Point of Inquiry, Your Billyness
I've cleared it with DK, Inc.—aka the sprawling industry known as Big Kos—to make tonight's C&J a rare event known as "Ask Me Anything."
I assure you I'm highly unprepared to unleash a mighty trickle of knowledge and wisdom upon you by answering any questions you might have about anything. Home repair, food, relationships, going Galt, mutant creatures living under your house, blogger etiquette, molecular biology, THE LAW...I know almost everything about making stuff up about anything, and tonight I'm willing to prove it. One small caveat: I don't know a thing about what's going on at this web site.
Keep in mind that the longer the evening wears on, the less coherent my answers will be. So please allow those with urgent medical needs and/or dinner plans to go first. Thank you.
And now, our feature presentation...
Cheers and Jeers for Friday, August 30, 2024
Note: Here's the schedule for next week. C&J will be off Monday so that we can sharpen our snow shovels, pre-salt the sidewalks, pre-make our emergency winter pots of clam chowder, and then get arrested for wearing white one minute after Labor Day. Back Tuesday to boast about how my new orange jumpsuit matches this blog.
—Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
6 days!!!
Days 'til election day: 67
Days 'til the Farm-to-Fork Festival in Sacramento, California: 6
Increase in voter registration among young Black women compared to August 2020, according to data firm TargetSmart: 176%
Percent increase among young Latinas: 150%
Annual amount by which U.S. workers are out-earning inflation: $1,400
Date on which Trump Media stock dipped below $20 for the first time, down from its high of $79 in March: 8/28/24
Percent chance that Billy Graham's granddaughter Jerushah Duford is voting for Kamala Harris in November: 100%
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Weekend plans…
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CHEERS to September. Hold on to your corsets and your straw hats, our ninth month (named after the god Octoberus, in one of the most hilarious paperwork mishaps in Pantheon history) starts Sunday and it’s busy busy, busy. A week after we pack away our whites on Labor Day, Congress straggles back to work just in time for Republicans to shut the place down in a hissy fit over the budget. (Though somehow they'll probably manage to squeeze in another impeachment inquiry over Joe Biden's inexcusable crime of being competent.)
Also: Wheel of Fortune gets a new host, and I sure wish it was Graham Norton instead of Ryan Milquetoast.
The kids—aka cannon fodder for lunatics with unfettered access to guns—are back in school and, for reasons no one can explain, they're not allowed to say "gay" or read books. It's also Hunger Action Month, Cat Month, Suicide Prevention Month, Sewing Month, and Let's Watch Putin Step On More Garden Rakes In Ukraine Month. Speaking of stepping on rakes, the 45th president gets sentenced on the 18th for his 34 election-interference crimes, but not before getting his giant head handed to him on a platter by Kamala Harris during the ABC News debate on the 10th.
The 9/11 terrorist attacks that Bush II could’ve prevented if he’d read his PDBs turns 23. (Kids, ask your parents.) Shoppers jam online stores looking for the perfect Autumnal Equinox and Mexican Independence Day gifts. ("A pair of socks? You shouldn’t have.") New England gets insanely beautiful as summer turns to fall. A full harvest moon happens on the 17th, but not before the Emmy Awards are handed out on the 15th.
All month: election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, election stuff, and election stuff.
Oh, and this is fun: we've just concluded our third full year since 2001 when we haven’t been at war. (But if you keep giving us side-eye like that, France, we’re comin’ for ya.)
