Sunday Morning Pre-Festivus Links

by | Dec 19, 2021 | Daily Links | 227 comments

Our skies are gray, the weather dithers between snow, ice, and rain, and there’s half-frozen mud everywhere. The town is empty, the shops are closed (except ours), and I’m on deadline for two articles so stuck inside. These are my grievances.

In the meantime, I have no Tales Of The Woke, but something weirder. SP did a test run of cupcakes to sell out of the cold case. Chocolate, with a crumbled mint candy topping. Now, one problem with our specials is that the staff loves them, and often, they never quite make it into the hands of customers. So it was with the cupcakes- one of the girls bought all of them and took them to work at her main job, a funeral home. She was late returning for her next shift and here’s the exchange in our group chat:

Girl: We had a fight break out at the funeral home but I’m coming into (next town) now.

Girl: It was very Exhilarating.

Me: Which side were you on?

WebDom: That of the dead guy I bet. Cause he’s the only one there who didn’t have to deal with it.

Girl: Unfortunately before I could do anything their was a stiletto heel in some ladies neck.

Me: Well, your day has certainly been more interesting than mine.

SP is convinced that the fight was over the last cupcake. She may be right.

Birthdays today include a guy who ran interference for me; a smart woman but who was no Einstein; the greatest pair of eyebrows of the 20th century; La Taylor Swift de son temps; a TV news/talk star whose fame has mercifully faded; a guy who filled a hole left with the departure of Desi Arnaz; a rather rapid guitarist; and some chick y’all talk about but I have no idea who she is.

Speaking of “no idea,” let’s look at Links.

 

“We’re going to keep this going forever.”

 

“But we’ll be generous and wait a couple weeks before bringing down the hammer.”

 

“And if the panic we induce kills your business, ah well, omelets and eggs.”

 

“And keep away from the Jews.”

 

It’s not just paranoia, they actually DO want to put us in concentration camps. Welcome to New York, the progressive utopia.

 

Of course we are. Those Boomers were waiting tables, loading trucks, working warehouses…

 

It’s a start, anyway.

 

Old Guy is feeling very surreal this weekend, so here ya go.

About The Author

Old Man With Candy

Old Man With Candy

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me. Wait, wrong book, I'll find something else.

227 Comments

  1. Sean

    Stiletto heel + violence.

    Russian mobster funeral?

    • rhywun

      That could have been a Rhywun clan funeral. There is a reason I avoid them.

      • Chafed

        Shoes are expensive to replace?

  2. Not Adahn

    My diner did their traditional “thank you for being a regular customer” gift of cookies. It’s touches like that which keep me going there, in spite of them being true believers in masking.

    • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

      One local diner always “closes” around 2 PM on Christmas Eve; closes for business, I mean. Then they bring out the bottles of booze, and all the locals drop in for a drink (free, of course, since they have no liquor license) and to shoot the shit with the husband & wife owners.

      They make the best, most real, club sandwich I’ve ever eaten, and which is the standard I use to judge all the others I’ve ever eaten. To date, all the others have not compared well.

  3. The Gunslinger

    “Only by laying out the stark difference in outcomes between vaccinated and unvaccinated infections could the gravity of the moment come through.”

    Right, because up till now nobody has been talking about a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” or saying “if you’re unvaccinated don’t go to the hospital if you get COVID”. Fuck right off assholes.

    Also, good morning Old Man.

    • DrOtto

      I got Covid in November from my wife’s twice vaccinated cousin. I’m unvaccinated. I didn’t go to the hospital. I’m doing my part. Twas like a moderate cold in my case.

      • Sensei

        Just spoke with friend. It ripped through his family last week. One son had almost no symptoms and likely brought it to the family. It took the other son down for about 3 days. After that it took out both he and is wife. He’s the only one vaccinated (for work with J&J). Knocked his wife down for 7+ days and took him down for something like 4.

        Best part is with the crappy store bought tests everybody, but he tested positive. My friend never caught it according to the store tests. He never bothered going for a PCR test of course. His feeling is that after seeing what his wife went through the J&J vaccine did knock down the severity, but given a choice would not have gotten it and he has no regrets that the rest of the family wasn’t vaccinated.

  4. Scruffy Nerfherder

    So New York wants to go full Australia.

    This is my shocked face.

    ?

    • Sean

      Crikey!

    • Ted S.

      Note that it’s dated January 2021.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, I’m assuming that’s some fever dream that didn’t pass.

        There’s always 2022, though! ?

      • Ghostpatzer

        January 6. Concentration camps for insurrectionists?

  5. Sensei

    My favorite bit from the CNN piece.

    (Biden had) determined ahead of time that his message would be muddled if he answered any questions afterward, so he sat uncharacteristically silent as reporters peppered him on their way out.

    • The Gunslinger

      That’s just perfect. The best description of our Dear Leader I’ve seen.

      • DrOtto

        I miss Pie too!

    • Sean

      Lulz

      • cyto

        Uncharacteristically silent? I mean, historically, sure. But not for the last 2 years. He has taken fewer real questions during his entire presidency than Trump in a routine afternoon covid briefing.

    • rhywun

      This. Is. CNN.

  6. SDF-7

    Huh… I know he borders on 21st Century – but I was expecting the attack eyebrows instead. Still, have to grant that they were… formidable.

    I’ll avoid ranting and raving about the 6th Circuit and how by that logic OSHA is unlimited. And since they only derive power by delegation from Congress — Congress is unlimited. Which seems really really odd given the explicit writing of the Constitution as “these are the only powers given by the States to the Federal”, but those magical penumbras of a living Constitution apparently scream out to them. Statist assholes.

    Re; restaurants — but really, small businesses in general — for all their supposed hatred of Big Corps, they sure seem set on bringing the most dystopian Sci-Fi of Corp/Gov dominance to life, don’t they? Almost like they’re almost always the opposite of what they say and they’re really a bunch of statist assholes or something… funny, that.

    Oh crap, New York — no Australia IS NOT A ROLE MODEL! Hope that one dies in committee… holy crap.

