A.M. Links: U.S. Conducts Airstrikes in Mogadishu, House Majority Whip Once Spoke at White Supremacist Conference, UN Approves New Probe Into Hammarskjöld Plane Crash

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  U.S. airstrikes in Somalia targeted a suspected leader of the terrorist group Al-Shabab.

• Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.), who recently plead guilty to tax evation, has decided to resign less than two months after being re-elected. 
• A political blogger in Louisiana has uncovered that House Majority Whip Steven Scalise (R-La.) spoke at an event organized by a "white civil rights" group in 2002.
• Teams searching for an AirAsia flight that went missing over the weekend extended the area off the coast of Indonesia where they are looking. Warships from the United States are joining the effort.
• A healthcare worker in Scotland who had returned from West Africa has been diagnosed with Ebola.
• Researchers in Germany were able to reproduce the fingerprints of the German Defense Minister using photos taken at a public event.
• The United Nations has approved a new probe into the 1961 airplane crash in which Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld died.

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Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.), who recently plead guilty to tax evation, has decided to resign less than two months after being re-elected.

Wrong party, dummy.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Hello.

"U.S. airstrikes in Somalia"

DON'T TOUCH THE ROADZZZZ!

[Rhywun]

Apparently the NYC GOP isn't robust enough to sweep his hideous crimes (illegals working under the table!) under the rug.

[invisible furry hand]

DIY tattoo kits predicted to be the next big thing in 2015 - but experts are already slamming the 'dangerous' inking trend

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/fem.....z3NODVpf4B

[Ted S.]

I think "experts" is the word that should be in scare quotes.

[gaijin]

Agree. HOw the heck does one get to be an 'expert' on self-inking?

[Zeb]

They aren't experts in self inking. They are experts in dangerous trends (IOW alarmist busy bodies).

[double ham fisted]

Prison time

[Zeb]

All of my home made tattoos are made with my own ingenuity. It's not too hard to make that kit yourself for about $5. And they look better than the ones in the article. Mostly.

[Ted S.]

Any idiot can cover themselves in "tribal" tats, although to be fair, tattooing one's back might pose a problem.

[Zeb]

I prefer to think of them as prison tats.

[SweatingGin]

I bought the domain self.ink, if anyone wants to put up a website about self tattooing.

Then I did a couple searches and found out it is a real thing.

[straffinrun]

DIY tattoo kits. I could find space for that box, but not the Ricardo one.

[straffinrun]

Ok, ok. *narrows gaze*. Neat, now I can see de plane.

[Swiss Servator, Winter...jetzt]

*stares blankly*

[Fist of Etiquette]

A healthcare worker in Scotland who had returned from West Africa has been diagnosed with Ebola.

Too late for that story. We all have new shiny objects in our gaze.

[Zeb]

Well, after it happens several times and nothing else happens, it becomes a lot less of a news story.

[some guy]

I seem to remember there being a lot of people demanding that all travelers from ebola-stricken countries be imprisoned in their homes for 3 weeks after arrival. Since then, a lack of such quarantines has resulted in... nothing. Are these people willing to recant or are they still demanding security theatre at the expense of liberty?

[Citizen Nothing]

Are these people willing to recant

Good one.

[Zeb]

One commenter here (can't remember which) did come out and admit that he went a little overboard.

[invisible furry hand]

Hundreds of Territorians paid almost $50,000 in fines for f**king swearing last f**king financial year

Others said they had no idea letting loose a foul-mouthed tirade could cost them a fine. Others still just didn't give a shit.

[Ted S.]

Would the cops recognize it if the people swore in their aboriginal languages?

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

Sounds like they were swearing in their aboriginal language. It just happens to be the cops aboriginal language as well.

[gaijin]

...Scalise (R-La.) spoke at an event organized by a "white civil rights" group in 2002.

WDATPDIM?

[Ted S.]

Robert Byrd is going to be the House Majority Whip?

[Andrew S.]

That's different!

[Ted S.]

True enough: Robert Byrd was in the Senate, not the HOuse.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Wow, exact same comment as when I posted this last nite. Byrd's the gift that keeps on giving I guess.

[Ted S.]

People actually read what I have to post.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

You're totally popular here!

[sarcasmic]

The shit I took this morning is more popular than you, Bo.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I like how you didn't get it and upped it with your petty anger. Classic sarc

[sarcasmic]

Don't worry, Bo. You are way too insignificant to arouse anger. In anyone. Except maybe your mommy when you don't clean up after yourself in her basement.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Nice walkback attempt. First 'you're as popular as poop' and now the 'you're on the internet in your moms basement.' You're to cutting edge comedy what Tony Bennett is to cutting edge music.

[Zeb]

Leave Tony Bennett out of this!

[Bo Cara Esq.]

He's doing the New Years thing this year with GaGa.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Bennett is AWESOME but Gaga? Seriously?

[Ted S.]

There hasn't been any cutting edge music since the death of Josquin des Prez!

[sarcasmic]

First 'you're as popular as poop' and now the 'you're on the internet in your moms basement.'

Those things are not mutually exclusive.

[Palin's Buttplug]

Bo is one of the few posters here that doesn't follow the Fox News script full time.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Fox News? We've got several posters here spinning to defend David Dukes organization. We're past Fox News.

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

Look! Right there, Sarc!

Bo has friends, who are just as popular as he is!

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Over another's head. It's like we've got the Bucs secondary posting here today.

[sarcasmic]

Bo has friends, who are just as popular as he is!

Bo and PB. They make a cute couple. Like a couple turds in a cat box.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Sarc really likes his poop.

[AlmightyJB]

Its not nice to tease him like that.

[Drake]

Whites don't get to have civil rights?

[Zeb]

Maybe I'm being unfair and presumptuous, but I think it is safe to assume that a group that calls itself a "white civil rights group" has some racist ideas and motivations.

In any case, it is obnoxious and divisive to make it about race (same applies to any group who calls itself a "black civil rights group").

Of course, the double standard is even more obnoxious.

[Free Society]

Either ethnic nationalism is an abhorrent evil everywhere and at all times, or it isn't. Of course the position that people of European descent are not ethically permitted to promote issues regarding their race or even to take pride in their ancestry, is a giant flaming ball of intolerable racism. It's really unfortunate that white nationalists have a leg to stand on when they make a point about government policies that seemingly seek to marginalize Europeans and drive it's civilization to extinction.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Wow, how far is Reason and it's commenters? Look no farther than this uncontested comment.

[Fluffy]

Either ethnic nationalism is an abhorrent evil everywhere and at all times, or it isn't.

Well, Bo, the fact that the comment contains this Socratic disclaimer makes it unnecessary to parse the rest of the concern-trolling that follows for thoughtcrime.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Yes, equating the ethnic nationalism of whites and blacks in this country is totally not a common rhetorical device of people like David Duke (national association for the advancement of white people).

[Irish]

Whether it's a rhetorical device of David Duke or not is irrelevant. It's a basic fact. Black and white nationalism are both evil, it's just that only white nationalism gets criticized. In fact, if you criticize racism among black people you yourself will get called racist.

I don't know how on earth you can read Free Society's post which flat out says racial nationalism is abhorrent and somehow come to the conclusion that he's advocating racism.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I don't think white and black nationalism, at least in the context of David Duke and the NAACP for example, are comparable in the social and historical context of our nation. When it's blacks that were enslaved and oppressed for centuries and are still comparably on general a disadvantaged minority then an organization to advance blacks seems different than one to advance whites.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

The latter smacks of a triumphalism that is at least a bit uglier.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Bo, you spend more time worrying about the appearance of an argument than you do the logic of an argument.

Personally, I think ethnic and heritage groups of all stripes are ridiculous.

[Irish]

"Personally, I think ethnic and heritage groups of all stripes are ridiculous."

Well then, you're a racist because David Duke also tried to claim there was an equivalence between white and black nationalists!

