July 9, 2012
July 8, 2012
September 21, 2011
August 25, 2011
The 2+2 Job Interview
…or, how to get hired in corporate America.
A businessman was interviewing applicants for a corporate position. He devised a simple test to select the most suitable person for the job: he asked each applicant, “What is two plus two?”
The first applicant had an economics degree. He thought for a moment and then said, “This bearish market indicates it could be as low as 2.5 and as high as 5.6, but it depends on what Bernanke says tomorrow and what the EU does with the valuation of the Euro.”
The second interviewee was a former Fox News political pundit. His answer was a confident, “Twenty-two, of course.”
The third job seeker was an ex-Microsoft phone tech. His answer was, “4.0, but you really should upgrade to the new 4.8 version! You can’t even get patches for 4.0 anymore!”
The next person was a former corporate lawyer. She stated that in the case of Malarkey v. Mathematics Professors of America, two and two seemed to be four, but that answer was contingent on any lawsuits that might arise from the inference that that answer was absolute, any subsequent riders that might be attached to the contract, any tort filings or motions currently under review, and any liens that might be imposed on the answer by the IRS. In any event, the lawyer refused to be responsible for her answer while the matter was still being negotiated out of court.
Next was a recently retired Republican politician. He said it depended on whether both twos belonged to a wealthy person or some poor schlub. In the case of a rich man, two plus two equaled “Tax cut”; in the case of the poor wretch, the answer was “Go to hell.”
Then there appeared a former Blue Dog Democrat. He said he would go along with whatever the Republican said while pretending he had a different answer.
An economist from the libertarian Cato Institute then entered. His reply to the question was short and sweet: “Unfettered free market capitalism is always the answer!”
Then a Messiah College graduate came into the office. She responded that two and two was whatever God said it was, unless it was something with which she didn’t agree — then it was socialist and evil.
The next-to-last applicant was a Teabagger. After many minutes of long thought he said, “Could you ask me an easier question?”
The final applicant had previously worked for Enron and Standard and Poor’s. The now rather frustrated businessman asked him, “How much is two plus two?”
The applicant got up from his chair, went over to the door and closed it, then came back and sat down. He leaned across the desk and said in a low voice, “How much do you want it to be?”
He got the job.
2011 RS Janes, rewritten from another joke.
www.fishink.us
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April 15, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Word on the Street Edition
In the spirit of the late Mike Royko’s Slats Grobnik, here are comments from the unFoxed Vox Populi:
– L.A. Mike, who was born and lived in Los Angeles for most of his life, on the Republicans paying $2K for simulated lesbian bondage at the Voyeur Club:
“What wrong with those dudes? It’s really stupid. For half that price in L.A. you could rent a motel room, hire a couple of hookers, see the same show up close and join in if you felt like it. You’d even have enough left for a bottle of some primo liquor. That’s really a stupid waste of money.”
– V.J., a small business owner for over 20 years, on Obama’s tax plan:
“I’m a middle-class small business owner and everybody was telling me, ‘watch out, Obama’s gonna raise your taxes!’ I just got my tax forms back from my accountant and I’m paying $800 less this year than last, and he specifically said it was thanks to two deductions Obama put through. If this is Obama’s big tax increase for the middle-class, keep it coming!”
– Anna, who worked in state government for 20 years, on Sarah Palin:
“I don’t get it – how do you quit as governor and then pass yourself off as a winner? How do you tell other families to practice abstinence when your own kid gets pregnant when she’s underage? Why does anybody take her seriously?”
– Al, who worked at a mail order firm, on the ruthless corporate culture:
“Worked at the same job for 12 years. We heard the rumor that company was being sold, but my boss, the owner of the company, looked me straight in the eye and told me he’d never sell and I’d always have a job there. Six months later we’re all fired and the owner makes off with a fortune from selling the company. I asked one of the ladies in accounting what happened – the S.O.B. was in the process of selling the company the very day he told me that B.S. that he’d never sell! The lady said he lied because he didn’t want people quitting to take other jobs before the new owner took over – wanted to squeeze every dime out of the place, even if it left us flat. He lied to my face and I thought this man was my friend!”
– Vernon, who managed an office for 10 years, talks about Michael Steele’s RNC spending:
“I’ll tell you this: If I had been charging anything from Tiffany’s or the liquor store to ‘office supplies,’ and I had approved an expenditure of a couple grand to a strip club, there would have been about two minutes before I was fired and out on the street. I don’t know how he gets away with it.”
