Crazy Eddie's Motie News: Wonkette

Showing posts with label Wonkette. Show all posts

Friday, April 24, 2020

Comments from the ninth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News for Flashback Friday

Happy Flashback Friday! I told my readers "Stay tuned for another of these retrospectives tomorrow" at the end of Alignment charts from the back catalog for Throwback Thursday with music by the Harp Twins. Since yesterday's tomorrow is today, it's time to follow through with the three most commented on entries of the ninth year of this blog.

Wonkette reacts to its Media Bias Chart placement, an update to 'A comparison of two measures of media bias shows readers and viewers respond to both ideology and quality' from April 4, 2020 had 12 comments, the most comments on an entry posted during the blogging year. I suspect most of the commenters came from Wonkette and Crooks and Liars. Add that to being the fourth most read entry posted last year, as I described in Explaining the Media Bias Chart, a popular topic of the past two years of Crazy Eddie's Motie News. Once again, thanks, Infidel!

Entertainment for the sixth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News from April 23, 2017 tied for the most comments during the posting year with 12 because of a series of persistent spammers. I recommend it to my readers just for the comedy value of some of the most inept spammers in the history of the blog. The entry currently has 23 comments, including nine from 2017, which placed it third for the year, so it missed being mentioned in Pins, comments, shares, and likes for the seventh year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News by one comment. Darn!

Company Man on JCPenney's decline updates tales of the Retail Apocalypse for the eighth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News from April 18, 2020 had 11 comments, the second most comments on an entry posted during the blogging year. This continues the trend of entries about the Retail Apocalypse eliciting a lot of comments, something I noted in last year's review of the most commented entries, Shopko liquidating, a tale of the Retail Apocalypse. Here's to posts about the Retail Apocalypse continuing to engage my readers!

As I was writing this, I wondered if I should also select the best comments from my readers for this post. That's not going to happen today. First, I really have to get to work (working from home is still work) and that would take too much time. Sorry. Second, I turn interesting comments into posts anyway, so I don't need to do that here. Instead, I'll just thank the commenters I listed in Statistics for the ninth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News, Infidel753, Bukko Boomeranger, Nebris, K-Dog, Paul W., Ranch Chimp, Lady M., jkl, and even my right-wing troll, Ed. You are better than a spammer.

I close with someone who was inspired to do something creative with her comments, Madilyn Bailey, who composed I Wrote a Song Using Only Your Comments!

I get soooooo many comments every day and you guys are quite creative so I decided to make a song out of them :) Madilyn Bailey

That was fun and I am now a fan.

I plan on posting two more of these retrospectives, one about Twitter on April 30th for Throwback Thursday and another in May about Pinterest to conclude the series. I doubt I will post the latter next Friday, as that is May Day and I already have something planned for that, so watch for it on May 7. In the meantime, stay tuned for something about the COVID-19 pandemic tomorrow. Back to reality, even if I'm in an "I can't be all DOOM all the time" mood.

Previous posts in this series.

Previous retrospectives about comments and likes.

Friday, April 3, 2020

Explaining the Media Bias Chart, a popular topic of the past two years of Crazy Eddie's Motie News

Happy Flashback Friday! Yesterday, I mentioned that I changed the topic of Record unemployment claims and coronavirus accelerating existing retail trends update tales of the Retail Apocalypse for the ninth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News and explained what I had in mind originally in a footnote.

It would have been an update to Wonkette reacts to its Media Bias Chart placement, an update to 'A comparison of two measures of media bias shows readers and viewers respond to both ideology and quality', but I'm saving that for tomorrow. Stay tuned.

I'll cover how this entry got its page views over the jump, but first I'm examining how the Media Bias Chart works. I begin with Newsy's Political media's bias, in a single chart from 2018.

Vanessa Otero set out to rank an ever-growing partisan media landscape, with the belief that an informed public is a better public.

In this video, Vanessa Otero mentioned a revised version of the Media Bias Chart. In Ad Fontes Media Inc.'s Intro to the Media Bias Chart Definitions and Methodology, she explains how the most recent version of the Media Bias Chart works.

If you've seen the Media Bias Chart and wanted to know how we put it together here's a thorough discussion about it. Ad Fontes Media Founder and CEO Vanessa Otero goes over concepts she covers in her public talks.

Of course, all stories these days are being examined through the lens of the coronavirus pandemic and the Media Bias Chart is no exception. Watch Polarization of Coronavirus Stories to see how.

