Obama just lost my vote

Posted By: Peter DavidPosted On:

A 37? The man bowled a 37 during a campaign stop in Altoona?
How in God’s name am I supposed to get behind a man who rolls a 37? Caroline bowls better than that, and she’s five. I mean, okay, granted, Obama can probably tell a joke better than she can. Her most recent endeavor which she told me just now:
“Daddy! Knock knock!”
“Who’s there?”
“Banana!”
“Banana who?”
“Banana chair!” (followed by hysterical laughter)
Yeah. Anyway..
Thirty seven? Out of a possible 300?
Yo, Senator: Here’s a bowling hint. That curved, deep wood channel on either side of the lane? The object is to keep your ball OUT of that.
I saw pictures of him in his endeavors. The man has no form at all. Even worse, he’s a lefty.
Open invitation, Senator: Come to New York, I’ll work with you for an hour, and we’ll have you rolling strikes in no time. Until then…
Thirty seven? Good lord, we have to have SOME standards for a president.
PAD

113 comments on “Obama just lost my vote”

  1. Luigi: “Peter, how long before you think Hillary or the right wing will actually use this as a reason why Obama shouldn’t be President?”
    She already has. There is even video of the press conference.
    Now let’s be fair–that was actually a pretty funny bit. And she hasn’t been too great on the funny this campaign.

  2. Basic physics: for the same energy input, a more massive ball will deliver more momentum. Also, a more massive ball can be given more energy via lifting it to the same height as a lighter ball. The tradeoff is that a heavier ball is harder to control, requiring more torque to put a spin on, etc. And you’re more likely to injure yourself if your technique isn’t good. So the trick is to use the heaviest ball you can control, and no heavier. 🙂

  3. I don’t know – he might accidentally miss the hunter and hit the quail, and that would look bad.
    Or he might shoot one of his lawyer friends, thus ensuring the VP spot.
    TWL

  4. Craig J Ries said:
    “Not the mamma!”
    Also from Dinosaurs: “I’m gonna bite you now!”
    –Capt Naraht

  5. I hope one day to have a daughter like that. I mean, I make jokes as weird as hers all the time. Drives everyone insane, which makes it even funnier. My poor, poor girlfriend.
    (Once upon a time, there was a party. What I was doing there is anyone’s guess, I hate parties. But it was a party of the theatre group I was part of at the time, and a lot of people there were very geeky. But then there was this one girl – a new girl who actually said she was just there because the director was cute – who kept calling us all freaks. This, combined with her rather spectacular stupidity, provoked my good friend Anna and myself into telling a large number of completely meaningless jokes to confuse her and freak her out.
    “Two men are walking down the street. A third one gets on a bus.
    *hysterical laughter*”
    It worked. Her eyes grew large, her brain overheated and her head exploded. Well, almost. But we certainly freaked her out.)
    Banana chair. I’m going to remember that. It made me giggle quite deliciously.

  6. Dinosaur references:
    I will always remember the image of the Baby hitting the father on the head saying “Not the Mama” over and over again. Earl warns him if he does it one more time he is going to throw the baby across the Room. The Baby blinks, smiles a big smile and then pulls back the pan and Yells Not the MAMA.
    Next shot is the Baby slamming into the wall and sliding down. he stands up shakes himself off raises up his arms and says “Again!”
    Anyone remember the Dino bowling team Earl was on?

  8. I sort of remember the bowling team, but my biggest memory is of their anti-drug episode. It was the usual thing, but then at the end “Robbie” broke character: “Hi. I’m Robert Sinclair. You may know me as charming teenager Robbie Sinclair on the hit TV show Dinosaurs. But I’m here to talk to you about drugs. One of the insidious things about drugs is that it causes otherwise funny shows to do the obligatory “message” episode, like this one. We’re only in our first season and we’ve already had one. So please, stay away from drugs, and prevent preachy sitcom endings like this one.”
    (I may not have the dialogue exactly right, but that’s the gist.)
    One of the single funniest episode endings I’ve ever seen.
    TWL

  9. Hillary just announced that on a campaign stop at a different bowling alley, she had a 319 game.
    Under sniper fire.
    At 3 am.
    With a phone ringing.

