Bush Has Put the U.S. 'Back In the U.S.S.R.'

[outrager 6]

An excellent article in Moscow Times. It points out a trend that is obvious for somebody who got to see both systems first-hand, but can be an eye-opener for most US-born readers.

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2004/05/17/006.html


Bush Has Put the U.S. 'Back In the U.S.S.R.'

By Alexei Bayer

When the Beatles sang "back in the U.S., back in the U.S., back in the U.S.S.R." in the late 1960s, I suspect they were trying to rile up the dyed-in-the-wool anti-communists of their parents' generation by wittily likening the Soviet Union -- then safely tucked away behind the Iron Curtain -- with the United States, defender of the free world.

How times have changed.

You may not be able to fly in to Moscow from Miami Beach on the now-defunct British Overseas Airways Corporation, but apart from that all of those seemingly far-fetched American delights described by the Fab Four can be found right here in post-communist Russia.

What's even more surprising is how much the United States has come to resemble the old Evil Empire. George Orwell, another sardonic Brit, would have been amused.

Russians who lived through the years of "developed socialism" remember well the inane, almost surrealistic slogans and policies of the time. If you happen to feel any nostalgia for the years of stagnation under Leonid Brezhnev, try taking a trip back to the U.S. of A.

You can start at the U.S. Embassy, which many Russians describe as the last vestige of the Soviet Union in Moscow. If fortune is kind and you actually receive a visa, brace yourself for your introduction to the world of Big Brother at the U.S. border, where you will be photographed and finger-printed. These procedures may seem irritating, but they could be big attractions as part of a retro-tourism package.

The renaming of French fries and French toast as "freedom fries" and "freedom toast" in the cafeterias of the U.S. House of Representatives last year takes the gateau, as it were. Too bad the Supreme Soviet never came up with this idea. Just imagine a decree changing the Russian word for skunk -- amerikanskaya vonyuchka, or American stinker -- to "freedom stinker."

Freedom is the buzzword in American newspeak. In Orwell's novel "1984," newspeak is a language that contains only words needed to express approved ideas. It has been calculated that in five speeches on Iraq last year, President George W. Bush used the words "liberty," "free" and "freedom" 131 times. In addition to freedom fries we have Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom in Iraq. The building that will replace the World Trade Center will be called -- what else -- Freedom Tower.

This unhealthy obsession with freedom is reminiscent of the old Eastern Bloc, where words such as "People's" and "Democracy" were liberally sprinkled in the names of member countries such as the People's Republic of Bulgaria. This trend lives today in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. As civil liberties are increasingly curtailed in the wake of 9/11, "freedom" may soon ring almost as hollow in the United States as it did in the Soviet-era people's democracies.

Patriot II, or the Domestic Security Enhancement Act, for example, stipulates that providing material support to terrorists is punishable with the loss of U.S. citizenship. There's just one snag, of course: This practice is expressly banned by the U.S. Constitution. Citizenship can only be renounced voluntarily. Not to worry. According to the Justice Department, a person's intent to renounce his citizenship need not be expressed verbally. It can be inferred by the authorities from his actions. Prosecutors at Stalin's show trials would have admired this twisted logic.

The comparisons are endless. Consider the new Iraqi flag, unveiled in April. With two blue stripes and a blue crescent against a white background it looks so much like the Israeli flag that you can't help but recall the 15 look-alike national flags of the former Soviet republics.

However amusing, alarming or appalling, these are facile parallels, of course. A more serious resemblance can be found at the level of government policy. Like the decisions of the Soviet leadership, U.S. policy is increasingly driven by ideology, not based on facts. In the old days, the U.S. government took a conservative, realistic approach to managing the economy. The Soviets, armed with scientific Marxism, were great believers in economic miracles. Shift productive assets from the rich to the state and -- presto -- you've got a highly industrialized, efficient and prosperous economy.

Today, Russia has finally realized that double-digit economic growth will have to be sustained for a decade before the country can catch up with Portugal. Americans, by contrast, have come to rely on economic miracles. First it was the new economy of the 1990s, and now the massive tax cuts intended to generate universal prosperity. What ever happened to the proverbial Yankee with both feet firmly planted on the ground?

The Bush administration's foreign policy is even more worrisome. It rejects the traditional approach that served the United States so well in the past in favor of Soviet-style adventurism. During the Cold War, Washington pursued a policy of containment, opposing Soviet expansionism and preserving the status quo. Now, driven by newfound ideological zeal, the United States is bringing down foreign regimes and exporting freedom at gunpoint.

