"It's A Festivus Miracle!"
Today is the magical holiday known as Festivus. In accordance with tradition, I submit part of my 2024 list for the cathartic Airing of Grievances. The following have disappointed me over the past year, starting with the most obvious:
• The American media that looked the other way while a sadistic, dumb-as-rocks convicted felon and rapist doused our country in gasoline without penalty...and the American voters who were dumb enough to think they’d save a few pennies on eggs if they set a match to it.
• The Republican party, for devolving into such an unmanageable mob that our nation’s de facto leader is now a South African billionaire Nazi lover who manufactures cars that burst into flames.
• The book banners, anti-Semites, and LGBTQ haters who have accomplished for freedom and equality with their Bibles and terrorist tactics what a baby accomplishes with creamed corn and a diaper.
• International climate conferences that act more like pro-fossil fuel conventions.
• Pragmatic purists who pretend to be purist pragmatists, purist pragmatists who pretend to be pragmatic purists, and pie that pretends to be cake.
• People who don’t shovel and de-ice their effing sidewalks. (Southerners, ask a northerner.)
• “Compromises” that only extract concessions from the left, and pundits who say the left needs to move to the right (but the right never needs to move to the left).
• Whoever felt it was necessary to take from us this year: Quincy Jones, Teri Garr, James Earl Jones, Bob Newhart, Shelley Duvall, Alexei Navalny, Dr. Ruth, Maggie Smith, and several members of the Daily Kos family.
• Squirrels who dine and dash. (Almond & walnut brunch is $4.95 plus tax, you little scofflaws.)
• And, as always: God, for not coming down here and straightening out this mess of a planet. She's dating another universe, isn’t she?
To them and the other 482 people and things on my list (up from last year's 467) I say... "I GOT A LOT OF PROBLEMS WITH YOU PEOPLE!"
And now, our feature presentation...
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, December 23, 2024
Note: Here's the schedule for the rest of the week:
Tomorrow EVENING: Join us around 7pm ET for A Very Special C&J Christmas Eve Bean Supper and Conspiracy Theory Nudeblogging. It's a moment to sit on wooden benches, free of the bonds of garmentry, and reflect on all the blessings of the season loudly, drunkenly, pungently and with no regard for the neighbors.
Wednesday and Thursday: No C&J, as I will be getting my hair done.
Friday: C&J at its usual evening time, around 7:15ET.
If you need to reach me Wednesday or Thursday, I'll leave the telex machine on between 2-4 am. Feliz Navidad. —Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
8 days!!!
Days 'til the little drummer boy drives Mary and Joseph out of their ever-livin' tree: 2
Days 'til the 20th New Year's Eve Hershey Kiss Drop in Pennsylvania: 8
Adjusted economic growth in the 3rd quarter, up from the original estimate of 2.8%: 3.1%
U.S. population growth in 2024, according to the Census Bureau: 1%
The last year when population growth was this high: 2001
Chart positions of I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and White Christmas on this date in 1952: #1, #2, #3
World record for most lights lit simultaneously on a Christmas tree, set in Malmedy, Belgium in 2010: 194,672
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Visions of Alpo-brand sugarplums, we presume…
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CHEERS and JEERS to dashing through the airspace corridors in a 10 20 35 50-dollars-per-carry-on-bag sardine can full of anti-vax cultists. Good news: holiday traffic is expected to be up again this year, meaning more of us are in a traveling mood. Bad news: if you're out in it, it's gonna suck tailpipe:
AAA projects 119.3 million people will travel 50 miles or more from home over the year-end holiday period* from Saturday, December 21 to Wednesday, January 1. This year’s domestic travel projection narrowly surpasses the previous record set in 2019 by 64,000 travelers. AAA expects an additional 3 million travelers this holiday season compared to last year.
[Honk Hooonk!!!] “Watch where yer goin!” “F*ck you!”
AAA expects air travel to set a new record this holiday season with 7.85 million passengers. That number surpasses the previous record of 7.5 million air travelers last year. … The number of Americans traveling by bus, train, and cruise this holiday season is up nearly 10% compared to last year.
Travel tip: to avoid congestion on the expressway, we suggest you buy yourself a magma-resistant submarine and take the alternate route through the outer core. Don’t forget to take a right at Albuquerque or you’ll end up in Kim Jong Un’s rumpus room.
