Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

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

“In the name of Zandar, I will fight the Stupid!”

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

An unpunished coup is a training exercise.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

This country desperately needs a functioning Fourth Estate.

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

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

We’ll be taking my thoughts and prayers to the ballot box.

We’re not going back!

It’s easier to kill a dangerous animal than a man who just happens to have different thoughts/values than one’s own.

Chutkan laughs. Lauro sits back down.

“And when the Committee says to “report your income,” that could mean anything!

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

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

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

It’s a doggy dog world.

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Sing It, Piano Man

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This part of the Vulture Billy Joel interview was pretty fire:

Wearing the Star of David wasn’t about politics. To me, what happened in Charlottesville was like war. When Trump said there were good people on both sides — there are no good Nazis. There are no good Ku Klux Klan people. Don’t equivocate that shit. I think about my old man:Most of his family was murdered in Auschwitz.The story of the Joel family’s experience with Nazi Germany is told in full in the 2001 German documentary The Joel Files. He was able to get out but then got drafted and went in the U.S. Army. He risked his life in Europe to defeat Nazism. A lot of men from his generation did the same thing. So when those guys see punks walking around with swastikas, how do they keep from taking a baseball bat and bashing those crypto-Nazis over the head? Those creeps are going to march through the streets of my country? Uh-uh. I was personally offended. That’s why I wore that yellow star. I had to do something, and I didn’t think speaking about it was going to be as impactful.

The whole interview is interesting because he discusses the people who hate them and he seems pretty grounded and at peace with things. Sounds like an interesting guy, actually.

Reader Interactions

123Comments

  2. 2.

    Derelict

    Billy Joel grew up in the same communities I did on Long Island. It was impossible to NOT know Holocaust survivors. One of my first girlfriends was from a survivor family.
    So, yeah–bashing Nazis with baseball bats is the least thing we owe to history. And ourselves.

  5. 5.

    Schlemazel

    When we were first married there was an old couple that shopped at the same grocery as we did. I noticed on summer that they both had numbers tattooed on their forearms. It was a chilling reminder that we were not that far away from those times. It was good of Joel to remind people of why there are not good people on both sides. Fuck Nazis

  6. 6.

    A Ghost To Most

    “Don’t let the bastards beat ya down”.

    How Billy Joel closed his show in Omaha, the night before I left the service.

    Fuck civility with fascists.

  7. 7.

    jl

    @different-church-lady: I thought a hedge fund had bought out Billy Joel and was selling him out at cut rate.

    And who hates Billy Joel? His music drives me crazy after two songs, and need a year or so to refresh my ears before another one. But I never hated the guy.

  8. 8.

    JPL

    When I watched the march and the klan and neo nazi’s shout the jews will not replace us, I cried. The next day I saw my neighbor and was telling him about it, and I cried again. Trump needs to be voted out, unless he is forced out before then. VOTE in the midterms and convince all that you know to VOTE. …

  13. 13.

    different-church-lady

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: True story: I was in a coffee shop a few years ago, and somehow their Pandora got stuck on “Say Goodbye to Hollywood” — just that one song, on a loop, over and over again. it was really crowded in there and the staff was so busy they weren’t really paying attention to the music.

    I was sitting at a big communal table, and after about the sixth time in a row, everyone was looking at each other, like, “They’re gonna do something about this, right?” After the ninth time everyone was looking at each other like, “Okay, one of us is going to get up and say something about this, right?”

  15. 15.

    Another lurker

    I had a next door neighbor with the tattoo. Commenter is correct, you could not grow up on L.I. and not know a holocaust survivor.
    When I see Nazi imagery, displayed on jacked up pickups, I see red. I needed to be restrained on occasions, when I spotted a double, verticle lightning bolts, symbolizing S.S., on a truck in a local parking lot. I saw the symbol in a train station parking lot, on Long Island and I have seen it multiple times, here in Fla.
    I am sickened and the last thing I need to hear is athat I need to civil to these mooks, Schmucks, low lives, redneck untermenchen etc. They do not deserve civility.
    trump symbolism, bumper stickers, window decals etc., is rapidly approaching the classification of hate symbolism, IMHO.

