Politics: A new beginning

[rufus leeking]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Article including this ......."speeches citing Teddy, who is surely one of W's primary political nemeses,"

where else but Mass. could someone be delusional enough to think TK is still a primary anything*. That having Teddy say he is against you gets you votes is one of the few certainties in American Politics.

*except once, when I was at a free food expo in one of the Senate office buildings called Taste of Oklahoma- he was the primary cause the serving line moved slow

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
The Straight Dope had a definitive list of Niagaranauts and their various fates, but its website seems to be malfunctioning today.

As the Straight Dope website came back up, the definitive list of Niagaranauts since Annie Taylor first did it in 1901:

• Annie Edson Taylor, a plump 63-year-old schoolteacher who claimed to be in her early 40s. She used a four-and-a-half-foot oak barrel packed with inflated pillows, a mattress, and an anvil (for ballast). Her ride was fairly uneventful, apart from the fact that she plunged roughly 170 feet over the falls in the middle of it; she was fished out 75 minutes after she'd gone in, bruised and shaken but alive. (She reportedly told onlookers, "No one ought ever do that again.") As with many Niagara daredevils, her feat earned her fame but not fortune--she made a meager living afterward posing for pictures with her barrel, and died broke.
  
• Bobby Leach, steel barrel, 1911. The first man to go over the falls, he survived, only to die 15 years later after slipping on an orange peel in Christchurch, New Zealand.
  
• Charles Stephens, oak barrel, 1920. Stephens also brought an anvil for ballast, but he strapped it to his feet. When the barrel hit the water at the base of the falls, the anvil kept going, breaking through the bottom lid and taking most of Stephens with it (his right arm was found still strapped in).
  
• Jean Lussier, 760-pound rubber ball reinforced with steel bands, 1928. Survived.
  
• George Stathakis, 2,000-pound barrel, 1930. The barrel was trapped behind and beneath the falls for more than 14 hours; Stathakis suffocated.
  
• William "Red" Hill Jr., 13 heavy-duty inner tubes lashed together with canvas webbing and fishnet, 1951. Died.
  
• Roger Woodward, 1960. Not technically one of the 15, because he used no barrel and didn't mean to go. Roger was seven years old at the time, and he's still the only person known to have gone over the falls unprotected and live.* (He'd been in a small boat that developed engine problems and capsized upriver.) Observers speculated that he'd survived because his life jacket and light weight brought him back to the surface quickly after the initial plunge.
  
• Nathan Boya, 1,000-pound steel-frame sphere covered in rubber and sheet metal, 1961. Survived.
  
• Karel Soucek, metal and plastic barrel, 1984. Survived. Killed the following year attempting a 180-foot barrel drop into a water tank in front of 45,000 at the Houston Astrodome.
  
• Steve Trotter, two plastic pickle barrels surrounded by inner tubes and covered with a tarp, 1985. Survived; repeated in 1995 with Lori Martin. First coed team.
  
• Dave Munday, aluminum and plastic barrel, 1985. Survived; repeated in 1993 in a converted diving bell. First person to go over twice.
  
• Peter DeBernardi and Geoffrey Petkovich, ten-foot steel barrel, 1989. Survived. First team.
  
• Jessie Sharp, kayak, 1990. Presumed dead, body not found.
  
• Robert Overacker, jet ski, 1995. Died. Rocket-assisted parachute deployed at brink of falls as planned, but wasn't tethered to his back.

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030718.html

*Obviously no longer an exclusive honor.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Rocket-assisted parachute deployed at brink of falls as planned, but wasn't tethered to his back.

Ouch. Was he a Red Sox fan?

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Sure there has, even on an annual basis.

May I refer you to p. 269 (warning: large pdf of Economic Report of President not suitable for dialup). Real GDP declined for two consecutive years from 1973-75, from 1979 to 1980, 1981 to 1982, 1990 to 1991, and in Q1 and Q2 of 2001. See also p. 274 (for percentage changes).

We can quibble over the definition of recession, but we've definitely had them--in the form of negative real growth--several times in the past 30 years.

Thanks, Burger -- I diagreed, but was too lazy to look it up. Too many young people these days have a very limited knowledge of even recent American history. I venture to say that this "Bush IIrecession" is the only one young club can remember. [He's clearly too young to remember the"Reagan recession" or even the "Bush I recession"].

S_A_M

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Ouch. Was he a Red Sox fan?

No -- a student of Wile E. Coyote, SUUPER-GENIUS.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
Thanks, Burger -- I diagreed, but was too lazy to look it up. Too many young people these days have a very limited knowledge of even recent American history.

S_A_M

The thing is with this recession/non-recession is that it seems worse than it is. It's like cruising along the highway at 90mph, and then you reach a town and have to slow down to 55. It feels like you're crawling, even though 55 is still pretty fast. We got a little too comfortable with 6% growth and 4% unemployment, and now 2% growth and 6% unemployment feel recessionary, even though by historical standards the growth is decent and unemployment low.

