Earlier today on Twitter, “testical tanning” was a trending topic. Why? Because Tucker Carlson is projecting his personal concerns about “low T” onto the nation (or at least half of it).
THERE IS NOT "SO MUCH DATA" ON TESTICLE TANNING. THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO DATA ON TESTICLE TANNING.
-your friendly local board certified Urologist https://t.co/IhQb4Aqqf0— Ashley Winter MD || Urologist (@AshleyGWinter) April 17, 2022
The good doctor’s thread thoroughly debunks this nonsense. But there’s a possibility Carlson’s audience will roast their wedding tackle under a heat lamp, thus rendering themselves unable to reproduce and providing a long-term solution to our immediate fascism problem. I thought y’all should know.
Open thread!
Alison Rose ???
But how can he tan something he doesn’t even have
bluegirlfromwyo
Could FSM possibly love us that much?
Emma from Miami
I have a vision of Tucker sitting in an ice bath to cool his “fever” *snickersnort
Elie
Honestly — its like these folks got infected with the stupid virus… Could anyone take this seriously??
Baud
OTOH, I hate tan lines.
MagdaInBlack
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen the phrase “wedding tackle” used. You made me spit my tea, Betty. Thank you !
NotMax
Wackity Sacks.
//
Martin
Culture war keeps getting weirder.
germy
Does tucker broadcast remotely from his own mountain lair or is he an in-studio guy? I don’t watch him so I don’t know.
Geminid
“You broke my will. But what thrill.
Goodness, gracious, Great Balls of Fire!”
trollhattan
Welcome, assholes. And please enjoy our seven-buck/gallon diesel, you useless work-avoiding bags of goo. BTW I’ve phoned Antifa on the 1-800 line, and they should be reaching out presently.
Is there anything more last-year than the trucker protest?
MomSense
@Baud:
@NotMax:
HAHAHAHA!!
Joe Falco
The phrase “tanned, rested and ready” will never be the same for presidential campaigns.
MattF
So, the lil’Tucker (pun intended) is poking into an area of concern. Medically. Well, he’s getting into the age group where the condition of one’s prostate is a possible cause of anxiety. Needs some Flo-Max, I’d guess.
CaseyL
It’s truly weird performances like this that make me wonder if there is anything at all animating Carlson other than a desperate, unquenchable need for attention.
jl
Wait… the linked twitter tweets say that men have something called a tunica VAGINAlis? Proof of rampant feminization of our menfolk right there. These libs can’t hide the awful truth.
Scout211
@trollhattan:
What California coronavirus restrictions? Masks for healthcare workers and facilities? That’s the only one that I see right now.
But let’s not confuse them and their performance with facts.
Suzanne
Naturally selecting themselves out of reproductive condition is not the worst thing.
The Moar You Know
@germy: I would bet the farm on this: he is lying.
MomSense
I learned a couple weeks ago that Fucker has a place in Maine. He apparently constructed a large barn which he has been using for his own tv studio. The person who told me thinks he was spending most of his time here and not at the FUX studios.
jl
Anyway, I’ll wait for the demo coming soon on the Rogan show, before I believe it.
justawriter
@Geminid: “Something’s Burning,
something’s burning
I think it’s love”
MomSense
@The Moar You Know:
See my comment above. It’s possible he isn’t lying, but he also isn’t saying that he’s been isolated at his large estate in Maine.
Roger Moore
@germy:
I wouldn’t trust as word Carlson says, including “a” and “the”.
Yutsano
This is not the worst part. The worst part is he has supposedly spawned. His “children” are going to need so much therapy…
delk
It’s Tucker’s ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ card. He can push any conspiracy theories and bigoted lies and if he gets called on it (or sued) he will say nobody should take him seriously. Would a serious news journalist have a segment on testes tanning?
JCJ
I imagine the men who will put there balls under a sunlamp are likely the same that would take hydroxychloroquine (despite not having an autoimmune disorder) or ivermectin.
jl
@Scout211: How big does a trucker convoy have to be in order to be noticed in Sacramento traffic?
scav
It’s certainly a new and somewhat unexpected twist to marketing oneself to one’s adoring fans: “Hey Guys! We’re all insufficiently manly! Let’s have a spa day!”
Enhanced Voting Techniques
You all do understand most of Tucker’s audience is older guys and guys in the middle of a midlife crises are notorious for doing stupid shit and falling for obvious scams. God knows I went threw that with my own dad when he bought a sports truck and I had to saved him from some scammer cleaning my dad’s savings out by pretending to be my dad and just trolling that slimy huckster until the grifter got so pissed he stomped off in a huff.
