A.M. Links: Janet Yellen Confirmed to Fed Chair, Pot Prices in Colorado Double, NYC-Based Satanists Want to Build Monument in Oklahoma City

• 

  Satanic Temple

  The Senate voted last night to confirm Janet Yellen's nomination to Federal Reserve chair. She is the first woman in the hundred year history of the Fed, but is expected to continue the policies of her predecessors.

• At least 100,000 people eligible for Medicaid are still waiting to be enrolled due to problems with the Obamacare website.
• Tea Party groups are pushing back against new regulations for tax-exempt organizations proposed by the IRS.
• In less than a week, the price of marijuana in Colorado has doubled as, surprise!, government regulations have helped leave supply far short of demand.
• Americans are living longer than ever, with the average life expectancy of today's babies approaching 80, according to the Centers for Disease Control.  Factoring for Obamacare?
• LA County's 71-year-old sheriff is expected to resign today, a month after 18 of his deputies were arrested in a federal corruption and civil rights abuse investigation.
• The Satanic Temple, based in New York City, hope to erect a ten-foot-statue of Baphomet at the Oklahoma state capitol. They say they want it to promote compassion and empathy, and it would also function as a chair for people to sit on the lap of Satan. Does New York have one?
• Dennis Rodman says Kim Jong Un is his friend and he loves him. He's returning to North Korea, bringing other former NBA players for an exhibition game for Kim's birthday. He says he doesn't want to tell Kim how to do things but hopes the game brings an opportunity to "talk about certain things."

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Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

It is literally a million degrees below zero out there right now.

[Certified Public Asskicker]

You must not be wearing a coat.

-Snarky Reason Commenter (not CPA, he says fuck the cold)

[Auric Demonocles]

That might be approximately what I was going to say...

[Certified Public Asskicker]

Ha, well I know all you need is alt-text to keep you warm. Ed's got you covered.

But not that evil Feeney.

[Auric Demonocles]

Today is a good day. It's a balmy 12 degrees out and there's alt-text in the AM Links.

[Live Free or Diet]

8F here. Not so bad when it's still, but the gusts are a horror.

[robc]

OF right now, but its supposed to hit 12F today!

Wind chill is only -14 right now, big improvement over yesterday.

[mad libertarian guy]

-1 right now (but -4 when I woke up this morning), and it's fucking freezing. Where the fuck is global warming when you need it?

I was going to do the only acceptable outdoor activity in this kind of cold, hunting, but I couldn't find my cold weather beenie/mask and gloves before it was too late.

[Agammamon]

Dear lord, how can you people live like that - its 44 here and the dog refuses to go outside to piss.

[Auric Demonocles]

I don't understand how you can not live like this. Fuck that 90 degree shit.

[BigT]

It was -12 when I awoke, and the Browns weren't letting anyone down today, for a change.

(Expect big letdown when new coach named, however)

[TANSTaaFL]

Josh McDaniels to the rescue! As a Patriot fan I welcome his hiring as Browns Coach. It will result in furthering the Browns futility and vastly improving the redzone play calling for the Patriots.

[Sudden]

L.A. as well? I mean, no need to brag. Our high today will only be 71F. We got nothing on the equator.

[Cunctator]

---"Our high today will only be 71F"---

Yeah, but with the wind chill, it will only feel like 70F

[Timon 19]

-7 now, wind chill -26.

Which is nothing, since last night it was -13 with a wind chill lower than -40 (the gusts were huge and frequent).

[JW]

Fuck winter. That is all.

[nailzer]

God I love Florida! It'll be in the 80's this weekend 🙂

[prolefeed]

Almost up to freezing in Austin now. Highs in mid 40s.

[Isaac Bartram]

Yeah, but it's 42?F (feels like 35?) here in Altamonte Springs right now.

Forecast high 48?.

[Isaac Bartram]

That was to nailzer.

[Jack Holby]

Balmy 42F at 9am in Colorado. Winter weather that I can handle.

[Capt. Rimmer]

Dog bowl barely froze. Deep south baby. Last in education third in heat.

[Enough About Palin]

+1 toasty dumb kid

[PD Scott]

It was 5? in suburban Atlanta when I woke up. I thought it was part of the deal, we put up with all that heat and humidity in the summer so we don't wake up to freakin' single digit temperatures.

[DontShootMe]

Go back to sleep. Wake up when it's in the double digits.

[Rasilio]

Yeah, my friggin car doors were frozen shut and then after I pried them open the door mechanism was frozen open.

I had to spend 20 minutes standing out there with a blow drier to get the doors to close properly

[R C Dean]

Oh, c'mon. Everyone knows the quickest way to thaw out a frozen lock, door, whatever is to piss on it.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Quickest way to have your dick fall off from frostbite!

[Mainer2]

It is literally a million degrees below zero out there right now

I must have told you a Billion times not to exagerate.

[Fist of Etiquette]

At least 100,000 people eligible for Medicaid are still waiting to be enrolled due to problems with the Obamacare website.

They really shouldn't have passed Obamacare until we got all the kinks worked out of the internet.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

It's evil how cold it is out there.

Hello.

[Rich]

Colder than the lap of Satan.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

The cold snap deserves its own Dante-esque story.

[Ted S.]

I agree that Canada is evil for sending us their cold air.

[UnCivilServant]

Hi.

Aren't Canukistanis immune to cold?

[Rufus J. Firefly]

When we wear the fur of freshly clubbed baby seal.

[UnCivilServant]

How fresh does it have to be? And do you need enough hides to cover you entirely or is it totemic magic?

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Just the extremities.

Thus, head, hands and feet.

The cuter the seal, the warmer.

[sarcasmic]

It's so cold a hooker offered to blow on my hands for twenty bucks.

[LC]

It's so cold, I saw a democrat with his hands in his own pockets...

[sarcasmic]

It's so cold a flasher described himself to me.

[Live Free or Diet]

Oh, "on!"
I was confused.

[TANSTaaFL]

It's so cold, Bill Clinton is sleeping with his own wife to stay warm

[Fist of Etiquette]

Dennis Rodman says Kim Jong Un is his friend and he loves him.

I am now convinced Rodman is an agent for the CIA. Or, alternately, a fucking idiot.

[Longtorso, Johnny]

Are those mutually exclusive?

[Live Free or Diet]

Prerequisite.
Oh, sorry, that was the NSA.

[WTF]

I wonder if Rodman realizes that the Korean team will be executed if his NBA guys embarrass them.

[Rufus J. Fisk]

I see some sort of sequel to Space Jam out of all this

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Ha. I told my wife "those NBA guys better throw the game if they know what's good for them" last night.

[Aresen]

With luck, Kim Jong Un will come to think of Dennis Rodman as an uncle.

[Longtorso, Johnny]

This person can vote: more science and essentialism
...My first essentialist thought on men's violence was that only men could ever build an entire necrophilic society around the raping and controlling of women's reproductive capacities because only men are biologically capable of doing it, using their own biology as weapons against women ? penis and semen. So I saw that patriarchy fitted to men's biology to the extent that it is only achievable through their biological capacity to rape and impregnate women. Also, I saw their hatred of women partly as an of envy women's reproductive power and obsession with their own incapacity to reproduce life....

[Longtorso, Johnny]

...I'm pretty sure that we'd have loads more healing, psychic, telepathic and other transcendental superpowers were we not crippled from birth by men, and that men have reduced our powers generation after generation of genocide.

It also means that only women would have had the necessary brain power to create language, writing, art, science, houses, pottery, and invent all the beautiful things of humanity. There is also increasing evidence that women are responsible for it throughout the history of humanity. Digging a bit deeper into the background of male history also attests of the fact that women have systematically been the inventors and creators while men stole their knowledge and skills, erased women's motherhood of it and turned the knowledge and skills into weapons against women and life....

[Rich]

women have on average 23% more corpus callosum than men

"My eyes are up *here*!"

[Live Free or Diet]

women have on average 23% more corpus callosum than men

"My eyes are up *here*!"

Corpus callosum, Latin meaning "tough body."
Absolutely baby! Now kneel down over here and blow on my hands.

[WTF]

women have systematically been the inventors and creators

Actually, no, no they haven't.

[Floridian]

women have systematically been the inventors and creators

Yet they can't program the damn microwave clock.

[Ted S.]

Blame the Patriarchy that designed microwave clocks for that one.

[invisible furry hand]

I saw American Hustle this afternoon, so now I keep thinking "science oven"

[Floridian]

Blame the Patriarchy that designed microwave clocks for that one.

Now you are thinking like a feminist.

[Entropy Void]

Women invented the DVD 'cos they couldnt program a VCR.

[Live Free or Diet]

My wife's vegetarian best friend couldn't figure out how to play a DVD on the TV we got for the kids 16 years ago. "Did you try just shoving it in the slit? It'll start right up."
She frowned at me. "You are so sexist."

[Entropy Void]

vegetarian or vagitarian?

[gaijin]

I think these rants are machine-generated. Some sort of experimental turing machine with settings for logical fallacy, fantasy and pscyhotic break set to eleventy.

[Enough About Palin]

Sort of like this?

Thomas Friedman Op/Ed Generator

[gaijin]

Excellent!

[Enough About Palin]

It is pretty awesome.

[Zeb]

This person is so sad, pathetic and obviously severely emotionally damaged that I can't even bring myself to make fun.

[wwhorton]

I love when radfem blather reads like Cannibal Corpse lyrics.

[KMA Too]

Johnny, who is this ridiculous cunt?

[wareagle]

I saw their hatred of women partly as an of envy women's reproductive power and obsession with their own incapacity to reproduce life....

this person has no clue how babies are made.

[General Butt Naked]

this person has no clue how babies are made.

I bet she does. Everybody does.

It's when a woman is hit by a bus and through the magic of science pushes out a baby 9 months later. You're just jealous that women are strong enough to not only survive getting hit by a bus but that you can't participate in the miracle of life*.

*unless you're a bus driver

[a better weapon]

HA! I'd forgotten about this joke.

[TANSTaaFL]

wareagle|1.7.14 @ 9:14AM|#

"this person has no clue how babies are made"

Well, the first step is foreplay.

An effective way to begin arousal is to watch the last :60 of the BCS championship game where Jameis Winston leads FSU down the field and throws the game winning TD with :13 left completing the collapse of Auburn and SEC dominance...

[Fluffy]

Also, I saw their hatred of women partly as an of envy women's reproductive power and obsession with their own incapacity to reproduce life

This is a common claim even among non-insane feminists and I've never understood it.

Have they ever, you know, spoken to any men?

I don't know any men who possess this "envy" to any degree whatsoever.

It's like kids in the chess club sitting around talking about how the football players wish they could play chess. Um...no they don't.

[WTF]

Yeah, when I think about women being pregnant, 'envy' doesn't really enter into it. More like thankful it's not, and never will be, me.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Kids in chess club don't talk about football either, nor do they give a shit about football players.

Jus' sayin'

[Red Rocks Rockin]

Kids in chess club don't talk about football either, nor do they give a shit about football players.

Except when they're complaining, "I'm a nice, sensitive guy that respects women and their feelings--I'd treat Brooke so much better than that asshole! She's only with him because he's on the football team."

[Heroic Mulatto]

It's obvious you never met a kid in chess club. Little Ravi Shivaraj was already betrothed to his future wife at the age of three and little Liu Zheng is aware that after he finished law school, after finishing medical school, of course, he'll have no problems finding a mate.

Well, at least, you're correct in that the White dude in the club gives a shit about football players, but that's because he's gay.

[RBS]

I've never actually been in a school that had a chess club and I went to boarding school.

[Heroic Mulatto]

Mine didn't have on either, except for those of us who played in the library during a free period. However in college, we did have one and later, at another institution, I was faculty adviser to the Chess and Go Club. They didn't give a shit about football either, but that was because this was in Thailand and they have no clue what American football is.

