Rex Kickass

QUOTE (bmags @ Sep 25, 2009 -> 04:22 PM) Really wouldn't mind this taking down menendez. Would prefer him to be taken down with a Dem governor at the helm though.

If this is true, its a huge disappointment to me about Pallone. The others don't surprise me, but I thought Frank would be better than that.

QUOTE (The Critic @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 04:08 PM) I don't think that's sad at all, but I also think one album would kind of cover it. Not a lot of musical growth from Wesley. And please.....it was The Wesley Willis Fiasco. No "and". He was a man of the people, he'd never minimize his band members like that! I had two opportunities, solo and band, thank you very much. It was the Wesley Willis Fiasco's last show. Apparently, the band's management forced them to stop touring due to an "incident in Toledo" I believe were the exact words.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 09:53 PM) Yes. And John Paul Stevens. They are both going in the next year. Only if she dies, I think. She loves being a justice. From everything I've ever heard about her, they'll pry that robe out of her cold dead hands.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 03:04 PM) Again, I'm a radical extremeist! Woot! GMAFB, people. When you say s*** like this, it's quite ignorant. No it's not. The brand of Reaganism that's being thrown around by the Glenn Becks and neocons of the world is a bastardization of the conservatism that Reagan ever preached. I'm no fan of his domestic policy choices - and some of his foreign policy, but Reagan may have said it, but his actions proved the opposite. Case in point, his tax hikes in 1982 and 1987. Case in point, the war on drugs. Case in point, increased defense spending. Hell, didn't he even work to preserve social security?

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 03:03 PM) There's getting ready to be a s***load more of the 9.7% that come off. A s***load. So while we will only see marginal increases in the "9.7%" number that keeps getting spouted, the numbers in reality are MUCH higher because there's so many people that have exhausted benefits. That part is unprecedented. But the government can fix it. Actually its not unprecedented at all. The shallow 2001 recession had the same effect although to a lesser extent. When a lot of the jobs that are lost in a recession never come back (re: manufacturing), this should be expected no?

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 02:30 PM) Republican doesn't mean anti-government. Perhaps you should tell that to Glenn Beck, Ron Paul, and anybody who actually believed Ronald Reagan when he said "Government is the problem."

QUOTE (The Critic @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 12:55 PM) Shuffle-agette City! The Wildhearts - Got It On Tuesday The Freeze - Talking Bombs Van Halen - Feels So Good Supersuckers - Stuff N Nonsense Tesla - Cumin' Atcha Live Sidewinders - Sara's Not Sober Chinatown - Sweet Easy Action Wesley Willis - Cut The Mullet Public Image Ltd. - Public Image OK Go - A Million Ways Oh man, Wesley Willis! If only I'd taken my available chances to see Wesley Willis and the Fiasco before he passed away. Is it sad to admit that I own four of his albums? Shuffle du Jour Cheekyboy - This is Halloween (mashup) Justice - Phantom Pt 2 We Are Wolves - So Nice So Cold Monkey - The White Skeleton Demon X Ray Spex - Germ Free Adolescents (Demo) Vinicius de Morais - Steodos fossem iguais a voce Asian Dub Foundation - Memory War Bettie Serveert - Smack Grizzly Bear - Ready, Able CSS - Music Is My Hot Hot Sex

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 01:02 PM) Bomber 1 is already indicted on the plot, well beyond perjury. The others, well, they may need to go that way. It's nice to put them away, but in reality an indictment is enough to keep them under surveillance and make them unusable for generations.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 01:00 PM) That is the impression I have gotten so far - they were tracking some folks, the folks got together in an unexpected way, and then a few details of the situation on the ground changed such that they needed to act quicker than originally planned. I just hope that doesn't mean they didn't gather enough evidence to put these people away. They cold have them on perjuring themselves to the feds, and there's probably enough there for a terror charge or two.

QUOTE (bmags @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 12:59 PM) KGB eyes is putin NSS I look at this and I think of Bette Davis Eyes. Then I replace KGB with Josef Stalin in my head and it fits the song.

QUOTE (bmags @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 12:56 PM) Sounds like his visit to NYC on Sept. 10 was the last straw to take care of this thing before it delivers. Maybe. I don't think they were operational yet, but they were getting close. There seems to be a shift in counter terrorism action in the last few months along the lines of what the UK does in "pulling the string along."

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 12:55 PM) Its not about expanding their power. You guys are thinking way too much like Americans. This isn't about money, or power, or any of that other crap. It is about fulfilling religious destiny. If it was about fulfilling religious destiny, this would have taken place a decade or more ago. This is about power. It's always about power. The people who really run the show in foreign policy in Iran don't show their face at the UN, and the clown that does, doesn't get to have a finger on a shotgun trigger, let alone a single missile.

Been hearing a lot about this out here over the last week. Getting the sense that they were getting close to operational, because they are still looking for some things, and they're talking openly now about the kind of bombs that they were using. Sort of trying to blow up the plot before the plot can blow up a subway tunnel.

