September 25, 2016

Nuclear power increases global warming

http://commondreams.org/views/2016/09/23/how-nuclear-power-causes-global-warming

September 23, 2016

If you haven't read Drew Magary's Trump rant, do yourself a favor

probably the best anti-Trump rant I've seen.

http://www.gq.com/story/a-word-for-donald-trump-voters

None of this is surprising, of course. Trump is a liar and a crook, and he commits abominable acts at such a frenetic pace that they get lost in the fury surrounding whatever horrible thing he does next. Keith Olbermann needed over 17 minutes on this site just to list a fraction of the atrocities Trump has staged during election season, and he’s gonna need 17 more minutes to cover what happens between now and Election Day. Remember when Trump said he would get rid of food regulations? That was Thursday.

Regardless, in the end, people are still gonna vote for this man. Maybe not enough to get him elected, but still: it’ll be in the tens of millions. (Note to the people causing the polls to fluctuate: What the fuck is wrong with you? I gotta meet the five percent of people who saw Hillary come down with pneumonia and were like, “Forget her, gimme the dictator with dryer lint hair.”) Nothing that Trump says, no damning piece of Trump reportage, and certainly no opinion piece like this one will stop his voters from pulling the lever. Nor will anything stop Trump from being the officious, braindead goon that he is. He will never answer for his crimes, and there’s a frighteningly large portion of the electorate that will always love him for that.

And so I’d just like to say to that portion of the electorate: Fuck you. No, seriously. Go fuck yourselves. I’m not gonna waste any more time trying to convince you that you’re about to do something you’ll regret forever. I’m not gonna show you old clips of Trump saying rotten things. I’m not gonna try to ANNIHILATE Trump by showing you records of his hypocrisy and greed. I’m not gonna link to a John Oliver clip and be like, “THIS. So much this.” Nothing’s gonna take down Trump at this point, so I’m not gonna bother. No no, this post is for ME. I am preaching to the sad little choir in my soul here.

Because while Trump is a miserable bastard, YOU are the people who have handed him the bullhorn. YOU are the people willing to embarrass this nation and put it on the brink of economic ruin all because you wanna throw an electoral hissy fit. YOU are the people who want to revolutionize the way America does business by voting for its worst businessman, a disgusting neon pig who only makes money when he causes problems for other people instead of solving them. YOU are the thin-skinned yokels who clutch your bandoliers whenever someone hurls the mildest of slurs at you (“deplorables”), while cheering Trump on as he leaves a bonfire of truly hateful invective everywhere he goes. YOU are the people willing to overlook the fact that Trump is an unqualified, ignorant sociopath because DURRRR HILLARY IS BAD TOO DURRRR.

September 23, 2016

The Most Deplorable Thing Trump Has Done Yet | The Closer with Keith Olbermann

September 23, 2016

Trump wants to stop and frisk and confiscate guns

I heard a clip of Trump on the radio where he was talking about doing "stop and frisk" in Chicago, because of all the murders-- his idea is they basically should just randomly stop people and take their guns away.

How does that possibly fit with his strong supporter of the Second Amendment and gun rights?

Not to mention there's the whole constitutional right against unreasonable searches and seizures.



Obviously the underlying idea is this will only happen to black people, so it's ok for him and his supporters. But fuck. It's just insane.

September 22, 2016

Nate Silver says I should be nervous about the election. Here’s why I’m not too nervous.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/09/22/nate-silver-says-i-should-be-nervous-about-the-election-heres-why-im-not-too-nervous/?utm_term=.741dea4ab14b

There are a few additional factors that make me even more confident about a Clinton victory:

1. Contra Trump’s claims that he will change the map by bringing out lots of new voters, none of the data I have seen suggests that this is true. There’s no hidden “reserve army” of Trump supporters in places such as Connecticut or Oregon.

2. Although Trump has surged in places such as Ohio and Florida, recent polling in crucial swing states for Clinton’s bare-minimum electoral path to 270 continue to show her with a comfortable margin of victory.

3. I’m assuming that Clinton’s vastly superior ground game and data operation will give her a boost of one to three percentage points above the polling averages, which could make the difference in places such as North Carolina, Florida and Ohio.

4. The last major moment endogenous to the campaign, when Trump can overtake Clinton, is the debates. And I think Clinton’s extensive debating experience, combined with her recent one-on-one debates with Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, leaves her far better prepared than Trump.

Really good piece from Dan Drezner with some interesting points. Of course, what he doesn't say exactly, is that Clinton wants people to think it's a close race, in order to keep supporters and on the fence voters complacent.

September 22, 2016

Does anyone understand the idea of pressure cooker bombs?

I don't quite get how the pressure cooker helps. If anything, a tight fitting pot would seem to dampen the blast. The homemade explosives aren't that powerful, are they? Just wondering if anyone else understands the "science" behind this. I don't really want to go searching around online for this.

September 21, 2016

WWII was not a "just war"

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2016/09/world-war-two-not-just-war.html#more-61336

World War II is often called “the good war,” and has been since the U.S. war on Vietnam to which it was then contrasted. World War II so dominates U.S. and therefore Western entertainment and education, that “good” often comes to mean something more than “just.” The winner of the “Miss Italy” beauty pageant earlier this year got herself into a bit of a scandal by declaring that she would have liked to live through World War II. While she was mocked, she was clearly not alone. Many would like to be part of something widely depicted as noble, heroic, and exciting. Should they actually find a time machine, I recommend they read the statements of some actual WWII veterans and survivors before they head back to join the fun. For purposes of this book, however, I am going to look only at the claim that WWII was morally just.

No matter how many years one writes books, does interviews, publishes columns, and speaks at events, it remains virtually impossible to make it out the door of an event in the United States at which you’ve advocated abolishing war without somebody hitting you with the what-about-the-good-war question. This belief that there was a good war 75 years ago is a large part of what moves the U.S. public to tolerate dumping a trillion dollars a year into preparing in case there’s a good war next year,[ii] even in the face of so many dozens of wars during the past 70 years on which there’s general consensus that they were not good. Without rich, well-established myths about World War II, current propaganda about Russia or Syria or Iraq or China would sound as crazy to most people as it sounds to me. And of course the funding generated by the Good War legend leads to more bad wars, rather than preventing them. I’ve written on this topic at great length in many articles and books, especially War Is A Lie.[iii] But I’ll offer here a few key points that ought to at least place a few seeds of doubt in the minds of most U.S. supporters of WWII as a Just War.

September 20, 2016

Trump sexual assault victim speaks out

&feature=youtu.be

September 17, 2016

how many people are losing sleep over the thought of Trump winning?

I know I am. I can't stand to see what this country has come to, and how simply awful this man is. I'm not even sure I can imagine the extent of the dystopian state we would be in, if he was sworn in as president.

September 15, 2016

Trump wants to "eliminate" food safety regulations

http://thehill.com/regulation/healthcare/296152-trump-says-he-would-eliminate-food-safety-regulations

In a fact sheet Thursday, the campaign highlighted a number of "specific regulations to be eliminated" under the GOP nominee's economic plan, including what they called the "FDA Food Police."

“The FDA Food Police, which dictate how the federal government expects farmers to produce fruits and vegetables and even dictates the nutritional content of dog food,” it read.

“The rules govern the soil farmers use, farm and food production hygiene, food packaging, food temperatures and even what animals may roam which fields and when,” the statement continued. "It also greatly increased inspections of food 'facilities,' and levies new taxes to pay for this inspection overkill.

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Please wake me from this nightmare!!!