Obama Commutes Sentences of 61 Prisoners, North Korea Warns of Famines, New Features for Snapchat: P.M. Links

• 

  internet

  President Obama commuted the sentence of 61 prisoners today, bringing his two-term total to 268.

• In the case of Luis vs. United States, the Supreme Court ruled, 5-3, against the pre-trial freezing of non-tainted assets.
• The Justice Department and the city of Newark, New Jersey have agreed on a settlement related to reforms of the city's police department.
• Prosecutors in Minneapolis announced they would not be filing charges related to the killing of Jamar Clark by police officers in November.
• Historians in Germany reveal the Associated Press entered into an arrangement with Nazi Germany in the 1930s to secure access in exchange for a promise not to undermine the regime.
• French President Francois Hollande has abandoned a plan to strip individuals convicted of terrorism of their French citizenship.
• While Kim Jong Un's weight has gone up, the dictator warned North Korea would be facing another famine.
• Snapchat gets new features.

Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

Snapchat gets new features.

Better screen grabs.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Hello.

Historians in Germany reveal the Associated Press entered into an arrangement with Nazi Germany in the 1930s to secure access in exchange for a promise not to undermine the regime."

Thus another example of what we know and knew all along. Media is state-run media by other means.

[Chumby]

Jawohl, herr Kommandant.

[The Hyperbole]

Screengrabs.

[Rhywun]

Snapchat, what is that i cant even

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Ugh, i mean, come. on.

[Rasilio]

Isn't it spelled Snatchchat?

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Snatchchaps? That's catching on with the kids these days, too, i hear

[Fist of Etiquette]

While Kim Jong Un's weight has gone up, the dictator warned North Korea would be facing another famine.

He needs that milk and those apples.

[Pan Zagloba]

+1 doesn't even like them, personally.

[Doctor Whom]

The glorious people's intelligence agency spotted Farmer Jones in South Korea.

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

+4 legs good, 2 legs bad

[Fist of Etiquette]

French President Francois Hollande has abandoned a plan to strip individuals convicted of terrorism of their French citizenship.

You say abandoned, I say surrendered.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Belgium are the new Vichy.

[PapayaSF]

Cheese-eating surrender monkeys. In 50 years when sharia is in place in France, it'll be the people who don't support Islamic terror who will have their citizenship revoked... if they're lucky.

[Notorious UGCC]

Important if true

h/t some other commenter

[Je suis Woodchipper]

Wash Post has some details.

Derek Hauger, the Wisconsin man who took widely shared video of the incident and posted it to YouTube, wrote that the man did not grope the girl, though.

"I was right next to this and saw the whole thing," he wrote. "The man never touched her like she said. She was just looking for trouble."

As the two argue, the older man moves his hand toward her several times, and a piece of paper in his hand appears to touch the girl's chest.

Sexual assault?

[Guestus III]

Sexual assault?

He looked at her....so eye-rape.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Phil Hartman would disagree with your definition of eye-rape.

[Chumby]

Hi, I'm Troy McClure. You might remember me from such self help videos such as "Smoke Yourself Thin" and "Get Confident, Stupid!"

[Crusty Juggler]

She was just asking for it?

I am outraged!

[Drake]

Looks like she took a swing. She was looking for trouble, why should we care?

[Je suis Woodchipper]

The man is now an "alleged groper" in the eyes of the media. And the pepper sprayer is a serial murderer.

[PapayaSF]

And of course, it proves that all Trump supporters are fascists. Just as the rapes and robberies and assaults at Occupy encampments proved that all Occupy supporters were... oh, wait...

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Making America classy again

Fuck these assholes for likely getting another Democrat elected

[JeremyR]

Thanks to Trump, the Democrats are going to get the Senate and probably the House.

I think mission accomplished from his point of view

[Migrant Log Chipper]

they won't get house...

[Suthenboy]

Important if not true.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Historians in Germany reveal the Associated Press entered into an arrangement with Nazi Germany in the 1930s to secure access in exchange for a promise not to undermine the regime.

You know who else seemed to have had secret agreements with the press?

[B.P.]

Saddam Hussein?

[Episiarch]

Every government ever?

[Rich]

Procter & Gamble?

[Pat (PM)]

Hillary Clinton?

[Doctor Whom]

Bishop Harry Jackson?

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

The Stonecutters?

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Who keeps Atlantis off the maps?
Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
We do! We do!

[Crusty Juggler]

Jack Vincennes?

[Chipwooder]

I see someone is a Badge of Honor fan

[Libertarian]

Journolist?

[Jerryskids]

Donald Tru....

oh.

[Drake]

Gutenberg ?

[cgr2727]

If not a secret agreement with the press to print favorable reviews of Police Academy and Short Circuit, how else do you explain his career?

[Restoras]

Stonecutters!

[PBR Streetgang]

Nolan Richardson?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Fuck. I came here to say this.

+40 minutes of hell

[Arkansaustrian Economics]

He didn't come over on that boat.

[Scarecrow & WoodChipper Repair]

William Randolph Hearst?

[Chumby]

The Bat Boy Found in Cave?

[Pat (PM)]

BMX Rider Owns Cop After Being Target of Harassment

LONG BEACH CA ? Lieutenant Cobel from the Long Beach police department is quickly becoming an internet sensation after he was the subject of a video showing him attempt to harass a group of BMX bikers. The problem for the officer is one man knew the law better than him, which resulted in the officer hurling a few insults and walking away in shame.

The officer can be heard in the video below telling a group of bikers that they must walk their bikes when they ride on the boardwalk near The Rainbow Harbor Esplanade. However, 33-year-old Sean Fontenot was familiar with the law, and asked if the law was recently changed.

"16.16.502 is the civic sectional code that states you can ride your bicycles around out here," Sean says. "So I don't know what law you are referring to."

After a brief banter, the officer condescendingly asked Sean if hey got his law degree on Facebook.

"So do I have to have a law degree to be an informed citizen?" Sean asks. "Is that what you're saying? Is it wrong to know your rights? Last time I checked, when officers come and try to invalidate your rights by telling you bullshit laws and enforcing their opinions, that's not what you are supposed to do."

Video is worth watching.

[B.P.]

33-year-old BMX biker? Ugh.

[jesse.in.mb]

I see you're unfamiliar with the LBC.

[GILMORE?]

trick needs school himself

[0x90]

So much drama...

[Riven]

Cop: You wanna go that way? Ok. We can go that way.

Yes. Let's.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Where did you get your cop certificate? At the jerk store?

[Free Society]

ha

[Los Doyers]

GIT OFF MUH BOARDWALK

[Florida Hipster]

So if the BMX guy got his law degree at FB and knows the law better than the cop, does that make the cop look better or worse? Idiot.

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Where did the cop get his law degree?

[Irish ?s Lauren Southern]

Comrades! I have discovered the Socialism subreddit, and would like to share some of my findings with you.

A socialist explains supply and demand.

"This is a good answer. I consider the 'crisis of overproduction' to be one of the most visible contradictions.
It basically means that capitalism will produce products to satisfy demand, without a larger plan in place. For example, in my city, the economy is on an upswing, and developers are building condos everywhere. None of the firms 'work' with eachother to decide how many condos they build. They just keep building to satisfy demand.
Eventually, demand will be met, and the last few condos will sit empty. It's inevitable, because thats the only way these developers will know how to stop building condos: when people stop buying them.
The problem is, these few empty condos are very bad for business. They will not be able to be sold. Once demand outstrips supply, prices plummet. The condo companies will be making less money, and they may have to lay off employees. Their stock prices will go down, and salaries and dividends will be cut. These cuts will start to effect the entire market, and before you know it, this snowballs, creating a recession in my city.
Capitalism is contradictory because the quest for more and more wealth inevitably leads to waste and recession. This is the anarchy of the free market."

[Juvenile Bluster]

reddit.com/r/socialism

NOOOOOOOOOOOOPE.

There isn't a single political subreddit worth reading. This includes /r/libertarian, which is absolute shit.

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

I'll let Rothbard explain why you're wrong...

[Juvenile Bluster]

/r/anarchocapitalism is also shit.

[bassjoe]

You clearly haven't read /r/The_Donald

[Juvenile Bluster]

I specifically use RES to block anything from The_Donald, SandersForPresident, or /r/politics.

[Chipper Morning Wood]

Is that where they stickied Molyneux's passionate defense of Trump?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

What the fuck is a "Reddit"?

[Restoras]

I dunno - some weird type of frog, I think.

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

I believe its some sort of hovercraft

[EMD]

/r/squaredcircle!

[Irish ?s Lauren Southern]

Socialists discuss what they would do with the Kulaks and wreckers in Hollywood

"Hollywood, as an institution, needs to be wiped and restarted."

"I think there would be less superhero movies, action movies, horror movies, and insipid comedies. Those films are usually created for the purpose of bringing in huge profits for studios. I'd like to see more historical dramas and social commentaries. It would be cool to see biopics made about Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Marx, Engels, Debs, Kropotkin, and other famous leftists."

Sounds riveting.

[Citizen X]

You bringing those links in here is making it abundantly clear: you're racist against Reasonable-Americans, too, and would like to see us suffer.

[Private Chipperbot]

Drink!

[OneOut]

"needs to be wiped "

Like, with a cloth" ?

/hilldog prog

[Pat (PM)]

It would be cool to see biopics made about Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Marx, Engels, Debs, Kropotkin, and other famous leftists.

I thought he said he wanted less horror movies.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

And insipid comedies.

[Guestus III]

That Che biopic was boring as fuck, so let's hope not.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

There are so many ways you can try and romanticize a murderous moron.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Agitprop was such a successful form of cinema; we should start it here.

/ignoring the fact that we already have it; it's just the wrong anti-capitalist message

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Rufus is right. One Sling Blade is enough.

