Oh, The Things You Learn On I-5!
ABOVE: Cheap piece of shit (right) and Ben’s car (left)
Have you been wondering where Ben Shapiro has been? In a traffic jam on I-5, that’s where. And being the industrious wingnut that he is (and perhaps because he now has lots of time on his hands*), Ben isn’t going to let the opportunity of a traffic jam go to waste. Not, of course, when a traffic jam is just further proof that all liberals suck.
Then we saw it. A sign. A large orange sign reading: Freeway Closed Ahead, 11 p.m.-4 a.m. It was too late to get off the freeway; it was too late to turn around. There were no turnoffs, no exits, no restrooms. We were stuck an hour from Los Angeles, bumper-to-bumper, moving less than 1 mph. Literally. During the next three hours, we moved a grand total of 1.6 miles. … Three hours is a very long time to sit in traffic, particularly when your radio is broken.
As a newly-minted associate at a large national law firm like Goodwin Proctor, you’d think that Ben could afford a car with a radio that works. Or maybe not.*
I assume there were liberals in the traffic jam; after all, this is California, where liberals dominate both the halls of government and the voting rolls. And I wondered what those liberals thought of the government’s handling of road repair.
Oh, I don’t know, Ben, they probably thought “Those damn liberals in Sacramento can’t do anything right.” Or maybe not, since the head of the California Department of Transportation is a Republican.
I wondered whether they were glad that the state of California allocates more than $13.8 billion to the California Department of Transportation each year, paying 22,000 full-time employees — and that not one of those employees had the common sense to post signs notifying drivers to take another route.
No, those liberals probably wondered why they forgot to check the Caltrans website, which lists all current road construction sites, including the one that snared the Intertubes-challenged Shapiro.
I wondered why the liberals in the crowd hadn’t considered that if the government can’t handle paving roads, it certainly shouldn’t handle the health care system.
You see the difference is that while liberals have to actually do road construction to pave roads, thereby inevitably causing some traffic delays, conservatives are able to pave roads solely using the power of prayer, which not only doesn’t cause any delays but also costs less..
I wondered why liberals believe that the people best qualified to handle the education, Social Security and welfare systems are the same folks who left the office at 4:59 p.m. last Friday thinking that they had done a good job with construction on the I-5. … Private industry has a stake in efficiency and customer service. The public sector has no such stake.
Poor Ben apparently thinks that state employees are paving the roads themselves. It should come as no surprise that California, like every other state, contracts road construction to private industry. Oops.
May all liberals sit through such traffic before they vote big-government Democrats back into office.
In Ben’s next column, Ben will explain why the long lines he encounters every Monday night at the grocery store are also caused by big-government Democrats, whose socialist policies have made all grocery stores in California worse than any supermercado in Havana.
*We’re not sure why, but all references to Ben have been scrubbed from the Goodwin Proctor website. Even his contact page is gone. I’m not terribly worried about Ben’s future because, of course, there’s always wingnut welfare.
Professional Victims
Are you sure that is Ben and not Damien from Omen?
Or maybe…are you sure that is Ben the rat and not Ben The Rat?
OK. California has a Republican governor and head of the Department of Transportation. It is also better than even money that the contractor actually doing the road construction is a Republican. So this is obviously the fault of liberals and Democrats who had no input into the decision making. Flawless conservative logic.
Yeah, he’s either Damien or…The SCARECROW!
HypErchondiracs.
“Those liberal clowns in Sacramento have done it again. What a bunch of clowns.” –Shapiromatic3000
I’m still wondering why the people who couldn’t protect the Pentagon and the World Trade Center on Sept. 11 – which was just a matter of keeping track of 19 people already known to American intelligence agencies – should then be expected to competently run a vastly more complicated task like transforming the Middle East into a democratic paradise.
I know. It’s treason to apply this kind of reasoning without blaming liberals.
Why does he continue to live in California?
I wondered why the liberals in the crowd hadn’t considered that if the government can’t handle paving roads, it certainly shouldn’t handle the health care system.
I refuse to take part in any government-sponsored health program that involves the medicinal use of asphalt, even if it provides “Detour Ahead” signs.
Fixed.
Three hours in traffic without a radio. Nothing there to distract him from himself.
THE HORROR!
THE HORROR!!
fucking libs…
Hopefully he’ll be able to blame the long lines of people waiting to vote this November on liberals too.
You see the difference is that while liberals have to actually do road construction to pave roads, thereby inevitably causing some traffic delays, conservatives are able to pave roads solely using the power of prayer, which not only doesn’t cause any delays but also costs less too.
Just ask Tim Pawlenty.
Paved roads are the White Jews of Infrastructure Maintenance!!!
As a traffic jam survivor in a conservative state…after 6 years of conservative debt I gotta say the ‘big-government democrats’ must be fuckin Huuuuuge – rivaling only Ben’s ability to bullshit.
