Tuesday, July 14, 2015

HERE TO PUMP YOU UP.

Having apparently given up on convincing voters on the issues, The Federalist is working on Arguments from Butchness. There have been a couple of stories in the news lately about Kitty Genovese-style mass indifference to attacks on the D.C. Metro, from which Federalist author Robert Tracinski extrapolates that liberals are pussies:
Ironically, the same people now making excuses for [Metro] cowardice are the kind who engage in exaggerated Kabuki theater displays about how evil slavery was and how terrible the Confederate flag is and how much they furiously oppose them—150 years after it took any courage to do so.
This causal or genetic link between disapproval of Confederate flags and cowardice is not supported by any evidence except, well, D.C., they're all Big Gummint sissies, right? Also, Tracinski saw in the paper that "at a Renaissance festival in Colorado, a 'wench-costumed woman' put a man in a headlock after he stole a jouster’s sword, which gives you some idea of the cultural difference between Colorado and DC." Maybe the Colorado wench was just high. Speaking of which, just in case you were wondering, Tracinski says he's no sissy either:
I know how I would react [to random violence] because I’ve done it. The last time I can recall was many years ago: two drunk guys in a parking lot were attacking a third guy, and I tackled one of the drunks, allowing the victim to safely escape. It was not that big a deal and did not involve much risk on my part, though I didn’t really know that going in. 
Giving Tracinski the benefit of every doubt, including sobriety, good for him but so what? I lived in New York City in the late 1970s; maybe I should have the Croix de Guerre, or at least bring it up when I run out of political ammunition ("Hey, I lived under the Koch Administration, motherfucker! And I say single payer rules!").

I also worked several years as a waiter and a busboy, so I can sympathize somewhat with Traciniski's colleague Peter Cook, who is proud of his experiences in F&B and retail, and I agree with him that "Everyone Should Work at Least One Crap Job." But Cook thinks this is a political distinction, too. He sneers at a few reporters (aka "the national media") who laughed because, after serving barbecue to a crowd, Scott Walker kept his latex gloves on while eating. Well, huffs Cook, "why wouldn’t you after spending that much time around ribs?" I can imagine why you wouldn't (for one thing, it makes you wonder if Walker kept serving up BBQ after slobbering over them), but Cook makes it a crusade:
Yes, gloves. That’s what food service regulations require. These two journalists seem unaware that when you prepare or serve food to other people, you should have clean hands while doing so, and the best way to ensure one’s hands are clean is to wear gloves. Doing so is not a freakish anomaly, but what food-service workers do daily, all around the country.
I was a dishwasher once, too. I wonder if the dishwashers Cook knows eat with their gloves on.

Also, the catchphrase "beta males," familiar to readers of MRA fedora dopes, has caught on at The Federalist: "Tocqueville Identified The Original Beta Males: Europeans," "Behold, The Beta Males Who Feel Good About Watching A Man Die," "while not all men can be alpha males, they can be men," etc. For readers who need a little more help with their masculinity, they have an article by Rebekah Curtis about how her husband made a real Second Amendment woman out of her with guns:
The guy loves guns: he has a lot of them, he’s good at shooting them, and he wanted me to be a part of it. Having my Second Amendment adherence bluff called has been a rough, but worthwhile, experience.
To each her own. I expect this outbreak is really about identity politics. Since gay marriage went nationwide and the Battle Flag came down, what conservative signifiers are left? Being a prick to working people and hatred of Mexicans, which in and of themselves have limited appeal -- but that appeal may be boosted if it's accompanied by a bit of swagger. It's been hard for conservatives to work machismo since that unfortunate Iraq war which all of them cheered and in which few of them served, and it just got worse when the gay rights avalanche made it harder than before to get away with portraying their opponents as sissies. The upside is that the gays, having been recast as fascist overlords, can be ignored, and the brethren can butch up and work on their manly prose physiques with some web sparring matches against accommodating strawmen. Maybe by the time the campaign heats up they'll be sufficiently ripped to call Hillary a bitch out loud and not run away.

250 comments:

  1. DN Nation4:46 PM

    "Ironically, the same people now making excuses for [Metro] cowardice are the kind who engage in exaggerated Kabuki theater displays about how evil slavery was"

    Words mean things: "Kabuki is a classical Japanese dance-drama. Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate make-up worn by some of its performers."



    Yeah. That's *exactly* like thinking slavery and its whitewashing are wrong.


    Also, not ironic. 0-2, you hack.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Bizarro Mike5:00 PM

    Confession time: I was a betamax male. However, with the demise of the format, I eventually had to go with VHS.

    And I think I identify as more of a digamma male. That whole wolf pack dominance thing turned out to be wrong, but all of that stupid language is still out there...

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ironically, the same people now making excuses for [Metro] cowardice are the kind who engage in exaggerated Kabuki theater displays about how evil slavery was and how terrible the Confederate flag is and how much they furiously oppose them—150 years after it took any courage to do so.


    but who would've thought? it figures.

    ReplyDelete
  4. J Neo Marvin5:04 PM

    Ironically, non sequitur non sequitur non sequitur non sequitur, therefore liberals are pussies.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Steve-O5:04 PM

    Behold: the Alpha Male

    "Fighting drunks turns out not to be very sporting."

