Humor

Humor Is Subjective

I don’t what it is, but sometimes a thing will just grab me as hysterically funny. I will laugh way out of proportion to the funniness of it. Part of it is the way that humor can build. When you’re laughing, every subsequent joke seems even funnier. But sometimes a joke just strikes my brain funny and I think I might die.

I just encountered a prime example. Via Cracked’s humorous article on infomercials, I found these two lines about the Pasta Pro (that stupid pot with holes in it). From Cracked:

For our money, the cameo by cocksucker husband, who irritably taps his watch when his wife drops the pasta, is the clear winner. The expected “Where’s my dinner bitch?” comment is never uttered, but it is practically swirling around on screen in capitalized letters like tiny angry-man sugar plums.

Also, on top of saving your marriage, the amazingly versatile Pasta Pro fits both gas and electric stoves.

You try to pull that shit with a regular pot, the bastard’s likely to burst into flame. You won’t have time to worry about that, though, as the fierce blows rain down from your husband’s belt.

So that set me up. Then this knocked me down from the infomercial product review message board:

Shitty Pot, Great Entertainment Value

7/17/2008 – Jenn of Alberta, Canada writes:
My boyfriend got this pot as a gift. He used it once and when he went to drain the pasta, the lid stuck to the pot and wouldn’t come off. He was very hungry. Instead of throwing out the pot, he decided that he was going to have some [] pasta whether or not the pot was going to cooperate. He eventually took it outside with a baseball bat and smashed it in. Not surprisingly, it didn’t take too long considering how [] the pot was to begin with. Two stars! One for the crappy pot and one for the strange looks he got from the neighbours that day.

I literally could not finish that comment the first time because I was laughing so hard. It made me have to go the bathroom. It’s not that funny, really. You probably don’t find it funny at all. But for some reason, it struck me at the right moment and put me in near hysterics.

This has become less common as I get older. When I was a kid and camping out, we could recite dumb jokes that, when combined with copious farting, would nearly result in suffocation. Such events are rare and memorable now. They were common then. It’s nice to watch my daughter get to the stage where I can make her laugh uncontrollably just by making her rubber ducks dance together.

Update: Also, is it just me? Or do the models in these infomercials seem to spend an inordinate amount of time holding the product in front of their chest? If I had to think of a theme for infomercials, it would be, “She’s not wearing a bra.”

'Culture'

Grads

Megan McArdle and Dan Drezner ask whether undergrad or grad school forms more of your character.

For me, it was definitely grad school. Part is that I was in a smaller tighter social circle — most of whom are still in my profession. I also shaped my career, which is a bigger influence on your life than how much gin you drank one spring break.

But the larger part is that I spent most of my undergrad years overcoming social awkwardness and enjoying being out of my parents’ house (i.e., wine, women and song — well, at least wine). I was much more serious about my career in grad school — I had an actual direction. Ironically, this freed up more time for having fun, reading classic novels and enjoying life. I even had a romantic life in grad school!

'Culture'

Defending Paris

In reading a review of Paris Hilton’s awful movie, I came across this good point:

But the real reason this film was savaged by critics is because Paris Hilton is the poster child for our current tabloid-blogosphere-TMZ-fueled obsession with the inane details of celebrities’ social lives. At the same time, it’s become hip among the more, shall we say, sanctimonious bloggers and critics to make knee-jerk declarations that the world is slowly getting dumber, to fondly reminisce about some golden intellectual age that never existed, and to piece together half-hearted comparisons between contemporary American culture and the fall of the Roman Empire. To those people, Paris Hilton represents the End of Western Civilization As We Know It.

Eh. To me, she’s just a vapid socialite who got famous for being famous. Nobody really thinks this a new thing, do they? I mean, honestly, what the heck did Edie Sedgwick ever do, really? Why does everyone know the name Charo? Why the hell was Anna Nicole Smith famous, again? And what, exactly, has Carmen Electra ever done with her life?

