Category Archives: Politically Incorrect

Hello Tom, I could really use your expertise. I have an extremely fearful dog who is highly aggressive. Over the course of four years Ive tried everything with her from training to Prozac, and nothing seems to work. She is loving to my husband and me, but a menace to everyone else. Can I set up a consultation with you to see if there is anything we can do to help her and our quality of life? We call our dog a lawsuit waiting to happen. One trainer has said that she is incorrigible, and will always be unpredictable. But she is so loving with us, I keep hoping that is not the case. We love her and consider her a member of the family, but we are really at our wits end. Can you help? Best, Nancy Dear readers, Once again Im going to be politically incorrect here Im not an all-rewards trainer.

I met this dog a couple of weeks ago. Ill call this dog LW (lawsuit waiting). Nancy (name changed to protect anonymity) told me that over the years, she spent quite a bit of money in hiring five different trainers, including the trainer who worked with then President Obamas dog. To no avail. When guests came to Nancys house, LW was either locked in another room or constrained by a leash that Nancy held closely until everyone left. LW was muzzled the whole time, and the guests were given a list of dos and donts to try to prevent enraging LW. They were told to try to avoid raising their voices, making sudden movements, moving about too quickly, etc.

Upon hearing this, I did manage to refrain from asking if the dog owned the house and paid the mortgage. When I asked what kind of corrections LW had received between the five trainers over the years, I was told ,None. Never? I asked. Never.

LW is a 20-pound mixed breed. When I entered the house and sat down at the dining room table, LW was behind a closed door wearing her muzzle and dragging a leash on her collar. The noises she made behind the closed door made it clear that she felt that she needed to kill the stranger in the house. I told Nancy to just open the door and say nothing as LW reacted to my presence. Ive orchestrated this type of meeting with territorially aggressive 90-pound dogs many times over the years. In my experience, already being in the house when the dog enters the room, as opposed to crossing the threshold into the dogs face eliminates 80 percent of most dogs territorial aggression.

All I can say here is, thank goodness this dog only weighed 20 pounds. I would have lost an awful lot of blood by the time I could get to the leash if not for the muzzle. She nailed me multiple times with the ferocity of a wolverine by the time I could pick up the leash to take control. Then, in between her leaps as high as my waist trying to bite me, I snapped the leash sharply while saying Uh-uh, at which point I think LW was totally shocked by the audacity of somebody actually causing her real discomfort for her aggression. The look on her face was almost comical she seemed stunned, but it only lasted a couple of seconds before I read another attack coming. So I corrected the thought with another Uh-uh leash snap. The aggression drained out of her like the water in a sink when the plug is pulled.

I then stepped back the length of the leash and called her to come. She didnt move, and gave me a look that said, Youre kidding, right? So I said, LW, you can do it hard, or you can do it soft, but youre going to do it! and using the leash, I dragged her to me. When she arrived I offered her a piece of baloney through the basket muzzle, and to my surprise, she took it.

Thats not a frightened dog. A truly scared dog wouldnt take filet mignon from the Square Rigger. After I called her to come several times, she realized that she might as well do it soft rather than hard, cooperate instead of being dragged, and although begrudgingly, she did come, sat, and took the treat. When I looked over at Nancy, her face was streaked with tears as she exhaled, I cant believe it!

Moral of the story, for two-leggeds and four-leggeds: When doers engage in bad behaviors that result in unwanted, unpleasant consequences, bad behaviors can be extinguished.

The Dogcharmer

Got a question for the Dogcharmer? Write him at dogsrshelby@msn.com.

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The Dogcharmer: She's a menace - Martha's Vineyard Times

In the Mel Brooks comedy, Blazing Saddles, the character playing a town official exclaims in what one would euphemistically call politically incorrect terms the preferability of certain ethnic groups in the town of Rock Ridge over others.

Specifically, Asians and African-Americans were more acceptable than individuals of Celtic origin.

National sovereignty is defined as the ability of a nation to be in control of its own domestic and foreign policy.

This is especially applicable to the control of a national border. For instance, you and I as individuals have the right to control who enters our domicile. Imagine if you will, sitting down to dinner with your family and a total stranger enters your house uninvited and sits at the table demanding to be served a meal. If you refuse the stranger claims loudly that your refusal is blatant racism and that the meal is a human right. Oh, and after the meal you are cajoled into providing a room for this person. Your house is now such a positive environment that this uninvited individual now brings relatives to live with you. These uninvited interlopers now begin to change your home environment to suite their own tastes. You and your family must now acclimate to their culture in various ways including the insidious adoption of their language even to the point of subsuming your own native tongue.