    ReplyDelete
  6. Bizarro Mike5:06 PM

    He is the toughest internet tough-guy on the entire INTERNET.

    ReplyDelete
  7. DN Nation5:07 PM

    As always, we're being lectured about how to be a hunka-hunka burning stud from a guy who looks like http://i.imgur.com/1NZLVI7.jpg

    ReplyDelete
  8. J Neo Marvin5:08 PM

    Ironically, slavery was like rain on your wedding day.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Bizarro Mike5:09 PM

    Delta male, tops.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Gromet5:10 PM

    We're only up to the Beta Male? I feel like we've been on the verge of the Omega Man since '96.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Is true! Iffen you weren't around during the Civil War you cain't complain about it now!! Science, people!

    ReplyDelete
  12. I'm going with human/hamster cross.

    ReplyDelete
  13. me, i prefer to think of myself as an omega man

    ReplyDelete
  14. People have eaten all the omega oil.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Gromet5:13 PM

    No, he's not Delta material. Those guys didn't quit when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor.

    ReplyDelete
  16. J Neo Marvin5:13 PM

    Frank Black really went downhill without Kim Deal being there to keep him in check, didn't he?

    ReplyDelete
  17. J Neo Marvin5:15 PM

    Bunch of Pi Males if you ask me.

    ReplyDelete
  18. I never know whether to blame testosterone poisoning or testosterone deficiency for these limp, odious, effusions of...manhood, if that's what it is. Get thee back to polishing thy AR-15's barrel, Tracinski.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Mike McCarthy5:30 PM

    I, for one, welcome our new gay overlords.

    ReplyDelete
  20. HKatz5:30 PM

    "while not all men can be alpha males, they can be men,"


    So if you can't be an alpha male, you can still be a man? But how you can be a man without being an alpha male, since they're the only true men in the sense of being manliest because they're alpha? If you aren't alpha, then you aren't a man. You're maybe pretending to be a man, the way an actor would, maybe even a Kabuki Theater actor, but not very convincingly, because in Kabuki Theater you wear makeup, right? Which means you can't be man.

    ReplyDelete
  21. LittlePig5:40 PM

    and I tackled one of the drunks, allowing the victim to safely escape.

    So what do you want, a cookie?

    ReplyDelete
  22. BigHank535:44 PM

    Christ, a fucking Carhartt jacket, another blue-collar staple overtaken by people desperately grasping for shreds of authenticity. That one's pretty goddamn spotless for a jacket designed for farmers, heavy-equipment operators, and mechanics, isn't it?

    ReplyDelete
  23. Gromet5:48 PM

    I'm now hoping an old photo surfaces of Obama eating ribs while wearing rubber gloves. I want to see wingnuts explain how that proves President Arugulafag Fancy-Mustard is an arrogant priss, while on Walker those same gloves continue to prove he's the rootinest tootinest man of the people.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Steve-O5:50 PM

    Cookies are for Beta Males. Shortly after his heroic tackle, he hunted down a deer, killed it with his bare hands, and ate the whole thing, antlers to hooves. Then, with a mighty belch, he wiped his hands off on the dirt ground and strutted away.

    ReplyDelete
  25. LittlePig5:55 PM

    The 'shoes on the desk' gambit. Yep, probably.

    ReplyDelete
  26. The gloves are to stop you contaminating the ribs. If there is contamination on the ribs and you eat using those gloves you will get the contamination. As a lab tech of 30 years I would die rather than eat in gloves that had been used to serve food.

    ReplyDelete
  27. Check out our new line of laptopwear!

    ReplyDelete
  28. J Neo Marvin6:04 PM

    Pretending you fought drunks is a damn sight less sporting, for sure.

    ReplyDelete
  29. It's like sleeping in a hazmat suit.

    ReplyDelete
  30. J Neo Marvin6:07 PM

    Yes, opposing segregation during the Civil Rights Movement took no courage whatsoever, right? Go die in a fire, you "drunk fighting" poser.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Brian J.6:10 PM

    But you're missing out on their other sterling article from today, "Will Marriage Dissidents Be Treated as Bigots or Pro-Lifers?" Although there's a typo in the title in that they spelled and o-r.

    ReplyDelete
  32. sigyn6:13 PM

    The whole idea behind latex gloves is that you're supposed to change them every time you switch tasks; otherwise you're still cross-contaminating everything.


    Silver lining: Hopefully Walker handled raw meat with those gloves too.

    ReplyDelete
  33. glennisw6:16 PM

    Ironically, the same people now making excuses
    The same people, really? Then surely you could quote them, right Robert? On both issues?

    ReplyDelete
  34. mortimer20006:20 PM

    Sadly, the other drunk was a concealed-carry patriot who decided to stand his ground against the corpulent conservative attacking his friend, so all we have of Mr. Tracinski is this very brave column.

    ReplyDelete
  35. glennisw6:21 PM

    Are you saying Scott Walker got testosterone on those latex gloves?

    ReplyDelete
  36. geraldfnord6:21 PM

    I've thought that teenaged American boys' attraction to Queen is that uncertain of their rôle and sexual possibilities, they're in good shape to appreciate the swagger a bisexual Parsee immigrant in a racist and homophobic country needed to produce and maintain, especially on stage. Well, that and Brian May.

