From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
The Things You Find Between the Sofa Cushions
Please rise and place your hand over your heart as Billy in Portland Maine, age 7 circa 1972, leads us in the Pledge:
I [Up arrow] pledge a legence to the
flag of the United States of
amiarica and to
the repuBlic for witches
stand on n nation under
god idavisible with
iberty and justis for all.
Thank you. Please be seated. Let us eat paste.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, May 28, 2015
Note: If this Thursday's a rockin', please come a knockin' because it means my magical escape-from-a-straightjacket-while-suspended-from-the-chandelier trick is going horribly wrong. (The key's under the giant boulder in the front yard. You'll probably need a shovel and some dynamite to get it.)
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8 days!!!
By the Numbers:
Days 'til
Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens:
204
Days 'til
Fairport Canal Days in New York:
8
Rank of Time-Warner Cable and Charter Cable, who are trying to merge, among 17 cable companies measured in the U.S. for customer satisfaction:
#16, #14
(Source: Consumer Union via
The Portland Press Herald)
Increase in home prices from March '14 to March '15:
5%
(Source: Standard and Poor's/Case Shiller survey)
Prison sentence for Holly Solomon, the lady who
ran over her husband because he didn’t vote in 2012, leading to her worst nightmare: President Obama's reelection:
3½ years
Number of bedrooms at the 45-story
Abraj Kudai hotel in Mecca, which will be the world's largest when it opens in 2017:
10,000
Number of floors that will be reserved for the Saudi royal family:
5
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Environmentalists do not underestimate the difficulties the United States faces in trying to wean itself from fossil fuel. Pretty much our entire transportation grid is based on the gasoline engine. "Lay rail," is one thing we could do. Switch to cars with hybrid engines, increase fuel-efficiency standards, change as rapidly as possible to renewable energy sources---the menu of alternative behaviors is already long and it works. We can cut greenhouse gases; we can even do it dramatically. We are not helpless.
We are, however, currently governed by an administration of oil executives and people whose main guiding principle seems to be opposing anything Bill Clinton favored. This is both pathetic and ridiculous. Kert Davies, director of Greenpeace USA's global warming campaign, said, "The Bush administration's climate policy smells like Exxon-Mobil."
---June, 2002
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Puppy Pic of the Day: The National Spelling Bee finals are tonight. I hiope the kiddos studied up on their dog names…
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CHEERS to the founding Intenders. Next month the Supreme Court will announce whether or not it will exploit a four-word anomaly in the Affordable Care Act to strike down subsidies given to people---like me, for instance---who sign up on the federal exchange in states that don’t have one of their own. Legislators who worked on the law back in 2009 and 2010 have been coming out of the woodwork to insist that Thomas, Scalia, Alito, Kennedy and Roberts leave the subsidies intact. Now a new voice has been added to the gaggle: Olympia Snowe, who fled from public office after becoming a victim in the Tea Party's War on Moderates:
The SCOTUS conservatives
may not be able to resist.
“I don’t ever recall any distinction between federal and state exchanges in terms of the availability of subsidies,” said Olympia J. Snowe, a former Republican senator from Maine who helped write the Finance Committee version of the bill.
“It was never part of our conversations at any point,” said Ms. Snowe, who voted against the final version of the Senate bill. “Why would we have wanted to deny people subsidies? It was not their fault if their state did not set up an exchange.” The four words, she said, were perhaps “inadvertent language,” adding, “I don’t know how else to explain it.”
But rest assured: if the Court rules against the subsidies and mortally-wound Obamacare, Republicans in Congress say they have the perfect solution for preventing millions of Americans from losing their health insurance. And as soon as they stop running away every time we ask 'em what it is, we'll find out what it is.
JEERS to knowing that this guy could become president of the United States if all the other GOP candidates drop out and Hillary Clinton turns out to be the worst campaigner ever. Yesterday Rick Santorum announced his candidacy, making him the seventh Republican in the race (out of a likely 18). Here are some fun facts:
Santorum's vision for America.
(But at least it's a dry heat.)
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Age: 57
Billionaire benefactor: Investment manager Foster Friess, best known for saying, "Back in my day, they used Bayer Aspirin for contraceptives---the gals put it between their knees."
