The cleaning lady came today, and did such a good job I walked around the house for two hours, perching on the edges of chairs and glaring at dust motes, lest they land somewhere and screw everything up. We hired this woman to come in twice a month last winter, when I was working three jobs and figured the choices were:
1) Build up a head of resentful steam over the condition of the bathroom, which is used only by Alan and Kate and is technically their responsibility; or
2) Hire someone else to clean it.
It’s been my experience that life will deliver many, many opportunities to be resentful of one’s loved ones, most of them more important than the condition of a bathroom, so I reversed my long-held vow that I would always clean my own house and gave it over to someone else. Her deep-set Slavic eyes haunt me into a tip, most weeks. Our house never gets that bad between visits. I hope she doesn’t run across too much evidence of American sloth when she’s here.
I’m so middle-class, it’s disgusting.
My neighbor in Fort Wayne cleaned houses. She left me with a collection of anecdotes I will treasure forever — the couple whose intervals between visits could be counted by the number of shoes left by the back door; the ones who refused to even clean up the blowing tumbleweeds of dog hair, and in fact let their infant crawl around on the floor in the midst of them; oh, and a few more. (Some came from another neighbor with the same job, who once told me of the uncomfortable conversations she had to have with some clients, about how she would NOT rinse out their bloodstained period panties, because it’s a BIOHAZARD, and do it yourself, you lazy bitch.)
Eh, it was one of those days. Lovely outside, and I did get out for a bit of it, but mostly it was nose/grindstone/other stuff. Redeemed by dinner, yes: Grilled salmon and Mark Bittman’s spicy-sweet green beans. Which you should run out and make, because damn, they’s good. Now we’re watching “Cedar Rapids” on HBO: “I do a pretty fair impersonation of Omar on the HBO program ‘The Wire.'” I hope the people on “The Wire” think that’s as funny as I do.
So, bloggage?
Why are babies so damn cute? So we’ll have more of them, I guess. (After you watch it once, watch it again and note the hand movements of the girl on the left. Babies are so smart.)
The 10 oddest items in the GOP platform. No. 2:
“Ideological bias is deeply entrenched within the current university system. Whatever the solution in private institutions may be, in State institutions the trustees have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their enormous investment is not abused for political indoctrination. We call on State officials to ensure that our public colleges and universities be places of learning and the exchange of ideas, not zones of intellectual intolerance favoring the Left.”
When I’m 100, I hope I’m…not alive to do stuff like this.
Happy Thursday, all.
Dexter said on August 30, 2012 at 12:50 am
Years ago I bought an old used car out of the paper’s ads. It was from an area of Fort Wayne near Wells Street. The house was inhabited by an entire family of people with strong Kentucky accents.
Grandpappy was puffing his pipe, the middle age family leader was chugging coffee, and a young woman was cooking huge vats of…well, vittles. Kids were running around everywhere.
It was old pappy’s car. It was cheap, it ran well, and I wanted it to use for a go-to-work vehicle.
When I got it home, I opened the trunk. Oh My Gawd!
Caked and layered rotten shitted-up male underwear were abundant. Old pap had been tossing his briefs into the trunk to hide them when he shit himself, no doubt.
I’d like to report that the episode cured me from buying used cars. Ha ha ha, right.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yaafy4Rk0A
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Deborah said on August 30, 2012 at 6:37 am
When I was in Santa Fe with Little Bird last week we went to get her a state ID at the DMV (which they call the MVD or the VDM, I forget which) an ancient couple walked in, the woman needed to get her license renewed. She said she was 93 very frail, couldn’t move very easily, I couldn’t believe she could still drive. Another very elderly man was down the counter going through the eye test and not doing well. Hopefully these people lived out in the country where they wouldn’t be around many people while driving.
Little Bird wasn’t able to get her state ID by the way, long, frustrating story.
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coozledad said on August 30, 2012 at 6:54 am
If Republican lapdog Ron Fournier says you’re running a racist campaign, you’re somewhere to the right of Pik Botha.
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-subsidization-queen-new-way-of.html
They’ve already started the voter misinformation campaign down here with billboards saying you need ID to vote in NC.
Fuck Romney. He’s just Nixon with less of a sense of humor.
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ROGirl said on August 30, 2012 at 7:02 am
I love the way the baby on the left turned her head and looked at the other one when the music started.
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 8:16 am
I’m w/ you, Cooz. Despite having said yesterday that Romney might not be a monster, today I hate those bastards. Ryan’s speech was full of lies and distortions. Fact-checkers all over the country are suffering from exhaustion, having stayed up all night describing all the things he said that aren’t true.
I am really scared that they are going to win.
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alex said on August 30, 2012 at 8:33 am
Sounds like the Republicans want to turn college into Bible Camp. Amazing that they’re laying these cards on the table and otherwise sane Republicans don’t even flinch.
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coozledad said on August 30, 2012 at 8:42 am
Alex: College will just be a place where a bunch of mediocrities with rich parents go to get shitfaced and fuck for a while until they get settled into some faith-based employment network.
The admissions process will screen in favor of tit jobs and cultural illiteracy.
Damn. That’s almost a description of the school I went to.
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nancy said on August 30, 2012 at 8:43 am
To be sure, platforms are almost always wetting-your-pants-in-a-navy-suit exercises, designed to placate the fringes. But they’re also statements of philosophy, so it’s useful to know where everyone’s thinking is headed.
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brian stouder said on August 30, 2012 at 9:10 am
Amazing that they’re laying these cards on the table and otherwise sane Republicans don’t even flinch.
I’ve been pondering the thing Alex referred to – “otherwise sane Republicans” – for the past week.
