Happy April Fool’s Day! Who needs jokes when we’ve got the real world.
This joker:
TIL!
Merriam-Webster defines ‘key bump’ after Cawthorn’s drug and orgy claims
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/03/31/madison-cawthorn-key-bump/?itid=hp_foryou
Russians fled Chernobyl with radiation sickness, says Ukraine as IAEA investigates
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/apr/01/russians-fled-chernobyl-with-radiation-sickness-says-ukraine-as-iaea-investigates
Pro tip(s) for summer vacays:
Have a great day!
Or… Just go camping. We do, for about a week a year, sometimes on a spot with just a fireplace and outhouse (we have kids). It does work well, because there is no cell phone service etc. (Moose river reservoir.)
I could never get away with the camping ruse. I’ve never worked anywhere that expected me to stay connected to the office while on vacation, but just in case I used to say, “and I’m going to be in (European country) and the WiFi over there is really spotty.” “Right, I guess it would be. Well, have fun and see you when you get back!” We parochial Americans. Such a sweet, simple people. I wonder how many people know that T-Mobile was developed by and is a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom.
Counterpoint: No, thank you.
I had to enforce the boundary when I was a manager. Not so much with them contacting me when I was on vacation (because they damned well knew better) but for them to not be constantly checking their email and doing other work shit when they were on vacation/day off/weekend/off the clock. I had a conversation with someone I used to manage a few years ago, who–like me–grew up with jobs which never offered benefits, so she had never taken a vacation. I’d gotten her started with taking three day weekends so she could get used to the idea of just not working on a weekday. Anyway, she told me yesterday that she’s taken three vacations in the past two years. I was very proud of her.
It’s nuts how so much management all the way to the top will deliberately screw up the planning and procedures of an operation, even to the point of blown deadlines, lost revenue and higher costs, just so they can maintain the illusion of control.
Given the choice between advance planning and a well oiled machine that can operate while people take vacations, or a dysfunctional operation which falls apart unless someone is checking messages at 3:00 am to put out a dumpster fire, they’ll always take option 2.
Every time I’ve managed someone, I always make sure I know how to do their jobs. And I always tell them, “It’s important for me to know this, because eventually you’re going to go on vacation, and I’m not going to call you.”
My very first boss had a rule: You don’t call me and I don’t call you. Something comes up, you figure it out, or table it until I get back. I’ll do the same.
Now I’m a worker bee again (getting paid more than when I was a manager–SUCKERS!) so I don’t give a fuck. But, my boss is a Very Good Boss who is all about making sure people take time off and disconnect when they do so.
My dad dragged the family camping and canoeing for over a decade for the summer time. Any time away from the office he said.
I got sent on Boy Scout camps and then as an adult went on various week long and/or weekend hiking trips.
I draw the line at winter camping though. I’ve frozen my ass off in disastrous Scout winter camps and had enough of that. Only way I’d ever endure a winter camp again was if I was in the military (because I was ordered to). Never again if I can. Still have some frostbite scars.
Let’s consult the expert, shall we?
New game kids!
Repug Coke Orgy Clue!
I’m going to guess Matt Gaetz with a key bump and key party in the Cloak Room.
Gonna assume that if Matt Gaetz is involved then we’re definitely talking underage.
I’ll say Gym Jordan with Ecstasy in the study.
Lindsey Graham with poppers in the restroom.
Don Jr with a mound of snow on the floor in the mens bathroom.
Let’s not forget the women. Marjorie Taylor Green with steroids in the gym.
Everything Trump touches … well, you know.
Just an update: Trump’s Social Network site is completely collapsing
Does anybody else think Catholics should maybe just stay away from children altogether?
Just me?
Pope Francis apologizes to Indigenous peoples for abuse at schools in Canada
Oh, Tennessee. It’s like you want to be Florida but you just can’t put the charm in crazy.
A Jan. 6 pastor divides his Tennessee community with increasingly extremist views
Turtle content. I wondered why Sheldon stopped listening to me.
Underwater noise causes hearing loss in turtles
In another sign that Mark Zuckerberg has lost his grip, Facebook was caught paying a right wing political astroturf company for a nationwide print media smear campaign against TikTok.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/03/30/facebook-tiktok-targeted-victory/
It’s as if McDonalds looked at bad sales among young people and decided the answer was to run a newspaper opinion page campaign against Popeyes, instead of worrying about its own food, service, and prices.
Never mind the latest unmasking of big tech’s libertarian BS — it’s always been a sham. How do you convince young people to move to Facebook with this kind of campaign slanted to an older demographic? Won’t parental disapproval help TikTok grow? Why do they think negative ads in the style of political campaigns are going to reassure investors that Facebook has faith in its products?
They’re idiots for thinking politicians getting riled up for a tech crackdown against one company won’t rebound against them too.
Zuckerberg’s top lieutenant Joel Kaplan has his fingerprints all over this, but Zuckerberg is too dumb and weak to see how many times Kaplan has failed him.
The article is a nice illustration of how astroturf works, by the way. Hacks like Bret Stephens and Thomas Friedman spend easily half of their workweek fielding pitches from PR outfits like Targeted Victory and coordinating with them on how to mesh with the rest of their campaigns.