    ReplyDelete
  37. I wonder how conservatives define terms like "alpha" and "beta." I ask because those terms are pretty well defined in the Manosphere. In those circles, an "alpha male" is someone who has anonymous sex with women of dubious ability to consent, whereas a "beta male" is someone who does sissy shit like take care of his kids. I don't know, if I were still writing about politics I would avoid using terms that could be linked to very detailed guides on how to emotionally abuse your girlfriend.

    ReplyDelete
  38. geraldfnord6:27 PM

    No, a beta male in their discourse is still a man by virtue of being superior to a woman.

    Or as I delight in having coined, at least to my knowledge, 'All Real Men find women suspiciously effeminate.'

    (I wonder if my never having gone through a childhood or adolescent period of hating girls is more common on the Left than the Right.)

    ReplyDelete
  39. geraldfnord6:30 PM

    Varys, is that you?

    If so, why the hell are you bald? Eunuchs don't get bald except at extremely advanced age. (Related note: Unsullied training selects for men with larger amounts of extra-testicular testosterone.)

    ReplyDelete
  40. The last time I can recall was many years ago: two drunk guys in a parking lot were attacking a third guy, and I tackled one of the drunks, allowing the victim to safely escape. It was not that big a deal and did not involve much risk on my part, though I didn’t really know that going in.

    Hmmm. . . Any possibility that the "two drunk guys" were actually trying to put paid to a mugger? If so, then Tracinski helped the bad guy get away by just plunging in when he "didn't really know what was going on." Oh, well!

    It's things like this that make me think all the rightwing clamoring for everyone to be armed to the teeth 24-7 everywhere is not going to lead to a reduction in tragedy. Because dopes like Tracinski will shoot first as they act out their hero fantasies, the potential for actually increasing the casualties among innocents is through the roof.

    ReplyDelete
  41. geraldfnord6:43 PM

    My endocrinologist was visibly shocked to find out I were severely deficient in testosterone (as were I and my wife). He said 'You're a nice, polite, guy, and most of them are so obnoxious my secretary can diagnose them.'

    Then, I thought of Harlan Ellison for some reason that got shot while escaping me.

    (Secondary hypotestosterone: clomiphene cleared it up, which I wanted solely for my bones' sake, and is much less icky-feeling and expensive than Androgel.)

    ReplyDelete
  42. Randy Gibbons6:43 PM

    This Alpha and Beta business is annoying. It'd be less so if some people didn't seem to take it seriously. The thing is, we're not really pack animals. If you're a wolf, you can't become the top dog (either sex) without having the qualifications, which - correct me if I'm wrong - are consistent across the species. Losing status is straightforward, too. As smart as these animals are, they don't seem to innovate very much along social lines.


    It's like Social Darwinism in that a little goes a long way. At some point you gotta step back from the pipe and think about how humans really work. Not to say that I understand human nature. But I have yet to see any good come of classifying people as Alphas, Betas, or Zetas if that's done. Status and masculinity are very subjective judgments, even within groups. For every set of benchmarks you could name, I could find you an exception-to-the-rules guy who is nevertheless calling the shots, being deferred to, whatever. Or vice versa: a stereotypical man's man who is not leading a pack or passing on his genes. But then, you could argue that by another set of standards, those two guys are not A & B but B & C. I don't care either way.

    ReplyDelete
  43. EndOfTheWorld6:43 PM

    So a Libertarian internet magazine is giving some anonymous Redditor shit for saying "I'm not sorry I put myself first." They're all about that enlightened self-interest until they need someone else to jump in front of a knife, ain't they?

    ReplyDelete
  44. geraldfnord6:45 PM

    I can thank Charles Stross' "Rule 34" for my understanding that....

    ReplyDelete
  45. geraldfnord6:48 PM

    Now he's gigantic.

    ReplyDelete
  46. geraldfnord6:48 PM

    Real Men worship their Pappies, and their Pappies' Pappies, unfrom the tenth generation.

    ReplyDelete
  47. geraldfnord6:48 PM

    And here I thought I was a released male...hey, maybe I'm a Beta Male 2.0, in which case I gather you've got to make way for me...or let loose The Sentinels.

    ReplyDelete
  48. geraldfnord6:50 PM

    Ummm-ra-hrarrrrl...pi.

    ReplyDelete
  49. geraldfnord6:50 PM

    ...which is why sex with him requires a long stopover in Atlanta.

    (Tip your veal, it'll be here all week.)

    ReplyDelete
  50. Randy Gibbons6:56 PM

    Once when I was maybe 15 my mom was driving me to school and noticed a couple of girls fighting in a parking lot, surrounded by other kids. One girl started bashing the other girl's head onto the asphalt. My mom (a slight woman of average height) stopped the car and leapt out to stop the fight. I didn't follow her, though. I thought it was a crazy move. I had to go to school with those tough latinas (and the boys standing around). Mom could've gotten herself in big trouble. I don't recall if she succeeded in separating them, but I recall the bystanders were incredulous on seeing her try.


    Is my mom a better man than Tracinski? Than me at fifteen, when I was 6' 2" (like now) but about 140#? Hell if I know. This sort of reasoning is not my bag.

