Bush wags the dog in Albania

[Mabus]

Remember when the RW pundits accused Clinton of "wagging the dog" and launching a missle to distract from his sexual "scandal"? So what happens in our current version of reality? Bush shows up in Albania (the country we "attacked" in Wag the Dog) and is greeted like a liberator (bet he wishes he had taken his "Mission Accomplished" codpiece) after he starts a real faux war to distract us from the guy that Clinton launched a missile at in the first place.

[thereismore]

1. No, we did not attack Albania. nt

[Mabus]

4. Exactly, the B-3 bomer will not be deployed along the Albanian border

;)

[Wwagsthedog]

2. You called? nt

[Mabus]

5. Cool avatar

But, like many of the Mabus threads I respond to, this one is generic.
:evilgrin:

[durrrty libby]

3. When I saw the Albanians reaching out to hug and touch him,

I wondered what is wrong with these people?

I don't get it.

[Mabus]

7. I heard on MSNBC or CNN that he's (once again) riding on coat tails

FDR for saving them from Italy during WWII and Poppy (not Reagan - eat that you freepers!) for helping to bring down communism.

The like the America we used to be.

[Cleita]

8. Probably lack of a free press.

It looks like it's happening to us too.

[Richard Steele]

15. One of them swiped his wristwatch, you know.

Link: http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/06/12/bush.albania.ap/index.html

[Cleita]

6. Maybe he'll like it so much that he will stay.

I doubt it though. Albania is poor and there is no treasury or oil to loot.

[Mabus]

9. But there are people to exploit

Gotta have a back up plan to make money when the oil dries up. Do you think those rickshaws are going to pull themselves?

[Joe Chi Minh]

10. Headlines on page 26 of today's (UK) Daily Mirror: Bush joins Norman

Wisdom as national hero in Albania.

Here's the link:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/tm_method=full%26objectid=19277308%26siteid=89520-name_page.html

[Mabus]

11. LOL

Now that's something I didn't know. I had to look up who Norman Wisdom is.

[Joe Chi Minh]

12. It's true you have to like slap-stick humour, but if you like Laurel and Hardy and

the Bowery Boys, for instance, as I do - my wife has total disdain for my sense of humour - you'll love him. He really is hilarious. Well imo!

Another thing, though, is that he is a fantastic person. He lives on the Isle of Man, but refuses tax-exile status and pays his income tax at the due rate.

[Mabus]

13. I love Harold Lloyd, Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy and the Bowery Boys

My husband and his friends say I have a masculine sense of humor and that's why I think the Three Stooges are funny too. I'll have to keep an eye for him.

We've got a locally owned video rental place that has a pretty decent British section. It's where my husband when to get the "Prime Suspect" series with Helen Mirren after I kept telling him how fantastic they were. He got hooked and I think he fell in love with Helen.

Thanks for the information. I learn so much on DU. :hi:

edited to add: this is whole Norman Wisdom thing is interesting and it borders on bizarre. Damn, imagine only having a very few movies to choose from. That is so weird.

[Joe Chi Minh]

16. Oddly enough, I'm more familiar with his stand-up televised stage

performances than with his films, But when I was working on the night-shift at Langley (near Slough, England...), we used to play little japes on each other. A mate of mine there used to come up behind me and call out in a Norman Wisdom kind of voice, "Mr Grimsdale! Mr Grimsdale!" (Norman Wisdom's boss in a department store, if I remember correctly); or in a booming vocie, "Cheese, Mr Christian?" Crazy stuff, but it brightened up the shift no end.

Anyway, I hope you have some luck with films. You should be able to get them on his Internet site for a few dollars. They're old, black and white films.

It was funny to hear Norman more recently on the box talking about how he got started in the army. Apparently he was supposed to be a singer, but at a concert, in the middle of one of his songs, he did one of his fantastic prat-falls, supposedly by accident; but he said he got so much laughter from the lads he was supposed to be singing to, he really laid it on thick from there. And after that concert, he didn't bother with the singing. Just stand-up comedy.

Even in his eightees he was doing these extraordinary prat-falls. I mean, you can't really imagine how funny they were without seeing them. It was all the other gumpish paraphernalia and carry-on.

[Mabus]

17. And suddenly it all makes sense

Bear with me for what some may interpret as Albanian bashing.

From what I understand the Albanians are huge fans of Norman's for a couple of reasons. First, from what I hear from you and from what I've read elsewhere he's not only a great comedian, he's a great at physical comedy. That's a plus in any book (as the Daily Show knows by its report on the hitnutuculus humor).

Secondly, Wisdom's movies were basically the only ones they had access to for years because they would cut off from the outside world for a while.

So, here's why Albanians like Bush: he's comical. It's the way he walks and the way he talks. He's goofy. He's uncoordinated and he's well-known for his pratfalls. He uses a lot of props when he does his "physical comedy". Bush is definitely a master of both "Pretzel choking" and "bicycle falls". Even better they have pictures to show that he's fallen and hurt himself. Bush is human, just like them! And because they would cut-off for so long they're stuck in the vaudeville-comedy mindset of physical comedy, they naturally love Bush (and his foil, Pickles).

Thank you. You've help make sense of the situation for me. ;)

[Joe Chi Minh]

18. Don't mention it. Your historical perspective makes a lot of sense!

[yellowcanine]

14. The late night stand-ups are going to have a field day - particularly with the part about someone

swiping the watch off his wrist. Bush thought they loved him and it turns out that they just wanted to steal his watch. How pathetic is that?