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Post by michaelw on Sept 29, 2018 18:24:29 GMT -5
How can you say this is not personal? Chris Cuomo was asking on CNN if Kavanaugh was a virgin at Yale! Seriously?
Just curious. Have you seen the list of questions Kavanaugh wanted Ken Starr to ask Bill Clinton?
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Post by michaelw on Sept 28, 2018 8:32:36 GMT -5
I agree, it would be perceived as too big a defeat.
Although in reality, Trump obviously can still nominate someone else for the opening. So the outcome of this nomination will likely have no bearing whatsoever on the general ideological makeup of the court. The right thing to do is just put forth a better candidate, IMO.
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Post by michaelw on Sept 26, 2018 17:14:23 GMT -5
(7) Did you see that fucking horrible yearbook quote of his about being a "Renate alumni". Yeah. He and several of his buddies apparently all claimed to have slept with this girl Renate in high school. Whether he actually slept with her or not I don't know or care, but I do care that he apparently was good with bragging about it as an in-joke in his fucking yearbook. Yep. In a cruel twist, Renate was one of the women who signed that letter in support of Kavanaugh, but didn't know about the yearbook until just now apparently. More here: edition.cnn.com/2018/09/24/politics/new-york-times-kavanaugh-renate-high-school-yearbook/index.html
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Post by michaelw on Sept 20, 2018 17:31:28 GMT -5
I very much doubt Kavanaugh will wind up unemployed and disgraced because of this. Right. (Well, disgraced is at least a possibility.) But he's still got a pretty nice gig on the DC Circuit Court. And just for some perspective, Merrick Garland and Douglas Ginsburg are still serving on the exact same court. If Kavanaugh were to fall short of the SCOTUS, he surely wouldn't be the failed nominee w/ the most compelling sob story. Wouldn't be in the top two, either.
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Post by michaelw on Sept 8, 2018 18:44:39 GMT -5
Beyond that, I really despise this series of orders approach, ala "hands up! turn and face away from me! start walking backwards! on your knees! keep your hands up! lay on your stomach!" I can see how it might be justified if the cops are dealing with a suspect who had just engaged in violent conduct, or one who had just dropped a weapon, but I don't think it's an appropriate approach all the time, especially for traffic stops where the cops have no actual evidence of wrongdoing. Agree. And as we've seen in the past, convoluted directions can end up w/ people being shot and killed for no good reason.
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Post by michaelw on Sept 6, 2018 18:02:12 GMT -5
Beyond that, yes Trump has somewhat made his own bed here. He's picked some shitty people without a doubt. He's made his own bed for another reason, IMO. Note Trump's reaction to Bob Woodward. His book is full of lies and phony sources, according to Trump. And that's been Trump's take on most things in the media, including the NYT specifically. And yet now, in the case of this op-ed piece, Trump wants the NYT to reveal the identity of the writer. How does he know the writer is really a member of the administration? How does he know the NYT didn't just write the whole thing themselves and use a false attribution? Maybe you or I don't think that's what happened, but why should Trump get to act like the NYT has suddenly morphed into the world's most reliable paper just because it suits him to rage about this op-ed piece? Trump looks a lot like the boy who cried wolf here, IMO.
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Post by michaelw on Sept 2, 2018 18:09:51 GMT -5
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Post by michaelw on Aug 29, 2018 18:35:44 GMT -5
Come on, that wasn't so much about politics as basic human decency -- except that, alas, it wasn't. Look, he denies it. He totally denies it. * *If you really want to cringe, just imagine how many votes Moore still would've gotten if he'd admitted he was guilty. You know it still would've been thousands of votes.
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Post by michaelw on Aug 26, 2018 17:45:53 GMT -5
I say nominate Machiavelli. His new book will be hitting bookstores at the perfect time.
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Post by michaelw on Aug 19, 2018 18:33:50 GMT -5
They should give her an honorary BS degree.
Would be fitting.
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Post by michaelw on Aug 18, 2018 22:40:50 GMT -5
That's interesting, especially that some British Jews might choose to come to the US over Israel.
TBH, the situation in the US can't be that much better, because I think the issues w/ Corbyn and anti-semitism aren't hugely different from Trump and the way he's emboldened the anti-semitic faction of the far right.
And in any case, it sounds like much of the abuse being discussed here is happening online, which I suppose is something that can be an issue regardless of location.
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Post by michaelw on Aug 17, 2018 20:37:06 GMT -5
I thought liberals were for free markets, freedom of religion, free speech etc They used to be. You're livin' in the past, man.
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Post by michaelw on Aug 17, 2018 19:19:32 GMT -5
But does she have the pee tape?
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Post by michaelw on Aug 17, 2018 19:16:40 GMT -5
One issue, I think, is that the Catholic church demands celibacy from its priests. This is fine for men with either a low sex drive or loads of self-control, but not so fine for most people. Two very close family friends, deeply religious and moral men, started on the path to priesthood. (I should note that my family is very Catholic, as are most of my hometown connections.) These men had a strong desire to serve the church. But what ultimately stood in their way was love. Both are married now with (big!) families. They are still fervent Catholics and active leaders in their churches. They gave up the church with deep regret, even as they looked forward to their lives with their wives and families. Had the Catholic church allowed their priests to marry, they both would almost certainly be priests today. So taking aside the men whose low sex drive or extreme self-control allows them to eschew sexual contact -- who can actually live up to the Church's demand for celibacy -- and what else do you have left? Men whose desires couldn't be fulfilled by marriage in the first place--e.g., those attracted to children. And alas, their roles in the church give them easy access to victims. Of course such men are a minority in the church. I don't need c.e. or Vince to tell me that. I've known a lot of priests, and most of them are good men whom I believe do their best to live up to what the church asks of them. But that minority -- I'm convinced that the celibacy requirement has served to foster them. Honestly, I think the protestants have this one right -- it is better to let priests marry. Allowing priests to marry might be a smart move, but I dunno how much that would really strike at the core issue here (the abusiveness). After all, people who are married and people who abuse children aren't mutually exclusive categories. What I would like to see first and foremost is the Church stop protecting people they know are guilty of this stuff. Such clergymen shouldn't be moved around from parish to parish, where new victims are always available. And people who have been involved in making those decisions to sweep things under the rug need to be dealt with, as well. Do that first, then re-thinking celibacy might be an option. (Or maybe they can all just become become Buddhist monks. They seem to have a better track record w/ celibacy, for whatever reasons.)
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Post by michaelw on Jul 27, 2018 22:52:35 GMT -5
Somehow I suspect a zoo w/ painted animals might actually attract more tourists than a normal zoo.
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