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Reason Morning Links: Herman Cain Camp Denies Sexual Harassment Charges, NYPD Ticket-Fixing Scandal Gets Bigger, White House Responds to Pot Petition
- While president of the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s, Herman Cain was accused of sexually harassing at least two female employees, both of whom received settlements from the NRA.
- More than 500 NYPD cops across the city have been accused of expunging tickets and summonses as favors. Sixteen have been arrested.
- Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske has responded to an e-petitioner who asked President Obama to stop the war on pot. Snippet: "As a former police chief, I recognize we are not going to arrest our way out of the problem. We also recognize that legalizing marijuana would not provide the answer to any of the health, social, youth education, criminal justice, and community quality of life challenges associated with drug use."
- Anonymous threatens to unmask Mexican police officers working with cartels.
- The NYT dives into Gov. Rick Perry's criminal justice record: “He has done more good than any other governor we’ve ever had,” said Jeff L. Blackburn, chief counsel of the Innocence Project of Texas. "He approaches criminal justice issues like a lay person rather than like a prosecutor or judge, which makes him open-minded and willing to embarrass the system." Unless, of course, it involves the death penalty.
- How Occupy Wall Street protesters handle crimes (like rape) in the Zuccotti Park camp: “We don’t tell anyone. We handle it internally. I said too much already.”
- A new study suggests that "municipalities get worse ratings for the same expected default because they pay ratings agencies less."
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Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:02AM|#
While president of the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s, Herman Cain was accused of sexually harassing at least two female employees, both of whom received settlements from the NRA.
Hypersensitive harpies, I say.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:06AM|#
Cain's lead must be real!
free2booze|10.31.11 @ 9:18AM|#
If it was two separate incidents of sexual harassment, I'm offended. If it was two chicks at the same time, I say "well done sir, well done".
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:32AM|#
Women are delicate flowers who have no place in the workforce, obviously. GOP voters probably understand this.
WWNGD?|10.31.11 @ 9:38AM|#
I want to agree with you, but I sense sarcasm.
free2booze|10.31.11 @ 9:39AM|#
GOP voters think women, especially women with massive amounts of cleavage, and wearing low cut blouses, are absolutely essential in the work place.
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:43AM|#
Not if they're going to be making a lot of trips to HR.
free2booze|10.31.11 @ 10:00AM|#
Nonsense. If a woman doesn't want me staring at her cleavage, then why is she wearing a low cut blouse? If anyone should be making a harassment claim, it's the poor men who are forced to stare at her fun bags all day long.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:21PM|#
Ted Kennedy employees were dying to do that.
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 9:55AM|#
Massive amounts of cleavage, inessential.
Low cut, inessential.
Blouses, inessential.
Damn, who knew! Seem I'm a Dem.
|10.31.11 @ 10:35AM|#
And you call them the stupid party why?
chris|10.31.11 @ 12:02PM|#
Sure women belong in the workplace. Assgrabbing dudes is no fun.
Zeb|10.31.11 @ 10:14AM|#
"Sexual harassment" is way too broad a term to make a reasonable judgment. If he said "hey, nice ass" to a couple of women at work, I can't get too excited. If he said "suck my dick or get fired", that's a whole different thing.
Joe M|10.31.11 @ 9:02AM|#
9 AM my ass. This came up at 9:02 AM. You're slipping, Riggs.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:12AM|#
+1
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 9:04AM|#
World's Greatest Babysitter Arrested:
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/20.....incidents/
Yeah, this link is old, but I just saw it as a backlink to a current story.
WTF|10.31.11 @ 9:11AM|#
The alleged victim was a 14-year-old boy she was hired to babysit, according to police
?? Why the hell would a 14-year-old need a babysitter?
Ice Nine|10.31.11 @ 9:19AM|#
I'm starting to think I need that one.
free2booze|10.31.11 @ 9:19AM|#
So the 14 year old could have sex with the baby sitter.. DUH!
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:37AM|#
Why the hell would a 14-year-old need a babysitter?
The 14-year-old was White Indian?
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 9:44AM|#
Dude, please.
A 14 year old White Indian getting to bang this 20 year old babysitter would be an injustice up there on the scale of the Crucifixion.
There's enough injustice in the world. Don't make up more.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:48AM|#
Actually I was thinking that a 14-year-old wouldn't be able to fend for herself if her parents were gone for more than an hour.
So they call in the babysitter to help her cope until they get back.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:48AM|#
14-year-old White Indian that is.
|10.31.11 @ 9:19AM|#
Bouchard is already facing charges of sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor in Clinton. The alleged victim was a 14-year-old boy she was hired to babysit, according to police. Those charges came following a 3-month investigation.
It is unclear if the same teen is involved in both cases.
Court documents also said that Bouchard was charged with illegal purchase of liquor, which police said she provided to the minor in Clinton.
I put stories like these in with UFOs and the Loch Ness Monster. Significant amounts of anecdotal evidence and tenuous physical evidence, but lots of 13 and 14 year-old boys who WANT TO BELIEVE.
I doubt that any of these exist, just the same.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:46AM|#
It always comes back around to Clinton.
Audrey the Liberal|10.31.11 @ 12:23PM|#
...and yet, If it was a male babysitter having sex with a fourteen year old client, you'd all be calling for his head. Double standards much.
|10.31.11 @ 12:52PM|#
Who's "you all?"
Besides, these women are as real as the chupacabra, so why get bent out of shape over it?
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 9:24AM|#
I see your hot baby sitter and raise you one drunken, vegan, IBS-suffering 32 year-old nailing 5 members of the football team.
http://jezebel.com/stacy-schuler/
Yes, in part, she blamed veganism!
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:27AM|#
not enough sausage?
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:28AM|#
+1!
|10.31.11 @ 11:21AM|#
Not enough protein.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 3:08PM|#
Certainly not enough B12.
B12 deficiency is bad for one's health. *sage nod*
|10.31.11 @ 8:11PM|#
Indeed. *turns to gf* you heard that, baby?
free2booze|10.31.11 @ 9:36AM|#
You have to love the caption at the bottom of the TV: "Guily of Sex with Football Team".
Did she choose her conquests one at a time, or did she challenge the entire locker room at once? Once you find out it was only got it on with five members of the team, you can view her with a little more class.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 9:40AM|#
Only 5 is clearly a mitigating factor. Only skanky vegetarians dip into the junior varsity team.
free2booze|10.31.11 @ 10:04AM|#
Her vegetarian cred should needs to be questioned. Obviously, she is a big fan of sausage.
Did her defense team make the claim that she was engaging in massage therapy for her IBS?
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 10:16AM|#
Only skanky vegetarians dip into the junior varsity team.
The teens were about 17 at the time. The age of consent in Ohio is 16, but it's illegal for a teacher to have sex with a student.
My question is Geez, which boy complained? Just say "no" dude!
WTF|10.31.11 @ 10:28AM|#
I'm guessing the dudes she didn't bang were the complainers.
|10.31.11 @ 10:41AM|#
It sounds to me like the parents of the "victims" are looking for some cash settlements. The idea that these 17 year olds are emotionally distraught because they banged a teacher is unpossible.
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 3:45PM|#
A teacher taught me how to really talk to a girl -- relax and banter. Before that I was more miss than hit. I owe that woman a lot.
I can't imagine being anything but happy about it.
|10.31.11 @ 9:37AM|#
She also blamed "Irritable bowel syndrome". She may be reversing cause and effect with that one.
Warty|10.31.11 @ 9:38AM|#
From one story I read about this:
How bad could fucking this chick be? Also, he should thank her for curing him of that Jesus shit.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 9:44AM|#
Here's another precious quote: ""He suffered from depression, loss of motivation … almost didn't go to college -- he was angry at home and he didn't want to be around family or anyone -- my son was not who he used to be," the father said.
The funny thing is, I used to act the same way as a teenager before I got laid.
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 10:18AM|#
I used to act the same way as a teenager before I got laid.
WHAM!
Nailed that one!
(OK, pun intended.)
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 9:48AM|#
Maybe he thinks people are evil because they STOPPED him from banging this chick MORE.
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 10:21AM|#
Actually, I think that now.
|10.31.11 @ 11:38AM|#
Now if we can only jail all of the other morons with degrees in education...
Matrix|10.31.11 @ 9:41AM|#
What 14 year old needs a babysitter?
