It was a pleasure meeting you. I’ll be back in Budapest soon, so let’s catch a workout then.

Wine is wine…it’s expensive. Good food is expensive too. What’s cheap here is labor. Massages are $10 or $15 for 90 minutes. Housing is less expensive than in Los Angeles, but comparable to Phoenix.

I hadn’t planned on an e-Junkie release but may do so due to requests.

Doubtful.

Hope to cross paths sometime soon, Lauren.

I’m not a runner either but that beach is a great place to do some sprints.

Good idea.

Bangkok yes, and some Thai islands.

Yep. He had a big meltdown.

I think MSNBC took down that video. Bummer.

Exactly.

You’re welcome.

I may go the “political commentator” route one day. Not for now, however.

Thanks Fuller!

Thank you and yes, more updates are coming.

Thanks! I use an iPhone 6. I carry my Nikon 5200D with me….and always use the iPhone 6.

No.

Awesome!

Rode dirt bikes as a kid, but never a sports bike through a city.

Yes, heading to the Philippines in a few days for a few days..

Automatic.

Thanks, Vy. I’ll be getting around Thailand more. I’ll let you know if I make there.

Might end up in Croatia for a bit. I would love to see Argentina, too.

We can’t do the jerseys with our current supplier, but in the future yes. Thanks for asking.

That’s more suitable for D&P. Cernovich dot com is for travel and marketing type stuff, more family-friendly.

Dan is good. Frank Kern also has some good articles, and Jeff Walker is my favorite by far. http://jeffwalker.com/blog/

Affiliate marketing and book sales. Plus I’ll get enough from Gorilla Mindset to carry me through rest of the year. I also turn down consults, but could some nice coin consulting.

Thanks. When did Padron stop making cigars in Honduras?

Japanese whiskeys are my favorite – Yamazaki and Hibiki.

I do live abroad.

Hookah lounges are great.

If other people aren’t sharing your work then it’s likely not very good content.

The water is OK, I hear. I drink bottled water, though, to be careful.

I took my writing more seriously, no more throw-away posts, which is what you’d done with the post I pointed out. “Raise your standards” is what I did and suggest others do.

Sounds good.

Yeah, he’s probably butt hurt and will never read or comment again, though, so I’m glad to have given the consult!

That’s what Gorilla Mindset is about.

Sounds like you have it figured out. Best of luck to you.

No, not everything is copied. Go look at Fit Juice. Those are all juices I’ve made personally. Every recipe is 100% me.

Does that mean no one else has made those same juices? Of course not. Many people will make the same discoveries.

When I do adopt something others have written, I also give credit. For example, “my” state control exercises are based on the NLP book.

Damian, I clicked on your site. You have a post about 3 muscle building foods. That is fucking lazy. End of story.

It should be “33 Foods” with pictures of you cooking the foods and your actual recipes and be 5,000 words at least.

When someone clicks on that, sees it talks about the power of meat, eggs, and fish…Why would they stay?

That is generic content that adds nothing new to the discussion.

Here is what I would tell you and everyone else who starts a blog and can’t built an audience. Stop being fucking lazy and derivative. Raise your standards.

Think, write with passion, and speak from the heart.

Add to ideas rather than copy. Yes, eggs are great. Everyone knows this. Saying eggs are great is nothing.

Now do you cook eggs in coconut oil with curry powder on top of them? Well prove it. Post your pictures.

That is how you go from a generic derivative copycat to YOU.

I never tried making money online until recently. I’ve always had something to say and always been able to build an audience, though. Guys who want to start generic sites with “life hack” tips and recycled / copied fitness content are going to have real problems building an audience let alone making money.

I don’t keep a budget.

I only have one observation to share later. It will be interesting to hear what people who grew up in SEA have to say about it.

Glad you like it, Samuel. This has been an experiment for me and it’s great you’re enjoying it.

Thanks, Andrew!

It’s been fun, more fun that I’ve had in a long time.

House music, thought lately I don’t listen to anything.

You have to buy a motorcycle out here, you can’t rent one (at least that I’ve seen). What I ride is more than big enough for here. If you drove a full bike you’d get in trouble, as the torque from the bike would be too much. When you’re at an intersection you are touching other people. Accelerate too quickly and that’s drama.

10,000 is my minimum expectation based on the data.

Yes, those leaders who follow the book never develop wisdom and discretion.

Yes, there was a point in m own life (2009 or so) when I started going things “for the stories” where that meant living the character of who I was and not who I truly was. It’s a bad road to take.

“Be nice to nice people.” Most people are pretty shitty. Hence why a person can seem nice and assholish.

One Arnold spent too much time making movies rather than studying survivalism. It’s better to focus on your life than on what others are or aren’t doing.

Thanks, Rev. I’ve gotten more positive as I became less reactionary and more visionary. I stopped caring about what the world was and focused on my vision for how my life should be. That was the big mindset shift I made.

I wasn’t aware you launched a new site. Congrats, Kyle!

Right. Everyone can use the same methods while still telling their own story. That’s the beauty of what I do…Anyone can do it if they truly want it bad enough.

Good one!

The whole MBNBC thing made them look awful. Only vile, smug people would identify with them.

You’re welcome, Gerard! Best of luck on your music and writing.

Maybe their sales are way up, in which that would make sense. I thought thought it looked and and deleted it. (I had been a customer before.)

Online is a different animal from traditional sales and marketing. Treat is like an entirely different area.

Amazon ran some tests and every time a person has to click, you lose 50% of your readers. That’s probably not exactly true for a site, but it is true that intermediate pages are bad for a lot of reasons and will cost you users.

Glad you liked it Jim.

Thank you, Pieter! That’s a good plan for optimal health.

Jon, I googled your name and the site that came up looks horrible. It looks very scammy actually. You need to give it a makeover.

I also had to dig to find your blog. This is what your blog URL looks like.

Who will remember that?

http://eetfit.com/eets-blog.html

OK, enough free advice. Get to work on a redesign (you can do it yourself using Thesis or Genesis). You may even consider buying a new domain and doing a rebrand.

Yes.

Sounds fun. Argentina is on the agenda for 2016. Also, thanks for the kind words! Glad to hear you are making great progress.

It’s all step-by-step laid out for you, though, so improvements can be made immediately.

Interesting. Maybe it is giving off that vibe. I’ll take that to heart and change it if needed.

Thank you Antonio!

Interesting. I wondered why my YouTube page ranks so highly when I don’t update much. It’s Page 1 of Google for my name, which is cool. Not complaining. But that explains it.

Thanks, I’ll check it out.

Funny you mention videos. I’m actually in talks about getting a video done. Good feedback; thanks!

Brain wave activation. It’s real.

California is expensive (which is fine) but the value is low. The roads are crap. The air is filthy. Vegas, Phoenix, or Denver are where I’d live if returning to the U.S.

It sounds like you’ve come a long way. You started off very unsure of yourself. This is great progress; thanks for letting us know!

Hah, thanks for the kind works but I’ll never go mainstream. I don’t miss California at all. Cali has fallen pretty far and a lot of people are leaving.

It takes a while. Write every day, even if you don’t publish it.

That is a great improvement, Andrew!

Perfect.

I’ll post an announcement when I make it out there. Looking forward to it!

Good recs, thanks!

Great to year you’re expanding your horizons, Chris!

Dog is great, being taken care of my his “grandparents.” Girl is doing great, too. Life is going well right now…Makes me wonder if it’s calm before storm.

Ladies love that pic, though.

It’s the first thing people see.

Thank you!

I remember those digital camera days, too. Glad those are behind us!

Hah, that makes a lot of sense actually.

I forgot about that. Awesome that you took action!

That is the right mindset shift to make.

Great tip, thanks Eric!

If they think they’re going to pimp Nick Denton rather than the other way around, they are twits not worthy of pity or a second thought.

I used to post on fitness message boards. Then I wrote about law. I even used to write about cigars. Your interests will change, evolve, and sometimes devolve. Just keep at it.

I don’t live in mountains (though that sounds nice).

Depends on who is the lawyer and who is the writer. I still have my law license and can refer out cases, so in my case it’s not mutually exclusive.

On the bright side, so are smart men like you.

Thank you Andrew; same to you!

Australia and New Zealand are on the agenda.

Probably a little bit of both.

No. He’s in good hands back in the States.

They are real goofs.

Media exists to distract us from what truly matters.

I watched that part about 10 times and made a gif at one point. It truly was ridiculous.

Exactly. One reason I’ve written more about business is because the modern man needs options and a way to earn his living outside of the system.

Exactly. It’s all projection. Their hearts are filled with hate and they are vultures, so they project those characteristics onto others. The media does not have the moral authority to judge me or anyone else.

Thanks for the feedback, Peter; much appreciated.

Check out one of those advanced sites to find out what the best deal is. The best deal changes all of the time, as sign-up bonuses vary.

Congrats on your excellent credit score!

Yep, sounds hectic and that’s what others have told me. No thanks!

Thailand is the next stop. Word on the street is that motoing there is crazy dangerous now and not worth the risk.

Glad you like it and I’ll be sure to check that episode out.

Thank you. Yes, I’m working on shirts.

Everything has worked out for the best and I wouldn’t change anything.

The System will always be corrupt. All we can do is take charge of our own lives.

You’re welcome.

Hah, maybe I should seek a sponsorship from the Vietnamese government.

Great job, Dylan!

I read all of Rand’s book in college, including her non-fiction/essays and read von Mises. There’s some truth in there but ultimately she was a dogmatist. No one has a comprehensive model of how the world works.

Thanks, Ben! I’ve been experimenting with new forms of story telling and am glad you’ve noticed and enjoy it.

Persian.

I see your email. Got it.

You’ll love it.

I’ll be abroad for all of 2015.

Crissy Field in San Francisco is nice, but I wouldn’t go to S.F. for the beaches.

I’m working on learning how to tell a story with pictures and only one caption, so it’s a work in progress. Glad you like it!

Traveling the world, biking up and down mountains and zig-zagging through busy city streets, hanging out at beaches….Women want danger and play.

No way to pre-order. I thought about doing a Kickstarter for the PR boost.

I’ll be checking out Thailand soon, too. How do you like it?

I’ll probably do something private for Gorilla Mindset. Mindset podcasts, workbooks/worksheets, and maybe even a forum.

It’s your life and you only get one. Nice to hear you made the decision that was right for you.

Great to hear from you, Jeremy? Let’s catch up one of these days.

How’d you like Hanoi? I spent Tet there. https://www.cernovich.com/happy-tet-2015-from-hanoi/

Thank you, Daniel.

Thanks, Bernhard.

I’m down to grab coffee. I’m in District 2.

I have to leave every 3 months. Which is fine, as I’m traveling a lot while in Southeast Asia.

You pay for healthcare out of pocket, which costs much less than U.S. The U.S. has highest healthcare costs in the world.

You could spend 2K a month and live a comfortable lifestyle or considerably more.

Thanks, Ray! As a general rule I don’t do consulting. What specific questions do you have? If there are a bunch, maybe we can make an exception to the rule.

Depends on exact place. Housing is probably 30% the cost as in Los Angeles. You can get a lot of bang for your buck.

The beaches themselves, yes, but they don’t have the mountains nearby as in Malibu. Nha Trang reminded me of the beaches in Cabo and Miami.

Thank you for the kind words, Guillaume.

Easier.

I won’t have to pay taxes to Vietnam. However, the United States is one of only two countries to tax income worldwide. It’s called global or worldwide taxation of income. I’ll still have to pay taxes to the U.S.

Thanks, Ben.

I do not. It’s not needed. Lots of people understand English, Google maps and other apps give you addresses of places to go. There’s Trip Advisor and other sites to gain info from.

Thanks for the note, Vy. Keep up the great work!

Oh man, get well soon! When you’re better the first coffee or juice is on me!

Thanks for the publicity, audience and increased advertising you have just given all of Gawker

You know they just lost a bunch of ads, yeah?

And they apologized – something Gawker does not do.

And their EIC had a meltdown and blasted a former advertiser – which is a huge no-no in the ad world as it sends a message that Gawker will destroy a brand that spurns it.

Yea, you are winning alright! Keep supporting bullies like Sam Biddle and other people who joke and make fun of neuroatypicals.

Tough guys!

Stupid stuff? C'mon. I quote

You do know Gawker writers (anti-GamerGate) have said stuff as bad or worse than I have?

And Chris Kluwe…Go read his Twitter. Go read that CBS article discussing what he may or may not have known about some very serious stuff.

Sorry, buddy, but you can't ride a high horse. You read Gawker sites and those people are no better or worse than I am, and you give them page views and thus advertising dollars.

Save your moralizing for church.

If you have intellectual arguments, I'm all ears. So far….I haven't heard anything other than, "Mike's a bad guy."

OK, God?

I'm sorry, I really don't see the issue with doxxing. If you own a house, I can get your name, number, home address, DOB, SSN, and tax history by doing a quick jaunt in the public records. Or I can pay $25-30 to get same pulled by a private firm if I'm out of state. There's nothing in doxxed information that isn't on the internet or already publicly available IRL

By your definition, no one who is anti-GamerGate has ever been doxxed.

Will you stand by that link of thinking when it's applied to your site and correct the record whenever someone claims a person has been doxxed?

Grifter, don't play games. It's all over the Internet. Picture of my home, address, everything.

Now confront the issue. Zoe Quinn doxxed me. Are you going to speak out, redefine doxx so it doesn't apply to me (but so that it applies to everyone else), or are you going to ignore it?

It's a gut check time for you and your intellectual integrity.

FYI, Zoe Quinn said that cheating on someone and then having sex with that person is rape.

So….Yeah, I said some stupid stuff (some makes sense in context, some was just trolling, and some…just wow).

But by her own definition Zoe Quinn is a rapist.

And she doxxed me.

Now what?

So… Mike Cernovich… tell us what you really think…

Yep. Pure evil. Conceded.

Does that excuse the doxx? Is it OK to threaten me?

What objective standards should apply?

Oh, you poor man. I don;t mean to sound unsympathetic, but do you have a link to the post,tweet,whatever where she did this? Because it sounds just awful

Smug and dismissive, as expected.

Zero intellectual integrity.

Furthermore, is doxxing alone not a reason to be cautious?

I was doxxed. By Zoe Quinn. Full on shot of where I live. The whole nine yards.

Is that OK? Is it OK to doxx the "bad guys"? What objective standards should apply?

Someone was trash talking me in the comments, and that's fine. I'm a horrible person. Cool. Now my question.

I was doxxed by Zoe Quinn's friend. Zoe Quinn widely retweeted it. That has been posted on Twitter. It's not even open to reasonable disagreement.

Is doxx'ing OK when Zoe does it?

Is it OK to doxx me because horrible person?

"If you are any type of legal expert that you claim to be, explain to me how prosecutors can ignore evidence of a crime when handed to them, lock, stock, and smoking barrel. It really is just that simple."

Did you know that prosecutors have the discretion to charge someone with offenses that overstate the seriousness of the underlying conduct (this is called "overcharging"), to charge someone properly, or to not charge someone at all?

Did you know that a judge has virtually no legal authority to second-guess a prosecutor's decision to charge someone with a crime? (Judges have other ways of getting their way, but they don't have the legal power to second-guess prosecutors.)

Did you know that you have no due process right to have someone prosecuted for a crime? That is, if no one prosecutes someone who harms you, you can't sue them for a civil rights violation under 42 U.S.C. 1983?

Did you know that if you're being prosecuted unjustly in state court, you can't sue in federal court (Younger abstention)?

Prosecutorial discretion. Google it maybe?

P.S. Did you know that some of us might say that prosecuting someone after a scorned spouse turns them in is a poor exercise of prosecutorial discretion, as it turns petty squabbles better suited for the civil system into criminal matters? Not everyone would agree, but may would, with the argument that prosecutors should "stay out" of this kind of nonsense and not set a precedent. Others would say it's great for spouses to snitch one another.

Law….It's freaking nuanced, I tell ya!

"Perhaps if you weren't spending all your time pumping iron and exercising the little grey cells, you would have read other articles on the subject."

How is this morally or intellectually different from fat jokes?

By the way, do a better job stalking me. Run my name through Google Scholar. And be sure to look up my *other* blog on Google Scholar and Google generally.

You may disagree with me, but good luck finding support for the proposition that I'm a dummy.

Since you don't want to seriously discuss the issues but want to resort to, "You have muscles," the equivalent of a fat joke, there's nothing for us to discuss.

Step up your game if you want to spar with the people's champ.

But again, feel free to stalk me. You'll feel narcissistic rage when you realize I have better credentials, a better body, better blood work (fasting glucose, insulin, cholesterol, lipids, etc.) and a better life than you.

Enjoy your Sunday.

If it wasn't an issue of selective prosecution, then the prosecutors would have opened up their files and turned over emails and notes regarding their decision to prosecution D'Souza.

After all, privacy is only for people who have something to hide.

When prosecutors refuse to abide by the standard they set for others, then one can only presume that prosecutors are indeed hiding something.

That or they are repugnant hypocrites – in which case I feel comfortable in my belief that this was a case of selective prosecution.