On a larger scale one can make the argument that this is happening to our country at the national level. The United States can no longer make the claim that we are a sovereign nation. We no longer have absolute control over who can sit at our national dinner table.

As I related earlier, Mel Brooks parody illustrates that all sovereign societies have the natural inclination to protect what is perceived as a cultural identity. This is not an issue of racism. This is an issue of sovereignty, national security, and the rule of law. The oldest objective of any government is to provide order or the rule of law. Without order the other ingredients of the trinity for a successful and productive society, freedom and equality, can never fully become reality.

The elephant in the room is the definition of the term immigrant. Liberals in their ongoing Orwellian efforts to hijack the English language obfuscate as usual, by using the term undocumented immigrant. I prefer the correct definition of illegal immigrant. U.S. immigration law, while admittedly convoluted, does provide a de jure framework for legal status, whether it be temporary or permanent residency and even a path to U.S. citizenship.

Very few incidents cause more consternation than standing in a queue and having an individual jump to the head of the line. Thousands of immigrants to the United States have patiently gone through the often tedious legal process to remain in this country. Yet, there are hundreds of thousands who believe that it is permissible to skip to the head of the line and become de facto immigrants circumventing U.S. law while claiming that to be deported under such circumstances is a violation of human rights. This new status quo is the result of an incestuous relationship between corporate business interests and the liberal agenda. In this Faustian bargain, Corporate America gains cheap labor and the political left increases its political voter base, thus creating the grassroots conservative viewpoint that there is no such thing as undocumented immigrants only undocumented Democrats.

Belatedly, from an historical viewpoint, the new Trump administration is attempting to carry out its Constitutional mandate and return U.S. immigration policy to the rule of law. The ban on immigration from Islamic countries, in effect a quota system, was an Obama administration initiative and so therefore from a counterintuitive perspective cannot be considered racist public policy.

President Trumps multitiered approach of deporting illegal criminal elements who have committed criminal acts against U.S. citizens, illegals who flagrantly and frequently violate civil statutes and laws, and illegals unlawfully employed by U.S. businesses, will create disincentives for illegals to remain in the United States.

Medical science also discovered belatedly that a fever in the human body is not a bad development. It is now known that our bodies are fighting off an internal infection by heating itself and creating a hostile environment to eliminate the unhealthy elements causing an illness. So it must be from the conservative perspective for the body politic of the United States. By creating an environment, in effect applying existing U.S. immigration law, that is hostile to illegal immigrants, sovereignty, public safety, and the rule of law may yet be restored.

As it now exists the status quo is a drain on our national resources in the form of lowering wages for American citizens, the ever escalating taxation to pay for social programs, welfare and otherwise, for illegals in this country; not to mention the exorbitant costs of public education for illegal children, especially in Texas. Most of us have personal household budgets that would quickly go into deficit and eventual bankruptcy if we had uninvited permanent dinner guests.

These views are not as some liberal commentators would have us believe bad nationalism. As a true patriot, I firmly believe that I am a citizen of the United States not a citizen of the world. Also, as a conservative citizen of color I believe that a true American is color blind and color conscious. As a minority of Hispanic decent and, according to the liberal imperative, my views cannot be considered as racist, I simply believe like the citizen of Rock Ridge that Americans should be able to choose who they want to invite to the collective dinner table within the framework of a pluralistic society and the rule of law.

Darrell Castillo is a former staff member on The National Security Council of the Reagan White House. He is a full-time professor at Weatherford College teaching Government and History.

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Guess who is uninvited and coming to dinner - Weatherford Democrat

Does the Hindi phrase Kadi ninda sound very much like Gujrati dish Curry Ninda to you? Chances are you have seen a viral post from Humans of Hindutva, a parody Facebook page which revels in taking the mickey out of right-wing rabble-rousers.

The post uses a still from Masterchef Australia to take a thinly veiled swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi and all other shades of the saffron brigade. And it is unapologetic about poking fun at the right-wings version of patriotism and its obsession for the cow.

In an India where political divides are becoming sharper, satirists are responding sharply. A heated exchange with a hyper-nationalist friend lead to the genesis of Humans of Hindutva (HoH). I think satire is important in a society like ours which is very sombre and servile, says the admin.

