A.M. Links: Does Obama Want To Win?, Venezuelans Consider Emigration, Ex-Feds Back Legal Dope

• After a couple of … uninspired performances, backers of President Obama openly wonder if he wants to be re-elected. The latest poll has Romney up by five points.

• The White House dipped its toes into the privatization waters — with responses to FOIA requests. Yes, they outsourced obstructionism.
• Greece is … still circling the drain. The country's exit from the euro is still seen as likely.
• Hugo Chavez's re-election has many Venezuelans actively contemplating the attractions of living elsewhere.
• Rand Paul took a piece out of his own party's presidential candidate for his saber-rattling, and called for a less-interventionist foreign policy.
• A marijuana legalization initiative on the Washington ballot gained the backing of former U.S. attorneys and FBI officials.
• U.S. manufacturing is floundering in a sea of federal regulations as a new rule is issued every two hours.

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Comments

[Lord Humungus]

Rove: The Dividends of Romney's Debate Victory
More Republicans than Democrats are registering and voting early in several battleground states.
http://online.wsj.com/article/.....on_LEADTop

[Ted S.]

The more neutral version of the story I read (RCP) suggests that Republicans are doing better in some swing states, while Democrats are doing better than other swing states.

Way to spin it Rove.

[Night Elf Mohawk]

Doesn't RCP's map show Obama shedding electoral votes in swing states? The version I see certainly does.

[Ted S.]

I was talking about early voting numbers (and absentee ballot numbers). There was an article on RCP about those running in favor of TEAM RED in some battleground states, and in favor of TEAM BLUE in others.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Hugo Chavez's re-election has many Venezuelans actively contemplating the attractions of living elsewhere.

THERE'S NO PLACE LEFT.

[Whiterun Guard]

They're all moving into Sean Penn's neighborhood.

[wareagle]

maybe George Lucas can turn the land he wanted to use for studio expansion into refugee housing. The folks in the Bay Area love that sort of thing, don't they?

[0x90]

A guy I know, from Caracas, moved to Turku, a few years ago.

[Bee Tagger]

U.S. manufacturing is floundering in a sea of federal regulations as a new rule is issued every two hours.

Sounds like rule manufacturers are doing better than ever.

[Fist of Etiquette]

The trouble is, they get paid regardless of output. They're doing it for sport.

[Lord Humungus]

Deaf Chief Diversity Officer Put on Leave After Signing Anti-Gay Marriage Petition
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.....-petition/

If your job is to promote diversity, signing a petition to get a referendum on overturning Maryland's gay marriage law on the ballot is bound to be controversial. But that's exactly what Dr. Angela McCaskill, Gallaudet University's Chief Diversity Officer, did in July. Now the resulting furor, first reported at Planet Deafqueer, has resulted in McCaskill being put on paid administrative leave today.

[invisible furry hand]

first reported at Planet Deafqueer

man, they got a website for everything

[John]

You couldn't write a parody of modern PC victim culture that would equal Gallaudet. It makes ordinary universities seem sane.

[NoVAHockey]

About 10 years ago the Post ran a story about a deaf couple that purposely set out to have a deaf child. Can't find the article, but a chat with the reporter about the story is at http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....040102.htm

[John]

I remember that. That was the sickest thing I have ever read. They also rioted when the university hired a president who wasn't deaf. It is a pathetic nuthouse.

[R C Dean]

In my lobbying days, I ran across just about every pressure group there was.

Nobody, but nobody, was more pipe-hitting militant than the deaf activists. I recall a meeting where a rule requiring that every pay phone (yes, this was awhile back) be TDY or whatever they call it.

It was pointed out to them that this would mean most pay phones would go away, resulting in fewer pay phones for everyone, and few if any additional TDY payphones. They said that was a good result as far as they were concerned.

[Ted S.]

Dammit, the fuckin' Aussie beat me to the punch.

TCM is running a series this month on Hollywood's portrayal of the disabled, and over on TCM's discussion boards, there was some yutz posting about the need for "person-first language", which apparently means focusing on the person and not identifying them by disability. One wonders what the poster would make of "Planet Deafqueer".

[Whiterun Guard]

Except one for me to find love.

[T]

You mean that's not why you're here?

[Whiterun Guard]

No, I'm just here for the attachment free sex.

[Auric Demonocles]

I don't know how sustainable the sloopy model is.

[invisible furry hand]

One day Jezebel will diversify into online dating and you'll be sorted

[Lord Humungus]

*shudder*

[BakedPenguin]

I thought they already partnered with these guys.

[Bobarian]

Sorted?

Is that some new urban dictionary term, involving plaid shirts, mullets, and big strap-ons?

[Rational Thinker]

That Ayn Rand cultist Paul Ryan is about to get the shit beat out of him by an actual experienced policy expert. Same as what happened to him when he tried to take on Obama over health care.

[Bee Tagger]

I now am aware of one person that plans on watching the debate tonight.

[Rich]

Ah, but will Obama be watching?

I trust that HyR will live blog.

[Drake]

Is this sarcasm?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Has to be. Paul Ryan is a Big Gov SoCon and would be despised by real Ayn Rand.

[nicole]

He's also, you know, a Catholic. Not much room there to join another cult.

[Zeb]

Sounds more like parody/performance art. And I think Buttplug nailed it.

[Groovus Maximus]

That turn of phrase was...highly distrubbing...

[benji]

You apparently don't read the fantasies of Democrats where Romney/Ryan want to disband the U.S. government and rape all the women because it's what Rand ordered.

[Zeb]

I thought Rand just wanted them to rape her.

[benji]

You know how she was about demanding everyone agree with her views on aesthetics and such.

[Lost_In_Translation]

So I take it Biden tagged out, because otherwise this is a non-sequitar.

[Rational Thinker]

Did you see what he did to Palin?

Ryan was practically crying when Obama decimated him at that health care thing. And Biden has decades of policy expertise.

[John]

But I thought Palin was horrible and stupid. What, she is a formidable debater now? And actually, the polls after the Palin Biden debate showed Biden won a close victory and that Palin more than held her own.

[VG Zaytsev]

Palin kicked slow Joe's ass in that debate.

[Palin's Buttplug]

She never answered a question addressed to her. You are truly as moronic as John is.

Maybe you are thinking of Tina Fey.

[VG Zaytsev]

Well, she didn't know about Joe Biden personally kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon and then got them admitted to NATO.

[John]

She addressed them all. You just didn't hear the answers because your monkey howling drown them out. And it is not like you would have understood the answers anyway.

[Restoras]

Monkey howling. I like that. I hope we hear more of it over the next couple of weeks.

[Coeus]

I hope we hear more of it over the next couple of weeks.

I have not the slightest doubt that you will.

[VG Zaytsev]

And Biden has decades of policy expertise.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA

[Rational Thinker]

His near four decades of highly regarded work in the Senate, especially on foreign policy where Ryan and Romney have zero experience, make the laughter be about you, not with you.

[VG Zaytsev]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

What exactly is his respected foreign policy resume?

Partitioning Iraq?

Getting Lebanon into Nato?

[Drake]

He did personally execute Bin Laden (drink every time he mentions it in the debate) after recommending against the mission.

Biden did his best to carry on Carter's policy of commie appeasement for decades.
http://spectator.org/archives/.....th-but-pur

[Stormy Dragon]

To be fair, Biden was one of the few people in Washington calling for use to leave Afghanistan ASAP in 2008, so I say he has more foreign policy sense than Obama, Romney, and Ryan put together.

[wareagle]

highly regarded, my ass. Biden has been wrong on damn near everything; THAT is his track record in DC. He's nothing more than a career federal tit-sucker whose greatest skill is to provide comedy to distract from the tragedy that is Obama.

[benji]

Speaking of tracks, he road the train* to work every day for nearly four decades, just like you and me!

*in a private car

[tarran]

Actually, I thought the conventional wisdom was that Biden protected Obama from assasination.

[Francisco d Anconia]

His near four decades of highly regarded work in the Senate, especially on foreign policy where Ryan and Romney have zero experience, make the laughter be about you, not with you.

Holy shit, you really weren't being sarcastic above?

Is your moniker sarcastic then?

[ant1sthenes]

No, it's just a sockpuppet.

[Drake]

Biden has decades of making a public spectacle of himself while on the government payroll. He is an old-fashioned demagogue who reveled in calling every conservative he encountered a racist since the Nixon Administration.

It won't be a debate on policy - Biden is disinterested in that nonsense. It will be a struggle for Ryan to talk past Biden's bullshit.

