Memo Day 2: Electric Boogaloo! Memo Day 2: Electric Boogaloo! Memo Day 2: Electric Boogaloo!
Sequels are so much better than the original. Rocky II, Jaws II (even though some certain deviant on here with a white panel van still refuses to watch the original), Temple Of Doom…instant classics compared to the original, right? Of course, the difference today is that the memos might be released whereas they weren’t released in Memo Day. So this is a different dynamic than in Hollywood. Maybe because there’s no casting couch. God, I hope there’s no casting couch in the House Judiciary Committee offices. That would be…unpleasant for all involved.
Wichita State gets shocked again. The Sun Devils continue to falter. And meanwhile, Villanova, Gonzaga and St Marys continue to dominate lesser opponents. A heavy slate of games on the ice last night, resulting in the following winners: Boston, Florida, New Jersey, Toronto, Carolina, Ottawa, Nashville, Tampa Bay, Chicago, Colorado, Dallas and Army.
Michael Westbrook is about to pay a hefty fine for shoving a fan and the Phoenix Open started up yesterday, and with it one of the most enjoyable venues in all of sports from a fan’s perspective.
Anyway, here are…the links!
Christ, what an asshole. That is all.
A federal judge is no fan of federalism apparently. I mean, there’s no federal system in place, there’s no violation of the Constitution at play here, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with this system other than the fact that a single man doesn’t think its “fair”. Shit, if the guy in the first link wasn’t so odious I could have saved the “Christ, what an asshole” for this guy. And while I’m no fan of depriving voting rights once a sentence is served, this system is in no way discriminatory against any protected class. If its to be overturned, it should be by a vote of the legislature.
Peter Thiel telling it like it is. I’m sure that’ll make him a lot of friends in his neck of the woods. Damn, I wish he’d move to Texas and speed up the exodus.
Was Trump an anti-Semite or did he just hate the Muslims? I can’t remember the latest talking points from the MSM Democrat Party. Well, this sure is a strange way to act toward people you fundamentally hate. Which makes me wonder if the media might have gotten this one wrong. Nah!!! That’s crazy talk. He still hates them all. And the blacks. And the hispanics. And women. And dogs. And probably even Asians and whitey, truth be known.
Ikea Founder doesn’t leave fortune to family. That’s his call, but I don’t think I’d have done the same unless my kids were assholes.
When you have a hard time finding a jury willing to convict four people on a video they recorded themselves, in which they kidnapped and beat a mentally disabled person while screaming “fuck white people” and “fuck Donald Trump”, then we might have a societal breakdown in Chicago. Or you have an idiot prosecutor who can’t tell the difference between knowing about a case and the ability to be impartial.
And on the lighter side: NEEEEEEERRRRRRDS!!!!!!!!!
This goes out to those Jeopardy! players.
Have a great Groundhog Day and a better weekend.
Comments
838 responses to “Friday Morning Links”
That stuff is glued down so good you would need a lightning strike to get it to budge.
When you have a hard time finding a jury willing to convict four people on a video they recorded themselves, in which they kidnapped and beat a mentally disabled person while screaming “fuck white people” and “fuck Donald Trump”, then we might have a societal breakdown in Chicago. Or you have an idiot prosecutor who can’t tell the difference between knowing about a case and the ability to be impartial.”
I thought we supported nullificationation around here.
Kidnapping, assault, and torture are not the sort of objectionable prohibitions needed nullification.
You need to adjust your sarc-o-meter, UCS.
I try, but the Model 82 has an error-prone midplane that keeps wiping the supposedly non-volitile memory.
Eh good enough for government work
He was so outraged that tap water dribbled out of his mouth and shorted out his funny-bone, which coincidentally resides in his keyboard. Now he has to cover it in rice (white, from the bulk bin).
D-minus.
I know you can do better than that.
*Suitably chastened but looking to one side*
You’re beginning to sound like John.
Ted, If want to be entertainingly insulted. I want people to strive for excellence in derogation!
*I want to be
Not ‘if’. Sheesh, I can’t type.
Now you’re beginning to sound like STEVE SMITH.
I’m more discerning about who I ‘interface’ with.
That’s like your opinion.
Oh wow check out Mister SoCon here.
Can’t we nullify a not guilty verdict?
Lynch’s Law?
+1 Tarmac
I’d be outraged but, c’mon, the guy was a Trump supporter.
Well, he is mentally disabled…
“…we might have a societal breakdown in Chicago. Or you have an idiot prosecutor…”
It’s both.
In Re: “Jeopardy!” – Those annoying pop culture categories were always the worst.
Also, it’s still on the air?
Alex is thinking, “I’m Canadian and I know about football!”
“Not much of a one for game shows, are you
TrebekUCS?”They’re okay children’s entertainment.
Penis mightier, You’re sitting on a gold mine Trebek!
+1 Anal bum cover
kidnapped and beat a mentally disabled person
::rage machine on::
Contradictions and nonsense..
That’s basically leftist dogma
We might know where Trump has been getting some of his wacky ideas
“The Heartland Institute, a libertarian, climate-denying think tank”
Deniers should be burned at the stake for their herasy.
And increase Carbon Emissions?! You MONSTER!
Make the fuckers into compost
I think the former administration banana republic thugs had that very thing in mind
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/03/10/us-attorney-general-we-may-prosecute-climate-change-deniers/
I will never forgive the fuckwits that voted for Obama and thats bad, I have close family members who voted for that piece of shit…twice.
They were so proud to show that they aren’t racists and also proud to vote for someone who actually despises individual liberty. Cuz racism is the worst thing that could ever possibly happen in the world and slavery only happened because racism.
I thought Heartland was paleocon?
“climate-denying think tank,”
They deny that there are climates? These guys really are anti-science.
There is no climate. We live in a static world made by god’s hand. And Jesus rode dinosaurs. /proggy stereotype of red staters
Typical proggy bullshit responding to an argument nobody is making. As if anyone denies that climate exists, or that it constantly changes, going through warm and cold cycles. Same bullshit with “rape denier” – trying to equate any disagreement with Holocaust deniers. They are completely incapable of arguing in good faith.
If they argued in good faith, they’d lose on the merits.
Exactly.
Altithermal 8,000 – 4,500 B.P….warm period 3500 years
Neoglacial 4,500 – 2,500 B.P….cold period 2000 years
Roman Warm 2,500 – 1,450 B.P. …warm period 1550 years
Vandal Minimum (Dark Age Cold Period) 1,450 – 1,150B.P. ….cold period 300 years
Medieval Warm 1,150 – 650 B.P. …warm period 500 years
Little Ice Age 650 B.P. – 150 B.P. …cold period 500 years
Modern Times 150 B.P. – Present …150 years into a warming period
I suspect the longer periods that are further into the past are due to our inability to see the smaller blips within those trends
There is nothing going on with the climate that is out of the ordinary. These climate change fanatics are nothing more than flim-flam artists. Run ’em out of town on a rail
Possible dumb question for the alarmists: how did the high atmospheric carbon not prevent the cooling in the 1960s?
“Oh, we’ve adjusted the data – there was no cooling in the 60s.”
Could we start calling them Sun Deniers
The sun is just a fucking burning ball of gas, and everyone knows that climate change is all man made you heretic!
B.P. confused me. What does British Petroleum have to do with our climate?
I’m gonna say that I bet a lot of those longer earlier periods have a significant amount of ups and downs inside them that the methods of measurement lose track of.
You should just extrapolate the satellite data so that you know what the real truth was.
No, no, no. The so called scientists who came up with that data were white heteronormative shitlords. Therefore, we have to throw all of that out. In fact, we have to just throw out all western science and start all over with only woke queer gendered folk in charge of science, for social justice. And if you disagree, you’re a racist. The science is settled!
If you challenge the left’s new religion, its priesthood, and point out the followers – known as watermelons because when you scratch that climate green veneer of legitimacy they try to project, what you find is the deep red of marxism inside – basically are a cult, and one of the most evil and murderous ones, you are the problem…
Correction: Chicago lost 4-2 🙁
Are the fans screaming for Coach Q’s head yet?
No. Three Cups buy you a bit of grace. But it probably is time for him to go – he just cannot handle young players, and the vets are going or gone (or dead in place like Toews).
Old style coaches like Quenneville and Babcock have had their day.
It’s amazing how they obsess over match ups and line changes and forcing offensively gifted players to play two-way hockey for its own sake.
Drives me nuts.
Ovechkin plays no defense and the Caps get their ass handed to them in the playoffs annually because of it.
Meanwhile, Nashville and Vegas have no offensively gifted players and are in first place.
You want to rip on Ken Hitchcock, be my guest.
Maybe my sarc mete is off.
he just cannot handle young players
Sounds like they need a Sandusky.
I’m screaming for Toews’ head. He has become a whiny pussy.
“Ikea Founder doesn’t leave fortune to family. ”
Instead of a will, he should have left them a diagram of his estate.
They’d never find the right size allen wrench, and be two bolts short.
They will have a more meager fortune derived from family-owned Ikano Group, a collection of finance, real estate, manufacturing and retail businesses which had total assets of about $10 billion in 2016 – so so meager
So meager.
I will also take 17% of $58 billion.
GD cheapskate
Battaglia smiled as the mother of his slain children, Mary Jean Pearle, and other witnesses to his lethal injection walked into the death chamber viewing area.
‘Well, hi, Mary Jean,’ he said, looking and smiling at his ex-wife. ‘I’ll see y’all later. Bye.’
That guy must have really really hated his ex wife.
SLD: I don’t like the death penalty because I don’t trust the government.
Some people, like this guy deserve it.
Cases like this make me question being against the death penalty. Still against it.
On the other hand, there’s no reason this guy can’t have gotten life, and been assigned a cell with the leader of the local MS 13. I’m sure it would be a matter of hours before he said something obnoxious to earn himself a long slow stabbing.
I’m not easily disturbed or ‘triggered’, in general. This guy’s personal website got close.
http://jdvdbattaglia.us.com/index.htm
/not sure how to post link – on iPad. Sorry
Man says his dog was approved for unemployment
I’ve been trying to get my cat to go out and get a job but she’s a lazy layabout and won’t even leave the house to collect disability.
Wait… Unemployment only responds to requests submitted to them.
Is there some poor unemployed schmuck actually named “Muchael Ryder” who doesn’t know he was approved because the agency sent his letter to a Dog?
Probably.
There is no fraud in our welfare system.
Fraud is the price we pay for civilization. Where would we be know without fraud?
You ask that in jest, but I often wonder how much better things would be if we didn’t do the stupid shit the marxists peddle…
I know you’re joking, but fraud really is the price we pay for running a welfare system. I continue to have a hard time getting upset about any of it. It seems like everybody loves the fraud: the left because it justifies a heavier hand in administering poor people’s lives, and the right because it somehow proves how horrible assistance programs are. But assistance programs really are a necessary evil at this point and the level of fraud is minimal. It really would be better all around to just accept that a minimal level of fraud is going to occur and move on.
I just watched Drumputinler deliver his speech at the Repub retreat. Standard boilerplate but at the end he walked out to the Rolling Stones “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”. Epic Troll! If I could vote, he’d have mine, just for that little bit of tom-foolery. Nearly as good as Winston giving the Vee to Hitler. I larfed and larfed.
Nearly as good as Winston giving the Vee to Hitler.
But no where near as good as Winston’s Mom giving the VeeDee to Hitler.
Trump’s music guys are on point. They played the theme to Air Force One when he gave his victory speech after the election, which was the first time I noticed a politician having fun with their music. I hope they keep it up.
Abbas claimed Trump is not an honest broker and called his peace plan “the slap of the century”.
*Slap*
*slaps in memoriam to our dear departed bag pipe player*
Needs that ass-slapping gif right here.
*FOR ALMANIAN!*
Much obliged!
To Almanian!
Fuck Michigan!
*SLAP*
Whoa. A palestinian claiming Trump is not an honest broker? My projection meter just broke because the needle hit 11 so hard.
No wonder that the left has chosen to side with these people…
Common values..
The slap of the century would be when Israeli tanks push their sorry asses into the Jordan.
Inside a Public School Social Justice Factory
http://www.weeklystandard.com/inside-a-public-school-social-justice-factory/article/2011402#.WnOCD05bp6k.twitter
At Edina High School, the equity agenda is the leading edge of a full-scale ideological reeducation campaign. A course description of an 11th-grade U.S. Literature and Composition course puts it this way: “By the end of the year, you will have . . . learned how to apply marxist [sic], feminist, post-colonial [and] psychoanalytical . . .lenses to literature.”
I don’t see how this shit is any different from people wanting creationism in schools
I’m not certain this is actually known to the general population.
I’ve found that school board and budget votes are deliberately scheduled and sited to avoid voter turnout from outside the teachers’ union, so as to avoid responsibility to the actual electorate.
And people have to go out of their way to find out the curriculum details, often meeting a great deal of resistance from the school districts. The path of least resistance becomes not engaging.
You would be surprised how many parents just never engage assuming these school systems are just teaching. When my kid was in school I made it a point to know what was going on specifically so I could educate the louses that were disengaged. You let the machine run unchecked, and the progs will make sure to devalue the tax money you pay to educate these kids, not to mention, turn out a bunch of marxist morons, ill prepared to deal with the real world.
Are they teaching creationism exclusively?
Edina High School is probably teaching social creationist view of human nature exclusively, but I have no way of knowing
That’s a choice school, that’s different!
No one has ever died from creationism?
Tell that to the guy who tried to feed a coconut to a T. Rex.
Creationism isn’t nearly as damaging as Marxist pablum.
I’d like to see a comparison of post-graduation success rates between the two.
I grew up one suburb away from Edina. They were our cake-eaters and were great at everything. Their gyms and arenas were filled with championship banners. Their average income was off the charts. They were winners.
I’d say it was sad to watch them turn onto little a socialist shithole, but I’d be lying.
Sounds like my school catchment area when I was a kid. All of those 1970’s era houses on the loopty-loop streets have turned to shit. The real monied class just moved uphill.
Same for me. Although I don’t know where the really wealthy people went. Probably left the state entirely.
Holy shit this is fucked.
Burn it down.
If I were a taxpayer in that district, I would be on a rampage.
Actually, you would likely do what many parents are doing – using the school choice process to try to get into Hopkins.
Is Hopkins better than Edina now for schools? I’m about to send a child off to Mpls Public Schools so I’ve been thinking about this stuff a lot…
If the bus drivers have a union, I would be using it to make sure Edina pays double time for any diversity training scenarios. If you want your socialist hellhole, I’m going to charge you out the ass for your socialist hellhole.
I can’t imagine that Edina wants a socialist hellhole. I think what they want is for other people, in other places, to live in socialist hellholes and they get to continue living in an upscale suburb with ample shopping and an effective police force…
“James Franco’s former high school has taken down a mural he painted and plans to remove other art donated by the celebrity alumnus who is facing allegations of sexual misconduct and abuse of power.
Removing the artwork from Palo Alto High School is ‘in the best interests of our students in light of our educational mission,’ Superintendent Karen Hendricks said on Thursday in a statement.
The statement did not mention the scandal surrounding Franco, which the school’s newspaper reported was the reason the artwork was removed.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5342753/James-Francos-high-school-removes-art-allegations.html
This is getting silly.
Those look like finger paintings.
MOMMY
abuse of power. is meaningless bullshit in this context
Has it been verified that Franco actually did anything wrong?
An accusation is a conviction
/Socjus Commandment.
Atticus Finch was a rape denier!!
Those paintings are proof enough!
New DC Superhero idea – Rapeproof!
Industry professionals would miss the nuance of the character.
