• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Republicans do not trust women.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

He really is that stupid.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

If you’re gonna whine, it’s time to resign!

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Giving up is unforgivable.

To the privileged, equality seems like oppression.

This blog will pay for itself.

Text STOP to opt out of updates on war plans.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Everything is totally normal and fine!!!

Trump should be leading, not lying.

“woke” is the new caravan.

We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.

Humiliatingly small and eclipsed by the derision of millions.

Mobile Menu

  • 4 Directions VA 2025 Raffle
  • 2025 Activism
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / z-Retired Categories / Previous Site Maintenance / We Can Sit and Talk and Not Talk For Hours and Still Have Things to Not Talk About

We Can Sit and Talk and Not Talk For Hours and Still Have Things to Not Talk About

by John Cole|  October 1, 20078:17 am| 27 Comments

This post is in: Previous Site Maintenance

FacebookTweetEmail

Consider this your Monday Opener.

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Steelers-Cards Open Thread
Next Post: Good News »

Reader Interactions

27Comments

  1. 1.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 8:23 am

    Free Newt!

  2. 2.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 8:31 am

    This is the 50th anniversary of sputnik.

  3. 3.

    Zifnab

    October 1, 2007 at 8:37 am

    i107.photobucket.com/albums/m306/BearMeat1845/reynold-suck.jpg

  4. 4.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 8:45 am

    I’m starting up a new protest movement for right-wingers.

    Free the Ely Six!

  5. 5.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 8:48 am

    How come the Mainstream Media doesn’t ever talk about how obnoxious environmentalists are? How they abused and tortured the Ely six, forcing them to behave in an anti-social manner?

    The real victims here are the Ely Six, and nature. Environmentalists are anti-environment by their very nature!

  6. 6.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 8:49 am

    OOPS! I SHOULD HAVE UsED more UPPER CASE!

  7. 7.

    Punchy

    October 1, 2007 at 8:53 am

    Riddle me this:

    $oil/barrel — $65, gallon gas $3.20+ (May)

    $oil/barrel — $82, gallon gas $2.55 (today)

    WTF?

  8. 8.

    Evinfuilt

    October 1, 2007 at 8:58 am

    $oil/barrel—$65, gallon gas $3.20+ (May)

    $oil/barrel—$82, gallon gas $2.55 (today)

    Refineries finally caught up with capacity due to the stable Gulf this summer.

    Our high prices had nothing to do with cost or supply. We just couldn’t turn it into gas and truck it all around the country.

    It only took them what 2 or 3 years since they said they were behind for them to catch up.

  9. 9.

    Xenos

    October 1, 2007 at 9:01 am

    Refiner capacity is the key, not the cost of crude.

    Whether that refinement capacity problem is due to overzealous environmentalists, or due to oil companies not wanting to make the investment to build new refineries since they see peak oil coming, is an interesting question. I have little insight on the subject, and I doubt anyone else here does, either.

  10. 10.

    Punchy

    October 1, 2007 at 9:06 am

    Our high prices had nothing to do with cost or supply. We just couldn’t turn it into gas and truck it all around the country.

    Capacity schmacity. I understand this has a role, but I find it impossible to believe that when your main raw material cost goes up 26%, that your product can go down 20%. I fail to understand how this isn’t manipulated.

  11. 11.

    whippoorwill

    October 1, 2007 at 9:11 am

    7 Responses to “We Can Sit and Talk and Not Talk For Hours and Still Have Things to Not Talk About”

    Sounds like Rummispeak to me, and it’s way too early on a Monday morning for that. Anywho, I wonder how the hippies up in Taos are treating the former commandant. I bet they got him feeding on Tofu and birdseed burgers while relaxing to Hearts of Space. A strange brew indeed.

  12. 12.

    Zifnab

    October 1, 2007 at 9:13 am

    Whether that refinement capacity problem is due to overzealous environmentalists, or due to oil companies not wanting to make the investment to build new refineries since they see peak oil coming, is an interesting question.

    I can tell you right now, with a father in the oil business and having applied for a number of positions at oil companies in college, it’s the latter far more than the former.

    One of the companies I applied to was running around and buying up old refineries just because it was so much cheaper than building new ones. The main reason is that refineries only begin turning a profit after 10-15 years. In 10-15 years, we probably won’t be turning crude oil into gasoline as our primary source of energy.

    Environmentalists have a hand in it too, but only because they won’t let oil companies build on the cheap. If you’ve got to build a refinery that isn’t going to explode or fall apart in 10 years anyway, its harder to make said refinery profitable. But environmental concerns are just one factor in a rather large equation.

  13. 13.

    John Cole

    October 1, 2007 at 9:25 am

    Sounds like Rummispeak to me

    It is from a movie.

  14. 14.

    John S.

    October 1, 2007 at 9:33 am

    $oil/barrel—$65, gallon gas $3.20+ (May)

    $oil/barrel—$82, gallon gas $2.55 (today)

    Aside from the standard explanation regarding refinery capacity and supply-side economics, the obvious answer is that the price is rigged more than a Diebold voting machine.

  15. 15.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 9:52 am

    Not a single one of you are talking about the Ely Six.

    Proof positive that you’re all racists! Sure, free the Jena boys, but don’t champion the Ely Six because they are white.

  16. 16.