If you have wondered who runs the page, you will have to wait the writer prefers to remain anonymous given the death threats and abuse that comes his way. But a few sketchy details are forthcoming: He has a weakness for whiskey. He is a voracious reader. He runs his own business and writes on breaks. And he is an insomniac which is why he often posts at the crack of dawn.

HoH borrows from the stylebook of the popular Humans of New York, but its dark commentary on current events and politics could not be more different than the originals empathetic portraits of ordinary people.

I have been waiting for years for the Indian equivalent of The Onion or The Daily Mash but nothing came around, says the admin. Thats when I realized that I should be the one to get the ball rolling.

HoHs acerbic posts take on the current political and social climate of the country commentators often jokingly ask which University of Sarcasm he graduated from. Sample this firecracker of a post -- accompanied by a photo of bald, evil movie villain Shakaal -- that lampoons the extreme right for its quest to turn India into a Hindu rashtra and for advocating scrapping reservations. It has been shared more than 5,000 times till date.

These are the kind of viral posts that helped HoH amass a following of more than 50,000 and a book deal in a short span of two months. Even the admin appears surprised by the success of his page.

Read more: Delhi BJP leader accused of posting Gujarat riot photos as those of Basirhat violence

I just wanted to make stupid jokes to make myself laugh because I cope best with any situation by finding humour in it, he says. As a kid I always doodled in my text books. I used to draw moustaches on historical figures and make them say dumb things in speech bubbles. Thats what I had originally envisioned for this pagea return to my juvenile self.

Two characters that often pop up in HoHs posts are Bhaktiman, the defender of the misrepresented right-wing and his arch-nemesis, the Librandu, who stands for all things bleeding-heart liberal. But while the page is peppered with such bizarre characters, the humour is decidedly gallows. But this is to be expected when the grist for HoHs satire mill is grim, every day news, plucked from newspaper headlines.

When I post about lynchings or sexual assault, my focus is not on the victims but on those who try to justify such psychotic behaviour. I think its fair game to ridicule such people by exaggerating their opinions, says the admin. If anyone thinks my humour is in poor taste or politically incorrect then they should remember that Im only mimicking the politically incorrect opinions of certain people.

Political satire in India is relatively tepid we have neither the sass of American late-night talk shows nor the classic British lampooning of Yes, Minister. But HoHs popularity goes beyond his biting words, which typically take him about five to ten minutes to write, to his unerring choice of a pop culture reference or a photo.

When it was reported that Aarogya Bharti, the health wing of the RSS, had issued a set of guidelines for women to deliver Uttam Santati, fair-skinned, tall babies, HoH put out a post that imagined the customised baby as Hollywood heart-throb Ryan Gosling.

The Ryan Gosling post had a staggering 14,000 likes and became a victim of its own popularity when Facebook took it down because of mass reporting by trolls.

Facebook depends on its users to report objectionable content, the trolls try to take advantage of the automated system which cant tell a real complaint from a fake one, says the admin.

A few of HoHs posts have been taken down by Facebook, but were eventually reinstated after he filed an appeal. I hope the trolls realize that each time they get a post of mine removed, they only give me more notoriety and coverage, he says.

His way of dealing with trolls is direct do your research to counter their views, but ban those who are not willing to engage. Many of them complain that Im biased against Hindus. Which is not true. Im biased against Hindutva, he explains. Not all right-wingers hate the page. Some make valid points and are open to hearing my reasoning behind posting something. At the end of the day, this is a silly parody page and people should visit it with low expectations.

See the original post here:
Humour is the weapon of mystery man behind Facebook's Humans of Hindutva page - Hindustan Times

Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez at a rally outside the White House on May 10, 2017. Perez has sworn frequently in public speeches since taking over the DNC earlier this year. Photo by REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Last month, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., bluntly summed up the Democratic Partys goals under President Donald Trump.

If were not helping people, Gillibrand told an audience at a New York University forum, we should go the f**k home.

Earlier this year, newly-elected Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez didnt mince words when assessing the White House budget proposal. Its a s**tty budget, Perez said in a speech in Maine, part of a cross-country tour that included several expletive-laced speeches.

In the aftermath of Mr. Trumps victory in the 2016 election, a growing number of Democrats have begun cursing in public, using language that in the past was reserved for private conversations away from voters and the media.

