President Obama Defends Iran Deal as Choice Between Diplomacy and War, Bill Clinton Urged Trump to Run, George W. Bush Reports for Jury Duty: P.M. Links

• 

  White House

  President Obama spoke in defense of the West's nuclear deal with Iran, saying the choice for the U.S. was between diplomacy and war.

• A hatchet-wielding gunman opened fire in a movie theater in Tennessee before being shot and killed by police.
• Bill Clinton reportedly urged Donald Trump earlier this year to run for president.
• Two former Ron Paul staffers were indicted on charges of conspiracy related to Paul's 2012 presidential campaign.
• A boat carrying more than 400 migrants capsized off the coast of Libya, killing at least 25.
• Wreckage from MH370, a Malaysia Air flight that went missing last year, was found on Reunion, an island in the Indian Ocean.
• George W. Bush showed up for jury duty in Dallas.

New at Reason.com:

• College Make 'Colorblindness' a Microaggression The worst thing about college speech codes is how they incite hyper racial consciousness. by Brendan O'Neill
• Saving Our Way into the Poorhouse Government claims its spending programs save money, but it keeps spending more money. by A. Barton Hinkle
• The Top 5 Ways Jon Stewart Was Full of Sh*t by Justin Monticello and Alexis Garcia

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Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

A hatchet-wielding gunman opened fire in a movie theater...

And somewhere P. Morgan pops a woodrow.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Buongiorno!

[Juvenile Bluster]

Rufus, were you looking for me (the poster formerly known as Andrew S) in the mourning lynx?

[C. Anacreon]

The famous brony poster? IThanks for the handle update.

[Juvenile Bluster]

Well, you didn't say infamous.

[Juan "Brushmaster" Seguin]

Oh, Dusty. In-famous is when you're MORE than famous. This man El Guapo, he's not just famous, he's IN-famous.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Are you back from tropical paradise?

[C. Anacreon]

At the Grand Cayman airport now, using a restaurant wifi. Can't miss pm links!

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I hate that part. Knowing you won't be back for months, maybe a year. Oh, the despair!

I head out next week.

[Raven Nation]

Where you off to?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Disney Aulani on Oahu. We're bringing all 3 kids, otherwise we would go somewhere very far from Disney.

[Raven Nation]

Ah! I missed the whimsy/sarc in your post and thought you were literally going for months. I would say have fun but perhaps I should just hope you survive.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I meant that there would be no vacation again for several months. That's the worst. On your way home, and realizing that you're back to the real world for a while.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Yes. I caught up and now I know.

/NBC rainbow swishes by.

[jesse.in.mb]

formerly known as Andrew S

That makes sense. The great handle shift has been a confusing time.

[Florida Man]

*hugs Jesse*
It'll be okay little trooper.

[jesse.in.mb]

At least I can count on YOU not to change your name.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

He used to be Floridian.

[Free Society]

Florida Man never changes. Every time I look at the news he's getting into some new wacky hijinks

[WoodchipperPatriarch]

Not until the grandkids visit and tell him how, anyway.

[Free Society]

Dont you ever forget where you got that handle. It's trademarked.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Isn't that just like a ____________, bringing an axe to a gun-fight?

[DEG]

Crazed Viking berserker?

[Inigo "Chip" DuBois]

Gimli the Dwarf?

[egould310 reppin' LBC]

Teenage bro from the Jersey Shore?

[Injun, as in from India]

The bad guy in one of the Indiana Jones movies.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Canadian,

[Juan "Brushmaster" Seguin]

Khornate Berzerker?

[Juice]

What was the movie? That seemed so important last time.

[Just say Nikki]

In Zimbabwe, We Don't Cry for Lions

MY mind was absorbed by the biochemistry of gene editing when the text messages and Facebook posts distracted me.

So sorry about Cecil.

Did Cecil live near your place in Zimbabwe?

Cecil who? I wondered. When I turned on the news and discovered that the messages were about a lion killed by an American dentist, the village boy inside me instinctively cheered: One lion fewer to menace families like mine.

My excitement was doused when I realized that the lion killer was being painted as the villain. I faced the starkest cultural contradiction I'd experienced during my five years studying in the United States.

Read the comments at your own risk.

[Injun, as in from India]

Article summary: "Don't whitesplain environmentalism to Zimbabwe, b****es."

[John Titor]

Well yeah. This has been one of the biggest "whiny Westerners are utterly selfish and self-absorbed' stories of the year.

[Crusty Juggler]

As though if you have not posted a selfie of you posing next to a photo of Cecil the lion, while shedding a single tear, on your instagram.

[Fist of Etiquette]

They don't don't call it the Enlightened Continent for nothing!

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

LOL, what kind of asshole messages a guy in Zimbabwe asking if he lived near the lion? Or thinks that he would care?

And to this guy's point, it was less than 2 months before Cecil that an editor on Game of Thrones was killed by a lion. I recall a lot of weeping back then, too (and mocking of her team for opening the windows when they're feet away from a LION).

[Just say Nikki]

Well, he wasn't actually in Zimbabwe at the time. He's studying in the US at the moment, just from there. Which is sort of weirder.

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

Right, guy from Zimbabwe. I'm mostly annoyed at the condescending, "You're from there, you must really care about ________." That it's applied to an entire African country just makes it worse. And racist, of course.

[widget]

I thought this worked better with "What do the baby zebras and gazelles think?"

[Irish ?s ESB]

HOLY FUCKING SHIT

Before colonialists like Cecil Rhodes, Africans were stone age people and just another part of the ecosystem. Big game, including but not limited to lions, kept their population under control. Now, the advantages of modern technology have allowed African populations to grow exponentially and take all the habitat for themselves and their livestock. If you don't like lions, you should move to the city and get a job. Leave the ecosystem the way is was only 25 years ago.

"It was so much better when you filthy niggers didn't have the benefits of modern technology!" the despicable pseudoliberal New York Times scumbag essentially argued. "You dirt poor subsistence farmers should just move to the cities! It must be really easy to pack up and move to a city when you're making $100 a month!"

[Irish ?s ESB]

^ Seriously, I'm not misreading this, am I? He is supporting the idea that things were better back when African populations were 'kept under control' by the constant threat of lion attacks, right?

[Just say Nikki]

That's actually not one of the worst ones I saw. But...yeah.

[Pro Libertate]

The world is their theme park.

[Warty]

The thought that leapt to mind when I read the comments is that black Africans are wildlife to those people. It's revolting.

[Mad Scientist]

Those helpful New Yorkers are just trying to find "a balance" among all the natives of Zimbabwe, whether they're lions or people. It's the least they can do.

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

Ditto. "Just another part of the ecosystem," like monkeys!

[Pro Libertate]

See Jim wrestle the wild anaconda and some uppity natives on Mutual of Omaha's Vile Kingdom.

[Warty]

"Crikey! Now I'm gonna stick me thumb in his butthole!"

[Pro Libertate]

The Crocodile Hunter was probably a racist, too. I mean, he was a white guy.

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

Marlin Perkins: Grand Dragon.

[Pro Libertate]

True fact: Marlin Perkins was high up in Gestapo leadership during the war.

[Mickey Rat]

There are a lot of animal.lovers who are misanthropes, and not in a fun way.

[Tonio]

Prelapsarian aggrandizement, aka belief in a mythical golden age when everything was just peachy. Also, hatred of one's own species.

[Warty]

Misanthropic eco-fascism. It's charming, isn't it.

Come to think of it, didn't all the movements that get lumped into the fascism category have significant back-to-the-land components?

[Tonio]

Misanthropic eco-fascism

Nice.

[commodious spittoon]

Googled the phrase. One of the first hits.

