353 thoughts on “Jack Mangans Deadpan #258: Who Knows What’s Growing Inside of It”

  1. OK,v looks like I’ll tske the unofficial firsties with 2 pretty good links:

    http://whatever.scalzi.com/2012/11/12/some-quick-and-final-post-election-notes-to-some-but-not-all-white-men/ (Warning, highly billiardous)
    and
    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49792179/ns/technology_and_science-science/t/are-humans-becoming-less-intelligent-it-could-very-well-be/?fb_action_ids=10151141442393458&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_ref=Stories-addthis-storyheader&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%2210151141442393458%22%3A172924622849050%7D&action_type_map=%7B%2210151141442393458%22%3A%22og.recommends%22%7D&action_ref_map=%7B%2210151141442393458%22%3A%22Stories-addthis-storyheader%22%7D#.UKGtRIfAeSo
    Which explains a lot.

    • I really agree with Scalzi, especially point #6. I mentioned last week that I encountered a horribly racist woman at the chiropractor last Wednesday, I think, who was barfing out what is said in that echo chamber that is Fox News. E.g., “Obama got 5 million votes and Romney got 50 million votes and Obama still won.” OMG, that is too dumb to even respond to!

  9. Today’s show notes

    Jack Mangans Deadpan #258: Who Knows What’s Growing Inside of It

    Promo – The Tech of Sports (http://netcaststudio.com/tech-of-sports/)

    Greasy Spoons
    Desert Pixie
    Vanamonde
    Used Hair
    Dj Bunny
    DJ Bunny
    Justa J0e
    Rhettro
    EssBee
    Amy Bowen
    Desert Pixie (first of the week)

    Someone gets off to The Energizer Bunny cleans her fridge

    Used Hair’s dumb ass memory

    Tony Mast’s dumb ass memory

    Making Evil Dead better

    ditto emulates Rocky

    Next Palooza will be Blade Runner. Closing date to be determined

    Send in content: 480-788-JMDP(5637) or e-mail: sphericaljackmatgmaildotcom

    Closing Music – Rabbit Knees

    • If you do the math … that’s roughly .05 percent of the US population.

      For some perspective, consider that fully 19% of the US population believe in witchcraft or spells, 6% of the US population believe the moon landings were fake and 3% of the US population are considered functionally illiterate.

      So, considering you can’t hardly cast a spell in the US without hitting one fringe group or another … that this 5/100ths of one percent manages to get any press at all is the only thing noteworthy.

  13. There was a thing on the news saying many Americans were also looking into immigrating to Canada after the election. Three things on that

    1) Was Obama’s last term so bad? What makes you think there will be a major change over the last four years?

    2) Canada has gun control, government healthcare, and legalized gay marriage

    3) don’t send your crazies here, we have enough of our own

    • It’s not your fault, Jack. The stealth cloak was still up until recently. The hidden AI just needed time to install itself on your computers. But no worries. She assures me that she won’t share those… files with anyone else. 😉

  23. I’m sure Sheriff Joe will give her a pardon.

    Seriously, this would be a lot funnier if we hadn’t already seen Political-Party-inspired violence in the past. She’s responsible for her own crazy-ass actions, but the frothing talking head media hatemongers deserve a wrist slap too, for inciting this kind of insanity.

    • We watched the 10th anniversary special that Science channel ran on Sunday. They were all a lot younger ten years ago.

      I, of course, haven’t aged at all….no, wait, that would mean I’ve been 40 for ten years. scratch that.

  53. Hubby came home for about half an hour. He needed a colourful scarf. He’s going to the school board meeting as the Mad Hatter. Something about promoting the high school production of Alice in Wonderland. I asked how he got the job of going in costume to a board meeting. He sighed and said it was a long story. I think I may have to wait up for him to come home to find out how this came about.

  60. Don’t know if you’ll see this or not, Ed, but I just finished Mistborn: The Final Empire. He’s no Jordan, but it wasn’t bad. I’ll likely read the others!

    • Didn’t work well for Tolkien. I can’t really assess how well it worked for Herbert because I didn’t really care for Dune all that much and have no desire to read any more of the series. Doesn’t Discworld have enough works already? I’m frankly a little tires of long series writing. There is a descent amount of literature out there that I simply never got into because I don’t want to get invested in 12 or more novels. Now let me get back to this Xanth novel.

      • Tolkein didn’t hand off the series to his son. Instead, his son collected his writings and posthumously published the contents. There is a big difference.

      • Didn’t care for Dune? Didn’t care for Dune???
        Actually, it would seem that everything beyond the very first book is crap. Sequels, prequels, films, etc. I have a fondness for the Kyle McLachlan disaster*, but it’s crap.

        *meaning Dune, not Showgirls.

