It’s Sunday. You’re hungover. Those fucking church bells are making your pounding head go nuclear. There’s only one remedy- enjoy yourself ignoring the Links.
Many shootings have made the news, key among them being this case of Affirmative Action for Mass Shooters. The NYT reporter, in a fit of “needing to empty her mind of vacuous thoughts” unleashed this gem:
The attack appeared to be the type of mass shooting by a lone gunman that has struck communities around the United States.
Despite assurances from my SJW friends that mass murder is a white-male-only occupation, I really do question the need for Affirmative Action in this profession. Here’s another example. To be sure, despite 28 people being shot, no-one died (yet), which unfortunately contributes to the totally unfair stereotype of Affirmative Action putting unqualified people into jobs just to be able to give a satisfactory ethnic/gender breakdown to EEOC.
And speaking of enstupidation, I am reduced to headshaking when I read shit like this. I can only think of the Middle East, where action is driven by rumors of nothingburger, and the aggrieved groups are so numerous and indistinguishable that one wishes that we could just gather them all together and fence them off, allowing things to take their natural course. But this is here, and in a place that I loved to visit and explore in my (((youth))). I truly hate people.
Some anniversary in North North Dakota was an excuse for social signalling by the usual collection of the hollow-headed. This is the sad effect of too much poutine.
Just in time for breakfast, a clever idea.
Fuck it, I’m now depressed. Day-drinking is my only remaining option. I suggest the same to all of you wonderful people who inhabit the Comments.
From a PIZZA menu. I can’t even…
“Why Getting Off To Anime Porn Is Shorthand For Supporting Donald Trump”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurenorsini/2016/01/21/why-getting-off-to-anime-porn-is-shorthand-for-supporting-donald-trump/#62b07ddc305e
TW: Forbes
Blocked. But it’s interesting that Forbes has turned into Everyday Feminism.
Protip: It’s quite easy to get back the block Forbes does for adblockers. Click on it, then close it out before it has a chance to finish loading. When you click on it again, you can read the page without any problems.
Nice, that worked.
Ah… I couldn’t follow the directions* but I tried again and it does work.
*Click on what?!
Click on the link to whatever page, close it out before it finishes loading, click on the link again.
Interesting. Sometime should write one about how getting off on babies dying is shorthand for supporting Hillary Clinton.
+1 Prog miasma
Short hand, or one hand?
Short hand or small hand?
John Titor and Akira hardest hit
Swing out Sisters is *art*, dammit.
Wait, I don’t know about that. What are you talking about?
[disclaimer: Reddit meme. Apparently the most popular hentai on Pornhub]
More cultural appropriation of a name … Corinne and Andy’s biggest market is Japan. Those guys love ’em.
Me? Well, it’s 80’s kulture so it’s about ready for the museum.
So…Eichenwald…super secrete Pepe?
So what is he secreting? Is he like one of those south American toads that secrete poisonous hallucinogens?
“Smarm”
That was actually a pretty funny article
Ha, look at this guy, everybody. He actually reads the articles before commenting on them. Nerd.
“Nerd”
Cannot deny that.
Nerds!
Just for the record, I lived next to Ogre when I lived in Redondo Beach.
His name isn’t Ogre in real life, but, you know, the guy who played him. He’s a biker.
One time I was working on my car, and this pissed off lady came knocking on Ogre’s door with a crying kid in tow. Ogre’s kid had beat up this other kid in the neighborhood, and the kid’s mom wanted an apology and to make sure Ogre’s kid was punished.
Ogre looks at his kid and says, “Did you beat him up?”
“Yeah”, the kid says.
“Well, why’d you do that?”, Ogre asked.
Ogre’s kid looks up with a grin and says, “Because he’s a nerd”.
Before that time circa the movie Revenge of the Nerds came out,”nerd” wasn’t really a thing.
There were always squares, but the things we think of as being nerdy weren’t nerdy back then.
Before there were personal computers, there were no computer nerds. Back when people were listening to Led Zeppelin lyrics referencing Tolkien and playing D&D, those things were not nerdy. When Star Wars came out, it wasn’t nerdy–it was unlike anything anyone had seen before.
Devo wasn’t for nerds until after nerd became a thing. Before that, they were avant-garde.
The word “nerd” is interesting because it’s like a one word oxymoron. In one sense, what people mean by saying something is nerdy is that it’s “uncool”, but it always seems to imply the popularity of something–and its coolness factor, too. Black, plastic rim glasses became cool again because they were so nerdy.
It’s Sunday. You’re hungover
Nope. I’m just hung, not hungover.
Not hungover anymore. Working on tomorrow’s hangover already.
Ack, I forgot to close an em tag. (I probably used i instead of em for the close tag. Stupid em and strong.)
Edit Fairy worked his magic.
I just hope the Edit Fairy doesn’t try to lure me into his van.
He’s not that kind of fairy. NTTAWWT.
And you’re too old.
“Many shootings have made the news, key among them being this case of Affirmative Action for Mass Shooters. The NYT reporter, in a fit of “needing to empty her mind of vacuous thoughts” unleashed this gem”
Is it just me, or does that rifle have no sights?
I’m guessing the lack of a grip is due to some stupid “assault weapon” law.
He would have killed ten more people of it had a grip.
Not only no sights (not that much of a problem really), but it’s also got a 10 round mag. You know, the kind that will impede the efforts of the shooter when on a murderous rampage.
Looks like it’s California and/or NY legal.
Interesting, as those modifications are supposed to make the gun completely unusable for mass murder.
Sadly, rather than saying “oh, this doesn’t work, let’s get rid of the law”, they’ll say “see, rekochlicans need to compromise with us some more and ban these guns completely!”
Wait a minute, Ireland’s new prime minister is a half-Indian gay guy.
But those things didn’t seem to pose much of a problem.
“His opponent, Housing Minister Simon Coveney…did express “deep concern” at the direction in which his rival would take [the ruling party] Fine Gael – suggesting Mr Varadkar’s economic policies would pull the party to the right.
“Mr Varadkar said Fine Gael should represent those “who got up early in the morning”.
“He went on to say he was talking about “people working in the public and private sector, the self-employed, carers getting up to mind loved ones, parents getting up to mind children”.
“But Fine Gael’s political enemies have tried to portray him as a rightwing ideologue – pointing to a recent campaign against benefits cheats.”
In Europe, it’s easy to become a right-wing ideologue. All you have to do is investigate people on the dole to see if they’re actually qualified. Or you say that gay rights may not survive massive immigration from countries where gays have walls toppled over onto them.
But let’s get to the important stuff, let’s use crude stereotyping to imagine the prime minister working in an Indian call center.
VARADKAR: “Top of the morning to ye, my name is Leo, how may I help you today?”
CUSTOMER: “Begorrah, I spilled me whiskey on the keyboard again, now I can’t press the ‘l’ key.”
VARADKAR: “Saints preserve us! Quick, you must do exactly I say. Get a bucket. Now turn the keyboard over and catch as much of that precious whiskey in the bucket as you can.”
CUSTOMER: “OK, I did that.”
VARADKAR: “Now drink it before you spill it again, you clumsy sod! Now, is there anything else I can help you with?”
CUSTOMER: “There was, but I forgot.”
VARADKAR: “Have a nice day, and may ye get to heaven before the devil know’s yer dead.”
I assume that this has to be his walk out music every time he makes a speech.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IFuVXzg_gkg
‘But Fine Gael’s political enemies have tried to portray him as a rightwing ideologue – pointing to a recent campaign against benefits cheats’
Yeah, that guy is a real wing nutter, how dare he not let people cheat the tax payers! He should come here and be a Democrat.
“Fyre Festival organizers blew all their money early on models, planes, and yachts”
https://news.vice.com/story/fyre-fest-organizers-blew-all-their-money-months-early-on-models-planes-and-yachts
No blow?
*urge to kill rising*
wtf. On that promo video, over footage of models frolicking on the sand and in the sea, we see superimposed:
Followed directly by:
Mr. Schneer said on Friday night that the hospital did not know about Dr. Bello’s criminal past when he was hired. “At that time, and as a result of a human resources and security department background check, which includes fingerprinting, there was no record of any conviction for sexual abuse,” he said.
Dr. Bello was a graduate of Ross University School of Medicine on the Caribbean island of Dominica, a New York State official said.
Bang up job, HR. Guessing he checked the right box.
Doctors are hard to come by.
We need a cap on the number of medical degrees granted.
Most states do that right? I know Utah does. Limits it to like 100 per year.
You can grant however many medical degrees you like, but there aren’t enough residency positions to train those people. You can’t even get a medical license as a U.S. graduate without a year of post-graduate residency training (two if you were educated abroad like this guy), and even then you have extremely limited job opportunities. Training programs are publicly funded because they are essentially playing a student who cannot practice independently and so is pretty much useless. Most hospitals are unable to support one because they aren’t big enough. You have to be able to get your residents enough cases so that when they graduate they are competent. The more positions you create, the less cases each doctor sees, so the less experienced they are when they graduate. Unless you want to completely remodel the way doctors are trained in the United States (and if you are, let’s see your proposal for doing it), you can’t just give out more MD and DO degrees unless you just want a lot of unemployable people wandering around.
Are you telling me that a licensing scheme acts as a bottleneck, keeping the supply of something low, and thus raising the price artificially?
Knock me over with a feather.
Egads!
Call me crazy, but it almost seems like the key suppliers of this service – doctors – might have a financial incentive to keep the supply low so that they can keep drawing their inflated salaries! Perhaps they’ve even formed a union-like organization that vehemently opposes any proposal that might allow the supply to grow and result in lower healthcare costs!
TurboTax has eaten into the CPAs, YouTube tutorials have eaten into mechanics, Uber and Lyft have eaten into cabbies, Craigslist has eaten into the classified ads, but there’s absolutely no way whatsoever that technology has any place in medicine. No sir. Every single patient must be seen by a fully licensed MD with 10 years of schooling. A nurse can diagnose strep throat, no sir.
I swear, the AMA is to people on here what Russia is to leftists at this point. It’s something you can blame for all the ills of health care, without a shred of proof being needed. The AMA has little influence on medicine at this point. Only about 25% of physicians belong to it. Most belong to organizations germane to their specialty, such as the American College of Surgeons, if they belong to an organization at all. Pharmaceutical companies, trial lawyer associations, senior citizens groups, and many other organizations have a lot more influence on medical policy than does the AMA.
As for salaries being inflated, who are you to decide how much I should be paid? By the way, I have no problem with you going to a nurse practitioner, PA, witch doctor, chiropractor (but I repeat myself), or whatever the hell you want, and paying whatever price you negotiate. But I’m tired of my profession being scapegoated on this board for all the ills of American medicine by people who have no idea what the hell they’re talking about.
If you were the one who made the rules, that would be great. But you’re not. The fault, as always, lies with the politicians because they ultimately make the laws that have created this mess.
I am a big believer that pretty much every issue in healthcare is a supply side issue, and those supply side issues are caused by restrictive government policies across the industry. Healthcare is not different from any other scarce resource: increasing the supply will lower the price, all things being equal.
The membership numbers of the AMA are kind of immaterial to the question of the organization’s effect on law because the AMA has legislators’ ears regardless. Although, as with any regulatory situation, I’m sure the AMA doesn’t get to dictate policy so much as negotiate with elected morons with lots of give and take on both sides (which is usually not to the benefit of the public, regardless of which side “wins”).
I’ve never vilified doctors but I will vilify the AMA. I understand that the two are distinct. And I will even admit that the AMA’s existence has probably resulted in less damage than if the aforementioned elected morons got to write policy straight from their own empty heads.
Ultimately, the problem is with the voters. It’s not going to change until people accept that doctors aren’t their slaves and that medicine is not immune to market forces.
Not true. You can go to a concierge provider right now and pay whatever price you negotiate.
Look, medicine has to have some sort of regulatory apparatus associated with it. I literally have the power to decide who lives and who dies. Now you can debate about whether or not it should be through the government or how much role they should have (much, much less in my opinion), but this idea that all we have to do to achieve health care nirvana is just deregulate everything is a utopian fantasy and it’s not going to happen in this world. It’s like saying that all taxes must be abolished. Never going to happen. We need to be talking about reforms that are possible, unless we just want to be old men yelling at clouds.