[Apatheist ?_??]

Substitute Math club for Chess club and that was my experience. Only in the American version the Indian kids were second generation and decidedly uninterested in arranged marriage machinations of their grandparents back in India. They mainly dreamed of getting a white chick to hide from their parents.

[Bronwyn]

Where did you go?
Deerfield Academy, '95

[Fluffy]

I did not intend to give offense to chess players.

I was merely groping for another example of people believing they're envied by people who really don't envy them at all, or who actively are pleased to not be participating in whatever it's being asserted is the source of the envy.

[Heroic Mulatto]

people believing they're envied by people who really don't envy them at all

So anyone who shows other people pictures of their kids.

[Clich? Bandit]

I make it a point to only show women who are friends, with children of their own, of the same age as mine. And then only 1, if they want more they can flip through the phone themselves.

[RBS]

Pretty much this. If someone asks to see a picture of my son I show them.

[Brett L]

I'm sorry you have ugly children.

[Clich? Bandit]

Ohh...she is cute. You should see the one in the Top Hat she got me for x-mas.

I have too often been on the other end of the LOOK AT MY KIDS stick. So I choose subtle respect yet enthusiastic commentary when provoked.

[playa manhattan]

My kid brings me good beer

[Fluffy]

I don't show other people pictures of my kid because I think they envy me.

I show other people pictures of my kid because my kid is more interesting to me than anything in their lives, so FUCK YOU WITH YOUR STUPID STORY ABOUT YOUR PULITZER PRIZE LOOK AT THIS PICTURE OF MY KID.

[RBS]

Also this.

[PD Scott]

obsession with their own incapacity to reproduce life

Sure, and when we try to create life in our mountaintop laboratories we get accused of playing God, meddling in things we weren't meant to understand!

[UnCivilServant]

Meddling with things Man was not meant to know.

[Kaptious Kristen]

I'm envious of men because y'all can't get knocked up!

[wwhorton]

I can make beer. That's all the "miracle of life" I need.

[RannedPall]

I'll just leave this here
returnofkings.com

[A wild THANE appeared!]

You can take it back with you, thanks

[Longtorso, Johnny]

This person can vote: PIV is always rape, ok?
...First, well intercourse is NEVER sex for women. Only men experience rape as sexual and define it as such. Sex for men is the unilateral penetration of their penis into a woman (or anything else replacing and symbolising the female orifice) whether she thinks she wants it or not ? which is the definition of rape: that he will to do it anyway and that he uses her and treats her as a receptacle, in all circumstances ? it makes no difference to him experiencing it as sexual. That is, at the very least, men use women as useful objects and instruments for penetration, and women are dehumanised by this act. It is an act of violence.

[Longtorso, Johnny]

...If we look at the act in more detail (skip this parag if you can't take it), PIV is a man mounting on a woman to thrust a large member of himself into her most intimate parts, often forcing her to be entirely naked, banging himself against her with the whole weight of his body and hips, shaking her like he would stuff a corpse, then using her insides as a receptacle for his penile dejection. How is this a normal civilised, respectful way to treat anyone? Sorry for the explicit picture, but this is what it is and it's absolutely revolting and violating....

...The fact intercourse causes so many infections and tears and warts attests to the unnaturalness of intercourse, that it's not meant to be. The vagina's primary function isn't to be penetrated by a penis but to eject a baby for birth. They are two muscle tissues / sphincters pressed against each other to help the baby be pushed out. Penetration of the penis into the vagina is completely unnecessary for conception....

[invisible furry hand]

channeling Andrea Dworkin is so 1987

[tulip]

At least Andrea Dworkin could formulate an argument. Her work was actually thought provoking and, at times, witty. This is Dworkin as interpreted by idiots.

[UnCivilServant]

Author of article: you fail biology forever.

[Tonio]

The fact intercourse causes so many infections and tears and warts attests to the unnaturalness of intercourse, that it's not meant to be.

This woman has never spent time in a barnyard, watched a nature film, or been treated to the yowling of neighborhood cats copulating. Fascinating how she misuses the word "natural."

[waffles]

I have met some women who really really like PIV. In fact I met a woman who liked PIV and other similar acts so much that she has decided to make such activities as frequent as possible. So that must mean we are both rape victims, utterly seduced by our own biology. That's okay.

It's okay to not like sex. Just don't tell the rest of the world that they're weird for liking it. If sex weren't really really fun would so many people exist?

[wareagle]

are you sure her fondness of PIV hasn't somehow othered you?

[waffles]

Nope. I think I'm being completely taken advantage of. If that's othering then I want to be othered again and again and again.

[wareagle]

and people make victimhood sound like a bad thing. I smell a speaking tour where you could offer a counter to that view. Maybe even a book.

[PD Scott]

"Other me! Other me harder, you othering other!"

[Rasilio]

Seriously.

My wife is fairly easily multi orgasmic through oral or manual stimulation, but give her the choice of a dozen orgasms over the coursr of an hour and 5 minutes of foreplay followed by 5 minutes of intercourse and she'll take the latter every time.

[playa manhattan]

5 minutes of intercourse? You're far too generous.

[WTF]

The vagina's primary function isn't to be penetrated by a penis but to eject a baby for birth.

Pretty sure you need the first one to get the second one. Absent technology, anyway.

[Rich]

Jive turkey baster.

[PD Scott]

Which are, uh, relatively phallic.

[gaijin]

Absent technology, anyway.

Which is further evidence of male oppression since the men have prevented the women from self-inventing the technology for creating sperm and depositing it in a way that is self directed and civilized.

[WTF]

Because the Patriarchy has stolen their creativity.

Astonishing that some idiots really believe this shit.

[Fluffy]

The vagina's primary function isn't to be penetrated by a penis but to eject a baby for birth.

"The pharynx's primary function is to breathe! Therefore, all eating is unnatural."

[Zeb]

the unnaturalness of intercourse

This is the truly amazing part.

[R C Dean]

The vagina's primary function isn't to be penetrated by a penis but to eject a baby for birth.

Lesbians everywhere will be surprised to learn this.

[Rufus J. Fisk]

If these women ever have a son, how can that son not end up completely hating women and therefore being rapists because they hated their own mother so much? Man i would love to troll over at that comment section. Mother of God!!

[Ted S.]

Didn't you post this one several days ago?

Why do you torture yourself by reading all this shit? It is some sort of bizarre kink? 😉

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Jesus.

Christ.

Meant for reproduction only? How the heck do they propose to get semen in them?

Bah.

I wonder how ugly the author and the commenters are because no normal, half-decent gal could possibly write the shit they were writing.

It's ludicrously fiendish and bat-shit gibberish.

[Fist of Etiquette]

You're all being trolled.

[mr simple]

Sex for men is the unilateral penetration of their penis into a woman (or anything else replacing and symbolising the female orifice)

How homophobic. This has to be a troll.

[Live Free or Diet]

First, well intercourse is NEVER sex for women.

Clearly, she's not doing it right.

PIV is a man mounting on a woman

That's certainly one way. IMO, not even the best way.

How is this a normal civilised, respectful way to treat anyone?

It's normal because that's how mammalian species propagate. IOW, it's normal because if it weren't, she wouldn't exist.

Civilised? Having a high state of social and technological development is dependent on having lots of people. You don't get lots of people without having lots of sex.

Respectful sex is something she would know about if anyone respected her.

[Tonio]

[T]o whom it may concern, I'm doing you a massive favour and being super nice in saying that i'm not publishing any comments which include the following:
"PIV as rape trivialises real rape victims" and "but, but, I like sex and you're insulting women or men who like sex"; and "you're just doing sex the wrong way"

Uh, no, you're refusing to engage with people who have opposing viewpoints, and trying (and failing) to claim the moral high ground, and being overall smug and dishonest.

[invisible furry hand]

Man who became trapped naked in washing machine says olive oil rescue was 'like a birth'

http://www.abc.net.au/news/201.....th/5189586

[Fist of Etiquette]

Talk about an unbalanced load...

[Rich]

olive oil rescue

Nice band name.

[Bee Tagger]

Dennis Rodman says Kim Jong Un is his friend and he loves him. He's returning to North Korea, bringing other former NBA players for an exhibition game for Kim's birthday.

Didn't Jesse Walker caution me to be skeptical of fanciful stories like this about North Korea?

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Yeah. I saw a former NBAer say something to the effect 'hopefully we can raise some money for charity.'

Man, you can't make this naivete shit up.

[UnCivilServant]

The Satanic Temple, based in New York City, hope to erect a ten-foot-statue of Baphomet at the Oklahoma state capitol. They say they want it to promote compassion and empathy, and it would also function as a chair for people to sit on the lap of Satan. Does New York have one?

No, we tend to frown on useful art installations and sponsor absurdist abstract.

I hate New York art.

[DJF]

NYC doesn't need a statue, it has the Federal Reserve Bank of NY, that is more then enough satanic for any place, even Hell does not have a Federal Reserve Bank?

[UnCivilServant]

Well, if we just petrify the governer, it'd do as a satanic emblem.

[Restoras]

NYC and NY also have Andrew Cuomo and Eliot Spitzer, the latter of whom I am sure would let anyone sit on his lap and most definately looks like Satan.

[Brett L]

Speaking of Ol' Spitz and laps.

The still-married former Love Gov and Smith, Mayor de Blasio's ex-mouthpiece, were spied frolicking near the family pool at around 4?p.m. Sunday at the Half Moon family resort in Montego Bay, Jamaica.

[invisible furry hand]

How dare you. Eliot Spitzer is too classy for that. Next you'll suggest he'd suck the toes of a topless woman in public

[Brett L]

Great minds, eh, IFH?

[invisible furry hand]

I don't mind the thinking alike - it's the smelling alike I fear.

Speaking of which, how is William?

[Brett L]

Young Master Beckett does a great job of turning breastmilk into poop and looking cute while doing it. And he only smells like spoiled milk after spitting up, so I guess he got his mom's scent genes.

[Restoras]

Good times, enjoy them! The little buggers grow up way to fast.

[db]

Good timing, guys.

[Matrix]

Yeah, lib "friends" on Facebook keep posting this and are saying it should be A-Okay if they allow things like Ten Commandment monuments and some such.

Okay, I don't buy the whole "separation of Church and State" as liberals see it. I'm not a Christian, but this is a prodominantly Christian nation. It doesn't bother me to see Christian idols about or monuments honoring the Ten Commandments. If the predominate religion were something else, I would expect to see it displayed more. But seriously, they are just trolling with this crap. The government doesn't need to cater to 10 people while offending 99.9% of the rest of the people.

[Fluffy]

I have to disagree.

The rule should be no monuments or all monuments.

The fact that this empowers trolls is a feature and not a bug.

[SugarFree]

If the monument had been there for decades, I might be sympathetic to your argument, but it was a recent and explicitly political act and the Christians jumped through some elaborate hoops to plunk that monument down. I'm fine with them getting a taste of their own medicine.

[Apatheist ?_??]

Yes they put up the ten commandments in fucking 2012, they knew what they are doing. At least the counter protesters are getting creative. The whole thing is tiresome.

[Zeb]

I am in favor of this sort of trolling. I'm pretty sure most professed satanists just do it to fuck with people.

[R C Dean]

If putting up a cross or other religious symbol on "public" lands or with "public" funds is an "establishment of religion", then

All religious symbolism is banned. Otherwise, government can grant any religion the privilege of "establishment" just for the asking.

[DesigNate]

As long as it's not done with "public" funds, how is that an establishment of religion?

[Fluffy]

The establishment part is when you let some religions do that with their own funds, but you declare the monuments of other religions too offensive to allow this.

Seriously, I don't see how much more explicitly you can violate the Establishment Clause than to declare, "Well, we're going to let the religions we like undertake activities on public lands, but your religion sucks and offends all right-thinking people, so fuck you, hit the bricks."

