Obama Still Promising to Close Guantanamo Bay, Donald Trump Says NFL is Weak Like America, David Bowie Dead: A.M. Links

Ed Krayewski | 1.11.2016 9:00 AM

(gabbec/wikipedia)

gabbec/Wikipedia

The White House chief of staff said President Obama is still planning to close Guantanamo Bay.
At a rally in Nevada, Donald Trump criticized NFL penalties for head-on-head collisions, calling the football league, like America, weak.
In an interview on This Week, Bernie Sanders said Bernie Sanders was Democrats' most electable presidential candidate.
Sean Penn's Rolling Stone interview with Joaquín Guzmán Loera helped Mexico track the drug cartel leader down.
Police in Cologne clashed with anti-Islam protesters who are demonstrating following a series of sexual assaults in the city on New Year's Eve attributed to Muslim men.
A Doctors Without Borders hospital in Yemen was bombed, killing four and injuring at least 10.
David Bowie is dead.

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Fist of Etiquette 9 years ago

David Bowie is dead.

1st celeb death of the year? Who will be the next two?
1. SugarFree 9 years ago
  
  Episiarch and your mom.
  1. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    "Celeb" is short for "celebrity," not "celebrated."
  2. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
    
    "Two dead in freak fisting accident - details at 11"
    1. Citizen X 9 years ago
      
      When Epi finally goes, i guarantee it will be in a way that few news outlets can publish.
      
      "SEATTLE - An unidentified man was found dead in undisclosed circumstances. Authorities are still trying to locate someone who is willing to clean up the body."
      1. BigT 9 years ago
        
        Bowie's last words: "Yet Lou Reed lives"
        
        gaoxiaen 9 years ago
        
        So does Frank Zappa.
2. Lee G 9 years ago
  
  I'd say Keith Richards is overdue
  1. WTF 9 years ago
    
    Keith Richards is immortal.
    1. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
      
      Is he the Strom Thurmond of rock and roll?
      1. Libertarian 9 years ago
        
        Dammit, he said "immortal." Thurmond is dead. Get a dictionary!
        
        Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
        
        The joke used to be that Strom was immortal. But I am showing my age.
        
        a better chipper 9 years ago
        
        MedPhyGuy, I dunno, I'm only 30 and remember joking about Strom's immortality in High School.
        
        Then again, maybe 30 is old and I'm in denial.
        
        Citizen X 9 years ago
        
        An essay consisting of nothing but Strom Thurmond jokes got me a 4 on my AP US Government exam in 12th grade.
      2. gaoxiaen 9 years ago
        
        He's the Ayatollah of Rock and Rollah.
  2. John 9 years ago
    
    He is actually in good health sans some arthritis in his fingers. If I was going to bet on one of the Stones dying, it would be Ron Wood. He had a nasty cocaine habit for a very long time and that tends to do in your heart eventually.
    1. Just a thought not a sermon 9 years ago
      
      In Keith Richards's biography, he mentions that Ron Wood was into crack cocaine for a period of time.
      
      I was also surprised that Keith took a dim view of Jagger's and Wyman's grouping-banging and womanizing, which he considered a real weakness in their characters.
      1. Rich 9 years ago
        
        You gotta snort draw the line somewhere.
        
        gaoxiaen 9 years ago
        
        With your father's ashes.
    2. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
      
      Richards has no organs left to die.
  3. Trigger Warning 9 years ago
    
    You misspelled "overdose."
3. Slammer 9 years ago
  
  Lou Reed?
  1. flaPjacks 9 years ago
    
    too soon.
  2. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
    
    You know, he's been very quiet about Bowie's death. Even Iggy managed to get someone to tweet about it
4. Just a thought not a sermon 9 years ago
  
  Okay, this one is shocking. Didn't he just put out a new album?
  
  And after Lemmy, it's true Keith doesn't look so safe.
  1. Raven Nation 9 years ago
    
    Yes. October story but the album did come out on Friday:
    
    http://www.bbc.com/news/entert.....s-34638413
  2. Irish ?s ESB 9 years ago
    
    He just put out a new album but it's been known he had cancer for the last year and a half.
  3. a better chipper 9 years ago
    
    Never was much of a Bowie fan, to be honest. But I've actually been enjoying Blackstar a lot. Girl Loves Me is my favorite on the album.
  4. gaoxiaen 9 years ago
    
    Damn it. I'm out of liquor. Please excuse the coherency of my following comments.
5. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
  
  Hello.
  
  CELEBRITY DEATH POOL!
  
  I take Fish.
  1. pogi chips for liberty 9 years ago
    
    Celebrity and Prog Rock are mutually exclusive.
  2. pogi chips for liberty 9 years ago
    
    Unless you were referencing Barney Miller, in which case my point still stands.
    1. WTF 9 years ago
      
      Abe Vigoda, still alive.
      1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        His name is TESSIO.
        
        WTF 9 years ago
        
        +1 It's not personal, it's business.
      2. Elspeth Flashman 9 years ago
        
        The hell?
      3. gaoxiaen 9 years ago
        
        Wrong. He sleeps with the fishes.
    2. EMD 9 years ago
      
      Or the lead singer of Marillion?
      1. pogi chips for liberty 9 years ago
        
        Not since 1988.
6. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
  
  My college freshman writing prof assigned us a bunch of vampire stuff including Bowie's "The Hunger." I actually studied the Hunger in college.
  1. SugarFree 9 years ago
    
    That's really cool.
    
    I keep dreading the inevitable remake of The Hunger. I mean, it isn't a great adaptation of the novel, but no one will capture the style.
  2. Lee G 9 years ago
    
    +1 DeNeuve/Sarandon lesbian sex scene
    
    A formative moment during my teenage years.
7. Just say Nikki 9 years ago
  
  1st celeb death of the year? Who will be the next two?
  
  Bowie is No. 2 to Pierre Boulez. So clearly Justin Bieber is next.
  1. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    We can hope.
  2. Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
    
    What do you mean when you nod your head yes but you wanna say no?
    1. a better chipper 9 years ago
      
      David Bowie has a lyric from the new album about saying no but meaning yes, too. Maybe Nikki is onto something here.
  3. Clich? Bandit 9 years ago
    
    I call Shatner if we are limiting to cnucks.
  4. gaoxiaen 9 years ago
    
    Please.
Fist of Etiquette 9 years ago

Sean Penn's Rolling Stone interview with Joaqu?n Guzm?n Loera helped Mexico track the drug cartel leader down.

And by announcing it there's no using him as a bird dog anymore, I guess.
1. a better chipper 9 years ago
  
  Hopefully that means he's a target for unforgiving retaliation now.
  
  ...something something juvenile internet bluster.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

RIP David Bowie.

Growing up in a small conservative town, Bowie was my first exposure to an alternative world. It was like a lifeline in a sea of conformity, something special for a shy, sensitive kid like myself. He seemed to be from a different planet, an alien among us lowly humans.

I started collecting his records at age ten. My best friend and I would spend hours discussing Bowie's lyrics, trying to get some deep philosophical insight from them, where often none existed. As I grew older - hello, punk rock! - I lost some of my taste for his music, but still recognized what an influence he was to my life. Without his music I would have gone in a completely different direction - who knows where.

And now he's gone - but his influence will be felt for a long time.
1. SugarFree 9 years ago
  
  I started with punk and then worked back to Bowie. Bowie left much more of an impression in the long run.
  1. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
    
    My Bowie thing started when I was 4 and saw him on the telly as Ziggy. He was more than music. Still is. So I am refusing to accept he is dead.
  2. Slammer 9 years ago
    
    I think 'Hunky Dory' is my favorite album.
    1. Lord Humungus 9 years ago
      
      One of my favs too - along with Low and Scary Monsters.
      
      I've also grown to appreciate The Man Who Sold the World which is really Mick Ronson's baby.
      
      Speaking of Mick Ronson:
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGWYGR3xy2Y
      1. Slammer 9 years ago
        
        Man who Sold the World is really a metal album to be because of Mick Ronson.
        And Earl Slick, Carlos Alomar, i think Robert Fripp...fuck, Bowie always had GREAT bands
        
        Slammer 9 years ago
        
        metal album to me
    2. KDN 9 years ago
      
      Ditto. Such a quirky little album.
2. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
  
  Boring. Just... boring. I didn't hate his stuff, didn't like it, it was just... boring. Generic.
  
  Great if you love costumes and dancing. I don't. Give me a guy in a t shirt shredding on a battered old Martin.
  1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
    
    OMG. Now you've done it.
  2. Rich 9 years ago
    
    I'm gonna bet you don't like Bruce Springsteen or Steve Miller either.
    1. Lee G 9 years ago
      
      Does anyone like Springsteen?
      1. Rich 9 years ago
        
        OMG. Now you've done it.
      2. Citizen X 9 years ago
        
        Union-courting Democratic politicians?
      3. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        Yeh. ME.
      4. Bill Dalasio 9 years ago
        
        Decent songwriter who sounds like a constipated ape.
    2. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
      
      You would win that bet. Yawwwwwwwwn.
  3. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    You're wrong, and that's ok. Sometimes people have to be wrong, as a warning to the rest of mankind to make better choices.
  4. Zeb 9 years ago
    
    I've always thought he did a few really good songs and a good amount of sort of boring filler. One of those peopel who I am glad existed, but I'm not going to go out of my way to hear much of his music.
    1. Florida Man 9 years ago
      
      He taught me it's okay to wear outfits that expose your dong around under aged girls. God bless that man.
      1. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
        
        He taught me it's okay to wear outfits that expose your dong around under aged girls.
        
        For me, it came naturally.
    2. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
      
      I'm not going to go out of my way to hear much of his music
      
      You should.
      
      He had a ten year hot streak in which he put out 12 studio albums which range from pretty good to astonishing. During that time he also made a few movies and toured frequently, all while cultivating a massive cocaine addiction and storing his own urine in the fridge. And when they pulled him out of the oxygen tent, he asked for the latest parties. A superhuman decade, really.
      1. SugarFree 9 years ago
        
        This isn't rock and roll...
      2. Zeb 9 years ago
        
        Which albums do you consider astonishing? I'll try to check it out.
        
        invisible furry hand 9 years ago
        
        I'm sure others will chime in to disagree, but I'd suggest the concept albums from the early 70s (The rise and fall of Ziggy Stardust & the Spiders from Mars and Diamond Dogs) or maybe Hunky Dory for something less rock but which is filled with cracking tunes.
        
        He then becomes more experimental, and you might consider some of the tracks on these to be filler because they're less conventional, but Low and "Heroes", (and maybe Station to Station) would be my picks. But it's all worth listening to.
        
        It's not the side effects of the cocaine. I'm thinking that it must be love.
        
