(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Cheers and Jeers: Rum and Rum Balls FRIDAY!!! [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2022-12-23 • The book banners, anti-Semites, and LGBTQ haters, who have accomplished for freedom and equality with their Bibles and terrorist tactics what a baby accomplishes with creamed corn and a diaper. • Pragmatic purists who pretend to be purist pragmatists, purist pragmatists who pretend to be pragmatic purists, and pie that pretends to be cake. • People who don’t shovel and de-ice their #!!@*^! sidewalks. (Southerners, ask a northerner.) • That I’ve been to paradise but I’ve never been to me. • Whoever felt it was necessary to take from us this year: Angela Lansbury, Christine McVie, Nichelle Nichols, Dr. Paul Farmer, Bill Russell, Sidney Poitier, and several members of the Daily Kos family. • Squirrels who dine and dash. • Lame-duck presidents who steal classified documents and dash. • And, as always: God, for not coming down here and straightening out this mess of a planet. She's dating another universe, isn’t she? To them and the other 491 people and things on my list (up from last year's 467) I say... "I GOT A LOT OF PROBLEMS WITH YOU PEOPLE!" And now, our feature presentation… - Cheers and Jeers for Friday, December 23, 2022 Note: Here's the schedule for the week ahead. We'll be off Monday and back Tuesday through Friday. As you go about partaking in your cherished holiday traditions, please remember the most important lesson of all: give a zombie someone’s brain and you feed it for a day, but teach a zombie how to hunt for people’s brains and you’ll feed it for an entire apocalypse. —Joyeux Billeh - By the Numbers: 15 days!!! Days 'til the little drummer boy drives Mary and Joseph out of their ever-livin' tree: 2 Days 'til the Florida Keys Celtic Festival in Marathon: 15 Amount by which a gallon of gas is, on average, cheaper than it was a month ago, according to Triple-A: 54 cents Amount spent on this year's race for governor in Maine, a record: $28 million Date the 1st legal pot dispensary will open in New York: 12/29/22 Year the first 30 Rockefeller Center Christmas tree was put up: 1933 Number of troops, horses, and cannon, respectively, that Washington took across the Delaware River on Christmas night in 1776 to beat the Hessian scum at Trenton: 2,400 / 200 / 18 - Puppy Pic of the Day: In Boston…Saved!!! - CHEERS to a holly jolly holiday. Okay, maybe that's a bit of irrational exuberance. But, hey, according to the mysterious Conference Board Index, the 'Murcan people are hangin' in there and seeing the glass as half full, at least: It’s the highest reading for the index since April 2022. “The Present Situation and Expectations Indexes improved due to consumers’ more favorable view regarding the economy and jobs,” Lynn Franco, senior director of economic indicators at the Conference Board, said in a statement. “Inflation expectations retreated in December to their lowest level since September 2021, with recent declines in gas prices a major impetus.” x Today we learned that incomes are up and inflation is down. Welcome breathing room as our economy has been growing. Another reason for optimism as we head into the holidays and the new year. https://t.co/WzCpCNvjI5 — President Biden (@POTUS) December 23, 2022 - “You’d have to be hiding under a rock not to see gasoline prices at the pump have plummeted nearly two dollars from the $5 high in June this year,” Christopher S. Rupkey, chief economist for FwdBonds said in a statement. It doesn’t hurt having a competent administration in charge of things. Thanks, Joe. CHEERS or JEERS (depending on where you are) to Mother Nature in a Santa hat. A white Christmas is always in the bag for us up here in Maine—our population is so white, if the ground’s bare (as it will be this year, thanks to today’s 50-degree temps and deluge of rain) we all just go outside and lie down in our yards and it looks like it snowed. Ha Ha Ha! But enough ho-ho-homogenization jokes. Here’s your Christmas weather map if you plan to be out ‘n about: Travel tip: to avoid congestion on the expressway, we suggest you buy yourself a magma-resistant submarine and take the alternate route through the outer core. Don’t forget to take a right at Albuquerque or you’ll end up in Kim Jong Un’s rumpus room. DOUBLE CHEERS to people who work on Christmas eve and Christmas day. Police, fire, utilities, media, national security, rum distilleries...and out front by a mile this year, our first-responders and hospital personnel. If you're not getting at least double pay and comp time, your employer should get a one-way ticket to a quail-hunting junket with Dick Cheney. (Or at least a one-way trip to fluff Mitch McConnell's wattle...or is that too