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Really? Who is trying to deplatform those they don't agree with? It isn't the right.

Yes it is.

Incidents at Harvard and Catholic Universities challenge idea that liberals are the only ones preventing ideas from being voiced on campuses.

"The Hosty case is only part of the growing conservative attack on freedom of speech on campus."

Data shows a surprising campus free speech problem: left-wingers being fired for their opinions

Oh please.

A. Man bites dog. You know perfectly well that the vast tide is in the other direction.

B. Seriously, Catholic universities? What would you expect? I don't think anybody would object to explicitly Leftist Universities requiring leftism from their faculty.

Really? Who is trying to deplatform those they don't agree with? It isn't the right.

Yes it is.

Incidents at Harvard and Catholic Universities challenge idea that liberals are the only ones preventing ideas from being voiced on campuses.

"The Hosty case is only part of the growing conservative attack on freedom of speech on campus."

Data shows a surprising campus free speech problem: left-wingers being fired for their opinions

Dumbest. Traitor. EVER.

Truly imagine the quality of person that Trump had to beat to make it into office. That's how low the bar was, and nothing indicates to me that it somehow has changed.

Stunningly, there are people on the left who say with a straight face that the same person/people should run again against Trump.

It seems to me the real traitors here reside in the DNC.

This is the free market at work. Exactly as intended by the corporations in charge.

This is the free market at work. It's ripe for unionization.

Good luck with that ... Sentiment from several sources (Google: Kavanaugh anti-union), quoting from the first:

Judge Kavanaugh routinely rules against workers and their families and regularly sides with employers against employees seeking justice in the workplace, including CWA members.

• CWA Opposes the Nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court
• Trump Unites Unions Against ‘Anti-Worker’ Kavanaugh for Court
• Kavanaugh Sided With Trump Casino in 2012 to Thwart Union Drive
• Brett Kavanaugh Ruled Against Workers When No One Else Did
• Brett Kavanaugh Once Sided With an Anti-Union Company That Scapegoated Undocumented Workers

THE DOCTRINE OF FASCISM-BENITO MUSSOLINI (1932)

Accepting mussolini's propaganda as an accurate description of fascism is like taking The Democratic Republic of North Korea's word that they are a democracy.

Instead, lets take the word of more neutral sources:

Although fascist parties and movements differed significantly from one another, they had many characteristics in common, including extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the rule of elites, and the desire to create a Volksgemeinschaft (German: “people’s community”), in which individual interests would be subordinated to the good of the nation.
Encyclopedia Britannica

An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization.
Oxford English Dictionary

> Now of all the players in American politics today, which group does this best describe?

These players:
The people who absolutely lose their shit at the thought of black people kneeling that they walk out of a football game.
The television network that fired a reporter who would not toe the line on climate change reporting
Colorado Republican lawmakers want to punish striking teachers with jail time.
Harper’s Editor Insists He Was Fired Over Katie Roiphe Essay - The New York Times
Professor celebrating Barbara Bush’s death deserves to be fired | Fox News
Joyce Peterson on Twitter: "Happening in Nashville right now: lawmakers trying to penalize the @CityOfMemphis for removing confederate statues by slashing a quarter million dollars in funding. https://t.co/ZAg0ntZl30"
Law Enforcement Has Quietly Backed Anti-Protest Bills in at Least 8 States Since Trump’s Election
Memphis-Based Journalist Taken Into ICE Custody After Arrest While Covering Protest (Updated) - Rewire.News
Sinclair producer in Nebraska resigns to protest 'obvious bias'
‘Black-ish’ Political Episode on Kneeling Canceled Over ‘Creative Differences’ – Variety
Republican governor forced to stop blocking Facebook users who criticize him | Ars Technica
AprilDRyan on Twitter: "It is back again. Not called on today for a question. It has been how long? Oh, my last question was about @StormyDaniels! And, I was just told I am on a list. Whatever! I have been doing this for 21 years. I am not new to the rode
Trump attends event about campus political correctness crisis, accidental

While agree the two party system could be improved various ways with additional parties and run-off type voting or other modifications, do not blame it for the reason Hillary lost or was a candidate. I.e. it was because Hillary was a bad candidate and everybody in the DNC was so afraid of the Clinton's power machine that nobody could think to have a real sit down with Hillary and tell her not to run.

I never use Facebook, so the Russians didn't somehow "mind trick" me into voting for Trump. Trump definitely can be a jerk, but I felt like I was voting for a jerk over voting for a criminal. Hillary came off to me as a criminal who thought she could fool me with her completely unbelievable email server stories. The real reason she had those servers is because she wanted to keep her backroom dealings from the prying eyes of the public.