    Zifnab

    October 1, 2007 at 9:58 am

    But Olson’s attorney, David Keegan, of Duluth, said of his client: “He’s a lifelong Ely resident who lettered in hockey, football and baseball, and he’s in his second year of college. There’s more to him than what’s been portrayed.”

    Piragis, who knows Olson, echoed that sentiment: “Two of the boys are in college, one comes from an established family with an uncle on the school board, and [the 16-year-old] is a very, very intelligent young man. You hate to see such promising young people put away forever.

    This is what our educational institutions are doing to our brave, capable, intelligent young men! If not for liberal Universities, this never would have happened. :-p

  17. 17.

    demimondian

    October 1, 2007 at 10:05 am

    It’s actually about refinery output balance. There’s a tradeoff between gasoline (light petroleum fractions) and diesel fuel (heavy fractions). When capacity is low, it’s possible to shift the balance one way or the other — and, yes, manipulate the price — to meet demand. Right now, the capacity in the petro market is sufficient, and supply is stable; the result is that fuel prices are down.

  18. 18.

    whippoorwill

    October 1, 2007 at 10:06 am

    It is from a movie.

    Was Rumsfeld in a movie?

  19. 19.

    whippoorwill

    October 1, 2007 at 10:25 am

    Was Rumsfeld in a movie?

    just kidding, John

  20. 20.

    Pb

    October 1, 2007 at 11:02 am

    The largest components in the price of a gallon of gas are: the cost of oil, taxes, and the refining costs; also in there are advertising and the station mark-up, but these are tiny. So:

    A barrel of oil is 42 gallons; using your other numbers: 65/42 = ~$1.55; 3.20-1.55 = $1.65. 82/42 = ~$1.95; 2.55-1.95 = $0.60.

    Adding in federal and state taxes averages to about 42 cents; let’s round it up to 50 cents for advertising and station mark-up.

    Therefore, refining costs would have gone from $1.15 a gallon down to $0.10 a gallon — I’m not buying it, something is very wrong there.

  21. 21.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 11:05 am

    Free the Ely Six!

    Free Newt!

  22. 22.

    Dave in ME

    October 1, 2007 at 11:06 am

    Ahmadinejad owns Bush’s ass:

    (AP) — TEHRAN, Iran – After being welcomed in New York with protests and a scolding from the president of Columbia University, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is extending an invitation to President Bush. Ahmadinejad tells Iranian state television that if Bush plans to travel to Iran, he’s welcome to make a speech at an Iranian university.

  23. 23.

    D-Chance.

    October 1, 2007 at 11:17 am

    The conservatives won’t wait a Friedman Unit to attack Tom on this, I’d guess…

    Times columnists are not allowed to endorse candidates, but there’s no rule against saying who will not get my vote: I will not vote for any candidate running on 9/11. We don’t need another president of 9/11. We need a president for 9/12. I will only vote for the 9/12 candidate.

    What does that mean? This: 9/11 has made us stupid. I honor, and weep for, all those murdered on that day. But our reaction to 9/11 — mine included — has knocked America completely out of balance, and it is time to get things right again.

    It is not that I thought we had new enemies that day and now I don’t. Yes, in the wake of 9/11, we need new precautions, new barriers. But we also need our old habits and sense of openness. For me, the candidate of 9/12 is the one who will not only understand who our enemies are, but who we are.

    Let the fun begin.

  24. 24.

    Phillip J. Birmingham

    October 1, 2007 at 12:03 pm

    I would pay CASH MONEY to see drunken squirrels on a shooting spree.

  25. 25.

    The Other Steve

    October 1, 2007 at 1:22 pm

    We don’t need another president of 9/11. We need a president for 9/12. I will only vote for the 9/12 candidate.

    What’s this got to do with the victimization of the Ely six?

  26. 26.

    YellowJournalism

    October 1, 2007 at 9:33 pm

    It is from a movie.

    Only one of the best movies ever!

    “She looks like a cocktail waitress on an oil rig.”

    “I know a man with a van, and he’ll take you back to wherever you came from!!!”

    “And to think, in some countries these dogs would be eaten.”

Comments are closed.

Trackbacks

  1. Balloon Juice says:
    October 1, 2007 at 11:51 am

    […] Yeah, this story is a silly trifle, but that’s ok. We live to serve. Treat this as another open thread. […]

Primary Sidebar

On The Road - lashonharangue - Costa Rica - Part 3 5
Image by lashonharangue (12/7/25)

2026 Pets of Balloon Juice Calendar

PLEASE REVIEW YOUR INFO ASAP

Recent Comments

  • Kristine on Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Desert Yardscaping (Dec 7, 2025 @ 4:13pm)
  • jonas on Tom Stoppard, High-Culture Influencer (Dec 7, 2025 @ 4:09pm)
  • HopefullynotCassandra on Cold Grey Dawn Open Thread: One Hopes for An Extinction Burst (Dec 7, 2025 @ 4:00pm)
  • Scout211 on Tom Stoppard, High-Culture Influencer (Dec 7, 2025 @ 3:56pm)
  • glc on Tom Stoppard, High-Culture Influencer (Dec 7, 2025 @ 3:49pm)

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
On Artificial Intelligence (7-part series)

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Balloon Juice Mailing List Signup

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix
Rose Judson (podcast)

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2025 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!