  17. 17.

    kindness

    Grew up in the northern suburbs of NYC. Most my Jewish peeps had family lost in the war. A couple had parents who survived the camps. All of them had it impressed upon their very being how horrible what happened in WWII was. We all did back then really. My Dad & uncle fought in it. If they were alive today I bet neither of them would be voting Republicans any longer. No love lost for Nazis. Not from them & their generation. That’s why back in my youth people who were sympathetic to it kept their mouth shut most of the time. Kind of their own closet, eh? Sadly they don’t seem to feel the need to stay closeted any more. That’s the Trump Effect right there.

  18. 18.

    trollhattan

    @jl:
    Pretty much this. Hate “Uptown Girl” with the heat of a thousand suns but the man himself lives admirably, so far as I know. This raises his stock considerably and has me recalling his past as a Golden Gloves boxer. Nazis take note.

  20. 20.

    debbie

    @Another lurker:

    We had survivors here in Columbus, Ohio too. In fact, a classmate’s mother survived Dauchau and father was one of the soldiers who liberated it.

    I was glad my parents and grandparents weren’t alive to witness Charlottesville. It would have broken their hearts.

  21. 21.

    A Ghost To Most

    They say that these are not the best of times
    But they’re the only times I’ve ever known
    And I believe there is a time for meditation
    In cathedrals of our own
    Now I have seen that sad surrender in my mother’s eyes
    I can only stand apart and sympathize
    For we are always what our situations hand us
    Its either sadness or euphoria
    So we’ll argue and we’ll compromise
    And realize that nothing’s ever changed
    For all our mutual experience
    Our separate conclusions are the same
    Now we are forced to recognize our inhumanity
    A reason coexists with our insanity
    Though we choose between reality and madness
    Its either sadness or euphoria
    How thoughtlessly we dissipate our energies
    Perhaps we’ll help fulfill each other’s fantasies
    And as we stand upon the ledges of our lives with our respective similarities
    Its either sadness or euphoria.”

    Sometimes, this song carries me.

  22. 22.

    JPL

    OMG I assumed that crazy gun nut would beat Cagle, and possibly by ten, but as of now, he will exceed that margin. When Kemp was secretary of state, he dissed Obama’s call to tighten the election process because of possible interference. Now because of his malfeasance, the state is paying for my credit monitoring.
    ugh. I might have to move to bama,

  23. 23.

    MuckJagger

    Kind of ironic that the guys who risked life and limb to fight the Nazis don’t seem to be able to recognize one. See story below.

  25. 25.

    JPL

    Kyle Griffin has this up on his twitter feed with a link to the NYTimes..

    Melania’s AF1 TV was tuned to CNN on a recent trip. Trump “raged at his staff” for violating a W.H. rule that trips should start tuned to Fox, NYT reports.
    NYT also reports the W.H. has ordered devices so the Trumps can watch TV in “separate hotel rooms.”

    sad

  27. 27.

    Mike in NC

    One of Trump’s early advisors was Sebastian Gorka, son of a member of the Arrow Cross, the WW2 Hungarian version of the Nazis. Then there are Bannon and Miller, who are ardent white supremacists.

  28. 28.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    @JPL:
    I found an FTFNYT article on that.

    And no matter who wins the Republican nomination on Tuesday, count on both parties to portray their general election rivals as extremists who would stray from decades of sensible leadership by Democratic and Republican governors alike.

    Remember, nothing really matters except the horse race, so sayeth the NYT. Don’t bother with the wider context of who’s actually worse, just make false equivalences to appear “objective”.

  29. 29.

    magurakurin

    @A Ghost To Most: l am not a big Billy Joel fan, and I get why some people don’t like his music. It has a bit too poppy feel for me. But, I think he is a very good lyricist and a fine musician. Piano Man is a very great song and it isn’t really Billy Joel’s fault that radio stations played it on continuous loop for 20 years making us rip out our ear drums when we hear it now. Also, too…this song is still very relavent

