Today I Learned: Roosters Crow, Not Cluck
In my defense I never claimed to be a smart guy.
As much as I love criticizing CEOs, there are a few thousand reasons while I’m not one. I delude myself into thinking my conscience couldn’t tolerate exploiting low-wage workers in exchange for two commas in my annual salary. Like the guy who tells his buddy he’d totally bang that chick over there, this arrogant assumption depends on me deluding myself into thinking I had that option in the first place.
The truth is not even my best friends would put me in charge of their child’s birthday party, let alone their Fortune 500 company. Not because they hate me (though they might), but because I can barely manage to produce a poorly edited manifesto five days a week before Tito’s Handmade Vodka relieves me of my faculties.
At least today I can report something on the copywriting front. As my longtime readers know, my writing is riddled with dipshit grammatical mistakes like typing “trail” when I meant “trial.” Ideally I would write my article, sleep on it, and then publish after another edit in the morning. That’s hard to do when people expect your musings at 4:59 a.m. It ain’t like I’m going to bed sober at 7 p.m. every day like I’m a happily married Mormon.
Anyway, my girlfriend read a bunch of old Rooster dispatches as if I didn’t already have enough evidence that she was a psychopath by simply associating with me. She is analytical and loves grokking over details where as I am more like fuck all that let’s get on to the next waking horror in life.
She said I could use a copy editor. I said yeah I think I’ve heard that before. In a functioning democracy, I would get paid $3,000,000 a year to write The Rooster and I could afford to hire a copy editor at a living wage. Also my penis would be 15 inches as compared to a charitable three.
Then she says haha no you idiot I meant me. To which I said haha okay but please don’t think I’m going to engage in premarital sex with you; I took a vow in front of God and I take that shit religiously.
I could see the disappointment on her face but because she likes me, I think I’ll let her copy edit as many articles as she can before she comes to her senses and runs screaming the other way.
Not that any of this applies to today’s dispatch. After all, there’s a reason I’m hungover on my couch and she’s at a job so important I can only talk about it in vague terms. (No, she doesn’t work for the CIA. Though now that I think about it…)
So, starting next week, I am hereby absolved of any typo. Will my work hit differently? Who knows. But please see my lawyer if you have any complaints.
REPEAL AND REPLACE? HOW ABOUT WE START WITH REPEAL.
House Speaker Bob Cupp has talked a big game about not being a corrupt asshole like his previous two predecessors. His actions, however, have fallen short of that lofty notion.
Cupp voted for HB-6, which is the politically correct term for the largest bribery scheme ever extorted upon Ohioans. You would think politicians would want to absolve that stain from their voting record as soon as possible. You would also be lucky enough to live in any other state.
From Todd Defeo of thecentersquare.com:
House Speaker Bob Cupp, R-Lima, has named lawmakers to serve on a new committee tasked with repealing and replacing House Bill 6, a ratepayer-funded bailout of two Ohio nuclear plants that led to a federal corruption probe.
Democrats said they were prepared to take action when the House met on Tuesday.
State Rep. Jim Hoops, R-Napoleon, will chair the committee, while state Rep. Cindy Abrams, R-Harrison, will serve as its vice-chair; state Rep. David Leland, D-Columbus, is the ranking minority member. The committee will hold its first hearing next week.
The formation of the House Select Committee on Energy Policy and Oversight is the latest fallout in the wake of the arrest of former House Speaker Larry Householder, R-Glenford. A federal grand jury indicted the former speaker and four others as part of a $60 million “public corruption racketeering conspiracy” to pass the legislation, a ratepayer bailout of two Ohio nuclear plants.
“Our plan is to work expeditiously through these complex issues,” Cupp said in a statement. “It’s important that we get this done and get it done right in a fair and open process.”
Obviously nobody has ever elected me to serve in the Ohio House. And maybe it’s for good reason because there’s no way I could be a member of the chamber and hear Cupp trying to hustle people without challenging him to a duel outside at high noon.
There should be nothing complex about repealing HB-6. That should be the baseline minimum under the circumstances. But Cupp has taken from the Big Energy Grail as well — maybe not to the point where the FBI wiretapped his phone as soon as he became Speaker though that remains to be seen — but what he really means is he’s trying to keep as many of the green energy deregulations on the books as possible.
That’s how politics work in Ohio. Working people get fucked over in a RICO scheme and the best our legislators will be able to manage before election day is a symbolic P.R. vote in the Senate. Meanwhile the Republicans, thanks to their rat-fucking gerrymandering, will likely pick up more seats in an election where they would be wiped off the map if anybody in this godforsaken state actually paid attention to what was happening in Columbus.
THEY’RE PISSING ON OUR LEGS AND TELLING US IT’S RAINING
We live in the richest country in the history of the world. That much is known. Unfortunately the capitalist interpretation of that phrase means a coterie of crazed pandemic profiteers get to own 26 yachts while the rest of us get to subsist on a diet of processed meats and canned vegetables.
18,719 Ohioans last their jobs last week. That number is almost assuredly higher considering that number only includes Ohioans who took the time to navigate the labyrinth of our state’s unemployed insurance system.
Nearly 19,000 Ohioans are on the brink of financial ruin and this number will be presented to us as good news.
From Kim Palmer of crainscleveland.com:
Ohioans filed 18,719 initial jobless claims during the week of Aug. 23-29, down slightly from 18,988 the previous week, according to report issued Thursday, Sept. 3, by the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS).
There have been 1,664,078 total unemployment claims filed since the COVID-19 pandemic shut down major portions of the state's economy nearly six months ago. That is more than the combined total of claims filed during the past four years.
Ohioans filed 339,957 continued jobless claims, down from 344,409 the previous week. Continued jobless claims represent unemployment filings submitted following an initial claim.
Keep in mind this number also doesn’t include the Ohioans who have simply given up trying to find work.
I wish I wasn’t joking when I say the next few months will be the hardest of our lives (unless of course you remember the Great Depression in which case buckle up buttercup because you know what’s coming). At least it will also be 32 degrees outside and get dark at 5 p.m.
IN THE GOOD OL’ DAYS YOU USED TO BE ABLE TO CONCUSS YOURSELF AT A CHILDREN’S PARTY WITHOUT HAVING IT GO VIRAL ON THE INTERNET
One reason I hate America is because I can no longer watch objectively hilarious videos like this without immediately thinking, “Damn, I hope that motherfucker has good insurance.” Because otherwise he’s now in debt peonage thanks to the time he drank three Coronas at a child’s birthday party and tried to impress kids by doing a backflip that he hadn’t attempted in the last 10 years.
Either way, this is a feeling that Browns fans will recognize well. The road to the Super Bowl never seemed so easy right until we’re down 21 points midway through the third quarter in the first game of the season.
THOSE WMDs. 6ix9ine says a whole lot of words about being a snitch… Black troops were welcome in Britain but Jim Crowe wasn’t: the race riot of one night in June 1943…The Polish phrase that helps live through tough times… White vigilantes have always had a friend in the police… The (literally) unbelievable origin story of the first fake news network.