[nicole]

Uninterested, but not at all disinterested.

And honestly, why would we not enjoy seeing any of these assholes cry on TV, even if that were the case?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Dickless Cheney takes the bullshit award for "Iraqis will greet us with flowers" and "Deficits don't matter".

I am sure you won't let go of Dick though.

[VG Zaytsev]

Yeah, that crazy old coot should have known that it was Libyans that would greet us with flowers and that deficits don't matter when a democrat is running the joint.

[Stormy Dragon]

Which would be great if Romney was running on getting out of places. But his entire foreign policy argument has been that Obama hasn't been interventionist enough and is afraid to use our military might.

[nicole]

Are we...holding him?

[Jordan]

Shriek's only capable of answering with "But... But... BUSH!!1" or something similar. He also thinks criticism of his TEAM BLUE comrades == praising Bush/Cheney. He is not capable of rational discourse.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Obama is a huge improvement over any GOP contender or recent POTUS.

Santorum, Bush, Gingrich, Romney - all pathetically bad.

[Francisco d Anconia]

Obama would be a slight improvement from Stalin.

...slight.

[NeonCat]

Stalin was way more competent than Obama could ever hope to be.

[John]

You really have to be a deadender to still believe in Biden, although he probably will do better than Obama did.

[benji]

For all the reasons he's lovable in other ways, I think Biden did quite well in all his 2008 debates.

[VG Zaytsev]

Yep,

The debates are a reality show only tangentially related to facts and policies.

Slow Joe will do just fine unless Ryan directly confronts his lies, and I don't know if Ryan's got it in him.

[Drake]

That is what it will boil down to - will Ryan yell "bullshit" and expose Biden?

[benji]

He can't. Look at the video Rational Thinker references about health care. There Ryan had the ability to challenge Obama directly.

In the debates you don't get that kind of time, and with all the complaints of Romney "controlling" the debate, the moderator won't allow it.

Plus, say what you will about Joe, he's not afraid of peddling abject bullshit to someone challenging him, unlike Obama.

[R C Dean]

If, IF, Ryan just lays back and plays it cool, he will "win" the debate. It sounds like the strategy for slow Joe will be to come out all aggressive and shit.

Hard to do that and not look like an asshole. Put "aggressive" and "gaffe-prone" in the same bottle and shake it up, and what comes out is unlikely to be well received.

Ryan wins by looking competent. Although the DemOp media chin-pullers on the teevee this morning were trying to say that a tie goes to Biden, it takes more than a tie to reverse momententum.

[alex griggs]

More evidence of the establishment's willingness to change the meaning of words to suit their purposes. Inactivity = activity, penalty = tax, and now tie = Bidenwin.

[sticks]

Thanks for the laugh. Needed it.

[wareagle]

That Ayn Rand cultist Paul Ryan is about to get the shit beat out of him by an actual experienced policy expert

is someone filling in for Biden?

[Brett L]

You know, I remember the Obama-Healthcare discussion differently. As in, Obama eventually just got to "shut up, he explained" after not having substantive answers to any of Ryan's points.

[OldMexican]

Re: Rationing Stinker,

That Ayn Rand cultist Paul Ryan is about to get the shit beat out of him by an actual experienced policy expert.

You mean before his debate with Biden, or after his debate with Biden?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Medicare fraudster and FL Gov. Rick Scott gives out phone sex number for meningitis hotline.

http://news.yahoo.com/whoops-f.....25979.html

[Bee Tagger]

I was under the impression that the .xxx domain was created specifically for public health crises. Why else would they use the universal sign of poison and death? 3 times, no less.

[Fist of Etiquette]

That's the moonshine jug domain, dummy.

[Groovus Maximus]

It's strictly for medicinal purposes.

[Lord Humungus]

*hiccup*

...and the banjos play on...

[sage]

"So I'm pinning my hopes on Biden. Yeah, I'm fucked."

[Lord Humungus]

Obama's bird-brained attack
http://www.politico.com/news/s.....82267.html

In an attempt at the cutting cleverness that escaped the president during his debate with Mitt Romney, his campaign aired a TV ad hitting the Republican for his alleged hostility to Big Bird. "Mitt Romney knows it's not Wall Street you have to worry about," the ominous voiceover declares. "It's 'Sesame Street'."

The problem with the widely panned spot is that it plays less like a spoof of Mitt Romney than a parody of one of the Obama team's own negative ads. It's just as dishonest, over the top and ? for lack of a better word ? stupid.

[John]

When you have lost Politico and get four Pinocchios from the "fact checkers" at the Washington Post...

[Lost_In_Translation]

SNL loves presidential elections, it gives them fleeting relevance for a few weeks ever 4 years.

[Palin's Buttplug]

SNL fails without talent.

Will Ferrell as Dumbya and Tina Fey as Sarah worked. Also the guy who played Clinton.

[John]

SNL fails when it is afraid to make fun of the powers that be. Being the house jester for the White House is never funny.

[VG Zaytsev]

Their parody of MSNBC last week was funny.

So yeah, their overall problem is being a bunch of pussies and proglodyte sycophants.

[Apple]

SNL's political comedy works when they treat all players, especially the president, as fools. You can tell they just aren't comfortable making Obama the fool. When they do attempt humor at his expense, it's always in a way he could laugh at too, never in a way that would make him legitimately uncomfortable. He's the first president in the show's history that has been treated that way, as far as I can remember.

[Ted S.]

There are people who watch SNL for their election parodies?

[Art Vandelay]

There are people who watch SNL?

[Brett L]

The WSJ article with the line "At least the president has found an agenda for his second term" was brutal.

[R C Dean]

One of the things that ad inadvertantly highlights is the complete failure of the Obama administration to police Wall Street.

Everyone of the villains they put on screen, as I recall, predates Obama. Yet we just had Wall Street put the country into a serious recession with its shenanigans. And nobody is even indicted for what sure looks like fraud and manipulation on an epic scale.

[benji]

As Taranto noted:

For one thing, Madoff, Lay and Kozlowski are criminals, but they are not "enemies." (An example of enemies would be the terrorists who killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya, which the Obama administration blamed on a video.) Kozlowski and Lay were both convicted during the Bush administration; Lay has been dead for more than six years.

[Enough About Palin]

Lay's conviction was thrown out.

[benji]

I copy and pasted it for the part about how the ad says they were "enemies" but point taken.

[Francisco d Anconia]

THIS! Bailouts instead of perp-walks? Fail!

[Red Rocks Rockin]

It's no accident that the stock market began its rise right after Obumbles opened his piehole about "profits to earnings ratios". They figured out right then and there they had him by the short ones.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

"Mitt Romney knows it's not Wall Street you have to worry about," the ominous voiceover declares. "It's 'Sesame Street'."

"In fact, we're so worried that Wall Street would keep the stock market below 10K, we refused to prosecute anyone that violated the Securities Act from 2009-2012!"

[Fist of Etiquette]

A marijuana legalization initiative on the Washington ballot gained the backing of former U.S. attorneys and FBI officials.

Wake me when the interests who make money off the drug war - the people who matter - back its easing.

[Lost_In_Translation]

Drug cartels aren't likely to come up and join the legalizers.

[T]

Wake me when active FBI agents and federal prosecutors back it.

[Gadianton]

I expect them to be filing amicus briefs on the side of the prohibitionists in the lawsuits which follow passage of the law -- This law will do irredeemable harm to our ability to conduct business and make a living.

[Gadianton]

Grr... Supposed to be in reply to Lost_In_Translation.

[Lord Humungus]

Video: Teens Feed Laxatives to Seagulls, Which Defecate on Crowd
http://www.opposingviews.com/i.....cate-crowd

Some unidentified teenagers in Venice, California, poured laxatives into pots of crushed potato chips and fed the mixture to seagulls. On a video (below) shot by the teens, the seagulls eat the snacks, then relieve themselves on the crowd of people below.

Roller skaters, parents, kids and a police officer were all defecated on by the birds.

[Rich]

Now, *that's* entertainment!

[Lost_In_Translation]

Tar and feathering, bring it back...

[Ted S.]

Am I a bad person for finding this hilarious?

[Groovus Maximus]

Yes, and I right there with you, so you reside in good company. -)

[Matrix]

If you are then I am too... sure, it the kid should be flogged, but it actually is quite funny.

[LTC(ret) John]

If you are, so am I!

[Timrek]

That was damn funny. Almost as funny in a painful way were some of the sanctimonious comments left by people on that site. Surely, they never did a single mean thing while they were teenagers. And I love how the prank stems from the removal of God and morality from modern life. Too bad a flock of laxed up seagulls couldn't crap on their heads.