If I want drugs, I need to go to an MD, right? Like, there’s no way for me to just go buy medication after I self diagnose, or bring my retired MD neighbor a basket of fresh produce because I’m too poor to afford a doctor’s visit?
That’s not freedom. Not even close.
That’s perilously close to “muh roads.” The entire tech sector has brought incalculable benefits to the world over the last 30 years, and continues to grow by leaps and bounds, pushing the boundaries monthly. Very very little regulation there.
I drive a car or carry a gun every day bud, so do I.
Never said that. Said that deregulation will lower costs. Just like it does every time it’s tried.
You mean, besides the courts? Although, they are inherently reactive, not proactive.
Whatever proactive regulatory apparatus exist, they need to be responsive. Governments are not. Deregulation allows people to set up alternatives.
The whole “get to decide who lives and who dies” bit is an egotistical red herring. Most medical care is not about life-or-death decisions. When it is, then higher standards can be applied.
A layperson can determine when you hit someone with your car or shoot somebody. A physician or nurse has enough training to kill people, scores of people, for years without detection. That’s not an insignificant difference.
Regulation does not equal government (I can’t believe I’m having to say that on a libertarian website). The roads must be regulated, whether by government or not. Everyone can’t just decide for themselves what side to drive on, for example. The public will demand regulation of medicine. How much and by whom are the questions. And I agree that deregulation will lower monetary costs, like deregulating airlines did, but there are still rules for planes.
And yes, you’re certainly free to go to your local retired MD with a basket of fruit or whatever. I’d happily treat you in exchange for my grass getting mowed or whatever price we agree on. You don’t have to go to a hospital for routine care, either. Urgent cares offer cash pricing and often are staffed by nurse practitioners.
It can be very hard for a layperson to tell if they have a life threatening condition. Most visits to an emergency room are for conditions that aren’t life threatening, but that’s in retrospect. I’ve seen a number of patients who thought they had a minor problem but it ended up being something really bad. One guy thought he had a painful bunion but he actually had no blood flow to his foot. He needed surgery within hours or he would have developed a gangrenous leg. He had no idea.
The tech sector is bringing down costs all over the place. In areas of medicine where it is allowed to operate, like eye surgery, plastic surgery, and telemedicine, it’s doing the same thing, even with those dastardly licensed practitioners.
This whole “oh, I should be able to diagnose myself and just buy antibiotics” thing sounds great, but in practice you run into a host of problems that are going to be very hard to solve through markets. It’s like vaccines. Who do you sue for getting measles when scores of people aren’t vaccinated? When antibiotics no longer work because of millions of unneeded antibiotics that people just bought off the shelf, who do you sue? It’s not as straightforward as you make it out.
That’s not really an argument against deregulation, considering that happens under the current system. This is textbook “See, the rock keeps tigers away1!!! Well, except for the odd tiger here and there. But it would be so much worse without the rock!!!!”
I thought it went without saying that, in this context, I am using regulation to refer to statist regulation, the kind that currently exists, not the private sector regulation that would result in an ancap market.
I was getting more at the whole “his magic government badge expired, so he can’t prescribe medication legally.” angle.
None of that makes a case for medical licensure or the other forms of regulation present.
Yeah, imagine how much costs would be lowered if you got rid of medical licensure.
We’re getting back into “muh roads” territory. Every single regulated market has had the regulators and their fellow travelers screaming about the dire consequences that were unsolvable through the market. Then deregulation happened, and all those consequences failed to appear.
Uh, does my own vaccine not protect against the disease? Then I guess I sue the maker of the vaccine for selling a faulty product. Or more brutally: antivaxxers have a built in negative feedback mechanism.
Then I go get the new, improved, antibiotics that my deregulated pharma corps are churning out like freaking Gmail updates in the absence of the FDA. The antibiotics panic is the most insane thing of a long list of the “I FUCKING LOVE SCIENCE!!” Crowds panics.
Government has crippled some of the smartest people and organizations in the world to the extent that they are being outcompeted by single celled organisms.
Viking, it’s pretty clear to me that no matter what I say you and I are going to fundamentally disagree on this topic. Therefore, I’m going to quit arguing, but I want to point out a few matters of fact on which you are ignorant for your own edification. I’m not mad at you, but really, it’s not as simple as you make it out to be.
No, your vaccine does not protect you 100% from exposure to a given disease. They will give partial immunity but you still can get the illness (hence why your lawsuit against the manufacturer is a nonstarter), which is why vaccinated people have still contracted measles in areas of recent outbreak. There will also be people who do not develop antibodies despite vaccination (the effect of all vaccines is variable depending on the patient). Vaccines work by herd immunity. The more people that receive a vaccine, the more effective it is in preventing the illness because each person is less vulnerable to the disease, even though their individual improvement in vulnerability is highly variable. Antivaxxers are more likely to get sick, yes, but a population of them will also infect some people who did get the vaccine, so it’s not a purely self correcting problem.
Antibiotics already do not work at all against certain organisms. There are strains of gonorrhea that are completely invulnerable to all antibiotics that we currently have.The strains of gonorrhea came from Southeast Asia where prostitutes are able to buy antibiotics to treat their STDs at the local pharmacy, just as you envision. Antibiotic resistance becoming a huge problem when they are freely available is happening now. It’s not a hypothetical.
I am actually familiar with the concept of herd immunity, and I have heard the free rider argument. But like most free rider arguments, it is one I am highly skeptical of in reality, because the typical “but but free riders!!! externalities!!!!” fearmongering doesn’t really hold up in the real world.
Then we get into the deontological perspective: Self-ownership is a first principle, and I don’t really want to abrogate it for any reason. People are free to refrain from vaccination, that’s a feature, not a bug.
Well my vision includes drug companies able to develop and manufacture new drugs without a decade of red tape at a cost of billions. As I said: government has hamstrung some incredibly smart and motivated people to the degree that they are being beat out by prokaryotes.
Again from a deontological perspective, self-ownership rules. Period. If some hypochondriac wants to go on an antibiotic regimen and completely fuck themselves up, that’s their business.
So why are 30% of new primary care physicians foreign educated?
Here’s a thought, maybe restricting degrees has made them so expensive that people don’t want to spend that kind of money to be a primary care physician?
Go back and read what I wrote above. More medical degrees is not going to solve the problem of a limited number of residency positions, which are limited by many factors (primarily the number of patient cases), not because of some fiat by the AMA.
Most American medical school graduates don’t go into primary care because it sucks, even if they went to a state school or had their school paid for by the military. The money isn’t good compared to other areas of medicine, the hours are terrible, the patients are a pain in the ass, reimbursement is a nightmare, and so forth. Foreign medical grads go into primary care because those are the only residency slots that are available to them and because they aren’t as competitive for subspecialty training positions as American trained residents. It’s not because their degree costs less (some of the Caribbean med schools actually cost more).
Getting rid of the CON laws=more hospitals=more residency positions, I would think.
https://www.ama-assn.org/sites/default/files/media-browser/public/arc/con-evidence-for-repeal.pdf
It looks like the AMA is in favor of repealing those laws, which is good. Hopefully Rand can slip that on Trump’s desk some Friday before he heads to Mar A Lago.
No, more hospitals does not equal more residency slots, for several reasons. It’s complicated, but residency positions are primarily government funded through Medicare. If you want to create more positions, the government will have to spend more money under the current system. Without funding, residents are basically a losing proposition for hospitals financially. You’d have to increase fees at teaching hospitals to make up for the shortfall, meaning it would cost a lot more to go to one. Either that, or the whole system will have to be scrapped and replaced with something else.
The biggest reason that more hospitals won’t produce more residencies is a matter of available cases. To graduate from a residency, a doctor has to meet minimum requirements. A surgeon, for example, has to perform a certain number of operations of different types. By the time you graduate from a surgical residency, you have been involved with thousands of operations. Most hospitals do not perform near the volume of surgeries you need to become proficient over a five year period (the length of a surgical residency).
For example, I was trained in a military program. We only spent one month a year at the base hospital because we didn’t see enough pathology there. We spent most of our time at the local trauma centers because that’s where there was enough volume of truly sick patients for us to become competent to care for the truly ill. Most hospitals in the community are like the base hospital and won’t be able to train a doctor to the level of proficiency that is the current standard (unless you want to extend the duration of residency training). There just aren’t enough cases, unless you’re prepared to accept a physician that just isn’t as experienced as what we’ve been in the past.
Maybe that’s what’s necessary. Maybe a graduated system is necessary. I can say for damn sure that any system which requires the government to pay for people to become doctors is fundamentally unsustainable.
So you mean to tell me that a licensing scheme creates a one size fits all standard, which artificially restricts the supply?
Well once again, knock me over with a feather.
Like, this is the point I’m trying to make: when you start with the premise of “A doctor needs X years of schooling, Y years of residency.” to be competent, then you’re already headed for high costs.
Obviously an hour of a doctor’s time is always going to cost more than an hour of a ditchdigger’s time, but under the current system, a guy who’s done nothing for a year but conduct a thousand perfect tonsillectomies wouldn’t be able to legally perform them, but a guy who’d assisted on fewer would, because he did it as a surgical resident.
I can say for damn sure that any system which requires the government to pay for people to become doctors is fundamentally unsustainable.
After reading the convo here, that is what I don’t get. Why is the government/taxpayer paying for that? Don’t these newly trained Doctors make money for the hospital? It sounds like a good gig to have others pay to train your future employees. Contrar P, it is my understanding there are a shortage of hospitals in metro areas and long wait times. Why are there not more hospitals to serve customers if that is what is needed to train future doctors?
That is an honest question, I am ignorant to the issue. I appreciate the insight of the conversation.
Viking, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Who is this person that has been performing thousands of perfect tonsillectomies for a year but can’t get a license to do them? It seems like you’re arguing a problem that doesn’t exist.
In order for a MD designation, or any other certification, to mean anything, there has to be some standardization. That’s true for realtors, plumbers, or whatever. There’s some sort of group that sets a standard to be met to achieve their endorsement. It doesn’t have to be government, but there has to be some sort of standard you apply to make sure someone is competent.
One of the core motivations behind libertarianism is not that I know how to do your job better than you, but that you know best of all how to do your job. I can’t tell you how your profession should be structured, and I’m not trying to.
However, just because you do a job doesn’t mean you know what’s best for everyone else who does the same job or a similar one. You might be a fine doctor, but your ideas on how to be a doctor might differ substantially from another fine doctor’s. Should one of you get to dictate how the other operates? How is that any better than me, a layperson in context, calling the shots for your profession?
Part of the problem is that an MD is not necessary for a lot of the things that by law or policy presently require an MD. Regardless of whether the noblest or basest of intentions went behind these requirements, they restrict choices of practitioners and consumers.
there has to be some sort of standard you apply to make sure someone is competent.
No there doesn’t, especially if the “you” is society, if the ‘you” means each individual person, sure, but that standard could range from wanting various certifications from numerous prestigious institutions to just liking the cut of a guys’s jib.
“Why is the government/taxpayer paying for that? Don’t these newly trained Doctors make money for the hospital? It sounds like a good gig to have others pay to train your future employees. Contrar P, it is my understanding there are a shortage of hospitals in metro areas and long wait times. Why are there not more hospitals to serve customers if that is what is needed to train future doctors?”
Sorry, sloper, but the thread is becoming cluttered so I think I’ll start quoting what I’m responding to just for clarity. I’ve thought about writing a column for the website about this but I’ve been outprocessing the military and starting a new job so have lacked the motivation.
The government helps pay for residencies for several reasons. One, a steady supply of doctors is seen as a public good. There is also a central planning aspect in that they are trying to make sure there are enough doctors to meet the projected needs of each medical specialty. Left up to our own devices, we’d all probably go into dermatology (sure, the market would eventually self correct, but in the meantime there wouldn’t be enough pediatricians and there might be some negative voter response to having nobody to care for their sick kids). Finally, doctors are mandated to provide free care by various federal and state laws and helping to pay for training becomes part of the reason governments can justify demanding what is essentially slavery.
