The cop had every opportunity to check with Charlie. Another safety issue for the cops? Going to a house they don't know? In that neighborhood?

And crappy as it is, he was resisting. Don't yell at a cop. Even when they are dead wrong. Just don't. Unfortunately that is just the way it is. Life isn't fair. And I know it is on top of hundreds of years of unfairness. And still. Tug your forelock, look at the ground, seethe inside. And you don't get arrested.

"You can't do that." Yes, unfortunately they can.

Did you hear what the female officer said at the very end? She told a fellow officer to "watch your back" when a car pulled up. Why? Because they might have a gun. These officers do live in fear for their own lives -- because we insist on "second amendment rights" and our streets are flooded with guns.

And does anyone think that the female officer was in the wrong here? She tried to calm everything down. She had no control over the cop who freaked when he thought the scary black man was calling on his friends to show up. And she resigned, lost her job, lost her income. I think she did the best she could under the circumstances.

Someone screwed up leading up to this , , but the engine thrust causing the destruction was probably the right call , for whatever reason , the ship was on its way to simply crash into the marina, and that would likely cause _much_ more destruction. Also obviously too late to call the tug boats . (When the video starts)

There seems to be a lot of wind. Even with tugs, there was going to be a problem. The ship doesn't have "thrusters" in the usual sense, but the main drive is on pivoting nacelles or "azipods". To keep from running aground in the winds, they obviously had to ramp them up beyond what would normally be used.

You don't tug on Superman's cape. You don't spit into the wind. You don't pull the mask of that old Lone Ranger. Oh, and you don't ever sit on another man's bike.

Imagine the type of guy he must have been. It's the 17th century, he must be a rich nobleman of some sort because he's clearly got the money and faculties necessary to create a high precision (for the time) device. He's doing well if he can read and write, so he's presumably an educated, sensible, respected person. He creates a device that he knows will magnify things and let him see things no one has ever seen.

The dirty bastard then masturbates onto the device and, holding it millimetres from his face, writes the sordid escapade down and sends it off to a bunch of super-intellectuals. Probably laughing maniacally the whole time.

I'm sure everyone would eventually be interested enough to wank onto it, but would you write it down and tell people!? It's the sort of thing you'd do but not take credit for. You'd just hint at it as you mentioned it to the scientists -

Dear learned sir,

Here's a new invention ... bet someone knocks one out on it sooner or later - not me, someone else. Filthy bastards...... be interesting though.

PS. Try it.

Seriously, worst case you have a scientifically justified tug?

PPS. Maybe give it a wash before you send it back

Lyrics:

Angels on the sideline
Puzzled and amused.
Why did Father give these humans free will?
Now they're all confused.

Don't these talking monkeys know that Eden has enough to go around?
Plenty in this holy garden, silly old monkeys,
Where there's one you're bound to divide it
Right in two

Angels on the sideline
Baffled and confused
Father blessed them all with reason.
And this is what they choose.
Monkey killing monkey killing monkey over pieces of the ground

Silly monkeys give them thumbs,
They forge a blade, and where there's one they're bound to divide it
Right in two.
Right in two.

Monkey killing monkey killing monkey over pieces of the ground
Silly monkeys give them thumbs, they make a club
And beat their brother down.
How they survive so misguided is a mystery.
Repugnant is a Creature who would squander the ability
To lift an eye to heaven, conscious of his fleeting time here

Cut and divide it all right in two
Cut and divide it all right in two
Cut and divide it all right in two
Cut and divide it all right in two

Fight over the clouds, over wind, over sky and
Fight over life, over blood, over air and light,
Over love, over sun, over another.
Fight for the time, for the one, for the rise and

Angels on the sideline again
Been so long with patience and reason
Angels on the sideline again
Wondering when this tug of war will end

Cut and divide it all right in two
Cut and divide it all right in two
Cut and divide it all right in two
Cut and divide it all right in two
Right in two
Right in two

@transmorpher

It's a little difficult to 'debate' your comment, because the points that you address to me are numbered but don't reference to specific parts of my post. That's probably my fault as i was releasing frustration haphazardly and sarcastically, and that sarcasm wasn't aimed at you. All i can do is try and sum up whether i think we agree or disagree overall.

Essentially everything is a question of 'taste', even for you. There's no escaping our nature, most of us don't drink our own piss, many of us won't swallow our own blood, almost all of us have a flavour that we can't abide because we were fed it as a child. So yes, our decisions are defined by taste. But taste is decided by the food that is available to people, within reasonable distance of their house, at a price they find affordable according to the society around them, from a range of food that is decided by society around them. Your average person does not have the luxury to walk around a high street supermarket selecting the most humane and delicious foods. People get what they can afford, what they understand, what they can prepare and what is available. Our ancestors ate chicken because of necessity of their own kind, their children are exposed to chicken through no fault of their own, fast forward a few generations, and thus chicken becomes an affordable, accessible staple. Can we reach a compromise here? It may not be necessary for chickens to die to feed the human race, but it may be necessary for some people to eat chicken today because of their particular life.

I don't like the use of the phrase 'if i can do it, i know anyone can'. I think it's a mistake to deal in certainties, especially pertaining to lifestyles that you can't possibly know about without having lived them. Are you one of the many homeless people accepting chicken soup from a stranger because it's nourishing, cheap and easy for a stranger to buy, and keeps you warm on the streets? Are you a single mother with coeliac disease, a grumpy teenager and picky toddler who has 20 minutes to get to the supermarket and get something cooking? Or one of the millions using foodbanks in the UK (to our shame) now? I don't think you're willfully turning a blind eye to those people, i'm not tugging heart strings to do you a disservice. Maybe you're just fortunate you not only have the choice, but you have such choice that you can't imagine a life without it. I won't budge an inch on this one, you can't know what people have to do, and we have to accept life is not ideal.

