing okay. But if they defend him and his policy, they’re off the friends list pretty quick.
@WaterGirl: Right? The “We can’t trust the President not to lie when there’s obvious criminal penalties” is tantamount to admitting that the President is hopelessly corrupt (and guilty) or is severely mentally compromised. Either case would indicate he should be removed ASAP.
TenguPhule
@MisterForkbeard:
I believe this is that woman’s way of saying a hired hitman or judicious applications of murder solve all relationship problems.
Mnemosyne
@glory b:
I am sometimes embarrassed that my elderly (step)mother’s bad upbringing in the pre-Civil Rights days makes her think it’s okay for to her to quietly share her racist thoughts with me when she thinks other people can’t hear, but at least she’s polite to people’s faces and not actively mean.
It’s the bare minimum of civilized behavior, but McMegan can’t even meet that low standard.
Corner Stone
It’s a Yahoo! link to a HuffPo piece but I found this brief blurb too much fun to not share:
Yup. Sean Hannity Found A Way To Blame Obama For The Stock Market Drop
“Because the Obama economy was so weak all of these years, we had just artificially cheap money,” Hannity said”
…
“Then, he declared that the plunge ― which saw stocks erase all their 2018 gains ― is actually good.
“In many ways, it’s a sign of the strength of the economy more than anything else,” he said “
Jamey
Can gastritis be fatal? Asking for a [mean] friend.
Lee Hartmann
“Save 25 percent of your income.” JHC.
I hope her employer reads that sentence and decides that a little pay cut wouldn’t hurt.
VOR
@Corner Stone: 10 pages, no pictures, and not (directly) about Trump. No way he reads something like that.
TenguPhule
@Jamey:
Depends on how much help is provided to it.
TenguPhule
@Lee Hartmann:
25% reduction sounds about right.
Turgidson
It’s often the people with indefensible, reprehensible, idiotic, cruel political and policy beliefs (and are often wealthy or privileged enough that policy decisions made by asshole politicians don’t affect them meaningfully) who say “don’t lose friends over politics.” People like, say, Megan McArglebargle.
If there weren’t at least some people adhering to that suggestion, the only people who might be willing to befriend them would be similarly cruel and insufferable assholes. And I’ve noticed that many cruel and insufferable assholes can’t stand the company of their fellow assholes, and are oblivious to their own assholishness.
Megan should add another entry. “Being obnoxiously confident yet almost always wrong about politics and economic policy, in ways the plutocratic fuckhead class likes to hear, is a highly lucrative career move. Made easier if one possess no soul or sense of shame.”
MisterForkbeard
@TenguPhule: Look, I appreciate hitmen as much as the next person, but McArdle needs to spell this shit out better. If it’s unclear, she’s failed as a writer. :)
Leto
@Corner Stone: @MisterForkbeard: The intern is still translating the memo into an MS Paint picture.
schrodingers_cat
@Corner Stone: He does look the part, though!
Corner Stone
@MisterForkbeard:
This seems, IMO, to be a deeper problem that has just been sublimated, not resolved. Having gone through something *similar* to this I will just say it’s not a great foundation to build the rest of a relationship on.
MisterForkbeard
@Leto: Nah, this is tailor made for powerpoint. They can use some snazzy slide transitions between the pictures detailing “Nunes = Good!” “Schiff = Bad” and “Trump is Best President!”
DougJ
She’s wrong, by the way. For too many liberals, being kind is easy, being mean is hard. We’re always trying to win the fucking Lady Bing Trophy instead of the Stanley Cup.
Brachiator
@schrodingers_cat:
I agree. She ranks lower than yesterday’s news.
Nicole
Oh I my god, I forgot how visceral my dislike of everything she says is. I’m mortified that we’re almost the same age; I really thought she was a Millennial. Not because I think poorly of Millennials; in fact, there are many things I like about that generation (the “take this job and shove it” mentality being a big one- much smarter than those of us who were deluded into thinking our job owed something back), but I think I just didn’t want to accept my generation, who were little kids during one recession and came of age during another one, could produce something like her.
But then, Paul Ryan. So. Yeah. Ugh. I think he also finds it much easier to be mean than kind.
Villago Delenda Est
Non fascists/neo-feudalists are calling this dizzy broad on her bullshit, and she’s going all snowflake.