[Connect_the_Dots]

http://www.heritage.org/Research/Budget/BG1660.cfm

I have been too busy to follow along today, but I was PMed yesterday that someone was going to post some (more) specific numbers about estate tax that would make me look bad(der). I did a little googling yesterday for some ammo, but couldn't find what I was looking for, but did come accross the above article. It takes both republicans and dems to task for their fiscal foibles and economic ignorance. It is worth a read if you have some time.

[spree: 10 Myths about Taxes, Spending and Deficits]

[Bil Mo']

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
The thing is with this recession/non-recession is that it seems worse than it is. It's like cruising along the highway at 90mph, and then you reach a town and have to slow down to 55. It feels like you're crawling, even though 55 is still pretty fast. We got a little too comfortable with 6% growth and 4% unemployment, and now 2% growth and 6% unemployment feel recessionary, even though by historical standards the growth is decent and unemployment low.

The other thing about this recession is that it leaves us all more time to post here.

So who feels the recession?

[Say_hello_for_me]

Maybe it just came out:

http://www.msnbc.com/news/984341.asp?0cv=CA01

The head of the Pentagon's muslim chaplain advisor's program was indicted as a backer (beyond cheerleading) of Osama and Hamas.

Just a FWIW, FYI.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
Maybe it just came out:

http://www.msnbc.com/news/984341.asp?0cv=CA01

The head of the Pentagon's muslim chaplain advisor's program was indicted as a backer (beyond cheerleading) of Osama and Hamas.

Just a FWIW, FYI.

It was the lead on the news Wed. night. At least on NBC, which obtained the tapes.

But I'm not sure the story is front-page material. Obviously it's not good, and it reveals that supporters of terrorism are able to work their way well into the government. But at least he wasn't off in Iraq fighting (or not).

I'm guessing there's some reluctance to run with the story because they inherently convey the idea that "you can't trust muslims anywhere," which is probably not a sentiment many people want to have ascribed to them.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Charles Krauthammer tells everyone to leave Gregg Easterbrook alone.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Charles Krauthammer tells everyone to leave Gregg Easterbrook alone.

I sympathize. I has a Jewess accuse me of anti-semitism based on a thoughtless comment, that was contrary to ever part of my fibre.

In college my best friend/apartment mate was Jewish, and he was always making Jewish jokes. After summer break I got to our new place first. I taped a sign to the wall outside the bathroom that said "SHOWERS" with SS symblols and an arrow pointing to the shower .

What I didn't know was his mom would help move him in. She didn't think it was funny at all. In fact, she decided I was a hateful asshole, although she knew from our history that I was not anti-Jewish.

I mean just 3 weeks before she had caught me and her 18 year old daughter semi-nude on the couch when she back early one night. Is that the act of an anti-semite? Plus, I always welcomed their hospitality- if I hated them would I have gone over there and drank 5 or 6 of their beers before heading out to the bar all those nights? No!

None of these facts about my real feelings helped her realize she should forgive me.

So, my point is, you just got to be careful about making dumb bigoted statements.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
But I'm not sure the story is front-page material. Obviously it's not good, and it reveals that supporters of terrorism are able to work their way well into the government. But at least he wasn't off in Iraq fighting (or not).

I'm guessing there's some reluctance to run with the story because they inherently convey the idea that "you can't trust muslims anywhere," which is probably not a sentiment many people want to have ascribed to them.

I disagree. There have been all sorts of stories on the prosecution of American Muslims for supporting terrorism -- and as to a PC motivation for not highlighting this story -- let's just say that I've heard the most thorough coverage on this issue from NPR.

I think that the messages and reactions from this story is not so much "You can't trust Muslims" as (1) "Holy shit! an active duty Army officer is an active supporter of al Qaeda!" and (2) "Holy Shit -- not only didn't the Army know, but they let him into Gitmo to communicate with the prisoners! What kind of security and background checks do they run before they give someone a TS clearance (I'll bet he had one) and a sensitive job like that?"

I thintk reactions (1) and (2) are why the right and the Admin aren't eager to talk about this story. Just like, according to Congressional Republicans the CIA is completely at fault for the intelligence "lapses" on iraq. No one from 1600 Penn.

S_A_M

[Tyrone Slothrop]

If Clinton said this a few years ago, conservatives would be apoplectic:

• We see a China that is stable and prosperous, a nation that respects the peace of its neighbors and works to secure the freedom of its own people.

But no, that would be President Bush, speaking this week to the Australian parliament.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

As reported by FOX, Rumsfeld's private views:

• It is pretty clear that the coalition can win in Afghanistan and Iraq in one way or another, but it will be a long, hard slog.

His words, not mine.