Question of the Day
Around which actress or actor would you turn into a quivering mass of excited babbling if given the opportunity to talk to hir about hir career and/or anything else?
I can think of two right off the top of my head: Meryl Streep and Ruby Dee. One of my favorite episodes of Iconoclasts was the one with Alicia Keys and Ruby Dee. When they're sitting at the piano and Alicia sings for Ruby...OMG. Blub.
Interesting
Particularly on a day that started with this post about status quo comedy, and included this post about Jimmy Fallon's rapport with female guests, I was interested to read this New York Times piece about the number of female writers on male-hosted late-night talkshows. Irin at Jezebel posts the scorecard:
"The Jay Leno Show": Zero.Wow.
"Late Show with David Letterman": Zero.
"The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien": Zero.
"The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson": One, apparently (his sister).
"Jimmy Kimmel Live!": One.
"The Colbert Report": One.
"The Daily Show with Jon Stewart": Two female writers just added.
"Late Night with Jimmy Fallon:" Three out of "about a dozen."
GOP Senators Want Term Limits
CNN:
A handful of Republican senators have proposed a constitutional amendment to limit how long a person may serve in Congress.Discuss.
Currently, there are no term limits for federal lawmakers, but Sen. Jim DeMint, R-South Carolina, and several of his colleagues are advocating that service in the Senate be limited to 12 years, while lawmakers would only be allowed to serve six years in the House.
"Americans know real change in Washington will never happen until we end the era of permanent politicians," DeMint said in a statement released by his office. "As long as members have the chance to spend their lives in Washington, their interests will always skew toward spending taxpayer dollars to buyoff special interests, covering over corruption in the bureaucracy, fundraising, relationship building among lobbyists, and trading favors for pork -- in short, amassing their own power."
Random Thought
You know what? I hate when candy makers put "fun size" on mini candy bar wrappers. What's fun about a tiny candy bar? Nothing!
Pattertoningson's Return
"I am done with your stinking corn. Bring me the pisswater."
[H/T to Shaker Knitmeapony, in comments. Photo via.]
Joan and Jimmy
So, I love Joan Cusack. Last night, she was on Jimmy Fallon's show, which is, like the rest of late-night American television, not great—although one of the things that I have liked about Fallon's show when I've watched it is that he treats his female guests like people rather than sex objects, and talks to them about their work in the same way he talks to men about theirs. And watching him go absolutely crazy with excitement that Cusack was on his show last night, I was struck with the thought that I don't believe I've ever seen one of the modern late night male hosts be so effusively admiring of one of their female guests.
I've seen them ogle their female guests plenty of times. I've seen them compliment their female guests on their "talent" using double entendres that turned the compliment into sexual objectification, as if afraid to speak seriously to a woman without sexual overtones. I've seen them reference female guests' impressive résumés, nominations, awards, without actually seeming to register that a successful person is sitting before them.
But I couldn't remember a time in which I saw one of them just be flat-out excited to have a woman as a guest, because he was her fan.
Fallon told Cusack she's the only actor to whom he's ever wanted to write a letter, just to tell her how brilliant she is in everything she does. He rattled off her roles that he's loved, told her what a great physical comedian she is, spoke to her almost reverently about a body of work that he (quite rightly) regards as an extraordinary comedic career. And it was fucking cool as hell to watch.
Though I admit, it saddens me that I consider it so remarkable.
[Transcript below.]
(If you're wondering whether Fallon would be the same with a younger and/or more traditionally beautiful actress, I'll just note that I found him to be similarly egalitarian when speaking to Cameron Diaz and Drew Barrymore. I don't watch the show enough to know if those are exceptions, but each of the few times I have seen him interview women, I've noted that he's been respectful—and seems to have fun with women in a way that men who demean them never do.)
Fallon: Joan, I have to say—I have to—you, you're the one, the only person that, that I—I've always wanted to write you a letter, 'cause—I've never met you, but I wanted to write you a—
Cusack: [reaches out and takes his hand] You're, you're so sweet!
Fallon: [laughs] Oh my gosh—you're just saying that!
Cusack: That's so sweet!
Fallon: I'm just loving this, that you said that. 'Cause I love the way you talk—I'm like a giant fan of yours!
Cusack: [humbly] Ohhhh.
Fallon: Like, every single movie that you do, I go, "Ah! She is amazing!" Right? You are absolutely awesome in like—do you remember, like—
Cusack: That's so sweet! [The audience applauds and cheers.] Thank you.