We'll go through examples of news stories from over the past few weeks that show how coverage of a virus quickly turned into differing left-right narratives in the United States

If you watched all the videos, congratulations! You now have a good education in media literacy.

Follow over the jump for how Wonkette reacts to its Media Bias Chart placement, an update to 'A comparison of two measures of media bias shows readers and viewers respond to both ideology and quality' earned its page views.

Meyers and Colbert preview Episode 3, Season 4 of 'The Worst Wing' — the impeachment trial begins

I concluded Meyers, Colbert, and Noah take closer looks at impeachment moving to the Senate and Parnas testimony to begin season 4, episode 2 of 'The Worst Wing' by telling my readers "That's it for Episode 2 of 'The Worst Wing.' Episode 3 should begin next week when the impeachment trial in the Senate really gets going. Stay tuned." Now that MLK Day is passed, it's time to get back to work. Both Seth Meyers and Stephen Colbert wasted no time by previewing the episode, AKA this week in the Trump Administration and campaign, and its plot about the impeachment trial beginning in earnest.

Late Night with Seth Meyers may air later, but it uploaded Trump Prepares for Impeachment Trial After Lev Parnas Bombshell: A Closer Look to YouTube first.

As he faces only the third Senate impeachment trial in history, the President is desperately trying to soothe his ego and pretend he doesn’t know the key players in the scandal.

Seth's segment looks like the openings of many shows that air weekly, which begin with the narration "Previously on 'The Worst Wing...'" and then show a series of clips from previous episodes that bear on tonight's show. It's a recap, not a preview, but it prepares the viewers for what they are about to watch.

On the other hand, Stephen Colbert's monologue, Trump's Legal Team Insists That 'Abuse Of Power' Is Not Impeachable, does preview how the week in Washington is likely to begin.

President Trump's lawyers hit the Sunday political shows to push the idea that there should be no impeachment trial because the abuses of power Donald Trump is accused of are not technically crimes.

First, a bunch of "vengeful zombies" is on the nose. As someone who blogs about zombies, I appreciate the image. Second, Trump's hiring Dershowitz and the rest of his legal team because they perform well on television reminds me that I wrote "Trump isn't staffing an administration; he's casting a reality show." This even extends to his defense team, which Wonkette lampooned in Let's Meet Donald Trump's All-Star Impeachment Defense Team Of ARE YOU F*CKING KIDDING ME?* I am already finding them entertaining, in a comic book/James Bond supervillain kind of way. Good for them, but bad for the republic, that they have a jury in the Senate who will likely be receptive to what passes for their arguments.

Stay tuned, as the episode has just gotten underway. I'm sure I'll be back with more recaps from comedians and maybe a serious news source or two as the week goes on. In the meantime, here's a reminder of where I got the meme "The Worst Wing."

*Yes, I know Wonkette is biased, as I noted in Wonkette reacts to its Media Bias Chart placement, an update to 'A comparison of two measures of media bias shows readers and viewers respond to both ideology and quality', but they are both perceptive and funny.

Thursday, April 4, 2019

Wonkette reacts to its Media Bias Chart placement, an update to 'A comparison of two measures of media bias shows readers and viewers respond to both ideology and quality'

I left off this series by telling my readers "I plan on resuming this series on April 4th with a retrospective about the most read entries covering media bias." That's today, so it's time to fulfill my promise by updating A comparison of two measures of media bias shows readers and viewers respond to both ideology and quality, the third most read entry during the eighth year of the blog.

Of all the stories I could have used to follow up on this entry, which was the last one to enter the all-time top ten, the rating of Wonkette is by far the funniest. Ad Fontes Media, which produces the Media Bias Chart, placed Wonkette on the chart in September 2018, one month after I posted the entry. Wonkette was not pleased and had pointed things to say about its placement.

Here at Wonkette, we often make #jokes in our headlines and say things that are not literally true for humor purposes, and when we do that it's pretty fucking spelled out, honestly. For instance, when we wrote that Pat Robertson beat up Hurricane Florence with his Bible and now Hurricane Florence is dead, we do not expect Ms. Otero to literally believe the hurricane is gone because Robertson beat it up!

Shorter Wonkette: Ad Fontes Media has no sense of humor. I've seen that before.

I'm not sure how Wonkette would react to being called a bunch of evil clowns. They would probably agree about the clown part, but maybe not the evil, although it would depend on the writer. I'm sure some of them would take it as a badge of honor.

