Sorry for the late entry today. It’s been a top-rack week around here, and now that I look back on the last time I used that term, I see it was precisely this time last year. It’s auto-industry holiday-party week, and Alan has been able to attend precisely one of them, because it’s also been a crazy week for auto-industry news. I hope the party planners don’t mind. They can always forward the sugared almonds to the office, and we’ll see them at the auto show, anyway.
As for me, I had a meeting in Lansing that ran to nearly three hours, causing me to miss what was apparently the wingnut story of the day, but fortunately, Roy Edroso has it covered.
I’ll bring you something else. I was in Sephora over the weekend, the makeup superstore, picking up stocking-stuffers. How do you sell makeup in such a crowded environment? Simple: The way you sell everything else.
I don’t want to be the old man yelling at a cloud, but I’m reminded of what got Molly Ivins fired from the New York Times back in the day: She wrote a funny piece about a chicken-plucking contest and used the term “gang pluck.” This, I read, led to an epic shaming confrontation with Abe Rosenthal, in which he railed that she was “trying to make the readers of the New York Times think of the phrase ‘gang fuck,’ WEREN’T YOU MOLLY,” etc.
Well, no one ever accused A.M. Rosenthal of having a sexy mother pucker. Although I understand his wife writes some pretty spicy lady-porn.
So play nice amongst yourselves today, and if you need me I’ll be off in the corner, shaking hands and bowing.
David C. said on December 11, 2013 at 7:40 am
I think it’s better news for General Motors that Mary Barra is an engineer instead of a beancounter rather than a woman instead of a man. She does have the blight of an MBA, but I suspect she just did that to get her ticket punched, and I hope she doesn’t believe any of the MBA BS.
282 chars
Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 11, 2013 at 7:49 am
Oh, for goodness sake.
22 chars
alex said on December 11, 2013 at 8:09 am
Regarding the parumpapumpum challenge, here’s a new one: Try to find a version with the original lyrics. It has become so corrupted over time that I’m unable to find the original lyrics on the internet.
“Mary nodded… The ox and lamb kept time.” These were joke lyrics in a novelty pop version from the ’60s or ’70s but have become accepted as the standard version. I know this because in the 1970s when I was at Howe Military School singing in the soprano boy choir, the choral instructor was teaching us proper diction. “Mary Nade.” (Pronounced nah-day.) We were told this was a latin term that meant “gravid” or something. And this was followed by “the ox and ass… ” but I don’t remember the rest.
We were a gleeful bunch of little singers. It wasn’t often we could use the word “ass” without getting backhanded across the room.
841 chars
nancy said on December 11, 2013 at 8:28 am
“Gravid” is kind of a 19th-century word for pregnant, so in this context it doesn’t make sense, unless Mary was in the process of delivering Jesus forgotten twin sibling.
I lost that challenge last weekend, when I heard a version by a local musician. I don’t know why — perhaps because I’ve been reading about “Inside Llewyn Davis” lately, but it left me thinking that the little drummer boy isn’t just a poor boy, he’s a poor musician. (Which is to say, he’s a musician.) He gives the only gift he has — his talent and ability. It’s a musician’s Christmas song.
And when you think about it, only a musician would consider a drum solo an appropriate gift for a newborn. Unless he played very softly, sort of a womb-heartbeat solo.
749 chars
coozledad said on December 11, 2013 at 8:43 am
Remind me to avoid going to one of those Republican funerals where they’re kicking each other in the nuts and the pinch-mouthed old ladies are swinging handbags at each other.
I went to a funeral for a Republican acquaintance a few years back. He died in what they used to call a watersports accident before it meant being a pisser or pissee.
The family pretty much snubbed me in the receiving line. I was never sure if it was because of the politics, or the fact they knew I knew their boy was banging sixteen year old hookers on his visits to “Guate” and leaving a five dollar tip. Anyway, I only went to the funeral to pay what tatters of respect I had for the living, and they were insufficiently aggrieved to keep from showing their red monkey asses.
