First off, Happy Valentines Day to all you lovebirds out there. Now let’s get the day going.
All that news out of the White House about Michael Flynn staying put turned out to be the real “palace intrigue”. Flynn has resigned from his National Security Advisor post after a very short time in office.
All the protests, marches and pussy hats haven’t prevented Donald Trump from maintaining his popularity out there in flyover country.
His Honor, Rahm Emanuel
Rahm Emanuel flew to D.C. recently in a bid to forge new relationships with the new GOP power players and shore up support from some old Democrat stalwarts.
UConn’s women’s basketball team won their record 100th consecutive game.
Former Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca’s legal defense took several hits yesterday, as he prepares for his retrial on federal obstruction of justice charges.
Too late for you lot now for Valentines, but the ladies love them some chocolate from this place:
http://www.vosgeschocolate.com/
The chocolate is good, but it’s the packaging that does the trick.
Now for some more important news:
Playboy: Nude photos are back
Anti-Trump fervor sparks a new, liberal kind of tea party activism
I assumed their non-nude policy had already bankrupted that failing media empire.
America’s top fortune cookie writer stepping down after 30 years
Life like the leaves of a tree; from spring to happy ending
“Unfortunately, because of the fast pace of events, I inadvertently briefed the Vice President Elect and others with incomplete information…”
Goodbye.
The CNN stories on this yesterday read like a checkout stand gossip rag. I watched the news last night for the first time in a while and holy crap. The left in this country is losing their minds. Talk about going off the rails…
Rahm has to maintain good relations with the people he will have to approach for a bailout, after all…
*renews prayer for threaded comments*
Ah gee – I didn’t even know it was Valentine’s Day. My wife, who left early to attend a small business group, didn’t say anything either*.
Hmm… test message or grocery store roses?
* it’s been super hectic in my neck of the woods. Helping my folks move – they got a great house in the country with a stream running through the back yard. And my wife’s dad was in the hospital with more heart issues, now in assisted living. And my ongoing car saga. And we had to licensed for being foster parents again, so we can go down the adoption route (which is a bureaucratic go-slow), and… oh, I’ll shut up.
We need threaded comments back.
RC seems to think women are like raccoons…love them some shiny, sparkly things, which they are totally not. No, really, they aren’t.
*Yesterday we were moving stuff out of a bedroom to paint the room when my wife dropped a thing-a-ma-bob and it broke. I remarked on how cheaply the thing was made and then added “No matter. It has no function, it’s just a decoration.”
She replied “No function? Just a decoration? That IS it’s function.”
And there you have it. The difference between men and women.
*text message
*runs off to grab the first cup o’ coffee of the day*
“(Playboy Magazine)…would be eliminating nude photography altogether.”
Whut? So they bought the ol’ “I only buy it for the articles” line? This is a joke, right?
What idiots. I am guessing sales are down.
“…the tea party movement that blossomed in 2009 in response to the presidency of Barack Obama.”
Lying liars lie. The MSM has become so blatantly dishonest it is breathtaking. They are rapidly becoming lunatic fringe material. The horseshit reporting yesterday regarding the ICE raids was probably some of the worst I have seen to date.
Is it social signaling to send your wife a Valentines Day card on Facebook when you’re actually sitting a few feet from her having your morning cup of tea while she has her coffee?
I don’t know whether it is or not, but it’s good policy
Cosmo pulls out all the stops to break down barriers. http://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/g8775555/substantia-jones-fat-couples-nude-photos/?src=socialflowTW
And by “break down barriers”, I assume one of the people in these pictures has dressed up as the Kool-aid kid and crashed through a wall.
Trigger warning: the piece is full of photos of fat, naked people. Like, really fat and really naked.
re: Cosmos photoshoot
If I was a petty man, I would make a John comment. But since he isn’t here I won’t poke fun at him.
I am not clicking that Sloopy. You cant make me do it.
The Supersonic Age
A cool interview with one of the founders of Boom Technology. His goals are a little out there (5 hours anywhere in the world for $100), but the world needs more supersonic transport.
And then there was this little gem:
Protectionism – what can’t it do??
“I assume one of the people in these pictures has dressed up as the Kool-aid kid and crashed through a wall.”
+1 Oh Yeah!
Or
God No!
Is doctoring a “job Americans won’t do”?
Swift repeal of Obama rules leaves former staffers steaming
‘It’s devastating,’ says a former Interior Department employee who worked on one of dozens of regulations in Congress’ cross hairs.