[prolefeed]

If it's done on public property, and only the preferred religious sect is allowed to do it, that's establishment of religion.

[Live Free or Diet]

The government doesn't need to cater to 10 people while offending 99.9% of the rest of the people.

Protecting the unpopular from the majority's use of government is the exact point of the First Amendment.

[prolefeed]

Letting the majority run roughshod over the minority -- or even a majority that doesn't get out the vote well enough -- is democracy.

The Bill of Rights is explicitly designed to curb the excesses of democracy by making lots of stuff not subject to vote or legislation.

[AlmightyJB]

I saw the picture and the headline and thought that was Janet Yellen on her new throne. Guess that's being a little unfair to Satan.

[DesigNate]

Yes New York has one, it's called the Mayor's Chair and it sits in the council chambers.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Tea Party groups are pushing back against new regulations for tax-exempt organizations proposed by the IRS.

Good luck. You're just being put on the list.

[UnCivilServant]

Uhh, weren't they already on the list?

[SugarFree]

This is the extra-secret list. The eventual "this is a fake scandal too" list.

[Snark Plissken]

It's 50F here in Prague. I'm so frightened of Global Warming right now I can barely type.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Are Czech women as easy as advertised?

[R C Dean]

I suspect the ones who advertise are pretty easy, yes.

[Bee Tagger]

Tea Party groups are pushing back against new regulations for tax-exempt organizations proposed by the IRS.

Did the IRS change the percentage of astroturf allowed in your foundation?

[SugarFree]

What in the ding-dong fucking hell is this screwed up shit? I'm a very tolerant guy, but for fuck's sake this creeps me the fuckshit out.

Secrets of the Living Dolls

[gaijin]

I think the producers of reality tv sit around high coming up with this stuff. "Wait, mate, what if we dressed a bunch of cross dressers up as sex dolls and did a show about it.?"

Next up: Secret of the Bronies.

[SugarFree]

It's like BASE jumping into Uncanny Valley.

[waffles]

Is there a point where the uncanny valley stops feeling weird and you need to escalate to further limits of creepy?

[SugarFree]

It's like warp speed. Occasionally you adjust it so that warp factor 10 remains the fastest possible speed.

[Restoras]

But this goes to warp factor 11.

[Snark Plissken]

Trigger warning!!!

That is fucking creepy.

[Brett L]

Rule 34, both the xkcd comic, and the Charile Stross near-future procedural seem to apply here.

[invisible furry hand]

Channel 4 really does some great docos. I think it was responsible for the awesome "Make me a eunuch"

[SugarFree]

Rubber bands and ice packs. People just don't have any individual initiative any longer.

[Brett L]

So they followed around married guys, eh?

Also, congrats on the Ashes.

[invisible furry hand]

Thanks Brett - those schmucks came good

The best eunuch was a pastor who removed his testicles so he could have a fake vajayjay for extra pleasure (he has hormone shots to maintain his sex drive. Oh, and he rerouted his urethra). I'll never forget the sight of him lying back on his bed, lifting his cassock, and moving his largish penis aside so we could check out his new bits.

BTW, his partner was living as a woman and saving up for her surgery, but money is tight on the salary of a clerk in holy orders,

[Brett L]

I just... That's just libertinism.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Bret, thanks for the science explanation/lesson yesterday.

[Brett L]

Very welcome.

[John]

I am tolerant too. But there are some things that really are signs of mental illness.

[Rich]

"I think we need to be tolerant of people who think different than us, but this is Oklahoma Hit & Run, and that's not going to fly here."

[Rufus J. Firefly]

I liked the part where one of the freaks was walking on the boardwalk chasing a bird.

Cla-sick!

[lap83]

I don't really see much of a difference between covering yourself with makeup and covering yourself with skin-colored rubber. I'm surprised it hasn't caught on with more women.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Americans are living longer than ever, with the average life expectancy of today's babies approaching 80, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Factoring for Obamacare?

This is why the contraception mandate. The state can't handle these potential resource drains.

[gaijin]

She is the first woman in the hundred year history of the Fed

So we should see all kinds of differences in the way the Fed works for the people, amirite?

[Rich]

Yellen will continue the policies of her predecessors, but in a more tender, nurturing way.

[gaijin]

Wise even

[CatoTheElder]

Well, "I would hope that a wise Jewess with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

[invisible furry hand]

You'll only notice a difference if a woman leads another country's central bank and their interest rates rise and fall in synch

[gaijin]

+1 economic cycle

[Live Free or Diet]

Oh crap, does that imply a 28-day economic cycle?

[Rich]

[Said Rep. Don Armes, R-Faxon,] "I think we need to be tolerant of people who think different than us, but this is Oklahoma, and that's not going to fly here."

With that attitude, Don, you're not getting re-elected.

[Ted S.]

Uh, this is Oklahoma. That attitude is probabaly a plus.

[Rich]

"Don's just too damn tolerant for these parts!"

[Palin's Buttplug]

You have to love low interest rates. These savers who gripe about them feel entitled to something for nothing. With inflation near death the market won't pay you 7% to use your money and you don't deserve it.

Thus spake the Market. Don't bitch about the Market.

[gaijin]

haha. In your world, the Fed = The Market.

[Certified Public Asskicker]

Lame.

[Restoras]

When you have fecal matter for brains that is what logic looks like.

[Jordan]

Do not criticize Central Planners, comrade. Without glorious People's Market Committee, you would have nothing.

[Palin's Buttplug]

I didn't mention the Fed. The demand for money is low thus the market is not paying much for it.

[Certified Public Asskicker]

Thus spake the Market Fed. Don't bitch about the Market Fed.

[gaijin]

🙂 9:12, 9:13, whatever it takes!

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

PB, our resident 94% pure libertarian and master market investor. All hail his reason and logic.

[WTF]

Shreeky, dishonest and retarded as ever.

[Palin's Buttplug]

What I wrote above is A priori.

[WTF]

Don't lock eyes with 'em, don't do it. Puts 'em on edge. They might go into berzerker mode; come at you like a whirling dervish, all fists and elbows. You might be screaming "No, no, no" and all they hear is "Who wants cake?" Let me tell you something: They all do. They all want cake.

[Live Free or Diet]

These savers who gripe about them feel entitled to something for nothing.

The work they did is nothing?
The things they went without is nothing?
The things other people want is nothing?
Did you get lost in the veil of money again?

[R C Dean]

Funny, I thought it was the folks using other people's money for next to nothing who apparently feel entitled to something for nothing.

Since this includes bankers, generally, whether they are hitting the discount window or holding real people's money for re-lending, I feel pretty safe that their use of an organization that they control (the Fed) to suppress interest rates to near zero is acting out this feeling of entitlement.

[DesigNate]

Wait, banks AREN'T using the money people put into savings to show how awesome their balance sheets are to get practically free money from the FED to turn around and loan to people at rates well above what they're paying?

I'm sorry buy 0.05% isn't an interest rate, that's a joke and a piss in your eye from the banks.

Who, in case your troglodyte brain forgot, WE FUCKING BAILED OUT.

[Emmerson Biggins]

That's below your normal trolling standards buttplug.

[Fist of Etiquette]

LA County's 71-year-old sheriff is expected to resign today, a month after 18 of his deputies were arrested in a federal corruption and civil rights abuse investigation.

So running off that sinking ship, is that a rat dressed as the captain or the captain dressed as a rat?

[John]

But FOE, he is no longer sheriff. He is just some schmoe now. Trust me, to a guy like him, resigning is cruel and unusual punishment.

[Restoras]

No badge, no uniform, no power to be a dick whenever he wants...fuck him.

[BigT]

Running away to protect his pension. Retire with a pension, or wait until feces meets fan and risk losing it.

[Fist of Etiquette]

He probably still has plenty of connections. And I would be surprised if he doesn't get to keep the badge.

[invisible furry hand]

A sperm donor dad has been granted access to his daughter despite the objections of her lesbian parents to his youthful partying ways.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com......6796827272

[Ted S.]

If they're going to try to make sperm donors pay child support, then sperm donors get visitation rights too.

[Rasilio]

This.

[Tonio]

I don't see anything about him paying support. It appears that under australian law the lesbian couple are the child's legal parents.

[SugarFree]

It's a different case in Kansas, Tonio.

[Fist of Etiquette]

...and it would also function as a chair for people to sit on the lap of Satan.

"And I want an evil pony, and an evil bike, and an evil Star Wars Lego set..."

"Well, have you been a good little boy this year?"

"No, sir!"

[gaijin]

...and it would also function as a chair for people to sit on the lap of Satan.

When you lap dance with the Devil, he leads.

[Rich]

😎

[Rich]

"And no milk and cookies -- here's a pineapple!"

[Auric Demonocles]

I want an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-Hundred-Shot Evil Range Model Air Rifle!

[SugarFree]

"You'll shoot your eye out, kid. Excellent choice."

[Auric Demonocles]

My real plan is once I have the rifle to use it to steal the rest of the toys.

[UnCivilServant]

Then you should have asked for a mass murder totem instead.

[Auric Demonocles]

Tea Party groups are pushing back against new regulations for tax-exempt organizations proposed by the IRS.

Oh come on, have the Tea Party groups even done any voter registration outreach programs in neighborhoods which coincidentally have demographics certain to come out in the Democrats favor? Have they done any promotion of the President's signature legislation? No? Then they obviously aren't tax-exempt.

[Brett L]

Greetings, reasonoids. And what a fine morning it is after that invigorating win last night, eh?

Best story so far: I have a friend who happens to have the first initial "J" and last name "Fisher" who has been at FSU longer than Jimbo. He posted a fun email he received from a very butt-hurt Alabama fan and lawyer.

"Beat 3d or 4th best team in SEC. Want to try our schedule next year?? Sorry forgot about Mizz. Maybe FSU is 3d in west. 4th or 5th in SEC?? You coached here. You know it is true.

[Lawyer Name], Partner

[Law Firm Contact Info]

And my response:

"Dear [Name Redacted], Partner,

Three points:
1.) While I graduated top of my class with two degrees from LSU, I was never given the opportunity to coach the football team there.
2.) Before firing off an email message to harass somebody, perhaps you should make 100% sure the person you are sending it to is, indeed, the person you intend to harass.
3.) Sounds like a big bunch of sour grapes to me. Go Noles!"

[Brett L]

Whoops. LSU fan. Not Alabama. Still a bit slow.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Auburn was productive most of the game. FSU rode three huge plays to three TD's.

But your team won fair. I don't think it made the SEC fear FSU a bit though.

[Brett L]

FSU gave up fewer yards per play and points than any team since Auburn restructured the offense after LSU. Though just barely.

[RBS]

Fucking SEC fans. From a Clemson fan, thanks FSU for winning. I don't think I could have taken another year of Cockfan acting like he won a national title by proxy.

[robc]

I normally never cheer for FSU. Never.

But last night was an exception for this exact reason.

Well, not USCe fans in particular, but same idea.

I use to have a sig on some sports boards: "Conference Homers are the worst form of fandom, that is why the SEC has so many of them."

[wareagle]

"Beat 3d or 4th best team in SEC

could have sworn that LSU was not in last night's game.

[Brett L]

C'mon. LSU wasn't even 4th in the SEC.

[wareagle]

makes the guy sound even more foolish. Congrats on your team's win. Hell of a game. We had chances but that's how it goes. After last year's debacle, can't complain too much.

[Brett L]

You'll be back and better next year. That coach and running back are great and the defense is darn good.

[Drake]

I love butthurt SEC fans. LSU actually has one real inter-conference game next year (Wisconsin). Alabama is sticking with the cupcakes (good luck against the Florida Atlantic Owls and Western Carolina Catamounts).

[Palin's Buttplug]

UGA has played Clemson and Boise State (while they were top five) in the regular season the last couple of years.

Lost both games too.

