NSA Continues Defending Surveillance, Judge Allows Defendant to Demand Federal Phone Records, Turkey Blames Protests on Social Media: P.M. Links

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  Credit: AMERICANVIRUS / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

  NSA officials claim its broad surveillance efforts have prevented 50 terrorist attacks in 20 countries. Meanwhile, the FBI is seeking the public's help in trying to solve an actual bombing that happened in 2008 at a Times Square armed forces recruiting center.

• A judge has ordered the federal government to respond to a request by a robbery case defendant of any NSA phone records connected to him in order to possibly prove his innocence.
• G-8 leaders, faced with the stern, uncooperative visage of Vladimir Putin, have called for peace talks in Syria without demanding President Bashar al-Assad's ouster.
• Turkey's government is responding to protests over its authoritarian behavior by trying to control social media and giving police more power.
• A National Council on Teacher Quality report has described America's system of teaching teachers as an "industry of mediocrity" and recommends, among other things, tougher standards on who is accepted into programs to become a teacher.
• Russia's near-visceral dislike of the gays continues apace as lawmakers approve a ban on adoptions by foreign same-sex couples.

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Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

NSA officials claim its broad surveillance efforts have prevented 50 terrorist attacks in 20 countries.

Nice, round numbers. I like it.

[Warty]

NED: How many men you killed, kid?
KID: Five.
NED: (disbelieving) How many?
KID:(angry) Five. I done killed five of them. That's including the Mexican, he done come at me with a knife.

[Redmanfms]

Yeah, except ol' Schofield comes clean.

Who wants to place bets on finding out that it was only one terrorist attack that was actually an FBI entrapment scheme?

[Mandy66y]

Start working at home with Google! It's by-far the best job Ive had. Last Monday I got a new Alfa Romeo from bringing in $7778. I started this 9 months ago and practically straight away started making more than $83 per hour. I work through this link, http://www.Bling6.com

[gaijin]

Nice, round numbers. I like it.

Well, it is more precise than 'dozens'.

[AuH20]

That whole fucking hearing was vomit worthy. But I think the most galling part was how now, NSA agents are considered the moral equivalent of soldiers. The Congressmen and women were falling all over themselves to praise the hardworking, heroic, amazing, tireless, and brilliant NSA agents who work so hard every day to keep our nation safe.

And, seriously, this happened:

Rep. Devin Nunes, R-California, brought up other controversies plaguing the Obama administration?the IRS scandal, "Fast and Furious," Justice Department leak investigations, and the U.S. consulate attack in Benghazi?and asked NSA officials to offer assurance that the agency is not leaking information itself.

Responding, Alexander said all the information the NSA disseminates is "100% auditable" and they have "not seen one of our analysts willfully do something wrong." The only mistakes he has seen are "honest mistakes," listing a typo as an example.

That's from CNN. Yes, the NSA agents are so awesomely better than us, so amazingly TOP MEN, that their worst mistakes are typos.

If the American people buy one second of this bullshit, they deserve everything they get from the government.

[Mike M.]

I've banged fifty supermodels in my lifetime. Unfortunately, I can't divulge any of their names.

[generic Brand]

Mike M. is dunphy?

[Thane-kin]

No, dunphy banged fifty supermodels after he heroically saved them from dogs

[Irish]

Before or after the surfing competition at which all the women gathered had spontaneous orgasms due to the Dunphmeister's surftastic abilities?

[Thane-kin]

At the same time. Duh.

[AuH20]

He was also curling a 250 lb kettle bell in his other arm.

[Rrabbit]

dunphy banged fifty supermodels after he heroically saved them from their own dog

[Atanarjuat]

By shooting it, I presume?

[Enough About Palin]

50 in 20 countries?? How many terrorist attacks HAVE there been in all of those countries (which one would think would include Iraq and Afghanistan). It's likely 50 would be little more than a rounding error.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

Wilt Chamberlain's numbers had more credibility.

[CE]

Did I say 50 attacks in 20 countries? I meant 80 attacks in 30 countries! Yeah, that's the ticket.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

G-8 leaders, faced with the stern, uncooperative visage of Vladimir Putin, has called for peace talks in Syria without demanding President Bashar al-Assad's ouster.

That's what the illuminati want us to think.

[Tim]

The Russians aren't about to see their number one sand source go down.

[PapayaSF]

Tartus naval facility.

[Fist of Etiquette]

...peace talks in Syria without demanding President Bashar al-Assad's ouster.

So, then, everybody wins!

[Matrix]

New Mexico woman unmasks robber to find it was her grandson
Wow... what a POS this guy is.

[Brandon]

Has he gotten his picture with McCain yet?

[NeonCat]

He would have gotten away with it if it weren't for his meddling grandma!

[Red Rocks Rockin]

Christ, he couldn't rifle through her wallet while she was asleep like any other deadbeat grandson?

[CE]

New Mexico? He's lucky his grandma didn't shoot him.

[Matrix]

Congresscritters promoting SHIELD Act to protect electrical grid from EMPs

[PapayaSF]

Every now and then, they do something worthwhile.

[AuH20]

Yeah, except the act actually authorizes them to create the agency from The Avengers

[Thane-kin]

And an invisible flying aircraft carrier thing?

[BiMonSciFiCon]

I'm for it if Sam Jackson is in charge.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

Posh Ottawa neighbourhood deporting squirrels across border into Quebec

[Fist of Etiquette]

They should try deporting those extra u's in their words.

[Mad Scientist]

I'm trying to catch them all and bring them to Quebec because they can't cross the bridge, eh.

Stories like this remind me that the U.S. does not have a monopoly on dumb ideas.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

Go home men's fashion, you're drunk

[Apatheist ?_??]

Ok, I wouldn't wear that outfit in picture 3 but I'd wear either the shorts or the the top as a t-shirt.

[PapayaSF]

Gosh, from those outfits you'd never guess that most fashion designers are gay....

[Fist of Etiquette]

Turkey's government is responding to protests over its authoritarian behavior by trying to control social media and giving police more power.

Have they tried data mining social media and giving police more power first?

[Archduke Pantsfan]

The trend is even more advanced in the US.

[BigT]

European homes are smaller, hence more difficult to fit in magnificent 90-inch TV's. Don't watch hockey without one.

[Irish]

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2013.....ith a Gun'

story in Ms. Magazine might be fake.

According to this bio, Yewman lives in Washington state. But Ms. Yewman's experience obtaining a concealed carry permit does not exactly match the regulations in Washington state. The concealed carry fee in Washington State is $52.50, not the $56.50 that Yewman states. In Washington state, applicants must undergo a background check separate from the background check they undergo when they purchase a firearm, which by regulation can take up to 30 days, not the seconds it takes to undergo a NICS check at the point of sale. Yewman mentions the second background check but states that she got the permit quickly, with no mention of any wait at all. That's possible, but the fee doesn't match. Also, wait times have been skyrocketing in Washington state this year. Concealed carry hopefuls tend to have to wait as long as two months everywhere but King County, which is first-come-first-serve. If you catch the courthouse there, or the Seattle police, on a good day, you won't have to wait more than about 45 minutes. Maybe Yewman researched deeply enough to know that, or got lucky.

[Irish]

That was a majestic SFing. I also think it was my first.

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2013.....-blanks/2/

[Zakalwe]

Nothing SF related can ever be majestic.

[SugarFree]

Lies. My balls are as majestic as three eagles fucking.

[hamilton]

"Three Eagles Fucking" would be an awesome name for a Native American or, alternatively, a metal band.

[Tonio]

And someday, young paduan, you will learn how to embed a linky in whatever text you want.

[Irish]

I do that all the time, man. I just messed up this once. Just this once.

[BigT]

Sure it wasn't one of your rogue assistants in Cincinnati?

[Art Vandelay]

By my count, you've SF'd 50 links in 20 countries.

/NSA

[BuSab Agent]

+1 Data Collection Center

[General Butt Naked]

I didn't know she was in WA. Dang, I would of called bullshit. I figured she was in AZ or VT and didn't actually have to wait for a carry license.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

From the "That's some fine police work, Lou" files.

Bound and decapitated Tulsa Man's Death was a suicide

Uh, yeah. His brother was accidentally killed when he fell down an elevator shaft onto some bullets, too.

[Enough About Palin]

Based on the scant info, it's possible. Hanging can decapitate a person. Think Saddam Hussein.

[PapayaSF]

And it's not unknown for someone to plan their suicide in a way to make it look like murder.

[Eduard van Haalen]

I thought this was the punch line to a joke: "Did the deceased decapitate himself before or after tying himself up?"

[Pro Libertate]

"Industry of mediocrity." This is why we are failing. We now aim for the mediocre. Naturally, we achieve it.

[Fist of Etiquette]

It's education failures all the way down.

[Pro Libertate]

An excellent foundation for reality.

[playa manhattan]

"Industry of mediocrity" is pretty generous by most standards...

[gaijin]

Interestingly, no school got an 'A' in the rankings. Only THE Ohio State University got a 3.5. Lotsa schools got 0. I'd like to see a costs plotted against a schools their ranking.

