Re: Re: humor

[Carrol Cox]

Sabri Oncu wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> But please do something about it. Most of us are not that young
> anymore, you know?
>

Your mail program _may_ have a command that will increase the font size
of the post you are reading. With Netscape Communicator each time one
hits Alt V F the font increases.

Carrol
 
> Sabri

Re: RE: RE: Re: Re: humor

[Ian Murray]

RE: [PEN-L:30527] RE: Re: Re: humor
- Original Message -
From: Devine, James
To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2002 3:52 PM
Subject: [PEN-L:30531] RE: RE: Re: Re: humor


I sent the following message:
>it's more likely that Joanna's browser isn't currently set up to read
"newsgroups." Mine isn't either. <
this appears in the archive of the listserver.
but the following is what I got from the list in MS Outlook:

>Symantec AVF replaced the message body with this text message. The original
text contained prohibited content and was deleted.<

what gives?

James G. Devine

===

Your font's too small? :-)

The system may have detected a virus.

Ian

RE: RE: Re: Re: humor

[Devine, James]

Title: RE: [PEN-L:30527] RE: Re: Re: humor





I sent the following message: 


>it's more likely that Joanna's browser isn't currently set up to read "newsgroups." Mine isn't either. <


this appears in the archive of the listserver.


but the following is what I got from the list in MS Outlook:


>Symantec AVF replaced the message body with this text message. The original text contained prohibited content and was deleted.<

what gives? 


James G. Devine
Professor of Economics
University Hall (Rm. 4227)
Loyola Marymount University
One LMU Drive, Suite 4200
Los Angeles, CA 90045-2659 USA
310/338-2948 (work); FAX: 310/338-1950
[EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine

RE: Re: Re: humor

[Devine, James]

Title: RE: [PEN-L:30525] Re: Re: humor





it's more likely that Joanna's browser isn't currently set up to read "newsgroups." Mine isn't either. 



Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine




> -Original Message-
> From: Doug Henwood [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Tuesday, September 24, 2002 3:02 PM
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: [PEN-L:30525] Re: Re: humor
> 
> 
> joanna bujes wrote:
> 
> >>Don't forget <news://alt.politics.socialism.trotsky>!
> >>
> >>Doug
> >
> >Hey Doug. Netscape says it can't find it. Was THAT the joke? Well, 
> >too bad, cause this is my one and only chance to tell my Trotsky 
> >joke:
> 
> Heavens no. I haven't visited it in ages. I can't remember the last 
> time I fired up Newswatcher even. Is it gone? Gosh, the world has 
> lost a strange gallery.
> 
> Doug
> 
> 

Re: Re: Re: humor

[ravi]

Doug Henwood wrote:
> joanna bujes wrote:
> 
>>>Don't forget !
>>>
>>Hey Doug. Netscape says it can't find it. Was THAT the joke? Well, 
>>too bad, cause this is my one and only chance to tell my Trotsky 
>>joke:
> 
> Heavens no. I haven't visited it in ages. I can't remember the last 
> time I fired up Newswatcher even. Is it gone? Gosh, the world has 
> lost a strange gallery.
> 

its very much around, it seems:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&group=alt.politics.socialism.trotsky

the reason joanna cannot see it is because her browser (netscape) is
probably not configured for an NNTP (news) server, or her server does
not carry that newsgroup.

--ravi

Re: Re: humor

[Doug Henwood]

joanna bujes wrote:

>>Don't forget !
>>
>>Doug
>
>Hey Doug. Netscape says it can't find it. Was THAT the joke? Well, 
>too bad, cause this is my one and only chance to tell my Trotsky 
>joke:

Heavens no. I haven't visited it in ages. I can't remember the last 
time I fired up Newswatcher even. Is it gone? Gosh, the world has 
lost a strange gallery.

Doug

Re: Re: RE: Re: Re: humor

[Doug Henwood]

Louis Proyect wrote:

>Actually, the character who inspired this thread--one Joe Queenan--is a
>frequent guest on the Don Imus show, which along with the Howard Stern
>show, encapsulates what's wrong with mainstream humor. Unlike the Marx
>Brothers, Mark Twain or Jonathan Swift, humor on these shows targets the
>weak, the underprivileged and the discriminated against. I once heard
>Queenan riffing on the Imus show about the tackiness and bad food at Red
>Lobster restaurants, which was in line with a book he was promoting titled
>"Red Lobster, White Trash, and the Blue Lagoon: Joe Queenan's America."