[KMA Too]

Ahhh...the sanctimony of the non-sanctimonious!!

[Apple]

I think it's funny, but had I been in the crowd, I would expect the right to beat the ever living shit out of the kids with no objections.

[Whiterun Guard]

First in an expected spate of domestic bio-terrorist attacks.

[Francisco d Anconia]

This is the kind of ingenuity that's been lacking in this country.

* maniacal laughter

[Bee Tagger]

After a couple of ... uninspired performances, backers of President Obama openly wonder if he wants to be re-elected.

It couldn't be that his performances were never as inspiring as they thought they were.

[benji]

You forgetting this:

Many spiritually advanced people I know (not coweringly religious, mind you, but deeply spiritual) identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul.

[benji]

Or "you're" or "u" or whatever you want to put there to correct it into English or urinespeak.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Jesus.

[robc]

I see what you did there.

[John]

I posted that the other day. The idiots who bought the Obama hype in 2008 should never be allowed to forget just how stupid they were.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Just keep on sucking on Dumbya's 23% approval rating.

[Whiterun Guard]

Gitmo, PATRIOT Act, Drone Strikes, welfare reform...

[Whiterun Guard]

Hrm, if this wasn't clear, I was crediting this stuff to Obama.

[John]

So we go from "lightworker" to "Bush was worse". Did you really ever think it would get this bad Shreek?

Since you don't think, of course you don't.

[Zeb]

What?

[Lord Humungus]

shit, Bush is running for a third term?

[John]

Yes. He is running under the name Obama.

[benji]

Not to mention as some innocent business man named Mitt Romney.

It's really unfair that Bush gets to run AGAIN for a fourth term after committing identity theft.

[wareagle]

and it's for a 4th term.

[VG Zaytsev]

No a fourth.

[Big Chief]

No, a fourth. He's about to finish his third.

[Restoras]

Jeez shreek, that's unbeleivably lame. Oh, wait, no it isn't. Obama has gotten that bad and is actually revealing himself to be less competent and less effective than Bush. That must really suck.

[The Other Kevin]

What is the word for a person who is so bad, they make you more appreciative of what you used to have?

[John]

As bad as some of our past Presidents have been, they were never cults of personalities like this. Obama and his followers really are a new low.

[Drake]

FDR was a cult. How else to explain 2 reelections during the Great Depression?

[benji]

The cult part of FDR's rule wasn't the re-elections, I could see someone like Clinton being re-elected over and over but not being worshiped, the FDR stuff involved people hanging his picture in their house like he was Jesus or even someone respectable like Warren Harding.

[John]

My grandmother was part of the FDR cult. And it wasn't good. But it wasn't anything like Obama. Part of it was that people back then were not as retarded as people like Shreek are now.

[Drake]

My grandparents were still arguing about it 50 years after the Depression.

[tarran]

My great grandmother was part of the cult - what was scary was that she forgave him for lifting prohibition since that was the price for getting social security. My grandfather (her son in law) was a businessman who had FDR's number. Apparently the arguments were epic, he had facts on his side, she had faith as her bulwark.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

I could see someone like Clinton being re-elected over and over but not being worshiped

Clinton's mojo always revolved around him being the equivalent of an overeducated frat-boy--someone who was a blast to hang out with both at the political rally and at the kegger. But I don't remember even the most ardent leftists viewing him like a messiah figure, even the feminists who fell over themselves to justify his treatment of women.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Fundies were bowing to life size cardboard cutouts of Dumbya in 2004.

[John]

Sorry Shreek, the voices in your head don't count as proof.

[Palin's Buttplug]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxdt_f0hwUg

I always bring facts.

[John]

No you brink hallucinations. You really need to get back on the lithium shreek.

[Ted S.]

Cinderella?

[R C Dean]

What is the word for a person who is so bad, they make you more appreciative of what you used to have?

A second wife?

[Timrek]

Bring forth the Laxed-Up Seagulls! !

[Red Rocks Rockin]

Many spiritually advanced people I know (not coweringly religious, mind you, but deeply spiritual) identify Obama as a Lightworker

People who are not spiritually empty at their core tend to not place their faith in a low-talent political hack with a sonorous voice.

[Pro Libertate]

His presidency has been far worse than uninspired. That's his problem. He has a record that overwhelms the bullshit.

[SIV]

I don't think Obama wants to win but that may be only because he knows he can't.

[Whiterun Guard]

Just the opposite. It literally doesn't matter what he does, he wins. So why bother putting any effort into anything.

[Drake]

It's always worked that way in the past. He became a successful author, part-time Senator, and millionaire without making any effort.

[Fist of Etiquette]

The White House dipped its toes into the privatization waters ? with responses to FOIA requests.

They're shipping them to the ISS onboard a SpaceX rocket?

[Whiterun Guard]

No, they'll be given to a consortium of approved Green Initiative compost manufacturers.

[Lord Humungus]

Warren: Blue-Collar Champion or Not?
She earned big bucks defending a corporation against the claims of asbestos victims.
http://www.nationalreview.com/.....y-woodruff

The interests of workers don't seem to have mattered much to Warren when there was a good payday at the end of the line. Add to that her possible illegal law practice and her refusal to provide more information on her work, and Massachusetts voters have grounds to question her honesty and whether or not Warren really deserves her image as a blue-collar hero.

[Bee Tagger]

It's unfortunate that her message alone is not enough to ensure she's never elected.

[VG Zaytsev]

Fauxcohantus is less that 100% honest?

Say it ain't so.

[Whiterun Guard]

Never trust a redskin.

[Groovus Maximus]

She spake with fork-ed tounge.

[R C Dean]

Oddly enough, in her "disclosure" of her clients, she left out Dow, which she helped in the breast cancer case.

When this was pointed out, she claimed that her work was to set up a trust fund for victims.

Which, of course, is a lie. When she worked for Dow, they were denying any liability and no work was done on a trust fund.

[Groovus Maximus]

I see the fork prongs in multitudes.

[Lord Humungus]

How to survive an atomic bomb - 1951 style
http://boingboing.net/2012/10/.....-bomb.html

[Matrix]

So jumping into a lead lined refrigerator will not work?

[Groovus Maximus]

There's that pesky asphyxiation thingie there, Matrix...-)))

[Brett L]

Duck... and Cover
Duck... and Cover

[Ska]

+4 explosives

[invisible furry hand]

Just submitted track names for Godspeed! You Black Emperor's new CD to Gracenote resisted the temptation to tag them as Easy Listening

[Bee Tagger]

I've been earnestly trying to avoid the free stream of the album online until my cd arrives in the mail. I caved for about 9 minutes of the first song the other day, but have succeeded otherwise.

[Drax the Destroyer]

CD? It's like you were born before 1999 or something.

God, I'm old.

[Bee Tagger]

The real question is why I'm not buying it on vinyl. I'm clearly interested in making sure the internet knows I love Godspeed! You Black Emperor, so why wouldn't I take it to its logical conclusion and buy the vinyl version regardless of whether I own a turntable.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Vinyl is pointless with digitally recorded music. None of the warm analog fuzz of reality will come through because IT WAS NEVER THERE TO BEGIN WITH. Or so my asshole audiophile "friends" tell me.

[Groovus Maximus]

You need better "friends."

[Fist of Etiquette]

I only listen to GYBE on my Victrola.

[Lord Humungus]

and now some local news:
Porn star Ron Jeremy will appear alongside anti-porn pastor at Daybreak church in Hudsonville
http://www.mlive.com/entertain.....er_default

Wes Dupin isn't expecting everyone to love his decision to bring a notorious porn star like Ron "The Hedgehog" Jeremy to speak at his church in Ottawa County, but that's really kind of the point.

"Church is not a holy club. It's not a place for all the saints," said Dupin, founding pastor of Daybreak church in Hudsonville.

[Whiterun Guard]

Isn't RJ jewish?

[Matrix]

he is

[Drax the Destroyer]

I think his real last name is SilverBaumenSteinOvichSkiGoldBergCrystal.

[Groovus Maximus]

You forgot Blumen and Rosen. And Klein as well, SOD knows there's gaggle of thems running around.

[Whiterun Guard]

I once knew a girl named Crystal Goldberg.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Did she live up to the stereotype, or was she not a spoiled brat?

[Brett L]

JAPs aren't so much a stereotype as a convenient descriptor.

[Byron]

Will there be a countdown before he 'comes' on stage?

