JayB

I was being sarcastic when I said that what Chavez was doing was shocking. I was anything but shocked, as it's been clear to me that this would happen for years, despite the various protestations that his fans on the left have been making for an equally long time. Tell me again, how any of this relates to the US elections of 2000?

Not understanding you here, Matt. We're obligated to praise someone who, upon being democratically elected, announces his intentions to take actions that will undermine and destroy the very political freedoms that a democratic system is supposed to preserve? "Now I'm no Hitler fan, mind you, but you can't dispute the fact that the guy *was* democratically elected before he turned Germany into a totalitarian state, so to scorn Hitler is to scorn Democracy itself." This seems to be the essence of your argument, here. "I'm not in favor of eradicating the Israelis myself, but the Palestinian people voted Hamas into office, so they're beyond reproach in my book and we'd better keep our mouths shut about the whole eradication thing, lest we attack the very principle of democracy."

Outraged? Interesting choice of words. Pretty much all that anyone has done is point out the inevitable consequences of choices that voters in another country have made. If the people of Palestine want an Islamist death-cult dedicated to the eradication of Israel to run things, that's fine, but we're under no obligation to subsidize it or support it in any fashion whatsoever. They cast their votes, they live with the consequences of that decision. If they'd rather starve than recognize Israels right to exist, so be it. In the case of Venezuela, they've elected a guy who's explicitly stated his intentions to try to make socialism work - One.....More.....Time - and the outcome will be economic ruin and political subjugation for all Venezuelans, except for functionaries within Chavez's party, who will make out quite well. Making these observations is one thing, outrage is another.

Sounds like a beanie-and-turtleneck clad Ginsberg wannabe channeling William Blake.

I can't believe that Gary and I are owning all of cc.com this badly . Sad, sad, sad effort on everyone else's part. One digi-cam and a pair of gorts and I could reign supreme forever.

BZZZZZZZT - Gary wins because he's wearing shorts over polypro! Look at all of those wands, though. No wands on Gary. Yeah the wands are a nice touch, but Gary got ya beat hands down. * Shorts over poly pro, check * 3 tools, check (4 if you count Gary) * 22cm ice screws, check (who the hell uses these anyways, 4 of them too) * gore-tex on a sunny day, check * rope behind the leg, check * clusterfuck around the shoulder, check * daisy chain going over the shoulder attached to pack(?), check Whatcha you got, wands, thats it, come on you got to do better than that if you are going to compete against gape-master. Somewhere in a storage unit back in Washington I have a photo that will crush any and all challengers. Some buddies and I went backpacking around Mt. Adams just after I finished high-school, and we hiked up to one of the morraines and took in the scenery. After being continuously disapointed by the lack of extremitude and drama in my previous hiking photos, I took out the 3/8" polypro cord that we had with us form some reason or another, tied one end around a rock, and walked down the morraine a bit, and then passed the rope behind my waist to make it look like I was rappelling. I handed my friends the camera and repeatedly emphasized the importance of them framing the shot so that the foreground would be cut off, and it would look like I was rappelling into some kind of gaping void, with a vast panorama spreading out towards the horizons behind me for dramatic effect. The visage also included acid-washed jeans and fake-oakley "blade" sunglasses for heightened effect. Unfortunately for me, my companions failed miserably in their foreground-cropping duties, so the picture showed me standing on a slightly inclined pile of dirt, and for reasons that no one who didn't know the backstory could possibly comprehend, leaning back a bit and holding onto a rope. Nothing could possibly top this.

Careful, careful. Word on the street is that the illuminati have had their eyes on one particular, wild-eyed socialist day-trader from the confines of their secret alcove for a while, and they'll have no compunction about fluoridating his water if he doesn't learn to keep his mouth shut.

I think there should be a special prize for finding the individual who combines the greatest number of the hipster-bingo elements in a single visage, and posting the evidence on the internet. Could be kind of like the mullet-hunts of yore.

The question is moot. I get the car.

And green grass in Boston. Sweet.

Hahaha. I could score Bingo 12X within 5 minutes of leaving my house on any given day.

What do you need a car for? You don't need a car to do whatever it is that you do with your time any more than I *need* a truck to carry my kayaks to rivers, or sleep in, or travel over snowy logging roads in Maine or whatever else I choose to do with it. I can pretty much guarantee that you're burning a hell of a lot more fossil fuel than I am per-week, so you're hardly in a position to question anyone elses choices or conduct - much less mine - are you? I don't ride because I think it makes me an eco-saint, I ride because I like being fit, hate sitting in traffic, and it saves me a bit of money. I only mention it when bloviating eco-wanks think that making the staggering personal sacrifice involved in....owning a subcompact with a couple of bumper stickers that advertise their empty and profoundly ineffectual moral narcissim "Free Tibet!" "Hey, Look at me, I want to Free Tibet! Aren't I something!"...makes them some kind of enviro-hero. Whatever. Until you adopt the life of a Yemeni goatherd and decide to spend the rest of your days squatting under a lean-to and subsisting on grubs and roots that you pry-from the earth with a digging stick, the fact of the matter is that you've got exactly jack shit on anyone else when it comes to the enviro-thing, and the only thing that makes you different from the guy in the F350 is the magnitude of your narcissm, not the magnitude of your ecological footprint, which is hardly any different.

Well, your reference failed to offer any statistics one way or the other about the US union labor content of Japanese vehicles, so my earlier, very specific refutation still stands. And you may 'think' its the unions who are to blame, but auto industry analysists, including those who have posted on the JAMA website, apparently don't agree. They claim that US protectionism, poor dealership relationships, and a lack of vehicles that the public might actually want to buy as the root of the problem, none of which have anything to do with unions whatsoever. I think your desire to blame unions dates back to Lee Ioccoca, when unions were much more powerful than they are today. Yeah - I'm sure this was management's idea: http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179.htm

Thanks for that link. Good to know which vehicles to avoid buying. May have to go for the FJ Cruiser instead of the Tacoma when the time comes to replace the current Toyota Pickup in a few years. Heaven forbid that you buy something more fuel efficient. I guess that would require a little too much personal responsibility than your supposedly traditional conservative nature is willing to cough up. I know, I know, you need a big pickup for all those heavy bulk loads you haul around every day. Hahaha. Yeah, the mid-90's Pickup is quite the behemoth. I've commuted to work by bike, day-in, day-out, in Seattle and Boston for the past seven years, and with the exception of a single three-year period, I have done all of my day-to-day commuting either on foot or by bike for the entirety of my adult life, so spare me the sanctimony unless you've got something more substantial than your fluoride-free lifestyle to bring to the eco-righteousness table there, amigo. Too funny.

Thanks for that link. Good to know which vehicles to avoid buying. May have to go for the FJ Cruiser instead of the Tacoma when the time comes to replace the current Toyota Pickup in a few years.

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=1690924675

BZZZZZZZT - Gary wins because he's wearing shorts over polypro! Look at all of those wands, though. No wands on Gary.

Looks like someone has thrown down the gauntlet in the cc.com gape-off. That's a reasonably strong effort by Gary, but I think that I can take him.

I have also found that doubling up sleeping bags was significantly colder than sleeping in single bags.

You sure about that?

Whoah. Pardon me while I snap a photo of the pig flying past my window.....

Hey - Jimbo's back. Not the kind of liberalism I was referring to, but that was a nice summary of your worldview, complete with custom neologisms. Thanks for the testimonial.

Yes, there is a difference between liberal economics and anarchism.

Looks like a good article. Thanks for sharing. Who should get credit for the neg-income tax idea? I must have mistaken popularization for invention.

No, and protectionism by another name. Partial yes.