Queenan profiled me in Barron's about 10 years ago (on orders from 
his then-editor, not on his own initiatve), and I got to know him a 
bit. He's a pretty vile piece of work - right wing, cynical, selfish, 
and mean. His poliitcs and his personality are a perfect match. He 
can be funny sometimes - he did a piece on the men's movement for GQ 
that was hilarious - but not very often. Like O'Rourke, he thinks 
it's really funny to piss on the poor and weak. Ha ha. Fortunately 
most of his books end up quickly remaindered.

Doug

Re: RE: Re: Re: humor

[Louis Proyect]

>I think it is more general than that.  I have been in situations, some
>dating back 20 years, some a lot more recent, where members of priveleged
>groups (rich whites, male physicians, etc.) Told crude anti-black,
>anti-semetic, anti-women jokes and if you didn't "go along" by laughing, the
>response was "you have no sense of humor."  

Actually, the character who inspired this thread--one Joe Queenan--is a
frequent guest on the Don Imus show, which along with the Howard Stern
show, encapsulates what's wrong with mainstream humor. Unlike the Marx
Brothers, Mark Twain or Jonathan Swift, humor on these shows targets the
weak, the underprivileged and the discriminated against. I once heard
Queenan riffing on the Imus show about the tackiness and bad food at Red
Lobster restaurants, which was in line with a book he was promoting titled
"Red Lobster, White Trash, and the Blue Lagoon: Joe Queenan's America."
It's really a snobbish dig at ordinary working people and how they live.
The irony is that Don Imus started out as a blue collar worker and ended up
as a multimillionaire playing off his blue collar mystique. It is all
bullshit, of course. Imus has the reputation of being a "bad boy" who
insults his ruling class guests, but in actuality he is a modern day court
jester. The social role of a court jester was to mock the King without
getting to close to the social relations that give him his real power. You
can also see contempt for working people in shows like SNL or Mad TV, which
offer up skits about feckless messengers, waiters, or truck drivers when
they are not mocking black people or the retarded. The funny thing, of
course, is that these shows are uniformly unfunny. If I was a writer for
one of these shows, I'd be developing material about rich lawyers,
investment bankers or pretentious show business figures, not the wretched
of the earth. 



Louis Proyect
Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org

RE: Re: Re: humor

[Brown, Martin (NCI)]

I think it is more general than that.  I have been in situations, some
dating back 20 years, some a lot more recent, where members of priveleged
groups (rich whites, male physicians, etc.) Told crude anti-black,
anti-semetic, anti-women jokes and if you didn't "go along" by laughing, the
response was "you have no sense of humor."  The more recent experienced
involved a President Elect of the AMA and a noted Radiologist telling crude
anti-women jokes in public meetings.  In the former case I pointedly
objected to the Executive Director of the American College of Radiology (a
women) and I think they quietly put out the word that these kind of jokes
didn't look so good at meeting, especially those related to breast cancer
screening.

There are still plenty of enclaves that are exclusively or almost
exclusively privileged, white and male.  When they think you are "one of
them" and not on thier guard, you hear some pretty amazing things.

-Original Message-
From: Carrol Cox [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 11:06 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [PEN-L:9792] Re: Re: humor




Carrol Cox wrote:
> 
> If you trace this legend back I suspect you will find its origins in the
> failure of British feminists to acknowledge how funny forced feeding
> was. Many feminists have also been lamentably incapable of seeing how
> funny wife beating is.

An offlist communication suggests that I was a bit too elliptic here,
and some expansion seems worthwhile.


I meant the legend of left humorlessness. I was partly being sarcastic
and partly implying a historical hypothesis: that the charge of lacking
humor has always been the first line of defense against "uppity women,"
and that its use against women predates its use against the left in
general. And while I can't come up with anexample right now, I'm pretty
sure that there has been over the centuries up to & including the
present a good deal of humor based on wife-beating.