Read about the paterfamilias dying a couple of years back, in the arms of his loving family and the Sons of Confederate Veterans. I had to laugh at “He died peacefully”. The only thing that old bastard ever did peacefully was stick a tumbler of Scotch under his nose, and even that had bad results.
1064 chars
coozledad said on December 11, 2013 at 8:50 am
According to Josephus, at least, Jesus had a brother James, who figured in the revolutionary politics of first century Judea. Not only did his shiftless brother eclipse him in the world’s imagination, Vespasian refused to shake his hand at Herod’s funeral.
256 chars
Connie said on December 11, 2013 at 9:20 am
In the morning news I see I called the reaction to the Raul Castro handshake. And in other news the sign language interpreter at yesterday’s memorial service was a fake.
169 chars
MarkH said on December 11, 2013 at 9:28 am
Prospero —
Are we done with Sons of Anarchy now? Sheesh.
60 chars
Basset said on December 11, 2013 at 10:14 am
Drummer boy… why, oh why, did Bob Seger decide to do that one? Almost had to turn his picture to the wall when I heard it.
125 chars
Jeff Borden said on December 11, 2013 at 10:20 am
Our local Mitch Albomesque “news” columnist, John Kass of the Chicago Tribune, chose to focus on the “selfie” with Obama, Cameron and the other politician. This nanosecond of activity, says Mr. Kass (the K is silent) shows the inherent self-worship of our black prince of a president.
God, right-wingers are nuts.
316 chars
Bitter Scribe said on December 11, 2013 at 10:41 am
I hadn’t heard that story about how Molly Ivins left the NYT. But it cements my opinion of Rosenthal as a pill.
Every time a Kass column runs, Mike Royko (whose space in the newspaper Kass now occupies) turns over once more in his grave.
240 chars
mark said on December 11, 2013 at 11:23 am
The “president selfie” story was the lead on msn.com and google news and elsewhere.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2521146/Nelson-Mandela-memorial-service-World-leaders-gather-South-Africa-remember-president.html
229 chars
Kirk said on December 11, 2013 at 11:44 am
Just got back from the Giant Eagle, where I heard a typically supermarket version of “The Little Drummer Boy” in public for the first time this season. I did hear the Bing Crosby-David Bowie version yesterday at home on a Christmas collection as I was doing the Christmas cards.
278 chars
Joe K said on December 11, 2013 at 11:48 am
Ok I think the far right went a bit far on the handshake story, but really, if that would have been a republican president your going to sit there and tell me the far left wouldn’t have tried to make a big deal out of it?
As far as the selfi goes, democrat or republican, I think it showed a lack of respect, you want a picture that’s fine, but find someplace else to do it, reminded me of Clinton laughing it up at the funeral until he notice the camera then went to his pouty face.
Personally I Didn’t think we should have had the flag at half mast, while mr Mandela was a great man, I think the lowering of the American flag should be reserved for Americans.
G.M. Putting a lady in charge, I know is a big deal but, I don’t care what gender you have in charge, just make a good car and don’t run the company into bankruptcy again, as a tax payer, you cost me 10 billion the last time.
Pilot Joe
902 chars
Jeff Borden said on December 11, 2013 at 11:52 am
Mark and Joe,
If you look at the photo of the selfie in progress, Obama is not the guy holding the camera. It was still a stupid thing to do, as it detracted from a pretty damned great eulogy he delivered. Not worth mentioning by righties or lefties, but there you go.
I’ve yet to take a selfie because I don’t have a smartphone. I’ve never tweeted or ever read Twitter, so I’m clearly halfway to the tar pits, but still, I have yet to see much good come from these social media breakthroughs.
499 chars
coozledad said on December 11, 2013 at 12:03 pm
http://wonkette.com/536296/ted-cruz-shows-dumb-old-president-obama-how-to-be-respectful-at-a-funeral-and-that-is-to-walk-out-of-it
130 chars
Dexter said on December 11, 2013 at 12:33 pm
When I saw “engineer” I cringed. Didn’t GM stockholders ever hear “those who ignore the past are doomed to repeat it?”
