Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: War; video may autoplay at link] Welp: "President Obama is directing the Pentagon to send special forces into Syria to advise the Syrian opposition in its fight against ISIS, sources confirmed to ABC News. ...A U.S. official says the White House will announce that Obama has authorized somewhere around 50 special operations forces to go into Syria to work with the rebel group known as the Syrian Arab Coalition. These forces will work along the Syrian border and not on the front lines with the rebel groups. They will provide training, assistance, and advice just as U.S. troops are doing in Iraq. They will not be in combat, they will work with the Syrian Arab Coalition to facilitate airstrikes, but they are not forward air controllers. They will be at the group's headquarters speeding up coordination of potential airstrikes. The White House is expected to characterize the change as 'an enhancement' of the existing training, advisory and assist mission in Iraq against ISIS."
[CN: Rape culture; sexual assault] For fuck's sake: "A Polish court has rejected a US extradition request for the film director Roman Polanski over his child sex conviction. '[Polanski's] extradition is inadmissible,' said Judge Dariusz Mazur at the district court in the southern city of Krakow. ...Mazur said the case was very complicated, but an extradition procedure would violate Polanski's human rights because he could be subjected to confinement." Boo hoo.
Hillary Clinton has picked up a couple of notable endorsements: New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gautam Raghavan and Jamie Citron, who are respectively President Obama's liaison to the LGBT community in The White House Office of Public Engagement from 2011 to 2014 and the former National LGBT Vote Director for Obama for America.
[CN: Carcerality; racism] In other campaign news, Clinton has proposed criminal justice reform that would disallow racial profiling by police and eliminate sentencing sentencing disparities "between crack cocaine and powder cocaine users," important because "lengthy crack cocaine sentences disproportionately affected African Americans who were not more likely than their white or Hispanic counterparts to use crack."
[CN: Death penalty] In less good news, Clinton still refuses to support abolition of the death penalty: "We have a lot of evidence now that the death penalty has been too frequently applied, and too often in a discriminatory way. I do not favor abolishing it, however, because I do think there are certain egregious cases that still deserve the consideration of the death penalty, but I'd like to see those be very limited and rare, as opposed to what we've seen in most states." The thing is, no matter how "limited and rare" the death penalty is, there is still a real chance of executing an innocent person, which is to say nothing of ethical objections to state-sanctioned murder. Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, is explicitly in support of abolishing the death penalty: "I believe it is time for the United States of America to join every other Western, industrialized country on Earth in saying no to the death penalty."
[CN: Sexual violence] This is a difficult but compelling piece in the New York Times: "States Struggle with What to Do with Sex Offenders after Prison." This quote from Democratic Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton sums up the problem very succinctly: "I consider myself certainly as committed to improving our social service efforts on behalf of people who need help in our society. But there's a line you need to draw for public safety—and these people, if you look at some of their case files, it's repeated, horrific crimes that put them in this situation." The "situation" being that they have finished prison sentences, but are still being held by the state, because they have been assessed to be likely to reoffend. This is the nature of many sexual predators: They simply can't/won't be rehabilitated. So what is the state to do with them?
The title of this piece is crap, but this story about how a trans woman's family greeted her disclosure and transition is lovely, particularly this heartbreaking passage about her elderly mother: "My Mum has dementia and quite a few of my family were concerned about what would happen if I came out to Mum, whether she might be too stressed to handle it. And anyway, so when I eventually came out to Mum, I did it early in the morning and she listened. I kept it very simple. And she said—at the end of it, she said, 'Well,' she said, 'What do you know?' She said, 'I've got a beautiful new daughter.' And she said, 'Come here, love.' And I cried on her shoulder and Tess cried too and it was all wonderful. ...I go and see Mum every few weeks and she's forgotten each time, and every time I tell her again, she gives me just the same beautiful reaction that she did exactly the same, almost word for word every time. I'm kind of the luckiest one of all because I get to come out to Mum 100 times a year, and every time, she's beautiful."