This charge is a variant, I believe, of the charge of political
correctness -- which *began* as a self=criticism within some women's
groups, taking off from references to  left debates over correct line,
and then was commandeered by the right. (There are several suggested
lineages other than this. In the late '60s there were many jokes within
the left abour "correct lineism," as well as many earnest arguments as
to correcg line.)

I think the charge has a material base -- it is amazingly easy to defend
*what is* without getting emphatic. It is amazingly difficult to attack
*what is* without appearing -- well, too emphatic. Samuel Johnson,
commenting on female preachers, compared them to a dog walking on its
hind legs: they didn't do it very well but it was amazing that they did
it at all. It's easier to make jokes about how bad Joe Hill's metrics
are than it would have been for his friends to joke about his being
shot. I do remember (long before my own radicalization) people making
jokes about the  Rosenberg executions. Probably their comrades did not
find those jokes funny.

Carrol

Re: Re: RE: RE: Re: humor

[Tim Bousquet]

Okay. Seeing how this is completely pointless:

Q. How many surrealists does it take to screw in a
light bulb?

A. Fish.


--- "J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>  How many real men does it take to screw in
> a light bulb?
>  Answer: None.  Real men are not afraid of the
> dark.
>  How many Jewish mothers does it take to screw
> in a light bulb?
>  Answer: None.  They would rather suffer in the
> darkness.
>  How many WASPs does it take to screw in a light
> bulb?
> Answer: Two.  One to screw it in and the other to
> fix the
> martinis.
>   How many rednecks does it take to screw in a
> light bulb?
> Answer: Four.  One to screw it in, one to write a
> country music
> song about how hard it was to do it, and two to go
> out in the
> parking lot and have a fight about it.
>  How many Virginians does it take to screw in a
> light bulb?
> Answer: Five.  One to screw it in, and four to talk
> about how
> great the old bulb was
> Barkley Rosser
> - Original Message -
> From: "Brown, Martin (NCI)"
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 2:27 PM
> Subject: [PEN-L:9758] RE: RE: Re: humor
> 
> 
> > Q: How many neoclassical economists does it take
> to screw in a light bulb?
> >
> > A: It would never get screwed in because the dark
> room exists and
> > therefore must be the result of market efficiency
> and pareto optimality so
> > there is no reason to screw in a light bulb; i.e.
> just accept the
> darkness,
> > it is the best of all possible worlds OR it is not
> the best of all
> possible
> > worlds but it is better than any other room in the
> house (did anybody
> look?)
> >
> >
> 


=
Subscribe to the Chico Examiner for only $30 annually or $20 for six months. Mail cash 
or check payabe to "Tim Bousquet" to POBox 4627, Chico CA 95927

__
Do You Yahoo!?
Get email at your own domain with Yahoo! Mail. 
http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/?.refer=text

Re: Re: humor

[Carrol Cox]

Carrol Cox wrote:
> 
> If you trace this legend back I suspect you will find its origins in the
> failure of British feminists to acknowledge how funny forced feeding
> was. Many feminists have also been lamentably incapable of seeing how
> funny wife beating is.

An offlist communication suggests that I was a bit too elliptic here,
and some expansion seems worthwhile.


I meant the legend of left humorlessness. I was partly being sarcastic
and partly implying a historical hypothesis: that the charge of lacking
humor has always been the first line of defense against "uppity women,"
and that its use against women predates its use against the left in
general. And while I can't come up with anexample right now, I'm pretty
sure that there has been over the centuries up to & including the
present a good deal of humor based on wife-beating.

This charge is a variant, I believe, of the charge of political
correctness -- which *began* as a self=criticism within some women's
groups, taking off from references to  left debates over correct line,
and then was commandeered by the right. (There are several suggested
lineages other than this. In the late '60s there were many jokes within
the left abour "correct lineism," as well as many earnest arguments as
to correcg line.)

I think the charge has a material base -- it is amazingly easy to defend
*what is* without getting emphatic. It is amazingly difficult to attack
*what is* without appearing -- well, too emphatic. Samuel Johnson,
commenting on female preachers, compared them to a dog walking on its
hind legs: they didn't do it very well but it was amazing that they did
it at all. It's easier to make jokes about how bad Joe Hill's metrics
are than it would have been for his friends to joke about his being
shot. I do remember (long before my own radicalization) people making
jokes about the  Rosenberg executions. Probably their comrades did not
find those jokes funny.

