Respect Authority

"Let me tell you about credit default swaps."

Seems like everyone’s talking about the economy these days: politicians, educators, my hairdresser. But despite the whole “worst recession since the Great Depression” thing, there remain a few places where I expect to have my fun, worry-free, with nary a mention of Ben Bernanke, unemployment or the falling dollar. Sesame Street is one of those places. After all, in a fantastical one-street town populated by talking puppets, who has time to wonder whether the financial sector will recover? Moreover, who cares? Bert and Ernie are already living frugally by sharing an apartment, Big Bird doesn’t waste money on frivolities like “clothing” and Oscar lives in a trash can. If ever there was a cost-conscious bunch, this is it.

So I’m a little bummed to read today that Elmo has taken it upon his little red self to address the troubled economy in a PBS special for families. The show, which will air on Sept. 9 and includes Al Roker and Deborah Roberts, will allow Elmo to “help parents and young children deal with economic hardship,” and is aimed specifically at families with children aged 2 to 8.

I’m sorry, but since when has Sesame Street been a forum for educating children on current events? And since when has Elmo; who doesn’t have what I would consider an authoratiave tone of voice, and whose most famous verbal contribution is prolonged giggling; been a role model for economic education? (One might argue that the one-time consumer chaos created by Tickle Me Elmo is an example of the very conspicuous consumption behind our current crisis).

The whole point of Sesame Street, and every show like it, has always been to teach kids essential morals like “share” or “don’t hit,” with a bit of basic arithmetic and color recognition thrown in for good measure. That’s why they’re all set in nonexistent fantasy lands—Eureka had a castle, Blue had a cartoon house and I’m pretty sure the entirety of today’s Yo Gabba Gabba is filmed in front of a green screen. These shows aren’t about so-called “reality.” And to be frank, I don’t think it’s necessary for a child under the age of 10 to understand the recession, anymore than I spent fourth grade trying to wrap my mind around NAFTA. Rather, when you’re a child, the economies of supply and demand end with Mom: you demand, she decides whether to supply. Knowing that her motivation is a dwindling 401(K) rather than a refusal to invest in Super Soakers hardly matters.

So I say enough Sesame Street—you were already on thin ice when the Cookie Monster started talking about eating cookies “in moderation,” (as though 3-year-olds who imitated face-stuffing eating habits weren’t in all likelihood already doomed to years of social isolation) and now this. Let kids be kids, otherwise they might as well start watching CNN.

“Relief” is not a word I’d typically associate with washed-up alterna-rockers Papa Roach having a “latest album.” Rather, I would use words like “unnecessary,” or “seriously, unnecessary.” Add to that the fact that the band’s most recent work was inspired by the economy and we have ourselves a real recipe for disaster. Disaster with drums and post-adolescent male screaming. And here I thought they’d already used up their last resort. (Get it? Papa Roach joke!)

“Going home and seeing foreclosure signs popping up all over my neighborhood where I was living … and seeing people get laid off and then people living off of credit cards and going into debt—that hopelessness and that desperation fueled the lyrics,” said PR lead singer Jacoby Shaddix in an interview.

In fact, one need not pore over insipid Papa Roach lyrics to discover the band’s empathy for the country’s plight. PR, which just wrapped up a tour with Buckcherry and Avenge Sevenfold—a time machine of some sort must have been involved; I find it hard to believe anyone would pay to see this tour in the year 2009—offered cheaper ticket prices to appease concert-goers. For a mere $40, fans were able to witness this trifecta of outdated music, a deal that apparently “packed houses,” according to Shaddix.

The band, whose Metamorphosis came out this year (did you know Papa Roach has produced six albums? SIX!), is now touring with Nickelback, which means some serious hair rivalry. PR hopes to reduce its ticket prices even further in the future.

“We know money ain’t falling from the sky at all,” said Shaddix. “We want to provide something for people to get down and have fun, because that’s what people need to do, especially in hard times.”

Worry not, Papa Roach. The time will come, far sooner than you may think, when fans pay a mere $3 to watch you perform, with a T-shirt and unlimited Bud Light thrown in for good measure.