The trend isnt entirely unprecedented, of course. In 2010, then-Vice President Joe Biden famously let an expletive slip during the White House signing ceremony for the Affordable Care Act. But the rise in examples of public cursing from Gillibrand, Perez, Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., and other Democrats marks a sharp departure from the usual language used by politicians on the left in recent decades.

The shift seems to be a reaction, at least in part, to Trumps crass tone as a candidate, and may have paved the way for a new age of political incorrectness. Whatever the reason, the rhetoric of Democrats in the Trump era, including that of rumored 2020 hopefuls like Gillibrand and Harris, appears to mark a departure from former President Barack Obamas professorial language and Hillary Clintons focus group-tested remarks, representing instead a tone thats angrier and perhaps more authentic.

The political atmosphere has changed since the anomaly of Donald Trump swearing and getting away with it, Indiana University English professor Michael Adams said.

Swearing has been in public spaces over the past few decades, Adams added. Until recently, in political discourse, people thought you needed dignity, and some voters would object to profanity.

That changed during the 2016 election, when Trump used crass and politically incorrect language to send a signal to voters that he was an outsider figure, said Jennifer Mercieca, a communications professor at Texas A&M University.

His whole argument as a candidate was that he wasnt corrupt, and he knew he wasnt corrupt, because he used politically incorrect language as one way to differentiate himself from establishment politicians who followed traditional political norms, Mercieca said.

Trump may have been onto something. His language on the campaign trail and its positive reception by supporters fits neatly into the well-known sociolinguistic theory of overt and covert prestige.

The theory holds that individuals use standard, widely accepted language to gain recognition and status or overt prestige, in linguistics jargon with a wide group of people. In a field like politics, that means using politically correct language that appeals to the broadest swath of voters and offends the fewest and thats what traditional politicians do.

On the other hand, individuals seeking covert prestige with a smaller, specific group of people use language geared toward that audience language that might offend society at large. Politicians often seek covert prestige by using local political dialect to appeal to certain voters, Adams said.

Bill Clinton could speak in a fairly statesperson-like way, but [when] he was talking to people in a small town in Louisiana, he would talk like those people, Adams said.

Then-Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump speaks during the third 2016 presidential debate. Mr. Trump use curse words frequently on the campaign trail. File photo by Joe Raedle/REUTERS

During his presidential campaign, Trump stood out in a crowded Republican field by working profanity into his speeches.

In a November 2015 speech in Iowa, Trump called the press scum and garbage, and announced his plans to bomb the s**t out of ISIS.

In a speech leading up to New Hampshires Republican primary, Trump said companies that move overseas for lower tax rates can go f**k themselves. In the same speech, he attempted to draw a contrast between Obamas work ethic and his own, saying that as president hed abstain from golfing and insteadstay in the White House and work [his] a** off.

Trumps primary opponents adopted his tone and coarser language in their stump speeches and press interviews in a futile attempt to catch up to him in the polls. Sen. Rand Paul R-Ky. said the idea of increasing phone surveillance after a 2015 Paris terrorist attack wasbulls**t. During an MSNBC Morning Joe appearance before he bowed out of the race, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., called Trump crazy as hell.

Since taking office, Trump has yet to curse in public, though he has often taken to Twitter to air his grievances. Nevertheless, longtime political observers said Trumps language was part of a broader cultural shift.

Theres a long history of presidents using crude language, but it was mostly done in private.

Trump follows a long line of coarsening in culture in general, whether in music or comedy or movies, said Floyd Ciruli, a Colorado-based pollster. I didnt expect it to jump into politics, especially at the highest level.

Theres a long history of presidents using crude language, but it was mostly done in private. President Richard Nixon was captured swearing often on tape in the Oval Office, but he assumed the conversations wouldnt be made public. President Lyndon Johnson had choice words for his advisors and tailors but they rarely made their way out of the White House.

Being polite was the default of politicians, Chris Hayden, the director of communications for the liberal Center for American Progress, said. Our president has completely thrown that out the window.

As a result, Democrats now feel more comfortable getting looser with their language since there arent severe ramifications for the totally out-of-bound things [Trump] has said, Hayden added.

Hayden said the change could be good for the party because voters like it when politicians can talk like normal people. It demystifies that Washington politician, Hayden said.