[Tonio]

Wow. Thanks.

[See Double You]

If that's a direct copy-paste of what he wrote, and there's nothing either before or after the quoted text that would change it's meaning, then no, you are not misreading it. He really thinks he can be completely racist if it's in service to Gaia.

[commodious spittoon]

Not only arguing for mass relocation but suggesting that starvation is a beneficial tool for keeping their numbers in check.

[Mad Scientist]

Not just starvation, but being attacked and eaten by lions is, apparently, preferable to the population of "stone age people" growing "out of control."

[Tonio]

You know who else liked the idea of people being attacked and killed by lions?

[Rufus J. Firefly]

I got nothing.

[GamerFromJump]

Caesar?

[John]

That is the worst and most racist cartoon lie I have seen in a long time.

[Irish ?s ESB]

Yeah, it is funny he thinks Africans were stone age people when there were actual, you know, African empires that existed at the time.

Here's a city from Iron Age Zimbabwe that held 18,000 people.

To put that in perspective, around the same time that Great Zimbabwe was occupied, London only had about 25,000 people. So in 1100-1200, the people living in Zimbabwe were about as urbanized as people in Britain.

[John Titor]

Hell, in the 12th century Mali was so rich that Musa Mansa's Haj to Mecca literally broke the local economies he passed through (he was extremely generous and actively devalued gold for decades).

[John Titor]

*13-14th century and his name was Mansa Musa. My West African history is rusty as hell.

[Medical Physics Guy]

Not to mention 14th century Mali, which I think was considered a highly accomplished society.

And that's not getting into northern areas like Morocco that make a decent claim to have preserved civilisation after the fall of Rome.

[Medical Physics Guy]

Well done John Titor. And you surely have the right century. Though I think Sundiata is from the 14th anyway.

[John Titor]

Looked it up, you're right, Mansa Musa, 1280-1337.

[Juan "Brushmaster" Seguin]

Fucking Kushite Empire, how does it work?

[CatoTheChipper]

It really is a lie, and a racist cartoon lie at that. Certainly there were stone-age tribes in sub-Saharan Africa. However, there were also tribes that had developed iron-age technology. Most were primitive compared to their European and Arab counterparts, but they were not stone-age. And a number of tribes had sophisticated and ancient cultures. For example, the Abyssinian kingdom traced its origin to the 2nd millennium BC, and Orthodox Christian culture in Ethiopia predates European Christian culture by a couple of centuries.

I've never studied African history per se, and my schooling was completed well before the politically correct era, most of it in the segregated South. But, even so, my impression has always been that the indigenous population had developed metallurgy before European and Arab colonization, and that Abyssinian and Christian cultures had been established in East Africa in antiquity. Geez ... I would have thought that, in a less racist era, students would have at least some modicum of understanding of African history and culture.

[John Titor]

The hell? Only 25 years? Does this person just imagine Africa as one continuous savanna of one-story mud huts filled with grass-skirt wearing, bone-nosed Africans?

It's also very White Man's Burden. "Hey, barely civilized Negroes! White people need to tell you how to live your life and what you should care about!"

[0x90]

Carol Brooklyn 2 hours ago

Lions, like humans, are creations and should not be murdered for sport. In the US people are hunted and killed for sport just like Cecil. They are generally people of color whose lives are not considered to be worth much just like Cecil's life was considered to be sport for billionaire Americans. If people are attacked by lions and other wild animals, the people should be protected by staying away from these animals. Why should the world be deprived of seeing such magnificent creatures because humans lack the common sense to stay away from them.

[Mad Scientist]

Dentists are billionaires!? Boy, did I go into the wrong field.

[GamerFromJump]

Millions, billions, they're all 1%ers.

/progtard

[DesigNate]

People are hunted for sport in the US? WTF.

[Tonio]

People are hunted for sport in the US?

Well, that's not an entirely unfair characterization of the actions of certain law enforcement agencies.

[Mad Scientist]

So, you're from France? Do you know my friend Pierre?

[Rufus J. Firefly]

You're from Canada? Do you know Gordon?

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

It's amazing how quickly #blacklivesmatter goes away when it's the progs ox lion being gored.

[Tonio]

OK, Trashy, I know it's late but I see what you *&^%$#@! did there and it's brilliant.

[Irish ?s ESB]

These people are the motherfucking worst:

Mr. Nzou the difference in our cultures is that we have come to terms with living within our environment which contain animals. We have the luxury of trying to solve the encroachment by humans into animal habitats. We see animals as having a right to roam their territory. We try to create a balance between the increasing demand for land by people and the decreasing of animal territories. We certainly do no compare animals rights that we feel compelled to protect in our country to the rights of the African people. We are outraged is that an American hunter lured this animal off a conservation area to kill it. We value life both human and animal. This was an American who went to another country and decided that all the money to upkeep the conservation area and the people who try to keep a balance between humans and animals was violated by one of us. We are in no way telling any African people to follow our values. But in saying this, I hope that we can reach an agreement to halt the extinction of animals in a way that the African people can still provide for their families. It is a delicate balance of life but one if we put our heads together we can achieve.

[Irish ?s ESB]

I like that he thinks the 'primary difference between our cultures' is that Americans are naturally more enlightened regarding animals, rather than that Americans are so fucking rich that animals aren't a threat to us due to our wealth insulating us. In Zimbabwe, where people are way poorer, they don't have that luxury.

The condescension and outright racism of New York Times commenters is pretty amazing.

Also:

We certainly do no compare animals rights that we feel compelled to protect in our country to the rights of the African people.

Really? Because the other guy absolutely supported the idea that Africa was a better place back when Africans were constantly getting trampled by rhinos and eaten by lions.

[lap83]

"Mr. Nzou the difference in our cultures is that we have come to terms with living within our environment which contain animals."

How much do you want to bet that the most dangerous animal encounter this person is likely to experience is a deer running in front of their car. Also, I bet they wouldn't exactly be thanking Gaia for the opportunity to commune with nature.

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

How much do you want to bet that the most dangerous animal encounter this person is likely to experience is a deer running in front of their car.

Fuck no, only rednecks have to deal with that. The worst this person needs to deal with is a pigeon shitting on his hipster glasses.

[Just say Nikki]

Only rednecks? Um, lol.

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

Adjust your sarcometer to channel 4.

[Juan "Brushmaster" Seguin]

*bangs fist on old-timey receiver*

Damn tube must've blown.

[lap83]

Well except when you don't let the rednecks kill some of the deer they have an annoying tendency to spread into the city.

[cavalier973]

I know what you mean. Rednecks have started spreading into the city here, too.

[Clich? Bandit]

Alone. Thursdays on Discovery or History or something.

FUCKING AWESOME SHOW!

These guys are practiced at survival and they are getting their asses kicked by mama nature. The fact that Vancouver Island hosts the largest amount of Cougar attacks in north america is awesome too.

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

Yep. Any thoughts on who likely won the $?

[Clich? Bandit]

Alan

[Irish ?s ESB]

EVERYTHING IS TERRIBLE

I can find Zimbabwe (formerly Southern Rhodesia) on a map. I also know that it has been run by an incompetent, flailing despot for decades, and that it is one of the most anti-gay bigoted countries on the planet.

Don't tell us to stand by and allow psychopathic American trophy hunters to assist driving lions into extinction because you want their money poured into a country that has been destroyed by your own incompetent dictator.

Never seen Lion King. Sorry. Go wallow in stereotypes about somebody else.

Is this guy blaming the Zimbabwean for the fact that his country has a dictator? I wonder if he would have told German Jews to go fuck themselves since it's 'their own incompetent dictator' that's causing the problems.

