The fearful cyclist's best friend

Tºm Shermªn™ °_° wrote:
On 3/10/2011 6:58 AM, Peter Cole wrote:
On 3/9/2011 9:32 PM, AMuzi wrote:
Tºm Shermªn™ °_° wrote:
On 3/9/2011 4:08 PM, A. Muzi wrote:
Radey Shouman wrote:
landotter writes:

[...]
Funny, sounds exactly like the kind of irrational hero fantasy the
Jebus huggin' teabaggists around here have rattling around in their
heads--sorta like a pious faction of Ralphie Parkers who never grew
up.

Kapow kapow kapow!

Poketa-poketa-poketa


Huh?
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pocketa


I wouldn't know what social misfits join landotter down at the
teabagging club:
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=teabag

but Tea Party activists of my acquaintance are not at all religious;
mostly atheist/agnostic.


Belief in lower taxes and fewer regulations on the rich curing all
ills is a religion.


Rabid ideologically driven rants from those who ought to know:

""There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the
people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by
violent and sudden usurpations. "
-- James Madison, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention [June 16,
1788]

In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 for relief of French
refugees who fled from insurrection in San Domingo to Baltimore and
Philadelphia, James Madison stood on the floor of the House to object
saying, "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the
Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects
of benevolence, the money of their constituents."
-- James Madison, 4 Annals of congress 179 (1794)

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare,
but only those specifically enumerated."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Albert Gallatin, 1817

enjoy more at your leisu
http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/quotes/govt.html

How about:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Madison

Notes of the Secret Debates of the Federal Convention of 1787, TUESDAY
JUNE 26TH "The man who is possessed of wealth, who lolls on his sofa, or
rolls in his carriage, cannot judge of the wants or feelings of the day
laborer. The government we mean to erect is intended to last for ages.
The landed interest, at present, is prevalent; but in process of time,
when we approximate to the states and kingdoms of Europe; when the
number of landholders shall be comparatively small, through the various
means of trade and manufactures, will not the landed interest be
overbalanced in future elections, and unless wisely provided against,
what will become of your government? In England, at this day, if
elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed
proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If
these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent
interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a
share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to
balance and check the other. The checks and balances ought to be so
constituted as to protect the [privatized property of the] minority of
the opulent against the [will of the] majority."

Ideologically, today the founding fathers would be hedge fund managers.

Of course even Madison revised his views after the period you (and I)
quote. I'm sure had he lived another 200 years he would have revised
them much further, but being a plantation owner, one would expect there
would be limits, but he might have evolved as far as Jimmy Carter.
Attempts to roll the clock back 200 years probably has most of the
founding fathers rolling in their graves. Even with their original
contempt for "the mob", they likely were smart enough to realize times
have changed, unlike the poor fools with the teabags, who seem barely
literate, and certainly no students of history.

+1x10^6



If it's all down to ad hoc vote buying, why bother with a
written constitution of enumerated powers at all?

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On 3/10/2011 10:13 AM, Peter Cole wrote:
On 3/10/2011 10:41 AM, Duane Hebert wrote:
On 3/10/2011 10:37 AM, Peter Cole wrote:
On 3/10/2011 10:26 AM, Simon Lewis wrote:
writes:

Racism today is not as extreme as back in the 50's or even the
60's, and it's clearly not PC at the macro level... and it
continues to diminish - but at this moment in time, in my
immediate social environment it is alive and well.

Of course it is. Different people will always be wary of others. It's
not necessarily a bad thing per se unless taken to extreme. In this
silly world we live in noting that someone has a different skin colour
is now "racism". Its not. Its stating the obvious.

Wow.


Yeah. I was about to say that noting that someone has a different skin
color is not racism but thinking that they're different (or "others") is
getting pretty close.

OK, I should retract a bit. I realize we've all a natural tendency to be
bigots and xenophobes, often unconsciously, and it may seem like an
over-correction to constantly beat the "PC" drum, but there's still
plenty of conscious stereotyping and scapegoating around and I'd, given
the not too distant past, rather err on the side of caution. Call me
over-sensitive, but I've got reasonably fresh memories of the alternative.