MattF
@JCJ: Not to mention the colloidal silver fans. Blue balls indeed.
hueyplong
This story almost seems too good to be true.
It’s like when the “tell them to drink bleach” thing actually came true.
Surely Tucker can think of some magical home usage for mercury next.
jl
@scav: IIRC, hot balls reduce sperm count. That’s the reason infections that produce fevers temporarily reduce fertility, and IIRC is not a special feature of covid.
And of course, there is the no true Scotsman (would not wear a kilt) angle.
Edit: Oh crap, I forgot that the kilt is a dress!! Difficult choices, hard decisions!
Edit2: OTOH, true Scotsman can tan their balls at will, so there is that. I’ll watch the Tucker Balls show after all. Probably full of one weird tricks and secret tips like that.
Old School
Who would have guessed this was possible?
Kent
“Great balls of fire!”
Let’s see if we can get them to soak their balls in rubbing alcohol (or bourbon) and set them on fire. That would be even better.
Gravenstone
Dare we tell Tuckems that it takes UV light, not red/infrared to cause tanning? Of course, that’d be a mighty sensitive area to inadvertently sunburn…
Mike in NC
I have no doubt that Carlson likes to display his testicles to female staffers at FOX “News”. He’s going down the same path that got his predecesor Bill O fired for sexual harassment.
Roger Moore
@Old School:
I keep saying to anyone who will listen that cryptocurrency is an attempt to recreate the financial system without any regulation. Since most of that regulation is there to control scams, you can imagine what the result looks like.
fancycwabs
I have yet to find a light source for irradiating my balls that’s brighter than they light they emit themselves.
Tony Jay
Ah yes, the New Conservative Man’s centrally-approved group activity. Tuckering the sin out of each others leathery golfbags three times a week while the womenfolk give quiet thanks for the conjugal hiatus brought on by too frequent ‘red-capping’.
Silly bastards
Spanky
Tanning is a response to UV light, not IR. So basically, absolutely everything remotely scientific about this shit show is wrong.
Dan B
One favorite response to Tucker’s “bromeopathy” video is (paraphrasing), “I’m sitting next to my gay husband, leading my gay kife, reading a gay novel as research for my gay novel, and Tucker Carlson’s video is more gay than anything I’m doing.” The video is more homoerotic than most gay porn. It’s revealing of Tucker’s inner fantasy of naked young muscly men without any women getting in their fantasy. This is why they want gays to be invisible. We burst their life in their toxic masculinity world.
JPL
@Kent: Maybe a curling iron would provide the adequate amount of heat.
Redshift
@Elie:
In the days of conservative mailing lists (snail mail) back in the 70s, they discovered that people who signed up for those lists were a gold mine for commercial marketing, and hence conservative “leaders” could make a bundle selling the lists. They’ve been selecting for gullibility in the decades since.
So yeah, the people who watch Fox or OAN or listen to InfoWars absolutely believe this stuff, because the kind of people who would believe this stuff are who they’ve sought out for their audience. (That they’re also gullible enough to swallow all the non-commercial obvious BS is just a bonus.)
JPL
@MomSense: Months ago, there was an article written about his studio in Maine.
I found this, but am blocked from reading. Since it’s a Bangor paper, maybe you have access.
link
Redshift
@JPL: Or maybe an iron iron…
Kathleen
@Dan B: “Bromeopathy” is brilliant. Ranks with “Chakra Con” (Maryanne Williamson) on Twitter.
Old Man Shadow
@CaseyL:
Self-hating homophobia would be my guess.
Dan B
@jl: Prepare to have your inner homo revealed by Tucker’s sweaty fantasy.
There should be a followip questionnaire:
On a scale of one to six how much did your testosterone level increase after watching this?
JPL
@Redshift: Perfect.
MomSense
@JPL:
I think the studio in Bryant Pond fell through. That was an old grange hall or something near his vacation house. This is something I hadn’t heard about. He apparently has a big property/compound in a completely different place with a large house and new barn.
Scout211
Interesting take on why Carlson’s “unvaccinated” status does not violate Fox’s COVID policy.
scav
Imagine all the manly manly bedrock patriots anxiously sending each other dick pics late at night desperate for reassurance that they’re tanned enough. The covert glimpses and comparisons in public urinals. Oh! I hope they’re wearing bibs as they glug their bleach so if they dribble they don!t lose more virile coloration.
Redshift
@trollhattan: It’sa “People’s Convoy” in the same way that North Korea is a “People’s Republic”…
Cameron
Tucker is no longer a nationalist, he’s gone glo-bal. OK, that sucked, I know.
