Ryan Elected Speaker, Boehner Sheds Final Tears, McConnell Blocks Ex-Im Bank Efforts: P.M. Links

• 

  Credit: Gage Skidmore / photo on flickr

  Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has been elected speaker of the House. He promised to fix a "broken" system.

• Ryan's election means that John Boehner (R-Ohio) can exit, stage right. He bid the House farewell today.
• Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has blocked an attempt by Democrats to get the Export-Import Bank reauthorized via a stand-alone bill.
• A federal court refused to halt the National Security Agency's bulk surveillance program before its transition period to the Freedom Act's new more-restrictive regulations is complete.
• The United States sent out a pack of fighter jets to intercept two Russian aircraft who got within a nautical mile of an aircraft carrier in the Pacific.
• Albuquerque Police Officer Daniel Webster died today after being shot during a traffic stop a week ago.

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Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has blocked an attempt by Democrats to get the Export-Import Bank reauthorized via a stand-alone bill.

By filibuster???

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Hello.

"Ryan's election means that John Boehner (R-Ohio) can exit, stage right. He bid the House farewell today."

Did he take his tanning bed with him?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I'm sure they have one in the congressional gym.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

'John, you're expected in chambe...(looks away)...whoa!'

[Somalian Road Corporation]

I learned last night that apparently Boehner was one of those obstructionist Republikkkans and not some milquetoast dipshit who rolled over before the fight even started on the debt ceiling debacle.

Then later the conversation shifted to John Oliver and Citizen's United which was even more fun. At least somebody didn't think to bring up Net Neutrality to really top things off.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has been elected speaker of the House. He promised to fix a "broken" system.

It's broke, too. Fix that.

[Ted S.]

Break the bureaucracy.

[Leigh]

We'll keep fixing it until its broken!

[C. Anacreon]

That would take a back-breaking effort.

[Ted S.]

Perhaps he should do more squats and build up his back muscles or something.

[Fist of Etiquette]

The United States sent out a pack of fighter jets to intercept two Russian aircraft who got within a nautical mile of an aircraft carrier in the Pacific.

This business will get out of control. It will get out of control and we'll be lucky to live through it.

[Ted S.]

Scott used "who" with aircraft??

[C. Anacreon]

Perhaps it was Jay-Jay the Jet Airplane and one of his friends. They would be each be a who, not it.

[Ted S.]

Little Johnny Jet

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Well, Sir, I was just thinking that perhaps there's another possibility we might consider. Putin might be trying to defect.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Wait to see if he pings back.

[wareagle]

so it's a "pack" of jets? Must be the new Air Force. Or Navy. Didn't see which branch put planes up.

[Fist of Etiquette]

One would assume the carrier itself launched the pack.

[Restoras]

Ah, you beat me to it. I clicked through and a 'pack' is apparently four aircraft. I guess I was mistaken when I thought a group of four aircraft is a 'flight'.

[gaoxiaen]

I thought a pack would be six. Or twenty.

[SFC B]

Wouldn't 20 be a case?

[Juice]

I'm not having a glass of wine. I'm having six. It's called a tasting and it's classy.

[Pan Zagloba]

Seriosuly, the correct term for flying thingies is "flock."

[Brett L]

Or a Murder.

[Atanarjuat]

That's a group of cops.

[Almanian's Rusty Woodchipper]

Gaggle

[Atanarjuat]

Kind of like a murder of crows, it helps to use the proper term.

[Brett L]

"You know, the finger bird!"

[Timrekgrun]

Damn it Fist, you beat me to it. I bet you don't even take a dump without having a plan.

[Fist of Etiquette]

You thought you could stroll in here 42 minutes later and still have a juicy quote available?

[Crusty Juggler]

Interesting.

[Fist of Etiquette]

10:30 AM? I'm long gone from AM Links by then.

[Solanum]

Please practice responsible parenting this Halloween

[Juvenile Bluster]

No.

I have things of Play-Doh to hand out to any allergic kids, but I wanna be the cool house that hands out full-size candy bars, and dammit, that's what I'm gonna do.

Saturday'll be fun. One of the houses on the cul-de-sac where we live is going to have a pizza party for the kids on our street, then all the kids are going out trick-or-treating together.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Pervert.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I have peanuts for the allergic kids.

[Ted S.]

I hope it's pizza and not deep-dish.

[Juvenile Bluster]

Deep dish is not pizza. If I say pizza, I mean pizza.

[Old Man With Candy]

Bless you, son, I raised you right.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

If you're giving whole candy bars to the real kids, you should give out whole heads of cabbage to the special snow-flakes.

