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Jay Ambrose still sucksquote:Hoping to find at least one thing Barack Obama did right in his first several years as president, supporters say this lifeguard jumped in the water, swam out to where it’s deep and saved General Motors and Chrysler from drowning. My God that last bolded part, loving laugh. WSJ's editorial he mentioned is here but what you probably want is this.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 07:50 |
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# ? May 27, 2024 02:53 |
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Saint Sputnik posted:Jay Ambrose still sucks What loving planet does this retard live on? Asian car companies like Honda, Toyota, and Hyundai dominated the auto industry for the past decade or two because they were giving consumers the cars they actually wanted, fuel-efficient sedans, while American auto companies floundered in market share because they kept making gas-guzzling SUVs that people don't want and can't afford. This seems pretty much just like the car version of conservatives bitching about energy-efficient lightbulbs. They twist and distort the facts to suit their arguments about how the big bad government is coercing businesses into being more efficient and offering better products and somehow hurting consumers and removing their choice to use shittier, less-efficient products.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 12:13 |
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If there's one complaint I have about my car, it's that it's entirely too fuel efficient. As an American, I demand the freedom to have to fill up my tank twice as often. It will go nicely with my freedom to be fired from my job for any reason, my freedom to be homeless, and my freedom to die of preventable illness due to lack of insurance.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 12:47 |
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Shasta Orange Soda posted:If there's one complaint I have about my car, it's that it's entirely too fuel efficient. As an American, I demand the freedom to have to fill up my tank twice as often. It will go nicely with my freedom to be fired from my job for any reason, my freedom to be homeless, and my freedom to die of preventable illness due to lack of insurance. What really gets to me are that the same types of people (i.e. conservatives)and frequently the same exact people, are criticizing Obama for high gas and energy prices AND for enacting new fuel standards or even just enforcing the energy standards (e.g. lightbulbs) enacted by Bush. Seriously, how much cognitive dissonance does it take to say, "loving high gas prices and electric bills, thanks Obama!" AND "Screw you Obama, don't tell me to have more-efficient lightbulbs and cars!" To contribute, this isn't an editorial, opinion piece, or letter to the editor, yet I can't help but share it because it really highlights the 1%-99% divide, providing some clarity and sanity in light of the anti-Occupy crap that's previously been quoted in this thread. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/bonus-withdrawal-puts-bankers-malaise-050100338.html Bonus Withdrawal Puts Bankers in "Malaise" posted:Andrew Schiff was sitting in a traffic jam in California this month after giving a speech at an investment conference about gold. He turned off the satellite radio, got out of the car and screamed a profanity. I just want to spam this article every loving time I hear some conservative or libertarian complaining about welfare queens, socialists, Occupy, tax rates, etc.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 13:00 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:http://finance.yahoo.com/news/bonus-withdrawal-puts-bankers-malaise-050100338.html That's the kind of poo poo I would expect to hear in Sweden or Norway with their massive taxes from some rich idiot in his well to do social safety nets, not a country where 1 in 4 children face food insecurity and health care is an eroding privilege.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 13:40 |
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I guess that article just shows that making a ton of money doesn't mean you automatically know how to spend within you means.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 15:39 |
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I can sympathize with the fact that if you have financial obligations and cannot meet them due to a change in expected income it can be a source of very real stress, regardless of where you are on the financial ladder, but this is just absolute bullshit:Bruce Leroy posted:http://finance.yahoo.com/news/bonus-withdrawal-puts-bankers-malaise-050100338.html
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 16:16 |
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This isn't actually an editorial but that article about the hard times of the banking class makes me think of the infamous memo that Larry Summes signed off on in 1991. I guess you could call this an opinion piece of sorts.quote:DATE: December 12, 1991 Summers claimed it was a sarcastic and said it had been doctored to make the World Bank look bad. If that's true they did a great job because the memo is indistinguishable from an actual neoclassical economic position. Plenty of economists have taken him seriously and pointed out that the logic is entirely consistent with neoclassical assumptions. It is barely an exaggeration to say that neoclassical economics dictate that a rich person's life and welfare is more valuable than a poor person's. From that perspective, its hardly a leap to claim that going from 50 to 40 grand per year is no worse than having to take your kids out of their ritzy Manhattan private school.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 18:31 |
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Here's a terrible and terribly pointless thing Yahoo News decided to throw in right alongside the regular news stories.quote:At this point in an election season, a campaign's every utterance shimmers with significance. At the same time, this time around, the campaigns have embraced social media. And the social networks, like whiskey, promote disinhibition. (Just ask Anthony Weiner.) Services like Twitter, Facebook and, more recently, the photo-sharing site Pinterest require that we let our guard down. They also mercilessly sideline participants who seem too repressed or officious.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 21:07 |
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quote:A Whiff of Privatization Thatcherism, the cure for America's economy.