MisterForkbeard
@Corner Stone: They’d been together for over 14 years at that point so they’re will past the “building a foundation on” step. It helps that basically everyone agreed with my brother, but that my sister-in-law has some significant hangups regarding her OWN parents and that factored in here. Usually they can work out their problems just fine.
If the choice comes down to “have months-long argument that could fatally wound an otherwise happy marriage” and “spend $500/month (that can be afforded) and recognize that both people need rest”, I know which decision I’d go with. In this particular case, the argument was more about who needed to give up their time. In the end, they realized that neither of them needed to give up their time. Win.
Corner Stone
@VOR: Surely Schiff and his team were smart enough to pepper the memo with mentions of Trump or Trump properties in there? And maybe one or two pages are pretty pictures of the Trump Tower Lobby where the treasonous meeting with Russia took place. Or maybe the pool area with a bikini clad Ivanka look-alike lounging somewhere.
Timurid
Cognitive dissonance. The other white meat. No, not that one. The other other one.
Get fucked, McMegan.
Matt
McMegan Translation: money is better than principles, see also my entire career. Ingenuity is only important as far as it helps you find somebody who’ll pay you money to not have any principles.
Haydnseek
@MisterForkbeard: Read her post, then read yours again. At no point did she say anything about winning. You did, then went on to relate some excellent examples of resolving interpersonal conflict that completely annihilated her original statement. Well done!
diierent-church-lady
I have paused reading your column, booked a flight to NYC, and I am coming to do that thing I’ve been meaning to do someday, WHICH IS GIVE YOU A RATHER VIGOUROUS DOPE SLAP FOR YOUR INSUFFERABLE CLAPTRAP!
Mnemosyne
@MisterForkbeard:
I am the world’s worst housekeeper. Rather than us getting into constant fights about my inability to do housework, we keep up with the basics and have cleaning people come in once a month to do the heavy lifting (scrub the floors, etc).
It didn’t solve the fundamental problem of me being a messy person who’s bad at cleaning, but it takes the edge off.
MisterForkbeard
@Haydnseek: Man, if only someone could pay me to write awful articles for the Atlantic. Maybe I can start writing occasional FP articles here about my sister-in-law. :)
@Mnemosyne: I am convinced that one of the best ingredients for a successful relationship is similar tolerance of mess. It can be worked around, but when both of you can look at the crap on the floor and simultaneously come to the same decision of “that half of the room is fine but that mess is awful” just saves so much annoyance from both parties.
trollhattan
25%? I’m trying to recall a time I was able to save that much and bingo, while still living with my parents!
Who would like to take this bet: McMegan and Suderdouche live in a rent-controlled apartment in support of Free Markets for Everyone.
Corner Stone
@Timurid:
Ok, so I’ve got chicken and I’ve got pork. Now you’re saying I need to shop for the other other white meat? Is this some kind of hipster thing? Like MajorX4’s hat?
Nicole
I wikipedia’d, and she went to Riverdale Country School, which is a private school for rich kids. Post-collge, I dated a guy who went there (their school years likely overlapped slightly). When I dated him, he aspired to do something with music. Now he works for a hedge fund. Sounds about right. (In all fairness, he wasn’t a bad egg, but privilege is hard to escape. As I recall, he went to Stanford on no financial aid, and yet insisted to me he was middle-class. And I think he really did believe that).
Also, I give McArgle Bargle and husband five more years, tops.
NorthLeft12
That first bit of advice did it for me. Being mean is easy? Really? What kind of horrible person thinks like that?
I am no longer a religion person, but I seem to recall being taught that Christians are supposed to be kind, generous, forgiving, charitable, peaceful, etc. ………you know, just like that jaysus fella.
I guess that kind of Christianity has gone out of style these days.
Leto
@MisterForkbeard: Haha, I thought of that but was like, nah, no way he sits through PP slides. But those three would do it: American flag background for Nunes, prison bars for Schiff, and MAGA for Trump. Throw in some dazzling effects and you probably have a winner.
Villago Delenda Est
@diierent-church-lady: I approve.
But her emails!!!
Just out of curiosity, how does McMegan expect people to both save 25% of their salaries and solve all their domestic issues by spending money. Per examples shared here, spending that 500/month on the housekeeper/daycare on a single salary doesn’t work out for most people.
Brachiator
@MisterForkbeard:
Did these people vote for Trump?