DOUBLE CHEERS to people who work on Christmas eve and Christmas day. Police, fire, utilities, media, national security, our first-responders, hospital personnel, and rum distilleries. If you're not getting at least double pay and comp time, your employer should get a one-way ticket to a bench-pressing session with Marjorie Taylor-Greene. (Or at least a one-way trip to fluff Mitch McConnell's wattle...or is that too cruel?)
CHEERS to great breakthroughs. It was during this week in 1947 that John Bardeen, Walter H. Brattain and William Shockley invented the transistor in New Jersey (and later won the Nobel Prize in physics for it). It originally was a relatively big old thing, but today they're as small as a single atom. To put that in perspective, it's the equivalent of all the good Republican ideas for dealing with infectious diseases, income inequality, climate change, and immigration reform combined. Except bigger.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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JEERS to ye jolly old fireball. We pulled this nugget off the Internet so it must be true:
"To deliver his gifts in one night, Santa would have to make 822.6 visits per second, sleighing at 3,000 times the speed of sound. At that speed, Santa and his reindeer would burst into flame instantaneously."
And yet...Santa does make his 822.6 visits per second, and does travel at 3,000 times the speed of sound, and he does deliver his gifts in one night, and he has not self-combusted. In fact, every year he gets tracked by NORAD. So someone owes Santa—and the world—an apology. How do I lodge a complaint with the internet?
CHEERS to the Pale Yellow Goddess. This is just a quick reminder that, as awesome as the Daily Kos’s intrepid bloggers are, there are amazing bloggers on other sites who help fuel the liberal netroots, and they deserve our support, too.
Indispensable truth teller Digby.
For example: how cool is it that Digby—aka Heather Parton—is on our team? She is one of the sharpest, most observant writers you'll find on the lefty tubes, and when you combine that with her Molly Ivins-like wit it's easy to see why "What Digby said..." has become the equivalent of the netroots bat signal—you see, you click. Digby holds her annual fundraiser this time of year so she can keep chasing after the bad guys. If you feel so inclined to send a little holiday cheer in her direction, here’s the link. (The donation buttons and snail mail address are on the upper left side of her page.) You won’t get much in return, though. Just the equivalent of a Ph.D. and…more Digby!
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Ten years ago in C&J: December 23, 2014
CHEERS to the start of something better. Ever since President Obama announced a resumption in diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States, there's been some predictable whining from the right, but mostly a big "it's about time" from the rest of the country (and the world). But anyone who thinks we're going to become all buddy-buddy right away is delusional. It's not going to be an easy transition because there are many ugly issues on the table to be dealt with, including torture, mass-incarceration, an over-intrusive surveillance state, failing to maintain adequate infrastructure, and massive income inequality. And, on the other side, the United States has similar concerns about Cuba.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to Menorah palooza. Wednesday will be one of dread in my neck of the woods, as I become what my neighbors fear most: an Episcopalian brandishing a dreidel and a platter of my homemade latkes topped with fresh fire extinguisher foam. Last year I took out six windows, two lampposts and a hedge with the former, and made the old lady down the street tap into her supplemental dental insurance with the latter. We trust things will be a little more peaceful where you are when the Jewish counterpart to Christmas starts Wednesday—late this year—at sundown. Which reminds me...
It was just before Hanukkah and Miriam was giving directions to her grown-up grandson, who was coming to visit for the first time since she'd moved to her new apartment.
"Come to the front door, "Miriam said. "There's a panel at the door. Use your elbow to push button 3A and I'll buzz you in. Come inside and the elevator is on your right. Get in the elevator and user your elbow to press the third-floor button. When you get out, my apartment is on the left. Use your elbow to ring my doorbell and I'll open the door for you."
"Grandma, that sounds easy," said the grandson. "But why am I hitting all these buttons with my elbow?"
Replied Miriam: "You're coming to visit empty handed?"
Happy Channuka, Channukah, Chanuka, Chanukah, Chanuko, Hannuka, Hannukah, Hanuka, Hanukah, Hanukkah, Kanukkah, Khannuka, Khannukah, Khanuka, Khanukah, Khanukkah, and Xanuka!!! Or, in the immortal words of thankfully-former Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker: “Molotov!”
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
Neuroscience Just Discovered That Cheers and Jeers Makes You Smarter for 24 Hours and Rewires Your Brain for Up to 2 Weeks
—Inc.
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