Sometime in the hour -- assuming he wasn't already on and I missed him. Which I doubt, because the first 15 minutes is all news, no think-stuff.

Important article.

Kurt Schlicter has argued the same premise.

Update: @rdbrewer tells me the segment had a glitch, and it will appear instead on Fox's website.

Posted by: Ace at 02:16 PM | Comments (110)
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Tonight's episode: Temptation at Lizard Beach.

His cloaca pulsed wetly.

I forget whose gag this is but I think it's @rdbrewer's.

I added the Gay thing because, brilliant. As usual.

Posted by: Ace at 03:18 PM | Comments (135)
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Funny.

via @saintrph & @formerdemintx

Posted by: Ace at 01:32 PM | Comments (209)
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I don't blame them.

I'd want a break from either of 'em myself.

And what will Obama be doing on his Male Company Only vacation?

Why, taking lessons in proper form from a $1000/hr pro.

He'll also be practicing his golf.

Heyyyyy-ooooo!

Posted by: Ace at 01:20 PM | Comments (104)
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Tired of waiting, and not wanting to whine, and not looking for a government handout, a rural Brit area does what was necessary to to get high speed internet.

They did it themselves and started stringing fiber, a lot of fiber. Volunteers. Digging trenches. Burying cable. Making splices. They're selling "shares" in the enterprise too.

OMG, free markets, supply and demand, no government interference, a community banding together to do something real besides bitch and whine. Maybe Britain isn't all washed up after all...at least the rural parts that is.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:34 PM | Comments (254)
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Sexton has a post which appears wonky but the point is simple enough.

Obama set a ratio of $3 in cuts to $1 in tax increases as a "balanced approach." And, by the way, this "balanced approach" was his own opening offer -- not his compromise with Republicans. This is what he claims he set out as his own ideal.

But, as we continue to negotiate, Obama keeps moving the goalposts. Now he only offers two dollars in cuts to one dollar in tax hikes -- and claims this represents a compromise.

A compromise, perhaps, but not with Republicans -- it's a compromise of Obama's own tax-and-spend proposal with the even more tax-and-spend proposals of the hardcore liberal wing of his own party.

We have long contended that Obama....

1. Lies in his public utterances to appear more moderate than he is, whereas, in his confidential political negotiations, reveals himself to be a hardcore liberal.

2. Constantly shifts the goalposts in a left-wing direction, even away from his own public declarations, which were themselves liberal, but not as leftwing as his actual goals.

Well, now we have proof-- We have the actual math of the situation. Obama comes out with a 3:1 opening offer and, in the course of negotiations, moves further to the left (and not to the center) to propose 2:1.

And Republicans are the ones who won't compromise, huh?

Posted by: Ace at 12:40 PM | Comments (227)
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Friends and family say they "weren't shocked at all...
I mean, just look at her"

And you thought our Valentine's Day thread was sick. It was only sick because it was real.

The woman above, Vickie Jo Mills, was sentenced to 2-4 years for poisoning her boyfriend 10-12 times since 2009. She would spike his drinks with eyedrops, which cause nausea, vomiting, and breathing problems when taken orally.

On the other hand, your liver's vision improves to 20/20.

Investigators say Mills said she wanted [her boyfriend] to pay more attention to her.

"I can cure you with my kisses," I guess, the strategy is. Munchausen Syndrome.

Psychiatrists say she did it because, in medical terms, "she's all rotten inside and's got poison in her eggs."

via @libertychick more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:34 AM | Comments (184)
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Well this does not surprise me. The State Of The Union Is......Dumber. Pretty funny that W scored higher than the vaunted Constitutional Law professor. more...

Posted by: CDR M at 06:53 PM | Comments (712)
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In 1954 a German-American psychiatrist named Dr. Frederick Wertham published a book called The Seduction of the Innocent, which claimed that comic books were causing children to become homosexual, promiscuous, delinquent and criminal, and also preoccupied by the occult.

Among his more famous theses was the claim that Batman and his young ward Robin lived out the perfect homosexual fantasy together at Wayne Manor, a hawk and his chicken, with no women around and lots of spelunking in secret caves.*

The book caused a Moral Panic -- what would America be without its frequent stupid moral panics? -- and resulted in the near-death of the comic book industry. The industry had to create a "voluntary" comic code to forestall Congress from legislating one; out the window were a hundred things useful to storytelling, even words like "terror" and even concepts like the undead.