Maybe there are other people like this as well. They voted for Trump and then went on automatic pilot, not paying attention to any current events, and assuming that Trump must be doing OK just because he is playing at being president.
I wonder what your friends think about Obama? Do they presume that he must have been bad just because he was a Democrat?
Villago Delenda Est
@NorthLeft12: They worship Jeebus, son of Mammon, now. Jesus of Nazareth was a fuckin’ commie.
HeleninEire
WTF? Honest to the Goddess why the fuck are we practically reprinting a full column from her. SHE CAN’T FUCKING COUNT!
Corner Stone
Anyone else see where Trump just told the country that either he gets what he wants on immigration he is all for a SHUTDOWN ?
trollhattan
@NorthLeft12:
I don’t want to support the notion McMegan is floating here but observe from the perch of dad-of-teen that we’re going through a bad social patch where claws and fangs are out practically everywhere, shredding relationships forged back in elementary school. It’s very painful to watch and difficult to help her navigate through.
But quite soon they all turn 18 and most will drop the shit and realize (again, for the first time) how important relationships are for navigating the demanding and cruel world.
What’s her excuse?
TenguPhule
@But her emails!!!:
Poor people are expected to commit their own murders. Only Rich people hire professionals.
Gex
@MisterForkbeard: Fair point. But “don’t try t” and “you can’t always” are two different things. And while you generously attribute the difference to her being a terrible writer, her history as a terrible person suggests that might she really mean it the way she wrote it.
rp
That thing about the restaurant is beyond idiotic.
TenguPhule
@Corner Stone:
Let me guess, its a day ending in Y?
Haydnseek
@MisterForkbeard: That makes no sense. I painted a picture of McMegan as a childish, unreasonable roommate. I was talking about your excellent examples of resolving interpersonal relationships that directly contradicted her ridiculous statement.
TenguPhule
@rp:
She’s gone plaid.
narya
I’ve been spending yesterday and today wading through poverty data on the people our health center serves; 37% of patients have income at or below $12,060 for the year (family of 1; number changes based on family size), and 49% have income below twice that. If she thinks they can possibly save 25% of their income, well, it’s hard to measure the amount of cluelessness in that.
TenguPhule
@HeleninEire:
Because Doug hates us all. Being a new parent has convinced him the world is evil and we all must suffer along with him.
Corner Stone
Apparently I do not have permission to edit even though the window clock is still going.
Trump threatens government shutdown if Congress doesn’t fix immigration laws
“If we don’t change it, let’s have a shutdown. It’s worth it for our country. I’d love to see a shutdown if we don’t get this taken care of,” Trump said Tuesday as he met with law enforcement officials to discuss the threat of the MS-13 gang.
TenguPhule
@narya:
That’s no moon.
bjacques
ARGH! ANd she had the nerve to quote John Scalzi. Nice try.
But…
Scroll down the comments to the mini-discourse on board games. You won’t be sorry.
TenguPhule
@Corner Stone:
Proposal accepted.
danielx
@Corner Stone:
Well, we do want to make the guy feel right at home, and how can he do that here at BJ without a certain amount of abuse? Vicious vitriolic jackals have reps to uphold too.
Roger Moore
@cope:
The full quote says you should always get one extra dish when you go out to eat so you’re trying something new; if you can’t afford that extra dish, that restaurant is too expensive for you. Like a lot of stuff in her list, it isn’t so much that the advice is terrible as that it’s being presented by an entitled person who is clueless about just how entitled she is. Ordering new items at a restaurant is a good idea, because it gives you a chance to find something you never knew you’d enjoy. But telling people “if you can’t afford an extra dish, you shouldn’t be eating there” is an obnoxious way of saying it. Maybe you should just order something new once in a while, or go to a completely different restaurant and be willing to live with the results. That gives you the benefit she’s talking about- finding something new to like- without spending money on an extra dish. It’s amazing she can take some actual good advice and turn it into obnoxious, patronizing tripe by putting her spin on it.
Paul W.
For real, what happened in this woman’s life that she kept thinking that “be mean” is either fun, cool, or the default attitude she is supposed to have? Holy fuck what a piece of shit.
TenguPhule
Tell me again how this ends without one side getting exterminated by the other.
Gex
@Gex: FYWP for not letting me edit my hastily composed comment.