[Crusty Juggler]

Soderburgh also did not include Che's execution phase.

[Free Society]

That Che biopic was boring as fuck, so let's hope not.

And it left out all the scenes of him sadistically executing child "counter-revolutionaries" with glee.

[Guestus III]

I wouldn't know, I saw it at a second run theater with beer. I got very drunk, very quickly and then slept through the second half. And by the way, I am talking about the Motorcycle Diaries.

...fires up the Google Machine....

Jesus, there were two Che biopics? And these guys are bitching about not enough leftist biopics?

[Chumby]

Warren Beatty's Reds not good enough for them?

[EMD]

What a snoozefest that shitshow was.

[The Last American Hero]

Somehow I don't think audiences want to go see non-fiction films featuring the enslaving of billions and the murder of millions under a murderous ideology.

[Social Contractor]

That's the problem comrade. People aren't wanting the right things.

[Hamster of Doom]

But how's the CGI and the explosions?

*lens flare*

[Mickey Rat]

That can happen.

It is portraying the murderous ideologues as the good guys that is the problem.

[EMD]

cough The Matrix cough

[paranoid android]

I'm mostly of a mind with Juvenile Bluster on this, but wait they have actual Stalin apologists?

*Grabs popcorn*

[Juvenile Bluster]

Oh, there are Stalin apologists all over Reddit.

Most of them are 15-20 year old Americans and Europeans. The Holodomor don't real (or it was the fault of wreckers/kulaks/Joos)

[Winston]

So how come German, French and British diplomatic recognition of the USSR didn't stop Holodomor?

[Restoras]

Yeah but what about Hodor?

[Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)]

Let's ask him...

Hodor

*Thanks, Hodor.*

Well, there you have it.

[Doctor Whom]

I knew some Stalin and Mao apologists in Ann Arbor. I never knew any Pol Pot apologists, but just give it time.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Some one has to be cool and come out with it, right?

[Restoras]

BAE, or whatever?

[EMD]

At least he recycled plastic bags?

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

That has to be a troll.

[Pan Zagloba]

Shit, a good, honest biopic of Lenin, Stalin or Mao would be ass-kicking riveting period drama with more intrigue, colorful personalities and visceral horror than all the HBO/AMC zeitgeist series put together. Of course, it'd be a lesson in 'be careful what you wish for' for the comrade above.

[KDN]

Yeah, I'd watch the shit out of an honest biopic of some of the old Bolsheviks. I don't think there's any chance that an honest biopic would ever be made, though. Most filmmakers would likely write off any script as reactionary propaganda.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

All those people who supposedly died in the gulags?

In reality, they took the oath and stood the Night's Watch!

[Hamster of Doom]

The bad stuff will turn out to be historically inaccurate. They explain everything in the sequel.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Lenin II: Gulag Boogaloo

Meh, I'd pay to see it.

[EMD]

Actually, Trotsky would be the most interesting to me.

[Pan Zagloba]

This man is not socialist enough! He implies that it's possible for condo prices to go down, when we all know that condos get picked up by super-rich people (Chinese or generic super-rich, depending on your level of self-unaware racism) who just let them sit empty in order to park their money and thus fuck over the normal people forever.

Sorry, when you live in Vancouver, "condo" becomes a trigger word...

[KDN]

That's what happens after the horrors of the recession: rich people buy all the condos for cheap since they're the only ones with any money and park their money their to restrict supply, thus achieving paper gains without ever injecting any wealth into the system.

[Pan Zagloba]

Almost - there was no real estate bust in Vancouver, the closest we got to it in 2008 was people refusing to sell because prices weren't going up. Hence, there had to be an explanation of how so many condos get sold at ludicrous prices if no one can afford them, and Absent Rich Chinamen became the boogieman. To the point that the city govt. had an inquiry into the issue which said, no, there are not millions of empty condos just sitting there. It didn't help.

[EMD]

We are Absent Rich Chinamen and we are here to rock you!

[Raven Nation]

"This is the anarchy of the free market."

He says that like it's a bad thing.

[Citizen X]

To him, it is, because if capitalism is self-limiting then it provides fewer opportunities for Top.Men. to do the limiting, and that's important for some reason.

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

I think I checked out that subreddit a few years back. I dipped in, read a few posts about the labor theory of value, and quickly had my fill.

[jarflax]

I beat and beat on rocks with my hammer and no money comes out. I don't think the labor theory of value works.

[jarflax]

This euphemism game just went self referential

[Chumby]

If no money comes out then no money shot?

[Irish ?s Lauren Southern]

I sometimes hear people try and compare libertarians to socialists on the grounds that we're both allegedly 'utopian.' But I think the obsession socialists have with "OMG, WHAT WOULD THE MOVIE INDUSTRY LOOK LIKE IN A SOCIALIST STATE!" shows the major difference, which is that libertarians never claim that *everything would be perfect* in a free market, merely that it would be best for the most people.

Socialists, on the other hand, think everything would be perfect in a socialist society - there would be no alienation, no depression, all art would magically be better for some reason...

They blame everything bad on the lack of socialism, and that shows pretty clearly how childish the whole thing is.

[Episiarch]

They think everything would be perfect *for them*. It's pure fantasy, basically a daydream reworking of the world to fit the way they would like it to be, as opposed to the way it really is. Not only would it not be, there is absolutely no rational reason to think "socialism" would deliver this fantasy world, even if you're being generous.

Basically, for a lot of people, "socialism" means "fantasyland". It's very strange how this concept/word got that status.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Rufusland.

Come for the hope and laughs, stay for the death.

EH?

[Riven]

I've come for less.

[Hamster of Doom]

Raaawr.

[tarran]

That reminds me of one of my favorite South Park episodes CartmanLand!

[W. Chipper Dove]

That was a good one. To hear Cartman openly sobbing because he's so happy, and then watch as he slowly loses everything, was just wonderful.

[Square = Circle]

To me the biggest fundamental difference is that the improvements that libertarians argue would come from libertarianism don't require anyone to behave any differently than they currently do, whereas socialism and communism are always predicated on a universal and nearly absolute change in fundamental behavior for most of humanity.

Socialism always seems "so simple" to socialists exactly because socialism is essentially "everybody should suddenly spontaneously realize that they shouldn't be selfish and should work together with everyone else toward the common good, at which point everything will turn wonderful all by itself."

[Horatio]

Libertopia does in fact require people to act differently than they currently do, specifically "don't agress others via government". This is why it will never come to pass.

[jarflax]

Leaving aside all the other problems with Socialism for the moment, there ain't no such animal as the common good. We ornery humans want different things.

[Social Contractor]

IMO anarchism requires people to act differently. Libertarianism- at least my version is a compromise of that.

[Libertarian]

When it comes to discussions on libertarianism, nothing sets me off quicker than someone trying to tell me that libertarians believe in Utopia. ARGH!

[Jerryskids]

That's the Big Point of libertarianism to me - and the reason it's a hard sell - that it's not going to solve all your problems, it's just the best chance of not screwing things up worse. Everybody wants the quick weight loss miracle diet and the libertarians are selling eat less, exercise more and in the end you're going to be dead anyway and maybe you'd be happier sacrificing a few more years in your eighties for a half-gallon of fudge ripple ice cream right now so what the hell do we know? diet. "As a general rule for government, leaving bad enough alone is better than trying to fix things" just doesn't sell, no matter how much evidence there is that, in the long run, trying to fix things has cost more than not trying to fix things. It's the same reason people buy lottery tickets - you know you're not going to come out ahead on the deal but maybe this time you'll get lucky.

[toolkien]

merely that it would be best for the most people.

-------------------

I usually don't go even that far. I'm not necessarily concerned as to outcomes as I maintain disinterest. The outcome could be good, the outcome could be bad, the outcome could be good at first, but bad on second thought, The outcome could be good, but events twenty years later prove that an alternative course may have been preferred. In short, I don't promise a utopia, nor do I make out some sort of derivation of Benthamism - most good for the most people. I simply maintain outcomes are so ephemeral and varied that Force is rarely ever justified except in the face of offensive Force defended against. Also, that even if or when a Force laden policy is proved bad by common opinion, held at that time, it is so slow to change course.

I've used the euphemism that socialism is the process by which certain people promise to keep people dry by pushing raindrops up one at a time. Socialism ultimately is insanity on the face of it, an insanity that can only be born from Romanticism. The results of 100+ years of Fabian socialism in this country amply shows how insane it is.

[Hyperbolical]

Socialism ultimately is insanity on the face of it, an insanity that can only be born from Romanticism.

+1 Roussonianism

[BigT]

I'm not necessarily concerned as to outcomes

Outcomes should be secondary to methods/process. A fair process is the desiderata. After all, the end does not justify the means.

[B.P.]

Somewhere along the line socialism switched from being a solution to rapacious capitalism's habit of leaving everyone poor, hungry, destitute, etc., to a solution to rapacious capitalism's habit of producing too much.

[Citizen X]

Well, socialism certainly limits the abundance of necessary goods, so at least it works that way.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

+ Wiping your ass with venezuelan monies

[Hyperbolical]

...capitalism's habit of leaving everyone poor, hungry, destitute...

When did capitalism leave "everyone poor, hungry, destitute, etc."?

Capitalism is merely the reinvestment of surplus assets to increase/improve output. How does that leave people poor? The serfs of the Middle Ages were certainly not better off than the burghers who traded in services in the towns and villages. But they were better off than the hunter-gatherers that came before agriculture allowed for the reinvestment of seed and toil into a steadier supply of food. Innovation and trade have always made people's lives better.

[kbolino]

Well, if you take the literal definition of "left", then it makes some kind of sense. In a leftist fever dream, adjusted for some semblance of reality, capitalism results in the rich getting richer while the poor stay poor.