Ideology is the cause of America's current woes in Iraq. There is no need to plan carefully when you possess the one true creed. Minor setbacks will be overcome, and the glorious prospect of Iraqi Freedom makes it all worthwhile. This explains why the Bush administration never bothered to develop a realistic strategy for pulling out of Iraq, and why control over U.S. forces in the country is lax enough to permit the much-publicized atrocities against Iraqi prisoners.

According to the ideology of freedom, the Iraqis, like every other nation in the world, should have embraced U.S.-style democracy and hailed the Marines as liberators. The fact that something closer to the opposite has happened is still being dismissed as a bump in the road to freedom, the work of a few Baathist extremists and foreign terrorists. Blinded by ideology, Bush administration officials appear increasingly divorced from reality when they discuss the situation in Iraq.

As the Soviet experience has shown, you can live in this kind of dream world for a while, but not forever, even if you possess the most powerful military in the world.


Alexei Bayer, a New York-based economist, writes the Globalist column for Vedomosti on alternate weeks. He contributed this comment to The Moscow Times.


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bsbd!

Yuri.

[Gravitymaster 0]

What a dumb article. It reads like it was written by a pimply faced teenager.

[turtlespeed 212]

It also reads like a piece of propaganda that tries to justify the authors political views. Objectivity is lacking just a wee bit.

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[kallend 1,651]

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What a dumb article. It reads like it was written by a pimply faced teenager.

Argument by name calling again. That's Ann Coulter's method.

I guess you can't actually rebut anything in it.

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[wmw999 2,150]

It's a viewpoint of an individual, written as exactly that. The fact that he's paid to write his viewpoints doesn't lessen that. He's not a reporter, he's a columnist.

Someone (that would be Yuri) said they agreed with much in it, based on his experiences of having lived in the Soviet Union and the US (and having traveled to a lot of other countries).

Personally, I think it goes a little over the top, but if people see things that way, maybe it's in our best interests to understand why, rather than to just tell them they're full of shit and ignore them. It's an article about viewpoints.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[turtlespeed 212]

right - well all except the "little" over the top.
More like a high altitude load on that one.

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[Gravitymaster 0]

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What a dumb article. It reads like it was written by a pimply faced teenager.

Argument by name calling again. That's Ann Coulter's method.

I guess you can't actually rebut anything in it.

And I guess you can't read something and recognise when it's just plain dumb without having to pick it apart. Thats a Jerry Springer "Democrat of the Year" method.

[kallend 1,651]

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What a dumb article. It reads like it was written by a pimply faced teenager.

Argument by name calling again. That's Ann Coulter's method.

I guess you can't actually rebut anything in it.

And I guess you can't read something and recognise when it's just plain dumb without having to pick it apart. Thats a Jerry Springer "Democrat of the Year" method.

I read stuff written by pimply faced teenagers for a living. You don't have a clue.

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[rehmwa 2]

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I read stuff written by pimply faced teenagers for a living. You don't have a clue.

Regardless of up-thread commentary, that's one the best flip comments of the day so far.

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Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[Gravitymaster 0]

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I read stuff written by pimply faced teenagers for a living. You don't have a clue.

Then perhaps you would benefit by reading more stuff written by adults.

[kallend 1,651]

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I read stuff written by pimply faced teenagers for a living. You don't have a clue.

Then perhaps you would benefit by reading more stuff written by adults.

I read the newspaper for that, and I come here for comic relief.

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The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[billvon 2,435]

>Then perhaps you would benefit by reading more stuff written by adults.

Based on what John does for a living, he probably has read more "stuff written by adults" than most people here.

[Gravitymaster 0]

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>Then perhaps you would benefit by reading more stuff written by adults.

Based on what John does for a living, he probably has read more "stuff written by adults" than most people here.

Probably so. I deal with PhDs all the time. Some are pretty cool and up on things, but most are pretty eccentric and anal. Not a personal attack on John, just an observation. Well read doesn't follow that one is well rounded or correct.

[kallend 1,651]

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>Then perhaps you would benefit by reading more stuff written by adults.

Based on what John does for a living, he probably has read more "stuff written by adults" than most people here.

