ivan

this totally sounds like a job for 007...of g.i. joe...or maybe santa clause!

"you can't reason people out of positions they were never reasoned into in the first place"

that woulda been bill hicks

i see whatcha did there

danse macabre!

Private prisons and pet care. the kardashians appear to be doing a damn fine job of taking over the world as well

holy shit, "why pres die" made 2 pages?! wtf did that even mean, so long as i'm here?

ya gotta have pix for the tr or it no-no count, senor - if ya got nothing, you can always do before n' after shoots of yer 'nards?

i'd say an article like this argues they're much no more than a happy-go-lucky supporter of the gov at pretty much anytime: http://www.npr.org/2011/06/16/137222043/why-the-war-powers-act-doesnt-work the wierd thing of course is i have no real problem w/ bombing libya - seems like the war powers act has it right - homeboy should ask if it's cool w/ the congress, though goddammit you know that wouldn't be much better...

if only the "tolerable administration of justice" didn't cover slavery in all its many forms "From the experience of all ages and nations, I believe, that the work done by free men comes cheaper in the end than the work performed by slaves. Whatever work he does, beyond what is sufficient to purchase his own maintenance, can be squeezed out of him by violence only, and not by any interest of his own." " * There is not a negro from the coast of Africa who does not, in this respect, possess a degree of magnanimity which the soul of his sordid master is too often scarce capable of conceiving. Fortune never exerted more cruelly her empire over mankind, than when she subjected those nations of heroes to the refuse of the jails of Europe, to wretches who possess the virtues neither of the countries which they come from, nor of those which they go to, and whose levity, brutality, and baseness, so justly expose them to the contempt of the vanquished." "This disposition to admire, and almost to worship , the rich and powerful, and to despise , or , at least neglect persons of poor and mean conditions, though necessary both to establish and to maintain the distinction of ranks and the order of society, is, at the same time, the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments." ~same guy. I think you'd enjoy reading his stuff if you haven't already. i like the enlightenment fellows just fine, damn near all of them, though their work makes poor night-time work for me i fear smith and jefferson and those fine folk were torn by the systems they perpetuated, still they persisted in them - the slavery of today of course in most metrical ways is far more splendid, but it still has the stink of a slaveship - ahh, i'm content enough

i've always admired adam smith, and practically all economists, for embracing that age-old mantra of social studies teachers: if ya can't dazzle them brilliance, baffle them with bullshit!

i'm sure i've heard virtue well spoken of, and of vice, the rumors about me are so very overstated:)

if only the "tolerable administration of justice" didn't cover slavery in all its many forms

jay's monkey scenario is apt enough - the people's budget gets nowhere b/c they have no party - there are only 2 parties, and ultimately they differ on very little - dem monkies are in league w/ each other, and they'll be goddamned if any other monkies gonna hone in our their bananas - even the genuine good ones among them are overwhelmed by the scale of it all

mississippi, like greece, has a fine honking engine encouraging emmigration

think i agree w/ all what you said but the "dysfunctional" bit - like all living things, our society is a shit-to-shoe-level one, just good enough to get by w/ predators and prey and hazy natural laws governing it all - its functioning they way it always has been - still, no reason to not want to change it and make it better, as you see the meaning of better, and i agree government regulation is a big part of that

sounds like just the opposite, east vs west? the side nearest beacon i hobbled back up, easy as punch - the end w/ the crazy switchbacks is the shite one, kids-wise

i sure as hell wouldn't want to hike my kids down the w side entrance at the 'zone/side - holy shit, you could roll a long, long way down that slope

think ben's been warming to the reality that i demanded he lead the hollow flake what's adam doing down there? think old justin might be about too, hanging out w/ the missus?

the 19th century through the 29 crash was the age of unregulated capitalism like today. Financial regulations were put in place to prevent boom-bust cycles of speculation, which was successful until these same regulations were dismantled by the new age robber barons. yes, you are missing the dotcom bubble crash in 2001. ah yes, how could i forget the dotcom thang - paid for no small number of nice things for me, thanks to my investing father so, to make a comparision, what is the time period in our enlghtened history when we had sane regulations? 1930-1980? several recessions in that period, i recall, though that's not exactly what we're talking about.

They are certainly more frequent than in the post-Depression era preceding the global financial liberalization and deregulation! more frequent now? uh...hell no - here's wikipedia's list: Panic of 1796–1797 Panic of 1819 Panic of 1825 Panic of 1826 Panic of 1837 Panic of 1857 Panic of 1866 Panic of 1873 Panic of 1884 Panic of 1890 Panic of 1893 Panic of 1896 pretty shocking regularity of course - looks like the typical 40 year old then would have lived through more than a half dozen in his time, whereas i only recall 2 in my own (the savings and loan bullshit of the late eighties and the recent shitstorm - am i missign somethign?) more severe? harder to judge or measure as times are different and the whole "fighting forest fires makes the eventual forest fire you can't stop a true disaster" idea

thought you were going to china old boy? wanna go cave crawling tomorrow or early next week?

Kenny is pissed. Joesph is an asshole. Yer gonna die. The end. When do you leave for the valley? need some fresh blood in here - the characters are becoming caricatures of themselves inshahallhah, ben and i leave next friday, assuming i can fight the urge to go out and bash meself in more before then - think ben's near having a stroke right about now - ha! open invite to anyone wanting to have a party on the swiss ledges friday night - going up there w/ mike for an evenign of chuckles...

poverty and hardtimes are the ancient engines that spurred the greek people to colonizing the med and generally getting alltogether the fuck out of greece doesn't sound like much has changed over the past 3000 years? maybe they should take out another mortgage on the parthanon?

lotta long posts in here - can someone give me the cliff-notes? i'll also accept someone coming over to my house to play nurse to my fucked up foot and feed me the medicine that will make me forget i'm blowing a 3 day adventure window