... why that is a problem vis-a-vis everybody staying poor is not entirely clear to me. But "income inequality" is apparently super bad. Because, reasons.

When you couple it with other things, like e.g. the government throwing people in prison, maybe you can wring some kind of sense out of it. But the funny thing is that damn near all of that is really "for their own good" type shit, which just turns this all into a self-licking ice cream cone. We need to do what's best for the poor, and we're clearly not doing it, despite the fact that what we're doing now is the result of the last round of "we need to do what's best for the poor".

[Migrant Log Chipper]

piss off, socialism leaves everyone poor, hungry, destitute, that shit bags like you can't tap dance around it shows what a disingenous twat you are.

[The Last American Hero]

While supply and demand price signals are not perfectly efficient, they are orders of magnitude more efficient than centrally planned economies that try to operate without them. In Soviet Russia, the reason there were bread lines wasn't because the bread was so damn good that people wanted to wait in line for it.

[jesse.in.mb]

Capitalist over-production: a few too many condos
Central planning over-production: multiple cities that will crumble to dust before they actually have residents.

[Riven]

Why you wanna ruin someone's good story and feelz with your... *sneer* logic.

[UnCivilServant]

"sneer logic" has a nice ring to it.

[Riven]

That's not the only thing with a nice...ring

I'm sorry. I can't stop.

[Horatio]

Tang or tatas?

[W. Chipper Dove]

Cock or bathtub?

[PapayaSF]

Actually, though, those Chinese ghost cities are not exactly pure examples of socialist central planning. As I understand them, they have a distinct capitalist aspect: they are investments by private (or semi-private) entities, admittedly caused in part by Chinese restrictions on investment. So they're not quite equivalent to central planning errors by Stalin or North Korea.

[jesse.in.mb]

That could certainly be at play, although IIRC, they were basically funded by the Chinese govt pumping money into construction for the sake of construction in a much more massive version of our "shovel-ready jobs" funding.

Even if the specifics of the building weren't planned out the entire idea of "ugh, our economy is collapsing we'd better pour state money on it to keep people artificially employed in unproductive tasks" sounds exactly like what the OP would prefer.

[Tornado16nb]

I think this has to be a troll job as well.

Since when are socialists cool with private developers colluding and forming a monopoly to keep their stock prices high and profits running in?

[Square = Circle]

Should have scrolled down before commenting.

[Tornado16nb]

You mean in reddit or here? I thought the troll comment was in response to Hollywood socialism

[Square = Circle]

I meant me - I said pretty much the same thing you did.

[Square = Circle]

"None of the firms 'work' with each other to decide how many condos they build."

Funny how this result of legislative fiat is held up as an example of market failure. Said "working together" might also be termed "price-fixing cartel," no?

[Irish ?s Lauren Southern]

If we had a monopoly this would all be planned, but socialists hate monopolies for some reason.

[Chumby]

But monopolies only happen in capitalism. They are created by it. When there isn't government involved. -prog

[GILMORE?]

Jesus christ that's painful.

[Suthenboy]

"Not smart enough to wipe his own ass"

You think that is just an expression? I have personally seen lots of them. I have seen people who have experience with chamber pots unable to make the connection between a bucket that you shit in and occasionally take out of the house to empty and a pot that is bolted to the floor and has built in disposal. That's right, they shit in the toilet over and over and over and no amount of instruction will get them to flush the damned thing.

I have seen people who commonly shit in ditches in plain sight and broad daylight unable to use a bathroom that just has a hole in the floor. Eventually someone misses the hole and leaves a pile of shit on the floor next to the hole. The next guy comes in, doesnt want to be near that so he shits on the floor next to it. This happens over and over until there is a line of turds leading out of the door into the ditch outside next to the road. Pretty soon they are all just shitting in the ditch by the road in plain sight and broad daylight.

Most of humanity is not smart enough to figure out how to take a shit. That socialism still has adherents is really no surprise.

[Citizen X]

Is the caption on that pic a dig at Trump?

[Fist of Etiquette]

Prosecutors in Minneapolis announced they would not be filing charges related to the killing of Jamar Clark by police officers in November.

Because this case of white cops shooting an unarmed black man is different than all those others.

[Rich]

Hollande has abandoned a plan to strip individuals convicted of terrorism of their French citizenship.

But they still get stripped of their hijabs, right? RIGHT?!

[Mr Drew]

Hey guys,
I'm taking the little one to pigeon forge/Gatlinburg tomorrow for a four day weekend. Anything we shouldn't miss? Remember, she's seven.
Thx.

[IndyEleven]

Aquarium in Gatlinburg is pretty good, though a little pricey from what I remember. We took the little one there about 13 months ago. And Ober Gatlinburg, though dated, can be neat for the view and the cable car ride.

[Arkansaustrian Economics]

Went to the Aquarium there a couple of years ago. They get all pissymoany if grab the sharks.

[Mr Drew]

The chance that I would ever try to pet a shark is miniscule. My one phobia.

I did once get escorted out of yellow stone for repeatedly trying to pet a buffalo.

Protip: Buffalo like Reese Cups more than peanut butter crackers.

[Ted S.]

How close is that to Dollywood?

[Private Chipperbot]

A seven year old girl will love the Dixie Stampede show & dinner. I thought it would be horrible and was pleasantly surprised. The kids really liked it.

[Jerryskids]

Last time we were up there (at Thanksgiving) we rented cabins up in the woods and the little one's most memorable moment was the "neighbor in a Mercedes convertible ignoring the 'do not leave food in your car because bears' signs show". I don't know if they put that particular show on on a regular basis, but it's quite extraordinarily entertaining.

[PapayaSF]

LOL

[Mr Drew]

If that show is on, I will absolutely watch it.

[Wizard with a Woodchipper]

Ripley's Believe it or Not museum, but I don't remember how age appropriate it would be. Klingman's dome is a great vista, but you would likely need to carry her for part of the walk/hike.

[Arkansaustrian Economics]

There's a huge buffet owned by Western Sizzlin.

It's everything you just imagined.

[Suthenboy]

"...she's seven." I hope you aren't teaching her to shoot.

A couple of days ago I took the 4 yo grandson fishing. Nothing is biting so I drew the SA Uberti .357 and asked him if he wanted to shoot it. Of course he did. (loaded with 38 spl: 3.5 grains of bullseye and 158 grain RNs)

I knelt down behind him with my arms around him holding the gun in front of him. I aimed and held the gun, he pulled the trigger.

First shot at a ball floating in the bayou he said "Ooooooooooooo!"

I asked if he wanted to do that again. He shook his head very enthusiastically. "Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!"

He burned up about three cylinders worth. This morning the first thing he said to me was "Can we go down to the water and shoot the ball?" He came out of his room in his pajamas but he already had his rubber boots on.

Of course this story is completely made up. I would never teach a child proper gun safety at an early age or foster an interest in shooting in anyone. Nope. I never would do that.

[Mr Drew]

Of course I'm not teaching her to shoot! What little girl would even be interested in a hot pink, hello kitty .22 rifle with a suppressor? Perish the thought.

[EMD]

Would she enjoy hiking? I mean, that's a pretty place.

[The Late P Brooks]

Historians in Germany reveal the Associated Press entered into an arrangement with Nazi Germany in the 1930s to secure access in exchange for a promise not to undermine the regime.

Same as it ever was.

[Notorious UGCC]

You know who else...wait...

[Fist of Etiquette]

The Justice Department and the city of Newark, New Jersey have agreed on a settlement related to reforms of the city's police department.

Does it at all involve nuking from orbit?

[Unicorn Abattoir]

The whole city, or just the police department? I'm good with either, just asking.

[KDN]

Come on, only like 2/3 of the city should be nuked.

[Suthenboy]

+ 1 righteous man

[Fist of Etiquette]

In the case of Luis vs. United States, the Supreme Court ruled, 5-3, against the pre-trial freezing of non-tainted assets.

Thus rewarding criminals simply because they haven't been proven as such!

[Episiarch]

You sure are good at thinking like an authoritarian.

(narrows eyes, loosens knife in sheath)

[UnCivilServant]

Is that a swiss army knife?

[Fist of Etiquette]

loosens knife in sheath

[insert Brock Samson quote here]

[UnCivilServant]

*stab*

Sorry, Fisty, threats only work when they're directed at the right target and you're willing to carry them out.

Make them after you've demonstrated that... oh you've bled out already.

[Episiarch]

Wait, does that make you The Monarch? No, of course not. You're Dr. Girlfriend.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Dr. Orpheus maybe. UnCivil is Shore Leave.

[Episiarch]

Then who is Baron ?nderbheit?!?

[Fist of Etiquette]

The better question is who is Girl Hitler.

[Episiarch]

Your mom?

[Fist of Etiquette]

You're Colonel Gentleman.

[UnCivilServant]

Sorry Fisty, you guessed wrong.

You heal strangely fast.

[Riven]

You mess with the Brock... you get the Samson!

[Fist of Etiquette]

Riven is Pete White, the albino.

[Los Doyers]

And what about me, cinnamon bun??

[Episiarch]

You're Dean.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Hank and Dean's half-brother/uncle. Dermott

[Fist of Etiquette]

Bobarian seems like an Augustus St. Cloud.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

And you are my arch, Master Billy Quizboy.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Molotov Cocktease.

[Los Doyers]

Finally on the other side of the cocktease fence, for once.

[Mr Drew]

Sometimes I feel like you guys have all watched eleven seasons of some tv show that I've never even heard of. Or, have all dropped acid from the same batch.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Six seasons of Venture Bros is a goldmine of ludicrous characters parodying Jonny Quest and comic books. It's perfect for this crowd of NERDS.

[Slumbrew]

Go ahead, take it from me!

[Rich]

pre-trial freezing of non-tainted assets

Nice album name.