Neat! "Using the VISTA telescope, astronomers in Chile have discovered a previously undetected band of young stars hidden away behind thick clouds of dust in the central bulge of the Milky Way. ...Using data pulled in by the Vista Variables in the Vía Láctea Survey (VVV) from 2010 to 2014, the astronomers found 655 candidate variable stars of a type called Cepheids. These stars are unique in that they expand and contract at regular intervals. Their brightness can change dramatically in just a few days or months. ...'All of the 35 classical Cepheids discovered are less than 100 million years old,' explains study co-author Dante Minniti in a release. 'The youngest Cepheid may even be only around 25 million years old, although we cannot exclude the possible presence of even younger and brighter Cepheids.' This would imply that there's a previously unconfirmed, continuous supply of newly formed stars in the central region of the Milky Way. What's more, by mapping these Classical Cepheids, the team highlighted an entirely new feature of our galaxy: a thin disc of young stars that stretch across the galactic bulge."
[CN: Animal cruelty] This story about rescued circus lions! "This male has no idea of the new life of freedom that starts in November." Blub.
David Beckham's daughter doodled a figure beside a heart on his palm, and he got it tattooed on him. Because Becks forever.
[CN: Violent imagery] Tom Hardy on whether he should be given an Oscar: "Lock me out of that, for your own good. It's like putting a wig on a dog, or a tutu on a crocodile. It doesn't look right, it's not fair to the animal, and inevitably someone will get bitten and hurt." LOL!!!
And finally! Breaking News: DADDY's HOME!!!
In the News
The Walking Thread
[Content Note: Descriptions of violence and self-harm. Spoilers are lurching around undeadly herein.]
Looking good, Grimes!
Welp, I finally got caught up on the first three episodes of Season 6 of my favorite show that I love to hate, so here it is—the return of The Walking Thread!
When last we left our totally trepid band of zombie slayers, Grimes Gang had made themselves at home in Aarontown, and by "making themselves at home," I obviously mean "introduced them to Grimes' special brand of Patriarchial Authoritarianism." Also: The W-Heads, a violent gang of exiled scoundrels, were looming ominously as the foils for this season.
Let's run through the first two episodes quickly, so we can get to the most recent episode, which has been the focus of MUCH DISCUSSION for REASONS!
The season premiere set out to accomplish two things:
1. To remind us that The Walking Dead is ART—beautiful, meaningful art—which is accomplished via awkwardly splicing together present-day color scenes of Grimes Gang shepherding a mass of zombies out of a quarry because GRIMES SAYS SO and black-and-white Pleasantvillian flashbacks to the hatching of the plan. A plan which is so fucking stupid, because, yes the noisy zombies in the giant pit are attracting other zombies, but those zombies are falling into the pit, so why not just contain the pit and fix the leak, as suggested by Ethan Embry? (Hi, Ethan Embry! I bet you can't hardly wait to be killed by a zombie, amirite?!) The quarry is basically a natural trapping pit of enormous size, which is SO LUCKY, and it seems a lot smarter and easier to secure the potential exits than lead a horde of easily distracted zombies to wherever the fuck Grimes is intent on leading them. "I never settle for smart or easy when MANLY AND COMPLICATED will do!"—Rick Grimes.
2. Reestablish that Grimes is King Patriarch Who Is Always Right and Must Never Be Questioned, which is established by Morgan's first line being "You were right!" and Deanna's first line being "Rick is right!" and Ethan Embry, who dares to question Grimes' infallibility, being killed by a zombie. That's what you get for challenging the Patriarchy, ya jerk!
Episode One ends with the sound of a blaring car horn leading some of the zombies off-track from their march to wevthefuck. WHO COULD HAVE PREDICTED SOMETHING WOULD GO WRONG WITH ONE OF GRIMES' SOLID PLANS?
We are left wondering: Who was blowing the horn?! And where are the W-Heads who were clearly being set up as the villains of this season? Which brings us to Episode Two.
This episode takes place back in Aarontown, featuring all the Leftbehindsies who weren't approved by Grimes to help execute his STELLAR PIT PLAN.
Ostensibly, the episode is about the W-Heads invading Aarontown, and their crashed truck whose perished driver leans on its horn, but that's just a backdrop for the REAL story, which is about Morgan's discomfort with Grimes Gang's murdery tendencies. He doesn't want to kill anyone, and he's real judgy about Grimes Gang killing everyone.