Mr. FIFY|10.31.11 @ 11:13AM|#
Team Obama thinks 26-yr-olds need babysitters.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 12:17PM|#
Owned!
Ice Nine|10.31.11 @ 9:53AM|#
Yeah, sure, I guess she breached a tacit covenant with the parents but I'm sure it was all cool with the babysittee.
A couple days ago I watched the sentencing of some young Ohio teacher who had just been convicted of having sex with five 17y/o male students. The highlight was the absurd and appallingly stupid "impact" statements verbally delivered in court by various sobbing mothers and fathers describing how this incident had ruined their sons' lives. Such "ruin" included the fact that other students were now "talking about them." Yeah, baby! While acknowledging that a crime had been committed, as an ex-high school junior I for one can verify that this saint in fact answered the prayers of every one of those boys, bolstered their egos immensely and surely enhanced their lives in some tiny way.
|10.31.11 @ 12:34PM|#
Teachers who sleep with age-of-consent students consensually should be fired but it should not be a crime. There's a weird double-standard where all men who sleep with underage teenagers are seen as predators while women who do the same with teenage boys are seen as teenage male daydreams fulfilled.
Likewise, those assaulted by men are "tragic victims of cruelty" while those assaulted by women are "lucky". Surely most cases are more complex than that - boys can be just as emotionally conflicted and trapped in a power play as victimized girls are, and girls often initiate and seek illicit relationships with older men or teachers they fantasize about (thus could hardly be considered "victims"). Morally, it's often more gray than black and white.
Of course, the flipside is that men assaulting women is not usually "news" unless it is attached to some other brutal crime, whereas seemingly every single accused female ephebophile or pedophile gets their face plastered on national and international news. Don't like your female teacher? Accuse her of sexual assault and you can easily destroy her life, family and career, with the media descending like a pack of hungry wolves. With men, it's more expected, to the point it might not even make the local news.
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:06AM|#
The two halves of the eurozone are locked in a broken marriage
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fin.....riage.html
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 10:17AM|#
Clearly what's going on there is everyone is scared to death that the minute Greece goes down, EVERYONE goes down with them. And all because the Greeks basically lied about their financial solvency in order to get admitted into Charles De Gaulle's Wet Dream.
Honestly, what's probably going to happen is that they'll keep trying to figure out bailout methods until either 1) the Germans tell the rest of the continent to go screw, or 2) all the funny money printing results in a European-wide Weimar situation, because the elites invested in this thing working will never admit that their experiment failed until it's too late. If the latter occurs, it's going to be Katy Bar the Door, because every major world power is involved in this excess financialization to a greater or lesser degree.
Joe M|10.31.11 @ 9:06AM|#
LP begging Paul to run on their ticket.
This quote is amusing:
Yeah, that's practically next week.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:14AM|#
Is there going to be a live stream of the convention this year?
Citizen Nothing|10.31.11 @ 9:28AM|#
An oldie but goodie:
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:50AM|#
+10 and love this pic!
WTF|10.31.11 @ 9:07AM|#
How Occupy Wall Street protesters handle crimes (like rape) in the Zuccotti Park camp: “We don’t tell anyone. We handle it internally. I said too much already.”
There's a STEVE SMITH joke in there somewhere, I'm sure.
|10.31.11 @ 9:12AM|#
I don't know what's worse, that they "handle it themselves" or that the interviewee silenced herself. Most likely in fear of repurcussions from the internal committees.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:15AM|#
The rape rape test.
|10.31.11 @ 9:36AM|#
it's only rape rape if it's falsely accused white lacrosse players
duh
Whoopi Goldberg|10.31.11 @ 9:39AM|#
it's only rape rape if it's falsely accused white lacrosse players
That's what I've been trying to tell people!
Morgan Fairchild|10.31.11 @ 10:34AM|#
Thus spoke the mall cop.
|10.31.11 @ 12:15PM|#
thus spoke the pippy troll who can't even use his real trolling name out of shame
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:16AM|#
She does not sound unresponsive.
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 10:23AM|#
The incident in the article sounded like something out of a Monty Python skit:
A sex fiend barged into a woman’s tent and sexually assaulted her at around 6 a.m., said protesters, who chased him from the park.
“Pervert! Pervert! Get the f--k out!” said vigilante Occupiers, who never bothered to call the cops.
“They were shining flashlights in his face and yelling at him to leave,” said a woman who called herself Leslie, but refused to give her real name.
These OWS camps are turning into fascinating petri dishes of SWPL communtarianism.
Almanian|10.31.11 @ 10:28AM|#
"Pervert! Pervert!"
REALLY? That's what they yell at a rapist? Fucking pantywaists.
Monty|10.31.11 @ 11:22AM|#
They shined the light in his EYES and YELLED. How can you call them pantywaists?
|10.31.11 @ 10:38AM|#
That is unless they can pin the crime on Herman Cain. Then the call Politico.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:26PM|#
Is it progress or not that the Bill Ayers date rape method was not used?
Anonymous Coward|10.31.11 @ 11:31AM|#
Steve Smith is on the Committee of Public Safety. It would be wise not to anger him.
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:07AM|#
Beacon Power bankrupt; had U.S. backing like Solyndra
http://news.yahoo.com/beacon-p.....19038.html
cynical|10.31.11 @ 9:41AM|#
Worked with them. Not shocked.
Gimlet|10.31.11 @ 10:36AM|#
"filed for bankruptcy on Sunday"
On a Sunday? WTF?
Chupacabra|10.31.11 @ 11:18AM|#
They spent the last million on a company party Saturday night.
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:07AM|#
You know, safety innovations like SWAT raids and asset forfeiture.
|10.31.11 @ 9:37AM|#
all after lying and saying they were going to take a different approach - with mj.
remember this is cop-o-crat kerlikowske we are talking about here. he was a hopeless piece of garbage in seattle PD why should we expect anything more from him in the obama admin?
CaptainSmartass |10.31.11 @ 10:48AM|#
Whoa, this is either an imposter or else I have to revise my opinion of dunphy.
|10.31.11 @ 12:16PM|#
i have been consistently critical of kerlikowske as a craven cop-o-crat coward.
show me one post where i said otherwise.
he DEFINES spineless cop-o-crat
Anonymous Coward|10.31.11 @ 11:34AM|#
National Drug Control Strategy
balanced; comprehensive; prevention; innovative; public safety; communities
Truth time. Do Seth McFarlane's manatees write government press releases on the side?
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:08AM|#
Something Has Exploded In a Spectacular Fashion On Uranus
http://gizmodo.com/5854642/som.....-on-uranus
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:11AM|#
The Zeitgeist community erupts in a revisionist "I told you so."
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:12AM|#
revisionistcollectivistQuetzalcoatl|10.31.11 @ 10:29AM|#
Who's the revisionist now!?
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 10:33AM|#
PWNED!
Devil's Advocate|10.31.11 @ 9:15AM|#
I saw that, looks pretty cool. It looks kind of like when Shoemaker-Levy (sp?) hit Jupiter; I wonder if something impacted Uranus as well since the explosions are all in a line as they were when Jupiter was hit.
robc|10.31.11 @ 9:29AM|#
Yep, thats what it looks like to me too.
Wow, big surprise, some random space rock smacks a planet.
How many meteors impact the Earth's atmosphere every year?
Yeah, yeah, most arent S-L in size, but still.
|10.31.11 @ 10:24AM|#
More likely is that it was an alien spacecraft, delivering ambassadors from a galactic confederation who had come to invite Earth to join. After joining, we'd have achieved total consciousness and had a post-scarcity society.
Oh, well.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 10:28AM|#
So we missed the singularity again, or something?
|10.31.11 @ 10:36AM|#
We're an amazingly unlucky species, at the galactic level.
|10.31.11 @ 10:59AM|#
pssst ... ProL, it's a cookbook.
|10.31.11 @ 11:05AM|#
Anti-Confederation lies!
NeonCat|10.31.11 @ 10:38AM|#
If they can't avoid a freakin' gas giant, how the hell can they deliver a post-scarcity society? Is that what they needed from us? People who can steer around objects 63 times the size of Earth? Or were they hoping Ralph Nader would write a book for them, Unsafe at any Delta-V?
|10.31.11 @ 11:06AM|#
They thought Uranus was a joke, not an actual planet. Our fault, really.
Gray Ghost|10.31.11 @ 12:48PM|#
Does the track of impacts (if that's what the atmospheric disturbances were) imply anything about the trajectory of the bolide? It looks to my very untrained eye like the trajectory might have come out of plane of the ecliptic, which would be noteworthy. Wouldn't be surprised if the math gave impact solutions for an in-plane trajectory though, with the train of impacts resulting from Uranus's rapid rotation.
mr scary simple|10.31.11 @ 9:16AM|#
A hemorrhoid?
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:18AM|#
"Hey doc... I can smell Uranus!"
"Oh, I'm sorry Fry, scientists renamed Uranus years ago to rid the earth of that stupid joke once and for all. Now it's called Urectum!"
|10.31.11 @ 10:15AM|#
wise crack you've made there.
Almanian|10.31.11 @ 10:30AM|#
I'm giving you both the Stink Eye
Barely Suppressed Rage|10.31.11 @ 11:28AM|#
... damn near killed him!
(for those who know that joke)
|10.31.11 @ 1:03PM|#
+1.
Anonymous Coward|10.31.11 @ 11:36AM|#
The simplest being we know very little about Uranus
And you will never learn.
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:09AM|#
Flat Tax This: Regulations Are the Boot On Hiring's Neck
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:10AM|#
Linky: http://www.forbes.com/sites/wa.....-tax-this/
DJF|10.31.11 @ 9:09AM|#
"""We also recognize that legalizing marijuana would not provide the answer to any of the health, social, youth education, criminal justice, and community quality of life challenges associated with drug use.""""
It would solve the problem of millions going to jail, which would help many of their health, social, youth education, criminal justice, and community quality of life challenges associated with going to jail.
|10.31.11 @ 9:44AM|#
I'm pretty sure legalizing marajuana would solve most of the criminal justice issues.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:10AM|#
How Occupy Wall Street protesters handle crimes (like rape) in the Zuccotti Park camp: “We don’t tell anyone. We handle it internally. I said too much already.”
If it happens in Zuccotti Park it stays in Zuccotti Park. No rape rape!
WTF|10.31.11 @ 9:13AM|#
"But they were not unresponsive..."
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:17AM|#
+1 with a drink.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:10AM|#
"Occupy Edmonton joins the call for Robin Hood tax."
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:18AM|#
They need to read the reason review of Robin Hood before they sound foolish.
Joe M|10.31.11 @ 9:24AM|#
So, does the Robin Hood Tax entail taking ill-gotten tax money from the government and giving it back to the people, just like in the story?
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:28AM|#
After the OWSers get their cut, yes it does.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:53AM|#
Don't forget about the extra equality that the
inner partygeneral counsel deserves.JMW|10.31.11 @ 1:06PM|#
Will the (drum) circle be unbroken!
Anonymous Coward|10.31.11 @ 11:41AM|#
*rubs aganst gums*
Yes. This shipment of stupid is definitely weapons-grade. We'll take it all.
Kristen|10.31.11 @ 11:59AM|#
Reminds of this classic customer service exchange
(haz blank target for your navigating pleasure)
Joe M|10.31.11 @ 2:40PM|#
Actually, that may be the correct number, if it's supposed to be a tax on every single buy/sell of stock, for example. If the average value of all trades in a day is maybe $100 billion, that tax amounts to $50 million/day. In a year, that's almost $20 billion. A 5% tax on every transaction would be $2 trillion, except, of course, it would destroy all the value along the way.
Trespassers W|10.31.11 @ 1:37PM|#
Occupy Edmonton combines my two of my least-favorite things: collectivists and Edmontonians.
|10.31.11 @ 9:10AM|#
Nothing says, "nurturing environment" like an armored personnel carrier on every corner.
Devil's Advocate|10.31.11 @ 9:11AM|#
That's really awesome, women of OWS. Because "protecting" OWS is more important than potentially bringing a rapist to justice. Way to stand behind your feminist bona fides.
|10.31.11 @ 9:15AM|#
the movement is more important than one person's desire for justice, which is flawed anyway. (I'm just trying to get into their heads, I guess.)
Devil's Advocate|10.31.11 @ 9:17AM|#
Yeah, I know. Just, the cognitive dissonance is rather mind-boggling.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:20AM|#
You see, OWS does not want to make the same mistakes that Occupy Oakland did, but admitting that they initiated violence.
Better?
|10.31.11 @ 9:39AM|#
cmon, this goes all the way back to che and revolutionary justice. except all backwards and shit
Suki|10.31.11 @ 10:11AM|#
I think it is even older than that.
Mr. Saveloy|10.31.11 @ 10:53AM|#
Are you sure it wasn't BG Sir Harry? I mean, he never was one to pass up the opportunity.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:15AM|#
Once again we're left to wonder what would happen if this sort of thing occurred during a Tea Party rally.
And the reaction is "we'd never hear the end of it".
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:20AM|#
If Tea Party: "Herman Cain did it!"
|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
+1.
|10.31.11 @ 9:21AM|#
The body politic is WAY more important than any real body.
cynical|10.31.11 @ 9:54AM|#
Well, if there more cults, these kids wouldn't be out there on the streets in the first place.
mr scary simple|10.31.11 @ 9:11AM|#
Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske has responded to an e-petitioner who asked President Obama to stop the war on pot. Snippet: "I'm a disingenuous fuck and I'm going to make up a bunch of problems so I can keep making lots of money and forcing rules down people's throats."
FIFY
squarooticus|10.31.11 @ 9:11AM|#
"Unless, of course, it involves the death penalty."
Is this part of the quote or not?
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:24AM|#
The open quote appears to leave it open to interpretation. It is an inkblot to separate the Liberaltarians from the Cosmotarians in comments.
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:47AM|#
If you will direct your attention to the article, it is an open quote because it continues to the next paragraph. Mr. Riggs probably should have closed it for clarity's sake.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:54AM|#
Revisionist!
Metazoan|10.31.11 @ 11:09AM|#
I saw it as not part of the quote. So which am I?
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:30PM|#
Why not be both?
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:11AM|#
Who Killed Horatio Alger?
The decline of the meritocratic ideal
http://www.city-journal.org/20.....cracy.html
robc|10.31.11 @ 9:32AM|#
So he is suggesting Harrison Bergeron as the answer?
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:12AM|#
Unless, of course, it involves the death penalty.
It is Texas, after all. Anything short of a capital crime is boys being boys.
|10.31.11 @ 9:46AM|#
Perry just hates them uppity judges and 'scuters.
|10.31.11 @ 9:13AM|#
Is John Corzine a criminal, in the conventional sense of the word, or just another egotistical buffoon who suckered a bunch of other egotistical buffoons into letting him throw their money away (while pocketing a big chunk of it)?
Ted S.|10.31.11 @ 9:21AM|#
Why can't he be both?
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:13AM|#
Robert Samuelson: The dangerous debate over cutting military spending
http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....story.html
T|10.31.11 @ 9:17AM|#
Somehow, I'm pretty sure we can maintain an adequate military for a lot less than we're currently paying.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
+1
The problem with the current Commander in Chief setup is turning the military into something not defense related at all. Like a big gay dating service focused on voter intimidation.
|10.31.11 @ 9:40AM|#
Depends how many more wars Obama is going to start.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:57AM|#
Using Obamamath, wars saved is the most important number. Bonus, an infinite number of wars can be fought as soon as enhanced volunteerism is introduced from people according to their ability.
|10.31.11 @ 10:26AM|#
Lives created or saved by war.
DJF|10.31.11 @ 9:19AM|#
"""below3 percent of national income, "''
First, the idiot needs to know that GDP is not the same as "national income", next that defense spending includes much more the just the Defense Department spending, and third that you determine spending by need, not just some arbitrary GDP number.
T|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
third that you determine spending by need, not just some arbitrary GDP number.
Nonsense. This is government. You determine spending by taking last year's budget and multiplying by 1.XX, where the XX is determined by how much blackmail you have on the House budget committee members.
Joe M|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
Wow, that is an idiotic article, even by Washington Post standards.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:27AM|#
+69
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:29AM|#
I aim to please.
|10.31.11 @ 9:49AM|#
America’s military advantage stems from advanced technology and intensive troop training. Obama repeatedly pledges to maintain America’s strength, but the existing cuts may do otherwise. Even before these, defense spending was headed below 3 percent of national income, the lowest level since 1940. The need to maintain an adequate military is another reason why spending on social programs needs to be cut and taxes need to be raised.
Disingenuous fuck
o2|10.31.11 @ 9:14AM|#
Skeptic’s own study finds climate change real
By Associated Press, Updated: Monday, October 31, 4:10 AM
WASHINGTON — A prominent physicist and skeptic of global warming spent two years trying to find out if mainstream climate scientists were wrong. In the end, he determined they were right: Temperatures really are rising rapidly.
The study of the world’s surface temperatures by Richard Muller was partially bankrolled by a foundation connected to global warming deniers. He pursued long-held skeptic theories in analyzing the data. He was spurred to action because of “Climategate,” a British scandal involving hacked emails of scientists.
One-quarter of the $600,000 to do the research came from the Charles Koch Foundation, whose founder is a major funder of skeptic groups and the tea party. The Koch brothers, Charles and David, run a large privately held company involved in oil and other industries, producing sizable greenhouse gas emissions.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....story.html
WTF|10.31.11 @ 9:21AM|#
It doesn't address the debate as to the cause, dipshit. We know there has been gradual warming since the end of the Little Ice Age in the 1800's. What is in disute is whether the warming is due to manmade origins or just part of the earth's natural warming and cooling cycles. (Hint - it's been warmer in the past, when there were no polar ice caps and no man made CO2.)
o2|10.31.11 @ 9:47AM|#
who's "we"?
o2|10.31.11 @ 9:59AM|#
other than the retarded voices in my head i mean
o2|10.31.11 @ 10:28AM|#
^spoof FAIL ! since the voice was WTF
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:29AM|#
The peer pressure became greater than the truth.
Jerry|10.31.11 @ 10:08AM|#
Scientist who claimed 'end of scepticism' on climate change under fire from colleague over 'huge mistake'.
Peer pressure eh.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:31PM|#
Peer pressure of the one is not as great as the peer pressure of the many.
DJF|10.31.11 @ 9:38AM|#
Just as I thought, Global Warming is a scam funded by the evil Koch brothers.
o2|10.31.11 @ 9:47AM|#
ok that's good
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:58AM|#
^^^Urine impersonator^^^
Jerry|10.31.11 @ 9:38AM|#
...global warming deniers.
There is that word again.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:46AM|#
The more they keep tossing it around, the more watered down it becomes, until it becomes meaningless.
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:14AM|#
George Will: Mitt Romney, the pretzel candidate
http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....story.html
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:02AM|#
This is a great article. The paragraph on his recent contortions on ethanol alone were priceless...
Pantless Deviant|10.31.11 @ 10:27AM|#
The axiom is as old as human striving: The perfect is the enemy of the good. In politics this means that insisting on perfection in a candidate interferes with selecting a satisfactory one.... Romney, however, is criticized by many conservatives for what they consider multiple conversions of convenience — on abortion, stem cell research, gay rights, gun control. But if Romney is now locked into positions that these conservatives like, why do they care so much about whether political calculation or moral epiphany moved him there?
-“Three Good Options for The Right,” George F. Will, March 2007
Apparently Will has flip-flopped on Romney's flip-flops...
BakedPenguin|10.31.11 @ 10:42AM|#
It's a shame - he's one of the better conservative pundits out there. Also, perfect may be the enemy of good, but crap is a far worse one.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:45AM|#
Maybe you could argue that while some "conversions" can be lived with at some point constant "conversions" cross a line...
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:47AM|#
I mean, most of Wills examples are of flip-flopping within the span of recent weeks. It's one thing (though bad enoough imo) to diametrically change your position on many fundamental issues from where you stood a decade ago, that can happen. But to flip flop on ethanol and collective bargaining several times in one month on top of that might make you think the person is simply too protean to think any conversion is an honest one.
Universal Statism Questionaire|10.31.11 @ 9:15AM|#
Do you approve of both types of city-Statist aggression?
• Universal Gambol Lockdown
• Universal Health Care
Trespassers W|10.31.11 @ 1:43PM|#
Gamboling should be limited to Indian reservations.
Pope Jimbo|10.31.11 @ 9:15AM|#
Against my better judgement I read the editorial page this Sunday in the local rag. I have learned my lesson.
A guest columnist goes on a huge rant about how the 1% are only there completely because of luck. And he's got proof!
He quotes a biologist at the U of MN who wrote a paper that demonstrates that all success is completely random.
So when you assume that everyone starts on Square 1 and returns are completely random, the results prove to be driven mostly by luck.
I was so urinated off, that I made my kids all endure an hour lecture (by me) about math and probability.
DJF|10.31.11 @ 9:23AM|#
So this means that my idea to compete against Starbucks with a national chain of stores selling onion and fish flavored milkshakes has an equal chance of success as Starbucks?
WTF|10.31.11 @ 9:25AM|#
Yes, because it's random. They have proof.
T|10.31.11 @ 9:28AM|#
Meat flavored popsicles, man. You'll make a fortune.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:31AM|#
Bacon and chocolate!
|10.31.11 @ 9:53AM|#
ARE..YOU..FUCKING..KIDDING..ME!!!
That could be a the best product ever.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 10:00AM|#
Prior art. My cut comes first.
Zeb|10.31.11 @ 10:26AM|#
It already exists. How could it not?
Quetzalcoatl|10.31.11 @ 10:34AM|#
I don't remember the name of the company, but there's a small candy-maker that sells bacon & bourbon lollipops online.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:32PM|#
Market niche for OWS: Bacon and white chocolate.
Trespassers W|10.31.11 @ 1:44PM|#
Vosges does a chocolate bar with bacon in it.
Almanian|10.31.11 @ 10:35AM|#
Come on guys - cheese shakes and butt-flavored cat food.
Guaranteed winners!! Amirite?
Almanian|10.31.11 @ 10:35AM|#
Oh, and cigarette-flavored ice cream! Mmmmm!
|10.31.11 @ 10:48AM|#
Tomacco, FTW!
|10.31.11 @ 10:27AM|#
So, if you assume success is random, your results are that success is, let's see, carry the one, ah, here we go.
Random.
|10.31.11 @ 10:56AM|#
I was so urinated off, that I made my kids all endure an hour lecture (by me) about math and probability.
My children feel their pain. Nothing like a really stupid news story to make me torture them with an hour long lecture. They often will say "did we do something wrong" to which I reply, "not yet, and I am hoping to assure that you don't in the future, either".
Pope Jimbo|10.31.11 @ 12:13PM|#
Good for you. I remember my father going on regular rants about various things when I was a kid. My smart ass sister and I would smirk and say crap like "No! Not lecture #247 again!" but it must have taken hold because we both turned out OK.
I'm not sure if my kids are smirking because I am too busy illustrating my points on a whiteboard (of course I use a whiteboard) to watch them.
|10.31.11 @ 6:37PM|#
What do you expect? We live in Minnesota. Klobuchar, Franken, and Ellis - That pretty much says it all.
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:16AM|#
Yelling at the guy to leave? Even OWS vigilante justice is lame.
Devil's Advocate|10.31.11 @ 9:18AM|#
Yeah, I know if I were a rapist I would be terrified of the ferocity of their vengeance.
WTF|10.31.11 @ 9:23AM|#
"Cardinal Fang! Fetch...THE COMFY CHAIR!"
|10.31.11 @ 9:39AM|#
Hey, they shined flashlights on him, too. Some of those better LED flashlights can give you quite the retinal afterimage.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 9:28AM|#
Well, he only jerked one out on someone's sleeping foot. it's not like he bundled mortgages into securities and managed to convince a rating agency to overvalue it.
Fist of Dead-iquette|10.31.11 @ 9:52AM|#
Seriously, that's what he did? Even their sexual assaults are effete. You could hardly call him a masher in today's society.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 10:24AM|#
I made up the jerking off and foot thing.
The other part, about bundled mortgages sold as over-valued securities, happened.
Fist of Etiquette|10.31.11 @ 10:32AM|#
A perfectly good pun shot to hell.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:32AM|#
So, as a group, they are not unresponsive.
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:17AM|#
US losing the peace in Iraq
http://www.bostonglobe.com/opi.....story.html
o2|10.31.11 @ 9:50AM|#
this was team boosch's negoiated withdrawal in 08.
Almanian|10.31.11 @ 10:36AM|#
Yeah, I blame Bush. Oh, wait...
o2|10.31.11 @ 11:06AM|#
so you blame bush for a negoiated withdrawal?
