I Don't Like You Either

The Philosophy of Gestures: Econobloggers Weigh in on AIG's PR Sleight of Hand

Hey, AIG found out a way to carry out a stunning public relations ploy by giving up their bonuses, while totally paying themselves big bucks as "retention bonuses"!   Ad-mir-able!   Deb Cupples discusses it here.

At Angry Bear, rdan quotes self-serving statements of AIG execs made to FT, in which they explain how retention bonuses are way better. 

Chicago Tribune: Moderate White Supremacists Alarmed by Increase in Hate Crimes Since Obama's Election

Says so right in The Chicago Tribune: Hate Incidents in U.S. Surge.  Look:

"Even some white supremacist leaders who describe themselves as moderates say they are alarmed."

Maureen Dowd on the Future of Print Journalism

A Penny for My Thoughts?

Nutshell version: 

"If my job were outsourced to India, some Indian journalist would get paid what I am worth."

Walk Him Out in the Morning Dew: Bill O'Reilly's Valuable Opinion on Homeless Vets

From Scott at World O' Crap:

Bill O’Reilly, as you may recall, doesn’t believe that any homeless veterans exist in this country as a result of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Now this may seem to contradict observable reality, but you have to remember, this is Bill’s opinion, which is worth millions of dollars a year to FoxNews, thus making it one of the finest opinions that money can buy. 

Jon Swift: Why Bush Should Pardon the Wal-Mart Shoppers

Our co-blog Buck Naked Politics rounded up blogger commentary on the trampling/stampeding death one Wal-Mart employee as a result of over-enthusiastic Wal-Mart shoppers here.  Mr. Swift has a somewhat different take.  Like William Kristol, who urged Bush to pardon wiretappers and torturers (see our nutshell summary), Mr. Swift would like to see Bush pardon the Wal-Mart shoppers and---following Kristol's lead---award the offenders the Medal of Freedom.

Sadly, No! Appeteasers

"After following his work for a few years, it seems fair to say that Pastor Swank’s default discursive mode will soon be indistinguishable in tone from the ravings on a bottle of Dr. Bronner’s soap." (Gavin M., Happy Swanksgiving)

"Blatt is the kind of guy that, had he been born a turkey..., he would have spent his formative years dreaming of growing up to be a spokesman for Butterball.   (Clif,  The True Meaning of Thanksgiving)

"I don’t know about you, but I’d rather convert to Mormonism than attend a Republican punk rock concert or watch a conservative performance artist perform. And what would a conservative performance artist do exactly? Smear her chastely-clothed body in crude oil while chanting “Drill, Baby, Drill”?"  (Clif,  Young, Dumb, Hung, and Full of _____)

Snark O' the Day: How Dems Can Reclaim the Integrity of the Marketplace

Without presuming to argue the religious questions addressed in the post, we were very interested in the conclusion of Poputonian's post at Rumproast, which takes a sharply incised line on the GOP conception of the free market. 

Walk Her Out in the Morning Dew This Morning: Peggy Noonan Looks for Signs of the Depression

The reason we started this blog is that when we read something like this ourselves, we can't think of anything to say. As Roy Edroso says:

It's like that scene in Post Office where Bukowski's finally had enough of that co-worker who's always muttering insults, and wheels on him only to realize that the guy is lost in a private fog and has no awareness of him or anything else around him. It takes a lot of the fight out of you.

SC Gov Laughs Merrily at the Idea of Palin as the GOP's Future

by Blue Stockings |  First, check out his opinion piece at Politico, where he mentions her along with other "quiet" GOP reformers busily enforcing those ends-in-themselves for the unreflecting "thinkers" of the GOP, small government and lower taxes. 

I am struck by how many of my colleagues around the country were quietly advancing the kinds of reforms and conservative principles that Washington politicians would do well to emulate.

Continue reading "SC Gov Laughs Merrily at the Idea of Palin as the GOP's Future" »

by Damozel | Writing on Henniger's dog-whistling about the secularization of the season, IOZ says:

Adam Smith it ain't.