Naturally, by the end of the episode, he has to kill someone to save himself—a W-Head who conveniently taunts him about his reluctance to kill him!—thus proving once again that Grimes is right about everything. Literally an entire episode dedicated to humiliating a black man for advocating nonviolence. COOL.
Also in this episode, we catch up with Carl the Hat, who is: 1. Becoming the perfect little patriarch, yelling at Enid, who wants to leave during the W-Heads invasion, that SHE ISN'T GOING ANYWHERE SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP. (She leaves anyway. Good girl!) 2. Suddenly hatless and sporting a haircut that makes him look like he's slowly morphing into Tig Notaro. I rechristen him: Tig Nocarl.
And Merritt Wever as the new doctor! Hi, Merritt Wever! (Merritt Wever was Nurse Zoey on Nurse Jackie, and that is a good show that I did not hate! I highly recommend it!)
As Episode Two ends, shit is fucked up and shit. Grimes' Zombie Relocation Plan is falling apart, Aarontown has barely survived a siege from the W-Heads, Aarontown extras are dropping like flies, and the only thing that ever saves anyone is a willingness to MURDER and FOLLOW GRIMES WITHOUT QUESTION.
We thus arrive at Episode Three, which opens with Grimes, Michonne, Glenn, Douchebag Beta, and assorted Aarontownians racing through the woods toward Aarontown to try to figure out who's blaring the G.D. horn! They are being slowly chased by the distracted faction of the zombie horde, and Grimes barks at Daryl over his walkie-talkie that he and Sasha and Sgt. Red Bull should keep leading the rest of the zombies to WHEREVER IN SLOW MARCH HELL they are supposed to be taking them.
Grimes then breaks off from the group on his own, explaining he's going to get the RV and (MAGICALLY!) redirect the distracted faction before they reach Aarontown. He tells Michonne and Glenn to leave the Aaronvillians in the group behind if they can't keep up, because they're WEAK and DON'T GET WHAT'S IT LIKE OUT HERE and blah blah fart.
Commence maneuvering to try to rescue this shitshow of an unaccountably stupid plan. Grimes Gang are competent and ruthless killers, because they've been in the shit, man. The Aarontownians are hapless rubes, who get picked off. One dude gets bitten in the shoulder, but soldiers on with Michonne and Glenn because he wants to see his wife one more time before he kicks. They swear to get him home.
While Grimes is off doing whatever the shit he's doing with the RV, Michonne, Glenn, and their quickly diminishing lot get trapped inside a pet store by the distracted faction of zombies. Glenn and Douchebag Beta volunteer to go set a feed store on fire to distract the zombies.
Eventually, Michonne and the others make a break for it. They are slowed by a fence, and Michonne barely makes it over. The dude who was bitten in the shoulder gets overrun by zombies, trapped against the fence, and they all STAND THERE AND WATCH HIM SUFFER instead of killing him as he's devoured. WHUT. This show.
Meanwhile, Glenn and Douchebag Beta discover the feed store has already burned down. Oh no! They get trapped in an alley by zombies, and they climb up on a dumpster as the zombies surround them. Douchebag Beta, who's been slowly losing it, puts his gun to his head and kills himself. As his dead body falls over, Glenn is knocked to the ground, directly into the center of the zombie horde.
Glenn screams and blood spatters all over his face, as we are meant to believe that he is being chomped to his demise. (I'll come back to that.)
As Episode Three closes, shit is even more fucked up and shit! Michonne and the two remaining Aarontownians, Heath and Scott, arrive at Aarontown only to find the outlying buildings have been torched. Grimes makes it the RV, only to be besieged by a bunch of W-Heads. He successfully kills them, only to discover the RV engine has failed, as zombies converge on him.
THIS PLAN WAS SUPER TERRIFIC, GRIMES! A+
That's where the episode ends. So! Let's go back to the MAJOR OMG MOMENT in the episode, which is Glenn's death. EVERYONE IS SO SAD! NOT GLENN!
I call bullshit. Glenn isn't dead.
