BUCKNACKT'S SORDID TAWDRY BLOG
We should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive & well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, chocolate, bier or wein in hand, body thoroughly used up, totally worn out and screaming "WHOO-HOO, WHAT A RIDE!!!!!!"
Mitch McConnell on Tuesday came out swinging against the growing calls among Democrats to ditch the filibuster, warning that the move would leave behind a "completely scorched-earth Senate" that would function "more like a hundred-car pile-up." Those are strange words of caution coming from McConnell, whose singular role in obstructing legislation as the majority leader—something he now warns will be the biggest consequence of killing the filibuster—earned him the label of "grim reaper." Still, if the filibuster was killed, McConnell went on, Republicans would feel emboldened to push through some of the party's most toxic items on their legislative wish list, including the defunding of Planned Parenthood; concealed-carry reciprocity across the country; and "sweeping" abortion restrictions.
All that bluster, of course, comes as Democrats move ahead with HR 1, or as Mother Jones’ voting rights expert, Ari Berman, calls it, "really the most significant democracy reform bill since the Voting Rights Act." Though it passed the House, it still faces a Senate filibuster—something Dems have warned they're willing to get rid of if it's used to block HR 1. Today, McConnell is left to issue threats of a political nightmare that he, for years, has already implemented.
Last week, President Biden signed into law historic anti-poverty measures as part of the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package. Now, Senate Democrats are pushing to make the temporary provisions from the American Rescue Plan into permanent fixtures.
The law gives most families a $3,600 tax credit for each child under age 6 and $3,000 for children aged 6 to 17. “Though framed in technocratic terms as an expansion of an existing tax credit, it is essentially a guaranteed income for families with children, akin to children’s allowances that are common in other rich countries,” wrote the New York Times’ Jason DeParle. Columbia University researchers project that the provision could cut child poverty in half. In its current form, the provision lasts only a year.
Yet even before the stimulus package was signed into law, some Democrats voiced support of extending the benefit indefinitely. Speaking on MSNBC on Sunday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer vowed, “I’ll do everything I can to make it permanent.” He added, “That’s one of the most important things we can do. We can change America, if we make them permanent.”
The stimulus package also expands the federal nutrition program for low-income women and children, enhancing monthly vouchers for fruits and vegetables from $9 for children and $11 for women to $35 for both. In a press conference on Sunday, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand called for the increases to be extended indefinitely.
Gillibrand previously called to permanently extend another provision, which expands sick leave benefits for workers. “One of my goals is to make paid leave permanent,” she toldYahoo Finance. “We are still the only industrialized country in the world without access to paid leave and most workers do not have access.”
—Julia Lurie
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WAP (WET ASS PUSSY) still has political conservatives and white "evangelical" Christians in an uproar 7 months after it was released by 2 Black women but somehow they were and 4 years later still are OK with donald drumpf's / trump's pussy grabbing video. What am I missing here???? This from Mother Jones.....
Last summer, when Megan Thee Stallion and Cardi B released “WAP”—which stands for wet-ass pussy—conservatives had a collective conniption fit. Prepare my fainting couch, the pearl clutchers wailed. At the time, I wrote that conservatives were offended by WAP because it was a song about Black women using their bodies not for labor, what conservatives seem to believe is the traditional function for a Black woman’s body, but for enjoyment.
Well, it’s been seven months, and they still have WAP on their minds. Today, you can find your local right-wing hysteric lamenting the fact that everything from Dr. Suess to Mr. Potato Head has been cancelled, and nonetheless WAP reigns supreme. Never mind that the song has absolutely nothing to do with children’s books or toys, the relentless conservative obsession with WAP finds it convenient to somehow conflate them.
