Let's face it: there's a war going on, and most people just want to bury their heads. Most Muslims are not terrorists, but most terrorists are Muslim. This is a point you won't see made in the NYT, or the WaPo, but it is true. the more the Muslim world is faced with atrocities committed in its name, the quicker it'll get around to disowning the terror, or throwing in its lot. Either action would be clarifying.
I should have mentioned the Muslim Ramadan riots going on in Belgium right now, or the recent Muslim riots in Paris, or Muslim honor killings in Norway, the murder of a Catholic nun in Somalia, the burning of churches in the Gaza Strip, or the Berlin opera house canceling a Mozart performance in response to threats of violence from Islamists who consider "Idomenio" offensive to Muslims. Etc., etc.
You're free to quote this (vastly-inflated) count because Saddam's no longer in charge. I'd bet he'd have killed six times as many people in the same time.
Watching Muslims crash airliners into the WTC and Pentagon changes you.
Watching people jump to their deaths, rather than burning alive after Muslims crash airliners into the WTC, changes you.
Watching Muslims blow up nightclubs in Bali changes you.
Watching Muslims murder thousands in southern Thailand changes you.
Watching Muslims murder Theo van Gogh changes you.
Watching Pim Fortuyn being murdered after he called Islam a "backward religion" for its treatment of women and gays, changes you.
Watching angry Muslims scream "Death to America" every Friday changes you.
Watching the arrests of British Muslims planning to blow up airliners in mid-flight changes you.
But we don't want to consider that, do we? No, it's all about Chimpy Bushitler McHalliburton and his fascist ride through history.
I think the TSA is a waste of time and money. It's part of the September 10 mentality, only more so. On 9/11, the only plane that didn't get to its target was the one where a militia formed and fought back, while the FAA administration fled and hid. Personally, I'd disband the TSA and use its budget to offer huge rewards for people who foil airline terror plots.
So, there I am, riffling through the mail. I see a letter from the VA. I read it. It says "Dear Vet, Apart from hating you, we also might have lost enough information to allow Russian gangsters simple access to all your financial holdings."
Then I get a letter that says "Never mind."
I really do believe that the Feds have begun to channel Rosanne Rosanna-Danna.
Oh. PS from the Feds: "We still really hate you. Please die soon. Quietly."
The last time we had a census, I filled out how many people lived in the house, and nothing else. The form was *very* intrusive, asking all sorts of demographic and lifestyle questions.
Weeks later, a census worker showed up at my front door. Instead of having her with fava beans and a nice chianti, I simply refused to answer her questions about household income, number of bathrooms, races of people living in the house, etc. When she mentioned a possible fine for non-compliance, I quoted the census part of the US Constitution, and asked her where she got the authority to do anything but count heads.
My wife was a little worried at the time, but she just sent me a one-line email: "Thanak God you didn't tell them anything."
Oh, I fully accept the right of the developer to develop. No problem there. I'd just have preferred a few more trees left in place, so the apartment building wouldn't loom quite so much.
The developer took the tack that it was land, to do with as he wished, and so he did. Right up to the property line. A standard Atlanta story. It'd have been nice if he'd been willing to be a nicer neighbor, but what can you do?
Williamson says free programs like these could eventually let ordinary citizens explore their city and contribute to planning schemes.
but I really don't believe it.
We just had a developer come in and build an apartment complex next to a mature neighborhood. Imagine that one day you have trees outside your house, and the next day you have a five-storey building.
We photoshopped a representation of what the apartment complex would do to the trees, and presented it to the DeKalb County (GA) commissioners, but it made no difference. I think they could see the added tax revenue to the county, and gave not a damn about the existing houses.
I wasn't personally affected - it was a number of my neighbors at the other end of the neighborhood, but I did learn that tools and the ability to predict impact don't really matter. What really matters is money to the local taxing authority.
If he's done all this at the behest of his family, I've no doubt the day will come when he'll stop and say "What the hell?!??!", followed by a year-long drunk.
If, on the other hand, he's self-motivated, I hope he ends up with a wall of Nobels.
I pray he doen't end up as a lawyer. Of course, if he does, it won't take him too long to realize that law is the process of chewing sawdust which thousands of others have already chewed over before him, and he'll depart post-haste.
It is impossible not to notice that, in some of the poorest parts of the world, most people, most of the time, appear to be happier than we are. In southern Ethiopia, for example, the poorest half of the poorest nation on Earth, the streets and fields crackle with laughter. In homes constructed from packing cases and palm leaves, people engage more freely, smile more often, express more affection than we do behind our double glazing, surrounded by remote controls.
In Ethiopia, male life expectancy is 42.88 years. George was born in 1963. Maybe that's why the cheery peasants in the fields are cracking up with laughter: they know that even if he moves in tomorrow, they'll only have to endure his column in The Gamo Gofa Times-Herald for another year or two.
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I'd expect this sort of comment from an Anonymous Coward.
Why don't you amplify your remark. I mean, all the Jooooooooooooooooooooos in New York got a message not to go to work that day, right?
You're a barking moonbat. Lower than whale shit at the bottom of the ocean. Beneath contempt.
Christ! The Crusades ended, what, 800 years ago? And that's an excuse?
Please step away from your keyboard until you acquire an average IQ.
Let's face it: there's a war going on, and most people just want to bury their heads. Most Muslims are not terrorists, but most terrorists are Muslim. This is a point you won't see made in the NYT, or the WaPo, but it is true. the more the Muslim world is faced with atrocities committed in its name, the quicker it'll get around to disowning the terror, or throwing in its lot. Either action would be clarifying.