[bassjoe]

How prosecutors read the decision: we have to expand the scope of "tainting".

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

That's what Peyton Manning did to that female trainer, right?

[Chumby]

He refers to it as "Omaha-ing" her. And he drank Busweiser afterwards.

[Rich]

Alt-text

[Ted S.]

Question for Hyperion:

You wouldn't know a good link for a brief primer on the political scandals going on in Brazil, would you?

I was just listening to a program on Radio Exterior de Espa?a that basically claimed it's all the horrid right wing going after leftist president Rouseff, and of course the Americans' fault too since they supported the 1964 coup.

[Raven Nation]

Pan American Post is a conservative/libertarian opinion site that is decent.

[Los Doyers]

I'm not Hyperion, praise jeebus, but I read this yesterday and found it informative.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/29/.....withdraws/

I've been following this for awhile, and it seems the noose is tightening around old Dilma's neck. It's corruption and bribery all the way down. Also, shame on you for listening to Radio Exterior de Espa?a.

[Irish ?s Lauren Southern]

My socialism subreddit has been talking about that too.

Surprise! It's a right-wing smear campaign to destroy the revolution!

[Los Doyers]

Yes, the revolution that already started with Dilma and has seen inflation levels rise to 10%. But hey, 4 reals to a dollar is great for me when I visit in June.

[coloraDOOM]

Duh doi

[grrizzly]

Scroll down to the composition of the Brazilian Congress. They have way too many parties. Also, most of them are socialist or communist.

[PapayaSF]

How many communist and socialist parties does one country really need? Wouldn't it be much more efficient to have one?

[ant1sthenes]

Especially if there are kids starving.

[PBR Streetgang]

I just got back from Brazil and the locals, primarily middle class, are furious with Rousseff and Lula. In their mind, both of them are thieves (see, Petrobas and "car wash" scandal) and that the middle class are punitively taxed (27.5% marginal income tax rate, 11% payroll tax on employees, 19% VAT + employers pay a, sit down for this one, 37% payroll tax) to support the poor and non-working that live in the favelas.
Nice people though, like the US dollars.

[Los Doyers]

What part, if I may ask? I'm heading out to Rio in June (no visa needed because of the Olympics!) for about a week, and then out to Paran? to meet someone who is likely catfishing me. Would love to hear your experience, as this will be my first time.

[Crusty Juggler]

who is likely catfishing me

That model/law student is totally not me.

[jesse.in.mb]

You know you can just ask him for dick pics, no?

[Los Doyers]

This is true. My dick pics are common domain.

[Crusty Juggler]

I have no interest in dick pics, because I am not a sick freaky weirdo from weirdotown.

I am into feet. So, if Los Doyers would like to send me pictures of his feet (preferably after he has spent a few hours traipsing around in the mud), then I would gladly accept them

[Los Doyers]

If you want feet, Playa Manhattan is absolutely your guy.

[Playa Manhattan.]

Oh yeah, I'm your guy. I have a friend who doesn't like feet, and I always find a way to sneak them into pictures. By the time she looks, it's too late.

[PBR Streetgang]

We were in Rio and then went to Iguazu Falls (I think that's in Parana) for 2 days. We stayed in Leblon and the people were super nice. Lots of English speakers throughout RIo particularly at the hotels and quite a few in Copa and Ipanema. Basically every restaurant had at least 1 person competent in English, in case you don't speak Portuguese. Everyone was really nice, but Copa apparently gets dicey after the sun goes down. We weren't out late, travelling with kids, but the police presence notably increased at dusk. The exchange rate, as you mentioned, is incredible. Airport security struck me as kinda lax.
Overall, LOVED It. Rio and Iguazu and both gorgeous and the people are really friendly and helpful.

[Los Doyers]

Awesome, sounds like a blast. Yeah, where I'll be staying in Paran? is very close to the falls. I speak Spanish, which has give me a bit of a springboard into my Portuguese studies the last two months, but they're of course still two different languages. Pepper in all the Brazilian slang and I have my work cut out for me. But meh, learning a language is fun, and I'd love to practice while I'm out there. Although I hear most will actually switch to English so *they* can practice, but whatevs. I'll actually be staying with a family that leaves either on the edge of, or inside of, a favela. So it will be interesting to hear their take on this Dilma shit. Thanks for sharing. It's funny you mentioned immigration, because I'll likely be bringing gifts in excess of the US$500 limit, so hopefully I can sneak them through and avoid paying their ridiculous 60% import tax.

[PBR Streetgang]

You'll probably be able to get the gifts through and you will definitely have a great time. Well, assuming no catfishing.
You are right about them wanting to practice English more than they want to hear Americanos practice Portuguese.
Where in Rio are you staying? I only learned the name of 3 or 4 of the hundreds of favelas, but got pretty familiar with the areas of the City.

[Los Doyers]

I believe the neighborhood is called Beco Londres. Yeah, I haz an excite. Caipirinhas for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

[PBR Streetgang]

OH, there is a Churrascaria place in Copa called Churrascaria Palace that serves Caipirnha made with Korean Soju. Highly recommend.

[Los Doyers]

Will make a note of that.

[gaoxiaen]

You'll love the roast camel hump.

[PapayaSF]

Wow, a catfishing scammer and the Zika virus. Have fun!

[Los Doyers]

Hopefully I can bring it back and spread it around CA. It's always good to catch something that isn't too deadly and pick up those immunities.

[Notorious UGCC]

link text"Yo, I got somethin' for your cis-normative asses right here!

"New York has joined cities such as San Francisco and Seattle in banning non-essential travel to North Carolina for city and state employees. These bans come days after the North Carolina state legislature passed an anti-LGBTQ bill that has already prompted a federal lawsuit....

"New York is one of 20 states that ban discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity in the workplace, housing, or public accommodations?two more states protect just against discrimination based on sexual orientation, while the remaining 28 states have no such non-discrimination laws. Earlier this month, de Blasio ordered all city-owned buildings to let people use the bathrooms that correspond with the gender with which they identify, and the City Council is currently considering legislation that would require single-occupancy bathrooms to be usable by people of any gender."

[Notorious UGCC]

http://gothamist.com/2016/03/2.....ity_an.php

[Cdr Lytton]

banning non-essential travel to North Carolina for city and state employees

It's a start. Just 49 states to add, along with the rest of the world to that ban on non-essential travel.

[Private Chipperbot]

Shouldn't all non-essential travel be banned for state employees...

[Hamster of Doom]

the City Council is currently considering legislation that would require single-occupancy bathrooms to be usable by people of any gender."

Seems odd. Gents, chime in please, as I've clearly wasted the opportunity to loiter in men's rooms during my ill-spent youth. But a public toilet with only a urinal? C'mon, like the sink isn't right there.

[jesse.in.mb]

Sounds like the bathroom in one of my favorite bars in Daegu. The women had a sit down toilet and then men had a hole in the floor.

I got screamed at by a woman for having vommed in (and cleaned to sparkling) the women's loo because I didn't want to drunkenly deal with the mechanics of vomming in a squat hole.

The places that I've been to that have implemented choose your own adventure bathrooms have had varying levels of success. Free-for-all single use bathrooms combined with a room with a row of urinals or a trough seems to be the most optimal solution. Sit-down toilets are used more optimally than separate men's and women's toilets but men who need to take a quick piss aren't left standing in line behind shitters.

[Arkansaustrian Economics]

You haven't lived until you've pissed while making terrifying eye contact in the mirror with Adjima-o'er-the-cathole.

[jesse.in.mb]

This guy knows.

I hated how hard it was to guess whether a bathroom in Korea would have a Western toilet or a squat. Out for a hike once and lunch was severely disagreeing with me. See a port-a-john and think "ha. serendipitous" and it's a squat toilet.

Never did get good at them.

[Arkansaustrian Economics]

That happened to me literally on my first trip to the bathroom in a bar in Korea, in Suwon back in 98. 19 year old kid from the Ozarks, and you walk in the room and see a 70-year-old woman squatting over a hole with no shame.

Naturally, I stayed for two years.

[jesse.in.mb]

It wasn't much different 10 years later when I was there. I remember seeing old guys just walk up to bushes in broad daylight and take a piss and thinking "well that's a bit freer than home" but then saw old women hitch their skirts and pop a squat in some bushes by the sidewalk in broad daylight and had NO idea what to do.

[OneOut]

How did she know you had vommed if you had cleaned to sparkling ?

vommed means vomited, right ?

[jesse.in.mb]

It does.

She wasn't upset about the vomming. She was upset that I had gone into the women's toilet, which was a tiny stone cubicle with a single toilet and a roll of toilet paper and flimsy wooden door. It was not like I'd violated the sanctity of a shared bathroom space or something.

The mens was the same thing with a hole in the floor and a curtain instead of a flimsy wooden door and was right next to the women's.

[Suthenboy]

Banning non-essential travel...I don't know what that means.

On the taxpayer dime? That should be banned anyway. Travel on their own dime and time? I don't think that boat will float.

[Crusty Juggler]

Watch an Underground Nuclear Explosion Melt the Ground into a Giant Crater

[Citizen X]

These masturbation euphemisms, i swear.

[Pan Zagloba]

$100 donation level 2016 - you will receive a copy of Legless Cats and Trump Levers: Dictionary of H&R Masturbation Metaphors (440 pages)

[Matrix]

Student assaulted by university employee because he dared be white while having dreadlocks

[Notorious UGCC]

I think it was a fellow-student, not an employee.

[Matrix]

all the reports say the woman was employed by the University. She may also be a student, but she is employed there.

[kbolino]

The overlap of students and employees at colleges/universities is pretty high. But working the library desk 8 hours a week for $10/hour while you are taking classes full time doesn't really make you a representative of the institution, even if you are technically an employee.

