Tags for this video have been changed from 'train, repair, railroad, big machine' to 'train, repair, railroad, crossties, sleepers, big machine' - edited by calvados

The problem with this is how Americans continue to mistake the office of the president as this all powerful dictator position.

The office of the president is not a kingship, it is not totalitarian. It is one branch of three and it's not even the most powerful branch. Congress is the most powerful branch.

So whenever we have these scandals (left or right) the focus is always on the president even though they may or may not have anything to do with it. I'm not saying they're blameless, but they're certainly not the ringleader. There may be no ringleader. Whenever we have this scandal, there's always this mistaken notion that it was some grand conspiracy with very specific aims and goals and I don't think that is typically the case. I think most of these scandals are simply born out of laziness or negligence or simply just protecting one's ass. Government is a big machine (even in the right wing fantasy of small gov't, it will always be big) and it's more likely it's some unintentional screwup than some pre-meditated maneuver.

IMO, this is most evident during Bush's administration. The guy is obviously not that bright. There was something else going on behind the scenes pulling the strings. Even though Obama certainly is far more intelligent, it still doesn't change a thing that there is a bigger machinery at work and one person alone doesn't steer the boat.

And no I'm not talking about some cliche'd Iluminati-style group. You've just got a large go'vt mechanism that wields a lot of power and it's run by fallible people which is a far simpler plausible explanation.

The only way it's going to be better is if people demand it. But we don't even have half the nation voting. So you have a better than 50 percent chance that any time you hear someone complaining about the gov't...they probably didn't vote.

This idea is old. We used to have kings and dictators, but eventually people demanded something different so they came up with councils and parliaments and congresses, etc that wielded the real power, but they kept the kings and queens as a distraction, as a symbol even though they lost the bulk of their power.

Again, I'm not saying the office of the president is blameless, i'm just trying to inject some perspective.

That's a big machine. I've driven a D8 before, and even that was a little intimidating.

My friend who owns several big machine lathes says the kid was trying to turn it in the wrong direction anyway.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

Not enough explosions.


Tisk tisk!
What you should have said is: Needs more cowbell.
You know, because it is McDonalds and they sell burgers --> Cows (well kind of anyway...) and they are hitting it with that nice big machine... but the sound isn't a cowbell but more like a crashing sound... too bad... did I spoil the fun by explaining it?

Okay, but now suppose that instead of one giant machine, it's actually many smaller machines that do things like move people around, generate electricity, mow the lawn, etc. Instead of the empire cruising around in it killing huge bunches of people at once, they instead just sell the machines to people, and don't mention that using the machines results in a colorless, odorless gas being released that will gradually change the chemistry of the air over time, and change the climate. Eventually, with billions of the machines operating over the course of a century, scientists eventually discover what the empire's been doing, but now they're the richest people on the planet, and will ruthlessly use their money to discredit the environmentalists as quacks and fools pulling hoaxes for political gain...

It'd be so much easier to fight the empire if it was just one big machine that the empire directly controlled, and used to kill billions of people in big showy explosions.

I think washing a cat is an exception rather than the rule. Generally they do a pretty decent job of keeping themselves clean. But if you do have to wash a cat (and I'm not convinced that the cat in the video really needed to be washed), I certainly think there are better ways than sticking it in a big machine and having a good laugh when it (justifiably) flips out (and filming it too, so that everyone all over the world can have a good laugh at your cat being traumatized).