Cheers and Jeers is a tasty weekday word pie from the great state of Maine.
Late Night Snark: Super Bug and Super Tuesday Edition
"While clinical trials are underway, there's no treatment for the coronavirus at the moment, and a vaccine could take between a year and 18 months to develop. You may be wondering: how scared should you be? And the answer is, probably a bit. It's really about trying to strike a sensible balance. If you're drinking bleach to protect yourself right now, you should probably calm the fuck down. If you're, say, licking subway poles because you're certain nothing can hurt you, maybe don’t do that. You want to stay somewhere between those extremes: don’t be complacent, and don’t be a fucking idiot."
—John Oliver
"No Purell! I got a bottle of that junk, and on the label it says it kills 99.99 percent of germs. What happens to the top .01 percent? Why are we protecting them? I say enough with the potions. Just use good old-fashioned bar soap and scalding hot water!”
—Bernie Sanders (Larry David) at White House coronavirus briefing on SNL
Continued…
Late Night Snark, continued….
"By the way, Americans, stop making fun of the Chinese for this virus. I mean, sure, they might have some interesting choices in edible meats. But don’t act like Americans are any better. We just stopped eating Tide Pods like two years ago."
—Michael Che, SNL
"As a practical matter, until experts advise that this [coronavirus] threat is over, we should all be following some basic advice. First: don’t be racist. That's just good general advice, for now and for later."
—John Oliver
"Last night was Super Tuesday. And today for Mike Bloomberg it was Oh My God I Wasted Half A Billion Dollars Wednesday."
—Jimmy Fallon
Click...
-
"Bloomberg isn't having the night he thought he paid for."
—MSNBC anchor Brian Williams on Super Tuesday night
"Sanders isn’t out of the race. He won a number of states, including Vermont, Colorado, and Utah. So at the very least we know he's a hit with snowboarders, snowboarders, and Mormon snowboarders."
—James Corden
And now, our feature presentation…
-
Cheers and Jeers for Friday, March 6, 2020
Note: The crew at Netroots Nation has opened up the public voting phase for panels and workshops to be featured at this year's convention in Denver(August 13-15). "The ideas you submitted cover nearly every progressive issue," says goddess Mary Rickles, "From conversations on the November elections to sessions on climate change,electoral justice and more. And we received some solid training submissions that appeal to all experience levels." Click here to log in and vote on your favorite panels and trainings. You can vote for as many sessions as you like, but you only get one vote per session per day, and you can cast a vote every 24 hours. Voting ends at 11:59pm next Tuesday, March 10. Netroots Nation thanks you. I thank you. The pope blesses you (but only if you eat all your vegetables). —Mgt.
-
By the Numbers:
Days 'til the primaries in ID, MI, MS, MO, WA, & Democrats Abroad, and caucuses in ND: 4
Days 'til the Oregon Cheese Festival in Central Point: 8
Current preference among likely Democratic voters in Michigan who plan to vote for Biden and Sanders, respectively, in Tuesday's primary according to a post-SC primary poll by WDIV and the Detroit News: 29%, 23%
Percent of Democratic voters on Super Tuesday who identified as LGBTQ, per NBC News: 10%
Amount that Michael Bloomberg and Joe Biden, respectively, spent in Super Tuesday states: $198.4 million, $2.1 million
Minimum percent of domestic and international flights, respectively, that United plans to cancel next month due to the coronavirus outbreak: 10%, 20%
Number of rivets in the Eiffel Tower: 2,500,000
-
Puppy Pic of the Day: In honor of International Women’s Day (Sunday), Eleanor and Fala...
-
CHEERS to March madness. The Super Tuesday nuclear bomb that went off on—[checks notes]—Tuesday scrldemba (that's "scrambled" scrambled—Pulitzer-winning wordplay!) my brain. I've been frantically running around the neighborhood with tears in my eyes leaving flaming bags of poo on everyone's doorstep while yelling "What's happening?!!?!!" like the eldest daughter in Poltergeist. So while the Pulitzer committee is deliberating over "scrldemba" (the apex of my writing career, you'll agree) let's take a deep breath, put on some Kenny G, and take a mellow pause to get our bearings on what's happening in Primary Land:
Original Candidates: Ryan, Bullock, Gillibrand, Castro, Bennet, Gabbard, Gravel, Hickenlooper, Bloomberg, Biden, Buttigieg, Messam, Williamson, Patrick, De Blasio, Warren, Sestak, Harris, Inslee, Booker, Sanders, Delaney, O'Rourke, Yang, Steyer, Klobuchar.
