It’s a testament to how nerdy I am that this just completely made my day:
At 9:46 a.m., another reporter walked into the press office.
“Good morning,” [Deputy Press Secretary Bill] Burton said.
“I came to introduce myself,” the woman said. “I’m Helen Thomas.”
Other notes from President Obama’s first day are here.
Twenty four hours….. now.
Sphere: Related ContentI know this is a bit thin, given my shabby posting record these last couple weeks, but whatevs…
I cooked an entire Thanksgiving dinner, I’ll have you know.
My cranberry sauce was great (it was just standard cranberry sauce). I also soaked figs in tea for multiple hours. And then roasted them. Something to behold, my friends.
Something to behold.
Anyhoo - having been away from Chicago for, like, years, I got out of the habit of reading The Onion, but this week’s main headline is definitely worth it:
Blue Angels Hold First-Ever Open Tryouts
87 Dead, 243 Injured in Day 1 of Weeklong Event
And my favorite part:
“Mark my words—I’m going to be a Blue Angel if it’s the last thing I do.”
And this Sunday, that dream came true for an incredible 43 seconds, as [Harold] Enderby got the chance to fly the famed Blue Angels’ F/A-18 Hornet directly into the tarmac during the first day of the Navy’s most dramatic—and colorful—audition program ever.
I often can’t get though reading things I find funny out loud - but I nearly lost my mind trying to read that.
In other news, it’s cold.
Sphere: Related ContentI’ve read a couple people over the last couple days talking about how Sarah Palin’s tragicomic interview with CBS’ Katie Couric last week might have been some sort of West Wing expectations-lowering stunt.
Having finally gotten around to watching the complete second half (foreign policy), it just can’t be the case. Sara has a couple of great YouTube videos of the interview/debacle. The one in which she discusses Israel (number two in LMS Brightside’s clips) is really the most frightening (and getting less play than the Russia nonsense).
While watching Palin stutter through her mishmash of talking points is grimace-inducing, reading the words is actually horrific. There’s no way that this was intentional; it is nonsensical:
PALIN: That’s why I say I, like every American I’m speaking with, were ill about this position that we have been put in where it is the taxpayers looking to bail out. But ultimately, what the bailout does is help those who are concerned about the health-care reform that is needed to help shore up our economy, helping the—it’s got to be all about job creation, too, shoring up our economy and putting it back on the right track. So health-care reform and reducing taxes and reining in spending has got to accompany tax reductions and tax relief for Americans. And trade, we’ve got to see trade as opportunity, not as a competitive, scary thing. But one in five jobs being created in the trade sector today, we’ve got to look at that as more opportunity. All those things under the umbrella of job creation. This bailout is a part of that.
As noted by Fareed Zakaria, ‘This is nonsense—a vapid emptying out of every catchphrase about economics that came into her head.’
The transcript reads like a slot machine - a question is asked and you get two oranges and a lemon.
Leo’s fumbling on the West Wing was a) fictional and b) behind the scenes and leaked. There is no way that the McCain campaign sent her out there to deliver that nearly unmitigated disaster.
Given her performance in the controlled environment of the interview and against Couric’s not terribly abrasive interviewing style, I don’t know that setting expectations too low is something the Democrats or Republicans can achieve.
Perhaps she’ll come flying out of the gate, but my anticipation for the veep debate is turning into creeping terror for Palin. I guess schadenfreude overdose is one way to change the tone of the campaign.
By the way, if you want to Interview Palin yourself, it’s not much different.
Oh, and boo to the LA Times Style Section.
Sphere: Related ContentOh, hot mics - when will you cease to plague the punditry among us?
They, the commentariat, who - while never saying a word of actual substance whilst on the air - have a legion of apt, insightful (and frequently profanity-filled) opinions on the matters of the day.
And those opinions are captured every time someone forgets to turn. the. damn. thing. off.
Peggy Noonan wrote in her column today:
Gut: The Sarah Palin choice is really going to work, or really not going to work. It’s not going to be a little successful or a little not; it’s not going to be a wash. She is either going to be magic or one of history’s accidents.
Fair enough. A seemingly honest assessment of a conflicted conservative.
