The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
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    The poor turkey (and I'm not talking about Palin) ...

    By Deadman on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:03am | Politics

    Sometimes, there can be no words. It's ... just ... too ... surreal ...

    Topics: 
    Politics

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    I can see Turkey from my back yard, yeah.  And also....Charlie, um, yeah.

     


    by LisB on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:23am

    And when turkeys raise their heads above Alaska.....we can see 'em, you  betcha.

     


    by LisB on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:27am

    Yeah, I didn't blink.


    by LisB on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:28am

    "Plans just include getting through the budget process that we're going through right now, building the state's budget based on the price of oil that has plummeted so greatly and reining in the growth of government and plans like that that have to do with helping to govern this state and building this team that is continually being built to provide good service to Alaskans. So in my role as governor, that's what my plans are all around."

    Definitely Presidential material


    by Michael Wolraich on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 11:18am

    hilarious. honestly i don't think I heard a word she said until she talked about needing to inject levity into a campaign ... while the turkey's head was getting chopped off in the background.

    and yet despite my focus on the turkey snuff porn, I still had the utmost confidence that whatever she was spewing was utter nonsense.


    by Deadman on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 11:25am

    I'm pretty sure I could have lived my whole life without the graphic knowledge of any of the steps that a turkey takes between gobbling around in the dirt to ending up on the Thanksgiving table, carved and read to eat.

    Just like I could have lived my whole life without the knowledge that Sarah Palin was in the world.

    Thanks a lot, universe. 


    by Orlando on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 11:27am

    I've been a vegetarian for fifteen years.  I have to say that I don't understand why people seem to be so fascinated by this clip.  This is where all those Thanksgiving turkeys come from.  Is it just the turkey being killed?  It can't be Palin.  This is easily one of the most coherent interviews she's done.  Try just listening to it without watching it.

    As an aside, Thanksgiving it coming up, so I always looks forward to being chastised for not eating the turkey.  I'm well into my second decade of putting up with this crap, so I'm pretty desensitized at this point.  What I find interesting is that people who do eat the turkey aren't desensitized to this sort of imagery.  It's weird to me, because I still have meat eaters periodically try and "gross me out" with their meat.  It doesn't gross me out that people eat it.  I know where it comes from, which is part of the reason why I don't eat it.

    People just seem to not want to think about where things come from, whether it's their food or their clothes or their gasoline.  However, none of this knowledge is mysterious or esoteric, just typically ignored.

    Maybe I'm completely off base here though.  Is there something particularly noteworthy about this clip other than the turkey being slaughtered?  How is this really different than doing an interview a month ago at a pumpkin patch?


    by DF on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:30pm

    Actually, I totally agree, DF.  As a meat-eater, I've always found an element of peace in recognizing that any meat I eat came from a fellow-creature and appreciating its life -- and its death.  I flirted with vegetarianism in grade school, when all my friends went veggie, and came to the personal realization that I was ok with eating meat, as long as I was fully cognizant of what I was eating.

    The clip itself -- if Palin is more coherent than usual, I guess I've just become desensitized by reduced exposure.  The turkey-killing doesn't bother me.  But Palin does.


    by CaliforniaPaige on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:40pm

    oh come on. you're not really saying you don't understand why this video is captivating, are you???

    palin is giving one of her patented palinesque interviews (you think this is a coherent one?? just read the paragraph that genghis lifted!) and talking about the need to inject levity in a campaign and have some fun while a turkey is being beheaded right behind her!! i mean, it's priceless. it's something SNL writers wouldn't be grotesque enough to come up with ...

    that all said, on the broader topic you raised, the beauty (and yes, curse, too) of progress is we don't need to think about where things come from and we can just enjoy the final products. The clothes I'm wearing were made by eight-year-old Vietnamese kids? The stereo I'm listening to was made in a Chinese factory polluting the Yangtze to the point where big fish can no longer survive in some of its tributaries? The foie gras I'm eating was made by people stuffing food down the throats of ducks to the point of choking them? ... Well, what can I do about all that? Don't ask, don't tell ...

    personally, i live in the middle ground when it comes to topics regarding meat or animal treatment in general. i love animals and find human abuse of them (like in some of those infamous PETA cow videos) to be absolutely despicable, yet I am not one to deny the naturalness of the food chain and our place at the top of it. I at one time gave up all meat but fish, but missed the variety of my diet so I now eat chicken and turkey. I only enjoy meat if I do not think about what it is I'm eating, so I do no like watching raw meat get prepared, or having blood in my meat. I think it's hypocritical to be vegetarian (for animal ethical reasons) if you wear leather or other animal by-products, yet am fully aware of my own hypocrisy on the subject. I find PETA people who want to outlaw pets to be excessively annoying, yet i understand their rationale.

     


    by Deadman on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 2:53pm

    I found it shocking. And I just really thought it was the fact that she didn't seem to notice. It is to me symbolic of her general obliviousness.


    by AM on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 4:50pm

    Is that a starbucks coffee cup in her hand? Possibly a latte?  Or was it picked just to match the flowing blood in the background?  Oh, the levity of it all.  Yup yup Sarah, you are so right - You do represent the majority of Americans.  Those real Americans that are amused by blood and gore and killing.  I cannot imagine why you didn't win. 