    There’s a place in the world for the angry young man
    With his working class ties and his radical plans
    He refuses to bend, he refuses to crawl
    He’s always at home with his back to the wall
    And he’s proud of his scars and the battles he’s lost
    And he struggles and bleeds as he hangs on the cross
    And he likes to be known as the angry young man
    Give a moment or two to the angry young man
    With his foot in his mouth and his heart in his hand
    He’s been stabbed in the back, he’s been misunderstood
    It’s a comfort to know his intentions are good
    And he sits in a room with a lock on the door
    With his maps and his medals laid out on the floor
    And he likes to be known as the angry young man
    I believe I’ve passed the age of consciousness and righteous rage
    I found that just surviving was a noble fight
    I once believed in causes too
    I had my pointless point of view
    And life went on no matter who was wrong or right
    And there’s always a place for the angry young man
    With his fist in the air and his head in the sand
    And he’s never been able to learn from mistakes
    So he can’t understand why his heart always breaks
    But his honor is pure and his courage as well
    And he’s fair and he’s true and he’s boring as hell
    And he’ll go to the grave as an angry old man
    There’s a place in the world for the angry young man
    With his working class ties and his radical plans
    He refuses to bend, he refuses to crawl
    He’s always at home with his back to the wall
    And he’s proud of his scars and the battles he’s lost
    And he struggles and bleeds as he hangs on the cross
    And he likes to be known as the angry young man

  30. 30.

    trollhattan

    @Mike in NC:
    Didn’t one of Trump’s earlier wives claim he kept a volume of Hitler speeches on his nightstand? “Say what you will about national socialism Dude, at least they had an ethos.”

  31. 31.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    @Patricia Kayden:
    What are the origins of the 27%? I know who identified it but how long has it been a “thing” in American politics? And does it exist in other democracies?

  32. 32.

    Barbara

    @Schlemazel: One of my German teachers was a Holocaust survivor. She always wore long sleeves and once someone asked her about it and she showed them her tattoo and started weeping. As for Billy Joel, I am sure he has had NFLTG for a long time.

  33. 33.

    TenguPhule

    Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan is dismissing Donald Trump’s threat to revoke the security clearances of six former top national security and intelligence officials who have been critical of his administration.

    “I think he’s just trolling people, honestly,” Ryan told reporters at a news conference today, addressing what opponents and experts say would be an unprecedented politicization of the clearance process.

    “This is something that’s in the purview of the executive branch,” Ryan added with a laugh.

    Please kill yourself, Paul Ryan.

  38. 38.

    Platonailedit

    Beware of what you wish for, especially from a clueless thug admin.

    Shares of Whirlpool, the U.S. based washing machine giant who was once in favor of stricter trade controls for its own industry, posted their worst day in over 30 years after executives blamed rising steel and aluminum costs for diminished quarterly earnings.

    “Global steel cost has risen substantially and, particularly in the US, they have reached unexplainable levels,” Whirlpool CEO Marc Bitzer told shareholders during a conference call Tuesday.

    Whirlpool stock fell 14.5 percent Tuesday, its worst day since October 19, 1987.

  39. 39.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @JPL:

    69-30%. That is fucking scary. Frankly, either of them winning is distressing enough, but that kind of margin is downright terrifying.

    In the 7th CD Dem runoff, my gal Carolyn Bourdeaux lost to David Kim. I’ll cheerfully work for and vote for him, but I was really wishing for a woman candidate to take on the SAD LOW-ENERGY Rob Woodall.

  40. 40.

    TenguPhule

    Trump administration officials are preparing to issue a proposal within days to freeze fuel-efficiency standards for cars and light trucks for six years and challenge the right of California and other states to set their own tailpipe standards, according to four current and former federal officials. The move would amount to one of the biggest regulatory rollbacks of the Trump presidency.

    The proposal, driven by a new analysis prepared by the Transportation Department’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), is likely to mark a sharp reversal from the findings NHTSA and the Environmental Protection Agency reached a year and a half ago in the waning days of the Obama administration.

    So much for State’s Rights.

    Via Wapo.

  41. 41.

    magurakurin

    @TenguPhule: I know it’s wrong to hope for another soul’s demise…but Paul Ryan is just another name on a long list of people whose departure from this mortal realm will make the Earth a better place.

  43. 43.

    Schlemazel

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:

    John Rogers was writing of the 2004 Senate election in Illinois:

    “”Obama vs. Alan Keyes. Keyes was from out of state, so you can eliminate any established political base; both candidates were black, so you can factor out racism; and Keyes was plainly, obviously, completely crazy. Batshit crazy. Head-trauma crazy. But 27% of the population of Illinois voted for him.[4] They put party identification, personal prejudice, whatever ahead of rational judgement. Hell, even like 5% of Democrats voted for him. That’s crazy behaviour. I think you have to assume a 27% crazification factor in any population

    https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Crazification_factor

    No clue if it really is universal

  46. 46.