No, those liberals probably wondered why they forgot to check the Caltrans website, which lists all current road construction sites, including the one that snared the Intertubes-challenged Shapiro.
As a veteran of LA’s freeway madness and now existing in self-imposed exile in the woods, I check that fucking website every goddamned day. We have fires, then we have rain, then we have rock slides, mud slides and then more fires then pouding Pacific storms. I’ve been here for five years and on five separate occasions every road leading into and out of paradise has been closed due to some sort of calamity.
I can haz intertoobz? They work for me.
Then again, I’m not a complete and utter idiot like “Eyebrow” Ben Shapiro
We locals call it I-5..us locals that use it from the Canadian border to the Mexican border.
A minor point, but it bugged the hell out of me when he described it as the road that connects Northern and Southern California…hello! Oregon and Washington, too. It’s THE major interstate out here. 101 pales in comparison, but is much more beautiful.
But besides that,,he’s an idiot.
This one really confuses me. The construction is being done at 11pm to 4am, specifically to affect the least amount of people. That actually sounds like a responsive change to what the public wants.
It doesn’t make it liberal or conservative to get road construction to happen during extremely off-peak hours.
Liberals would put up signs until you couldn’t see the road any more. We’re too much about information. Conservatives would say, “Why are you driving at night? Get off the road, you drug addict looking for a fix,” and laugh at his misfortune of getting stuck in midnight traffic.
This kid is deranged.
Most of all, I wondered why liberals are so worshipful of government in the face of all available evidence.
IRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQIRAQ
I’m just going to continue to blame George Bush. I hate to have to reset my fault-finder.
And Ben, good luck at the unemployment office. I hear the libs have caused massive lines there as well.
I’ve seen fires and I’ve seen rain.
I’ve seen rock slides that I thought would never end.
I’ve seen mud slides when I coudln’t find a friend.
But I always thought I’d see you again.
I just bought a bunch of organic food in a gay neighborhood where they are building a light rail mass transit system in the heart of Texas. I wish Ben knew that. I think it might make his head explode and I’d enjoy that.
I think Ben’s radio is probably just fine.
However, as has been demonstrated over and over again by the conservative’s distress at hearing or seeing things broadcast that offend them, there is something about leaning Right that makes one unable to work an ‘off’ knob.
So then I guess men at work signs aren’t the swastikas of liberal fascism. I really thought I was on to something there. Oh well.
May all liberals sit through such traffic before they vote big-government Democrats back into office.
Well, you know, it was California’s first traffic jam, so most residents haven’t had the life-altering experience that Ben had. On the off chance there’s another traffic jam in a blue state, maybe some more folks will see the light. Ben can only hope. Personally, if we even have backup due to road repair here in New Jersey, I’m making sure we elect nothing but Republicans. Then we won’t have to worry about having the funds for that evil late-night road work.
Blue Buddha, you continue to be hilarious. Also that anonymous post above is mine, but I’d like to disown myself from the liberal fascism bit. Poor taste even for me.
Not the “Virgin” Ben Shapiro?
Was there some cataclysmic** event that I did not hear about?
(** Cataclysmic to approximately one of the involved parties.)
Yeah, it’s strange. Does he really think those are GOVERNMENT employees out there on the road crews?
Do you suppose all the trucks and equipment with the contracting company’s name and logo painted on them might have distracted him?
The government’s role is to FUND the work, not DO the work. Do you suppose he actually doesn’t understand that?
I mean sure, you can believe that the funding is misallocated or badly managed, but if you can’t tell the difference between the contracting office and the contractor, you really need to study a little harder.
Ben. As my old pal Eric Draven said. Try again. Try harder…
mikey
Don’t let Purity Balls Ben know that we’re on the verge of putting high-speed rail connecting SF to LA. He’d lose all bowel control.
Yeah, if liberals are so smart, how come people still get chickenpox, huh? Why haven’t liberals cured chickenpox or colds, huh?
If they’re so smart?
Well?
In CA there are (usually) warning signs up for A MONTH before major road construction. THe dates and times are displayed in FLASHING LIGHTS up and down the roads leading to the sites. People just don’t pay attention.
can we put “literally” in there with “methinks” ?
I followed Clif’s link to Caltrans, entered one numeral in the Check Current Highway Conditions search at the top of the main page , and arrived here:
Trip planning, functioning radio, conservatives, personal responsibility, blah, blah, blah.
What a whiny little pisher. This child isn’t old enough to complain about the government. Sounds like he’s picked up some uninformed attitude from hangin’ around cranky old people. Plus he looks like the quintessential smug prep-school sadist. In conclusion, off with his head!
If there were no liberals, there would be no I-5. If there were no I-5, Ben would be home right now masturbating. DAMN YOU LIBERALS!
Why does he continue to live in California?
