Bill Pullman for President!

I hate the way that wingnuts talk about the use of nuclear weapons as though it were the same thing as dropping a conventional bomb or sending a few divisions somewhere. If a nuke is ever again used, I can’t imagine society will exist much longer afterward. Even if it does, it will probably not be a small-d democratic society.

How does I get me one o’dem WW jobs? ‘Cause, I think I could be good at it. True, *I* would have to work at it but still.

Also, what’s with this idea of Obama as pacifist? He’s fucking the shit out of Afghanistan (take that, bus of civilians!). And he’s got that whole assassination of American citizens thing going on. He’s not exactly a dove. It’s almost as though these people can’t accept the idea of a democrat who will use violence.

Wait, this is missing a joke: My dog has no nose.

Is there a cost benefit analysis to dropping a nuke on a country? I sort of figured that to be the nuclear option, wherein you have abandoned any hope of political reconciliation and are facing obliteration yourself. Needless to say, when you decide to drop a nuke, you can’t very well give too much of a shit what anyone else thinks of it. And just what would be a “remotely plausible circumstance”? I would think the circumstances would need to be far more than remotely plausible, if such a circumstance even exists.

Extra dumbfuck points for the the movie reference, Joanie. After all, the most compelling proof is make believe TV and movies!

Shorter wingnuts everywhere: We can only blow up the entire fuckin’ planet like 100 times over now! MY PENIS IS SHRINKING!

Really, Progressive Center Left Grrl Voice of Truth, your dog has no nose? How does he smell?

Is “if memory serves” the new “central to my point”?

Anyway, Obama has long had hang-ups with nuclear weapons

Fuckin pussy.

I agree with LoadPants that “[…]most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts.”

Wasn’t Reagan president once? Even with the Evil Empire, Khaddafi, etc. as his nemeses, his core values ended up not nuking them.

So I think JonahGoldbrick is calling Reagan out as a pussy and professing his manlove for Truman.

Really, Progressive Center Left Grrl Voice of Truth, your dog has no nose? How does he smell?

Terrible.

This terrible joke was brought to you by Verizon Wireless. Are you tired of paying too little for your wireless? (TM)

Since nuclear weapons have no military value, I’ve got no problem with a president who wouldn’t use them.

But at the end of the day, using nukes is such a huge deal that I think most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts. And, suffice it to say, I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances

suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
suffice it to say, I don’t think
.

Fuck, I hate this country sometimes.
Sorry. Totally off-topic, but I am inconsolable about this.

Plenty of money for our Excellent Imperial Adventures, but school librarians? Can’t do nuttin’ for ya, man.

Dude, I have, like, so many hang-ups about nuclear weapons. They really harsh my mellow.

I sort of figured that to be the nuclear option, wherein you have abandoned any hope of political reconciliation and are facing obliteration yourself.

You forgot massive, overreactive, retaliation, as in the completely plausible scenario where another nation launches a chemical or biological attack on us.

Of course, the anti-Obama crowd is all about “this is a deterrent” but really, I can’t see N. Korea standing up and saying “HA HA, we just dumped a planeload of anthrax on Seattle” — so just how, exactly, would anyone be sure of a state sponsor of such an attack? And what if it was Al Qaeda that set it up? Who would we nuke then?

These people are somewhat short* on the thinking-it-through front.

*VPR

If there’s a nukulur war, I think that we know that Jonah–assuming he isn’t reduced to a large pile of Carbon-14–will be one of the first to be eaten, although any would-be cannibal that’s read one of his columns will suggest that he be used for non-dietary purposes.

Dollars to donuts that Goldberg knows literally nothing about SANE/FREEZE, except that they had “hangups” with nuclear weapons. Imagine the horror if he learned that many of their stated goals were adopted in the START treaty signed by the noted communist Ronald Reagan. (Also, just how much of an asshole do you have to be to blow off any and all concerns about nuclear proliferation as “hangups”? Never mind, don’t answer that.)

Plenty of money for our Excellent Imperial Adventures, but school librarians? Can’t do nuttin’ for ya, man.

Well, what these fucking fucktards don’t realize is that any money they may have put into technology is only useful for checking Facebook and playing games at this point because there are no librarians/media specialists left to teach kids how to use the technology for education. Besides that, there is the fucking appalling practice of just LOCKING UP THE LIBRARIES because they don’t have the staff to run them. What the fuck?

Sorry. Totally off-topic, but I am inconsolable about this.

In one of my jobs I spend a fair bit of time talking to school administrators and or staffers at educational collaboratives. They are hurtin’ and see more of the same down the road.

We may be making a bit of progress in this country, but damn, we have a long way to go.

But at the end of the day, using nukes is such a huge deal that I think most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts.

I’d prefer to think presidents would make the decision based upon the actual, factual situation at hand and be smart enough to realize that instincts can be wrong and so-called values unmoored from reality are fucking stupid. I would also like to think “not murdering countless innocent civilians” is a pretty common core value. I’m such an idealist.

If a nuke is ever again used, I can’t imagine society will exist much longer afterward.

Even just the one?

I mean, I’m not defending nukes or anything, but a total collapse?

BTW, how long have we been told evil terrorists are ON THE VERY VERGE NAY ON THE THRESHOLD ITSELF of getting ahold of a nuke and we’re yet to see any evidence of it?

We’ve seen chemical and biological weapons; considering the effect a few small packages of brown powder had on this country why would they even bother with atomics, pray tell?

“A Nation with School librarians”

HA! Those are only public schools. They don’t count.

.Also, just how much of an asshole do you have to be to blow off any and all concerns about nuclear proliferation as “hangups”?

Right? We’re not talking about, like, oral sex, here. Jesus.

If there’s a nukulur war, I think that we know that Jonah–assuming he isn’t reduced to a large pile of Carbon-14–will be one of the first to be eaten, although any would-be cannibal that’s read one of his columns will suggest that he be used for non-dietary purposes.

Seems like a shame though. There wouldn’t be the sort of industrial infrastructure to render all that fat into tallow for candles and soap.

Well, to be perfectly truthful, Obama’s tone in the Sundial article is not unsympathetic to the anti-war, anti-nuke, pro-Freeze sentiments. And you know, if he didn’t vehemently object to the no-nukes mania that swept college campuses as a college student 27 years ago, then by God, he must be a pacifist hippie now that he’s President.

Dollars to donuts that Goldberg knows literally nothing…

While I agree wholeheartedly with your assessment of Jonah’s capacity to know anything about anything, I would strongly suggest you not mention “donuts” any where near him (or his name, even).

You could lose fingers or an arm in the resulting feeding frenzy. Or get trampled.

Just a heads-up there.

any money they may have put into technology is only useful for checking Facebook and playing games at this point

AY-fucking-MYN.

I was at the local library this past weekend – I sincerely am considering just using the internet card catalouge from now on, and I sincerely love wandering the stacks to find stuff I didn’t even know I wanted to read. But the idjits on teh KOMPYOOTERS are just too much of a pain – they put the card catalouge on-line and it’s impossible to get to a machine for all the Facebook and Myspace and video poker crap.

Talking about nuclear weapons as tokens in a psychological game is a party game for wankers. We used to have bombers armed with nuclear bombs flying patrols routinely in the continental U.S. One was accidentally dropped onto one of the Carolinas. When the bomb was found, six of the seven safety devices had failed. So we stopped doing that. Rue the day when wankers have the slightest bit of actual influence on nuclear treaties and policy.

In one of my jobs I spend a fair bit of time talking to school administrators and or staffers at educational collaboratives. They are hurtin’ and see more of the same down the road.

On the selfish front, it fucking frustrates the hell out of me, because this is what I want to do with my life. I could make more money in a different career path, but I know I don’t want to, and I know I’ll be miserable if I try. And the reason for that is that these jobs are *important* for children and for the future in general.

Sorry, I’ll stop now. Back to making fun of Pantload!

“Even just the one?”

Can’t have just one. Ever play Defcon? Fucking depressing as hell.

“Everybody Dies”

That’s the game motto, and it’s very realistic.

Also, with my taxes behind me, I’m freshly reminded of how much money I spent blowing people up overseas. I think I should compute the portion of my tax that’s spent on that stuff and donate an equal amount to MSF in hopes of it all equaling out. Sorta a “sorry we blew your kid’s legs off. Here’s a nice doctor with some sterile gauze.” Maybe it won’t help.

We are going about this all wrong. The modern conservative gets the core of his believes, not from the Bible, Ayn Rand or papers written by policy wonks in think tanks. Summer blockbusters and TV is where all their arguments begins and end. Torture? JAck Bauer does it all the time and just look how often he has saved America! Nukes? Bill Pullman used them in ID4 ( the fact that they were useless, weellll we won in the end didn’t we, thats all that counts, right? ).

We need to stop trying to convince them that they are wrong, and start making movies where CO2 makes zombies and the heroes stop them by mowing the undead hoards with a tricked out Prius. Smart ass one liners fly as fast as zombie guts in this 3D thriller!

Or this- In world where nothing is as it seems, one man discovers Health Insurance companies are run by MUSLIM TERRORISTS- and the only defense we have is single payer health care. Throw in a death ray or funny robot and Megan Fox and we got a hit.

The list is endless, they just have to be big loud, dumb and fun ( and a soundtrack by John Williams). And here is the important thing, we ( the left) have to pretend to hate them. Then sit back and watch as wing-nut columnist spread our message for us.

Goldberg should have taken my course on the history of nuclear weapons. Maybe not, because he probably would have accused me of liberal fascism because I didn’t make the argument that bombing the hell out of enemies both real and perceived is, like, totally awesome.

On the selfish front, it fucking frustrates the hell out of me, because this is what I want to do with my life. I could make more money in a different career path, but I know I don’t want to, and I know I’ll be miserable if I try. And the reason for that is that these jobs are *important* for children and for the future in general.

Ah, you’re one of the “little people,” then. Got it.

donate an equal amount to MSF

The Motorcycle Safety Foundation? Thanks for thinking of us but we’re actually self sustaining. Give it to Doctors Without Borders or someone equally deserving.

Ah, you’re one of the “little people,” then. Got it.

AKA, “suckers,” apparently.

( and a soundtrack by the shameless John Williams)

With that stipulation, I’ll sign on.

That Defcon game certainly sounds depressing. I guess it’s no small comfort that missiles don’t actually travel at warp speed. It takes longer for the delivery vehicle with the bomb to fall than it takes missiles to reach their targets in that game.

Not to give the wrong impression, the missiles’ targets are coordinates at high altitudes not the area that it is to be destroyed beyond all human reason.

Give it to Doctors Without Borders or someone equally deserving.

No way, I’m giving it to Médecins Sans Frontières , the way cooler group in no way affiliated with this silly English ki-nighit … er … “Doctors Without Borders” group. Nope. No sir! As a pinko hippy-whats-it, I can only donate to French groups.

The Motorcycle Safety Foundation? Thanks for thinking of us but we’re actually self sustaining. Give it to Doctors Without Borders or someone equally deserving.