Carrol

Re: Re: humor

[Carrol Cox]

If you trace this legend back I suspect you will find its origins in the
failure of British feminists to acknowledge how funny forced feeding
was. Many feminists have also been lamentably incapable of seeing how
funny wife beating is.

Carrol

Re: Re: humor

[Ellen Frank]

>
>Postscript:
>
>Q.  How many graduate students does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>A.  One, but it takes him eight years.
>
Q:  How many actors does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A:  10..  One to screw in the lightbulb and 9 to stand below and 
shout "that should be me up there!"

Re: RE: RE: Re: humor

[J. Barkley Rosser, Jr.]

 How many real men does it take to screw in
a light bulb?
 Answer: None.  Real men are not afraid of the dark.
 How many Jewish mothers does it take to screw
in a light bulb?
 Answer: None.  They would rather suffer in the darkness.
 How many WASPs does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Answer: Two.  One to screw it in and the other to fix the
martinis.
  How many rednecks does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Answer: Four.  One to screw it in, one to write a country music
song about how hard it was to do it, and two to go out in the
parking lot and have a fight about it.
 How many Virginians does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Answer: Five.  One to screw it in, and four to talk about how
great the old bulb was
Barkley Rosser
- Original Message -
From: "Brown, Martin (NCI)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 2:27 PM
Subject: [PEN-L:9758] RE: RE: Re: humor


> Q: How many neoclassical economists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: It would never get screwed in because the dark room exists and
> therefore must be the result of market efficiency and pareto optimality so
> there is no reason to screw in a light bulb; i.e. just accept the
darkness,
> it is the best of all possible worlds OR it is not the best of all
possible
> worlds but it is better than any other room in the house (did anybody
look?)
>
>

Re: Re: humor

[ann li]

I don't know if there ever will be an answer to Yoshie's question: "Where's
an American conservative
today who writes like Michael Oakeshott?" because it would actually require
such a conservative to have a sense of humor (or irony even), although at
the risk of pen-l ad hominem censure, I nominate D'Souza's writings before
his relationship with noted pundette, Laura Ingram or are they even funnier
afterwards?

Since "Celebrity Death Match" has come on the air, a D'Souza vs. Cornel West
steel cage match would be nice.

And I especially like Jim's:
"
> Q: How many post-modernists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: none -- that would end up replicating the totalizing modernist vision
> perpetrated by the Enlightenment.
>
> Q: How many romantic conservatives does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: none -- that would lead to the Enlightenment-inspired destruction of
the
> traditions that hold society together.

Re: Re: Re: humor

[J. Barkley Rosser, Jr.]

 How many ants does it take to screw in a light
bulb?
 Answer: Two, if they can get inside.
Barkley Rosser
- Original Message -
From: "Jim Devine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 2:02 PM
Subject: [PEN-L:9752] Re: Re: humor


> At 01:39 PM 3/29/01 -0500, you wrote:
> >  How many Madisonians does it take to screw in
> >a light bulb?
>
> my answer is the same, and different, based on political theory:
>
> Three, because one person can't be trusted with all the power.
>
> >  How many Californians does it take to screw in
> >a light bulb?
> >  Answer:  Five.  One to screw in the light bulb and
> >four to share the experience.
>
> you should know better! Californians don't screw in light bulbs! they do
so
> in hot-tubs.
>
> Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
>
>

Re: Re: Re: RE: Re: humor

[Ian Murray]

- Original Message -
From: "Jim Devine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 11:40 AM
Subject: [PEN-L:9763] Re: Re: RE: Re: humor


>
> >
> >
> >How many economists does it take to flog a joke about light bulbs into
> >oblivion?
> >
> >Ian
>
> at least it's not a pointless flame-war, though of course the latter would
> make screwing in the light bulb unnecessary.
>
> Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
*

Hey somebody has to play the humor police lest we escalate and the secret
Monty Python joke is rolled out and we're all killed.