Dan B
@CaseyL: Possibly unquenchable desire for sweaty mano a mano with manly men?
Desire for attention, but from who?
JPL
@MomSense: I did search the NYTimes for the article that I saw, and it wasn’t there. What I remember is that he and family stayed in Maine during the pandemic. He did broadcast from home
you could be neighbors.
Betty Cracker
Speaking of sociopaths, Madison Cawthorn fired a staffer who has since filed a wrongful firing complaint on FMLA grounds and is now spilling all kinds of tea. Story at Smoky Mountain News:
Do tell, Ms. Wiggins!
Citizen Alan
@Yutsano: Isn’t one of them named “Buckley”? The poor child.
oldster
Worst. Recipe. Ever.
for Rocky Mountain Oysters.
Citizen Alan
@Old School: The thing that pisses me off the most about Crypto currency is that when it finally inevitably collapses, every goddamned libertarian in the country will demand a government bail out.
Old School
@JPL:
Maybe because Tucker threatened the reporter.
Hoodie
@jl: Not many opportunities for tanning much of anything in Scotland . . . This thing reeks of white male panic about powerlessness, otherwise known as empowering people other than white males. This thing is so ridiculous it’s pretty clear that Carlson is just punking these dopes and laughing all the way to the bank. Pure cynicism.
Calouste
@Dan B: Reminds me of Dan Savage commenting about some Republican (maybe Rick Santorum): “He talks more about gay sex than I do, and I’m a gay sex therapist!”
SiubhanDuinne
@Redshift:
…or a waffle iron….
bluegirlfromwyo
@SiubhanDuinne: …for that masculine tartan
Kay
@Betty Cracker:
Low quality hires. Madison Cawthorne will be considered a conservative statesman compared to the next crop. The standards just get lower and lower.
Scout211
@Old School:
I did a news search as well. The local reporting started with 2019 articles about Carlson building a broadcast studio near his house, then articles in 2020 about Carlson being furious that the fact that he was building a studio was leaked, then more articles in 2020 about his decision to “scrap” his plans to build a studio (which in fact, was a lie because he did build the studio). Then in 2021, his studio was ready to broadcast his show, announcing only that he had a “new set.”
The article I posted at 52 uses his broadcast studio in Maine as the reason that Carlson is not violating Fox’s vaccination policy. He is based in Maine, not New York.
Of course Antifa made him move to Maine.
// ?
Brachiator
It is beyond strange to see right wing pundits and reporters go to increasingly dangerous and self-harming extremes as they try to cling desperately to insane ideological positions.
Also, Tucker Carlson is not showing much testicular fortitude. The Democrats drove him…nuts.
Ruckus ??
@Scout211:
They likey started raising money for this over a year ago and it’s taken them this long to get the money to fuel the 6 pickups and get the permits. And damnit they are going through with it, reality be damned. I mean come on, when has reality ever been within a thousand miles of their wheelhouse?
Kay
@Betty Cracker:
Screw that. So the people they all call pedophiles are supposed to help them elect a slightly less disgusting far Right Republican so they don’t have to live with this embarrasing evidence of their shitty judgment?
We’re all just in service to the Republican Party. It is unimagineable to her that a Democratic voter might have a different goal.
I’d vote to keep him. He’s amusing and he doesn’t do any work anyway. He’s a plus.
Suzanne
@Hoodie:
Y’all know that I read Dreher’s batshit crazy blog to keep an eye on the crazy. (I may have to stop because the crazy is fucking terrifying, BTW.) But there have been a few interesting comments on the blog in the last couple of weeks. One commenter noted that drug use has stolen the dignity of the white working class and made them ashamed. Multiple commenters have pointed out that it’s the “elites” on the left who went to college who are kicking the asses of social conservatives at getting/staying married and having kids. On a different thread, someone noted that the left “doesn’t preach what they practice”. All in all, the sense I get is just abject terror. They’re so threatened by women, racial minorities, LGBTIQ+ because they are seeing that it’s not just that non-college-educated white men won’t have power in government, not just that they won’t make much money. It’s that they literally will not be able to take a leadership role in a family, they won’t ever have (legitimate) children to pass down a faith tradition, and they’ll probably get into drugs. And they see gay people making families and they’re jealous.
Jeffro
“REPUBLICAN QUACK SCIENCE IS BAD FOR YOUR HEALTH”…probably too long for a bumper sticker, but maybe could be part of a t-shirt?
