Ukraine Prepares to Fight Back, Americans Doubt Economic Recovery, Lennon's Killer Says He's Sorry: A.M. Links

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  Ukraine is preparing to defend itself against Russian forces in its eastern regions. "The invasion by Putin of the regular Russian army is a fait accompli," said Anton Herashchenko, an adviser to the Ukrainian Interior Minister, on his Facebook page Thursday, while Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko canceled a visit to Turkey to focus on Ukraine's military response. 

• Even as economic recovery moseys forth, most Americans—71 percent—now say the Great Recession "exerted a permanent drag on the economy." In November 2009, only 49 percent said the same.
• Gun tourism is a thing, and an increasingly popular one.
• What happens when one half of a California mall has an $8 minimum wage and the other half must pay $10 per hour?
• Ferguson and other St. Louis-area police departments face steep overtime costs for all that time cops spent out pepper-spraying people and playing conquering army. 
• Let's talk about Gen X for a change! Overall the generation is in more debt than either millennials or boomers; the single most indebted cohort are 44 year olds, who owe on average $142,077. 
• John Lennon's killer says he's "sorry for being such an idiot." 

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Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

Ferguson and other St. Louis-area police departments face steep overtime costs for all that time cops spent out pepper-spraying people and playing conquering army.

Money well spent.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Agreed!

/F.O.P. local

[Bee Tagger]

They do have to buy their own pepper.

[Doctor Whom]

Gei? sou.

The masses will be honored to pay more taxes to fund their own oppression.

[jmomls]

Maybe if the masses hadn’t been lootin’ and burnin’, the overtime wouldn’t have been needed.

Oh, well.

[Fist of Etiquette]

John Lennon’s killer says he’s “sorry for being such an idiot.”

Letting Jared Leto play him, he means.

[sarcasmic]

Cover your balls…

[Tonio]

Trigger warning?

[sarcasmic]

‘I’ll put a round in your a** so quick’: Florida police chief defends cop who threatened to shoot young black man because he filmed his partner throwing him on the ground
A cell phone video of the confrontation was recorded February 4, 2013, in Boynton Beach, Florida
The clip shows a police sergeant dragging a young black man from a car and his partner pulling a gun on another passenger
Boynton Beach Police Chief Jeffrey Katz defended the officers’ actions, saying the occupants of the car were antagonistic and had no ‘fear of police’

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…..g-him.html
These kids were almost killed for failure to show sufficient fear.

[Ted S.]

I thought you were supposed to trust the police, not fear them.

[sarcasmic]

If you’re not cowering in fear then you are a threat.

[Doctor Whom]

There is no right way to behave around the police.

[sarcasmic]

Not acting suspicious is more suspicious than acting suspicious.

[Doctor Whom]

And doing everything legally is a sign that you’re doing something illegal. I only wish I were making that up.

[sarcasmic]

If you do everything legally then it is a sign that you are afraid, and thus suspicious.

If you don’t show sufficient fear then cops are justified in threatening to kill you.

Doesn’t matter what you do.

[Juice]

That cop looks like the BTK murderer.

[Juice]

Did he mean that he was going to ass fuck him? If he meant that he would shoot him, then he would put a bullet into him, not the whole round.

[Juice]

Am I allowed to call a black cop a nigger now? I imagine that wouldn’t go so well. It’s lucky for that kid that white people usually don’t give a shit about being called a cracker.

[sarcasmic]

The moment police shoot ‘Cops’ cameraman dead as they ‘tried to show off for cameras’ by taking robber down in hail of bullets

Bryce Dion, 38, was wearing a bulletproof vest when he was shot by police
Dion worked as a sound engineer on Spike TV reality show for seven years
It is first death of a crew member in the 27 years ‘Cops’ has been on air
Police also shot and killed the suspect, 32-year-old Cortez Washington
The ‘handgun’ he had turned out to be an Airsoft gun firing plastic pellets
His grieving family have claimed officers were grandstanding for the cameras

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…..oting.html

[gaijin]

by taking robber down in hail of bullets

Robbery is a crime punishable by death now?

[Drake]

Police academies should reconsider teaching the “Bullet Hail” volley fire maneuver to cadets.

[Tonio]

It’s called “spray and pray,” Drake.

[Drake]

I think of spray-and-pray as an individual move. We need a better term for a dozen cops simultaneously spraying bullets everywhere.

[Lord Humungus]

The Tet Offensive?

[Scarecrow Repair]

Spree sprayers.

[Griffin3]

Death Blossom.

Or is that one already taken?

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

“Iraqi Death Blossom”

[Doctor Whom]

Without trial, too.

[The DerpRider]

Hail, Ming.

[Ted S.]

I guess we know who’s not around in the afternoons. 🙂

[Tonio]

I’d really like to be able to have some sympathy for Mr. Dion, but am unable to muster any because of his work on a show glorifying cops.

[sarcasmic]

aye

[Idle Hands]

I don’t feel that show glorifies cops so much as shows what kind of dbags your dealing with when you encounter them.

[thom]

Meh – just another working stiff trying to make a paycheck.

[sarcasmic]

SWAT team raid gamer’s room and arrest him while he’s playing online… and the whole thing is captured on his webcam

Popular Jordan Mathewson was live-streaming game in Littleton, Colorado
Suddenly huge armed team burst in yesterday and forced him to the ground
Hoax forced dozens to be evacuated and two nearby schools were closed
Caller had claimed he was gunman who shot two people and took hostages
It is part of growing trend of ‘swatting’ with pranks reported across the U.S

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…..ebcam.html

Mr Mathewson then had to show the officers in excruciating detail how to switch the camera off.