What does Peggy Noonan really think, though? Only a MSNBC hot mic can tell us [video and transcript]:
It’s over… The most qualified? No. I think they went for this — excuse me — political bullshit about narratives… Every time the Republicans do that, because that’s not where they live and it’s not what they’re good at, they blow it.
Hell yeah, Pegs!
Also, whoops!
How much better would political television be if stuff like this was actually on the air. Have an opinion, let’s argue! Great!
Finally, Noonan also wrote today:
…[Palin] is a feminist not in the Yale Gender Studies sense but the How Do I Reload This Thang way, because she is a woman who in style, history, moxie and femininity is exactly like a normal American feminist and not an Abstract Theory feminist…
Note: any gun-toting feminist already knows how to reload that ‘thang’.
Sphere: Related ContentI’m still mystified by the Palin choice.
But at least it’s clear what the Republican line is going to be.
Both Kristol and Dean Barnett out of the Standard have columns about how the left is going to try to ‘diminish’ Palin. They’re trying to get out in front of what are the obvious criticisms of Palin so they can say, “See? We knew the Left would do this!”
They’re also setting expectations low - both have comments about how she’s bound to screw up on the campaign trail - in the hopes that all she’ll have to do is turn up and bring in the Clintonistas.
Kind of reaffirms my point about her just being ‘another vagina’ when die-hard Republicans are promising stuff ups on day one.
It’d be nice to think that the Clinton holdouts are too smart for that. But given the fact that some pro-Clinton women appear set to cut off their abortion rights to spite Obama (otherwise known as cutting off your fallopian tubes to spite your face), I’m not so sure about that.
John McCain will screw you nearly as fast as you’re screwing yourselves, ladies…
Anyway, this post is supposed to be about some vice-presidential history.
Dan Savage pointed out last week that the choice of Biden vaguely resembles the selection of Lloyd Bentson for Michael Dukakis’s 1988 run against G.H.W. Bush. Bentson was a witty, Washtgton insider - a choice designed to prop up the young, dashing man at the top of the ticket.
And, wow, what a depressing electoral map that produced. (Eclipsed only by 1984’s abysmal results…)
Here’s hoping Obama doesn’t get into any tanks in the next two months.
I think Biden’s a bit better than that - again, I can’t wait to see that debate. (Bentson’s opponent in the veep debate was, of course, Dan Quayle, to whom Palin is already being compared.)
Biden is ridiculously charismatic in a way that I think Bentson was not. (Truth be told, I’m not based that on much aside from my complete lack of knowledge about Lloyd Bentson. I looked up that election because I couldn’t remember who was on the ticket with Dukakis.)
Biden also lives in the YouTube era, where videos like these exist:
And I have to back up Ezra Klein’s support for Biden for this gem alone (this is Klein’s quote followed by the clip video he posted):
Giuliani, of course, took umbrage, and said Biden lacked foreign policy experience. This led to my favorite YouTube of the campaign, in which Biden dismantles Giuliani, live on television, while walking to his car. [emphasis original]
I laugh out loud every time I see Biden’s face at the end of that.
I’m coming around on the Biden choice, especially versus Palin.
Anyway, this is mostly a post to get rid of some of the links I’ve had hanging around in my browser. [Going to finish the clean up job with some hysteria/sexing up over at The Age tomorrow morning - and then I can close Firefox!]
Sphere: Related ContentA squirrel has its own webpage.
And not just any squirrel, but the trained squirrel of a former USO pinup girl/country singer in Boca Raton, FL, dressed up in tiny, often shiny outfits. Sometimes with guns.
I feel that tells you about everything you need to know.
Other than the fact that the squirrel is apparently a bit right wing. You have to scroll down just about a third of the way for the really amazing stuff. And then there’s lots more scrolling.
Also, if you have suggestion for what Sugar Bush Squirrel should do next, a handy form is here. The pictures obviously took a great deal of effort (and careful stitching), but I adore this apparently free-association list of possible squirrel outfits:
Those are good (damn, you Cheeseheads), but this is the section that blows my tiny mind:
Firstly, Maggie would be pissed that she had to be identified so explicitly. And second…
Liam Niesson?
Who would want to see a squirrel dressed as a random actor, and, more importantly, how would you know! He’s just a person. Is she going to put the squirrel in jeans with a cigarette? Or on the set of Schindler’s List?