[gaijin]

the fuck?
* I'd like to see a schools costs plotted against their ranking.

[mad libertarian guy]

"Industry of mediocrity." This is why we are failing. We now aim for the mediocre. Naturally, we achieve it.

And only just barely.

[Thane-kin]

Serious question: what is so bad about Chris Christie?

Before anybody goes crazy, this is not "I like Christie, why do you all have to be so mean to him, MY FEEEELZ". I don't pay attention to him so I really don't know.

[Palin's Buttplug]

He is a moderate. The GOP likes real wingnut Bible-beaters who make the Jerry Falwells of the country swoon.

[Enough About Palin]

Thane-kin| 6.18.13 @ 4:33PM |#|?|filternamelinkcustom

Serious question: what is so bad about Chris Christie?

Before anybody goes crazy, this is not "I like Christie, why do you all have to be so mean to him, MY FEEEELZ". I don't pay attention to him so I really don't know.
reply to this
Palin's Buttplug| 6.18.13 @ 4:42PM |#|?|filternamelinkcustom

He is a moderate. The GOP likes real wingnut Bible-beaters who make the Jerry Falwells of the country swoon.
reply to this
Reply to Comment

Is Thane-kin PB's sockpuppet?

[Thane-kin]

I should cock-punch you for that.

[jesse.in.mb]

Go on...

[Thane-kin]

I have a comment below about Warty flailing his dong about, if you like.

[MP]

The OMG JERZY SHORE GIVE US $$$ WE

[MP]

fucking squirrels...GIVE US PREVIEW BACK

Anyhow...

The OMG JERZY SHORE GIVE US $$$ WE HEART OBAMA bullshit really left a bad taste in my mouth.

[Fist of Etiquette]

His actions suggest he's a statist with no regard for property rights, gun rights, pretty much individual rights.

[Hash Brown]

This. He showed promise early on, when he wrassled with the teachers' union, but he's since shown his true, statist colors.

[Art Vandelay]

Well, sure. But BESIDES that.

I mean, how did he score on the Libertarian Buttplug Test?

[PapayaSF]

As discovered by another commenter here (IIRC jesse.in.mb), preview doesn't work for you because you have an email address associated with your handle. Change your account settings to delete the email and preview works correctly. Weird but true.

Another weird thing (at least for me): under the box to reply at the end of a thread, there are styled buttons for preview and submit (in that order) aligned flush right. But click on "reply to this" under a comment, and the buttons are unstyled, flush left, and in the other order. The Kocktupus may need to cough up a little extra web design dough.

[Thane-kin]

The Kocktupus may need to cough up a little extra web design dough.

Hey, child slaves can only accomplish so much.

[PapayaSF]

And even with preview, I misspelled "Kochtopus".... *SIGH*

[General Butt Naked]

Serious question: what is so bad about Chris Christie?

He's a fat piece of shit that laps at Dear Leader's festering cunt for doggy treats and so that he can get on the teevee. Any person that would deny me the right to defend myself can set themselves afire on pay-per-view and I'd take out a loan to watch.

I hope that fat fuck loses his fat fucking feet to the diabetes he'll inevitably acquire.

Fuck Christie.

[Palin's Buttplug]

You're not one of those idiots who thinks Christie cost Romney the election, are you?

Romney never had a chance and the good polls reflected it.

[General Butt Naked]

What the fuck are you on about now? You can fucking join him for all I care.

[CE]

I blame his selection of Paul Ryan for VP. COuldn't carry Wisconsin and it cost him Florida. Should have gone with someone from Ohio or Florida who didn't scare old people.

[MP]

"he'll inevitably acquire"

You're forgetting he's been surgically altered. He'll be lean and mean in no time.

[General Butt Naked]

He'll eat his way out of that shit. It requires more discipline then just getting the surgery.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

My cousin got it a couple years ago, lost a shit-ton of weight at first, and is now nearly back to what he was before the surgery.

Despite his protestations, I suspect that he thought it would be a quick fix and that it wouldn't be a complete lifestyle change. He could probably drop a good chunk of the weight off, but he doesn't have the inclination to work out on a regular basis.

[gaijin]

yes, Butt, how do you really feel about him? 🙂

[Rebekah]

I'd say his price controls anti-gouging policies during Sandy are pretty deserving of contempt for anyone with a passing understanding of economics, if being from Jersey isn't enough for you.

[Drake]

Christie's the best Governor we are going to get here in NJ. But - he certainly is not a small government conservative.

He's been a lawyer, a lobbyist, and a District Attorney - so pretty much a ward of the state his entire adult life.

[Rich]

A judge has ordered the federal government to respond to a request by a robbery case defendant of any NSA phone records connected to him in order to possibly prove his innocence.

"Got your 'response' right here!"

[John]

Some defense attorney friends and I were talking about this. This is a valid claim.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Yeah, the claim is valid, however it's pointless. Assuming that the NSA does in fact have data that definitively places him in a different location, they aren't going to turn that over. With no way for the defense to actually go through their giant database, all they have to do is deny having any data on his whereabouts. Good luck proving otherwise.

[Pro Libertate]

YOUR REQUEST IS DENIED. NATIONAL SECURITY.

[gaijin]

haha. The dweebs testifying today used the term 'egregious' about a dozen times to describe the light that was shined on their cockroach motel.

[Pro Libertate]

MUST PREVENT ANOTHER PEARL HARBOR.

[JW]

It turns out that the suspect has South African heritage.

YOUR DENIAL IS DENIED. DIPLOMATIC OVERRIDEMENT.

[Pro Libertate]

NATIONAL SECURITY TRUMPS ALL OTHER LAWS, MORALS, ETHICAL CODES, AND GUIDANCE PROVIDED BY MISS MANNERS.

[JW]

Sorry, but I'm using the Chewbacca Defense.

OVERRULED.

[Pro Libertate]

You know nothing about the law. National security trumps all known codes of ethics, morals, law, and religion. Even the Bible must submit to the needs of national security. That's why the Romans killed Jesus, you know--national security.

[JW]

You fool, this is not THE Chewbacca Defense. This has nothing to do with Endor.

It's that I get to rip your arms out of your sockets when I lose.

[Pro Libertate]

Well, in this scenario, that defense is strictly limited to the government, not to little people like you and me.

[CE]

You can't have 100 percent security and 100 percent privacy. -- Barack Obama

Uh, we never asked for 100 percent security.

[gaijin]

the claim is valid, however it's pointless.

I agree, though for different reasons. I think the NSA will claim this court has no jurisdiction over what they do. Oh, and also because FYTW.

[John]

It is not pointless. If the NSA doesn't turn it over, the case must be dismissed. The government can't withhold Brady evidence.

[Pro Libertate]

They'll turn it over, all right. It will be black with the following word: REDACTED.

[Hash Brown]

Or, more precisely, REDACTED FYTW

[Gray Ghost]

Haven't RTFA, but who's prosecuting him? If the state (as opposed to the Feds) why is the federal government obligated to provide evidence in a state criminal hearing? They aren't prosecuting him.

Now, if it's a federal case, I see your point.

[Gray Ghost]

Further, does Brady impose an obligation on the prosecution to investigate in order to develop potentially exculpatory evidence? I get that, if they have the evidence, ethically they must disclose, but are they obligated to go looking for it?

[Agammamon]

The computer says no.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

Cat goes fishing

[Zakalwe]

"We're gonna need any kind of boat."

[Brett L]

Florida Man, terrible supervillain, unlucky in love.

A Florida man says that a first dated [sic] ended with him being beaten, forced to strip at gun point, robbed and then left in a cow pasture.

[Clich? Bandit]

Jeebus that Florida Man has problems.

[Killazontherun]

She gave him a night he will always remember. If I was him, I would be putting out want ads to get her back.

[PapayaSF]

Always a bad sign when a woman shows up for a first date with two other dudes.

[NeonCat]

How the war on drugs hurt the American asparagus industry.

Good article.

http://nowiknow.com/the-war-on-asparagus/

[T]

So obviously, we need to subsidize the American asparagus grower to make up for the harm caused by subsidizing the Peruvian grower. That's how it works, right?

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

tougher standards on who is accepted into programs to become a teacher

Are there...any standards for this at this point? I thought it was like specifically a study track for morons.

[John]

Yes,

You have to have the ability to tow the union lion.

[Brett L]

an "industry of mediocrity"

And like a copy of a copy, teachers go out and become mediocricies of mediocrity.

[Irish]

Education majors have some of the best grades of any major, despite coming into college with some of the lowest test scores.

Truly, teachers are our greatest natural resource.

[Pro Libertate]

As scams go, it's a doozy.

I worked with a PhD in some hard science, don't remember which, and he told me that he respected all terminal degrees, even law, with one exception: Education. This coming from an academic.

