Oh God, John McCain, he is getting more senile by the hour. Somebody handed Walnuts a copy of the Wall Street Journal, which, in the paper’s effort to fill all of its blank pages with words about anything besides disgraced overlord owner Rupert Murdoch, said let’s type words comparing Tea Party people to hobbits. Uh, sure! Hobbits are of course the most topical fantastical children’s story character for a columnist to choose this summer, but old Walnuts thought this was hilarious and appropriate and so he marched onto the Senate floor with this editorial in hand and read it aloud, to make his point about everyone in the Tea Party being insane. And now magically everyone is super upset including Sharron Angle (?) and Rand Paul and Discover magazine, who will naturally all respond with more “Lord of the Rings” references.
Here is the WSJ passage to blame in all of this:
But what none of these critics have is an alternative strategy for achieving anything nearly as fiscally or politically beneficial as Mr. Boehner’s plan. The idea seems to be that if the House GOP refuses to raise the debt ceiling, a default crisis or gradual government shutdown will ensue, and the public will turn en masse against . . . Barack Obama. The Republican House that failed to raise the debt ceiling would somehow escape all blame. Then Democrats would have no choice but to pass a balanced-budget amendment and reform entitlements, and the tea-party Hobbits could return to Middle Earth having defeated Mordor.
This is the kind of crack political thinking that turned Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell into GOP Senate nominees. The reality is that the debt limit will be raised one way or another, and the only issue now is with how much fiscal reform and what political fallout.
It is a mystery why Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell are involved in this, since they are mercifully not actual elected representatives and have less than nothing to do with the entire debt ceiling negotiation. Nonetheless, the victimized Angle shot off a flurry of angry statements and tweets calling John McCain “Lord of the TARP,” which does not rhyme with anything nor make much sense so we give that a D- for creativity. She also points out that the hobbits are sort of the heroes of the books, which okay on that one, since the WSJ metaphor didn’t entirely make sense to start.
Rand Paul somehow also got into this fray by pointlessly declaring he would rather be a hobbit than a troll. Uh, zing? Is he calling Walnuts a troll? Yes, apparently. Are there even trolls in the books? Tolkien was better at making up mythical creature names than just calling something old and confused a “troll,” but Rand Paul is not, apparently. So he gets an F.
And of course, Discover magazine points out that Middle Earth is where Mordor is pretend located, hobbits live in the Shire, etc etc, which is the only truly salient point, since it suggests that the WSJ writer did not bother to read even the Wikipedia entry for the Lord of the Rings trilogy before writing the column and confusing poor old Walnuts. HUGEST F OF ALL. [WSJ/Politico]
{ 267 comments }
He has Walnutzheimer Disease. It makes you get more rational as you grow senile.
John Jingle Walnutzheimer Smith. His name is my name too!
Wasn't Walnutzheimer Joe the Plumber's surname?
I know as a medical fact that Walnutzheimer disease only makes you more of a political shapeshifter the farther away from re election you get.
Correct me if I'm wrong. but I think that's what hard core drunks call a "moment of clarity".
John's answer to the debt problem will just be "Marry a millionaire"
I wanted to up fist you but your # was just too perfect.
Oh cool, we get to have a nerd-fest of LOTR comments! I'll start: McCain reminds me of old Butterburr (the old guy who Gandalf said was kind of dim). Cantor is surely Wormtongue, except Wormtongue had more principles.
This is just like the time that Conan the Cimmerian (= Walnuts) carried the message of Yog-Kosha (= the editorial's author) to the dread sorcerer Yara (= uh, Joe Biden, I guess) in the Tower of the Elephant (= Capitol bulding).
Somebody's been smoking the Black Lotus.
Kucinich is Tom Bombadil?
Bohner is Dildo Buggers.
Needs MOAR Cheer.
The years have not been kind to Sméagol.
Hobbit, trolls, dungeons, dragons…wtf?….am I the only 40-something that went from reading Dr. Seuss to surviving Herman Hesse?