  11. Was she carrying an 8lb baby under each arm and wearing the stone bodice of McAdder?

  16. Yup, I remember the show DINOSAURS (and not just ‘cuz my store sold both DVD sets, which I think make up the whole show). What I remember most was the ending [SPOLIER ALERT — if you care about the ending of a show that’s been off the air for 14 years now) as an amazing downer: Earl, the show’s hero, accidentally starts the ice age that leads to the extinction of the dinosaurs, and the last shot was the dinosaurs huddled together for warmth as the snow fell. Enjoy, kids!

  17. So, Obama shot a 37? No wonder Hillary won here in Michigan. With over 90,000 league bowlers in Detroit and over 250,000 statewide, we’re not gonna vote for somebody who can bowl. And Obama should be embarrassed for letting people know that he was throwing a 8 pound ball. Real men throw 16 pound balls. For all you non-bowling types, a 16 pound ball is the heavest ball you can use bowling. Heck, I’d throw a 20 pound brick if if was legal.
    “ROCKIN’ & WRECKIN’ IN THE D”
    Peace.

  19. Posted by Sig at April 1, 2008 09:39 AM
    At least there’s a lane in the basement of the White House. He’ll have plenty of time to practice.
    Last I heard (a LONG time ago, as you’ll see), the bowling lane was installed over the swimming pool by Nixon’s people. (Nixon preferred bowling to swimming.) Then, when Ford (on his school swim team, I think?) took over, he had the lane torn up so he could swim. Were replacement lanes ever put in?
    And, at the rist of turning this into a “Dinosaurs” thread, the best phrase from that show imho was “We’re going to need a new Timmy!”

  20. “Hillary just had a press conference where she challenged Obama to a bowl-off. Winner take all!”
    _____
    One switched letter away from challenging Monica?

  22. Lousy bowler… good basketball player…
    I wonder how he dances? That’s probably a significant indicator.
    Can he dance as well as, say, Hitler did? That Hitler… now there was a dancer. He could dance the pants off Churchill, you know…

  23. Can he dance as well as, say, Hitler did? That Hitler… now there was a dancer. He could dance the pants off Churchill, you know…
    Not only that, but he was better looking than Churchill, he was a better dresser than Churchill, had more hair and told funnier jokes. Plus he could paint an entire apartment in one afternoon. Two coats!
    PAD

  24. I realize that’s from The Producers, but all I can think of is Kate Bush’s “Heads We Dance.” Cool song if you’ve never heard it.
    TWL

  25. Whoops, sorry. That’s “Heads We’re Dancing” if you want to look for it, not “Heads We Dance.”
    TWL

  26. I love Banana Chair! Why has no one posted Banana Chair t-shirts at CaféPress yet?
    Does Caroline bowl with those pop-up gutter blockers? (which they never had when I was a kid. @#%$ kids today … all those balls I watched slide down the gutter … ahem sorry) If so, she may have Barack at a slight advantage.

  27. Not taking any of this too seriously, please, But If that were me (and yes I do understand how busy campaigning could be) I would have found an hour somewhere just to maybe bowl a few frames and get the rust off. And umm ehhh embarrassed to say now that I bowled with an 8 pound ball until I was 18.
    Cmon…you can’t tell me Obama doesn’t have a few rich friends with a lane in their house. Yeah I’m serious about that part. 🙂 (No Im not rich, and yes I do know 2 people who have a bowling lane in their house. They are rich)

  28. Michael, maybe he did practice beforehand and he’s just that bad.
    One weird thing, I disagree with a Daily Show joke from last night. They showed a clip of someone saying “Obama should stick to basketball,” and then Jon Stewart said, “Wow, that’s really… racist.” That seems oversensitive to me. The guy didn’t say that all black people are good at basketball, he said that Obama was good at basketball. Since Obama was on his high school basketball team, that is true. That joke didn’t seem racist to me, it just felt like a variation on, “Don’t quit your day job.”

  29. Hey! I’m a lefty, and I have an average of 125! (this, after bowling for 11 years…ick)
    And I liked your daughter’s joke….
    I made up a joke when I was 7 years old:
    “Cats have kittens, dogs have puppies. What do guinea pigs have? New Guineas!”

