lol, what a load of crap

>> ^bareboards2:

Jesus H Christ.
I have to look at sexist crap day after day. I find one funny thing that takes a jab at guys -- a commercial most likely written, produced, directed and most definitely acted by guys -- and I get a load of crap from you.
Lighten up.
I hear this all the time. And I'm saying it back now. Lighten up.
In reply to this comment by ChaosEngine:
>> ^bareboards2:
No, just a relief from the unrelenting onslaught the other way....
>> ^ChaosEngine:
Haha! Sexism is hilarious when it's directed at men!


So two wrongs make a right?
good to know, cheers.


If you're going to stand up against sexism on the sift (and if you look at my comment history, you'll see I've actually been on your side), don't be surprised if you're hoisted by your own petard.

But tbh, I really don't care that much about that video. The "sexism is hilarious when it's directed at men" was a throwaway remark.

Okay, so Jesus did exist..that wasn't made up, which means the bible is an eyewitness account of his life....and now, his disciples weren't brainwashed, we just don't know what they did..well, we do, not only from the bible but from many external sources External sources verify at least 50 people from the NT were historical figures..engravings and statues even tell us what 18 of them looked like. There are 39 sources outside the bible which verify 100 facts about Jesus' life, teachings crucifixion and ressurection..some good examples are Flavius Josephus, Cornelius Tacitus and Gaius Suetonius.

Flavius Josephus, a roman historian wrote:

“At this time there was a wise man who was called Jesus. And his conduct was good, and (He) was known to be virtuous. And many people from among the Jews and the other nations became his disciples. Pilate condemned Him to be crucified to die. And those who had become his disciples did not abandon his discipleship. They reported that He had appeared to them three days after his crucifixion and that He was alive."

As far as what I pasted is concerned, yes some of them could be interperted either way..but not all of them. Many of them are quite precise in making statements about the nature of the Universe..which certainly critics would use to try to prove the bible isn't true if they weren't. Such as that the stars are innumerable to man, yet finite..that there are as many as there are grains of sand. At the time there were no telescopes so they could only see around 5000..no one suspected the trillions and trillions of stars we know about today. Or the fact that God hangs the earth on nothing, when at the time everyone thought it was supported by something..or that there are springs in the sea, mountains in the sea, that the Universe had a beginning..etc. Pretty good for made up, I think..

>> ^Mazex:
Lol don't just copy paste a load of convoluted statements that you got off some website and flout it as fact...
There might of been a guy called Jesus, but I don't for a second believe he was born from a virgin, managed to perform miracles and managed to be resurrected. All those things are part of the bible too, and they have nothing to do with the archaeological record, which is why you citing it, is pointless.
Its obvious that the problems people have with believing the Bible is that it cites a load of miracles and preaching about a God that has never been proven. And you expect everyone to believe it, and believe they are going to Hell if they commit sins and don't repent.
His resurrection being true or not has nothing to do with being brainwashed, it has to do with it being a lie, its a story, its made up, its not real. What his disciples did isn't fact either, you don't know what happened. Because all that's left is a book they all wrote. If you experienced it, and thousands of others experienced it and lived to this day, then I'd say there might be more people that could believe it. But just writing a story down, and then expecting everyone to hold it as truth forever, isn't necessarily truth.
With all these scientific facts that are supposedly revealed in the Bible, you are missing the real truth completely. None of them are scientific claims, they are all you interpreting scientific facts from words. You can pretty much interpret anything that's happened with any piece of literature. Especially with the Bible which has been translated and revised so many times over the years, the actual form of it, is nothing like what it was originally. So your little world of the Bible pre-determining scientific discoveries is a complete farce, please actually think constructively and again don't just copy paste a load of crap from the internet.

Lol don't just copy paste a load of convoluted statements that you got off some website and flout it as fact...

There might of been a guy called Jesus, but I don't for a second believe he was born from a virgin, managed to perform miracles and managed to be resurrected. All those things are part of the bible too, and they have nothing to do with the archaeological record, which is why you citing it, is pointless.