Joe Friday

Re: Re: humor

[ravi narayan]

Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:

> 
> Postscript:
> 
> Q.  How many graduate students does it take to screw in a light bulb?
> A.  One, but it takes him eight years.
>

probably the more correct answer is:

Q.  How many graduate students does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A.  one graduate student and one professor. the student to do the work
 and the professor to take the credit.

to tie it into another thread, i have heard an interesting spin on an
old joke, worth repeating:

response from classical economics professor in india to student who
suggests that socialism might have something to do with kerala's
higher literacy and freedoms: "it might all work very well in practice
but it will never work in theory".

--ravi

-- 

man is said to be a rational animal. i do not know why he has not been defined
as an affective or feeling animal. more often i have seen a cat reason than
laugh or weep. perhaps it weeps or laughs inwardly - but then perhaps, also
inwardly, the crab resolves equations of the 2nd degree. -- alasdair macintyre.

RE: Re: RE: RE: Re: humor

[Eric Nilsson]

At 02:27 PM 3/29/01 -0500, you wrote:
> >Q: How many neoclassical economists
> does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A: The bulb would not have burned out in the first
place if not for government regulation.

Eric
.

Re: Re: RE: Re: humor

[Jim Devine]

>
>
>How many economists does it take to flog a joke about light bulbs into
>oblivion?
>
>Ian

at least it's not a pointless flame-war, though of course the latter would 
make screwing in the light bulb unnecessary.

Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine

Re: RE: Re: humor

[Ian Murray]

- Original Message -
From: "Brown, Martin (NCI)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 11:22 AM
Subject: [PEN-L:9755] RE: Re: humor


> How many quantum mechanics does it take to screw in the light bulb?
>
> One to screw it in at a probability of 95% and one to not screw it in at a
> probability of 5%.

**

How many economists does it take to flog a joke about light bulbs into
oblivion?

Ian

Re: RE: RE: Re: humor

[Jim Devine]

At 02:27 PM 3/29/01 -0500, you wrote:
>Q: How many neoclassical economists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A: It's hard to tell, but one thing we know is that the government can't be 
trusted to do so!

or:

A: first we have to prove that the light bulb exists!

Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine

RE: RE: Re: humor

[Brown, Martin (NCI)]

Q: How many neoclassical economists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A: It would never get screwed in because the dark room exists and
therefore must be the result of market efficiency and pareto optimality so
there is no reason to screw in a light bulb; i.e. just accept the darkness,
it is the best of all possible worlds OR it is not the best of all possible
worlds but it is better than any other room in the house (did anybody look?)

RE: Re: humor

[Brown, Martin (NCI)]

How many quantum mechanics does it take to screw in the light bulb?

One to screw it in at a probability of 95% and one to not screw it in at a
probability of 5%.

-Original Message-
From: J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 1:40 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [PEN-L:9749] Re: humor


 How many Madisonians does it take to screw in
a light bulb?
 Answer: Three.  One to screw in the light bulb,
one to order the morning buns, and one to reminisce
about the sixties.
 How many Californians does it take to screw in
a light bulb?
 Answer:  Five.  One to screw in the light bulb and
four to share the experience.
  and my all time fave
  How many Zen Buddhists does it take to screw in a
light bulb?
  Answer: Two.  One to screw in the light bulb and one
NOT to screw in the light bulb.
Barkley Rosser
- Original Message -
From: "Jim Devine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 11:18 AM
Subject: [PEN-L:9734] humor


