The United States Postal Service has issued a new stamp featuring the Statue of Liberty. Only the statue it features is not the one in the harbor, but the replica at the New York-New York casino in Las Vegas.
You might think that the post office would have just gone with the original, the one off the tip of Lower Manhattan that for 125 years has welcomed millions of New York's huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Instead, they accidentally used the 14-year-old statue that presides over thousands of weary gamblers a week.
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Is there any evidence of an Obama administration crackdown? I'm a gambler who may be screwed out of a thousand bucks I had left on PokerStars, so I'm just as cranky as anybody. But from what I've read, the feds has the sites dead to rights on money laundering. Expecting them not to prosecute when they've been essentially handed the case on a platter is asking too much.
You don't mean "doubling down". Doubling down is a very sane bet at the blackjack table when you have the right cards against the dealer's. What most people mean when they use that phrase is "increasing your bet when you're losing," which is NOT doubling down - it's the Martingale betting system if anything. Doubling down when you're losing is a totally reasonable bet if the circumstances are right.
You and I are the ones haunting the nets about this widespread mistake which seems to have entered the language over the past decade, replacing the previous, and appropriate, "double up". I attribute it to the increased popularity of casino blackjack, causing people to hear the phrase without knowing what it meant. I can't remember what the result was of a Google engrams comparison of the trends in the phrases, but I think it confirmed my observ'n.
Another aspect of this mistake is the inappropriateness of the metaphor I now see all over the place. The player who doubles down is doubling the stake in return for a promise not to take more than one more card. In most situations where the metaphor is used, the one said to be doubling down gives no indication of stopping there. This would not be a problem if the more appropriate phrase, "double up", were used.
It is possible that the "down" has gotten popular in metaphor by association with "bear down" and in some cases "crack down".
To quote Barry Goldwater's successor, this isn't doubling down, this is all in.
Of course, the metaphor is valid if you're talking about doubling down when you've got garbage cards, and our current ways of choosing government spending is a 2, 4, 6, and 9 of different suits.
Hey, the guy already made two proposals that are infinitely better than any mayor from Team Blue or Team Red has made.
Stopping the drug war and prostitution prosecution would at least open peoples eyes. Wonder what the reaction would be after a couple of years when crime is down, population is rebounding and tax receipts are growing?
I bet 99.99% of the people who saw this stamp never would have known this if not for the media coverage. The story is a big "so what?!?" and I'm a stamp collector.
Does Jesse Walker actually get paid for this for posting shit like this? Get a real job in the private sector--something that doesn't run on donations from dimwits-- you tiresome righ-wing asshole.
Little Maxie is well within his capabilities to bite the pillow while banging (heh.....banging) away at the laptop keeping us all entertained....well maybe not as entertained as the guy behind him doing the driving!
Speaking of our slow descent into barbarism, I was reading where Scott Ritter of UN inspections in Iraq fame was convicted last week of chatting up an undercover detective pretending to be a 14 year old. Now understand, he never tried to meet said 14 year old. And he said on the stand that he assumed the person on the other end of the conversation was an adult pretending to be a 14 year old. But they still convicted him.
Can someone explain that to me? I could see if he had tried to meet up with the 14 year old. That would show he really thought the person on the other end was a minor and intended to act on it. But the only evidence in the case was that he jerked off to their conversation. There was not even any camera or mic involved. It was just an internet conversation. And there was no minor involved. It would also be different if he really were talking to a 14 year old and her father found it. Then I could see a conviction. But here we have no attempt to act and no minor. How the fuck is that a crime? People roll play all sorts of wierd shit on the internet. There is no way that two consenting adults are not allowed to role play as children. And if that is legal, it is impossible to prove, absent some kind of concrete act on Ritter's part, that he didn't think it was an adult on the other end. That is by definition reasonable doubt. What the fuck is wrong with people?
Good to know. The next time I cruise the web, looking for under aged girls, I'm going to pretend to be a 14 year old. If the state goes for a conviction, they're going to have to go after the other fake 14 year old too.