Quite honestly, the direct impression I have is some (large) number of folks begin their thinking with the conclusion that they don’t like/don’t trust/are frightened by – the incumbent president.
In casual conversation in a large gathering of mostly white males, I kept overhearing/getting hit with the same several points: “Food stamps are being given to 48% of the country!” (actually its about 14%, but who’s counting, eh?) “You didn’t build that!” (that one is the one that gets the saliva and spittle really flying, and which truly stunned me.
Romney’s campaign doesn’t have to gin up this phony ‘misunderstanding’ – all that they have to do is surf on it!
And the one that truly mystified me was the growing anger at the president for killing bin Laden; or – more rightly, the frustration that President Obama achieved this. The attack line is – we shouldn’t even ‘know’ that it was “SEAL team 6!” –Obama blabs and blabs all our secrets! This is going to get SEAL team 6’s families killed! Etc
And just never mind the new book that one of them has apparently published; if anything happens, it’s Obama’s fault.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-57502917/seal-tells-60-minutes-book-is-for-honor-not-politics/
Condi Rice gave the closest thing to a good speech at that convention last night. The next best moment was when Governor Walker had a quick interview with Rachel Maddow on msnbc; I particularly liked when he whined and cried about how Rachel (and Ed) allegedly “talked over” him. Apparently he’s never watched Shit-for-brains-Sean Hannity (et al) at Fox, but we digress
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Icarus said on August 30, 2012 at 9:37 am
we opted to get a cleaning lady instead of cable. Betty and her friend comes in every other Tuesday for a couple hours and the condo looks great. money. well. spent.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 9:44 am
The fact-free GOP convention is the result of $Palin’s loathsome assault on America’s collective intelligence. A reasonable person would read this, read Ayn Ryan’s “speech”, and find the editorial an accurate assessment. Instead $Palin have almost convinced by her homey Fox-broadcast propaganda that WaPo is a socialist propaganda rag vent on destroying America as we know it. Tragic as it is ovine and stupid as grunt. I’ve got a brother who I am sure will vote for Willard Windsock. But he’s not liable to believe a word Rmoney and Ryan spout about welfare or medicare. He makes a lot of money at corporate law, and he wants to keep as much of that as possible. Venal, and disappointing to me, from a guy that had a huge RFK sign over his childhood bed from the Michigan Democratic Convention.His vote is based on informed self-interest. But he’s an unusual GOP voter in that he understands they are lying like snakes, and he just doesn’t care. Half of the American electorate seems convinced Windsock means a better life for them, against all odds and evidence. Perhaps they deserve what they get if they succeed in electing the true-life Gordon Gekko. To paraphrase Willard, “Greed is NOT good, it’s an American virtue passed down from the Founders my friend. And corporations are my friends, people. That’s why I won’t tell you their names.”
Still, GOPers are a big enough tent to include some guys that would flunk out of Neandathal (thank you Jimmy Castor) school that seem intent on hitting the Lakehurst with the GOP Hindenburg. How about this pathetic, clueless Viagra addict?
When a reporter asked Smith to clarify what kind of situation was similar to becoming pregnant from rape, the candidate responded, “Having a baby out of wedlock. Put yourself in a father’s position. Yes, it is similar.”
Did he really mean “Put yourself in a rapist’s position.”
That baby dancing video is the anti-Ally McBeal version.
And doesn’t the GOP’s constant resort to the intentions of “the Founders” with no apparent clue they understand them in the slightest remind anybody else of some FUBAR, virgin-sacrifying culture on Star Trek that cause a big argument about the Prime Directive? How ’bout that Treaty of Tripoli, and Washington’s prescient Farewell Address warning about foreign entanglements, you stupid PNACers? And those are the guys, like Unabomber Bolton that are schooling Willard Windsock on foreign affairs. This country may be heading into serious muck and mire, a slough of despond.
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Julie Robinson said on August 30, 2012 at 9:46 am
We watched the Stewart/Colbert interpretations of the convention and even those were enough to raise my blood pressure. Fortunately, the laughs far, far outweighed the outrage.
According to this article, Stewart and Colbert are the top two shows watched by Democrats. Number three? My other fav, 30 Rock. http://www.washingtonpost.com/football-vs-30-rock-does-what-you-watch–how-you-vote/2012/08/29/eaead94c-f1e8-11e1-a612-3cfc842a6d89_gallery.html#photo=1
College football on ESPN was #1 for conservatives, followed by Antiques Roadshow and (blech) Hoda and Kathy Lee on the Today Show.
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Dorothy said on August 30, 2012 at 9:51 am
The 100 year old driver who hit all those folks? His birthday next week is the same as Mike’s aunt who we’re currently dealing with. They are 14 years apart. We had been crossing our fingers for at least 5 years that we would not get a phone call from the police or coroner saying she either killed herself or a lot of other people with her car. After last night’s phone call to the personal care home, where he had to listen to her moan about a hat we didn’t save for her (after we took her exactly what she asked for and needed at the home, we donated the rest), people stealing her Bic pens (previously it was her mouthwash, then they put Dawn detergent into her hand soap in the kitchen, the list goes on and on), he is seriously thinking of talking to her attorney and asking they appoint a guardian to deal with her. She is aggravating us to the point that we are arguing too much and stressing over so many things that it’s impacting our marriage. And this is just since mid-April this year. I shudder to think what we’ll be doing a year or more from now.
We paid a cleaning crew to come in and clean her condo this past Monday. They did a good job (we stopped to look at their work before we headed home) but they were more than an hour late and didn’t call to say they’d be so late. (I called the service to ask where they were after 35 minutes.) And they forgot to clean inside the kitchen broom closet. Three workers – $340 dollars for three hours of work, which included a $20 discount.
