Humor

Recycled Humorous Links For Your Enjoyment

· April 12, 2018 · Aesthetics, Art, Humor, Public Debate · , , , · No Comments

–Sweet van

–Zombo.com. You won’t know unless you click.

–Who reads the newspapers?

–Still the funniest one, I think.

-Via David Thompson, if you don’t have time to watch Gymkata, this is the next best thing.

-Click here to experience ‘The Gobbler.‘

‘If you’re ever wondering what the War Room of “Dr. Strangelove” would look like if the movie had been directed by Prince, here you go.’

–

‘Think Foreigner’s ‘Eye Of The Tiger’ meets a standard Journey/Eddie Money-esque power rock ballad, chock full of all the standard cliches: ‘highest fever’ ‘roll the dice’ ”new horizon’ brand new start’ ‘hit the right spot‘

All of this tacked onto the end of Schwarzenegger’s pure uncut 80’s sci-fi action thriller…

Almost too much to bear.

Thanks, readers:

 

Monday Poem-Ogden Nash: The Purist

· April 9, 2017 · Aesthetics, Art, Humor, Poetry, Uncategorized · , , , · No Comments

The Purist 

I give you now Professor Twist,
A conscientious scientist,
Trustees exclaimed, “He never bungles!”
And sent him off to distant jungles.
Camped on a tropic riverside,
One day he missed his loving bride.
She had, the guide informed him later,
Been eaten by an alligator.
Professor Twist could not but smile.
“You mean,” he said, “a crocodile.”

–Ogden Nash

Repost-Sunday Quotation: P.G. Wodehouse

· March 25, 2017 · Aesthetics, Art, Humor, Literature, Modernism, Public Debate · , , , , , · 2 Comments

“You can’t be a successful dictator and design women’s underwear. One or the other. Not both.”

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If you have an hour or so, and you want to read one of the funnier short stories ever written, I recommend Uncle Fred Flits By, by Wodehouse.

I could not find it for free, but you can check out the first few pages at the above link.

Also, this piece discusses some of Wodehouse’s darker characters. There’s a polished musicality and a keen ear that leads to superb comic timing and great depth. It’s farcical and moves along nicely, but also a provides a look at a whole society and generation through the goings-on of a lovable fop.

You don’t have to be Anglo, nor an Anglophile, to appreciate such writing I don’t think.

What a ghastly Youtube still:

***I got nuttin’ these days but reposts.  This blog doesn’t pay!

Update And Repost-Death & Tax Credits-From The Observer: ‘New York May Become First State To Incentivize Diversity In Writers’ Rooms’

· January 2, 2016 · Aesthetics, Art, Current Events, Free Speech, Humor, Journalism, Law, Public Debate · , , , , , , , , , · 9 Comments

Egads, New York

Egads, New York:

Update: A7373 here and S 5370 here.  Both have passed the NY Senate And Assembly.

‘Well, thanks to two new bills currently gaining traction in Albany’s assembly and senate, New York may become the first state to incentivize adding diversity to a production’s writing staff.

The bills, A47373 and S 5370, would modify the existing production state tax credit, so that certain New York writing income would qualify as an eligible expense.  A company would have to employ women or people of color, and a portion of their New York salaries would qualify for the credit, which hasn’t been the case previously.  It’s capped at $50,000 per writer, and an overall expenditure of $3.5 million a year.’

So will writers’ rooms have to send-in photos every quarter, or a list of diverse-sounding names to ensure they’re receiving the credit?

Will there be surprise, on-site inspections with a potential room full of white guys fleeing like cockroaches?

On that note, via The Federalist, ‘Get Ready For Racial Quotas In Your Neighborhood:’

Play nice, children:

‘HUD intends to insert itself into local zoning efforts through the AFFH (Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing) program to push affirmative action in housing policy, directing HUD grant recipients to “affirmatively further the Act’s goals of promoting fair housing and equal opportunity.’

You will play nice.  Now, who isn’t playing nice?

Seriously, who?  Where do they live?

