kimmy

It's Betsy's specialty. Insult people and spew ignorance, and when they react negatively, say "So much anger! You atheists hate Christians so much!" We don't hate Christians, Betsy, we just hate you. -k

yeahyeahyeah, but it's also got little fingers and little eyes. It can suck on its thumb and make funny faces. As inane as that sort of argument is, it's compelling to a lot of people because it affects people on an emotional level rather than an intellectual level. -k

When I read the title, I for some reason assumed it was about Dubya's mother, not his daughter. I don't know much about Barbara Bush at all; I don't know if she has ambitions of being a public figure of any sort... all I really recall about her is that she was the "other" Bush girl, the one who wasn't in tabloids for alcohol-related misadventures. I do recall, however, that Laura Bush was supportive of gay marriage (and spoke out on behalf of gay teens who've been targets of bulling, as well). So I don't think it's accurate to portray Barbara's statement as a departure from her parents. She differs with her dad, takes after her mom. Gay marriage generates an especially wide range of opinions because it has two axes (axises? axis? I dunno. an X and Y coordinate) that are not inherently linked. On the one hand, one's feelings about gay rights, and on the other, one's feelings about marriage. A person with very strong support for gay people in general might not support gay marriage in particular because he attaches a traditional meaning to the word marriage. A person with no particular interest in gay rights might take a "why not?" approach to gay marriage because he doesn't have any particular attachment to any specific definition of marriage either. I know an elderly woman who is gay who scoffs at the people demanding gay marriage, because she doesn't believe the significance of the word "marriage" is worth fighting over. "They could just call it 'pair-age' and be done with it," she said. My own attitude is similar... I'm strongly in favor of gays being treated equally, but have no attachment at all to the word "marriage" so I'm kind of at a loss as to why it's worth all the fuss. If "civil unions" had all of the rights and benefits of marriage, to me that's the important part. The word "marriage" has special significance to other people... that withered old fool Eureka who used to post here was very liberal in disposition, yet was strongly opposed to gay couples using the word "marriage", because he came from a generation where that word carried a special significance. -k

I would *LOVE* usage-based billing. Scrap the exhorbitant flat-rate fee I pay just to get on the network, and bill me for the bandwidth I actually use. That would be more than fair. While you're at it, give me a usage-based data option for my cell phone. Don't offer me some stupid plan where I pay $50 a month for some pathetically small amount of data. Only a low-grade idiot would buy a plan like that. Give me the opportunity to buy it by the megabyte, you dirtbags. If Canada had real competition, this wouldn't be an issue. People would already have any number of options. Since we've got these tiny little oligarchies running these industries, we consumers get dicked around like nowhere else in the world. Personally, I as a consumer support whatever is going to make Shaw and Telus and Bell and Rogers miserable. They deserve it. They're assholes, all of them. -k

I believe that since DiPietro left his own crease, there's no extra sanction against Johnson. Cooke is a piece of fecal matter. He's going to get what's coming one of these days, and it's going to be funny when it happens. I associate myself with the remarks of Evander Kane: Tough-guy Cooke decides to pick a fight with an 18 year old rookie and gets his head blasted clean off. Justice just doesn't get any more poetic, does it? DiPietro is one of the most fragile men on the planet. The moment he took off his gloves, you just knew he was going to get injured. -k

I'm just trying to understand why Christians are willing to lie to spread their "Truth". Doesn't it make Baby Jesus cry when people tell lies? -k

I think he's annoyed that a thread about this year's Oscar-nominated movie got derailed into yet another inane thread about The Who. It seems like there are already half a dozen The Who threads on this board, which is more than enough. -k

That book is as imaginary as the little story in your opening post. -k

That's what you get for buying SUPER LUCKY Hong Wing Pow Brand. -k

Betsy's uncle was a pile of dirt; her aunt was a piece of bone. -k

I don't think anyone should wear Uggs, August! You'll have to elaborate on why you don't think the system works. By the most obvious metrics-- good results for the largest number of students-- the system appears to work very well. Where the system may not work particularly well is for students who are not "typical". These proposals we're now seeing -- "afrocentric" schools, a school aimed at children from poor families-- appears to be an attempt to address that problem: we're good at dealing with "typical" kids but not very good at helping the exceptions. Do you have "choice"? I believe there are plenty of private schools, charter schools, and so on. There's also home-schooling. How would you give parents more "choice" in a "sustainable" manner? Give us an idea of what you'd like to see to make the system less "soviet". -k