Has Bob Stempel been forgotten? Engineers make bad marketing decisions, and you can look it up. Engineers do not belong out front. This corporation, I can’t believe they gave this gig to this woman. I also do not believe the crowning HAD to be a woman, but if that had any part in it, fer crissakes, couldn’t they come up with a marketer and not an engineer?
When Stempel was tar-and-feathered out of office, all we read about for days was “engineers just can’t communicate with sales and promotions”. Right? And Stempel was a gem of a man, exemplary career milepost maker…just not a good fit on top.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/11/business/11stempel.html?_r=0
799 chars
nancy said on December 11, 2013 at 12:36 pm
I will jump in on the selfie story, as stupid as it is, and say this: I’ve learned many times through the years that you can NOT judge a situation from a single photo, or even a series of them, especially at an event like this. I didn’t watch it on CNN, and I don’t even know what the setup was, only that it was in a soccer stadium. Was this between speakers? During a break? We don’t know.
Also, facial expressions in an instant can be very deceiving. Scowly Face may be due to an itchy toe you can’t get to.
I do know that the narrative of Babe Magnet Barack and His Bitchy Wife is pretty well-established on the right, though, so carry on.
And I have yet to attend a funeral (this was a memorial service, a very different thing) that didn’t feature at least some smiles and laughter, frequently at the express direction of the deceased. When a great man dies at 95, having played a key role in destroying an evil regime, it is perfectly OK to celebrate.
969 chars
Sherri said on December 11, 2013 at 12:51 pm
Hey, Dexter, not all engineers are incapable of talking to marketers and sales people! I was actually pretty good at translating between engineer-speak and marketer-speak. Some engineers are bad at communicating, and some marketers are dumb. Don’t tar them all with the same brush.
281 chars
LAMary said on December 11, 2013 at 12:55 pm
Joe K, we flew flags at half staff for Winston Churchill and Pope John Paul II. I just googled it to confirm my memory.
119 chars
Bitter Scribe said on December 11, 2013 at 1:32 pm
A guy at Forbes, of all places, puts the screws to Walmart.
232 chars
Jolene said on December 11, 2013 at 1:32 pm
Some place on the web this AM, I saw an article that confirms Nancy’s point. The guy who took the selfish picture said that there was laughing and talking going on all around the group–not to mention singing and dancing in the rest of the stadium-/and that, seconds earlier, Michele had been smiling and talking with the rest of the group. In other words, give it a rest.
372 chars
Judybusy said on December 11, 2013 at 1:33 pm
Bouncing off Nancy’s oabservations about memorial services: I also heard a story on NPR about South Africans dancing and singing in the days following Mr. Mandela’s death, to celebrate his life. The best memorials/funerals do have some bittersweet laughter as we remember the best about the newly departed.
On a completely unrelated note: has anyone seen The Butler? Caught it last night and myself and the other three in the party were very moved by it. It’s an amazing story on many levels. Here is the screenwriter’s take.
676 chars
Prospero said on December 11, 2013 at 1:36 pm
How normal, civilized people behave when honoring the departed.
Anybody that uses the term (not word) selfie, automatically cedes the right to criticize anybody else’s behavior.
And Obama-detesters are just making a stink about this to draw attention away from the fact that teabanger-traduced Lamar Alexander was employing a child pornographer.
Who micturated in your TRIX Mark H?
481 chars
Deborah said on December 11, 2013 at 1:41 pm
I would compare the memorial service to an Irish wake. I’ve been to a few, the ones I have been to were definitely celebrations, lots of remembering the good times.
I’m in the middle of bread making, haven’t done it for ages. We have a big pot of onion soup simmering on the stove too.