[Brett L]

Yeah. Chem III was my favorite class. You had ChemE's taking it as an easy chem elective and science ed majors for whom it would be the hardest class in college. Seriously, the half of the class on average, median, and deviation nearly broke them. The prof, bless him, reviewed that test individually with every person. Mine was, "good job, looks like you did the arithmetic wrong on this one problem." The person before me was in there for 30 minutes.

[Auric Demonocles]

This just shows how good the teachers we have teaching future teachers are.

[Pro Libertate]

Ah, pre-teach.

[Killazontherun]

With apologies to the late Ms. Huston, 'I believe teachers are the future, and because of that we are so fucked.'

[Sidd Finch]

education majors ? teachers

[Irish]

Yes, but I would assume that there is a large degree of overlap.

[Sidd Finch]

Not really. Less than half of education majors ever teach. And a lot of teachers that need to be smart (AP and stuff) weren't education majors.

[PapayaSF]

Is it because all the extra education majors just become school administration bloat?

[Heroic Mulatto]

^^^^THIS IN SPADES^^^^^

[Sidd Finch]

I think those people teach for a few years and get some bullshit masters like Education Administration.

Most of the ed majors who never teach were there for a MRS degree, too dumb to pass the tests, or student-taught and didn't like it.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

From the comments:

In any event, I can only reflect on the high quality teachers I have had and my children have had that totally refutes this attempt to denigrate the teaching profession.

This is amusing, because I can count on one hand the number of "high quality" teachers I had during my formative years. Most were merely average and I had quite a few that were effectively worthless (e.g., coaches who spent class time writing up game plans for the cross-county rival instead of teaching).

You know why people gush about the great teachers they had 20 or more years after graduating high school? It's because, like any profession, they stood out against a sea of mediocrity.

[Mad Scientist]

And don't forget, those great teachers would never be able to find any work if the education system were privatized.

[Pro Libertate]

They were generally mediocre back when I was in K-12, in the 70s and 80s. I can only imagine how much worse they are now. My kids rarely praise their teachers.

[John]

surveillance efforts have prevented 50 terrorist attacks in 20 countries. Meanwhile, the FBI is seeking the public's help in trying to solve an actual bombing that happened in 2008 at a Times Square armed forces recruiting center.

But they have all of these magical algorithms that can totally find terror plots.

[Rich]

"We never claimed it was a perfect law, uh, algorithm!"

[MP]

And zero effort given to the question "well, what advantage did PRISM give that an individualized warrant would not have?"

[Pro Libertate]

To be fair, the NSA and the FBI are blood enemies. They have a code of honor and hate that you just don't understand. Though they are unified in their hate of the CIA.

[John]

That is true. It is not like the NSA would ever share any information they have.

[Pro Libertate]

I mean, why would they?

I liked the NSA better when no one knew it existed.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

Chinese efficiency

[PapayaSF]

The guy can't drive a scooter, either.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Russia's near-visceral dislike of the gays continues apace as lawmakers approve a ban on adoptions by foreign same-sex couples.

Foreign vodka-swilling couples? Ochen horosho.

[Tonio]

You know who else didn't like the gays?

[BiMonSciFiCon]

Barack Obama?

[hamilton]

Bill Clinton?

[Zakalwe]

Lucille Bluth?

[Archduke Pantsfan]

Pete Campbell?

[Numeromancer]

King Edward the Longshanks?

[GILMORE]

A nice headline pair @ Reuters today

United States to meet Taliban to seek Afghan peace

'Taliban is ready to talk peace' with Afghan state: Afghan official

http://www.reuters.com/article.....OA20130618

Two Afghan children beheaded in separate incidents

http://www.reuters.com/article.....J420120831

An adolescent boy and a young girl have been beheaded in two separate incidents in Afghanistan, local officials and police said on Friday, in the latest brazen attacks that have raised fresh questions about a splintering Taliban.

A 12-year-old boy was kidnapped and killed in southern Kandahar province on Wednesday, his severed head placed near his body to send a warning to police, said provincial governor spokesman Jawid Faisal.

Encouraging developments in the Just War abound!

[Matrix]

maybe if the locals starting doing this with suspected Taliban members, they would fuck off.

[BigT]

An eye for an eye. That's the [uncivilized] spirit.

[Matrix]

Well, barbarians sometimes only respond in such a way. You can't just sit back and ask them not to do it anymore. Unless you make them fear you, they will keep it up.

[Thane-kin]

I haven't read the whole piece yet, but I liked this line:

He contributes to the website LewRockwell.com, the eponymous fever swamp of Lew Rockwell, who is widely suspected of having written Ron Paul's racist newsletters.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Someone does not appear to be aware of Lysander Spooner. I'm so shocked!

[Thane-kin]

The anti-Lincolnites hate that the North instituted a progressive income tax; they never bother to complain that the Confederacy did the same. They hate that Lincoln suspended habeas corpus; they never note that Jefferson Davis did, too. They hate that the North resorted to a draft; they don't care that the Confederacy also had one. They hate that Lincoln fought a war against his countrymen; it evidently never occurs to them that Jefferson Davis shot back (let alone that he fired the first shot).

Anti-Lincoln == pro-Confederacy?

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

I mean, what about people who hate Lincoln because he destroyed even the thinnest veneer that the US has the consent of the governed? How can people who even believe remotely in a social contract not think the Civil War destroyed it?

[John]

I mean, what about people who hate Lincoln because he destroyed even the thinnest veneer that the US has the consent of the governed?

But that is just totally not true. I would take the government of 1870 over what we have now in a heartbeat. All of the things that people blame Lincoln for, Lincoln either didn't do or stopped happening after the war was over.

It was TR and Wilson who started the real damage. The weird hatred of Lincoln I will never understand.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

If you can't secede, you can't consent. By acting like secession was simply a nonoption, he absolutely voided any idea that the US has the consent of the governed.

[John]

I blame the South for that. They are the ones who tied the idea of succession to the preservation of slavery. If it hadn't been for the South, secession wouldn't have gotten such a bad name.

[sgs]

"I blame the South for that. They are the ones who tied the idea of succession to the preservation of slavery. If it hadn't been for the South, secession wouldn't have gotten such a bad name."

None of that invalidates her point or makes your point correct.

That's another of your typical non-answer answers.

[sgs]

And honestly, your entire premise there is retarded, the Civil War occurred because of Lincoln, yet you're moronically blaming it on the south choosing to leave.

Newsflash, if Lincoln had let them leave the Civil War never would have happened.

That puts it on Lincoln, whether you like it or not.

[The Immaculate Trouser]

Then that goes double for the slaves who couldn't secede from the South.

Even if you believe that a state can unilaterally consent to a course of action on behalf of its citizens, the South could not truly have consented without consulting a third of its populace.

Lastly, not all forms of secession are legitimate. Secession engaged in in order to oppress other human beings is not legitimate, which is why force used against robbers, rapists, and their like is considered legitimate in libertarian thought.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

If it were up to me, every single individual would secede, separately, from every political body. I'm not going to apologize for the south, but I strongly believe that Lincoln's desire to preserve the Union completely destroyed the possibility of any future secession for any possible reason, to the point where it is literally unthinkable for most people in this country, and that if you cannot secede, you cannot consent.

[CE]

Everything the government now does it does without the consent of two thirds of its populace, the non-voters.

[CE]

And half of the third who do vote are pissed at every decision the government makes.

[T]

If teh Confederacy still existed or had a successor state, I'd be more than happen to discuss it's failings. But I don't spend much time on the anti-liberty policies of the Carthaginians, either, because Scipio Aemilianus made that point moot.

[Irish]

This is yet another reason I hate Lew Rockwell. We get tarred as being crazy because a nutcase like Lew Rockwell calls himself a libertarian.

Rockwell will write paeans to dictators provided the U.S. hated them enough. Hardly strikes me as something a libertarian would do.

[Thane-kin]

+1 newsletter

[CE]

Lew Rockwell rocks. He's actually quite reasonable. Some of the people who write on his site are pretty far out there, but Lew Rockwell himself is very moderate for an anarchist.

[Brandon]

It's ad hominems all the way down.

[CE]

"Widely suspected" taking the place of "rumored on the Internet with no proof whatsoever, based purely on guess work".

[Archduke Pantsfan]

From 1528: Studies on the Proportions of the Female Body by Albrecht Durer

[hamilton]

Coming soon: Sports Illustrated: the Etchings Issue

[Warty]

What the fuck is going on with that bitch's gunt? Did she have vulvular rickets?

[NeonCat]

It was a dark and terrible time. Just check out any back issue of Early Modern Wenches.

[Fist of Etiquette]

I wonder what her ye olde BMI is.

[The Immaculate Trouser]

Penis Snatching on the Rise

Shockingly, it's not a Jezebel article.

[Pro Libertate]

Wow, I just struck a whole continent from my travel wish-list in less than a second.

[Zakalwe]

But I'm so tired of abortion articles, too!

[jesse.in.mb]

I feel like penis snatching should be easily verifiable.

She's a witch!

[Fist of Etiquette]

Are they at least leaving a vajayjay in its place?

