March, 2016 archive
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Gun sense, indeed:
A gun-loving social media activist was shot and wounded Tuesday by her 4-year-old son while driving.
Investigators said Jamie Gilt was driving a four-door pickup truck hauling a horse trailer about 3 p.m. when the boy somehow managed to gain access to a .45-caliber handgun and shoot her from the back seat, reported the Florida Times-Union.
(snip)
The woman apparently maintains a Facebook page called “Jamie Gilt for Gun Sense,” which has been deluged with critical messages since her accidental shooting.
I reckon that the moral of the story is, “Don’t let your offspring find your ammosex toy.”
Virginia Beach Drinking Liberally Tomorrow 0
Fun and fellowship for liberals. Join us and talk about anything in a relaxed atmosphere.
When: Thursday, March 10, 6 p.
Where:
Croc’s 19 Street Bistro
620 19th Street (Map)
More here.
All That Was Old Is New Again 0
Petula Dvorak considers the “Trump effect.” A snippet (emphasis added):
It’s like all of those horrible school integration photos of screaming crowds surrounding black students in the 1960s are being reenacted.
She’s quite correct, you know. I was there. It’s the same mobs, the same hate.
In related news, Der Spiegel looks at Trump and is not amused.
“Macho Macho Men” 0
Turns out the cowboy cosplay isn’t fun any more.
The Bundy Bros just want to take their AK-47s and go home.
“Raging Hormonal Imbalances” 0
Samantha Bee suggests that men are too emotional to be in charge.
Warning: Almost as tasteless as a Republican debate.
Via Raw Story.
Abnormal Psych 0
There’s a whole new phobia come to town.
You All Shush Up Now 0
Southern Beale discusses the sexist payload of shushing a sister. A snippet:
Why? Because you’re telling me I’m not important. You’re discounting me. You’re saying my ideas don’t matter, and that I don’t have the right to express them.
Men interrupt each other all the time and I daresay they don’t have that same response. It’s just how they communicate. But men and women come at communication from very different places.
Seriously? 0
Yesterday, I got two spam emails telling me that Donald Trump wants a smarter America and trying to sell me some concoction based on trumped-up claims.
I reckon the strategy is that anyone who believes Donald Trump wants a smarter America will believe anything.
Strange Bedfellows 0
Welcome to the morning after the night before.
The Lincoln that Time Forgot 0
Thom and David S. Reynolds discuss the Lincoln of the Party Once of Lincoln.
During the Great Depression, one wag remarked (and it’s still true today), “The Republican Party has gone from being the party that freed the slaves to being the party that frayed the sleeves.”
The Retirement of Sisyphus 0
Philadelphia, like many jurisdictions (not just cities), has a “pension crisis.”*
The cause of the crisis is not pensions. The cause of the crisis is the decision of governments small and large to agree to pensions, then choose not to fund them. Now that funding time is due, the solution of choice seems to be to screw the workers who have been paying their share of the pension plans all along through payroll deductions.
The Philadelphia City Controller, looking at the example set by professional fraudsters, has proposed a novel idea: buy out pensions at a cut rate so that the pensioners, now that they have reached retirement age, can keep right on working. A snippet from the story:
The payments would represent only a portion – say, 50 percent – of what a retiree could expect to receive over a lifetime. Still, a fair number of retirees might be enticed by the prospect of a cash windfall they could invest on their own, Butkovitz said.
“This would give people the opportunity to start a business,” he said. “Or do something that could potentially change their life and provide financial security long-term. And, of course, they could convert it into an annuity.”
You can take it from me, starting a new business or gambling at the Wall Street track is not a retirement dream of most persons at retirement age.
Retiring is the damned retirement dream, one which is more and more a stolen dream.
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*In Philadelphia’s case, the problem is exacerbated by the systematic screwing given Philly by the Republicans in the state legislature. For example.