DRINK BLEACH
BRING UV LIGHT “INSIDE THE BODY”
GUZZLE HORSE DEWORMER
SKIP THE MASKS AND VACCINES
TAN YOUR BALLS
-GQP, 2022
Jeffro
double OUCH
CaseyL
@Old Man Shadow:
@Dan B:
Not sure about ol’ Tuck himself, but I strongly suspect “closeted and self-hating” describes a large percentage of his fan base.
Dangerman
Just nuts roasting on an open fire…
wetzel
Supposedly this End of Men montage is actually real.
What doesn’t kill you makes your dong hurt.
I love how they had a guy drinking raw eggs like Rocky. Drinking raw eggs gives you biotin (B7) deficiency. There is a protein in egg white, avidin, where avidin:biotin Kd dissociation constant is one of lowest measured, so at very low concentrations the avidin will saturate with biotin, and you don’t absorb any biotin and you get the vitamin deficiency. That guy will experience thinning hair with progression to loss of all hair on the body; scaly, red rash around body openings, etc. Heck yeah!!! Tango and Cash!!!!
SiubhanDuinne
@Dangerman:
Some guy ripping off your clothes…
Ken
It’s got elecrolytes.
rikyrah
@germy:
I don’t believe him.
Periodt.
Suzanne
@CaseyL: I am sure that a lot of the crazy right wing is closeted and self-hating gay, but I also think we underestimate how many of them are fucken jealous of gay men.
I think a lot of straight white dudes (mostly Christian, mostly without college education) saw a specific life for themselves as a birthright. That life included being a patriarch and being able to afford stuff like new pickup trucks and to have your pretty, loving, and worshipful wife stay home with the kids, and she would think you were handsome even if you gained weight and didn’t take care of yourself (because self-care is what gay men and aging women do). And people would look up to you with gratitude as a provider because you were The Man.
And instead, all the women that you want are practicing assortative mating and they make their own money and probably make more than you and they are not into you. And the beauty ideal has shifted and everyone laughed at the idea of Blake Shelton being considered sexy (but you kinda look like Blake Shelton). And you can’t afford that pickup truck and actually lots of people don’t think it’s cool anyway.
VeniceRiley
@Ken: It’s what plants crave!
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
MAGA men being fooled by a liar…
SiubhanDuinne
@jl:
Vagina is simply the Latin word for “sheath.”
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
Is penis Latin for sword?
Spanky
@Suzanne: I think I speak for many on this blog, present and past.
Fuck’em.
SpaceUnit
This is clearly some kind of collective, flailing cry for help.
Carl Jung just puked in his grave.
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: If Mel Torme were alive he would reach down your throat and rip out your heart with his bare hands.
japa21
@Gin & Tonic: And there’s not a jury in the world that would find him guilty.
Matt McIrvin
@Suzanne: It was just a few years ago that I remember conservatives gloating that they would inherit the Earth because liberals weren’t having babies (often they imagined that liberals were getting abortions all the time for kicks). Now… I suppose they imagine sinister conspiracies ruining it.
scav
@Baud: While chugging bleach down through their nose. . .
RaflW
Goddamit. Some asshole Federal judge in FL just voided the mask mandate on planes. This country is run (or, at least part-run) by insane people. Fuck.
germy
@RaflW:
She also believes paper money is unconstitutional.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
No. The penis mightier than the sword.
Suzanne
@Spanky: Oh, I agree. I don’t feel badly for them, really. I commented on a thread a few days ago about how I had read part of Michael Sandel’s book “The Tyranny of Merit”. And it’s a really interesting book and it has a lot of insight to offer to the current moment. But ultimately what conclusion I came to is that much of the white working class is really resentful that college-educated people, and women, and minorities, and gay people, etc…. are just doing better in life than they are, and they won’t be satisfied until they are doing better in life. And by “doing better”, I mean making more money.
Sandel talks a lot about building a society of mutual and equal respect for one another, which I think we would all nodnodnod to. But it’s simply not going to happen that we’re all going to be economically on the same footing or that white men with less education are ever again going to make more bank than a woman with a degree. So where does that leave us? With a resentful cohort of whiny incel assholes. And ergo, I also come to the same FUCKEM conclusion.
Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
@bluegirlfromwyo: Has the NYT asked people in Ohio diners how they feel about Tucker’s movie yet
@Suzanne: I have heard that plumbers and electricians are raking in the cash.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: This is great!
West of the Rockies
Hey, wingnuts, inject your junk with horse dewormer–it makes you super-duper manly!
Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
@Baud: OK, I laughed our load or (LOLed if you are under xx years old.)
RaflW
@Suzanne: This has been my central thesis about what has so totally warped Rod Dreher. He knows other people are enjoying sex, but he’s so bad at it that while he and his wife have managed to procreate, he knows he doesn’t satisfy his wife, and is probably so tormented by some unexamined fundy guilt (and, possibly, a hair trigger) that he doesn’t find sex to be a pleasure either.