With Democrats in the minority in Congress, I think theres a general sense that you have to show passion, resistance to all of these issues that liberals oppose, Ciruli said. Making the language basic and more profane demonstrates that.

Senator Kamala Harris, D-Calif., at a ceremony in Los Angeles on July 3, 2017. Harris and other Democrats have grabbed headlines by dropping curse words in public in recent months. Photo by REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

In May, during a guest appearance on the popular podcast Pod Save America, Harris grabbed headlines by offering an unusually candid response for a U.S. senator to Rep. Raul Labradors, R-Idaho, claim that nobody dies because they dont have access to health care.

What the f**k is that? Harris said. Her reaction to the House health care bill was not an anomaly. The New York Times reported that the freshman senator is no stranger to curse words.

But Mercieca warns that Democrats need to be careful when using crude language. It can work when trained at unpopular legislation, but can backfire if its used to disparage other politicians, she said.

There are plenty of recent examples of lawmakers profane comments misfiring.

On the Senate floor in 2004, then-Vice President Dick Cheney told Sen. Patrick Leahy D-Vt., to go f**k yourself, a comment that did not sit well with Senate Democrats.

While speaking at an event in New Orleans last weekend Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., ripped into Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carsons credentials to run the department. Waters said she planned to take his ass apart when Carson testified before the House Committee on Financial Services, where she is the ranking Democrat.

The comment drew heavy criticism from conservatives, suggesting that coarse language by lawmakers may rally their partys base, but doesnt necessarily boost bipartisanship.

Democrats will need to figure out the right balance between laying down a well-placed curse word to prove a political point, and coming across as just plain vulgar.

Carolyn Lukensmeyer, the executive director for the National Institute for Civil Discourse, said that by electing Trump, voters clearly rejected political correctness. Still, Americans dont want profanity to become commonplace in political speech, she said.

The public does not want this type of political correctness where politicians talk out of two sides of their mouths, Lukensmeyer said. But also, they arent ready for politicians to use swear words or degraded language about other groups of people.

Polling bears this out. According to a recent NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist survey, seven in 10 Americans think civility in Washington has gotten worse since Trump was elected. A January poll by the public relations firm Weber-Shandwick found that nearly eight in 10 Americans believed the 2016 election was uncivil. In the same poll, a majority of Trump and Clinton voters 72 percent and 81 percent, respectively said that incivility has risen to crisis levels.

[There is] absolutely no question political discourse and everyday discourse has been profoundly degraded, Lukensmeyer said.

What that means for Democrats who are cursing more frequently remains to be seen, said Hayden of the Center for American Progress. Voters will respond to politicians who show more visceral anger, but Democrats will need to figure out the right balance between laying down a well-placed curse word to prove a political point, and coming across as just plain vulgar.

Thats the line that we draw, he said. The question is, are Americans smart enough to make the distinction.

Originally posted here:
What the #$@! Democrats are swearing more. Here's why - PBS NewsHour

Courtesy of Cards Against Humanity

Cards Against Humanity has "released" a new edition of their popular, if politically incorrect game, but this time, it's just for women. The "For Her" set comes packaged in a hot pink box and sports the "For Her" label on its logo, but despite a $5 hike in its cost, the cards are exactly identical to original game sets.

According to a satirical press release, Cards Against Humanity community director Jenn Bane says the decision to make the "For Her" set was because " its 2017, its time for women to have a spot at the table, and nevertheless, she persisted. Thats why we made Cards Against Humanity for Her. Its trendy, stylish, and easy to understand. And its pink."

While the pink set is a joke, its clever commentary on the "pink tax " that women often face. The "pink tax" is a phenomenon where things like personal care items and clothing marketed towards women will sometimes cost as much as 7% more than the same products for men.

Bane told Business Insider that the "For Her" set is a "very stupid" idea and that she doubts that people will actually buy the women't edition.

"Women don't fall for gimmicks, especially not gimmicks as stupid as this one," she said.

However, in case the "For Her" set has as much success as Cards Against Humanity's 2014 Black Friday deal of a box of "bullsh-t" (a literal box of poop,) which ended up selling 30,000 at $6 a pop, the company has committed to giving the profits from the women's edition to Emily's List, a PAC devoted to helping more Democratic women get elected to public office.