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# ? Mar 1, 2012 22:04 |
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Dr. Tough posted:Thatcherism, the cure for America's economy. My favorite part of this kind of conservative/libertarian privatization talk is when they use the internet. They talk about how great the free market is and how it would give us the same or better stuff than the government, but they are using a communication method only possible via government development and subsidization. The internet would really not exist as it is today without the government, as private businesses were refusing to invest in the fledgling internet which they believed was an unprofitable boondoggle. 25 People Who Think President Obama Killed Andrew Breitbart Bruce Leroy fucked around with this message at 00:59 on Mar 2, 2012 |
# ? Mar 2, 2012 00:55 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:25 People Who Think President Obama Killed Andrew Breitbart The avatars are honestly the best part of that. Also I forgot to include a picture of the guy that wrote the editorial that I posted: Why yes I would trust this man's advice on economics, why do you ask?
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# ? Mar 2, 2012 19:06 |
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I realize the online comments file attached to newspaper articles is a little too lowbrow even for this thread, but I don't think I've ever seen racism so casual-like. In a discussion about Wal-Mart coming to Miami community... Commenter 1: In "dark" areas, another words. Commenter 2: What do you mean by "dark areas"? Commenter 3: Don't pay any attention to the dummy. She even wrote "another words" instead of "in other words". Clearly she is clinically retarded -- or recently climbed off of a raft.
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# ? Mar 4, 2012 16:05 |
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Helsing posted:Honestly if I were pro-life I'm sure I'd be frustrated at the clever sloganeering lying behind the term "pro-choice". I'm sure that the vaguely progressive connotation the word holds is part of why the pro-abortion movement adopted it so widely. Except you would also have to be blind about what YOUR term implies about the other side. Being called Anti-Choice is not only accurate (They don't want it to be a choice) but also a lot better than being called Anti-Life, which isn't accurate (They don't want ALL babies aborted).
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# ? Mar 5, 2012 01:48 |
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Taerkar posted:Except you would also have to be blind about what YOUR term implies about the other side. I've definitely met people who, for this reason, prefer to identify as anti-abortion.
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# ? Mar 5, 2012 01:54 |
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This is the first time a letter to the editor has made me angry enough to write a response.posted:‘Zero nutritional value’ Any thoughts on this? I've only got 175 words so I can't add too much more but I think I hit all the salient points.
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# ? Mar 6, 2012 16:44 |
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panascope posted:This is the first time a letter to the editor has made me angry enough to write a response. Point out that higher gas prices are the free market in effect. Why does he want big government intervention into the free market?
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# ? Mar 6, 2012 16:57 |
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Hey look, an opinion piece on Iran by none other than Mitt Romney!A loving idiot on foreign affairs AKA Mitt Romney posted:Beginning Nov. 4, 1979 , dozens of U.S. diplomats were held hostage by Iranian Islamic revolutionaries for 444 days while America’s feckless president, Jimmy Carter, fretted in the White House. Running for the presidency against Carter the next year, Ronald Reagan made it crystal clear that the Iranians would pay a very stiff price for continuing their criminal behavior. On Jan. 20, 1981, in the hour that Reagan was sworn into office, Iran released the hostages. The Iranians well understood that Reagan was serious about turning words into action in a way that Jimmy Carter never was.
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# ? Mar 6, 2012 23:08 |
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Wait, so is he openly admitting that the Reagan administration supplied terrorists with weapons, and that he plans to do the same?
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# ? Mar 6, 2012 23:17 |
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zeroprime posted:Wait, so is he openly admitting that the Reagan administration supplied terrorists with weapons, and that he plans to do the same? Reagan was so serious about turning his words into action that he sent over some missiles for the Iranians to try out first.