You'd prefer maybe Vonnegut?
Listen: John McCain has come unstuck in time.
I don't know. Something about the 'baggers always reminds me of Lovecraft.
Yeah, but try saying John McCthulhu fast.
Do not mock dead Cthulhu! He dreams his terrible dreams in his sunken city of R'lyeh … but when he returns those who worship him will be devoured first.
Some of them do resemble Wilbur Whateley; some of them, the brother in the attic.
But most of them look like Pickman's Model.
Yeah, I got over WKRP too.
Head of the Class I can understand, but not WKRP!
Mmmmm Bailey Quarters.
As long as you stick Burroughs and Robert Anton Wilson in there somewhere, we're on the same page.
Which Burroughs? Sarah and Michele could be mahars, except that they are not intelligent.
W.S. — I was a teenaged beatnik.
So McCain is really Adam Weishaupt, then? Du hexe Hasen…
Yes, and Teabaggers = The Revolution of Lowered Expectations.
If you don't see the fnord, it can't eat you.
When the shit hits the fan, Walnuts goes for Teh Comedy, like when he went on SNL to, in effect, wave the white flag at Obama, since there was no way in hell he was going to be elected President. So obviously, this is just desperate snark-whoring to get back into John Stewart's guest rotation.
The Muppet John McCain is a better guest.
You mean, when the debt hits the ceiling fan?
Oh little man, so spic and span, where were you when the debt hit the fan?
The saddest part of his campaign is when he appeared in a skit with Real Sarah Palin (Tina Fey) on a QVC spoof where she goes rogue. It was funny, but also awkward because it was right before the election. The joke was that Sarah knew he'd lose on Tuesday, and she was already hawking her Palin 2012 T-shirts. I was baffled as to how he agreed to do a skit like that.
That said, it wasn't anymore strange than Sarah doing Weekend Update during the campaign. It was supposed to show she could take a joke, but they just brutalized her with her there, and it was sad because she didn't seem to get that folks weren't laughing with her but directly in her stupid face.
Sharron Angle should just take the advice she gave to women who became pregnant as a result of rape: Make lemonade.
Oh, and STFU.
I'll take pointless analogies for $500, Alex.
A news day filled with Tea Party loons, deadbeat dads, TruckNuts, and Lord of the Rings.
Just when I thought I couldn't take anymore without of shot of whiskey, you have to go and mention John McCain. Sheesh…
In his writings, Tolkien depicted Hobbits as fond of an unadventurous bucolic life of farming, eating, and socializing…They claim to have invented the art of smoking pipe-weed… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobbit
I for one think it would be a fine thing for these modern day hobbits to return to their bucolic lifestyles and smoke pipe – weed…and leave Washington to the grown – ups…
Well you do have to wonder what Boner and his Teatarded twerps have been packing in their pipes.
There are no grown-ups in DC. Slightly less sociopathic children, yes, but no adults. Except Bernie. He's the exception to all the DC rules.
I like to call Senator Sanders "Bernie Not The Madoff".
How do we get 99 more like him?
So it's The Wall Street Journal which has a deficit… of relevence and humor.
And the only important LOTR parody is this one.
Tim Benzedrine ftw!
Hashberry. Nozdruls, also.
Moxie, Pepsi, and the ball hog.
Wearing, if I recall correctly, a Nova jersey.
"Do you like what you doth see…?" said the voluptuous elf-maiden as she provocatively parted the folds of her robe to reveal the rounded, shadowy glories within. Frito's throat was dry, though his head reeled with desire and ale…"
Hairy toes, I love hairy toes!
Aww, man, that was my favorite book when I was twelve. I didn't even know why "Dildo Bugger" was so funny; it just was.
One TRUCK NUTZ to rule them all
How come I don't have any clue what the Journal is talking about? Oh right, I'm not a virgin.