Newly minted doctors (MDs and DOs) do not make money for the hospital, even with the Medicare funding (and grant money, which makes up another key component of residency funding). As they aren’t viewed as competent to practice independently (there’s a reason they tell you to avoid teaching hospitals in July, when the new graduates arrive), all of the care they provide is supervised by an attending physician, who must also see each patient and who, of course, also must be paid by the hospital. The attending would have to see the patient anyway, so it’s a duplication of effort with the added salary of the resident thrown on top. You could argue that having residents means the attending gets to see more patients, so there’s more revenue, but in practice I can tell you that having students slows you way down. If you’ve ever supervised inexperienced people it’s very similar.
The hospital does get benefit from the arrangement, in that most residents stay around where they trained to practice. So it’s not entirely a loser on their end, and a large part of the reason they agree to do it in the first place.
There is a shortage of hospitals in metro areas. Part of it does have to do with certificate of need laws in some places (and other reasons I won’t go into for brevity), but in the main it comes down to the fact that in cities much of your payer population will be either indigent (i.e. you’ll never see a dime) or Medicare/Medicaid (which reimburse poorly). It costs an enormous amount of money to build, equip, and staff a hospital (along with the regulatory costs which are incredible), so there has to be a reasonable expectation the place will generate a positive cash flow if you’re going to risk that kind of up front investment. The average cost just to build one is about $400 per square foot nationwide and it’s likely higher in metro areas (apparently in New York it’s $1200 per square foot). Think about how big a building even a small hospital is. The high opportunity cost with considerable uncertainty about future revenue is the main reason more places aren’t built.
We have a shortage of doctors, but we need to limit the number of doctors because there’s no room for new doctors. Got it.
You yourself said that a surgical residency was 5 years. Therefore my Tonsillectomy Savant wouldn’t be licensed because he hadn’t done the time, even though his competence is, IMO, amply proven.
That is what I was getting at. All industries train people. They pay them shit wages during training and then offer incentives to keep them on. Maybe I am being simple minded there. Yes, the whole providing services for no fee is a nut kick but I am not sure how many times a Doc gets hosed with no payment at all. Maybe the hospital, but I would guess the Doctor still gets a check that week. We have all been screwed over for not receiving what we thought we should have for a service provided.
I hope you do write something up. I would like to read it. Have a bourbon and don’t take the discussion as an attack. I don’t think the disagreement is intended that way.
“You might be a fine doctor, but your ideas on how to be a doctor might differ substantially from another fine doctor’s. Should one of you get to dictate how the other operates?”
That’s exactly what happens in a medicolegal proceeding. If you sue your doctor for malpractice, your attorney will retain other doctors to serve as expert witnesses. That witness will then testify what the standard of care is concerning the condition you had and whether the individual doctor satisfied it. Laypeople are unable to accurately judge what constitutes good care, just like I’m completely unqualified to tell you if a house is properly wired, except in egregious cases. It’s not because I’m dumb or a bad person, I just don’t have the expertise.
“Part of the problem is that an MD is not necessary for a lot of the things that by law or policy presently require an MD.”
Such as what? Sure, there is an inordinate amount of regulation that could be removed. I won’t argue with that. I’d like to see state medical boards be eliminated, for example, and replaced with a national certification (whether through the federal government or competing private agencies which are my preference). I’d also like to see the DEA be eliminated so I don’t have to shell out $750 bucks every few years for each state in which I work (as well as for a host of other reasons). I’d like to see tort reform. There are many other areas where I’d like to see regulations revoked.
“No there doesn’t, especially if the “you” is society, if the ‘you” means each individual person, sure, but that standard could range from wanting various certifications from numerous prestigious institutions to just liking the cut of a guys’s jib.”
This is so screwed up I don’t know where to begin. You said there should be no standards for awarding certifications, then turn around and say prestigious institutions can award certifications. Which is it? I’m pretty sure the average politician (and their voters), who ultimately will be what makes these decisions, will not be willing to go along with a policy of “interview people until you find one that you think makes a good doctor, but all of those degrees don’t assure competence”.
Such as what?
Most prescriptions, for one thing. Regular checkups, for another (although PAs can do that in many places). Again, this is not about me knowing better, it’s about the government not knowing better.
That’s exactly what happens in a medicolegal proceeding.
Key word: legal
In case my “key word: legal” comment comes off a excessively glib (drink?), the whole point of what I’m arguing (which is commingled with other arguments other people are making, sorry for any confusion) is to disentangle law and medicine. Yes, there will be interactions between the two even in an “ideal” system. But professions should drive themselves, not be overly cautions lest they run afoul of myriad laws, nor optimize their practices to maximize government benefits, nor in general grovel to lawyers, politicians, or judges.
A layperson may be unsuited to adjudicate malpractice tort, but doctors are answerable to their paying patients in the same way any other market provider is answerable to his customers. The less medicine resembles business, the more it turns into slavery.
I understand what you meant. My point about the legal proceeding was for illustration only, although the fear of legal action is driving an inordinate amount of medicine to the detriment of the patients, ultimately. If someone has a bad outcome, they may not understand the doctor did everything a reasonable person would have done in that situation and may have actually provided exemplary care. Similarly, if someone has a good outcome, they think the doctor was great, even if he/she actually blundered into it.
There have been several studies recently that showed that facilities with higher rates of patient satisfaction with care had higher rates of mortality and morbidity (death and bad outcomes). In other words, although the patients thought everything was great, they were actually more likely to have a bad result from their care, which would seem to be of a poorer standard than other facilities where patient satisfaction was lower. More opioid prescriptions, for example, produce higher satisfaction scores, but also increased death rates. More study is ongoing.
You said there should be no standards for awarding certifications, then turn around and say prestigious institutions can award certifications.
I said no such thing, I refuted your claim that there <strong has to be a standard for competence. I, you, or anyone else can set whatever standards we or they want and certify/underwrite/vouch for anyone we deem meets them. Ultimately it is up to the end user to determine the value/accuracy of any such recommendations. As I see it the government as safety inspector has done more harm than good, as now people think they no longer need to be prudent consumers of goods and services.
“We have a shortage of doctors, but we need to limit the number of doctors because there’s no room for new doctors. Got it.”
Nice strawman. If you blow really hard it’ll fall over.
It’s not a strawman, that is your argument.
leonadasiv: “Doctors are hard to come by.”
Ted S.: “We need a cap on the number of medical degrees granted.” (sarc)
Contrarian P.: “You can grant however many medical degrees you like, but there aren’t enough residency positions to train those people.”
You then go on to explain all the reasons that this might be so. But that is irrelevant. There is no benefit to artificially limiting the number of degrees granted when there is a shortage of doctors. And the fact that 30% of our new primary care physicians are foreign educated, shows that there is plenty of room for additional US earned degrees. How they get trained is a problem that will take care of itself.
“You yourself said that a surgical residency was 5 years. Therefore my Tonsillectomy Savant wouldn’t be licensed because he hadn’t done the time, even though his competence is, IMO, amply proven.”
General surgeons don’t perform tonsillectomies. ENTs do. In any event, if your hypothetical space alien who has performed all these tonsillectomies came to earth, then yes, he could not be licensed to do them without going through a training period. If what you mean is an ENT that was trained overseas, in general he/she would need to go through an abbreviated residency program. I worked with a surgeon who did med school and residency in Mexico that was doing two and a half years of a surgical residency in the States for just that reason.
How many tonsillectomies could he have done in those 2.5 years?
Like, that’s exactly what I’m getting at.
“That is what I was getting at. All industries train people. They pay them shit wages during training and then offer incentives to keep them on.”
True, they do. I’d like to see a revamping of the training of physicians in the U.S., but despite many hours of thought I cannot think up a system that is significantly better than what we do now without significant drawbacks that would make it a political nonstarter.
“Yes, the whole providing services for no fee is a nut kick but I am not sure how many times a Doc gets hosed with no payment at all.”
I’m an emergency doc, so I get paid an hourly rate. The hospital where I’m currently working sees a lot of indigent care and writes off a ton of bills. I still get paid my hourly when I’m there, but our staffing isn’t what it would be to see everyone in a timely manner because the physician firm and hospital can’t afford to hire more staff. So I don’t take a direct pay cut, the physician staffing company and hospital do, but we don’t hire as many doctors and nurses and the ones that we do have don’t work as much as they could because they can’t be paid. Patient wait times get longer. A few shifts ago I had a patient with a partial amputation sitting in a chair in the hallway because we didn’t have enough nursing staff to open up a room to put him in.
“Have a bourbon and don’t take the discussion as an attack. I don’t think the disagreement is intended that way.”
Nah, we’re cool. Part of doing what I do is having a thick skin. I argue passionately about things, but afterwards we’re still friends.
I don’t know how to solve the problem. I do know how to let someone else who does know solve it.
Step 1: Strike every law endorsed by the AMA
Step 2: Strike every medical regulation
Step 3: Limit medical liability in civil courts
Step 4: Wait
Love how they tagged Zimmerman was a ‘white hispanic’ but this guy was just plain old ‘Henry Bello.’
Editor: Shhhh, they make think he’s Italian or Spanish!
Gays in Syria are just throwing themselves off buildings, and ISIS is trying to stop them.
And trump is the evil one for not mentioning Pride Month….
That Zinnia Jones sounds like a complete moron.
But at least I believe she exists, unlike this libertarian woman “Andrea Myers”.
I am scrolling down this person’s feed and she genuinely believes that it’s not happening. Genuinely. She said “so I have to accept their unverifiable backstory about murder based on one ambiguous photo or get swarmed by shitweasel trolls.” I think I might throw up.
I enjoyed her tweet where she said, “You’re just using these examples of [ISIS LITERALLY MURDERING GAYS] to spread bigotry”
Xhe is also upset that straight guys don’t want to date a woman with a penis.
“Woman is praised on Twitter for stopping to clean up Trump’s defaced Hollywood star”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4657530/Woman-praised-cleaning-defaced-Trump-Walk-Fame-star.html
Would.
All those stupid stickers. People really are ignorant tribalist fools, aren’t they? “RESIST HOMOPHOBIA/TRANSPHOBIA!” When has Trump done anything bigoted towards LGBTQWERTY folks?
Remember, when on the campaign trail, he said marriage should be between a man and a woman…oh wait that was B.O, the most wonderful president ever.
I don’t think he has. He was for same-sex marriage about 20 years before HRC.
A better question is what has Team Blue done for LGBT?
Even better question: why is it the government’s business at all?
When the left says we need to stop politicizing something, they mean, the government needs to stop people from disagreeing with them.
It seems like when one party bemoans that something has become “politicized”, what they really mean is “waaah, we got the government involved in this thing, but now the other party is doing things that we don’t like!”
Hey shitweasels: if you don’t like something being “politicized,” don’t get the government involved!!
The absolute argument is it shouldn’t be. But getting the government completely out of marriage wasn’t a realistic goal.
It is frustrating to think that Trump was objectively so much better with regards to treating the homos like anyone else than either Obama or Clinton, but is still accused of being a hater.
That’s because most “victim” groups are lead by DNC shills. Principals over principles. Some people are starting to wake up to that but they always have a new generation to brainwash in school and on social media.
It’s literally stereotyping. He’s a brash, cocky, caricature of a CEO. Therefore he must be racist, homophobic, and misogynist. Guy’s been in the public for 30 years but no one ever called him a racist, a sexist, or a homophobe until he ran for President as a Republican.
Maybe he ran as a Republican because having spent a lot of time in NYC, he suspected that Democrats are really shitty people. Now they’ve proved it to him beyond any doubt.
Trump has ‘hung out’ with a lot of quiet republicans over the years. If you go back and look at his political donations, he’s consistently donated to both sides – which is obviously a sensible strategy if you’re involved in NYC society and business.
