tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-54510992012-02-01T20:54:58.195-05:00where i blather on about stuff and you read it and like itupyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comBlogger53421100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-79301870890923159772012-02-01T17:57:00.000-05:002012-02-01T14:06:39.131-05:00

since construction began in the 1990s, the west bank separation barrier has been controversial. the critics slammed the wall, which in places extended deep into the west bank to encompass various settlements, as nothing but a land grab, to create a de facto border seizing palestinian land to improve israel's position at the bargaining table. the other side, claimed that the barrier wasn't related

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-87628322544831374832012-02-01T08:54:00.005-05:002012-02-01T20:54:58.203-05:00

it's not just that i disagree with the politics behind the move. putting aside my thoughts about the abortion issue, i think the komen foundation made a really stupid move. part of their success is that the organization was not entangled in partisanship or the culture wars. most people, from every corner of the political spectrum, have friends or loved ones who have fought the breast cancer. the

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-44467268429577383022012-02-01T08:44:00.001-05:002012-02-01T10:52:42.627-05:00

if this is true, why isn't there more news coverage coming out of "liberated syria"? when rebels took control of benghazi, libya, al jazeera quickly set up operations there and western news organizations quickly followed their lead. so why is coverage of syria still limited by the assad regime's refusal to issue visas to journalists? i'm guessing that the opposition is exaggerating things a bit.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-10604588434567391712012-01-31T20:32:00.005-05:002012-02-01T12:51:55.891-05:00

now that that's over, romney can go back to not caring about hispanics.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-28281735044093353762012-01-31T08:28:00.000-05:002012-01-31T09:43:53.362-05:00

stephen walt splashes some cold water on bergman article from sunday's NYT magazine. really all walt is asking is that we keep in mind the motives of the people being quoted. people have been predicting that israel is about to attack iran every year for the past decade. as i said earlier, an israeli strike on iran is more likely in 2012 than it has been before (but that's more about iraqi

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-11442688245286566382012-01-30T20:09:00.000-05:002012-01-30T20:09:08.009-05:00

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-86725315609500923392012-01-28T15:29:00.000-05:002012-01-28T15:29:53.495-05:00

ali abdullah saleh resigned months ago and yet news articles continue to call him "president". i'm not faulting the news organizations. it's hardly clear whether the resignation was real. i just find it interesting thato any articles just seem to assume that the "resignation" was basically horseshit. saleh is both president and a former president, depending on who is talking about him.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-25803513872860810212012-01-27T08:38:00.001-05:002012-01-27T09:52:39.825-05:00

last night, after seeing josh marshall's post that "I think this debate is a bigger mess than any of the previous one", i actually tuned in for a bit. man, that was terrible. maybe i didn't see the good bits. i did see the part where the palestinian american identified himself as a republican and asked what the candidates would do for the palestinian cause. mitt's answer was that everything bad

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-74760623182860965972012-01-26T17:43:00.000-05:002012-01-26T14:05:13.971-05:00

awesome: Newt would show up at the campaign headquarters with an empty bucket in his hand — that was a symbol of some sort for him — and I never did know what he was doing or why he was doing it, and I’m not certain he knew either.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-34154856747754640492012-01-26T08:41:00.005-05:002012-01-26T16:52:04.851-05:00

the this american life episode i mentioned two weeks ago has both prompted a response from apple, and has gotten the NYT to start reporting on the labor practices that produce apple products. this comes just as apple posted record profits. apple's $13.1 billion is the second most profitable quarter for any company anywhere in all of recorded history and it has made apple the most valuable u.s.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-77015608022629940532012-01-26T08:35:00.004-05:002012-01-26T16:54:13.809-05:00

i've been a sci fi geek for as long as i remember. so it kills me a little inside to come out as anti-permanent moon base. but that's where i am. i just don't see what is to be gained from having one. sure, there are probably lots of unforeseen benefits to a crash program to establish a moon base. the apollo space program resulted in all kinds of technological advances that no one expected.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-58703810024286506092012-01-24T20:21:00.002-05:002012-01-25T10:31:38.696-05:00

well lookit that! it's time for my annual post about how much i dislike the state of the union address. or not. what could i possibly say now that i haven't whined about in any of my eight prior posts? except i've even already said that, i already talked about how i've already aired all my complaints in prior posts in last year's post. have my state of the union whines reached a new