[BigT]

As best I could reconstruct from witness accounts, the stranger had stopped to purchase a cup of tea at the market. After handing over the money, she clasped the vendor's hand. The tea seller felt an electric tingling course through his body and immediately sensed that his penis had shrunk to a size smaller than that of a baby's.

Nancy Pelosi visits Africa!

[AuH20]

What should Zerlina Maxwell #AskPelsoi when she interviews her this weekend at Netroots Nation?

So far it is all proggies, but you might wanna pass the link on to your TEAM RED friends and family for some lulz.

http://tinyurl.com/ln2ptyr

Sorry for the tiny url usage. Damn squirrels. First link is Feministing, second is twitter.

[Tonio]

Sure they are, Goldie, sure...

[AuH20]

Damn it, Tonio, you caught me. I was just trying to lure you and jesse and Doctor Whom into watching gay pornography.

Curses!

Foiled again!

[jesse.in.mb]

I'm confused. Why would you want to distract me from one set of gay pornography to look at a different set of gay pornography?

[AuH20]

Wouldn't you like to know?

Mwahahahaha!

[SugarFree]

joe used to lecture me about my tone. Whiny little midget.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Meanwhile, the FBI is seeking the public's help in trying to solve an actual bombing that happened in 2008 at a Times Square armed forces recruiting center.

So, they're seeking the NSA's help then?

[Thane-kin]

You know, it feels a bit cheap picking on morons on tumblr, but still, this is insane.

Ooops, I guess I just tone-policed her.

[Brett L]

Holy shit. I think the internet may collapse upon itself.

[NeonCat]

She did use all caps, so we know she's serious.

[BiMonSciFiCon]

I sincerely hope all of those people are in high school. Someone posted a link this weekend to a tumblr dedicated to making fun of social justice warriors, and it was truly one of the more pathetic things I've ever read. Well, the tumblr was entertaining, the people he/she made fun of were pathetic.

[BiMonSciFiCon]

I sincerely hope all of those people are in high school. Someone posted a link this weekend to a tumblr dedicated to making fun of social justice warriors, and it was truly one of the more pathetic things I've ever read. Well, the tumblr was entertaining, the people he/she made fun of were pathetic.

[BiMonSciFiCon]

My first double post. F'ing squirrels. Get them to Quebec already.

[Fist of Etiquette]

I love all your comments but I really wish you wouldn't use the term "insane" either casually or seriously for that matter. It's a legal term with certain connotations for the mentally ill. I hope you realize what I mean.

[Apatheist ?_??]

DON'T TONE POLICE HIM FISTY.

[a better weapon]

Kill yourself?

[PapayaSF]

Instead, exhale while rapidly moving a horizontal finger up and down between your lips.

[Warty]

Until recently, I thought tumblr was just for porn. So it's for porn and angry feminists, I guess?

[PapayaSF]

Missy, I think I'm detecting some microaggression. Is it that time of the month?

[AuH20]

Juanita Diaz-Cotto lowers the average human IQ all by herself

I came from a poor, working-class, and very generous family. My father, grandmother, aunts, will take the shirt off their backs and give it to someone who needs it. Sharing is a big thing.

I don't understand having more than the basics that you need in your house, or the idea that it's everybody for themselves, because I wasn't raised like that. We are our brothers' and sisters' keepers. We were put here to look out for each other, and as I have grown older I have developed as a result of that. I was raised in Catholic schools, and I forgot all about it because I was too busy critiquing the Catholic Church. And now I've come back to the idea that all my work was informed by being guided by spirituality. Native Americans talk about ancestors. African Americans talk about ancestors. I don't talk about ancestors, but there have definitely been a lot of saints looking out for me, you know what I mean? There have been a lot of spiritual forces guiding my work and I only came to realize it after I had finished the work.

I'm older and I see how complicated life is. It's not just about white people oppressing us all the time. Or males oppressing us all the time. Because women oppress women. And blacks oppress blacks and Latinos oppress Latinos. Even though we don't control the system we still feed into it.

[AuH20]

Background: She's a sociology professor at SUNY-Binghampton who has taken issue with the current prison system. On that, she is totally right (wants to end the drug war, legalize outdoor drinking, legalize prostitution). But for such fucking retarded reasons. To wit:

Guernica: Have you ever felt any kind of tension between your roles as an activist and an academic?

Juanita Diaz-Cotto: Oh my god, I almost didn't finish my Ph.D. because I felt such a conflict between the two. Part of it was laziness and the other part was knowing all these people are being oppressed. Then I realized the leaders who I respected were professors and they were educated. At some point I said, "Mao was educated. Fidel Castro was educated." All the people I look up to, Marx and Engels, they were educated. And on top of it, they were European! So yes, I have that conflict. I have students who have that conflict now. They're activists and they've been facing the conflict of whether they should quit school to become activists.

I explain to them: No, because as an academic you can do everything. You have so much freaking free time to publish and to write and to organize the community. You can help document the community. You have so much privilege. You cannot quit academia. You can do it all.

[AuH20]

I mean...

Guernica: Can you do a little reimagining for me? What does a truly just and fair and equitable criminal justice system look like to you?

Juanita Diaz-Cotto: I've got to go back to The Communist Manifesto for that one. When we think about a communist or a socialist society, we're thinking about a society in which people have been educated enough, spiritually, to care about each other. To me, communism is very Christian. The ideals are very Christlike. We care enough about each other so we respect each other so we don't have to go hoard what we have.

[John]

To me, communism is very Christian

Nothing says "Christian" like trying to create paradise on earth without God.

These people are not even good Marxists anymore. The Marxists were evil but at least they were not retarded.

[AuH20]

I think that was my favorite line.

"To me, an ideology based on the rejection of religion is very religious."

If this woman had taken over the USSR instead of Stalin, it would have fallen apart in 6 months.

[Tejicano]

I would lay any money down on a wager that there probably were any number of people like her leading the Bolsheviks. Does the term "useful idiot" ring a bell? Freaking easy marks for people like Lenin or Stalin.

[PapayaSF]

Nothing says "Christian" like the spirituality of Marx and Mao.

[JW]

When we think about a communist or a socialist society, we're thinking about a society in which people have been educated enough, spiritually, to care about each other.

Or else.

[Ted S.]

Binghamton is not part of the Hamptons. It's a shithole in the Southern Tier.

[John]

My IQ dropped from just trying to read that. What the hell is she even saying?

[NeonCat]

Liberation Theology is where it's at, it seemed to me.

[PapayaSF]

Maybe 30 years ago.

[AuH20]

I honesjustly had the same response. Just stunningly, insanely, incredibly, unbelievably stupid. I want the US government to study this woman so we can weaponize her stupidity and use it against our enemies.

[gaijin]

Part of it was laziness...

it's a bigger part than she realizes

[Metazoan]

+workers of the world

[Pro Libertate]

I have an idea. We should make each person a slave to one other person.

[hamilton]

Dibs on Kate Upton.

[JW]

Aw man, I got Janice Dickinson.

[Pro Libertate]

As a slave or as a master?

[JW]

It's not going to to work out either way.

[Pro Libertate]

No one said this was going to be easy.

[JW]

This is all your stupid fault! You handle things on "toenails and anal bleaching" night!

[T]

You don't have enough coke, huh?

[JW]

Does anyone?

[Pro Libertate]

This is a question only you will be able to answer. That's like the old Indian practice of giving a white elephant to your greatest enemy.

[BelowTheRim]

+1 on the Janice Dickinson comment JW.

Not only funny, but self-deprecating at the same time.

When was the last time she was relevant?

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

I don't understand having more than the basics that you need in your house, or the idea that it's everybody for themselves, because I wasn't raised like that. We are our brothers' and sisters' keepers the slaves of strangers we associate with not freely, but because some other person we associate with not freely, but because of blood, created them.

FIFH

[Irish]

I'm older and I see how complicated life is. It's not just about white people oppressing us all the time. Or males oppressing us all the time. Because women oppress women. And blacks oppress blacks and Latinos oppress Latinos. Even though we don't control the system we still feed into it.

Okay, looks like she's on the verge of making a pretty important realization...

Then I realized the leaders who I respected were professors and they were educated. At some point I said, "Mao was educated. Fidel Castro was educated."

...and then she decides that dictators are totally cool and among her favorite leaders. How do these people get jobs.

[NeonCat]

Re: jobs

She went to the right (leftist) schools, says the right (leftist) things?

[AuH20]

Wil Wilkinson is on a role: He utterly takes apart the "Cost-benefit" reasoning behind fucking over the fourth ammendment

The thrust of this argument is simple: terrorism is such a minor threat to American life and limb that it's simply bizarre?just stupefyingly irrational and intellectually unserious?to suppose that it could even begin to justify the abolition of privacy rights as they have been traditionally understood in favour of the installation of a panoptic surveillance state. Would Americans give up their second-amendment rights if it were to save 3000 lives? Well, it would, but we won't. Surely the re-abolition of alchohol would save more than 3000 lives, but we're not about to discuss it. Why not? Because liberty is important to us and we won't sell it cheaply. Why should we feel differently about our precious fourth-amendment rights?