New DC Superhero idea – Rapeproof!
And his nemesis, STEVE SMITH!!
My money is on STEVE SMITH!
Always bet on STEVE SMITH. Always.
You can’t rape rapeproof, because rapeproof is willing.
But Rapeproof can withdraw consent after the fact, so consensual sex becomes rape later on.
Barkus is willin’!
He yelled at a shitty actress, that’s a capital offense.
That sounds a lot like “I’m getting even”
So, he wanted you to suck his dick and you did. What a monster!
It’s like that Ansari thing. Apparently he went down on her first and it just got awkward. Sometimes it just don’t work out the way you featured it. Not a crime, just two humans trying something that didn’t quite gel. Sub-par sex is not rape.
Like Danny Masterson’s chick – who he allegedly raped in the middle of an 8-year relationship.
My gf does this to me every few days*. Anyone have Gloria Allred’s number?
*Well, not in a car.
I still have no idea who this is.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-5344215/Madison-Beer-flashes-major-cleavage-racy-white-bustier.html
Would if she bought me dinner first
Cooked me dinner first.
Looks like Kim Kardishian (sp?) junior, before the booty implants.
She has had some work done, I’d wager. Maybe Mr Anacreon can weigh in.
Nice rug burns on her knees.
I noticed that too, makes her more attractive.
Needs matching elbow burns, though.
Not if she is leaning on a sofa so she can cushion her head slamming into that..
I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess his ruling would have been different in a second amendment case.
Well all felons are dangerous!!
Maybe and maybe not. But the state has a right to impose any punishment it sees fit, short of something cruel and unusual. And if they sentence someone to “five years in prison and 30 years of probation including the loss of voting rights”, wouldn’t that satisfy this guy?
Either way, this ruling ignores precedent that goes back to our founding documents.
Oh I know, this guy is obviously just ruling based on his personal desires, and not on the constitution or any legal principle.
Important here is that the Florida Constitution says that felons will be barred from voting. The governor and clemency board are technically issuing partial pardons to restore their civil rights. The power being disputed here is vested in the Governor by the state constitution. Its exactly analagous to the Presidential clemency and pardon power. Charlie Crist, when governor, instituted a streamlined formula that basically said if you completed your sentence and probation, you could automatically vote if you hadn’t been charged again. Scott rolled that back a little bit. But not even to the Bush era.
It seems to me that striking down the current clemency system would automatically lead to no felons getting their voting rights restored.
For some reason this judge seems to think that in finding that the current system is unconstitutional he gets to decide what the new system will be, absent any input from voters or any constitutional or legal authority.
I don’t have to be on the other side of an issue to call out an autocratic idiot. So I’m calling you out, Mr. Tyrant.
I’d like to see felons voting and second amendment rights restored upon completion of sentence. I don’t like having half citizens. If you’re too dangerous to be allowed your right to bear arms, then you shouldn’t be released from prison. If you’re too dangerous to vote, oh well. Plenty of non felons are doing massive amount of harm with their voting.
Which is fine and we have a constitutional amendment process that doesn’t include a judge just declaring whole parts of the Florida constitution no longer valid because the zeitgeist is moving.
I would also prefer that we just have a shit-ton of fewer felonies.
I’m fine with that.
I don’t like having half citizens. If you’re too dangerous to be allowed your right to bear arms, then you shouldn’t be released from prison.
^This. First all victimless crimes should be eliminated as crimes. Once that’s done, I think most crimes that involve a prison sentence should be for life or execution (if one believes in the death penalty). If the crime isn’t serious enough for that, then the punishment should be handled through restitution to the victim.
No one should see daylight again for murder, rape, or armed robbery of an innocent. Theft, property damage, involuntary harm to another should only involve compensation to the victim.
This requires a major shift in thinking though. Instead of prison as punishment, it has to be thought of as a means to protect the public. People who do not present a danger to the public should not be living in little boxes. But people who have shown through their actions that they do represent a danger should be kept away from the public. I actually think we should treat them well as we hold them in captivity. Declaring somebody unfit to be free in society creates an obligation for their safety, health, and well-being.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-5343053/Kate-Mara-premiere.html
“Do you like to fish? Because you’re trolling with that fly.”
That’s ‘tarded.
The wife-o used to have a leather skirt like that… but those days of crazy fun dressing are long gone (after she joined the law priesthood).
My ex owned hooker boots. The only time I ever got to see them in action was when her three year-old son put them on, plus a satin cape and nothing else and went scampering about in our sketchy neighborhood screaming “I’m Batman” at the top of his lungs. He’s doing hard time, nowadays…
Environmentalist students pressure Stanford to disinvite Charles Murray for some reason
“psuedo-science”
I don’t know Murray’s work, so I can’t argue either way, but wasn’t it mostly based off of statistics?
Yes. And anyone who has read The Bell Curve would know that it doesn’t advocate racism.
“Dangerous ideas” like environmental justice, water, waste and more. Did Maxine Waters write this press release?
No. It would have read:
“Da virement is potant. Wifou da virement, we gon die. So we gots to peach fowty fie and fix da virement.”
Just imagine the level of idiocy among the people who keep voting for her.
She’s coming apart.
One day soon she’ll finally keel over while addressing Congress. Her wig will be askew and the scorpions will make a run for it.
*gif of the guys from Friday saying DAYUM*
If you haven’t seen this video yet, it is rather illustrative. Rep. Waters is afeared of the Red Menace and the vocal audience member is the type who keeps sending her back to DC.
http://www.theamericanmirror.com/maxine-waters-russia-get/
I read that in her voice and got a funny look from a co-worker while I was holding back a laugh.
Stanford’s Haas Center for Public Service, says it works on issues such as “climate change, environmental justice, water, waste, and more.
I see them working with waste by shoveling this load of shit. But I’m unfamiliar with anything else they might be involved with.
Haas makes good cnc machines and sponsors a Nascar driver.
I’m disappointed that Gene Haas (presumably) gave money to Stanford for that bullshit.
Semi-related; I get to go for a visit at the Haas factory in Oxnard in April. Pretty pumped.
That’s pretty cool. I’d like to see that. Some sort of training I presume?
It’s a “thank you” thing (with a dose of sales pitch I presume) Haas does with it’s customers through it’s re-sellers. It’s a quick trip; fly out Wednesday am come back Thursday pm, but everything is covered by them. We just have to pony up $250. Our salesman said it used to be completely free, but too many people were canceling at the last minute so they started the $250 charge to try and curtail that.
I don’t own one nor have I ever run one, but from what I’ve gleaned from others is that they’re a great value but not particularly rigid.
This is accurate.
Back in my manufacturing/engineering days, the company was making the decision of outsourcing machining or keeping it inside for our commercial operations. The correct decision would have been to outsource it, but one of the 5 founders who loved CNCs made a big stink about it and convinced the CEO to allow him the budget to build out a production machine shop.
Being an idiot, he bought 58 vertical Hass CNCs (for flexibility in production) instead of 3 good horizontals with a good tool changer/tombstone loader.
Within two years I was outsourcing my production to another machine shop to save cost.
As I understand it they have been working on improving the rigidity/accuracy of the machines and have made some big improvements over the last decade or so. That said, they aren’t high-end machines, and don’t pretend to be. But they can machine parts to .001″ accuracy all day long. Depending on the part/material, a decent operator should have no trouble maintaining .0005″. They are a great value for what they are and their post-sale support is top notch.
They are also a great American success story. Gene Haas built his first vertical mill in 1988 and just 9 years later, shipped the 10,000th machine. In 2014 annual sales hit $1 Billion. I’m not sure why Gene Haas doesn’t get more attention/praise outside the industry.
I have nothing against Haas machines. Just bad memories of piss poor business decisions.
No, I know. I didn’t mean to make that sound like I was rebutting you, more just trying to inform the masses!
How many of these student group exist?
They’re the fruit flies of intellectual rot in academia.
Not a single person at a college where Murray has been attacked (like this, or like what happened at Middlesbury College) has read the Bell Curve. I’m 100% confident in that statement.
*Ed McMahon voice* You are correct, Sir!
But if they did read it, it probably wouldn’t change their minds.
We respect and encourage debate from diverse perspectives…except that one. And this one. And that one over there. And…
“If the reader is now convinced that either the genetic or environmental explanation has won out to the exclusion of the other, we have not done a sufficiently good job of presenting one side or the other. It seems highly likely to us that both genes and the environment have something to do with racial differences. What might the mix be? We are resolutely agnostic on that issue; as far as we can determine, the evidence does not yet justify an estimate.”
By failing to deny that genetics may play a role, he is totes racist!!
User Testing in the East Timor hinterland
TL;DR: To build our product, we had to take user research to a remote place. This is the story of what we did, what went well, and what didn’t.
Julian Finn leads the Development and Product Team at Mautinoa Technologies, a startup aiming to bring banking-like digital payment solutions to the most vulnerable communities in the world with no access to the financial system. The team assembles experts with backgrounds in IT security, software development, finance, humanitarian work and UX. Together, Mautinoa devised a digital payment system that does not have to rely on a stable internet connection or expensive smart card terminals, but rather builds upon smartphones, smartcards, and NFC technology.
https://medium.com/@mautinoa_technologies/user-testing-in-the-east-timor-hinterland-469a538fbb23
Fairly interesting if you ignore the unnecessary mention of climate change. Although were I a SJW I would find ways to call this racist.
Money is a western concept used to enslave and oppress other cultures. It’s known that if given the choice, they would not use money.
Iceland MPs propose ban on circumcision of boys
Bill suggests six-year prison term for anyone guilty of ‘removing sexual organs in whole or in part’
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/iceland-circumcision-ban-boys-islam-judaism-religion-medical-reasons-muslim-jewish-a8188701.html
It being Iceland, the guidance is probably to just remove the whole kid.
Your morning NPR rage inducer where the interviewer comes off as simultaneously incredulous and aghast.Well I was going to play that one, but apparently since it makes the interviewer look bad and the guest seem completely reasonable in his support of the release of the memo, they omitted it from their website.
Instead they did make the other interview available where (surprise, surprise) the interviewee is totally against this perversion of intelligence oversight.
NPR is filled with hacks.
Hold on, I found it. They buried it with no transcript, unlike the opposing viewpoint interview.
https://www.npr.org/2018/02/02/582631171/this-memo-is-not-going-to-erode-national-security-says-rep-will-hurd
Hah. The interviewer is actually sputtering with indignation halfway through the interview.
But their soothing tones are so comforting for the brain dead.
This particular interview has a consistent overtone of “HOW COULD YOU POSSIBLY”
My favourite incredulous flustered NPR commentator is Ari Shapiro.
Do you mean Mr. Lispy?
Not Mr. Lispy, just another generic poof. But during the first healthcare reform battle in 2017 after reacting with incredulity, he was trying to abbreviate some Texas representative’s point and cut him off. The Rep wouldn’t allow him to and steamrolled the rest of his talking points over Mr. Shapiro. It was hilarious.
This is Mary Loise Kelley.
I swear, half of NPR commentators have a voice for print.
*EDIT FAIRY TO THE RESCUE!*
Boo, tag fail.
I think you dropped this:
>
Even my leftist, feminist, etc wife completely rolled her eyes and lost it last week when NPR referred to pro-lifers as “opponents of a women’s right to choose” in a piece on abortion.
They have become completely insufferable. Just this morning, they were repeating the “Super Bowl causes human trafficking!!!!!” myth.
This Flamin’ Hot Cheetos ice cream is weird — but we can’t look away
They were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.
And yet my inner pedant couldn’t help plucking out that last sentence. “most popular flavor…. second only to…”
Again in the category random shit on twitter I find amusing
https://twitter.com/AcademiaObscura/status/954009289798144000
This was at Brigham Young University (Mormon university in Utah). Probably the most exciting development the campus police had in the past 10 years.
The cop should have said, ready or not, here I come before searching.
But did the cops holler Billy Goat?
Barstool Jordie is protecting the Rocky statue!
Thing’s been defaced twice, first by Vikings fans and then by Pats fans. This cannot be allowed to happen again.
Jebus H I’m anxious about Sunday.
I know some dudes in Charlottesville than can lend him a hand.
Why be anxious? They’re playing the Patriots. The halftime score’s gonna be 42-0 in the Eagles’ favor, Gronk, Hogan, Amendola, White, and Cooks will all get knocked out of the game by the Eagles’ D…but TOM BRADY will still find a way to win that game.
Sounds about right.
Tom Brady and the refs.
There was a huge analysis of how the Patriots plan for the refs in each game along with their game plan, and how it isn’t a conspiracy to help the Pats win. I guess I can buy that, but given the level of boundary pushing that the Patriots have done in the past (Spygate, Deflategate), I just can’t help but think that they do indeed buy off the refs.
The refs are recruited from a random McDonald’s right before the game so they can’t be tainted. I think I read that somewhere.
Justin Timberlake says, “My son will never play football“, adding, “because the boy got his Y chromosome from me, Justin Timberlake.”
“My son will never play with guns.” “My son will never climb a tree.” “My son will never know the love of a willing and ardent woman”.
I suspect his son might not “know” a woman period…
NTTIAWWT
He’s actually a good golfer.
Besides, Timberlake’s pop routine has probably earned him more ladies to smash than the average football player.
It’s the same thing your whole life: “Clean up your room. Stand up straight. Pick up your feet. Take it like a man. Be nice to your sister. Don’t mix beer and wine, ever.” Oh yeah: “Don’t drive on the railroad track.”
Is it too early for flapjacks?
You know a great many places that sell those are open 24 hours a day, right?
That’s not counting your ability/inability to make them yourself.
“I, uh, actually I agree with that last one.”
OT – I had the runs yesterday so Wifey brought me some Immodium on the way home from work. This morning she asked me if it helped and without missing a beat I *donned reading glasses* and said “It remains a hot-button issue”. YEEEEEEAAAAAHHHHHH! What have you people done to my brain?
Real Japanese commercial. Yes, they are talking about that.
It’s Asian so it’s Wise. I liked the turd examples!
ONE OF US!
ONE OF US!
Gooble Gabble
Miami is a sex-obsessed, booze-filled money suck – but we’re pretty happy, survey says
I hate Miami and everything and everyone in it.
Since I transferred from the Miami to the Fort Lauderdale office I’ve maybe been in Miami a total of 7 days (since 2011), which includes yesterday and today.
Florida’s East Coast is one unbroken strip mall from North Monroe County to the Georgia border; I hate it. I was born in the Keys and wifey has lots of family in North Miami Beach but damnation! Everything East of Arcadia gives the agita something fierce.
If you’re talking about driving up A1A, you’re correct.
I was driving from here to Savannah, Georgia once and wasn’t strapped for time, so I figured on taking A1A up the state instead of I-95, for the scenery. Mistake.
The fresh prince haz a sad
-Those four black kids will go out into the wild and still commit crimes. So they’ll get nabbed for something – or be shot because of the murder rate.
-What’s the difference whether the Paluhstinyuks are at the table? They’ll just break it the next morning with a rocket launch.
-Ikea. Weird. He chose a thing over family. Yeh, ‘rationally’ it’s an interesting move but man it’s weird – and boring. Watch the documentary ‘Agnelli’ as a comparison. Compelling high drama.
Well, the family does have another 10 billion dollar business empire to fall back on.
But limited control if that, if I read correctly.
Unrelated-to-anything gripe:
I am so sick of readers/viewers expecting modern sensibilities out of characters in period pieces and finding protagonists offensive/unlikeable if they express anything but near-SJW level enlightenment. In re specifically (today, at least) The Alienist.