Prove it.
you can be a slut and tolkien nerd.
trust me.
Virgin cover excuse
You better be sorry for that header picture, KBJ.
So is Gollum McWalnutz Slinker or Stinker?
Isn't this one of the signs of the Apocalypse?
Or maybe A·pack·a·shits?
Why does this bring to mind the Harvard Lampoon parody Bored of the Rings? Which one is Frito and which one is Dildo?
All of them, Katie. And that book was a semi-classic.
My favorite part was the Ballhog.
Funniest book ever. Up there with PG Wodehouse.
i think McCain is more like Saruman in this version.
One does not simply crash an A-4E into Mordor.
all i can do is respond with a selection from one of Peter Jackson's early works:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLAcDQLOiDg
How anybody can crash an A-4 is beyond me.
Surface to air missiles can ruin your whole afternoon.
God, I feel old. I remember when the WSJ was respected.
Hell, I remember when John McCain was respected.
Haha, you said "respected" but meant "repeatedly crashing planes and then getting shot down"
Let's not forget trying to sink one of our own carriers.
Yeah, that was covered in the "repeatedly crashing planes" part. lol
BTW, I remember second-hand about him dumping his for Cindy, 'cause his first wife got disabled and fat. He was Newt Gingrich before there was a Washington Newt Gingrich.
Ah, yes, the Forrestal Fire!
Yeah Charles Keating respected the hell out of Walnuts.
Hell, I remember when John McCain was respected.
I remember that as well. Never understood it, but I do remember when they marketed his inconsistency and general instability as a positive trait.
Gollum is not looking good even by Gollum's standards.
I bet these idiots never read Tolkien. Republicans and Orcs share much in common. Trolls not so much.
Who has time for Tolkien when there a classics like Atlas Shrugged to be read?
This is good news for Viggo Mortensen.
Mmmmmmmmm. Viggo Mortensen.
This is good news for Sauron.
So was A History of Violence.
Eastern Promises. Buck naked fight scene. That is all.
I'd vote for that.
The nastiest and most unglamorous cinema fight ever.
Now I can't work anymore.
Shorter Teabagger double speak:
“Ha! This is unassailable logic that will cause Obama and the other socialists to weep like little girls. Pass that tube of airplane glue.”
I might say that isn't what Tolkein meant but since I could never get past the first page of his books I will just stick with "Walnuts is an idiot".
I never read any of that crap, either. I don't know what half the comments on this post even mean!
What, you never heard of movies?
Sorry, I don't see those types of movies, either. I''m more the indy type movie watcher. Going to see "Terri" this weekend, although I admit I did guffaw (slightly) during Bridesmaids.
Librul elitist!
"Lord of the TARP,” which does not rhyme "
Oh yeah…well, I'm tired of seafood. I guess you could say I'm Bored with the Carp.
Walnuts deserves to burn in the 7th ring of hell for foisting Snowbilly on an unsuspecting nation. Does he not see the irony that he started this whole Tea Bag crap by bringing that shrill harpy down to the lower 48? It's like Typhoid Mary bitching that everyone is sick.
There is no way he should get a free pass on thrusting Palin and her brood into the nation's consciousness. Bill Kristol got it started but McCain made it into reality, for which he should spend the next few hundred centuries being reborn into constant pain in avici hell. Real fucking karma.
I double that . That brainless train wreck billionaire bastard.
anyway, His Dark Materials is better. Tolkien could have benefited from treating his books like the teabaggers want to treat our government.
Um, making them smaller?
(And the _His Dark Materials_ Trilogy really is wonderful.)
yeah–made them smaller, not destroyed them.
Thanks, If i had wanted to taste my dinner twice, I would have only eaten half of it.
I can't wait to watch McCain bite off Rand Paul's finger.
Topor of Dysplasia has spoken.
Well, this is just precious…precious.
u mad, Walnuts
U maaaad. Hah, u maaad!
Rand Paul is dissing trolls?
