Letters to the Editor
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@RMP and others
Pervez Musharraf:
Actually, there were no pieces of the road anywhere on the chicken. We have a recording of a phone call congratulating the road.
Chogyam Trumpa:
There is no chicken. There is no road. Only the cross moved.
Actually, I was pretty impressed and somewhat surprised by Hillary Clinton's statement. She proved she knew what was going on, in some detail, which seems to be a quantity in short supply on the campaign trail right now. Seemed like the old Hillary (I am cautious though, several times in 2004 I thought I saw the old John Kerry).
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BENAZIR BHUTTO
Don't let that chicken cross the road! It's armed with a gun and a... Boom!
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If I may....
Shooter's misogyny, it seems to me, is a subset of his more general misanthropy. His reaction to AIDS, for example, is typical. When I think of AIDS, I remember death in a friend's eyes, relive the pain of not letting him know that I knew until he was ready to tell me -- a willing, if anguished collaborator with him in his desire to live as normal a life as he could while it ws still possible. For shooter, it's test everybody so I can't get it, and fuck 'em if they don't like it.
As for my characterization of Peggy Noonan, I wasn't intent on disparaging her gender so much as her pretensions, which are gender specific in that sad way which so many right-wing women favor -- think Anita Bryant, Ann Coulter, or Elizabeth Dole.... They don't wiggle when they walk, or giggle when they talk any more than Hillary does -- they're far beyond that -- but they think that the rest of the womenfolk should, if only to keep the men strong and dominant, and the honorary men -- themselves -- in the positions of influence which they're so unwilling to grant to their sisters. Pallas Athene would be as displeased with them as Aphrodite.
For myself, I honestly don't care one way or the other; God knows that gender identity, sexuality -- all of it -- is as fraught in our own age as in any other, and far more public. I have a great deal of sympathy for anyone who can navigate our common sexual minefield and come out the other side reasonably sane.
Still, I think Glenn has the right idea. When you encounter people who are so hell-bent on dominating the ground of our political debate, you can do worse than judge them by their own yardsticks. That's all I was trying to do with my crack about Ms. Noonan. I guarantee you it had nothing whatever to do with misogyny on my part.
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I'll play, RMP!!!
Why did the chicken cross the road?
TIM RUSSERT
I can't tell you whether the chicken crossed the road or not. My own policy, when talking to chickens, is to keep the conversation confidential. If I want to use any of the chicken's cluckings, I ask permission.
CHRIS MATTHEWS
I saw the chicken swagger across the road. Does it have sex appeal? Can you smell the English Setter's lather on this chicken, the sort of mature dog's lather, you know, from after he picked up the chicken? Do you smell that sort of, little bit of lingering biscuit breath? The manly after-aroma that lends such masculinity to the chicken's swagger...?
HOWARD FINEMAN
That chicken? There is, dare I say it, an old-feather quality to that chicken that some voters, indeed a lot of voters, find reassuring. And I speak for the chicken-watching common man, you know.
SHAILAGH MURRAY
YAAWWN. That's my view of the chicken flap.
PEGGY NOONAN
That chicken poofed his feathers for a full two minutes--I saw it on YouTube. His masculinity is suspect. We simply CANNOT have such chickens traversing our roads in these dangerous times. Be afraid. Be very afraid. I am serious.
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@WT
I dunno, though, your attitude towards embalmers and cheerleaders is...
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Why I am such a pain in the ass..
Because you keep bending over..
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Why?
Why am I such a pain in the ass?
I predict no one will answer this question.
That's an easy one.
You are a pain in the ass because you are such an ignorant coward.
I know, I know, I shouldn't be responding to the cowardly troll, but that one was just hanging there over the center of the plate, as if it were on a tee, and I couldn't resist.
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You are both wrong!
It's because I keep predicting that no one will answer that question!
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@ondelette
@WT
I dunno, though, your attitude towards embalmers and cheerleaders is...
-- ondelette
AnonCoward could fill in the blanks for you on that sentence.
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That should be...
Do you know why you are both wrong?
I predict no one will answer this question!
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Who's on First? What's on Second? No, ...
The numerous 'Anons' around here are making this place dizzying.
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dizzying?
Is that a word?
I predict no one will answer this question!
I predicted no one would answer this question: Why did the chicken cross the road?
But I was wrong!
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@ kitt
Of all the anonymi, L.W.M.'s tongue-in-cheek one is the most recognizable, and for me the most fun. I don't know why he do the police in different voices, but over the months, I'm become as fond of some of his alter egos as I am of bebop and good celery.
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Which came first...
The chicken or the road?
I predict no one will answer this question!
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Douglas Moran re smart words
Indeed. Often very smart people can take complex ideas and frame them in simple words. I think the physicist Feynman was/is noted for this.
There have been a number of folks who have critically examined Bush and his use of malaprops. Some have concluded they are very much a put-on. When Bush is not shukin' and jivin' the public or the press, his speech is clipped and to the point. There is none of the verbal stumbling, mumbling, and fumbling that encourages folks to think him dumber than a stump. Apparently, Bush tailors his language to his audience. When he wants to assume the role of the good-old-boy and folksy commoner, his choice of words are selected to reinforce that image. At other times, Bush gives no evidence of being a legacy, Gentleman's C student - in fact, very much the opposite.