Re #56, Georgiana:I took a good look around and decided I did not want to keep having to fill out treatment plans that allowed three visits to a man who fell six stories down an elevator shaft and quit and started a new career.After reading this sentence through four times and parsing it differently each time, I gave up.
I can't guess why you'd blame the insurance company for letting you visit an accident-prone doctor (unless he was the only choice they allowed you), or for his choice to change careers.
And was his change of career from something else to medicine? Or from medicine to something else, denying you further visits beyond the third?
Or was the patient the man who fell down the shaft and quit and started a new career? Wouldn't the old insurance stop covering him when he quit, or soon thereafter? And wouldn't the new job's insurance decline to cover pre-existing injuries altogether, at least initially — or did this take place after the Clintons' health insurance portability act?
Or were you... well, I could keep asking, but by now you see the range and type of my confusion. Please help.
Patrick, you really can't figure out whether or not this was "meant as a jape"?As regular readers know, I'm a fan of some conspiracy theories. And so really, what could be a more compelling conspiracy theory than the plot to destroy the American newspaper, hatched -- in our imagination anyway -- by a secret cabal of bloggers and Web gurus meeting in a diner off Calle Ocho in Miami, then launching their assault on circulation from a Grassy Knoll somewhere in cyberspace?I thought those first two paragraphs made his japery open and aboveboard.
Except this is one conspiracy that can be easily debunked.
Re #280, Larry Brennan: Stage fright? (Page fright?)
“I don’t know how I’ll be able to drive it with my arm in a cast,†Bruce Lucent shoots back. “It’s lucky I wasn’t killed outright like so many people are when they have horrid automobile wrecks.â€That was written by Hugo Gernsback (reports of whose death were clearly premature), and I claim my five Quatloos!
“Fortunately, fast and efficient Emergency Medical Services, based on a program founded by Lyndon Baines Johnson the 36th President of the United States helped y’all survive an otherwise, deadly crash,†Isadore chuckled.
Re #53, Steve Buchheit:#50 Raven, "Steve, you're severely confused, and a poor speller."Steve, I'm sorry. I meant to be funny by saying that and then getting the words so wrong myself. Instead, all I managed to do was stick my clumsy foot in it, to be insulting and unfair and wrong. Please forgive me.
Sometimes more than others,...
Following up JBWoodford's #89: "Rules of Engagement?" is in From the End of the Twentieth Century, but not online, AFAICT.
Re #13, albatrossIt's creepy the way that, once you have a model of the world, your natural tendency is just to exclude stuff that doesn't fit.Early last century, Charles Fort wrote about this tendency over and over, starting with The Book of the Damned — the "damned" being reported and recorded events which didn't fit our understanding of how the world works, and which accordingly were simply omitted thereafter from official discussion or consideration.
A little essay by Loren Eiseley titled "The Hidden Teacher" (in his book The Unexpected Universe), also comes to mind. (It's summarized at the end of this webpage, after some other remarks worth mulling over; in fact, that whole site's worth exploring.)
Re #18, Jon Sobel — and #40, Laurence — and some commenters inbetween:
"Christianist" (like "Islamist") is intended to convey "someone who is not merely a member of the ______ religion, but determined to impose that religion on others, esp. as part of a group sharing that goal." This is a fairly clear distinction, and refers to real people and groups.
There are other terms for Christianists (some of which they themselves may use, like "Dominionists")... but "Christofascist" (like "Islamofascist") is a more provocative and less accurate term, and (like Rush Limbaugh's "Feminazi") is quickly seen as propagandistic.
It's worth noting that immediate physical violence is not an essential part of the "______ist" job description. Many simply want to use the standard political process to have the laws changed so that, for instance, American becomes legally a "Christian nation" and Biblical law becomes enforceable by courts — and then any violence upon gays, pagans, heretics, adulterers, etc., will be committed by the power of the state, not by their own hands.
Re #34, Steve Buchheit:No no no. This is a war against Islamofloutists, the evil villany of the world.Steve, you're severely confused, and a poor speller.
Islamoflautists play wind instruments, specifically flutes.
The evil violany of the world is perpetrated via stringed instruments, notably the villainous violas, and the base bass cellos. (Their manifestos are composed in villanelles.)
Mike, you can take it from there. Mike? Oh. Damn.
Adina, they've made the correction — which means the link in my #59 no longer backs me up.
Re #201, Michelle:
Another Big Name Author (whose identity will here remain a pronoun) accosted a woman rather taller than himself:HE: What would you say to a little f**k ?I've always liked Astra.
Astra: "Hello, little f**k." [sweeps majestically onward]
(So did a much nicer author, and I'm happy she made his last years more pleasant.)
Revisiting pegkerr's comment "He had the backbone of a rigorous classical education..."
How little anyone realized the extent of the truth in that remark.
As a small, almost unnoticeable in-joke, John M. Ford began his first published novel, Web of Angels, with a quote from Perkin Warbeck, a play by the English dramatist John Ford (whose dates are given as "1586 - c.1640?", note the question mark), "perhaps best known for the tragic play 'Tis Pity She's a Whore".
JMF himself wrote and performed in plays — How Much For Just the Planet? is a musical-comedy Star Trek novel, and Casting Fortune notably features the use of real magic in presenting stage plays. The two John Fords clearly had common interests.
But the truth has inadvertently slipped out: the two were in fact the same person: John M. Ford himself is also the author of 'Tis Pity She's a Whore. (If you don't believe me, click that link and see for yourself.)