Racist, racist, racist! /Bo

[Free Society]

When it's blacks that were enslaved and oppressed for centuries

How many of these slaves have you met?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Oh, sheesh. I've met their great grand kids if that makes you happy.

[Free Society]

Oh, sheesh. I've met their great grand kids if that makes you happy.

Why would it? I thought you were claiming that the currently living blacks were the victims of enslavement. That not being the case then I must ask, what the fuck are you talking about?

My great great great great great great great great great great great grandpappy had his lands stolen by the Normans in 1066. Am I entitled expropriate the property of the nearest Frenchmen with a Norman dialect that I can find? Or did my ancestor deserve what he got because was an Anglo-Saxon? After all, my Anglo-Saxon ancestor likely had a few of his descendants engaged in the slave trade, so naturally that makes him vicariously guilty of some crime too, right?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

"Why would it? I thought you were claiming that the currently living blacks were the victims of enslavement. "

You thought wrong. I'm only stating that blacks on average are comparatively bad off in relation to whites, and that's the context black and white advancement orgs should be judged in.

[Irish]

"I don't think white and black nationalism, at least in the context of David Duke and the NAACP for example, are comparable in the social and historical context of our nation."

I like that you cherry pick an extreme example of white nationalism and a relatively milquetoast example of black nationalism. I could use Louis Farrakhan as my example of black nationalism and some random guy celebrating his German heritage at Oktoberfest as my example of white nationalism. Those are obviously not equivalent because I've purposefully cherry picked them in order to prove my point.

Let me give you an example, Bo. There's a man in Chicago who is Puerto Rican and is fighting against white people and black people moving into 'his' neighborhood. The guy got a glowing write up in Chicago Magazine for fighting against 'gentrification.' Can you imagine a white person fighting against Puerto Ricans moving into his neighborhood being treated the same way?

If not, then I've proven my point. No sophistry on your part will change the basic fact that if a white person and a non-white person behave in exactly the same way, it is only the white person who will be criticized. This is racist, and it's idiotic to pretend it's morally justified.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Try this one Irish. In 1950 if you formed an association to advance white people would you be doing the exact thing that the NAACP at the time was doing? Literally you would, but would you really find the two comparable? Most wouldn't because context matters. The reason why most people would find a congressional white caucus worse than a congressional black caucus has to do with historical (only one of the groups can be said to be disadvantaged historically at least comparably) and current social contexts (most reps are already white).

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Literally you would, but would you really find the two comparable?

They are comparable. They're both wrong.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

The NAACP in 1959 was wrong?

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Yes. The issue at hand was that skin color was used to differentiate between humans. The answer was to remove that differentiator. Treat everyone as an individual with equal rights, not a member of some "group" based on appearance or other irrelevant standard.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

But the NAACP was not the society to advance a color blind society, it was a society to advanced black people. By the literalistic thinking put forward here some would have to condemn it! But that's silly. When one race is being systematically disadvantaged to root for their advancement is not the same as the triumphal celebration of a group that's comparatively well off. Some here think blacks are no longer disadvantaged such that rooting for their advancement is veering into racism itself, ok, but realize many others think there's still enough disadvantage to warrant that kind of rooting. It's just not comparable to an advancement of whites movement.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Some here think blacks are no longer disadvantaged

I'm not one of them. I just think that the root of their disadvantage lies in identity politics, the perpetual victim complex, and the systematic government efforts to make them permanent wards of the state, whether in prison or not. The solutions that were implemented to correct the decades and centuries of abuse were the wrong ones and now they are reaping what was sowed.

You want to play the game of "feelz". That's fine, but that's what it is and nothing more. It does nothing to actually improve society for the long term and advance towards a "colorblind" nation.

[Irish]

Holy fuck, Bo. Yes, in 1955 the NAACP was a good organization because it combated the actual white racism that was oppressing blacks all over the south.

Now explain to me how black people murdering whites in Florida during the Miami riot because they had audacity to have pale skin is in any way similar to the founding of the NAACP.

Black nationalism today has nothing to do with combating white oppression. It has to do with the advancement of black xenophobia. You're right, context matters, which is why the different context in 2014 makes black nationalist organizations today vastly different than they were in 1958.

Get your head out of your ass and stop talking about my grandfather's generation when we're trying to discuss something a bit more recent.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Ok, so at least you don't see an explicitly ethnic racial group as always bad. You just think that the context has changed. Perhaps you can forgive the NAACP for not thinking that line has been crossed given blacks comparative disadvantage and under representation on average?

I'd agree some black nationalism is only plain racism. But you and others were arguing black racial orgs are equivalent to white ones, given history and current social reality that's silly.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Perhaps you can forgive the NAACP for not thinking that line has been crossed given blacks comparative disadvantage and under representation on average?

That should be the first indicator that their approach didn't work and perhaps there's another solution to the problem.

[lap83]

It should be pointed out that the philosophy of the NAACP wasn't the only direction African American advancement could have taken. Booker T Washington's view of advancement through hard work and prosperity could have served African American's a lot more, in my opinion. It's the direction that Chinese and Japanese Americans took and they've flourished despite discrimination. But the NAACP represents a triumph of Du Bois' philosophy of political advancement over economic advancement. So what do you get? Political gains for a few and resentment and poverty for the rest.

[Free Society]

The reason why most people would find a congressional white caucus worse than a congressional black caucus has to do with historical (only one of the groups can be said to be disadvantaged historically at least comparably) and current social contexts (most reps are already white).

Let's apply your little beliefs consistently and see what kind of madness ensues. The slave-holding American South has historically been economically and politically disadvantaged relative to the North. I suppose then that the South is entitled to force the North to subsidize it. A person born with 9 fingers must be entitled to expropriate the property of those born with 10 fingers, right?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I'm not talking about any subsidizing of anyone, I'm pointing out how a pro white and analogous pro black organization can be racist and not racist dependent on the historical and social context.

[Free Society]

I'm pointing out how a pro white and analogous pro black organization can be racist and not racist dependent on the historical and social context.

No you're promoting a species of equality where one group gets more 'equality' than another on the basis of feelings about history and malleable context.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Thinking about things out of context is faulty, yes.

[Fluffy]

I'm pointing out how a pro white and analogous pro black organization can be racist and not racist dependent on the historical and social context.

You didn't accomplish that. At all.

At most you argued "Yes, the NAACP is racist, but let's cut them some slack about it."

That is entirely different - entirely - from proving that an organization for racial advancement can be racist and not racist based on context.

[Enough About Palin]

I don't think white and black nationalism, at least in the context of David Duke and the NAACP for example, are comparable in the social and historical context of our nation. When it's blacks that were enslaved and oppressed for centuries and are still comparably on general a disadvantaged minority then an organization to advance blacks seems different than one to advance whites.

FIFY

[Zeb]

I would say that black nationalism (or black pride or whatever it is) is more understandable and sympathetic that white pride/nationalism. But it is still racists and detrimental to race relations. It may have been useful and empowering when blacks were systematically discriminated against and marginalized. But at some point you have to give that up and stop with the up vs. them shit if you really want to put ugly issues of race behind us.

[OldMexican]

Re: Bo Cara Esq,

Yes, equating the ethnic nationalism of whites and blacks in this country is totally not a common rhetorical device of people like David Duke

Because, obviously, making those comparisons means you must be a neo-confederate nazi white supremacist and not someone who is simply pointing out the logical incongruence of accepting the validity of one evil for historical reasons over the other.

[Don Mynack]

So now is a bad time to bring up the Arab Slave Trade?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_slave_trade

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I'm curious what the point is you are making by bringing it up?

[Free Society]

I would add that the Arab slave trade was unfathomably brutal and genocidal. If you were in a slave market in Africa, you'd rather toil under the yoke of European masters vs Arab and Indian ones. There's a reason you don't see the descendants of the African slaves living in communities in the Middle East. It's because upon enslavement the men were castrated and worked to death. While the women were raped, their offspring had their heads bashed in upon birth and then they too were worked to death. The slaves that went west at least had criminal owners that were vaguely inculcated with enough Western philosophy and it's resultant moral values that such treatment of their slaves as the Arabs did, would have been impossible to casually impose without pain of conscience or social condemnation.