[HeteroPatriarch]

Ah yes, Work/study, which gives students a horribly fucked up idea of what is involved in "work." There's a reason it counts as financial aid and not just a job.

[Citizen X]

Looks like somebody wasn't around this morning!

[Riven]

Some of us work for a living, Citizen X!

[Citizen X]

Do you not have internet to dick around on at your job? What kind of hellhole do you work in, Riven?

[Riven]

Of course I do! And I also have the freedom that it doesn't even matter that my screen doesn't face away from the door. I'm just actually busy until 2ish every day.

[Matrix]

I was briefly, but didn't see anyone post the link. And I was busy on a conference call nearly all fucking day...

[Citizen X]

Rico posted it at noon.

[lafe.long]

... ...and I posted it in yesterday's PM linx

[Los Doyers]

Ugh, so last links.

[The Late P Brooks]

Capitalism is contradictory because the quest for more and more wealth inevitably leads to waste and recession. This is the anarchy of the free market.

Oh, HORROR.

[Rich]

What do Jesus Christ, Muhammad, Siddhartha Gautama and Moses all have in common? Besides being religious figures, they are all men. Yet looking around the world, the majority of their followers are actually women.

Ah, HA!

[Ted S.]

I think more women worship that Gaia shit, too.

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

Really makes you think.

[Square = Circle]

Did not look at the link, but pray tell - how does anyone know that the majority of Moses' followers were actually women? Did someone perfect that telescope that looks backward in time? Because last I checked, Exodus and Deuteronomy were the only versions of the Moses story, and I don't recall either one going into many specifics on demographic trends.

[jesse.in.mb]

Wut?

The article is about women tending to be more religious currently than men. Not about the direct disciples of those particular figures.

Globally, more women than men identify with a religion, pray daily and say that religion is "very important" to them, according to data from the Pew Research Center. Around the world, 83.4 percent of women say they identify with a religion, compared with 79.9 percent of men, Pew says, meaning there are about 100 million more religiously affiliated women on the planet than men. But why?

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

Women are weak and need a strong sky daddy man. That's also why they want welfare and vote socialist.

Pretty simple.

[jesse.in.mb]

Which came first, the name change or the persona change?

I'm enjoying it, but I'm curious about the narrative arc here.

[Suthenboy]

You forgot 'less rational'.

[Domestic Dissident]

Historians in Germany reveal the Associated Press entered into an arrangement with Nazi Germany in the 1930s to secure access in exchange for a promise not to undermine the regime.

State-approved journalists end up at the New York Times, real journalists end up like Andrew Breitbart and Michael Hastings.

[Crusty Juggler]

And Bob Simon.

[Chumby]

Then what the fuck is Brian Williams?

[EMD]

He used the word journalist, not asshat.

[Winston]

So what's the libertarian take on bathroom equality? Should urinals be banned for their male privilege? And how do gender neutral bathrooms fit in with safe spaces?

[Doctor Whom]

Whatever any business chooses to do?

[Rich]

how do gender neutral bathrooms fit in with safe spaces?

*Nice* catch! BAN PUBLIC RESTROOMS!

[The Last American Hero]

In the first edition of Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand said "A Penis is A Penis". In later editions, it was edited down to "A is A" to be more ruthlessly efficient.

[Pan Zagloba]

Wow, that gives a new perspective on Ditko's Mr A character!

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

And how do gender neutral bathrooms fit in with safe spaces?

Not at all, really.

"Safe Spaces" in the modern socio-political context are by definition places of discrimination.

[Pat (PM)]

So what's the libertarian take on bathroom equality?

If it's a government building, you can walk in, stand in the center of the room, and start urinating while helicoptering your dick and they have to accommodate you. Otherwise, up to the building owner.

[Winston]

You bring up a interesting point: aren't bathrooms a system of segregating rooms by function and discriminate against the people who want to piss in jars or just shit on the floor?

[Square = Circle]

Yes, but contrary to popular belief, there are people in the world who in fact *deserve* to be discriminated against. We call them "assholes."

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

Should urinals be banned for their male privilege?

Do you mind if I piss in the sink?

[Crusty Juggler]

U.S. Allies 'Borrowing' Munitions To Drop On ISIS As U.S. Stockpiles Are Also In Question

[The Late P Brooks]

It would be cool to see biopics made about Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Marx, Engels, Debs, Kropotkin, and other famous leftists.

If only society would force Michael Bay to make a biography of Trotsky...

[Notorious UGCC]

icepick, baby

Too soon, too soon?

[UnCivilServant]

I thought he was done in with an ice axe - a totally different implement.

[Notorious UGCC]

You seem strangely familiar with the details of his death...

/sarc

[Dong of Justice]

Captain America and Iron Man don't agree with each other. Decide to fight.

[Crusty Juggler]

Hawkeye is gay, right? His wife is just a beard?

[Riven]

Pretty elaborate beard. Don't they have a whole herd of spawn?

[Juvenile Bluster]

His wife is pregnant with their third kid in Age of Ultron.

[Crusty Juggler]

That's what he wants you to think.

[Riven]

So basically a herd.

[Crusty Juggler]

I'm not buying it.

[Riven]

Hey, man. I wouldn't buy a whole passal of kids, either. I already pay to get a shot to prevent it.

[Florida Hipster]

Make sure you take enough shots to kill it or you just get fetal alcohol syndrome.

[Hamster of Doom]

"Litter" is also acceptable. As is "side", but only if one has enough children to form a sports team.

[Riven]

If I was going to have kids, I'd have to have nine. So I could have my own baseball team.

The Mont-Anals.

I love it already.

[See Double You]

Montana Anals, huh?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

pregnant with their third kid in Age of Ultron.

So what is that, like... the third trimester?

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

His wife.

Would.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

Hey, Ed. Watch. Wanna see this bunch go nuts?

Betty or Wilma?

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

Can a man really be gay when married to Linda Cardellini?

[Crusty Juggler]

Yes, when that man is a character portrayed by Jeremy Renner.

[Episiarch]

(perks up)

Did someone say Linda Cardellini?

[Slumbrew]

Linda Cardellini is a big part what makes Grandma's Boy a guilty pleasure for me.

[Juvenile Bluster]

Seriously, I'm nervously excited about this movie. The Civil War storyline is my favorite Marvel storyline of all time.

[Riven]

I'm not familiar with the canon, but I am super jazzed about the Civil War movie. Of all the Avengers, Captain America is my favorite, and I never thought I would say that. But he's just so...principled I could almost swoon.

Crying shame he's a blond.

[commodious spittoon]

I liked the idea of Superman vs. Batman before RLM explained that the only way DC would do it is by toning down Superman's douchery and making their disagreement pretty cosmetic. Can't risk the brand.

[UnCivilServant]

But Superman has always been a dick - from the golden age onward...

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

The Russo brothers did such a bang-up job with the last CA movie that I'm already sold on this one. I am weary of the length and the broad cast of characters, because it looks to function like the third Avengers movie, but if they deliver the same kinetic action, I'll be satisfied.

[Dong of Justice]

Can't wait for the porn parody of this film.

[Private Chipperbot]

Name checks out.

[Dong of Justice]

Just think of all the creative ways they can utilize Ant-Man...

[Riven]

Me gusta...

[Private Chipperbot]

/Trump's lawyers furiously sending out cease and desist notices.

[commodious spittoon]

"We're still friends, right?"

"Depends on how hard you hit me."

Translation: masochist.

[Jerry on the rocks]

Two police officers have been mowed down and killed by a bus hijacked by protesters at a demonstration in Venezuela, according to local officials.
Authorities say the two were killed during a protest over a hike in public transportation fares in Tachira state, in the western town of San Cristobal.

[Pat (PM)]

Libertarian moment?

[Ken Shultz]

"While Kim Jong Un's weight has gone up, the dictator warned North Korea would be facing another famine."

There are two main survival mechanisms for communist economies: 1) territorial expansion 2) periodically reducing the population.

Ukraine, Cambodia, Great Leap Forward, it's always the same. If you can't expand your borders and you want to be communist, then periodically somebody's gonna have to do without food.

They try to minimize the cyclical kill offs through death camps, etc. I mean, if somebody has to starve, it might as well be the critics, right? But every one in a while, due to El Nino, whatever, there isn't going to be enough food to go around.

We'll see one or both of the following happen: 1) North Korea will engage in saber rattling through its nuclear program or otherwise to force a crisis summit and get aid from the west without losing face. 2) China will step up aid on its own to prevent a humanitarian disaster from spilling across its borders.

[Juvenile Bluster]

#2 is definitely going to happen. China has absolutely no desire to see a flood of hungry migrants try and cross that border.

[Chumby]

Europe discriminates against Muslim Middle Easteners. China discriminates against Asians.

[commodious spittoon]

No wonder you all abandoned me in the other thread. You had another party to go to. Well THANKS FOR THE INVITE.

*storms from room sobbing*

[Rich]

*** pats commodious on, well, side ***

There, there. You were just taken in by the late lynx yesterday, weren't you? It's OK ?.

[__Warren__]

Feds step on their dicks again.

Turns out all that nonsense about making banks be responsible for monitoring "suspicious" accounts has caused them to close down the accounts instead, which forces the account holders out of the visible and monitored banking system and into the shadows.

I'm happy about this as that means more people are blazing a wider path in developing unmonitored banking which might lead to making it easier for anyone else who wishes to to escape from the state-controlled system.

The idiot fed-boys own rules are now nurturing the cash economy when they've just started to ramp up efforts to quash it. *golf clap*

[Riven]

I'm not surprised--if the Feds understood incentives, they wouldn't be, either.

[Rich]

"*Now* we can monitor them with our *intel* systems! BWAHAHAHAHAAA!!"

[The Last American Hero]

So the more they tighten their grip, the more that slips through their fingers?

[Crusty Juggler]

So the more they tighten their grip, the more that slips through their fingers?