And within that idealism and choice problem we can include illnesses that once again in IDEAL situations could survive without dead animals, nevertheless find it necessary to eat what they can identify and feel safe with.

Yes, those damn gluten hipsters drive me round the bend but only because they make people think that a LITTLE gluten is ok, it makes people take the problem less seriously (see Tumblr feminism... JOKE).

I agree that we must look at what action we can take now - and that is why i keep reminding you that we are not in an ideal world. If the veganism argument is to succeed then you must suggest a reasonable pathway to go from how we are now to whatever situation you would prefer. My "ideal farm" description was just me demonstrating the problem - that you need to show us your blueprint for how we start again without killing animals and feeding everyone we have.

And on that subject, your suggestions need to be backed by real research, otherwise you don't have any real plan. "It's fair to say there is very little risk" is a nice bit of illustrative language but it is not backed by any fact or figure and so i'm compelled to do my Penn and Teller impression and call bullshit. As of right now, the life expectancy of humans is better than it has ever been. It is up to you to prove that changing the diet of 7 billion people will result in neutrality or improvement of health and longevity. That proof must come in the form of large statistical analyses and thorough science. I don't want to sound like i'm being a dick, but any time you state something like that as a fact or with certainty, it needs to be backed up by something. I'm not nit picking and asking for common knowledge to have a citation, but things like this do:

-- 70% of farmland claim
-- 'fair to say very little risk' claim
-- meat gives you cancer claim - i accept it may have a carcinogenic effect but i'll remind you so does breathing, joss-sticks, broccoli, apples and water
-- 'the impact to the planet would be immense' claim - in what way, and what would be the downsides in terms of economy, productivity, health, animal welfare (where are all the animals going to be sent to retire as of day 1?)
-- etc. etc.

Oh, and a cow might get its protein from plants, but it walks around a field all day eating grass, chewing the cud and having sloppy shits with 4 stomachs and enzymes that i don't have................. I'm a bit puzzled by this one... I probably can't survive on what an alligator or a goldfish eats, but i can survive on parts of an alligator or fish. I can't eat enough krill in a day to keep me going, but i can let a whale do it for me...?

Exploring tugs until...............

your stance about veganism is very similar to the climate deniers in that you choose to buy into myths and lies as opposed to looking into the facts youself. the documentary i posted considers the issues of local, and so called "small" farms also. they are no more humane or less cruel than so called "factory farming" and are every but as inefficient and environmentally devastating. "factory farming" is a mere symptom and the root cause is the commodification of sentient non-human animals, just as in the past humans used to commodify other human beings of certain races. for example here is an article on the myth of "humane" animal farming: http://freefromharm.org/animal-products-and-ethics/factory-farming-alternative-farming/

the fact that climate change is driven in large part but the raising of non-human animals for food is without question a well documented fact. the human population is without a doubt a major factor but above this issue is the fact that it requires MANY times the resources to produce on calorie of flesh, dairy or eggs than it does to produce one calorie of plant based food. are you aware that in the USA, around 80% of crops grown are fed to the 10 billion farmed animals who are murdered every year for food? it has been estimated that 800 million humans could be fed on the crops which are grown for farmed animals alone. these issues are also gone into detail in the documentary.

as far as "tugging on your heart strings" goes, how is having compassion and empathy for anyone who suffers a bad thing? no one would be questioning it if the victims were human children but since they are "only" cows, pigs chickens and fishes (all of whom feel pain just like you or i do, perhaps even more so), suddenly violence against them is considered a matter of personal choice. the bottom line is that if you would not wish to expeience something yourself, it is never moral or ethical to force others to experience it, especially not in the name of a momentary taste sensation.

finally, here is a quote which i think best summarizes the situation:
“Aren’t humans amazing? They kill wildlife – birds, deer, all kinds of cats, coyotes, beavers, groundhogs, mice and foxes by the million in order to protect their domestic animals and their feed. Then they kill domestic animals by the billion and eat them. This in turn kills people by the million, because eating all those animals leads to degenerative – and fatal – health conditions like heart disease, stroke, kidney disease, and cancer. So then humans spend billions of dollars torturing and killing millions more animals to look for cures for these diseases. Elsewhere, millions of other human beings are being killed by hunger and malnutrition because food they could eat is being used to fatten domestic animals. Meanwhile, few people recognize the absurdity of humans, who kill so easily and violently, and once a year send out cards praying for “Peace on Earth.”~ David Coates

I have to say, tug captains and crews are certifiable maniacs. God love 'em. And heroes to boot.

Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs Exploratory tugs

If not dead. Check the neck on impact. And then watch as they tug him out of there.

You would not believe how much attention the media over here spend on his appearance and overall attitude. Shaves his head, doesn't tug his shirt in, doesn't wear a tie, drives a motorcycle... a rockstar by every measure.

There were regular forecasts that the chicken would come home to roost for him any day now; that the public would recognise his responsibility in their suffering and that they would turn against them.

And every single time, the public cheered him on even more. The press couldn't understand it at all. What a glorious fella he is, throwing the entire establishment out of balance like this. Maybe someone should project his face onto the ECB monstrocity in Frankfurt at night, just to rub it in.

Anyways, I don't have a clue why he resigned. There are several rumours, but beyond that, nothing solid.

As for the comments: they are my way of processing my rage. Doesn't work particularly well though, I'm still pissed off. But it's nice to hear that it provides a different perspective for some folks.

You mean does she at least deserve an exploratory tug?