[Juvenile Bluster]

Meh. I can't blame the kids. There are kids with genuine allergies, and I feel for them. My problem is the "MY KID CAN'T EAT GLUTEN (NO HE DOESN'T HAVE CELIAC BUT HE STILL CAN'T EAT GLUTEN) / MY KID IS ALLERGIC TO (LIST OF 10 THINGS THAT YOU CAN'T BE ALLERGIC TO)" parents.

[R C Dean]

"Here. Have a rock. Totes hypo-allergenic."

[Pope Jimbo]

Our old next door neighbor used to host a pre-treating party in order to keep the kids from climbing the walls before it got dark. I was put in charge of coming up with the gross stuff for the older kids. I still have all sorts of molds for jello brains, eyes, etc.

The best house on my street though is the guy who gives cider with rum to all adults trick or treating with their small kids (older kids trick or teat on their own). I still wander down for the cider even though my kids are now too cool to trick or treat anymore.

[Fist of Etiquette]

That child should dress up as a porcelain doll so that the neighborhood knows how to treat him.

[Atanarjuat]

Or Bubble Boy.

[Rhywun]

Kids didn't have all these allergies in my day but if they had, I'm sure we'd have "included" in the fun all right.

[Fist of Etiquette]

They were long dead before trick-or-treating age.

[brady949]

Natural selection

[Sapient Mulch]

Kids didn't have all these allergies in my day

"Back in my day, we had allergies that were a lot worse than these pansy ass allergies you kids have nowadays. Why if I showed up complainin' about some sissy pants 'peanut allergy', my mom would sit us down with a jar of Skippy, and the crunchy stuff mind you, not that wimpy creamy crap; she'd hand us a spoon and sit there until we finished the whole goddamn thing, tell us to wipe our damn noses, quit wheezing and go out and play. She'd steer us towards the door if our eyes was swelled up and pat us on the back and tell us she loved us."

/curmudgeon

[Rich]

I know a guy who gave away burned-out Christmas tree bulbs for Halloween.

[Fist of Etiquette]

A federal court refused to halt the National Security Agency's bulk surveillance program before its transition period to the Freedom Act's new more-restrictive regulations is complete.

We simply cannot go unsurveilled. Those gaps are where the terrorists live!

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

"The United States sent out a pack of fighter jets to intercept two Russian aircraft who got within a nautical mile of an aircraft carrier in the Pacific."

That is a colossal fuck up. One mile?

[Restoras]

How many is a pack of fighter jets, anyway? Sounds like a lot...but it was only four. I guess 'pack' sounds better than 'flight'.

[Bern-o-Matic 5000]

Certain brands of beer sell in four-packs, and I usually raise a similar objection. Four does NOT constitute a pack.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Should have sent out a case a fighters.

Dat a show'd dem rooskies!

[Timrekgrun]

Hell no, they'd just drink them!

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I think it's called a fourship, but somebody who knows more about it than I do can weigh in.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Foreskin? Are you trying to start a fight?

[Almanian's Rusty Woodchipper]

Foreskin? Why don't you just cut it out?

[Anomalous]

I thought there were 20 to a pack. Oh wait, that's cigarettes.

[Gray Ghost]

What would you like the fighters to do? Shoot it down? Play chicken with it if it came inside 50 nm from the carrier?

There's a kabuki dance to these things---the Bears were probably spotted 400 nm or more from the carrier, and talked to the entire time they approached. If they turned on a targeting radar, or opened bomb doors, that'd be a hostile act, and they'd get swatted.

But until that happens, right of overflight and navigation applies to everyone. Not just the U.S. Go see the videos of IRGC speedboats doing circles around some Tico CG in the Straits of Hormuz. As long as nobody's shooting at each other, or on actual collision courses with ~30 seconds to impact: no blood, no foul.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

1 nm puts them between the carrier and the rest of the battle group. Targeting options are very limited at that point.

[tarran]

It also is well within the minimum distance for anti-ship missiles.

Meaning that the only weapon the Bears had at that distance were any side arms the Russian air-crew happened to have on their persons.

[Old Man With Candy]

Meaning that the only weapon the Bears had at that distance were...

...Cutler interceptions.

[Gray Ghost]

Well within C-RAM range or trust the Rhinos (F/A-18F---proof that Congress will let the services have a new airplane if it can be spun as a modification of a prior airplane. See, also, F-15E) at the Bears' six to kill them.

I dunno if an actual overflight is permitted, and if so, how low is too low, but people have the right to freely travel. Doesn't mean it isn't rude as hell, and unnecessarily provocative to do so, but they have the right to do it.