Fallon: Like, even, Sixteen Candles—Sixteen Candles, you had the headgear on and braces; you didn't even have any lines, and you're like trying to sip water out of the water fountain [mimics that scene perfectly], like, and then—oh my god! I'm like— [motions excitedly]
Cusack: Can I just tell you that I, when I was getting married and I was [puts on voice and demeanor to indicate silliness and that sort of "oh I was so young and goofy" reflective attitude] gonna register for my dishes and china and stuff—
Fallon: [laughs expectantly, like he's so excited to be being told a story by Joan Cusack zomg!] Yeah!
Cusack: [still in silly voice] It was November and I went up to the counter and I was like, "I think we're gonna go with this pattern," and I just felt really weird and queer, 'cause what does china have to do with marriage, anyway—[Fallon laughs expectantly again]—it's so awkward, 'cause he kinda liked china and I didn't really like it and that was just a whole weird thing—
Fallon: [laughs] That's weird!
Cusack: Anyways, so we go up there and the guy goes, "Hey! I went as you, in the neck brace, for Halloween this year!" [Fallon laughs and claps] And I was like [crosstalk], "That's so…bizarre!"
Fallon: [laughs] Well, that just shows how great you are at acting, and comedy-wise—
Cusack: Oh, that's so sweet.
Fallon: —that, like—[looks at paper on desk] I'm just gonna go down—Broadcast News, when you were running down the hallway, with the tapes—
Cusack: Awww.
Fallon: Amazing.
Cusack: That was Jim Brooks.
Fallon: School of Rock—Jim Brooks, yeah.
Cusack: Yeah. Amazing.
Fallon: Amazing. School of Rock, when you [crosstalk]—Edge of Seventeen, when you—
Cusask: Awww.
Fallon: —when you do that—I mean, it's just, people went, I went [shrugs helplessly] nuts. I go: "How are you doing this?"
Cusack: Ohhh. See, you're making me blush! [puts hands to her cheeks]
Fallon: Uh, Working Girl. Working Girl! Come on! [audience cheers]
Cusack: Carly Simon! [Simon is a guest on the show, too] Omigod! And she's here!
Fallon: And Carly Simon's here! So weird!
Cusack: She's here!
Fallon: I remember like—
Cusack: [as if to Carly Simon] It's like, "You made that movie! That song is so awesome!"
Fallon: Well, lemme—at the end [to audience]—I don't know if you've ever seen Working Girl—I watched it recently, and I was just, 'cause I love it, that, at the end, she gets her own office…? And you're just making, you're like, [mimics being on phone] "You got your own office! Omigod!" And you're like, you made me, and I was like feeling your emotion, like, just, and, and, and Melanie Griffith is cheering, she's in her office, and the camera pans out and there's like ten thousand offices in this building.
Cusack: Yeah, that's cool.
Fallon: Just one building in New York.
Cusack: Right.
Fallon: And you go, "Wow, that's so cool." You know? It's just—[facepalms] I love that movie so much!
Cusack: You know what? You got your own office.
Fallon: That's right—hey, you said it! [claps] I do! [audience cheers]
Cusack: You do!
Fallon: And I jump up and down every day!
Cusack: You got your own office! And this is awesome. This is a great show.
Fallon: Yeah. We have our own roaches—everything. [refers to an earlier bit in the show where a huge hissing cockroach brought on by an animal expert escaped; Cusack looks around comically for the roach, which is actually in a container on the floor] Yeah, exactly. He's down there; he's got his own questions for later.
Cusack: He's your little Ed McMahon.
Fallon: He really is, yeah! And he goes, [in McMahon voice] "Yes!" And then he hides somewhere dark. It's pretty cool.
Jason Schwartzman, who was an earlier guest and is sitting on the couch next to Cusack: Ed McRoach.
Fallon: Ed McRoach, yes. [Cusack laughs; crosstalk.] You live in Chicago, though?
Cusack: I do. I do. I live in Chicago.
Fallon: I love Chicago. That's—you're always—the whole family's from Chicago, right?
Cusack: Yes. Yeah.
Fallon: Your brother's John Cusack.
Cusack: That's right. Who is saving the world, I think, this week.
Fallon: That's right! 2012 is the movie out this week.
Cusack: Yes.
Fallon: And he's saving the world.