Some biases are morally just, however. For example:

People who love kitty-cats People who hate kitty-cats.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On 3/10/2011 7:12 PM, (PeteCresswell) wrote:
Per Simon Lewis:
Of course it is. Different people will always be wary of others. It's
not necessarily a bad thing per se unless taken to extreme. In this
silly world we live in noting that someone has a different skin colour
is now "racism". Its not. Its stating the obvious.

I lived 10 years of my life in Hawaii - where
interracial/intercultural issues are an accepted fact of daily
life. Trust me: where I live, racism is alive and well.

No, in Hawaii the prejudice is reserved against tourists, despite that
tourism is essential to the local economy.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On Mar 10, 4:58*am, Peter Cole wrote:
On 3/9/2011 9:32 PM, AMuzi wrote:





T m Sherm n _ wrote:
On 3/9/2011 4:08 PM, A. Muzi wrote:
Radey Shouman wrote:
landotter writes:

[...]
Funny, sounds exactly like the kind of irrational hero fantasy the
Jebus huggin' teabaggists around here have rattling around in their
heads--sorta like a pious faction of Ralphie Parkers who never grew
up.

Kapow kapow kapow!

Poketa-poketa-poketa

Huh?
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pocketa

I wouldn't know what social misfits join landotter down at the
teabagging club:
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=teabag

but Tea Party activists of my acquaintance are not at all religious;
mostly atheist/agnostic.

Belief in lower taxes and fewer regulations on the rich curing all
ills is a religion.

Rabid ideologically driven rants from those who ought to know:

""There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the
people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by
violent and sudden usurpations. "
-- James Madison, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention [June 16,
1788]

In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 for relief of French
refugees who fled from insurrection in San Domingo to Baltimore and
Philadelphia, James Madison stood on the floor of the House to object
saying, "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the
Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects
of benevolence, the money of their constituents."
-- James Madison, 4 Annals of congress 179 (1794)

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare,
but only those specifically enumerated."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Albert Gallatin, 1817

enjoy more at your leisu
http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/quotes/govt.html

How about:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Madison

* Notes of the Secret Debates of the Federal Convention of 1787, TUESDAY
JUNE 26TH "The man who is possessed of wealth, who lolls on his sofa, or
rolls in his carriage, cannot judge of the wants or feelings of the day
laborer. The government we mean to erect is intended to last for ages.
The landed interest, at present, is prevalent; but in process of time,
when we approximate to the states and kingdoms of Europe; when the
number of landholders shall be comparatively small, through the various
means of trade and manufactures, will not the landed interest be
overbalanced in future elections, and unless wisely provided against,
what will become of your government? In England, at this day, if
elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed
proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If
these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent
interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a
share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to
balance and check the other. The checks and balances ought to be so
constituted as to protect the [privatized property of the] minority of
the opulent against the [will of the] majority."

Ideologically, today the founding fathers would be hedge fund managers.

Of course even Madison revised his views after the period you (and I)
quote. I'm sure had he lived another 200 years he would have revised
them much further, but being a plantation owner, one would expect there
would be limits, but he might have evolved as far as Jimmy Carter.
Attempts to roll the clock back 200 years probably has most of the
founding fathers rolling in their graves.
snip

Yes and no. Most of the founding fathers would agree that the
Constitution is not a suicide pact and that it has to be given a
somewhat flexible interpretation. However, I think they would have
been surprised by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Constitution was
intended as a restraint on federal power and did not purport to
protect individual liberties from infringement by state governments.
Jefferson proposed revisions to the Virginia criminal code that could
never pass muster under the Federal constitution. The punishments
were the picture of cruel and unusual (e.g. drilling holes in the
noses of adulterers). The Civil War changed everything by extending
the Bill of Rights to the states. I am not sure the founding fathers
would have gone along with that. -- Jay Beattie.