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# ? Mar 6, 2012 23:19 |
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Boondock Saint posted:Hey look, an opinion piece on Iran by none other than Mitt Romney! The gently caress? 9/11 didn't have anything to do with nukes or Iran. poo poo, it was just a case of flying really big planes into buildings, that's pre-"nuclear age" technology. A loving idiot on foreign affairs AKA Mitt Romney posted:Like Reagan, I have put forward a comprehensive plan to rebuild American might and equip our soldiers with the weapons they need to prevail in any conflict. By increasing our annual naval shipbuilding rate from nine to 15, I intend to restore our position so that our Navy is an unchallengeable power on the high seas. The US not only spends more on military expenditures than any other nation in the world, but we actually spend more than the next 14 combined Our navy already is unchallengable. Russia and China, the nations with the second and third largest military expenditures, have a whopping one aircraft carrier each compared to the US' 11 carriers. Spending more on shipbuilding (or any other area of the military)isn't really going to improve our place as the most dominant military power in the world. More importantly, simply spending more money isn't an actual plan, as it isn't even correlated with military success, let alone causative. Just look at how a bunch of illiterate Iraqis and Afghanis with Soviet-era weapons have been kicking our asses for the past decade. A loving idiot on foreign affairs AKA Mitt Romney posted:Just as Reagan sought to defend the United States from Soviet weapons with his Strategic Defense Initiative, I will press forward with ballistic missile defense systems to ensure that Iranian and North Korean missiles cannot threaten us or our allies. Does he mean the SDI and "Star Wars" that were the only sticking point between us and complete Soviet nuclear disarmament? Gorbachev was willing to completely disarm the Soviet Union's nuclear capabilities with the US' own disarmament if the US would just end the "Star Wars"/SDI boondoggle, but Reagan botched the entire agreement with his idiocy and senility. Does Romney mean the SDI that actual scientists (e.g. the American Physical Society) deemed physically impossible at the time and highly improbable even within the next decade, meaning that Reagan purposely gave up the greatest opportunity to advance peace and global security in decades for something that wasn't scientifically tenable? Seriously, Reagan was an absolutely awful president and I'm loving sick of historical revision that paints him as some kind of great leader, especially since he literally committed treason.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 03:13 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:Just look at how a bunch of illiterate Iraqis and Afghanis with Soviet-era weapons have been kicking our asses for the past decade. I'm pretty sure Iraq had really rather good literacy rates before US citizens bombed all their schools - probably better than the USA has today, in fact. If you want to complain about revisionism, physician heal thyself. It's no better than the right-wingers who proclaim themselves the champions of Iraqi women whilst murdering and raping them via their military full of rapist-murderers and bombing the institutions which would preserve the rights of women in Iraq. FFS, pre-Gulf War, there was an active feminist movement in Iraq, condoned and funded by Saddam Hussein's government.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 03:26 |
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Brown Blitzkrieg posted:I'm pretty sure Iraq had really rather good literacy rates before US citizens bombed all their schools - probably better than the USA has today, in fact. If you want to complain about revisionism, physician heal thyself. It's no better than the right-wingers who proclaim themselves the champions of Iraqi women whilst murdering and raping them via their military full of rapist-murderers and bombing the institutions which would preserve the rights of women in Iraq. FFS, pre-Gulf War, there was an active feminist movement in Iraq, condoned and funded by Saddam Hussein's government. What is your source for such a claim? I was using this Frontline source, which cites: quote:Sources: Middle East Review World of Information; CIA World FactBook, Jan. 2002; U.S. State Department, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, Dec. 2001; U.N. Human Development Report; UNICEF; UNESCO; Amnesty International; U.N. Special Rapporteur These sources are from before the Iraq War began in 2003 and the article is dated November 2002, so let's see what they have to say about pre-war Iraqi literacy: Frontline/World: Truth and Lies in Baghdad posted:People So, I'm betting that there is/was pretty good chance that Iraqi insurgents are/were illiterate.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 04:05 |
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It would be interesting to see how that rate changed between the two Gulf wars. The Frontline article mentioned that child mortality had increased significantly, so it's probably safe to say that there was some level of decline in the education they were getting.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 04:18 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:What is your source for such a claim? The Iraq war began in 1989 or thereabouts. I can't remember exactly when because I was only a small child. Hostilities died down for about a decade, then resumed. Also: Frontline? Are you loving serious?
