MIKE Hunter's smaller car thesis??

Probably the same way that someone could prove that Bush has been clean and
sober for quite a while now.

moe n curly made the assertion that Bush was drunk, it is up to him to prove
it. You cannot prove a negative.

 

It is a mistake to confuse inarticulateness with stupidity. I, too, wish I
could speak like Winston Churchill did but it ain't gonna happen. On the
flip side, riveting oration does not guarantee fitness. Adolph Hitler was a
stunning orator and a brilliant tactician - give the devil his due - but
there was a smoking crater where his humanity should have been. Or, as Bill
Watterson observed about his comic creation Calvin, "I prize his ability to
precisely articulate stupid ideas."

It's a wonder any of us can speak our thoughts at all. Consider it; we have
abstract thought patterns often unlike anything in the natural world (this
subject is a good example). Those thoughts have to be framed in a language
as abstruse as English, given reasonable syntax, and then translated into a
coordinated muscular action that forms recognizable words from movements of
the diaphragm, larynx, throat, soft palate, tongue, jaw and lips. There
isn't even time to "proofhear" what we are going to say.

Somebody once pointed out that communication must have the power to shock.
Saying "it is cold today" to somebody who is sharing the weather is
pointless; it conveys nothing. Saying "Our tears give God his power" is
profound, but it was scripted (South Park, 'Cartmanland.') It is no surprise
the most profound ideas are written before they are spoken because
epiphanies are not normally verbal in character. We do not speak of the
importance of speeches as much as we do the importance of writings, and not
only because speech is ephemeral. Lincoln's 'Gettysburg Address' and
Hitler's 'Night and Fog' speeches are remembered not for their profound
content but for the emotional effect they had and for the actions that grew
from each. For all that, each of those was scripted.

Or, as I would have put it in person, "You see, um, I think - or I would
think - you, or we, should, um...."

Mike

 

It is a mistake to confuse inarticulateness with stupidity. I, too, wish I
could speak like Winston Churchill did but it ain't gonna happen. On the
flip side, riveting oration does not guarantee fitness. Adolph Hitler was a
stunning orator and a brilliant tactician - give the devil his due - but
there was a smoking crater where his humanity should have been. Or, as Bill
Watterson observed about his comic creation Calvin, "I prize his ability to
precisely articulate stupid ideas."

It's a wonder any of us can speak our thoughts at all. Consider it; we have
abstract thought patterns often unlike anything in the natural world (this
subject is a good example). Those thoughts have to be framed in a language
as abstruse as English, given reasonable syntax, and then translated into a
coordinated muscular action that forms recognizable words from movements of
the diaphragm, larynx, throat, soft palate, tongue, jaw and lips. There
isn't even time to "proofhear" what we are going to say.

Somebody once pointed out that communication must have the power to shock.
Saying "it is cold today" to somebody who is sharing the weather is
pointless; it conveys nothing. Saying "Our tears give God his power" is
profound, but it was scripted (South Park, 'Cartmanland.') It is no surprise
the most profound ideas are written before they are spoken because
epiphanies are not normally verbal in character. We do not speak of the
importance of speeches as much as we do the importance of writings, and not
only because speech is ephemeral. Lincoln's 'Gettysburg Address' and
Hitler's 'Night and Fog' speeches are remembered not for their profound
content but for the emotional effect they had and for the actions that grew
from each. For all that, each of those was scripted.

Or, as I would have put it in person, "You see, um, I think - or I would
think - you, or we, should, um...."

Mike

 

Funny - that happened to me. I suffer from PTSD and have only slowly
adjusted to being touched at all. Last year I was working inside a truck and
a co-worker came up behind me and poked me in the side. My reaction brought
HR into the picture. The response from the female HR representative:
touching in itself is permitted with the "bathing suit" restrictions unless
and until the party being touched objects. (I have trouble adjusting to
being hugged but I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings by objecting after
it already happened.) I work for a Fortune 500 company in the US so I would
expect this to be pretty mainstream.