Yeah, why doesn’t he move to good ol’ red-state, All-American Mississippi, like where my folks live. Shit, my old man can sit in his front yard all day and not see one car drive by. Couple pick-up trucks, sure, especially during hunting season. Ya notice, though, these whiny-type wingnuts never seem to live in the heartland they love so much.
Was there some cataclysmic** event that I did not hear about?
He got married week or so back, didn’t he, or am I making that up? One presumes Young Ben’s got him some of that good puddin’ by this point, but one never knows with the wingnut-type of folk. They may be trying to time conception for Reagan’s birthday or something, since a good boy like Ben would never have sex for pleasure, not his and definately not hers, because female orgasms are objectively pro-terrorist and anti-Jesus. Or something like that.
Anyhow, you’d think if he had gotten laid in the last week or so, he wouldn’t see such a whiny little shit. Like he’s the only motherfucker ever got stopped in traffic. Jesus, he should try navigating Atlanta, he’d get cut to pieces.
Ben lives in Los Angeles? And he’s shocked and appalled by traffic delays?
Whiny little dipshit.
I stepped in some gum on the sidewalk the other day. All I could think was, “stupid fucking conservatives.”
Last week I realized I’d run out of toilet paper. All I could think was, “stupid fucking conservatives.”
My dog is shedding like crazy right now. I suspect stupid fucking conservatives are to blame but I’ll wait a day or so until I’m confident they’re to blame. Then I’ll blog it and hope someone pays me.
Ben has been so quiet I just figured he was in the witless protection program.
To what should be no one’s surprise, a conservative responds to a difficult situation by getting pissy and finding a scapegoat.
Next…
Indeed. There are also flashing signs on all major feeder freeways to 5. I knew about the Fix I-5 plans months in advance and I never get closer to the road than 80 in Roseville.
This is definitely a case of Not-paying-attention-to-the-road-signs-itis. Big surprise.
The fact is, if Ben was reading the liberal media – as, for example, the LA Times – he’d know about this construction. I’d also be willing to bet there was a Detour sign, and he just missed it.
As for this insipid way to construct a column – “take your own life experience and generalize” – that’s sadly what people learn when they write for College newspapers (liberal or conservative, doesn’t matter).
If it weren’t for all those folks on liberal food stamps in the lines, Ben could get home with his cheetohs and Dr.Pepper without any delays.
But the uppity freeloaders insist on going through the check-out like they were normal people with real money.
What he ought to do, on I-5, is go up the shoulder and then bully himself back into traffic after gaining five or six car-lengths…
If it weren’t for all those folks on liberal food stamps in the lines, Ben could get home with his cheetohs and Dr.Pepper without any delays.
But the uppity freeloaders insist on going through the check-out like they were normal people with real money.
What he ought to do, on I-5, is go up the shoulder and then bully himself back into traffic after gaining five or six car-lengths…which is what his hummer-humpin co-ideologists typically do…the pricks!
In J-school, I have been told, you are taught that in order to do a think piece on something, you have to think.
This bit of arcane knowledge seems to be some kind of trade secret.
What Mz. Nicky said. Also, this–
“In conclusion, off with his head!”
–is not just pleasing rhetoric, it’s damn fine justice, too.
“Private industry has a stake in efficiency and customer service. ”
No they don’t. They have a stake in making as much money as fast as possible.
Soooo, his solution to all this traffic hubbub is to privatize the roads? Okay, I’m not sure how having a toll plaza ever two miles is going to help traffic flow, but whatever creams your twinkie, man.
Privatized roads ROCK!!!11!!! For comparison, check out how much British Rail “improved” after privatization. And how much “cheaper” power in California got after deregulation.
I think we can still call him Virgin Ben because I’m sure his honeymoon made the wedding night bedroom scene in “On Chesil Beach” look like a letter to the editors of Penthouse scenario in comparison.
And hey, is that a Rambler in Ben’s driveway? Looks like he took it to Earl Scheib. Paging Amy Alkon. Clif found your car. Get him, Amy!
Point of order: US 5 is in Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.
I-5 is in Washington, Oregon, and California.
Ce n’est pas la même chose.
[Clif adds: Okay. Fixed. Thanks.]
I thought traffic signs giving drivers better alternate routes were part of the nanny state. Also, they embolden the terrorists! We should change the laws so that giant SUVs can simply drive over smaller, more efficient LIE-beral cars!
That’ll teach those stupid progressives. BWAHAHAHAHA!!!11!1! cough cough USA!
Um, didn’t our hard-earned tax dollars, which would have been at least in part ear-marked for infrastructure upkeep of U.S. freeways, basically get swiped out of our hands and given to Halliburton, Blackwater and KBR to help them hurt Iraqis? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think that was a shrub/dead-eye dick move.
