I'm pretty suge he just said fug -

the stuffy atmosphere of a poorly ventilated space; also : a stuffy or malodorous emanation .
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fug


So um, nothing to see here - nothing to see - All people that work for the 7-second delay company can back about their business...

Just look at his last comment, and allow your hopes to be dashed. Ultimately he's just a birther negrophobe.>> ^ChaosEngine:

>> ^quantumushroom:
Based on BHO's performance, he doesn't deserve a second term.

I must be going mad. I could've sworn QM just made a political statement without resorting to childish name-calling or ridiculous hyperbole.
A sign of things to come? One can only hope.

>> ^seltar:
Are you fucking kidding me, @bremnet & @Chaucer?
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/harp
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/harp
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/harp
http://www.websters-dictionary-online.org/definitions/harp
It's also called a harp.
Get over it, and/or fuck off!
Also, why am I defending the title of the YouTube video?



My point exactly. Can't believe you bit again, and with such passion this time. Good to be right I guess. Carry on.

Are you fucking kidding me, @bremnet & @Chaucer?

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/harp
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/harp
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/harp
http://www.websters-dictionary-online.org/definitions/harp

It's also called a harp.
Get over it, and/or fuck off!

Also, why am I defending the title of the YouTube video?

@messenger

"You said I was wrong, and "effect" is never a verb."
-
I said you were wrong, I never said that it's "never used as a verb." You've quoted most (all?) of my posts so we can be relatively certain they are not edited.
--------------------
--------------------
"you talk about "personal effects". This is meaningless."
-
You sure about that?
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/personal+effects
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/personal%20effects
http://definitions.uslegal.com/p/personal-effects/
https://secure.ssa.gov/poms.nsf/lnx/0501130430
For someone with English as THE major focus of their life for the past 12 years, I'm very surprised you have never heard of the phrase "personal effects."
-
*increases bullshit radar's maximum power*
So, you're telling me that the focus of your life has revolved around the English language and the phrase "personal effects" is meaningless?
*bullshit radar bursts into flames*
kay...
--------------------
--------------------
In your second sentence, you have all the "effect"s and "affect"s backwards. A correct sentence could be:
My personal affects (things I own) and the effects of my person on others effected (caused to happen) other affects (moods/emotions).
-
Negative; the sentence isn't all backwards.

My personal effects (noun, see definitions' links above) and the effects of my person (noun, I did get this wrong in the original) on others affected (verb form, the definition for the noun form doesn't make sense in this context [not at all]) other effects (in this case, I suppose you could possibly use affect as a noun, but its use in the language is arguably near extinction today).
--------------------
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Also, no comma between a subject and verb.
-
What is this^ in reference to?
--------------------
--------------------
Finally, you still seem confused on which word to use. We can't have someone's life's work done poorly now can we? I recommend you practice which word to use by reading up on the subject at the Purdue Online Writing Lab: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/660/01/
-
After studying, you can test your affectiveness effectiveness (see what I did there?) at their use by trying the sample exercises provided by the same site: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/exercises/4/24/42/
-
Here are some other sources that may help you better understand your own life's work:
http://grammar.quickanddirtytips.com/affect-versus-effect.aspx
http://crofsblogs.typepad.com/english/2005/08/effect_as_a_ver.html
http://www.esm.ucsb.edu/academics/documents/grammar_style.pdf
http://www.writersblock.ca/tips/monthtip/tipsep99a.htm
http://prpost.wordpress.com/2012/02/10/raven-remember-affect-is-a-verb-and-effect-is-a-noun-usually/
http://imgi.uibk.ac.at/mmetgroup/MMet_imgi/tools/mayfield/affect.htm <-- the most precise and concise source I could find
--------------------
p.s.
Does anal retentive have a hyphen in it?

It's Keen's Mustard (try a google image search on that exact phrase) after Thomas Keen, founder of the company (born in 1801, quite a while after Jimbo's big bag'o'trivia has him founding the company). See http://mccormick.com.au/keens/history/mustard-history.aspx

McCormick have bought the Australian rights to the name.
>> ^jqpublick:

Definition 1 c) is where it comes from.
Definition of KEEN - Merriam-Webster online
1 a : having a fine edge or point : sharp
b : affecting one as if by cutting <keen sarcasm>
c : pungent to the sense
But maybe Keane just exploited the coincidence, I don't know.