We may have personal standards that differ. As far as my wife goes, I would
not object to somebody rubbing her shoulders in a public setting unless she
gave me a look to make it stop. It really isn't a big deal to her - it's
just part of her world. She's a hugger; I am not. BTW - my wife works in a
nursing home. Patients' family members and co-workers hug her all the time.
It would drive me crazy... and not just the hugging part.

Mike

 

Funny - that happened to me. I suffer from PTSD and have only slowly
adjusted to being touched at all. Last year I was working inside a truck and
a co-worker came up behind me and poked me in the side. My reaction brought
HR into the picture. The response from the female HR representative:
touching in itself is permitted with the "bathing suit" restrictions unless
and until the party being touched objects. (I have trouble adjusting to
being hugged but I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings by objecting after
it already happened.) I work for a Fortune 500 company in the US so I would
expect this to be pretty mainstream.

We may have personal standards that differ. As far as my wife goes, I would
not object to somebody rubbing her shoulders in a public setting unless she
gave me a look to make it stop. It really isn't a big deal to her - it's
just part of her world. She's a hugger; I am not. BTW - my wife works in a
nursing home. Patients' family members and co-workers hug her all the time.
It would drive me crazy... and not just the hugging part.

Mike

 

Now that's just weird. People at work touch her all the time (nurses can't
work without touching and being touched) but there is context to consider.
Touching usually indicates purpose or familiarity - you lack familiarity and
your purpose would be... ah, suspect.

Mike

Mike

 

Now that's just weird. People at work touch her all the time (nurses can't
work without touching and being touched) but there is context to consider.
Touching usually indicates purpose or familiarity - you lack familiarity and
your purpose would be... ah, suspect.

Mike

Mike

 

Perhaps, but as I said before, there are some jobs which, in MY opinion,
require clarity of communication. So, let's replace "stupidity" with
"incompetence". There are other examples. Some years ago, Kodak created a
bit of a ruckus when it refused to consider one of its employees who had
applied for a different job within the company. He wanted to be one of the
people who stands at a podium and speaks to audiences from the investment
industry. One problem: As a speaker, he was only fluent in ebonics. The news
mentioned threats of a lawsuit for racial discrimination. I assume Al
Sharpton never got wind of the story, or he would've made a trip to
Rochester to spew his nonsense. I don't recall how it ended, but it did so
quietly. I suspect someone explained to the guy that if someone spoke only
Romanian, they would not have been considered for the job either. He was
probably a smart guy, but if you can't tell, than who cares?

Back to your president:

What indication do YOU have that his speech isn't telling the truth about
his intelligence? Please don't say "Yale".

 

Perhaps, but as I said before, there are some jobs which, in MY opinion,
require clarity of communication. So, let's replace "stupidity" with
"incompetence". There are other examples. Some years ago, Kodak created a
bit of a ruckus when it refused to consider one of its employees who had
applied for a different job within the company. He wanted to be one of the
people who stands at a podium and speaks to audiences from the investment
industry. One problem: As a speaker, he was only fluent in ebonics. The news
mentioned threats of a lawsuit for racial discrimination. I assume Al
Sharpton never got wind of the story, or he would've made a trip to
Rochester to spew his nonsense. I don't recall how it ended, but it did so
quietly. I suspect someone explained to the guy that if someone spoke only
Romanian, they would not have been considered for the job either. He was
probably a smart guy, but if you can't tell, than who cares?

Back to your president:

What indication do YOU have that his speech isn't telling the truth about
his intelligence? Please don't say "Yale".

 

......or behaving like a drunk in a bar.

 

......or behaving like a drunk in a bar.

 

Not my president - our president. We've had more than forty of them and
(excepting Lincoln) they were all our presidents. (I only voted for GWB the
second time around - in 2000 I wrote in a candidate.) Clinton was my
president too, although I never voted for him.