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-2426579888624662412012-01-24T17:42:00.000-05:002012-01-24T16:21:07.122-05:00

believe it or not, it looks like this site is not a parody. and so a bunch of teatards, who are probably unaware that prior to 1921 the u.s. did not bar anyone (other than chinese people and other asians) from legally settling in the u.s. because they were from a foreign country, might go ahead and "deport" themselves to some place they have never been before.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-86677615597592838782012-01-24T08:34:00.003-05:002012-01-24T10:58:05.675-05:00

it also bans stem cell research, which is much less funny.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-20883165111038083092012-01-23T19:58:00.000-05:002012-01-23T19:58:22.561-05:00

i guess in the post-citizens united world, you can't run a successful national political campaign without a patron.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-76563557435241846862012-01-23T08:33:00.002-05:002012-01-23T11:06:38.485-05:00

i'm still convinced that romney will ultimately be the GOP nominee. putting aside the fact that newt is simply too good to be true, eventually republicans are going to notice stuff like this, people like barney frank saying "I never thought I’d live such a good life that I would see Newt Gingrich be the nominee of the Republican party.," or this widely disseminated photo on facebook: when push

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-87548732784983136902012-01-21T20:38:00.003-05:002012-01-21T20:56:33.690-05:00

just a couple of days ago, it looked like the republicans were finally getting around to settling for romney. it's been obvious all along that is what they would do eventually. but then just a few days ago. there was another shift in the winds and newt began his surge through south carolina. so why did is this twice written off widely disliked disgraced former speaker once again threatening

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-66276702989747969152012-01-20T17:16:00.001-05:002012-01-21T13:20:22.802-05:00

romney has a point. an ethics report about a would-be president is even more relevant than the candidate's personal tax returns. err, never mind.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-77052774337753164072012-01-19T20:59:00.001-05:002012-01-19T20:59:17.775-05:00

unsurprisingly, the favorite to win the GOP nomination has not yet heard about the end of the soviet union (or for that matter, the hyper-capitalism of modern china)

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-26354593348629388952012-01-19T00:01:00.004-05:002012-01-19T00:01:00.197-05:00

sometimes i don't post anything all day as part of a massive web-based boycott to protest stupid legislation that threatens the internet as we know it. and sometimes i don't post anything all day because i don't feel like it.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-40564975801656304532012-01-17T20:27:00.003-05:002012-01-17T20:34:59.714-05:00

TPM highlights this exchange:Blitzer: On this specific issue of Erdogan and the other turkish leaders, in your words they’re Islamic terrorists? Are you saying that? Perry: I say if they are treating their citizens that way, that they approach that terminology. When you allow for honor killings, wolf — I mean, I hope you’re not defending honor killings as an appropriate act in any country, much

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-4558093813056104992012-01-17T08:35:00.005-05:002012-01-17T13:18:46.432-05:00

one thing i wish got reported more often is the reaction to off-the-cuff ignorant remarks by american politicians about foreign countries by the people who live in that country. a related issue is the persistent double standard about how we talk about other nations. american candidates regularly and openly discuss which foreign countries they want to attack. but if a foreign leader or potential

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-67420629358777389672012-01-17T08:21:00.002-05:002012-01-17T15:47:41.172-05:00

the article mentions (as many others have before) that queen elizabeth is "one of the world’s richest women". it also mentions how she "shed a tear" when the british government took away her last yacht in 1997. if she misses having a yacht so much, why does she need british taxpayers to buy one for her? maybe being the queen means that she isn't really in control of how her wealth is spent?

