One week ago the Greek people delivered a searing referendum result. Two/thirds told Angela Merkel to stuff it where the sun don't shine.
OTOH, polls also indicated that the Greeks wanted to remain in the euro. With this type of national schizophrenia to guide him, the often puzzling and self-contradicting Alexis Tsipras went back to his bosses in Brussels and got his hat handed to him.
As of this morning anyway, a badly shorn Greece remains in the Euro with yet another bailout at the cost of $50 billion collateral of hard assets, including one assumes both the Acropolis and the Parthenon.
Many of us winners standing on the sidelines were hoping for a Grexit and a return to a devalued drachma, which would have wiped out the debts of Greece and the paper assets of many Greeks (which is why they desire to remain in the euro). This would be a truly leftist maneuvre that as an added benefit would roil markets from Beijing to New York and put the flimsy German Empire AKA the Eurozone under debilitating pressure to merely survive.
Krugman is one of those who joined me in wishing economic collapse on all parties. The Greeks, he argues, have already suffered a collapse and the deal to which Tsipras agreed this morning will certainly end the immediate banking crisis and restore badly needed cash flow to the average citizen and business but at what long term cost?
He also passes along rumours that Syriza never had a Plan B to return to the drachma in any event and Tsipras was actually hoping the "yes" side would prevail in last week's referendum to give him the cover he needed to capitulate. In fact the resounding "no" vote gave him cover to act like an actual leftist however he chose to be mindful of the short term desire of his countrymen to remain in the euro, the future be damned.
Eh, well, this morning's events take the starch out of another leftist moment of truth, of which there are few enough these days that shouldn't be wasted.
There is still hope. The national Parliament must complete the about face by ratifying the draconian bailout terms by Wednesday. The people's reaction will be the most interesting. Will they be relieved or ready to fight back against the PTB?
As well, several neoliberal parliaments in northern Euro countries who have already voted not to give the Greeks one more centavo (or wtf they call it in Europe) must also capitulate and do an about face and ratify a third bailout for Greece. Indeed, Merkel's Germany must do the same.
And this begs the hypothetical: in his leftist moment of truth, what would Bernie do?
I think I already know the answer.
61 comments:
I like your contributions. A fleshed out entry perhaps on why Hillary Clinton sucks might be nice. I don't know how you react to requests.
My rough draft is done. Like most of my stuff, it is a bit hazy for grokking. The Atticus Finch revelation is a beaut. People are apparently losing their minds over it. It was the ultimate fake leftist whiteysphere to the rescue of the Black man schtick. It was done even better before Lee in a Bette Davis movie. Well, let me fact check that.
The alleged crimes were different, but In This Our Life (1942) wasn't much different in skeleton form from To Kill a Mockingbird published in 1960. In This Our Life was based on a novel by Ellen Glasgow. This stuff interests me. I never heard of her, but to this day, I remember that movie! You don't remember most of them after a while. The good ones, you do.
My guess is Harper Lee was a more together form of Zelda Fitzgerald and nailed the one jump shot of her career at the buzzer, while Zelda's clanked hard off the rim. It had no touch. I actually read that! It was her version of F. Scott Fitzgerald's story.
People complain that we mail it in, but others certainly have lived off of one or a few masterpieces much more excessively than we ever did.
And we supply these off to the side comments for regular guy antiquity for centuries to come.
I never socratised it, but I have heard that Abe Lincoln was a racist bastard. That would be my hunch about the new Harper Lee revelation. I am a newbie for this. I read her book and loved the movie like all good white kids.
She seems to be a form of Greta Garbo, so the mystery deepens.
She is like Abe Vigoda. They never die.
Generally, I don't do requests. I post only when time permits and something strikes the old fancy. This Greece thing is interesting because the pobre little faux leftist Syriza just got their asses whacked by the Big Deutsche Mark Machine and it was sickening to watch.
Especially after the people bravely voted "nein!" Then to see this capitulation....but yes the entire story from the Greek side is one of contradictions. The early returns provided by the Graun this AM are that the greeks are generally favouring to hold their noses and stick with the euro.
We'll see. the northerners may not let them if their parliaments don't accept this bailout.
It could be hasta la vista EZ and hola Vladimiravich.
At that point I gotta believe the US intervenes more forcefully. And then the real fun begins.
It is no coincidence the medium is the conspiracy has been rising in the dfq2 charts. There is a new big war on terror hoax. This one seems to be out of Boston as was a previous one a month or two ago.
CNN was total garbage propaganda today.
Yes, the stock market did well on word that the Greek problem has been addressed. A police captain's son or something was cointelpro'ed. I need to search for that story. My initial reaction is this is exactly what I was talking about a few posts back. That one was on the Newburgh Four. They were totally entrapped into bogus charges. And CNN puts on ex-CIA guys pimping for The Program.
This will make it into history books that the war on terror is a big, fat hoax.
hot off the presses ~ Son of Boston Police Captain Arrested as Possible Terrorist
http://abcnews.go.com/US/officials-son-boston-police-captain-arrested-terrorist/story?id=32414150
It is curious what entries catch fire on this blog. Obviously, the clickbaiters are always gonna top the charts, but beyond that it is the comment threads that are the key.
People like our interactions. How else to understand the enduring success of my mailed in "Exile" schtick? Great thread work on all sides, including the obligatory intrablog combat.
perhaps the one of which I am most proud, and which I believe has had more than one extended run at the top of the charts, was my double clickbater "Assange Inducts Snowden." That was classic DT. I'm surprised it is not in all time top ten.
Now that we aren't WWE'ing the gate much anymore with meltdowns and deleted comments while the entries are flying fast and furious, airmailed in as it were, I suspect our hit ratios for these newer entries will not match previous highs.
But I could be wong.