[Drake]

Seems some of the SEC Teams are willing to play a big game outside the conference early in the season. I believe the computers and voters should penalize teams (from any conference) for scheduling joke games.

[mr simple]

I love butthurt SEC haters. They still went 7-3 in their bowl games, which is the best record outside of the Sun Belt Conf. (2-0).

[Drake]

I would love to see an SEC vs. Pac 12 Bowl series or early season games. The match-ups would be great and the games would be exciting. (and I'll bet on the Pac-12 overall)

Maybe with a playoff system (so a perfect record isn't essential), schools will be more likely to take a chance on a challenging game.

[mr simple]

I think a playoff system is great and does allow for better schedules. As is it seems a little unfair to require a perfect season to reach the national title game. It's a lot easier to make it through, say, the Big 10 than it is the SEC, ACC or even the PAC 12. So I understand scheduling easier non-conference games. The thing is everyone does it. There are a few good non-conference games every year, but most big schools don't want to blow their chance early when maybe their team isn't ready. That's why I like a an 8 team playoff with the major conference champs and a few open slots. I like that in basketball we get a lot of good non-conference games to start the season -UK has played Mich St, NC and U of L- as coaches are less afraid of a loss. Of course they have gone overboard and have too large of a tournament.

I would bet on SEC most seasons. This year wasn't a great defensive year for them but usually they are tops in overall defense, which is the type of football I like and why I like their games. Outside of Stanford, who plays defense in the Pac-12?

[RBS]

Outside of Stanford, who plays defense in the Pac-12?

Pretty much just SC.

[Drake]

Look at all the bowl game scores. Does anyone play defense? Everyone got lit up.

[mr simple]

Yes, that's why I excepted this year. I just hope this isn't a trend.

[Cdr Lytton]

I would love to see an SEC vs. Pac 12 Bowl series or early season games.

As long as there's plane tickets for the No Travel conference.

[Pro Libertate]

It's silly. Most years, the SEC is clearly better than other conferences. Playoffs will likely show a similar record of SEC domination, at least for the near term. These things can change, of course, especially as the game changes.

I think the strength of the conference was greater back when recruiting tended to be more regional. Florida (the state, I mean) used to only send a few high school players around the country. Now, players are distributed more widely.

Congrats to FSU. I actually predicted Auburn would win, basically for the reasons we saw for most of the game--FSU couldn't really deal with their offense--but they managed to overcome it with the same mojo Auburn had to get to the title game against all odds. And no, I don't particularly like Auburn either.

[RBS]

I don't hate the SEC at all and I love watching most of those teams play. I do hate the constant fellating of the conference by the Four Letter.

With Clowney going pro and no SEC national champ what the fuck are those guys going to talk about for the next 7 months?

[Pro Libertate]

Thank God we're moving towards playoffs.

[KDN]

Too bad it's 12 years too late.

[robc]

4 letter? You mean ESECPN?

That is 6.

[Pro Libertate]

Speaking of Clowney, I bet the Bucs draft him if available. The conventional wisdom is that they'll take a QB, but I think they'll have to stretch quite a bit for one at 7, and an edge rusher is a huge need.

[John]

Cloeney will never last until 7. He is too much a physical freak for that. After he destroys the combine workouts, someone in the top three will have to have him.

[mr simple]

Probably predicting a resurgence of the Big 10. Musberger actually said they had a good bowl season after the Mich St win. I can't remember who called the Ohio St. game, but they were gushing about how good the Buckeyes, and best in the nation in many areas, were even as they were losing. Some people just won't let an idea die.

[RBS]

I can't remember who called the Ohio St. game

Matt Millen and Joe Tessatore. I'm pretty sure they found Braxton Miller after the game for a parking lot circle jerk.

[KDN]

Tessatore maybe, but Millen hates the Buckeyes.

They're not wrong, though. Ohio State's running game, o-line, and front seven were as good as anybody's (though the o-line played like shit against Clemson), and with their recruiting and coaching staff they're going to continue disappointing in big games for years to come.

Their problem was that their biggest weakness this year was way larger than any other contending team's biggest weakness, and was duly exploited. But they still took a very good Clemson team to the wire despite it being an unfavorable matchup for them (I honestly figured Boyd to Watkins would go for at least 10/175 and 3 TD's before the game started), their playing without 2 of their top 4 defenders (including the only member of the secondary worth a damn), and Miller playing hurt.

[RBS]

True, Millen was probably giving handies to the refs. I have no idea how he though that game was well officiated. It was terrible on both sides.

16/227/2, you were close.

[Brett L]

They're not wrong, though. Ohio State's running game, o-line, and front seven were as good as anybody's

About as good as Notre Dame's, not as good as Texas' was in a year that got their coach fired.

[KDN]

Nonsense. Just look at the running splits; OSU ran for 308 per game and gave up 109. This contrasts with 151 / 168 for ND and 196 / 183 for UT. Feel free to bitch about the schedule, but that's not enough to make up for that kind of discrepancy, and that discrepancy is a reflection of their line strength.

[Brett L]

Clemson put up 198 and gave up 193. Y'all gave up over 30 points a game to the only people with any strength in your schedule. You're as good as the 10-25 best, not in the top 10 this year.

[Pro Libertate]

Ohio State isn't even good. They're on the way to being good, but they're a ways away still. Great's not even in the discussion.

[BigT]

Now that Urban Meyer will be putting mostly his recruits on the field I expect Ohio State to be significantly improved. Meyer (and some other SEC coaches) recruit speed, figuring they can teach technique. OSU (and some others) have been too enamored of big High School statistics rather than ability.

I'd put Carlos Hyde against anyone. I think he'll make the best pro of any of the runners in college this year. Braxton Miller will last a year or two as an experiment. The OSU secondary was weak all year, and the D-line covered for them. But Michigan exposed the weakness and MIch St and Clemson exploited it. New D coach will also help.

[Don Mynack]

Auburn was the underdog and covered, and left 10 points on the field. One of the easier bets I made all year.

What was shocking was how pedestrian Winston was - Manziel had 4 TD and over 400 yards passing and 1 rush TD against this same defense, the Mizzou QB had similar numbers - while "Famous" had a paltry 237 yards. He's also slower than molasses, and has a pretty weak arm. What an overrated player.

Congrats to FSU, though. Scoreboard.

[Brett L]

His arm is fine. He's not quick, although he's fast enough in a straight line. Dude changes direction slower than a oil tanker. Also, he had about 325 against the same Duke D as Johnny Football in three quarters.

[Eduard van Haalen]

The ACLU used to argue in court that certain forms of censorship were wrong, but
now they tell the Supreme Court that this censorship is OK after all. They say their position has "evolved over time." You believe in evolution, don't you?

TRIGGER WARNING: The censorship in question would be imposed on prolife protesters, eg, forbidding them from peacefully distributing literature within 100 feet of an abortion clinic.

(From Overlawyered)

http://dlvr.it/4fLPLk

[Eduard van Haalen]

(From the link within the link, it seems the latest case tries to impose a 35' no-speech bubble, and the Supremes want to use this case to re-examine a precedent allowing a Silence 100' Radius spell, I mean law.

[Eduard van Haalen]

Ah, the 100' radius lae allowed speechnso long as the speaker was 8 feet away from the speak-ee. IOW no handing out leaflets.

[DJF]

This is like when the feminists were against the unequal relationships when bosses dated their employees and then suddenly thought it was all fine when Clinton and the intern scandal happened.

[Zeb]

Here's a question. And I honestly haven't made up my mind about the answer. Is it my right of free speech to follow you around wherever you go in public every day and call you an asshole and a murderer and whatever other unpleasant things I can think of?

[robc]

Yes.

[waffles]

That's harassment, not speech.

[R C Dean]

Its both?

[Zeb]

So then how does it differ from protests outside of clinics? Or does it?

[Juice]

If you can't easily escape the in-your-face taunts then I'd say that someone could intervene to stop it. If the taunter is not following the tauntee around then I'd say that intervention is not warranted at that time.

[Zeb]

I harassment in public is not protected speech, then I would be inclined to say that neither is protesting abortion as close to the entrance to an abortion clinic as you want. The people employed there cannot easily escape daily taunting.

[Zeb]

If.

[prolefeed]

The NAP doesn't protect you from people saying things that upset your fragile psyche. If they block your path, that's initiation of force. Saying stuff you find unpleasant, not so much so.

[waffles]

This. The moment you follow me around to call me whatever you want that's harassment. If I attempt to avoid your name calling and you pursue me haven't you violated the NAP?

[prolefeed]

Not seeing how people saying stuff you'd rather they didn't is a NAP violation.

Not seeing how following you around in public is a NAP violation, though even having public spaces arguably violates the NAP.

The NAP doesn't mean assholes can't be assholes.

[waffles]

I guess. But it seems like degree matters. Following combined with asshole speech could be seen as threatening. Are threats of violence protected speech too?

[SugarFree]

It's an asymmetrical motivation structure. The people working in clinics aren't interested in following the leafleteers home and calling them vile names through a megaphone all night, or showing up at their children's school to hold up posters of women dead and bloody from botched backalley abortions, or ringing a church to scream at parishioners going to mass. The staff and visitors to the clinics bring it on themselves by not answering speech with more speech.

[Juice]

Yeah, I would call that harassment.

[Tonio]

And what about the people who obtain the speaking schedules of politicians and always show up outside to protest?

I'm going with "both" here -- both free speech and harassment. I'm not sure how much protection one should have in public from potential harassers.

[Aloysious]

The Satanic Temple, based in New York City, hope to erect a ten-foot-statue of Baphomet at the Oklahoma state capitol.

I think this is rather appropriate.

[Rich]

HHS 'Corrects' Obamacare Rule, Waives Comment Period and 30-Day Delay

It's OK "if the Secretary finds for good cause that the delay is impracticable, unnecessary, or contrary to the public interest, and incorporates a statement of the findings and the reasons therefor in the rule issued."

Another fine example of the rule of law.

[Auric Demonocles]

"It's the LAW." is only a valid argument against change when it's the legislature that wants to change a law.

[Rich]

The infuriating thing is: it's the legislature that puts these things in the LAW. 8-(

[db]

Look, if the law says that people should be treated unequally, then everyone is treated equally under the law regardless of what unequal treatment they receive.

How that end-around passes muster, I don't know, but everyone seems to buy it. The law creates classes of people and institutions that can be treated unequally and then the claim is made that under that law unequal treatment *is* equal treatment. It really boggles the mind.

[prolefeed]

In less than a week, the price of legally sold marijuana in Colorado has doubled

FTFY.

[Clich? Bandit]

Thank you. I can still get weed no problem and cheaply.

[John]

Things to do before you die, take a Taxi lap around the Nurburgring with Sabine Schmitz and her 911 RS.

http://www.rsrnurburg.com/car-.....-taxi-laps

[Ted S.]

Spa-Francorchamps is an actual road course. My German relatives and I rode on it, not quite realizing what it was until we reached the grandstand.

[John]

Yes it is. Up in the Ardennes. Rumor is Sabine is the new Stig.

She is not pretty. But I have a terrible crush on Sabine Schmitz. I am seriously going to save my shekels and do that before a I die. She is the mistress of the Nurburgring and has done more hot laps on it than anyone else. She grew up near it. This is a woman who told Jeremy Clakson after he had done an 11 minute lap in some kind of Jaguar that she could beat that time in a van and sure enough either did it or came awfully close. She is just awesome.

[WTF]

She came close in a stripped out van. It was funny watching guys doing a lap in their Porches and BMW's getting passed by a van, driven by a girl.

[John]

That was the best part. All of these old men in the 911s getting passed by a Ford Transit driven by a cute blond.

[tarran]

She is not pretty.

With that smile and poise?!? She is beautiful!

