From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE
Hey, Love yer Sig...
Every now and agin' C&J toodles 'round the comments in diaries and front-page posts looking for signature lines (which you can create in your user profile, a feature that will also be available in the upgraded version of Daily Kos, except in giant flashing neon lights, or so I hear). Here's some brain candy from you, the unwashed (but well-coiffed) orange rabble:
Ethel Waters as Petunia in Cabin In The Sky (1943): "Sometimes when you fight the Devil, you gotta jab him with his own pitchfork." (avamontez)
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Daily Kos: It's like high school, but with better beer and less making out. (turnover)
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A learning experience is one of those things that says, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' Douglas Adams (dougymi)
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"In politics, absurdity is not a handicap." --Napoleon Bonaparte (PBen)
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"How did you go bankrupt?" "Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly." - Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises. (weasel)
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Bumper sticker seen on I-95; "Stop Socialism." My response: "Don't like socialism? GET OFF the Interstate highway!" (Clytemnestra)
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"Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by being governed by those who are dumber." Aristotle (camlbacker)
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Unapologetically pro-citizen. Not anti-corporation just very pro-citizen. (CanYouBeAngryAndStillDream)
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Republicanism: the political theory that the poor have too much money and the rich do not have enough. (Bacchae1999)
And my favorite for this round, from Boris Godunov:
I finally put in a signature!
And a darn fine one. Well done. We now return you to our regularly scheduled mayhem under the watchful eye of our corporate overlords.
Cheers and Jeers, now in BlizzardVision, starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Note: We have room for about 5-6 more people at the New England Kossack/C&J Meetup coming up on Saturday, February 19 from 1-4 at the Portsmouth Brewery in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. It's simple to get to and the parking is, like me, cheap and easy. Please RSVP to my better half, Michael, at cuckolds04103 [at] gmail.com. Oh, and the secret phrase for gaining entry to our special table is, "Hey, who hit you with the ugly stick?" Say it loud as the staff there is somewhat hard of hearing.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Presidents Day: 19
Days `til the Eelpout Festival in Walker Minnesota: 16
Amount Portland, Maine's city snowplow operators get paid: $19/hr. regular, $28/hr. overtime
Width of the path a plow can clear with its side blade down: 32 feet
(Source: The Portland Press Herald)
Number of candidates who have filled out paperwork so far to seek the presidency in 2012: 76
(Source: Federal Election Commission via The Week)
Percent of men surveyed who say they look forward to going clothes shopping: 44%
Percent of women who say they look forward to going clothes shopping: 51%
(Source: USA Today)
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 174 (including 3 Beast Governments and 1 Christian Center with a mysteriously large following). Soul Protection Factor 4 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: All that butt sniffing finally paid off.
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CHEERS to furry fortunetellers. If this morning feels like yesterday morning, Surprise!!! It's Groundhog Day again! Let's take a spin and find out how the rodents did this morning:
Staten Island Chuck: Early spring.
Shubenacadie Sam: Early spring, eh.
Malverne Mel: cancelled due to either the blizzard or public intoxication.
Punxsutawney Phil: At Gobblers Knob, the official groundhog---or, as I prefer to call it, "woodchuck" (thank you, Rhodes Scholarship!)---did not see his shadow this morning. Good news for water skiers. Bad news for downhill skiers.
And for the 8th year in a row I got out of bed, stood up, and couldn’t see my toes. I think that means another year that Hostess gets to keep their Twinkie plant open.
JEERS to Snowzilla! How uncommon is the storm now ravaging a 2,100-mile stretch of American Motherland Freedom Soil, affecting nearly 100 million Yearners to Breathe Free? It's such a rare and extremely hazardous storm that it's been designated by the National Weather Service as a "Blizzard Unsympathetically Launching Lightning, Snow, Hail, Icicles and Thunder" (BULLSHIT). It's been called historic, once a century, awesome, unprecedented and, particularly among the younger generations, "super awesome cuz no school today!" Southern Maine is expected to get over a foot, so Michael and I were running around yesterday frantically getting our emergency supplies together. Only this morning did we realize how miserably we'd failed. We forget the olives.
JEERS to the Whiniest whiners in all of Whinydom. Hey, Wall Street! You say you can't stand Democrats because we're so oppressive that we hinder your ability to make money? Really? That's your story and you're stickin' to it? Well, then, perhaps you could explain how the Dow Jones Industrial Average under Democratic President Barack Obama oppressed itself like a turbo-rocket yesterday and smashed the 12,000 mark, reaching the highest level in two and a half years? Well???
[Six months later...]
Take your time. We'll wait.