I was dubious about Bush's abilities until he had to deal with the
California electric power crisis in 2001. Governor Gray Davis of California
was lobbying Bush for tighter price caps on electricity at a time when
wholesale prices were running wild. Bush refused to do that (by executive
order) because it would make the situation worse. It wasn't obvious - I had
to think about it - but it was certainly true. Capping electric prices would
ensure there would be no increase in generation because the product would
probably have to be sold at a loss. Letting the reins go was painful for
everybody involved at the time, but it created a "gold rush" for new
generation that brought new power plants on line in record time. (Good
thing, too; historically the average time to complete a proposed plant is 15
years.) The utility I work for built two peaking plants in less than two
years.

For behind-the-scenes accomplishments (always a cheat for the president
responsible because reporters and commentators don't want to talk about
them) Bush helped put together the Israeli land concession to Palestine.
That the Palestinians threw away their chance by electing Hamas was too bad,
but the concession had the potential to stop the bleeding in one of the
hottest spots in the mid-east.

I am disappointed with Bush's performance in the last year or two, but we've
seen second term presidents get froggy before. My conservative friends
disapprove of my admiration for Franklin Roosevelt, but for sustained
leadership of the US he simply has no peers. Roosevelt and Reagan presided
over two amazing economic turnarounds and each deserves recognition. GWB
merely applied Reagan's principal of reducing tax burden to pull us out of a
relatively minor slump.

Mike

 

Not my president - our president. We've had more than forty of them and
(excepting Lincoln) they were all our presidents. (I only voted for GWB the
second time around - in 2000 I wrote in a candidate.) Clinton was my
president too, although I never voted for him.

I was dubious about Bush's abilities until he had to deal with the
California electric power crisis in 2001. Governor Gray Davis of California
was lobbying Bush for tighter price caps on electricity at a time when
wholesale prices were running wild. Bush refused to do that (by executive
order) because it would make the situation worse. It wasn't obvious - I had
to think about it - but it was certainly true. Capping electric prices would
ensure there would be no increase in generation because the product would
probably have to be sold at a loss. Letting the reins go was painful for
everybody involved at the time, but it created a "gold rush" for new
generation that brought new power plants on line in record time. (Good
thing, too; historically the average time to complete a proposed plant is 15
years.) The utility I work for built two peaking plants in less than two
years.

For behind-the-scenes accomplishments (always a cheat for the president
responsible because reporters and commentators don't want to talk about
them) Bush helped put together the Israeli land concession to Palestine.
That the Palestinians threw away their chance by electing Hamas was too bad,
but the concession had the potential to stop the bleeding in one of the
hottest spots in the mid-east.

I am disappointed with Bush's performance in the last year or two, but we've
seen second term presidents get froggy before. My conservative friends
disapprove of my admiration for Franklin Roosevelt, but for sustained
leadership of the US he simply has no peers. Roosevelt and Reagan presided
over two amazing economic turnarounds and each deserves recognition. GWB
merely applied Reagan's principal of reducing tax burden to pull us out of a
relatively minor slump.

Mike

 

I didn't vote for his father, but I was OK with calling him our president
because he was not a fool. I have disowned his son, though, because in his
own small mind, he is using faith as a reason to kill our soldiers. So, he's
your president, but certainly not mine. Faith has no place outside of family
life. When used to kill other people's kids, we're getting into a
constitutional problem, at least in the United States of America.

As far as his speech issues, we'll continue to differ on this. I have no way
of spending large amounts of time with GWB, so I don't know how he would
handle daily problems without a support staff. I do not believe he had much
to do with any positive events during his presidency.

 

I didn't vote for his father, but I was OK with calling him our president
because he was not a fool. I have disowned his son, though, because in his
own small mind, he is using faith as a reason to kill our soldiers. So, he's
your president, but certainly not mine. Faith has no place outside of family
life. When used to kill other people's kids, we're getting into a
constitutional problem, at least in the United States of America.

As far as his speech issues, we'll continue to differ on this. I have no way
of spending large amounts of time with GWB, so I don't know how he would
handle daily problems without a support staff. I do not believe he had much
to do with any positive events during his presidency.

 

Where is the $500,000.00 you owe, druggie Joey?