It takes no particular perspicacity to note that our holidays-without-the-holy came about not through the secularizing efforts of "Northerners and atheists," the gangs of post-doctoral post-modernists slavering to gnaw on the soft edges of Christendom, but through the commercializing efforts of the various and sundry pillars, columns, flutes, and scrolls of American state capitalism. The gradual erosion of "Merry Christmas" in favor of "Happy Holidays" doesn't mark a moral retreat in the face of religious multiculturalism or anti-Christian laïcité. It marks the commerce-driven extension of a shopping season, one that now extends from before Halloween to the post-New Year sales. "Happy Holidays" isn't culturally inclusive; it's commercially inclusive.

Which --- as the sinners of Hadleyburg remarked in a slightly different context --- has got the Hallmark on it.

by Teh Puppet Mistress |

Before he Goes [Kristol]

Nutshell version:  Bush could perform a real service to me and other discredited neocons by (1) lying some more; and (2) pardoning the worst offenses of his minions so that no one connected with his administration can discredit us further.

blue stockings | The Politico and others wonder why we aren't hearing more from Joe.

by Damozel | Like Nora Ephron, I am practically in love with Chris Matthews despite his many, many flaws and excesses.  Watching him when he isn't talking but listening causes a thrill to go up my leg.  So  I am trying to decide how I feel about this. 

Thanks, Sarah! Bye

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

The Daily Show's Best Sarah Palin Moments

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

And then there's this:

by Blue | Procrustean economics major and so-called "libertarian" Megan McArdle has attracted more than her usual heaping helping of well-deserved loathing and contumely.   I have collected a few of them here for posterity.

by Teh Nutroots | I haven't had the stomach to deal with this visual roster of conservative females, so offensive to decency and reason it actually burns. 

by Blue Stockings | I can't stand Sarah Palin, but the squeamishness over Turkeygate doesn't sit well with me.   I said why here, but IOZ says it better.  Thanksgiving Day seems like the right time to make this point.

by Mr. J.Q. Public | Swift's Thanksgiving Day post is an unusually savage one.  But there is a reason for that. 

Thanksgiving celebrates the day that Pilgrims and Indians sat down to eat together before the gay secularist Indians divided this country and tried to foist their atheism and savage decadent culture on the God-fearing pilgrims.

by Blue Stockings | Doubtful.  Amazing the powers people attribute to Hillary, who didn't even beat Obama the first time.

The Mahablog discusses the gloomy forebodings of Clinton-averse right-wingers.

by Blue Stockings |  I don't think so.  But it's a meme that's emerging since the Lieberman thing and the media are running it for all it's worth.  Here's a piece by James Kirchick in The New York Daily News to prove it, all "Obama isn't afraid of the raging, impotent netroots because Joe Lieberman blah blah netroots furious rah rah blah dee blah blee." Read it yourself. 

by Teh Puppet Mistress | H/T Radio Free Mike.  What makes it awesome is that it is running to the Benny Hill theme.

by Damozel  | ....wielding Jonah Goldberg's hilarious, oxymoronic diatribe as her personal weapon of choice.  As chronicled by Gavin M. of Sadly, No!, this tale is (partly, though only partly) the tale "of her New York rampage, baying through the streets with book awave."

by Teh Nutroots | At Under the Lobsterscope  Bill Tchakirides reports:

This is apparently a response to the Congressional comments on the three auto bigwigs taking private jets to D.C. to beg for $28 Billion.

I look at this as corporate humor.

I'm waiting to hear if any of the CEO's are going to take Charles Grassley's suggestion about cutting their own salaries to save their companies. 

But I ain't holding my breath.

by Teh Puppet Mistress | Via Politics After 50, this link to a site where you can tell them what you think of them.  You can write your own letter or use theirs.

But hers is awesome.  "I just had a certain bone to pick, so I picked it," she says modestly.  It's good all the way through, but here are my favorite bits:

by Teh Puppet Mistress | Myers:  The Wall Street Journal is a Very Silly Place

The United States has some serious problems: an ugly war, a shaky economy, a bad government (on the way out, at last). It's been a rough eight years. So of course it must be someone's fault, and Daniel Henninger has a simple explanation: blame the atheists. Especially blame the atheist's successful war on Christmas. He says, "A nation whose people can't say 'Merry Christmas' is a nation capable of ruining its own economy."

by Teh Nutroots | Hey, it's Sarah Palin day!