[Raston Bot]

Talking trade-offs is great fun with do gooders. My favorite is foreign aid to prevent AIDS vs childhood dehydration or milaria.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Rep. Burgess: Abortions Should Be Banned Because Male Fetuses Masturbate

http://livewire.talkingpointsm.....cause-male

[itsnotmeitsyou]

I'd think that was an argument FOR abortion. Those little bastards are already going to hell for touching themselves in an impure manner, no point in letting them be born so that they can continue to disrespect the Lord's Temple, just to go to hell anyway.

[Auric Demonocles]

Already a full post on it earlier this afternoon.

Well not quite a full post. It was missing alt-text.

[Coeus]

Marcotte want's to call men's rights activists bluff.

I suspect 2-3 men will take this offer a year if it becomes law. Maybe even a dozen! I think I can live with that! It's certainly worth taking this hypothetical out of the arsenal of "men's rights" activists who are just floating this hypothetical to establish their real argument, which is that child support is a ripoff and they shouldn't have to pay it to their ex-wives and the kids they deliberately brought into this world.

I think someone needs to tell her it's not a bluff. Most of her regulars are either furious or just positive that she's joking.

[AuH20]

Marcotte needs to listen to The Gambler some more.

When you have as few intellectual cards as she does, you need to be very careful about trying to call bluffs.

[Brett L]

it's time to deal with the largely imaginary plague of "forced fatherhood", i.e. women getting pregnant and carrying pregnancies to term against the father's wishes, and then suing him for child support. This happens occasionally, though compared to men trying to force women to get pregnant against their wills, it's so rare that it's comparable to shark attacks in its frequency.

Wait, uh, do we have access to completely inverted datasets?

[Coeus]

It's their standard tactic. Claim it doesn't exist, then when proof is shoved in their face enough times, claim it's such a statistically small occurrence that it's not even worth mentioning, then what that's refuted enough times, blame it on men being evil.

See: negging, false rape claims, domestic violence with the woman as the agressor, etc.

[AuH20]

You forgot the other favorite, borrowed from climate science: Claim that studies to the contrast of feminist orthodoxy are just "mansplaining" and therefore invalid.

[Warty]

"men's rights" activists (scare quotes because it's a phrase akin to "white pride" in its purpose and paranoia)

I don't particularly give a shit about the men's right movement, but this jumped out. What was she saying about paranoia, again?

[Irish]

The unnecessary parentheses also completely breaks the flow of that sentence. I realize that criticizing Amanda Marcotte for her inability to write is like criticizing the Hindenberg for its color scheme, but she could at least put some effort into quality control.

[PapayaSF]

Standard prog thinking. Just as women's rights trump everything and thus so-called "men's rights" are just a cover for sexism, minority rights also trump everything, and complaining about (e.g.) racial quotas that discriminate against whites must be paranoid.

[PapayaSF]

Also: There are feminist who argue against DNA paternity testing because it "removes the right of the women to name the father of her choice." And courts regularly uphold child support payments even after men prove they aren't the father of the kid. Would Marcotte be willing to support laws that mandate child support only with proof of paternity? Seems fair to me.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

God, I love/hate that she thinks this is a "bluff" and not something that would be actually fucking justice and only completely logical.

and the kids they deliberately brought into this world.

Cite? I don't even believe it's possible for a man to deliberately bring a kid into the world. Only the woman can choose that. It's always her fault.

[AuH20]

Y'know, I am kinda amazed that this argument is gaining traction. I tried making it many times to people at my very liberal liberal arts college just a few years ago.

...

It... did not go over well.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Not that I ever called them "paper abortions," but this is one of those things where I thought forever that everyone thought, "This should be the way this works" -- after all, it's only logical -- and found out that 99% of people thought I was totally out of my mind.

[Auric Demonocles]

I never really thought about it much before getting to college. Thinking about it for about 10 minutes got me to the conclusion that as long as abortions and child support existed, there should be some kind financial abortion available for men.

To my surprise, as in most of the discussions in that philosophy class, I ended up on my own in the debate.

[Gray Ghost]

I know the reason why it won't fly---the state ain't paying for anything it doesn't have to---but why not make it a presumption that the father is not on the hook for any child born outside of wedlock? Now, if he wants to voluntarily assume those rights (and responsibilities) have at it.

[After going to actually read the article.]

She's absolutely out of her mind if she thinks that only a few guys would take that bargain, even with her idiotic no-contact rules attached to it. What the hell is it with today's 'intellectual' discourse that someone can write something as glaringly, obviously wrong as her article, and not be laughed out of the room? Never mind that: how does she feed herself? Or not drown from looking up during a rainstorm?

Damn you all for inducing me to click the insanity that was her article.

[AuH20]

The idea has never really been that big, mostly because historically, the state/church had to take care of children born out of wedlock, as there weren't many economic opportunities for their mothers. The Church of England got especially pissy about this in the late 1700s, and made dudes pay up for the kids they sired out of wedlock.

Then again, there weren't abortions, latex condoms, or the Pill back then. So it shouldn't be that relevant today, but I think it may be where the cultural bias towards it comes from.

[Apatheist ?_??]

Well maybe Marcotte is coming to us Pro-lifers side and believes that the kid is brought into the world at conceptions. Probably not though, I really don't see how it is logical from the pro-choicer point of view.

That said, while a paper-abortion sounds logical in theory (from a pro-choice perspective) in practice it would have all kinds of shitty consequences in implementation. Wouldn't it encourage women to hide their pregnancies? Related to that, what time of pregnancy is the deadline for serving notice? Is that deadline tolled if the pregnancy is hidden? How do you prove it?

I'm sure it can be worked out but I'm also sure it would be abused.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

They talk about that a bit. Some of them want the guy to have to decide in time for the woman to also decide whether to have an abortion or not. But I've always thought men should be able to waive parental rights at any time. Or make you sign something at the beginning of the relationship waiving any rights to possible future children and indicating no desire for such, etc.

[Auric Demonocles]

Those problems are resolved by making it opt-in to fatherhood. If the women wants him to be on the hook, he needs to be notified by X date into the pregnancy (sometimes before she can no longer get the abortion). If she doesn't have it in writing that he's been served and accepted the rights and responsibilities, he's got the financial abortion. If he declines, he has the financial abortion. If he opts to decline rights and she gets an abortion after, he pays half the abortion cost.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Exactly, Auric, I was about to comment just to that effect. Fatherhood should be explicitly opt-in.

[Apatheist ?_??]

Well I think you opt-in when you put your p in her v but I'm not pro-choice.

An opt-in system still has all kinds of ways of being abused. I'm not saying it can't be worked out but any legal process created by the legislatures and courts is going to have issues and people abusing it.

[Auric Demonocles]

Focusing on "paper abortions" is a way to soften up an audience to the demands of men who want to foist all the responsibilities of child-rearing onto their exes while still getting to float in periodically to be the big hero who takes the kids to Disneyland once in awhile.

Which people seeking this "financial abortion" want to have anything to do with the kid? Isn't the whole point that you don't want the kid at all, and would prefer she get an abortion?

[AuH20]

Goddamnit, Auric, stop taking the stuffing out of Amanda's straw man. She needs that much kindling so that the flame will dwarf her stupidity.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Wow, she seriously is retarded. 2-3 men? REALLY!?

She thinks that making a law that would absolve men of any and all potential fathering duties would only be used 2 or 3 times a year.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Ok, seriously, my co-workers just wanted to know if I watched a funny cat video or something.

Amanda's obliviousness to reality is priceless. You know what would happen? Single women would be getting knocked up at unprecedented rates and never see a single dime from the fathers. If you told guys that they can go to the bar, pick up women, have unprotected sex, and then just sign a "paper abortion" if they knock the girl up, there would be a cheer that could be heard from space. Then, in about 9 months to a year, we'd have Amanduh writing another article about how slimy all these deadbeat dads are for signing away their parental rights.

*wipes tear from eye*

Thanks, Coeus. I needed that laugh.

[John]

What would happen is single women would be getting knocked up a lot less often. If having a child meant actually having to assume responsibility for it rather than sponging off of some man and or the state, single women would miraculously start finding the money for birth control or the will to close their legs.

[AuH20]

But I don't believe that these "paper abortions" (and damn do they need better branding on that) will absolve the state of responsibility, just the father.

As I typed that, I realized that I must be wrong, because the state would never let fathers off the hook if it was paying. Literally as I was typing it, gears in my brain were whirring, going, "Wait a second... no, no, that can't be right."

[John]

True. But if women had to bear the full consequences of getting pregnant, they would get pregnant a lot less often.

[itsnotmeitsyou]

Good point, both of you.

It would hinge completely on whether the state would still provide support. But, one of her conditions for the "law" is that they would receive a SS type stipend for being a single mom. If the state would provide that, and possibly other support, the rate of single mothers would skyrocket.