Back to Wonkette's reaction.

Wonkette is not to the left of Jacobin. In fact, Jacobin would probably tell you that their own selves, verrrrry self-righteously. We are also not to the left of The Intercept.
...
I would agree we are 'nonsense damaging to discourse' but we're HYPERPARTISAN LEFT not EXTREME LEFT and we do NOT BELONG IN MISLEADING, we belong in EXTREME/UNFAIR INTERPRETATION OF THE NEWS.

In other words, "Yeah, we're biased, but not that biased!" According to their own view of their site, it belongs on that chart next to Daily Kos, not where it is the the left of Jacobin (I agree, that's silly) and just above Patribotics (that's insulting).

Ad Fontes Media responded to Wonkette's reaction.

The main reasons for Wonkette’s low quality placement are that in our ranking methodology, highly unfair characterizations of political opponents, such as ad hominem attacks, name calling, and foul language result in low scores for quality and high scores for bias—even if it’s for humor.

I see they object to this. I am not calling them “fake news.” That term is not on the chart. Note that the category they are in for quality is “propaganda/ contains misleading info,” which is an “and/or” category. That is, the category is propaganda OR misleading. My ranking categorized them as “propaganda” because its articles get such high scores in the “unfairness instances” metric on the article grading rubric. Propaganda is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as “information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view.” Many Wonkette headlines are also misleading—for example, though the headline says otherwise, the chart does not say it is “fake news,” and, it is ranked meaningfully higher than Louise Mensch’s blog, Patribotics. However, Wonkette’s articles can be categorized more often as “propaganda” than “misleading.”

That was Ad Fontes Media's justification of its placement of Wonkette. What about Wonkette's defense that it's all a joke?

“It’s funny/it’s just a joke/it’s “clever snark”

This is true. Their writing is hilarious, especially as viewed through the lens of other liberal, internet savvy, politically astute readers who love a sick burn. However, things that are funny can also be unfair at the same time. So insults, ad hominem attacks, curse words, and name calling, WHILE VERY FUNNY, are still unfair means of persuasion. We categorize several rhetorical devices and statements as unfair in our rankings. A general guideline for what counts as “unfair” are 1) practices not in accordance with journalism ethics and writing style guides and 2) types of information that would not be admissible in court according to rules of evidence. I’ve written more on the “unfairness instances” metric in this previous post.

You may not be convinced that funny insults make a source low quality (just merely biased, you may concede), especially if you like and agree with them. If you like Wonkette and the names it calls Republicans and Trump, consider what you would think of the quality of a source on the right if it regularly called Hillary Clinton a bitch or a hag or worse. Also consider what moderate or slightly conservative readers would think of the quality of Wonkette’s stories in terms of how persuasive they are to them.

Ad Fontes Media then goes on from Wonkette to all kinds of political humor.

I admit it was my subjective decision to have that underlying premise, but I submit that this type of content only serves to reinforce one’s existing beliefs and alienate the other side, and is therefore, highly polarizing. There are certainly lots of sources that do this: for example, John Oliver, Bill Maher, and other evening comedy shows also use pretty cruel humor. There is an audience for it because it is cathartic. There is an important place in our discourse and democracy for humor—we need to have the freedom to be able to make fun of our leaders. But to the extent people rely on it for 1) news ( i.e., fact reporting) and 2) takes on the news (i.e., analysis/opinion), I think that kind of content is highly polarizing, and thus, extremely damaging.

As support for the proposition that it is damaging, I point to the state of our country’s current discourse and the resulting election of our current president.

I’m not saying these sources have no merit. Humor has purpose. I watch these shows. I’ve read lots on Wonkette. But to the extent people rely on these for news, I argue they should not rely on them, and to the extent these sources try to fill the space where news is, they do damage.

That's a sobering thought. It won't stop me from using John Oliver, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, Trevor Noah, or Samantha Bee to comment on the news, but I will be more cautious about doing so when I could use a more serious news source.

Follow over the jump for how this entry gained its page views, along with a story about how entertainment media shapes our biases as well plus the first appearance of the Media Bias Chart on this blog.

Trump-Pence: TP for Cornholio's bunghole

When I last mentioned ~~The Penguin~~ The Donald, I wrote that he was worse than George Wallace. That written, I was hoping his pick for Vice President would provide more entertainment than Wallace's running mate Curtis LeMay. In particular, I commented and repeated "please, let it be either Gingrich or Palin--the laughs will keep coming all the way to Election Day!" Newt Gingrich was in the running as was Chris Christie, but as the following clip from Stephen Colbert shows, Mike Pence got the nod instead.