        Zeb 9 years ago
        
        Unconventional is right up my alley. It's more some of his more straightforward rock stuff that I don't find terribly compelling.
        
        invisible furry hand 9 years ago
        
        OK, you can safely try everything from Low to Scary Monsters then, because that's his krautrock / Kraftwerk period. I adore the title track to Station to Station, which is the album just before Low, but the album then becomes a bit safer, so it's probably not the best place to start. Even if you try Diamond Dogs, which is a sort of rock album, you'll hear the shift to more art pop kick in on side 2 (he then veered into plastic soul for Young Americans, which you can probably ignore, although it is fine in its own way).
        
        BigT 9 years ago
        
        Without Bowie would we have had Madonna or Lady Gaga?
        
        Not that I blame him for those living abortions.
  5. OO=======D 9 years ago
    
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sa6bI_95G9I
    1. OO=======D 9 years ago
      
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GA27aQZCQMk
  6. Azathoth!! 9 years ago
    
    Costumes?
    
    David Bowie didn't wear costumes.
    
    I mean..., if you really thought that.....well.....you'd just miss the whole point.
  7. gaoxiaen 9 years ago
    
    You must have been a little kid in the sixties or seventies.
Fist of Etiquette 9 years ago

...Bernie Sanders said Bernie Sanders was Democrats' most electable presidential candidate.

In Europe.
1. WTF 9 years ago
  
  You know what other socialist was an electable candidate in Europe?
  1. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    Man, i am just completely drawing a blank.
    1. gaoxiaen 9 years ago
      
      I wish that I were. Well, tequila.
  2. Paulpemb 9 years ago
    
    Barack Obama?
  3. Anomalous 9 years ago
    
    All of them?
2. Mickey Rat 9 years ago
  
  That only had to be true relative to the other Dem candidates.
invisible furry hand 9 years ago

Finally, someone has invented a vaginal speaker for foetuses. Behold, the babypod
1. Lee G 9 years ago
  
  Aren't there waterproof cases for iPhones already?
  1. Bobarian (Would Chip Her) 9 years ago
    
    What about an I-pad?
2. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
  
  that babies hearing external noise clearly is "solely possible via the vagina",
  
  There's the pseudoscience right there. Babies hear fine in the womb. But they just hear filtered sounds. That is what they are supposed to hear and what stimulates the development and bonds the baby with the mother's voice. Jamming a speaker into one's chocha so that the baby hears "clearly" is pseudoscientific crap.
  
  A sucker is born every minute.
  1. Matrix 9 years ago
    
    Not only that, but there may be the possibility that direct sounds could prove harmful to their hearing development. I'm not a doctor, but it seems plausible.
    
    I could see the unintended use of this... vibrations in that part of the body. Yeah, women will be using this for things other than it was intended.
    1. Anomalous 9 years ago
      
      Turn the bass way up.
      1. WTF 9 years ago
        
        Gotta love that Big Bottom.
    2. A Frayed Knot 9 years ago
      
      It will still be filtered - the sound will have to pass thru the cervix and aqueous environment in which the fetus is living.
      
      As for other purposes...I guess it depends on the the devices low frequency response characteristics...
      1. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
        
        Exactly. The word clearly is such crap anyway. What the hell does it mean for a fetus to hear clearly.
        
        Zeb 9 years ago
        
        Well, it's probably safe to say that the sound would be clearer. I.e. less attenuated at certain frequencies. But I don't think there is any reason to assume that that is a better situation for the developing fetus.
    3. Rich 9 years ago
      
      Yeah, women will be using this for things other than it was intended.
      
      SEXIST! Shove it up your ass!
      1. WTF 9 years ago
        
        I suppose that's an option....
      2. Libertarian 9 years ago
        
        "Honey, have you seen my ear buds?"
3. Mendelism 9 years ago
  
  Parents-to-be can share their babies' listening experience using split headphones which hang out of the vagina.
  
  Charming.
4. BigT 9 years ago
  
  Won't sell until they have an option to put it on vibrate.
  
  (and this has been posted at least twice before)
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Woman has surgery to remove catfish embedded in her stomach
The fish dug its spines into the woman's belly while she was swimming in Brazil

The fish embedded itself in her belly while she was swimming in the S?o Paulo beach resort of Itanha?m, Metro reported.

The woman was taken to hospital, where the fish and its spines were extracted from her skin in surgery, a local ambulance worker wrote on Facebook.

"We were alerted to an incident where an object had penetrated a swimmer's stomach and when we got there, discovered it was a fish," wrote Marcelo Araujo Tamada.
1. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
  
  Same one that lodges in the urethra?
  1. Just a thought not a sermon 9 years ago
    
    That's the candiru.
    1. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
      
      My mistake. I thought is was Warty.
      1. Citizen X 9 years ago
        
        The only barbs in Warty's urethra are his own.
Fist of Etiquette 9 years ago

The White House chief of staff said President Obama is still planning to close Guantanamo Bay.

Right after changing the culture of Washington, and Cash for Clunkers Part II.
1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
  
  He's gonna wait until the last day he's in office and make like Bat-Man and disappear into the night.
2. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
  
  And ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
Bee Tagger 9 years ago

Sean Penn's Rolling Stone interview with Joaqu?n Guzm?n Loera helped Mexico track the drug cartel leader down.

Is this interview the reason Twitter is considering expanding to 10,000 characters?
1. John 9 years ago
  
  Iowahawk described it as a mash up of Falcon and the Snowman and I am Sam.
  
  That guy really is a national treasure.
Lee G 9 years ago

Buy the Playboy Mansion, complete with aging zombie and couch stains
1. Just a thought not a sermon 9 years ago
  
  Pass.
2. John 9 years ago
  
  Ewww. The Rolling Stones said it was a dump in 1972. I can't imagine it has aged well.
  1. Certified Public Asshat 9 years ago
    
    The women somehow always stay young.
3. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
  
  I just saw the Curb Your Enthusiasm episode at the Playboy Mansion. That was fucking hilarious.
  1. Knarf Yenrab! 9 years ago
    
    I really, really miss that show.
4. Citizen X 9 years ago
  
  I bet it smells really funky.
  
  I'm talking about Hef, but probably the mansion too.
  1. Certified Public Asshat 9 years ago
    
    Moth balls and pu***, er, perfume.
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

Low-paid apprenticeships not attractive enough for most refugees
..."Odd jobs won't get the refugees anywhere," said Hans Peter Wollseifer from Germany's Skilled Crafts Organization. "We don't need hundreds of thousands of people pushing wheelbarrows. We need skilled people, and we need a large number of them."...
1. John 9 years ago
  
  Cytoxic assured everyone yesterday that these refugees don't need skills to make it in Germany. Just work, pick something up, move it, clean it.
  
  No shit, he actually said that.
  1. Irish ?s ESB 9 years ago
    
    It's insane. You cannot operate in a modern economy, especially in a highly bureaucratized Europe, without some sort of skill level. People who think Sweden's economy is going to be improved by massive numbers of unskilled laborers are completely delusional. They're going to be a net drain on the welfare state while also being more prone to criminality than native Swedes.
    
    Just wait until one of these European countries gets a large enough unassimilated, poor, unskilled Muslim minority to have their own political party that gets 15-20% of the vote. You could have governments that rely on deals being made between left-wing parties and unrepentant Islamists and people think this isn't going to be potentially catastrophic?
    1. Ra's al Gore 9 years ago
      
      Just wait until one of these European countries gets a large enough unassimilated, poor, unskilled Muslim minority to have their own political party that gets 15-20% of the vote.
      
      Submission: A Novel Hardcover ? October 20, 2015
      by Michel Houellebecq (Author), Lorin Stein (Translator)
      
      ... In an alliance with the Socialists, France's new Islamic party sweeps to power. Islamic law comes into force. Women are veiled, polygamy is encouraged, and Fran?ois is offered an irresistible academic advancement--on the condition that he convert to Islam....
      1. R C Dean 9 years ago
        
        You don't even need that. As Rotherham demonstrates, a much smaller number concentrated into a single district gives plenty of leverage.
2. UnCivilServant 9 years ago
  
  We need skilled people, and we need a large number of them.
  
  Which is not what you're getting in this migrants - who have a massive illiteracy rate from the latest data. Oh, and stop calling them refugees. If they made it all the way to Germany, they're not fleeing conflict, they're seeking money.
  1. John 9 years ago
    
    And stop saying this is free markets and open borders. In a free market system there would be no welfare and no incentive for these people to come. They are coming for welfare. That is not free market or free movement. That is just internationalized theft from the German people.
    1. Lee G 9 years ago
      
      Slight clarification. In a free market system, the incentive would be to come to work. If there were no demand, there would be little to no immigration. Welfare radically distorts the incentives.
      1. John 9 years ago
        
        Yes it does Lee. And it makes immigration an enormous problem where it otherwise would not be. If we didn't have public schools or welfare, immigration would not be an issue. Only people with family or real economic prospects would show up. The immigration rate would always correspond to the demand for new labor. When you add public services and welfare into the equation, immigration will always be unaturally high and damaging.
        
        robc 9 years ago
        
        Agreed...which makes the solution obvious.
        
        And it isnt stopping immigration.
        
        Ra's al Gore 9 years ago
        
        They aren't immigrants if the govt is paying their way here.
        
        John 9 years ago
        
        Yes it is Rob. At least until you can do something about welfare. Open borders with welfare is national suicide.
        
        robc 9 years ago
        
        Then do something about welfare.
        
        We have two proposed solutions, one which increases liberty and one which decreases liberty. Lets put our time and effort into the former.
        
        If we refuse to do it, we deserve to implode.
        
        *we* referring to the nation.
        
        Bill Dalasio 9 years ago
        
        Open borders with welfare is national suicide.
        
        This would have been more accurate. It just isn't the case that the welfare state would be success without those icky foreigners to muck it up. The truth is, there simply isn't enough of them to make an otherwise workable system fail. Welfare is a disaster because of math, not because of the immigrants.
        
        Rt. Hon. Judge Woodrow Chipper 9 years ago
        
        If we didn't have public schools or welfare, immigration would not be an issue.
        
        I agree that welfare's increasing disincentive to work creates the demand for unskilled immigrant labor.
        
        I would argue that, in some cases and the US being the most obvious, minimum wage is a greater magnet. Any immigrant willing to stay under the radar will work for less than minimum wage - which is something an employer just can't take the chance on with an actual citizen.
        
        I'm not sure about the public schools, it's not like the unskilled are adamant on their children going to school, other than maybe as a free baby-sitting service. There's enough unskilled Americans not sending their kids even to free school as proof. Public schools are welfare for the principals, administrators, the building trades, and half the teachers.
Bee Tagger 9 years ago

In an interview on This Week, Bernie Sanders said Bernie Sanders was Democrats' most electable presidential candidate.

Just imagine if he sets the career stolen base record, he might speak in the 6th person at that point.
1. Rich 9 years ago
  
  + at least 1 Bob Dole
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

German Justice Minister: Cologne attacks planned in advance
Germany's Justice Minister Heiko Maas was the latest high-profile politician to speak out about the string of sexual assaults in Cologne on Sunday. In an interview with the popular "Bild am Sonntag" newspaper, Maas voiced his suspicions that the crimes which have the whole country reeling were not the result of an opportunistic mob mentality but a thought-out, planned attack on the city's women.