I'm glad the sparring is over. I don't actually think heated debate draws people to blogs anymore. I think it is a dinosaur of a blog formula. That was the DKos way. It was Huffington's formula. I think it works like a garage sale. It does well in real time, but eventually there is nothing good left. Dkos is a shell of itself. That used to be the #1 internet blog. Huffington is not what it used to be. It is like night and day which I say it got better by becoming more so-called normal. Yahoo is trying to enter the fray, but I don't see it happening. Twitter also seems to have shot its load.
Flame fests worked here too, for example, with the big ass thread Al Giordano of Narco News showed up on. There was another big one, national wingnut appreciation day in which Larry and I think even the racist smash-up artist from Rense showed up. I'm sure that got some views.
Blog fighting works for the short term. I don't think it works long term.
The Peg Entwistle and Theresa Duncan stories did well. So did I believe the one on Lyndon Larouche. Posts on blogger do very well on google searches. My Entwistle article basically came out of nowhere.
It seems that the search engine is where the biggest page hits come from. That means it is on us to hit the right topics, especially not well-known ones, and then let it brew.
Of all my stuff on Kimberlin/Breitbart, it is the Patrick Frey one that gets the most page hits. In theory, it should have been say on the Aaron Walker emails.
A lot of those hits obviously came from the venn diagram part including both us and that kooky, Breitbart neocon milieu.
There are three options for creating the top post list which I'm sure you've noticed, for seven days, 30 days, and all-time. I'm sure that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy at times. Plus, the farther back we go, it is simple mathematics that those entries have had a greater opportunity to amass page hits.
It is really about hitting blog taters. It's also about timing. It's also about the passing of time.
For the irrelevant record, I do not have this blog count my visits.
Maybe one of these days, I'll list the all-time page hits for every article. It would probably be too much work to put them in order according to most hits. They would be in order of date posted. The current number of individual entries for this blog is at 317.
I do agree that our personal blogging relationship also generates page hits. And I do not underestimate that sometimes it is the comment area that is the main reason an entry pulls its weight for stats.
I now see that only a few paragraphs from each Pando article is free. Put a fork in them. They're done.
I suppose the question of the impact internecince blog warfare on the stats could be answered with a review of the data. Surmising on it in biased, uneducated fashion by either of us probably serves no purpose other than to prove (as if more is needed) the udder fatuousness of punditry.
It is evident to me that the all time leading blog posts tend to be clickbaiters (based on certain names or trending topics as you mention) that also have interesting, sometimes dramatic thread commentary.
Whether the the threads are the cause of the post's popularity our correlative I suppose could be debated but I have long noticed our better dialogues (including TLNL, Bob and even Larry) appended to the threads.
I looked at the stats of the past few weeks and it does appear we do our schtick a disservice by overposting mailed-in entries within a short time period. This leads both to a smaller readership per masterpiece and seemingly less focused less concentrated comments.
For instance, if you go back a month and entries stayed at the top for 1-2 weeks you see much more views and comments, all of which possess our normally high quality veracity and infotaining values.
Tsipras is staring down a gun barrel pointed at him by his own party members and rightfully so. He caved in Brussels, although it is hard to fault him as Merkel's aim was not only to stab him in the back but twist the knife and sever Greek leftism's spinal cord.
Make no mistake, this crisis is watershed for the future of "democratic socialism" which many people doubt exists in reality, IE that true socialism even in this day and age, maybe more than ever, reuires a dictatorship of the proletariat. What we have today is a dictatorship of financial capitalism (SEE Lenin, V.I., "Imperialism: the Highest Stage of Capitalism" circa 1916 for d-tales).
The Syriza spin is pretty good. Basically, the global capitalist masters (IE Germany) pulled a coup in Brussels with the primary intention of toppling the leftist government in Athens. Thus, says Tsipras' supporters, if Syriza's critics of the deal topple Tsipras they are Merkel's useful idiots playing into her paunchy hands.
OTOH, bringing down Tsipras and replacing him with an even more left-leaning leadership who rejects the deal is one of the possible results, although at this moment that seems doubtful.
And the mighty righties in other Euro capitals are also weighing in negatively, which could backfire on the dumpy hausfrau and scuttle the deal in any event, which means Greece will be forced out and back into the drachma. Most trusted economists, included yours truly, believe this to be the most effective long term economic and political solution for Greece. However, it comes with an immediate price tag: the Greek people who have any money left in a Greek bank will lose it all.
Similarly, this happened in Argentina in the 90s, and Argentina quickly rebounded after devaluing their currency. However, this analogy is not perfect because Argentina is a much more vibrant country economically than Greece and so possessed the means to quickly grow their way back to fiscal health after the devaluation.
It is a very tough call here. Very tough. The next week of political rounds in teh Euro capitals, many of whom are rightward leaning will be quite interesting.
I have mixed feelings about Pando. On the one hand, that chick is totally disgusting. And that drunk dude isn't far behind. OTOH, they have Ames and Levine, plus the War Nerd (who many people believe is actually Ames) and sometimes good comment on the darkside of the Medium is the Conspiracy.
But I don't read there regularly and if they are forcing subscriptions on people than yeah, I'm done. Aldo their format sucks, which I think you have alluded to in the past.
And I grok your criticism of their investors, however it is not the same set-up as the Intercept (which to be fair also occasionally posts some good schtick, like the series about the NJ murder of the high school girl and subsequent wrongful conviction (or was it?) of her BF.
Omidyar is actively stifling that place by buying off talent rather than presenting it. He has made Snowden a complete slave to the global capitalist system, as he lounges in relative luxurious prison of his own making with his hot GF in Moscow.
I have very little respect for Snowden, to be honest. Yes, he done good, however he still remains part of the problem not the solution, a cowardly sell-out to save his own skin and become who knows how enriched, as obviously same for Greenwald who is a complete fuckstick also. The transparency quotient on both these "fighters for transparency" is absolutely .000.