And as I see the Russian investigation - Trump's friends were gathering evidence to get Hillary thrown in prison. That's the 'big" Russian connection, nothing more. Which to me seems entirely plausible that Hillary would have gleefully dealt with the Russians somehow if it served her purpose.

Just like she dealt with the big banks because it served her purpose then, regardless of the fact that every Democrat I knew or could see was spouting off as to how horrible the banks were. Not to mention the countless "occupy Wallstreet" protests!

Just how two-faced she is - At least Trump was honest about accepting the results of the election, which Hillary et al seems to never have done.

And I am sure Americans won't mind paying more for their goods. I am sure they won't end up going to China for them instead. There are plenty of cheap asses to go around.

Goods are already priced to maximize profits - you know that fast food chains charge the same amount for their food, whether in the U.S. or Australia where the minimum wage is twice as high? Years ago a study was done that said it would cost all of 46 cents a cart if Wal-Mart were to increase their minimum wage to $12.50 an hour - and that's if they passed all of the wage increases onto customers, as opposed to out of quarterly dividends.

Gods I'm so glad to see you saying that.

War Hero John McCain runs... we can't let him win or lose, we'd better say he's waging a WAR ON WOMEN and is SEXIST!
http://inthesetimes.com/articl...

Romney runs, a governor with a reasonably liberal history, especially regarding women's issues? One who wants to be SURE that women get representation in his possible future administration that he gets started, early, on the task of making a list of qualified women? That becomes "binders of women". Romney is waging a WAR ON WOMEN and is SEXIST!
http://www.theguardian.com/wor...

So, there's no longer any benefit to being a Republican who isn't sexist. Liberals will call every Republican sexist, no matter fucking what they do. Just go ahead and remove "is not overtly sexist" from the requirements list for being a Republican.

These people have been BEGGING for Trump. Refuse to compromise. Call everyone a bigot who doesn't agree with you. Insist it is your radical SJW bullshit way or the highway. Deny any voice at all to moderates and conservatives alike. Make no room for them at any table, wage a goddamned war. Richly deserved IMO.

Regardless of how self serving or fraudulent you may think she is, the odds of Hilary accidentally plunging the whole planet into world War three due to ineptitude seems significantly lower than with Trump.

Yes. Instead, Hillary the War Hawk will plunge the whole planet into WWIII intentionally.

Let's go with the assumption posited so frequently by the press that Donald Trump called women Bimbos and Pigs. He never said 'All women are bimbos and pigs'. He said 'Rosie O'Donnel is a pig' and 'Megyn Kelly is a bimbo'.

Before he said any of those things, there was already a long list of ugly things he'd said about women.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

People who speak in women this way have low character. They are nothing more than accessories to him. Hell, his wife gets her minks the same way minks get minks. It's all about appearance to him, and like everything else regarding Trump, that's shallow.

Forget for a moment that Trump himself is a profoundly ugly person. He's orange, with a bad combover and a neck that looks like it's filled with 2 gallons of vanilla milkshake. As my sainted grandma used to say, "You can see his soul in his face".

http://inthesetimes.com/images...

I love your comment. At the same time you accuse Trump of being harsh to women, you point out that he is profoundly ugly, and suggest that his soul is just as ugly as his face. Well, then how come he has had so many very good looking women in his life? Because women are angels, right? They dated or married him out of the inifinite goodness of their hearts, right?

Ha! Women are shit. Most women are hopelessly spoiled by being so sought after and therefore having high market value, they are selfish, vapid, manipulative, cowardly, obsessed with their own survival and self-preservation, and usually get involved with men for the social or financial assets men possess, not for the persons they actually are. The so-called "bad boys" understand that and that's why they score so often, and women like them. Only fools are kind to women more than occasionally. So you can only be a woman or a fool. Trump has may flaws, but that is not one of them.

Let's go with the assumption posited so frequently by the press that Donald Trump called women Bimbos and Pigs. He never said 'All women are bimbos and pigs'. He said 'Rosie O'Donnel is a pig' and 'Megyn Kelly is a bimbo'.

Before he said any of those things, there was already a long list of ugly things he'd said about women.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

People who speak in women this way have low character. They are nothing more than accessories to him. Hell, his wife gets her minks the same way minks get minks. It's all about appearance to him, and like everything else regarding Trump, that's shallow.

Forget for a moment that Trump himself is a profoundly ugly person. He's orange, with a bad combover and a neck that looks like it's filled with 2 gallons of vanilla milkshake. As my sainted grandma used to say, "You can see his soul in his face".

http://inthesetimes.com/images...

Hey, New Yorkers are tough -- what's a little radioactive water?

Yeah, radioactive river water is all fun and games until something like this crawls out of the slime:

http://inthesetimes.com/images...

Just imagine the babies

We don't have to imagine. We've already seen the first human-rodent hybrid:

http://inthesetimes.com/images...