People act like it’s a new, shocking, outrageous thing that someone with no perceptible talent became a household name. But if anything, Paris Hilton just breathed new life into an ages-old phenomenon. The only thing that’s arguably different these days is that fame has become more pervasive, as people demand more and more information about celebrities at their fingertips. People complain that Paris and her ilk are always in our faces, and yet, her name is consistently one of the most popular internet search terms. Come now, Paris didn’t make you type her name into Yahoo, did she?

I’m sure back in Ancient Rome, the people followed the adventures of spoiled socialite Lutetia Villa just as ardently. We always seem to have a place for pretty but useless people.

I will add this in defense of Paris. The video she did on energy policy for her “presidential campaign” was quite funny. And she made more sense than the actual candidates.

Healthcare

Medco Healthco

Just to show that stupid ideas about healthcare come from the private sector too, the head of Medco wants cookbook medicine for everyone:

Dave Snow, CEO of the big pharmacy-benefits manager Medco, is making the rounds to tout his ideas on health reform, the topic of the day with Barack Obama about to take to oath of office. Snow stopped by Health Blog HQ and told us he likes an idea that HHS nominee Tom Daschle has been kicking around: a Federal Reserve for the health-care system.

Snow said the time has come for doctors to follow set protocols on how to treat patients, and to be paid based on whether they do it. Basically, ‘If X, then do Y,’ and ‘If Y, then do Z,’ sort of stuff. Snow concedes the public doesn’t trust the private sector to come up with these kinds of rules.

As opposed to how we trust our government.

So he wants some smart folks to get together in an “apolitical” body like the Fed, and do it themselves.

Apolitical? Apolitical? In Washington? And I thought I was naive. I wonder if this apolitical body will be throwing lots of money at Medco.

What is it about certain people that they think of government as some sort of benign, objective, infinitely fair entity? Does no one appreciate that when buying and selling are controlled by politics, the first things to be bought and sold are politicians? Does no one appreciate that even when our overlords’ intention are benign, they can still get it wrong?

I mean, really. Saying healthcare should be run like the Federal Reserve Board? Has this idiot not been paying attention to the mortgage collapse?! Did he miss the double-digit inflation of the 70’s? What the hell?

“I’m fine with this big, national board creating this standard,” Snow says.

Well, I’m not. Snow is buying into the biggest misconception kicking around healthcare reform circles — that doctors diagnose patients by taking symptoms, looking them in a great big book and giving a prescribed course of medicine.

But as I’ve noted about a million times, symptoms are not always clear. And a course of medicine can not be set in stone. Some patients tolerate certain courses of treatment better than others. But Dave Snow — and many politicians — apparently think that course of treatment are best prescribed out of a Washington office in a one-size-fits-all fashion. So you can look forward to uniform treatment. Also more complications, more needless deaths, more “medical errors”, more expense and less freedom.

Jesus, is this the quality of CEO we have these days? No wonder our economy is collapsing.

Of course, with his background, arrogance and ignorance, he’ll be the perfect person to be tapped for a health care reform committee to show Obama’s support in private industry. The press will laud his appointment as showing “bipartisanship” and “listening to every voice” (except that of the doctors and patients). Apparently, having industry insiders set public policy is good when it’s liberal public policy.

And everyone will miss that he’s dumber than a bag of hammers.

Actually, I don’t think he’s dumb. I think he’s scum. Critics of the free market never seem to grasp that big business hates the free market. Dave Snow does not want doctors making their own decisions and deciding to prescribe cheap medication or no medications to their patients. Under the guise of “reform”, he wants to politicize every diagnosis in America so that a medical company — his medical company — can make sure that the money flows their way.

'Culture'

Speech Wars

Marc Ambinder tips us to this site, where you can check the frequency of words used in inaugural addresses. “Non-believers”, “muslims” and “data” were words used for the first time by Obama today. The first one really jumped out at me as it’s the first time I can recall that a President has acknowledged atheists (I’m not one, incidentally, but I play one on the internet).