The problem stems when the carrier group doesn't necessarily know that the bad guy is within one nm...

[gaoxiaen]

I was on an LST and once we got buzzed by a Soviet jet within 50 ft. Everyone threw whatever hardware was handy (bolts, shackles, tools, etc...) up in the air. He came by a second time but not very close.

[Gray Ghost]

Video to just how close the Russians (Soviets back in 1988 when this video was shot) would come to ships that really pissed them off. Zip to around 3:00 on the video to watch USS Caron, a Spruance DDG, trade paint with some Soviet light vessel. Mirka-II, IIRC.

(And wiki confirms.)

[R C Dean]

What would you like the fighters to do? Shoot it down?

Why not? Give a warning, and if they don't back off, shoot them down.

Play stupid games, etc.

[Gray Ghost]

That's generally an act of war, and a 'bad thing' between two nuclear armed powers

No idea if INCSEA still applies between the Russian Federation and the US, though since Russia and the US still have meetings on it, I guess so, but it was a good attempt to prevent misunderstandings and miscommunication like shooting at each other's stuff. INCSEA gets covered, here at 2-47, and the important bits are things like:

(4) Ships of one country will not simulate attacks by aiming guns, missile launchers, torpedo tubes, or other weapons at the ships of the other country, and will not launch any object in the direction of passing ships nor illuminate their navigation bridges [and]
(7) Aircraft will use the greatest caution and prudence in approaching aircraft and ships of the other party, in particular ships engaged in launching and landing aircraft, and will not simulate attacks by the simulated use of weapons or perform aerobatics over ships of the other party nor drop objects near them.

In short, there's nothing new about these types of intercepts. 1 nm does strike me as close, but there are plenty of old stock photos of Bears buzzing carriers back in the Soviet Union days, and Phantoms buzzing things like Kiev and Kirov.

[Juice]

the Bears were probably spotted 400 nm or more from the carrier

That's REALLY fucking close.

[waffles]

who got within a nautical mile of

I'm aware that a nautical mile is somewhat longer than a regular mile, but why? What does that extra 800 or so feet mean. Why knots? These are really unimportant questions though. I am actually fond of inconsequential and bizarre units. As an engineer it gives me numerous opportunities to point out errors. And people love it when you show them that they are wrong. That's how I make friends.

[Juvenile Bluster]

1 nautical mile = 1.152 surface miles. I have no clue why it's that way either.

[Restoras]

Isn't it knots because that's how they measured speed on sailing ships - by the number of knots passed through your hand on a knotted line when it was dropped in the ocean?

[kinnath]

Sayeth Google:

A nautical mile (symbol M, NM or nmi) is a unit of distance that is approximately the length that spans one minute of arc on the surface of the Earth, measured along any meridian. By international agreement it has been set at 1,852 metres exactly (about 6,076 feet).

[kinnath]

In other words, it's a division of the circumference of the earth.

[kinnath]

http://science.howstuffworks.c.....tion79.htm

"A nautical mile is based on the circumference of the planet Earth. If you were to cut the Earth in half at the equator, you could pick up one of the halves and look at the equator as a circle. You could divide that circle into 360 degrees. You could then divide a degree into 60 minutes. A minute of arc on the planet Earth is 1 nautical mile. This unit of measurement is used by all nations for air and sea travel."

[The Hyperbole]

If you were to cut the Earth in half at the equator, you could pick up one of the halves and look at the equator as a circle

no, you couldn't

[Restoras]

How do you know kinnath isn't, like, all swole?

[Fist of Etiquette]

BUT WHAT WOULD HE BE STANDING ON WHILE PICKING IT UP. Use your head.

[Pan Zagloba]

On the other half, duh!

[Just say Nikki]

A turtle. Duh.

[gaoxiaen]

But all the magma and stuff would spill out.

[Tejicano]

You're supposed to put saran wrap on it to keep all that stuff in. Don't you know anything?

[tarran]

That's not quite correct. It's an arc minute of latitude, not equatorial longitude. The two would be the same if the Earth were a perfect sphere, but as it is not, the distances are different.

[kinnath]

so wikipedia is smarter that how stuff works.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Because the earth is a mishappen sphere, (like FoE's head) but a minute arc is based on rotation around the center, the length of the NM would be based entirely on the distance of that point on the sphere from the center.

Being based on either latitude or longitude would be completely immaterial.

[Agammamon]

You are correct that its an arc minute of latitude (former navy guy who did exactly this for a couple years) but its not because the Earth isn't a perfect sphere.

Its because longitude lines converge at the poles - therefore the distance between them decreases as the latitude increases - while latitude lines are always parallel.

