Saturday Morning Disappointment Links

by | Aug 20, 2022 | Daily Links | 269 comments

Well, that was a bust. I wore the great leisure suit that WebDom picked out for me, the peach one, to our local bar and hangout. I waited for the expected onslaught of ladies hungry for Hot Man-Meat, which did not happen. The place was crowded since it’s move-in weekend for one of the colleges, so there was a lot of potential targets. But instead, I got a lot of funny looks and people backing away when I approached. Doing my first line check, my fly was closed. No boogers hanging out of my nose. What could be the problem?

I found WebDom and had her observe. She looked very thoughtful, as if she were trying to suppress laughter. “I think I see the issue- this is too avant garde, too modern fashion for a hick town like this. It would play better in New York City, where this is all the rage. You know what might make this a bit less jarring to the yokels? A different color. How about we try this again next week, but using the powdered blue leisure suit?” What a great idea! I have an amazing and thoughtful daughter.

Birthdays today include the grandson of our best president; the Norman Rockwell of poetry; SugarFree’s muse; an architect who created some of the worst shit ever erected; an author who wrote some of the worst shit ever published; a guy who shared a barber with Marty Allen; a demonstration that in an ugly pool, shit rises; a guy who, in any kind of just universe, would have been our greatest president ever; a delightful guy who set me on the path of my early career in science; a guy who shared a barber with Geert Wilders; perhaps the greatest chef in America; the pioneer of screaming rock; an absolutely brilliant singer/songwriter; a guy who made his fortunes as a punchline; and a woman who made her fortunes as a punchline.

Let’s get on with Links.

 

Totally expected.

 

“My bank account needs refilling, stat!”

 

Whereby routine PM can be politicized.

 

While I’m cutting and pouring glass, this is what other scientists are doing.

 

Every once in a while, Culture Warriors are right.

 

“Our country is fucked up. What can we do for a distraction?”

 

It’s totes OK when leftist politicians and religious “leaders” say this.

 

I don’t often agree with Politico, but this time, yeah.

 

And here I thought Utah was the Powder Capital of the United States.

 

Old Guy Music is an absolutely wonderful tune featuring one of our Birthday Boys. Like I said, brilliant.

About The Author

Old Man With Candy

Old Man With Candy

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me. Wait, wrong book, I'll find something else.

269 Comments

  1. Count Potato

    “Just 4% to 9% would come from businesses making north of $500,000 a year — meaning the legislation is in sharp contrast to President Biden’s longstanding claim that he wouldn’t raise taxes on anyone making less than $400,000.”

    This is my shocked face.

    • thrakkorzog

      Man, This is where I need a Fry.gif.

      “I’m shocked”
      “shocked”
      “well not that shocked.”

      • Ted S.

        “I’m shocked”

        Your winnings, sir.

      • thrakkorzog

        Ok, the Casablanca response works also.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      I guess I better stock up on lube. I’m probably going to need it.

    • Grumbletarian

      Professional fact checkers have rated this story “Shut the Fuck Up, Traitor”.

  2. Atanarjuat

    80% of new IRS revenue will come from small businesses earning under $200K: tax experts

    By the way, in that clip that is going around of the dysfunctional IRS trainees barging in to arrest a suspect, the scenario wasn’t a billionaire, as Thomas Massie pointed out…it was a lawn guy’s home.

  3. SDF-7

    Based on the Lockdown Years, I’m pretty convinced “going after small business” is seen as Feature, Not Bug. The big corps give them more money and the more centralized the economy, the easier it is for them to control. So yeah, Totally Expected agreed.

    What I didn’t expect skimming the article — picture of Manchin wearing a dual flag (US and Ukraine) pin. I mean, yeah… having it in Twitter bios is one thing and all… but this is a sitting US Senator wearing a pin that sure looks like he’s declaring allegiance to both there. And I have to assume all the Congresscritters are too. (And yes, of course they *can* — just saying, members of the US government should have clear allegiance solely to the US and the Constitution… allies are allies, not sovereigns we pledge fealty to.)

    And I’d try a different tack, OMWC — surprise WebDom by going full Country Line Dance instead — flannel shirt, jeans and boots. Go for the rustic look… the “I may be a man of science but I can still tear down a u-bend!” look. And good morning!

    • rhywun

      Manchin wearing a dual flag

      Outrageous and also totally expected.

      • R C Dean

        When I recently opined that dual citizenship shouldn’t be a thing because of the dual loyalties, if not obligations, it creates, there was some pushback. So I guess at least some wouldn’t have a problem with a Senator having dual loyalties/obligations.

      • Pat

        Gotta be honest, I don’t really care. Politicians are universally pieces of shit anyway, I assume all of them have a first loyalty to satan. I myself feel no particular affinity for America and would happily leave it the moment something better came along.

      • Brawndo

        Dual citizenship for government employees already seems sketchy, but not being prohibited for members of Congress seems so obviously a bad idea, especially in the modern age when they can just vote to give money away to other countries.

        Renouncing citizenship is always an option for people that were born in other countries that wish to be in Congress.

      • juris imprudent

        Loyalties, obligations – what quaint concepts.

      • Drake

        It’s long been a matter of speculation on how many members of Congress hold dual citizenship with another country. There is no way of knowing because it is not prohibited and there is no disclosure requirement.

      • rhywun

        I don’t care about dual citizenship that much, if that’s what this is – the outrageous part to me is the virtue signaling and taking sides in a war – hell, promoting it – that is none of our damn business.

      • thrakkorzog

        My dad told me a story about going to S. Carolina. He figured the Black people there must hate Strom Thurmond, since he was their rep since forever. And Strom Thurmond was a racist. I don’t mean to call someone a racist just because I disagree with him, I mean he straight up ran for president on a policy of keeping Jim crow alive.

        Turns out he was big on all politics is local. And he brought home the bacon. If you wanted to mail a letter in his district, you were going to be mailing it at the Strom Thurmond memorial mailbox #112. Just so you know who ordered that mailbox.

    • Nephilium

      If he’s aiming for the college crowd, he could go with the adult onesie instead.

      • Count Potato

        Zardoz monokini?

  4. Count Potato

    “”The system essentially gets a bonus symmetry from a nonexistent extra time dimension,” the researchers wrote in the statement. The system appears as a material that exists in some higher dimension with two dimensions of time — even if this may be physically impossible in reality. ”

    Good thing I’m not a physicist, because that sounds like bullshit.

    • KK of the Lesser Glibertarians

      Sounds like the “ether” that scientists thought comprised empty space in of days of yore

      • Ted S.

        What do you have against phlogiston?

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Oooooo…. bonus comment symmetry

      We’re physicists!

    • SDF-7

      It sounds like the Physics version of the software engineering principle: “Every problem can be solved by another layer of indirection / virtualization”. Don’t understand your experimental results? Posit another dimension!

      I did appreciate the article *eventually* letting us mere mortals know just what they meant by a “Fibonacci laser” though. Only took them like 2/3rds to do it, but they got there eventually.

    • Grumbletarian

      But can they save it in a bottle?

