Been a while since the last one. When I got home from the evening bike ride with the dog yesterday, I found our neighbor with a couple of three month old Jack Russels that his cousin is fostering. The little monsters tag-teamed Max of course. Each one would run out and collide with Max or nip at his legs and then dive under a piece of furniture to hide until the other one did the same thing and got Max turned around again. Eventually they got him stuck trying to squirrel his way under a porch coffee table and circled around to jump on his butt. I envision a long life of shouting, chasing and hair loss for their forever family.
Obligatory Max pic.
Chat about whatever.
Shari
This is going around my right-wing Facebook friends
http://www.ijreview.com/2012/04/688-tax-system-explained-beer/
I can’t even think where to begin to counter it
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
Maxpuppeh! Thank you for showing him!
Chag Sameach and Happy Easter to all those who celebrate.
Frank in midtown
If you have money in a Swiss bank (or in a bank that does business with Swiss banks) you might think about moving it. A little over a year ago a lucky bust at the Italian side at the Swiss border turned up $54 Billion in forged US Treasury Bonds. Last week there has been a bust by Italian authorities at a house IN Switzerland with $60 Trillion in forged US Treasury Bonds. Nobody knows if any of the fake bonds made it into the secret Swiss banks as collateral for secret Swiss bank loans.
geg6
MAAAAAAAAAAX!
Gawd, I adore that beautiful boy. Max is too nice to those little yippy dogs. He should just eat them.
In good news in my life, my John has been released from physical therapy. The new knees are working beautifully. The physical therapist recommended just a lot of walking, which suits me fine. I need to drop about 5-10 pounds and have found walking to be the best way to do it. And I basically gained the weight because I could only stand to use the treadmill a few days a week (I much prefer walking outside, with company) and John just simply couldn’t do it. And with the operation, I couldn’t do anything because I’d come home from work and have to do pretty much everything around the house. Now we can get serious about walking again. And Otis is fat, too. So he’s going on the same exercise regime as I am. I can’t wait.
And Cole, if you’re reading, Lily and Rosie pics, please. It’s been way too long.
JPL
@Shari: Change your friends. That was just plain silly. You’re not lucky if you are poor no matter how many beers you drink.
DDon
I had previously been complaing about the website not laying out properly. Just want to say the new site looks GREAT and I no longer have problems viewing it in IE.
Nice Job!
JPL
@Shari: Since Mitt pays less than 14 percent, I guess his share would be pretty small. Of course, mormons don’t drink so there’s that. That’s the way our tax system works.
scav
A little happy firebranding from the left, although helás! c’est la gauche française. Jean-Luc Mélenchon: the poetry-loving pitbull galvanising the French elections. He’s got a flat tax too: 100% over £300,000 [a f(l)at-tax). Now this is Trotskyist socia1ism, you poor repubs cowering under the bed from the big nasty scary Obama.
RossInDetroit
@Shari:
First problem: Rich people don’t drink beer where poor people drink, much less split a tab with them.
But of course the article will make ‘sense’ to a lot of fools.
Gex
Repost from less appropriate thread:
Texts from Hillary
Well, I think it’s funny anyhow.
Frank in midtown
@Shari: The “split” of the beer is not an accurate description of the “split” of the benefits from government nor the “split” of benefits from the economy. It also doesn’t count any taxes other than progressive income tax, and ignores the benefit of tax deductions and loopholes to the folks at the top. Simply put, that is a false construct that fails as a meaningful analogy of the capitalist system. It also begs the question that there is another “bar” (e.g. marketplace) where the rich guy could make his money. If he goes Galt he’s got to give up making money or he has to find another viable marketplace that will suffer his free-riding.
ET
Not having the best of days. I feel like crap. I just wants to cuddle with the Max.
Raven
@Frank in midtown: splift
RossInDetroit
The beer comparison also assumes that all drinkers benefited equally from the beer pitchers. Rich people get a lot more in terms of government services for their money than the poor do. That would be like the one rich guy out of 10 people drinking 1/4 of the pitcher himself.