This is just a little taste from Lenin's prescient masterpiece:
"As banking develops and becomes concentrated in a small number of establishments, the banks grow from modest middlemen into powerful monopolies having at their command almost the whole of the money capital of all the capitalists and small businessmen and also the larger part of the means of production and sources of raw materials in any one country and in a number of countries. This transformation of numerous modest middlemen into a handful of monopolists is one of the fundamental processes in the growth of capitalism into capitalist imperialism; for this reason we must first of all examine the concentration of banking."
In the US of A-holes you can thank one Bill Clinton, through his financial services guru/henchman Robert Rubin for making the Wall Street oligopoly possible by undoing the depression era Roosevelt firewall between investment banking and commercial banking.
This concludes todaze stat padding.
I notice you taking a hard left turn. We need Sanders, period, for any chance of improvement or true hope. Otherwise, it is going to stay the same or get worse.
You make some good meta points. The statistics are inconclusive. I got that blog itch out of my system and am back to I might never write again. Or it will be crispy and good.
I agree there is nothing more boring than a blog that mails in something cheap each day. I think Digby used that formula. I haven't read the Eschaton guy since 2009, something about a Roy Brynaert.
I don't see how I can squeeze out any more from the .00001% or wtf of the total number of Snowden documents.
There's nothin new under the scientology sun. Tom Cruise is starting some mega-sized Scientology's Version of CNN or something.
Fricken sweetie from King of Queens escaped. That is some crazy, awkward schadenfreude.
As I tweeted today, (I went back for a limited cameo to plug us.) some of us have known the whole time about certain things.
I wouldn't have cared less about Greece if you hadn't brought it up. I read some Counterpunch. It's relevant. You mentioned Bernie. I made one entry about Hillary, Digby-style. That was not too shabby.
I think I hit for the cycle. The game went extra innings.
And your stuff was all prime grade donkeytale product.
This stuff brews. We set the trap. The content is there.
You build it and they come.
I agree Ames and Levine are good as is War Nerd who is John Dolan. Not Ames. Ames was Johnny Chin, if I'm not mistaken. It's a long story involving sordid, alleged satire.
I covered Pando pretty good for my Twitter gig. Yes, Sarah Lacy is a menace, same as John Hope Bryant. They move into the available spaces.
Paul Carr is the middle man between the tech-crunchy Thiel lover and the cool dudes.
It is quite different between first look intercept and pando. I concede that point, Mr. Bond. But it's still the same in many ways. Thiel is spy factory. He may not have the power Omidyar has over Greenie, but as I socratised, Pando has been kissing Thiel's butt and pimping him to society.
Yes, Snowden is a tool. That's why I said that's where Assange and Eddie differ. Julian had a blog and thought shit like regular guys. Snowden joined the NSA or CIA or something. Anyone joining them sucks from the get-go. I give Snowden credit for the monstrous contribution, but we are not getting enough of the goodies. That is why all they ever talk about is phone meta, as if they just have our names, dates of calls, to who, you know, like fuck you that's on the phone bill anyway. They have the content. They had the content even before 9/11. It's called echelon. Some of us knew this the whole way. But we were labeled as conspiracy kooks.
Hey, my Pando entry was similar to the Hillary one. Those were solid base hits.
My Snowden stuff turned into a two parter and old-school my schtick.
You liked the one on Batt.
You just have to let it brew. It is out of my system.
I figured as much. remember, I am an alkie. You go through that dry drunk period where you aren't drinking but its hard to give up the behaviour patterns. Actually most of your recent stuff is great. I'm just talking posting startegy as opposed to content.
The only one I didn't find truly dairy worthy was the Celtics piece because it was just a basic re-hash of many of your Celtic related comments but sportstalk of any ilk is always in bounds with me. Besides, this is your blog. And who knows, the Celts may win 50 next year although I'd take the under on that one.
We have the British Open coming up this week and that should be fun, especially with Spieth coming off his 4th win of the year at the vaunted Deere, John Classic and looking for his 3rd major of the year (which would be herstorical by all measures). This is also Tiger's favourite BO course and he's been talking some smack lately so it should be dramatic. Who knows, maybe Woods will get off the schneid. Hopefully he's been spending some quality time in the hot tub tending to his....uhhhhhhm... back.
I'll be following the liveblog on the Graun, although I doubt it will be live. Nothing like British golf commentary for me. And the British Open at St Andrews is my all-time fave golf event. Nothing else comes close.
I have always been hard left. You just pick out the parts you want to believe and disregard the rest to fit your narrative flow. Which I can dig. I loved my time as a charter DLC political operative in your mind.
And this isn't a critique of Tsipras or Sanders as much as recognition of just how difficult it is to be truly leftist in charge when global capitalism is coming after you with a vengeance.
I still believe the deal will crater anyway, if not now then down the road.
I'd take the bet that there will be still be a Grexit, given the the current odds are about 2 to 1 even with the so-called third bail out on tap.
I never saw the attraction in booze. I did partake, not huge amounts like we know certain people went at it. Weed was good. It helped free the mind, man, to write sociology. To really think about stuff and read.
Didn't Marx eventually say capitalism would implode on itself? I don't know how much Bernie Sanders could get done, but I do know that executive order is something of a blank dictator check. He gets to pick all the cabinets and whatnot. He is very smart. Hopefully unlike Assange, he knows how to vet out the riffraff.
I've no clue about grexits or third bails, but the rest of it made sense.
Oh, and supreme court justices are selected by the president. Hopefully Bernie could pull an semi-FDR and turn us around in eight years.
He is up against the vast right wing conspiracy numbnut Hillary Clinton had the gall to usurp the phrase away from leftiers than thou.