QUOTE (bmags @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 10:44 AM) Serious props to Obama for getting Medvedev in on Iran. No as soon as health care is done, i hope he gets to work on obvious stupid policies that will cause distractions now like some of what Sullivan is talking about on LEGAL immigration reform where we are losing a lot of great minds because of stupid policies. Hopefully the puppetmaster in Russia will allow Medvedev to follow through on those actions. I think we are getting to a point where Russia may, in fact, act - simply because with oil not being nearly the economic darling to them as it was a year ago, it makes sanctions a lot less painful to Russia.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 09:45 AM) They are already supplying money and weapons to the Palestinians, and weapons and money in Iraq. In this day and age I don't believe you can't take people at their face value, especially if we allow them to go nuclear. They are doing this, because it helps consolidate power regionally. Supplying the Palestinian insurgency helps gain them influence in both Palestinian territories and, to a lesser extent, Lebanon. Supplying weapons and money in Iraq gives them influence in Iraq. Deploying a nuclear weapon does nothing but end their power, not expand their power. Having a nuclear weapon and not deploying it expands their power virtually forces us to the table, because we suddenly have a vested interest in Iranian stability.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 09:40 AM) The big difference between those two is that they don't have the ability to take action... yet. Nothing in their history indicates that they even would.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Sep 24, 2009 -> 01:26 AM) And he's not going to let Achey keep spouting that s*** over and over for years if he didn't want it out there. Rhetoric and action are two different things.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 03:26 PM) Its playing with terminology here. You don't have to worry about even finding other funding or shoring it up in a big hurry, its fine until the 2030's. Its just that its going to start using the trust fund - which is for this very purpose - earlier than anticipated. Its worth noting and monitoring, but nothing worthy of panic. What is not being discussed though, that I have brought up before, is you DO put the whole shebang at serious risk when you continue to allow Congress to BORROW from the SS Trust Fund for general purposes, which they have been doing for a while now. That, IMO, needs to stop immediately. And when employment recovers, so will the trust fund deficits.

QUOTE (ChiSox_Sonix @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 03:54 PM) Some cosmetic surgeries are legal medical procedures that can be, at times, medically necessary as well. So they should be covered. Far be it from me to prohibit insurance companies to choose what non basic procedures they would cover.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 02:59 PM) Which is pretty much exactly why the Obama admin is lying when it saids that federal funds would not fund abortions. They are playing accounting tricks that would make Enron proud. And its bulls*** that he has to tiptoe around it to begin with. It's a legal medical procedure, and can be at times, medically necessary. Insurance companies should be able to cover legal medical procedures, no matter who is funding it, as long as the plan specifically covers the procedure.

Another Fresh 10: The Streets - Can't Con An Honest Jon James Brown - Talking Loud and Saying Nothing (Extended Version) Jens Lekman - The Opposite of Hallelujah Hard-Fi - Hard To Beat Jens Lekman - I Saw Her in the Anti-War Demonstration Gnarls Barkley - Transformer BT - Smartbomb Gnarls Barkley - Charity Case Serge Gainsbourg - Le Claqueur de Doigts Elvis Costello - My Mood Swings

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 12:31 PM) I am told that is what the UN is supposed to be for. If not, we are pissing a lot of money away on nothing. Besides I feel giving the nuclear ability to a country like Iran is way more destabilizing than any military action could be. It's definitely not worse to Iran turning Israel into a glass parking lot after we negotiate with them, and they keep up their proud history of chasing a nuclear program anyway. The UN only works for us if we work within the UN. The UN was basically created as a means to talk away war. Effectively stalling any progress on something until the fuel to fire peters out. It's why very little gets done out of the Security Council. The UN definitely has its uses, it always has - but on the whole the US should not cede its interests to the body. Iran as a state would not attack Israel via nuclear weapons directly. I just don't see that possibility. Because as reckless as Achmawhatever talks, the powers that be in that state always act rationally in respect to foreign policy. People who hold on to power without legitimacy (as the Supreme Council of Iran clearly does) tend to purely act in the interest of preserving that power. North Korean nuclear weapons aren't a huge threat, because nuclear detonation from North Korea signals the end of that ruling apparatus. The same goes for Iran and Israel. Mutually Assured Destruction regimes prevent Iran from being reckless as a state with a nuclear weapon. Given the IROI's history of acting rationally as a state actor, there is no need to be overly worried in that sense. However, what concerns the US and the Western world (and rightfully so) about nuclear proliferation is these states using nuclear programs as a means for financial independence by selling technology and materials to nonstate actors who tend to be traditionally irrational (since there is little power for them to keep grasping on to.) Or by using a nonstate actor with nuclear material to further its ideological goal. Both of these are what's keeping nuclear theorists up at night. So the balancing act is pretty difficult, and makes negotiations unavoidable, in my view. Without military intervention, it'd be virtually impossible to prevent some form of weapons program from happening in these scenarios, no? Tighter sanctions simply provides greater encouragement for these weapons programs as an economic savior. Military intervention runs the risk of destabilizing the entire region, as well as the loss of life of thousands or even millions of people. Establishing a productive relationship with a rogue state has a couple goals that seem to be beneficial to the public interest. First, its a lot harder to develop in secret when you are being actively engaged in that issue. Second, it gives the more powerful state the ability to at least guide intentions for a program that they may or may not be able to halt development of. Lastly, it helps provide the more powerful state with intelligence about what exactly the true intentions of the program are, both on a physical level as well as a political one.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 12:28 PM) George W. Bush. Anti-intellectual, sure. But not an idiot by any means.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 23, 2009 -> 12:23 PM) And FWIW I never said to ignore the problem. Don't put those words into my mouth. Please don't turn this into if you aren't for one extreme, you are for the other. There are still ways to try to make them stop without sitting down and negotiating our way into giving them something for holding the world hostage. So short of committing our military to another operation, or committing another nation's military by proxy - and risking destabilization of the region in question, what other options are there besides economic sanctions (already in place, and not having the best effect) if there isn't some form of contact to try and hammer out a resolution? We either disdainfully ignore the problem, or we try to hash it out - in a multiparty system if possible, but face to face if necessary.