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Whirled Views 8.12
Good morning!
Today’s quote is from a movie:
“Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil. And I want you to remember this, that love … true love never dies. You remember that, boy. You remember that. Doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in.”
Topic: Watercooler Chatter, WorldMagBlog
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Good Morning Shipmate. Today’s quote is from Secondhand Lions 2003 from Robert Duval. He is from San Diego Lynn.
I will take my coffee a 4 shot espresso.
Now Set the Special Sea and Anchor Detail. Make all preparations for pulling into port.
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My husband and I were talking about Robert Duvul just the other night. We were watching a scene from “The Apostle”. We both have pentecostal roots and were amazed at the realism of the scene. What a great actor and a Republican I think.
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In the early morning, there is a momentary lull from the storm…
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I watched Secondhand Lions, and that quote would lead to slightly skewed thinking were one to listen to it, but it was a pretty good movie overall.
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Joe B. @ #1: Port? a most delicious sweet wine normally used for recipes and a glass for dessert……
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Good morning all. I have been having to behave at work and have not gotten to check in with you. I will be starting a new job September 1. Some days I may even be able to work from home. It will require that I renew my insurance and real estate licenses. I will be running a database for a guy that has 4 insurance offices and coordinating his efforts. I think (hope and pray) it will be a good opportunity for me.
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That’s good news, Kim! I’m glad you were able to check in today – hope you and Chloe are doing okay.
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Hi Kim, I’ll pray that it works for you. I was beginning to worry; we hadn’t heard from you for a while. Mumsee had been absent a while too. I think she went camping. I hope she doesn’t have something to add to the “Worst Vacation” thread. EYG and AJISUUN have been gone a while too.
If you go back a week, you’ll see that we lost Vicky (VS).
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For you ladies out there, US astronomers have found a white dwarf star that has converted all of its Hydrogen and Helium to Crystalline Carbon. Talk about a carbon footprint!!! The star is the size of our Sun and it, yes you guessed it, it is pure diamond – 10 trillion, billion, trillion, trillion carats worth.
I claimed this star for my wife on our anniversary this past Sunday but I told her if we ever really got there one day she would have to share it with poor people of the universe since Obama also claimed it after I did saying he had outgrown the bounds of earth and was now Emperor
Can’t wait to see the movie which is due to come out right before the election.
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Yes, Obama is now Emporer Ming of teh Universe and of Flash Gordon Fame. It was only a matter of time.
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I believe that Puddleglum (whom I’m told I resemble in character) said much the same thing to the witch when she tried to convince he and the children that there was no sun, and that the underground was all that there was to reality.
Great lines really- one of my favorite passages from C.S. Lewis in The Silver Chair.
Darn tootin. You tell ‘er boy!
http://www.sam-graf.com/blog/2005/10/05/thus-spake-puddleglum/
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Answer for JJF yesterday,
The chart says that people in the $19,000 to $37,500 bracket would get an average of an $892 tax reduction under Obama and a $113 tax reduction under McCain. Can you provide some evidence — like a link to a source more reputable than you — that disputes these numbers?
Making less than $37.500 a year puts you in the lowest 50% of American tax payers that currently pay an average of 2.99% of their income in taxes. A person making $37,500 would pay on average about $1,125. a year in taxes.
It does not shock me that Marxists would lower that pitiful amount these American workers pay in taxes by another $832 thus reducing even the tiny amount of taxes these people currently pay to nothing. They are anti capitalist and and anti American Marxists after all.
What the left advocates is that the richest 50% of Americans pay the entire freight of the poorest 50% of Americans and that the poorest 50% should pay no taxes whatsoever. I have no problem with that so long as they do not claim to be Americans when they pay the same taxes as Illegal Aliens – zero.
I find this nothing more than robbery and those advocating it pickpockets at best.
We have turned half of Americans into nothing more than bums and no better than illegal aliens who live off the charity of others.
I’m guessing we should at least consider taking in a few good illegal aliens and getting rid of some really bad Americans.
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Chas,
Yes, we have been camping but had to take a break as we have a court appearance in the north country. Once that ten hour drive is over for our three minutes of fame, we will be back in the mountains, lawn chairs in the creek, letting the cool mountain stream running under us, cooling us down a good fifteen degrees. Guess I do approve of air conditioning after all, when done the green way. The kids are planning to be baptized this next week as some of the church body will be joining us for part of the time.
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Next week after we get back from vacation in Indianapolis (leaving tomorrow, returning Sunday) we’re going to look at getting another dog. Someone at my company is selling some Golden retriever/lab puppies, which sounds like a good mix to me.
My younger son is very eager to get another dog, saying he hadn’t realized how much he would miss Duke. (One of the worst aspects of Duke’s death, for him, was that just in the previous week or two he had been upset when Duke peed in the hallway again and said he wished Duke were dead. So naturally he felt awful, and we had to reassure him that it wasn’t his fault Duke died, that the reason he had peed in the house was because he was old and his body wasn’t working right anymore.) He’s been waiting impatiently for this trip to Indianapolis, now he’s also eager to get back because I said we wouldn’t look for a dog until after we got back.
