Cheers and Jeers: Tuesday

From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE...

I have nothing to say about Netroots Nation. Except...

The event was insanely well-organized and orderly, especially the anarchy workshop.

Austin was hot. An oppressive, prickly, stifling, blast-furnace heat that turned human hair into glass. But at least the humidity was in check.

In my swag bag I received a condom with a note on the wrapper that said, "Protect the U.S. Constitution." I wasn't aware that the founding fathers wrote it on a penis.

If we can ever figure out how to turn sweat into fuel, Al Gore will be able to power the planet for at least the next thirty years.

Lining the walls in the rotunda of the state capitol are portraits of former Texas governors. Ann Richards' portrait sits next to George W. Bush's. If I was in charge I'd put yellow police "CRIME SCENE: DO NOT CROSS" tape between them.

Political views aside, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom looks and sounds like he could be Joe Biden's baby brother.

The boxed lunches had names like "The Norwegian" and "The Wellington," but there was nothing labeled "The American." I guess they couldn't round up enough transfats in time.

Ninety percent of the discussions were "Chomsky this" and "Chomsky that" and "Chomsky's my BFF 4evuh." Not a word about our real hero, Jane Fonda.

If Code Pink's goal is to prevent people from wanting to join Code Pink, they're succeeding.

One of the horse-and-carriage drivers on 6th Street confirmed that liberals tip much better than conservatives. Picking up a Republican by the Governor's mansion virtually guarantees no bonus carrots for Bossie.

John Dean can catch flies with a pair of chopsticks. Richard Clarke can stop your heartbeat with his index finger. Paul Krugman has the nicest toes of any New York Times columnist. Don Siegelman is always the classiest guy in any room unless Jotter's there. Darcy Burner and Donna Edwards must be cloned forthwith. And if you meet Jim Hightower and don’t want to pinch his cheeks you're not human.

There was a right-wing "counter-conference" in Austin at the same time as Netroots Nation. It sucked so bad that Bob Barr came to our place instead and even Michelle Malkin closed her laptop and spent an afternoon pole dancing.

All the front-pagers are taller and sexier in person. Their eyes, however, are a bit distracting. Not just because they glow, but because they emit a low buzzing sound.

I promised a link to the site that sells the waving Obama watches so you wouldn’t steal mine off my wrist. Fair enough---here ya go.

The only person at the whole convention to actually pull my finger was Pastor Dan's five year-old son, Billy, so he wins the secret million dollar jackpot!

Travel tip: The shorter an airline pilot's turbulence message is, the worse the turbulence will be. If he turns on the Fasten Seat Belt sign and simply says, "Flight attendants take your seats," it would be a good time to put your affairs in order.

And finally, Patrick Beach of the Austin American-Statesman is so bad at snark that his parenthetical should be I-Suck.

What'd I miss around here? Cheers and Jeers starts in There's Moreville... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]

Cheers and Jeers for Tuesday July 22, 2008

Note: Lieutenant!  There aren’t enough rose petals strewn about the floor of my comfort capsule.  And the merlot is too tannic.  You have failed me for the last time.

-

By the Numbers:
Days 'til the general election: 105
Official organizers' estimate of attendance at the Netroots Nation convention: 2,500
Official Park Service estimate: 25
Number of political or advocacy web sites that, according to their owners at NN, I must go to right now to "register, donate and volunteer just 2 hours of your time per week": 185
Number of causes (according to the literature in my swag bag) for which I have to take "immediate action" or risk losing our party, our planet, our puppies, and/or our potty parity within a month: 37
Chance that the Austin Hilton Hotel has a 13th floor: 100%
Average number of skin layers that were rubbed off attendees' knuckles from all the "terrorist fist-jabbing": 2.5
Percent of Austin Carriage Service's Percheron horses that are flaming liberals: 89% (one's a Libertarian)
Number of bloggers who are still sitting in the Hilton lobby, finishing up "just one more post" before catching their flight, which actually left 36 hours ago: 7

-

Tuesday Words of Wisdom from the Right-wing Blogosphere:

"Obama isn't dumb, unfortunately."