On 3/10/2011 11:05 PM, Jay Beattie wrote:
On Mar 10, 4:58 am, Peter wrote:
On 3/9/2011 9:32 PM, AMuzi wrote:
T m Sherm n _ wrote:

Belief in lower taxes and fewer regulations on the rich curing all
ills is a religion.

Rabid ideologically driven rants from those who ought to know:

""There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the
people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by
violent and sudden usurpations. "
-- James Madison, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention [June 16,
1788]

In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 for relief of French
refugees who fled from insurrection in San Domingo to Baltimore and
Philadelphia, James Madison stood on the floor of the House to object
saying, "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the
Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects
of benevolence, the money of their constituents."
-- James Madison, 4 Annals of congress 179 (1794)

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare,
but only those specifically enumerated."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Albert Gallatin, 1817

enjoy more at your leisu
http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/quotes/govt.html

How about:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Madison

Notes of the Secret Debates of the Federal Convention of 1787, TUESDAY
JUNE 26TH "The man who is possessed of wealth, who lolls on his sofa, or
rolls in his carriage, cannot judge of the wants or feelings of the day
laborer. The government we mean to erect is intended to last for ages.
The landed interest, at present, is prevalent; but in process of time,
when we approximate to the states and kingdoms of Europe; when the
number of landholders shall be comparatively small, through the various
means of trade and manufactures, will not the landed interest be
overbalanced in future elections, and unless wisely provided against,
what will become of your government? In England, at this day, if
elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed
proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If
these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent
interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a
share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to
balance and check the other. The checks and balances ought to be so
constituted as to protect the [privatized property of the] minority of
the opulent against the [will of the] majority."

Ideologically, today the founding fathers would be hedge fund managers.

Of course even Madison revised his views after the period you (and I)
quote. I'm sure had he lived another 200 years he would have revised
them much further, but being a plantation owner, one would expect there
would be limits, but he might have evolved as far as Jimmy Carter.
Attempts to roll the clock back 200 years probably has most of the
founding fathers rolling in their graves.
snip

Yes and no. Most of the founding fathers would agree that the
Constitution is not a suicide pact and that it has to be given a
somewhat flexible interpretation. However, I think they would have
been surprised by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Constitution was
intended as a restraint on federal power and did not purport to
protect individual liberties from infringement by state governments.
Jefferson proposed revisions to the Virginia criminal code that could
never pass muster under the Federal constitution. The punishments
were the picture of cruel and unusual (e.g. drilling holes in the
noses of adulterers). The Civil War changed everything by extending
the Bill of Rights to the states. I am not sure the founding fathers
would have gone along with that. -- Jay Beattie.

I gladly defer to your obviously superior knowledge of constitutional
law and intent. My Madison quote wasn't intended to illuminate his
attitudes on those matters directly, but more his general (and typical
among his founding father peer group) views about protecting the
minority property owner's wealth from the unsympathetic will of the less
affluent majority. Contrary to the state-issued propaganda which most of
us were forced to endure (American history, revised), the US was founded
as a plutocracy, by intent, something Madison's comments should confirm
to the skeptical.

Forbes recently reported, based on government data, that currently the
richest 400 individuals in the US have an equal amount of assets as the
bottom 150 million citizens. We have the same relative wealth
distribution as Egypt and China. No revolution here, no dictators
either, we can maintain such a disparity and popular acceptance of a
plutocracy via propaganda alone.

Slave owners and beneficiaries of slavery formed a tiny fraction of the
Southern militias during our civil war. Like the tea party members of
today passionately defending the principles of plutocracy, they
irrationally supported a small number of wealthy elites who cynically
and skillfully exploited them to maintain their franchise. Plus ça change.

As Michael Moore recently said in Wisconsin, our country isn't broke,
far from it, it's just that most of the wealth is in the hands of our
nobility, we don't call them that, but that's just part of the
propaganda. US productivity has risen 10% since the start of the
recession, foreclosures and layoffs continue, jobs are being created by
US companies, just not here. Profits are being made, just not being
shared or taxed. After losing trillions of citizen's wealth in
fraudulent Ponzi schemes, not a single criminal has been prosecuted,
instead they have been awarded bonuses from the people's money -- that's
if it really is government of the people, for the people and by the
people -- which it isn't and never has been, by design, all propaganda
to the contrary.