Read the rest here:
Cards Against Humanity Cleverly Mocks Discrimination With Pricey Pink 'For Her' Game - TIME

Viewers of Seinfeld reruns today (and those who watched each new episode as it came out) are in a unique position. The show, which premiered in 1989 and ran through 1998, contains some storylines that many people in 2017 would consider controversial or politically incorrect. Chances are, actually, that some of these Seinfeld episodes might not even make it through production if they were suggested today.

Jerry Seinfeld, the shows star and namesake, has gone on record as saying hes opposed to adhering to political correctness in comedy. Unfortunately, in todays world, everyone is offended by everything which tends to make for some boring TV comedy (and redundant boycotts). Luckily, Seinfeld still airs repeat episodes on a regular basis and has a large cult following.

After a hefty 171-episode binge-watch, LifeZette selected 17 episodesthat probably wouldnt be written today out of fear of criticism from liberal snowflakes and left-wing culture hawks.

Scroll through the gallery to see which episodes probably wouldnt run in 2017without extreme criticism.

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17 'Seinfeld' Episodes Not 'PC' Enough for Today - LifeZette

Mike Rotman has heard the song at sporting events all over the country.

Rotman, who grew up in Windsor and lives in Southern California, wears the distinctive blue-and-green of his childhood team when he's at a game. And invariably, folks who see the Whalers logo offer a few bars of that famous little diddy.

"Everywhere I go somebody always sings 'Brass Bonanza' if I'm wearing a Whalers shirt, no matter where in the country I am," Rotman said. "It's insane, man. I'm a little embarrassed by it. I don't look for attention. But people just know it, no matter where I am."

What do people around the country know about Hartford? Sports fans know the Whalers, who departed for North Carolina 20 years ago.

And unlike most professional sports franchises, the Whalers have a soundtrack. The franchise left, but the song remains.

Interest in "Brass Bonanza" has spiked with news that the song's composer died on July 4 in Brussels. Jacques Ysaye, also known as Jack Say, was 94.

His song originally was titled "Evening Beat" and was sold to a musical library. In 1976, Whalers announcers Bob Neumeier and Bill Rasmussen who would later create ESPN used the song as a bridge on the team's season highlight LP.

Whalers executive George Ducharme later told The Courant's Jeff Jacobs that he was looking for a song to get people out of their seats. When he heard "Brass Bonanza," he was hooked.

"Three notes and everybody knows what it is," Ducharme said in 2003. "It's a marketing dream."

All these years later, people still know what it is.

"The song was synonymous to the team," Howard Baldwin said Tuesday. "You think of the song and you think of the team and winning because it was always played after a goal and a win."

Baldwin, one of the founders of the franchise, moved the World Hockey Association team from Boston to Hartford in the mid-1970s. He was always looking for unique ways to sell the team in the new market and the fight song proved to be gold.

Hartford Courant file photo

Not that it was always popular, even within the team offices.

"The hockey guys resisted it a bit in the beginning but then embraced it," Baldwin said. "The visitors hated it."

The song would endure through the 1980s, acting as background music for a generation of hockey fans. Players joked about the song opponents mocked it but it caught on and became part of the scene at the old Civic Center.

Greg Malone spent a few seasons with the Whalers in the 1980s and his son Ryan later played in Hartford as a member of the AHL Wolf Pack. Ryan Malone's memory of Hartford as a 5-year-old kid?

"Obviously, the Hartford Whalers' anthem, the fight song," Malone told The Courant in 2014.

Malone hummed the song. He also told a story about mimicking the song after scoring a goal when he and his brother played indoor hockey with a rolled up sock.

By the late '80s, kids all over Connecticut were humming the song after scoring a goal in street hockey. Rotman's friends at Syracuse University would sing the song after he scored in foosball as a college student in the late '80s and early '90s.

"There was a lot of pride in it," Rotman said. "It was our identity."

Yet in 1992, new general manager Brian Burke replaced the song with a foghorn after the Whalers scored.

"I did it because there were players who were embarrassed by it," Burke later told NHL.com. "An NHL team with a fight song, they were embarrassed by it."

Burke would leave the Whalers for a job with the NHL and "Brass Bonanza" returned. But the team left in 1997, leaving Hartford without a major league franchise.

Still, everything surrounding the franchise lived. The logo endured and the colors, adopted by the Eastern League's Hartford Yard Goats, remained tied to the market.

And as Whalers Nation grew and moved around the country, the song was not far behind. The song became part of the playlist at Fenway Park in the early 2000s, mainly because Enfield native Megan Kaiser was in charge of the ballpark's music.

