The Republicans are having a “subdued” convention start because of Hurricane Gustav, but let’s be clear about this: the reason the GOP is taking this approach is because W. et al screwed up the response to Hurricane Katrina was so completely. We know that during Hurricane Katrina, W. was busy congratulating Brownie for doing a heck of a job.
But what about John McCain? Well, as Salon.com reminds us here, Johnny was sharing a little cake with George while New Orleans was turning into a disaster zone. And as this clip (via boing-boing) makes clear, McCain must have been on some kind of frosting sugar-high when contemplating the seriousness of the mistakes FEMA was making in 2005:
So what have we learned? McCain really likes birthday cake and horses. And apparently he’s okay with unwed mothers, too.
It’s interesting because Republicans would say that the big plus that McCain has over Obama is experience– his wisdom, his statesmanship, his good judgment, etc. But when we actually look back at his judgment about some particular issues like Katrina, like saying we’ll be in Iraq for 1,000 years, like any number of other weird things McCain has done and said, Republicans say we should give him a break for speaking off the cuff.
Fort Hays State University fired a professor and debate coach on Friday, just weeks after video surfaced on YouTube of his dropping his shorts in front of judges at a national tournament. The university also suspended its debate team, one of the best in the country, over concerns that the collegiate-debate circuit had become too uncivilized.
The coach, William Shanahan III, a professor of communication, got into a shouting match with a judge—and at one point briefly dropped his shorts and exposed his underwear—during the national tournament this past spring of the Cross Examination Debate Association.
Curiously, both articles lack a couple of key links. First, there is the video– yes, actual video at the debate– of the event in question:
There are a variety of different remixes and such on YouTube too. It wasted my morning, I can tell you that.
The actual mooning event happens quickly (I didn’t see it the first time through) and at about the 36-37 second mark. Though the video goes on for quite a while after that. I watched about three minutes and then scanned through the rest. To be honest, I can’t really tell what the argument/fight here is about– I am guessing a disagreement about a decision. One article I read said it happened after the quarter final round. Note that the screaming match involves people saying “fuck” quite a bit.
To me, it looks like these folks have just gone kind of nuts, cracking under the pressure of a big tournament, and– this is just a guess– sleep deprivation. These late tournament rounds often don’t begin until well into the evening after a full day of competition. And you have to remember that debate at this level is as much of a competitive and intense an event as the game to play into the “final four” at the NCAA basketball tournament. When I was in high school and college debate 20+ years ago, I saw plenty of arguments where an occasional “f bomb” was thrown. So in the broad sense, I don’t think the idea of a near brawl breaking out is that weird.
Still, just as you don’t routinely see basketball coaches throwing chairs across the court, you don’t usually see arguing coaches/debaters dropping their pants, if even briefly.
I also think this video is ample evidence of something that every academic already knows: just because you are a professor and you have a PhD doesn’t mean you are above behaving badly.
The upshot here is that McCain was asked during a press conference where he said everything was “okie-dokie” with the economy, someone asked him how many houses he owned, and he said he couldn’t remember and to “get back” with him on that. Here’s the video:
To be fair, the Obamas are hardly paupers themselves, though I have to assume that they own only one home. It’d be a pretty bad “don’t throw rocks if you live in glass houses” sort of political move if that weren’t the case. And, as I heard clarified on NPR this evening, the McCains really have “only” four homes they use on a regular basis: one in Virginia, two in Arizona, and one in California. The McCain spokesperson said that there were other “investment properties” in the mix.
Still, this whole thing raises a couple of important points.
First, John McCain is rich— like really freakin’ rich. Well, at least his wife is really rich– she inherited one of the largest beer distributor businesses in the country– but that seems like fair territory to me since so much was made of Kerry’s rich wife by George “my family has more money than God and Satan combined” H.W. Bush. Obama has had his own quasi-shady real estate dealings, but as FactCheck.org suggests, there’s really not a there there.
Second, how fullofdementiadoyouhavetobetoforget and/or not be able to clearly answer the simple question “how many houses do you own?”
I was browsing through boing-boing and came across an entry on “the original” farting preacher video:
Okay, it’s kind of funny– probably not four minutes worth of funny, but still.
And then I looked at the “related videos,” and saw that there was something like 40 related videos. It would appear that they all have the same premise: television preachers accompanied by strategically placed farting noises. And then I did a search for “farting,” and it appears this is a cottage industry on YouTube, farting noises accompanying politicians, actors, other celebs, movies, cartoons, you name it. Weird.