  5. Scruffy Nerfherder

    “The system essentially gets a bonus symmetry from a nonexistent extra time dimension,” the researchers wrote in the statement. The system appears as a material that exists in some higher dimension with two dimensions of time — even if this may be physically impossible in reality.

    Uhhh…. I think you should stick with the glass, OMWC.

    • juris imprudent

      And yet, despite these kinds of strange things we are to believe the physics that insists the universe has a consistent order. Because if it doesn’t we aren’t likely to ever really understand it.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Dude, Sam Harris says the universe is deterministic and free will doesn’t exist. He’ll figure it out and then explain it to us in small words that deplorables can understand.

      • juris imprudent

        I just love how people have faith without realizing they have faith, particularly when they are arguing that faith is always an unjustifiable thing.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        When I read about his latest shenanigans of “I’ll lie to stop the Devil,” I went back to review some of his other stuff and came across this gem.

        Whether criminals like Hayes and Komisarjevsky can be trusted to honestly report their feelings and intentions is not the point: Whatever their conscious motives, these men cannot know why they are as they are. Nor can we account for why we are not like them. As sickening as I find their behavior, I have to admit that if I were to trade places with one of these men, atom for atom, I would be him: There is no extra part of me that could decide to see the world differently or to resist the impulse to victimize other people. Even if you believe that every human being harbors an immortal soul, the problem of responsibility remains: I cannot take credit for the fact that I do not have the soul of a psychopath. If I had truly been in Komisarjevsky’s shoes on July 23, 2007—that is, if I had his genes and life experience and an identical brain (or soul) in an identical state—I would have acted exactly as he did. There is simply no intellectually respectable position from which to deny this. The role of luck, therefore, appears decisive.

        At least he can claim he has the soul of a sociopath.

      • R C Dean

        “I have to admit that if I were to trade places with one of these men, atom for atom, I would be him”

        I find that intellectual poseurs often state tautologies as if they were deep insights. It’s kind of a “tell”, really.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        But it has the “atom” word in it! He’s so smahttt!

        I’ve lost all patience for reading the sophists of our day. Gussying up an age old controversy in “smart people” language and pretending that it’s some revaluation is manipulative.

  6. Atanarjuat

    enables scientists to store information in a far more error-protected way, thereby opening the path to quantum computers that can hold on to data for a long time without becoming garbled.

    Yeah, I’d hate for all the cat pictures, clips of Hunter Biden beating off, and soyjak memes our culture has produced to be lost to history.

    • SDF-7

      To give them credit here — I don’t think they meant in terms of archival storage there. I was thinking more like “to even be usable for computation” aka more like current volatile RAM. If your DIMMs and / or cache are constantly corrupting themselves with the conflicting quantum states of the rest of the universe, your quantum computer isn’t going to be very effective and all.

      • Atanarjuat

        Of course, beyond my initial glibness, archival storage could be very useful for storing things such as good photos of the British Museum’s cuneiform tablet collection.

      • R C Dean

        Those cuneiform tablets aren’t going to archive themselves, after all.

        Oh, wait . . .

      • Atanarjuat

        If your objection to creating a digital records of historical artifacts is that the artifacts still exist, consider that they are prone to destruction in fire, looting, return to the home country and being subjected to a lower standard of preservation, etc, and that the digital records make them more accessible to the public online without visiting them in person.

      • Pat

        they are prone to destruction in fire, looting, return to the home country and being subjected to a lower standard of preservation, etc

        True of any medium though. A fairly routine (by geological time standards) solar flare will one day obliterate most forms of digital information that aren’t stored in an optical format or preserved in a prohibitively expensive Faraday cage within a bunker.

      • Nephilium

        I remember the good old days when we were told the CD archives would last for centuries. Then a couple years later we found that there was significant degradation on most optical discs.

      • Pat

        Disc rot is a bitch. That and even the highest density optical formats nowadays are just simply insufficient for backing up large quantities of multimedia type data.

  7. Count Potato

    “Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Friday introduced a measure that would make it a felony to provide gender-affirming medical care including puberty blockers and hormones to transgender youth under 18.”

    I’m generally against laws that restrict medicine, but it’s become politics not medicine.

    “The measure would also prohibit using federal funds for gender-affirming health care, including in Affordable Healthcare Act plans, and bar colleges and universities from offering instruction on gender-affirming care.”

    That’s retarded.

    • Atanarjuat

      As Kurt Metzger pointed out, the point of puberty blockers is basically to make trans people hotter when they are adults. Considering the procedure’s irreversible nature and large percentage who later regret it, there is an argument for banning.

    • Tonio

      “gender affirming”

      • Old Man With Candy

        That phrase lights the OMWC Bullshit signal.

      • juris imprudent

        Well genital mutilation is considered bad.

      • TARDis

        That’s exactly why it should be called the Anti-Mutilation Bill.
        The Cons need to quit using woke language. Gender affirming, my ass.

        What should we really call the Inflation Reduction Act? I prefer the “Fuck Small Business and Hidden Pass Through Taxation Act”.

    • juris imprudent

      I will simply note that Article I provides no such legislative power. Un-constitutional as proposed.

      • R C Dean

        No, but until we overturn Wickard it is within the power granted by SCOTUS.

        The restrictions on federal funding should be be fine, regardless.

      • juris imprudent

        I will continue to treat Wickard with all the respect I give to Scott v. Sanford.

    • Ted S.

      If Title Ix can be used to force colleges to dump due process, why can’t it be used to force colleges to adhere to 1A and 2A among other things?

  8. Gender Traitor

    Like I said, brilliant.

    Thank you so much for this! Heartily concur! (And what a wonderful opening line! 😆)

    There’s a lilac bush right here at the corner of Tranquility Base, but it hasn’t bloomed for several years. Maybe too old or got pruned incorrectly? Dunno, but I wish it would flower again. 🙁

    • KK of the Lesser Glibertarians

      At my old place there was a lilac bush that I would pass by on my commute, when I used to commute.

      You bet your ass I stopped & smelled the flowers every day.

      • Gender Traitor

        Damn right!

        (Ummm….which ones are the Lesser Glibs? I know I don’t think of you as lesser in any way! [::secretly fears she’s among them::])

      • SDF-7

        I’m certain I’d be ranked there, if I get anything beyond “Annoying Lurker” in the first place.

      • Fourscore

        That’s not trash, those are collectibles. Somewhere, someone is collecting old aluminum pots and pans

      • rhywun

        Same here. I don’t really “stop”, though. Just slow down.

        My hometown has a Lilac Festival every year – imagine walking around a big park full of them.

      • KK of the Lesser Glibertarians

        I’d probably faint from how good it smells!

    • Pat

      I grew up in the “Lilac City”. I probably seen half a dozen lilac bushes there my entire life. One of the places we lived when I was very young had one. It gave me allergies.

      • Pat

        This might also be a good time to discuss whether it’s pronounced Lie-Lock or Lie-Lack.

      • MikeS

        lock

      • Gender Traitor

        lack!

      • TARDis

        ^^^Colonizer confirmed.