Ed, your logic is weak. War Machine said some of the same crap Paul Elam and MRAs have said. OK, big deal.

I've said some of the same things feminists have said. I'm not a feminist.

I've said some of the same things vegans have said. I'm not a vegan.

Does simply saying something that group x says make that person part of group x?

Heck, I am not an MRA. I think they are pathetic betas males who cry about life rather than take charge. But I bet you can find me saying some of the same things MRAs have said. That does not make me an MRA.

You keep dodging that issue. What is your principle? If I say things that you and PZ say, am I a member of the ironically named Free Thought community?

Come on, be a bit more honest than D'Sousa!

Ed, your post on War Machine is instructive and supports my earlier claim that you support thoughtcrime. I'll include the full paragraph for context:

—
"You may have heard about the MMA fighter who calls himself War Machine brutally beating his ex-girlfriend, porn star Christy Mac, last week after coming to her house and finding her with another man. There have been many disturbing things about the story, especially those who somehow thought the fact that she’s a porn star somehow makes the situation less appalling or more understandable. Even more disturbing are the views this asshole expressed, which put him right in the mainstream of the MRA movement."
—
Do you believe it's "even more disturbing" to express words and thoughts than it is to physically beat a woman nearly to death?

Are words and thoughts *worse* than rupturing someone's spleen?

Maybe we just have different views on the world.

I don't care what you say. I would never beat you up for it.

Nothing you have said to me or anyone else is more disturbing than what War Machine did to Christy Mack.

Why do you believe otherwise? Are speech and thought "even more disturbing" than attempted murder?

As for the selective prosecution argument, you are correct that I can't prove a negative. I can't prove D'Souza was singled out because prosecutorial decision making is generally off limits as a matter of separation of powers.

That's why I noted my personal experience in this matter. Talk to some trial lawyers about campaign contributions. Look into $3,000 donations being made by legal assistants.

Using shell donors is common. So why go after D'Souza?

I'd sure like to be a fly on the wall or see the emails. Unfortunately separation of powers (as it's understood by courts) prevents judges from going into those details.

It's thus not my fault that I can't prove D'Souza was singled out.

Given what I (and anyone who has worked in the federal system or even followed it) know about federal prosecutors, I feel comfortable in my belief that D'Souza was singled out for his views.

Unlike the War Machine dispute, this is one where reasonable minds can differ. You have your views and biases and expertise and I have mind.

(That said, given your tactics and thinking displayed during the War Machine exchange, I'm unwilling to concede that your mind is reasonable.)

Ed, was your claim that War Machine was an mens' rights activist honest? Or did you capitalize on a brutal beating to smear your ideological adversaries in an unfair way?

You claimed War Machine was an MRA because he made some of the same statement that MRAs have made. Let's run with that.

I have said that eating factory farmed meat is immoral. Know who else says that? Vegans. Therefore, I'm a vegan.

War Machine said that Christy Mack had a right to be in adult entertainment. Know who else says that? Feminists. Therefore, War Machine is a sex positive feminist.

I never knew anything about you until you made a clearly dishonest argument (do you stand by it?) in an attempt to made you ideological adversaries look bad.

It was dealing from the bottom of the deck to spin that story in a way to make Paul Elam and those guys look bad. No leader in the MRA community would have had anything to do with War Machine and none supported his conduct.

You have no moral authority to judge me, D'Souza, or anyone else.

Free speech creates odd bed fellows!

I think anyone who has practiced criminal defense and understands election law sees the selective prosecution angle.

How is it that legal assistants at Trial Lawyer Firm Of Your Choice can afford to make campaign contributions to Democratic candidates? Yet they do, year after year. Go to Open Secrets and look up law firms and campaign contributions. Where's that money coming from?

Heck, as a law student I was used as a shell donor by a plaintiffs firm. Long story short: I was a valet as a plaintiffs firm as a law clerk. It was communicated that tips given to me would be donated, because I was such a good Democrat. No one was prosecuted. (And the statute of limitations has run, so come at me, bro!)

The shell game is played by all. Why was D'Souza singled out?

I think D'Souza has horrible views and am no fan of his. I also think the prosecution was unjust because he was almost certainly singled out for his criticism of the Administration.

I also think that Popehat has been a good friend to PZ Myers, Ed Brayton, and even me. In fact, Ed Brayton and I shared a lawyer! (Not Popehat, another lawyer.)

Ed Brayton previously claimed that War Machine, a "man" who beat his girlfriend, was a men's rights activist, a clearly intellectually dishonest argument. War Machine had made some of the same points that MRAs had made. By Brayton's logic, War Machine was a feminist because he dated a porn star, and that would thus make him a sex positive feminist.

Also, to violate Godwin's law. Hitler. Vegetarian. Therefore, Nazis.

It's thus clear that Brayton will engage in intellectual dishonesty to score points. However, unlike Mr. Brayton, I do not believe people should be imprisoned for thought crime. I hope Mr. Brayton remains a free man.

So this thread cracks me up. Ken disagrees with me on many issues. But Ken is able to separate the person from the ideas. Ken also has intellectual integrity.

When Ken calls attention to people he is friendly with, you'd think they might think, "Maybe he has a point." (When he calls me out, I admit he has a point. I go "too far" on purpose, to counter-balance the extremism on the other side. In a perfect world, I'd be more reasonable. But you can't be reasonable with feminists and fellows like Mr. Brayton. In a Platonic world, however, I am wrong. In the real world, well, it's bare knuckles.)

Anyhow, I love this comment thread and post. Free speech really does bring the SOBs together in one space.

So: if the government is censoring, then it is censoring by every single tort law, regulation, anti-discrimination law, and rule of evidence. That makes a mockery of the concept of censorship.

If there weren't more criminal laws than anyone can count and if the government weren't micromanaging people, you'd have a point.

But the government is everywhere. Lawsuits are easy to file.

When people have to watch their words lest they be used against them, that makes a mockery of the government and not of the usage of the word censorship.

It's also that it's a dishonest rhetorical attempt to equate criticism with violence or government suppression, thus falsely equating it with official censorship.

Ken, you note that Pax's tweets could be used against him in an employment discrimination cases. If an employer terminates an employee to avoid having outside-of-the-office conduct be used against the employee in a lawsuit, then isn't that de facto censorship?

In other words, Pax's speech is most certainly limited by the government – specifically, case law and regulations determining what is discriminatory. If Pax hadn't said anything that could have been used against BI in a lawsuit, then there'd be no official censorship. But since, as you note, his words "could be used against him in a court of law," then the government has regulated what Pax can say on Twitter.

You're also ignoring some longstanding Internet norms (that are now changing, of course).

For years, only the most wretched people would track you down and find your real address and "out" you online. Most message boards had norms against revealing a person's personal information. That was a recognition that a person's online activities should not spill over into his real life.

(There are other norms, too. Most people believe that family is off limits. So even though it's within everyone's free speech rights to find pics of your spouse and children and mock them, that's really slimy and there are strong mores against that. You just don't do that kind of stuff.)

Here it's different, since Pax wasn't anonymous and he wasn't being outed. But the same principle applies.

If you don't like what a guy is saying, argue with the guy on Twitter. Exchange emails. Blog about him. Don't call his employer, though.

Rather than debate or shame Pax, the mob went after his employer.

Hey, that was the mob's right. But that doesn't mean it wasn't bullshit and that it wasn't demonstrably different from having online debates/Twitter wars.

I passed it on my first attempt. I had to take it again. (Life is often not fair.)

When checking online for my results, I typed the code that was listed on my admissions ticket.

"The above name does not appear on the list of successful applicants."

That was almost the worst feeling I've ever had.

After a few minutes of feeling like crap I thought, "Maybe the 3 is really a faded 8."

Sometimes wishful thinking is true. I passed.

May Adam only have to take that wretched exam once. Congrats!

People have to use "bullying" and "harassment" because today's society only validates people who are victims.

If someone comes at me, I'll never cry. I'll fuck the guy up. That makes me an asshole, or dangerous, or mean, or whatever.

But if someone comes at me and I cry, then I'm deserving of attention and respect. My voice will be heard.

More people will cry about unfair treatment because crying is the only thing that works.

Grandy, it's not an intellectual argument. It's a yes-or-no vote.

So we can focus on what matters or what doesn't matter.

Given the way the economy has been going, you'd think people would grow up; focus on what matters; and leave trivialities aside.

That hasn't been the case, which is why we Americans deserve what we've got coming.

TomB, you seem to know a lot about politics and economics.

How did you – personally – get rich. You must be rich, after all, based on your posts

Maybe we can learn something from you.

For those of you who, unlike TomB, do not believe that ignorance is a man's highest value, I suggest you take a look at Warren's academic research:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Warren#Academic_career

It should become clear why so many monied interests want to keep her out of the Senate.

When people in America talk about suffering, I now laugh.

You argue over Indian bullshit while Wall Street rapes you. You turn against the very people who want to serve your own interests.

I used to care, but now find it all very funny.

Tom, do you even know what you're talking about?

Since when did saving the Middle Class have anything to do with wealth redistribution?

You are obviously unfamiliar with Warren's work – and the broader debate.

Go troll someone else.

Warren has devoted her entire career to saving the Middle Class.

Fortunately the corporate-controlled media has found a way to get the very people who need her the most to hate her.

Good job, guys, for being patsies for the very people who deem your existence a nuisance.

Holla.

You are just running things man. Love the recent work!

Your co-blogger Patrick and I have the irony of having to turn to the Russian Times for any decent reporting on the U.S.

I did the same thing over a year ago. Haven't had a spam attack since.

“Do not call up that which you cannot put down."

I am reminded of the biker scene in "A Bronx Tale."

Don't fuck with people, because one day you'll fuck with the wrong guy. And when you receive the beating of a lifetime, no one should answer your cry for mercy.

I am actually anti-mercy. If you are good to people, generally you won't need mercy. Mercy is what people who do wrong ask for – but after they've been caught doing wrong. (Grace is somewhat different, and applies generally when people make negligent mistakes rather than intentional misdeeds.)

And, of course, if you sue 81 people who earn their living litigating, no amount of tears will save your trust fund. Your soul will be destroyed. If you want to keep your soul, well, don't summon the beast.

Someone mentioned that people call our for Big Government, which is a good insight. I also see the quote as representing something else.

Another movie – Braveheart. If the government makes life so oppressive for the people – by fucking William Wallace's wife – do not expect loyalty from the citizenry.

If you don't want the mob hacking your heads off, ala France in 1789 or Russia in 1918, again, don't call out the mobs. Because you only got what you summoned.

Speaking of which…

How many people remember Joe Stack? Two funny things from that event:

1. The large number of people who expressed an, "I don't agree with him, and disagree with what you did, but nevertheless understand why he did what he did…" sentiment.

Imagine that! No mainstream person expressed that sentiment at McVeigh or the Unibomber. Yet with Stack, the conversation was heading towards empathy.

2. How quickly the corporate-controlled media killed the story. The narrative was not going the way of our corporate masters. People weren't saying, as they did with the Unibomber, "Stack is nuts!" Any media attention would only have roused the rabble, and thus a highly interesting, newsworthy story went into the buzzsaw.

Wall Street should not summon more Joe Stack's, but if they do, should we care what happens?

Never thought I'd be more cynical than Ken, but I'm thinking the lawyer is feeling pretty balls right now. He wrote a nastygram, and the guys at Red State punked out. That lawyer got to make a nice call to the client.

Plus, a lot of people are in the market for lawyers without personal integrity. Need a guy who will make up the law and threaten people so long as the check clears? Now everyone knows whom to call.

The biggest one (probably the same 5.something you felt in your current office) started rattling my apartment. I thought, "Cool, a good earthquake this time." Then the apartment kept moving, and moving…

Short earthquakes are great fun. The long one had me somewhat spooked. My dog didn't seem to notice the 'quake.

Haha. I love it! Love songs and romantic comedies = arrest for stalking. Yet somehow the lyrics are not creepy when Lionel Richie sings them. Consider, too, The Police's, "Every Breath."

Categories, though that's a TypePad thing, and I can't speak to WordPress.

It ends up being pretty nice over a period of years of categorizing posts. Here, e.g.,:

http://federalism.typepad.com/crime_federalism/prosecutorial-misconduct/

Sorta fun to stroll through your own archives, too.

Do you get enough cases from cold calls that it's even worth taking them? One boss wouldn't even take cold calls. You didn't get to talk to him unless a lawyer he trusted gave you his #, or unless you paid him for an hour of his time. No website, either.

Winer didn't send her to talk on TV about her 3-month relationship. She was already whoring herself. "He knew I was going on the show Hannity, where I would use this false information to defend him in front of millions of people." And, "Greta Van Susteren the evening of Weiner’s tearful press conference…"

If she had been a better person, Weiner wouldn't have lied to her – as he'd have known she would lie for him.

Powers is one reason I am racist – I don't care much for white people. In most non-white cultures it wouldn't even need to be stated that you'd lie for your friend. They simply get it. Morality is contextual, and duties to one's friends trump duties to strangers. I would lie on network TV 1,000 times to save a friend, especially when people are asking things they have no business to ask.

For that reason, I advise men against dating white/WASP women. Persian and Jewish women may be a little loud and sometimes a big pain (um…aren't all women?), but they'll be down for you when you need them.

The whiter and more educated a woman is, the more likely she'll sell you out. Weiner's own (non-white wife) has been discrete. At least Weiner knew enough to dump Powers – who remains in love and obsessed with him even though they only dated for three weeks! – in favor of a non-white woman.

Saying, "Everything is fine" when it's not is obstruction of wife – and the cover-up is worse than the crime. Women are far more tolerant of male incompetence than male dishonesty. Griffin v. California does not apply to courts of spouses. There's no much even an knowledgeable guy can do.

It's not just picking on a kid. It's normalizing the behavior. "All the cool kids make fun of 'retards.'"

Man, fuck that dude. He's an adult. He can fight back.

If I had his info, I'd post it without remorse or hesitation.

When you call this action oppression and tyranny, you marginalize yourself and make people disregard you when something truly oppressive, like arbitrary arrest, actually happens. You trivialize those abuses by lumping this with them.

If the guy had not shut up, he would have been wrongfully arrested.

Are you starting to get it? Or you still gonna troll?

"Scooter Libby," your problem is in applying logic and law evenhandedly with respect to regular people (house boys) and the state (mastah).

Doctrines like equitable estoppel, adverse possession, termination of easements…That's all nonsense common law that applies to people. The law does not apply to the state.

I wish it were hyperbole. Yet look at what's happening in San Francisco. Dozens of drug cases have be dismissed because videos (no one knew the cameras were running) showed that police perjured themselves. [Link is posted at my name.]

Police are lying every day. Prosecutors, too. Why?

Because they can.

They can lie because people like James don't care, and even "good guys" think I am being hyperbolic. I'm not. This country is in a bad place, and you are only one interaction with a cop-in-a-bad-mood from a false accusation.

Where do you think this ends? In which society has government-misconduct-as-a-matter-of-course ended well?

Geez, Mike, hyperbole much?

So I am an asshole for posting "mean words" on a website. This conduct upsets you. Meanwhile, you fucks are defending police threatening to arrest someone for having a basketball hoop.

LOL.

I would not support racially-restrictive covenants. I in fact do not support this particular issue. But that does not mean the law is invalid. Racially-restrictive covenants, on top of being a bad idea violate the 14th Amendment and the Civil Rights Act. This issue does not violate a constitutional or other federal right in any way.

So the Constitution is the sole authority a person can look to when judging tyranny? Or is the Constitution itself based on some other principle?

I can tell you this: It wasn't written by men who think anything like you do.

If the state enforcing a valid law passed by an elected legislature that involves a property right that you knew the city owned when you bought your house is tyranny, what isn’t?

Every tyranny has "validly enacted laws." Even Nero enacted laws. In fact, a pseudo-rule-of-law has been part of every tyranny. "Show trials" even involved actually judges enforcing written laws.

And yet people with a moral conscience and understanding of liberty – indeed, the very people who allow you to live to be free to be a mancunt – are appalled by tyrannies past and present.

So your point really doesn't make any sense. It just reveals your own status as a good little house boy. I hope you're at least getting a pat on the head from your masters, or maybe even a warm bowl of porridge.

I gather James would support racially-restrictive covenants? After all, if people contract to disallow black people, what's the problem?

This HOA stuff is typical bullshit libertarian slave morality. "You're free to be a slave!"

If people want to be passive-aggressive cunts, let them go the fuck over their neighbors houses and take the shit down.

Instead, they make their private dispute over petty bullshit (and if you give a fuck about basketball hoops, you are a serious god-damned loser who deserves to die) into a police matter.

Once the cops are call, then yes, it's a boots-on-your-throat issue.

But guys like James will always be good house boys. James is in the majority, which actually makes me feel pretty good. When the tyranny really comes, I won't care. You're only getting what you asked for.

Spoken like a good little house boy, James.

My sympathy with my friend’s experience is also “but one manifestation” of the sickness we all suffer?

Yes. You took someone else's rape, and had to make it about you and your friend. Nir wasn't bad merely because he mocked an alleged rape victim. He was bad because your friend was almost raped, and thus his attack on an alleged victim was really, somehow, about you.