[Fist of Etiquette]

Rand Paul took a piece out of his own party's presidential candidate for his saber-rattling, and called for a less-interventionist foreign policy.

In the saying, I believe the rattling is preferential to the much quieter drawing. Anyway, let your candidate have a swing or two with it before getting all pissy, for crying out loud!

[Lord Humungus]

and some more local news:

Resident using torch to singe squirrel's fur started Holland Township apartment fire
http://www.mlive.com/news/gran.....cart_river

Kohsel said the resident was using a propane torch on a deck on the third floor of Clearview Apartments when the deck caught fire about 12:29 p.m. Wednesday. The resident was removing the squirrel's fur in preparation to eat the animal, the chief said.

Flames spread to the roof, burning it off part of the building. Kohsel said eight apartments were destroyed, and apartments on lower levels were damaged by smoke and water.

[benji]

Yo, Humungus, I saw a post of yours on an earlier article I was reading and thought I should let you know.

Gary Johnson won't be on the Michigan ballot.

Blame the Michigan GOP/Ruth Johnson.

[benji]

BTW. For any others suffering under Tyrant Snyder's anarchic hellscape. If you plug in your voting details on michigan.gov/vote you can get a sample ballot which has links to candidate websites and financial information.

[Lord Humungus]

no GJ? wow...

[benji]

He says he was put on the GOP primary ballot without his approval after he withdrew. And then he filed his paperwork to get back on the ballot as Libertarian four minutes too late.

And the Sec of State and a court denied them putting Gary E. Johnson on the ballot as Michigan law doesn't allow replacement candidates this late as ballots are apparently being printed soon.

[Ted S.]

Isn't Michigan the state running the Texas Doppelg?nger Gary E. Johnson?

[benji]

Check above, they were trying it but it's been blocked and is unlikely to be allowed.

[R C Dean]

$20 says the gourmand was a Hmong immigrant. Odd that the perp's name isn't mentioned in the article, no? There's a ton of them in the upper Midwest, and when I lived there, they still hadn't assimilated well.

They were notorious for just wandering around anyone's land, hunting squirrels using the "spray and pray" method.

[Enough About Palin]

A friend of my next-door neighbor trapped the neighborhood squirrels and ate them. White boy from up in the Iron Range. The Hmongs just steal my apples and garden produce. But I'm cool with that.

[sarcasmic]

Vibrating glove? Hmmmm.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sci.....p-car.html

[invisible furry hand]

this was nowhere near as exciting as it sounded.

[Brett L]

No worries, wait until the DIY teledildonics hackers get hold of it.

[sarcasmic]

Disobedient flier flicked in the balls by TSA goon.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new.....-down.html
Nothing else happened.

[Matrix]

It would be difficult for me not to use my knee to break that MFers face if he flicked me in the nuts. But if that happened *I* would be the bad guy, right?

[sarcasmic]

Assault a federal employee and your life is forfeit.

But we're all equal, right?

[Rich]

"It was simply a reflexive response as I fell to the ground in agony, Your Honor."

[sarcasmic]

Ali Larter is still good enough to eat!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvs.....s-gym.html

[sticks]

Jersey girls!

[Restoras]

I imagine she would be quite yummy.

[Drax the Destroyer]

I would give her plenty of ugly, stupid, misbehaved children.

[sarcasmic]

Drunk woman was hogtied, paraded around naked, and teeth bashed in by police.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new.....rrest.html
Nothing else happened.

[Whiterun Guard]

Shouldn't have argued with her betters.

[Brett L]

Gods, the areas just outside of populous Florida cities have built up some sort of white trash barrier that triples the trashiness. I can't tell if this is waves of yokels who want city work but country living or if its just naturally attractive to a certain trashy person-type, but fuck me. Lower Alabama (the Panhandle) isn't this trashy.

[wareagle]

that's the difference between rednecks and white trash. Rednecks have jobs, keep their kids in line, help their neighbors, and go about their business. And they are the bulk of Lower Alabama. Lower GA, too.

[invisible furry hand]

EU to VW: Don't worry about CO2 rules

European Energy Commissioner G?nther Oettinger has written a letter to Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn, assuring him that new EU restrictions on CO2 limits will not harm the auto giant.

New European Union regulations will set a limit on the amount of carbon dioxide that the entire fleet of cars by a particular carmaker is allowed to produce on average. The amount is set at 130 grammes per kilometre by 2015, and 95 grammes per kilometre by 2020.

But carmakers can dodge the limits by building a few electric cars, which will bring down the average emissions for the whole fleet.

http://www.thelocal.de/nationa.....45499.html

[Whiterun Guard]

Much better story in the same 'paper':

http://www.thelocal.de/society/20121009-45439.html

[invisible furry hand]

Caught in a "delirium of hormones," as a police statement on Monday put it,

When oh when will someone write a book called "Delirium of hormones"?

[Groovus Maximus]

One and done. I am trying to find a publisher. -)))

[LTC(ret) John]

I think it sounds like a good all-girl techno band name.

[Whiterun Guard]

"Winter is coming. No summer. No, I mean winter. No summer. YAARRRGGH HULK RAGE"

[tarran]

I'd be smiling too if I had pulled that off. 😀

[robc]

We have a morning link to a story that was a main story yesterday?

[sage]

Who are you - Suki?

[robc]

Between the general failure to hat-tip, and Tucille's failure to read the reason front page, the standards around here are dropping.

[Lord Humungus]

why if I had a subscription...

[robc]

Back when Postrel ran this place...

[Rich]

Who are you - Suki?

Hey, I heard she was *dead*.

[Zeb]

She has an irritating habit of resurrecting from time to time.

[John]

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-J.....990-Debate

In the days that followed, Raddatz--then known as Martha Bradlee, after her first marriage to fellow reporter Ben Bradlee, Jr.--came under intense criticism from the League of Women Voters for what they called "irrelevant," personal questions.

How many husbands has this broad gone through?

[benji]

As noted on Red Eye when the question was raised, three. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

[John]

Not at all.

[Ted S.]

All at the same time would have been better.

[Matrix]

The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence says that the government owns a monopoly on force

They support governments only having the power to kill, even political violence! Hooray for genocide!

[John]

Click through to one of the linked articles and you get this gem

Blogger Miguel, of Gun Free Zone, recently caught CSGV taking their twisted philosophy to its logical extreme, and tracked this Twitter exchange, in which gun rights advocate LC Scotty asked CSGV if rounding up a minority group for the concentration camps would not justify armed resistance:

So govt rounding up citizens based on relig/ethnic id would not warrant armd resistance if courts bless as constitutional

CSGV's astounding response:

Correct. As long as the Const. is functioning as our system of gov't, there are peaceful methods for redress.

Wow

[Restoras]

This is what T o n y beleives in.

[nicole]

Actually, as it turns out, as long as the Constitution is functioning as our system of government, we are supposed to have guns to overthrow it with.

For all the "shall not be infringed" and "militias aren't the point," we need to be more clear about that message.

[Restoras]

But nicole, there is so muc vagary in the phrase "shall not be infringed" that how do we really know that's what the Founders meant??

[VG Zaytsev]

Apparently the asshole doesn't know that Korematsu lost his lawsuit and that SCOTUS's ruling still stands.

[Whiterun Guard]

Doesn't know or doesn't care?

[Groovus Maximus]

Yes.

[sarcasmic]

The "We are Government" crowd puts absolutely no limits on government power.

[John]

http://washingtonexaminer.com/.....HbHIaCX-YL

How the liberal media loved Obama to death.

He was not just a Democrat, he was also a liberal. He was not just a liberal, he also biracial, also multinational; also hip, cool, and clever. He was themselves as they wanted to be. Like them, he was gifted at writing and talking (and, as it turned out, not much beyond that), like them, he stood up for Metro America; like them, he viewed the people outside it with a not-very-measured disdain. "I divide people into people who talk like us and people who don't talk like us," said David Brooks, speaking for all of them. "You could see him as a New Republic writer ... he's more talented than anyone in my lifetime ... he IS pretty dazzling when he walks into a room."

And just like them, he is a shallow empty suit.

[Restoras]

like them, he viewed the people outside it with a not-very-measured disdain

Is there any more reason to hold the left completely contemptible than their view on people who are not as lucky as they are?

Absolutely disgusting.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Fuck Metro America. It comprises the most crowded smelly violent hell-holes in this shit-stained country. Give me middle of fuck nowhere mountain land any day. FUCK THE CITIES.

[Fluffy]

I live in what passes for the mountains on the east coast, in the middle of one of the few remaining white spots on the Verizon map, and I gotta tell you the people here are no better.