Animals are no more terrifying than humans.

#deepthoughtswithNYTcommenters

this is unfortunately the view of a small minded immature person ill equipped, apparently, to see the big picture. That lions and other wild animals are in many locals heading for extinction is apparently lost on this guy who sits fat and happy (on whose nickel by the way?) on a U.S. campus many thousands of miles from the leonine horrors he claims to have grown up around tells you all you need to know about him.

This guy from Detroit totally knows more about the situation than the guy who actually grew up in Zimbabwe.

[Just say Nikki]

Pesky ignoble savages, eh?

[Mad Scientist]

That last guy could have saved himself a bunch of time and simply written "uppity nigger."

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

"Uncle Tom snuck off the plantation. Get your guns and horses, it's time to go nigger hunting again"

[Rufus J. Firefly]

They truly are disgusting, presumptuous racists.

NYT is a piece of rag at this point.

[WoodchipperPatriarch]

You really think this guy would've called Hitler an incompetent dictator? "Progressive visionary" seems more likely.

[WoodchipperPatriarch]

Maybe the worst one:

Tom J. Berwyn, IL 6 hours ago
I think the issue at hand is disgust that yet another wealthy guy did as he pleased with no concern about the consequences. In this case, to a renowned lion. In other cases, to the middle class worker, or to our financial system, stock market, real estate market, the list goes on. It is a national resentment that is building. The lion is a metaphor.

It's a metaphor, guys, so you can't call it stupid!

[Medical Physics Guy]

The lion was performing a narrative

[Invisible Handjob]

Yeah, those comments, holy shit. "Outrage Imperialism" is a great term for this. From a recent Bleeding Heart Libertarian post:

Outrage Imperialism (defn): The outrage of many people in the developed world at events, institutions, and practices that those in the developing world are largely untroubled by or recognize as costs worth bearing. Often, but not always, associated with practices from the developed world's own past that many people in the West now believe are unacceptable for everyone, even though forcibly eliminating them would harm those the Westerners claim to be helping through their outrage.

See, for example: Cecil the Lion, sweatshops, pollution, large families.

Also see: First world problems

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

+1 lion pelt

[Juice]

One lion fewer to menace families like mine.

Does he really think that Cecil, the tagged and named lion, was going to go on a human hunt?

[Fist of Etiquette]

George W. Bush showed up for jury duty in Dallas.

Check the font on his summons!

[cavalier973]

I wonder if he's heard of jury nullification.

[Injun, as in from India]

George W. Bush showed up for jury duty in Dallas.

Verdict: No WMDs.

[jesse.in.mb]

A hatchet-wielding gunman opened fire in a movie theater in Tennessee before being shot and killed by police.

I like that gunmen are diversifying to keep it interesting.

[Injun, as in from India]

Bloomberg's "Everytown USA" will still be classified as a "mass shooting".

Remember that lunatic in Santa Barbara? He used a knife, a BMW, and a gun.

Event classification? Mass shooting.

[*GILMORE*]

yeah, i know. But really, couldn't he also have been a gun-wielding hatchet-man? Who got hatcheted?

Also, I think "Person of Hatchet" is probably less problematic.

[jesse.in.mb]

Just seeing "A hatchet" I assumed "job" would be the next word. Maybe the gunman just read this article and felt he needed real-world practice.

[Clich? Bandit]

I like hatchet wounds. Jesse likes hatchet jobs. discuss

/This is why there are no libertarian women

[Clich? Bandit]

For hatchet jobs performed by hatchet wounds see ESB.

[lap83]

Who needs both a gun AND a hatchet? A hatchet should suffice.

[jesse.in.mb]

We're all a little nostalgic from when mass murders put a little artistry and skill into their work, lap.

[*GILMORE*]

PALEO-KILLER!

[jesse.in.mb]

artisanal mayo murder

[cavalier973]

Deep Six Pizza

[Juan "Brushmaster" Seguin]

He wanted an extra attack in close combat.

[Not an Economist]

He also only fired at police. Not that it matters.

[rts]

Vancouver police officer, found guilty of assaulting cyclist

A Vancouver police officer was found guilty on Tuesday of assaulting a cyclist during an arrest that was videotaped and posted on Facebook two years ago.

However, Vancouver police said in a brief statement that Const. Ismail Bhabha ? who had pleaded not guilty ? will remain on duty in his current position in patrol.

Makes sense.

[R C Dean]

So, convicted of a violent felony, and still on patrol.

In the US, getting convicted of a violent felony usually costs you the ability to own a gun. I wonder if the same is true in Canada, and if they are putting him on patrol without a gun?

Naturally, the cop union is pledging their continued support of this violent criminal.

[rts]

The relevant section of the Criminal Code.

"Simple" assault is punishable by a jail term of up to 5 years, so this would not disqualify him from owning a gun.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

See: Baca, Lee. Sheriff of Los Angeles. Carried a fake gun because of a DV conviction.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Const. Ismail

And Chief Ahab?

Was the cyclist a big white guy?

[Fist of Etiquette]

...saying the choice for the U.S. was between diplomacy and war.

Loves those false choices, doesn't he?

[R C Dean]

Apparently, our only choice was between ineffective diplomacy and war.

[Pro Libertate]

He's really being dumb with this latest propaganda, because our chances of going to war remain the same. I mean, what happens when the Iranians are caught violating the agreement? Hard to put the sanctions genie back in the bottle with all of the countries we'd need to play along, so what options will remain then?

[widget]

He left out nation building, conquest, and ignoring the problem. Probably some others, but I am not a deep thinker.

[Not an Economist]

What I find funny is some of those people chanting death to America, are at a minimum the bosses of the people he negotiated with.

[Injun, as in from India]

Muhammad Yunus recently turned 75 years old.

Nobel Prize Winner Thinks No One Should Ever Retire

The word 'retirement' is a very harmful word because it tells you that you have no more use left in you. You retire a ship, you have no use for it, you just put it in mothballs.

...

What about discounts for senior citizens. Are you pro or con?

I am as good as anyone else. Why should I have a discount? You are treating me differently.

...
Going into a bank should be just like when you shop. You don't need courage to buy groceries.

[Florida Man]

Maybe he should mind his fucking business.

[commodious spittoon]

What.

[Medical Physics Guy]

Someone please shield the senior professors at my institution from ever reading this. Retire away gents.

[GamerFromJump]

In truth, if I had unlimited time, I would probably do something for a 20-30 year stretch, and then change to something else. Keeps things interesting.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Bill Clinton reportedly urged Donald Trump earlier this year to run for president.

Oh, I'm sure he did.

[Catatafish & Woodchips]

And if Trump doesn't get the nomination, Bill Clinton will be urging him to run as a third party candidate. You know, because Ol' Bill really thinks America NEEDS the Donald.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Wreckage from MH370, a Malaysia Air flight that went missing last year, was found on Reunion...

In the wrong place, which can only mean someone moved the island.

[paranoid android]

L O S T

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

The wreckage is covered in Polar Bear piss.

[Free Society]

Polars bears? Cripples walking around like they own the place? Something just doesn't seem right.

[Injun, as in from India]

Muhammad Yunus recently turned 75 years old.

Nobel Prize Winner Thinks No One Should Ever Retire

The word 'retirement' is a very harmful word because it tells you that you have no more use left in you. You retire a ship, you have no use for it, you just put it in mothballs.

...

What about discounts for senior citizens. Are you pro or con?

I am as good as anyone else. Why should I have a discount? You are treating me differently.

...
Going into a bank should be just like when you shop. You don't need courage to buy groceries.