[lap83]

I thought she was pretty too, in an efficient German sort of way

[John]

I think so too. I just didn't want to get into the usual hit and run "she is a dog, you clearly have terrible taste in women" debate. But yeah, Sabine is the bomb. She is just not Hollywood starlet pretty. But who cares. Some anorexic, silicone starlet can't drive the Nurburgring in seven minutes.

[prolefeed]

She looks like a young, female version of Anthony Hopkins.

That is all.

[R C Dean]

She is not pretty.

Jeebus, John, maybe there is something wrong with you.

[John]

See above RC. I was just trying to avoid the usual Hit and Run debates about women. I think she is very pretty. But usually saying even a gorgeous woman is attractive on here illicit the "oh my God she is so ugly" responses.

[tarran]

Oh my god!

If I had the money to burn...

[db]

The prices are surprisingly affordable. Depending on the day, as low as EUR395. Imagine that; she probably turns the lap in

[John]

My guess is that she is probably pretty affable and customer friendly and not a bitch. If she were, the supply of suckers would dry up quickly.

[db]

Uh, I have no idea why half my post became squirrel food.

I wrote that she probably can turn a lap with passenger in less than 10 minutes (oh, yeah, the less than sign), turn a passenger around in 30 minutes (with whatever refuel, photo op, car checkout, etc., is necessary. If she does 10 laps a day, she can rake in at least EUR4000, which is not bad for a day's work, even with maintenance and insurance expenses.

[John]

She just got paid four thousand euro to spend a day driving a race track and hanging out with admirers.

That sounds like very good work if you can get it. More reason why Sabine just might be my idol.

[db]

OMG, Sabine is awesome. You have to love a woman who can drive like that.

[mr simple]

The Satanic Temple, based in New York City, hope to erect a ten-foot-statue of Baphomet at the Oklahoma state capitol.

This is so lazy and why I hate "devil-worshippers." Baphomet is at most a pagan idol and probably just a corruption of the name Mohammad (Mohamet) and is in no way synonymous with Satan.

[John]

Real Satanists never live up to the image I have of them from listening to heavy metal. You expect Alyster Crowley living in some Welsh country home having orgies and sacrificing virgins. Instead you get earnest annoying failed hippies.

[Eduard van Haalen]

Never met a real Satanist, but from their literature they deny Satan exists and use him to symbolize what they deem true human values.

It's like Unitarianism, but with more elaborate ceremonies.

[Eduard van Haalen]

Never met an *avowed* Satanist, I should say.

[Clich? Bandit]

One theory holds that Enlil, the ancient Sumerian God, was the "harsh" god of the OT and Enki was the, the scientist, was the "nice" god. Well Enki and Enlil had an argument and the theory goes Enki became the "satan" of old and Enlil the "God". The big thing is though Enki was the one who loved Man, his creation, so that means the "God" that demands subservience is Enlil and he is bad while Enki gives free will and knowledge (the fruit) and he is good. SO, if you look at it modern religion (Abrahamic) focuses mostly on Enki...hence satan...Yup, fundies are satanists.

[John]

Or really Atheism with more elaborate ceremonies. What is the fun of being a Satanist if you deny Satan exists?

[Eduard van Haalen]

You have to ask? Freaking out the normals, that's the fun.

[John]

Doesn't worshiping something you claim exists do that even more?

[Eduard van Haalen]

If they thuoght Datan, as traditionally conceived, was real, only a few hard-core fanatics would want to worship him.

[Zeb]

I think freaking out the normals is a big part of it. I doubt that there are all tha many truly sincere satanists out there. But there is a bit more to the actual belief system. Satanism is either a weird undercurrent of Christianity or a hedonistic, materialistic worldview (more the Lavey sort).

Remember, satan originally just means an adversary. It doesn't have to be the god of darkness or the ruler of hell or something like that.

[Outlaw]

http://www.quickmeme.com/img/d.....54d63c.jpg

On topic: DC Comics' Lucifer series was really good. If you're into comics and have never read it, pick 'em up.

[lap83]

There is Theistic Satanism, LaVeyan Satanism, and Luciferianism. Only the second one is athiestic, but I think it's more common.

[Eduard van Haalen]

Splitters!

[Entropy Void]

So go work for Le Pommebees in France, bitch.

http://www.theguardian.com/com.....needs-tips

[SugarFree]

Most of these receipt controversies are turning out to be hoaxes. The racist Red Lobster one and the lesbian one have so far, I believe.

[John]

And Oprah in Switzerland.

[Agammamon]

. . . not because I did anything illegal or against company policy, but because I embarrassed this person.

Yes dear, you *did do something against company policy - its against company policy to *embarrass* the fucking company. That one rule is pretty much industry standard, no matter what your industry is.

Plus, tips *are* optional - What you're wages are is not my problem. Its not my responsibility (heartless teabagging ratfucker that I am) to help you raise your family. I don't care that what you're wages are, are not enough to live on, are less than minimum wage, whatever. That's between you and your employer. 18-fucking-percent is ridiculous as 'standard'. You wanna tip? Provide me some service that's worth the money. Fucking Subway employees want tips nowadays.

[Agammamon]

I can't understand why I was fired over this. . . I did my best to protect the identity of all parties involved

Here's your problem right there - nobody cares that you did your *best*, only what YOU did. You're a nice person? Who cares? Good mother? Fuck you, stay home with your kids.

[sarcasmic]

Mentally ill 18-year-old shot dead by police in front of his mortified family after parents called them to help him as he had an episode
Keith Vidal, 18, was held down by two officers and shot dead by another, his family alleged at a Monday press conference
He was having a schizophrenic episode when his family called 911 to help calm him down
The officer who shot the boy to death was on the scene less than a minute before firing his gun, according to an incident report
A detective has been put on leave while authorities look into the incident

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new.....isode.html

the Southport Police Department officer said 'we don't have time for this' and shot the boy to death while two officers held him down

Feared for his life.

[John]

You have to be a quite a cold blooded killer to just shoot someone like that. He will never pay for it, but that is the definition of a monster.

[sarcasmic]

After thinking about it, I'm starting to doubt the story. It says that the father grabbed the cop as he was getting ready to shoot the kid a second time. Nobody grabs a cop and gets away with it. Unless the father was beaten by all three cops to within an inch of his life, I find it difficult to believe that he grabbed a cop.

[John]

I am not sure. The other cops may have been a bit stunned. A handgun going off inside of a room like that would have made a hell of a bang. And even cops had to have been a bit shocked when he just shot the kid. I could see where the other cops were too stunned to do anything.

Also, the cop was from another department. The cops often hate other departments. So they might not have given a shit.

[Zeb]

They (and the one who shot) might have also realized that he just committed murder and was completely unjustified.

I'm sure that he will never see the punishment he deserves, but unless I am missing some important information, this seems like it might just be egregious enough that some charges will come. It does happen occasionally. Like when that cop shot the guy on the subway in Oakland a year or two ago.

[SugarFree]

Mehserle was only convicted of involuntary manslaughter and spent a mere 7 months in LA County Jail in a private cell.

It was something to eat, but still a mighty thin bowl of gruel.

[Zeb]

Certainly. I'm just saying that this seems like a case where we might get a little bit of thin gruel. Not what he deserves, of course, but they don't universally get off without any criminal charge at all, which several people seem to be implying.

[CatoTheElder]

When they restrained the murderous cop from walloping the stunned, grieving father of the murder victim, the two other cops exhibited the vestiges of humanity that they have. Certainly they, too, were stunned by murderer's brutality.

I am sure that, on they have had time to reflect upon what they did, they will do their duty to protect their brother pig.

[Drake]

Well, they did calm him right the fuck down.

[UnCivilServant]

http://reason.com/blog/2014/01.....illed-by-c

There was some discussion on the matter.

[sarcasmic]

Stunning in stripes! Maria Menounos shows off her amazing figure in monochrome-string bikini for day two of Mexican vacation

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvs.....exico.html
I'll be in my bunk.

[Mongo]

Long live the new flesh.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

And no excessive tattoos anywhere.

[sarcasmic]

Google "Maria Menounos bikini malfunction." You will not be disappointed.

[Raston Bot]

A bit skinny for me. But thanks- I appreciate your effort and production finding/posting these.

[prolefeed]

Yeah, you can take slim too far, and she does that. But if that floats your boat, good on ya.

[Juice]

Belly button ornaments are the worst. I don't care how hot a girl is, if she's got one of those things dangling in her belly button it's just a huge turn off. I don't know why but I fucking hate them with a passion.

[EdWuncler]

"If I say a whole system must be upset for me to win, I am saying that I cannot sit in the game, and that safer rules must be made to give me a chance. I repudiate that. If others are in there, deal me a hand and let me see what I can make of it, even though I know some in there are dealing from the bottom and cheating like hell in other ways" ~Zora Neale Hurston

Happy Birthday to Hurston who I didn't know till a year ago that she was a libertarian.

[John]

She is a great writer. But, she was a total iconoclast and was way too smart to buy into the bullshit leftism of post war black thinkers. As a result she was basically written out of history for a long time only to be discovered later.

We spend all of this time wasting students' time with lousy minority writers in the name of "diversity" and the academy largely ignored Hurston, a black women and easily one of the ten best American novelists of the 20th Century.

It almost makes you think the academy is really about leftism not diversity.

[Eduard van Haalen]

Haven't read her work, but I think Their Eyes Were Watching God is sometimes assigned.

[John]

It is. But it wasn't for a very long time. She has made a bit of a comeback.

[Heroic Mulatto]

The biggest crime is that Hurston's work as a zombie hunter is almost completely ignored.

Seriously.

[invisible furry hand]

What a relief to click on your links and not get bestiality but a learned exposition on the infernal slaves of voodoo

[Heroic Mulatto]

Sometimes, I choose to stay my hand.

[EdWuncler]

Absolutely. A lot of the black and white academics basically ignored her works because she didn't tow the line. She basically ranted against racism but at the same thought that forcing people to cooperate and be together would make race matters alot worse. And she was right.

People like Sowell and Shelby Steele are shut out of acadamia because their views clash with many of those in the ivory tower. In college, I've learned all too well that the universities aren't exactly the bedrock of the exchange of ideas.

[Irish]

Is Thomas Sowell really shut out of academia? He's taught at Cornell and the University of California - Los Angeles. He now works for Stanford.

[EdWuncler]

True but I've really never heard of him in the mainstream until a couple of years ago.

[Mokers]

Uh oh:

http://www.autonews.com/articl.....-late-2015

Berkshire Hathaway to help import Chinese cars to the US. Why is Warren Buffet shipping jobs overseas? Boycott!

[Palin's Buttplug]

Buffett is a capitalist first and a liberal second.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

Cronyist first PB.

[OldMexican]

Re: Palin's Buttwipe,

Buffett is a capitalist first and a liberal second.

Placing Profits over principles?

Maybe he's no liberal...

[R C Dean]

No, profits over principles is part of the liberal way. The other part is "profits from and for principals".

[Lord Peter Wimsey]

"Buffett is a capitalist first and a liberal second."

In other words, Buffet wants the fruits of free markets for himself, but liberal statism for everyone else. That makes him a liberal douch bag first and second.

[db]

Just like he fired 30% of Heinz employees in Pittsburgh. He's a real down to earth man of the people, that Buffett.

[prolefeed]

I don't have a problem with either an employer or an employee terminating their employer-employee relationship if it quits being to their mutual benefit.

You can hate on Buffett for a lot of things, but this ain't one of them IMO.

[db]

I have no problem with it from a business standpoint. He does not get to be hypocrite about it and avoid criticism, however.

[John]

http://washingtonexaminer.com/.....le/2541670

Walmart Health Plan is cheaper and offers more coverage than Obamacare.

[Mokers]

But they can only do that because they don't pay a living wage. And what if that 70 year old greeter isn't getting maternity coverage?

[Rich]

Well, that plan is from *China*, duh!

[Agammamon]

The premium payments are low and the coverage excellent, but they get you on the airfares - only Chinese hospitals are in the network.