The mountains are full of meth heads living in trailers plying the 13 year old daughters of their toothless girlfriends with booze and fucking them silly. And then cashing their SSI disability checks.

It would be easier for me to write poems to the virtue of rural folk if the head under every mullet didn't host a brain mired in dissolution.

[John]

Sadly this is true. It used to be that shit only went on in the Hillbilly belt. Now it is everywhere. There was a time when people who lived in rural areas really were hard working good people. But that generation died off and their kids and grandkids are Honey Boo Boo.

[Enough About Palin]

WTF is the deal with Honey Boo Boo? Who gives a fuck about some fat toddler?

[Ted S.]

They do it to escape the reality of having to live near Fluffy.

[Fluffy]

Probably.

I'm like Josie Wales. You can follow me by just following the trail of men who have lost all hope that I leave behind me.

[Drax the Destroyer]

...and I gotta tell you the people here are no better.

But you are missing my point. All people are awful. The "wilderness" simply has less of them. Be they meth-heads, wife-beaters, or Ned Beatty rapers, there are still less of them. It's all about quantity, not quality because when it comes to people, there is only one quality: SHIT.

Oh and another think. FUCK THE EAST COAST. AND THE WEST...

AND MICHIGAN...

[Drax the Destroyer]

Think = Thing....

FUCK OHIO

[LTC(ret) John]

AND OIHO!

[Ice Nine]

It would be easier for me to write poems to the virtue of rural folk if the head under every mullet didn't host a brain mired in dissolution.

I don't know, Fluffy, the poetic beauty of that paragraph would be hard to top.

[Auric Demonocles]

plying the 13 year old daughters of their toothless girlfriends with booze and fucking them silly.

Fucking the daughters or the girlfriends?

[Brett L]

Yep.

[Mike M.]

When I think of "Metro America" the movie Gangs of New York is pretty much the first thing that comes to my mind.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

"Gangs of New York" is one of those Hollywood productions where you inadvertenly end up sympathizing with the person who's supposed to be the bad guy.

See "Bunker, Archie" for this phenomenon on the small screen.

[ant1sthenes]

What's that?

He's every person /
they need to be?

[Restoras]

In Kennebunk, ME, zumba classes mean soemething else...
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/vide.....n-17440773

[John]

At least you would know the hooker was going to be in a good shape.

[Tim]

This is the first time I've ever given a shit about Zumba.

[Restoras]

I was listening to a Boston sports talk show this morning and they were speculating that the Secret Service might be frequent attendees, given that 41 doesn't play much golf or do much fishing anymore.

[Tim]

Hmm.

[Ted S.]

The thrust of the article should be that there's nothing wrong with prostitution, of course.

[Rich]

backers of President Obama openly wonder if he wants to be re-elected

He wants to spend more time with the family.

[John]

Sorry. But no one is going to believe that Obama is just dying to spend more time with Michelle.

And Jesus is Frum a ball licker.

[Ted S.]

Ah, but Frum is the right kind of conservative.

[Rich]

I agree, John.

I think it's more like "Who needs this shit? I've made it into the history books and am set for life. Someone else can clean up Bush's mess."

[John]

Oh he will be in the history books alright. But they are generally pretty unkind to one term Presidents. All that money doesn't make for being remembered as a loser.

[Jerry on the road]

If it pays the bills...

[Tim]

We just weren't good enough for him...

[Groovus Maximus]

I know, he really never was that into us...I guess we just never say it coming.

[Tim]

Was it the guns and religion?

[invisible furry hand]

no, it was your bitter clinging to reality that did it

[The Late P Brooks]

Morning Joke had some commie douche on who has made a documentary about the drug war. Apparently anybody anywhere who ingests any amount of a drug is an "addict". And- If teh evul banksterz aren't in jail, we have clearly failed as a society.

Who knows, though; maybe that is the approach will will open people's eyes. Personally, I wanted to jump through the teevee screen and stab him in the eye with my mechanical pencil.

[John]

I never watch that stuff. But have the liberals and the media just gone all in on the drug war?

[Restoras]

The drug war is all about three things Liberals have orgasms thinking about. 1) Control over people they find detestable lacking in self-control, and 2) Expanding government power, and 3) Fewer personal liberties.

All in the name of progressing to a better society, of course.

[John]

And right thinking people are never affected by it. Just brown people and white trash. You know the people we need to control.

[Tim]

Yeah, used to be the commie douches were smokin weed. We're gettin old.

[Zeb]

I think that even most liberals who want legalized pot are still pretty much into the drug war otherwise. Weed is OK sometimes, but crack/heroin/meth (depending on what the news media are into this year) are so bad that something has to be done. Think of the children, you know.

[John]

Whenever someone gives the answer "some day you will have children and realize it is different", you ought to be able to kick them in the nuts with no legal sanction.

[Ted S.]

Meth especially is the "bitter cling" drug, used by the group of people it's OK to hate.

[VG Zaytsev]

I never watch that stuff. But have the liberals and the media just gone all in on the drug war?

Actually, the commie douche was arguing for ending the drug wars, and treating drug use as a 'public health' issue ala alcohol.

[R C Dean]

The "public health" approach is just lipstick on the pig. It still involves the cops and courts (only special "drug courts") and locking people up (only for Soviet-style "forced therapy").

But progs love them some well-polished jackboots, so its no surprise.

[benji]

Speaking of that show, I saw that Joe is considering a 2016 run for President.

[VG Zaytsev]

I doubt he could be Hillary in the primaries.

[benji]

She's going to run in the GOP primaries?

[Groovus Maximus]

AHA!!! Pro'L Dib was right after all! I will never doubt his spice laced steamed pundi rice visions again!

[R C Dean]

After Benghazi, I have serious doubts about Hillary's viability. There's only one person she can pass the buck to, and he is the world champion at dodging responsibility.

[Drax the Destroyer]

Wait...so I'm addicted to NyQuil then? FUuuuuuuuuuuUUUUUU

[Groovus Maximus]

How can you watch that shit, Brooksie? Mika's voice alone sends me into conniptions. She's the Ralph Wiggum of the MSLSD.

Mechanical pencil? -)))

[Enough About Palin]

" Personally, I wanted to jump through the teevee screen and stab him in the eye with my mechanical pencil."

If youi ever do, please bitch-slap Mika for me. Thanks.

[John]

http://www.freeenterprise.com/.....n-finances

How rigorous is the audit program? Not very. The OIG report states that "OLMS did not determine overall if its [audit program] was effective in detecting criminal and civil violations of the LMRDA to improve safeguards of union assets." In other words, OLMS cannot demonstrate whether it is effectively promoting union transparency and financial integrity. As an example, according to the OIG report, in a sample of 513 audits, OLMS only identified violations in 81 (16%) of the audits. However, when OIG reviewed the same 513 audits, it found that 473 audits (92%) contained violations of the federal disclosure requirements that should have been found by OLMS. Whether attributed to OLMS's incompetence or union favoritism, this glaring disparity is simply unacceptable.

This report will likely raise some eyebrows of those union-represented workers who ? either voluntarily or involuntarily ? pay dues or fees to labor unions:

92% of union financial reports contain errors?
OLMS ? the agency that is supposed to promote union financial integrity ? only caught 16% of them?

[invisible furry hand]

Prudie's first problem today is excellent: Husband fears he and wife might divorce and split their assets 50/50, so he wants her to sign a post-nuptial to limit her to 20%, or else he'll divorce her. Please feel free to spot the basic error here

http://www.slate.com/articles/.....ingle.html

[Drax the Destroyer]

Shouldn't have bought the cow...

[Ted S.]

Is he coming into the marriage with 80% of the assets? If so, then I don't see the problem.

[Fluffy]

The problem is game theory.

Making the request NOW incents her to immediately divorce him to secure her 50%.

She has no incentive to sign the agreement. And even asking her to sign the agreement shows her that he is considering a first strike, and may act to hide assets, commit a fraud on the court, etc., so she is powerfully incented to launch her own first strike immediately before he can put his plan into effect.

[Ted S.]

There's an xkcd.com cartoon in this somewhere.

[Tim]

Maybe this is a double fake out and he wants her to file for divorce now.

[OldMexican]

Re: Fluffy,

Making the request NOW incents her to immediately divorce him to secure her 50%.

Or better - it incentivizes her to poison him and thus obtain 100% of the assets!

[Coeus]

I think it's more about future assets. He feels he's going to be rising in the tax brackets soon, and he wants to protect 50% of that. It means he's willing to sacrifice 50% of what he has now in order to keep anticipated higher future earnings.