Has his base base heard about this yet?
Funny thing, the picture Rand linked to in his tweet wasn't of a troll, but of Gollum (but not with McCain's head. Only Our Wonkette would think of that).
His head stomping followers are going to be upset.
I said it before and I'll say it again. You know who I really hate? Tom God-Damned Bombadil. I'd just really like to haul off and punch that asshole in the face.
Fuckin' Tom Bombadil.
Holy shit man, I fucking detest that prancing fuck! He can stick his merry ditties up his arse.
Tom Bombadildo will be played by Marcus Bachmann.
"Ho! Tom Bombadil, Tom Bombadildo!"
So, if Marcus plays Tom Bombadildo, who gets to be the Ho?
Peter Jackson, is that you?
frankly, i think this wins my comment of the year.
But where are the Harry Potter analogies?
Deficitus reducto!
Considering the reducto curse blows everything completely to shit, putting the caster in as much peril as anyone else, this is very appropriate.
When, hundreds of years from now archaeologists read the Congressional Record, they are so not going to be believing this motherfucker and his motherfucking bullshit held a position of authority in the worlds greatest deliberative body. Although they will have a pretty good idea of why this great experiment called democracy failed in the United States. So, there is that.
I'm pretty sure Planet of the Apes can happen without the miracle drug in the new film giventhe de-evolution of humans we see here.
When they read that Santorum was actually elected senator, lost his seat and then had the chutzpah to run for President–they may give up the whole project.
Be proud Amurikans! Our senate got to this point without Caligula.
Tea Party Members = Orcs, IMHO.
So I guess the question facing us all is:
_____ TEAM WALNUTS
_____ TEAM PAULTARD
(check one)
Can't we just throw both off a bridge somewhere?
Don't forget the burlap sack.
I choose death.
No…. cake!
Well, we're out of cake! We only had three bits and we didn't expect such a rush. So what do you want?
Thankfully, I saved one last bullet for a case just like this.
God all Fucking Mighty, I despise Tolkein's books and that picture of Walnuts is just repulsive, I need something pretty to look at.
Open blouse. Look down.
Best line of the day
Yeah, but it would have been so much hotter when I still thought Fare was a women.
Oh, I did! I thought it was totally hot and kind of girl powerish.
I spent my childhood up to midway through college in what we now call "Fanboy Culture," which, in the 60s through early 80s was not the lucrative, pretentious money machine it is today. Also, when I was a kid, no pretty girls would be caught dead near a comic book or sf novel, which is one of many reasons I curse at today's youth.
Anywho, are you familiar with Michael Moorcock's essay "Epic Pooh"? It is an infamous takedown of the politics behind Tolkien from another, more politically progressive English fantasy author. Good stuff if you like literary feuds, and who doesn't?
http://www.revolutionsf.com/article.php?id=953
The Wall Street Journal Professional with Factiva?
What the hell is Factiva?
Is it anything like Zestapeel or that Spring Fresh Smell?
A pil that makes them poop out the loosest newz in town?
Yeah, yeah, but this is a step up in literary allusions from the constant Charlie Brown and Lucy and the football references.
As for me, I think the best work of fiction to reference here is "Everyone Poops." Hennngh?
How about " go the fuck to sleep"? My new nominee for the nobel in literature
The Samuel L. Jackson audiobook version is a classic, too.
McWalnutz has removed any possible doubt that he now lives in Muddled Earth.
Frodo Lives!
As much as I would love to say "Crash and burn John McCain!"
It would be lost in his reality.
OT.
Anyone know how McDownfister is handling the DT's?
Sales of cheetos and pornography are up over 30% in his county.
Damn!
Knew I should have invested.
You've got to diversify. Add some cheetos and bathtub gin to your hobo beans portfolio if you really want to make it in thunderdome.
This is the kind of crack political thinking that turned Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell into GOP Senate nominees.