He didn't jerk off to their conversation. In reply to the message that the person at the other end was 15 YO, he sent a picture of himself masturbating, like a sarcastic emoticon. Like the masturbating bear on O'Brien.
Whether I think it should be a crime or not is irrelevant. The point is that I'm intelligent enough not to go into chat rooms and put myself in a situation that could get me arrested, especially on charges for the one bit of human sexual activity that both liberals and conservatives tend to frown on.
Considering that it was an adults-only chat room, and that he'd been set up like this before (charges dropped), yes, I would.
Well, a person with brains would have enough common sense not to take that chance, but maybe that's asking too much of today's citizens.
So, I see other's ref'd the third shot at getting Ritter - that means this latest episode does NOT involve actually showing up at a Burger King for a real-life, non-cyber meeting with an "internet 14 year old"? Like one of the times he was arrested for this stuff?
IF he did that before, then he should have been punished. And I am no fan of Ritter. But the fact remains I don't see how it can be a crime to talk dirty to an adult pretending to be a 14 year old. There is no sexual act and no child. Where is the crime?
"Emily" told Ritter she was a 15-year-old girl from the Poconos, at which point Ritter asked for a picture other than the one "Emily" had posted on her account. Ritter then sent her a link to his Web camera and began to masturbate on camera.
A little more than just saying he was fapping, but shouldn't be a crime, because no minor was exposed to the video of fappage, only a consenting adult intent on entrapment.
The post office in my town opens at 8:30AM on weekday mornings. I stop by on my way to work to pick up my mail from my PO box. It's comical to see everyone showing up on their way to work expecting to get an annoying errand out of the way around 8:15, and cursing at the door and waiting in line. Great customer-focused business! Meanwhile, Fedex and UPS open at 7AM so you can get stuff done.
"Hey, yeah! Maybe it's still there, underground in the ruins of Old New York, helping some ant defeat another ant, or helping some piece of dirt turn its luck around."
To be fair, they probably used the fake statue because the real one is so tarnished and weathered and doesn't look as good against the pretty blue sky.
What you expect NY to spend money on lame shit like upkeep of monuments? They didn't bilk the taxpayers of the day so that the taxpayers of today would have to to get bilked for upkeep. That's not what bilking is for, goddamit!
Honestly, it's a pretty dastardly scheme by the French. Stick us with a huge publicworks project we didn't ask for, but that people will certainly vote for the upkeep of. Cheese-swilling Liver Monkeys!
I wonder if the gurus of Reason would ever care to regale us with tales of fuckups by private cops or the scams of sleazballs marketing snake oil. Probably not.
Success in the market usually means making a profit by selling something people want to buy, not realying on domations from dimwits to produce garbage that nobody but a small number of zealots would ever pay for, idiot.
FTA: Orrin Hatch (Statist-UT) proves he's a total fucking asshole. "Rather than initiate a single new case since President Obama took office, however, the only development in this area has been the dismantling of the task force. As the toxic waste of obscenity continues to spread and harm everyone it touches, it appears the Obama administration is giving up without a fight."
Comical, especially with respect to the administration's crackdown on gambling.
the administration's crackdown on gambling that doesn't make sufficient campaign contributions.
Wonder how much MGM gave the USPS to have (part of) their casino appear on a stamp...
Is there any evidence of an Obama administration crackdown? I'm a gambler who may be screwed out of a thousand bucks I had left on PokerStars, so I'm just as cranky as anybody. But from what I've read, the feds has the sites dead to rights on money laundering. Expecting them not to prosecute when they've been essentially handed the case on a platter is asking too much.
the DOJ logo on your PokerStars site. Silver platter or not.
Hilarious!
Upon being told of this, my wife said, "That's tacky. God, this is the kind of thing that makes us look stupid."
I can't improve on that, so I won't even try.
How dare that tax-thieving, classless organization steal our icon?
I think this particular handle suits you best, rectal. Well, other than "Inbred retard rectal". Or "abject moron".
Epi, whatever turns you on
Why can't he quit you?
I suspect your wife looks pretty stupid even without this.
Eeeeeeeeedddddddddward...come loofah my strreeeeeeettttchhhhh marks.
