As you've shown repeatedly, Dr. Ed, that "burly man" schtick works because mainstream media types are themselves hungry to be seen themselves as "burly men" or at least sympathetic to said "burly men" so they'll fall for it every time. A year from now -- it'll be like this never happened...
OT: One of the repeated lines in Unforgiven is when Beauchamp tells someone he's a writer and the reply is "Letters and such?" To modern audiences, that's a laugh line. But back then when literacy rates were fairly low, there were professional letter writers who would write a letter for you that you could then mail to your kin back home or whomever you needed to communicate with.
For myself, there was a stretch of about 3 years back in the early 00s where I had a reasonable trade going in . . . writing letters for rich people. It freaked me out at first that people with 7-figure incomes were actually willing to pay to have a letter written, but I soon figured out that most of them were actually terrible writers and wanted me to put their thoughts into some form that did not make them look like angry grade-school kids. So that line in Unforgiven has a special resonance for me.
Now I'm burning with curiosity about what sort of letters rich people would pay someone to write. Was it all "Your tea party Thursday last was sheer heaven, Miss Haversham!" or something else?
The vast majority of them were letters to government organizations or other businessmen. An example was a letter I wrote for the owner of a large construction firm who needed the county planning and zoning people to clarify some regulations for him with regard to a development he'd been contracted to build. His client thought everything was approved, but he wasn't so sure about it and didn't want to pay an attorney to figure it out. So, hire me to write the right letter to get the right answers in writing!
The second-largest chunk of that business was letters to the editor. Yes, J Money Gotrocks will have his letter to the editor ghost-written so he doesn't have to end his missive with "I am not a crank."
Did he actually say "politicians", or was he just talking about Roger Stone? Trying to figure out what McCarthy's up to with that cringe headline stunt. (He has to know "I will closely question my colleague about his suggestion that some of his colleagues are perverts" is only going to invite hilarity, right? It's the PR equivalent of a green screen.)
He said, "I look at all these people, a lot of them that I’ve looked up to through my life, I’ve always paid attention to politics." That certainly implies politicians, but it does not say specifically politicians
I agree watching people in actual danger fight off an invasion took a lot of the wind out of the convoy’s faux-macho sails: “these guys in Ukraine are out fighting Russians in the street while their houses are bombed, but you don’t want to get a vaccination shot? Maybe sit the fuck down and shut up, whiner.”
And yeah, I think J6 made enough of a traumatic impression on the majority of non-lunatic citizens that any call-back to it will be disastrous for future fascist protests.
Actual long-haul truckers work too hard for too little pay to be able to afford a week's time and gas — much less three or four — for this nonsense, and most of them don't own their rigs. It's such a shitty job that right now the annual turnover rate is around 90%. The smart money in trucking is with diesel mechanics ($100K+/yr.) or — guess what? — management.
So many Americans don't see the things that make their lives difficult - or even unbearable - as being politically actionable. Politics is basically football without the helmets, something to cheer or boo before you go back to your shitty no-benefit job, but not something you actually expect anything practical from. The shitty no-benefit job, on the other hand, that's your own fault because you didn't get enough education or it's your boss's fault because he's an asshole, so the answer is to quit for some other shitty, no-benefit job. Same with unaffordable child care, rent that takes more than half your paycheck and medical bills that drive you into bankruptcy. What's politics got to do with these things? Not one damn thing.
That's a convenient thing about capitalism: it doesn't leave you with just one or two signatures signing-off on the atrocities and oppressive acts, and they (to be fair) tend to be smaller-scale and slower.
Dead Butch would be a great name for a white CIS male free neo-punk band, maybe the punk band I need.
Anyway.
Great photo at the top. When we did our cross country thing last summer, we passed two tractor trailers that had gone off the road; separate days, probably a few/couple hundred miles apart. One could imagine how they happened. Hint: Not weather related.
Meanwhile, I hope Roy’s not teasing us and this is the last post to dis the manly men trucker patriots. As noted, the comrades tell me our disrespect for these fine workers is what prevents them from rising up and throwing off the shackles of their capitalist parasitic masters. Surely, the revolution is imminent.
I wish I had a link to the trucker who posted last month about the causes of the supply chain disruptions and pointed out that union truckers like him were doing just fine, it was the independents and non-union shops that were suffering. He got paid whether hauling on the highway or stuck in line for hours at a port, while they only made money while moving a load they couldn’t get to. It’s the embrace of politics that hurt themselves (anti science, anti union, etc.) that marks these convoyers as suckers, not a great look.