Ergo: No one should have sexy fun time. Especially two guys together (why that in particular is such a problem, I don’t want to even speculate. He should stay in his own terrible cishet misery club of one and not say another word in print. Eww.)
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@germy: FSM save us!
Anyway
@Suzanne:
But college degree is not a guarantor of anything. We hear about getting saddled with debt at a young age before beginning a career; degree-inflation means you don’t make much money starting out; young people live in parents basements etc etc.
Young people don’t have it easy – what are these MAGAts so jealous of?
debbie
“Bromeopathic.” ?
Suzanne
@Matt McIrvin: I dated an airman for a short time before I met Mr. Suzanne. I went to a couple of functions at the AFB with him. I remember him speaking with great disdain about the “dependents”, aka some of his colleagues’ wives. Another friend of mine whose husband is in the Army talked to me about this, too, how a lot of the “military wives” are women who don’t have much education and don’t really have careers. And I guess it’s a big social divide and having a wife with an education and maybe a career is a big status symbol for some of these dudes. (Of course, having an independent career when your husband keeps getting sent all over the place is very difficult.)
Anyway, the social conservatives still don’t think enough white babies are being born. But they are pissed AF that liberals are kicking their asses at it.
germy
@debbie:
trollhattan
@germy:
She’s also about nineteen and a Federalist (duh) and clerked for Clarence Thomas. Yay, Trump.
Dan B
@CaseyL: I agree that Tuck may just be pandering to his base but it’s fascinating that he idolizes the hyper masculine rather than the Hemsworth, Ryan Reynolds, Chris Evans hunks who are so at ease with being thoughtful, funny, and empathetic. Instead he goes for the Tom of Finland and gay Leather Daddy stereotype of masculinity. They’re all going for hyper-dominant visions of manhood that are violent and often self destructive. He seems to know he is not, and ne er has, or will be, an alpha male outside of his whining on TV. In a crowd of hypermasculine men he would immediately be the butt of the joke. He seems afraid of being teased as a wuss.
RaflW
@germy: Oh my g-d, her lack of qualifications is stunning. Do businesses realize that by humping for Republicans, they’re helping install such utter legal morons that it’s a crapshoot how they might rule on cases they’re involved in?
I’m sure the assumption is that, hey they’re conservative, it’s okay. But as Republicans start to threaten political retribution for biz’s that don’t toe the GOP line, these wildly reckless courts might just find whatever thinly disguised rationales they need to screw companies over. Brave new world we’re hurtling towards!
Suzanne
@Anyway:
Well, even with shit-tons of debt, it’s still generally a better financial decision than not (for most people). That’s not to say that going to college will ensure that you make lots of money, by no means. But still there is a significant gap in earning potential over a lifetime between college grads and non-college-grads.
It’s also a status thing, and I think this is the most important part. Increasingly, college grads marry one another and concentrate their wealth. That used to not be the case. Even things like health and life expectancy and weight appear to correlate with having a degree.
debbie
@Geminid:
Letting you know the latest about JD Vance. Some people are unamused by Trump’s endorsement:
(obviously, my bold)
Dan B
@Baud: Greek!
Doncha know?
Penis = ticket to Greek warrior lovers club.
Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
@debbie: Yep, Drupf auditioned for the magats and won their endorsement, not the other way around. They wil absolutely turn on him if he strays from the magat line.
Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
@germy: I want a like Button us for this!
debbie
Some of the replies might amuse the more juvenile among us.
debbie
@Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!):
The rally may be more interesting than I thought it would be.
Brachiator
@Ken:
RE: DRINK BLEACH
Tucker Carlson’s balls got electric lights.
Cameron
@RaflW: Sorry, I’m going to keep mine on when I take the bus. I’ll probably be the only one, but whatever.
germy
@trollhattan:
She called thomas the “greatest living american”
Ksmiami
@bluegirlfromwyo: I say let them all injure themselves- I mean a Trump judge just announced that the CDC has no authority to limit the spread of disease… these people are beyond hope. Truly, may they all die painful long out deaths; our society will be much better off in the long run.
debbie
Baud
@germy:
I can’t believe she ignored my existence like that.
Suzanne
@Ksmiami: Every time I think we’re reached Peak Stupid Shit, I’m proven totally fucken wrong. I mean, injecting bleach, eating horse paste and shitting oneself in the grocery store…. and that still wasn’t the pinnacle.
Whatever. If this is what it means to be a coastal liberal elitist, I’m all in.