Brick, I feel like a cat, with a hot tin loofah!
With my pedant's hat on:
You don't mean "doubling down". Doubling down is a very sane bet at the blackjack table when you have the right cards against the dealer's. What most people mean when they use that phrase is "increasing your bet when you're losing," which is NOT doubling down - it's the Martingale betting system if anything. Doubling down when you're losing is a totally reasonable bet if the circumstances are right.
Pedant's hat off.
You must be great at parties. Everyone loves a pedant.
Pedantphiles.
I'm a pedant, and I love myself. 🙂
You and I are the ones haunting the nets about this widespread mistake which seems to have entered the language over the past decade, replacing the previous, and appropriate, "double up". I attribute it to the increased popularity of casino blackjack, causing people to hear the phrase without knowing what it meant. I can't remember what the result was of a Google engrams comparison of the trends in the phrases, but I think it confirmed my observ'n.
Another aspect of this mistake is the inappropriateness of the metaphor I now see all over the place. The player who doubles down is doubling the stake in return for a promise not to take more than one more card. In most situations where the metaphor is used, the one said to be doubling down gives no indication of stopping there. This would not be a problem if the more appropriate phrase, "double up", were used.
It is possible that the "down" has gotten popular in metaphor by association with "bear down" and in some cases "crack down".
As long as we're using blackjack analogies, our government sure loves to split fives and keep those eights intact.
To quote Barry Goldwater's successor, this isn't doubling down, this is all in.
Of course, the metaphor is valid if you're talking about doubling down when you've got garbage cards, and our current ways of choosing government spending is a 2, 4, 6, and 9 of different suits.
Shit, we're talking about blackjack, not poker, and I just gave an example that adds to 21. Substitute a bad blackjack sequence please.
the statue it features is not the one in the harbor
Sacr? bleu!
OK, fuck the post office and the dumbshits i charge of it.
Now that I got that out of the way...there's finally a Team Blue guy out there worth voting for.
Holy shit. I can't wait to see how this one plays out in the media. The article needs to be reprinted in every major paper in the country.
Breathe slowly baby 😉
Drudge already ran it
So it is virtually guaranteed to be ignored by the NYT, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, The LA times, and the Washington Post.
Worth voting for? Obviously, you haven't had more than incidental exposure to Fieger.
Hey, the guy already made two proposals that are infinitely better than any mayor from Team Blue or Team Red has made.
Stopping the drug war and prostitution prosecution would at least open peoples eyes. Wonder what the reaction would be after a couple of years when crime is down, population is rebounding and tax receipts are growing?
I bet 99.99% of the people who saw this stamp never would have known this if not for the media coverage. The story is a big "so what?!?" and I'm a stamp collector.
welfare stamps don't make you a collector baby
Why not honor a simulated replica of liberty ... isn't that what we've got in this country?
^FTW
Yo mean to say that government is paying homage to an artificial monument that watches over gamblers? Sounds about right to me.
How fucking stupid of a stamp designer do you have to be to fuck this up?
How fucking stupid of a stamp designer do you have to be to fuck this up?
Easy, simply make the stamp designer a committee.
Stupid and government worker go hand in hand.
What designer? They just payed a stock photo company for an image. The stamp text didn't even require any thought probably.
Does Jesse Walker actually get paid for this for posting shit like this? Get a real job in the private sector--something that doesn't run on donations from dimwits-- you tiresome righ-wing asshole.
Maxie Hates List entries:
72- Jesse
726- dimwits
77- real jobs
88- private sector
98- right-wing assholes
21- getting paid
You misspelled righ-wing assholes.
Does Jesse Walker actually get paid for this for posting shit like this?
No, it's the weekend. I do it for love.
On weekdays it's called fucking the dog.
On weekends, fucking the dog is called me!
Sounds like a Blondie song.
A rare live performance where Debbie Harry is neither too high nor lip-synching. Profound nuclear power/weapons comment at 5:30 in. Or not...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....re=related
Arf. Yip. Snap. Nip.
Does Max actually have a side job as a gay prostitute?