    ReplyDelete
  51. 150 years ago, the people too cowardly to come out publicly against slavery would be Southerners who kept their mouths shut while the Confederates launched a war against the rest of the nation.


    It certainly wasn't "liberals," who pretty much kicked the asses of evil slavers to hell and back.

    ReplyDelete
  52. tofu gives you boobies.

    ReplyDelete
  53. Randy Gibbons7:03 PM

    I thought I heard that baldness was associated with high testosterone.

    ReplyDelete
  54. it does have a certain fraternal appeal, I suppose

    ReplyDelete
  55. Ellis_Weiner7:08 PM

    "Ironically, the same people now making excuses for [Metro] cowardice are
    the kind who engage in exaggerated Kabuki theater displays about how
    evil slavery was and how terrible the Confederate flag is and how much
    they furiously oppose them—150 years after it took any courage to do so."


    This is pure Monty Python.



    JOHN CLEESE: Excuse me? Oh I SEE. You're saying slavery was horrible NOW. But--may I ask? Where were you THEN? Where were you when slavery was ACTUALLY GOING ON? I don't recall seeing you take a firm moral stand AT THE TIME, do I...

    TERRY JONES: Well, uh, no. Wasn't born back then. That'zz 150 years ago.


    JC: Ah.

    ReplyDelete
  56. He's sort of missing the whole point of Bystander Syndrome. He was the only bystander, therefore he was the only one who could do something if something was going to be done. The situation on the Metro is a whole bunch of people looking around because they thing someone else will do something.

    ReplyDelete
  57. The whole alpha/beta thing for wolves is outdated at this point.

    ReplyDelete
  58. There is a serious conceptual error at work here which may amount to mental illness. In the solipsism of Walker's belief that he is wearing the gloves to protect his hands rather than to protect the food and the psychosis of the belief that he should keep them on from fear of getting on his fingers stuff that he's not afraid to put in his mouth.

    ReplyDelete
  59. This a million zillion times until the end of the universe.

    ReplyDelete
  60. Ellis_Weiner7:14 PM

    But in Kabuki, the women are played by men. Oh dear, the poor Federalist. No wonder they're so confused.

    ReplyDelete
  61. What kind of jouster uses a sword?

    ReplyDelete
  62. Randy Gibbons7:14 PM

    And people? Don't tell me I'm wrong about everything.

    ReplyDelete
  63. Everywhere I go
    I'm jouster gigolo

    ReplyDelete
  64. Possibly he is fed by other people and so is unused to food handling?

    ReplyDelete
  65. Ellis_Weiner7:17 PM

    Walker was probably just being lazy. Or dim--I heard some of his I'm-in speech yesterday, and he sounded like some frat idiot who someone gave a sheet of paper to and said, "Here, read this and run for President."

    ReplyDelete
  66. ...and standing for the Grand Old Flying Circus Party...is Jethro Q. Tracinskistitty

    ReplyDelete
  67. It's just a primitivizing of gender relations and human relationships, denying/evading the negotiated consensual basis which civilized people make the core of theirs. That's what makes them MRAs, after all- they suck at negotiating needs and consent properly.

    ReplyDelete
  68. Randy Gibbons7:21 PM

    Well and concisely put.

    ReplyDelete
  69. Ellis_Weiner7:22 PM

    Queen schmeen. Look at Bowie in his androgynous Ziggy days.

    ReplyDelete
  70. redoubtagain7:24 PM

    Life goes on behind me

    ReplyDelete
  71. There once was a jouster called Nance
    Who was short of the cash for a lance
    She could only afford
    A ridiculous sword
    And the bodkin she kept in her pants

    ReplyDelete
  72. He is supposed to have worked at a McDonalds in his youth. They may actually not be allowed to take their gloves off at lunch break. Glad I only worked at the old school kind of restaurant where you just wash your hands every 40 seconds or so.

    ReplyDelete
  73. Hey, could you spot me? I'm about to bench press 11 billion pixels.

    ReplyDelete
  74. redoubtagain7:34 PM

    All this. Straight out of McMegan's Shooter-Bumrush Elementary School Handbook.

    ReplyDelete
  75. Argh! I guess Maccas didn't really worry about the workers so much. Yep handwashing is better IMO

    ReplyDelete
  76. The Southerners didn't have time to come out against slavery. They were fighting for something important! (A misinterpretation of the tenth amendment.)

    ReplyDelete
  77. mgmonklewis7:38 PM

    You had me at "Arguments from Butchness."

    Warmest regards,

    Aristotle

    ReplyDelete
  78. J Neo Marvin7:39 PM

    You're probably right. That would be the same sort of angrily misunderstanding a situation and jumping in to proudly make a fool of yourself and bragging about it afterwards that made Breitbart famous. Remember the anti-child soldiers demonstration?

    ReplyDelete
  79. redoubtagain7:40 PM

    That makes two of us. (And you could see our cheapass store owner visibly wince whenever any of us used his precious soap and water.)

    ReplyDelete
  80. I can beat up two internets while typing with one hand. Wait, they didn't sound right, let me rephrase . . .