Wired is a site that actually pays their writers. The internet has become a place where everybody wants stuff for free, and expects writers to be unpaid; the internet has been flailing around trying to find a model where writers can actually get paid for their work-- but having trouble finding one.

So, give them a little credit-- if you are neither willing to look at ads nor willing to pay-- basically, you want stuff for free--well, ok, don't go there: you can get plenty of free content elsewhere on the internet. It's a race for the bottom. But they are at least trying to find a way to survive and keep paying their writers.

(Hufflepuff Post is probably about the worst of the lot-- their business model is "we get millions of dollars, people who write for us get nothing.")
  http://blogpaws.com/executive-...
  http://www.mayhillfowler.com/p...
  http://inthesetimes.com/workin...
  http://nymag.com/daily/intelli...
http://www.theguardian.com/com...

Instead of spending millions lobbying why don't the unions start worker-owned companies? Because they can't cease making demands of "capitalists" anymore than a flea can jump off a plump dog

Who says they don't?

I asked Siri if she was spying on me for Apple. She said that she's not good with food.

It seems the domain knowledge in Siri is somewhat uneven. According to reports, if you ask Siri for a blow job, it will recommend escorts close to you. However, if you ask Siri to eat your pussy, it will recommend some nearby pet stores...

Really.... There's little in common with the JBS or KKK in the "Tea Party" though they've gravitated to that bunch because they've more in common with the "Tea Party" than anything else out there. That doesn't make them anything like it. However...

In regards to your remarks about the Democrats not having anything to do with the American Communist Party...

Democratic Socialists of America
Young Democratic Socialists

As said of the founder of the DSA: "Throughout his life, Harrington simultaneously embraced the thinking of Karl Marx while at the same time rejecting the "actually existing" Communist systems of the Soviet Union, China, and Eastern Europe."

You can't embrace the thinking of Marx without really ending up being a Marxist- all the "actually existing" systems are variations on the theme.

The Communist Party USA

We already know this bunch, you mention them outright...

The Movement for a Democratic Society (MDS)

This is a unifying organization that represents a unified front for orgs such as DSA, CPUSA, etc. and is comprised of members of these other organizations.

Now, where am I going with this, you might ask...

These very much Communist/Marxist organizations, work within the Democratic Party to get their way on things.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/5317/mobilized_in_motor_city/
http://mds-austin.pbworks.com/ (look for the Democratic Party Convention notes...)

There's more if you dig, but the claim that the Dems have Marxists and Communists in their make up and in their midst is an accurate one, unlike the one you made. MDS was directly involved with Obama's getting elected, has been directly involved with Democrat Party platform policies for years, and in the end, if you look at just what has been going on in this country for the last TWO years, there's been this move to try to make this country Marxist in nature, in spite of what the Constitution says on some of the actions taken.

Denying there's an influence there that permeates the organization is about like saying that the Republicans, Tea Party, or Libertarians are all members of the KKK or JBS. Neither of which is true. It is no better than saying the Dems have all the Communists there- not true either, but with the case of the leadership of the Democratic party, it IS the case if you do a bit of digging.

Do you mean governments like Pittsburgh?

"I'll field that one: Unions are irrelevant."

Now, I was going to respond thusly -- If that's true, then:

(a) Why do about half of Americans approve of labor unions?
http://www.gallup.com/poll/122744/Labor-Unions-Sharp-Slide-Public-Support.aspx#1

(b) Why is there a multi-billion dollar union-busting legal industry?
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3326/unionbusting_confidential/

But then I realized that the line "the union is irrelevant" is actually a quote from one of the union-busting lawyers in the article linked above. So I suspect that the parent post is actually just propaganda/astroturfing.

Not the most scholarly of sources, but:

http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/2797/

Although it was quite funny, it's a straw man and the study itself has some serious flaws. Some people really do have serious glandular problems or diseases causing obesity. My cousin was a beautiful young woman until she developed lupus... she went from somewhere around 120 pounds to, well, I'm not going to speculate. I'm not sure what exactly caused the obesity, it could have been anything from hormonal changes to medications she had to take, but I know her house isn't exactly filled with twinkies. I feel terrible walking around with her in public. Not because I'm embarrassed to be with an obese woman, but because I get so upset at the looks people give us. People look at her like she just killed and ate their favorite pet, then they look at me with a slightly different look of disgust.

In addition, I feel that while this may be accurate, we'd be pushing the environmentalism too far to cite it as a reason for people to lose weight. Even if it would save some energy, fuel, and materials, all of the savings are overshadowed by the significant social and medical advantages. If we could waste just a little more food and fuel to ensure a longer life expectancy, we would.