>> ^CrushBug:
>> ^Boise_Lib:
"Keen as mustard"
That's a new one to me.

I think there is a brand of mustard in England by the name of Keane, so that might be where the phrase comes from.

Definition 1 c) is where it comes from.

Definition of KEEN - Merriam-Webster online

1 a : having a fine edge or point : sharp
b : affecting one as if by cutting <keen sarcasm>
c : pungent to the sense

But maybe Keane just exploited the coincidence, I don't know.




>> ^CrushBug:

>> ^Boise_Lib:
"Keen as mustard"
That's a new one to me.

I think there is a brand of mustard in England by the name of Keane, so that might be where the phrase comes from.

From Merriam-Webster:
3 a : a state, situation, or series of events involving interesting or intense conflict of forces
>> ^brycewi19:

Umm. Hate to say it, but I would classify that more as "Action" than "Drama".
Just sayin'.


>> ^spoco2:


And I agree. That's not Drama 'We know Drama'. No you don't. If you pick a movie in the 'drama' genre you're going to get very little of what was just shown and far more deep discussions and crying and long stares into the middle distance.
Apparently "We know Action but think it's called Drama"

This one!
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fuck

>> ^ghark:

>> ^Auger8:
Single greatest word in the English language!

which one?

>> ^quantumushroom:

If you support gay marriage, you support polygamy by default.

Bullshit. Polygamy is defined by wikipedia as a marriage which includes more than two partners. Or would you prefer websters, which defines it as marriage in which a spouse of either sex may have more than one mate at the same time. The fact that a marriage contains two wives or two husbands does not make it polygamous.

>> ^quantumushroom:

At least you, @ChaosEngine have the stones to actually support both. I'd even go so far as to agree with you, with the exception that I'll freely admit there are/will be many unforeseen problems with both gay marriage and polygamy.


We've had gay marriage (actually civil unions but marriage in all but name) in NZ for years now. Society has failed to collapse. Are there potential issues with polygamy? Undoubtedly. Hell, I'll admit that there are potential issues with gay marriage. Thing is, there are issues with marriage, period. Even in a committed monogamous heterosexual marriage, there's all kinds of problems, because people are flawed. Being gay or polygamous doesn't make them any more or less flawed. I'd prefer we dropped the polygamous angle now, since it's derailing the conversation. I don't mind debating it, but I feel it's orthogonal to this issue.

>> ^quantumushroom:

I don't equate pedophilia with homosexuality. What I dispute is your confidence that within 20 years, whatever authority you believe the State will have to prevent pedophile "unions" will still exist.

Well, the state grants the marriage licence. I see no proposal to change that, so the authority will remain intact. As for allowing pedophile "unions", how does gay marriage affect that? Age of consent is a well defined concept that applies to everyone, heterosexual or homosexual.

I really am getting tired of repeating this, but context, nuance, judgement. Think is not a four letter word. The world is not black and white, and it is an oversimplification to view it as such. War is sometimes justified, lying is sometimes the right thing to do and I am comfortable making the distinction between a union of two consenting adults and an adult and a child. Why? Because I can weigh up the merits of each individual case and make a judgement.

>> ^quantumushroom:

If no one here has a problem with california or any state revoking election results, aka the will of the people, welcome to fascism.

Fascism? Are you actually serious? Leaving aside how much fascists really don't like homosexuality, you have completely failed to understand democracy.

There are already well defined limits on the will of the people. To use your own analogy, how would you feel if california had passed an amedment legalising pedophilia?

>> ^gorillaman:

It's funny how this word that apparently everyone but me is able to apply accurately suddenly becomes so elusive when it's time for you to spit out a definition. Historically it has been difficult; but so many experts have weighed in here, thirty of them so far echoing Inigo Montoya, that together you ought to have a pretty solid consensus.
But you don't.
Well, I use two definitions of fascism. Both equally valid, both describe Obama.
My broad definition of fascism is anything that restricts freedom for a bullshit reason. You guys might not like that one.
My narrow definition of fascism is any political movement characterised by most or all of the following: nationalism, collectivism, authoritarianism, militarism, and stupidity. Obama's regime is five out of five by that measure.
Narrower definitions exist - they're not useful to anybody but historians.
I believe fascists should be killed. I want all of you to believe it too.