[Drake]

Depends on the state.

[Brett L]

Bitch feeding the 5 year old pissed on basil. Please tell me you did that to my kid some time. I'll slap the shit out of you and then tell you, "I was just trying to teach you a life lesson."

[tarran]

I thought it was funny...

If my kid came home complaining that my neighbors did that to him, I'd tell him, that's what you get for pissing on their food.

[Brett L]

I guess it annoys the shit out of me that the "adult" intellectually understands that pissing on the stuff did no harm - she wasn't out to hurt the boy - but rather than telling a 5 year old "don't piss in my yard", she gets on some righteous set-an-example kick. Fuck her. Be an adult. Say to my child, "don't pee in my yard anymore. That's against the rules." Totally within your remit. Leave the life lessons to his parents.

[invisible furry hand]

as Prudie pointed out she is playing mind games with a kindergartener, which is kinda piss-weak. He's scarcely a foeman worthy of her steel

[Coeus]

Same here. It's a good life lesson.

[R C Dean]

I doubt it would be enforcable anyway; there's no consideration (or at least not adequate consideration) in the technical legal sense.

[Palin's Buttplug]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/.....t/1626471/

The number of Americans seeking unemployment aid plummeted to 339,000 last week, the lowest level in more than four years.

The sharp drop, a shocker to analysts and investors, offered a hopeful sign that the job market could be picking up.

The Labor Department says weekly applications fell by 30,000 to the lowest level since February 2008.

Welch needs to go full wingnut now.

[LTC(ret) John]

There is this really cool website - HitampersandRun - they even have a whole post addressing this!

Or maybe not. Here are the Wall Street Journal's Sarah Portlock and Tom Barley with a detail from an unnamed Labor Department source: "However, the report may not be as positive as the sharp drop indicates. A Labor Department economist said one large state didn't report additional quarterly figures as expected, accounting for a substantial part of the decrease."

And here's Reason's Anthony Randazzo with a minority opinion on the housing recovery.

In this era of politicized everything, it would be nice to know what that "large state" is.

[Mike M.]

Probably California or New York. Boy, talk about a creative, yet ridiculously transparent, way of fudging the numbers. How fucking pathetic can these cretins get?

[John]

Those bad poll numbers are really getting to you aren't they?

[Restoras]

They are in full-blown panic mode. It isn't pretty but will be delicious.

[Tim]

He ain't pretty no more...

[Jordan]

U6 has not budged.

[John]

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2012.....-warnings/

Eric Marshall of Lawyers Committee Opposes Voter Fraud Warnings

[Coeus]

I posted something about that a few days ago, and dunphy said that libertarians could be just as irrational about other stuff. Still waiting for an example of that (hell, even the hypothetical he provided was complete bullshit).

[This Just In]

Andrew Engeldinger fucked sheep.

[Restoras]

So he and He Who Must Not Be Named are compadres?

[The Late P Brooks]

How can you watch that shit, Brooksie?

It's like jump-starting my heart with a 24V battery. Blood pressure and temperature go right through the roof.

And- havwe you ever noticed how much Mika Fluffszinski looks like the monster from Alien in profile?

[Groovus Maximus]

I have. She's positively xenomorph-tastic. Zebginew must be so proud of his...whatever it is. Yet another example of shattering the the myth of The Sultry Slavic Wimmins. When her Babooshka Gene expresses, Oj UZHOS!!!!

[invisible furry hand]

Jeez get it right doc. It's not as if Zbigniew Brzezinski is that hard to spell. Or indeed to say

[Groovus Maximus]

Actually, it's pretty easy to say. I never could spell Polish names well.

Also, that pile of bljad' made some rather interesting remarks WRT to Russia not too long ago.

[nicole]

It's like jump-starting my heart with a 24V battery. Blood pressure and temperature go right through the roof.

That is why they call it "Morning Joe," isn't it?

[The Late P Brooks]

You could practically see Scarborough recoil in horror at the notion of "legal" drugz.

[benji]

Won't hurt his 2016 bid.

[Drax the Destroyer]

...recoil in horror at the notion of "legal" drugz

These are the types of people I wish drunk drivers on.

[KDN]

So you want them to get home safe and sound 99.995% of the time instead of 99.997%?

[Drax the Destroyer]

I see what you did there.

Good form. Good form.

[Restoras]

I wonder if Turkey would be willing to take Greece back into the fold of thier former empire.

[Drake]

Then they can regain the title of "Sick man of Europe".

[ant1sthenes]

They don't have to take the Greeks back.

[Fluffy]

I wonder if total drug legalization would actually lead to people using cocaine and heroin and meth in greater numbers, or if a general legalization would lead to chemical innovation that produced a safe alternative.

I don't know enough about chemistry to know if soma is possible. (Soma being defined as an inexpensive, orally administered drug that safely produces intense euphoria with a low risk of overdose.) But it seems doubtful to me that people would be using basement meth and heroin of unknown provenance in a legalization scenario.

[Restoras]

Isn't soma the effect that Ambien produces?

[LTC(ret) John]

It is difficult to get proper insurance coverage, stay away from the mosquito cloud of plaintiff lawyers and wade through the bureaucracy to get approval and permission to sell life saving medications in the US.

Will it be easier for Uncle Fred's Genuine Southern Illinois Cooked Meth? ROKKSTAR Heroin? Say Hello to My Little Friend Powder Cocaine?

I am in favor of a lot of decriminalization, but legalization is not going to be some sort of simple solution or cure all. The WOD should be ended and the states can decide what they want to enforce or not. Then we can see what works - federalism, give it a chance!

[John]

If you had total legalization, people would use pharmaceutical grade speed, cocaine and opiates. If you ever meet someone who did drugs in the 1960s, they talk about how much better the drugs were then. There was little or no control over the pharmacies. So rich people would literally just buy their own pharmacies. The quality of the drugs were much higher and they were much safer.

Think about it. Who do you think would make better drugs, some PHD working for Bayer or some meth billies with a freshman chemistry book?

The other intriguing thing about legalization is it would open up research into making better drugs. Maybe it is possible to make cocaine that is not addictive or speed that has fewer side effects. Right now we have no idea since no one does any serious research into these drugs. If they were legal and the big drug companies were making money off them, they would.

[KDN]

Who do you think would make better drugs, some PHD working for Bayer or some meth billies with a freshman chemistry book?

I bet you could work that notion into an award-winning drama. Maybe get it on HBO or AMC or something.

[John]

Is that show still on? How have they gotten around the fact that the guy had a terminal disease and should be dead by now? Did he get better?

[KDN]

Apparently season 5 just wrapped up. I'm not sure how it ends up since I got into it late (just finished S. 2 on Netflix), but they made the cancer thing go away pretty early in the show's run. Not totally unrealistic either, my father-in-law had a more advanced stage than he did and was in complete remission after about 2 years.

My personal opinion of the show is it's a bit overhyped and much better acted than it is written, but it's still a fine show and worthy of my time. The wife loves it though, which means one less evening a week of TLC or bad sitcoms in the background while I play video games on my PC.

[Coeus]

---------Spoilers------

It's in mid-season break. There were only 8 episodes so far. And if you paid attention to the intro of season 5 (set one year later), you can see him taking a handful of prescription pills that look like the ones he was taking for chemo.

[John]

http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.c.....alifornia/

Obama only up by 14 in California.

[NoVAHockey]

That's crazy. But what happens if Obama gets crushed on the east coast early. loses VA, OH, FL -- maybe even PA --

Why would you vote in CA or WA if you're a D? That could cause huge problems down ballot for them.

[John]

http://www.realclearpolitics.c.....e_map.html

Look at all of the toss ups on the Real Politics maps. And that is based on very optimistic turn out projects for Dems. If the turnout is even close to the historical average, all those toss up states go Romney and the election is over before 7PM western standard time.

[NoVAHockey]

yesterday MI was a lean blue.

[LTC(ret) John]

I can only hope the election is over early - I have to get up at 4:45 am for work.

[Mike M.]

If Obama actually loses PA, then it's obviously a mini-landslide for the republicans. I kind of doubt that will happen though.

[John]

Right now the RCP average has Romney up 1.5 in Pennsylvania.

[Mike M.]

Never underestimate the awesome power of the Philly democrat vote fraud machine, which is probably the strongest in the country.

[LTC(ret) John]

I have only one reply to that

CHICAGO

That is all.

[Spoonman.]

You're assuming any politician in Philadelphia is remotely competent, which I can tell you from my 45th-floor view is false.