We're definitely supposed to think that Glenn is dead! But unless Glenn has anatomy unlike every other human being on earth, and his intestines are actually in his throat, it wasn't Glenn's innards that were being eaten; it was the innards of Douchebag Beta, whose corpse was lying on top of him, after their fall from the top of the dumpster.
The only question is: How will Glenn get away?! Or will he not get away?! I would laugh for ten million years if it turns out I'm right and Glenn has been protected by Douchebag Beta's corpse, only to then be immediately killed in the next episode!
I hope Glenn finds a way to crawl into the dumpster and just live there forever.
I mean, if I had the choice between living in a dumpster, surrounded by the dulcet tones of gurgling zombies and the ceaseless echo of their rotting limbs thrashing against the dumpster's exterior, or having to spend one second of my life obliged to genuflect to the alleged wisdom of Rick Grimes, I would dive in that dumpster faster than Dr. Mulletsworth can volunteer to stay behind on a dangerous mission.
Next week: More of this garbage.
This Sounds Fun
Remember how this Republican primary was not going to be a total shitshow? Whooooooooooops!
Republican presidential campaigns are planning to gather in Washington, D.C., on Sunday evening to plot how to alter their party's messy debate process — and how to remove power from the hands of the Republican National Committee.There's complete chaos and constant revolt in the Congressional Republican caucus. Why not in the Republican primary?
Not invited to the meeting: Anyone from the RNC, which many candidates have openly criticized in the hours since Wednesday's CNBC debate in Boulder, Colorado — a chaotic, disorganized affair that was widely panned by political observers.
On Thursday, many of the campaigns told POLITICO that the RNC, which has taken a greater role in the 2016 debate process than in previous election cycles, had failed to take their concerns into account. It was time, top aides to at least half a dozen of the candidates agreed, to begin discussing among themselves how the next debates should be structured and not leave it up to the RNC and television networks.
If I weren't all too aware that nothing reunites Republicans like a Democratic nominee they are keen to defeat, I would enjoy watching the spectacle of the Republican Party potentially destroying itself.
Plus there's that whole thing about how there's still a real chance that one of these bozos could become the next president and steer the country into utter ruin, which kind of puts a damper on any potential enjoyment at watching this clusterfucktastrophe.
"Inappropriate" Doesn't Begin to Cover It
[Content Note: Misogyny; victim-blaming.]
On Wednesday, I noted that Bernie Sanders' "brain trust," apparently comprised of three men, told some terrific (ahem) jokes about how Hillary Clinton would make a swell vice-president: "Look, she'd make a great vice president. We're willing to give her more credit than Obama did. We're willing to consider her for vice president. We'll give her serious consideration. We'll even interview her."
Immediately and understandably, a number of people criticized these comments as belittling and misogynistic.
Coming on the heels of Sanders' accusing Clinton of "shouting," which he insisted was not the misogynistic dogwhistle that it seemed to be, one might imagine that Sanders, who defended himself by saying, "All that I can say is I am very proud of my record on women's issues," might prove those oft-claimed feminist bona fides by forcefully condemning his team's demeaning "joke" about Clinton.
Instead, all Sanders could muster was: "Every campaign has statements come out which are inappropriate. That was inappropriate. Clearly, I have a lot of respect for Secretary Clinton."
Actually, Senator, that's not very clear at all. Especially when you refuse to name what's happening here as misogyny, substituting instead a lesser, vague categorization of the comments as "inappropriate."
Yes, those comments were inappropriate. But the reason they were inappropriate is because they were sexist.
Jeff Weaver, Sanders' campaign manager and the man who made the shitty comments, wouldn't even acknowledge they were inappropriate. Instead, he offered: "It certainly, I think, could be interpreted as edgy or snarky but nothing more."
Edgy? Really? He went there. The tired defense of the most odious comics, trading in ancient stereotypes and calling it cutting edge humor.