Probably so. I deal with PhDs all the time. Some are pretty cool and up on things, but most are pretty eccentric and anal. Not a personal attack on John, just an observation. Well read doesn't follow that one is well rounded or correct.

First it's debate by name-calling, now it's guilt by association.

To save you time and trouble, here's a list of other poor debating tactics you might use:

ad hominem -- Latin for "to the man," attacking the arguer and not the argument (e.g. The Reverend Dr. Smith is a known Biblical fundamentalist, so her objections to evolution need not be taken seriously);

argument from authority (e.g., President Richard Nixon should be re-elected because he has a secret plan to end the war in Southeast Asia -- but because it was secret, there was no way for the electorate to evaluate it on its merits; the argument amounted to trusting him because he was President; a mistake, as it turned out);

argument from adverse consequences (e.g., A God meting out punishment and reward must exist, because if He didn't, society would be much more lawless and dangerous – perhaps even ungovernable. Or: The defendant in a widely publicized murder trial must be found guilty; otherwise, it will be an encouragement for other men to murder their wives);

appeal to ignorance -- the claim that whatever has not been proved false must be true, and vice versa (e.g., There is no compelling evidence that UFOs are not visiting the Earth; therefore UFOs exist -- and there is intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe. Or: There may be seventy kazillion other worlds, but not one is known to have the moral advancement of the Earth, so we're still central to the Universe.) This impatience with ambiguity can be criticized in the phrase: absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

special pleading, often to rescue a proposition in deep rhetorical trouble (e.g., How can a merciful God condemn future generations to torment because, against orders, one woman induced one man to eat an apple? Special plead: you don't understand the subtle Doctrine of Free Will. Or: How can there be an equally godlike Father, Son, and Holy Ghost in the same Person? Special plead: You don't understand the Divine Mystery of the Trinity. Or: How could God permit the followers of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam -- each in their own way enjoined to heroic measures of loving kindness and compassion -- to have perpetrated so much cruelty for so long? Special plead: You don't understand Free Will again. And anyway, God moves in mysterious ways.)

begging the question, also called assuming the answer (e.g., We must institute the death penalty to discourage violent crime. But does the violent crime rate in fact fall when the death penalty is imposed? Or: The stock market fell yesterday because of a technical adjustment and profit-taking by investors -- but is there any independent evidence for the causal role of "adjustment" and profit-taking; have we learned anything at all from this purported explanation?);

observational selection, also called the enumeration of favourable circumstances, or as the philosopher Francis Bacon described it, counting the hits and forgetting the misses (e.g., A state boasts of the Presidents it has produced, but is silent on its serial killers);

statistics of small numbers -- a close relative of observational selection (e.g., "They say 1 out of every 5 people is Chinese. How is this possible? I know hundreds of people, and none of them is Chinese. Yours truly." Or: "I've thrown three sevens in a row. Tonight I can't lose.");

misunderstanding of the nature of statistics (e.g., President Dwight Eisenhower expressing astonishment and alarm on discovering that fully half of all Americans have below average intelligence);

inconsistency (e.g., Prudently plan for the worst of which a potential military adversary is capable, but thriftily ignore scientific projections on environmental dangers because they're not "proved". Or: Attribute the declining life expectancy in the former Soviet Union to the failures of communism many years ago, but never attribute the high infant mortality rate in the United States (now highest of the major industrial nations) to the failures of capitalism. Or: Consider it reasonable for the Universe to continue to exist forever into the future, but judge absurd the possibility that it has infinite duration into the past);

non sequitur -- Latin for "It doesn't follow" (e.g., Our nation will prevail because God is great. But nearly every nation pretends this to be true; the Germans formulation was "Gott mit uns"). Often those falling into the non sequitur fallacy have simply failed to recognize alternative possibilities;

post hoc, ergo propter hoc - Latin for "It happened after, so it was caused by" (e.g., Jaime Cardinal Sin, Archbishop of Manila: "I know of ... a 26-year old who looks 60 because she takes [contraceptive] pills." Or: Before women got the vote, there were no nuclear weapons);

meaningless question (e.g., What happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object? But if there is such a thing as an irresistible force there can be no immovable objects, and vice versa);

excluded middle, or false dichotomy -- considering only the two extremes in a continuum of intermediate possibilities (e.g., "Sure, take her side; my husband's perfect; I'm always wrong." Or: "Either you love your country or you hate it." Or: "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem");