Edit: We didn’t pay for the cleaning crew – Aunt’s checking account paid for the cleaning crew. But we made all the arrangements.
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Colleen said on August 30, 2012 at 10:07 am
We have a cleaning lady twice a month. As someone said earlier, money well spent. Am hoping we don’t have to get rid of her, as husband lost his job of 35 years earlier this week. Anyone looking for an excellent radio producer?? I know someone….
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Dorothy said on August 30, 2012 at 10:17 am
Colleen I’m so sorry to hear that. My brother who is 9 years older than me (he’ll be 64 in December) lost his job about 4 years ago. I think he’d been there for about the same amount of time as your husband had been at his job. He actually ended up getting a job with the Unemployment Commission in Pittsburgh (am I using the correct term?). He likes his job (and is grateful for it, at his age) and has been promoted at least once.
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brian stouder said on August 30, 2012 at 10:24 am
Pros – to me, the laugh-out-loud moment was when Pastor Huckabee solemnly intoned that Governor Romney gives 16% of his income to charity every year.
IN the hierarchy (or lowerarchy?) of silly-ass shit we’re asked to believe, there are dingleberries, and there are klingons; and then there is this homey-talkin’, alligator smilin’ revival-tent huckster from Arkansas who – when he isn’t beseeching us to sign some “Repeal Obamacare” petition/fundraising scam – is trying to charm 50.01% of the voters into entrusting a secretive super-rich guy with the powers and prerogatives of the presidency of the United States, even though that same super-rich guy doesn’t trust we, the rabble, to be able to read his tax returns, and assess any “partisan attacks” that might follow, our ownselves.
The fundamental message is – Romney doesn’t trust the voters with the truth; and Huckaboo-boo says “he’s a generous guy – trust me”
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Deborah said on August 30, 2012 at 10:27 am
The first time I ever hired a cleaning team to clean my house, I cleaned it all first so I wouldn’t be embarrassed when they came. They were fantastic, three or four ladies, less than an hour. This was a long time ago in my former life when I lived in a house.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 10:28 am
VG new Bob Dylan song (if you don’t like him in general, you probably won’t like this, but the tune and the band performances, particularly great upright bass, are infectious), with a really annoying video starring a Zoe Deschanel lookalike:
http://www.vulture.com/2012/08/watch-bob-dylans-duquesne-whistle-video.html?mid=agenda–20120829
I love college football, but ESPN Gameday is unwatchable and so football brain dead it needs to be put out of its misery. Lee Corso makes one wish they could resurrect the old fool/fart Beano Cook. Yeah, zombie ND shill. I do love Roadshow, particularly when some smug jackass gets shot down by the experts and then decides to argue with them about their worthless tschotskes. And what the hell is “Hoda”?
This GOP support of taking American land by eminent domain for a Canadian corporation to build the Keystone XL pipeline to get diesel fuel rapidly to our Chinese overlord Fu Manchu in the interest of North American energy independence is totally whack. How in hell does this not alienate GOP base voters? Just mystifying:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/keystone-down-the-line/?tid=rr_mod
Fascinating detail:
Eminent domain is a touchy topic in Texas. In 2002, Gov. Rick Perry proposed a Trans-Texas Corridor, a private sector network of highways. The main artery would be a 600-mile road running from Mexico to the Red River that would be the width of four football fields. After an outcry about the seizure of private land – and increased traffic from Mexico – the state transportation department killed the idea.
Entrepreneurs were gonna build that, not the gubmint, right? Right? Four football fields wide? That’s a quarter of a mile.
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Sue said on August 30, 2012 at 10:36 am
Geez, doesn’t anyone read my comments? I posted the baby video yesterday, right here, to a big nothing response.
I haz a sad… basset, say something encouraging to me please.
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Connie said on August 30, 2012 at 10:42 am
Following up on yesterday with this headline from the Free Press: Bicyclist dies after being shot in confrontation with motorist in Taylor. http://www.freep.com/article/20120830/NEWS02/120830008/Bicyclist-dies-after-being-shot-in-confrontation-with-motorist-in-Taylor?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE
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Julie Robinson said on August 30, 2012 at 10:51 am
Colleen, I’m so sorry. It seems the radio biz is as bad as newspapers these days. The only place that seems to be hiring is Sweetwater, but I’m sure you already know that.
Dorothy, forgive me, but I can’t resist–were they pink Bics?
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brian stouder said on August 30, 2012 at 10:52 am
Sue – yesterday I thought you were replying to Nancy’s baby video…but in any case, I always read and enjoy your posts! (and basset’s, too)
Connie, all this gunplay is definitely bad magumbo…just ask the Secret Service guys on the Mitt Romney plane!
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Dorothy said on August 30, 2012 at 10:58 am
Highly doubtful, Julie! And Sue I recognized the links were the same (yours yesterday, Nancy’s today) but didn’t say anything about it. You’re brilliant at finding good links!!
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Charlotte said on August 30, 2012 at 10:58 am
Loved that baby video — my best friend had twins and they did all sorts of goofy stuff like that. I spent the winter of greif after my brother died on Nina’s couch with one or the other of those babies (they Would Not Sleep). Now they’re almost 8, in third grade — whole people with opinions and everything.
As for cleaning — I’ve been a cleaning lady and have hired cleaners — it was actually a job I liked. Paid pretty well, I’d only clean when people weren’t there, and its one of those things you can always do to make an extra buck. So never had an issue with hiring someone. Like anything, don’t be a dick, and your cleaners won’t tell stories about you …
Fires here not under control yet, but not as bad as we’d thought. Several homes lost — looks like the Pine Creek Lodge is standing, although damaged. Haven’t heard about the church (very picturesque white frame church in the trees) but it was right in the line of fire. My hunch is Brautigan’s old house is probably gone too … Most of the updates are on the Livingston Enterprise Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Livingston-Enterprise/106610909368172
We sat on the roof here in town last night watching — smoke from two big fires, one in Pine Creek, one south of Bozeman. Fire glow. Orange moon. Ashes slowly raining down. It was pretty apocalyptic (as was the not-so-good pizza we ordered).