And he didn't stop there. He then victim-blamed Clinton, laying the responsibility for his own misogyny at her feet, and at the feet of feminists who defend her against misogynistic attacks:
"When we are the subject of attacks and innuendo from a super PAC that is openly coordinating with the Clinton campaign, when the opposing campaign is going to level accusations of sexism against the senator, which have been widely criticized in the media and condemned, I think it's important for people to know that we are not just going to take those attacks and be a punching bag for the Clinton campaign," he said. "It's just not what we are going to do. They launched a vicious attack on us, we let them know that we're not going to be a punching bag and now we're ready to resume important issues facing the country."So, because Clinton has "attacked" Sanders for using language ("shouting") that has a long and well-known context of being used to discredit women, and because his team thinks it's mean that she pointed out he had used marginalizing language against her, it's her own fault for being "uncivil," and thus she deserves to be targeted by more misogyny. Which isn't misogyny! Geez! It was just a joke!
..."We have controlled the agenda in this campaign, I think it's fair to say the other side has controlled the tone," he said. "We hope that tone returns to the kind of civil discourse on the issues we've been looking for the whole time."
This is literally the same dynamic that misogynistic men use in spaces like this one, day after day. Use loaded rhetoric, either as a deliberate dogwhistle or because they don't know or care the first thing about the history of sexist language, to imply that a woman with whom they disagree is a hysteric; then deflect being called out by rejecting feminist analysis of that language and its context, while simultaneously claiming to be a great feminist ally; then project blame for their hostility onto the woman they'd demeaned by accusing her of a lack of civility. All with a heaping helping of "jokes don't matter."
It's straight from the Misogyny 101 Playbook, and the best Sanders, who asserts an unassailable record on women's issues, can do is say it's "inappropriate."
This is a perfect replication of the abuse dynamic used against outspoken women every day of our fucking lives.
"Inappropriate" is insufficient. To put it politely. After all, I wouldn't want to be accused of being uncivil.
Open Thread
Hosted by a snow goose. [Image via.]
This week's Open Threads have been brought to you by birds.
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker DesertRose: "What's the last thing that made you laugh so hard you had tears in your eyes/a sore tummy/whatever happens to you when you really laugh hard?"
Playing a memory game with Deeky, the rules of which are very simple, but we kept making it more and more elaborate as we went along. Both of us were laughing so hard at times that we were crying, coughing, about to collapse. It was perfect.
Quote of the Day
"The cynics will scoff. They'll say it's not possible [for the House to become functional again]. You better believe we're going to try."—Newly elected Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, during remarks on the floor of the House today.
Uh, I don't think it makes someone a "cynic" to be dubious about his election being a magical panacea for the divisive ills in Congress. I'm pretty sure it's not "cynical" to conclude that there might be dysfunction in a place that has been profoundly compromised by dysfunction for a very long time.
But hell. Republicans have never been fans of logic.
Ugly Provision in Budget Deal for People with Student Loan Debt
[Content Note: Harassment.]
A provision in the new budget deal will allow federal student loan debt collectors to bypass the Telephone Consumer Protection Act in order to bombard borrowers via auto-dialers:
Consumers with cell phones who haven't given companies permission to bombard their mobile devices with texts, pre-recorded messages or calls made using auto-dialers are typically protected under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.And lest you imagine this is just the work of outgoing Speaker John Boehner, who has close ties to debt collections industry lobbyists, or his pro-corporate, consent-hostile party, President Obama is fully on board, too: "Obama has repeatedly pushed Congress to change the law to allow more of these calls, on the grounds that doing so would lead to higher recoveries on delinquent student loan debt."
But the measure in the potential budget deal (Section 301) would amend existing law to allow companies to use auto-dialers when they call borrowers' cell phones -- even when federal student loan borrowers haven't consented to them, and even if the borrowers will be charged for them. Creditors already have the authority to auto-dial borrowers' land lines without consent.
...Consumer groups have warned that allowing debt collectors and loan servicers to auto-dial borrowers' cell phones would waste precious cell phone minutes, especially for low-income households that rely on prepaid plans, and that even when borrowers manage to get student loan specialists on the phone, they're frequently misled or given incomplete information, including about income-driven repayment plans.
This, despite the fact that there is "little, if any, independent evidence that giving debt collectors or loan servicers this power would lead to fewer loan defaults or delinquencies."
Basically, it's an excuse to harass people. People who are frequently already under an enormous amount of stress and pressure because of student loan debt.
