Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

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

You cannot shame the shameless.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

Let there be snark.

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” is supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

People are weird.

The lights are all blinking red.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

President Biden is doing good where he can, and getting it done.

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

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

There’s always a light at the end of the frog.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

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Reader Interactions

72Comments

  2. 2.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Oh, that’s brilliant. I’m literally weeping with mirth. Now I have to go watch it again.

  3. 3.

    Alison Rose

    The thing about taking the u out of (most) words cracked me up, too. Also reminded me of one of my favorite tweet-meme jokes.

    Tweet:

    Why is it “cancelled” in the UK but “canceled” in America?

    Reply:

    Cuz we gave you that L in 1776.

  8. 8.

    gene108

    It is true. We do not switch to the metric system because we still have the freedom to be free.

    We will resist French Imperial hegemony in weights and measures for as long as it takes for the world to demand the same FREEDOM!!!

  9. 9.

    SiubhanDuinne

    I’ve now watched it three times in a row and I’m still shrieking with laughter. Jesus, that’s a funny bit.

  10. 10.

    eclare

    We had to learn a song about the immiment metric adoption in third grade.  I still remember some of the lyrics.  Talk about useless information stored deep in my brain.  They are next to the song lyrics I remember from a song celebrating Johnny Appleseed.

  14. 14.

    Eric K

    Just started watching last nights show (on this skit now) so far they are batting 1.000, best SNL episode in years

  16. 16.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @WaterGirl:

    Thanks for asking, WG. Almost all of the bruising has faded, and the cut over the eye is healing nicely. Forehead still has a couple of lumps that are tender to the touch, but all in all it could have been much worse. I haven’t even taken an Aleve since Wednesday.

  19. 19.

    BellyCat

    the bit about “And all men will be free!” from the AA cast member. “You asked me about temperature.” With the response, “I did not!”

    Dying here…

  28. 28.

    Matt McIrvin

    For what it’s worth, right now the Tory government in the UK is making a big pointless noise about bringing back Imperial weights and measures, because tradition, and did those feet in ancient times walk upon England’s mountains green, or something.

    (And when Americans comment on this, most of them don’t realize that we *don’t* use Imperial measures–our fluid volume units have the same names as the Imperial ones but they’re all different! Whoopee, fun times!)

  29. 29.

    Rose Weiss

    Thanks for the biggest laugh I’ve had in a long time! That skit was hilarious. I loved the Black guy prominently  continuing to ask and being essentially ignored. So on point.

  33. 33.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @gene108:

    After reading people in metric countries complaining about price increases at the gas pump, be happy we have not converted to the metric system. A per unit price change of .20 cents is only a $3.40 increase for 17 gallons. It’s $12.85 for the same amount of fuel in liters with that same .20 cent increase.

    The oil companies would love that to no end.

  37. 37.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Matt McIrvin:

    For what it’s worth, right now the Tory government in the UK is making a big pointless noise about bringing back Imperial weights and measures, because tradition, and did those feet in ancient times walk upon England’s mountains green, or something.

    The UK Tories have their finger on the pulse of the real issues people care about, just like the GOP /s

    I always like metric measurements. Way easier to convert than imperial and it’s more intuitive

  40. 40.

    Splitting Image

    @Memory Pallas:

    “Glamor” just does not look glamorous .

    One of my favourite little bits of word trivia is that the word glamour is derived from grammar. The fact that glamour and glamor still rhyme with grammar regardless of how they are spelled (spelt?) is one of the fun little things about English that makes it so enjoyable for non-speakers to learn.

    I also love that words like row and bow rhyme in two different ways. It’s cute that anybody thought they could make English spelling seem rational by removing the “u” from a few words.

  41. 41.

    Ken

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: Brilliant! Who are you parodying?

    (At least, I assume it’s a parody. “20 cents per unit” is obviously going to depend on the unit, and a 20 cents per gallon change would be a nickel a gallon change in a country using metric units. And dollars, but I understand there are a number of dollarized countries.)

  42. 42.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Ken: I thought the reasoning was that using smaller units would make it easier for oil companies to hide a price hike because it would seem smaller in per-unit terms. In which case we should measure gasoline by dekaliters, obviously.

  43. 43.

    Balconesfault

    @Eric K: The cold opening was f***ing horrible.   First because the ageism thing about Biden is so deadly stale writers should be openly mocked for resorting to it … secondly because Christopher Walkens talent was completely wasted … third because Mikey Day’s impression of Biden completely misses the mark to a degree it makes one wonder if he’s actually watched Biden talk, or just watched other comics doing their own parodies of Biden.