Almost thought this was for real.

Also John Williams is the shit.

On the selfish front, it fucking frustrates the hell out of me, because this is what I want to do with my life. I could make more money in a different career path, but I know I don’t want to, and I know I’ll be miserable if I try. And the reason for that is that these jobs are *important* for children and for the future in general.

But you earn a “psychic wage”! Don’t you feel lucky?

If you’re going to draw national war policy lessons from ID4 I would say the main one is to buy Apple products, not nukes. Implanting a virus in the alien defense computers? There’s an App for that.

But at the end of the day, using nukes is such a huge deal that I think most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts. And, suffice it to say, I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances

Yes, and isn’t this a GOOD thing?

We may be making a bit of progress in this country, but damn, we have a long way to go.

So true. When the idea of the government participating in providing a healthy and educated population (even for the darkies and the fgts) is called socalifashisncomunist, we do indeed have a long, long way to go.

AKA, “suckers,” apparently.

Behind me in line, sister. Age before beauty and all.

hate the way that wingnuts talk about the use of nuclear weapons as though it were the same thing as dropping a conventional bomb or sending a few divisions somewhere

Well, wingnuts don’t think it’s enough to kill enemies’ citizens and decimate their cities and destroy their economy. You have to nuke ’em.

Smart ass one liners fly as fast as zombie guts in this 3D thriller!

Oh fine, now ZRM will come through and get all butthurt about the zombie hatein’.

Well, he would if he could feel his butt.

Mendacious D has a link to Jonah’s bleating about the film “How to tame your dragon”. I think he spends a bit too much watching movies and making shit up about them but maybe one has to take ones head out of the popcorn bucket occasionally to, you know, watch.
I guy I know played soccer against the Russian Embassy team in 1985, I am a Commie too?

Throw in a death ray or funny robot and Megan Fox and we got a hit.

And Steven Seagal. Don’t forget oscar snubbed, best actor in a generation, dammit.

I am a Commie too?

Yes.

SASQ.

Yes, and isn’t this a GOOD thing?

Central to his point. No. Best bet: Nuke first, ask quest… well, nuke first.

I may be wrong, but I think it’s in the fine print of the Nobel Peace Prize that the recipient is sort of expected to, you know, oppose use of nuclear weapons and all.

Well, you have to hand it to old Jonah the Whale: few people so full of themselves look so naturally the part.

I wouldn’t hand him anything other than a kick to the junk. Or maybe one of those exploding cigarettes.

So, does Jonah know that the only person ever to order the use of atomic weapons in combat was a liberal Democrat? Who also wanted universal healthcare?

Okay the beef chuck is now ground and vac-packed so allow me to mention something that was on my mind while manning the old KitchenAid.

If memory serves, he was in effect a SANE Freeze guy at Columbia (or he wrote an article placing himself in that camp).

It’s worse than getting their understanding from the movies. As long as Jonah has something in his (teensy half-dozen neuron) mind, there’s _no need_ to look it up as it is simply true. It’s laziness at all. It’s something far more problematic.

When the wing nuts talk about the psychology of the use of nuclear weapons, they generally assume that the enemies they’re so enthusiastic about having don’t have the same inhibitions about using nuclear weapons for the same reasons that we do. The actual effects the weapons have and the dangerousness of having them has as much impact on any leader who has enough knowledge to build nuclear weapons as it does on our leaders. Imagine knowing enough about nuclear weapons to build one, and then owning it. It’s supremely daunting, which is one of the reasons why so few countries have them. Wing nuts like to pretend that the entire government structure of their current nation non grata is composed entirely of psychopaths, but that usually isn’t the case. The Iranian Ayatollah has a standing fatwah against nuclear weapons, for instance. The entire nation is not hell bent on building nuclear weapons, much less using them. Kim Jung Il is an extreme outlier, though his willingness to use a nuclear weapon may easily be overstated.

It is comforting for me to trust that the people who formulate our nuclear policies are not influenced by this idle chatter. In this fight, the heavyweights who are extremely well versed in nuclear issues are in both corners. The pundits aren’t even in the ring, they’re sitting in the nose-bleed cheap seats. People who actually have to bear the burden of responsibility for nuclear safety 24/7 don’t fuck around with mind games. Hopefully, Lugar will knock some sense into Senate Republicans.

Oh fuck me. Please insert “not” immediately prior to “laziness”.

PeeJ said,
April 14, 2010 at 0:34 (kill)

Oh fuck me.

Tuesday already? I’m sleepy.

Wing nuts like to pretend that the entire government structure of their current nation non grata is composed entirely of psychopaths, but that usually isn’t the case.

They seem to love to think that people in countries like Iran aren’t made almost entirely of people who are just trying to get by in life, like the superhuman and ultimately supreme Americans. It’s well documented that the average citizen in Iran has a generally positive attitude toward Americans, if not a bit of healthy apprehension in response to people like Senior Loadpants and Monsieur Crackpipes openly cheering the idea of dropping nukes on Iran. Rule number one in critical thinking: 99% of the world’s population is just trying to work, take care of their families, and make a better life for themselves. Somehow, nuking them doesn’t seem like a hot idea if you’re not stupid.

It’s laziness at all. It’s something far more problematic.

**acknowledging the inserted “not”**

Then why bother with the “if memory serves”? Seems like if one wishes to pull a poopball out of his fudge tunnel and dub it fact, one would dispense with the qualifier.

It’s not like he thinks about what he’s writing. It’s just a cliche that falls easily – probably inevtiably – off his crayolas.

Amen, tsam. People is people. Wing nuts don’t like people.

Are you ready kidz?
(I can’t heaaar you!)
I said, “Are… you… ready?”

Who works for the mag built by William Buckley?
(Doughbob Loadpants)
Abhorrent and callow and whorish is he!
(Doughbob Loadpants)

If nucular nonsense is something you wish
(Doughbob Loadpants)
Then step off the boat and fart til you squish!
(Doughboooob Loadpaaaaaants)

ha ha ha ha!

If Esteev is around, thanks for the dickipedia link from the Brooks thread. I gave you a shout-out.

islmfaoscist said,

April 14, 2010 at 1:02

Win!!

Ha! Shit, now that’s going to be stuck in my head all day.

It’s not like he thinks about what he’s writing. It’s just a cliche that falls easily – probably inevtiably – off his crayolas.

Ah, I see. How stupid. If you’re going for credibility, especially in critcism, “if memory serves” sort of undermines your whole thesis. But then we’re not teabaggers, meaning we actually pay attention to shit like that instead of accepting it as fact if memory serves.

Did he even see ID4? The reason the Prez didn’t want to use nukes initially was that he’d be roasting HIS OWN COUNTRY with them, not to mention any American survivors.

It’s good thing the nukes didn’t work, or all we have is a radioactive, albeit alien-free USA afterward……………

…………wait, did I just describe the conservative utopia?

Let’s see, Obama has:
*adjusted our nuclear policy to reflect the obvious fact that it is not in our best interest to nuke countries that don’t threaten us with nukes;
*negotiated a common-sense, incrementalist treaty with Russia to reduce the quantity of nukes we have aimed at each other over time;
*implemented a program to gather up and secure nuclear materials with an eye to keeping them out of the hands of actual terrorists;
*convinced the Ukraine to completely abandon its nuclear program and eliminate nukes from Ukrainian soil;
*convened the largest gathering of heads of state in 50 years to discuss nuclear policy

But, yeah, he’s an idealistic flower-child with no experience in the real world of nuclear weapons and international relations. We should totally trust Sarah Palin’s time as commander-in-chief of the Alaska ANG to provide the kind of experience needed to stand up to the Soviets.

Well, Sarah Palin DOES have the kind of experience needed to stand up to the Soviets.

Seeing as how they don’t exist, I think she can handle them.

Seeing as how they don’t exist, I think she can handle them.

Similar to the way I once stood off the entire Golden Horde: they’re all dead since like forever, so I win.

What’s this hysteria over chemical and biological weapons? Sure they provide nastier deaths than most weapons, but they should hardly be classified as weapons of mass destruction. The reason it was easily agreed to ban them is that they weren’t actually that effective in warfare, though the effects they had on the people they did kill were horrifying. Of course, lots of agencies are working hard to make them more effective (including ours, no doubt), more deadly, and less likely to kill those who deploy them. To use any chemical or biological attack, however as an excuse to use nuclear weapons is opportunistic and evil. That’s why Obama stipulated that is must be a significantly harmful attack, which is not 12 people dying in a subway attack.

One thing to bear in mind, the only difference between manufacturing a virus for defensive vaccinations and manufacturing viruses for offensive weapons, is the delivery device and intent.

You know, dropping a nuclear bomb on other human beings is seen as a pretty horrific thing – worse than going back on vacation while a major city drowns in a hurricane storm surge or using Spanish Inquisition style torture methods to extract false confessions for political purposes. The man who instigated nuclear war would be more reviled than Osama bin Laden, Jar Jar Binks or whomever it is that’s responsible for Celine Dion’s career.

… I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances.

I could say “Thank Goodness!”, but really – this should be a prerequisite. It’d be like being thankful that the President isn’t a host for the Broodax Imperiate.

It was funny watching people go nuts about the threat of Saddam’s Sarin nerve gas knowing that lots of people have Sarin nerve gas in their kitchen cabinets, in the reach of children. It’s called “bug spray”. After banning chemical weapons, countries proceeded to put them into household products.

He’s even less likely to use nukes than the president in Independence Day, and that Bill Pullman character first needed to mind-meld with one of the aliens to be extra-super-sure that they were evil conquerors. The fact that most of America’s — and the world’s leading cities — had been obliterated wasn’t enough. After all, it could have been a misunderstanding.

his whole logic is based on the idea that you obligated to use nukes to make your point. You gotta nuke enemies that dare nuke you.

rightwingers seem to think that nukes are some kind of magic super-weapon that kills the enemy twice as dead or something, and so with it’s not enough for us to just blow them up. We have to nuke ’em back or it doesn’t count.

And of course in the movie ID4 the aliens didn’t use nukes to destroy the world’s cities. whatever their weapons were, they weren’t nukes.

To use any chemical or biological attack, however as an excuse to use nuclear weapons is opportunistic and evil.

And even more mind-boggling, the ever-crazed Michele Bachman seems to advocate using nuclear weapons to retaliate against cyber-attacks.

do these people even think about what comes out of their mouths? Oh, sorry, I know the answer.

… I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons skullfuck the still warm corpses of random world leaders he strangled to death with his bare hands – on camera – under almost any remotely plausible circumstances.

Better than “plausible” nuclear war.

… I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons institute a draft and invade South America – not any one specific country, the whole fucking continent baby! under almost any remotely plausible circumstances.

Still better than “plausible” nuclear war.

… I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons listen to Jonah Goldberg as if he had something intelligent or meaningful to say on camera under almost any remotely plausible circumstances.

Okay, that’s a tough call.

Please ignore the extra on camera. It got left there because of your mom.