Capturing the truth with cameras is a threat to officer safety.

[Ted S.]

Why did he have to turn the camera off? (That’s a rhetorical question, of course.)

And swatting is a good reason why most of the country’s SWAT teams should be disbanded.

[Jordan]

People should start swatting the homes of cops.

[Drake]

Are they trained to all yell different shit at the same time?

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Gale: All right, ya hayseeds, it’s a stick-up. Everybody freeze. Everybody down on the ground.
Feisty Hayseed: Well, which is it, young feller? You want I should freeze or get down on the ground? Mean to say, if’n I freeze, I can’t rightly drop. And if’n I drop, I’m a-gonna be in motion. You see…
Gale: Shut up!
Feisty Hayseed: Okay then.
Gale: Everybody down on the ground!
Evelle: Y’all can just forget that part about freezin’ now.
Gale: Better still to get down there.
Evelle: Yeah, y’all hear that, don’t ya?
[Everybody lays down. Gale looks at the now-empty teller windows]
Gale: Shit! Where’d all the tellers go?
Teller’s voices: We’re down here, sir.
Evelle: They’re on the floor as you commanded, Gale.

[Pro Libertate]

Still my favorite Coen film.

[Citizen Nothing]

I luv ta drive.

[Pro Libertate]

[Tosses grenade at rabbit.]

[Citizen Nothing]

Sometimes it’s a hard world for small things.

[Xeones]

“Boy, you got a panty on your head.”

[SugarFree]

Without confusion and contradiction, people might not give the cops an opportunity to kill them.

[Lord Humungus]

People Aren’t Buying Guns

Coming off a year of record sales, the gun market is cooling off. And overeager gunmakers are still struggling to dial down their expectations.

In the recent quarter, Smith & Wesson (SWHC) sales dropped 23 percent, to $131.9 million, and profit plunged 45 percent, to $14.6 million, according to a report late yesterday. Long guns and “modern sporting rifles,” in particular, lost favor among shooters, but handguns cooled off as well. Smith & Wesson shares slumped almost 15 percent on the news.

[Drake]

I hope they stop buying ammo too. I finally broke down and bought a brick of .22 lr for $70 on Monday. I looked at my last box, $21.90.

[sarcasmic]

Coroner rules that young black man, 22, who was handcuffed behind his back shot HIMSELF in the chest
Victor White III, 22, died while handcuffed in a deputy’s car in Louisiana
Initial police reports say he shot himself in the back while restrained
But coroner’s report ruled he was shot in the chest and declared suicide
Mr White was found with cocaine and marijuana on March 2 this year
The father-of-one was then taken to be questioned by narcotics detectives

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…..chest.html
The coroner, prosecutor and cops are all on the same team.

[Doctor Whom]

I’d like to think that things like that will get progs to question the omnibenevolence of government. The more likely outcome, however, is that they will care only insofar as there is a racial angle and will still believe that government is omnibenevolent the rest of the time.

[invisible furry hand]

A micro-secessionist

Last April Jeremy Geia posted his driver’s licence to the chief minister of the Australian Capital Territory, where he was then living, with a polite note explaining why he no longer needed it.

Then he returned his passport and Medicare card to the federal government.

Geia sent them back because he had decided to “leave Australia” while remaining in this continent, by reverting to his tribal name and adhering primarily to the law of his people, the Yidindji of north Queensland.

[Fist of Etiquette]

…most Americans?71 percent?now say the Great Recession “exerted a permanent drag on the economy.”

Yeah but what do they know? They re-elected the most economically illiterate administration in recent memory.

[Doctor Whom]

But … but … Bush!

[Lord Humungus]

Roman toilet seat unearthed near Hadrian’s Wall

The only surviving wooden Roman Empire toilet seat has been unearthed near Hadrian’s Wall.

The seat was discovered intact and well preserved due to the preservation conditions at the Vindolanda site in Northumberland.

“We are absolutely delighted with the find,” said Vindolanda director of excavations Dr Andrew Birley: “There are many examples of stone and marble toilet seat benches from across the Roman Empire but this is believed to be the only surviving wooden seat, almost perfectly preserved in the anaerobic, oxygen free, conditions which exist at Vindolanda.”

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Designed by the Emperor Commodus.

[Jordan]

+1 merciful

[Jerryskids]

I’ll bet you’re just flushed with a heady sense of pride at coming up with that stinker.

/He has a wife, you know.

[gaijin]

The seat was discovered intact and well preserved…

Was it left up?

[SugarFree]

That it was intact means Warty never used it.

[invisible furry hand]

I didn’t think he ever bothered with toilets

[db]

He sends all his shit through a temporal rift to Sandi, who applies it.appropriately.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Who will be the first to take a shit on it?

Hello. Very busy this morning.

[UnCivilServant]

Some Roman. It’s probably a used seat.

[Ted S.]

Lisping Fonzie, I think.

[Reverend Mayhem]

Lisping Fonzie

Now that’s a great online handle.

[expat]

splinters!!!

[invisible furry hand]

The perfect pet for a libertarian

[sarcasmic]

Her chatty Side! Lily Collins flashes slim pins in denim hotpants and patterned kimono as she picks up coffee in New York

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvs…..-York.html
It’s official. I’m in lust with Phil Collins’ daughter.

