tvashtarkatena

He could also have done The Nose if one of Napolean's artilleryman hadn't blown it off. Or is that a myth, too?

It must come from voting for people who surround themselves with people who don't actually know how to do anything. Rummy. Gonzales. Wolfie. And yes, that impeccably credentialed idiot Condi. This kind of high profile, knee jerk desperation is the mark of a bowl full of incompetents. The only guy that knows how to git 'er dun in that Administration is Cheney. Nuff said there.

Like I said previously, I hope President Elect Obama makes the right choices. I don't have any real issues with the party right now. I am keeping an open mind and hoping that things get worked out in our favor. I'm a pragmatist, but I think it's important to see the bigger picture and take it all in, not just the narrow field of view that is partisan politics. Somehow I don't see President Elect Obama forward deploying returning troops to Poland or the Fulda Gap. I think he's already indicated little willingness to stand by the countries that put their necks on the line and courted a ballistic missile shield to begin with. Only time will tell, after all this is all just speculation. I was referring to Obama's stated goal of increasing deployment in Afghanistan. In addition, actually having some troops in reserve, should a conflict arise, might increase American negotiating leverage a bit. Sheeit, we've overblown our wad so much that even the Iranians don't take us seriously anymore. Obama's shown character and backbone his whole life. He just handed one of Washington's most notorious street brawlers his ass in an American presidential election; one of the toughest political battles anyone can take on. This is in addition to his proven intellect and analytical capability. I'd say he has the raw materials to enact a successful foreign policy agenda, even in this current world of tough customers. In contrast, McCain would have been a predictable, repetitious, and increasingly confused and tired adversary for a rising star like Medvedev, if his unimpressive behavior during this election is any indication. Just speculating, of course.

So why the 700 billion - we pulled that number out of our ass because it sounded big - bank bailout? Hey, it pisses me off too, and it seems arbitrary (and probably too low), and you can already see everyone angling for their piece whether them getting some is good for the rest of us or not. Shit, part of me would like to see all the fuckers lined up and mown down, but then i remember that we're all implicated here. Perhaps they helped to supply copious amounts of highly-refined junk, but only because the rest of us stuck our faces in the bags almost before they were opened and we snorted like hell. Anyone else notice the Bush Administration's chronic habit of ignoring a problem, freaking out when it hits, and trying to put out the fire with pallet loads of cash? Iraq anyone? Didn't 13 billion in cash go completely missing there (In addition to the trillion wasted)? That was just a prototype for this bailout. Put out a Craigslist ad: "Huge pile of money available to solve urgent problems" and see who shows up.

Europe has different emissions standards (more lax), as well as safety standards. Personally, I think America's gone way overboard on the safety requirements; something that has really hampered the ability to make truly inexpensive, light weight, efficient personal transport. Americans do suffer culturally Excessive Safety Drive; most surveyed SUV owners cite a feeling of safety (they're actually more statistically dangerous to ride in, actually, than a standard sedan) as their number one purchasing criteria. Not the small Euro cars are that unsafe. There's a video on Youtube of a Smartcar heading a jersey barrier head on at 70 mph; the occupants would have survived with minor injuries. The thing didn't even think about flipping over, either. Contrast that with the Range Rover I saw flip over on the University Bridge this past year because it grazed a side barrier at a whopping 20 mph. What an utter piece of overhyped shit. Legislate mandatory motorcycle use: Eliminate global warming, traffic congestion, road rage (nobody can hear you yell), our domestic transportation industry woes (Harley's doing just fine) and overpopulation all at once.

No. 9, No. 9, No. 9, No. 9, No. 9.... almost complete.

Smelted: Las Vegas NV Poured through Great Lakes IL, Artesia, Vallejo, and Napa CA Forged: Sonoma CA Tempered: Annapolis MD, Berkeley CA Currently rusting in Seattle WA, with a brief stint in Portland OR

Invincibility. Can't sleep. Food gone. Cigarettes gone. Need bismuth or pyrolitic graphite. My God, the insects!

"It's about political freedom and control" is neither a point nor an argument. It's not even a sentence. Guns are one of four things: a toy, a defense weapon, a fetish, or collector's art. They have no other roles. Gun ownership carries absolutely zero political power of any kind in this country. If we were in a tiny banana republic with a poorly equipped army, it might be a different story, but here there is no chance, zero, of an armed citizen's uprising getting past the first volley fired. You'd be wiped out immediately. You'd definitely make a statement, though. Political power here is achieved through electoral power, money, influence, friendship, and the threat of an unraveling of the social contract in times of desperation. The latter has happened; Watts, Chicago, New York, New Orleans, and all the other chaotic upheavels in our history, but these were very different from what Bill's talking about. For one thing, they didn't involve very many guns. (I've already noted that bombs are the weapon of choice for an grossly outmatched antagonist). For another, they weren't planned, and they had lost their political agenda. They were simply desperate, pissed off people who'd lost it or were wreaking some recreational havoc. The civil war provided on exception, but such a region wide revolt would not be possible in today's more homogenized, geographically mixed country. When you started shooting, your neighbor, rather than the National Guard, might well be the first one to put you down. There is no connect the dots line between private gun ownership and how government behaves, other than the NRA's standard package of voting issues. Pure electoral political power, whatever 'threat's individual may fantasize they pose to the government simply isn't noticed by said government. It therefore exists only in the minds of those who have some otherwise unsatisfied emotional need to believe in it. It would probably be more productive for those folks if, rather than preparing for the Mother of all Battles, they examine what they are missing and find a more realistic way to fulfull it.