I liked weed. Alcohol is a depressant ultimately and makes you sick. It's a toxin. Marijuana is nature.
The basketball post remains because I predict around 50 wins this year after 41 last year. And a card shown is a card played.
The Greek guy may be in over his head. He doesn't have full Castro powers to git it dun.
I agree with you, sooner or later, something has to give.
It sucks to have to go all in on Bernie Sanders, but what else do we have for keeping hope alive?
The trading/free agency season is winding down. The C's make a move today, but it was more like Danny making side bets.
I will definitely post on hoops in October and November when it starts again. Someone even requested once that I post more on basketball. I see Bill Simmons got pushed out. I took a quick glimpse and it seems Bill Boston Guy has integral something (see the message, the medium is). If we transformed your schtick into a scientific data correlation system, I'd bet ESPN ranks at the worst for infotainment shock numbing therapy. Simmons was behind the thirty for thirty movies. Those are good. Or he just out-priced himself. Bill Murray said in Meatballs, "It. Just. Doesn't. Matter."
Oh yes, it is all about Tiger Woods. He is a bum. No one believes in him. Even Whoopie Goldberg is changing her tune on Cosby. Tiger Woods would have been better off in the Babe Ruth days, though racism, ugh, no.
Bernie is starting to hit on Race issues. He uses the real unemployment numbers, too. The guy is legit. Now we'll see what happens after he's taken this hit of a "socialist can never be elected."
If that makes sense.
I googled Grexit. I now see that this topic is way out of my league. I can only think of it in terms of the few Counterpunch articles I read trying to catch up. I apologise for not being more informative.
The details yes, are not your cup of tea.
However, this is as important a historical and political development as it is economic. The economics are not that difficult to grok if you keep it at a high level and not be concerned with details.
Politically, it is fraught with interesting drama obviously for the lefties in Greece but also for the righties elsewhere in Europe.
Bernie fans should watching this for clues and cues as well.
The global imperialist boot crunching against defenseless leftist Greece is so blatantly obvious the sympathetic reaction around the world should only help galvanise leftist action against the PTB wherever we find them.
And as you know so well, they can be found everywhere all the time.
(waves to NSA minders)
Wonder if Varoufakis returns to his post at UT-Austin? Very impressed with him
"Yanis Varoufakis, who stepped down as finance minister last week, threw his lot with the dissenters.
“How can I possibly vote yes to monsters and the new Versailles Treaty?” he said in reference to the peace accord that ended World War I and imposed harsh terms on the losers.
Even Greece’s creditors have split over the best path for the struggling Mediterranean nation. A scathing International Monetary Fund report released Tuesday concluded that Greece’s debts are unsustainable even with its third rescue package in five years — which will require further spending cuts for the country’s battered economy. The report suggests a 30-year grace period for repayment.
“No matter what form it takes . . . one way has to be found in order to release the burden and allow the country to demonstrate that it can be back on a sustainable path,” IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde told CNN on Wednesday."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/greece-due-to-vote-on-bailout-bill-even-as-imf-casts-doubt-on-the-deal/2015/07/15/81f91992-2a72-11e5-960f-22c4ba982ed4_story.html?hpid=z1
Yeah, the Versailles Treaty is always a good one to name drop. And throw in the enclosure acts of the 1300's. That was major change.
I definitely got a full serving of education. I can tell you did, too. It's not about grades and academic medals. It's about going through the whole meat grinder which is interdisciplinary studies mixed in with some weed and common sense.
People can't rip out the prose you do without going on that razor's edge path towards enlightenment.
I am keeping an eye on it. You are correct about Hillary. Are these people stupid? They must be so unaware. And here we are writing for a small but erudite perhaps a tad eccentric demographic of the aware but can only pontificate.
I tried Twitter and some British kid is saying there wasn't much difference between baby boomers and Generation X. And some other person, a pro-Stalin or sympathiser wtf is simply trolling me.
The medium is the message explains it all. I mean, I can zap a few, but the status quo stench overpowers everything. People are still fixated on attacking Fox News and that petty shite I stopped following many years ago.
Obama is like a cult.
Sanders needs to pound on New Hampshire and Iowa, while letting the internet get through to all the other states.
I think Hillary lost a ton of Black votes with her all lives matter comment. Remember when she implied there was still time for her to get the nomination using RFK as an example?
That's an innocent gaffe? I wouldn't want her as president, no way. This Sanders thing makes more sense by the day.
And you are correct, if world events can hit a perfect storm, then Machiavellian science says it will make it to our side of the pond too. We can hope.
Somehow "Susan Polk Was Innocent of Murder" is at the top of the blog leader board. They should let her out. There seems to be nothing new on her in years. She got a raw deal.
Sure, that is click bait, but I nailed the post.
Varoufakis might also have analogised the murder of Rosa Luxembourg, her corpse dumped unceremoniously into the Landwehr Canal.
One should never minimise the atrocities visited upon Greece by the invading Nazis as a source of ongoing humiliation.
Frau Tale says Koreans are still living through the the multigenerational trauma of the 40 years under the thumb of the Japanese in the 20th Century, although some of that national inferiority complex has now been relieved by the stunning economic success of Korea in the preceding 15 years or so.
Her mother and most young women of that time were routinely brutalised by the vicious Japs, who today cannot seem to be a feeble nation of impotent goofballs. Karma baby.
And K-Pop and Korean culture which fluorishes today in Japan and all over the world gives my wife an almost comical sense of pride in her traditions. Koreans are some of if not the very best people on earth.
I retract the idea that I am not good at details. There's so much going on. So much has gone on. I am excellent with details when I pay attention.
It's the people who act like they are God's gift to details who are not very smart.
The Japanese did do a lot of damage.
They also made some wonderful movies.