Those poor bureaucrats. Whatever will they do?
While I am outraged at what happened to Sloopy’s mom (Is she ok? Is her situation actionable tort?), I am quite impressed with the exodus and this resulting World Wide Web Page. Erudite conversation and well-written articles are a winning combination but a rare find. Thank you to all involved.
re: Bureaucrats frustration at not being able to bankrupt people and raise unemployment
“My biggest disappointment is a majority in Congress ignored the will of the people,” said Pizarchik, who directed the Interior Department’s Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement from 2009 through January. “They ignored the interests of the people in coal country, they ignored the law and they put corporate money ahead of all that.”
Someone tell me again why Trump is the devil? The will of the people, my ass. Joe Pizarchik really needs to be unemployed.
@l0b0t, mom is better. They’re navigating the criminal portion now. Their attorney doesn’t want to file anything civil until that’s resolved. He said he’s seen that municipality drag out petty shit like this for over a year just to avoid an excessive force complaint to the state having sworn testimony included.
But there most definitely will be a civil case.
In his mind, the will of the people = regulations with the force of law enacted a month before a president leaves office and the other party will hold the Executive branch and both legislative chambers.
In other words, he’s an idiot.
I like threaded comments, too, but when we did that, people bitched that it was too hard to find new comments. So the founders are taking a vote amongst themselves about a Final Solution.
Wait, that never ends well for us.
OMWC. You’re on the clock. A Final Countdown.
OMWC – Threaded has it’s drawbacks but non-threaded makes it difficult to find responses. I guess a decade of Reason comments has me comfortable with the devil I know. I suppose I could learn to love a new devil.
*shrugs*
That’s the problem with rule by pen and phone. They are not hard to come by.
Has anyone made a “no nudes is good nudes” joke yet? I’ll check H&R.
My comment got flagged for moderation? Was I naughty?
“That’s the problem with rule by pen and phone. They are not hard to come by.”
They wanted a king, they got one. New king, new decrees. Now they are blaming the monster they created for eating them. I would laugh but for the likelihood that the next monster will eat us.
“Has anyone made a “no nudes is good nudes” joke yet? I’ll check H&R.”
I think someone just did. The pun just doesnt seem to have the ring of truth though.
I wonder if Georgetown will be able to sit out its Islamic slavery scandal?
“Georgetown had changed the names of Mulledy Hall and McSherry Hall because Mulledy and McSherry had once been involved in selling some slaves back in the early 19th century. When Christina Hoff Sommers spoke at Georgetown, feminists demanded trigger warnings and a university official threatened College Republicans. But defending actual slavery and rape is still okay at Georgetown.”
We automatically flag anyone who shits up Hit and Run.
Am I the only one whose comments are being flagged for moderation? What gives?
“We automatically flag anyone who shits up Hit and Run.”
Why did you invite me, then?
Looks like I’m screwed.
::kicks pebble::
If I have to submit to moderation but nobody else does, it’s not worth it.
It’s not you Eddie. It’s just buggy.
We’re working through finding that sweet spot between getting overrun by spambots and having to captcha for every comment. Just bear with us as we get this thing underway.
OK, then, I’m confident that, with all these computer types, the bugs will eventually get squished.
Like I said to Eunice, when I first saw the check for $100,000 I couldn’t believe it, but you too can earn ca$h working on your computer at home. All you need is a web cam, some lotion and…
Or is that too spammy?
“feminists demanded trigger warnings ”
Doesn’t that mean they already know and dont need trigger warnings?
Nice SF there, sloop.
No-one invites the Maltese Inquisition.
“No-one invites the Maltese Inquisition.”
We aren’t going to do the hate speech isnt free speech thing, are we? I went to a fair amount of effort to invite as many people here as I could. I imagine a fair number of them will say things we dont agree with.
Suthenboy, where would we be if people weren’t snarking Eddie?
I think there should be “achievements” for levels of subscriber count:
At 100, invite Hihn
200, invite Tony
300, invite AmSoc (classic, not new)
and then 500 Shreek
Troll immigration policy
“No-one invites the Maltese Inquisition.” The Maltese are worse than Maoris.
https://youtu.be/zGgEwD2Fi9Q?t=22m04s
And by ‘we’ I mean some of us, a different set, will disagree with almost anything anyone says. That is the way it is supposed to be. Everybody poops, dont’cha know.