Can't you see what the problem is? Some things are wrong even if you cannot relate to them at all. Well, that is if there is any sort of morality.

If we're all amoral now, then nothing is immoral unless it bothers us. I'm OUTRAGED, therefore it's BAD. Morality is therefore another branch of aesthetics.
(Indeed, probably the only way to understand modern morality is to view it as nothing more than a matter of personal taste.)

Linus, he's a narcissistic voyeur. We all are. Hell, you've taken someone else's rape and given it meaning only insofar as it related to you. Since *your* friend was almost raped, somehow that makes the guy's comments that much worse.

I'm not defending the guy, as I'd never even heard of him. Yet his conduct is but one manifestation of the sickness we all suffer.

Is he that much more despicable than any other journalist? Or us?

Journalists love tragedy, as it's good for ratings. It's good for ratings, because that's what we want. Give us rapes to watch and talk about. Oh, we must turn our eyes away, oh wait, we'll open them a little bit…

Ever notice how the media won't even list the name of a woman who claims to have been raped? This rule is followed even when the rape accusation is proven false.

And yet here is CBS, and the alleged victim (she has a history of ethical lapses, and her word is not credible) running their mouth off about the rape. And here were are, paying attention.

Are we really any better than Nadir? Why?

I love how he "apologized" for not realizing Twitter wasn't private.

But I won’t discuss politics with them, and as a general rule I won’t discuss religion without good reason

I like talking about books and strip clubs. I also like sugar-free Jell-O. The question wasn't about what you or I'd discuss. The question is whether it's appropriate to disregard a person's opinion on x because of his view on y.

You seem unable to state a case for why one should disregard a person's view on x, because of his view on y. You state your preferences for conversational topics, but, again, that is a separate issue.

I'll join in the narcissistic love fest. When I admire a person for whatever reason, I specifically do not want to hear that person's views on politics, God, or morality. Because that person will be *wrong* and will seem like an idiot. It ruins the image.

Still………..It's not all about me. It's about what is right. To someone living in a culture of amoral narcissism, the distinction between "I don't like it," and "It's wrong," isn't obvious.

That’s different from holding a position that is so throughly contradicted by reality that it’s absurd

You're being politically correct by not classifying religion as an absurd belief.

Fact is: We believe all sorts of things not because they are true, but because we have an emotional need to believe those things.

Look, man, I have met fantastic lawyers whose political views were totally moronic – to me. I worked with one who who – when it came to a very complicated area of law – was undeniably brilliant. She got a column for a legal newspaper, and, everyone just said, "What? She really believes that?!" Even people who agreed with her ultimate conclusions couldn't countenance her reasoning. If all you had to go on were her political columns, you'd consider her an idiont. And you'd be wrong.

Knowledge, like ethics, is contextual. Another guy I worked for was a notorious philander, but was super old-school about rules for citing opinions. E.g., he wouldn't let quote case language if it came from a a case arising out of an unrelated area of law. It wasn't just because of credibility, either. The guy was a true believer in legal ethics – even where, as with case citations, I wasn't even trying to be shady.

In general, people should be evaluated based on what subject matter they are speaking of. I'm very much interested in Doug Kmiec's view of the Constitution. I am less interested in his view that bread becomes human flesh after a robed man says a few magic words.

You and others want to take a short cut. Rather than evaluating arguments and actually engaging in effortful thinking, you want to ignore someone. That's fine. It's lazy and contemptible, but many people in life choose to life as sluggards.

Vox Day is smarter than I am, and he believes in God. Ken at Popehate has a higher IQ than I, and he believes in God. Doug Kmiece is much smarter than I, and he believes in God.

Yet I should ignore people who are smarter because they hold a "wrong" belief.

Well, if they are smarter than I…Could it be that I am the one who is mistaken?

Also, as relates to the theory of evolution: I wonder how many of you have read Aristotle's Sciences, and realize that his view was recognized as true by all-right thinking people. And yet he was totally wrong. If you take a history of science course (and all of you smug pricks have, right?), you realize that what everyone *knew*….Well, it was wrong.

What makes you so certain that we, today, are more right than Aristotle was, in his day?

We can have beliefs, sure, and some things are probably more certain than others. A serious study of history, however, should provide us some humility.

The average person believes in evolution only because that's what he or she was told to believe.

How does that establish someone is a right-thinking person?

What percentage of people who "believe" in evolution have read The Origin of the Species? Or even Richard Dawkins?

How believing the right conclusions – which are right only because a man in a robe said they are right – a sign of thoughtfulness or education?

Charles, you have me confused with another "Mike," since I support progressive taxation.

Anyhow, the chick who had sex with the guy was looking for fame, anyway. She got what she wished for. Homeboy is lucky that she didn't falsely accuse him of rape, as has happened to that Steeler's quarterback.

Her daddy is a hedge fund manager, and she's had all the privileges and advantages of life.

I'll get over this outrage in about…yep, already over it.

The story is gaining legs….Thanks to his "supporters."

The bigot probably wishes this story would just go away. His "supporters" won't let this drop – even if it means that they'll force him into martyrdom.

If the lawyer is asked to move on (if this story blows up), conservatives will blame liberals. Yet if conservatives STFU already, it will blow over.

Still developing…

Mirengoff is a sell out! He wants to chase the big bucks rather than speak his mind. He is like a musical performer or other artist who conforms to what the big corporations want them to. He's like Pearl Jam – before they started to suck!

He put his own GREED and the need to please his CORPORATE MASTERS above his philosophical devotion to truth, art, beauty, and the Good.

*Spits at ground*

Piper: Thanks for the update. That blogger is further proof that CONservatives hate the free market. Bigoted Paul-o-boy could have remained at Powerline. He choose to earn more money at Akin Gump. This was a free, rational, voluntary economic decision.

Yet the CONS are crying about it.

I was once told to choose between a blog post and a job. I kept the blog, and didn't cry about it either.

Free markets! Yeah, babe.

write a post aimed at making fun of the way ‘injuns’ speak, even if it’s a joke

See, it's not that you lack a sense of humor: It's that you're a fucking moron.

Native Americans actually don't speak that way. It's only bigoted white people (ahem) who think they do.

Thus, you continue humiliating yourself.

Please keep it up!

I just read someone refer to Powerline as Powerwhite blog. That was almost as fun as Dave's self-humiliation.

Thanks for the laugh, Dave – and for the reminder why I'm libertarian. People like you want to tell me how to live my life? Call me Freedom Wolf, and leave me the hell alone.

Meanwhile, a federal judge sentenced a guy to a year in prison for saying fuck in open court. (See today's post at Simple Justice.)

Goes to show what a scam justice is. It's all form, and no substance. Unless one is cynical, and believes that the substance is not an objective search for truth, but is instead a tool of tyranny. In that case, federal criminal courts do indeed offer much substance.

Now that's a fun post.

It’s bizarre to jump to the conclusion that Herr German was some kind of predator

When perverts with easy access to sex see a problem with a sexual relationship, probably there is something wicked going on.

Also been reading, "The Forsaken: An American Tragedy in Stalin's Russia"

Amazing read that mimics today in the U.S. Much more relevant – though much less learned – than Decline and Fall. Rome!

Fools, we should be studying Russia. It's closer in time *and* the historical sources are better.

Been working my way through the Revolution to the Oligopolists.

The Ames-Levine list is good.

http://ameslevinelist.com/

Hilarious comment thread.

Love is when libertarians insist that the state be given a monopoly on force, and then cry when the state misuses force.

Umm………What did you expect to have happen?

Contracts, you're humiliating yourself. Please carry on…

Sovereign immunity might not apply, but qualified immunity will. The cop will claim that he had a court order prohibiting Joel's conduct, and this the cop simply made a good-faith mistake of law. Minnesota is located within the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, and so there are many three-judge panels that will excuse the cop's misconduct under qualified immunity.

At least when it all collapses, they'll be enough blame to go around that none should be given pity.

Be careful, or SHG is going to show up to tell you that you're "pulling a Norm." ;-)

#1 reason people don't follow Christianity? Answer: Christians.

Hottie Sangria: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/sandra-lee/hottie-sangria-recipe/index.html

"aggressive-aggressive is just as much a loser’s proposition"

That's how cowards rationalize never taking action.

The park dad was popping off. He should STFU in the future. He won't, because everyone tolerates nonsense as a coward's credo has been wrapped up moralisms.

You don't want aggression-aggression? Then STFU and mind your own business. And if you don't, well….Some folks out there are still teachers in the school of hard knocks.

Society would be better off if more were willing to stand up for themselves rather than pretend that walking away like a coward is the upright thing to do.

Kids need to see that there's an alternative to being a passive-aggressive bitch. You handled the situation appropriately.

Being born into a rich family is proof that God wanted them to be rich. Why are you attempting to thwart God's will?

I think he (and shamefully Mr. Irony himself, Patrick) missed it by a country mile

You were conned by a passive-aggressive, and probably don't realize what a slave you have become to euphemism. Read "Politics in the English Language" – twice – and call me in the morning.

A passive-aggressive always has cover. I'm not saying you're a dumb fuck who lets people manipulate you with their passive-aggressive words, but I'm not saying you're not, either.

Jonah Goldberg said he wanted someone dead without saying he wanted someone dead. There are legitimate reasons to disguise one's desires. There is a federal law against inciting someone to commit murder, so one must be careful.

I doubt Jonah Goldberg's punk ass was thinking about the law. He was just being his passive-aggressive, bitchy self.

And you fell for it.

Jonah Goldberg is passive-aggressive. That's a far worse offense than calling for someone's assignation.

Hahaha!. It's like there's an army of you guys who hate on those of us who prefer the well-groomed. The comments to the Guess Her Muff section always bring out the war.

It's a generational thing. A lot of guys even shave their arm hair. (*Cough* Norelco Body Groomer *Cough*) Probably someone would say that the Beauty Industrial Complex has reached men. I saw that if proper grooming was great enough for the ancient Romans, then it's good enough for me!

I thought the post was lame because he didn't close. Making out isn't a one-night stand. It's a fail.

He is saying that her hair is what stopped him. That's exactly what someone who couldn't close would say.

Pussy is for closers!

Have you watched The Wire? I resisted for years, until I realized it was futile.

As cynical as I am, I never really understood agency costs quite like I thought I did.

Baca, like all of The Wire's characters, isn't doing what's right for his taxpayer-employer: He's doing what's right for himself.

Sounds trite, I know. Maybe that's the genius of the show: The artist makes us appreciate in concrete form what we all think we understand abstractly.

With white male privilege what it is, I don't even need to send cover letters.

Man, that video was awesome.

The guy probably thought he was getting revenge. Instead, he made a fool out of himself. He also showed complete cultural ignorance. Whining about a woman cheating on you is worse than whatever "slut sanction" even conservatives would impose on infidelitous women.

A buddy of mine (very conservative) was cheated on, and he went around telling everyone. I had to explain to him that people look down on men who get cheated on; and that by complaining about it, he only validated his wife's decision to cheat on him. He would even tell women he wanted relationships with that he was divorced because his wife cheated on him. (!)

The type of guy to whine about being cheated on is, by definition, the type of guy who'd get cheated on.

Maybe that is too Zen for conservative Christians.

do you think many Americans would mind living in the UAE, Malaysia, or Indonesia

Most would. Which is my – and the German chancellor's – point.

If you take a look around and like what you see, and then look at other countries and do not like what you see…What exactly should you conclude?

Indeed, the reason I hate Wall Street so much is because I do not like what I see in countries with huge wealth inequalities. Thus, it does not surprise me to hear that many countries are opposed to importing America's "Wall Street values."

b/c educated people like yourself ought to know better than to paint 1.5+ billion people with such a broad brush

This is the most ironic statement of the day.

The current Political Correctness dogma states that smart people judge each person individually.

And yet that's completely moronic.

The more you study history, or demographics, or psychology…The more patterns and commonality you see emerge.

We laugh at the Salem Witch Trials. How primitive. Well…What about the Sex Offender Hysteria of the 1980s? When you look deeply, you realize that while separated by centuries of "civilization," we remain primitive and thus subject to hysteria.

We are not unique snowflakes. Even my egotistical self could be steroptyped.

If you know my age, race, and sex: You can make all sorts of judgments about me. If I tell you I'm a white male aged 24-40 and you don't guess that I've been married, then you're a moron. If you aren't willing to guess that I purchased a new car within 5 years – because that would be sterotyping – then you're not sophisticated: You're silly.

When judging groups, you won't be 100% right, but you'll make better-than-chance guesses. Or would you not pull a U-turn upon seeing yourself in a trailer park. ("But sometimes there are old retirees who live in trailer courts!" only demonstrates why you turn around.)

Islam today is where Christianity was in the Middle Ages. If Christianity today were the Middle Ages variety, it should be discriminated against.

Hell, I even believe that some Christian varieties should face discrimination. The Evangelical stuff is dangerous. Methodists are pretty legit, though, as are Episcopals. When it comes to those types of Christians, I can't tell how they are any different from us pagans.

The great thing about Christianity is that it's totally watered down, and thus is not much of a threat to secular values. If you doubt this, read the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire's discussion on Christianity. *Real* Christianity is indeed a threat to a capitalist nation. People spend too much time praying to make money and to fight and die in wars. Dangerous stuff.

You can go on Wikipedia and view a list of Muslim countries. You ready to live in any of those places? Why then should I want that crap exported to my country?

I dunno. I like buying stuff. If FB can find me stuff to buy, isn't that a win?

Serious question for Patrick: If this FB scandal upsetting to you because of privacy, or consumerism? My intuition is that, on a deep level, you don't consumerism – which is a large part of what FB is about.

The privacy angle never moved me. Facebook is still artificial reality. You can manufacture an identity that has little to do with your "true" self. Indeed, how many of us run web cams into our bathrooms; or film ourselves watching Internet pr0n?

I never see this as a privacy issue. Even though we "share" on Facebook, we're still only sharing that part of us that we want others to see.

We keep the deep dark shit to ourselves – or to anonymous message boards.

As an advocate for equality of the sexes, I’d like to point out that the facts of the case also support a charge of rape against HER.

That is impossible, because women are not capable of being active sexual choosers. Instead, they can only agree to consent to allow a man to take him. Or so the feminist thinking goes.

I don't know one guy who hasn't been ridiculed for his sexual "choice" made the night before while drunk. Are those women that I and every other guy had sex with while totally – and obviously – wasted, rapists?

Why not? We clearly couldn't give knowing consent.

If a drunk man and a drunk woman have sex, are they both rapists?

If not, why not?

If people truly took equality seriously, 90% of "date rape" wouldn't be filed. But feminism is not about equality – it's about male oppression.

Or didn't anyone learn anything from the Duke LAX Prosecution?

CEJ: That link is a great insight into how brainwashed the average American male has become. If a girl says it's rape, then he believes it. Clearly he didn't think it was rape. Yet she guilted him, and as a product of the American culture, he eventually bought into her lies.

Unfortunately for women, the average American male has become a pitiable creature. Soon enough there won't be any men around willing to protect women from real rape. Or do we believe that as a the "last remaining superpower," the Nanking Massacre or Rape of Berlin could never happen here?

True enough, Jason. The two most illogical force in the universe are a man's cock and a woman's feelings. A sensible person heeds neither.

If the thing is big enough to slip his hands through so that mimics the form of knuckle-dusters, I think it isn’t outside the realm of possibility that it might have been intended for such use

The problem is that the statute bans simple possession without intent to harm.

The statute makes sense when applied to brass knuckles. There's no legitimate use for them, and thus banning simple possession presents no problems.

Yet there are legitimate uses for a D-Ring (lesbians seem to really like carrying them), and thus we must all rely on the good graces of police not to arrest us, and prosecutors not to charge us, when possessing them. Generally it's a bad idea to criminalize otherwise lawful conduct, because it gives law enforcement too much power.

If you're banging a cop's wife, is that an innocent D-Ring in your pocket, or a deadly weapon? Should cops have the discretion to make that call?

Interesting 9/11 thought experiment….

Without blogs, most of the truths about the bailouts would have been unknown. If I had said, in an era without blogs, that the Federal Reserve was going to launder billions of dollars of taxpayer to Goldman Sachs…That'd be nuts. People who, during the American Revolution would have been best described as Loyalists, would decry such nonsense. "Nonsense!" "Outrageous!" "Insanity!"

And yet…The bailouts happened. Now the best the Loyalists can do is spin it. Well, sure, billions were laundered through the Federal Reserve to Goldman Sachs. But that was needed to save the country. "Stabilize the financial system!"

Blogs have made it so that the Loyalists cannot deny the facts. They can only spin them.

People with specialized knowledge and disloyal to the power elite have become whistle blowers. The Loyalists are no longer controlling the facts.

9/11, in an era of Twitter, would have been a different affair. Firemen on the science were saying, "I hear explosions." There were many reports. Those firemen were later told to stop saying such things.

People with iPhones would have been taking pictures from inside the scene. They might have seen Thermite. Or wiring. Who knows what those photos would have revealed.