CHEERS to packin' up the station wagon and leaving Walley World. Three years ago this week the deed was done. Marked in the history books. Having triumphed in every possible way, including destroying the last remnants of the Taliban, al Qaeda, ISIS, and Chik-Fil-A, the United States of America withdrew from—[checks notes]—Afghanistan with its head held high. My recollection: A nation was built. A free society was born. $2.3 trillion was spent with utmost care and transparency. The world could do little that late August morning but cast their jealous eyes upon our greatness as we prepared to welcome our men and women in uniform back home with thunderous applause, ticker-tape parades, brass bands, all-you-can-eat buffets, balloon animals for the kids, and an approval rating for the Biden administration north of 90 percent. The sun shone high, the flowers all re-bloomed, and all was right again as Johnny and Jenny come marching home again, hurrah, hurrah. And in other news, my mom dropped me on my head when I was a baby.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS to "One ringy dingy...Two ringy dingy..." On August 30, 1963, a hotline was set up between Moscow and D.C. for the purpose of keeping the superpowers in constant contact during emergencies. It worked really well. In fact we hear an aide to Khrushchev is still shuffling around Red Square looking for Amanda Hugginkiss.
CHEERS to home vegetation. Now that Labor Day weekend is here and Maine is snowed in until next June (28 inches last night!), the TV is in complete control of our lives.
Tonight at 8 we’ll be live-tweeting the famous “salt monster”—or should I call you Nancy?—episode of Star Trek at hashtag #allstartrek (via the H&I Network).
Unfortunately there's not much on this weekend, now that the 24-hour Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon has been ripped from the fabric of society like a strip of cheap Velcro. (When I worked at a Saginaw, Michigan radio station in the late 80s, we always volunteered to helm the MDA phones at night, and it was a little eerie doing it in a huge empty mall at 2am. They sprung for some good chow, though. But the zombies were obnoxious.)
The most popular movies and streamers home videos, new and old, are all reviewed here at Rotten Tomatoes. You can check out the WNBA schedule here, while the baseball lineup is here, starring the Boston Red Sox who have won so many World Series that everyone has lost count, believe me. NBC has coverage of the 2024 Paralympics tonight and Sunday night.
Tonight: Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson joins Margaret Hoover to talk about the security and integrity of the upcoming elections that Republicans hope are neither secure nor integrity’ish.
Sunday on 60 Minutes: a profile of Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, and a history of the Channel Islands. Other than that, the TV sphere is a barren wasteland and if you choose to wade into it, may god help you. Now here's your Sunday morning lineup:
Now here's your Sunday morning lineup:
Meet the Press: Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA); Sen. Tom Cotton (WEIRD-AR).
This Week: Gov. Jared Polis (D-CO); Sen. Lindsey Graham (WEIRD-SC).
Main topic this week on ‘Face the Wabbits’: tort reform.
Face the Nation: National co-chair for the Harris-Walz campaign Mitch Landrieu; Gov. Maura Healy (D-MA); Rep. Tony Gonzales (WEIRD-TX);
CNN's State of the Union: Rep. (and soon to be Senator) Adam Schiff (D-CA).
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA); Trump campaign weirdo and Arlington National Cemetery desecrater Corey Lewandowski.
Happy viewing!
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Ten years ago in C&J: August 29, 2014
CHEERS to focusing on the important issues. President Obama gave a press briefing yesterday to discuss various troubling events on the international front that will require much thought, debate and intelligence to deal with. Here's the official internet summary of what you need to know about the briefing: OMG the president wore a tan suit, that's the signal to turn America into a Muslim wasteland. Several right-wing bloggers were briefly hospitalized with imagination-induced pearl-clutching injuries. After their release, they were re-admitted after suffering traumatic shock when they realized they'd briefly felt happy that their pearl-clutching treatment was subsidized by Obamacare.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the workin' stiffs. Monday is Labor Day, and the folks at Axios got all you barge-toters and bale-lifters something nice to mark the occasion: good news about how the labor movement is increasingly popular:
The share of Americans who say they disapprove of labor unions hasn't been this low since September 1967, per new Gallup data.
Bingo.
Unions have seen a resurgence in recent years, with an uptick in strikes and organizing efforts, helped along by more positive public sentiment and, until recently, a strong labor market that emboldens workers to push for more from their employers.
70% of Americans said they approved of unions, per Gallup's most recent poll, conducted in August. That's just one point shy of the record hit in 2022
And to all the right-wing crabbypantses who deride unions but belong to them anyway and love the benefits they get from them (though they’ll never admit it): you're welcome.
Have a great weekend. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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