    “Early” retirement for boomers? I haven’t done the math — but I’m pretty sure all the boomers are well into expected retirement age now. Gen X is certainly in the “early” possibility, and probably starting to get there normally. Or is this part of their expectation that we all die in the fields. Statist assholes.

    I’d feel better about decriminalizing drugs if they didn’t have such a crap record decriminalizing everything else these days. No faith in them to not screw it up.

    Anyway — good morning, OMWC. My plan is to think as little as possible about the news to avoid stress coronaries. The cupcakes do sound great (I’m a big mint chocolate fan). At least with the stiletto in the neck they were convenient to the morgue, I suppose.

    • Ted S.

      I was thinking former German Minister of Finance Theo Waigel.

      • rhywun

        Wow!

      • Ted S.

        I just went to Google and started typing “Theo Waigel” into the search box. One of the auto-completes I got was “theo waigel augenbrauen”. 😆

      • rhywun

        lol

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Jeez, those are impressive.

      • hayeksplosives

        Sam the Eagle agrees

    • cyto

      Over at Volokh the story is that they are going to strike it down because it doesn’t follow the law…. And how this fits with letting the mandate stand and denying a full panel hearing is beyond me.

      My prediction, an entirely partisan court will reach an entirely partisan result. Not remains to be seen whether the Supreme court has the stones to stop government overreach.

    • creech

      Youngest boomers (born 1964) are only 57.

  7. Rebel Scum

    “For the unvaccinated, we are looking at a winter of severe illness and death for the unvaccinated — for themselves, their families and the hospitals they’ll soon overwhelm. But there’s good news: If you’re vaccinated and you have your booster shot, you’re protected from severe illness and death,” the President said.

    Fuck. Off. You. Dishonest. Cunte.

  8. Rebel Scum

    The Occupational Health and Safety Administration said Saturday that it would not issue citations tied to its coronavirus vaccination mandate before Jan. 10 so that companies have time to adjust to and implement the requirements.

    Wasn’t this prohibited by the courts?

    The announcement came after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth District in Cincinnati decided on Friday that the mandate for large employers could go forward, reversing a previous court decision made after 27 Republican-led states, conservative groups, business associations and some individual companies challenged the mandate.

    Ah…Well I’ll continue my policy of not complying with this tyrannical horseshit anyway.

  9. Rebel Scum

    they are entering their second winter of the coronavirus pandemic

    The only pandemic is that of government.

    the omicron variant is looming.

    It’s a flu. Take your vitamins and deal with it.

  10. juris imprudent

    Boomers blamed for retiring? I can just see the headlines in the coming years – death spike due to Boomers.

    • Tonio

      No, the headline will be “Boomers Finally Dying in Significant Numbers; Good Riddance.” /Boomer

      • rhywun

        Maybe from Gawker and friends.

        Boomers will retain their grip on the major media until the end.

      • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

        The Boomers (of which I am one) are a de facto gerontocracy that’s so terrified of age and death that they’ve bent the policy actions of an entire planet to their desire to never die, including getting the youngest generation to take an experimental treatment with unknown long-term side-effects — y’know, that same “long-term” that the Boomers will definitely not be around for.

        I’m ashamed of my generation. We were supposed to be brave.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, they have got some ’splainin’ to do.

  11. Gender Traitor

    Fine. If you won’t feature the birthday girl herself, I’ll link this lovely cover from someone (most of) you wouldn’t expect (and whose kinky boots Taylor Swift isn’t fit to kiss.)

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Huh, I’ve never heard her just sing minus her schtick. Better than I thought it’d be.

      • rhywun

        She did one of her hits on Howard Stern (!) and it was amazeballs.

        True talent.

      • rhywun

        Ugh Youtube served up a vastly inferior cover of The Goonies ‘r’ Good Enough after that.

        I need to figure out how to disable that “feature”.

      • Gender Traitor

        Here you go. I love this whole album (all covers of songs she heard growing up.) Only one of hers I own. Merry Christmas.

      • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

        That’s a great album, and Lauper’s voice was a revelation to me, only being previously familiar with her “pop” stuff.

    • Mojeaux

      Even though she is singing music I love, I just can’t get into her voice. It sounds “small” and childlike.

      For some reason, I am comparing her to Monica Mancini, but I don’t know why.

  12. l0b0t

    Ok, that cupcake story was worth the wait.

    • Trigger Hippie

      Chocolate Mint Cupcake Stiletto Stabbing was the name of my garage band.

    • LCDR_Fish

      Need a few of those cupcakes – carbs be damned!

    • ElspethFlashman

      I can imagine that funeral homes must be the sight for a lot of fights, etc. Just like the courthouse. People have a lot of emotions bottled up, stress about someone’s death, and a score to settle.

      • rhywun

        And valuables to fight over. Ask me how I know.

      • Mojeaux

        My family and I had a serious discussion at the funeral home as to whether to actually have a funeral at all. My Gma from Hell #2 had prepaid for her funeral, so it didn’t make any difference but see: “from hell” part. I did not want to honor her. Nor did my aunt (her daughter). My cousin, who is a lot more gracious person than either me or my aunt (her mother) cajoled us into it with “there were a lot of other people who loved her who would want the funeral, and the funeral is for the living). I finally said, “Fine.” I regret to this day giving in.

      • Gender Traitor

        The only thing you should regret is not stabbing Gma with a big pin during the viewing to confirm that she was really dead.

      • Mojeaux

        My aunt, cousin, and I dressed her for the funeral, per [[[our people’s]]] customs. She was definitely dead.

      • Gender Traitor

        Still, a public pin jab would have made your point.

  13. Rebel Scum

    The US and Canada are reportedly on a short list of countries that could be labeled red by the government on Sunday, as the number of Omicron cases soars above 130, daily cases hit an all-time high and the positivity rate neared 1%.

    Does anyone take this bullshit seriously at this point?