I don’t know why seeing more faux-victim whining from Ben makes me want to mention this, but have I told everyone that I broke a tooth Thursday? I mean, it broke while I was sleeping, apparently, because right after I got up, I felt something hard between my teeth and there it was. Never had that happened before – apparently it’s another joy of being middle-aged. Took a few minutes to even figure out where it came from…apparently the inside back quarter of one of the very back upper molars just gave up the ghost. Fortunately it doesn’t hurt – at least not yet – but I’m sure this means that since thankfully the liberals haven’t managed to saddle us with socialized medicine I’ll be forking over in excess of $1000 to the dentist of my choice sometime within the next two weeks.
Hey, it’s not like I was gonna use that money from my tax return for anything important.
Here in Maine, construction crews still adhere to The Great Covenant of The Workers on Roadways of 1215 and, accordingly, always post the first “Road Construction Ahead” notification sign percisely 500 feet AFTER a driver’s last opportunity to exit said roadway. Most folks are unaware of this historic document since the news of its signing was overshadowed at the time by stories about a missing “fair-haired girl” from Shropshire, continued analysis of the “Innocent’s” upset victory over the highly favored “John’s” in the previous year’s Cow Bowl (now known as “The Battle of Bovines”), and the signing of some over-hyped political thingie, the Magma Catheter or some such.
BTW – “percisely” is the Olde English spelling.
I’m sorry, but my Bush hatred isn’t nearly as irrational as virgin Ben’s free-floating liberal hatred. What a putz.
The CalTrans website has live streaming videos from cameras placed up and down I-5.
I’ll bet some tech-savvy poster can figure out where all the detour signs were on the route…and prove Unibrow to be an ignorant liar.
ugly and whiney is no way to go through life ben.
just sayin.
and do something about those fucking eyebrows you freak! what, are you trying for a role in the next star trek movie?
another conservatard inconvenienced. damn.
Waitaminnit, he is stuck in traffic without a radio BUT with his brand new wife and he is miserable?
Nice one Ben…
She’s a liberal! Burn her!
owlbear1 said,
August 23, 2008 at 23:31
Waitaminnit, he is stuck in traffic without a radio BUT with his brand new wife and he is miserable?
She came without directions.
*supply yur own punctuation, pervies!
any government-sponsored health program that involves the medicinal use of asphalt,
That self-styled “Doctor” Ambrose Pare would have us abandon the use of boiling tar as a treatment for gunshot wounds. He claims, would you believe it, that gunpowder is not actually toxic, so it is not necessary to cauterise the contaminated tissue. He is, needless to say, a liberal, and an example of all that is worst about godless “evidence-based medicine”.
OT, but has anyone else noticed how quickly it’s become as though Tim Russert never lived at all?
Wingnut logic: Republicans have broken the government. Therefore government can never work. Democrats think government can work. Therefore they must not be elected.
In the UK, the symbol for Road-works Ahead looks like “men opening umbrellas”. In NZ, oddly enough, it looks more like “men pissing on sofas”.
Unfortunately my application for a research grant to explore the sociological implications of this differences was turned down.
WP is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful piece of software I have ever known in my life.
Roger L Simon has posted his latest masterpiece for all of us to enjoy!
It’s almost as if he’s realized that you guys haven’t said much about him lately!
Nobody noticed that for the first five hours of their trip, Virgin Ben and Mrs. Virgin Ben “sailed along happily at 80 mph”? As I understand it, that’s somewhat over the speed limit.
Because you see Ben’s married now so stop calling him a virgin. His next article will be about all the homosexual IslamoAtheist terror partying that was going on at Monday’s convention. It’ll start “My wife and I were watching the convention on TV”. I bet he’s even started introducing himself as “I’m the recently married Ben Shapiro. I should introduce you to my wife someday.”
Also note that Ben was going home to LA. The construction was one hour from LA. I don’t know why he was in Sacramento, but he’s basically saying that he didn’t know about freeway construction in his own city at a time when he was travelling. But then I guess that’s not surprising for a political writer who, as pointed out above, doesn’t know which party his DOT chief or Governor is from.
The most entertaining part is the total disconnect between what he’s writing about and what he’s trying to say. It’s positively surreal. For example:
This is a very tasty sammich – which highlights the important issue that Ben Shapuro is a talentless hack.
Look a rainbow – such a stark reminder of Ben Shapiro’s lack of intelligence or perception.
I just heard a siren go by, I hope it’s not on its way to Ben Shapiro’s house – you know Ben Shapiro – he wasn’t a POW like McCain was.
Also, over 60 comments and I’m the first to call Alanis!
Like Ra-a-a-ain, on the POW camp where John McCain was imprisoned for over half a decade.
