The Third Slip: Issue 34 - The Desolation of Smog
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This is issue 34 of The Third Slip. 34, of course, is a Fibonacci number which means that this issue will be a sum of the unfunniness of issue 13 and the hopelessness of issue 21. On with the news…
At home
Make haze when the blame game shines If you have any friends from Delhi, no doubt Facebook has told you that the weather there isn’t exactly fit for human (or for that matter, dinosaur / demogorgon) consumption. The only thing dirtier than the air in Delhi is the political mudslinging happening, as nobody wants to take the blame. Medianama editor Nikhil Pahwa offers several practical solutions.
GST Revision It’s time to update your Excel templates that you created to split restaurant bills with your friends (what do you mean you don’t have a template?) because the GST council has revised the GST on restaurant bills to 5% and made a number of other downward revisions. The revision has been attributed to an image problem for the government and also to pressure from the opposition. Irrespective, it’s great to know that we finally have a government that realises it can’t continue with its bullheaded ways, and even more gratifying to know that there is such a thing as an opposition.
Gag reflex! What do you do when you bite more than you can chew and people are making fun of you for it? Increasingly, satire on social media is being clamped down on - cartoons, Whatsapp posts and stuff criticizing the government. We remain safe as bhakts generally don’t have the patience for 1500-word newsletters.
Equal opportunity attackers This week, North India, in a bid to shed its reputation of attacking black tourists, took a major step forward by attacking a white Swiss couple. Another win for egalitarianism!
Hyderabad is poverty-free! Yay! Well, not quite. The city police have decided that all its beggars should be locked up rehabilitated in Chanchalguda Jail because Ivanka Trump is coming to Hyderabad for a business summit. The begging ban is in place until January. Meanwhile, the police commissioner’s pet cat was seen drinking milk with its eyes closed so that no one can see it lapping up the bowl.
Transit Sandwich
Everyone is disappointing
The Supreme Court of India, whom we have praised extensively on TTS over the past many issues, played host to some surreal scenes this week after an allegation of corruption against benches of which the CJI was a part. This was to be heard by a five-judge bench excluding the CJI. Except, the CJI overruled this, made a new bench with him in it to hear a case which was against him, and basically said that he was the supreme master. Any resemblance to a WWE match involving referees being chair-shotted and replaced are figments of your own imagination and TTS shall not be held liable for libel.
Sigh! The latest to be accused of sexual misconduct? Louis CK. Like Trevor Noah said, “When I see a celebrity trending on Twitter, I’m just praying that he/she is dead.” Quartz helpfully edited his apology letter.
LOLz of the week
An intentional own goal Donald Trump set up a voter fraud committee. Said committee was sued. By one of the committee’s own members. Commiteement issues?
Want to become a Pune University topper? Your chances will improve if you don’t eat meat / partake of alcohol. The reasons are not exactly scientific.
Around the world
Texas Shooting A terrorist killed 26 people in a Church. After it was revealed the killer was not a Muslim and just a white guy, his terrorist status was corrected to ‘mentally unstable’. Paul Ryan, meanwhile, asked people to avoid killings in Churches by… Er, praying.
Take me down to Paradise Papers (to be read in trailer voice-over)
From the stars of the 2016 international hit “Panama Papers” comes a new, bigger hit. Paradise Papers. Watch as the world’s biggest corporations get as creative as they can to avoid paying tax. Starring: “We swear we ain’t hearing your conversations” Facebook; “Give us all your money” Apple; “Just doing this so I’m relevant” Twitter; “Same as Twitter” Queen Elizabeth II, and more. For our fans in India, we have Apollo Tyres, The Essel Group, Hinduja Group, Videocon, and of course, the man who will advertise anything and say any slogan written by stoned copywriters, Amitabh Bachchan. Stay tuned and don’t forget to watch the after-credits, who knows what’s coming next year?
Absolutely Amazing Amitabh Bachchan fact: He prefixes each tweet of his with T and the number of days he’s been on Twitter. Also, all his tweets have an out of place picture of himself. Even weirder fact, this is the only thing you are going to remember from this week’s issue. Sigh.
New best pals Trump became best friends with Xi Jinping of China - you know, the country stealing all US jobs and “raping America” just a year ago? Xi’s cracked the easy Trump formula: Lots of pomp and flattery and no hard talk will happen. So a march and excited schoolkids happened, and no actual discussions. Good.
The best mutation you’ll see Is not some David Attenborough-narrated thing, but evil Saudi Money turning into silicon valley (and Softbank) funding. Oops.
What if? The TTS Writers’ Guild theory that Trump is actually a hired hand by the Democrats to make Obama look better has credence. After all, Trump publicly tried to belittle Obamacare, which made a lot of people realise it’s actually not all that bad, and this week saw the biggest number of signups for a long time. Already, Dems are doing great in recent state elections.
Bonn to be wild Oh, fun, some climate change talks are about to happen. Developed countries are like an advertising agency that pitches magnificent ideas, but when asked to execute, says “Oh you wanted us to execute also and not just make a beautiful 200 slide presentation? Oh, er…”. Developing countries are not pleased.
Trump destroys the two pillars of hope that we clung to in 2016. Remember when fake news used to be just The Onion and a lot of fun? Remember when we could parody politicians to gain some comic relief? This official, real, completely authentic (yes we are not exaggerating sarcastically) tweet from Trump this morning is the final nail in the coffin of parody.
Biz & Technology
Google’s Waymo has started testing autonomous vehicles. Hello future.
Goodness gracious, Alibaba sold $25 BILLION worth of stuff on Singles’ Day!
Facebook’s trying hard to fight fake news and failing, possibly because its best engineers are working hard to replicate dog filters from Snapchat?
TTS Trivia Section
What does Germany now have in common with Australia, Bangladesh, India, Malta, Nepal, New Zealand, and Pakistan? They all recognize a third gender, officially.
What has every other country in the world - including Syria - done, but the US hasn’t? No, the answer is not adopt the metric system (the fellow outliers there are Burma and Liberia). The correct answer is: Sign the Paris climate treaty. Trump was right, he really did manage to put America all by itself. Even a country who is embroiled in the worst civil war in recent times said “hold my gun, this treaty is important”.
LinkedOut
Remember remember the 8th of November… last week marked the anniversary of two monumental disasters
Trump showed us that Fake News is the biggest threat to free and fair democracy. Can Germany’s tough new law fix Facebook?
One year since the demonetisation fiasco. Prem Panicker tells us how Modi pulled off the greatest magic act ever performed.
From the New Yorker, A historian explains how Stalin turned Stalinist
A podcast recommendation - Heavyweight explores the moments in people’s past life that were not acted upon and tries to resolve them. If you want to try one episode, we recommend #5 Galit.It’s beautiful.
That’s it for issue 34 of The Third Slip. Don’t forget you can now tell us how much you love us, twice as much on Twitter (Chuck | Tony). Or you can email us and tell us how we can do better, or just send us virtual hugs (we love virtual hugs. Or high fives). Since you're only one of 3 people to read this far, why not share The Third Slip with a friend or with strangers on the internet on your Twitter/Facebook? Until next week, we leave you with this totally relevant bumper sticker.