I’ve never read the Alientist, but I’ve had Agatha Christie on most of my commutes of late (audiobooks account for most of my “reading” these days). The interwar sensibilities and lack of appologia were refreshing.
*as a distinct change of pace from the eggshell flooring and culture of offense that spread through today.
i read it, but for the life of me can’t remember a damn thing about it.
I’m reading books from that era for my WIP.
I tried to read Christie. Couldn’t get through the last third of the one I began.
OTOH, I got through Elmer Gantry in good time, although I was disappointed there was no real end except an implicit “and he kept going the way he always had.” Well allrightythen.
I can definately see why people wouldn’t be able to get into her books. A lot of them are a slow burn, and a couple don’t have that great of a payoff for it.
I have not read anything by Sinclair Lewis.
White Internet People?
Yes, who are also a Work In Progress. (I write novels.)
Ah. I had some sort of confused on-going education idea.
The ignorant are rising to prominence. Just as during the Chinese Cultural Revolution anything that is not in line with the party is subversive. They are literally protesting art galleries now. It’s fun to see people who ostensibly support free speech fall over themselves trying to defend this madness. Remember, this all began with the grown-ups looking the other way to iconoclasm
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/28/arts/design/chuck-close-exhibit-harassment-accusations.html
Disturbing
Who says SJW are enlightened?
They do. Now check your privilege and kowtow to your betters!
Perhaps I should have put “enlightenment” in quotes.
I was pulling your chain. Your leg. Your….
I don’t have one of those.
You forgot Caddyshack II and Smokey and the Bandit II
Oh good lord. My head hurts now.
Cannonball Run II.
Evil Dead II. So disappoint!
Porkys II: The Next Day
I went to the original with my entire Grad Class and was sorely disappointed by the hyucks. Mind you, at least 90% of these people cheated the final exam for English so no surprises there. I fucking hated that movie (except for young Kim Cattrall, she can visit anytime she wants to).
I get every cable channel, streaming service, etc., known to humanity, and I cannot seem to be able to dial up Cannonball Run to humor my son. We did manage to watch the sequel.
This guys agrees with me.
I Wanted Ted Cruz To Be President, But Donald Trump Is Working
Kimball? Of The New Criterion?
Same.
I’ll take Trump over Cruz. Rand would’ve been better than both. No one would be better than anyone.
Rand or nothing
I love Rand. But I doubt his trolling skills were strong enough to stand up the onslaught the Democrats were going to mount against whoever won.
I am hoping that people like Rad learn from Trump. You don’t play by rules against the people that not just use the rules to then crucify you, but won’t play by the rules themselves..
I think that will be the best legacy Trump can leave any other future candidate not from the party of Marx.
I think part of Ron and Rand’s appeal was the fact that they were gentile. They were able to take fringe positions, like auditing the Fed and ending overseas military adventurism, and make them sound mainstream. If Rand played the role of Trump, I think he would lose some of his appeal
I hope you meant genteel
I said what I meant. Stupid auto correct.
Nobody seems to have learned the lesson. They still run and hide at the first mention of an -ism.
I suspect that the media pack is what holds them back. Any apostate gets a full slate of “have you stopped beating your wife” style questions. Only Trump seems to have the skill to handle this sort of attention.
I still don’t really understand how he does it. I’ve read Scott Adams take on it, and although it worked out as he predicted, I still don’t get it. Because it doesn’t work on me, any more than “what would you like your payment to be” works on me at the used car lot.
I do wish I could pull it off in real life:
“Your project is running over budget and behind schedule.”
“It is going to be great. Just great. The best! …. And Nancy from accounting…. she’s getting fat, isn’t she? I mean, I’m no expert, but that broad is a blimp, right?”
Part of Trump’s effectiveness is his exploitation of the media’s short-attention spans and love of drama. So he gives them meaningless drama with his Twitter Feed, while out of sight and mind, he pushes deregulation and downsizes federal agencies.
Rand, bless his heart, would be in front of a microphone trying to explain why deregulation and government downsizing is a good idea – and be crucified for it.
Well said Drake..
Trump is a master at feeding the hyenas the carrion they want, then doing his shit. As I have now told several people: ignore what the man says or tweets, and focus on what is getting done, and you will see that for all his boorish ways and crassness, the right things are happening.
The left is scared to death that Trump will actually not just succeed at making things better for the plebes, but that plebes realize that. Nothing is more damaging to the progressive movement than people getting a healthy dose of reality, and adjusting accordingly.
https://twitter.com/CathyYoung63/status/959115470103302145
I think I know why Ron Paul and Judge Napolitano are persona non grata within the ‘Libertarian’ Party. They are too critical of war and the FBI. The FBI is super libertarian-y
Remember, these people supposedly have no problem with government leaks, but they are offended when Congress exercises its oversight authority
They’re only offended when that oversight might implicate Democrats.
It is like the establishment conservatives versus the “alt-right”? The difference being the alt-right actually means what they say.
Cathy Young of the “Don’t support Pam Geller’s Free Speech. She’s icky.”
Am I supposed to know who this is?
Pam, Eeeeeew.
Two thoughts:
1. Straffinrun wrapped that argument up in the first comment.
2. Pam Geller sounds like the love child of Pam Dawber and Sara Michelle Gellar.
Cathy Young of the “Impose Trade Restrictions on Russia”, but I still totally support ‘free trade’ or something. I am struggling to see what the difference is in her beliefs versus Bret Stephens. Which is not a dig at either, as I think they both have fair points, but I can’t get past the fact that one rightly refers to himself as a ‘neoconservative’ and the other pretends like that label doesn’t apply
Nothing will punish Putin like taking food out of Russian peons’ mouths.
And the logic is inconsistent, because these are the same people insisting that trade restrictions don’t work in the case of Cuba, for example. So why would they work with Russia?
I ended my subscription when they put Young’s nonsensical diatribe as their cover story
4.1% unemployment. 200,000 new jobs in January.
I heard someone on the left already tried to claim that was because of Obama’s policies…
It is because of Obama’s policies… being repealed.
I’m sure they were vague on specifics. Or just mentioned the stimulus and government jobs created.
It is continuing a trend that started under Obama. Whether the trend would have continued under Clinton is a non-testable assertion. So I would say that they aren’t wrong, but at some point Trump policies are continuing the recovery or expansion.
I have talked to several small business owners, including one that decided to no longer sell his business when Trump won the election, and to the last one, they told me all the economic activity is attributable to the fact that the commies lost the last election. Trump destroying the Obama pen & paper legacy is just a bonus to these people that now see an opportunity that would never have been made available to them under SJW rule. Conversly, that cock gobbler Immelt at GE has been blaming the company’s recent misfortune, not on the fact that the rent seeking days are now gone, but on the fact that they now have to actually compete…
There was a good article about that in the wsj recently. It was about a new enthusiasm sweeping businesses, both small mom & pop as well as multinational, about America being a good place for business again. An enthusiasm not since for at least a decade or even longer.
At the small business level, businesses are looking at investing in that expensive new piece of equipment they held off on for years, or maybe expanding to a second location. The big guys are starting up new plants with hundreds of millions in investments.
Same. My business has gone way up in the last six months.
2017 was our best year in more than 10.
Confidence is real.
Mine too. Orders from everywhar
I have my opinions that mirror yours, but if you just look at employment, the trend was down in 2016 (under Obama) and down in 2017 (under Trump). I don’t think economics is sufficiently granular to know when the effects of one policy ends and the new policy starts.
GE got a nice article in Business Week.
How GE Went From American Icon to Astonishing Mess
A lot of it has to do with psychology. Business owners see Trump as pro-business, so they act accordingly. When you have a president who says stuff like “you didn’t build that”, you’re going to hunker down.
^^^^THIS^^^^
The most important factor in any kind of economic recovery will be the actual morale of the people that make the decisions.. We heard a lot of lip service during the Obama years from the big government rent seeking types, but saw little if any gain. Now we got exactly the opposite, and it all started right after people realized Clinton was not going to be in charge to continue the decline of the Obama years.
I agree. Although there were some positive trends that started under the last administration, but that’s only as a predicted result of the economy limping along for close to a decade. This growth? I’ll give this to Trump. The tax cuts are going to kick everything into high gear. I think for small and mid sized business, the hope of not having to deal with the ACA provisions and more regulations may have led to some optimism.
My company is expanding this year directly related to the lowering of taxes for alcohol. It adds about sixty cents in profit for ever bottle we sell. That’s a big margin. Obviously, just one anecdote, but sometimes that’s the only way to size up the economy.
…positive trends that started despite the last administration,…
So much this Suthen..
As I’ve mentioned here before, I help finance many infrastructure-related capital projects for rural America and I have seen a huge uptick in my pipeline over the past couple of months. I’m certain this is partially sparked by the reduction in taxes and rollback of regulation.
Well it kind of is,
The Bubble that was created under Obama is starting to inflate. The economy is not hot right now because of any solid fundamentals. It is hot for the same reason it was hot in 1998. Within 18 months when that bubble bursts and we find ourselves in a major recession at best it would be nice if people remembered the bubble was a product of Obama’s deficits
?
McJobs!
Must be jobs building the robots that McDonald is going to use to replace the $15 an hour unskilled laborers…
Just got an email from my bank telling me my employer did a direct deposit, and it looks like that tax cut has put a nice extra chunk of change in my pocket!
Can a brotha get a table dance?
Congrats.
I’m not getting up on the table though.
I’m getting an extra $25 a week. Not exactly riches but I won’t say no.
You are going to believe your bank statement instead of Nancy? There is no hope for you. I bet you even voted against your own interest.
My wife was look at her direct deposit and called me over because her paycheck was bigger this time for some reason…
Trump and the Repubs need to do a better job publicizing this and taking credit. A lot of people joke Trump for his tweeting, but in all seriousness, how else do you push messages like this to ordinary people when the MSM buries it 20 feet underground?
My wife’s check went up $200. The change hasn’t hit mine yet.
That’s about what mine went up as well Drake..
And I am due for a huge raise and bonus in the next few weeks, according to my management, so I don’t pack up and go to greener pastures. This was not something that affected or concerned them (they didn’t want to lose me, but opportunities were slim) for the last 8 or so years…
Yep -They better make it rain in my direction in March. Otherwise I’ll find myself a nice raise with half the commute.
(I might do that either way.)
I am making the same on a 26 paycheck per year as I was in 24 last year — with a 2% raise. So by my math, I’d need to take home about 6% more each paycheck.
Do what Reagan did and talk directly to the people through TV. “My fellow Americans, today you may have noticed that your paycheck was a little bit bigger than what you’ve been getting for the past 8 years. This is what tax reform is all about…”
^^^THIS^^^
Youtube would be perfect for this, or to go a real shitlord, he could use Minds, but he’d crash the servers.
Yes, please, I want my investment to pay out.
Iad 27% on my 401k in 2017. That is about 22% better than my average under the 8 years of obama.
Was not even going there myself Lachowsky, but yeah…
Yeah I earned 21% on my 401(k), but I’m still convinced that the stock market is in a bubble.
I think you are likely right that it’s a bubble. I think the cutting of the corporate income tax rate in 2018 and beyond may make the pop not nearly as bad as the last one and the recovery much quicker.
Also, don’t take this as investment advice. I’m no expert.
I have 98% of my holdings in equity since I’m still a long, long way from retirement. Still, I hope you’re right that it won’t be bad. Either way, I’ll probably ride it out, since the long-term data suggests that we always recover eventually.
I’m looking at a minimum of 25 years before I retire. I’m almost all equity as well. don’t figure I’ll go conservative for another few decades.
I’m getting mere crumbs from the tax cut ($300 more per month, woohoo!).
$180 is no longer stolen from my paycheck each month. That’s a huge amount – almost 2 weeks worth of food for me.
CRUMBS!
You are just eating crumbs…
Enough crumbs make a decent pie crust.
I did the math and I will take home approximately $2,250 more each year. Fuck anyone that says that those are crumbs. I’m not rich, and I will gladly take back over 2 grand.
I think Trump may have just earned my vote in 2020.
I frankly don’t care who you are or how much money you have, but if you think $2K is chump change and anybody that thinks or intimates that people that would rather keep that much of their own earnings are bad or an idiot, is fucking douchebag. What should gall people is that the fucking tax and spenders are saying that if you feel keeping a decent chunk of your money for yourself is good, particularly because someone else might have gotten to keep more of their own earnings, you are somehow the bad one.
Being driven by envy and jealousy is an absolutely shitty way to go through life.
Totally agreed. As much as I like to laugh that rich people from blue states are the ones that will be hurt most by the tax reform, ultimately I wish those people were able to keep more of their money too. Regardless of your political affiliation and wealth, you deserve to keep the money that you earn.
“Totally agreed. As much as I like to laugh that rich people from blue states are the ones that will be hurt most by the tax reform, ultimately I wish those people were able to keep more of their money too. ”
I certainly feel some schadenfreude towards the usual loaded blue state rich people that have constantly told us it is in our benefit to pay more in taxes while their accountants worked hard to make sure they didn’t. Fuck that crowd and their asshole friends in the political class that have fucked over the people working hard to achieve the always elusive American dream and have instead catered to people that vote for a living.
I’m beginning to think that my parents’ move to their new house was a mistake.
My 76yo dad and I went to the local auto show last night and he was limping around, had a hard time getting in and out of cars, and was really hunched over. When they were living out in the middle of nowhere, he looked a lot better; busy cutting trees, hauling wood, and splitting logs. He also hiked a lot, having to go up and down dunes / hills. You never would have guessed that he was in his 70s; looking more like a late 50-something.
Now? In their new house, he sits around a lot, has natural gas powered fireplaces and is landlocked enough that there is nowhere to hike to.
You know, this is something I observed with both my father and my FIL. Both were active and lead great and active lives, but as soon as retirement turned into sitting on your ass in front of the TV, both were dead in less than 2 years…
Staying active is key to staying young, if not physically, at least mentally..
I saw something once that their was a strong correlation between the inability to walk 1/8th mile and impending death.
It makes sense obviously, but being active keeps things going. Its why hip breaks are so devastating.
Same thing happened to my Grandad. Gotta keep moving.
A friend’s dad is in his mid 60s, and has had hip trouble from his mid 40s on. Luckily, my friend’s sister is a very good personal trainer in ABQ (where they moved back to when they retired), and has had her parents as clients for years. She kept him going with exercises, and got his hip replacements put off by almost 5 years, according to his doctors. Luckily, my parents retired right before age 60, and are much more active now than they were before (plus my mom consults so much, and earns enough doing it they haven’t touched their retirement funds for two years). My dad is a very handy guy, and is always working in the area where he lives (he teams up with a neighbor who is also older, and has had recent knee and hip problems, and was for years, the caretaker of the property my parents bought in 2004, and my grandmother’s property in the same community since he was a teenager). I’m hopefully going to live in their guest cabin for at least 6 months, depending on my job situation, so I can get out of debt entirely and find a job within a few hours of them (now it’s a 9 hour drive to them, I’d like to be weekend visit distance).
I’ll buy active in retirement definitely keeps you up and running.
My grandfather died last year at almost 85 from cancer basically everywhere.
He retired in 1994 from his job as a machinist and after was always busy doing something outside and physical. Usually something involving fixing or repairing heavy machinery.
He really only slowed down in 2016 after my grandma died…but that was probably as much from the cancer as it was loss of his wife of 60 years.
Causation could also go the other way — if your health is failing, it gets pretty exhausting to stay active.
My dad retired in 2006 and he told me, “you have to have a hobby already lined up before you retire; otherwise, you’ll just sit in front of the TV all day and die within two years”.