The tea party "revolution" isn't a revolution, it's an anti-revolution.
A coalition of the gullible and confused. It's not patriotism, it's
willful ignorance and mean-spiritedness. If they got paid, they might be
called class warfare mercenaries, but for most of them, calling them
greedy and cynical would be a compliment and the hallmark of leadership
potential.

Per Tºm Shermªn™ °_° ":
No, in Hawaii the prejudice is reserved against tourists, despite that
tourism is essential to the local economy.

In the context of my experience 40+ years ago, I would agree with
that.

In the Hawaii I experienced, people stereotyped each other and
had names for various subgroups, but nobody was really angry over
it. You might see a Korean guy snap out at somebody and people
say "Typical yobo...." or my neighbor would say "Japanese girls:
they think they **** ice-cream"... but nobody was really looking
down on anybody who belonged to an ethnic group in the islands.

Stereotyping, yes... racism, IMHO, no.

Even people from the mainland - who were, OTOH, subject to what I
think of as racism - could fit in if they made an effort to adapt
to the local culture. GI's were a subgroup of mainlander which
got an extra dose of that.

The stereotype of mainland caucasian was dirty, hairy, loud, and
over-sexed. A girl I went to school with at UH told me that,
until she went to college, she believed (as did everybody around
her) that my people only bathed on Saturday night.

OTOH, where I lived for several years in an area called "The
Jungle" in Waikiki, the Hawaiian women I knew referred to me as
"the good haole"....

Several years ago, I went back for a month and got the impression
that things were vastly different now - although that was not
enough time to really tell.
--
PeteCresswell

On 3/11/2011 8:14 AM, Peter Cole wrote:
On 3/10/2011 11:05 PM, Jay Beattie wrote:
On Mar 10, 4:58 am, Peter wrote:
On 3/9/2011 9:32 PM, AMuzi wrote:
T m Sherm n _ wrote:

Belief in lower taxes and fewer regulations on the rich curing all
ills is a religion.

Rabid ideologically driven rants from those who ought to know:

""There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the
people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by
violent and sudden usurpations. "
-- James Madison, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention [June 16,
1788]

In 1794, when Congress appropriated $15,000 for relief of French
refugees who fled from insurrection in San Domingo to Baltimore and
Philadelphia, James Madison stood on the floor of the House to object
saying, "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the
Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects
of benevolence, the money of their constituents."
-- James Madison, 4 Annals of congress 179 (1794)

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare,
but only those specifically enumerated."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Albert Gallatin, 1817

enjoy more at your leisu
http://econfaculty.gmu.edu/wew/quotes/govt.html

How about:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Madison

Notes of the Secret Debates of the Federal Convention of 1787, TUESDAY
JUNE 26TH "The man who is possessed of wealth, who lolls on his sofa, or
rolls in his carriage, cannot judge of the wants or feelings of the day
laborer. The government we mean to erect is intended to last for ages.
The landed interest, at present, is prevalent; but in process of time,
when we approximate to the states and kingdoms of Europe; when the
number of landholders shall be comparatively small, through the various
means of trade and manufactures, will not the landed interest be
overbalanced in future elections, and unless wisely provided against,
what will become of your government? In England, at this day, if
elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed
proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If
these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent
interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a
share in the government, to support these invaluable interests, and to
balance and check the other. The checks and balances ought to be so
constituted as to protect the [privatized property of the] minority of
the opulent against the [will of the] majority."

Ideologically, today the founding fathers would be hedge fund managers.

