PunkAssBlog.com

I’m not really at a moment in my life where I’m able to post properly, alas. Just thought I’d pop in to register a quick nod acknowledging that this Hellbound handbasket we’re all riding in has just picked up some steam, now that the Democrats appear to be joining hands with the Republicans to raid the US Treasury and hand it all to the rich bastards who got us into this mess in the first place. Rather than, say, bringing them up on charges for it.

For the in depth analysis, I recommend any of Arthur Silber’s last 10 posts or so. Please don’t mind the naughty words he uses. Sometimes “stupider than shit” really is the apropos turn of phrase.

And if you don’t mind a healthy dose of smug in your pith (and I for one don’t!), IOZ really satisfies:

How can I make this into a metaphor that everyone can understand? Remember in mob movies, how they’d set up a front business to launder money, run as much through as they could, run the business into the ground, torch the place, and then collect the insurance? Well. There it is.

In the mean time, I’m going to make a small prediction.

Although much of Charlie Chaplin’s humor is timeless, some of it doesn’t fare as well today. One reason is because so much of his humor was “food humor”. The Little Tramp was perpetually hungry, and scrounging or stealing food in ingenious ways (sometimes even from children!). This is a famous scene from The Gold Rush (1925– do your best to ignore the unnecessary narration that Chaplin added later):

Humor like this is only moderately amusing today; but it used to be HILARIOUS. That’s because starvation was a common cultural theme 100 years ago. Americans could relate in a way that, nowadays, most of us (thankfully) don’t.

I think that, the way things are going, “food humor” is poised for a comeback before too very long.