Feb 042015
 

Day 91.  This is today’s only article, because I was unable to sleep last night night and have to stay up for a grocery delivery.  Tomorrow may be a light day too, because I have to go out for a haircut.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:18 (average 4:44).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Upworthy: They Asked 100,000 Men What Makes The ‘Perfect’ Woman. Ellen Chimes In.

 

I fully agree with her, but it is improving. When I was a young man, we considered the perfect woman a blonde nymphomaniac with big boobs, whose father owned a liquor store.

From The New Yorker: Media advisers to former Governor Jeb Bush are hoping to exploit nostalgia for what is widely seen as the greatest era in American history, the years 2001 to 2009.

Tracy Klugian, who heads the newly assembled Bush media team, said that he and his staff are poised to tap into the nation’s longing for a time “when everything in this country seemed to be going right.”

A centerpiece of the marketing strategy will be evoking memories of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. “It’s been a long time since the United States has invaded another country for no reason,” he said. “People are sentimental about those simpler times.”

Additionally, Klugian and his fellow Bush marketers hope to remind Americans of “a chapter in our history that showed what this nation was made of: Hurricane Katrina.”

“A lot of people are nostalgic about the way the government didn’t panic about Katrina and instead took its time to come up with a response,” he said. “I think when we look back on those days, we all say, ‘Heck of a job.’”

Finally, Klugian said, the Bush team hopes to rekindle Americans’ memories of “one of those most exciting times in recent history,” the financial meltdown of 2008.

Andy just gave us a perfect summary of what we could expect from Strike Three.

From Daily Kos: Here’s a post about the story from a Vermont blog: No good deed goes unpunished. Apparently a local TV station did a story about it and got a huge number of incredibly ignorant comments on their Facebook page, here: WCAX: One state senator thinks Vermont should have a Latin motto. What do you think?.

The crazies came out of the woodwork: "If you live in the United States, you need to learn English!" "Vermont ain’t no Latino area." "This is America, not Mexico or some other Latin-American country." And so on.

The stupid… it burns.

Apparently these people don’t know that "E Pluribus Unum" is a Latin phrase. Or that Latin was the language of educated people until well into the Medieval Period. Or that prior to Martin Luther (Germany) or Wycliffe or Tyndale or King James (England) you pretty much had to read the Bible in Latin. It helped if you knew Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, too.

Latin Motto for the Republican Party: E Elephantus Merda.

Cartoon:

0204Cartoon

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  34 Responses to “Open Thread–2/4/2015”

  1. I took Latin for 1 year in a public High School, but it was the 70's & people weren't as Stupid as they are today.  The Teacher wasn't as bright as I'd have liked though – she called it a Dead Language, even though it was still spoken in Masses & used in Science & Law… *heavy sigh* Sanskrit is a Dead Language, Latin should be at least considered a Techno-Language! 😉

  2. Given the Latin roots of English and romance language words, if you know at least some Latin you usually know your own language(s) better than those who don't. 

    I hope the 3 strikes theme isn't used like in criminal justice where we could never be without a Bush again.

    How about the 1950's perfect man: disqualified once he opened his mouth…

    You sure it isn't helium in that cartoon?

  3. 3:09  You didn't want to attempt to eat that train anyway TC . . . too much iron for your system!  You'd ruin your teeth and you'd rust out from the west coast rain!

  4. Upworthy: 
    There is no such animal as a perfect woman,,, or perfect man either. 
    It's all a fallacy.

    The New Yorker: 
    What a snow job Tracy Klugian is attempting in trying to promote the "good old days" for Jeb. Ugh!
    Save us all from Bush III. On strike 3 and out!
    Our country cannot afford another Bush in the White House.

    Daily Kos: 
    Many medical words have their roots in latin. One of the classes I took was the study of medical words and its meaning. The use of latin-based root words is already with us on a daily basis. 

    Looks like the educational system in Vermont is broken and has failed to teach their citizens basic skills. Sounds like the commentators in the WCAX comment page got left behind.

    Cartoon: 
    They don't need the oxygen. They're already giggling high sniffing the odorous fumes from the Keystone XL pipeline.

    E Elephantus Merda.
    Et elephantos cacas.
    Do elepants cacas in silvis?

    Having fun with Google translation. lol.

    • Yeah, E Elephantus Merda is really more Italian than Latin – but it works AND is fun …

      Operor ursine bestia curtus obvius silva?

      –> –> Do ursine animals defecate in the copse?

      –> –> –> Do bears shit in the woods?

      • Facit ursus cacas in silvis?  =  Does a bear shit in the woods?

        Now, knock off the 'F' = Denying the bear shit in the woods?  That has to be Republicanus/Teabagger!

        Or plural = Operor ursi cacas in silva?

        What a trip down memory lane . . . using Google translate of course.  I remember using "ob, e, ad, de" (because, from, to, about) when taking notes, especially in history, because it was less writing and faster.  Anybody using my notes went nuts!

  5. Game Of Intelligence
    There was a blonde who was sitting next to a lawyer on an airplane. The lawyer was naturally bored, so he kept bugging the blonde to play a game of intelligence with him.

    The blonde was reluctant, so the lawyer offered her 10 to 1 odds. He told her that every time she could not answer his question, she owed him $5, but every time he could not answer hers, he'd give her $50. The lawyer figured the blonde was so dumb, he could not lose, and the blonde thought for a few minutes and reluctantly accepted to play his game.

    The lawyer fires his first question "What is the distance between the Earth and the nearest star?"

    Without saying a word the blonde handed him $5. The blonde then asked the lawyer "What goes up a hill with 3 legs and comes back down the hill with 4 legs?"