CMM
I’ve seen variations of that beer/tax thing before. But everything old is new again at some point on the Internets. Also, all your base are belong to us.
It doesn’t address the substance of the claims, but the authorship: http://www.snopes.com/business/taxes/howtaxes.asp
Shari
@JPL:
Mostly old high school friends. I went to school in Indiana. ‘Nuf said.
Mark S.
Via alicublog, Sully and Dreher are debating religion and buttsecks. Here’s Rod:
Because most churches have signs saying “Darkies Welcome”?
CMM
That’s because the default mode in most churches is not to openly reject blacks and Hispanics, therefore there is no need to signal to that population that this particular church has a different policy than the usual one. Duh.
More oppression of the straight white male, how do they manage to get out of bed every day?
kindness
Just sayin’, Max only has to catch one of those lil buggers once.
TooManyJens
I need to develop some way to take a step back and not engage when I’m tempted to get caught up in some stupid flamewar. I mean, I’ve been flipping my shit over stuff way dumber than even the flamewars we have here, which should tell you something. It’s like I’m turning into one of those SF creatures that feeds on rage. It’s not like I enjoy it — it’s horrible — but I don’t know how to stop doing it.
Mnemosyne
@Mark S.:
See, most people would assume that a congregation that was “open and affirming” for gay folks would also be open and affirming for people of color (especially, you know, gay ones), but apparently in Roddy’s world, being a friendly congregation for gay folks automatically means you exclude people of color.
What a strange, strange world there is inside Rod’s head.
TooManyJens
@Mnemosyne:
In theory, yes, but in practice you can’t assume this. Sad but true.
To Dreher, I would say that 1) that church may well have been racially insensitive; but 2) LGBT people have been attacked in the name of Christianity in a way that blacks and Hispanics haven’t. Not that people haven’t used their religion to justify racism, but there’s nobody out there saying that being black or Hispanic is inherently unChristian, there are tons of churches with black and Hispanic congregations, etc. People of color are less likely to need to be told that, yes, there’s a place in a Christian church for them.
Yutsano
MAXPUPPEH!!
In my edition of First World Problems, I have to go into work for a whopping two hours. This is only because my site manager had a total freak-out about numbers and cut leave availability to next to nothing. So far as I know the union hasn’t challenged this. I’ve decided to be as non-productive as possible. That’ll work, amirite?
BD of MN
A former Twin Cities (and Chicago) TV weather guy, Republican, entrepreneur and 1%’er writes an article on climate change…
Paul Douglas on climate change denial
rikyrah
does anyone watch Person of Interest?
if so, at the end of last night’s show, did Elias kill his father and brother?
my DVR went whacky.
Mnemosyne
@TooManyJens:
I’m sorry, did you just agree with Rod Dreher that people of color who see gay-friendly congregations should automatically assume that they are not welcome?
Because that’s the assumption he’s making — people of color are all uniformly anti-gay, and all gay people are white, so a congregation that’s welcoming to gay people is by definition one that people of color will feel unwelcome in.
I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen because, frankly, white people suck, and a whole lot of white gay men seem to think the only problem with discrimination and bigotry is when it affects them, but I also can’t accept Dreher’s assumption that a gay-friendly congregation is by definition unwelcoming to people of color.
ETA: To be clear, it’s not like Dreher went inside to see what the composition of the congregation was. He assumed that any gay-friendly congregation is automatically racist.
burnspbesq
@Mark S.:
Andrew has been mopping the floor with Dreher and his army of straw men all week. It has been pretty awesome to behold.
burnspbesq
@Yutsano:
How about you only go after the biggest balances? What’s the point of working in Collection if you don’t get to fuck the rich?
TooManyJens
@Mnemosyne: I didn’t say they can assume they’re not welcome. I said they can’t necessarily assume they are welcome. There’s a difference.
