I LOL’d
And when I LOL, I like to share the moment. Via The Daily Show...
HE. LIKES. BEER!
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, May 1, 2024
Note: Funeral services for South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s political career will be held this afternoon at 3:30 over at the Pierre animal shelter. Speakers praising her accomplishments in the public sector will include—[checks notes]—nobody. Please join us afterward for kibble-based refreshments in kennel 6.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til summer: 50
Days 'til New York's Rochester Lilac Festival: 9
Cost of creating the world's largest solar and wind power plant in the western Indian state of Gujarat, which is being built by the nephew of a coal baron: $20 billion
Factor by which the green power plant is larger than the city of Paris: 5x
Number of homes the plant will power: 16 million
Rank of 2023 among warmest years for the Gulf of Maine, which had a surface temperature 2 degrees above normal last year: #5
Number of driverless semi trucks with which Aurora Innovations plans to start hauling freight between Dallas and Houston later this year: 20
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 187 (including 5 volcanoes and 1 end times event worth celebrating). Soul Protection Factor 16 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Goofing around on the steps…
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CHEERS to May! The month of flowers, Mom’s Day, Teachers Day (May 7), Armed Forces Day, Victoria Day, Lost Sock Memorial Day, National Pet Week, “End of the Middle Ages” Day (May 29—for Republicans a day of mourning), and Cinco de Mayo.
It’s National Hamburger Month for carnivores and National Salad Month for vegetarians. The Webby Awards (and their famous 5-word acceptance speeches) will be awarded on the 13th, a week after the Pulitzer Prizes are announced on the 6th. Memorial Day weekend kicks off the summer season in 24 days, but not before we celebrate Star Wars Day (i.e. “May the Fourth Be With You”) and mark with righteous anger the 54th anniversary of the Kent State shootings, now taking on new relevance with the pro-Palestine actions on campuses across the country. Full moon arrives on the 23rd, so make a note to look up, think of Neil Armstrong and all our departed space pioneers, and give it a wink. Sequels and remakes dominate the new movie and streaming schedule, including Deadpool III and Mad Max 5, along with a remastered re-release of The Beatles’ 1970 Let It Be that has the MAGA cult’s “Fuck Your Feelings” t-shirts in a twist because John Lennon once sang “Imagine all the people livin’ life in peace.”
And we’re happy to report that the Daily Kos contributing editors will once again dress in their frilly best to dance around the Maypole, although we’re not so happy to report that, also once again, they’ll end up with a bent pole, a huge granny knot, and a pile of eyewitness phone-cams with their memories erased. God bless our treasured American traditions.
CHEERS to this morning's easy layup. The Trial of the Century continued yesterday, with a former Republican president of the United States charged with a cut-and-dried case of election interference. After Judge Juan Merchan fined him $9,000 for violating his gag order and threatened jail time if it happened again, the defendant took his seat and the sketch artist drew the scene in the courtroom as the trial continued…
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Ha ha ha ha ha!!! Nobody could see nothin' because Trump kept farting the whole time! Thank you, my job delivering the comedy goods is done here. Let's move on…
CHEERS to having to choose the lesser of two evils. Not sure why they had to say this publicly. After all, I'm told that when your enemies are beating each other senseless it's best to just let them continue. But whatever:
House Democratic leadership announced Tuesday that Democrats would kill an effort to oust House Speaker Mike Johnson from his position, amid threats from Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and other hardliners.
Johnson said he did not request the assistance of Democrats as he hangs on to the speakership. “I’ve not requested assistance from anyone,” he said.
"Ahem! Ahem! Ah…Ah…Bullshitahchoo!!!" said God.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS to a memorable growth spurt. On May 1, 1931, #1 U.S. attraction the Empire State Building was dedicated. It was the tallest building in the pleasant village of New York until 1972, when the World Trade Center rose above it. It regained its "tallest" status in the worst possible way 28 years later. But today it plays third fiddle to the new One World Trade Center tower and the luxury apartments of 432 Park Avenue. There, there, Empire State—if it's any consolation, King Kong always liked you best.
CHEERS to tackling the currently-thorniest issue head-on. Israel! Palestine! Gaza! Hamas! Iran! Netanyahu! Biden! Likud! The Knesset! Congress! Protests! Excessive force! Unhelpful University presidents! Super-unhelpful red-state governors! Right-wing U.S. astroturfers and foreign troll farms exploiting the situation to make things even worse! Mass confusion! Chaos and carnage! Shifting alliances! And a universe that couldn't give two shits, as I shall now demonstrate…
Questions? Please address them to the photo above. It possesses a lot more clarity than I do.
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Ten years ago in C&J: May 1, 2014
CHEERS and JEERS to the "jobs jobs jobs" picture. The employment numbers for April were announced by the Labor Department this morning. The good news: private-sector job creation was stronger than expected (288k actual vs. 215k predicted). The bad news, according to Jared Bernstein, concerns the unemployment rate, which fell to 6.3 percent but don’t start high-fiving your pet ferret yet because…
The decline in unemployment is entirely due not to job creation, but to labor force decline (employment actually fell slightly in the household survey). This important and closely watched indicator—the labor force participation rate—also fell 0.4 tenths, reversing recent gains and returning the lfpr to its low where it stood at the end of last year, commensurate with levels we haven’t seen since the late 1970s.
Yes. The labor force shrank in April, coinciding with the first full month after open enrollment for Obamacare ended. I believe the conclusion from this jobs report is obvious: the death panels are working.
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And just one more…
JEERS to the other date besides 12/7/41 which will live in infamy. Putting this little bit of history down here in the cellar where it belongs. 21 years ago today—now more than a generation ago—our steely-eyed chief warrior, Commander Codpiece, who’d lied his pantaloons off to get our country to approve going to war with another country that hadn’t done a thing to us, dressed up in a flight suit and pretended to fly a plane out to an aircraft carrier, where he made a victory speech under a banner that said MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. And oh how the pundit class swooned. Let these clips (and this is just a tiny sample) forever be anvils around their necks…
"Well, that was probably the coolest presidential image since Bill Pullman played the jet fighter pilot in the movie Independence Day. That was the first thing that came to mind for me."
—Joe Klein
“Speaking as a woman, and listening to the women who called into my radio show, seeing President Bush get out of that plane, carrying his helmet, he is a real man.”
—Laura Ingraham
”…a one-time fighter dog.”
—Wolf Blitzer describing Bush
“Al Gore had to go get some woman to tell him how to be a man. And here comes George Bush. You know, he's in his flight suit, he's striding across the deck, and he's wearing his parachute harness, you know, and I've worn those because I parachute, and it makes the best of his manly characteristic. … You know, all those women who say size doesn't count—they're all liars. Check that out.”
—G. Gordon Liddy, now burning in hell
In fact, winning the war was so much fun that Commander Codpiece went on winning it for another eight years until his successor decided that enough winning had been won. When it was all over, hundreds of thousands of people had lost their lives, limbs and minds and Commander Codpiece’s taxpayers were on the hook for trillions of victory dollars. Oh, and filling the vacuum Commander Codpiece created was a nightmare army of ISIS orcs whose favorite things in the world are raping women and burning people to death in cages. But the important thing is, Commander Codpiece and the very serious pundit class are still living happily ever after to this day. The End.
Have a happy humpday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
"There’s nothing in Bill in Portland Maine's 'performance'—if that’s the word we’ll use—that would indicate he cares, prioritizes, or ever valued or ever did anything to support a clean kiddie pool."
—Nancy Pelosi
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