This is pretty awesome too.

by Blue Stockings | Palin is interviewed. Turkeys are slaughtered in the background. I'm just not sure how to interpret that. Or rather, I can't improve on HuffPost.

Some videos you just have to see to believe. On Thursday, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin appeared in Wasilla in order to pardon a local turkey in anticipation of Thanksgiving. This proved to be a slightly absurd but ultimately unremarkable event. But what came next was positively surreal. After the pardon Palin proceeded to do an interview with a local TV station while the turkeys were being SLAUGHTERED in the background!! Seemingly oblivious to the gruesomeness going on over her shoulder, she carries on talking for over three minutes. Watch the video below to see for yourself. Be warned, it's kind of gruesome.

Yeah, it is. But maybe it will do people good to see where their food comes from?

by Teh Puppet Mistress | I don't usually find The Politico laugh-out-loud funny, but this article filled me with effervescent glee.

by Teh Puppet Mistress | I've been steadfastly ignoring this latest wingnut meme all week, but The Toot sees off the most recent attempt of wingnuts who miss blowing hard on the big bullshit horn about their superior superiority and want to feel right-eous and holler and bloviate about something.   They need their fix of self-congratulatory self-righteousness.

Snark O' the Day: IOZ on the Secularization of the Season

by Damozel | Writing on Henniger's dog-whistling about the secularization of the season, IOZ says:

Adam Smith it ain't.

It takes no particular perspicacity to note that our holidays-without-the-holy came about not through the secularizing efforts of "Northerners and atheists," the gangs of post-doctoral post-modernists slavering to gnaw on the soft edges of Christendom, but through the commercializing efforts of the various and sundry pillars, columns, flutes, and scrolls of American state capitalism. The gradual erosion of "Merry Christmas" in favor of "Happy Holidays" doesn't mark a moral retreat in the face of religious multiculturalism or anti-Christian laïcité. It marks the commerce-driven extension of a shopping season, one that now extends from before Halloween to the post-New Year sales. "Happy Holidays" isn't culturally inclusive; it's commercially inclusive.

Which --- as the sinners of Hadleyburg remarked in a slightly different context --- has got the Hallmark on it.

Wingnuts in the Nutshell: William Kristol

by Teh Puppet Mistress |

Before he Goes [Kristol]

Nutshell version:  Bush could perform a real service to me and other discredited neocons by (1) lying some more; and (2) pardoning the worst offenses of his minions so that no one connected with his administration can discredit us further.

Not a Peep Out of Biden?

blue stockings | The Politico and others wonder why we aren't hearing more from Joe.

Tweety to Run Against Arlen Specter in 2010

by Damozel | Like Nora Ephron, I am practically in love with Chris Matthews despite his many, many flaws and excesses.  Watching him when he isn't talking but listening causes a thrill to go up my leg.  So  I am trying to decide how I feel about this. 

Snark O' the Day: Best Sarah Palin Moments? Three Videos--Let's Call Them "Dumb, Dumber & Dumbest"

Thanks, Sarah! Bye

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

The Daily Show's Best Sarah Palin Moments

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

And then there's this:

McArdle Watch: "Markets R Dumb" & "Let Them Eat Bubble Packs"

by Blue | Procrustean economics major and so-called "libertarian" Megan McArdle has attracted more than her usual heaping helping of well-deserved loathing and contumely.   I have collected a few of them here for posterity.

Medusa in Furs, or GOP Calendar Girls: Loathly Hags in a Monthly Roster of Infamy

by Teh Nutroots | I haven't had the stomach to deal with this visual roster of conservative females, so offensive to decency and reason it actually burns. 

Turkeygate Part 2 (I Can't Believe I'm Defending Sarah Palin)

by Blue Stockings | I can't stand Sarah Palin, but the squeamishness over Turkeygate doesn't sit well with me.   I said why here, but IOZ says it better.  Thanksgiving Day seems like the right time to make this point.

Snark O' the Day: Jon Swift Advises Us to Celebrate Thanksgiving Before Barack Abolishes It

by Mr. J.Q. Public | Swift's Thanksgiving Day post is an unusually savage one.  But there is a reason for that. 

Thanksgiving celebrates the day that Pilgrims and Indians sat down to eat together before the gay secularist Indians divided this country and tried to foist their atheism and savage decadent culture on the God-fearing pilgrims.