Origuy
I’m wondering how this mask order will affect international flights. Foreign countries might say, “no mask, no land.” Judge Kimball may not care if Americans cannot fly out of the country, but airlines and their business customers may have other ideas. She should be put on the no-fly list herself.
Brachiator
@debbie:
Tucker Carlson’s Great Balls of Fire?
Ksmiami
@Suzanne: I just hope they do us a favor and go to Jesus so we can move forward and yes I include the inferior court 6
Baud
@Origuy:
Airlines still can do what they want, and they will follow international requirements.
Steve in the ATL
I am in Panama City, Florida on business and OMG the humanity I can’t even describe it. I will need my memory erased after this
Mai Naem mobile
I wonder if this has anything to do with the studies of men who have had COVID being more likely to have se×ual problems – there was the study of urologists finding the COVID virus in male genitalia months after having COVID. Also not being able to get it on as one could say.
wetzel
A penis in time saves nine.
Too many penises spoil the broth.
A penis saved is a penis earned.
KenK
Oh, this is such bullshit. I’ve been undergoing weekly UVB treatment for 11 years, and no signs of improved T-levels. All I have is a scorched scrotum to show for it…
germy
@Baud:
I have shirts older than her.
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2022/04/the-takeover-of-the-federal-judiciary-by-radical-reactionaries
germy
@wetzel:
Tuck Everlasting
Geminid
@debbie: Interesting. This Saturday’s rally at the Delaware County Fairgrounds could be quite a show. I hope Vance gets booed.
Trump already got Pennsylvania Republicans riled up over his endorsement of Dr. Oz, and the dynamic is similar to the one described in the story you excerpted. People want to blame Trump’s advisors for that one, but this Vance endorsement smells like a commercial transaction.
And I don’t think any endorsement can get Ohioans to like J.D. Vance. The rest of the field isn’t much, but Vance and Mandel are two of the creepiest and most repulsive politicians around.
Kathleen
@germy: Ha! Perfect!
wetzel
@germy:
When I was three I had no sense
I stuck my dick in an electric fence!!!!!
I moved a little over and it burned my balls
It made me mess my overalls!!!!!
Suzanne
@RaflW:
I also think that most of the crazy people of this type are secretly terrified that there isn’t a God. They really, really want there to be a God because they’re putting themselves through a lot of suffering and deprivation and weird guilt shit. And if there isn’t a God, then the joke is on them for inflicting that shit on themselves. They know that many of us laugh at them (because they’re stupid assholes shining lights on their balls) and the only thing that makes that bearable is the hope of a heavenly reward, or what non-Christians might call karma.
Dreher is also one of those people who would be into Dungeons and Dragons if he wasn’t religious. There’s a type that needs that arcana, that convoluted rule structure. Things to memorize. Details and minute distinctions that they really want to matter.
Nothing is pleasurable for these people, certainly not sex, but really not anything.
Kathleen
@Dan B: It def has a “Triumph Of The Swill On Steroids” vibe.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@debbie: Gibbons is the most conventional R in the primary, no? And didn’t he recently endorse the Kinsleyan Gaffe that is Rick Scott’s economic platform?
Villago Delenda Est
Geeze. I never studied urology, but a female nurse friend informed me that she liked her men in briefs, not boxers, because it lowered fertility by scrunching up the scrotum and raising the heat of the testicles. These dickweeds are just going fucking insane with this. What is it like to walk around with sunburned balls, I wonder? I’m not going to find out for myself, that’s for sure…
Ken
@wetzel: And let us not forget the club.
cain
Hope springs eternal. :-)
They’ll still manage to blame Democrats and sue Nancy SMASH in some way. While Tucker’s balls stays clean and untanned.
Kathleen
@debbie: Is DeWine still planning not to go do you know? I was a little suspicious about his latest positive CoVid test LOL.
Do you mind sharing whom you are supporting in the primary (Whaley vs. Cranley)?
Kathleen
@Brachiator: That could come in handy the next time Greg Abbot effs with the power in Texas.
germy
I think I found out where Tucker has been broadcasting from:
Geminid
@debbie: I have this fantasy where Vance gets 18% on May 3rd, Timken gets 19%, Gibbons 20%, Mandel 21%, and Matt Dolan wins with 22%. This will never happen, and that’s probably a good thing for Tim Ryan.
Kathleen
@germy: Tuck’s Tanfastic Testes
Kathleen
@germy: Sounds like a remedy for ED that Tucker would tout.
germy
@Kathleen:
whole lotta shakin’ goin’ on.
Kathleen
@Geminid: And that’s saying something considering Ohio’s Rethugs are an especially pernicious and toxic brand of vampires and ghouls.
