Friday, October 06, 2006
TIGERS 6, YANKEES 0. Mr. Rogers, where was this shit when you pitched for us? I ain't seen curves like that since they closed Billy's Topless.
I liked the Tommy Lasorda commercials, too. Lasorda's blog is just okay, though I love when he says stuff like "Go out and vote for Nomar, it is your duty!" I wonder what it would be like if comments were unmoderated. (What a pity Earl Weaver isn't around to do podcasts.)
UPDATE. Actually Tommy can curse pretty good too when a pitcher's giving him a hard time during a fucking World Series game. (The organ music is a wonderful accompaniment.) But Weaver had more style.
11:48 PM by roy edroso
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LITERALLY. David Brooks says, oh yeah, you liberals think the Foley scandal is bad, well, there's an underage seduction in The Vagina Monologues but you liberals love that, don't you?
Stunned onlookers point out to Brooks that The Vagina Monologues is a play, whereas Mark Foley is a real person. Ann Althouse -- she takes pictures, you know! -- responds:The third letter notes Brooks's omission of the "simple point" that what Mark Foley did was "real" and "The Vagina Monologues" is "make-believe." But, again, the enthusiasm for "The Vagina Monologues" is very real. There are a lot of things you could say to this. You could try to explain to these people the concept of fictional characters. You could try to explain that not every character in every scene speaks for the author. You could try to explain that these cows are very small, while those cows are far away.
It would all be a waste of time. Some kinds of ignorance are so obviously the result of hard, patient work that all you can really do about them is marvel at God's creation and move on.
UPDATE. I just had to haul this comment on up to the front of the class: "Millions of people enjoyed Silence of the Lambs, and yet if a Republican were caught engaging in murder and cannibalism, you can only imagine how the hypocritical liberals would react."
UPDATE II. Comments at Professor Althouse's place also augment the hilarity, but in a different way:Didn't the left give us performance art and haven't leftists, in their never ending pursuit of absolute equality, instructed us the everything is art and that we're all artists? When'd we do that? I've got to start coming to more of the meetings.
1:21 PM by roy edroso
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SHORTER CRAZY JESUS LADY. Now that I no longer work for any of the people Bob Woodward is exposing, it's amazing how much better his writing has become.
12:46 PM by roy edroso
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YEAH, WE GOOD. I have a cold and lots to do but I can't keep myself from watching these Mets. They're pumped bigger than usual, but not out of proportion -- their playoff jam is a natural extension of their regular-season jam: more clapping and arm-flinging between plays, but outside of that the same easy, team-wide shit-eating grin at being part of a very good machine.
I only got one game in at Shea this year, but even over the TV their pleasure this season has been radiant. It's very different from 2000, when the madman Bobby Valentine pushed by force of cap-chewing will a bunch of pretenders into the World Series, only to watch them crumble against the hated Yankees. I'll always respect Bobby V for that -- it was a brilliant specimen of the ridiculous persistence that keeps Mets fans sane in the long off-years. We've had shitty teams and shitty seasons, but sometimes, just as we're saying to hell with it, we come back from the concession stand to find we ain't done so bad after all. 2000 was the apotheosis of Orange and Blue* hope against hope.
But in the past few years the Mets have gone another way. They've reinvigorated the farm teams and shown something resembling patience. Look how Willie Randolph and Omar Minaya have nurtured the present crew. Who knew it was a good idea to lose Mike Cameron and gain Carlos Delgado? Dumbass me, I thought that was a wash. I thought Tom Glavine was a bad bet from day one, and expected we'd trade him away in the new era -- but look at his line tonight! And whatever the Skipper has been saying to Reyes and Wright ought to be recorded and kept in a vault for future generations to Talmudically ponder. And Julio Franco! 48 goddamn years old! Makes it to first and bats in a run! I haven't trusted an old man on the Mets since Derek Bell pulled up lame in 2000 -- and he was only 33.
They were overexcited in the 9th -- Reyes' throw pulled Delgado off the bag for the first out, and for the last. But they got the job done.
We're up 2-0 and our small-ball team is looking at the harder-they-fall Cards in the NLCS. It ain't '86, but it's pretty sweet.
Why to love the Mets, here. Why to hate the Yankees (like you need a reason), here.
* Yeah, I'm Old School.
12:14 AM by roy edroso
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Thursday, October 05, 2006
SHORTER MICHELLE MALKIN: If I can't post on websites that don't want me, the Islamofascists will have won.
(Why doesn't she just take her top off? I'll post her stupid video if she does.)