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-67873084106284874962012-01-16T18:07:00.001-05:002012-01-16T16:07:33.025-05:00

download the whole thing

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-88968006210772462502012-01-16T17:46:00.001-05:002012-01-16T14:53:04.562-05:00

this makes no sense. i thought under the post-citizens united regime, superPACs are supposed to be third party entities that don't coordinate with any campaigns, even when they essentially act as one of the campaign's hired guns. so how can the campaigns agree for the superPACs to hold their fire without coordinating with them? if the superPACs are really acting independently and aren't taking

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-37746597191367441772012-01-16T08:56:00.003-05:002012-01-16T12:08:23.493-05:00

as glomarization pointed out on FB, a federal district court has implicitly held that rick perry, rick santorum, newt gingrich, and jon huntsman are "[f]ringe candidates and crackpots" (see the top of page 12 (pdf)). however they do get to be called "honorable" in the caption.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-90084460806324098072012-01-16T08:42:00.006-05:002012-01-16T13:59:56.065-05:00

The Colbert Report Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive yeah, i know everyone posted this already. but it's really too great not to post. i just wish embedded comedy central videos played on iOS devices.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-60915220404957242942012-01-16T08:32:00.021-05:002012-01-16T14:27:18.160-05:00

as i sat on my semi-empty train to work this morning, i realized that i have never had martin luther king day off (at least i've never had a day off because it was martin luther king day). MLK day became a federal holiday through an act of congress that was signed by the president in 1983 but didn't go into effect until january 1986. in january 1983, i was in 7th grade. even though the law

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-10543244091147104682012-01-16T07:16:00.001-05:002012-01-16T08:53:45.737-05:00

as you've probably heard, huntsman is out. poor guy. he's the only one of that arbitrary group of "major candidates" (i.e. the ones who were invited to the debates) who never got a turn to be deemed a "front runner." which is pretty pathetic when you consider what a gang of yahoos it was. as Tim F said, huntsman was betting in the fact that there were still a significant number of sane

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-26915899243294092642012-01-11T20:54:00.002-05:002012-01-11T21:00:58.658-05:00

i must admit, i felt a little sick listening to this week's TAL episode on my iphone. now i'm posting about it from my ipad. if you use any apple products, or actually any electronic product at all (or at least one that was made in the past decade), you really should listen to it. (mike daisey's blog is here)

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-50428790413898007682012-01-11T17:43:00.000-05:002012-01-11T15:03:25.804-05:00

a lot of the reasons the world used to be cooler seem to involve animals. (via elayne)

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-63220075613765045282012-01-11T08:37:00.002-05:002012-01-11T14:19:23.687-05:00

via memeorandum, i see that ron paul is getting a big head after his second place finish in the new hampshire primary  yesterday (i don't remember him asking everyone but santorum to drop out when ricky essentially tied romney in iowa). but i wonder how much yesterday's results can be attributed to the free state project. the free state project was started in 2001 by libertarians who were tired

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-26589176596805876052012-01-10T17:45:00.002-05:002012-01-10T17:00:25.147-05:00

touchdown jesus quicksand jesus smited by lightning bolt jesus! (via glomarization on FB)

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-47027282670378719262012-01-10T08:31:00.000-05:002012-01-10T09:18:02.153-05:00

i understand why mittens and other demagogues on the right want to frame the issue that way, but is it really putting "free enterprise on trial" when you question the behavior of a particular individual within a free enterprise system? supporting the overall system does not mean you have to approve of everything anyone might ever do within that system. is that too complicated a distinction for

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-39055035277265116802012-01-10T07:53:00.001-05:002012-01-10T08:59:39.077-05:00

starting tomorrow, we can all go back to thinking that new hampshire is a small relatively insignificant state for another three years.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-34118400957641719972012-01-09T20:09:00.001-05:002012-01-09T20:10:26.811-05:00

the psychic monkey has spoken. once again the lesson is that everybody hates mittens, even grampa the psychic monkey. (via the ex-blogger roxpop)