Candidates remaining: Biden, Sanders, Gabbard.
Contests that have happened: IA, NH, NV, SC, ME, AL, OK, TN, MA, VT, TX, CA, MN, VA, NC, AR, UT, CO, American Samoa, Mars rovers.
Contests left: 32 states have yet to weigh in, along with the remaining territories, Americans Abroad, and, because of an archaic mechanism hidden deep in the primary rule book, Denmark.
Delegate count (1,991 needed): Biden 621, Sanders 553 per NBC News
Next contests: North Dakota caucuses and Idaho, Michigan, Missouri, Washington, Mississippi, and Democrats Abroad primaries next Tuesday.
Next debate: Sunday, March 15 in Phoenix.
That brings us all up to speed. Phew. Now I can go about my normal routine of leaving flaming bags of poo on my neighbors' doorsteps, but without all the obnoxious running and shouting.
P.S. Along with Will Rogers, Oklahoma’s finest:
Nevertheless, she’ll persist. (I hear the view from the Senate majority leader’s office is lovely.)
JEERS to the Quack-in-Chief. Let's check in and see how Trump's latest roundtable discussion with doctors on the front lines in the management of the coronavirus situation is going:
"Can't you fight the coronavirus by rubbing it on your skin? I've heard that many times."
"No, Mr. President."
"But if you have the virus you should still go to work. I believe that's what many people are saying."
"No, sir."
"But it doesn't really matter because the virus is all gone. There's, like, 15 cases, but those are going down very rapidly and beautifully."
[Doctors, giving up, crack open bottles of gin] "Whatever."
"And our magnificent troops are stringing barbed wire all around the viruses and they'll be sending them to Gitmo very, very soon, according to my generals."
[Doctors now passing around bongs] "Sure! Aye aye, Skipper!"
"And I've got Jared and Ivanka looking at this very, very closely, and they'll be ready to release their Coronavirusian peace plan in the next week, or two weeks, maybe sooner, we'll see what happens."
[Doctors now tapping each other's knees with rubber hammers to see whose kicks the highest] "And don’t forget Jim Bakker's Miracle Colloidal Silver Coronovirus Neutralizer! That'll do the trick, Bucky!"
"I have Mike Pence in the other room ordering a case of it now. Glad you thought of it. Of course, I thought of it first, but I'm glad you thought of it. It's good to be in synch during a real major national crisis that's also a hoax created by the Democrats."
[Drunk, stoned doctors now putting inflated rubber gloves over their heads] "God blesh da Unished Shtetts!"
If on the odd chance we end up emerging from the rubble, might I recommend a nice parliamentary system?
JEERS to an unsatisfactory conclusion. On March 6, 1857, the Supreme Court ruled in the Dred Scott case. Their brilliant conclusion: slaves aren’t citizens, according to their strict interpretation of the Constitution:
[I]n the opinion of the justices, black people were not considered citizens when the Constitution was drafted in 1787.
According to [Chief Justice Roger] Taney, Dred Scott was the property of his owner, and property could not be taken from a person without due process of law.
In fact, there were free black citizens of the United States in 1787, but Taney and the other justices were attempting to halt further debate on the issue of slavery in the territories. The decision inflamed regional tensions, which burned for another four years before exploding into the Civil War.
Chief Justice Taney—with political pressure from none other than President Buchanan—thought the decision would settle the issue of slavery. I think enough time has passed that I can say with reasonable confidence: what a dope.
CHEERS (or, if you hate it, JEERS) to emerging from the dark times. I know, I know…for many of you Daylight Saving Time sucks. But up here in Maine where global warming is a hoax, it's a real shot in the arm to get that extra perceived hour of daylight, and well worth the excruciating childbirth-like pain of losing an hour of sleep. So here's the deal: make a note to turn your clocks ahead an hour Sunday morning. Or better yet, make a note to tell someone else in your house to do it because you're sick of always being the one who has to do it.