Really just fucking thrilled that both parties could find a way to work together in order to devise a way to harass people with student loans, especially after they came together years ago to tell under- and unemployed people to take out those loans and buy themselves an education, instead of creating and keeping onshore for those people jobs with a livable wage.
Um.
[Content Note: Domestic violence.]
This is how you show that you're really taking domestic violence seriously:
On Sunday, the NFL unveiled its new anti-domestic violence PSA, featuring Pittsburgh Steelers cornerback William Gay talking about his mother, who was killed at the hands of a domestic abuser when Gay was only eight years old.For the record, the NFL has repeatedly failed to fine, or in any other way hold accountable, players for committing domestic violence. But they have fined William Gay nearly $6,000 for advocating against it.
On Wednesday, the NFL fined Gay $5,787 for wearing purple shoes in honor of his mother and Domestic Violence Awareness Month.
"I broke the rule," Gay told NFL.com's Aditi Kinkhabwala, adding that he hopes the NFL will donate the fine to a domestic violence cause, despite the fact that the NFL usually donates fines to the NFL Player Care Foundation and the Gene Upshaw Players Association’s Player Assistance Trust.
Cool priorities, NFL. As always.
My belated condolences to William Gay, and my thanks to him for being an advocate, and for breaking the rules to do it.
Daily Dose of Cute
Someone is thinking about Tony again!
As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to share pix of the fuzzy, feathered, or scaled members of your family in comments.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
Representative Paul Ryan has been elected Speaker of the House. Which puts him way closer to the presidency than being on a ticket headed by Mitt Romney ever did.
[Content Note: Reproductive coercion; misogyny; violence] China has gotten rid of its long-standing "one child" policy, but has not altogether removed reproductive restrictions. Instead, it has been replaced with a "two child" policy. "Some celebrated the move as a positive step towards greater personal freedom in China. But human rights activists and critics said the loosening—which means the Communist party continues to control the size of Chinese families—did not go far enough. 'The state has no business regulating how many children people have,' said William Nee, a Hong Kong-based activist for Amnesty International. 'If China is serious about respecting human rights, the government should immediately end such invasive and punitive controls over people's decisions to plan families and have children.'"
[CN: Police brutality; racism] Of course: "Nearly one year after 12-year-old Tamir Rice was killed by Cleveland Police Department Officer Timothy Loehmann, the grand jury has begun to hear evidence and decide if Loehmann and his partner, Frank Garmback, should face criminal charges for their actions on November 22, 2014. While the Cleveland Police Patrolmen's Association told ABC that the officers were subpoenaed to testify both last week and on Monday, Rice's family says it learned of the proceedings from press reports." The way this family has been treated. I am angry beyond description.
[CN: Death; disablist language; moving gif at link] This is an incredible and heartbreaking story about the tenacity of a man who mourned his wife, who died on a perilous mountain, by spending 22 years digging out a ridge with his bare hands so that no one else would suffer her fate. He didn't literally use a teaspoon, but, you know: Teaspoons.
I love this girl: "A 10-year-old girl who was born in China wants lawmakers to change the Constitution so she can run for president. ...Alena Mulhern testified on Wednesday before a Massachusetts State House committee that everyone should have the opportunity to lead the country. Alena was adopted from China and moved to Kingston, Mass. when she was 10 months old. 'I am an American as much as you are and everyone else. And I don't really remember China that much. All I know is America,' she told WBZ-TV. ...Alena is trying to persuade state lawmakers to pass a resolution asking the U.S. Congress to amend the Constitution to state that natural-born citizens include foreign-born adopted children. She asked the committee to consider 'all the great candidates' who cannot serve their country due to 'a law that came into existence more than 200 years ago.'" Kids today! Get ON my lawn!
[CN: Homophobia] Carefully chosen words: "Former senior Vatican priest Krzysztof Charamsa who came out earlier this month, and was subsequently defrocked by a Polish bishop, is criticizing the Vatican's treatment of gay Catholics saying they've made their lives 'a hell,' in a letter addressed to Pope Francis."