I don’t worry about him too much. He’s 75, but he restores motorcycles and goes on a lot of trips (he’s ridden his motorcycle in South America, Africa, Europe, and all over America).
A friend’s mother, active and outgoing, wasted away in an easy chair for years. She asked her what happened. Mom said, “I sat down and never got up again.”
Reading an old thread, it seems there is some bad blood between the split groups of commenters. There are some who got left behind who I miss, although not having to scroll past spam and insanity and hatefulness is wonderful.
One I used to enjoy reading was Fluffy. Anyone got his contact info to invite him here? I even (almost) remember his name from the cover of the book he wrote.
I’d been reading comments over at TOS and noticing the regulars I liked were falling off, but before that, even, I noticed Agile Cyborg not posting. Does anybody know what happened to him?
I assume he transcended.
Agile Cyborg was actually Tulpa. Tulpa liked to take LSD at times, hence the weekend night posts.
I liked his seemingly nonsensical rants. They made me work and were interesting enough I was willing to do so. Most of the time I could either follow his line of thinking or deduce what had triggered the rant. I thought he was brilliant.
In a Charles Manson kind of way? 🙂
I can appreciate crazy like a fox.
Tulpa isn’t real. It’s like a depiction of a Hindu god with many arms, each typing on a different internet device.
Nice try at misdirection there, Tulpa.
I dont have any hard feelings toward any of the non-troll commenters over there. The staff however…
I don’t even have hard feelings towards the trolls. I found them a source of great amusement – and they usually fell for the prodding.
I lingered for awhile before finally completely abandoning it. If I remember correctly, Fluffy was not a fan of everyone splitting off to come here.
I didn’t even linger. After what they did to Sloopy….boy, that really burned my ass. It was just plain malice to the guy who least deserved it. They were always closet proggies, or most of ’em anyway and proggies are some nasty people. I walked away and never looked back.
Took me a bit to realize people had left, but when I found out I had another option, I moved on and never looked back either. Your assessment that they are proggies pretending to be something else is dead on too.
Same here. I had really cut back after the election anyway, but the minute I heard about the Glibs, I left and only ever go there now when there is a link from another site to one of their stories, which is about maybe once or twice a month.
Same here, after their contemptuous dismissal of Sloopy, combined with their progtard drift, I was done pretty much as soon as I found out about the Glibs site.
Thirded. That fiasco was quite an eye-opener for me, to see just how far they’ve fallen.
Then, on top of that, when Antifa started bashing in heads and Shikha effectively said that the victims deserved it, this camel’s back was broken. I jumped ship the moment I found out the USS Glibertarians was ready to sail.
What happened?
Very briefly, since I’m posting from my mobile – Sloop’s mom was the victim of no-shit police abuse in the course of her official duties as a school nurse. The incident was covered by a local TV station.
TOS had covered many equivalent incidents, but gave Sloop the blow-off when he suggested that TOS do a write-up on the incident. “Too local” was the flimsy excuse they used.
Fuck a duck! That’s rough, Sloopy. Sorry that happened.
Especially since they liked to use his kids for fundraising, it just seemed massively shitty.
I still peak in sometimes. Kind of like rubbernecking a spectacular crash on the highway.
Is it worth the derp? Or are you just into inflicting pain on yourself?
Kind of the opposite of buyer’s remorse. Since I decided to leave, it’s fun to watch it bomb – like California.
Thomas Brookside, which was not his real name either.
Thanks.
I’ve said this before and people pushed back, but I wish chemjeff were on here. I thought he was fairly honest, but definitely skewed left. Would be good diversity
Chemjeff was hated, HATED on the Slate boards because he was a right-wing provacateur. Go figure…
he tried. he made a few terrible attempts at starting arguments. they went the way they normally go, and he left.
search the glibs site for his name, and you’ll find him peeking in on at least 2 occasions (that i can remember).
I remember going in one day, and all you bastards had just – gone.
So much for that “Band of Brothers”, “Nobody Left Behind” shit. It was like that time that all your buddies egged you on in the schoolyard to take on the school bully, and you screw up the courage to do it, you stride up to the bully and call him out, glance behind you, and all your friends? GONE!
I felt like I was “Round Eyes” version of Hiroo Onoda.
That’s what you get for hanging out with a bunch of rabid individualists.
TL/DR
I was late to the party at TOS but I appreciated the humour. When I found out that the funny had migrated to this site, I was sold. I wasted ten years at Slate and about six at Salon.
Eegads, Slate and Salon? You’ve come a long way, my friend
Salon used to be a writers’ forum. Greenwald was the editor back then, I think. Open Salon was an excellent feature but truth be known, in 2006 I was basically an online virgin. Slate used to make hay by being contrarian so I probably followed some Hitchens links to their site. I had some fun over there but the TDS became too much, haven’t been back for months. This is the place to be.
I came from Mises. Figured I needed to see what was happening in the culture warz.
I came through Mises, I guess, because my first introduction to libertarian thought was around 2007 and back then everyone was into the Mises stuff, because of Ron Paul. I never commented there, though. From there I went on to Reason, because Mises was sometimes too much.
I’m (still) not a libertarian, but I ended up at the old site because of the vitriol around the SAFE act, and the generally hostile atmosphere of the sites I was on to any thought that was pro-gun. I needed a respite.
It’s amazing that we all came to be here, some through random clicks, others through pure tenacity. Signs and wonders, Friend.
I’m still a big consumer of Mises content. Funny that other libertarians think the Mises guys are monolithic.
No they’re not. And I should have clarified. I have Lew Rockwell to be a little much. I still listen to Tom Woods’ podcast and I like Robert Murphy. I agree far more with the people associated with the Mises Institute than I do the Koch affiliated groups
No they’re not. I should have clarified. I find Lew Rockwell to be a little much. I still listen to Tom Woods’ podcast and I like Robert Murphy. I agree more with the Mises Institute affiliated people than I do with the Koch affiliated people.
DAMN IT
Mises is distilled libertarianism. As you say, it can get to be a bit much, but no else is going to the extreme edges like they do. Rockwell is one of those guys that we can let history judge. I’m no tribalist, yet Lew makes me look like Trump.
I discovered ToS via Instapundit; back when I was a “conservative”. Moved here due to the TDS (and I didn’t even vote for the dude – or anyone)
I came through McArdle’s blog when she threw a link her hubby’s way in…2012? and thought it was a revelation. So I guess, nepotism works!
Hey, I lingered behind at TOS for at least a week, telling others that an alternative was in the works and telling people to email me for more info. I brought about twenty folks over. Surprised they let me get away with that, but I was didn’t link to here.
Remember, one man’s Gladys Aylward is another man’s Pied Piper.
Everyone’s favorite Reagan cock slobberer
Peggy Noonan: The Left’s Rage and Trump’s Peril
She ain’t wrong
I don’t love Peggy Noonan, but she is an excellent weathervane.
‘Would’ younger Peggy Noonan
Faint praise. You get to a certain age and “younger” almost guarantees “would”.
Ask OMWC!
Hitler?
I used to read her regularly. Now their are better writers who go past the observations and analyze they “whys” of Democrats behavior.
I stopped reading her when she complained how she was “tired” of all this history…in the Fall of 2004. I read that after I came back from an 11 hour patrol, where I nearly got blowed up. I might have punched her in the gob, if she had been standing in front of me. Oh, poor tired Peggy…UP YOURS!
History is only irrelevant when it is an obstruction, it seems.
The GOP went thru a large bout of that in the 00’s.
Yeah, I feel bad for them.
You don’t see meager and $10B in the same sentence often.
I donno, I followed the Zimbabwean current crisis through to the end of the ZBD.
We were saying about Atwood?
“Margaret E. Atwood
✔
@MargaretAtwood
Thank you @SenateCA! ‘In all of us command’: Senate passes bill approving #genderneutral anthem wording http://www.cbc.ca/1.4513317
3:26 AM – Feb 1, 2018″
My hatred for the Liberal party of Canada is exponential.
“That’s patriarchy: how female sexual liberation led to male sexual entitlement | Van Badham https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/feb/02/thats-patriarchy-how-female-sexual-liberation-led-to-male-sexual-entitlement?CMP=share_btn_tw … The dividing moment was 1966 when The Pill became widely available, as I recall.”
Remember when she defended her pal? Yeh. It was more because, clearly, it was a pal than rooted in anything else.
4 replies 77 retweets 141 likes
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Margaret E. Atwood Retweeted
LA Review of Books
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@LAReviewofBooks
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Linda Gordon’s “The Second Coming of the KKK” serves as a lesson for what the alt-right could become if it attained a greater level of respectability. Robert Slayton writes: http://ow.ly/t9a630i7J8T
She’s a whack job pseudo-intelletual.
We need to start work on the normthern wall to keep out the refugees from the People’s Socialist Democratic Republic of Canada when it reaches “ran out of other people’s money” stage stupid.
Canada out Canadas itself.
Truly the Nick Gillespie of North America
Maggie’s just trying to keep up. I think the progs have exceeded even her and she feels left out.
Alias Grace is an excellent read, tho.
French lyrics are still 19th Century as fuck, though.
Protect our homes and our rights
Said rights apparently don’t include free speech.
It’s the same thing your whole life: “Clean up your room. Stand up straight. Pick up your feet. Take it like a man. Be nice to your sister. Don’t mix beer and wine, ever.” Oh yeah: “Don’t drive on the railroad track.”
It’s like deja vu all over again.
Mr. Hentai predicts Nunes will go to jail for obstruction of justice. DU swallows it hook, line, and sinker.
No kidding, but there literally are ads for Hentai when I click on that. My fault or Ken’s?
You could watch something other than Swing Out Sisters when you go to pornhub, you know.
Out of curiosity, don’t link, but explain what is ‘Swing Out Sister’ in the most SFW way that you can.
I thought it was this
I never heard of that band
Very big for a while in the mid-80’s.
I used to hang out in their social circle in the early 80’s before they formed the band when I had an artsy girlfriend at college.
That must have been fun. The artsy girls are the ‘fun’ girlfriends
Cello, flute (all varieties) and “Fabric Science”. Oh yes. lotsa fun, but a lot of drama too. The GF knew Corinne pretty well. She was always more focused on fame than fashion, but she was (is) great company, but a totally over-the-top fag hag, and they’re still ::dons outrageous 80’s sunglasses:: … Big in Japan.
It’s something I learned about on a Reddit comment.
Take the title and remember that Japanese hentai consumers really, really like incest for some reason.
They like watching incest. There is a slight difference.
Honestly, given how many of the “popular” videos on the front page of Pornhub in the US involve incest, it’s apparently a popular fetish.
(ew)
I’m not liking this conversation anymore.
Here you are. Corinne Drewery is one of my favorite singers.
My refresh skills are not fantastic.
I’m not getting those.
So disappointing.
OK. It’s just me. Not technically Hentai, however.
Risky click of the day
How can you obstruct justice by providing oversight, which is Congress’ responsibility? We have gone off the rails
“Have gone“…?
Shit, we have been in la-la-land for close to a decade, maybe even two, now…
Or when there is not even any credible evidence of an underlying crime to obstruct.
The comments are apoplectic.
Christ, that first comment not only wishes ‘death’ upon someone because of politics, but also misuses the definition of ‘treason’, which to be fair has become the hallmark of the modern Left
Lenin would have only seen opportunity in those idiots.
Leftists truly believe they are in a holy war, and the other side is just devils and demons they need to slay.. As others have noted.. All projection, all the time..
OOC, I wonder what the Venn diagram of people who want to execute their political enemies and people who don’t support the individual right to own firearms happens to be…I’m going to guess there’s a lot of overlap.
Great point there Bill…
“The entire GOP has to be fumigated.” – Or maybe we could just have them take a shower and then dry them off in an oven. Wash the nazi right off of them.
Weren’t the hollywood types collectively calling for gulags and mass graves a week ago?
I think things are going to get ugly.
Hollywood types, being collectivists, would call for genocide and the destruction of the left’s enemies… and not see the irony in the difference between they way they are and behave, and the almost comical accusation that it is their enemy/opponents that are the evil ones..
Goebbels would love these people.
In one of his Maps of Meanings lectures, Jordan Peterson discusses the Nazi perception of their racial enemies. He observes that the Nazis perceived members of lesser races as being like insects carrying disease, and that it was no coincidence that the Nazis chose to use an insecticide to exterminate them.
Yep. Not a coincidence that Zyklon B was an pesticide.
”Union head blames understaffing” :
18-year-old shot at courthouse in Maniwaki, Que., is in a coma
Yes, there is a video. Yes it’s an actual quote from the article.
“If we were properly staffed, enough guns would have gone off that they would be dead, not costing taxpayer dollars.”
Alright, maybe I should’ve add that the video shows 1 constable wrestling with the kid while 4 others are just standing around watching them.
I guess the required ratio by the union would be 10 to 1.
Their temperament is no better than Mr. Trump’s .
Phew. I was worried, for a second.
Having a blast with my prog coworker who’s battling the post office on the phone this morning. She’s not getting what I’m saying but at least I’m amusing myself.
What did you say?
“Having a hard time with that government created monopoly, are ya?”
Stan Lee back home after being hospitalized for irregular heartbeat
Comic book legend Stan Lee reportedly spent the night at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles Wednesday night.
Lee, 95, was taken to the hospital with shortness of breath and an irregular heartbeat, according to TMZ. He is reportedly in stable condition.
Must ahve watched Black Panther and figured there were not enough SJW call outs?
Feel bad for him while you can – I’m sure accusations will come eventually.
He’s 95
any beating of his heart at all should be consideed irregular
I’m feeling a bout of yellow fever coming on.
http://archive.is/kzdYZ
1, 8, 12, 26, 35.
7. Hot chick with a weapon every time.
#39
Learned in conference: If you have knowledge that your employer is doing sketchy things and skirting securities laws, run it up the chain. If they ignore you (and especially if you get fired for it), narc. Narc hard. SEC gives you a percentage of what they screw your employer for. 38 cases, 50 whistleblowers since 2015, total of $180 million in awards to the narcs.
I’d like to see that version of Ghost.
In the mean time you could end up living under a bridge or overpass..
I always tell people to skip the steps where they involve HR or company Compliance people, and go straight to a lawyer. Both HR and these compliance offices exist to protect the company, not the employee.
Same deal in healthcare. One of our competitors got hit with a big 8 figure fine because their compliance officer played a truly impressive long game.
(1) She destroyed her own credibility internally.
(2) She ran a problem up the chain, but nobody cared because she had already destroyed her own credibility.
(3) She ratted them out the feds.
I think her take-home was around $8mm.
Hilariously, she then set herself up as a healthcare compliance consultant. I can’t believe anybody would be stupid enough to hire her. I sent our contracting department a memo putting her on a permanent blacklist.
Abrazo?
I’m ready for the memo release. I called off work, and I’m sitting at my computer surrounded by snacks, water, and a bottle to pee in.
This should be one hack of a show to follow..
I find it easier just to lay some newspaper down under my chair. Peeing in a bottle is too much work.
WHERE IS MAH FUCKING MEMHO!
I WANT THE GODDAMN MEMO!
So you’re saying [removes sunglasses] . . . you didn’t get the memo?
Hey Sloop, tell us where the Bad State touched you, You really don’t like California do you,
and it’s become quite insulting, but hey We are all the same out here, right?
Dude, everybody thinks we all like incest anime and sniff women’s panties. Oh yeah,….nevermind.
needs moar tentuhclz
There are plenty of good people in Kali, it’s the state government we hate. It’s a living, breathing example of what progs envision for the whole country and it’s simultaneously sickening and frightening. It reminds us what we should be fighting against. So I get where he’s coming from, but you’re right, there are lots of regular, everyday good people there and we shouldn’t forget that.
