Jim Lane
Jim Lane's JournalRight-winger suggests that Obama CAUSED Hurricane Sandy for political ends.
There's an interesting thread at redstate.com about the fiasco of Project ORCA (the Romney campaign's GOTV operation). In the lead piece and the comments, some folks who seem knowledgeable about computer issues describe the multiple failings of the campaign's honchos and hired consultants.
In among the comments is a real gem from wbb1950. He (I'm guessing "he"
begins by disdaining any "conspiracy theory" to explain the election results. He nevertheless sets the groundwork for such a theory, by asking how else one could explain a victory by a president with "a track record of failure in foreign and domestic affairs" against such a credible challenger, and one whom the "credible pollsters" showed to be winning.
We then get 15 numbered paragraphs inviting us to connect the dots. We begin with 2008: McCain was leading in the polls, the financial crash caused him to lose, human beings can cause markets to crash, and Soros did so in Britain in 1992.
Then comes the parallel to 2012:
election. Then came the hurricane Sandy. Thereafter he lost the election.
5. No prior hurricane has devastated all major battleground states to this
degree. ... Was this the long awaited October surprise?
6. Human beings have the ability to manipulate weather patterns. Bush 43
set up project HAARP to generate sand storms in Iraq. Obama has expanded
it.
....
15 Would a mind capable of dropping bombs on a civilian population have
moral compunctions against crashing markets and creating storms to secure
political power?
To their credit, even some of the redstaters mock this notion.
I won't worry about this unless it seems that wbb1950 has gotten wind of our plan for the October 2016 earthquake.
5 signs that Mitt Romney can still win
This Republican isn't just whistling past the graveyard, ignoring unpleasant realities. The article has some serious analysis that any Democrats tending toward complacency should keep in mind: http://theweek.com/article/index/233477/5-signs-that-mitt-romney-can-still-win
Paraphrasing, so I can note all five without overexcerpting:
1. The pollsters' models of the electorate are based on 2008, but this year, black, Latino, and young voters won't turn out in the same numbers.
2. "In many swing states, Obama is polling under 50 percent, and I bet undecideds will go heavily for the challenger."
3. The economy is in bad shape, and if Romney keeps hammering that point, Americans won't re-elect the President.
4. Conservatives are more motivated. This is the most original of the five so I'll quote it in full:
5. A "September swoon" isn't fatal, and Romney has time for a comeback.
As many DUers know, the author could reasonably have added a sixth sign: Many people who tell the pollsters that they'll vote for Obama won't actually do so, despite their best efforts, because of right-wing voter suppression and possible outright fraud with electronic voting.
Question about the movie "Adam"
I recently saw this movie and I'd like to know how far to believe its portrayal of the Aspie title character. His traits fit with what little I know about AS; on the other hand, I don't trust Hollywood to let the facts get in the way of a good story, and it wouldn't surprise me if some things were either hyped or downplayed in the interest of the basic rom-com narrative.
So, what's the community's view of this film?
Multiple Freepers post sensibly (check the temperature in hell).
It occasionally happens that a thread on Free Republic includes one thoughtful and valuable comment (leading to suspicions here that its author will soon be zotted). In this instance, though, we see more than one Freeper who seems to have a few functioning neurons.
Matters begin in typical FR fashion, with a bonehead anti-government harangue in this thread http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2893725/posts (titled "HHS Spends Taxpayer $$$ on....Slavery???" . Freeper Gabrial reports seeing a sign in Houston for an 800 number for reporting instances of slavery to the Department of Health and Human Services. Gabrial objects to this use of tax money. Apparently, Gabrial thinks that slavery ended with the Civil War and subsequent scare-mongering about it is just another librul boondoggle. So far, so normal.
Then things get weird. In the very first response, Freeper muawiyah mentions exploitation of domestic servants and concludes, "So, yes, slavery exists in modern America." Half a dozen other Freepers join in to educate Gabrial about the contemporary problem of human trafficking.