Marvel retired its long running Dracula and monster-themed comics due to this*; I think EC comics -- the Tales from the Crypt guys -- wound up getting really hurt. William Gaines was the one who suggested the "voluntary" comic code within the industry; but then he got more than he bargained for.

Gaines called a meeting of his fellow publishers and suggested that the comic book industry gather to fight outside censorship and help repair the industry's damaged reputation. They formed the Comics Magazine Association of America and its Comics Code Authority. The CCA code expanded on the ACMP's restrictions. Unlike its predecessor, the CCA code was rigorously enforced, with all comics requiring code approval prior to their publication. This not being what Gaines intended, he refused to join the association.[13] Among the Code's new rules were that no comic book title could use the words "horror" or "terror" or "weird" on its cover. When distributors refused to handle many of his comics, Gaines ended publication of his three horror and the two SuspenStory titles on September 14, 1954.

Since comic books titled precisely with the words "horror," "terror," and "weird" were Gaines' stock in trade, he really lost out there. His company wouldn't have survived, except for... Mad magazine. Fortunately, "mad" (insane) was still permitted.

The new news is this: While Wertham's various speculations and interpretations have always been ridiculous (and ridiculed), it now turns out he faked his research, too.

He claimed he'd documented case-studies of Superman (a "fascist," in Wertham's estimation) and Batman (a gay fascist) causing all sorts of bad behavior in children.

But he lied. Yet another guy who wanted to control (and also wanted notoriety, status, and money) and wasn't at all scrupulous about his methods.

Although there have been persistent concerns about the clinical evidence Wertham used as the basis for Seduction, his sources were made widely available only in 2010. This paper documents specific examples of how Wertham manipulated, overstated, compromised, and fabricated evidence—especially that evidence he attributed to personal clinical research with young people—for rhetorical gain.

...

For example, in “Seduction,” Wertham links “Batman” comic books to the case of a 13-year-old boy on probation and receiving counseling for sexual abuse of another boy: “Like many other homo-erotically inclined children, he was a special devotee of Batman: ‘Sometimes I read them over and over again. … It could be that Batman did something with Robin like I did with the younger boy.’ ”

What Tilley found in Wertham’s notes, however, was that the boy preferred “Superman,” “Crime Does Not Pay” and “war comics” over “Batman,” and that he had previously been sexually assaulted by the other boy – all information that Wertham left out.

Wertham was right about one thing -- Wonder Woman's creator was preoccupied with sexual bondage, and frequently depicted Wonder Woman (or other women) in bondage because he really got his kicks from it. The creator later admitted it.

He was a weird cat. On other hand, he lived with two women, polyamorously, so he got some things right.

He also invented one component of the modern polygraph. That's why his fantasy heroine has that stupid lariat of truth, which is like the dumbest super power in all of comics (Aquaman laughs at it). This lariat of truth just happens to wrap around your torso just like the chest-expansion measuring cord in a polygraph.

And is also good for bondage. It's really hot when Wonder Woman wraps that lariat around another woman -- say, a busty one, in a black leather coat -- and compels the Bad Girl to tell her darkest secrets.

Write what you love, love what you write.

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Loophole: Eddie Willers writes:

Mad didn't have to conform to the Comics Code. It was printed on bigger paper than most comic books, and was black and white, so it was considered a magazine rather than a comic book.

Hm! Maybe they defined that way because they were skull-f***ing Gaines' other magazines, I mean, his other comics.

* The "Aunt Harriet" character was introduced, IIRC, precisely to address this claim. But I don't know how much a frumpy 60-year-old matron actually Heterosexes Up Wayne Manor. Having two unrelated men of vastly different ages with Secret Lives and a very Secret Pasttime having to employ Funny Misdirections and Evasions to Hide Their Shame from an older woman with more conventional ideas about life (including the idea gentlemen should stop galavanting around and get married to proper girls)... pretty sure this makes things more gay, not less.

I mean, you're one George Peppard short of Truman Capote romp, aren't you?

Thankfully, they dropped this character when the Gay Coast was clear.

** Marvel has a bunch of stupid characters with the basic template: He has vampire powers, but he's not a vampire, he's a mutant with vampirish powers.