I have interacted with some of the smug progs from Kali, and suffice it to say that I don’t like them very much either. Not enough to wish they get put in ovens or killed in other grizzly ways like many of them are likely to respond to my disdain for their dogma, mind you.
Thanks Q, i didn’t need to read a tear down first thing in the morning,
Dude, I am from Illinois…when people rag on “Illinois” they aren’t saying I am corrupt, venal, incompetent, etc. They mean our entirely blameworthy G. Well, that and Cub fans.
I left Los Angeles in 1994. It flt like the place was on a cliff and about to fall in. There was a Republican Governor and Mayor but you could tell they were probably the last Republicans ever in those jobs (I guess Arnold sort of counts).
The people there are now getting exactly what they asked for – good and hard.
https://twitter.com/RLibertyCaucus/status/959289867929731072
It’s official: the Republican Liberty Caucus is more libertarian than the ‘Libertarian’ Party
I’ve said it before, even before it went all Cosmo SJW wacky, the LP was useless because of the nature of American politics. We’re much better off doing entryism in the Repubs and influencing it from the inside.
Maybe. The only problem is that there would not be enough libertarians to fully influence Republican policy. There would have to be an alliance with another faction and obviously neoconservatives are out of the question
I always approached it that Libertarianisim is a process, not a party. It’s a philosophical argument that has no end goal, other than to increase liberty. If it meant working with the left on issues of sex, drugs and speech (oh, how times have changed!) then I would happily support those planks. If it meant working with the Republicans on shrinking government and increasing free trade (oh, how times have changed) than I was with them.
I take my Glib with me, no matter what shithead party I agree with on a particular issue.
The idea of libertarian party is as silly as calling oneself the “science party”.
Exactly this
Well, that and the fact that they are whining about the Libertarian party not having Republicans speak at their convention. You don’t see a slate of LP members on the schedule for the RNC either.
I mean that would make sense if the Libertarian Party didn’t always nominate the worst Republicans as its nominees. How can you justify having Bill Weld on your presidential ticket, but not allowing Ron Paul to speak (who was the Libertarian Party presidential nominee in the 80’s)? Are we going to pretend like they would have rejected Bill Weld or Gary Johnson from speaking?
I think they should take Rand as a dual party nominee. They won’t do it, but they should.
Well, at least they should if they can’t convince The Rock that he’s a libertarian.
Kane is a libertarian. Could nominate him.
Or Hulk Hogan. I’d vote for Hulk Hogan
Put Michael Caine on.
He’s 80something and not a natural-born citizen, so he’s ineligible to win. He’d still be better for the party than any single politician I can think of. Just tape a half our interview and play clips from ti as needed.
If you wanna put Caine in, might as well go whole-hog and put Connery in.
He might not be much of a libertarian, but he’s not politically correct either.
Nah, Connery is a Scottish separatist, which probably means Commie.
Caine is legit classic liberal guy, who knows how to articulate his position, and has wealth of life experience to draw on.
Although, if we get them in character as Peachie and Danny…
(yes, my Man Who Would Be King blu-ray arrived, I’ve not seen that movie in more than 20 years)
The LP, and other third parties, are non-starters. Because math. We may transition to two different parties, but after 2016 I don’t expect that to happen in our current technology/communication/media environment.
Entryism and coalition building is the way to advance any minority position.
The GOP could probably benefit from a properly constituted ‘Libertarian Caucus’.
Favorite reply: “The Libertarian Party is committing political suicide.”
Uh…. sure.
sigh So, I found out yesterday I didn’t get the job. My manager received an email of feedback from my interview. He said his takeaway from it was I needed to be louder and show more enthusiasm. So, the interviewer tells my manager that he liked me, I interviewed well, seemed smart, reliable, and a hard worker. But apparently that doesn’t matter because ZOMG, I didn’t show a lot of enthusiasm in my interview! I don’t get a promotion because of trivial shit. Do all interviews have to be a damn show? You’ve got to put on a total act just to pass it? You can’t act like a normal human being like you will if you get the job?
That’s more feedback than I usually get. If I get a response at all it’s usually “I’m sorry, we’ve picked someone else”. So I have no idea what interviewers are looking for.
You know one thing they aren’t looking for.
Honesty, apparently. The manager who hired me at the state commented that I was the only candidate who hadn’t exaggerated my actual skillsets and padded my resume. I don’t bullshit well in a verbal format (or indeed, in any serious format), so I’m bluntly honest in interviews. It does provide an accurate assessment of what they’d get, but I don’t think it makes managers feel all that warm and fuzzy.
That’s where solid references come in handy. How much can you learn in an interview, really?
Well I learned that one prospective consultant thought that “Tell me about some of the work you’ve done on X” meant “do an internet search and read the first article about the product that google spits back”.
We did not extend him a job offer.
Funny you should mention this, because I just recently had a situation where my boss asked me to interview someone that not only turned out to be unqualified for the position but had a padded resume, only to find out this was a personal friend of my boss and my boss had helped pay for his resume to be padded. My boss is still there, but the guy never got hired because I said no way.
It seems these days padding your resume is a big deal. I have always done the exact opposite and as a general practice leave a lot of things off my resume because I would usually get told I was not just over qualified, but – according to them – would end up bored and leave. Heck, my current employer had a fit when they discovered the school I told them I had a BS in EE from actually was where I got my Masters and they freaked out even more when they realized I still hold a security clearance and worked on a ton of things I never mentioned on said resume.
It is a big deal – if you’re willing to lie there, how can you be trusted with anything?
The question is if omission is a lie or not. If I get asked I am more than willing to volunteer the information, then back it up. Putting shit on the resume that you have no clue about however is IMO grounds to never trust you again.
Not unless it’s an omission like failing to disclose “I used to work at Y, but they fired me for stealing from the company”.
Never been fired or been in any kind of trouble despite my hardcore anti-PC attitude, but I agree: failing to disclose negative things is also a quick way to disqualify oneself.
This incarnation of my resume is heavily enbriefened, for exactly that reason. Somehow, in the last 16 years, I’ve acquired so much (useful) experience that it’s an impediment, apparently, according to a couple of well-respected career development consultants. I guess it’s a good place to be, but it makes no sense.
As a manager, I want people like me – and that’s what I see as being the problem – if I do actually go salaried instead of launching this biz, my prospective boss is likely to want people like him, and not like me.
Fuck that noise, I don’t want people like ME as subordinates. That’d be hellish.
::Puts on Toronto/Alberta Snowbilly academic accent::
We’re all low on Trait Agreeableness, that’s for sure, eh?
Well, my manager was the one who received the feedback. Though he did tell me he would forward the email for me to look at.
That’s utterly ridiculous. Sorry to hear that
Fake enthusiasm is the best predictor of job performance, it is known.
Meh – last year I went to a job interview at a medical device manufacturing plant. The Plant Manager showed up to introduce himself and had a zealot gleam in his eyes when mentioning their Lean practices. And isn’t Lean just great? And don’t you just love Lean?
Me: Yeah. (because who doesn’t love a bloated added layer to the manufacturing process that probably spends more money in time and personnel than it does in saving money?)
Never gore their ox, or they will make you pay for it man..
That was your opportunity to jump on the DevOps Choo Choo, you dolt!
Another thing he asked:
Him: So how did you hear about this company? (said with obvious pride).
Me: Uhm… the headhunter told me about it. (and it was a rink-dink company that none would have heard of – compared to the multi-site campus I work at, which manufactures parts that I you will see everyday).
“How did you hear about this company?”
“Um, which company is this again?”
My current job, the only question that threw me for the loop was this one.
“How did you hear about the company?”
I don’t know. Because YOU yourself called me out of the blue and asked me if I was interested?
I sat there in stunned silence and poured myself another sample of their whiskey.
I had the same problem when I was looking for a job.
They ask the dumbest questions, and I suck at acting or pretending, but I tried and was told many times that I had the experience and knowledge they were looking for, but always got passed.
The job I got, the interview was straight work and scenario based questions. I found out later that he decided to hire me immediately after the interview.
I hated the whole interview process, if you’re good at being phony, it works I guess.
I’ve had interviews that were entirely BS HR questions. Makes me highly doubtful I want to work there and I’m sure that comes through in my responses.
I don’t want someone who’s good at being phony, I want someone who’s good at doing the work.
This is the problem with the consultant-filled environment we are in. There are a lot of people out there who’s main skillset is getting hired. They get hired, hang out for a few months, then start working on the next position.
As the person doing the interviews, it made it really hard – particularly when dealing with older, more experienced workers. They knew how to handle themselves in an interview, so getting the truth is really, really tough.
Most managers don’t work at it as hard as I do in interviews, because they’ll just fire them and hire another one. I hate firing people, so I put a lot of effort into figuring out if I’m being shined on or not. Also, I don’t regard specific skills as the most important criteria. I value motivation and talent above everything else. If you are bright and you have a motor, you’ll be a success. And if you don’t, no amount of training will make up for it.
But testing for programming or engineering skills is easy. Testing for character and talent? Much tougher.
They knew how to handle themselves in an interview, so getting the truth is really, really tough.
Yeah, I interview lawyers sometimes. My techniques are . . . non-standard, to the point where the recruiter from HR who usually sits in on our Skype interviews stopped coming to them. Basically, the interview is me getting them off their script and off their game.
I usually go through my last week or so’s email and phone inquiries for “hypotheticals” to ask them. In-house, at least in my department, you have to resolve a lot of those questions on the spot, so I tee them up for the interviewee and ask them how they would respond. By the time I hit them with the third or fourth one, I have a decent idea whether they are any good. Many law firm lawyers can’t work that way; they have been trained to check with colleagues, do research, blah blah. Sometimes you gotta do that, but when floor staff calls, they need an answer right fucking now.
Interviewing and assessing skills is easier when the skill set is tangible. Assessing if someone that claims to be able to develop in a certain language really can do so is easy to gauge with a few technical questions. When the job is more soft skill oriented, people that know how to bullshit will always have an advantage.
I rock at scenario based questions (“What would you do in…?”) but completely fall apart at the behavior-based interviews (“Tell me about a time when…?”) I don’t know if this is just because I am not good ad tooting my own horn or whether I am a complete fraud.
“Tell me about a time when you had to deal with a difficult co-worker.”
“I think the time I dealt most effectively with a difficult co-worker was when I laid some groundwork in advance. And by groundwork, I mean I dug a hole in the desert.” [Silence. Dead-eyed stare at the interviewer.]
“Tell me about a time when…”
“I’m afraid that my current employment contract would require that I kill you after I did.”
Try telling a new boss that you can’t tell him something because the Official Secrets Act of 1911 forbids you from doing so, doubly so because he is a citizen of a ‘foreign power’ with a straight face.
‘cmon, man, there are only so many different variations on the “Tell me how you fucked up, recovered and saved the world? Now tell me what you learned>” scenarios.
You should be able to drag out one or two true ones.
Yeah, I know this. Something just goes blank in my mind and I always just want to say “I don’t know, I’ve done that shit lot’s of times.” But that’s not really what they’re looking for. I’ve kind of gotten to the point where I just write off the interview the moment I hear “Tell me about a time”.
“Tell me about a time you failed to deliver on your promises and had to clean up the mess”
“Well, that’s a difficult one, because as I stated, I do a lot of managing expectations. I don’t over-promise, and so there’s very little gap between what I say I will do and what I actually do.”
I did not get the job. (Paraphrased, but actual interview question)
I’ve had to hire people and sometimes I’ve had several good candidates with no idea which is better. Basically a coin-flip. The last time, I actually walked the resume of the runner-up down to another hiring-manager who quickly hired her.
On the other hand, they job market is great right now, so get out there and find something better.
I have a rule that if I give anyone a face-to-face interview (its usually 2 or 3 per hire), I call the ones who didn’t get the job to let them know, and try to give them some insight into why we went with someone else.
Face-to-face interviews aren’t about finding whether you have the capability to do the job. I know that before I do the interview. They are about finding out if you will fit on the team.
Pretty much this. We just finished f2f interviews for a position. Our final ranking was very different from what we had after phone interviews.
Call me cynical, but the “peace talks” between Israel and Palestine are always a complete waste of time. When only one side wants peace, there is no coming to a conclusion. You may not be interested in war, but war may be interested in you. The only way this works is if peace becomes a better option for the Palestinians than continuing to provoke and fight. That’s why I’ve been saying for years and continue to say to Israel: just steamroll over them and beat them into paste until they can’t take anymore. Then they’ll authentically want peace. Fuck the international community, they’ll hate (((you))) no matter what you do, so do what’s best for the country.
It’s pointless theater. Violence is the only way this gets solved (unfortunately).
If outside countries stopped donating money to the Palestinian Authority, and allowed it to collapse in insolvency, I suspect that things would change for the better pretty dramatically.
That is also true for foreign aid to the state of Israel, BTW
I see a direct correlation with the Danegeld that used to be paid to the North Koreans until recently, and the lucre handed to the PA still.. My recommendation would be to do what they did to Kim and to tell the PA the bribery days are over. I suspect after that, things will finally really change.
“It’s pointless theater.”
So much this..
That is why these people are now all pissed at Trump. He is basically exposing this truth to the people that were not paying close enough attention and had bought into the bullshit being peddled by the Jew haters.
It’s kinda what I pointed to up top.
Whether they’re present or not is really irrelevant because the Palestinians do not negotiate in good faith because they know damn well they’re not going to honour it.
They had the deal of a lifetime under Clinton back in 1993 then that cocksucker Arafat went all berserk. He got everything he asked for and then some and still decided to be a dickhead. I hope he’s burning in hell somewhere.
How bad has Law & Order become?
I stopped watching it a few years ago when it became apparent to me it was a silly liberal show. But now my wife – who is as apolitical and even clueless as they come – noticed the recent episode was insulting her intelligence. She found it to be in poor taste and woefully poorly written because it clearly had an axe to grind and a political agenda.
I blame SVU almost entirely for the OMG PEOPLE ARE GOING TO KIDNAP AND RAPE MY CHILDREN! panic. /nosarc
Look on the bright side. They made if fun to walk around central park with a hoodie on and leer at joggers.
I also blame it for the normalization of prosecutorial misconduct in the minds of the public. These people are GUILTY. Who cares if the prosecutors break the rules to get them convicted?
Agreed. Also got sick of Olivia’s endless angst.
Oof. You want to punch that face.
And the gambler. Bah.
The characters seemed so forced.
Orbach was the best one of them all!
Make that a noir film slap.
Watching L&O was one of the things that turned me from a supporting cops to being suspicious of them.
^^^That.
I loved Lenny and Mike.
And I did love Criminal Intent.
D’onofrio was believable.
Lenny was the best. And Criminal Intent, at least the first few seasons, IMO was the best L&O.
Unrelated except in my mind: DS9 was the only Star Trek I could stand and I really liked it.
My oldest brother said he had to stop watching it because he found himself rooting for the bad guys.
There is a lot of media where that happened to me.
Usually becuase the villain was competent, intelligent and put in the effort, while the designated hero was insufferable in one or more ways.
As a teenager, I remember rooting for the Jackal to kill De Gaulle.
As an Englishman, I still do.
#6.2 thinks Hans Gruber got a kind of shitty deal.
The Closer is what did this for me.
Didn’t they have an episode about Gamergate? ZOMG the gamerz are coming to kill us all!
Wait, that wasn’t a parody of anti-gamergaters?
Fake news?
NBC News is reeling after “Nightly News” anchor Lester Holt appears to have been badly fooled by North Korean propagandists — giving a cheery report from a ski resort in the Hermit Kingdom that looked to be bustling when it was widely known to actually be a ghost town.