[Injun, as in from India]

Can't believe it's been one year already. Still a private company, still a private decision, still a shareholders' problem.

CVS banned tobacco. Now its sales are hurting - General merchandise sales tumbled nearly 8% last quarter

[Just say Nikki]

Well, I stopped shopping there. Glad to see this.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

You are the 8%!!!

I bought a fan from their seasonal aisle last week. Couldn't help it. It was hot, and I needed a fan.

[iCarl]

I was lusting over a pharmacy tech there the other day.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Korean or Chinese?

[iCarl]

WHAT ARE YOU IMPLYING???

Vietnamese, IIRC.

[Injun, as in from India]

I was lusting over a pharmacy tech there the other day.

Okay, I interpreted "pharmacy tech" as a cool gadget, like a modern insulin pump or something. Until I saw Playa's comment. I'm officially a nerd now.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Pharmacy techs are the 3rd person to know about your STDs after you and your doctor.

Great chance to pick up chicks.

[iCarl]

Check out that sexy little Siemens over there!

Eh, I'm more of an Omron guy.

[Pan Zagloba]

Okay, I interpreted "pharmacy tech" as a cool gadget, like a modern insulin pump or something.

I was literally about to post the same.

[Crusty Juggler]

, I stopped shopping there

As did I. Je suis Nikki. (and/or Tulpa).

[iCarl]

A Little Africa in China

Two years ago, I decided to go to Guangzhou to find out what life was like on the ground in "Little Africa," also known as "Chocolate City," labels coined by the Chinese media...

emphasis mine

[jesse.in.mb]

Chocolate City evokes something entirely different in my mind.

[Mrs. Lemuel Struthers]

See, now, I thought you were going here.

[jesse.in.mb]

But I bet you're glad I didn't.

[R C Dean]

Looks like it is located on a major river delta.

Probably fabulously corrupt, too.

Reminds me of the American Chocolate City.

[Injun, as in from India]

Her name sounds Bengali. What a shame.

SJW professor making charges of racial profiling is tripped up by dashcam

"His asking if I could speak English shows that he had racially profiled me and was not able to give me a concrete reason for stopping me."

...

In the recording, the officer asks if Roychoudhuri knows why she is being stopped. When she says no, the officer is heard saying, "Okay. There's that big gore area with white lines painted across it and you cut in front of it, in front of me, thinking it's a lane or something. You have to wait until it's a dotted white line."

The investigation concluded that the officer never asked Roychoudhuri if she spoke English and that he clearly explained to Roychoudhuri why she was pulled over.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

So she lied.

Tsk, tsk.

[commodious spittoon]

Fake but accurate. Sometimes the narrative needs a little shot in the arm.

[DEG]

But it fits the narrative, so it's OK.

[Florida Man]

Moar dash camz plz.

[jesse.in.mb]

Meanwhile, in Russia...

[Free Society]

poor cows...

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

BlueSpiritFire1 5 months ago
I know people are upset by the cows, but I have to laugh. They just rolled out like bowling pins and the get up and start ambling around like 'Wtf where's the feed!? This isn't our stop!'

[DEG]

She was cited for failure to drive in the established lane.

A Connecticut cop citing someone for failing to stay in a lane? I call bullshit.

[DEG]

On second thought, if she had out of state plates (which I doubt based on the story), I could believe it.

[Raven Nation]

Apparently she's been arrested for making false statements during her official complaint. I don't have much sympathy for her per se, but they could have just showed her the video and asked her if she wanted to withdraw her claim.

[Injun, as in from India]

Dear Dr. Krugman, please contrast the UK with Greece, without a jaundiced eye toward austerity.

Britain's economic recovery just caught up with the US and nobody even noticed

[Just say Nikki]

Most people haven't noticed the U.S. recovery either.

[jesse.in.mb]

2 gay NFL players would come out if media wouldn't make a big deal out of it, report says

I'll do that thing I don't want to do when a thing I know is going to happen won't happen anymore.

How'd that work out for Lena Dunham's BF?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Oh, did he finally come out of the closet?

[jesse.in.mb]

No. Wasn't he the one that he said would marry Dunham if gays could get married and then said he wasn't really into doing that?

[Just say Nikki]

Yep.

[*GILMORE*]

""Walking through the New York City streets, so full of passion, possibility, and debate, I must admit that I wondered what might happen to me now in the marriage department," she wrote. "What would happen to any of the many straight girls with this particular set of principles in play? We were exposed, vulnerable to marriage's strange power once more."

Soon after, she texted and tweeted teasing messages to Antonoff about getting married, but to her surprise heard nothing back."

""the ruling caught him by surprise, and his politics were pure and not as self-interested as mine were starting to feel."

It wasn't because he didn't necessarily want to get married, but because as a man he hadn't been forced to constantly think about weddings and their meaning the way that a woman does, she said."

Wow. Deep. Magical stuff.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Wow. Deep. MTragical stuff.

[0x90]

Wow. Deep. MTrVagical stuff.

[Medical Physics Guy]

It wasn't because he didn't necessarily want to get married, but because as a man he hadn't been forced to constantly think about weddings and their meaning the way that a woman does, she said."

Womansplaining.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

said he wasn't really into doing that?

How could anyone blame him?

[Red Rocks Rockin]

In Dunham's case, "why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free" was never more appropriate.

[Hamster of Doom]

She thought she was making a principled stand, he thought "when gays marry" was synonymous with "when pigs fly"?

[jesse.in.mb]

I have a friend that had one of those arrangements and is now hitched. He seemed a little nervous after the fall of prop 8.

[Warty]

NFL players being "privately" openly gay is nothing new. I believe the 1993 Houston Oilers had two gay players, the team knew about it, nobody cared. I'm sure 20 years later the media circus would be orders of magnitude more annoying than any bigotry they'd suffer from coming out.

[Pro Libertate]

How's Johnny doing? Has he been arrested with coke and several prostitutes yet?

[Warty]

He's still tediously clean. I hope he leaves Jesus and goes back to Cocaine soon. In the meantime, Josh McCown has the best chin in the entire world. I guess that'll do for now.

[John]

Josh McCown is your quarterback. The guy is 37 years old and was never any good to begin with. Every time you think it can't get any worse, the Browns prove you wrong.

[EdWuncler]

+1

My girlfriend is from Cleveland and it's downright depressing hearing her Dad and brother in law discuss football. But you have to give it to them, they go to almost every game year in and year out.

[Warty]

I'm tremendously excited about this team. The secondary is great, the defensive line is really good, the linebackers are adequate, the running backs are good, the receivers are crap, the offensive line is fantastic, there are zero quarterbacks on the roster, and the coach is actually really good. The team might well go 4-12, but it'll be an entertaining 4-12.

[John]

They have Josh McCown as a quarterback. Sadly, the NFL has made it impossible to win if your quarterback sucks. I hope they start Manziel. He would at least be fun to watch lose. I hate duds like McCown.

[EdWuncler]

I remember McCown when he played in Chicago. He wasn't too terrible (which a low bar to set) but I don't think he's going to contribute much to the Browns.

[Pro Libertate]

He was very good for a month with the Bears. That's it, that's his career.

[Warty]

But his jaw. His jaw!

[Pro Libertate]

He's like the perfect Aryan image of a QB. I bet Hitler is his great-grandfather, albeit with some genetic engineering.

[Juan "Brushmaster" Seguin]

Is he from Brazil?

[Pro Libertate]

I bet you win all four in a row. There will be a great copulation of a f?te in Cleveland during that wonderful four-week period. Until McCown returns to normal and Johnny is arrested in Moscow with coke, a prostitute, Putin, and Snowden in a dress.

