“As a parent today, I’m worried. I’m worried for our country,” Walker told a few hundred conservative activists in a darkened amphitheater, standing in front of a red stage curtain. “I’m worried about my sons and your sons and daughters, my nieces and your nieces and nephews and grandsons and granddaughters, and I’m worried that we’re headed down that same path that worried me years ago in my own state.”Ooh! The darkened amphitheater. The red stage curtain. Oh, no: Worry!
Walker is telling us what's wrong with America. Why not what's right with America? The obvious answer is that if things are going swimmingly, then we should want another Democratic President.
Ward's writing fits squarely into the genre called They'll Tell You Who They're Afraid Of. He proceeds to blabber about "an undertone of testiness in his stump speech, leavened with chest-swelling machismo fueled by his defeat of a recall effort in 2012 and his re-election in 2014."
Testiness and machismo seem like the opposite of gloom, but I guess gloom is the overtone and testiness is the undertone, while machismo is the leavening.
I won't accuse Ward of mixing metaphors. I think he's got a consistent food-prep metaphor going there.
It calls to mind that line from "Rosemary's Baby." Rosemary takes a nibble of the mousse that the devil-worshiping next-door neighbor has tainted with a knock-out drug and worries: "It has an under-taste. A chalky under-taste."
What's in this mousse anyway? "Mousse," in Wisconsin, we call it "mouse," because we are as naive-or-sinister as the Satanist next door. It's gloom mousse, but it has a testy undertaste, a macho, testy undertaste!
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32 comments:
...a testy undertaste...
I'm having trouble with the metaphor, as I don't actually know what testies taste like.
I'm calling Bullwinkle on the gloom mousse metaphor.
So the MSM has obliterated the Cruz campaign already and they're back to dumping on Walker? I thought they'd "move on" to Rubio.
I was going to do a language thing about testicles, Ignorance, but the OED makes it clear that the "testi" in "testiness" means head. And a testy person is headstrong, not testosterone-feuled. But I think Ward thought he had 2 related concepts there with "testiness" and "machismo."
A testy undertaste...
...sounds like teabagger lingo!
Clip added.
I thought Walker sent all his time arranging Amnesty for dirty Hispanics needed by Koch Brothers on their wage slave plantations. That's the story du hour.
This is a derogatory op-ed piece masquerading as news.
I miss Garage, his Walker hatred is out and proud, not like these weasels of the national press.
Is it permissible to refer to Hill as testy, or is that one of the banned adjectives? It does have a masculine flavor.
Good sleuthing in the origin being unrelated to testicles.
Yahoo Politics -
Both the title of an internet provider of third rate content and the author's attempted characterization of Walker's style.
Consider the source. You have to be pretty far down the list to write for or be picked up by Yahoo.
I miss Garage
How can you miss him if he won't go away?
You don't really say "mouse" in Wisconsin, do you?
Good candidates listen to their crazy critics. I remember thinking Tom Daschle couldn't seem to utter a sentence without saying "I am saddened".
"I'm worried" is a disheartening phrase. He should go for things like "the future is bright" and "we're gonna get out of this place".
Ronald Reagan projected optimism as much as possible. I think he must have had a little card saying "be optimistic!" in front of him when he spoke. All candidates should do that.
Never take a bite out of a mouse.
Yes, MayBee-- really, in Wisconsin mousse is pronounced with an ow rather than an ou? Perhaps AA is making a joke we're not catching.
I love the smell of testosterone in the morning!
When you order chocolate mousse in Madison, the waitstaff lectures you about race.
When you order chocolate mouse in Madison, the waitstaff lectures you about race.
Scott Walker is the devil; he wants to drug and rape us.
"Perhaps you'd better have your legs tied down in case of convulsions."
Minnie: As long as she ate the mouse, she can't see nor hear. Now sing.
Mrs. John F. Kennedy: I'm sorry to hear you aren't feeling well.
Rosemary: It's just a mouse bite.
Mrs. John F. Kennedy: Perhaps you'd better have your legs tied down in case of convulsions.
Rosemary: Yes, I suppose so. If it was rabid...
Mrs. John F. Kennedy: If the music bothers you, please let me know and I'll have it stopped.
Rosemary: Oh, no, no, no. Please don't change the program on my account...
Mrs. John F. Kennedy: All right. Now, try to sleep. We'll be waiting for you up on deck....
Rosemary: You... you had me while I was out?
Guy: It was kinda fun in a necrophile sort of way.
I saw one of his stump speeches on cspan.
I did find it funny when he was talking about ISIS coming for his family and the families of the audience members.
That stuff seems to work for a lot of R primary voters. Old white folks eat that stuff up.
So the the Senior Political Correspondent Jon Ward of Yahoo is familiar with the taste of taint.
Well as long as we're talking food prep metaphors here, I'd add that the writer of this piece of drivel has served up a "meadow muffin". Or if you want to vary that and go the dessert route, "a road apple".
Still it's good to see the East Coast press get all wee wee'd up about these fellows from the middle of the country. Their mantra is, "Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid For These Fellows Are Not Like Us!"
There are some among us, myself included, who would call that a good start.
I was going to do a language thing about testicles, Ignorance, but the OED makes it clear that the "testi" in "testiness" means head. But I think Ward thought he had 2 related concepts there with "testiness" and "machismo."
Egad, I hope he included trigger warnings for undergraduate rape-phobic females in the headline.
Beta Rube said...
This is a derogatory op-ed piece masquerading as news.
I miss Garage, his Walker hatred is out and proud, not like these weasels of the national press.
3/30/15, 9:08 AM"
Thumbs up! When it comes to Walker, there is no ambiguity with Garage which is in a way rather honest and refreshing.
How is this different from Obama feeling the need to fundamentally transform America?
Get this: Non-incumbents want to change things.
I did find it funny when he was talking about ISIS coming for his family and the families of the audience members.
I know the point you are trying to make (re: fear mongering), but the reality of smuggling a dirty bomb across the Mexican border is not out of the question.
But who really thinks that everything is going swimmingly in America?
Worry resonates with the electorate, because we are rationally worried. We want someone in government who pays attention to our worries, and tries to do something about them.
"smuggling a dirty bomb across the Mexican border is not out of the question."
I'd love to see a pol suss out this personalized scenario even a little more than Walker does, just in case some members of the 95%-white-primary need a little more of a nudge. E.g.:
"The D's are weak on defense and won't name terrorism, hence ISIS will bring a dirty bomb from their Iranian friends in Tehran to Tijuana, and then they'll cross the boarder with illegals who will steal your job and/or social security check, and then they'll drive to Iowa to blowup you and your kids. Vote for me and you won't be killed by ISIS!"
"Walker is telling us what's wrong with America. Why not what's right with America?"
Right, Walker is real anti-American. Elect Walker and we'll be longing for the days when we had a real pro-American president like Hussein Soetero, who is always so positive about America and its citizens. In my opinion, what's wrong with America is that we elected an anti-American to be president- Twice! That indicates something deeply troubling about its citizens, and something dangerously unhealthy for the nation.
"Yes, MayBee-- really, in Wisconsin mousse is pronounced with an ow rather than an ou? Perhaps AA is making a joke we're not catching."
Yes. You're not catching an allusion to something in Rosemary's Baby. If I had made a longer clip, you would have heard it.
Ah, thanks! :-) I've never watched that movie, only seen snippets here and there. I occasionally tell myself, 'you should!', with respect to that and other significant pop culture events but, eh, perhaps next week. Am trying to listen to Schoenberg and those people lately: they're as much modernity as I can deal with for the time being.
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