Meer Nederlandse
That’s Queen Bea again, taking the Scout Oath. -=Kidding=-. That’s her and Prince Claus on her Coronation Day in 1980. Then they went off to live in Castle Drakensteyn.
I bet you thought that’s where Scrooge McDuck lives.
Anyway, I don’t have anything meaningful to say today, so I thought I’d tell you my one Dutchman story.
I used to hang out in USENET back in the day and in this one newsgroup there was a particularly obnoxious Dutch guy. You know the type: boring faux-sophisticate European smarty pants always ragging on Americans.
Oh, you Americans and your flag and your pledge and your primitive nationalism and your silly patriotism, always chanting U-S-A…U-S-A. We Europeans have moved beyond such childish notions of blah-blah-blah-blah-blah. I think he lived in a committed threesome with two women and drank a lot of wine. You know what I’m talking.
Well, one day, I made a remark about Queen Beatrice. It wasn’t even particularly rude remark — I think I referred to her as “Queen What’s-her-name” — and the man came unstrung. I mean howling and screaming about respect and my betters. The bulgy eyes and flecks of spittle were implied, as this was in the days of text only.
Um-hm. Because nothing says ‘modernity’ like groveling subservience to royalty.
Have a good weekend, folks!
April 26, 2013 — 10:39 pm
Comments: 17
Tired of mocking the Mexicans. Let’s make fun of the Dutch.
This is Queen Beatrice of the Netherlands. Yes, as far as I can tell, she always has that goofy look on her face. She is abdicating the Dutch throne in favor of her son, Willem. Oh, don’t worry, that’s just how they do it over there.
To commemorate, the crown commissioned a song and — here’s where everything went badly wrong — the songwriter asked the Dutch people to submit verses and concepts to be incorporated. The result was so mind-bendingly stupid, 38,000 signed a petition to “kill it, kill it with fire!” Or, in the original Dutch, “doden, doden met vuur!”
It’s a weird mish-mash about watching over Willem while he sleeps, building a dike with bare hands, wakefully eating stamppot together, a traditional Dutch sausage and potato stew. Also, it breaks into a gentle rap in the middle that invites the Dutch people to make a W with their fingers and wave it around. Oh, it’s a treat.
But that’s not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about how close Dutch is to English. It’s like goofy English. LOLcat English. It’s what somebody who didn’t speak English would make people say in a Warner Brothers cartoon starring people who speak English. Here, check out some random lines from the Koningslied (the King’s Song):
Wij lopen met je mee Door de regen en de wind
We walk with you Through the rain and the wind
Ik behoed je voor de storm
I am saving you from the storm
We staan voor elkaar, niet te breken
We face each other, not to break
Een vlag, twee leeuwen
One flag, two lions
Voor jou, mijn kind
For you, my child
Voor m’n pa, voor m’n ma
For my dad, for my mom
Loop voor jou door de wind en regen
Walk for you through the wind and rain
Ik bouw een dijk met m’n blote handen
I’m building a dike with my bare hands
En hou het water bij jou vandaan Laat me weten wat je droomt
And keep the water away from you Let me know what you dream
Drie vingers in de lucht, kom op, kom op De W van Willem is de W van wij <--- rap, y'all
Three fingers in the air, come on, come on The William W of the W we
De W van Willem De W van wakker, stamppot eten
The W The W William of waking, eating stew
Only, it sounds more like, blubble-up-a-lubbiddle-up. Like a cartoon drowning man. Which…Holland, I guess. Makes sense.
Anyway, here it is in a Dutch newspaper. In Dutch (link to the song at the bottom). Enjoy!
April 25, 2013 — 10:23 pm
Comments: 32
We set fire to a gypsy. You?
“April is a big month for anti-government and right-wing individuals. There’s the Columbine anniversary, there’s Hitler’s birthday, there’s the Oklahoma City bombing, the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco.”
–NPR’s Dina Temple-Raston, speculating that the Boston Marathon bombers were home grown (before the Tsarnaev brothers started shooting up the place, obviously).
Okay. Wow. Let’s take those in reverse order. “…the assault on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco…” was a really horrible episode in our history, in which a house full of religious nutcases were burned alive by federal agents for no good reason. It did indeed horrify all kinds of people, and someone out on the “here be dragons” fringe of the right did indeed retaliate with the Oklahoma City bombing. Which is a desperate embarrassment to the third or so of the country that is in the mainstream right and has been used as a stick to beat us for twenty years. It is not a day for celebration in any way, shape or form.