Being gay-friendly does not automatically mean that a congregation (or any other kind of social group) is welcoming to people of color, even LGBT people of color. I wouldn’t have thought that would be a controversial statement.
jl
Nice pic. That is a beautiful dog. TimF should just call Max ‘Mighty Dog’.
cmm
I didn’t read that Rod was saying that by specifically stating that they welcome gays, they are implying that they don’t welcome black and hispanic people, just that it was another variation of criticism along the lines of how come there isn’t a straight pride day, or why do they have a Miss Black America when black women compete for Miss America? Or why is everyone only protesting when a white guy kills a black guy, not when blacks kill other blacks? I read it as him saying how come the churches go out of their way to let gay people know they are welcome but don’t put out signs letting other races/ethnicities know that? WHY DO TEH GEYZ GET SPESHUL TREATMENT??
Mnemosyne
@TooManyJens:
I guess you missed the NOM strategy paper.
But, yes, gay people are all bigots, so people of color should assume they’re not welcome in gay-friendly churches. Can’t imagine why saying that would be controversial.
Mnemosyne
@cmm:
I think he’s doing that, but I also think he’s promulgating the idea that LGBT people and people of color are two opposing groups and if you accommodate one group, that must mean that you can’t possibly be accommodating to the other. Because, y’know, gay people of color don’t exist, especially in urban areas.
Mnemosyne
@Mnemosyne:
Also, too — I’m not denying that some people are assholes, and some assholes run churches. But it seems weird to insist that gay-friendly churches are by definition excluding people of color.
Frank in midtown
@Raven: Freudian splift? Amsterdam is lovely in May, you should joint me there.
WaterGirl
@TooManyJens: What do you think of Tim Johnson retiring? Have you heard any scuttlebutt about this?
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: Yep.
Edited for clarity: Yes, i watch it. And yes, he did kill them. Blew up their car.
Frank in midtown
@TooManyJens: You should visit wwww.youarenotsosmart.com and read about what goes on in the brain when folks are confronted with opinions they don’t like.
ExurbanMom
Oh, such a noble looking specimen is Max. I want him to have a playdate with my dog, so they can run around the yard wearing each other out, flop down and pant, and get up and do it all over again. And slobber over a water bowl. And just be crazy puppehs. Dogs are so awesome.
TooManyJens
@WaterGirl: Haven’t really heard anything, other than that it’s convenient that the GOP now gets to slate anyone they want without them having to face the primary voters.
TooManyJens
@Mnemosyne:
If you’re claiming I said this, you’re lying and you owe me an apology.
I mean… seriously. Reply to the actual comments, not the ones you’re imagining.
TooManyJens
I’m going to try this one more time. You stated that most people would assume, upon seeing a sign saying, “we are open and welcoming toward gay people,” that the congregation is also open and welcoming toward people of color. I am saying that unfortunately, that correlation is not as strong as we’d like it to be. I think we have all had the experience of thinking that membership in (or being an ally of) a particular oppressed group will make people more sympathetic to another oppressed group. And sometimes that’s the case! But oftentimes, it’s not. There do exist people who oppose the oppression directed at them but are totally unconcerned about or even perpetuate other kinds of oppression. THIS IS NOT AT ALL THE SAME AS SAYING THAT ALL GAY PEOPLE ARE BIGOTS. However, it is a fact that being gay or gay-friendly is no guarantee of enlightened racial views. Just as being a women is no guarantee that a person won’t be homophobic, or being disabled is a guarantee that someone won’t be sexist, or whatever. So, like I said in my original comment, in theory you might assume that a gay-friendly congregation would also be welcoming to people of color, because you’d think people who were anti-oppression on one axis would be anti-oppression on others, but in practice that may or may not actually be the case. You can’t just assume.
And if anyone in this thread who is not Mnemosyne still thinks I’m calling all gay people bigots and saying that people of color automatically are unwelcome in gay-friendly churches, then I will turn off my computer for the rest of the night because that would mean that my ability to communicate is obviously shot to shit.
Mnemosyne
@TooManyJens:
This is what you said:
To me, this sounds like you’re saying that people of color should assume that churches that advertise themselves as gay-friendly will not welcome people of color. I’m not really sure what distinction you’re trying to draw between “not welcome” and “can’t necessarily assume they are welcome.”
