July 1998 and I was there.

Side note: Pat is the only artist to win a Grammy in 10 different categories.

Gog, you magnificent bastard.

NV

So then I went looking through Old Guy Stuff from High School days, and was stunned to see the accompaniment on this. I liked Benson back in the day, but that team for that project seems like thermonuclear overkill.

This article poses an issue I used to share here during gay marriage debate:

"In acknowledging the reality of same-sex attraction, you are indirectly acknowledging the reality and importance of biological sex as a driver of attraction."

And this passage was interesting:

"Stonewall UK, for example, was set up in 1989 to fight Section 28 of the Local Government Act of 1988, which....

I think that's how it is across the planet. Even as lesser nations have absorbed the technolgies (and warped their economies) to present American-toned news and media to distract their populations, the heroic, tits-out allure of American culture has roared in their imaginations... But they still can't do as well with their own product. (Name a Taiwanese movie. Or a Bulgarian one or an Algerian one or a Brazilian one or a Zambian one.)

American media —film & broadcast & all the rest— rule the human imagination. People who live lives in squalor and abject submission to oppressive regimes look at our history and audacity as the model for their own egotistical daydreams, if not their actual conduct... Because after all, rooting out corruption and authoritarianism is risky and uncertain.

…

I'd like to think this inconsistency gnaws at their souls, but it quite obviously doesn't. With this year's compelling exception of Hong Kong, almost no one on the planet is embracing the model of American liberty with the courage it requires & deserves.

I remember shredding a few of Amy's commenters about this a few years ago: It was tremendous fun.

…

Consider these words reviewing work by David Bentley Hart:

By declaring that God could be found in the inherent dignity and beauty of each person, no matter what their station in life, and most especially in the face and lives of the poor, Christ turned the world upside down. Suddenly slaves were not slaves, but the children of God who demanded freedom. Race was no longer important. The poor were not pathetic, but the face of God himself. Over time and as the freedom revolution unfolded, people wanted more and more of it. Christianity saw the birth of hospitals, the university, anti-colonial movements, the civil rights movement, even changes to language itself.

Times are changing, even since that 2013 blog post. Credit where due! Even in this time of crumbling media empires and venues, Amy Alkon has pursued a life of self-reliance and principled independence. She works like Hell. We should hope that living proudly at the beach in one of the world's intellectual and fashion capitals has been as rewarding as women around the world, less-bold ones, must imagine it to be.

I love & admire Bjorn Lomborg, who retweeted the link…

…But I also love my neighborhood, and that's it.

As mentioned above, others aren't so good at this. We aren't as good as we used to be either, but still.

As mentioned above, others aren't so good at this.

Well, they've got a cargo cult understanding of our form of government to a greater or lesser extent. Fighting against corruption and authoritarians requires work, and some amount of balls to be able to withstand the slings and arrows that will come your way, assuming they don't send the Cheka to have a chat about your wayward opinions.

We aren't as good as we used to be either, but still.

As it was heard:

“Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?”

“A Republic, if you can keep it.”

The keeping it is in some doubt. I'm less worried about the debt than I am about the people that want the government to protect them from mean memes and harsh words. And insist that only agents of the government overseen by Orange Man Bad should have all the guns.

Any time Crid posts a link to a past thread, I go back and read it to see if I was a liar then, or I'm a liar now. I seemed to have been elsewhere for that one, though. That may have been the period where they were blocking access to the Goddess at work. (We had some really dumb net-nanny software for a while. It blocked access to a lot of vendor sites that we needed to get to. To get something whitelisted, you had to get a signoff from a lieutenant colonel or higher. That's the Army for you.)

I kind of wish the site had a button you could click that would generate a link to a random blog post from the archive.

As one wag noted, this cat has spent more time in the endzone at MetLife Stadium than the Jets have.

https://twitter.com/NFL_Memes/status/1191546848600829953

David Thompson has some thoughts on yesterday's porch thief article in the Atlantic.

Readers will note Ms Smiley’s attempt to trivialise habitual thievery by selectively mentioning the contents of packages that were stolen, as if the thieves hadn’t just swiped someone else’s property regardless of the contents, which were, presumably, only discovered later. Not caring what it is you’re stealing and doing it anyway isn’t, I’d suggest, the strongest excuse for habitual criminal behaviour. [As illustrated via Schuler in the comments, here, here and here.]

https://davidthompson.typepad.com/davidthompson/2019/11/its-petty-when-it-happens-to-someone-else.html

Here 1 headline: Thieves steal $3,000 worth of 8-year-old’s medicine off Lubbock porch

Here 2 headline: Porch Thieves Steal Boy’s $5000 Kidney Medication

Here 3 headline: Mother says video shows thief stealing son's cancer medication off porch of Summerlin home

I have a radical idea: If it isn't yours, don't take it.

"that team for that project seems like thermonuclear overkill"

Now that's a lineup George can still name-drop at parties.

"Yeah, I threw [INSERT INCREDIBLY TALENTED WORLD CLASS MUSICIAN NAME HERE] a bone and let him play 'Breezin' with me."

