>> ^Winstonfield_Pennypacker:

Moderately well performed & sung song with a message that is beyond idiotic. The NAACP and others are full tilt trying to say the TP is 'racist' - but they have no evidence except very rare, isolated kooks that they cherry pick out of millions (that's when they aren't just liberal plants).
The tea party isn't racist. The only real racists I've seen lately are the douchebags in the Black Panthers. Everything else is a bunch of liberal jerkwads trying to gin charges of racism where no racism exists with the objective of trying to get all the blacks who are disillusioned with the Man-Child's incompetence to turn his plummeting polls around.


Calling a video that generalizes a group idiotic while generalizing another group. Classic

Moderately well performed & sung song with a message that is beyond idiotic. The NAACP and others are full tilt trying to say the TP is 'racist' - but they have no evidence except very rare, isolated kooks that they cherry pick out of millions (that's when they aren't just liberal plants).

The tea party isn't racist. The only real racists I've seen lately are the douchebags in the Black Panthers. Everything else is a bunch of liberal jerkwads trying to gin charges of racism where no racism exists with the objective of trying to get all the blacks who are disillusioned with the Man-Child's incompetence to turn his plummeting polls around.

The Beatles did drugs??!?!? I'm so disillusioned.....

>> ^griefer_queafer:

I dont know. I love Carlin in many ways, but this is really just postmodern apocalypticism at its worst. He's like this big fucking catastrophe maven, and it sickens me how proud he is of it sometimes.
But I get it: its not like I have to choose between enjoying his routine and caring about the oil spill in the gulf... right???


I see your point.

He was very close to the end of his life in these videos (parts 1 & 2), and I think that he could sense that the end was nigh. That could be part of it.

I think the futility took a toll on him. He had been speaking out against the stupidity for so long, and really reaching millions of people, but it didn't make any difference. He saw the sixties come and go, and lo and behold in his twilight years he witnessed the rise of the Bush regime, and two more wars we didn't need.

I think he's quite correct regarding the illusion of choice we have here in the USA, and how voting is but an extension of that illusion.

What I see is a talented, compassionate, brilliant artist who is at wit's end.

In part two he said something like "if you scratch a cynic, you'll find a disillusioned idealist" and he admitted to being such a one.

He was a man who spent most of his life trying to warn everyone that the ship was sinking, but nobody paid attention. I understand fully.

It seems you need to rethink a few things here. You don't seem to really understand the general Libertarian philosophy.

References please.

If the general Libertarian philosophy is actually described somewhere please point us to it. For the most part it seems that Libertarianism is nothing more than a catch all for anyone disillusioned with both the Dems and the Reps, hardly a 'movement' with any kind of unified policies. That very ethereal lack of any consistent policy is exactly the criticism made of Libertarianism.

The only common belief seems to be the 'your freedom ends were mine begins' philosophy, which arguably is already the underlying goal of a great many democratic constitutions universally rejected by Libertarians. If you hold to both those thoughts, your 'philosophy' is no longer consistent with itself, and you can't expect it to be taken seriously.

@SDGundamX

I've seen stuff recently on one of those BBC documentaries about the planet regarding compassion in animals. I don't have a specific example or reference, but I remember being surprised at seeing examples like these:

http://www.harunyahya.com/articles/70self_sacrifice_sci14.php

Sure, you can argue that because of our bigger brains, humans have more complex morals, but many of them stem from the same things other animals already do. We just happen to have the capacity to think about them objectively if we're in a reflective mood.

I agree that what you've pointed out is the weakness in Harris's argument during this talk. However, I think if you gave him more time or presented what you've just said to him, he would have plenty to say. I don't think science is quite as easily co-opted. Religion, in my experience, continues to fragment. New denominations continuously pop up, and people constantly re-define what their religion means to them, which is very natural to do. But, it's kind of wonky because establishing a belief system that ignores this very human trait (constant redefinition based on new information) is fairly naive. On the other hand, I see science as having converging properties since it is based on fact and by its very nature admits it is never 100% certain of anything.

People VERY MUCH enjoy certainty. They follow leaders and invest in companies who say they have "vision" and who claim to know what to do and how to plan for the future. The problem is, nobody knows what will happen in the future, and as our world gets more and more interconnected and complex, our ability to predict gets even worse than impossible...and the more certain we are about how things will play out, the more devastated we will be when we're inevitably wrong. The problem with science is that it has the courage to say "I don't know", whereas most people automatically follow leaders (both religious and political) who give them confidence and have all the answers. Then, people are always surprised and disillusioned when the predictions are wrong.

I'm not surprised.

berticus-That trump card comes from a man who is married to one of the most liberated of females on the planet.... peggedbea, you'd have some enlightened discussions with her should you care to, and she'd probably be the first to want this content seen by women everywhere-not here, but everywhere-They are poking fun about it on EIT, more for the shock value of the gay women and spiritual elements combined, give ya that-but dudette....the faqs state the simple reasoning behind the exclusion of it here on the VS...Here I was proud to be upholding the rules of the place, by pointing out the obvious while tongue in cheekishly hobbling the abuser...never expected it to stick (thanks lucky)

please be ye not disillusioned with all males, some of us are not like the dweebs and freaks you may have encountered. Hang in there,
Like Billie(man's name) Holiday wrote:

"Some day he'll come alooooong, the man(men) you looooove;
and he'll (they'll) be big and stroooong, the man(men) you loooove..
and when they (he) comes yer waaaaay, you'll do yer best, to make them(him) staaaaaaay!"