Cusack: I think so. He's saving the entire planet, so—
Fallon: I just thought of another great thing that you did—I just thought of another great thing: Say Anything.
Cusack: Say Anything.
Fallon: Where you play his sister in the movie, and you're the mom—
Cusack: Yes.
Fallon:—and your kid is in karate—[Fallon gets excited all over again]
Cusack: That's—aww, you're so sweet!
Fallon: I love you in every single movie! You're so good!
Cusack: Oh my god. [flattered] Oh my god.
Fallon: I love you. I'm just, I can't—it's why I always wanted to write you this letter. I can't believe I'm having the opportunity to talk to you. And be weird on television.
Cusack: Aww. [
They both laugh.]
Photo of the Day
Raden Soemawinata jumps into the Brighton Pier in Victoria, Australia after galeforce winds swept Bibi the Pooch right off the pier and into the water. As owner Sue Drummond, who wasn't sure she was strong enough to brave the waves with a dog, looked on frantically, Soemawinata "stripped down and dove into the bay to save helpless dog."
Raden was a humble hero about the situation saying, "It was pretty cold and windy, but it wasn't such a hard decision to jump in, it wasn't such a great feat." He also added, "I'm a part-time model, so getting into my jocks isn't so different to what I do for work."Soemawinata was on the pier that day with his family, spreading his grandmother's ashes.
[H/T to Shaker Kristen.]
Shaker Gourmet: Eggnog Cake
Here at Shakesville you can have your cake and liquor too!
This recipe comes from Shaker nia_74656, who says this cake was "born from a love of rummy eggnog". Yo ho ho!*
If you'd like to participate in Shaker Gourmet, email me at: shakergourmet (at) gmail.com. Please include your Shaker name (and a blog link, if you have one!).Eggnog Cake (With Rum Glaze)
4 eggs
2 cups brown sugar
1/3 cup cream
1/3 cup eggnog
1/3 cup spiced rum
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups white flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
Preheat oven to 350 F.
Beat eggs in small bowl; add sugar and beat until combined.
Heat cream, eggnog, rum, butter and vanilla in a small saucepan over low heat until butter melts. Set aside.
Combine flour, baking powder and spices in a large bowl.
Add cream and egg mixtures to flour mixture and beat until no longer lumpy.
Pour batter into greased bundt pan and bake until inserted toothpick comes out crumbly, approximately 40 minutes. Cool for 5 minutes and invert onto plate.
-- For the glaze --
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup spiced rum
1 1/2 tablespoons butter
While the cake is baking, prepare the glaze. Heat sugar and rum in small saucepan over low heat until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and add butter. Stir in butter until melted. After inverting cake onto plate, pour half the glaze on top. Let it soak in, and pour the rest of the glaze on. Cool completely.
* Har, har, har! Rum = pirates = Yo ho. Eggnog = holidays= ho ho. Where do I come up with them? /Balki Bartokomous
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
Strips One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67. In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman and a biracial queerbait telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.
This is totes what Jesus would do.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Washington said Wednesday that it will be unable to continue the social service programs it runs for the District if the city doesn't change a proposed same-sex marriage law, a threat that could affect tens of thousands of people the church helps with adoption, homelessness and health care.Just so we're all on the same page, the Catholic Church doesn't want to extend partner benefits to same-sex married couples, because they view homosexuality as a sin. The Catholic Church also believes that all of its employees are sinners, by virtue of its doctrine viewing all humans as sinners. But they're not arguing that they shouldn't be compelled to extend benefits to those sinners, nor would they argue that providing healthcare coverage to people whose bad health habits they regard as sinful (gluttony! sloth! lust!) is a tacit endorsement of those sins. It's a special argument reserved especially just for the very special case of gay people and their specialized sin.
Under the bill, headed for a D.C. Council vote next month, religious organizations would not be required to perform or make space available for same-sex weddings. But they would have to obey city laws prohibiting discrimination against gay men and lesbians.
Fearful that they could be forced, among other things, to extend employee benefits to same-sex married couples, church officials said they would have no choice but to abandon their contracts with the city.
"If the city requires this, we can't do it," Susan Gibbs, spokeswoman for the archdiocese, said Wednesday. "The city is saying in order to provide social services, you need to be secular. For us, that's really a problem."