I'm amazed that Donald Trump is who they picked to be hero of the worker man. I guarantee he has the softest hands and any sweat he might break is more about an overabundance of body fat then any kind of physical exertion . Same goes for Tucker Carlson . I wouldn't be surprised if either or both of these guys had a butt wiper on the payroll . I doubt that either have ever trimmed their own toenails. I'm certain they couldn't drive a standard transmission . I guess there's always a certain bunch that doesn't feel right if they aren't kissing the bosses ass . Maybe that's what they're so unhappy about . Maybe deep down inside they know they're nothing but a candy ass suck up. Of course that's not their fault and so they need someone to take it out on..
Decades ago, the Republicans used to trot out some welder from Louisiana who would say "No poor man ever hired me" before being put back in his box for the next performance.
In our town, BITD, we had a People's Welder. Nobody called him that – we all called him Steve – but the work he did, and the scandalously low fee he charged, made him everyone's goto guy. I took my truck in one day 'cause I broke one of the motor mounts. Steve said just leave it here in the driveway, and go for a walk. So I did. When I got back he told me that when he started the truck to move it next to his big welder he smelled gas, and looked under the hood, and found gas spurting outta the fuel pump. So he was a little less than eager to weld under those circumstances, which I could not find a good reason to argue. But then he said go on over to the auto parts place – I already checked and they got a rebuild in stock, so you can just do the replacement here. So I walked over (small towns – gotta love 'em) and got the other pump, brought it back, borrowed Steve's tools, got the old pump out, installed the other one, ran it awhile to be certain it worked, and then went for another walk while Steve welded the mount.
Seems like the term "working class" gets over-used these days, so I'm narrowing my definition to "At some point forced to ride a bicycle to the auto parts store." Extra points if it wasn't your bicycle.
I would like to ask my sister, whose one issue is ending abortion, why the abominable ogre Trump is her only choice. Can't God do any better than that?
Yeah, put 8 of these mouth breathers outside a federal office or state capitol and the press will be there, scratching their chins wondering "what's driving these hardworking sons of the soil?"
I looked him up on Wikipedia, just because I haven't heard the name in years, and man what a life he led, even though he died young. He was in a bunch of Broadway shows, even subbed for Raul Julia at one point, did lots of TV and even some movies, all of them B grade. The guy was a trooper, as they used to say. I can always respect someone who shows up ready to work, even when the work is schlock.
I like the graphic, though I’m getting really tired of people turning everything into The Apotheosis of Science. “I do nothing without Science, I trust the Science, I AM BECOME SCIENCE.” Sorry, it’s just a personal annoyance; YMMV.
As soon as Senator Skeletor (R-FL) appropriated "It's Just Science" for his "God sayeth there be but two genders, man and woman he created them" screed, I knew that "trust the science" had jumped the shark, the moon, and the constellations. https://rescueamerica.com/steps/9-gender-life-science/
Great coverage, you're America's favorite source for PC (People's Convoy) news. But what's with the Broersma truck photo at the top? Namibian miners union? WTF?
As you've shown repeatedly, Dr. Ed, that "burly man" schtick works because mainstream media types are themselves hungry to be seen themselves as "burly men" or at least sympathetic to said "burly men" so they'll fall for it every time. A year from now -- it'll be like this never happened...
They're all W.W. Beauchamp in Unforgiven. Except they're not sucking up to the real killers.
OT: One of the repeated lines in Unforgiven is when Beauchamp tells someone he's a writer and the reply is "Letters and such?" To modern audiences, that's a laugh line. But back then when literacy rates were fairly low, there were professional letter writers who would write a letter for you that you could then mail to your kin back home or whomever you needed to communicate with.
For myself, there was a stretch of about 3 years back in the early 00s where I had a reasonable trade going in . . . writing letters for rich people. It freaked me out at first that people with 7-figure incomes were actually willing to pay to have a letter written, but I soon figured out that most of them were actually terrible writers and wanted me to put their thoughts into some form that did not make them look like angry grade-school kids. So that line in Unforgiven has a special resonance for me.
>angry grade-school kids
[INSERT OBVIOUS OBSERVATION ABOUT AN EX-PRESIDENT]
Now I'm burning with curiosity about what sort of letters rich people would pay someone to write. Was it all "Your tea party Thursday last was sheer heaven, Miss Haversham!" or something else?
The vast majority of them were letters to government organizations or other businessmen. An example was a letter I wrote for the owner of a large construction firm who needed the county planning and zoning people to clarify some regulations for him with regard to a development he'd been contracted to build. His client thought everything was approved, but he wasn't so sure about it and didn't want to pay an attorney to figure it out. So, hire me to write the right letter to get the right answers in writing!
