Off_White

I'd think it was pretty silly even if she was Republican. Friction between the two parties seems like a pre-existing condition, and this was just a handy pretext in an ongoing spat.

You play with the cat, sometimes you bleed.

Yeah, I gotta go with pitch 4 on the Evil Twin Arete.

Merkin? Your invocation of a pubic wig is insulting and uncalled for sir!

I don't know all your reasons, but I really respect that you followed through on your convictions.

People join the military for a lot of reasons. A friend of mine enlisted in the Navy the day she turned 18. As the eldest of 10 kids, there was no way she was going to stay around in the podunk southern town she was born in and help raise her siblings like her parents expected her to. Her folks were very angry with her. She's now retired from the military and a department head at an art school.

Let me get this straight, McDermott is being fined for warrantless wiretapping? Silly fool should have waited a decade until it was legal. What was Boehner worried about anyway? If he wasn't doing anything wrong, he's got nothing to be afraid of. FYI: Boehner is house minority leader John Boehner, not Boner as in KK's pet name for Kevbone.

Oh, perhaps I meant we're coming around to the question, I haven't seen much in the way of solutions.

Doug, it was probably better for the guy to make the effort and have it not work out than to just give up and feel guilty over whether you should have tried.

Thanks DeChristo, agree or disagree, Hitchens is almost always worth reading. It's funny how what is billed as a book review is much more about Hitchens, he even goes so far as to write the summary points he'd put in the book if he wrote it! It's worth taking the time to read the article. This quote from an article Sam Harris wrote in the Los Angeles Times alarmed Hitchens, perhaps because it's quite possibly true. It seems to me that a defense of Liberalism that isn't fascist is a part of what we're talking around here.

Oh, perhaps we can agree: Christianity AND Islam generally suck and have ample examples of intolerance. I don't want either of them in charge of my government. Better now?

I'd hazard a guess that it could be what happened for the west that didn't happen for Islam: The Reformation. The fracturing of the Catholic Church and the plethora of Protestant sects that sprung up led to a diversity that slowly diluted the power of any one church, and led to both the flowering of Liberalism and encouraged the development of rational science. I'm weak on my middle eastern history. When did Wahabbism come about? Wasn't that essentially a fundamentalist reformation within Islam, something that put the blinders on and hit the brakes? I know it's what my step grandmother would have liked to see happen here, she used to complain that God didn't want people to know so much, and that too much education was a bad thing. Seems like I recall it was WWI that really put the nail in the Ottoman Empire's coffin, but things must have been slipping for quite awhile before that.

Bug: That was an interesting article Recycled posted, though the actual source appears to be Canadian: link

You made me curious, so I did a little searching. In fact, it only appears to have been used once on this board in a pro-war context in the form "fuck the towelheads" by Gotterdamerung back in 04 in a thread about Abu Ghraib. Every other occurrence of the term is by someone on the left rebutting or recasting someone's anti arab opinion, or in quoted material from elsewhere. Our right wing on Cascadeclimbers is more politically correct than they are given credit for, and the phrase is more often used here as a dirty arguing trick to denigrate another's position by applying an extra wash of rascism. You know, like I've just done. So, maybe that bumpersticker is way out of line, at least within the context of this website. better?

Same rules of engagement for Home Depot, eh?

KK, I've heard several people say it with full intent. One exact quote, by a young enlisted man speaking to his buddies, "I'm going to Iraq to kill me some towelheads." I've also heard "sand *" used in this context. It's understandable, killing another human being is not something to take lightly, and it's easier if you can dehumanize your target. Perhaps "infidel" is sufficiently pejorative to serve that function on their side. Certainly some form of this process has been around as long as warfare. That doesn't mean I have to stand up and applaud it. Hatred of the Other, whether based on race, religion, gender, sexuality, or social class, is the central flaw of humanity.

Oh, I think I understand, you have your set theory backwards. The "kill the towelheads" crowd is a subset of McCain supporters, but not all McCain supporters are of that group. By the same token, if the Log Cabin Republicans endorse McCain, it doesn't mean that McCain is in favor of gay marriage.

I'm unclear on why you think this. Is it that you find the phrase offensive? Is it the notion that someone who feels this way would be a McCain supporter? Is it my implication that xenophobic racism is present on our side as well as in the radical elements promoting jihad?

fuck clucking, lets go base humping b6Yy-B-k7h8

I'm sort of surprised there isn't some penny stock advertised there that I can invest in to be in on the ground floor of the coming oil rush on North Dakota.

The Seattle REI used to be up on Capitol Hill and FF was right across the street. When REI moved down the hill, FF followed. They understand the dynamic. In the same way, when Starbucks moved into a new town, they usually tried to set up shop in the same block as the best coffee joint. They never put the old shop out of business, they were just drafting the leader.

Agreed, this is a great running thread, thanks Bill! The Edelrid Fat Rock Slim I got last winter (thanks to this thread) is a nice cord.

We had 3" yesterday morning, looked like full on winter with flocked trees and snow covered pastures, but it's just been drizzling this morning. Still, weather forecast for Tenino shows snow showers through Sunday. Yeah, I'm really looking forward to spring and unabashed rock season, but I kind of like this.