Off topic but really good material;

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/expose-the-party-crashers/

Having been accused of racism one too many times, PJTV is currently spinning the entire thing as a liberal conspiracy to discredit the Tea Party movement by infiltrating it and pretending to be racist.

Quote of the year; “DO get photos or video of any offensive signs or behavior — racist signs, signs connecting O’s administration to Nazis, anti-Semitic signs, signs calling for violence — and send them to tpcrashers@pjtv.com.”

Right off the bat, I can think of at least one article by Pajamas Media CEO Roger L. Simon titled “Is Obama Objectively Pro-Fascist?” written sometime last fall. I don’t have the time or patience to go through all the PJTV archives right now, but if we have to incriminate everyone who’s compared Obama or liberals to Nazis or said that they were Nazis, pretty much the entire organization is going to have to turn itself in.

Ditto “racist signs” – you can’t scroll through any PJTV comments section even slightly related to immigration or terrorism without reading at least a few scathing comments about what utter scum Muslims or nonwhite immigrants are. PJTV might not do the swastika/cross-burning thing anymore, but they’re as racist as these guys ever were.

As attempts at damage control go, this is pathetic.

So now being a SANE/freeze guy is a disqualification for president? You have to be an ardent advocate of the use and proliferation of nuclear weapons? I guess in a few years, unless you were a confederate reenactor, you won’t be allowed to stand for office.

Went back and re-read a plot summary of ID4, and was reminded that of course at the ending of the picture the “good guys” launch an improvised nuclear bomb suicide attack.

Which is central to Jonah’s point, I suppose.

I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances

He says that like it’s a bad,/em> thing.

Jason Levin has way too high an opinion of the media. d00d’s got a great concept, but with teh fucking shtipid eeeeedee-ahts running teh News – you know folks who think Victoria Jackson would be a good interview – all he’ll suceed in doing is shifting the Overton wondow further rightwards.
</drunken pissedpessimism>

I’d go with Palin, cause she could give head to Putin’s rear.

I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances.

Yes, I agree. Obama, better known to Republicans as THE ANTICHRIST, has negotiated this treaty in good faith and will follow it to the letter.

Wait, what?

‘…the ever-crazed Michele Bachman seems to advocate using nuclear weapons to retaliate against cyber-attacks.”

Whoo. A slightly more balanced person might recommend that we just stop using Windows in our defense system, and develop its own operating system with its own encryption, like Germany has. The threat of disruption in the warning system is very real, and is taken seriously. And there are other possible threats a cyber attack can pose. A red team, in exercises, found that it was possible to hack into a communications system and give an entire fleet of submarines an order to launch. The system was changed to prevent such an event.

But, I suspect that ‘Shelly Shit-for-Brains’ would like to have a policy that ANY cyber attack instigated by another nation is a good excuse to kill a few million civilians, turning their environments barren cancer factories in the process.

I despise Armageddon Christians. There are a lot of fundamentalist Christians who believe absolutely that nuclear war heralding the Second Coming and Rapture is prophecy. Worse yet, some of these people believe that it is equivalent to a bat signal that will notify Christ that it’s time for him to get busy. There has been a frightening number of these sort in the Air Force Academy, though it appears their number may be dwindling.

But the idjits on teh KOMPYOOTERS are just too much of a pain – they put the card catalouge on-line and it’s impossible to get to a machine for all the Facebook and Myspace and video poker crap.

The library in nearby Davis uses a browser-based catalog, but they have terminals that are card catalogs only, with no Internet access, as well as the internet-capable terminals.

In case anyone doubts what wiley says above about the broken arrow incident in NC:

http://www.ibiblio.org/bomb/index.html

suffice it to say

“Suffice: The Jonah Goldberg Story”.

Christ on a cracker, can we not just all chip in and buy Jonah a penis pump? I mean come on.

He’s just dying to see that, to view the blackened bodies. Like more than a few people I know, 9-11 provided an awesome adrenalin rush to Jonah, and he’s jonesin’ for another fix. Probably the first time his pecker’s stood up in years.

Evil, heartless son of a bitch.

why would they even bother with atomics, pray tell?

To piss off the Spacing Guild, duh.

But you earn a “psychic wage”! Don’t you feel lucky?

Ha ha ha ha! *cry* The irony is that being a librarian was supposed to be my paid, steady gig (with health insurance) that would be fulfilling enough that I wouldn’t want to kill myself, but allow me time to work on my writing. Apparently, I might be better off freelancing.

AKA, “suckers,” apparently.

Behind me in line, sister. Age before beauty and all.

I guess it’s too much to ask to have a career helping others *and* a decent middle-class existence.

/derail for reals

Jonah a penis pump

NO DO NOT WANT. This is worse than the thought of Debbie Schlussel pegging Sean Hannity!!!!!!!

The library in nearby Davis uses a browser-based catalog, but they have terminals that are card catalogs only, with no Internet access, as well as the internet-capable terminals.

Yeah, our public library is like that, too. I’m surprised that some libraries don’t do this!

“DO get photos or video of any offensive signs or behavior — racist signs, signs connecting O’s administration to Nazis, anti-Semitic signs, signs calling for violence — and send them to tpcrashers@pjtv.com.”

Heh. I say we find one of their own obnoxious articles like the “objectively pro-fascist” one you mentioned, run the URL through one of those shorteners like bit.ly, and paint the short URL clumsily on a sign after some poorly spelled O’Bamma = Nazzi! with a backwards swastika.

Then just shoot a pic of the sign – up against the sky, don’t need to go anywhere near a TP event – and email it in.

It depends on the Commander-in-Chief. Sure, worries about violating a treaty might — probably would — make using nukes more “costly” in a president’s cost-benefit analysis.

Cost – what? Clearly this fat dumb fuck has no idea what the payload of just one ICBM would do to the planet. This brainless piece of shit probably thinks he can shelter from the fallout by pulling one of his chins over his head.

They really really really can’t handle the fact that the Cold War ended without everyone dying in atomic fire.

They got so invested in their short lives and really wanted to enact a once and for all battle between “good and evil” where their meaningless lives would be mercifully cut short and best of all the world wouldn’t continue without them. That they’d literally be the last meaningful people in the World.

It terrifies them that the world will continue on after they die and they’ll have the same ignoble pointless end as their fathers and father before them and their investment in a dangerous and stupid crusade for more and more nukes was pointless and meaningless.

It’s why they can’t seem to let go of the Cold War and are desperate for some new existential threat that would justify unleashing Armageddon for.

This becomes really obvious when you look to the Rapturist fundies, but the Nat Review types also display this worldview in spades.

I can’t imagine how pathetic one’s life must be so that the biggest obsession and goal in your life is how the world can still end in apocalyptic fire. How empty one’s soul must be for that to be the thing they look forward to…

And then I weep for all of us who have to live with all of them and deal with their murderous death wish.

But at the end of the day, using nukes is such a huge deal that I think most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts. And, suffice it to say, I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances

No, he’d only double down on a war in a country that no Western nation has ever defeated, but he has no sack for war, according to JoeNahhhhhhhhhh!

I can’t imagine how pathetic one’s life must be so that the biggest obsession and goal in your life is how the world can still end in apocalyptic fire.

What if it’s just an obsession, not a goal? And you’re not looking forward to it?

I swear I’m not pathetic…

I get the impression that a PENIS pump for JaJojo would be a waste. In my opinion, though it be ever so humble, he’s not really psychofapping to war so much as just completely fucking oblivious. To everything. The world does not exist outside of whatever he has in mind at the moment.

ID4? Where one lone nut sacrifices himself for the future of all mankind? Jonah is truly demented to think that is in line with the Conservatard Creed- I gots mine, fuck you! Props for the FlavaFlav reference, too.
Jonah’s place in post-nuke scenarios? Cat food! My cats will eat anything!

That’s an interesting analysis, Cereberus. Most people find comfort in knowing that the world goes on after they’re gone. That someone would rather destroy civilization, than let others continue to enjoy it is incomprehensible to me. Even more incomprehensible is that being a common view of the world. Personally, I find the prospect of self-imposed extinction far more disturbing than my own inevitable death. It seems evident that almost everyone else on the planet should feel the same way, and that those who don’t should be tucked safely away in institutions with soft walls and available restraints.

At this point, it’s bad for the mental health not to acknowledge that mass insanity may be upon us.

We need to stop trying to convince them that they are wrong, and start making movies where CO2 makes zombies and the heroes stop them by mowing the undead hoards with a tricked out Prius. Smart ass one liners fly as fast as zombie guts in this 3D thriller!

LOVE.

‘…the ever-crazed Michele Bachman seems to advocate using nuclear weapons to retaliate against cyber-attacks.”

And if anything were to originate in Minnesota’s 6th district?

But at the end of the day, using nukes is such a huge deal that I think most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts.

This sentence embodies, not just your everyday, garden-variety Goldbergian stupidity, but an advanced form of stupidity. Because it pretends, not only to be “thoughtful,” but to flaunt insight into human nature.

But it’s meaningless. What decision, from which socks to put on in the morning to whom to marry (to whom to nuke) is NOT based on one’s “core values and instincts”?

There isn’t one. That’s what a decision IS: a subjectively-rooted conclusion to act in a certain way, based on objective facts and on subjective “core values and instincts.”

Goldberg has stroked his chin thoughtfully and delivered up, in tones advertising his opinion of himself as a shrewd judge of human nature, an empty truism. And then delivered what he thinks is a triumphant conclusion based on it.

Of course, point this out to him and he won’t care. The gasbaggery at The Corner is never about what is true, provable, arguable, or even sensible. The Corner (like most of the right-wing blogosphere) is a gang of sniggering eighth-grade boys, of all ages and sexes, competing to see who can make up the most “devastating” critiques of anyone and anything to their ideological left based on an imaginary connection to reality.

You want intellectual honesty from Jonah Goldberg? Forget it. It’s not present in his core values or instincts.

the heroes stop them by mowing the undead hoards with a tricked out Prius.

If you threw in a gag where one of the zombies was Algore, it’d be a slam-dunk.

“DO get photos or video of any offensive signs or behavior — racist signs, signs connecting O’s administration to Nazis, anti-Semitic signs, signs calling for violence — and send them to tpcrashers@pjtv.com.”

Ha ha, of COURSE those people have to be crashers, no teabagger would EVER carry signs like that! Of course, I’m watching Frontline right now, and they JUST showed the tea part bullshit from last summer, and several lovely signs were shown.

I guess it’s too much to ask to have a career helping others *and* a decent middle-class existence.

Barbara Gorden manages. Are you less of a librarian than she?

T&U-

That’s healthy and just means you need to play more Fallout games. I’m more talking about the Rapturists and their secular counterparts who seem to be looking forward to the end of the world.

Are you less of a librarian than she?

Currently, yes. Although I, too, dreamt of being a superhero as a child. Also, a rock star. Though I never really enjoyed “Jem.”

That’s healthy and just means you need to play more Fallout games.