Dan B
@Mai Naem mobile: The MSM has not reported on shrinkage of the peen and wedding gift bag (or whatever Betty C called it).
They have dropped the ball on this story!
Suzanne
Does anyone else see Vizzini as the platonic “ideal” of all Republicans?
Kathleen
@germy: Bwa ha ha.
Baud
I wonder if heat lamps would burn off excess nutsack hair.
Kathleen
@Dan B: Well considering they’ve all lost theirs…
debbie
@Kathleen:
Fran’s come down with COVID now. Like those two can’t spend one second apart! ?
DeWine was being very noncommittal about the rally. He has some sort of prior commitment and can’t promise he’ll be there. ??♀️
Geminid
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: State Senator Matt Dolan would be the conventional Republican in the race by the standards of ten years ago. Now he has the moderate conservative lane to himself and still seems to be running last.
That Ohio party has gone off the deep end. Trump won the state by 8 points twice, and Republicans seem to think Ohio is now Arkansas.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Pshaw, voodoo math!
Kathleen
@debbie: Did it have something to do with the anniversary of Grant’s birth, or was that just a Twitter meme, or is that an old guy’s version of “I need to stay home and wash my hair”?
Dan B
@Dan B: Wedding tackle
wetzel
Tuck’s Everlasting Penis Tanning Bed
Tucker’s brown frankfurter
Had flattened out to a hamburger
He needed to tan it further
So he built an ionic converter
Into which to place his member
A resonating chamber
As brown as brown September
In which to place his member
The swirling radiation
Was so damn satiating
That now it’s brown like bacon
And the skin has started flaking
Steeplejack
I’ve been chuckling about “bromeopathic therapy” all day. I hear it in a Keanu Reeves stoner voice.
debbie
@Geminid:
I still don’t believe there will be a May 3 primary or even two separate primaries. The GOP has lost its grip on reality. Everyone’s trying to out-brinkmanship everybody else.
debbie
@Kathleen:
I think you might be right. I was only half-listening.
Geminid
@debbie: I bet the TV and radio stations want to see a postponement. They’re making a lot of money on this primary. Their viewers and listeners probably wish it was over already.
Brachiator
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Interesting to see a Republican arguing out loud in favor of the rich.
Kathleen
Dana Milbank just published a column about Tucker. The comments are hysterical.
Another Scott
Wow.
Good, good. Every seat matters, every time.
(via LOLGOP)
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott:
?
Geminid
@Brachiator: I read that Gibbons said this last fall on some Crain’s Business podcast. He probably thought he was speaking to a niche audience. But there’s no such thing now when you’re running for office.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Suzanne:
I agree completely. Plus, they think we make all this money without doing ‘real’ work. As in, work that requires physical strength. The thing is that if they go into the trades, they start out making a lot more. Too many of them, though, are not responsible with that money. Without a consistent saving and a sound investment strategy, they will be in for a world of hurt later when their bodies wear out. Meanwhile, the college educated marry later, are more likely to invest for retirement, etc. They start out poor and do well later, right when the white working class are seeing their economic prospects shrink.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Another Scott:
good to see somebody focusing on ground-up rather than the top-down solutions that have too often become the default in recent years
Baud
Via Hillary’s Twitter.
Ken
What are they going to have instead? Pistols at dawn? A steel cage death match? A replay of that scene in “The Dark Knight” where the Joker tells three thugs “I’ve only got one opening in my crew” and tosses a broken pool cue between them? A comparison of scrotal melanin content?
Suburban Mom
Okay, since this is an open thread and the prior one is old, I’m delurking to point out that state-level public school text requirements have a history as a source of shady dealing. When a large system changes textbook requirements there are new deals to be cut, and money to be made. I wouldn’t be one tiny bit surprised if the latest decision about Florida math texts turned out to be a way to suck up to Fox News and reward a few friendly producers of classroom materials. Someone in Florida should keep an eye on who gets the contracts to supply the “acceptable” texts.
KrackenJack
@Gravenstone: Clearly they need full spectrum for maximum benefit: microwave to x-rays at least.
prostratedragon
@scav: Thank you, the suspense was killing me.
Kay
@Suburban Mom:
Thanks. The Indiana “ban CRT” bill went down because they were afraid of not qualifying for AP courses.
The wrath of the AP parents – sent those Republicans scurrying away :)
Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
@Another Scott: I hope this isn’t a decade too late. Like I’m afraid the Environmental Voter Project is.
Danielx
The jokes, they write themselves…
Although I will bet that right now somebody somewhere is filing a patent application for a Tucker-endorsed tanning light.