– Lily, a waitress at an upscale restaurant, on GOP tax cuts:
“Why doesn’t the media ever call these guys out? They get up there, these Republicans, always talking about tax cuts and they’re rich as fuck! Sure, they want tax cuts – for themselves! Yeah, I got my little piddley-ass tax cut from Bush, and the price of everything went up, including my state taxes, so I went way further in the hole. They really treat us like we’re too dumb to know what they’re doing. Fuckers!”
– Rory, who once worked at a mental health facility, on the Teabaggers:
“These people must all have Alzheimer’s like Reagan. They don’t remember we had big deficits and big government under Republicans since Reagan? They don’t remember Reagan bailed out the savings and loans in the 1980s? I didn’t see them out there screaming and yelling then. They think the shitty economy started under Obama? Give me a break. They just hate him cause he’s black. These tea party people should go to their doctors and be tested for Alzheimer’s – they’ve definitely lost it. I mean if they can afford a head doctor on their fixed incomes — oh, wait a sec, Medicare will pay for that, so they’re covered!”
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February 1, 2010
Bush as Existentialist
If you think that it is highly likely that it will be a very long time until the Republicans and Democrats agree on anything whatsoever, then there is an experiment you should try.
If you make a serious suggestion that former President George W. Bush deserves a place of honor in the Existentialists Hall of Fame; Democrats will want to tar and feather you, and Republicans will form a lynch mob. Both will be very adamant and be in full agreement that you shouldn’t say that.
The Republicans are trying so hard to disavow any hints of elitisim in their agenda and conduct and, instead, want to do the branding necessary to firmly establish their political party as a populist movement that only wants to improve the lot of the union worker and the bank clerk. There’s a rumor (which is being started right here) that the theme song for the Next Republican National Convention will be the Rolling Stones rendition of “Salt of the Earth.”
A Republican consulting firm has established the guiding principle that more Americans like corn than caviar.
The concept of lumping George W. Bush in with the likes of French Intellectuals such as Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre will be sufficient to send most of Ronald Reagan’s disciples staggering off to the nearest emergency room (where all immigrants and some Americans get free medical services?).
Democrats, on the other hand, will recoil in horror at any hint of seriousness in the suggestion that George W. Bush is an Existentialist because it will be misinterpreted to mean that they think that you think George W. Bush was smart enough to be ranked as a genius deserving a place alongside the likes of Camus or Sartre. The Democrats will react as quickly and as energetically as a bull at the rodeo when the gate is opened.
It would be easier to preach the gospel of Ferdinand at a bull fight than it would be to get the Hartman, Maddow, and Malloy fans to second the idea that Bush was an outstanding example of Existentialism in action. Note the words “in action.” Isn’t a part of Existentialism the “to be is to do” school of thought? If George W. Bush instinctively acted in an Existential way, without bothering to put “Being and Nothingness” on his famed reading list, then he was an Existentialist and thus eligible for membership in the Existentialists Hall of Fame.
Didn’t 43 cause a ruckus when he casually mentioned that “Le Stranger” was on his reading list?
On the web site for Princeton University this definition of an existentialist will be found: “a philosopher who emphasizes freedom of choice and personal responsibility but who regards human existence in a hostile universe as unexplainable.” So Bush and Cheney decide they gonna kick Saddam’s ass, they get a convenient excuse, they replace a Congressional Declaration of War with a clause in the doctrine of Executive Privilege, they replace the Chancellor-for-life title with Commander-in-Chief, and then when the war goes into extra innings, they hide behind a tsunami of “no one could have possibly forseen” bullshit, and if that doesn’t fit the definition of Existentialist, then this columnist had better start singing the song with the line about “gimme three steps towards the door.”
In “The Rebel,” Camus wrote: “The advocate of crime really only respects two kinds of power: one, which he finds in his own class, founded on the accident of birth, and the other by which, through sheer villainy, an underdog raises himself to the level of the libertines of noble birth whom Sade makes his heroes.” Do you seriously think, if Camus were alive today, that he would be doing political punditry for Fox. They just couldn’t hire the man who said: “A free press can, of course, be good or bad, but, most certainly without freedom, the press will never be anything but bad.”