Nonetheless, generations of people like Bo have made the word 'slavery' virtually synonymous with 'Western civilization'.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I certainly don't think slavery is limited to white Europeans over blacks. I've never said or implied such foolishness.

[Zeb]

How is the Arab slave trade at all relevant to this issue? Yes, it was more brutal and lasted for longer than the European slave trade. But it really has no bearing on race relations in the US. White people have historically run things in the US, not Arabs.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Some people are so sensitive about whites or Europeans being criticized that they conflate anything they see as on that vein with everything in that vein. So we are talking about all kinds of irrelevant things, like are Europeans worse than Arabs or did the Europeans contribute more to the world than the Chinese.

Of course what I was talking about is how groups for the advancement of this or that group have to be judged in their historical and social context, which determines largely how chauvinistic they appear.

[Bill Dalasio]

Trite social justice warrior attempt at demonization and demand for ostracization. Completely missed the level of analysis the audience is capable of.

2/5

[Zeb]

It is always a bod thing in my opinion. I think taking pride in your ancestry is pretty dumb too (though I don't really think that Europeans aren't permitted to take pride in their ancestry, there is plenty of that in mainstream culture. Pride about whiteness generally is a bit taboo because it is so often code for white supremacy.) And I really hate the idea that race should be part of anyone's identity.

It's really unfortunate that white nationalists have a leg to stand on when they make a point about government policies that seemingly seek to marginalize Europeans and drive it's civilization to extinction.

It really is. Europeans were so successful because they developed some really good ideas and technologies, not because they were uniquely greedy or brutal. And lots of people would probably call me racist for saying that.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

You think we've got "government policies that seemingly seek to marginalize Europeans and drive it's civilization to extinction?" That strikes me as rather nutty fringe.

[Fluffy]

Strictly speaking, grammatically the sentence says that it's unfortunate that the policies we have allow fringe groups to make fringe claims with a whiff of plausibility.

It's like saying that it's unfortunate that the Tuskegee experiment's indisputable truth makes it possible for people to be taken in by claims that AIDS was a biological weapon.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I think only nuts would see policies today as 'destroying European civilization' and those kind of nuts will see anything as doing that.

[Fluffy]

I think only nuts would see policies today as 'destroying European civilization' and those kind of nuts will see anything as doing that.

I don't think it's necessary to be nuts.

I think anyone who keeps track of opinion in academia or in elite media might conclude that the destruction of European civilization is a desired end, for the simple reason that in those contexts a great many people admit it openly.

But that's making Pauline Kael's mistake. While in some contexts those voices can seem important or even dominant, in the real world everything they say is irrelevant and western civilization stumbles on.

But if I wanted to cherry-pick leftist thinking for evidence of a grand plan to destroy European civilization, I certainly could. And it would be easy for some of my listeners to mistake the prestige of the people I quoted for actual influence and effectiveness.

[Free Society]

I think only nuts would see policies today as 'destroying European civilization' and those kind of nuts will see anything as doing that.

Ever read a copy of The Nation? The entire class of court intellectuals has a well established dream of utterly wiping out the existence of European identity and revising world history, since in their view such identity and historical success of Europeans are the reasons for the existence of all evil in the world.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

@FS

The attacks on objectivity and the promotion of relativism and deconstructionism is, in my mind, the most insidious of the efforts to tear down the gifts of Western civilization.

[Free Society]

I think only nuts would see policies today as 'destroying European civilization' and those kind of nuts will see anything as doing that.

Let's take the climate alarmists for example. They would establish carbon emission "allowances" whereby Western countries, i.e. developed countries, would be forced to compete economically with their arms and legs tied behind their back. The entire 'social justice' crowd offers proud and relentless vociferous support for policies that would "check your privilege" as a white person or otherwise seek to increase the standing of non-whites at the violently coercive expense of whites.

Denying the reality of this drive towards cultural genocide is to either close your eyes, or to embrace the supposed righteousness of that goal.

[tarran]

It really depends on how you define Western Civilization.

There are a cluster of competing ideologies that are very much intertwined throughout European history, each seeing itself as the exemplar of civilization.

Some of these ideologies are pretty destructive and rapacious -particularly the ones that posit that an enlightened few are divinely ordained to rule over the vulgar masses.

Additionally, you can find adherents to any ideology that were pretty scummy, violent people.

It appears to me that the dominant movement in modern academia is a form of progressivism that is pretty much opposed to both classical liberalism and the right-wing of the aristocracy-cum-church that liberalism was contending with in the 16 - 19th centuries. The progressives are not trying to destroy western civilization so much as they don't really care about it; they merely wish to sweep aside any institution or cultural more that stands in their way. And they have a simplistic paradigm that lumps all that stands in their way in one big bad blob.

This lack of understanding will be their ultimate undoing.

[Free Society]

There are a cluster of competing ideologies that are very much intertwined throughout European history, each seeing itself as the exemplar of civilization.

Some of these ideologies are pretty destructive and rapacious -particularly the ones that posit that an enlightened few are divinely ordained to rule over the vulgar masses.

Obviously not every European is right about what constitutes European civilized history. The ideological heritage of these various schools of thought has had disagreement stemming all the way back to the cradle of European civilization, when the Philosophs and Sophists squabbling over the ownership of the public perception about who is in possession of the best method for finding truth. Or when the Aristotelians validated the decentralization of power that would characterize Europe, while the philosophy of Plato would lend credence to ideologies promoting the enlightened few and general irrationality in the pursuit of truth, like the fascists, the Communists etc.

I have no doubt that a great many of the world's evils, conventional wisdoms and irrational philosophies have their origin in ancient European societies. Communism, progressivism, socialism and the like for the most part weren't brought to Europe from outside, but are in fact competing schools of thought, or more generally could be described as perversions, and have their origins in the ancient academies of European philosophers and sophists.

[Irish]

"You think we've got "government policies that seemingly seek to marginalize Europeans and drive it's civilization to extinction?" That strikes me as rather nutty fringe."

Given that European culture is viewed as morally suspect by history professors in government schools and that this hatred of European culture is actively taught to the students, I'd say it's not particularly fringe.

You cannot possibly deny that the dominant left-wing culture despises European culture, views it as an avatar of imperialism, and thinks white people are evil.

They make it pretty clear that they believe all these things. It's impossible to read a left-wing site without coming across posts talking about how evil whites are. And lest you decide to inexplicably claim that my pointing out other peoples' racism makes me racist (as you've argued with other people in this thread), I think any anti-black animus is just as evil.

There. Will that disclaimer quell your desire to claim I hate non-white people, or are you going to go for it anyway?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I think the dominance of left wing history professors is greatly exaggerated and posed no 'threat' to European civilization.

[Irish]

Yeah, they're just trying to eliminate every benefit handed down to us by western civilization, like the rule of law, free speech, and open markets.

And they're succeeding. They might not be trying to eliminate Beethoven concertos, but they're tearing down the basic civilizational building blocks that allowed such works to be created. And they're winning.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Now you are the one conflating things. So every anti market or free speech push is anti European civilization?

[Irish]

In modern times? Yes. Go ask a leftist his opinion on free markets and tell me how long it takes him to start talking about imperialism.

You want to know the first thing progs complained about after Obama talked about reopening relations with Cuba? The fact that evil free trade might cause McDonalds or Kohls to open in Cuba.

These things are directly connected. Progs hate European civilization and they flat out admit that part of their hatred of European civilization relates to markets and free trade.

I am conflating nothing. I am telling you what they think, and your contrarian idiocy and unwillingness to consider your positions has no bearing on the arguments of the left.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Your problem is that the strains leftists can be said to like-such as Marxism- are themselves products of European civilization!