    Israelis are banned from traveling to red states without special permission

    But it is Republicans that typically support the Jewish state…

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Omicron spreads so readily it’s impossible to stop anyway. The freaking Israelis have really gone off the deep end.

      • Brawndo

        Can’t say that I care. They had an apartheid state already, now they’re just extending the scope to vaccinations.

  14. Ted S.

    SP is convinced that the fight was over the last cupcake. She may be right.

    You may be crazy?

    • cyto

      You got her number? She just might be the lunatic I’m looking for….

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Nooooooo……. please no Billy.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Hey, Only the Good Die Young was OK. That’s about it though.

      • Ozymandias

        BULL-SHITTT, all you Billy Joel haters!!!
        Cold Spring Harbor is a great first album, even if “She’s Got a Way” is what’s memorable about it.
        See “Summer, Highland Falls” for what a piano ballad can be; “Angry Young Man” is a brilliant and fun old guy rant; “The Ballad of Billy the Kid” is all-around great.
        I think “And So It Goes” has some of the most beautiful lyrics ever written about heartbreak and finding love in its aftermath.

        “In every heart, there is a room –
        A sanctuary safe a strong…
        To heal the wounds, from lovers past
        Until a new one comes along.

        I spoke to you
        In cautious tones
        You answered me with no pretense
        And still I fear, I said too much…
        My silence is my self-defense.

        And every time I’ve held a rose
        It seems I only felt the thorns
        And so it goes, and so it goes
        And so will you soon I suppose

        But if my silence made you leave
        Then that would be my worst mistake
        So I will share this room with you
        And you can have this heart to break

        And this is why my eyes are closed
        It’s just as well for all I’ve seen
        And so it goes, and so it goes
        And you’re the only one who knows

        So I would choose to be with you
        That’s if the choice were mine to make
        But you can make decisions too
        And you can have this heart to break

        And so it goes, and so it goes
        And you’re the only one who knows”

      • The Last American Hero

        “Trump and Clinton, Russian spies,
        Covid lockdowns all the time,
        I’ve got no talent and no time
        To waste away on these rhymes

        We didn’t start the fire….”

        Yeah. Fucking genius.

  15. LCDR_Fish

    Re Facebook – still overdue on deleting my account even though I haven’t logged in for most of the year…..however for some restaurants, etc who only post their specials on FB (including Gourmeltz for reach and bandwidth) – is there any way to view pages without logging in? It used to work, but for the last few months I’ve only been directed to the login page with no exception/bypass links.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      He’s correct though: (most) people respond to incentives including negative incentives. Hopefully in the coming years, after the panic recedes, these jackasses who pushed this life destroying stuff will face civil and legal penalties that will wreck them but we’ll see.

  16. rhywun

    While restaurants in the U.S. and United Kingdom are open without restrictions

    Um…

    • Ted S.

      LoTT; DR.

    • Brawndo

      IIRC Pete Quinones made fake Twitter handles pretending to be a black person that would call woke white women “Mayonnaise monkeys”

  17. Rebel Scum

    Wrongthink will not be tolerated.

    Actor Jay Johnston has been served with a ban from Fox’s ‘Bob’s Burgers’ after he was allegedly spotted at the Jan. 6 Capitol riot

    Should have joined BLM/Antifa in arsoning a city block.

    • rhywun

      The aftermath of the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot has—largely—been the story of a glaring lack of consequences.

      Annnnnnd… I’m out.

      Never change, The Daily Beast.

      • Sean

        Well, in the respect that Ashley’s murderer is still free, I’ll agree.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Was he supposedly actually rioting or was he just there?

      • juris imprudent

        Even if he just THOUGHT about going – that is insurrection too!!!! /the self-inflicted retards

  18. Rebel Scum

    So you admit that it is a politically motivated witch hunt.

    When asked what investigators Cohen is speaking with, Deutsch said, “Cy Vance’s people, both, both the attorney general and the district attorney. He has met over a dozen times. He spent 50, 60, 70 hours going back to when he was in prison. You know, they are not— you know public officials, and you know guys — they are not doing this for the sake of doing this. They are doing this with an end game. And I believe as we get closer to maybe, you know, midterm elections or sometimes that’s politically timely, I am not saying there are politics involved in this — Trump is going to be indicted. I believe that with every bone in my body.”

    He added, “Al Capone did not go to jail for murder. He went to jail for tax evasion. Donald Trump, I don’t believe, will go to jail for insurrection for sedition against the government. He will go to jail for bank fraud, mail fraud, and insurance fraud — not go to jail, be indicted, certainly.”

    You literally just said that there are politics involved. And of course he won’t because that didn’t happen.

    • rhywun

      The walls are closing in!!1!

      /in case you ever wondered why my taxes are so fucking high

  19. PieInTheSky

    A cat tried to follow me inside my house. Stupid cat.

    • Ted S.

      What do you have against cats?

      • PieInTheSky

        well outside my house nothing really though they do kill songbirds

    • Old Man With Candy

      What instrument did he play?

    • Sean

      He just wanted a cheesburger.

      No pics?

      • PieInTheSky

        well no I shooed it and closed the door. it was a boilerplate black and white cat nothing remarkable

      • Tres Cool

        Was it white/black or black/white? TOS Star Trek did a great episode on that one.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      That was him teeing up a prime opportunity to slag Manchin and was a friendly question. She’s not good at politics at all.

      • Zwak, All dressed up in his ridiculous seersucker suit

        She sucks so much because she is literally the definition of an affirmative action failure. At every point in her career, she has sucked and been promoted up due to her race and sex. And it shows here when she is on the national stage. She has no idea how to glad handle, disseminate, appear useful or any other politician’s trick of getting nothing done while looking competent. And, let us face it, that is the bottom line of her job.

        Her mentor HRC was the same way. They have this idiotic belief that anyone can do this, and all they are doing is putting a vagina where a penis usually gets stuck. But they didn’t do it the hard way.