Catholic Charities, the church's social services arm, is one of dozens of nonprofit organizations that partner with the District. It serves 68,000 people in the city, including the one-third of Washington's homeless people who go to city-owned shelters managed by the church. City leaders said the church is not the dominant provider of any particular social service, but the church pointed out that it supplements funding for city programs with $10 million from its own coffers.Ah, it reminds me of those lovely words spoken by the Savior during his Sermon on the Mount: "And lo I beseech you to fuck over the homeless if the gays get too uppity."
"All of those services will be adversely impacted if the exemption language remains so narrow," Jane G. Belford, chancellor of the Washington Archdiocese, wrote to the council this week.
Councilperson David Catania, who sponsored DC's same-sex marriage bill and chairs the Health Committee, sniffed at the church's threat: "They don't represent, in my mind, an indispensable component of our social services infrastructure." Councilperson Mary Cheh was even less generous, saying the church's behavior was "somewhat childish."
Suffer the little children to go unto irrelevance.
Stupak Starts Making Threats
"We won because [the Democrats] need us," Stupak said. "If they are going to summarily dismiss us by taking the pen to that language, there will be hell to pay. I don't say it as a threat, but if they double-cross us, there will be 40 people who won't vote with them the next time they need us -- and that could be the final version of this bill."Congratulations, Democratic Leadership. That's the inevitable result of treating choice as an optional position for members of your caucus.
On today's New York Times op-ed page, Kate Michelman (former president of Naral) and Frances Kissling (former president of Catholics for Choice)* make plain the cost of "Trading Women’s Rights for Political Power."
Political calculation aside, the House Democrats reinforced the principle that a minority view on the morality of abortion can determine reproductive health policy for American women.Instead, the same "values voters" who believed the Democrats are enemies of decency and freedom believe it still—and now so do pro-choice women. And rightfully so.
...The Democratic majority has abandoned its platform and subordinated women's health to short-term political success. In doing so, these so-called friends of women's rights have arguably done more to undermine reproductive rights than some of abortion's staunchest foes. That Senate Democrats are poised to allow similar anti-abortion language in their bill simply underscores the degree of the damage that has been done.
Many women — ourselves included — warned the Democratic Party in 2004 that it was a mistake to build a Congressional majority by recruiting and electing candidates opposed to the party's commitment to legal abortion and to public financing for the procedure. Instead, the lust for power yielded to misguided, self-serving poll analysis by operatives with no experience in the fight for these principles. They mistakenly believed that giving leadership roles to a small minority of anti-abortion Democrats would solve the party's image problems with "values voters" and answer critics who claimed Democrats were hostile to religion.
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* Kate Michelman was also employed by the John Edwards campaign. Frances Kissling weighed in on the controversy surrounding Bill Donohue's attack on Amanda Marcotte and me, in opposition to Donohue. I've never met or corresponded with either of them.
Daily Kitteh
Potter, having arrived on our proverbial doorstep yesterday, and using the Felinus Cutiatus charm, is now the newest tenant at Château Deeky.
[Cross-posted.]
The Not-Quite-Daily Teaspoon Report
Here we go again, Shakers, time to lay it out there: show us how your teaspoon shines!
ô,ôP
Remember: the teaspoon is an indivisible unit. If you done some, you done a whole teaspoonsworth. Be proud of your acts, no matter how small they seem, because that's how teaspoons work: little by little, the ocean gets emptied. And there's no scale for determining whether something is or isn`t a teaspoon - no sizism here!
The idea here is to comment with acts of teaspooning that you've seen or done in the last couple of days.
We're still going with the "no congratulations" rule for now, and will for the next one too, and then we'll have a discussion and see whether people would rather continue without them, or start letting people say "hey, that was cool!".
Cowards
[Trigger warning.]
Via email...
Liss: Because this week isn't sucking enough already, and enough people haven't already let us down, here's David Mitchell (sans Webb) defending "edgy" comedy.
And not only defending it, but honest-to-fuck WHINING that if people don't stop picking on the poor saps just trying to make their living telling jokes that pick on marginalized people, then comedians will take their balls and go home.
I seriously quit the motherfucking world.
Deeky: Wevs. Fucking crybaby. He and Webb are dead to me now.
Liss: The most precious part has to be his ridiculous fucking whinging about how comedians just want to be liked. Yeah, but never by the right people. They—at least comedians who use "edgy" humor—want to be liked by bullies who would otherwise pick on them, so they ingratiate themselves by picking on the weak and the disenfranchised.
