Gas Bandit's Political Thread V: The Vampire Likes Bats

[Krisken]

C'mon, you know you thought I was going to post some obscure blog as the source, and you were gonna all be like "Gassy, that guy's just some psycho right wing nutjob nobody's heard of," and I'd be all like "so's your mom!" and you'd have been all "boo hoo!" and I'd have been all "ha ha!" and then the king of the internet would come and give me a virtual castle filled with hot bitches.

Actually, I just forgot to post the source, but your immediate request for the source prompted me to have fun with it.

I'm glad you had a good time. I honestly check out your links because I want to verify for myself the veracity of the information. You know as well as I do that you can't take anything as fact without some digging. I checked NPR's sources afterwards as well, so it's not something personal, it's for consistency.

I'm just glad you used a good source. Means we don't have to go back and forth into a situation that follows up with me rolling my eyes and you doing happy spins in your office chair.

 

[Krisken]

Also, do those numbers include the funding that didn't go in the original budget and were voted on by Senate at a later date to help fund 2 wars?

 

[Adam]

Warning: some graphic images

http://abcnews.go.com/US/cops-witne...ermans-version/story?id=16371852#.T7Wl18W4x8G

 

[Krisken]

And still no one can corroborate what happened before Martin attacked Zimmerman. Back to square "Shouldn't have been following the kid after being told not to".

 

[SeraRelm]

Except some stories, including Zimmerman's are saying he was heading back to his vehicle after being told he didn't have to follow Martin.

 

[Adam]

Gone over that already. There's audio of what happened, and it wasn't what you're quoting there.

Transcript:
911 dispatcher: Are you following him? [2:24]
Zimmerman: Yeah. [2:25]
911 dispatcher: OK. We don’t need you to do that. [2:26]
Zimmerman: OK. [2:28]
911 dispatcher: Alright, sir, what is your name? [2:34]
Zimmerman: George. He ran.
911 dispatcher: Alright, George, what’s your last name?
Zimmerman: Zimmerman.
911 dispatcher: What’s the phone number you’re calling from?
Zimmerman: 407-435-2400
911 dispatcher: Alright, George, we do have them on the way. Do you want to meet with the officer when they get out there?
Zimmerman: Yeah.
911 dispatcher: Alright, where are you going to meet with them at?
Zimmerman: Um, if they come in through the gate, tell them to go straight past the clubhouse and, uh, straight past the clubhouse and make a left and then go past the mailboxes you’ll see my truck. [3:10]
911 dispatcher: Alright, what address are you parked in front of? [3:21]
Zimmerman: Um, I don’t know. It’s a cut-through so I don’t know the address. [3:25]
911 dispatcher: OK, do you live in the area?
Zimmerman: Yeah, yeah, I live here.
911 dispatcher: OK, what’s your apartment number?
Zimmerman: It’s a home. It’s 1950 – oh, crap, I don’t want to give it out – I don’t know where this kid is [inaudible] [3:40]

 

[Krisken]

Go over it all you want, it doesn't change the order of events in the transcript.

I'm confused as to what you two think I'm trying to say here. He had a hell of a lot of time between "We don't need you to do that" and the time he got attacked. I'm not saying Zimmerman did the wrong thing during the fight. I'm not saying Trayvon was innocent in this. I'm saying that the evidence put forth doesn't really absolve Zimmerman's initial actions.

 

[jwhouk]

Killing someone is generally frowned upon, intentionally or unintentionally.

 

[SeraRelm]

Hmm? Oh, it looks like you're saying they told him to stop looking and he kept on going. I'm saying his story (and it sounds like Adam is saying) is that he said "Ok" and was heading back to his truck after they said he didn't have to follow Martin. If he was indeed heading back to his truck, then

square "Shouldn't have been following the kid after being told not to".

makes no sense.

 

[Adam]

Killing someone is generally frowned upon, intentionally or unintentionally.

Except Hitler. That it is always okay.

 

[SeraRelm]

Not if it changes the events of human history to place us in an ultimately worse situation!

 

[Krisken]

And that is my problem with both sides of the argument. The 'if' that isn't clear from either argument.

If nothing else it shows the flaws of the Stand Your Ground law and how it encourages this sort of behavior (stalking suspicious people, carrying weapons while doing so, etc). Not really something I want out of people who think they are part of the neighborhood watch.

 

[SeraRelm]

You should work for a news outlet.

 

[Krisken]

You should work for a news outlet.

Lol, now THAT was definitely not a compliment!

 

[SeraRelm]

Heh, it's just that you keep using certain terms to skew your descriptions.

 

[Krisken]

Sorry, but following someone is still stalking. I'm just not convinced it isn't.

 

[GasBandit]

The US is "ready to attack Iran" if it doesn't stop it with the nukes. Though I don't disagree that military force may be necessary vs Iran, I suppose I'd disappoint my audience if I didn't point out that the guy who won a nobel peace prize for not being George W. Bush and ran (partially) on a platform of ending middle east military actions is poised to start his 4th. (If you include military advisors - The previous 3 being Libya, Uganda and Yemen).

 

[AshburnerX]

Even I thought it was really stupid. He should have given it back.