[db]

Ah, the idyllic bliss you could have, escaping this land of confusion with your true love, who could become Mama to your children, soothing you with here invisible touch, and finally retiring to a home by the sea to play domino.

[creech]

What’s the big deal? I saw ten women hotter than her on the train to freaking Philly this morning.

[sarcasmic]

I live in Maine. Google “hot Maine women” and then cover your eyes.

[Idle Hands]

I feel like I would expect to see a lot of penis for some reason.

[Idle Hands]

She’s that guy from genesis daughter.

[Fist of Etiquette]

What happens when one half of a California mall has an $8 minimum wage and the other half must pay $10 per hour?

Brother against brother?

[UnCivilServant]

Stores move to the $8 side?

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Sotres on $8 side can’t get labor and the stores on the $10 side lose money.

Lose-Lose…so a perfect governmental outcome.

[gaijin]

^this. Also, “see, capitalism does not work -Prog”

[Doctor Whom]

Even more government intervention will be required.

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

The comments are derptastic:

If you think Laissez-faire economics is always good, take a look at Mexico now and the U.S before Theodore Roosevelt. When oversight of an economy is done intelligently as it is in Germany today, it produces a vibrant society.

I liked this response, though:

so you are saying we should kill off all of our mental and physical defectives?

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Mexico is laissez-faire? Derp.

[trshmnster the terrible]

Ah yes, teddy Roosevelt, saver of the unions, sociopath of all the sociopaths.

[brokencycle]

Wasn’t there an article yesterday that Germany would be like 31st in the state rankings of GDP/capita?

[Tonio]

A learning experience?

[Juice]

In the end, Ryzak raised her prices a little bit and made up the rest by cutting into her profits.

See, teatards? It worked. We reduced profits with no other consequences.

[sarcasmic]

‘It’s just her way of saying hello!’: Excited lioness pounces on conservationist for a hug … forgetting she’s bigger than him

Valentin Gruener raised Sirga the lioness from birth at reserve in Botswana
She greets him like old friend and they cuddle and rub noses in cute video
Mr Gruener works at Modisa Wildlife Project which conserves big cat habitat

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new…..t-hug.html
Here kitty kitty…

[Brett L]

Its all fun and games until you accidentally trigger her prey instinct and she bites a hole in your brain pan.

[Lord Humungus]

Winchester woman finds 3ft wasp nest on bed

John Birkett, of Longwood Services Pest Control, said removing the 3ft (91cm) nest from a bed in Winchester was his most unusual job in 45 years.

He said it would have been “extremely dangerous” if the homeowner had tried to remove it herself.

“I just stood back in amazement,” Mr Birkett said.

The nest was discovered by a woman at her house in St Cross, in an unused spare room, where a small window had been left open.

[Jordan]

Not really related: the internet has taught me that a lot of people don’t know the difference between a yellow jacket and a bee. What’s up with that?

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

They just see a yellow, winged bug that scares them.

[Jordan]

It pays to know the difference, since one wants to horribly murder you, and the other just wants to frolic among the flowers.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Indeed – every time I see a yellow jacket, I wish for flame thrower.

[Tonio]

Wait, aren’t they* all just undifferentiated bugs to you, Alpenhorn Boy?

(*)What the rest of us call arthropods.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

I know the difference.

As much as I would love to start the lobster/sea bug thing again (heh heh heh)… I just think the average knucklehead or urban dweller sees yellow-bzzz-ouch.

[invisible furry hand]

Mother’s annoyed Facebook post leads to her 4 year old getting expelled

http://www.news.com.au/technol…..7040490450

[Bee Tagger]

YOU know those moments when you instantly doubt hitting that ‘post’ button?

The ‘mail’ button? I can never get a handle on the language.

[sarcasmic]

Newly-single Bella Thorne steps out with male friend after confirming split from long-term boyfriend Tristan Klier

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvs…..Klier.html
Does the DM have someone follow her around? They got something on her like every other day.

[UnCivilServant]

The DM doesn’t have to the Paparazzi know they can sell the pics, so they do it on spec.

[Juice]

I don’t know what it is about her, but I just find this girl thoroughly unattractive. She looks like I should find her attractive, but just like Taylor Swift, there is this inexplicable unattractiveness about her.

[Lord Humungus]

Hello Kitty is not a cat, plus more reveals before her L.A. tour

You read that right. When Yano was preparing her written texts for the exhibit at the Japanese American National Museum, she says she described Hello Kitty as a cat. “I was corrected ? very firmly,” she says. “That’s one correction Sanrio made for my script for the show. Hello Kitty is not a cat. She’s a cartoon character. She is a little girl. She is a friend. But she is not a cat. She’s never depicted on all fours. She walks and sits like a two-legged creature. She does have a pet cat of her own, however, and it’s called Charmmy Kitty.”

I grew up with Hello Kitty everything and all I have to say is, MIND BLOWN.

[Ted S.]

I’m reminded of the Simpsons’ episode where they go to Japan and pass the Hello Kitty factory. 🙂

I also miss Bonsai Kitten.

[UnCivilServant]

I also miss Bonsai Kitten.

I want someone to sell those with with plastic jars and plush kittens.

[invisible furry hand]

Scotland’s gingers in pictures.

Trigger warning: rangas, everywhere

[UnCivilServant]

Is that why even the Highland Cow is a ginger?

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Auric applauds.