It’s not the only song about sex one can hear on a regular basis, and it’s certainly not the only vulgar music the youths are listening to today. (Let me introduce you horrified Fox News hosts and other guardians of all that is right and good about America to my favorite Spotify playlists!) But, like so many of the problems facing conservative America, the connection that exists among cancelling Mr. Potato Head and Dr. Seuss, while permitting WAP to reign supreme, is ultimately the responsibility of Black people—or at least whatever stand-in word we’re using for Black people these days.
A few weeks ago the Dr. Seuss estate announced that of the approximately 39 books Theodore Seuss Geisel wrote, six of them with racist and offensive imagery would no longer be in circulation. It was a carefully considered business decision, but conservatives, like comedian Tim Young, behaved as if this was only the first step on a slippery slope, and soon the President of the Woke Mob would replace all children’s books with sexy rap lyrics.
Your conservative relatives, who mainline Fox News from dawn ‘till dusk, have concluded that liberal teachers, who are planted in public schools like some communist cells from another era, are teaching children all over the country all this woke nonsense. The cherished and totally illusory Leave-It-To-Beaver version of the country will soon be replaced by first graders chanting WAP lyrics—”there’s some whores in this house, there’s some whores in this house”—every morning before the bell rings instead of the Pledge of Allegiance. (And we all know the violence that the libs inflicted on school prayer.)
Adding a little fuel to the flames, it didn’t help that Cardi and Meg performed their hit song at the Grammy’s on Sunday night, an awards show that literally exists for many of the same people who write and perform songs like WAP. The timing was propitious. Not only had Dr. Seuss been obliterated, but the company that makes the potato toys had recently announced that they were dropping the “Mister” part of the name. The reasoning was so that children could make whatever kind of families they wanted. They later reassured customers that Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head would continue to exist.
It’s unclear what the point of the announcement was (and I don’t care because I am an adult), but the main takeaway was that concerned parents could sleep soundly at night knowing that plastic potato heads were still available to children far and wide. Enter Dave Rubin, a conservative YouTube show host, who connected the Grammy WAP performance with the so-called cancellation of Mr. Potato Head. “We took out Mr. Potato Head because he was a Mister,” he complained, “but we have [WAP]…that’s all okay.”
Conservatives are up in arms! First, Black people demand to stop being killed by police, now my potato toys and Dr. Seuss? What’s next? Women in the workplace? A woman of color as vice president?
Conservatives are amplifying this non-issue because they’re hoping their followers, fans, and viewers would be distracted from the fact that they’ve already lost the most important battles that actually mean something in individual lives. The vaccine rollout, the COVID relief bill, action on climate change, fixing our dismal health care system—these are the issues that non-Fox News viewers, and even some Fox viewers as well, care about. According to recent polling, 41 percent of Republican voters are in favor of President Joe Biden’s massive COVID relief bill. Republicans and right-wingers know they can show nothing in terms of policy or achievements to present as arguments against any of those major issues. So, they’ll just ignore them all and pretend that this country’s most the most pressing emergency is that Black rappers are rapping about sex and your kids will have to settle for Green Eggs and Ham (still being published and sold!) for their bed time story instead of If I Ran the Zoo.
I almost feel sorry for right-wing ideologues. They used to be so good at creating a boogeyman to terrify their increasingly isolated supporters: A Black president run amok, caravans of immigrants coming to take your jobs, and of course, the always-looming specter of full equality. They tested out die for the economy during a pandemic last spring, but it just didn’t have the same oomph as Mr. Potato Head provides.
Of course, conservative grievances always have been performative, but the discourse around WAP has reached such new levels of farce that I find myself genuinely confused. Are people like Rubin and Young simply performing for the outrage machine? Or, seven months after WAP hit number one on the charts, maybe they finally really believe their own bullshit.
Theodor Geisel wrote dozens of beloved children's books under his pen name of Dr. Seuss. "The Cat in the Hat," "Green Eggs and Ham," "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" and "The Lorax" are just the highlights from a collection that has remained popular for several generations.