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Related On This Site: $8 cheeseburgers, operating losses and writers: From The New Yorker: ‘Writing Powered By Amtrak’

Repost-From Poemshape: ‘Let Poetry Die’

Ken Burns makes a good documentary, but he’s also arguing he absolutely needs your tax dollars in service of what he assumes to be a shared definition of the “common good” as he pursues that art.  The market just can’t support it otherwise. Repost-From ReasonTV Via Youtube: ‘Ken Burns on PBS Funding, Being a “Yellow-Dog Democrat,” & Missing Walter Cronkite’…From NPR: Grants To The NEA To Stimulate The Economy?…We’re already mixing art and politics, so…
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Here’s a suggestion to keep aesthetic and political judgements apart-Roger Scruton In The American Spectator Via A & L Daily: Farewell To Judgment…

From 2 Blowhards-We Need The Arts: A Sob Story…

 From Big Hollywood: ‘The National Endowment For The Art Of Persuasion?’

A museum industrial complex…more complexes…who are the people museums should be serving? James Panero At The New Criterion: ‘Time to Free NY’s Museums: The Met Responds’

Via Reason: ‘Salvador Allende’s Cybersocialist Command Center’

Two Monday Links On Nudging-No, You’re Going To Do What We Say

· February 10, 2014 · Communism, Culture, Current Events, Economics, Humor, Media, Politics, Public Debate, Radicalism · , , , , , , , , , , , · No Comments

NPR via Althouse ‘It Takes More Than A Produce Aisle To Refresh A Food Desert‘

How can you be against the ‘community?’

‘Alex Ortega, a public health researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles, agrees that providing access to nutritious food is only the first step.

“The next part of the intervention is to create demand,” he says, “so the community wants to come to the store and buy healthy fruits and vegetables and go home and prepare those foods in a healthy way, without lots of fat, salt or sugar.”

Dear Reader, I invite you to please indulge my fancy.  Below is an excerpted scene from my hit play Quinoa, Community, Cancer & You-How To Be Good & Healthy For the 21st Century:

Intern–Mr. Ortega, sir, the numbers aren’t…the numbers aren’t what we were hoping for.

AO–It’s ok, Andrea, let’s have a look.  This happens every month (rustling of papers…the audible ticking of the clock on the wall…a door closes sharply down the hall)

AO–I see then. I see. Who did the research here?  Who put this report together? (Ortega brings a heavy laborer’s hand to his brow and stares at his desk)

Intern–An independent firm, sir, but I did some research on HealthWebPlusNet.Gov and it says they’re affiliated with Community Interests & The General Will, same as us.  I don’t recognize no names on there.

AO-Do I know any of them?

Intern–I don’t think so, sir.  I haven’t seen them ever.

AO-Well, I’m not understanding then.  We’re getting great feedback on that quinoa recipe drop over Food Desert 2 last week.  I did a walkthrough over there on Tuesday. People seemed happy.

Intern-I know sir, I know. I hear those recipes are really good.  My auntie collects them all. They’re really great.

AO-And all the price-allocation dials are still turned to 11?

Intern-Of course, Mr. Ortega, of course.

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That’s just a teaser, folks.  There’s more where that came from.  But now onto the People’s Green Front, somewhere between science and ideology: Maria Konnikova At The New Yorker: ‘Hot Heads In Cold Weather‘

Capstick & Pidgeon?:

‘A slight change in presentation, however, may shift attitudes in the direction of climate science and away from the vicissitudes of local weather. A study out this month, from the Cardiff University psychologists Stuart Capstick and Nicholas Pidgeon, found that periods of exceptionally cold weather in the United Kingdom had the opposite effect as they did in the United States: more people believed in the truth of climate change. The reason for the difference? The media had framed the weather within the context of climate change, emphasizing that it was unnatural, rather than simply cold. Perhaps if people here were told that it’s not just brutal out there, it’s unnaturally brutal, they, too, might jump to a different conclusion.’

If you can’t think for yourself, there are plenty of people to do it for you.