Goodness.

[Restoras]

Right? If that's not a masturbation euphemism I don't know what is.

[Bobarian (Would Chip Her)]

I think thats a line translated from a german schiesse video.

Notice how it made someone perk up?

[Chumby]

Eine Neue Hoffnung

[bassjoe]

The federal Financial Crimes Enforcement Network director a year and a half ago or so issued a statement criticizing banks for not banking smaller money services businesses (MoneyGram, PayPal, etc.) as that forces the MSBs to use more-expensive and less-secure methods to handle customer money and drives customers to gray or black market services.

Which was ironic because it has been FinCEN-supported enforcement actions that has made banks hesitant to service MSBs; regulators regularly fine banks for not properly monitoring MSB activities. Banks' completely reasonable reaction has been to simply stop servicing MSBs.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Snapchat gets new features.

Stop the presses.

[commodious spittoon]

The ability to record in real-time users reading about snapchat updates and yawning deeply?

[a better chipper]

Pardon me for doing a little personal venting, but has anyone ever had a professional reference torpedo them for a job before?

After having an offer ready to go, and having assurances from the hiring manager that I had the job, the last step was to talk to my references. Now they won't say who it was, and I've used them all before, but they called me back and said there were too many red flags to ignore. This happened yesterday, so I'm still pretty blind-sided by it all. They wouldn't say if it was just one reference or not, but I keep in touch regularly with all of them and got all of their enthusiastic permission to continue using them as a reference for this job.

I've talked to all of them personally since and they all assure me they gave me good marks (the hiring organization used a survey format instead of phone) and that they weren't confused on the format of the survey. Someone is lying to me and I can't figure out who it is or what the motive would be. It's maddening!

Anyone else ever had something like this happen to them? I'm apoplectic about the whole thing because it's really fucked me over professionally (they requested my current boss be a reference, so that rocked the boat) and my family (money lost, and we would have been in the same city as my wife's parents) and I have no idea where to go since no one is budging.

[a better chipper]

I shouldn't have said "talk" to my references. Because they didn't. It was just some survey submission, which in and of itself is ridiculous.

[Private Chipperbot]

Sounds like it's entirely possible one of them just didn't understand the survey. I get reference calls, even for people who don't list me, and I'm very, very careful about my answers. I'd never answer in any way that didn't come across worst case as neutral about a prospect.

[Ken Shultz]

The first guy I'd suspect is your current boss. He's the one with the most obvious motive.

[Ken Shultz]

P.S. As a rule, I never accepted a counter offer a current employer.

[a better chipper]

Of all the references, he'd probably be tied for the most surprising, but you're right that he does. We're friends outside of work, fantasy football leagues together, kids play dates, and all.

He's helped provide good references for people other than myself who he was less cool with. I'd be super bummed if that turned out to be the case for me.

[grrizzly]

Of all the bosses I had, the only one who tried to fire me was the one who I had thought to have the best professional/personal relationship with. At the end I wasn't fired, but I still think that my story was crazier than the one in American Beauty.

[OneOut]

Get out of corporate bullshit life and develop your own life.

It will take a while but insulate yourself from such pettiness and games.

Find something you like to do where you are judged and paid for your production and not your political acumen.

You'll live a happier life.

[Rich]

they all assure me they gave me good marks

Perhaps you were a victim of the "I cannot praise a better chipper's work too highly" write-up?

[Tornado16nb]

Tell each one independently saying something along the lines of "hiring company insinuated that you gave me a bad referral and was wondering why you did that to help going forward" and see what their reaction is.

[a better chipper]

Its really looking like I'll have to do that if HR can't give me something to work off of. I hate risking seeming mistrusting to the good references that were being honest though.

I've got stellar employee evals going back years, covering all but one reference from a summer internship in grad school years ago. I've decided what I should do is scan and forward them to the hiring manager and say "these evals working with each of these references were all extremely positive while I was working there. Is it possible a mistake has been made?"

[jesse.in.mb]

Waterboard each of them until you get the information you need.

[a better chipper]

You're hired!

[Cdr Lytton]

...right after you talk to his references?

[jesse.in.mb]

They are all...complaint, thankyouverymuch

[toolkien]

Never underestimate that the Human Resource person wanted another candidate, so they torpedo'd you and used the references as the rationale since every other metric probably was met (positive interview notes, good overall interviews, schooling sufficient, experience sufficient, etc). I've run into plenty of cows in Human Resources who make sure they get the outcome they want. The "references" can be manipulated as no one in the target company will probably follow up on it.

Did you have any notion Human Resources wasn't enamored of you?

It's so damn scary how much power Human Resources has in our society today. The people who generally have no notion of production, engineering, or finance have first control over the talent the company acquires. Add in that they are now becoming more and more complicit in regulatory expansion, and its a toxic double whammy.

[a better chipper]

That is my only other thought and I have no idea. I didn't meet with anyone from HR, and as far as I know, they only talked with my potential supervisor and received the survey results.

They narrowed it down to myself and one other person before I came onsite for my interview, so perhaps someone in HR was friendly with the other candidate. Otherwise I have no idea.

I basically outlined for one of the directors how to tackle their next project, which enamored him. That is also annoying. Nobody gets anything from me for free!

[OneOut]

Perhaps that's the problem.

That director did get something from you for free. He had your idea and decided to advise HR your competitor for the job could implement HIS idea better than you could.

Get the fuck out of the corporate world unless you have a certain amount of psychopathy.

[commodious spittoon]

Or perhaps they told you one of your references didn't check out as a slimy way to get out of informing you that the boss's grandson needed a cush job.

[Chumby]

I'd press the potential employer hard and ask to meet with whomever you prime contact there was. Maybe an "off the record" lunch. Maybe someone there didn't want you and deep-sixed the surveys. Shit happens.

I was once hired then unhired because an unqualified person that was a member of a protected class contested the first time they had the job open (only one good candidate and they didn't like the pay).

This could be construed as slimy but get a very loyal friend to act as a potential employer and go through the same thing with your regerences. Maybe wait at least a month so if at least one of them screwed you they would reconsider. Dunno.

[Notorious UGCC]

This article came out last year, but seems timely:

"Black Magic: Hoodoo Witches Speak Out on the Appropriation of Their Craft.

"We talked to modern Hoodoo practitioners about cultural appropriation in witchcraft and keeping the African American slave folk magic alive....

""Wihout an African ancestral link, the practice becomes something other than Hoodoo," says Madame Omi Kongo, a rootworker who comes from a long line of female practitioners....

""Hoodoo is the power of intention, confidence, and faith manifested," she explains. "Hoodoo broadcasts the beauty and power of black culture at its root." Practicing a mix of Hoodoo, Puerto Rican Spiritualism, and West African traditional religions, she incorporates different aspects of her heritage into her magic. "I do what works for me being that my ancestry is so diverse," she continues. "I work the way my spirits move me.""

[Rich]

rootworker

Heh.

[Irish ?s Lauren Southern]

"""Wihout an African ancestral link, the practice becomes something other than Hoodoo," says Madame Omi Kongo, a rootworker who comes from a long line of female practitioners...."

Hoodoo appropriation.

[commodious spittoon]

John Fogerty?

[__Warren__]

This guy.

[Winston]

So Ron Bailey was talking about "Melding socially liberal businesspeople, non-warmongering Democrats, and avowed libertarians into a new party".

Not sure how that is supposed to work. I mean he is making several large assumptions such: Socially Liberal businessman are fiscal conservatives, support the libertarian social agenda, oppose war, that there are large numbers of "non-warmongering Democrats" and that those "non-warmongering Democrats" support libertarianism in any way...

[toolkien]

Well, as far back as 2005 I was hoping fiscally conservative, socially liberal Republicans would forge a "third road" with Blue Dog Democrats. Never even came close to happening.

We're going over that cliff and there's no stopping it. The most annoying part is going to be seeing all the shocked, uncomprehending faces when it happens. And the reactionary responses in the entirely wrong direction. Hardliners will flourish, and liberty will decline precipitously

[Winston]

No we'll need a strongman like Trump or a strongman to save us from Trump...

[Chumby]

Gary Condit was my favorite blue dog Dem.

[Sevo]

"While Kim Jong Un's weight has gone up, the dictator warned North Korea would be facing another famine."

I seem to recall a link to an apologist who claimed 'Yeah, in the mean, ol' '90s, people starved, but this isn't the '90s anymore; it's gotten far better'.
Pretty sure it was in regards to the woman who fled NK; anyone remember?

[Winston]

Well this article did claim that things are improving in North Korea:

http://reason.com/archives/201.....ots-capita

[BigT]

There's too much good news here.

Nut punch time!

Man fatally shot by Ariz. police officer begged for life

PHOENIX ? A Texas man fatally shot by a Mesa police officer in January was heard begging for his life moments before his death, according to a police report released Tuesday morning.

A witness and a transcription of officer video footage describe Daniel Shaver saying "Please don't shoot me" and "Please don't shoot," just before an officer later identified as Philip "Mitch" Brailsford unloaded his service weapon.

Brailsford has been charged with second-degree murder and was terminated from the Police Department.

On Tuesday, the Mesa Police Department released the police report, 911 calls and other material from its investigation of Brailsford's shooting of Shaver, who was unarmed, at a hotel in January.

The material released did not include officers' body camera video from the scene.

[Juvenile Bluster]

I posted this in the morning lynx. That's not a nut punch, it's a nut kick with steel toed boots.

[commodious spittoon]

Except for the firing and charges. Apparently even cop unions have their limits.

[Pat (PM)]

Don't get too excited. As we know, charges are not the same as convictions.

[cgr2727]

Charges are not even the same as indictments, especially when the chummy-with-cops prosecutor tanks on purpose in front of the grand jury. If they can indict a ham sandwich, why can't they indict a pig?