States won in 2012: 11
Central campaign theme: "Libertine men and scarlet women and ragtime, shameless music that'll drag your son and your daughter into the arms of the jungle animal instinct! Mass'teria!!!"
Base: Conservatives who admire the sincerity of his whackdoodle beliefs
Debate persona: Wally Cleaver meets Father Coughlin
Location of campaign announcement: Penn United Technologies, a Christian-based oil and gas industry equipment firm whose web site says, “we exist to glorify God.”
Fun fact: His use of sweater vests in 2012 caused a national non-spike in the use of sweater vests.
His campaign slogan:
SANTORUM 2016---PLEASE DON'T GOOGLE ME.
JEERS to petty stooges. In a proud moment for the Republican party, forty-three years ago today, in 1972, the White House "plumbers" hit the Democratic National Headquarters at the Watergate Hotel, setting in motion a series of events that would lead to Nixon's resignation in disgrace. The first clue that something was amiss: their bill was reasonable.
CHEERS to rational and/or irrational exuberance. Eh, who cares what kind it is…it's still exuberance…
Consumers are more confident
these days, thanks to a stronger
economy and potent medications.
Consumer confidence unexpectedly increased in May from a four-month low as Americans grew more sanguine about the economy and employment opportunities. The Conference Board’s index of sentiment advanced to 95.4 from a revised April reading of 94.3, the New York-based private research group said Tuesday. The median forecast of 68 economists in the Bloomberg survey called for 95. […]
The report showed a pickup in planned purchases of cars, homes and appliances. The share of Americans that said they intend to buy a new house climbed to 1.4 percent in May, the highest since November.
Curious, I decided to check on my wealth portfolio, and they're right: my coffee can has three
more pennies, six buttons and a marble. Jeeves, fire up the Studebaker---we're going to Applebee's!
JEERS to those darn kids. 269 years ago, England's first indoor swimming pool opened. It was followed moments later by the first pool-side sign: "We don't swimmeth in thy chamberpot. Please don't peeth in our pool." Killjoyeths.
JEERS to criminals with 22-centimeter-wide balls weighing exactly 16 ounces. They looked like white-collar crooks. They acted like white-collar crooks. They smelled like white-collar crooks. They talked like white-collar crooks. The unfortunate one who got eaten by cannibals tasted like a white-collar crook. They're crooks! Of course I'm speaking about the FIFA crooks, and I love the details of the way the slimeballs were nabbed:
Swiss police descended on a quiet luxury hotel in Zurich this morning and arrested seven officials from world soccer governing body FIFA. The men had gathered at the tony Baur au Lac---an establishment that features an in-house florist, its own exclusive brand of chocolates, and a mysterious but intriguing amenity called an "IT butler" — in preparation for Friday's vote for FIFA president.
But instead they found themselves under arrest on US federal charges, including racketeering, wire fraud, money laundering, and other charges relating to bribery and corruption.
They didn't arrest the head crook, but word is he's sweatin' bullets. While they're at it, I think they should add a couple extra investigations into FIFA, including finding out who allowed all that vuvuzela racket, and who paid Tom Brady a freezer full of wienerschnitzel to deflate the balls at the 2014 World Cup so Germany could win.
He hasn't denied it!!!
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Ten years ago in C&J: May 28, 2005
JEERS to the tightening...necklace?? Forget the Green Zone---things have gotten so bad in Iraq that the entire city of Baghdad is being encircled by 40,000 troops "like a bangle around the wrist." Now we know why the Iraqi forces are so weak---the Pentagon's been outsourcing their training to the Home Shopping Network.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to Rudolph William Louis Giuliani III. St. Rudy 9/11 gets a break today, but only because it's his birthday, the one day a year when we valiantly resist the urge to jeer him. Here's the stripper for your party, sir:
Just make sure you get her home on time. At midnight she turns back into a lying racist asshole.
Have a nice Thursday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
Kenyan Lawyer Wants to Buy Bill in Portland Maine for 50 Cows, 70 Sheep and 30 Goats
---Mediaite
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