[video:youtube]h_eBqlFpnNY Speaking of turds, would anyone care to off the emo fuck in this vid for me?

I briefly visited Argentina during their period of hyperinflation. Several areas had taken to printing their own local money, Wild West style. It was strange but wonderful to get a 5 course, white linen steak dinner at a 5 star restaurant for $2.50. On the same trip, I spent 3 weeks in Peru, which only had 8000% inflation. The heaviest item in my backpack was the stack of cash, which was being flown in from several out of country sources because the domestic mints had long since run out of capacity. I liked the Peruvians in general, they were a bit more engaging than their Bolivian counterparts, but man, did they love to steal stuff, and they were damn good at it. I suffered a few failed attempts but never lost anything. The biggest pain in the ass for the tourons I met who did get stung was not what they had stolen, but continually having their clothing and backpacks slit open. I wonder if that behavior has subsided a bit since then.

Even a cursory observation of turds can be instructive.

You're making the ridiculous implication the Medvedev's speech would have been somehow different had McCain been elected; conveniently projecting your own political bias into the Russian's actions. Oldest propaganda trick in the book. I believe it's called blowing smoke up your own ass. I reality, of course, an increasingly belligerent Russia would have greatly preferred a McCain victory, so that the bulk of our forces would continued to be tied up in our Iraqi money pit. Under Obama, many of those forces will either be freed up or redeployed closer to the Russian border. This fairly obvious conclusion would have required you to go a few steps beyond the "liberals are pussies" ceiling of your analytical capability, so I'm not too surprised at your assertions.

Even a tapeworm is beautiful to another tapeworm.

It is amazing politcally locked down I feel by not owning a gun. complete sarcasm..... I think Bill should increase his political freedom by waving his loaded arsenal around at the local mall. There may be a temporary hiatus in his physical freedom, however... Be sure and pick up a soap on a rope while you're there, Bill!

"Put silver wings, on my son's chest...." This is kind of like saying "If vastly superior aliens ever invaded, I'd find a way to defend ourselves against them." Uh, OK. Whatever you say, myan.

Doing so will mean walking away from a long term American strategic plan and billions of dollars already invested. I don't think they can do it. Sorry, time will tell though. I didn't think Clinton could balance the budget like the first campaign pledge stated and was happily proven incorrect on that one. Here's to hope and change: No. Doing so will be to walk away from a waste of a trillion dollars and pouring 340 million dollars a day down a shithole and getting nothing back. The money already invested is sunk cost; completely irrelevant. We have virtually no criteria for success in Iraq anyway, so I say Mission Accomplished as of...right now. Bye, Iraqis. Sorry about completely fucking your entire region up, but the shit's now hitting the fan at home. Most of our troops hate you hadjis and the sandbox you live in anyway. Later.

Or repeatedly stab your tiny balls with a dull fork until you bleed out; basically a real life enactment of what you do online on a daily basis.

How will you "do the right thing" for your country? Plenty of guns around the house I'd wager, but the mess you'll leave the missus! I'd go with pills. Oh, and don't forget the adult diaper and plastic sheets.

Jayb's apparently unaware of the basic business principle of sunk costs. His is, as usual, a moralistic argument the floats far, far above the world in a clean, bright atmosphere, devoid of oxygen. It doesn't really matter that the auto companies fucked up. That's in the past; there's nothing to be done about it. What matters is what to do next to mitigate the damage. Jayb has neither the life experience nor an acceptance of how the American public actually behaves to have even a remote understanding of what would happen to the entire American economy if this country lost its last large manufacturing industry. Without this understanding, he's left with his usual, tired cliche's about the free market and encouraging innovation; par for the course for someone who knows little to nothing about the commercial world. The government isn't in the business of funding private industry, so Jayb's argument that an auto company bailout ultimately diverts funds from more deserving companies is still born. This is an emergency measure to prevent a national economic disaster, nothing less. Those more deserving companies will be still born if the failure of our largest manufacturing industry takes everyone else with it. Jayb's niceties about how deserving they are will be just that. In any case, those companies do not need government assistance. The auto industry does. The American economy, even in the best of times, could never afford to lose it's auto industry. The job loss ripple effect would be far, far too devastating. It's not the best of times, not that a purist like Jayb would notice such trivialities. The government not only should, but must bail out the auto companies. Not to do so would be like watching your next door neighbors house burn down because you know they never change the batteries in their smoke alarms...and ultimately watching your own house burn down as well. It's a ideological fool's argument in the face of a much dirtier, grimmer, and more complex reality. In return, the government should obtain a huge equity stake, and legislate the required production of exactly what this country needs in terms of fuel efficient vehicles to achieve energy independence. Some say heads should roll. Fine. Kill the auto executives for all I care, but that industry must survive for the economic health of the country as whole.

