July 11, 2018

This is the product of a massive and sophisticated propaganda machine

That's been running now for decades. It's not just FOX and hate radio, but the entire infrastructure of think tanks that come up with the talking points and propaganda messages.

They've managed to create a population of Pavlov's dogs numbering in the tens of millions, who are conditioned to believe and behave in any way they want. Millions more people are more subtly influenced, even liberals.

At minimum, we need to create our own infrastructure to begin combating this machine.

July 11, 2018

A sitting R president would certainly have made a gigantic stink out of it.

With the elected R legislators joining in, going to the media and holding press conferences, pissing and moaning about how unprecedented and unfair it was.

They would also use every procedural tactic that they could possibly come up with.

Might even do an astroturf "protest" movement, like they did with the teabaggers, when they were harassing and disrupting Dem town halls.

They very likely would have ended up getting their way. If not, at least no one would be able to accuse them of not trying.

July 10, 2018

Yes. It comes from think tanks funded by Koch bros and other shadowy billionaires.

They've been building this propaganda infrastructure for decades.

July 4, 2018

They need to open these facilities up for public inspection immediately

And there needs to be prosecutions where appropriate.

A Republican congressman was just refused entry to one of these facilities, and told that they would need two weeks notice before allowing him access.

The Red Cross has been refused access.

The most likely reason for this level of secrecy is that the conditions are so heinously bad that they would be recognized as crimes against humanity if they were known.

June 27, 2018

Maybe we're about as interesting to them as cockroaches are to us.

And about as desirable to get to know.

June 27, 2018

I think that sounds idiotically provincial.

It's more about a failure of imagination, and maybe a sort of neo Ptolemaic desire to see humanity as the center of the Universe.

I think the greatest likelihood is that we simply don't yet even remotely have the tools to seriously search for intelligent life outside our Solar system. I think that we probably can't believe conceive of the sorts of signals that more advanced life than our own might be putting out there, and probably couldn't even register them with our current technology.

I hate human arrogance.

June 7, 2018

This is what Planet Earth does.

There's really a kind of beauty to it.

It's too bad about the houses, and the nice vacation spot, but plate tectonics and vulcanism aren't just going to stop, just because there are humans on the planet now.

June 4, 2018

I don't know why they keep referring to it as an "accident".

It was a clearly a negligent discharge. I'm not even sure there's such a thing as an accident where firearms are concerned. It's just a way to allow gun owners to not take any personal responsibility.

December 12, 2017

I'm furious with Gillibrand.

I don't consider myself sexist (I'm a woman if that makes any difference).

I'm not upset with her for acting like a politician, or for going after power, I'm upset because she did it by stomping on the face of a fellow Dem.

I'm more upset with her than her colleagues because she chose to position herself as the ringleader. I would be just as upset with any man who did the same. I don't think it's feminist to go easy on someone just because they're female.

No matter the number, accusations that are highly questionable and mostly anonymous don't equal guilt. Or do you not think the R smear machine is capable of producing numbers of those sorts of accusations?

I hope the posters currently gloating over Franken's demise will be happy if, next year, we have Senator Pawlenty instead.

July 16, 2017

First of all,

Now that I've got that out of the way, it was not just introduced to canon last season. It was implied in the regeneration scene that introduced Matt Smith. Time Lord gender changes became canon in the Season 6 episode, The Doctor's Wife, with the discussion about the Corsair. The female incarnation of the Master was introduced in Season 8, (last season was Season 9). Last season showed an actual on air gender changing Time Lord regeneration.

It has never in the history of Doctor Who been established canon that Time Lords can't change gender. It just wasn't established canon that they could, and even back then, the idea was seriously considered and often teased.

So, it was always going to happen sooner or later, and it's been canon since 2011, and implied earlier than that.

I'm just extremely grateful that both Moffat and Chibnall are more progressive in their vision than many of the dudebro fans.