"No one can tell me that it wasn't coordinated and prepared," the minister said. "My suspicion is that this specific date was picked, and a certain number of people expected. This would again add another dimension [to the crimes]."..
1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
  
  I thought it was a video?!?!?
  
  Can anyone confirm this?
  1. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
    
    We'd better start arresting Youtube film-makers and anyone critical of the administration, just to be sure.
  2. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
    
    Amazing how no video, cellphone or security, has surfaced. Just remarkable.
    1. Mr Lizard 9 years ago
      
      The Zuckerberg mammal is quite adept at blocking them
      1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        If only there were a way to disseminate information without Facebook.
        
        Mr Lizard 9 years ago
        
        Well yes there, and I'm sure we'll see them soon. I'm pretty convinced that he is pulling them as fast as he can. And I wouldn't put it past Google to do the same via YouTube. Basically I'm blaming the delay on the above. Eventually the intertubes will produce the videos.
        
        Rhywun 9 years ago
        
        That's cynical even for your species.
        
        Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        People said the same about Tea Partiers spitting and being racist. Me, I'll believe there's video when I see it.
        
        R C Dean 9 years ago
        
        Its frickin' Europe, and a big public area. Of course there is security cam video, and you know there has to be a ton of cell video.
        
        It is curious that none of this has surfaced, except for some video with celebratory fireworks and gunfire.
        
        Think about that, though. How is it possible that any "migrant" has a gun legally? Where did they get them? Why, one might even ask, does a migrant have a gun in the first place? Not that they don't have the same use for them as anybody else, but it strikes me as kind of odd that countries with strict gun control nonetheless have armed migrants wandering around.
        
        DEG 9 years ago
        
        The only video I've seen with guns is a video of a neighborhood in Berlin. Some folks took a Spiegel video, modified it a bit, and called it a video of activity in Cologne.
        
        Modified video
        
        Original Spiegel video
        
        DEG 9 years ago
        
        By the way, I don't claim credit for figuring out the modified video was original a Spiegel video. I broke my rule against reading youtube comments and dove into the comments on the modified video. Someone else figured it out and posted an analysis in the comments.
        
        Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        I don't speak German. So. What are they saying?
        
        DEG 9 years ago
        
        I only understood part of it. The Spiegel video is about some crazy New Year's celebration in a Berlin neighborhood.
    2. DEG 9 years ago
      
      I've poked around on YouTube. The only video I can find of the event are a bunch of idiots being stupid with fireworks between the Hauptbahnhof and the Dom.
2. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
  
  "No one can tell me that it wasn't coordinated and prepared," the minister said.
  
  It's always good to assert without evidence. It couldn't POSSIBLY be rich pickpocketing and robbery opportunities with gropes as diversions.
  1. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
    
    After his initial denial his strategy is becoming clear. He will hide behind the idea that it was organized crime and therefore doesn't really reflect on the migrant population.
    1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
      
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=382njADcWvE
      
      Someone posted this last night. I forget and too lazy to check.
      1. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
        
        "What in God's cock" is my new favourite phrase
    2. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
      
      Are Mexican migrants in Pasco, WA and Amarillo, TX responsible for MS-13 activity in Los Angeles?
      1. Illocust 9 years ago
        
        MS-13 is motivated by money. Rape gangs aren't. If every member of MS-13 died tomorrow someone would quickly fill the niche. The same is not true for the rape gangs.
        
        Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        "It's different this time."
        
        Spoiler: It never is.
        
        Illocust 9 years ago
        
        I throw a punch at my brother's stomach. Some random dude on the street throws a punch at my brother's stomach. Same action by different people with different motivations results in a different situation and different appropriate response.
        
        Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        So, your theory is that if we collectively held all migrants responsible for rape, that would stop rape from happening.
        
        How do you like your Second Amendment?
  2. DEG 9 years ago
    
    There are shit-tons of beggars and pickpockets hanging around Cologne's Hauptbahnhof and Dom.
    
    On my times in Cologne's Hauptbahnhof, I heard many announcements about pickpockets in the station. I think pickpocket targeted me while I was walking through the station, and he changed his mind when I glared at him. The beggars are quite aggressive. One flipped me off when I refused to give him money and another called me an asshole for refusing to hand over money.
  3. Rt. Hon. Judge Woodrow Chipper 9 years ago
    
    And who goes out on New Year' Eve?
3. Rich 9 years ago
  
  "No one can tell me that it wasn't coordinated and prepared," the minister said.
  
  Minister, it wasn't coordinated and prepared.
  1. Swiss Servator 9 years ago
    
    HE SAID YOU CAN'T DO THAT!
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

SEX CRIMES ACROSS GERMANY: THE COVERUP UNRAVELS
...Broadcaster ZDF had to apologise for a 'cover up' after it failed to report the Cologne story for three days, even though it knew about it.

And until Thursday, a week after the attacks, there had been silence from Mrs Merkel's ministers about the backgrounds of the perpetrators. Initially, they insisted there was no evidence that new migrants were involved in the violence....
1. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
  
  See also
  
  Sweden's foreign minister has dared to tell the truth about Saudi Arabia
  
  I wonder if the long anticipated feminist brush fire is finally starting to spread through Europe, or whether the progressive feminists will in the end, shut up and stay on the reservation.
  1. Medical Physics Guy 9 years ago
    
    oops meant for this to follow the next article
  2. John 9 years ago
    
    I will believe it when I see it. I think what might happen is women will stand up and tell the truth for their own safety and feminists will go down in flames denying it for the cause.
  3. Illocust 9 years ago
    
    It won't matter. The sexist culture feminist protest is the culture they observe in their daily lives. A.K.A. liberal enclave culture. Refugees won the instersectionality contest, so feminist are going to have to step out of the way.
    1. Free Society 9 years ago
      
      A.K.A. liberal enclave culture. Refugees won the instersectionality contest, so feminist are going to have to step out of the way.
      
      There are already protesters in Cologne calling for an end to racism and injustice towards immigrants. You can't make this shit up.
      1. R C Dean 9 years ago
        
        And the cops are taking their side, and going after the "conservative" protestors who want migrants to stop molesting and raping.
2. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
  
  At the risk at rebooting this debate seeing how intense it can get,
  
  "The anti-immigration Sweden Democrats Party has repeatedly made the claim that the high number of rape reports is at least partly due to the influx of Muslim immigrants.[34][35] Two reports from the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention (BR?) are relevant to the rate of rape among immigrants to Sweden and their descendants. The latest published report that indicates the association between immigrants and rape was published in 2005 and revealed that from 1997 to 2001 foreign born individuals were 5.5 times more likely to be charged of rape than individuals born in Sweden to two Swedish parents and that foreign born individuals from all regions, apart from East Asia, committed sexual assaults at rates up to 5.3 times greater than that of individuals born in Sweden to two Swedish parents.[36]
  1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
    
    The report doesn't break down the foreign born category by country of origin despite the fact that country of origin ...has been found to be highly predictive of crime rates in other Nordic countries.[37] However, a 1996 report by the BR? did break down rate of rape convictions by country of origin, using data from 1985 to 1989 it found particularly high rates of rape convictions among certain immigrant groups. Among the highest rates we individuals born in Iraq, North Africa (Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia), Africa (excluding Uganda and the North African countries), and Romanian/Bulgaria who were convicted of rape at rates 20, 23, 17, and 18 times greater than individuals born in Sweden respectively.[18] Although, according to crime victim surveys from the BR?, the actual rate of sex crimes has been more or less unchanged in Sweden between 2005 and 2014, despite the fact that immigration has increased during the same time period."
    
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_Sweden
    1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
      
      There is no part of "predictive" crime analysis that gives me warm, happy thoughts. Let's stick with waiting until someone commits a crime, catching them, and punishing them and them alone.
      1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        Yeh. While I'm not gonna dismiss these stories outright or narrative accounts from my friends and family across the pond, the fact is I can't conflate their experiences with what's happening here. In Montreal, we have a large Muslim community and have yet to see this or hear about it in the news.
        
        Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        They're just covering it up. This is known.
        
        *turns brain back on*
        
        I've never seen a bunch of men make such a stink about investigating two rapes. And groping? Name me anyone here who previously thought groping was an emergency, instead of just an enthusiastic hello.
        
        Michael Ejercito 9 years ago
        
        That is because it was a different set of Muslims that migrated to Quebec than the ones who migrated to Germany.
        
        Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        Perhaps. Maybe it'll change with the 'refugees'.
        
        Mind you, I don't think they can come and swarm like they do over there. For starters, it's -20 with the wind chill.
3. Drake 9 years ago
  
  The silence on sexual assaults by Muslim immigrants in Europe is fascinating. Feminist cultures that have systematically feminized their boys and ostracized those who rejected the indoctrination, but have also imported millions from a cultures where sexual violence is commonplace. They are too PC to even describe what is happening, much less address the problem.
  
  http://stuartschneiderman.blog.....islam.html
  1. Michael Ejercito 9 years ago
    
    It is as the feminist leadership is acting contrary to morality and feminism.
    1. BigT 9 years ago
      
      It is as [if] the feminist leadership is acting contrary to morality and feminism.
      
      Ready for Hillary??
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

Exposing Major PC Cover-up in Sweden ? Leading Daily Dagens Nyheter Refused to Write About Cologne-like Sex Crimes in Central Stockholm
...Then Wierup continues, pondering why the events haven't been covered in the media previously. He claims it's "unclear" (why that is), despite that his colleague Hanne Kj?ller, according to the psychologist, explained that the editor at Dagens Nyheters Stockholm section earlier dismissed the whole story as "SD fabrications".

"Why the widespread sexual harassments, in the midst of central Stockholm, with some minor exception, were left in a media shadow, is unknown to me. But the very suspicion that the sexual assaults were considered awkward to (write about) is a betrayal of the victims", writes Wierup in the very same newspaper that covered up the whole incident to begin with.

After Wierups article is published, some readers are catching on. Andreas Ericson, editor at the now-canceled magazine Neo, is pondering on Twitter if Dagens Nyheter is withholding some information....
1. Paulpemb 9 years ago
  
  So, can we start describing the media's refusal to report on criminal actions by immigrants as 'Stockholm Syndrome'?
  1. Swiss Servator 9 years ago
    
    And we can describe my gaze as *narrowed*
2. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
  
  Wow, that almost sounds as dangerous as being a college student at an Ivy League university.
3. Michael Ejercito 9 years ago
  
  How is what they are doing different than what the Catholic Church did?
  1. BigT 9 years ago
    
    The good fathers were plugging young boys - complete outrage. These god-fearing Mooslims are dorking young womens - no problem. Muhammeds will be Muhammeds.
    
    It's the patriarchy at work.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Zentai: Japanese dress in full-body suits to escape pressures of modern life

Japanese professionals, office workers and pensioners are dressing in full-body lycra suits to escape the pressures of modern day life.