[Free Society]

Now you are the one conflating things. So every anti market or free speech push is anti European civilization?

Not every single one, but mostly yeah.

Your problem is that the strains leftists can be said to like-such as Marxism- are themselves products of European civilization!

Oh my gosh, you mean European civilization isn't a monolith, with no deviations, perversions or competing schools of thought within it? Gee wiz, here I thought that everyone agreed with Aristotle and Socrates could never find a debate partner.

[JPyrate]

Yes by taking peoples words out of context, you can make anyone look like a fruitloop.

This is why I call you Boring Bo.

[Free Society]

It really is. Europeans were so successful because they developed some really good ideas and technologies, not because they were uniquely greedy or brutal. And lots of people would probably call me racist for saying that.

If we tallied up the sum total of human progress, I'd think we'd see the most indispensable institutions, for example free markets and the scientific method, came out of European societies. For all the evils attributed to people of European descent, it yet remains clear that if we could undo all of their achievements as if they never walked the earth at all, the present state of all of man would be little better than that of an ancient slave state. That's not a celebration, it's a statement of fact which makes the widespread denunciation of that is European, to be wholly irrational.

[Irish]

The same could also be said of various advancements made by the Chinese and the Arabs as well. Mathematics never would have taken off without Arab numerals (which actually originated in India) and early Chinese technological advancements were of huge importance to the entire landmass of Eurasia.

If you remove any of them we would have been vastly worse off than we are today. Europeans are just the most recent.

[Free Society]

The same could also be said of various advancements made by the Chinese and the Arabs as well.

It certainly could and this isn't a pissing contest. Yet these groups are not castigated by the state-dependent intellectual class as deserving of being eradicated from history for their transgressions.

Europeans are just the most recent successful.

The characteristic European achievement of decentralized political power goes back a very long ways. They weren't late to the game, it's just that history is written and promulgated best by large centralized polities. While the oriental empires were erecting their vast and powerful bureaucracies to centrally control society, European polities were decentralizing, discovering natural law and struggling to rule in the face a profound and deeply seeded cultural disrespect for centralized political authority. That decentralized culture is what allowed for the existence of those later achievements of European civilization.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Nationalism is generally bad news, because it tends to involve chauvinism and bigotry and discrimination vis-a-vis outside groups.

Now, researching your ancestors and taking pride in their accomplishments is great, so long as we're talking about one's own personal biological ancestors, not just people who came from the same continent as your ancestors.

It would be nice if civil-rights groups fought racism wherever it pops up, but it seems that's not always the case. There's nothing wrong with, say, a black or Irish-American or Jewish group, or even a generic white groups, keeps an eye out for discrimination against their group, so long as it doesn't degenerate into (a) finding discrimination everywhere, or (b) calling for discrimination against other groups.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

European civilization has given us Very Good Things as well as Very Bad Things. Same for other civilizations. Also, there is plenty of interaction between the various civilizations.

Giving Europeans sole credit for science and civilization is another matter, likewise blaming Europeans for everything bad in the world.

Also, the lefties who preach about European wickedness should realize that many (not all) of the worst atrocities by Europeans were against other Europeans.

[Free Society]

Giving Europeans sole credit for science and civilization is another matter, likewise blaming Europeans for everything bad in the world.

No one is arguing for their sole credit. I'm saying the contributions of European culture to the betterment of humanity have been indispensable and so to say that European and otherwise Western cultures have been a scourge upon humanity is exceedingly false.

When a narrative would have you believe that Europeans virtually invented slavery or at least practiced it worse than anyone, ignores that it was Europeans and their culture that virtually eliminated slavery from the face of the earth. Not to say that Europeans get sole credit on that count too, however it's extremely revealing that accusations of racism, imperialism, or associations with slavery et cetera, carries huge weight in European societies. The fact that within the culture we excoriate ourselves for those aforementioned -isms in our history tells you something about the moral character ingrained in our culture.

I don't see the Chinese lamenting their historical plundering in South East Asia nor do I even hear many Mongolians bemoaning the massive amount of death dealt by Ghengis, quite to the contrary they look at these escapades with pride. You can scarcely find a Westerner who hasn't been at least reminded on a nearly daily basis, that the historical brutality of our cultural forebearers is not to necessarily be celebrated.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

so long as it doesn't degenerate into (a) finding discrimination everywhere, or (b) calling for discrimination against other groups.

How often does that happen?

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Sometimes.

[AlmightyJB]

Double standard or not this is going to get a lot of media play. Not really what the GOP needs. Of course this will be sufficient evidence of a GOP war on black people. I'm not sure what his intentions were but seems pretty stupid at best. Facts are not really going to matter anyways.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

They should just drop him as majority whip and quietly give him a good committee assignment. That deals with the pr aspect.

[buybuydandavis]

'Maybe I'm being unfair and presumptuous, but I think it is safe to assume that a group that calls itself a "white civil rights group" has some racist ideas and motivations.'

That's exactly the line the Progressive Theocracy, therefore you're perfectly safe to spread it yourself.

The President can belong to a Marxist Black Supremacist Church, but if whites want civil rights, it's "Boo! Hiss!".

[Bo Cara Esq.]

It's David Duke's group.

[Don Mynack]

Does it matter that he talked to them? Or does it matter what he said to them?

[Mike M.]

Nope. If you're white, you're automatically evil due to the original sins of slavery, discrimination, etcetera. And if you oppose Obama and the liberals, you probably don't even deserve to live.

[Citizen Nothing]

Hey, can we talk about the war on Christmas now?

[Bo Cara Esq.]

If you're Orthodox there's still time.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

It's the Sixth Day of Christmas (or the fifth in some traditions)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T....._Christmas

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Tell your buddies that you're Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican or Lutheran and you are appalled at how people are disrespecting your culture by not giving you presents each day for 12 days.

I already got my 6 geese a-laying. Of course, feeding them, the pipers, the drummers, the lords and the maids may be kind of expensive, so I may have to lay them off. Except the maids.

[Fluffy]

Personally, if I ran for office I'd speak to any group of voters no matter how small and no matter how fringe.

I'd speak to Communists. I'd speak to fascists. I'd speak to fucking NAMBLA.

Hell, I'd even speak to the Teachers' union.

In fact, I'd go out of my way to address crazy and marginalized groups like all the ones I just listed above. First, because that's the fucking job description; second, because that's the only way to stop people from playing this, "You sanctified that crazy group with your holy political presence!" game.

[tarran]

I'd speak to fucking NAMBLA.

I wouldn't waste my time; unless you look like Marlon
Brando, those assholes aren't going to vote for you.

[Fluffy]

When I was younger, I was really thin (and neat) and looked many years younger than I actually was.

And if you think I wouldn't have trolled the gay organizations looking for votes from guys who thought I was their dream twink, you're sadly mistaken and grossly overestimating my ruth.

[Ted S.]

Wouldn't you have to look unnaturally young for NAMBLA to vote for you?

[Zeb]

Not a Southpark fan?

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

North American Marlon Brando Look-Alikes, for those of you who missed the reference.

[invisible furry hand]

Butters, time to take one for the team

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

"Oh hamburgers"

[tarran]

"Hi, everyone. I am a young boy looking for fun times with older male. I like to-"

[again, his screen fills with cascading replies. He picks one]

"Oh, this one looks good: HungDaddy. "

[starts typing] Hello, HungDaddy.

[reads the reply] "Hi. I'm eight and a half inches."

"Damn, dude, this guy's tiny. He must be a dwarf.

[replies] Sorry, I'm not interested in being friends with midgets. Midgets piss me off. Frowny face.

[Swiss Servator, Winter...jetzt]

Hell, I'd even speak to the Teachers' union.

You, sirrah, go to far!

*leaves room, chin up*

[Fluffy]

But it's the PRINCIPLE. I can't refuse to speak to anyone, no matter how despicable.