    JPL

    @SiubhanDuinne: When I texted my son at 8:06 he laughed. He thinks Kemp is easier to beat, but unfortunately he could be the next governor. ugh. I’m a big Abel fan, but Mc Bath is holding her own. Definitely to close to call.

  48. 48.

    SFAW

    @Patricia Kayden:

    I think it originated from a former BJ commenter. I believe that there may be a BJ post explaining its origin.

    I think it originated elsewhere, but I can’t remember from whom. If memory serves, it was deduced/developed as a result of the Senatorial contest between Barack Obama and Alan Keyes, so that puts it around 2004 or 2005, I think?

    If I decide to be un-lazy, I’ll look up the “27 percent Crazification Factor”

    ETA: John Rogers at Kung Fu Monkey, but I see Schlemazel has already noted it.

  49. 49.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    @TenguPhule:
    So Ryan thinks “trolling” people by screwing with the security clearance process in a partisan, dictatorial way is acceptable behavior? Unacceptable.

    I agree. Ryan should kill himself for shitting all over the oath he took when he assumed office.

  53. 53.

    Yarrow

    @Schlemazel: It’s universal. There was some election in some other country where a candidate was clearly batshit crazy and guess what percentage of the vote he got? That’s right…27%.

  56. 56.

    Urlhix

    @SiubhanDuinne: @JPL: I thought crazy-eyed Cagle would be easier to beat, but the gun nuts have spoken. Kemp needs to have a hammer and sickle hung around his neck for the election shennanigans. I’ve been sharing the Politico article on GA hacking with leaners (aka dipshits) around here and they are universally appalled.

  57. 57.

    TenguPhule

    Potential perils are in plain sight: An intense and unpredictable tariff battle is alarming businesses across the country. The annual federal deficit is heading toward $1 trillion. Credit card debt is soaring. And the synchronous wave that lifted every world economy at the year’s start has dissipated.

    So what?

    Such risks have done little to puncture the exuberant optimism that is encouraging American businesses to ramp up hiring and consider new investment.

    The confidence is rooted only partly in hard-nosed data, like the rapid pace of growth expected for the second quarter and record low jobless rates. It is also a sign of harder-to-measure sentiment. “Animal spirits are high,” said Tim Ryan, United States chairman of the global accounting and consulting firm PwC, referring to the gut feelings and impulses that can drive economies to elation or despair.

    Business leaders who complained that they sometimes felt vilified as engineers of inequality — or greedy exploiters — now say they are pleased to be viewed as part of the solution, creating jobs and wealth. “They feel good about themselves, like they are the good guys,” Mr. Ryan said, describing comments from hundreds of chief executives to his firm over the past quarter. “They are sitting up a little straighter in the chair.”

    The optimism index of the National Federation of Independent Business is in the 99th percentile, an “astounding” number, according to the group’s president, Juanita Duggan. At the start of this week, nearly nine out of 10 companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index reporting earnings so far had beat expectations.

    “I’m bullish,” Mike Ferretti, chief executive of Great Harvest Bread Company in Dillon, Mont., declared. At the beginning of 2016, sales were so slow that the company sharply discounted the initial franchise fee for its bakery cafes, from $35,000 to $20,000. This month, Mr. Ferretti restored the $35,000 price. “We’re confident that the economy is strong enough to not need the discount.”

    Via the FTFNYT

    We are so fucked.

    The idiots running businesses are full of confidence. The Titanic is unsinkable.

  59. 59.

    JPL

    @Urlhix: My son thought Kemp would be easier, because he is just crazy, but being GA it probably doesn’t matter. The one thing with Abrams, is she can get out the vote and maybe flip some state seats. We need help in the house races also.

  60. 60.

    jl

    @TenguPhule: If we banned states from requiring mufflers and seat bells, we could sell more hearing aids and drive a lot more business the emergency rooms. GDP would soar.. Good for business. MAGA!

    Also, CA earthquake building codes drive up construction costs, and reduce reconstruction business enterprise after quakes. Should ban those too.
    Hope someone asks Kavanaugh about it.

    Edit: patchwork of state fire and electrical construction codes also hamper business. And remember way back in the day, fire marshals were vanguard of the deep state, trying to break up Trump rallies. Food for thought. Outlaw them and pass a bill of attainder on their issue.

  61. 61.

    PsiFighter37

    Billy Joel is the man. Have loved his music since my late middle school / early high school days, even though he had already stopped recording new music at that point. I’ve been to 2 of his concerts at MSG, and I should probably make it to another one of them before he decides to lay on a couch in a Plexiglass box.

