Alright then. Saturday morning and I bet you have been waiting for links. Well, you will have to settle for these.
- Yes, I bet some of them do.
- Mosul sucks.
- Scavenging badger don’t give a ….?
- Hmmm, can you say “re-election considerations”?
These will have to do for now. Enjoy!
Today, at CNN:
The Russia/Flynn/Freedom Caucus vortex of questions and tension at the White House
What does that headline mean? I have no idea. But it doesn’t sound good for Trump.
That. Is. CNN.
It means they don’t have anything substantial to run with, so might as well innuendo again.
I have hearsay and conjecture. Those are kinds of evidence.
Yes, the inadmissible kind.
The best kind! Proof? We don’t need no steenkin’ proof!
Hey since Trump knows somebody who has a third cousin who’s best friend’s sister is dating a man who’s boss is friends with somebody who works for a Russian immigrant he is totally under the control of the Russians. I know this is true because I read it in the New York Times.
They make smoke. Then claim “where there is smoke, there is fire” to make more smoke.
I still haven’t seen a shred of evidence the “the Russians hacked the election”.
You are just using overly strict and narrow conceptions of things like, “Russians”, “Hacking”, “Elections”, and “Evidence”
Someone here posted this link yesterday:
http://takimag.com/article/the_russian_deflection_jim_goad#axzz4cudAn6zR
*adds an entry to bucket list*
I read it. I have RSS feeds for Goad + McInnes in my phone. Goad usually has to slip in one ‘suspiciously racist’ remark just to maintain his street-cred with Taki-readers but he avoided it this time.
the comments of course adhered to the rule @ Takimag, which is that “someone will deny the holocaust before 5 posts are made”
The comments there are surprisingly bad. Because even though the articles are largely snarky and irreverent, I’ve never seen them post anything that was actually racist. So I don’t know how they got such a readership. Sad.
I meant that I’ve never seen them publish any articles that were actually racist. Then again, I might not have been paying attention.
I think it depends on your standard of ‘racist’. Goad might actually self-identify as one, maybe not. I don’t think he’s a derbyshire/or ‘scientific racist’ a la the Vdare types; he’s just more of a punk who refuses to apologize to anyone for having impolitic opinions about race. Which is basically what i always thought should be considered”normal” even if you did have a few shitty opinions.
I think the more-genuinely-racist readership enjoys him because he makes them feel more normal. He may not be on their team, but he’s ‘one of the good ones’ who regularly defends white-people-interests. I just read him because i think he’s funny and always good for a contrarian perspective.
Is this the “Derbyshire” you mean?
http://takimag.com/article/the_talk_nonblack_version_john_derbyshire#axzz4d0sxdid5
Because I can see how people could find that racist.
Yes, Derbs is more of their “Flagship”-race writer.
my point was i don’t think Goad was in the same category of thinker as Derbs, but he’s certainly perfectly happy alongside him.
The sort of thing i enjoy from Goad =
Black People Don’t Drink Coffee
its actually about Starbucks and their SJW-pandering marketing campaigns. its pretty brutal
I was really disappointed with Keith Ellison did not become the DNC chair. I thought the Dems have decided to return to some semblance of sanity. But then there’s this:
RUSSIANS!
Heh, i was so so wrong. The party’s back! Break out the popcorn and enjoy the show!
Who are commies in all but name. Wow, they really don’t want to win an election any time soon do they.
It’s more fun punching up when you’re sure that your own nose won’t be fractured. I’m so goddamn sick of these people.
Have we ever had a non-pol, outsider not anointed by either party, threatening to drain the swamp guy win the presidency before? The self-appointed ruling class feels threatened. The voters, sick of the corruption and breathtaking incompetence of said ruling class, have put a guy in the oval office to clean their shit up. The ruling elite of both parties want him gone and are attempting a soft coup. They want to unseat him and get things back to the way they were.
They see us as cattle…tax cattle…and thing we will just mooo and go along if they are successful. I dont think that is the case. One way or the other we are living through a very significant time in our history.
The freakout is definitely way more than just having assumed Hillary would win. Like Trump, I largely blame the blame the media. Unlike Trump, I would also include Fox News. The Republicans got exposed as a herd of RINO’s when they couldn’t repeal the ACA. They had seven years to figure it out. Although Trump doesn’t seem that intent on draining the swamp. A big part of why the “repeal and replace” failed is that he wanted to keep much of the ACA.
You really think he had any opinion on what should be in health care policy? He just decided to sign on as “closer” on this great deal cooked up by Ryan (who was scared shitless of an actual debate/vote in the Senate – wonder why?). I’m not sure who was the bigger idiot in that whole fiasco.