Its obvious that the problems people have with believing the Bible is that it cites a load of miracles and preaching about a God that has never been proven. And you expect everyone to believe it, and believe they are going to Hell if they commit sins and don't repent.

His resurrection being true or not has nothing to do with being brainwashed, it has to do with it being a lie, its a story, its made up, its not real. What his disciples did isn't fact either, you don't know what happened. Because all that's left is a book they all wrote. If you experienced it, and thousands of others experienced it and lived to this day, then I'd say there might be more people that could believe it. But just writing a story down, and then expecting everyone to hold it as truth forever, isn't necessarily truth.

With all these scientific facts that are supposedly revealed in the Bible, you are missing the real truth completely. None of them are scientific claims, they are all you interpreting scientific facts from words. You can pretty much interpret anything that's happened with any piece of literature. Especially with the Bible which has been translated and revised so many times over the years, the actual form of it, is nothing like what it was originally. So your little world of the Bible pre-determining scientific discoveries is a complete farce, please actually think constructively and again don't just copy paste a load of crap from the internet.

What a load of crap.

I don't often side with the cops but this guy (driver) is a genuine waste of taxpayer money. If he's driving around using a bull horn and blowing off at cops while driving, I would argue he IS a distracted driver.

I think it's funny that the second the supervisor showed up his story quickly changes from "I mayyyy or mayy not have been using a blow horn." I would further argue that this attempt to cover up his actions is consciousness of guilt.


Edit: On a side note, I hate the fact that he's throwing around his military credentials like he shouldn't be subject to the same laws as any other American.

>> ^lantern53:

Which part of the 'right wing drivel' is BS?
The part about individual freedom and responsibility?
The part about fiscal responsibility?
The part about following the Constitution, which is the founding document of this country?
The part about free markets?


Wait. Fiscal responsibility? Free markets? Really? The right wing is still trying to lay claim to those virtues? If nothing else, I had hoped the Federal bailout package of the Wall Street scumbags who were the knowing architects of the ongoing global financial meltdown would have purchased us an end to that load of crap.

That's right, Lock everyone up in their homes, so then they can't hurt each other.
Maybe put some padlocks on the outside of their homes to keep them in...

What a load of crap!
Charge with loitering if it's loitering but don't restrict a person's rights!

>> ^quantumushroom:

Thought this was a load of crap, until I opened the Bible and read about Judas screaming, "I WORK FOR DICK JONES!" as Jesus threw him around.


Quantum, sometimes you come up with gold.

Thought this was a load of crap, until I opened the Bible and read about Judas screaming, "I WORK FOR DICK JONES!" as Jesus threw him around.

Up? Another money-printing pixar typical 'old man who hates kids spends time with kid, then come to like them as kid learns valuable life lessons'. Pfft.

Haven't seen Zombieland - yet another goreporn with bursts of comedic goodness but mostly bogged down in the gutters of pop culture.

Matrix - what a load of crap. Unrealistic plot. Washed up actors/actresses giving it one more go. Arrogant neo-religious overtones meant to guide viewer through a cascade of emotional discovery, but crashing several times on the way. Modern reinterpretation of the bible - if you don't see that you're a maroon.

The Princess Bride? Great movie - for teenybopper girls (actually, I've never seen it, or Lawrence of Arabia).

Casablanca - gimme a break. The black & white just oozes pretension. That ending? C'mon - mysterious doesn't always equal good.

The Godfather? Glamourizing organized crime while simultaneously annoying my ears with that wheezy voice on Brando. Try some Halls ferchristsake!

>> ^gtjwkq:
I'd be delighted to get into that subject...(loads of crap)


You must have played some serious dodgeball at recess eh?

>> ^bmacs27:
How exactly is force the exclusive domain of the government? What about the polluter that is forcing you to breath lower quality air? I can't do anything about that. I need a government to enforce my property rights over the air. Yes, the government employs force. It's our only recourse against the force employed by concentrated capital.