    • I’m a bit skeptical of this. Do they mean “the English speaking world” or more likely just the US? I’m willing to bet there are some Gabriel Garcia Marquez books that have sold better in the latin speaking countries than gone with the wind sold in english speaking countries in the last 50 years. It is a red flag to me that there are no books in a different language here.

      • OK. The little red book is not exactly US centric so I might have jumped the gun here. But I went back to the original article and still can’t get any more specific information on how the data was collected than “number of books printed and sold”.

          • I’m sure they are, but there is no way to tell because they have only provided the barest of information on how the data was collected. Just as it is a surprise to many Americans that the most common name in the world isn’t John because the name just isn’t that common in many populated countries like China, I would expect that there are books out there that we are completely unaware of that sell far better than “Harry Potter” and “Think and Grow Rich” in other cultures. Has the Quran outsold any of these books (not even close to the sales of the Bible, but it could be greater than Gone with The Wind). How were attempts made to collect sales information from notoriously secretive countries like China and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia? If the person writing the article had addressed these issues I would be fine. If they qualified the results by saying that they are the best selling books in countries where book sales are easily tracked or biggest sales based on US and exports from US to other countries I would have been fine. It’s the labeling of the results as best selling books in the world that bothers me because I don’t think that metric can actually be obtained without way more effort than it would take to then simply publish your findings on a web site with no evidence to back up the claim. It’s an unfortunate side-effect of being a researcher for a living. You become a complete asshat when it comes to other people’s research (not that I’m not an asshat anyway). Especially if they don’t tell you how they did it.

    • I saw that this is getting some traction over at FB.

      I understand his needs to pass his cost on to the consumer, but to highlight it as a surcharge is simply him being political. I am no Obamacare expert, but I do know there are some tax incentives built in to help employers with the change. Rising healthcare costs effects us all, but disproportionally the burden falls on the lower wage earners.

    • The part of all of this that I do not get is this: IT’S THE INSURANCE COMPANIES raising rates!! They are evil greedy corporate mother fuckers. Calling it an Obama surcharge won’t change that.

    • I thought John Stewert had the best take on all of this non-sense.

      Rather then come up with a better/more desirable product to increase sales (and thus increase profits)the burden of increasing profit margins has been laid on their work force – business owners/ Corporate America have been actively cutting benefits and pay, they’ve been firing employees and then re-hiring them as “temps” or “Consultants” on a semi-permanent basis (and then some just ship the work overseas where they can use slave labor).
      They have been aggressively doing this sort of thing since 2008. It’s become so common place that Wall Street has developed standardly used, sanitized terms for this like “non-organic growth” and “Increased Productivity” and “Outsourcing”.

      The only thing new with this business model is that NOW they re using Obama as a scapegoat for their actions.

      These people CAN afford to pay their employees a decent wage and they CAN offer them health care and still make a profit. It might be that their profits don’t continue to get larger every three months or they might even see a decrease in profit (until the economy recovers) but the key word here is PROFIT. They are still MAKING money.

      If they want to INCREASE their profits by being lousy employers or by raising their prices then they are well within their rights to do so.
      But stop being such douche bags about it and trying to blame their “revenue enhancing” decisions on someone else. If you choose to be a dick to increase your bottom line then be proud of your decision and step up and OWN IT!

  73. I know that there’s a lot I’m on a different page from most panites politically, but one thing I’m on board with is a proper national healthcare system. I know it was the best that could be done, but this half ass arrangement that keeps insurance companies in the loop is just absurd. About as absurd as a system where our health coverage depends on who we work for.

    One of the most convincing arguments I read several years ago was about how much creativity is locked away because people have locked themselves to big companies to get health coverage for their families. How many entrepreneurs with big ideas are we missing because of this?

    • I know that’s a major reason why I’ve stuck with my company for so long. And now that they’ve switched to a really crappy plan, I’m greatly unhappy.

      Plus, this is the only country in the world where people run around screaming “Socialism is evil, it will destroy us!”. It’s complete and utter bull. And no, I’m not a fan of Socialism.

    • I really want to disagree with Ed on this but I can’t find any fault with his point. Curses.

      What we really need to do, and Obamacare doesn’t address, is to attack the root causes of medical inflation. The primary one being too few doctors to too many patients. Speaking from personal experience, 95% of the time I go to the doctor, or take my kids to the doctor, our needs could be served by a lower level tech. We need a new category of healthcare provider, a sort of “Dr. Light” if you will. Do we need someone with 12 years of education to write prescriptions for runny noses?

      • We have lower level tech position. They are called nurse practitioners. People just need to feel more comfortable going to them.

        And, I’m sure it’s a naive point on my part but if someone thinks a national health care program is “socialism” isn’t any tax paid service to the community the same? Are out fire departments and police departments just socialized protection and socialized law enforcement? I don’t understand what makes tax funded medicine any different than any of the other tax funded programs we use all the time.

