Hi, morons. Some of the trollbusters weren't able to make it to work today, and we apologize for the mess that PLC made earlier. In the interest of cleaning up as quickly as possible, we weren't able to do much more than just sanitize the thread. We did erroneously knock out one post that was a sockpuppet- our apologies on that.

We're hoping that PLC isn't one of these professional trolls like frito/T-Dub who actually spends money on an anonymizer in order to better troll the world, but this is the first encounter any of us has had with it... rest assured, we have an urgent message out to Ace to ban his IP address (which apparently is in Illinois, not Quebec like it was claiming).

Anyway, we'll try to be better on top of things. Sorry about that.

Thanks,

The Trollbusters

Posted by: TrollBuster at 09:43 PM | Comments (3)
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Global warming is insidious and evil in the worst ways possible. In this case, it has cleverly disguised itself as a never ending winter in northern Canada.

It is the winter that refuses to go away in northern Manitoba and most of the eastern Arctic.

Prolonged cold snowy conditions in the Hudson Bay area are expected to obliterate the breeding season for migratory birds and most other species of wildlife this year.

According to Environment Canada, the spring of 2009 is record-late in the eastern Arctic with virtually 100 per cent snow cover from James Bay north as of June 11.

May temperatures in northern Manitoba were almost four degrees C below the long-term average of -0.7, and in early June, temperatures averaged three degrees below normal.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration images confirm snow and ice blanket all of northern Manitoba, part of northern Ontario and almost all of the eastern Arctic as of June 12. U.S. arieal flight surveys confirm the eastern Arctic has no sign of spring so far...

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 08:59 PM | Add Comment
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Tonight is art appreciation night at the ONT. In order to bring some culture to your lowbrow lives, IÂ’m pleased to present to you a collection of Strange Statues From Around the World.

I suppose itÂ’s safe for work. I mean, its art, right? Gratuitous display of junk if you ask me. The other thing is that none of the statues and installations are captioned to tell you their name or where theyÂ’re located. As if you care anyway.
more...

Posted by: Open Blog at 06:14 PM | Add Comment
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I'm not watching--in fact I'm going to see Transformers--but if any of you poor unfortunate souls are watching, here's a space for your wailing laments.

More [DrewM.]: A brief video from the chairmen of Conservatives for Patients' Rights responding to the President's AMA speech which laid out much of what Obama is talking about tonight.

Posted by: Gabriel Malor at 05:02 PM | Add Comment
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Buzz Aldrin+stupid Snoop Dogg rap song=Awesome

As great as this is and it is great, it's only Aldrin's second biggest hit ever. Number one is below the fold. more...

Posted by: DrewM at 02:32 PM | Add Comment
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Supposedly, a couple of outlets say, he has the votes on the "Assembly of Experts" (an assembly of people who are not experts in anything, except barbaric religious dogma) to remove Khamenei.

But no plan for what comes next.

Big question mark on this one. Huge story, if true.

Posted by: Ace at 01:46 PM | Add Comment
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A few points:

1) He came pretty damn clean. In fact, he's being criticized by many for providing too many details. A guy on FoxNews said this showed poor political judgment. I don't know -- maximum candor may be the best political judgment and avoid the drip-drip-drip, and even if it's not, there's still something of value in maximum candor, anyway.

2) Shep Smith is a lying liberal weenie and people need to stop giving him ratings. All he could squawk about were Sanford's "lies, lies, lies," but, under the circumstances, Sanford told relatively few lies. Yes, he did obviously lie about his whereabouts to staff members, and he did, as he kinda-sorta admitted (while hedging disingenously), intend those staff members to propagate the lie on his behalf.

Still, given the situation, there were relatively few lies told. I mean-- this was a four day scandal, during which he himself was stone silent. The lie told -- maybe repeated a couple of times, but the same lie -- was that he was hiking. And he told that to staffers.

A lie is a lie is a lie, but Shep Smith seems eager to multiply them into the hundreds.

3) Sanford comes off badly when attempting, half-heartedly, to disclaim any attempt at lying or cover-up. He doesn't quite admit this and doesn't quite deny it. Better to just admit the obvious than engage in such a half-hearted attempt at obfuscating. He does this, I imagine, because he doesn't want to invite that comparison with Clinton, that is, the cover-up of the scandal. But in Clinton's case, it was actual a criminal cover-up, so it's already distinguishable, and there's no sense disputing the obvious.

Plus Sanford's thing went on for four days.

4) He spends a lot of time -- too much time for many commentators -- explaining his relationship with his dear, dear friend. I think commentators want the typical playbook call where he disowns the relationship entirely and writes the woman out of his life completely.