But…wait…dear lord, Hitler’s birthday?!? If you turned America upside down and shook her hard, I bet fewer than a hundred genuine neo-Nazis would fall out. A kind of right wing, I guess, because they always say so. But just…really, NPR?
Whoa, hang on, the Columbine anniversary? The hell? Two punk kids shoot up their high school? That’s not even…there’s nothing…that’s not right, left or anything. That’s just. No.
This all happened last week, obviously, when nobody knew nothing. Which is why I didn’t post about it then. I was in no mood.
Is it too much to ask our publicly-funded media not to accuse me of Hitler worship? And they wonder why we talk about defunding them every time we get a majority.
April 24, 2013 — 10:50 pm
Comments: 64
Thinks I don’t umberstand
So, this here immigration bill. Are hispanics really for it? I mean, the ones that immigrated legally. The pundits say a) the hispanic population is our fastest-growing demographic and b) they’ll hate the GOP forever if the bill dies. But will they? As a point of solidarity? Because why else would you want to vote in 11 million (or 20 million) more people to compete for your job in a crap economy?
The new incomers won’t vote against us because they can’t; that whole ‘path to citizenship’ thing takes a decades, I think. I mean, they can vote illegally, but they can do that now.
Meanwhile, if it got through, wouldn’t this ultimately hurt the Dems with all the other demographics that will be competing against the newly legal immigrants? The blue collar and entry-level job markets, where I assume most of this influx will be aiming, includes a disproportionate amount of the Democrat base. I mean, you’re desperate to find work, it’s not going to escape your notice who pinched your job and how they got here, is it?
Why is business supposedly for this thing? Once illegal immigrants are legalized, they have to be paid minimum wage and Obamacare and all the rest of it. They’ll be like any other entry-level employee, but with more language and cultural problems. So how is it helpful to have so very many of them?
And finally, if this bill squeaks by in the Senate, it hasn’t a hope in hell of making it through the Republican House without being gutted, so isn’t this all moot? So why has Marco Rubio decided to piss his career down his leg for this?
If only we had a class of professional investigators whose job was to track these things down and explain them to thickos like me.
April 22, 2013 — 10:32 pm
Comments: 28
You disappointed Him. Again.
Oh, that was sweet, wasn’t it? That look on Obama’s face at the Gun Control FAIL presser? Oooo…the preznit, he mad.
That was the one bright spot in a pretty rough news week.
April 18, 2013 — 11:10 pm
Comments: 27
Oh, do it, do it, please!
As you surely know, Anthony Weiner is thinking of running for mayor of New York. Which would be awesome. Y’all know how I love me a dick joke!
My first thought was, no way. You don’t come back from a multiple-target creepy dick-tweeting scandal. I was flipping through old YouTubes of Weiner performing — he was a godawful camera whore, if you remember — and I had forgotten how desperately I longed to poke this guy in the snoot. He’s a hyperactive, sarcastic, loudmouthed, obnoxious, prancing smartass.
New Yorkers loved him. It dawned on me, those YouTubes were uploaded by people who adored him. They were delighted to watch him wave his arms around and scream. The majority of his constituents didn’t want him to resign when he did. So, dick jokes or not, it isn’t out of the question.
Hoo boy! You thought Bloomberg was a national hate object. If they elect this jackass, the rest of the country will have no choice but to saw Manhattan loose and tow it out to sea.
Oh, I found this. It’s from the Women’s National Republican Club’s awards dinner last year. I don’t know who Andrea Tantaros is, but I like the cut of her jib:
Andrea Tantaros held up a cocktail wiener and starting going off on the sexting-crazed ex-congressman who resigned in disgrace. “You’ll recognize this from the cocktail hour. It’s a little wiener. It’s in a symbolic silver tray, too, right Bob?” she said, referring to Turner, who succeeded Weiner following his scandal. “Thank you for restoring the dignity of the House and properly managing your Twitter account,” she told Turner.
Speaking of dick jokes – tomorrow. Here. Six sharp WBT. Dead Pool Round 49.
April 11, 2013 — 10:47 pm
Comments: 26
Crazy chicken lays crazy eggs
A Mapp egg. They’re always like this. Usually, she lays half a dozen or so and then goes broody for the rest of the season, so <shrug>
Changing the subject. I’ve tried not to, but couldn’t miss some of the very public ugliness triggered by Maggie’s death. Out of all proportion to anything she actually did. Not too many of the intellectual elite who hate her most are coal miners, after all. I’ve come to the conclusion it’s because she laughed at the chattering classes. And because she was right. And because of a quality that’ll take me a minute to explain.
