Yes, you really did just hear that gaffe. Here is the question: Did a Democratic Member of Congress just gaffe up really, really badly in one direction, or the other?
Translation: Did he botch, or tip, it?
Tag Archives: Russia
I Really Don’t Want To Know What Kind of Cheese That Is
Yeah.
A Siberian dairy plant was temporarily closed Friday after its workers had been found bathing in milk, a Russian consumer oversight agency reported.
Trade House Cheeses, a dairy producer in Omsk, about 1,600 miles east of Moscow, was closed for 90 days by regional authorities for an urgent inspection after complaints resulting from photographs and a video posted by one of its employees on a Russian social network.
In the photographs and video clips posted on New Year’s Eve by worker Artyom Romanov, a group of undressed employees relax in a container of milk as part of their celebration. While still partly undressed, they then demonstrate cheese making in a clownish manner.
(Loiko)
I … um … didn’t need to read that. But I did. So you get the chance, too.
____________________
Loiko, Sergei L. “Russian dairy plant closed after workers bathe in the milk”. Los Angeles Times. March 28, 2014.
What Can Make Him Feel This Way? Bi Guy, Bi Guy … Talkin’ ‘Bout Bi Guy ….
Honestly, I had thought we had gotten over the old gay vs. bi dispute.
And then along comes Vladimir Putin to reignite it.
Something, Something, Burt Ward
A legacy of acrimony between President Putin and the Muslim-dominated North Caucasus came to the fore last week when a female suicide bomber from that area blew herself up on a bus in Volgograd, killing six people. The town where she was from–only a day’s drive from Sochi–had been under counterterrorism surveillance for at least a year . . . .
It is not that one cannot be more specific, but, rather, the question of why one needs to Emma Margolin’s report for MSNBC verges on revolutionary language:
A legacy of acrimony between President Putin and the Muslim-dominated North Caucasus came to the fore last week when a female suicide bomber from that area blew herself up on a bus in Volgograd, killing six people. The town where she was from–only a day’s drive from Sochi–had been under counterterrorism surveillance for at least a year, according to Time magazine.
The bomber’s motives remain unclear, but she appears to have been aligned with an insurgency group whose aim has been to transform the region into an Islamic stronghold and expel Russian forces, whom they view as occupiers. Over the summer, the movement’s self-proclaimed Chechen leader released a video message calling for the use of “maximum force” ahead of the Winter Games.
The attack follows a bloody two months in which over 130 people have been killed in clashes between government forces and militants, sparking nationalist riots this month in southern Moscow. A majority of those deaths took place in Dagestan, where the Boston bombers lived before emigrating to the U.S.
As prime minister, Putin directed the second Chechen war. Over a decade later, those separatist powers remain strong. Experts have warned that last week’s suicide bombing could be the first in a chain of attacks against Russian targets.
Certes, there are all manner of newsish biscuits and treats to be found in all that, but the narrative is what counts here. To the one, there is something about the liberal bias of reality. But, to the other, there is also the part about recognizing one’s liberal tendencies in making human choices instead of simply cheering the cause.
Something, something, Burt Ward.
This thing writes itself.
At least, I hope, since I can’t explain it otherwise.
This town needs an enema!
Well, what headline would you write?
Eduard Korniyenko reports for Reuters:
A health spa in Russia has unveiled a bronze monument of three cherubs carrying an enema, a design inspired by the 15th century Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli.
Around 100 hospital staff and patients at the spa in south Russian cheered when balloons lifted a red drape into the sky unveiling the oversized version of the pear-shaped medical instrument.
“We administer enemas nearly every day,” said Alexander Kharchenko, the head of the sanatorium which specializes in treating illnesses of the digestion tract.
“So, I thought, why not use our sense of humor and give it a monument,” he said of the bronze statue that stands about 1.5 meters high.
The monument, designed by Svetlana Avakova, cost around $42,000; the artist says she looked to Botticelli’s “Venus and Mars” for inspiration:
“The irony is that the little infants steal the weapons of Mars. They joke with him, with the god of war, and war is a tragedy.”
“Likewise, an enema is an unpleasant procedure as many of us may know. But when cherubs do it, it’s all right.“
Further irony is that, in the fifteenth-century masterpiece, Mars is actually asleep; the cherubs are joking with or talking to Venus. But, hey, the end result is a line for the ages.
When cherubs do it, indeed. Strange as the work may seem, I admit I like it.
B.D.'s Last Refuge 