I got the Pim Fortuyn bit wrong. I apologize.
I should have mentioned the Muslim Ramadan riots going on in Belgium right now, or the recent Muslim riots in Paris, or Muslim honor killings in Norway, the murder of a Catholic nun in Somalia, the burning of churches in the Gaza Strip, or the Berlin opera house canceling a Mozart performance in response to threats of violence from Islamists who consider "Idomenio" offensive to Muslims. Etc., etc.
You're free to quote this (vastly-inflated) count because Saddam's no longer in charge. I'd bet he'd have killed six times as many people in the same time.
In related news, al Qaeda is polling badly in Iraq: http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/30289.html
But that doesn't serve *your* story line, does it?
Now go crawl back under your rock until you have something substantive to contribute.
Watching Muslims crash airliners into the WTC and Pentagon changes you.
Watching people jump to their deaths, rather than burning alive after Muslims crash airliners into the WTC, changes you.
Watching Muslims blow up nightclubs in Bali changes you.
Watching Muslims murder thousands in southern Thailand changes you.
Watching Muslims murder Theo van Gogh changes you.
Watching Pim Fortuyn being murdered after he called Islam a "backward religion" for its treatment of women and gays, changes you.
Watching angry Muslims scream "Death to America" every Friday changes you.
Watching the arrests of British Muslims planning to blow up airliners in mid-flight changes you.
But we don't want to consider that, do we? No, it's all about Chimpy Bushitler McHalliburton and his fascist ride through history.
I think the TSA is a waste of time and money. It's part of the September 10 mentality, only more so. On 9/11, the only plane that didn't get to its target was the one where a militia formed and fought back, while the FAA administration fled and hid. Personally, I'd disband the TSA and use its budget to offer huge rewards for people who foil airline terror plots.
And New York was going to need 100,000,000 telephone operators by the middle of the 20th century.
Get a grip, for God's sake.
So, there I am, riffling through the mail. I see a letter from the VA. I read it. It says "Dear Vet, Apart from hating you, we also might have lost enough information to allow Russian gangsters simple access to all your financial holdings."
Then I get a letter that says "Never mind."
I really do believe that the Feds have begun to channel Rosanne Rosanna-Danna.
Oh. PS from the Feds: "We still really hate you. Please die soon. Quietly."
Where civil servants become uncivil masters.
The last time we had a census, I filled out how many people lived in the house, and nothing else. The form was *very* intrusive, asking all sorts of demographic and lifestyle questions.
Weeks later, a census worker showed up at my front door. Instead of having her with fava beans and a nice chianti, I simply refused to answer her questions about household income, number of bathrooms, races of people living in the house, etc. When she mentioned a possible fine for non-compliance, I quoted the census part of the US Constitution, and asked her where she got the authority to do anything but count heads.
My wife was a little worried at the time, but she just sent me a one-line email: "Thanak God you didn't tell them anything."
Oh, I fully accept the right of the developer to develop. No problem there. I'd just have preferred a few more trees left in place, so the apartment building wouldn't loom quite so much.
The developer took the tack that it was land, to do with as he wished, and so he did. Right up to the property line. A standard Atlanta story. It'd have been nice if he'd been willing to be a nicer neighbor, but what can you do?
So, China wants a large population of smart people, trained and able to ask fundamental questions, who won't question Party Orthodoxy.
Good luck.
One of two things will happen: Another cultural revolution, or the overthrow of the regime.
Given that the PRC is a mature fascist state, I know where my money is.
but I really don't believe it.
We just had a developer come in and build an apartment complex next to a mature neighborhood. Imagine that one day you have trees outside your house, and the next day you have a five-storey building.
We photoshopped a representation of what the apartment complex would do to the trees, and presented it to the DeKalb County (GA) commissioners, but it made no difference. I think they could see the added tax revenue to the county, and gave not a damn about the existing houses.
I wasn't personally affected - it was a number of my neighbors at the other end of the neighborhood, but I did learn that tools and the ability to predict impact don't really matter. What really matters is money to the local taxing authority.
Just sayin'.
If he's done all this at the behest of his family, I've no doubt the day will come when he'll stop and say "What the hell?!??!", followed by a year-long drunk.
If, on the other hand, he's self-motivated, I hope he ends up with a wall of Nobels.
I pray he doen't end up as a lawyer. Of course, if he does, it won't take him too long to realize that law is the process of chewing sawdust which thousands of others have already chewed over before him, and he'll depart post-haste.
Your guilty pleasures are a subpoena away from being public knowledge.
"Only the dead have seen the end of war." - Plato.
Hezbollah was dug in, well-trained and well-indoctrinated, could listen in on what the Israeli's were doing, and still had its ass handed to it.
Nasrallah himself has called this war a catastrophe for Hezbollah.
In Ethiopia, male life expectancy is 42.88 years. George was born in 1963. Maybe that's why the cheery peasants in the fields are cracking up with laughter: they know that even if he moves in tomorrow, they'll only have to endure his column in The Gamo Gofa Times-Herald for another year or two.
On a related note:
http://sourcefrog.net/projects/meantime/
Here's a web site about the agreement:
http://www.dfat.gov.au/trade/negotiations/us.html
My God! Those ads really get in your face.
I can only see so many half-page ads about going back to school to get a nursing degree.
Will there be a "The Trouble with Islam" day, or a "Where were you on 9/11" day?
Not a chance.
Google's a collection of moneygrubbers happy to use US protections to make a global fortune. EVIL pricks that they are.
...comes into his own.
Well, ok, except that in this case they have a record of wanting to, oh, I don't know, assasinate authors like Salman Rushdie. Etc.