[Spoonman.]

Oddly, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports Obama 8 points ahead this morning.

They also called Innocence of Muslims a "deadly film" so I don't trust anything they say.

[Spoonman.]

They also say the DNC is pulling funding from 4 Congressional races locally.

[Enough About Palin]

Back in the early 80's, when I was living in Central PA, I read the Inquirer every day. Back then, it was still a good paper.

[John]

http://andrewsullivan.thedaily.....-dish.html

No doubt after a serious re-education session, Andie Sullivan changes course and says he still has hope.

[John]

The money quote

They infer that I've given up or turned on him or whatever. And, yes, I am prone to drama, but have safeguards against it - we made sure to run dissents all day yesterday, and the Dish team's mission is to push back at me, not echo me. I just want to reiterate a few things: that I still firmly believe it is essential for global stability and economic recovery that Obama be re-elected; that his record is about as good as anyone could expect given the circumstances; and that I have seen the alternative to him lie and shape-shift so much in the last couple of weeks, he is even less principled and more ruthless than I feared.

Obama let him get away with it for one devastating night. The Dish won't for a second from now until the election. I haven't given up. I've just been given an electric prod to get back into the arena. And fight back.

Sullivan's tears taste even better than I thought they would.

[wareagle]

I just find it amazing how the smartest man to ever walk among us let a debate opponent get away with alleged lies while that opponent had no problem calling bullshit on the smartest man ever.

[T]

I still firmly believe it is essential for global stability and economic recovery that Obama be re-elected

Talk about pharmaceutical grade drugs. WTF is he on?

[LTC(ret) John]

A variety of things - he has the AIDS cocktail of drugs, steroids to help keep muscle mass, etc, and he enjoys cannabis too.

[MJGreen]

Look at how stable the world has been the last four years!

[The Late P Brooks]

if a general legalization would lead to chemical innovation that produced a safe alternative.

We have seen the pernicious (and poisonous) results of basement chemists trying to get around the definition of ILLEGAL drugs. I think meth and Bath Saltz! and a bunch of other drugs would *almost* disappear if marijuana and cocaine were legal and easily obtainable. But that would be harm reduction and not behavior control.

[John]

From what I have been told, anyone who is dumb enough to use meth when pharmaceutical grade speed and coke are available, pretty much needs to die to save the gene pool.

[T]

There's a reason Adderall is popular, and it ain't ADHD.

[Enough About Palin]

"Pelosi: A Romney win 'will take us to a period before Lyndon Johnson'"

And that's a bad thing???

http://dailycaller.com/#ixzz290043h00

[benji]

A 89% top tax bracket?

[Eduard van Haalen]

Pelosi: Romney would return U.S. to JFK era!

[Brett L]

Tax cuts for everyone! "A rising tide lifts all boats."

[The Late P Brooks]

I still firmly believe it is essential for global stability and economic recovery that Obama be re-elected

SRSLY?

[Pro Libertate]

It's Opposite Day.

[John]

Poor Sullivan. That sad little beardo douche bag is going to have such a hard time going forward.

[Brett L]

Somehow he survived his Palin's vagina obsession with a job, he'll get through this, too.

[Tim]

No it's not.

[LTC(ret) John]

Ah, but by denying it is, when it actual is, you have affirmed that it really is!

[Tim]

Evrything that harry Mudd tells you is a lie.

[Stormy Dragon]

Compared to "I want to invade anyone who even looks at us funny" Mitt, Obama may be the best option for global stability, if only in the "world's talled midget" sense.

[Stormy Dragon]

Plus, my desired outcome for the election is that a larger than expected turn out for Gary Johnson costs Mitt Romney the election by a narrow margin. That can't happen if Romney actually wins.

[John]

So your desired outcome is Obama winning. But we already knew that.

[Stormy Dragon]

Yes, because while Obama is a terrible president, I think Romney will be even worse.

[John]

Then Obama must not be that bad. And if Obama wins re-election because the Rs were split, do you really think he is going to give a shit about Libertarians? I don't.

Basically you preferred outcome is Obama winning and Libertarians having absolutely no political influence for the next four years.

[Stormy Dragon]

No, but It may make the Republicans start giving a shit.

[John]

No they won't. They will just hate Libertarians even more. And they won't be in power so who cares if they do?

You are just concern trolling.

[Stormy Dragon]

They will just hate Libertarians even more.

And you wonder why I'm not Romney supporter.

[tarran]

Basically you preferred outcome is Obama winning and Libertarians having absolutely no political influence for the next four years.

My prefered outcome ain't going to happen.

But, consider the two realistic choices:
1) Obama winning and Libertarians having absolutely no political influence for the next four years.

2) Romney winning and Libertarians having absolutely no political influence for the next four years.

Which one is worse? Their policies are nearly identical from a macroeconomic standpoint, so their administrations are going to be train-wrecks. ROmney of course lies and pretends that he supports free markets, when it's pretty clear that he is essentially a Kennedy Democrat. So he will harm the free market brand.

Obama on the other hand is far more corrupt than Romney.

So lots of people find themselves saying things like:

I think [Romney] is better than Obama. But I go back and forth between whether he is good enough to make a difference or whether it would be better for Obama to win. I honestly don't know. ... But I don't consider it unreasonable at all to think it might be better in the long run for Obama to win and continue with his train wreck of an administration.

Personally, I judge that libertarians will have more influence in the aftermath of a failed Obama administration than a Romney one.

[John]

If Romney wins, he will owe the base of the Republican Party big. And he will be ripe to be primaried if he fucks up. That will force him to do things he doesn't want to.

[Stormy Dragon]

Yeah, like all those primary challengers Bush faced in 04.

You are right that Romney will owe the base of the Repulbican Party big. The problem is that the base he'd owe is big government jesus-freak neocons.

[tarran]

If Romney wins, he will owe the base of the Republican Party big.

There are few libertarian impulses in the Republican base. In fact the Republican base is no more libertarian than the Democratic base. Both groups are similarly afraid of letting their neighbors be free.

[John]

Tarran,

The Republican base is much more of a problem at the state level than the federal level.

[tarran]

"Keep your government hands off my medicare" is a problem at the state level?

Are you fucking serious?

I may be guilty of sampling bias (all the Republicans I know come from the Rust Belt of the People's Republic of Massachusetts), but in my experience Republicans are terrible at all levels.

They... overwhelmingly... hate... freedom... full stop.

[John]

"Keep your government hands off my medicare" is a problem at the state level"

For the 7,000 time, that slogan was objecting to Obama taking $700 billion out of medicare to pay for Obamacare. It was a legitimate complaint.

And yeah, your sample is legitimately skewed. Northeastern Republicans are not the same as Western or midwest ones.

[tarran]

For the 7,000 time, that slogan was objecting to Obama taking $700 billion out of medicare to pay for Obamacare. It was a legitimate complaint.

If that was the complaint, why the choice of adjectives?

My medicare? It's the government's medicare.

No. Most older Republicans that were protesting were incensed at the idea that they would lose free goodies that the productive taxpayers are shoveling their way.

[John]

Jesus Tarren

Do you think that Mass Republicans, all five of them, are the "Republican base"?

[tarran]

Well somebody is voting for the freedom haters that make up the Republican contingent of Congress.

BTW, my earlier statement should have been rust belt (Ohio, Indiana, PA) or MA....

[John]

I know, he might bomb Libya, and be planning to bomb Iran and invade Syria or something.

Good thing none of that is happening now.

[Stormy Dragon]

Except Romney is campaigning that Obama is being "too moderate" in Libya and that we ought to be sending troops there to hunt for militants and train their militias. So again, on pretty much every issue, Obama is terrible, but Romney seems to be arguing in favor of making things even worse.

[tarran]

My sense is Romney is not serious about his bomb everyone else rhetoric. It's more a product of the ghost of his father's campaign hanging around his neck.

[John]

And our enemies will decide whether we go to war more than the President will. These things are driven by events.

[Stormy Dragon]

My sense he is, in that he has the same generally unserious view of foreign policy that most of the Republican establishment has: that everything in the international arena is simply a contest of wills. All we have to do is show that we're "tough" enough and everything will fall into place the way we want it.

[John]

that everything in the international arena is simply a contest of wills.

That is a terrible way to think. The better way is to constantly apologize and appear weak. Look how everyone in the Middle East loves us now after Obama did that?

[Stormy Dragon]

Yeah yeah, Obama doesn't spend enough time fellating your warboner. We get it.