1:15 PM by roy edroso
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THE HE-MAN JESUS-HATERS CLUB. Remember the right-wing gibberish about the Amish schoolhouse murders? (Psst, just say yes! It's two posts down!) We can officially top it, now that John Derbyshire has weighed in on the treasonous, Jesus-emulating Pennyslvania Dutch grandpa who counseled some of that other-cheek* crap. In response to John Podhoretz' objection ("this story disturbs me deeply... I'm not sure I would want to be someone who succeeded in rising above hatred..." He needn't worry), Derbyshire writes:A civilization that can't summon up some pretty widespread hatred for a man who lines up little girls and shoots them in their heads, after having been foiled in an attempt to molest them, is a civilization with a spring broken somewhere. Here, the famously unstable Derbyshire seems to conflate "civilization" (in Derbspeak, the United States of America and all affilated homosexuals) with the Amish grandpa -- a brain-chemical rather than a philosophical issue, as even Derb must, when sedated, understand that ours is a society pulsating with inchoate hatred, and that much of it is discharged upon the perpetrator(s) of the criminal-outrage-of-the-week, albeit in absentia via dinner-table conversation or barroom braggadocio. (Those of us who have regular contact with Americans will recall how often we were told what Joe Citizen would do if he got his hands on Bin Laden, in those days before George W. Bush declared Bin Laden irrelevant.)
Leftover inchoate hatred then devolves upon wives, girlfriends, rival football teams, and perpetrator(s) of the celebrity-outrage-of-the-week.
You know you've reached some sort of a milestone when you make Rod Dreher look sane.
As I've said before, I'm not a Christian except in habits and morality. Derbyshire says he is one, and yet visits upon a perfect Imitator of Christ the sort of treatment he usually reserves for gay people. I would say it represents a new low, but I have been writing this for a few minutes, and I'm sure something worse has been published meanwhile.
* Duncan, don't even start. I checked the Sermon on the Mount, and the other-cheek stuff was not a typo.
UPDATE. A little clarifying on linkages added.
10:32 AM by roy edroso
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Wednesday, October 04, 2006
THE END OF THE AFFAIR. The Foley scandal continues its widening gyre. Foley himself is becalmed in rehab, but no one cares about him. The Parties are surfing the gyre. The Republicans have the worse job, and are trying all kinds of wild shit to reverse its course. The Perfesser hehindeeds through the howling wind that it's really about gay hypocrisy, or pro-gay hypocrisy that's really anti-gay, or some damn thing. His comrade cries out:Does anyone seriously think that the Democrats can position themselves as the party of sexual restraint? The party that will be tough on gay men, straight men, or anyone else who gives off even a whiff of impropriety?
Please - this is not a bidding war the Democrats can win and I am reasonably certain that, after years of "sex is a private matter", it is not a war the Democrats want to start. But like most shouting into the wind, this is bootless. As previously noted here, the Democrats are considered the Party of libertine sex, as a thousand Leno jokes will attest. The Republicans have encouraged that perception, and positioned themselves as the Party of family values, and benefited from the comparison. When one of their own got caught out, no one thought the roles had been magically reversed. We just thought the Republicans had fucked up. Again.
Remember when the cry over Clinton was, it's not the sex, it's the lying/perjury/hypocrisy? Now it's not the sex, it's the fuckups. We expect our politicians to lie and perjure themselves and be hypocrites, but when Denny Hastert goes blundering around trying to explain Foley on the radio, it may be that the average observer is not reminded of Clinton or Gary Condit or Jim McGreevey, but of Rumsfeld, and "Brownie," and Abramoff: the spectacle of a Party that runs nearly all our government, once again giving mumbled, grudging responses when things go wrong on their watch.
When the Foley scandal subsides, no lingering taint of sex madness will adhere to the Republicans. The stink of failure may grow a smidge more ripe, though.
9:55 PM by roy edroso
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THE ELEPHANT, THE BLIND MAN SAID, IS VERY LIKE A LIBERAL CONSPIRACY. Hugh Hewitt directs our attention to this analyst of the recent Amish schoolhouse shooting, who closes:How a culture finds a balance between love and weakness, fear, aggression and violence, is a puzzle that is not easily solved. I wonder if a more mobilized society, one which deems it appropriate and acceptable for all members of the society to have the right and the knowledge to defend themselves, will not eventually be the avenue of wisdom. So, there's your answer: if the Amish schoolgirls were packing heat, none of this would have happened.
Dr. Mrs. Ole Perfesser, asked about the incident, says, "I mean, we focus so much on the mental health of girls and women, and we’ve neglected a lot of the boys and men in this country. You go into a school, and a lot of times, the boys’ psychological and mental health is sort of neglected." Damn bitches, hoggin' up the mental health care. Every time I go to my court-mandated therapist appointments, they're all looking at me like, what's this guy doing here?
