Tag: Humor

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Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell

May 19, 2020

Way back during the 2016 Presidential campaign, I think it was, I received a solicitation for money for HRC by way of Joe Biden. It included the phrase “Here is my ask:” I took this to mean “Here is my request.” Still, ask is a verb, not a noun, and this left an impression on me. The impression was that maybe Joe wasn’t so bright.

Neal Katyal and Joshua Geltzer recently wrote an opinion piece in the NYT (“The Appalling Damage of Dropping the Michael Flynn Case.” 5/8/20). In it, they use “tell” as a noun, twice. Here is the tell…. And there’s a second tell. Two Georgetown Law professors, for crying out loud.

I first thought, from context, that they meant here is the point or here’s the takeaway and had somehow become law professors without realizing that tell is a verb. That seems entirely plausible these days. However, it appears that, after some investigation, Here’s the tell means something more like Here’s their giveaway. It’s a term found in poker.

Yes I know there is no Academie anglaise, and useage is king in English. But come on guys. I haven’t heard tell used this way anywhere else. I don’t play poker and, well, it turns out Joe doesn’t have three Nobels after all.

So Ask remains a verb. And Tell remains a verb.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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Of Briefcases and Walls

August 16, 2019

How is it that a briefcase can be heavier on both sides at the same time?

We place the briefcase against the wall. It falls away.

We turn it around. It falls away.

How can a briefcase be heavier on both sides at once? Is there a repelling force? Science gives no clear explanation for this common phenomenon.

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity

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A State of Wedding Exists

August 10, 2019

Humankind has approximately fifty percent fewer problems than Mankind.

If we look honestly at what we would want changed in the world, most of it stems from the behavior of homo-so-called-sapiens and, looking even more honestly, to the behavior of the male of the species.

The male of the species is on average larger and more aggressive than the female of the species. This was a tremendous advantage in the days of rocks and sticks. Less so in the age of killer drones and nukes deliverable by Amazon. But it’s behind the power imbalance between the male and female. The latter appears from recent research to perhaps be the smarter of the two, but has less power. The male, better at lifting heavy objects and winning domestic disputes, hogs what it can. Its favorite group activity is called war and it spends its time planning the next one.

While rare counter examples can be found, the female of the species appears more interested in making the world a better place in which to live. To this end, it prefers planning weddings to planning wars. Therefore, in a rational country, presence of a dick and balls would be immediately disqualifying for the holding of high public office.

News headlines might then read “A State of Wedding Has Been Declared Between the United States and the Peoples Democratic Republic of You Name It.”

It is probable that many of the marriages, hastily arranged, would not work out. But the party planning, the music, the dancing, the free food and drink would be fabulous. And the product – babies – are widely seen as preferable to corpses. Even though the male of the species likes to confuse the two, sex and violence are not the same thing, or even in the same category of thing. The former is pro-life, the latter is anti-life. Further, even though a bad marriage may be bad, it beats choking on mustard gas while flagging down machine gun bullets far from home. Does it not, guys?

MOE

M.I.C.H. – Modernity, Intelligence, Complexity, Humanity