My husband suggests we buy a book on training and taking care of a dog, and make it a family project to all learn how to do this right (our previous two dogs were adults when we got them and we never managed to train them, even something as simple – and necessary – as to heel). Anyone have a good suggestion of a book like that? (I’m sure there are a lot out there, I just hoped to get a recommendation of one that had actually been helpful to someone.)
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Pauline, Golden Retrievers and Labs make some of the BEST dogs. Be patient. The stay adolescents for a while. Is there a PetSmart near you. The offer classes for the human/pet.
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Pauline, I don’t know of a dog-training book, but when I was a girl I took my dog to 4H dog training. It was fun, and he learned to obey.(And I taught him!) It was my first exposure to 4H, and later I was in a couple other 4H clubs (photography and performing arts).
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My friends, I am godlumps, and I’m part of The McCain Action Team!
It’s time for some straight talk, my friends.
If you liked George Bush’s Adventures in Iraq, you’re going LOVE John McCain’s Iran and Russian Wars! He might even throw in World War III as a bonus!
John McCain: Bush’s Third Term — only more misguided!
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Llama,
For the record, I’m in that bottom 50% (though I’m single, so I do pay some income taxes). As far as being tax-free goes, I wish. Get rid of Social Security tax (which takes 15% or so of every self-employment dollar) and then you can talk about the bottom half of Americans not paying any taxes. (And yes, I think everyone should pay taxes, but Social Security is a burdensome “tax” that makes it extraordinarily hard to get a business off the ground. I’d gladly pay more in federal taxes and get rid of that nightmare of a “tax” that’s really government theft.)
But Social Security, federal taxes, a high sales tax, property taxes, gas taxes, and all the rest of it hardly put me as an untaxed citizen. Again, I’m not arguing for lowering my federal tax bracket farther–I’m glad I don’t pay much in federal taxes–but saying that the tax load is actually too high for those who don’t earn much. I think I only pay about 5% of my gross income to federal taxes–but then, my gross income is before my office expenses and all the other expenses of self-employment, not to mention mortgage interest and giving–and no American should pay more than 5% to the federal government anyway. Yes, pay more to states, fine, since the primary government should be state and local government, but the federal government should never have become so much of a behemoth that I’m paying 5% of my gross income, plus 15% to Social Security, before I can spend a dime–and then paying additional taxes as a healthy portion of the money I pay on gas and other necessities. And that 5% of my income is seen as a low percentage. No, I don’t pay too little–we all pay too much.
Pauline, the monks of New Skete have two dog-training books (one specifically for puppies) that I used a lot. I trained my collie myself, no classes, through reading those books and a few others. (I never trained her specifically to heel, though, just to walk obediently on leash. The “heel” position seemed a bit unnecessary, and not something that she or I could readily do together. I’m not graceful enough for that kind of precision, which party steps where when you turn a corner.)
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Did you see that John McCain is basing his foreign policy on a wikipedia article?
God help us all!
CQ Politics has the breakdown.
one of the first countries in the world to adopt Christianity as an official religion (Wikipedia)
vs.
one of the world’s first nations to adopt Christianity as an official religion (McCain)
And then again here:
After the Russian Revolution of 1917, Georgia had a brief period of independence as a Democratic Republic (1918-1921), which was terminated by the Red Army invasion of Georgia. Georgia became part of the Soviet Union in 1922 and regained its independence in 1991. Early post-Soviet years was marked by a civil unrest and economic crisis. (Wikipedia)
vs.
After a brief period of independence following the Russian revolution, the Red Army forced Georgia to join the Soviet Union in 1922. As the Soviet Union crumbled at the end of the Cold War, Georgia regained its independence in 1991, but its early years were marked by instability, corruption, and economic crises. (McCain)
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JibJab are back, just in time for the election:
http://www.jibjab.com/originals/time_for_some_campaignin
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For those of you alive in the 1940s, some questions. I’m editing a book set in the 1940s (1947, with some flashbacks as far back as 1940). Neither the author nor I was alive back then, and it occurred to me that it might be easier to ask actual people than to try to do research online, on some of these “everyday life” questions. If you can answer any, that would be helpful.
1. Anybody have any idea how long a letter would have taken to get from Berlin to America?
2. Would commercial airline seats (international) have been readily available, and what kind of bathroom accommodations would they have had on a plane (like today’s?)
3. If a man and a woman drove somewhere together, would they have changed drivers from time to time, or would the man have done all the driving?
4. Did car doors lock?
5. Was a car started as easily as today, simply turning a key and the engine revs to life? (In an earlier book by this author, I had to take out a seatbelt, so I know she isn’t necessarily accurate about forties-era cars.)
6. How long did it take (on ship) to travel from America to Africa? (I know that for my parents in the 1950s it took a month, but my sister tells me that they took a freight ship since it was cheaper, and that was why it took so long.)
7. Would casual friends (not close friends) have used each other’s first names? (My mom never forgave our culture for transitioning to first names, but I simply don’t know when this kind of change happened.)
8. In introducing an adult to a child, would you have said, “Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson” or “Jack and Alice Ferguson”? (the author has only first names, and I KNOW that wouldn’t have been what was done–but the scene is tricky since the people are actually using a false last name and the person introducing them doesn’t know it).