Starchild has that beat covered.
ask epi
Side Job?!?
Little Maxie is well within his capabilities to bite the pillow while banging (heh.....banging) away at the laptop keeping us all entertained....well maybe not as entertained as the guy behind him doing the driving!
Speaking of our slow descent into barbarism, I was reading where Scott Ritter of UN inspections in Iraq fame was convicted last week of chatting up an undercover detective pretending to be a 14 year old. Now understand, he never tried to meet said 14 year old. And he said on the stand that he assumed the person on the other end of the conversation was an adult pretending to be a 14 year old. But they still convicted him.
Can someone explain that to me? I could see if he had tried to meet up with the 14 year old. That would show he really thought the person on the other end was a minor and intended to act on it. But the only evidence in the case was that he jerked off to their conversation. There was not even any camera or mic involved. It was just an internet conversation. And there was no minor involved. It would also be different if he really were talking to a 14 year old and her father found it. Then I could see a conviction. But here we have no attempt to act and no minor. How the fuck is that a crime? People roll play all sorts of wierd shit on the internet. There is no way that two consenting adults are not allowed to role play as children. And if that is legal, it is impossible to prove, absent some kind of concrete act on Ritter's part, that he didn't think it was an adult on the other end. That is by definition reasonable doubt. What the fuck is wrong with people?
Good to know. The next time I cruise the web, looking for under aged girls, I'm going to pretend to be a 14 year old. If the state goes for a conviction, they're going to have to go after the other fake 14 year old too.
lol
Other defenses
I masturbate like a 14 year old
I think like a 14 year old
I screw like a 14 year old
Scottie loved me too, once upon a time.
What law was said to have been broken?
I just Googled it, and get this: it was said to have been an adults-only chat room.
This has got to have something to do with his job. Apparently it was the 3rd attempt to set him up this way.
apparently, third time's a crime...
He didn't jerk off to their conversation. In reply to the message that the person at the other end was 15 YO, he sent a picture of himself masturbating, like a sarcastic emoticon. Like the masturbating bear on O'Brien.
I only send out masturbation pics ironically!
And he said on the stand that he assumed the person on the other end of the conversation was an adult pretending to be a 14 year old.
:O LOL
Seriously, would anyone who isn't a complete moron actually buy this?
People role play on the internet all of the time. Is it your opinion that this should be a crime?
Whether I think it should be a crime or not is irrelevant. The point is that I'm intelligent enough not to go into chat rooms and put myself in a situation that could get me arrested, especially on charges for the one bit of human sexual activity that both liberals and conservatives tend to frown on.
Considering that it was an adults-only chat room, and that he'd been set up like this before (charges dropped), yes, I would.
Well, a person with brains would have enough common sense not to take that chance, but maybe that's asking too much of today's citizens.
Considering that it was an adults-only chat room, and that he'd been set up like this before (charges dropped), yes, I would.
You think it's just a coincidence that this happens to Scott Ritter? They have a long memory.
So, I see other's ref'd the third shot at getting Ritter - that means this latest episode does NOT involve actually showing up at a Burger King for a real-life, non-cyber meeting with an "internet 14 year old"? Like one of the times he was arrested for this stuff?
IF he did that before, then he should have been punished. And I am no fan of Ritter. But the fact remains I don't see how it can be a crime to talk dirty to an adult pretending to be a 14 year old. There is no sexual act and no child. Where is the crime?
Same as offering $10000 for the services of an undercover cop posing as a hit man. It's an attempt to commit a crime.
He was aquitted of the criminal attenpt. He never tried to meet her. Try again.
from: http://www.poconorecord.com/ap.....WS/1140319
A little more than just saying he was fapping, but shouldn't be a crime, because no minor was exposed to the video of fappage, only a consenting adult intent on entrapment.
An adult pretending to be a 14 year old? Sounds like the United States congress.
Too much booze, you got it backwards.
A 14 year old pretending to be an adult? Sounds like the United States congress.
ftfy.