What happens on other websites doesnt concern me. I am hoping this will be a truly free and open forum and I am pretty excited about the possibilities it presents. A free speech web forum where all of the content is user contributed…where else can you find something like that?
I dont have a problem with blocking out spam-bots, but Eddie isnt a spam-bot.
Having said all that, this isnt my website. I dont get to make the calls.
“…where would we be if people weren’t snarking Eddie?”
I dont know about you but I need a choir of monks now and then.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7vvPXz-Qes
*confession – I have no idea who those guys are or what any of that means
Choir of Monks
Suthenboy has it right, IMO. I don’t need an echo chamber/circle jerk of the same opinions over and over again. I welcome difference of opinions because that’s what really helped me come to know and love libertarian philosophy–reading comments and arguments from differently minded folks. I want that here.
This is how you headline:
On long journey to asteroid hookup, OSIRIS-REx seeks ‘Trojans’
http://tucson.com/news/science/on-long-journey-to-asteroid-hookup-osiris-rex-seeks-trojans/article_05d19739-54da-5c1b-b88f-ec4081119228.html
I dont even have to click that to know what it is Max.
*kicking myself for not posting that first.
Check, Check One Two. Can you hear me?
Roger, trshmnstr; we are receiving you.
OK, so I have a libertarian question for all you fine folk. Here’s the scenario:
My wife and I went to a local bar/grill for dinner the other night. We live in the Vegas area, and around here the (rather complicated) law of the land is that in most cases, bars can permit smoking, while restaurants cannot. Since everything is a bar/restaurant/casino hybrid of some sort, usually this means there is a video poker bar with people smoking away (and eating or not), and then an area with tables and the like with various non-smoking signs. We don’t smoke, and aren’t so fond of the smell, so we tend to sit in the table area when patronizing such establishments.
So that evening, the place was packed, and we eventually got a table next to some people who were all smoking. Now, I am definitely not a fan of smoking laws on general principles, and I suspect that nobody in restaurant management was eager to enforce this particular law. Is it appropriate to either awkwardly engage the neighbors in a conversation about the no smoking sign on the wall, or (passive-aggressively IMO) let the waiter know, or what?
It’s such a trivial thing, but at what point does inconvenience become aggression? Our experience was definitely changed as a result of this (we didn’t say anything at the time, mostly rationalizing that it wasn’t a big deal), but was it appropriate? What if we were of the opinion that secondhand smoke is objectively harmful? (we aren’t, despite the prevailing media on this topic)
Looks like the Grouch made it back in. Good.
Good! The spam monster got ahold of me and didn’t let go for a while.
I clicked to the link to the spam monster’s home page and it mentioned that it blocked comments from “misfits,” so I assumed that nobody on here was being allowed to comment.
Thanks for the quick restoration, sloopy!
Max, either is fine. Perhaps it’s the restaurant’s policy to not allow smoking, so IMO, askin someone to respect that (if you ask the other patrons) or to enforce it (if you ask the waiter) is perfectly fine.
Personally, I’d ask the restaurant manager if he wanted to enforce it. Let him make the decision. If he chooses to, good. If he chooses not to, just mark it off the list of places to go and vote with your wallet.
Yeah, I’d have just politely asked, Max. Worst case scenario, they say no, and if that’s the case, you could ask the waitstaff for a little help.
but at what point does inconvenience become aggression?
I would say that it would theoretically approach fraud if a restaurateur were to advertise a non-smoking section with a sign but not respond when patrons complain about smoking in the non-smoking section.
I don’t see it as much different than complaining that you got trout when you ordered sea-bass, and the restaurant saying “tough shit.”
Good! The spam monster got ahold of me and didn’t let go for a while.
Ha HA, Kinda makes senSe, d0esn’t it? Way too crazy for mE, LOL!
[insert Anonyb0t joke addy here]
*Protip: Don’t include silly joke addies, the Almighty Spam Filtre smites with extreme prejudice.
Yeah, I get the feeling that the signs are there because of a legal requirement, rather than actual restaurant policy. It felt icky to be all of a sudden like “that’s the law, enforce it” when all my life I’ve been firmly in the other camp.
Testing…hello all you anarchorumplestiltskens…
Why do I see Trump in that word?
When I encounter people smoking in a No Smoking zone, I demonstrate my sharpshooting skills by shooting the cigarette right out of their mouth. Of course, I’m a shitty sharpshooter, so things can get messy.