How about instead we go down the (admittedly controversial) route of using a dictionary to define fascism, as opposed to your "anyone who disagrees me" definition. Here, I'll even look it up for you.

"Fascism : noun
1: often capitalized : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition
2: a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control Now, if you truly believe that Obama satisfies those requirements, you're either a) an idiot or b) suffering from a severe case of first world problems.

Hyperbole adds nothing to the discussion.

>> ^moodonia:

>> ^honkeytonk73:
All religions are cults.

There are sets of criteria which define what is a cult and what is a religion, I understand that most people feel the need to share their personal beliefs whenever the subject of belief arises but lumping the two together is inaccurate.


I see where you are coming from.. however:

According to most mainstream English dictionary definitions of the word "cult", all religions fall into said category. The concept of a religion being non-standard (unorthodox), not mainstream, or not 'right' rests solely as the opinion of the individual perceiving said religion in question. It is a matter of perspective. My declaration that all religions are cults puts them all on equal ground without a preference to the religion of my familial ancestry. Calling one's own religion a 'true religion', and all others cults, comes from a false/biased perspective. That makes it one's own definition, not a standardized definition.

While a roman catholic might consider themselves a member of a 'true religion', they just might consider a southern baptist group in Oklahoma to be a cult. Meanwhile the baptists mentioned would consider the roman catholics 'cult-like' with their insistence of ritual and pomp and circumstance surrounding their traditions... most of which are not even in the Bible, and were mostly developed for it's 'oooh ahh' factor with colorful shiny costumes and incense.

Were the Greeks, Romans or Egyptians.. all members of 'cults'? Their religion most certainly was mainstream and heavily followed during their age. Could they be labeled as cults today? Most certainly. Just because a religion is main-stream, or followed by a majority does not make it any less a cult.

Merriam-Webster: "a system of religious beliefs and ritual; also : its body of adherents"
Wikipedia: "A system of religious veneration and devotion directed toward a particular figure or object."
Dictionary.com: "a group or sect bound together by veneration of the same thing, person, ideal, etc. "
thefreedictionary.com: "A system or community of religious worship and ritual."
Oxford: "a system of religious veneration and devotion directed towards a particular figure or object"
Websters: "Followers of an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices."

@marbles:

First you need to acknowledge what a conspiracy is. When two or more people agree to commit a crime, fraud, or some other wrongful act, it is a conspiracy. Not in theory, but in reality. Grow up, it happens.

Thanks for the vocabulary lesson, but I used the term conspiracy theory, not conspiracy. Conspiracy theory has a separate and more strongly suggestive definition (this one from Merriam-Webster): "a theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators."

I openly acknowledge that the government of the United States has and does commit conspiracies, as you define the word. (You mentioned Operation Northwoods in a separate comment; a post on Letters of Note from few weeks ago may be of interest to you, too, if you haven't already seen it: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2011/08/possible-actions-to-provoke-harrass-or.html.) The actions described therein, and other such actions, I would aptly describe as conspiracies (were they to be enacted).

Definitions aside, my problem with posts like that of @blastido_factor is that most of their so-called conspiracies are easily debunked. They're old chestnuts. A few minutes' worth of Google searches can disprove them.

It may be helpful to distinguish between what I see as the two main "conspiracies" surrounding 9/11: (1) that 9/11 was, to put it briefly, an "inside job," and (2) that certain members of the government of the United States conspired to use the events of 9/11 as justification for a series of military actions (many of which are ongoing) against people and countries that were, in fact, uninvolved in the 9/11 attacks. The first I find no credible evidence for. The second I consider a more tenable position.


The Pentagon is the most heavily guarded building in the world and somehow over an hour after 4 planes go off course/stop responding to FAA and start slamming into buildings, that somehow one is going to be able to fly into a no-fly zone unimpeded and crash into the Pentagon without help on the inside?

Once again, much of what you mention can be attributed to poor communication between the FAA and the government agencies responsible for responding to the attacks (and, for that matter, between the various levels of government agencies). And again, this is one of the major criticism levied by the various 9/11 investigations. From page forty-five of the 9/11 Commission: "The details of what happened on the morning of September 11 are complex, but they play out a simple theme. NORAD and the FAA were unprepared for the type of attacks launched against the United States on September 11, 2001. They struggled, under difficult circumstances, to improvise a homeland defense against an unprecedented challenge they had never before encountered and had never trained to meet."