> [was: Re: [PEN-L:9723] RE: Re: RE: Re: A Fair Deal?]
>
> David S. wrote:
> >Michael --
> >
> >I am not surprised at all that you don't find P.J. O'Rourke funny.  You
> >don't strike me as a Republican Party Reptile.  What about Dave Barry --
> >another semi-libertarian?
>
> Dave Barry is very funny (at least to me), as is Scott "Dilbert" Adams.
But
> I notice that these guys have been shifting to the left.
>
> ---
>
> Today's (3/29/01) Dilbert --
>
> frame# 1. TV says to Dilbert: "Buy your electricity from the Dogbert Power
> Company."
>
> frame# 2. Dogbert saying to the TV camera: "We generate all of our power
> with the help of California environmentalists."
>
> frame# 3. Workers at power plant: "These are getting harder to find
> lately." (carrying an environmentalist, bound & gagged, to be stuffed in
> the furnace.)
>
> -
>
> I can't cite evidence about Dave Barry.
>
> >In fact, do Lefties have a sense of humor?  Or do you have to wait until
> >the revolution comes before you are permitted to smile?
>
> (BTW, not all leftists are revolutionaries, as should be obvious from
pen-l.)
>
> My experience is that people who lack a sense of humor are distributed
> randomly across the political spectra. The sort who are typically
humorless
> are called "politically correct," a group that is also randomly
distributed
> in this way. Listen to some of the anti-abortion folks some time.
> Bureaucrats of all types fit this category.
>
> Leftists strive to keep their jokes from being at the expense of those who
> have been getting the short end of the societal stick for generations,
> which sometimes cramps their style. (However, it does encourage the
> practice of the highest form of humor, i.e., plays on words.) This is
> sometimes encouraged by the defensive posture encouraged by being a small
> minority of the population. But if you can find a copy, look at THE BIG
RED
> JOKE BOOK (Pluto Press, 1980s?) some time. It's got a lot of great jokes,
> often at the expense of bureaucrats.
>
> Some of the best jokes come from anarchists (on the left) and libertarians
> (on the right). This is probably because these folks believe in breaking
> down societal barriers (like Lenny Bruce). But sometimes they end up
> dwelling on being obnoxious, like P.J. O'Rourke, who ends up being funny
> only to those who enjoy hate and right-wing resentment. Bill Maher has
> tendencies of this sort.
>
> Q: How many post-modernists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: none -- that would end up replicating the totalizing modernist vision
> perpetrated by the Enlightenment.
>
> Q: How many romantic conservatives does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: none -- that would lead to the Enlightenment-inspired destruction of
the
> traditions that hold society together.
>
> Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
>
>

RE: RE: Re: humor

[Brown, Martin (NCI)]

Correction.  I meant the SAME one

-Original Message-
From: Brown, Martin (NCI) 
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 2:22 PM
To: '[EMAIL PROTECTED]'
Subject: [PEN-L:9755] RE: Re: humor


How many quantum mechanics does it take to screw in the light bulb?

One to screw it in at a probability of 95% and one to not screw it in at a
probability of 5%.

-Original Message-
From: J. Barkley Rosser, Jr. [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 1:40 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [PEN-L:9749] Re: humor


 How many Madisonians does it take to screw in
a light bulb?
 Answer: Three.  One to screw in the light bulb,
one to order the morning buns, and one to reminisce
about the sixties.
 How many Californians does it take to screw in
a light bulb?
 Answer:  Five.  One to screw in the light bulb and
four to share the experience.
  and my all time fave
  How many Zen Buddhists does it take to screw in a
light bulb?
  Answer: Two.  One to screw in the light bulb and one
NOT to screw in the light bulb.
Barkley Rosser
- Original Message -
From: "Jim Devine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Thursday, March 29, 2001 11:18 AM
Subject: [PEN-L:9734] humor