Zing! That's some biting commentary from the asshole that brought us Sarah fucking Palin, isn't it?
Winning forever.
Seriously, what's next though. John McCain questions someones flying skills?
In fairness, that was the Journal, who's editorial page doesn't really care for guns and what have you, just that Rupert Murdoch's ass is well kissed, and that everyone forgets what a despicable piece of shit he is. OOOOH, look over there, something shiny!
I wish they would stop with the fucking theatrics. McCain, Obama, Reid, Boehner, Pelosi, and the whole sick crowd of ham actors in Washington. Just stop it. We know you're not going to default, OK? The financial markets know it, too. Just look at the indices–just the usual ups and downs. So stop trying to create anxiety. It won't work, and all of us are anxious enough about other things without you assholes trying to make it worse with your lame efforts to create dramatic tension. Just cut our entitlements and give the rich their tax break and get it over with. You fuckers. (/rant)
So … in this analogy … Christine O'Donnell IS a witch?
Tomorrow he'll call the Teabaggers 'rarebits' and demand independence for Wales.
You fiend!
Bully, I say, bully!
Oh! Oh, I say, what a rum pass this is!
Bosh! The lads will be giving thee a jolly good thumping for that gross display of public vulgarity, I dare say!
Time to trot this one out again:
"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."
–John Rogers
That is the best quote ever; it will always be useful.
Shoot, thought I'd removed it before any comments. In case anyone was wondering, it was the same as Fare la Volpe's, the eminently useful John Rogers quote about LOTR and Atlas Shrugged.
Oh, shut up, McButterteeth. You went full-on Teabagger yourself while running for re-election last year.
To quote Kung Fu Monkey:
"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."
Har! OK, I'll delete mine.
Sorry! Didn't see!
No problem! Always room for multiple quotes of that wisdom
Okay, girls, this is why Spanky McDownfirst hates us. You gotta take or steal the credit and say you were first! Just like highway traffic, on the internet it's kill or be killed!
I'm thinking Obama and Biden with Elven ears right now….
I though Obama already had the ears, being Spock and all …
Was Peggy Noonan drinking and typing again?
When is Dame Peggington not? When is she not?
Oooh now that ken's not here can we make fun of Peggers again?
Had the sublime zen moment of actually watching and listening to Dame Peggy on Morning Joe as I was reading this. Naturally, she was blaming Obama for this mess. He's just not man enuf for her. One can only guess what kind of a vibrator she has stashed in her stocking drawer.
Peggy is the ultimate concern troll. She's never quite openly mean, she's just always "concerned" about shit.
the typeriter hs ben drinking
Getting the TEA caucus members to out themselves as spazzdorks was the wily old senator's plan all along. Like the Dale Earnhardt demo plays that hobbit shit.
Who knew they had the LOTR books at the Hanoi Hilton?
It was one of many forms of torture.
Ho Chi Minh preferred the term "enhanced interrogation" — just like Cheney Ho.
Now, now. Don't talk about Liz(ard) like that.
if the WSJ is right, I'll never have to leave my country club!
No cry albino. Iz B ok.
Nobody else is hearing the song, "I'd rather be a hobbit than a troll. Yes, I would. If I only co-oo-ould, I surely wo-oo-ould," complete with Peruvian flutes?
I did hear it- I couldn't remember the real words though-something about a snail.
"I'd rather be a sparrow than a snail."
Mr. Simon also expressed a preference for being a hammer rather than a nail.
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/s/simon+and+garfunkel/…
On a related note, I always wondered why, in the midst of making love in the afternoon to Cecelia, up in his bedroom (makin' love all day), anyone in his right mind would get up to wash his face.
Unless I really don't want to know.
I'm guessing we don't really want to know. I remember a lot of barely adolescent speculation about this at the time. Those conversations never went well.
Squirting, I always thought.
I think the Walnuts/hobbit illustration is the best or at least most disgusting use of that tongue out picture yet.
All things are circular. Bitches.