Okay, phew. I knew I was neurotic and superstitious; I didn’t want to be pathetic, too.

Unfortunately, any attempt to deconstruct Teh Pantload (or, really, any Wingnut pundette since Jan. 09) is inevitably fruitless because what they say and write doesn’t matter, even to them.

Did Obama do something that in any way recognizes the fact that the US isn’t the only country on the planet? ZOMG HE’S TEH WEAK JIMMAYCARTERPANSY WHO HATES AMMURRICA!

Did Obama do something that in any way exercises the authority granted him under the law and constitution? ZOMG HE’S TEH POWER-MAD HITLERSTALINMAOCRAT WHO HATES YER FREEDOMZ!

Were those two “somethings” the same fucking thing? ZOMG HE’S TEH WEAK POWER-MAD HITLERSTALINCARTERPANSY WHO HATES YER FREEDOMZ AND AMMURRICA!

They’re the Cleese character in the Argument Clinic sketch, with the only difference being that session never ends because Koch, et all have comp’d them for the rest of their miserable lives.

any attempt to deconstruct Teh Pantload (or, really, any Wingnut pundette since Jan. 09) is inevitably fruitless

You’re probably right, but I’ve got a pinch bar and chainsaw ready to try.

Then just shoot a pic of the sign – up against the sky, don’t need to go anywhere near a TP event – and email it in.

Wouldn’t it be a more amusing (and potentially disruptive) idea to make up signs that said Teabagers support HCR? And higher taxes for the rich? And more education funding? [Add your specific remedy here].

I mean, if you could get some realistic looking TeaTard signs saying some of those things you force the TeaTards to deny they support such things, right?

That might be wholesome.

Dirt is good. Or so I tell myself.

You’re probably right, but I’ve got a pinch bar and chainsaw ready to try.

Piker.

Combine harvester.

With lights.

too lazy to get off my fat butt and waddle over to the Google Search engine and find out
They have some sort of bicycle arrangement, there, that they have to pedal while a thing like a weaver’s loom searches teh interweb. To discourage it’s use it also canes them on the arse while it searches.They can’t get Derbyshire off it somedays.

Combine harvester.

I live in a thirteenth floor apartment.

To discourage it’s use it also canes them on the arse while it searches.They can’t get Derbyshire off it somedays.

Oh, good Lord. I’d rather hear about Pantload’s penis pump.

I live in a thirteenth floor apartment.

Drive ’em down to street level and out onto the sidewalk. This thing is street legal (it’s got plates on it, anyway).

ITS

ITS

You were right the first time. 🙂

You were right the first time. 🙂

Batarang, right in the nuts.

Yeah, our public library is like that, too. I’m surprised that some libraries don’t do this!

I wonder if it’s a case of having too few terminals (or too little space for more terminals) to dedicate some to non-Internet-accessibility. The former, at least, could be mitigated if the library could successfully request computer donations– a card catalog wouldn’t require bleeding-edge hardware as long as it could run IE and the catalog software adequately.

I wonder if it’s a case of having too few terminals (or too little space for more terminals) to dedicate some to non-Internet-accessibility.

And I just remembered that Federal Depositories are required to have a certain number of internet stations open to the public, so that could also be an issue in combination with space/affordability restrictions.

That might be wholesome.

Devious! I love it.

You know who else probably would have never used nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances?

They can’t get Derbyshire off it somedays.

I would be very surprised indeed to learn that the saddle of that contraption is not nearly half a lascivious old, white supremacist by now.

Chee-tard.

Is Herr Pantload really that fat?

I don’t think any of you libruls ever think about the feelings of all the Proud Americans who made these nuclear weapons and kept them read all so your precious leaders wouldn’t let them be used

Why don’t you think of them for once?

What are these “remotely plausible circumstances”? Is their plausibility more remote than, for example, the “ticking time bomb” scenario which we were advised to envision when we talked about torture?

It sounds like the gist of this summit is that the US essentially isn’t going to use nukes unless we get nuked ourselves. Now, if Jonah Goldberg thinks that’s not a remotely plausible circumstance, then I’m actually pretty relieved (though if Kristol or Krauthammer were to say so, I would be digging a shelter or moving to Madagascar). I mean, I’m sure he’d want us to “retaliate” against some country like Iran getting the bomb by going all SACPOP, and then REDCHI and SOVWAR follow suit, and then the propellor on the red beanie gets spun, but it’s nicer not to be expecting that all the time.

It really is outrageous that people seriously started talking about using nuclear weapons against Iran not only as an act of preventive aggression against a nation for having the potential to make a nuclear weapons, but also as a legitimate tool of non-proliferation. Jon Stewart really pegged the neo-cons when he described them as a slobbering, belligerent drunk breaking a bottle then challenging everybody in the bar to a fight over an imaginary insult.

The irony is that being a librarian was supposed to be my paid, steady gig (with health insurance) that would be fulfilling enough that I wouldn’t want to kill myself, but allow me time to work on my writing. Apparently, I might be better off freelancing.

You actually have a library job??? Or had one and walked away from it? I’m a recent MLS grad with a horrifying amount of student loans and about as likely to get a library job as I am to be the next Queen of France. Actually, given the budget cuts, becoming a monarch is probably *more* likely. Oh yeah, I have a HUGE beef with universities right now. Alright, that first graduate degree was predicated on the coming mass retirement of college professors–no one knew that those positions would simply be eliminated. Okay. At least I got tremendous intellectual growth out of the ordeal.

But library science? That was about retraining for a white collar career…only there are no jobs. And just like those anticipated university openings that mysteriously vanished into the budget ether, those library jobs aren’t coming back. The department knows this and continues to pump out graduates–some of whom have the literacy skills of your basic junior high school student–as if the nation is facing a desperate librarian shortage.

The cruel irony is that now that I have my degree, I am locked out of every library job except that of fully-fledged-sitting-at-the-information-desk-and-fielding-reference-questions librarian. Once you are MLS, your options are professional or none at all: no working your way up from the mailroom here.

*Sigh* So now I take an online course on medical coding and hope to get a data processing job at a hospital. Sort of the middle class experience in a microcosm, I suppose: dreams of white collar respectability replaced with the realities of the pink collar ghetto.

Oh man. I’m going to have to get a mullet now, aren’t I???

P.S. Sorry about the rant. I’m consolidating student loans and the numbers involved have depressed me a wee bit…

You have a degree in library science? The only college class I ever fell asleep in was a library science class. I was working on a bachelor in fine arts. The glare of eight librarians—-most of them working on their master’s is burned forever into my brain. Librarians rock. Far from being mousy, they are staunch defenders of the first amendment and guardians of posterity. When Ed Meese was calling librarians, telling them to take declassified information off the bookshelves, librarians all across America told him to fuck himself and hung up the phone.

Have you checked out the possibility of working in some kind of archive? Cataloging art work or objects?

So what’s wrong with SANE/Peace Action/The Freeze? And what’s wrong with not using nuclear weapons “under any remotely plausible circumstances”?

Because our enemies know so they can nuke us with impunity now. That’s the theory. For reals

But at the end of the day, using nukes is such a huge deal that I think most presidents, most human beings, would make the decision based on their core values and instincts. And, suffice it to say, I don’t think Barack Obama would ever use nuclear weapons under almost any remotely plausible circumstances

I’m trying to picture any set of remotely plausible circumstances in which using nukes would be appropriate; it’s not coming. The MAD concept was always insane – if all their nukes are flying at us, why would we bother to nuke them back? What are we defending? There’d be no America left no matter how many times we nuke them, so what would we be fighting for?

I suppose, in the event that only one nuke hits America, you could justify firing one nuke back at whatever country did it. But that’s not remotely plausible either; what country would risk firing anything less than the total number of nukes required to obliterate us, knowing we’d survive and retaliate? The only plausible scenario of us being nuked right now is by a stateless terrorist organization like al-Qaeda which, by definition, you can’t nuke back.

He’s even less likely to use nukes than the president in Independence Day, and that Bill Pullman character first needed to mind-meld with one of the aliens to be extra-super-sure that they were evil conquerors. The fact that most of America’s — and the world’s leading cities — had been obliterated wasn’t enough. After all, it could have been a misunderstanding.

As a sci-fi nerd who loves that movie, I object. The President wasn’t squeamish because he had to be extra-super-sure, he was squeamish because he knew the fallout from using nukes on American soil would wreck the country (and planet) far beyond anything the aliens had done to that point. Jonah, like the SecDef in that movie, hasn’t processed that because both of them just enjoy bombing for the sake of bombing.

Of course, point this out to him and he won’t care. The gasbaggery at The Corner is never about what is true, provable, arguable, or even sensible. The Corner (like most of the right-wing blogosphere) is a gang of sniggering eighth-grade boys, of all ages and sexes, competing to see who can make up the most “devastating” critiques of anyone and anything to their ideological left based on an imaginary connection to reality.

Sadly, yes. The description “he/she is like a dumb person’s impression of what a smart person should sound like” applies to probably the bulk of the right wing blogosphere (not even the authors so much as the people in the comments section, where everything really gets unleashed). I can’t recount the number of times I’ve seen a conservative deliver similar meaningless, empty “truisms” with a look of epiphany on their face like they’ve just invented peanut butter.

Hey librarians: I sympathize. I really do. I’m an historian; we have as few or fewer job opportunities than you do.

There have always been proponents of limited nuclear warfare— even when MAD was in full bloom and we had two preposterously huge nuclear arsenals in the world. The amount of damage that can be done to this world in 15 minutes cannot be grasped with our puny little minds. Many influential proponents of limited nuclear warfare in the Bush II cabinet, have been briefed on every conceivable danger of nuclear weapons and nuclear warfare. They know all the scenarios, yet still believe that it is possible to win a nuclear war if you strike FIRST. (The Russians had good reason to oppose the missile shield.) I can’t believe that the neo-cons will ever get the upper hand is nuclear policy. Reagan had the SALT talks. Bush the elder kept the crazies in the basement, that Bush II put in his cabinet, and that was very scary to me, but it looks like somebodies bigger than them told them to put it back in their pants.

When Bush II told Los Alamos to get ready for live testing in six months, Congress denied the funds. The people who work with these things aren’t reckless. If Bush had ordered a strike out of the blue, I believe that someone would have sent some specialists to take away the bottle and put him to bed. The president doesn’t really have the power to order a nuclear strike on his own authority. The football was a ruse, that McNamara fell for.

When it gets down to actually making a decision about using nuclear weapons, it stops being a chess game in your head and the people making the most consequential decision a human being has ever made, will have to wonder if they will spend eternity in a nuclear blast and who the hell are they anyway, and what the hell are they doing.

“I sort of figured that to be the nuclear option, wherein you have abandoned any hope of political reconciliation and are facing obliteration yourself.”

When you have tickets on the Pat Robertson Mothership of Rapture, you don’t give a damn about no earth and in fact can’t wait for its destruction, because you heard its gonna be a rockin’ time on the space cruise. Jesus casinos not withstanding.