[Clich? Bandit]

Warty's disappointment and subsequent leveling of the city this year will be epic. It is so cute to see pre-season optimism.

OT: Fucking KUBIAK for the win bitches! Doncos go to the superbowl AGAIN, 5 bucks...any takers?

[Pro Libertate]

It won't last.

[John]

Meanwhile, Tebow has come back from the dead. It is the first resurrection in 2000 years.

http://www.inquisitr.com/23112.....ster-spot/

[Pro Libertate]

The best thing that could ever happen to the NFL is Tim forgiving it for its sins and returning as a starting QB.

[Crusty Juggler]

Tim is going to cure Chip Kelly's racism.

[John]

That is it. No one in the NFL cares. An NFL team is full of all kinds of people who should hate each other but don't because everyone is there to do a job. The idea that introducing a gay guy into a locker room that already has everything from die hard hunting and fishing rednecks to prep school rich white guys to hard core black guys from the worst neighborhoods in America would be some kind of a big deal is something so stupid only a sportswriter would be dumb enough to believe it.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

John, we had fun at your expense in the AM links.

[John]

There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.

Oscar Wilde

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

"President Obama spoke in defense of the West's nuclear deal with Iran, "

And compared the republicans to the Mullahs of Iran.

Because he's classy like that.

[Injun, as in from India]

How empires collapse.

Urine-Corroded San Francisco Lamp Post Falls in Street, Nearly Hits Driver - Pee is getting to be a big problem in San Francisco.

"We believe there was some contribution of dog or human urine on the base of the pole"

[jesse.in.mb]

Science is on it!

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Making it splatter back on you?

Excellent.

[jesse.in.mb]

I feel like it's a much better solution than putting someone on a sex-offender list.

[Injun, as in from India]

Can science tell us what percentage of the street pole urine belongs to a former mayor of San Francisco who is now messing up DC as a Senator?

[jesse.in.mb]

Not sure. Get me a research grant and I'll let you know conclusively.

[Enough About Woodchippers]

When I go to San Francisco, I stay in the financial district. Same with New Orleans and other large cities. They tend to be the cleanest parts of town. I saw a real-time app of where there is shit on the sidewalks/alleys/streets of Ess Eff. The area around City Hall had shit all over the place. The financial district, one lonely dump about five blocks from my hotel. Funny that shit tends to gravitate to City Hall.

[Enough About Woodchippers]

SF Poop Map

[0x90]

Emanates from, rather...

[GamerFromJump]

And here I thought that only happened in China. At least, that was the first place I ever went where people didn't pick up after their dogs or children.

[Pan Zagloba]

oday in Accomplished Female Athletes of Eastern and Central Europe, I present Donata Rimsaite.
Olympic Pentathlete (arguably the coolest of sports) and a European Pentathlon Champion in 2010, she is Lithuanian but has been competing for Russia since 2011.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Meh.

[WoodchipperPatriarch]

She looks like an airbrushed Helen Hunt.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

"A hatchet-wielding gunman opened fire in a movie "

A gun-wielding hatchetman??? That sounds scary!

[Fist of Etiquette]

How do you open fire with a hatchet? USE YOUR HEAD.

[DEG]

India is the world's largest beef exporter.

A country where cows are sacred is exporting a record amount of red meat.

India was the world's top beef exporter last year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, widening its lead over other more established suppliers such as Brazil and Australia.

That's because India exports large quantities of meat from water buffalo -- a member of the bovine family classified as beef by the USDA.

I'm reminded of "If you call a dog's tail a leg, the dog doesn't have five legs."

[WoodchipperPatriarch]

About time they put those lazy fucking water buffalo to some use.

[0x90]

Can I borrow your towel for a sec?

[DEG]

Puerto Rico attracts billionaires despite economic woes.

Still, some say the tax exemptions could make Puerto Rico the next Singapore -- an extremely wealthy tax haven.

Peter Schiff moved his asset management firm from Newport Beach, Calif., to San Juan in 2013. Schiff has bought a house in the Ritz Carlton compound just outside San Juan and water is not a problem for him. He plans to move there once his son graduates from high school. Individuals must live in Puerto Rico for 183 days a year to qualify for tax breaks.

But his company is already enjoying financial benefits, paying a low corporate tax rate of 4%. In California, Schiff's firm had to pay the U.S. corporate tax rate, which is about 35%. He says tax breaks like those encourage him to create more jobs, which Puerto Rico badly wants.

"I'm saving a lot of money," says Schiff, CEO of Euro Pacific Capital. "It's the closest thing to renouncing your U.S. citizenship without actually doing it...You're still an American, you're just out from under the IRS."

Comments are what you would expect.

[Injun, as in from India]

My favorite comment so far.

Progressives are so unaware of their own totalitarian tendencies. I once heard a very similar comment from an 80+ year old retired Ivy League professor.

What we really need are fewer people. Say what you want about the Chinese government, but they had the single child policy absolutely correct. Fewer people would be the biggest solution to unemployment and global warming.

[John]

That is not fair to totalitarians. "We need fewer people" shows genocidal tendencies. Progressivism is a death cult.

[Irish ?s ESB]

And they're also total morons since Europe has vastly worse unemployment than America does and has far lower birth rates.

That's not how unemployment works, you morons. You can't just have fewer people and voila, unemployment goes away.

[widget]

Fewer people would certainly cause fewer anthropological greenhouse gas emissions than more people. I doubt it would have any effect on unemployment though. There's a baseline segment of the human population that is unemployable. This would include the severely retarded, the insane, the aged, young children, and 2 or 3 kids from the 40 students in your high school social studies class who fell into none of those categories. Unemployment data probably has some value, but it's very hard to interpret.

[0x90]

"Fewer people would certainly cause fewer anthropological greenhouse gas emissions than more people."

Depends how many fewer, doesn't it? To materialize, each (newer, cleaner) technological advance requires a certain critical mass of potential inventors, working with the benefit of knowledge hard-won by their forbears. Had population levels stalled in the mid 19th century, how much longer would it have taken to reach the level of refinement in, for example, internal combustion engines, that had been reached by the late 80's by Honda, Toyota, et al? Meanwhile, consider the pollution produced by 1.5 billion people living on turn-of-the-century technology for however many centuries.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

80 years old and still no wisdom.

Sad.

[Injun, as in from India]

Read and weep. Compare this to Muhammad Yunus' attitude at age 75.

The Dark Side: Citizens Choosing Perpetual Psychological Adolescence

A significant number of young people now conclude, 'The government will pay for and take care of all the big things in life ? health care, college education, retirement income, day care. This will require higher taxes, but all of those taxes cover all the important things. I'll get to keep what's left over. That's my allowance.'

[DEG]

Fucking sad.

[Mrs. Lemuel Struthers]

Reality will have its way.

Something like 30 states have underfunded public pension schemes. Chicago's is near bankruptcy. Eventually these folks will wake up to find all those services are nearly valueless. They'll have healthcare that doesn't provide adequate care, degrees with no employment value, and pension plans with a devalued currency.

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

SOAK THE RICH!!!!1111!!!!

[John]

So the Iran deal is a choice between diplomacy and war? Can't we not give them a $150 billion dollars and also not go to war with them?

[lap83]

He wasn't talking about war with Iran.

[Winston]

From the linked O'Neill article:

Gwendolyn R.Y. Miller, a diversity consultant who advises educational institutions on how to tackle racial microaggressions, says being color blind is a "microinvalidation," since it serves to "exclude, negate, or nullify the psychological thoughts, feelings, or experiential reality of certain groups."

So the progs are now going full reversal on race? Jesus. They've been going there for a while (if not all the time) but still...