What I’m getting from your comments is that you’re assuming that any people of color who want to join a gay-welcoming church need to be cautious because they may not be welcome. The only reason to assume that people of color wouldn’t be welcome in a gay-welcoming church would be because of an assumption that gay people are bigots. I’m really not sure how else I’m supposed to interpret what you said.
To me, it sounds like you’re saying the same thing Dreher did, which is why I’m getting pissed off:
Suffern ACE
Well, I can see this went well. Anyway. I thought I’d post a link before I forgot it. I intend to pull it out whenever I think of all those poorly staffed local newspapers that aren’t able to cover the goings on in their statehouses, leaving their communities starving for news.
Mnemosyne
@TooManyJens:
That is not how what you first said came across. At all. You came across as agreeing with Dreher that the church was being hypocritical because they said they welcomed gay people but clearly would not welcome people of color.
I think you missed the binary system that Dreher was setting up, where all gay people are white, all white people are bigots, and obviously a gay church in a “lily-white” neighborhood would reject any people of color who tried to join.
Yes, it’s true that membership in one oppressed group does not automatically make you sympathetic to other oppressed groups. In fact, I said that. But it also does not automatically make you unsympathetic, which is what Dreher was saying. And I was more than a little shocked to see you apparently taking his side and agreeing that our working assumption should be that a gay-friendly church will reject people of color.
ETA: Also, too, most mainline congregations that advertise themselves as gay-friendly (such as Church of Christ or Episcopalians) usually advertise themselves as welcoming to everyone, which is why religious extremist Dreher hates them.
ETA #2: The assumption that “gay” and “person of color” are mutually exclusive groups drives me up the wall. Just saying.
Mnemosyne
@TooManyJens:
If I did misunderstand you, then I apologize. But what you were saying really came across as continuing and encouraging the kind of thing that NOM is doing when they deliberately pit gay people and people of color against each other.
Mnemosyne
Last word: I guess what I’m saying is that Dreher is such a jackass that I am completely unwilling to take him at his word when he assumes that the gay-friendly church in his neighborhood does not welcome people of color. Knowing him, it’s entirely likely that he thought this while walking past the African-American pastor and her Latina girlfriend.
Dice
@kindness: Most big dogs, unlike most humans, are naturally inhibited from attacking smaller dogs. Strooth: I live with a pack of about a dozen labs, pits, and pugs.
TooManyJens
@Mnemosyne: There’s no “if.” You misunderstood. And thanks a lot for the benefit of the doubt, by the way.
TooManyJens
On the bright side, the rage from this thread (among many other things) helped fuel a nine and a half mile run. So maybe I really should be thanking you.
Miss Mouse
Does anyone else keep getting random anti-virus reports for trying to connect to ‘connexity.net’ when visiting this site? Every time I try scroll through a page here, I get a Norton warning that my computer is trying to connect connexity.net and that it can’t verify the security signature. I always cancel out, so I’m not connecting to it, and my general virus scan is clean. Is anyone else having this problem? Is it just a bad ad script?
SmoovP
Rosco.
http://patrickhouston.com/dl/Rosco006.jpg
Well, poop. Tryin’ to put up a pic of Rosco, but can’t figure out the proper image tag…
Mnemosyne
@TooManyJens:
If you come back, here’s where I was coming from: I hate hate hate when people concede right-wing talking points to conservatives.
Dreher was not coming from a position of lamenting that American racism still permeates our churches. He was coming from a position that liberals are the real racists, and he can totally prove it because there was a sign outside a liberal church that welcomed gay people but not people of color.
So, no, I am not willing to agree with Dreher that a mainline liberal church is just as likely to be full of racists as his church is. And call me naive, but I do think that a liberal church with a gay-friendly sign actually is more likely to be welcoming to people of color than one without a rainbow out front.
TooManyJens
@Mnemosyne:
I don’t really care in this case. I wasn’t talking to Dreher, I was talking to you, and you said something about what one could assume that I didn’t think was correct. You don’t even think it’s correct, in that you have stated multiple times in the thread that being gay or gay-friendly doesn’t mean that one can’t be a dick about race. But somehow me saying it makes me the bad guy. Fuck it, I’m done with this conversation.