Imagine the tweets that'd have come out of the WTC buildings. "I hear explosions."

Now, of course, the Loyalists would spin the "explosions." Yet the facts would have been reported. Creating the facts is always preferable to spinning them.

In an era of the Bailouts, it's truly hard to dismiss "conspiracy theories" as nutty. Moreover, an understanding of cognitive bias leaves one unimpressed with Popular Science articles. What scientist would dare say that 9/11 was a controlled demolition? One *tenured* professor did, and he was fired.

Hell, that moron who does some TV show almost lost his job for making the totally true claim that suicide bombers are not cowards. Because those of us who would die for nothing are brave? Imagine what would happen to people with the audacity to claim that the same people who were to profit in the trillions, were the ones responsible for the terrorist attack.

In an era of social media, another 9/11 will be very difficult to pull off. Little Brother is watching.

You people can’t even stop a guy you know is an islamic extremist from walking onto a plane with dynamite attached to his johnson.

How would that benefit anyone in power? Keeping the people horrified of Muslims is good for business. Any rational businessperson responding to current incentives would invest in pro-jihad propaganda, encouraging wayward youth to strap dynamite to themselves.

There's lots of profit for old white men to make in terrorism.

Does the website note that the SEC destroyed documents involving insider trades made pre-9/11?
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2010/06/sec-government-destroyed-documents.html

Whatever happened to that $2.3 trillion that Rumsfeld was grilled about the day before 9/11?
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/01/29/eveningnews/main325985.shtml

Should Operation Northwoods inform our view of 9/11?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

What about the Gulf of Tonkin Incident?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_of_Tonkin_Incident

Is the U.S.'s covering up of an Israel attack on an American ship, designed to bring the U.S. into Israel's war with Egypt, relevant to anything?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Liberty_incident

I would indeed be interested in the government's explanation for those mainstream-media-reported events. I mean, that's not even the *crazy* stuff. That's the tame stuff you can find in conventional news sources – though to a sane person, it'd sure looks insane, and leaves a person wondering about what hasn't been uncovered….

I rarely buy BP gas anyway, so my “boycott” would be meaningless.

As is everything you do your entire life. In 100 years, you and your other decisions are dust. Nothigness.

Does that mean one should do nothing?

propose a boycott against the federal agencies who dropped the ball

This is certainly getting warmer. A massive tax revolt would be warmer still. But when the Feds come knocking, will the oppressed masses fight back? Once the collective finds to the right answer to that question, then hope, change, and reform are all possible.

Until then, keep funding your oppressors so that BP executives can receive larger bonuses.

the real lesson is that we should wean ourselves off of the stuff altogether.

Yes, and many other Real Lessons. Among others is this: BP made billions; its CEOs are all mega rich; and the people get nothing. Thus, the Real Lesson is the elites need not care or act responsibility. The rich win, the people lose.

This is a classic tragedy of the commons situation, with no commons tax.

The oceans is a shared resource that many profit from. BP takes a huge shit it in. Now everyone else is forced to suffer. What's the Real Lesson in that?

Shouldn't BP be indicted? I guarantee you that I could formalize a criminal case against BP for its environmental crimes. I guarantee that I could get a conviction. I am not even the smartest or most talented. It's thus lunacy to suggest that BP could not be convicted.

Yet BP won't be prosecuted. Its executives won't have to give up any of the money they made while engaging in conduct that led to the ruin of an entire economy. No one who had the power to prevent this spill will be held accountable.

The same people who put aside long-term safety for short-term profits (year's bonus depends on the prior 9-12 months of profits) will keep their bonuses. They will keep their millions.

Another Real Lesson is that there is nothing we can do about this – nothing we can talk about openly or in polite company, anyway. We can vote. What good will that do? How is Obama working out for all of you?

There are thus other Real Lessons which shall for now remain unstated. If more people wake up, and realize the futility of voting, then perhaps class will be held, and Real Lessons discussed.

Pilates injuries…iPad agonizing…First world problems are great. (I say that entirely non-sarcastically. They really are great problems to have.)

Why don't you SEO Ricard Drake's name by posting it in blog title? By linking to his law firm page, you're actually giving him positive SEO.

Late to the party, but Congrats!

Not to play gunner, but it's a hard hypo because if the person is legitimately mentally ill, legal services will not help them. If you find nothing (because there is nothing to find), the schizophrenic client will believe you are part of the conspiracy. So what have you done other than expand the conspiratorial web?

If the person is only a little bit paranoid but is not legitimately mentally ill (yeah, epistemic question; how can *you* know?), of course you should serve them. The issue then is simply one of: Can this person be fully informed? Often people have "crazy" ideas that they *know* are crazy; but just indulge them. (Hell, until recently, those of us who wanted to lynch Goldman Sachs were crazy and spouting conspiracy theories. After some investigation, well, ahem, some of us were right and 99% of everyone else were wrong.)

Clients often want lawyers to run fools' errands. What are the odds of having a habeas petition granted? Less than 1% in the abstract; and even with a solid issue, the AEDPA is going to toss you into sub-10% territory. Does that mean you don't file the writ? Or do you say, "Client: You're crazy for wanting us to file the writ. This is basically hopeless."

A hopeless person, fully informed, can be served. To many, their only hope is a late KO. They know they have only a puncher's chance, and they're going to take that shot. Let them swing.

The issue is then whether the person is so lacking competency that the person cannot be fully informed. If the person lacks competency, then taking the persons' money is unethical.

This shouldn't apply to lawyers as a matter of legal ethics – but Ethics ethics. A person shouldn't sell tin foil hats to those lacking competency, either. And the dirty hands fallacy explains why it's no defense to say that someone else will serve the client.

Interesting take.

Probably, too, it's just further evidence of narcissism in our society. People are things to watch and observe.

I'd feel really really really creepy watching even a very cute, legal, co-ed sleeping. "That's a person, and I'm violating her."

To a modern day American/narcissist, the light bulb doesn't go off. It's just another reality-TV show.

@Mike: if you read the article, you’d see that Patrick even cited the relevant case law for *that* specific state

*Wondering how I'll ever overcome the shame*

It is true that liberal philosophy tends towards protection of the weak and relatively powerless: anti-discrimination statutes

Sorry, bro, but I grew up as poor and powerless as can be. And liberals completely destroyed what chance we'd have to live a normal childhood – all because my dad had the back luck of being born white:
http://federalism.typepad.com/crime_federalism/2009/04/frank-ricci-and-me.html

This issues are far more complex than you or other liberals want to give it credit for.

Watch "American Hollow." None of the liberal elite seems to care – because, again, those people are white.

In some states, the wiretap law does consider a conversation with a police private. I remember a case involving a guy who recorded a traffic stop. The arrest was upheld.

Call it the War on Little Brother. They want to watch us; but they do not want us watching them.

adding some exculpatory bullshit about what the soldiers did or didn’t know.

Eh….Stuff like this is a road to nowhere.

If we had been born Germans in Germany, we'd have fought for the Nazis, too. We are no better than the Nazi soldiers. We simply have not be put into the position they were put into.

And as for what Nazi soldiers fought for….Again, it's not what Hitler was fighting for. People fight in wars because they are sold lies about wars; or because they are conscripted. So it doesn't make much sense to judge the average Nazi foot soldier considering that we'd have done the same thing had we been gentile Germans.

Oh, no…We'd surely go Thoreau and go to prison instead.

*Looks around. Sees no one in jail for civil disobedience for anything.*

If someone thinks he’s right about some particular thing, and everyone else is wrong, there’s some (small) chance he’s a visionary.

LOL! Recognizing that the people who actually die in a war are fighting – in their own minds, anyway – for something different than those who send people off to war…is hardly visionary. It takes some work to recognize that most of what you believe was put inside your head by very powerful people, and for their benefit; but it's not as if many others have not come before me.

It doesn’t matter whether your perspective is that of the elites, the populists, Marxist, libertarian, or any other theory or perspective.

You must not come from a common family or hang out with common folk.

What my common folk friends and family think about the Iraq War is entirely different from my CEO friend who works in the Military Industrial Complex thinks. One speaks of the American way of life. The other speaks of profit.

Not too hard to imagine that the common folk had a different motivation for fighting the War of Northern Aggression than the slave owners.

Again, though, if we want to get empirical there are surely dozens of speeches and accounts from foot soldiers.

It’s like saying that the answer to “Why did I have McDonalds for breakfast today?”

Your analogy fails for a number of reasons, but yes, I have an answer to your question: You had McDonald's today because it contains sugar, fat, and salt. See The End of Overeating.

You also ate it because you watch television, and are informed/brainwashed into thinking it tastes good.

Anyhow, we're going way far afield. Still, there is most certainly a a reason why you ate McDonalds today. And, no, it wasn't because you were hungry. And, yes, it was precisely because you were told to eat it.

Same thing with the Civil War/Confederacy. You're a foot soldier, and you don't even know it.

Oh, and I am not nit-picking or trying to be difficult or clever!

It just seems to be the case that everyone assumes that whatever "something is about" – is universal.

Was Nazi Germany about killing Jews? To many it was. Yet the average German lived in denial of the death camps. To the average German, then, Nazism was about something else. Well…What?

Probably it would be healthier for all of us to realize that most of what we do is not about what we think it's about. Instead, most of what we do is programmed into us by those who control us. Heck, look at libertarians – pitching fits over reforms of executive pay and decrying any attempts to regulate Wall Street. The themes are "freedom," yet it's clear that libertarianism is not about freedom: It's about the enslavement of the average American by Goldman Sachs et al.

Claiming that the Confederacy was about slavery takes for granted that the people who actually died to defend the Confederacy were not fighting for slavery. They were fighting for something else. Well…What?

Probably it'd be more instructive to read motivational speeches the generals gave their soldiers; or to look at recruitment flyers; or read the newspapers/propaganda outlets of the day.

I'm guessing there won't be much in those materials about slavery. Instead, we'll hear universal/collective unconscious mythical themes about Northern aggression, and the need to preserve institutions and the Southern way of life. All vague enough that the listener about to suck a piece of lead into his gut can impose his own meaning onto the abstract term.

what was at the heart of the Confederacy

What is America about? Ask most Americans, and they won't say, "Enriching Wall Street and other monied interests at the expense of everyone else." Yet that would be the truth.

So…Who gets to say what America is about? Who gets to say what the Confederacy was about?

Popular and elite opinion will differ. If you want to say that the elite opinion is right; and that the elites sell lies to the people in order to get the people to serve the interests of the elite, cool. Yet it seemed your argument was not so nuanced.

To the power elite, the war was about slavery. To continue enriching themselves, slave owners got people who could never afford a slave (or anything more than a hovel for themselves) to fight and die.

What did the people who were sent off to die fighting for? Probably not slavery. More likely they bought into themes of sovereignty and encroachment.

It's kind of like saying: What was the Iraq War about? Ask the line soldier, and you're going to get a very different answer than if you asked the CEO of Halliburton.

Your worldview obliquely suggests that there is little difference between a savage beast & an equally savage, feral child.

Yours, too – and pretty much everyone else's. At least if you're honest.

Society exists to tame. Those who cannot be tamed are put into prison or mental institutions. We wait until some magical number – 18, usually, although 14 is old enough if the crime is bad enough.

People are given a chance to recover from their feral state. If they can't, we lock them in boxes.

Under some theory of utilitarianism, probably that's the right thing to do. You don't let a wolf run loose in a school yard. One might ask: Doesn't the wolf have rights, too? To answer that, we'll just talk about a wolf's rights ending at the bridge of our noses – as if that is anything other than an unsatisfactory tautology.

These are very complicated issues. Problem is….Folks live in a fantasy world, and do not understand why society exists, or how and for what reason society was organized.

yet on the surface it appears that your solution to both of these unrepairable creatures is the same, i.e., to be “put down.”

You can call putting people into prison whatever you want to call it. Don't pretend that your solution is somehow more humane than mine.

The only reason – in reality – I oppose putting people down is due to flawed human institutions. If I had God's-eye knowledge about stuff, I'd be in favor of it. Putting down permanently damages would spare the damaged person continued suffering. It would also prevent the damaged person from harming others. Human suffering would substantially decrease.

Instead, we allow damaged humans to live; harm others; reproduce (like rabbits); thus brining even more damaged people into the world. So don't act like my ideas are the frightful ones.

Of course, such a solution can't work given humanity's unwise nature. If we were more logical, then, yes, I'd be in favor of ending the cycle of sociopathy and destruction before it begins.

Some children are broken beyond repair. Not amount of sentimentality or superstition about the innocence of children will change that.

Sad story; but what happens when the kid starts torturing the family dog and raping neighbors?

Suddenly that child has not just become the adoptive parent's problem – but instead has been made everyone else's problem.

Not sure what the answer is. I am sure that a high level of moral certainty and outraged is unwarranted.

There is no good answer about the problem of broken humans. When animals act out and viciously attack others, they are put down. Yet because of our superstitions about souls, there exists a belief in redemption.

Sort of weird. A guy who is born without an arm cannot be redeemed into having two arms. Yet when the piece of meat inside our heads is deformed, we pretend as if the damage is reversible – since, after all, we're talking about redeemable souls rather than mere biological parts.

Need a epilogue in light of his most recent comment.

Haven't had lulz in a while.

My general ethic means no mentally-handicapped jokes. No jokes about bipolars or schizos, either. Those are debilitating illnesses that cause a person to have legitimate problems functioning in society.

What of narcissists? Ethical to laugh at them?

Anyone? Anyone? Jack?

lulz at people buying a product because a celebrity endorses it.

lulz at becoming emotionally invested in people who appear on our TVs.

lulz at caring about a pro athlete's persona life.

As long as my monkeys perform for me, I don't care if they sling crap on their spare time.

P.S. It causes chuckles knowing people are more worried about whether Nike's celebrity athletes (that it pays millions) are sleeping around….than whether Nike is exploiting children for commercial gain, or dumping toxins into local environments, leading to an increase in cancer in children.

The American people, rather than Tiger Woods, are the ones in need of rehab.

Most women rely on the power of their looks – rather than status or personality – to attract men. This is especially true in college. It seems, then, that most campus cuties are rapists.

But are you friends with anyone who voted for either McCain or Obama, both of whom opposed gay marriage?

Short answer: A person who votes for a politician votes on a bundle of goods. If someone voted for either candidate on the gay-rights issue (re: a single issue voter), then that person would most certainly not be my friend.

Deeper answer: Anyone who takes a presidential election seriously isn't going to be friends (in the Aristotelean sense) with me. It's not innate discrimination. It's just that we won't have the chemistry necessary for shared understanding and intimacy. Those who think there is a material difference on issues that matter between Obama and McCain are brain-washed, and therefore too boring for me.

Halliburton's profits are just fine under the Obama administration. Obama and McCain both supported the bailouts. Both loaded their staff with banksters and defense contractors.

The single most important issue – the issue that will have the biggest effect on you and your children – is the theft of taxpayer money by the defense and banking industries. The "national debt" isn't some abstract concept: It's an actual debt your children will need to pay, and it's a debt that exists because of Defense and Banking. Obama and McCain are supplicants for both interests.

Heck, even where Obama is "different" – healthcare – is a joke. Healthcare Reform was a GOP plan – and it was written by insurance companies. LOL. Yep…These guys are all so different!

It's not a about being a nihilist….Yet if you're not smart enough, post-bailouts, to know the deal about the major political parties…then we likely won't jibe. If, post-bailouts, an Obama supporter doesn't realize, "Holy crap was I fooled. No one is immune to popular movements, and I'm reminded why Ben Franklin gave his purse to a friend during a George Whitefield revival, as anyone can be sucked in to a charismatic. I got suckered," then the person is soulless and mindless.

I'd rather watch Jersey Shore than converse with a partisan.

doesn’t want to treat people whose political views differ from his

Nah. I had this discussion in college. I told a guy, "You're a Socialist. This means that, if you had your way, you could completely ruin my way of life. You would make me a slave to the State. Thus, you are my enemy."

If it were just ideas, think what you want. In politics, you are bringing those ideas into my life. Obama's supporters have materially altered this doctor's way of life – and of practicing medicine.

I personally am no longer friends with people who oppose gay marriage. It's not just your IDEA that gays don't deserve equal rights: It's that they are specifically trying to, through the political process, deny gays equality of citizenship.

People can't hide behind their votes in a non-libertarian society. Whom and what you vote for has real-world impacts on me.

If you come into my home to steal something, you're a thief and I will treat you accordingly. If you use democracy to allow yourself entry into my home, I will still view you as a thief.

This doctor is not the crazy one. The crazies are those who think that supporting a political policy is an impotent act; or those who seek to insulate their acts of thuggishness through the political process.

A mob is a mob is a mob, and the mob has begun looting the doctor's office.

I don’t wonder why some blogs have the high traffic they do. I know, and I despair.

Years ago someone said, "Television is democracy. And that is what terrifies me."

The same could be said of highly-trafficked blogs.

Her post is a joke. A psychopath understands morality all too well. That is why they are so many SUCCESSFUL psychopaths: They know how to play on your morality as a means for them to get theirs.

Thus, her post is a total embarrassment, as it reveals a complete lacking of understanding of psychopathic personality.