Columbine Dad tells Katie Couric that it's all about abortion. (Hat tip to God Is For Suckers.)
This guy's just nuts.
If you're wondering why these guys think the Foley scandal is a Democratic plot, this will give you a hint. For them, everything bad that happens in life has something to do with a little bag of fetishes labelled "liberalism." That's why they can go on mouthing rank absurdities while the rest of us are giving them that Springtime for Hitler stare.
UPDATE. Red State commenter: "President Bush has called a meeting next Tuesday of 'experts' to figure out what can be done. I hope this is not just a political move to appear to be in favor of protecting kids, but is actually designed to get real results." I wonder if he was trying to be funny.
7:56 AM by roy edroso
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Tuesday, October 03, 2006
WHY IS JANE GALT? A few posts back I challenged Jane Galt's notion that if we don't like our present economy, it means we also don't like iPods and 2-way wrist TVs and all the other great innovations of our times. Now she says this means my readers and I are Marxists with "a deep emotional need for things to be getting worse in order to justify their political beliefs."
Obviously arguing with her is a waste of time, but I will leave one question: if I think the Marx Brothers are funnier than Adam Sandler, does that mean I prefer the Great Depresssion to the Clinton Boom?
12:13 PM by roy edroso
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Monday, October 02, 2006
ANIMALS CAN BE BRED AND SLAUGHTERED… Reihan Salam reviews Mike Judge’s Idiocracy. The premise of the film, he says (I haven't yet had the pleasure), is that “yuppies” won’t breed, so slack-jawed yokels who like fart jokes will inherit the earth and manage it very badly. Sounds pretty funny. Here’s Salam’s reaction:…[Judge is] telling thoughtful Americans that we can't expect other people to solve our problems for us. If you're alarmed by the callousness and the crassness of our culture, which you certainly should be, do something about it. Lead or follow. Getting out of the way is not an option. Failing that, you should at least try to outbreed the people you hate most. We’ve seen this idea before in conservative circles: that The Right People are underbreeding and thus allowing the Wrong People to dominate. Of course, usually the Right People are portrayed as the White People. I don’t think Salam’s saying that, but what is he saying? That smart people should “outbreed” stupid people? That “yuppies” should outbreed the underprivileged?
It is rare and sort of charming when they show faith in any branch of science at all, but even I know that genetics is more complicated than that.
3:27 PM by roy edroso
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WHY I AM A DEMOCRAT. A Republican talks to underage boys about taking off their underwear, and conservative bloggers agree: Democrats are immoral.
"How can -- why should? -- Democrats resist doing everything they can to hurt Republicans with this?" says Professor Althouse. Why, you could more easily separate fornicating dogs than detach Democrats from such scandal. "Of course, there's profuse salivating over on the pro-Democrat blogs," says the Professor. "Democratic leaders in the House have made their moves..." But in the end, Democrat saliva is, like everything else produced by Democrats, hurting the country:So it seems in the run-up to the election we won't have to talk about Iraq and terrorism and detainees anymore. Let's talk about sex. Such is the dream life of Althouse when Bill Clinton is not making her think about cigars. (She's not the only one. Dean Barnett's response is, "I’ve never met a person in private life who indulged his appetites with as much vigor as Bill Clinton did" -- further proof, as if it were needed, that Dean Barnett doesn't get around much.)
Meanwhile The Ole Perfesser says Foley's Pedopublican antics are a net loss for the New York Times, and Daily Pundit says the 16-year-old was asking for it. That provokes deep thought among Stop the ACLU's commenters: "I don’t know if flirting with a 16 year old is legal in Washington DC or at the federal level. There are states it is legal for an older individual to have sex with a 16 year old..." See, this is why I read law blogs: news I can use!
It may be that the Foley IMs only skirt felony. What these guys affect not to realize is why the spectacle of a Republican nailed for sexing up teens is so funny and resonant. It has little to do with legalities, or even right and wrong. On the off chance that they really don't understand, I would recommend a reading of Tartuffe.
Or, if they're impatient or illiterate, they can have this explanation: when you work for, and identify yourself with, a bunch of homo-hatin', sex-averse moral scolds, it's freaking hilarious when you're caught stroking it to male teeny talk. That's why the "B-b-b-b-but Gerry Studds" rejoinder doesn't work. We're Democrats -- we have to get laid constantly, by whomever or whatever is available. It's in our DNA, like treason.
The narrative of our current politics is admittedly all fucked up, and stacked absurdly against the Party of Jefferson. But it does have little compensations like these.
10:46 AM by roy edroso
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