288 chars
Joe K said on December 11, 2013 at 1:59 pm
I’m all for the celebration, my funeral hopefully will be at the airport, with a keg and food, all my pilot and rugby buddy’s, along with any of you that can make it, then my ashes are going to the rugby field where they can make a tee out of them and place the ball on top and kick off to start a match, then play on top of me mixing me into the pitch.
La Mary, I know we have done the half mast for others, just my opinion it should only be done for Americans.
All I’m saying about the criticism is reverse the politics and honestly ask yourself if you would or wouldn’t criticize.
Play on,
Pilot Joe
606 chars
Prospero said on December 11, 2013 at 2:24 pm
Romney defense. Or Shrub defense. Coulda been the Ryan defense, but everyone knows Granny-starver was a product of the evil SSI. Maybe AquaBuddha defense when he’s arrested for kidnapping.
Reverse the politics? Pardon me, but when people that dislike President Obama because of melanin criticize him for no other reason, it isn’t politics. It’s racism. And is there any evidence the President gave that woman an unsolicited backrub?
Phonephotogate is most amazing for pointing out what a short dick Obamaissellingouttomultinationalsgate had. This whole thing is starting to look like monkeys throwing caca.
775 chars
Deborah said on December 11, 2013 at 2:45 pm
Bitter Scribe that Forbes link is right-on I’ve sent it on to others. Thanks.
77 chars
LAMary said on December 11, 2013 at 2:45 pm
Pilot Joe, I would wonder about any US President who attended the funeral of a foreign dignitary and refused to shake hands with one of the other world leaders attending. Hitler would be the only exception I can think of. The self portrait was picture was sort of dumb, but who knows what was going on in the stadium at the time. The people in the picture are smiling. They aren’t making silly faces or obscene gestures.
Mostly I think Joe Arpaio and the sheriff in South Carolina are entitled to their personal opinions. I hope they don’t do their jobs entirely based on their personal opinions since they are required to carry out what they are instructed by law or their supervisors to do. I have my personal opinion of Joe Arpaio and it has nothing to do with political parties. I just think he’s an attention whore, a racist, and probably crooked. Mostly he’s an attention whore.
889 chars
Jeff Borden said on December 11, 2013 at 2:47 pm
Thanks for that link, Bitter Scribe. It was a bracing corrective to so much of the right-wing economic bullshit flying around these days.
I guess we as a nation are going to have to go through all the bullshit we endured 100 years ago when labor and workers had to march, fight, bleed and die for some basic rights in the workplace. Our overlords apparently want us dumb, poor and unemployed so we will fall over in gratitude at the generosity of their minimum wage jobs, so they’ll keep pushing. As the guy in Forbes notes, any card-carrying righty has to hate unions, collective bargaining, workers’ rights, etc. and, in fact, Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas, of course) has argued there should be NO minimum wage.
Sooner or later, the suckers wake up to the grift. It’s a fking shame we failed to learn from the past and I fear future years are going to see some pretty ugly confrontations between us and the 1%.
914 chars
alex said on December 11, 2013 at 2:49 pm
if that would have been a republican president your going to sit there and tell me the far left wouldn’t have tried to make a big deal out of it?
Darned tootin’ I’m gonna sit here and tell you that. We “far leftists” fully expect that a Republican president would observe proper decorum and shake Castro’s hand just as Obama did. Now if a president were to do what Marco Rubio says the president should have done — use the occasion to tell Castro off and make a scene — then we’d make a big deal of it.
Joe, I suspect it never occurred to you until now that you object to flying the flag at half mast for others. And that’s because Fox never objected to the practice either until it was flown for Nelson Mandela.
730 chars
Jeff Borden said on December 11, 2013 at 2:57 pm
You know, if Rupert Murdoch cured cancer and erectile dysfunction, it wouldn’t make up for the tsunami of shit he created with Fox News. Feed anything into the Fox puke funnel and it comes out dirty, angry and wrong.