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Judybusy said on August 30, 2012 at 10:59 am
Colleen, so sorry to hear about your husband. That must be very hard indeed, after 35 years.
When I was young, I worked as a domestic. Most of it was pretty wonderful, as I worked for elderly people that I enjoyed spending time with–I quickly learned part of the job sometimes was the social contact. I did a brief stint as a nanny with some light housekeeping. The mom thought this included picking up their underwear from the floor. She was quite suprised when I informed her that they were perfectly capable of tossing it down the laundry chute a few feet away. Thus the brief stint part. She wasn’t born to an easy life either; before she married, she had been a single mom and used AFDC (AKA welfare.)
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 10:59 am
4dbirds, how is your daughter today?
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 11:09 am
Sue: I noticed, and, in fact, emailed the video to a bunch of people (something I rarely do) and I included credits. I was kinda wondering why Nancy didn’t mention your link yesterday. She usually does when she repeats one.
Bad pizza in Montana? Say it ain’t so.
I personally find it hilarious that the rightwingers have gone all “What have you done for us lately?” on Uncle Juan Williams’ ass. He’s a tool and a toady, and they are making themselves look like even bigger assholes, as if that were possible. Don’t diss Ann RMoney? Her dildo hubby said she’s a chief campaign adviser on women’s issues, she gave a primetime convention speech, and of course, GOPers are unfailingly respectful toward the First Lady, right Rush, you fracking slug?
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Deborah said on August 30, 2012 at 11:19 am
Sue, I too watched that video yesterday from your link and passed it on to a few others that I thought would enjoy it. Sorry, I didn’t mention that I did that. I always enjoy your comments.
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Sue said on August 30, 2012 at 11:30 am
Yay! I don’t has a sad anymore. Thought I was lost in the crowd.
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brian stouder said on August 30, 2012 at 11:33 am
Further to the smoke and mirrors within which the rightwing noise machine is straining mightily to obscure President Obama’s successful elimination of bin Laden, go read this. I guarantee – if you haven’t gotten hit with all this political revisionist “history” yet – you certainly will.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/29/opinion/bergen-obama-osama-books/index.html?hpt=hp_c2
an excerpt:
In the course of reporting a book about the hunt for bin Laden, I spoke to scores of White House, Pentagon and intelligence officials familiar with the hunt for al Qaeda’s leader, more than a dozen of whom had firsthand knowledge of Obama’s decision-making process about the operation to take out the terrorist leader. Many of those officials spoke to me on the record. I also traveled to Pakistan three times after bin Laden was killed to do my own investigation of the hunt for al Qaeda’s leader and spoke to a number of Pakistani military and intelligence officials who investigated the bin Laden raid and its aftermath.
Based on that reporting and also what is available on the public record, Miniter’s account of the intelligence that led to bin Laden and the decision-making surrounding the operation that killed him is a pile of poppycock served up with heaps of hogwash.
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Heather said on August 30, 2012 at 11:34 am
Dexter: Bleah! I don’t think I would have ever gotten over the horror.
I’d love to hire a cleaning lady. I don’t really need one right now, as my place is not big and I’m on my own, but I could see doing it if I were living with someone. I clean because I have to, but I hate doing it and anyway I’m not good at it. Also heavy cleaning aggravates my back and results in more chiropractor bills.
If I can just bitch here for a second–I have a day job as a marketing copywriter (totally my dream by the way) and despite my telling the marketing managers here at my company for YEARS the level of detail and guidance I need to write halfway decent copy for them, I just had to send back five, count ’em, five vague content requests. Writers are not mindreaders!
/rant
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nancy said on August 30, 2012 at 11:40 am
If it makes you feel any better, Heather, Alan took Kate to an audition the other day in which the Svengali in charge told the bassist, “Play it the other way.” “What other way?” “The way Kelly played it, that one time.”
So it’s not just you.
Sorry, Sue, for forgetting to hat-tip you on the babies. THE BABIES WERE SUE’S GET, EVERYONE. Not literally, but you know what I mean.
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Julie Robinson said on August 30, 2012 at 11:48 am
Sue, I confess that I don’t click every single link, but I had seen yours earlier in the day, and I couldn’t figure out a way to comment on it that didn’t sound uppity. Two adorable babies might even beat out adorable puppies and kittens.
And I think Nance has a point about why babies are so cute. I certainly got baby fever after two close friends had them, and the product of that fever will be 32 on Monday. She’s spending her birthday weekend volunteering at the Wild Goose Festival in Oregon.
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Sue said on August 30, 2012 at 11:49 am
Some of the commercial cleaners I’ve worked with have also done residential and they all say they prefer commercial. Apparently it’s a combination of unreasonable customers and slovenly behavior.
That’s saying something, really, because you would not believe the condition of the restrooms commercial cleaners come across. I’ve worked in a medical clinic and in an office & factory and it makes no difference, I’ve found the same conditions everywhere. You’d have to stand up and aim to get those substances in that variety into and onto the places I find it. What do people do in those stalls?
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 11:58 am
We are definitely going ex-pat if Willard wins:
https://secure.internationalliving.com/EECI/EECIN8A9?o=794355&s=799601&u=57106734&l=480394&r=Milo
Ecuador looks like a perfect place to head, but Willard might pull a Raygun Grenada bonehead move to go after Assange.