Time to check your Vice-Presidential fantasy league. If you picked Mike Pence, you might be a winner.

Colbert had so much fun with Pence as Trump's VP pick that he opened his monologue the next day with America's Got Mike Pence Fever!

Excitement about Trump's running-mate announcement has spread like a contagion. The main symptom of Pence Fever: Knowing who Mike Pence is.

I knew who he was, but I have never blogged about him before.* Time for a Mike Pence label.

The hilarity continued when Trump's campaign released its new logo incorporating Pence as its pick. Legal Insurrection, Huffington Post, and Wonkette all had field days documenting the hilarious reactions to the unfortunate graphic design. My favorite was one that captured the first thought I had when I saw the logo.

For those of you who don't get the joke, here's a video demonstrating it.

*Snork* Now I know what to call Mike Pence--Cornholio!

Now I've found the hilarity in Mike Pence as Trump's running mate. It almost makes up for Gingrich not being on the ticket--almost. Let's see if Cornholio can provide more comedic inspiration between now and November.

ETA: Raw Story just reported "After a day of ridicule for a poorly designed Trump/Pence campaign logo that launched a thousand memes, the Trump campaign disappeared the design from their official website overnight." Well, that was quick.

*Nor have I blogged about his most notorious act as Indiana Governor, signing Indiana Senate Bill 101, titled the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. That was actually perfect for me, because it was about social justice, drum corps, and gaming. Yes, really. Maybe I should write about it. Better late than never.

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

Bill Kristol's bad joke

I made an aside about Bill Kristol in 2016 could be a good year for minor party candidates.

The Atlantic wrote There's Still Time for a Serious Third-Party Presidential Run. Yes, if it's the Libertarians or Greens, who will have ballot access in a majority of states; the Libertarians might have ballot access in all of them. No, if it's William Kristol's quixotic crusade to draft someone like Romney as an Establishment alternative to Trump; the deadline to get a true independent on the ballot in Texas has already passed. Besides, any idea Kristol favors is likely to be a bad one.

Earlier this month, Kristol proved me right when his search turned up--David French?

Over Memorial Day weekend, Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard hinted that anti-Trump forces were poised to mount a major candidate to run as an independent. Last week, news broke that the candidate Kristol had in mind was French, a writer for the National Review who served in Iraq and was awarded a Bronze Star.

Really? He couldn't get Jon Huntsman? Fortunately, that news turned out to be too bad to be true.

In an article posted on the National Review’s website Sunday night, French said he opposes both Trump and Hillary Clinton but determined after “serious study” that he would not be the right candidate for the job.

“[G]iven the timing, the best chance for success goes to a person who either is extraordinarily wealthy (or has immediate access to extraordinary wealth) or is a transformational political talent. I’m grateful for the opportunity to serve my country, and I thank God for the successes I’ve had as a lawyer and a writer, but it is plain to me that I’m not the right person for this effort,” he wrote.

Heath Ledger's Joker best summarizes my reaction to both announcements: and I thought my jokes were bad.

For more laughs, read Wonkette on the subject.

As for Kristol, he should give up on his quixotic quest, as I wrote in CNN and MSNBC interview Libertarian candidates William Weld and Gary Johnson.

[William] Weld running with Johnson [is] a very serious ticket should the Libertarians actually choose both. They are serious about being the alternative to Trump and whoever he picks (please, let it be either Gingrich or Palin--the laughs will keep coming all the way to Election Day!) Too bad neither will meet the approval of William Kristol; the Libertarians are insufficiently hawkish and interventionist for his taste. He'd be better off with Hillary Clinton, but he'll never admit it. No wonder liberals call him "Captain Always Wrong."

Well, he isn't always wrong; he's right in this tweet: "Official position of the leadership of the Republican Party: Trump is an inexcusable bigot, and Trump must be our next president." Even a stuck clock is right twice a day. My advice is to wait another 12 hours to listen to him again.