In addition there’s the wingnut concept of “I’m rubber your glue.” rule.

Like a moron apartment dweller who thinks that he could destroy his neighbor downstairs by burning down just the first floor.

squeamish

but where do i get the squeams?

“if memory serves” is clear proof that the Doughy One did NOT remember this “fact” about Obama. More likely he read it in some other wingnut blog, and copied/pasted it into his stickies to use in one of his columns.

Ultimately, when and how a country uses its nuclear weapons does not depend on treaties.

This statement would make more sense if the treaties in question were conventions about when nuclear weapons could be used, but since the agreements and proposed agreements are about reducing their numbers, it’s mindless afflatus.

“If memory serves,” which is shorthand for “if I weren’t too lazy to get off my fat butt and waddle over to the Google Search engine and find out,”

I hope there are exceptions to that rule.

Please ignore the extra on camera. It got left there because of your mom.

Her skills as a porn movie director still leave much to be desired.

He’s even less likely to use nukes than the president in Independence Day, and that Bill Pullman character first needed to mind-meld with one of the aliens to be extra-super-sure that they were evil conquerors. The fact that most of America’s — and the world’s leading cities — had been obliterated wasn’t enough. After all, it could have been a misunderstanding.

But Jonah, the “Bad guys” in Independence Day were described as “a species that travels from planet to planet, destroying all life and harvesting natural resources before moving on to the next planet.”
Sound familiar? Except for the moving on to other planets part? Prolly not, huh?

I think the best part of ID4 is an alcoholic Vietnam Vet, a Black Marine Captain, and a Jew scientist save the planet from being harvested, profitably.

eh, Jonah?

You were right the first time. 🙂

Batarang, right in the nuts.

Yes, I was right the first time, something I realized after the self-pwnage correction. At that point, I decided bed was the best option.

“If memory serves,” which is shorthand for “if I weren’t too lazy to get off my fat butt and waddle over to the Google Search engine and find out,”

Shorter Pantload Article: “Some assembly required.”

Come on, are we not kidding ourselves? Even if Obama nuked Iran and north Korea, rounded up and shot the hippies, and brought Mike Savage and John Bolton into his cabinet as secretary of defense and state department (respectively) he (Jonah) would still be whining on how Obama was a effeminate wanker.

What the man needs is not a penis pump, but a blow job. Since J-Lo turned him down, hes got worse. The very least the NRO crew could do is have a whip round and hire a hooker. Cant cost too much more that $100? The alternative is more self abuse in the form of his tedious, masturbatory bullshit columns until the eventual explosion wipes out the NRO office in a tragic, yet hilarious way.

apologies for being so graphic.

apologies for being so graphic.

Breakfast.

I am trying to eat my breakfast.

Ur doin it wrong. Should be drinking it.

I am trying to eat my breakfast.

Then don’t [blogwhore warning] read my latest.

/Ur doin it wrong. Should be drinking it./

make sure you use bendy straws, like lil sarah insists on…

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h3GtZWT88dhVvgkbcDKaUuHG2ahwD9F2NE6O0

Then don’t [blogwhore warning] read my latest.

Ah. Huevos rancheros?

With Obambi in charge, we probably wouldn’t even do anything if we were nuked. Heck, O’Kenya would probably never visit the blowed-up American city and would instantly go on an ‘apologizing’ tour to the world, before he surrendered to Surinam.

Ah. Huevos rancheros?

Possibly. The class instructor was a very funny, very tough Mexican.

The fact is, if memory serves me correctly, Obama was a hard left stalinist who followed the tenants of Adolf Hitler, which is socialism, high taxes and take the peoples freedom away by any means and surrender to the enemy.

Gary, don’t forget getting Canada, Mexico, and the Ukraine to send us their highly enriched uranium.

That’s got to be worth some sort of -ism.

Russell Giambelluca, the university’s vice president of business and finance, said Tuesday that no one at the university was advised to destroy specific foundation documents, and staff members routinely shred and dispose of paperwork that is no longer needed.

Palin hasn’t even given the speech yet, Russ…

Oh, good Lord. I’d rather hear about Pantload’s penis pump.

Her name is Lucianne…

You actually have a library job??? Or had one and walked away from it? I’m a recent MLS grad with a horrifying amount of student loans and about as likely to get a library job as I am to be the next Queen of France.

No, I’m a secretary.And I fucking hate it. I’ll be done with my MLS in August.

And just like those anticipated university openings that mysteriously vanished into the budget ether, those library jobs aren’t coming back. The department knows this and continues to pump out graduates–some of whom have the literacy skills of your basic junior high school student–as if the nation is facing a desperate librarian shortage.

*cry* I know. It’s a fucking joke.

I hold out hope that the economy will improve and the Baby Boomers holding onto their positions will retire. Of course, their jobs may just be cut, but I’m trying not to get into OMG I AM SO FUCKING FUCKED.

I’m seriously thinking about joining Americorps if I can’t find something by the end of the year.

Hey librarians: I sympathize. I really do. I’m an historian; we have as few or fewer job opportunities than you do.

Aw, man, now I’m thinking of the historian in my program a couple of years ago. I go part-time, so most of the people I started school with have graduated. She was going into library science because there ain’t shit out there for historians. I wonder if she’s found anything?

Yes, I was right the first time, something I realized after the self-pwnage correction. At that point, I decided bed was the best option.

Good call. And now I’ll stop posting.

During the Bush years, I chatted with a friend who worked for the UN, who basically said that the rest of the world is fucking terrified of the US, because the Right Wing actually think that they can use all the nukes they’ve been stockpiling. Every time a Republican president was elected, the rest of the world hunkered down and waited for disaster.

The US doesn’t even have the decency to follow a consistent foreign policy – y’all keep flip-flopping, and it makes people nervous. Pantsload is the representative Repub mindset as far as they’re concerned, which is basically why Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize – everyone else in the world was glad beyond belief that he was elected, because the end of the world could be put off for at least four years.

I think they hope the Nobel will encourage him to run again, so they can breathe easy for 8 years. I haven’t asked the Foundation, but my brother tells me they’re pretty nice that way.

I’m seriously thinking about joining Americorps

Joining a militia is not the answer.

The issue in the liberal arts and social sciences (and, IMO, an MLS will place you firmly in that camp) is that the distortion of US society (at least since 1980 and arguably since WWII) has focused everything on (a) pure profit and (b) killing those who get in the way of pure profit. Even a scumbag like Henry Ford understood that his long-term business depended on people of his workers’ class being able to buy his cars, an understanding that is beyond any current-day CEO I can think of. There used to be a balance between the Randian ideals and the ideals of sane human beings – a shitty balance, perhaps, but a real one. Now every fight is one to the death, so the universities pack in as many students as they can get, regardless of demand and regardless of the long-term consequences. Every big business is focused on quarterly profits regardless of the long-term consequences which has, among other things, contributed to the destruction of the media. Every election is now a referendum ON KILLING AMERICA’S SPARKLE UNICORNS so no compromise on any issue is possible.

We’re fucked. I’m going to back to scrubbing those detached testicles from my memory.

“the rest of the world is fucking terrified of the US, because the Right Wing actually think that they can use all the nukes they’ve been stockpiling. Every time a Republican president was elected, the rest of the world hunkered down and waited for disaster”

Ahh….keep talking….almost there……..aaaaahhhhhhhhhhh…..splat

Then don’t [blogwhore warning] read my latest.

Wait. You actually need a class to warn you NOT to stand on a scaffold dozens of stories above the CONCRETE sidewalks of NYC without some for of “harness” securing you to the “structure” in case of, say, high winds or too many beers with lunch????

You actually need a class to warn you NOT to stand on a scaffold dozens of stories above the CONCRETE sidewalks of NYC without some for of “harness” securing you to the “structure” in case of, say, high winds or too many beers with lunch????

By law, yes. The instructor wisely recommended against pissing off a scaffold because someone will call the cops and you’ll lose your scaffold card.

She was going into library science because there ain’t shit out there for historians. I wonder if she’s found anything?

There are plenty of jobs for librarians out there. Usually they involve doing research on-line and then cataloging it and cross-referencing it. My sister is a librarian (was even a high officer in the ALA) and she’s had plenty of jobs and has worked steadily for forty years now.

The problem for librarians is the work tends to be more transient and less permanent than the “shhh” kind of job they used to get.

The instructor wisely recommended against pissing off a scaffold

I thought that was what the empty Windez bottle was for.

WindeX.

Sorry, broken finger make typing herd.

Every time a Republican president was elected, the rest of the world hunkered down and waited for disaster…a Muslim got his wings

Fixed!

“The instructor wisely recommended against pissing off a scaffold because someone will call the cops and you’ll lose your scaffold card”

How much abuse will a scaffold take before it gets pissed off?

How much abuse will a scaffold take before it gets pissed off?

D’Oh!

I hate you.

The issue in the liberal arts and social sciences (and, IMO, an MLS will place you firmly in that camp) is that the distortion of US society (at least since 1980 and arguably since WWII) has focused everything on (a) pure profit and (b) killing those who get in the way of pure profit.

I know. And I really can’t do anything else. I mean, I can, but I don’t want to and I’m a special snowflake.

The problem for librarians is the work tends to be more transient and less permanent than the “shhh” kind of job they used to get.

Yeah, I mean, I can definitely freelance and get temp positions, and I’ve been interested in maybe freelance indexing, but I kind of need something permanent. I really, really need health insurance, and most likely any places that the husband would work don’t offer it or it’s really bad. And if he wants to open up his own business, it’s really important that I have something that brings in money on a steady basis. Maybe I should just make him go to architecture school, like he’s been considering.

T&U

http://www.freelancersunion.org/

The good news about database work is it can be pretty long term, and companies who don’t do it look pretty foolish (imagine WebMD with last year’s H1N1 info, for example).

Too, you don’t want to leave it up to IT or software to determine what’s relevant, because that can look even dumber.

And FYWP!

Eated TWO posts???

Oh. Sure. Let that one thru, you miserable commenting software!

The good news about database work is it can be pretty long term, and companies who don’t do it look pretty foolish (imagine WebMD with last year’s H1N1 info, for example).

Too, you don’t want to leave it up to IT or software to determine what’s relevant, because that can look even dumber.

During the Bush years, I chatted with a friend who worked for the UN, who basically said that the rest of the world is fucking terrified of the US, because the Right Wing actually think that they can use all the nukes they’ve been stockpiling. Every time a Republican president was elected, the rest of the world hunkered down and waited for disaster.

The US doesn’t even have the decency to follow a consistent foreign policy – y’all keep flip-flopping, and it makes people nervous. Pantsload is the representative Repub mindset as far as they’re concerned, which is basically why Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize – everyone else in the world was glad beyond belief that he was elected, because the end of the world could be put off for at least four years.

I think that’s an accurate assessment of the rest of the world’s opinion, and it explains why in 2003, people in most other countries in the free world listed Israel and the United States ahead of Iran and North Korea as the number one and two threats to world peace. (Of course, that only makes the right wing more convinced that they’re right. Part of their apocalyptic/exceptionalism thing, the idea of them against the world appeals greatly to them).