  20. PieInTheSky

    ‘Wind’ from Earth’s middle layer blows through a secret passage beneath Panama

    https://www.livescience.com/mantle-material-flow-panama-window

    A geological secret passage beneath Panama may explain why rocks from Earth’s mantle are found more than 1,000 miles (1,609 kilometers) from where they originated.

    This opening, located some 62 miles (100 km) below Earth’s surface, may allow a flow of mantle materials to travel all the way from beneath the Galápagos Islands to beneath Panama.

    This never-before-discovered form of transport may also help explain why Panama has very few active volcanoes.

  21. Brawndo

    This might ruffle some feathers here, but I see lots of (mostly deserved) shit talking of millennials. Fuck the boomers. They have had institutional and cultural control for longer than probably any generation in existence and have voted for and supported both parties that engineered the empire and monetary policy that has ravaged not just our economy and future prosperity, but dozens of third world countries around the world. And most of them are going to die off before the full consequences of their preferred policies really start to rear their ugly head.

    • PieInTheSky

      Fuck boomers, All My Homies Hate boomers

    • rhywun

      You’re not wrong.

      /Gen-X – “don’t look at me”

      • Mojeaux

        I will sit by you.

      • MikeS

        *high five*

      • Zwak, All dressed up in his ridiculous seersucker suit

        My group, or whatever.

    • creech

      Just remember, however, no Boomers ever voted for LBJ, the asshole that really got U.S. rolling downhill.

      • Tundra

        *Woodrow Wilson waves from hell*

    • juris imprudent

      Yeah, along the lines of creech, when the Boomers were being born and raised, a shit ton of stupid stuff was already under way for Pax Americana all thanks to the Greatest Generation. As a slightly past-peak Boomer, my first presidential vote was cast in 1976 – already 30 years into the Cold War (and no one at that time would’ve imagined the end of that that came in ’89).

      Hell, if you really want to condemn Boomers, do so speaking to their role as parents and the generations they raised.

      • Brawndo

        That’s certainly one of my bigger criticisms. What the people in power are doing to children during covid is unbelievably evil, but it’s not an entirely new attitude either.

    • kinnath

      Eh. Fuck off.

  22. Rebel Scum

    Of course it will.

    New York Governor Kathy Hochul said that she plans to introduce legislation that would change the state’s definition of “fully-vaccinated” against COVID-19 to include a booster shot.

    “At some point, we have to determine that fully-vaccinated means boosted as well,” Hochul told reporters at a press conference Thursday. “And we’ll give people a sufficient timeframe to make that happen.” …

    “People are underestimating the power of Omicron because they say, ‘people aren’t getting sick, they aren’t going to hospitals,’ but if you have a million more people infected, that means you will have over-flowing hospitals at this rate,” Hochul said.

    Hochul’s comments come as Chief Medical Advisor to the President Dr. Anthony Fauci has suggested that redefining “fully-vaccinated” to include a booster is “on the table.”

    “There’s no doubt that optimum vaccination is with a booster,” Fauci said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” via the New York Post. “Whether or not the CDC is going to change that, it certainly is on the table and open for discussion.”

    Take the clot shots until you die.

    • SDF-7

      “People are underestimating the power of Omicron because they say, ‘people aren’t getting sick, they aren’t going to hospitals,’ but if you have a million more people infected, that means you will have over-flowing hospitals at this rate,” Hochul said.

      Really? So the hospitals have been “over-flowing” due to the common cold, etc? If A then not B (Omicron infected aren’t going to hospitals) means if A then B in your world, huh? Idiot statist asshole.

    • Rebel Scum

      It doesn’t matter. Resistance is futile.

      • PieInTheSky

        tell that to the people making me do QRC runsets

    • Old Man With Candy

      That’s actually clever. It’s a way of creating a distributed capacitance. It was a common deal back in the days of encapsulated PEC modules made with thick film (screen printed) conductors and resistors- this is a modern version.

      • Sensei

        Aren’t you supposed to only stay in your authorized engineering lane?

        You haven’t greased the appropriate palms to have any opinions on electrical engineering. Experience be damned!

      • Old Man With Candy

        Hey, I was handed the title Technical Expert unasked. That’ like getting a blue checkmark.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Functionally it’s a first order low pass filter with a DC block.

      Hard to determine much else without the rest of the circuit.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Bah, I obviously need more coffee. High pass.

  23. Rebel Scum

    Kulaks and wreckers.

    Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is arguing that “corporate greed” is responsible for a surge in car prices. …

    “This market concentration has reduced competition, allowing giant corporations to deliver massive returns for shareholders,” Warren wrote. “But it has harmed consumers by enabling these dominant companies to increase prices and underinvest in key capabilities, which has the effect of also reducing product innovation and product quality.”

    “These semiconductor manufacturers are putting stock price, profits, and growth ahead of the needs of American consumers and workers,” the lawmaker continued. “As the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated, this behavior can lead to terrible consequences and shortages for our country.

    Local, state, and federal governments are, of course, blameless.

    • Sean

      So tedious.

      • Q Continuum

        She doesn’t pass the Turing Test.

    • rhywun

      JFC that is maddening.

      LOOK IN THE MIRROR, HON.

    • Grumbletarian

      “These semiconductor manufacturers are putting stock price, profits, and growth ahead of the needs of American consumers and workers,” the lawmaker continued. “As the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated, this behavior can lead to terrible consequences and shortages for our country.

      Bitch, the company for which I work has had teams of technicians putting in 60-hour weeks or more for more than a year now trying to catch up on demand. We are limited by material availability and space. You can’t build a Class 1000 clean room in a parking lot in a week, idiotic crone, and we can’t pull parts out of our asses to make machines to make computer chips.

      I hope you starve to death in a fire, because just burning to death would be too quick a demise.

    • Brawndo

      I blame Cash for Clunkers. Completely destroyed the lower end of the used car market

      • PieInTheSky

        but it saved the environment (because of course new cars don’t need energy to be produced)

      • Q Continuum

        And more-so, if those cars are electric they run on the magic unicorn farts that come out of those holes in the wall!