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Proffessor Mark Kleiman lays out the plagiarism case against the McCain Campaign. Not that a President should be held to the tough standards of an undergraduate or anything
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Godlumps, the “Bush’s third term” rhetoric might influence some people, but doesn’t the dishonesty of it bother you at all? I mean, we often vote a VP into office, and we might with some credibility be considered to be continuing the former Administration’s policies. But McCain and Bush see things very differently, and have no official link other than the fact that McCain is officially a Republican (but is more accurately a RINO). It’s really kind of silly to say that an attempt to put a person of the same party in office is an attempt to give that president a “third term.” So, if honesty is important to you at all, this is a call to it. Thank you.
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The only real 3rd party is the Constitutional Party. The Libertarians and Greens are just off shoots of the RINO’s and the Dems.
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“No, I don’t pay too little–we all pay too much.”
And we have too many who suck up all that we do contribute, including the politicians.
I like that “Tax Freedom Day” model that illustrates tax percentages by graphing how long during the year we work for the Gubmint, and how long during the year that we actually work for ourselves…
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Bless your heart, Cheryl.
According to Congressional Quarterly’s Voting Studies, in 2007 McCain voted in line with the president’s position 95 percent of the time.
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I am interested in the answers to Cheryl D’s questions.
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Cheryl,
I thought the author was supposed do that kind of research?
Sorry I can’t help you with any of those questions either. If I were more observant and knowledgeable about cars I would be able to tell you about the locks – but since I’m not, I won’t.
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GLUMP,
Please give it a rest. That one blasted note you’re tootin’ is hurting my ears.
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Hello my friends, I am godlumps, and I’m part of the McCain Action Team!
Did you know John McCain is a war hero? It’s true!
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WASHINGTON | Most U.S. corporations and foreign companies doing business in the United States pay no federal income tax, according to a new report from Congress.
The study by the Government Accountability Office, expected to be released today , said two-thirds of U.S. corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, and about 68 percent of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.
Collectively, the companies reported trillions of dollars in sales, according to GAO’s estimate.
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Still waiting to hear from the atheists, et al about why they post comments. I got a number of good reasons from many conservative Christians.
On peace negotiations (not trying to get in the way of Georgia and Auburn), at the moment there is an uneasy truce between me and NJLawyer.
I am still trying to decide what I should say or not say to Nick Peters. I tend to agree with him about the Middle East, and not about some other things.
Still trying to decide whether I should apologize to Victoria. I was serious about “Why Not?” as a good rason for posting, and she interpreted it as a sarcastic putdown. As “Victoria Alert” was a sarcastic putdown, I can’t really blame her can I?
There are some other people whom I’m not posting comments toward because they get bent out of shape, and they seem not to be posting comments because I am always bent out of shape. We’ll see if this unspoken arrangement holds.
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I should get credit for stealing the term “Race to the Bottom” and using it to describe flame wars. I am going to suggest a series of regular post topics such as “Meditations” and “Raves and Rants.”
My first one will be positive and constructive. Once a month, WOW should have a Race to the Top Topic.
What would it look like? I don’t know. Let’s try it in September and see what happens.
Negative suggestion tomorrow. Stay tuned.
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Godlumps, He’s a Republican, and so is Bush. That isn’t a shock. He also undercut his own party in significant ways. But we really are all tired of hearing you spout off about Bush and McCain.
Make It Man, Yes, the author is supposed to do that kind of research. But I fact check anything that sounds questionable and anything else that I can, and then, if I have unanswered questions, I send them back to the author with “Have you verified this?” Trust me, I’ve found some pretty big gaffes in doing fact-checking . . . and once winced when I read a book edited by a colleague and not fact-checked, written in an area on which I knew more than my colleague and would have tossed out a very large percentage of the book’s “facts” as downright inaccurate. So, I fact-check random stuff–statistics, spellings of names, dates–anything that will lose credibility with an expert if the book is wrong.
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Gee, Random: “On peace negotiations (not trying to get in the way of Georgia and Auburn), at the moment there is an uneasy truce between me and NJLawyer.”
Well, you’re lucky. Godlumps is in my sights for calling me “SO OLD.” Better him than you.
For what it’s worth “why not?” as a reason for posting is as good as any other. It’s right up there with “I feel like it.” I don’t either one is particularly sarcastic.
Kim, congratulations on the new job! Real estate is coming back, or so I’m told, in certain markets more than others. I hope yours is one of those.
CherylD, I may be “SO OLD” but not “THAT OLD.” Nevertheless, I suspect that some mail from Europe didn’t get through in the early ’40s. You could probably google the answer to that one, and also look at pictures of cars from that time to see if the doors had locks. With respect to the introduction question, in the 50s, as children we were told to call an adult using Mr. and Mrs. I never called an adult by his/her first name unless there was Aunt or Uncle in front of the name as a sign of respect, or unless the person wanted to be called by the first name. My sister allowed her kids (born late 70s/80s) to call her friends by their first name.
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#20 Thanks for the cartoon I especially like the Hilary chair shot on Bill.
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My news crawler had an article about Louisiana Senator (D) Landrieu who is running for re-election:
“Landrieu will attend the “Lipstick, Laughter and Libations” fundraiser for Barack Obama at a Washington restaurant next week, but she won’t help host it. [What an interesting name for a fundraiser.]