[tarran]

That is true, but that's not what I'm talking about. The circumpolar circumference (40,008 km) of the Earth is different than the equatorial circumference (40,075 km).

SHUT UP! IT'S A BIG DIFFERENCE!!!!

[Agammamon]

But that's not irrelevant to navigation except when close to land - in which case we're going off of visual and radar bearings to get a fix.

In addition, the discrepancy is so minute that even at the pole its the difference of 10 feet over a nautical mile. We simply do not navigate with that level of precision. Even the bog standard GPS used has a position error of 70 ft in the best of cases.

[Gray Ghost]

In addition, the discrepancy is so minute that even at the pole its the difference of 10 feet over a nautical mile. We simply do not navigate with that level of precision.

There are applications that do, though I agree there probably aren't many.

Ballistic missiles come to mind. At ~4200 nm from Minot to Moscow, you're talking about a couple of miles difference if we assume a constant 5 foot per nm error.

[Agammamon]

Its a 3.5 nm error at a flat 5ft/nm over 4,200 nm. And keep in mind that the error drops from 10ft/nm at the pole to about 3ft/nm by 45 deg latitude.

Important for hitting a hardened launch or CC facility - not something even an airline would be all that concerned about.

[Agammamon]

To be clearer - the number of degrees in a circle drawn around a line that intersects both pole would *always* be 360 degrees. But the *circumference* of that circle differs based on your latitude. The closer to the poles, the smaller the circumference.

Therefore the distance covered by an arcminute of longitude varies dependent on how close you are to the pole.

Arcminutes of latitude are perpendicular to longitude and the circumference of each arc is the same no matter what your longitude.

What this means, practically, is that you can use the vertical (latitude) position scale as a distance scale on the chart - but not the horizontal position scale. Measure a distance between two points with a compass then lay that compass against the latitude scale and see how many minutes are covered - that's your distance between points.

[tarran]

What this means, practically, is that you can use the vertical (latitude) position scale as a distance scale on the chart - but not the horizontal position scale

God! How I miss piloting!

[Bern-o-Matic 5000]

My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead, and that's the way I likes it!

[Timrekgrun]

You got a lot o stones saying that.

[bacon-magic]

How many engineers does it take to screw in a light bulb?
ans: 1, that's how many engineers it takes to screw anything up.
You're welcome waffles. /rigging fabricator turned salesman
F.Y.I. The real world is not a blueprint.
(I do like you guys, but man you can be dense, almost liberal arts dense)

[C. Anacreon]

Q. How many psychotherapists does it take to change a light bulb?

A. Just one, but the light bulb has to want to change.

I'm often surprised at how many people who work in mental health have never heard that one.

[bacon-magic]

I went to school to become a Psychiatrist, did way too much partying and wound up getting a real job with a lower suicide rate. *smokes doob and smiles

[Brett L]

For colossal fuckups, get a team of engineers together.

[bacon-magic]

On a Government project is peak derp.

[Sapient Mulch]

For colossal fuckups, get a team of engineers together.

And have them describe the non-engineers they report to.

[Gray Ghost]

The real question, bacon, is how many hammers does the engineer need to get the light bulb screwed in?

[Anomalous]

Q. How many feminists does it take to change a light bulb?

A. THAT'S NOT FUNNY!!!

[Agammamon]

Oh, no - you are hugely wrong.

Q: How many engineers does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A: You're asking the wrong question, engineers don't screw in lightbulbs - that's what techs do. Engineers construct and review the Standard Operating Procedures the tech will use to change the lightbulb. And will review and approve and asked for amendments to the SOP. And will then review the the work package for proper formatting and completeness and do a final review of the paperwork once the tech has signed off that they've completed the task. And sometimes they'll go into the field to spot check that the tech has a valid work package and is following the procedures outlined therein.

[tarran]

You left out the tagout/lockout procedures.... 😉

[Homple]

Although "work packages" are often redundant boilerplate, the tagout/lockout procedures do a lot keep people alive.

[db]

A nautical mile happens to equal one minute of latitude, and one minute of longitude at the equator. Reckoning transit times becomes much easier that way since they are demarcated in minutes and seconds of arc.

[waffles]

Yep. It actually makes pretty good sense. It's not nearly as bad as units of energy and efficiency for HVAC systems. The DOE has two different programs for simulation of building energy use each using different algorithms. One puts all output in metric, the other, a whole host of incongruous units from legacy designations. So I get therms, Btu, tons cooling, Joules, watts and all manner of ratios thereof in the same reports.

[Brett L]

Tons cooling?

[Restoras]

I think she means Totes Cooling

[Gray Ghost]

Tons cooling?