I
fearmourn for my smutty friend’s sanity…mikey
Interesting that he is no longer listed on Goodwin Proctor’s website. His name isn’t on the general list of attorneys with S surnames, either. It’s also interesting that (according to his bio) that if he graduated from UCLA in 2004, which means he must have graduated from Harvard Law School in 2007, and therefore would have been up for a jfederal judicial clerkship in 2007-2008, Such a clerkship generally would not have ended by this time, in order for him to work for that law firm. If all this is correct, what this tells me is that Shapiro is such a buffoon and wingnut that even no Federalist Society-loving GOP federal judges would hire him for a clerkship after law school, which is pretty much de rigueur for any HLS graduate with intellectual pretensions.
Look, government can’t handle roads – therefore anything more important than roads – like health care, global warming, education, Social Security and
the Iraq Warwelfare – shouldn’t be handled by the government!I also mused on the broader questions, questions of much greater significance, depth and coherence than Ben’s. Is it time yet for another glass of bourbon? (Incidentally, the answer was yes)
There were no turnoffs, no exits, no restrooms.
Golden showers in the back seat of the Shapiro Love-Mobile?
Ben has come a looooong way since his virgin days!
Broader kweschions?
Okay.
Style point: “Mr. and Mrs. Virgin Ben Shapiro”?
Shorter Ben Shapiro:
I’m too stupid to live.
Did I do that right, all you Leider, Neiners?
Style point: “Mr. and Mrs. Virgin Ben Shapiro”?
I’m gonna go with “Master and Miss Virgin Ben Shapiro.” You have to earn the “Mister” and “Missus.” If you’re lucky, repeatedly.
Mmm. It doesn’t look right. I can’t figure out how to do the formatting. Italics, that sort of thing.
But seriously, who takes off on an anti-liberal riff while stuck in traffic in California? Wonder what the .. ah… marital dynamics were in that car at the time. “Hey, stoopid, I told you to check the website before we left… “
Love it:
Oh yeah, the irony of it all.
Incidentally, Mikey, have you introduced your Russian friend to
the wonders of FuckbumRB’s tasteless, sophomoric misreading of Cyrillic letters?I wonder if Ben blames liberals every time his local 7-11 runs out of snowcones and cheetos. Perhaps liberals are also to blame for his latent homosexuality and lack of interest in his wife.
Private industry has a stake in efficiency and customer service.
A lot of free-market cheerleaders say this, but it’s not always true. In fact, it’s only true if you’re talking about an industry with a) a bunch of competing firms, and b) low or nonexistent barriers to entry for new firms.
Otherwise, you just get shitty service and inefficiency, usually for a lot more money than you’d pay government to do it.
Ben’s married now
The miraculous powers of the snapper are apparently not as universally therapeutic or illuminating as once thought.
Yeah! REAL men don’t fix shit until it experiences catastrophic failure, preferably with loss of life so we can go to Code Brown pretending it wuz th’ terrists.
Wow.
Clearly Ben struggles with the concept maintenance.
But here’s what I really don’t understand:
“We” is plural so I’m going to assume there was more than one person in the car. Couldn’t they have passed the hours by (Warning crazy radical Islahomo concept ahead) talking?
Maybe his passenger was in the trunk.
Sure spencer, but in this case we’re talking about roads. Clearly the barrier to entry for someone wanting to put in a major highway is zero – if it only weren’t for all that liberal government meddling. I mean what stupid moonbat socialist thought that the government should be in the business of building roads?
Maybe his passenger was in the trunk.
Strapped to the roof.
Ah yes, the miraculously funny Fuckbum Post.
Legendary….
mikey
We score surprisingly high in a Google search for that term.
I love you, WordPress.
I 5
[IN THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA AREA]
IS CLOSED FROM THE JCT OF SR 91 /IN FULLERTON/ TO ARTESIA BLVD
/IN BUENA PARK/ (ORANGE CO) FROM 2330 HRS EACH NIGHT TO 0400 HRS EACH MORNING
7 DAYS A WEEK THRU 8/29/08 – DUE TO CONSTRUCTION – A DETOUR IS AVAILABLE
I’m still wondering why the people who couldn’t protect the Pentagon and the World Trade Center on Sept. 11 – which was just a matter of keeping track of 19 people already known to American intelligence agencies
Hoosier X, it could have been even simpler: how about just getting a single ferkin’ plane off the ground in less than an hour? Jeebus, spends more than the rest of the world combined on weapons, and can’t even get one supposedly fast-response jet into the air? My cats could do better than that, and they’re asleep for 18 hours a day. Sheesh.
But Caltrans Website, you’re run by LIEberuls. How can we believe a word you say?
Private industry has a stake in efficiency and customer service. ”
No they don’t. They have a stake in making as much money as fast as possible.
Actually, Some Guy, they have a stake in making as much money for as LONG as possible.
This is why there is an old industry joke about how every construction company hopes for a road works contract – they’ll not only be set up for life, they’ll be able to leave it to their grandkids.