“Landrieu’s campaign said her name only was added to the online announcement of the fundraiser on Obama’s Web site as a mistake. Her Republican opponent’s campaign said she is trying to keep her distance from her party’s presidential candidate and removed her name after they pointed it out.
“She was never scheduled to host,” said Landrieu campaign spokesman Scott Schneider. “She is attending, and there was some sort of clerical error in which somebody said she was hosting, but she is not.”
“A spokesman for Landrieu’s GOP opponent, John Kennedy, said he believes the senator removed her name because she doesn’t want to be too closely connected with Obama in Louisiana, which has trended Republican in federal elections.”
Well, there you have it from the AP.
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Thank you for making the case that McCain just goes along with the Washington elite of his party.
Interestingly, John McCain chose NOT to vote a lot. And still manages to vote with Bush 95% of the time. I’m guessing he votes with Bush 100% of the time — when he can be bothered to show up at work.
Here is a small sample of issues he felt weren’t important enough to bother voting on:
Prohibiting the Funds in S 1200 from Being Used for Abortions
S Amdt 3896
Prohibiting U.S. Assistance for Groups that Support Coercive Abortion
S Amdt 2707
Roe v. Wade Amendment
S 1692
Income Limit for Subsidies to Farmers
S Amdt 3810
Limit on Farm Subsidies
S Amdt 3695
Defense Department FY2006 Appropriations bill
HR 2863
Transportation, Treasury, HUD, Judiciary, Appropriation
HR 3058
Interior Department FY 2006 Appropriations Bill
HR 2361
Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for the Department of Defense
S 2340
Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007 (CHIP)
Temporary Tax Adjustments Act of 2007
HR 3996
Energy Act of 2007
HR 6
Defense Authorizations Bill
HR 4986
GI Bill and Other Domestic Provisions
S Amdt 4803
Increasing Taxes on Profits, Rescinding Certain Tax Deductions, and Increasing Tax Incentives for Alternative Energy Programs for Oil Companies
S 3044
National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008
HR 1585
Bridge Repair Funding
S Amdt 2792
Implementing the 9/11 Commission Recommendations Act
HR 1
Department of Homeland Security Appropriations
HR 2638
Alternative Energy Subsidies
S Amdt 1704
JOBS (Jumpstart Our Business Strength)
HR 4520
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 Amendments Act of 2008
HR 6304
Alternative Energy Tax Incentives
HR 6049
Amendment on Certain Energy-Related Programs, Including the Development of Oil and Natural Gas in Coastal Areas Not Covered by a Moratorium
S Amdt 4329 to S Con Res 70
Funding for Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan
S Amdt 4818
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Cheryl D: #21
I can help you with some of that, but not all at once. I’ll whack at it as I get a chance. I was going to send my e-mail, but Kim says she’s interested, so I’ll post here. Don’t hesitate to question some of my statements. I’ll do the easy ones first.
4. Car doors locked. You had to use the key. There were no keyless systems of any kind.
5. Starting a car could be tricky. If it was well tuned, it would start with a couple of turns. If not tuned it could be a pain. In my 1950 Chevvy, you turned on the ignition, pressed a button on the dash and it cranked a few times and fired. I usually had to play with the choke and hold my tongue right (that’s a saying). You had to be sure the car was in neutral, or you had the clutch down. I did both. In the old movies, they started cars and whizzed off, I usually had to let it run a couple of seconds, then put it into gear.
7. Casual adults used first names, but not at first. In business, a “Mr.” would probably be used, but if it was well established, the first name basis worked. I don’t know of any firm rules. Things didn’t change much between the 40’s and 50’s, except during the war. WW II changed a lot, but it was pretty stable until the sixties.
8. I don’t really know how to answer this. Actually, you didn’t introduce an adult to a child. You introduced the child to the adult. The adult was always “Mr. Furgeson”. I never knew the first names of some of my friend’s parents. (Interesting aside; I was in our church in Virginia 38 years. The daughter of a friend married and often returned. She always, even as an adult, called me “Mr. ..” but her husband called me “Charlie”. As he should.)
More later. Some of this I don’t know for sure, but I will give my best guess. If you ask Lynn, she will give my e-mail address. I think I posted it somewhere.
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Cheryl, it is, indeed important to do fact checking. I remember in one of Tom Clancy’s books (I’ve read all of them.) he had an accident happening on I-85 just outside of Columbia, SC. I-85 goes through SC, but about 100 miles from Columbia. Columbia has 3 interstates, but none of them is I-85.
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A few more interesting “couldn’t be bothered to vote”s from McCain. Some of these were very close votes too. Probably relaxing by the pool at one of his McMansions?
Offshore Drilling in Virginia
S Amdt 1566
Preventing Petroleum Export Organizations (NOPEC Act of 2007)
S Amdt 1519
Removal of ANWR Provision from HR 2863
S Con Res 74
Restriction of Federal Assistance Based on Compliance with Federal Immigration Laws
S Amdt 4309 to S Con Res 70
Supplemental Appropriations for the Department of Defense and Timeline for Withdrawal from Iraq
HR 4156
Immigration Enforcement and Employer Sanctions Amendment
S Amdt 4259
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Of the 12 Republicans running in competitive Senate races — five of whom are incumbents — only three have said they will be attending the Republican convention. Six are definite no-shows, and three are on the fence.