The post office in my town opens at 8:30AM on weekday mornings. I stop by on my way to work to pick up my mail from my PO box. It's comical to see everyone showing up on their way to work expecting to get an annoying errand out of the way around 8:15, and cursing at the door and waiting in line. Great customer-focused business! Meanwhile, Fedex and UPS open at 7AM so you can get stuff done.
Having a box at the UPS Store is vastly preferable to having one at the post office. Haven't had a government PO Box in over a decade.
It took awhile to figure out but I get it now. It's that 'come hither' look that Lady Liberty is casting in the Vegas version that gives it away.
Ah New York, the city that inspired a casino in Las Vegas.
"Hey, yeah! Maybe it's still there, underground in the ruins of Old New York, helping some ant defeat another ant, or helping some piece of dirt turn its luck around."
or helping some piece of dirt turn its luck around.
Fry, there's no helping "rather".
Dirt doesn't need luck.
Does this somehow explain hippies?
To be fair, they probably used the fake statue because the real one is so tarnished and weathered and doesn't look as good against the pretty blue sky.
What you expect NY to spend money on lame shit like upkeep of monuments? They didn't bilk the taxpayers of the day so that the taxpayers of today would have to to get bilked for upkeep. That's not what bilking is for, goddamit!
Honestly, it's a pretty dastardly scheme by the French. Stick us with a huge publicworks project we didn't ask for, but that people will certainly vote for the upkeep of. Cheese-swilling Liver Monkeys!
I wonder if the gurus of Reason would ever care to regale us with tales of fuckups by private cops or the scams of sleazballs marketing snake oil. Probably not.
Fortunately, Max, we have your goon musings on livejournal and your OKCupid profile to witness your fuckups in real time.
ssshhh! You're stealing the content of my next dictatorial campaign speech.
Here, have one, you're obviously upset.
The next time the unamerican Kenyan dictator Hitler is mean to you, I'll be here.
Like the New York Times, perhaps - the source of the evul "righ-wing" story.
Nobody sends donations to the NY Times. It relies entirely on the market.
Tell me, then, why the fuck that shit rag hasn't yet gone under?
In what way are donations not part of the market?
Success in the market usually means making a profit by selling something people want to buy, not realying on domations from dimwits to produce garbage that nobody but a small number of zealots would ever pay for, idiot.
This might end up being important.
I hope the Supremes don't fuck this one up. If they do, kiss your 4th Amendment rights goodbye.
The court said then that people on public roads have no reasonable expectation of privacy.
A. Of course, cops are not people.
B. It's not like we're cutting your brakelines or anything.
Obama makes first good decision since taking office. Republicans threaten to fuck it up.
Look for Bams to get all "hard on porn" in the run-up to 2012.
FTA: Orrin Hatch (Statist-UT) proves he's a total fucking asshole. "Rather than initiate a single new case since President Obama took office, however, the only development in this area has been the dismantling of the task force. As the toxic waste of obscenity continues to spread and harm everyone it touches, it appears the Obama administration is giving up without a fight."
OH NOES!!
The government is going to LEAVE PEOPLE THE FUCK ALONE in one small aspect of their private lives. How the fuck can we live with ourselves?
Exactly. Why are the feds involved in porn prosecutions in the first place?
We know more than ever how illegal adult obscenity contributes to violence against women, addiction, harm to children, and sex trafficking.
Citations needed.
He's from the government. We don't need no stinking proof.
Damn straight!
I have no joke here, I just like saying "USA: FIRST-CLASS FOREVER"
Any chance of this stamp being withdrawn and becoming a valuable misprint like the Inverted_Jenny?
100 in existence (estimated) VS. millions(?) of Forever stamps sold
millions? Try $3 Billion worth- 6-7 billion stamps in print.
I think the statute in Vegas has more to do with liberty than the one in new york. So I am OK with this.
Jesse Walker is a fucking welfare case.
Get your high heels on and get back out on hooker row.
It must be hard having no non-imaginary friends.
It's the Post Office, we're lucky they didn't accidentally include this image of a spiked-hat torch-wielder.
Actually, no we're not lucky. That would have been a kick-ass stamp.
And far more indicative of our government than a statue representing Liberty.