Holt — who returned early from North Korea after scathing reviews — reported for “Nightly News” from the Masikryong ski resort on Monday, a facility that is the brainchild of Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un and is typically empty. The resort, built to create the appearance of a prosperous nation, was largely deserted during peak 2017 ski season, according to multiple reports.
But for Holt’s appearance, the North Korean government appears to have brought in skiers — wearing identical outfits — and staged the scene, something Holt did not appear to realize.
FOX vs NBC. I am amused.
Now imagine he did this type of report from Russia. Imagine how fast he would be fired (and rightly so).
If he’d have done it from the old USSR he would have gotten an emmy!
Deluded American commie relieved to find that he can openly sympathize with NK commies. News at 11
Next, send him to Venezuela, then Cuba so we can marvel at the utopian wonders there.
He should win the Walter Duranty Award.
I watched that report when it aired.
He did point out that he was highly monitored and only shown what they wanted him to see, and he did report that there were very few cars on the road. He also seemed to copy the Shane Smith travel log a bit, so I was surprised at how quickly the report petered out and fell into reporting the propaganda. He talked about being told that all the nice places are only for the elites in the party, but then when he had some party boss’s wife at the ski resort, he didn’t even ask her what she does for a living. He just played it the way they wanted it done…. “look how lovely this resort is. The Korean people are wonderful and will overcome.”
So he deserves some scorn. Not untempered scorn, but scorn nonetheless. For a real peek, go watch the Vice Guide to North Korea. That’s a great version of the North Korea tour.
A reporter going to North Korea should toe the party line while there, but upon arriving back home put together a report of “Here’s what I couldn’t say with the sword of damocles over my head inside that country”
And destroy his chances of being invited again? Foolish!
North Korea is a “once and only once” kind of destination. If you’re lucky, it won’t be the last item on your bucket list (intentionally or not)
You’ve got to put on a total act just to pass it? You can’t act like a normal human being like you will if you get the job?
Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who are more impressed by the elbows-up appearance of busy-ness than by actual competence and productivity .
I learned early on in my Army time that as long you carry a clipboard and a screwdriver, you can go anywhere and do anything, including hardcore goldbricking, without being questioned.
Same thing in the Marine Corps, if you act like you are supposed to be there, people assume you’re supposed to be there.
It’s not a military specific trait.
If people look at you and you look like you belong, they don’t question you.
^^^THIS^^^
https://twitter.com/shoe0nhead/status/959126070187393031
“So the inevitable has happened, F1 gridgirls have been banned. Ridiculous that women who say they are “fighting for women’s rights” are saying what others should and shouldn’t do, stopping us from doing a job we love and are proud to do. PC gone mad”
All the grid girls are pissed (as they should be). Somebody clearly thought these were the type of women to stand by silently. Jokes on you, motherfucker.
People love to tell woman that they don’t know what’s in their own best interest, in the name of “feminism” (see: sex work)
I like this headline.
Bitter Feminists Go After The Hot Cheerleaders. Here Are Their First Victims.
I don’t see any difference between these kinds of feminists and incel fedoras. Both spend their lives bitching and whining about what hot people do.
That seems to be the consensus.
https://twitter.com/hashtag/gridgirls
Is Glibs run on an old Amiga server? I haven’t seen this error in a very long time. Just got it while trying to post.
Somebody forgot to put the OS disk back in the floppy drive.
I just got the same message on a page refresh.
That’s Varnish, the page caching solution, fucking up.
All those Norsemen responsible for Varnish were probably Amigabros.
JohnR EU was funny with his “You’re better off without that job you enjoyed” shtick:
Aw, thanks dad!
a nurse – I don’t like being around sick people and excrement.
a teacher – I’m anti-union
a veterinarian – Animals hate me
a tv presenter – with my face for radio?
I don’t hate you.
I appreciate that.
but your average domestic shorthair and most breeds of dogs don’t want me near them.
Well, I’ll grant you that I don’t speak for all Animals.
Luck for him… a Grizzly mauling is a terrible thing.
You might even call it grisly.
The first 3 take a lot of time, a lot of money, and a lot of interest.
The fourth probably requires sleeping with more people (#metoo) than being a grid girl does, if you want to get to the top.
Grand Prix? More like Grand Puxxies.
Also, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, would, and I can’t see much of Mr. Purple Shirt but given the law of averages, probably would.
British darts did the same thing: http://www.bbc.com/sport/darts/42841620
And here’s one of the girls complaining about the ban: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-42872257
Feminists are now saying they have to fire women to empower women, or something.
Formula 1 was a hell of a lot better before it got woke.
But remember, Selena Gomez posting pictures of herself naked and Beyoncé standing on a stage mostly naked are totes empowering. But girls on a race track in clothes that would even be considered pretty close to office-appropriate are totally objectifying women/oppressive to people that don’t even watch racing.
Somebody posted a picture of some grid girls next to a picture of some Muslim women in full sack-and-facemask, and asked which one was women empowered to wear what they want, and which one was women being oppressed by the patriarchy.
That’s a good comparison, but has proven to be ineffective. You can’t convince people who have chosen to go full-retard. I really do think the tide is starting to turn on these idiots, though.
Corporate and government policy will be lagging indicators, though.
Can’t wait until they kill Top Gear.
Never mind.
F1 got wind of all the anger and repealed the change
This is funny, sad but funny
24 hours til this!
Till you catch the flu?
I am afraid to ask..
Sardine can to the antipodes.
Copper Mountain I believe.
I would like a word with whoever transformed a chair into a torture device for United.
It was Jack Donaghy.
KouchTown – siddown or get outta the way!
(noticed the cattle in the back. Let them eat crumbs!)
/1%er
What category seat did you get?
West of the Mississippi = first class. Given my anxious tendencies, it’s the only way to fly.
Also, I love sipping a bloody mary while the rest of the herd boards.
I’d love to fly first class, but I don’t want to foot the bill. So at most I’ll go for business class, because I don’t fit in the cattle seats.
Usually on domestic flights, there’s only first and economy (and premium economy). $650 round trip DCA – DEN. For me, it’s well worth the extra $200 once a year. When I go to ABQ in the fall, I’ll probably break my “rule” and fly economy, though.
In case it’s not obvious – I don’t fly much. I hate dealing with security. Even the metal detector at the courthouse for jury duty was at the “irksome” level that I’d rather not have had to deal with. The rapiscanners in airports and the associated kabuki test my reserves of patience far more than the lines do.
Even flying only about half a dozen times a year, PreCheck is so worth it. It would be worth it if I only flew once or twice a year.
I despise having to pay for what should be the “normal” model of security, but it is what it is.
JB, I travel at most once a year. I don’t have the money or vacation time to do it more often.
I wish that a Federal secret security clearance qualified me automatically for Pre Check. It’s ridiculous that I essentially have to go through the same process I already went through to get my job.
KK, you’ve been cleared to know things. You still might blow up the planes.
I fucking put my paper printed boarding pass in my cargo shorts last time I flew, and the fuckers put me in the Rapiscanner, and patted down the cargo pockets. I was pissed, because they claim no responsibility for your shit when it’s on the x ray machine line, what happens if my boarding pass is stolen or lost in your shitty security area?
Fun fact – the current US Passport will set off metal detectors.
I was most displeased when I discovered the fact and had to deal with the resultant attention.
Even flying only about half a dozen times a year
Lookit Mr. Rockefeller here flying all over for his big important job.
I don’t have the money or vacation time to do it more often.
Lookit Mr. Rockefeller here with his vacation time and vacation money.
I’m not Rockefeller, but I used to work in his Tomb (the Empire State Plaza)
Because you get to hang out with Sheila Jackson Lee?
It’s going to be 84 degrees today, keep your snow KK I’m in shorts at work in February,
anything above seventy is sweltering.
^^^This
Well that’s where the AC comes into it
/HVAC Guy, And KK, do have a Blast, and be safe on the Mountain…
🙂
P.S. I ordered plastic mini top hats to glue onto my helmet, and they never came 🙁
So Trump irretrievably tainted public opinion against the defendants without having said a word, and conservatives did nothing but pound away at their keyboards like demented mongoloids making death threats against the poor kids. el oh fucking el, what a dumpster fire of a paragraph.
I seriously doubt the Fox News commentators made death threats.
From the Guardian article somebody linked above:
Where once the patriarchal structures of cultural production were censorious of women’s sexuality in film, art, literature, now the depiction of it is hypersexualised and explicit – but the structures of production remain just as patriarchal.
An entire industry has been built on the need to remove all meaning from language, and replace it with the clicking and whirring of 1950s science fiction automata.
Brave new world…
F1 gridgirls have been banned.
!!!!!!!!
This never would have happened if Bernie were still running the circus.
No one needs 250 laps while children are starving.
250 laps is a lot of work for a grid girl.
Saint Ayrton will surely Save us all!
Did Bernie ever put Tamara out on the grid, ‘cos he should have.
What is it with these various sports, or whatever the hell F1 is considered, pandering to and kissing the asses of shrill jackoffs who aren’t fans while pissing off those who are? It doesn’t make any damn sense.
The people who run them are more interested in scoring points with their social circle than they are in actually doing a good job running their sports. See, also, Roger Goodell.
More tales of Neo-Victorianism (TW: Rico Soave)
No alt text? Soave is the Gillespie of TOS.
A good man should know his limitations. Soave is no Shackford. He’s not even ENB when it comes to alt-text. Better not to try and make a mess.
So I guess there is a #MeToo angle here: The painting literally depicts a sexual crime.
Alright, point to Soave, that’s funny.
Damn these Puritans, if they manage to win this is going to be a drab world.
I foresee a great future for my new furniture stockings business.
JHTFC
It’s always about the conversations.
My office is immediately next to the Scottsdale Princess. There are drunk golf people…everywhere. Its not even 9am yet.
I’d love to be drunk on a Scottsdale golf course right now.
Something I mentioned yesterday in the PM links about the auto show I went to:
The muscle and sports cars were the most crowded placed with people waiting to take their turn to sit inside. This included the Challenger, Mustang, Camaro, even the little Minis, and especially the Jagaur F-Type. But I thought it was funny that most buyers of new cars don’t actually buy these but instead end up in a truck or SUV/CUV. So the dream is still there but practicality usually takes over when it comes to getting a vehicle.
If I can only have one vehicle, I’m going to pick the utilitarian option.
If I have the space and funds for more, I might look at more fanciful alternatives.
So the Accord instead of the Civic?
I own a C-Max.
Oddly, it’s one of the rarer cheap Fords. I got it because it was comfortable to drive and not cumbersome without giving up the normal amounts of carrying capacity.
*places. (I got some cruddy sleep last night)
When I went to pick up my truck there were two GT350s parked in the delivery bay. Sweet cars and actually fairly reasonably priced. But, alas, you can’t haul stuff, tow stuff, or enjoy special IRS deductions with them.
That said, I really would love a Maserati for the weekends!
If you’re a car person, you absolutely have to go to Barrett Jackson in Scottsdale at least once, even if you’re not in the market for a car. Its an auction and they need the buyers to be able to eyeball the cars, so all the cars on sale are out in big tents (or on their showroom next to the auction). Plus, they stage them for auction outside so you can hear them run, etc. There’s around 1300 cars, a trade show with all kinds of cool gear, plenty of booze and food. It is surreal and awesome. Plus, they put all the stuff that’s been sold back on the lot with the sale price on it, so you can see what people paid.
My fave this year was a 1941 firetruck, complete with water cannon. I think it sold in the mid-40s.
Apropos of nothing- Hopscotch, starring Walter Matthau, is an excellent movie.
Also, this just came on. For Sloopy.
I’m curious – now that some of the tax reform has taken effect – what are my fellow Glibs planning on doing with the money that is no longer being stolen from them each paycheck?
I’m contemplating either increasing my 401(k) contributions or using it to pay down more student debt each month. What will you do with yours?
I haven’t seen it yet.
I don’t expect to until the 7th. I’m liable to either sink it into my debt or up my deferred comp.
I haven’t seen it either, yet. Based on the various websites, our household tax bill should be cheaper by $6k, which is nice. I’m thinking we’ll throw any extra at debt. We can probably stick with that plan for at least a year or two before it stops being relevant.
Two people I work with were complaining that their take home went down this month – one by a chunk. I’m confused because my early calcs said mine should go up.
I guess they could be affected by changes in personal exemptions like Creech said below. I’m single, so I didn’t get hit on any of the “pay less for having babies” incentives. In fact, I didn’t even know that they were reducing any of these exemptions.
Did your benefits cost go up?
Yeah, but the reduction in take home was higher than allowing for benefits from what I was told. I’ll have to wait until next month to see what happens with mine because I got an extra stipend in January that prevents me from doing a comparison.
I think the three main groups of people who lost out were people needing large SALT deductions, those with massive mortgages, and those with a ton of kids (the increased child credit does not offset the lost personal exemption).
I thought that SALT and mortgage interest deductions only hit you when you file your taxes each year. Aren’t those taking effect in 2019 (the 2018 tax year)?
I just meant the general groups who would lose out. You’re right that the only group who would see an immediate negative impact (at least that I listed) would be those with large families.
People will get hurt potentially because there were no changes to the withholding tables, especially around child credits. I read recently that you might need to readjust your withholding choices to account for that.
people needing large SALT deductions, those with massive mortgages
I find it amusing that Donnie Two-Scoops has maneuvered the Dems into opposing higher taxes on rich people.
Already maxed out for my 401(K), so I am going to blow the money on booze and bitchez..
What increase? I’m in that group where the new standard deduction and loss of personal exemptions is a lot less than my previous itemized deductions plus personal exemptions.
And I’m o.k. with that as long as my stock investments soar.
I’m in a spot where my 2017 itemized deductions hit the halfway mark between the old standard deduction and the 2018 standard deduction.
Itemized deductions affect your regular paycheck?
That’s not possible. You can only take personal deductions on payroll. One for yourself and one for each dependent. At this point, it’s apparent to me that the only entity that I get a regular paycheck from, has not yet implemented the new rules because my check is the exact same amount it was on Jan 15th.
Okay, that’s what I thought. Yeah, employers have until the 15th of Feb, like you said below. I hope you get a hefty chunk of change no longer stolen each pay period, Hyp.
Remember you can always split it between drinking and paying down debt. Drinking is important.
The raise that I got was pretty substantial, so if I get a reduction in tax rate, that will be a really nice start to the year. I think I will because I don’t have children so I have no deductions to lose. I claim 1 for me, and wife claims 1 for her and then we file jointly.
It’s really hard to even guess right now because most of the stuff posted online is skewed specifically to trick people into believing they are going to pay more. I just stopped paying attention and decided to wait to find out.
Yeah, I really don’t understand it. Most of my friends are in their 20s without kids. They’re complaining about the tax reform but they are the ones that directly will benefit from it. The propaganda around this has been really effective – but I’m not sure if the narrative is going to survive the reality of my friends actually having more $$$ to spend each month.
I took it in the pants for the last 2 pay stubs. Mr Trump is lucky I don’t get to vote.
On the other hand, this wasn’t a surprise, and I should be able to do some mitigation for my 2018 return.
Not a citizen? What’s taking you so long?
There are a couple of things, among which is FATCA and IRS double-taxation regulations for Americans who have the affrontery to live abroad.
Mrs. Drake needs a new car this spring. Any further surplus would hopefully go into savings and maybe a decent vacation for once.
Nice. I’d really like to do a vacation too. I want to do some international travel while I’m still in my 20’s, but my personality always nags at me to pay down my debts before spending a few grand on a trip.
