>> ^Fletch:

In reply to this comment by ant:
>> ^Fletch:
Reminds me so much of the opening scene of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Looks good.

Submit it.

Did that already, almost 6 years ago. Don't remember why I discarded it. I think it was deaded, and I couldn't find a replacement (or something).


Resubmit.

In reply to this comment by ant:
>> ^Fletch:

Reminds me so much of the opening scene of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Looks good.


Submit it.


Did that already, almost 6 years ago. Don't remember why I discarded it. I think it was deaded, and I couldn't find a replacement (or something).

>> ^Fletch:

Reminds me so much of the opening scene of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. Looks good.


Submit it.

>> ^enoch:

great.
thanks ant.
like i didnt have enough stuff in the day to do now i have to watch this show.
why?
because it is pretty frikkin epic..thats why.


Yeah, I still haven't watched it either but will I like it?

I actually watched the show last night when it aired and I was disappointed.
And I'm not alone, as this article, this article, and this article have all lambasted the first four episodes.

". . . at it's worst, the show chokes on its own sanctimony."

But worse than that is that Sorkin could've done so much better.


>> ^RhesusMonk:

The show isn't all didactic ranting (as well founded in this case as I think it is). The West Wing is the greatest television ever produced. Give the man more than four and a half minutes and I'm sure we'll be pleased.>> ^Trancecoach:
Disappointed that Aaron Sorkin has gone the way of the "Old Man Syndrome," where things "used to be better" until the younger generation came along and effed it all up... The reality is that the younger generations are stuck with the mess that their forebears have left for them, so if you really need to blame someone for the mess we're in, start with yourself, old man.
Still, the show has potential and, unless we dissolve the nation state, we're in to recreate the 20th century, and we all remember how great that was the 1st time!

Tags for this video have been changed from 'newsroom, america, Aaron Sorkin, HBO' to 'newsroom, america, Aaron Sorkin, HBO, Jeff Daniels' - edited by messenger

>> ^Trancecoach:

So, I posted this video to a Ron Paul supporting friend of mine. Here is his response, written directly to Noam:
"Hi, I saw this and noticed you used an emotional tactic when you referred to the person on life support and Ron Paul's first answer was with Liberty. First, some context of what he was dealing with... Notice what makes the crowd cheer! - http://www.colbertnation.com/th
e-colbert-report-videos/396581/september-13-2011/cnn-tea-party-republican-debate .
"You are a very well read man (there are whole sections of you in bookstores, sorry, havn't read any) so I'm surprised you havn't read his overview, I've explained it for "Liberals" here: http://case4ronpaul.blogspot.com/2011/10/overview-of-ron-pa
uls-plan-to-restore.html (I know economics, please explain to me how this won't work? Keep in mind Obama has already started condensing 6 departments into 1) .
"Also, if you have been following politics then you may have noticed that the only person that the "Libertarians" have been able to work with is Senator Bernie Sanders (who has been fighting on the front lines for lot longer than you) and he has a team of economists to help us with the FED - Read about Sen. Sanders' team of economists here: http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=de4c73fb-131c-4a25
-b83e-4604eaefcebb ."


Your Ron Paul supporting friend is a nice guy, but...

So, I posted this video to a Ron Paul supporting friend of mine. Here is his response, written directly to Noam:

"Hi, I saw this and noticed you used an emotional tactic when you referred to the person on life support and Ron Paul's first answer was with Liberty. First, some context of what he was dealing with... Notice what makes the crowd cheer! - http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/396581/september-13-2011/cnn-tea-party-republican-debate .

"You are a very well read man (there are whole sections of you in bookstores, sorry, havn't read any) so I'm surprised you havn't read his overview, I've explained it for "Liberals" here: http://case4ronpaul.blogspot.com/2011/10/overview-of-ron-pauls-plan-to-restore.html (I know economics, please explain to me how this won't work? Keep in mind Obama has already started condensing 6 departments into 1) .

"Also, if you have been following politics then you may have noticed that the only person that the "Libertarians" have been able to work with is Senator Bernie Sanders (who has been fighting on the front lines for lot longer than you) and he has a team of economists to help us with the FED - Read about Sen. Sanders' team of economists here: http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=de4c73fb-131c-4a25-b83e-4604eaefcebb ."

Factually incorrect? Tell this guy:

"We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. And I have just one interest, and if I am wrong … somebody else can have my job. I want to see this country prosperous. I want to see people get a job. I want to see people get enough to eat. We have never made good on our promises. … I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started...And an enormous debt to boot!"

--Henry Morgenthau, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury during the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt

If the revisionist history of the left was accurate, the Golfer-in-Chief could reproduce the results of FDR's "success".


FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate


"High wages and high prices in an economic slump run contrary to everything we know about market forces in economic downturns," Ohanian said. "As we've seen in the past several years, salaries and prices fall when unemployment is high. By artificially inflating both, the New Deal policies short-circuited the market's self-correcting forces."



>> ^JiggaJonson:



>> ^quantumushroom:
Ah FDR, that delightful 'benevolent' fascist whose policies prolonged the Depression and whose ass was saved by WW2.

That was as retarded as it was factually incorrect.

Far too long....

>> ^quantumushroom:
QM:I'm happy to see that you accept the label 'right wing nutjob', that saves us time.
If it makes you happy to believe that, go right ahead. And there is no time being saved here at the sift.


Make me happy? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
It saved me time to waste on other stupidness.


I wonder where you get your 90% figure (or your implication that 100% of teachers unions are democrat)...if true, why don't right wingers believe in education and journalism? No one is stopping them from being teachers or journalists.
"MSNBC.com identified 143 journalists who made political contributions from 2004 through the start of the 2008 campaign, according to the public records of the Federal Election Commission. Most of the newsroom checkbooks leaned to the left: 125 journalists gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Only 16 gave to Republicans. Two gave to both parties.
The pattern of donations, with nearly nine out of 10 giving to Democratic candidates and causes, appears to confirm a leftward tilt in newsrooms."


So, in your small sampling, it's 87%. I somehow think the sampling may have been intentionally skewed, but OK. Note I didn't disagree with your stat, just questioned it's origin, if it was Faux, I would discount it offhand.


You're part right about McCain, I did respect him for the most part (but didn't always agree with him) until he sold his soul and lost his mind in/after 2000 when the 'straight talk express' took a 90 deg right turn into a sewage filled ditch of lies, direction changes, blatant pandering, and BS. It makes me shudder to think what might have been if he had been president during his 'right wing wind sock' days, turning whichever way the right wing wind blew that day.
Yeah, because things are going SO great with the clueless community organizer at the helm. Did you see the Dow drop 500 points today? No confidence in the Obamateur, from Americans or the world.


You seem to assume that because I think McCain is worthless now that Obama must be my preferance, and that I support his policies and actions and think he's leading us strongly. That is an incorrect, and all to often made assumption. Why must you continue to make an ass out of umption, do what you like to yourself.


You have no idea when or how I was raised, so you should refrain from commenting on that subject. Let's just say your statement is wrong, as I'm sure are most of your assumptions about me.
Well, you're not overtly libertarian or conservative. So what's LEFT?


I'm what used to be republican. I'm a social liberal, and fiscal conservative. There is no sane party I can call home today.


The idea that the left is 'running roughshod' over the right is more complete insanity, the left is incapable of being cohesive enough to do much of anything intentionally. The right is cohesive, but their ideas are insane and proven repeatedly to be wrong for the most part. I do give them credit for knowing how to get their agenda furthered, I just disagree with their agenda as enacted.

Obama is on track to spend more than bush, but he has not yet. The reasons for the respective spending sprees and amount of each is another discussion in itself.
Sorry, this is untrue. Obama so far has spent 3 trillion in 3 years, whereas Bush spent close to 5 trillion in eight years, much of it opposed by the Right.


This is why people call you nuts...you are insisting that 3 trillion is more than 5 trillion, and that spending sprees and tax (revenue) cuts under total republican control were against republican (the right's) wishes.


All taxpayers tired of being 'over' taxed are not right wing nutjobs, or even right wingers. That's an utter falicy and insulting BS. It's seemingly easy for you to point at the failings of one underfunded, over administrated program (public schools) and make the leap to the theory that all governmental programs are failures, but that is a gross simplification of a multifaceted problem.
Goverment schools are "underfunded"? On what planet? BTW, there is no direct correlation between school performance and how much money is spent per student. I believe DC spends the most per student and you can see how well that turned out.


Underfunded because of insane administration costs, better? More money doesn't automatically make better schools, but it helps, but not if it's all spent on non-school related administration expenses.


Even so, that theory doesn't hold water. The 'free market' for higher education shows that many, if not all completely 'private' schools provide sub par education (if any at all) while many schools using 'public' funds are among the highest ranked in the nation.
And yet how many liberal politicians send THEIR kids to private schools, even as they need teacher union votes? Competition weeds out crappy private schools while failing government schools keep churning out dummies. Government schooling is a racket, as well as unconstitutional at the federal level.


I'm not sure your arguement here...I'm not a liberal politician, or a true supporter of them, so how does what they do relate to me? I've been to good and bad private and public schools, the ones with money always had a leg up. I really believe if you have children, you should be taxed the cost of a decent education and allowed to spend it at the school you prefer (excluding religious school, that's another issue). Since this doesn't happen, I prefer decent public education be purchased with my tax dollar rather than prison cells and barbed wire. I do see it as an either or situation.