Friday, November 6, 2015

Doctor Carson and his Amazing Technicolor Labcoat

Dr. Ben Carson has finally said something outlandish enough that it induced me to remark on it. I'll let Wonkette have the honors of explaining: Surprise, Dr. Ben Carson’s Latest Pyramid Scheme Involves Actual Pyramids.*

My own personal theory is that Joseph built the pyramids to store grain. Now all the archeologists think that they were made for the pharaohs’ graves. But, you know, it would have to be something awfully big if you stop and think about it. And I don’t think it’d just disappear over the course of time to store that much grain.
Carson, of course, is referring to the well-known biblical account of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, in which a dream warns Joseph, held as a slave by the Pharaoh, to stockpile grain during a period of plenty to tide Egypt over during a seven-year famine, saving the grateful nation and inspiring a musical treatment by Andrew Lloyd Webber, which is why the Egyptians worshipped Cats. And to Carson, it’s obvious the huge granaries for that project would still have to be around, since everything in the Bible actually happened, like Noah’s Ark.

I guess Dr. Carson accepts the following advice, whether it comes from the Bible, folklore, or Andrew Lloyd Webber.

After all, it made the character of Potiphar from the Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat film rich.

Starring Maria Friedman as the Narrator, Joan Collins as Potiphar's wife and Donny Osmond as Joseph. From the 'film version of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.'

Follow over the jump for more.

A Detroit funny from Wonkette and Deadline Detroit

At the end of last week’s Derp Roundup: Your Weekly Waltz Through A Wonderland of Weird, Doktor Zoom included this bit of old but funny piece of performance art that happened this summer in downtown Detroit.

And finally, this make-of-it-what-you-will story of a beautiful prank in Detroit. It happened last summer after the city declared bankruptcy, but at Derp Roundup, we feel no obligation to deprive you of stuff just because someone sent a tip long after something happened (on the other hand, please don’t do that). See, Detroit has this big statue commemorating Joe Louis, and it’s a mighty fist:

Context? Who needs Context?
Well, OK, maybe a little context? ~~Fist~~ First off, it’s not a photoshop; the artist “Jerry Vile” installed the can of Crisco as a comment on the inevitable pain that the bankruptcy would cause the city. Sadly, it was removed as “abandoned property” by 2:00 of the afternoon he dropped it off. Some people got no sense of humor.

The full original story is at Deadline Detroit and includes this gem.

I should read Deadline Detroit more often.

Monday, December 23, 2013

Happy Festivus!

I may be a doomer here at Crazy Eddie’s Motie News, but I love holidays, including fake ones. Here’s one more to add to the list--Festivus! I’ll let the cast of Seinfeld explain.

A brief History. As told by George Costanza of the NBC Show Seinfeld.
I do enough airing of grieveances here the rest of the year. If you want to read some, I recommend Kunstler's rant from today about Helicopter Ben’s last press conference. If you want a humorous take on that tradition, surf over to Wonkette, which is snarking on Rand Paul on Twitter and making fun of Mitt Romney a Man of the Year award. As for feats of strength, forget it. I’m on vacation!

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

No Death Star means more signatures needed for future petitions

On December 14th of last year, Kotaku reported Petition to Build the Death Star Gathers Enough Signatures to Rate a Response from the White House. A month later, The Guardian was among many to relay the White House's response.*

White House Death Star petition is a no-go
Petition urging building of Star Wars-style weapon system rejected as 'administration does not support blowing up planets'
Conal Urquhart and agencies
guardian.co.uk, Saturday 12 January 2013 07.16 EST

Paul Shawcross, the head of the science and space branch at the White House Office of Management and Budget, outlined the reasons why the White House was not planning to build a Death Star, an artificial planet used with devastating consequences in the Star Wars films.

He said the estimated cost of $850 quadrillion would not help deficit reduction plans and asked: "Why would we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?"

The original has a clever title, This Isn't the Petition Response You're Looking For, which I thought was one of the best things about the reply, along with a listing of all the science and space accomplishments of the Administration and a burnishing of Obama's nerd credentials.

As for the cost the official response cited, it came from Centives, a blog written at the time by a couple of economics undergraduates at Lehigh University. It turns out to be a severe underestimate, as the figure is for just the steel. One reader noted in comments that the total cost of modern warships is ten times that of the steel alone. Add cost overruns, and the price would be about one sextillion dollars. That's one followed by eighteen zeros. No wonder the people at The Monkey Cage blog wrote Death Star? No thank you.

The story didn't end there. Fast Company as republished in Scientific American reported the next reaction by the Obama Administration.