The funny thing about it all is that anything that ever bears and resemblance of not having been a win for Trump, sends the left into orgasmic frenzies of declaring victory? Victory? You have less power than anytime in the last 100 years, you’re coming off as completely loony and there is nothing in the cards that look good for you in the foreseeable future. It’s like I’m watching the foozball and my team is down 52-0 with 3 minutes left in the game, when they make a field goal and I’m jumping around declaring victory. They’re completely unhinged. And that ‘victory’ of Ryan’s healthcare getting shot down is actually a devastating loss for the left. They have no handle on reality at this point.
Damn laptop, going back to desktop here.
Beautifully summarized, Suthen.
The shocking lawlessness on display and the tepid, at best, response is very worrying to me. The weaponized civil service, already barely constrained due to their de facto tenure, is trying to completely slip the leash. We have gone to war against the bureaucracy, and you go to war with the President you have, not the President you wish you had. I feel like to have to choose between Trump and the Imperial DC Establishment. Given that choice, I’d rather Trump prevail.
One way or the other we are living through a very significant time in our history
I tend to agree, and to think about what’s happening in this way: the declining fortunes of America’s middle class (beginning awhile ago with the decline in industrial employment, automation, the Internet, and outsourcing, and accelerating rapidly during the 2007-10 economic crisis) has introduced permanent instability in the social order of the country. So long as life was good and the American Dream attainable for the middle class, we were all OK with an oligarchy controlling most of the money and political power here. But that’s increasingly not the case, and if Trump’s election showed us anything, it showed us (a) there are enough pissed-off, desperate people to sway a Presidential election, and (b) the established elites here are either too arrogant and disconnected to recognize the problem, or they have no idea how to solve it.
The biggest problem for the “middle class”…is the fact that we don’t really have any real definition of it other than some fuzzy idea of “more than poor, less than rich”
I’d guess that most people’s popular conception of it is, “have enough money and stability to send your kids to college”
given that college is turning into quarter-million-dollar day-care… that’s a problem right there on a number of levels.
i really don’t think the things most people popularly-identify as being ‘the problem’ (e.g. “industrial employment/automation/outsourcing”) really has as much to do with it as they think. Most of the transformation of the US economy from industrial to service-industry happened decades ago. And we *do* still ‘make stuff’. Lots of stuff. we’re the …what… 3rd largest industrial export-economy on earth? The conventional narrative of ‘what is affecting the (so-called) “middle class” is riddled with contrived myths about shuttered factories and line-assembly workers.
Its not that. I would argue its actually far more about the steadily declining prosperity of small-towns/cities in favor of big-cities; and the decline in the number of small-businesses that provide basic goods/services to support those smaller communities.
” Its not that. I would argue its actually far more about the steadily declining prosperity of small-towns/cities in favor of big-cities; and the decline in the number of small-businesses that provide basic goods/services to support those smaller communities.”
Exactly that Gilmore. But I understand the source of the confusion. In a free market, when a factory shuts down. The people who uses to work in it could simply find work someplace else. Maybe another factory. Maybe some would start their own small business, which if successful, would hire many more people. That doesn’t happen much anymore because the government has made it much harder to start a small business.
I live in the sticks. Spend a lot of time in the middle of nowhere. I drive through these tiny towns with shuttered shops and theorize about what happened to them. Hardware and furniture stores in a town of several hundred. Surely technology had something to do with it. When transportation became reliable/comfortable enough it became much easier to drive the 70 miles to buy groceries. Certainly, the internet can bring shit to your door. So technology is one theory.
But then I look at the more recent closures (last 20 years). The roadside bars/restaurants in the middle of nowhere, the ones you wondered how they made it to begin with yet survived for many many years, are now gone. My technology theory doesn’t really cover them. I don’t think there are any fewer people living in those areas now, so it needs to be something else.
My theory, which of course confirms my biases, is that these establishments survived on a shoestring margin and when the regulations increased they could no longer make it go. Sure the bigger establishments, with higher profit margins, can absorb the costs, but not the little guy. The struggling little guy, the people that everyone in government is purportedly pulling for, is the guy taking it in the ass because of government regulation. These tiny failed establishments are the poster children for what regulation actually does to an economy.
Same holds with startups, as you mention. You want business to prosper? Make it easy to do business.
Definitely I’m raising my son right. At breakfast this morning we were talking about meat consumption, and my son (13) who goes to a school where I’m pretty sure the teachers all cried on election day, still came up with the point that regulations on meat production must have driven prices up which lowers the number of people who can afford it. (I’m sure part of it is he’s heard me make snarky comments about regulations before) but still, he came up with it on his own. so I’m proud of him, and hopeful that he’s not the only one of his generation who sees this is a problem.