I'm sure you did call the feds attempt at stoping the failed CEO's from looting the failing companies we had just bailed out "obamatrons trying to loot corporations in the name of "social justice" ", so why isn't it 'the far right trying to loot the pensions and paychecks of the teachers' in the name of social justice? What's good for the goose...right? A legal contract is a legal contract, right?
I was never a fan of any bailout. Bush was barely conservative as it was. The left was too busy hating Bush to notice him rubber-stamping most of their spending requests. Stupid Hillary is on record claiming she'd like to seize all of the oil companies' profits. To the best of my knowledge, some states are making some teachers pay a tiny fraction more for their own health insurance and/or pension. Hardly the a$$rape by unnamed "far right" specters you're insinuating.


I'll never understand the arguement that, when confronted with their own abhorrent behavior people answer with 'look, that other guy I always call an a$$hole is doing bad stuff too'.
As I understand it, many states are cutting back on pension payments, or not paying them at all. At the same time they are regulating teachers, denying them union status, and forcing renegotiation of in place pay and work hours/load contracts. Not total a$$ rape, but close, and certainly not fair or acceptable treatment.

I'm not sure if you are ignoring my last statement there or if that's some kind of 1/2 assed, racist response. Either way, TOTAL FAIL.
Knowing me, I probably just didn't give a sh1t. Nothing personal. Youse guys have such thin skins when it comes to these faux-racial matters. What part of 'Kenyanesque Hawaiian' is racist? Odumbo's fadda was Kenyan and he (the son) was purportedly born in Hawaii. Where's the racism? Only in your mind.

I said:Letting right wing nutjobs re-write contracts and negate our obligations was one of our biggest mistakes.

You replied: Fail. The Kenyanesque Hawaiian never met a spending cut he liked. He's overclocked this economy because he wants to cripple it. Here comes the broom to sweep the moonbats out of the belfry.

The ridiculous infactuation with his ancestory (race) is where the racism is. Kenyanesque only applies if he acts Kenyan, and he does not. It is intended to be racially insulting, you know it, we know it. Either give it up or own it.
It's sad that you just don't give a sh!t about your people being so unstable that you can't trust any agreement made with them. That's my issue, not so much their political party, but their actions and trustworthyness. I'm hardpressed to find a politician of either party I wouldn't call fectless and feculant. I call out the right more often because they went bat sh!t crazy and deserted me, leaving me partyless.

QM:I'm happy to see that you accept the label 'right wing nutjob', that saves us time.

If it makes you happy to believe that, go right ahead. And there is no time being saved here at the sift.

I wonder where you get your 90% figure (or your implication that 100% of teachers unions are democrat)...if true, why don't right wingers believe in education and journalism? No one is stopping them from being teachers or journalists.

"MSNBC.com identified 143 journalists who made political contributions from 2004 through the start of the 2008 campaign, according to the public records of the Federal Election Commission. Most of the newsroom checkbooks leaned to the left: 125 journalists gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Only 16 gave to Republicans. Two gave to both parties.
The pattern of donations, with nearly nine out of 10 giving to Democratic candidates and causes, appears to confirm a leftward tilt in newsrooms."

FOX news appears to 'tilt' right. You may have heard of them.

As for conservative educators, they're out there but are a minority on kollij kampii.

You're part right about McCain, I did respect him for the most part (but didn't always agree with him) until he sold his soul and lost his mind in/after 2000 when the 'straight talk express' took a 90 deg right turn into a sewage filled ditch of lies, direction changes, blatant pandering, and BS. It makes me shudder to think what might have been if he had been president during his 'right wing wind sock' days, turning whichever way the right wing wind blew that day.

Yeah, because things are going SO great with the clueless community organizer at the helm. Did you see the Dow drop 500 points today? No confidence in the Obamateur, from Americans or the world.

You have no idea when or how I was raised, so you should refrain from commenting on that subject. Let's just say your statement is wrong, as I'm sure are most of your assumptions about me.

Well, you're not overtly libertarian or conservative. So what's LEFT?

The idea that the left is 'running roughshod' over the right is more complete insanity, the left is incapable of being cohesive enough to do much of anything intentionally. The right is cohesive, but their ideas are insane and proven repeatedly to be wrong for the most part. I do give them credit for knowing how to get their agenda furthered, I just disagree with their agenda as enacted.



Obama is on track to spend more than bush, but he has not yet. The reasons for the respective spending sprees and amount of each is another discussion in itself.