Furthermore, it seems to me that one of the biggest mistakes made by a lot of the conspiracy theorists who fall into the first cateory (see above) is that they judge the events of 9/11 in the context of post-9/11 security. National security, on every level, was entirely different before 9/11 than it is now. That's not to say that the possibility of this kind of attack wasn't considered within the intelligence community pre-9/11. We know that it was (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks_advance-knowledge_debate). But was anyone adequately prepared to handle it? No.

In any event, when's the last time you looked at a map of Washington, DC? If you look at a satellite photo, you'll notice that the runways at Ronald Reagan airport are, literally, only a few thousand feet away from the Pentagon. Was a no-fly zone in place over Washington by 9:37 AM? I honestly don't know. But it's misleading to suggest that planes don't routinely fly near the Pentagon. They do.


And how did two giant titanium engines from a 757 disintegrate after hitting the Pentagon's wall? They were able to find the remains of all but one of the 64 passengers on board the flight, but only small amounts of debris from the plane?

In truth, I don't know enough about ballistics to speak for how well a titanium engine would withstand an impact with a reinforced wall at hundreds of miles an hour. But, if you're suggesting that a plane never hit the building, here's a short list of what you're wilfully ignoring: the clipped light poles, the damage to the power generator, the smoke trails, the hundreds of witnesses, the deaths of everyone aboard Flight 77, and the DNA evidence confirming the identities of 184 of the Pentagon's 189 fatalities (64 of which were the passengers on Flight 77).

Regarding the debris: It's misleading to claim that only small amounts of debris were recovered. This from Allyn E. Kilsheimer, the first structural engineer on the scene: "I saw the marks of the plane wing on the face of the building. I picked up parts of the plane with the airline markings on them. I held in my hand the tail section of the plane, and I found the black box ... I held parts of uniforms from crew members in my hands, including body parts." In addition, there are countless photos of plane wreckage both inside and outside the building (http://www.google.com/search?q=pentagon+wreckage).


Black boxes are almost always located after crashes, even if not in useable condition. Each jet had 2 recorders and none were found?

You help prove my point with this one: "almost always located." Again, I'm no expert on the recovery of black boxes, but here's a point to consider: if the black boxes were within the rubble at the WTC site, you're looking to find four containers that (undamaged, nonetheless) are roughly the size of two-liter soda bottles amidst the rubble of two buildings, each with a footprint of 43,000 square feet and a height of 1,300 feet (for a combined volume of 111,000,000 cubic feet, or 3,100,000,000 liters). (You might want to check my math. And granted, that material was enormously compacted when the towers collapsed. But still, it's a large number. And it doesn't include any of the space below ground level or any of the other buildings that collapsed.) Add to that the fact that they could have been damaged beyond recognition by the collapse of the buildings and the subsequent fires. To me, that hardly seems worthy of conspiracy.


Instead we invaded Afghanistan and started waging war against the same people we trained and armed in the 80s, the same people Reagan called freedom fighters. Now we call them terrorists for defending their own sovereignty.

Here, finally, we find some common ground. I couldn't agree more. You'd be hard-pressed to find a more ardent critic of America's foreign policy.

>> ^marbles:
First you need to acknowledge what a conspiracy is ...

@blastido_factor:

There's an old Jewish proverb that runs something like this:

"A fool can throw a stone into the water that ten wise men cannot recover."

Your stones, fortunately, aren't irrecoverable. I'll offer some counterpoints to a few of your claims, and I'll leave it up to you to fish for the truth about the others.


- The alleged masterminds of 9/11 have never been produced and never put to trial, despite having supposedly been captured in 2001/02

I don't know what you mean by "produced," but here's something I do know: I started a case in small claims court earlier this year (in New York City, nonetheless), and I was told I'd have to wait at least four months to appear before an arbitrator. (It's likely that I'll have to wait longer, if, for example, I opt to appear before a judge.) Simply put, trials take time. Given the complexities of a trial involving the masterminds and perpetrators of 9/11, ten years is hardly cause for conspiracy.


- Total failure of the air defense system. The Pentagon was struck One hour and Twenty minutes after the attacks began, yet there was no response from Andrews Air Force base, which is just 10 MILES away and supposed to be in charge of defending the capitol."

