Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
The Stars Might Lie, but the Numbers Never Do
After last night's tough loss to the Yankees, the Red Sox are now 6 1/2 games back, with only six games left to play in the regular season. Mathematically, they can pull off an upset and land in the playoffs, but there are a lot of if's involved. If they win the rest of their games (3 with Chicago and 3 with the Yankees). If Tampa and the Yankees lose all their remaining games. The post-mortem for a tough season will come. Right now, the prayers are in and the money is, as always, on the home team. GO SOX.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
You might have missed this one
Jerusalem (JTA)—A leading Israeli rabbi has come out against the tradition of using a live animal for the kapparot ceremony.
Religious Zionist Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, the chief rabbi of the West Bank settlement of Beit El and the head of the Ateret Cohanim Yeshiva in Jerusalem issued a religious ruling suggesting that it was better to give money to the poor rather than wave a live chicken over one's head and transfer one's sins to the animal in order to achieve atonement for sins in advance of Yom Kippur.
The ruling came at the request of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Israel, Haaretz reported.
The above article does beg for a comment: First off, this is crazy! However long this ritual of flinging a chicken about over one's head, it needs to stop, for more than the obvious reasons. It makes Jews look like nuts. We've got enough against us as it is, what with controlling the World Bank and the entertainment industry, and being the brunt of the ire of hate groups, racists and various and sundry other angry goyim, not to mention the arabs. In fact, the whole ritual seems like something the arabs would do. It just seems too barbaric for members of the tribe. Let me be clear, I am not governed by any Yeshiva or settlement on the West Bank. I haven't gone to a synagogue since moving to Oregon and used to go to the High Holiday services at the Laugh Factory in West Hollywood. My wife and I have chickens. I hesitate saying we "own" them. They are very much their own hens and roosters.We house and feed them. I would no more think of twirling one over my head than I'd put a loaded gun to my head. Especially, Fabio, who has had it in for me since the year gimmel, or last year, whichever came first. Come to think of it, I'd like to put a loaded gun to his head, but my wife would never forgive me. Besides, I'd have to get a gun. Which brings me to the conclusion that just because the Marx brothers and the Three Stooges, along with Henny Youngman, Lenny Bruce and Shecky Green were all Jewish is no justification for twirling a chicken over your head. The laughs you may get are outweighed by the shame you will feel of having chicken shit on your nice black coat and having to explain it to the Chinaman at the dry cleaners.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Las gallinas de arriba cagan a las de abajo.
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR
Sunday on Face the Nation, Bob Schieffer asked House Minority Leader John Boehner about the proposed tax cuts. He asked him three times, just to make sure he and his viewers heard it right. Boehner said that he would vote for the bill if it offered cuts only for those making under $250,000 a year. He said it three times...
... then he was called up on the carpet by his counterpart in the senate.
Is it me, or does Mitch McConnell look like an alien middle-age Ninja Turtle zombie? Yeah, I know... but I digress. McConnell stated emphatically there will be no exceptions to the tax cut. It is non-negotiable. His cohort from the land of Mex-bashing, John Kyl was quoted in today's paper as saying that "his party will not give ground."
The rich will get richer. And the blind will be led to the cliff's edge. Maybe the Tea Party populace can't read. Maybe they want to enable the rich more than they already are. Maybe their hate for our President and his party is so virulent that they will take every contrary position, even if it directly and adversely affects them. Can this issue be more transparent? It is not good for those who seem to be supporting it. It is bad for 98% of the population.
Maybe President Obama will stay try to his word and not back down to these hypocritical whores. And I don't use that term lightly. I don't quite know what else to call Mr. Boehner, especially after the revealing article in Sunday's New York Times. It the presumptive next Speaker of the House is not only a chain-smoker and avid golfer, but is best friend to big business lobbyists-- not surprisingly, tobacco company flunkies among them, who have contributed "at least" $340,000 to his campaigns. The Times article reported that "Mr. Boehner won some of his first national headlines in 1996 after he was caught handing out checks from tobacco lobbyists to fellow Republicans on the House floor. Then the fourth-ranking House Republican, he said he had broken no rules and was simply assisting his lobbyist friends, who were contributing to other Republicans’ campaigns."