According to experts, the craze called Zentai, provides welcome relief from a society that demands conformity.

University student Yukinko spends most of her time in the library or at choir practice by day, but she is also a member of the secret Zentai club.

"My family is conservative. They like me to be quiet and feminine but in secret I wear all over tights and let loose," she said.

Yukinko dresses in the lycra suit once a week and said she only feels totally liberated and free in her "second skin".

"I'm a different person wearing this. I can be friendly to anyone and I feel as if I can do anything," she said.
1. Rich 9 years ago
  
  "People can't see us and its difficult to see them," Zentai leader Seiwa Tamura said. "So whether one is a teacher or public servant, we become without identity and our true self emerges".
  
  Especially after falling into an open manhole.
2. Just a thought not a sermon 9 years ago
  
  "They like me to be quiet and feminine but in secret I wear all over tights and let loose"
  
  ???
  
  I knew a real conservative girl in college who's idea of letting loose was to listen to PDQ Bach. She would laugh and laugh. I can't imagine what losing her virginity must have been like for her, assuming it's ever happened.
  1. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    I think a good friend of mine from high school married her.
3. Rhywun 9 years ago
  
  Leave it to Japan to out-weird the plants-sprouting-out-of-your-head thing from China.
  1. Swiss Servator 9 years ago
    
    Its a weirdness arms race in the East!
    1. Slammer 9 years ago
      
      Japan will always win
      1. Rhywun 9 years ago
        
        China is losing only because of the commies. Get them out and then we'll have a real battle on our hands.
        
        Citizen X 9 years ago
        
        +1 Greater East Asian Weirdness Sphere
    2. Rhywun 9 years ago
      
      Eastasia has always been at weird-war with itself.
      1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        And thank all your gods, else we might not have the rich anime collection we enjoy today.
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

Prophet Mohamed cartoons 'censored' at Charlie Hebdo memorial exhibition in Israel
Two cartoonists have reportedly claimed they had their drawings of the Prophet Mohamed censored during an exhibition in Israel commemorating the Charlie Hebdo attack.

The artworks were part of an exhibition called Apr?s Charlie, or 'After Charlie', taking place in the French Institute of Tel Aviv to coincide with the first anniversary of the attacks at the Paris offices of the satirical magazine.

The Times of Israel reports that one caricaturist featured says his art work was removed, whilst another says his was partially covered with a sticker....
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

Vladimir Putin says he didnt intend to scare dog-phobic Angela Merkel when he brought his Labrador to a meeting

Is Spiked Online Editor Luke Gittos A Sexual Cuckservative?
1. Lee G 9 years ago
  
  Merkel is afraid of a big, dumb, Black Lab? Really?
  1. John 9 years ago
    
    But she thinks hundreds of thousands of young, Syrian men are no threat whatsoever. That is fucked up.
2. Juvenile Bluster 9 years ago
  
  You post RoK links just to get me angry, don't you.
3. Free Society 9 years ago
  
  Is Spiked Online Editor Luke Gittos A Sexual Cuckservative?
  
  How very rambly .
4. Cdr Lytton 9 years ago
  
  Putin is the master of fucking with other world leaders. If you had a shellfish allergy, it's would be a seafood dinner at the Kremlin that night, staged in a way to make refusing look bad. "And here are the Russian fishermen who caught tonight's dinner. They're hard working salt of the earth men who want to know how much you appreciate their labor." or something like that.
  1. Illocust 9 years ago
    
    I'm sorry, but is it bad that this is what makes him one of my favorite world leaders. Not in a policy way, but his attitude.
    1. Cdr Lytton 9 years ago
      
      Not at all. Especially since those people usually aren't used to being fucked with. And they're too wrapped up in these polite fictions to call him out on it. Hoisted by their own retard.
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

Drunk with power - how Prohibition led to big government | New York Post
...In fact, the national constitutional ban on the sale, production and transportation of alcohol was critical, she argues, to the building of our modern American state. This state had been "interventionist yet weak, heavy on coercion yet light on social welfare" before Prohibition. After repeal, Americans found themselves reeling from years of violent crime, which government authorities had handled with disgraceful incompetence and corruption.

They also found themselves with a newly established federal penal system that encompassed a powerful FBI, streamlined federal record-keeping, a national crime commission, immense prison growth combined with professionalized prison administration and, writes McGirr, "muscular federal policing" that included extensive new authority. Thanks to Prohibition, crime had become both "a national problem and a national obsession," and the results were dire.

The logic of Prohibition, chillingly, "put the private home at special risk," says McGirr.
1. WTF 9 years ago
  
  At least the government had the decency to actually pass an amendment to give them the constitutional power to ban booze.
  1. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
    
    Yeah, prohibition was a bad and anti-liberty policy, but i appreciate that its advocates at least acknowledged that they otherwise lacked the power to enact it.
2. Just a thought not a sermon 9 years ago
  
  In Last Call, Daniel Okrent explains how the 16th, 18th, and 19th amendments were all intertwined, and all progressive causes. The Prohibition amendment (18th) couldn't pass until the Income Tax (16th) did, as the federal government needed a way to replace all the lost revenue from taxes on alcohol. And both of those relied on providing women the right to vote (19th), as it was women who heavily supported the temperance movement.
  1. UnCivilServant 9 years ago
    
    How could the 19th have helped pass the 18th and the 16th?
    1. WTF 9 years ago
      
      Don't stop him, he's on a roll.
3. BigT 9 years ago
  
  government is like beer...
  
  ..both the cause of, and [for liberals] the answer to, all of life's problems.
Fist of Etiquette 9 years ago

At a rally in Nevada, Donald Trump criticized NFL penalties for head-on-head collisions, calling the football league, like America, weak.

Brain injuries would only strengthen his voter base.
1. Drake 9 years ago
  
  I have to agree with Trump - I turned off the Bengals-Steelers game after that unnecessary roughness on a defenseless receiver penalty - for a hit five steps after the guy caught the ball.
  1. Idle Hands 9 years ago
    
    I don't see how that was "dirty" but the Steelers hit that took out Bernard was "clean". .
    1. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
      
      I was more surprised that Ryan Shazier didn't get an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty for all of his swaggering and dancing and gesturing during the 10 minutes that Bernard was lying on the field writhing in agony and being examined by the medical staff.
2. Overt 9 years ago
  
  Trump would bring back real lions and gladiators if he could.
Derpmaster General 9 years ago

I submit the following linked photograph from my days at Mizzou Law a couple years ago.

http://postimg.org/image/7zt92t6w7/
Bee Tagger 9 years ago

At a rally in Nevada, Donald Trump criticized NFL penalties for head-on-head collisions, calling the football league, like America, weak.

He makes me want to use my head as a stylus and slam it into the ballot for Trump later this year.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

keep it classy...

6 arrested in assaults at Steelers-Bengals game

Emotions ran high on the field and in the stands during the Cincinnati Bengals and Pittsburgh Steelers Wild-Card game Saturday night, leading to at least six fan arrests by the game's end.

The rivalry between the two teams reached a boiling point in Saturday's game that concluded the Bengals' playoff dreams with a 18-16 loss. That tension extended to some fans who chose to take out frustrations with punches, headbutts, and one man even urinated on another inside Paul Brown Stadium, according to police. In total, three Bengals fans and three Steelers fans were arrested.
1. Swiss Servator 9 years ago
  
  "one man even urinated on another inside Paul Brown Stadium"
  
  OK, which one of you was this?
  1. Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
    
    /looks up innocently and whistles.
    
    Next year, Ravens.
  2. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    It's Ohio - is this even news?
    1. BigT 9 years ago
      
      And I suppose YOU've never pissed in the stands at a football game!
      
      I was surprised at how few things were thrown on the field - and NO whiskey bottles! The wussification of america is complete.
  3. Certified Public Asshat 9 years ago
    
    Like any of us would really be Bengals fans.
  4. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
    
    The article doesn't identify which team the urinater supported.
    
    Aw, who am I kidding? Has to have been a Bengals fan.
2. Juvenile Bluster 9 years ago
  
  But remember, Philly fans are the worst! Why, they once threw snowballs at Santa Claus!
  1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
    
    Yeh but as you know better than me, the thing about that is it wasn't necessarily done for its own sake. The late 60s and 70s were a dark time for Eagles football and they had had enough and were reacting to Kuharich's poor reign. Hence, fuck you Santa.
    1. Juvenile Bluster 9 years ago
      
      Oh, I know that very well. It's just that it was 50 years ago. At some point ESPN has to stop talking about it. After that all they have is a couple of drunk idiots throwing batteries at JD Drew in 1998 and that retard fuckhole Angelo Cataldi getting a few people up to NY to boo Donovan McNabb at the draft. If this happened in Philly, it would be top news on ESPN for a week.
      
      *grumble*.
      1. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
        
        Philly fans are assholes. Back in the pre-Bryce days, when the Nats were terrible and the Phillies were decent, Philly fans would regularly descend upon Nats park from Philadelphia or Jersey or whatever pee-pee-soaked heckhole they are from, and harass everyone and generally act like assholes.
        
        I also recall an incident in Philadelphia in which Jayson Werth broke his wrist catching a fly ball and left the field to chants of "Werthless."
      2. OneOut 9 years ago
        
        Eagles fans once cheered while Michael Irwin lay unconsious on the field and immobile with a spinal injury
        
        There was once youtube video of an eagles fan with his fingers down his throat puking on a teenage girl in the seat below him. She was a fan of the other winning team.
        
        My in laws from eastern PA hate the Eagles because of crap like that.
        
        OneOut 9 years ago
        
        Michael Irvin
        
        OneOut 9 years ago
        
        Michael Irvin
        
        EMD 9 years ago
        
        Irving Washington.
3. What's that smell? 9 years ago
  
  They all seemed to have punched women in the face. What are they...Syrian Refugees? (insert rim-shot)
4. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
  
  The Steelers prove it's better to be lucky than good this season. Holy mackerel were the Bengals retarded.
  1. WTF 9 years ago
    
    The Seahawks were pretty damn lucky, too.
    1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
      
      Yeah.
  2. KDN 9 years ago
    
    As I explained to my wife while watching the Jets choke away the season, things have a way of working out for the Steelers.
    
    I fully expect some freak injury or extremely unlikely chain of events to happen that will ensure the Steelers' appearance in the Golden Anniversary Bowl. God is a Steelers fan, after all.
    1. Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
      
      As a Bills fan I share your Jets fan pain. The Cardinals have not won a Super Bowl and have been terrible for long stretches, so I am rooting for them. Also, I appreciate Bruce Arians' Kangol collection.
      1. KDN 9 years ago
        
        I jumped on the Chiefs bandwagon, but I'm not rooting against anyone in the NFC. Especially Carolina, since Cam being a SB hero would cause aneurysms throughout the sports punditocracy.
        
        Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
        
        $cam Newton?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
        
        KDN 9 years ago
        
        HE DISRESPECTS THE GAME! HE'S BAD FOR THE NFL! THINK OF THE CHILDREN THAT WATCH THESE SHENANIGANS!
        
