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Here's a letter to the editor from my local paper http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2011/jul/27/letters-editors/?opinionletters quote:Wealthy people make sacrifices Wont someone think of the rich!
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 14:24 |
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# ? May 23, 2024 16:10 |
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Yes, the only reason poor people aren't rich is because they aren't willing to work 14 to 16 hours a day.
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 15:25 |
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Gee, I wonder what happens when you compare how much they paid versus how much of the total income they make. I BET there's a correlation. But maybe that's just crazy talk.
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 15:29 |
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Lee Harvey Oswald posted:Here's a letter to the editor from my local paper the top 10% payed 71% of taxes while only controlling 71% of the nation's wealth. Socialism!
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 15:34 |
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Cal wrote again today about how Norwegians should be armed to the teeth. I'm starting to think he gets his paycheck from the NRA or something.quote:How long would the Norway gunman have lasted in Texas or any state where concealed-carry laws are on the books? I ran a survey while on a cruise: in Texas, 3 minutes; in Montana, 7 to 8 minutes; in Arizona, 2 minutes; and in Nevada, 3 to 5 minutes. I also loving love how he completely ignores Norway's extremely low violent crime rate under gun restriction laws. (Also holy poo poo, according to this, 1.3 million registered guns are in the hands of only 300k Norwegians?)
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 18:12 |
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Saint Sputnik posted:Cal wrote again today about how Norwegians should be armed to the teeth. I'm starting to think he gets his paycheck from the NRA or something. No shooting would ever take place in Texas. Especially around people well trained in the use of weapons and combat.
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 18:17 |
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Just whipped this up, that site is full of stats and good for quick comparisons.
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 18:22 |
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A survey on a cruise? Cal Thomas is a hard hitting reporter folks!
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 18:28 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:What really bothers me about conservative assholes like Cal Thomas is that they are intentionally ignoring the fact that Norway has very low crime rates and small prison populations compared to the US. These positive results are very likely due to all the social welfare programs that prevent crime in the first place and far more humane prison policies that reduce recidivism, but such policies are anathema to conservative ideologues like Thomas. I love how the U.S. reaction to this - and to the shooting of that democratic candidate - was 'let's loosen up gun laws', whereas Norwegians have basically said 'terrorise all you want, we aren't going to stoop to your level'.
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 18:33 |
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Peanut President posted:Several local small town post offices are probably gonna get closed, this was in the comments: But things in the private sector close all the time!
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# ? Jul 27, 2011 19:35 |
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Bubbacub posted:Yes, the only reason poor people aren't rich is because they aren't willing to work 14 to 16 hours a day. This is true in a way, actually. If they'd worked willingly that implies they could choose to say no, and thus in order to make them work that much they'd have to be drat well compensated. The problem is that they unwillingly work ridiculous hours.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 01:23 |
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Bubbacub posted:Yes, the only reason poor people aren't rich is because they aren't willing to work 14 to 16 hours a day. Orange Devil posted:This is true in a way, actually. If they'd worked willingly that implies they could choose to say no, and thus in order to make them work that much they'd have to be drat well compensated. The problem is that they unwillingly work ridiculous hours. There was a news story a few months back about how McDonald's was hiring 40,000 new employees in one of the largest hiring plans by a single employer. To her credit, Diane Sawyer actually investigated the matter and found that the vast majority of the positions (over 90% if I remember correctly) were standard customer service jobs in their restaurants paying only slightly above minimum wage, and a household with both adults working full-time at these positions would still be below the poverty line. She