--
Scott in Florida

There ought to be one day-- just one--
when there is open season on senators.

Will Rogers (1879 - 1935)

 

Where is the $500,000.00 you owe, druggie Joey?

--
Scott in Florida

There ought to be one day-- just one--
when there is open season on senators.

Will Rogers (1879 - 1935)

 

I lost faith in GHW Bush when he refused to acknowledge he sold the 1991
economic policy to Congress in return for support in Desert Shield / Desert
Storm. I can accept realpolitik, but he lacked the guts to stand up and
admit it. Bush senior was never a strong leader.

As far as the Iraq war, there was never any doubt it was necessary. CIA
intel was the very least of it; UNSCOM had been driven out of Iraq even
after Tariq Aziz admitted to them the existence of enough botulinum toxin to
depopulate a continent and 8000 liters of VX - enough to fill 11 of their
standard chemical shells and kill up to a million civilians apiece in
crowded cities by devices deliverable by small airplanes or even cars. In
the final UNMOVIC report, days before the invasion, it was recognized there
was no evidence the VX had been destroyed as claimed nor any rationalization
of why that would have happened. When Russia told us the time is near it was
time to make the move. How would you feel about GWB if he had presided over
the slaughter of ten million Americans and allowed Saddam to hold himself up
as the one who could lead the Faithful everywhere to victory over the
unbelievers? Or would that have been a smart chance to take?

There also was never any doubt this is global Islamic revolution in
progress. Our infotainment sources tend to focus on the middle east while
the South Pacific and Africa go largely unnoticed. Iran has never made any
bones about declaring themselves to be the nucleus of Islamic revolution to
replace the last Caliph, who was deposed in 1924. Al Qaida publicly declares
their television programming to be "the Voice of the Caliphate." Saddam
occupied the seat of the Four Righteous Caliphs - Baghdad.

I'm sure you're right about all this being irreconcilable between us. In
case you're wondering, it doesn't diminish my opinion of you - you have
stood your ground well. I value worthy adversaries much more than I do
people who happen to agree with me without giving it any thought.

Mike

 

I lost faith in GHW Bush when he refused to acknowledge he sold the 1991
economic policy to Congress in return for support in Desert Shield / Desert
Storm. I can accept realpolitik, but he lacked the guts to stand up and
admit it. Bush senior was never a strong leader.

As far as the Iraq war, there was never any doubt it was necessary. CIA
intel was the very least of it; UNSCOM had been driven out of Iraq even
after Tariq Aziz admitted to them the existence of enough botulinum toxin to
depopulate a continent and 8000 liters of VX - enough to fill 11 of their
standard chemical shells and kill up to a million civilians apiece in
crowded cities by devices deliverable by small airplanes or even cars. In
the final UNMOVIC report, days before the invasion, it was recognized there
was no evidence the VX had been destroyed as claimed nor any rationalization
of why that would have happened. When Russia told us the time is near it was
time to make the move. How would you feel about GWB if he had presided over
the slaughter of ten million Americans and allowed Saddam to hold himself up
as the one who could lead the Faithful everywhere to victory over the
unbelievers? Or would that have been a smart chance to take?

There also was never any doubt this is global Islamic revolution in
progress. Our infotainment sources tend to focus on the middle east while
the South Pacific and Africa go largely unnoticed. Iran has never made any
bones about declaring themselves to be the nucleus of Islamic revolution to
replace the last Caliph, who was deposed in 1924. Al Qaida publicly declares
their television programming to be "the Voice of the Caliphate." Saddam
occupied the seat of the Four Righteous Caliphs - Baghdad.

I'm sure you're right about all this being irreconcilable between us. In
case you're wondering, it doesn't diminish my opinion of you - you have
stood your ground well. I value worthy adversaries much more than I do
people who happen to agree with me without giving it any thought.

Mike

 

You might find this interesting. Your library may have it:
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?z=y&EAN=9780393062113&itm=1

We're dealing with Northern Ireland in the Middle East, but Bush has no idea
of the similarities, and how he's botching it. This is because he does not
read.