I forget which company/companies it was, but they managed to milk a local road-widening project for nearly 3 years – turning a 4-lane highway into an 8, down about five miles of flat countryside with minimal rocks. Us notorious liberals up in NH were all wondering if there was any way to get the government to light a fire under them to speed them up, but apparently once the contract has been handed over, a company has to REALLY fuck up to lose it, hence liberal MA’s inability to do anything about Halliburton until after the Tunnel started leaking…
I guess if his radio wasn’t working, he couldn’t hear notifications of road closings and delays, either.
Obviously, sinister liberal conspiracists must have broken into his garage and disabled his car radio! Otherwise this shining representative of the Party of Personal Responsibility could hardly blame liberals for his getting stuck in a construction zone…
(And having been a courier in the heat of summer with routes passing through aforementioned Endless Road Destruction/Widening projects at wages that did not pay NEARLY enough to be worth being stuck in bumper-to-bumper at 98F, my sympathies for Widdu Ben’s Vewy First Twaffic Jam are …shall we say, limited? Geez, all these Manly Wingnuts ever do is whine and complain about things that most people deal with on a daily basis WITHOUT the endless freakouts of ZOMG! The store was out of matchbook cases! Clearly this is a sign of Impending Doom, caused by the Decline Of The West!!!1!)
At least I’m senile. What’s your excuse, Ben?
Married or not, at least he still has his brain-cherry.
That picture screams “not to be left alone with children, pets or livestock – ever” … & his blogride on the waaaahmbulance confirms it.
Getting emo about no radio in your car? What does a transistor radio cost, like 7 whole bucks retail? Uh, & you work at a fucking law firm? Can I have the firm’s name, so that I can recommend them to this guy I know who’s suing me?
Someone should get him to try several rounds of the fun edutainment traffic-jam game of “see how many cars have one person per car” – since a ridiculously simple choice like carpooling would make those packed roads (& the air) a mere 30-60% clearer. Yeah, I know, that’s a probable non sequitur, since Benbot probably ranks carpooling two places below terrorism on his hate-list.
Sigh. Gag.
“The I-5”? Is this something other people say, or is it just Ben? I grew up in Oregon, and we called it eye-five, or sometimes “the freeway” or “the interstate” (it being the only freeway/interstate anywhere near my town).
I gather people in California call their roads “the five”, “the one oh one”, etc, which feels wrong to me, but I guess I can accept it.
But does anybody else actually say “the eye five”?
Kinneson slammed shut the gate and the HypErchonDiracs burst forth with corruscating beams of pure force.
“This is the power to take the fight to Boskone!” he exclaimed.
People in NorCal usually drop the ‘the’ when talking about the lcoal highways, e.g. ‘101’ not ‘the 101’, ‘take 280 south to …’ not ‘take the 280 south to …’
The 5 is ‘the 5’ though, mostly, I think.
Well, if all else fails, he could always take up a career singing about checking your credit score online.
Oh, wait. That would require having a singing voice that didn’t resemble a cat being tortured, and if the Virgin Ben’s writing ability is any indication…
By Clono’s tungsten thyroid gland! Those corruscating beams will never penetrate the hull fields let alone the trafficonium jammers on the eye-five!
We score surprisingly high in a Google search for [Fuckbum]
Despite this thread, Sadly,No does not even register on Google’s search list for “hand-job monkeys”. Instead the list is topped by Mrs Tilton’s citation of the S,N! thread. Google is a fickle jade.
You have 3 choices driving to LA from Sacramento. If the 5 is blocked you can drive 2 hours west to the 101 or 2 hours east to the 395. Ironically Ben’s God put a mountain range between LA and the central valley and there is no “detour”.
Sorry for the inconvenience dipshit.
Apparently, Private Benjamin is still employed as an attorney. I looked him up on Martindale Hubbell’s web site and he is apparently now working at the firm of Bergman Dacey. The profile at the new firm does not have his picture, but I am fairly certain it is him.
Private industry has a stake in efficiency and customer service.
Tell it to the private contractors doing the state’s work, kid.
I smell sitcom!
I hate to break it to you, Ben, but you can’t marry your hand.
Speaking a native Northern Californian, I beg you to please stop using articles in front of route numbers. Hearing or reading “the I-5” is like nails on a chalkboard.
For those wondering why Ben and his wife were unable to make the time fly, he explains, “My wife was ****ing off, so there wasn’t much in the way of conversation.” My guess is after 5 hours in a car with Ben, she wasn’t ****ing off, she was ****ting her wrists.
I grew up in Southern California. At least until I left in the late ’60s, we never called it “the 5” or “the I-5” or anything but Hwy 5. Same with Hwy 101…we also called it Pacific Coast Hwy, and I have no idea when it became PCH.
I’ve lived in Northern California since then, and the same applies – no “the” in front of anything.
Sorry, meant to say I was agreeing about No. Cal.
Evidently not. According to the bio that is linked at Martindale (the name is in hypertext), that Benjamin Shapiro is older than our Ben, and went to different schools – Stanford and Loyola.
