65 Replies to “Oh, Shiny Potato!”

  1. Yes, although was it not petite pomme de terre?
    Road apples, yes, it does have a nice ring to it. But hey, that is all we had as kids. We could not afford real hockey pukes.

  2. Freeland is a dangerous ideolog. Not too
    bright. And of course she has the full confidence of ‘Spud’.5

  3. Apparently some of the other leaders (Merkel, Obama etc) held an important meeting on the situation in Ukraine yesterday and did not invite Little Potato. Of course, the CBC is wondering out loud why they snubbed him (their exact words), especially as Canada has soldiers in the region.

  4. The CBC was bemused the little Potato was not engaged in a conversation by world leaders regarding Ukrainian security as he has many eyes in the area. Be rest assured he will be included in talks if the region runs out of grain vodka,hash browns or if it requires photographic assistance.

  5. I’m with you, Don. I had the exact same thoughts when she became a Grit MP. I listened to her speak when she was with Reuters and had just published a fatuous book (to huge critical acclaim from leftards and the economically illiterate around the world) about Plutocrats, and could not help but think, heaven help us if this woman ever goes into politics. And now she is a cabinet minister. Sigh.

  6. This is a problem with being too insular.
    I had a Chinese wife. She told me that Chinese people often give their kids nicknames that Westerners would not understand (like “Little Vomit” or “Big Acne”). The rationale was that if you gave a kid a nice name (like “Pretty Polly” or “princess”), then the gods might take an interest in the child and pluck him/her away from you.
    I don’t think this intended as an insult by the Chinese.

  7. Thank you Captcha for highlighting something that irritates the hell out of me every time I hear it! And it IS used primarily by left-leaning interviewees!

  8. What kind of comment is this? I cooked for my wife as often as she cooked for me, and we both made potatoes from time to time.
    As I said in my previous post, this forum is far too insular. China has more people than any other country on the planet, and you are woefully ignorant of their ways (as I am; just less than you).
    They called PET “Pudo” because it’s the closest phonetically they could come to “Pierre Trudeau”. In the same way, they call America “mei go” because to a Cantonese speaker, that comes closest to “America” phonetically. The fact that the characters can be read to be “beautiful country” is just a coincidence. Canada’s name translates, roughly, to “plus” “seize/take/hold” and “big”, which some lyrical Chinese translate as “big opportunity”, but it’s really just “ja-na-da”.
    So the fact that “pudo” means potato is just a coincidence as well. It’s not an insult. And anyone who reads this forum knows I consider the Dauphin the worst PM of my life time, and he hasn’t even had time to do anything yet. So I’m far from an apologist, but let’s try to stay grounded in reality, shall we?

  9. I don’t doubt you, Kevin, and I’m not defending Oz one way or the other but I read somewhere recently (I thought here at SDA but it’s not on this thread at least) that Chinese called westerners ‘potatoes’ as an insult. So I began Bing searching and found these items…

    nanheyangrouchuan [responding to a previous commenter in the quotation]
    “I see that your fancy American education has merely taught you that it’s funny to insult poor people.”
    Jeremiah; If you are in China, you already know, but if not, the nightly news uses the word “tu3 ren2” dozens of times in a single 30 minute broadcast and it means “dirt person”. “Tu3 dou4”, ie potato, is also used to describe rural folk in China. CHinese love looking down on others and that is why they are so sensitive to anything but praise from the west.

    [I’m not bothering to see what Western accent marks the 2, 3, and 4 equate to for tu ren and tu dou.] And I found this (and we’ll see if the Chinese characters turn out okay!)

    [Chinese nicknames for different provinces]
    Shaanxi 陕西
    洋芋蛋
    potato
    (Potatoes used to be their main food supply. Derogatory.)

    I also found this on a story about ‘Vegetable insults around the world’ although Justin wasn’t being called a sweet potato:

    @auntielucia2 by contrast, it,s an insult to b called huan su (sweet potato in Hokein) as that means “stupid”.

    So I wonder if it might not be a backhanded nickname? Excuse any blockquote errors too. 🙂

  10. Justin Trudeau, AKA Mr.Potato Head. I love it!
    Is there anywhere in the world a bigger air head than Chrystia Freeland?
    This woman is beyond embarrassing. It makes me ill to think she represents
    Canada to the world.

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