12/22   What the deal with flyng a confederate flag?  I always assumed
        it was a symbol of racism, but some people seem to do it so
        casually that I'm not sure that's it anymore.
        \_ it's a southern heritage pride thing, which oftens involves
           the flag waver ignoring how pissed off a brown person might
           get about it.  whatever, i don't care, i'll never live anywhere
	...

8/3     I have lived in N Cal all my life and have had a very sheltered
        and liberal life. Actually it's pretty deprived as well. I've
        never been to the South, and I'm wondering how accurate the
        portrayal of the hicks are in the movie Sweet Home Alabama?
        \_ No. Hollywood is exaggerated.
           \_ What does North Hollywood have to do with it?
	...

6/3     Clinton 'open' to joining Obama
        http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7432696.stm
        \_ That would be pretty funny if this happened and then Obama was pres
           but then died somehow and then HRC was president.
           \_ At least we would know that it wasn't the Ku Klux Klan who
              assasinated Obama.  http://www.dailysquib.co.uk/?c=117&a=1227
	...

6/2     Obama is willing to ditch his own church in order to win the election.
        http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080601/ap_on_el_pr/obama
        How faithful.
        \_ After hanging out with the Klan for 20 years, he decides it's
           politically expedient to leave.
           \_ Yeah, the Klan.  That's right.  What an apt analogy.  I mean
	...

10/31   Fred Phelps gets $11 million spanking.
        http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071031/ap_on_re_us/funeral_protests
        \- are naive "force or fraud" libertarians outraged?
           \_ This verdict is absurd and will be overturned. Phelps clearly
              has free speech protection here. Plus, isn't Phelps like the
              best troll ever?
	...

5/3     So I watched "Frontline/American Experience" this week. The topic
        was "The Mormons". I always knew the Mormons were a cult, but
        they are even more cultish than I thought. I especially liked
        the part about baptising dead Holocaust victims, which for
        some reason Jewish people are not too happy about. I wonder why.
        \_ Hi troll.  This is the same PBS which refuses to show the special
	...

10/29   Mark Steyn op/ed in the Chicago Sun Times.
        http://www.suntimes.com/news/steyn/114966,CST-EDT-steyn29.article
           The invaluable Brussels Journal recently translated an interview
           with the writer Oscar van den Boogaard from the Belgian paper De
           Standaard. A Dutch gay "humanist" (which is pretty much the
           trifecta of Eurocool), van den Boogaard was reflecting on the
	...

3/17    Gotta love it:
        "NEW YORK - Protesters joined bagpipers, marching bands and thousands
        of flag-waving spectators at the St. Patrick's Day parade Friday after
        the parade's chairman compared gay Irish-American activists to
        neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and prostitutes."
        \_ what do gay people have against prostitutes?
	...

11/30   Lieberman has visited Iraq four times in 17 months. He said there are
        signs life is returning to normal, including a profusion of cell phones
        and satellite TV dishes on rooftops.
        "About two-thirds of the country is in really pretty good shape," he
        said, noting most attacks are in the so-called "Sunni Triangle" region.
        "Overall, I came back encouraged."
	...

6/20    Curiosity got the best of me, and I read the Lancet study, too.  It's
        quite thorough, undeceptive, and straightforward.  Responding to
        emarkp's post (http://csua.com/?entry=38170
        RE: Confidence Intervals. (1)Assuming a normal(it's not, it's
        skewed), there's a 90% certainty there were over 40k dead, 85%
        certainty over 51k dead, 75% certainty over 68k dead. (2) this CI
	...

1/23    Amusing TNR aticle on far-far-lefties
        http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=express&s=frank012105
        qwertyuil/dsfghjk
        \_ Frothing lefties is more like it. Gyah. Why can't we liberals as
           a whole just jettison these tinfoil hatters once and for all? Is
           it because they have all of the phone bank lists? Gyah!
	...

10/25   The New Yorker magazine endorses a presidential candidate for the
        first time in its 80-year history.  Who?  George W. Bush!  Not!
        http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?041101ta_talk_editors
        "As a variety of memoirs and journalistic accounts have made plain,
        Bush seldom entertains contrary opinion. He boasts that he listens to
        no outside advisers, and inside advisers who dare to express unwelcome
	...

2/10    I like Woz, and I like iWoz, but let me tell ya, no one worships
        him because he has the charisma of an highly functioning
        Autistic person. Meanwhile, everyone worships Jobs because
        he's better looking and does an amazing job promoting himself
        as God. I guess this is not the first time in history. Case in
        point, Caesar, Napolean, GWB, etc. Why is it that people
	...

11/2    California Uber Alles is such a great song
        \_ Yes, and it was written about Jerry Brown. I was thinking this
           as I cast my vote for Meg Whitman. I am independent, but I
           typically vote Democrat (e.g., I voted for Boxer). However, I
           can't believe we elected this retread.
           \_ You voted for the billionaire that ran HP into the ground
	...

2/20    Ok serious question, NOT political.  This is straight up procedural.
        Has it been declared that we didn't find WMD in iraq? (think so).
        So why did we go into iraq (what was the gain), and if nobody really
        knows, why is nobody looking for the reason?
        \_ Political stability, military strategy (Iran), and to prevent
           Saddam from financing terrorism.
	...

8/5     Regarding NKorea relesing the journalists, here's what I think the
        actual deal between Kim and Obama is:
        - Both agree that Kim needs to save, or gain, face to pave the way for
          his son's succession and for NK's stability.
        - Both agree that Obama doesn't like losing face by publicly
          apologizing.
	...

4/27    "Obama the first Asian-American president?"
        http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090427/pl_afp/uspoliticsobama100daysasia
        Just like the way Clinton was the first African-American president.
        \_ Two wars, a banking, housing, and general economic crisis, a truly
           massive deficit, and now, Swine Flu.  Has any president except for
           Lincoln and Roosevelt faced worse?
	...

3/13    So Bill Clinton doesn't know what an embryo is?
        \_ obCigarJoke
	...

2/27    CA unemployment increases from 9.3% to 10.1% for Jan
        \_ Good thing the legislature passed the biggest tax increase in
           history!  That should solve it.
           \_ because cutting taxes has done such a great job so far!
                \_ it has.. giving mortgages to poor folks did us in
                   \_ 100% horseshit.
	...

2/3     Well said: "What gets people upset are executives being rewarded for
        failure. Especially when those rewards are subsidized by US taxpayers."
        \_ Turns out, he gets it.
           \_ Talk is cheap.
              \_ Freedom is strength.
        \_ Isn't this something like FDR might have said?
	...

2/1     Pres. Obama keeps rendition
        http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-rendition1-2009feb01,0,7548176,full.story
        \_ This does not mean what you (or the LA Times) think it means.
        \_ More on how this article does not mean what you (or the idiotic
           LA times) think it means:
           http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/02/02/renditions
	...

1/27    http://www.realnews.org/index.php-option=com_content&task=view&id=59&Itemid=189.htm
        [Title: Hilary's Bush Connection. Summary: Ties to Alan Quasha.]
        \_ I knew hillary was evil!
        \- in case you are interested, the old white guy to the right of
           the clinton-bushco picture [chalmers johnson] is a former ucb
           prof who sort of went nuts.
	...