Doug Ross, “The Horrifying Chart That Democrats and RINOs Don’t Want You to See”.
Notes Doug,
We have two missions: to politically obliterate the Marxist Left that has subsumed the empty husk of the Democrat Party; and to continue our hostile takeover of the Republican Party, in order to return it to its Reagan-esque roots.
We have no choice if we are to save this Republic.
Sorry, Doug, but the Party has spoken: what Republicans want is a polished, moderate, big government technocrat and ruling class insider who is willing to mouth conservative pieties to get elected, but ultimately act as a prudent helmsman and manager of a grand bureaucratic state once in office.
— Albeit one that will lower certain tax rates to get the economy going.
You know: take us back to that grand time when, as Nancy Pelosi so candidly put it, “Party didn’t matter” in DC.
The real existential problems this country faces aren’t a concern to the GOP. Winning elections and controlling the federal monster is the endgame.
And GOP voters are proving themselves too spineless ever to change that dynamic.
And GOP voters are proving themselves too spineless ever to change that dynamic.
As a skinny robot once said: “Then we’re stupid, and we’ll die.”
And damn if she wasn’t right!
And me, stuck in IL – I keep voting for the most classically liberal folks I can…
Oh, we can do better than Reagan-esque:
Can I hear an amen for Silent Cal Coolidge? Harding? Bueller?
Those “utopian spasms” convinced the Soviets we were serious about a ballistic missile defense program they couldn’t afford.
Via Insty and others:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/14/uk-police-seize-computers-of-skeptic-in-england/
Three skeptic sites, including Steve McIntyre’s ClimateAudit.org, are being targeted for having been the first to receive/post the ClimateGate e-mails, and it appears they’re trying to find the identity of the leaker.
Quips Insty: “Hey, whoever it was made important people look stupid. That’s unforgivable.”
Summary from Christopher Horner here:
http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/2011/12/obamas-justice-department-joins-britains-climategate-leaker-manhunt/2006206
At what point do we decide that we cannot be held to the rule of law because our sovereign will has been usurped?
As a skinny robot once
I’m behind on my sci-fi refs. What’s this from?
My geekish phrasing of this is “where’s our Rubicon?”
Bladerunner, spoken by Darryl Hannah’s character.
Who was not a robot exactly.
I’ve seen Bladerunner and read the book and still I missed it.
Gah.
We’ve seen things those Founder/Framer people woudn’t believe.
“Who was not a robot exactly.”
I’ve lost the thread of the story (to a bad memory). What was the deal? That the created human-likes weren’t “ensouled”, because created by human art or something?
At what point do we decide that we cannot be held to the rule of law because our sovereign will has been usurped?
I’ve often mentioned my desire for a few brave governors to tell Washington to piss off. Honestly, though, I’ll be happy to see any unit of government tell any other unit of government that they don’t recognize the other’s authority in a particular matter.
Really effin’ happy, in fact.
They were created by humans with genetic modifications for certain jobs. Geneticly human but legally property. Slaves. There are many, myself included, who have concluded that the “hero” Deckard is himself a replicant who doesn’t know he is one, like Rachael was before he told her.
[…] season has been long and enters into it’s final phase. The way I see it, it’s been a lost opportunity for America to be made aware of the stark differences between true conservatism and American […]
There are many, myself included, who have concluded that the “hero” Deckard is himself a replicant who doesn’t know he is one, like Rachael was before he told her.
It’s hard to conclude otherwise, since that’s what Scott thought too, but I think it’s a cheat myself, and a terrible one at that.
Deckard was written as a human; Scott was just trying to make his status more ambiguous. I actually like that idea; after all, only a trained professional can tell the difference.
I don’t mind the ambiguity in terms of the eternal question what makes us human?. But through the Director’s Cut and the Final Cut, it’s become less ambiguous and more definitive. And that I think is a cheat.
The point was “What IS the difference”?
The difference is there is no difference if they’re all replicants, which is completely uninteresting from a dramatic standpoint. It diminishes Deckard’s feelings for Rachel and ambivalence/repugnance about his job. And it demeans Batty’s decision to spend his last moment of life saving Deckard’s.
That’s what Scott gave up for a cheap shock at the end of the movie, and it was a mistake.
This might be a question for Jeff. The writer of the original story wrote Deckard as human. The screenplay writer wrote Deckard as human. Harrison Ford played Deckard as human. Ridley Scott attempted to suggest, as a director, otherwise.
Who wins?
I think it doesn’t much matter. Everyone’s intention is clear. You decide what you want to think.
My own personal thinking is this: the replicants aren’t human mostly because they don’t have any real memories, or in fact a real childhood. They’ve got substantial portions of their humanity that’s undeveloped, but they manage to fill that in with something, left to their own devices. Given a chance, and given some knowledge, they’d wind up still oddball, but more human. They’re basically genetically human anyway, except for the built-in auto shutoff.
So, really, the only difference is the externally-imposed mortality, and the fact that they’ve never had the ability to bond properly with other people. This they learn, some, through watching.
Who wins?