Of course, this study isn't really very good. While the global demand for food would likely drop, you'd have a significant jump in energy and oil prices. All of the formerly obese Americans, spending hundreds less on food every month, would be ready to hit the beaches, ski slopes, etc. with their extra money and less embarrassing bodies.

Finally, BMI is a shoddy system that I'm sick of seeing. BMI was developed at a time when leeching was an accepted medical practice, and hasn't changed significantly since then. BMI can not differentiate between lean mass and lard. This means that a society of body builders would have the same average BMI as a society of, well, lazy Americans.

Getting back to serious topics, it's very important to note that global food shortages (and corresponding rises in prices) are not caused by increased demand. They're caused by reduced supply, which has been, in part, caused by food aid programs. When people become dependent on food aid programs, a small series of events can raise food prices enough that food aid programs can't afford to send food. You can imagine how well this works out for impoverished areas that have lost their indigenous food production capability.

...U.S. officials surrendered a growth industry and good jobs, while making the United States dependent on China for critical military and commercial technology...

U.S. Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Indiana) appealed to the Bush administration last fall to use powers under the 1988 Exon-Florio Amendment to the defense bill to block the transfer of the Valparaiso plant on national security grounds because the operation supplied 80 percent of magnets needed for smart bombs. The plant's move to China was denounced in lengthy magazine exposés from both the right (Insight) and left (Counterpunch). But the Bush administration did nothing.

"But do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites, standing for absolutely nothing. All they do is show you've been to college." -KV

The issue is not that people have something to hide, it's that there is no oversight in what these secret programs are doing. If the FBI wants a wiretap, they can already get one by getting a warrant, a process which comes in with judicial oversight. Additionally, how can a person verify that the information is correct and, if it's not, have the information corrected?

A very real problem that can occur with unmonitored surveillance (i.e., spying) is that the data can be used for harmful and illegal and/or unconstitutional purposes. In particular, it is possible to suppress free speech by targeting political opponents with spying and pressure. The following article provides information about several cases where this has occurred: http://www.inthesetimes.com/issue/27/02/feature3.s html

How can citizens of the US have any guarantee that the US gov't is not interfering with the political process by persecuting people based on their political affiliation?

Software == Algorithms. And algorithms (being mathmatical expressions of scientific truths), should not be patentable. Copyrightable yes, but patentable, no...

This whole mess came about because of rulings by the Supreme Court and Federal Circuit court allowing both algorithms (mathmatical proofs if you will), and business method patents (the scarier patent from a business persons perspective) to exist. The business method patents hinder innovation in a way never before dreamed. Imagine you owned a business wanted to serve cereal (simplified business problem). To your horror, somebody else has already patented the business method of serving cereal in a restaurant! You are now in a lawsuit and unable to serve CEREAL to your guests! You are screwed, and the economy takes another dive...
cereal patent

I personally find it interesting when right-wingers, in efforts to their misdeeds, point to the spec in our eyes while ignoring the logs in theirs.

Labelling genetically altered foods would certainly be nice, but it seems a bit beside the point considering that it is currently illegal in the United States to test beef for Mad Cow disease.

"I am of course notoriously hooked on cigarettes. I keep hoping the things will kill me. A fire at one end and a fool at the other."

"Human beings are chimpanzees who get crazy drunk on power."

"We are all addicts of fossil fuels in a state of denial, about to face cold turkey. And like so many addicts about to face cold turkey, our leaders are now committing violent crimes to get what little is left of what we're hooked on."

"My government's got a war on drugs. But get this: The two most widely abused and addictive and destructive of all substances are both perfectly legal." (alcohol/cigs)

"History is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies and misfortunes of mankind."
"The same can be said about this morning's edition of the New York Times."

"There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don't know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president."

"For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere."

"My government's got a war on drugs. But get this: The two most widely abused and addictive and destructive of all substances are both perfectly legal." (alcohol/cigs)

"History is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies and misfortunes of mankind."
"The same can be said about this morning's edition of the New York Times."

"There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don't know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president."

"For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere."

-- 2004 Kurt Vonnegut "Cold Turkey"
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/cold_turkey/

http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/1351/

Who said anything about telling people where they can and can't go? Why would an ID prevent you from going somewhere? Is there some secret clause in this law that states that once you receive this new ID, you must get permission before traveling over state lines? My Social Security card has never prevented me from going anywhere.

Then you haven't had your name on the Do Not Fly list. Yosuf Islam, previously known as the singer Cat Stevens, found himself on it. Sen. Ted Kennedy has been barred from flying a number of tymes because his name was on it. He may of killed someone when he went off the road in a river but he's not a terrorist.