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-25864606792477776382012-01-09T17:30:00.001-05:002012-01-09T16:38:08.382-05:00

it's amazing how after not posting for just a few days, it already seems like i haven't written anything here for forever. and yet, even with my recent lack of posts, the column of posts on the left side hasn't yet grown shorter than the column of links on the right. (thanks to all those long-winded posts around new years) so i guess i still have time before i can be officially charged with blog

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-59693550022599964062012-01-06T17:50:00.000-05:002012-01-06T13:50:51.186-05:00

...but the PBGC pays a company's unfunded pension liabilities from its own funds, not from the u.s. treasury. so it's not really accurate to say that "the taxpayers lost", at least not in the sense that the PBGC payments were taxpayer funded. as the wikipedia entry notes, the PBGC is funded mostly by premiums paid by ERISA-regulated defined benefit pension plans, with some funding also coming

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-63064172204406637982012-01-06T08:43:00.001-05:002012-01-06T11:17:12.363-05:00

this is why people should not say that mitt romney won the iowa caucuses. i'm not saying that because edward true's error shows that santorum really won it by 12 votes instead of romney by 8. i'm saying that because when the margin is that close, we don't know who got the most votes. every vote has some degree of human error. just about everything that humans do have errors. people make mistakes

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-31821491726474179372012-01-05T17:43:00.004-05:002012-01-05T22:52:39.102-05:00

this crazy conspiracy theory seems unmoored even for a conspiracy theory. i mean, birthers may be nuts, but if they were right (that is, if the president really weren't born in the u.s. and if the law would not automatically grant him citizenship through his mother no matter where he was born), then obama would not be eligible to be president of the united states. if, on the other hand, obama had

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-10976965387918218312012-01-05T08:56:00.001-05:002012-01-05T11:51:13.504-05:00

while i don't blame herman cain for trying, the only real question is whether the media pulls another palin and continues to pay a lot of attention to the guy even though he has no real chance of ever holding a political office. surely there is a saturation point for these kind of useless media darlings. they can't give cain a full-palin while also palining palin, can they?

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-3921339916604071822012-01-05T08:42:00.000-05:002012-01-05T11:30:48.045-05:00

as ismail haniyeh does his tour of the middle east. i keep wondering how he got out of gaza. i assume he crossed into egypt at rafah (rather than through the various crossings into israel). but that means that egypt let him pass, which itself is significant. and i wonder if there will be another standoff when he tries to come back, like there was in 2006.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-69247800735516468792012-01-05T08:38:00.001-05:002012-01-05T09:13:58.601-05:00

alfie lopez is about to be a delegate in the VA general assembly?

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-16645794566687166832012-01-04T08:24:00.001-05:002012-01-04T15:14:14.187-05:00

it looks like things are rapidly wrapping up, with some of my favorites hinting that they will drop out. i guess the question is where the perry and bachmann supporters will go. they are probably around 15% of the primary/caucus voters. i doubt if paul will get many. and as two not-romney candidates, mittens probably won't get them either. which means ricky and newt may end up with a small boost.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-10107838325751184212012-01-03T20:39:00.005-05:002012-01-04T09:05:45.546-05:00

i predict that buddy roemer, who is still running tho nobody knows it, will get fewer votes than herman cain, who has effectively dropped out. buddy might even get less than "no preference." UPDATE (1/4/2012): and herman beats buddy with almost double the votes (58 cain to 31 roemer)! and no preference creams them both at 135.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-4159633612201204272012-01-03T17:54:00.000-05:002012-01-03T13:54:37.822-05:00

it is remarkable how little the W comes up in the current GOP presidential race. it is a testament to how president bush has become quietly discredited, in the eyes of many republican voters, even if the party leadership has never actually said so. on the other hand, most of bush's most controversial policies (e.g. indefinite detention, guantanamo, the wars in afghanistan and iraq, tax cuts,