According to Harrison Ford, the director.
I could argue this enjoyably all evening long, but I have to go figure out what I’m cooking for a house full of sick people.
I tried that once, but they remembered I was cooking for them before they got sick.
I offered to cook something different.
In the case of Rachael she has, as an adult, all we as adults have of a childhood (if orphaned) memories, trinkets, pictures. Deckard as replicant would be a Rachael who had had enough time to develop the emotions of a born human.
I understand your concerns Ernst. My sense that Deckard was a replicant in the movie, came before I saw those later versions. It centered around how he seemed to be the only Bladerunner who could survive multiple missions going up against beings designed to be stronger, faster, smarter in some ways, than those born human.
Anyways I like both the book and the movie[s]. I must as I’ve bought the movie in VHS then Laserdisc then two different DVDs. Another book/story that deals with, what I see as, the subject of this one is Dydeetown World by F. Paul Wilson.
See, my impression was that Deckard spent his career Void-Comping and retiring earlier generation replicants and was in way over his head with the Nexus 6es. Rachel saved his ass and Batty spared him.
I agree that he was no match for Leon or Roy hand to hand but I saw him and Rachael as not specialized for combat but more generalists. He was able to survive the attacks by both Zhora and Pris and his hanging on the edge of the building was more than human, to me.
Different takes we have. Have to rewatch it soon with your comments in mind. Tonight though is the tivoed “Criminal Minds” from last night and “Person of Interest”.
Well, most of the GOP voters were always so spineless (or complacent, to soften it just a bit); some Republicans are as hooked on the notion of government ‘freebies’ as are the vast majority of Democrats. And those who are not spineless, and will cast a primary vote for Bachmann or Santorum (if they even remain on the ballot) (or, better, write in Palin) are far too few in number to make any difference whatsoever.
We’ve lost the culture war I’m thinking. It’s now mainstream ‘American’ to feel ‘entitled’ to something or other; what’s not settled in this new mainstream mindset is just how much one gets, and when in life this free ride needs kick in.
Something will have to scare the shit out of the fat, dumb and happy Americans with this entitlement mindset. Then, you’ll see the herds break Right or Left; either as traditional (classic) Americans of the steel-spined sort, or flock to the enticements of Marx and the siren song of Socialism. I’m betting many will probably go that way (dare I say 99%?), because we’ve lost to the Left so many of the last several generations.
“Then, you’ll see the herds break Right or Left; either as traditional (classic) Americans of the steel-spined sort, or flock to the enticements of Marx and the siren song of Socialism.”
So, two herds. It could be true, but it’s a hard pill to swallow. I’d sooner ask, counter-traditionally (sort of, at least by modern lights): who taught the founders? If there’s to be a break actually swimming in synchrony with American political philosophy, I’d watch for people to start studying Montesquieu seriously, a la Mr Levin. That, however, would be a distinctly unherdlike behavior, though I’d like to maintain, characteristically American. It’s a radical deal, our founders set up, the most radical in history to my way of thinking.
I hear you on Person of Interest geoff. Followed by the openly amoral Patrick Jayne on a very special Mentalist.
These ‘herds’ are not the sort to read so deeply, sdferr. Remember, the masses, the Godless masses, are more animals than thinkers. ‘Herd’ is aptly chosen, unfortunately.
I think faugh on that serr8d. All these people read. Many, or most, read the Bible. It doesn’t get any more deep, so far as that goes. Montesquieu doesn’t present greater difficulties, surely.
Heh. Poll the ‘American Idol’-watchers; how many of those have cracked any tome of any weight of late?
We’ve lost the culture war I’m thinking.
We surrendered preemptorily in 1992 when Buchanan took the stage and told us that there was a culture war and the GOP’s collective response was you can’t say that!.
If we only have to worry about the Godless masses, we’ll be just fine.
If we’re talking herds, that Godless one is quite small. Perhaps more like packs of wolves that eat babies and unattended house pets. I know that I’m often overcome with these urges without any moral framework in sight to stop myself.
I do sometimes wonder when people say these things if it’s a form of confession. That if they ever had a crisis of faith, they’d go crazy with the raping and murdering because that always sounded like such fun if God wasn’t there to stop the party.
God doesn’t care about rapings and murderings happening amongst average humans, bh; He’s just collecting souls when they are all finished playing, and keeping the best of those for his collection.
Oh, and the rest that don’t make that collection? Reborn as Iranians I’m thinking… )
I do rather like that metaphor. (But that was a snarky tangent on my part, regardless.)
I’m merely saying that one shouldn’t blame non-believers for much more than having a bunch of loud-mouthed assholes in their ranks. Simply not enough of them.
Our problem is the cult of “gimme free stuff” and roughly 5 times as many believers joined that cult as the total number of non-believers in existence.
Living in a world where communism meant starvation (ask the Pilgrims) and pacifists ended up scalped had a lot to do with it. All the various flavors of Leftard insanity require a world that is rich enough to sustain the illusion that the line between civilization and barbarism is more than paper-thin requiring constant and uncompromising and brutal defending.