The right people, of course, with all the right ideas, policies, and knowledge.

Related On This Site:  Sunstein’s got to create some space between the Bloomberg backlash and the totalitarians on the Left: Daddy’s Gonna Make You Do It…Cass Sunstein At The New Republic: ‘Why Paternalism Is Your Friend’

Kant is a major influence on libertarians, from Ayn Rand’s Objectivism to Robert Nozick’s ‘night-watchman’ state:  A Few Thoughts On Robert Nozick’s “Anarchy, State and Utopia”…Link To An Ayn Rand Paper: The Objectivist Attack On Kant: Repost-Youtube Via Libertarianism.Org-David Friedman: ‘The Machinery Of Freedom’…Anarcho-capitalism:  Pro-market, anti-state, anti-war…paleo-libertarian: Link To Lew Rockwell Via A Reader…

Anarcho-syndicalist, libertarian socialist and sometime blind supporter of lefty causes:  Via Youtube: (1 of 3) Kant, Chomsky and the Problem of Knowledge…

New liberty away from Hobbes…toward Hayek…but can you see Locke from there?: Repost-From Public Reason: A Discussion Of Gerald Gaus’s Book ‘The Order of Public Reason: A Theory of Freedom And Morality In A Diverse And Bounded World’

Richard Rorty tried to tie postmodernism and trendy leftist solidarity to liberalism:  Repost: Another Take On J.S. Mill From “Liberal England”

Catholic libertarianism: Youtube Via Reason TV-Judge Napolitano ‘Why Taxation is Theft, Abortion is Murder, & Government is Dangerous’

The classical liberal tradition…looking for classical liberals in the postmodern wilderness: Isaiah Berlin’s negative liberty: A Few Thoughts On Isaiah Berlin’s “Two Concepts Of Liberty”… From George Monbiot: ‘How Freedom Became Tyranny’…Looking to supplant religion as moral source for the laws: From The Reason Archives: ‘Discussing Disgust’ Julian Sanchez Interviews Martha Nussbaum.New liberty away from Hobbes?: From Public Reason: A Discussion Of Gerald Gaus’s Book ‘The Order of Public Reason: A Theory of Freedom And Morality In A Diverse And Bounded World’…Richard Rorty tried to tie postmodernism and leftist solidarity to liberalism, but wasn’t exactly classically liberal:  Repost: Another Take On J.S. Mill From “Liberal England”

Awesome Badness-Gymkata: Sorry About That Arrow To The Chest, Yankee Imperialist Pig-Dog’

· June 26, 2013 · Culture, Humor, Music · , , , · No Comments

You remember this cinema classic, don’t you?

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They play for keeps in Karabal.

Still looking for awesome badness on this blog.  If you think you’ve got some awesome badness, preferably 80’s awesome badness, send it my way.Add to Technorati Favorites

It may get put up.

From James Lileks: ‘The Gobbler’

· May 26, 2013 · Architecture, Art, Culture, Humor, Journalism, Media, Public Debate · , , , , , , , · No Comments

Click here to experience ‘The Gobbler.‘

‘If you’re ever wondering what the War Room of “Dr. Strangelove” would look like if the movie had been directed by Prince, here you go.’

After taking the photo tour, I remain convinced that ‘The Gobbler’ exists in its own realm of awesome badness.  Such a shag-covered, abandoned love-child of the late 60’s and early 70’s is challenging just what I thought I knew about American culture.

And while I can lounge in the bathos of this Wisconsin motor court/supper club’s global ambitions, and walk through the valley of the shadow of its modernist, U.N. international style, I still can’t fathom the intentions of its authors.

Why, Gobbler, why?

–Want to lose an afternoon?  Visit Lileks.com.  A fine humorist with a sharp pen and a keen eye.  This is what the internet is for.

Additionally:  Donald Pittenger, at Art Contrarian, and formerly of 2 Blowhards, has been looking at modernism.  From the banner of his blog:

‘The point-of-view is that modernism in art is an idea that has, after a century or more, been thoroughly tested and found wanting. Not to say that it should be abolished — just put in its proper, diminished place’

Here’s Australian art critic Robert Hughes discussing the Albany plaza, and almost hyperbolically criticizing the aims of modernist architecture.