Energy to convert one ton of ice to liquid water. From here:

Since latent heat of ice (heat required to convert water into ice at the same temp.) is 80 Kcal/kg, one ton equals to 3000 Kcal/hr (Kilo calories per hour) or 12,000 BTU/hr (British Thermal Unit per hour).

[waffles]

You got it. I'm new to this industry and surprised how few people even question where these units come from. But I bet just bout every central air system in the USA will have a capacity in tons. We can blame Carrier for this because it was how they sold the original stuff to yokels in the days of yore.

[Gray Ghost]

IIRC, other than experimental versions like the earliest attempts to cool the White House, a/c was used to make ice. That was it. So in that context, using those units makes perfect sense.

[gaoxiaen]

When I did construction, for units of weight less than a ton we always used Wallies, named after our boss.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

You know what I hate? SEER.

[Sapient Mulch]

"a person who is supposed to be able, through supernatural insight, to see what the future holds."

Well I don't believe in that stuff, but hate?

[Homple]

The buyers at time were using ice for cooling so they needed to know how much ice the a/c units would replace.

Are you going to get into Horsepower next?

[R C Dean]

Only at H & R can we get these highly erudite, yet oddly abusive, exchanges about the most minute of technical minutiae.

I LOL'ed about halfway through.

[bacon-magic]

The debate was too much for Reason...no Trumpicle. Lovely. Now stop trolling us and spread some libertarian around.

[Restoras]

Apparently, the Great Libertarian Moment came and went, all the important libertarian issues were addressed and corrected, and all that's left is mopping up on the fringes.

[bacon-magic]

Oh, ok then. I'll just read the comments then. When is SugarFree going to include Huma in the Clinton Debauchery Tales?

[Pan Zagloba]

When the fourth seal is broken.

[SugarFree]

soon

[bacon-magic]

4th seal? Isn't that Trump's Trumpeters Trumpeting Trump?

[Pan Zagloba]

Let's see:

And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see. And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

Doesn't sound like Trump to me. However

And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see. And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

See - crown represents Trump's hair, and conequering represents WINNING. So Trump is the first seal.

To complete the prophecy, Sanders is third, Graham is second, Hilary is sixth, and the cries of commentariat when SF does release his magnum opus will be fifth.

[bacon-magic]

That no eared cat is creepier then a hairless one. And I'm triggered by that pack of Pell Mells on the counter. *vapes up a storm in the office

[Irish ?s ESB]

Peak Guardian

"Men are pretty terrible people. They commit significantly more violent crimes, robberies and assaults each year than women do, according to the Department of Justice. They are more likely to show anger in the workplace and be rewarded for it while women are affected negatively for the same behaviors. They even take up too much space on public transportation when "manspreading". I could keep going.

Men probably dominate all these "terrible" statistics because, now and throughout history, they've dominated the world. But that doesn't give them a pass. They are still to blame even if they don't know better, and it's high time their dominant position ? their entitled ignorance ? was questioned and dismantled."

I like that when men do more bad things than women (homicide, theft, violence, etc.) it's because masculinity is evil, but when men do more good things than women (starting tech companies, getting into important STEM fields, building all our houses) it's because men are oppressive and women would do all those things just as well if men weren't so wicked.

Any sex difference is evidence that men are evil, which is a pretty great racket in a sexually dimorphic species where some degree of sex difference is guaranteed.

[Pan Zagloba]

Headline: It's time to do away with the concept of 'manhood' altogether

Photo of author: Already on it

[Rhywun]

He just wanted an excuse to post that photo.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Plus men committed almost 100% of those nutscaping incidents from yesterday's PM Links.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Yeah well, go read a thread where people defend cops. Some of the most aggressive stances come from women.

[Pan Zagloba]

As in many other things, Kipling knew this shit a hundred years ago.

[bacon-magic]

^awesome.

[Gray Ghost]

It was the women, after all, that "would come out to cut up what remains."

[Rich]

"Do you like Kipling?"

"I don't know. I've never Kipled."

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

It's my understanding that the fart in that story actually made a "kiple" sound.

[Old Man With Candy]

Yeah, I was trolling at NRO about the cop/classroom kid/cellphone deal, and the vast majority of incandescent anger and cop fellating came from female posters.

[brady949]

If you want a good laugh, check out their Jessica Valenti columns. It's just constant, angry, sexist outrage.

Don't even think about commenting on it though. You'll be deleted.

[Pan Zagloba]

Valenti column should only be experienced through Sargon of Akkad's YouTube channel. I wish he'd go back to his muse, I don't recall him eviscerating her articles in a while (though I did miss last few This Week In Stupid episodes).