“Nobody likes a funeral,” said a Senate Republican press secretary who spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing “the overall climate of general malaise about the party” as the reason for hesitance on the part of Republicans.
On the House side, according to a report in The Hill, during a July 31 conference call National Republican Campaign Committee Chairman Tom Cole of Oklahoma discouraged congressional hopefuls from attending, saying that doing so would potentially be a “waste of time.”
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On McSame voting 95% of the time with Bush, Cheryl retorts: “He’s a Republican, and so is Bush.”
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So, who fired the first shot?
1. South Ossetian separatists?
2. Georgians?
3. Russians?
Are the Russian’s engaging in an “Operation Freedom” campaign for the South Ossetians or are the Georgians engaged in an “Operation Freedom” campaign against the Russians?
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btw, please don’t answer using wikipedia. I don’t want pat presidential candidate answers.
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Believe it or not, there are other issues than Iraq on which legislation was passed that was good for the country. That’s the 95%. McCain is WELL-KNOWN (I’m so old I have to shout) as a bi-partisan Senator that this is just the usual nonsense that Godlumps tries to foist on people with little accuracy or context.
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Thanks, Chas. I was hoping you’d weigh in! One of the author’s premises is that her main character hates her last name and tries to avoid using it…but that didn’t change social etiquette of that day. (In other words, someone else wouldn’t have used her first name in an introduction to a child just because she hated her last name.) It makes it awkward, because I want the author to have freedom over her own character, but also keep it accurate to the time period!
My e-mail is my dot editor at juno dot com (change the dot and at to punctuation, no spaces, of course).
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RN: I post because I know that I will eventually get Godlumbs to join the McCain team. I see in #30 that it worked.
Cheryl:
1. How long for a letter from Berlin to USA Where in USA? It matters. . It depends. In Arabia, air mail came in two or three days, depending on the TWA schedule. Berlin and NY or some major city probably had two day service. (That’s better than it is today.) If it wasn’t air mail, it went by ship and took a couple of weeks. In those days, you had to buy an “Air Mail” stamp to get a letter sent from NY to Chicago by air. Only important mail went “Air Mail”. Railroads ruled. The letter from Berlin would take at least two days. TWA, BOAC or KLM would not fly non-stop from NY to Berlin. From Westover, Mass., we flew to the Azores or to Iceland then on to Europe. I never flew the “Constellation” (C-121), but it would fly Westover to Ireland non stop.
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I have found some ridiculous errors, myself, in books I have read. Some are just spelling errors, but many are errors that have a character doing something that just would not have been done. Others are errors, such as the seat belt one, of things that were not invented yet. It really takes away from the enjoyment of a novel to find such errors. Cheryl, you obviously do a good job.
I was born after the 40’s, but not much. I never knew a woman to drive a car when a man was in the car. My husband still does most of the driving. The both of us are amazed when the issue of who will drive is brought up by our daughters and their husbands. It was no issue for us. Fortunately, I am glad to sit and relax, while he drives most places. My daughters sometimes prefer to drive or one or the other has more reason to be tired.
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I see that GL McSpam is active again…
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Thanks, Chas, about the air mail info! This letter arrived within a week from Berlin, I think, and I didn’t know if that was possible, but it looks like it would have been. (My parents were in Nigeria in the 1950s, and it took months for them to get mail from the U.S., which is what made me wonder about other countries sending mail to the U.S.)
Starting a car, too–her description really did seem too easy….
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Well it appears Russia is winding down it’s attacks now. Yesterday Pres. Bush, and the leaders of France and Germany also called for Russia to pull back. That wasn’t enough though. It took Obama’s weighing in to finally get them to stop. At least that’s the opinion of the idiot Gov. of Virginia, Tim Kaine. Yeah, he says they did it because Obama told them to. He’s not even Pres. yet, and he’s already stopped a war. Is there nothing he can’t do? Or that his lackeys won’t give him credit for? Check it out.
http://tinyurl.com/59raf4
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Remember the town hall meeting that was to take place at Ft. Hood tonight? The one Obama regretfully couldn’t attend, because of a scheduling conflict? Yeah, and what was that conflict, what was so important that he couldn’t, yet again, find time for the troops? Boogie boarding in Hawaii while vacationing. That’s way more important than the troops.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2008/08/democrats_call_their_conventio.asp
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GL
The irony
McCain misses votes for pro-life bills yet he’s got the pro-life vote
McCain misses votes for energy bills yet now he has the plan.
McCain misses votes for Iraq/Afghanistan yet foreign policy/military is supposed to be his stregth.
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AJ-
The Weekly Standard? Really?
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HRW- 54
You caught that too.
McSame is such a maverick he doesn’t even vote!
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The thing is, some of those votes were very close and he could have made a difference, but couldn’t be bothered.
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This is a public service announcement: Please do not feed the Comment Spam Troll.
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Klasko —— YEP, the ‘Troll’ will eat anything, LOL
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Some prominent Republican passengers are jumping off the McSame Straight-Talk Express to form Republicans for Obama.
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The link above is to the news story on Republicans for Obama.