Somebody should open a newspaper to this article, roll it up, and swat Kasich on the snout for his bullshit convention performance. Put the mendacious mutt on dogshaming. He’s taking credit for some light at the end of the economic tunnel in Ohio that is almost solely a result of Obama’s auto bailout that RMoney derided. Of course Kasich isn’t talking about public sector jobs he helped destroy by trashing the public employee pension fund in Ohio while he worked fo his corporate overlords at Lehman Bros.
Brian, anybody that uses the term “In the course of reporting a book” is, by definition and most definitely, a pompous and fatuous horse’s ass. And simultaneous translation is required for that last clause. The intelligence was Poppycock with hogwash? What Miniter said was poppycock with hogwash? Enquiring minds want to know what the hell you meant, asshole, and what language you were translating from. And the cutesy diction of “poppycock” and “hogwash” is beneath an opinion. The shitheels have decided to go Swift Boat on the OBL front, but I don’t see triumphalist racist GOPers really buying that claptrap (see, it’s easy). Mainly, this idiot believes he’d get truth from the Pakistan military and intelligence people? My God that’s painfully dumb as grunt. And according to this idiot, it was Pentagon brass and intelligence officials with their lips flapping.
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DellaDash said on August 30, 2012 at 12:19 pm
Sue – even on days when I just skim comments and go to no links, I always pay attention to what you have to say. Even knew at jump that you would have something professional to contribute about cleaners for hire.
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DellaDash said on August 30, 2012 at 12:27 pm
Ole Pappy’s vittle shit, Dex? There’s a story to dine out on!
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 12:38 pm
Michael Tomasky says the RMoney campaign message is Vote for me, I’m white, and I’m not a socialist. He’s also reminded of Milhous when confronted with Willard, as coozledad is:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/08/28/michael-tomasky-on-how-tricky-mitt-romney-is-aping-richard-nixon.html
It’s the unmistakable and unshakable un-likability of the prick. It’s tru, and it’s kinda funny, because Milhous is undoutedly the sort of wierdo that would have been a target and a foil for Mitt’s “hijinks” back at Cranbrook. Back in ’04, GOPers wer big on Kerry as the unlikeable arrogant elitist. Now they love Mittens? How do they manage to bend over so far to get their heads inserted in anuses? How do support a guy that is such a dick you can be sure his dad would have walked out of the RNC before supporting him?
Dexter, if Buddy Repperton ever starts giving you shit, you’ll wish you had that car back.
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Maggie Jochild said on August 30, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Sue, I watched yr link yesterday and loved it. Sorry I didn’t comment then, I guess I’m spoiled by that effin Like button you-know-elsewhere.
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4dbirds said on August 30, 2012 at 1:04 pm
So sorry Colleen. 35 years, that must really suck. Thanks to everyone for the well wishes. My daughter remains hospitalized and is on many many antibiotics. She has called me at work three times today to tell me about some cute commercials on TV so I think she’s feeling better.
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Dorothy said on August 30, 2012 at 1:33 pm
That made me smile, 4dbirds! Glad she seems to be on the mend.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 1:49 pm
4dbirds, great news. Septicemia is difficult to treat because it requires some hit and miss to find the right antibiotic. I lit a candle after early mass this am, with you and the kiddo in mind.
Incredibly cool car photo:
http://obituarytypo.blogspot.com/
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alex said on August 30, 2012 at 2:00 pm
My own informal survey of mainstream media sites such as Time and CNN shows that they’re barely calling out Ryan’s lies and distortions, if at all, and here’s more on that.
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 2:14 pm
He is getting hit pretty hard by various WaPo voices, alex, and the blogosphere is going nuts. Based on what I saw on TV this AM, however, they re unrepentant.
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coozledad said on August 30, 2012 at 2:22 pm
How Romney came by his money: looting the FDIC.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-federal-bailout-that-saved-mitt-romney-20120829
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Connie said on August 30, 2012 at 2:26 pm
Piece on NPR/Here and Now today where Politifact laid out several of those lies. There was also a mention of a front page NYTimes story about Ryan’s lies about the closing of an auto plant in his home town.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 2:57 pm
The GOP platform also has a half-hearted endorsement of the abominably unfair scam, national sales tax. Value-added tax schemes are potentially worse, because manufacturers and sellers will just treat this as another point at which to jack profits. Anybody that doubts that should consider the incredibly bogus argument that renters don’t pay property taxes. Why, because landlords fail to pass them through out of the goodness of their skinflint hearts. Laugh or puke. Puke or laugh. Analogous to the stupid claim that raising the minimum wage and indexing it for inflation would “kill” jobs. Right, because those Mickey D’s franchise owners don’t need all those facsimile burger flippers, they’re just trying to help out by employing them. Our own Jim Demint (nutsack, SC) is a proponent of the natsalestax. Why he’s known widely ’round here as Jim Demented. Dement wants the sales tax applied to food. That entire idea is FUBAR. He argues it’s fair because the tax would be the same 22% on poor people buying necessities for life as rich people buying all sorts of ridiculous shit they don’t need. Shit, when you put it that way…
The GOP concern about foreign fertilizer supplies is pretty gutdom funny until you figure who they’re worried about is Future Bombers of America following in Tim McVeigh’s footsteps. Of course, they favor statehood for Puerto Rico which is across part of the ocean, and reject the notion for DC, which their fat asses sit on every day. If that GOP Hispanic vote share goes down anymore, they’ll bag that one quick. They were talked out of retroactively rescinding Hawai’i’s statehood and ruling Obama an actual fufiner at the last minute, wiser heads favoring sticking with obnoxious and deceitful innuendoe. Exploitin citizens of the Marianas? That would be an affront to the memory of Casin Jack Abramoff. And this one is a true GOPer comedy classic:
Now, three decades later, as we face the task of cleaning up the wreckage of the current Administration’s policies, we propose a similar commission to investigate possible ways to set a fixed value for the dollar.