This just in married professional athlete has a taste for Las Vegas Fluzzies, men everywhere shocked and disillusioned, forced to take comfort in the arms of their mistresses'.

I guess I misunderstood you. I thought you were trying to make the point that consumerism was an effective form of democracy. I earnestly concede your point that businesses without business go out of business, though I wouldn't call it 'bringing down' which is a term that implies deliberate intent.

Corporations do care about small towns. Walmart is famous for setting up shop in small towns and putting local businesses out of business. In many places, Walmart is the only shopping option. When a business as large as Walmart comes to town, they can usually strongarm local governments into tax breaks and beneficial infrastructure projects. I only know of one case where Walmart was prevented from building a store, and that was in the small town of Los Angeles. I sure hope you are right about Walmart, but I only see people becoming more dependent on Walmart as they ravage the underclass.

Democratic government is people power by definition, even when the government you elect fails to stand up to powerful financial interests. I too am disillusioned about the current state of our state, but what gives me hope is that more and more people are becoming aware of these problems through increased access to information and technology.

Despite my screenname, I don't believe things are getting worse. I believe things have always been bad, and that it is only our increased access to information and communication that gives us the perception that things are getting worse. This new awareness (potentially) gives us the opportunity to diagnose problems and (hopefully) fix them. I believe the shift in the electorate from Bush towards Obama is evidence of this, and whether or not his administration has the power to make the changes they promised, he will at least make it easier for the next president.

This is why I see hope in darkness, and the will for change in our dystopian present.

I think this has been a fully fledged character assassination attempt and I am disgusted by it. I am not afraid of what you'll think of me, because the truth is on my side.

This thread, or rather all the rumblings behind this thread, is filled with vicious lies which I can only assume stems from peggedbea. I am deeply troubled by this.

Rasch, this will be my last message directed to you, because I really don't like you and I haven't for a long time. I will make this as delicate and level-headed as I can. You have been misinformed. My messages to both AC and bea after my texas trip have been different ways of asking "What happened?" because none of them would tell me what they were upset about.

I don't know what you and the rest have been told about the trip to Texas, but I am very much not in denial. I do know what happened when I was there, and it was what I wrote in my message above.

Furthermore, where else have you read about my trip to Texas? If it's anything I've written then please present it. I know I talked to AC about it before I went over there, but I've never talked to you about anything? How can you know anything that doesn't stem from peggedbea? Is it not possible that she's the one that's either in denial or just lying for the hell of it.

I have heard a few rumors about what I allegedly did over there and elsewhere. Here's what has been relayed to me

1. You flew to Texas to visit Bea, out of the blue and without an invite.
This is false. We discussed it in the lounge and later on messenger and she invited me. I don't know anyone that currently live in Texas, why in the hell would I book a (very expensive, I might add) trip to texas out of the blue? How could I ever even expect to be allowed to stay with her then? It just doesn't make sense.

2. From the beginning you engaged in a lot of sexual talk with her, some of it around her kids- to the point of telling her 5 year old that she could legally have sex when she's 15.
The latter part is a bold-faced lie. I never, ever talked to her kids about ANYTHING sexual. I talked to bea about it, but that was certainly as much her as it was me. We talked a bit more subdued, but like we've talked in the lounge. Anyone who has ever been in the lounge knows that she talks way more shit than I do, and people who know me in real life know I'm not nearly as sordid when I'm talking face-to-face. And I would fucking never talk about sex to a child. Fucking hell, that's pure evil spreading a lie like that.

3. You grabbed InflateableVagina's ass and boobs while staying with Bea, and generally freaked everyone out.
No and yes. I didn't grab her ass, I think I smacked it. The boob thing was just an immature prank that turned out to be way out of line. I acknowledged that above, and I have apologized to ivy about that. I can't say that I generally freaked everyone out, but I suppose I could have freaked the three out that were there, bea, ivy and their friend rick. The kids were long gone to be by that time, and they certainly liked me both.

A little context as well, this was the second day I was there (tuesday). I was there from monday till thursday morning. I do remember that after it happened ivy or bea said that it was inappropriate, but ivy seemed to laugh it off and I did the same. I shrugged it off as an immature prank gone a little overboard. We were all a bit drunk and I acted like a high-schooler, that was it. I've apologized for this on many occasions now to ivy.

The next whole day, we went to Six Flags and not a word was mentioned about it, so I thought, that I stepped over the line, but it looked like they forgave me, so let's just move on. We were still having fun and bea and I were still talking fine together, so I assumed everything was alright.