I like that expression.

Even with my own inflated self-worth, I say to myself, "If no one else has truly thought of this before, probably that's because it's a bad idea."

Fun to think of one's self as a visionary; most of the time it's delusionary.

Good for Romney. I've had to check a few people for various violations of the social contract. It's the only way to return to order. As it is, everyone passively-aggressively mumbles about line cutters and other deviants.

I was kind of jealous by that comic.

I had this long post in my head that I was going to type about Huxley was right. Then I Googled to see if anyone else had posted similar thoughts. Found a comic. PWNED. (Being PWNED never felt so good!)

Relatedly, a friend told me in response to my question about Orwell that the phrase we had been looking for is "self-defeating prophecy." Orwell was a prophet whose prophecies never became true because he made the prophecies.

RIP Daisy.

Very fun story.

I feel you, man. And kudos for having the integrity. I almost voted for BHO myself. If the market meltdown hadn't occurred, and I hadn't looked into his Wall Street connections: I would have. He really did seem different.

I'm starting to believe the conspiracy theorists who claim that, upon inauguration, the President gets The Talk. "Here is what you will do. Here is what will happen to you and your family and everyone close to you, if you don't."

I block at least 10 spam followers each week. Don't know how many weeks I've been on Twitter, but I'd have many more fake-followers. I even block "real" people who are just collectors or are hoping for a follow-back. E.g., Brian Cuban, who follows 25,000+ people.

That attitude is the problem, Bennett Michaels. People know they can leave spam with impunity. It's an odds game. What are the odds that you'll get caught spamming? Usually low. What are the odds that get called out for spamming when caught? Very low. Thus, spamming is worth the risk. Some of us would like to change that analysis.

I'm reminded of the advice my tax law professor gave. "When clients ask about being audited, I tell that that their odds of being audited are low. If they are audited, there's a 100% chance that they will going to feel the hammer of the IRS. So don't cheat on your taxes."

The odds of being caught spamming might be low. If you're a lawyer spamming my site, though, there is a 100% chance that I will identify you and do everything I can to ensure that the world knows you're a spammer.

Apropos this discussion. Yes, the PC crowd will complain about anything:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1004044225

Cartoon here:
http://dailycartoonist.com/index.php/2009/11/19/mallard-fillmore-protested-at-newsday/

No doubt Newsday had no fear of being sued (at least under a viable theory). They did want to avoid the drama. Same thing with using "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas."

Newsday apologized to avoid more drama.

But unless I am missing an entire area of the law, I don’t think anyone is forcing retailers to say “Happy Holidays.”

It's not lawsuits they fear. It's drama. Even stupid drama is a distraction. Even drama that doesn't directly affect the bottom line like a boycott would, is bad for business. It distracts employees. It distracts customers from purchasing things that they don't need and probably can't afford, in order to show their love to people – since love cannot exist absent concrete expressions like toys and sweater vests. The corporate directive is: Must avoid drama.

PC freaks are nothing if not dramatic. Next time you're at the 3rd Street Promenade, stop in at Houston's. No, Houston's wasn't going to be sued for calling a salad, "Evil Jungle Salad." They were going to deal with a bunch of drama. Thus, they dropped the name.

The Merry Christmas lunatics want to get their way by causing drama. Yes, you are right to mock them. They are ridiculous and probably incredibly miserable people who lack any meaningful relationship with God. Care about Christmas? Go volunteer at an animal shelter; feed the homeless; stop spending money on material possessions and instead write a check to organizations that feed the poor.

LMAO at the nonsense! A bunch of (self-professed) Christians are upset that commercial enterprises won't validate them. Why are they even buying material objects that they don't need when people are hungry, and children are being sold into sex slavery? I'm a pagan, but willing to bet I'll write more checks to charity than the Christians (in name only) who are butt hurt over a corporation's lack of interest in their needs.

Faux controversies like this are a reminder that modern Christians are indeed a joke, and have no comprehension of Christianity. "Dear Jesus, make the corporations be nice to me so I can spend money on material objects. Amen."

That may be true, but the website that the original post is about is exactly about the kind of people who are offended at the absence of “Merry Christmas” and therefore suffer the same agonizing narcissist injury.

Sure. I hate the Merry Christmas people, too. How many more times do I need to say that? Just because I hate them doesn't mean I can't see their perspective. I can also see the perspective of the non-Christians. Everyone wants validation. That is why society is pathetic and we are on the fast track to total decline.

After all, if the phrase “Merry Christmas” were truly just an empty phrase devoid of any true meaning, then no one would get upset when someone didn’t say it to them.

In a culture of narcissism, those are the only injuries that matter.

Think about it. How much time do people spend tending to real human relationships – the relationships that matter, and that involve people who love them? People will spend freaking hours controlling how people with no connection to them think. How long does it take to get dressed to simply go outside? Yet people obsess over wardrobe…Why? To impress perfect strangers, of course. Let's make everyone we're going with (who presumably love us) late….Because we must manage the impression of people who won't care if we live or die. Silliness.

Why even care if a complete stranger wishes me anything – holidays, christmas, whatever? It doesn't matter. A car hits me, I die. The witnesses who just wished me will will only care insofar as they get to say, "I just saw an accident!" They get to tell their friends a story. That I died means nothing. My death is merely an interesting scene in their movie.

Thus, caring pro or con what a stranger wishes you is empty – and, frankly, trivial. Tell me to "Fuck off" or "Happy Holidays." Essentially, it's all the same….Totally meaningless and a non-event in my life.

I have gotten way off track, though, and have abused my Popehat commenting privileges. Nice chatting with you. (Sincerely meant; though obviously somewhat ironical giving my earlier comments!)

Run a Google search for [+"Merry Christmas" +offensive]. Lots of hits. Yes, there is a large contingent of whiners who find saying Merry Christmas to be offensive.

Also, the assertion that retailers have moved to “happy holidays” to prevent “temper tantrums” strikes me as an empirical assertion.

I've actually worked shit retail jobs, and gotten "the memo" about what's offensive or not; and what should be said or not. "Merry Christmas" is indeed part of the memo. Running a Google search for [boss told me not to say merry christmas] will turn up plenty of hits. Different search queries would not doubt turn up many more examples.

The stuff people complain about is amazing. In Santa Monica, Houston's changed the name of the "Evil Jungle Salad" to "Spicy Thai Salad" due to some complaints about offensiveness and other various threats. True story. Businesses want to avoid drama and hassle.

The same kind of people to become offended at "Merry Christmas" are exactly the kind of people with nothing better to do than agonize over the narcissist injury. "How dare you not validate ME and MY religion and culture!" Add a complicit media, and you have drama. It's all very pathetic (shouldn't religious people be more worried about feeding the poor than having their religion validated by some corporation), but such is the state of the U.S.

Also, note that the complainers on the linked web site don’t merely object to “happy holidays” — they are horrified by references to other non-Christian holidays as well.

Probably. They are freaks, too. You are acting as if I am picking sides. I hate both groups, and consider them a pathetic gathering of collectivists too afraid to face reality on their own terms. They have been swallowed by their swallow cultures.

I am not defending them so much as hypothesizing about their motivation. Freaks are more often made rather than born. I've seen lots of sensible and tolerant become become insensible and intolerant as a way of acting out against the PC culture.

That sounds suspiciously like “In order to fight political correctness, it was necessary to adopt it.”

If you meant to insert "methods", then yes, sure. The Church of PC has it figured out. Yell and people and shame people into doing what you demand. Don't believe in affirmative action? Scream, "Racist!" That's much more effective than logic or reason. Thus, some members of the otherwise silent majority are screaming and throwing fits. Witness the Tea Parties.

For some reason I don’t think you see the irony in using the terms ‘disgusting’, ‘hypocritical’, ‘liberal’, etc to make your point about how annoyed you get when describing the types of greetings people use this time of year.

Why should I? Aristotle, who taught moderations in all things, explained in The Rhetoric that, "Moderation in all things," is merely a maxim. One should not, e.g., be moderate in one's toleration of evil. Thus, there is no prima face evidence of ironing in my comment. If liberals are disgusting and hypocritical, why not say it?

I'll say it. Liberals are disgusting and hypocritical. So are conservatives. Probably so am I. Such is life.

Mike, what exactly is it about a culture that wishes people “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas” that you object to?

Me? I don't, and never said it was my view. I merely articulated the view held by millions of Americans – a view which isn't facially insane.

I don't even celebrate my birthday unless friends compel me to. Holidays at one time united people into a common culture, and thus had (maybe still have) value. I don't care about such things, and lack the gene to PERSONALLY care about such share normed and values. The rest of you can get together and then bitch about your families. I'll toss the Jolly Ball around at the dog park with my dog, happy that everyone else is out of my way.

One in five Americans are not Christians, which does not make them all “filthy, hypocritical, politically correct liberals.”

Which means four out of five are. Yet the one out of five must throw temper tantrums for not validating their in-group.

I'm not a Jew. Wish my Happy Hanukkah. I'll take it and not be offended. Yet wishing people Merry Christmas is enough to give many liberals a heart attack. OMG you're totally excluding non-Christians by saying Merry Christmas!

I'm not Christian, either. Wish me Merry Christmas. I'll take it! Besides, it's an empty greeting, like "How's the weather?" I'd prefer people not address me in public, anyway. You don't care if I live or die…So why give me a "warm greeting"? It's fake and meaningless.

Anyhow, saying, "Happy Holidays" is NOT designed to be inclusive or tolerant. It's designed to prevent Christians (whatever that term means these days) from wishing people Merry Christmas. "Happy Holidays" exists because a minority of people will throw a temper tantrum if stores don't comply. It's therefore unsurprising that some out of the four out of five who are being marginalized might throw a fit.

Part of it is a backlash against what's perceived as a Church of PC attack on Christmas. On Facebook last year, some people wrote status updates saying, essentially, "How dare you wish someone a Merry Christmas!?! It's offensive to Jewish people." Thus, the perception is that we are not allowed to say, "Merry Christmas."

I think Americans are more tolerant than people give them credit for. If people were saying, "Merry Christmas," and "Happy Hanukkah," most would be cool with it. But saying, "Happy Holidays" is perceived as a way of saying, "You can't say Merry Christmas."

As for why people care….There are many explanations. One is that the Christmas Wars isn't about Christmas. It's about the Culture War. Leftists and other politically correct interests are trying to mold the culture in the PC Church's interest.

Before living in California, I'd have chalked that to Red State paranoia. Having lived around filthy, hypocritical, politically correct liberals for nearly a decade now…It's not paranoia. There really is a movement to change the culture. The fight against the Church of PC might be the most important fight left. Losing the fight will ensure we fall hard – and fast.

Perhaps the Christmas stuff is a silly battle. Perhaps. Then again, this year I will expect to see some disgusting liberals lecturing us about how offensive wishing someone Merry Christmas is. In which case…Maybe the battle is not so silly, after all.

I lasting changes to the way I live my life and to what I consider important in the world

Good man. There are few problems a few hours each week in the weight room can't solve. Plus, even if you eat too much, you're "big guy fat" or "linebacker" fat rather than a small skeleton with bags of fat swinging around.

Plus, the rules of how society treats you change. I've been skinny, big-guy fat, and just downright 260-pounds fat, and am currently fit/balanced. It's sad, man, but the shit fat people say about facing discrimination is almost all true.

Perhaps more importantly if people wanted to loan me money at rates nearing 0% I’d be backing up the truck asking for it.

Of course. See, e.g., home-equity loans/using house as ATM to purchase depreciating assets and other consumables. See, also, recent market meltdown.

The U.S. is living on payday loans. We keep borrowing money to spend on things that will not lead to a positive ROI. There's a hope we're going to get a super large bonus or something that will put us in the clear.

The same thinking that leads a person into financial ruin has led the U.S. to financial ruin.

We are much to in debt with China and if they decide to call the loan, we are screwed.

They will be equally screwed. China is part of our Ponzi scheme. We don't call it a Ponzi scheme, due to brainwashing and conditioning.

China loans us money so that we can purchase their products with the borrowed funds. Under macroeconomic theory, this makes everyone richer. That is, of course, silly. And yet that's been our so-called word economy for several years.

China has remained the base of the Ponzi. If they back out, we'll be our own base. The difference between a government-run Ponzi and Madoff's Ponzi is that the U.S. government, by being able to print its own money, can always serve as the base of the Ponzi scheme.

How long before that base collapses? That's the exciting question. Living in the days before the base collapses will be among the most interesting years of our lives – terrifyingly, traumatically, and devastatingly interesting.

28 pounds is something to be proud of. Congrats.

I've voted in every election since turning 18. The only reason I vote is to avoid a "scandal" like this should I ever run for elective office.

Voting is trivial. Thinking that one's vote matters is narcissism. It's an empty gesture that I make simply so that I may be able to manipulate the self-important years from now.

First, I see nothing creepy about seeking all evidence that can exculpate your client. That's zealous advocacy. I think it's creepy that the Rules make it more difficult for a lawyer to obtain exculpatory evidence.

Second, I think the answer is less obvious that the commentariat suggest.

What is the matter she retained the lawyer for? To help her testify in the criminal case? Or to possibly pursue a civil lawsuit? If it's the latter, then the contact would not concern the "subject of the representation." Here, you want to impeach her in a criminal prosecution. What happens in the civil case is none of your concern.

Sad news. It would have been sadder if she had lived her last days out in a steel cage rather than a warm bed. You gave her a home and received a friend. My condolences, Patrick.

Er….Anyone else notice the "criminally insane" people wearing quasi-Jason/Halloween masks? Upper-right hand corner of the linked-to article. Not sure which is creeper: WaMu or criminally insane people wearing masks.

Congratulations! (Group blogging is as much an anniversary for the co-bloggers as it is a birthday.)

Ezra: It's not just the game. It's talking about the game before and after. Changing in the locker room. The banter and b.s. It is a potential issue.

If women don't want to play, what can you do? It's like the perversion of Title IX. Wrestlers who want to wrestle for free can't; because women who don't want to play volleyball are bribed to play.

I'm a dude who doesn't follow sports. You think that doesn't cause me to "miss out" on some office politics? Of course it does. If I cared, I'd read the headlines to have silly discussions with people who are emotionally involved with the troubles of multi-millionaire strangers. Not worth it; but I understand how others might feel left out.

Plus, it's a man's world and manly games. You think if women ran things, people wouldn't be shoe shopping instead of playing basketball? Both are equally frivolous activities. Because basketball is "manly," though, of course it's viewed as being superior to shopping. Both, though, are ultimately just distractions from the pointlessness of existence; and of our own mortality.

If he did play with women, _they_ would probably have pictures of him blocking shots captioned “Obama gropes female White House staff.”

Not true. Clinton likely raped a couple of women. He definitely sexually harassed several. No biggie. When you're alpha (Obama, Clinton, Ted Kennedy) and liberal, you can abuse women with impunity.

I'd scream, but I have no mouth.

Stares in awe.

+1 Ken. They probably welcome the criminal charges. It's just more attention – which, ultimately, is all they care about.

Doctors are disinclined to criminalize medications that have had life-giving results to patients, as exemplified by their patients’ markedly increased quality of life.

The placebo effect would cause a similar increase in quality of life. Thus, noting that I know people who medicate is a red herring. FYI, my mom is bipolar and has been on meds her entire life. After dozens of different types of meds, she seems to have found the "right ones." Could be due to placebo. Again, though, an improvement in her quality of life doesn't establish causation.

If you are referring to conclusions based upon Meta Analyses of multiple, similar articles, it is important to know the orientation of the academic (or non-academic) who has summarized 500 hundred articles into a pity paragraph

There was a uproar at a recent APA meeting. The psychiatric community has been in denial, though you know very well about what I speak.

In any event, your entire comment is non-responsive. Your initial comment stated: "legalization of the drug, for any purposes, whatsoever, is not [reasonable]."

Well, why not? Why is it OK to alter my brain chemistry using Prozac but not marijuana?

As is often the case, we need only follow the money. A doctor can write a $cript for Prozac; but not for marijuana. Thus, the medical trade guild opposes marijuana legalization.

We should also criminalize Prozac. I'm definitely tired of people walking around like zombies. Have the moral courage to deal with the cruel reality of life without drugs. Damn druggies.

Incidentally, emerging research suggests that most anti-depressants are no more effective than placebo. In fact, a lot of research suggests that medical treatment is only poorly associated with improved health outcomes. Heresy is often truth.

I don't see many doctors seeking to criminalize Prozac, though. Funny how that works: If I doctor can write a $cript, a drug is suddenly safe, effective, and mandatory.

Happy Birthday!

BTW, this sounds like a "conspiracy theory" to me. It must therefore be untrue. Clearly the FDA has our best interests in mind. Clearly cave-dwelling Muslim savages orchestrated the largest terrorist attack on American soil without any help from the government whatsoever. Clearly, clearly, clearly.

I don't think Patrick was being "Seriously?????" ;)

Speaking of rape apologists:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/28/sex-abuse-religion-vatican

we dumped money into companies instead of let capitalism work its “magic” in policies begun by the Bush administration and we didn’t hear the words Socialism.