CHEERS to bold leadership. Sixty-three years ago today, in 1948, Democrat Harry Truman urged Congress to adopt recommendations by a presidential commission on civil rights. It's almost breathtaking in scope. He ended his message to Congress with this, a statement that resonates just as loudly today:
[W]e must protect our civil rights so that by providing all our people with the maximum enjoyment of personal freedom and personal opportunity we shall be a stronger nation---stronger in our leadership, stronger in our moral position, stronger in the deeper satisfactions of a united citizenry.
We know that our democracy is not perfect. But we do know that it offers freer, happier life to our people than any totalitarian nation has ever offered.
If we wish to inspire the peoples of the world whose freedom is in jeopardy, if we wish to restore hope to those who have already lost their civil liberties, if we wish to fulfill the promise that is ours, we must correct the remaining imperfections in our practice of democracy.
We know the way. We need only the will.
Oh...did I mention he's a Democrat?
CHEERS to the beginning of the end. Hosni Mubarek, who became Egyptian president when Anwar Sadat was killed by people throwing chairs on top of him (that's how I remember it, anyway), announced yesterday that he won’t run for a 500th term as Terrible Leader. But---always a but, isn’t there?---he wants to continue fluffing the palace pillows until September. No dice, Grampa, say the protesters and President Obama, it's time for you to pick out your rockin' chair now. So that's where it stands as of this morning. At this point there's hope for a quick resolution so that the nation, paralyzed for weeks, can finally start the process of cleaning up and removing the stench that has spread across the land. Step 1: change the Sphinx's litterbox.
P.S. Whoa...when the Egyptian people told Mubarek, "Either you go or we go," they weren't kidding.
JEERS to weapons of mass annoyance. On February 2, 1991, during the first Gulf War, Iraq fired Scud missiles at Israel and Saudi Arabia. Today it's better known as the Battle of Yes Saddam Hussein Was That Dumb.
CHEERS to Big News...um, y'all. So this morning Michelle Obama and I were texting back and forth, and she's, like, "You tell 'em." And I'm like, "You tell 'em, you're more famous." And she's all like, "Nuh uhhhh." And I'm, like, "Yuh huuuuh." So we got into this big texting fight and then I get a call from her mom that's, like, "You apologize to my daughter right now, you insensitive twerp!" So then I find out it's all bullcrap because Michelle had this email ready to go before I even texted her, and all her Facebook friends knew about it, like, an hour ago. So bogus:
I am thrilled to make sure you are the first to hear some very exciting news. Charlotte, North Carolina, will host the 46th Democratic National Convention in 2012.
Barack and I spent a lot of time in North Carolina during the campaign---from the Atlantic Coast to the Research Triangle to the Smoky Mountains and everywhere in between. Barack enjoyed Asheville so much when he spent several days preparing for the second Presidential debate that our family vacationed there in 2009.
Oh, Barack Barack Barack. That's all this is about, y'know. It's always about Barack. Barack for student council! Barack for hall monitor! Barack for safety patrol! Let Barack pick the dodgeball team! Let Barack read the morning announcements! So then Michelle just texted me again: "Orange Julius after school?" So we're cool.
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Five years ago in C&J: February 2, 2006
JEERS to losing another ally. Coretta Scott King died yesterday at 78. Her words eclipse anything we could think of:
"Hate is too great a burden to bear. It injures the hater more than it injures the hated."
"I believe all Americans who believe in freedom, tolerance and human rights have a responsibility
to oppose bigotry and prejudice based on sexual orientation."
"Women, if the soul of the nation is to be saved, I believe that you must become its soul."
Oh yes yes yes to that one. Now go on and be with your husband---I expect you've got a LOT of catching up to do.
Vewy vewy quiet cheers to Ben Bernanke. Today he takes the oath as our new Federal Reserve Chairman. It will be a seamless transition from Alan Greenspan. Everything will go smoothly. No bumps. No problems. No panic. No eating anything that goes "Crunch" until he goes home from work.
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And just one more...
CHEERS to blowin' this popsicle stand...kinda sorta. After spending over 200 days in "space," a team of astronauts is about to "land" on "Mars" in a simulator that will help prepare humans for a real voyage at some point in the future. It's pretty amazing. Everything has been created to reflect actual conditions that they'd encounter on such a trip, including the Martian surface, which is a desolate place, cold and oxygen-starved and void of intelligent life. But Michele Bachmann says they gotta clear out of her office by 5.
And now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a little blizzard to tame. Meet my Bic lighter, you flakes! Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
I have to confess: I’ve never read Bill in Portland Maine. Not once.
---E.D. Kaine
Balloon Juice
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