Many people don't realize that the good doctor had a long and successful career as a commercial illustrator and political cartoonist before he became famous for his kids' literature. The Dartmouth College grad was approaching 40 when he joined the U.S. Army in 1943. He was put in command of the animation department of the 1st Motion Picture Unit, which was created out of the Army Signal Corps.
Geisel's commanding officer was Col. Frank Capra, chairman of the unit. Even though Capra is renowned for directing family-friendly movies like "It's a Wonderful Life," "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" and "You Can't Take It With You," he created a soldier called Private Snafu to star in racy cartoons that would hold the attention of new recruits.
Private Snafu shorts were produced by an all-star team. Geisel wrote the shorts with a team that included children's authors P.D. Eastman ("Go, Dog, Go," "Are You My Mother?") and Munro Leaf ("Ferdinand the Bull"). The writers collaborated with Looney Tunes animators Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett and Frank Tashlin and voice actor Mel Blanc (Bugs Bunny, Yosemite Sam) to create a series of forgotten classics.
The team made 25 shorts for the War Department, although the last one was never released; it disappeared after the producers turned the master film over to the Army. There are also two post-war Snafu shorts made by a different group of writers and animators.
Anyone who thinks Dr. Seuss always had the best interests of the little ones at heart will be shocked to see Private Snafu in action. Check out these alarming examples.
This episode offers a stern warning about excessive drinking and the dangers of hanging out with foreign women who are way out of your league. Plus, there are swastika boobs broadcasting Allied troop movements to Nazi headquarters.
Well, hang on. In this episode, we meet Snafu's girlfriend Sally Lou, a fetching young lady who reads his letters while not wearing a top or bra. Her strategically placed elbows keep the cartoon in PG-13 territory, but she's definitely a girl our hero is going to want waiting for him back home. That devotion to Sally Lou doesn't stop him from having topless pinups on the wall of his tent somewhere in the Pacific.
Oh yeah, this one's a warning about why military censorship of your letters home is both necessary and patriotic.
We open with a gag about the weather being so cold it would "freeze the nuts off a jeep;" cue actual lug nuts dropping off a jeep's wheels. While this joke will seem incredibly mild to a generation raised on "Two and a Half Men," there's zero chance that line would've been approved for actual home front presentation by the Hollywood Production Code office in 1943.
Once we pan inside the barracks, we see the walls covered with pinups who seem to be wearing fewer clothes than we'd see on the actual pinups that soldiers could acquire in real life. It's worth noting that director Frank Tashlin went on to direct live-action movies and made Jayne Mansfield a star in 1956 with "The Girl Can't Help It," a picture that featured Jayne in gowns that were technically covering everything but still managed to make her seem naked.
This episode addresses concerns about what may be going on back home and features grandpa watching barely clothed burlesque girls and a smooth, French-accented Jody turning into a bulging-eye wolf when he tells Sally Lou what big eyes she has, even though he's drooling as he stares at another part of her anatomy.
C'mon, you know where this is going because of the title. Of course, it starts with warnings about how to avoid getting blown up by bait left behind by a retreating enemy, but we get to the actual boobs and traps pretty quickly.
Let's just say these women are actual bombshells who have their own booby traps. This cartoon is also the first appearance of the Looney Tunes gag that features a character who plays "Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms" on a piano with a bomb switch connected to the last note's piano key. The joke was recycled for future Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner cartoons and never failed to deliver.
Since they were made by the government, all of these films are now in the public domain and you can watch them on YouTube. Back when they were made, however, they were kept under lock and key so they wouldn't corrupt young minds.
Dr. Seuss went on to write the screenplay and lyrics, plus design the sets for the incredibly weird 1953 movie musical "The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T" before "Horton Hears a Who!" vaulted him into the upper tier of children's book authors in 1955.
There's sexism, racist imagery and immature jokes in all these cartoons that would never get Pentagon approval today. Still, these shorts educated and entertained millions of American service members during the era, and they offer a fascinating glimpse into the mindset and culture that won World War II.