It’s a fun tool to play with. Something interesting I found: “God” barely shows up at all in speeches until Lincoln and hits its peak under Reagan. “Slaves” and “slavery” were basically unsaid until Lincoln. Bush was the most prominent user of “freedom” and “liberty”, ironically enough. “Security” peaked with Truman. Obama only said change once, far less than Clinton, Johnson or Taft. So apparently, Taft was change we could believe in before Obama was. Who knew?

Still waiting for someone to say “suckers”.

Sports

Cowardice In Review

Earlier this year, I dinged ESPN’s experts for making lame and unimaginative picks for the NFL season. I pointed out that they basically picked the same teams to make the playoffs this year that made it last year whereas only half of playoffs teams repeat from year to year. If you’re going to be wrong, at least be wrong with some style. As stupid as picking Cleveland to win the AFC would have been, at least it would have been entertaining. Picking Dallas to win the NFC — as most did — was both wrong and boring.

Let’s see how they did with their ultra-safe conservative picks.

They unanimously picked New England to win the AFC East. Had Brady not gotten injured, they probably would have been right. The Pats just missed.

Twelve picked Pittsburgh to win the AFC north. Right again. Four picked Cleveland which was … um … really wrong.

Ten picked Indy to take the AFC south with six taking Jacksonville. Indy was a wild card, so I’ll give them points for that. Jacksonville was a dreadful disappointment.

Everyone picked San Diego to repeat as AFC West champ. They were right but barely.

Only 5 out of 16 analysts picked Tennessee to even make the playoffs. Not one picked Baltimore or Miami. Excluding the Ravens and Dolphins seemed quite reasonable four months ago. But the reason analysts are paid money, supposedly, is to see the things that we ordinary clods don’t. Not one analyst looked at Parcell’s record or Baltimore’s defense and said, “Hey! Here’s a crazy tought…!

But so far, so good. The analysts correctly picked SD, Indy and Pitt to make the playoffs and some of them had Tennessee. I’ll cut some slack for not getting the division and wild car winners just right. Let’s give the analysts 3.5 out of 6 picks correct.

Now we get to the NFC, where it gets really fun.

Fourteen analysts picked Dallas to win the NFC East. In fact, Dallas was touted at the beginning of the season as the probable Super Bowl winner. Dallas melted down in a game Greg Easterbrook called the worst he’d ever seen. Injuries played their part but egos played a bigger and foreseeable one. Their collapse should have been especially obvious to those with insider information like, um, paid analysts.

The analysts split the NFC North between Green Bay and Minnesota. Half-right.

The NFC South was given to New Orleans on 15 ballots. Eeesh.

The NFC West was given to Seattle on 14 ballots. Oops. I chided two analysts for picking Arizona to win that division. So that’s me being dumb.

Of the six NFC playoff teams, Philadelphia and New York got a lot of picks as wild cards, Arizona and Carolina got three picks, Atlanta got none. We’ll count Philly and New York as correct picks by the analysts. With half-credit for tapping Minnesota to take the NFC North, that’s 2.5 out of 6 picks right for the analysts.

In other words, they got 6/12 picks right. The breakdown, just counting correctly called playoff teams — without any distinction between wild card and division winners — reveals the tremendous groupthink that dominated ESPN’s preseason picks:

Chadiha: 6/12
Clayton: 6/12
Graham: 4/12
Green: 4/12
Joyner: 6/12
Kuharsky: 6/12
Mosley: 6/12
Paolantonio: 5/12
Pasquarelli: 6/12 (bet he boasts about picking Arizona!)
Sando: 7/12
Seifert: 6/12
Walker: 5/12
Wickersham: 3/12 (that’s what you get for being bold, I guess)
Williamson: 6/12
Williamson II: 4/12
Yasinskas: 6/12

I praised Wickersham for making his picks interesting. But I wouldn’t be too embarrassed if I were him. The guys who went conventional didn’t do much better.