Nobel Winner Krugman Talks About His Meeting with Bush

A New Clinton Administration?

by Blue Stockings | Doubtful.  Amazing the powers people attribute to Hillary, who didn't even beat Obama the first time.

The Mahablog discusses the gloomy forebodings of Clinton-averse right-wingers.

Snark O' the Day: "Raging" "Impotent" Netroots, Eh?

by Blue Stockings |  I don't think so.  But it's a meme that's emerging since the Lieberman thing and the media are running it for all it's worth.  Here's a piece by James Kirchick in The New York Daily News to prove it, all "Obama isn't afraid of the raging, impotent netroots because Joe Lieberman blah blah netroots furious rah rah blah dee blah blee." Read it yourself. 

Needful Diversions: Sometimes I Get Tired of Politics So Here, Instead, is a Shrimp Running on a Treadmill

by Teh Puppet Mistress | H/T Radio Free Mike.  What makes it awesome is that it is running to the Benny Hill theme.

The "Spite Caucus": One Right Wing Woman's Personal Journey...

by Damozel  | ....wielding Jonah Goldberg's hilarious, oxymoronic diatribe as her personal weapon of choice.  As chronicled by Gavin M. of Sadly, No!, this tale is (partly, though only partly) the tale "of her New York rampage, baying through the streets with book awave."

GM To Sell 2 Private Jets

by Teh Nutroots | At Under the Lobsterscope  Bill Tchakirides reports:

This is apparently a response to the Congressional comments on the three auto bigwigs taking private jets to D.C. to beg for $28 Billion.

I look at this as corporate humor.

I'm waiting to hear if any of the CEO's are going to take Charles Grassley's suggestion about cutting their own salaries to save their companies. 

But I ain't holding my breath.

You & Your Health: Write a "Dear John" Letter to the Insurance Industry

by Teh Puppet Mistress | Via Politics After 50, this link to a site where you can tell them what you think of them.  You can write your own letter or use theirs.

But hers is awesome.  "I just had a certain bone to pick, so I picked it," she says modestly.  It's good all the way through, but here are my favorite bits:

Snark O' the Day: WSJ Blames Atheists for the Collapse of Wall Street

by Teh Puppet Mistress | Myers:  The Wall Street Journal is a Very Silly Place

The United States has some serious problems: an ugly war, a shaky economy, a bad government (on the way out, at last). It's been a rough eight years. So of course it must be someone's fault, and Daniel Henninger has a simple explanation: blame the atheists. Especially blame the atheist's successful war on Christmas. He says, "A nation whose people can't say 'Merry Christmas' is a nation capable of ruining its own economy."

Katie Couric Talks to David Letterman About the Palin Interview

by Teh Nutroots | Hey, it's Sarah Palin day!

This is pretty awesome too.

Talkin Turkey: The Sarah Palin Turkey Slaughter Incident

by Blue Stockings | Palin is interviewed. Turkeys are slaughtered in the background. I'm just not sure how to interpret that. Or rather, I can't improve on HuffPost.

Some videos you just have to see to believe. On Thursday, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin appeared in Wasilla in order to pardon a local turkey in anticipation of Thanksgiving. This proved to be a slightly absurd but ultimately unremarkable event. But what came next was positively surreal. After the pardon Palin proceeded to do an interview with a local TV station while the turkeys were being SLAUGHTERED in the background!! Seemingly oblivious to the gruesomeness going on over her shoulder, she carries on talking for over three minutes. Watch the video below to see for yourself. Be warned, it's kind of gruesome.

Yeah, it is. But maybe it will do people good to see where their food comes from?

Suffering Fools: GOP Senators Get Sent to Funky Town

by Teh Puppet Mistress | I don't usually find The Politico laugh-out-loud funny, but this article filled me with effervescent glee.

Conservatives Declare Us the Victors in Iraq: "THE WAR IS OVER AND WE WON"

by Teh Puppet Mistress | I've been steadfastly ignoring this latest wingnut meme all week, but The Toot sees off the most recent attempt of wingnuts who miss blowing hard on the big bullshit horn about their superior superiority and want to feel right-eous and holler and bloviate about something.   They need their fix of self-congratulatory self-righteousness.