No kidding. All you have to do is scan of his list of publications to understand that Joel Bleifuss is not exactly an impartial observer - more like someone who has a vendetta:

"The Importance of Not Getting Over It"
"Lies Judith Miller Told Us"
"DeLay May Be Gone, But His Legacy Isn't"
"No Child Left Unrecruited"
"Bush Apologistas"
"Stand Up For Peace"
"Christian Restorationists"
"The New New Orleans"

From his article "The New New Orleans"

Back on message, Bush said, "This poverty has roots in generations of segregation and discrimination that closed many doors of opportunity."

That's undisputedly true, but in a strange permutation of racial politics, the color of the skin of those displaced by Katrina has been used to deflect attention away from a system of class oppression that is an equal opportunity disabler.

While race certainly has its role, American poverty is most firmly rooted in a class system--a system maintained by an economy that allocates the wealth of society to those who already have the most. One of the ways that wealth is created is to ensure that unskilled workers are not paid a living wage.


Let's take a look at Steve Freeman - he is the academic of the two. His web page is located here. He is a professor of organization, strategy, and entrepreneurship. PhD in Organization Studies from MIT. His list of papers and research are certainly impressive in the field of business organization. OK, I might want him if I were starting up a business, but certainly not as a pollster - he lacks the experience.

The real clincher though is from the FAQ:

Have you been able to obtain the "pure" data from the polling consortium? Data has been made available, but not the data that could be used to verify the validity of the election

Has evidence come to light since the publication of these pieces which would explain this exit poll discrepancy? No such evidence has come to light. All indications are that if the primary exit poll data were made available, it would conclusively show count corruption and identify where count corruption occurred. Unless there is some great public pressure or successful legal action, none of this primary exit poll data will be released.

Was the count accurate? There is little reason to have any confidence in the official count, and many reasons to question it.


He's kidding right? They don't have the data that would verify the validity of the election????????? So wouldn't this be the same data that would invalidate the election? The FAQ continues ....


Have your papers been peer reviewed? Yes. There is no formal mechanism for papers like this (nor is there any good forum in which to publish them), but when I leave a "t" uncrossed in these papers, people write to the dean and demand my dismissal (actually, they do that anyway). The conclusions of the initial paper, in fact, has been accepted, and the "debate" has moved on.

I guess refereed journals such as "The Journal of Politics", "Journal of the American Statistical Association", "Political Analysis", "American Journal of Political Science" are not good forums to publish their results in. Translation: We couldn't find a reputable journal who would publish our results in so we'll release a book. I am also glad that although they couldn't publish their work, the results have been accepted and the "debate" has moved on.

No kidding. All you have to do is scan of his list of publications to understand that Joel Bleifuss is not exactly an impartial observer - more like someone who has a vendetta:

"The Importance of Not Getting Over It"
"Lies Judith Miller Told Us"
"DeLay May Be Gone, But His Legacy Isn't"
"No Child Left Unrecruited"
"Bush Apologistas"
"Stand Up For Peace"
"Christian Restorationists"
"The New New Orleans"

From his article "The New New Orleans"

Back on message, Bush said, "This poverty has roots in generations of segregation and discrimination that closed many doors of opportunity."

That's undisputedly true, but in a strange permutation of racial politics, the color of the skin of those displaced by Katrina has been used to deflect attention away from a system of class oppression that is an equal opportunity disabler.

While race certainly has its role, American poverty is most firmly rooted in a class system--a system maintained by an economy that allocates the wealth of society to those who already have the most. One of the ways that wealth is created is to ensure that unskilled workers are not paid a living wage.


Let's take a look at Steve Freeman - he is the academic of the two. His web page is located here. He is a professor of organization, strategy, and entrepreneurship. PhD in Organization Studies from MIT. His list of papers and research are certainly impressive in the field of business organization. OK, I might want him if I were starting up a business, but certainly not as a pollster - he lacks the experience.

The real clincher though is from the FAQ:

Have you been able to obtain the "pure" data from the polling consortium? Data has been made available, but not the data that could be used to verify the validity of the election

Has evidence come to light since the publication of these pieces which would explain this exit poll discrepancy? No such evidence has come to light. All indications are that if the primary exit poll data were made available, it would conclusively show count corruption and identify where count corruption occurred. Unless there is some great public pressure or successful legal action, none of this primary exit poll data will be released.

Was the count accurate? There is little reason to have any confidence in the official count, and many reasons to question it.


He's kidding right? They don't have the data that would verify the validity of the election????????? So wouldn't this be the same data that would invalidate the election? The FAQ continues ....


Have your papers been peer reviewed? Yes. There is no formal mechanism for papers like this (nor is there any good forum in which to publish them), but when I leave a "t" uncrossed in these papers, people write to the dean and demand my dismissal (actually, they do that anyway). The conclusions of the initial paper, in fact, has been accepted, and the "debate" has moved on.