Long term storage of films and other data? What happens if you drop it?

The goal of Project Silica, which began in 2016, is to create a solution ideal for cold storage -- data that needs to be stored but rarely accessed for long periods of time. Archived master copies of films are usually only taken out of storage for remastering projects. Between their infrequent use and the volatility of celluloid, old movies sitting in studio warehouses are a reasonable use case for Microsoft's glass storage.

https://www.engadget.com/2019/11/04/microsoft-archived-superman-project-silica/

> I seemed to have been elsewhere
> for that one, though.

Dood, you were Commenter #1.

Besides, who's calling you a liar?

(I always defend myself as mulititudinous and cosmopolitan. But never Vogue.

Austin was a snoozer, but still.

CommieCare™.

Never brag.




Your ex is banging a new guy, but when they go to a party, you have to put on a jacket and stand with them to chitchat with her friends:

But in reality, simply “sitting out” is not even an option for Hinchcliffe, per a recent report by Toronto Star.

TheStar‘s Norris McDonald reported that Hinchcliffe will still need to earn his salary, which is roughly $500,000 per year, in 2020, by going to the races, spending time in their hospitality unit, shaking hands with people, doing appearances away from the track, etc.

McDonald also reports that the team would claim a breach of contract and stop paying him if he refuses. Hinchcliffe’s lawyers have reportedly already threatened to sue the team, but they have been told that the team will withhold Hinchcliffe’s pay if they do.

CommieCare™

Oh, that's so going to work out well. I'm afraid that England is so far gone that they don't know what pitchforks and torches are good for.

How far behind are we? 30 years? 50? maybe not even because if you can "punch a nazi" as a moral good, how far behind can you say "deny the nazi health care" as a moral good?

The next logical progression is "send the nazi to the gulag".

Holiday meaning.

Moral nuance.

Historical daredevil amazement.

Postmodern safety factoid.

Wait. How are the free little libraries bad?

https://www.popville.com/2019/10/as-if-my-hangover-wasnt-bad-enough-now-i-need-to-smash-my-head-into-a-wall/

The lingering war of words between Oberlin and Gibson's Bakery.

https://legalinsurrection.com/2019/11/ted-koppel-despite-verdict-oberlin-college-president-still-makes-allusions-to-a-pattern-of-racist-behavior-by-gibsons-bakery/

It's the Deep State. Once you're a made man, you're a made man. To coin a phrase, leave the gun, take the cannoli.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/zoetillman/justice-department-metoo-sexual-harassment-assault-aponte

"Wait. How are the free little libraries bad?" ~IRA

They posted the note right there IRA. It lays out the problem quite clearly. Little Free Libraries aren't part of the union.

So I'm out busing my butt trying to get back into running again, and here you dumb motherfuckers are, killing each other over a fucking chicken sandwich!

"busting my butt" -- excuse my fat fingers.

In the meantime, he seems nice.

Twitter’s Ban on Political Ads Will Only Make Things Worse, according to Daily Signal writer John York.

What say you guys?

It looks like an environ-MENTAL Nanny State rule in Key West is about to go bye-bye.

Florida Senate moving quickly to kill local sunscreen laws

From the People's Republic of Maryland (Kalifornia East):

Conservatives Need Safe Spaces Too!

So nice of the media, looking out for vulnerable teenage girls.

Hot Mic Catches ABC Anchor Saying Higher Ups Made Her Ditch the Epstein Story

"Besides, who's calling you a liar?"

I am! I've gone back and read some other past threads on things that I've changed my mind about since then. It's a bit embarrassing sometimes.

Meanwhile, on to the big news of the week: What do you think about Penske buying the Speedway?

1. Glad he's still engaged enough to do it.

2. Wish Donahue was still around to get a job in the front office.

3. Remember when, in the late 1970's, Mae West made a sex comedy at age 84? Critics were unanimous: She shouldn't have done this.

The 500 is just a big, dumb, violent auto race, and it's hard to imagine what could make it relevant to the smartphone generations.

Years ago National Geographic had an article about Nascar, written by someone famous, but I forget who. They said the postwar enthusiasm for auto racing blossomed after the naive hillbillies had come back from the Big One with much richer tolerance for bloody entertainment than they'd had before.

As America's culture has grown so very much less patient with violence in both domestic and international contexts (drones excepted), it's difficult to imagine anything that could restore the glow to the IMS.

It's in the landing pattern for the airport, so I've flown over A LOT over the last five years. Each time I've tried to imagine some combination of additional turns or hills over landfill or excursions into the neighborhood that would make it interesting, even if all the OK Boomers died off and let go of their ovoid fantasies.

There's nothing. Fashion is cruel! We know that. Every city in America with a early-20th population greater than 50,000 has an elegantly ornate theater that's gone to Hell, with water damage and fallen fixtures and heartbroken locals.

But whatcha gonna do?

Presumably, real estate development, as with the old Denver airport et al.