Iraq was the first example of “makes people nervous,” because it was so obviously and blatantly irrational – and I’ve read perfectly conservative, hard-nosed strong-on-defense members of European governments who say the exact same thing. Vietnam at least made some sense – we were defending an ally against a communist threat, and sure, our ally was despicable, but at least it made some kind of sense in terms of realpolitik, within a broader Cold war context. Iraq didn’t – it was a choice apparently driven by nothing but America’s desire to “pick up any little country and throw it against the wall.”

With the Democratic victories in 2006 and 2008, a lot of people (myself included) kind of breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that the U.S. was coming around and that the previous insanity could be ascribed to post-9/11 PTSD. Now, we’re seeing a vicious, racist, psychotically irrational conservative resurgence pioneered by Sarah Palin, who talks about waterboarding, Gitmo and bombing Iran and is getting deafening cheers for it by a huge fraction of the American people. To a lot of people, America seems to be going completely around the bend, not just as a post-9/11 condition but as the new permanent state of affairs. And since we still have the world’s best military and second-biggest nuclear arsenal, you can see why so many are scared shitless.

To a lot of people, America seems to be going completely around the bend, not just as a post-9/11 condition but as the new permanent state of affairs. And since we still have the world’s best military and second-biggest nuclear arsenal, you can see why so many are scared shitless.

Including Americans.

KILLING AMERICA’S SPARKLE UNICORNS

This should go in to production.

it was a choice apparently driven by nothing but America’s desire to “pick up any little country and throw it against the wall.”

The analogy I always use is the guy who, after he gets elbowed in a crowded bar, finds the smallest guy sitting on a stool and tosses him off, because *some*one did it and why not blame this guy.

Liking this anti-bagger cartoon.

http://www.freelancersunion.org/

Oooh, they have good dental insurance. But no health insurance unless you live in New York.

Wev. I’ll figure it out. It’s not like librarians are the only people suffering in this economy.

Liking this anti-bagger cartoon.

Ha! I was just looking at that!

The fact is, if memory serves me incorrectly, Bush II was a hard right pantywaist who followed the tenants of Ma Baker, which is centerpiece liberlism, no taxes and add to the peoples freedom by giving them free unicorns and budgies and surrender to the golf handicappers.

The analogy I always use is the guy who, after he gets elbowed in a crowded bar, finds the smallest guy sitting on a stool and tosses him off, because *some*one did it and why not blame this guy.

No, no, Tommy Friedman today sez we had a pure motives. When we went over to tell the sand people to “suck on this”, what we meant was suck on these ice chips while you squeeze out a child in our image. And Ps. we’ll bit the shit out of you if the kid doesn’t look like we want it to, because don’t hate us for our freedom you ungrateful fucking shoebomber types.

When we went over to tell the sand people to “suck on this”, what we meant was suck on these ice chips while you squeeze out a child in our image. And Ps. we’ll bit the shit out of you if the kid doesn’t look like we want it to, because don’t hate us for our freedom you ungrateful fucking shoebomber types.

Holy shit, that really was an actual Shorter.

TnU could look here.

You’d be surprised how well you’d fit in.

Liking this anti-bagger cartoon.

LuLz! I said the same thing to my mom! She was complaining about paying her tax (“I work hard, why should I give money to people on the dole” etc). And without seeing that cartoon I told her to move to Somalia where the government doesn’t exist and taxes are nonexistent. But, the idea of being kidnapped for ransom or killed in some turf war I guess isn’t cool to mom-dukes.

Oh, and when I asked if her taxes had gone up, she replied, “I don’t know.”

SO WHAT ARE YOU COMPLAINING ABOUT?

TnU could look here.

Or here (possibly NSFW. It won’t get past my Websense)

Maybe I should just make him go to architecture school, like he’s been considering.

Only if he’s willing to get the anal and scrotal piercings.

Only if he’s willing to get the anal and scrotal piercings.

Is that required for the scaffold card?

Speaking of sexy librarians, where’s #ala 2010 going to be held?
I ask for a friend. For research purposes.

Speaking of sexy librarians, where’s #ala 2010 going to be held?

DC. Michelle Obama is on the schedule, I think.

DC. Michelle Obama is on the schedule, I think.

I think just her arms.

DC. Michelle Obama is on the schedule, I think.

I think just her arms.

Nope, sorry, they’re in sri lanka

TnU could look here.

If I were less of a baby about where I want to live, I would probably have a better time finding something…

Or here (possibly NSFW. It won’t get past my Websense)

Totally SFW. And not that sexy.

Only if he’s willing to get the anal and scrotal piercings.

Is that required for the scaffold card?

No, just four hours of boredom.

Only if he’s willing to get the anal and scrotal piercings.

I think he could live with the scrotal…don’t know about the anal.

To a lot of people, America seems to be going completely around the bend, not just as a post-9/11 condition but as the new permanent state of affairs. And since we still have the world’s best military and second-biggest nuclear arsenal, you can see why so many are scared shitless.

Have been since the Reagan years, really. I grew up in the UK, going on anti-nuke rallys. Yes, I iz comyounist pinkoe. Clinton was a bit of a break, but then the US went and ruined it by electing Shrub. I live in the US now, and remember really wondering what the hell people were thinking when he got re-elected. I realized that the repubs amongst my acquaintances were simply refusing to see anything wrong, sailing great big gun ships down de river of denial.

Seriously, growing up in Europe in the late ’70s (oops, outed my wrinkly status) was similar emotionally to my husband’s experience growing up in the US in the ’50s; would the world end soon? And the answer always came back: “Not before your homework is due”.

That reminds me that one of my professors punched his ex-girlfriend’s boyfriend at the ALA conference a couple of years ago. I wish I had been there, because it was totally OMG NERDFIGHT!!!!!!!11!!!

Sadly enough, there aren’t really any “hip” librarians in my program (thank God–those people seem like douchebags), much less sexy ones.

I don’t know about any of that nuclear stuff, but the any mention of St Ron gets me all tingly and, yes, hot. More, please….

Sadly enough, there aren’t really any “hip” librarians in my program (thank God–those people seem like douchebags), much less sexy ones.

You would think that such a hyper-literate bunch would understand porn tropes better.

The weird thing about the Reagan years is, while people were legitimately concerned about his proximity to the nukes, we always kept in the back of our minds that Reagan wasn’t insane. Senile, maybe, which was frightening enough but not insane.

With Bush and certainly with Palin, ehhhhhhhh, that reassurance is not existing…

You would think that such a hyper-literate bunch would understand porn tropes better.

Librarians need a superhero to idolize, and I don’t mean Noah Wyle’s god-awful straight-to-cable rip off of Indiana Jones.

using Windows in our defense system

sweet undead fuck, is this true?

We really are doomed, aren’t we?

You would think that such a hyper-literate bunch would understand porn tropes better.

Right? Ugh. Mostly, they just sit around in jeans and t-shirts and talk about Twilight. Seriously. Adult people. Who are obsessed with Twilight.

With Bush and certainly with Palin, ehhhhhhhh, that reassurance is not existing…

I dunno, actor, while Palin is definitely nutz, Bush seemed dumb not insane. But, he was voted in through divine interference. Yes, interference.

The weird thing about the Reagan years is, while people were legitimately concerned about his proximity to the nukes, we always kept in the back of our minds that Reagan wasn’t insane. Senile, maybe, which was frightening enough but not insane.

And it didn’t seem that conservatives in general were interested in bringing about the End of Days. Now that seems to be a central, badly-hidden tenant of conservatism.

Adult people. Who are obsessed with Twilight.

Escapism has reached an all-time low.

We really are doomed, aren’t we?

“General, sir! Our last intel shows multiple missiles fired from points in South Asia over an hour ago!”

“What’s the latest status?”

“We don’t know, sir. When we went to look, we got the Blue Screen of Death!”

In other news, let the discrimination lawsuits begin!

From the LA Times article:

The bill cements the position of Arizona, whose border with Mexico is the most popular point of entry for illegal immigrants into this country, as the state most aggressively using its own laws to fight illegal immigration the most bigoted state in the Union.

FIXED!

In other news, let the discrimination lawsuits begin!

I just took a fast look around my office. Two partners, one from NYC, one from CT. Engineers: an English immigrant, an Argentinian immigrant, a Brooklyn native. Admin: half Native American, from Oregon. Three pasty white, two somewhat darker, one very dark. My partner is the only one who’d pass teabagger inspection as a “real ‘merkin.”

Escapism has reached an all-time low.

My teen lit professor chastised me for not even wanting to have it as a “beach read.” I’d like to point out that a) I rarely go to the beach, and b) my favorite “beach read” is A Confederacy of Dunces, so yeah, I think I’ll be fine just knowing that it’s like teen crack with unhealthy sexual attitudes and female self-loathing.

“It also requires police officers, if they form a ‘reasonable suspicion’ that someone is an illegal immigrant, to determine the person’s immigration status.”

Gee, I wonder what would constitute a “reasonable suspicion”?

Also from the LA Times article:

The bill’s author, State Sen. Russell Pearce, said it simply “takes the handcuffs off of law enforcement and lets them do their job.” puts them on anyone who doesn’t look like a state senator…

Fixidly

Gee, I wonder what would constitute a “reasonable suspicion”?

Tattoos.

Gee, I wonder what would constitute a “reasonable suspicion”?

“Nice tan, Pedro. You get that here or in Guadalajara?”

using Windows in our defense system

*ding*

“It looks like you’re trying to launch nuclear missiles!

Do you want to:

* Launch all missiles
* Launch only a few
* Order some Viagra and sublimate my agressive tendencies
* Go back and try something else”

Gee, I wonder what would constitute a “reasonable suspicion”?

That would be “anyone who is tan-ish.” It could get hairy because, last I looked, ‘Zona gets a lot of sun.

*ding*

“It looks like you’re trying to launch nuclear missiles!

Springy the paperclip, weapon of mass distraction.

That would be “anyone who is tan-ish.” It could get hairy because, last I looked, ‘Zona gets a lot of sun.

I forgive you

I just took a fast look around my office. Two partners, one from NYC, one from CT. Engineers: an English immigrant, an Argentinian immigrant, a Brooklyn native. Admin: half Native American, from Oregon. Three pasty white, two somewhat darker, one very dark. My partner is the only one who’d pass teabagger inspection as a “real ‘merkin.”

If I didn’t know better, you’re running a terrurst kabal!

Bake em away Toys!

I forgive you

Thank you, kind sir. I bow to your fast typin’ fingas’. *cursty*

BTW, how was the Secret Sci Club, N__B/Actor? Couldn’t make it.. Next time for sure. I need more beer on Tuesdays.

Tattoos.

To paraphrase myself*: “Look at me!!! I’m [white] Can you believe they fuckin’ stopped ME???”