  63. 63.

    Urlhix

    @JPL: I agree Abrams should have a long tail statewide. And I doubt she has any major skeletons, or we would have heard about them already. Kemp, otoh, is relatively unknown and is neck-deep in the election scandals of the last few years.

  64. 64.

    PsiFighter37

    @Urlhix: Nathan Deal was also pretty scandal-plagued when he ran against Jason Carter…much good that did us.

    I am highly skeptical we will win in Georgia, but if Abrams manages to pull it off, that will be a very positive sign.

  65. 65.

    MagdaInBlack

    @TenguPhule:

    At the start of this week, nearly nine out of 10 companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index reporting earnings so far had beat expectations.

    Earnings. Thats all they see.

  66. 66.

    TenguPhule

    @jl: Much of the business ownership community seems to no longer care.

    They’ve decided that nothing can stop them now. They’re invincible. Politics will not affect them at all.

  67. 67.

    TenguPhule

    @MagdaInBlack:

    Earnings. Thats all they see.

    Yep, the lagging indicator. When earnings are crashing, its already too late. The dumbass fucks.

  69. 69.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Sirius has a station that was kind of folky/singer-songwritery and is now devoted to rotating big names going on Their Really Absolutely This Time We Mean It Final Tour (Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Billy Joel, now U2), songs, interviews, some covers, etc. I mostly flip through it but when it was devoted to Billy Joel a few of the interviews made clear that he has a big complex about Springsteen.

  70. 70.

    JPL

    @Urlhix: She owed back taxes, and if you can’t manage your own finances, yadda, yadda, yadda. She needs to get out quickly with an ad explaining that. Since I have an antenna, I already saw a Hillary, Nancy Pelosi ad, but that seems old to me. If I could advise her, rather than sandblasting Stone Mountain’s racists figures, I’d suggest
    she would put up a plaque explaining when the monument was built.

  71. 71.

    TenguPhule

    Donald J. Trump
    ✔
    @realDonaldTrump
    So sad and unfair that the FCC wouldn’t approve the Sinclair Broadcast merger with Tribune. This would have been a great and much needed Conservative voice for and of the People. Liberal Fake News NBC and Comcast gets approved, much bigger, but not Sinclair. Disgraceful!

    2:39 PM – Jul 24, 2018

    a reminder, the Sinclair assholes were behaving so badly that Ajit Pai of all people was unable to approve of them.

  76. 76.

    TenguPhule

    Cornyn declined to describe directly what McGahn advised senators. But the influential No. 2 Republican said that documents from Kavanaugh’s time in the White House Counsel’s Office were “fair game” but that the paperwork from his service as staff secretary was not.

    “The one that just seems to be a bridge too far that the Democrats never requested before his 2006 confirmation to the D.C. circuit are the staff secretary documents, which aren’t really his documents,” Cornyn said. “He was more or less a traffic cop.”

    What is he trying to hide?

  77. 77.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Timurid: Obligatory

    Andrew Burton @ burtonad
    Had Obama been heard on tape (in July 2010) coolly discussing with his lawyer paying off his mistress in 2008 – by cash or check – Republicans would have won 350 seats in the House in November 2010 and Biden and half the cabinet would have been shamed into resigning.

  78. 78.

    NotMax

    @Yarrow

    In progress. Software updates downloading as we type. Also got her a pretty case for it to make it easy to prop up when reading at the dining table or in bed. Figured a monochrome case, when shut, might be too easy to blend in under certain instances and effectively become invisible.

  79. 79.

    Urlhix

    @JPL: I forgot about the Stone Mountain thing. That’s an own goal, for sure. Of course I’d just advocate putting Outkast up there too and not mention sandblasting ever again.

    @PsiFighter37: It is always an uphill fight in the deep south, but Abrams is a much smarter pol than Jason Carter ever was.

  82. 82.

    Barbara

    @Mary G: It’s not up to the lawyer to waive privilege. Not sure what is going on here. If Trump could have asserted ACP, it was his privilege to waive. The penalty for Cohen for releasing the information would be some kind of professional sanction. It’s not clear to me whether or not the information could be excluded from being used as evidence, but if it could, my guess would be that it would only be excluded from a proceeding against Trump himself.

