Welcome to The Mean Pool

By Randy Molton, Mountain Xpress, Asheville, North Carolina

Hi. The cartoon above is pretty hard-ass, isn’t it? Wincingly broad-brush, arguably less than fair, kinda … mean. It’s been around on the Web for years, seldom circulated, but it was summoned up Saturday by professor Robert Reich, the former U.S. Secretary of Labor, liberal economist, and now the deeply knowledgeable, deeply reasonable and rational, urbane, genteel, gentlemanly host of a successful Substack newsletter. Reich re-used that cartoon on Saturday. It startled me, under his name.

Yay. I think we’ll be seeing more of this sort of thing in journalism, thank goodness. The New York Times did something of the kind late last week, a stealth attack on the specter of what might well be an end-of-the-world Grim Reaper presidency under an angry, vindictive, mentally unhinged paranoiac. It was a stunning choice by mainstream editors who have apparently decided Enough Is Enough. .

The Times story was masquerading as a relatively objective examination of how a global nuclear war could be launched by any U.S. president (note: any) with no legal or practical restraints on his or her decision, a decision that may have to be made in 15 minutes under soul-rattling pressure. But there can be little doubt of the story’s actual intent, which was to place us all in mortal fear of a potential Trump second term. Here is the piece. It is quite short and succinct, and blunt, and illustrated for maximum terrifying suspense. There is no equivocation. You should read it. I’m giving you the time. I’ll be back in 10 minutes.

Many of us probably knew much of what’s in this article. It is not really groundbreaking, except in its tone and timing.

Which leads to today’s Gene Pool Gene Poll.

Good. Now please send in questions and comments to the Orange Button below, ignoring that it is orange, inasmuch as its color is nonpolitical, unrelated to the subject at hand. This is an evenhanded and balanced poll.

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A couple of Gene Pools ago, a reader asked me if I had any changes planned for the newsletter in the coming year; I said there were some I was weighing — in particular, the resurrection of a few go-to staple subjects I had developed over 21 years of writing my humor column for The Washington Post. These include funny interviews with unexpectedly funny people on unexpectedly wacko subjects; examining current events through doggerel , further curation of the “Googlenope” — a wicked literary trope I had invented — and whatnot. In short, bringing the flavor of the old column to the Gene Pool more often.

This is Week One of the grand experiment, and I decided to bottom dwell, by revisiting the smart-ass routine that was — according to polls — both the most liked and the most disliked trope of all, one I returned to roughly thrice a year. So, I once again dialed a phone number that was whispered in agate type on the container of a retail product. I never expected what happened this time, because it never really happened before. Never met a customer service specialist quite like this one.

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Signature® Antacid Tablets

Me: I would would like to ask you a question about your product, which I bought at Safeway. The bottle is oddly generic looking, identifying itself by no product name, but only as “antacid tablets.” The only brand name on it is “Signature,” which is apparently a Safeway house name for generic products.

Sam: Yes.

Me: I tried to figure out why this product had no name, and then it came to me, slap to the forehead: This product is identical in chemical content and appearance and taste to TUMS, a brand-name drug that people realized could be anagrammed to SMUT, which proved a bit of a liability for TUMS, because it left its company open to abuse from vulgarians and moron prankster callers, and so forth. So, to avoid even the possibility of that problem, even inadvertently, I suspect your company chose no name at all.

Sam: It is more complicated than that.

Me: Well, before you educate me, let me inform you of something.

Sam: All right.

Me: “Signature” anagrams to “Stag urine.”

Sam:

Me: It ALSO anagrams to “Tiger anus.”

Sam:

Me: And in fact, “Safeway Stores” anagrams to “Fo’ yer ass sweat.” So.

Sam: We only manufacture the products. The retailers we sell to, they choose the names. We sell these to Wal-Mart and CVS and Safeway. They choose the labels.

Me: Oh.

Sam: But we should talk about this. It is important. Because every brand has some problems, every word can have different slants, different meanings. In English, all words can be bastardized, with different hostile connotations and there is nothing we can do about it. I am telling you what goes on. The English have tea, but that word can mean something different in America.

Me: Something you smoke.

Sam: Now think about Aunt Jemima.

Me: Say what?

