By John Y. Brown III, on Thu Nov 15, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
Aha!!! And the secret of movie popcorn.
I love those “aha moments.”
You know the kind…Like when you finally realize why and how movie theaters get away with charging $4.75 for a bucket of popcorn (chewy air, basically, with artificial butter flavoring).
I think I figured it out.
You know when you are at a movie with your spouse and a scene begins that reminds you of a recurring disagreement you’ve had with your spouse on som e petty matter? And the scene takes a decided and clear turn in the direction you did not want it to take? And you sense it is only going to get even more apparent and more embarrassing to you? And you are waiting for the person representing your spouse is going to say the exact same words on screen that your spouse has said to you. Except this time the entire audience is on her side?
And you know that she knows. And suspects that she knows that you know.
At that exact moment, you stand up, let out a sigh to indicate boredom, and say, “I’m going to go get some popcorn.”
And you go in the lobby by the concessions until the scene is over and a new scene is far enough along that she may have forgotten (or out of courtesy, really, not mention) the scene when you return to your seat. And you start to feel a little relieved.
But before you go back inside the theater you go up to the concession stand and say, “I’ll take an bucket of popcorn, please.” And however much they want to charge you for it, you will pay. Even $4.75.
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Nov 12, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
You are going to want more cow bell with that laptop.
Years ago in my MBA class I remember learning that the extra warranties that a certain unnamed tech store was offering customers had an 80% profit margin. They got sued and changed their policy—in part.
But since then I have never been able to bring myself to purchase one of these. You know the ones. You buy a new laptop and for another $150 the store provides an extended warranty on top of the manufactures warranty.
It’s always an awkward moment for me when I get to that point with the sales clerk. I know it’s coming. “Sir, have you heard about our extended safety coverage opportunity? It’s a great deal…”
I usually stop them and act like I don’t have the authority to make such an executive decision (either in my home; or my business, which I own). I say something like “I need to run it by my firm and let them decide. But not right now.”
But last night I had an unusually pushy sales clerk. After my standard response he said, “No. You can’t wait. It’s pretty much a point of purchase opportunity and that’s it.”
I shook my head and said, “I understand. I’ll just pass for now.”
And then after a pregnant pause I heard, “May I ask why you are not taking advantage of this offer? It’s really smart to do.”
“Huh?” I thought to myself. “Is he calling me stupid? Do I have to justify everything in the store I’m not buying today? Gee. Seems a little heavy handed. What could I say that would be clever but also make this point? Hmmmm. How about, “Look. I’m gonna come clean with you. I’m an idiot and need you to explain the warranty to me really slowly so I can understand this time.”
Or, “Look, I’m an adrenaline junkie and love to try to beat the odds in every area of my life—but especially with Bungie Jumping and with laptop warranties.”
And then I settled on it. “I think —if I hear you correctly—what you are trying to say….is to tell me, ‘Dude, you are going to want more cow bell. Am I right?” Hinting that the “good deal” warranty was about as helpful as a clanging cow bell in the background of a 70’s rock song.
But by this point the sales clerk had already walked away. And the only place I can share my somewhat clever– but way too late–quip is to post it today on Facebook.
Just hope he sees it. And get’s my cow bell reference.
By Bradford Queen, Managing Editor, on Wed Nov 7, 2012 at 1:00 PM ET
President Obama: “Tonight you voted for action, not politics as usual. You elected us to focus on your jobs, not ours. And in the coming weeks and months, I am looking forward to reaching out and working with leaders of both parties to meet the challenges we can only solve together. Reducing our deficit. Reforming our tax code. Fixing our immigration system. Freeing ourselves from foreign oil. We’ve got more work to do.”
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Mitt Romney: “Like so many of you, Paul and I have left everything on the field. We have given our all to this campaign. … I so wish that I had been able to fulfill your hopes to lead the country in a different direction, but the nation chose another leader. And so Ann and I join with you to earnestly pray for him and for this great nation. Thank you, and God bless America. You guys are the best. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks, guys.”
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Nov 5, 2012 at 1:30 PM ET
I was thrilled when I heard that my favorite hot comic, the always edgy, sometimes painful, usually hilarious Louis C.K. was hosting Saturday Night Live this past weekend.
And while his monologue was brilliant, the following skit — in which he plays our 16th President in the same style as his eponymous show — was one of the LOL funniest things Saturday Night Live has done in some time.
Here’s an NSFW version, racier (and with more laughs) than the skit aired Saturday night:
Our Gen Y closing argument debate cannot be complete without hearing from the generation’s unofficial spokeswoman, actor/writer/director Lena Dunham. Here’s her controversial Obama endorsement, “First Time.”
Joe Biden’s alternately snarling, eye-rolling, interrupting, grinning, occasionally weird performance seems to have traded off two conflicting outcomes: temporarily motivating Democrats who were unsettled by Barack Obama’s passivity in the first debate while repelling independents who got a florid reminder of just what it is they find distasteful about political combat.