[John]

No dipshit. Obama is getting us into and will continue to get us into more wars. If you love war, just show all of your enemies weakness. That is the quickest way to get war. Put Obama in there for four more years and we will be at war with at a minimum Iran and Syria and possibly North Korea too.

[Stormy Dragon]

If you love war, just show all of your enemies weakness. That is the quickest way to get war.

We need more war in order to avoid more war!

[Proprietist]

My sense is that Obama is not really serious about pissing trillions down the drain on stupid crap.

- Obama voter in 2008

[Brett L]

Just which wars has Obama kept us out of?

[invisible furry hand]

You're at peace with Tonga. Isn't that enough?

[Spoonman.]

I am guessing neither Obama nor Romney know where Tonga is.

[LTC(ret) John]

Not for long, those miserable islanders shall soon feel our droned wrath!

[Art Vandelay]

You mean the 57th state?

[benji]

The War on Women!

[JEP]

That's a "wars created or saved" question.

[John]

http://www.realclearpolitics.c.....false.html

Debbie Wasseerman Schultz, DNC chair: Piers, it is not okay for you to be saying that the administration was putting out completely false statements. They put out information that they had at the time based on the intelligence that they were given --

Piers Morgan: That turned out to be completely wrong.

Wasserman Schultz: Well that doesn't mean it was false. It doesn't mean that it was deliberate. It means that.

Morgan: What?! Now wait a minute. If you put out a false statement, then it's false, it's wrong. It's both of those things.

Wasserman Schultz: But you're suggesting that it's ? Piers, what you're suggesting is that it was somehow deliberate.

Yeah Debbie, they really thought it was a protest.

[tarran]

Try getting an obamabot to admit the president lied. They can't. I usually use their whole thing about not prosecuting marijuana dispensary owners/operators who comply with state law.

I'm not a sadist like Episiarch, so I usually don't crucify them on the cross of cognitive dissonance too long, but it's quite entertaining. It's as if they would rather dip their genitals in gasoline than admit that the one is liar.

[benji]

I'm sure she was right there arguing that Bush was just wrong about WMD, it wasn't a lie. It just turned out to be wrong and they were relying on the information they had at the time.

[T]

I understand Poodlehead's point. If somebody feeds you bullshit, and you repeat it in the mistaken belief that it's true, you aren't lying. But to seriously argue a lack of mendaciousness in this case is pretty hard, unless you're a complete knee-biting hack like Poodlehead. Everybody and their poodle knew it was a terrorist attack well before Rice went on TV spouting her bullshit. And if the SecState didn't know that when she opened her yapper, she needs to fire everybody at State who is responsible for telling her what's happening. If I had gotten sandbagged like that when my staff knew what was going on, I would have had heads on pikes outside of my office.

[Drake]

In Debbie's defense, she is too stupid to understand the questions or the DNC talking points she was handed.

[R C Dean]

It was wrong, and they knew it was wrong when they said it.

Everybody now knows the whole "video protest" thing was wrong. After the hearing yesterday, we now know that they knew it was wrong while there were peddling it.

[benji]

Like Fast and Furious though it wasn't anyone at the top, this was all the fault of some minor analyst or something.

[John]

Even if you take her at her word, I think it makes them look worse. She is saying that we had an ambassador murdered in a terrorist attack and the Administration was too incompetent to even understand that it was an attack.

I think they are better off admitting they lied.

[R C Dean]

In a way, its almost a drawback that this was such a massive clusterfuck. Its three scandals in one, so that its hard to focus on any one of them without getting distracted by another:

(1) The refusal to provide security or recognize the threat.

(2) The lying about the attack itself.

(3) (The so-far under-reported one): the complete and utter failure to respond in any way whatsoever.

[The Late P Brooks]

which wars has Obama kept us out of?

None, actually. But it grieves him.

[The Late P Brooks]

Piers, what you're suggesting is that it was somehow deliberate.

Deliberate obfuscation, coming from the White House?

Iposserous!

[Brett L]

Haha. Politicians are tools. "Pro-life" Republican got his mistress an abortion. Its funny how people are so pro-life until their life (or their sister's, kid's,etc.) is the one that's about to be inconvenienced by that little clump of cells. I hope this dude gets sent home to live his miserable life somewhere that isn't DC. We've got enough hypocrites and philanderers, thanks.

[John]

that is our entire political class. Rules are for the little people. They all love the drug war but did drugs when they were young and so forth.

[Restoras]

I have always been a bit skeptical of guys who claim to be pro-abortion. Mostly I think they just want to have an out in case they knocked someone up.

[Proprietist]

Besides sick eugenicists, who claims to be pro-abortion?

[Eduard van Haalen]

"Nobody is *for* abortion!"

Of course not. But plenty of people are in favor of legalizing abortion, subsidizing abortion, requiring companies to provide abortifacient drugs to their employees, establishing "bubble zones" and other restrictions on free speech so as to limit prolife protests, and against informed-consent laws for abortion which they would support for many other consumer transactions.

But nobody is pro-abortion. That is simply a myth.

[Coeus]

I am pro-abortion. If you're even considering it, there's probably a damn good reason why.

[Pudgeboy]

Is this a joke?

[Red Rocks Rockin]

I have always been a bit skeptical of guys who claim to be pro-abortion. Mostly I think they just want to have an out in case they knocked someone up.

In fairness, this applies for women who are pro-abortion as well.

Look at the rhetoric, and for most, their motivation has very little to do with "personal freedom" as a general principle, and a lot more to do with the fact that the kid would put a serious crimp in their adolescent self-indulgence.

[Azathoth!!]

A decade ago.

Please.

If it'd been last week, it'd be a story, as it is, it's the story that he probably tells as his 'come to Jesus' moment.

[Jumbie]

OT: JURY DUTY QUESTION.

I've looked at the list of upcoming cases that I am likely to sit for as in my jury duty stint.

Almost no drug cases which would be clear-cut for jury nullification on my part. A whole lot of 'carnal knowledge of a child under 15 or under 16' cases though. That wording indicates consensual sex.

So I was wondering how you guys view these cases under the ambit of Jury nullification. If you think that there was no harm done would you vote to nullify?

It's all academic since this country (Guyana) doesn't recognise nullification, but I was curious about how the principle was viewed in such icky situations.

[John]

All depends on the circumstances and the difference in age. If it is a 19 year old kid with a clearly intelligent and consenting 14 year old girl, I would nullify in a heartbeat. If the minor is mentally handicapped or if the adult is old enough to not be hanging around with teenagers, I would fry them.

[Matrix]

but she's so mature for her age!

[John]

They don't call it jail bait for nothing. To me that gets a teenager or someone young enough to still be hanging out with 18 year old girls off. As far as old guys, I have the same sympathy for them that I do when these people on Animal Planet who play with Gaboon vipers get bit. If you are 40, there is a whole universe of obviously legal women for you to mess with. If you choose to risk it by hanging out with 18 year old girls, too bad.

[tarran]

Sure. Look, if you feel the guy shouldn't go to jail, vote to acquit.

The whole idea of having a jury is to absolve the state of responsibility, by putting the punishment/freedom decision in the hands of people outside the state.

So it's your call. If they tell you that you have no choice but to convict, then they are using you as a patsy and the moral (if risky) thing to do is to refuse to go along with the charade.

[benji]

Depends on the exact details but I mostly want to make this about me by also lamenting I just got called for jury duty.

[R C Dean]

So I was wondering how you guys view these cases under the ambit of Jury nullification.

Jury nullification is just jurors voting their conscience. If you don't think the defendant should be punished for what he did, vote to acquit.

[Proprietist]

Camille Paglia obliterates the Democratic Party and Obama, ditches for Green Party, praises Mark Levin and the right-wing critics of the police state over the Left, blasts the idea that government can spend its way out of recession. Good stuff...

http://www.salon.com/2012/10/1.....ng_images/

[John]

Paglia is smart as hell and actually has principles. One of my favorite day time fantasies is being some internet billionaire and buying the New York Times and making it into a real newspaper. I would immediately fire the entire editorial staff. But I wouldn't want to make it into a conservative hack rag. I would just want to hire intelligent people from all points of view. Finding them from the liberal point of view is well neigh impossible. I would pretty much have to make Paglia and the chick who writes Fire Dog Lake offers they couldn't refuse.

[T]

Yeah, Paglia's a little nuts but sharp as hell. You may not agree with her, but she will make a good case and make you think.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

Greenwald would be a good lefty addition as well.

[John]

Only if he was allowed to just write on civil liberties and nothing on the economy, politics or especially Israel.

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