The Koreans have the nicest smiles.
It is not even 7:30 a.m. yet. I can't muster any kind of wake the f up everybody.
Like I said at the beginning or whenever, Greece is one of those historic victims of capitalism. It has some potential. The Irish deep down might become a leader. You speak of Japanese atrocities and there's no denying it. But don't forget about the minor detail of the British also being Nazis.
I mean Nazis as a descriptive, not that the Brits were actually German.
And now Canada is also full of it. I thought Canada was supposed to be one of the cool beans nations. They are also garbage.
Koreans make fabulous movies and TV entertainment as well. And they are doing it today not yesterday.
Sad to say but there is a little bit of Hitler (along with a little bit of Elvis) in everyone.
It is only when the little bit overhwelms that we have problems. Humans are such a complex breed of trained monkeys.
As the great Nazi misanthrope Louis Ferdinand Celine remarked, humans are nothing more than "monkeys with the gift of gab."
FWIW, I grokked that you were not up to date on the economic details of the Greek catastrophe specifically. Economics takes some study and it is still difficult to comprehend without real world business examples to make sense. Plus most people find it boring.
If you do delve into the Greek problem at any level you will be absolutely amazed at hos they are being abused by Germany and it's sycophants in other Northern Nazified European backwaters.
You may see that Varoufakis ironic Versailles Treaty comment is spot on and not at all hyperbolic.
In general, European PTB sucks as much today as it ever has going back to 1492 at least.
Or 1300.
Speaking of movies, I edited out the Jim Carrey pic on "The Medium/Conspiracy" masterpiece.
Sometimes the pic fits, such as the Tsipras and also the great Manson shot you added to "The White Album" is probably your alltime best.
And then there is Sharapova on "Exile" which come to think of it, her fine ass may be the real reason behind that mailed-in entry's inexplicable popularity. That and it is one of the final (I believe) appearances by TLNL.
And i know the intention is good but you are not spending hours searching for the correct fit which I also understand.
But, honestly, sometimes the prose doesn't require picture headings. And sometimes it is rather too jarring for me, such as Jim Carrey, whose "comedy" is generally crap.
I'm done/
I like to add a photo because they show up on the most popular entry widget. I bet you have the snipping tool to make screenshots. I only add them because you don't.
I'll recycle the Jim Carrey photo into another entry. I do think you're wrong though about its appropriate placement in the medium is the message story. It was called The Truman Show and pretty much summed up McLuhan's ideas.
You can be very opinionated. You also said that George Carlin was a bad comic. Why not just say some people like broccoli or wtf and I don't? You can't say broccoli is generally crap as if that's factual.
I am not a big Jim Carrey fan either for some of his stuff, like Ace Ventura or when he was on The Wayan Brothers.
We are in the post-talent era anyway. Everything is a huge drop down in excellence. Both creators and viewers are simply mailing it in these days for the most part.
I can't believe how bad the news has gotten. I mean that in terms of production values, not in say comparing how bad the actual news is comparatively.
Today is nowhere near what went on with Hitler and Stalin.
In its own way it still sucks. But I meant just look at who are the actual people being put on CNN. They are not real journalists. At least Carrey and Carlin were real comics, whether their personalities/gags turned you off or not.
You might say, I loves me some Gallagher. I didn't. I thought he sucked. But then again, I am still trying to figure out why Bob Hope was so popular. I don't think he ever made me laugh, not once.
I wasn't a big fan of Johnny Carson, but I admit he had some major skills. Letterman. These people can grate on you, in a personal way, but there is no denying the talent. Jack Benny I understand. He was the original Letterman. Hope not so much.
Opinions are definitely fun.
Yeah, I mean why bloviate unless you have strong opinions. I could probably word it more artfully.
Actually, there are a very few stand up comics I like, and even of those I like them in movies and sketches, IE non-stand up.
So as always, its a cup of meat thing as opposed to black and white.
Carlin is particularly irritating because he is revered by youngsters who don't know any better.
His schtick was totally mainstream and only went "daring" after the whole of the youth movement opened that space up for him. He was a follower not an innovator. Was he funny? To me, not really. He was cloying and middle brow at best.
Lenny Bruce was the innovator. Carlin a pale mainstream imitation of Bruce. Which I think to his credit Carlin admitted at one point.
Mort Sahl was the innovator from a political humour standpoint.
Although he ended up arch conservative, again, I think. Not sure
For the record I don't find Seinfeld funny either.
Bill Murray. Funny.
Andy Kaufman. Funny.
Rodney Dangerfield. Funny
Larry David. Funny
Woody Allen. Funny
Johnny Carson. Funny
Jack Benny. Funny
Roseanne. Funny
WC Fritos. Funny
Oh, forgot the Larry Sanders Show guy (cant recall his name). Funny
Letterman. Funny
Sarah Silverman. Funny
Leno. Sucks
Tina Fey. Not funny
Jon Stewart. Not funny
Colbert. Funny
That new chubby faced blonde chick. Funny
That was Gary Shandling. Yes, he was funny. I'll copy and paste:
Letterman. Funny yes
Sarah Silverman. Funny disagree
Leno. Sucks agree, but he had a year or two when he was funny then read his press clippings too much.
Tina Fey. Not funny yes
Jon Stewart. Not funny true
Colbert. Funny yes
That new chubby faced blonde chick. Funny don't know who you mean
I am not too interested in Mort Sahl and especially if he turned into Mort KKK. I liked Carlin's politics and thought he was funny. I do understand what you're saying about him being overrated for leftiness. I recall that same idea being applied to Edward R. Murrow. This is off the topic of funny, but some think he showed up after the fact and made it seem he was the greatness for being intrepid.
Lenny Bruce I don't know. I found him to be not as funny as folks pushed him as. To me he seemed more activist than performer. Flip Wilson. Was he funny? I didn't think so.