If the state would not offer any support to a woman who had a child under a "paper abortion", guys would still be cheering in the streets, but women would take more precautions like taking the pill or insisting on condom use.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Yeah, well that's part of what makes these people fucking retarded, too. It's called "waiving parental rights." There are already words for this shit.

[John]

Yup Nicki. And men do it all of the time. It allows their baby mama to get her new man to adopt her kids. You can't adopt without consent of both natural parents.

[Auric Demonocles]

I think it's not unreasonable for a man who gets one of these to still be on the hook for some costs.

Namely, half the cost of an abortion.

[Coeus]

Works for me. Hell, I'll spring for the whole thing. I'll even throw in a few transvaginal ultrasounds to sweeten the deal.

[Auric Demonocles]

It comes back to the idea that deciding to have a kid isn't a choice.

[Auric Demonocles]

That was the start of a comment somewhere else, then I decided to skip and just respond to Coeus. I apparently clicked on the "reply to this" spot twice. EDIT BUTTON!

The actual comment I wanted to make:

The funny thing is I actually wouldn't take advantage of a financial abortion, and would break up with any women who got an abortion over my objections.

[JW]

A National Council on Teacher Quality report has described America's system of teaching teachers as an "industry of mediocrity" and recommends, among other things, tougher standards on who is accepted into programs to become a teacher.

Being hawt and having a predilection for teenage boys should be among the new standards.

[Pro Libertate]

Should be? I dunno, the news the last few years would seem to indicate that they already are.

[JW]

That was just a beta program. It's ready for production!

[Pro Libertate]

Kids today. Teacher sex-toys and high-end computer games.

[Auric Demonocles]

Poor bastards. We promised them high-end teachers and computer game sex-toys.

[Pro Libertate]

Yeah, I know. Just like this stupid future to get it exactly backwards.

[The Immaculate Trouser]

Today's Deep Thought from Amanduh, courtesy of Catholics:

Man, Catholicism does weird shit to people's brains. It's funny that they call themselves "pro-life", when their tactics?obsessing over blood, fetishizing surgical pictures, sending scalpels in the mail?seems much, much closer to the habits of a serial killer.

Q: If a right-wing patriarchial oppressor ever hijacked Amanduh's blog to discredit feminists, would anyone notice?

[Mad Scientist]

Only Poe would know!

[John]

All of those people who are concerned about the genocide. It does weird things to their brains. Their obsession with blood, fetishing over violence, protesting and stuff.

The thing with Marcotte is what a victim she is of our education system and culture. At some point, she was probably a smart young girl. And thanks to various feminists in our education system in culture, her head has been filled with shit for so long she is not so stupid as to be beyond hope.

[Mad Scientist]

Don't let her off that lightly. To believe all that crap she had to actively participate in the downfall of her intellect.

[John]

True. She didn't exactly fight back. But still the people that taught her that shit and rewarded her for such stupidity bear some responsibility.

[Brett L]

Well, at least we know what's most effective, now.

[AuH20]

I love Amanda's hard on against Catholics, but it is easily explained. From her wiki:

Born in El Paso, Texas, Marcotte was raised in the small town of Alpine in the west of the state. She graduated from St. Edward's University in Austin, Texas with a degree in English literature.[8]

....

In 2008, Marcotte published her first book, It's a Jungle Out There: The Feminist Survival Guide to Politically Inhospitable Environments

For those of you who don't know, St. Edward's is a private Catholic college.

[John]

But it is in Austin. And it is hardly conservative. I think Marcotte just really really wanted to be a victim. Where she was didn't really matter. She was going to be a victim and write about it no matter what.

[AuH20]

John, you forget: To a True Progressive? like Amanda, having to spend even an hour in Texas on a layover is a visit to hell.

She grew up and went to school in Texas. Truly, she is a Martyr for the Progressive Cause.

[Gray Ghost]

For Chrissake, it's St. Eds. I.e., where you stash your brat when they want to attend college (in Austin!), you can afford private school, but they aren't smart enough to get into SMU or Southwestern University. Or UT, for that matter.

Not like she was going to Baylor or anything.

Hilarious. Her going to St Eds explains so much now. Is it still a gigantic party school? Admittedly, I'm basing this off a very low n of graduates I know.

[Thane-kin]

[not] smart enough to get into SMU or Southwestern University. Or UT, for that matter

wow

[Coeus]

Not like she was going to Baylor or anything.

Hehe. Baylor. Where the majority of the gay students are in seminary. Almost every southern baptist I know is denial of that fact. Seriously, seminary is like 1/3rd gay.

[The Immaculate Trouser]

It appears she also graduated with an English degree, which explains her elegant prose.

[John]

And her complete inability to make a rational argument.

[AuH20]

Nicole, don't YOU have an English degree?

Yes, I'm mostly riling you up over Amanda dishonoring your major.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Hells no I do not. God I can't imagine studying lit in an average American liberal arts college (not that I went to one of those either).

[AuH20]

I just kinda assumed because you were a copy editor and you fap to Moby Dick. World is full of surprises!

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

What I really fap to is Mardi.

[AuH20]

Nicole, did you just make the mistake of revealing your real name? On reason?

That is almost as bad a mistake as GOB regularly makes.

[Thane-kin]

It's a retweet

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

It was actually me tweeting at someone else.

[Thane-kin]

Ah, nvm.

Kids these days with their twitters and their bookfaces.

[mad libertarian guy]

Even in English there are different tiers of smart. Basically, everyone sees the medievalists as the smart ones as you have to do more than just bullshit your way through some shitty books, but have language skills (in grad school I had to know 3 dead languages, and have a passing familiarity with a 4th), and textual skills.

And the medievalists agree. Those studying 20th century American lit are fucking tools.

[Tejicano]

Oh no... I believe I may have grown up with one of her parents.

But then the late Richard Ramirez grew up in our neighborhood so I can still hold my head high.

[Raston Bot]

Another brew day come and gone. Two IPAs, one wheat/pils (back left carboy) that will be dry hopped with citra.

[kinnath]

For anyone that remembers. The beer and metheglin were big hits at last week when I was on vacation.

[Raston Bot]

Did you end up going with East Kent Goldings?

[kinnath]

1/2 oz Target @60 minutes
1 oz Challenger @15 minutes
1 oz EK Goldings at end of boil

IBU ~40

[Matrix]

Is it okay to drink when pregnant?
For the past couple of decades, the propaganda has been that there is absolutely no safe level of alcohol consumption when pregnant or nursing. We've survived thousands of years on it, and Europeans have never stopped the practice. But here in America... one drink of alcohol while pregnant, and you are LITERALLY WORSE THAN HITLER!

[Warty]

My sister-in-law only likes beer when she's pregnant. Her kids turned out just fine, thank you very much.

[AuH20]

Your sister... children...

Dear God, people, it is as I feared. There are babies being born with genetic material resembling Warty.

We all trained for this people. Execute Omega Scenario!

[Warty]

You are already too late. We are legion.

[JW]

World War W.

[AuH20]

There is no way the MPAA would ever let it near theaters.

Kind of like Warty himself.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

direct to DVD

[Thane-kin]

Can't it grace SyFy first?

[Bryan C]

"Industry of mediocrity." This is why we are failing. We now aim for the mediocre. Naturally, we achieve it.

We'd be a lot better off if we stopped buying into the self-congratulatory preening of the education industry. Actual K-12 level teaching really isn't that hard. One does not require "tougher standards" and special credentials to pass along reading, writing, basic math, etc. And, yet, colleges are swamped with students who must essentially take high school all over again in order to function at even the most basic level. That's not mediocrity, it's willful incompetence.

[Pro Libertate]

It's really bad now. I've met kids that are friends of my kids who are "A" students. Across the board. At "A" schools. And they are not even close to being smart.

[Coeus]

Another feminist take on "paper abortions"

This is great. What's the style of argumentation where you acknowledge the other person's points, then pretend that they didn't make them in the next paragraph?

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Is retardation an argument style?

And the men who don't want to pay to support their own children, who a former female partner is doing the actual hard work of raising, aren't particularly sympathetic.

HER FAULT. HER FAULT. HER FAULT. HER FAULT. I mean seriously, why is that so hard to understand? He didn't want to do the "hard work of raising" the kid and she did. Period.

[AuH20]

Nikki, here is the honest answer, as near as I can tell from feminist theory: For women to have true reporductive freedom, someone else needs to pay for it.

Okay, they wouldn't put it that way. They would say that the state must pay for abortions, because if poor women are unable to afford abortions, then they don't have "meaningful" access to the right to an abortion. Its not really a choice, because they can't afford to make that choice.

Similarly, it is not really a choice to raise a kid, if you can't pay for that kid. So the sperm provider must pay if she wants to keep it, and the state if she doesn't so that the woman actually has a "real" choice.

It's "THIS IS WHY POSITIVE RIGHTS ARE UTTERLY RETARDED" 101

[Auric Demonocles]

He didn't want to do the "hard work of raising" the kid and she did. Period.

For some reason, our society treats having a kid like something other than a choice.