On the other hand, he still shows up in the State Bar database as working at Goodwin Procter.
You have to keep a current address on file with the bar, even if you are inactive.
The maximum speed limit on the I-5 is 75 miles per hour. Someone notify the government about this scofflaw.
Also, what kind of asshole is he that he couldn’t actually engage his wife in conversation? Also also, I have never seen any road construction in California (lived here all my life) that wasn’t well-signed well in advance. Plus they were doing this in the wee hours of Sunday night on a non-holiday weekend. What kind of self-absorbed dipshit makes the public claim that the government failed because it inconvenienced him instead of thousands of other drivers? What a fucking dick.
What a wuss!!!! “Wah-wah I’ve been stuck in traffic for three hours.”
John McCain was stuck for five and a half years! In prison!!!!
Would that be “light in the loafers rail”?
If that’s “an hour from Los Angeles”, his given destination, when the lad is driving in from Sacto, he really needs a better map.
To be fair, if you’re only going 80 coming down the straighter parts of I-5, everybody is passing you. Everybody. Yugos. Everybody.
Unavailable for comment…
Poor Ben.
Evidently not. According to the bio that is linked at Martindale (the name is in hypertext), that Benjamin Shapiro is older than our Ben, and went to different schools – Stanford and Loyola.
Thanks Zuzu. When I did the Martindale search, that was the only Ben Shapiro who turned up, so my bad for assuming it was the same person.
‘we also called it Pacific Coast Hwy, and I have no idea when it became PCH.’
When Burt Bacharach wrote the song?
Conversely, not using articles in front of route numbers makes you sound like you’re pretending to be a Soviet spy.
“Da, comrade, take I-5 to San Fransisko before nogoodnik Jonah Goldberk arrive. If you are late in arrivink before Goldberk can expose gay agenda, all is lost.”
Yes, he’s a symbiot.
Looks like he’s in LA too…I wonder how often he’s mistaken for the “other” Ben Shapiro. Poor guy.
Uh, song?
I am SO out of the loop.
Pretty much any REAL contract, that being one negotiated in good faith rather than as just another corporate/crony giveaway, contains SLAs. Service Level Agreements.
That is, if the project does not meet requirements for resources or timelines, not counting post-contractual scope-creep or change orders, there are significant financial penalties levied.
It is pretty common for the infrastructure contracts I’ve read. We’ve been doing some significant seismic retrofit projects here in the bay area and the contracts have been discussed endlessly by the press. If your state does not insist on them in it’s contracts, it’s a pretty clear indication that there is evil afoot…
mikey
Aw, poor widdle benny boy. He loves to play the victim so much, we ought to get him a nice present.
How about a REAL reason to feel like a victim? If he likes playing pretend so much, he should love the real thing!
I’ll contribute an axe handle and the barbed wire..
So, what does the man/boy with the eyebrows of a Sasquatch do for a living?
Did anyone mention that the amount the state pays for roads from taxes…
…Used to come from car registrations? Our Republican Governator was elected on the platform of not charging people to use the roads what the roads themselves actually cost.
I mean, because we have that budget
surplusdeficit, and all, too.I was kinda hoping marriage would have made him less of a whiny-ass, stupid little punk.
No such luck.
Who is this poor woman who married him? She looked deeply into his unibrow, and thought, “Yes! THIS is the man I want to spend the rest of my life with!”
A recently released convict who hadn’t had sex in 10 years?
A woman who’d been raised in a convent her entire life, never met a man before, and mistook him for one?
A former mental patient who still has difficulty distinguishing between reality and fantasy, and therefore think’s he’s just a hallucination?
A woman who’s both deaf and illiterate, and hence doesn’t realize what a putz he is…yet?
A woman with self-destructively low self-esteem and a deep streak of masochism?
A beard? (I don’t REALLY think he’s gay…but maybe she does.)
Help me ouit here…what sort of woman would marry little Ben?
Down in Los Angeles we normally reffer to the various freeways by their numbers; “You got to take the 110 for three miles and get off here..” and such, me personaly I always called them by their destination names; the Harbor freeway, the Santa Monica freeway etc
YOU TAKE THAT BACK!
The first generation Chevy Nova was a very nice car.
That is all.
Great smackdown.
You know, if you got on I-5 in Sacramento and drove 80 mph the whole way, you’d be in LA in less than five hours. Just sayin’. They must have STOPPED at some point, or he was LYING about his SPEED. Someone check the KERNING on his LICENSE!
“You have to keep a current address on file with the bar, even if you are inactive.”
True, but it’s not something you need to change immediately in most states (not sure about California) if there’s a change in employment status. Generally, you get some degree of a grace period before you change your address. He may still be at Goodwin Procter, but the fact that the Bar website still lists him as such isn’t necessarily proof of that one way or another.
…he wasn’t at the bar when I was there, a few minutes ago (mind you, I wasn’t checking all the eyebrows).