Or: She has the power of witchcraft, but it's not really witchcraft and she's not really a witch; she's a mutant, with the mutant power to control witchcraft. (What?)

I think these characters were created (or retconned, post-creation) to backdoor monsters and magic back into the books, but with the shiny new Perfectly Scientific Explanation That's Not Occult In Any Way explanation attached.

Posted by: Ace at 10:38 AM | Comments (368)
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I wrote yesterday about the transfer of power between Lautenberg and Booker, cracking that a smooth transfer of noble power had been executed, with the Signet Ring and Senatorial Scepter to be formally transferred at St. John's sometime round next Hallows.

Nancy Pelosi helps make this point.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday that she opposes a cut in congressional pay because it would diminish the dignity of lawmakers' jobs.

"I don't think we should do it; I think we should respect the work we do," Pelosi told reporters in the Capitol. "I think it's necessary for us to have the dignity of the job that we have rewarded."

Several points on the words used:

"Respect." She insists, straight off, on respect. Respect is, in a democratic, egalitarian system, not demanded and not owed due to status, but rather freely conferred due to achievement. Lady Pelosi demands "respect" not for Congress' performance -- the threat of a pay cut arises entirely due to its failure to perform -- but simply because the Status of Congressmen grants it.

It doesn't. Not in America.

"We." "I think we should respect the work we do." I can't help but note that this first "we" in this sentence, first person plural, is being used in a rather odd sense, second personal plural, you. That's not the same use as the Royal We, but we have seen these games with pronouns before, and We Are Not Amused.

"It's necessary." Aristocrats are fond of conceiving of their unearned and unwarranted privilege as being "necessary" for the smooth functioning of society; when their privileges are questioned, they don't say "But I like my unearned privileges," they instead claim that their privileges somehow better the lives of the peons. You see, they're not being selfish; they're thinking of the soft-brained illiterates on whose behalf they labor so heroically.

The lower lot, you see, need the structure of a society with firm strata so they can know their place. And thus they need those in the upper strata to have these privileges. It's necessary. She's just thinking about the common man, you know. That's all Lady Nancy ever thinks about.

"Dignity." Dignity is related to dignified, which expressly once meant-- and still does mean -- "having the air of a dignity," that is, of a worthy person whose worthiness is conferred by official position within a society.

And "dignity" itself comes from the feudal system:

early 13c., from Old French dignite "dignity, privilege, honor," from Latin dignitatem (nom. dignitas) "worthiness," from dignus "worth (n.), worthy, proper, fitting"

And while I can't prove the etymology, I'd posit dignity is related to the word "distinction" -- as in a badge of honor (as given on the battlefield) or, in the case of the nobility, the social investiture of superiority in a class.

"Rewarded." But you haven't been "rewarded" a perpetual gift; you've instead been hired for a job, a job in which the employers may see fit to increase and -- note this well -- decrease your compensation, depending on your performance. Lady Nancy, however, sees it as the former.

It should be noted that in previous centuries offices were purchased and carried with them benefits. For example, a rich-but-untitled nobleman in France could purchase some office -- say, Postal Inspector General -- and that office carried with it certain privileges otherwise restricted to the nobility.

This idea of perpetual gifts -- once Knighted, you cannot be unknighted, short of treason -- is entirely anti-American. We do not "reward" our civil servants, as Louis Capet did, with permanent social position and "dignities." We give them jobs -- at which they serve at our pleasure -- with the terms of employment changeable by the employer.

This is exactly what distinguishes a class position from a job -- you can lose your job, you can have your pay cut. You are not entitled to the job; you haven't been rewarded it, you've been hired for a hitch.

It is necessary for social fluidity that not only can people advance in status, but that they can also decline in status. If a status, once attained, cannot be lost -- even for nonperformance of the job that brought it -- then it's not a job, it's a 17th-century royal office sold on the open market to the second sons of noblemen, like a colonelcy.

Back in the day, the military office of colonel was in fact freely sold. One bought a "colonelcy." The aristocrat just had to pay the crown and pay to equip the troops under his command, and bang, with no actual military background or ability to lead men into battle, he became a colonel. With all the "dignities" that office came with.

Conservatives are the retrograde ones? And Lady Pelosi, pronouncing upon her dignities, rewards, and Right to Rule, is the progressive?

Pull the other one.

Posted by: Ace at 09:27 AM | Comments (415)
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