[Somalian Road Corporation]

This is the first thing that comes to mind when Jessica Valenti gets mentioned around here:

In which @reason puts the last nail in their credibility coffin: Is the UVA Rape Story a Gigantic Hoax? http://bit.ly/1A7phcl

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

"Ryan's election means that John Boehner (R-Ohio) can exit, stage right. "

Lifetime membership at Cop-A-Tan?

[Juvenile Bluster]

No making fun. He can easily be a pumpkin for Halloween, for example.

[Just say Nikki]

Campus Reform tries to fisk a ridiculous flowchart for acceptable Halloween costumes, proves only that its writers have no idea what a flowchart is:

The first questions asks, "Are you planning on painting your face black to mimic a skin tone?" If the answer is yes, the chart informs one that, "That's called blackface, and it's never okay, no matter how clever your costume is."

If the answer is no, however, the chart does not praise the sensitivity of the costume-wearer, but rather implies that they might be a mass murderer, asking, "Are you Hitler? Do you have anything to do with Hitler?"

[Juvenile Bluster]

Relevant XKCD

The flowchart is ridiculous, the fisking is ridiculous, everyone's a dumbass.

[Ted S.]

I prefer this xkcd flowchart.

[Pan Zagloba]

The flowchart is a joke, and the article failed to get it, right?

[Just say Nikki]

Oh, I doubt it. The article still failed to get it, though.

[wareagle]

when the first question is wrong, the rest can be disregarded. Blackface is very specific; it's not random painting of a face to black. It's painting to black with a specific purpose, a minstrel show type thing, not to resemble the black character depicted in a costume. My god, these people are just beyond stupid.

[Irish ?s ESB]

Progressives do not know what blackface is. The reason black face was offensive was because it involved racial stereotyping, but, being morons, progressives have now determined that it would be horrifyingly offensive if I went as Barack Obama for Halloween.

It's complete nonsense - going as any white president is cool, but a white guy going as the black president is somehow racist.

[wareagle]

The Alabama-teacher-as-Kanye incident also provided more proof of the griefing pecking order. Not a word about the guy's wife with the padded ass going as Kim. No manufactured outrage from the womenz.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

You know, I don't do Halloween but if I were to, I would be Black Face just to piss these assholes off.

[gaoxiaen]

Not too many white witch doctors.

[Ted S.]

Well, there was Susan Hayward....

[Juice]

We need to start calling these people what they are, prudes.

[GILMORE?]

What does the word "fisk" mean?

""That's called blackface, and it's never okay, no matter how clever your costume is.""

Duh. Robby told us this the other day and crazy people said crazy things because he was just being informative.

[Bern-o-Matic 5000]

Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has been elected speaker of the House. He promised to fix a "broken" system.

The system isn't broken. The fact that laws aren't being passed during a politically polarized time means the system is working as designed.

It's a feature, not a bug.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Albuquerque Police Officer Daniel Webster died today after being shot during a traffic stop a week ago.

Has anyone yet linked this to the Department of Justice coming down on them for having quick-trigger police?

[Juvenile Bluster]

You know someone has. I'm waiting for the statement from the union to that effect.

Meanwhile, why is the guy who allegedly murdered him being charged in *federal* court?

[MarkLastname]

OT but more important than anything in the article: Bad Lip Reading just released their take on the Democratic debates!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_yxGsWHx9o

[Cytotoxic]

Remember 'Ethereum'? They did a bare-bones release back in July. People here, including myself, thought they were over-stating the case for their software. Apparently Microsoft thinks there is some serious value in Ethereum though because they are partnering up with an Ethereum-based developer.

The software giant has formed a partnership with Brooklyn-based Consensys, a startup that is building products and services for Ethereum, an alternative platform to bitcoin. Through the partnership, customers of Azure, Microsoft's cloud-based business service, will have access to tools that will allow them to experiment with and build products that can digitize and automate a plethora of operations, from securities trading to cross-border payments to corporate accounting, and offer them to their own customers.

http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat.....-on-azure/

[__Warren__]

In the Road Warrior how come they let their master mechanic ride the tanker? He was probably the most important person in the group and they were about to make a 1000 mile journey in vehicles that would require constant maintenance.

I get putting the top leaders and warriors up there to make the tanker look valuable but putting him up there was a waste.

The movie is in my personal top 10 of all-time but that bit has always bugged me.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Cold water on a rate hike by December.

[Juice]

The Feds CANNOT raise rates, but they have to pretend like they might soon. But they won't for a long long time.