Frankly, I don’t see him as having any strong political affiliations, and where he expressed an opinion that could be interpreted politically, he’s deliberately embraced the minimal risk approach. His objective was to succeed as a businessman, and I doubt he saw any point in making any more enemies or garnering any more adverse publicity than he can avoid.
In short, I’m not sure that he had any kind of political philosophy as we would recognize it over and above gaming the system in his favor where possible, and trying to influence policymakers for his benefit where he needed to.
Indeed, I’m not sure that even now, he’s driven by adherence to any strict philosophical issues. I think he sees a lot of situations that are ‘broken’ and he’s just looking for answers. Some of the answers he selects are self-evident to us, but unconventional to supporters of big government.
Actually, he was dogged by accusations of racism in the 1980s relating to the tenancy practices of the property management company he inherited from his father.
But, there’s not much to those accusations, and you’re right on the gist of it.
Were they actually racist, or were they “we only rent to people with good credit” racist?
I don’t think anyone had a smoking gun memo of “don’t rent to niggers”. There is some weak evidence that they may have steered black applicants away from rental properties dominated by whites, but the only thing anyone can prove conclusively (as in, Trump said as much) is that they were absolutely uninterested in renting to welfare recipients regardless of skin color.
Yeah, that’s some dumb shit. The little wall was quite clever, though.
My only nitpick is that by posting to Twitter she was inviting praise. A little “look at me” ness going on there.
The ableism sticker is how you know it’s a real brain trust putting those on.
“He said he didn’t know what sparked the dispute, but shortly after the concert began shots rang out.”
“The shooting occurred around 2:30 a.m. about 1 mile east of the state Capitol building.”
I’ll be the first to admit that I know absolutely nothing about night club life, but starting a concert at 2:30 am is not likely to bring out the best attendees.
Wow I missed that part. Yeah 2:30 am is ridiculously late to begin any kind of event that doesn’t involve getting laid.
From the “At this point, let’s just figure out who’s running for President on each side in 2024” file…
Aren’t the Dems already the unapologetic party of urbanites? They clean up in the cities.
It seems like an incredibly stupid idea. Alienate the non Urban areas, and you still can’t guarantee everyone in the cities will agree with you.
Also, I’m guessing this means they want to prog even harder, which is supposed to attract the people that didn’t vote for them last time… or something.
They get higher proportions of the votes in some urban areas than Kim Jung does in North Korea’s elections.
Well, America is made up of mostly large cities and the Dems did lose most of them last time, so it sounds like a winning strategy.
/how can anyone be this stupid?
Has Joy Reid ever said anything intelligent? every time I see a tweet of hers it’s something completely stupid.
The people have failed their leaders. Political hobbyism is wrecking America.
The Democratic Party, the party that embraces “engagement,” is in atrophy in state legislatures across the country. Perhaps this is because state-level political participation needs to be motivated by civic duty; it is not entertaining enough to pique the interest of hobbyists. The party of Hollywood celebrities also struggles to energize its supporters to vote. Maybe it is because when politics is something one does for fun rather than out of a profound moral obligation, the citizen who does not find it fun has no reason to engage. The important parts of politics for the average citizen simply may not be enjoyable.
Political hobbyism is a problem not just for Democrats. The hobbyist in the Oval Office is evidence enough of the Republican version. Donald Trump’s election was possible because both political parties mistakenly decided several decades ago to have binding primary elections determine presidential nominations. Rather than having party leaders vet candidates for competency and sanity, as most democracies do, our parties turned the nomination process into a reality show in which the closest things to vetting are a clap-o-meter and a tracking poll.
And another “political scientist” calls for a return to the smoke-filled room. Only Top Men can deliver us from the deplorable rabble.
Democrats have been getting their asses handed to them in state and local elections because nobody votes for them. Obviously the fault lies with the voters.
I hate that argument: most democracies do it, therefore doing it makes you a better democracy.
Most totalitarian states provide national defense, should we stop doing that because we want to be non totalitarian?
Mom: “If all the other democracies were jumping off a bridge…”
we get universal health care?
I for one would feel much better voting for the people chosen by McConnell, Ryan, Pelosi, and Schumer. We need our betters to save us from ourselves.
The Democrat’s Super Delegates are pretty close to a smoke-filled room.
^This
The superdelegates were created to make sure the party VIP’s would be able to stop some crazy candidate like McGovern from winning the nomination again. It worked this time just like it was supposed to. It kept Bernie from ever seriously challenging Hilary. Unfortunately, it also was a bit too heavy handed and alienated a shit ton of those Bernie bros from the general election.
“Rather than having party leaders vet candidates for competency and sanity, as most democracies do,…”
TOP. MEN. tell people who to vote for in most democracies. Good for them. We aren’t a democracy.
No no, gerrymandering is why Democrats lose state legislative seats. I’d wager some of them may think it’s why they lose governor’s races too.
The whole gerrymandering argument is ridiculous*. The majority party controls redistricting. The Democrats can’t have lost something they held for a while through gerrymandering because they got to draw the damn lines in the first place.
* = Of course, so is the “Russian hacking” bullshit. And gerrymandering is a real problem, but it’s not why the Democrats are in such sorry electoral shape right now.
Yeah, the thing is that if you’re going to have legislators representing a physical area, then the government, composed of those legislators, is going to decide what those districts are. The party in power during redistricting is going to have the opportunity to put their thumb on the scales. They’re just mad that due to their fecklessness and incompetence over the past ten years, the nation has fewer elected Democrats then any time in history.
In other words, the “scourge of gerrymandering” is due entirely to them sucking so much that people across the nation, from sea to shining sea, are voting Republican, and letting Republicans control the redistricting process.
Yeah, if anything the gerrymandering narrative should be, “you fucked up so badly that even though you got to draw the districts, you still lost them”.
If the Dems were the majority of governors and had a majority in the Senate, then the gerrymandering argument would have some weight. But they don’t, so the more likely reason the Dems aren’t winning elections is because people aren’t voting for them.
Damn, that is a good point. If they really were being suppressed by gerrymandering, then they could still win Senate seats and governorships.
LOL Stupid Koch sucker, clearly time traveling Trumpkins from the future drew the state borders to favor the Rethukklikans.
The Russians are somehow involved too, but Rachel Maddow hasn’t told me how they did it yet.
/prog
Umm. Hasn’t every Dem who’s won the presidency since LBJ been a long-shot type? All of the Top.Men-endorsed candidates have lost.
Funny how these things are only ever a problem when there’s a trend of Democrats losing.
Morning y’all – I spent all of yesterday with our new potential adoptee… ok, looks like we’re going to adopt this kid.
It’s weird but this young man thinks I’m like the coolest person evah – following me around and listening to my opinions like manna from heaven. He doesn’t realize that the real power resides with my wife. I’m just a humble servant to her cause. Also weird for a natural introvert like myself.
Also cultural / class conflict: Trying to explain concepts to him – like why making money for yourself is great – freedom to do what _you_ want to do. He came from a poor family where they lived off of the government teat. Bringing him to our middle-class home, pool, and seeing my family reveals these cracks. Of course maybe my own expectations are too damn high – I was a bloody fool at the same age.
this young man thinks I’m like the coolest person evah
So you haven’t shown him your hifi.
I did – he’s confused by the whole preamp vs amp thing. “So the amp just boosts the power from the preamp?”
Me: yes and no.
Also he was really confused by the vacuum tube preamp (a Dynaco PAS) I showed him. And the jaw drop when I said the design was 60 years old. Also mystified by the McIntosh 2100 I have sitting in the spare bedroom. 100Ws out of such a huge amp?
The PAS was my first pre-amp. And I still use one.
I recently built a new Dynaco PAS – including the metalwork. All new circuit boards, transformer, power supply capacitor, switch, pot, etc. No tone controls.
It sounds – surprise! – much like a stock PAS but just has less age problems.
Are they still using that piss-poor two-ECC83-with-no-follower topology?
I’ve got a box full of burned out power transformers from PAS preamps where someone tried to add an extra tube as a CF, and exceeded the marginal current ratings.
Of course! It’s all part of that vintage magic! /lulz
The power supply is so weak, some people think they sound better if they take out the indicator light.
You could always count on David Hafler to make something as cheap as possible. Still – messing with Dynaco gear is always great fun, at least back in the days when I could get a Stereo 70 for $100. Now not so much.
Nice project. I like the baxandall tone controls, myself. Anyway, I think I have five of them, including the one I’m currently using. A few years ago, I took one completely apart, sanded the chassis, depopulated the boards, etc. and I haven’t got around to rebuilding it. I wasn’t planning on changing much except the rectifier, and regulating the heater supply.
Once you go tilt control, you’ll never go back.
… then LH sits down and starts looking at his coupon collection.
And then all is lost.
Why are you cool? I can hazard a guess.
An adult who engages with him in a context that isn’t focused on making him do something? An adult that engages with him on something approaching an equal level, that isn’t transactionally focused? I don’t know the kid’s background, but maybe you’re interacting on what seems to him a non-coercive basis?
You’re going to have a better idea of his history than us, but even in stable family units, people often don’t treat their kids the way you’re treating this one.
That’s pretty spot on – I imagine once I start laying the discipline down – school! – there’s going to be a change. Right now I’m big brother, not a dad.
If you’re lucky you might not have to lay down discipline that much. Lots of coverage is given to unamangable adopted kids, but I know a lot of families with adoptees, and a significant proportion of them are relatively straightforward – and in many cases the kids have been adopted as teens, who are of course promoted as being the toughest cases.
One of the most successful adoption scenarios is a family I know with three kids, all adopted, and every kid went thru’ the “you’re not even my read dad” stage. Bill – the father in the family – has what I think is a good response:
“That’s true. But you know, you’re here because we wanted you here, not because I’m forced to raise you.”
– or variations on that.
My observation (the value of which may be debatable) is an extension of my views on raising kids in general – figure out if you can really trust them to be responsible (not forgetting they are still kids) and treat them as adults as much as you can. Try and differentiate this kind of parenting from all the other parents that your family interacts with. In the case of adoptees, I’m sure this’ll be more difficult, but in the long run, an extended unrealistic adolescence when a kid is 17-20 is something I’d want to avoid.
Lastly – IMNSHO – you can be a big brother AND a dad. You can’t be both at the same time.
Good advice all around. This is all new to me so lots of 3AM thoughts on the best way to handle this stuff. He’s a good kid – and seems quite intelligent. He has also ragged on his own biological parents for doing nothing with their lives. It seems like this young man wants to go out their and succeed, but doesn’t know how. But he’s friendly and outgoing, gets along with everyone, so there’s a real chance he could get somewhere with his life.
It’s the whole trying to get him to “past his past” thing that has me the most worried. There’s an element there – a bit white trash wanna be gangster – that can be annoying. But he, after all, still a teenager.
Everyone has a past. Few people get the luxury to “turn the page” cleanly and become the person they want to be without having to drag their personal history around with them.
That process of “becoming the new me” is very liberating, and in his case, nobody will criticize him for reinventing himself.
I look at this as a great opportunity for him – if he’s willing to run with it. We’ll be there to support him and try to show him the way. I suppose the rest is up to him!
And thanks, Number 6. Good for me to talk this stuff out.
Yeah, if the kid can get a clean break from his past, it can be a great thing. After her divorce, my Mom moved from Southern Ontario to Alberta when I was in my mid-teens. The first year or so was extremely difficult (I didn’t know anything else), but after I adjusted I realized nobody knew my history. They couldn’t point at me and say “I remember when so-and-so was picking his nose in class in third grade” or whatever just to try and put me down. I could have any backstory I wanted, so I chose to be mysterious. Drove my fellow teens crazy.
It really was, as 6 says above, liberating.
Cool, but what about the new car?
I bought my wife a Countryman S (with a 6-speed manual, of course). I’ll hobble along in my car until the day I decide to replace it. Too much going on – $$$ and personally – for me to consider a replacement right now.
The dealership we bought from does nothing but foreign cars – they have some beautiful Ferraris in the show room. The owner was a first generation Italian who also works on cars. Great to hear him expound on the joys of owning cars, especially problematic European makes. “Do you want to drive something fun or a Toyota? Sure it’s reliable, but it doesn’t bring you any joy.”