short-term vs. long-term -- a subset of the excluding middle, but so important I've pulled it out for special attention (e.g., We can't afford programs to feed malnourished children and educate pre-school kids. We need to urgently deal with crime on the streets. Or: Why explore space or pursue fundamental science when we have so huge a budget deficit?);

slippery slope, related to excluded middle (e.g., If we allow abortion in the first week of pregnancy, it will be impossible to prevent the killing of a full-term infant. Or, conversely: If the state prohibits abortion even in the ninth month, it will soon be telling us what to do with our bodies around the time of conception);

confusion of correlation and causation (e.g., A survey shows that more college graduates are homosexual than those with lesser education; therefore education makes people gay. Or: Andean earthquakes are correlated with closest approaches of the planet Uranus; therefore -- despite the absence of any such correlation for the nearer, more massive planet Jupiter -- the latter causes the former);

straw man -- caricaturing a position to make it easier to attack (e.g., Scientists suppose that living things simply fell together by chance -- a formulation that wilfully ignores the central Darwinian insight, that Nature ratchets up by saving what works and discarding what doesn't. Or -- this is also a short-term/long-term fallacy -- environmentalists care more for snail darters and spotted owls than they do for people);

suppressed evidence, or half-truths (e.g., An amazingly accurate and widely quoted "prophecy" of the assassination attempt on President Regan is shown on television; but – an important detail -- was it recorded before or after the event? Or: These government abuses demand revolution, even if you can't make an omelette without breaking some eggs. Yes, but is this likely to be a revolution in which far more people are killed than under the previous regime? What does the experience of other revolutions suggest? Are all revolutions against oppressive regimes desirable and in the interests of the people?);

weasel words (e.g., The separation of powers of the U.S. Constitution specifies that the United States may not conduct a war without a declaration of Congress. On the other hand, Presidents are given control of foreign policy and the conduct of wars, which are potentially powerful tools for getting themselves re-elected. Presidents of either political party may therefore be tempted to arrange wars while waving the flag and calling the wars something else -- "police actions," "armed incursions," "protective reaction strikes," "pacification," "safeguarding American interests," and a wide variety of "operations," such as "Operation Just Cause." Euphemisms for war are one of a broad class of reinventions of language for political purposes. Talleyrand said, "An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old names have become odious to the public").
(c) Carl Sagan

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[Gravitymaster 0]

Pretty angy and over the top response, John. Kind of ironic your response made my point. Relax...

[PhillyKev 0]

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It also reads like a piece of propaganda that tries to justify the authors political views. Objectivity is lacking just a wee bit.

His political views being anti-authoritarian? Yeah, I agree. He does try to justify that view point. Does a pretty good job of it, too.

[Gravitymaster 0]

Here's a few back at ya, John:

1) Attack The Messenger: Instead of addressing the argument that has been made, people using this method attack the person making it instead. This is particularly easy for many delusional people on the left who believe that almost everyone on the right is a racist, sexist, homophobic, Fascist who longs for the return of the Confederacy and is planning to start throwing leftists in prison camps if they let their guard down for five minutes. The charge made doesn't even have to be accurate, in fact it's better in some ways if it's off target. That's because the more whacked out the charge is, the more compelled your opponent will feel to spend his time defending himself while you continue to make your points.

2) The Bait & Switch: When a claim is made and your opponent refutes it, don't try to respond, simply change the subject. Example,

Lefty Debater: I think we all know what kind of job George Bush has done with the economy. Right off the bat, he got the economy into a recession.

Conservative Debater: Excuse me, but you're incorrect. The recession started under Bill Clinton, not George Bush.

Lefty Debater: Well what about his tax cuts? They're for the rich, the rich I tell you!

Conservative Debater: What about getting rid of the marriage penalty and increasing the child tax credit? Are you arguing that only rich people get married and have kids?

Lefty Debater: Haliburton, did I mention Haliburton? What about that, huh? I guess you want to dodge that issue.

The best part about this from the left-wing debater's perspective is that since they never acknowledged they were wrong, they can feel free to make the exact same incorrect claim in future debates.

3) The Blitzkrieg: The goal here is blast your opponent with so many accusations that they can't possibly respond. Example,

Lefty Debater: George Bush? Who would defend someone who was AWOL from the National Guard, used coke, lied about weapons of mass destruction, raised taxes on the poor, wants to cut Social Security, is the worst environmental President we've ever had, and who has destroyed the US economy?