Post-Mad Cow disease regulations are part of it, but as can be seen, the simple economic fact is that currently production is lower than 10 years ago, but export demand is much higher. Fact is, cattlemen make much more money selling their beef to the Japanese than to us.
My theory, which of course confirms my biases, is that these establishments survived on a shoestring margin and when the regulations increased they could no longer make it go.
This, but also there are those that could still make plenty of money, but not as much as they discovered they could make doing other things (like selling scented candles, or selling mismatched socks, or something).
Also, the owners may retire, and no one wants to continue slinging burgers and beers in Toadkiss Holler, USA.
In my small city we had ten pubs shutter. First they came for the smokers and then they came for the drinkers. They made “clean air by-laws” which must have been a kick in the balls (I stopped going when I couldn’t enjoy a smoke with my suds even on the patio) and then they lowered the drunk driving limit to .05 which is basically two beers. Now we have the Red Baron waiting in the parking lot. One cop, 120 nabs in one year. “Gee, I wonder why no one darkens our door anymore, even though we have drink specials?’
and the decline in the number of small-businesses that provide basic goods/services to support those smaller communities
Hello WalMart!
That’s certainly part of it. But they’re not the only culprit; you might as well blame every single big box retailer, amazon, itunes, the Gap, and on and on and on.
We do still manufacture and export a ton of goods, but my understanding is that we no longer employ a lot of humans to do so. That is, we still have lots of factories and make lots of stuff, but most of the actual work is done by robots. I see your point, and I’d agree that “outsourcing” is often overblown as an explanation for America’s ills. But I think automation has had a real impact.
I see your point about small towns/cities vs big cities. Though it might be more a case of DC/NYC/Boston/Chicago/LA/Bay Area vs everywhere else.
True but as i said most of that damage was done by the mid-late 1980s. At least in many of the areas that people stereotypically think we’ve lost *since* then. (e.g. automotive, steel, etc; heavy industry)
i think the central bit of my argument is that people are only now bemoaning changes that have actually been going on for far far longer than they realize; they seem to think that “America lost its way” since the 2000s, when it actually probably happened 20 years earlier.
What’s been happening since then isn’t really because of manufacturing robots and industrial outsourcing. What’s been happening since then is mostly the ageing/retirement/depopulation of much of small-town america. And I think most of what people are bitching about *now* has more to do with that than it does the “Factories and robots”-shit.
That isn’t saying that the factories & robots shit isn’t real or didn’t happen. Its just that people talk about that stuff because they don’t know what the fuck else to talk about.
My point is that most people talk about this “hurr durr outsourcing + manufacturing” stuff as though it is the #1 issue and the only thing that matters. They’re mostly wrong.
That stuff happened a long time ago – and sure, its probably bad for a certain segment of the population…. but there are also a lot of other things that have fucked the same people, but nobody talks about the wider range of issues because they’re so fascinated with this mythic idea of the Chevy Truck-drivin, Factory-Working, Blue-Collar guy in a small town. Its not that they completely mis-identify the problems, its just that the language people use to articulate the problems are tied up in a sense of cultural angst.
I think small-business over-regulation, increased healthcare costs, education costs, and demographic depopulation of many satellite cities have probably had far more of a degrading effect on the quality of life for far more of the ‘middle class’ than has loss of some of our industrial-base in certain regions of the country. but we prefer to just talk about the Industrial stuff because it helps reinforce a simpler-narrative which connects to a cultural-identity.
Some of that image (the Chevy Truck dude) also comes from a time when the demographics were favorable to people in the workforce. There’s an article floating around about White Death, and it points out that people born in 1945 had employment advantages that people born 10 years later did not have. The image of the 1950’s America being a place where companies were “loyal to their employees” was based on a situation where companies did not have any choice but to be “loyal”, because the work-age population was limited. By the 1970’s and 1980’s, the Baby Boomers were supplying quite a bit of labor, so companies could be more selective in who they hired and who they kept on the payroll.
This small badger buried entire cow by itself — and it was all caught on camera by People in besieged Mosul Old City ‘dying of starvation’ as Isis shoots anyone who tries to flee 2 Democrats who will vote to confirm Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch in besieged Mosul Old City ‘dying of starvation’ as Isis shoots anyone who tries to flee Kids want teacher suspended for sexy selfies to come back.
Um…wut?
Oh boy. I think my links are getting blurred.
Put the sake… down!
More fugu!
Let’s eat!
The frog gave a look of…”what the fuck just happened to me?”
I’ve had frog legs, and I routinely eat and enjoy haggis. Hell, I’ll eat chitlins. But I draw the line at eating an animal raw while it winks at me.
IIRC, there’s a Japanese saying about fugu – ‘you have to be crazy to eat it, but you also have to be crazy not to eat it.’