---Commenter "Brandon" at RedState

All together now: One...two...three... Classy!!!

-

Puppy Pic of the Day: Weed-B-Gone

-

More Austin:

CHEERS to the stars and stripes stars forever.  Heat and their major newspaper aside, Austin was pretty much a kick-ass host for Netroots Nation.  But the capitol of the Lone Star State has an obsession with stars.  They plaster 'em on trash cans, planters, sewer covers, sprinkler heads, trolleys, buses, banners, fences, road signs, park benches, toilet paper, doormats, baby strollers, footwear, office buildings, churches, mugs, bricks, lampposts, shirts, purses and dog collars.  They don’t have stoplights, they have starlights.  When people go to Starbucks they have an orgasm with their coffee.  Buy a can of Campbell's Chicken with Stars soup in Austin and you get a tablespoon of broth and a giant pasta star that weighs half a pound.  They are star struck.  (You'll never catch us obsessing over something like that in Maine---really.)  But anyway, thanks for everything.  Except the governor.

CHEERS and JEERS to Madame Speaker.  Nancy, Nancy, Nancy...what are we going to do with you?  You are a liberal enigma wrapped in a grandmotherly riddle and topped with excruciatingly awkward hand gestures.  Your blatant waffling on FISA and impeachment forced me to leave the room more than once.  I'd respect you more if you just came out and said, "Look, corporate lobbyists and special interests are a fact of life at the moment, and if we piss 'em off they'll do everything they can to bury us.  So you're not gonna get everything you want right now and that's the way it is and I'm sorry."  At least it'd be honest instead of patronizing.  At the same time, we agree on plenty of things, and you not only came to Netroots Nation and listened to us, you also stuck around and talked to many of us one-on-one.  Plus you looked fabulous.  So damn you.  And thank you.

CHEERS to Howard Dean.  His speech Thursday night was on the low-key side, but his impromptu rally in Brush Park earlier in the day was great (watch a clip here).  For those of you wondering: yes, we still have the power.  And we're up to thirty percent solar and ten percent fry-vat grease!

(itty bitty) JEERS to the most conspicuous no-show.  Look, I'm not mad that Meteor Blades wasn't at Netroots Nation even though he was a scheduled speaker.  (I did lash out briefly at the hotel porters with my six foot-long Nerf bat.)  No, I'm mad at the pilots of the black helicopters I hired to rendition him to Austin, but who apparently took him to the Malibu Tiki Hut instead (mercenaries are so counter-bribable).  Next year: I'll do it mah own goddam self!  Pack light, MB---I can only carry so much.

CHEERS to Netroots for the Troops (NFTT).  So you right-wingers don’t think we lefties support the troops, huh?  Well Suck. On. This.  And as Kossack Brillig said, "It's sad that we had to do this at all because we never should have sent our troops into Iraq in the first place."  Crazy liberals.

CHEERS to a city on the cutting edge.  In addition to Austin showing off their eco-friendly hybrid school buses, there was something else happening next to the convention center that you don’t see very often in a major American city: workers layin' down track for some brand new light rail service:

Could it be a dream? You go to work, but you’re not stuck in traffic.  You don’t check your watch, wondering if you’ll be late.  Instead, you read the sports section or choose a song on your iPod.  You arrive early for a change and are remarkably stress free.  Soon, sleek new trains and buses will make this dream a reality.

Include a bar car and it'll be standing room only.

JEERS to unintended consequences.  After Al Gore announced his plan to make America energy independent within 10 years (Yay!), we shook his hand and extracted the genetic material from the pool of sweat he left in our palm.  We were then able to produce 40 perfect clones (albeit 1-inch clones because apparently I missed a step in the fermentation process) who were given orders to secretly infiltrate Congress and the White House to rewrite bills and amend Bush's signing statements.  But as fate would have it, the Mini Als were released in D.C. yesterday during rush hour and never saw the FedEx truck comin'.  They leave behind no spouses and no kids, but one big, tragic splotch on Constitution Avenue.