Liam Niesson’s primary defining characteristics are that he’s tall and Irish, neither of which is going to be adequately conveyed by a squirrel in an outfit.
Obviously, I voted for Liam Niesson.
h/t: CuteOverload
Sphere: Related ContentAnd by ‘questionable,’ I, of course, mean ‘awesome’!
Violeta got me to watch Eurovision last night. I was a bit truculent about it (surprise!) since I’m not that down with pop music competitions. Or Europe.
May I just say that my cherry has been popped and eyes opened to the incredibleness that is horrible Europop mixed with xenophobic British commentary.
Much of the voting appears clustered around regional blocks, a fact not lost on the English commentator speaking over the hosts. As the tallies from each country came in, his wonderful, vaguely racist running commentary became more and more hilarious.
Presumably drinking, he commented on the outfits of country representatives (’I see you dressed for the occasion,’ ‘Would you wear that for a bet?’), and lambasted them if they didn’t move quickly enough to their results (’YES?!’).
He could not get over the fact that the Azerbaijani act was getting points. Every time someone voted for them he was like, ‘Recall that this was the one with the angels and demons,’ sometimes just outright expressing disdain for the number. He was similarly repulsed by the Spanish act (which, seriously, touche - it was bad.)
The most amazing commentary, however, came during voting of former-Soviet block countries, which - to be fair - did tend to vote for their one-time ruler. He criticized them each in turn, his voice tinged with ennui:
You see? Latvia, Estonia – they know which way their bread is buttered.
By far the most best was his comment about the Ukraine’s 12 points to Russia, which literally made me laugh until I thought I was going to throw up:
You vote for Russia, and the oil flows through.
Some of the comments were a little more questionable, such as the results from Switzerland (whose votes went to Turkey, I think):
That must be the result of guest workers…
But, oh my god, the apparent lack of any control by the station over this man’s commentary was amazing. Basically, it was like watching a xenophobic Europop MST3K.
(I actually like Europe quite a bit. And I think the French act should have won - it was the only song I actually liked.)
Sphere: Related ContentSay that five times fast.
A kind of throwaway news item about the Western Australia opposition leader sniffing a woman’s chair - yes, le sigh - is made wonderful through the joys of spirited storytelling.
Here are the last three paragraphs:
Local media said Buswell has previously admitted to snapping a Labor party staff member’s bra as a drunken party trick and has been accused of sexist remarks by a retiring Liberal politician.
The deputy Liberal leader, Kim Hames, said he stood by Buswell, describing him as a “rough diamond with a robust sense of humor”, but adding he needed to change his behavior.
Hames also said there was no one to replace Buswell.
That’s not much of a party trick. I mean, if you’ve ever seen a woman topless, you kind of know whereabouts to grab.
But I really love the last paragraph. I sometimes wish news stories came with the ba-bum-ching! with which they were clearly written.
Sphere: Related ContentHe just can’t seem to find any.
During his charming (and possibly media/democracy-destroying) appearance on Deal or No Deal the other night, Bush quipped:
I’m thrilled to be on ‘Deal or No Deal’ with you tonight. Come to think of it, I’m thrilled to be anywhere with high ratings these days.
Hilarity ensued, no doubt, across the nation he’s taken to the woodshed.
Or maybe not.
The episode on which Bush appeared had the lowest ratings in the show’s history.
That poor guy just can’t catch a break. Keep strivin’!
Sphere: Related ContentThe Onion’s AV Club, consistently one of the best reads the interwebs has to offer, has apparently had some time on its hands.
To wit, they came up with a list of ‘12 surprisingly controversial Wikipedia pages‘. We probably shouldn’t think too hard about the Wikitrail that led this endeavor (or the number of hours ‘wasted’) because it’s hilarious.
My favorite is #4: Rotary International.
As users AndyJones, Aldux, and Bridesmill try to repair the damage, M. Larcin starts sections called “CONTROVERSY OR SEGREGATION? vote here!” and “The blanking of Rotarian Conferencemakers by BridesMill- Polemic,” while accusing his opponents of being “pro-Episcopalian theists” and “racist against French.”
My brief perusal of the ‘talk’ section yielded the comment in the title. Another random grab below:
I am a democrat, I mean a French socialist. I mean that I am then a traitor, a cynical, a pervert and a *foul language removed* communist.
Priceless.
Sphere: Related Content