College bands began playing it. At Endicott College in Beverly, Mass., the song was used at football games because the team was coached by Connecticut native and Trinity graduate J.B. Wells and South Windsor native Marc Zirolli was in charge of the public address system.

That was 14 years ago. The song is now played at college hockey games, at Dunkin' Donuts Park, at high school events, at weddings and on ringtones throughout New England.

Actually, make that ringtones across the country. Rotman, a writer, producer and director whose credits include "Politically Incorrect" and "South Park," has been in Los Angeles since the early 1990s, but he continually returned for Whalers games and will be at Dunkin' Donuts Park for Whalers Alumni Weekend.

Yes, his ringtone is "Brass Bonanza."

"It's just a known entity," Rotman said.

Rotman is the founder of the web-based entertainment network Streamin' Garage and has tried to incorporate the song into his work. He did use former Whalers radio voice Chuck Kaiton, so there is some strong Hartford hockey presence on his site. Kaiton, incidentally, is expected to be in Hartford Saturday for Whalers Alumni Weekend.

When Jacobs tweeted news of Ysaye's death Sunday, Rotman offered this response: "The greatest composer to ever live. No one has touched my life more."

He's not alone. For fans of a certain age, the song is like the soundtrack of a childhood. It's quite a legacy.

Continue reading here:
Ode To Joy: 'Brass Bonanza' Unites And Excites Whalers Fans, And Is Back In Spotlight - Hartford Courant

Known as the most politically incorrect game there ever was,Cards Against Humanityis rumoredto delve even further into its appallingly hilarious dark and crude humor by creatinga Disney-themed pack.

(via giphy)

Following the success of the Harry Potter-inspired pack, Cards Against Muggles, these Disney inspired cards really could be the next best drinking game. The news was first circulated by Pretty52 after Cards Against Humanity themselves allegedly posted a picture of the first 18 cards on Facebook.

While the post was soon taken down, what goes online in the first placecan travel the world in seconds and indeed a hardcore fan managed to take a screenshot before the picture was deleted.

The new Disney inspired banter includes cheeky answers involving "vaginal burns from Lumiere," "Quasimodo's private time with his bells" and this might make you cry "Bambi's dead mother."

While it is still unsure whether this pack will actually become a reality considering the post has since been deleted, we are hoping we will be pleasantly surprised with its release.

Kiss your childhood innocence goodbye and get ready for a bundle of laughs it's time to witness Disney like you've never seen it before.

Read More ->These Postcards Let You Stay Close To Old Friends Without The Hassle Of Talking To Them

Originally posted here:
Cards Against Humanity Might Be Releasing A Disney-Themed Pack - Konbini US

Amid the chaos and division that has paralyzed American politics, one community of Trump supporters is striving tocut through theinsults, petty memes, and misconceptions hurled left and right.

This collective of conservatives, all users on social news site Reddit, run the subreddit Ask Trump Supporters to connect with critics and facilitate discussion.

With eight moderators, including a non-supporter of Trump, the subreddit aims to exist as neutral ground where every comment is moderated equally, and everyone with an open mind who participates in good faith is welcome.

This subreddit is about bridging that gap that has been formed by our media and getting to better know each other, the subreddits wiki reads. How do you get to know someone better? Ask questions. Ask yourself why you hold that view of Trump supporters or non-supporters. Respectfully ask the other person how they came to those conclusions.

Recent popular threads relate to Trumps retweet of a CNN meme and his visit to Europe to meet with other world leaders for the G20 conference.

It all sounds, well, quite open-minded. Non-supporters of the presidentwho are identified by flair saying as much next to their usernamesare actively encouraged to engage and question the social perspectives and political motivations of those who do support Trump, known on the subreddit as Nimble Navigators. Its an initiative that is simply not happening elsewhere.

To make it happen, however, moderators enforce a number of rules. These are aimed at maintaining a space for civil, honest, and thoughtful conversation. One pointed requirement, for example, is that all comments must be clarifying questions in an effort to better understand the answers given by Trump supporters. Moderators actively remove posts they deem to0 argumentative or leading questions.

On top of this, the moderators emphasize what they call posting in good faith and require this standard be upheld by both pro-Trump redditors and non-supporters.