As someone who generally avoids food that could kill me, that stuff must taste amazing considering the risk.
Google says it’s actually kind of bland. Also this:
“But nowadays, you are not likely to die from fugu poisoning so long as it is prepared by someone with an official license.”
“Official license”
Regulatory capture works internationally.
Proof positive that regulations are magic.
“Not likely to kill me” is perhaps not quite enough assurance for me.
“Here, eat this mushroom. Its not likely to kill you.” No thanks.
+1 Robin Thicke
In today’s episode, staffinrun has been replaced by a bot using Markov chains to simulate a human posting. Lets’ see who can tell the difference.
What, is April first not a thing anymore?
Not since reality caught up with The Onion.
Scavenging badger was my nickname in college. Or was that the band that opened for Lou Reed? You know who else opened for Lou Reed? Also, fried chicken was let down by the Cleveland Browns one last time.
Laurie Anderson?
Leave the poetry to AC.
I’d sure like AC to migrate over. Sometimes, I’m not in the mood, but man, he does have a unique gift.
Drinking at 7:30 AM is always fun.
Drinking at 7:30 AM and watching Liverpool kick Everton ass is even funner.
It’s Wake And Bake Saturday chez OMWC. These links are funnier now.
Glad to be of service.
They could be kicking ass a little harder but yeah. (Does coffee count?)
And… just as I say that –
I should add that I’m time-shifting because who the hell gets up at 7:30
Someone up for drinking and watching their fave footy team.
GO LIONS! (Unfortunately, I can’t watch live because no one outside of Columbus cares about Columbus.)
I figured it was that nobody cares about MLS.
And I figured it’s because no one cares about soccer except European Communists.
European football is pizza; MLS is deep-dish.
You’re just bitter because Rochester’s bid was rejected.
Seriously, though, it’s a great place for slightly washed up superstars to go when they get a step too slow for Britain or Italy.
I think it’s Rhywun who was from Rochester. My sister went to school there, but that’s the extent of my connection to the city.
I work 6-2:30. Even on weekends I can’t sleep in late.
Schlacke-Dortmund was entertaining.
Dortmund games, if nothing else, are usually very entertaining.
I would like to have witnessed the hissy-fit Moobs pitched at this.
I wonder if, just short of 60, those in tough re-election fights will be allowed to show how “reasonable” they are.
Who knows what cold, cynical calculations go on in that reptilian brain of his.
You could have left off the last three words and still be right.
Normally I don’t give in to tantrums, but I don’t think I could survive seeing him cry again.
Some of the comments are just weird, there’s some left wingers saying (fairly rationally, but the last four months has made that a low bar) that they don’t have a problem with the nomination but they don’t like Gorsuch because “he closed his mind at a young age” and “like most conservatives he’s unwilling to evolve.”
Does “evolve” just mean “make shit up to justify policies and law supported by the left-wing?”
Yes. The purpose of the Constitution is to limit government. The goal of progressives is to expand government. So having justices that won’t pull things out of thin air is anti-progressive. Just look at that dipshit in Hawaii.
Well, from the prog perspective, conservatism/libertarianism = ideology while progressivism = truth.
Yes, as well as using international law in your decisions regardless of what the constitution says.
‘Evolve’ means agreeing with us. /the left
“Evolve” means come on in, City boy, the water’s fine fine fine! And then you get raped.
What should happen is that they get their way and Gorsuch doesn’t make it. Then at some point in the next year, the Trumputin nominates some hardcore libertarian and then they use the nuclear option to push that person through. The Democrats have no composure at all at this point. They’re chasing the wind.
I think Trump played this beautifully. Gorsuch is a nominee who is obviously unobjectionable on the merits. He’s the perfect vehicle for pulling the Nuclear/Reid Option and setting the precedent for future nukings.
What’s funny is, filibustering SCOTUS nominees is actually not much of a tradition anyway. No SCOTUS nominee has ever been filibustered; the only time it has been used was to prevent Fortas from becoming Chief Justice.
Brack Rives Matter.
“Trump inflames racial tensions world-wide”
/NYT
Perspectives on immigration with Harry Reid:
http://articles.latimes.com/1994-08-10/local/me-25434_1_legal-immigration
It’s totally cool when *we* do it. Also, he evolved!
So, apparently FIFA wants to remove much of the drama from WC qualification. Six spots to CONCACAF + 8 to AFC: they should just automatically qualify some of the top teams in each federation. And the playoff tournament? According to one report: “a theoretical playoff lineup in November 2025 in the United States would be: China, Curacao, Ecuador, Morocco, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Tahiti.”
Yeh, it’s dumb. At this point just include everyone!
Like the NCAA tournament going to 64 teams; and apparently they want to expand that? I could be wrong.
Canada still won’t be able to qualify.