You have to establish your bona fides with the most extreme case you can find, and, well, all the Manson family people all still in jail.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

This. The whack-a-mole game of privilege and identity politics is tiresome.

The key would be to have a consistent message across the groups. That is where I will bet that 90% of politicians fail miserably.

[Pope Jimbo]

Does it count as consistent if the speech is basically the same, but they use funny accents based on the audience?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaDQ1vIuvZI

[Fluffy]

Not only is it tiresome, it makes no logical sense.

When trying to succeed at politics, it would seem to be necessary to convince people who don't start out agreeing with you to change your minds.

That would seem to make it necessary to spend the most time speaking and arguing with people who disagree with you the most.

If you don't do that, why, it's almost as if our entire campaign process is a sham of deliberation, where we go through the motions of political forms that no longer have any real meaning! (Sarc)

[Citizen Nothing]

So do you think Scalise also made a serious attempt to get an invite to speak to the NAACP? Maybe he did, but I'd be surprised.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Look Citizen, there's a few ways to dismiss this.

1. Who cares who speaks to who?
2. Robert Byrd!
3. What's so bad about white power groups? I mean, we got a Black Caucus and all!

So stop confusing things!

[Irish]

I doubt he made a 'serious attempt' to get invited to speak to this group. They probably offered to give him campaign money and he said okay without bothering to research who was cutting the check.

If the NAACP went to a GOP candidate and said 'hey, we'll give you a bunch of money' the candidate would be where the NAACP wanted him to be when they wanted him to be there.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I doubt they offered him any money as a group. That's the kind of thing that gets scrutinized because it's recorded under FEC rules.

[Fluffy]

This sub-thread is a discussion of how I personally would conduct a political campaign, both as a function of my own inclinations and the way I see the political process, and as a function of how I'd go about insulating myself from the criticism that is dogging Scalise today.

I doubt Scalise made any such effort, because he's just not as fucking clever as I am.

Personally, I would have spoken to the NAACP - and NOW, and the SEIU - once a week, at least, and luxuriated in the delicious aura of their boos.

"Boo more! Yeah, like that! I like it like that!" (Eyes roll white.)

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

You could even speak to the police unions.

BOOYAH!

[Fluffy]

You could even speak to the police unions.

Oh, man, don't tease me like that.

Just thinking about the speech I'd give the police union makes me want to run to my bunk.

[Pope Jimbo]

Penn Jillette and Glen Beck run into this sort of stuff when they go on each other's shows.

Their friends all chide them for "legitimizing" the other side.

Yeah it would be nice if you could go meet with any crazy group out there and not be branded as a heretic.

Are you so worried that talking to white supremacists will result in you being converted?

[sarcasmic]

Their friends all chide them for "legitimizing" the other side.

In the name of equality, tolerance and inclusiveness, inferior people with intolerant ideas shall not be included.

[R C Dean]

Doesn't it matter what Scalise said to the (alleged) racists?

I mean, if he was goose-stepping onto a stage and Nazi-saluted a big swastika (which I gather is what I am supposed to believe), that would be one thing.

If he chewed their asses for being a bunch of dumbfucks, wouldn't that be OK? Laudable, even?

[invisible furry hand]

'No proof of contraception, no dole': The former Labor Minister who says anyone claiming unemployment benefits should not be allowed to have children

[Steve G]

Can they at least try???

[Bones]

Hey, if you live at the forced beneficence of others, don't be surprised when they try to add conditions.

[Bill Dalasio]

Don't you understand, Bones? That beneficence is there right. The kulaks are supposed to shut the hell up and pay!

[gaijin]

...a new probe into the 1961 airplane crash in which Secretary-General Dag Hammarskj?ld died

WDATPDIM?

[Steve G]

FAKE HYSTORICAL SCANDULZ!!!!!11

[AlmightyJB]

Meh...they should keep busy doing stuff like this all the time i.e. nothing important.

[Andrew S.]

Palm Beach County, Florida police looking for duo who put up anti-police flyers

But it's totally about "vandalism" and not the message!

[Steve G]

"Hey Jimmy! Pull a couple guys from homicide to work this one, will ya?"

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

Hey Jimmy! Pull a couple of guys from vice to work this upcoming homicide, will ya?

[Swiss Servator, Winter...jetzt]

Oh, zing!

[Ted S.]

Two-time Best Actress`Oscar winner Luise Rainer dies two weeks shy of her 105th birthday.

No less talented than Lou Reed.

[Fluffy]

At least Olivia de Havilland keeps on trucking.

You go Melanie! You were always the hot one! Ashley was right!

[Ted S.]

Norman Lloyd (the bad guy in Alfred Hitchcock's Saboteur and I believe one of the teachers in Dead Poets Society) is alive and older, having turned 100 in November. Olivia's only 98-1/2.

[Fluffy]

Yes, but you have to give Olivia bonus years for all that time she spent maintaining her fake Joan Fontaine identity.

All those years count double.

[Cdr Lytton]

And she helped christen Southern Pacific's Daylight trains almost 78 years ago.

[Enough About Palin]

"The following year, her portrayal of a Chinese peasant in The Good Earth won her a second statuette, at a time when Oscar winners were disclosed some time before the ceremony."

SHE APPROPRIATED CHINESE CULTURE!!!

[Ted S.]

Researchers in Germany were able to reproduce the fingerprints of the German Defense Minister using photos taken at a public event.

Gotta love those biometric passports.

Next up, tattooed ID numbers.

[gaijin]

Next up, tattooed ID numbers.

aha! That explains the danger of the self-inking trend in teh other AM link story...Identity theft is the devil's work.

[Swiss Servator, Winter...jetzt]

You know who else utilized tattoo numbers for ID?

[robc]

Cancer patients?

[Steve G]

The Organization?

[sarcasmic]

Vampire Houses?

[SIV]

The Beast?

[Beautiful Bean Footage]

+666

[invisible furry hand]

Miley Cyrus?

[Charles Easterly]

A poseur Anti-Christ?

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

Fist is no poseur.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Fo sho.

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

tattooed ID numbers

Get into the right century!

It's gonna be bar scanner codes on the back of your neck, base of your spine, and inside of wrist. Redundancy is important.

[Zeb]

Wouldn't that be easier to fake than fingerprints?

RFID chips are the thing.

[Cdr Lytton]

A healthcare worker in Scotland who had returned from West Africa has been diagnosed with Ebola which will shortly be used to produce another fine Scottish food.

[invisible furry hand]

A dram or two of a good single malt kills Ebola. Fact.

[Medical Physics Guy]

Well that doesn't explain how she has any Ebola left then. Unless she's one of those Glasgow Buckfast drinkers.

[Charles Easterly]

She must not be a true Scotsperson.

[Agammamon]

Irn Bru - kills brain cells *and* ebola.

[Irish]

I'm actually inclined to believe that Scalise didn't know they were white supremacists. After all, what's the one, singular goal of everyone in congress? To get reelected. What would hurt your chances of getting reelected? Speaking at a white supremacist conference.

It seems far more likely that the sort of venal, arrogant scumbag who makes it in American politics would accidentally speak to a bunch of racists because he's too lazy to check who he's talking to than that he would purposefully speak to a bunch of racists.

[sarcasmic]

"How much? I'll be right over!"

[robc]

See also, Fluffy above.

Speak to anyone and everyone and problem diffused.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Supposedly he was short staffed and rushing through the state speaking to all kinds of groups. He was just a state rep at the time.

[robc]

So, the fluffy strategy.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

But what did he say? That's what matters.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

Something about honkies.

[Zeb]

Yeah, it makes a big difference if he just gave a standard campaign speech, or if he was specifically addressing the group and saying he supports their cause or something.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

The funny thing his defense of 'I had no idea who I was speaking to' sound worse to me.