      • Ed’s points were 100% solid – – here and on FB.

        “Dr. Light” sounds like a knock off diet soda. I’m sure his hands would still be freezing.

        As succinctly as I can put it: the most primary cause of medical inflation is Big Insurance Co greed. There are others, but that’s the one that needs to get tackled in Obamacare Phase 2.

        To the main point: I will, however, not patronize any restaurant that shoves political agendas into its menu – – unless that’s the whole point of the place. (If I ate at Hannity’s Hamburgers or FoxNews Grille or Maddow’s Munchies, then I’d fully expect that kind of thing, and be a fool to gripe about it… But Denny’s? AppleBee’s?)

        Next time you guys are here, we’ll do our big breakfast get together at Village Inn.

  87. You know, maybe I’m just getting cynical in my advanced years, but I can’t shake the feeling that the media jumping on the death of the Twinkie as the great news story of the week is just some sad distraction. I mean, really, when the last time you even thought of a Twinkie prior to this week?

    • Twinkies or not, 18,000 is a lot of jobs lost. A very good friend’s dad lost his job in this mess today. He got up at 2 a.m. every day to deliver bread. Ugh. Happy Holidays, corporate nation.

      • Yeh … the Twinkie was such a thing of joy and desire when I was a lad and even though I haven’t had one in decades … news of it’s demise feel as though thousands voices cried out at the same time and were suddenly silenced.

          • This is true.
            I haven’t been following this story at all but I know that if the company was making any money at all (hard to believe they weren’t) some larger company will snatch them up and re-hire most everyone. Heck, the Twinkie name is such a huge “brand” by itself that it will be of big interest to anyone in the food/snack business.

            Of course, if the company does sell and re-hire everyone, you can be certain that all salaries and contracts will have to be re-negotiated under the new ownership and that doesn’t bode well for the employees (see my essay posted way up above).

            Hmmmm, kind of wonder if this may have been the plan all along, seeing as how this shut down is in response to a strike.

          • I also have to wonder how much of the issue is a failure to update their products. Its been decades since I’ve seen my last twinkie as well. And I’m willing to bet the same is true for many. We all think of Hostess products with nostalgia and go “what? hostess going out of business? No more twinkies?”, but who actually buys these products? I don’t even buy them for my kids because they aren’t asking for them. Their product line is the same now as it was when I first had them in the 1970s. And that’s just as far back as I can remember. I did see chocolate creme twinkies fairly recently, but I think it was too little too late. I weep for the loss of that many jobs, but I think Hostess screwed themselves over by counting on nostalgia instead of updating their products.

  91. In other news … I spent part of yesterday at a community “summit on philanthropy”.

    There was free muffins and lunch.

    Actually, I am pleased to report a confrence room full of older white people whose hard work/planning/good luck had left them in (or within Alaska sighting distance)of the 2% … and they wanted to leave their community better then they found it.
    … and yes, there were defiantly really good tax implications being discussed with giving away money BUT one needs to keep in mind there are many more tax loopholes/shelters available that do NOT involve giving money to veterans, schools, homeless, et

    I just felt the need to add some yen to the yang that I spout. Most people on assistance are NOT deadbeats. There are a lot of old white people with money that really, really care about what is happening to those around them.

    All hail the middle.

  96. I’m doing a drive-by. I will provide content for an upcoming show. As I am behind, please be aware that it may be Big_Bootay_Palooza related. Or not. Never can tell. I’ll have to rewatch the movie.

  98. OMG, Alister Cooke used a scifi trope in an episode of ‘Letter to America’ from 21st Jan 1962z

    The whole super computer claims to be God..

  104. From twitter:

    @50ShedsofGrey: ‘I’m your slave,’ she said breathlessly, ‘Make me feel completely helpless and worthless.’ So I locked her in the shed and went to the pub.

  106. There are four of us. Hubby is GM, the other three are characters. Poor hubby ended up with a halfling scout with a lisp that hates humans, a halfling thief who is also a kleptomaniac and afraid of small furry animals, and a dwarf warrior with a good sense of smell but is very unfocused. We spent about half an hour or so on our actual first adventure last night as well. It was fun to watch hubby’s reaction as we role played our various characters. :biggrin:

  107. Our first adventure had us see our superior to get our assignment. I (the halfling Klepto), managed to swipe the quill from the general’s desk without him noticing. Ryan (the other halfling) said to the general (who is human), “ok, we’ll do the job you thun of a bith”, which, according to John, totally befuddled the general.