Sam: The pancake syrup. They changed her picture for no reason. There was nothing wrong with the way she looked. She looked proud, fine. But people said things, hurtful things, and so they changed it. English is an aggression against native people and minorities. I am Indian. I feel this. There is nothing we can do. Am I wrong?

Me: No!

Sam: It’s impossible to say anything without getting criticized. Maybe math is racist.

Me: Math?

Sam: People could say that, and we would have to change mathematics.

Me: So nothing means anything?

Sam: Everything means nothing.

Me: Omigod.

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So, there you have it on Day One: An existential customer service representative.

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Okay, we are entering the real-time questions and observations segment of The Gene Pool, in which you ask questions and make observations, and I respond in real time. If you are reading this in real time, please remember to keep refreshing the screen. Today’s Q’s and O’s are a mixed bag, influenced by my Weekend Gene Pool challenges: Careers you considered but abandoned, for better or worse, and the weird and almost exhilarating Biden turnaround. Also, infidelity, because that topic, from a previous GP, seems to have long, attractive legs.

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Q: When I was in 2nd grade (1960 or so), our teacher asked us to write about what we wanted to be when we grew up.  I said I wanted to be a milkman.  My mother was very disappointed when she saw it.  She wanted me to be a lawyer like her father.  I told her that I put milkman because I couldn't spell "lawyer".  But the truth is, I just liked the idea of riding around in that little milk delivery truck with the sliding door.

Regarding your fond memories of Olinsky’s, the Jewish deli in the Bronx where they were allowed to fish pickles out of a barrel with their bare hands: When I was in high school, I worked at a deli and one of my responsibilities was replenishing the pickle supply.  I had to go into the basement and scoop the pickles out of the barrel with my bare hands into a plastic tub.  That brine was so cold it would numb my arms.

– Dabug

A:  The suffering was good for you. It made you a mensch.

On a related topic, how did it become a trope of jokes that the milkman bedded bored housewives?   Yes, the milkman used to come to the house, but at 6 am., before the kids left for school and had to be fed.  Also, he didn’t have much free time.  There was milk to be delivered. Maybe he came back in the afternoon? 

Here’s a pretty good milkman schtick. One minute long. Can anyone tell me what this fumble-mouthed bloke is saying in his final line? I haven’t a clue.

Q: In your poll, I’m one of the relatively few who opined that Trump will win the election.  I did so out of a sense of what I’ve been reading in the e-papers and seeing online, NOT that I’m hoping he will win.  After all, you did state that our responses should be according to our gut feelings on the issue, rather than hopes. My HOPE is that Biden collects every electoral vote there is to be had, and buries Trump once and for all.

A: Is this the most important election ever?  That’s an eye-rolling, deeply hackneyed, opportunist contention, and inevitably false, but it is solemnly uttered in most every presidential election by both candidates.  But I think this year it is almost true.   The election of 1860 was more important. Then, this one in 2024. Then, maybe, 1932. Then, you’d have to go to the contingency election of 1801, following an electoral vote deadlock, when Congress chose Jefferson over the insidious insurrectionist Aaron Burr, who was politically pen-knifed in the back by Hamilton.

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TIMELY TIP: If you’re reading this on an email: Go back to the top of this post and click on "View in browser" to see the full column live and online, and to read and make comments.  If you are doing it in real time, keep refreshing the screen to see the new questions and answers that appear as Gene regularly updates the post.

Remember Q’s and O’s:

If you support Donald Trump, I strongly urge you not to upgrade your subscription to “paid.” It would bother and consternate Mr. Trump, especially if you are a big guy who weeps in his presence, sir. Instead, save that $50 and invest it in his various defense teams because he is obviously being railroaded on bogus charges of rape, obstruction of justice, election interference, fraud, being a horrible human, etc.

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Q: I have always held firm that ALL presidential elections are a referendum on the incumbent (which is why it infuriated me that Hillary Clinton refused to brag about the previous 8 years of economic growth, preferring instead to go on about those "left behind", but I digress). 

With that in mind, I've found the notion of Biden stepping aside to be absurd -- tantamount to conceding the point that the incumbent wasn't good.