[Jordan]

"It's not just the number, but who they are. You'll find under the Obamacare exchanges that the academic hospitals have declined to participate, along with the specialists who practice at those hospitals. The same is true of cancer hospitals," she said.

"People who are seriously ill need to stay away from these exchange plans," McCaughey said.

Slayton said the gap between doctor availability in Chicago under the Obamacare and Walmart plans is dramatic.

"You will notice there are 9,837 doctors [under Obamacare]. But the larger network is 24,904 doctors. Huge, huge difference," he said.

And more people will learn the hard lesson that health insurance != health care.

[John]

Yes and no. It is healthcare in the sense that your insurance plan determines which doctors you will see. So if you plan has a shitty network of doctors, you health care is going to suffer.

If insurance just paid for any doctor you went to rather than only paying for ones on the network, insurance would not be healthcare. But since the insurance plan is also the network, it is in a real sense one and the same.

[Jordan]

If insurance just paid for any doctor you went to rather than only paying for ones on the network, insurance would not be healthcare.

Huh?

[Rasilio]

Unless of course there are not enough doctors leading to your inability to get an appointment or the mix of types of doctors does not give you access to the medical specialists you need.

In which case you have insurance and *SOME* access to health care, just not the care you actually need.

[Entropy Void]

Guess Rep. Grayson's wife couldn't take it anymore, either.
Lose 18 mil, lose the wifey.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com.....73715.post

[Eduard van Haalen]

It says the 18 year old child is "not a party to the divorce," implying that the 4 minor children *are* parties. But I doubt they're parties in the strict sense of being able to speak for themselves in court (through a guardian ad litem). Am I correct?

[Juice]

Lolita?

I mean who names their daughter that?

[Agammamon]

They figured they needed at least one stripper in the family.

[Rich]

Students may only carry clear, plastic bags on campus.

It's a slippery slope to mandated nudity.

[John]

On college campuses at least, that might be one slippery slope we want to fall down.

[Auric Demonocles]

I'm not sure it's worth having the hot chicks naked if it means everyone else is too.

Oh god, the physics lectures... shudder

[John]

You can always look away. It of course depends on the college. Clearly not worth it at Bryn Mawr or some east coast lesbian school. But at a big Southern State school? The physics lecturer would be an acceptable downside when you are talking about that kind of up side.

[UnCivilServant]

I went to college in upstate new york. Where 6F is normal weather for the current term. I can think of a great many logistical problems with such a rule here.

[Restoras]

Clarkson? Plattsburgh? St. Lawrence?

[UnCivilServant]

RIT.

[Restoras]

Ok, I guess that qualifies as "upstate"...:-)

[Auric Demonocles]

Cornell, RIT, University of Rochester, RPI...

[Auric Demonocles]

You can look away when there is 1 person around and when you don't have to watch what that person is doing.

[UnCivilServant]

A clear plastic bag makes it easier to decide what person is carrying goods worth stealing. I'd bet on an uptick in bag snatching after that rule.

[Eduard van Haalen]

Uh, it's a private high school, not a college, and someone left threatening notes referencing a specific day. The security precautions are based on this.

[OldMexican]

Re: Rich,

Students may only carry clear, plastic bags on campus.

My entrepreneurial senses tell me that there's an opportunity for see-thru backpacks to cater to students of paranoid universities and colleges.

[General Butt Naked]

Most high school's now require clear backpacks. They've been making them for a while now.

[General Butt Naked]

Oops

The high schools in sentence one don't own anything.

[John]

http://www.breitbart.com/Breit.....al-Warming

Chris Hayes is butthurt that the big meanies at Drudge keep making fun of global warming.

It is really great. All my life only those on the right were ever subjects of ridicule. But thanks to the AGW cult, leftists are the punchline for once. To any person outside the leftist hive "I blame Al Gore" or "How about that global warming" will always illicit a laugh. These people have become a joke and they are so smug and insulated from reality they don't even realize it.

[Restoras]

They retreat into self-rightousness. It's delicious.

[John]

The best part is how he claims "no one ever said it wouldn't stop getting cold". Ah, yeah they did. They said that Americans and British would have to explain to their children what it was like back when it snowed.

They are so fucked. The only way they can sell the drastic solutions they want is to claim the effects are going to be immediate and drastic. But every year they claim that and none of them happen, they look more and more foolish and are reduced to saying "we never said it would be that bad", in which case they lose any justification for drastic action.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

I don't know how I feel about man-made climate change. The only thing I know for certain is a government led "fix" will most certainly do more harm to our liberty and likely not really fix the problem of CO2 emissions... especially with more and more of the 3rd world using more and more electricity, likely produced through the burning of coal.

The only true fix will be a free market fix. If nuclear hadn't been regulated to the extent that it has, coal would have seen a much further displacement in the United States and abroad. As it stands, NG and coal, for the time being, are the cheapest forms of electricity producing fuels we have. The only way those will ever be truly displaced is when a cheaper alternative appears. Environmentalists should focus on that part of the problem, not on government mandates to force technology or rules down our throats.

[gaijin]

should focus on that part of the problem, not on government mandates to force technology or rules down our throats.

But that would be hard...and require skills...these are inconvenient truths. "so let it be written, so let it be done" is so much more convenient.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

Any problem ever has only been fixed by government force, right? Private sector innovation has never solved any problem ever. I mean, wind and solar don't even solve the problem so their solution is bunk to begin with. It is a fucking nightmare of cronyism with the average citizen being fucked by higher energy prices and an ever increasing unstable grid for those extra cents/kwh.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Wow, this is very reasonable. Are you on the right forum?

AGW is certainly real and only the market can solve the problem. NG is a bridge fuel and the rapid demise of coal (in the US) is evidence.

[OldMexican]

Re: Palin's Buttplug,

AGW is certainly real and only the market can solve the problem.

How real is AGW, you say? It is so real, that the market has completely ignored it (that is, us, real people) whereas only lefty academicians, governent grant-seekers and clueless journalists continue to cling to the idea like someone who clings to the rip cord of a parachute that refuses to open.

[General Butt Naked]

Global warming could be happening exactly as claimed with regards to temperature, but the doomsday predictions accompanying the rise in temperature could be total, power-grabbing bunk. Because people in aggregate aren't feeling these repercussions means that there isn't the market activity coincidental with what global warming supposedly does.

As far as I can tell, warmer temperatures are historically a boon to mankind and without government interference a few more degrees would be very beneficial.

[Jordan]

It's so real that the models on which most of the science is based still can't account for current global temps and are quietly being revised.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

A lot of smart people I know believe in man-made climate change. I don't fully buy into it to the extent that some are fear mongering.

What I do know is that if I had to choose between the dirtiest form of coal, lignite, or wind and solar for electricity, I would choose the coal 100 times out of 100.

[prolefeed]

Wind and solar are great if you plan on never having windless days -- or night.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

You make too much sense, Smilin'.

Which means it MUST be ignored.

[tarran]

Environmentalists should focus on that part of the problem, not on government mandates to force technology or rules down our throats.

Except that the leading environmentalists are proponents of a religion that hates consumption and wants to push people into an ascetic 'virtuous' lifestyle.

When natural gas was expensive, they promoted it. The moment a process was invented that made it abundant and cheap, they turned against it.

The CAGW movement are as deluded as some 19th century seventh day adventist trying to force people to get ready for the imminent second coming of Christ.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

I fully agree and realize that. I just mean, if they were honestly worried about climate change this should be how they go about it. I know, I'm living a bit of a fantasy.

From my experience so far, it really is a small minority that believe government force should be left out of the equation all together, which is sad. The nuclear blogs I comment on are usually full of commentators calling for more government money and grants to get nuclear going. There are complaints about the regulations but most wan't a *new* government fix to counter the over-regulation problem initiated by the government to begin with. In a sane world the fight would be fully for pulling back the regulations and letting private investors take the gamble.

But it really is the "if our guy was just in charge" mentality. There is little thought to the idea that maybe government shouldn't have the power to destroy an industry when the wrong guy is in charge.

[Brett L]

I'll start believing its serious when they stop taking private jets to the conferences.

[John]

http://pjmedia.com/vodkapundit.....nfreude-4/

Single mother can't afford obamacare. She supported it because she thought it would help people like her. Reality is a harsh teacher.

[invisible furry hand]

Clarification: she's not a single mother

Her husband works for a non-profit organization that pays for his health care, but the couple is unable to afford to have her and their son covered under his plan.

[John]

Good catch. And he works for a nonprofit. I bet her and her husband were good little hopey changers in 08 and 12.

[Don Mynack]

He should at least bite the bullet and cover the kids. What a beta-male loser.

[Palin's Buttplug]

So she is no worse off.

[John]

And the program didn't do her any good even though it was sold as a way to help people like her.

Sure we fucked millions of Americans, but we didn't make the people we were trying to help worse off.

You retards are so screwed.

[OldMexican]

Re: Palin's Buttwipe,

So she is no worse off.

Yeah, so much for Affordable? Care.

[Fluffy]

So she is no worse off.

Except for the fact that now in addition to not being able to afford insurance she also has to pay a fine.

Because to incredible morons like Obama, pointing a gun at the head of people with no disposable income and telling them to buy insurance or pay a fine helps those people.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Time to change the ACA to 'No worse off Care.'

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

If you are middle class: 'Probably Worse Off Care'

[Juice]

During the 08 campaign he was against individual mandates. He gave very good reasons why they were bad. So he knows full well what he's unleashed.

[Lord Peter Wimsey]

Yes, BP, not being able to afford health insurance under Chocolate Nixon means you are no worse off.

No one is worse off.

Anyone who says otherwise is a [insert epithet here].

Questions?

[WTF]

She will be when she has to pay the penaltax, moron.

[Fluffy]

We should make Penaltax Day a special Reason holiday.

Like this year's Salty Ham Tears Day, only scaled up.

[Rasilio]

Uh yes she is.

It is not called a Penaltax for nothing. So nothing has changed about her situation except she now has to pay a penaltax that she otherwise would not have had to pay.

That money could have been used to cover at least a part of her Out of Pocket medical expenses

[CatoTheElder]

Well, since she's going to have to pay the greater of $695 or 1% of gross income in ObamaCare penaltax, I'd say she's worse off.

[Rasilio]

Oh then her solution is easy.

Get divorced

She'll no longer be eligible under her husbands plan and will qualify for subsidies

[CatoTheElder]

The wife and I have discussed this option to game the system. The incentive for an older couple to divorce can run into the $1000s per year.

[Rasilio]

We've discussed the same as well. We could save a couple hundred a month on health insurance plus since she is considering going back to school my income would no longer be a factor in her financial aid calculations

[John]

http://abcnews.go.com/US/amtra.....d=21445064

The joys of government railroading.

About 500 passengers aboard three Amtrak trains were stranded overnight in a remote part of northern Illinois because of blowing and drifting snow, Amtrak officials said today.

The trains were halted late Monday near Mendota, about 80 miles west of Chicago. The passengers were aboard the Southwest Chief from Los Angeles, the Illinois Zephyr from Quincy, Ill., and the California Zephyr from the San Francisco Bay area, Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari told The Associated Press.

The trains became stuck around 4:15 p.m. ET Monday after they hit a 12-foot snow drift that paralyzed the engines, passenger Bryan Plummer told ABC News today by cellphone.

[Jordan]

DON'T BITCH ABOUT TRAIN MARKETS!!1

/Palin's Derp

[Entropy Void]

I know it's from NewsMax, but still viewworthy.
Asimov's predictions from 50 year ago.

http://www.newsmax.com/newswid.....dgetphase1

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

The appliances of 2014 will have no electric cords, of course, for they will be powered by long-lived batteries running on radioisotopes.

He forgot to predict government bureaucracy in the form of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission stopping any of this from advancing for civilian use.

