From Pine View Farm

December, 2012 archive

New Year’s Eve Reading 0

Be prepared: Psychology Today explains why beer goggles work.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 2

All that politeness is starting to get silly.

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Race Card Review, with Melissa Harris-Perry 0

With a twist:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Via Raw Story.

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Fast Away the Old Year Passes 0

If you can’t laugh at life, it will just make you cry.

Dave Barry looks back on 2012; read it to keep from crying. A nugget:

In domestic business news, Facebook, a company with a business model that nobody really understands, spends $1 billion to buy Instagram, another company with a business model that nobody really understands. Since everybody involved is about 19 years old, Wall Street concludes this must be a good idea.

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QOTD 0

Bette Davis:

Brought up to respect the conventions, love had to end in marriage. I’m afraid it did.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Belle Rose is quantifying the courtesy:

There was one in Harrisonburg a few days ago. And as of today, at least 283 across the United States of America since the Newtown massacre on December 14, 2012. That averages nearly 19 per day. We’re talking about gun deaths. Afghanistan is safer.

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Merchants of Hype 0

At Asia Times, Ellen Brown comments on coverage of the phony phiscal cliff (emhasis added):

The “fiscal cliff” has all the earmarks of a false-flag operation, full of sound and fury, intended to extort concessions from opponents. Neil Irwin of the Washington Post calls it “a self-induced austerity crisis”. David Weidner in the Wall Street Journal calls it simply theater, designed to pressure politicians into a budget deal:

    The cliff is really just a trumped-up annual budget discussion. … The most likely outcome is a combination of tax increases, spending cuts and kicking the can down the road.

Yet the media coverage has been “panic-inducing, falling somewhere between that given to an approaching hurricane and an alien invasion. In the summer of 2011, this sort of media hype succeeded in causing the Dow Jones Industrial Average to plunge nearly 2,000 points. But this time the market is generally ignoring the cliff, either confident a deal will be reached or not caring.

The goal of the exercise seems to be to dismantle Social Security and Medicare, something a radical group of conservatives has worked for decades to achieve.

It’s kabuki choreographed by Republicans to hide their radical goals under fantastickal costumes, a man-made crisis constructed to cause panicky concessions because panic!

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Priorities 0

Actions speak louder . . . .

The two Republican U.S. senators from Utah have scheduled fundraisers on the ski slopes in the first days of January, just as America is likely to be headed over the fiscal cliff.

Remember, the phony phiscal cliff was a Republican creation. In their world, fund-raising trumps governance.

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Responsible Fiscals 0

Driftglass reviews the history of Republican fiscal conservatism over the past 30 years.

It is most instructive.

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Patriot Games 0

Boy runs around shooting guns.  Then asks his mother if he can play video games.  Mother says,

Via Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Brothers in arms.

Authorities say a Wilmington (NC–ed.) man who thought he was shooting an intruder ended up killing his own brother.

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Leashed Lawmakers 0

Dogs labelled McConnell and Boehner complaining that

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QOTD 0

Nikolai Gogol:

It is no use to blame the looking glass if your face is awry.

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Facebook Frolics 0

Musical Notes Reunited and it feels so good.

(That’s somewhat similar to how I ended up in Virginia Beach, the one really good thing that has resulted from my signing up for the Zuckerboard.)

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The Golden Dukes 0

Talking Points Memo announces this year’s Golden Duke Awards honoring the most egregious scandals of 2012.

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Fiscal Cliffnotes 2

Your assigned reading for the weekend:

MarketWatch on who’s to blame.

Dick Polman on Republican unfitness to govern.

Daniel Ruth on longing for the good old days.

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“How Can You Keep Them Down on the Farm Now That They’ve Seen Paree?” 0

Use text messages.

Last month, the kingdom of Saudi Arabia expanded a system in which it sends Saudi men text messages, known as SMS, to notify them when their wives or other “dependents” leave the country, as part of its regulations requiring women to obtain permission from their guardians to travel. In a twist that proves technology’s power, Manal al-Sharif, the woman who in 2010 launched a campaign to obtain for women the right to drive, used Twitter to inform the world of the story.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Inculcate politeness from an early age.

A one-year-old from Bessemer City (NC–ed.) was in the hospital Friday night, receiving treatment for a gunshot wound in his arm.

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Great Moments in Liability 0

Picture of window with highlighted area

Warning:  Open windows can be hazardous.  Adding screens does not help.

And it was on the ground floor.

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QOTD 0

Fuzzy Zoeller:

Vodka does not ease back pain. But it does get your mind off it.

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