216 chars
Deborah said on December 11, 2013 at 3:04 pm
Joe, I think your memorial wishes sound wonderful. My husband and I want to be cremated, we’ve designed a memorial that we will place on our land in Abiquiu that will consist of 2 shallow spun brass bowls, attached to a concrete base, which we will have made and embedded in the next few years. The one who goes first will have their ashes saved in a box until the other of us goes. Then our ashes will each be placed in one of the bowls and let the wind mingle and disperse them on the land. No names will be on these bowls, so someone stumbling upon them in the future will have to guess what they were for.
609 chars
Henry "Hank" Chapin said on December 11, 2013 at 3:13 pm
Abe Rosenthal was a notorious tyrant. My college friend, Ed Klein, made his career at the Times when he was taken under the wing of Rosenthal in Japan. Unfortunately, it resulted in Ed’s go-along-to-get-along strategy: “If Abe likes it, I LOVE it.” Also, the Times back then was famously anti-women. I guess Molly Ivins wasn’t on the team.
339 chars
Prospero said on December 11, 2013 at 3:27 pm
Half-mast is incorrect. The proper term is half-staff.
http://grammarist.com/usage/half-mast-half-staff/
Lessen’ you’re Canadian or French or some other non-Murrican.
And the flag is a glorified rag, and it’s been flown at half-staff for genuine evildoers like Ole Strom and Jesse Helms and Milhous Nixon and R. Raygun.
328 chars
Sherri said on December 11, 2013 at 3:46 pm
This isn’t the first time the US flag has been flown at half-staff for a non-American. Winston Churchill, Pope John Paul II, Anwar Sadat, Yitzhak Rabin and King Hussein of Jordan were all so honored at their death.
214 chars
Judybusy said on December 11, 2013 at 3:46 pm
Joe, I would have been positively gobsmacked had President Bush shaken Raul Castro’s hand, and admired the guts it would have taken to do it, given his party’s likely reaction. And I love your memorial service, too.
I’d add Pol Pot and Mugabe to the list of non-shakers. Come to think of it, Mussolini, Kim Jong-il (which of course couldn’t happen–far too much at stake)?
375 chars
Prospero said on December 11, 2013 at 4:18 pm
Another thing from which the dumbass wingers are trying divert attention. A teabanger congressman so stupid the idea that preventive medicine lowers health care costs for everybody is too much for his peabrain to take in. Who ties this bozo’s shoes for him?
367 chars
mark said on December 11, 2013 at 4:35 pm
You are too smart for us prospero. We wingers used our domination of the media (world-wide) to poke front-page fun at the ego-in-chief on Wednesday morning, in order to divert attention from a stupid comment that would be made by an obscure congressman on Wednesday afternoon. You figured it out, Deputy Dog.
310 chars
Deborah said on December 11, 2013 at 4:45 pm
My daughter has been making jewelry out of shell casings, which for us anti-gun people might seem strange but if you hear the whole story it’s really not. About 15 years ago my husband and I were touring Death Valley with his daughter and her husband and they took us to the Manson Ranch, the place where Charles Manson was caught. While there I saw a bunch of shell casings on the ground and gathered them up (not from the Manson years but more recent, many people had gone out there to shoot). When I got home I gave my daughter the shell casings, knowing that she was a creative person who could figure out something to do with them. This was before 911, I probably would not have gotten through security with them today. She thought they looked like Tibetan bells and made some jewelry, earrings and pendants out of them that resembled bells. Since she has moved to Santa Fe they have become something people want to buy. Not necessarily the “bells”, but since then she has devised ways to make things with crystals, semi precious stones and the like. There are shooting ranges in the area where she collects the shells and has gotten some of them silver plated for people who don’t like brass or nickel. Anyway, it has become a way for her to make things that give her great satisfaction to do. While she sells them, it is by no means enough to sustain her, but who cares. She has gun people who are very interested in these pieces she makes which we think is great. Crossing the divide and all that. We think of them as making something beautiful out of something that can be deadly, and they’re recycled too, made with things that are considered junk left on the ground.