What does this mean? An acknowledgment that not all Trump supporters are alike, and not all non-supporters alike. Practically, this translates to a curtailment of the language of partisan caricature. Non-supporters of Trump are not libtards or cucks nor are Trump supporters are bigoted racists.

It is, in many ways, the exact opposite of the popular, hyper-pro-Trump subreddit, The_Donald, where non-supporters are banned and liberals are constantly mocked.

We have this rule to keep the communication open the moderators explain. Not posting in good faith is when a user is not engaging in thoughtful discussion, and instead is hostile or extremely biased to others viewpoints, to the detriment of discussion.

Ask Trump Supporters also enforces an outright ban on memes, trolling, doxing, vote manipulation or brigading in contrast to other pro-Trump online communities.

In this respect, it is alternative in culture and moderation standard, despite being part of and endorsing a broader pro-Trump networkthatincludes The_Donald and AskThe_Donald.

The notorious and often politically incorrect The_Donald is the biggest community of Trump supporters on the website and serves as an incubator for much of the pro-Trump hype online, with nearly half a million subscribers. It has made headlines several times for its memes and trolling. Members of the The_Donald have also engaged in vast crowdsourced investigations into the Democratic National Committee email dumpby WikiLeaksduring the run up to the 2016 presidential election, and set out to prove a conspiracy theory involving murdered Democrat staffer Seth Rich.

The_Donald moderators manage their own question and answer subreddit called AskThe_Donald. It focuses more on policy conversations than The_Donald but remains insular and designed to serve Trump supporters and suppress differing opinions. Users have complained openly about the extremely ban-happy moderators there.

Although originally established by The_Donald moderators, who during the pre-election period pointed their users there, AskTrumpSupporters eventually broke away and revamped its rules. A quick scroll through either of these subreddits shows just how different the mission of AskTrumpSupporters now is.

Our goal isnt to promote an echo chamber, one moderator tells the Daily Dot, but to combat misconceptions by media and 80 percent of Reddit.

Motivated by the desire to be objectively understood and listened to, the rules around interaction work to displace the noise and ridicule that has come to dictate political discourse. In implementing it, moderators have been forced to not only disarm the quick judgement of the left but confront the limitations of rabid right-wing shitposting.

Doing so has led to conflicts with other pro-Trump moderator circles and it being dropped from promotion on The_Donalds banner. The community has also been accused by The_Donald diehards of being loaded with CTR shillsDemocratic supporters paid to spam pro-Trump online communities with liberal propagandabecause of the neutrality of the comments.

Reddit drama might be way inside baseball, but its indicative of what it often costs to reach across the table in a culture of hyper-partisanship.

Boasting a subscriber count of over 30,000 users, however, an appetite for conversation across the political divide quietly grows. And in this small corner of the internet, its been instigated by the presidents supporters.

Read more:
Meet Ask Trump Supporters, the only place where Trump fans and haters actually talk - The Daily Dot

A great action movie can be as American as baseball and apple pie. Some of the finest movies of the genre follow an individual who goes up against a group or a power structure connected to authoritarianism and violence.

The idea of one man or woman taking a stand and stopping what he or she sees as the atrocities of society is about as American as it gets.

Related: Three Celebrities Who Think Theyre Experts

Heres a look at four action movies every American should take the time to watch. (And if you feel weve missed any, email us at [emailprotected] with your recommendations!)

1.) Die Hard, 1988.John McClane is the perfect American hero. Hes flawed, politically incorrect, and agitated by authority, but he never leaves a job unfinished or an innocent person at risk.

"Die Hard" remains one of the best action films of all time, not just because of its impressive set pieces, stunt work, and lack of computer-generated imagery (CGI) but because of the performance of Bruce Willis as New York City detective John McClane. An actor originally from New Jersey, Willis brought an attitude and a toughness to the character that made him believable and charming.

He'd always do the right thing, but he'd be sure to curse the whole time through and complain about why he was there in the first place and that's what any average Joe would do. He wasn't the hero because he wanted to be; he saved the day because there wasn't anyone else around to do it. What's more American than that?

It may have been released in 1988, but no action film since has quite topped the lightning in a bottle that was "Die Hard."

Plenty have tried to mimic the film's success by taking the same basic concept of "wrong guy in the wrong place at the right time" but few viewers remember those copycats. Everybody remembers "Die Hard."(go to page 2 to continue reading)

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Four Action Movies Every American Needs to See | LifeZette - LifeZette