*What? It was, like, the third thing that came up when I Googled “Erick Erickson border patrol”.

I need more beer on Tuesdays.

I missed it, nursing a busted bank account/hand

BTW, how was the Secret Sci Club, N__B/Actor?

I was in scaffold heaven. B^4 is nursing a hangover, most likely.

“Look at me!!! I’m [white] Can you believe they fuckin’ stopped ME???”

I get pulled aside at airports all the time. I’ve learned to expect it as giving the TSA immunity from charges of profiling.

“No way! Would we pull the big ba

“No way! Would we pull the big ba

ld guy with “WASP” written all over his face if we profiled???”

Springy the paperclip, weapon of mass distraction.

Fishes Of Mass Filtration!

I’ve got up a Tommy Friedman post, basically wondering why he doesn’t have a dickipedia page of his very own.

To paraphrase myself*:

You have to set your goals high. As I’ve mentioned before*, Abe Rosenthal once wrote an op-ed in which he quoted himself quoting himself.

*This comment, of course, is me paraphrasing myself paraphrasing Abe quoting himself quoting himself. The singularity is near.

Actor – nice save. I’m sure no one noticed.

Esteev’s day has officially become: What Will Scott Clevenger Say? Day

Actor – nice save. I’m sure no one noticed.

I need to work out the kinks on the new finger.

Esteev’s day has officially become: What Will Scott Clevenger Say? Day

I predict he’ll say the following:

“Get the fuck out of my living room before I call the cops! I’m on DEADLINE!”

*This comment, of course, is me paraphrasing myself paraphrasing Abe quoting himself quoting himself. The singularity is near.

It must be true because I’ve read it multiple times on the Internet now.

I’ve got up a Tommy Friedman post, basically wondering why he doesn’t have a dickipedia page of his very own.

I take your blog whoring and raise you some shameless self promotion.

Question for the day though – Is Tom Friedman the only person who’s never seen his Suck On This moment?

I’m on DEADLINE!”

Sidenote: I’m a smartphone dork and Clevenger is the best twitterer ever.

*This comment, of course, is me paraphrasing myself paraphrasing Abe quoting himself quoting himself. The singularity is near.

Not quite yet, though. I will paraphrase you paraphrasing yourself paraphrasing Abe quoting himself about quoting himself. Then you can paraphrase me paraphrasing you paraphrasing yourself paraphrasing Abe quote himself about quoting himself. And then Abe can quote you paraphrasing me paraphrasing you paraphrasing yourself paraphrasing Abe quoting himself about quoting himself. Then we’ll be much closer.

I’m a smartphone dork and Clevenger is the best twitterer ever.

He’s the Clevengest!

…hangs head in shame…I’ll go work now….

Is Tom Friedman the only person who’s never seen his Suck On This moment?

If by “suck on this moment” you mean his penis, no.

I’ve got up a Tommy Friedman post, basically wondering why he doesn’t have a dickipedia page of his very own.

This is an excellent question. Also, that sentence you quoted sends me into deep despair.

And then Abe can quote you paraphrasing me paraphrasing you paraphrasing yourself paraphrasing Abe quoting himself about quoting himself.

Fortunately, without use of Ouija board or bad sci-fi-movie tech, Abe’s moldering flesh won’t be doing anything.

Then we’ll be much closer.

Circumlocuting the bowl…

Fortunately, without use of Ouija board or bad sci-fi-movie tech, Abe’s moldering flesh won’t be doing anything.

I know! Thank goodness! And Ouija boards are scary.

I know! Thank goodness! And Ouija boards are scary.

This happened to Sarah, too.

Maybe I should just make him go to architecture school, like he’s been considering.

Holy hell, have things gotten so bad that this is considered a GOOD MOVE?

The construction industry, like so many others, has severely contracted and will not be expanding rapidly anytime during what remains of my life. Architects are considering becoming librarians. Or porn actors.

Architects are considering becoming librarians. Or porn actors.

Unfortunately, they can’t achieve those kinds of erections either.

I think the growth industry for the 21st century will be chipping arrowheads out of flint. Especially if Obama is a one term president.

Unfortunately, they can’t achieve those kinds of erections either.

I’ll break your other fingers.

Hey! Don’t you have some self-pwning to do?

Holy hell, have things gotten so bad that this is considered a GOOD MOVE?

Yes. I mean, other than the massive amount of student debt he would accrue. It’s a better move than a blue-collar career where all the jobs are being outsourced to unskilled laborers. This is not to say that there isn’t a market for what he does/could do, but it’s certainly not stable.

Architects are considering becoming librarians.

NO. Tell them not to do that.

Or porn actors.

Sadly enough, I think this might be the best prospect for employment.

I need to work out the kinks on the new finger.

Careful you don’t go blind doing that.

Hey! Don’t you have some self-pwning to do?

I never self-pwn. You guys merely can’t understand me.

Careful you don’t go blind doing that.

Doing what? Learning “Lola” on the keyboard?

I never self-pwn. You guys merely can’t understand me.

And the Cubs never lose. The game just sometimes ends before they win.

The game just sometimes ends before they win.

That’s Jonah for ya!

The game just sometimes ends before they win.

Say, don’t you blog for America’s Shittiest Website™ because you comment on a blog that sometimes has posts from someone who occasionally covers ASW™?

Neocon.

Hey! Don’t you have some self-pwning to do?

He subbed that out to me on a part-time basis. He can’t handle the full workload with his injured hand.

OK, I’ll bite.

How’d ya break the finger?

Journal of the Plague Year and T&U, I know it’s probably over the line and unforgivable to even suggest, but have you considered becoming a corporate librarian?

I’ll go wash my mouth out with beer now.

How’d ya break the finger?

I tore off some guy’s rear-view mirror after he cut me off on my bicycle.

Speaking of Jonah, I know the bones on that nuke ’em all turd have been picked pretty clean but:

The fact that most of America’s — and the world’s leading cities — had been obliterated wasn’t enough. After all, it could have been a misunderstanding.

Afterall US policymakers in the executive branch would never get something so very important, so very wrong. Like whether a foreign country had WMD’s and had to be invaded and occupied for a decade or so in order to secure them.

I tore off some guy’s rear-view mirror after he cut me off on my bicycle.

One on the side of the vehicle or the one on the inside of the windshield?

Speaking of SCUZE MAH FIN-GAHS:
PR0N

It was a van, so side-view mirror.

It was one of those moments I thought I was immortal. I used to be able to do that easily. Now, not so much.

Kids, don’t try this at home!

T&U, I know it’s probably over the line and unforgivable to even suggest, but have you considered becoming a corporate librarian?

Yes. Or a hospital librarian. And those can be fun jobs, because you have to dig for information, which I enjoy, but I also really hate doing things for assholes.

It was one of those moments I thought I was immortal.

Oh. I misread that. Immortal.

I was confused for a sec.

Oh. I misread that. Immortal.

I was confused for a sec.

Well, tearing off some dude’s rearview mirror isn’t very nice, either, even if he did try to kill you.

I think you overlooked the key phrase: “any remotely plausible circumstances”. Since that pretty much defines the boundary on the other side of which the Pantload lives, there is not much point in reading the rest of his dribble.

Well, tearing off some dude’s rearview mirror isn’t very nice, either, even if he did try to kill you.

That’s a very midwestern idea of “nice.”

speaking as a midwestern bicyclist, the reason we don’t tear mirrors off of cars that tried to kill us, is they don’t stop.

the Doughy One has a new Op-Ed at LA Times about Obama’s supreme court appointment.

Every word in it is a lie, including “and” and “the.”

That’s a very midwestern idea of “nice.”

Next time strap an AK47 across your back. That’ll fucking show those stupid van driver guys. Remember, an armed society is a polite society.

Or a ninja sword if an AK is not available. New York has all these liberalfacist gun laws which is why everyone is dead because the crinimals run the city.

That’s a very midwestern idea of “nice.

You know how we do.

speaking as a midwestern bicyclist, the reason we don’t tear mirrors off of cars that tried to kill us, is they don’t stop.

That, too. Plus, you don’t know if they’re packing.

Next time strap an Hello Kitty AK47 across your back.

Fiqqst for greater politeness through arms.

the Doughy One has a new Op-Ed at LA Times

I don’t like to sound like one of those “good old days” cranks, but wasn’t there a time when media outlets actually put a little bit of effort into at least an appearance of respectability? I know it’s the Op-Ed page, but shit, having a completely uninformed, inflammatory, fearmongering dumbshit seems like they’re trying to fuck everything up.

So I think JonahGoldbrick is calling Reagan out as a pussy and professing his manlove for Truman.

Well Jonah can go and let K-Lo shovel a pile of manure on him while both wear dainty leather get-ups. No matter how much Mr. Goldbrick wants to get all pufftery with me, I ain’t lettin’ it happen. Not because I’m straight … just because if there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s reactionary, conservative children of privilege. The discomfort those country-club dorks had with Dick Nixon almost made me like the feller — and you know how much I disliked Dick Nixon!

Next time strap on a strap on an Hello Kitty AK47 across your back.

F1xt for making an afternoon of it!

Apologies for the continued drift, but since I will be looking for full-time work very soon, the job conversation is interesting.

I’ve found that in my field (history), it’s becoming more necessary than it ever was to consider “alternative” (read: non-academic) careers, something that most history graduate programs are loath to suggest, let alone encourage. I’m not even bothering to look at academic work; it would be great if I could get into some place like Google, but that won’t be easy. Most of the jobs out there that I could do are in the federal government, most of which would (right now) make me a spear carrier for American empire. Hmm.

Oh, and nuclear weapons are very dangerous. Don’t use them.

Doing what? Learning “Lola” on the keyboard?

Is that what TEH KIDZ are calling it these days?

Hey T&U, one thought for the librarian thing. What about finding a way to be a funding wizard for libraries? You know, the Queen o’ Grants or some such. For example, libraries are eligible for Erate funding (gazoogle it). I deal with Erate at one of my jobs and who knows, there might be a niche for consulting or finding a spot in a larger library system for someone who knows where to go for library grants. My thinking is, if you know how to squeeze more money out of the system for libraries, you’re going to have job security.

/job counselor

OT: SHIT MOAT

OT: SHIT MOAT

Poop bubbles set FREE!

I’ve found that in my field (history), it’s becoming more necessary than it ever was to consider “alternative” (read: non-academic) careers, something that most history graduate programs are loath to suggest, let alone encourage. I’m not even bothering to look at academic work; it would be great if I could get into some place like Google, but that won’t be easy. Most of the jobs out there that I could do are in the federal government, most of which would (right now) make me a spear carrier for American empire. Hmm.

There are a fair number of historians employed by government agencies that deal with construction and by large a/e, g.c., and c.m. firms. First, the whole issue of dealing with preservation requirements: most preservationists have fair to poor research skills. Second, what used to be on the site? What proposals for the site have been made in the past? Third, does a building meet designation criteria? Does it have hidden environmental problems from past uses?

My thinking is, if you know how to squeeze more money out of the system for libraries, you’re going to have job security.