Camus again: “I have seen people behave badly with great morality and I note every day that integrity has no need of rules.” Does that mean that sidestepping the Geneva conventions and leading the Christians for Torture posse qualifies Dubya for membership in the Existentialists Hall of Fame? Isn’t the Bush Family motto: “Fuck your rules!”?
“When one has served in a war, one hardly knows what a dead man is, after a while. And since a dead man has no substance unless one has actually seen him dead, a hundred million corpses broadcast through history are no more than a puff of smoke in the imagination.” Isn’t it obvious that George W. Bush would concur completely with that Camus quote? When one has served as a pilot in an Air National Guard unit that can’t provide the type of aircraft that one had been trained to fly, doesn’t that leave the fellow free to choose to become the Commander-in-chief and thus be free of messy encumbrances derived from dead bodies?
George W. Bush might not agree that he is an existentialist, but most of the existentialists also rejected the suggestion that they be dumped into that category.
Sartre said: “Man is nothing else but what he makes of himself. Such is the first principle of existentialism.” Thus if a man becomes the Commander-in-Chief by fiat of the United States Supreme Court, that’s just as good and better than being elected by the voters.
Can we get a witness from Nietzsche? In “Thus Spoke Zarathustra,” Nietzsche said: “But thus I counsel you, my friends: Mistrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful. They are people of a low sort and stock; the hangman and the bloodhound look out of their faces. Mistrust all who talk much of their justice! Verily, their souls lack more than honey. And when they call themselves the good and the just, do not forget that they would be Pharisees, if only they had – power.” Sometimes, by God, they get it!
So would that be referring to the members of the Bush family?
When Camus said “You know what charm is: a way of getting the answer yes without having asked any clear question” was he referring to the Dubya challenge to America: “Come on, what say, we invade Iraq!”?
Wasn’t saying “I’m the decider” tantamount to openly declaring himself to be an Existentialist of the highest rank and thus qualified to be considered for a place in the Existentialists Hall of Fame?
At this point some readers may challenge the columnist’s credentials to elaborate on the subject of Existentialism. If a man chooses to call himself an expert on Existentialism; isn’t that sufficient? Isn’t a self-proclaimed expert on Existentialism a walking, talking personification of the philosophy of “to do is to be”? Would it be better to get a philosophy professor from Cal Berkeley to fact check this column? Wouldn’t that be a repudiation of the Republican/Existentialist heroic reliance on the code of self determination? “If I say this beach is safe to surf; it’s safe to surf!”
It was best said in some graffiti from the Sixties:
Camus: “To do is to be.”
Sartre: “To be is to do.”
Sinatra: “To be, do be, do.”
Now, the disk jockey will play Edith Piaf’s “Non, je ne regretted rien” (Bush’s theme song?), Les Baxter’s “Poor People of Paris,” and Bobby Darren’s “Mack the Knife.” It’s time for us to cut out. Have a “le jazz hot” type week.
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January 11, 2010
Giuliani “forgets” 9/11; hilarity ensues
Liberals get so perturbed by Fox when they hear lies, half-truths, and distortions. This past weekend, when Rudy Giuliani tossed off his one-liner about the United States experiencing zero terrorist attacks on Dubya’s watch, those words aggravated, upset, and riled up (can I say “pissed off”?) the Democrats to an extreme level because there is just no way that day could have slipped his mind. So why did he say what he said?
The Democrats are getting unnecessarily discombobulated because they just don’t get it. What is happening is similar to the (very) old comedy routines that were filmed by Alan Funt who would use his “Candid Camera” to record the “hilarity ensued” aspect spawned by his adolescent boy stunts. One of his most famous segments involved the rigging of a U. S. Post Office mail box so that it seemed to talk to some of the people dropping letters into it.
Sooner or later the Democrats will (eventually) realize that Fox News is just (IMHO) just some good ole boys pulling their chain with a comedy series that portrays the antics of a bunch of patriotic hillbillies who are completely convinced that members of the Bush family can do no wrong. Did anyone ever accuse Mary Tyler Moor of telling on-air fibs because of something she said during her fictionalized TV show about television journalism?
Do you still “not get it”? Fox News is kinda like a cross between the Dukes of Hazard and George Carlin’s classic comedy routines that skewered radio. Shouldn’t the Fox News motto be one word: “Gardyloo!”?