[Zeb]

Unless he just speaks to anyone who will hear him. I think that is a perfectly reasonable way to go about it. Just talking to people is not necessarily an implicit show of support.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

I'm doubting he speaks to Planned Parenthood or the SEIU.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

I'm doubting he speaks to Planned Parenthood or the SEIU.

Probably not. But Rand Paul spoke at Howard University and was pilloried for it by the left. So who should Republicans speak to?

[Irish]

"Probably not. But Rand Paul spoke at Howard University and was pilloried for it by the left. So who should Republicans speak to?"

How was he pilloried? Leftists criticized him because they disagreed with what he said, not because he spoke at Howard.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

Apparently he was "whitesplaining" at a black university. A term that I find not only racist to whites, but demeaning to blacks.

They're certainly free to disagree and I welcome the argument, but the reductio ad cutis color is pure drivel.

[tarran]

not because he spoke at Howard.

Actually they were pissed that he dared show his face in Howard University. But it was team based outrage; Rand Paul is not a racist, Byrd was and yet many of same people pillorying Paul over his choice of venue would not let out a peep about Byrd because he was the right team.

Personally, I don't think giving a speech to white nationalists is a problem. Walter Block loves to tell the story about the time he tried to convince a group of neo-nazis to ally with libertarianism ("you can have ovens! you just won't be allowed to put people in them").

If he had said "I gave my stump speech and it was well received; not a group I agree with, but I'll talk to anybody" it would be over pretty quickly.

It's the "I was busy; I don't recall" shtick that I find squirrely. How the fuck do you not remember a remarkable event like a white nationalist conference? If I were a politician and that happened to me, it would be a war story I'd love to tell. The only reason to keep it secret is if he said something there that he finds shameful.

[Citizen Nothing]

and was pilloried for it by the left.

Well, damn! We certainly wouldn't want to piss off the left!

[Pope Jimbo]

I have a good friend from high school who has risen to become a big wig at the state level of politics.

It is really hard to get a beer with him now. You basically have to be willing to meet at 11:30 at night on a Wed for any chance.

Why? Because he is constantly out giving stump speeches to any group that will have him.

I think it is believable that someone called this guy's campaign and said could you stop by our dinner next Monday? We'll have 100 people there and we'll pass the hat. And the campaign said sure he'll be there without really checking who they were.

[tarran]

My guess is that it was more than a campaign speech.

While researching a post at the Liberty Papers, I spent a lot of time surveying the various forms of White Nationalism.

There is no way Scalise didn't know what these people were about the moment he walked in there. It also appears that somebody was promoting his candidacy on stormfront, meaning what he said resonated with them.

"It was just announced that Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson will enter the race in the 1st Congressional District," Hebert wrote. "Those that attended the EURO conference in New Orleans will recall that Scalise was a speaker, offering his support for issues that are of concern to us."

In my experience, the White Nationalists, the Race Realists etc are less overt about racial prejudice because they recognize it's no longer hip and cool to be racist against non-whites.

But, racism is the central tenet of their political beliefs. They tend to bang on about European culture now, but every article I read basically conflated a person's culture with their racial make-up.

Comically, a large number of them promote socialism-lite while decrying it. Bunch of clueless wankers.

[Irish]

Well if that's the case, then he's royally fucked and it's going to be hilarious watching him squirm.

[tarran]

Of course, one should recall that originally a bunch of stormfronters were promoting Ron Paul.

So it's possible he went in, gave his speech, said the EEOC were bastards (they are), and they said, hey this guy is not too bad.

Certainly the stormfront people say nothing about the content of his speech; just that he was a Republican clean of any baggage and that if he ended immigration, affirmative action and fight crime they would support him.

It's just that if I ended up stumbling into a coven of white nationalists, I would remember it. I can understand giving a speech to the Palmsdale Rotarians and completely forgetting about it. David Duke's name kind of sticks in one's memory.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

My guess is that he sought common ground and support based on opposition to illegal immigration. Scalise promotes the English as the Official Language BS and an end to birthright citizenship as well as having repeatedly opposed amnesty.

But this is what the discussion should be. Not who he spoke to but what they spoke about.

[straffinrun]

Did he sing? Any people of color there?

[SIV]

HUD spends too much with no accountability:

the meeting was productive locally as State Representative, Steve Scalise, discussed ways to oversee gross mismanagement of tax revenue or "slush funds" that have little or no accountability.
Representative Scalise brought into sharp focus the dire circumstances pervasive in many important, under-funded needs of the community at the expense of graft within the Housing and Urban Development Fund, an apparent give-away to a selective group based on race.

[Azathoth!!]

He was going on about graft, corruption and cronyism at the time, and that's what he spoke about.

[SIV]

What would hurt your chances of getting reelected? Speaking at a white supremacist conference.

Not in Metairie.

[Enough About Palin]

^^THIS^^

I recall motorcycling in Louisiana back in '97. There'd be signs that read "David Duke County" affixed to telephone poles about 30 feet up.

[invisible furry hand]

Putin critic gets suspended sentence - but his non-political brother gets jail time

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30630635

[Medical Physics Guy]

I read a review of a new book called Putin's Kleptocracy. Is it me or was the Western media as well as the intelligence community pretty well asleep on the systematic KGB re-takeover of the country over 30 years?

[Zeb]

Not entirely. All the information I have about Russia comes from the Western media and I figured it out.

[John]

For the most part yes. Russia is in many ways another failure of western aid. After the USSSR failed, various "top men" western economists went to Russia and there was a hufe influx of World Bank IMF aid. The top men as usual completely fucked it up because they didn't understand the society and the people they were dealing with. The old Soviet Communist Party was really not much different than the old Italian Mafia. Just because they lost control of the country, didn't mean their power base and organization died. In some ways losing control, by freeing them of the responsibilities of running the country, allowed them to concentrate on their real business, stealing. So you flood the country with billions in aid administered by top men morons whom any Russian street vender could fleece. The old communist party in the form of the KGB and various associates stole all of the money and over the last 30 years have used it to take over the country again.

[Bo Cara Esq.]

The privatization went badly too. And there was serious mob type violence going on. Internationally we were humiliating them. They turned to the strongest warlord around to restore some stability and pride.

[Irish]

The privatization in Russia was just cronyism and theft. It wasn't legitimate privatization like what they were doing in Poland or the Baltic, which tended to work very well. It was more akin to outright looting by former Soviet insiders.

[John]

The biggest American strategic blunder of the post Cold War was the war against Serbia. That war destroyed all of the good will that we had with the Russian people after the Cold War. That resentment became one of the biggest drivers of Russian nationalism. Clinton basically restarted the cold war so that the Kosovar mafia could get their own UN protectorate. He also set the precedent that ethnic enclaves had a right to leave larger countries. So when the US complains about Russia breaking off the Russian majority areas of Georgia and Ukraine, the Russians legitimately look back at the Kosovo war and see the US as hypocrites out to destroy Russia.

That war was without question illegal under international and domestic law, was fought based on a lie, was fought in a way that was contrary to international law (we won by targeting civilian infrastructure such that the Serbian people became so miserable the revolted against Milosovich), and did long term and grave damage to US interests and its relationship with Russia.

[Bobarian (Mr. Xtreme)]

And the only reason we got involved in that was to obfuscate a blow-job and some perjury.

This was also where we fired the one bullet left in the gun that was NATO. NATO is now a useless anachronism.

[John]

It was that and it was Cass Sunstein's bitch wife Samantha Power's pet project. She felt guilty over doing nothing about Rwanda and decided soothe her conscience by bombing the Serbs over bullshit lies about genocide. And to think she is now the US Ambassador to the UN. She has fucked up every single thing she has ever touched and done nothing but be rewarded for doing so.

[Ted S.]

Apparently there isn't the moral panic over sledging in Russia that there is in Australia?

[invisible furry hand]

There's a moral panic over sledging in Australia? News to me. Now, can I borrow your brain? I'm building an idiot.

[Ted S.]