[Catatafish & Woodchips]

Color of skin, content of character.

Toe-may-toe, toe-mah-toe.

[R C Dean]

But doesn't banning being color blind also serve to "exclude, negate, or nullify the psychological thoughts, feelings, or experiential reality of certain groups."?

[0x90]

Sooner or later, it's everybody's turn to be othered.

[Catatafish & Woodchips]

Does Obama not realize what he's saying or just not give a shit?

http://thefederalist.com/2015/.....-must-end/

[John]

Both.

[John]

Life in Prog paradise. Urine corroded lamppost falls into street nearly hitting driver.

http://www.popularmechanics.co....._218339936

[Notorious G.K.C.]

You know who else destroyed Poles?

[croaker]

Same theater, management told a man with a CWP that neither him or his sidearm were welcome.

Karma. I hope they get sued, as this was a forseeable consequence.

[John]

Spain's economy is recovering after government stopped spending so much money. Pauli Krugnuts hardest hit.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com.....e25819288/

[Injun, as in from India]

+1 Krugnutpunch

[Irish ?s ESB]

I posted that earlier and my favorite part is that every one of those countries has clawed its way out of depression except Greece. So the only country still fucked is the one that's been fighting hardest against austerity measures.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Good for Spain.

[Irish ?s ESB]

It should be noted that Spain's MASSIVE RECOVERY is a stout 3.1% annual GDP growth rate.

And they're one of the fastest growing countries in Europe.

And idiot liberals want us to be more like the Europeans, even though the entire continent is totally stagnant in every way.

I'm going to cry now.

[EdWuncler]

These are the same people who call themselves racially tolerent but yet hold Europe as the apex of civilization despite a lot of the countries being xenophobic as fuck.

[Irish ?s ESB]

The only European economy really recovering in the way they should be recovering is Ireland, and they're one of the countries Krugman was most down on because of their 'austerity.'

I have a feeling that's going down the Krugtastic Memoryhole.

[Irish ?s ESB]

Check out Ireland's last seven quarters.

Grew at an annualized rate of: 4.9, 2.9, 4.1, 7, 3.7, 6, 6.5. THAT'S a recovery, none of this 3.1% Spanish shit.

[Mad Scientist]

I have a vague memory of him arguing that Ireland was only recovering because it was siphoning companies from the rest of Europe by offering lower tax rates. Sort of like New York having a gun problem only because the surrounding states (except New Jersey) won't fall in line. See also: New York and cigarette taxes. It's ALWAYS the fault of someone else who won't play along. Why is why, in the end, it always comes to mass murder.

[Irish ?s ESB]

because it was siphoning companies from the rest of Europe by offering lower tax rates.

So Krugman was arguing in favor of low taxes then, right?

[Mad Scientist]

No, he was saying the low rates were "unsustainable."

Everyone knows high tax rates are completely sustainable!

[Medical Physics Guy]

Don't forget: Texas is only a success because of cheap land

[Crusty Juggler]

The behavior of Europe's sports fans should inspire American's to act in a similar fashion.

I AM BEING SARCASTIC

[Pan Zagloba]

And that 3.1% growth is after taking a nosedive in 2007. Article doesn't mention that Spain bet hard on "green" energy and took it in the shorts.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Yes. But for Europe, it's better than 1% or no growth.

[Winston]

http://www.theatlantic.com/mag.....et/306393/

http://www.theatlantic.com/mag.....ff/376215/

I must admit I lost a lot of respect for Mencken on reading these articles. Seems he was a proto-Thomas Friedman. Also he wrote a third unpublished, now lost, article for the Atlantic called "After Germany's Conquest of the United States" which would show good the US would have it under Imperial German occupation.

[John]

Menken was one of the biggest assholes who ever lived. I understand why people found him being such to the right people entertaining. Why anyone would look up to him or have any respect for him has always been a mystery to me.

[*GILMORE*]

I presume you feel the same way about Chris Hitchens?

[John]

Yes. That is a good comparison. Hitches was an epic asshole who could turn a phrase and was entertaining when he was being an asshole to someone who deserved it. But I don't look up to him or really have any respect for him as a person. He was from everything I have seen a drunken narcissistic bore of a human being.

[*GILMORE*]

Yeah, the problem is you don't seem to be able to discriminate between the person's opinions and their talent as a writer.

the things that Menken was right about, he was right about so eloquently that people will be quoting him for 200 years.

The shit he was wrong about it mostly forgotten, but its certainly there. Most people don't care.

[*GILMORE*]

"...Is mostly forgotten"

[John]

Yeah, the problem is you don't seem to be able to discriminate between the person's opinions and their talent as a writer.

Not at all. I disagreed with Hitchens about a lot of things. But I also agreed with him especially about the problems associated with Islam. I probably agreed with him more than I disagreed. And I think he had plenty of talent as a writer. That however doesn't mean he wasn't generally an asshole.

the things that Menken was right about, he was right about so eloquently that people will be quoting him for 200 years.

So what? I never said he was a bad writer. I said he was an epic asshole. One has nothing to do with the other. Ezra Pound was a hundred times more of an intellectual force than Menken. Pound also was an unrepentant fascist but that doesn't take away from his ability.

And you way over estimate Menken's ability. He could turn a phrase but he wasn't a deep thinker or much of an intellectual force.

[Winston]

Yeah you can be a good writer and a complete asshole.

He could turn a phrase but he wasn't a deep thinker or much of an intellectual force.

No kidding. Reading these articles he seems to have the intellect of those people who gush over China or Europe today. He seemed to hate American elite for not being TOP MEN like Bismarck or the Kaiser. Hell he made no attempt at some kind of moral equivalency with Britain or France. Seems to negate his supposed far-sighted libertarian attitudes (that and is support for Eugenics).

[Irish ?s ESB]

Mencken didn't support eugenics. Here:

THE MORE I plow through the literature confected by the eugenists and their allies, the birth controllers, the more I am convinced that their great cause is mainly blather.

The fact is that the difference between the better sort of human beings and the lesser sort, biologically speaking, is very slight. There may be, at the very top, a small class of people whose blood is preponderantly superior and distinguished, and there may be, at the bottom, another class whose blood is almost wholly debased, but both are very small. The folks between are all pretty much alike. The baron has a great deal of peasant blood in him and the peasant has some blood that is blue. The natural sinfulness of man is enough to make sure of that. No man in this world can ever be quite certain that he is the actual great-great-grandson of the great-great-grandfather whose memory he venerates.

He wrote one article people use to claim he supported eugenics, but that one article was clearly a satire.

[Irish ?s ESB]

The satiric article actually includes the following paragraph:

Civilizing the sharecropper, white or black, would probably have the same effect on him, just as it has had the same effect on the Indian. But the process would not only be immensely costly, as I have argued, but also revoltingly cruel, as I have demonstrated. It would involve the slow and painful deaths of hundreds of thousands of poor persons who, however stupid they may be and however mephitic, are nevertheless God's creatures, and what is more, free citizens of the United States. To have at them with machine-guns would be far more merciful, besides being cheaper. But having at them with machine-guns would shock the moral sensibilities of the whole human race, including Hitler and Stalin. Tender-hearted persons would rush into the courts asking for injunctions against it, and judges delicate enough to grant them would be readily found. Thus the enterprise would be tied up, and its discussion corrupted and made insane by politicians, theologians, labor leaders, and other such rogues.

It reads almost exactly like a modest proposal and has the same intent.