Myside bias. You only pay attention when people attack "your" side. It's a favorite cognitive bias; most of us don't even know we have it. Because we are all fair and impartial judges – even when judging people on our side. ;-)

Anyhow, run a Googlse search for: [privatize gain, socialize loss bush paulson]

As a hilarious footnote: It was the Maryland Chamber of Commerce that kept trying to block an anti-SLAPP law; and they are the ones who neutered the one that passed.

I thought, according to the Chamber of Commerce, that were too many frivolous lawsuits!

Well then…Let's dismiss the frivolous ones early one, shall we?

I still get 100 hits a week for Kenny Glenn, cat abuser. And another 100 or so for David Motari, the dog-killing Marine.

Both were bullshit "stories" that I broke by reading a site populated by 4Chan Btards. Both led to record days of traffic and comments.

Don't you love it when you give a thoughtful analysis of an interesting legal issue…And get ZERO comments!?

Andrew T: Witness today; suspect tomorrow. After all, if you were present to "witness," the offense, who's to say you didn't do it?

Chris Dodd is all show. He's going to lose his Senate seat due to his receiving bribes from Countrywide. Dodd also inserted a provision in the bail out legislation that ensured AIG officials – the same ones who blew up AIG – got their bonuses. (Coincidentally – NOT! – AIG gave a bunch of money to Dodd a few months earlier.)

The real action is with Barney Frank. Frank attached his support to Ron Paul's Aud the Fed Bill. The Audit the Fed Bill has 282 co-sponors – more than enough to pass the House. It's stuck in committee. LOL!

Ain't that something? A bill has more co-sponsors than needed to pass the House. Yet the bill hasn't even been voted on.

No conspiracy theory here, folks. ;-)

I support an audit of the Fed. Once people start looking inside, support is going to die. My hunch is that this entire stock-market rally is due to the Fed's purchasing of equities. The only thing propping up this Ponzi is the Fed. Maybe even people like me would oppose an audit if we saw what was going on inside.

Most stock transactions involve black boxes talking to each other. The Fed is propping up this market rally, enriching Goldman Sachs and other banks in the process.

Not much was made out Cybersecurity Czar Melissa Hathaway's White House exist. Just another personnel change? Ha!

Hathway was squeezed out by Friend of Goldman, Larry Summers. No one is going to get a look inside those black boxes. If we did, we'd see the largest fraud in human history.

P.S. I have ridiculed people for years when they brought up the Illuminati. Conspiracy theories have always been a hobby of mine; an interesting distraction from a hum-drum life; but not something I believed in. After looking into how Wall Street operates, it really is hard to see how anything other than a conspiracy theory explains what is happening.

It might not be the Illuminati; but it's something pretty fucking close.

Patrick, the target may be fat, but it is also not that fringe. The idea (which again I argue is both infeasible and impossible) that armed insurrection somehow keeps the government honest is a backbone of the NRA

"Honest" is a relative term. I fear unjust tickets, speed traps, and small towns of all types. I do not worry about a genocide within the U.S. borders.

In a very important sense, an armed populace keeps the government honest.

The insurrectionists seem to suggest that being armed gives one a veto ( ie Ed Brown) for laws you don’t agree with.

So some people at the margins-of-the-margins might suggest this…Therefore…No guns?

You're a smart dude, Ezra. It's time to do some heavy lifting by actually addressing what people are arguing.

One becomes intellectually weak, living in San Francisco. When you're constantly throwing out clap-traps to a receptive audience, no one's brain gets a work out.

We Popehat readers care too much about you to let you get away with such things here. So…Let's see some heavy lifting.

How many more police abuses against the innocent, or prosecutorial abuses against those guilty of administrative violations, before you feel like a subject and not a citizen?

Yep. Great example of liberal cognitive dissonance. Most liberals – and especially San Francisco style liberals like Ezra – see a problem with police abuse. Um…Hello! Police are able to beat people up only because they have the full backing of the government.

So, while recognizing that there are substantial problems with police abuse…Liberals therefore "reason" that there could never, under any circumstances, be a time when the government might decide to go "full tyrant" on American citizens. Because the same government that allows cops to beat up people, the same government that executes and imprisons innocent people…would never go that far.

Oddly enough, Nazi Germany implemented gun-control laws, disarming Jews.

OMG…Godwin's law!!!

Can you name any mass murder of an armed populace in the 20th century? What would Stalin have done if he had faced an armed populace? Mao? Pol Pot?

Of course, tyranny can never happen in America. Because we're special!

In that sense, Ezra, leftists like you are no different from the right-wingers you mock.

Who needs guns? It's like not any of the bad stuff that has happened in dozens of other countries in the 20th century, could ever happen here. Cuz we're Team America: F' Yeah!

Small towns in Iowa (and elsewhere) scare me. I lived in one. They are mini-police states.

There was an interesting case involving illegal seizures involving Southwest. As part of a joke, Southwest had police come out to arrest an employee who had just made it through her probationary period. The employee had a nervous breakdown.

She filed a 1983 suit, and got past summary judgment since motive is irrelevant. Even if the cops meant well (in the Southwest case, it seemed like they did), so what. The standard is for an arrest is an objectively reasonableness belief that probable cause of a crime exists. Still, I felt sort of bad for the cops in the Southwest case.

These Iowa cops are just trying to extort money. I wonder if there's a dormant commerce clause cause of action in there, too, since out-of-staters are being discriminated against.

More on our good friend, the spammer from Lucas Law Center:

"SAN FRANCISCO – Saying 'unprecedented' complaints against some members of the bar leave it no choice, the State Bar on Friday released the names of 16 attorneys it is investigating for misconduct related to loan modification businesses.

One of those lawyers is: "Paul Lucas, Lucas Law Center."

It shouldn't be surprising that someone who spams law blogs would also be under investigation for other misconduct. Still, it's an amusing footnote.

Logical fallacies are rules of rhetoric one uses when attempting to be truthful and sincere. In politics, it's might makes right. Political rhetoric is about force of will rather than a search for truth.

If you punch me in the nose in a fist fight, I don't scream, "Ad hominem!" Politics is no different than a street brawl.

So… TypePad does a pretty good job of catching spam. I haven't gone into my spam folder in months. If I miss a comment, unlike Popehat, I don't care. I don't dig through shit for truffles.

Today, however, I took a peek. I found several spam comments from July; from the "Lucas Law Center." I went to his URL. For a good laugh, here you go:

http://lucaslawcentertoday.com/

Spamming today; in receivership tomorrow. Epic.

Mr. Barovick: Here is what you don't get, since your blog is a piece of shit marketing device.

My blog gets a lot more readers than I ever would have imagined. My full name isn't on my site. I don't blog to get cases. I blog because I care about content. Thus, my posts are pretty good.

Same with Popehat. These guys don't even use their real names. Content is king.

While SHS uses his full name, he does fuck-all to promote his practice.

NOT coincidentally (and I really cannot overemphasize the "NOT"), we all have respectable audiences. When you blog to educate rather than reach your hands into someone's pocket, you get the respect of an audience.

Leeching motherfuckers like [attorney] want to do what we have elected not to do – capitalize on our hard work.

Look, man, if anyone is going to make $$$ off of my blog, it will be me. Yet [attorney], who contributes nothing, seek to suck money out of us. Rather than offer to pay Popehat's bandwith fees (blogging has expenses other than time), he wants a freebie. He's a head lice.

Do you not get how disgustingly parasitic that is?

If [attorney] would just come in to apologize, at least I would move along.

As it is now, I am pissed off and thus likely to make my ow contribution. I am considering a blog post with [attorney]'s name prominently noted. I guarantee that whatever I post, will end up on the first page of Google's search results.

I have real work to do now, though.

If [attorney] would just do the decent thing, apologizing for his scummy, Four Hour Workweek marketing practices, I will forget it.

Otherwise, he will be viewed as the paragon of the only thing I hate about blogging – comment spam. I need a concrete target for an abstract hate. Such is life. It ain't fair.

Why doesn't [attorney] just drop in with a comment, send an e-mail, and apologize?

That's what I'd do. Heck, it's even worked on me.

I posted a truthful – but damaging post – about something stupid a young lawyer did. He wrote me a long e-mail detailing the facts. He made a mistake and was asking me to help him move past it. I confirmed his story. Pulled the post. Stuff like that no doubt happens often.

It's pretty amazing what can get done when you don't lecture people who have been on the 'Net for over a decade, about good e-manners. Especially when said 'Net peeps are posting from their own blogs.

1. This was an awesome post. Thank you.

2. Sullivan's conviction was approved at a pretty high level. The Acting Deputy Chief of the Crim. Dept. is the one who signed the order and argued the motion:
http://federalism.typepad.com/crime_federalism/2009/09/andrew-sullivan-drug-case-dismissal-approved-by-highest-levels-of-doj.html

I'd have felt bad for an AUSA who walked into an ambush. Here, it was a real player involved. Which, incidentally, is worse. If some 27-year-old blog reader did Sully a solid…That's just bad judgement. No biggie. When high-level officials are meddling, then there's a problem.

A couple of passes to 4 Play and some lap-dance money. (Just tell him that the girls don't actually like him.)

I feel the same as Patrick. If you can skate, skate. But DOJ shouldn't grease your axles.

Thanks for the link.

Stories like these are beginning to corrupt my soul. I only half-joke that if I ever have children, I'll raise them to be sociopaths. Playing by the rules isn't a chump's position. Better to be shameless and ruthless if you want to make it big in America.

This sounds fun, Patrick. Email me if you need a co-conspirator.

+1 Patrick. Imagine, too, if the PhD had been nice to the writer. Maybe they'd have developed a relationship leading to Pynchon actually agreeing to receive a copy of the guy's dissertation. Instead, the PhD became a blog's punchline.

I'm usually 1/2 troll, so it's all good. Now enough with this love fest. Two minutes of hate is good for the soul.

Ken: Of course not. If antthing, TV writer man is superior to PhD. After all, he is producing something of his own rather than becoming a "doctor" by footnoting someone else's work.

Chris: different things give people different pleasure. Where did I say otherwise. I like reading and going to strip clubs. If you get you dopamine elsewhere, good for you.

Let me savor my own two minutes of hate….Inhales…

So you're getting a PhD in English, but you're such a loser that you're writing shit about someone else's thought and works? This is what those morons do? If you have a B.A. in English and can't write your own shit, then you suck and need to hang it up. I mean, maybe get an M.A. if you really like reading and want a credential that signals to others your love of reading….But a PhD in English on another person's English? How lame!

I watched less than 20 hours of television over a 5-year span. Had never seen an episode of Seinfeld. When 9/11 hit, I had no idea whom Osama bin Laden was. I did read serious literature, books on science, and philosophy.

Now I follow all the news and am current and shit. I'm also about 10 IQ points less intelligent. It's better to sleep than watch television.

TV is shit. People need to learn how to become bored. Sit in a room with nothing but yourself. You'll figure something out. You might even get rid of the fear of being alone – which is itself responsible for most human problems. You're afraid to be alone, so you attend stupid cocktail parties conversing with morons when you could be spending time thinking about timeless truths and classical literature. Or even having an original thought or two.

Times up. Thanks for the forum to share my hate!

Isn't his passive-aggressive response great? I deeply regret the comments I made in what I believed to be a private conversation.

You're right, dude. I'm a jerk for spying on you. Please accept my apologies.

My last comment, btw, was not a troll. I did some Googling on this Mellissa person, and she strike me as your typical 115 IQ social climber. I could probably articulate her shallow little soul in about 5 minutes. I could guess where she shops (Nordstrom on a good week), what car she drives (BMW 3 series, or maybe an E class Mercedes – she doesn't have *real* money, but wants the status of a "elite" car), and what books she reads (you know she's read The Secret).

She would be the first to volunteer to teach a CLE. Because, lacking the intelligence necessary to doubt one's self (re: Dunning-Kruger), she would of course feel qualified to teach a room full of people as smart or smarter than she is.

People like her make a lot of stupid mistakes because, while above average IQ and thus "smart," they tend to think they are in the 130 range. They jump into a Big Boy and Big Girl's world. Hence, this fiasco!

Sure, I don't respect her. I wouldn't associate with her. I'm just not ready to hang her.

Now analogize to the web.

Except that the web is new. N.P. is probably the smartest lawyer I've ever met. He was clueless about blogs. So if N.P. didn't really "get it" at first, then I have a lot of sympathy for lesser minds.

I think the most likely take is Ken's. Yes, this lawyer showed bad judgment. I just don't think it was willful or intentional. Not even willful blindness. Surely, she was negligent. Perhaps even reckless.

My guess: She looked at her site, thought, "Ooooh, shiny," and then went back to nit-wit functions to talk about synergies and expanding one's network.

So a bunch of lawyers, lawyer bloggers, and readers of lawyer blogs are just certain any any average lawyer would, of course, understand blogging; and check her site religiously.

Self-selection bias, anyone? ;-)

Excuse my while I decide whether to check Google Analytics, Woopra, or SiteMeter. (Ha! All of them). As well as do Technorati search, Twitter search, Google Search, and Google Blog Search using my full name, last name, nickname, and blog's name. Then a Google "link:" search. I shall then copy and paste my posts into Google, to see if anyone has stolen my most delicious content.

Which is clearly what any reasonable and mentally-healthy person should be doing after a full day's work.

I am sure glad we have someone setting up programs like WIC and foodstamps

Among small-l libertarians (i.e., not the Libertarian Party people), no one is going to talk shit about food stamps, man. No; there is no principled libertarian way to support food stamps. We are cool with that. No hobgoblins allowed.

Most small-l libertarians are going to say that a low-but-strong safety net is fine. Now, should I be paying for poor people to have cable television? That's when there are problems.

Incidentally, Patrick recommended Ad Nauseum to me. One can be a capitalist and still anti-consumerism, and opposed to corporate manipulation. Incidentally, Ad Nauseum had a discussion of Coca-Cola in there. Yeah, Coke has done some evil things. Nothing like what the government could have done, though. Holodomor, anyone?

Incidentally, how many of today's liberals were at one time Stalin apologists? Lots and lots and lots. I don't know many libertarians who are apologists for the De Beers diamond company. Blood stones are evil. De Beers is evil.

Now, the difference between De Beers and Stalin was that we can boycott De Beers. How do we boycott our own government? What if the people who try organized a government boycott receive a visit from KGB.

Thus, for many of us, libertarianism is seen as a lesser-evil. No, capitalism and free markets do not always lead us to the best results. But the world has experimented with Big Government. We saw how that worked out. It was worse. No thanks.

By the way, this year my charitable giving is WAY down. I made a tax error two years ago, and am being slammed by the IRS.

Thus, I will have several thousand less to give to charity this year. It will be hard to keep up with my past giving.

Meanwhile, Goldman Sachs will have several billion more. Tax dollars at work.

So why should we increase taxes and have the government do more? So that big industries with government juice will further enrich themselves?

No, thanks man.

I love my country. I love multinational corporations. I do not love the intersection of the two – which is our corporatocracy.

I'm a libertarian. I read Mother Jones, dude. I also regularly donate to charity. Every month I either write a check or give blood.

I regularly wager with liberals who lecture me on morality. It's always a simple wager: "Let's send out donation receipts to a neutral third party. Whoever has given less of their income – as a percentage of income – will donate $1,000 to the other's charity."

I also ask people how often they give blood. Not very often; and certainly not once every 2-4 months.

Funny….I've made my charity wager to at least a dozen liberals. Never had a taker.

Liberalism is a way for corrupted souls people to feel good about themselves. Liberals are no different from Sunday-morning Christians. Be a rotten person; but spend an hour at church or claim to be liberal…And redemption is yours!

Now you should start getting some traffic for people searching for "Porn Blog." Well done, sir.

I'll make my guess before checking. I think there is an affirmative right to a Republican form of government. Which I think is kind of cheating, since it presupposes a government. Now…Let's see if I'm right.

A non-consensual touching of genitalia is, as you note, sexual assault. Therefore, I would sue all involved not only under 1983, but common law. I'd plead it as sexual assault. I then would issue a very Googleable press release saying, "[Insert names of doctor, hospital, and police officers] sued for sexual assault."

It always cracks me up with judges complain about being forced to exercise their judgement!

Good man, Ken.

This is good public service. I've posted what I thought were obvious frauds on my blog. People have commented and thanked me for forewarning them.

The downside or being a country lawyer.

Get well soon.

Stay well.

Philosophically, the neutrality issue is always an interesting one. Is the law neutral? In a sense, sure. Yet if the majority of us were some sect of hat-wearing Muslims, the law would most certainly allow us to wear hats in court. Thus, the law really isn't neutral. It's mean to favor (or at least not disfavor) the pro-Christian majority, even though, superficially, that doesn't seem to be the case.

Eh, in this job market, ruling by fear should be easy. "Man, I REALLY REALLY REALLY hope we land this client. Otherwise, I won't know what to do…"

*Browser windows simultaneously close. Hailstone sound of typing heard throughout office.*

Ken, I re-read your comment. I am contra reading comprehension.

Looks disgusting; and I'm someone who as a point of pride has eaten through most of the "Worst Foods" list.