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        All the neat ‘90s cars got crushed because of that program and it’s a damn shame.

      • DrOtto

        And destroyed a used parts stream for the cars that weren’t destroyed in that horrific attack on poor people.

      • Mojeaux

        Everything the left does is to make life harder for poor people. Some of them know it and do it gleefully. Some of them know it and don’t care. The rank-and-file proggies don’t know it at all. They NEVER make the connections.

        Last night I saw on FB a proggie crying about his increased taxes. I laughed. The part that made me sad was that he didn’t follow the logic all the way back to the source.

      • Zwak, All dressed up in his ridiculous seersucker suit

        I was trying, once, to explain to a prog that all the environmental laws that they pass, hurt poor people. All the labor laws, hurt poor people. And they could not get their heads around the idea of a trade-off that must take place for all of this. That if you put a clean air restriction on a manufacturing plant, no matter how important you think it is, that is going to go into the business’s calculation of everything from payroll to whether to stay operating in that state. And, how that will screw the poor, each. and. every. time.

      • Mojeaux

        They really are elitists of the worst kind. They hate the poor, and since they will always be with us, they must be kept down in the dirt where they belong.

        Oh, and those upstart middle-classers need to be shown who’s boss, too. They aren’t aristocrats. They’re involved in trade.

      • westernsloper

        You know who else had a destroyed lower end?

      • Q Continuum

        Hemicorporectomy patients?

      • MikeS

        Lisa Sparxxx?

      • Ozymandias

        “I bet when she takes a dump it’s like throwing a Hershey bar down a hallway.”
        – a fellow pilot while watching anal porn scene in our stateroom during deployment

  24. Q Continuum

    “One of the more insidious myths making the rounds this year was that young people didn’t want to work because they were getting by just fine on government aid.”

    Ummm… your entire article serves to support this statement. If Boomers are retiring (which, DUH) that means there are openings (again, DUH). Unemployed young people, in a healthy labor market, would then fall into those jobs. However, Bidenbuxx are keeping people home making at least as much to sit around watching JOI videos on OnlyFans.

    Then again, truth and CNN have a relationship similar to that of a field mouse and an owl so… par for the course.

    • Rebel Scum

      to sit around watching JOI videos on OnlyFans

      *closes private browser*

      Some of us have to work for a living to support that habit.

    • Sean

      Would they though? I don’t think boomers occupy the more entry level positions.

      • Q Continuum

        In that case, a mid-level Gen X’er gets promoted and the Millennial/Gen Z’er slips in.

        Invisible hand and all.

      • Zwak, All dressed up in his ridiculous seersucker suit

        It’s the same thing with building luxury apartments. As buildings age and have less cache, rich people move into the new buildings, opening up spaces, cheaper spaces, in older buildings. At least, that is how it would work in a normal market.

    • Brochettaward

      I will be starting my own OnlyFans in case the hall monitor bans me. People need to know where they can find The First That Will Change Everything.

      • Brochettaward

        I have to keep a day job, though, no matter how wildly successful it will be. Like Superman needing his alter ego Clark Kent.

    • juris imprudent

      So I went and looked up the prime working age (25-54) labor force participation rate. It dropped around 3 percentage points during the Covid lockdown insanity and has recovered at least half of that. If you look at the trend line over 40 years, it is a small blip.

    • Q Continuum

      Pie gets it.

  25. westernsloper

    and some chick y’all talk about but I have no idea who she is.

    Me neither.

    • Old Man With Candy

      Shut the fuck up, Sloper.

  26. Semi-Spartan Dad

    (c) A person who is detained pursuant to subdivision two of this section as a contact of a confirmed case or a carrier shall not continue to be detained after the department determines that the person is not infected with the disease or that such contact no longer presents a potential danger to the health of others.

    Interesting that “determines that the person is not infected with the disease” was not sufficient for the stated purpose. I’m guessing the health department will consider anyone unvaxxed, not masking, not following curfews, etc to be a potential danger to the health of others.

    When a person or group is ordered to be detained pursuant to subdivision two of this section for a period not exceeding three business days, such person or member of such group shall, upon request, be afforded an opportunity to be heard. If a person or group detained pursuant to subdivision two of this section needs to be detained beyond three business days, they shall be provided with an additional commissioner’s order pursuant to subdivisions two and eight of this section.

    I thought this was funny (opportunity to be heard). They can’t keep the woke drivel out of their fascist proclamations. I’ll have 556 reasons to be heard, but probably not an option for NY residents.

    • Rebel Scum

      I’d want to watch without the other dude present.

  27. Ozymandias

    A solid B. I had a sensible chuckle over that one. Not enough to snort my coffee, but good – better than a C.

    • Ozymandias

      Oh well. Brooks’d it. I haz blame de squirrelz.

  28. Sensei

    Houston we have a problem. Mind you he’ll still vote “yes” for something we all hate. It will just be next year.

    Manchin says he won’t vote for Build Back Better Act

      • Q Continuum

        Negotiate? Deescalate? Since when does that raise Lockheed’s stock?

  29. The Other Kevin

    I can relate to your cupcake story. Mrs. TOK is known for some seriously good cupcakes. She make as PB&J cupcake with her homemade strawberry jam, a Snickers one that is really complicated, and a raspberry coconut one that is my favorite. I believe people would fight over those.

    I’m still a bit confused here. Omicron is spreading over the world very quickly, and has been for at least weeks (probably longer). If it were killing people, wouldn’t we see those stats climbing right now? Instead I’m still only aware of one death from it. But once again we are in panic mode for no reason.

    Life is usually a roller coaster, but right now it’s worse than usual. The vax mandates were stayed by a bunch of courts, but now they’re back, and New York is seriously considering locking people up for the crime of being potentially exposed to a virus.

    • The Other Kevin

      Addendum: The youngest TOK went to her homecoming dance last night. No masks, no social distancing, and it looked like a great time. My only complaint is she’s following the trend in which girls her age wear dresses that are entirely too short.