[MP]

Oh c'mon. If there's one thing Asimov predicted, it was Government bureaucracy. He just predicted it would all be Top Men.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

The good ol' Top Men fallacy.

[Juice]

Asimov was a great scifi writer, but he was politically idealistic and naive (retarded).

[Griffin3]

Really, if you are willing to squint and whitewash predictions like this Newsmax article, even Krugman's predictions can be made to sound like gospel truth.

There will be aircraft, of course, but even ground travel will increasingly take to the air a foot or two off the ground.

Several companies are now producing concept cars that can fly, although interstate highways remain a top source for transportation and such flying vehicles are not mass-marketed.

Interesting to see asimov's predictions, but newsmax's commentary made me dumber for having read it.

[Emmerson Biggins]

I was not that impressed with his accuracy really. Hindsight is 20/20 so maybe I'm being too hard on him. But still, seems like all the stuff he got right was pretty easy, and then the list tries to spin his bad predictions into good ones.

[OldMexican]

Dennis Rodman says Kim Jong Un is his friend and he loves him. He's returning to North Korea, bringing other former NBA players for an exhibition game for Kim's birthday. He says he doesn't want to tell Kim how to do things but hopes the game brings an opportunity to "talk about certain things."

That is, talk about certain photos of Rodman in compromising situations with a little burro, that Kim Jong Un promised to return to him after a few quid pro quos.

[UnCivilServant]

Please, no one could think less of Rodman at this point.

[PD Scott]

Until recently, no one was thinking of Rodman at all.

[Agammamon]

*Now* you know why he's really been going to NK.

[mad libertarian guy]

I discovered this morning that there are few things that will make a man angrier than not being able to find his cold weather camo beenie/mask and gloves once he's made the last second decision to take advantage of rare -4 degree temperatures and try and blast himself a coyote.

[Aloysious]

Wile E. Coyote usually blasts himself.

[Restoras]

Can you tie the neighbors cat to a stake and just shoot the coyote from your bedroom window?

[Clich? Bandit]

Insert Chicken for cat, wild dog for coyote, and roof of house for bedroom window, and you just described my mother when I was 8yo.

[Emmerson Biggins]

coyotes are easier to shoot when it's cold?

[The Late P Brooks]

Berkshire Hathaway to help import Chinese cars to the US.

Jeeps?

[OldMexican]

Yes, but here they will be called Cheeps

[PD Scott]

The 2014 Great Jeep Forward, with a 5 year payment plan.

[WTF]

It will likely be the Trumpchi.

[KB Check Release]

OT:

Yesterday on my way to lunch I had AM talk radio on and Glenn Beck (yes I know) was talking about how he thinks Peter King is insane/off the reservation etc... in regard to Snowden.

Beck also talked about how he disagrees with some of Rand Paul's opinions on Snowden but overall he thinks Rand is right on point and has been for some time on this issue.

I was really refreshed to hear someone (of what I consider establishment GOP mouthpieces) not talking about how Rand's foreign policy is insane and actually give the guy compliments on his political ideas.

I think it is a great sign that the GOP might actually be ready for a shift to freedom.

Prolly not though.

[John]

Beck is not establishment GOP. And Paul was brilliant in admitting that Snowden is not without sin but that King and company are nuts on the issue.

That said, most people are tired of the war in Afghanistan and think the Middle East should burn in its own shit.

People were tired of it in 2012. The only reason they rejected Ron Paul is that he couldn't shut up and make that point without going on about how the the Muslims have a legitimate beef. No one outside of a small minority is going to want to listen to how hard the Muslims have it, which is how that came off.

Rand is a lot smarter than his dad and won't make that mistake. He will instead make the simple argument that it is no longer our problem and if it does become our problem, ruble doesn't make trouble. The GOP base will be very receptive to that message.

[tarran]

IF you parse what Paul said, he didn't say Snowded should go to jail. He said that is Snowden broke the law, a light jail sentence would be in order.

I think it was a beautiful bit of sophistry. It is a position that everyone except us extremists can live with.

[Heroic Mulatto]

At this point King is McCarthy 2.0, including being a little correct about an academic point or two. I look forward to King's eventual implosion and disgrace.

[Eduard van Haalen]

McCarthy publicized cases of Reds and comsymps working for, or advising the government. King just bloviates.

[Bill Dalasio]

This is about right with regard to Ron Paul. I really can't figure out why he had to stick with the "blowback" argument. "It's just not our problem and it isn't worth our blood and treasure" would go over well with a lot of Republicans.

[John]

The dark night of fascism forever falling on America and landing on Europe

It is difficult to go more than a day in France without hearing someone express the conviction that the greatest problem in the country is its ethnic minorities, that the presence of immigrants compromises the identity of France itself. This conviction is typically expressed without any acknowledgment of the country's historical responsibility as a colonial power for the presence of former colonial subjects in metropolitan France, nor with any willingness to recognize that France will be ethnically diverse from here on out, and that it's the responsibility of the French as much as of the immigrants to make this work.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytim.....ver/?_r=1&

How long before the mass deportations followed by putting those left in ovens?

[Fluffy]

How long

Five minutes after the pension money runs out.

[John]

Yup. And the socialist politicians will never understand how they contributed to it happening. If you spend a generation telling the middle class and the majority to go fuck themselves while importing immigrants in and killing the economy and punishing anyone who makes a buck, you shouldn't be surprised when the majority starts to listen to anyone who is willing to address their concerns even if that someone is pretty awful.

[tarran]

My understanding is that the French police actively participated in the Holocaust, and never were called to account for it.

[John]

Most of France participated in the Holocaust. One of the great lies that Europe tells itself is that the "Nazis were solely responsible for the holocaust". Outside of Italy and the Netherlands, all of Europe happily deported their Jews and when the war was over told them they couldn't come back.

Ever wonder why that whenever someone talks about the Exodus of Jews to Israel after the war they never really explain why the Jews all went there instead of going home? The assumption is that they were so scared by the Holocaust that they wanted to leave. To some degree. But mostly it was because when the survivors went home the local populations told them they were not welcome there anymore. They had nowhere else to go.

I listened to a speech a few years ago by a Holocaust survivor who was a small girl living in then USSR now eastern Poland who managed to survive the Holocaust by living alone in the woods for five years. One of the things she talked about was how when she went home after the war she was told she couldn't stay there. Years later after the fall of the Berlin Wall she went back to her old town and all of the people there welcomed her pretending that it had never happened, even the ones who were old enough to know better.

That is a microcosm of Europe and the Holocaust.

[invisible furry hand]

I think it would have been pre-war eastern Poland, which post-war became part of the USSR, but yeah, that sounds right. There were pograms in Poland after the war, for God's sake.

[tarran]

But mostly it was because when the survivors went home the local populations told them they were not welcome there anymore. They had nowhere else to go.

That jumped out to me when I first encountered the term "Stateless person" reading some survivor's memoirs. I remember thinking how can he be stateless, when he had a home town, and presumably the citizenship that all the people who hadn't been kidnapped from that town ended the war with.

[Calidissident]

I believe Denmark IIRC also did a good job of protecting their Jews

[seguin]

All these are subject to my poor memory:

As few Finnish Jews as there were, the Finns refused to let the Nazis take them.

The Bulgarians under Tsar Boris also refused, at least when it came to Bulgaria proper.

The Italians refused in the most stereotypically Italian way. "We'll do it tomorrow...."

[invisible furry hand]

Even the minorities get in on the fun - behold one of the country's most popular comedians

[mr simple]

This can't be. I've been told that racism is a uniquely American thing and it's mostly contained in the South. We're the only country that ever had slaves. It is known.

[OldMexican]

This conviction [that the greatest problem in the country is its ethnic minorities] is typically expressed without any acknowledgment of the country's historical responsibility as a colonial power for the presence of former colonial subjects in metropolitan France[...]

Leave it to a NYT blogger to completely fly off a tangent when criticizing a country's penchant for blaming others for problems created by their own government.

Who cares about this abstract "historical responsibility" that the blogger alludes to? Why should that be either comfort or intellectual happy place for a regular French person? The argument is inane. The problems facing the French are entirely their own doing; they have the government that they voted for, and no other. They wanted free stuff paid by others, except the others also want the same. This is what the blogger should be saying, but reading his mini-bio (he's a professor of the history and philosophy of science, whatever that means) tells me he will never accept such an explanation and instead continue to feel outraged by this wave of popular nativism.

[John]

And it will never occur to him that giving people free shit and setting up the "rich" as all purpose scapegoats for the country's problems might create a mindset that makes it very easy for the country to use minorities as the scapegoat when the free shit runs out.

[OldMexican]

Re: John,

might create a mindset that makes it very easy for the country to use minorities as the scapegoat when the free shit runs out.

Exactly. He goes on and on expressing his dismay at the level of hostility shown by many French towards minorities (to whom France owes a great deal of "historical responsibility", presumably) without even a consideration to the argument that the state's policy of cultivating envy among people to the point of moral decay is the cause of the hostility in the first place.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"without even a consideration to the argument that the state's policy of cultivating envy among people to the point of moral decay is the cause of the hostility in the first place"

In much the same way that many supporters of affirmative action decry the hostility to minorities on campus and in government workplaces and then call for more affirmative action to combat it, without thinking that perhaps it is giving of special advantages to some of the people on campus and in the workplace that might make some who do not get them resent those who do.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I do not think those in Europe who are anti-immigrant are so because they charge the immigrant populations with being rich, in fact it is usually the opposite (they see the immigrants as the equivalent of 'poor trash').

[Restoras]

You're right, they are anti-immigrant because they are still deeply nationalistic and quasi-racist. Unfortunately for ethnic europeans they are screwed unless they decided to revert back to their ethnic cleansing ways.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

In fairness to them, at least some of them might be led by fears about the growing influence of Muslim immigrant populations in threatening some basic freedoms. They should not generalize this feeling, but such nuance is a great deal to ask for in a nation where the headlines daily document some concerning behavior by Muslim immigrants in the country.

[Restoras]

I don't disagree but I'm not sure how much slack I want to give them considering that they willfully imported cheap labor from Muslim countries in order to make their socialistic policies kinda/sorta work for a little while, and are now beginning to suffer the consequences.

[OldMexican]

Re: Bo Cara Esq.

I do not think those in Europe who are anti-immigrant are so because they charge the immigrant populations with being rich, in fact it is usually the opposite (they see the immigrants as the equivalent of 'poor trash').

Indeed, but a culture that promotes envy also fosters jealousy. The fact is that the French want free stuff and also a rigged game that favors them and not others. This is the undelying motivation in such sentiments like anti-immigration and labor or minimum wage laws.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I do not know. It seems to me that a lot of anger towards groups like immigrants is better characterized as 'resentment' than jealousy, a resentment that 'those people' are 'coming here and taking jobs and benefits.' While the scapegoating is similar to scapegoating wealthy minorities (or those perceived as wealth minorities), I am not sure the originating emotion is.

[Restoras]

I wonder if the 'rigged game' in favor of ethnic Europeans (especailly in France) might be a reason that so many 'poor' and 'disaffected' youths decide to torch private property every New Year's Eve?

[John]

The "rigged game" is welfare. Not every Frenchman is on the dole. A lot of them work just like us. And the ones who work and pay outrageous taxes are not too happy about giving welfare to Muslim Yutes who do nothing but burn shit down.

Welfare really is societal poison. It creates a debilitating sense of entitlement and dependence in its recipients and eventually horrible resentment in those paying the bills.

[Restoras]

I think the 'rigged game' is that the Algerian et al cheap labor that was brought in was done so to support the socialism the French wanted for themselves but didn't want to pay for. And now those that are being used for that end are waking up to it and don't care for it very much.

[John]

Actually no Restorus. Yes, cheap Algerian labor was brought in. But they stopped doing labor a long time ago thanks to socialist economic policies. If the Algerians had jobs instead of being on the dole, they wouldn't be rioting and the native French wouldn't hate them so much.