On Fox News, no matter what happens, the Pres has to come off smelling like roses if he’s a Republican and, conversely, worthy of immediate impeachment if he’s a Democrat. The Fox reaction is totally dependent on the political affiliation of the current President. Once the liberals catch on to the running joke premise of this long running comedy series, they will be able to relax, enjoy it, and “play along at home.”
The challenge facing the good ole boys at Fox News can best be understood via the old story about the Irish cop investigating a traffic accident.
Officer O’Brien is called to the scene of a TC (traffic collision). When he arrives, he sees two cars crunched together, at a traffic light. The rear of one is tangled with the front of the second vehicle which is being driven by the monsignor at Officer O’Brien’s church, Father O’Malley. The cop runs up to the priest’s window and says: “Father, how fast was he goin’ when he backed into you?”
The cop knows that the good Irish priest can not be at fault, (thinking that it could be is like believing that if someone flaps his arms fast enough, he can fly) but there has to be an explanation for what happened. It is immediately evident to the Irish cop what happened and then all he needs to know is the speed of the jaunty sports car which (obviously) just backed into the front end of Father O’Malley’s Chevrolet Sedan.
Conservatives know that when they tune in to the comedians on Fox, they are going to get some hilarious and entertaining details about just how fast the Democrats “hot rod” was going when it backed into the Republicans’ family values black four door sedan.
Fox News does for journalism about the same thing that Edgar Bergan did for ventriloquism. Since Bergan’s lips used to move while his wooden dummy (Charlie McCarthy [W. C. Fields used to refer to Charlie as; "termite bait"]) was supposed to be talking, so Bergan (and Charlie) became a big hit on radio, where the moving lips didn’t matter. For a conservative audience insisting that “journalists” stick to the truth while smearing the Democrats, is like trying to hear Bergen’s lips move on radio while Charlie McCarthy is talking. You will only spoil the entertainment value by thinking about those minor flaws.
Aren’t both Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hanity known for their “deadpan delivery?”
Some young folks may never have heard the classic George Carlin comedy routines about the hippy-dippy weather man, life at a radio station (WOLD?) and the tagline songs about fictional Wonderful WINO radio. Pitty. If they had, they’d be hip to the shenanigans being broadcast daily on Fox News.
Didn’t the New Yorker magazine try to let the cat out of the bag when they ran the famous cartoon with the caption: “I’m not a newsman, I play one on TV.”? Isn’t the framed original sketch on display at Fox News Headquarters?
Using the reduxio ad absurdum style of argumentation, we’ll concoct a hypothetical development in the war on (oil field) terror(tory) as an example of the unappreciated creative comedy genius available to those who tune in to Fox news.
Suppose, that someday, somehow, Osama bin Laden turns up at the gates of the White House and wants to surrender and repent. Obama makes the “collar” (as they say in police circles) and the press is invited to cover the arrest and subsequent “perp walk” when the outlaw leader is led to the “Black Maria” waiting to take him away.
The pro-liberal media would be ecstatic covering the historic arrest.
For Fox, the challenge would (as always) be to portray what had just happened as a colossal blunder and a harbinger of impeding doom for the United States.
Impossible, under the circumstances, you say? Anyone saying that, has been fooled again into expecting journalism from Fox and not being hip to the creative hysterically funny improv comedy they were watching.
Think about it. How could this fictional event be manipulated into sounding like a major gaff by President Obama?
If this columnist were the Managing Editor overseeing Fox’s coverage of this imaginary event, here are three suggestions about how to spin it:
President Obama didn’t use the correct wordage while reading the suspect his Miranda rights and thus “queered” the case and insured an inevitable mistrial.
In bragging about the arrest, Obama had tainted the jury pool in the entire USA thus making a fair trial impossible.
President Obama had planted the “bloody glove” evidence in his enthusiasm to get a conviction and, subsequently, some good lawyers would make sure that Osama got a “not guilty” verdict in a fair trial.
If Fox, had covered VE day and wanted to make it look bad, how would they have reported it? “Allied troops entered Berlin today, but the troops under the command of the Democratic Commander-in-chief let Germany’s top war criminal disappear.” See how easy that was?