    ReplyDelete
  81. mgmonklewis7:41 PM

    No kidding. On the farm, coveralls like that look pristine exactly once, the very first time you put them on. After that, they look like work clothes. Cripes, he looks like an overeager feed salesman on his first day on the job.

    ReplyDelete
  82. and a dildo with a condom on it.

    ReplyDelete
  83. http://truthaboutguns-zippykid.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/GWG_glendale.jpg

    ReplyDelete
  84. Rick Venema of COLONIAL HEIGHTS, VIRGINIA would like a word.

    ReplyDelete
  85. Zeta Man
    http://images.franchiseherald.com/data/images/full/22789/michael-douglas-as-hank-pym.jpg?w=570

    ReplyDelete
  86. I'm now hoping an old photo surfaces of Obama eating ribs while wearing rubber gloves.I'm not, because that would suggest that at one time, Obama was a thoughtless fucking imbecile, too.

    ReplyDelete
  87. susanoftexas8:06 PM

    Gamma male.

    ReplyDelete
  88. Megalon8:10 PM

    I bet he's one of those assholes who won't shut up about what a stud he was back In the ten tenth grade.

    ReplyDelete
  89. And the bodkin she kept in her pantsThat's not what I heard.

    ReplyDelete
  90. I may have been unconsciously influenced by the kabuki references downthread.

    ReplyDelete
  91. In my day, we didn't have a Metro. I had to take an assortment of buses to H.S.

    *washes hands in Pilate's finger bowl*
    ~

    ReplyDelete
  92. The phrase "allowing the victim to safely escape" lacks what I think he assumes is a ringing tone of valor. The image that comes to mind is of three drunk guys slugging away when this pudgy hysteric throws himself at the ankles of one and the other two wander off into the night looking for more beer.

    ReplyDelete
  93. What's a marriage dissident? A guy in a long beard and a che guevara hat who complains about his wife?

    ReplyDelete
  94. While pudgy hysteric shouts "Unhand him, varlets. I will smite thee!"

    ReplyDelete
  95. Kind of opposite to a marriage celebrant?

    ReplyDelete
  96. Ah yes: Alpha fucks and beta bucks. I.e. women marry beta males and use them for their money, while fucking only alpha males and bearing only the children of alphas. Thus beta males are (supposedly) always raising other men's children.

    ReplyDelete
  97. And what rough trade is this, pray tell?

    Having my Second Amendment adherence bluff called has been a rough, but worthwhile, experience. what does this even mean? How rough did it get? Did she shoot her own foot off?

    ReplyDelete
  98. Is this Odd's bodkin? I heard he's not a dude you want to be crossing.

    ReplyDelete
  99. OMG Aimai, she married her guy and then he unexpectedly started cleaning his guns--lots of them--on the marital bed:
    my husband came out to me as an emotionally stable gun nut, I wasn’t thrilled. The guy loves guns: he has a lot of them, he’s good at shooting them, and he wanted me to be a part of it.

    She's not too explicit but it looks like they've traded fucking for going out to the range to get lead poisoning together.

    ReplyDelete
  100. No worries. It's nice looking at the Alpha Male Called Petraeus sucking up to the Commander-in-Chief like he's not sure he has permission to eat but he'd probably prefer not to anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  101. KC45s9:09 PM

    I've tackled a threatening drunk. It doesn't make me a hero. It just makes me someone who attends family reunions.

    ReplyDelete
  102. Ok, I actually went ahead and read the article. I don't know whether to be sorry for her, or appalled, or both. First, she explicitly compares everything about gun ownership to sex and her body, but the husband completely drops out of the story. Second, she sounds as bored by him and his guns as anyone would be--its like she married the guy and then found out he liked to pick his nose and eat the snot and decided she might as well join him because it was too much trouble to leave him.

    ReplyDelete
  103. tigrismus9:34 PM

    No, it doesn't. SAD FACE.

    ReplyDelete
  104. coozledad9:35 PM

    Delta male:

    https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d1/Howlin%27_Wolf_1972.JPG

    ReplyDelete
  105. coozledad9:43 PM

    I know a guy who used to roadie for Leon. They had to go pick him up from the hotel, because the show had started and Leon won't there. He was passed out the whole time they drove him to the amphitheater, and tottered and passed out on the steps to the stage and fell in a mudhole.


    When he finally made it to the stage, he killed it.

    ReplyDelete
  106. Oh my. I saw him once in Buffalo, and it may have been the last time I went to a rock concert. Because why bother?

    ReplyDelete
  107. BigHank5310:04 PM

    Oh dear.

    I still hate guns and wish I didn’t have to think about them, but do
    any of us need to be reminded that the world is full of really messed-up
    people with guns? If I ever ran into one of them, I’d rather be able to
    defend myself with more than moral outrage.


    The odds aren't on your side, sweetie. Sorry. And having watched a lot of people practice their shooting, the absolute best thing to do when you encounter a really messed-up person with a gun is to run the fuck away.

    ReplyDelete
  108. First, she explicitly compares everything about gun ownership to sex and
    her body, but the husband completely drops out of the story.HOT.

    ReplyDelete
  109. What's a marriage dissident?Someone who likes shackles and repeatedly storming the barricades?