***Fun fact, he pronounces the “Boogie Woogie”  the “Boo-gie Woo-gie.”  

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Related On This Site: They designed a city in the heart of Brazil that really doesn’t work for people: Brasilia: A Planned City

No thanks to living in planned communities upon someone else’s overall vision?: Roger Scruton In The City Journal: Cities For Living–Is Modernism Dead?…Repost-Via Reason: ‘Salvador Allende’s Cybersocialist Command Center’……From Grist.Org Via The New Republic Via The A & L Daily: ‘Getting Past “Ruin Porn” In Detroit’… some people don’t want you to have the economic freedom to live in the suburbs: From Foreign Policy: ‘Urban Legends, Why Suburbs, Not Cities, Are The Answer’

A structure in the desert…not even a city Update On LACMA, Michael Heizer And The ‘Levitated Mass’-Modern Art And The Public;..where is modernism headed? Via Youtube: Justin, The Horse That Could Paint…

Denis Dutton suggested art could head towards Darwin (and may offer new direction from the troubles of the modern art aimlessness and shallow depth…the money and the fame) Review of Denis Dutton’s ‘The Art Instinct’

Michael Dirda From The Sunday Times Via The A & L Daily: ‘H.L. Mencken At Full Throttle’

· April 13, 2013 · Culture, Literature, Poetry, Public Debate · , , , , , , · 2 Comments

Full piece here:

“As a student of his native literature, Mencken favours writers with the authentic American yawp – Walt Whitman and Mark Twain, the humorists George Ade and Ring Lardner. Huckleberry Finn is the novel he loves most (followed, somewhat surprisingly, by Joseph Conrad’s Lord Jim). He judges Emerson to be overrated – “an importer of stale German elixirs, sometimes direct and sometimes through the Carlylean branch house”. He can’t bear the circumlocutions of Henry James and the gentility of William Dean Howells”

Also On This Site: How might Nietzsche figure in the discussion, at least with regard to Camille Paglia.  See the comments:  Repost-Camille Paglia At Arion: Why Break, Blow, Burn Was Successful…Here’s Nietzsche scholar J.P. Stern on Nietzsche’s anti-Christian, anti-secular morality (Kant, utilitarians), anti-democratic, and anti-Greek (except the “heroic” Greek) biases…

From Poemshape Via Andrew Sullivan: ‘Let Poetry Die’…Here’s a suggestion to keep aesthetic and political judgements apart-Roger Scruton In The American Spectator Via A & L Daily: Farewell To Judgment…English departments can’t just copy “(S)cience”…yet they have so much to offer.

From Monty Python: ‘Is Dennis An Anarcho-Syndicalist?’

· March 2, 2013 · Humor · , , , · No Comments

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Apparently, Dennis is suspicious of King Arthur’s claims to rule, and thinks himself part of an autonomous collective.

Related On This Site: Libertarian socialist and anarcho-syndicalist:  Via Youtube: (1 of 3) Kant, Chomsky and the Problem of Knowledge…Martha Nussbaum criticizing Chomsky’s hubris in Martha Nussbaum In Dissent–Violence On The Left: Nandigram And The Communists Of West Bengal

From Michael Totten At World Affairs: “Noam Chomsky: The Last Totalitarian”

Update And Repost: ‘A Canadian Libertarian Making Noise: Ezra Levant’

· October 26, 2012 · Foreign Policy, Humor, Immigration, Law, Philosophy, Politics, Public Debate · , , , , , , , , , , · No Comments

Here are Levant’s opening statements during his investigation:

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Levant was fighting what he saw as an infringement upon his freedom of speech by the Human Rights Commission of Alberta.  As editor of the Western Standard, Levant published the Danish cartoons of Mohammed, and found himself investigated by, in his words, “a kangaroo court.”