Another Scott
@Origuy:
I’m shocked, shocked.
Grr…,
Scott.
Danielx
@Ken:
A biting-off-live-bat-heads competition, per Ozzy, followed by all the R candidates being thrown into a pit of rabid wolverines. First to emerge alive wins.
RepubAnon
@Roger Moore: Precisely! I can have my pay electronically deposited into my bank account, and pay for things electronically with a credit card. I pay fees for this, and get the protection of rules such as being able to dispute inaccurate charges. (Debit cards don’t have this protection – which is why I use credit cards.)
The only advantage I see to cryptocurrencies other than the speculation bubbles is that it’s easier for my money to be stolen.
RepubAnon
@Brachiator: Brokeback Mountain Oyster Bar?
Quantumman
….bro nuts roasting on an open fire… (sung to a familiar Christmas song).
Suburban Mom
@Kay: I’ve met those parents and they are scary. Don’t ever get between the kid they consider to be Ivy or near Ivy bound and the last available seat in AP Physics.
laura
@Dan B: my wag is that he’s a deeply closeted homosexual who’s sexual awakening in the Bay Area came at a time when Tom of Finland was errrrwhere- the actual ToF art material, the leather daddies in the Castro, the BAR, the whole scene and it’s both his imprint and deepest source of shame and uh oh feelings in the no no spot. His public facing persona is such an unfuckable square from the land of William F Buckley and his barely contained hysteria on the “rare occasions” that he turns to the subject of manliness just makes one wonder about his choices, his motivation and why, at the dimming of the day, he is such vile filth. If I’m off track, please steer me straight, constructive criticism is my jam!
TonyG
There’s really nothing more MANLY than obediently doing whatever some dweeb on teevee tells you to do. Obey your teevee!
TonyG
@laura: If Tucker is not gay, I need to get my gaydar adjusted.
Spanky
@Baud: Exactly! Bookmark this as another example of Hogan’s “moderate” cred being the result of the MD legislature, and absolutely not his governing philosophy.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@laura: I would be very much unsurprised if we someday learn you are right.
Tucker once claimed to have been groped in a DC park mens room, and then said he and a friend went back and beat the guy up. I saw this in real time, and it was pretty obvious he was making the whole thing up as he went along, and the vigilanteism he thought made him sound tough and macho was a fantasy
Ruckus ??
@Suzanne:
Well they only know one direction and that’s always the most stupid, because it doesn’t help anyone. Even the rich assholes who are stealing everything not tied down and some that is.
Bupalos
@Suzanne: Hate to be the bearer of this news, but fascism isn’t actually genetically determined. And it flourishes best in societies that do this Us/Them thing.
bluegirlfromwyo
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: In other words, I was supposed to plan poorly to avoid hurting white working class male feelings. Screw that. They can suck on their personal responsibility.
Dan B
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: His story begs several questions.
Why would anyone grope him? It would be like squeezing Wonder Bread. (Apologies to Wonder Bread.)
Does he believe his ‘manly allure’ would make the gehz swoon?
Would he ever go into a public restroom? He seems like the fussy type who would hold it until he got to a first class hotel.
Would he go to a public park? Private clubs at private golf courses seem his modality.
Everything screams prissy wimp. (Emphasis on ‘screams’.)
Bupalos
@Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!): yes agreed, this is true. I don’t really know about this whole taxonomy of the right wing male.
Its culture folks. The wingers who can stay off drugs out in exurbia make decent money and pair up with traditionalist women just fine. Frankly some tech school kid that goes right into a trade might be (strictly and myopically speaking) be making a better financial choice than a lot of college kids.
There are other reason why these are less likely to he happy marriages or happy people.
Bupalos
@Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!): i’m not sure there is any “line.” More like just a demand to reflect their anger and bitterness. As long as Trump calls people names, refuses to respect anything decent, and generally affirms and projects the idea that all of morality is a scam and that nothing is true… well he’s golden. For a broad majority if his “supporters” that’s what matters. And there is basically zero chance he could ever stop doing any of thoae things because those aren’t thimgs he’s faking, that’s who he is.
TonyG
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Young men are pretty damn stupid too. Maybe it’s all downhill after age 10.
Mai Naem mobile
@Suburban Mom: i wonder if Rupert Murdoch is involved in text book publishing. I only know he’s involved in regulat book publishing. I remember from years ago that Texas was a big influence in school text books chosen. I’ve never understood why California wasn’t mentioned since its a larger state. I am guessing Florida has a big influence now as well with their increase in population.
Villago Delenda Est
@germy:
Show your work, bimbo.