These companies work overtime to coordinate messages, plant stories, and generate followup letters to the editor “oh that Bret Stephens, so smart and handsome too!” And 95% of pundits are too lazy and dull to conceive of any other way to operate except by being force fed.
I don’t think Zuckerberg has lost his grip. I think this is exactly what he wants Facebook to be — a right-wing megaphone that broadcasts crazy. It’s pretty obvious that’s where Zuckerberg’s sympathies lie. At this point, Facebook should just merge with Fox News.
I agree Zuckerberg is completely on board with Joel Kaplan’s right wing vision.
But he’s lost his grip because he and Kaplan have failed at rule #1 of PR — never let people know about the PR. This is only the latest super detailed look behind the curtain to hit the press recently.
One of the basic jobs of PR is to maintain the narrative of CEO as either a god or an illusion. Steve Jobs wasn’t nearly as involved in the creation of the iPhone as he was portrayed, but Apple PR squelched the role of other players. Meanwhile Sundar Pichai is deeply involved in the direction of Google, but their PR has successfully kept his name out of the limelight. And in both cases, nobody focuses on the PR operations that make this happen.
Zuckerberg is in the bad zone in between. He’s well known but also seen as adrift and at the mercy of others in his operation. And this piece is the latest example of how Joel Kaplan’s PR operation has helped cause more damage to Zuckerberg.
Good point. Always make sure the man behind the curtain stays there.
Sometimes, the kids are alright.
I have a FB account which I deeply regret because I hate FB with a passion initially because they’re mining my personal data but now because they’ve turned a couple of former friends into raging loons (one of them has brain damage) screaming about Qanon and bamboo ballots. I had to unfriend them.
As for the RW libertardian bullshit, I’ve seen too much at my time in Telco (electrical/software/it engineers tend to be the most infected by Randian bullshit in the engineering profession.) Usually the worst people I worked with were libertards. Some were brilliant assholes in the mold of Sheldon Cooper whose work was offset by feelings of punching them repeatedly in the face. Most were incompetent assholes whose non work/office politicking was made worse by wanting to punch them repeatedly in the face.
I helped destroy the career of one of the worst and have no regrets doing so (despite the childish moralizing of my housemate whose faux concern for the guy’s family. I have seen this former director give no concern for the families of those he outsourced or fired over the years and I just showed that shithead the same concern. I basically told my idiot housemate to shut the fuck up.)
Yeah, I forgot the engineer/right-wing connection and made a joke about Trump and raking forests the other day to an engineer (we had high fire danger that day). Oops.
@bluedogcollar
Forgive me if I am stepping out of bounds here but I don’t follow the reference to Brett Stephens and Thomas Friedman wedged in a comment about Facebook and TikTok?
To me, it kind of reads like a bit of a “shot” at Jake for mentioning them in previous posts? I don’t believe this to be the case, mind you, but if it is I think it’d be unwarranted on account of the fact that Jake went out of his way to make it clear that anything they say is more than questionable at best.
It is likely that I am reading way too much into this because I am so used to communicating with Jake on a personal level but I know he’d never intend to put forth the idea that Brett Stephens is actually worthy of any type of praise…or to be taken seriously at all…aside from a point he made that certain data lined up with something he said?
Or, perhaps more likely, you’re equating the FB/TikTok bit and Stephens/Friedman?
Whatever the case it didn’t seem like a natural fit with the first part of your comment the way the reference to Apple/Google in the following one did so I figured I was missing something and I’m hoping that it isn’t what it seemed like it might be for obvious reasons.
I have to say, I worked in a horrendous industry for time on/time off — journalists are notoriously awful at working a lot of extra hours and not shutting things down — but even the boss at my last paper was almost evangelical about if you take time off, take it off.
It shouldn’t have to be on the worker to say “my time is my time” but not only should Americans do it more, we’re 100% in the right no matter what job we’re doing.
And speaking of workers, HELL FUCKIN’ YEAH let’s unionize the shit out of Amazon: https://www.npr.org/2022/04/01/1090178347/amazon-staff-reject-union-in-alabama-yet-lean-toward-it-in-nyc
Wow, she went from one cult to another!
https://www.rawstory.com/ginni-thomas-lifespring-cult/
That video is incredible.
But it also kinda sounds like she was all in on right-wing idiocy even before that.
She should be selling Amway, not access to Pubes Thomas.
Actually, it sort of suggests that she’s a victim here. Thomas, a known sexual predator, latched on to somebody with major mental issues. Someone with a history of being programmed that he could control and manipulate and gaslight. I’m not going to excuse her actions, but it’s a pretty creepy scenario.
My theory also explains why she’s still around. I didn’t understand why Thomas didn’t just cut her loose. If there’s a history of abuse there, Thomas could be afraid that if he divorced her, she could go berzerk and start telling everyone. Same thing with Jan. 6. Thomas tried to cover it up to the limits of his ability, because he’s afraid she might get deposed and again, start spilling the tea.
The Premier of ONTARIO, folks: