Reason Late-Morning Links

* "Crude-sucking barges" blocked from cleaning oil spill.

* Joe Biden: Recovery Act is totally working.

* American citizen executed by firing squad.

* Nancy Pelosi withdraws DISCLOSE Act over outrage at NRA exemption.

* Hillary Clinton says Justice Department will sue Arizona over immigration law.

* Kid with toy soldiers on his USA/camo cap sent home for inappropriate dress.

* Sarah Palin: "If somebody's gonna smoke a joint in their house and not do anybody any harm, then perhaps there are other things our cops should be looking at."

(Hat tip to our morning commenters.)

Comments

[sage]

I think that might be the first comment I've heard Palin make regarding the drug war (to be fair, I filter out a lot of her noise). Kudos to her.

[Suki]

I heart that comment.

[AlmightyJB]

It's a start

[Tim]

You should have posted: "Good afternoon Reason!"

[Suki]

It's not afternoon here yet, lol. I believe in comment integrity.

[Tim]

You might be the only one.

[John]

You cannot come out right now and advocate full legalization. People won't go for it. But you can say sensible things like this. Lets see the drug warriors explain why we should be spending limited police resources on someone growing pot in their back yard.

[Fluffy]

I think we're farther down the path to legalization being an easy policy position to take than you do, but like JB said, it's a start, I guess.

We'll see what she says in 18 months.

[John]

she will say the same thing. She will not be for full on heroin via the internet. But I she will still have this position.

And hard to say about what can be advocated for and what can't. The problem is for someone like Palin or Rand Paul is that the media so wants to portray them as kooks. Anything they say even remotely out of the conventional wisdom is immediately jumped on by the media as evidence they are nuts. If Palin came out for full legalization, the reaction would be similar to the reaction to Paul's remark on the CRA. The media would throw such a fit that any other message would be drowned out.

[Fluffy]

Sorry, miscommunication. I meant legalization for pot.

I don't expect to see a lot of heroin legalization talk, either.

[John]

But if you stop enforcing possession, you have effectively legalized it. Isn't possession and growing for your own use pretty much legal in Alaska? Or is that a myth? But if we could ever get to a point where you could grow and possess your own, it would only be a matter of time before people realized the stupidity of it being illegal to sell or bring into the country.

[skr]

decriminalization is not the same as legalization. That is what they have in Amsterdam. It created a gray market for pot where an illegal produc magically becomes quasi-legal. This has been an open invitation for money laundering by organized crime as they can produce pot with dirty money and sell it at a coffeeshop and "poof" clean money. Not a very good idea.

[Cabeza de Vaca]

It use to be legal in Alaska to consume in the privacy of your own home. The Alaskan legislature changed the law & it no longer is.

[crenata]

The Alaska legislature can not overrule the Alaska Supreme Court decision of Ravin (1975). We are still allowed to posess up to 4 ounces in our homes, and I think it used to be considered 4 plants for personal use. Ravin stands, but there are issues about the legislative action (I can't recall all the details; I ought to call a friend who is very well versed on the whole mess; has to do with 1 ounce v. 4 etc.), which are winding through the courts. Google Ravin and read all about it if you want. I just do my thing and try to avoid any and all cops. They're really bad up here to. Btw, Todd and Sarah were right about the Trooper issue.

[prolefeed]

But if you stop enforcing possession, you have effectively legalized it.

Not even close. Legalized means vast fields of the stuff being grown, with waaaaay lower prices and easy access to purchase in stores. It means nobody anywhere gets locked up for growing, transporting, or smoking it.

[?]

I filter out a lot of her noise

She's the vuvuzela of American politics.

[John]

No she isn't. That distinction belongs to President Vuzuvula. Palin just posts on facebook and hosts a TV show I don't watch. President Vuzuvual takes over prime time TV at least once a quarter.

[Jersey Patriot]

People still watch network television?

[Invisible Finger]

Or the vulvazela.

[Tonio]

I was waiting for someone to make the obvious pun. Thanks.

[Max]

My God, yes! Sarah Palin has the makings of the new great libertarian hope. Oh, this is so exciting. Ron Paul, Sarah Palin--the tide is turning!!

[Episiarch]

I don't have time right now to write a new one, so I'll just repost this:

Edward sat in front of his browser, relentlessly clicking the refresh button for H&R; the neglected microwave burrito half eaten next to him was crawling with roaches, but he didn't notice. The roaches didn't even flinch as he screamed "POST SOMETHING SO I CAN COMMENT YOU CUNTS!!!" every few refreshes. He would occasionally wipe the spittle from his mouth and the sweat from his vein-webbed forehead with a grimy towel, never looking away from the screen.

Suddenly, the screen changed: a new post! His hands shook as he clicked on the comment link, like a heroin addict's when attempting to find a vein after going too long without a fix.

He began to drool as he mashed the keys furiously, his eyes red and bleary but oh so intently staring at the screen. He completed his comment and clicked submit. That's when he began to rub himself. Refresh, then stroke...refresh, then stroke.

He needed lubricant, but to his dismay, the Vaseline jar on the desk was bone dry. He began to panic, and then his eyes strayed to the roaches. With lightning speed, his unoccupied hand lashed out and crushed a large roach into goo.

With a maniacal smirk of satisfaction on his face, Edward smeared the roach innards on his penis and began the cycle again with a sigh...refresh, stroke...refresh, stroke.

[-]

A for effort, C- for execution.

[Episiarch]

You get an F for daring to even think of grading my work.

[-]

"Work"? I hope you don't get paid for that.

[Episiarch]

Talking with you about it is all the payment I need.

[Lexicon]

I think he was hoping for a more detailed description *of* the execution than "crushed a large roach into goo."

[-]

No, I was looking for better writing.

[Tonio]

Don't let random-character guy get you down, Epi. It was a good post. Sometimes the only thing that gets me through the day is the bile and spleen from you, Sug, Warty et als.

[prolefeed]

You're a sick, sick bastard, Epi.

Strong work!

[Urkobold?]

FIRST, BIGGER, ROUNDER TITS. NOW A CRITICISM OF THE DRUG WAR.

THE URKOBOLD IS ERECT WITH ANTICIPATION OF HER NEXT MOVE. SEX TAPE?

[Fluffy]

Perhaps with Steve Smith?

[Episiarch]

STEVE SMITH ALREADY RAPE PALIN DURING TRIP TO ARCTIC WILDLIFE REFUGE! SHE SURPRISINGLY LIKE STEVE ADVANCES! STEVE MEET HER ABOUT 9 MONTHS BEFORE TRIG BORN!

[Andrew Sullivan]

Aha!

[STEVE SMITH CHIMERA]

I HAVE A LITTLE BRO-BRO!!!!!? DADDY NEVER TOLD ME! JR. WONDER IF LITTLE BRO LIKE TO PLAY HIKER LIKE BRISTOL!

[R C Dean]

Didn't Palin's comment basically mirror current Alaska law? Aren't small amounts in the home decriminalized in Alaska?

[SugarFree]

The governor before her changed that.

Despite blindly groping for an understanding of freedom, she's still for The War on Drugs.

[SugarFree]

"If we're talking about pot, I'm not for the legalization of pot," Palin said. "I think that would just encourage our young people to think that it was OK to go ahead and use it."

Suggesting tha the police should pursue at-home use of small amounts of weed is a step forward, but let's not pretend it's some sort of giant stride.

[wylie]

After decades of walking backwards, it sure seems like a great stride forward.

[SugarFree]

My objection is mostly having to do with the "Tea Party / Palin, etc. are libertarians" meme.

Pot needing to stay illegal for the sake of the children is not a remotely libertarian statement as far as I understand the ideology.

(Yes, I know legalization talk is political suicide...)

[John]

No they are not Libertarians. But they are closer to Libertarians than most Republicans. The media only calls them "Libertarians" because "Libertarian" has become a convenient slur.

[Edwin]

They are as libertarian as any large number of Americans are going to be.

[prolefeed]

They are as libertarian as any large number of Americans are going to be currently .

The tide is turning on the WoD. A few decades now, it will be political suicide in most of the country to advocate locking people up for smoking weed.

[sage]

When I moved up there in about 1990, it was legal to posess up to four ounces for personal use. There was a ballot initiative that struck that down (it narrowly passed, btw).

I must say that throughout high school and afterward I had many, many interactions with Anchorage PD. I never had any issues with them acting like pigs. But I'm a plain old white boy, so YMMV.

[prolefeed]

Palin's statement was still a bit nanny-statist, but more sensible than what most politicians say.

The question is whether she would actually implement that, or if it is campaign bullshit that she would ignore, the way Obama said a lot of shit that he didn't do once in office.

[?]

Lust of the Mohegans:

Tribe scores $54 million in stimulus loot for billion-dollar casino.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/.....d=10889408

[Episiarch]

But Mohegan Sun isn't nearly as huge as Foxwoods! The Mohegans have to compete properly with the Pequots! They need that money.

[SugarFree]

The End of the Best Friend

"I think it is kids' preference to pair up and have that one best friend. As adults ? teachers and counselors ? we try to encourage them not to do that," said Christine Laycob, director of counseling at Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School in St. Louis. "We try to talk to kids and work with them to get them to have big groups of friends and not be so possessive about friends."

"Parents sometimes say Johnny needs that one special friend," she continued. "We say he doesn't need a best friend."

[John]

The anchoress was all over this story. She pretty much nails it here

"This isn't about what's good for the children; it is about being better able to control adults by stripping from them any training in intimacy and interpersonal trust. Don't let two people get together and separate themselves from the pack, or they might do something subversive, like?think differently."

http://www.firstthings.com/blo.....riendship/

[JEP]

Certain personality types are more likely to trust people than others. I personally just very few people and only have a few close friends.

The trend these days is that anyone who's introverted is seen as being socially dysfunctional. I believe the psychology community actually considers being introverted a neurosis now.

[John]

I used to trust people more when I was young. But I learned in the school of hard knocks that those who seem the most friendly and nice are often the ones who do you the most harm and those who seem stand offish often turn out to be the most trust worthy. The older I get the more introverted I am.

[.]

The trend these days is that anyone who's introverted is seen as being socially dysfunctional. I believe the psychology community actually considers being introverted a neurosis now.

Gotta watch out for those loner types - never know when they might go off. 😉

[SugarFree]

The Japanese novel Battle Royale used this as a plot device. If you've only seen the movie, read the book it's even better. (Spoilers ahoy...)

It's an alternate where the USA fought to a stalemate in the Pacific theater in WWII and then turned isolationist. Japan goes on to conquer China and most of SE Asia and turns Communist.

At some point the 1950s, they begin the Battle Royale, a fight to the last man standing. They maroon a 9th grade class on an island and arm them, giving them three days to have a single-living winner or all die. This is the basic plot of the movie.

But the book explains that it's not one class, but dozens every year. And it gives the rationale that the movie never provides: If you grow up thinking that there is a good chance that you might have to one day kill everyone you go to school with, you form no permanent bonds. You try to make no close friends. This disrupts the trust that could foment a revolution.

[Episiarch]

But Shuya and Noriko show that with love, you can kill everyone else.

[B]

Is there anything in the book to explain why Battle Royale 2 was so shitty?

[SugarFree]

Sadly, no.

[objector]

From the movie, I got the impression that none of the kids knew what was coming.

[The Gobbler]

When everyone is your friend, no one is your friend.

[wylie]

But but but, they're only trying to promote Sharing. It's caring, dontcha know?

Hey, maybe Johnny doesn't need to be raised with any siblings either, hell, the Parents are probably just contributing to his selfishness too! Ditch em all and let schools raise them entirely!

(Collectivist Fucks)

[Deman Llama]

As a parent, I totally appreciate it when an "expert" sweeps in and tells me how to raise my children. If it weren't for experts, my kid probably wouldn't have survived six years.

My child's teacher told my daughter she was obligated to "share" her extra snack money with a child who didn't have any snack money. My child told her that was socialism and unfair, and she did chores to get her snack money, so if the other child wanted to put my daughter's crayons away for her, she would give him some snack money for it. The teacher wrote a stern note home, telling me it was inappropriate for my daughter to say that. I responded with an equally stern note saying it was no only inappropriate for the teacher to attempt to censor my daughter, but it also amounted to stealing for her to take money from my daughter's snack money, that my daughter wasn't using to purchase a snack, without my permission. No more notes home. My daughter now goes to private school.

[John]

Your daughter kicks ass. What a fuckhead of a teacher. Who steals from kids? If she was so concerned about the poor kid, why not give the kid the money herself? No instead lets guilt a six year old into doing it. That is sick.

[libertytexan]

"Who steals from kids?"

Pretty much every politician ever.

[wylie]

My child told her that was socialism and unfair...

There's still some hope for the future. Thank you, Llama.

[Deman Llama]

I have worked very hard to teach her the value of work, and also to stand up for herself. Teachers can be the worst of the bullies- using guilt and manipulation to compell little kids to do things they don't want to/shouldn't have to do.

That kid faithfully scoops the cat box and pulls weeds in the garden to get her couple of dollars a week. I'll be damned if she's going to be forced to hand it over to some other deadbeat kid who is probably the spawn of equally deadbeat parents who think they're entitled to my kid's money.

[Michael Ejercito]

I have worked very hard to teach her the value of work, and also to stand up for herself. Teachers can be the worst of the bullies- using guilt and manipulation to compell little kids to do things they don't want to/shouldn't have to do.

Why the hell do people listen to those bozos anyway?

[JW]

Awesome. Kudos to you for doing a bang up job with your daughter.

[dbcooper]

NY Times has been on a douche spree recently. Check out this asshole parade:

Should Parents Be Jailed When Kids Drink?

I hate me some dries ...

[Tonio]

The Soviets did shit like that.

[capitol l]

The first paragraph made me barf a little, so I'll share it with everyone:

Parents who sanction teenage drinking parties are making a huge mistake. These parents are encouraging the very behavior they are attempting to control. Even worse, they are communicating disrespect for legal authority to young people who are just forming their attitudes about how to behave in society.

*barf*

[prolefeed]

Even worse, they are communicating disrespect for legal authority to young people who are just forming their attitudes about how to behave in society.

I've explicitly encouraged my children to stand up to and disrespect authority figures in school who not only haven't done anything to deserve respect, but are peddling socialism.

I've told them that you don't get in trouble when you go to the principal's office if you can calmly explain the bad behavior of the teacher and why you stood up to said behavior. And that if the principal acts unreasonably, I'm ready to go to the school and talk with him or her about the misconduct of their teachers.

[Deman Llama]

If parents were allowed to smack their kids upside the head when they acted like little jerks, without having to worry about Family Services showing up the next day to investigate the "abuse," we might not have these kinds of stupid douche articles, written by stupid douche experts on how to raise sissy children who can't seem to break free of their parents.

This is just another instance of new-age parents trying to be "involved" in their kids lives. Don't let your kids drink in your back yard. Sneaking booze taught me the fine art of discretion. I learned how not to make a public spectacle of myself- something that has been lost on many of today's youth.

[John]

That is a good point. Also, there is a lot to be said for learning that some rules are meant to be broken, but only broken with care. Drinking too much as a young teenager and puking, did a whole lot to teach me not to be an alcoholic.

[M]

Why not just put Methanol in the Keystone? Oh wait, they already did that during prohibition.

[M]

Why not just put Methanol in the Keystone? Oh wait, they already did that during prohibition.

[M]

whoops

[Fluffy]

This is the inevitable result of the way the schools now falsely conflate bullying with exclusion.

They basically explicitly say that the problem with friendship is that it excludes people. Well, yeah, it does - it excludes people I think are assholes.

Not being friends with people is different from beating them up. That seems really easy to understand, unless you work for a school district, for some reason.

[Michael Ejercito]

This is the inevitable result of the way the schools now falsely conflate bullying with exclusion.

They basically explicitly say that the problem with friendship is that it excludes people. Well, yeah, it does - it excludes people I think are assholes.

Not being friends with people is different from beating them up. That seems really easy to understand, unless you work for a school district, for some reason.

Why are people who work in education bereft of common sense?

[prolefeed]

Why are people who work in education bereft of common sense?

Because the people who can make it in more lucrative careers tend to have more common sense.

[capitol l]

His favorite playmate is a boy who was in his preschool class, but Ms. Shreeves says that the two don't get together very often because scheduling play dates can be complicated; they usually have to be planned a week or more in advance. "He'll say, 'I wish I had someone I can always call,' " Ms. Shreeves said.

Jesus, these people are maniacs. An eight year old should not be busy, or have appointments. These kids are going to grow up to be serial killers, mark my words. The rigidity of life and over scheduling is going to create a whole generation of sociopathic cat skinners.

They seem to think that a kid's life should be like a facebook page; a lot of meaningless "friends", without the intimacy of a real friendship.

[Fluffy]

I think the article is silly, too, but don't jump on the "Dissing Facebook" bandwagon. The folks on that bandwagon are just as silly as these folks.

[capitol l]

@Fluffy

I don't hate Facebook, it was just used as an example of people supplanting a small number of intimate friendships with a large number of superficial friendships. I could have used MySpace if you like.

Though you do seem quick to defend Facebook...seems kind of suspicious. Are you in the pocket of big social networking? Who paid you off, Fluffy?

[John]

That is fucked up. What the hell is the matter with that kid's parents. You are right. They are raising a sociopath. Poor kid.

[SugarFree]

'I wish I had someone I can always call,'

Saddest damn thing ever.

I grew up without a best friend (we moved a lot) and look how I turned out. Do parents really want me as their offspring?

[John]

Maybe you should make that into some kind of public service announcement. Call the Ad Council today.

[Episiarch]

Creating a generation of NutraSweets: most horrible thing ever, or most hilarious thing ever? Assuming you're not one of the people he targets on one of sprees, that is.

[Clich? Bandit]

The abundance of awesome psyco porn prose would be interesting at least.

BOOYA!

[The Angry Optimist]

Sprees? You cruel bastard. You know he can't have candy.

[Jordan Elliot]

"Saddest damn thing ever."

Truly, Reading that article didn't even make me mad. Just really sad.

[JEP]

Ghostbusters!

But, you're right. It's a damn shame stupid people have children and then ruin the child's life...

[Spoonman.]

I was rarely allowed to go over to a friend's house and vice versa, and whenever I did I magically was believed to be behaving terribly afterwards, which was of course the fault of me seeing this friend, so getting to see a friend for me always involved lots of yelling afterwards.

Yeah, I was pretty damn socially awkward until 18 or so.

[Atanarjuat]

Spoonman, that sounds really familiar. I remember one year I didn't see a kid my age for the entire summer break (7th grade), although it got better by the time I was in high school. I was pretty awkward even later than 18. I'm making damn sure my kid gets to have as much social interaction as he needs.

[prolefeed]

I grew up without a best friend (we moved a lot) and look how I turned out.

Don't blame it on the moving. My father was in the military, and my more social siblings quickly formed new friendships. Whereas if I had stayed in the same place all my childhood, I would still have been the geeky smart kid conspicuously lacking in friends.

[skr]

what happened to:
kid:" Bye Mom. I'm going out to play."
Mom:"Ok, be back for dinner."

[Skid Marx]

I grew up just a few blocks from the Mississippi River. By the age of ten, we would wander the banks a good two miles in either direction, pretty much like Tom Saywer and Huck Finn. Our only responsibility during the summer months was being on time for lunch and dinner.

By the time we were twelve, we were bicycling a good five miles in every direction.

I pity the kids of today.

[capitol l]

Skid, that sounds awesome.

I grew up in VABeach, and behind our house were woods leading to a drainage canal. One year they drained the canal to widen it, or something. It was a kid's dream; mud that you could sink up to your knees in, toads, empty work sites with huge earth movers, and these huge bullfrogs that you had to use both hands to pick up.

[smartass sob]

You were a lucky kid. All we had was Buffalo Bayou and the country club and park that backed up to it. Better than nothing though.

[prolefeed]

Yeah, my mother would kick us kids out of the house and order us to not come back inside until dinner.

So we went outside and did stuff that was fun.

[JW]

Cable news, email and milk cartons. The constant stream of bad news, urban myths and ZOMG sex offenders! really created a generation of anxiety-ridden idiots.

Fortunately, I rid myself of that anxiety and my kids are the happier for it.

[JW]

Christ on a pogo stick. The NYT is a just magnet for fuckstained idiots. Here's a tip for the NYT staff: running stories about sociopaths raising the next generation of joyless turds doesn't make you contrarian. It just makes you a bunch of elitist douchbags, ready to jump on whatever the latest fad the Ivy leaguers manage to dredge up out of the depths of their warped psyches.

I would KILL for a neighborhood for my kids to run around in a backyard filled with friends. But no, we managed to move into the most disassociative neighborhood imaginable, with the kids scattered about on all the various blocks and most of them going to a half-dozen different private schools. The rest are hispanic, which culturally sets up barriers; they have no interest playing with the white kids, since there's about 200 of their own "kind" to play with.

It really fucks up the social vibe of the area. We manage with play dates with kids miles away that my kids go to school with and bond with, but it just isn't the same. They have best friends, just not any nearby they can see every day.

[JEP]

It's the whole diversity thing again. They don't like the idea that someone can not like another person.

If Joe doesn't like Bob, they consider it bullying if Joe walks up to Bob and goes "Bob, you're a douche and I don't like you."

If Joe does it every morning before class and leaves messages on Bob's voice mail, then it might be an issue. But in general, you should reserve the right to not like other people.

[Pro Libertate]

WTF?

[SugarFree]

OT: The only Sanford and Son and Dune thread I can dig up.

[wylie]

and hope that he could find a yak-herding position in Upper Mongolia.

You think the American job market is tough?

Nice trip in the wayback machine to a simpler, unthreaded, era.

[capitol l]

This post is filled with right-wing code implying Edwards is an "immoral homosexual"...

[Pro Libertate]

I saw a statement about how policy-savvy Edwards was in that thread. How ridiculous!

[Pro Libertate]

That's not it. There's definitely such a thread, but I can't find it, either. When I did the Urkobold post on the topic, I titled it with the word "continued", as it was a continuance of a discussion already going on in a Hit & Run thread.

Curiouser and curiouser.

[SugarFree]

There is a block of posts that are missing and that is about the right era. (There is a MNG thread I've been dying to throw in his face.)

They've mentioned a server crash in the past.

[Pro Libertate]

I demand that my history be restored! There's some great bits from that era! In fact, I believe the whole Urkobold business started back then.

[John]

I got him with is "Republicans pissing on the constitution" statement about Republicans wanting to end the filibuster for judges. The whining and equivocating was wonderful.

[SugarFree]

I once got him to claim to know more about libertarianism than anyone else on the board.

[capitol l]

Jeez, I had to dig through 100 comments about John Edwards to find this.

Here it goes:

As taught to the young Fred Sanforides by his mother, a Been Grossedout witch:

I must not see ugly. Ugly is the taste-killer. Ugly is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face away from your ugly. I will permit it to pass over there and away from me. And when it has gone past I will turn a squinting eye to see its path. Where the ugly has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

Gods below, you ugly.

[Pro Libertate]

See how naturally Fred and Dune flow together?

[Skid Marx]

"Ugly is the little-death that brings total obliteration."

I always thought that little-death referred to orgasms.

[Pro Libertate]

Not in this context.

[Joe Biden]

Stand up, economy! Awww, what was I thinking... Everybody stand up for the economy!

[The Angry Optimist]

The economy's in a wheelchair, bless your heart...

[R C Dean]

Could the vast resources of the Reason staff perhaps be tasked with keeping a list of all the ways that the federal government has actually interfered with the Gulf cleanup? For starters, I can think of:

(1) Blocking artificial sandbars.
(2) Requiring cleanup workers to work no more than 20 minutes per hour.
(3) Refusal to issue Jones Act waivers so foreign vessels can work.
(4) Blocking barges.

[Kant feel Pietzsche]

THIS is why the BP spill is going to be Obama's "Katrina". Dozens of inter-locking federal agencies, represented by hundreds if not thousands of "deputy whatevers", each with the power to say no, but no one with the authority to say yes. It's not a bug, it's a feature. The last federal agency that responded to crisis in a timely and coherent manner was the military in the Korean conflict. Since then, even they can't get it right.

[Robert]

Nobody has tried to explain what's in it for the Coast Guard to stop the barges. I just don't get it. What could there possibly be for anybody to gain that way?

[PIRS]

"* Nancy Pelosi withdraws DISCLOSE Act over outrage at NRA exemption."

This is good news.

I am on the Florida 9/12 Project Mailing list. I recently got an email list that had the following message in it.

****CRITICAL LEGISLATION ON THE FAST TRACK****

The House is Scheduled to Vote TODAY June 17!
Today's vote was made possible through a backroom deal between the National Rifle Association and Speaker Nancy Pelosi. NRA's Wayne LaPierre called Citizens United "a defeat for arrogant elitists." But look who's elitist now? Under the NRA deal in the House bill, the new rules won't apply to the NRA - and in exchange for the special carve-out - the NRA has agreed to throw grassroots groups like Tea Parties and 9/12ers under the bus because the NRA no longer opposes passage of D.I.S.C.L.O.S.E.

D.I.S.C.L.O.S.E. Is a partisan bill written in secret and quietly being rushed simultaneously through both the Senate and House towards speedy passage to shield dozens of vulnerable Progressive incumbents who stand to lose their seats in November.

Capital Switchboard: 202-224-3121

[LarryA]

despite the NRA exemption ? which would also cover AARP and the Humane Society

So Pelosi would be okay with AARP and HSUSA?

While the exemption was later extended to other groups, the CBC remained concerned about the bill's potential impact on the NAACP and other progressive groups.

Right on. Exempting the NRA definitely woke some people up.

Today's vote was made possible through a backroom deal between the National Rifle Association and Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

According to the NRA statement, there was no discussion of a deal, backroom or otherwise. Given Pelosi's record, that's a lot more believable than the two working together.

Under the NRA deal in the House bill, the new rules won't apply to the NRA - and in exchange for the special carve-out - the NRA has agreed to throw grassroots groups like Tea Parties and 9/12ers under the bus because the NRA no longer opposes passage of D.I.S.C.L.O.S.E.

NRA still opposes DISCLOSE, but won't comment on the "NRA exclusion" (Which, NOTE also applies to AARP and HSUSA.) Which is good tactics, because:
1) Exempting the big groups and not NAACP, LULAC, NOW, etc. is the most effective way to doom the bill in Congress. As it has done.
2) Stirring up the issue of exempting the NRA and not NAACP focuses the MSM spotlight on the previously ignored angle that "corporation" includes all the non-profit advocacy groups, and not just commercial organizations.
3) If you think Citizens United had a case, guess how SCOTUS would view a law that restricts free speech for all but a handful of corporations based mainly on membership.

Whichever Democrat thought up the exemption shot his party in the foot.

[Mike M.]

"The Coast Guard came and shut them down," Jindal said. "You got men on the barges in the oil, and they have been told by the Coast Guard, 'Cease and desist. Stop sucking up that oil.'"

That's it. Obama, you make Richard Nixon look like a saint, you lowlife piece of crap.

I beg you Congress, Joe Biden, or God help us, the military if need be, remove this evil son of a bitch from office before it's too late for our country.

[John]

Nixon was at least competent.

[Skid Marx]

^^THIS^^

[BakedPenguin]

um... price controls, wage controls.

Still, I'd probably take Nixon over Obama at this point, because he was more honest.

[John]

His economic policies were lunacy, true. But I was thinking more that Nixon was competent in running the executive branch.

[Jordan Elliot]

NIXON'S BACK!!!

[PIRS]

That is it - every bird, every turtle and every fish that dies from this point forward can be honestly blamed on him.

[wylie]

DAMN YOU, NIXOOOOOOOOOOON!

[creech]

BP should have the guts to subtract $1mm per barge turned away from the $20 billion in protection money paid to Obama.

[Tim]

Perhaps incompetence in it's purest form is indistinguishable from deliberate malfeasance.

[The Libertarian Guy]

Obama can't have results happening. It would ruin the "let's demonize all uses of fossil fuels" mantra.

[wylie]

Re: Hilldog and Arizona

I didn't know the Sec'o'State was in charge of the DoJ. Learn something new everyday.

Why is she even discussing it? Because immigration is "foreign affairs"? Seems like once they're here, it's a domestic issue, but that's just my completely uninformed and arrogant opinion.

[wylie]

Uninformed indeed: from wikipedia, "Supervises the United States immigration policy abroad."

Still that sticky bit about "abroad" though. Or is that just some misspelled sexism?

[Tim]

The Secretary was unavailable for comment because she was abroad.

[MattXIV]

Remember, this is the Obama DoJ, so whenever it does something controversial, Bush is in charge of it.

[wylie]

I thought we were blaming Nixon now?

[James Ard]

Too bad Slovenia wouldn't be a little more slovenly.

[Tim]

Slovenia is doing all right, Slavonia on the other hand...

[dbcooper]

Apparently they are sponsored by the estate of Charles Schulz.

[?]

Good grief!

[Pro Libertate]

Dammit, we need to win this game!

[?]

0-2.
Not good.

[BakedPenguin]

We're like Spain, only more pathetic, because we don't go in with such high expectations.

The US soccer team is looking like it going to fulfill as many expectatioins as the Obama presidency.

[Pro Libertate]

This is silly. We should be able to beat Slovenia. If we lose, our chances of advancing will be quite slim.

[James Ard]

I am an Albanian now. Hopefully they will play with their America love in full bloom.

[James Ard]

Albania, Algeria, what's the difference?

[BakedPenguin]

If we lose, our chances will be zero, and deservedly so.

I'm getting flashbacks to 1998. We lose to a former team from what used to be Yugoslavia, then to an Islamic country. The only difference being we tied the Western European powerhouse this time.

[?]

Back in it!

[BakedPenguin]

Good one, Landon. Now just one more. I'll be happy to eat my previous nay-saying words...

[John]

Not sure a tie does us much good, unless we destroy Algeria. Need two more goals.

[Pro Libertate]

YES! Tied it up! Let's win this thing!

[Pro Libertate]

And took the lead except that there was some phantom offsides call. Elizabeth! This is the big one! I'm coming to you, baby!

[Pro Libertate]

Ah, so we now have a controversy. The U.S. won that game. Guess we can't have that, can we?

I'm embitterfied.

[John]

Screw over the Americans is the favorite indoor outdoor sport of Eurotrash everywhere.

[Pro Libertate]

About your comment above, if we merely beat Algeria and England beats Slovenia, we're probably in. We'd have 5 points in that scenario, and Slovenia would have 4.

Since there's a possibility of an England-Slovenia tie, we should try to get a good enough goal differential to overcome Slovenia's.

[John]

The British can bail us out for once. We have saved their sorry asses enough times. They owe us one by beating Slovenia.

[Pro Libertate]

Another option, assuming we beat Algeria, is for Slovenia to beat England.

[Ted S.]

Just a victory by two goals. (Or, a victory by one goal, and the England/Slovenia game not to end in a draw, at which point total goals scored would come into play.)

[Pro Libertate]

Of course, Algeria could eff up everything by beating England and us.

I think we'll make it with a win, though it would be best to cover our goal differential.

[James Ard]

GOOOOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLL

[Pro Libertate]

Ah, Donovan returns.

[?]

Notice how short the "halftime" is in soccer? If this were the Super Bowl, Fleetwood Mac would still be performing.

[Aresen]

BTW, since the England-USA game came out as a tie, how are the US Embassy in England and the British Embassy in Washington going to settle their bet?

[CoyoteBlue]

Oral sex.

[Pro Libertate]

DVD collections.

[wylie]

Guys, its all about compromise: How about Oral Sex Compilation DVDs?

[anomdebus]

I believe they both need to mow their lawns in their wife's Sunday best dress.

[Groovus Maximus]

How about each country, in their wives' best Sunday dresses mow the other wives' cuntry lawns, and the wives can do the manscaping?

[Invisible Finger]

Sarah Palin: "If somebody's gonna smoke a joint in their house and not do anybody any harm, then perhaps there are other things our cops should be looking at."

Yeah, like jaywalking.

[Old Mexican]

Four bullets.

With two loud bangs in quick succession, Ronnie Lee Gardner's quarter century on Utah's death row ended.

Death by a firing squad - a man's execution. Death by lethal injection is for pussies.

[Jordan Elliot]

You know, if we're gonna have executions in this country, this is how they should be done.

I have to wonder though why it was not a CNS shot? In such a controlled environment, it would be the most expedient. Perhaps not wanting to scar his face.

[dbcooper]

I think that in Utah you choose your execution method, and he chose the firing squad.

[Jordan Elliot]

Yeah I read that part but (I skimmed the article) is the inmate allowed to choose where the shots will be? I was thinking it was more just a generic "Firing Squad" choice.

[Isaac Bartram]

Only inmates sentenced before 2004 get to chose. Since then it's exclusively lethal injection.

I read somewhere that the last guy who chose the firing squad did it for shock value.

Frankly, I'm not convinced that the firing squad is a particularly cruel or inhumane method of execution.

[dbcooper]

Gary Gilmore? Tracers in the dark.

[B]

Maybe they hit his spinal cord, which is part of the CNS.

[Aresen]

From the linked story about the executions:

If the man known as one of Utah's most notorious criminals was a monster, family members said, it was only as a result of his abusive upbringing. And Gardner's appellate attorneys long had argued that if his jurors had known more about his childhood, they would have sentenced him to life in prison, instead of death.

Personally, I am opposed to the death penalty, but I hate this kind of "poor guy with rotten childhood" crap.

Tens of millions of people have equally rotten childhoods without going on to commit two murders. To hell with Gardner. If there is a case that deserved the death penalty, this was one of them. I think of it more as "putting down a mad dog" than I think of it as a "death penalty".

[John]

Did you see this little nugget?

"The intervening 25 years were punctuated by attacks on other Utah State Prison inmates and a standoff in a visiting room during which he broke a glass partition, barricaded the door and had sex with his half-brother's wife as officers looked on helplessly. "

Note it says "had sex" not "rape". So apparently the chick wanted to do him. That is fucked up.

[Tulpa]

She was not unresponsive.

[Mike Laursen]

My Anthropology professor, who did his Thesis study on San Quentin, said that the prisoners were all for the death sentence -- for prisoners who kill their fellow prisoners.

[Ronnie Lee Gardner's Family]

He was a wonderful boy. Always making people laugh. No way he killed those people.

[Tulpa]

Note that Mr Welch takes the "outrage" angle to this story, complaining that an American Citizen was executed by firing squad. No mention of the fact this particular citizen was convicted of murdering people, given enough due process to choke a horse, and turned down the option of lethal injection.

I agree with Old Mexican, it's ridiculous that murderers and traitors are put to sleep like the family pet instead of being put to death like the scoundrels they are.

[SugarFree]

Feces-squirting thieves sought in Toronto

[Tim]

How much does it pay?

[Jordan Elliot]

The shit you come up with...

[Tim]

Follow my antics on FeceBook.

[Old Mexican]

Joe Biden: Recovery Act is totally working.

This from the same individual who said that "we" need to spend more in order to save "us" from bankruptcy.

[Max]

How about a Palin/Paul ticket? Shit, it couldn't fail! Ron Paul has mindless fanatics in his pocket, and Sarah Palin would draw in the mindless non-fanatics. Who else is there?

[Tim]

What America needs is another Bush Brother, JEB in '12!

[Skid Marx]

The drunken uncle that shat you out?

[Old Mexican]

Re: Max,

Out there are the single-celled brain Obama fanatics who participate in libertarian blogs just to get off...

[Stop the Madness]

And on the Democratic ticket Green/Johnson. Old Alvin and Hank would make this evening news worth watching.

[Garrett J]

Re: The Palin comment

Not sure if anyone watched the television premier of Judge Andrew Napolitano's Freedom Watch on Fox Business, but that comment sounds exactly like the one she made on the show over the weekend (when she appeared along with Ron Paul). I'm just curious if the Politico story is in reference to her comments on that show or something else entirely.

Her remarks on the Judge's show were in response to the Judge's libertarian probing questions. Not only did she make the marijuana remarks, but she also made a point of agreeing with the Judge that the government should not be able to read the e-mails of American citizens without a warrant. The Judge had asked the question just like that and only after her response did he point out that such activity was authorized by the Patriot Act. I don't recall Palin speaking out against the Patriot Act before so it was quite interesting, whether it was a libertarian step or the Judge pulling an intellectual fast one on her.

[Fact Check]

Don't be fooled by the marijuana remarks. Sarah Palin is no Ron Paul. If you believe in American Exceptionalism, then you believe that the American Empire is justified. Empire and small government don't mix. You can have one or the other.

Look at the majority of Palin's statements and you'll find that she is much closer to a neo-conservative than a Libertarian.

[John]

"Empire and small government don't mix. You can have one or the other."

If you believe the US in any way has an "empire" post 19th Century, then you really have no idea what the term means. There was a time when the US did have an "empire" in the sense that we were kicking out the Indian tribes and taking over the continent. But the frontier closed in the 1890s. We have had nothing approaching an empire since. Sorry but a piss poor collection of colonies across the Pacific don't really count.

The irony of course is that the US was much more expansionist, imperialistic and militaristic in the 19th Century than it ever was in the 20th Century. Yeah, we never had a large standing army, but that didn't stop us from taking over the entire continent. And it did all of that with a government that any "small government" supporter would love to have back.

Your whole statement is just nonsense.

[Fluffy]

We were fighting Stone Age savages most of the way, and a flat-on-its-back Mexico the rest of the time.

We probably could have defeated the Indians without ANY army, simply by putting a bounty on them. Homesteaders would have pushed the Indians out of the way fairly easily. The resources of most large wagon trains were more than capable of destroying all but the largest Indian forces.

[John]

The Indians put up a pretty good fight. They were very mobile. It wasn't until after the civil war and they sent out infantry that kept hunting them year around that we defeated them. The US pulled out most of its troops from the West during the Civil War. And the settlers generally got their asses kicked.

Regardless, the point still stands that the US was a lot more small government yet militaristic and imperialistic in the 19th Century than it is now. That whole, big government empire thing is just bunk. We could have a very small government that maintained nothing but a large Armed forces and still go out and build an empire. Or, we could have a socialist hell hole, but no Army and completely isolationist foreign policy. One does not preclude the other.

[Chinny Chin Chin]

I believe in American Exceptionalism in that our system of government was unique at its inception, and still stands as a fine model. That makes this nation exceptional.

Please note this has nothing to do with "empire".

[?]

The suspects would squirt feces on their victims, and then inform them of the mess on their clothing.

Then they pick their shitty pockets. That's not how I thought feces-squirting thievery would work. Trailing a stream of diarrhea is a great getaway strategy.

"It leads right to him!"
"Sure does!"

If you had liquid shit spraying out of you the whole time, you could take anything from anybody.

[Tim]

Be ironic if they got caught by DNA testing.

[SugarFree]

The lesson is: Never squirt your own shit on somebody. You need to find an ass-patsy.

[Tim]

You've got it all worked out, haven't you?

[wylie]

ass-patsy

*Big-Ass Grin*

[Skid Marx]

Be a great nick name for Max.

[wylie]

Nah, because then I'd associate him with happiness instead of bullshitmunching.

[Skid Marx]

You associate ass-patsy with happiness? That's mighty strange.

[wylie]

The concept of having another rectum to blame for feces-spraying-sprees warms the cockles of my heart.

[John]

Slovenia 2 US nil. My God we suck. What the hell is wrong with them.

[Tim]

They haven't gotten over the Canadians spraying them with feces.

[Episiarch]

We have zero chance of going all the way, so who gives a shit?

[John]

it is soccer. So it is hard to get too upset. But it would have been nice to win a game or two and get to the out rounds.

[John]

You have obviously never rooted for a small market baseball team or a less than tradition rich college football program.

[Tim]

I blame our lack of moral fiber.

[Aresen]

Didn't eat their Wheaties?

[Tim]

They wanted to hit the ground running.

[Tim]

The key to victory is to hold nothing back.

[Old Mexican]

Re: John,

Slovenia 2 US nil. My God we suck. What the hell is wrong with them.

The Slovenians all have played in European professional teams for years...

BTW, Mexico bested France 2-0 yesterday, sooo . . . sucks to be you! 🙂

[John]

Why would I care if Mexico beat France? I am not French.

[Old Mexican]

Re: John,

Why would I care if Mexico beat France? I am not French.

I know, but I am Mexican, and the team won, whereas yours is not - so, sucks to be you!

😉

[John]

And besides, it will take at least a hundred years for the Mexicans to live down their 02 elimination round loss to the US.

[Old Mexican]

Hey, 2:1 - not bad, your team may just catch up . . .

[John]

And even if the US does suck, it looks like my master race for-bearers in Germany are going to win the whole thing. so that is something.

[BakedPenguin]

They lost to Serbia this morning. Also, it's now 2-2.

[John]

No kidding? Bastards. They won their first match though, so they still should get through.

[BakedPenguin]

Ghana will be a tough match. Still, I think all they'll need is a tie.

[Ted S.]

If Ghana and Serbia both defeat Australia, a draw for Germany against Ghana does no good. Germany would wind up in third place with 4 points.

[BakedPenguin]

Ah, good point.

[BakedPenguin]

No, it sucks to be me. John isn't Frnch, he just likes the women.

[P Brooks]

"While we aren't there yet, we will be soon. Reforming the way Washington works and taking on corporate greed is never easy."

The finest minds in the country are at work on this.

[Tim]

The finest minds in the country are here making Poo jokes.

[wylie]

Fight Corporatist Ignorance, or Make Poo Jokes....Hmmm, that's a tough one.

I'm gonna have to go with #2

[Tim]

At least 100 years from now when these files are parsed by wretched grad students seeking doctorates in philosophy, history etc, they will get a laugh.

[Fist of Etiquette]

"Crude-sucking barges" blocked from cleaning oil spill.

"Texas Tea" bagging boats bobbing helplessly at docks.

[Fist of Etiquette]

"Oil-slurping ships" tethered passively to piers.

[Fist of Etiquette]

"Slick-licking vessels" submitting to dominance, "not permitted release" from harbor.

[Fist of Etiquette]

My talents are wasted on you people.

[P Brooks]

A A Milne hates it when you make Pooh jokes. Ya buncha irreverent hedonistic nihilists. No wonder you don't have any friends.

[John]

Once a dick always a dick apparently

Bob Etheridge's History of Violence [John Hood]

I've talked to dozens of politicians, reporters, and others here in North Carolina who insist that the Bob Etheridge they saw in the "Who Are You?" video earlier this week bears no relationship to the man they've known for decades as a county commissioner, state legislator, state school superintendent, and congressman. In fact, I'm one of those people who found Etheridge's behavior surprising, given my own experiences with him over two decades.

It turns out, however, that we may not have really known the man at all. From the Southern Pines (N.C.) Pilot comes an account of a previous incident:

Brandon Leslie, who moved away seven years ago and is now an attorney in Oxford, Miss., said he had an encounter with the now seven-term Democratic congressman from Lillington almost 14 years ago.

In the fall of 1996, when Leslie was a senior at Pinecrest High School, he said he met Etheridge at a Pinecrest football game. Etheridge?then the state superintendent of public instruction?was challenging incumbent Republican David Funderburk for his congressional seat. At the time, Moore County was part of the 2nd District, which Etheridge now represents.

Leslie said he introduced himself to Etheridge and asked him about his stance on a particular education program. He said Etheridge didn't answer his question, so he pressed him two more times.

"And that's when he grabbed me by the shoulders, he shook me, and I'll never forget it, he said, 'Son, you need to learn to respect your elders,'" he said by phone on Wednesday. "I was just so taken aback, I think my jaw just dropped, and he walked off."

http://corner.nationalreview.c.....JiOWU0OTA=

[The Angry Optimist]

He was just defending his right to privacy, John.

[John]

Yes, because asking someone a question is just like taking a picture up their skirt. Seriously, do you hang out in public bathrooms or something? Why are peeping Tom's such a cause so near and dear to your heart?

[The Angry Optimist]

I think what set me off was your soccer-mom-esque hyperventilating combined with your lawℴ posturing - you're like a mini Joe Lieberman.

[John]

We can't hang out in high school parking lots hoping to get good pictures up the girls' skirts. The dark night of fascism has descended on America.

[The Angry Optimist]

Up next: John sees bathtub pics on Facebook from a proud mom, calls the FBI.

"Oh it's a lascivous display of naked underage genitals! Throw the book at 'em!"

[John]

That is not the same and you know it. You honestly think it should be legal to sneak around and take pictures up women's skirts without their and publish them on the internet? Yes or no. Because that is what we are talking about. We are not talking about baby bathtub pictures. So stop wasting your time and at least address the proper issue.

[The Angry Optimist]

Ah ah, that is not the issue that I originally dinged you up about, and you know it. You said 'throw the book at him', which entails fifteen years for "child porn" (calling upskirt shots "porn" is nigh-on-fucking-hysterical). That's what we argued about.

And yes, we are talking about baby bathtub pics, because "the law is the law", John.

I found it doubly-delicious that you, ardent conservative you allegedly are, were openly asking for a federal prosecution for what should be a state crime, even though you usually acknowledge that Fed involvement in traditional state areas of control (i.e. criminal justice for cimes that do not cross state lines) is overreaching bullshit.

So, John, which of these typically Progressive tenents do you support?

1. Wildly disproportionate sentences for crimes with no real vicitims
2. federal supplanting of traditional state powers
3. Hypernannyism about "TEH CHILDREN"

Or is it all three?

[John]

So you think the women who has a picture looking up her skirt published to millions without her consent is "no real victim"? Yeah that makes sense. There really was a victim in the Perez Hilton case. The asshole who publishes such a picture is as bad as the person who takes it.

That case is totally different than the ones you are raving about. Basically you shot your mouth off without thinking it through and are too small of a person to admit your mistake. We are not talking about innocent pictures of babies. We are talking about a picture taken of an underage girl without her consent and published to millions. If you can't understand the harm in that, you are either stupid or just being disingenuous. Since you are not normally stupid, it is pretty obvious it is the latter.

[The Angry Optimist]

You're the one who said "the law is the law", John. It's the principle we're talking about here.

Thought experiment: what if she was walking naked down the street and people took pictures? Would you back a prosecution then?

Note too that the only response from the alleged "victim" is stating that the "perp" was an idiot for publishing the pics, not that she felt victimized or exploited. So, yes, like I said, no real victim.

[Fluffy]

I think you're overstating the case here a bit, if you're talking about the Miley Cyrus thing.

I haven't seen the photo, but as far as I am aware she was being photographed getting out of a vehicle [when literally hundreds of photos are taken in a few moments] and one of those photos happened to find her exposed, because her skirt was so short and she wasn't wearing any underwear.

That's pretty far from hanging out under the bleachers at a football game, or drilling a hole into the girls' showers at the high school, or stalking someone in their home at night.

If people are taking Cyrus' picture at the beach [which her publicists would ordinarily ENCOURAGE] and while she's being photographed her top falls off, is everyone there a pedophile child pornographer?

In any event, let's be real here. Cyrus wanted this to happen. There's no way this was an "accident". For months now she has been engaged in a deliberate marketing campaign where she's dialing up the raunch of her image step by step to escape from her Disney image. I really don't believe this isn't just one more part of that.

[John]

Perhaps so. But she is still 17. And to my knowledge she never consented to the pics. If you can show me that she deliberately posed for them, then that is a different story.

[prolefeed]

Perhaps so. But she is still 17. And to my knowledge she never consented to the pics.

She knows she is followed around by paparazzi all the time, and chose to slide out of a car in their presence in a short skirt and no underwear?

That is SO not the same as some perv snapping upskirt pics of someone with a reasonable expectation of privacy.

[WTF]

How proud her daddy must be. Billy Ray must be getting an achy breaky heart over how his little angel has grown up - from Hannah Montana to Britney Spears to Paris Hilton. Too bad that the kid feels the only way she can maintain her stardom and keep getting attention from fans is to get sluttier and sluttier.

[alan]

So you think the women who has a picture looking up her skirt published to millions without her consent is "no real victim"?

She left her house with out panties, so yes, she gave her consent to the possibility she would be flashing a camera.

[alan]

Have to agree with Fluffy. It's okay, even admirable of you, that you hate that Frankenstein headed twit Perez Hilton, John, but there is no reason to distort the law. There has to be a 'lewdness' aspect for that to apply, and a functional shift in a persons legs to get out of a car in a public space does not meet that definition.

I haven't seen the snap shot, but for my money, Emma Watson's eighteenth birthday party gift to the world was the best. Tasteful black panties, see through in the front, and a nicely shaped bush. Classy gal!

[Joe M]

You get the government you deserve:

Arizona immigration law supported by majority in poll

[PIRS]

To be honest, I am neutral on this issue. For two reasons:

1. It merely enforces already existing federal law.

and

2. While I, personally, am opposed to the Federal Law I can understand the frustration some who have to foot the bill for government school systems and emergency room visits have. If you want to get more people to support free and open borders privitize (or marketize if you prefer) those issues so tax dollars to not support them and you will see far more people support the idea of open borders.

[?]

World Cup soccer will never be able to compete for the hearts and minds of NFL fans until they start taking TV timeouts for every change of possession. What's with all this constant action? I barely have time to satiate my addiction and get a salty, decadent snack.

[brotherben]

Ugggggh. Salt Bad!

[?]

But I'm addicted! Just like oil!

[Aresen]

Personally, I need the time to get another bowl of ice cream and piece of cake.

Or another drink.

[Tulpa]

There's constant action at a kiddie playground on Memorial Day, but you don't sit and watch that for 90 minutes, do you?

[The Angry Optimist]

Genius is so few words.

Seriously, it's 2010, things are being done with technology like we have never seen, and the whole world is enraptured by a game that makes golf look exciting.

Soccer in one act:

Oh! Ooohhh!....Awww, just missed
Oh! Ooohhh!....Awww, just missed
Oh! Ooohhh!....Awww, just missed
Oh! Ooohhh!....Awww, just missed
Oh! Ooohhh!....Awww, just missed
ONE FRIEND TO ANOTHER: Well, 1-0, so it was a good game.

[brotherben]

Hockey looks like that to me. It's just soccer on ice.

[The Angry Optimist]

At least you can wall-check and out-and-out fight in hockey. The exaggerated acting on the soccer field when it comes to "hits" makes "Days of Our Lives" look like Les Miserables.

[Brett L]

Like there's any fighting in the NHL anymore.

[Former Hockey Fan]

It is not like it use to be by a long shot. Most players still have uninterrupted rows of teeth.

[Fluffy]

Yeah, but there IS physical contact.

Soccer can be 1-0 all it wants - if they let the players clothesline each other, it would be pretty much action-packed.

[Robert]

I see a lot of Episiarch's sentiment, which may however have been sarcastic, expressed by lots of people regarding lots of sports, at least in the USA, and especially in NYC. I'm just the opposite. Plus, I tend to follow teams who get much less att'n than small market baseball or less than tradition rich college football teams get. It's all about the game -- or the tiny portions of the game, bit by bit.

[Robert]

There's constant action at a kiddie playground on Memorial Day, but you don't sit and watch that for 90 minutes, do you?

Damn right I do, or would. I've even coached children's football. And I don't have any children of my own.

OPC are fascinating & adorable, and you can't beat the price. It was very interesting watching the girls down the block grow up playing outside, and how their att'n span at their own games changed from summer to summer.

[Dateline NBC]

Robert, don't leave home, OK? We're sending someone for you.

[Aresen]

I got a great kick out of my niece and nephew when they were growing up.

I could take them to a violent movie, buy them sugary treats, get them flying higher than kites.

Then take them home and give them back to their parents.

(Sneakiest revenge ever for a little brother on a big brother.)

[?]

In that case the hearts and minds of NFL fans can suck it. No sense ruining the game for them.

[Soccor Fans]

Kick a ball between two posts for an hour. We like our game real simple. Baseball, popular in Asia and the two Americas, but too complicated! Football, different offense and defense teams, how are you suppose to keep up with that?

[?]

GOOOOOAAAAAALLLLLL!

[John]

Thank God.

[BakedPenguin]

Ah, fuck, we almost went ahead!

[SugarFree]

Fucking bullshit. String that umpire up from a lamppost.

[BakedPenguin]

He's the same asshole who apparently can't see pushing when it's done by eastern Europeans...

[?]

We hates it!

[BakedPenguin]

They had to pull Altidore away from the ref after the game. I don't blame him.

Ah, well, if England can beat Slovenia, and we can beat Algeria by two goals, we can still make it through.

[Aresen]

And in the 89th minute of the US-Algeria game, with the US ahead by three goals, Gabriel's Trumpet sounds, the Rapture occurs and the Tribulations begin.

[BakedPenguin]

Aresen, it's hardly like that's a hell-freezing over scenario. We should have scored three goals (and a win) against Slovenia, but it's hard to beat the refs.

[libertytexan]

Actually if England beats Slovenia and we beat Algeria by any amount we make it through.

[libertytexan]

We can also make it through if they tie with the three way tie broken by goal difference.

[Ted S.]

Or if Slovenia beats England and the US beat Algeria.

[Kant feel Pietzsche]

World Cup referees are just like the UN. They will hose us every chance they get.

[The Oracle of Delphi]

Tony|4.28.09 @ 2:32PM|#

People who use the term "RINO" are the cause of the Republican party's demise. Thousands of moderate Republicans in Pennsylvania switched parties to take part in the Democratic primary there and haven't looked back. This is going on all over the country--the most closed-minded and demanding demographic in the country has forced anyone who doesn't check all the conservative boxes out of power.

Senator Specter's prime motivation was obviously self preservation. He'd never win a primary in the Republican party now that the party has expunged all moderates, but that says as much about the party as it does Specter. A Democrat is going to be elected in 2010 whether it's Specter or someone else. The Republican party is hemorrhaging power and will continue to do so for as long as people still remember the Bush administration.

Valuing two-party rule is fine (I think it's deeply misguided and belied by history), but you can hardly blame the Democrats for there not being two viable parties anymore.

I wish there were two voices in politics. I wish there were 15. But there aren't. There's one party interested in governing and one party completely overtaken by radicals. Even the K-Street Project guys were more reasonable than the wackos left in the party, but they're mostly gone. It was wrong to say "pox on both houses" back then because one party was way way more entrenched in corruption and corporate welfare. It's even sillier now.

[Michael Ejercito]

Any reason you reposted Chony's post?

[Bobby]

He has been kicking the Democratz Penultimate Guardians Of All That Is Good meme around in several post recently as if he is gearing up to bombard us with DNC materials for the campaign season. Just letting him know it is not going to fly.

[Tony]

I've been saying nothing but what I said in that post from April of last year. What's your point?

[alan]

If Tony was a DNC plant wouldn't his most logical moves be to pat us on the head when we get things 'half right', and then proceed with a liberaltarian argument instead of a hostile one?

[Bobby]

Ah, this isn't the

http://reason.com/blog/2010/06.....nt_1760701

thread just under this link. Meant to post at the end of it.

Take a lookie, you'll see what I mean.

[P Brooks]

We should have scored three goals (and a win) against Slovenia, but it's hard to beat the refs.

*dabs tear*

[WTF]

Penn Gillette makes some sense.

Whither the preview button?

[alan]

There is a whole lot of stupid in the newspapers all across the globe.

A round up of opinion from several German newspapers:

http://www.spiegel.de/internat.....79,00.html

There is a lot of ignorance on display across the board but for historical inaccuracy, and redefining 'sensibility' to mean its opposite, this one takes a prize.

"International markets have started to take environmental problems seriously. BP stock has fallen by almost 50 percent since the start of the oil catastrophe. Ratings agencies have downgraded its creditworthiness to near-junk status. And banks have stopped sealing long-term contracts with BP."

"This situation is new. When oil companies in the past soiled the Niger Delta or the Amazon, markets tended to reward them -- because corporations that skimped on security also increased their profits, to the detriment of the environment and the public interest. Now the costs of environmental damage have started to weigh on the balance sheet, with consequences extending to the possible bankruptcy of a multinational."

"This new environmental sensibility has been possible not through a sudden display of reason on the markets, but through political decision-making. President Barack Obama made it clear (in early June) that BP won't be exempt from criminal investigation. He's also maintained a moratorium on new oil exploration on the deep-ocean floor, and looks determined to end corruption in federal oil agencies."

It has been said, 'those who can't, teach'. Add to that, 'those who edit at newspapers never even try.'

[Mike Laursen]

"Crude-sucking barges" blocked from cleaning oil spill.

No Kevin Costner saves the Gulf link? As much as I hate to do it, I have to give props to Costner and Sarah Palin today.

[?]

Gulf Of Dreams?

http://washingtonindependent.c.....in-costner

[Jim Treacher]

Weedbagger?