I’ve considered grantwriting and stuff like that in general…whatever I wind up doing, I’m definitely going to explore more non-traditional fields.

grantwriting and stuff like that in general

My brother made a very good second career teaching school districts how to write grants and account for special needs students. There’s a bunch of money out there to help schools with those kids but many districts don’t know how to get it and how to keep it. I imagine something similar is true of libraries.

My bro had the advantage of several years as a school principal where he had to learn all that stuff but didn’t you [T&U] just say you liked researching? You’d even not be working for an asshole but perhaps I presume.

Well, tearing off some dude’s rearview mirror and hurting your hand isn’t very nice, either, even if he did try to kill you.

Fixed for mortal relativism

speaking as a midwestern bicyclist, the reason we don’t tear mirrors off of cars that tried to kill us, is they don’t stop.

Well, see, in the city, there’s too much traffic to just keep going.

That’s the weird thing about biking here: cars will cut you off to beat a light or shit, but you end up catching up to them at the next light and flipping the bird at them and then sailing thru the light (I live in a fairly quiet part of town) and into the sunset while they wait. And wait. And wait.

“We will use nukes at the drop of a hat” = “we’re so totally lacking in even minimal confidence in our conventional forces as a deterrent that we must rely on the constant threat of Armageddon to keep potential enemies at bay.”

“We will use nukes only as a last resort” = “we have enough spinal integrity & IQ points to know that our conventional forces can already lay waste to ANY potential enemy between breakfast & lunch with ease – & here’s the proof.”

(tl;dr — wingnuts are WATBs who need a puppy, a soother, & a big hug from Mommy)

So on my way to work Monday, I nearly T-boned a motorist who pulled out in front of my bike while I was riding downhill at 25+ MPH. I believe I might have said something to him (who knows?!) so he slowed down and rolled down his passenger side window to argue with me. That was fun. He claimed he couldn’t see me. I regret that I couldn’t come up with “It’s your job to see me” rather than just yelling insults but hey, the adrenaline was a-flowin’.

Never got close enough to tear off a mirror, not that I would have anyway, being a liberal pussy and all.

WC,

I don’t mind when I’ve snuck up on them, you know, like around a blind curve or something. I figure it’s up to me to be careful doing something like that, but this asshole was in the damned bike lane, clearly marked with the friendly white lines and the outline of the stick figure with the penis hat and two wheels between his legs.

He was pulling out of a parking spot while texting, and sort of corralled me into traffic, so I took umbrage.

You’d even not be working for an asshole but perhaps I presume.

I suppose there are assholes everywhere, so I guess it depends.

but this asshole was in the damned bike lane

I fucking hate that shit. I swear, drivers here PURPOSELY drive/park in the bike lane because they hate hippies.

I fucking hate that shit. I swear, drivers here PURPOSELY drive/park in the bike lane because they hate hippies.

Y’know, I can usually be OK with it when they double park in the lane, because it’s hard to find conveniently places to stop on the street around here. Double parked, and I have a few moments to glance over my shoulder and merge, but this jackass just tooled right in, and it’s not like I was speeding.

If I was doing twelve mph, I’d be shocked since I was approaching a just-turned green light and saw the stack of cars waiting. I was anticipating one of them jumping into the lane from the other direction to go around someone making a left hand turn or something.

I was hoping he’d chase me. There was a police stationhouse just a block or two away, and I would have led him right to the door.

There are a fair number of historians employed by government agencies that deal with construction and by large a/e, g.c., and c.m. firms. First, the whole issue of dealing with preservation requirements: most preservationists have fair to poor research skills. Second, what used to be on the site? What proposals for the site have been made in the past? Third, does a building meet designation criteria? Does it have hidden environmental problems from past uses?

Good point, N_B. The Park Service does a lot of this kind of work, and it is for the most part a non-spear carrying agency. I have some connections at NPS, so perhaps I could make use of them in some way.

Have been since the Reagan years, really. I grew up in the UK, going on anti-nuke rallys. Yes, I iz comyounist pinkoe.

I don’t remember the eighties (wasn’t born until the end) so happy to hear an opinion from someone who was there – still, from what I’ve read in history, it seems that Reagan wasn’t actually insane on the nuclear front. If I understand correctly, most of the anti-nuclear movement at the time was in response to his deployment of Pershing missiles on West European soil; but in response to Russia’s deployment of SS-20s, it made sense, especially since it gave the U.S. a stronger bargaining position at the START talks (which eventually resulted in a decrese in nukes, under the Reagan/Bush leadership).

SDI, of course, was another matter, and so was that exercise that nearly convinced the Russians we were going to war.

Trouble is, I’ve seen nothing at all in the current GOP leadership that indicates that they’re capable of being flexible enough for things like START. Bush did a few good things, but then invariably did something worse that washed away the good. Palin and the rest of the teabagging community, I don’t think are even capable of being as “good” or rational as Bush was, which doesn’t bode well for whenever they get back into power.

That, and foreign policy is being guided less and less by cold and heartless realpolitik and more and more by mad, pseudo-Biblical rhetoric like “the Jews are God’s people” or “Islam’ll never stop threatening us until we convert them all.” To put it in terms the Goddamn Batman can relate to, the face of the GOP is looking less and less like Lex Luthor and more and more like the Joker. It’s true in domestic as well as foreign policy.

(I got nuthin’ for the caption contest, so I’ll just post here and laff at my betters’ rapier wit upstairs)

And it didn’t seem that conservatives in general were interested in bringing about the End of Days.

What, are you new?

They sure did, or at least the ones that pushed the Reagan bunch into power did. Reagan was the first to really court the evangelical dopes and their puppetmasters (you know, the teabaggers’ forebearers) and they were predicting and wishing for the End Times way back then too.

I don’t mind when I’ve snuck up on them, you know, like around a blind curve or something.

Me either and in a blind approach situation I make sure I can stop if I have to. In this case, I was riding down a long straight stretch, in the bike lane, on an arterial. There was a line of cars along the curb but this dope pulled out of a cross street without even trying to see if there was a bike coming. I could sure see him and half expected him to pull out in front of me but that didn’t make me any less mad or scared. Yeah, come to think of it, I’m pretty sure I said something.

What, are you new?

No, but I don’t remember those days very well.

Reagan was the first to really court the evangelical dopes and their puppetmasters (you know, the teabaggers’ forebearers) and they were predicting and wishing for the End Times way back then too.

You’re right. It just seems like they weren’t as, I don’t know, explicit about it then like they are now. But again, although I am not as young as Chris, I still don’t remember much about the 80s unless it had to do with My Little Pony and Babysitters Club books.

Reagan was the first to really court the evangelical dopes and their puppetmasters (you know, the teabaggers’ forebearers) and they were predicting and wishing for the End Times way back then too.

He also put them in his pocket and zipped it up. I’m not sure how he did this, whether it was the intoxication that Falwell et al felt at actually having the ear of a President or their naivete, but he gave them not one damned thing they asked for in supporting him in 1980. He claimed to be the natural heir to Goldwater and they flocked to him like he was a messiah.

And then he stabbed them in the back. Made some noise about family values, and then never went to church, not once in the White House, and yet was perceived somehow as “of the faith,” mostly because he defended religion while in office.

Sheesh. Name a President who hasn’t…

Reagan’s whole deal was to talk a good game and convince the rubes. He was pretty damn good at it, too.

Reagan’s was the first Presidency where substantive differences between candidates mattered less than the personality and perception.

And then he stabbed them in the back. Made some noise about family values, and then never went to church, not once in the White House, and yet was perceived somehow as “of the faith,” mostly because he defended religion while in office.

I think that’s pretty much every single president since. George W. Bush certainly didn’t do much more to help them. While they may occasionally toss the rubes a bone on gay marriage (an issue where most Americans are still with them, and those that aren’t are all on the other side anyway), I’ve never seen any kind of concerted push to abolish abortion from conservatives in any branch of government. It’s a prop, never been any more than that.

Second, what used to be on the site? What proposals for the site have been made in the past? Third, does a building meet designation criteria? Does it have hidden environmental problems from past uses?

Need an architect on your staff? I work cheap, just a bit of booze and some occasional branes, and I already know Vectorworks….

so I took umbrage.

.. as well as taking a mirror.

Does it have hidden environmental problems from past uses?

Followed by…

Need an architect on your staff? I work cheap, just a bit of booze and some occasional branes…

Maybe I’m wrong but I’d assume “having a zombie in the neighborhood” would quailfy as an “environmental problem.”

Maybe I’m wrong but I’d assume “having a zombie in the neighborhood” would quailfy as an “environmental problem.”

“There goes the neighborhood”, eh? life-ist.

life-ist

Hey, some of my best friends are zombies.

I just wouldn’t want my daughter to marry one.

.

.

(which is especially hilarious (to me) (I slay me) because she is wearing a T-shirt RIGHT NOW that says
“Zombies Were People Too.”)

Maybe I’m wrong but I’d assume “having a zombie in the neighborhood” would quailfy as an “environmental problem.”

Depends. Is he still chained to the stake?

(which is especially hilarious (to me) (I slay me) because she is wearing a T-shirt RIGHT NOW that says “Zombies Were People Too.”)

INTEREST!

Website?

so I took umbrage.

Sure, take all the umbrage and leave none for the rest of us!

Oh wait. That was me that said that. Capitalist tool!

Website?

No.

@Chris:
That, and foreign policy is being guided less and less by cold and heartless realpolitik and more and more by mad, pseudo-Biblical rhetoric like “the Jews are God’s people” or “Islam’ll never stop threatening us until we convert them all.” To put it in terms the Goddamn Batman can relate to, the face of the GOP is looking less and less like Lex Luthor and more and more like the Joker. It’s true in domestic as well as foreign policy.

This is the nub, here. With Reagan, we thought it might be arrogance, or maybe a misguided attempt to forestall the spread of communism in Yoorp, not to mention the irritation at our own government being total doormats and licking the US’s boots with the bases (money!!! Lovely lovely money!!!AHAHAHAHA!!!!) on British soil and all that.

But at least Reagan seemed rational (if a bit senile) most of the time. The latter-day Republicans scare the shit out of the rest of the world, because they really do seem to believe in actually nuking things, rather than playing the game of toe-to-toe-i’ll-blink-the-same-time-you-do so no country appears to lose face to its people. This lot think they’re ordained by God to make over the world into their image or bring on Armageddon* trying, kind of like Martin Sheen in The Dead Zone.

*Shorter Rapture: “Arm-a-geddon outta here!”

Website?

No.

I found it already and ordered three.

Website?

No.

And not your boobs, silly, the SHIRT!

Altho, if you’re in the mood to share…

Altho, if you’re in the mood to share…

Unless you wish to join the “Bulemia Behave-alike Diet Program” you do not want to see my moobs. Promise.

Unless you wish to join the “Bulemia Behave-alike Diet Program” you do not want to see my moobs. Promise.

Any port in a storm. Besides, I can post them to Fark.