As usual, Democrats on Capitol Hill will help their Republican colleagues set their pocket watches. If left to do it themselves, they won’t stop until they've turned 'em back fifty years.
CHEERS to Pa Bell. 144 years ago today, in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received a patent—#174,465—for a new and exciting communications device, one of the features of which was the insertion of a diaphragm. Bell called it the telephone. Republicans, of course, called it a harlot.
CHEERS to home vegetation. Rumor has it there's stuff on TV this weekend and I guess I'll take them at their word.
After Chris Hayes and Rachel Maddow do that thing they do tonight, Bill Maher's guests on Real Time are political scientist Rachel Bitecofer, actor Brian Cox, Ross Douthat of the NYT, The Atlantic writer Caitlin Flanagan, and Anthony Scaramucci. New home video releases include Mark Ruffalo going after Dupont in Dark Waters, and the hit W.W. II movie Midway. The NBA schedule is here and the NHL schedule is here. (I’m rooting for the Bruins to win the Stanley Cup this year, but only because I think the Teeth are gonna get knocked out early.) Daniel Craig, whose new James Bond movie just got moved from April to November, hosts SNL. On 60 Minutes: how climate change moved a Dutch skating competition to Austria. Marge realizes she's an internet addict on The Simpsons, and Peter starts coaching a minor-league baseball team on Family Guy. If you missed John Oliver's excellent segment on the coronavirus last week, you can watch it here. He's also got a new episode of Last Week Tonight Sunday at 11.
Now here's your Sunday morning lineup:
Meet the Press: NIAID director Dr. Anthony Fauci; Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan; Bernie Sanders.
This Week: Bernie Sanders; Ben “Dr. Stabby” Carson (if he can stay awake long enough).
Face the Nation: Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT); former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb; I’m shocked to learn Trump actually appointed a Surgeon General—Jerome Adams talks coronavirus Sunday.
CNN's State of the Union: Bernie Sanders. Surgeon General Jerome Adams.
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: NIAID director Dr. Anthony Fauci; Bernie Sanders.
Happy viewing!
-
Ten years ago in C&J: March 6, 2010
CHEERS to the arrival of the banjo-strummin' cavalry. Always nice to have a living legend on your side in a labor dispute, and the latest to weigh in on the strange Madison times is a man who knows a thing or two about unions—folk singer Pete Seeger:
"Maybe the Republican governor, he's done us a favor by bringing the problem to national attention," the 91-year-old Seeger said in a telephone interview from his New York home.
"It shows the whole country how much we need unions. We may end up thanking him." […]
Seeger, who's been singing since the Great Depression and released a record in 1942 titled "Talking Union," said he was following the issue in Wisconsin.
"Without collective bargaining rights we'd be right back to primitive times," Seeger said.
Upon hearing the news, Governor Scott Walker called Seeger's remarks outrageous and then drew a frowny face on his cave wall. [3/6/20 Update: I really miss Pete. I really don’t miss Scott.]
-
And just one more…
CHEERS to the fairer equal sex. Sunday is International Women’s Day. I think I’ll do something extraordinary and just shut my pie hole and let them do the talking…
"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal."
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Declaration of Rights and Sentiments (1845)
“It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union” ... “Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less.”
—Susan B. Anthony
“The word’s out: I’m a woman, and I’m going to have trouble backing off on that. I am what I am. I’ll go out and talk to people about what’s happening to their families, and when I do that, I’m a mother. I’m a grandmother.”
—Elizabeth Warren
"Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice, or representation."
—Abigail Adams
“As you know, there’s a difference in how some of our leadership talk about how we should handle all of this. They say, ‘Maxine, please don’t say impeachment anymore.’ And when they say that, I say impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment.”
—Rep. Maxine Waters
“At present, our country needs women's idealism and determination, perhaps more in politics than anywhere else.”
—Shirley Chisholm
"I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels. Life's a bitch. You've got to go out and kick ass.”
—Maya Angelou
Organizers ask that you wear something purple Sunday. If, instead, you chose to mark the occasion by running around in a red MAGA hat, it’s no problem: please stay where you are and a complimentary purple nurple will be dispensed free of charge.
Oh, and As of today, there are only 300 days left in the year. Please plan your 2021 New Years resolutions accordingly. Who knows? Maybe humanity will defy the odds and make it that far. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
-