Chupacabra|10.31.11 @ 12:31PM|#
The pull-out method seldom works.
|10.31.11 @ 9:56AM|#
poor defenseless Iraqis. How will they ever survive. Obviously we need to permanently occupy their country. Let's set up a base outside every major city and start creating American compounds so we can assure them that father/uncle sam will always be by their side so their government never wavers.
Retired Army General Keane can eat shit.
|10.31.11 @ 10:34AM|#
I have always contended that the Iraqi "Democracy" would fall apart shortly after the US troops departed. If it took General Keane until now to figure this out, I despair about the analytical abilities of the senior US military officers.
|10.31.11 @ 10:44AM|#
Who cares. Either the Iraqis defend themselves or tough luck. They have had eight years to get their act together.
Raston Bot|10.31.11 @ 12:10PM|#
Thank you.
Hollow Weenie|10.31.11 @ 9:17AM|#
How Occupy Wall Street protesters handle crimes (like rape) in the Zuccotti Park camp: “We don’t tell anyone. We handle it internally.
Do they cut his balls off, or just confiscate his Rohypnol?
Devil's Advocate|10.31.11 @ 9:19AM|#
Apparently they yell at him.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
What? They yell at them? Instead of counselling the perps?
They's real tough on crime down in Zuccotti Park!
|10.31.11 @ 10:29AM|#
First, they have to round up one of the designated human microphones, so the rest of the Occupados know what to yell.
Mr Whipple|10.31.11 @ 11:59AM|#
+1
$6M RoboTorso|10.31.11 @ 9:18AM|#
Met police using surveillance system to monitor mobile phones
Surprise! No warming in last 11 years
|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
Met police using surveillance system to monitor mobile phones
My guess is that it would be the SCORPION LISTEN system.
cynical|10.31.11 @ 10:01AM|#
Did they buy it off of the Murdochs?
The Hamilton|10.31.11 @ 9:18AM|#
I have a little sumpin' sumpin' Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske can smoke....
NotSure|10.31.11 @ 9:25AM|#
Those Anonymous hackers better be careful, while companies like Visa will not like their sites being attacked, they will never retaliate because of the bad publicity it will generate.
The Mexican drug cartels probably will have no problems disemboweling some nerdy computer kids though, and then releasing it on youtube for the other anonymous hackers to see.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:33AM|#
RACIST!
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:26AM|#
Police: Fla. pizza workers burned down rival store
http://apnews.myway.com/articl.....956O0.html
T|10.31.11 @ 9:30AM|#
Cutthroat competition, indeed.
Of course, if the only pizza choices are Domino's and Papa John's, the correct answer is "get a burger".
Herman Cain|10.31.11 @ 9:37AM|#
I see a market niche!
Hey baby, how'd you like me to fill your market niche?
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 11:40AM|#
Domino's actually isn't that bad since they changed their product. Used to be that their pizzas weren't any better than the cardboard they were delivered in, but they're honestly quite edible now.
Papa John's, however, has always been bland styrofoam.
Kristen|10.31.11 @ 12:12PM|#
Papa John's has the worst pepperoni known to mankind, too.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 9:33AM|#
Better headline: Free market capitialist competiion leads to life-endangering arson!
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 9:37AM|#
Libertarian Owner defeats competitor: WITH FIRE!
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:34AM|#
Proof of how Capitalism works.
|10.31.11 @ 9:48AM|#
Uncle Enzo approves.
http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshir.....ture/9b02/
|10.31.11 @ 9:59AM|#
In ancient Rome, the managers would be set on fire. Fair's fair.
|10.31.11 @ 9:27AM|#
Returns varied, solely by chance.
Garbage in; garbage out.
Fucking simulations- how do they work?
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:35AM|#
Are you still boycotting the new blog layout?
|10.31.11 @ 10:29AM|#
And he's right to do so. Horror and moral terror have erupted since the adoption of this. . .abomination.
If only I had his strength of will.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:34PM|#
He has the right to have his babies gestate in a shoe box too. Just sayin'!
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 9:30AM|#
More OWS Gold:
http://www.nydailynews.com/opi.....mments_tab
These people are putting on a fucking CLINIC in demonstrating why primitive communism and absolute direct democracy by "consensus" are stupid ideas.
OK, so they're already splitting into classes, based on perceived level of commitment. An Inner Party, and proles, if you will.
Sounds like the Community Watch needs wider powers. And maybe a take-charge guy to run it.
OK, so they're about to decide that a self-selected steering committee will take over the prerogatives of their democratic institution, and will use that new power to make sure that the "sharing of resources" benefits the politically-connected and committed Inner Party, and not the freeloading proles.
This is all screamingly funny to me.
T|10.31.11 @ 9:32AM|#
They're recreating soviet communism on a tiny scale, right before our eyes. How long before the goon squads start cracking heads?
I think this proves, yet again, where the Left ends up if you give them what they want.
|10.31.11 @ 9:43AM|#
it also reminds me of pj orourkes comments about how many men joined the movement just to schtup willing hippy chix.
no mention of whether they were responsive or not
Hollow Weenie|10.31.11 @ 9:50AM|#
no mention of whether they were responsive or not
That's what Rohypnol is for.
Zeb|10.31.11 @ 10:32AM|#
"willing hippy chix"[sic]
o2|10.31.11 @ 9:56AM|#
nah, ignorant analogy. the homeless are publically urinating & defecating, drinking, stealing, & fighting.
>these behaviors threaten OWS since the po po will use them as pretext.
|10.31.11 @ 10:03AM|#
in other words, OWS had no plan of how to prevent this beforehand. And their organization both demands and precludes free handouts.
Cognitive Dissonance FTW.
Cabeza de Vaca|10.31.11 @ 10:23AM|#
Stupid homeless Kulaks!
JMW|10.31.11 @ 10:09AM|#
They're recreating soviet communism on a tiny scale, right before our eyes. How long before the goon squads start cracking heads?
"This time, it'll work. This time, socialism will be a success. This time..."
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:41AM|#
Is there 'surprise' leader going to arrive in a private rail car, or are they going to have a march down Broadway?
NotSure|10.31.11 @ 9:41AM|#
It seems the nomenklatura (the original protesters) is in conflict with the lumpen proletariot.
|10.31.11 @ 9:47AM|#
Organizers, who have already cut kitchen hours and taken other steps to discourage freeloading, are hoping that the winter cold will help clear out hangers-on and give the active participants time to consolidate their gains to date and refine their structures
Why not? Holomodor was a spectacular success the first time around.
T|10.31.11 @ 9:51AM|#
Holodomor, JW.
But cutting the food rations of the undesireables is straight out of the playbook, isn't it?
Seriously, do these guys have a manual or something? Or is this just the natural consequence of the belief system?
|10.31.11 @ 10:14AM|#
Holodomor, JW.
Thanks, but my spelling almost sounds like a virtual Middle Earth realm. Way better, IMHO.
T|10.31.11 @ 10:21AM|#
Hodor?
o2|10.31.11 @ 10:49AM|#
hurr durr!
|10.31.11 @ 11:02AM|#
No, that's the one with the buxom elvish harlots and their Ent pimps.
|10.31.11 @ 11:06AM|#
is this just the natural consequence of the belief system?
Yes, it is.
Joe M|10.31.11 @ 9:53AM|#
It was those damn farmers not following the great vision that caused all the trouble.
|10.31.11 @ 10:01AM|#
Somebody should be recording this and let us know when "Piggy" gets it.
Also,
"I see your utopia has turned into a fruitopia...ha...ha...ha."
Mr Whipple|10.31.11 @ 10:03AM|#
Critical flaws of anarcho-Communism/Socialism
1) There will always be a "Ruling Class"
2) There will always be resentments of that Ruling Class.
KDN|10.31.11 @ 10:04AM|#
In before White Indian.
|10.31.11 @ 10:05AM|#
Its great that OWS is doing in hypertime what Russia did in relative slow motion over 8 decades. Real life lessons on the failure of communism.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:13AM|#
You realize that the comment the communists have about the supposed lessons of the USSR are eerily similar to the ones that many libertarians have about the failures of some "pro-market" or "deregulatory" reforms, right? That wasn't "real communism/libertarianism" or "didn't go nearly far enough."
|10.31.11 @ 10:25AM|#
Like what?
The communist argument was based on the thought they could change people's motivations through control and direction. The libertarian argument has always been that people's motivations being what they are, how do you achieve the best results with minimum control and direction. Its hard to say the libertarian argument is wrong when the governments solution is try and control and direct the economy, call it laizzefaire and then get it horribly wrong. In other words, pursuing a communist direction and blaming the libertarians is laughable.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:30AM|#
I'm saying that the line "well, that wasn't really x (communism or libertarianism respectively" is what devotees of both ideologies say to real world examples of failed policies labeled at the time as x.
It's a problem any movement that posits an ideal as opposed to a continuum in contrast to reality is going to have. It's not falsifiable because evey real world attempt at x can after the fact be labeled as having fallen short and therefore not "really" being an example of x.
|10.31.11 @ 10:56AM|#
But what real world example can people use for libertarianism?
AFAIK, every time somebody said, "well that wasn't real libertarianism" about a system of government in the real world, their statement was accurate.
|10.31.11 @ 10:56AM|#
But what real world example can people use for libertarianism?
AFAIK, every time somebody said, "well that wasn't real libertarianism" about a system of government in the real world, their statement was accurate.
T|10.31.11 @ 11:03AM|#
Just because people label the policies as libertarian doesn't mean they are, MNG. People point to the 'Bush deregulation' of banks as failed libertarian policies when they were nothing of the kind.
Gimlet|10.31.11 @ 11:13AM|#
You lost me at "I'm saying".
NotSure|10.31.11 @ 11:21AM|#
Libertarianism is not science, unlike Marx that was trying to create a human scientific framework, it cannot be falsified like most belief systems, because it makes not scientific predictions in the first place.
You are really attacking free markets, and raising the idea of market failure. I can give countless examples where the freeing up of markets lifted millions out of poverty, or industries that emerged out of nowhere without government help, or companies that out compete government equivalent. Or bringing up the "superior" French health care, ignoring the fact that they are drowning in debt and begging China for cash. The evidence overwhelmingly points to free markets beating command economies. For every example of some Oliver Twist free market tragic story, I can give you hundreds of capitalist triumphs.
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 10:25AM|#
No, not really.
Here their specific complaints are absolutely essential components of their desired social arrangements.
They have their perfect participatory democracy in their General Assembly. They are finding it unsatisfactory precisely because it empowers any asshole who wants to show up on the meeting steps just as much as it empowers the people who had the original vision for the protest. They can't call that a bug when it's a feature. And they can't say the problem is that it doesn't go far enough, because there's no farther to go. It's already "perfect".
And they have their perfect sharing of resources. They are also finding that unsatisfactory precisely because people are using it as designed, and precisely because it's absolute and can't go any farther.
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 10:35AM|#
Or wait - did you mean the comments in that old blog link, or in my article link?
Sorry, I got confused.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:41AM|#
I was replying to LIT. I assume he meant by the "failure" of the USSR its colosal economic failure, so I'm referring to the economic effects of policy labeled x. Is X is utopian then you get a non-falsifiable kind of thing where the libertarian or the communist can just, after the bad economic effect that may follow the policy, simply say it "didn't go far enough" and so it "wasn't really x."
I prefer movements that put foward more testable propositions like "the more x, the less y" or something rather than "Utopia or bust."
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 10:54AM|#
I took LIT's comment to mean that they started with their ideal, but in the face of the practical results of that ideal, they're gradually stepping back from it, in exactly the same direction(s) that the Bolsheviks did.
"Let's share all property!" becomes "Oh shit, people are showing up for free stuff and not contributing anything! Let's not share all property any more!"
"Let's have a perfect direct democracy where the people organize in non-hierarchical collectives!" becomes "Oh shit people aren't doing what we thought they would, let's transfer all power to the Politburo!"
And so forth.
|10.31.11 @ 12:09PM|#
pretty much. since collective farms result in collective laziness, THOSE IN CHARGE then force some people to farm and share their goods collectively.
When collective democracy results in policies that go against the original collective, the original collective decides they can't allow the policies to contradict their belief structure, so they restrict democracy.
Its pretty much proceeding step by step.
NotSure|10.31.11 @ 11:33AM|#
You don't have to put quote marks around failure, the USSR really was an utter failure. Play sophistry games all you want, but in the end the USSR is no longer there, it failed.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 10:26AM|#
Except as a joke, no one will respond to this with the cliche: "Shut up! True libertarianism was never tired in Somolia!!"
|10.31.11 @ 10:59AM|#
So, libertarianism = warlordism now?
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 11:01AM|#
Why is it that when you let people hire, work and trade freely, there are people who think that's evil?
Why is it that when people tell you at the point of a gun you can only hire at their say, work at their say and trade at their say, there are people who think that's good?
Mr Whipple|10.31.11 @ 11:57AM|#
Because under the Capitalist/free market system, you must either work or starve. That's exploitation. The Capitalist exploits the human need for sustenance by forcing people to be wage/slave-laborers.
Please, try to keep up.
[/sarc]
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 3:52PM|#
Thanks for the [/sarc] BTW.
If you're alone on a desert island, you must either work or starve. Are you exploiting/enslaving yourself? Or is the state at fault for not having installed a nipple?
I gotta know.
Cabeza de Vaca|10.31.11 @ 10:25AM|#
And the new ruling class becomes the new 1%.
|10.31.11 @ 10:32AM|#
One day, they may figure out that there is always a "1%".
Its mathematically inevitable, after all.
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 11:07AM|#
Shhhh! You'll wake the chidren. And when they're awake all the children can't all be above average.
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 10:42AM|#
The dedicated participants’ stronghold is on the park’s east side, facing Broadway. The stragglers tend to cluster on the park’s west side, facing Cedar. The rift between them is growing.
How long before people on the stragglers' side hire a lawyer from the SPLC to file for enforced integration?
RoboCain|10.31.11 @ 11:29AM|#
How long before someone turns it into a musical?
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 11:43AM|#
Goddamn...+1.
|10.31.11 @ 10:50AM|#
There is a classic Onion article about how socialism failed in house full of communist roommates. It talks about how no one cleaned up after themselves and just sat around talking leftist politics all day. I am not going the article justice but you get the gist. These people are just an ongoing Onion prank
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:37PM|#
Sounds like an old British TV show about college students.
|10.31.11 @ 1:14PM|#
that's Neil's bedroom! Neil, your bedroom's on fire!
RoboCain|10.31.11 @ 11:21AM|#
How do they get away with tents? Afaik, that's against the NYC law. There is even a sign there that says tents aren't allowed. Which was enforced back when it was warm.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:39PM|#
Do unoccupied tents count?
Anonymous Coward|10.31.11 @ 11:54AM|#
All power to the vanguard party.
|10.31.11 @ 1:12PM|#
Gah! this is getting ridiculous. But the thing that gets me is I can foresee some lame biographies coming out of this movement, future heroes of the left going on speaking tours, other people who were in the movement attempting to go on similar speaking tours being "marginalized," but were'nt "true to it's roots/cause/etc."
Ice Nine|10.31.11 @ 9:33AM|#
Wall Street protesters prepare for winter weather
Eric Martin, who is on Occupy Boston's winterization committee, said the group had raised about $35,000, which could help buy winter supplies. Various ideas are being discussed to keep tents warm without using combustion-based heaters, which are forbidden. Another proposal: igloos.
"We're looking at ideas from military vets to survivalists, to the homeless community to indigenous peoples," Martin said.
Wait, Eskimos are indigenous to Massachusetts?
Incidentally, don't you just know that there is going to be a high absurdity quotient in a statement whenever it includes the term "indigenous peoples"?
Ice Nine|10.31.11 @ 9:33AM|#
Oh well, forget the link.
Chief Talking Bull|10.31.11 @ 9:36AM|#
Hey, OWS? I'm from the indigenous community and we live in fucking houses now, just like real people do.
Also, spend a weekend occupying Foxwoods. Two buffet tickets with each room booked!
Cabeza de Vaca|10.31.11 @ 9:56AM|#
The indigenous community used a forbidden thing called fire to keep warm.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 9:43AM|#
They might get a little more help from the homeless if they start sharing meals with them again.
NotSure|10.31.11 @ 9:43AM|#
Indigenous people have used "combustion-based heaters" as well, does that mean it it ok to use then ?
Suki|10.31.11 @ 10:02AM|#
Yea, just watch Avatar when they go to round up the plains Indians in the epic battle to kick the Europeans off of Pandora.
Warty|10.31.11 @ 9:51AM|#
without using combustion-based heaters, which are forbidden.