How would Fox have reported VJ Day? Since they can have the writers dream up facts that are going to be sure laugh-getters, they could have said: “After missing Tokyo by several hundred miles and dropping their ordinance on the wrong town, one called Hiroshima, the Democrat Party led American forces lucked out, because that close call scared the crap out of Japan’s Emperor. Unfortunately (more hypothetical alternative history here) the intelligence analysts couldn’t immediate connect the dots involved in Japan’s offer to surrender and the Democratic President approved a second atomic attack. Hey, Fox News has never promised you an unbiased report from the rose garden. Sure, they use the “fair and balanced” label, but have they ever claimed to be unbiased?
How long will it take for Democrats to figure this out? Don’t many of TV’s most famous comedy writers pick up some easy “freelance” money by submitting their best one-liners to Fox News?
Can anyone seriously contend that there will be any modicum of skepticism, on Fox, in 2012, when there is a (electronic voting machine generated) groundswell of enthusiasm for Jeb’s run for President?
Charles Foster Kane (Orson Wells) said: “If the headline is big enough, it makes the news big enough.”
Now, the disk jockey will play:
X-files theme music
Sheb Wooley’s “Purple People Eater”
Buchanan and Goodman’s “Flying Saucers” Part I and II
It’s time for us to go get beamed up.
Have a “Klaatu barada nikto” type week.
November 6, 2009
The Tattlesnake – Post-Election Portents and Predictions Edition
…And How the Big Media Speculators Got It Wrong Again
The usual Big Media Punchinellos were out in force the past few days, blaring and bleating the Beltway Conventional Wisdom that the Democratic Party’s loss of the gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey are a sure referendum on Obama Administration policies. This is the sort of doomed facile reasoning found in the bottom of a Washington cocktail glass typical of Our Pundit Class who, from non-existent Iraq WMD to Fred Thompson’s popularity with voters, can never seem to fit the square peg in the round hole, pound though they might.
A brief review of the Dem candidates in VA and NJ clearly shows why progressives and like-minded independents didn’t bother to vote for Creigh Deeds in Virginia or Jon Corzine in New Jersey, and it had nothing to do with Obama. For various reasons explained below, they were both terrible candidates.
Creigh Deeds: In an era of change, Deeds was a shambling throwback, a dismal campaign clunker with four flat tires, who rejected Obama’s advice and help until it dawned on him in the final weeks he was going to lose in a landslide. He ran a miserably negative campaign, devoid of ideas, and presented his pap on toast so dry even peppy Dem loyalists fought to stay awake during his speeches. A Dem Blue Dog so blue he threatened to opt out of a public option should it become available to Virginians, he was nearly as conservative as his GOP opponent Bob McDonnell. Why leave the house to vote when the choice is between a Republican and a Dem who thinks like a Republican? Seen clearly, this was a referendum, and portent of the future, for Blue Dog Dems rather than President Obama.
Jon Corzine: The one-time ‘Garden State’ US Senator who was just bounced from the governor’s mansion is a Goldman Sachs Golden Boy who made piles of money on Wall Street and insists on spending it on vanity campaigns. Why he doesn’t just buy a new summer home or sumptuous overpriced yacht instead of squadering his fortune to impose himself on our political process is beyond me, but Corzine has never shown much talent for governing once elected, and what few things he has accomplished were always moderate to the point of invisibility. Jon is the kind of drab Dudley Do-Nothing the Democratic Party needs to send packing, if they expect to keep the majority in the future. Again, the portentiousness of Corzine’s defeat was not his affiliation with Obama’s policies, but the yellow line up the middle of his back from avoiding tenaciously either the right or left lane. He will not be missed, at least by this writer.
The point? Neither of them were progressives and didn’t stir independents or liberal Dems to go out and vote for them.
And now to stare into the crystal – but not Kristol – ball for some predictions on the Republican winners of those two elections:
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October 3, 2009
May 28, 2009
The Tattlesnake – Suggestions for the Fox Populi and the Other Media Maroons Edition
Remember, Kids, Freedom Isn’t Free: While I would never support censoring anyone’s freedom of speech, I think there should be special conditions for those in the right-wing media who regularly abuse this right by using it to spread outrageous fabrications and misleading distortions. Following are a few suggestions:
– Sean Hannity should be required to do his program in between regularly scheduled televised waterboarding sessions, say at 30-minute intervals every time he’s on the air. It’s could be like the half-hour time mark, “This is Sean Hannity and it’s exactly 8:30 – brggghhhh — arrggghhhh, STOP, STOP!!!!” This will end when Sean admits waterboarding is torture and quits show business the next day.