pointedly asked a McDonald's executive about it during an interview, to which the executive was basically caught off-guard and was a bit flustered before replying that there still were some jobs at higher levels within the company and which paid better. It wasn't just on the nature of the 40,000 jobs where McDonald's was being deceptive, the executive whom Diane Sawyer interviewed actually began at one of these positions and rose to VP position within the company. It's obvious that the implication they are trying to send out is that such advancement is possible within their company, which is true, but they are relying on the public not being insightful enough to realize that this woman is the exception and most of their employees work dead-end McJobs for terrible remuneration. This is a tangible example of the kind of deception and lying by omission that wealthy individuals and corporations rely on to perpetuate the misconception that upward mobility is not only possible but likely, and all poor people have to do is work hard and they'll be rewarded or at least not be poor anymore.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 08:35 |
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THE GAYEST POSTER posted:No shooting would ever take place in Texas. Especially around people well trained in the use of weapons and combat. Awesome example given that no soldiers are allowed to carry guns at fort hood.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 09:00 |
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Saint Sputnik posted:Cal wrote again today about how Norwegians should be armed to the teeth. I'm starting to think he gets his paycheck from the NRA or something. That's because guns are a panacea to crime for conservatives. Every crime imaginable can pretty much be solved and prevented just by adding guns into the mix. The most hilarious part is that there might be some effect in having citizens capable of protecting themselves, but it's not just a simply matter of having more guns. People actually need to know how to use them and that doesn't mean some target shooting. You'd actually have to teach gun owners how to effectively use a weapon in a real firefight against something that's going to fight back. There was a somewhat amusing ABC News piece after a major violent massacre (Virginia Tech, I think) where they put a bunch of random people in a classroom with paint ball guns and had someone barge in like a school shooter. The people were supposed to take him out and save everyone, but most people instinctively just hid and those that did shoot at him missed wildly and were basically not likely to stop the perpetrator before they killed or injured everyone. The results might be slightly different if everyone involved was already a gun owner, but I doubt it would be much different, e.g. the Tuscon, AZ shooting. Regardless, guns are a panacea to them so that they don't have to acknowledge that they are not just intentionally ignoring but actually directly demonize policies that would actually reduce all crime, including violent crime. Conservatives consistently and nearly constantly demonize the very social welfare policies that Norway has, which are likely some of the main contributors to their very low crime rates. Many (most?) conservatives don't really care about implementing rational policies that would actually create the effects they desire. All they care about is promoting the policies they like (e.g guns, tax cuts, deregulation, etc.) and just convince themselves that those policies, in absence of all empirical facts (and often contrary to actual empirically-supported research and statistics), will lead to those consequences they say will happen. Shalebridge Cradle posted:the top 10% payed 71% of taxes while only controlling 71% of the nation's wealth. Socialism! This is exactly what I'm talking about. They don't care about actual evidence and statistics about who has how much money/wealth. They just think it sounds unfair that a small group of (insanely rich) people pay the majority of taxes, while a bunch of freeloading (incredibly poor, by American standards, e.g. price index, inflation) people don't pay any federal income tax (even though they pay virtually all other taxes, which are generally the regressive ones that hurt the poor even more than the progressive federal income tax). "Flat tax" sounds fair and equal until you actually know that most of the wealth is controlled by a tiny minority who tricks everyone else into fighting over the scraps. Ned posted:A survey on a cruise? Cal Thomas is a hard hitting reporter folks! I'm simultaneously amused and enraged that he thinks that it's somehow valid research or at the very least equivalent to the work of actual pollsters and researchers who develop, administer, and analyze surveys/inventories. It's basically that anti-intellectualism Sarah Palin is so fond of. Who needs education, training, and experience in research methods and statistics when you can just ask a bunch of other people around you on a cruise for objective evidence? The homespun wisdom of "real" Americans is more important than asking any real "experts" or having any methodological "rigor."
