Thursday, June 05, 2014

Thursday Night

Usually I don't tell you when I'm trolling, but this is horrible.

Early Happy Hour Thread

Tomorrow is Friday!!!

Skinny Legs In Thrall

It's been a long time since I read a Robbins novel, and I enjoyed them when I did, but this is a pretty good take.

..adding, memory is that Skinny Legs and All is the novel where ratio of interesting observations to smugness is highest.

Who Amongst Us?

Dowd was once an actual reporter. Just a reminder.

Bored Aristocrats

I forget who it was who used that term, I think in reference to Michael Kinsley. I'm not quite sure Mr. Colvin fits this description, but he probably will eventually. It's all just palace intrigue, and none of it, not even mass human suffering, really matters.

Thursday Is New Jobless Day

312K new lucky duckies.

Still ok.

The Worst People In The World

I suppose it's healthy that I am still capable of being surprised, but a bit nuts too.

Wednesday, June 04, 2014

Jack Booted Thugs

It's weird how easy it was for people to reconcile "we need guns to protect us from the government thugs" with "cop killer is the worst song ever." Not endorsing killing cops, but the expressed idea in the song that sometimes cop killing might be appropriate, or at least wished, isn't any different from the general rhetoric from white guys with guns that their guns are there to be a defense against government tyranny. Maybe they just should've named the song "BATF AGENT KILLER" or "BLM AGENT KILLER."




Wednesday Night

Probably not entirely work safe. Rock on.



In Which I Try To Piss Off Gun Nuts

Somehow I missed a word (shocking). Spot it!

Where Should I Put My Dirt?

The story doesn't say just why a contractor might have been dumping dirt there.
DOVER, Del. (AP) — State transportation officials said Wednesday that they believe a contractor is responsible for dumping a massive mound of dirt suspected of shifting the ground underneath an interstate highway bridge and forcing its closure.

Made Man

I never dug that deeply into Geithner's bio, but I certainly had thought before, "how exactly did he become president of the New York Fed?"

He's A Funny Guy

I wonder if the WaPo has an empathy extraction machine positioned at its office building.

I don't believe he felt any of the emotions he claimed to feel, he just wanted to write about the Richard Cohen character, an important role in the Washington Morality Play.

Great White Father

Won't link to it, but little Tommy Friedman's column today made me want to burn everything down.

It Might Actually Benefit Them

I've been somewhat puzzled by Big Fast Food's continued, if perhaps muted, opposition to minimum wage increases. As with Wal-Mart and other big companies, I'd expect them to support it. Yes, they have to pay their loser workers more, which gives the bosses a sad, but if there are any legitimate concerns for minimum wage hikes like this it's that small local, more mom-n-pop type stores, might be driven out of business. Big companies can reduce costs elsewhere because they have market power that allows them to squeeze suppliers. A minimum wage increase might increase their relative advantage and reduce the competition a bit.

I don't think this is a reason to oppose a minimum wage hike, but I'm surprised big companies don't see it this way.

Parking Neutral

That it happened is great, but that it took so long and that probably the only way it actually got through was that it didn't reduce neighborhood parking by a single spot is kind of sad.

It isn't that I don't think neighborhood parking concerns are legitimate, it's that I don't think the parking above all crowd usually knows what it's doing. Though it finally changed, for years they loved curb cuts and garages on new development because they had "parking." Of course, they achieved this by by subtracting one public spot to create one private one. Forcing new tenants to purchase/rent spots just attracts the kind of household which will certainly have one - and likely more! - cars. Creating nice pedestrian spaces attracts...pedestrians!

If they knew what they were doing they'd get behind significantly increasing parking permit rates, at least for any household with more than one car. Though, I guess, a lot of these people are in the "4 car household" crowd. The problem.

Election News Of The Day

Horrible person Matt Miller did not win or qualify for a runoff.

Tuesday, June 03, 2014

Late Night

Rock on.

Evening Thread

enjoy

Mavericky

Hilarious.