He doesn't do that. I think that's because he's in love with her and won't throw her under the bus.

That doesn't make it noble or anything. But the media seems to be expecting him to say "and it's all over now, and a huge mistake," etc., etc., and he doesn't appear nearly willing to say that. The complaint seems to be that Sanford's not saying the typical, Oprah-approved contrition stuff, and they're holding it against him that he's deviating from accepted Contrition Tour form.

I don't know. This seems a silly complaint. Hold it against him for the affair and etc., but not that he's deviating from the damage-control PR checklist.

5) Obviously his presidential chances are over, and likely his governorship, too, although he only has a year left in his term.

His Priorities: Girl Thursday writes:

In his press conference, he seemed more concerned about the mistress than his wife and sons.

I don't know if I'd go that far but that's what I was getting at, too. I don't say it makes it "better." But I think it's clear he's not writing this woman off. I'd say the chances of reconciliation with his wife under such circumstances are very low indeed.

I just mean it makes this different. This doesn't seem to be a fling. He seems in love with her. I don't argue that thinking he's in love makes an affair better, but it seems odd to criticize him according to the usual just-a-fling-type-affair standard, when this doesn't seem to be that.

Update: Brian in New Orleans writes:

His wife released a statement maybe an hour ago saying they had separated two weeks ago when she found out he was having an affair. She told him not to have any contact with her or her children and that's why she didn't know where he was.

I guess that sort of explains his Argentinian getaway. He felt "free," even though he really wasn't free at all.

Love Letters: Emails leaked to the press.

Embarrassing details.

You have a particular grace and calm that I adore. You have a level of sophistication that so fitting with your beauty. I could digress and say that you have the ability to give magnificent gentle kisses, or that I love your tan lines or that I love the curve of your hips, the erotic beauty of you holding yourself (or two magnificent parts of yourself) in the faded glow of the nightÂ’s light - but hey, that would be going into sexual details ...

Three and finally, while all the things above are all too true - at the same time we are in a hopelessly - or as you put it impossible - or how about combine and simply say hopelessly impossible situation of love. How in the world this lightening strike snuck up on us I am still not quite sure. As I have said to you before I certainly had a special feeling about you from the first time we met, but these feelings were contained and I genuinely enjoyed our special friendship and the comparing of all too many personal notes ...

Leaked by whom?

The story says these are from his personal email account.

I can think of only one person, off-hand, who would have likely access to his personal email account and have an interest in exposing the affair.

Of course, it could also be an aide I don't know about.

The fact that someone has these emails sure suggests that the same person tipped the AP to start inquiring as to Sanford's whereabouts.

I think this actually hurts Sanford all the more. I think a lot of people are more forgiving of Clinton-style use-'em-and-lose-'em predations than they are of this guy falling in love.

Plus, a lot of people don't think that a sober, older leader-type should lose his heart and therefore his head at all. It may strike many as extra-special flakey and foolish.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:53 PM | Add Comment
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He appears dead, at least. Uploaded today, but there is no information provided as to where or when it's from.

Light Graphic Violence Warning. A lot of screaming, so turn the speakers down. more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:28 AM | Add Comment
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Whenever we on the right complain about media bias in films, the left hectors us that we're making mountains out of molehills, that we're reading too much into entertainments, that we're obsessive, and that we're actually sometimes even "chilling" the free speech rights of multimillionaire producers, directors, writers and actors.

Interesting, then, how a liberal twit from Variety loses his shit to to see "President Obama" named in the Transformers movie, and portrayed as someone who (quite accurately) is naive enough to believe he can negotiate with villains.

I see... a stealth political message in a popcorn movie suddenly is worth taking seriously and getting snippy about.

Gee, I wonder what caused the sudden reversal of opinion.

Posted by: Ace at 10:37 AM | Comments (1)
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Gibbs say they aren't invited any more.

It doesn't seem that any were planning on coming to begin with, perhaps The One just doesn't like being snubbed. It's hard to tell since things are always so personal with Him, just look at how often he says "I".

Reaganite! [ace] President Obama, aka Johnny Hot-Dogs, actually has finally roused himself to take the bold, dramatic, strong action of a minor diplomatic snubbing.

However, even in this minor bit of "smart diplomacy," Gibbsy makes it sound like it's not a snubbing at all -- it's the Iranians own decision. The decision to rescind, he says, is due to the fact no one RSVP'd.

Even on this, Johnny Hot-Dogs is voting "present." The White House will not say that this is in response to the brutality in Teheran. Quite the opposite. The reason given is the Iranians' own lack of interest in weenie diplomacy.

(Moved from another post to this one.)

Posted by: DrewM at 09:58 AM | Comments (12)
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