I did watch Winter's Bone, and I think it's an incredible movie. The setting is amazing. It's almost like a foreign country with a completely alien culture. The movie creates a sense of the people and the place so convincingly that I almost felt like I had been there. I don't know if Jennifer Lawrence is an outstanding actress, or if it was just the result of a really compelling character and a really strong script. Whichever the case, I think Ree Dolly is one of the best movie characters I've seen in a long time, and I found myself really emotionally involved in her story. She's 17 and she's been given all of this to deal with, and she knows full well she's probably going to get hurt or killed but she pushes ahead anyway without a second thought, because her set of values simply doesn't permit anything else. The hopelessness of her situation was really depressing for me... the realization that even if she succeeds, she's still in a miserable situation. That she seems to accept that without a moment's thought about herself makes her either heroic or tragic, I'm still not sure which. Spending a couple of hours with Ree Dolly and her messed up extended family actually left me feeling a little rattled. I found that scene extremely unsettling to watch, probably in some part because she bears an uncanny resemblance to myself at that age. I think Peter Jackson just tried to do too much in the space of 2 hours. Michael Imperioli's detective role, in particular, didn't have much to do with the heart of the story and never really led anywhere. I also thought they spent too much time in her afterlife. I thought the Magritte/Dali surrealism was kind of cool, but I wasn't that interested in watching her running through fields or frolicking with her little friend in that afterworld. To me, the heart of the story was: -Susie watching her family try to carry on without her. -Susie watching her annoying little sister grow up to become the woman that she herself never got to become. -us, the viewer, wanting to see creepy-dude get what's coming. I thought that worked pretty well... it almost seemed like he was going to get away with it, didn't it? I never read the book, which I gather is widely beloved, but to me those were the elements of the movie that I thought were the strongest, and I think he could have made it a better film had he stayed more with those aspects. -k

Like you guys, I think the idea of niche-market schools is pretty stupid too... but just to play devil's advocate: Private schools where uniforms are required have argued that uniforms make life easier for the children by removing the stress and status issues and social issues attached to fashion and clothing. Hypothetically... could a "school for poor kids" benefit children in the same way? I mean, we'd like to think that when we send our kids to a public school they'll mix freely with people of all backgrounds... but everybody knows that in reality that cliques form along many different dividing lines, and economic status is probably a significant one. (I didn't have any "poor kids" in any clique I belonged to... but the schools I attended tended to be in pretty affluent areas.) -k

The only incandescent bulbs in my home are the ones inside my stove and my fridge. I use CFL bulbs in my fixtures and lamps, and I use LED floodlights in some directional lighting swivels in my living room. I'm very pleased with all of it, and wouldn't go back to incandescent. I've had a grand total of 1 CFL bulb fail. It went dim after about 3 years of daily use, with no flames, explosions, or any of that sort of thing. Of course, I buy bulbs from a reputable manufacturer (Philips) rather than buying SUPER LUCKY Hong Wing Pow Brand bulbs from the dollar-store. -k

"Acknowledge your white privilege... or I'm-a knock you out, bitch!" "I was cleaning it and it went off..." As you would expect, the hand of justice was swift and harsh, as Mr McIntyre was sentenced to 3 days of community service and a $50 fine. -k

However, it's interesting that the purveyors of this fiction, this modern-day Aesop's Fable, attached the magic name Albert Einstein to it. The "appeal to authority" fallacy is never more fallacious than when the authority in question never even said what is claimed. When he began to apply his theory of relativity to the universe at large, Einstein discovered he had a problem: how to explain how the universe was stationary? His theory said it couldn't be. He pondered the problem and came up with a "cosmological constant", a galactic fudge-factor that could explain why the universe could be stationary in spite of what his theory told him. Later, when astronomers proved that the universe isn't stationary but in fact expanding rapidly, Einstein called his "cosmological constant" the biggest blunder of his life. Why? Because he had modified his theory to accommodate a widely held assumption that turned out to be completely false. -k

Something positive can be created from nothing, provided a corresponding negative be created simultaneously. Reed Richards explained it in an episode of The Fantastic Four. That's why they always had to travel to the Negative Zone to fight menaces. -k