My RSS feed from the ABC had this item this morning:

Sledging incidents threaten final day of Boxing Day Test

There are growing concerns that the on-field sledging between the Australian and India during the Boxing Day Test could explode into some kind of physical altercation. Some commentators are warning that the sledging between the two teams is a ticking timebomb.

Of course, it's only the journalists who are in a froth about it. But it's your taxes going to fund this frorh. 🙁

[invisible furry hand]

That's not a moral panic, that's my national broadcaster kindly tipping me off to the possibility of a bit of biff. As it happened, there was no biff, but the hilarious Indian batting collapse still made it worth watching.

[Pope Jimbo]

What the fuck is a chinese downhill sledging?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfs7K89FlzI

[invisible furry hand]

Unpleasant comments from Australian cricketers intended to upset their opponents and distract them from playing well. Classic sledges usually provoke a clever response eg

"Hey Eddo, why are you so fucking fat?"

"Because every time I fuck your wife she gives me a biscuit"

[Pope Jimbo]

So it is like a psyche out in baseketball

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1kjqZrCeMQ#t=282

[Steve G]

At least they're alive...for now

[Rufus J. Firefly]

"A healthcare worker in Scotland who had returned from West Africa has been diagnosed with Ebola."

Yawn.

So mid-2014.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Could someone please explain all this?

Enter at your own risk. Mega-derp:

http://bit.ly/1CRvXiR

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Rania Khalek: "Independent journalist. Objectivity is bullshit."

Nice way of giving you the right to move goal posts at will.

[Kaptious Kristen]

Fuck you, United and Orbitz, you protectionist cronyist bastards.

[invisible furry hand]

Jesus, that's pitiful

[Pope Jimbo]

Way back in the 80's this was a good way to save money flying from Memphis. You could buy a ticket that started in Little Rock, then show up at the Memphis terminal and only use the second leg of you flight.

North West started cracking down on it in the 90's. I remember that there was a thriving shuttle bus service that would drive people from Memphis to Little Rock to start their trips.

The whole way airline tickets are prices is incredibly convoluted. The first project I worked on after college was a system to automatically audit airline tickets. There was a team of at least 30 people who worked on the pricing sub system.

[John]

I would love to read that article but it has an ad plug in that manages to be nastier than even Reason's adware. It literally crashed firefox and almost crashed my entire computer. I got two sentences into the article and this ad appears that took up the entire screen and immediately froze my browser and for a few seconds my entire computer.

[Kaptious Kristen]

Sorry about that. I don't see any ads, ever, so I don't know which sites have those layover things.

[John]

I don't have administrator rights on my work computer. So my ability to block adware is limited.

And Firefox is getting well on useless these days. Everything seems to crash it. It is getting so bad that Explorer is becoming a real option and Explorer is the worst browser ever created by man.

I keep finding that the browsers can't keep up with the adware. Even my up to date Chrome program on my home computer will sometimes crash. My home computer has up to date Chrome and Adobe Flash and there is still shit out there it can't handle, and I am not talking about malicious porn sites. I mean legitimate news sites and such.

[Kaptious Kristen]

My Chrome at home sometimes has trouble handing all the social media sharing shit. Facebook seems to make things especially slow.

[John]

Yes. It is all of the damned widgets that run trying to get you to share the link on social media. It is such bullshit. If I want to share the link, I know how to cut and paste the address.

[sarcasmic]

I use Firefox with Adblock Plus and I don't have any problems at all.

[John]

I don't have administrator rights and can't install that. But I will try that on my home computer.

[sarcasmic]

Maybe your system admin will do it for you if he's halfway cool. Oh, wait. You work for the feds. So your administrator is probably some petty tyrant who views the network as his personal empire. Never mind.

[Warty]

You need administrator rights to install addons to Firefox? Are you sure? That's retarded, if true.

[sarcasmic]

You need administrator rights to install addons to Firefox? Are you sure? That's retarded, if true.

I thought the same thing so I googled it, and it is indeed true.

[Warty]

Blow your IT guy and get him to install Chrome. I believe you can install addons without an administrator account.

Also, quit your job and work someplace that trusts you to operate a computer. Jesus.

[Kaptious Kristen]

The Feds kind of have reason to not trust their employees with normal computer operations. I'm pretty sure that State Department hack from the fall was due to some dickweed falling for a phishing email, seeing as they disabled all hyperlinks in emails for a couple of weeks, and now they have an intermediate warning screen whenever you click a link in an email.

[Warty]

Oh, I understand why they're not trusted. He should still find a less nightmarish place to work.

[sarcasmic]

Occasionally Flash will cause the browser to freeze, but that's rare.

[Fluffy]

It could also be your internet connection.

Work internet generally will have a complicated group of whitelists and blacklists and any one internet page you browse to could be calling dozens of servers on each list.

So you get a long hang on pages while your work internet figures out if it wants to let the page load or not.

And Chrome is not as good at pulling the trigger on killing pages as it once was.

The other problem I have these days is with wireless. The fucking social plugins take FOREVER to load, in wireless terms. But the pages are programmed to try to hide the content until after the social plugins load. So again you get weird time-outs and hangs, and it gets harder and harder for Chrome to fight its way through, even with AdBlock Plus.

[tarran]

Basically, airline fares are based on what the market will bear from Destination A to Destination B.

Suppose you wanted to fly to destination B, an noticed that:

Destination A to Destination B costs $300
Destination A to Destination C with layover in B costs $200

You could purchase a ticket to destination C and just not show up for the second leg. Savvy travelers have been doing this for 30 years. Now a kid writes an app that finds these "inside fares" and facilitates consumers taking advantage of it.

And United is losing their shit over it.

[Andrew S.]

Note that the airlines have always hated this, and if they caught you at it, they'd cancel your ticket. They'd do the same thing with when people would buy crossover round trips (back when Saturday night stays were more of a big deal, if you knew you needed two short trips to a city, you could buy a ticket from City A to City B leaving on Tuesday, returning in 2 weeks, and a ticket from City B to City A, leaving in 2 days, with opposite itineraries). So it's no wonder they'd lose their shit over it.

[Agammamon]

I got caught up in this accidentally once - sort of.

Bought a ticket to SF (through a stop in San Diego) but last minute change of plans required me to drive to San Diego.

Tried to fly out from SD and they told me that since I didn't show up for the first half of the flight, they cancelled the ticket

[Kaptious Kristen]

Yeah, I think it works better when you show up for the first half and skip the second half. I've never attempted to skip the first half for that very reason.

[Pope Jimbo]

In the olden days before online ticketing a lot of business travelers would book through a travel agent (who could actually price and print tickets).

One of the perks of using a travel agent back then was you could show up on a Monday and remind the agent that you had told them to reserve you a 30 day advance ticket for that Wednesday and the agent could do that for you.

If the ticket was audited the airline would call the agent and the agent would have to make up the difference in price. Given that the audit rate was something around 5% your chances were pretty good that you would get away with this.

The project I worked on automated the whole thing. Every ticket was scanned, run through OCR and then price checked. The audit rate was something north of 95%. The airline was stunned at how much money they were being ripped off for by the travel agents.

[Drake]

I used to buy at least one back-to-back a month. I would use different airlines to make sure they didn't notice.

[Raston Bot]

I stopped using Firefox for that reason. Chrome handled that story without an annoying ad.

[Mike M.]

Soldiers forced to move their Hawaii wedding so that Obama can get in a round of golf.

What a delightful, thoughtful man.

[Agammamon]

Eh, I can't really blame this on *him*.

Most likely the course managers didn't even bother to inform his staff of a potential conflict - 'of course the president can play here (we'll just move these nobodies out of the way)'.

[John]

I blame that on his douche bag staff. I am sure he had no idea. I imagine some 20 something Ivy League douche bag whose daddy got him a job at the White House told the golf course to tell the couple to go fuck themselves. But don't worry, in ten years or so that same douche bag will be no mature or smart and will be holding an important government position.