"I should get months of paid time off because I am having a baby"

"It's not fair to pay women less for having taken time off to raise kids. She should get the same salary as a man that worked the whole time she was mothering."

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

For some reason, our society treats having a kid like something other than a choice.

Yep. And it's a choice on the part of exactly one person: the woman who does or does not have it. No one else can make that choice. And yet virtually everyone else becomes responsible for other women's kids in some way or another.

[AuH20]

With Plan B now over the counter, there is even less of an excuse than their ever was before. Now, even if the dude didn't wear a condom, there is a way to make sure you don't get pregnant without resorting to abortion.

[Auric Demonocles]

Well, there's a tiny bit of choice that men have. They can make it a possibility or not.

[John]

And unless she was raped, the women chose to have sex. And she chose not to take the pill, which is like 99% effective.

[AuH20]

Seriously. Condoms are cheap, readily available, and successful in over 9 out of 10 encounters with proper use. Also, the government's funding of Planned Parenthood is explicitly based on the idea that Planned Parenthood will use that money to give women who could not otherwise afford it birth control.

Also, given that human beings have successfully had and raised children since we began, could we please stop it with the "hard work" of child rearing? Frustrating, exhausting, terrifying... all yes. But hard? I'm pretty sure every parent has a "Holy shit kids are resilient and it is actually difficult to really fuck them up" story.

[Auric Demonocles]

But birth control costs $3000 a year!

Who cares if that buys you enough Trojan value packs to have sex over 12 times a day.

[Apatheist ?_??]

Condoms are cheap, readily available, and successful in over 9 out of 10 encounters with proper use

Actually its better than that. When someone says a form of birth control is 90% effective it means that over the course of a year it will be effective, not per encounter. And I believe the perfect use rate for condoms is 98%. Condoms plus birth control (~99% perfect use) and you are very unlikely. Hell, even pull out and birth control. When people say their birth control "failed" it usually means they failed to use it properly.

[AuH20]

I know I was going low on condoms, but couldn't remember the exact % above 90.

[Apatheist ?_??]

Problem is "perfect use" takes quite a bit more effort than many people are willing to.

[JW]

HER FAULT. HER FAULT. HER FAULT. HER FAULT.

Late to the party, but I'll posit that sticking your unprotected dick into a woman's vagina constitutes assumption of the risk.

[Coeus]

I take it you're a member of team asprin?

[JW]

Eh?

[Coeus]

You know, the way to prevent needing an abortion.

[JW]

Sorry, drive home, gym and dinner....probably dead now, but I wanted to answer.

Without making any moral judgement, I believe that everyone has agency and with that agency comes assumption of the risk, regardless of the situation.

You don't want to get stuck paying for a kid for 18 years or possibly pick up an STD? Don't stick your dick in a woman without taking proper precautions. You don't want to get stuck raising a kid after the guy skips town and/or catch the clap? Choose your partners better and oh, use birth control.

This is no different than jumping out of a plane. Use the proper tools to prevent the sudden stop (or don't jump out of a plane).

[Coeus]

This is no different than jumping out of a plane. Use the proper tools to prevent the sudden stop (or don't jump out of a plane).

Paying child support is not gravity. It's something that's enforced by the state. Risk for std? Certainly. Risk of fractional slavery for 18 years? No fucking way. There is nothing in the laws of nature that says I have to get my paycheck docked.

[JW]

No, knocking up a chick is like jumping out of a plane.

I'm ambivalent on the issue of mandatory child support, but my own moral code says to be a man in that scenario and owe the fuck up to the situation you willingly helped create. Ultimately, the woman better be on top of the situation, because papa can easily skip town and leave her holding the bag, or in this case, the rugrat.

The libertarian solution? The pre-fuck contract.

[mad libertarian guy]

It's a matter of trying to force on to men what many men have forced on to women forever. To argue that men haven't stuck women with the sole responsibility of raising a child is disingenuous. They are simply trying to turn the tables, sticking it to men to be solely responsible for raising children.

It's a revenge plot. Because intellectually they are 14, and it's all they understand.

[Thane-kin]

So this is old but I just remembered I was going to post it.

Guy posts (mostly) shitty reasons he's no longer a "skeptic", rife with logical fallacies.

Gets called out for it, declares 'CITING LOGICAL FALLACIES IS USUALLY COWARDLY AND LAZY'

(I agree that logical fallacies are often invoked improperly [ad hominem comes to mind] and aren't necessarily trump cards, but mostly he's a moron)

[Warty]

he's a moron

Way to ad hom, you glib of glib glib glib glib glib glib.

[Thane-kin]

I couldn't quite make that out. Care to say "glib" a few more times?

[Irish]

One demographic skeptics are particularly uncomfortable with is the female of the species.

Like all true anti-sexists, he believes women are a different species.

[T]

Natasha Henstridge doesn't seem to share much with my genetic material.

Shame, really.

[AuH20]

Nathasha is definitely on my list of people to share genetic material with.

[The Immaculate Trouser]

Time for another edition of "Guess Who Said It?"

Marc and I are both huge fans of "Rosemary's Baby", which is, in my opinion, a true classic of feminist horror, even though it was directed by ye ol' child rapist Roman Polanski.

Remember, kids, only the first correct guess gets the Andrew Sullivan Undulating Venus Bushtrap of Horror.

[AuH20]

We've had too much Marcotte today, so I'm going with... whoever their other retarded feminist writer is?

[AuH20]

I am the only one who isn't really into Mad Men? I tried the first episode, and when they were going on about "This IBM product is made by a man, but women can do it to" only to reveal... it's not a computer! It's a typewriter!... Or "I think America will love a war hero".... but its not Kennedy! Its Nixon!... I realized that the show would pull way too much cutesy historical bullshit for my tastes.

[Thane-kin]

I've yet to see a single episode.

[The Immaculate Trouser]

My wife likes it a lot, but it's just a high quality soap. Nothing more, nothing less.

[jesse.in.mb]

I've been told by a few people to watch the first and last episode of season 1 and then start in earnest with season 2. I can't do that, so I gave up after two episodes of season 1 and have never gone back.

[John]

Someone needs to point out that in order for Prism to make us any safer, you have to assume that terrorists reveal their plans in emails and phone calls. If they talk in code or if they use other methods to communicate, Prism is useless. Moreover, if they only think about doing it and then decide to do it on their own later, Prism is useless. They read the emails between Husain and Al Alwalaki. Army Intel did anyway. And the emails consisted of Hussain asking if it was okay to kill the infidel. So what? There was nothing there that proved that Hussain was about to become a terrorist. So reading them did no good.

Implicit in the entire program is the idea that terrorists are going to spell out their plots to each other via email or phone. And there is little or no reason to believe this to be true. So even if they can find the right emails chances are they won't say anything.

[Warty]

It's not useless, in the sense that just having a map of who talks to whom tells you an enormous amount of information. For instance, draw a graph whose nodes are cell phones and whose edges represent calls between phones. Do you have any subgraphs that are isolated from the rest? Could be terrorists. Investigate.

[John]

That is true. But you will never get the info of who is a terrorist or might be from the phone calls alone. You have to have some idea of who to look for to start your graph. And at that point it becomes just an ordinary police investigation. So there is no longer a need to collect all that information. Just get a warrant and collect what you need.

[Pro Libertate]

I tell you one thing that's got to get the NSA's attention--strong encryption.

[Warty]

iEYEARECAAYFAlHAZgYACgkQOASD FHIQWEaAFASqretgty356FWgDHW doENGIOqldPWNASDHWDeoAHYIDLSwiAyHQ+aGIRMD IqpfhqwQHIQFGRIAo

[Pro Libertate]

Dude, that's munitions. You just used munitions in a thread.

[Thane-kin]

Don't be ridiculous.

[PapayaSF]

It's called traffic analysis.

[gaijin]

it's all about being able to punish those responsible for (whatever),(whenever).

[John]

And you can do that without Prism.

[gaijin]

yes, but it is so much easier to sift through data with a few clicks on a keyboard.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

Anyone here following Race Across America?
Christoph Strasser is on pace to possibly do it in less than 8 days.

Strasser is into the Appalachian Mountains, the cruelest section of RAAM where after having ridden over 2500 miles the racers are faced with relentless mile after mile of steep hill repeats on twisty rural back-roads dotted with farms and little else.

[Coeus]

Progressive white preacher is tired of being called a racist.

Sucks when they turn on you, don't it?

And here's a response.

WHITE MEN CAN'T JUMP OUT OF THE FRYING PAN THAT EASILY

Finally (and it breaks my heart to say this because I have found his work quite helpful in the past)? I found it utterly infuriating that Tony Jones did not respond more humbly and graciously to the women who detected hints of racism in his comments. When a member of a minority group says, "I feel marginalized by your comments," the proper response is to 1.) Stop what you're doing, 2.) Reflect on your behavior, and 3.) Consider the possibility that you may well have caused some offense. The proper response is NOT to tell the member of said minority group that he or she is wrong because you say so. For Pete's sake, Tony, what in the world were you thinking? Please apologize.

