From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
They're Back. Oh Yes They Are.
Armed with nothing but thrift-store suits and a lack of shame, these iconoclastic revolutionaries lie their way into business events and government functions to expose the dangers of letting greed run our world. In their third cinematic outing (after The Yes Men and The Yes Men Fix the World), they are now well into their 40s, and their mid-life crises are threatening to drive them out of activism forever – even as they prepare to take on the biggest challenge they’ve ever faced: climate change. More than the first two films, The Yes Men Are Revolting is as much a character study as it is an entertaining depiction of their latest interventions. Revealing the real people behind the ruses, at its heart lies a hopeful message about
One thing I love about the Yes Men is that, as brilliantly and successfully subversive as they are, you can still tell that they're often nervous wrecks before they pull one of their stunts. They're living, breathing embodiment of the word courage: feeling the fear but doing it anyway. Here's the trailer for their latest movie:
Screenings start this week in selected cities. Official site here. Bring on the inflatable Armageddon suits!
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Note: Yikes---I just saw one of the ten lords a' leaping face-down in the gutter with an empty bottle of Jack Daniels in his hand. The off-season can be brutal sometimes.
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4 days!!!
By the Numbers:
Days 'til Father's Day:
12
Days 'til the
Indianapolis Pride Parade:
4
Percent of Americans who favor a path to granting undocumented immigrants legal status:
72%
Percent of Democrats and Republicans, respectively, who favor that legal status:
80%, 56%
(Source: Pew Research Center)
Amount by which a NYC fortuneteller allegedly scammed a man to ward off evil spirits and hook him up with a woman who spurned him:
$700,000
(Source: AP)
Number of times each of the three major credit rating agencies have downgraded New Jersey's credit rating under Chris Christie:
3
Percent chance that John McCain (b. 1936) is older than Spam (b. 1937):
100%
Stanley Cup Finals:
Tampa Bay leads Chicago 2 games to 1
Women's World Cup Soccer
USA 3 Australia 1
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Tuesday Words of Wisdom from the Right-wing Blogosphere:
Triple-play from some "Top Commenters" at Powerline...
A logo as narrow as their minds.
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We, as a nation, have simply lost the will to win. If ISIS is a true threat, then where are the leaders like Churchill, Eisenhower and Patton?
---Kenneth M
WH is going to invite ISIS to join the UN.
---David G
There's little doubt the current resident grew up embarrassed of his country and has always wanted to spit in our country's eye in hopes of becoming a hero to the third world, and gain the admiration of the Hate America group and those members who teach our youth.
---James S
All together now: 1…2…3…
Classy!
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Ghost
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CHEERS to Meetup Fevuh! For the sixth year in a row, New England Kossacks will be cavorting with nature at the annual meetup at Mayim's Maine cottage by the lake about an hour northwest of Portland. It's coming up in a couple weeks on Saturday, June 27 from roughly noon 'til whenever:
A Maine meetup
with a helluva view.
Same deal as other years: I’ll gladly cook and have beer and assorted non-alcoholic beverages. Lake should be warm enough for fun if anyone wants. We have a canoe, a kayak, and plenty of rocks to swim to (and to scrape knees on....). Dogs (well-behaved....) welcome, but Hobbs and Penn prefer to be the only kitties ;-)
If anyone wants to spend Friday and/or Saturday night (for fun, or because it's a long drive.....), I've got room for several, plus some tenting space. For more information/exact directions or to RSVP, email me at killearnan at gmail.com or send a Kosmail.
It's a super way to experience the beauty of Maine at the best time of year with the best of friends. Michael and I (and Haley the Wonder Dog with the new knee) will be there along with other local Kossacks and we hope you'll be able to join us for what has become an annual DKos summer tradition. As a special bonus, we'll let you fire the catapult we set up every year that's calibrated to launch rotten tomatoes into Governor LePage's back yard. He's so stupid he thinks they're coming from Canada.
CHEERS to yodeling for freedom. President Obama strapped on Jetpack One and zoomed off for the G-7 summit in Germany this week. The Obama diary has pics and video galore here. This is pretty cool:
"I TOLD you we should've
taken a left at Dusseldorf!"