Of course even Madison revised his views after the period you (and I)
quote. I'm sure had he lived another 200 years he would have revised
them much further, but being a plantation owner, one would expect there
would be limits, but he might have evolved as far as Jimmy Carter.
Attempts to roll the clock back 200 years probably has most of the
founding fathers rolling in their graves.
snip

Yes and no. Most of the founding fathers would agree that the
Constitution is not a suicide pact and that it has to be given a
somewhat flexible interpretation. However, I think they would have
been surprised by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Constitution was
intended as a restraint on federal power and did not purport to
protect individual liberties from infringement by state governments.
Jefferson proposed revisions to the Virginia criminal code that could
never pass muster under the Federal constitution. The punishments
were the picture of cruel and unusual (e.g. drilling holes in the
noses of adulterers). The Civil War changed everything by extending
the Bill of Rights to the states. I am not sure the founding fathers
would have gone along with that. -- Jay Beattie.

I gladly defer to your obviously superior knowledge of constitutional
law and intent. My Madison quote wasn't intended to illuminate his
attitudes on those matters directly, but more his general (and typical
among his founding father peer group) views about protecting the
minority property owner's wealth from the unsympathetic will of the less
affluent majority. Contrary to the state-issued propaganda which most of
us were forced to endure (American history, revised), the US was founded
as a plutocracy, by intent, something Madison's comments should confirm
to the skeptical.

Forbes recently reported, based on government data, that currently the
richest 400 individuals in the US have an equal amount of assets as the
bottom 150 million citizens. We have the same relative wealth
distribution as Egypt and China. No revolution here, no dictators
either, we can maintain such a disparity and popular acceptance of a
plutocracy via propaganda alone.

Slave owners and beneficiaries of slavery formed a tiny fraction of the
Southern militias during our civil war. Like the tea party members of
today passionately defending the principles of plutocracy, they
irrationally supported a small number of wealthy elites who cynically
and skillfully exploited them to maintain their franchise. Plus ça change.

As Michael Moore recently said in Wisconsin, our country isn't broke,
far from it, it's just that most of the wealth is in the hands of our
nobility, we don't call them that, but that's just part of the
propaganda. US productivity has risen 10% since the start of the
recession, foreclosures and layoffs continue, jobs are being created by
US companies, just not here. Profits are being made, just not being
shared or taxed. After losing trillions of citizen's wealth in
fraudulent Ponzi schemes, not a single criminal has been prosecuted,
instead they have been awarded bonuses from the people's money -- that's
if it really is government of the people, for the people and by the
people -- which it isn't and never has been, by design, all propaganda
to the contrary.

The tea party "revolution" isn't a revolution, it's an anti-revolution.
A coalition of the gullible and confused. It's not patriotism, it's
willful ignorance and mean-spiritedness. If they got paid, they might be
called class warfare mercenaries, but for most of them, calling them
greedy and cynical would be a compliment and the hallmark of leadership
potential.


+6.02x10^23

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731,-83.985007
I am a vehicular cyclist.

On Thu, 10 Mar 2011 20:12:36 -0500, "(PeteCresswell)"
wrote:

Per Simon Lewis:
Of course it is. Different people will always be wary of others. It's
not necessarily a bad thing per se unless taken to extreme. In this
silly world we live in noting that someone has a different skin colour
is now "racism". Its not. Its stating the obvious.

I lived 10 years of my life in Hawaii - where
interracial/intercultural issues are an accepted fact of daily
life. Trust me: where I live, racism is alive and well.

I've lived about half my life outside the U.S. and thus haven't yet
been properly exposed to the political correctness syndrome. My
experience in every country I've lived in is that there are US and
'the others'. US being the handsome, intelligent, witty and lovable
folks and 'the others' are dirty, ignorant, despicable, and generally
the world would be better off without them, people. In places like
Irian Jaya or New Guinea if you meet one of the 'others' it is
socially correct to spear him.

For myself I've always viewed the political correctness gang as a
group that is frantically trying to show the world that they aren't
really as bad as they are reputed to be.


Cheers,

John D. Slocomb
(jdslocombatgmail)

Per J. D. Slocomb:
For myself I've always viewed the political correctness gang as a
group that is frantically trying to show the world that they aren't
really as bad as they are reputed to be.

That rings true to me.

But I'd also venture that it's a big step above those who are bad
and proud of it. We've got them too...
--
PeteCresswell