Remember, white guys are not allowed to ever defend themselves. Even if they're progressives.

[Mad Scientist]

I don't I feel in the least bit sorry for people who find themselves being whipped by a whip they helped to create.

[Raston Bot]

Oh that's great stuff.

[Warty]

Coeus, you're a cunt. Oh, wait a minute, do you feel marginalized by my comment? Shit, I'd better stop and reflect on my behavior.

[Coeus]

I would call you a pile of putrid cum-flecked bile on Lindsey Lohan's bathroom floor, but instead I shall stop, reflect on my behavior, and consider the possibility that I might have caused some offense. Then I'd remember that I don't give a shit about social justice or white guilt, and tell you to go fuck yourself with a severed donkey penis smeared with tabasco sauce.

[Warty]

Jesus, dude, how about a trigger warning? Some people might have bad memories of severed donkey penises smeared with Tabasco.

[Coeus]

Then they're obviously doing it wrong.

[T]

You haven't been back to Tijuana since, have you?

[trshmnstr]

The problem is the Tabasco... You gotta use the one with the wooden lid.. Cholula?

[Irish]

It's like watching Dr. Frankenstein be killed by his monster.

[Outlaw]

Good! Fuck him, he's the enemy.

Reading their insanity and watching this pansy retard being torn to shreds by his former comrades is wonderful. He is such a moron that he was apparently unaware the lefties eventually eat their own.

Hopefully this guy's just the appetizer and there's a main course coming.

[PapayaSF]

I believe that all the "detecting hints of racism" that goes on these days probably knocks a half point off the GDP.

[Fatty Bolger]

This Might Be The Best Yearbook Quote Ever

A high schooler used science to sneak a Notorious B.I.G. lyric into her senior photo.

[Auric Demonocles]

Okay, commetariat, let's hear your yearbook quotes (if they exist).

I didn't do one, though I was named most likely to succeed (in the later discredited fraud-filled superlative voting).

[Auric Demonocles]

Pro Lib, you can use your yearcavepainting quote.

[Pro Libertate]

Your prejudice against preliterate societies is unbecoming.

Actually, we didn't have any yearbook quotes. Picture, name, that's it. And I went to a big, rich school.

[Archduke Pantsfan]

You know Cuneiform? You know Sanskrit? It's neither of those.

[Auric Demonocles]

Picture, name, that's it.

Yeah, that's all we had too.

Except for the friends of the people doing the yearbook (for credit apparently?). They could get themselves in a bunch of other places.

[Pro Libertate]

I remember a couple of supreme jackasses on the yearbook staff. Figures. I mean, who would even want to do that?

[Auric Demonocles]

In my time there it was a bunch of the dumb girls who were a little attractive, but thought they were 9s instead of 6s. The people working on the yearbook were this one group of ~5ish girls who were all friends, and the creepy 35 year old staff guy who ran it.

[BiMonSciFiCon]

"I can't believe I ate the whole thing."

[Auric Demonocles]

WARTY: Surprise sex is the best sex.

[Thane-kin]

I am now envisioning Warty bursting through the wall Kool-Aid-man style, flailing his dong and yelling "SURPRISE"

It's not pleasant

[Tejicano]

My HS didn't have yearbook quotes but in my first platoon after boot camp I was named "Most likely to create a nationally televised incident". Does that count?

[Brett L]

Let be be the finale of seem/the only Emperor is the Emperor of Ice Cream

And I only got that in there because my younger brother's soccer teammates sister was on the yearbook committee. Apparently, poems in the Norton Anthology issued to all seniors aren't okay.

[Thane-kin]

This is one of my favorites.

When it comes to talking on the internet about girls being hot, are high school seniors fair game?

[Coeus]

Patton Oswalt says he has come to the understanding that rape jokes are not OK.

And the feminists smell blood in the water.

What follows will inevitably be interpreted, by those inclined to take it that way, as the insufficient gratitude of an angry feminist who is never satisfied, which I cannot control.

I would think that that would be relatively easy to control.

And the comments are great. Someone is talking about him "dictating from his throne of privilege". Damn, I guess I never realized how awesome it was to be a short, pale fat nerd with a nasal voice. I bet he's been universally loved his whole life. That privileged bastard.

[John]

If only he had been born an attractive, upper middle class white girl with parents and boyfriends who cater to her every whim. Then he would really understand what hardship is.

[Thane-kin]

You need to look at the author's pic.

...or maybe you already did?

[John]

I didn't. Okay, she is a fat homely girl. So maybe she did have it hard.

But my point was more about the idea that any woman automatically has it harder than any man.

[Thane-kin]

Yeah, I agree.

[Red Rocks Rockin]

I didn't. Okay, she is a fat homely girl. So maybe she did have it hard.

The only thing that bespectacled manatee's ever had hard is her vibrator.

[Warty]

And fuck him for pussing out on rape jokes. A comedian doesn't have to censor himself in order to not be a dick.

[Pro Libertate]

I like how some awful things are off-limits, while others are peachy.

[AuH20]

There is going to be a fucking revolt, if I know comics. Oh, the big Hollywood ones may stay quiet, not wanting to rock the boat and lose potential millions.

But rape jokes will be told at open mics, and even more so if they become a taboo topic. And eventually, some of those people doing it at open mics and showcases will break and keep doing them.

[Thane-kin]

But he has King of Queens minor-character-privilege!

[Matrix]

Making murder jokes is okay. "I'm going to KILL you!" Assault jokes are okay. "I'm going to whoop your ass!" But rape jokes are off limits?

[John]

And prison rape jokes at the expense of men are totally okay. So are jokes about men having small penises. Completely kosher at all times.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

My favorite part is where she comes down on herself for a minute:

I am a survivor of rape, and I have held myself accountable for perpetuating the rape culture: "I have done it. I have perpetuated the rape culture. We have all done it. We were born into it, and we were all socialized to have contempt for consent." One of many examples.

Now if only we can get the rest of them to realize the real rape culture is government.

[AuH20]

So, wait... rape culture is the feminist version of original sin?

[Fatty Bolger]

Never thought of it that way before, but it fits.

[Warty]

socialized to have contempt for consent

What?

[Thane-kin]

You were born that way.

[Nikkis enthusiastic dissent]

Hey, she's right about that! Just not when it comes to sex...

[Fatty Bolger]

It means that since birth you have been taught by your entire culture that the idea of sexual consent is laughable and unnecessary. Do you deny it, rapist?

[AuH20]

It means that since birth you have been taught by your entire culture that the idea of sexual consent is laughable and unnecessary.

You know, there are a lot of Southern black men, historically speaking, who would disagree with that proposition.

[Pro Libertate]

Oh, comes down on herself. I see.

[Sidd Finch]

rape jokes

highest score:

Statistically... 9 out of 10 people enjoy gang rape.

[Brett L]

I'll forgive him since he played such an awesome character in Justified.

[Matrix]

Sexist judge has the audacity to expect female attorneys to dress in a professional manner in court

How dare he! Demanding women live up to the same standards as men!

[Coeus]

Linked that a few days ago from Jezebel. They really, really don't understand what "equality" means.

[Thane-kin]

Wait, what?

[Warty]

100% what? That's what I want to know.

[Thane-kin]

Isn't it obvious?

[NeonCat]

That is why China will fail, Americans will give 110%. If we feel like it.

[Virginian]

http://www.xojane.com/it-happe.....isney-rape

Oh my fucking god. She was raped. Then she didn't report it for a while. She kept associating with the guy. Then reports him not to the police, but to Disney.

Disney clearly should have fired some guy based on hearsay. Of course.

[Thane-kin]

I dunno, the bulk of her complaints seem to be directed at the Disney employees who spoke to her about it, and if she related their words truthfully then some of it was pretty messed up ("why didn't you scream?" wtf?)

[Eduard van Haalen]

"NH Court: You Can Choose a School So Long as It's Secular

"Earlier today, a New Hampshire district court upheld the "Live Free or Die" state's nascent scholarship tax credit (STC) program, but limited the use of scholarships to non-religious private schools.

"Earlier this year, the ACLU and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State filed a lawsuit claiming that New Hampshire's school choice law was unconstitutional under the state's Blaine Amendment, which prohibits the public funding of religious schools. The law grants tax credits to corporations in return for contributions to non-profit scholarship organizations that fund low-and-middle-income students attending the schools of their choice.

"The decision hinged on whether or not tax credits constitute "public money....

"...the NH trial court rejected this traditional understanding of "public money" in favor of the plaintiff's "all your money are belong to us" argument....

"...The NH trial court judge, by contrast, holds that any taxpayer's income on which the government might have a claim is instantly "public money," even before collection, and it remains so even if the existence of a tax credit or deduction means that government will never collect it."

http://www.cato.org/blog/nh-co.....ts-secular

[Matrix]

So, then one should not be able to claim tithes as a deduction. Any money donated to a religious organization should not be deducted on one's taxes.

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