It’s the Our Shit Doesn’t Stink Standard”. If they made it gold, they’d have to run off all their Canadian and Sudafrikaans robber baron buddies from their non-paying mineral rights on US public lands. God knows who these fools would decide to invade in the interest of building up a gold reserve.
The whole platform is your old-fashioned laff riot. These people been hangin’ with Ron Paul too much and the crazy done rubbed off.
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Deborah said on August 30, 2012 at 3:05 pm
“Back in ’04, GOPers wer big on Kerry as the unlikeable arrogant elitist. Now they love Mittens? How do they manage to bend over so far to get their heads inserted in anuses?”
Prospero, as you know, it’s the lock step, echo chamber mentality. When W was pres my right wing sister didn’t say word one about how he jacked up the deficit. But now that we have a Democrat for a pres, she thinks the deficit is the biggest deal since the spoon was invented. It doesn’t matter what the facts are or what they said yesterday, as long as they are on board with the talking points, that’s all that matters with them. And power they’ve got to have that power.
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Julie Robinson said on August 30, 2012 at 3:18 pm
4dbirds, that’s fantastic–if she’s perky enough to pick up the phone and dial you, I bet she’ll be out of there very soon.
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Connie said on August 30, 2012 at 3:27 pm
See also this article about Ryan lies at Americablog which includes a link to a Fox News web site article about Ryan’s lies. http://www.americablog.com/2012/08/every-time-paul-ryan-attacked-last.html Yes, I said Fox News.
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 3:28 pm
James Fallows has compiled a list of Ryan fact-checking items. Apparently, he’s going to appear on the NBC Nightly News w/ Brian Williams tonight, so it will be interesting to see what he is asked and how he answers.
Clint Eastwood is going to speak on Mitt’s behalf tonight. I may gag.
4dbirds, glad to hear your girl is better.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 3:53 pm
A treat for Zadie Smith fans:
http://www.npr.org/2012/08/29/159991094/exclusive-first-read-zadie-smiths-nw?ft=3&f=100876926&sc=nl&cc=bn-20120830
I’d describe her prose as elegant and razor-sharp. If Martin Amis is matter, Zadie Smith is anti-matter.
On the way back from the chain supermarket where they shop, though it closed down the local grocer and pays slave wages, with new bags though they should take old bags, leaving with broccoli from Kenya and tomatoes from Chile and unfair coffee and sugary crap and the wrong newspaper.
That’s some slice-and-dice class dissection. Now throw ’em on the coals and cook ’em rare to barely pink.
An immensely talented young woman.
My new bike lights came just now. Cateye brand, high quality from REI. And some new gloves.I always buy them from REI because I have a membership and I love the dividend credit at Christmastime. 1000 lumens headbeam, from three LEDs with a fresnel lens so the beam is wiiiiide. Mobile:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQ5pi3UR5dY
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 4:18 pm
Deborah: Hypocrisy conflated with ovine stupidity is a new and disturbing one on me. I know, I’ve commented here before about having read Teillhard in depth. Well, Teillhard imbues me with hope for mankind and creation, but the current ovine racist GOPers sure poop that party. These fuckers will end this country if they get their way, and won’t that be a cosmic joke when the stupid teleprompter-reading Kenyan anti-colonial evil mastermind only achieved his evil goal by inciting their inner ignorance and racism? I wonder since that dweebish turd DiSouza brought it up if it wouldn’t create a smoky overload if you asked one of these shit-for-brains about antiColonialsim amongst the Founders. These aholes would label the “Founders” socialist miscegenators, and they’d string Teillhard up for being the 20th Centuries most brilliant and divinely-inspired evolutionary biologist.
Nancy: Quick question. Do you have any more news about “The Wars of Other Men” than is available on the Kickstarter website? I’m anxious to see this movie.
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nancy said on August 30, 2012 at 4:25 pm
I believe the final-final-final DVDs are being locked, and when they are, you’ll get your lovely keepsake. Either that, or it will be available on the web. I’ll ask Mike Z., our director.
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churchlady said on August 30, 2012 at 4:37 pm
Interesting range of responses to the lies of Paul “Ann” Ryan (and I’d wish Prospero would Ann in quotes when calling Paul Ryan “Ann Ryan.”). On the one hand a blogger for Fox News (Sally Kohn?) says three words describe the speech, and two of them as deceitful and misleading. Meanwhile Wolf Blitzer following the speech, says there were 6-8 things that fact-checkers might like into if they feel like it, implying that they won’t. Wow, I forget what CNN’s current slogan is but airily passing on lies in a politician’s speech sounds more like a crap channel, then a news channel.
And E . J. Doinne defends Juan Williams for dissing Ann Romney’s speech – by dissing her speech as well.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 4:54 pm
Fallows could have a single index card that he wrote “What did this asshole say that even smelled like the truth?” in lavendar Bic for her. The extent of the lying is gargantuan. It’s reached “Tell the opposite of the truth, devoid of the slightest kernel.” stage and these Troglodytes will believe it unquestioningly:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlRXQEA0yj0
Frighteningly accurately predictive video.
I always felt I’d feel gypped if I wasn’t around for Armageddon happened and C. Doesn’t mean I want to see the Apoacalypse effected by communal brain meltdown on the part of human beings. I never understood how people could say shit like “I’m glad” (insert name or honorific or pet-name) isn’t around to see this, but the current GOP would have been too much to subject my JFK-campaigning in downtown Mephis and open-housing-marching in Birmingham MI mom and dad that raised me to value human life to ever be subjected to. I know that may seem mellerdramatic, but I was reared to believe in Jesus of the New Testament, and I take social justice as Christianity seriously. If I’m true and head to Ecuador, I will cause trouble. Of course, if I stay here I will too. I have never seen the world so full of contaminated shit as it is right now. And it is pissing me off.
