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Overnight Open Thread - Depressingest Day Edition

Do Presidents Age Faster in Office?

Well that's the common perception but research shows that presidents by and large are more healthy and youthful than their peers - even after leaving office.

Neo-neocon has a theory on why we perceive presidential aging to be faster than normal:

I’ve noticed in my own life and among my friends, as well as for public figures, that visible aging doesn’t progress in smooth linear fashion. It advances in fits and starts and discrete bumps.

...There’s a group who hit the aging wall in their mid-to-late forties, going almost overnight from young to oldish. They’re the canaries in the mine. Another bunch “turn” quite suddenly in their late fifties, with the early sixties a time of particular peril for many.

These periods happens to coincide with the ages of many presidents while in office. I hereby submit that it’s not so much the stress of office—after all, the stresses come with an awful lot of perks, too—but the age of presidents during their administrations that is accountable for some of this perception of accelerated aging in presidents on the part of the public.

Ronald Reagan was a classic example of someone who went from young to middle-aged practically overnight. That wasn't so great for his film career, but luckily for him he maintained most of his middle-age good looks for the next 30 years.

January 3rd officially The Most Depressing Day of the Year
So if you were feeling down today, cheer up - others were unhappy too.

With many returning to work for the first time in over a week with little to look forward to, today will be one of the year's most depressing days.

Experts suggest that the January blues will be at their worst today as festive cheer is displaced by having to face up to the grim realities of day-to-day life.

And tomorrow is Divorce Day so you have that to look forward to.

Idiotic Quote of the Day
[Okay this may have already been covered here before but just in case it wasn't...]

“The scale of Right Wing sociopolitical sabotage necessitates a Nuremberg-scale trial for all the corporate agents and treasonous capitalisto-fascist architects of our democracy’s current and most pressing misery. From the blatant Republican policy doublespeak emanating from think-tank sponsored word doctors to the outright obstruction and lies expectorated by Republican congressional representatives and senators, the very concept of governance can only be considered once the culprits are removed. Driven to real madness by unadulterated greed they have embraced an ideology, the success of which hinges upon the very ruin of this nation.”

— Actor Steven Weber (from the 1990s NBC sitcom Wings) writing at the Huffington Post, October 24 (MRC Notable Quotables)

This word salad of buzz-words is typical of what you get when a insecure, not-so-educated person tries to sound like an intellectual. I suspect the only people impressed are the other poseurs.

'Pick-pocketed in Peckham'

The late Sam Francis gave us the invaluable term “anarcho-tyranny” to describe that state of society in which “we refuse to control real criminals (that’s the anarchy) so we control the innocent (that’s the tyranny).”

Britain is far gone in anarcho-tyranny. Among my Christmas mail were a card and letter from a relative we barely communicate with the rest of the year. To make up for her side of the delinquency, she sends us a nice chatty summary of all that’s happened to her large and bustling family in the previous twelve months.

The family mentioned then listed five different felonies committed against them during the past year which makes them positively privileged compared to what the average Briton endures.

TWA Stewardess School, 1961
Of course the problem with today's stewardesses flight attendants is that they're all from the class of 1978 and they hate you.

The Original iPhone, Circa 1983
The Apple Phone never got produced but for its time it looks pretty slick. Hell even now it looks better than most office phones.

Crimes By Astrological Sign
Well since it hasn't been normalized by the number of people born each month, it's pretty much bogus. On the other hand I am an Aries and I have to admit that I do have strong chaotic evil tendencies although these are generally offset by my inherent laziness and aversion to punishment.

The Yahoo AoSHQ group. You know the way.

Tonight's post brought to you by the Sidewinder:

Now in its 6th decade of killing bad guys.

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