Everyone has access to some form of violence, and violent impulses are part of human nature. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but the initiation of violence against another usually is. There are many ways to repress the initiation of violence, but the ultimate resource is violent retaliation. In a civilized society, a government should try to establish a monopoly over the use of force, so that private citizens can concentrate on more productive endeavours and not have to worry about coercion from fellow citizens.

The level by which an individual is free of coercion from others determines how civilized a society is.

So, I'm not saying government has actual exclusivity over violence, but the reason we have government is so that it creates a monopoly over violence, so that it can use violence itself to repress those who use violence against each other. That doesn't mean government is allowed to go nuts and use violence to plan our lives, redistribute wealth, establish monopolies, control the currency, etc.

Services that *require* violence should be done by government. You can't have a "wagging finger" police, they're law enforcers, you can't have courts that can't apply punishment or incarceration, a military that shoots flowers, etc. However, any other service that doesn't *require* the use of force to be performed (education, healthcare, housing, insurance, product safety, space exploration, research, etc.), should be done and will tend to be done better by the private sector.

Please explain to me the law of nature which prevents corporate oligarchy in the absence of government force. Collusion is the rational selection for a small number of powerful agents. They reap the return, prevent entry into marketplaces, and price gouge when privy to exclusive control over an inelastic market (such as healthcare). You've been reading Ludwig too much... I'd recommend reading more of his brother Richard's work. He actually contributed to knowledge.

Well, how would they prevent entry into marketplaces in a free market? Usually it's the collusion between govt + corporations that stops new players from getting in a market with legislation and subsidies. If that's out of the picture, what's left, price dumping? Dumping can push competitors away, but, while it lasts, it's good for consumers (lower prices) and a dumping company's profit takes a hit. No matter how wealthy a company is, it can't practice dumping forever.

If, through price gouging, a company tries to take advantage of its "monopoly" in a market, that creates demand for competition. No matter how inelastic a market is, that doesn't stop the dynamics of supply and demand.

If you're dismissive of Ludwig's contribution to economics, yeah, I hear ya. Whatever knowledge he contributed got pretty much diluted in the mess that economics currently is. If after years of study you were lead to believe you're an economist, I can only offer you my sincere condolences.

Like I stated, healthcare is an inelastic market like police, fire, and water. As such, it should be provided by the government because the status quo of a small number of profit-driven actors in the market leads to price gouging.

You're talking about a highly regulated market that is about 60% provided by government. Gee, I wonder why it's so inelastic.

I'm not saying people got greedy... (loads of crap) It was the banks writing a junk bond, and slapping a smily face on it.

Look into how low interest rates set by the Fed for so long encouraged people getting into debt, how government pursued policies to encourage home ownership (good intentions gone bad), how the subprime market was only possible because of government guaranteed loans.

I've said this before, but I always find it curious how creative interventionists become when they come up with all sorts of "unsolvable" problems that arise from a free market, yet can't use any of that imagination attributing bad consequences to government intervention in a regulated market. It's always the market who gets the blame.

Actually, they do. If our dollar were to suddenly become worthless, they would have no currency reserves. While I agree, they have the upper hand in this, they've already seen what a collapse of consumption on our soil does to their own economic growth. (...)

China along with many other countries were duped into using dollars as reserves, pieces of paper we can print as many as we like. For a while now they've been accumulating actual reserves, such as gold, in preparation for the "quantitative easing" we'll soon be indulging ourselves in.

Consumption isn't a huge favor the world needs from us. Anyone can consume, it's not that hard. what matters is that you pay for it and America hasn't been able to do that for a very long time now. Hell, China has many more consumers than us who can actually pay for stuff with real money. Why would they care to export to us when they can consume most of their goods themselves?

Do you think a chinese is thankful he works in a dishwasher factory so he can go home and wash his clothes by hand on a rock? Or making cars for us so he can ride his bicycle to work?