Bill Murray. Funny. yes
Andy Kaufman. Funny. yes
Rodney Dangerfield. Funny yes
Larry David. Funny yes, the true genius behind Seinfeld, not Jerry Seinfeld. And anyway, Seinfeld was the fourth funniest actor on that show, and that's only if you include the leads. Run down some of the other people, and Jerome Seinfeld falls to the middle of the pack.
And Oh. My. God. John Daly is making some magic in England. I think he won only two or three majors and at least two of them there. If Daly can stay in this, then I will definitely watch more.
Woody Allen. Funny yes, the earlier stuff and writing. He may be a scumbag, but there's no denying his greatness.
Johnny Carson. Funny I concede this, although he was never my cup of tea.
Jack Benny. Funny yes
Roseanne. Funny well, for a time period I'll agree.
WC Fritos. Funny Thanks. I'm not allowed to vote for myself. And anyway, I am in the process of dropping the fake narcissism schtick. I'm gonna can it with talk of greatness, unless it's about other people.
(continued)
The funniest woman imho is Andrea Martin from SCTV. In opinion fact, the other woman on that show was also remarkable. I think she's Catherine O'Hara.
You can't teach funny. John Candy was funny. Steve Martin, to me, was not very funny.
Bill Murray could be the funniest person of all time. And I agree with you how oftentimes these comics can deliver some of their best stuff in non-comedies. Murray did that a couple times. I think even Steve Carrel won an Oscar for that wrestling movie or at the least he got rave reviews. That guy is very funny!
I have another rough draft done. I pounded it out. It's not great, and of course my schtick tends to be repetitive, so it'll be yet again on the FBI. I just figure the rope-a-dope is done and it's time to drop the anchor punch on the spy factory.
It's time to go Mike Tyson on the Military-industrial Complex. And to go full circle, Mike Tyson is a funny guy. He is proof that people can change. There wasn't a biggest creep on the planet than Mike. Now he's like a Teddy Bear as long as he keeps popping those pills.
Adam Sandler: was funny
Chris Farley = funny David Spade = not funny
And somehow Jim Breuer was funny. It was from him that I first learned that David Spade is an ass. I mean, it was kind of obvious, but Breuer confirmed it in some interview.
They don't make funny people like they used to.
Bea Arthur - as Maude, funny as Golden Girl - not funny
Conan O'Brien is funny. Andy Richter is extremely funny. As is Chris Elliott. I like a goofy kind of funny. I loved Steven Wright, that monotone schtick. And you are correct Kinnison was funny. I think women can also be funny. It's just that guys tend to be louder and zanier which makes it easier to remember them.
John Belushi was wrong that women can't be as good as men at comedy. That's ridiculous. Though he was funny. He was very funny. Chevy Chase was funny for one year of SNL then a couple very good, underrated movies. Then he lost it. He is not funny and is apparently one of the most hated men in Hollywood.
Owen Wilson and Ben Stiller are very funny. Will Farrell was funny.
Edith Bunker was a comedic genius. Maureen Stapleton could deliver the funny cheese. As could Carroll O'Connor. Yeah, maybe Norman Lear moved into a space, yadda yadda. Those were great shows.
Richard Pryor. He is up there for greatness with Poitier. He could do drama also. Oh, and then his co-star Gene Wilder. How was he not funny?
I don't disagree with any of your calls there with the exception of Silverman and carlin.
Sarah is caustic, sarcastic and extremely brutally honest. She may be the closest thing to Lennny living.
I just didnt think Carlin was that funny. Probably a generational thing. I mean none of van Gogh's contemporaries liked him when he was alive either.
Come to think of it, I don't care that much for van Gogh either. LOL.
You have to admit even as you recognise they are the enemy that Google is greatness in search. I typed in chubby faced blond comedienne and there she was in a nanosecond:
Amy Shumer
In fact, I recall singing the highest praises of JEAN stapleton on this very blog.
In many ways she was easily the best thing about All in the Family. Which is also a show I didn't think was all that great. Not generally a huge Norman Lear fan, with the exception of the Jeffersons.
george is the historic troll. The rest is pretty forgettable to me, and extremely formulaic. Funny in its day maybe but not timeless.
Oh yes Jean, not Maureen, though the other lady also had acting chops. Today is very hazy for me. Nothing is waking me up.
The Jeffersons was good. Unfortunately, the real Lionel left at the beginning.
That guy was the Barry Sanders of sitcoms. He did his damage, then took off. A poor man's Greta Garbo. I think the same thing happened with Lamont from Sanford and Son.
That show had funny all over it, the Big Three of Redd Foxx, Grady, and Lamont. Even Bubba was funny. And the dumb white cop and groovy Black cop.
News Radio was funny with Phil Hartman. Don't forget about him.
Yes, Google rules. There was a method to my madness of joining Blogger.
I am not an SEO or player type. I do have a sense of what it takes to generate page hits. But I no longer care. Writing is somehow fun even during hazy times.
I'm trying to create a space. I have a good sense about what I experienced and what I left behind. From a personal internet experience, these are uncharted waters.
ok, one moe than i reaaly gots to go.
If you are looking for an authentic lefty comedian who was also hilarious while essentially only doing one schtick over and over again and yet actually made it in the mainstream (to a degree) look no further than......Professor Irwin Corey.
Correction; "is" not "was".
He is still alive at 101. Interesting life:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irwin_Corey
"the World's Greatest Authority."
That's reincarnation schtick theft, if I'm Lenny Bruce. Otherwise, the series on my greatness was simply a coincidence.
He's apparently in this Phil Silvers episode:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3MJUk-pDBw
This show is so not funny. I think Corey shows up later as Chester. It's a crime this guy isn't more well-known and it's amazing he is still alive.