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-16584379609253925352012-01-01T20:40:00.000-05:002012-01-01T21:13:07.942-05:00

here, in no particular order, are my predictions for the coming year. as always, the following is what i think is likely to happen and not what i necessarily want to happen: 1. the republican party nomination fight will end no later than the day after "super tuesday" (super tuesday being march 6th, i mean march 7th) 2. mitt romney will be the republican presidential candidate. 3. mitt not pick

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-7622322766659217952011-12-31T23:59:00.295-05:002012-01-01T20:44:26.398-05:00

one year ago, i posted 22 predictions for 2011. wanna see how naive and foolish i was back then? i do too. so here goes. 1. president obama's approval ratings will be roughly the same (within the margin of error) on december 31, 2011 as they were on december 31, 2010 (for the purposes of measuring success in this prediction, i will use the gallup daily presidential job approval poll and for

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-7808294296415727042011-12-31T14:33:00.002-05:002011-12-31T18:09:04.917-05:00

yesterday (or maybe today) samoa moved from one side of the international date line to the other. on that island december 30, 2011 never happened and december 29th slid right on over to december 31st. presumably they chose that date because they wanted the change to become effective with the new year, but they didn't want to erase the new year's holiday in the process. so why didn't they just

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-25777988626095807202011-12-31T13:23:00.003-05:002011-12-31T15:44:31.499-05:00

i usually keep my new year's resolutions. most people don't. i'm convinced that my success has less to do with my willpower than they way that i come up with my resolutions. and so, by request of no one, here are my thoughts on getting a good new year's resolution. the typical new years resolutions is something like "i will lose x pounds" or "i will finally finish reading that book.'" the

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-24420025990385054922011-12-30T08:39:00.002-05:002011-12-30T09:42:49.949-05:00

it's hard to argue with this. sorry santa...

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-73946759054217540562011-12-29T17:26:00.000-05:002011-12-29T13:27:04.005-05:00

check out this average of polls for iowa. the yellow line is the only one with a clear upswing. could this finally be the long-promised santorum surge?

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-3252968193167194972011-12-29T08:51:00.009-05:002011-12-29T15:50:51.800-05:00

watching a bunch of americans rap in a language they don't know. the song title, "men kazakhpyn", means "i am kazakh". which i guess is what makes it extra funny. people singing "men kazakhpyn" seems to have replaced "qara zhorga" dance videos as the current kazakh youtube fad.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-4063872342071698652011-12-29T08:43:00.001-05:002011-12-29T09:23:29.445-05:00

how exactly did the catholic church, which on paper at least is about a whole variety of issues, become little more than an anti-abortion/anti-gay organization in this country? i don't get it. the church has all kinds of stances about things like income inequality, social justice, the death penalty, labor rights, aid to the poor, etc. but these days if i see an article about the catholic church

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-72618096527887667752011-12-29T08:33:00.000-05:002011-12-29T08:55:19.159-05:00

so much for that theory.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-27187065224445268232011-12-28T08:40:00.000-05:002011-12-28T09:48:16.451-05:00

i was a little suspicious whether observer missions like the arab league's current one in syria do any good anymore. in ye olden tymes, observer missions had value even if they didn't do anything but show up and report what they saw. that's because the missions would place outside eyes in a troubled region, threatening to tell the world if they found anything nasty and thus deterring regimes from

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-77206622712084176472011-12-27T17:36:00.002-05:002011-12-27T13:59:16.296-05:00

what i've never understood about north american union-based conspiracy theories, is why a single country comprised of a merged u.s., canada and mexico would be so scary. obviously, if the resulting country were an oppressive dictatorship, that would be scary. but that's because i don't want to live under a dictatorship, not because the geography would include places that are currently in mexico