Congratulations and good luck when he finds out who the real boss is in the house.
An apprentice Lord of the Wasteland? When will he learn how to use the nitro kit on the dune buggy?
What kind of libertarian decreases the supply of orphans?
I think it’s great you are adopting this kid. It’s a big mitzvah. Good for you (and him.)
*crackly speaker sound* Also: the Gray Skies Barrel Finished Gin has run out. Send resupply party! Over and out.
Ugh – my wife brought home a fifth of Beefeater. The horror.
I like Beefeater. I think it’s the grapefruit.
It’s not bad – but not as good as Gray Skies. Or Liberator. Or Hendricks.
I like Solveig.
The wife and I will mosey down here for lunch. https://yelp.to/qTKq/Fba0wj4nsE
I foresee a couple Ton Collins and a dozen oysters on the shell in our future. Will take your gin suggestions. The bar is extremely well stocked at this place.
I haven’t tended bar in decades, but for highballs I think simple gins that only hit a couple notes are best. More complicated flowery gins are better suited for martinis, imho. So Gordon’ or Tanqueray , not Boodles or Bombay.
God bless you.
“I foresee a couple Ton Collins”
How big are the glasses?
Look at me! See how smart and witty I am!
Criticism is not censorship, and no matter how insistent Twitter’s free speech brigade might be, I felt safe knowing that we could always go back to the text. The Constitution was on my side.
But that was when I thought facts had power, when what we think of as the truth was based more on observable reality and less on the incantations of paranoid uncles who would rather die of preventable diseases than let America’s first black president leave an intact legacy. When the “free speech” canard started nibbling away at me, around 2012 or so, it seemed as goofy as the idea of Donald Trump becoming president. Oops.
Since then, the anti-free-speech charge, applied broadly to cultural criticism and especially to feminist discourse, has proliferated. It is nurtured largely by men on the internet who used to nurse their grievances alone, in disparate, insular communities around the web — men’s rights forums, video game blogs. Gradually, these communities have drifted together into one great aggrieved, misogynist gyre and bonded over a common interest: pretending to care about freedom of speech so they can feel self-righteous while harassing marginalized people for having opinions.
So when people criticize this Sarkeesian person, it’s okay? Apparently not.
I’m not sure what the point is, other than men are bad, because they’re not woke.
America’s first black president leave an intact legacy.
We must leave this mess intact, to fellate the ego of one man.
Her article has convinced me the NYT laid off the wrong people.
Lindy West isn’t employed by the NYT.
They’re reprinting the sort of drek that rainbow-haired SJW’s like her put on their Tumblr blogs. this is their new cost-saving business model. I expect it will be a huge success.
Once again, to the left free speach means: I get to say what I want sans criticism.
Funny that she doesn’t want to extend that to others.
Criticism isn’t censorship. Using violent disruption against your political opponents, attempts to deplatform, and the use of public institutions to prevent others from speaking are.
TW: Lindy West
And is the NYT this desperate to find people to write opinions?
I’m just happy to live in a world where the Democrats have finally acknowledged that they are against free speech.
Yeah, unfortunately, shrieking that all disagreement is hate speech and hate speech is violence, while being blind to actual physical violence committed by fellow travelers, is going to continue to go badly.
“Ms. Sarkeesian has been relentlessly stalked, abused and threatened since 2012, when she started a Kickstarter campaign to fund a series of YouTube videos critiquing the representation of women in video games.”
Sarkeesian deliberately trolled 4chan, and had her friends threaten her, so she could play the victim to raise money with that Kickstarter.
A Kickstarter where she got 100K but still delivered late.
Is pathetic that anyone takes her seriously. She claims to love video games, yet there’s that nice video of her saying she’s not familiar with video games. Which is it, little girl? Bitches to the UN about day-to-day harassment, then name calls someone quietly sitting and listening to a talk of hers.
*It’s
She’s a flim flam artist and everyone is aware of it but a lot of people are way too heavily invested in her to admit it publicly.
I was happier when for the last 6 months she wasn’t being talked about. It’d be nice if the media would just quit acknowledging her.
“Nothing is more important than the First Amendment, the internet men say, provided you interpret the First Amendment exactly the same way they do: as a magic spell that means no one you don’t like is allowed to criticize you.”
I don’t know of single person that thinks that.
I can think of one. Anita sarkeesian.
Though maybe that it’s what you were saying.
Look into the field, don’t you see that strawman? He believes that.
“Feminists and Social Justice Activists Call for Video Game Developer Censorship Blacklist”
Thought policing is alive and well in the new media as social justice activists ramp up their crusade to silence and de-platform “wrongthinkers” from producing content within their medium, citing issues as nebulous as “cyberviolence” as reasons to censor those who oppose progressive ideology.
Following the explosion of outrage against an independent game developer who once expressed views critical of feminism in the video game industry, outrage warriors are now calling for the industry to enact strict rules against hiring and associating with developers whose views do not align with feminist orthodoxy.”
https://heatst.com/gaming/feminists-and-social-justice-activists-call-for-video-game-developer-censorship-blacklist/
I wish they would fix their shitty website.
Yeah Heatstreet’s web page is awful. I thought it was associated withe the WSJ?
Not associated with anyone soon – it’s going bye bye in a month.
I’d like a list of games made by wrongthinkers as well. That way, I know which games I definitely must buy.
All of them with scary black guns that have things that go up. IOW, almost all the top money making games.
Tough fucking shit, they’re not getting it. Didn’t they get enough of that last time? Are they a glutton for punishment? The vast majority of gamers already hate feminists with a burning passion.
I don’t think they expect to get it from the wider gaming community, they already know they’ve got the majority of Western development studios eating out of their hands. For whatever reason, all the AAA developers in America, Canada, and Western Europe seem to think that SJWs represent the majority of the gaming community, and keep pandering to them. Until that stops, they won’t.
Yup. For some reason, game industry keeps experimenting with Moar Social Justice and failing, but the results of said failure are never ascribed to Social Justice. It’s really like socialism.
I love, love, love when they get fucked by SJW for failing to pander correctly, though. Idiots who made Deus Ex: Mankind Divided thought they were so hip by trying to leverage BLM with their #auglivesmatter bullshit. Instead, SJWs ate them up and made them go through self-criticism sessions because You Do Not DO THAT! And all it did was make other people leery of the game. Even though it’s apparently neither in-your-face about it, nor bad otherwise (I’ll probably get it this steam sale).
Sadly, it’ll never stop. People who make stupid decisions rarely get punished for them, and their replacement will be vetted by the same SJW-infested system that threw up the previous lot. All they need to make sure is that cash cows keep bringing in the goodies, and keep those within safely conquered territories of the Culture War.
Mankind Divided isn’t in your face about it, but it doesn’t walk the line nearly as well as it could have (something that reasonable people criticized it for.) It still essentially takes the side of the oppressed augs (granted, they’re suffering actual oppression) and doesn’t do as good a job as it could have with the other side.
Still a great game though.
Yeah, when I asked my friend who played it, he was baffled about ad campaign that had little to do with the game itself. An unforced error, as it were, by idiots hoping to score extra prog points on the cheap and instead getting fucked from both ends. Less fun than it sounds, as the sales were bad enough to put the series on hold.
Something something, Andromeda….
The ad campaign could have been representative of the game. If they wanted, they could have given you the option of sympathizing with either group (like The Witcher games did so well,) but, they decided to back off right at the last moment.
Doesn’t bother me too much, I’m more pissed at the abrupt ending that probably won’t get resolved anytime soon now.
Ah well, at least there’s Cyberpunk 2077.
Years of seeing left and right derp, the only conclusion I can come to: there is a large swath of people who would welcome a dictator. And even one that wouldn’t 100% align with their interests, provided that leader went after their enemies.
Exactly as it has always been.
People don’t want freedom; they want a benevolent master.
It’s surprising to me how few people really want true freedom, but I guess it’s too much responsibility for most.
Well, that’s somewhat determined by what people thing ‘true freedom’ is. If you’ve been brought up to consult the Newspeak Dictionary regularly, our “true freedom” isn’t going to look much like their “true freedom”.
True freedom of opportunity then. But the statist have twisted that term too.
O’Brien nods, smiling enigmatically.
So much for Minnesoda Nice, I guess.
Uffda, some Indian immigrant who is muslim moves to the boonies of western Minnesoda to become a small town doctor is upset because his neighbors voted for Trump. I mean quite the deal upset.
The whole story is about how he can’t forgive his neighbors for voting for Trump because Trump had said bad things abut muslims. And the whole story is sympathetic to his whining.
He also started giving lectures to the rubes on what islam is. He did so at the invitation of a local lutheran pastor. At one lecture (at a church) some small town religious rubes yelled bible quotations at him. A lot was made of how badly that scared him and how he wore a bullet proof vest to his next lecture (vest was provided by neighbor).
It is a long piece and I can’t see any evidence that anyone has treated this asshole with anything except open arms. Yet he is thinking of leaving simply because his neighbors voted for Trump.
“Yet he is thinking of leaving simply because his neighbors voted for Trump.”
Someone get that man a plane ticket.
We moved to a small western Minnesoda town when I was 3. If I had stayed there and married a local, my kids would have been considered locals. I don’t think this jackass realizes how well he has been treated.
Those complete bastards in Minnesoda, sold him a house in the nice part of town, personally welcomed him and his kids to the school, and the butchers went out of the way to slaughter cows in the halaal way so he didn’t have to drive to Mpls for his meat.
Can you imagine the horror of having to live that life?
No shit. If he’s so unstable that he’d want to pick up and move from a place he likes only because of the way his neighbors voted I’d have to call his judgment into question, problematic for a doctor.
Also, the comments seem to be giving the guy a fucking tonguebath. Ugh.
In case I wasn’t the only one wondering:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uff_da
Uuffda. I think I have tried to educate you heathens about this before. Yeah, it is a great word used by the Norwegians that I grew up around. Meaning all comes down to the tone and context.
By the way it was used, I assumed “Uffda” was his name.
A red flag for me was this paragraph:
Pics or GTFO. When will the left figure out that any use of these anecdotes about “hate crimes” are actually having the opposite effect?
Or when will they figure out that shit like the above is almost certainly a 4chan troll who is having a hearty laugh right now over this whole article?
We spent yesterday morning at the Farmers’ Market in Cedar Rapids, IA. It’s HUGE, like 15,000 people there. As you’d expect, the attendees were predominantly rural whites. There was a smattering of folks in Muslim headgear in the crowds, and of course all those rednecks taunted and threatened them, pulled off the scarves, and screamed, “GO BACK WHERE YOU CAME FROM, FUCKING AY-RABS!” and the cops tackled them looking for bombs.
Oh wait, it wasn’t a Prog fever-dream; the reality was, no one paid the slightest attention to them, everyone was busy enjoying a beautiful sunny day with wonderful food, drink, and arts.
Not making everything about politics is literally worse than Hitler.
You know who else wanted everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state?
Roscoe Filburn?
Hilary Clinton?
Yet he is thinking of leaving simply because his neighbors voted for Trump.
Well… bye.
There has been debate in our church on this kind crap. The lib members want this kind of outreach. The actual Christians just pointed to the church mission statement (which talks about preaching to and converting non-believers). “Sure, invite them over so we can convert them from their false religion.”
Abrahamic sibling rivalry amuses me.
Still better then the pizza place that sells Pork free bacon. I’ve already seen two locations shut down in less then a year.
People should be more openminded about their pizza toppings, there’s no right or wrong topping.
*looks at picture*
Wait a minute…mashed potatoes? Fuck that!
When SP saw that, I heard words I did not know that SHE knew.
We like our carb laden flatbreads out here in fly-over country. I’d be curious what SP’s take on the Mac and Cheese pizza would be:
They have a mashed potato pizza as well.
Sounds like a decent mac-n-cheese. I’ll take that with a real slice of pizza on the side.
I’d like to apologize for this. It’s called pagash, and it is one more thing that you can blame on Scranton.
We need an excuse to rag on Scranton?