Here's hoping that McCain and Angle throw their hats in the ring and run for president. Then we can reject them both (again).
Is he claiming the title of Dildo T. Baggins?
I'm confused. Did Dilbo Dagney build the train to Mordor, or not? Or did they all "Go Gandalf?"
Lord of the Rings? I'd take Jihadist and the 70 virgins for 500, please.
Henghhhhhhhh… Henghhhhhhhhhhh….
I knew it, Chris Christie is Peter Jackson.
I think we should wait to hear what Joe the Plumber has to say about this before we pass judgment.
Wait! Where is he? Oh noooooo!
At the beginning, the main Wizard guy was shooting off fireworks at the main kid's birthday party. He had the power of explosives or gun powder or whatever. So why didn't he make a bunch of bombs and shit and use them against the bad guys at their castle at the end?
Roger Zelazny addressed this in The Guns of Amber.
Why, yes, I am a nerd. Why do you ask?
What he say about it
It's a really good idea. Depends on whether you can find the appropriate explosive powders for the alternate reality you reside in, of course, which can be a challenge.
This is what you get when you have a representative democracy in a nation of idiots.
The Nazgûl are not amused.
This is what we get for not being raptured.
confused walnuts= redundant
Everyone on Facebook tonight is going mad about this "Ochocinco" fellow, who is also a hobbit? I can't tell.
Since nobody else is dorky enough to point it out, yes there were trolls in LOTR. They were the huge dumb guys that smashed stuff. Kind of like Chris Christie.
And they kept arguing among themselves until they turned to stone. Not once during the entire trilogy did they pass a bipartisan bill.
How many planes did McGollum crash again?
OT Vote will not be held tonight at all, Boehner will be a weeping and drinking.
It's actually a refreshing change seeing the Republicans having trouble reining in their loons. They're still all assholes, of course, but usually they're lockstep assholes.
He also looks like he missed a tanning bed appointment.
It's probably a mistake, but I'm getting this small flicker of hope that even Bamz won't be able to pass up the opportunity to swoop in on 14th Amendment wings and shout "CHILDREN!!!! KNOCK IT OFF!!!!"
Poor Bones has got to be thinking "I didn't sign up for this shit".
As he is wont to do, anyway. So, not much of a change.
Were they attacked by Ents?
Fuck LOTR, fuck the Tea Party and fuck this senile, serial jet crashing asshole for inflicting a whole clan of Snobilly Grifters on us. I'm going to bed now…
Don't make Sauron Angle mad.
The second amendment and lemonade aren't a good mix?
Right, she's pretty fucking crazy already.
I always figured Walnuts as more of a Smurf; but that's just me. Oh, and an Asshole, also, too, as well as.
To use more contemporary nerd-speak, The Boner debt-ceiling bill: Fail, or Epic Fail?
Lifetime Achievement Fail.
There is another and even worse option: Charlie Sheen Winning!
The biggest surprise to me: Sharron Angle, Christine O'Donnell, Rand Paul, and Sean Hannity know what books are.
Movies. Not books.
OK, OK… one more.
I would be strongly inclined to fire whichever editor let that pass. They're fucking bitter, faceless cogs anyway, and not likely to be noticed by anyone except Poynter.
Oh, hey, since I haven't seen it here, I suppose I should pass along The Chart That Should Accompany All Discussions of the Debt Ceiling
(Crossposted to the other discussion of the Debt Ceiling, because It's That Good)
wow thanks for that.
Goddamn. Well, I knew it was bad, but damn. Fuck these teabagging morons.
right. like the fucking baggers wouldn't haven't used the ring already.
They'd have given it to the Kochs so they could create jerbs. Of course, the Kochs would just pat them on the head and use it to smite poors instead.
I don't like the tone of this post. McCain attacked the tea party and specifically called out two of it's most silly almost-politicians. That's really all I need to know. Fuck if I care that the analogy didn't work all the way through.