      • Fourscore

        Correct, MikeS

      • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

        Lie-luck.

      • juris imprudent

        No one asked for the Canucki mispronunciation.

      • slumbrew

        Listen, buddy…

  9. Tres Cool

    whaddup doh’

  10. SDF-7

    Re: the jackass in Oklahoma — my first thought was that he was just fundamentalist Christian (where, like most other religions it *is* the default that “If you don’t do it our way, sorry… you *are* going to Hell… come to our side, we have cookies!” — advantage of being lapsed/fluid Catholic… we have Purgatory for this to cover the “What about the kids who never got a chance to know Christ? The sincerely good people elsewhere?”, and frankly you can make a reincarnation argument for Earth *being* Purgatory… plus the whole if you *know* Christ in your soul (by being open to God), is that what He meant in the first place, not knowing in your brain is an interesting argument).

    Anyway… but yeah, reading the article, I strongly suspect the guy is in fact a bigoted ass using his faith to cover for it. Between the coat-changing squishies and the bigoted asses who get a shot because they’ll at least fight the Culture Wars, it does seem like it is really hard to get decent candidates. Almost certainly because those you’d want to do the job are busy running their own lives for the most part.

    • Pat

      plus the whole if you *know* Christ in your soul (by being open to God), is that what He meant in the first place, not knowing in your brain is an interesting argument).

      I always hated that mind/soul or brain/heart duality in Christianity even as a child. Never got it. I guess I’m too much in my own head that way. I distinctly remember one time in chapel in the first grade at our evangelical pentecostal Christian school. They brought up the whole class to the front of the room (bad enough for the shy kid) and then tried to explain to us how to “receive the holy spirit” so we could pray in tongues. And the instructor told us “You need to turn off your mind and just open your heart. Tell your mind ‘Mind, shut up!'” And at 6 years old I remember thinking “How are you supposed to turn off your mind?” I tried, and the more I focused on emptying my mind or telling my mind “Shut up!” the more my mind started contemplating what I was doing. Needless to say, I was one of about 3 kids in the group who was never able to “speak in tongues”. I’ve experienced the same thing in terms of soteriology and theology throughout the rest of my life. Some part of me resonates with the concept of a god and the need for salvation, so maybe that’s my “heart” or “soul” or whatever. But I don’t “get it” intuitively at that level.

      • juris imprudent

        Too bad you weren’t worldly enough to say “that sounds kinda zen”.

      • Pat

        Lol, yeah, ironically as an adult I had the same problem trying “mindfulness meditation”.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I always hated that mind/soul or brain/heart duality in Christianity even as a child

        I always took it as a metaphorical attempt to split rational thought from emotive feeling.

      • Pat

        That’s precisely the extent to which I don’t really get it. Maybe I’m “on the spectrum”.

  11. The Late P Brooks

    House Republican leaders have started to lean into culture war fights regarding transgender individuals, with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) pledging to bring up a bill that prohibits transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports if Republicans win the House majority.

    Greene on Friday tweeted that two Republican U.S. Senate candidates – J.D. Vance of Ohio and Blake Masters of Arizona – have promised to support her bill if they are elected.

    Suddenly, out of the blue, Republicans have pushed gender affirmation, which was completely not on anybody’s radar, into the public sphere. Why? No one knows.

    What sort of evil bloodthirsty maniacs would oppose something good and wholesome like gender affirmation?

    • rhywun

      “lean into”

      Stop. It.

  12. The Late P Brooks

    I see everybody’s favorite self-righteous egotistical twat Liz Cheney rushed into a teevee studio to tell us all Kevin McCarthy is totally unqualified to be Speaker of the House.

    She is the true heart and soul of the party, but those sheep fuckers in Wyoming are just too dumb to comprehend her superior moral character.

  13. Fourscore

    It’s not you, OM, it’s ‘them’. They just aren’t ready for a mature man. My suggestion is to hang out at the post office the day SS checks come.
    I think there’s a country song about older whiskey and younger women or maybe it’s the other way around. I forget.

  14. Scruffy Nerfherder

    The stupid is just coming too fast now. I can’t keep up.

    https://thedriven.io/2022/08/19/bank-australia-sets-date-to-cease-petrol-and-diesel-car-loans/

    Bank Australia will stop loaning money to drivers to buy new cars fuelled by petrol or diesel from 2025, it said on Friday.

    The decision to stop funding the sale of fossil-fuelled cars is part of the bank’s strategy to achieve net zero by 2035, and comes as the federal government readies to release its National Electric Vehicle Strategy which is expected to put the discussion about legislating fuel emissions squarely on the table.

    • Sean

      Awesome.

      *Points to avatar*

      /sarc

      I assume manufacturers still offer credit down under. Right?

      • R C Dean

        Manufacturers/dealers/finance companies also need debt financing. Cutting off their debt financing if they finance ICE cars would do the job.

    • rhywun

      LOL I want to see Australia string EV chargers every 50 miles across the desert. 🙄

      Well, I always say this crap will eventually die out under the weight of its own stupidity, but wow… the billions that will be flushed down the toilet first. What a shame.

      • SDF-7

        In a sane world where the government and regulators weren’t pushing it, their competition would eat their lunch. There won’t be enough EVs produced in 2025 to come near the usual market for car loans, after all.

    • Timeloose

      That’s not attainable. There is not enough infrastructure to build all electric cars to meet that deadline.

      Isn’t Australia the place where it’s 1200 miles between major cities.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        I’d have more respect for them if they were losing their asses on car loans and decided to frame their abandonment of the market, but I think they’re really that stupid.

      • rhywun

        They really are that stupid. This rush by every corporation to out-woke each other is not going to end well.

    • Atanarjuat

      Australians won’t be able to replace older cars with newer ones that generally get better gas mileage. So they’ll keep driving the older ones. Brilliant.

      • Drake

        A bigger, less cool, version of Cuba.

    • juris imprudent

      New explanation for the Mad Max apocalypse I suppose.

    • Brawndo

      This might work to our favor in the States. It’s such a close timeline compared to all the “deadlines” they float here (2035, 2050, whatever) that we’ll have plenty of time to watch it utterly skull-fuck their system and correct course.

      That’s my (overly) optimistic take

      • JasonAZ

        Yeah, I’ve been thinking the same thing. We’ll see. Trying to be optimistic, but humanity is pretty stupid and getting more stupid every day.

  15. KK of the Lesser Glibertarians

    Getting ready to hitch my precious Nissan Versa to the dolly and drag it down the road for the first time

    😬

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Somebody had their boogerhook on the trigger.

  16. The Late P Brooks

    It’s a college town, man. dirty painter’s pants, sandals, and a tie-dyed “Question Authority” t-shirt.

    • Atanarjuat

      There’s an old local guy who has a weird hippie home built like a pyramid with a swimming hole on the property. He always has 2 or 3 topless college girls running around the place. Personally I think someone closer to ones age would be far less annoying.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Where is this Shangri-La of which you speak?

