Discussion of cabinet-staffing yields:
You don’t want the camel pissing in the tent.
True, but not unproblematic. There are of course two tent metaphors: better inside pissing out than outside pissing in, and the problem with letting the camel get his nose in the tent is, pretty soon you get the rest of the camel, too.
And these metaphors have, it seems to me, opposite implications for cabinet-staffing.
The Edge of the American West 
21 comments
November 18, 2008 at 4:28 pm
dana
He who hesitates is lost, but one should look before one leaps.
November 18, 2008 at 4:34 pm
Jason B
In my ethics classes, someone would inevitably say, “But what about someone who likes camel urine?”
November 18, 2008 at 4:41 pm
andrew
That’s a hell of a tent, if it’s furnished with cabinets. I guess they’re just temporary fixtures, though.
November 18, 2008 at 5:50 pm
kieran
hey eric, I’m a couple days late but I have a graph for you. Alas, it’s sitting on my MacBook and the ground crews at San Jose have decided to not give our plane a gate at this time. Also, the lady next to me is kind of crazy.
November 18, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Vance
The second metaphor suggests the problem with the first — if a camel in your tent is pissing, it’s probably not pissing out.
kieran: is she crazy enough to read EotAW?
November 18, 2008 at 6:01 pm
kieran
crazy enough to keep trying to engage me in conversation.
November 18, 2008 at 6:08 pm
ben wolfson
Actually the metaphors are easily reconcilable once you understand what the “nose” really is.
November 18, 2008 at 6:25 pm
urbino
The truth comes out. You’re all a bunch of secret Muslims.
November 18, 2008 at 6:34 pm
eric
I have a graph for you
Woo-hoo! Christmas has come early!
November 18, 2008 at 8:18 pm
Kieran
Here ya go. Gawd bless us evr’y one.
November 18, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Sifu Tweety Fish
Worst of all would be the camel pissing on the tent. It pisses in the tent, hey, move the tent. But on the tent, hoo boy. I don’t care how many times you wash it.
November 18, 2008 at 9:12 pm
JP Stormcrow
You can lead a camel to a pig, but you can’t make him fuck it. … But you *can* make him deny it.
— LBJ (I think)
November 18, 2008 at 10:02 pm
davenoon
How about a cat pissing on your front door. Because I’ve got that, like, every fucking day of my life.
November 18, 2008 at 11:09 pm
eric
But did you offer the cat the Secretaryship of State, is the question.
November 18, 2008 at 11:37 pm
ben wolfson
It pisses in the tent, hey, move the tent
Some tents have bottoms, you know.
November 18, 2008 at 11:43 pm
Stinky
There you go again, amid the techno-landscape of The Edge of The American West… the wall between private vitriol and public debate is once again reduced to rubble by an onslaught of open misogynistic expression. Surely you cannot expect this obvious “camel toe” reference to go unnoticed or its implication that Senator Clinton is a mite tight in her pantsuit of choice to go unanswered. And the implication that post-menopausal mothers are incontinent is one of the most sexually toxic claims of this new millennium. Even at this late date, the phallocentric powers that be are left openly wondering—on an academic blog of all places—”How do we beat the bitch?”
The blatantly “pussy” reference is beyond the pale. Only an unrepentant male oppressor would invoke such a loaded construct in regards to a great American Stateswoman, leader and mother. It takes a village to raise a child, but it takes a nation of millions to hold back one vibrant WOMAN.
November 18, 2008 at 11:48 pm
ben wolfson
Your comment would be strong, Stinky, without the italics and bolds. Sometimes underplaying your hand is the strongest move.
November 18, 2008 at 11:54 pm
ben wolfson
Stronger, that is.
November 19, 2008 at 1:15 am
Stinky
Ben, I like your Plato, Socrates, and two men in a chimney joke. When I got to the third day, I was sure it was going to turn into a joke about two men in a shower—but it didn’t and it’s funny.
November 19, 2008 at 1:19 am
ben wolfson
Thanks. I can only take credit for the form, though; the matter belongs to all.
November 19, 2008 at 1:29 am
Stinky
I knew you were on Plato’s side. I bet the dirty guy in the chimney was Aristotle.