And was that a snide reply Nancy? I live in a very rich backwater of society. I sent a chunk of cash you convinced me was a worthwhile investment. I parbly could have procured a couple ounces of pot, really good pot, in Ecuador for that same figure. Thanks for paying attention, I suppose. I never expected anything but a few minutes enjoyment of somebody else’s wit and intelligence. Whatever. Your tone seeme dismissive and superior. My question had nothing to do with money but my interest in seeing the movie. Holy shit, there are a lot of scary monsters out there. Watch for Don Blassingame back on the scene for Massey. My only interest in the film is “artistic” Damn I hope it’s good.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 4:56 pm
Sorry, chuchlady, I didn’t get that. And Nancy, on the movie, this is just moviefan.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 4:57 pm
How does anybody figure out what a shit you are?
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 4:58 pm
Prospero, I believe you have misperceived Nancy’s tone. Peace, brother.
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alex said on August 30, 2012 at 4:59 pm
In defense of Ann Romney, she rocks that Republican Matron look better than Callista Gingrich or Cindy McCain. Maybe she uses a better toner in her hair or is just closer to natural blonde than the other two, who look cheap no matter what else they happen to be wearing. As for her speech, I missed it but I remain skeptical of the reports that she “humanized” her vacuous husband.
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 5:13 pm
Wow, I’m not a moron. Want to try to contradict you fracking morons?
As we sy. Ee that were brought up by my parents believe that human beings are guaranteed human rights, GOPRtTs believe they ar leeches on our good. What the fuck is wrong with these assholes? We don;t care about the least of our brethren? I BELIEVE WE DO AND THESE SHITHEADS ARE REVOLTING LIARS
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Prospero said on August 30, 2012 at 5:17 pm
I’M SERIOUS, NSNCY WAS GIVING NE TH WHATEVER. I WASN’T TRYING TO GET TO ANYTHING AT ALL, AND SHE IS BLAMING ME BIGTIME, NO SHITE? NOT EVEN CLOSE.
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LAMary said on August 30, 2012 at 5:29 pm
Alex, her old photos show her as having dark brown hair, but maybe she’s prematurely blond. Here’s a great recent photo of her:
http://www.sodahead.com/united-states/why-does-the-left-so-despise-ann-romney/question-2810063/?link=ibaf&q=&imgurl=http://images.sodahead.com/profiles/0/0/2/2/7/8/9/7/1/Ann-Romney-83160443201.jpeg
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 6:07 pm
I agree, alex. I thought she looked great–hair, makeup, dress, the whole thing. I don’t know what effect her speech might have had. It’s been more praised than criticized, but there has been some criticism too–both for treating their early days of living on the proceeds of stock that someone else had purchased for them as if they were actually poor and for some of the harder, more political lines.
The NYT had an interesting piece today on how Romney fought his way back after losing in 2008. There’s a part of me that admires his achievements and his willingness to commit himself to work and to learning, and I think he is, in some ways, a decent individual. (Ryan I have no time for. The more I think about him the madder I get.) But I also don’t think he is honest or that he understands how life feels to other people. Not evil like Cheney, but willing to take whatever is in his way to get what he wants–to say whatever will work, as with the welfare ads. I dunno. Maybe this is just the nature of men who seek after power, but I don’t think Obama has the drive to dominate at his core.
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brian stouder said on August 30, 2012 at 6:07 pm
Pros –
1. agreed about who the fracking liars are.
2. agreed about Anne – who I like from this distance (she beats the hell out of Callista or Mr Palin or Mr Bachmann or Ms Cain…although Ms Santorum seemed to have a certain magnatism), but who I’m pretty certain I would dislike if I was on the same PTA committee as her. What the hell am I sayin’? – She’d never ever ever ever ever be on any PTA of any school where my kids go!
3. I’ll agree – on faith and confidence in your judgement – about the works of fiction you’ve read and enjoyed. I’m not a big fiction reader, but based on your taste in music and other things that I do have some experience with, I’m sure that work that pleases your tastes would also please mine.
BUT – (there had to be a “but”, right?) Nancy is your friend, and although I don’t think she was blowing you any shit – if I’m wrong and she was – this is still good stuff, yes?
I mean, even if nancy was to smack one of us* around, that’s still good stuff (if you ask me). It just shows she’s paying attention to what the hell you said, yes?
*”one of us” meaning, one of us loyal season-ticket holders up in the cheap seats here at nn.c, as opposed to trolls like DTT, who simply get the bum’s rush
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MarkH said on August 30, 2012 at 6:31 pm
Coozledad, I stopped reading that Rolling Stone article when I got to the part where Dickinson proved he didn’t do any research. The FDIC is NOT funded by tax dollars. It is funded by the premium dollars paid by the banks for protection, buttressed by investments in US Treasury bonds. When the FDIC goes in, no tax money is involved to protect depositors.
http://www.fdic.gov/about/learn/symbol/
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alex said on August 30, 2012 at 6:45 pm
Just caught Scott Pelley interviewing Ryan and calling him on the Standard & Poore’s lie. Ryan was adamant and seemed to barely stop short of calling Pelley the liar. What an aggressive, smug, cynical piece of shit. I hope someone wipes the floor with his ass because he’s dangerous.