I came across this via Johndan’s blog. If you are a fan of Quentin Tarantino and are willing to work your way through the subtitles (it was a film done in Brazil), it is well worth 15 minutes.
One of the side effects of doing research on blogs and probably anything Internets-related is that it’s really easy to get distracted. For example, my “research” somehow brought me to this:
Perhaps I ought to take a break and mow the lawn….
I don’t know why I remember this, but here’s a fun-fact about Elvis impersonators that I was actually able to track down on the web here:
When Elvis Presley died in 1977, there were an estimated 37 Elvis impersonators in the world. By 1993, there were 48,000 Elvis impersonators, an exponential increase. Extrapolating from this, by 2010 there will be 2.5 billion Elvis impersonators.
Well, that statistic hasn’t come to pass, but we did have the chance to experience multiple Elvis-like performers the other night right here in Ypsilanti at the Michigan Elvisfest. It was a fine slice of local culture; here’s a brief video with a few highlights:
A few highlights to add:
It was kind of an interesting crowd– sort of a mix of a mix of white trash/red-neck folks, people who like the country and western, hard-core Elvis fans, locals out for a good time (that’d be us), and hipsters there on a goof. Actually it was a pretty fun group all in all.
There’s a whole Elvis impersonator culture out there that Annette and I were completely unaware even existed. For example, it isn’t “Elvis Impersonators,” but “Elvis Tribute Artists,” or “ETAs.” The MC (who was also an former ETA) kept bringing up all sorts of events similar to the Michigan Elvisfest all over the midwest and beyond. Who knew?
Sadly, we only saw one real Elvis Tribute Artist– or is that Elvi?– performing that evening, as you can see from the video. There was a staging area where there were ETAs standing around waiting to get their pictures taken and selling their ETA CDs and other merchandise.
Remembering her college youth, Annette noticed a lot of similarities between this thing and drag shows. For example, the adoring fans gave the various tribute artists flowers, which, I am told, is the practice at drag shows, too. Which makes sense since what is an impersonator excuse me, tribute artist but someone in drag?
The video features Annette drinking a beer, which, for those who know her, is about as rare as (interestingly enough) an honest to goodness Elvis sighting.
Frog Island was a good place to see a show, but every once in a while, we’d get a whiff of sewage smell. I have no idea where it was from, maybe the river, maybe a water treatment plant near there, I don’t know.
So, that’s another thing to check off my “to do in Southeast Michigan” list.
The scene: Me at the local Hollywood Video with two DVDs: disk 1 of the first season of The X-Files, and disk 1 of the first season of Heroes. We’re seeking video entertainment suitable for the whole family, and we had good luck watching the full runs of Buffy the Vampire Slyer and Firefly on DVD, so we thought we’d give these shows a spin. I’ve seen all of The X-Files but none of Heroes, so I went for the one disk of each approach.
I take my choices to the counter and to the drowsy young Dude behind the counter. He looks like someone I would have seen at the Origins convention a few weeks ago: in short, his bad haircut, greasy grooming, piercings, and general surliness suggest a certain kind of uber-geek, one comfortable with science fiction movie trivia, required saving throws in AD&D, and comic book collecting.
Me: I’d like to rent these.
Dude: (Sighs) Sure, whatever. (Scans DVD in machine thingy). Of course, you’re going to be another victim here.
Me: Excuse me?
Dude: Heroes. Horribly horribly predictable. You’ll figure out everything you need to know after the first six episodes. Nothing changes after that.
Me: What about the whole villains thing? That’s how they are advertising the next season.
Dude: Right, like I don’t know how that is going to turn out.
Me: Aren’t you supposed to be selling the videos here?
Dude: I only like selling the good ones. You’ll see what I mean.
Me: What about The X-Files?
Dude: That’s excellent, of course. I’m looking forward to the movie to see what they do with the characters after all those years. Regardless, these videos are yours until Thursday.
Here’s a kind of fun map/graphic: “Watching the Growth of Walmart Across America,” from Flowing Data. Interestingly, I see that Iowa was a relatively early-adapter of the world’s most evil chain store.
But what about John McCain? Well, as Salon.com reminds us here, Johnny was sharing a little cake with George while New Orleans was turning into a disaster zone. And as this clip (via boing-boing) makes clear, McCain must have been on some kind of frosting sugar-high when contemplating the seriousness of the mistakes FEMA was making in 2005: