Postulate: Purposeless fun fact, Superman Returns cost more than ten times as much to make as the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Resource Center has raised since 2002.
Response: In all fairness, at least 10 times as many people stood up and walked out of Superman Returns than ever have from the Paralysis Center.
2.
ET
I think you should have posted a pet picture to get the masses talking. Otherwise it’s like listening to crickets.
3.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
This is good news for McCain!
4.
asiangrrlMN
If you go Galt, John, then the Galters have won.
P.S. I second the pictures of pets request. I can haz Tunch, plees?
5.
Englischlehrer
I had 2 three-hour classes of Business English today, about 20 students ranging from ages 20-27. Some of them make my job easier, some more difficult, some more interesting, some more picturesque. I wrote on the board for both classes “Speak English or Die!” and of course there was still German being spoken in the speaking exercise. I can only be the language nazi (a term i have used a few times in classes over the years) so much, this is their chance to speak English and make mistakes without embarrassing themselves in a real, business setting.
In terms of other news, the Germans on the whole are thrilled at the idea of Obama, even though they can talk about some of his problems without emotion. They are, however, jaded some of them, thinking that Americans will be in Iraq and Afghanistan forever and I cant argue with them.
The American Newspapers class is slowly but surely catching on, they were able to list 7-10 of the biggest news stories from the past week, and some of them are following your blog. Keep up the good work.
I have a couple of questions for a follower of the main lefty blogs but somehow missed some slang i want to know
1)freep
2)the origins of “teh” for the
3)Burkean bells
4)wingnut (I know what it means but how it came to be
Also, John, when was your breaking moment with the Republicans? What do you miss about them?
Drink some great beer, eat some great food, watch a bunch of movies, then come back and tell us all just how stupid we are. We’ll be waiting for the abuse, you know we can’t live without it.
“I have a couple of questions for a follower of the main lefty blogs but somehow missed some slang i want to know
1)freep”
Freep is short for Free Republic, a conservative website known for finding online polls and getting all of their members to vote on the conservative side. So when DKos says to freep a poll, it means to go there and vote up the liberal side.
8.
schrodinger's cat
Request fur Tunch photos thirded. Plz we needs our weekly dose of Tunch. Meanwhile here is blog topic that is not related to politics: yodeling kittehs. You can try this on Tunch and report the findings over BJ if you survive the experience.
“If you want to see the Pittsburgh Steelers, invite us when we don’t win the Super Bowl,” he told Pittsburgh’s WTAE-TV. “So as far as I’m concerned he would have invited Arizona if they had won.”
This is just an old Internet meme. Lots of people make that typo, and now it’s picked up overtones of being the kind of thing that an overexcited newbie would say.
4)wingnut (I know what it means but how it came to be)
I’ve always assumed that it’s a contraction from “right wing nut” or “left wing nut”.
15.
SGEW
Ooo. I can answer some of these:
1)freep
From “Free Republic,” a particularly nutjob right-wing site with remarkably virulent posters referred to as “freepers” (self-described, I believe).
2)the origins of “teh” for the
From typos, a la pwn (a typo of “own”) or sprinkling the number 1 amongst excessive exclamation marks (from accidentally failing to hold down the shift key).
3)Burkean bells
From right here (DougJ’s own creation, iirc). Ringing the bells of Sir Edmund Burke, one of the founders of so-called “conservatism,” as an answer to all of society’s ills. N.B.: this has nothing to do with the sublime versus the beautiful.
4)wingnut (I know what it means but how it came to be)
From “Right Wing Nut Job” and its variants, methinks.
Also, John, when was your breaking moment with the Republicans?
Terry Schiavo.
What do you miss about them?
I cannot answer for Mr. Cole, but I would suspect “moral certainty.”
[edit: should’ve known others would get in answers before I could type out mine.]
16.
asiangrrlMN
@RobRob: ‘Meh’ is like ‘eh, whatever’, but with more emphasis. Coincidentally, those are also my initials.
@John Cole: Ha! You still got it, John. Don’t ever change (too much).
Well that makes you a typical Democrat. We hate each other, but less than we hate Republicans. The real test, of course, is how much you hate yourself. Self loathing is worth its weight in gold.
And, you have nothing to say? Pfeh. We get up and comment every day, with nothing to say, and go ahead and say it anyway. It’s what you can do with real adversity that determines character. Stop whinging.
Just kidding. Enjoy some time off.
24.
SGEW
@flukebucket: Night Watch, without a doubt. But pretty much every single one is a winner.
If you would have called us all idiots I would have had to break out the smokes.
26.
Laura W
Bleh feh meh is how I like to use it.
But I’m verbose.
27.
Brick Oven Bill
On my road trip, I passed a line of 14 windmills. Of these two were spinning. A very sharp friend of mine asked me about this topic coincidently two days later. He asked me (paraphrasing):
“If the wind is constant, why are only a certain number of windmills spinning?”
The reason for this is that resistance to rotation is provided by the generator that the windmill spins. The resistance is generated by running current around the generator’s magnet. Remember that electricity is generated by moving a conductor through a magnetic field. The magnetic field is made stronger by running current around the magnet.
So my answer for my friend was that the windmills that were stationary were attempting to generate power, and those that were spinning were either freewheeling, generating no power, or maybe generating very little power.
1)to us idiots, how can I put the blue links into the word. I see some stuff here in the Leave a Reply section but I am too stupid to see.
ex. my blog is jasonconga.wordpress.com how can i type my blog but have it blue with the link built into it?
2)and how do the RSS feeds work?
3)Do you think Obama is so clever to bring the other mechanisms of government into the fold in terms of the torture memos released and prosecutions? It is so hard to know if it is politically shrewd or just shrewd or just what…
4)What about an occasional recipe thread, like one key ingredient, like broccoli or something and then have people post recipes with broccoli?
all right, i think i am taking advantage of the spirit of the thread…
34.
Brick Oven Bill
I stand corrected ThymeZoneThePlumber. I should have stated that the 12 of 14 stationary windmills were either trying to generate power, were broken, or were otherwise not functional. This would have been a more complete statement.
Thank you for the clarification.
35.
pandera
Being that all three of you (from what I’ve gathered) are scientists – why is there never any discussion of atheism and the entertaining atheism brouhahas that crop up so often? …just wondering.
This is why RINOs have to go. They will not listen. They don’t want to listen. The left and the country clubs are one in the same.
yes, i know when i want some groovy left-talk, i head for the country club.
37.
bago
@Brick Oven Bill: Wait. You’re saying the wind might be as fickle as the blowing wind? You’re blowing my fucking mind. Next, you might want to describe the clarity that insight had. Perhaps using the metaphor describing the difference betwixt night and day.
Being offline does not mean broken, or not functioning. It means offline. There are a variety of reasons for it. And of course, wind speed is the biggie. Some units will be configured to be dormant at higher wind speeds than others, for various reasons. The pitch of the blades is set to make the blades “feather” into the wind and not turn the machine. Not unlike an airplane propeller.
If you would spend 15 minutes talking to somebody who actually owns and operates a wind turbine, you might learn something. Of course, you would have to shut up to make the experiment work.
39.
Comrade Stuck
I have nothing to say and need a break. Think I might unplug for a few days.
Well, you could do like me, and murder your computer, as I am now typing from the county library with 7 minutes left on my hour. It wasn’t really murder, and was more like negligent computercide by an idiot with a screwdriver.
The interweb builds up in the brain however, and it has been nice having that clear away and actually do other stuff. Of course, now all my info comes from cable news which has it’s own corrosive effects. Well, times up, and some lady is staring at me to GTF off her computer.
40.
asiangrrlMN
@bago: No. That is just wrong to do to Fry and Laurie.
@Englischlehrer:
1. In the Leave a Reply area, do you see a space for Website under “Name” and “Mail”? Type your site in there, and I assume your name will come up blue.
As for the rest of your questions, I have no answers.
Rachel Maddow Ezra Klein now spinning at Washington Post.
all countries, incidentally, with higher life expectancies than our own)
Does that take into account the shorter life expectancies of the US’ larger black and Hispanic communities?
Or is it like progressive favorite US infant mortality rate statistic that just ignores it.
42.
Brick Oven Bill
Bago also makes a good point that the wind is fickle. This is why 90% of European wind generation capacity has to be backed up by on-line conventional sources of electricity, operating in an inefficient manner. This is why windmills have a negative net effect on ‘greenhouse gases’, after their production and maintenance aspects are taken into effect.
Federal subsidies for wind is $23.44/MWh. This is because wind cannot compete economically, just as they cannot compete with an argument of reduced emissions, which is a whole different hoax.
1) To make a clicky link, you use the “Ext. Link” button. It will pop up a dialog box where you can enter your link. When you’re done with the text that you want link, you push it again to close the tag. Alternately, you type the text where you want the link to appear, highlight it, and then click the “Ext. Link” button. Note, though, that the crappy preview system here doesn’t display a comment correctly if it has more than one link.
2) RSS feeds work if you have a feed reader. I’m not sure what to use if you’re working in Windows, since I only use them under Linux. The basic idea, though, is that you copy the RSS feed address into your reader, which then goes out and checks periodically if there is anything new. They’re great if you want to follow a bunch of blogs.
Wind generation was never intended to replace all the other ways to generate power, Bill. It’s a supplemental kind of power product, really.
On a typical wind generator farm, the machines are operated by various parties, who may buy or lease the equipment, sometimes as partnerships or cooperatives. There could be many different business models in effect on a wind farm from one machine to another.
Some machines be configured to produce power only during peak wind periods, or have different algorithms set to measure and gauge the likely behavior of the wind over periods of time, at different times of the day, at different times of the year. The particular model in use for one machine may be based on minimizing maintenance costs and only selling power at optimum times, whereas another may choose to produce power even during suboptimum times, following a different business model, and the two machines may sit next to each other on the same farm.
You really don’t know a fucking thing about this, do you?
45.
SGEW
All teh trolls have come out to play today!
46.
Bad Horse's Filly
I’m fourth in line (I think) for more pet pictures, especially Tunch. I think unplugging is a great idea. I was forced to by 4 weeks of relentless work and it actually felt great. I’m back, but with less tension around it all. Obama seems to have things well in hand and doesn’t seem to need my snarky input on various subjects.
And I, too would feel better if you called us all ignorant fuckheads again. xo
47.
South of I-10
Since this seems to be open thread question day, can someone tell me why my 2002 Honda Civic is intermittently stalling? Last time it stalled on me while driving down the road (luckily in a neighborhood). Will stall, run rough for a few minutes and then run normally. I don’t think my mechanic wants to touch it. “Bring it in when you are experiencing the problem,” he says. Maybe I should call him when I stall in the middle of a busy intersection, he can come pick me up and check out my car! Not cool, I am driving around with a 4 year old most of the time. I don’t actually expect any answers, but I do feel better having bitched about it.
yes, because including figures for black and hispanic life expectancies gives a misleading impression of overall American life expectancies. Just like including black people in polls about Obama distorts the picture of what Americans think about him overall.
Strangely, nobody ever wants to screen racist fucks out of the “overall American” population.
49.
JL
@Alan: This might be the first time that I agreed with a commenter from HotAir
– I’m completely FOR Palin running as an independent Conservative just to PROVE to the GOP elites they suck that bad.
I would phrase it differently though, Run Sarah Run!
4)What about an occasional recipe thread, like one key ingredient, like broccoli or something and then have people post recipes with broccoli?
Yeah, well, be careful what you ask for there. Search the archives under FOOD. You’ll find plenty. And then you’ll find posts like this one that were not intended to turn into food wars but somehow, lots of people had opinions on cilantro last November. Yawn. The fascination factor there was second only to the lengthy condiment thread in which BOB blew many minds by asserting that pickles could be left out and did not require chilling. (I think that was his assertion?)
I will say that thanks to this blog I have learned to not only prepare brussels sprouts to perfection, but also to love them. I just had left over, frozen, steam-in-the-bag BS (ha) for lunch, and have a bag of fresh ones in there to saute tonight with GINGER, garlic, sweet onion and yellow squash.
I like to think my one small contribution to this riveting topic has been KALE.
First thing I would say is that you need a new mechanic.
You might want to look at various proactive things you can do, like changing fuel, replacing a fuel filter, etc. How many miles on the car? What is its service history? Oxygen sensors and other such devices can cause problems like the one you describe. Some of these things might be scheduled for replacement under the maintenance guidelines.
But a mechanic who just blows that off? I would never go back to that guy, but that is just me.
Perfect brussel sprouts: Wash and quarter them, place a cup or so in a bowl with two tbsp water, some butter, garlic or garlic powder, a little salt and pepper, cover and microwave for two mins. More or less depending on your microwave and how tender you like your sprouts. Baste with the buttery water at the bottom of the bowl.
Absolutely the best. Also make sure you get fresh tender sprouts. They get tough as they get older.
Not that I am not embarrassed by his asshattery, Harrison is well known around town as “that crazy-ass mutha.” As in, literally crazy. No one understands the guy or what makes him tick.
But who needs to, really? He’s a fucking great football player and I don’t give a damn about whether he understands what these WH ceremonies are about or not. At least he won’t be embarrassing us like Joey Porter did last time by saying he’d be a bad ass with Shrub and then doing nothing at all. He can stay home and no one I know will miss him, even (according the the local news reports on this last night) his teammates.
@jenniebee:
So you believe in comparing apples and oranges if it fits the narrative and if someone points that out it is racism. How progressive to you.
Ezra was trying to give the impression the shorter overall American life expectancy is the result of “inferior” US healthcare.
57.
MikeJ
Since this seems to be open thread question day, can someone tell me why my 2002 Honda Civic is intermittently stalling?
You are not alone, sez the mighty Gazoogle:
Results 1 – 50 of about 5,120 for 2002 Honda Civic is intermittently stalling. (0.45 seconds)
Is it possible to read the error codes on that car without special equipment? Just knowing if a code had been set might tel you something.
58.
MikeJ
So Paul L believes that America has great health care, if you don’t count all the dead people.
I second Night Watch – I am a big fan of all the Vimes books, and Night Watch might be my very favorite. Going Postal is great too – Ankh-Morpork, but not city watch. If you liked Small Gods, Monstrous Regiment is another completely different culture than A-M. Also try something like Carpe Jugulum to see if you like the witch books.
That’s a widely misunderstood controversy. A slightly shorter life expectancy is less about the quality of healthcare in the US than it is about the very high cost of that care, which doesn’t produce a higher life expectancy.
Another way to look at that is that other countries provide coverage to more people, they don’t have the exhorbitant costs — especially the costs born by individuals, families, or businesses — and they compare well on things like life expectancy.
Another way to look at it is, America has the greatest healthcare in the world for those who can afford it or are lucky enough to have the insurance needed to get it. Like US Senators, for example. But for people are on the margins, or don’t have coverage at work, or can’t get coverage at work, or can’t work … we have Republican, You’re On Your Own healthcare. Which amounts to, basically, you are Shit Out Of Luck.
Millions of Americans are one bad xray, one car accident, one rotten test result away from health and financial ruin. That’s really criminal, if you ask me. Don’t you think so?
@ThymeZoneThePlumber: I’m so GLAD you reposted that! I am really in love with the sautee method, but I put it off for days ‘cuz, you know, I hate to cook. The microwave I can do.
65.
The Saff
Anyone watch “Breaking Bad” on AMC? One of the best shows evah.
Well, I haven’t been to Ezra’s new digs today, so I’m answering blind, so to speak.
But could it possibly be that one of the major factors for why African Americans and Hispanics have shorter life expectancies is a lack of medical treatment due to lack of fucking health insurance. I mean, when a person with diabetes (rates are higher among Hispanics and AAs due to poor diet which is due to low income) or sickle cell anemia has to rely on the ER as their only source of medical care and the costs of the ER treatment are higher due to their lack of health insurance and inability to pay cash up front for the bill, how often do you think that person seeks out treatment? Is it possible they wait until they are so sick that they are untreatable? And how much dietary counseling do you think they get in those ER visits? Or screenings for prostate or cervical cancer or how many stress tests are they doing there?
You really are a lower quality troll than our pet BOB, aren’t you?
69.
Phoebe
You and Andrew Sullivan. It’s a good time of year to go sniff the flowers.
I second The Saff’s praise for Breaking Bad, of course.
70.
South of I-10
@MikeJ: We actually took the car to Auto Zone (they have the machine to read the code), but I don’t remember what it is – don’t have it written down here. It was a pretty generic code, not one that specifically referenced a sensor or something like that.
@ThymeZoneThePlumber: Only about 35,000 miles, I am very close to work. I am going to take it somewhere else and get them to check it out.
Anything dealing with cars is extremely frustrating to me, because I really don’t know enough about it to know if they are BSing me or not.
I’m pretty sure that’s a personal record for John.
Usually a revelation like that is followed up by a flurry of a half dozen or more super lengthy and pretty well thought out essays. I think just sharing his burn out with us frees up his energy and he gets all wound up again.
72.
LD50
If you’d like a few laughs read the comments on this Hotair thread.
For a bunch of people embracing politics that most Americans don’t want, they sure throw around the insult ‘elitist’ a lot.
Also, it’s cute to see that there are still people keeping the Bill Ayers/ACORN flames alive.
@Laura W: So what you are saying is that we are his therapy group.
74.
alhutch
@South of I-10: If the car just “stops running”, figure either a fuel delivery problem or an electrical problem. Simple things in the fuel circuit are the fuel filter and fuel pump. Electrical might be more complex, such as the circuit providing power to the fuel pump or ECM.
Engines don’t just stop, something makes it happen. Have the car scanned and see if any ECM “trouble codes” have been set. That might point a good mechanic in the right direction quickly.
All of this assumes of course that proper maintenance has been done on the car appropriate for the current mileage. If not, catch up the maintenance first.
I see upthread you state you did get the codes checked. Where ever you take it next, lead with the code output, especially if AutoZone happened to clear them. Could save diagnostic time.
75.
Das Internetkommissariat
@gnomedad:
Speaking of Hitler:
Did you know that becoming a dictator with ambitions of conquering the world requires you to lose a testicle in combat?
76.
Throwin Stones
@South of I-10: Have you noticed if it’s running hot when it stalls? Does it start right away after stalling?
77.
JL
@geg6: Paul is probably lamenting the fact that the wealthiest nation in the world can’t provide health care for all its citizens. Are we to assume that Europeans only service a middle class?
78.
Fulcanelli
@South of I-10: As someone who worked in a Honda dealership for 6 years (parts dept.) and is fairly familiar with the beast I’d say it sounds like a fuel pump problem. Now this is not a very common problem with Hondas as a rule, but for a short span of years Civics had some fuel pump problems and I believe yours may be in one of them.
I’m thinking they’ll need to pull the fuel pump and inspect it to identify which one you’ll need because there are a couple of different models depending on where the car was manufactured.
A caveat: You may want to bite the bullet and go to a dealer for this problem, versus an after market shop or at least go to one that specializes in Honda/Acura.
79.
Laura W
@AhabTRuler: As my favorite FOJ (Friend of Jung) would say: Don’t pathologize the Mystery.
Paul, you have two options here. Either you can admit that the higher rates in infant mortality and lower life expectancy in the US is due to a lack of access to health care among poor people, who are disproportionately black and hispanic, or you can argue that there is something unique about being black or hispanic that makes those races (hispanic being a mix of european and native american) fragile and prone to die early despite absolutely equal access to health care, even though factually they don’t have it.
Since the second argument says that race is the single greatest determining factor in determining life expectancy, then it is inherently, intrinsically, unavoidably, and by any definition you choose to apply, racist. That is the nature of racism, to prefer to explain phenomena and events in terms of race. Usually seen in conjunction with blind willful ignorance, see Paul L.
John, when was your breaking moment with the Republicans?
Terry Schiavo.
was it a mixed board then? pretty remarkable for a former repuke to cultivate a mostly liberal crowd.
82.
D-Chance.
Just robo-post a couple of “Open Threads” each day, so we’ll have something interesting to read around here while you’re gone.
83.
Fulcanelli
With all this talk blowing about concerning wind turbines I’m actually pretty psyched about the news that a company that makes wind turbines is locating to my state. An actual manufacturing company and the jobs that come with it is moving to RI instead of leaving it. Whooda thunk it?
You may want to bite the bullet and go to a dealer for this problem
I agree, take it to a Honda dealer. It’s a sure bet they have seen the problem before. They will not blow you off like his mechanic did. If they do, you have a complaint to Honda.
86.
Drew
@South of I-10,
I agree with Fulcanelli, I had a problem similar to the one you are describing and it turned out to be the fuel pump (it was in an older Honda, though). I thought fuel pumps were either working or not working, but this one worked intermittently.
ThymeZoneThePlumber is also on-time with his suggestion… get a new mechanic!
Drew
87.
LD50
So you believe in comparing apples and oranges if it fits the narrative and if someone points that out it is racism. How progressive to you.
Ezra was trying to give the impression the shorter overall American life expectancy is the result of “inferior” US healthcare.
I think Paul’s point was just that if it weren’t for those pesky minorities driving down the curve, America would have the greatest health care system in the world, and everyone would love the Republicans and hate Obama. And since the Brown folks don’t *really* count, there’s really no need for National Health Care.
88.
LD50
It was a largely righty board then with a few Dem antagonists.
must be something in the blogosphere water supply……. Sullivan’s taking a break too.
91.
gex
Time to update your link to Ezra Klein.
92.
South of I-10
Thanks everyone! So let’s see, you can get all your info about politics, pets, food wine and now cars from BJ. I really do appreciate your suggestions.
4)What about an occasional recipe thread, like one key ingredient, like broccoli or something and then have people post recipes with broccoli?
we had a broccoli discussion thread. i’m waiting for a zucchini bread recipe topic.
98.
JPK
@South of I-10: I had a problem with my own ’02 Honda Civic about a year ago that’s a bit similar to the symptoms you’re describing. Although in my case the onset of the stalling was very sudden and there were also weird problems going on with my electrical system — no radio, headlights were dim, things like that. I brought it in almost immediately. Turned out to be I needed a new alternator.
one of the major factors for why African Americans and Hispanics have shorter life expectancies is a lack of medical treatment due to lack of fucking health insurance
The differences were attributed to a combination of injuries and such preventable risk factors as smoking, alcohol, obesity, high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol, diet and physical inactivity — particularly among people from 15 years to 59 years of age. They were not due to income, insurance, infant mortality, AIDS or violence, said the study’s lead investigator, Christopher J.L. Murray, director of the Harvard Initiative for Global Health.
Since the second argument says that race is the single greatest determining factor in determining life expectancy, then it is inherently, intrinsically, unavoidably, and by any definition you choose to apply, racist. That is the nature of racism
No one knows why African-American women go into labor three or more weeks early, more often than babies of any other race or ethnicity, according to the March of Dimes.
“This is not only a socio-economic problem; a woman can do everything right and still have a premature child,” said Dr. Diane Ashton, associate medical director, March of Dimes. “We need to find out why this happens and what we can do to ensure that African-American babies are carried full-term and born healthy.
102.
Ash Can
@Paul L.: Your link is to an article from September 2006. A more recent article, from April 2008, on the same study, includes more detail as well as direct quotes from Murray and his associates. It also directly contradicts much of the information in the 2006 article. Either further study yielded different results, or the source you cite messed up.
@Ash Can:
I find it interesting that the article you linked choose to include a quote from a “public-health expert” who appears to not been a researcher on the study from Harvard University and the University of Washington.
James Wiley, a public-health expert at San Francisco State University, said the paper should sound an alarm — for individuals and for public officials. Wiley said Americans should heed the message to quit smoking, eat right and exercise, a message he said should be aimed not only at adults but at children as well.
104.
TenguPhule
hey were not due to income, insurance, infant mortality, AIDS or violence, said the study’s lead investigator, Christopher J.L. Murray, director of the Harvard Initiative for Global Health.
Of course one can be covered by insurance, and if they won’t pay out, you’re just as fucked as the uninsured.
[. . .] how can I put the blue links into the word [. . . ?]
When you’re composing, highlight the word you actually want to appear in your message, then click the “Ext. Link” button just above the comment text-entry box. It will prompt you for a URL.
Note: They don’t seem to work (at least for me) if you omit the “http://” prefix.
I highlighted the word URL in the paragraph above, clicked “Ext. Link” and put in the hyperlink. It ends up looking like this in your message:
I like to think my one small contribution to this riveting topic has been kale.
Dear lady, you are too modest. Not just kale–boiled kale.
110.
gwangung
I find it interesting that the article you linked choose to include a quote from a “public-health expert” who appears to not been a researcher on the study from Harvard University and the University of Washington
Probably because he read the study, unlike most people.
By the way, he’s the director of the SF State Center for Health Disparities Research and Training. Qualifies as a public health expert for anybody who has an IQ above room temperature.
You really have to work at being this stupid and racist, don’t you?
bago
Burn of the week:
Postulate: Purposeless fun fact, Superman Returns cost more than ten times as much to make as the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Resource Center has raised since 2002.
Response: In all fairness, at least 10 times as many people stood up and walked out of Superman Returns than ever have from the Paralysis Center.
ET
I think you should have posted a pet picture to get the masses talking. Otherwise it’s like listening to crickets.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
This is good news for McCain!
asiangrrlMN
If you go Galt, John, then the Galters have won.
P.S. I second the pictures of pets request. I can haz Tunch, plees?
Englischlehrer
I had 2 three-hour classes of Business English today, about 20 students ranging from ages 20-27. Some of them make my job easier, some more difficult, some more interesting, some more picturesque. I wrote on the board for both classes “Speak English or Die!” and of course there was still German being spoken in the speaking exercise. I can only be the language nazi (a term i have used a few times in classes over the years) so much, this is their chance to speak English and make mistakes without embarrassing themselves in a real, business setting.
In terms of other news, the Germans on the whole are thrilled at the idea of Obama, even though they can talk about some of his problems without emotion. They are, however, jaded some of them, thinking that Americans will be in Iraq and Afghanistan forever and I cant argue with them.
The American Newspapers class is slowly but surely catching on, they were able to list 7-10 of the biggest news stories from the past week, and some of them are following your blog. Keep up the good work.
I have a couple of questions for a follower of the main lefty blogs but somehow missed some slang i want to know
1)freep
2)the origins of “teh” for the
3)Burkean bells
4)wingnut (I know what it means but how it came to be
Also, John, when was your breaking moment with the Republicans? What do you miss about them?
The Grand Panjandrum
Drink some great beer, eat some great food, watch a bunch of movies, then come back and tell us all just how stupid we are. We’ll be waiting for the abuse, you know we can’t live without it.
Cheers!
zzyzx
“I have a couple of questions for a follower of the main lefty blogs but somehow missed some slang i want to know
1)freep”
Freep is short for Free Republic, a conservative website known for finding online polls and getting all of their members to vote on the conservative side. So when DKos says to freep a poll, it means to go there and vote up the liberal side.
schrodinger's cat
Request fur Tunch photos thirded. Plz we needs our weekly dose of Tunch. Meanwhile here is blog topic that is not related to politics: yodeling kittehs. You can try this on Tunch and report the findings over BJ if you survive the experience.
RobRob
@englischlhr
one more, what the hell does meh mean?
The Grand Panjandrum
@Englischlehrer: For all but Burkean Bells go to the Urban Dictionary. That one I believe is a DougJ original, but you can ask him.
Face
Fuck your Steelers’ Harrison and the arrogant horse he rode in on
WTF is THIS?
Ya think, you stupid dumbshit?
Svensker
@Englischlehrer:
teh = the, came about because it is a common typing mistake. The kids started doing it deliberately because it was amusing.
John Cole
@Englischlehrer: The only thing I miss about being a Republican is thinking I was right all the time.
Other than that, I have found them to be remarkably similar. Like, for example, I still hate most Democrats.
Roger Moore
@Englischlehrer:
Short for Free Republic
This is just an old Internet meme. Lots of people make that typo, and now it’s picked up overtones of being the kind of thing that an overexcited newbie would say.
I’ve always assumed that it’s a contraction from “right wing nut” or “left wing nut”.
SGEW
Ooo. I can answer some of these:
1)freep
From “Free Republic,” a particularly nutjob right-wing site with remarkably virulent posters referred to as “freepers” (self-described, I believe).
2)the origins of “teh” for the
From typos, a la pwn (a typo of “own”) or sprinkling the number 1 amongst excessive exclamation marks (from accidentally failing to hold down the shift key).
3)Burkean bells
From right here (DougJ’s own creation, iirc). Ringing the bells of Sir Edmund Burke, one of the founders of so-called “conservatism,” as an answer to all of society’s ills. N.B.: this has nothing to do with the sublime versus the beautiful.
4)wingnut (I know what it means but how it came to be)
From “Right Wing Nut Job” and its variants, methinks.
Also, John, when was your breaking moment with the Republicans?
Terry Schiavo.
What do you miss about them?
I cannot answer for Mr. Cole, but I would suspect “moral certainty.”
[edit: should’ve known others would get in answers before I could type out mine.]
asiangrrlMN
@RobRob: ‘Meh’ is like ‘eh, whatever’, but with more emphasis. Coincidentally, those are also my initials.
@John Cole: Ha! You still got it, John. Don’t ever change (too much).
Roger Moore
@RobRob:
It’s an expression of bored indifference. ISTR that it’s originally from The Simpsons.
SGEW
@John Cole: Ha! Nailed it.
Alan
If you’d like a few laughs read the comments on this Hotair thread.
flukebucket
I have just recently read “Guards! Guards!” and “Small Gods”.
Which other Pratchett book would you most highly recommend?
MikeJ
Wikipedia sez, “The dismissive term “Meh”, which was popularized by the show,[94] entered the Collins English Dictionary in 2008.”
The show in question of course being the Simpsons.
Betsy
I like to think of “meh” as a verbal shrug.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@John Cole:
Well that makes you a typical Democrat. We hate each other, but less than we hate Republicans. The real test, of course, is how much you hate yourself. Self loathing is worth its weight in gold.
And, you have nothing to say? Pfeh. We get up and comment every day, with nothing to say, and go ahead and say it anyway. It’s what you can do with real adversity that determines character. Stop whinging.
Just kidding. Enjoy some time off.
SGEW
@flukebucket: Night Watch, without a doubt. But pretty much every single one is a winner.
The Grand Panjandrum
@John Cole:
If you would have called us all idiots I would have had to break out the smokes.
Laura W
Bleh feh meh is how I like to use it.
But I’m verbose.
Brick Oven Bill
On my road trip, I passed a line of 14 windmills. Of these two were spinning. A very sharp friend of mine asked me about this topic coincidently two days later. He asked me (paraphrasing):
“If the wind is constant, why are only a certain number of windmills spinning?”
The reason for this is that resistance to rotation is provided by the generator that the windmill spins. The resistance is generated by running current around the generator’s magnet. Remember that electricity is generated by moving a conductor through a magnetic field. The magnetic field is made stronger by running current around the magnet.
So my answer for my friend was that the windmills that were stationary were attempting to generate power, and those that were spinning were either freewheeling, generating no power, or maybe generating very little power.
My observations were made in T. Boone’s ‘wind corridor’. Here is a generator 101 article.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@Brick Oven Bill:
The information means nothing unless you know how each unit is configured, whether it is online, and what the wind speeds are at the time.
Units are often taken offline for maintenance or other reasons.
In short, the information you have there means nothing.
Which is pretty standard for you, I think.
Das Internetkommissariat
I think you should go chill a few days in San Diego.
Seriously.
bago
puttin on the ritz. Poor Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie.
Cain
@Brick Oven Bill:
Another stunning yet confusing conclusion, BoB. Thank you for that bit of insight.
cain
bago
The simpsons officially put forth the definition of meh.
Englischlehrer
more questions
1)to us idiots, how can I put the blue links into the word. I see some stuff here in the Leave a Reply section but I am too stupid to see.
ex. my blog is jasonconga.wordpress.com how can i type my blog but have it blue with the link built into it?
2)and how do the RSS feeds work?
3)Do you think Obama is so clever to bring the other mechanisms of government into the fold in terms of the torture memos released and prosecutions? It is so hard to know if it is politically shrewd or just shrewd or just what…
4)What about an occasional recipe thread, like one key ingredient, like broccoli or something and then have people post recipes with broccoli?
all right, i think i am taking advantage of the spirit of the thread…
Brick Oven Bill
I stand corrected ThymeZoneThePlumber. I should have stated that the 12 of 14 stationary windmills were either trying to generate power, were broken, or were otherwise not functional. This would have been a more complete statement.
Thank you for the clarification.
pandera
Being that all three of you (from what I’ve gathered) are scientists – why is there never any discussion of atheism and the entertaining atheism brouhahas that crop up so often? …just wondering.
HyperIon
@Alan:
my favorite:
yes, i know when i want some groovy left-talk, i head for the country club.
bago
@Brick Oven Bill: Wait. You’re saying the wind might be as fickle as the blowing wind? You’re blowing my fucking mind. Next, you might want to describe the clarity that insight had. Perhaps using the metaphor describing the difference betwixt night and day.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@Brick Oven Bill:
Being offline does not mean broken, or not functioning. It means offline. There are a variety of reasons for it. And of course, wind speed is the biggie. Some units will be configured to be dormant at higher wind speeds than others, for various reasons. The pitch of the blades is set to make the blades “feather” into the wind and not turn the machine. Not unlike an airplane propeller.
If you would spend 15 minutes talking to somebody who actually owns and operates a wind turbine, you might learn something. Of course, you would have to shut up to make the experiment work.
Comrade Stuck
Well, you could do like me, and murder your computer, as I am now typing from the county library with 7 minutes left on my hour. It wasn’t really murder, and was more like negligent computercide by an idiot with a screwdriver.
The interweb builds up in the brain however, and it has been nice having that clear away and actually do other stuff. Of course, now all my info comes from cable news which has it’s own corrosive effects. Well, times up, and some lady is staring at me to GTF off her computer.
asiangrrlMN
@bago: No. That is just wrong to do to Fry and Laurie.
@Englischlehrer:
1. In the Leave a Reply area, do you see a space for Website under “Name” and “Mail”? Type your site in there, and I assume your name will come up blue.
As for the rest of your questions, I have no answers.
Bleh. Today is a bleh day.
Paul L.
Rachel MaddowEzra Klein now spinning at Washington Post.Does that take into account the shorter life expectancies of the US’ larger black and Hispanic communities?
Or is it like progressive favorite US infant mortality rate statistic that just ignores it.
Brick Oven Bill
Bago also makes a good point that the wind is fickle. This is why 90% of European wind generation capacity has to be backed up by on-line conventional sources of electricity, operating in an inefficient manner. This is why windmills have a negative net effect on ‘greenhouse gases’, after their production and maintenance aspects are taken into effect.
Federal subsidies for wind is $23.44/MWh. This is because wind cannot compete economically, just as they cannot compete with an argument of reduced emissions, which is a whole different hoax.
Roger Moore
@Englischlehrer:
1) To make a clicky link, you use the “Ext. Link” button. It will pop up a dialog box where you can enter your link. When you’re done with the text that you want link, you push it again to close the tag. Alternately, you type the text where you want the link to appear, highlight it, and then click the “Ext. Link” button. Note, though, that the crappy preview system here doesn’t display a comment correctly if it has more than one link.
2) RSS feeds work if you have a feed reader. I’m not sure what to use if you’re working in Windows, since I only use them under Linux. The basic idea, though, is that you copy the RSS feed address into your reader, which then goes out and checks periodically if there is anything new. They’re great if you want to follow a bunch of blogs.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@Brick Oven Bill:
Wind generation was never intended to replace all the other ways to generate power, Bill. It’s a supplemental kind of power product, really.
On a typical wind generator farm, the machines are operated by various parties, who may buy or lease the equipment, sometimes as partnerships or cooperatives. There could be many different business models in effect on a wind farm from one machine to another.
Some machines be configured to produce power only during peak wind periods, or have different algorithms set to measure and gauge the likely behavior of the wind over periods of time, at different times of the day, at different times of the year. The particular model in use for one machine may be based on minimizing maintenance costs and only selling power at optimum times, whereas another may choose to produce power even during suboptimum times, following a different business model, and the two machines may sit next to each other on the same farm.
You really don’t know a fucking thing about this, do you?
SGEW
All teh trolls have come out to play today!
Bad Horse's Filly
I’m fourth in line (I think) for more pet pictures, especially Tunch. I think unplugging is a great idea. I was forced to by 4 weeks of relentless work and it actually felt great. I’m back, but with less tension around it all. Obama seems to have things well in hand and doesn’t seem to need my snarky input on various subjects.
And I, too would feel better if you called us all ignorant fuckheads again. xo
South of I-10
Since this seems to be open thread question day, can someone tell me why my 2002 Honda Civic is intermittently stalling? Last time it stalled on me while driving down the road (luckily in a neighborhood). Will stall, run rough for a few minutes and then run normally. I don’t think my mechanic wants to touch it. “Bring it in when you are experiencing the problem,” he says. Maybe I should call him when I stall in the middle of a busy intersection, he can come pick me up and check out my car! Not cool, I am driving around with a 4 year old most of the time. I don’t actually expect any answers, but I do feel better having bitched about it.
jenniebee
@Paul L.:
yes, because including figures for black and hispanic life expectancies gives a misleading impression of overall American life expectancies. Just like including black people in polls about Obama distorts the picture of what Americans think about him overall.
Strangely, nobody ever wants to screen racist fucks out of the “overall American” population.
JL
@Alan: This might be the first time that I agreed with a commenter from HotAir
I would phrase it differently though, Run Sarah Run!
Laura W
@Englischlehrer:
Yeah, well, be careful what you ask for there. Search the archives under FOOD. You’ll find plenty. And then you’ll find posts like this one that were not intended to turn into food wars but somehow, lots of people had opinions on cilantro last November. Yawn. The fascination factor there was second only to the lengthy condiment thread in which BOB blew many minds by asserting that pickles could be left out and did not require chilling. (I think that was his assertion?)
I will say that thanks to this blog I have learned to not only prepare brussels sprouts to perfection, but also to love them. I just had left over, frozen, steam-in-the-bag BS (ha) for lunch, and have a bag of fresh ones in there to saute tonight with GINGER, garlic, sweet onion and yellow squash.
I like to think my one small contribution to this riveting topic has been KALE.
JenJen
@Cain: I’m still trying to figure out what, exactly, made the friend in this story “very sharp.”
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@South of I-10:
First thing I would say is that you need a new mechanic.
You might want to look at various proactive things you can do, like changing fuel, replacing a fuel filter, etc. How many miles on the car? What is its service history? Oxygen sensors and other such devices can cause problems like the one you describe. Some of these things might be scheduled for replacement under the maintenance guidelines.
But a mechanic who just blows that off? I would never go back to that guy, but that is just me.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@Laura W:
Perfect brussel sprouts: Wash and quarter them, place a cup or so in a bowl with two tbsp water, some butter, garlic or garlic powder, a little salt and pepper, cover and microwave for two mins. More or less depending on your microwave and how tender you like your sprouts. Baste with the buttery water at the bottom of the bowl.
Absolutely the best. Also make sure you get fresh tender sprouts. They get tough as they get older.
geg6
@Face:
Not that I am not embarrassed by his asshattery, Harrison is well known around town as “that crazy-ass mutha.” As in, literally crazy. No one understands the guy or what makes him tick.
But who needs to, really? He’s a fucking great football player and I don’t give a damn about whether he understands what these WH ceremonies are about or not. At least he won’t be embarrassing us like Joey Porter did last time by saying he’d be a bad ass with Shrub and then doing nothing at all. He can stay home and no one I know will miss him, even (according the the local news reports on this last night) his teammates.
omen
@Paul L.:
bastards purposely die early just to make america look bad.
Paul L.
@jenniebee:
So you believe in comparing apples and oranges if it fits the narrative and if someone points that out it is racism. How progressive to you.
Ezra was trying to give the impression the shorter overall American life expectancy is the result of “inferior” US healthcare.
MikeJ
You are not alone, sez the mighty Gazoogle:
Results 1 – 50 of about 5,120 for 2002 Honda Civic is intermittently stalling. (0.45 seconds)
Is it possible to read the error codes on that car without special equipment? Just knowing if a code had been set might tel you something.
MikeJ
So Paul L believes that America has great health care, if you don’t count all the dead people.
Or, I guess he doesn’t consider them “people”.
Emma Anne
@flukebucket:
I second Night Watch – I am a big fan of all the Vimes books, and Night Watch might be my very favorite. Going Postal is great too – Ankh-Morpork, but not city watch. If you liked Small Gods, Monstrous Regiment is another completely different culture than A-M. Also try something like Carpe Jugulum to see if you like the witch books.
geg6
@ThymeZoneThePlumber:
Thank you for answering BOB quicker than I could. It really has saved me lots of time and eons of aggravations.
And this was the exact sentence I planned to end my post to BOB explaining the rudiments of wind power. Great minds and all that, eh?
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@Paul L.:
That’s a widely misunderstood controversy. A slightly shorter life expectancy is less about the quality of healthcare in the US than it is about the very high cost of that care, which doesn’t produce a higher life expectancy.
Another way to look at that is that other countries provide coverage to more people, they don’t have the exhorbitant costs — especially the costs born by individuals, families, or businesses — and they compare well on things like life expectancy.
Another way to look at it is, America has the greatest healthcare in the world for those who can afford it or are lucky enough to have the insurance needed to get it. Like US Senators, for example. But for people are on the margins, or don’t have coverage at work, or can’t get coverage at work, or can’t work … we have Republican, You’re On Your Own healthcare. Which amounts to, basically, you are Shit Out Of Luck.
Millions of Americans are one bad xray, one car accident, one rotten test result away from health and financial ruin. That’s really criminal, if you ask me. Don’t you think so?
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@geg6:
I pretty much assume it any time Bob posts on any subject. He clips some fluff from Google and then spins a yarn around it.
omen
@Englischlehrer:
whadya know?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teh
Laura W
@ThymeZoneThePlumber: I’m so GLAD you reposted that! I am really in love with the sautee method, but I put it off for days ‘cuz, you know, I hate to cook. The microwave I can do.
The Saff
Anyone watch “Breaking Bad” on AMC? One of the best shows evah.
gnomedad
Fun fact: “The Producers” has opened in Berlin:
‘FRÜHLING FÜR HITLER UND VATERLAND’
JasonF
Looks like you made it 17 minutes.
geg6
@Paul L.:
Well, I haven’t been to Ezra’s new digs today, so I’m answering blind, so to speak.
But could it possibly be that one of the major factors for why African Americans and Hispanics have shorter life expectancies is a lack of medical treatment due to lack of fucking health insurance. I mean, when a person with diabetes (rates are higher among Hispanics and AAs due to poor diet which is due to low income) or sickle cell anemia has to rely on the ER as their only source of medical care and the costs of the ER treatment are higher due to their lack of health insurance and inability to pay cash up front for the bill, how often do you think that person seeks out treatment? Is it possible they wait until they are so sick that they are untreatable? And how much dietary counseling do you think they get in those ER visits? Or screenings for prostate or cervical cancer or how many stress tests are they doing there?
You really are a lower quality troll than our pet BOB, aren’t you?
Phoebe
You and Andrew Sullivan. It’s a good time of year to go sniff the flowers.
I second The Saff’s praise for Breaking Bad, of course.
South of I-10
@MikeJ: We actually took the car to Auto Zone (they have the machine to read the code), but I don’t remember what it is – don’t have it written down here. It was a pretty generic code, not one that specifically referenced a sensor or something like that.
@ThymeZoneThePlumber: Only about 35,000 miles, I am very close to work. I am going to take it somewhere else and get them to check it out.
Anything dealing with cars is extremely frustrating to me, because I really don’t know enough about it to know if they are BSing me or not.
Laura W
@JasonF:
I’m pretty sure that’s a personal record for John.
Usually a revelation like that is followed up by a flurry of a half dozen or more super lengthy and pretty well thought out essays. I think just sharing his burn out with us frees up his energy and he gets all wound up again.
LD50
For a bunch of people embracing politics that most Americans don’t want, they sure throw around the insult ‘elitist’ a lot.
Also, it’s cute to see that there are still people keeping the Bill Ayers/ACORN flames alive.
AhabTRuler
@Laura W: So what you are saying is that we are his therapy group.
alhutch
@South of I-10: If the car just “stops running”, figure either a fuel delivery problem or an electrical problem. Simple things in the fuel circuit are the fuel filter and fuel pump. Electrical might be more complex, such as the circuit providing power to the fuel pump or ECM.
Engines don’t just stop, something makes it happen. Have the car scanned and see if any ECM “trouble codes” have been set. That might point a good mechanic in the right direction quickly.
All of this assumes of course that proper maintenance has been done on the car appropriate for the current mileage. If not, catch up the maintenance first.
I see upthread you state you did get the codes checked. Where ever you take it next, lead with the code output, especially if AutoZone happened to clear them. Could save diagnostic time.
Das Internetkommissariat
@gnomedad:
Speaking of Hitler:
Did you know that becoming a dictator with ambitions of conquering the world requires you to lose a testicle in combat?
Throwin Stones
@South of I-10: Have you noticed if it’s running hot when it stalls? Does it start right away after stalling?
JL
@geg6: Paul is probably lamenting the fact that the wealthiest nation in the world can’t provide health care for all its citizens. Are we to assume that Europeans only service a middle class?