The latin Americans here don't riot do they? No because they have jobs and are too busy working. Make it impossible for them to work and put them all on welfare and we would have the same problem.

[Kaptious Kristen]

When I was on an exchange program in France in 1987, it was all "Arab this", "Arab that". Those people are the biggest fucking xenophobic racists on the planet. Well, probably not as much as the Norks, but close.

[seguin]

I was born there...MY dad has told me stories of snide Frenchmen complaining about how awful blacks were treated in America.

He usually replied with "Yeah, just like Algerians here".

That shut them up.

[The Late P Brooks]

This is from Jesse's post yewsterday about Schweitzer:

Schweitzer was beloved by the "libertarian Democrat" crowd back in the Bush years, when the Netroots were looking westward for new approaches to politics. Almost a decade later, the governor is sounding the same notes: anti-war, pro-privacy, in favor of civil liberties, and?this is where the libertarian leanings melt away?generally interventionist on economics. (He does score some points hitting Obama for being a corporatist, but he doesn't seem very interested in anti-statist alternatives.)

Schweitzer is whole-heartedly opposed to the First Amendment with regard to political speech and monetary contributions.

Fuck him.

[Drake]

Sounds like a traditional Democrat from 40 years ago, not a Libertarian at all.

[General Butt Naked]

Someone posted that because he was governor of montana he must be good on 2nd amendment issues. Is he?

'Cause here in PA (which has more liberal gun laws -in a good way) we have a goodly amount of banners and lukewarm "blue dogs".

Specifically after Sandy Hook a bunch of NRA A rated dems let their true feeling be shown vis a vis 2nd amendment issues. Especially that assfuck Casey.

[John]

Sorry but if he thinks the government should have a say in how you spend your money to support political causes, he is not "pro-privacy". There is more to privacy than abortion and the NSA.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Schweitzer has openly called for single payer, that should be enough for any to judge him as nothing like a libertarian.

[invisible furry hand]

Creepy mannequin sold for ?700

http://boingboing.net/2014/01/.....um=twitter

[The Late P Brooks]

Someone posted that because he was governor of montana he must be good on 2nd amendment issues. Is he?

I'm not sure, if push came to shove, how vigorously Schweitzer would defend the 2A rights of "civilians". Especially as a potential Demo candidate for President. He was out of office when Sandy Hook happened; as far as I know, he wisely kept his yap shut. I don't trust him.

I expect the lieutenant governor, who apparently will be shoved into Baucus' chair in the Senate, to vote however Chuck Schumer tells him on any gun control legislation. Just like Tester.

[John]

It is my fervent hope that at least a few of the dumb ass anti gun Californians who infected Montana end up getting eaten by a bear or something.

[mad libertarian guy]

It is my fervent hope that at least a few of the dumb ass anti gun Californians who infected Montana end up getting eaten by a bear or something.

One of the wolves the most fervent of anti-gun(hunters) seek to protect despite their economic destruction would be more fitting.

[Sevo]

Just in case you might be wondering,
"Pelosi: Snowden should 'come back and face the music'"
Yep, the hag wants to extract a pound of flesh for making it clear the light-bringer is just one more tin-pot dictator.
http://blog.sfgate.com/nov05el.....for-leaks/

[John]

I am really glad that craven bitch didn't do what even the worst of past politicians would have done and resigned after she lost the House as speaker. She is the gift that keeps on giving. Anytime a lefty tells you that they really are concerned about the NSA and agree with Snowden did, you can throw Pelosi in their face and ask "then I guess you have had it with the Democratic Party too?".

She is such a walking talking embarrassment. But she is a woman and a Democrat and of course will never be asked to shut up or step aside.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

What I want to know is, when is the GOP House or even some of the Senators going to do something about the NSA. So far we have Amash-Conyers (in which more House Republicans voted nay than yea) and some good words by Paul, but we should be getting some bills and filibusters out of this.

[John]

It is not a GOP versus DNC issue. There are people in both parties who cravenly support the NSA and people in both parties who want something done. So a GOP majority won't guarantee anything.

The issue is does the public get pissed off enough about this that people in both parties who are now neutral or soft supporters of the NSA decide it is in their political interest to go after it and do Democrats decide that they are going to have to go after Obama.

If that happens the NSA is in a lot of trouble and things will change. But until that happens it will be a few people like Paul and Wyden making waves but not much else.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I get that it is not a party issue, my point is that I realize why so many key Democrats like Pelosi and Reid do not take steps against it, they are 'company men' and essentially work for the administration who supports this. My question is why more Republican officials are not pushing bills and filibusters against it, after all they have all the political reason to oppose what the administration does. Boehner, McConnell, Cantor, etc., are missing a golden opportunity to take egg and rub it all over the administration's face.

[Restoras]

Most Republicans are 'company men' also. They don't want to let go of any more power/control than necessary to keep their seats and not piss off those they live and work with.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"Most Republicans are 'company men' also."

Sure, but I would think exposing and combating a program currently administered by a Democrat administration would be good for their company.

[Restoras]

The Republicans are 'company men' in the sense that they occupy the same halls of power as the Democrats.

That is the 'company', the 'company of power' that the Republicans are in as well as the Democrats.

[John]

It is two things Bo. First, a lot of people make a lot of money off the national security apparatus and don't want it disturbed. Those intelligence contractors make a lot of money and the companies spread it around liberally. Second, is that most politicians are stupid and rely on what they think is the easy rhetoric. A lot of them haven't figured out yet that it is no longer 2002 and the "we have to stop the terrorists" doesn't work like it used to.

[Restoras]

It seems to me the simplest explanation is that there is no political benefit fro them to do so. They all want to stay in power, first and foremost, and perhaps see no benefit to pursuing anything along those lines politically so of course do not. All you have to do is look at Peter King as a perfect example of that.

[db]

The whole "just face the music" crowd is being so dishonest here. They want to act like he'll be treated fairly and possibly given a slap on the wrist. In reality, once they get their hands on him, he'll be torn to pieces in the media as every mendacious shithead politician takes a whack at him from the safety of their position that "it's just the law" that he be punished.

God, what a loathesome bunch.

[John]

Even if he were to get lucky and get a jury to nullify the law, he would spend years in solitary waiting for trial. They would never let him out on bail and would stick him in supermax while he waited.

Snowden is committed. No way can he come back. Only a dishonest evil bitch like Pelosi could claim he should come back.

[db]

They would scream for his blood, he'd be convicted and sentenced to death, and only the majestic clemency of Obama would bestow upon him a commutation of sentence to life imprisonment with hard labor in Leavenworth.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Pff, Obama does not do clemency.

http://www.propublica.org/arti.....nt-history

[John]

A jury might not. A judge would. But juries are very unpredictable things and very well could tell the government to get bent and give him a light sentence or even acquit him.

The funny thing is that Snowden coming back would be a nightmare for Obama. A trial would be nothing but a months long exposition and reminder to the country how loathsome Obama and the NSA is.

Pelosi of course knows that and doesn't want Snowden back. But since every single word she utters is the exact opposite of the truth, she claims otherwise.

[Raston Bot]

"I think he should come back and face the music for what he did ? (but) the music shouldn't be the death penalty or life in prison."

Sounds similar to Rand's.

[db]

She may not think so, but plenty of others will, and once they get their mitts on him, all bets are off. And I sincerely would not put it past her to join in the feeding frenzy if it became clear that she would have the cover of the herd of bloodthirsty voices.

[OldMexican]

From the 24/7 links:
55% of Americans support legalization of marijuana, according to a new CNN poll

In the meantime, that lovable curmudgeon and all-purpose sourpuss Bill O'Reilly thinks that a) drugs will weaken the fabric of the American society, as if there were no drugs before 1955, and b) that the left is especially attracted to the drug culture, as if controlling our very lives wasn't the left's steak and eggs.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

This is nothing new from the Right. 'acid, abortion and amnesty'

[Kaptious Kristen]

Poor old Bill never made it out of the 1980's crack baby/crips n bloods Inside Edition mindset. He just needs you to pat him on the head and tell him Reagan is still prezznit.

[OldMexican]

You should've heard him yesterday going off against texting, of all things, calling it an "addiction" that threatened the American Way of Life? or something.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I am guessing he then followed up with a lament about youth congregating on his lawn.

[OldMexican]

Oh, God - something in the vicinity of that. He was extra-obnoxious yesterday when asking Mary Catherine Ham if she wanted her baby girl to smoke marijuana.

[Brett L]

I hope she said yes.

[Cdr Lytton]

returning to North Korea, bringing other former NBA players

Kim Jong Un is making a real life version of the Ring?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Yes, you Peanuts keep saying that all the billionaire liberals are rent-seekers while the rich conservatives earned theirs the hard way.

Evidence says the exact opposite.

[General Butt Naked]

Citation please.

[Smilin' Joe Fission]

Yes, please provide examples of this. With links to the original comments of course.

[Rasilio]

False dichotomy

It is entirely possible to both be a rent seeker AND have earned your money the hard way

[Zeb]

No, many, if not most, rich conservatives are rent seekers too. It's basically the nature of big business in the US today, sadly.

[Raston Bot]

http://blogs.reuters.com/rolfe.....-betrayal/

*ahem*

[sarcasmic]

When I was eight my mother took me on a train from the Pacific to the Atlantic. I puked the entire time.

[robc]

A friend of mine did Chicago to SF a few summers ago. They arrived about 24 hours late.

[waffles]

Neat! Do you remember it well at least?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Buffett is always cited as a rent seeker while the Kochs inherited their money and spend far more on lobbying than Berkshire does. Like 10x more.

But the Kochs are never criticized like Buffett.

Gates is hated here. Soros, Jobs, Page, Allen, Brin, etc.

All because they are liberal.

[General Butt Naked]

If it always happens, then maybe you could provide some links that specifically back up your claims.

I mean, if this is endemic as you'd have us believe, you should be able to provide at least ten ironclad links in support of your assertion.

[Fluffy]

Gonna have to ask for a definition of "lobbying", dude.

Because "lobbying" to keep an estate tax in place that leads to wealthy customers seeking out an insurance product you sell is rent-seeking.

"Lobbying" to try to stop the EPA from making it illegal for private citizens to buy your coal or oil is not rent-seeking.

[Agammamon]

Gates and Jobs aren't hated here. Mocked - often, hated - never.

[SugarFree]

I took the train from Cincinnati to Philadelphia once. In regular seats it was a torturous hell, but in a private compartment on the way back was OK, if still boring and slow as hell. This trip was also the first and last time I drank a canned margarita.

[John]

I haven't. But I hear it is a great book. I have to be in the right mood to read about such things since they are so depressing.

This women was an 11 year old girl and lived in the woods of Eastern Poland being hunted by the local population. They would sick their dogs on her. Her story is just heart breaking and incredible.

[SugarFree]

A piece of willful blindness about Bloodlands, via Warty The Foul.

[Restoras]

If I remeber correctly, Niall Ferguson's book War of the Worlds discussed this as well. The Wehrmacht would show up with the Einsatz Gruppen not far behind and everywhere they went the locals pointed out where all the Jews lived.

[John]

I saw that. He just can't admit that Stalin and Communism were evil so he writes the whole thing off as "chaos".

No Coats, it is not Chaos. It is the inevitable and monstrous result of the stupid ideology you follow.

[db]

but in a private compartment on the way back was OK,

"What are you doing back here!?"

"Performing my ablutions, duh!"

[SugarFree]

I did get to take a shower while sitting on the toilet, so there was one cheap dream I got to live out.

[seguin]

BABOU! Lana, he remembers me!

[Juice]

Tragedy of the commons. They HAVE to seek rents because everyone is doing it.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

I felt he was an opportunist way back when I was in investment in the early 2000s.

When the mainstream carries a flag for someone that's the time to start asking questions.