Big Ol' Smitty

B@RTOK's come daringly close.

DVDs will be $10 and laptops will be $20. You had me on your side with the antireligion then you gotta go and lapse into stoner-blowing-all-our-minds mode.

Ted Nugent, truly a man's man: editorial in Chicago Sun-Times

Actually, I went "needle in the haaaa-aaaaay", "neeee-dle in the haaaaaaay-ay-ay."

That's the first thing I said when one of my students told me this today.

This is actually how I feel about my own mother--the most important person in my life next to my wife. I respect and love her so much (my father was abusive, mentally unstable, left when I was 3, terrorized my mom, and then killed himself) for raising me and my brother single-handedly. The other day I realized that the only thing I begrudge her is raising us in a Southern Baptist Church. In my opinion, there should be no such thing as a "Muslim child" or a "Catholic child," because children are not mature and intellectually developed enough to make these sort of major life decisions. The story of Edgardo Mortara sums up well why I feel this way. If I have kids, I am going to let them make these sort of decisions on their own.

Ted Nugent threatens to kill leading Democrats, then does William Wallace impersonation.

You're completely right. Religion is also on the upswing in America, by the way.

That wasn't really me that said all that stuff by the way.

Personally, I'm offended by your insinuation that religion is what's wrong with the world and think people could do with a bit more religion in their lives, not less. The world has been separating itself from religion for decades, and what have we gotten? Skyrocketing crime rates, widespread abuse of mild altering substances, the erosion of the family unit, and basically a gentrification of society based on ethnicity, income, and world view. Religion could be used as a common bond to bind people from all cultural groups together.

My bad.

See, I disagree with Invader here, as I do on many issues (such as teh mexcans). But it seems the Iraq War has brought us together. (I think it's worth it to try to help people in other countries, just not on false pretenses and in a bumblingly incompetent manner)

It wasn't actually all the same people in charge. Bush the Elder's foreign policy people were primarily these and Bush the Younger's were primarily these. How Cheney and Rumsfeld ended up being both is odd, as demonstrated by the cognitive dissonance produced by watching that Cheney video from '94 that YPOV and I both posted.

Yes, Jingus, the fact that I think we shouldn't have undertaken the biggest foreign policy blunder in at least a generation clearly demonstrates that I supported the torture and rape rooms of Saddam. In fact, a big chunk of Americans now (retroactively) support the policies of The Butcher of Baghdad. Remember kids, the only possible approach to dealing with dictators and rogue states is to make up a bunch of shit about them that isn't really true, tell people that you're going to get blown up by nuclear bombs if you don't invade them, and call anyone who disagrees a dictator-coddling dirty fucking hippie. That's a humanitarian foreign policy. Just ask Jingus.

Also, we should have never invaded in the first place.

Ding ding ding! We have a winner. Bush is already laying the groundwork for this with the Vietnam comparisons. "We coulda saved them foreigners (cause that's all we ever really wanted to do in Indochina & the Middle East) if it wasn't for them dirty hippies!"

Are all English and Canadian doctors starving to death?

I'm a teacher too and, not to brag, but my free health care is better than yours. I have vision and dental and my prescriptions are like $4. My copay is heli-low, too.

Not all are declining, but they definitely have lower birthrates.

I don't think he's really asking about the Holy Roman Empire. The Holy Roman Empire was just an (failed) attempt to revive the Western Roman Empire, which had fallen 300 years earlier.

Um, I think we should include labor & environmental standards in trade agreements.

So, a California pastor summoned a curse on Americans United for Separation of Church & State.

If protectionism=tariffs and subsidies for rich farmers, count me out. If protectionism=labor and environmental standards in trade agreements, like the ones it looks like we are going to negotiate with Peru and Panama, well then Springsteen me up.

I think metro is arguing that a US incursion into Pakistan would be incredibly unpopular and create instability for Musharraf, who might subsequently lose power. That power vacuum would then be filled by some form of Islamist theocracy. I think it's important to remember that Obama's comment was purely hypothetical, there would have to be "actionable intelligence" and Musharraf would have to deny US entry into Pakistan. I think metro raises good points. However, I think in that case, if I was president, I would attack bin Laden/al Qaeda despite the risks. Coddling a dictator isn't a good enough reason to not attack the world's greatest villain/terrorist group.

http://crookedtimber.org/2007/08/12/strategic-analysis/