Fulcanelli
@South of I-10: As someone who worked in a Honda dealership for 6 years (parts dept.) and is fairly familiar with the beast I’d say it sounds like a fuel pump problem. Now this is not a very common problem with Hondas as a rule, but for a short span of years Civics had some fuel pump problems and I believe yours may be in one of them.
I’m thinking they’ll need to pull the fuel pump and inspect it to identify which one you’ll need because there are a couple of different models depending on where the car was manufactured.
A caveat: You may want to bite the bullet and go to a dealer for this problem, versus an after market shop or at least go to one that specializes in Honda/Acura.
Laura W
@AhabTRuler: As my favorite FOJ (Friend of Jung) would say: Don’t pathologize the Mystery.
jenniebee
@Paul L.:
Paul, you have two options here. Either you can admit that the higher rates in infant mortality and lower life expectancy in the US is due to a lack of access to health care among poor people, who are disproportionately black and hispanic, or you can argue that there is something unique about being black or hispanic that makes those races (hispanic being a mix of european and native american) fragile and prone to die early despite absolutely equal access to health care, even though factually they don’t have it.
Since the second argument says that race is the single greatest determining factor in determining life expectancy, then it is inherently, intrinsically, unavoidably, and by any definition you choose to apply, racist. That is the nature of racism, to prefer to explain phenomena and events in terms of race. Usually seen in conjunction with blind willful ignorance, see Paul L.
omen
@SGEW: Also,
was it a mixed board then? pretty remarkable for a former repuke to cultivate a mostly liberal crowd.
D-Chance.
Just robo-post a couple of “Open Threads” each day, so we’ll have something interesting to read around here while you’re gone.
Fulcanelli
With all this talk blowing about concerning wind turbines I’m actually pretty psyched about the news that a company that makes wind turbines is locating to my state. An actual manufacturing company and the jobs that come with it is moving to RI instead of leaving it. Whooda thunk it?
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@omen:
It was a largely righty board then with a few Dem antagonists.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@Fulcanelli:
I agree, take it to a Honda dealer. It’s a sure bet they have seen the problem before. They will not blow you off like his mechanic did. If they do, you have a complaint to Honda.
Drew
@South of I-10,
I agree with Fulcanelli, I had a problem similar to the one you are describing and it turned out to be the fuel pump (it was in an older Honda, though). I thought fuel pumps were either working or not working, but this one worked intermittently.
ThymeZoneThePlumber is also on-time with his suggestion… get a new mechanic!
Drew
LD50
I think Paul’s point was just that if it weren’t for those pesky minorities driving down the curve, America would have the greatest health care system in the world, and everyone would love the Republicans and hate Obama. And since the Brown folks don’t *really* count, there’s really no need for National Health Care.
LD50
How long did the changeover take?
Englischlehrer
@The Saff:
glad to hear that, my norwegian friend just gave me season 1 and 2 and i was going to start watching them soon.
my blog attempt 1
lizzy
must be something in the blogosphere water supply……. Sullivan’s taking a break too.
gex
Time to update your link to Ezra Klein.
South of I-10
Thanks everyone! So let’s see, you can get all your info about politics, pets, food wine and now cars from BJ. I really do appreciate your suggestions.
Jen R
Paul L’s comment is just a preview of Byron York’s next column on health care.
ThymeZoneThePlumber
@LD50:
My recollection … about a year, from early 2005 until about early 2006. A few die hards hung on to fight the fight, but they eventually gave up.
TenguPhule
Men at Arms, Nightwatch, Going Postal, The Truth, Hogfather, Thud, Monstrous Regiment
TenguPhule
Welcome to the Democratic Party, where the infighting is the only fighting going on.
omen
@Englischlehrer:
4)What about an occasional recipe thread, like one key ingredient, like broccoli or something and then have people post recipes with broccoli?
we had a broccoli discussion thread. i’m waiting for a zucchini bread recipe topic.
JPK
@South of I-10: I had a problem with my own ’02 Honda Civic about a year ago that’s a bit similar to the symptoms you’re describing. Although in my case the onset of the stalling was very sudden and there were also weird problems going on with my electrical system — no radio, headlights were dim, things like that. I brought it in almost immediately. Turned out to be I needed a new alternator.
CeriConversion
Everybody here needs to see some Roomba art. It’s cute and cool.
Paul L.
@geg6:
Race, Income, Geography Influence US Life Expectancy
Paul L.
@jenniebee:
March of Dimes Racists
Why Are African-American Women Twice As Likely to Have a Premature Baby?
Ash Can
@Paul L.: Your link is to an article from September 2006. A more recent article, from April 2008, on the same study, includes more detail as well as direct quotes from Murray and his associates. It also directly contradicts much of the information in the 2006 article. Either further study yielded different results, or the source you cite messed up.
Paul L.
@Ash Can:
I find it interesting that the article you linked choose to include a quote from a “public-health expert” who appears to not been a researcher on the study from Harvard University and the University of Washington.
TenguPhule
Of course one can be covered by insurance, and if they won’t pay out, you’re just as fucked as the uninsured.
Oops.
Steeplejack
@flukebucket:
I also just finished Guards! Guards and am about a third of the way through Men at Arms, the next one about the Night Watch.
Here is a really good chart with which to navigate the various Discworld threads.
TenguPhule
Then Feet of Clay, Jingo, Fifth Elephant and Nightwatch and you will have reached Discworld Nirvana.
After which you will be ready for Thud, Going Postal and Making Money.
Steeplejack
@Englischlehrer:
When you’re composing, highlight the word you actually want to appear in your message, then click the “Ext. Link” button just above the comment text-entry box. It will prompt you for a URL.
Note: They don’t seem to work (at least for me) if you omit the “http://” prefix.
I highlighted the word URL in the paragraph above, clicked “Ext. Link” and put in the hyperlink. It ends up looking like this in your message:
with angle brackets instead of curly braces.
Let’s see if my HTML-fu actually works.
Edit: Damn you, Balloon Juice blog software! It fucked up the use of “<” and “>”.
Further edit: But now it puts them in?! Fuckety-fuck-fuck-fuck. That is all.
Steeplejack
@jenniebee:
I was about to respond and saw that once again you have already anticipated my inner rageaholic. Thanks.
Steeplejack
@Laura W:
Dear lady, you are too modest. Not just kale–boiled kale.
gwangung
Probably because he read the study, unlike most people.
By the way, he’s the director of the SF State Center for Health Disparities Research and Training. Qualifies as a public health expert for anybody who has an IQ above room temperature.
You really have to work at being this stupid and racist, don’t you?
Well, I admire anyone who works at something…
Steeplejack
@TenguPhule:
I’m on it, I’m on it!
Ash Can
@gwangung: Hey, if straws are all you’ve got, you have to grasp at ’em for dear life.