The second-largest chunk of that business was letters to the editor. Yes, J Money Gotrocks will have his letter to the editor ghost-written so he doesn't have to end his missive with "I am not a crank."
Again: The breadth of experiences and especially former jobs Roy's people have still surprises me, and is one of the best things ever.
I think they may have been inviting Madison Cawthorn to their orgy
Did he actually say "politicians", or was he just talking about Roger Stone? Trying to figure out what McCarthy's up to with that cringe headline stunt. (He has to know "I will closely question my colleague about his suggestion that some of his colleagues are perverts" is only going to invite hilarity, right? It's the PR equivalent of a green screen.)
He said, "I look at all these people, a lot of them that I’ve looked up to through my life, I’ve always paid attention to politics." That certainly implies politicians, but it does not say specifically politicians
Not really a problem that "Burly Man" isn't playing right now, switch over to "Frightened Suburban Mom" for six months.
If you don't like that one, we got "Family that buys 12 gallons of milk a week suffers from Biden-flation."
Motilla!
Duck Dynasty!
He takes his big truck and he drives it downtown
While commuters flip him off with their terrible frowns.
Motilla!
Normal people on subway trains
Wonder if the truckers have got any brains.
Motilla!
Oh, no! How low can they go?
Motilla!
Nicely done!
Ho Ho Motilla!
Ye- eh- eah!
If only History would in fact shew _anything_ again and again with any kind of clarity….
I agree watching people in actual danger fight off an invasion took a lot of the wind out of the convoy’s faux-macho sails: “these guys in Ukraine are out fighting Russians in the street while their houses are bombed, but you don’t want to get a vaccination shot? Maybe sit the fuck down and shut up, whiner.”
And yeah, I think J6 made enough of a traumatic impression on the majority of non-lunatic citizens that any call-back to it will be disastrous for future fascist protests.
Actual long-haul truckers work too hard for too little pay to be able to afford a week's time and gas — much less three or four — for this nonsense, and most of them don't own their rigs. It's such a shitty job that right now the annual turnover rate is around 90%. The smart money in trucking is with diesel mechanics ($100K+/yr.) or — guess what? — management.
So many Americans don't see the things that make their lives difficult - or even unbearable - as being politically actionable. Politics is basically football without the helmets, something to cheer or boo before you go back to your shitty no-benefit job, but not something you actually expect anything practical from. The shitty no-benefit job, on the other hand, that's your own fault because you didn't get enough education or it's your boss's fault because he's an asshole, so the answer is to quit for some other shitty, no-benefit job. Same with unaffordable child care, rent that takes more than half your paycheck and medical bills that drive you into bankruptcy. What's politics got to do with these things? Not one damn thing.
Dammit! Voting Machines! Now they givin' MACHINES the VOTE!
That's a convenient thing about capitalism: it doesn't leave you with just one or two signatures signing-off on the atrocities and oppressive acts, and they (to be fair) tend to be smaller-scale and slower.
Right, I think about that scene in Grapes of Wrath where the bulldozer driver shows up at Mulie's property.
Maybe they appreciate it vicariously, reading (on this blog obvs) about subsidized performers doing a Carol Burnett skit of how their work sucks.
MAGA Max: Beyond Grifterdome (speaking of Lord Humongous)
Where's the Feral Kid when we need him?
Dead Butch would be a great name for a white CIS male free neo-punk band, maybe the punk band I need.
Anyway.
Great photo at the top. When we did our cross country thing last summer, we passed two tractor trailers that had gone off the road; separate days, probably a few/couple hundred miles apart. One could imagine how they happened. Hint: Not weather related.
Meanwhile, I hope Roy’s not teasing us and this is the last post to dis the manly men trucker patriots. As noted, the comrades tell me our disrespect for these fine workers is what prevents them from rising up and throwing off the shackles of their capitalist parasitic masters. Surely, the revolution is imminent.
That's a cattle truck with a screen. Let's hear a moment of silence for the cows...
"We're eatin' good tonight boys", said the tow-truck driver as he pulled up to the wreck.
Never steered you wrong...
I wish I had a link to the trucker who posted last month about the causes of the supply chain disruptions and pointed out that union truckers like him were doing just fine, it was the independents and non-union shops that were suffering. He got paid whether hauling on the highway or stuck in line for hours at a port, while they only made money while moving a load they couldn’t get to. It’s the embrace of politics that hurt themselves (anti science, anti union, etc.) that marks these convoyers as suckers, not a great look.