    ReplyDelete
  110. Meanie-meanie, tickle a person10:34 PM

    Maybe by the time the campaign heats up...

    Hopefully--or not--they'll remember that dry strawdust can be quite flammable, indeed explosive. Ask anyone who's ever worked in a grain elevator...

    ReplyDelete
  111. TGuerrant10:44 PM

    And he's still wearing the cup he wore in 7th grade...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRAnNArP-Z4

    ReplyDelete
  112. Meanie-meanie, tickle a person10:49 PM

    ..as a two dollar pistol!

    ReplyDelete
  113. montag210:49 PM

    The sepia tone is so, umm, `50s. Evocative of fedoras, yep. And trains. And Rearden metal.

    But the eyes, the eyes show fear. And there's a bit of weakness around the mouth, maybe a too well-fed look.

    This is the guy in the film noir that spills all the beans he has (not a great many) after the first threat of violence.

    When the chips are down, this fella's a pants-wetter, mark my words. Which is okay, unless you're pretending that you're not one.

    ReplyDelete
  114. montag210:55 PM

    If that's the latest euphemism for barbecue sauce, then, yeah, probably.

    ReplyDelete
  115. TGuerrant10:55 PM

    Uh-uh. If you'd been born to the leadership class, you'd recognize The Glove as a symbol of power.

    ReplyDelete
  116. montag211:04 PM

    As a metaphor for Walker, yeah, that works.

    Pretty well, in fact.

    ReplyDelete
  117. Meanie-meanie, tickle a person11:14 PM

    Gramma male

    ReplyDelete
  118. montag211:14 PM

    It's also a shitload of wishful thinking.

    By people who have generally really fucked up at being people.

    ReplyDelete
  119. AGoodQuestion11:22 PM

    (By contrast, at a Renaissance festival in Colorado, a “wench-costumed woman” put a man in a headlock after he stole a jouster’s sword, which gives you some idea of the cultural difference between Colorado and DC.)


    No,it gives you some idea of the difference between Renaissance fests and everyday life. I've been to King Richard's Faire in Carver, Mass and this anecdote didn't make me blink. Massachusetts, people!

    ReplyDelete
  120. AGoodQuestion11:24 PM

    On the other hand he's already got the prion disease that turned him into Scott Walker.

    ReplyDelete
  121. montag211:26 PM

    "I still hate guns and wish I didn’t have to think about them...."

    "But, Jesus, they're in my face all the fucking time now, and I don't know what to do. He keeps bringing even more of the goddamned things home. It's like the Pennsyltucky Arsenal in here. There's six goddamned footlockers in the garage full of nothing but ammunition.

    "And today, he said he could get a great deal on some hand grenades, but only if he bought a gross, and what did I think, since I was always looking for deals when I shopped.

    "It's okay, though. I'm getting used to it, though it's been rough at times."

    ReplyDelete
  122. AGoodQuestion11:28 PM

    Omega Theta Pi, definitely.

    ReplyDelete
  123. AGoodQuestion11:30 PM

    This monkey hasn't gone to Heaven.

    ReplyDelete
  124. AGoodQuestion11:34 PM

    I never hated girls especially. Always been bi-hate-ual, I suppose.

    ReplyDelete
  125. AGoodQuestion11:38 PM

    Once you've decided to live in a He-Man fantasy world, you might as well convince yourself that you've sired a bunch of other men's kids as well. In for a dime...

    ReplyDelete
  126. StringOnAStick11:50 PM

    A psychotherapist I knew once stated that the more liberal people are, the less structured and enforced the specified gender roles. Conversely, the more conservative, the more you are going to get your ass kicked for not acting exactly as your gender is expected to.

    ReplyDelete
  127. StringOnAStick11:53 PM

    Not just IMO, but proven, at least according to the OSHA presentation for dental workers I am required to attend every year.

    ReplyDelete
  128. geraldfnord12:00 AM

    I cast Magic Missile!

    ReplyDelete
  129. geraldfnord12:01 AM

    ...and a baby's arm holding an apple.

    ReplyDelete
  130. StringOnAStick12:09 AM

    Back when I was a young, short, curvy, blonde geologist I started carrying a gun after a few scary encounters while doing field work. My 22 year old brain was capable even then of realizing the gun would do me no good, or worse, so I started just hiding in the woods when I heard people coming and ditched the gun. Run the fuck away was option #2, but hiding always worked.

    ReplyDelete
  131. StringOnAStick12:13 AM

    Hell, I live in Colorado. You so do NOT want to mess with the Ren Faire wenches. The word "toughness" cowers in their presence, and they wait all year for this cosplay opportunity.

    ReplyDelete
  132. jennofark12:17 AM

    So, if the liberals who now oppose the Confederate flag, 150 years after it took any courage to do so are sissies, what does that make the conservatives who still lack the courage to oppose it?

    ReplyDelete
  133. John Wesley Hardin12:31 AM

    "Having my Second Amendment no anal adherence bluff called has been a rough, but worthwhile, experience."

    ReplyDelete
  134. John Wesley Hardin12:35 AM

    I'm relying on it.

    ReplyDelete
  135. nedlyx12:35 AM

    Hay that photo was my old avatar in its complete form!