Moderator: That's great, but the question was, "Should the Israelis kick Arafat out of the "Disputed Territories"?

It doesn't matter if all -- or even any -- of the accusations are true, relevant, or make any sense. The goal is just to get them out there. Making an accusation takes a few seconds, refuting one takes much longer. So an opponent confronted with these accusations will never actually have time to respond.

4) Enter The Strawman: Tremendously exaggerating your opponent's position and then claiming to fight against a position they don't hold is always a great way to dodge the issues. In all fairness, this is a technique often used by the left & right. But still, the right can't hold a candle to the left in this area. I mean how many times have you heard, "Republicans are going to take your Social Security away," "The GOP wants to poison the water and the air," "Republicans want to take away your Civil Rights" etc, etc?

This whole concept has gotten so out of hand on the left that we now even have some people on the left comparing the Israelis to Nazis. Look, when you're claiming that a bunch a Jews defending themselves from people who want to kill them are like Nazis, you've gone so far past irony that you almost need a new word to describe it like -- "Idiorony" or "outofyourmindony". But that's what happens when people wink at all these strawmen that are tossed out in debates. Eventually some people start to take them seriously and build on them.

5) History Will Be Kind To Me For I Intend To Write It: The technique is similar to using strawmen in some respects. What you try to do is to rewrite history, to claim that a debate in a previous time was different than it actually was. Here's an example of how this is done,

Mother: I told you to be back by 11 PM and you're just getting in at 1:30 AM!

Teenage Daughter: I don't think I remember you mentioning that...

Mother: I told you 3 times to be in by 11, I left a note reminding you on the dinner table and snuck one into your purse, I called you on your cellular phone at 10:30 and reminded you to make it home by 11 and I even told your boyfriend he'd better have you back in time.

Teenage Daughter: Oh, oh, oh wait...I remember now -- you meant 11 PM? I thought you meant 11 AM. I thought that by getting in at 1:30 AM I was here 9 and 1/2 hours early. Silly me!

Mother: Nice try, you're still grounded!

The build-up to Iraq war has been treated in a similar fashion by the anti-war crowd. Before the war there were complaints that Bush wouldn't stick to one reason for invading, now there are claims that it was only about WMD. There was almost no debate on Capitol Hill between Dems & the GOP about whether Iraq actually had WMD until after the war when it became apparent that none were going to be quickly be found. Throwaway lines that were hardly noticed before the war (like the controversial yet true 16 words in the State of the Union speech) have been treated as if they were core arguments made by the Bush administration after the fact. It's all just a way to rewrite history.

6) I'm Not Hearing You -- La La La: Just totally ignoring what your opponent has to say and going on to something else is another technique often used by politicians of all stripes, but no one, and I mean no one, can hang with Yasser Arafat and company when it comes to totally blowing off any uncomfortable questions that are asked. For example...

Moderator: So Mr. Arafat, are you willing to disarm Hamas & Islamic Jihad?

Arafat: The Israelis want to kill me! They are causing all the problems! We want peace, but the Israelis don't!

Moderator: That's fine Mr. Arafat, but are you willing to disarm Hamas & Islamic Jihad?

Arafat: Why don't you ask the Israelis if they will stop their terrorism against our people? Why don't you ask them that?

Moderator: Mr. Arafat you seem to be ignoring my question.

Arafat: Are you questioning me? Do you know who I am? I am general Arafat! This interview is over!

When they duck the question, it's a pretty good indication that they don't have an answer anyone wants to hear.

7) Motives Matter, Results Don't: Oftentimes when people on the left are losing an argument or can't explain why they seem to be so inconsistent on certain issues, they start questioning the motives of their opponents. For example, if you favored going to war with Serbia based on nothing more than humanitarian grounds, then logically you should also be in favor of invading Iraq for exactly the same reason. But of course, that's not how it works for a lot of people.

So to get around that, they just claim that there are impure motives afoot. The Bush administration may have claimed to care about stopping terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, humanitarian causes, or UN Resolutions, but it was really all about stealing oil, getting payoffs for business buddies, getting revenge for an attack on "daddy", because Bush needed Iraqi sand for his garden, Bush was jealous of Saddam's rugged good looks, etc, etc, who cares -- they're all equally ridiculous. When the real issues are too tough to deal with, it's all too easy to just pretend something else is what you're really upset about.