– Bill O’Reilly should have to do his show without a teleprompter or a script. Also, every antagonistic guest – which would constitute his entire guest list — would be a complete surprise that O’Reilly would have to deal with on-air in ‘real time’ without preparation. Oh, and the guests would all wear Keith Olbermann masks. This will stop when O’Reilly admits he uses a teleprompter and a script to do his show and there’s nothing wrong with that. He’ll also have to stop ambushing people with whom he disagrees, and say Olbermann’s name at least once during every program, until he quits show business the next day.
– Glenn Beck should be required to have Whoopi Goldberg and Joy Behar on his show as regular co-hosts. He would also have a crawl running under his name whenever he’s talking on the air, “Glenn Beck, Stand-Up Comic: You’re an Idiot If You Listen to Me!” until he quits show business that evening.
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April 1, 2009
The Tattlesnake: What Fools These Morsels Be Edition
Separate the wheat from the chaff in this April Fool’s Day quiz: which are the real news items and which are the fakes (and no cheating with the Google):
1. Pacino Eyes Run at NY Senate Seat
(New York Daily News)
Excerpt: “The veteran actor told the Daily News that he thinks ‘the time is ripe for progress, and I can bring the progress.’” […]
“On the inevitable comparisons to his role as mobster Michael Corleone in ‘The Godfather,’ he said, ‘If a little ‘Michael’ helps me get things done in Washington, that’s not a bad thing is it?’”
2. Octomom Admits Praying to Satan
(Christian Science Monitor)
Excerpt: “Saying she was frustrated with her life at the time and what she termed ‘God’s dissing me totally,’ Nadya Suleman revealed today that she prayed for Satan’s help a week before she found out she was pregnant with octuplets…” […]
“‘I was really desperate and felt like a real loser,’ she said, ‘and I’d never do it again.’”
3. Florida Attorney General Reopens Limbaugh Drug Case
(Reuters)
Excerpt: “Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum told the Miami Herald Wednesday that, based on grand jury testimony in an unrelated drug case, he has sufficient evidence that the talk show host violated his probation by continuing to use narcotics after the date of his plea agreement.” […]
“Roy Black, Mr. Limbaugh’s attorney, claimed no such agreement was ever struck with the court.”
4. Miss Universe and Miss USA Tour Guantanamo
(Associated Press)
Excerpt: “Miss Universe and Miss USA have taken a firsthand look at the U.S. prison for terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay.” […]
“‘I didn’t want to leave, it was such a relaxing place, so calm and beautiful,’ [Miss Universe Dayana] Mendoza wrote on [her] blog.”
5. Something Fowl in Customs
(MSN)
Excerpt: “A 23-year-old man flew into Australia with a pair of pigeons hidden in his pants. According to the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service, the man was concealing a live pigeon in each leg of his trousers.”
6. CNBC Hires Ex-Treasury Secy. Paulson as Analyst
(Bloomberg)
Excerpt: “‘What better business analyst can you have than a former secretary of the treasury?’ asked Dan Bledsoe, the cable financial channel’s senior V.P. for programming. “This will amp up our credibility 1000 percent.’”
7. Zucker Plans ’24′ Spin-Off to Star Garofalo
(Entertainment Weekly)
Excerpt: “David Zucker, executive producer of Fox’s hit show ’24,’ has announced Tuesday that he will launch a similar program starring controversial actress Janeane Garofalo as a government agent who ‘does her own thing, law-wise’ tentatively titled ‘The 24 Woman’. […]
“‘It will appeal it the same audience as the current show, same format,’ Zucker said, ‘With a little more sexiness from Janeane, but there will be plenty of rock’ em, sock ‘em action.’”
Click ‘Read on’ for the answers.
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March 17, 2009
March 5, 2009
Tough Assignment
[Note: portions of this column have been fictionalize so that the Personnel Department would have an excuse to lay off the fact checker.]
The Chief (for you non-journalists, that’s what we pros call the editor) invited me for a bit of balcony time and, before sitting donw, I took a look at the magnificent view from this high up and thought about the figure of speech about “walking the plank.”
“What’s up?,” I asked.