BTW, build the danged sanity-fence!
Rand Paul, Mario Rubco, and the teabagger House take offense at "almost-politician" analogy.
Good.
OT, but is posting comments locked for anyone else in the Kumbaya thread on the sidebar?
Si. I'm not getting what is going on, over there.
I love how the Republican Party is spinning more out of control, lately. With the only problem being that we're all caught in the middle of this shoot out. But, besides that Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play, right?
Boehner is toast regardless of how this turns out. He handled this hostage-taking so poorly that the Teabaggers will eat him alive. They didn't like him to begin with; now they have a real reason to get rid of him and install one of their own.
Not going to look this up, but weren't those trolls in the scene where Bilbo and the gang were camping and heard voices and Bilbo tried to sneak up on them but they popped him in the sack and were planning to cook him even though they didn't know what he actually was, maybe a big, hairy rabbit, and he was only saved because Gandalf sneakily kept them all arguing with each other until daylight when, obvs, they turned to stone?
If there's an even bigger nerd than me who can confirm or deny, it would be appreciated.
Yes, there are trolls in the Lord of the Rings, and, yes, Rand Paul is a troll, just not one of the smart ones.
Maybe Boehner is the leader of the giant spiders?
It's well past (my) bedtime here on the Left Coast, but before retiring, I feel I must ask the non-musical question"
WHERE DA FUCKEN JOBS, BONER???!!!???
Up his ass. We need to pull them out one by one.
It's Friday, it's 2am, and it's time for a little rant now that the downfisting has gone.
Apologies in advance to those here who know more about this than me, and I know there are a lot.
This job-creation bullshit as an excuse for cutting taxes on the highest earners is nothing but that, bullshit. There are a lot of ways to make money in this country and that's one of the reasons I love this place so much, but this cutting taxes on the wealthy is horrendous doublespeak.
Quick primer on why, and apologies to people who already know. There are a few ways to become a corporation, all of which involve issuing shares. The mechanics differ slightly between countries, but US law is based on UK law, which I happen to know quite well.
So, your basic privately held S or C corp issues shares. Now you're a corporation, a shareholder even, even if you're a one-man band doing pool construction. Yippee! Let the money roll in! No. If you're an S, you report money coming in as profit as income on your IRS forms – you gain little advantage apart from not being held liable for the company's debts. C is different. Your income paid as salary from the C is taxed as if you were employed (which you are), and any profit made in the C can be reinvested or whatever and is taxed separately – your salary is an operating cost and is accounted as such.
I'll touch on publicly traded in a second, but think of a C corp you're running yourself with perhaps five employees. You can adjust your salary at any time because you're the sole shareholder and you are the law as to how that happens. OK, fine. Is there a 2% tax hike on over 250K? Well, you figure out where your salary is, how much money the company is raking in, and go "more money is more money" and just get pissed because you're making a bit less than before. It has, and I can't emphasize this bit enough, no effect on the company itself – it's purely personal income which is at stake. Cutting your own salary and reinvesting in business growth would, long term, be more profitable if you know what you're doing. Same goes for C-corps with multiple shareholders, although then you could pay dividends to augment your salary should the shareholding allow, but that's too boring to talk about. Suffice to say that there are many ways to extract money from a C with multiple shareholders which can fuck with your taxation rate.
Now we come to publicly traded. A CEO job is advertised by a large company hoping to acquire an executive with superlative skill. That budget has been set beforehand, by the goddamn board. Jon Fuckball turns up and makes a fantastic flat package even before any bonus incentives. He could run that shit into the ground and still make $500K. Thems the rules.
A lot of C-corps are run by "lifestyle" people – have a company large/pecunious enough to make you a decent living. I'm one of those, but I still like to think I'm nice. Often, it's these grafting fuckjizzles who can't get enough for themselves if they're too shit to run a decent business that scream bloody murder for a top-10% tax cut. That tax cut can give Dakota a BMW 5 series when she's sixteen. There are a lot more of that type of person than CEOs. CEOs don't give a fuck, they can get whatever the fuck they want from the board if they perform. No, it's the fucking Ford dealership owner in Sisterfuck, Iowa, or some plant rental cunt in Shitball, SC who are the biggest whingers about this.