[Irish ?s ESB]

And here's the end of that article:

I add one more amendment. There is no reason why the cost of this great moral enterprise, at least while it remains experimental, should be thrown on the taxpayer. It is a proper subject for private philanthropy, and no legal impediment, so far as I know, stands in the way. Any American citizen is free at the minute to destroy his fecundity at will, and any other citizen is free to aid and encourage him to do so. I therefore suggest that some well-heeled lover of humanity come forward with a donation to start the campaign. Let him put up $50,000 to spread the news from end to end of the Bible country, and another $50,000 to indemnify the first 1000 or 2000 candidates. The birth-controllers already have an effective propaganda in operation, and it is possible that they may be induced to lend it for the purpose. All that is needed is a beginning. Once the first brave squad of bounty-men returns home, and reports begin to circulate through the Frauenzimmer, the pressure upon the laggards will become so enormous that only a few irreconcilables will be able to hold out. The experimental fund will suffice to purge and uplift half a county; ten or fifteen million dollars would be enough to rescue the whole of Arkansas.

This is the only time he ever 'supported' eugenics, and anyone who reads that should realize it is not serious.

[*GILMORE*]

My reading of the pro-german treatises linked to doesn't seem to make him out to be quite the claimed Ubermensch-worshipper either.

[Winston]

But this new democracy that thus arose in Germany was not, of course, a democracy in the American sense, Or anything colorably resembling it. It was founded upon no romantic theory that all men were natural equals; it was free from the taint of mobocracy; it was empty of soothing and windy phrases. On the contrary, it was a delimited, aristocratic democracy in the Athenian sense?a democracy of intelligence, of strength, of superior fitness?a democracy at the top. Its prizes went, not to those men who had most skill at inflaming and deluding the rabble, but to those who could contribute most to the prosperity and security of the commonwealth.

[Winston]

In the practical business of operating the state, in its units and as a whole, the final determination of all matters was plainly vested, not in politicians or in majorities, but in experts, in men above all politics, in the superbly efficient ruling caste. The professional mayor, aloof from party passions, unreachable by intrigues, remains today a characteristic German figure: the supreme triumph of intelligence over mere voting power. And one recalls, too, such typical representatives of the new order as Rudolf Virchow, for years a hard-working Berlin city councillor, and Wilhelm Koch, the greatest bacteriologist in the world and Germany's general superintendent of public health, her pre-Gorgasean Gorgas. Koch rid Germany of typhoid fever by penning up the population of whole villages and condemning whole watersheds. It was ruthless, it was unpopular, it broke down and made a mock of a host of 'inalienable' rights?but it worked.

[Winston]

Another difficulty: the food-supply. Two Food Dictators have wrestled with it. One was quickly and ignominiously unhorsed; the other, Doctor Max Johann Otto Adolf Torlilovitz von Batocki, shows signs of an uneasy seat. A complex and vexatious problem, too maddening to go into here. But this much, at least, may be said of it: that the prime obstacle to its solution is not an actual shortage of food, but a failure in discipline. The peasants, the cattle men, the commission merchants?all these yield to avarice, holding back their stocks for better prices, producing rather what is most profitable than what is most needed. While Berlin ate potato flour, good rye was being fed to hogs. While Berlin paid a dollar and a half a pound for geese, the country barnyards swarmed with them. While Berlin went without butter, there were yokels who greased wagons with it. For a year past Dr. von Batocki has been struggling against this failure of team-work, this very un-German rebellion, this treason of the peasants.

[Winston]

Let us not forget that in his autobiography he said "When World War actually started, I began forthwith to whoop for the Kaiser and I kept up that whooping so long as there was any free speech left."

[*GILMORE*]

If he sided with the peasants you'd probably call him a communist.

I still fail to see why his comments in 1914 are supposed to be read though a one-dimensional modern day filter and denounced as heretical.

[Winston]

If he sided with the peasants you'd probably call him a communist.

So his support for command economy should not be criticised, especially one who would later attack the New Deal?

I still fail to see why his comments in 1914 are supposed to be read though a one-dimensional modern day filter and denounced as heretical.

Imperial Germany was an militarist welfare state. How is supporting that not "heretical" on a libertarian site? It's not like Imperial Germany was not criticised by liberals at the time. And he didn't even bother to resort to moral equivalence in those articles. Oh and he was the same guy who attacked Wilson and FDR for doing things he defended Germany for doing. How can that not be criticized?

[Winston]

Oh and in first article he openly attacked Socialists and Liberals so you can't argue that he changed his mind when the New Deal came around.

[*GILMORE*]

' How can that not be criticized?"

It can, but your one-dimensional damnation version of it is fucking retarded.

To be fair, its what you do.

[Winston]

It can, but your one-dimensional damnation version of it is fucking retarded.

Yes, because H.L. Mencken was known for avoiding that sort of thing in his polemics.

Anyway I don't think I'm "damning" him but pointing out how he is little different from the likes of Thomas Friedman. Which is certainly true. His gushing over how undemocratic Germans Got Things Done unlike the ignorant, corrupt baboons in the US is scarcely different from the people who bemoan how America is not like Europe and China. Just disappointing that the Iconoclast Forward-Thinker Truth Teller was just as willing to fall for the Foreign TOP MEN bullshit as people today are.

[Winston]

And yes I know full well that the anti-German hysteria of WWI was terrible and Mencken was right to oppose it and he was right to not like Britain or France or Woodrow but then again how is that different from someone today who hates Obama, Bush, police shootings in the US, US wars, Britain and France and gushes over China?

[Winston]

Also I don't think this means that he is a terrible writer or that he should be purged from existence but I do think his views on Imperial Germany were stupid and makes me question his supposed libertarian bonafides.

[Winston]

He wrote one article people use to claim he supported eugenics, but that one article was clearly a satire.

Fair enough. However I don't think his love of Imperial Germany was satirical though. In his autobiography he admitted that he saw WWI as a battle between German and Anglo-Saxon worldviews and supported the former.

[EdWuncler]

Is it just me or has Tony switched from Libertarians are heartless to Libertarians are psychopaths? It's unbelievable that not forcing people at gunpoint to provide charity is seen as being psychopaths.

[Mad Scientist]

You misunderstand. The narrative is that libertarians would actively prevent anyone from helping anyone else. The psychopath moniker is meant to reinforce the narrative. The truth is irrelevant, of course.

[EdWuncler]

It's like with the whole Planned Parenthood shabang or forcing employers to provide their workers with birth control. Because I am against forcing people to fund Planned Parenthood or forcing employers to provide birth control, I hate women and want them to not have access to birth control. It's absurd.

[Mad Scientist]

And wanting to get rid of the DOE means we don't want anyone to have an education. And wanting to get rid of the DOT means ROADZ! It's the same lie every time.

[EdWuncler]

Fucking Bastiat.

[CatoTheChipper]

As much as I dislike W, I have to give him props for not pulling strings to get out of his jury summons.

[John]

He is by all accounts a genuinely nice guy. His brother seems to be the asshole of the family.

[Juvenile Bluster]

Which one? He has several asshole brothers, doesn't he?

[John]

Are there any other brothers besides Jeb?

[Pan Zagloba]

We'll find out in 2020 cycle!

[Pro Libertate]

Bill Clinton was adopted. Think about it.

[lap83]

because HM isn't here I'll post it instead
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0_-CjvmDe4

[CatoTheChipper]

S&L scoundrel Neil.

[TwB]

True. But I guess W figured that since he got out of going to Vietnam, he might as well serve his country when called to do so, right?

[R C Dean]

You mean the W who volunteered to fly one of the most dangerous planes in the AF at the time, and asked about transferring to Vietnam but was turned down?

That W?

[Crusty Juggler]

The guy who got C's at Yale? LOL

[John]

Yeah because your grades in college are totally the measure of your intellectual and moral worth.