[lap83]

“I was bullied at school and thought it was because of my red hair but it was probably because I was annoying”

heh

[Elspeth Flashman]

My kiddo’s best friend is a ginger and both his parents are. I think they sought each other out, somehow, because of the ginger-ness.

[Lord Humungus]

Spiders force Suzuki to recall more than 19,000 cars

Spiders have forced Suzuki to recall more than 19,000 midsize cars.

The automaker says spider webs can clog a fuel vapour vent hose in some 2010 to 2013 Kizashi cars, cutting off air flow. If that happens, it can cause the gas tank to deform, causing cracks, fuel leaks and possible fires.

The recall was prompted by seven reports of the problem. Service centres will replace the vent line with one that has a filter on the end. They’ll also replace gas tanks if necessary.

[Jordan]

There are people who buy Suzuki cars?

[Elspeth Flashman]

Suzuki made 19,000 cars?

[Jordan]

This story is all kinds of suspicious.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

*Honda employee flees, dropping large jar labeled ‘spiders’*

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

Like some cat from Japan, he could lick ’em by smiling…

Those spiders might be from mars.

[invisible furry hand]

Oh Bobarian, you took it all too far, but man could you play guitar

[Fist of Etiquette]

the single most indebted cohort are 44 year olds, who owe on average $142,077.

McMansions cost more than that, don’t they?

[Ted S.]

No offense, but does anybody else dislike the term “McMansion” and its “you have a type of house I don’t like” snobbery?

[Jordan]

There used to be a troll here named Chad who thought the government should confiscate everyone’s wealth since they’d just waste it on “cheap Chinese crap” and “McMansions”. Meanwhile, he’d brag about his art collection with no sense of irony. He also had a hardon for Japan.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

So….a customer for the “Dutch Wife” then?

[Raven Nation]

Whatever happened to Chad?

[JW]

Something horrible and ironic, I hope.

[Fist of Etiquette]

OFFENSE TAKEN.

I always used it to mean mortgaging a certain type of house for outward appearances and then not having the means to furnish it.

[trshmnster the terrible]

I thought it meant big new house of low construction quality on tiny lot in subdivision filled with variants of the same floor plan. See also: cookie cutter house.

[Citizen Nothing]

Just a matter of personal taste, but I could never understand pouring so much money into a place on such a tiny lot.

[creech]

There’s been envious types ever since Org crawled out of the cave and built a hut in the open air.

[lap83]

Is it ok if I use the term without snobbery? It just fits.

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

I find your anti-snobbery snobbery to be micro-offensive.

[Lord Humungus]

Is the Universe a 2D Hologram?

A new experiment has been recently launched that may soon be able to provide proof regarding whether the universe is a 2D Hologram or not.

It has been believed for many years that the world was three dimensional, but to determine if the universe would actually be two dimensional, physicists at Fermi National Laboratory in Illinois have set up an experiment called the holometer, which might finally be able to determine how the universe stores the information people interact with everyday.

[PD Scott]

It would explain why so many seem so shallow.

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

That joke was a little flat.

[ant1sthenes]

Ah, the perils of being 3d, but thinking so much differently.

[Lord Humungus]

Trial set for woman accused of running over husband for not voting

Holly Nicole Solomon, 30, has pleaded not guilty to aggravated assault and disorderly conduct charges in the incident just days after President Barack Obama’s re-election.

Authorities say Solomon was upset about Obama’s re-election and began arguing with her husband when she found out that he didn’t vote.

Daniel Solomon, who suffered a fractured pelvis, told investigators that his wife believed their family was going to face hardship as a result of Obama’s election.

[UnCivilServant]

his wife believed their family was going to face hardship as a result of Obama’s election.

To be fair, she wasn’t wrong.

[tarran]

Talk about self fulfilling prophecy!

[Jerryskids]

They warned his wife repeatedly that if she voted for Mitt Romney terrible things would happen – and they were right.

[hamilton]

Vote or die.

[invisible furry hand]

Hmm, so do I go for Giant Douche or Turd Sandwich?

[Bardas Phocas]

It doesn’t matter which candidate you vote for – Your planet is doomed.

[gaijin]

hah!

[Ted S.]

It’s not as if his vote would have mattered.

[creech]

See, proof of GOP voter suppression efforts.

[Lord Humungus]

Boomer Wealth Dented by Mortgages Poses U.S. Risk

A growing number of homeowners are reaching retirement age still owing money on their houses. The share of Americans 65 and older with mortgage debt rose to 30 percent in 2011 from 22 percent in 2001, according to a May analysis by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau based on the latest available figures. Loan balances also increased, with the median amount owed climbing to $79,000 from $43,400 after adjusting for inflation, the data showed.

“There were old-fashioned beliefs probably 30 years ago” that included “you should pay off your house before you retire,” said Olivia Mitchell, executive director of the Pension Research Council at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School in Philadelphia. “This is no longer the case.”

[Drake]

How does math work? If I want to retire in 16 years, what term mortgage would be appropriate?

[Doctor Whom]

Typical loonytarian, asking people to plan ahead like that. We need a government program to take care of that.

[trshmnster the terrible]

Now they’re going to ratchet up the “fair share” bullshit. God forbid they live in a house they can afford, eat food they can afford, and drive a car they can afford. Nope, those of us who plan on paying our houses off by 40 are the crazy ones, and it’s just so unfair that we are so lucky! It definitely has nothing to do with minimizing debt, setting realistic expectations, and sticking to a damn budget! Nooooo none of that shit matters.

[F. Stupidity, Jr.]