The G7 leading industrial nations have agreed to cut greenhouse gases by phasing out the use of fossil fuels by the end of the century, the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, has announced, in a move hailed as historic by some environmental campaigners.
On the final day of talks in a Bavarian castle, Merkel said the leaders had committed themselves to the need to “decarbonise the global economy in the course of this century”. … Environmental lobbyists described the announcement as a hopeful sign that plans for complete decarbonisation could be decided on in Paris climate talks later this year.
One of Obama's objectives outside of the G-7 was to smooth things over with German President Angela Merkel after some embarrassing surveillance incidents. They finally came to a mutual agreement: Merkel will let bygones be bygones, and the United States Secret Service will start reporting to work in Bavarian lederhosen.
P.S I've just been informed that Obama won last night's double-or-nothing wienerschnitzel eating contest against Merkel, so the Secret Service can stick with their traditional booze-stained dress pants. Crisis averted.
CHEERS to a shifting tide. The Wall Street Journal has analyzed some recent polling data and found that the number of voters identifying themselves as liberal is up three points (to 26%), while those identifying as conservative are down 4 points (to 33%) Conclusion from Jason Easley at Politics USA:
The Republican Party continues to move to the right while the rest of the country is moving steadily to the left. For decades, Republicans were successfully able to demonize the word liberal, but in post-Great Recession America, liberals are making a comeback.
The reality is becoming impossible to deny, there is a growing wave of liberalism in the United States, and the only things keeping the Republican Party from being swept under are gerrymandering and regional political polarization.
And voter suppression. Can't forget voter suppression.
CHEERS to hot Joe-on-Joe action. On this date 61 years ago, during the Army-McCarthy hearings, attorney Joseph Welch quietly destroyed bedraggled, belligerent Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy with the immortal words: "Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?" Within a couple years McCarthy was dead of alcoholism, and today his grave is guarded by a giant emaciated demon barn owl. It's good to have like-minded company.
This is also what it looks like when
Chef Boyardee blows his top,
CHEERS to the flying flan. Looking like a puffy pastry and delayed by a few days, NASA
finally got to test its new flying saucer---the Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator---yesterday, achieving an altitude of 180,000 feet and a speed of Mach-4 before falling victim to a faulty parachute, for which we can all thank Herb in the NASA sewing room. It's
primary mission:
The LDSD project, led by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, and sponsored by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate in Washington, is conducting this full-scale flight test of two breakthrough technologies: a supersonic inflatable aerodynamic decelerator, or SIAD, and an innovative new parachute. These devices potentially will help us deliver double the current amount of payload — 1.5 metric tons — to the surface of Mars. They also will greatly increase the accessible surface area we can explore, and will improve landing accuracy from a margin of approximately 6.5 miles to a little more than 1 mile. All these factors will dramatically increase the success of future missions on Mars.
The craft will also perform a critical secondary mission: flying to other planets in the middle of the night and administering anal probes to unsuspecting farmers in remote areas with no witnesses. Let's see how
they like it!
CHEERS to proud moments in American history. One day, years from now, you'll be bouncing your grandchild on your knee. And that sweet little cherub will turn to you and say, "Why is June 9th a holiday?" And you'll look down into those sweet innocent eyes, pinch those pink puffy cheeks, and say, "That was the day in 2006 when Tom DeLay went to work in Congress for the very last time. And then you'll go into the kitchen for ice cream and Oreos. Because that's the kind of awesome grandparent you are.
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Ten years ago in C&J: June 9, 2005
JEERS to the 'S.S. Loofah.' So few people signed up for Bill O'Reilly's "Love Me! Worship Me! Adore Me! cruise that it was cancelled. Back to playing with your falafels in the shower, big guy.
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And just one more…
JEERS to summer homework. Sorry, kids, but apparently your math teacher isn’t letting you forget what you learned during the school year:
And, yes, there
will be a pop quiz at the next rest stop.
Have a nice Tuesday. And don't forget to tip and rec the Animal Nuz fundraiser blogathon posts and toss in a few bucks to keep Eric Lewis's nibs engorged with ink. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"I am against discrimination of all kinds: race, religion, sexual orientation or whatever Bill in Portland Maine's last name is."
---Barbara Bush
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