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 09:35 |
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Brown Blitzkrieg posted:The Iraq war began in 1989 or thereabouts. I can't remember exactly when because I was only a small child. Hostilities died down for about a decade, then resumed. First of all, I was quite obviously and explicitly talking about the most recent war in Iraq, not the one that happened 20 years ago. I was talking about the Iraqis who have been fighting against the US for the past decade, not the Iraqis who fought 20 years ago, though there is likely to be at least some overlap between the two. If you are going to (somewhat) change the subject, you are going to have to be more explicit about which war in the Persian Gulf you are referencing. Secondly, Frontline is an acceptable source, it's not like I used Free Republic or Democratic Underground, but more importantly, all of the sources used are reputable and verifiable, including the US State Department, the UN Human Development Report, UNICEF, UNESCO, and Amnesty International. The Dark One posted:It would be interesting to see how that rate changed between the two Gulf wars. The Frontline article mentioned that child mortality had increased significantly, so it's probably safe to say that there was some level of decline in the education they were getting. Yeah, it would be interesting to get more specifics on that, but it was the information relevant to what I was talking about. For some reason, Brown Blitzkrieg started talking about Gulf War I, when it was pretty obvious I was talking about Gulf War II. I guess I shouldn't be surprised after looking at his rap sheet, which includes gems like: Brown Blitzkrieg posted:I recently stopped being an organ donor in case a white Australian lives because of my donation. Death to whites who would withhold sovereignty from the true owners of this land, but especially death to reactionary whites who make this place unbearable for me to live in, and are forcing me to emigrate as soon as I have the money saved. or his earlier posts in this very thread: Brown Blitzkrieg posted:but you can hardly say Stalin killed millions of people. Millions of Nazis, yes, quote:
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 11:28 |
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Bruce Leroy posted:First of all, I was quite obviously and explicitly talking about the most recent war in Iraq, not the one that happened 20 years ago. I was talking about the Iraqis who have been fighting against the US for the past decade, not the Iraqis who fought 20 years ago, though there is likely to be at least some overlap between the two. First of all, it's just one long war, there really shouldn't be a pretence that it ever let up. More Iraqis died from starvation than were killed in the first shooting part of this monstrous war of aggression. You're talking about a gap of 14 years, not even a generation. Was it mostly fourteen year olds who were fighting against American oppressors? Hey, TV reporters are famous for their accuracy and integrity, so I won't ever mistrust you again. But even if they are actually illiterate, what's the point of saying this? What does it do other than strip noble freedom fighters of their dignity by pointing out their failures
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 12:20 |
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Brown Blitzkrieg posted:First of all, it's just one long war, there really shouldn't be a pretence that it ever let up. More Iraqis died from starvation than were killed in the first shooting part of this monstrous war of aggression. Seriously, you are so loving dumb that you rival the stupidity of the editorialists and letter writers we are making fun of in this thread.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 13:10 |
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Here's more horribleness about abortion from my college paper. Columnist's view on abortion is misguided quote:In a previous column, Jonathan Brooks compared abortion to the genocide of millions of Jews during the Holocaust. Pretty reasonable, right? Uses numbers and what-not. How could Jonathan Brooks not concede his ridiculous bullshit point a little bit? Oh, he'll just...ignore the content of that letter completely. Standing up for the rights of unborn fetuses quote:The only non-violent form of abortion is performed using medications, usually mifepristone. However, these only account for 17 percent of abortions in the USA. The remainder of abortions are likely performed by suction or curettage. gently caress this guy so much. He goes into every one of his columns with the presupposition that fetus=baby. He never even comes close to addressing that his point-of-attack is so horrendously flawed. And he never once addresses the issue of women's rights.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 15:17 |
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He also misunderstands what "tissue" means.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 15:37 |
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V. Illych L. posted:He also misunderstands what "tissue" means. I must admit I'm not sure how he misused that. Can you explain a little more about tissue to me? edit: VVVV interesting, I was unaware of the differences in the meaning of that term. Thank you for teasing it out for me. That kind of misuse of scientific terminology reminds me of the way people will bash evolution for being "only a theory." Kro-Bar fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Mar 7, 2012 |
# ? Mar 7, 2012 16:18 |
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"Tissue" in the sense of "embryonic tissue" is a term for similar cells connected by/to an extracellular matrix. The average human has a bunch of different tissues, from bone to skin to brain to whatever - the embryo consists of, well, one: Embryonic stem cell tissue. The first separation is into three forms of tissue (endoderman, mesodermal and ectodermal) which then go on to form various organs/tissues. So calling a human "human tissue" would be incorrect, since a human is in fact a conglomeration of a bunch of tissues. Calling an early embryo "embryonic tissue" is correct, since it's literally just a bunch of connected cells at that point.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 16:50 |
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I don't even have words for this one:quote:Protesters use tactics of mayhem and bedlam Love how it goes all at the end there.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 17:28 |
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I can't tell if Jonah Goldberg is being sarcastic or if he thinks Margaret Atwood is a conservative, or what. (Excerpt) quote:The Obama campaign insists that “if Mitt Romney and a few Republican senators get their way, employers could be making women’s health care decisions for them” and require that women seek a permission slip to obtain birth control.