I thought trans-bathrooms were a prerequisite for the host country now.
Do they stone gays in Qatar?
Obviously already approved countries don’t count. And the idea will be quietly dropped after the North American selection if there is one.
One of the reasons I find the foot stomping and complete hysterics over Trump being Hitler/A Nazi/whatever to be absolutely absurd is that he ran on Democratic immigration policy from the 90s and trade policy of…Ross Perot in the 90s.
THE HORROR, IT’S LIKE IT’S 1933 ALL OVER AGAIN!
Given the average age of one of the major cohorts freaking out over Trump, they probably think the 90s happened right after Kristallnacht. They don’t strike me as particularly woke when it comes to historical awareness.
If they knew about Kristallnacht, they wouldn’t be matching in black shirts, smashing windows and destroying the property of religious minorities while claiming to be anti-fascists.
People have said that Trump stole most of his platform from Dick Gephardt’s 1988 presidential run
(i confess, i wasn’t paying enough attention at the time to note what it was)
I do remember that Democrats ran a laugh-a-minute-crop of candidates (which included Lyndon LaRouche, David Duke, Joe Biden and Jesse Jackson)
Gary Hart was the one i thought looked like he had his shit together.
Then he drooped out after he got caught eating Rice.
https://brucegerencser.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/donna-rice-4.jpg
+1 Monkey Business
Well, to be fair, it was a little bit different when he did it:
“Cut Legal Admissions by Two-Thirds”
Gotta make room for the illegals, right Harry?
Off to brunch and then greyhound races and casino, no doubt there will be drinking again today. Love a long weekend.
Here is a sane article about The Bell Curve:
http://www.quillette.com/2017/03/27/a-tale-of-two-bell-curves/
Cops called in to stop kid’s hockey game join in instead:
http://wgntv.com/2017/03/30/police-called-to-stop-street-hockey-game-join-the-kids-instead/
What about the rule of law? Those kidd were blocking a street. They should have been beaten and pepper sprayed, at the minimum.
Also, now those kids have a twisted perception of how interactions with police officers should go. One of those kids is going to grow up and get himself killed for trusting officer friendly to not shoot him when he gets his wallet out of his pants.
What’s the opposite of a nut punch? Nut stroke?
Nut-tonguing
I’ll be in my bunk.
We always referred to it as “ball-cupping” but it’s probably just a regionalism.
I see I missed a spirited scotch discussion last night. Wah wah. I had just resupplied my *other* favorite vice, and I was pretty gone by the time the post even went up. Lol.
That said, Laphroiag (10) was too challenging a scotch for me. I’ve been assured that not all Islay scotches are pure, concentrated peat/medicine, so I’m not writing them off. But I’m certainly going to buy a bottle of Balvenie’s (12) DoubleWood before I go adventuring in Scotland again.
And you people and your light beers. Why do you do that to yourself?
Mmm. Laphroiag. Tastes like a campfire.
At arm’s length, even.
you people and your light beers. Why do you do that to yourself?
Because I would be 300 lbs if I didn’t. I am a health nut.
Lol… I log all of my food on an app (that syncs with an independent fitness tracker). … So I appreciate where you’re coming from. I plan ahead so I can drink and eat the things I really enjoy, like the kind of beer you pour in a pint glass, hold up to the light, and nothing shines through.
I used My Fitness Pal before. It is a handy app. I need to get back to that. It does tend to make a person with proper priorities tailor their eating around their drinking.
I’ve found it very helpful. I used to be a rather pudgy Riven. I went from ~180 down to 120, found I looked like hell, painstakingly put on another 20, and I’ve basically been in recomp mode, maintaining around 135-140. It takes a lot of the guesswork out for me.
Nice!
I use it mainly for the macros. Make sure you hit your protein and fat numbers and everything else seems to fall into place.
Unfortunately, I prefer beer to other booze, so I need to manage carefully or I’m a chubby yeti in no time.
That’s pretty much how I use it. Make sure I get 100-130 grams of protein, 30% minimum of the rest of the day from fat, and fill the rest in with delicious, cheap carbs. Calorie count depends on what I’m going for. Right now I’m cutting, so trying to keep it under 2k every day.
No calories in weed either!
Do you supplement your protein or try to go strictly whole food?
It’s all just numbers to me. So protein powder is just more food. For the most part, that’s the only protein specific supplement I take. Every morning starts off with 60 grams of whole milk and 30 grams of protein powder immersion blended together, then slowly add hot coffee and pulse the blender until it’s smooth. (Or else it’s just a nasty consistency)
I use dymatize iso 100 in cinnamon bun flavor, but they recently “improved” it. If you can find it in the black tub, it’s great; tastes awesome and blends well. If it’s in the white container… it’s grainy, doesn’t blend well, and doesn’t even taste as good. *kicks rocks*
No calories in weed either!