By and large the best Wall Street Journal illustration ever.

Apparently there was a run on the bank somewhere in Amish country — which in my mind equates to all those bearded crazies storming the local feed store and demanding full withdrawal of their grain supplies. Thank God this guy was there.

Seriously though, if the Amish—with their utter lack of personal belongings or luxurious excess…and the whole making of one’s own food/goods thing—are worried about finances, then the rest of us are totally and completely fucked.

Short on cash? Make your dress out of twigs and shit.

The recession has caused all manner of American hardship: lost houses, lost jobs, lost college educations. But all of that bad news pales in comparison to the real heartbreaker: prom.

The New York Times reports today that teens throughout the country are contemplating whether it’s worth it to attend their high school proms this year, given the event’s high costs and their parents deflating job security. Some are foregoing must-haves like a $400 dress, while others are opting not to get their hair professionally styled. Still more are offsetting their parents’ prom contribution by working part-time jobs. 

Really recession, now you’ve just gone too far. It’s one thing to take away people’s income and ability to pay for food and childcare, but eliminating their chance to pay $5 per bobby pin to have their hair put in some labyrinthian coif held together by hairspray and superglue? Forcing near-adults, just a few years shy of living in the “real world,” to work part-time at local retailers in an effort to help foot their $1,000 prom bill? Well that’s just cold. 

Worry not, dear readers. Despite its doom and gloom introduction, the Times goes on to say that there has been negligible slowdown in the lucrative prom business. Party buses are still being booked by the dozen and most dress designers say there are still plenty of girls out there spending $500 on a gown. Morevoer, guys are complementing their rented tuxes with “more accessories, like hats.”

Thank God. No one wants a federal bailout of the men’s prom hat business.

Yes, he is.

While, I’ve long lost interest in America’s Death Spiral (I’m busy plotting the comeback!) Krugman’s latest blooooog entry annoyed me enough to care again.

The Geithner plan has now been leaked in detail. It’s exactly the plan that was widely analyzed — and found wanting — a couple of weeks ago. The zombie ideas have won.

Zombie ideas? Really? You’re a fucking Noble laureate Paul Krugman. Aren’t you beyond awkward fitting analogies? Aren’t we, as a people, beyond alarmist propaganda? You have no idea how to fix the economy, no one does, and your pseudo-intellectual doom-saying doesn’t address the problem at hand.

Maybe Geither’s plan to save the world is like pumping gallons of seawater into my California roll (oh my, that’s fun) but I believe in happy endings. In my worldview, when the handsome lead desperately pumps the chest of a decidedly drowned love interest — just when it seems certain they’re dead — the beautiful maiden finally coughs up water and is ready to make out. America’s waiting for her Zac Efron, Paul Krugman… get on board.

[The Conscience of a Liberal - NYTimes.com]

If you’re anything like me, you spent the past weekend wallowing on the couch amid forlorn take-out wrappers and empty beer bottles, wondering how you managed to pass that whole ‘college’ thing with flying colors and still get fucked out of job security.

So with that level of unabashed optimism in mind, let’s take a look at some of the shit that didn’t hit the fan over the last six months. Hell, shit that maybe even rearranged itself on the ground in a way that one might consider borderline appealing: a little bean-bag of shit into which we can nestle ourselves and pray that everything gets better, soon. 

1. Quiznos and Subway, long foes in the world of toasted and non-toasted lunch fare, upped the ante on their price battle in the last few months. The result: Quizno’s, long the better-tasting option—and with a distinctly less depressing in-store environment—now offers $4 foot-long subs. 

2. Teenagers everywhere are preparing to lazily indulge in a summer of video games and Kool-Aid, since their parents have long since stopped expecting them to get out and find “one of those so-called ‘job’ thingies.”

3. The mainstream media, ever the pre-recession purveyor of breaking news like “Britney Spears: Still Crazy!” is finally reporting on things that matter – like economics, politics, war and Chris Brown. 