cruel?) - BRIEF SANITY BREAK - x This Senate Democratic Majority confirmed a historic slate of 97 diverse, well-qualified judicial nominees. We will keep going, and our democracy will unquestionably be better for it! pic.twitter.com/o3CQjY08x7 — Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) December 23, 2022 - END BRIEF SANITY BREAK - CHEERS to great breakthroughs. It was during this week in 1947 that John Bardeen, Walter H. Brattain and William Shockley invented the transistor in New Jersey (and later won the Nobel Prize in physics for it). It originally was a relatively big old thing, but today they're as small as a single atom. To put that in perspective, it's the equivalent of all the good Republican ideas for dealing with the pandemic, income inequality, climate change and police reform combined. Except bigger. CHEERS to home vegetation. Holiday specialness is in the air this weekend, starting tonight at 8 with How the Grinch Stole Christmas (NBC) and How Mickey Saved Christmas (ABC). Or you can catch an interview with Yo-Yo Ma on “how music transcends time” on Firing Line at 8:30 (PBS). Tomorrow night at 8 NBC presents its annual showing of It’s A Wonderful Life, competing with Home Alone on ABC. The new movies and streamers are all reviewed here at Rotten Tomatoes. (The Knives Out sequel is now streaming, and the early-Hollywood tale Babylon with Brad Pitt opens in theaters.) The NBA schedule is here, the NFL schedule is here, and the NHL schedule is here. On 60 Minutes: a profile of cookbook author Ina Garten, the decline of English pubs, and the first female virtuoso player of the ancient West African instrument called the kora. Now here's your Sunday morning lineup: Meet the Press: Repeat of the show’s 75th-anniversary tongue bath. CNN's State of the Union: Preempted by...something. If the Sunday shows would only show cats in Santa hats, their ratings would quadruple. Face the Nation: House Jan. 6 Select Committee member Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD); the roster is rounded out by the CBS News Chief National Affairs and Justice Correspondent, Chief White House Correspondent, Chief Legal Correspondent, Chief Investigative Correspondent, Chief National Security Correspondent, and Chief Correspondent Corresponder as all of the other Correspondents got into a fight in the CBS News cafeteria and are no longer speaking to each other. This Week: Preempted for Disney theme parks propaganda. Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: Disgusting homophobe and pedophile-enabler Cardinal Timothy Dolan spreads holiday hypocrisy; Wreaths Across America founder Morrill Worcester; MAGAt musician Michael W. Smith. Happy viewing! - Ten years ago in C&J: December 23, 2012 JEERS to the whiner of the week. Mainers voted to grant marriage rights to same-sex couples last month. Because of the historic significance of this new law, Portland Mayor Michael Brennan announced that City Hall would open at 12:01 on December 29—this one night—so that gay couples can apply for their licenses as soon as possible. But, of course, no good deed goes unpunished. Some jerk just had to go quill-and-ink-crazy and carrier-pigeon a letter to the editor of The Portland Press Herald. Janet Mowatt, please explain why you're upset: One minute after the gay marriage law goes into effect! It certainly didn't take long for the gays to start receiving special treatment. When is the last time Portland City Hall opened its doors after midnight, and on a Saturday no less, just so a heterosexual couple could obtain a marriage license? Never! No matter what kind of reasoning we could come up with for City Hall to open early, we are made to wait until regular business hours. City Hall should change their business hours sign on their front door to read "M-F 8-4; Sat. Hrs. (gays only) 12:01-3 a.m." That sounds to me like a special privilege. Dammit. She's on to us. I think we should move to Plan B: anyone wanting to get a marriage license at City Hall at midnight should come incognito to ward off further criticism. To blend in, please arrive dressed like a marble column. - And just one more… CHEERS to the sounds of the season. There is simply no other way we could possibly think of to end tonight’s column... x The wait is over! @jeffgoldblum’s highly anticipated Christmas album is here, and it’s unlike any holiday compilation you’ve ever heard before. ✨ 🎶🎄#Colbert pic.twitter.com/LHoMQey2aM — The Late Show (@colbertlateshow) December 15, 2022 Give him all the Grammys already. Have a great holiday weekend. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today? - [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/12/23/2143189/-Cheers-and-Jeers-Rum-and-Rum-Balls-FRIDAY Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/