I guess refereed journals such as "The Journal of Politics", "Journal of the American Statistical Association", "Political Analysis", "American Journal of Political Science" are not good forums to publish their results in. Translation: We couldn't find a reputable journal who would publish our results in so we'll release a book. I am also glad that although they couldn't publish their work, the results have been accepted and the "debate" has moved on.

I really shouldn't even bother, but here goes:

First of all, how many people do you know that first of all would go through the trouble of getting tased just to get one belief out there? Second of all, how many people do you know that actually expect to get videoed just because they're shouting their beliefs in the library? Third, how many "morons" do you know that become "rich" because they saying what they felt was true so they were tased by police 5 times? Furthermore, he was tased while on the ground being told if he didn't get up he'd be tased again!

According to an article by Silja J.A. Talvi, "People who have experienced the effect of a Taser typically liken it to a debilitating, full-body seizure, complete with mental disorientation and loss of control over bodily functions."

So next time you think you're going to be wise and bitch about how people can make so much money off of such an easy thing, try it before you do it!

High turnout is bad for the right wing.

Um, except in the previous election (here, I'm referring to the US), when it was the Republicans' ability to create a high turnout that was credited with much of their election success.

Actually, the Republicans appear to have won the 2004 election by magically creating millions of votes out of nowhere... it's probably not the best example for the point you're trying to make: The exit polls were right -- Freeman and Mittledorf.

And in general, it's a pretty well-accepted truism that high-turnouts in the US favor the Democrats -- ir appears that conservatives are better about getting their act together to fill in forms, which is not necessarily something for the Democrats to be proud of. Though on the other hand, if you're inclined to think of the Democrats as the party of the little guys, that appears to be pretty accurate -- a lot of the voter fraud exploits the Republicans were using in 2004 involved trying to disenfanchise the downtrodden (e.g. ex-convicts, black people, etc).

Proponents of this initiative boast that other data mining systems, such as Starlight, have already proven their worth in the fight against terrorism. However, given the fact that the current administration knew full well that Osama bin Laden intended to use hijacked airliners as missiles in a terrorist strike, but chose not to act, and that the CIA managed to uncover this information without a wholesale violation of the privacy of American citizens, I really can't see the justification here.

Why exactly does the Bush administration need such vast amounts of information to conduct their 'war on terror'? And why were they unable to use the perfectly good intel they did possess to thwart the worst terrorist attack ever on American soil?

One thing's for sure...it doesn't really matter whether the people OK this initiative or not, as Dubya & Company have amply demonstrated a complete contempt for the law of the land.

Actually, it's the Corporate Justice System. Prisoners make fine cheap laborers for a good number of American corporations, as well as a profit center for said corporations and privately run correctional facilities. Now do you understand why having some reefer is an imprisonable offense? It's always the dollars. (Not surprisingly, Tom DeLay has profitted from prison profit centers. Hopefully someone will now profit from his imminent incarceration...)

You mean there was no such thing as the Concorde? Heh. Dude, I'll tell you what I tell the Americans too: please don't get your "facts" about other countries purely from propaganda.
I mean the Concorde was not created by a single country. :D Tu-144 was.

There's a fine line between parity and having 2-3 times the army of the whole NATO combined. We're talking countries combined which had more than twice your population, and an order of magnitude more powerful economies.

The number of soldiers is just one indicator. Why aren't you surprised that the United States spends nearly three times that of all its potential adversaries combined (and almost as much as during the Cold War)? The Army the Soviet Union had was adequate for its defence. Nobody would support a huge army just in spite.

Not enough of either of them per capita, that's what you didn't have. Your industry divided by the population lagged behind more and more. And it was more and more lagging behind technologically, as in: more and more of what you produced was lower tech. Which is really why it lagged. All while military spending per capita was growing higher and higher.

Aha! Now I get it. In 1917 we had higher tech industry, with tons of different products per capita. But then with each passing year we had less and less and it was lower and lower tech. Now I get it. You really make no sense at all.

Yeah, technically you had a bit of every industry, but in some cases after you subtract the part that was producing or researching exclusively to support the army, you're left with... well, let's put it like this: _technically_ you had some, in the same way as I _technically_ have an agriculture, because I have a couple of potted plants on the balcony.
This simply isn't true. Military expenditures were high, that's true. According to Ponomarenko A., they were 1416% of GDP in 1960s, 1013% in 1970s and 89% in 1980s. For comparision, the United States spent about 67% of GDP in 19651988. Considering that a) the US economy was larger than the Soviet economy and that b) other NATO countries spent money too, it was not surprising that the Soviet Union had to spend a bit more. But that hardly matters that much.