[Juvenile Bluster]

The article I posted had the information that the cop's been offered a sweetheart deal (negligent homicide)

[Guestus III]

At least that would result in him going to jail. Might be the best possible outcome given the usual outcomes.

[commodious spittoon]

Oh, and another case of "I thought he had a gun, so I called men I know have guns and a dispassion for human life to take care of him." Fuck you.

[BigT]

Sorry, JB, I was out all morning, hiking.

[bassjoe]

That sounds like first degree murder. Shooting somebody AFTER that person begs for his life isn't considered premeditation? I think a normal person would have been charged with first degree on those facts.

But I guess I should be happy he was charged at all...

[commodious spittoon]

Just wait till the judge dismisses the case because it should have been prosecuted as murder in the first degree. Double jeopardy is technically innocent!

[bassjoe]

Ugh, I forgot about that miscarriage of justice. "He was charged with a homicide charge less severe than what he should have been so he's innocent... and double jeopardy applies... so fuck you, dead person's family".

[Hamster of Doom]

Holy. Shit. The guy who worked in pest control, with the wife and kids the PD never even bothered to notify? The widow found out when she started calling around looking for him, as I recall.

[Riven]

Super nut punch.

On to the important question--

The Widow: would, with prejudice.

[OneOut]

Uh, Riven ?

That's a little too soon, even for Reason.

This is a truly sad nutpunch. This is an atrocity. A man is on his knees begging for his life and the cops shoot him to death. Joking about doing his widow is out of bounds for

Humor isn't an option for this.

[HeteroPatriarch]

TIWTANFL!

Wait, what?

[Winston]

So people are complaining about the damage ISIS did to Palmyra. But weren't they slave-owners?

[Pat (PM)]

But weren't they slave-owners?

Unpossible. Only white people owned slaves.

[Notorious UGCC]

National Review writer indulges in schadenfreude as several Trump supporters show signs of buyer's remorse

"Technically we're supposed to welcome previous Trump fans-turned-foes with open arms. But barring some miraculous comeback by Ted Cruz, the Trump campaign will have cost the Republican party the presidency after eight years of Obama, and perhaps the Senate and even the House -- not to mention Scalia's replacement on the Supreme Court. Years of effort spent attempting to dispel the accusations of inherent Republican misogyny, xenophobia, hypocrisy, ignorance, and blind rage have been undone by Trump's campaign. And every Trump advocate in front of a camera had a hand in this.

"We're not just gonna hug it out."

[Libertarian]

Read that piece earlier today and enjoyed it. Especially the comments about Coulter and Newt.

[Pat (PM)]

Well, if Trump was the Jefferson Davis of our era, I suppose there had to be a William T. Sherman.

[Pat (PM)]

Well, if Trump was the Jefferson Davis of our era, I suppose there had to be a William T. Sherman.

[Pat (PM)]

The squirrels have been with us in every generation.

[kbolino]

I don't care if you're pro-Trump or anti-Trump but at least wait until the fucking election is over before issuing the fatwas.

Not called the Stupid Party for nothing...

[commodious spittoon]

Nope. The GOP needs to take its lumps, cut loose the Trump contingent, and wave as it floats away. They are nothing but poison and their brand of pestilential populism needs to be excised outright, full stop. Lose the election or burn the party to the ground, but don't bother entreating with these people. Trump is the candidate of a managed decline: it's the admission that we're going to do nothing to bring back business or entrepreneurs, nothing to scale back the regulatory, administrative, and welfare state, nothing to loosen up the needless restrictions on human enterprise, that we're going to embrace the progressive agenda, double-down, and bring their brand of welfarism out of their dismal cities and into the suburbs and countryside.

[Winston]

Trump is the candidate of a managed decline: it's the admission that we're going to do nothing to bring back business or entrepreneurs, nothing to scale back the regulatory, administrative, and welfare state, nothing to loosen up the needless restrictions on human enterprise, that we're going to embrace the progressive agenda, double-down, and bring their brand of welfarism out of their dismal cities and into the suburbs and countryside.

Except....which Republican does this not describe? Rand Paul?

[commodious spittoon]

Cruz would break our hearts in ways, but at least he wouldn't fucking revel in it.

[commodious spittoon]

Meant to amend my point somewhat--I'm not a Cruz backer. He's the best of the current bunch, but that's a low bar to clear. I would have liked to see Rand clinch it, but there was no real chance of that. I will more than likely sit out election night.

My contention is that the idiots Trump panders to wanted themselves a burn-it-to-the-ground, anti-establishment, outsider candidate, and they had that choice: Cruz would have taken them onboard gratefully. Instead they went with the insubstantial, intellectually nowhere moron who best reflected their own aimless desires.

Cruz may not have been a libertarian's wet dream, but he's leagues better than Trump. Cruz would have been merely disappointing, but Trump is specifically the candidate of expansive government.

[Hamster of Doom]

S'ok, broheim. We've not yet gone so far that a milquetoast "compliment" counts as an enthusiastic endorsement. You're good.

[Crusty Juggler]

COULTER: Moreover, I'm a little testy with our man right now.

YIANNOPOULOS: You are? Daddy's annoyed you?

[Yes, Yiannopoulos calls Trump "Daddy." Because that's perfectly normal.]

COULTER: Our candidate is mental! Do you realize our candidate is mental? It's like constantly having to bail out your 16-year-old son from prison. Let's move past last night's tweet -- you know perfectly well what tweet I'm talking about.

This is the worst thing he's done. I mean the McCain thing -- I would say there are only really two, liberals would say, "Oh, every day," no, everything else I could probably defend. I could. I think. Most of that is them overreacting . . . But the McCain thing, that was a dumb joke, it didn't work. Oh, well. Didn't kill him. But that tweet last night . . .

YIANNOPOULOS: And he's retweeting these images that are, like, 'I don't need to make implications, you know, the pictures speak for themselves.' And a picture of Cruz's wife and a picture of Melania!

COULTER: That's exactly the tweet I'm talking about! No, you can't defend it! This is when we're bailing out sixteen-year-old out of jail!

YIANNOPOULOS: It's so outrageously funny!

A lower level of political discourse commonly found on a H and R Trump thread? I think so.

[Notorious UGCC]

When Ann Coulter is telling you you're being immature...

[commodious spittoon]

Yes, Yiannopoulos calls Trump "Daddy." Because that's perfectly normal the sort of thing a professional troll does.

[commodious spittoon]

That's exactly the tweet I'm talking about! No, you can't defend it! This is when we're bailing out sixteen-year-old out of jail!

Dear, that sort of thing is the only reason Trump enjoys any traction at all, because he's ludicrous and knows how to generate spectacle and outrage, and above all, his mush-headed supporters want the spectacle of a man breaching the confines of the politic while indulging their persecution complex. Unfortunately for you and the rest of your party, these people will not overcome the rest of the country that finds him risible.

[GILMORE?]

Person posts shit on Twitter, goes to jail

[Winston]

You Know Who Else posted Stupid Shit on Twitter?

[GILMORE?]

Everyone?

[Notorious UGCC]

Twitler?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Bono?

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Well, she posted something on twitter about joining ISIS then tried to board a plane to Turkey.

Which, by the way, wouldn't the best thing we could be to let people join ISIS in Syria right now? What's the life expectancy over there?

[Hamster of Doom]

Why is that our business? Let her go. Good luck, sweetheart, may all your dreams come true.

[GILMORE?]

Diplomacy = "It Takes Two to Tango-Edition"

"Those who say the future is in negotiations, not in missiles, are either ignorant or traitors," Khamenei, who has the final say on all matters of state, was quoted as saying by his website.

His comments may have been directed at former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the de facto leader of a more moderate political alliance, who last week tweeted "the future is in dialogue, not missiles".

[Notorious UGCC]

I'm sure he meant conventional missiles, not the nuclear kind.

Why you gotta hate?

/sarc

[GILMORE?]

I know you're being facetious....

...but for the sake of people who are stupid enough to actually posit that =

There is absolutely zero practical strategic or tactical utility to missiles that are built to be fired at targets hundreds and hundreds of miles away....

...that can't hit a point target. i.e. "within a few hundred yards."

The missiles they test are basically useless without a payload at least *remotely equivalent* to nuclear capacity. Otherwise, you've just spent billions of dollars on a weapons system that is less-accurate and less-destructive than a conventional "Dumb Bomb".

[Loki]

Historians in Germany reveal the Associated Press entered into an arrangement with Nazi Germany in the 1930s to secure access in exchange for a promise not to undermine the regime

They still do the same thing today with our government.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

Oh, just in case some of you only get your news from Reason: this is a real thing.

I know it's not about Trump, or a Trump supporter...or a Trump rally. But it probably passes as substantial news. Or it fucking should.

[Notorious UGCC]

Has Trump tweeted anything about this yet?

[Notorious UGCC]

Wait, wait, I bet Trump is going to built a *yuge* server and it's going to be super-secure!

[Pan Zagloba]

And he'll make foreign intelligence agencies pay for it?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

I misread that as a *yuge* sewer.

I think it works better.

[Crusty Juggler]

Since the email arrangement came to public knowledge a year ago, the State Department has found itself defending Clinton in scores of lawsuits from groups, individuals and news outlets who say they were wrongly denied access to Clinton's federal records.

Poor State Department.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

Loretta Lynch's law firm is heavily entwined with the Clinton political machine. There will never. be. an indictment.

[Winston]

We need a TOP (WO)MAN to save ourselves from Trump.

[Notorious UGCC]

Loretta Lynch's defense of the Obamacare birth-control mandate is the culmination of a long crusade.

[Libertarian]

There will never. be. an indictment.

True. No indictment before the election because we'll be told that they don't want to affect the election. And no indictment after the election because it will be old news, and we need to look to the future and not litigate the past.