1677 chars
Basset said on December 11, 2013 at 4:58 pm
Or, for something a little more functional, one might try making whistles out of shotgun shell bases:
http://callmakersnews.com/shop-talk/how-to-make-a-duck-whistle/
168 chars
Joe K said on December 11, 2013 at 5:02 pm
Alex, give me some credit, I know it been flown half mast for foreign dignitary before, it just my opinion.
Pros I never reply to any of your post, mostly because I don’t like you,
But I think you should go on down to the local vfw or American legion, walk in and loudly pronounce that the American flag is a glorified rag.
Hopefully that’s the last we will hear from you.
Pilot Joe
388 chars
MarkH said on December 11, 2013 at 5:24 pm
Pros @23 — Kurt Sutter did. Apparently you gave up on SAMCRO a while back, certainly before I did. He destroyed his own franchise with that season finale last night.
So I just got back from a very nice birthday lunch with the wife. Happy to share this day with the likes of McGuane, Harrison, Teri Garr, others. Here’s a complete list of those born on this day.
http://www.nndb.com/lists/863/000106545/
412 chars
Deborah said on December 11, 2013 at 5:37 pm
Happy Birthday Mark H.
22 chars
Deborah said on December 11, 2013 at 5:58 pm
Another good name by Charles Pierce, he calls Senator Patty Murray of Washington Senator Landingham because of her resemblance to that character on The West Wing.
162 chars
alex said on December 11, 2013 at 6:09 pm
Well, Joe, maybe you’ve always felt that way—I have no way of knowing—but it’s the first time it has ever been used as fodder by the right-wing outrage machine and probably the first time most people have ever given it any thought. It’s also the first time a president has ever been attacked for shaking hands with the leader of a communist country at a gathering of world leaders, even though they’ve all done it because that’s just what presidents do. Obama can’t shit a curved one without the right-wingers going ballistic over it. Obama derangement syndrome is the bubonic plague compared to the sniffles that were Bush derangement syndrome.
649 chars
Basset said on December 11, 2013 at 6:36 pm
Well put, Alex… but tell me, why DO you hate America?
55 chars
coozledad said on December 11, 2013 at 6:42 pm
Alex: When Obama speaks in foreign countries, he’s a rock star. That’s as it should be.
Republicans just miss the days when old Bonzo could spray some revisionist chamber of commerce spooge over a bunch of dead Nazis and piss all over the graves of the peoples and countries they tried to incinerate, as well as the Americans who helped the Russkies kill the motherfuckers like penicillin in an agar plate of syphilis.
Reagan and the apartheid regime he supported are burning in hell with all that totenkopf trash buried in Bitburg cemetery, and Republicans are all ass-hurt about it. Perpetual victims.
611 chars
Danny said on December 11, 2013 at 6:51 pm
There’s funny and then there’s unintentionally funny. I am not sure which I like better… too much!
Anyway, on the topic of President Obama shaking hands with Castro, it is really asinine for the media to be critical of this. But the media tends towards that, especially on slow news days.
295 chars
Jeff Borden said on December 11, 2013 at 7:02 pm
A-freaking-men, Cooz. I have serious man love for you, brother.
Time has tempered somewhat my feelings about St. Ronald and, of course, compared with the current crop of rightwing stumblebums, he was a towering intellect and a pragmatist who raised taxes 18 times during his presidency when that trickle-down economics thing wasn’t working out so well.
Most presidents have to hold their noses to do business with certain world leaders. I get it. What’s so damned unfathomable to me about Reagan was his admiration for the contras of Central America, who he once praised as being like our founding fathers. Wha??? A bunch of priest and nun murdering right-wing fanatics are on the same level as Washington, Jefferson and Adams?
Maybe it’s because I teach at a Jesuit university and walk past a memorial to the Jesuits slaughtered in El Salvador on my way to the classroom, but I think we’ve too easily forgotten just how rotten our country acted in those days.
Obama likely will enter history as a mediocre president when it is all said and done, a product of his own insular nature, his trust that some working comity would emerge in D.C. and, of course, the nasty, dirty little (cough, cough racist) gremlins waving their teabags and Gadsden flags around thwarting his efforts at every turn.