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 09:16 |
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calmasahinducow posted:Awesome example given that no soldiers are allowed to carry guns at fort hood. Yeah, I was going to write the same thing. Most weapons on domestic military bases are locked away unless they are being used under authorization, e.g. sentries/guards, specific training requiring them, etc. Cahal posted:I love how the U.S. reaction to this - and to the shooting of that democratic candidate - was 'let's loosen up gun laws', whereas Norwegians have basically said 'terrorise all you want, we aren't going to stoop to your level'. We all know how stupid that is. What Norway needs to do is torture some Muslims (any will do) and start a few unwinnable foreign wars against perceived enemies under the auspices that if they win those wars, there will never be any terrorism Norway ever again.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 09:19 |
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calmasahinducow posted:Awesome example given that no soldiers are allowed to carry guns at fort hood. There were people with CC at the Giffords shooting. If I recall correctly, one of them later said he didn't draw because he didn't know who was doing what and it makes sense. Let's imagine you're nearby during the Giffords attack. You're standing somewhere doing a thing, you hear shots and screams so you think to yourself "Finally my chance!" and you pull your gun out and leg it to the commotion, where you see a people running everywhere, people on the ground crying/dead and man with a gun aiming at somebody and obviously about to shoot. You can't see who he's aiming at but that's not important because you've only got one moment in time to act and save somebody's life. You remember your classes and your drills, you pull out your weapon you sight carefully, you breathe out and squeeze the trigger. Man with gun gets hit, drops, grats you're a hero! Except. The guy you just show was another CC holder just like you who was also responding to the shots and screams(also one of your bullets went through the almost-hero and killed a kid half a block away). Does anybody have any way this could be avoided while still relying on random people possessing weapons as a way to deter crime?
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 09:28 |
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katlington posted:There were people with CC at the Giffords shooting. If I recall correctly, one of them later said he didn't draw because he didn't know who was doing what and it makes sense. How about proper social programs that include adequate treatment for the mentally ill (possibly as part of some kind of universal healthcare program) which basically prevent most of those kinds of incidents in the first place, rendering the random, armed citizens as just a bunch of people with security blanket substitutes.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 10:11 |
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Adding to the confusion and unlikelihood anyone would have shot back: Breivik was dressed as a cop. I want to see someone start advocating making cops illegal in light of that. I was wrong about Cal Thomas writing a second pro-gun article yesterday, that was Michael "did I mention my dad was Ronald?" Reagan. But here's Cal's article today: quote:Texas Republican governor and potential presidential candidate Rick Perry will headline a “Call to Prayer for a Nation in Crisis” on Aug. 6 at Reliant Stadium in Houston. Literally "gently caress the poor, God doesn't even want you to bother praying for them."
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 18:09 |
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" nations with the most prosperous economies are the ones with the most limited governments." Somalia - a beacon of light to us all
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 18:34 |
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quote:Perhaps what’s needed is less praying for results favorable to one side and more listening to what the One to whom each side is praying has already said. Given how well Rick Perry's prayer for rain worked this year, it sounds like the One is saying, "gently caress you, Rick Perry."
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 18:57 |
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Saint Sputnik posted:the poor population in 2009 was 14.3 percent, five percentage points lower than in 1964 when Lyndon Johnson announced a “War on Poverty.” Today’s poor, however, have a far different profile than they did back then. The war on poverty has had success at combatting poverty, therefore we must stop it. They are angry the poor people we have aren't living in shanty towns like during the great depression.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 20:18 |
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Shalebridge Cradle posted:The war on poverty has had success at combatting poverty, therefore we must stop it. They are angry the poor people we have aren't living in shanty towns like during the great depression. Yeah, I don't quite get that line. So the war on poverty has achieved some level of success? Why is that a bad thing?
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 20:29 |
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Shalebridge Cradle posted:The war on poverty has had success at combatting poverty, therefore we must stop it. They are angry the poor people we have aren't living in shanty towns like during the great depression. If you aren't miserable 24/7, you have no right to complain.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 20:29 |
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I especially like how having TWO color televisions, a/c, and an Xbox suddenly means you've "made it". Whenever I see somebody with two TVs, I know I think "drat, this person is loaded!" You think they could use net worth or something as a metric rather than which inexpensive electronics are in the house. It's not like electronics slide into obsolescense quickly or anything, right?
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 21:18 |
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But I'm an old man with lots of money and I don't have an xbox or iPhone! *hops into a limo for a 5k a plate fundraiser*
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 21:27 |
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I like the fact that they ALWAYS say that they're color TVs. As if having black and white TVs is perfectly ok with them, or possible to do in 2011.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 21:34 |
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fishmech posted:I like the fact that they ALWAYS say that they're color TVs. As if having black and white TVs is perfectly ok with them, or possible to do in 2011. It's kind of a re-assuring affirmation of the target demographic of these emails... Also sad that indicates how long the EXACT same thing has been circulated...