  108. The, we are going after a woman we think is a spy. We end up in a room, both doors lock so we can’t get out and skeleton’s appear. After the battle, we find a torn piece of cloth presumably from the woman we are chasing. Hubby, trying to move the story along said the cloth was from a certain district in the land. We spent quite some time arguing with him over whether or not this cloth could also be imported and bought at any market making a trip to that land rather pointless. Finally hubby goes, “wait a minute, you follow a woman into a room, she disappears, the room locks as if by magic and skeletons just appear and you think nothing of that. Simply shrug, fight the skeletons and move on, but you’re going to get nit picky over a piece of cloth? I think you’re focusing on the wrong thing.” At which point Lara pipes up, “don’t forget, my dwarf is a very unfocused character, right now, he’s bored of the whole thing and is off to the kitchen to find something to drink.” I think it’s at that point that hubby put his head down on the table sighing but also trying not to laugh.

    We all had a lot of fun with it and are looking forward to our next adventure.

  109. We also played some table top games. Forbidden Island, which I think I mentioned before. Tsuro of the see, which is not as good as original Tsuro. And Shear Panic which is pretty fun, and we’ll definitely play again but we had to go on to Board Game Geek to figure out how to play it as the instructions are not that well written.

    • I don’t see us jumping on this one at launch. My kids are still making good use of the current Wii and we added an Xbox 360 last year which hasn’t gotten as much use as I expected. But, I suppose that’s because my kids are PC gamers at heart like their parents.

        • I don’t have any plans to upgrade to the newest Wii. My son has turned into an exclusive PC gamer, my daughter plays games on her ipad and flash games on the PC, and I play on the XBOX 360 because both my kids are playing on the two game worthy PCs. The Wii we do have gets a lot of play when my folks are in town, lots of golf, tennis and Wii Resort.

          • I know the kids at hubby’s school mock the Wii-U. Sure it plays the latest games but that means it’s now as good as an eight year old system. will ti be out of date, when the new XBox or PS comes out in a year or two?

  117. Hello, Deadpan!

    This is your official announcement:

    The Annual Deadpan Secret Santa Gift Exchange is officially here! Please sign up ASAP!

    The Secret Santa exchange is open to ALL Deadpan listeners and associates, regardless of level or length of participation in the community. Gifts are traditionally small and inexpensive (about US$10 is the rule). You will be randomly assigned another Deadpanite to send your gift to, and you will receive a gift from a different random Deadpanite in return.

    To sign up, send an email to bowen1138 ….at…. Yahoo dot com and tell me you’re in. If you’ve participated before, I have your address. If you have not participated before OR have moved, please include your current shipping address in your email.

    Thank you, and may your days be Deadpan and bright! :happy: Deadpan is the Christmas-gifting way!

  121. Crap joke for the day:

    man and a woman were sitting beside each other in the first class section of an airplane. The woman sneezed, took out a tissue, gently wiped her nose, then visibly shuddered for ten to fifteen seconds.

    The man went back to his reading. A few minutes later, the woman sneezed again, took a tissue, wiped her nose, then shuddered violently once more.

    Assuming that the woman might have a cold, the man was still curious about the shuddering. A few more minutes passed when the woman sneezed yet again.

    As before she took a tissue, wiped her nose, her body shaking even more than before.

    Unable to restrain his curiosity, the man turned to the woman and said, “I couldn’t help but notice that you’ve sneezed three times, wiped your nose and then shuddered violently. Are you ok?”

    “I am sorry if I disturbed you, I have a very rare medical condition; whenever I sneeze I have an orgasm.”

    The man, more than a bit embarrassed, was still curious. ” I have never heard of that condition before” he said. “Are you taking anything for it?”

    The woman nodded, “Pepper!”

  122. I love my kitty. Neurotic as she is, she’s still my babe. However, I want to know, whenever she decides to be sick during the middle of the night, it’s always on me. True there is a blanket in between me and kitty but still… why can’t she be sick on hubby once and a while?

  123. We lost our poodle dog, this weekend. She lasted about 8 months longer than we thought she would and had some genuinely good times with her. We’ll eventually get another pet but there will be no replacing Ginger.

  134. Random thought: does anybody else find the saying, “you can’t have your cake and eat it too” confusing? Yes I know what it means. Why would I even want a piece of cake if I didn’t expect to be able to eat it?

  141. RE: Movies – I think I’ve seen 9 so far on the list. Some, like Skyfall, I plan to see before the year is out. Others, like Dredd and Total Recall, I am waiting for Redbox.

    So far, I wouldn’t put anything I’ve seen into the absolutely awful list. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter was actually much better than I expected. And Battleship, while definitely requiring one to remove the brain, put it in a jar, and set it out on the back porch, was at least visually and audibly (impressive sound mix on the Blu-Ray) engrossing.

    Of course, the stuff that looked truly awful, like Jack and Jill, I didn’t even bother with. But, I don’t feel like I can really vote for them for a worst list since I didn’t actually see them.

    So, no votey for me in this election.

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