Their government is also being stupid because they're still trying to prop up the dollar and devaluing their currency by keeping it pegged. They'll wise up eventually.

I didn't say hyperinflation... I said inflation. Between 2 and 4% inflation is a good thing. If you disagree, you are beyond help.

That's kind of a silly statement. Governments like inflation, people who have to produce and earn money don't. That's like saying "low interest rates are good". Depends on who you ask, they're good for debters, but not good for lenders and savers.

As for the Austrian school, yes, it's BS. (BS)

"The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design." -- Hayek. Not that a keynesian would care.

No force, but enforce contracts. Right.

Touché Señor Nitpicker I meant something along the lines of "don't allow use of force among citizens".

It's easy not to worry about how the rules are set up so long as they are benefitting you. Once you see that not everybody is getting a fair deal, you realize the moral, and even selfish reasons for entering a broader scoped social contract. In the end, we all benefit from a well educated, healthy society. We just need to put up the VC.

Unfairness is, most often than not, advanced by the use of force. Problems that don't involve force to begin with, don't require force to be solved. Violence is in a different domain. That's like bullying people into liking you.

Why aren't you questioning the selfishness of those who advocate the use of force? They want power over a whole domain of other people's lives. They say people are being wronged yet they propose using the most destructive tool, something that opens up so much potential for abuse, to solve everything.

Libertarians are always worried about individuals instead of this group, or that group, or whoever claims to be speaking for the interests of society, not out of blind selfishness, but because "individual" is a very cool concept with the following magic properties:

An individual is the smallest minority, so when you help the individual, you help the minority that needs the most protection from abuse (they're the smallest!). An individual is the most numerous minority, so you help the most minorities. An individual is the majority because everyone is an individual. So when you keeps things always at the level of individual, individual rights, individual liberties, etc. you're helping everybody and people tend not to be benefitted at the expense of others.

That sounds a lot more fair to me.

>> ^quantumushroom:
You amaze me with your complete lack of looking into ANYTHING QM.
I don't need to look much beyond the Constitution, which says nothing about 'free' healthcare for all or robbing one group of people who worked hard to pay off others who didn't.


Bingo!

You treat the constitution like others (you perhaps also?) treat the bible... your one stop shop for everything. Everything begins and ends with one document and you'll be damned if any further discussion will be had because apparently that document is perfect. (Let's ignore the raft of amendments... they... um... just fine tuning and already perfect document aren't they?)



Have bothered AT ALL to look at other countries that do healthcare a SHITELOAD better than the US? How do you not think it's fair to provide necessary healthcare to everyone in your country? Under what warped logic do you think that only those that can afford it should be able to live, while those that can't die?
How does that work?


Life isn't fair and no amount of government force will make it fair. I wonder if you lefties even know what's going on in America. Socialized medicine practically exists NOW. WTF is Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security? S-Chip? You'd have to work pretty hard to not get the care you need, especialy if 20 million Mexican illegals are getting it.

No one is saying that the US system is GOOD now at all. But what you DO have is the situation where private health companies are consulted BEFORE you get treatment to see if you will be covered for that treatment. THAT is absolutely insane. Look, here in Australia we have public and private... public health guarantees you all the necessary health care you need, and you pay a levee on that in your taxes (Medicare levee), if you take out Private health care (as most do), then you don't have to pay that levee as you are paying your own way via the private insurer. You don't suddenly stop getting public health, just the hospitals get paid by the private insurer rather than the government. Also, private health care gives you elective benefits and better rooms in hospitals etc. (ie. your own room rather than shared). The deal is, you can get better 'extras' etc. surrounding core health care by being on private, but you never miss out on the necessary care by not being able to afford it... and that's the way it should be.