At some point, Gorbachev found the country in a position where it just didn't have enough industrial capacity (after subtracting all the expenses) to keep up with the NATO any more. That's why he, and most of the supreme soviet for that matter, rushed to suddenly play nice and democratic. Because there just wasn't enough industrial capacity left to keep up the old "we can bury you all" game and facade.
That is a lie. Gorbachev is a traitor and a liar. For example (speaking about the same figures), in 1991 he claimed that the Soviet Union spent +20% of its GDP on defence. Careful scientific analysis carried out by specialists (historians, economists, military strategists, etc.) shows that this is demonstrably false. In the late 1980s defence spendings amounted to about 6-7%.

So if you don't believe me about the state of the industry, hell, I guess you can argue that with them too, then. Because it didn't look more viable to your own supreme soviet either.
Gorbachev is a liar. That was demonstrated time and again. He was motivated to destroy the Soviet Union (paid by Pizza Hut, may be) and he did it.

So I guess you didn't plunder the resources of the whole Eastern Europe after WW2, right? I happen to know first hand that whole countries were not just drained of some mineral resources to support the URSS economy, but in a couple of cases were left literally depleted of some resources. So, please. Spare me the propaganda.

Any examples? Spare me baseless accusations. Please tell me which exactly whole countries were literally depleted of some resources that were sent to the Soviet Union either for free o

"In my opinion Diebold's election system is one of the greatest threats our democracy has ever known, and the only way this will be exposed is with a Congressional investigation with subpoenas of not just Diebold officials but Diebold technicians."

Yes, I'd agree with that. But good luck with a congressional investigation, they probably won't even be able to get a real room to have meeting about it. Just like Downing Street. Karl Rove is a genius.

What butthole did the democrats have there heads up when let this scam be part of the 2004 election? They had 4 years! How you can have a company with the contract to build paperless voting machines being run by a loyalist to the incumbant party and not have the opposition do anything about it - IS RIDICULOUS!

I hope there is an upset in 2006, or it is going to be another 2 years of a radical Whitehouse running around unchecked, digging the US into deeper holes at every turn.

But really, were is the outrage? I mean this is your democracy?!

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In comparison, Madagascar made $18 million, just last weekend, and nearly $130 million total US box office in the last three weeks.

I'm curious to know how many screens each of these movies were released on. (A bit of digging.)

Princess Mononoke:

The movie is playing on only 47 screens and has a per screen average of $5,171, which is the fifth highest per screen average out of the top 30 movies. (Source)

The final numbers were released on Tuesday for the opening weekend (limited release) of Princess Mononoke. The movie played only on eight screens throughout the U.S., bringing in $144,446 to place 33rd at the Box Office. However, the per screen average for Princess Mononoke was a hefty $18,000 which was good enough for second place (out of the top 60) in per screen average. First place went to Being John Malkovich , which had a per screen average of $25,509. (Ibid.)

Spirited Away:

Disney, stung by the flop of its poorly dubbed version of Princess Mononoke, cautiously floated Spirited Away to 26 theaters in September. Now that number is up to 151, and the film is gamely holding its own on a crowded playing field. (Red Dragon, for example, hogged 3,363 screens on its opening weekend.) (Source)

Madagascar: probably playing in every first-run theatre, on multiple screens, at multiple times.

[sarcasm]Gee, I wonder why the box office totals are the amounts they are.[/sarcasm]

I think another comment had it right: perhaps these movies and stories are too complex for a the majority movie goers who expect animation to be simplistic, moralasing children stories.

Anybody remember the AMBER Act... which was (imo) a good 'thing'?

Did you know Senator Joe Biden (D-Del.) snuck, the RAVE Act into the AMBER Act (See H.R. 834 Source: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi ?dbname=108_cong_bills&docid=f:h834ih.txt.pdf (Note: this is a PDF file)).

Do you even know what the RAVE Act was? Here's a snip:

Section 305 of the CLEAN-UP Act stipulates that:

`Whoever, for a commercial purpose, knowingly promotes any rave, dance, music, or other entertainment event, that takes place under circumstances where the promoter knows or reasonably ought to know that a controlled substance will be used or distributed in violation of Federal law or the law of the place where the event is held, shall be fined under title 18, United States Code, or imprisoned for not more than 9 years, or both.'

Under the provision, any concert promoter, nightclub owner and arena or stadium owner could be fined and jailed, since a reasonable person would know some people use drugs at musical events."

The thing about this Act is, "Taken literally, the law is so broad that letting people smoke marijuana at a private house party could be a federal felony." Source: http://inthesetimes.com/comments.php?id=322_0_2_0_ C

Salon.com's take was, "Your glow stick could land you in jail" By Janelle Brown
.
Event Promoters could get up to 20 years in jail and a $250,000 fine if participants do drugs.
Source: http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2003/04/16/rave/i ndex_np.html

Having been one of 'those' who implemented usenet and having invested many hours into trying to understand, I offer this for consideration.