I liked him in Rushmore.
Right, and I should have said more in my original. As long as they’re willing to hold his mail, he can use that address ’till he has another. Likely he’d have to figure something out by the time he renews in the new year.
It appears y’all have missed Ben’s column in which he announced the happy occasion, and then promptly used it to attack Obama.
Note that both the headline and the first sentence are exactly the same: “I got married last week.” As if he had a need to convince people (or perhaps himself) that this actually occurred.
Also: the lucky girl is 20. Do with that what you will.
What do you bet that she’s Ivanka from Ukraine and she’s trying to get a green card?
some significant seismic retrofit projects
Seismic Retrofit is my pick for band-name of the thread.
Seismic Retrofit is my pick for band-name of the thread.
I kinda liked “the lucky girl is 20” and “men pissing on sofas”.
Of course, the big question now is, when it came time to consummate the marriage, did the new Mrs. Shapiro have her body covered with a sheet, with a hole cut in it to allow for Benji’s entry?
I see the Seismic Retrofit as a Village People covers band, all dressed as construction workers.
Young Ben, there’s a place you can go
Ben Shapiro, when you’re short on your dough.
You can drive there, and I’m sure you will find
Many ways to have a good time.
It’s fun to drive on the In-ter-state 5
It’s fun to drive on the In-ter-state 5.
VBennie’s article needs to be saved.
Whenever a putz takes VBennie’s words seriously & quotes him, this article needs to be sent.
Wherever VBennie applies for a job, the HR dept needs a copy of this article.
VBennie’s picture needs to be the definition of whiney-baby fucktard.
And another thing: Ben could have gotten through that traffic jam in no time a-tall, if only he weren’t too much of a fucking wussy-boy to ride a goddamn motorcycle. In fact, I’m surprised he didn’t mention all the bikes that presumably lane-shared right past him while he was sitting there fuming in his cage with the non-functioning radio and mousy* wife.
Or would that have cast asparagus on his manhood or something?
*ok, somebody prove me wrong.
No, asparagus would have *helped* his manhood. (It’s phallic shaped, after all.)
That poor wanker needs all the asparagus he can get. Too bad it’s out of season at the moment.
Somebody call Joe Rogan. Ben Shapiro is clearly ripping off Adam Carolla’s old Caltrans bits from the old Loveline show.
Too late for anyone to likely read this but perhaps a good coda to this comment section. My wife and family were also stuck in the same jam on the same night as Ben (wonder if we drove alongside of him at any point). He is right about the insanity of the signage: it all appeared too late and with too little information (e.g., where) to avoid the jam.
But here is where the liberal and conservative mind differ. Operating under very little sleep the night before I was still able to realize that this was an unusual situation. My experience has been that CalTrans is generally quite good about road closure warnings, often deploying signs 100+ miles in advance, especially in the case of a full closure. Moreover, I noticed that there were a large number of truckers caught in the jam. I found this very suspicious as they almost always operate from up-to-date traffic info.
So, instead of simply bitching into the air, I sent an e-mail to CalTrans asking what was up. To be honest, I didn’t expect much (anti-govt conservative propaganda has seeped somewhat into my brain). And yet I received a personal, well-written response from a CalTrans spokeswoman within 30 minutes. Turns out that it wasn’t CalTrans but an LA County project. Due to what had happened with the jam on Sunday night (the signs that were up indicated that the closure was to be repeated the next night), CalTrans was now working with the county project and was also planning to put up their own detour information separately. I decided to follow-up the next day and, according to the spokeswomen, CalTrans noted no complaints for the subsequent night’s closure. Hmm. Government working?
And here is the kicker…
Ben was also right in noting no apparent actual construction activity on the closed section of the freeway. But I did notice, at one point, a construction vehicle driving haphazardly and even dangerously on the median toward the closure (many cars had pulled over to wait it out so this truck almost clipped a few). Seemed like the driver had somehow screwed up seriously in getting stuck in the traffic as if it wasn’t anticipated. Additionally none of the construction vehicles on site were marked with any sort of state or county symbols.
In other words, it appears an incompetent private contractor was at fault, stranding even their own workers within the mess. I find it quite possible that the contractor failed to warn CalTrans at all about their planned closure and then ineffectively placed two non-informative (only time/date not where) warning signs at points long after any detour was possible (there was only one possible detour at the most northern part of the county and the better detours for truckers would have been far into a completely different county). And really what does the private contractor care anyway if thousands of individuals and other businesses are hurt by the unexpected closure? They likely get their payments regardless.
So really this story argues the EXACT OPPOSITE of Mr. Shapiro’s position. That’s not surprising at all.
[…] Post-Virgin Ben and Mrs. Ben have moved back to California where he is being harassed by Islamocaltransworkers and we discover that the twenty-something year old newlyweds can’t think of anything to do […]