  47. 47.

    StringOnAStick

    It pains me that so much of my physics and chemistry education/testing was just unit conversion brain teasers, just so we could avoid going metric.  Canada decided to convert at the same time we were going to; we bailed out and they went ahead and did it.  Smart move.  I

    That sketch was brilliant.

  48. 48.

    Matt McIrvin

    @StringOnAStick: My physics and chemistry education was pretty much all in metric. One exception was that the physics department machine shop still used US units, as I recall, because that was what the machine tools were calibrated in.

  49. 49.

    StringOnAStick

    @Matt McIrvin: My first undergraduate physics prof made sure every exam was a garden of unit conversion delights.  We were allowed to have one 5×7 index card with unit conversion factors for each exam. What a fecking waste of time and effort.

  50. 50.

    wjca

    @StringOnAStick: Canada decided to convert at the same time we were going to; we bailed out and they went ahead and did it.

    My suspicion is that we’re going to sneak over to it.  So gradually, and quietly, that the xenophobes and reactionaries don’t even notice.  Already in progress.

    Consider, for example, that the drinks you pick up at the grocery are all sold in (usually half) liter bottles.  Auto mechanics still need SAE wrenches and stuff for older cars.  But new cars?  Metric everywhere you look.  (And, for all us elitists, science and engineering courses routinely do things in metric.  Have for years.)  I’d guess that pretty much the last to go will be speed limits and highway mileage signs.  Just because even the densest will notice that.  But by then, it will be all over but the (impotent) shouting.

  51. 51.

    FastEdD

    It’s like when I hit the wrong button on some sub-menu in the car. I look down and OMG I”M GOING 100!!

    That’s kilometers per hour dumbass. You’re going 62 mph. Nevermind.

  52. 52.

    opiejeanne

    @wjca: I remember when the bigger soda bottles were switched from half gallons to 2 liters, and there was an ad campaign to let us know that we would actually get a little more soda for the same price. I just nodded my head and gave my kids some cold tapwater when they complained that they were thirsty, because I’m that kind of monster.

  53. 53.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Yes, but daily price changes are a huge complaint in Australia, for example. High prices are bad enough but daily swings in the per unit price (.10-.20 cents a liter) makes it worse. Fuel price swings are a huge issue for a lot of people in these countries.

    Would you rather pay .20 cents more per unit for 17 units or 64 units? Change to metric here and we get to feel their agony with every price change.

  54. 54.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Ken:

    No parody. For example, in Australia there are daily price swings in some places that are quite large. The reason I am saying “unit” is that our units are gallons and theirs are liters. A 17 gallon fill here is a 64 liter fill there. If our price goes up .20 cents a gallon our increase is $3.40 at the pump for a 17 gallon fill. If their price goes up .20 cents a liter, the increase at the pump for them is almost $13.00 for that fill.

    I’m not talking about the cost of gas between our countries, just the effect of a small change in the price per unit and that there are fewer gallon units than liter units in a fill.

  55. 55.

    ColoradoGuy

    It wasn’t until I went to a British school in Hong Kong (in the Sixties) that I realized Americans used a greatly simplified version of British Imperial units. I had to memorize medieval units like Rods, Chains, Furlongs, and weirdest of all, Stones, which are only used to weigh people. WTF? And a unit of time I’d never heard before, a “Fortnight” (14 days).

    Even stranger, Hong Kong used HK Dollars as a currency (100 cents to the dollar), while the UK-sourced math lessons were in the perverted Pounds/Shillings/Pence units, with Guineas (21 shillings) thrown in just for the added kink factor. I was baffled how the residents of the Isles weren’t driven completely insane by all this archaic medievalism in the simplest of daily transactions.

  56. 56.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: Yes, but why do you think the price swing per unit is the thing that would remain constant if one changes the unit system? Is there a mechanism that would determine that? Is it just because of a comparison between the US and Australia? If they measured in milliliters would the price swings be 1000 times as large?

  57. 57.

    Ruckus

    On my front page I have a speech from Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

    The post shows me a different Y Tube. Definitely not Zelenskyy.

    I watched the one on the front page first and it didn’t seem to be as funny as the one up top……

  58. 58.

    Ruckus

    OK I watched and enjoyed the clip in the actual post. And went back to the front page and the correct video showed up. It is funny.