I'm amazed that Donald Trump is who they picked to be hero of the worker man. I guarantee he has the softest hands and any sweat he might break is more about an overabundance of body fat then any kind of physical exertion . Same goes for Tucker Carlson . I wouldn't be surprised if either or both of these guys had a butt wiper on the payroll . I doubt that either have ever trimmed their own toenails. I'm certain they couldn't drive a standard transmission . I guess there's always a certain bunch that doesn't feel right if they aren't kissing the bosses ass . Maybe that's what they're so unhappy about . Maybe deep down inside they know they're nothing but a candy ass suck up. Of course that's not their fault and so they need someone to take it out on..
Decades ago, the Republicans used to trot out some welder from Louisiana who would say "No poor man ever hired me" before being put back in his box for the next performance.
In our town, BITD, we had a People's Welder. Nobody called him that – we all called him Steve – but the work he did, and the scandalously low fee he charged, made him everyone's goto guy. I took my truck in one day 'cause I broke one of the motor mounts. Steve said just leave it here in the driveway, and go for a walk. So I did. When I got back he told me that when he started the truck to move it next to his big welder he smelled gas, and looked under the hood, and found gas spurting outta the fuel pump. So he was a little less than eager to weld under those circumstances, which I could not find a good reason to argue. But then he said go on over to the auto parts place – I already checked and they got a rebuild in stock, so you can just do the replacement here. So I walked over (small towns – gotta love 'em) and got the other pump, brought it back, borrowed Steve's tools, got the old pump out, installed the other one, ran it awhile to be certain it worked, and then went for another walk while Steve welded the mount.
Charged me $30.
You're the... um... exception that proves the rule! Yeah, that's it!
Seems like the term "working class" gets over-used these days, so I'm narrowing my definition to "At some point forced to ride a bicycle to the auto parts store." Extra points if it wasn't your bicycle.
Nearly all his masculinity is fake. OTOH, his supporters want to be dominated and knows Donnie does that. But it has nothing to do with masculinity.
I would like to ask my sister, whose one issue is ending abortion, why the abominable ogre Trump is her only choice. Can't God do any better than that?
As I said in LGM, the film Convoy marked a nadir in Sam Peckinpah's career. This convoy proved to be no different.
I love that movie. I recognize that it's a fantasy.
Ever seen Bring Me the Head of... never mind.
That's my favorite film by Peckinpah.
I love it too! But man it is off kilter (a big part of its charm). Convoy was mainstream by comparison.
"...even the normal stupidly, lazily complicit media was forced to think: Why are we covering these guys?"
Yes, that's exactly what they said right before they went out to cover these guys again.
Yeah, put 8 of these mouth breathers outside a federal office or state capitol and the press will be there, scratching their chins wondering "what's driving these hardworking sons of the soil?"
Screw the stupid news coverage of the “People’s Convoy.” I’d rather watch reruns of “Password” with Bert Convy.
When he drove down the street in his El Dorado
Bert Convy never got called an asshole
Not at R.I.S.D..
Allen Ludden was better
Indisputably so.
I remember Bert more for Tattletales
I looked him up on Wikipedia, just because I haven't heard the name in years, and man what a life he led, even though he died young. He was in a bunch of Broadway shows, even subbed for Raul Julia at one point, did lots of TV and even some movies, all of them B grade. The guy was a trooper, as they used to say. I can always respect someone who shows up ready to work, even when the work is schlock.
He was a minor league baseball player and in a band in the 1950s
Maybe there's a version of It's a Wonderful Life where Clarence the Angel shows Bert Convy what this world would be like if he was never born.
I almost went with Tattletales but didn’t know if it would be too old and obscure.
old and obscure have become my middle names
Dana Gould's "Hangin' with Dr Z" is the next best thing—though I wish Dr Z had more Maurice Evans to him than Robert Evans, these days.
I like the graphic, though I’m getting really tired of people turning everything into The Apotheosis of Science. “I do nothing without Science, I trust the Science, I AM BECOME SCIENCE.” Sorry, it’s just a personal annoyance; YMMV.
P.S. I am not a crank!
As soon as Senator Skeletor (R-FL) appropriated "It's Just Science" for his "God sayeth there be but two genders, man and woman he created them" screed, I knew that "trust the science" had jumped the shark, the moon, and the constellations. https://rescueamerica.com/steps/9-gender-life-science/
Senator "Trust The Science, But Steal The Money" Skeletor (R-FL)
I am Science, Destroyer of Worlds!
Yeah, no shit.
Love it! Perfect.
Great coverage, you're America's favorite source for PC (People's Convoy) news. But what's with the Broersma truck photo at the top? Namibian miners union? WTF?
WaPo to right-wing truckers: "I wish I knew how to quit you."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/03/31/dc-trucker-convoy-leaves-protest/