But Biden unleashed revealed something about what has happened to the liberal political mood in this season. Beneath the back and forth over the quality of Obama’s economic stewardship, and the predictable jabs at the wealth and tax records of the first nominee since 1940 who has substantial private sector experience, there has been another context to this campaign, that is both retrograde and novel at the same time: namely, the left’s strategy of attack by caricature and ridicule, and the implicit worldview that conservatism is an oddball blend of plutocracy, racial resentment, sexual backwardness, and selfishness.
The backward leaning part of the theme is the resemblance to Franklin Roosevelt’s and Harry Truman’s exuberant Republican bashing, at least in the brutal depiction of the GOP agenda. But FDR’s tongue-lashing had a notable high-mindedness: the broadside in his 1936 acceptance speech about mastering the forces of greed in a second term was exquisite rhetorical theater of a kind Barack Obama as president has utterly failed to master. Moreover, the New Deal’s anti-Republican barbs were accompanied by a raft of prospective domestic legislation.
The core of the modern liberal sneer strategy, and Biden made it fairer than ever to describe it that way, is much more novel, not terribly high-flown, and not at all forward-looking. The technique unfurls itself daily behind the desks in MSNBC’s studio, where all but a select few anchors (Joe Scarborough, Chuck Todd) moderate rolling denunciations of all things Republican, without much pretense at balance, in the august editorial pages of the New York Times, which has traded in its vanishing profits as the paper of record for the mantle of intellectual enforcer of the left, and in a coherent, organized blogosphere which ritualistically strikes at every conservative pretense imaginable. Missing is any sustained rationale for what an Obama second term might look like, beyond the standard fare hike in upper income tax rates and a generalized commitment to more “investments” in conventional Democratic objectives.
The novelty is in the reversal of a generation of Democratic attempts to soften Republican/conservative opposition through persuasion. During the Clinton era, Democrats regularly sought to co-opt Republicans by shifting right on welfare and budgets, and moved back and forth between partisanship and outreach. Nor is there much trace of the feints liberals made a decade ago toward evangelicals, much less Obama’s 2004/2008 emphasis on reducing partisanship.
Spared the tactical imperative of persuading even mainstream conservatives, or crafting a legislative portfolio that could overcome gridlock, liberalism circa 2012 is largely a negative project aimed at dismissing the Right’s substantive and intellectual credibility. Nancy Pelosi’s eye-rolling at doubts about the constitutionality of the healthcare law, the establishment media’s persistent denunciations of the Tea Party as Neanderthal relics of George Wallace, the African American media’s trope that conservatism is racial backlash are all of a piece with Biden’s tactic of describing conservative economic policies as discredited claptrap.
As Barack Obama and Mitt Romney duke it out, several of our contributing RPs — including Krystal Ball, Michael Steele, Jeff Smith, Rod Jetton, Jason Grill, John Y. Bornw, III, and The RP himself — will be providing their live commentary of the debate. Read below.
And you too can join the fun. Simply go to your normal Twitter account and use the hashtag #RecoveringPol. Your tweets will appear below LIVE!
Feel free to interact with the RPs by using their handle (i.e. @JeffSmithMO) in your tweets. They are likely to respond and engage.
<Tweets from @RecoveringPol/rps
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Oct 22, 2012 at 12:00 PM ET
Great debate moments.
It is the season of debates, it seems.
Which got me wondering: What is the greatest closing argument I’ve ever seen in a debate? How about you?
The answer that kept coming up for me was a debate I watched in college several years after it took place. William F Buckley, Jr. debated a California governor who later became our president.
And won.
The issue was one I cared little about: The Panama Canal Treaty.
But there was a modern eloquence–and elegance, passion, wit, and substantive command of the issue at hand that impressed me more than any other debater in any other debate I had seen before or since.
Here is the clip. Agree or disagree, you have to admit, you are watching a master debater at the top of his game:
After a successful debut of our new virtual debate feature last week during the second presidential debate, we’ve decided to try it again — bigger and better.
Tonight, at 9 PM EDT, when President Obama and Governor Romney square off for the third and final time, more than a half dozen of our contributing RPs — ranging from Michael Steele to Krystal Ball to Jeff Smith to Rod Jetton to Jason Grill to John Y. Brown, III to The RP himself — will be offering their contemporaneous comments via Twitter, and The Recovering Politician’s home page will provide a live feed of their tweets.
Even better, you are asked to join in. Simply go to your own Twitter account, make your statement and be sure to type the hashtag #RecoveringPol somewhere in your tweet. Your tweets will also be broadcast live here at The Recovering Politician. If you agree or disagree with a point a certain RP is making, you are encourage to call them out — type in their handle (i.e. @JeffSmithMO) to your tweet. In all likelihood, they will respond to you.
So, please join us tonight for some fun civil dialogue as the presidential candidates make their final case to the American people.
Aha!!! And the secret of movie popcorn.
At that exact moment, you stand up, let out a sigh to indicate boredom, and say, “I’m going to go get some popcorn.”