I’ve told you before, working with engineers was one of the best things that ever happened to me. Engineers are practical men. They do what I used to think scientists do: they do stuff, they observe the result and they are confident they have just learned something worth knowing. How much pressure did the fastener take before it snapped? At what temperature did the adhesives fail? How much schmutz accumulates in a pipe carrying hard water over an 18 month period? (“Schmutz” is a useful engineering term I learned).
Some of the scientists were like that too, surely — or science wouldn’t advance. But some were more interested in the hypothesis and not so keen on the result.
And moving away from the hard sciences into the soft sciences and the humanities, I observe there is a whole class of clever thinkers who fall in love with ideas. Big, complicated ideas. Elegant ideas. Beautiful ideas that are difficult to grasp. And really, honestly, deep down but without saying so they don’t give a shit if the ideas are true or not. They’d rather not know. It spoils the effect.
In fact, I’m convinced some of them especially love with ideas that are false, because it takes so much effort, so many hours of study, so much scholarship to clasp a falsehood to your bosom. You have to be one of the highly-educated elite to believe really obviously dumbass stuff. Squares don’t get it. Your grandma don’t get it. Toothless hillbillies laugh at you, so you KNOW you’re on the right track.
So you get Joe Biden — nobody’s idea of an ideas man, but he hangs around them and absorbs their chatter like a parrot — wisely opining that we have to spend money to keep from going bankrupt. Because you have to be extra fucking smart to understand how that works.
And then along comes Maggie and says, “any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.” Cash in, cash out, new shoes will have to wait until next month to make it balance. A housewifely skillset. And she governed with it. And it worked.
And all the overcredentialled Oxbridge (or Ivy League) technocratic smarty pantses who believe themselves our natural ruling class (including quite a few on “our” side of the aisle) foam and gnash their teeth. It’s all so ugly and ordinary and dreary.
It demeans them and their powerful brains.
April 9, 2013 — 10:12 pm
Comments: 27
Things you don’t like to see in your inbox
This isn’t spam. I’m registered with the US Embassy in London, so’s somebody knows where I’m supposed to be in case I…bump into Dennis Moore and I’m fresh out of lupins or something.
They don’t contact me often. The previous email I got from them was telling me the last mailing day for packages to reach home by Christmas. Then this.
The Department of State has issued this Worldwide Caution to update information on the continuing threat of terrorist actions and violence against U.S. citizens and interests throughout the world. U.S. citizens are reminded to maintain a high level of vigilance and to take appropriate steps to increase their security awareness. This replaces the Worldwide Caution dated July 18, 2012, to provide updated information on security threats and terrorist activities worldwide.
I don’t remember getting a Caution in July. I think it would’ve stuck in my head. Anyhoo, it rambles on for two thousand words of badly-formatted blah-blah-blah — stuff pretty much anyone who follows international news would probably know. This bit was cute:
In September 2012, civil unrest, large scale protests and demonstrations as well as violent attacks – some of which were in reaction to an anti-Islamic video and cartoons – targeted U.S. missions and schools overseas including in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Sudan, and Yemen.
That’s as close as it got to Benghazi. Note the dollop of weasel sauce in the middle. If anyone wants a copy of the whole boring thing, I’ll send it to you or post it or something.
So! Why? And why now?
February 20, 2013 — 11:49 pm
Comments: 15
I’m trying to be all shocked and outraged
I’m trying really, really hard to feel menaced. I really am. But. I dunno.
If you haven’t seen the North Korean propaganda YouTube everyone’s talking about, go see it now. No, I mean it — if you want to see it, go now. Copies are being taken down as quickly as they’re uploaded, on account of it violates Activision’s copyright.
Yeah. The games company. That scary bomb-America footage was stolen from the computer game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. And the soundtrack is a tinkly piano version of We Are the World.
Are you askeert yet? Because there’s also a sleeping Korean, dreaming his dreamy dreams of world domination, and smiling in his sleep. And an occasional swoosh of sparkly stars, like the one that wafted out of Tinkerbell’s wand in the introduction to Disney’s Wonderful World of Color. B-r-r-r-ing.
If this were any scarier, it could be an episode of My Little Pony.
February 5, 2013 — 11:15 pm
Comments: 28
I’m pretty sure Hillary wears flats
New Secretary of State John Kerry reported for duty Monday, acknowledging that as Hillary Rodham Clinton’s successor he has “big heels to fill“…
Could somebody just…I dunno…come up behind me and smack me upside the head with a shovel until the ouch goes away? Thenk yew.
February 4, 2013 — 10:19 pm
Comments: 24