  83. 83.

    dexwood

    Fuckin’ Nazis. Good for nothing. I grew up in Baltimore. My next door neighbor, Mr. G, showed me his tattoo one day after I cut his grass. We sat on his front porch drinking Cokes, talking. My first girlfriend’s mother, 1966, showed me her tattoo. Educational moments for a kid raised and educated Catholic. Fuck trump.

  85. 85.

    hueyplong

    This is uninformed speculation, but my take on the tape is that Cohen leaked it in an effort to show people on all sides that a tape like this one only makes sense if he’s explaining it. [The reference to “David” seems to be, as people on the Maddow show speculated, “David Dennison” so that it’s about the payoff.]

    He’s obviously still angling for a pardon because if the hypothetical deal offered by Mueller were good enough, he’d have already taken it.

  90. 90.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    @JPL:
    Nah, the figures at Stone Moutain should be destroyed. Here’s a compromise: the state of Georgia hires a world-renowned realist painter and they paint a picture of the monument and hang that in a museum. Acceptable?

  92. 92.

    Mnemosyne

    @Barbara:

    It’s not clear to me whether or not the information could be excluded from being used as evidence, but if it could, my guess would be that it would only be excluded from a proceeding against Trump himself.

    That may be the answer — Cohen may still be trying to protect Trump, and is willing to do so even at his own expense.

  94. 94.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Barbara: Just because Cohen is a lawyer does not mean that every Trump-Cohen decision is privileged. I have been a corporate counsel and have been asked for my opinion about a business decision. I always prefaced my answer with a “this is not legal advice” and followed up with a memo saying the same.

  98. 98.

    Barbara

    @Omnes Omnibus: Well of course not every conversation is privileged but this sounds pretty straightforward. Who knows, like I said above, these guys are so sloppy.

  100. 100.

    A Ghost To Most

    @magurakurin:
    Oh, yeah. Listened to “Turnstiles” a bit ago.

    “Miami 2017 (The Night the Lights …) has proven stubbornly prophetic.

  106. 106.

    eemom

    “Piano Man”, really? Possibly the most disgustingly self-adoring song ever written.

    Also, he deserves to burn in hell for “Just the Way You Are”.

    That said, I do agree he’s a talented musician, and there are some songs of his I like. I also respect what he did here. More generally, however, he has a smug, assholish persona.

  108. 108.

    Gin & Tonic

    @eemom:

    More generally, however, he has a smug, assholish persona.

    I had to re-read this comment to see who’d posted it.

  111. 111.

    Keith P.

    Billy Joel was my first concert ever (Houston, 1992 or 1993). Just a real, real fun show, where everyone sings along with all the songs. I’d never been to a concert before, so the whole time I was asking “When is he going to play ‘Piano Man’? He’s going to play it, right?” Then he ends the show…no “Piano Man”. But there’s an encore…except it’s something like “We Didn’t Start the Fire”. I’m in shock that he doesn’t play “Piano Man”. Then, he does a *double* encore with “Piano Main” (I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a double encore), and it brought the house down.

  117. 117.

    Jager

    @dexwood:

    There was a tiny little corner market around the corner from my mom’s parents house, the grocer, Mr. Rosenberg had a concentration camp number.

  119. 119.

    Bill Arnold

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:

    I meant if it there was any evidence of the 27% existing earlier than 2004.

    Sure. It is after all a fundamental constant of human nature [0][1]. Something about scale-invariance mumble mumble perhaps. :-)
    [0] Also, curiously, it’s almost exactly 37 (one of my favorite prime numbers) times the fine-structure constant :-)
    [1] I have not seen a reference prior to 2005 either. Pretty sure it’s entirely from here: https://kfmonkey.blogspot.com/2005/10/lunch-discussions-145-crazification.html
    ETA @Hkedi [Kang T. Q.] linked it above I see

  120. 120.

    Irony Abounds

    Billy Joel’s biggest sin is that his music is too popular. It drives music snobs absolutely crazy. They can handle critically panned artists who don’t last all that long, but when someone the critics hate sells over 100 million albums, they get deranged. He has produced a solid body of work that millions of people enjoy and he puts on a helluva concert. Haters can go pound sand as far as I’m concerned.

  121. 121.

    Darrin Ziliak (formerly glocksman)

    I like Billy Joel’s older stuff.
    Uptown Girl can DIAF, but Say Goodbye to Hollywood and Captain Jack are great.

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