I am, however, concerned that none other than Ezra Klein has been pounding the table for Biden to step aside. His argument: this election will be a referendum on Trump, so the only opponent who will lose to Trump is the one even LESS popular than The Donald. Sadly, Biden is polling at historically low levels for an incumbent this close to an election. Klein argues that if Biden stepped aside, an openly brokered Democratic Convention held in August would deliver a compromise nominee with plenty of time and money to Beat Trump.

My hopes is that I'm right and Klein is wrong, but this is going to be a very high stakes test of these theories.  

A: I agree about the stakes.  Biden’s gamble is enormous, potentially squandering what is now seen, and will likely be seen by historians, as his greatest accomplishment… saving the country from Trump.  .  Ezra’s column was a limburger wedge, or a mackerel left out overnight: It very quickly did not age well. And a column by the ordinarily widely respected Ezra released other panic-prone pundits to follow suit.  You should know that Ezra has kind of apologized, though in a weaselly way, hiding behind subtle humor: 

“Fine, Call It a Comeback – If the Joe Biden who showed up to deliver the State of the Union address last week is the Joe Biden who shows up for the rest of the campaign, you’re not going to have any more of those weak-kneed pundits suggesting he’s not up to running for re-election. Here’s hoping he does.”

Jeff Tiedrich responded thus: 

“No, Ezra, it’s not a comeback. Joe Biden didn’t go anywhere. Joe Biden wasn’t decrepit four weeks ago when you wrote your hit piece, and he didn’t magically get better.”

Q: A portion of the attack on Biden’s age is dog-whistling racism. He will die and a black woman will become President. Comparing Trump and Biden’s mental acuity will have little affect because, as of now, there is no VP issue on the other side. 

A: Maybe he’ll choose Katie Britt!  She probably has a nice behind!

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Q: Your Weekend Gene Pool headline: “What, Was He Biden His Time?”
How long have you been hanging on to that?  I hope it’s been at least since Uncle Joe (non-Stalin division; what can I say I love the nickname in its most innocent form) was Vice President.

A: I’m sure others have used it.  But I have been holding it since 2008, for the one time it would be truly appropriate. 

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Q:  Katie Britt the junior senator from ‘Bama is the personification of Kinder, Küche, Kirche. The senior senator's name, Tommy Tuberville, looks like he’s ought to be the mayor of Tatertown. 

A:  Haha.  Indeed.  K-K-K is German for “children, kitchen, church,” the supposed role of women in society.   I like the Tatertown line. 

Q: Back in the Swinging Sixties, before EZ Pass, I was a sullen, insolent, insouciant, indolent teenager on a mandatory Bataan Death March family trip that involved driving onto the Pennsylvania Turnpike. As we drove through the Turnpike entry gate, my father was handed a toll ticket by a somnambulant mouth-breathing future Trumpster. He had no other responsibilities but to hand those tickets to entering vehicles. I asked my father: “ Is that all that guy does? He just hands out tickets as cars enter? He doesn’t do anything else? He doesn’t even have to know how to make change?” “Yes,” my father barked, “ it’s a goddamn outrage. And that bastard gets paid a ton, with all kinds of benefits, and a fat pension at 50. The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission is the most corrupt organization in the world. Worse than the Mafia, worse even than the Democrats, blah, blah, blah…” I, as ever, tuned out my old man. What I did realize was that I had, at last ,found my life’s calling. – Jon Ketzner 

A: Unless I’m missing something, which I may be, you need to tell us what your life’s calling has become, Jon.

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This is Gene. I would like to hear from people who voted against the media being tougher in coverage. I suspect you have an arguable and valid point, and would like you to elaborate.

Q: As for career I considered and feel free to use this if you want: In elementary school, in third grade I believe, every once in a while the teacher would gather us all to sit on the floor at the front of the room to discuss science subjects. I always vibrated with interest, no doubt dominating what passed for discussion. I told my mother I couldn’t decide what I wanted to be - a rocket scientist of a dinosaur scientist. One time when I was sick and stayed home, the teacher told my mother she was canceling science corner because I wasn’t present. I’m still interested in science, but like you, when I got to the age where I hoped some girl might actually want to have sex with me, the pocket protector/protractor look seemed like a nonstarter.  – Tom The Butcher.  