Tired Of Star Wars Fans, The White House Is Raising The Bar On Online Petitions
By Anya Kamenetz
January 18, 2013

Want an official response from the government? You'll need to collect at least 100,000 signatures.
...
Under its We the People initiative, anyone is able to submit a petition on any topic, and if it receives enough signatures, the White House staff pledges an official response. At first, that number was 5,000. Then it rose to 25,000. But after a recent petition asking the administration to build a Death Star from Star Wars forced a (hilarious) official response, the bar now's been raised to 100,000 signatures.

Mother Jones elaborates on this news in the aptly titled "My God, What Have We Done?": White House Staffers React to Insane Online Petitions. That makes me glad I didn't sign the petition. That way, this was not my fault!

*I found two other articles worth reading about the release. PoliticusUSA added visuals to the response in the good-natured No Death Star, ‘The Administration does not support blowing up planets’. So did Wonkette, who added their trademark snark in Obama Administration Crushes Nerds’ Dreams, Will Not Build Death Star.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Sustainability through the looking glass with Jeff Wattrick of Wonkette

I'm showing "The End of Suburbia" to my students this week. They would probably love it if I posted the answers to the worksheet they have to fill out. I won't, not for all of them. Instead, I will point out I have answers to a few of the questions scattered throughout my blog.

For example, part of the answer to #8, "include how peak usage contributed to the crisis" is mentioned in the introduction to the worksheet post. I comment on the answer to #9 "What are the issues involved with the various modes of generating electricity, concentrating on the problems with natural gas?" in Portland is watching "The End of Suburbia", where I note things aren't as bad now as they were nine years ago when the film was shot. I mention part of the answer to #18 "How do the people interviewed think the American people will react to energy shortages? Include the political effects" in several entries. All one has to do is search for 'maniacs.' I used it first in a post about Michele Bachmann demagoguing the price of gas. Finally, one of the possible answers to #29 and #30 (it will work for either) is in Kunstler in a Big Yellow Taxi and some more are in the introduction to the worksheet entry among the student reactions.

So, what am I going to do instead? I'm going to excerpt Metro Detroit's own Jeff Wattrick's Dispatches from the FEMA camps, his satire of corn pone fascist thinking about sustainability.

Between now and Obama’s second inauguration, Wonkette will be your source for exclusive details about our shining path to a new America that will be like Greece crossed with Cuba but only more Muslim-y. Also gay.

Follow over the jump for Jeff's fantasized solutions to suburbia, a way of life that became the new American Dream and promised space, convenience, affordability, family life, and upward mobility, but instead ended up decanting cities into the countryside and becoming the greatest waste of resources in the history of the world and a living arrangement that has no future.*

"Vagina" goes viral

This has been a very busy week here in Michigan, and especially in Metro Detroit. In addition to the recall of Troy Mayor Janice Daniels, the agreement to build a new Detroit-Windsor bridge, and rising local gas prices, all of which I've blogged about, the following sustainability-related stories all made the news this week:

The big story this week from Michigan, the one that sucked all the oxygen out of the room as it went viral on social media and the national and international press, was the silencing of State Representatives Lisa Brown and Barb Byrum in the Michigan State House, ostensibly for saying "vagina" and "vasectomy" respectively. Join me over the jump for a sampling of the reaction so far, along with an overview of what was being debated when the incident happened.

Total Recall of Troy Mayor: A serious to silly update

The recall of Troy Mayor Janice Daniels has sprouted legs since I blogged about it two days ago. First, it made the local TV news. Take it away, WXYZ!

The mayor of Troy is facing a recall after a petition calling for her ouster was turned in.

In the segment, Daniels discounted the legitimacy of the recall.

"They're based upon my positions that I take, my votes that I take, and that is hardly reason to recall someone. A recall should be used if someone commits a crime and I have committed no crime."

That's not true, as a press release from Recall Janice Daniels quoted in The Oakland Press article about the story points out.

“This assertion has no basis in fact. Michigan’s Constitution and subsequent legislation ... permits recall for any objectionable conduct during the elected official’s term in office. In contrast, when an elected official has committed an illegal act, the officer can be removed ... (in) a completely separate and distinct procedure.”

In The Oakland Press article, Daniels also cited the example of Scott Walker in Wisconsin.

“I’m proud of the results in Wisconsin, where Scott Walker’s team proved the people don’t like recalls,” she said.

That same article also linked to Janice Daniels' website and concluded by quoting the Mayor's appeal for donations and volunteers to fight the recall. They didn't link to the website of the pro-recall group, so I will.

Recall Janice Daniels!

Things get silly over the jump.

Crazy Eddie's Motie News