      • Atanarjuat

        I couldn’t find it again. In the woods someplace, about halfway between Tallahassee and the coast.

      • Nephilium

        I think I may have a new retirement plan.

      • Atanarjuat

        He’s part owner of a store that sells sarongs and Himalayan salt lamps and crystals and whatnot. I guess that’s part of the pipeline.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Ah, so he’s baiting them.

      • SDF-7

        It is probably mutual.

        (Judges note: “We would have also accepted ‘GO AWAY, BAITIN!’.”)

      • Brawndo

        *golf clap*

      • Atanarjuat

        It wasn’t in Arizona, but was about that size. Pretty similar. I remember it had a skylight for a tropical ficus tree to grow out of, but the winter air kept killing any part of the tree that poked out. Near that there was a hot tub grotto made of stone that was drained of water. He also had an old circus wagon on the property that one of the girls lived in.

    • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

      But you should smell like patchouli. None of that “eau de actual labor” should sully the outfit.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      I had a boss who got rolled by a Costa Rican hooker and then tried to pin it on people at the factory for stealing his wallet.

      He was stupid and an asshole.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Let her rest in his room, eh? The man’s a saint.

    • Pat

      Shoulda drove out here to Pahrump. The whores are legal, and they live at the brothel, so you can always come back and inquire to the hostess about your missing Rolex.

      Also, this is a good reason to not wear a Rolex. If you wear a watch snob watch, your typical whore probably won’t realize it’s valuable.

    • Brawndo

      Prostitution is legal in Vegas, no need to pretend you weren’t paying for some trim

      • DrOtto

        Illegal in Clark County (Vegas), legal elsewhere in the state.

      • Pat

        Correct. Counties with a population not exceeding 700,000 are permitted to license brothels if they so choose, but not obligated to do so. Counties with a population exceeding 700,000 (Clark county, which contains Las Vegas, Henderson, and unincorporated Paradise where 90% of “Las Vegas” is) are not permitted to license brothels.

      • Pat

        Accidentally backspaced part of my parenthetical. Should read: (Clark county, which contains Las Vegas, Henderson, and unincorporated Paradise where 90% of “Las Vegas” is, has a population just over 2 million)

      • Brawndo

        Is that recent? I was there in 03 and they were handing out flyers for hookers to call up.

      • Pat

        Those “services” are all illegal. The bike cops come around and chase off the Mexicans slapping those obnoxious fucking cards in your face every few months. The legal status of prostitution in the state was pretty well resolved by the late ’70s

      • Atanarjuat

        I had a sleazy coworker tell about his misadventure with a hooker in Vegas. Apparently he gave the agency like $150 or maybe even more. So someone who wasn’t the person in the picture shows up at his hotel room and tells him “that was just for me to show up, it’s another $400 to suck or $700 to fuck, otherwise I’ll leave and keep the $150” (I might be misremember the amounts but they are in the ballpark). So it’s a combination of sex work and con artistry or maybe just robbery.

    • DrOtto

      I was listening to Artie Lang in an interview on one of the SIRI XM comedy channels and he gave a great life hack – if you hire a hooker and you or her leave the room for any reason, she needs to start clapping. Clapping hands can’t take anything.

  17. Ted S.

    an author who wrote some of the worst shit ever published;

    The movie version is a hoot. And I just watched Barbara Parkins in another mess of a movie, The Kremlin Letter.

  18. Atanarjuat

    “Where is heaven exactly, given that we have multiple telescopes up there beaming back information.” – Sam Harris

    Auron MacIntyre @AuronMacintyre 21h
    For all their rhetoric about intellectual inquiry and rigor the new atheists could never advance beyond the reasoning of a 13 year-old Reddit poster
    They asked a question that stumped their Sunday school teacher in 1st grade and assumed that was the end of the debate

    I once had a weird discussion with a fairly smart guy (physics degree) about libertarianism that sort of went like this. He acted like pulling out the “what about ROADS” card immediately trumped everything. I think it caught him completely off guard that I had a measured response, and he began flailing.

    • juris imprudent

      What is outside the known physical universe Sam? You do have an explanation for that, right?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        What I never understood is how the “Rationalists” like Harris are so beloved among the Postmodernist idiots that currently rule.

        Then I realized that the “Rationalists” are just there to provide a fiction of reason and logic to the current postmodernist craze. Harris has admitted as much with his current diatribe on Trump. If he’s willing to lie about that, what else is he willing to lie about?

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Harris replaced faith in god with faith in institutions. The man’s a fool but we all gotta believe in something.

      • juris imprudent

        Evolution is entirely situational. Run the simulation one million times and the odds of getting exactly the same result twice are beyond comprehension.

  19. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Sugarfree’s muse

    I always figured Sugarfree was really kind of a William S. Burroughs guy.

    • Old Man With Candy

      I always describe him as Lovecraft crossed with Bukowski.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Interesting crossbreed, particularly since Lovecraft loathed the little people.

  20. The Late P Brooks

    Newspeak for “We need dictatorial power”

    Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, shared how “frustrating” it is when health decisions are politically driven.

    “It’s frustrating when people are making health based decisions through a political lens.” Walensky told Fox News’ Dr. Marc Siegel. “We’ve done everything that we can, and I continue to put my head down to steer the ship to steer. What I believe with science is the foundation science leading the way. Our policies are driven by science and they, of course, have to be interpreted in the context of all of health, [for] all of all of society.”

    ——-

    Walensky shared her desire in the future to be consistent, truthful and transparent in the face of political pressure and public health crises.

    “We need to show our work. We need to inform policymakers. We need to update things along the way as we proceed to that finish line. We need practical, timely recommendations that take early peeks of the data and adjust along the way.”

    We shouldn’t have to “convince” anybody. They need to shut up, bend over, and submit to our superior understanding of their needs.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Anyone who thought the CDC would reform itself by becoming more accountable hasn’t been paying attention.

      • juris imprudent

        CDC, Pentagon, FBI & Intel agencies – take your pick.

      • JasonAZ

        No reform. Just shut it down. Along with all the other agencies.

  21. Sean

    GF: “The weather girl is getting fat.”

    Me: “Huh.”

    • SDF-7

      I would have gone with “The anchor probably knocked her up.”

  22. The Late P Brooks

    “Masks have been a challenging message. What I will say is we have seen time and time again, data after data that demonstrate that masks have decreased infection and that they work to decrease infection, especially higher quality masks.” Walensky said.

    She claimed, without evidence.

    • rhywun

      Yup, that’s a flat-out bald-faced lie.

      • Brawndo

        Cloth-faced lie, if you will.

    • juris imprudent

      Would she also claim that the ‘vaccines’ inhibit transmission?

  23. SDF-7

    Just another day in Chumptown:

    Daily Quordle 208
    8️⃣5️⃣
    6️⃣🟥
    quordle.com

    Extra annoying because I actually missed that I *had* all the letters on the LR which would have kept me from the 50/50 guess situation at the end that I got wrong. TL;DR: I’m an idiot.

