Mother, mother, mother - there's too many of you crying.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

In Montana a Green candidate was on the GOP payroll.

slow down here- how are the two different? Especially, Ty the Dems are fucking another Dem in Illinois. You think it's okay because it's okay for the party to screw a man, and in such a racist manner? I don't think you do. Try typing the words "yes the dems were bad." I'm not asking you to post it, just type the words. Can you try?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

slow down here- how are the two different? Especially, Ty the Dems are fucking another Dem in Illinois. You think it's okay because it's okay for the party to screw a man, and in such a racist manner? I don't think you do. Try typing the words "yes the dems were bad." I'm not asking you to post it, just type the words. Can you try?

I am only OK with Dems fucking other Dems, in Illinois and elsewhere, if it is consensual, which it sounds like it wasn't, and so that would be bad.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Trump doesn't lie, he bullshits.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

In Illinois, the democrats put up two fake candidates in the speaker's primary race. His challenger has the last name of Gonzales. The Machine put up "two sham candidates with Hispanic last names to split up the Hispanic vote". At least that's what Gonzales's lawsuit alleges.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...913-story.html

"The decision also indicates an interest in digging into the time-honored tradition of placing sham candidates on a ballot." Only in Illinois is this a time-honored tradition.

For years here the tradition was that when republicans thought they had a shot at a democratic race they would put up a third party candidate with the last name "Kennedy" to drain a couple percent. But there is a long tradition in Democratic primaries of trying to split the Irish vote with a couple well-named straws.

This one backfired because the Republicans were just too stupid about it. This about it - assume you're on the fence, but one side is too dumb to even cheat well.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

This one backfired because the Republicans were just too stupid about it.

Hopefully applies to McCabe too.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

For years here the tradition was that when republicans thought they had a shot at a democratic race they would put up a third party candidate with the last name "Kennedy" to drain a couple percent. But there is a long tradition in Democratic primaries of trying to split the Irish vote with a couple well-named straws.

This one backfired because the Republicans were just too stupid about it. This about it - assume you're on the fence, but one side is too dumb to even cheat well.

An actual Kennedy might be the next governor of Illinois. Too bad he's up against a guy (Pritzker) who's much richer than him.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

This piece is very good.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

The real problem is not Trump so much as the many Republicans -- most of them -- who voted for him and continue to support him.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

This piece is very good.

Generally an excellent piece, but I wouldn't say FA should be read over the NYT because of those differences in the two articles. Anne Bernard's work for the NYT on Lebanon and Syria is excellent, and she could have told you anything about Iran that was in the intercept piece (and the author ought to know that). But NYT made an editorial choice to drive the reporting out of Israel, and she's the third name on the list, and so the piece is empathetic to the Israeli view point rather than the Iranian. FA publishes such pieces too, just as the NYT also publishes some good stuff that doesn't take an Israeli perspective (this is a huge change from past NYT policies - twenty years ago, I wouldn't have said that).

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

In Illinois, the democrats put up two fake candidates in the speaker's primary race. His challenger has the last name of Gonzales. The Machine put up "two sham candidates with Hispanic last names to split up the Hispanic vote". At least that's what Gonzales's lawsuit alleges.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...913-story.html

"The decision also indicates an interest in digging into the time-honored tradition of placing sham candidates on a ballot." Only in Illinois is this a time-honored tradition.

Also outrageously ridiculous.

TM

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Generally an excellent piece, but I wouldn't say FA should be read over the NYT because of those differences in the two articles. Anne Bernard's work for the NYT on Lebanon and Syria is excellent, and she could have told you anything about Iran that was in the intercept piece (and the author ought to know that). But NYT made an editorial choice to drive the reporting out of Israel, and she's the third name on the list, and so the piece is empathetic to the Israeli view point rather than the Iranian. FA publishes such pieces too, just as the NYT also publishes some good stuff that doesn't take an Israeli perspective (this is a huge change from past NYT policies - twenty years ago, I wouldn't have said that).

(Nevermind. Accidentally responded to wrong post.)

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

This piece is very good.

Agreed.

I think one could subtitle it with "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."

I particularly liked the criticism of think tanks and the press. They happened to hit me while I'm reading Taleb's latest, Skin in the Game, in which the author rips think tanks, pure academia, and punditry, and the dilettantes they attract, for a solid 40 pages of the introduction.

Abstract thinking has its place, but its track record in recent world affairs is deplorable. Robert McNamara? Iriving Kristol? Bastardizations of Milton Friedman's work?