he's a wonderful singer. inspirational. Ashcroft provided almost endless entertainment during his tenure. When "Si Senor Gonzales" came along, however, I realized that Ashcroft was not the bottom, nor anywhere near it. It's still incredible to me how good that criminal partisan fuck Gonzales made Ashcroft look. In addition enacting the SS's version of American human rights policy and wiping his filthy ass with our Constitution, Gonzales put icing on his legacy by completely politicized the Department of Justice. All with Bush's complete, smiling approval, of course. Fucking.Incredible. Gonzales is one guy that truly deserves to be ass rammed in a maximum security prison for the rest of his life.

What I saw from the McCain campaign and its lackeys: -Obama is a terrrorist (not true) -Obama is a muslim (not true) What I saw from the Obama campaign and its lackeys: -McCain is an "erratic", tempermental old man (true) -Palin is woefully unqualified for the position of VP (true) The difference between the two campaigns was stark. McCain, a life long mysogenist, has led a sordid love life full of prostitutes and extra marital affairs. His ethical record based on the Keating 5 scandal alone is abysmal. Obama's campaign never touched any of those issues. All in all, Obama was true to his word about running a campaign focused on the issues. In sharp contrast, McCain/Palin went after every scrap of guilt by association they could find, which amounted to nothing. When the Ayers thing got a big yawn, they tried a blatantly racist campaign to link Obama with Islam and terrorism. Disgusting. McCain had nothing on the issues save a doomed-to-fail-again re-hash of Bush's policies. It's no wonder he didn't focus on them much, instead choosing to try to smear a man who easily rose above it. Towards the end, McCains pathetic focus on Obama, devoid of any real message save the tired, anti-liberal tripe and impossibly weak innuendo that provides red meat for the nation's more ignorant half, bordered on pathological. He pounded that same nail with that same hammer, despite continually sliding poll numbers, over and over and... McCain ran the most underhanded, untruthful, and despicable campaigns I can remember. His addition of Trailer Trash Barbie fit the tone of his lie machine perfectly. The man is a complete and utter tool. Anyone who fell for his bullshit should probably kill themselves now by the most expeditious means possible. We need to voluntarily depopulate to mitigate resource depletion; it might as well be the dumber half that checks out.

Um...blacks drive Esplanades. Or Escalades. Everglades? Anyway, Cadillacs.

A Fur-trader convention....why? As astute CC.comers - you heard it here first back in April. Long before the rest of the nation had caught wind, as they still haven't to this day. Now the Fur Trading accusation is close, so close to publication. I had heard it was the hairdresser though, so maybe you can't believe everything you hear. Got to give Obama credit for not pulling this one out of the closet during his race against her in the primaries, especially when he was behind in the polls. Big props to dude. Link "At first it seemed to be just another vicious little rumour started by Village Voice editor Michael Musto back in August - but now, what started as an unfounded piece of gossip is starting to get credible confirmation from various reputable DC sources (albeit off the record of course...) Hillary Clinton has been having a lesbian affair with her top female aide, the sexy Huma Abedin. This would not be the first time that Hillary has been accused of being a lesbian, however this rumour would be the first to be backed by so many high-level reputable sources. Amongst those corroborating the story of Hilary's lesbian affair, is highly respected journalist and author Ron Rosenbaum. In his October 30 article “Shocking Inside DC Scandal Rumor: A Media Ethics Dilemma” Rosenbaum said the Los Angeles Times has a story “wrapped up and ready to go about what is a potentially devastating sexual scandal involving a leading Presidential candidate” and they are currently ’sitting on it’ because the paper can't decide “the complex ethics of whether and when to run it.” Although Rosenbaum didn’t name Clinton specifically there is enough evidence that she is in fact the target of his accusation. So what do you think? Hillary Clinton a Lesbian? 1st ever Lesbian president? Maybe she just wants to even the score with Bill by also sleeping with a female aide!" Frankly, speaking for myself and most guys on this web site: I want to see more pictures. Like hot weather, close couple beach pictures say.....NOT that it's my business of course. Just sayin' is all..... You want to see Hilary Clinton in a bikini? DOOD. Put the guns down. Get help.

Wasn't replying to you, Miss Center of the Universe.