So now the only question is... where will he show up next?
And notice that the CBW provided is not covered at all in that table. It addresses, as you noted, only "conventional weapons sales" — which very nicely excludes both CBW and the "dual use" equipment. Don't you think those types of supplies were chosen with that in mind? As for the previously-listed use of front groups, authorizing the release of stockpiled US weapons from other nations and NATO, bank manipulations, and other indirect assistance, under the counter — the Reagan/Bush team clearly understood both the need and the techniques for obfuscation and deniability. As if the Iran-Contra and S&L scandals hadn't adequately demonstrated that.
Re #125, Peter Erwin:Comments on who did or did not "arm" Iraq: There's a short summary on the aptly titled Wikipedia page Arms Sales to Iraq 1973-1990, from one one can see that the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact accounted for about 69% of the monetary total, follwed by France at 13% and China at 12%, with the US coming in at... 0.5%.The tempting thing about CBW is the kills-to-costs ratio, compared to "conventional" weapons. Mustard gas in the trenches, or sarin in the subways, the same incentives apply. That's why all the pressure "civilized" governments and international bodies can bring to bear is needed to provide disincentives, starve the practice and the trade, stomp them both out. But Reagan and Bush fed them under the table.
Re #54, pegkerr:
A wonderful telling, Peg, and I drank it in greedily, because I so much wanted to go, and it just wasn't possible.
One quibble, which I'll put here since I couldn't comment there.He had the backbone of a rigorous classical education — totally self-taught, mind you, since he dropped out of college probably because he was just ahead of everybody....Actually, he dropped out to go to New York because da Godfadder made him an offer he couldn't refuse: help start Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine.
Would you, or I, or anyone else here, have refused an offer like that — if we'd had Mike's abilities?
Comment on my ownThat would fit a Cold War viewpoint ("the Soviets" vs. "the West") — but not a Muslim viewpoint, to which the Soviets/Russians, Western and Eastern Europe, and the USA are all equally Ferengi (etymologically, "French").I forgot to include this as a parallel:
A tourist from the USA goes down a street in Latin America with a local guide. They pass a wall on which is painted in huge letters, "YANKEE GO HOME!" The guide starts to apologize to the tourist — who interrupts to say, "Oh, don't worry, I completely agree, I'm from Dixie myself."
(Above is my entry in "False Dichotomies" for 2006.)
But Patrick, but Patrick, haven't we always seen the distinction between "fan" and "pro"?
And you're a "pro", so — just like Forry Ackerman and Wilson Tucker and John M. Ford himself — it follows as the night the day that thou canst not be a "fan".
Ummmm... maybe I should have saved this a couple of weeks, until the sting had faded, and you had reached the point of weary resignation that would let you smile faintly with something resembling gallows humor....
Re #118, Dave Luckett: Fair enough, and credible since the rest of your statement fit Iran.
But then your #116's...Why, then, is its subsequent use of suicide bombers against its regional neighbour ascribed to despair caused by western hegemony and defeat at the hands of the west?... is inexplicably asked, because we've already discussed the answer.
As detailed above, Iraq was conducting CBW (chemical/biological warfare) against Iran, killing tens of thousands of Iranians, defeating them in battle with weapons acquired from "the West".
When saying ""Saddam was mostly equipped by the Soviets, and then by the Russians...", did you mean to exclude the Soviets/Russians from "the West"? That would fit a Cold War viewpoint ("the Soviets" vs. "the West") — but not a Muslim viewpoint, to which the Soviets/Russians, Western and Eastern Europe, and the USA are all equally Ferengi (etymologically, "French").
The Soviet occupation of Afghanistan also used CBW; it was another traumatic imposition by unbelievers upon Muslims, requiring jihad — which is (by definition) what the mujaheddin engaged in, from whom came al-Qaeda.
In a holy war, their religious authorities agree, martyrdom is surely blessed. Is it surprising that devout Muslims might seek it, or that parents might want their children to be blessed?
Saddam Hussein's Baathist government was secular, not Islamic — even though its members were personally Muslims — thus it was a non-Islamic government imposed on Muslims, intolerable to the Islamists. This is why Osama bin Laden, veteran of the Afghan anti-Soviet resistance, hated Saddam Hussein, and offered to help expel him from Kuwait.
But when the US-led coalition did it instead, American troops were left stationed in Saudi Arabia — also intolerable to someone like Osama bin Laden, himself a Wahhabi and expatriate of that "holy land". This was the specific offense he cited in declaring jihad on America. That made the 9/11 suicide missions "martyrdom".
I get the impression you think Israel is the central complaint of Islamists. But it's merely one more (though glaring) example of non-Islamic intrusion — along with the overthrow of Iran's Mossadegh, the Soviets in Afghanistan, Iraq's Baathists vs Iran, and then the Americans in Saudi Arabia.
Until, of course, Bush "cut and ran" — withdrew American troops from Saudi Arabia — to boast thereafter that his heroic actions had prevented further attacks on American soil.
#116, Dave Luckett:... the first use of suicide bombers was by Iraq .... [emphasis added]No, it was by Iran.
Please tell me that, unlike the President of the United States, you know the difference.
Confirmed and fixed links for #223, Paula Lieberman:
"Old Sturbridge Village" is indeed http://www.osv.org/ ;
http://www.bostoncentral.com/events/tour/p1129.php
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2006 | 127 |
| 2004 | 15 |
Total: 142 comments. View all these comments on a single page.
The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Raven:
Show all comments by Raven.