I am thinking of going on a no alcohol weed diet for awhile. I haven’t even smoked it since it became legal here. I always had jobs where I was tested regularly. Now that I am unencumbered by good employment and getting fat(er), I might need to look into it.
You know, I do love that it’s zero-calorie. But it does make me much more likely to indulge my munchies.
Sober Riven looks at MFP in the face of munchies and decides what will fit.
Intoxicated Riven just says fuck it; I’ll deal with the fallout later.
western, a, umm, friend of mine recommends getting a good vaporizer for “wax” (I think he has an Atmos Kiln) and going with concentrates.
Your guy finally coughed up? Congrats. And I hope you learned a lesson about trusting stoners with money.
He did. Got some sour diesel for my trouble… and a new source lined up. Lol
“Sour diesel”?
{Googles furiously}
Oh. It’s herb.
Learn somethin’ new every day.
Hah! There’s some weird names out there. I’d love to grow my own and cross polinate until I find the perfect “Riven’s special blend.” Sigh. One day.
I’ve never used, but friends of mine who believed that our Prime Minister, The Hair That Walks Like A Man™, was going to usher in a new era of peace and great stonage (whilst my friends happily cross-bred stuff in their garden) are becoming increasingly dismayed at the plans of the Canadian FedGov to tax and regulate marijuana production and sale come 2018.
What did they think government does?
If government regulated the cultivation and sale of marijuana, in five years there’d be no marijuana grown that’d be worth buying (with apologies to Milton Friedman).
I expect to see underground marijuana sales continue, perhaps even intensify, once the new regime’s in place. Should be interesting.
Well, what’s interesting about that around here is that people who have a medical need of it can grow their own. I think that’s nice. I’m definitely a recreational user, but I still like that feature for people who need it.
That said… the state legislature is trying to change it so they can’t grow their own… because they can’t tax home growers the way they could tax buyers. That’s some bullshit right there.
Huh. Describes Oregon’s pot regime to a T. Supply went down and price up because there aren’t enough state licensed labs to test for pesticide residue, which is a requirement under the legalization scheme. Imagine that.
Real Sour Herb BTW and tasty too
I hate you kids. Being old means it’s tough to find a source. Took me three years after moving to Chicago, and even with that, I only have a single unreliable supplier. A similarly situated buddy of mine (a retired judge!) and I have been discussing the possibility of a Denver road trip, just to stock up for a year or so.
That sounds like a risky trip.
A trip to Denver sounds like a lot of fun. But the only reason I have backups is because I just know quite a few people around here who smoke…and they all have “the best guy.”
If you kids do a road trip to Denver and play pool with the local crew, watch out for DenverJ! Total hustler!
Need to hang out with bands. They’ll hook you up with a guy fast.
I hang out with communist folk singers. Seriously.
Some kind of bizarre penance?
How the hell do you not have a guy?!? Are they lame communist folk singers?
Lame, yeah. Old, def. Most of the ones I know well enough to hit up live in other cities, and we just hang out when they’re passing through on tour.
*jots down license plate info for CrimeStoppers reward*
You will lose a lot of potentecy in that year of storage, just sayin,
Cali is good for some things
/Pot Card
Buncha fuckin’ hippies around here
So, I also missed the Scotch discussion so I too will offer my opinion. My wife loves Laphroiag which I’m OK with but is a little too peaty to be a fave. She also likes Lagavulin which Mr. Simple recommended last night. I find that milder than Laphroiag but usually costs quite a bit more. My personal preference is Jura which is an island distillery. Diurach’s Own is their best & most expensive. But their cheaper brands are also good.
Irish whiskey: Tullamore Dew is my usual. But Powers is better although more expensive. There’s also one called Irish Manor which I like but is hard to find.
Lastly, I learned a lot about my likes and dislikes by going to tastings.
I’d like to try Lagavulin, as well. I’m pleased to hear it’s not so damn peaty. I felt like I was in a bog. If a scotch takes two cubes to make it drinkable… well… that’s not a very good scotch for me.
You are so right about Tullamore Dew. Best Irish Whisky I’ve had to date at that price point.
I also like a nice Canadian blended: Pendleton.
Yep. TD is my standard nightcap. $25 at the grocery store.
The Lagavulin 16 is excellent. I’ve had Jura, but it has been a very long time and I really don’t recall.
Jura’s an Island, not an Islay, so it’s more like Oban.
Lagavulin is my absolute favorite. I can get into Laphroaig, but my wife absolutely hates the smell of it, so I basically never drink it.
How do you resupply blowjobs?
I wouldn’t really call those a vice. More like “God’s work.”