The next morning at 4 or 5 in the morning, she knocked on my door and woke me up and explained that someone in her family had died and she had to go away to another part of the state to deal with it. She was very distraught and I've not brought it up before because I don't think it's nice to share such things here, but that's what it's come to. I'm sorry in advance to bea for this, but she's made it abundantly clear that she has no trouble lying to people about what happened, so I have lost all esteem for her and can't be concerned with it anymore.

We drove to the airport in the morning with the kids half-awake on the backseat, she dropped me off and drove on to what she had to deal with.

I wrote Ivy a text message later in the morning asking if she had heard anything from bea and if she was alright, so she can attest to that as well. After that bea blocked me on facebook and ignored all PMs on videosift (and promptly deleted them) and AC wrote me that she didn't want to speak anymore out of the blue. What am I to believe here? I mean, can't you see a possible connection? If bea spread a lie to AC about me that was a terrible as the one above, I could understand that AC reacted the way she did. If only she had told me that, if that's the case.

4. You have been communicating with Alien Concept - planning a visit, and claim to have pictures of her that you found somewhere.

I have indeed been communicating with alien_concept. We've been communicating a great deal since the lounge started, I think. We had a good talk in the lounge, and I'm pretty sure there were other people in there as well. I can't remember which of us asked for a messenger address, but in any case we started talking on messenger as well, because I thought she was fun and I can only assume she did the same to me (well, she said as much at least). I've never been planning any visit to her. I've talked to her about it; that it could be cool to meet up at some point; but she's always wanted her boyfriend to come over before any other sifters. And I can respect that. I did some friendly jabs at her about how cheap it was to go to London, but there were never any plans to go anywhere. We had talked about me coming by after new years, or maybe make the siftup then, when her boyfriend was there as well, but it never panned out to anything concrete. I certainly don't have any pictures of her that I've "found somewhere". She has sent me exactly 5 pictures over messenger herself, nothing sordid or anything. At some point, I think during this winter, I sent her some videos of myself playing guitar like the blog posts, which she at the time thought was fun.

When she all of a sudden wrote her "I don't want to talk anymore" I was completely baffled and saddened. Mostly because I didn't understand why she did it. She said that I "didn't respect her and her boyfriend's relationship", but I never saw it as me trying to horn in on her, we were just talking and having fun. We were both in our talks, I didn't just yap at her leg all the time at all. So I pestered her a bit after she wrote it, because I wanted her to reconsider and at least explain to me why the sudden change of heart and because I considered us friends, and friends do have at least a little lee-way to deserve an answer.

I still very much like the rae that I've talked to and I like ivy still too. I'm completely disillusioned about peggedbea. I liked her, but I don't anymore - this is just vicious and she should be stopped. Rasch, you and some others in here are so quick to judge me and deem me guilty, when it's just not true. This is not denial talking, this is reason talking. If you have heard any other rumors about me, bring them out! We're already doing the laundry in public, we might as well do it proper.

I'm am still not the crook in this and by now I've laid myself bare and exposed more about people I liked that I would have wanted to. This disturbs me, it really does.

I am glad that there are some sifters who still have my back and support me, because the truth is still on my side.

"We need a culture of courage in Washington instead of a culture of cowardice."

I couldn't agree with that man more. Democrats are proving over and over and over again that they are cowardly and I am becoming more and more and more disillusioned over my hopes for the Obama administration and a democratically controlled Congress.

Frankly, Obama's 180 on this (or perhaps more accurately 90 right turn) shows he does NOT have the courage of his convictions, and is willing to simply give up on something because it is hard. That is NOT the man I voted for and it eats me up inside to see him do this.

Goddammit, the one things modern "Republicans" have in spades is the cojones to take the bold steps and initiatives, dam the torpedos, and run in a direction until they by-GOD get what they want. Unfortunately they wanted a war for profit and the elevation of corporate profits over the safety and health of America's citizens.

If Democrats could find the same sack as Republicans had under GW, this debate would be over and done with. Use their tactics! Call supporters of the status quo unpatriotic, show up with guns to anti-healthcare rallies! Pay priests and pastors HUGE sums of cash to get them to tell their congregations Jesus would want public healthcare! Get country music stars to write songs for you! Christ people, republicans wrote the godsdamn playbook on this, just friggin COPY IT!

Disillusioned? Telling it like it is

You get an MA or a PhD by continuing to work in the field. Maybe I was disillusioned, but I wanted nothing to do with big research and jumped to education.

Dag is a prime example of the concept "first among equals", thanks to his visionary idea of the best user-moderated admin system on the web on this the best website in the universe. That vision has suffered some blows, which has triggered the disillusioned dictator we have today, but he seems to be on a speedy recovery on his way towards VS4.

Congratulations, and know that we not only appreciate what we have been served so far, but support you in making it ever better.

Damn, you know what!? I just grabbed my 2009 dictionary from the shelf and sure enough douchenozzle has Evan Sayet listed.

--The guy needs to realize that perhaps his freinds were idiots instead of throwing out the word "Liberal", you know like: them, they, others, liberal, neo-con, socialists, enemy, disillusioned ... It seems to me that his understanding is a little bit myopic.