I spent the day at a cattle auction, which was a new experience. I didn't go to purchase any animals, but to get a flavor for how these events flow. The idea is that I would gain a little insight into how the software I've been working on the last few years works. My takeaways:
I missed today's Fresh Air story on what impact the attack of "socialist" would have in terms of the power of that language, but it reminded me of something that struck me in hearing some of McCain/Palin's attacks. Back in the day you could equate socialism with acknowledged baddie the USSR, but with the Soviet Union now a relic of history the best they can come up with is Sweden. This struck me as odd, because I would wager most Americans think of maybe three things when they hear "Sweden": ABBA, IKEA, and hot blonde women. These may resonate with voters, but not in the way I suspect Republicans would like.
I've seen this brought up a few times:
Yesterday, as Ron Chusid noted, McCain was on CNN and took this to the next level, announcing that he would have vetoed the same spending bills he'd voted to support.
The criticism here is that McCain is being inconsistent, and while I think that is true I don't know that support for a bill as a senator should necessarily translate into support as president. I'm sure there are a number of bills that have local issues in them (whether evil earmarks or not) that make sense from the perspective of a state representative, but that may not cut the mustard from a national point of view. Not that I want to defend McCain, but I also think this isn't something that should be automatically considered a "flip-flop."
A question for Miss Manners. If you're sitting in a restaurant at lunch and have been waiting for 15 minutes for someone to take your order, is it rude to call the restaurant on your cell phone and demand service? 'cause that's kinda what I just did.
Really? This doesn't represent the views of Anheuser-Busch? Go fig.
Some thoughts:
1) These photos are gorgeous.
2) Clearly flash photography. I bet that bird was seeing spots.
3) How would Mandy react if we tossed her across the room and fired off a flash?
I think these "Yo Mama" jokes are hilarious. Chandra does not, and merely looks at me with a mixture of confusion and indulgence as I read them to her. *sigh*
Yo mama's so ugly, Obama said "You can put lipstick on a pig and it would look a lot like yo mama on dollar margarita night."
On Eschaton today, I found the following:
While Malkin obviously has a rather inconsistent record on these issues, I actually agree that the media has gone nuts on our friend Joe in ways they shouldn't. It seems as if the guy likes the attention, so maybe it isn't a big deal in this case, but I really don't think the fact that someone talks to a political candidate and then gets mentioned by another political candidate in a debate is license to make every detail of this guy's life national news.
I have to disagree with this. McCain did more than just mention "Joe the Plumber." He referenced Joe repeatedly throughout the debate, to the point of creating an instant drinking game. Once you're elevated to that kind of presence I think some level of investigation is warranted. What's more, Republicans have a recent history of plants and people who seem to be independents or undecided when in fact they are not. At this point we should not take anyone they trot forward at face value, and the only way to not be taken in is to do the kind of digging we've seen recently.
There are three pillars of the Republican party. Ever since I was a kid, I think the conventional wisdom has been that Republicans support the rich. That still holds true. Over the last couple of decades, they have also laid claim to the extremely religious. I don't know when it happened, but it's become apparent that the third pillar of the Republican party must be the retarded.
I think McCain has provided enough fodder for Tina Fey to get knocked off her perch as queen of the impersonators.
I just got back from a vaudeville show!
Reference clarification: This is a line from a Spike Jones record whose name I cannot remember.
Thanks to early voting, I was able to cast my ballot today. Cross your fingers that Diebold doesn't erase or change it.
One of the bits that struck me about the VP debate last night was the interaction between Biden and Palin afterwards. You couldn't hear what they were saying, but it looked to me like Biden was giving Palin a dressing-down about something. She looked like nothing more than a schoolgirl being lectured by the principal. I'm wondering if this had anything to do with it (emphasis added):
Forget the tight stripper skirt, forget the metallic eyeshadow inappropriate for anyone over the age of 40, forget the cloying sitcom delivery, the lies, the cruel and calculated needling of Biden by calling his college professor wife a "school teacher" and saying "she'll get her reward in Heaven" (to a man whose first wife died in a car accident) -- she's an idiot.
Based on these word clouds, the key terms Sarah Palin wanted to focus on were "also" and "going." I'm actually surprised that "energy" wasn't the biggest since she seemed to prattle on about that no matter what the question. Normally these word clouds are just mildly interesting, but I think the contrast with Joe Biden's in this case is telling, and is a clue to why people are saying he won the debate.