+ 1 toughest neighborhood
Hardware store.
Laphoraig, for times when you really need to drink the essence of burning hospital supplies.
There is not a death violent enough, and or painful enough for a person who would shoot innocent people trying to get to safety. That said, why isn’t this guy on the phone telling the Iraqi army where the bad guys are?
That said, why isn’t this guy on the phone telling the Iraqi army where the bad guys are?
My guess is fear of reprisal if the Iraqis get pee-pee schwacked by ISIS.
Reprisal? Sounds like he doesn’t have much to lose at this point. The army will eventually roll in there. It won’t end well.
recall that the “Iraqi army” is often represented by members of Shia militias who routinely rape/murder the sunni-civilian residents for “giving shelter to ISIS” and forcing them to come way up north when they have no interest risking their lives for strangers.
more recently/locally =
i think it helps explain why reports are always citing how the Iraqi army is constantly sending in their ‘golden brigades’ or their ‘special forces police’ and 100 other colorfully-named “super-elite” units… which i think is to reassure the press and the iraqi public that ‘these guys’ have been vetted and cleansed of Badr brigade/PMF militia-presence.
Ya, there could be something to that. What a mess.
“The Affordable Care Act set up new markets for people who don’t get insurance through work or the government.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/31/upshot/obamacare-choices-could-go-from-one-to-zero-in-some-areas.html?_r=1
Yes, nothing like that existed before.
OT: Longtime lurker here. Over at TSTSNBN a while back, someone posted a link to a website where you could slice and dice international trade numbers and create some pretty neat graphics as output. Anyone recall what that site was?
wto(dot)org/english/res_e/statis_e/merch_trade_stat_e.htm
intracen(dot)org/itc/market-info-tools/trade-statistics/
comtrade(dot)un(dot)org/
don’t know what you’re specifically referencing, but those are a start
This?
That’s it, BP. Thanks!
that’s cute.
FYI it looks like their sole data source is still just UN Comtrade stats (linked above); meaning, they provide fancy visualization tools, but not as much raw info, necessarily.
e.g. i don’t see anything in volume terms on their site. everything is in USD$
I liked the GILMORE on the other site.
The one on this site seems like a butthurt asshole.
?
sorry for trying to answer your question.
my comment above was just an observation that the harvard site has less than the total comtrade set. which may or may not have been relevant to your question.
Wow! Crystal Palace doesn’t quite upset the apple cart but does give it a good shake.
Yeah, I would not have called that.
Didn’t watch, because I loathe Chelsea, but them losing makes my weekend.
Yep. Still Chelsea’s title to lose, but I’m all for making the PL race more interesting.
Meanwhile in Scotland, two players on the same team sent off at halftime for fighting each other:
http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/39389868
Chelsea dominated but couldn’t finish at all. It was a fun match to watch.
Went to go see Archspire last night. Arkaik was there too, but I’m not a huge fan. Local bands were there that sucked, but it was ok. Good thing about most death metal shows is that usually there aren’t that many people there and the band members are the ones selling you a T-shirt. The sound in that place (Cafe 611 in Frederick, MD) was godawful though.
Vacuuming My Duck
Totally NOT what I expected.
Stupid cute, though . . .
I joked not long after signing up here that I am now a Kept Man. This is partly true as I took a sabbatical by leaving my former employer. it wasn’t working, i was miserable, and if I had to spend 20-odd more years in a cubicle or office looking at spreadsheets and financial models and analytics I was going to blow somebody’s brains out. Or feed them to a woodchipper. Whatever. Fortunately my wife and I have always lived well below our means and stockpiled our savings like squirrels with comments at the other site so I was able to just walk away and ponder a bit.
About three weeks ago though, I stumbled into a business opportunity and now I’m working more hours than ever. Partly, I need to liquidate a rental asset to use the funds to capitalize the new business, so I bounced the renters and have been working on getting the house in shape to sell. I’ve done low-level plumbing, electrical, carpentry, painting, etc. All those handyman tasks I normally hired out. In addition I’ve been working with my biz partner, understanding his agricultural piece of the operation and how it all works. As the excess from his finished goods are going to be my inputs. I’ve been learning to grow, cultivate, feed, and care for the plants that should help give me a lifestyle where my work supports my life instead of being my life.
In the next six to nine months I’ll be a legal (well, at least for the state I’m in) supplier of pharmaceutical grade processed essential oils and distillates. I haven’t been this excited about anything in a long time. I may lose every penny of the investment and in 2 years be looking for a new job. But I’m taking my shot at being an entrepreneur and my own boss. And while 10-12 hour days of doing everything from the aforementioned spreadsheets I use to dread, to schlepping water to the grow room, to re-grouting a tile shower to insulating a flower room, to dealing with gov’t flunkies, I’m going to bed tired but smiling.