If there was a plan that was created about the time of MacAurther, "THEY" did not count on the existence of the Internet. Source: http://www.flyingsnail.com/Dahbud/theplan.html

Use your imagination and picture how things might be if there were no Internet....

Then figure out what "THEY" will attempt to control next...that will probably be attached to another major bill....and not the one that comes in your mailbox every month.

This site is a worthwhile visit: http://www.unrealid.com/

http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/553/

"And do you know why I think [George W. Bush] is so pissed off at Arabs? They invented algebra. Arabs also invented the numbers we use, including a symbol for nothing, which nobody else had ever had before. You think Arabs are dumb? Try doing long division with Roman numerals."

not entirely historically accurate, but i thought it was funny. you can read the full article here

• Improper storage of cocoa and marshmallows
• Posession with intent to distribute of a conterfeit Rubik's Cube
• Violation of a work visa (after the employer was ordered to fire him)
• Eating curry?
• Photographing Cheney's Hotel
• Finding sensors on public lan near area 51
• Bribing city officials to let customers touch topless dancers

If this was on SNL 4+ years ago it would have been some funny shit.

Yes we do. Or at least the Bush adminstration says we do.

Also on the drawing board are un-manned satellite gunships that would smash earthly targets with non-explosive tungsten rods. Such projectiles, known as “Rods from God,” would be so hard and traveling so fast that they could penetrate and destroy a four-story underground bunker.

His style can take a little getting used to, and on a controversial subject I imagine it could be even harder to understand him. It doesn't help that the OP linked to Micheal Moore's reposting instead of the orignal on In These Times

Anyway I also wanted to let you know that I've 'friended' you because of your reply - reasonable discussions are rare enough these days in any medium that it's worthwhile to befriend anyone that demonstrates they are able to carry one out :)

>compelling motivation to vote "NOTKerry"

What's the compelling motivation to not vote for Kerry?

I can see the anti-Bush side. I mean he DID start a war for no apparent reason, killing 17 thousand people in the process (including Iraqis). http://www.iraqbodycount.net/

Apparently, Kerry's not a good leader because he sometimes changes his mind... It's not exactly going to send him to the same circle of hell.

And now, buried in the BushCo press, the news that Bush knew that there were no Iraqi WMDs, nuclear, biological, chemical or otherwise. Even the 7/04 Senate "Intelligence" whitewash report stated that "that the White House 'misrepresented' classified intelligence by eliminating references to contradictory assertions", misleading America. Stop lying about these oafs and get with the program of defending America from the nightmare they've woven around us.

Slashdotters constantly whine about how out of touch with technology gov't is. That is until it comes to law enforcement. Then they want the cops to be restricted to using laws designed for 1960 on criminals using technology from 2004.

I do not think this is quite true. The Patriot Act does not say to throw out all of your 1960's equipment and to buy new equipment created in the 21st century. Nor does it say to stop using the laws which were written in the 1960s. It simply broadens those laws as well as loosens the restrictions on when and how the laws can be applied.

Such as wire taps. It used to be that all wire taps (because of Watergate) had to be requested - now they do not. The reason being that in Watergate (1970s if I remember correctly) wiretaps were used by the republicans against the democrats illegally and I believe it was the FBI who did it under direction of the White House staff and/or president.

Now, not thirty years later, wiretaps can again be done without restraint so long as it can be construed to be in defense of the nation. (Which is strange because the republicans are again in office and it means we can have another Watergate and say it is justified because of a terrorist threat.) Also, suspected terrorists can be taken in and held without recourse for an indeterminate amount of time. (As has already happened.)

So basically, we want the cops to be restricted so that they play by the same rules we would have to play by if we were playing at being cops. That being - that there should be equitable checks and balances between the need to investigate possible problems as well as to retain our liberties. "And how," you ask, "do we do that?" Simple - we need a check and balance system which allows someone (say a judge) to decide if a certain action should or should not be taken. Which is (more or less) what we had before the Patriot Act came along.

To be fair though, we could use some changes. The FBI, CIA, NSI, CG, DPS, PDs, FDs, armed forces, and all other emergency agencies should all operate under one system. The reason they didn't was to make it harder to create a Police State. The reason they should is so known offenders can not disappear as easily as they can. So some changes - yes. Police State - no. Yanking people into who-knows-where who say things outside of what someone else considers to be the norm - no. Arresting people who steal - yes. Not using standard practices to do so - no. (ie: Sending Certified, Return Receipt letters to people when dealing with cease and desist matters [instead of E-MAIL!] or a courier if the person refuses to sign for the letter.) And the most controversial part - involving the FBI - yes - IF, as in this case, the person or persons were trafficing across state boundaries. When that happens - it becomes a federal offense and a matter for the FBI. With or without the Patriot Act.