I really should ignore it, just for a year.
Pay off debt. Write angry letters to HR about how dental insurance is literally the opposite of insurance since it covers small routine costs and not rare, catastrophic costs, so in the name off accuracy could you update the new-hire brochure to change the words “dental insurance” to “literally shit.”
I keep signing up for the “enhanced” dental plan because I haven’t been in years and keep telling myself that this is the year I will finally go. I expect I have a huge bill coming. I’m such a pussy when it comes to the dentist.
I haven’t been to the dentist in almost 10 years. It’s been about seven for my wife. I don’t have an aversion to going, it’s just a low priority and keep overlooking it.
Neither of us have had any dental problems. We also don’t have fluoride in our water *gasp*
Last time I went I had two wisdom teeth pulled and a root canal/crown done. $5K, including the anesthesia.
Novacaine doesn’t work on me, and my teeth are sensitive. I get panic attacks just scheduling an appointment. I need to be OUT before having any work done.
The dental costs me (that I see on my paycheck) way less than 2 checkups plus an x-ray and it paid for 1/2 of a crown last year too, so I am not going to complain too much about it being not really insurance.
My kids had some bacterial infection in their mouths. One had a half dozen caps, the other had four and a root canal that failed and had to turn into an extraction a few months later. Wife had an implant put in. We ended up 5 figs of out of pocket and literally hundreds of dollars paid by insurance.
From what I’ve heard, employers have until the 15th of this month to implement the changes? There was no change in my check on the 30th. My next check will be the 15th, so I should pay attention.
Oh, and the plan is to drink more. No, just kidding, saving more money is the plan.
I am still exempt due to carryover business losses. Talk to me in 2019. Maybe.
*puts a notification on Outlook calendar*
I have no idea if mine has hit yet because my most recent check included a small quarterly bonus and no matter what I do I can’t seem to make what I think the withholding should be match what actually was withheld. (Its a big company so I assume they are doing it right)
Still, my guess is gonna be about 40 a month lower on withholding for mine. Not sure on the wife’s yet, and won’t be able to tell for a couple months since she’ll be on leave later this month.
I’ve already bumped my 401k up by an additional percent.
I thought it was funny that most buyers of new cars don’t actually buy these but instead end up in a truck or SUV/CUV. So the dream is still there but practicality usually takes over when it comes to getting a vehicle.
I don’t know, and I am an automotive outlier (to say the least), BUT- I just don’t get why people feel compelled to buy an absurdly large four wheel drive pickup to drive every fucking day. Do you really need an F350 to go to the goddam grocery store?
I get it. They’re popular. If you’re dragging your roping horses all over Hell and gone every weekend, sure. But the people who have a serious demonstrable NEED for those trucks are pretty thin on the ground.
It really only bothers me when people with gigantic trucks tailgate me or generally drive like assholes. Sure, anyone driving like an asshole, regardless of their car model, will piss me off. But for some reason, assholes who drive huge trucks and people who drive Priuses make me way more angry.
My biggest problem with people who own oversized trucks is their tendency to find the spot where their super-bright hi-beam grade regulat lights flood all your mirrors and leave you blind.
^^^ THIS ^^^ Fucking, this.
Well, the consequences of being rear ended by a gigantic truck would be much higher.
I would have much less of a problem with people with big trucks if they would learn how to park.
If you can’t control it, you shouldn’t be driving it.
Our downtown area has those diagonal parking spots, and whenever people park huge trucks in there, they stick out halfway into the lane.
at my last job, co-worker bought a V10 Ford F250. He said he needed something to haul his boat.
His boat? A little bass boat with an outboard motor that could have been hauled by just about anything with a trailer hitch.
Or put on the roof of a sedan like a canoe?
But the people who have a serious demonstrable NEED for those trucks are pretty thin on the ground.
When I look around at what I have a serious demonstrable need for, and what I actually own, the gap is. . . .significant. And irrelevant.
I’ve heard the people who drive those monstrous pickup trucks and suburbans the size of a school bus, complain about spending $800 a month on gas. Some of them don’t even have children at home, why the fuck do they need a school bus?
What the fuck does need have to do with it? I love the fact the we are a wealthy enough country that people can buy what they want.
But Bernie said no one needs a school bus. I was only talking about people who complain about how much they spend on gas while driving a vehicle that is a gas hog. It’s sort of annoying. It’s like drinking a fifth of liquor and being mad because you’re drunk.
Ah, gotcha. We call those people ‘whiny bitches’.
$800 a month on gas
At around $3.00/gallon, that’s over 250 gallons a month. At 15 miles per gallon (F-250 mileage), that’s around 4,000 miles per month. You drive that much, you’re going to have gas bills.
Yep. Had a neighbor whose mom was a horse trailer dealer. She did well enough (living in Cincinnati, she was able to broker deals for Kentucky horse breeders and serve Indiana and Ohio markets) to afford both a F-350, and an Explorer, and his dad was a doctor who drove a Prius. Most of the time the F-350 just sat there, and the neighbor and I would help out with neighborhood watering and mulching using the F-350 when we couldn’t borrow my dad’s truck.
I want a Silverado, I’ll admit, but 90% of the time that bed space is just going to waste for me. It really is about the cab size and then having a pickup for the maybe once every couple of months I could really use one. In reality, when it comes time for a new car I’ll probably get something like an Equinox. A “fun” car wouldn’t be very practical right now, and as a tallish person I’ve gotten used to driving vehicles I fit in comfortably, so it’s soccer-mom SUV/CUV for me, methinks.
Naptown, I’m not sure how tall you are, or if you don’t mind leaning back in a car, but I’ve had Equinoxes from 2012-2017 models as loaners while my car is being serviced, and the biggest problem I have with them is that my torso is too tall for them (i’m only 5’8″, but I have a disproportionately long torso. My head always hits the ceiling in them. My guess is that it’s a conspiracy by automakers to make sure men have to purchase bigger sedans or larger SUVs, (particularly SUVs, since they are the most profitable for car makers).
Uh oh. I’m 6’3″ and have my grandfather’s orangutan-like build: big, long torso, long arms, short legs. In a Toyota Highlander I’ve got about an inch of clearance if I’ve gotten a recent haircut. And ever since I sold my Prelude I’ve vowed to never drive a car I can’t sit bolt upright in.
Yeah, definitely test drive it. A former co worker (5’5″ woman) had her head within 4 inches of the top of one she bought with a moonroof.
We just bought the wife a 2011 GMC Terrain. We really like it. I’m 6’0″ and I feel very comfortable in it.
Leg room in a Subaru Crosstrak is surprisingly ample.
You’ll use the bed waaay more than you think. Super crew pickups are the handiest vehicles in existence.
I have noticed that whenever a friend buys a pickup all of a sudden he gets very popular on weekends, especially if someone’s moving, buying a mattress or appliance, or hauling wood.
Funniest thing – the proggies in my family all drive prii, leaves and teslas. Guess who suddenly isn’t a horrible, gun-toting, freedom loving knuckledragger when there is something to move?
I used to buy station wagons, but they’ve all become so fucking stylish, you can’t fit anything in them.
My favorite car was a 1984 Volvo 240 DL wagon. It only hit 65 if you were going down hill, but the thing was damn-near indestructible, and I could fit everything in it. The great thing about those cars is that even the gasoline versions (which mine was) used the same engine block as the diesels, which were thick as hell, so you really had to abuse the hell out of them to break them. Also, you could fit a midget in the engine bay comfortably. I saw a few projects on the Internet where guys had done engine swaps with Corvettes, because there was so much room under the hood the engine would fit.
I’ve had many 240s. 2.3 liters of tough motherfucking engine. One of the best cars ever made. At one point I owned an XC70 and, while nice, was nowhere near as awesome as the 240s.
I miss them.
Which leads to the bumper sticker: “Yes, this is my truck. No, I won’t help you move.”
I drive an F-150. Company vehicle. 6 1/2 foot bed because IRS. Do I absolutely need it? Probably not, but I fucking love it anyway. Comfortable, quiet, nice looking, tows a 32 foot trailer easily. Previous vehicle was a Tahoe I drove the snot out of. One of the best vehicles I’ve ever had.
For myself, a larger vehicle is just preferable. Wife hates them, so she drives a Passat.
It’s nice to have choices, I think.
My brother’s truck is paid for by his company. I don’t think he’s ever hauled material for work, but they pay for it anyway. I don’t get it.
Tax laws.
We bought a used Ram to haul lumber and compost and suchlike. It’s a going-to-Home-Depot-only POS, which we use when my Granny car is out of commission. But I adore that thing. I eyeball big Ram trucks (please, let it be diesel and manual transmission) with unhealthy lust. Problem is fighting with husband over who gets to drive it.
I have an 02 4wd silverado that I drive when I need a truck. For everything else, I have a little chevy sonic. It works out well this way. I think it’s rather dumb to wear out an expensive vehicle like a truck commuting to work. I’ll wear out my $12,000 sonic and keep my truck for another decade.
Hmm.
I was just sounded out for a spot as secretary on the Board of Directors for my gun club. Given that I am a dedicated shirker of anything other than personal responsibility, I think I should decline the ‘honor’.
Car vandalism play-by-play
The only response should be to mix the audio track with yakkety sax.
I think Benny Hill would be more appropirate.
In other words, Yakkety Sax.
Don’t talk back.
Speaking of car vandalism. I drove by this car a couple days ago in SF.
Speaking of car vandalism. I drove by this car a couple days ago in SF.
https://imgur.com/gallery/sfE6b
That shit is annoying. At the place I lived at before where I live now, there was some asshole parked on the street whose car alarm would go off for hours before the asshole would go shut it off. This happened on a almost weekly basis for months.
Call in a noise complaint and have it towed.
Yeah, I’ve had the same thing happen here and wanted to friggin kill the owner after an hour of it. The garbage piling is a whole lot nicer than calling for it to be towed. That’s a minimum 500 bucks here.
Years ago, we had to pop the hood and disconnect the battery a couple of times on neighbor’s cars. Technically a crime, I suppose. But no jury on earth would convict you.
Is the Memo out yet? My internet is down.
Whatever, I’m gonna go watch some incest hentai, BRB.
Yeah, where’s the memo? There is a memo, right? Or did Trump make it up to troll the left?
*in my best Lumbergh impression*Didja get the memo?
Didn’t sound anything like him. Keep working on it.
For myself, a larger vehicle is just preferable. Wife hates them, so she drives a Passat.
It’s nice to have choices, I think.
That was really my point; I have a full size four wheel drive chevy pickup from the mid ’80s. Compared to what they’re putting out now, it seems like a mini truck, but I only drive it when I “have” to (mostly when the snow is deep and/or drifts on the road down the hill are bad). It’s a pain in the ass to drive and park. I would hate to have to use it as my daily driver. If you the hypothetical “you” wants a Lincoln Blackwood, that’s your lookout.
I’d much rather drive the Honda wagon to the store. Or the 914.
Hell yes. It kills me to see the covered Spitfire in the garage every morning. Spring is coming!
pics?
https://imgur.com/EbOKktP
Purdy, but I would never fit inside that.
This is one of the reasons I’ll probably never own a Civic Type-R, despite it pushing every single one of my mid-life crisis buttons.
Why do the Cosmos trust the FBI? Up until now they pretty much literally had nothing good to say about them at all. But they can get rid of Trump which is all that matters.
They don’t, they have TDS.
Why do the Cosmos trust the FBI? Up until now they pretty much literally had nothing good to say about them at all.
Because the distinction between principles and principals was more a feature of the comment section than the writing staff. And getting all principled about libertarianism might make it hard to differentiate yourself from those icky old conservatives at this point in time.
Any journalist who is not explicitly right wing will eventually become a prog person. That’s why glibertarian articles aren’t written by journalists.
My theory is that it’s actually a consequence of the success of libertarianism on the right. If a libertarian journalist doesn’t want to be considered a conservative journalist, they increasingly have to lean left (and yes, even to the point of abandoning any rational semblance of libertarianism).
Funny that Timberlake is doing the Super Bowl again. In today’s climate the left would crucify him for a nipplegate for demonstrating violence against black women, patriarchy, white privilege, etc…
In today’s climate, the left is cheerleading for the FCC to exert control over the internet.
TOP MEN not socons will be doing the censoring.
THE MEMO HAS BEEN RELEASED! IT’S THE END! DOGS AND CATS SLEEPING TOGETHER, LOCUSTS!
Link?
Go to Drudge, the link isn’t up yet.
I don’t think I’ve ever visited that site.
Nothing bad will happen if you do. I don’t think, I’ve been going there for about 15 years occasionally.
Memo
Thank you, but There’s also this one
Wonder what is in it that got the left so upset rather than ignoring it?
Here you go.
Nothing surprising, then. Time to clean house.
I made that same point. The radical change in tactics got me to do something stupid, have hope. There’s still like a 99.9% chance that nothing happens, but the meltdown is so extreme, I can’t help but think this time might be different. I’m sure Lucy will pull the ball away any second.
I’m just guessing there’s something in there they don’t want out in the open.
“*Andrew McCabe confirmed that no FISA warrant would have been sought from the FISA Court without the Steele dossier information.”
And that dossier was paid for by the Democrats and Hillary Clinton and all of it is probably fabricated. So the Democrats may have been using FISA to spy on Trump’s team through nefarious means.
And McCabe and others knew that the source was paid for by the Dems. So the Dems paid a guy to smear their opponents (nothing unusual about that is politics), but then used that smear to spy on their opponents with the full support and knowledge of the FBI. Didn’t something happen to the last guy that tried to use government agents to spy on opposition?
All in all, nothing that couldn’t be reasonably assumed, but nice to have it spelled out. Also, I don’t see how any of that could threaten national security, but I’m sure that aspect, the attempted Dem cover up, will be ignored.
The worst of it is, is that we now have an entire team of investigators investigating Trump, being paid for by the tax payers, based solely on a memo from a guy who hated Trump and would do anything to keep him from being president. Shut this fucking circus down, reimburse the tax payers and start cleaning house at the FBI and Justice Department.
We can start with McCabe’s pension. No, you don’t fucking get to stay on until you’re fully vested or whatever, you get to go find yourself a job in the private sector. And BTW, you’re disbarred.
I suppose there’s a national security angle: our top agents are credulous stooges who can be bought off with fairy tales about Republicans.
Does it address how much of a role Ohr played in bringing it to their attention? I can’t see how that situation (hiring his wife for a matter he was involved with on the FBI side, and him not reporting it) wasn’t tantamount to bribery.
From initial reporting looks like what anyone not blinded by politics has been saying. Use of spurious information to utilize the FISA court to go after a political opponent.
Then again it would be awesome to actually see the facts behind the memo released too
But is any of this surprising seeing how the Obama admin went after political opponents using the IRS, etc? It just sounds like more of the same, and I’m sure Obama had his hands in this.
For a guy that the media insists was “scandal free”, it sure seems like an awful lot of bureaucrats he commands go rouge and all to his benefit. Let’s not forget the unsealing of divorce records when he was running for a lowly senate position.
Let’s not ignore the fact that the subjects of the ensuing investigation were unmasked by the same political actors. This is the sort of thing where everyone involved from McCabe through the love birds through Power should be looking at very long stints at Leavenworth. Trying to maintain a constitutional republic where people think they can play these games gets very, very difficult.
The fact that nothing will happen is part of why I’m not hugely optimistic for the republic’s prospects.
AAANDDD, My van broke as soon as I got on the Freeway, So it’s now in the shop, and I lose a day
/temptation to scream on 11!
Is it a KIA?
Not killed, but wounded, it seems.