Sorry, long rant.
tl;dr = company finance is utterly separate from personal taxation unless you're a chimp. Fuck the tea party.
Shit, I'm so angry about this that I'm going to reply to myself.
The greatest natal environment for a business is somewhere where people have money to spend. It's not some fucking neo-feudalist ayn rand/teabagger paradise where the rich percent use the povertons as the fodder for money-vacuums. FUCK THAT, seriously, FUCK THAT. Consumer spending is key and that requires a nuanced approach to taxation of income.
There's a vision out there which perpetuates a society in which one can prosper despite any hamstringing in birth situation. Education is one of the keys to that. Oh, yeah, but let's cut that shit, because poors go to public schools. Now I'm back to rage-induced cardiac event mode.
Good rant. Maybe in the next Republic.
Why aren't you Job Creators talking to each other and shaming each other into some kind of responsibility for this country?
Chet, ol' buddy, I think I might be a rare breed. Sure, I'm one of them thar job creating types, but I have a social conscience and wouldn't mind paying a bit more in tax if it meant people didn't have to die in the street from poverty.
I'm certainly not a member of a country club or some godawful bullshit like that.
I know there are a lot of you out there, even at the millionaire/billionaire Gates/Jobs/Mark Cuban level. I just don't understand why the rich with consciences aren't calling each other out on this crap.
They are at best Sackville-Bagginses.
Looks like someone beat the WSJ and Walnuts to the punch:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w65menUWLIY&fe…
Isn't the real analogy "Game Of Thrones"? Every flawed and despicable character gets to deliver a soliloquy after shtupping a lobbyist-provided whore, and then the innocent and most-principled get killed. "Winter is coming," also.
Ya laughing at us now Europe? Henghhhhhhhh? I think the laughing has probably gone to horror/disgust at what passes for political discourse during a wholly manufactured crisis in U.S. America.
Ignore this…just a test post. I was trying to post something in the Bill Nye thread, but I can't.
How odd. Is there something wrong with ID this morning or am I fucking things up?
You must understand, young teabagger, it takes a long time to say anything in Congress. And we never say anything unless it is worth a lot to our reelection campaign to say.
tweets calling John McCain “Lord of the TARP,”
Yeah, whatever. Better that than the Queen of the Derp, which he gave us, also.
Created this a few weeks ago just as the light started shining on Grover Norquist again. I've been calling him the Grima Wormtongue of the GOP for years. I call it: The Banishment of Grover Wormquist.
http://youtu.be/w65menUWLIY
And, yeah, if this doesn't give me nerd-cred, nothing will.
Okay, so basically LOTR is too complex for the Senate, the WSJ and Discovery Magazine. Lev Grossman should come and give them all a tutorial in how to read fantasy novels.
I thought we were an autonomous collective.
I'm a scrawny little homo, and is there anything more girl empowering than your gay best friend telling you that your tits rock? *snap snap*
O R'lyeh?
you should make sure to copy that somewhere because it's brilliant.
did you actually work on lotr/tt?
Here's a nice bit of muck.
Dreamboat!
Heh, I'm still not convinced either way, but it doesn't matter. You could be a twinky six-pack ripper, you could be a foxy ladyparts snarkmaster. Hell, you could be a 300lb sofa-surfer. Doesn't matter here, just matters that you rock, and you do.
I used that one in an Atlas Shrugged (The Free Market Shrugged) movie thread. But great minds and all that. . .
With the sinking of The Undefeated, when will the Right realize that they can't make their conservative values blockbusters no matter how many plebes they threaten to the box office? Or that they don't know how to use popular culture in analogies?
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