    To make myself feel a little better — went and did this:
    Daily Duotrigordle #171
    Guesses: 34/37
    Time: 07:21.48
    3️⃣4️⃣ 3️⃣3️⃣ 3️⃣2️⃣ 3️⃣1️⃣
    3️⃣0️⃣ 0️⃣4️⃣ 0️⃣5️⃣ 2️⃣9️⃣
    2️⃣4️⃣ 2️⃣5️⃣ 2️⃣6️⃣ 2️⃣7️⃣
    2️⃣8️⃣ 0️⃣6️⃣ 0️⃣1️⃣ 0️⃣7️⃣
    2️⃣2️⃣ 2️⃣1️⃣ 2️⃣0️⃣ 1️⃣9️⃣
    1️⃣8️⃣ 1️⃣7️⃣ 1️⃣6️⃣ 1️⃣5️⃣
    1️⃣0️⃣ 2️⃣3️⃣ 0️⃣9️⃣ 0️⃣8️⃣
    1️⃣1️⃣ 1️⃣2️⃣ 1️⃣3️⃣ 1️⃣4️⃣
    https://duotrigordle.com/

    • robc

      Daily Quordle 208
      5️⃣6️⃣
      4️⃣3️⃣

      • robc

        Chessle 189 (Normal) 5/6

        ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛🟨
        🟩⬛🟩🟨🟩🟨
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        https://jackli.gg/chessle

        Same as always

      • Sean

        #waffle211 4/5

        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
        🟩⭐🟩⭐🟩
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
        🟩⭐🟩⭐🟩
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        🔥 streak: 16
        🏆 #waffleelite
        wafflegame.net

      • Grosspatzer

        Chessle 189 (Normal) 2/6

        ⬛🟨🟨⬛🟩🟨
        🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

        https://jackli.gg/chessle

    • Sean

      Daily Quordle 208
      4️⃣6️⃣
      5️⃣3️⃣
      quordle.com

    • rhywun

      Meh-town.

      Daily Quordle 208
      8️⃣6️⃣
      7️⃣3️⃣

    • Grumbletarian

      Daily Quordle 208
      7️⃣6️⃣
      4️⃣3️⃣

    • Tundra

      Daily Quordle 208
      7️⃣5️⃣
      6️⃣4️⃣

    • Pat

      I had “monad” stuck in my head…

      6️⃣🟥
      8️⃣5️⃣

      • rhywun

        Ha I almost tried that but instead I tried a different wrong guess first. 🙄

    • Grosspatzer

      Daily Quordle 208
      4️⃣6️⃣
      5️⃣3️⃣
      quordle.com

    • grrizzly

      Daily Quordle 208
      4️⃣6️⃣
      5️⃣3️⃣

    • whiz

      Daily Quordle 208
      5️⃣6️⃣
      4️⃣3️⃣

    • Grummun

      5 7
      6 3

  24. Atanarjuat

    I guess this is a year old, but I just stumbled across the Special Inspector General for the Afghanistan Reconstruction’s report (https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/lessonslearned/SIGAR-21-46-LL.pdf). Shockingly, most of the money was thoroughly wasted. Even the vast majority of the infrastructure improvements have deteriorated, are lying unused, or both. It mentions multiple times the directives to push for equality for women backfired due to lack of local understanding during implementation.

    The U.S. government also clumsily forced Western technocratic models onto Afghan economic institutions; trained security forces in advanced weapon systems they could not understand, much less maintain; imposed formal rule of law on a country that addressed 80 to 90 percent of its disputes through informal means; and often struggled to understand or mitigate the cultural and social barriers to supporting women and girls. Without this background knowledge, U.S. officials often empowered powerbrokers who preyed on the population or diverted U.S. assistance away from its intended recipients to enrich and empower themselves and their allies. Lack of knowledge at the local level meant projects intended to mitigate conflict often exacerbated it, and even inadvertently funded insurgents.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      “It mentions multiple times the directives to push for equality for women backfired due to lack of local understanding during implementation.”
      Or they understood it just fine but very much disagreed with it.

      • Atanarjuat

        Worded poorly, the lack of understanding was on the part of the Americans, therefore the implementation was flawed.

      • juris imprudent

        MOAR EDUCATION!!!

    • juris imprudent

      How big a font do you need to get across everything contained in a single word: hubris?

      • Atanarjuat

        Does that concept cover the greed involved though?

      • Pat

        Hubreed? Grubris?

  25. Raven Nation

    While they’re beatin’ the devil out of a guy
    Who’s wearing a powder-blue wig.
    Later he’ll be shot
    For resisting arrest,
    I can still hear his voice crying
    In the wilderness.
    What looks large from a distance,
    Close up ain’t never that big

  26. KK of the Lesser Glibertarians

    My dad said he would be here between 9 and 9:30.

    “If you’re on time, you’re late”

    But he’s just late.

    • Pat

      A dad is never late, nor is he early. He arrives exactly when he means to.

    • Brawndo

      In college, I was briefly an education and history major. In one of my ed classes, a student talked about how his teacher was on Lombardi time: “if you’re early, you’re on time. If you’re on time, you’re late. If you’re late, don’t bother showing up.”

      I said “so by the transitive property, if you’re early, don’t bother showing up?”

      Crickets. There were math majors in the room too. These people are teaching children today.

  27. The Late P Brooks

    You could always try not lying

    This week, the Centers for Disease Control announced it will overhaul itself in response to pandemic mistakes. The first thing the CDC should do is to clarify what those mistakes were.

    While many experts think those mistakes are obvious, half of the public assumes the mistakes involved too many, overly strict rules that were kept in place too long, and the other half assumes the mistakes all revolved around rules that were too loose and abandoned too soon.

    Some are furious that the agency suggested vaccinated people could take their masks off in the spring and summer of 2021. Others are furious that mask mandates returned and proliferated as the country dealt with vaccine-evading variants.

    ——-

    The purpose of the CDC is to serve the public, and part of that is to communicate with us clearly and honestly. That means honesty about uncertainty, which is always an issue in science but more so when dealing with something that’s never happened before. (Yes, there was the 1918 flu, but Covid is a very different pathogen spreading in a changed world.)

    If your communication consists of lies and hysterical fearmongering based on bogus models, you’re pretty much doomed to failure from the get-go.

    *Lies like, “Covid is a completely unique and unlike any pathogen ever previously seen. It’s unstoppable, except by demonstrations of faith like draping a talisman over your face.”

    • Pat

      Somehow I doubt that if they had email and furry porn in 1918 the results would have been that much different.

    • Count Potato

      I love the scientific position that it spreads at Trump rallies but not BLM protests.

  28. Atanarjuat

    Oh good, a British MP is publicly discussing recreating a “Guns of August” scenario for this new century:

    Tobias Ellwood MP @Tobias_Ellwood Aug 19
    Let’s make it clear now:

    ANY deliberate damage causing potential radiation leak to a Ukrainian nuclear reactor would be a breach of NATO’s Article 5. @thetimes

    The information in the article OMWC linked is a bit hard to parse. The Russians occupy the nuclear plant, and it has taken a few rocket attacks. If they have stored ammunition there or garrisoned it, those Russian military assets are a legitimate (if stupid and risky in this case) target, right, just as Russia was allowed to shoot back at Azov guys who took up positions near civilians? But the Ukrainians aren’t taking credit for the attack. And now the British John McCain wants us to get involved.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      How would the radiation levels from one damaged plant in Ukraine compare to the radiation levels after a general or even tactical nuclear exchange I wonder? The dude needs to have some tea and some crumpets and to shut the fuck up.