-
The Rest
-

CHEERS to travelin' man. After sneaking away from his media posse to single-handedly capture a nest of Taliban evildoers with nothing more than a revolver made of licorice, Barack Obama flew to Kuwait where he thanked the troops and sank a three-pointer from 50 feet.  Then it was off to Iraq, where the government gleefully expressed support for his withdrawal timeline.  Going through Barack's mind yesterday (a la Will Smith): "I make this look good."  Going through McCain's head yesterday: "I'm fucked."  My point: good day for the home team.

JEERS to stinkin' up the joint.  John McCain was in Maine yesterday.  He shuffled in, made the local media feel all googly (as opposed to "Google-y", which he still doesn't quite get), and disappeared without leaving a tip.  Meanwhile, adding insult to injury is this AP article which begins:

If Sen. John McCain is really serious about becoming a Web-savvy citizen, perhaps Kathryn Robinson can help.  Robinson is now 106---that's 35 years older than McCain---and she began using the Internet at 98, at the Barclay Friends home in West Chester, Pa., where she lives. "I started to learn because I wanted to e-mail my family," she says---in an e-mail message, naturally.

Blogs have been buzzing recently over McCain's admission that when it comes to the Internet, "I'm an illiterate who has to rely on his wife for any assistance he can get."

At what point do we start feeling sorry for this man?  Right...the fifth of Never.

JEERS to Bushian behavior.  Did you hear about this?  The Senate rejected the president's proposal to enlarge the Supreme Court by 6 justices.  His plan was denounced as "court-packing" by critics.  July 22, 1937.  Franklin Roosevelt.  But nice try.

(Mild) CHEERS to candidates who make John McCain look, um, still old.  Happy 85th birthday to Bob Dole.  Best thing he ever said: "If you're hanging around with nothing to do and the zoo is closed, come over to the Senate. You'll get the same kind of feeling and you won't have to pay."  C&J would add: If the Senate's closed, the House is right next door.

JEERS to udder insanity.  Along with the Terri Schiavo saga, the Janet Jackson "wardrobe malfunction" at the 2004 Super Bowl will go down as one of the silliest "controversies" of the Bush II years.  So it warms my Wheaties to see that a U.S. Court of Appeals has nixed the $550,000 fine levied against CBS and told the Republican-dominated FCC to go pound sand.  So congratulations, boob, on your victory over the boobs.

CHEERS to nabbing the gangsta.  On this date in 1934, John Dillinger was gunned down in front of Chicago's Biograph Theatre.  It was payback for recommending "Speed Racer."

-

Three Years Ago in C&J: July 22, 2005...

JEERS to Don Rumsfeld.  Morale is getting lower in the military, so what does the head of our military have to say about it?  "Hey, it's the Army's fault, not mine.".  You're right, Don.  Bad, bad army.  You should all come home right now and report for KP duty stateside.

CHEERS to your health tip of the day.  Wearing a really bulky coat in the middle of July in London can lead to heat stroke.  Or death in a hail of bullets.  So stick to a colorful tank top.  And drink plenty of fluids!

-

And just one more...

CHEERS to the letter P.  And which gate, pray tell, will the netroots crash next?  If you haven't heard, the answer lies 21 seconds into this classic FedEx ad.  August 13-16, 2009.  Or, in blog time, about ten seconds from now (I'm not even going to bother unpacking from Austin).  More details here.  Oh, and I probably shouldn't let the cat out of the bag, but I can't help it.  Three words: penthouse suite orgy.  But keep in mind there will be a two whipped-cream-can minimum.

-

Oh, and may we gently, softly, delicately suggest: STAY AWAY FROM THE DEVIL JALAPENOS! STAY AWAY FROM THE DEVIL JALAPENOS! AAAAAGHHHH!!!  Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?

-

Today's Shameless Testimonial from the Official C&J/Netroots Nation Terrorist Watch List and Guest Book:

"I like cheese."
---Hunter

-