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Sherri said on August 30, 2012 at 7:02 pm
MarkH, if you read the whole article, you’ll see that Dickinson does know that the FDIC is funded by premium dollars. His point, which is not made very clearly or well, is not that the FDIC is funded by taxpayer dollars but that it is backed by taxpayer dollars; that is, if the premium monies are not enough to support the bailouts, the FDIC is backed by the full faith and credit of the US government. Now, not only is that distinction not made clear in the article, putting it in the article is unnecessarily incendiary, since the bailout of Bain never threatened to exceed the FDIC fund.
The major point of the article still stands: Romney will screw anybody out of a dime.
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coozledad said on August 30, 2012 at 7:11 pm
Mark H: So that validates Romney’s shakedown of Bain’s creditors and the FDIC for seventy cents on every dollar of the debt incurred by looting their own company? The FDIC exists to protect depositors-what happens when it’s bled dry by this hatch of bedbugs and another group of them decide to gamble with depositor money.
The only solution I can see for criminals like Romney is a repegging of currency that eliminates the value of their take, or sending them directly to the jailhouse for thirty years of buggering.
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coozledad said on August 30, 2012 at 7:20 pm
The article (if you read through it) also explains a lot about why the revelations about Romney’s tenure at Bain are starting to reach flood stage-he was throwing away the livelihoods of everyone at Bain who made less than 200 grand, and wrecking his own company.
No wonder they want to skullfuck him.
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brian stouder said on August 30, 2012 at 10:52 pm
two words –
Clint Eastwood…..
wow.
I mean, wow.
Epic fail
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Rana said on August 30, 2012 at 11:20 pm
Re: Ann Romney – people say she’s appealing, but I have to admit I can’t see it. There’s something chilly about that smile of hers that just turns me off. Like she’d slash my tires in the night if I crossed her at the PTA or something.
Re: cleaning. Packrats + laziness + small apartment = crapload of cluttered mess. Lately I’ve been taking inspiration from this site.* I’m particularly fond of the before-and-after shots, both because the afters are gratifying and because the befores look like something I’d see in my own home.
*Name of site has a rude word in it, for the delicately minded and those at work. Contents are SFW, however.
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Linda said on August 30, 2012 at 11:22 pm
Mark H, you SHOULD have read the whole Rolling Stone story. He specifies that no tax dollars were involved:
“But while taxpayers did not finance the bailout, the debt forgiven by the government was booked as a loss to the FDIC – and then recouped through higher insurance premiums from banks. And banks, of course, are notorious for finding ways to pass their costs along to customers, usually in the form of higher fees. Thanks to the nature of the market, in other words, the bailout negotiated by Romney ultimately wound up being paid by the American people.”
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Jolene said on August 30, 2012 at 11:45 pm
Brian, you ought to go on Twitter and search for “invisibleObama”. Very funny stuff.
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brian stouder said on August 31, 2012 at 12:04 am
Jolene – I’m still gob-smacked.
And I will say – even allowing for a joking intent that simply missed – when Clint ended his flatly bizarre “speech” with the “Go ahead, make my day” riff, it made my stomach turn.
Recall that that line is a gun “joke” from a Dirty Harry movie, wherein Clint has his enormous handgun aimed directly at a guy who is at point-blank range, after a gun battle in San Francisco. And when Clint’s character says “Go ahead, make my day”, he’s challenging the guy to give him an excuse to kill him there and then.
I think that that line, after his delusional conversation with the invisible President Obama who “sat” behind him, was even more disconcerting than the rest of his addled remarks.
Then again, I guess I should just go to bed
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brian stouder said on August 31, 2012 at 12:09 am
One last thing before I go to bed – what is with the flag pins on the lapels of the republicans? Specifically, there is a dark spot or mark (or something) on every one I saw; on Rubio and on Romney and on the others.
What was that?
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Dexter said on August 31, 2012 at 12:24 am
Oh shit…my computer was found by this phony FBI malware bug that demands $200 from a cash card from Walmart or Walgreens as punishment reparations for stealing movies from the ‘net. It’s a scam, and how did it get past my iolo virus protection program? If iolo can’t find it via a scan I’m doing now, I gotta do a System Restore. Damn.
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Dexter said on August 31, 2012 at 12:36 am
Here’s the Ron Bennington interview with the two ladies who made the new Detropia documentary.
http://theinterrobang.com/2012/08/is-detroit-the-canary-in-our-coal-mine-why-we-cant-ignore-detropia/
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Catherine said on August 31, 2012 at 12:46 am
Patton Oswalt just tweeted, “To restore balance to the Universe, Obama must have Tommy Chong onstage at the DNC talking to a steak.”
Also: “‘If Clint Eastwood ever talks to a chair on national TV, people will need a way to reassure each other’ — inventor of Twitter, March 2006”
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Catherine said on August 31, 2012 at 1:04 am
Last one, I swear, from DC Debbie on twitter: “Clint Eastwood still makes more sense than Sarah Palin.” Oh, just go to twitter and search on Clint. So many variations of the classic: “Clint just spotted backstage wrestling an imaginary black bear/continuing his speech to a water cooler/yelling at people for sitting on Invisible Obama/etc.” Comedy gold! OK, just one more from Matt Yglesias: “Clint Eastwood demonstrating that seniors may not be prepared to navigate a menu of subsidized private insurance plans.”
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Prospero said on September 2, 2012 at 12:26 pm
WillardWindsock it truly a POS. Nobody would have put u with that shitheeel in high school. What a shithead.
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Prospero said on September 2, 2012 at 12:38 pm
Don’t know what sort of hellholses ya’all lived through in HS, but my Jocko popular kids wouldn’t have allowed Mittens” hijinks No fucking way. We did not believe in treating other kids that way. We’d have kicked his ass, and made it stayed kicked. We believed bullying was disgusting behavior.
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