    ReplyDelete
  136. I had my first crush on a girl in first grade. She was a pretty Cuban girl whose parents were refugees. I can't remember having a period during which I hated girls, though there was a while where a lot of the other boys did and I went along with a lot of the teasing and insulting girls purely to get my share of the girls' attention. Always had a crush on some girl, though, from first grade onward and my friends made a sport of figuring out who and exposing me in the most embarassing possible fashion.


    Thirty-some years on, I'm still basically convinced that the male gender has substantially more and worse assholes. And the GOP is basically their frat house.

    ReplyDelete
  137. John Wesley Hardin12:37 AM

    No, I'm pretty sure these guys think slavery was a free ride when you're already there.

    ReplyDelete
  138. John Wesley Hardin12:37 AM

    If you can't be an athlete, you can be an athletic supporter.

    ReplyDelete
  139. jennofark12:41 AM

    anal adherence


    Sounds painful.

    ReplyDelete
  140. John Wesley Hardin12:42 AM

    If it persists for more than four hours, see your doctor.

    ReplyDelete
  141. And maybe that garage-door-opener setup from 9 to 5.

    ReplyDelete
  142. The same He-Man fantasy world where women don't have jobs, or if they do, they're not paid in any recognizable form of currency, because the menz are forced, forced I say, to pay for everything.

    ReplyDelete
  143. "I did not hoist my boobs up to my chin to put up with this kind of foolishness!"

    ReplyDelete
  144. Longitudinally Enabled1:18 AM

    Granma male

    ReplyDelete
  145. montag21:34 AM

    Y'know, I'm not sure we're ever going to identify the exact malady afflicting the Scott Walkers of the world. In fact, I'm not sure there's a simple cure for mean and stupid and allergic to the truth.

    Which isn't the same thing as saying that we should have to suffer them in politics. That all these corn-fed bowsers feel that level of entitlement ought to have the American public worried, rather than screaming for more.

    It's as if the GOP has been taking marketing tips from the WWE.

    ReplyDelete
  146. montag22:08 AM

    I'm still trying to digest the differences between this and his Federalist blurb photo.

    Either he's a master of fuckin' disguises or he's twenty-five years older than he wants people to think.

    I don't really know what to think about that, but I do know that he wants people to think he's an intellectual and he can't fuckin' write or think clearly, so, maybe, taken together, it means he's just an all-around poseur.

    ReplyDelete
  147. TGuerrant2:24 AM

    All those Duggar kids? They're mine. Every last one of them. Michelle sends Jim Bob out to check the cell tower and we pop another one in the oven. He'd go crazy if he found out, but he'll go crazy anyway because they're all genetic liberals and will carry Arkansas for Sasha Obama in 2036.

    ReplyDelete
  148. TGuerrant2:26 AM

    Fond of it.

    ReplyDelete
  149. But I thought whether one was a man was related to one's choice of cigarettes. Could Jagger have been wrong? I find this unsatisfactory.

    ReplyDelete
  150. montag22:31 AM

    Geez, Obama is all of 6'1-1/2", maybe 6'2", and Manly General Petraeus looks like a Munchkin next to him.

    No wonder he has issues.

    ReplyDelete
  151. TGuerrant2:32 AM

    The dog whistle decyphering box has just printed out a report:

    The Federalist means that these liberals taking away your guns and emasculating police forces will just run and hide when the subhumans they've unleashed slaughter your sons and your daughters and take your stuff.

    ReplyDelete
  152. TGuerrant2:33 AM

    Obama's shirts never wrinkle. How can that be?

    ReplyDelete
  153. montag22:35 AM

    So, it's policy analysis, eh?

    ReplyDelete
  154. TGuerrant2:59 AM

    Only the finest kind. He didn't say Mandingo even once.

    ReplyDelete
  155. OtherJimDonahue5:07 AM

    I think it's his college yearbook photo.

    ReplyDelete
  156. I'm trying to behold the beta males who were glad to watch a man die, but the only male mentioned was a 76 year-old. He'd be more properly called a beta-blocker male.

    Also, last night I rode the D train from 9th St to Atlantic Avenue and then took the 4 from Atlantic to the end of the line, the Woodlawn station in the Bronx. There were no assaults, should I feel guilty that I didn't have to thrown down with a perp?

    ReplyDelete
  157. The Koch brothers regurgitate partially digested talking points into his mouth.

    ReplyDelete
  158. Invariably, you see someone who handles money while still wearing the glove he or she is wearing while they handle the food.

    I'll take clean hands over dirty gloves any day.

    ReplyDelete
  159. The safe word is "rimfire".

    ReplyDelete
  160. Jaime Oria7:17 AM

    Dear Guns & Ammo,
    I never imagined this could ever happen to me...

    ReplyDelete
  161. BigHank537:27 AM

    Oh the bright side, since they're cut for peasant bodies, they're actually an okay fit for our potato-shaped tastaturfuhrers.

    ReplyDelete
  162. It all depends on what you want from life.

    ReplyDelete
  163. A little trichinosis would go a long way in his campaign.

    ReplyDelete
  164. TGuerrant7:48 AM

    He eats with David Brooks at the Applebee salad bar and everybody wears gloves there.

    ReplyDelete
  165. I guess when you're born to play music, that's just what you fucking do.