John Lennon’s killer says he’s “sorry for being such an idiot.”

Now when will Yoko Ono apologize?

[invisible furry hand]

An honest-to-God gorgeous song from Yoko Ono

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B43UCr8py70

[Juice]

Well, that was garbage.

[Ted S.]

+1 Julian Lennon

[Lord Humungus]

The CBO’s New Budget Outlook: Debt Ahoy!

By CBO’s estimate, the federal debt held by the public will reach 74 percent of GDP at the end of this fiscal year, a level not seen in the US since the topsy-turvy budgetary days of FDR and WWII. By 2024, the federal debt is projected to reach 77 percent of GDP. Before the onset of the recession, federal debt constituted a “mere” 35 percent of GDP. If current economic trends continue, debt levels that were once rationalized by extraordinary economic circumstances may simply become the new normal.

The CBO is more pessimistic than the Obama administration about GDP growth over the next decade, but they’re probably still more optimistic than a lot of Americans. These projections are assuming improvements in aggregate demand, higher consumer spending, and a turnaround of the housing sector. Should any of these changes fail to materialize, GDP growth may remain below even the CBO’s tempered projections, and the debt-to-GDP ratio could be even higher than expected.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

“line by line” baby, “line by line”.

[Lord Humungus]

Bernie Sanders: Companies Relocating Abroad Are Disrespecting Vets

“I think where the American people get really, really angry is that we have families that are sending kids off to war, these kids get killed, they come home wounded ? and then you have corporations where we’re seeing corporate profits at an all-time high,” Vermont’s socialist senator told CNN on Tuesday. “Many of these corporations have absolutely no loyalty to the people of the United States or to our government.”

Sanders worried that if more companies feel the need to move abroad because some U.S. companies have already done so, federal tax revenues that pay for infrastructure, education, and health-care could be imperiled.

[Jordan]

Spoken like a true fascist.

[Tonio]

No, actual fascists are snappy dressers.

[Ted S.]

+1 Hugo Boss

[Ted S.]

They’re more patriotic because they’re trying to keep the government from getting their money.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Piss on you, Bernie.

/a vet

[Drake]

If anyone knows how Veterans feel, it’s Bernie Sanders.

[Ted S.]

I think Richard Blumenthal knows better.

[VG Zaytsev]

I’m sure the CNN reporter asked him how corps could be disloyal if they aren’t people.

[ant1sthenes]

Would you think about all them people
Who gave up everything they had?
Would you think about all them War Vets
And would you start to feel bad?

Freedom isn’t free
It costs folks like you and me
And if we don’t all chip in
We’ll never pay that bill
Freedom isn’t free
No, there’s a hefty fuckin’ fee.
And if you don’t throw in your buck ‘o five
Who will?

[Steve G]

“Preparing to defend themselves” !?! They’ve had how long to ‘prepare’ for this? It’s not like it was freakin Pearl Harbor or anything.

[Lord Humungus]

Mayor: Adult Illegal Aliens With ‘Graying’ Hair Enrolled in Public Schools

The mayor of Lynn, Mass. says that some of the illegal aliens from Guatemala who are enrolled in her city’s public schools are adults with graying hair and “more wrinkles than I have.”

“They are not all children,” Judith Flanagan Kennedy told reporters at a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday.

[tarran]

Since the schools don’t start till next week, how the fuck has the mayor formed an opinion of what they look like? I don’t see any new student orientation sessions on the district calendar…

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

In our school district, the school is open the week before classes start so you can go in and find locker, load it up with stuff, check your class locations and drop off your paperwork (registration, physicals, etc). No formal “student orientation” until day before or such. Maybe their district is the same?

[Lord Humungus]

For my son’s school, that was last week… they even do class pictures at that time.

[tarran]

That’s not how it works in MA.

At least in my district, the new students start a day early…

It could be true that there are geriatrics attending public schools here in MA. Or the Mayor of Lynn could be simply another racist New England democratic politician. My bet is on the latter.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Probably a few older illegals, now conflated to a horde?

[tarran]

Probably a parent, and a racist new england democratic politician.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Ah, Parent…had not thought of that. Bet you have it right.

[Ted S.]

Hasn’t the mayor ever heard of progeria?

[Tonio]

Gee, if only they had to present some sort of age-verified ID to register…

[VG Zaytsev]

racist

[Matrix]

AGEIST!!

[The Late P Brooks]

Gun tourism is a thing, and an increasingly popular one.

Headline from a news story I did not read:

Why Do We Allow Kids to Shoot Guns?

That kid- you’re not allowed to raise him.

[robc]

Xers bought too much house, at the wrong time.

[EDG reppin' LBC]

Re: Gen X debt. Most of that debt is in mortgages. So that’s not “bad debt”. That’s called “rent money”. Bad debt would be revolving credit i.e. credit card debt. Bad debt would be student loan debt, yet you’re still unemployable. Bad debt would be an unaffordable car note.

The only problem with mortgage debt is that Gen X overpaid for their houses. But that is because the Fed and it’s artificially low interest rate schemes of the last 20 years led to inflationary home prices.

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

Most people as they go through life, tend to probably have their highest incomes and most debt while in their 40’s. When you’re younger, you typically aren’t able to accrue as much debt and at fifty youare starting to take retirement seriously and are focused on reducing debt.

So I don’t see this as news.

[The Late P Brooks]

Ferguson and other St. Louis-area police departments face steep overtime costs for all that time cops spent out pepper-spraying people and playing conquering army.