    The clip is repelling and fasinating.  I grew up on a farm and my father had a couple of old fashioned hog killings of the hogs my brother raised.  A very large community event with about 100 people all doing some part. Interesting and disgusting at the same time.  I struggle with the human animal I am and the social progressive being I (and all humans) want to be, failing constantly but taking great hope in the fact I do find this clip repuslive.

    What I really want to know is 1) Sarah Palin so uncaring about what is thought of her she would do a video in front of a turkey killing 2) does she think this what most americans do or 3) is this just an Alaska thing?


    by Bluesplashy on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 5:22pm

    I haven't thought about this in years, but I grew up on a small farm, and had occasion to slaughter chickens. We used a piece of string, a stump and an axe. We bought a few dozen peeps at the cooperative, and when they grew up we had too many roosters, so several of them, even ones with names (Colonel Cluck), ended up on the dinner table.

    {Oh, what a surprise - the Obama girls are going to Sidwell Friends. My HS used to play football against them. They do have one of the best LEED buildings there.}


    by Donal on Fri, 11/21/2008 - 6:58pm

    Having not grown up on a farm, and having watched this video at work today with a chick *(no pun intended) who knew what was going on, I have to say that the whole slaughter action going on behind Palin has affected me in a way I had not expected.

    You do all realize that the turkey is NOT losing its head, don't you?  Instead, it's being drained of all of its blood.  Kicking all the while...

    I didn't realize this last night, when I first saw the video.  My friend had to point out the point of the funnel.  It made me not want to eat Thanksgiving turkey.

    There must be a kinder way to put a bird to sleep, no?

    That being said, I had a personal issue happen at the same time, which also sickened me, and I had to write a poem because that's the way I am.  Not that you'd understand it but, here's what I'm left bleeding tonight:

    COULDA USED YA TO TALK TO AS A SOUNDING BORED
    AND YEAH I MEANT THE TYPO
    COULDA USED YA TO MAKE ME FEEL BETTER
    BUT I’M THERE ON MY OWN
    AND I CAN HANDLE IT MYSELF, THANKS VERY MUCH
    I’VE ALWAYS HANDLED WITH CARE
    AND A LOVING HAND

    AND

    I’LL GET PAST THIS, HANDLING IT SMOOTHLY
    AS ONLY I CAN
    NO NEED TO WORRY ‘BOUT ME
    SILLY

    BUT STILL

    IT WOULD’VE BEEN NICE TO HEAR SOME SYMPATHY
    AMONGST THE CURIOSITY
    SOME SMALL MEASURE OF CONCERN
    WOULD’VE GONE A LONG WAY

    I SUPPOSE IT’S HARD TO FEEL FOR SOMEONE
    WHO FEELS FOR ANOTHER AFTER THAT ANOTHER
    PUT ME THROUGH THE SARAH PALIN TURKEY BLEEDING MACHINE
    AND LEFT ME DRAINED OF BLOOD
    YOU BETCHA

    STILL….
    I COULDA USED YOUR ARMS AROUND ME
    AND A MURMUR NOW AND THEN
    TO LET ME KNOW YOU ARE MY FRIEND


    by LisB on Sat, 11/22/2008 - 3:35am

    I love it, lis. "Sounding bored" especially. Sorry you had a rough night!

    by Orlando on Sat, 11/22/2008 - 8:43am

    Draining the blood is kosher, although that guy doesn't exactly look like a pious Jew.

    Since the bible prohibits all meat from animals which have died from natural causes, and all animals which have been killed by beasts, traditional Jewish thought has expressed the view that all meat must come from animals which have been slaughtered according to Jewish law. These strict guidelines require that the animal is killed by a single cut across the throat to a precise depth, severing both carotid arteries, both jugular veins, both vagus nerves, the trachea and the esophagus, no higher than the epiglottis and no lower than where cilia begin inside the trachea, causing the animal to bleed to death; many apologists for Orthodox Judaism argue that this ensures the animal dies instantly without unnecessary suffering, but many animal rights activists view the process as cruel, arguing that the animal may not always lose consciousness immediately, and some activists have called for it to be banned[59][60].

    To avoid tearing, and to ensure the cut is thorough, such slaughter is usually performed by a trained individual, with a large razor-sharp knife, which is checked before each killing to ensure that it has no irregularities (such as nicks and dents); if irregularities are discovered, or the cut is too shallow, the meat is deemed not to be kosher, and is sold to the non-Jewish public. Jewish rabbis usually require the slaughterer, known within Judaism as a shochet, to also be a pious Jew of good character, who observes the Shabbat, and believes that the slaughter victims are sacrificing their lives for the good of the slaughterer and their community; in smaller communities the shochet was often the town rabbi, or a rabbi from a local synagogue, but large slaughterhouses usually employ a full-time shochet if they intend to sell kosher meat.


    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosher_foods


    by Donal on Sat, 11/22/2008 - 1:24pm


    by Orlando on Sat, 11/22/2008 - 8:42am

    Ha!!  And I love the cartoon!!!!  Laughing  Thanks!


    by LisB on Sat, 11/22/2008 - 10:51am