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# ? Mar 7, 2012 23:42 |
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Here's a lovely fresh perspective to the I-P conflict:quote:Addressing anti-Zionism
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# ? Mar 8, 2012 00:08 |
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Saint Sputnik posted:I can't tell if Jonah Goldberg is being sarcastic or if he thinks Margaret Atwood is a conservative, or what. He's being ironic. He's saying the Blunt Amendment wasn't that bad, it wouldn't have curtailed the rights of women any further than they were curtailed at the beginning of this year, and invoking a dystopian novel ironically to make the point. He's wrong, of course, the Blunt Amendment would have given ANY employer the ability to strike ANY procedure they were religiously opposed to from their coverage, which would have been a stark rollback of every American's rights.
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# ? Mar 8, 2012 00:11 |
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bairfanx posted:I don't even have words for this one: What is it with conservatives not understanding Time's "Person of the Year?" It's not necessarily a compliment or endorsement, it's simply acknowledgement of an individual(s) who has been extremely important and influential over the past year. I don't think anyone could really dispute that Hitler was one of, if the not the most, important people in 1938. Saint Sputnik posted:I can't tell if Jonah Goldberg is being sarcastic or if he thinks Margaret Atwood is a conservative, or what. Goldberg is a total piece of poo poo and it's not surprising that he would intentionally ignore the realities and truth of the issue, but I think it would be hilarious to see his reactions once the Blunt Amendment allowed a fundamentalist Muslim employer to refuse coverage for an employee wanting to see an opposite-sex physician or a Scientologist employer refusing to cover any mental health services other than e-meter auditing. Elim Garak posted:He's being ironic. He's saying the Blunt Amendment wasn't that bad, it wouldn't have curtailed the rights of women any further than they were curtailed at the beginning of this year, and invoking a dystopian novel ironically to make the point. He's wrong, of course, the Blunt Amendment would have given ANY employer the ability to strike ANY procedure they were religiously opposed to from their coverage, which would have been a stark rollback of every American's rights. It's pretty obvious that Goldberg's only thinking of Christian and Jewish employers. He would immediately object to employers of any other faith, especially Muslims, restricting their employees healthcare coverage based on their religious beliefs. It's kind of like how conservatives advocate for school prayer, but it's obvious that they are referring to Christian prayers and that they would freak the gently caress out if the prayer were Islamic. Herman Merman posted:Here's a lovely fresh perspective to the I-P conflict: It's funny how the author doesn't specifically mention any of their supposed examples of "good" colonialism and how they purposely leave out the fact that those "post-colonial despots" were only able to obtain power and commit unspeakable acts because of what the colonial powers did, e.g. Darfur and Sudan. It's pretty obvious that they did not cite specific examples because they knew that any reader with even a cursory knowledge of world history could tear down any given example as being a net harm to the native people of the colonized nation, just look at how assholes like Rothbard tried to portray Chile as being better because of Pinochet's Western/American-backed rule while ignoring his reign of terror on the Chilean people. I also like how this author ignores how Western powers haven't ceased colonialism just because they don't have the blatant de jure control over those nations like they used to. Western nations now use "soft" power, such as through corporate control and influence, to have de facto control over other nations.
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# ? Mar 8, 2012 00:41 |
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quote:Zionism will only cease being demonized in the politically correct corners of the West once our schools and film industry cease to demonize colonialism.
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# ? Mar 8, 2012 00:55 |
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zeroprime posted:Stop portraying the annihilation of indigenous people as a bad thing Pfft, just shut up with all that "Trail of Tears" bullshit. You're totally ignoring how awesome reservations are, they have roads AND schools.
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# ? Mar 8, 2012 00:59 |
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# ? May 27, 2024 02:53 |
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bairfanx posted:I don't even have words for this one: I love how he goes from "How dare they place such a high honor in the hands of those loving hippies" to "You know who else was Person of the Year? That's right... "
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# ? Mar 8, 2012 01:10 |