This brings to mind one of Fearless Fosdick’s finest hours, when he was braying ecstatically about all the overtime the cops were racking up during the Boston Lockdown.

Protect and Serve, indeed.

[Lord Humungus]

Watch 100 topless people get tasered by their loved ones

South Carolina-based portrait photographer Patrick Hall is sick of taking pictures of people who look like they’re faking it ? happiness, earnestness, solemness, whatever. Hall wants to capture raw emotion. And so he figured the best way to find it would be with a taser.

Hall’s most recent project, The Taser Photoshoot, is essentially exactly what it sounds like: A series of photographs and slow-motion shots of people’s faces as they’re getting tasered. The still frames capture participants’ ? excuse me, volunteers’ ? expressions at about the moment they’re struck with 300,000 volts of electricity, while the accompanying video shows the moments leading up to the tasering as well. Watching people’s faces go from anxiously anticipatory to literally shocked is indeed raw, to say the least.

[Gbob]

Damn it. Now I have a new fetish. Hope this doesn’t turn me into a filthy degenerate. Or a cop.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

I’m not an engineer, but 300,000 volts sounds…dangerous.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Volts get your attention, but its the amperes that kill ya!

[trshmnster the terrible]

To accent Servator’s point, the most dangerous current is around 0.1-0.2 amps. Not enough to stop your heart, but enough to induce fibrillation.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Looks like an orgasm compilation

[John]

I wish people would stop reporting on Lennon’s killer. Regardless of what you think about Lennon, he was a father and a husband and a human being who was minding his own business when that asshole murdered him. The fact that Lennon happened to be famous shouldn’t buy the asshole who killed him extra attention. Like all murders, he deserve to rot in a hole to be forgotten by the world. The media just needs to stop printing stories about him. He doesn’t deserve the attention.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Yeah, and “murderer says oops, he’s sorry” isn’t exactly headline-grabbing material.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Yes, he should repent, but the media won’t tell us if a purported repentance is sincere, we can’t look into his heart. So are we going to report on every killer who *claims* remorse?

[Lord Humungus]

Liberals have a white privilege problem too

As police, pundits, politicians and their supporters sought control over the narrative of events in Ferguson, they drew from the deep well of moral panic and race hatred that in many ways define our contemporary political landscape. I am not talking about the moronic counter-protests by the Klan, or the impending race war hallucinated by capital-R Racists. I am talking about the insidious language of white privilege ? the civil, polite, unconscious adoption by white people of racially normative viewpoints that give us comfort and help explain the world on our terms.

For those of us born with white skin, white privilege is the air we breathe; we don’t even have to think about it. It is like the fish that never notices the water in which it swims. It is a glorious gift we have given to ourselves through the social order we have constructed, from top to bottom and bottom to top. It is the pillage of continents, the enslavement of people, the hatred of dark-skinned “others,” all somehow magically laundered by our commitments to democracy, self-reliance, individualism and the “post-racial, color-blind society.” It is our abject unwillingness to confront our history, to correct the deficits of our memory, to lean against the amnesia of a white story told

[John]

What t he hell does that even mean? It is just a bunch of words and catch phrases thrown together. There is not a single meaningful sentence in that entire quote. Nothing. There is not a single concrete example or any meaningful connection to anything in the real world. It is all just make believe concepts thrown up in the air.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

What would constitute confronting our history, if previous attempts don’t count – the Civil War, the fight for civil rights, the bookshelves groaning under the weight of commission reports, studies, and historical work, the self-flagellating blot posts, etc?

Oh, right, we haven’t fully confronted our history until we realize that we must become racist against whites.

[Tonio]

Wait, there are cap-R racists? Like they have an actual Racist Party or something?

[VG Zaytsev]

It’s also known as the Democrat party.

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

they have an actual Racist Party

With a name like Tonio, you’ll never get on the guest list.

[Ted S.]

“Privilege” is just a rhetorical cudgel used to shut down debate from anybody you don’t like.

[Doctor Whom]

This. It’s the latest thought-terminating clich

[VG Zaytsev]

If white privilege is a real thing, then why do people seek out and amplify their minority status? From outright frauds like Churchill and Warren to mixed race people Soledad O’Brien it seems that everybody wants to be something other than white.

And it wasn’t always like that. Passing for white was a real phenomenon among African Americans before the 1960s.

[ant1sthenes]

It’s Salon, did you expect anything less than full retard?

[OldMexican]

For those of us born with white skin, white privilege is the air we breathe

According to the guy, white privilege is a natural thing. Nothing one can do about it. Why talk about it, then?

It is a glorious gift we have given to ourselves through the social order we have constructed

So much for the fish that does not know it is swimming in water. I guess his version of white privilege does not include logical consistency. Or cogency.

By the way, this is nothing more than tired old cultural Marxism.

[Juice]

I wonder how much privilege a white person feels in an all white community, like some shit town in the middle of Idaho.

[The Late P Brooks]

By CBO’s estimate, the federal debt held by the public will reach 74 percent of GDP at the end of this fiscal year, a level not seen in the US since the topsy-turvy budgetary days of FDR and WWII.

But having the Fed hold interest rates at or near zero is helping the economy!

[Jordan]

S&P 500!!!11oneoneeleven

[JW]

Ryzak says she’s fine with raising the minimum wage.

Then, why weren’t you paying your staff more to begin with? Are you suggesting they weren’t worth it before, but now, suddenly, they are?

She just wishes it was the same everywhere ? across the mall, California, and the entire country.