      • Pat

        How would the radiation levels from one damaged plant in Ukraine compare to the radiation levels after a general or even tactical nuclear exchange I wonder?

        It would be nice if we had some kind of data about a how much radiation is released from a damaged Ukrainian power plant for comparison…

  29. The Late P Brooks

    The U.S. government also clumsily forced Western technocratic models onto Afghan economic institutions culture.

    I’d say that pretty much covers it.

    A fools errand, carried out by Grade A fools.

  30. Sean

    I have a thumb drive that died and I would like to retrieve the data. Any suggestions?

    • Nephilium

      Unreadable, not detectable, or inaccessible?

      Have you tested on another machine?

      Unfortunately, there’s usually not a lot of good options.

      • Sean

        Unreadable.

        Yes.

      • Nephilium

        But the driver installs and it shows as an accessible drive?

        That’s not a good sign, that would mean the most likely failure is the memory chip.

      • Sean

        Yes.

        😞

    • Pat

      You’d have to desolder the memory chip and swap it onto another controller/PCB in all likelihood. Presuming it’s not the memory chip itself that went TU.

    • Count Potato

      ddrescue?

      • Sean

        *Googles*

        Linux?

        😞

      • Pat

        If you were capable of plugging the thumb drive into your computer and writing data to it, you’re capable of booting a live Linux thumb drive.

  31. Tundra

    Good morning, Old Man!

    Sorry about the drought. The blue suit should help.

    Now, about those links:

    Fuck Ukraine, fuck Russia, fuck Europe, fuck NATO, fuck the IRS, fuck the FedGov, fuck groomers, fuck Kari Lake (would), fuck the SC.

    *snorts line of coke*

    God bless CO and John Hiatt.

    • Pat

      Fuck Ukraine, fuck Russia, fuck Europe, fuck NATO, fuck the IRS, fuck the FedGov, fuck groomers, fuck Kari Lake (would), fuck the SC.

      Forever and ever, amen.

      • PieInTheSky

        that is noise not music.

      • Pat

        The harsh noise genre apparently hasn’t caught on Romania.

      • Tundra
      • rhywun

        Yeah, about covers it.

    • PieInTheSky

      screw you buddy some of us live in Europe

  32. Pat

    Controversial social media influencer, former reality TV star Andrew Tate banned from Facebook, Instagram

    Controversial social media influencer and former reality TV star Andrew Tate was banned from Meta platforms Facebook and Instagram on Friday.

    Tate, 35, was banned due to violations of Meta’s policies on dangerous organizations and individuals, according to the BBC. Before he was banned, Tate had over 4.7 million followers on his Instagram account, @cobratate.

    The former kickboxing champion discussed the ban with popular Twitch streamer Adin Ross.

    “I’m quite understanding of their position,” Tate said. “It’s not a big loss for me. It’s not something I use too often.”

    […]

    In 2017, during the height of the Harvey Weinstein allegations, Tate was suspended by Twitter for saying that women should “bear responsibility” for being sexually assaulted.

    Tate’s popularity grew amid outlandish comments about women’s intelligence, saying they’re “intrinsically lazy,” and is a strong proponent that men should have “authority” over a woman when in a relationship.

    Never heard of this guy before, but if those opinions are what got him shitcanned, makes you wonder how all those Islamic clerics stay on the same platforms.

    • Atanarjuat

      My cousin went to an offbrand Ivy League wannabe school and came back a raging feminist. She posts about this guy daily, otherwise I never would have heard of him. However, to be fair, he had 4.7M followers so apparently some young people are listening to him and we are just separated by a generational gap. To your point, the censors have never been concerned with consistency.

  33. The Late P Brooks

    Good news, everyone!

    Over concerns of a pair of Bay Area cities, the California High-Speed Rail Authority board finalized its choice of a route alternative for about 49 miles of tracks between San Francisco and San Jose. Thursday’s actions included certification of thousands of pages of environmental analysis for the stretch, in which high-speed trains will eventually share an upgraded and electrified rail corridor with the Caltrain passenger train service on the San Francisco Peninsula. The 8-0 vote (with one board member absent) took place in a meeting held by teleconference among rail authority board members scattered across the state.

    It represents the latest step in providing the environmental clearance for a statewide system that is ultimately planned to link San Francisco with Los Angeles and Anaheim by way of the San Joaquin Valley, with electric-powered trains carrying passengers at speeds up to 220 mph. “Today is really a momentous event, with a tremendous amount of work behind it to get where we are today with an environmentally cleared project from the Bay Area through the Central Valley,” Tom Richards, a Fresno developer and the authority board chairperson, said after the vote. “If nothing else, what it does is prepare and move this entire project forward toward construction.”

    It wasn’t dead, just resting. Gathering strength.

    You don’t suppose there is a big check for (California) choo choos hidden in that Inflation Reduction Act, do you?

    • PieInTheSky

      it will be done when nuclear fusion comes around

      • juris imprudent

        Now that is a funny thought – CA finishing the high speed rail and then not having a grid that could support it.

        Narrator: The heat death of the universe will come before the completion of CA high speed rail.

      • rhywun

        Maybe they can pull it with a fleet of electric cars.

  34. Atanarjuat

    Wow, I had assumed that thing was abandoned. I remember reading about it in Reason years ago. I wonder what the initial estimate for completion was. They couldn’t possibly have told the voters in 2008 that 14 years later they’ll still have nothing. Yeah, lets pay countless billions for something that won’t exist until long after we’re all dead.

    • Atanarjuat

      I tried searching for the sales pitch for the California HSR, didn’t find it, but apparently the feds are planning to connect Atlanta to Washington DC too, because why not another expensive boondoggle?

      • thrakkorzog

        All is going according to plan according to crazy Scifi writers.

    • rhywun

      There is a couple-mile connection from Long Island to Grand Central, various parts of which have been under construction since the 1960’s. Apparently, it’s almost done, and just in the nick of time to feed a larger crush of workers into Midtown.

  35. The Late P Brooks

    screw you buddy some of us live in Europe

    If you can call that “living”.

  36. Q Continuum

    “I’VE come up with the perfect solution to my girlfriend’s orgasm problem: Having a threesome. I think the reason she never reaches climax during sex with me is because my manhood’s too small[…]I just need to find another guy with a penis bigger than mine.”

    Ummmmm ok?

    “I’m not gay”

    If you say so.

    “I’ll enjoy watching him have sex with her[…]In fact, the idea really turns me on.”