        /faints
    2. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
      
      So THIS.
      
      Like it happened with Dalton. I stand by if he's in there they lose. They counter they didn't have Bell but Dalton is the bigger loss in my view. You know, QB.
Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago

17 Items Every Fan Of 'The Golden Girls' Needs ASAP
1. Pray to all the Golden Girl Saints with these candles.
2. Live your life with this motto on this coffee mug.
6. This awesome toilet seat will definitely be a conversation starter. Hopefully the convo takes place after it's been used
9. Make sure you're ready for sexy time with these panties.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Experts Blame Obama for North Korea's New Nukes

News of a North Korean nuclear test earlier this week set off an explosion of finger-pointing by Republican presidential candidates?Barack Obama, they say, is to blame for the American failure to halt the hermit state's progress on developing weapons.

Normally such a rabid rush to pin a crisis on Obama could be shrugged off as partisanship, but in this case. Nuclear nonproliferation experts agree: Obama, they claim, is responsible for the failure of America to prevent North Korea from expanding its nuclear program. America's strategy on North Korea in the first years of the Obama administration, was led by the White House and National Security Council.

The Obama administration concept of 'strategic patience' emerged early on in the administration after the scathing experience of North Korea's 2009 nuclear test. The strategy essentially demanded that North Koreans recommit to concrete steps towards denuclearization?such as allowing inspectors and freezing fissile material production?as a precondition of any future talks.
invisible furry hand 9 years ago

New atheists must become new vegans: Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins and the extra burden on moral leaders
1. Longtorso, Johnny 9 years ago
  
  Can I just stick to being an old, meat eating atheist? When they want to extend 'rights' to my bacon, they're gearing up for a govt crackdown on dissent on the issue.
2. John 9 years ago
  
  This is why atheists are so silly and pathetic. Does Dawkins think that the eternal nothingness that he thinks awaits him after death will be different if only he lives by the "right moral values", whatever those are?
  
  I would posit that the problem is not that Dawkins and those like him don't believe in God. The problem is that they believe in God but think they are God. Dawkins thinks we should all be vegetarians. Good for him. As for everyone else, what the hell difference does it make?
  1. Zeb 9 years ago
    
    Some atheists, John. Come on. And plenty of silly and pathetic religious people out there too.
    
    That said, these guys are a bit silly and pathetic. It's too bad. Dawkins, at least, is a very interesting thinker. Too bad he can't shut the fuck up about telling everyone what they should think and do and just write about the things he has something interesting to say about.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      I make no comment about Dawkins' ability in his original field and I give him credit for standing up to Islam. When Dawkins starts talking about metaphysics he gets very silly very quickly.
      1. Zeb 9 years ago
        
        Yes, he sure does. It's pretty sad what passes for new philosophy these days.
  2. BakedPenguin 9 years ago
    
    Here you go, John.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      Back at you Penquin.
      
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxFmkg5dcyk
      
      CS Lewis takes the idea of truth and meaning, or complete lack thereof, in a Godless universe and explains it better than anyone.
      1. BakedPenguin 9 years ago
        
        You missed the point. He's a UK atheist who wants a stop to Muslim immigration. "Atheist" means nothing in regard to other political positions, but feel free to keep collectivizing.
      2. Zeb 9 years ago
        
        I quite like Lewis, but the problem I always have with that line of argument is why would you assume that truth and meaning are universal things and not something about human minds (or comparable intelligences) and language?
        I know this is a huge simplification, but it always seems to come down to "I want to believe in a universe where truth and meaning are somehow absolute, so there must be a God."
        
        I find a similar problem with his famous trilemma. There is a fourth option which seems the most likely, and that is that the Jesus of the Bible is a fictional character, perhaps based on a real religious figure.
        
        John 9 years ago
        
        It doesn't assume that at all Zeb. It in fact assumes the opposite. If there is no God and no eternal life then it doesn't matter whether whether there is eternal truth or meaning. Atheists are always spouting off about truth as if it is somehow self evident that truth exists or that knowing it is some universally good end even if it does.
        
        If we all are destined to eternal nothingness, who cares whether we know the truth? A comfortable life living a lie sounds a lot better than a miserable one knowing the "truth" whatever that is. In a Godless universe, the only thing that matters is the individual.
        
        How should one live in such a universe? The answer is not that they should be immoral. It is that they should be amoral, as in utterly lacking in morals. You just do whatever makes you happy and allows you best to get through life whatever that is. There is no right or wrong way, no truth, justice or meaning. There is just beings coming into and going out of existence and trying to make whatever they choose out of the experience.
        
        Zeb 9 years ago
        
        As an argument for the existence of God, it must assume that. As an illustration of the consequences of a godless universe it doesn't, as you say.
        
        But the thing is, if there isn't a God and a universal morality, then there isn't. "Wouldn't it be nice for the universe to be like X" isn't a good argument for the universe actually being like X.
        
        As to the question of how one should live or what matters or who cares about truth is entirely up to the individual. I'd also point out that doing whatever makes you happy is, in fact, a system of morality. And the one that most people live by. Do you think that people take up religion because it makes them unhappy?
        
        BigT 9 years ago
        
        How should one live in such a universe? The answer is not that they should be immoral. It is that they should be amoral, as in utterly lacking in morals. You just do whatever makes you happy and allows you best to get through life whatever that is.
        
        Complete nonsense.
        
        "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" is a very pragmatic statement. And it has nothing to do with any gods. Morals do NOT come from religion or god, they are innate human characteristics that have developed as a means of survival/prospering that have been hijacked (ok, adapted) by shamans and priests for their own purposes.
        
        MJGreen - Docile Citizen 9 years ago
        
        I know this is a huge simplification, but it always seems to come down to "I want to believe in a universe where truth and meaning are somehow absolute, so there must be a God."
        
        In at least one of these conversations, that's what John's argument amounted to. His response to a godless universe is that it sounds really depressing. He does nothing to address the actual argument that there is no divine power, we are just organisms with better brains, religion and morality are subjective social constructions, etc. He just says, as he does here, that such a reality sounds bad, so... therefore it can't be true?
        
        Zeb 9 years ago
        
        I happen to think that a godless, meaningless universe presents many wonderful possibilities. And lots of bad ones. Which sounds like the world we live in.
        
        But in any case, who says the universe owes us meaning and intelligibility? It's a pretty huge assumption without much basis.
3. Hyperbolical (wadair) 9 years ago
  
  t's time that Sam Harris' fellow scientists and public intellectuals start realizing that the ethics of eating meat is an important issue. As each one of them is arguably attempting to contribute to building a just and humane global civilization, they should stop pretending that nonhuman animals are not its citizens.
  
  Because every religion needs dietary restrictions and other purity laws to be complete.
Bee Tagger 9 years ago

The White House chief of staff said President Obama is still planning to close Guantanamo Bay.

When will the teleprompter tell him to do it?
1. Libertarian 9 years ago
  
  Wouldn't it be cool, so very, very cool, if some hacker managed to take control of his teleprompter? Hilarity. It would ensue.
  1. Swiss Servator 9 years ago
    
    "Fuck you, San Diego!"
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

David McGinnis ?@dav_mcg 2h2 hours ago
I genuinely didn't think David Bowie could die. I thought he would just return to his home planet.
1. Cdr Lytton 9 years ago
  
  RIP David Bowie. I saw him on his last tour. Took a stadium and made it feel like a smaller intimate venue and just got the crowd going. One of the best concerts I've ever been to.
  1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
    
    For me it was The Wiggles.
    1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
      
      Would.
      1. Swiss Servator 9 years ago
        
        C'mon, Tim. -1 Captain Feathersword.
        
        Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        Greg's a hot potato. Raaowr.
        
        Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
        
        Ew.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Suspect Shot by Paris Police Tied to German Migrant House

The man shot to death by the police in Paris last week as he approached a police station with a meat cleaver and fake explosives was a petty criminal who used multiple identities and who lived in a house for asylum seekers in Germany's most populous state, the German police said on Sunday.

But the authorities in France have not fully confirmed that account, which comes amid increasing tensions in Germany about the influx of more than a million migrants over the past year. A wave of assaults against women in Cologne on New Year's Eve has led Chancellor Angela Merkel to propose tougher asylum regulations.

Late Saturday, the police in the western German state of North-Rhine Westphalia acted on a tip from the French authorities and raided an asylum shelter in the town of Recklinghausen, where the man had been living, the state police said.
1. Free Society 9 years ago
  
  A wave of assaults against women in Cologne on New Year's Eve has led Chancellor Angela Merkel to propose tougher asylum regulations.
  
  After she lets in the equivalent of a large destitute middle eastern city set up shop. A wee bit late for that.
  1. Rhywun 9 years ago
    
    The next German elections ought to be interesting... considering that all of the major parties are to the left of Merkel except a couple "far-right" ones that the media are always hyperventilating about.
    1. Free Society 9 years ago
      
      I love Germany, I've got many German friends who are some of my favorite people on Earth and I've spent lots of time there. But Germans are fairly susceptible to groupthink. One thing that always annoyed me was their grossly overzealous approach to following minor rules. I was nearly assaulted by an angry mob in Koln for jay walking, there were no cars and my little crime caused no problems at all, but the other people in the crosswalk were absolutely enraged that I crossed and they were still waiting for the little hand signal. They acted as though I stole their crosswalk, that I deprived them of something. I find that mindset completely baffling.
      
      So it will be an interesting election. I think we're more likely to see left parties move slightly right than we are to see right parties win elections.
      1. Rhywun 9 years ago
        
        I love Germany too and yep, they do like their rules - but I think that same trait is also why "the trains run on time"* and there seems to be less corruption than we're used to.
        
        *And when they don't, they apologize for it.
      2. Rhywun 9 years ago
        
        I was nearly assaulted by an angry mob in Koln for jay walking
        
        I tend to go with the flow so I imagine when I lived there long ago, I probably waited along with everyone else. "When in Rome"...
2. R C Dean 9 years ago
  
  a petty criminal who used multiple identities and who lived in a house for asylum seekers
  
  If the frickin' Germans can't even vet these people (and there's no way an active petty criminal should be a recognized asylum seeker), then I don't think anyone can.
Rich 9 years ago

the Democratic debate on Sunday

*Never* on a Sunday!
Ivan Pike 9 years ago

Remains of lost 1800s whaling fleet discovered off Alaska's Arctic coast.

NOAA archaeologists have discovered the battered hulls of two 1800s whaling ships nearly 144 years after they and 31 others sank off the Arctic coast of Alaska in one of the planet's most unexplored ocean regions.
1. John 9 years ago
  
  I read a good book about that. The entire fleet was sunk after the war had ended by a Confederate privateer who had not gotten the news.
  1. Restoras 9 years ago
    
    I'm surprised they were sunk. You'd think the prize value would have been high for all those ships.
  2. Ivan Pike 9 years ago
    
    You must be thinking of something else. From the article.
    