> [was: Re: [PEN-L:9723] RE: Re: RE: Re: A Fair Deal?]
>
> David S. wrote:
> >Michael --
> >
> >I am not surprised at all that you don't find P.J. O'Rourke funny.  You
> >don't strike me as a Republican Party Reptile.  What about Dave Barry --
> >another semi-libertarian?
>
> Dave Barry is very funny (at least to me), as is Scott "Dilbert" Adams.
But
> I notice that these guys have been shifting to the left.
>
> ---
>
> Today's (3/29/01) Dilbert --
>
> frame# 1. TV says to Dilbert: "Buy your electricity from the Dogbert Power
> Company."
>
> frame# 2. Dogbert saying to the TV camera: "We generate all of our power
> with the help of California environmentalists."
>
> frame# 3. Workers at power plant: "These are getting harder to find
> lately." (carrying an environmentalist, bound & gagged, to be stuffed in
> the furnace.)
>
> -
>
> I can't cite evidence about Dave Barry.
>
> >In fact, do Lefties have a sense of humor?  Or do you have to wait until
> >the revolution comes before you are permitted to smile?
>
> (BTW, not all leftists are revolutionaries, as should be obvious from
pen-l.)
>
> My experience is that people who lack a sense of humor are distributed
> randomly across the political spectra. The sort who are typically
humorless
> are called "politically correct," a group that is also randomly
distributed
> in this way. Listen to some of the anti-abortion folks some time.
> Bureaucrats of all types fit this category.
>
> Leftists strive to keep their jokes from being at the expense of those who
> have been getting the short end of the societal stick for generations,
> which sometimes cramps their style. (However, it does encourage the
> practice of the highest form of humor, i.e., plays on words.) This is
> sometimes encouraged by the defensive posture encouraged by being a small
> minority of the population. But if you can find a copy, look at THE BIG
RED
> JOKE BOOK (Pluto Press, 1980s?) some time. It's got a lot of great jokes,
> often at the expense of bureaucrats.
>
> Some of the best jokes come from anarchists (on the left) and libertarians
> (on the right). This is probably because these folks believe in breaking
> down societal barriers (like Lenny Bruce). But sometimes they end up
> dwelling on being obnoxious, like P.J. O'Rourke, who ends up being funny
> only to those who enjoy hate and right-wing resentment. Bill Maher has
> tendencies of this sort.
>
> Q: How many post-modernists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: none -- that would end up replicating the totalizing modernist vision
> perpetrated by the Enlightenment.
>
> Q: How many romantic conservatives does it take to screw in a light bulb?
>
> A: none -- that would lead to the Enlightenment-inspired destruction of
the
> traditions that hold society together.
>
> Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine
>
>

RE: Re: humor

[David Shemano]

Now you have inspired me:

Q: How many Marxists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A:  None -- The light bulb's own internal contradictions contain the seeds
of its own
revolution.

A:  Two - one to screw it in, and a second to hand out leaflets.

Q: How many conservatives does it take to change a light bulb?

A: One -- after reflecting in the twilight on the merit of the previous
bulb.

Q: How many running-dog lackeys of the bourgeoisie does it take to change a
light bulb?

A:  None -- that's the proletariat's work!

Q: How many Chinese Red Guards does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A:  10,000 - to give the bulb a cultural revolution.

Q: How many nihilists does it take to change a light bulb?

A: There is nothing to change.

Q: How many economists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A: Two. One to assume the ladder and one to change the bulb.

See generally:
http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/Humor/Jokes/Light_Bulb_Jokes/

David Shemano

Re: Re: Re: humor

[Doug Henwood]

How many Teamsters does it take to change a light bulb?

Thirteen. You have a problem with that?

Re: Re: humor

[Jim Devine]

At 01:39 PM 3/29/01 -0500, you wrote:
>  How many Madisonians does it take to screw in
>a light bulb?

my answer is the same, and different, based on political theory:

Three, because one person can't be trusted with all the power.

>  How many Californians does it take to screw in
>a light bulb?
>  Answer:  Five.  One to screw in the light bulb and
>four to share the experience.

you should know better! Californians don't screw in light bulbs! they do so 
in hot-tubs.

Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] &  http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/~jdevine

Re: Re: humor

[Ian Murray]

four to share the experience.
>   and my all time fave
>   How many Zen Buddhists does it take to screw in a
> light bulb?
>   Answer: Two.  One to screw in the light bulb and one
> NOT to screw in the light bulb.
> Barkley Rosser


No. It's four.

the 3rd screws in the non-light bulb

the 4th non-screws the light bulb and the non-light bulb

Ian

[PEN-L:6209] Re: RE: humor and sensitivity

[Henry C.K. Liu]

Max Sawicky wrote:

> >I've gotten worse from HCKL in the past and didn't complain, but I'm not
> gonna bother him any more; he takes the fun out of it.

Give an example or evidence what you got from me in the past that justifies your
making fun of my name.
BTW, if you had pronounced my name LIU properly, you silly pun would not have
worked.  The name is not LU, it is LIU, accent of the i, as in li-u.
It is a very famous name in China.  It belongs not just to me personally but to
my family the history for which traces back to the 7th century.  Anyone slightly
familiar with Chinese history would recognized the name and know its proper
pronounciation.
Your idea of fun is offensive.

HCKL