And your intro also speaks of being simple minded also:
Doesn't everyone deserves a free home
There is such a thing as government housing, and it's used by people who have fallen on hard times until they can afford something better. The houses are never fantastic, and you wouldn't want to stay in them, but they provide shelter while you try to pick yourself up... Of course you rally against such ideas and think they'll only be populated by the lazy, and how dare they get a roof over their head when you work for all you have...
I don't object to safety nets, but you know and I know that's not what we're talking about here. Also, with the Christianity bashing that goes on here at liberalsift, I wonder where the morality of the left exists on its own merit? Was every atheist born knowing 'the right thing to do'?

Wah? Huh? I don't get the point of this comment at all. If you're going down that religious path of 'well, I have this book that tells me my morals, and what is right and wrong... you must have no morals and not know what's right and wrong because you don't have a book', then sorry, but that's an insanely stupid tree to be barking up. If you truly believe that you would do 'bad things' if you didn't have the fear of god punishing you for breaking his commandments for doing so then you are a 'bad person'. Most of us don't do 'bad things' because we don't want to hurt other people or make life worse off for others, not due to some selfish fear for ourselves.


Um... ok, if you don't think there's a need for 'soup kitchens' and other such ways for people who have become destitute, then I would LOOOOOVE for you to end up jobless sometime and not have any family support, and then you can say there should be nowhere for those without money to be able to find shelter and food.
I'd friggen love it.
Well that's just fucking wonderful. With all the shit you've been through, you'd rather just wish harm on others that disagree with you, eh?

I didn't wish harm on you. I wished destitution on you (which doesn't have to physically harm you at all, just take your ego down a few notches). I wished that you ended up with no money and therefore be reliant on the very things that you think shouldn't exist, because apparently you lack a iota of empathy and are incapable of ever seeing how someone could end up poor and without help and need some help to get back on track. Sometimes, for some people such as yourself, the only way to get through that 'it's other people' mentality is for it to affect you directly.


You're making shit up that has nothing to do with my argument, so here it is again worded slightly different: is it the government's obligation to provide "free" basic everything ALL the time the way they claim to want to do with healthcare?


No, and no one is suggesting that the government should provide everyone with free everything. What we're saying is access to healthcare should not be dictated by your bank balance. I, because I earn a good wage, should not be able to get a heart replacement if I need it, but let someone else die because they couldn't afford the operation. That just isn't right, and nowhere in the bible does it say anything about looking after only those who can afford it. In fact, I'm pretty sure it talks about taking care of the weak and needy.


automobile No, but free/heavily subsidized public transport works wonders for actually being able to get to... oh, I dunno... jobs.
I'm not against local public transportation. In some places it works, in others it's been an expensive disaster. And it's not my point. But if you think people with no car have a right to a "free" bus, so be it.
No, people who have no access to their own transport through not being able to afford it, despite their best efforts, should be able to use public transport to get around. If you deny people the ability to get around, how are they ever going to get to the jobs to make the money to be able to pay for these things themselves?



(plus for kicks a high-paying job that pays the same whether you're a brain surgeon or sweep floors)?
Now you're just being a douche. You've got no concept of how any of this works do you? You think that those at or under the poverty line just LOVE living in government housing and surviving on handouts... hell, why bother working when life is so grand hey?
You're an idiot. People don't want to remain like that, people never want to GET like that, but some people do, some through no real fault of their own (some by their own fault, but so what). The idea is, you give them a hand through those times until they can once again become a constructive member of society. And people WANT to get a good job and be able to buy their own home/car and feel like they've been productive. I don't know anyone who enjoys relying on the handouts. But I sure as fuck know people who HAVE HAD to at one time or another and are bloody glad those things were in place to catch them during the tough times.
And some of these people now work for multinational companies in technical roles and are doing very well for themselves... because they were helped during the rough patches.
It ends up costing LESS in the long run you know.
Yeah, that's why we're several trillion dollars in debt. I have another theory about those success stories: those people might have made it whether there was government aid available or not.

Um... you're several trillion dollars in debt for many, many reasons, not least of which is the trillions of dollars you spend on your damn military. You can't take anything you don't agree with and try to suggest THAT is why you're in debt... sorry, doesn't work.