Excellent.
|10.31.11 @ 10:08AM|#
they must have had to translate from the original German of "verboten"
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 11:33AM|#
The answer is to heat with mulch. I wonder how many OWS frostbite victims we'll see before they figure that one out. Also, they will need to insulate with dry leaves or crumpled paper. The smell will be awesome!
Really, though, I expect they'll run to hotels at night or be driven off completely by the cold.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 10:07AM|#
Solar and wind electric heaters! Until someone points out Mao's Great Leap Forward, realizing that it is perfectly acceptable to cut down and burn all of the trees to make heat and iron. Bonus: the trees are on private property!
bill quoted|10.31.11 @ 10:45AM|#
Igloos in Boston? Good luck with that. Checking Weather Underground for January 2011 data, average high was 34 (max of 56) and the average low was 22 (min of -2). Miminal snow.
Live Free or Diet|10.31.11 @ 11:19AM|#
Besides: igloo, a box made made of ice. Yeah, I'd wanna spend a winter in Boston in an ice cube. Real toasty. Dimbulbs.
RoboCain|10.31.11 @ 11:35AM|#
Also, I think igloos used fires.
|10.31.11 @ 9:36AM|#
Mike Riggs -- You need an endquote after the NYT/Perry criminal justice blurb, or did Blackburn really comment on the death penalty exception?
|10.31.11 @ 9:37AM|#
It's fixed!
T|10.31.11 @ 9:47AM|#
And we're leading the way in tomorrow's Balko stories!
Weaponized drones in Houston.
This can't possibly go wrong, can it?
DJF|10.31.11 @ 9:56AM|#
In related news, the Defense Department announces the successful testing of a new computerized defense system they call “Skynet”.
Butts Wagner|10.31.11 @ 12:08PM|#
In related news, Defense Dept acquires robot for...clothing testing...yeah, clothing testing.
Cliché Bandit|10.31.11 @ 12:58PM|#
Disturbing yes, but in all honesty you could buy a $300 RC chopper for yourself and drive it into theirs and really fuck it up. Or even use a slingshot and rock, MSRP $7.99 rocks included.
|10.31.11 @ 9:54AM|#
Maybe if they used organic human excrement in their combustion heaters, they could get permission...
Suki|10.31.11 @ 10:34AM|#
Does that also count as free range?
Zombie Jimbo|10.31.11 @ 11:57AM|#
No, the only certified free range hippies remaining on the east coast are in Vermont. City hippies are penned up in the park.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:00AM|#
I was curious as to whether our resident GOPartisans would apply the same level of caution and critical thinking to the Cain accusations as they did to the DSK case (in other words, none), or would the fact that they like the politics of one man and not the other be an excellent predictor of whether they rushed to judgment or not?
KDN|10.31.11 @ 10:15AM|#
Cain probably did it and your point is valid, but it's not exactly an apples to apples comparison. This seems to be a one-off whereas DSK was a known philanderer and so very French. I mean, would you trust a Frenchman around your wife or daughter? Those frogs only think about two things: sex and cheese. And surrender. So three things: sex, cheese, and surrender. And wine. So, four things: sex, cheese, surrender and wine.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:19AM|#
A surrendering rapist? C'mon :)
|10.31.11 @ 11:09AM|#
Truffles?
And MNG is absolutely right here. The only difference being DSK's episode happened in the present and the story happened right before our eyes and the events were fluid. With the Cain thing, it was so long ago and the facts are firmly established and enshrined in writing, it will be looked at differently by the resident GOPartisans.
I'm not saying they are right, and I still believe DSK is a scumbag serial sexual assaulted. Cain, however, may be the kind of guy to make lewd comments to women in the workplace. I'm sorry, but I can't conflate the two.
And I hate Team Red, so please don't go down that road.
|10.31.11 @ 11:25AM|#
Where are the facts enshrined in writing? All we have are four anonomous sources.et these women go public and hear what they have to say and show me where the facts are known. In Dsk the women filed a criminal complaint.
Apatheist|10.31.11 @ 11:35AM|#
Sexual harrasment isn't a criminal issue. They did seek legal recourse and recieved a settlement. Cain's campaigned has refused to deny that the settlment exists so it is in fact in writing somewhere. Obviously people settle for reasons other than guilt so I remain skeptical and as sloopy said rape and making dirty jokes are not even in the same ballpark.
What this really shows is the incompetance of Cain's campaign. If they didn't think this was going to come out they are morons. They should have been prepared to respond immediately instead of looking like chickens with their head cut off.
|10.31.11 @ 12:02PM|#
They say there was a settlement. But we don't know because we don't know who is saying it. Regardless, after clinton sexual harassment no longer matters.
Suki|10.31.11 @ 12:42PM|#
No, it no longer matters for the right people who speak the right things.
|10.31.11 @ 10:28AM|#
I apply the same standard for all sexual harrassment charges. Was the woman hot? If so, I will excuse you.
Abdul|10.31.11 @ 10:29AM|#
The worst accusation against Cain, and it's hard to tell becuase they don't come from first-hand accounts, is that he made "inappropriate comments."
There's a world of difference between that and what DSK was accused of as well as the reliability of the sourcing.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:33AM|#
I'm analogizing the rush to judgment, not the offenses dude.
Try again.
"well as the reliability of the sourcing."!!!!
Yes, in the one case we had a known liar, in the other case we have two women whos veracity is unknown.
Wow. See the kind of desparation hackery leads one into?
|10.31.11 @ 10:58AM|#
In DSK we had a known person who filed a complaint with the police immediately. Here we have four unknown people who claim something to politico twenty years later. Totally different levels of evidence. Is this another hill of stupid you plan to die on
|10.31.11 @ 11:13AM|#
I admit I rushed to judgement somewhat in the DSK case. His actions and the victim's actions in the immediate aftermath, as reported, certainly pointed to something fishy going on.
So, to placate you MiNGe, I will rush to judgement in the Cain story. As reported by the media, he may have made two mildly lewd remarks. My rush to judgement=yawn.
|10.31.11 @ 11:13AM|#
Wow. See the kind of desparation hackery leads one into?
We see it in all of your posts. Every. Single. One.
|10.31.11 @ 10:55AM|#
Let's apply the same standards. In disk we had a know person who filed a complaint of rape. In Cain we have four unknown people who claimed he made an unwanted sexual anvances 20 years ago. So the cases are in no way comparable. If a hotel maid has sex with Cain and claims rape, I am believing the maid. But since that is not what happened, Dsk has nothing to do with this. And you are just being your usual partisan dick self to claim it does
Gimlet|10.31.11 @ 11:21AM|#
You lost me at "I was curious".
Fist of Etiquette|10.31.11 @ 10:01AM|#
More than 500 NYPD cops across the city have been accused of expunging tickets and summonses as favors.
Mace a corralled protestor without provacation? Nothing. Interrupt the flow of revenue to the city, watch the justice!
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:05AM|#
It's worse, did you see the quote the rep for the police union had over the weekend? He said "looking out for one's family and friends is not a crime."
When you are an officer and the "looking out for" involves using your authority to favor them then it surely is (and should be).
Zeb|10.31.11 @ 10:42AM|#
"looking out for one's family and friends is not a crime."
Yeah, that's quite the whopper. Guess what? It is a crime if it involves doing illegal things.
Anonymous Coward|10.31.11 @ 12:00PM|#
looking out for one's family and friends is not a crime.
I guess all of that crap in the state and federal statutes about aiding and abetting is just there for the commoners.
Kristen|10.31.11 @ 12:26PM|#
I would love to see someone charged with abetting in NYC use this quote in their defense. The schadenfreude wouldl be delicious.
|10.31.11 @ 4:07PM|#
I'm pretty sure that defense won't work for the cops charged, nor anyone else.
The PBA is bad about defending officers no matter how bad their actions. The PBA president defended the cop that sodmized Loumia. He was framing it as if Loumia deserved what he got. That's the usual LEO line.
KDN|10.31.11 @ 10:31AM|#
That 500 doesn't even count the thousands of moving violations not issued every year because a driver has proof of knowing a guy (I'm up to 15 over 11 years, 3 of them in NYC). Considering how ridiculous traffic laws are in this country, I'm not unhappy with the current arrangement.