    • Rebel Scum

      (probably longer)

      The scamdemic was over before it was announced. Likewise for each and every variant. You can’t stop the spread of a respiratory illness. Take your vitamins and get on with your life.

  30. hayeksplosives

    I keep reading the ridiculousness of triple,, quadruple jabbing, and double masking and I think “surely the inefficacy of this is obvious to everyone. Surely they will give up and let us get back to normal.”

    But no. It’s like the bishop at the end of Ladyhawke muttering “…Then no man shall!” before he attempts to murder Isabeau. He didn’t have to preface it with “well, if I can’t have her…”; we the viewers understood that part.

    Similarly, the hacks and parasites of the world will never know contentment and satisfaction, “so no man shall!”

    All we need now is Rutger Hauer to run him through with his sword so we can be freed to live again.

    • Ozymandias

      Very well said, Hi-X. I dig that.

  31. The Late P Brooks

    I have noticed in the last few days the talking point has become, “Don’t kid yourself. Don’t try to pretend omnicron is less deadly. It’s just that the vaccines protect you from its most deadly effects. VAXX or DIE!”

    • rhywun

      “It may kill everybody or it may not. STAY SAFE!”

  32. ElspethFlashman

    In case LH hasn’t mentioned this: our antique shop gave us a two -week notice that they are closing. That was December 15, and we can move out as late as January 15, but no sales after the 31st of December… . So that was sucky news to hear. The impetus for this is the elderly building owner decided to sell. The new owner didn’t want to make a deal with the store manager who handles the leas, etc. Also the daily manager had a massive heart attack (he’s only 45! but needed 10 hours of surgery) recently and will be out of work until February at the earliest.

    Some of the other booths/ vendors are talking about relocating as a group. We already had a second booth in the works but it’s not as ideal as our first space. So we have a bit of uncertainty chez Humungous /Flashman.

    • Gender Traitor

      That’s sucky news any time of year, but especially now. ? I certainly hope your holiday sales are good and you find a good alternate location in the new year.

    • Mojeaux

      I totally admire anybody who cane make serious money in a booth. LH must have an uncanny knowledge of his items.

  33. The Late P Brooks

    Fuck the boomers. They have had institutional and cultural control for longer than probably any generation in existence and have voted for and supported both parties that engineered the empire and monetary policy that has ravaged not just our economy and future prosperity, but dozens of third world countries around the world. And most of them are going to die off before the full consequences of their preferred policies really start to rear their ugly head.

    Speaking as a boomer (born 1955- just turned 66):

    I approve this message. Fuck the boomers and their love of Government Great Things.

    • Annoyed Nomad

      At age 60, I’m classified as a boomer, but don’t relate to the older boomers. The official “boomer generation” spans too many years. There is micro generation called Generation Jones that my cohorts fall under.

      And yeah, my wife (age 59) and I retired “early”, but we’re not the reason for the supply chain problems or the lack of grocery or restaurant workers, so the article author can fuck off.

    • Ozymandias

      I have to say that I have been secretly loathing the fucking Statist Boomers (present company excepted) for quite some time. I’m 52 and son of two wonderful Boomer parents (born a week apart in ’47) whom I love dearly… but holy shit, they have been brainwashed to believe that all problems require government to fix. And they hold this belief despite living through LBJ and Nixon – their conclusion? Republicans are bad, mmmKay. They hold massively discordant views and can maintain a level of cognitive dissonance that causes me near-physical symptoms, but it only serves to prove to me that the Media as a propaganda arm goes back much further than we would like to admit. God bless them, but fuck their ideas and that whole generation.
      They can’t die off fast enough; and we’ll have to pry power from their “cold dead hands,” I fear.

      • Tundra

        Wow. Are you my brother?

        I have exactly the same situation. Lovely people with a severe case of NPR poisoning.

      • Zwak, All dressed up in his ridiculous seersucker suit

        Yep. Same boat here, and my mother was even an NPR music DJ (volunteer, natch) Fuck to they love some big brother.

      • Mojeaux

        GenX is out of the game. Oh, hell, we were never in the game, except to spawn the Millennials. Our cohort is too small and the Boomers have lived too long.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        LOL, I’m the Gen X product of Depression era kids and my kids are Gen Z.

        None of us are in the big generational cohorts. Perhaps that has affected our perception of the issues.

      • Mojeaux

        Yeah, my parents are from the Silent Generation, too. (I’m assuming that’s what you mean by Depression-era kids.) My conception was inspired by the Vietnam draft.

      • westernsloper

        I have exactly the opposite situation. I am son to statist big government knows best Republicans. +1 drug war. I did eventually convince them the Bushes were total pieces of shit so they are not totally ignorant.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Add in FDR saved the country first with his New Deal and then fighting the Natzis, and that’s my mom. My dad is a left of center socon, who would be mostly on board with the above if the leftists stopped aborting babies.

      • The Other Kevin

        Sounds like we have the same parents. Mine grew up in a very blue corner of Indiana. They have a house that’s worth 3x mine, yet they still think they’re not rich and the Democrats are on their side. To them Republicans are the party of the rich, and want to take away their social security. They don’t realize there is a culture war going on, and that their party doesn’t reflect their values at all. They still think politics is the same as it was in 1955, and haven’t noticed how massively different things are now.

  34. Sensei

    (Screams at sky) – I really despise the NYT.

    She Broke Japan’s Comedic Barrier Playing Drunks and Fools (Yep, Men)

    Women have been doing rakugo for a long time, with many different stories with men as the main characters and audiences of both sexes have enjoyed their performance. JFC…

    straff and I have discussed it once or twice here. Sadly, it doesn’t translate to English very well as it has lots of puns and cultural references. It’s also cultural within Japan – for example one of my friends loves it while the other doesn’t care for it.

  35. MikeS

    One person for every 15 sq.m. will be allowed to shop, and increased enforcement of mask-wearing will be established.

    Israel sounds fun.

    • Rebel Scum

      They learned from the Germans.