The link to their site is:
http://www.republicansforobama.org/
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Speaking of errors in books, one of the most amusing I’ve read by in the book The Best of Father Brown, by G.K. Chesterton. The erroneous assumption really mattered in that case, because it was the key to the mystery. I won’t spoil it, but it said something like this:
“If you dropped a pebble off the top of the cathedral, it would be something like a bullet by the time it hit the ground.” Clearly the author had not heard of terminal velocity. But then, that was a long time ago. There was also a common misconception in another book, Saint, by Ted Dekker. (which is a very interesting book, so I’m not criticizing it)
The line was something like the following:
“He carried to of his favorite guns at his hips, .45 caliber 1911’s, with enough firepower to knock a man across a room.” The “flying across the room after getting shot” scene is in the movies a lot, but like the line in Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six goes, “If only it were that easy.”
Isn’t it nice to have cars so much easier to start and drive nowadays?
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John McCain has some misconceptions too, RIO. He doesn’t know the difference between Shiite and Sunni, thinks Iraq and Pakistan share a border, thinks Czechoslovakia still exists, and thought Iran was training al Qaeda.
And no, Grandpa, troop levels in Iraq are NOT down to pre-surge levels. There are still 20,000 more there than bofore the escalation. For crying out loud.
We got big trouble if the Confused and Befuddled John McCain finds his way into the White House as Bush’s Third Term.
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Cheryl,
3. When we drove from Columbia, SC to Ft. Worth, Texas in 1957, I did all the driving. I don’t know why, I just did. Usually, the man did all the driving. You almost never (I don’t recall ever) saw a woman driving a car with a man in the right seat.
We trade off now, but not often. She doesn’t like to drive interstate. I love them.
My wife was/is a great navigator. With a map, she’s better than GPS. My friend, Vernon, used to drive straight through. He used to preach for TANE, (Texas Alcohol and Narcotics Education) and I would tell him that driving 24 hours at a time was worse than drinking. He did it anyhow. He survived and now is a retired AF Chaplain.
He didn’t want to spend $6.00 for a motel.
If it’s important to the story, nobody will notice if a woman does some driving; otherwise, no.
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Cheryl:
If starting a car is an issue, as I said, I used to let the car idle briefly to warm up. “Warm up” is a catch-all term. The primary reason was to let the oil pressure rise. It wasn’t instantaneous as it is now. Some people didn’t care. They didn’t put 100,000 miles on their cars.
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Speaking of GPS’s, the one my family has in the 12-passenger van termed “Great White” by someone who had another large van whom they named “Big Red.”
So, combining that with my own one-word description of it, I affectionately call it (this might make Mr. Lumps angry) G.W.B. And no, that doesn’t stand for “George W. Bush.” It’s “Great White Bull,”
even though it’s only a Ford E-350 with 12 seats and a V-8, rather than a gold one owned by a family in our church, which has 15 seats and a V-10.
Oh, it seems I lost what I was trying to say about our GPS. What I was getting to was that if Chas’ wife is a good or even decent navigator, she’s probably much better than our GPS, because the little machine is retarded. It has made us go miles (OK, maybe not quite that far) out of our way down different roads just to turn around, where a human navigator would say “Go and make a U-turn up ahead, and head in the opposite direction.” And once, to do the 180° turn, the GPS told us to go down a side road where there were lots of “No Trespassing” and “Trespassers Will Be Prosecuted” signs. And this was late at night…but we eventually found our way and got on home. But then it follows the example of our other demented electronic devices, like one desktop PC, which will turn itself back on after being turned off sometimes. And then there’s thee car CD player/stereo system, which will often turn off unless slight pressure is applied to a button but the button isn’t actually pushed, and other times it will scan radio channels by itself, and best of all, once music was playing on it and I tried to turn it off, and then it turned back on again. So I turned it off again and it came back on again. This happened about three times.
I suppose one explanation for it being a not-so-dangerous H.A.L. Jr. is because it was a replacement for the stock CD player which broke, and was the cheapest one on the shelf at Wal-Mart…
I don’t think I do so well when writing long posts. Drill could fill up the whole screen and still keep people interested and amused (probably laughing), but I don’t quite possess that talent.
Whew! I’m finished.
Maybe that’s where the “Rio” name came from-the fact that I can often get carried away and talk about a certain subject for a very long time…just like a river (”rio”) goes on and on. Then there’s the humorous explanation, the fact that “Rio” equals “trio” minus a “t,” and I’ve certainly lost at least one “T” (shirt) before.
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RIO,
I don’t have a problem with it, but your GPS obviously resents having the initials of a failed president.
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11 Aug 2008 // Next week, John McCain will attend the fundraiser for his campaign, which is being hosted by a close ally of Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed:
On Thursday afternoon, Republicans around Georgia received an invitation from Reed, who will serve as a host of a “special event” for McCain at the downtown Marriot Marquis on Aug. 18.
John McCain may want to review the 66 pages of correspondence between Mr. Reed and convicted felon, Jack Abramoff, which was obtained by his committee. Those emails between Reed and Abramoff are posted at http://governmentdocs.org.
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I’m glad I don’t have a GPS. I am quite capable of getting very lost all on my own.
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Even for World on the Web this is a very strange week. I think something momentus is going to happen before this week is over.
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Business and Media Institute
FCC Commissioner: Return of Fairness Doctrine Could Control Web Content
McDowell warns reinstated powers could play in net neutrality debate, lead to government requiring balance on Web sites.