Haydnseek
Hey Mr. Forkbeard. Wanted to delete this comment because I might have misunderstood yours, and I’m not interested in being mean. but FYWP wouldn’t let me. Just wanted to let you know and by the by, I live in your area. Maybe we’ll get a chance to talk at the next meet up.
‘
MisterForkbeard
@Gex: Well, being a terrible person isn’t exclusive to being a terrible writer. I firmly believe she’s both.
JustRuss
Well, it is unfair that some people, including some who work full time, are homeless, while others have billions. But somehow I don’t think that’s what’s bugging these billionaires. From what I’ve seen, most billionaires squander their fortunes trying to make everything more unfair, by supporting Republicans and busting unions. Which, strangely, actually increases their fortunes.
MisterForkbeard
@Haydnseek: Absolutely, let’s meet up sometime. I’m in the north bay a most of the time and in the Peninsula another 3 times per week, so I’m basically everywhere. And always happy to meet up with another balloon juicer.
Roger Moore
@But her emails!!!:
By having two very large incomes. SATSQ.
TenguPhule
JFC. Via FTFNYT.
Remember when we were all comforted that FEMA had to have a professional appointment mandated by Congress after Katrina?
And we believed even fucking Trump couldn’t possibly fuck that up?
We were wrong.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
Checking in to say Mr DAW had his MRI this morning but we won’t get the results until he sees his doc on Friday. I think I’ll insist on going along to that appointment. The doc will tell him what he thinks and what he wants to do now, and it’s good to have a backup when you’re trying to absorb that kind of info.
Brachiator
@TenguPhule:
A shutdown smack in the middle of tax filing season. OK. Trump is insane. And the GOP leadership would be insane to stand behind him on this.
A long shutdown might mean that, as in 2013, the IRS would not send out refunds.
The Democrats should urge anyone with a tax balance not to pay it until April 15 if there is a shutdown (but make sure to file that tax return).
If the March deadline passes and Dreamers are affected, the Democrats need to point out every Republican who said that they wanted to help the Dreamers.
James E. Powell
@Duncan Watson:
And when people dish out advice like “save 25% of your income” and “don’t borrow money” they never acknowledge what would happen to the economy if everyone did that.
TenguPhule
@Brachiator:
Yep.
Democrats in the Senate would be stupid and crazy to make a deal when the other side is literally calling them traitors.
Wild Cat
@DougJ: Mike Bossy pretty much did both . . .
Timurid
@Corner Stone:
I’ve rarely had the pleasure of tasting it, but cognitive dissonance keeps the Village very well fed.
trollhattan
@James E. Powell:
No kidding. Cripes, she has credit cards, does she not realize that with every charge she is literally borrowing money? If poor, instead of that Amex she’d be down at the corner payday lender, shoveling out an order of magnitude more interest in order to get an advance to pay the rent.
Empathy, she does not haz it.
Gelfling 545
Read the memo? But it’s full of all those confusing words and sentences. And punctuation. What’s that about? No pictures or mentions of the greatness that is Trump either.
danielx
#1 is about the only thing I can go along with, with the proviso that it’s not hard at all. In the end, kindness is all that matters.
My own rules of life change on a day to day basis. Examples:
– Don’t do stupid shit.
– Learn from it when you do stupid shit and are faced with the consequences.
– Don’t be any more of a fool than you can help. You will be at some point (you’re human), but try to avoid it.
– Have good tires on your car.
– Change the oil in your car regularly.
– Know how to cook.
– Carry some cash.
– Carry some cash especially when traveling, but not too much lest some asshole cop find an excuse to steal it (seize it).
– Keep your abode as clean and uncluttered as you can. Do it even when you would much rather be doing something else.
– Don’t give advice unless asked, unless it’s part of your job.
– Know that your rules are not universal. Example: if someone has to choose between an oil change and buying groceries…
– Never buy an out-of-warranty Chrysler product.
– Never buy a Fiat. Ever.
– Know when to take a chance.
Annnnd….
– You really don’t need to write down your own rules for others, they have their own.
diierent-church-lady
WHAT TO ORDER IN A RESTAURANT IS NOT ONE OF THE TOP 12 CONCERNS IN LIFE, YOU FUCKING VAPID C-WORD!
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
A lot of this is just clueless, but I do want to say something about kindness. I used to think it was trivial and maybe superficial, kind of like politeness. But I’ve since concluded that kindness is hard. Within a family, it’s sometimes downright heroic.