I’ll spare the analysts the embarrassment of reviewing their Super Bowl picks. Wait a minute, no I won’t:

NFC Champ: Dallas (12), New Orleans (2), Philly (1), Seattle (1)
AFC Champ: San Diego (8), New England (5), Indy (2), Jacksonville (1)

Not one analyst got even one conference champ right. Mike Sando, who got 7/12 picks right, was the only one to even pick a team that made the conference title game. In fact, he was the only analyst to pick, as NFC champ, a team that even made the playoffs.

Now, my picks weren’t much better. I got 3/12 right, taking dives on Jacksonville, Cleveland, Green Bay, Seattle, Dallas and New Orleans. That’s what I get for reading everybody else’s picks before I make mine.

But I’m not paid to do this. I don’t have exclusive insider information. I don’t live and breath football. These guys do.

I don’t mean to pick on ESPN’s analysts, really. I just think the whole exercise of predicting the season is silly. And, given the perfunctory way the analysts seem to approach this exercise, I think they know how dumb it is.

Previewing the season is another thing entirely. If someone writes an article that talks about what team they think will win the NFC, what teams could play spoiler, what teams could be dark horses — and explains their reasoning — that’s fun and interesting. That’s why I buy Football Prospectus ever year. So I know what to look for.

But these long tables of picks that ESPN loves to run — in all sports — are just boring. No analysis. No insight. Just conservative picks that are about as good as throwing darts at a board. When Dallas was tapped by 12 of 16 experts to make the Super Bowl, that made them no more or less likely to actually do it. So what’s the point?

Politics

Kids In The Factory

I have to credit to a liberal when he acknowledges reality:

Nicholas Kristof writes a depressing column about Cambodian kids who spend their days picking through giant heaps of garbage seeking usable scraps and dreaming of the day when they might be able to work in a sweatshop. I think it’s wrong to say that all consideration of international labor standards is merely aimed at keeping people stuck on the trash heap, but it’s a valuable reminder about the generally limited ability of just saying “no” to things to accomplish what people want. Part of the reason sweatshops exist and attract laborers is that life on the garbage heap is even worse, as is the life of a third world subsistence farmer. If you want to improve things, you need to actually be expanding the set of feasible options, not just arbitrarily closing down one path. And this happens in a variety of fields. Some neighborhoods in DC seem to have the idea that if they put tight restrictions on opening new chain stores or bars and restaurants that this will magically conjure up a diverse mom-and-pop economy. In practice, you get empty storefronts; crowded, mediocre bars and restaurants; and people driving to chain stores in the suburbs.

In both cases, there’s nothing wrong with the objective. But it’s a mistake to think that purely by vetoing stuff you can force the kind of positive action you want. To raise actual labor conditions in the third world, we need to create more prosperity and more economic opportunity not just say “no” to particular forms of bad conditions.

This is the argument that libertarians have been making for decades. My particular favorite lesson on this subject was when the libs got children banned from the textile industry in Bangladesh. The children went back to the sex trade.

'Culture'

Survive

The dramatic crash into the Hudson today (about which I wrote at Right Thinking) got me to this article in Time about survival, panic and Rick Rescorla. A must-read.

The most dramatic thing that jumps out is that people respond better to crisis with training. For example, all those fire drills you did in school actually do result in better responses to real-life fires. In the absence of prior knowledge or training, people tend to freeze.

I’ve read similar about the Holocaust, how Jews would just stand there and get shot or walk calmly into gas chambers because they simply had no mental apparatus for dealing with what was happening to them.

When I get on a plane, I actually look around for an exit and think about what I’ll do if there is a crash. I think I’ll be doing that a little more seriously from now on.

And doing fire drills when the family gets older.

Astronomy, Sports, Mathematical Malpractice, Whatever Else Pops Into My Head