PIRS|10.31.11 @ 10:03AM|#
"Anonymous threatens to unmask Mexican police officers working with cartels. "
Will this include the Mexican police officers working with that huge cartel based out of Washington, District of Criminals?
|10.31.11 @ 10:18AM|#
unmask Mexican police officers
It's cool that even the cops wear lucha libre masks in Mexico!
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:26AM|#
They will only give up that mask after a long ardous cage match.
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 11:47AM|#
Hair vs. Mask
T|10.31.11 @ 10:34AM|#
All Mexican citizens have lucha libre masks for time of need, Mongo. It's in the Mexican Constitution!
Even Old Mexican has one he wears when he ventures out to promote libertarianism. It's a silk screen of Ayn Rand's face in bold primary colors.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:37AM|#
+1
Red Rocks Rockin|10.31.11 @ 11:49AM|#
I won't believe it until I see his Saturday morning action show on Azteca.
Warty|10.31.11 @ 10:04AM|#
My Shit's Fucked Up
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:07AM|#
"“He has done more good than any other governor we’ve ever had,”"
Perry is pretty bad on criminal matters, but he's great compared to Romney. Perry pardoned 35 people in the Tulia debacle, Romney has bragged about the fact that he never pardoned one person as gov of Mass. What a jerk Romney is.
T|10.31.11 @ 10:19AM|#
In what little tepid defense I will offer of Perry, the governor does not have absolute pardon power in Texas. The details are boring and uninteresting except to students of TX government, but a committee makes recommendations to the governor. If the committee doesn't recommend pardon, he can't pardon. One of the other regular lurkers and occasional posters knows way more about this than me and can give you more details.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:21AM|#
Understood, but that makes Perry look better imo. He has a much more restricted pardon power than Mitt did but used it more than Mitt.
T|10.31.11 @ 10:31AM|#
I'll buy that argument. Perry did more within his limits than Mittens did with almost no limits.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:35AM|#
Romney pardoned no one. If four years are we to believe that he through intense study found no example of injustice that should be combated throough the pardon powers the Founders gave our executives in order to do just that? Or did he pardon noone because of unprincipled political calculation?
Is there anyone who thinks this question is something other than rhetorical? That man is scum.
Zeb|10.31.11 @ 10:55AM|#
I don't think you'll get much disagreement on that one.
Whappan?|10.31.11 @ 11:55PM|#
Yeah, I think his attitude can be summed up by his response to the medical marijuana dude in a wheelchair from the last election cycle. I don't remember all the details, or the exact exchange, but basically the guy was asking Romney something to the effect of "Marijuana is the only thing I've tried that alleviates my symptoms, what would you have me do?" and Romney basically blew him off. It showed his utter disdain for anyone who couldn't be of use to him.
Mike M.|10.31.11 @ 10:08AM|#
Rural rebellion brewing in California.
California state government and the whacko environmentalist extremists that they work for are engaged in a quiet campaign of harassment and intimidation against the remote rural residents in the north of the state. They are sneaking around and trespassing on people's private property unannounced, armed in many cases. The people up there feel, probably with justification, that the leftists are trying to drive them off their land and put an end to the rural way of life.
Jerry Brown is about as much of a libertarian as my dog is.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:26AM|#
I don't know about your analogy there, AFAIK your dog has never coerced anyone...
Brett L|10.31.11 @ 1:12PM|#
Eh. Most dogs understand property. Some of them are a little hazy on the non-aggression principle.
Montani Semper Liberi|10.31.11 @ 10:10AM|#
So-called rising income inequality due to changes in household demographics
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:20AM|#
We also recognize that legalizing marijuana would not provide the answer to any of the health, social, youth education, criminal justice, and community quality of life challenges associated with drug use."
Er, it might provide the answer to those challenges that center, I dunno, around people being harrassed, arrested and incacerated for pot though you goofball.
Supreme Generalissimo Fluffy|10.31.11 @ 10:30AM|#
Yeah, but to him the way this statement translates is:
"How are we going to stop people from using marijuana if we don't arrest them?"
He's already decided that marijuana use produces health harms (which I guess is true, but no more true than for alcohol use), social harms ("Niggers smoke pot - you don't want to be like a nigger, do you?", youth education harms ("We told you not to smoke pot and you won't listen!"), criminal justice harms ("Pot users will run amok committing burglaries and muggings to buy more pot!") and community quality of life harms (Not to be redundant, but once more "Niggers smoke pot - you don't want to be like a nigger, do you?").
It makes more sense when you incorporate all the historical Drug War assumptions.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:37AM|#
Let's say you assume that legalization will leave lots of pot-related health, social, education and criminal harms (that's probably somewhat the case). My point is, doesn't he realize that prohibition makes for its own harms, and those harms will certainly be "answered" by legalization?
|10.31.11 @ 12:50PM|#
you are talking about fucking kerlikowske here. he does his master's bidding. god knows what he REALLY thinks. when he was chief of SPD he was a tool for the mayor. now, he is a tool for obama. they are both statist ninnies, thus kerlikowske apes them.
duh
|10.31.11 @ 10:38AM|#
I believe he just wants to give the police the power to carry out summary executions during MJ raids. That way, they don't have to arrest people.
MNG|10.31.11 @ 10:43AM|#
"he just wants to give the police the power to carry out summary executions during MJ raids."
Nah, just of their dogs. The people are needed alive to justify the funding for drug courts and such.
|10.31.11 @ 10:45AM|#
Officers rally for ticket fix cops
http://www.wpix.com/news/wpix-.....0102.story
Mike M.|10.31.11 @ 10:52AM|#
Tony LaRussa announces his retirement. Talk about going out on top.
|10.31.11 @ 11:22AM|#
Did not see that one coming"
Good for him. Now he can overmanage some SPCA neutering program.
Kreel Sarloo|10.31.11 @ 10:55AM|#
Good luck on that last one. After years of government paternalism the "indigenous peoples" are even more helpless and clueless than you people are.
|10.31.11 @ 10:58AM|#
doesn't he realize that prohibition makes for its own harms[?]
Evidently not.
rts|10.31.11 @ 11:03AM|#
Too little debt is as big a problem as too much debt.
Scruffy Nerfherder|10.31.11 @ 11:08AM|#
Oh the horrors!
Old Mexican|10.31.11 @ 11:23AM|#
A problem for whom, you ask? Why, the banksters!
And you thought the NPR guys were pure souls? They're as paid and bought for like the rest of the media.
Matrix|10.31.11 @ 11:38AM|#
That's the problem with a lot of statists. If the government currently does something and someone comes along saying it shouldn't, statist claim it will NEVER get done. They don't understand that market will respond to a need. So, in the case of T-bonds being used as safe investment, that money could be easily invested in other ventures. And those ventures would actually produce positive results, not trying to fund bad government policies.
Several of the commenters on the website who claimed to be university educated in Economics were channeling Keynes in their comments. It was vomit inducing.
rts|10.31.11 @ 11:49AM|#
statist claim it will NEVER get done.
Paging Mr. Bastiat... Mr. Bastiat please pick up the white courtesy phone.
Matrix|10.31.11 @ 1:48PM|#
Hey, just because the guy lived 200 years ago does not mean his ideas cannot be directly applied to today's times.
rts|10.31.11 @ 2:43PM|#
Bastiat should be required reading in high school. (In my household, he certainly will be).
Warty|10.31.11 @ 11:17AM|#
So, editors, nothing about this weekend's 1000-post abortion?
Cliché Bandit|10.31.11 @ 1:06PM|#
what u talking bout willis? I am not a weekender on here.
Lord Humungus|10.31.11 @ 1:28PM|#
This morning, I did not dare to open that thread in the fear of Incif collapsing.
Cliché Bandit|10.31.11 @ 1:47PM|#
Is it this one? cause that is some stupid shit right there. It has everything.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 2:38PM|#
"Before Reasonable, I was pulling my hair and wearing down my teeth with constant grinding, White Indian's stupid was that bad.
But now, with Reasonable, I can enjoy the comments section with no need to worry about my physical and mental health.
Thanks Reasonable!"
|10.31.11 @ 11:55AM|#
Obsessive-compulsive behavior can be a scary thing.
JMW|10.31.11 @ 2:40PM|#
No. kidding.
|10.31.11 @ 8:09PM|#
My best friend’s mom makes $77 an hour on the computer.She has been out of job for 9 months but last month her check was $7487 just working on the computer for a few hours. Read about it here NuttyRichdotcom
Nike Dunk Low|12.12.11 @ 12:55AM|#
thanks