  30. Hey! I’m a lefty, and I have an average of 125! (this, after bowling for 11 years…ick)
    A couple of years back, went on a first date with a lady who liked to bowl, so we decided to give that a try. I had bowled exactly twice in my life and I was about 8 when I had, so I consider that time to have been my first experience with bowling. I scored 112 on my first game. Admittedly, I score in the 90s on the second and third games, but I blame the fact that my fingers were sore from being rubbed wrong on release/not having built up the proper calluses(sp?).
    And I’m clumsy, uncoordinated, and basically hopeless as an athlete. I think I’m going with the theory the blogger, digby, posited that Obama was using a right-handed ball.

  31. 37 is certainly a magic number. Count all the 37s you see in one day and you will see…
    (The blog is written in swedish and not completed, but at least it is about the powers about 37..)

  32. The drilling of the ball wasn’t the problem. The problem was that he was bringing his arm across his body instead of straight through in a pendulum arc.
    PAD

  33. The drilling of the ball wasn’t the problem. The problem was that he was bringing his arm across his body instead of straight through in a pendulum arc.
    So he’s just lousy at it, huh? Well, I admit I had the advantage of having my girlfriend giving me tips on what I wanted to do throughout the game. He probably couldn’t take advantage of any coaching and still look “presidential.”

  34. >”Banana chair!” (followed by hysterical laughter)
    Yeah. Anyway..
    So she gets her humour from her mother’s side, hunh?
    (Duck & hide…)
    (Maybe Obama should have found an excuse to come up here and try 10 pin bowling. Much smaller, lighter balls, easier to control…)

  36. The funny thing about this topic is that when I first read it, I thought it was a joke by PAD. I mean, c’mon: On April Fool’s Day PAD (an avid bowler) announced not only that the chink in Obama’s armor is his bowling skill, but also that Obama bowled an amazingly low 37! I mean really, who’d believe it?
    Amazingly, I learned the truth about this story when, as I read it here, they reported it on THE DAILY SHOW. Go figure: I found out the truth behind a news story from a fake news comedy show!

  38. I like the Banana Chair joke. It’s pretty funny. It reminds me of that old joke:
    “How many surrealists does it take to screw in a light bulb? …
    A FISH!”
    Ah, I love that joke.
    To be fair to Mr. Obama, he bowled a 37, but he quit after or during the 7th frame. Which means that, had he bowled three more frames, he was likely to finish with a 52 or 53. Or, if you approach this with the logic of the Clinton campaign, he could have possibly finished with a 127!
    Now, the fact that he didn’t finish the game might label him a defeatist or (worse) a quitter in some people’s minds. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
    The fact was, the game was being video taped. It was part of Mr. Obama’s campaign stops across Pennsylvania. Obama had thrown several gutter balls and realized that he had to stop in order to live up to earlier campaign promises: To Avoid Gutter Politics!
    Personally, I think it was admirable of Mr. Obama to have the self-awareness, grace and courage to withdraw from a situation where he was clearly in over his head, where seeing the game out to the bitter end would likely lead to some worse outcome.

  39. Thanks for that link, Joe V! A bit insulting to Mamet, perhaps, but pretty good stuff.

  41. Apparently–according to a Newsweek article I read–McCain has a hard time lifting his arms due to them being broken repeatedly during his POW period. So, it’s very likely he couldn’t even bowl a 37! That being the case, Peter, you can now sleep soundly knowing your candidate is still the best choice!

  42. Well, perhaps McCain and Obama can get together for a poker game once the nominations are sorted out. Highest ratings ever for ESPN 2.

  44. I read somewhere that something like 1/3 of all the US presidents to date have been left-handed, including Clinton. We lefties do crazy šhìŧ in this world.

  47. It’s fascinating that Obama should be discussed for such foolish trifles as bowling. We ARE talking about a person who very well could be the next President of this country. Who gives a dámņ about his bowling score anyway?? The most intriquing news I’ve heard about him was a threat to bring Al Gore into an Obama adminstration. Imagine the EPA being run by a proven enviromental fraud. Truly fascinating!

  48. “Who gives a dámņ about his bowling score anyway??”
    People with a sense of humor.

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