    • Fourscore

      “One person for every 15 square miles will be allowed ”

      The reason I’m thinking NoDak but not to worry, MikeS, I’ll go west

      • MikeS

        You’re always welcome in NoDak. But visits from Pope Jimbo will have to cease.

  36. Tundra

    Good morning, Old Man!

    I’d like to know more about the funeral home donnybrook. That should make a good family story for some lucky people!

    • Old Man With Candy

      I’ll get a fuller story when I see the Girl later this week. I hope it’s worthy of Jerry Springer.

  37. The Late P Brooks

    Ministry of Truth announces victory against Eastasia

    The emergence of the Omicron variant has thrust the nation — and the White House — back into an uncertain pandemic reality, posing both public health and political challenges for a leader whose ultimate success depends almost entirely on his ability to contain the virus.

    Already, cases and hospitalizations are surging in some parts of the country, leading to a 31% increase in cases and a 20% increase in hospitalizations from two weeks ago.
    Yet Biden and his team have all but ruled out new lockdowns, and behind the scenes, administration officials have been debating how to shift public attention from the total number of cases — which appear likely to surge, even if many are mild — toward the number of severe infections that are overloading health systems and causing interruptions to normal life.

    Some of Biden’s advisers are encouraging the administration to begin discussing publicly how to live alongside a virus that shows no signs of disappearing, a potentially stark shift in messaging for a White House that once touted “freedom from the virus.”

    Steering public attention away from the total number of infections and toward serious cases only — as some Biden advisers have encouraged — could prove a challenge after nearly two years of intense focus on the pandemic’s every up and down. It is a part of a growing conundrum that Biden faces as the Covid-19 pandemic refuses to abate.

    “We’re getting to the point now where … it’s about severity,” said Xavier Becerra, the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, in a meeting with reporters this week. “It’s not about cases. It’s about severity.”

    I assume they will be meeting with the legitimate media their steno pool to showcase and explain the new story board.

    • Sensei

      How do we get the genie back in the bottle?

    • Fourscore

      “how to live alongside a virus that shows no signs of disappearing”

      I hear my neighbors discussing this, I think they said virus.

  38. The Late P Brooks

    Becerra said the issue recently arose during a meeting at the White House with Biden’s Covid response team. Other officials also said the issue of how to refocus the public away from total cases toward the severity of illness has been an ongoing subject of discussion within the administration.

    “There’s a degree of difficulty that now comes in trying to decide what means it’s severe and what you have to do to stay out of that threshold of severity,” Becerra said. “But I think that’s where we’re heading, is to try to be able to tell the public that.”

    They looked over their shoulders, and hardly anybody was behind them.

    They’re just scrambling to get back in front of the parade.

  39. The Late P Brooks

    How do we get the genie back in the bottle?

    Cattle stampedes are a lot easier to start than they are to stop.

    • westernsloper

      Speaking of cattle, I have noticed on my early morning drives after the sun comes up the the cows in a field all stand beam to the sun which makes sense because that shows the most cow hide to incoming warmth from sunshine. What I want to know is how the fuck they all decide to face the same direction? Weird.

  40. The Late P Brooks

    I’d like to know more about the funeral home donnybrook. That should make a good family story for some lucky people!

    *granddaughter peers into casket, flips out*

    “You can’t bury her with that necklace. She promised it to me!”

    • Tundra

      That’s why I’m having a Viking funeral.

  41. The Late P Brooks

    For the President, how to proceed with a new surge is a question not only of public health but also of politics. Biden and his team have long asserted that ending the pandemic and returning the economy to normal is the cure for his political woes. A spike in cases over the summer due to the Delta variant, paired with renewed restrictions and mask requirements, coincided with a softening of his approval ratings.

    “Softening”

    *slaps knee, guffaws*

    How do we mitigate this hysteria we have done everything in our power to stoke for more than a year? It seems to have diminished in its political utility.

    • Q Continuum

      Like how a jet liner is “softened” when if flies into the side of a mountain.

    • The Other Kevin

      Biden is absolutely terrible at politics. Hate on Bill Clinton all you want, but that guy was smart enough politically to read the room and realize he needed to change course if he wanted to keep his job.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Don’t make me nostalgic for the Clinton years, dammit.

      • Ozymandias

        “I’ll bet you never thought you’d see the day you’d be willing to suck a dick to get Bill Clinton back, huh?”
        – Me to some hardcore Republican military friends during Obama’s second term

  42. The Late P Brooks

    What I want to know is how the fuck they all decide to face the same direction? Weird.

    Same way 200 flying birds all decide to turn left at the same time.

    Fucking magnetism.

    • MikeS

      Animal magnetism.

  43. The Late P Brooks

    Still, the emergence of Omicron has caused the White House to begin contemplating all of its options ahead of a potential surge. Officials said their priorities include making sure hospitals have the resources to deal with a potential influx of patients, particularly in areas where vaccination rates remain low. The administration has deployed public health surge teams to states experiencing rising cases and hospitalizations. And officials plan to put renewed emphasis on the importance of masking in public places.

    Kabuki today, kabuki tomorrow, kabuki forever.

  44. westernsloper

    On todays menu at Chez sloper is surf and turf. Smoked prime rib with a side of garlic shrimp ala North Shore of Oahu. No rice of course.

  45. mikey

    OMWC. I usually don’t get your jazz picks, but I do enjoy me some Sun Ra.

  46. The Late P Brooks

    Purge the weak-kneed agnostics, in favor of True Believers

    Three retired U.S. Army generals have warned of insurrection or possibly even civil war if the results of the 2024 presidential election are not accepted by sections of the military.

    Retired Major Generals Paul D. Eaton and Antonio M. Taguba joined retired Brigadier General Steven M. Anderson urged today’s leaders to act to prevent such scenes, calling on today’s leaders to “war-game” an attempted coup.

    In an op-ed for The Washington Post published on Friday, the former military leaders said they were “increasingly concerned” about the “potential for lethal chaos inside our military, which would put all Americans at severe risk” in the aftermath of the election.