    The lawyer's face looked extremely puzzled. He spent several hours, looking up everything he could on his laptop and even placing numerous air-to-ground phone calls trying to figure out the answer. Finally, the angry and frustrated lawyer handed the blonde $50.00.

    The blonde put the $50 into her purse quickly without saying a word. The lawyer was outraged at this point and asked, "Well, what is answer?"

    The blonde glanced at him with a smirk on her face and handed him a $5 bill. 

  6. Mamabear! That was hilarious! Loved it!
    If we get anywhere near close to a Shrub III, I will migrate to Canada! Ugh! And this repukkklican congress is really shoving me closer and closer to doing it forever!

  7. 3:38 average 4:44.  Very detailed tiny engineer.  Could have fooled me.

    Upworthy – I think I am a tad older than you.  I remember when the perfect woman was all of that, but also clinically mute.

    New Yorker – I hope they do a really, REALLY good job reminding people of all that.  I really do.

    Daily Kos – My bachelors degree is in Latin, with a Greek minor, which, alas, does NOT mean I could do any better than dmhit 66 who posted "Vah!  Denuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum… (Oh! was I speaking Latin again? Silly me …"  But I did appreciate the suggestion by dallasdunlap for a Republican motto, from Tacitus:  "Auferre trucidare rapere falsis nominibus imperium" thoughtfully translated for us all by Captain Frogbert as "They plunder, they slaughter, and they steal: this they falsely call Empire."  Interestingly, the southern US was by and large the last part of the US to stop teaching Latin in high school.  They may even still be doing it.  Everyone in my class who wanted to teach headed south.  So you really can't fairly say "I would have expected this from Mississippi or Alabama" as one might say of other craziness.

    Cartoon – Shall we form a grassroots group to stamp out oxymorons by depriving them of oxygen?  Damn takers!

  8. Puzzle — 3:09  You didn't want to attempt to eat that train anyway TC . . . too much iron for your system! You'd ruin your teeth and you'd rust out from the west coast rain!

    Upworthy — I'm legally blonde, well blonde/gray/purple; blue eyed in both eyes; slender compared to a Sherman tank; non smoker except when I get really angry and then the smoke comes out my ears; a social drinker, I can drink water around anyone; and like Ellen, I get hung up on the graduate degree.  I have a bachelor's degree but I haven't found a bachelor yet!

    The New Yorker — Keep the Bushes in the ground where they all belong and well covered in dirt!  They certainly don't belong in a rose garden!

    Daily Kos — Oh my!  Some people really are nucking futs as Richard would say.  I had 2 years of Latin in highschool.  My mother said "taking typing".  I didn't.  Latin has served me very well though and it really bugs some people.  I have even been banned from playing word games at parties.  Such ignorance as was displayed is downright criminal.  I do like your motto for the Republicanus/Teabagger party: E Elephantus Merda.  I think I'll adopt my first high school's motto: veni, vidi, vici (I came, I saw, I conquered)

    Cartoon — Oxymoron?  It's a crime to waste oxygen on a Republicanus/Teabagger and shoould be considered a crime against humanity.  Just like when they gave Chickenhawk Cheney a new heart . . . that was a waste and a crime against humanity.

    • Here's a motto I would like to adopt, it isn't in good Latin, and I would happily relearn any improvements, but an old friend of mine told me this when life was being more than usually appalling – he said 'noli illegitimi te carborundum' – 'don't let the b******s grind you down'! 

    • I had read all of Caesar before I reached high school.

  9. Upworthy:  Their answers surprised me, didn't know they wanted a woman with intelligence, since so many are involved on sending us back to "barefoot and pregnant".   I agree with Ellen.

    The New Yorker:  Andy is prophetic.  We are still trying to recover from those years, really, really, don't need another Bush in the White HOuse.

    Daily Kos:  This is a prime example of the dumbing down of America.  I doubt that a handful of schools even teach Latin anymore, and so much of our language is derived from it.  Moreover, there has been so much ranting and raving about the "immigrants" that people actually believe that their lives and livlihoods are endangered by immigrants. I am sure the Native Americans wish they had kicked out most of our ancestors, too.  Love your motto.

    Cartoon:  best description of Republicans that I have seen!

     

  10. New Yorker – oh ANDY!

    Daily Kos – Heaven help us – the Right Wing Fanatics do seem to hate education, don't they?  Oh dear! (And sadly, my school stopped teaching Latin the year before I joined it, so I have only collected a few phrases through my life, some of which would be quite appropriate for those poor things, but perhaps I'd better not!). I utterly love your Repuglicon motto TC!

    Cartoon – brilliant – but would they understand it?

     

     

  11. Upworthy ~ I remember your version of the perfect woman too but in my neck of the woods, she was mute too, just like in Joanne D's world.

    New Yorker ~ I don't long for those days at all. Jeb should have listened to his Mother, The country can't afford another RepulicanT president, let alone a Bush!

    Daily Kos ~ Firstly, it is sad to know that so many people responding on that blog think that Latin in an immigrant's language and they are telling Latinos to learn English. Secondly, Vermont already has a motto and they chose to have theirs in English : Freedom and Unity.       Quod stultitia mortalium est.

    Cartoon ~ Quick, somebody tell them that President Obama wants them to breathe!

     

     

  12. Jeb Bush. Pure as the driven SLUSH!.(lots of $,s from the "For Profits.)You cannot make a silk purse out of a pig,s ass!

    Latin taught in the schools in the UK. Real asset when visiting European countries who speak the "Romantic language,s."

    Beats telling "foreigners" That they should all speak English.

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