From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE
Meanwhile, in Houston...
So I'm sitting around yesterday, feeding baby orphans with one hand and nursing some stray rattlesnakes back to health with the other while gazing wistfully at the spot on my mantle where my future Nobel Peace Prize(s) will go, when all of a sudden I get to thinkin': I wonder how Congresswoman Gabby Giffords is doing. I mean, I know she's at a really really really (x 10) good rehabilitation hospital in Houston, but since her arrival there I haven't heard much.
So I put the babies and the snakes back in their cage and shoveled a path through six feet of snow to my communications silo, where I keep the Google throbbing on impulse power. Illuminated only by my Donna Summer revolving disco ball security orb, my fingers hacked a path through the deep, dense data brush until I found the needle in the haystack. From a little known underground fringe publication called USA Today:
For the latest on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, check out this Twitter message from her husband Mark Kelly:
"Today was a huge day for GG. Lots of progress!"
And the swap-shop rag Politico adds:
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), one of Giffords’s good friends, said Monday that she visited Giffords this weekend and saw the congresswoman making progress. "Gabby continues to defy the odds & is so appreciative of all your support," Gillibrand wrote on Twitter. "Pls cont[inue] to keep her in your prayers."
A recent Fox News poll, by the way, shows that 77 percent of voters believe Giffords was, indeed, literally saved by all your prayers. If you have time, would you mind doing something for Michele Bachmann, too? No, no, you're right---too big a job for a mere 310 million people.
Oh, and here's something else I found---a little factoid about Giffords that tells you something about why her constituents love and respect her so much:
Giffords' office handles about 2,700 constituent requests per year---almost four times the average handled by the nation's 435 members of the House of Representatives. There now are about 900 requests being actively worked on by Giffords' staff. Since Giffords took office in January 2007, her office has opened nearly 10,000 cases.
We're sending positive vibes for many more "huge days" for the Energizer Congresswoman. And marveling at the stamina of her staff.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, February 3, 2011
Note: For a delicious blizzard stew, mix one part snow with two parts snow, bring to a boil, simmer, add two cups of snow and then gently stir in half a tablespoon of snow. In a separate bowl, mix snow, snow, snow and snow, then add mixture to the snow. Add snowballs. Season with snow. Stir until snowy. (And if you feel daring, toss in some snow to add a dash of "Zing!") Serves several million...whether they want it or not.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til spring: 46
Days `til ArtFest Fort Myers: 2
Rank of Santa Rosa, Calif., Portland, Ore., Burlington, Vt., and Portland, Me. among America's "Top Foodie Cities": #1, #2, #3, #4
(Source: CNBC/Sperlings Best Places via The Portland Press Herald)
Percent of Americans who belong to a church or synagogue, according to a Gallup poll: 61%
Number of previous years in which the number has been that low: 0
Average football game telecast length: 174 minutes
Minutes of, respectively, commercials, players huddling or milling between snaps, and actual football action: 60, 75, 11
(Source: The Wall Street Journal)
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Suddenly, the administration is left with the only good reason there ever was for getting rid of Saddam Hussein in the first place---he's a miserable s.o.b. You will recall that this is precisely the argument the administration rejected. [Paul] Wolfowitz said that human rights violations by Saddam against his own people were not sufficient to justify our participation in his ouster.
Now, according to the president, Saddam Hussein is a "madman." Oh, come on. An s.o.b., yes, but crazy like a fox---always has been. It wasn't even crazy of him to have invaded Kuwait, given that April Glaspie, the American ambassador at the time, told him, "We have no opinion on your border disputes with Kuwait."
For everyone who ever cared about human rights and longed for years to get rid of Saddam Hussein, this late-breaking humanitarianism on Bush's part is actually nauseating.
---February, 2004
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Puppy + Wolverine + puppy booties = Awwwwww...
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JEERS to the idiot's guide to saving your skin. Y'know, I was really hoping that Hosni Mubarek would read the camel poo on the wall and exit the stage with a bit of dignity and pride, not only to save face for himself but also to show the world that Egypt can have a change of government without going all Shah-of-Iran's-last-throes on itself. It was not to be. Mubarek released a ruthless goon squad on the peaceful protesters in Cairo and Alexandria yesterday, and I have a few things I'd like to say to them:
>> Way to involve the animal kingdom in your little domestic squabble. Horses and camels? Really? Nothing B-movie stereotypical about that! Hey, you want to show off real dexterity? Next time hack and slash your way through the crowd on pogo sticks. Or are you so insecure you can only attack unarmed people while riding a beast you need a stepladder to mount? At least come in on giant pigs so there will be some thematic unity between your morals and your mode of transportation.
>> You do realize that there were families in the crowd, yes? And families often have children, yes? And indiscriminately attacking a crowd with children is bad, yes? Okay. I never thought I’d say this, but...I'm turning this point over to Sarah Palin so she can describe to you what happens when you piss off a mama grizzly.
>> THEN: This will not turn into Tiananmen Square. NOW: You want duck sauce with your thug brutality?
>> How fascinating---almost surreal---to see so many A-list anchors and reporters get caught totally flat-footed in Cairo by the speed and viciousness of Mubarek's dead-enders. NBC's Richard Engel and CNN's Anderson Cooper both got assaulted. And Brian Williams had to move his anchor desk inside his hotel room mini-bar. Great way to win hearts and minds---piss off the press.
>> I, too, have been the victim of rock-throwing. Not to put too fine a point on it, but it fucking hurts and you never forget the sound it makes. Can't we just once have a skirmish where one side tries to bore the other to death by, say, reading Ayn Rand into a bullhorn?
Despite the violence, I'm still optimistic that the peaceful side will prevail. Why? Gandhi, mostly:
"First they laugh at you.
Than they ignore you.
Then they fight you.
Then you win."
Never gets old. And dictators never get it.
SHRUG to Jay Carney. In yesterday's C&J poll, 62 percent of you had no opinion about the new White House Press Secretary. I saw him on The Chris Matthews Show and other Sunday talkfests when he was still working for Time, and other than seeing how he and his wife, ABC News correspondent Claire Shipmen, made an adorable beltway couple, he made no impression on me. So I was grateful to receive this EXCLSIVE background info from Kossack Vicki at our C&J tropical paradise desk:
Carney used to work for the Miami Herald Key West Bureau in the late 80s. Plenty 'o stories from back then, but we were all too fucked up to remember most of them. No wonder I had a vague idea of recognizing him from somewhere. Vague, vewy, vewy vague. Like most of the '80s.
But one thing everyone can agree on: given what the position has become, all Carney has to do is remove the 'e' from his name and he'll fit right in. Happy dodging and weaving, kid.
CHEERS to musical diplomacy. It seems like only yesterday that the Village People hoofed it up the charts with YMCA. The single peaked at #2 on the Billboard Top 40 chart on February 3, 1979. It's a national anthem for gays, but even the most rabid right-wing Christians can't resist gyrating to it at wedding receptions. Wow---who knew that when we finally found common ground it would be disco??
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Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda... GONG!!!
This is another edition of The One Word Answer Man. CNN's Ed Hornick asks: The GOP 2012 candidates: Where are they?
Pluto.
Now back to Cheers and Jeers.
Gong! Gong!! BuddaBuddaBudda... GONG!!!
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CHEERS to truth in journalism. Rolling back the Bush tax cuts on the rich was a no-brainer way to help make a modest dent in our fiscal situation, yet somehow they got extended for another couple of years. Republicans were ecstatic and assured us that---[pat pat]---tax cuts don’t have any impact on the deficit, sonny. So kudos to The Portland Press Herald for making it plain in their headline last week: "Deficit forecast: from bad to awful. It's now expected to hit about $1.5 trillion this year, escalated by the recent tax-cut measure." So the next time you hear Rep. Paul Ryan or Eric Cantor screaming about deficits, feel free give 'em a big fat middle-finger salute. They have met the enemy of deficit reduction...and it is their own sorry asses.