Sorry, this is untrue. Obama so far has spent 3 trillion in 3 years, whereas Bush spent close to 5 trillion in eight years, much of it opposed by the Right.

All taxpayers tired of being 'over' taxed are not right wing nutjobs, or even right wingers. That's an utter falicy and insulting BS. It's seemingly easy for you to point at the failings of one underfunded, over administrated program (public schools) and make the leap to the theory that all governmental programs are failures, but that is a gross simplification of a multifaceted problem.

Goverment schools are "underfunded"? On what planet? BTW, there is no direct correlation between school performance and how much money is spent per student. I believe DC spends the most per student and you can see how well that turned out.

Even so, that theory doesn't hold water. The 'free market' for higher education shows that many, if not all completely 'private' schools provide sub par education (if any at all) while many schools using 'public' funds are among the highest ranked in the nation.

And yet how many liberal politicians send THEIR kids to private schools, even as they need teacher union votes? Competition weeds out crappy private schools while failing government schools keep churning out dummies. Government schooling is a racket, as well as unconstitutional at the federal level.

I'm sure you did call the feds attempt at stoping the failed CEO's from looting the failing companies we had just bailed out "obamatrons trying to loot corporations in the name of "social justice" ", so why isn't it 'the far right trying to loot the pensions and paychecks of the teachers' in the name of social justice? What's good for the goose...right? A legal contract is a legal contract, right?

I was never a fan of any bailout. Bush was barely conservative as it was. The left was too busy hating Bush to notice him rubber-stamping most of their spending requests. Stupid Hillary is on record claiming she'd like to seize all of the oil companies' profits. To the best of my knowledge, some states are making some teachers pay a tiny fraction more for their own health insurance and/or pension. Hardly the a$$rape by unnamed "far right" specters you're insinuating.

I'm not sure if you are ignoring my last statement there or if that's some kind of 1/2 assed, racist response. Either way, TOTAL FAIL.

Knowing me, I probably just didn't give a sh1t. Nothing personal. Youse guys have such thin skins when it comes to these faux-racial matters. What part of 'Kenyanesque Hawaiian' is racist? Odumbo's fadda was Kenyan and he (the son) was purportedly born in Hawaii. Where's the racism? Only in your mind.

Interesting... in the time before the 8.9 on this map (it is now classified as a 9.0 by the USGS and Japanese seismologists: http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2727&from=rss_home) there was a relative lull in activity.

Not that I'm an expert in seismology, but it would appear that without the "maintenance" quakes, there was a hold back of serious pressure causing the big one to occur.

>> ^criticalthud:

>> ^rebuilder:
>> ^criticalthud:
Seismic activity has increased

Source, please.
http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2439&from=rss_home
"Scientists say 2010 is not showing signs of unusually high earthquake activity. Since 1900, an average of 16 magnitude 7 or greater earthquakes — the size that seismologists define as major — have occurred worldwide each year. Some years have had as few as 6, as in 1986 and 1989, while 1943 had 32, with considerable variability from year to year."
Increasing population densities do mean earthquakes will be more devastating than before.

yes
http://www.detailshere.com/earthquakeactivity.htm
i'm not a geological scientist, but i think we should be concerned


*sigh*... you're doing the common alarmist and conspiracy theorist thing of ONLY looking at sites which are non professional. ONLY believing people who take whatever data there is and come to YOUR conclusion. Ignoring any that use ACTUAL proper science and CORRECT data analysis to disprove your line of thinking. You do this saying 'I don't trust the major sources of information'... which just means that you only believe those that don't grasp it properly.

Sorry, but it doesn't work like that:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/learn/topics/increase_in_earthquakes.php

>> ^rebuilder:

>> ^criticalthud:
Seismic activity has increased

Source, please.
http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2439&from=rss_home
"Scientists say 2010 is not showing signs of unusually high earthquake activity. Since 1900, an average of 16 magnitude 7 or greater earthquakes — the size that seismologists define as major — have occurred worldwide each year. Some years have had as few as 6, as in 1986 and 1989, while 1943 had 32, with considerable variability from year to year."
Increasing population densities do mean earthquakes will be more devastating than before.


yes
http://www.detailshere.com/earthquakeactivity.htm
i'm not a geological scientist, but i think we should be concerned

>> ^criticalthud:
Seismic activity has increased

Source, please.

http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=2439&from=rss_home

"Scientists say 2010 is not showing signs of unusually high earthquake activity. Since 1900, an average of 16 magnitude 7 or greater earthquakes — the size that seismologists define as major — have occurred worldwide each year. Some years have had as few as 6, as in 1986 and 1989, while 1943 had 32, with considerable variability from year to year."

Increasing population densities do mean earthquakes will be more devastating than before.