This would be accurate, except for the fact that the post says the exact opposite.

Not at all.

Of course ID theft is a risk. It has always been a risk. Except that people are only NOW screaming, "Look at the risk!" because the unwashed masses might soon be able to access PACER filings. The presupposition of that position is that only certain types of people should be able to access PACER.

It's like when people started getting all uppity over gay adoption. Those same people, never in their lives, had an opinion on adoption. Suddenly, when gays want to adopt, those until-now-uninvolved people had all sorts of opinions on adoption. It made one wonder: "What is really motivating your arguments? Is it adoption qua adoption; or gays qua gays?"

You must look beneath the surface of an argument. Not are premises are stated. Many unstated premises are not even known to the one making the arguments. Indeed, that is why there are shelves on research on cognitive bias.

Also, too, I didn't see Eric T. suggesting that PACER access be limited on a need-to-know basis. I.e., if the case ain't yours, you shouldn't be able to access case documents. Really, why are you on PACER looking things up if it's not your case?

Thus, one can only infer that the current arrangement of PACER is OK. Or at least OK enough that we don't need posts about ID theft and other horribles.

Incidentally, I am contra Ken and Patrick on PACER. I think PACER is great, and cheap. If the government is able to turn a profit by providing a valuable and time-saving service (I use PACER to find complaints when researching an unfamiliar area of law)…. Man, that's almost libertarianism.

PACER is, to me, something majestic. It's not perfect, but it's damned good.

But what about tax dollars funding PACER? Well, how tax money actually goes into PACER? I doubt much. So it seems that the taxpayer protest is really a protest over not being able to obtain a disproportionately large benefit. It's like people who end up paying 5% in incomes taxes and who send their kids to public school attending Tea Parties. Um, you already get much more than you give. My ears are deaf.

Now, in a perfect world, we'd have PACER stop receiving taxpayer funding. Make it self-funding. It clearly could be. Of course I'm sure there'd be some protests over that, too (though perhaps not necessarily from Ken and Patrick). How dare the PRIVATE SECTOR get control over PUBLIC documents!?!

Sometimes you just can't win. All of this is enough to make a guy a cynic.

The NY PI law blog post is just a great example of an elitist not realizing he's an elitist. His post presupposes that all the lawyers and others who have access to PACER are Just Good and Right People. How does he know this?

He doesn't. It's just ASSUMED. Bias is a mother fucker like that.

Also, if my family were rich, I'd be able to search people on PACER/Lexis-Nexis/AmeriSearch. Actually, I'd be able to run an NCIC database query; but that's another story.

Why don't people who want to limit RECAP also want to limit PACER? Make it a blanket rule that you can't access PACER unless it's for official business. I'm not sure the statute, but I know I can't run your credit just because I want to see it.

Yet they don't want to do limit PACER. Like me, they are hobbyists, too; and also like to snoop. But, again, we are Just Good and Right people, and therefore may be trusted.

Fuck everyone else.

I've recently followed http://twitter.com/LittleSkillet

In L.A., I followed http://twitter.com/kogiBBQ

I also donated to http://saveourtacotrucks.org/

Unfortunately, big-government liberals make is hard on taco trucks. Which is why I love listening to San Francisco hipsters, hippies, and emos bemoan the oppression of independent food vendors. Um, fellas, that's the only enviable outcome of the Big Govt you've created.

My wife is very possessive. She was disinterested in Facebook until I joined. Thereafter she immediately joined, and made sure to send me a status request noting that she was married to me.

(She religiously reads my blog and monitors my Twitter, too. And God help me if I blog about anything she doesn't approve of – which is often.)

She's not exactly pleased that I even have male friends; female friends are even worse. She tell me to "be careful" because I have taken up a friendship with an older gay male who owns the same breed of dog as I do. (We meet at the dog park where our dogs to play.) Because, OBVIOUSLY, being seduced or roofied are real risks, ya know?

If it were up to her, she'd possess all of my time and all of my soul. Sad thing is, she's not malicious. Poor thing is just too much in love with me. The oppression feels the same to me.

Thanks for the talk on the couch. ;-)

There must be something in the air. Get Well Soon.

That Floyd Abrams letter was cliche. Your point was much better. So sick of hearing, "more ideas, not less," "unpopular ideas," "marketplace of ideas," etc. I'm reminded of George Orwell's discussion of dead metaphors in, "Politics and the English Language."

Again, your point is much better – and not often enough repeated. If we want to keep corporations out of politics, then the New York Times should stop opining on political issues.

Once the public starts to understand that the Times is just another corporation with an agenda, we'll all be more free.

Making kids obese pisses me off, too. If I fed a kid a slow release poison, I'd be in jail. If I fed my kid crap, ensuring that the kid would develop Type II diabetes (which used to be called Adult Onset Diabetes until parents started killing their children with food)…. Well, that's just my prerogative as a parent and the Nanny State had better keep its hands off of my dinner table!

I don't know…. I hate the Fat Police more than most…. But what if she smoked?

She's making a lifestyle choice that is medically unhealthy.

A fat person advertises these choices. So it'd be like if she walked around with a cigarette in her ear.

Plus, Surgeon General is a scam position, anyway. How long did we go without one? No one seemed to notice.

If we're going to have a face of public health, shouldn't it be a healthy face?

BTW, I always thought Ezra was a chick. Anyway, glad to hear Ezra is a man, baby. It's proof that I am a true feminist. I snark equally at men and women.

*Pats self on back for being a true believer in equality*

Most people reading that article online will relate (selection bias if ever there was selection bias; lol). Having related to the article, the reader will then infer that the article is true. We are all solipsists. We only read things to confirm what we believe to be true; or to validate us.

Anyhow, it's great to hear that what I do is normal. I am afraid of being abnormal. Thanks for linking to the obviously true story.

I would much rather insurance companies did not make a profit. Perhaps they should become non-profits, like ACORN. Because there is no profit in ACORN?

Or, even better: Insurance CEOs should accept a cool million from Goldman Sachs. Like Barack Obama did. Or accept millions in "consulting" and "speaking fees," like the public-minded Larry Summers.

Thank God we have so many people supporting "healthcare reform" who aren't concerned with profit.

LMFAO at having a deformed brain that cannot recognize the that corruption in government is all encompassing. Only issue is whether people backing a Democrat or Republican will get paid on any given Sunday.

Until the corruption at least reaches tolerable levels, I don't want government doing anything involving billions (yet alone trillions) of dollars.

Re: Ken's initial post. Heading at WSJ.com now reads: "House leaders said they will drop $550 million in funding to buy eight Air Force passenger planes for top officials' use."

I doubt that, had people not been such "choads," no such headline would not have existed. People are pissed and taking to the streets. Finally.

Congress is scared. Their hope is that the people will calm down. I hope not. It's time to hit the reset button. Get everyone of these mother fuckers out.

Long live the choads!

I welcome the populist outrage.

The same government responsible for the bail outs want to "fix" health care. No, thank you.

So even if the plebeians know not what they do; I care not, so long as they continue their mob action.

So many people (including me) thought of Goodfellas re: Blankfein's comments. Not saying you're not original! Rather, it's fascinating that so many of us thought the same thing: These people aren't going to spend because they are thieving mother fuckers who need to lay low lest they draw more attention.

That we are literally not in the streets is something I do not understand. Diffusion of responsibility problem? Hopelessness?

Lawyers like Spence promote that mythology, because it’s good for their ego and their bottom line.

Nah. Gerry Spence himself has said – repeatedly – that he spends at least 10 hours of prep time for every hour he's in trial. It's his followers who say otherwise. Suddenly someone is not so mythic when it's revealed he has to work hard.

At every Spence seminar (I've been to seven full working days' worth), he's said the same thing: 8-10 hours of prep time per hour in court. People refuse to hear that, though.

He will, of course, make himself appear to be bumbling. In his "At Trial" video series, he comments on how he "lost" his pair of glasses. He's just a helpless old man.

The Imelda Marcos case was a great example. He gave a "rambling" opening statement, and got PWNED repeatedly by the prosecution. He was just a helpless old man who couldn't ask a question without drawing an objection. He's such a failure to his poor client. He also won.

When Spence dies, I hope his biographer gets the facts right. The guy works insane hours. And he's never tried covering that up.

Happy Birthday!

I was kidding!

Most hateful book review ever? My god, man, it's like you passively-aggressively trying to sabotage the fucking thing!

I'm about halfway through the book. Unlike Patrick, I actually like it. Or, at least, when I blog about it, you'll be able to TELL that I like it.

LMAO @ thinking [sic] the meeting is about reducing tensions and controversy between whites and blacks. It's called Obama is covering his ass. Every political consultant has agreed that Obama made a huge mistake by even commenting.

He is trying to get the American public to move on…. to health care, cap-and-trade (which will make Goldman Sachs – who has given Obama millions – billions of dollars), etc.

Because I am not a hack, I will note that Obama did finally speak out against Mike Nifong:
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/LegalCenter/story?id=2980582&page=1

So it's not like the guy finds it impossible to see beyond black-and-white. Then again, Obama didn't speak out against Nifong until the public had already decided that Nifong was out of control. So there were cynical motivations, most likely.

That said, this meeting has nothing to do with Obama trying to be a mediator. Obama is a racist. Still, the American public hadn't realized it until the Gates controversy. Obama needs to get everyone else focusing on other things. Or, at the least, to stop focusing on Obama's racism.

Oh, and yes, it is racist to think that when a white cop arrests a black man, that the white cop was being racist. As the facts actually show, the arrest had little to do with race. Obama assumed that to be the case, since, after all, the arrest was made by a white cop.

The media, incidentally, didn't pay much attention to the fact that a BLACK cop was present during the arrest. Which is just more evidence that cops who aren't racists are still mother fuckers.

This incident has revealed what should have been obvious to all those who are not blind:
1) Barack Obama is a racist.
2) The American people support a police state.
3) There is a lot of white racism directed towards blacks.

The media mostly covered up 1. Flyover red necks don't really comprehend Obama's hybrid of liberal-elitist anti-white/pseudo-Muslim black power racism. Most in the media can't see it, since, well, they suffer from the liberal-elitist-anti-white racism. So, if you asked them, they'd say: "What's to cover? He's just like us!"

I heard way too many people say, re: 2: If a cop tells you do do something, then you'd better do it. Those people vote and serve on juries. Lovely.

Re: 3. The GOP has become so "elite" now that it's unable to see the untapped white anger. Thus, people in the GOP talk of amnesty for illegal immigrants. Few accused Obama of his racism. The guy wrote a book about "A Story of Race and Inheritance," and people let him pretend he had transcended race. LOL.

Ricci put a nice face on liberal racism. Yes, white America: People like Obama hate you so much that they will deny you jobs – no matter how much harder you work than everyone else – because you are white. That is racism.

This has all been very fun to watch.

It's been amusing watching the message boards I read go dark. People will defend Obama. But there aren't endless posts about hope and change.

Hopefully Obama will teach the swine a lesson: "We politicians consider you means to our end. We care about nothing other than increasing our power, wealth, and status. The End."

Well, you did lob the soft ball.

That's what I hate about psychology. So much if it is dressed-up morality. "We don't LIKE that you LIKE video games." So fucking what? People like what they like.

If I want to sit around eating Oreos, playing video games, why is that unhealthy? Because it does not comport with some psychologist's value judgments about the world?

Psychology is religion for atheists.

Let's not omit the Christians:

"CHRISTIANITY

"Believing that an omnipotent, omniscient cosmic jewish zombie can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and drink his blood, all the while you telepathically communicate with him to tell him you accept him as savior and master in order so that he can remove the evil force from your soul caused by an ancient woman made of spare ribs who talked to a talking snake and ate a magic apple.

You might know where I live, but not where I'm from. I have a picture of me, as a teen, chilling with four AK-47s. My first concert was the Charlie Daniels band; my second was Hank Williams, Jr. My brother is in prison for a meth-related offense. If that ain't country… well…. you know the rest!

LOL @ at Mac-using technogeek qualifying as a "country lawyer." Then again, if centimillionaire lawyer Gerry Spence can get away with it, why can't you?

hair on the cake

If that means pubic hair on the urinal cakes, then bravo, sir. Bravo!

That'd be a beautiful place to die.

lulz

"It feels weird to be on the State’s rights side of the argument for once"

LOL. This is a concession that you are just as much of a hack/hypocrite as your ideological opponents.

How would the lawyers feel if there were a law passed saying you had to represent clients like, say, client molesters? You had no choice. You would represent child molesters or lose your law license.

What if the government said all of us had to work for, say, Green Peace or the NRA or the NWO…. or rap with NWA?

In our employment decisions, we have a lot of freedom. Not every employment choice is a matter of conscience, but many are. I would not, e.g., work for the Democratic Party in any capacity.

If we don't like the conditions of employment, we quit. Professionals are given a lot of discretion in choosing what services they'll provide. Even a criminal lawyer, e.g., is not required to represent pedophiles. (Excluding the rare case where a judge mandates pro bono.)

The pharmacist, like the rest of us, has a job to show up to. You are basically saying, "Violate your conscience or quit your job." No, not just a job – an entire profession. How many here, after spending tens-of-thousands and years training for a profession, would like to have that "choice" presented to you?

Now, if employers impose those restrictions on employees, I have no beef. Show up for your job. If you don't like it, find another job.

If the government is saying, "Violate your conscience or give up profession," then there's a problem.

I think you are rather missing one of David’s points, which is that you are cheerfully treating all Muslim women as fungible in service of the idea that the state should restrict the actual, legal freedom of all in order to protect what I will call the “empirical freedom” of some.

You could say that of every law. Any generally applicable law restricts the freedom of some. There is no such thing as Perfect Freedom.

Even in anarchy, there'd be restriction of freedom. It might be de facto, but it'd be there. Heck, we have seen Anarchy, State, (Non) Utopia in many African countries. No government. Just "private" collectives (of tribes).

Would, on net, a society be more free if the freedom of some were restricted? Often, yes, that is indeed the case.

Now you might say that some actions are legitimate. Yet I've never found the distinction between physical and mental compulsion to be persuasion. I think that libertarians tend toward bookishness, and thus too easily are willing to create the No Physical Harm principle.

I might add you are also glossing over the difference between Muslim women in Muslim countries with Muslim women in Western countries, and effectively treating their experiences as fungible. Some honor killings aside, they are not.

And you are treating them similarly. So I guess we should both be stoned to death.

But I am not treating them are entirely the same.

Still, how many of these Western Muslim women are converts? They just decided, upon age of maturity, to subjugate themselves to men? That doesn't fly with me; and I doubt it does with you, too.

Rather, children were subjugated at birth, and indoctrinated into a state of submissiveness. Thus, they are not Muslim by any definition of "choice."

Oh, and I speak from some experience. Until a few years ago I believed in God. This was not by "choice." Rather, from a very early age I was told nightmare-inducing stories of Hell. I was literally brainwashed by my parents. I didn't reach Christianity in adult hood. So to say that, as a 27-year-old (when I finally rid myself of the nonsense), I "chose" to be a Christian would require you to ignore, well, pretty much my entire life. And, most importantly, my formative years.

Give me a kid and I can make that kid believe whatever I want him or her to. I could turn a kid into a scholar or a whore. To then look at the adult and say, "You choose to be a whore!," again, simply ignores what actually occurred.

Now, as a Western white male, I could finally choose to believe (or not) in God. I wasn't worried about getting beaten up. Unlike a woman, I wasn't inculturated into a world of total submissivness or closed-looped thinking.

Thus, yes, it is indeed contra reality for us as Western white males to speak of the free "choice" all of these Muslim women have made.

For example, “court” is a concrete institution, but “worldview” is pseudo-analytical blather. Swapping the one for the other when you’re called out for wielding meaningless generalities doesn’t rebut; it concedes.

Not at all. I could have formulated the issue in any number of ways. Would you rather discuss a philosophical issue with someone who has a Western worldview, or a Muslim worldview. That would indeed be a meaningful distinction. As would be a "Christian worldview" from a "Western worldview."

There is a rich literature in this. Poke around Google Scholar or Google Books or something. It's almost like you're arguing that there is no such thing as Western culture, which is highly amusing.

Now, that's not to say that a person with a Western worldview would not be a Christian or Muslim. I am simply noting that these are indeed distinctions that we would recognize in any other context not involving playing debating games.

A Western person would, e.g., be more open to reason than an Evangelical Christian or Muslim.

Somewhat relatedly to my earlier point. Were these contracts the product of "free choice." I highly doubt it:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-bofa30-2009jun30,0,6339542.story?page=1

Sure, I could say, "They signed the contract. Ergo, freedom!" Yet that would require one to ignore the actual reality of the contract.

The concept of “worldview” is likewise vague to the point of uselessness in all but the most carefully circumscribed discursive contexts.

Comments like these are cute. People feel especially clever when making them, and reading leather bound books. I read some essays by Charlte Forte. He claimed that there is no such thing as categories. That there is no difference between water and land. As a general principle, yes, we shouldn't overly categorize things. Categories are indeed hard to define. Still .. step off of the island into the water…. see if you don't notice a difference.