The North Tower was struck at 8:46 AM, the South Tower at 9:03 AM, and the Pentagon at 9:37 AM. By my math, the Pentagon was hit fifty-one minutes after the first plane hit the WTC and thirty-four minutes after the second plane hit. The 9/11 Commission estimated that the hijacking of Flight 11, the first plane to hit the WTC, began at 8:14 AM. It's misleading, in this context, to consider the hijacking of Flight 11 as the beginning of the attack (I assume this is what you meant); it wasn't until the second plane hit the WTC that the nature and the scale of the attacks became evident. Could the communication between the FAA and NORAD have been more prompt, and, thus, more effective? Yes. (Rightly so, this is one of the major criticisms lobbied against the agencies responsible for responding to the attacks.) Is the delay of thirty-four minutes cause for conspiracy, given the lack of precedence in handling such a coordinated attack and the confusion surrounding the events of the attack? No.


- The remains of the twin towers were quickly carried off and buried before any forensic investigations could be done.

Your use of the word forensic is categorically flawed. (The first and third definitions of forensic, according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, are as follows: (1) "belonging to, used in, or suitable to courts of judicature or to public discussion and debate, and (3) "relating to or dealing with the application of scientific knowledge to legal problems.") NIST's reports are chock-full of forensic analyses; have a look for yourself: http://www.nist.gov/el/disasterstudies/wtc/index.cfm. Forensic investigations also led to the identification of a significant number of victims. According to Wikipedia: "Within a year, medical examiners had identified the remains of 33 victims who had been on board Flight 11. They identified two other Flight 11 victims, including the lead flight attendant Karen Martin, after body fragments were discovered near Ground Zero in 2006. In April 2007, examiners using newer DNA technology identified another Flight 11 victim. The remains of two hijackers, potentially from Flight 11, were also identified and removed from Memorial Park in Manhattan." The methods used to identify these victims (DNA testing, in many cases) were nothing if not forensic.

You're also neglecting the simple fact that the removal of debris was necessary from a health standpoint. Again, according to Wikipedia: "The thousands of tons of toxic debris resulting from the collapse of the Twin Towers contained more than 2,500 contaminants, including known carcinogens. Subsequent debilitating illnesses among rescue and recovery workers are said to be linked to exposure to these carcinogens."


- Of all the cameras around the pentagon, including the security tapes taken from local gas stations, only one blurry clip was released.

Three videos, not one, were released. According to Wikipedia: "A nearby Citgo service station also had security cameras installed, but a video released on September 15, 2006, did not show the crash because the camera was pointed away from the crash site. The Doubletree Hotel, located nearby in Crystal City, Virginia, also had a security camera video, and on December 4, 2006, the FBI released the video in response to a freedom of information lawsuit filed by Scott Bingham. The footage is 'grainy and the focus is soft, but a rapidly growing tower of smoke is visible in the distance on the upper edge of the frame as the plane crashes into the building.'"


I don't fault you, or others like you, for wanting to "think twice" about the explanations given for certain of the events surrounding 9/11. I do fault you, though, for spending so little time on your second round of thinking, and for so carelessly tossing conspiracy theories to the wind.

>> ^hpqp:

Sigh. For a moment (when you edited your first reply to something less childish and insulting) I thought you didn't want to come off as a closet misogynist with the rhetoric of an angry tweenager... guess I was wrong.

>> ^Yogi:
>> ^hpqp:
@Yogi
Yes, technically a "whore" is "a woman who engages in promiscuous sexual intercourse, usually for money;" but also "a prostitute or promiscuous woman: often a term of abuse" (Collins Engl. dictionary; the part in bold comes up in practically all the online dictionaries google presents when searching "whore dictionary definition", and the Oxford Dictionary classes this word as "derogatory").

But this is not about definitions, it's about use, and your reactionary response seems to betray the fact that you know this full well (which is perhaps why you chose to truncate the M&W definition of "whore").
Your comment that I originally responded to contained truth, and would have probably received a lot more upvotes if it hadn't been for the first phrase. My response, in any case, was not meant as a personal attack, but simply a "heads up" to the negative connotation that term carries.

Fuck Off.



You don't understand what Fuck Off means? It means I don't care whether you live or die...just FUCK OFF!