    The shipwrecks, and parts of other ships, that were found are most likely the remains of 33 ships trapped by pack ice close to the Alaskan Arctic shore in September 1871. The whaling captains had counted on a wind shift from the east to drive the ice out to sea as it had always done in years past.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      My mistake. I was thinking of this
      
      http://www.adn.com/article/201.....bering-sea
      1. Ivan Pike 9 years ago
        
        Nice, I hadn't seen that before.
      2. commodious spittoon 9 years ago
        
        This would make a terrific movie. Better than the snoozer Melville flick last year, anyway.
    2. OneOut 9 years ago
      
      The rescue wasn't nearly as cut and dried as the article made it seem.
      
      The whale boats were in a spot where the whaling was excellent the year before but this was during a time period when whale population had been decimated in most places and they had nowhere else to go with expectations of success.
      
      That is why they stayed later in the summer than was smart.
      
      When the anticipated wind shift didn't come as it had in past summers it was a disaster in the making. There were an unusual number of captian's wives and children in the fleet because they expected to be able to stay in one place to fill their holds and not have to visit numerous whaleing grounds around the world as usual in that time of whale stock declines..
      
      They had to take to the wgale boats and sail the overlaoded and open decked boats about 80 to 1200 miles in freezing seas.
      
      The seas were angry that fall my friend.
      
      They were lucky to have survived It wasn't the cake walk the article makes it sound like.
Drake 9 years ago

Obama and his hack SecDef trying their best to fuck up my Marine Corps before they leave.

http://lucianne.com/thread/?artnum=858093
1. Free Society 9 years ago
  
  I think he has just the right skill set to succeed. No one is better at blundering and just generally fucking shit up.
  1. Drake 9 years ago
    
    My hope is that they are such piss-poor managers, the Commandant will succeed in delaying any action for a year with studies and time-wasting committee reports/
Rich 9 years ago

Obama is still planning to close Guantanamo Bay.

What, like with a naval blockade or something?
1. Raven Nation 9 years ago
  
  +1 Remember the Maine
Rich 9 years ago

"All warrying parties are regularly informed of the GPS coordinates of the medical sites where MSF works," said Raquel Ayora, the group's director of operations.

"Warrying" -- I like it!
1. Juvenile Bluster 9 years ago
  
  So long as they don't send their coordinates to all Wartying parties.
  1. Mr Lizard 9 years ago
    
    Warty does house calls?
    1. Citizen X 9 years ago
      
      Why did you think the Middle East was so fucked up?
      1. Mr Lizard 9 years ago
        
        I thought that was STEVE SMITH doing nation building?
        
        Citizen X 9 years ago
        
        STEVE SMITH's preferred habitat of dense woodland largely doesn't exist over there anymore, thanks to the Sumerians, Assyrians, Achaemenids, etc. That's why there is an open rapist niche for Daesh et al to exploit.
        
        Swiss Servator 9 years ago
        
        STEVE SMITH READY TO JUMP IN ON EUROPEAN ACTION - BUT RESTRICTED TO BLACK FOREST RIGHT NOW.
Zeb 9 years ago

I'm boycotting Bowie's death until we get more on Lemmy. Lemmy was at least as important and far more awesome than Bowie.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

But let's not focus on the "winner" here because the real winner of the lottery system is not the person who buys the winning ticket. The real winner is the government, which taxes the winner. The government automatically withholds 25%, but the winner will be bumped into the highest marginal tax bracket in the case of the lump sum. In addition, the player will very likely pay a state tax (usually 4% to 9%) and perhaps even local taxes. While the Powerball will be marketed as a $900 million prize, the actual payout to a winner in, say, Washington D.C., will be only $289.6 million ? a full 68% less than advertised.

On the other hand: You should really buy a Powerball ticket today

Importantly, the revenue from the lottery is itself a type of tax often termed the "poor tax," given that the lottery has a disproportionately negative impact on the poor. Typically, about 25% of the revenue goes to fund state programs, but according to Duke University economics professor Charles Clotfelter, author of "Selling Hope: State Lotteries in America," there's little evidence that this has any meaningful positive economic effect. Sadly, a whopping 15% of the revenue goes to financing the marketing of this gigantic economic drag. So the lottery system actually looks a lot more like a massive back-door tax scheme than anything else.

http://www.marketwatch.com/sto.....2016-01-10
1. Zeb 9 years ago
  
  But we totally aren't taxing rich people enough.
2. Rich 9 years ago
  
  25% of the revenue goes to fund state programs, but ... there's little evidence that this has any meaningful positive economic effect.
  
  Oh, very well. Make it 30%.
3. Illocust 9 years ago
  
  Yep, and even better, if you try to set your family up for life the government is going to take another cut of the money you give them. Thankfully my state doesn't have an income tax, so that's a little more money I'd get to keep.
  1. Certified Public Asshat 9 years ago
    
    But if we just let people give money away while they are alive, how would we tax them when they are dead?
4. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
  
  The Illinois Lotto is too broke to pay winners, but is still selling tickets.
  
  Some lucky dog.
5. Juvenile Bluster 9 years ago
  
  Fun fact (may say this in the article, too lazy to click): The US is the only first-world country that taxes lottery winnings.
  1. Certified Public Asshat 9 years ago
    
    As bad as California is with taxes, it does not tax lottery winnings.
  2. kbolino 9 years ago
    
    They're also the only first-world (and maybe only non-Communist) country that taxes foreign income of its citizens and corporations.
    
    FYTW
6. Libertarian 9 years ago
  
  I live in a state without an income tax, so don't know how it works. But couldn't the winner move, for example, from NY to FL in February and not get taxed on the income he received in January for the taxable year of 2016?
  1. Certified Public Asshat 9 years ago
    
    No, the income was earned in NY. FL is also littered with auditors who work for NY.
7. MJGreen - Docile Citizen 9 years ago
  
  Well, yeah. That's the only reason so many states deign to allow this form of gambling.
8. Akira 9 years ago
  
  "Importantly, the revenue from the lottery is itself a type of tax often termed the "poor tax," given that the lottery has a disproportionately negative impact on the poor."
  
  Lottery tickets are something that the poor people CHOOSE to buy, though. It's not like the lottery is some kind of ethereal force that just takes money from peoples' pockets and takes it from the poor more than anyone.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Gallup: Share of Democrats reaches record low

The share of Americans identifying as Democrats dropped to a record low in 2015, according to the latest Gallup results published Monday, in the latest indication that Americans' attachment to either political party is at or nearing historical lows.

Overall, 42 percent over the course of the past year identified as independents, a slight drop from the 43 percent who identified as such in 2014. While Democrats maintained a small advantage over Republicans ? 29 percent to 26 percent ? the Democratic share is at its lowest in Gallup history.

Prior to 2015, the lowest share of Americans identifying as members of the Democratic Party came in 2014, with 30 percent. Going back to 1988, 29 percent is the lowest overall share of self-identified Democrats since the polling institution began interviewing subjects via telephone instead of in person. According to its data from 1951 to 1987, however, there was never a year in which less than 37 percent identified themselves as Democrats, making the 29 percent the lowest in Gallup's 65 years of asking the question.
1. John 9 years ago
  
  They have basically told all but rich white people to go fuck themselves. I can't see that working out well for them. And when it doesn't, I don't see how they can fix it. The Obama Democrats have built their entire political brand around voting Democrat being a way to show you are superior to middle class and poor white people.
  1. Zeb 9 years ago
    
    Maybe they will try being the overtly racist party again.
2. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
  
  Meh. It'll go back up.
  1. Illocust 9 years ago
    
    It will, but the population trends were supposed to mean that it would go down in the first place. It seems that assimilation is working at cross purposes to identity politics.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      I read things about how in so many years the country will no longer be "majority white" and always ask "what does that mean?" There is a huge amount of intermarriage between native white and Asians and Hispanics and more intermarriage between blacks and whites than there once was.
      
      To say that the country will no longer be "majority white" is to buy into a no shit racist and white supremacist view of race and adopt the one drop rule. I know several white people who married Mexican or South American wives. Are their kids not white? Does the white half not count?
      1. Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        We'll be post-white.
        
        John 9 years ago
        
        Why? I know plenty of people with Hispanic and Asian parents who are more culturally white than I am. To say we will be "post white" is to say that anyone who has even a drop of black, Hispanic or Asian blood is no longer "white". That is racist nonsense.
        
        Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
        
        That is racist nonsense.
        
        Yup. So is the notion that "not white" = "Democratic voter," especially as various ethnic groups (particularly Hispanics) have been in the U.S. for several generations, move into the middle class, and have other concerns beyond simply race and/or immigration. Democrats are actively trying to make sure that never occurs.
        
        Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago
        
        I was joking. Didn't realize it could me twisted into that.
        
        THE COLORS WILL BLEED INTO ONE JOHN.
      2. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
        
        The goal of those on the left is to divide us by tribes and keep us at each other's throats. Ideas like "melting pot society" and cultural assimilation are destructive to their identity-politics oriented strategy to maintain power.
        
        Free Society 9 years ago
        
        This is why some people, the real crazy people, get the idea in their head that immigration is being used as a cudgel to win political power. Maybe, just maybe, the welfare-immigration system we have in place is just another government program meant to replace one population for another.
      3. Free Society 9 years ago
        
        What gets me is how openly people boast of that demographic change. Journalists, leftoid activists and academics are positively gleeful that one racial category will have less voting power and cultural influence relative to other racial categories. Smells like a species of racist supremacism to me. I half suspect that many of those people wouldn't mind seeing white people going extinct entirely, such beliefs, that whites and their culture are inherently evil and the world would be better without them, are the product of teaching white guilt for a couple generations now.
        
        John 9 years ago
        
        White people are to them what Jews were to the old Europeans. Look at the way Progs reacted to the Duke LAX case and compare it to the conservative French reaction to the Dryfus case. The behavior in each case is exactly the same.
3. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
  
  MOAR PERMUNINT DEMMOCRATIK MAJARITEE!!!11!!!!
4. Princess Trigger 9 years ago
  
  They've got a lock on the gay vote.
  To paraphrase LBJ: I'll have those Fags voting Democratic for 200 years.
5. MJGreen - Docile Citizen 9 years ago
  
  But... demographics!
John 9 years ago

http://www.nationalreview.com/.....re-satanic

David Brooks and David Corn, "Ted Cruz is satanic". No shit. They said that in those words and meant it literally. Who knew good dry cleaning and pressed pants are apparently a sign that one rejects the Dark Lord of Hell?
1. Lee G 9 years ago
  
  Brooks is a twat. His high-minded concern-troll schtick got old about a decade ago.
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Us vs Them: When Politics is Treated Like a Football Game, No One Wins

Among other things, the study found:

41 percent of partisans agreed that simply winning elections is more important to them than policy or ideological goals;
35 percent agreed that policy is a more important motivator for them to participate in politics;
Only 24 percent valued both equally or expressed no opinion; and
38 percent of partisans agreed that their party should use any tactics necessary to "win elections and issue debates."
1. Mr Lizard 9 years ago
  
  When one side wants to disarm the other it tends to focus things
2. MJGreen - Docile Citizen 9 years ago
  
  "Football game" is a nice way of putting it.
  