Neat! "NASA's Cassini spacecraft successfully completed its close flyby of Saturn's moon Enceladus today, passing 30 miles (49 kilometers) above the moon's south polar region at approximately 8:22 a.m. PDT (11:22 a.m. EDT). Mission controllers established two-way communication with the spacecraft this afternoon and expect it to begin transmitting data from the encounter this evening. Images are anticipated in the next 24 to 48 hours." *jitters with excitement!*
[CN: Violence; assault; transphobia] What in the everloving fuck??? "Fast and Furious star Michelle Rodriguez will go under the knife for Tomboy, A Revenger's Tale, the gender-swapping action movie to be directed by Walter Hill. Sigourney Weaver is already on board to also star in the project... The script, written by Hill from a story by Denis Hamill, centers on an ace assassin who is double-crossed by gangsters and falls into the hands of rogue surgeon known as 'The Doctor,' who turns him into a woman. The hitman (now a hitwoman) sets out for revenge, aided by a nurse named Johnnie, who also has secrets." I am literally without words.
[CN: Images may be NSFW] Someone put me into a fucking cannon and fire me directly into the sun already, because I AM DONE: "Men are taking photos of their balls in front of beautiful landscapes: Nutscaping is a photo-taking trend which involves dropping your trousers, whipping out some testicles (yours, if you have them), and gently hovering above the camera so your balls hang down like a majestic moon in the sky."
In 100% more adorable news: THESE PICTURES of a baby orangutan! Squeeeeee!
Please Look at This
Kaiser: "Tom Hardy cuddles some big dogs on an episode of For the Love of Dogs." I promise you won't regret it.
My expert recommendation is that you look it now, and at least three other times throughout the rest of the day.
Round Three Wrap-Up!
Last night was the third Republican debate (only eight more to go!) and I did not watch it! I tuned in just in time to see the closing statements, and I immediately regretted it!
After reading the transcript and watching clips this morning, I believe it's pretty clear that, although the official theme of the debate was "Your Money, Your Vote," the unofficial theme of the debate was WE HATE EACH OTHER SO MUCH!
Here's a fun exchange between Ohio Governor John Kasisch and gold toilet aficionado Donald Trump that essentially translates as:
Kasich: "YOU ARE SO TERRIBLE AND INCOMPETENT AND HAVE NO SKILLS TO BE PRESIDENT!"
Trump: "YOU ARE A LOSER AND OHIO IS STUPID AND YOU WORKED FOR A BANK AND I BET YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE A GOLD TOILET!"
What a neat debate!
And here's a fun exchange between former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Florida Senator Marco Rubio that essentially translates as:
Bush: "YOU AREN'T EVEN DOING YOUR DAMN JOB! JUST QUIT WHY DON'TCHA?"
Rubio: "YOU NEVER COMPLAINED WHEN JOHN MCCAIN WASN'T DOING HIS JOB! I AM UNAWARE THAT MEANS I JUST CONCEDED YOUR POINT! STOP ATTACKING ME IT WON'T WORK!"
Rubio was right about that last bit! Nothing Jeb Bush does is working! He's definitely not a job creator FOR HIS OWN DAMN SELF! Boom!
The debate was long on bickering and short on substance—and what policy ideas were discussed were of course total garbage. Rubio won the night, in my opinion, and had the best line of the evening (which, by the way, followed one of the worst lines of the evening):
Rubio: —to take off from that point and argue the same thing, and that is that one of the things you're watching tonight are eleven quality candidates debating an important issue. The Republican Party is blessed to have eleven good candidates—there are ten good candidates—and the Democrats can't even come up with one. And on this issue, on Medicare in particular, it's important, because they're gonna demagogue over what we're saying here tonight. Everyone that's up here tonight that's talking about reforms, I think, and I know for myself I speak for this, we're all talking about reforms for future generations. Nothing has to change for current beneficiaries. My mother's on Medicare and Social Security. I'm against anything that's bad for my mother! [laughter and applause] So, we're talking about reforms for people like me and people like Senator Cruz, as he talked about earlier, who are years away from retirement and have a way to plan for these changes. [glitch in audio] It's not too much to ask of our generation, after everything our parents and our grandparents did for us.Eleven quality candidates! LOLOLOLOLOL NOPE!