4. With pretty much the entire country desperate for a new source of income, people (read: politicians) have started looking a tad more favorably on one-time nemesis of morality: marijuana. We may soon be forking over tax dollars for the right to smoke up (conveniently and legally), but at least we’ll be forking them over at CVS.

5. Starbucks has revealed the first chinks in its armor, belying that perhaps it is not the global superpower we had always assumed. McDonalds, on the other hand, definitely is.

6. The recession is environmentally friendly: getting your electricity turned off is kind of like unintentionally going green.

7. People are finally enraged over the proliferation of mothers with more than five children, specifically those who subsist on the hard-earned tax dollars of those of us not choosing to get knocked up every six minutes.

8. Staying home and drinking alone is now frugal, instead of pathetic.

9. More strippers.

10. [Given tight resources, all RA Top Ten Lists have been reduced to nine items. Ignoring that this is our first and only top-ten list to date, simply assume the repercussions will be both widespread and difficult to bear.]

Despite the fact that the company just leveraged its brand new headquarters to raise capital, the New York Times Co., parent of the eponymous newspaper, is still finding time to taunt us with an attention to detail that implies real to-the-bone layoffs have yet to truly affect the Grey Lady. 

Indeed, this week the NYT posted on its Web site an article titled “Speak, O Muse, of Fallen 401(k)s and Malignant Mortgages,” a compilation of reader-submitted poems about the economic downturn. No, I’m not kidding. Shockingly, and perhaps a testament to the fact that no one reads the Times for its poetry beat, only about 100 readers responded. Here are some choice excerpts, which vary from the smug to downright bitter: 

Those of us who’ve lost it all, 
Thought not about the cost at all.
Those of us who are content,
Gave thought to every single cent.
John Duvall, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY

(Apparently not part of any company-designated and uncontrollable 401(k) plan that invested in now-deteriorating mutual funds, thus costing said plan holder hundreds of thousands of dollars in retirement money through no fault of their own). Read More ›

After about a thousand pages and what feels like years of babbling, the apocalypse-averting stimulus-recovery-rescue bailout package has been finally passed and signed. The economy works again! Right? Right?

Um, maybe.

The first point that merits making is that the Republican bitching was kind of intellectually honest — in that the bill wasn’t exactly a stimulus package, nor did it directly address the emergency at hand. They complained that the monies appropriated by the bill are for something called “spending” rather than “stimulating.” Which, according to Republicans, doesn’t equal “job creation.”  

That being said, Republicans haven’t proven themselves capable of crafting sustainable economic policy, so any criticism they offer should be taken with a huge, absolutely inedible grain of salt. However, it still remains to seen whether the Democrats’ bill (with provisions for birth control, education, and energy independence) will fill America with smart, capable and productive citizens who can do something other than manage other people’s money (poorly - I’m looking at you, you fucking bank managers). Read More ›

If there’s one person who could ruin America’s fairly universal loathing of Wall Street executives right now, it’s Michael Moore.

The fat activist (fativist), behind movies that include Bowling for Columbine and, more recently, Sicko, is putting out a call for people in the banking, brokerage and insurance industries to give him the inside scoop on the nation’s latest abysmal failure: Wall Street. 

“I am in the middle of shooting my next movie and I am looking for a few brave people who work on Wall Street or in the financial industry to come forward and share with me what they know,” Mr. Moore wrote on his Web site this week. “Based on those who have already contacted me, I believe there are a number of you who know ‘the real deal’ about the abuses that have been happening. You have information that the American people need to hear.”

Thanks, but no thanks. First of all, no one is more capable of destroying liberal thinking by shoving it aggressively down people’s throats than Moore. No matter how much I’ve agreed with his political and social positions in the past, I cringe when I see him on camera: a 683-pound representation of how Americans that benefit the most from this country (freedom of speech, capitalism, cheeseburgers) are those who appreciate it the least. I believe in gun control too, and universal health care, and preventing future terrorist attacks by having at least a marginally less sketchy government - but when Moore exploited a teen crippled by gunfire to picket the offices of gun-selling K-Mart, well I mostly just believed in using guns to kill annoying fat people. Read More ›

The recession is taking a toll on everything - even elevators! 