[Brett L]

Oh, look. The Waco police are threatening legal consequences against whomever released video footage of bikers who appeared to not be spoiling for a fight at Tein Peaks earlier this year.

[Restoras]

I guess they haven't heard of the Streisand Effect?

[Ted S.]

Funny how "If you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to hide" always seems to go out the window when it comes time to apply it to the police.

[Juice]

This is a very interesting interview on the Waco biker gang topic.
Basically the cops were the ones doing all the shooting.

http://scotthorton.org/intervi.....niel-penn/

[Gray Ghost]

Ballistics and/or autopsy reports should give a clue. Probably we haven't seen many from this.

5.56 TAP, or whatever LEO uses, makes a much different wound than the handguns CNN was showing in the video. Shouldn't be difficult to distinguish wounds with small entries, no powder marks and violent lead snowstorms, from 9mm/.38/.380 through and throughs.

Regardless, the GQ article mentioned in Juice's link has some howlers in it. As fucked up as I suspect McClennan County Sheriffs and Waco PD can be, I don't think they had guys with 'squad automatic weapons' mowing down bikers. Else the dead would've been a lot higher than 10 or so. There's a whole lot of 'we dinna do nuthin' in that article too.

Still shouldn't have locked up, what was it, 170 people with ultra-high bail.

[Cytotoxic]

So with Gillespie going Full Salon, I propose that he be replaced by AnonBot. He basically can't do worse, and might even fire Richman.

[Cytotoxic]

WHO estimates that oral herpes infects 2/3 of humanity under 51.

http://news.nationalpost.com/n.....sore-virus

[Brett L]

That's why I never kiss em on the mouth.

[Bern-o-Matic 5000]

Who does?

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

A doctor, I think.

[Juice]

Well, if you've ever had a cold sore...

[Pan Zagloba]

Gavin McInnes says stuff I agree with, and stuff I don't, but he's always entertaining. However, in this video, the absurdity of the topic is even too much for him.

How bad is it? It taught me that there is a pseudo-science thing called facilitated communication, and it's the sanest thing in the video!

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I linked to something about that the other day. It was pretty gross.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Here you go:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10......html?_r=0

It gets really interesting when she takes off his diaper and blows him.

[Pan Zagloba]

That's the article, and that very thing is the punchline.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Not clicking on that.

[Old Man With Candy]

Fuck you for posting an intriguing line, then linking a PAYWALL STORY.

[Pan Zagloba]

Watch the video and see the context.

[Juice]

Dude, just click "private browsing" or google search the article title or even the url and click.

[SFC B]

That woman was hoisted by a petard of tactical nuclear yield.

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

What made them so upset ? what led to all the arguing that followed, and the criminal trial and million-?dollar civil suit ? was the fact that Anna can speak and D.J. can't; that she was a tenured professor of ethics at Rutgers University in Newark and D.J. has been declared by the state to have the mental capacity of a toddler.

Beautiful. This story has everything.

[Cytotoxic]

Gavin McInnes is a moron who seriously blames Ahmed the clock maker for 'assembling something that looks like a bomb'.

[wareagle]

whatever it looked like, a clock was not it.

[Cytotoxic]

It looked more like a clock than a bomb.

[wareagle]

not really, but whatever confirms your biases. No one covered themselves in glory here, no matter how much you want to focus only on school folks and cops. Maybe dad can fire up the outrage machine again to explain why I'm wrong.

[Cytotoxic]

Pro-tip: bombs contain something called 'explosive'. Also, detonators.

[ant1sthenes]

Pro-tip: The absence of explosives is one thing that distinguishes a "hoax bomb" (what he was accused of having) from a "bomb" (a thing he was not accused of having).

[kinnath]

When you grow up, we can walk you around some of the engineering labs here and show you what digital computers look like when they are not packaged for public consumption. I'm sure we can even find a few with digital read-outs suitable for displaying the current time.

[wareagle]

since it was so obviously a clock, you would have thought some of the images of it would have cleared all doubt. Little things, like numbers or some such that one might expect on a clock. The school folks going overboard doesn't change that.

[kinnath]

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news.....55881.html

So we got a external power cord, a power supply, a processor board, an interface card connected with a ribbon cable to a cheap serial display showing faint burn-in pattern of HH:MM.

What we don't got is anything remotely looking like explosives.

If you think this looks like a bomb, you are an ignorant moron.

[GILMORE?]

No one ever thought the object was a bomb

People thought the kid *intended to create a hoax-bomb*

No one ever even suggested there was confusion that it might be "real". The bomb squad was never called.