A:  Tom, this is The Gene Pool.  We traffic in Truth, however uncomfortable.  That last line of yours should read “I hope some girl might actually BE WILLING to have sex with me…”  Words matter.

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Q: In the late 80s, some geniuses thought that if they brought folks together in a hospital setting, once a week, and had them eat NOTHING, what a great, scientific way to lose weight fast that would be! And it was. We intrepid dieters drank five protein shakes a day, totaling 300 calories, and nothing else, for twelve weeks. And yes, I lost 60 pounds. I also lost my gall bladder, as did many, if not most, people on the program, including, reportedly, Oprah Winfrey. All that bile just sat around waiting in vain for some fat to metabolize, and, finding none, turned itself into lovely crystals more commonly known as gallstones. I gained the weight back in just about — you guessed it — twelve weeks. 

A: Wow!

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Q: About 20 years ago, I took at job at a company that had the most toxically aggressive sales-driven, competitive, mansplaining culture I'd ever seen. It was non-stop cursing, shouting profanities down the hallway, calling people pussies and fucking-this and fucking-that -- a Wolf of Wall Street kind of vibe.

And of course they would gamble on anything. When one of the executives said he needed to lose weight, it quickly became a competition, a winner-take-all event where each of them tossed in $250 "to make it interesting."

Now, I am not a gambler. I would never risk $250 on anything but a sure thing, but they didn't know me well yet. I was just the slightly quiet new guy who wasn't as fat as any of them. So when said I could stand to drop a few pounds, they were happy to take my money. And of course at the official weigh-in (where I wore my heaviest jeans and sweater), they ribbed me and said I had no chance.

Over the next weeks, I followed my time-tested crash diet, eliminating simple carbs and fats with aggressive portion control. As they were departing the office for their daily full service restaurant lunch together (where they'd harass waitresses and congratulate themselves for skipping the bread basket), they'd lean into my office and give me a quick lecture on how the dressing on the salad I was eating at my desk had more calories than their whole meal (if they'd asked, I'd have told them I'd skipped the dressing altogether).

I never did anything unhealthy, except for the final 36 hours when I don't think I drank a thing. I was pretty parched for the weigh-in, wearing my beltless summer trousers.

It took months to get those mamzers to all pay up,. They never gambled with me again.

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A: For some reason, this reminds me of a corny old episode of Andy Griffith show, where Barney, who was a little shrimpy guy,  needed to beef up for a physical to remain a deputy sheriff.  Had to be a certain wait.  But he got the hiccups for several days and could not eat.  (This made no sense, even by schlock 1960s sitcom standards of believability.)   He was too light by a few pounds on weigh-in day, but passed the exam.  He passed because the rules said you could wear only a lighweight shirt, pants, and your nametag necklace, and Andy hatched a scheme that broke no rules.  Under his shirt, Barney had worn a four-pound nametag necklace under his shirt. 

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Q: I saw my heart’s desire when my mom was driving home from shopping. The fire department! I shouted that I wanted to be a fireman! Mom replied it was a volunteer fire department. Did I know what “volunteer” meant? No. It meant that while the people who worked there liked fighting fires, they didn’t get paid for it. That made no sense. In order to be a paid firefighter you had to NOT want to fight fires? What a stupid system. So I never became a fireman. Or a logician.

A: Your logic may be not far off.  I’m still thinking about it, but we DO accept jobs we love at less pay than than we’d demand for jobs we do not love.  Every journalist knows this.

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Q: I think the key to Biden success will be if the SOTU speech changes the narrative in the media. Every presidential election, there seems to be a dangerous group think among the major media outlets. Bush vs Gore was the dumb guy against the stiff guy. McCain was “the maverick”, etc. So far, in this election, it’s been that Biden is the old, bumbling guy. If the media changes that because of this speech and starts to respect and report on Biden’s quite obvious effectiveness, he can win. If it doesn’t, God help us. 

A: Yes, I think all elections get reduced to two or three-word labels.  One of the least apt was in 1996, when Bob Dole was portrayed as a humorless, wooden, robotic grump.  In fact, he was one of the funniest guys the Senate ever had.  A very dry wit who cracked people up. 

Wait till the chat is over, and read this piece by the great Laura Blumenfeld, in 1996.   It humanizes Dole better than anything you have ever, or will ever, read.   It’s not about his humor.  It is about his vulnerability.  An astonishing “get” for a young writer.  