  Politics is war. An election is just a bloodless battle, in which the largest army is declared the victor.
Mr Lizard 9 years ago

Fat disingenuous mammal picks winning strategy

http://hotair.com/archives/201.....h-the-nra/
Lord Humungus 9 years ago

Juan Williams: Angry white women

The NBC News/Esquire magazine poll, conducted with Survey Monkey, found 54 percent of white Americans have been getting angrier over current events during the past year.

That is far higher than the 43 percent of Latinos and 33 percent of black Americans who say the last year of political, economic and cultural events have left them feeling angry. In fact, 73 percent of whites (compared to 66 percent of Hispanics and 56 percent of blacks) say they get angry "at least once per day."

And the angriest white people are white women.

Fifty-eight percent of white women say they are angrier right now than a year ago. Only 51 percent of white men say the same thing, as do just 44 percent of non-white women and 32 percent of non-white men.

In political terms, the anger of white Republican women is at the heart of the finding that Republicans are far angrier about the nation's direction than Democrats. Sixty-one percent of Republicans say they are in a political rage over current events as compared to 42 percent of Democrats.
1. Mr Lizard 9 years ago
  
  You know who else pissed off a bunch of white chicks?...
  1. Citizen X 9 years ago
    
    Every dude on Hit'n'Run at least once a week?
  2. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
    
    Juan Williams?
  3. Sapient Mulch 9 years ago
    
    George Bush?
2. Irish ?s ESB 9 years ago
  
  That's a stupid fucking poll. It's a self-reported poll where white women are more likely to say they've been angriER. So it's not any sort of measurement of how angry they are, it's a measurement of whether they're more angry than a year ago. And how can they even know? Do you know how angry you were in January 2015? If you were pissed off then, you probably don't recall it with any clarity, so anything that pisses you off now seems more immediate.
3. Libertarian 9 years ago
  
  And the angriest white people are white women.
  
  I didn't need a poll to tell me that.
  1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
    
    It's all the rape. We should do something.
commodious spittoon 9 years ago

David Bowie is dead.

Doc Hammer, Chris McCulloch hardest hit.
Entropy Drehmaschine Void 9 years ago

Not sure whether to cry or kill ...

Pappy Van Winkle Family Orders Its Stolen Bourbon Destroyed
1. John 9 years ago
  
  Don't worry. It is not that great. It is just rare. I think it has a medicinal taste to it. I have never understood why it is such a big deal. There are plenty of other better and cheaper options available.
  1. Idle Hands 9 years ago
    
    I'd take woodford or michters over the limited exposure I've had.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      Me too. I had a bartender give me a couple of ounces of it last year as a thank you for my giving him a lot of business. It wasn't bad but it wasn't fantastic either. I am totally with you about Woodford being a ton better. Woodford is some really good stuff.
      
      Also, "bourbon" just means it is from Kentucky. There are a ton of really good small batch wiskey makers who have arisen in this country over the last ten or 15 years. There is no reason to spend the kind of money they charge for Pappy Van Winkle.
      1. Libertarian 9 years ago
        
        From Wikipedia:
        
        The Federal Standards of Identity for Distilled Spirits (27 C.F.R. 5) state that bourbon made for U.S. consumption[18] must be:
        
        Produced in the United States[19]
        Made from a grain mixture that is at least 51% corn[20]
        Aged in new, charred oak barrels[20]
        Distilled to no more than 160 (U.S.) proof (80% alcohol by volume)[20]
        Entered into the barrel for aging at no more than 125 proof (62.5% alcohol by volume)[20]
        Bottled (like other whiskeys) at 80 proof or more (40% alcohol by volume)[21]
        
        John 9 years ago
        
        Why then is Jack Daniels not bourbon? The filtering?
        
        Slammer 9 years ago
        
        Jack is called Tennesee whisky on the label, but I believe they got some sort of legal exception for calling it bourbon.
        
        Ska 9 years ago
        
        I think it's that sour mash mixture doesn't qualify for the corn part.
        
        gritzly 9 years ago
        
        I'm too lazy to look it up right now, but, if memory serves, Jack does qualify to be bourbon. However, the company says they are not a bourbon, they're "Jack Daniels". ie, it's a branding issue.
        
        B.P. 9 years ago
        
        Jack Daniel's qualifies as bourbon based on the law. They choose to market it as Tennessee whiskey and the TTB, which approves labels, is cool with that.
        
        Je suis Woodchipper 9 years ago
        
        I too thought there was a Bourbon County requirement.
        
        B.P. 9 years ago
        
        A distillery just opened in Bourbon County for the first time in 70 years.
      2. robc 9 years ago
        
        There is no KY requirement for bourbon.
        
        Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
        
        Exactly. There is there New York bourbon, Oregon bourbon, etc.
2. Aloysious 9 years ago
  
  What a genuine waste.
3. R C Dean 9 years ago
  
  This place has a bunch of small batch boozes for sale, and good write-ups. Fascinating stuff:
  
  http://www.caskers.com
Ivan Pike 9 years ago

Since I wasn't posting when it happened.

Happy Birthday Alaska.

January 3, 1959.
SugarFree 9 years ago

The collision of Warty, Bowie and Steve Smith from Doomcock of Doom:

1971 CE
"I am not going to let you rape David Bowie, Steve Smith!" the large one in black said.

David Bowie lounged on a couch and watched the stubbly giant argue with a black-clad bodybuilder. They were both so beautiful.

"STEVE SMITH WANT BLOND GIRL!" the naked one yelled hoarsely. Its voice was like a handful of nails thrown in your face. It turned to David Bowie and displayed its enormous and heavily-scarred penis.

"Get away from him!" the other one said. Something shot out from its midsection and buried itself in the naked one's thigh. David Bowie leaned forward to get a better look. It was a black claw trailing a wire almost too thin to see. It began pulling the naked one away from him. It howled in frustration.

"BLOND GIRL!" the naked giant yelled and held out its powerful arms, a blue axe glowing in his left hand. Seconds later they were both gone.

The next morning David Bowie took the same dose, but nothing happened to even compare.
1. SugarFree 9 years ago
  
  I chose the date to suggest that Warty and Steve Smith inspired:
  
  Oh! You Pretty Things
  
  Wake up you sleepy head
  Put on some clothes, shake up your bed
  Put another log on the fire for me
  I've made some breakfast and coffee
  Look out my window and what do I see
  A crack in the sky and a hand reaching down to me
  All the nightmares came today
  And it looks as though they're here to stay
  
  What are we coming to
  No room for me, no fun for you
  I think about a world to come
  Where the books were found by the golden ones
  Written in pain, written in awe
  By a puzzled man who questioned
  What we were here for
  All the strangers came today
  And it looks as though they're here to stay
  
  Oh! you Pretty Things
  Don't you know you're driving your
  Mamas and Papas insane
  Oh you Pretty Things
  Don't you know you're driving your
  Mamas and Papas insane
  Let me make it plain
  You gotta make way for the Homo Superior
  
  Look at your children
  See their faces in golden rays
  Don't kid yourself they belong to you
  They're the start of a coming race
  The earth is a bitch
  We've finished our news
  Homo Sapiens have outgrown their use
  All the strangers came today
  And it looks as though they're here to stay
  1. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
    
    Oh man, look at that caveman go
2. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
  
  A beautiful tribute, Mr Free
3. Citizen X 9 years ago
  
  I teared up a little. Thank you for this, Mr. Free.
  1. Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
    
    I teared up mostly from your tears, but it was a sweet story.
Irish ?s ESB 9 years ago

I had someone tell me the other day that the Cologne attack was a hoax because there aren't any videos out there on Youtube about the attacks.

Problem: This isn't like the Jackie situation where you have one person's word and no evidence. It's a situation where 100 women have lodged reports of groping, theft, and two cases of rape; where the government has already admitted it happened and fired their police chief; and where you have officials coming out and flatly stating that this was premeditated. Furthermore, there are 30+ people in custody.

That sure is a lot of shit for something that didn't happen. It was also chaotic and occurred within a large crowd so it's not surprising you'd have difficulty capturing a video in such a situation.

Christina Hoff Sommers also said "you shouldn't blame all refugees just like you shouldn't blame all men for rape," but that completely misses the point. I'm not blaming all or even a large portion of refugees, it's just that any intelligent person had to know stuff like this was going to happen given the prevalence of gang sex assault in the Middle East and North Africa. Unless you missed the large number of brutal rapes in Tahrir Square, you really have no excuse for not realizing things like this were inevitable given a large enough number of people from these regions. It might be a small percentage that behave this way, but a small percent of 1 million refugees could potentially run over 100,000 people.
1. Irish ?s ESB 9 years ago
  
  This whole situation is just completely fucked. People were called bigots for warning about stuff like this, then when it actually happens no one says "wow, I guess you weren't bigots and based your fears on evidence," they say "well, you're still a racist because not all of them are like this."
  
  Jesus Christ.
  1. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
    
    GRAB ITS MOTHERFUCKING LEG!
  2. John 9 years ago
    
    It is totally fucked up. My other favorite is "some of the people doing this were previous immigrants and not the refugees" as if that matters.
    1. Elspeth Flashman 9 years ago
      
      That's exactly what was being argued on NPR this morning (I exposed myself so you don't have to).
2. Drake 9 years ago
  
  Sexual violence is a fact-of-life in most of the Middle East. Magical thinking Europeans thought they could import millions of Muslims without importing their problems - then set them lose on the feminized passive population. Enough to make me believe it's not completely accidental and the answer will be more government.
  1. Rhywun 9 years ago
    
    Sexual violence is a fact-of-life in most of the Middle East.
    
    And not just there. Remember all the vicious gang-rape stories coming out of India last year? What we're seeing is fairly common behavior in any backward society.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      Were those gangs Hindu or Sikh? I don't remember but I don't think so.
      1. Citizen X 9 years ago
        
        Jains? Parsees? Assyrian Orthodox? I'm drawing a blank.
    2. R C Dean 9 years ago
      
      MENA, India, and big chunks of Eastern Europe. There were rape epidemics in the Balkans during the ethnic cleansings there, as well.
      
      Mass rape is a tool of conquest.
      1. John 9 years ago
        
        Yes it is.
3. John 9 years ago
  
  No one is blaming all of the refugees in the sense that they want them all thrown in jail. The underlying assumption of the "you can't blame them all" crowd is that the refugees have some right to enter any country of their choosing and denying them entry is some kind of punishment. No, it is not. They have no right to enter any country they choose and each nation has a right to deny them entry based on their own self interests. And the fact that allowing large numbers of North African and Middle-eastern men into your country is likely to create a rape problem is a perfectly valid reason for denying people from those areas entry. The fact that not all of them are rapist is irrelevant.
  1. Old.Mexican 9 years ago
    
    Re: John,
    
    No one is blaming all of the refugees in the sense that they want them all thrown in jail.
    