[R C Dean]

Yeah, that guy, who went on to get an MBA from Harvard.

I knew Harvard MBA students shortly after W was there. There's no cakewalk, there's no legacy thumb on the scales.

W made some major errors, but this myth that he was a draft-dodging idiot is just that: a myth.

[kinnath]

There was no way he was going to be seated on a jury.

But yeah, showing up is classy.

[Warty]

Which Cleveland eyesores need fixing before the Republican National Convention in 2016?

1) It's "need fixed", you illiterate boob. Learn to talk gooder.
2) We used to call the bridge underpass that they show in the third picture "the rape tunnel". When it rains, the sidewalk gets buried under under many inches of mud.

[*GILMORE*]

Why Cleveland?

I mean that in the broadest possible sense.

[Trshmnstr doesn't recycle]

Because Cleveland Rocks!

[Warty]

It's a mystery. If they wanted to do it in Ohio, why not Columbus or Cincinnati? There are Republicans in those places, at least. Cleveland is purely New England Yankee in culture.

[*GILMORE*]

I'd think they might as well have gone for Detroit.

At least then, they'd get great bang-per-buck, as well as draw attention to the (referencing below quote) " a perfect example of the urban blight created by Republican best-intentioned govt policies"

[John]

They picked Cleveland because Ohio is a swing state. But everyone in Ohio hates Cleveland.

[Pro Libertate]

Well, there's the Browns. Perhaps the city government should take over the team.

[EdWuncler]

It's pretty hilarious that the GOP decided to have their convention in Northeast Ohio where it's blue as fuck. In Cleveland Heights, the city council held a session where they declared that money is not indeed, speech.

[Warty]

"Cleveland Heights: Berkeley, But Snow"

They have signs that say "Cleveland Heights: A Nuclear-Free Zone". Fuck Cleveland Heights.

[EdWuncler]

It's a beautiful town and my girlfriend and I have thought about moving there because of the unreal real estate prices but after reading about their bullshit liberal stances, I would rather move to Shaker Heights or Beachwood.

[iCarl]

Holding religious, political, special interest, and business conventions in Rust Belt cities, especially Detroit but occasionally the likes of Cleveland, seems to be in vogue right now.

[iCarl]

bossblue
2 hours ago

Don't fix anything for the GOP convention......Let 'em come in and have their spooky, kooky pow wow...and then they can get the Hell out of town.

Vince Irenicus
2 hours ago

@bossblue The GOP belongs here. Cleveland is a perfect example of the urban blight created by Republican policies.

[EdWuncler]

Wow.

[R C Dean]

That would be the Cleveland without a single Republican on its City Council (although there is a Green or two)?

And hasn't had a Republican mayor in 25 years?

That Cleveland is an example of Republicans creating urban blight?

[Pro Libertate]

AUSTERITY.

[Juice]

Dennis Kucinich was mayor of Cleveland. That tells you all you need to know about the place.

[Mad Scientist]

Ha! Totally! All those republicans mayors just ran Cleveland into the ground!

[EdWuncler]

I think what gets me about the Progressives is their refusal to take accountability for their policies. Cleveland has been a Democratic stronghold for a long time and if any of the progressives had any sort of integrity, they would re-evaluate their policies. But they won't because they are awful.

[kbolino]

Cleveland is a perfect example of the urban blight created by Republican policies.

Who can forget the Republicans in the Cleveland City Council? All... 0 of them. Hmm, it must be the 3 Republicans on the 11-member Cuyahoga County Council! They really fucked Cleveland up in the 4 years they've been around. I'm sure they were working behind the scenes when the previous, Democrat-dominated county government was spending most of its time under federal indictment and serving time in federal prison.

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

As communist countries only fail because capitalist countries are mean and shut them out, Democratic havens fail because Republicans outside do all they can to destroy them.

[CatoTheChipper]

from Smithsonian Magazine article, Venezuela Is About to Run Out of Beer

falling oil prices now mean that U.S. dollars have become few and far between. That's creating a real crunch for Venezuelan companies like breweries, who must buy U.S. dollars in order to do business with foreign markets or import goods into the country.

According to Smithsonian, the meanie capitalists won't take their precious Bolivars, so Venezuelan breweries can't import grains and hops to brew beer. Somehow, before it used its oil money to subsidize food imports, Venezuela actually had a significant agricultural sector. Also, it didn't occur to the Smithsonian writer that Venezuelan propaganda reported that its grain production had grown to all-time highs by around 2010. It's fallen off a bit since then, but the official figures are much higher than the pre-Chavez days.

Bozos can't keep their stories straight.

[widget]

Modesty panels.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modesty_panel

[Mazakon]

Wisconsin's Shame: Audiotape discredits dis-creditors' story

[*GILMORE*]

Facts don't "discredit" lefty narratives.

All they have to do is wave their hands and say people are "grasping" and their critics will be hushed.

[R C Dean]

"See? This tape that we edited to omit the first part of the raid totally discredits her account of the first part of the raid!"

[Ken Shultz]

"President Obama spoke in defense of the West's nuclear deal with Iran, saying the choice for the U.S. was between diplomacy and war."

False dichotomies are false.

[jdgalt]

Well, that answers my question from yesterday. Clinton urged Trump to run, knowing that Trump would "spoil" the Republican candidate the same way Ross Perot enabled Clinton to win in 1992.

So why did Trump take him up on it? Is Trump really stupid enough to believe he can win?

[0x90]

He's a billionaire narcissist; I think the question of winning or losing probably doesn't much come into it.

[*GILMORE*]

The Atlantic moans about the "Makeup Tax"

"The "makeup tax" Brittain mentioned is very real. Women invest time and money into doing their makeup because it impacts their relationships and their paychecks. And while both genders tend to buy haircuts, shaving cream, and moisturizer, the price of makeup is something men never have to worry about."

"Every morning, as my boyfriend zips out the door and I spend 30+ minutes getting ready, I wonder about how the 'hair-and-makeup tax' affects other women?especially ones I admire in high-pressure, public-facing jobs,"

This is why fat, bald men with acne and bad teeth make the best salespeople, the best newscasters, the best PR men, and always get promoted to CEO. They only go to gyms or otherwise take care of themselves for purely narcissistic reasons.

[Pan Zagloba]

Is there some weird feminist contest for seeing who can get most bullshit, petty irritation published? Christ, this is beneath the "Air Conditioning is Sexist," and I thought that was the nadir.

[lap83]

"Every morning, as my boyfriend zips out the door and I spend 30+ minutes getting ready, I wonder about how the 'hair-and-makeup tax' affects other women?especially ones I admire in high-pressure, public-facing jobs,"

Um yeah, it's not men who pressure women to spend tons of time on hair and makeup, it's other women.

[lap83]

"Every morning, as my boyfriend zips out the door and I spend 30+ minutes getting ready, I wonder about how the 'hair-and-makeup tax' affects other women?especially ones I admire in high-pressure, public-facing jobs,"

Um yeah, it's not men who pressure women to spend tons of time on hair and makeup, it's other women.

[0x90]

I seem to notice a correlation between a person's tendency to call things "taxes" which aren't, and a complementary tendency to call actual taxes by other, less threatening names.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

Tutto bene.

/Si restringe lo sguardo guarda gli altri.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Kind of?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Cyclists always get their "karma". Always.

[C. Anacreon]

I knew a guy in the Mafia named Two-Toe Benny.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Takes after his mom?

[Rufus J. Firefly]

They have the best nicknames.

Better than those shitty sports ones.

[The Last American Hero]

+1 He Hate Me

[Crusty Juggler]

BRING BACK THE XFL