He was a regular on Carson and the very excellent, underrated Steve Allen syndicated talk thingie of the mid to late 60s.
Both Allen and Carson (more quietly) were lefties.
Okay, fast forward to 11:10 and you can watch Irwin Corey.
I'm sure there is schtick all over the internet. Did you read his wiki? He used to bum change in his spare time even after he was rich and famous, then give the money to charity.
I think he is the blogging Harvey Penick to our Tom Kite and Ben Crenshaw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1Q2wzNeEOI.
Yes, I read it. Unfortunately I ended up on the stupid phil silvers show. Not. Funny.
I published a new one. The rough draft was pounded out this morning while we were conducting a cross-fire of comments.
The Truman Show was a great movie. You may want to give it a new chance. The internet makes it seem that we are all Truman Shows. You said it was interactive or something.
Basically the FBI makes the targets feel that they are special snowflakes with a calling to greatness. Forget about getting a job, saving, meet the girl of your dreams, or try, make friends, play cards, basically have a life..... Nope, the world is falling apart and only you as Tom Cruise Scienterrorist can make the difference.
Then the chumps are supplied with the FBI owned weaponry they are arrested with possession. Ooooohhhhhh, home grown ISIS bitch has been snagged by brave FBI and their sewer rats. That's what I'm talking about.
It should be out of my system, but it never stops and no one does anything to stop it. So I have started the DFQ2 war on fake terrorism.
Germany passes their end of the bailout, but in ironic symmetry to Tsipras's own parliamentary "win", Merkel looses many supporters from her own party in the process of selling something no one wants but enough of everyone on all sides apparently are too afraid of the unknown to let loose. So the can, as per usual will get kicked down the road and the crisis will only grow worse in time.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/18/world/europe/germany-greece-bailout-talks.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
I feel you on these set-up fake bust schticks, but this is how the FBI operates since time immemorial. They have no way of finding the real loose canons, such as an actual killer in Chattanooga, but the killer in Chattanooga will keep the flame alive and the FBI will show that they are doing "something", everyone will agree that it is very difficult to catch actual conspirators before an actual event occurs, the FBI will get a free pass and the whole process will continue over and over.
So yeah, it never stops and no one does anything to stop it, primarily because it cannot be stopped until the entire system changes and the American way of relating to the rest of the world changes, but alas, everyone including the fake left, are too afraid of the unknown (see comment directly above) to take the necessary leap, and so the status quo obtains.
For now.
This counterpunch article takes care of your last two posts.
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/07/17/greek-lessons-for-americans/
"For these reasons and others – a media system dedicated to dumbing down political discourse is high on the list — the beneficiaries of the neoliberal order in the United States feel at least as secure as the vultures that led the attack on Greece."
As for my schtick, it will stand the test of time. CNN is crazy nuts drinking the kool-aid. There is not one Counterpunch person ever on there.
And there are even more videos, it is non-stop, of police murdering civilians and basically practicing mayhem. These are legitimation crises.
People should re-watch the interview done with Erich Fromm by Mike Wallace. The medium seemed a lot less conspiratorial back in the day. I'm not naive and saying there was a free press back then. But now there is none.
Obama visited a federal prison. That guy never developed any balls. It's too little, too late from Obama. He's been dicking us around for six years and now all of a sudden he is mailing in concern.
The answer is not Republicans. I do not know why people waste so much time on getting into stereotypical debate or froth towards them. That is so 2000 to 2010.
Maybe the internet just makes it seem things are much worse. Like how news could create a crime wave by spending a little more coverage on it.
Stupid people are running the country. Both sides are very ignorant and greedy. Yet we are trolls, narcissistic, and insignificant according to the status quo. But that's okay. We saw something historical happening in real time and faced it down.
Many people will learn a thing or two from us. You build the enlightenment adorned with infotainment nuggets and the people will take their medicine eventually and grow up.
ISIS is recruiting American domestic terrorists? My schtick says it is the Spy Factory which is creating all of this. And with all the rhetoric and scare tactics, I am thinking this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Unfortunately, these patsies help their fake terror war because garbage outlets like CNN are operating on a 4th grade level of comprehension while leaving out most of the details.
I'm not saying it's true, but sometimes these articles sound like they were lifted from us.
"As Bernie Sanders poll numbers have surged, Hillary Clinton has been faking left. Only a fool would believe a word she says. Like her husband, she is an inveterate liar. And, like him too, she cannot keep from occasionally flaunting her duplicity."
Faking left? Fake left?
That article actually sounds a lot like what you've been saying.
Wow, I thought I went off on wild digressions. In fact I know I do because it's often deliberate. The dude's trying to fit the confederate flag into the discussion. One of the main things professors taught us was to answer the question. Yeah, sometimes you just had to bs your way through the blue books for exams.
One prof was very worried about me because my work was awful. It was on purpose. I said, Guy, it's nothing personal. I am taking this one pass/fail. A D- works for me.
It wasn't just that, but I wasn't going to tell him that he was extremely boring and not really teaching us anything. It was some bullshit Philosophy class. Those who can't do any subjects at all, pick philosophy, then end up getting cab jobs with their PhD's. True story, bro.
Now, with the FBI fake terror schtick this has already been exposed over and over. They have done this act forever, at least since the cold war.
If you can expose them creating a real killer, such as the Chattanooga guy, then you would have something.
I could see DFQ2 winning a Pulitzer at that point.
And why are we taliking about this in this thread when you hae perfectly good masterwork sitting atop the front page?
The Greek story has about run its course although it still has tone of mileage.
Tsipras booted his hard left contingent out of the cabinet yesterday, thus cementing the decision: he's fake left and the fake left prevailed.
for now.