And then they have the unmitigated temerity to call themselves brave.
Oh yeah. It takes a real fucking hero to tell jokes about people who've had their fucking legs blown off.
Deeky: Yeah, that's a total toady move. What an ass.
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The argument always, always, goes: No topic should be totally off-limits, and, you know, I actually agree with that. But context is everything.
As is the perspective from which the joke is being told, and its intended audience: After I once observed acerbically in comments that anyone can participate in discussions of sexual assault "even without the benefit (ha!) of having been raped," Shaker Carleigh said, "You are one of the handful of people on the planet that know how to make a rape joke funny." To which I replied: "That's because my rape jokes are for rape victims, not rapists."
Rapists and rape apologists loathe the sort of dark survivor humor that, contrary to diminishing and normalizing rape, instead casts in stark relief what a fucked-up rape culture we live in—and, by extension, how fucked-up rape, rape apologia, rapists, and their allies are. Nothing makes a rapist/apologist squirm like a joke that firmly implies he is a deviant piece of shit, told by a survivor whose devastating irreverence is evidence of a strength of character he can barely contemplate.
The same goes for any bully: A racist, a misogynist, a homophobe, a transphobe, a disablist, a fat-hater, a xenophobe, a privileged jerk of any stripe who belligerently wields hir privilege like a weapon. They don't like being the butt of the joke.
And so "edgy" comedians tell "edgy" jokes that play to their sensibilities, lampooning the marginalized and the disempowered, crushing the underdog for the entertainment of the big dogs. (And hope that no one will heckle them.) But that's not really edginess at all; it's cowardice.
What's edgy is mustering the fortitude to walk a line that refuses to pander to bullies. What's edgy is finding the joke that says something new about an old topic; that challenges convention, not entrenches it; that risks something.
It's hard to argue that it's impossible to be funny, be relevant, make a career that way when there's someone who's proven it eminently possible, and spectacularly so.
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Deeky: I totally have a Mitchell and Webb clip scheduled too. Douche.
Liss: You can either unschedule it, or I can post it immediately after your post and you can look like a huge asshole. LOL.
Deeky: LOLOLOLOLOL!!! That, literally, made me cackle like a fool.
[H/T to Shaker Charlotte.]
Dear Rhode Island: Your Governor Sucks
Angering gay rights supporters, Rhode Island Gov. Donald Carcieri Tuesday vetoed a bill that would give same-sex couples the right to plan the funerals of their deceased partners.That's so wrongity-wrong-wrong that it's like a very wrong thing made of wrong parts with lots of little wrong bits all over it. I just feel like I cannot say this enough: Putting that up to a vote which is subject to deeply held prejudice is ruling not by democracy, but by mob mentality.
Calling the bill a "disturbing trend" toward the erosion of heterosexual marriage, Carcieri said the decision should be left up to the voters.
"If the General Assembly believes it would like to address the issue of domestic partnership, it should place the issue on the ballot and let the people of the State of Rhode Island decide," Carcieri said in a letter to lawmakers.
I just can't even believe shit like this is up for fucking debate in a society that fancies itself civilized. No less that the debate yields a bill with horseshit provisions like "requir[ing] couples to be in a relationship for at least one year and meet other criteria, such as owning property together." No less that even with those horseshit provisions, it's still too "radical" for Governor Privilege and his Merry Band of the Desperately Insecure, who are positively panic-stricken about their super-special relationships losing the shimmering, golden glow that can be conveyed upon their gloriously gilded unions only by denying equality to same-sex couples.
Anyway: "Democrats have a veto-proof majority in the Rhode Island General Assembly and the bill sponsors said they will seek to override the veto." Good.
[H/T to Shaker Koach.]
Top Chef Open Thread
Chef Tom Colicchio will drink. your. milkshake!!!
He will also, if you will accompany him into his suspiciously sexy kitchen, show you the proper way to toss a salad.
Buenas Noches, Lou Dobbs
My favourite xenophobic asshat, Lou Dobbs, has been let out of his contract at CNN. Effective immediately. Lou stunned his viewer by dropping the bombshell in the middle of tonight's broadcast.
Dobbs is "considering a number of options" including competing in The Next Iron Chef challenge, tangoing on Dancing With Conservative Has-Beens, and special Cinco de Mayo correspondent at Telemundo.
Hasta la vista, Lou.