Oh, I get it, you want everyone to be as fucked as you want to be.

[db]

It’s like when people selling raffle tickets give 3 or 4 tickets to every person who buys them, saying “you have more chances to win.” No, everyone has the same chance to win if they all get the same number of.tickets for a nominal fee. I have actually seen people do this.

[Lord Humungus]

L.A. Mayor Garcetti expected to announce plan for $13.25 minimum wage

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti is circulating a plan to raise the city’s minimum wage to $13.25 an hour over three years, followed by annual boosts keyed to inflation, according to business representatives and City Hall officials.

The action is expected to be announced on Labor Day.

So far, the proposal has received a cool reception from major business groups worried about the effect on payroll and the possibility that higher wages could drive jobs out of the city. Even some labor leaders dislike it because the hourly wage does not immediately rise to at least $15, a goal that unions have been pursuing for months to help their members cope with the city’s high cost of living.

Full Speed Ahead, California!

[The Late P Brooks]

She just wishes it was the same everywhere ? across the mall, California, and the entire country.

CONFORM.

Everything not prohibited is mandatory.

[Idle Hands]

How can someone not look at this rationally and realize that at the very least raising the minimum wage nationally would do absolutely nothing as it would just increase the cost of living across the board? Are opponents are so tiresome.

[sarcasmic]

You don’t understand!

People deserve a living wage!

They deserve it!

DESERVE!

[Mercutio]

“Deserve’s got nothin’ to do with it.”

[trshmnster the terrible]

There should be a simple slogan to express this. Maybe “money is not magic” gets the point across.

[John]

http://espn.go.com/blog/new-yo…..gettable-o

This isn’t an important or particularly interesting story. But you don’t often get to say

The Price is Wrong Bitch!!

[Idle Hands]

I am so glad that the yankees spent all that money and suck this year. Anybody who thought the yankees would be a playoff team with that horrendous infield was probably an idiot.

[KDN]

Anybody who thought the yankees would be a playoff team with that horrendous infield was probably an idiot.

And yet, the Royals and O’s are going to make the playoffs with infields that are even worse.

[Colonel Slanders]

Hang on there Kemosabe. While at the moment things are looking good for the Royals, Detroit still has 6 games left with KC and the Tigers have basically the whole month of September against their division rivals and the Royals have the last two weeks against the division and 3 with the Yanks. Don’t write it up yet. Detroit was back in July when they were 7 ahead of the Royals.

[Matrix]

This cannot be said enough:

Fuck the Yankees!

[JW]

Let’s talk about Gen X for a change! Overall the generation is in more debt than either millennials or boomers; the single most indebted cohort are 44 year olds, who owe on average $142,077.

Older people with higher salaries and greater earning potential than their younger counterparts are more credit worthy and are able to buy bigger things on credit. News at 11.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Yeah, $250K/yr income – $20K debt on a nice car, $122K left on a $550K mortgage…..NEEDZ A BAILOUT!!!!

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Catfight among abortion supporters –

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/j…..goes-rogue

[John]

I love it that they can’t figure out how a movement designed around the premise that women should be able tokill kill unwanted children just can’t find a positive message.

“Reproductive Justice” I love that. How about a sub tag “Rich White Women helping to keep minority birth rates in check since 1973”

[trshmnster the terrible]

“Rich White Women helping to keep minority birth rates in check since 1973 1913”

FIFY

[Xeones]

Well Grandpa he sells condoms
That he sticks in the head with a pin
Grandma does abortions –
My God, how the money rolls in!

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

No justice, no piece?

[Andrew S.]

http://www.dailynews.com/gener…..ing-deputy

Officer driving on narrow road. Takes eyes off road to type on the computer in his car. Hits cyclist. Cyclist dies.

You get one guess as to whether anything else happened.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Ummmm….nope?

[Palin's Buttplug]

Q2 officially 4.2% GDP growth. There are some really disappointed wingnuts out there now.

[John]

Of course there is danger of it ever being quietly adjusted down later “unexpectedly”. That only seems to happen with every single economic statistic. And gee, the Black Jesus only needs 20 or 30 more quarters like this before he makes up all of the damage to the economy he has done. Just thing, ten or twelve more quarters like this and some of the 11 million long term unemployed might find jobs. Looks like everything is coming up Obama.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Yes, “all the damage” he caused in the 2008 Financial Collapse.

You really are an ignorant partisan.

[Sevo]

Palin’s Buttplug|8.28.14 @ 10:19AM|#
“You really are an ignorant partisan.”

Yes, you are, turd.

[Andrew S.]

One quarter of growth (assuming it doesn’t get revised down later)! THE ECONOMY IS SAVED!

Fuck off, troll.

[Palin's Buttplug]

“Troll” = not sufficiently Team Red here.

[Sevo]

Palin’s Buttplug|8.28.14 @ 10:20AM|#

“Troll” = Partisan, lying turd.

[OldMexican]

Re: Peter Caca,

Q2 officially [“officially”! Ha!] 4.2% GDP growth.

Until they revise it again, blaming the weather or something. Just like last time.

[The Late P Brooks]

You get one guess as to whether anything else happened.

Cop went home safe at the end of his shift?

[sarcasmic]

Not only that, but he deserves pity. I mean, he has to live with this for the rest of his life. He’s the real victim here. Poor cop.