8) That Context Is On A Need To Know Basis: Stripping away the context of a situation is a favored technique of people who hate the United States. They talk about something the United States has done without discussing the reasoning behind it, the actions that provoked it, or other things that the United States might have also done that would place us in a more favorable light. It's very easy to make someone look like a bad guy if you simply don't include every detail that doesn't support your case. For example,

Lawyer: Your honor, I intend to prove that my client is innocent of all charges and that the police shot him maliciously, recklessly, and without cause as he was minding his own business at the park.

Judge: He was minding his own business? According to the police report I have in front of me, your client had shot 3 drug dealers who were standing in "his spot" and was firing off rounds from an Uzi at a passing school bus, two nuns on a nearby park bench, and at the officers as they arrived. That doesn't sound like he was "minding his own business" to me.

Lawyer: It does if his business is being a drug dealing thug -- ha, ha, ha! Hey, that's just a little joke. It was getting a little tense in here....you're not laughing. OK, just checking -- is that plea bargain still available?

9) That's Mean, Mean, Mean! When it comes to certain subjects, ordinarily rational people turn into complete bubbleheads. For example, you could probably put together a bill that called for nuclear waste to be dumped in every Walmart in America and as long as you called it the, "Feed The Children For A New Tomorrow Bill" about a 1/3rd of the American population would support it. So naturally, some people take advantage of this and claim that certain policy proposals are "mean". Once you say that, results, logic, how expensive the project is, etc, etc, goes out the window and the argument becomes over whether someone is "mean" or not.


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[benny 0]

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What a dumb article. It reads like it was written by a pimply faced teenager.

Argument by name calling again. That's Ann Coulter's method.

I guess you can't actually rebut anything in it.

And I guess you can't read something and recognise when it's just plain dumb without having to pick it apart. Thats a Jerry Springer "Democrat of the Year" method.

Obviously you disagree with the message of the author. But language is obviously used by the government as a means to an end. If they didn't think it was important why did they spend our tax dollars to change the menus to read "freedom fries"?

Never go to a DZ strip show.

[vmsfreaky1 0]

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What a dumb article. It reads like it was written by a pimply faced teenager.

Well, i think its on the money! so nyeer!

[mpsniper98 0]

or terry mcauliffe's......

NBFT

[TomAiello 25]

Gravitymaster, Kallend,

Please try to be at least civil guys. No one enjoys reading long posts where every word is bolded.

Maybe we could go back to discussing the article?

-- Tom Aiello

[email protected]
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[TomAiello 25]

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I deal with PhDs all the time. Some are pretty cool and up on things, but most are pretty eccentric and anal. Not a personal attack on John, just an observation. Well read doesn't follow that one is well rounded or correct.

I worked on a university campus for several years. My general observation was that education (and intelligence, actually) were pretty much unrelated to consideration, thoughtfulness, or value as a person.

In other words, the proportion of wankers who have PhD's is about the same as the proportion of wankers in the general populace.

Somehow, I suspect that kallend isn't one of them, but I've never met him IRL, so your guess is as good as mine.

-- Tom Aiello

[email protected]
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[wmw999 2,150]

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In other words, the proportion of wankers who have PhD's is about the same as the proportion of wankers in the general populace

I'm sorry, this is Speaker's Corner -- the voice of reason is not allowed

Wendy W.
(which comes out Ermfu E/ when you shift to the right one key)

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[TomAiello 25]

Hmmm. I can never predict where I'm going to agree or disagree with Yuri on politics (odd, since I agree with him on the vast majority of life issues, it seems). In this case, I'd say I mostly agree.

The US trend toward statism in the last 100 years is very disturbing. The acceleration of that trend in the last decade is downright terrifying.

Honestly, though, I don't think it's a Republican v. Democrat or Bush v. Kerry issue.

I guess all I can say is that I think the article hits a lot of good points, and I agree with many of them. But I don't think the fix is so simple as voting for someone else, and, honestly, I think that much of the world is having similar problems.

What was it Jimmy Rogers said in Investment Biker?

"Statism is the great political disease of the 20th century."

Maybe the 21st century will be better.

-- Tom Aiello

[email protected]
SnakeRiverBASE.com

[Faber 0]

ha ha nice one.. i didnt borther to read the artickle,but just the head line,the responds are as expected.. he he

Stay safe
Stefan Faber