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New York, 6:23 AM
Sat Dec 19
47 posts in the last 24 hours
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12/07/09
12/06/09
Call me crazy here but if I am president, much less the first black president to be elected, any legislation that crosses my desk that even hints of cutting the Secret Service and all it provides gets bounced out of hand. Anything short of that is insanity defined.
12/06/09
I take lots and lots of comfort in this.
12/06/09
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12/06/09
But no, you're right. Freedom of expression is the real culprit here.
12/06/09
12/06/09
By any standard your jaundiced eye can perceive, Bush, Cheney, et. al., wiped their collective asses with the Constitution, but somehow that escapes you, doesn't it? You don't get to use phrases like "respect the limitations on federal power that our founders put there" because you don't have the faintest idea of what that phrase denotes. That is, until you can grasp the concept of phrases like "separation of church and state," and "checks and balances between the three co-equal branches of government."
Take any one issue, like the way that the Bush administration circumvented the FISA courts to justify illegal domestic wiretapping of American citizens, and then declared blanket amnesty for all the multi-national phone companies that were complicit in this travesty of what is supposed to be justice. Or the suspension of habeas corpus, or Guantanamo, or rendition, or the increased use of Predator drones to carry out de facto assassination with ever-decreasing means of oversight...
No, on second thought, don't do any of that. Go back to your bucket of pork rinds, your flat screen TV tuned exclusively to Fox News, and that doormat of the Constitution that you've had made that sits outside your front door with a convenience that borders on the sublime.
Being furious with the Democrats for the bucket of steaming fuck that characterizes our current plight is like being irate with the Iraqis for their contribution to 9/11.
That metallic taste in the back of your mouth? That isn't backwash from that last beer you sucked down, Richard--it's irony.
Enjoy.
12/06/09
Now as for Bush... without directly defending anything that he did, I will just say that it is much easier to swallow alleged constitutional transgressions when in the name of effective national security during a time of war than a perpetual and permanent limitation on individual freedoms in the name of a socialist power-grab. For most people anyway... particularly the ones with guns. And if history has taught us anything, those are the ones who usually matter most in the end.
12/06/09
12/06/09
Our constitution is simple and short for a reason; the founders KNEW that they wouldn't be able to predict every new innovation or form of tyranny that men would develop in the future, so they set up a very basic but very strict framework on how to limit and separate powers. The air force is an arm of national defense, which the constitution clearly provides powers to the federal government. Climate change treaties that allow UN bodies to tax and fine private American individuals and businesses without having to answer directly to them is called TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION and was pretty high on the list of things the founders were against. I hope this lesson was helpful.
12/06/09
12/06/09
What republicans opposed was that D.C. was not seeking statehood -- they were seeking some quick and easy cake-and-eat-it-too third way that didn't make any sense.
But if you are not directly electing those who tax you, you should not be taxed.
12/06/09
Here's just one of many problems with what you're saying: you're drawing a direct line from politicians' alleged failure to "defend the Constitution" - your analysis of which I don't agree - and saying that gives the populace a logical reason to want to kill politicians. NO. It gives them a right to vote them out of office and elect others. It is precisely this notion that any - any - kind of logical line can be drawn between political choices and violent thought or action that scares the bejeezus out of rational Americans like myself. You legitimize the whackjobs - and sound like one yourself - when you say that elected officials' "deliberately dismantl[ing] core" principles of the Constitution "make people with guns want to kill them." How about just calling a spade a spade and saying these people are deranged, perhaps racist, perhaps uneducated, perhaps otherwise mentally ill people who should be stopped from the UNPATRIOTIC act of wanting to assassinate a president? Even in my deepest days of despair over the Bush/Cheney years, I never, ever, ever wanted any harm to come to them - I just wanted them to get out of office and be replaced by someone I thought was better.
Jesus Christ on a popsicle stick.
12/06/09
No principles there, just politics.
Also, I should point out that the main argument against D.C. statehood is a Constitutional one. So it seems your more than willing to disregard the Constitution when it suits you (see the myriad of abuses under Bush). But you're willing to argue that violence (or threats of violence) against the president is justifiable because the "Democrats disregard the Constitution".
Whatever.
12/06/09
It's OK everyone. No need to feed him anymore. He clearly has no clue what the constitution actually says. (Or what Obama's policies are for that matter.)
12/07/09
OHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You so funny!
12/07/09
12/07/09
12/06/09
You could re-work it to say: "The Nature of the Death Threats Against President Obama...."
I'm just saying.
12/06/09
President Biden would then be the second coming of LBJ & would get passed all the laws that Obama has been incapable of getting passed, like healthcare reform.
These guys are scary, but really, really stupid. George W. Bush stupid!
12/06/09
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12/06/09
This is precisely the kind of sentence that the crazies write!