Muzak Holdings LLC, the company behind elevator music less-than-affectionally referred to by the same name, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection today, in the hopes of restructuring some debt so elevator passengers the world over won’t be forced to give up soft-jazz renditions of “Hit Me Baby One More Time.” 

What exactly about the market for elevator music has so changed in the last few months? Are bands charging more for the privilege of having their songs watered down to paltry renditions even our parents could enjoy? Are people using elevators less? Are those damn in-elevator TV screens hoarding the market for lift entertainment?

“Muzak is a solid business with an outstanding customer base, but we are burdened with substantial debt obligations established over a decade ago,” Chief Executive Officer Stephen Villa said in a statement. Well yes Stephen, you do have an oustanding customer base since until they stop constructing buildings with multiple stories, or we all start wearing personal jet packs, elevators seem to be a much-needed accessory in the realm of ascension. 

Peronally, I would advise the company to jump on the lagging record business and explore some sort of in-depth partnership. Like using their elevator distribution agreements to play, you know, actual original songs. Now that’s innovation.

In a few hours, America will swear in its first real life, jive talking, b-balling, black-Hawaiian president, and sometimes I forget how significant that is (probably because I’m too busy planning my shanty house for the shanty town we’re all moving into). 

Barack Obama’s election means a lot of things to a lot of people, but fundamentally it symbolizes, in no uncertain terms, that anyone in America can grow up to be the President. A huge departure from the sort of recovering alcoholic, coke snorting retard you’d like to have a beer with who stole the election eight years ago.

Unlike Bush, Obama can’t do much worse. You’d be hard pressed to find someone who’s doing better than they were eight years ago. The world is ending environmentally, economically and politically. Holiday Season 2008 was like a menopausal mother who ruined Christmas by going broke over unaffordable makeovers that haven’t really worked.  

Politically, well, omgshoes. It seems the only thing we’ve been spared these last eight years is a huge famine in a part of the world that isn’t always starving (I’m looking at you Africa, get your shit together). In other words, Barack Obama was elected to save the fucking planet.

The least we can do is draw up a tidy list that organizes Obama first term’s various challenges in bullet format:

To Do

• Invent 10 million jobs by organizing the largest governement infusion of capital in history. Make sure that money is spent on sensible infrastructure improvement, viable social programs and not stolen by inept/corrupt local politicians across the 50 states for pork projects. Kill Rod Blagojevich. (New York Times)
• Save an auto industry that thinks it’s a good idea to use millions of bailout dollars on full page ads in the New York Times, USA Today, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal thanking America for its “investment” in them. (Gawker)
• Transform America’s energy infrastructure and industry so that we don’t turn our purple mountains and fruitful plains into an oven we stick our fat heads in 50 years from now. Try not to look like Jimmy Carter. (Houston Chronicle)
• Redirect troops from Iraq into Afganistan and establish stability in a state that hasn’t seen law nor order since before my parents graduated grade school. Try not to look like an international pussy. (RealClearPolitics)
• Reestablish reputation worldwide. (Daily Telegraph)
• Hope that asteroids, aliens and hurricanes stay away. (Colbert Nation)
• Run for President again. (NY Post)

"You know the difference between you and me? I make douchey shirts look gooood."

Once marginalized as an uppity Internet liberal truth Nazi, the perennial correction of the talking point “9/11 led to the Iraq War” finally scored a victory.

Today, the independent Senator from Vermont - Bernie Sanders - wrote to his local Smithsonian and got them to change the caption under the official Bush portrait.  The original caption read:

Bush found his two terms in office instead marked by a series of catastrophic events: the attacks on September 11, 2001, that led to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq…

…and the Smithsonian in response to the complaint decided to “delete ‘led to’”. 

Bravo, Smithsonian.  Thank you for making historical accuracy cool again… and also making sure two words don’t mislead 22nd century scholars - who will only have your ruined collection to piece together pre-apocalyptic history.

[TPM Election Central]