    ——-

    And they outlined four preventative steps they argue should be taken:

    First, the leaders of the Capitol riot should be held accountable. They called on the Department of Justice, the House of Representatives’ Select Committee investigating January 6 and Congress to “show more urgency.”
    Second, the Pentagon “should immediately order” a soldier review on the Constitution and electoral integrity, and on the laws of war and how to deal with an illegal order. “No service member should say they didn’t understand whom to take orders from during a worst-case scenario,” they wrote.
    The Army’s actions should also involve finding and removing “potential mutineers” and stopping efforts to subvert the chain of command through propaganda.
    Finally, the generals advised the Department of Defense to war-game a potential insurrection or attempted coup following the 2024 presidential election “to identify weak spots” and deal with them.

    ——-

    The generals warned that while U.S. service members take an oath to uphold the Constitution, in the case of a disputed election, loyalties would be split and some might choose to follow orders from the losing candidate who does not accept defeat.

    “Under such a scenario, it is not outlandish to say a military breakdown could lead to civil war,” they wrote. If such a situation were to arise, the generals warn the enemies of the U.S. could take advantage of it.

    Nonetheless, the generals seemed hopeful that could be prevented if Congress and the military “take decisive action now.”

    Obviously, the peril is dire. We should probably just cancel elections until further notice.

    Because abundance of caution.

    • Raven Nation

      So, they’re calling for Mark Milley to be arrested?

    • rhywun

      the leaders of the Capitol riot

      Did they ever stop to consider that there weren’t any?

    • Ozymandias

      Trial balloon. They’re going to keep beating that drum in advance of 2022 and likely 2024.
      By the time that election arrives, it will no longer be considered crazy to suggest that the U.S. military needs to be stationed at various election centers in November 2024.
      Watch.
      You heard it here first.

  47. kinnath

    Regarding the boomers . . . .

    I grew up reading lots of articles explaining how the “greatest generation” had held political power much longer than any previous generation. And that this was preventing “boomers” from taking the reins of power.

    Remember. Biden is not a boomer. Pelosi is not a boomer. McConnell is not a boomer.

    Obama is younger than me. While he was still part of the “boomer” cohort, the kids born in the 60s had absolutely nothing in common with the kids of late 40s and early 50s. Ideologically, Obama is far more GenX than boomer. So, as far as boomer Presidents go, we had Clinton (born 46), W (born 46), and Trump (born 46). All were terrible in the own unique ways. But they certainly did not represent a common viewpoint of how to run the world.

    I was born in the back half of the boom. And I have lots of issues with the “boomer” born in the first half. But to echo JI from earlier, the single biggest thing I blame them for the way they raised their children.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Dr Spock, destroyer of America.

    • Ozymandias

      I would agree that part of the problem is the “Boomer” designation is way, way too broad a category. I think someone here posted an article a ways back about how the divide should really be categorized.
      I’ve always thought in terms of “generations” and “half-generations” – being ~ 25 and ~12 years, respectively. I think that’s where cultural differences get wide enough that there are significant changes in television shows watched, musical tastes, fashion, comedy, etc. such that you don’t really have the same cultural touchstones to tie you together.
      Parents tend to have kids @ (roughly) 25 years, give or take. My parents had my sister and I at 19 and 22, but now it’s trending the other side of that, but either way, I think once you get more than 10 years apart from someone else, you were a teenager and had left behind “kid” interests.

      All that said, I think the true Boomers are the post-WW2 babies. Kids who were born in the late-50s come from a very, very different America than late 40s. The true Boomers were shitting their pants about Vietnam – the next generation didn’t face that. It’s a very, very different reality to have been worried about the draft out of high school while someone else was in 2nd grade. Completely different sentiments and cultural touchstones, IMO.

      • kinnath

        I was born in 57. Vietnam was on the TV pretty much continuously from the time I was old enough to “understand” what TV was (say 6 years old and beyond). I worried about the draft pretty my entire childhood. As much as Nixon was an asshole, I worship him for existing Vietnam when I was 17.

      • Ted S.

        I’ve argued that the generation that inflicted its suck on us is a combination of the first half of the Boomers — the ones old enough to be politically aware through Watergate — and the people old enough to remember World War II but not old enough to have fought, who to me seem to have some resentment over the “Greatest Generation”.

        Their suckitude has led to focusing everything through a lens of what happened from the death of White Trash President Kennedy (spare me the Camelot bullshit) through to Watergate. It’s why gay/trans/whatever rights seem be treated the way the civil rights struggle of the 1960s was, and we have the ubiquitous -gate suffix for any scandal, even for NFL teams breaking league rules.

        The Early Boomers and the Dan Rather (born 1931 IIRC) generation still hold a lot of cultural sway. The Late Boomers and early Gen X rebelled with the 1980s, which is part of the reason the disco era/the 80s are seen as so horribly trashy. And the Early Boomers have kept on trying to make the 60s paradigm the default, something that’s had a lot of influence on those Millennials ready to rebel against the 80s parents.

  48. The Late P Brooks

    By the time that election arrives, it will no longer be considered crazy to suggest that the U.S. military needs to be stationed at various election centers in November 2024.

    Meanwhile, those who resist the vaxx will be purged. It’s a good proxy for the sort of critical thinking which might lead them to hesitate when ordered to fire upon the insurrectionists.

    • Ozymandias

      ‘Zaccly.

      • Tres Cool

        “So the doctor told his patient, “you dont have ED. You’re wife has zaccly disease.”
        The guys says ” whats Zaccly Disease?”
        The doc says “her face look zaccly like her ass”

      • Ozymandias

        I woke up with one of my first hangovers in college on a friend’s floor (another Marine).
        I had that swollen and chapped tongue phenomenon.
        “Ahh, bad case of the zacclies, eh?” He said over his cup of coffee.
        “Huh? Wha-??”
        “When your mouth tastes ‘zaccly like your asshole.”
        “Ah. Yes.”

      • Tres Cool

        the classics never get old!