CHEERS to gouda eatin'. 196 years ago today, in 1815, the world's first commercial cheese factory was established in Switzerland. Couple years back they voted to ban minarets because of the scary Muslims. My, how the neutral have fallen.
CHEERS to second chances. If 2011 hasn't gotten off to a good enough start for you, here's good news: you get a do-over! Today marks the start of the Chinese New Year---4709. Specifically, the Year of the Rabbit. If you were born in 1915, 1927, 1939, 1951, 1963, 1975, 1987 or 1999, you are...
...calm and gentle, but persistent. Quietly charismatic, thoughtful and calm, rabbits are admired for their tactful and considerate dealings with all who know them. As such, they are most often depended upon for their wise counsel, or as someone in which to put valued trust in a personal friendship or a business dealing.
One of the most cautious signs in the Chinese zodiac, they are the chess players who take their sweet time before making a move. Yet, they are also the ones most likely to win any intricate game of strategy!
On the other hand, you're delicious on a bed of rice pilaf with a dash of oregano and a nice glass of Ostertag Fronholz Pinot Gris 2003. Thupthpthpthpth!
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Five years ago in C&J: February 3, 2006
JEERS to the contortionist wing of the Republican party. Before Bob Woodruff was injured by a roadside bomb they complained: "How come the liberal media only talks about dead and wounded soldiers in their front-page Iraq coverage?!" After Bob Woodruff was injured by a roadside bomb in Iraq they complained: "How come the liberal media only talks about Bob Woodruff in their front-page Iraq coverage when they never show our troops on the front pages?!" Color me confused. Color them looney.
CHEERS to missing the mark. In Florida, representatives of the knuckledragger wing of the Republican party have failed to get enough signatures for a referendum to ban marriage equality in the state constitution. Now the group Florida-4-Marriage (clever!) can go back to what they were doing before. Bitching about their spouses.
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And just one more...
CHEERS and JEERS to one of the two things in life that are certain. (Hint: it ain't death!) On February 3, 1913, the 16th Amendment, establishing the beloved income tax, was ratified and became part of the U.S. Constitution. Here is our annual posting of the full text (in italics so it looks old and wrinkled and historic):
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.
Further, Congress shall have the power to take all tax dollars collected and burn them, eat them, turn them into confetti, light cigars with them, or wad them up and shove them up their butts.
Congress shall also have the power to conspire with giant corporations to use tax dollars to build a war machine that can destroy every planet in the solar system many times over. We want guns. BIG guns! Tanks, planes, nukes, bunker busters, aircraft carriers and a few thousand bullets for every man, woman and child. And bazookas---we need lots of bazookas. Anything that proves to the rest of the world that we've got the biggest penis on the planet must be arsenalized. We are woefully short on lasers---let's fix that.
If the citizenry is paying a reasonable and fair share of taxes in order to allow vital and necessary services to be funded domestically, those taxes must be cut so that these services can be funded properly---with massive loans from China, India and Japan.
At various times, taxpayer-funded corporate bailouts may be necessary. These bailouts will be prioritized in the following order: white collar idiots, white collar dolts, white collar crooks, white collar morons, white collar charlatans, and white collar bloodsuckers.
Finally, Congress shall impose the strictest penalties on citizen scofflaws who fail to pay their income taxes on time and in full without exception. And by 'without exception' we mean except if you're rich and can afford really savvy CPAs and lawyers who can get you out of paying them. Or if you're really rich and you "forget" to pay them, in which case: tut tut.
Okay, that's our amendment. You may now begin stuffing hundred-dollar bills down our pants.
Have a nice Thursday. And remember: when nature defies you, defy nature back. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"You can't live in a world without delicious, naughty Cheers and Jeers. It's no fun."
---Michelle Obama
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