Canadian investors receive significant tax benefits for investing in Canadian ventures. If you invest your money in a Canadian enterprise, it's almost as if you never earned it in the first place as far as the tax man is concerned. If we lived in a purely free market, that money would have been taxed at the same rate that money that is spent on buying a new car or a new home, but instead it's an opportunity to reduce your taxes while potentially acquiring an asset. We already have that. We have any number of government grants and funding opportunities available for business, for everything from encouraging technological innovation and research and development to encouraging economic diversification to encouraging new industries in depressed regions. (it's not just new businesses, mind you... one need only look at the amount of cash that's been given to GM or Bombardier to name two.) Of course lower taxes would be great for businesses once they're actually at the stage of being profitable. But if lower taxes came at the cost of, say, ending the tax benefits that Canadian investors receive for investing in Canadian ventures, I doubt the overall effect is positive. Weigh the effect of higher tax rates on successful businesses against the number of ventures that are killed off by the obstacles that new businesses face, I think it's obvious where the real benefit is. -k

I think Wahlberg is better than people give him credit for. He tends to get a lot of blue-collar hero type roles, but he's capable of doing more. The last movie I saw him in was The Lovely Bones, and I thought he was really believable as the father who never emotionally recovers from his daughter's disappearance. (The Lovely Bones was kind of a trainwreck because Peter Jackson wanted it to be 5 different kinds of movies at the same time... but the cast was all very strong, particularly Wahlberg as the heartbroken father, Saorise Ronan as the main character, and especially Stanley Tucci as the creepy guy down the street.) Don't blame August... he cut-and-pasted that straight from the CBC article he linked to. I'm watching this movie later today. I've read nothing but good things about it. -k

Betsy is the internet's answer to that wild-eyed dude who stands on the street corner and hands out Jack Chick tracts. The easiest way to be left alone is to just take one, nod and smile, and move along quickly. -k

How many businesses in the formative stages pay tax at all? I believe that many businesses in this country, particularly ones that are young and small and without net income, pay very little tax at all. Is tax really what kills new businesses? I suspect that raising sufficient capital is probably the greatest obstacle to getting started. Other barriers to entry (difficulty in obtaining permits or regulatory listings, for example) are closely related. Convincing capable people to invest their talents in a risky venture. That's before you even get to market. Then you have the challenge of either convincing consumers that your new and revolutionary product or service is something they need, or prying customers away from established, experienced businesses who offer similar products or services with the advantages of an established reputation and customer base. I believe that Canadian tax laws are actually very generous to businesses in their formative stages. And I believe that by the time businesses actually have positive income to pay tax on, they're over the hardest part of the the journey. I don't at all believe that tax is what kills new businesses in Canada, so I don't believe low taxes would be more helpful than more practical assistance. I think that if help came in the form of assisting new companies in raising capital, speeding up regulatory processes, linking up with capable employees, identifying markets, that sort of thing... it would certainly be more valuable than lower taxes. -k

While the decision certainly was made by a non-government body, I would not be so quick to characterize it as an example of what you'd get in a "libertarian paradise". Was this decision made because they were afraid they'd lose listeners over the issue? Or was this decision made because they feared some sort of legal action if they rejected the complaint? Maybe they did this because they were afraid of ending up in some sort of Human Rights Commission action or civil rights lawsuit. Who actually made the decision. Was it made by business people who were concerned about their ratings? Or by some sort of legal advisor with an eye toward avoiding legal trouble? Or was it decided by some diversity consultant borrowed from a local university? In a real "libertarian paradise" there wouldn't be any need for a "CBSC" and each broadcaster would establish their own standards. I suspect that this organization's reason for being is the fact that government regulations do exist, and to assist member broadcasters in avoiding legal trouble with regulators. -k

Remember the thread where RickiBobbi was telling people that DaBears could win the Superbowl with Rex Grossman as quarterback? Jay Cutler did a great Rex Grossman impression this week... I only caught the 2nd half of the Steelers-Jets game, and based on how that went it's hard to believe that the game had been 24-0 at one point. I was hoping for the epic comeback, but no luck. I will be cheering for the Packers... I don't wish for anything good to happen for Ben Rapistberger. -k

Probably more than would succeed without the assistance. Which is, not surprisingly, why our own government goes to great lengths to assist Canadian entrepreneurs. (I suspect the US has many similar programs as well). One might argue that when it comes to entrepreneurship and small business (and maybe even not-so-small business) we're already a socialist state. -k