    Gay or cuck? You decide!

    https://www.thesun.co.uk/dear-deidre/19534255/my-girlfriend-cant-climax-threesome/

    • Pat

      I’m about as self-loathing as they come, and certainly no kind of sex god, but I can’t get my head around the cuck thing. Different strokes (heh) and all that.

  37. The Late P Brooks

    “It really reflects what we’re trying to do: get service started in the (San Joaquin Valley) where construction is under way, and we’re trying to advance that full Phase 1 system from San Francisco to Los Angeles,” Kelly added. “By getting this done, we can now start designing those other segments as we bring operations forward in the Valley. We can advance the design, start talking about acquiring right of way, and figuring out the rest of the San Francisco-LA project.”

    “Acquire right of way.

    *guffaws, slaps knee*

  38. The Late P Brooks

    I just need to find another guy with a penis bigger than mine.”

    Head on down to the glory hole, and start auditioning potential subjects.

  39. The Late P Brooks

    For a full San Francisco-Los Angeles/Anaheim system, the rail agency estimated earlier this year that the costs could range from a low of $72.3 billion to as much as $105.1 billion. Much of that wide variation stems from the uncertainty of how much it would cost to tunnel through mountain ranges, as well as the price of property that would be needed before construction could begin.

    Sure, why not? It’s not like they could find a better use for that money.

  40. Count Potato

    “An absurd and disturbing cancel campaign in public health

    Some attendees at an upcoming conference want to prevent Dr. Leana Wen from speaking. Their accusation? She has been expressing views on COVID that are essentially mainstream among the public.

    This November, Boston will host the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association, the largest public health conference in the world. Past meetings have drawn more than 12,000 attendees. The event will feature hundreds of sessions and thousands of presentations. Yet one scheduled talk, by Dr. Leana Wen, a CNN medical analyst and frequent pundit, professor of health policy at George Washington University, and former president of Planned Parenthood, has caused an uproar. This week some members released a public letter, now signed by more than 500 people, that seeks to have her banned from speaking at the meeting.

    The list of grievances against Wen — together with the demand that her invitation to speak be rescinded — exposes a strain of thought among a section of the public health field that is wildly out of touch with the values of most of the American public. It is also indicative of why at least some parts of the public health establishment have lost the confidence of so many regular people.

    Wen is referred to as “unscientific” for suggesting, this spring, that vaccinated people should be able to return to a pre-pandemic normal. She is called “unethical” for largely agreeing with the new guidance for schools from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which relaxed restrictions on distancing, masks, and automatic quarantine after the agency weighed the harms of such interventions against the fact that today COVID-19 poses a far lesser threat than it did earlier in the pandemic. She is chided for mentioning learning loss as an issue of concern related to keeping kids out of school. And, among still other complaints, Wen is accused of being “fatphobic” for saying that eating doughnuts every day is not healthy.

    The letter calls for Wen to be replaced by someone whose work is “consistent with anti-racist” and “anti-eugenicist” public health practices. (Wen declined to comment when I reached her this week.)

    The letter reads like a parody of woke righteousness. Yet it has been signed by epidemiologists, physicians, researchers, administrators, and PhD candidates and postdocs in public health, at Harvard, Yale, Brown, Johns Hopkins, UC Berkeley, and Emory, among other institutions.”

    https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/08/18/opinion/an-absurd-disturbing-cancel-campaign-public-health/

    I can’t wait for woke civil engineering.

    • Pat

      It’s nice to see the ctrl-left finally acknowledge, albeit accidentally, that Planned Parenthood is a eugenicist organization.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Wen is referred to as “unscientific” for suggesting, this spring, that vaccinated people should be able to return to a pre-pandemic normal.

      This is their objection. They got a taste of fame and power and they do not want to give it up.

  41. Atanarjuat

    Report from DNC social media outreach: after a brief lull, the pro-Biden shilling has resumed.

    Example A: “When people ask if we are better off than we were 2 years ago, I remind them that 2 years ago we were using freezer trucks as morgues.”

    Wow, thanks Biden for inventing natural immunity!

    Example B: A comparison of unemployment from when Biden took office compared to now.

    Example C: A list of everyone in the Trump orbit who is now a felon, followed by “Trump only hires the best people!”

    Hmm, the willingness of the Deep State to punish people for associating with Trump is pretty terrifying.

    • Pat

      Over/under on Trump taking an icepick to the skull while exiled in Mexico?

      • Atanarjuat

        I don’t know, I could see Trump being convicted of some document classification technicality and getting the book thrown at him, or getting reelected in 2024 and the TDS being ramped up higher than ever, who knows.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        I think they’re mildly terrified of what might happen if they kill him. It won’t be like 1963 when they could pin it on the Soviets.

        In fact, they should be mildly terrified of what might happen if he drops dead from natural causes, a significant percentage of the country isn’t going to believe it.

      • juris imprudent

        TDS being ramped up higher than ever

        Considers what that might look like. [crawls under bed in abject terror – worse than SF can induce]

    • Brawndo

      Two years ago, even amid riots and public health totalitarianism, I was more optimistic for our future than I am now.

  42. Count Potato

    “Ok, moving on. Slide #53 likens capitalism to COVID. We are also told that westerners are egomaniacs, while Indigenous people are collectivist yoda shamen who say things like “we are one””

    https://twitter.com/jonkay/status/1560468712175669249

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      The Comanche say hi.

    • Negroni Please

      Lol. The holocaust was inspired by Canada. Priceless

  43. The Late P Brooks

    I don’t know, I could see Trump being convicted of some document classification technicality and getting the book thrown at him, or getting reelected in 2024 and the TDS being ramped up higher than ever, who knows.

    A President running the country from a prison cell would be a fitting swan song for the Republic.

  44. Count Potato

    “🔥 New Post: Announcing InAppBrowser – see what JavaScript commands get injected through an in-app browser

    👀 TikTok, when opening any website in their app, injects tracking code that can monitor all keystrokes, including passwords, and all taps.”

    https://twitter.com/KrauseFx/status/1560370732705742848

    No idea how Apple and Google justify carrying TT.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      The NSA probably already has total access, so whatever man,,,

  45. The Late P Brooks

    Maybe they can pull it with a fleet of electric cars.

    Oxen, more likely.

  46. The Late P Brooks

    Proprietary infomation

    The world’s largest asset manager BlackRock Inc. (BLK.N)warned the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) this week that its proposed rules aimed at fighting “greenwashing” by fund managers will confuse investors.

    BlackRock made the claims in a letter filed this week in response to a SEC May proposal to stamp out unfounded claims by funds about their environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) credentials. The rules also aim to create more standardization around ESG disclosures. read more

    Regulators and activists have become concerned that U.S. funds looking to cash in on the popularity of ESG investing may be misleading shareholders over their ESG credentials.

    While BlackRock acknowledged the need to boost oversight, it questioned the SEC’s demand for more details on how funds should categorize strategies and describe their ESG impact, arguing such details could mislead investors about how much ESG really matters when managers pick stocks and bonds.

    Regulators and activists have become concerned that U.S. funds looking to cash in on the popularity of ESG investing may be misleading shareholders over their ESG credentials.

