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Those yellow fake ribbon magnets, have a lot in common with urine.

As Slacktivist points out, under the current system, we're not the ones making the decisions, and we're not really involved in, or opting in to, the government's decisions.

TDIJ, that's the problem with your proposal. Opt-in government only works for those who can afford to opt-in. Starving college students, people trapped in minimum wage jobs, and the elderly can't afford to opt-in to their government, as much as they depend on it. The beauty of the New Deal and the welfare state is that it harnesses the wealth of those that have to support those that have not. As New Orleans has shown, a government that does not care for its neediest is a government not worthy of its mandate.

Just pretend nothing happened in 1776...

I don't think the inability of the destitute or just-getting-by to contribute is cause for dismissing the idea. (Maybe adding a $25.00 version. The truly destitute still couldn't manage it, but you'd be surprised how much more revenue it might generate.)

Should this idea be implemented, it wouldn't be the person in the rustbucket snarled at, it would be the guy in the Hummer.

Julia: Ugh, did you notice the "people wouldn't know where their donations are going" bit in the article? That one line pretty much trashes the whole concept -- even if I would have considered it before.

So; who needs to hear about it at the USO in order to start Phase 1?

So, as far as I can tell, they started out as a way to actually support the troops (and their families); later, of course, they became a way to cover up that paint scratch on your Hummer H2.

Support Our Ribbons

(I particularly like my friend's ribbon, though it is not in the least political.)

FWIW, a lot of the current deficit bonds are bought by the Chinese government. They buy them for reasons which are still a little... unclear.

Well, it's pretty easy math. If they sold War Bonds, there would be some people buying them. Of course the Libertarians wouldn't like them (or at least I'd guess this after seeing the "Bonds are not free money" boilerplate that always comes in my Voters Information Guide and is attributed to the Libertarians), but it's better than a magnet accessory.

Why have to choose? With very little extra effort and cost, War Bonds could be printed on magnetic material, and one could prove one Supported Our Troops by displaying one's bonds on the back of one's SUV.

Because people would steal them. And by people, I mean me.

My mom clearly remembers all the signs throughout her childhood exhorting people to do the patriotic thing and pick up hitchhikers.

“It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need and the air force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber.”

I think that sort of thing actually happens in Russia these days.

Oh, fuck:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1108972-1,00.html

'Prisoners were designated as PUCs (pronounced "pucks")—or "persons under control." A regular pastime at Camp Mercury, the report says, involved off-duty soldiers gathering at PUC tents, where prisoners were held, and working off their frustrations in activities known as "F____a PUC" (beating the prisoner) and "Smoke a PUC" (forced physical exertion, sometimes to the point of collapse). Broken limbs and similar painful injuries would be treated with analgesics, the soldiers claim, as medical staff would fill out paperwork stating the injuries occurred during capture. Support for some of the allegations of abuse come from a sergeant of the 82nd Airborne who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Human Rights Watch quotes him as saying that, "To 'F____ a PUC' means to beat him up. We would give them blows to the head, chest, legs, and stomach, pull them down, kick dirt on them. This happened every day. To 'smoke' someone is to put them in stress positions until they get muscle fatigue and pass out. That happened every day. Some days we would just get bored so we would have everyone sit in a corner and then make them get in a pyramid. This was before Abu Ghraib but just like it. We did that for amusement.

"On their day off people would show up all the time," the sergeant continues in the HRW report. "Everyone in camp knew if you wanted to work out your frustration you show up at the PUC tent. In a way it was sport. The cooks were all U.S. soldiers. One day a sergeant shows up and tells a PUC to grab a pole. He told him to bend over and broke the guy's leg with a mini Louisville Slugger that was a metal bat. He was the cook."'

For amusement. To work off frustration.

The Administration will try to rewrite the victory conditions, but if the goal of the war was to establish a stable, democratic Middle East, we've lost. When this report comes out we will have, and deserve, zero credibility as a source of democracy and a model of the rule of law.

It's all over but more years of misery and lies as our leaders drag things out to save face.

I have a warm regard for this sticker.

The magnets annoy me. It isn't that I dislike them, in specific, but I have no way to know which ones are sincere (in the way Linus hopes his pumpkin patch are sincere), and which ones are just there to be visible.

Which makes me sneer at all of them.

The problem with the bonds he mentions (for Louisiana, and presumably Rita) is that the people who are making the plans are, in their own words, planning huge social experiments, and of a sort they seem to be keeping from being clear, and which I, for one, mistrust.

I doubt the bonds for this are going to be trumpeted as, "Help us pay KBR and Blackwater".

TK

It's raised only US$600 since it was started earlier this month.

Compare that with how much private fundraising efforts have been able to pull together for rebuilding New Orleans.

MKK

I was rather proud of this one.

Please look at my post of 9/24 again, more carefully this time.

I was QUOTING from a news story.

The material in the quote marks ("") was copied from the story at the link I provided.

If the story is a lie, please take it up with TIME magazine.

Hmm...never posted before, fake email address, dumbass comment incoherently phrased. A difficulty of nomenclature: is 'troll' or 'internet fucktard' the correct term?

Hey, at least she thoughtfully started the disemvowelling process all by her little own self...

If anyone wants to really help the troops in Iraq, consider recycling your magnets with Magnets for Armor - http://www.magnetsforarmor.org

The magnetized ribbons may help to compensate for shortages of a critical high-tensile steel and ballistic glass for windshields and door windows.

Refrigerator magnets and others are useful too!
Send them to us:
Magnets for Armor
PO Box 122
Frostburg, MD, 21532