By Jeff Poor
Business & Media Institute
8/12/2008 5:37:12 PM
There’s a huge concern among conservative talk radio hosts that reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine would all-but destroy the industry due to equal time constraints. But speech limits might not stop at radio. They could even be extended to include the Internet and “government dictating content policy.”
FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell raised that as a possibility after talking with bloggers at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. McDowell spoke about a recent FCC vote to bar Comcast from engaging in certain Internet practices – expanding the federal agency’s oversight of Internet networks.
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Cheryl D.
We lived in the Northwest in the 1940s, which was a more casual culture than I understood was true of some parts of the country. I don’t remember mom, when talking to us children, ever speaking of adults by their first names only. We knew what their names were, but she either spoke of them as Mrs. Smith, or if a very close friend, maybe Helen Smith.
When mom talked about our grandmother, she was Grandma (last name) If we talked to her, we said, “Hi, Grandma.” Our aunts and uncles were Aunt Jane, Uncle Bob, etc. never just their first names.
If an adult had called and one of the kids answered, I doubt if she ever said, “this is Carol,” but would have either said “your neighbor,” or “Mrs Smith.”
When mom called someone on the phone she announced herself — “This is (first name last name). I don’t remember if she ever just said “this is (first name).” She was a stay at home mom, and though she attended church meetings and some other functions, she wasn’t the party or ultra-social type, so she may not have known anyone whom she would just identify herself by her first name on the phone.
By the way, we had a black phone with a rotary dial. We lived in a small town, and in the 40s our number was low, 535. I believe we got a four-digit number in the later forties, but I don’t remember when we finally had to use a number with one-digit-prefix hyphen four digits.
The phone lived on a small table in the hallway, suitably called — what else? — the telephone stand! It was outside mom and dad’s bedroom, where dad could get to it quickly if his crew had an emergency in the night. If it rang in the day time, we could still go from the living room or kitchen to the hall to answer it. We did not have extensions, or a living room phone in those days, nor would it have been approved for us to have long chatttery phone sessions — the phone had to be free in case somebody really needed us. That was, of course, a trait of our family, both because mom and dad weren’t the frippery chattery type, because they had made themselves public servants for church or community people who might need something, and of course the phone needed to be free most of the time for “just in cases.” (Dad was the manager of a public utility district. If the lights went out, he was out the door in a flash.) The electricity did go out more often in those days, than it does now.
If mom was going next door, she said, “I’m going to see Mrs. Smith.” Our neighbors were friendly but never considered “best friends.” Or she would say she was going to visit (the Johnsons, or Mary Jones. she often visited then widows and elderly to cheer them up).
We would certainly not have been allowed to call adults by their first names. And if our parents were present at all, they had the privilege of carrying on a conversation with the adults without us butting in constantly, we were to show the courtesy of letting them talk, unless the other adults purposely addressed us, or our parent told us to tell them “so and so” — or else we were all on such good terms that we were automatically included.
I don’t know if this was a general custom or our family’s idea. We certainly weren’t raised that children were to be seen and not heard, in other ways.
Girls wore dresses or skirts to school and church. There was a dress code of sorts. Even in the 50s, a boy could be suspended from school for streaking his hair — bleaching a blond streak down the middle. Again, in the 50s, when dad was the Sunday School Supt, I never heard him call the church secretary anything but Mrs. —-. The reason I was there in the office to know, was that I was excused from my class early because I was the piano player for closing exercises, but I had to arrive before the other classes were dismissed.
I don’t remember the full formal introduction ritual — Mrs. Smith, meet my daughter —-,; —- meet Mrs. Smith. If we were seeing for the first time someone my parents already knew, I suppose they said, “and these are our children.” Or maybe the other person said, “And these are your children?” (not a “duh” question, but an acknowledgement.) I honestly can’t remember them being formal about introducing us to new adults. Maybe they said “And here are the Smiths.” Or maybe the Smiths turned to us and said, “And we’re the Smiths.” It wasn’t a big production. Maybe they just greeted the Smiths and we just waited for them to greet them and go on.
If we knew someone was coming to visit us, they would say, “The Smiths are coming over” I think we had some low-key hint whether they were going to be mom and dad’s friends or if we were invited to join in. When they arrived, we simply said hello. Not being obligated to call them by name, or have their names repeated to us.
Dad would have been more likely to be called his first name when certain people greeted him, than mom. Because he was so well known in town, and had more involvement with his peers. I’m sure his crew called him by his first name, and probably some of the church people. But since he was a manager, not a “laborer”, he certainly would have been Mr. — to a lot of people.
Oh yes, and teachers would NEVER have been addressed by their first names in public, not by adults or children. And preachers probably likewise.
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Vic0-
A BMI link? Bless your heart.
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I didn’t say the GPS was the one I occasionally call “GWB,” it’s the van that contains the unit.
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Then the van must be like Bush, and is preventing the GPS from knowing the truth about what’s really going on
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Silly season for the Olympics
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http://tiny.cc/sillyseason
Silly season for me. This is what I meant to post.
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The Drudge Report’s revelation Thursday of…misdealings by John McCain with a telecom lobbyist opens a host of questions on precisely what McCain’s relationship with the telecom lobby might entail….