“Your columns haven’t been very funny lately,” he snarled (all editors snarl even when they are having a tender moment with their wife).
I hesitated.
“Come on, hurry up, give me an explanation fast. I have stuff to do,” he snapped.
“The country is in a war which is an eight year old search for WMD’s that do not now exist – nor have they ever existed, for that matter – the country is full of empty houses while the streets are full of homeless people asking for spare change, GM is also panhandling in a corporate sort of way, the stock market is singing the old Chubby Checker song that asks: ‘How low can you go?,’ a girl at the Berkeley Bowl asked for a donation to the San Francisco Homeless Services Coalition, but I had to promise a plug in my next column rather than a donation, and I’m supposed to make things seem funny?”
“That’s your assignment. You seem to understand what you gotta do, so what’s the problem? You’re whining and sound like that old routine done by Eddie Lawrence”
“Well, I, um, . . .”
“Come on spit it out, whazamatta you?” he grumbles
“Well, I don’t think there’s much I can say in a column to give folks a good chuckle when the Prez is going to take troops out of a stalemate and move them to a fight in a country that has never been conquered.” I responded.
“So what’s the problem?” he snorts.
“Well, only Rush and a few dittoheads will think what’s happening to the country is funny,” I say.
“So write about something else, dummy.” he huffs.
With that he dismisses me with the advice: “I expect a wonderfully funny column to be posted by the morning of Friday, March 6, 2009. You choose: either you do that or I’ll have Ilse (she-wolf of the accounting department) prepare a buy-out package for you?”
So I warmed up the computer and started writing.
A man and a dag walk into a bar. The man takes several $10 bets that the dog can talk. He bets ten guys and then puts the dog on top of the bar and asks him about his favorite radio program, Rush Limbaugh’s morning diatribe. The dog says nothing. The bettors grow restless. The guy begs the dog. Nothing.
The people demand their money. He screams, yells, cajoles, and pleads for one good simple declarative sentence. The dog barks and the guy has to pay up.
They leave the bar and the guy throws a tantrum. He ends by asking: “Can you give me one good reason not to beat the snot out of you?”
The dog takes a deep breath and smiles: “Can you imagine how much money we are going to make in that bar tomorrow night?”
Can you read this column and not think of the W. C. Fields quote: “Anyone who hates Dogs and Kids Can’t be All Bad.”
Now the disk jockey will introduce the younger readers to and remind the old folks of just how good “The Old Philosopher,” done by Eddie Lawrence, was. It’s time for us to take the dog for a walk. Have a laugh filled week.
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March 3, 2009
Bush’s Presidential Library to Open
George W. Bush’s Presidential Library, slated to open April 1, 2009, will be a storefront in the Oil Country strip mall in Dallas, Texas, located between a payday lender and an Army recruiting office and across the street from the Piggly-Wiggly. The only reading matter on the shelves, aside from an autographed copy of ‘My Pet Goat,’ will be Junior’s collection of Christmas and birthday cards from Ken Lay, Jack Abramoff, Karl Rove, Tom DeLay and other GOP luminaries, with a ‘Win the War on Terror’ video game and a ‘Watch This Drive’ putting green in the back. Visitors will be required to remove their shoes before entering and it will be open from 10 to 4 daily. Admission fee will be your common sense or a hundred shares of Halliburton stock — unless you’re a friend of the family, a Blackwater mercenary, or a member of the Carlyle Group. Then admission is free.
March 2, 2009
The Tattlesnake – ‘True’ Tales From the ER Edition
Emergency Room log entries from various sources, purported to be on the up-and-up:
– Patient admitted ER with self-inflicted gunshot wound to left palm. (He was testing to see if gun was loaded!) Police are going to arrest him for unregistered weapon that he brought to ER with him. He wanted cops to check and see if gun was working properly!
– Patient’s abdominal discomfort caused by overeating. He was trying to set the world record for Big Mac consumption. He downed 12 before he got sick.
– He was admitted with complaints of ‘burning mouth’ after eating a jar of jalapeno peppers. We’ll wait for lab results to determine if that’s the cause.
– This woman is 80 and says she hasn’t had a period in 30 years. She hasn’t had one now. She sat on some spilled hot sauce in her underwear.
– The patient has no previous history of suicides.
– Patient is tearful and crying constantly. She also appears to be depressed.
– Genital examination reveals that he is circus sized.