But this is terrific: "I'm against anything that's bad for my mother!" Good one, Rubio. (He's used that in other speeches and debates before, but not quite so effectively. He really delivered it perfectly last night.) Naturally, when I say it's a good line, I mean it plays really well to his base—one of the few traces of effective politicking last night. Which doesn't mean it's not a shitty sentiment, because it is. Perfectly emblematic of conservative politics, which are about What's Good for Me and Mine and Fuck You.
Also: What he is proposing is dishonest garbage. And with any change in benefits, the concern isn't the people who are an entire generation away from retirement (and good job subtly reminding the viewers how young he is), but the people who are nearing retirement and don't have "a way to plan for these changes."
Anyway. You don't need me to tell you that Republicans' policies are crap!
You also don't need me to tell you that Mike Huckabee is a dirtbag, but I enjoy it so much! So here is Mike Huckabee answering a question about his biggest weakness:
I don't really have any weaknesses that I can think of. But my wife is down in the front, and I'm sure if you would like to talk to her later, she can give you more than you will ever be able to take care of.Oh ho ho. What a card, this guy. He's perfect, but his harpy of a wife will give you a litany of complaints about him!
Mike Huckabee: Delivering policy AND comedy from the 1950's straight to your face!
In conclusion: These nightmares want to be your president. (Unless you don't live in the US. In which case, I will accept money and chocolate as sympathy gifts that they want to be my president.) And none of them should be allowed within eleventy-seven miles of the Oval Office. Or an Office Depot. Just to be safe.
Take a Nap, Lindsey Graham. Just Take a Nap.
[Content Note: Misogyny.]
Actual Headline: "Lindsay Graham pours beers, contemplates marrying Carly Fiorina."
Actual quote:
"Date, marry, or make disappear forever," said Bash. "Take your time, senator."Graham, a natural wit, found his way around the question. "Date" came first. "Sarah Palin -- we'll go hunting on our first date," he said. Next was "marry," an easy joke set-up.
"Carly, because she's rich," said Graham.
When Bash pressed, and asked Graham if he would erase the existence of Hillary Clinton, he was ready with the punchline.
"No, but is she rich? She said she was flat broke."
Actual laughter: [this space intentionally left blank.]
Actual GOP candidate: Lindsey Graham. Can someone call the Senator a cab? It's clearly time for him to go home. Goodnight Senator! Don't forget to take your nonsensical misogynist asshattery with you!
Open Thread
Hosted by the yellow-shafted northern flicker.
[Photo: "Northern Flicker" by Nature's Pic's. Licensed under Attribution via Commons.]
Question of the Day
What is the most regrettable album you've ever purchased?
The Return of Bruno by Bruce Willis. On cassette.
Round Three
Tonight is the third Republican presidential primary debate. Are you so excited for another presidential debate?! If you are so excited about another presidential debate that you can barely contain your enthusiasm, please check this box: □
Here is apparently everything you need to know about it. Also you should know that it is definitely going to be terrible!
Am I going to watch the debate? Probably not! Am I going to live-tweet it? Probably not!
I didn't watch the second Republican debate, and I still feel really great about that decision!
Irrespective of my debate decision-making, here is a space for discussion about the debate, before and during. Spoiler Alert: Donald Trump is going to say a lot of garbage words!
The Wednesday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by hats.
Recommended Reading:
Sikivu: [Content Note: Misogynoir; police brutality] Black Girls and the Police State Menace
Anne: [CN: Disablism; misogyny; self-harm] What I Wish Everyone Knew About Sylvia Plath
Fannie: [CN: Misogyny] Saletan to Clinton: Stop Shouting
Danielle: [CN: Misogyny] Female Scientists Asked How They Will Cope without Men or Makeup in Space
Sean: [CN: Sexual assault] Dennis Hastert Pleads Guilty in Sexual Misconduct Cover-Up Scandal
Fae: [CN: Marginalization] We'll Be Making the Asexuality Visibility Happen
Veronica: Thinking of Doing NaNoWriMo? I am.
Leave your links and recommendations in comments. Self-promotion welcome and encouraged!