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Q: This was in my Substack feed just now.

A:  I think you are comparing the start of this Willie Wonka scene to Biden’s sudden, unanticipated transformation from the corpse at Weekend at Bernie’s to Superman, yes?

Q: I think that the election will be a landslide. Even one trial, even one trial day, will be significant. And with one conviction, he’ll lose his passport and sentencing for prison will be scheduled. I understand how he seems to have avoided all these dire predictions up until now. I also understand black swan theory, that people don’t easily accept predictions of things that have never happened. I believe that the courts and military at least will rise up against an autocracy.

A: From your mouth to God’s ear trumpet, as old Jews like me like to say.

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Q: Hey Gene…Ketzner here…I am a recovering actuary…a vocation far less glamorous or rewarding than a Turnpike toll ticket hander-outer.

A: My ma wanted me to be an actuary. It was the worst judgment she ever made in her life. No job would have been worse for me. I would have been a better ballerina.

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Q: I had hooked up my best friend with my girlfriend’s best friend. After their date, ‘Mary’ ran over to tell ‘Susan’ she was going to marry ‘Bob’. Susan told me and we had a good laugh since she was a junior in high school. They did get married at the end of her junior year of college. Of course being pregnant at the time might have something to do with it. Years later they were living in Los Angeles with three kids and he was a dermatologist. I was still around as the fun, single uncle. Bob loved to go to strip clubs which I found amusing since Mary was Jaclyn Smith’s doppelgänger. One time he tells me that one of his nurses told him that she found him sexy. The next time he admitted that he an affair with the nurse. I told him he was angling for some trouble. This was in 1978, before AIDS. I didn’t tell Mary. They lasted another 8 years before the split. Both are happily re-married now. I responded to the question with “I think” I would. But that is because of AIDS. Not funny, but true.

A: Noted.

Q: I was never too concerned about weight, but when my doctor said my cholesterol numbers were a little high, I took action.  I hopped on the disused treadmill and every evening without fail walked for at least a mile at a brisk pace with an elevation.  Every day.  My cholesterol improved, and I lost weight.  I installed a spare TV in front of the treadmill.  I tried upping the pace to a jog, but that wasn’t for me.  I wound up losing about 40lbs, and the cholesterol numbers improved.  Then for various reasons I stopped doing the treadmill and 20lbs came roaring back.​

A: Hm.  I actually used a treadmill for the first time just a few days ago, and am still using it.  Kinda like it.  I’ll keep in mind that I don’t wanna become willowy.  Manfully sturdy is my goal.   Or “husky.”

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Q: A reader recently told you a story of inadvertently letting Google upload his wife's pictures to the cloud, against her express wishes that the pictures remained private, and you replied: «Almost all my stuff is in the cloud, but only I have access to it».

I think this was not a good reply. Your reader was right to feel he had screwed up.

I hope I don't come off as paranoid but: once you upload anything to any part of the Internet, assume it will one day be available to everyone on Earth.

Your stuff may be in the cloud and password protected; but there's no foolproof system  that can keep hackers out. 

Also, while uploading stuff to "the cloud", you're just sending it to someone else's computer - your stuff will be accessible to sysadmins at Google or Apple or whatever. You also don't have to be a tinfoiled Roganite to suspect the NSA can access pretty much anything online, no matter the level of protection. 

You may think the above is a bit paranoid, and I agree. You and I probably don't have to worry about Tim Cook or the Deep State or whatever snooping on our vacation photos. 

But then there's carelessness; tech companies regularly foul up and make public stuff that was supposed to be secret  (one very funny example was Amazon Canada accidentally revealing the real names of some of their book reviewers - some turned out to be novelists giving rival authors one-star reviews). And there's AI: the stuff you upload is almost certainly being used to train AI models, which may cough it all up if the wrong prompt is used. 

TL;DR: once you put your buttcheeks online, everyone can seem them.

A:  Thanks.  We’ll end on this sober note.

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Okay, as always, I exit today begging you to send in more Questions and Observations, or Quobservations. I will address them Thursday. You send them here:

Also, more of the begging. I am required by the laws of God and Man to do this.