    Now if I could only figure out why the clip from Adam’s Ukraine post was showing up in this one……

    OK I am not going to allow myself to go down that road, I might only have 25-30 yrs of life left……

  59. 59.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    I get the impression that the US keeps the old system of measurements out of a sort of sociological inertia – a third of a billion people spread across a significant fraction of a pretty large continent is a lot to deal with, after all – while the UK does so out of sheer bloody-mindedness.

    It also strikes me as peculiar that the UK still measures vehicle fuel economy in miles per gallon, while selling fuel by the liter. I don’t demand everyone go metric – heck, my brain still works in Fahrenheit even after being in Greece for fifteen years – but is it too much to ask to be consistent?

  60. 60.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: They measure fuel efficiency in miles per imperial gallon, and since imperial gallons are bigger that makes the numbers look mysteriously impressive to Americans. Just one place where that difference can trip you up.

  61. 61.

    M31

    years ago I played that fun “Dictionary” game with super nerdy grad school friends, and one day we had “bring your own dictionary day” and along with the usual Latin and Klingon and Anglo-Saxon, someone brought a book called “A Dictionary of Obsolete Cornish Agricultural Terms” published in like 1832

    it was amazing

  62. 62.

    Central Planning

    @Odie Hugh Manatee: ​
    What kind of math is that?
    A liter is slightly bigger than a quart, so really you need to change your gallon uplift to $0.80 to make it close to a $0.20 liter increase. And, you’re ultimately paying less filling up your tank if there’s a $0.20/liter increase vs a $0.80/gallon increase.

  63. 63.

    lowtechcyclist

    Since I’m pushing 70, I’ve grown up with inches, feet, yards, ounces and pounds, ounces and pints (is a pint the same as a pound? I remember asking my dad – they’re both 16 ounces!), but aware of the silliness of the whole system.

    But when I became a parent and my son was at an age to try to explain our systems of measurement to him, I totally gave up, and let the school system try to teach it to him.  It was one thing to keep it straight for myself, but the idea of explaining it to a child was just too much.

    Fuck this stupid measurement system, I’m ready for metric anytime we want to switch.

    (Except temperature.  The 0°-100° Fahrenheit range almost perfectly encapsulates the range of temperatures that are tolerable to be outside in.  If the temp outdoors is below zero or above 100, then most all of us just stay the fuck inside unless we have little choice about it.)

  64. 64.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Odie Hugh Manatee:

    daily swings in the per unit price (.10-.20 cents a liter)

    Those are pretty minuscule price swings though – fractions of a penny?!  .20 cents per liter is still less than a penny per gallon. ;-)

  65. 65.

    Matt McIrvin

    @lowtechcyclist: The weight of a fluid ounce of water is close to a weight ounce, but, again, there’s variation between US and British fluid ounces. I honestly never got the hang of ounces– these small units are where metric really makes more sense to me.

  66. 66.

    Matt McIrvin

    (There’s an old rhyme, “a pint’s a pound the world around”, but it’s not– that’s only nearly true for US pints, of water or something of similar density. But a liter of water is close to a kilogram the world around. At least at everyday temperatures and pressures.)

  69. 69.

    Another Scott

    @StringOnAStick: PV = nRT

    OK, what is “R”??

    R = 10.731577089016 psi⋅ft3⋅lbmol−1⋅°R−1
    R = 8.31446261815324 J⋅K−1⋅mol−1
    R = 8.31446261815324×10^7 erg⋅K−1⋅mol−1
    R = 8.20573660809596…×10^−5 m3⋅atm⋅K−1⋅mol−1
    …

    That little equation teaches one the importance of consistent units, but man, it made trying to memorize what R was a pain in the butt.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  71. 71.

    Brachiator

    @Matt McIrvin:

    For what it’s worth, right now the Tory government in the UK is making a big pointless noise about bringing back Imperial weights and measures, because tradition, and did those feet in ancient times walk upon England’s mountains green, or something.

    Very apt reference. It’s so strange, and funny, that fervent BREXIT supporters are saying, “We can’t bring back the actual Empire, but at least we can bring back Imperial Measure. God save the King!”

    Too ridiculous for words.

  72. 72.

    Unkown known

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Metric wins on this front. It is very water-based.

    1 cubic centimetre of water weighs 1 gram, and heating it 1 Celsius (or Kelvin)  takes 1 calorie of energy

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