Not at all, just pointing out that potato pizza is one more reason to hate on it.
I mean, I personally really like pagash, buy that might be culinary Stockholm syndrome, heyna?
Well, it’s not pizza but of all the things you can put on dough you could do a lot worse than potatoes.
*shovels down another forkful of fried potatoes and Weißwurst*
It isn’t pizza, and unlike the deapdish heretics, we don’t pretend it is. It’s pagash, a giant open face pierogi.
I’ve never been a pagash fan. There is a variety of great pizza around the Wilkes barre area. Neapolitan style is still my favorite, but I do like a fried Sicilian occasionally . It’s a gut bomb but a few slices now and again are cool with me.
Let me tell you about a potato pizza that is actually pizza- I based it on something I had in Torino and Bergamo, but it’s definitely an adaption rather than a copy.
Thin slice Yukon Golds. Toss with chopped rosemary, olive oil, salt, and a dash of Styrian roasted pumpkinseed oil. Sautee sliced onions in olive oil until they are caramelized, then toss in some chopped wild mushrooms.
Spread out the dough, Cover with a single layer of the sliced potatoes, then scatter the caramelized onions and wild mushrooms on top. Then top generously with grated Raclette (or if you live in a benighted area where that God of Cheese is not available) Gruyere. Bake in a super hot oven on a pizza stone.
Mashed potatoes? No. No. No.
Only addition would be to add thyme to the rosemary.
Thyme? Thyme? So… many… puns…
must… resist…
Sage advice, FB. One must avoid the temptation to pun.
Always good advice to avoid the pun, otherwise the idiots come out of the woodwork and pepper the comments with idiocy. As to pizza ideas. I thought I would try a realm of flavors from my childhood yesterday. I made a mayo/mustard/Worcestershire sauce and spread that on a dough and topped with bologna and mild cheddar (I could not find the american cheese of my childhood. They don’t make cheese like that these days. It is all Velveeta garbage). Total flop. The mustard dominated the flavor profile and the bologna was lost. It needs work. I call it the, “Trailer Park”. I am thinking maybe Kraft dinner for a base.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/881503147168071680
Best President in the last 100+ years easily. If he makes an actual WWE appearance while in office, greatest ever.
Lolololololol
Some of these comments are pure derp. Mike P Williams: How are we at the stage in human evolution where the president tweets violent, rightwing memes? Nothing you do shocks me anymore.
Let me guess he was cheering on Kathy Griffin
Edward Hardy, who describes himself on his profile describes himself as a member of House Stark, journalist, and social media editor:
That’s right, Ed. And nothing else happened.
Isn’t it funny….Trump is basically hitler and a fascist. But yet they complain when he isn’t working
God how would the country survive a President who played golf constantly and made silly videos.
https://youtu.be/wC1NGWM8gP8?t=20s
I didn’t work this weekend either.
I haven’t read the replies, though I probably should. He’s proven himself to be the Shaolin Grandmaster of trolling.
The best part of this tweet is that CNN will have to report on it today. It almost makes me wish I had cable.
This. Someone with a cable please tell us later.
LOLOLOL
Oh Gu, fuck yourself.
Oh man, the constant trolling of the left with his Twitter is hilarious! It’s a short time into his presidency, but I can safely say he’s already the best president of my lifetime so far.
OK, that’s actually pretty damn funny. Good God, people really need to lighten up. The only thing that would be more accurate would be CNN beating their own ass.
Interesting, there are a lot of people posting critical response after critical response after critical response. They really are obsessed.
I can only imagine that people like this hang out on his account all day, hitting refresh constantly – you know, like us here. Except we don’t get 47,000 comments and we actually read each other’s shit rather than just post narcissistic twaddle.
Speak for yourself, I’ll narcissistically twaddle all day long.
Euphemism?
Not if he can do it all day long. Even at 18, there were limits…
When Zero Sum Game and GILMORE had a longish discussion over meme-magic some months ago, I came out of their exchange siding with GILMORE. Dammit though, the way things have played out, I’m starting to think there’s something to this whole TRUMP-Pepe-Kekistan business.
neither here nor there….
but the core of my point on that topic wasn’t to say that the meme-ing has “no effect”
it was more that 1) the population involved is tiny, and 2) the engagement is superficial and ephemeral
its just a new medium in which the same old culture-war stuff happens. its not going to change anyone’s minds who weren’t in the process of changing already; it mostly serves to reinforce pre-existing tribal identities with shared lingo and symbolism
it has literally no effect on 99% of the population. and by the time you get a larger share of the population all networked and tweeting etc.? something new will have come along. its just grist for the mill.
Well, I was TLDRing a discussion from months ago, and it’s likely that I plowed right over the nuances of that discussion. It’s also likely that I’m doing a “wet streets cause rain” thing with this stuff. I’ve been up for (counts) about 28 straight hours, with the help of some…substances. So I just want to believe, that’s all I’m saying. I WANT TO BELIEVE
I enjoy the same things as much as you do.
I think Trump’s tweet today should be archived in the Trump presidential library as
– “the First Presidential PWNAGE”
Meth is bad, Ummkay
The kids don’t say pwnage or own anymore, Gilmore. It’s all rekt nowadays.
I mean, I would have agreed with you before today.
But the President of the United States of America just tweeted a meme. Plus I think memes have kind of gone mainstream, people swapping them on Facebook and what not.
my comment was more in reference to the KEKistanti/Pepe the frog meme-warriors who purposely shitpost racist comments in order to drive SJWs into a greater tizzy and prompt the wider public to reject them
i.e. what ZSG and i were talking about in the discussion FSJ referenced
not ‘usage of memes’ in general.
North North Dakota? Is that a coincidence or do you owe me a ‘bum tap’?
Trudeau is an idiot.
I told my wife on Friday of all the PM’s to be part of the 150th bash. ‘He’s going to do something stupid.’
There you go. 10 fucking provinces we have. 10. Not 20. 10. He had one fucking job. And it’s not like he forgot PEI – which Potato Edward Island. He forgot a wealthy province that pays into the equalization system more (and takes less – the opposite of Quebec) than any other province I believe on a per capita basis. Then again, it’s also the province that hated his father most thanks to the NEP which was perceived to be a program that stole from them.
drop ‘which’. Whatev.
I’m going cycling in a bit.
Uffda! Are you casting aspersions on the one world leader who can talk intelligently about quantum computing?
I actually just watched that for the first time. How can he get credit for being so smrt for that bit of stage craft? Any Jr. High school kid could have written that as an answer on a pop quiz.
Like Obama, believe want to believe he’s that smart.
Ugh. The quantity of pseudo-scientific woo spouted on the topic of QED is frustrating. But it’s bound to happen, I guess, when you try to analogize something that has no analog.
Actually, isn’t that the point? Instead of binary, it’s analog.
No, in that sense, analog would correlate with using real numbers instead of bits. This would be concerned with some form of many-valued logic (e.g. fuzzy logic), as opposed to putting a set of (quantum) bits into superposition and working over all possibilities in parallel, before then collapsing the system and reading off a value (a traditional bit string, as with a classical machine), which itself holds some probability of being incorrect.
I am starting to come around on this trump fella. Especially as he takes a chainsaw to obama’s federal agencies.
I’m skeptical on a lot of things (foreign policy, tax reform, Trumpcare being as bad as Obamacare), but he’s done some good things. Not enough to get me to vote for him in 2020, yet, but he’s improved my opinion of him.
(he’s still an idiot and really should stop twittering for his own good. I don’t care how crazy it makes the left.)
I would say he needs to stop some personal feud type tweets
No, he must never stop tweeting! The pant shitting from his damn tweets is just too much fun.
He’s the first President ever to actually question the value of NATO post 1989. We’ve spent two decades, three complete two term administrations, with the supposed statesmen just continuing on with idea that it is perpetually 1985, and the tanks are lined up behind the Fulda Gap. Poured away trillions based on that idiotic idea.
Trump actually bringing up cost-benefit analysis into our foreign policy conversation is an enormous difference maker from a libertarian POV.
The Trump tax plan (https://assets.donaldjtrump.com/trump-tax-reform.pdf) would be a huge improvement from what currently exists.
If it passed as written, it’s an enormous tax cut, which also flattens the tax structure, and also eliminates the loopholes and the carve outs and the exemptions that siphon off enormous amounts of wealth into the pockets of tax preparers and accountants.
Depends on what happens. Rand might have the inside track now, and he’s pounding the “hold to our word, repeal Obamacare, then we can look at reform.”
I’m glad that he’s questioning the value of NATO, but I don’t think he’s going to do anything about it. We just sent 300 Marines as part of a Rotational Force into Norway for the next year, and they’re expecting to continue it.
I mean, it’s a signed and ratified treaty, it’s not like withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement. He can’t just unilaterally withdraw from NATO. But he’s the only President in decades to question the Beltway Consensus on foreign policy, and that’s worth something.
I couldn’t care less what he says. If you listened to Obama’s words early in his Presidency, he sounded pretty good too. I care about what he does. And what he’s done doesn’t give me any hope that he’s any better on foreign policy than his predecessors.
This is what I mean. He says NATO is outdated, and maybe he believes it, but I doubt he’s going to do anything substantial.
Maybe. Maybe not. The first step is getting the idea out there, swimming against the tide of the the Beltway Establishment, both flavors of which are absolutely in accordance that there should be some kind of American Hegemony.
I know President Libertarian, once elected, sells off all our overseas bases for a profit, withdraws from all our entangling alliances, and slashes the military budget while simultaneously privatizing Social Security and returning to the gold standard in his first 100 days.
But in the real world, Trump is the first guy with actual power to be somewhat amenable to the idea that maybe, just maybe, stationing American troops in Ukraine transforms NATO from a shield alliance to a sword alliance, and is likely to lead to war, not to peace.
True. I’d also forgotten where he criticized them for defense spending back in May, so it doesn’t look like it was just a campaign talking point. And it’s still early days. I don’t expect us to withdraw completely, I know that’s not happening for decades, if at all., I’d just like to see him take some small steps in drawing down the number of troops we have overseas. Maybe he will, I just don’t think it’s likely.
I think that’s just an annual exercise. I I think that’s an annual exrrcise. I was supposed to go on it in 1991 if the Gulf War had not saved me. My battalion went to the Gulf the rest of the Regiment went to Norway – above the Attic Circle in February. We had a couple of guys with minor shrapnel wounds. They had 2 Marines dead from the cold.
I’m somewhat relaxed about this. Commitments like this Rotational Force are somewhat necessary for building cadre with specialist knowledge in the terrain, tactics and liaison with allied troops. It’s probably as valuable as joint-forces training and is complementary to it.
If you accept that a nation has a need for a well-trained and effective military, it’s prudent to have at least some of your personnel experienced in conducting operations in all environments.
I think that overall, this kind of commitment is very low on the priority list, and the real measure of Trump’s commitment to reform needs to be evaluated in other ways, such as clear force reductions and realignment of major commitments such as South Korea and Europe. EUCOM has over 60,000 personnel dedicated to it. 300 Marines sent to Norway, who would otherwise be sitting in Stuttgart really doesn’t matter that much, except to the guys freezing their balls off in Hammerfest.
I was always kind of on the “both sides do it, the Democrats probably a bit more, but most elections fall outside the margin of fraud” opinion on voter fraud.
But holy shit, the blue states are really fighting this election panel. It really makes me wonder just how many votes cast are fraudulent.
http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/did-votes-by-noncitizens-cost-trump-the-2016-popular-vote-sure-looks-that-way/
The science isn’t quite as settled as they want to claim here, as elsewhere.
I don’t know. I’d be opposed to the Fed Gov getting it’s hands on voting records.
Well,
A: They probably already have them, somewhere in Ft. Meade.
B. Having legit elections is kind of a big deal. Like I said, I was always kind of one the “both sides do it” but obviously the Democrats have the edge because they have these packed urban districts, controlled by Dem political machines. So if only 60% of the voters show up in a precinct in Philly that has 10,000 registered voters, then they can go ahead and manufacture another 2,500 straight ticket Dem ballots, because everyone in the room is a Party Member in good standing. The Republicans would have to do the same thing in like 40 rural precincts to get the same result.