 

[Chad Sexington]

Even I thought it was really stupid. He should have given it back.

I'm not sure how this would have looked. There's a lovely video where Richard Feynman explains his disdain for "honours and epaulets", and then answers as to why he went to the ceremony when he won the Nobel Prize for Physics, as it would have seemed like he was saying "Oh I'm too good for your club" and there would have been even more headlines about someone rejecting the prize. The Peace Prize is different, I suppose, but still... I'm not sure refusing/returning the prize is a good move, really.

 

[Krisken]

It almost seemed political, tbh. A sort of "Maybe we can get this president to not go to war so damn much" attempt. It obviously failed.

 

[Shegokigo]

How is Romney camp spinning this?
http://www.romneyeconomics.com/gst/gst-steel-slide-08

Or is it a full on ignore? Perhaps it's another "I was young, I don't remember those events clearly. Everyone does dumb things when they're young".

 

[Necronic]

That was actually a pretty good read.

 

[Necronic]

Ok, so you don't have to wait for Romney to respond, at least not on GST steel. Of the items mentioned in your link this one bothered me the least, since its easy to recognize steel as a failing industry, and the other investments struck as pretty messed up (buying a company, leveraging it to the ears to promote an image of growth, then cashing out right before it all comes crashing down.)

But anyways, there's a couple good articles about GST out there, here's one of them:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303360504577410573651845802.html

 

[GasBandit]

THIS IS NOT A BIRTHER POST. OBAMA IS CLEARLY CERTIFIED BORN AMERICAN.

It is a post about how Obama is not above manipulating the presentation of his persona, incorporating convenient untruths, to gain an advantage. For example, fudging the details of an academic bio to make one's self look more cosmopolitan/international/whathaveyou... or amalgamating girlfriends into one fictional person in his autobiography, or claiming (untruthfully) in the 2008 campaign that his mother had spent her final days clashing with insurance companies during her fight with cancer that ended in her death.

There's something very cynical, perhaps sociopathic, about a man who would try to lie about circumstances around his mother's death for political leverage.

 

[Necronic]

Dude, a borderline personality is a prerequisite for running for president. Can you imagine the ego it takes to do something like that? Also that link is pretty sad.

Also Obama was born in Kenya.

 

[Adam]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS...irthplace-1991/story?id=16372566#.T7Zte1LN6So

"This was nothing more than a fact checking error by me--an agency assistant at the time," Goderich wrote in an emailed statement to Yahoo News. "There was never any information given to us by Obama in any of his correspondence or other communications suggesting in any way that he was born in Kenya and not Hawaii. I hope you can communicate to your readers that this was a simple mistake and nothing more."

(For the record, I consider a fact checking error saying $705 million instead of $507 million. Getting his country of birth wrong is malicious lying either for the sale of the book, or Obama actually was born in Kenya which I'm not really inclined to believe)

 

[Necronic]

Yeah, but you believe that because you've been brainwashed by all the flourinated water you drink.

 

[Eriol]

Yeah, but you believe that because you've been brainwashed by all the flourinated water you drink.

Personally I hope they're putting fluoride (H2SiF6) and not fluorine (F2) in my water, but hey, that's just me. I think you're looking for the word "flouridated" there (wiki).

I know I'm being an ass. I'm kind of a "grammar nazi" when it comes to chemical compounds. And I'm not even a chemist (or related) by trade either.

 

[Necronic]

Pretty bad for me to do that since I'm a chemist IRL, and I know how toxic flourination is.

Guess it must be all that corn syrup I've been drinking.

 

[Covar]

Personally I hope they're putting fluoride (H2SiF6) and not fluorine (F2) in my water,

That's what they want you to think...

 

[TommiR]

I find it amusing that conversation regarding GB's previous article focused solely on Obama and his Nobel Peace Prize, and that not a single thought was voiced over ANY aspect of policy or strategy, or even morals, behind a situation where one country is threatening to commit an act of war against another country.

 

[GasBandit]

I find it amusing that conversation regarding GB's previous article focused solely on Obama and his Nobel Peace Prize, and that not a single thought was voiced over ANY aspect of policy or strategy, or even morals, behind a situation where one country is threatening to commit an act of war against another country.

Except for the part where I prefaced it with "I realize it may be necessary to take military action vs Iran," which indicated my agreement with the "reluctant but prepared" stance? I was just pointing out the irony that the Great Unifier, winner of the Peace prize, has invoked the military more than George "W is for War" Bush.

 

[TommiR]

You were the one who posted the article, so I kind of took it for granted that you had at least a passing interest in discussing it's contents. I was referring more to what followed after your post.

 

[GasBandit]

You were the one who posted the article, so I kind of took it for granted that you had at least a passing interest in discussing it's contents. I was referring more to what followed after your post.

I would love to argue talk about Iran. I just thought everybody else would be tired of it from the last time. Which... seemed to be borne out because everybody focused on the nobel part.

Unfortunately, 6pm on a friday means I'm probably about to vanish until monday.

But hey, why not get that ball rolling! Do you, TommiR, think that military intervention in Iran will be necessary, or could even be justified?

 

[Krisken]

::watches intently:: Now THIS could be interesting.