    ReplyDelete
  166. Well, it could be a Christmas present on Christmas day . . . but I don't see no decorations so I'll just go along with "ripoff of workingman's clothing in order to make some vague point about something."

    ReplyDelete
  167. coozledad8:06 AM

    That's exactly what my friend said.
    I didn't know that Leon arranged the slide guitar bridge for George Harrison and Pete Ham on Badfinger's "Day After Day" and played that glissando piano bit.
    Nice stuff.

    ReplyDelete
  168. Its actually a ripped from the headlines cautionary tale that is more or less identical to phil robertsons pornified rape fantasy of how atheists would stand by, gunless and dickless, while their atheist wives and daughters were raped. This is a perennial revenge fantasy on the right.

    ReplyDelete
  169. redoubtagain8:13 AM

    Rule 34's "Saturday Night Special"

    ReplyDelete
  170. Its hard not to be reminded that the US is full of " messed up people with guns" when you married one.

    ReplyDelete
  171. I had a probation officer tell me once, in reference to a guy who had been arrested 25 times, "they're just criminals." It's a mindset, not like yours or mine, but still like something we've been seeing since the dawn of time. People gonna steal, people gonna do all kinds of nasty shit and it's never gonna stop. And if Mark Twain was right, which I believe he was, we're probably stuck with it, Americans being what we are. http://www.quotes.net/quote/1685

    ReplyDelete
  172. TGuerrant8:32 AM

    That jacket looks so different on Matthew McConaughey. Mebbe Trac shouldn't zip it so high up. Give just a hint of moob cleavage.

    ReplyDelete
  173. coozledad8:33 AM

    Along with some rolling around, trying to become part of the nearest hedge, and crying.

    ReplyDelete
  174. redoubtagain8:35 AM

    Kappa male:

    ReplyDelete
  175. coozledad8:37 AM

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M17aG_Po2Y

    ReplyDelete
  176. tigrismus8:37 AM

    that explains why she's so full of crap

    ReplyDelete
  177. tigrismus8:43 AM

    Oh, so it IS a lance in your pocket.

    ReplyDelete
  178. coozledad8:45 AM

    There was this, too. It might have just been the times.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoA1oQZyjUI

    ReplyDelete
  179. That is so wrong./em> The kitty vagina is nice, though.

    ReplyDelete
  180. tigrismus8:49 AM

    Lightning bolt! Lightning bolt!

    ReplyDelete
  181. Give him ten minutes. Notice he's not using a knife and fork.

    ReplyDelete
  182. coozledad8:54 AM

    He looks like a HUAC paralegal.

    ReplyDelete
  183. tigrismus9:08 AM

    He can read and write, so I'd have guessed Gamma, but either way that means there are clones.

    ReplyDelete
  184. Helmut Monotreme9:08 AM

    it already has.

    ReplyDelete
  185. The guy loves guns: he has a lot of them, he’s good at shooting them, and he wanted me to be a part of it. Having my Second Amendment adherence bluff called has been a rough, but worthwhile, experience.

    Sorry, ladies, he's taken.

    ReplyDelete
  186. He had to have something to wash that down with:

    ReplyDelete
  187. Q: How many real men does it take to change a lightbulb?

    A: None! Real men aren't afraid of the dark.

    ReplyDelete
  188. TGuerrant9:16 AM

    Mmmmm, I'm sticking with the perennial black-on-white violence fantasy of the right. Not that there isn't a perennial rape fantasy and Christianist revenge accoutrements available to accessorize all ensembles, but the crime Tracinksi's slobbering over is male-on-male violence. The perp did rob women on the train, but Trac just didn't have a rapey angle to work here.

    ReplyDelete
  189. Northampton9:18 AM

    I noticed none of these manly alpha male authors are bragging about their military service. I wonder why that is

    ReplyDelete
  190. Helmut Monotreme9:22 AM

    One who likes a decisive end to a bout?

    ReplyDelete
  191. billcinsd9:23 AM

    mail male

    https://images.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mikeruddbillputt.com%2Fhome%2FIssue96%2FCliff-Clavin.jpg&f=1

    ReplyDelete
  192. Randy Gibbons9:26 AM

    The Yezidis are interesting, but this is some serious ur-misogyny:

    "Then Eve was created. But according to the Yezidis before copulating the primal couple enrolled in a kind of competition to see if either of either of them could bring forth progeny independent of the other. They both stored their seed in a sealed jar and then after an incubation period opened them. Eve’s jar was opened and found to be full of insects and vermin, while inside Adam’s jar was a beautiful boy-child. This lovely child, known as Shehid bin Jer, “Son of Jar,” grew quickly, married, and had offspring. His descendants are the Yezidis. Thus, the Yezidis regard themselves descendants of Adam but not Eve."
    http://www.yeziditruth.org/yezidi_religious_tradition

    ReplyDelete
  193. tinheart9:27 AM

    Because they're all like Batman, and Batman didn't take orders from no sissy sergeant!

    (They're like the heroes America deserves, but not the heroes America needs.)

    ReplyDelete
  194. tinheart9:27 AM

    "One wrong move and I swear I'll blow this thing right off!"

    ReplyDelete