[GILMORE?]

Do you think that includes everyone associated with hillary?

Because i think an indictment of her underlings (a la, Huma, Mills, Sid Blumenthal) is certainly possible. Sid had NSA raw intel being circulated in an unsecure email when he wasn't even supposed to have had access *at all*. There's enough out there to hook people other than Hillary.

[__Warren__]

It would be amusing to see the rationale if the Clinton in-group is left alone but those others who got/gave the info get prosecuted.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

What does that mean though? We've had the 'underlings' of presidents being thrown (and eaten) by the wolves for decades. Isn't that the point of political loyalty?

[PapayaSF]

Hillary could still have her campaign mortally wounded. If the FBI recommends indictment and it doesn't happen, then there are likely to be leaks and public resignations. Not everyone in the FBI is a Democratic Party stooge.

[Tornado16nb]

Since it hasn't happened yet I don't think it will. It was swept under the rug

[PapayaSF]

No, they are still working on it. Word is that Hillary and aides will shortly be interviewed. They will try to Martha Stewart her.

[Pan Zagloba]

What difference at this Trump does it make, Sloopy?

[sloopyinTEXAS]

It makes no difference, apparently. There are way more important things to discuss that the presumptive nominee of one major party being under FBI investigation, her closest associates being granted immunity, federal judges compelling testimony and a whole host of pay-for-play evidence dripping out.

That's chickenshit compared to an arm grab by a surrogate.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

There's nothing Jerry Springer about the Clinton email scandal.

*cameras going dark*

[Loki]

While Kim Jong Un's weight has gone up, the dictator warned North Korea would be facing another famine.

So what is Kim Jong-Un's title? I know his old man was Dear Leader, and Kim Il Sung was Great Leader (among others). Rotund Leader? Corpulent Leader?

[Winston]

Well according to Wikipedia:

Supreme Leader and First Chairman of the
National Defence Commission

First Secretary of the
Workers' Party of Korea

Supreme Commander of the
Korean People's Army

Chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party of Korea

[Notorious UGCC]

Nice titles...I wonder if he's fat enough to feed Pyongyang for a day?

[Winston]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Jong-il

After his death, he was designated as the "Eternal General Secretary" of the WPK and the "Eternal Chairman of the National Defence Commission"

Kim-Il Sung is of course "Eternal President".

[Libertarian]

Piker.

U.S. President:

Executioner (kill list, drones)

Legislator (signing statements)

Supreme General (Commander in Chief)

Supreme Leader (executive orders)

Judge (Giver of clemency)

Chief Executive (Executive Branch)

Supreme Father (hugs people after natural disasters)

[Winston]

How's the internet connection in Pyongyang?

[Loki]

I'm sure the party leadership has great internet connections. The rest of the peasants, not so much.

[Libertarian]

If you're accusing me of blatant, ridiculous hyperbole, I plead guilty.

[commodious spittoon]

The Turgid Tyrant.

[Loki]

Meh, I like my suggestion of "The Corpulent Leader" better.

Either that or "The Ayatollah of Rock and Rolla" but Lord Humungous may not like that. He'd have to go unleash his Dogs of War on Kim's fat ass for using that title.

[Chumby]

He bowled a 300. Leave him alone.

[Krabappel]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03......html?_r=0

The New York Times doesn't understand the difference between a state mandated minimum wage of $15 an hour and a specific company in the Bronx "voluntarily phasing in" the new minimum wage. Phasing it in must mean "hiring better employees at higher wages".

[GILMORE?]

Apple Calling FBI Bluff = Show Us How You "Cracked" Our Phone

If the U.S. Department of Justice asks a New York court to force Apple Inc to unlock an iPhone, the technology company could push the government to reveal how it accessed the phone which belonged to a shooter in San Bernardino, a source familiar with the situation said.

If the U.S. Department of Justice asks a New York court to force Apple Inc to unlock an iPhone, the technology company could push the government to reveal how it accessed the phone which belonged to a shooter in San Bernardino, a source familiar with the situation said.

If it turns out the FBI 'has a method' to break Apple's consumer encryption, are they compelled to share it with the company if they ever make future demands on them in a court of law?

Also notable = mentioned in this CNBC piece, one commentator notes that the FBI had probably gotten the ability to break the phone within a 'few days' of the San B. shootings, suggesting that their subsequent demands to Apple were purely (surprise) for legal precedent, and had no practical need for their compliance.

[sloopyinTEXAS]

My guess is that somebody in the FBI figured out how to swipe right. And they'll never admit it.

[HeteroPatriarch]

I think they went to the morgue for a thumbprint.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

If it turns out the FBI 'has a method' to break Apple's consumer encryption, are they compelled to share it with the company if they ever make future demands on them in a court of law?

No.

suggesting that their subsequent demands to Apple were purely (surprise) for legal precedent, and had no practical need for their compliance.

Absolutely. And their withdrawal was strategic. They're going to wait for a 'better' case and re-assert then.

[GILMORE?]

""No""

The article suggested if they keep pursuing the NY case that this situation may in fact pop up. The EFF has this to say about it =

this new method of accessing the phone raises questions about the government's apparent use of security vulnerabilities in iOS and whether it will inform Apple about these vulnerabilities. As a panel of experts hand-picked by the White House recognized, any decision to withhold a security vulnerability for intelligence or law enforcement purposes leaves ordinary users at risk from malicious third parties who also may use the vulnerability. Thanks to a lawsuit by EFF, the government has released its official policy for determining when to disclose security vulnerabilities, the Vulnerabilities Equities Process (VEP).

If the FBI used a vulnerability to get into the iPhone in the San Bernardino case, the VEP must apply, meaning that there should be a very strong bias in favor of informing Apple of the vulnerability. That would allow Apple to fix the flaw and protect the security of all its users. We look forward to seeing more transparency on this issue as well.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

As a panel of experts hand-picked by the White House recognized, any decision to withhold a security vulnerability for intelligence or law enforcement purposes leaves ordinary users at risk from malicious third parties who also may use the vulnerability.

Wait a second though, the EFF seems to be making a purely ethical argument, not a legal one. Well, I mean they mention the VEP but does anyone believe the government abides by the VEP? When has the government discovered vulnerabilities in various systems and immediately trumpeted the hows and whys of the methodology? Isn't everything the FBI and NSA does in the realm of "domestic spying" depend on finding vulnerabilities in consumer products, allowing them to listen to our phone calls and read our Tweets?

[GILMORE?]

I suspect the reality is that Apple knows that there was no actual "cracking" of the phone, and that the M.O. was simply 'using the password which they acquired'.

i think Apple/EFF argument here is trying to milk concessions out of govt by making them claim they "have a secret method" in court, thereby making further demands on Apple moot.

its not a legal argument to force disclosure... but its a tactical argument to get the govt to suffer the consequences of their own bullshit claims.

[Chumby]

There is far more snitching than sleuthing in the FBI.

They had the password or somebody's buddy at NSA got it for them.

[You Sound Like a Prog (MJG)]

OK...

The Travel - State Dept Twitter account:

Not a "10" in the US? Then not a 10 overseas. Beware of being lured into buying expensive drinks or worse?being robbed. #springbreakingbadly

As ENB asks: "Why is the state department negging us?"

[GILMORE?]

Don't worry! They have learned how to backtrack Clinton Style =

Travel - State Dept Verified account
?@TravelGov

Some have been offended by our earlier tweet and we are sorry that you people are so shallow and hysterical (1/2)

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

So, do ugly people need to worry about getting robbed or not?

[HeteroPatriarch]

ENB is a 10 in any country.

[commodious spittoon]

Only to libertarians, who love smart women who love markets and hate roads. So she's only a 10 in Somalia.

[GILMORE?]

So she's only a 10 in Somalia.

She's at least a 12! I think you should have to spend at least 2 extra camels to buy a blonde woman.

[PapayaSF]

That reminds me, I had a funny anonymous conversation online with a woman who was going on about how she wanted to be a Muslim because Muslim women are treated so respectfully. I tried to talk some sense to her, to no avail. Then she said that she knew this because she had spent a month in Yemen(!). I then went into full mockery mode: "Oh yes, Yemen, that bastion of women's rights! Just ask any woman there. Well, of course they can't talk to you unless their man is around, and maybe not even then! But if they were allowed to speak, they'd tell you how happy they are!" She stopped responding after that....

[kbolino]

I think women are allowed to talk to other women, but I think the husbands/brothers/fathers/other designated male keepers can veto that in some cases.

[JeremyR]

Well, that's how it went for Yvone Ridley. She was kidnapped by the Taliban and converted to Islam after being released because Islam freed her from male oppression and all that patriarchy stuff

[widget]

Easy does it PapayaSF. Cynthia Anne Parker. I am sure the name rings a bell, but you should her recall the her life story. Kidnapped as a child by Comanches in a Texas massacre she was later reunited with kin only to take every chance she got to back to the Comanche.

[W. Chipper Dove]

le Stockholm Syndrome

[ashleycox0025]

Before I saw the bank draft which had said $9426 , I didnt believe that...my... brother woz like actualy earning money part-time at there labtop. . there uncles cousin has done this 4 less than fifteen months and by now repaid the dept on there place and got a great new Mini Cooper . read the full info here ...

Clik This Link inYour Browser
http://www.JobToday60.com

[annytaylor00025]

Before I saw the bank draft which had said $9426 , I didnt believe that...my... brother woz like actualy earning money part-time at there labtop. . there uncles cousin has done this 4 less than fifteen months and by now repaid the dept on there place and got a great new Mini Cooper . read the full info here ...

Clik This Link inYour Browser
http://www.JobToday60.com

[Uncle Jay]

RE: North Korea warns of famines

Gee, I wonder if Dear Leader has to worry about going hungry?