Also, you jackals rock when an internet acquaintance needs a few kind words.
That is all.
I need to go deal the crap I wrote today.
ET
OK in “fairness” (for number 6) her audience are those who aren’t poor but complain that they are. Her audience is most assuredly NOT those for whom 25% of their income is a BFD and they need every cent (and more) every month.
JPL
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): Waiting sucks. I’m so sorry for both you and your hubby, and praying for a good outcome.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Megan doesn’t believe in lifelong learning.
The millions of people learning languages and musical instruments in their 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s,… will be surprised that Megan has told them their brains don’t work any more, and that they should stop.
There are still plenty of languages left on my lifelong-learning list, and I’m over 60. I learned Italian in my 50s. I’m not going to claim that I “learned” Danish, but the bit I picked up was in my late 50s. Of course you can learn new words.
This comment, which I admit took me by surprise, now makes me wonder about the Venn diagram between liberalism /conservatism and lifelong learning.
Mnemosyne
@Paul W.:
Remember, she’s a Randian who got her start blogging as “Jane Galt.”
I’m surprised she’s as relatively human as she is.
TenguPhule
@danielx:
Sounds like some interesting stories behind those two.
Corner Stone
@danielx: If I could offer some advice, you may want to pare this down a bit.
TenguPhule
@Mnemosyne:
Humanity not in evidence.
Roger Moore
@TenguPhule:
It’s amazing how bad a job you can do when you don’t care enough to do a good one.
danielx
@Corner Stone:
It was an exercise; nobody should pay attention.
Except for that rule about Fiats. That’s an absolute.
trollhattan
@TenguPhule: @danielx:
It gets a little complicated now that you can buy a Japanese Fiat. Which predominant car culture wins the reliability history clash? Talk about dissonance.
TenguPhule
@trollhattan:
The Fiat. Don’t buy it. Not even Japan can save it.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@MisterForkbeard:
We have very different tolerance for mess, but we’ve worked out a different compromise. She’s allowed to scoop my stuff into a bag if it’s been cluttering up a public shared space for long enough. If it’s one of her spaces, the timeline for scooping is much shorter. In contrast, my piles are safe in spaces which are considered mine, one characteristic of which is that the clutter can be kept more or less out of sight.
danielx
@trollhattan:
I know it’s a rebadged Mazda, but…no. Mazda should never have been foolish enough to do that deal. If you want a Miata, get a Miata.
Mike in NC
@Corner Stone: What is it about the MS-13 bogeyman and Republicans? Didn’t turn out so great for Ed Gillespie in Virginia. Will it play in Peoria with a better result? Maybe they should just go back to talking about the New Black Panthers to rile up the FOX News geezers.
Jewish Steel
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: I wrote a little something about that but cut it for concision’s sake.
AARP:
Megan likes to start her articles with a little amuse bouche of wrongness.
Villago Delenda Est
@trollhattan: Is she old enough to remember when women were not allowed credit cards unless secured by their husbands?
TerryC
@Paul W.: I keep thinking that instead of “mean” she really meant to say “thoughtless” in a way that results in mean consequences.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Villago Delenda Est: Hell, we knew a couple in the 90s, an entrepreneurial couple with a video production company, who ran into that crap with the banks on professional loans. She was the business and people end, he was the techie who was happiest hanging out in the edit studio all day. But the bank refused to believe her title of “President” was anything but a figurehead.
Villago Delenda Est
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Well, it is possible that the bank had prior experience with the Trump Organization…
Corner Stone
@danielx:
Ahem.
Immanentize
Much better advice — The Deteriorata (excerpt — Nat’l Lampoon)
That still cracks me up.
Gin & Tonic
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Well, shit, there goes my plan to learn Japanese after I retire. Now I don’t know what I’ll do with my time.
HeleninEire
OK here comes Helen +4. Want to know what happened to me with this stock market slide? I lost, in one day, $30,000 (funnily almost to the penny).
My take on Megan is Fuck you rich girl.
I grew up in a one parent household. We were told we were middle class but really we were blue collar working class. But I am old enough to have believed that if you work hard you can do anything. So I got a college degree when girls did not do that. The boys got union jobs. The girls became secretaries until they married the union guys. Didn’t do that.
Then many years later I got Masters from Columbia University. My step sister was so out of the loop that she asked “is that a college?”