And modern "journalism," captured as it is? (NYTimes's greatest sin was cheerleading for the Iraq war.) MSNBC? FOX? The Fourth Estate is a trailer park. And they're dumb as all fuck. Is anyone surprised a reporter is dim or lazy enough to think something is worth printing solely because it was said by someone who works for the "[Insert] Institute"?

I recall one politician asking the right question about Iran: "Why aren't they entitled to have a nuclear program?" We can argue, of course, about whether we have a right to prevent them from having one for our own interests. But there is no credible argument that a sovereign nation may not be allowed to pursue a nuclear program.

But... that politician was Ron Paul, so the media said, "He's crazy!" Nevermind the point made. The media killed the messenger, a la Bill Maher after 9/11 ("How dare anyone say the highjackers were not cowards!").

This article is truly depressing because it clearly makes the case that the high information voter often isn't that much more enlightened (in any manner that matters) than the low. In many instances, they've simply absorbed different qualities of opinion paraded as fact. Or in some instances, biased tripe.

If Iran wants reactors, it has every right to pursue their acquisition. If we don't like it, we have a right to do whatever we can to stop it. ...And then suffer the criticisms ensuing from doing so. It'd be nice if the press wrote that. It never will.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Agreed.

I think one could subtitle it with "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."

I particularly liked the criticism of think tanks and the press. They happened to hit me while I'm reading Taleb's latest, Skin in the Game, in which the author rips think tanks, pure academia, and punditry, and the dilettantes they attract, for a solid 40 pages of the introduction.

Abstract thinking has its place, but its track record in recent world affairs is deplorable. Robert McNamara? Iriving Kristol? Bastardizations of Milton Friedman's work?

And modern "journalism," captured as it is? (NYTimes's greatest sin was cheerleading for the Iraq war.) MSNBC? FOX? The Fourth Estate is a trailer park. And they're dumb as all fuck. Is anyone surprised a reporter is dim or lazy enough to think something is worth printing solely because it was said by someone who works for the "[Insert] Institute"?

I recall one politician asking the right question about Iran: "Why aren't they entitled to have a nuclear program?" We can argue, of course, about whether we have a right to prevent them from having one for our own interests. But there is no credible argument that a sovereign nation may not be allowed to pursue a nuclear program.

But... that politician was Ron Paul, so the media said, "He's crazy!" Nevermind the point made. The media killed the messenger, a la Bill Maher after 9/11 ("How dare anyone say the highjackers were not cowards!").

This article is truly depressing because it clearly makes the case that the high information voter often isn't that much more enlightened (in any manner that matters) than the low. In many instances, they've simply absorbed different qualities of opinion paraded as fact. Or in some instances, biased tripe.

If Iran wants reactors, it has every right to pursue their acquisition. If we don't like it, we have a right to do whatever we can to stop it. ...And then suffer the criticisms ensuing from doing so. It'd be nice if the press wrote that. It never will.

"Rights" have nothing to do with it. It's a question of understanding another country's perspective so that we understand what they want and are likely to do. (Frankly, some degree of racism enters into it, because we are too quick to decide that Iranians and North Koreans are simply crazy and irrational, something we would not do with Iceland or Switzerland, for example.)

[Adder]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I'm reading Taleb's latest

Having read two of his prior works, I don't really fathom what would make someone want to subject themselves to more.

I recall one politician asking the right question about Iran: "Why aren't they entitled to have a nuclear program?" We can argue, of course, about whether we have a right to prevent them from having one for our own interests. But there is no credible argument that a sovereign nation may not be allowed to pursue a nuclear program.

Technically, they are a signatory to the non-proliferation treaty, which is a credible argument that a sovereign nation may not be allowed to pursue a nuclear program, but yeah. Probably fair to say that the subsequent revolution and actions to pursue weapons are effectively a withdrawal, though.

Anyway, they aren't "entitled" to nuclear weapons, and I don't think we should just throw up our hands and welcome it, but should be limits on what we are willing to do to prevent it that should stop far short of war.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Adder

Anyway, they aren't "entitled" to nuclear weapons, and I don't think we should just throw up our hands and welcome it, but should be limits on what we are willing to do to prevent it that should stop far short of war.

I am as worried about fire arrows as the next caveman. Lothar and the Hill People aren't entitled to fire, and I don't think we should just throw up our hands and welcome it, but there should be limits on what we are willing to do to prevent them it that should stop far short of meeting between our caves to club each other.