Still, with exceptions like Franken’s election in MN, I thought that elections were generally within the margin of fraud. But the resistance to turning over this data really makes me wonder.
The left is totes on board with counting illegals when it comes to feeding at the federal trough, but when it’s about voting it’s suddenly none of your business.
Nah, it’s just reflexive, no deeper motive than that.
Here in Indiana, the voting issues have been in Democrat primaries and smaller local elections.
That is where I would assume voter fraud changes elections (see: Senator Stuart Smalley)
Consider why Democrats hate the Electoral College so much. Without it, voter fraud – IF as severe as described in that article – would most certainly affect national elections.
https://twitter.com/EmilyEldritch/status/878773453670592512
LOLWTF?
He was on the set of Waterworld?
Oh dear me.
IT WAS THE PIG MAN, JERRY!
I actually had a dream like that when I was on Percocet in the hospital. They say you don’t dream in color but I swear that dream was in vivid colors.
I don’t know why anyone says that. I always dream in color. And often colors are more vivid than they ever are in real life.
I’ve heard that too, and it is just weird. How would “they” know? I think that if you think you dream in color,then it’s in color. If my brain just fills in the color, how is that different from dreaming in color?
Never got that either, it’s like saying you don’t remember in color.
I never noticed dreams being in black and white.
I was on percocet when I was ‘in’ for my exploding gall bladder. Unicorns and rainbows – never wanted to come down!
I nearly bronied out that night.
I had mine out about eighteen months ago; Excruciating until the dilaudid kicked in.
Well, for years, I’d self-diagnosed as being lactose intolerant. I had two incidents in the distant past that the ERs both diagnosed as a coronary problem, one of which ended up with me on beta blockers that took me 3 months to get off again.
Correct diagnosis was undertaken by a late-20’s ER guy who nailed the problem in 5 minutes flat by jabbing me under my right ribcage and avoiding the punch I aimed at him.
Had the pear-shaped bugger out and since then, no problem with milk, no problem with fruit, only thing I have to watch is when I *really* pig out on ribs.
As a survivor, I’ve been told that the pain is worse than childbirth. It’s my badge of honor, since I con’t get cluster headaches.
Is this where CNN and NYT get their sources?
The Palmer Report, all Trump, all Russia, all the Time
LOL, OK, let’s say that.
He’s not, the hat is. SugarFree said so.
I doubt Trump has ever done drugs in his life. He doesn’t even drink.
Neither did Hitler!* See? THEY’RE ONE AND THE SAME!
*Later in life
He has said he’s never done drugs. I doubt he’d lie about it either.
I don’t think he’s ever even drank alcohol.
But did the ASTROS win?!
Astros 5, Cal -3
Banks are scary
“This isn’t the time to put the brakes on regulation,” said Mark T. Williams, a banking expert at Boston University and a former bank examiner for the Federal Reserve. He noted that with the 10 largest American banks holding 80 percent of all banking assets, “this concentrated financial power residing at the top banks should be carefully monitored.”
Maybe the regulators shouldn’t have done everything they could to force the banking sector to consolidate, then.
Naah, that can’t be right.
Nope couldn’t be
These banks are too big to fail. You don’t want them to be small enough to fail, do you?
“Lesbian ‘Gender Non-Conforming’ Couple Tries to Force Son to Have ‘Queer’ Gender Relationship
I’m constantly like trying to queer my relationship with him and get him to wear tutus. He hates it. He’s just like, ‘no,’” Michelle said.
http://www.mrctv.org/blog/lesbian-gender-non-conforming-couple-tries-force-son-have-queer-gender-relationship
Poor little dude. Here wear a tutu. How many times do I have to tell you bitches I don’t roll like that.
Uhhhh… if you can get your kid taken away by letting him play at the park by himself, how is this not considered child abuse?
So… I thought all of this wasn’t a choice…. It was genetics…
Their argument is that gender identity is imprinted on young minds by societal brain washing (ironic?). See there is no reason that children who differ biologically should prefer one type of toys, hairstyles, or clothing over another.
I have two daughters. Funny thing is that I would always ask them if they wanted some remote control car or something in addition to their baby dolls. Not for any gender nonsense but because I wanted an excuse to buy those things so I could pay with them. They wanted nothing to do with any of it:) my oldest daughter would be more likely to empathize with that gender neutral bs but growing up she was the girliest girl I’ve ever seen.
I had a remote control Barbie convertible. Would that have counted?
Lol. I suppose:)
These people are leftists, which means they’re opposed to individualism.
I thought these two things were mutually exclusive.
tag fail…
Happy secession day, you fucks.
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=408
About the Declaration there is a finality that is exceedingly restful. It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth or their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was no equality, no rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction can not lay claim to progress. They are reactionary. Their ideas are not more modern, but more ancient, than those of the Revolutionary fathers.
Love me some Coolidge.
I think I’ll celebrate it by seceding some gin from its parent bottle.
Nothing secedes like success.
I posted that quote on my FB page a couple years ago. Many howls, some defriending. This is why I don’t FB any more.
Who was the greatest US President? Coolidge or Cleveland? Tough choice for me.
Which one died after a month? Harrison?
Yeah, Harrison.
I like Cleveland, if only so that my list of “Democrats I’d unreservedly vote for” isn’t left empty.
As an experiment, I posted that quote and immediately got 3 likes. Coolidge is my vote for top BTW.
*bookmarked
Just picked up this little gem yesterday.
http://www.ruger.com/products/lcr/specSheets/5452.html
Haven’t shot it yet, probably gonna hit the range today. I am a huge fan of Ruger and I’ve been looking for a nice little pocket gun for CCW. Up to now, I’ve been carrying a Kimber Pro Carry II commander sized 1911. It’s a little big and heavy for summertime carry so I went with the compact revolver.
Very nice. Was in gun store the other well and they put one of these P938 micros in my hands. Man that thing felt so nice and sights came right up perfect in line every time I brought it up. I may have to go back and get it.
https://www.sigsauer.com/store/p938-nitron-micro-compact.html
Can’t go wrong with a Sig. I got the De Santis Nemesis holster for my new acquisition and I dig that too. If you’re looking to do pocket carry, check it out.
That’s actually a really good holster for the money. I have one for my Glock 43 that works really well.
I have a few pocket holsters. Just bought another one recently but not sure the brand.
I think of I were to do pocket carry on an SAO I would want the thumb safety covered since it most likely be cocked and locked.
Guy at the range let me shoot a 938 a few weeks ago. As you’d expect, well built, accurate (recognizing it’s small and I have hands the side of a bunch of bananas). If I had a need of a pocket carry, it’d certainly fit the bill.
Good to know. I figured as much but always good to hear a solid review.
Ergonomics on a gun that small are really important – and not just for aesthetic reasons. Chances are, it won’t be “fun” to shoot a lot, but it’s not a range gun, is it?
I have an officers special 45 which I love to shoot so yeah, I’m not seeing it being a problem. I would definitely want the extended mag for my pinky if I was planning on putting more than 50 rounds through it.
If it’s an officers gun, doesn’t it just go off by itself?
Not that kind of officer. That’s what Glocks are for:)
Was it the nitron one above or the BRG with the finger grooves?
The Nitron is what they had in stock
I bought one JB. I love it. I put it in a paddle holster that is so comfortable I barely know I am wearing it. Nice for carry. It takes a little practice to be able to hit well. I found it surprisingly hard to hit with. For practical purposes it is fine but if I try to hit with it like I can with a J-frame Smith (one inch spot at 15 yards), not so much. Great defensive gun, comfortable to carry but terrible for target shooting.
Thanks for the insight Suthen. Hard to beat a revolver for accuracy. If I can hit a pie plate at 15 yards that’s probably good enough for a carry piece. I’m a decent shot so I’m sure that won’t be a problem with a sig. What kind of paddle holster do you like?
Uh….lemme go get it and see.
Huh. Nothing on it, just ‘made in paraguay’. I will post a photo.
It fits nicely, good quality black leather with a plastic paddle for the waistband. I hardly know I am wearing it.
https://postimg.org/image/svjbcjuyr/
Thanks! I’m thinking probably a Tagua? I appreciate the share.
That is nice. I would be very interested in hearing your opinion on it’s performance.
Range? That’s a shame. You need somewhere to shoot where you can poke holes in stacks of wet newspaper, sheet metal, 2x4s etc so you can gauge the terminal ballistics.
Good stuff.
I’m presently jonesing hard for one of these: https://www.wilsoncombat.com/edc-x9/
Fortunately, they’re running around an eight-month wait list, so by the time it arrives I might be able to afford it.
That’s pretty sharp.
Fucking nitwit on ABC says “TRUMP IS GONNA GIT SOMEBODY KILLED!” about that CNN rasslin tweet.
Now she says nobody at CNN is afraid of
Trumpthe Big Bad Wolf. Noble strugglers, one and all. Somebody get that woman a paper bag to huff and puff into!I actually enjoy that tweet. Some animosity between press and state is good.
Trump and the media deserve each other. Bunch of 2 year olds.
Yes, Trump tweeting out a corny video edit of him body-slamming CNN is going to get somebody killed.
It’s not like the Left has mobs of “anti-fascists” committing actual physical violence or gaggles of celebrities musing and joking about assassination.
Gaggles? as in more than one gaggle? Admittedly I don’t follow these things but I don’t think some third rate comedienne and an actor or two add up to gaggles.
Probably a pretty big red flag when the person you’re dating insists you wear a blindfold whenever you’re around him.
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/woman-tricked-friend-sex-fake-penis-found-guilty-article-1.3291353
I have to wonder if the “victim” knew what was going in the entire time and the at some point just got tied of the fake phallus. I meant “on” not “in” but seems like in works better.
Dah-dah
Dah-dah
Lady look like a Dude!
In fact, the mugshot makes he look like the girl that Justin Dennis aspires to be.
I remember that from a couple of years ago.
I know the Dickie’s incident was linked to in yesterday’s morning links, but I’m not sure if this was posted. A singer from a different band, War on Women, wrote an article on why it was so bad and we all totes have to come together to stop this kind of stuff.
Takeaways:
If someone wants to interrupt your performance and stop people who voluntarily paid money to be there from enjoying it, that’s just free speech and you’d better listen.
If you say anything negative about said interrupter, you’re misogynist because she’s a woman.
You can’t swear at “punk” shows because there are women and children in the audience.
All men are just a hair trigger from these misogynistic outbursts.
How do these people exist? How can you be so stupid and yet be able to do anything productive to gain notoriety?
I am shocked, SHOCKED I SAY, to learn that uncivil behavior was taking place at a punk rock concert. One would expect nothing but the highest standards of decorum from something labelled The Warped Tour.
I’m thinking it’s more of a family event for people who were into the hardcore scene, and are now grown up and have kids.
How low can a punk get?
1. “at risk”?
2. How the fuck did modern punk become pro-establishment?
Same way as “progressives” became anti-free speech authoritarians.
Every movement, with hindsight, blames some other movement’s “Southern Strategy”* which inverts all the meanings.
*speaking of which, I have a “Southern Strategy”, but I understand Lauren’s had a restraining order issued. Meh.
Maybe the same way that the 60s hippies who were fighting ‘the man’ are now the mans biggest supporters?
Because to the sjw neoprogressive the political is personal and the personal is political. The must take over every group they associate with and turn it into an organization that requires loyalty oaths and where every action by a member tows the lion. I think this is why this bugs me so much. I was never much of a joiner, so I didn’t notice the takeover of the “Skeptic” and “Athiest” communities until it they were complete and didn’t especially care. Now they’re moving in on a group
I used to identify with. Granted, punk has always had a more leftist bent, conservatively died c.1997, and I haven’t actually associated with that scene in over a decade, but keep the punk name out of your mouth if you’re trying to associate with this trash (her, not you.)