[Citizen Nothing]

Yeah. Of all the thousands (millions? quadrillions?) of things to legitimately criticize Obama for, this seems kind of petty and contrived. But I guess it stirs the emotions, so...there you go.

[Cdr Lytton]

I am sure he had no idea.

Of course not. But he should have. The imperial presidency is a fucking steamroller that bulldozes everything around it any time it moves. He should just stay home or go to Camp David. Want to go to Hawaii for a personal vacation? Book a seat on United and a room at the Grand Wailea on his personal credit card.

[OldMexican]

The government's relentless war on poor people... I-I mean "poverty": 21 states set to make poor people's labor more expensive on January 1st

The increases will lift the hourly wages of 2.4 million workers by up to $1 to an average of $8 and a high of $9.15, according to the Economic Policy Institute. The federal hourly minimum is $7.25.

[Kaptious Kristen]

It's all good. They'll soon see that minimum wage isn't all about the feelz and that their emotional policy-making will result in higher unemployment and more expensive shit.

Oh, who am I kidding? They'll just demand higher minimum wages to make themselves feel better.

[sarcasmic]

Those jobs are terrible and not worth working. It's better to outlaw demeaning work and put people on the dole. Since nothing is better for a person's self worth than not being able to provide for themselves.

[Pope Jimbo]

Hikes in the minimum wage are good for me. I work doing IoT stuff for businesses looking to automate shit and cut costs.

Quick server restaurants are especially open to replacing workers with equipment to save money. By monitoring they can also make sure that the workers that are still there are not slacking off.

So even if the poor people get to keep their job, automation and monitoring is going to make them work way harder than before. No more pretending to filter the grease in the fryer. Monitoring makes sure they are actually doing their tasks.

[Raston Bot]

Richmond, a Democrat, said he didn't think Scalise "has a racist bone in his body," citing their work on "issues that benefit poor people, black people, white people, Jewish people," according to the Times-Picayune.

Another Republican representative, Steve King of Iowa, also jumped to Scalise's defense. "Jesus dined with tax collectors and sinners," King said, according to the Washington Post. "I know his heart, I've painted houses with him post-Katrina, and I know he is a good man."

All signs point to him being just another opportunistic pol and not some principled racist.

[Enough About Palin]

"All signs point to him being just another opportunistic pol and not some principled racist."

What a terrible thing to say about Jesus.

[Enough About Palin]

A political blogger in Louisiana has uncovered that House Majority Whip Steven Scalise (R-La.) spoke at an event organized by a "white civil rights" group in 2002.

One event? Is that as bad as attending the racist Reverend Jeremiah Wright's church for 20 ears?

[Michael Ejercito]

How many Klan meetings did Robery Byrd attend?

[Michael Ejercito]

Would the electorate at large ever put up with race baiting by politicians?

[Andrew S.]

Sarcasm should be less obvious than this, you know.

[SugarFree]

My prescription that still had a refill was cancelled because it was one year and one day old.

I hope everyone in the DEA burns in hell for a thousand eternities.

[Andrew S.]

I'm generally not the type of person to wish suffering upon people. But for the DEA, and for the politicians that enable them, I hope every one of them suffers from a horribly painful condition, for which no doctor is willing to prescribe them anything that works to reduce the pain.

[sarcasmic]

Anyone who zealously enforces unjust legislation deserves a slow and painful death.

[invisible furry hand]

They saved your life and you don't even care

[sarcasmic]

Just last week I was able to get my doctor's office to renew a prescription for something I hadn't been prescribed in three or four years. Initially they wanted me to go in for a visit, but relented after I persuaded them otherwise. Then again we're talking about Flonase, not some happy opioid.

[SugarFree]

Yeah, this was just an Albuterol inhaler. Mister Big Time Drugman wanting to breathe and shit. What an ego I have.

[sarcasmic]

I'd call your doctor's office. We're not talking about pain killers or anything. Unless they're completely unreasonable you should be able to convince them to call in a refill.

[SugarFree]

The pharmacy filed a refill request for me, but they have to find a doctor in office to fill it for me. I should have it tomorrow, but the situation of being one day late was just so absurd.

[Warty]

What what what? I assumed it was some fucking Vicodin or something at least a little bit fun. What a bunch of fucks.

[SugarFree]

I never get anything fun. I could really use some codeine cough suppressant right now, but I know there's no point even trying to get any.

[Warty]

SIZZURP

[Kaptious Kristen]

My doctor made me come in to the office for a second go-around of Chantix. No amount of begging and reason (I had been on it before with no bad side effects) could sway them. And my dentist is on my case constantly about smoking, yet refuses to prescribe Chantix.

[sarcasmic]

Chantix falls into that category of anti-depressants that are linked to suicide (a link that I find to be absurd - like depressed people are like more likely to commit suicide and stuff? like OMfuckingG!), which makes doctors very leery about prescribing it willy-nilly.

[sarcasmic]

You know what? Screw the Chantix. Get yourself a battery, a vaporizor, and some nicotine juice. You get all the nicotine without the tar and shit, and it doesn't even smell. I stealth vape at work all the time. And I can vape in the car without stinking it up and getting tar on the glass.
Check out ecig1.us.

[Kaptious Kristen]

I have some convenience store vapes, which I use in a pinch (I like them because they're lightweight and the "filters" are soft & squishy like a real cig).

But the Chantix has been a miracle drug for me. A normal course of Chantix is 6 months, and I need about 2 years of it to get really stable in my non-smoking. I just wish I could find a doc and an insurance plan that would let me do it for 2 years straight. Maybe I'll find a new doc and ask him/her if they would just give me 2 years worth of refills and I'll pay out of pocket for whatever my insurance won't cover.

[sarcasmic]

Five years ago I quit with Chantix. Only took two weeks. Stuff gave me near constant flatulence and crazy dreams, but it made the cigarettes taste like ashes in my mouth. So I quit. Then a year ago I started vaping.
Buying from that website is dirt cheap. A battery costs ten bucks and lasts for as long as a month. The vaporizors are a buck and last for a couple weeks. The juice is cheap as well. All told I may be spending five bucks a week on my nicotine addiction, without all the side effects of smoking. Being that I like nicotine, it's worth it to me.

[Kaptious Kristen]

That's awesome! I bet smokes are expensive up there in the GWN, too. I live in Flavor Country, so cheap smokes are only $4.

It took me a about a week for the Chantix to kick in and make the cigs taste like a house fire. I'd say it made quitting about 80% easier than NRT (nicotine replacement) or cold turkey.

Part of my problem with smoking is the routine of it. I crave routine in almost all aspects of my life, and smoking is a big part of that. That's why I finding vapes to only be mildly satisfying.

I'll check out the site.

[Warty]

You could have been addicted. Show some gratitude. In between your screams of agony, I mean.

[Citizen Nothing]

Speaking of Froot Loops, this whole thread is like a big, overflowing bowl. Now I'm hungry.

[sherryesearcy]

my best friend's mother makes $82 /hour on the computer . She has been without work for ten months but last month her pay was $14362 just working on the computer for a few hours. this page............
????? http://www.netjob70.com

[Warty]

Panopticon

[Kaptious Kristen]

Hey gize! Giada "Lollipop Head with Big Scary Teeth" De Laurentis is single!

[sarcasmic]

With a rack like that, many things can be forgiven.

[Charles Easterly]

Don't overlook the cooking skills. Everytime I visit my dentist and most times I visit my bank they have her on.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

So the dentist is trying to get repeat business?

[Charles Easterly]

No doubt.

Additionally, the dentist and I have had some pretty good chats.
After an initial conversation regarding the economic state of our nation I introduced him to several authors (starting with Henry Hazlitt), websites, and Youtube videos.

[koreytoye]

my neighbor's half-sister makes $74 every hour on the internet . She has been without work for 10 months but last month her paycheck was $18600 just working on the internet for a few hours. visit the site....
?????http://www.netjob70.com