F350 Van with a Triton V10, the Dragon, it’s badass most times
I guess you could say it was KIA.
Damn it all.
*sends good vibes @ Yusef, baleful glares at TK*
*looks at Commodious, licks paw, kneads couch and lays down for a nap*
🙂
What broke?
injector coils? again, third time doing this, Good mechanic, shitty parts?
I’m expecting the memo to be much ado about nothing, but I’ll be happy to be surprised.
Elsewhere….the Daily Beast published a story claiming that Devin Nunes refused to deny to the House Intelligence Committee that he composed the memo with the assistance of the White House. Only one problem with that – he DID deny it. The story was written by Betsy Woodruff and Spencer Ackerman. I’m sure you all remember Journolist member Spencer Ackerman:
I’m expecting that no matter what it says, it will immediately be hand-waved by Democrats as:
1) Probably erroneous.
2) Politically manipulative.
Etc.
And if the situation were reversed, Republicans would do the same to Democrats.
..
But it’s clear from the shenanigans that both sides think this is a big deal. I mean, why all this otherwise?
Russia probe lawyers think Mueller could indict Trump
If that’s all they’ve got, they’ve got nothing and an indictment will backlash so hard you’ll see ex-FBI and DOJ staffers panhandling in the DC subway.
Those dumb fuckers are going to burn down Washington rather than be held accountable.
Huzzah!
It’s Politico. Whatever they say, it’s never true and usually the opposite. As far as accuracy is concerned, they’re the worst ever.
True, but I do believe they will publish whatever they think the best case against Trump is.
If they do indict Trump, I expect his response will include a massive document dump showing all the crimes committed by DNC/DOJ/DNC/Fusion, and asking why they aren’t being indicted. I suspect this whole memo kerfuffle is the warning shot that if they want to play, he is more than willing to play, too.
The entire Russian thing is fake and there’s no way for them to prove it’s not fake, so I think it’s checkmate for Trump, all the way. They have nothing, however the damage that could be done to the Democrats, Clinton, certain figures at the FBI and Justice dept and even Obama, is massive. This was a desperation effort concocted by Clinton and a lot of people bought into it and ran with it. However, they must have forgotten that Obama is no longer POTUS.
All the hysterical overreaction from the left makes a lot more sense knowing that it was fed by people credibly worried that they might spend time in jail.
Plus, I love that there is a DOJ memo written when an indictment of Clinton was on the table, basically saying you can’t indict a sitting President.
I’m still wondering if Trump isn’t setting up a pardon of his people who Mueller has already gotten pleas from. His attacks on the investigation could be battlespace prep for that.
No way! Trump is a moron and intellectually unfit to be president!
Is there a fruit of the poisonous tree angle here? If all they’ve got on Manafort, Flynn, and Papadopulos are process crimes stemming from an investigation that never should have taken place, that seems like a pretty tenuous position to be in.
Is there a fruit of the poisonous tree angle here?
You bet your ass there is. If the FBI/DOJ improperly obtained warrants, then any evidence from those warrants, and any evidence that evidence led to, is inadmissable. Obtaining a warrant on a pretext or misrepresentation (hello, dossier!) would gut their case.
There’s a reason sentencing was postponed on some of the pleas that Mueller got, and I think this is the reason. Those pleas may be about to be withdrawn, and a fight started over what evidence is admissable and whether the government has a case.
Uh huh. Sure he will.
Trump has them bent over like Marsellus Wallace and they’re pounding the barrel shrieking THIS TIME WE’VE GOT HIM!
People use LOL all the time without actually laughing out loud. You made me truly laugh out loud, hard. Hard and Marcellus Wallace was getting pounded in the ass by Zed.
I almost didn’t post it because I thought, How does one shriek around a ball gag? But that made me titter too.
Hard AS, that is, not hard and.
It’s amusing that they have pretty much conceded defeat over at DU over this. Even those delusional goofballs know the game is up on this one. They’re bemoaning the fact that Wray, Rosenstein are on their way out and even Sessions. They’re fucking complaining that Trump might fire Sessions! For fucks sake, lol.
At what point can I call this a literal coup attempt without being hyperbolic?
I called it a coup attempt from almost day one. That’s exactly what it is.
I wouldn’t worry about Trump being indicted ahead of the midterm election.
If the Democrats get control of the House, they won’t care about the Mueller investigation anyway.
They’ll impeach him just because he’s Trump.
Why would Mueller subject himself to Republican scrutiny when he could just throw kerosene on a Democrat controlled fire?
I think that’s Mueller’s game, right there: Wait for the Dems to win in November and immediately start impeachment proceedings, and then feed the impeachment proceedings, using his ongoing zombie investigation to put law enforcement weight behind the Dems political jihad.
Anyone see today’s Rasmussen Trump Approval poll?
It jumped about 8 points in Trump’s favor in one week.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/trump_administration/trump_approval_index_history
I found it interesting because it’s the first time I’ve seen Trump’s Approval match his disapproval. Best I’ve yet seen.
And I think the guy is just hitting his stride. This November should be very, very entertaining.
Barack’s approval at this point was 50 approve, 43 disapprove. Trump is 49 approve, 49 disapprove. With a 3% margin of error, approval is a statistical tie, and disapproval is within a whisker of a statistical tie.
Byron York
✔
@ByronYork
More House Intel memo key point: DOJ official Bruce Ohr relayed information about Christopher Steele’s bias. Steele told Ohr that he, Steele, was desperate that Donald Trump not get elected president and was passionate about him not becoming president. http://ow.ly/FN1g30iaoEV
11:54 AM – Feb 2, 2018
Steele’s primary objective was to get paid as much as possible from as many people as possible. Turning up the hysteria to 11 helped advance that objective.
Those damn, dirty, money-grubbing Brits.
I’m sure that the case will be made, as Sullum did at TOS the other day, that the memo and the dossier are both no big deal because there were any number of rationales for spying on Carter Page anyway. It would have been easy to get a FISA court to OK it with or without the dossier. OK, but if that’s the case, then why did they use it?
as i said the other day over there…
…this is one of the strangest pivots i’ve ever seen from a magazine who normally argues that dometic surveillance is one of the hugest problems in the US govt for exactly this potential reason
its just that suddenly, when their worst-predicted outcomes prove to be correct….they find themselves defending the practice because they don’t like the people it was being used against.
So, the memo says that the Democrat’s opposition research was key to the FBI’s warrant request, . . .
It is implausible to argue that the FBI wasn’t trying to throw the election for Hillary.
This isn’t about FISA or the Fourth Amendment.
It’s about the FBI being out of control and unaccountable to the point that they effectively worked as an arm of the Elect Hillary Clinton 2016 campaign.
The obstruction of justice and perjury charges I was talking about yesterday are nothing compared to trying to throw a presidential election.
Time for the American people to break out the torches and pitchforks.
Exactly. The FBI has always been a problem. They fancy themselves kingmakers. It’s long past time they were broken up and
scattered to the winddevolved to other agencies.try and remember that the FBI is a large bureaucracy, and that a handful of people could have implemented this project with only a few people and some cover being provided at the executive level (mccabe, presumably). It doesn’t mean the entire agency was involved in some intentional conspiracy.
Exactly. Obama politicized the DOJ/FBI like every other agency he touched with his appointments. It was a corruption of the agency goals at the top, not at the bottom.
I agree with that. However, I don’t think their interests were a mystery either.
The intelligence services were opposed to Trump because he campaigned on making nice with Putin and, effectively, ceding Syria to Assad and his Iranian allies.
Hillary couldn’t have done that and wouldn’t have done that–and she was gearing up for a long struggle in Syria whether through proxies or through an invasion. That’s why the intelligence services were against Trump. That’s why John McCain and the neocons were against Trump.
I’ll speak of the FBI’s interests on this as if they were a single organization. Mueller transformed the FBI from a domestic law enforcement agency to an international spy agency, particularly in reference to international terrorism, and the FBI saw Syria as their baby, a justification for more power, and a justification for more funding in the future. Trump rained on that parade, so the FBI threw its support behind Hillary Clinton.
There are individuals who made these decisions, and they need to be exposed to the light, indicted, and prosecuted.
I can think of all sorts of laws this has violated. Let’s start by getting the Office of the Special Counsel started on investigating violations of the Hatch Act.
Yesterday, I linked a WSJ article showing that the FBI had Clinton’s missing emails for 30 days before they informed the congressional committee that was investigating Hillary’s email server. The FBI officials who told congressional investigators, first, that they didn’t have the emails, and, second, that they had only recently found them were both perjuring themselves and obstructing justice.
By all means, find each and every individual in the FBI that violated the law, and have them indicted and prosecuted.
That being said, the FBI needs to be reformed from the top down to see how deep the rot has settled.
from the report:
it was being run by a small cadre @ the top.
And that cadre needs to be punished to the full extent of the law.
Plus, the fish rots from the head, one bad apple, etc. The entire agency is tainted and its functionality severely impaired due to the loss of legitimacy. I wouldn’t lose any sleep over some babies being tossed out with the bathwater. Unless an example is made of the FBI and DOJ that puts the fear of the Lord into every other federal employee, pour encourager les autres, the rot will continue throughout the rest of the administrative state.
Remember, Trump called out civil service reform in his SOTU. I don’t think it was an accident. If you strike at the king . . . . Well, I think they did, and they fucking missed.
I should have added . . .
The memo says that the Democrat’s opposition research was key to the FBI’s warrant request [and the FBI knew its origin].
They used Democrat opposition research–and they knew it was Democrat opposition research.
That makes the that they weren’t working to throw the election for Hillary implausible.
I don’t know what’s in people’s hearts. I can only look at what they do. If you use Hillary’s opposition research to run interference for Hillary and get her elected, then from what I can tell, you were running interference for Hillary to get her elected.
The FBI needs to be torn apart and put back together.
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men
pranced about on the pieces till it could never be put back together again.
The FBI needs to be torn apart and put back together.
I’m not so sure I agree with that “put back together” part.
“That makes the [argument] that they weren’t working to throw the election for Hillary implausible.”
Fixed!
It would depend on what the opposition research was, though, wouldn’t it?
So, for example, Syldavia is having an election. Candidate Muskar hires a firm to investigate his opponent Staszrvitch for any dirt to use in the campaign. The firm discovers that Staszrvitch is regularly receiving packets of cash for Col Sponz and that two to three days prior to each meeting with Stazzrvitch, Col Sponz visits the mistress of the Bordurian naval attache. Muskar contacts the security services and provides them with this evidence.
This would be a perfectly legitimate pattern of facts justifying investigation of Staszrvitch being compromised by Bordurian intelligence.
Obviously this isn’t the case here. I’ve yet to read any coherent explanation of what this ‘collusion’ was supposed to be; and so far the only evidence against Trump is clearly manufactured whole cloth out of thin air.
RE: Thiel’s comments
there seems to be wisdom there, but it also seems like the SFGate writers were desperate to avoid making his remarks clear enough for a reader to actually understand.
they broke all the quotes apart so that you never read 3 sentences in a row to grok his meaning; instead they pull out lots of words to put in ‘scare quotes’ so that “”OMG he called East Bay a failed state”” is the only take-away. And he supported trump!
his point, if i can presume to assemble one out of the pieces, seems to be that the Bay Area should, if anything, be a model for the progressive ideal of governance. you’ve got a huge amount of wealthy companies pretending to throw huge amounts into all sorts of govt and prive-public partnerships to bring on the Proggy Utopia….
….but no one’s happy, and the people the proggy idealists are always claiming to give a fuck about – the minorities in the east-bay just across the water, but still ostensibly in their urban mandate – are basically worse off than they’ve ever been and haven’t seen a single goddamn benefit from 3 decades of huge innovation and wealth-creation in liberaltopia
You’d think with a one-party state with nearly limitless amounts of money and people with Do-Gooder intentions, you’d at least see a handful of ‘experimental communities’ and ‘magnet schools’ and innovations in governance… or public-works projects that employ lots of low-skilled people in some efficient manner, upgrading, say, their energy and water infra…. (represses laughter)…
…. basically, i think you should see my point (even if it isn’t exactly what Thiel is saying). somehow the progs never seem to “Think Local” about the utility of their own political ideas. They only think about forcing their way into the very tippy-top of govt, where they can force their *obviously* great ideas on everyone, where they will surely bring about utopia.
but the fact is that not only do they seem unable to implement utopia in their own backyards…. its even worse than that. Its less than ‘barely breaking even’. its more like rotting from the inside out, where the poorest are basically less mobile, where their purchasing power is vastly reduced due to the huge price-inflation of proggy-areas, and they’re all being taxed to death without a single monorail to show for it.
again, i think he’d have a great point to make, if only anyone would print his full remarks and not put their fingers in their ears and go, “UGH TRUMP SUPPORTER”
SfGate/The Chron has always had a pretty hard lefty bent, but over the last two years has steadily drifted into straight up propaganda. This is standard for them now. Any deviation from the progressive dogma is not printed. That piece is a perfect example of exactly how they operate. I comment there because it’s my home town paper, but I can only take small doses of it.
Apparently, McCain is already running his yap about how the memo release and allegations against the FBI only helps Russia. What a fucking piece of shit. Too bad this ass will never reflect on just what a piece of shit he is.
The exact defense the DNC used when their emails were released. “Yes, we were corrupt shitheads, but by you knowing about it, it hurts trust in institutions so really you should ignore it.”
Can’t wait for it to come out that he was the Republican working with the Kremlin’s US propaganda team, ie Fusion GPS.
Isn’t McCain also terminally ill with a very short time left? And he’s choosing to use it for petty political grandstanding instead of spending it with his family. The guy has grandchildren, for fucks sake. It would be terrible to have such a shallow life.
Maybe his family know him better than we do, and want even less to do with him than we do.
If they do indict Trump, I expect his response will include a massive document dump showing all the crimes committed by DNC/DOJ/DNC/Fusion, and asking why they aren’t being indicted. I suspect this whole memo kerfuffle is the warning shot that if they want to play, he is more than willing to play, too.
I see this as an extremely low probability best case scenario. However, what we have going for us is Trump’s complete lack of investment in the status quo. He’s not part of any political establishment apparat, and he certainly has no family dynasty to defend. The GOP establishment have let no opportunity to slander him pass untaken. Their pleas to abstain from letting the world burn might very well fall on deaf ears. And I’m okay with that.
I don’t think they will indict Trump. If they do, I think a brutal retaliatory response is exactly what he would do. God knows they have provided him with plenty of sticks to beat them with, and I think he’s just the guy to do it.
They think Trump is under their guns because of Mueller. The memo shows that they are under Trump’s guns as well. I think the memo sets up an irrefutable case for a new independent prosecutor to go through the FBI/DOJ/DNC with a flamethrower. In my dreams, this independent prosecutor indicts Mueller.
Does Trump have to go through the AG, or, if the DOJ is wholly compromised, can he just appoint an independent prosecutor himself?
re: the FISA memo
what irritates me is that there still seems to be no transparency of the underlying FISA application.
is this true or not? McCarthy argued 2 months ago that the president could unilaterally declassify the FISA applications themselves, which would make the memo nothing more than “footnotes” to is.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/454493/steele-dossier-fbi-trump-should-disclose-warrant-applications
instead, people are arguing about the footnotes and pretending the source-evidence is still ‘unknown’. its a backasswards argument imo.
The entire Mueller investigation exists solely to create a pretext for impeachment, and any action Trump takes will be mischaracterized and used to spread hysteria. Trump is letting Congress do the dirty work of dismantling the credibility of his opponents and Mueller. Well, more like the cleaning work, since what they’re undoing is dirty.