Originally, a letter was written by Syed Soharwardy, an imam living in Alberta, to the Alberta Human Rights Commission.  Soharwardy claimed that the cartoons were morally offensive to the religion of Islam.  Levant believed his decision to publish the cartoons was protected by Canadian law, and that Soharwardy found a path to legal action (at the expense of Canadian taxpayers) through the Human Rights Commission because no one else would take Soharwardy’s claims seriously.

One of Levant’s main concerns seems to be the the way in which someone like Soharwardy, (with unchallenged religious beliefs, and illiberal ideas of social freedom), has infringed upon his freedoms through an institution like the Alberta Human Rights Commission.

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Heading towards a theme, here’s Mark Steyn discussing complaints brought against Macleans, Canada’s largest publication, by the President of the Canadian Islamic Congress (who sent three representatives) to TVOntario.   They were upset at the pieces Steyn had published there.  The complaints went through the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal for alleged “Islamophobia” and “promoting hate:”

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Pretty heated.

Again, the focus here is not whether Islam is a religion whose followers would eventually clash with the idea of separation of church and state, and/or identify with a larger global pan-Muslim population at the expense of their adopted countries.  That’s a different debate.  We know that here in America, they are granted a space created by our Constitution for freedom of religion in the public square and no specific religious test for office.  They must follow our laws and are protected by them.  Living and working alongside one another has its benefits and I generally favor the melting pot approach.

The debate here focuses on the effect that multiculturalism, the human rights crowd, and the public sentiment behind them can have upon freedom of expression when Human Rights Commissions are allowed legal recourse to settle this kind of dispute.  This is one of the consequences of those ideas in action, and it’s not exactly liberal.  It’s the multicultural solution, and it can be absolutely chilling on speech, placing onerous financial burdens on citizens, and it can create a sort of shadow court with aims of its own (if not jurisdiction) operating alongside the regular courts.

We’re not anywhere near Choudary territory yet, but remember that Nidal Hasan, the Ft. Hood shooter, had some problems with “workplace violence”.  Most multiculturalists really don’t see a problem with their approach.

***A friend points out that the illiberal tendencies of the Muslim complainants in both cases and the illiberalism of the multiculturalists is a good fit.  Just don’t be a Canadian on the receiving end.

***This also helps to confirm the libertarian contention that libertarians are the true classical liberals, and modern liberalism has followed the logic of moral relativism, a lot of Continental, New Left, neo-Marxist influences in feminism and race theory which lead to an unhealthy desire to control and be controlled by the State, which will grow larger and larger.

Also On This Site:  From The BBC-Kurt Westergaard: ‘Cartoonist Attacker In Danish Court’

Repost-From Beautiful Horizons: ‘Christopher Hitchens and Tariq Ramadan at the 92nd Street Y’

Virtual Philosophy has a series on free speech and some links and notes to J.S. Mill’s ‘On Liberty’ among others.  Is Mill’s utilitarianism enough?:  From virtual philosopher: ‘Free Speech: notes and links for course at Free Word Centre’

A British Muslim tells his story, suggesting that classical liberalism wouldn’t be a bad idea…as a more entrenched radical British Left and Muslim immigration don’t mix too well: From Kenanmalik.com: ‘Introduction: How Salman Rushdie Changed My Life’… Via YouTube: ‘Christopher Hitchens Vs. Ahmed Younis On CNN (2005)’…

Free speech (used both well and unwell) meets offended Muslims: ‘Mohammad Cartoonist Lars Vilks Headbutted‘During Lecture’……From The OC Jewish Experience: ‘UC Irvine Muslim Student Union Suspended’…From Volokh: ‘”South Park” Creators Warned (Threatened) Over Mohammed’

Repost-Eugene Volokh At The National Review: ‘Multiculturalism: For or Against?’…Theodore Dalrymple Still Attacking Multi-Culturalism In Britain…From The Volokh Conspiracy: Multiculturalism As A Traditional American Value

From Sultan Knish: ‘The Mirage Of Moderate Islam’

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