Red Lobster Was In The Pocket Of Jumbo Shrimp

What happened when Thai Union got shellfish.

Author

Rusty Foster
May 20th, 2024

[At the Red Lobster corporate offices for my CEO interview] “Hello sir, I—” *briefcase full of shrimp falls open*.

Apparently in Red Lobster’s waning days it served as a sort of reverse shrimp arbitrage, funneling corporate debt into the pockets of Jumbo Shrimp via the decapod-craving gullets of American boomers. Frankly, it looks like Red Lobster equity holder and shrimp supplier Thai Union saw an opportunity and got… shellfish. In The New York Times, Ali Watkins waxed elegiac:

Versatile and resilient, the lobster survives by molting, shedding its skin and growing into a new, bigger shell. But eventually, energy runs low and the transformation becomes more difficult.

Red Lobster, one of America’s best-known shellfish ambassadors, has reached this stage in its life cycle: The once-ubiquitous restaurant chain filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Sunday after more than half a century as the country’s pre-eminent seafood franchise.

At press time the DOJ was reportedly investigating Olive Garden’s financial ties to Big Soup or Salad and Breadsticks.

What else could you eat? A lot of fluorocarbon compounds, made by 3M (j/k you already did). Bud Light, if you want to make our new contender for most corrupt Supreme Court justice, Sam Alito, mad. Poison Oak. Black flies.

Today in the World: “Iran’s president and foreign minister die in helicopter crash.” They must have found out something about Boeing. The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for five terrorist leaders this weekend. I thought they finally invented a both sides that Times Opinion couldn’t endorse, but David Kaye guessayed:

In seeking the arrests of senior leaders of Israel and Hamas, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court has given the world a promise of accountability.

Regardless of the outcome of the cases, the prosecutor’s request that the court issue arrest warrants for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas’s Yahya Sinwar helps cut through the polarizing language of the moment and promotes the idea that the basic rules of international humanitarian law apply to all.

I guess you do gotta hand it to them! One member of the panel that recommended these I.C.C. charges was famous British human rights lawyer Amal Clooney, who is married to an actor. Meanwhile here at home, Jonathan Katz makes a good argument that Joe Biden is trying to defeat Trumpism without touching the roots of American fascism.

The political problem here should be obvious. How do you explain to a student who just watched, say, the NYPD throw their friends down a flight of stairs for participating in a nonviolent protest — acts committed without so a peep of condemnation from the president — that a vote for him is a vote against fascism?

I Am The Very Model of a Modern Surgeon General:

[SURGEON GENERAL]
Microplastics have been found in every human testicle
Although their base components are completely indigestible
If you’ve a nut you’ll find it’s got a little bit of bisphenol
As well as polyethylene in quantities detectable.

[CHORUS OF GIRLS]
As well as polyethylene in quantities detectable!
As well as polyethylene in quantities detectable!
As well as polyethylene in quantities de-tec-ti-tec-ti-ble!

[SURGEON GENERAL]
We know that human blood and milk are also full of PVCs
but now they’ve found three-thirty micrograms per gram in our testes.
Spermatogenesis is less and throughout all our endocrines,
between no micrograms and this result there is a vast difference.
In short to have your swimmers be sufficiently adventure-y
you’d need to have been born within a less polluted century.

[CHORUS OF GIRLS]
In short to have your swimmers be sufficiently adventure-y
you’d need to have been born within a less polluted century!

I’d apologize to Gilbert and Sullivan but they’ve done worse themselves, and they know it.

Finally: Jeremy Renner broke his taint. I am pro-taint and I take no pleasure in reporting this. And from Jessica DeFino: Shampoo For Your God-Shaped Hole (unrelated).

Today Song: Yves, “Slut”

Thanks Music Intern Sam. I just want to say up front that we’re into the last two weeks of Tabs for the whole year and I am simply not going to be trying very hard. In fact, I’ll be off this Thursday and Friday, and next Monday for a college scouting trip to Canada. So there’s probably only five Tabses left! Will I pad all of them with unnecessary parody song lyrics? Let’s find out.