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February 14, 2009
The Tattlesnake – What’s in a Name? Edition
A Rogue By Any Other Name…
From an AP news story yesterday:
US Security Firm Mired in Iraq Controversy Changes Its Name
Blackwater Worldwide renamed Xe as company tries to salvage its tarnished brandThe Associated Press
February 13, 2009Blackwater Worldwide is abandoning its tarnished brand name as it tries to shake a reputation battered by oft-criticised work in Iraq, renaming its family of two dozen businesses under the name Xe. The parent company’s new name is pronounced like the letter z.
Read the rest of the AP article here.
Now that the schutzstaffel wannabes at Blackwater have taken the plunge, perhaps some of our other fetid corporations will do likewise to improve their ‘brand image’:
Halliburton could rename itself ‘Dick’s Kids’ – “Won’t you help them help themselves with your tax dollars?”;
Kellogg, Brown & Root could turn into ‘Beds, Breakfasts & Beyond’ – “You’ll be shocked at our low prices!”
General Dynamics could become ‘Jets ‘n’ Stuff’ – “Hey, there, America, we’re flyin’ for you!”
ExxonMobil could go with ‘OXOXOX’ — “We just love you and you’ll love us!”;
DynCorp could become ‘The Dyners Club International’ – “Always at your service!”;
Bechtel could be rebranded as ‘Builder’s Square’ – “From a shed to a skyscraper, we’re on your side!”;
The Carlyle Group could change its name to ‘Defense R Us’ — “If it rolls, flies or floats, we’re there!”;
And Blackwater itself, instead of the weird ‘Xe,’ could change its name again to the more comforting ‘Snuggle Security’ – “We’re your blankie when you’re afraid.”
Matching Prominent Republicans with Appropriate Film Titles
The story is Dan Quayle saw the 1972 Robert Redford film ‘The Candidate’ and thought it was a primer on entering politics instead of a warning about selling out one’s principles. Ronald Reagan is said to have had a regular weekly ‘movie premiere night’ while in the White House. Then we had GOP Rep. Kevin McCarthy using a clip from the 2010 Ben Affleck crime saga ‘The Town’ to make a point to Teabaggers in Congress. For a party that has so much enmity towards Hollywood, seems the GOP loves itself some flicks, which got me to wondering what movie titles would accurately reflect certain prominent Republicans. For better or worse, here’s what I came up with, in no particular order:
– Rick Perry: ‘They Live!’
– John Boehner: ‘The Lost Weekend’
– Mitch McConnell: ‘Hell Comes to Frogtown’ (or, ‘White Hunter, Black Heart’)
– Mitt Romney: ‘Liar, Liar’
– Michele Bachmann: ‘The Unbearable Lightness of Being’
– Tim Pawlenty: ‘The Incredible Mr. Limpet’
– Sarah Palin: ‘Mars Needs Women’
– Allen West: ‘Watermelon Man’
– Paul Ryan: ‘Throw Momma from the Train’
– Herman Cain: ‘Blackula’
– George W. Bush: ‘Moon Over Parador’ (or, ‘Wag the Dog’)
– Dick Cheney: ‘Above the Law’
– Scott Walker: ‘Gone with the Wind’ (or, ‘The Great Dictator’)
– John Kasich: ‘Joe Dirt’
– Rick Snyder: ‘Shadow on the Land’
– Rick Scott: ‘The Hucksters’
– Rupert Murdoch: ‘Citizen Kane’
– Rush Limbaugh: ‘It Came from Outer Space’
– Glenn Beck: ‘Dumb and Dumber’
– Bill O’Reilly: ‘The Mouse That Roared’
– Sean Hannity: ‘Frances the Talking Mule’
– Ann Coulter: ‘Heathers’
– Michael Savage: ‘Home Alone’
– Frank Luntz: ‘The Phantom of the Opera’
– David H. Koch: ‘The Magic Christian’
– Karl Rove: ‘Revenge of the Nerds’
– Ron Paul: ‘Dr. Strangelove’
– Rick Santorum: ‘Look Who’s Talking Now’
– Newt Gingrich: ‘No Country for Old Men’ (or, ‘Goldfinger’)
– Donald Trump: ‘Mr. Bug Goes to Town’ (or, ‘Hairspray’)
© 2011 RS Janes. www.fishink.us