So I worked for 30 years. All in nonprofits and I lived below my means. And here I am. I saved for so long. I will be OK this time (its my 4th “crash”.) I don’t need this money for 7-10 years.
I’m writing this except to say don’t assume that the people being hurt in this downturn are your enemies. I am your friend. Don’t laugh and point. I am one of you.
Also too, I swear to God, if I hit post and a new post shows up I am so reposting this.
Gin & Tonic
@Immanentize:
Well, it is the Second Law of Thermodynamics, not the Second Suggestion of Thermodynamics.
diierent-church-lady
D-C-L’s TOP 12 RULES FOR NOT BEING VAPID IN PRINT:
1) SHUT THE FUCK UP
2 – 12) REPEAT RULE 1
Leto
@danielx:
FTFY. Owned three and they were all clunkers. I’ll walk on my hands for the rest of my life before I buy another Chrysler/Dodge product.
Ruckus
@schrodingers_cat:
The only reason I can see is to make mocking easier. And because we normally just ignore her, because of course she’s an asshole, with all the reasonableness that goes along with that.
Corner Stone
@Leto:
So…after the first one you wanted to see if it was just a lemon? And then after the second you decided to go for the trifecta?
Interrobang
I’m 43 and picked up about a hundred words of Yiddish the other evening, like six verbs or so and a bunch of nouns, prepositions, and idiomatic phrases. My language brain is nowhere near like dead. (Of course, it helps that so much of basic Yiddish is cognates to English words, even if they’re archaic, like “kenen,” to know, which is like the Scots “ken,” and “mantel” for coat, which is like “mantle,” the capelike garment people used to wear).
Chet
@MisterForkbeard: co-sign. She’s better with the relationship advice than the financial advice.
low-tech cyclist
Some odd thoughts about McMegan’s crap list:
First: #6 is in a fight with #8 and #10.
(6) Save 25% of your income, but (8) go ahead and do that expensive thing you’ve been wanting to do, and (10) if there’s a domestic conflict that can be resolved by spending a bunch of money, spend it.
Yeah, that’s gonna work.
Also, of course, (6) just plain isn’t possible for tons of people. If you’re making $10/hour, you won’t be able to stash away $5000/year. Ain’t happening.
#2: Friendships v. Politics: Friendships are key, but McMegan seems to say, “therefore, politics isn’t that important.” For many, political decisions can be the difference between life and ruin. Old people live much better than they used to, on account of Social Security and Medicare. The ACA and CHIP have enabled millions of Americans to get health care without going bankrupt. A President that’s happy to let ICE run wild is ruining the lives of Lord knows how many people who’ve lived here most of their lives as contributing members of society.
Politics < friendships, up to a point. If your friend has political beliefs that support governmental cruelty, how's that morally different from being cruel to the people that you both know? It's easier to be cruel to people when you don't see the results.
Less of a big deal, but #3: always order an extra dish when you go to a restaurant. No, I don’t think so. Why would I order more food than I can eat? My wallet can afford it, since life has been kind to me. But my waistline can’t.
And #12 about the dinner rolls – WTF?! Dinner rolls? Haven’t bothered with them in longer than I can remember.
What a doofus.
DougJ
@Wild Cat:
So did Obama politically speaking
Leto
@HeleninEire:
I don’t assume this at all, quite the opposite. Just reminds me of how the military is moving to a 401k style retirement system and how crashes like this will affect my Airmen’s long term future. What’s that Master Sgt Snuffy? You just lost 40% of your retirement savings a month before you retire? Well just remember rule 11. Good luck!
Roger Moore
@Mike in NC:
It nicely ties together worries about crime and worries about immigration. When your whole shtick is selling fear, combining two fears seems like a great idea.
randy khan
I only clicked to look at 12, as she’s sometimes okay on foodie stuff. But, no, it’s equally stupid – she says to make more dinner rolls than you think you need because argle bargle. Actually, you probably should make fewer dinner rolls than you think you need. I make rolls or roll equivalents every year for Thanksgiving and Christmas. There always are leftovers and nobody wants to take them home. (That’s okay, because I like them myself.)