Well, you know the old saying: “When you work for yourself you only have to work half-days, and it really doesn’t matter which 12 hours you pick.”
Good on ya! Starting my own business was the second-best decision I ever made.
Thank you. And yeah, I’ve heard the biggest asshole boss you’ll ever have is when you work for yourself; that guy doesn’t want you taking vacation or having days off or anything!
Sounds fantastic. Good on you!
Awesome. Good luck and keep us posted,
I’m taking my shot at being an entrepreneur and my own boss. And while 10-12 hour days of doing everything from the aforementioned spreadsheets I use to dread, to schlepping water to the grow room, to re-grouting a tile shower to insulating a flower room, to dealing with gov’t flunkies, I’m going to bed tired but smiling.
Nice. Good luck.
There was an interview with Marc Guggenheim about his upcoming X-Men book in which Guggenheim said that the post-ResurrXion X-Men would be “more about the X-Men as heroes than the X-Men as a struggling minority fighting for their very existence.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Reading between the lines of the signals from Marvel, it seems the company is pulling back on its push for greater representation and diversity in their titles and pursuing a strategy similar to what DC Comics dubbed “meat and potatoes” before their DC Rebirth relaunch.
I blame Trump.
Again:
We saw the sales of any character that was diverse, any character that was new, our female characters, anything that was not a core Marvel character, people were turning their nose up against. That was difficult for us because we had a lot of fresh, new, exciting ideas that we were trying to get out and nothing new really worked.
It was the old things coming back in that time period, three books in particular, Spider-Man Renew Your Vows, that had Spider-Man and Mary Jane married, that worked. The Venom book worked and the Thanos book worked. You can take what you want out of who might be enjoying those three books, but it is definitely a specific type of comic book reader, comic book collector that really liked those three series.
Gosh, I guess ticking off boxes on an SJW diversity checklist isn’t as fresh, new , and exciting as he thought.
If they hadn’t changed out all of them, maybe it would’ve worked, but when you change ALL the legacy characters within about two years — especially the three core ones from the movies (Thor, Iron Man, Cap) – of course some of your readers are going to think you’re spitting on them, plus the people interested in the characters from the films see nothing they recognize. Then you combine it with a growing reputation of treating the X-Books like shit out of sheer pettiness, and write those new “diverse” characters as if they came out of Gender STudies 101, no duh they’re going to sell like crap. I found MOckingbird intolerable (and I can withstand a lot of modern feminism); I can’t imagine any male but the most SJW-infested would buy it.
I get that they want to broaden the readership by focusing more on the population which hasn’t been traditional buyers, but they went about it (mostly) wrong. Push Black Panther, push Valkyrie if you’re looking for diversity, don’t make Iron Man into a black chick.
Slate’s Aisha(!) Tyler had a rant about whitewashing the Ghost in the Shell. She had her ass handed to her in the comment section by the nerds. It was epic but not quite the troll as when she averred that Santa was a penguin.
One tactic that worked on an issue that wasn’t a #1 recently was a special up-priced issue. “When we’re going from the $3.99 to the $9.99 Spider‑Man we almost tripled sales,” Gabriel pointed out. “Yes, there were incentives put on it. There were some variants, but to see triple sales on the $9.99 Spider‑Man book and to hear from half of the retailers saying, ‘This helped make our week,’ and then another portion of the retailers saying, ‘Shame on you Marvel for making us more money,’ we sit back. The only thing we have to look at are the numbers and comments like that. We’ll go with the numbers any day, because we’re interested in making us and you money.”
Since I’m reading through these comic book stories, I guess I will continue to post excerpts:
But the economics of creator-owned are tempting. “The things that I’ve heard from a number of creators who do creator owned stuff at Image,” a retailer explained. “They tell me that they can sell half the number of copies at Image, and make twice the money that they do on a Marvel book. Now I don’t know if those are exact numbers, or if they’re exaggerating or whatever. That’s sounds to me like it’s definitely one of the things that makes your job difficult at acquiring talent.”
Florida Man Spotted Near Indy, Trying To Kidnap A Wife!
Okay, so it’s from Zerohedge, but it’s still funny as Hell. Good on the UK Russian Embassy for having a sense of humour on April 1st!
any character that was diverse, any character that was new, our female characters, anything that was not a core Marvel character, people were turning their nose up against.
i haz a surprize.
On a side note: The best comic strip ever.
On a side note: The best comic strip ever.
Close, but no cigar.
WB has a definite echo of “Laser Eraser & Axel Pressbutton” from the 80’s.
What you need is a real man’s comic strip.
That is to say Milton Caniff’s wartime Stars and Stripes exclusive “Male Call”.