And in regards to those that would have made it one way or another... not necessarily so at all, although you'd LOVE to think so, because that's the right wing brain. "Successful people will always be successful with no help from anyone else". Which is a load of crap. SOME people pick themselves up completely independently and become successful with no external help, but ALMOST ALL have support from many places. A particular case I'm thinking of (a friend), spent years being horrendously insecure in themselves and doing f-all for his career and being effectively 'a drain' on society as you would say. But now he earns a good wage and is giving back to society through his taxes, so therefore paying back for his time. He needed that time being supported to get out of that rut. If there was no support... well, I don't know what would have happened to him, but it wouldn't have been nice.


Also... it'd be friggen hilarious if you got some illness that cost an enormous amount of money to treat, and your private health care provider decided that it wasn't covered (as they like to do)... then you'll be bleating that there should be public health.
If an American with a serious illness that requires expensive treatment knocks on Canada's door seeking asylum, do they let him in? Any Canadian sifters, let me know.
If you take nothing else away from this: I don't pretend to have all the answers, while Big Government tyrants do. I oppose socialism in general and in particular this health scam the Obamunists are trying to pass as quickly as possible before the people realize what they thought were brownies are really dog turds.
A government big enough to pay for your kid's "free" health care is also big enough to say, "You're over the limit for treatment costs. Back of the line."


Huh? You've given up again... you've obviously got some hardwired words in your brain that are 'bad':
'Socialism' = bad
'Big Government' = bad
without really thinking through what you're saying.

Saying that a government can turn around and deny care is, well ridiculous when you're comparing it to private companies that do it ROUTINELY. If government does it (please do give me examples where they have... hmmm? I can pull out stupendous amounts of private health examples), then they have public outcry from the country to contend with because it's health care that WE are all paying for. If a private company denies treatment then you'd just say 'Well... it's a free market, go with another provider'.

I really think that you've been taught to believe these right wing mantras but, like most right wingers, you haven't thought through the consequences of those actions AT ALL... You run on an endless loop of 'hard work will get you what you need', whereas we run on one that says 'a fair go for everyone'. Your loop ignores how people get started in the first place, how people need help to get up from being poor and uneducated and pull themselves up to be really productive members of your country. You think that anyone who can't afford to go to university or get healthcare or have a car only lacks those things purely through their own laziness. We think that maybe you help people to have the opportunity to become educated and not be sick, and maybe that gives them a better chance to spend time learning a trade and becoming skilled and earning a great wage and getting their family moving on and up rather than staying poor and a drain on society for ever.

Really... and Apple lawyer complained about THIS?

THIS shows a reality... Macs are way more expensive than PCs, I just bought a Dell Laptop with a 15.6" screen for $AU891 (without my additions, $745 was how much I could have got it for). The cheapest Mac here in Australia is the MacBook at $1600! And, as she says, it has a 13" screen. To get a Mac with a 15" screen you pay.... $2600! That's a huuuuuuuuuuuuge difference in price. And while you get SOME things that are better, and you may think that it's worth that extra money, if all you want is a laptop to surf the web, do your schoolwork and (in my case), use as a portable DVD player for long trips for the kids when we go on holidays... then I think I'll be paying the $700-$900 rather than the $1600-$2600 price range please.

But Apple are allowed to run ads saying that PCs always crash but Macs don't? What a steaming load of crap.

THIS is fact, you can get a PC for a lot less than a Mac.

I'm sure people will now rant and rave about how the quality and features of a mac at that price are comparable to a pc of that price, but you're missing the point.

People want entry level computers

Mac does not make entry level computers

Excellent video which really highlights that the concept of "traditional marriage" is a load of crap. If we go with "traditional marriage" we should take into account that women have historically been treated like property in most "traditional" marriage scenarios.

Dowries, wives being burned on their husbands funeral pyres, killing your wife if you suspect she's unfaithful... all "traditional" aspects of marriage...