As those sages said years ago, “new generation coming and we really got to stand up to them.“
“But now we have Trump, and while the white dudes in power are still conservative, they also look just like the Dickies or Phillips. Bands like this often look and sound exactly like the people they’re rallying against—those who hate women and queers and people of color and refugees and people with physical and mental challenges, and they sound just like them to us.”
Because judging people on their looks is so woke?
“DONT THINK ABOUT WHAT PEOPLE SAY = LOOK AT THE COLORS! RAINBOW GOOD. WHITE MAN BAD””
those who hate women and queers
Yup white conservatives hate women AND queers. They’re all asexual.
As mentioned yesterday, GG Allin is spinning/shitting himself in the grave right now.
I saw the Dickies years ago. Funniest concert I’ve ever been to – when the singer pulled out a giant penis puppet and started singing The Who’s “See Me, Feel Me”
A)the Dickies have been awesome for 35 years or so
B) Punk rock is supposed to provoke and offend. God help this bitch if she were somehow transported to a Fear show around 1980.
C) the Warped Tour has been shit for a long time.
re: many of the links people provide here…
Reminder: the NYT – never exactly ‘100% committed to reasonable objective new-reportage’ during the work-week – always turns into a progtard shitshow on Sundays.
to be fairTo be sure, they normally leave room for like 1 “not retarded” thing in the sunday magazine. its a fun game to play over brunch: sort through the paper and try to find that one piece that makes at least some headline-concessions to reality.Then again, i haven’t played this game in years, so they may have abandoned the whole “where’s waldo” thing.
As an alternative game, its fun to compare their comparatively-neutral weekly news stories to the editorially-laden coverage you find on the weekends. Mild concerns become existential-hysteria, broken up by recipes for mango chutney, and guides to the best yoga studios on the hamptons.
At this point, NYT and WaPo might as well just go full on Tabloid like the Daily Mail. Fake boobs and freak shows sure beats the hell out of their fake news.
Free the Nipple! (Possibly NSFW)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-4655630/The-rise-designer-nipples.html
in my opinion, they already have.
I’ve said this to most of my peers: “news” is the stuff you get in an AP/Reuters newsfeed. They’re the 2-3 paragraph stories that list facts (“X happened. Y said Z about it”) They don’t “explain” shit to you: it just is.
What the MSM does is take news and turn it into “Stories”: spin the fuck out of it to try and couch it into some larger narrative theme they’re pumping. Its “Political Soap Opera” littered with a few factual details.
I think the transformation of NYT/WaPo into feels-mongers is entirely complete. the only problem is that they’re still pretending to be something else. See: the impassioned “WE ARE SO BRAVE AND WE RISK OUR LIVES FOR TRUTH”/”Democracy Dies in Darkness” nonsense you heard over the past few months.
i mean, how rich is it that “Guy from Playboy magazine” is the one who insists that they’re just honest people trying to share ‘the truth’ with the public. “Come for the titties, stay for the Truth-to-Power”
Alright, I laughed pretty well at this. This is the kind of stuff Reason should be doing, instead of joining in with CNN and the rest of the media’s ridiculous pant shitting.
I agree, but at least they are Remy a platform.
Remy is the man
Impeachment march
https://youtu.be/hysD3UjMw9M
Pace earlier comment
Totally. Would.
I blame her lips.
Yeah she totally does it for me.
Lauren Southern. She’s great.
Looks too much like Rachel Miner circa Californication.
What makes her special is that she’s right wing and good looking, which really pisses off the left, all of their women are fugly.
Can’t really disagree with that.
Too much gorgeous blond? I’ll take that every day.
I’m more of a Faith Goldy guy myself but Southern certainly ain’t hard on the eyes either.
So horrible, she’s in America during our Glorious 150 Year Celebration of How Much Canada is WOKE (Except We Are Also Horribly Unwoke Racists)?!?!? PM Zoolander is gonna have to put on his Judgmental Socks!
For an extra laugh, white supremacists losing their shit in the comments when she made a video where she offhand mentions not being one.
Ugh too hot outside to #resist today. I think I’ll stay in.
I think it would be informative to show these events from a greater distance.
you have like “20 protestors” and “100 people taking pictures of protestors”. from which 1000 blog-entries/Youtube clips/media narratives will emerge arguing that this was a significant gesture of popular will against the tyranny of Trump.
when its really just a few dozen people…. none of whom, if you spoke to them individually, actually have anything interesting to day.
I remember some debate where post debate they interviewed one of the house Republicans and than the counterpoint were these handful of retarded extreme leftist prog women presented as if they represented half the country.
Griefers gonna grief
In a statement on Sunday, CNN wrote: “It is a sad day when the president of the United States encourages violence against reporters.” The network added: “Instead of preparing for his overseas trip, his first meeting with Vladimir Putin, dealing with North Korea and working on his health care bill, he is involved in juvenile behavior far below the dignity of his office. We will keep doing our jobs. He should start doing his.”
Boo hoo hoo whycome you no taken us serious?
I love how they are trying to turn themselves into a victim class. There’s more cases of reporters themselves carrying out actual violence against Trump supporters than by actual Trump supporters.
“juvenile behavior far below the dignity of his office.”
In other words he’s acting just like the media taking heads.
“Goddammit, Trump, you’re supposed to stay meek and quiet, and let us criticize you with impunity! Romney and McCain understood how the game was played! Don’t you even Republican, bro?”
TURN AROUND, REF!!! HE’S GOT A FOLDING CHAIR!!!
lol
He has a point. I’m concerned the those toothless white trash trailer park rednecks who like pro wrestling will be motivated to get off their tractors, put down their PBRs and their meth pipes, and beat up the press.
Wait, the Julius Caesar play? Harmless symbolism and jolly good fun.
“In 2004, Dr. Bello was arrested and charged with sex abuse and unlawful imprisonment after a 23-year-old woman told officers he had grabbed her crotch area outside a building on Bleecker Street in Manhattan and tried to penetrate her through her underwear, a law enforcement official said. The woman told officers that Dr. Bello had lifted her up in the air and dragged her while saying, “You’re coming with me.”
Fuck this Bello guy for being a homicidal fuck, but I’m calling bullshit on that crime description. Sounds like 50 Shades of Grey or some bullshit.
Considering how he ended up going out I wouldn’t put anything past the guy. What he supposedly did, and pleaded guilty to, is really no crazier sounding than going on a shooting spree at a hospital where he had been fired for sexual harassment.
he had grabbed her crotch area
Obvious Trump supporter.
When I read that I immediately thought he was Nigerian. I didn’t know the Caribbean fellas went for that. ( I have heard with my own ears Nigerian men say to a woman, “you will be coming to my room”. Weird dominating male culture thing going on there) I don’t know if I call bullshit. The crazy fuck just shot a bunch of people. I don’t think I would put sexual abuse past him.
I’m wondering if the accuser didn’t want to testify. Community service is pretty weak.
“You will be coming to my room” sounds to me like somebody who’s not a native English speaker not fully understanding what the progressive aspect is used for.
Say what you will about Dr Bello. A guy who will set himself on fire and then shoot himself is not lacking in commitment.
He has an ethos.
http://theweek.com/articles/709088/how-andrew-cuomo-broke-new-york-subway
Cuomo doesn’t prog enough!!!1!11111 Needs MOAR FUNDING!!!!!
No one progs hard enough. Everyone ends up against the wall sooner or later.
Yeap
http://hotair.com/archives/2017/07/02/california-democrats-single-payer-advocates-stop-bullies/
Trump tweeted a doctored video of himself clothes-lining and then beating the shit out of CNN.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/881503147168071680
The media is going apoplectic. Carl Bernstein is showing up on the Sunday news shows saying that the video isn’t just anti-CNN. It’s anti-free speech.
I haven’t seen or heard Urkobold in ages, but I have to think he’d be impressed. Nobody trolls the media like Trump. If Trump isn’t one of Urkobold’s acolytes, then maybe Trump is Urkobold.
It’s like that.
Lol
“Baltimore Sun media critic David Zurawik says President Trump’s anti-CNN tweet is tantamount to fascism”
http://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2017/07/02/zurawik-ferguson-trump-anti-cnn-tweet-facism-funny-sot-rs.cnn
This from the CNN show “Reliable Sources”.
Poor CNN, discredited by hidden video and now they’re being made fun of. Trump’s ability to set the media’s agenda is truly impressive: Keep it up O’ Orange One.
If you look at the byline under the CNN show, it reads, “Are Trump’s Anti-Media Attacks Inciting violence?”
It’s been eight months. They’re still shitting their pants. They can’t help it. They can’t stop.
I have never laughed as hard as I did on election night, and it’s still funny. Every time I think I’m getting sick of the antics already, I watch some mainstream media coverage of Trump, and it instantly gets hilarious all over again.
If anyone is inciting violence they are
Funny haven’t all the violence that i have seen covered turned out to be hoaxes, lies or false flags?
Lol wow
“tantamount to fascism”
“literally Hitler”
Pretty close.
MSM: “The fuck’s a metaphor?”
When did Kathy Griffin behead Trump? Do these people really have the memory of goldfish, or is it just that they adopt whichever stance makes them look better?
“This is sick. This is disturbing. This is pathological. This is violent. This is reckless. This is authoritarian,” wrote Mother Jones editor David Corn, who is also an MSNBC analyst.
And the media swallows the bait, line, sinker, rod and the Evinrude.
Yankees leaving town after losing 2 of 3.
It’s baseball. Who cares.
Germany won a meaningless tournament with its B team.
Greetings colonial scum, I wish you well on your upcoming Filth Colonial Rebellion Day. I personally, am hungover from twelve hours of drinking and crashing a Sunday mass on Upstanding Commonwealth Citizens Day.
You mean the “Thank God we’re not Canadian” day?
Whatever, Brit. You got the Queen on your money, you’re British.
Least our Queen wasn’t a Wookie for eight years.
Fuck. Sorry, everyone. I got an alert that some shit I’d opened was toxic, so I shut down my computer.
Without remembering to save what I’d already done on my fucking SNP episode. Regrets, bros & babes. I know I’ve been lacking recently, and I really wanted to do this one to make up, but {insert expletive] working for three hours and losing it for nothing kind of changes you parameters, if you will. I’ll try & do something midweek.
No sweat, take a break. Sorry that shit happened.
Sorry to hear that.
You need to refresh obsessively – obsessive-compulsive disorder helps.
It’s fine. It was an uneventful week at CNN anyways.
No worries. Something to look forward to next week. Which Latina hottie was toxic file? Or were you working on the beefcake issue? I bet it was beefcake.
Oh, fuck, that’s right. I owe the Glib wimmens and gays a beefcake episode. Thx for the reminder.
But no, it was just stupidity. “User error”. Or just bad luck. I wasn’t reminding the prince of Nigeria about the millions he’d promised me
There are no woman libertarians.
Those thicc things HM posts aren’t hot; they’re like Olive Oyl in reverse.
Ted S.
Japan PM’s party suffers historic defeat in Tokyo poll, popular governor wins big
Shimomura-san, I humbly recommend blaming the Russians and intolerant xenophobes that would vote for the “Tokyo Citizens First” party.
They’re more likely to blame Koreans.
Hmm, so this Shimomura guy was responsible for winning Tokyo for his party…and he failed.
There is only one thing for him, as an honorable Samurai, to do.
Not all Japanese politicians do the honorable thing.
Gosh, honest Abe (yes, I know it’s pronounced differently) suffered a defeat, and may well suffer a much larger one later…
I’d offer a tear, but I can’t spare the moisture…
Eeew.
You think that’s a “eww”? 法則に従います！
I never follow the rules. You lucky I didn’t say “Ewe”.
No double swords for you!
Perhaps the greatest politician in the world.
Yes, but is Toyama Koichi the messiah?
I don’t think so.
Both of those guys belong at the Libertarian convention.
They would never beat The Jacket’s Japanese host.
“Japan was confusing. I was confusing too.”
That’s not former Winged Hussar and all around badass Janusz Korwin Mikke.
That first exchange is exactly Friedman vs Moore. Wow.
When someone reads the comments on a Glibertarians.com article for the first time.
This is a thing that happened.
Is this a furry bowling league?