OK, some of them take the opportunity to flog one of their favorite targets, illegal immigration... but still, the whole thread is astonishingly advanced for that lot.
The “explain DU3" experiment failed. Rebooting it...
The Wikipedia article about DU is quite out of date, as it doesn’t reflect the advent of DU3. With this post I solicited Duers’ help in updating it, but only one person ventured into Wikipedia editing. Thanks to him or her, and to Fearless for providing the link that supported that addition.
Trying another approach: The one DUer who contributed there also edited the talk page to add a list of “Some topics to consider including”. It’s a good list. Anyone who wants to tackle one of these items can post a short explanation here, and I’ll incorporate it into the Wikipedia article. This is watered-down help in the sense that you don’t need to include the detailed instruction that you might provide in response to a member's request here for help. It’s just a summary for non-DUers who are curious about our little corner of the Internet.
Here’s the list:
Terms of Service / Community Standards
Self-moderation
* The Host (Including Forum v. Group Host differences)
* Jury Duty / The Jury Process
* The MIR Team
Descriptions of the Main Forums / Groups (including the concept of "Safe Haven Groups"
Return of the DUzy
Differences between DU2 and DU3 / The DU2-DU3 Changeover
Updated popularity statistics (for this item and the next you can see the current state of the article here)
General upgrades to current text quality (specifically on the repetitious Controversies section)
Screen Capture of the Main Page for photo
A bit of legalese for copyright purposes: If you post anything in this thread as a proposed contribution to Wikipedia, then, as per Wikipedia policy, you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License License and the GNU Free Documentation License. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license. What all that means is that I can plug your words into Wikipedia and then other people can copy them elsewhere. I'll credit you by your DU screen name unless you tell me otherwise.
Thanks for any help you can give!
Volunteers wanted: Help explain DU3
The Wikipedia article about DU is out of date in that it doesn't reflect the transition to DU3. (In fact, it's even out of date as to DU2 -- for example, it still lists the Top Ten Conservative Idiots as a current feature.) It needs the help of a few knowledgeable DUers.
Just so no one is worried about accidentally messing up the article while trying to improve it, I've created a temporary spinoff -- a copy of the article within my Wikipedia user page. People can work on that until there's general satisfaction with it, then our new text will become the article.
You can help by going to the spinoff at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JamesMLane/Democratic_Underground. You click on "Edit this page" (that link is along the top and along the left and at the bottom because Wikipedia wants to make it easy for people to find it and improve articles). Make your changes, then click "Save page" under the edit window.
Some things to know:
* The talk page for the article (at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:JamesMLane/Democratic_Underground) can be used to raise questions about how to explain something, to discuss differences of opinion, etc. You can join an existing thread or start a new one with the "New section" link on the left. I've started with some comments about how we might organize the material.
* Be bold in editing pages! This is general Wikipedia policy. You don't need to use the talk page for every change. Go ahead and do what you think ought to be done. Someone who disagrees can undo your change and explain why on the talk page; then we'll all work it out.
* Don't worry about formatting. Basic wiki markup is: Two apostrophes before and after text italicizes it, three apostrophes before and after bolds it, two open brackets before and two close brackets after creates a wikilink to another article -- but I'll be checking the page to fix any formatting foulups, so just focus on the content.
* You don't need to make the article perfect; just make it better. Any edit that improves the article is a step forward, even if it leaves in place defects that you don't have the time or knowledge to fix.
* Registration is optional and free. You don't even have to provide an email address, but if you choose to, you won't be spammed. You can read more about registration at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Tutorial/Registration and, if you choose, register at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:UserLogin. An advantage of registration is that the page history shows the chosen screen name of the editor who made each edit. If you don't register, your IP address will be shown.
Collaborative editing is different from the individualism of DU, but I hope some folks will give it a try so that the article about DU isn't so badly out of date.
Profile Information
Name: Jim LaneGender: Male
Hometown: Jersey City
Member since: Fri Nov 12, 2004, 11:22 AM
Number of posts: 11,175