Uh-hunh.
"From 2000 to 2007, Mr. Boehner flew at least 45 times, often with his wife, Debbie, on corporate jets provided by companies including R. J. Reynolds. (As required, Mr. Boehner reimbursed part of the costs.)
In addition, over the last decade he has taken 41 other trips paid for by corporate sponsors or industry groups, often to popular golf spots. That makes him one of the top House beneficiaries of such travel, which has recently been curbed as a result of changes in ethics rules.
Mr. Boehner continues to travel to golf destinations on a corporate-subsidized tab, though now it is paid for through his political action committee, the Freedom Project. In the last 18 months, it has spent at least $67,000 at the Ritz-Carlton Naples in Florida, at least $20,000 at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Gainesville, Va., and at least $29,000 at the Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, federal records show, for fund-raising events."
So, when the hapless Tea-Partyists rant about wanting their country back, what exactly are they talking about? Checkbook diplomacy? Maybe they mean taking the country club back. But they don't have a chance on that score. Those clubs are restricted. When they stick that bumper sticker on their family sedan, they'd better think of the ramifications. Between Glenn Beck, Boehner and McConnell, I am no longer sure who will play Lonesome Roads in the remake of A Face in the Crowd. They are all certainly as convincing as Andy Griffith, though not nearly as entertaining.
What? McConnell in a cowboy suit, singing and-a-laughing? I don't think so,
... then he was called up on the carpet by his counterpart in the senate.
Is it me, or does Mitch McConnell look like an alien middle-age Ninja Turtle zombie? Yeah, I know... but I digress. McConnell stated emphatically there will be no exceptions to the tax cut. It is non-negotiable. His cohort from the land of Mex-bashing, John Kyl was quoted in today's paper as saying that "his party will not give ground."
The rich will get richer. And the blind will be led to the cliff's edge. Maybe the Tea Party populace can't read. Maybe they want to enable the rich more than they already are. Maybe their hate for our President and his party is so virulent that they will take every contrary position, even if it directly and adversely affects them. Can this issue be more transparent? It is not good for those who seem to be supporting it. It is bad for 98% of the population.
Maybe President Obama will stay try to his word and not back down to these hypocritical whores. And I don't use that term lightly. I don't quite know what else to call Mr. Boehner, especially after the revealing article in Sunday's New York Times. It the presumptive next Speaker of the House is not only a chain-smoker and avid golfer, but is best friend to big business lobbyists-- not surprisingly, tobacco company flunkies among them, who have contributed "at least" $340,000 to his campaigns. The Times article reported that "Mr. Boehner won some of his first national headlines in 1996 after he was caught handing out checks from tobacco lobbyists to fellow Republicans on the House floor. Then the fourth-ranking House Republican, he said he had broken no rules and was simply assisting his lobbyist friends, who were contributing to other Republicans’ campaigns."
Uh-hunh.
"From 2000 to 2007, Mr. Boehner flew at least 45 times, often with his wife, Debbie, on corporate jets provided by companies including R. J. Reynolds. (As required, Mr. Boehner reimbursed part of the costs.)
In addition, over the last decade he has taken 41 other trips paid for by corporate sponsors or industry groups, often to popular golf spots. That makes him one of the top House beneficiaries of such travel, which has recently been curbed as a result of changes in ethics rules.
Mr. Boehner continues to travel to golf destinations on a corporate-subsidized tab, though now it is paid for through his political action committee, the Freedom Project. In the last 18 months, it has spent at least $67,000 at the Ritz-Carlton Naples in Florida, at least $20,000 at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Gainesville, Va., and at least $29,000 at the Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, federal records show, for fund-raising events."
So, when the hapless Tea-Partyists rant about wanting their country back, what exactly are they talking about? Checkbook diplomacy? Maybe they mean taking the country club back. But they don't have a chance on that score. Those clubs are restricted. When they stick that bumper sticker on their family sedan, they'd better think of the ramifications. Between Glenn Beck, Boehner and McConnell, I am no longer sure who will play Lonesome Roads in the remake of A Face in the Crowd. They are all certainly as convincing as Andy Griffith, though not nearly as entertaining.
What? McConnell in a cowboy suit, singing and-a-laughing? I don't think so,
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