If I said: You are facing charges for a criminal offense. You have the following choice:
A) Trial in a "Western" court system;
B) Trial in a Muslim court.

We all know damned well which you and everyone else would chose.

So, yeah, I can play clever games with categorization. It's not especially hard.

Though, as I'd say to Forte, "Just jump into the middle of the ocean and tell me there's no difference between water and land," I'd tell you to go assert your rights in a Muslim court. See if you don't notice a difference between the Western way and the Muslim way.

Now is when I'll wait for a "clever" response like, "Well, maybe if I were on trial for rape I'd want to be tried in a Muslim court!" Har, har. Consider me so totally PWNED.

We all know damned well that there is a meaningful distinction between the Western world and Muslim world. We can all play games and pretend there is no difference. Which is fine with me. I've been known to troll, too. Difference is…. I know the difference between when I'm trolling and when I'm spewing pseudo-intellectual bullshit! ;)

This reminds me of the argument for seat-belt laws, but lacks even the cause-and-effect-of-higher-taxes-for-everyone argument. It’s purely a “you-know-not-what-you-do” argument.

LOL. No. More like: "These women live in a culture where, if they wear their seat belts, they will be beaten. Perhaps their children will be taken from them. Perhaps they will be removed to Saudi Arabia. Therefore, to spare them the drama inherent to their repugnant culture, we will demand that all persons wear seat belts."

Somewhat relatedly: Much to the chagrin of libertarians (and thus they never discuss it) smoking bangs have been very successful. Even the bar owners who "had their rights trampled" tend to see the smoking bans as a net positive.

Often what appears to be paradoxical is not. Reality is really weird sometimes.

popular justification for increased economic regulation is that poor people don’t actually have the freedom to choose among contracts

This is indeed empirically true. Poor people are also generally stupid and unsophisticated. I supported the credit card reform legislation – at least insofar as the late fee funny business and other shady practices were concerned. I also don't have too much sympathy when contracts of adhesion are invalided. "Freedom of contract" is thrown around as if it means something. Usually, it doesn't. There is very little freedom of contract.

How do you distinguish the empirical arguments that drugs and cigarettes and alcohol addict people

True. You can choose to become addicted, though. I have never used cocaine, because I know I would become addicted. If I want to make the choice to become an addict, then my choice is free – at least at the inception.

Moreover, if there were a way to screen addicts, then it might not be a bad thing for government to prevent addicts from consuming alcohol.

Or am I making an incorrect assumption that you would try to distinguish any of those arguments?

This statement ties into this one: you ought not be able to accept job terms of which Nancy Pelosi disapproves

I am still a libertarian because I do not trust the government to make decisions based on empirical facts or logic.

So, what will end up happening is that you and I will have a lot of disagreements at the margins.

I am not a libertarian because it's empirically sound; or because "freedom" is property understood by libertarians. I'm a libertarian because the only likely alternative is a large government. It is also a fact that no one can suppress freedom like a large government.

Still, in a perfect world, there's a liberal-conservative-libertarian hybrid. Polices disallowing women from being allowed to "choose" to wear Scarlet letters would co-exist with a free market for labor.

In the real world, though, that's impossible.

David: Who said there was a Western-Eastern dichotomy? I said Western-Muslim. And, yes, I would argue that the dichotomy makes sense. If you don't think the Muslim world has a different world view and approach to life than the Western world, then I'm not sure we can even have a conversation. Our premises would be too far apart.

Incidentally, Muslim women are also "free" to leave the oppressive French state. If they want to wear their garb, leave France. In light of Ken's post, what's wrong with my conception of freedom? Freedom means: If you don't live it, leave!

So, by Ken's logic, we could also say that the Muslim women are simply making a free choice to not wear their garb.

Now, I know that is not Ken's point. Yet I am only being half-cute. I also suspect that Ken would say that compulsion of the state is different from compulsion of private actors. I would say, "In the Western world, yes!"

Yet that is the dividing line of our disagreement. We are talking about this issue as products of Western culture.

In the Muslim world, though, private actors compel much in the same ways government compels – namely, through the barrel of a gun.

If I'm a white dude living in the Western world who doesn't want to work with you, it's all good. What are you going to do…. Blog mean things about me? If I'm a Muslim woman who doesn't want to wear the garb, well, a nasty blog post would be the least of my worries.

And, of course, in the Muslim world women are inculcated in a society of learned helplenssness.

I disagree with guys like Ken and Patrick on discreet issues because they are non-empirical libertarians. Many of us libertarians just come up with theories based on a Western understanding of the world. We don't consider empirical facts. We say, "freedom," and "choice," and "free will," as if those concepts are clear and have universal meaning.

We toss around words like "free choice," that, to us, make total sense. Yet, as people commonly like to quip, "I don't think 'free choice' means what you think it means."

Eh, I totally disagree… though my comment would be as long as your post.

Short answer: In general, your post suffers from a Western-centric bias. The way you and I, as white Western men, give up our freedom is much different from the way Muslim women "give up" their freedom. Thus, your entire post is informed by this Western conception of freedom. I think I should do a post on that bias, anyway.

Lol at chevon's comment. Serious or not (hard to tell), it had me laughing out loud in the airport. Thanks!

Never heard of him. I'll YouTube him later.

What a genius!

I am going to visit my best friend this weekend. What will we do? Eat Papa John's while watching TBN. We are big fans of Creflo Dollar!

There is no better show on television than a good TBN Praise-a-Thon. I'm not even half-joking. It's true.

Each of the shysters has a different pitch. There's this Arab used-car-salesman looking guy. Benny Hinn. Paul and Paula – and their son, who his most assuredly gay. Creflo and the black ministry technique.

It really is fantastic entertainment.

How many of you old guys who want to game young women spent your 20’s and 30’s building your body, cultivating your mind, and starting businesses?

If you’re a man in his 40’s with cash and who is in shape, and with a little style, you wouldn’t be asking about meeting younger women. They’d be coming to you.

Bruce Willis was ~38 in Pulp Fiction. He’s not a great looking guy, but he clearly has the swagger and self-confidence a man of accomplishment has. Even without celebrity, he’d have been pulling younger women on the regular.

Men who haven’t taken care of themselves while insisting on game advice are no different from the garden variety entitled American princesses.

Want to game young women? Step one: Take care of yourself.

“Naomi Wolf herself is an attractive woman”

You have completely discredited yourself, as you are obviously not a desired man. Your opinion is thus as irrelevant as the old hag’s.

Women want, perhaps more than anything, to be entertained. Women are developmentally no different than a toddler. I have been with doctors, lawyers, teachers, white trash sluts, hicks, red necks, college girls, and nearly every other type of girl. Even “smart” ones have an inability to sit still still, shut the fuck up, and read a book.

A guy with a cool life story is entertaining. He can tell her stories. He can inspire her to dream of unseen lands and untold riches and fame.

A man tells a woman stories just as he would entertain a toddler.

There’s also the “fake it to you make it aspect.”

Much of game is mimicing how successful people act, in hopes that women will falsely infer you are a successful person.

Well, now you’re successful – at least as you, I, and many others define it.

Therefore, you are no longer acting successful. You simply are. It’s Zen.

Like Real Assanova, you are at the highest level of game.

Roosh, yes, based on the the number given alone.

It’s based on how *old* you look, in my experience.

Dark men like you don’t get age cracks and wrinkles, so you’re going to look 30ish longer than most. White guys like me who wear SPF, use serums, and stay in shape are going to stay in the sweet spot.

Women regularly approach me, and have for the past couple of years. I *look* 26-31 (age range women given me). Women have also begun negging me.

So the chart is relevant insofar as you read into it as, “How old does the man look/how old does the chick think the man is?”

Although the beta males at OK Cupid draw a false conclusion, their data shows what’s happening in your life. In short: You’re getting older.

For a man, 28-36 is the sweet spot for getting women. Check out this chart:

http://cdn.okcimg.com/blog/older_lover/Desirability.png

OK Beta’s analysis here:
http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-case-for-an-older-woman/

This was an impressive troll job, Roosh.

Great post, though as with most wisdom, it will be rejected.

American men are fucking pathetic, and it’s no wonder women don’t want to fuck them. You faygots won’t even approach women, because you’re too fucking timid. Instead, you wait until you have a “safe space” to meet a girl. I’m surprised you don’t just sit at home waiting for your Jewish mommies to set you up with a “nice girl.”

Thankfully you fucks are my “competition.” I’m 34, and getting more girls than ever. No one ever told me that I was not waging a war against my own impending middle age, but instead was waging a war of attrition. I just need to survive while you all die out.

To all you cunt faggots who remain too chickenshit to approach a woman: Thank you.

Living in S.F., I regularly get hit on by gay guys. I’m always polite. Most will ask right away, “Straight or gay?”

Anyhow, to me it’s a compliment to be hit on. It’ll be a much sadder day when I’m too unattractive for gay men.

A lot of haters.

The reason most of you hater fucks live pathetic lives is because you’re afraid of failure. Don’t go to Iceland! You might fail!

One must wonder, though: What has living your risk-averse life ever won you?

“However if you got tight game and know how to dress you can overcome this”

This is true, but here’s how I look at fashion: Your body is the canvass.

The Mona Lisa on a paper bag wouldn’t have been a masterpiece.

Too many guys buy into the game stuff, looking for short cuts. They neglect the canvass.

Solo: You and your boys are into thicker girls than me and mine.

No hidden insults there. We’re just into different scenes.

All good.

By the way: How many of you guys complaining about “fat” Western women are going to hit the gym today? How many of you have a 10″ or great drop in between waist and jacket size?

I wear a 44″ jacket, and a 32″ waist. While not big by bodybuilding standards, it creates a very female-friendly aesthetic.

Based on what I see on my “game” blogs, not many of you are in shape. Why then complain about fat, ugly Western women?

Other than VK Empire, most “gamers” are flabby – or skinny and shapeless.

Put on some muscle mass, and you’ll appreciate the truth of what I wrote in comment 18.

Solo: I just read your blog. Let’s say that the difference scenes we run in are why we have different experiences.

I am 33, and I’ve noticed a masculinity shortage in the 25-and-under age group. They have been brain washed into believing that men and women are the same; that gender has been socially constructed; and that being a man is bad. When not brainwashed, they are drugged with Adderall. Also, environmental estrogens (plastics) are everywhere: Thus, testosterone levels are lower.

For a man who is “traditionally male,” these *are* the salad days. These should be the best days of our lives. We have basically no competition from younger guys.

A good friend of mine who is 40, and in great shape, is still in the game.

If you have a nice body (which you can maintain into your 50s), wear sunscreen (especially if you’re white), get Botox, color your hair, and do some of the other bullshit beauty rituals of a woman….You will be killing it into your 40s.

The future is bright.

Women are boring. If you didn’t want to fuck a woman, how many (other than relatives) would you talk to?

“You may remember the old Persian saying, ‘There is danger for him who taketh the tiger cub, and danger also for whoso snatches a delusion from a woman.” – Sherlock Holmes.

“Did you really just do that? I’m being friendly and respectful to your friend and you rudely interrupt. Did your parents teach you to be anti-social like that?”

Nah. That’s too nice to the woman. It gives HER a chance to lecture me.

Fuck that.

If a bitch is cock blocking me, she’s going to feel the pain. I am going to mind-fuck her.

Try ruining my night? Fine, bitch: I’ll ruin yours. I have sent cock-blocking women away crying.

I do not feel entitled to a woman’s attention. If a chick isn’t it me, that’s her right as a free citizen. A chick can roll her eyes when I approach, and I am not going to want to hurt her. Again, it’s her right to reject me.

Cock blockers, though, are straight-up haters. They are trying to pull apart two people who, in this lonely and fucked up world, are actually make a connection.

Cock blocking is anti-social behavior that must be stopped. Cock blocking continues because there’s not cost to it. Cock blocking me ain’t free, though. You will cry if you cock block me.

“You pull either of these and you’ll look like a crazy man.”

Typical Western male/pussy thinking.

If some cock blocking whore things I look crazy, so what?

The more important word a man can learn is, “Next!”

You live in a world of scarcity, and that’s why you’re a pussy. I live in a world of abundance. If one (or even one hundred) women look down on me, so what? There are so many women in this world, even if 90% hate me…So what? That’s a lot of pussy left to slay.

Every man’s theme song should be Gangster of Love by Geto Boys:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6If4uSFbgM

Here’s what I use. I’m very serious in my tone, and almost empathetically wince when delivering it:

Wow, your life must really suck.
What do you mean/WTF do you mean?
You’re life is so miserable and unhappy that you can’t bear seeing anyone else have fun. That must suck.
[Banshee screed.]
No, really, I am so sorry.

Then I walk away.

If you practice the right facial expressions, it fucking kills them. Emotionally, it’s making a woman feel like the male equivalent to a loser.

You’ve reached the hedonist’s paradox. The Wiki entry for “Paradox of hedonism” is a pretty good introduction.

When are you going to open your travel consulting business?

You could charge at least $50 an hour to consult with guys on trips, or permanent relocation. I would absolutely pay you more than $50 an hour for advice on what to see. I’d offer, say, a flat rate of $250-500 for when I take my big trip next year.

Not huge money, but you’d be able to work from the coffee shop.

Did the judge identify the prosecutors by name, in his order?

If not, why not?

If so, it would be helpful to identify the unethical prosecutors by name. It’s only fair, since DOJ issued a press release prominently displaying the names of the Americans who were prosecuted by unethical agents of DOJ.

Signalling doesn’t explain the conduct, since bringing up the topic of meat eating is a great way to anger everyone at the dinner table. Few of us mention it. Thus, I do not go around signalling moral superiority because of my views on vegetarianism.

Rationally, I know eating meat is immoral. I still eat meat.

To anyone who has read David Hume, my conduct isn’t mysterious.

Reason doesn’t move us. Emotion does. My emotional need to eat overwhelms my emotional need to spare animals (who are far away from me) from suffering.

Do you have a cite on that insider trading incident? From what I know of securities laws, doing what you describe wouldn’t be illegal

Then you are mistaken.

This is black-letter law. A couple of minutes of Googling would give you the source you desire. Why not just Google it yourself?

Mixed martial arts fans remember when what is now known as UFC was called “human cockfighting.” Even though, like bare-knuckled boxing, large gloves were not used. Unlike in boxing, fighters who receive a mini-concussion (and thus are knocked down rather than out) are immediately TKO’ed – which is safer for the fighter.

I would trust Johnson & Johnson Company’s claims over that of a politician. The free market trends to punish companies that lie; where as voters are always willing to forgive politicians for their lies. Why is that?

“Nobody cares about what you know, until they know that you care.” Cliche; but probably true. A cynic doesn’t care – or he seems that way. An idealist seems to care.

Robin: Not sure you need to do much else than quote Nietzsche on slave morality. The power elite create a morality that enslaves others. The power elite themselves never follow their own morality.

Al Gore lives in a mansion and flies on public jets. Yet he preaches against the evils of global warming and carbon consumption.

Catholic leaders preach abstinence while raping children (and covering up the rape of children).

The Saudi Morals Police exists by royal edict. Saudi royalty rape their sex slaves without any hassle from the Morals Police.

Parents who teach their children idealism are simply doing what those parents have been programmed to do.

My marriage became much less sexless when my wife found me in a hot tub with another woman. I made no apologies and offered no explanations. The best way for a man to end the sexlessness of his marriage is to cheat. Cheating subconsciously alters a man’s confidence. It’s a reminder of his sexual market value. His wife senses the change.

Of course, if a man cannot cheat on his wife with a woman at least as good looking as his wife…Who can blame his wife for not desiring sex with him?

Incidentally, by definition, a man in a sexless marriage cannot cheat. If there is no sex, there is no cheating – since how can you be sexually unfaithful to someone when there is no sex?

I also flip the script. A woman who is not having sex with a man is as much of a cheater as the man. If the deal of marriage is sexual monogamy, then that presupposes sex. If there is no sex, then the woman has cheated as much as a wandering spouse.

The FDA blew it with tryptophan, too.

Haven’t people known that red is a power color for decades? Red = “power tie.”

Well, how is what you’re saying a refutation of what I (or Robin) wrote? If anything, you concede that people attend universities for the status. Which was Robin’s point. My proposed thought experiment was just another way of supporting Robin’s contention.

Thought experiment: If Harvard dropped to #50 in the US News rankings (and collective consciousness in general), would Harvard alums be upset? If so, why?

If Harvard was one of the best colleges when the alums attended; why care about the subsequent drop in ranking? All that should matter to alums was this: It was a great school that imparted great knowledge when the alum attended.

Of course, we all know how alums would react. Why the negative reaction? If university is about knowledge rather than prestige, then a drop in rankings shouldn’t matter to alum.

Very interesting results. I’m reminded of a Woody Allen line from the hilarious Small Time Crooks: “I’ve always wanted to know how to spell Connecticut.”

Learning a musical instrument or foreign language are things people can do. It requires effort, but it doable. Why then don’t more people speak a foreign language or play a muscial instrument?

Do people really “want” to enhance those abilities? Or do they “want to want” to enhance those abilities?