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 21:42 |
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Well, since I live in the DC Metro area, I get one of the worst papers in the country shoved towards me at the subway station every day. These are both from yesterday's paper alone, but it's a year's worth of stupid. One isn't a bad column so much as a cringe worthy conclusion, and the other one is just First, a man who no one cares about yet he still has his face on newspaper boxes citywide, Michael Barone: "Under Obama, Millennials move into the GOP column" http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/07/under-obama-millennials-move-gop-column Ok, well, first off, it's exclusively among white people according to the actual polls, and still the most movement is towards being an Independent, but otherwise it's just a "meh" column. However, lines like this used by anyone make me cringe: quote:In the wake of the 2008 election, I argued that there was a tension between the way Millennials lived their lives -- creating their own iPod playlists, designing their own Facebook pages -- and the one-size-fits-all, industrial-era welfare-state policies of the Obama Democrats. What kids really want is no funding for education and tax cuts which OBVIOUSLY create like 10000000 jobs. This can clearly be seen in the way they use Facebook. Seriously, I'm just sick of these stupid arguments that Facebook is some great sign of generational originality and philosophy and not a time wasting communication tool. And now, the main even: "An officer and a gentleman" http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/07/officer-and-gentleman quote:Rep. Allen West, R-Fla., is an officer and a gentleman, a career soldier elected to Congress in the 2010 midterms. First off, I love when "feminist" is still used as a bad word. Secondly, that man was in movies. Great generals were also drunks, homosexuals, and violent sociopaths in some cases. Maybe you should consider that all that stuff was, you know, fiction? And speaking the way Bronte wrote is akin to sticking feathers in your butt to be a chicken.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 23:09 |
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Goatman Sacks posted:" nations with the most prosperous economies are the ones with the most limited governments." And then there's China.
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# ? Jul 28, 2011 23:19 |
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fishmech posted:I like the fact that they ALWAYS say that they're color TVs. As if having black and white TVs is perfectly ok with them, or possible to do in 2011. I'm pretty sure that it's because the survey/study is actually pretty old, maybe from the 80s? That's also why VCRs are mentioned. The XBox could be from another study, and he's just mixing up statistics into a Heritage Foundation poo poo sundae. e: Wrong, it's from 2004, using data from 2001. http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2004/01/understanding-poverty-in-america Still no mention of Xboxes, so he is just mashing up statistics. Neptr fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Jul 29, 2011 |
# ? Jul 29, 2011 00:02 |
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I haven't picked on the Gainesville Times lately. Their letters to the editor are absolutely gold.quote:Look for Obama to take on gun control if he wins second term If that's not enough, a follow-up from another reader: quote:In response to Dr. Tom Smiley's letter about President Barack Obama and guns, I have to make a few comments.
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 00:14 |
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RC and Moon Pie posted:Sorry, but in a base environment (as opposed to acidic) lead won't leach. Thank goodness for all that basic rain!
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 00:23 |
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Makes me want to write a followup to both of those.quote:I couldn't agree more with the previous citizens' bold and informative words. Furthermore -- Oh excuse me there's a knock at the door. Let me just reach for my bedside handgun and...
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 01:40 |
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Allen West is funny because he's a war criminal who ran on a platform of "I'm a war criminal!" and got elected because Americans love war criminals.
