Friday links! Declinism edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links, Uncategorized 4 Comments
A 12 year-old does the "make it rain" gesture in a song her parents paid to produce that is currently #29 on the Hot 100.

A 12 year-old does the “make it rain” gesture in a song her parents paid to produce that is currently #29 on the Hot 100.

Alison Gold’s “Chinese Food,” about how she likes Chinese food, has hit #29 on the Billboard Hot 100. Her parents paid to have the song and video produced by ARK Music Factory, the same company responsible for Rebecca Black’s “Friday.” It’s kind of gross that adolescent rich girls can get professional-quality production and songwriting for vanity projects, but it’s terrifying that ARK Music Factory can make those vanity projects into hits. They’ve done it twice now—three times if you count “It’s Thanksgiving.” Today is Friday, popular culture is an algorithm that only requires Patrice Wilson to select a day or food, and the time has come for us to embrace the dread declinism. Won’t you admit that everything is going to hell with me?

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Friday links! So close edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 1 Comment

so close

For a second there, it looked like the we were out of the woods on this whole shut-down-the-government-and-cause-a-world-economic-crisis thing. The president has rejected House Republicans’ proposal to raise the debt ceiling for six weeks, which would have demanded minimal concessions from Democrats but also would not have ended the shutdown. The government is still closed, and our statutory borrowing authority has a little less than a week. But there is reason for hope: the GOP’s proposal made no mention of Obamacare, and enough GOP moderates are breaking ranks with the ideologically pure that a clean continuing resolution is possible. Today is Friday, and we are so close to having a functional government. Won’t you pine with me?

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Friday links! Phase three is profit edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 3 Comments

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO5sxLapAts

It’s been a full week of shutdown mania here at Combat! blog, and we are no closer to answering the fundamental questions. When will government open for business again? What force could stir either side to relent? How unified is the Republican Party? Did the Obamacare defunders actaully go into this with no plan for what to do if their demands were not met? The answer to that last question, terrifyingly, seems to be yes. Senator Ted Cruz (R–TX) reportedly had no endgame when pressed by fellow Republicans Wednesday, and he is supposed to be the smartest guy in his delegation. Today is Friday, and the Tea Party has lived its dream to shut down the federal government and replace it with nothing. Won’t you stare grimly at the news with me?

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Friday links! Compromise or I’ll murder us all edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 1 Comment
Would this man do something merely to aggrandize himself?

Would this man do something merely to aggrandize himself?

Come on, America: let’s stop all this fighting and fussing. Let’s put aside the disagreements, the system we developed to arbitrate our national will through representatives and votes, and compromise by giving me what I want. When you disagree, you have to compromise eventually. That’s what mature people do. We should definitely compromise in this case, because otherwise I’m going to destroy us all. Our factories will lie ruined atop our schools. Our children will earn pennies a day performing on the internet for the Chinese. The Koch brothers will divide our corpses between them to burn for fuel. Today is Friday, and everything is going to be fine, provided you just compromise. If you don’t, I’m going to murder everybody.

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Friday links! Giving up edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 1 Comment

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Human beings are caught in a constant struggle between being true to themselves and being true to others. That’s why giving up is so popular. Why devote your life to the real and the good, sacrificing your own interests for compassion and/or enduring the slander of strangers to live with integrity, when there are so many streaming video services out there? Today is Friday, and nothing feels better than rolling over and letting go. Won’t you forget how it felt to care with me?

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