I have no idea what point anyone is trying to make. It was a stupid fucking non-event by a kid who apparently wasn't even clever enough to "make" anything (instead moving a existing clock from its original case to another one)

the only thing noteworthy is that Big Wigs like Obama, Zuckerberg and MIT all felt they'd be sending positive social signals by declaring Ahmed a boy genius and worthy of national celebration. Which is the real absurdity.

[Agammamon]

Still didn't look like a bomb.

And even if it did - that's not actually illegal.

[wareagle]

I didn't say it was illegal. I said it did not look like a clock. The kid and his family got to feed the perpetual outrage machine, he's now back in the family's native area, and the gang got a few minutes of bitching about stupid cops and school people.

[Cytotoxic]

They have every right and reason to be outraged, conservative nitpicking and hair-splitting aside.

[Somalian Road Corporation]

Ahmed is a straight-up fraudster who claimed that stripping the internals out of a mass-manufactured clock and putting it in another container was an "invention". He's not a "clock maker".

[Cytotoxic]

Venezuela's government is down to selling its gold.

http://www.valuewalk.com/2015/10/venezuela-broke/

[__Warren__]

It's routine I'm sure but only an idiot would buy this gold without doing an assay.

[Cytotoxic]

Modi isn't a total disappointment apparently. India moved up 12 spaces in the World Bank's annual 'ease of doing business ranking'.

India has become more efficient is business regulation. 10 years ago it took 127 days to start a new business in India. Now it takes just 29 days.

http://www.dnaindia.com/money/.....nt-2139850

Even if India doesn't go half as free as America, this will still result in the generation of a vast amount of wealth and competitive pressure. Yay.

[The Late P Brooks]

He promised to fix a "broken" system.

*shudders in horrified anticipation*

[Rasilio]

--"The United States sent out a pack of fighter jets to intercept two Russian aircraft who got within a nautical mile of an aircraft carrier in the Pacific."--

An aircraft whose sole military role is launching stand off cruise missiles, it is more of a threat from 100 miles away than it is from 10 and from a mile away it isn't a threat at all.

In otherwords nothing to see here not really a newsworthy story

[GILMORE?]

Still, keep Maverick up and ready on Alert 5

[Ken Shultz]

"A federal court refused to halt the National Security Agency's bulk surveillance program before its transition period to the Freedom Act's new more-restrictive regulations is complete."

I'm sure the "Freedom Act" is great, whatever it says, but I still like the Fourth Amendment better.

[__Warren__]

Little kids need to wear shock collars. Get too loud and zzzzappp!

[Brett L]

My kid was shrieking in Walmart loud enough for someone else to say something. I just don't hear it.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

You're that guy, huh?

[Cytotoxic]

Silence your spawn already. Fuck.

[Cytotoxic]

Ayn Rand (PBUH) has recently published a new novel.

http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy.....exclusive/

[mfckr]

This img needs a Reason alt-text:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CShMBpQUcAA5MpY.jpg

[Atanarjuat]

Ew.

[TonyaPatterson]

Start working at home with Google! It's by-far the best job I've had. Last Wednesday I got a brand new BMW since getting a check for $6474 this - 4 weeks past. I began this 8-months ago and immediately was bringing home at least $77 per hour. I work through this link, go? to tech tab for work detail,,,,,,,

---------- http://www.4cyberworks.com

[C. Anacreon]

Here's what I would suggest: have every kid who comes to your house get whatever candy you wish to give. When the boy in question comes by, give him a rock.

Hey, it worked for Charlie Brown. And rocks tend to be hypoallergenic.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

This rock: does it have moss on it?

[Sapient Mulch]

Hey, it worked for Charlie Brown.

Charlie Brown is a crack addict??!!!

[Jordan]

Wow. Just wow. Flat Earthers actually exist.

[__Warren__]

We prefer the term Linear Globeists!

[tarran]

You know, these people are pig ignorant;

Let's take their claim that the horizon doesn't dip, the higher the observer is above sea level.

Anyone who has navigated on the ocean using the starts will tell you that it's bullshit; when you read the angular altitude of the star above the horizon, the first calculation you do is a correction based on how high your observation platform is. The higher your bridge-wing, the higher the star appears to be.

They also don't understand how potential energy works in a spherically symetrical gravity field, but that's a rant for a different day.

[__Warren__]

This is one of most favorite unhinged conspiracy truther movements. Flat-Earthers are just plain fun compared to other sorts.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Can I get a Bugs Bunny 'Yeesh'?

[Brett L]

How do they think GPS and the Sun work?

[__Warren__]

Quit mansplaining with your "science".

[Juice]

You know, these people are pig ignorant;

Um, I don't think it's serious.