Cheap shots: Blizzard edition

Beyoncé and Kathryn Jean in happier times (K-Lo in costume as a Discworld Dwarf). Photo via Heyonick

Kathryn Jean Lopez of the National Review (via ThinkProgress) wants to know:

Why can’t we have a national entertainment moment that does not include a mother gyrating in a black teddy?

Sorry, but that's a little too much like why can't we have a White History Month? Gyrating mother-free national entertainment moments are a dime a dozen where I come from. I wonder what cable company she has.

So he plead guilty, do he? Typo of the week, from ThinkProgress:

Floyd Corkins, 28, of Virginia on Wednesday plead guilty to a shooting a man at the conservative Family Research Council in August, CNN reports. As a motive, Corkins told a judge he wanted to intimated gay rights opponents.

Floyd, Floyd, that's not how to do it. You'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar.

Banker suit by Vivienne Westwood, fall-winter 2013.

I wish I'd written this:

To be read in the voice of Paul Harvey.

And on the eighth day God looked down on his planned paradise and said, “I need someone who can flip this for a quick buck.”

So God made a banker.

God said, “I need someone who doesn’t grow anything or make anything but who will borrow money from the public at 0% interest and then lend it back to the public at 2% or 5% or 10% and pay himself a bonus for doing so.”

So God made a banker.

God said, “I need someone who will take money from the people who work and save, and use that money to create a dotcom bubble and a housing bubble and a stock bubble and an oil bubble and a commodities bubble and a bond bubble and another stock bubble, and then sell it to people in Poughkeepsie and Spokane and Bakersfield, and pay himself another bonus.”

So God made a banker.

Click to Play

Dodge’s 'farmer' ad

In this Super Bowl ad, Chrysler pays tribute to the American farmer.

God said, “I need someone to build homes in the swamps and deserts using shoddy materials and other people’s money, and then use these homes as collateral for a Ponzi scheme he can sell to pensioners in California and Michigan and Sweden. I need someone who will then foreclose on those homes, kick out the occupants, and switch off the air conditioning and the plumbing, and watch the houses turn back into dirt. And then pay himself another bonus.”

God said, “I need someone to lend money to people with bad credit at 30% interest in order to get his stock price up, and then, just before the loans turn bad, cash out his stock and walk away. And who, when asked later, will, with a tearful eye, say the government made him do it.”

God said, “And I need somebody who will tell everyone else to stand on their own two feet, but who will then run to the government for a bailout as soon as he gets into trouble — and who will then use that bailout money to help elect a Congress that will look the other way. And then pay himself another bonus.”

So God made a banker. 

Brett Arends, MarketWatch; via Crook & Liars.

Humility Watch:

From AntTracts.

At the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday, Obama called for “humility” that “carries over every day, every moment.”

“Let us retain that humility not just during this hour but for every hour,” the president said. “And let me suggest that those of us with the most power and influence need to be the most humble.

But in his Thursday radio broadcast, [the American Family Association's Bryan] Fischer concluded that God must be ignoring Obama if he has to pray for humility every day.
Raw Story (http://s.tt/1zy1M)

Yes, Fischer got his humility after one go. Little trick he picked up from David Brooks. That Obama is such a scrub, huh?

Ralph Lauren, David Lauren, and  the bathtub Matisse. Found art by Guccifer.

I have absolutely nothing to say about the heist of Bush family emails reported in the Smoking Gun, including George W.'s portraits of unclothed portions of his body (totally SFW unless you're supposed to be, like, working) except to express my childlike and nonpartisan delight at the news (to me) that Neil Bush's daughter is married to the son of a famous fashion designer (pictured above), making her name (drumroll) Lauren Lauren.

Also too, an illustration of partisan bias affecting even me:

In a December 27 e-mail to his four siblings, Jeb Bush saluted his ailing father’s “kindness and good nature” and pointed to “how kind he was with President Clinton and he helped restore his sordid reputation. A very tough thing to do but with kindness, dad probably helped Bill Clinton than anything he himself has done.”

I swear I had no idea Clinton was suffering from a "sordid reputation" when he left office with a 66% approval rating. I thought it was Clinton who was doing old George a favor, taking time to hang out with him.