I’d still vote for him over Reagan, Bush I, Dole, Bush II, McCain and Romney with a smile on my face and a song in my heart even though Gitmo is still open, we use drones like Kleenexes, our every utterance is captured and recorded and none of the fking bankers who destroyed our economy are in jail.
1609 chars
MichaelG said on December 11, 2013 at 7:09 pm
You guys are pikers. I lost the Drummer Boy Challenge two weeks ago.
Belated Happy Birthday, Charlotte. I’ve been out of town the last couple of days and didn’t bring a computer with me.
How old are you MarkH? Happy birthday to you too! I’m 69 and think Dexter is 64 or so. For sure I’m not getting any younger.
President Obama shaking hands with Raul Castro is exactly the sort of thing that Mandela was all about and couldn’t be a more appropriate thing to see at a Mandela memorial service.
523 chars
MichaelG said on December 11, 2013 at 7:10 pm
I still haven’t forgiven Regan for firing the Air Traffic Controllers.
70 chars
Prospero said on December 11, 2013 at 7:12 pm
Raygun got elected by bribing the Ayatollahs to hold onto the hostages from the American embassy to prevent an October Surprise. Why doesn’t the car thief and arsonist Issa investigate that, since his other investigations have turned to merde?
243 chars
mark said on December 11, 2013 at 7:14 pm
Reagan was a ridiculously strong swimmer.
41 chars
LAMary said on December 11, 2013 at 7:17 pm
“I’d still vote for him over Reagan, Bush I, Dole, Bush II, McCain and Romney with a smile on my face and a song in my heart even though Gitmo is still open, we use drones like Kleenexes, our every utterance is captured and recorded and none of the fking bankers who destroyed our economy are in jail.”
Me too.
315 chars
ROGirl said on December 11, 2013 at 7:21 pm
MichaelG, I was thinking the same thing about the handshake at the event to commemorate the life of Mandela. Nobody would have given it a second thought if George Bush had shaken his hand, and he probably would have said something about having been taught by his mother to be polite.
283 chars
Dorothy said on December 11, 2013 at 7:44 pm
I was six years old when my Grandfather McCarthy died, and thus my first experience of going to a funeral home. I remember being shocked to see some people laughing and smiling, because at home my mother (it was her dad who died) was crying more than I thought was humanly possible. Then I realized that people were telling stories about Timothy McCarthy, and most of them were pretty darned funny. If a six year old can draw that conclusion, why couldn’t the media think like that, too, instead of criticizing the selfie?
524 chars
MarkH said on December 11, 2013 at 7:52 pm
MichaelG: 62.
14 chars
Kirk said on December 11, 2013 at 8:01 pm
MarkH @57: I beat you there by a week.
39 chars
Prospero said on December 11, 2013 at 9:02 pm
Mark H @42: I recorded SOA last night, but haven’t watched it yet. I thought it should have ended when the bullet transected Clay’s carotid. And Happy Birthday to you.
And what I said earlier about wagging the dog, I thought it was pretty clear that was sarcasm. A fairly prominent dickhead GOP Senator said that not long ago about the President. Speaking og GOP Senators, Jack Kingston is running for the Senate in Georgia. When I used to go to parties with lawyers in Savannah, the consensus was that Kingston was the dumbest member of the legal community but for one other guy, who listed himself in the yellow pages as A Abel Attorney. For that jailhouse desperation call bidness.
688 chars
Jolene said on December 11, 2013 at 10:11 pm
Kingston is a genius, Prospero, compared to Paul Broun, who is running for the same Senate seat.
96 chars
Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 11, 2013 at 10:30 pm
Long day, quick scroll, tired eyes: so, Reagan shook hands with the little drummer boy two weeks ago, and that’s a problem why?
127 chars
alex said on December 11, 2013 at 11:13 pm
Because Joe thinks presidents should only shake hands with Americans.
69 chars