    You can't blame Muslim refugees for the actions of a few hundred provocative whores.
    
    Hey, I am just saying what the mayor of Cologne basically implied. And the mayor of Vienna. And several leftist outlets.
4. invisible furry hand 9 years ago
  
  There probably is a lot of video on phones. Unfortunately the gangs were stealing phones, along with handbags. The German cops probably won't release any CCTV video either, at least not right away.
5. Free Society 9 years ago
  
  I had someone tell me the other day that the Cologne attack was a hoax because there aren't any videos out there on Youtube about the attacks.
  
  And certain persons on these very boards were busy wagging their finger at people not to "jump to a conclusion" that virtually all of the perpetrators were Levantine and North African Arabs, despite that all of the witnesses in multiple cities said this was the case, the authorities said this was the case and there is not one single suspect who is (ethnically) German nor do German males have a gang rapey modus operendi. A rational person would realize that there is basically no other demographic group in Germany that would perpetrate this sort of flash gang-rape mob.
  
  It might be a small percentage that behave this way, but a small percent of 1 million refugees could potentially run over 100,000 people.
  
  This "small percentage" argument is bullshit. It takes a community to make trends within groups. Even if it were 1% criminal/terrorist/thug in that population, this ignores the huge proportion of the community that gives them moral support and cover. And it's that population from which the "tiny minority" is constantly replenished.
  1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
    
    A rational person would realize that there is basically no other demographic group in Germany that would perpetrate this sort of flash gang-rape mob.
    
    The identified suspects included 17 people from Algeria and Morocco, as well as three Germans and one U.S. citizen.
    
    Someone pick up the mic for me.
    1. Free Society 9 years ago
      
      *dusts off microphone*
      
      There's a paywall. But on this point other sources have said something similar to "Two German citizens, an Iraqi, a Serb and a U.S. citizen were also among those seen to have committed crimes during the night.". Which is sort of ambiguous as to the exact nature of the crime for which they were detained. Secondly, as is very common in Swedish reporting, a 2nd generation immigrant rapes a Swedish girl, the report will read basically "Swede rapes Swede." They're talking citizenship, not culture or ethnicity.
      
      I'd be shocked if the US and German citizens involved, were not Muslims as well. It just seems odd that in an organized Muslim 1,000 man gang rape battalion included some non-Muslims with no cultural connection to the rest of the group whatsoever.
      1. Hamster of Doom 9 years ago
        
        And certain persons on these very boards were busy wagging their finger at people not to "jump to a conclusion" that virtually all of the perpetrators were Levantine and North African Arabs, despite that all of the witnesses in multiple cities said this was the case, the authorities said this was the case and there is not one single suspect who is (ethnically) German nor do German males have a gang rapey modus operendi. A rational person would realize that there is basically no other demographic group in Germany that would perpetrate this sort of flash gang-rape mob.
        
        It takes some brassies to be so stunningly wrong, in writing where everyone can see it, with a citation, and think that with the proper dodging the argument can be saved.
        
        I will apologize for the paywall though. I had no idea, it was just one of several that came up on a search. The relevant info is quoted in the money shot.
        
        Free Society 9 years ago
        
        What have I dodged? It looks like you didn't even read what I wrote. Ethnically German =/= German citizen. And as of yet, I've not found any sources to indicate Hans and Franz as one of these suspects.
    2. R C Dean 9 years ago
      
      Algeria and Morocco are MENA nations with, I suppose, similar cultures as Egypt, etc. Basically, you're left with three Germans (who could be the children of MENA immigrants, and a US citizen out of all this.
      
      I would speculate that, once a rape mob gets going, a few locals might join in. Which begs the question of who got the rape mob going?
6. Libertarian 9 years ago
  
  "I had someone tell me the other day that the Cologne attack was a hoax because there aren't any videos out there on Youtube about the attacks."
  
  I didn't know that "pics or it didn't happen" was being taken so literally.
  1. R C Dean 9 years ago
    
    Probably a cop.
    
    "Youse got no video, so shut up."
7. Zeb 9 years ago
  
  Just having a lot of young men from different cultures without much going on in their lives is potential trouble. Add to that a culture which tolerates a lot of mistreatment of women and has little respect for their rights and you have potential for some bad things. You don't have to condemn all refugees and immigrants to say that culture is a problem here.
Sevo 9 years ago

"The White House chief of staff said President Obama is still planning to close Guantanamo Bay."

Yeah, and the check's in the mail, too.
1. John 9 years ago
  
  And how many people will die at the hands of the people we let lose from there?
  
  http://nypost.com/2015/03/25/p.....-networks/
  1. Zeb 9 years ago
    
    They won't let them loose.
    1. John 9 years ago
      
      Yes they will. They will turn them over to be held by other countries who will then turn them lose after allowing a few months for the story to drop from the headlines.
      
      If it had been possible to give them to other countries with the real assurance they would never be turned lose, George Bush would have closed GUITMO. They only kept it open because there is literally nowhere else to send these guys.
      1. Free Society 9 years ago
        
        I assumed they'd just be moved to blacks sites that have less publicity surrounding them.
        
        Zeb 9 years ago
        
        That's what I'm thinking.
        
        Old Man With Candy 9 years ago
        
        You mean like Chicago's South Side?
        
        Free Society 9 years ago
        
        #BlackSitesMatter
        
        Knarf Yenrab! 9 years ago
        
        Shameless that they didn't do this in the first place; they must've thought imprisoning people without trial in a very public way would be more appealing to Americans than making them disappear or killing them outright. Seems like they were right.
      2. Zeb 9 years ago
        
        Oh, there must be some other places to put those people. Or just fucking shoot them. It's not as if the administration has bee shy about killing people without due process.
        
        I also have a hard time believing that these people are so uniquely dangerous that releasing them would cause any real change in the terrorism situation. Especially when they've been out of circulation for many years and probably don't really have the connections and knowledge anymore. You'd think they had 100 Hannibal Lecters in there the way some people talk about it.
        
        Crusty Juggler 9 years ago
        
        You'd think they had 100 Hannibal Lecters in there the way some people talk about it.
        
        According to the Chuck Hagel interview he did after he left office, one of the reasons the Obama admin got rid of him was because he did not authorize the release of enough Gitmo inmates, which he said he did not do because his people were telling him how terrible they were. He wanted to release them, but he couldn't. I believe Panetta and Gates said something similar.
        
        John 9 years ago
        
        That is the truth Juggler. All of the evaluations of the people at GUITMO were released by wikileaks. They were part of what Bradly Manning leaked. I am not sure if they are still on the net but they make for interesting reading. Those guys were not dirt farmers in the wrong place at the wrong time.
        
        The problem is that we knew they were dangerous but did not have enough evidence that would be admissible in federal court to prove their crimes. So, trying them in federal court or by tribunal, which the doofuses in the Bush administration made just like federal court, was not an option.
        
        R C Dean 9 years ago
        
        So, trying them in federal court or by tribunal, which the doofuses in the Bush administration made just like federal court, was not an option.
        
        SCOTUS laid out the necessary due process for military tribunals to try them. It was never even attempted. I don't recall the details at all, but I have a vague recollection that what SCOTUS required was pretty doable.
        
        Free Society 9 years ago
        
        I also have a hard time believing that these people are so uniquely dangerous that releasing them would cause any real change in the terrorism situation.
        
        Well more than a few detainees that have been released were held in US black sites or otherwise 'prison for terorrists' went on to head up terrorist cells and entire organizations. Abu Bakr al-Bahgdadi comes to mind. But I'm not sure what the "recidivism" rate is for Guantanamo specifically.
        
        Zeb 9 years ago
        
        The question there is, would someone else have headed those cells, or equivalents, or did the released detainees have some unique ability to organize terrorists? I can't say I know for sure, but it just doesn't seem likely that the people in Guantanamo are that special and unique that they really would make any significant difference. I'm not necessarily saying that they should be released if there is good reason to believe they have done terrible things and plan to do so in the future. Just that the fears seem overblown.
        
        Free Society 9 years ago
        
        I don't dispute the overblowness of it all. But if anything, a stint in a place like Guantanamo is going to make someone more likely to be a terrorist, not less. Maybe I'm wrong, I don't know. I'm not sure on the recidivism rate, but if it's anything like the federal government's recidivism rate for the regular ole prison system, it's probably not good.
2. Rt. Hon. Judge Woodrow Chipper 9 years ago
  
  And Bill Clinton won't come in your mouth.
Slammer 9 years ago

NPR: No-nonsense nurturing

"Your pencil is in your hand. Your voice is on zero. If you got the problem correct, you're following along and checking off the answer. If you got the problem incorrect, you are erasing it and correcting it on your paper."

In "no-nonsense nurturing," directions are often scripted in advance, and praise is kept to a minimum.

BUT:

No-nonsense nurturing makes some education specialists uncomfortable, though. "Maybe we are doing them a favor by teaching them codes of power, but maybe we're also participating in some kind of, I don't know, colonization," says Barb Stengel, an education professor at Vanderbilt University. "We're simply teaching kids to look like me."
1. Zeb 9 years ago
  
  Because there must be one correct way to educate people.
Old.Mexican 9 years ago

Police in Cologne clashed with anti-Islam protesters who are demonstrating following a series of sexual assaults in the city on New Year's Eve attributed to Muslim men.

Being anti-rape = being anti-Islam, by the way. Just a reminder.
1. Rhywun 9 years ago
  
  Also, "far-right" and "ultra-conservative".
2. Free Society 9 years ago
  
  I don't see what's wrong with being anti both. Islam is a set of ideas and ideas are not above criticism or opposition.
  1. Derp-o-Matic 5000 9 years ago
    
    It's not about critically assessing the strengths and weaknesses of various view points, Free Society, it's about vilifying your opponents.
  2. R C Dean 9 years ago
    
    Anti-Christian(ity) - rational.
    
    Anti-Islam - bigoted.
    
    I can't figure it out, either.
rosybrown6596 9 years ago

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invisible furry hand 9 years ago

You're very welcome Tundra. There's another one of Ziggy Stardust too
Elspeth Flashman 9 years ago

There's a starman waiting in the sky He'd like to come and meet us but he thinks he'd blow our minds.
gaoxiaen 9 years ago

Are you implying that there is a God?
Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago

Is Walsh still alive this morning?
Zeb 9 years ago

I'm thinking more of the mainstream news. And I'm going to bet we get a lot more from the Reason writers about Bowie than Lemmy. I know H&R commenters have a fitting appreciation for Lemmy.
robc 9 years ago

Joe or Steve?
Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer 9 years ago

Blair.
UnCivilServant 9 years ago

NYC is the most backward part of New York.
Rhywun 9 years ago

Brownsville probably counts.
Rhywun 9 years ago

Except for all the upstate cities that have much higher crime rates.

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