The Continuing Decline Of Western Civilization ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Let them eat Prozac! As you may or not be aware, China's economy has altered dramatically in a single generation (just goes to show that capitalism and democracy are not the same thing). You probably haven't noticed that the Chinese have gone, in that same generation, from universal (if rudimentary) health care to being 74% uninsured. The response of most pro-capitalism experts seems to be 'it will eventually sort itself out...or they'll all die, one or the other. This certainly won't affect us anyway. What's that? SARS? Never heard of it.' And because I enjoy a good thrust and riposte, 12 states (in the US, silly) have now declared public health emergencies mostly because seniors can no longer afford their prescriptions due to the new Medicare law. Lucky break for the insurance companies, huh? add to the discussion - 0 entriesposted by tcdowc - 11:11 pm - 01.16.06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seriously, why does everyone trust these people? Look, Harriet was ousted not because her qualifications sucked, but because she wasn't considered to be a reliable conservative. So when the people who cried to get rid of her because she lacked convincing conservative (meaning far-right activist) credentials start saying that Alito is really a moderate, look how well he writes his opinions, how much sense does it make to believe that? It makes no fucking sense at all. Alito is far more conservative that Scalia, and he gives Thomas a run for his money. Just because he's soft-spoken doesn't mean that he won't try to overturn or do an end-run around Roe (which is widely popular, consistantly supported by 70% of the population), or vote against anti-discrimination laws such as Miranda, or any number of things which give Ralph Reed wet dreams, as well as supporting pratically unlimited power for the Executive. He is bad bad bad. But now the Washington Post op-ed page has endorsed him, believing that they sense the direction of the wind. add to the discussion - 0 entriesposted by tcdowc - 10:36 pm - 01.16.06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Whither the dry hump indeed I don't have a link for this, but in the new issue of The Atlantic Monthly Caitlin Flanagan has an article about the emerging 'blowjob nation' and how we have fallen on horrible times or something. I read an excerpt here, and this link will familiarize you with her previous work. Apparently, it has become quite the fashion for young ladies of tender age to run around sucking the cocks of tender young lads, and Ms. Flanagan thinks that the feminists are to blame for this. Ms. Flanagan also appears to believe that oral sex is by nature a degrading, humiliating experience. All of which leads me to believe that Ms. Flanagan gives shit head. I bet she doesn't swallow either, probably thinks it's icky. Which is fine, I think she's icky. So here's the question: is there a blowjob epidemic? Are our middle- and high-schools full to bursting with cock-suckers? This seems highly unlikely to me, but if anyone actually knows, let me know. via LGM. add to the discussion - 0 entriesposted by tcdowc - 9:56 pm - 01.16.06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Weekend links! or how I blew off my S.O. and ruined our relationship From the NewYorkTimes, a nice little piece on why drug companies really are evil bastards. Turns out it really is more profitable to treat people for symptoms than for the disease. The nice example given was that insurers don't cover trips to podiatrists for diabetes sufferers, but they will help defray the cost of the much more expensive amputation down the road. Hard to tell if anyone cares about this, but a Guantanemo prisoner is boycotting the military tribunal there. Makes sense really. If they aren't going to let you go even if they find you to be innocent, why bother participating at all. If the NSA is reading this, I of course support the tribunal whole-heartedly. What we need are more secret prisons. In a nice affirmation that all is right in Washington, Fafblog has an interview with Samuel Alito. Just a sample: ALITO: I'm open-minded on abortion, Fafnir. In fact I think it's safe to say that just like every other recent Supreme Court nominee, I've managed to go through a decades-long law career while never actually giving any significant thought to abortion as a legal issue at all. Robert Farley at LGM has a post up suggesting that a monarch plays a vital role in a democracy, seperating the executive from the symbolic executive. This frees up the actual executive to be far more engaged with the press and the public. It's an interesting theory. I had a couple of other things which were really great, but stupid Windows fucked up and I lost the links. So to make up for it, here is some interesting information on the thickness of the atmosphere: Using boundary layer theory as an example, we can define the thickness of the atmosphere to be the altitude that encloses 99 percent of the total mass of the atmosphere. Looking at the chart, we can see that this seems to be about 31 kilometers. The halfway point, where half the mass of the atmosphere is below and half above occurs at 5.5 kilometers. Another interesting fact is that when you are cruising in a modern jet transport at 11 kilometers, you are above 77.5 percent of the atmosphere. The total mass of the atmosphere turns out to be 5.3 zettagrams (5.3 Zg). Neat! add to the discussion - 0 entriesposted by tcdowc - 6:04 pm - 01.13.06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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