[Idle Hands]

I don’t know how I feel about this story:

three people who came upon a crash scene in Brazoria County where two children were killed by a drunken driver say they heard gunfire moments later.
None of them, though, say they saw anyone at the scene with a gun.
hey testified Thursday inside a packed courtroom during the trial of David Barajas, who is charged with murder in the shooting death of 20-year-old Jose Banda in December 2012. Barajas’ two boys, 11-year-old Caleb and 12-year-old David Jr., were killed when Banda rear-ended their father’s truck.

He got off, I can’t even imagine being in his situation; however he did kill a guy.

[sarcasmic]

If I was on that jury there’s no way I would have convicted the guy. At least not based upon what I know.

[Idle Hands]

I get reasonable doubt and the fact the drivers were asshats, but the circumstantial evidence is off the charts and saying he had motive would be an understatement. People don’t need to cum on everything to earn a conviction. However if you are looking at it from the fact that the drunks were scum I agree, I just don’t know if I could acquit.

[Idle Hands]

and I really don’t envy the jurors.

[Idle Hands]

Then again it is Texas.

[SIV]

however he did kill a guy

No weapon, no witnesses, no confession.
The state argued he killed the guy but couldn’t prove it.

[Brett L]

It was right to put him before a jury of his peers, it was right for them to acquit. That is the very definition of justifiable homicide under common law.

[JW]

I’m not ambivalent about it at all. I’d have shot the fucker too.

[sarcasmic]

aye

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

I’d have probably bare-handed murdered the drunk…

But I’d have probably convicted the Dad too (but of the lightest possible sentence)

[tarran]

There were witnesses who said the dad never left the scene…. his hands had no gunfire residue.

Personally, I think he is innocent. I think one of his relatives did the deed. The witness accounts have the dad bawling his eyes out on the side of the road until after the shooting.

I wonder if they decided to charge the dad because it was easier than doing actual police work?

[Bobarian (dinosaur hunter)]

I did not follow into the details…

disregard my conviction.

[Juice]

Juries don’t sentence though.

[jamesrk]

Even if he admitted to it, they just committed manslaughter at the least (felony)and were still in the vehicle(weapon).

“i saw him trying to start the vehicle”

[The DerpRider]

Sexism in the Senate!!! I guess they were all Democrats, because no names…

[The Late P Brooks]

Good news, everyone; the chocolate ration has been increased. Instead of two six ounce pieces, you will now receive SIX one ounce pieces.

Big Brother wants you to be happy.

[Swiss Servator, Bern baby Bern]

Double-plus good!

[Sevo]

Mr. Cortopassi points out that “Arithmetic is not an opinion!” and shows the CA “balanced budget” sort of ignores a debt of $250Bn.
http://www.liar-liar.com/
(8/28 issue)

[CatoTheElder]

Let’s talk about Gen X for a change! Overall the generation is in more debt than either millennials or boomers; the single most indebted cohort are 44 year olds, who owe on average $142,077.

They better get to work. Not only do they have to pay off their debt, they have to pay for my social security and Medicare, and my kids’ ObamaCare subsidies.

Sucks to be GenX because the inevitable tax rate increases are going hit hard in their peak earning years.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Yeah, thanks for the reminder.

[Brett L]

I, personally, am in great shape as long as the state of Florida pension system remains solvent. My father is five or so years into his second guaranteed benefit pension. As a taxpayer I hate it, as a probable heir to much of the pension money he is collecting while working a state job, I’m more sanguine about it.

[Sevo]

Are you surprised that insurance companies have found ways to compensate for “pre-existing conditions”?
Of course not:
“Have insurers found new ways to avoid the sick under Obamacare?”
http://www.pottsmerc.com/healt…..-obamacare

[Juice]

I don’t see how a high copay singles out people with pre-existing conditions. Anyone with that policy would have to pay the same copays right?

[SIV]

Our long lost Caucasoid Ainu brother is back in the news. What continues to vex me about this ever since the remains were found is how easily the government got away with quickly and totally destroying the site, obliterating all context for the find.

The Smithsonian‘s tagline: He’s the most important human skeleton ever found in North America implies he was found at “the most important archaeological site in North America” which was then almost immediately crushed under thousands of tons of rip-rap.

[db]

That is very cool, but depressing how the Corps of Engineers is still stonewalling further scientific enquiry while the Native American tribes are continuing to assert ownership of the skeleton in contradiction of all facts discovered to date.

[Drake]

Like any government agency, they can be counted on to do the wrong thing.

[SIV]

“What does this prove? My granddaughter plays with human dolls”

[OldMexican]

Even as economic recovery moseys forth, most Americans?71 percent?now say the Great Recession “exerted a permanent drag on the economy.” In November 2009, only 49 percent said the same.

We haven’t experienced the real recession yet. Not until all bad debt is liquidated or written off can you say we had a recession and we’re on the way to recovery. But that hasn’t happened because of massive government intervention. Of course, court historians are already starting to say that nuestro amado se?or presidente saved the economy from collapse just like they have been lying about Hoover’s and Roosevelt’s Great Depression (I noticed this watching a particularly entertaining segment in Bill O’Reilly’s show yesterday evening, when a professor of history said that history will say in 30 years that nuestro amado se?or presidente saved the economy from collapse.)

[Jesus H. Christ]

Lennon’s killer can rot in prison. AFAIAC, when he dies, his corpse can remain in the cell. He should never leave.

[jmomls]

He should have extra time tacked on his sentence for failing to even hit Yoko Ono EVEN ONCE.

[Entropy Void]

They have him incarcerated in the Hotel California?