From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Headlines You Won't Read This Week
Opponents of Iran nuclear agreement announce detailed alternative
Black Lives Matter movement loses steam
Limbaugh reverses slide in popularity, sponsor support
But here's one you will. Because you just did.
Jindal's presidential prospects brighten
Slow news day ahead
Cows admit role in global warming, form climate task force
Scott Kelly tweets uninteresting photo from International Space Station
Planned Parenthood caught doing something illegal
More Democrats than Republicans booked on Sunday morning shows
Daily Kos Hillary vs. Bernie pie fight ends in Chafee upset
Cat expresses gratitude after owner cleans litter box
Majority of Americans agree: summer going by too slowly
(For the record, Scott Kelly's tweets are
friggin' amazing.)
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, August 17, 2015
Note: One of my recurring nightmares is realizing that I've forgotten to write a Note for C&J. Why it always ends with me losing a Jell-O wrestling match to the Lorax on Tatooine remains a mystery.
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11 days!!!
(And A++ for the gorgeous promo art.)
By the Numbers:
Days 'til the first official Senate-ratified National Lobster Day:
39
Days 'til the
River City Roots Festival in Missoula, Montana:
11
Estimated cost to clean up all the abandoned non-coal mines in the U.S.
$20-50 billion
(Source: EPA)
Current death count from that huge explosion in Tianjin, China, up from the original estimate of 17:
112
Percent chance Jeb Bush is open to using torture as president the way his brother did as president:
100%
(Source: Jeb Bush)
Increase in U.S. factory production in July after an 0.3% dip in June:
0.8%
(Source: Federal Reserve)
Average number of words a dog can learn:
165
(Source:
Parade)
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Monday yawns… (Adding: our pooch Haley was also a serial yawner as a puppy, but half of them ended up getting abandoned halfway through because she got distracted by something.)
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CHEERS to a life well lived. This has not been a good month for Georgia. On the heels of last week's announcement that former president Jimmy Carter has cancer, yesterday we got the news that civil rights icon and all-around "We're not worthy!"-worthy human being Julian Bond has died at 75:
A great American.
He was one of the original leaders of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, while he was a student at Morehouse College in Atlanta.
He moved from the militancy of the student group to the top leadership of the establishmentarian N.A.A.C.P. Along the way, he was a writer, poet, television commentator, lecturer, college teacher, and persistent opponent of the stubborn remnants of white supremacy.
He also served for 20 years in the Georgia Legislature, mostly in conspicuous isolation from white colleagues who saw him as an interloper and a rabble-rouser.
Two things I didn’t know about Bond: he hosted a 1977 episode of
Saturday Night Live, and he co-founded the
Southern Poverty Law Center, which today is an indispensable organization that keeps a close eye on the hate groups (most notably the Family Research Council, which remains a darling of mainstream news outlets, much to their shame) that aid and abet white supremacists. Condolences to his friends, family, colleagues, hometown of Nashville and…well…the world.
P.S. This...
Trump took time to
pose with fairgoers
CHEERS to campaign vows and butter cows. All political eyes were on the Iowa State Fair over the weekend. Hillary (who snagged Tom Harkin's endorsement this time around) and Jeb traded jabs, Bernie Sanders attracted big crowds and beat Hillary in an informal (
very informal) straw poll, the butter cow was worshipped (including some long-distance luvin' by me
on twitter), candidates nibbling pork chops on sticks proved to be slightly less embarrassing on camera than ones fellating corn dogs, and Rick Santorum got to hear
all the ideas that were rattling around in the head of the one person who attended his meet-'n-greet. But, seriously, the star of the show can be summed up in the words of
a fairgoer I'd like to party with:
“Look up in the sky!” Greta Tarbell, 63, cried out. “There’s Trump! He’s got his own helicopter. Have at it, baby!”
Game. Set. Match. Very rich, very classy match.
HA HA HA!!! to great moments in wingnut nostalgia. Here's a gem from the mighty C&J archives that we enjoy holding up to the light of day every once in awhile. Savor the hackery posted ten years ago by John Hinderaker at what was once the awesomest conservative blog in the universe (according to Time magazine), Powerline:
"Great painter."
It must be very strange to be President Bush. A man of extraordinary vision and brilliance approaching to genius, he can't get anyone to notice.
He is like a great painter or musician who is ahead of his time, and who unveils one masterpiece after another to a reception that, when not bored, is hostile.
Now, based on brother Jeb's clumsy, unforced-error-ridden primary performance, I have to wonder if Hinderaker was maybe more accurate in his assessment of 'W' than I originally thought. And wondering that makes me wonder something else: is there a convenient place around here where I can hurl?
JEERS to letters from the C&J mailbag. Sent via Camel Post:
Dear Sudan's Leaders,
Hello! How are you? I am fine. Boy oh boy, I just checked the weather in Khartoum and it's so hot I bet you could fry a political dissenter on the sidewalk. Mid-80s here, but the humidity…don't get me started! Ha ha.
On the other hand, pants
can be highly flammable.
I'm writing because I just heard the news that you've just sentenced a Christian woman in your country to 20 lashes for "indecent dress", or as it's also known: wearing pants.
I advise against this for two reasons: 1) Oh my god you horrible people, what the fuck are you thinking?!! If you go through with this, I can promise anyone connected to this sentence will spend their afterlife shackled to a splintery chair in the front row of a never-ending parade of CPAC keynote speakers. Not even Dante conceived of a circle of hell that grisly.
I forget the second reason.
In closing, please enjoy the rest of your summer, by which I mean go fuck yourselves.
Sincerely,
Bill in Portland
And I stuffed the envelope with glitter.
CHEERS to things that go clank…or is it clunk? On this date in 1835, Solyman Merrick of Springfield, Massachusetts got a patent for improvements to his invention called the screw wrench. Humanity has been throwing them into the works ever since.
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Ten years ago in C&J: August 17, 2005
"Harper! Build the dang fence, eh."
CHEERS to sticking around to fight the right. According to Canadian immigration statistics, the number of Americans applying for residency in Canada actually
dropped right after the November 3rd elections. Says Immigration Minister Joe Volpe: "I guess I'm happy Republicans and Democrats have found a way to live together in peace and in harmony." Oh Canada, I just want to hug your sweet naïveté like a teddy bear.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to Star Wars Star Wars Star Wars Star Wars! (Spoiler alerts!) As of midnight tonight, there are just four months until The Force Awakens becomes the highest-grossing movie of all time. Here's a bunch of new sneak peeks in the land of Empire vs. Rebellion to get your Monday morning pulse rate up:
> Lots of cool new pics (and a handful of mild spoilers) from Entertainment Weekly
> See the SW7 action figures here.
> From this week's Disney Expo (D23) in Anaheim: new poster with Han Solo! (While Luke and Leia have smaller roles, we hear Han is one of the major characters with a lot of screen time.)
> The John Williams Fan Network reports that one of the horn players on the scoring sessions calls the experience “One of the absolute highlights of my career…It’s amazing how new and fresh John’s music is, but it’s also distinctively Star Wars."
> Baby Princess Leia on a speeder bike may or may not be part of the movie.
And here's a Korean TV spot that's basically the same as the current movie trailer except it has a few seconds of badass footage of what the post-Vader imperial forces look like:
You can tell it's a superior fighting force by the sign at their recruiting office: "No Oath Keepers allowed."
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"With a few notable exceptions, Bill in Portland Maine basically has a normal invertebrate genome that's just been completely rearranged, like it's been put into a blender and mixed."
---Caroline Albertin, Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago
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