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 02:33 |
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calmasahinducow posted:Awesome example given that no soldiers are allowed to carry guns at fort hood. Literally assassinated a President in Texas and back in the good ol' days (when everyone had guns) Texas had it's own nation shaking massacre http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Whitman I wonder how many people he could have taken out if he had an assault rifle
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 03:59 |
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RC and Moon Pie posted:I haven't picked on the Gainesville Times lately. Their letters to the editor are absolutely gold. That's some pretty classic fearmongering, including the oft-mentioned conservative trope that the UN is trying to ban private gun ownership. I've not heard about any gun clubs getting shut down, but I bet it was because they were shooting out on public land or somewhere else where they didn't own the property and were basically polluting by shooting large amounts of lead ammunition. If true, they probably would have been left alone if they simply just switched to "green" rounds that use tungsten and other metals instead of lead. Thenipwax posted:I especially like how having TWO color televisions, a/c, and an Xbox suddenly means you've "made it". Whenever I see somebody with two TVs, I know I think "drat, this person is loaded!" You can buy an old original Xbox for dirt cheap today, so it really shouldn't matter if a poor family has an Xbox. Hell, they might have even gotten it from Goodwill or some other charitable organization after it was donated by some middle class or wealthy kid that got a 360 for Christmas. De Nomolos posted:"An officer and a gentleman" The best part is that Allen West is a "gentleman" for his vitriolic diatribe against Wasserman Schultz, but she is somehow a "shrew" because she originally asked how West can support Republican debt ceiling proposals that cut Medicare benefits when he represents so many elderly people in Florida. One is a legitimate question that many of his constituency might be interested in and the other is someone deflecting criticism with indignation to prevent people from realizing what a selfish prick he is. Goatman Sacks posted:Allen West is funny because he's a war criminal who ran on a platform of "I'm a war criminal!" and got elected because Americans love war criminals. He's a war criminal?
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 07:03 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:He's a war criminal? Yep While serving in Taji, Iraq, West received information from an intelligence specialist about a reported plot to ambush him and his men.[11] The alleged plot reportedly involved Yahya Jhodri Hamoodi, a civilian Iraqi police officer.[11] West, who was not responsible for conducting interrogations in Iraq and had never conducted nor witnessed one, had his men detain Hamoodi.[11] In the process of detaining Mr. Hamoodi, soldiers testified that Hamoodi appeared to reach for his weapon and needed to be subdued.[11] Hamoodi was beaten by four soldiers from the 220th Field Artillery Battalion on the head and body.[12] West then fired his pistol near Hamoodi's head,[11] after which Hamoodi provided West with names and information, which Hamoodi later described as "meaningless information induced by fear and pain."[11] At least one of these suspects was arrested as a result, but no plans for attacks or weapons were found.[11] West said "At the time I had to base my decision on the intelligence I received. It's possible that I was wrong about Mr. Hamoodi."[11]
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 15:01 |
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This morning, a local talk radio fellow did a call-in piece on a recent published statistic that claimed a 64% increase in the number of children living with grandparents. Of course, he didn't bother to mention where the statistic came from or what "living with grandparents" included, so he launched into a diatribe that basically amounted to "kids these days." And naturally, no mention at all of anything besides irresponsible kids that could be the cause of this, like for example underemployment and in-home care for the older generation by their children (the parents of these kids living with grandparents). So I looked up the statistic / article when I got home. And sure enough Google found it (or a related article) in about two seconds... http://blog.aarp.org/2011/07/27/caregiving-recession-likely-behind-64-rise-in-children-living-with-grandparent/ quote:There are many different data sets we can look at regarding family living arrangements, multigenerational households and grandparents caregiving for grandchildren, but consistently they all show growth in recent years. The latest Census Bureau report on the topic once again confirms the increase in families bringing generations together. Yet another example of omission so that some random bit of news fits the narrative of "things were better in the good ol' days when we read the Bible and people were hard-workin' Americans instead of lazy kids like today." It doesn't surprise me, but that kind of intellectual dishonesty still boils my blood. And yeah, I realize this is relatively minor compared to Cal Thomas. But still...
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 16:21 |
What's funny is that multi-generational households used to be the norm. My great-great grandfather lived in my grandmother's home when she was a young girl. Unsurprisingly this was before the New Deal.
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 16:35 |
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# ? May 23, 2024 16:10 |
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Armyman25 posted:What's funny is that multi-generational households used to be the norm. My great-great grandfather lived in my grandmother's home when she was a young girl. Unsurprisingly this was before the New Deal. They still are in many parts of the world. Multi-generational households actually reinforce "traditional" values. I suppose we could argue about whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, but whatever it is, bitching about "boomerang" kids is a relatively new thing. The conservative element can rarely see past the end of their noses, though, so I'm not really surprised.
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# ? Jul 29, 2011 18:21 |