This catastrophe is sure to continue for years perhaps decades, maybe all time until saner heads (the IMF has already) admit the loans can never be paid back and if there is no haircut on the debt (lessening of the principle amount of loans) they will require ever more and larger bailouts to service, all in the name of keeping Germany's banksters afloat.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/18/greece-debt-crisis-reforms-fail-yanis-varoufakis
Varoufakis, who has warned austerity measures for Greece will strengthen support for the far right, told the broadcaster: “This programme is going to fail whoever undertakes its implementation.”
He insisted Tsipras did not fire him from his role as finance minister. “He didn’t get rid of me,” he said.
“Alexis Tsipras at some point decided that his government, our government, was at gunpoint. We were given a choice between being executed and capitulating and he decided that capitulation was the optimal strategy.
“I may disagree with him and I declared that by resigning my post but I understand precisely the very difficult position in which he finds himself.
“We’re completely united in lambasting the highly undemocratic and economically irrational policies of the European Union towards the government.”
Greece seems to be in a holding pattern. The good guys left the bases loaded, but the game's not over.
I think the biggest exposure was of Hal Turner. Maybe it seems I am being Rainman, suybstitute Hal for Judge Wapner.
The bottom line irrelevant give and take since the internet kicked in has been you are a government disinfo agent. The other side would remark you say that to anyone who disagrees with your kookiness.
And who got the Hal Turner scoop? Hmmmm. It was anonymous. No one knows. And we can bet it wasn't an inside job. That was when Anonymous was the real deal. They cracked Scientology on the head. Yes, everyone (er, uhm, obviously not everyone) knows that Scientology is whacked out goobledy schlock. Butno one had the details. The Tom Cruise video was the frosting on the suzie q. Somewhere I wrote Tome Cruise, Scienterrorist. That was a good one.
The Mormons is something very f'ed up. I am fascinated by legitimation crises, what they are and what's being done about them which is apparently not much.
Oh yes, Scientology was like Daily Kos in 2004-05, right before the shite hit the fan. So kudos to Anonymous and what they did to Scientology and Hal Turner before getting co-opted by the Spy Factory.
The answer to your question is non-disclosure agreements and Obama who you helped get elected as a useful idiot for the DLC (just kidding, don't want to fight - wouldn't be prudent), the Obama cult leader has put a purple nurple on anyone blowing the whistle on anything.
I can truly understand more and more how Field Negro could be called a fake leftist. He is going well out of his way to say blah blah Republicans this and that to Obama.
It is on the level of Keith Olbermann. We can remember the rants. Do we remember the details? I doubt it.
Scoops are relative and I try not to take credit for any I didn't actually scoop. Like the Alexandrovna BK fake exoneration schtick. That was outed by an anon coward at Democratic Underground. Within my BK-Raw Story-Bradblog work there were scoops. I thought Lori Grace was a huge scoop of pulitzer cheese for the small internet pond category anyway.
I think we have this joint/format figured out pretty good. You figured it out a long time ago. It's best if we try to keep coments on the current entry or on a few of them if the entries are flying fast and furiously.
Hey, it's a small world. Lisa from Prince's Revolution part of his band started following me.
I believe it is slow and steady for us. I bet most of our views come from folks who know us or stumble onto us, then gobble up the entries. Blogger is kind of user-friendly for stuff like listing the archives on the right side. You build the content, then the wonderful audience finds it.
But yeah, let's never forget Hal Turner. Weintraub knew he was a sweet target to troll bust. Yet, Dave was going after him from the political angle. I had the most brief of interactions with him. He was going to start a conspiracy theory day where you could post anything on his blog to do with that. He wasn't into them himself, but he ideologically had a problem with how Daily Kos made their declaration against them.
I told him about Alexandrovna, briefly. He liked her and Raw Story, but he said he would give me a fair chance to present. He was gone a week or two later. Maybe even days later. I blame MBNYC and the other political operatives for his death, but especially Bouldin for posting pictures of him on that big NY blog and shaming him for his weight. Dave tried to take off the weight too fast. That's what killed him. The same thing happened to a very good actor named Laird Cregar who died at 31. I think DFQ was 38, but I'm not sure.
We are just planting seeds. We are obviously quite different in most ways, but there is something, and something big, that we do share, and it's in the desire to get people to take a closer look at who and what they are actually supporting.
It would be huge if it turned out the Chattanooga shooter was in contact with FBI sewer rats, et al. The Spy Factory is saying they never heard of the guy. I think even if the paid fakes were not in contact with him, he was in contact with their online materials.
I don't have the means to take investigations past the internet. Say with that guy Harry Link who was flashing major weaponry on youtube videos. I'd need a real reporter to finish the job.
Now, if Mandy Nagy had given me credit in her big article, I would have had no problem with her. But seeing that I was able to identify on my own at least one major donor, Lori Grace,
that solidifies that the scoop was mine. Breitbart found other info, say with the Barbar Streisand/Soros foundation type funding etc.. That was simply ridiculous and outright plagiarism. I am sorry she is apparently in a very bad way health-wise.
Back in Greece, some dark voices have been accusing my man former Finance Minister and UT prof Varoufakis of conspiring a secret return to the drachma that would have enriched him and his cronies at the expense of Greek savings account holders.
Today, Tsipras boldly (and somewhat humorously) stepped in to put a stop to the conspiratard nonsense.
"Earlier today, PM Tsipras launched a defence of the embattled Mr Tsipras. In parliament, the Syriza leader said:
"You can blame him as much as you want for his political plan, his statements, for his taste in shirts, for vacations in Aegina."
"But you cannot accuse him of stealing the money of Greek people or having a covert plan to take Greece to the precipice.""
Tsipras now says, contrary to the rumours that Syriza had no 'Plan B' (Grexit with a return to the drachma), that he ordered Varoufakis to develop Plan B.
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