    “The proposed requirements would increase the potential for greenwashing and lead to investor confusion,” BlackRock wrote in its letter.

    “The granular nature of requirements will inevitably lead to the disclosure of proprietary information about these strategies, reducing the competitive advantage of those unique insights.”

    Gibberish in, gibberish out.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Musk has something to say about that I’m sure.

  47. Count Potato

    “We’re not going anywhere @Starbucks!

    Literally, we’re superglued to your counter

    We’re demanding that @Starbucks end the vegan milk upcharge because it’s better for humans, other animals, and the Earth!”

    https://twitter.com/peta/status/1516833951674904579

    If I were Starbucks I’d solve the problem by not selling vegan milk.

    • Pat

      Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of pricks. I hope they go bankrupt hoist on their petard.

      I particularly enjoyed this bit of schadenfreude in light of Starbucks’ strident opposition to any reform or oversight of mail-in voting in US elections.

      • JaimeRoberto (carnitas/spicy salsa)

        Hoisted on their own retard.

  48. Count Potato

    Good thread here:

    “Here is the list of the beliefs that private companies *went to court* to force onto their employees

    French is saying this should be allowed

    – Members of one race, color, sex, or national origin are morally superior to members of another race, color, sex, or national origin”

    https://twitter.com/politicalmath/status/1560705695850323969

    WTF happened to David French?

    • rhywun

      Meh, companies can *try* to “force” you to believe anything they want. Doesn’t mean it’ll work.

      • Count Potato

        But they shouldn’t have to make you sit through it.

      • rhywun

        Why not? If they’re paying you.

        I’d say it goes off the rails if they try to compel you to believe it. But even then I’m not sure because they’re all kinds of gobbledygook they make you conform to (“Our Values” etc.).

    • Pat

      In principle I don’t have a problem with companies requiring their employees to believe in nonsense in order to work there, as a matter of free association. In theory, it should make them less competitive and unable to attract employees. However, the last several years have proven to me conclusively that free market theory is a gigantic, festering pile of horse shit. That’s not how it actually works. How it actually works is that a couple of dozen oligopolistic multinational corporations with market caps near or exceeding the trillions of dollars get to box you out of the employment market through collective market power unless you toe the line.

      This is also illegal, of course, under U.S. employment law, but since the aforementioned couple of dozen oligopolistic multinational corporations with market caps near or exceeding the trillions of dollars keep lawmakers and regulators as pets, those laws are worth about as much as the paper upon which they are written.

  49. PutridMeat

    I hate walking through my bedroom after listening to Jordan Peterson.

    But a good interview on the Lex Fridman podcast if you have 3 hours to spare.

    • Tundra

      Yeah, that came through my feed. I may give it a listen.

      Responded to your email, btw.

    • westernsloper

      I can not remember where I heard it but I remember hearing Lex Fridman was/is a proponent of lockdowns and masking during the dark times. I stopped listening to him then. Anybody have evidence in the contrary?

      • PutridMeat

        I had not heard that and it would surprise me if he was, but who knows. I know a lot of very smart – not just edumacated, but genuinely possessing of raw intelligence – people that bought, and still buy, all this crap hook, line, and sinker, so it’s certainly possible. But he tends to put together a very good interview with interesting guests, so I can listen without condoning things he might be terribly, horribly, wrong about.

  50. EvilSheldon

    Here’s some disappointment. I just DQ’d out of the NY State Championship. *sad trombone*

    • slumbrew

      Sorry, dude

      • EvilSheldon

        Thanks. It certainly could have been worse, and I did get to shoot two stages at least.

    • Gender Traitor

      Oh, no! I’m so sorry! 😦 What happened?

      • EvilSheldon

        AD’d while making ready on the third stage. *sadder trombone*

      • slumbrew

        Ooof.

      • Gender Traitor

        😖

      • slumbrew

        “I was DQ’d for being too handsome – I was dangerously distracting to the other competitors”, I’m assuming.

    • Sean

      Sorry dude.

    • Tundra

      Sorry, Sheldon.

    • Count Potato

      Try to look on the bright side.

    • westernsloper

      Aah fuck. Sorry dude.

    • Pat

      <– Out of the loop

      What sport/event?

      Regardless, sorry about the DQ. Keep ya dick up

      • EvilSheldon

        USPSA. Action pistol match.

        On the plus side, no one got hurt, and I still get to hang out with Not Adhan, who is every bit the gentleman you would expect.

      • Pat

        On the plus side, no one got hurt, and I still get to hang out with Not Adhan, who is every bit the gentleman you would expect.

        Silver lining, anyway. You’ll get ’em next time.

  51. Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

    Apropos of absolutely fucking nothing, the Twitter account I established some months ago is just a fabulous place to get my snark on.

    Such a target-rich environment. Endless entertainment value.

    Mind you, real thinking appears to be engaged in very parsimoniously, if at all, on that platform. Fortunately I knew that going in, so no disappointment.

    • Atanarjuat

      What’s your screen name?

      • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

        JamesBEAM_Glib

      • Atanarjuat

        Wow, you’re a MILF!

        I was banned once, and I don’t think I can get into my 2nd account. I did have fun getting under the skin of various bad actors (sometimes high profile people will go back and forth with you). I still check in on a few accounts using nitter, just to see the latest thing everyone is talking about. Some are famous, like Glenn Greenwald, and some are glibs like Warty. I’ll add you to the list.

  52. The Late P Brooks

    “Controversial” remarks

    Darren Bailey, the GOP nominee for governor, returned to calling Chicago a “hellhole” of a town Thursday during Republicans’ rally at the Illinois State Fair.

    “Chicago, that once-great city, didn’t become a hellhole just because of Lori Lightfoot and Kim Foxx. Starting with JB Pritzker, our leaders are all in cahoots,” he said, referring to Chicago’s mayor, the Cook County state’s attorney and the governor, all Democrats.

    Later with reporters, Bailey defended the comment, asking rhetorically, “When is the last time that Chicago experienced a night without a shooting? It’s been a while. It’s been a long time.” ABC 7’s Craig Wall has more

    It’s not COMPLETELY a hellhole. Probably. Maybe.

  53. westernsloper

    “I highly appreciate another U.S. military aid package in the amount of $775 million. Thank you @POTUS for this decision,” Zelenskyy wrote. “Ukraine will be free,” he added.

    Fuck you and you mutherfuckers who are stealing from us to send to other mutherfucken thieves. Fuck you all mutherfuckers.

    I shall now sand my hardened filler and not think about this again today. Peace!

  54. The Late P Brooks

    AD’d while making ready on the third stage.

    Is that “D” for discharge?

    • R C Dean

      I’ve had a couple of those in my life (no euphemism). They are scary as shit. One was a hang fire, the other was raw stupidity at the end of a long day.

  55. Suthenboy

    Two guys are walking down the street. They see a beautiful young woman in a short skirt walking towards them.

    Guy 1 – ” I wish I could be invisible so I would get close and have a look up that skirt.”

    Guy 2 – ” Invisible? That’s easy. Just turn 50.”