12/06/09
12/06/09
Upon closer inspection, I've realized that your quote is missing a chunk.
12/06/09
12/06/09
I've commented previously on the most disturbing aspect of this situation - the light jail time, if any at all, that's being given to these people. (See the Denver "incident." )And my own paranoid - or not - thoughts about why that is.
So I didn't read it - I hope that Brek guy didn't get his job back. (What a cliche - the impotent-feeling man getting puffed up on his guns and the false power of his security gig.)
America: Full of the Crazy (and their enablers). And the beloved 2nd Amendment.
12/06/09
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12/06/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/22/09
Also, when is that thing going to be decommissioned? How long are they supposed to last?
11/23/09
TILL THE END OF TIIIME!!
(imagine my voice as being that of a crotchety but adorable hundred something year old scientist.)
11/23/09
#tips
11/22/09
11/22/09
11/22/09
In fact, a thorium reactor is incapable of melting down, produces a tiny amount of waste, and actually eats other nuclear waste because it needs a small quantity of uranium to kickstart the thorium reaction. This is working technology in Russia right now and the only reason we don't have it here is that stories like this scare people into fearing all nuclear power. Meanwhile, coal plants spew out significant amounts of radioactivity every single day. Yes, coal is slightly radioactive and when you burn it, all that radioactive material goes up into the atmosphere, carried by the smoke.
I used to be totally against nuclear power because of scary events like these, and they are scary, but then I learned about modern, safe nuclear power and I have definitely changed my tune.
11/22/09
You're really competing in the bad analogy olympics there. Gold.
Here's my end of the wild, wanton speculation: government workers at Three Mile would have killed everyone in PA by now.
11/22/09
I think pointing out that 1970's technology is dangerous is a great PSA.
But, hey, it's not like we should care about all those toxins released into Hudson many years ago either?
It's not like radiation has a half life that will outlive our kids, grandchildren, great grandchildren, great great grandchildren, great great great grandchildren, great great great great grandchildren - ad nauseum for thousand of years - so why worry at this point?
It's not like cancer is caused by radiation - only cigarettes. I know this because our leaders who care about the next 10,000 years of human life have told me so.
11/22/09
[www.washingtonpost.com]
11/22/09
11/22/09
[www.google.com]
[www.google.com]
[images.google.com]
An ill maintained and corroded oil pipeline burst at the Conoco Phillips’ Kuparuk oil field in Alaska, causing one of the largest spills of oil-laced water on the North Slope in US history.
Dumping nearly 95,000 gallons didn’t hamper production though, and things were business as usual as workers finally finished cleaning up the spill that occurred almost three weeks earlier.
This is the second incident of its kind, and you may remember the BP spill of 2006 where 200,000 gallons of crude oil spilled onto the Prudhoe Bay oil field. That spill was also caused by corrosion.
America’s oil infrastructure is dated. Lets repair what needs to be repaired, but instead of overhauling the system, let move on towards a renewable fuel source. I welcome the day when we don’t have to worry about an algae biofuel spill.
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
#tips
11/22/09
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11/23/09
On 21 August 1945, Los Alamos scientist Harry K. Daghlian, Jr. suffered fatal radiation poisoning after dropping a tungsten carbide brick onto a sphere of plutonium. The brick acted as a neutron reflector, bringing the mass to criticality. This was the first known criticality accident causing a fatality.
On 21 May 1946, another Los Alamos scientist, Louis Slotin, accidentally irradiated himself during a similar incident, when a critical mass experiment with the very same sphere of plutonium took a wrong turn. Immediately realizing what had happened he quickly disassembled the device, likely saving the lives of seven fellow scientists nearby. Slotin succumbed to radiation poisoning nine days later.
On 30 December 1958, a Los Alamos chemical operator named Cecil Kelley working on plutonium purification switched on a stirrer on a large mixing tank, which created a vortex in the tank. The plutonium, dissolved in an organic solvent, flowed into the vortex. Due to a measurement error, the mixture contained 3.27 kg of plutonium, which reached criticality for about 200 microseconds. Kelley received 3,600 rads according to later estimates. The other operators reported seeing a flash of light and found Kelley outside, saying "I'm burning up! I'm burning up!" He died 35 hours later.
Wrong. Idiot.
11/23/09
11/23/09
The SL-1, or Stationary Low-Power Reactor Number One, was a United States Army experimental nuclear power plant which underwent a steam explosion and meltdown on January 3, 1961, killing its three operators. The direct cause was the improper withdrawal of the main control rod, responsible for 80% of neutron moderation in the poorly designed reactor core. The event is the only fatal reactor accident in the United States.
11/23/09
11/23/09
I've got a good one for you...did you know that more people have died in Ted Kennedy's car than there are people who still find Chappaquiddick jokes funny or original.
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/23/09
11/22/09
11/22/09
#damn