Leto
@Corner Stone: First one was the car my parents gave me. Didn’t have a choice. Second was what the wife and I could afford at the time (E2 salary, single income with wife kid, in 1998 was… low.). Third was a few years after Mercedes-Benz had owned them, thought maybe some of the QA process had rubbed off, plus I liked the styling of the car. Third one was totally on me. Third one really sealed the deal for me:blown head gasket as I was leaving Biloxi AFB 7 days after Katrina hit. Broke down somewhere in Alabama and it was sold for scrap a few days later. Again, I’ll walk on my hands across fields of glass and alcohol for the rest of my life before I own another Chrysler product.
DocSardonic
Reading one of McArglebargle’s columns is akin to going to a five star patisserie for desert and coffee. Only to find that the chef is blind in one eye and can’t see with the other. You order and find that he confused the coffee beans with peppercorns and the sprinkles are rat shit, and he can’t total your bill due to gastric distress.
MomSense
This seems like a particularly useless list. I thought she was much older but then I’m of the opinion that meanness causes premature aging and trout mouth.
TenguPhule
@Leto:
Sadly, being ripped off by financial products sold by fellow ex-military who happen to be scum of the earth is a very real risk for many serving in the military who trust but forget to verify.
Hint: 50% loss up front from fees is a huge “We want to Fuck you Hard” sign in mutual funds.
Corner Stone
@MomSense:
For some reason I always think of her as early 30’s. I don’t know why as she has been polluting our discourse for what seems like forever.
buckguy
I knew Mcardle back in the day when she was trolling as Jane Galt on TableTalk. Her tone never changes 9or ceases to be tone deaf), she affects on sort of familiarity (she used a diminutive of my screen name w/o asking—it’s kind of like a maiden aunt doing a diminutive of you screen name except there is no family reason to tolerate it). then she’s engage in a discussion based on her assumptions of what I thought. And then she would hurdle into some logical inconsistency that that she’d deny was such a thing. Here she does the be kind, but then a could be mean (or bad) references—which is it? Ans he assumes we were all jerks in middle school/junior high like her. It’s kind of a like the Reese Witherspoon character from “Election” but they spent way too much time with a maiden aunt, absorbing mannerism that died out long ago. The aunt probably had one of those old fox coats with the poor fox chasing its tail around the collar and was wearing it in the 80s. So Mcardle became an old soul, but an annoying one.
Duane
I never hated McMegan. Now I do.
Frank McCormick
@Duane: She’s a Goldstein and always good for a two minutes hate.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady):
Hoping for positive news.
P.S. If you take a friend, you’ll have four for bridge while you discuss the case.
MomSense
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady):
Sending you big hugs and positive thoughts.
Van Buren
Re #5: In the 80s, my father used to drag me to parties with his defense contractor executive friends.I used to hate them, because I was the youngest person there by 2 decades, had nothing in common with those people, didn’t want to embarrass my dad by spouting off about Reagan, and wasn’t fond of the country and bluegrass inevitably blaring. And then one year, I spent an hour chatting with Sloan Wilson about his WWII experiences in the North Atlantic, and I learned to be a bit more open minded about things.
ixnay
Just when I thought I had my gag reflex under control … .
Wayward
@TenguPhule: Yeah, it’s got a Fiat motor, not the Mazda one. There will be tears.
Jake the antisoshul soshulist
@Thoroughly Pizzled:
Hit lefty protesters with a 2×4.
Gex
Friendship is more important than politics?
In recent months the President of the United States both joked that his VP wants to hang everyone like me and he also set up a special group in the DOJ to make sure that religious people in the careers that make the difference between life and death can just let me die.
To suggest that I should be friends with anyone who votes for the party that pushes those policies, whether that person endorses those particular policies or not is outrageous.
To that end, she’s correct only because any one who votes Republican is not a friend of mine and hasn’t been since the early 2000’s.
schrodingers_cat
@Gex: How have you been? Long time no see.
Panurge
1. “Experimenting with being mean” kind of explains a lot of that eighth-grade mindset, TBH.
2. The title and idea “12 Rules for Life” is probably drawn from SJW-basher-of-the-moment-and-not-really-conservative-at-all Jordan Peterson’s book of the same name, currently all the rage in his hometown of Toronto.
Cephalus Max
I’m late to this (as always, dropping in after the fact from RSS), but I want to say I love this post with the heat of a thousand suns.
Or ten thousand.
(Whatever…my calculator has confusing buttons.)
GeoWHayduke
@MisterForkbeard:
Something is quite wrong if you have to rest for two hours between work and home duties. Undiagnosed sleep apnea?