“Recent reports on McCain’s relationship to telecom lobbying focus on his noted opposition to “net neutrality” efforts aimed at preventing broadband companies using their ownership of internet “pipes” to discriminate between content providers based on profitability. At present, the internet is a “neutral” playing field with free and equal access to all, and any censorship or “gatekeeping” by carriers strictly prohibited. On grounds of “free competition,” however, McCain has supported the efforts of broadband carriers such as Comcast, AT&T, and Verizon at gaining congressional permission to control access to websites on a two-tiered basis consisting of a fee-based “fast track” for more profitable websites and a “slow track” for sites whose owners can’t afford the fee.”
Anyone have a guess as to McCain’s position on net neutrality, given his less than stellar googling ability? I bet he takes the side of whoever pays him the most.
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Also from the link above:
From McCain’s home state of Arizona, Tucson Weekly notes that in 2006 McCain cast the deciding vote against the Snowe/Dorgan proposal to preserve internet freedom, noting also that McCain took in $44,250 in contributions that year from big telecom.
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Thanks, Marilee.
I was raised by older parents (42 and 50 when I was born) who were if anything more conservative than their peers. Mom never did learn to accept use of first names, even between people of the same age, but would complain about the fact that society had gotten so informal. She referred nostalgically to the days when you’d known someone for years before one of you said, “Please call me Cheryl,” and the other said, “And you can call me Marilee.” I was born in 1967, so basically I grew up in the 70s and 80s. By the time I was a teenager, our churches had kids calling adults by their first names, and no way were we allowed to. (I felt daring that I considered it OK to use first names for people up to about 25. I had friends who were several years older, and simply didn’t want to be calling potential friends by their last names and thus starting the relationship as a “juvenile.”)
My mom sometimes referred to her friends by first and last name (I remember her doing that with her best friend’s name) and sometimes just Mrs. —. We were only allowed to use last names.
In one church where my brother and sister and I were the only people in the whole church who used last names, when I was about 16, I started calling people by first and last name in conversations with others just to be clear. (Even our 82-year-old pastor was “Curtis” to everyone, even four-year-old children. So if I said “Mrs. Burns,” no one knew who I was talking about! I finally learned to say “Esther Burns” when talking about someone, “Mrs. Burns” when talking to her, and then I was being accurate and respectful enough. My brother and sister protested that I was being disrespectful to use first names along with last names, but my mom said that was OK. I think Mom and I were both tired of the conversations in which I said, “Mrs. Burns” and she said “Who?” and I said, “Esther Burns,” and we mutually agreed it was OK to simply say “Esther Burns” in the first place.)
I like it that in the South kids still say “Miss Cheryl” to adults. “Sir” and “ma’am” are nice too, though not having grown up using them, they’re still a little awkward for me.
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Last night Jon Stewart quoted Bush “International mediation is the better way to solve disputes”
Tonight he quoted the US ambassador to the UN “We think we’re past the era of solving disputes with military means (break) in Europe”
Sometimes he doesn’t need writers, the irony just stares in our face.
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For Godlumps;
The Republican Mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska endorses Obama.
http://tinyurl.com/6fjxm8
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdJUCU1UH2w
An other one for Godlumps — the best is the end, Pat Buchanan on McCain “He will make Cheney look like Ghandi”
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The Financial Times has a lengthy article on what are being dubbed Obamacans (Prominent Republicans backing Obama over McBush) here.
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Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) — Almost one-third of U.S. homeowners who bought in the last five years now owe more on their mortgages than their properties are worth, according to Zillow.com, an Internet provider of home valuations.
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HRW-
Best quote in the whole video, besides Pat Buchanan, is Rumsfeld speaking hopefully about what he knew they were doing. and hoping to get away with:
“There are a lot of people who lie and get away with it. That’s just a fact.”
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Yes Yes, by all means lets vote for Obama, who has received a ringing endorsement from Hamas. Makes me just warm and fuzzy all over.
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I don’t care who you vote for Joe. Just don’t vote for more of the SAME with McCain! It’s time for a different approach.
Ideally, we would elect a libertarian who respects the Constitution. Vote for BOB in 2008! If not, vote for anyone but McCain.
We can’t afford to go on with the same failed policies the McBushies have given us.
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You know what, GL?
You might make me feel slightly proud of being a “McBushie,” as you so kindly refer to us as. Even though I disagree with much of what Bush did and what he believes, he has still done good things like appointing conservative justices and cutting taxes.
And he has stood by his decision to go into Iraq.
So I can be one be one of the few left who stand for what they believe in, even if it’s not popular.
So maybe I’m like Ann Coulter, but I won’t go there because I think it’s possible that she makes inflammatory comments just so she will get yelled at. In essence, she might like being the one that everyone knows and hates because she says what she believes without caring how she puts it.
I have some things in common with her, but although I like being the one to differ with the majority (one against many), I don’t purposely try to make enemies or call people names.
But when the truth needs to be told, I will tell it, and if some people are “offended,” “by all means, be offended! The truth is often not comfortable to live with. However, this does not mean that I am trying to offend people in the name of truth.
I hope Lynn or the other blog managers (if there are any others) will make an “edit bio” option
someday. I, for one, want to change mine.
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