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-85330979930786617042011-12-27T08:41:00.003-05:002011-12-27T10:29:23.968-05:00

good news for ron paul: with possibility that he might win in iowa, the media is finally starting to pay serious attention to him. bad news for ron paul: the media is finally starting to pay serious attention to him.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-27450605840666433482011-12-27T08:32:00.002-05:002011-12-27T09:13:32.790-05:00

more and more i am seeing the debt crisis in europe as a relatively straightforward wealth transfer. investors bet on the greek economy (i.e. bought greek bonds) and lost. rather than take their losses, the political system is coming to their aid and are forcing other people to pay for the investor's mistake. no default will happen, investors will get the full returns for the bonds they bought,

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-12761871449759332752011-12-25T00:01:00.003-05:002011-12-25T00:01:01.962-05:00

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-5191487043817222952011-12-24T13:30:00.003-05:002011-12-24T14:14:17.435-05:00

assuming they follow the letter of the law, only mittens and paul will be on the virginia primary ballot. personally, i have my doubts whether VA will resist the pressure to change the rules given that several so-called "major" candidates didn't qualify. atrios suggests that this means the candidates who didn't qualify aren't really serious about running for president. but i think it's more a

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-18460451446675026422011-12-22T06:33:00.000-05:002011-12-22T06:33:44.983-05:00

is this report true? if so, could this be the tipping point for the assad regime?

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-23423357781499322252011-12-21T17:52:00.001-05:002011-12-22T20:22:24.968-05:00

what a crock. just a few years ago, liberals were dinging president bush for using signing statements to justify ignoring laws he didn't like. bush's defenders noted that signing statements had been used for years by prior presidents, including democrats, without a peep from bush's liberal critics. the critics replied by noting that bush's signing statements were different than the statements of

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-43678315351875823072011-12-21T17:20:00.000-05:002011-12-21T16:32:50.429-05:00

hey, look at that! i guess the iron lady didn't settle that falkland conflict after all. actually, looking back it strikes me as a prey strange little war. i think to the extent i took a side back then, i was vaguely pro-british, the UK being automatically deemed the good guys in every conflict since 1813. but in retrospect, it really is quite strange that they would go through such great

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-35492763222858174562011-12-21T08:56:00.002-05:002011-12-21T08:57:30.272-05:00

the time that i realize that i need X number of CLE credits before the end of the year or i will lose my law license. i'm spending the whole day today being lectured at about ethics. the sad thing is that even with a whole day of being lectured at, i still won't quite have enough credits for the year. so i also have to get an hour or two online at some point within the next ten days. in any

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-65198447906021240072011-12-20T08:03:00.002-05:002011-12-20T09:09:00.041-05:00

with everyone piling on gingrich, why should this site be left out? i give you: supervillain or newt? i got a 70%. see if you can beat my score.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-65279795669542195442011-12-19T08:46:00.000-05:002011-12-19T13:41:03.299-05:00

a few years ago, if you had asked me which world leaders i thought were actually crazy, as in mentally ill, i would have listed three: turkmenbashi, kim jung il, and moammar qadhafi. now they're all gone.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-29411645609043614262011-12-19T08:28:00.001-05:002011-12-19T10:58:09.754-05:00

for a while i was spilling more electrons here about the iraq war than anything else. so i guess it's worth noting the end. meanwhile, i have seen a lot of people say this really isn't the end; that because u.s. contractors remain in the country, "the iraq war", or at least american involvement in it, really isn't over. and there is something to that. for a war that has been declared over

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-37353912548835554612011-12-18T14:23:00.001-05:002011-12-18T15:11:43.808-05:00

the six-month old strike in western kazakhstan has turned violent after strikers started making political demands, which prompted a police crackdown and a riot by protesters. the government is blaming the violence on "hooligans" and is imposing a 3-week "state of emergency" on the western kazakhstani town which will allow the government "to prohibit audio and video recording." how exactly does

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-85962189444758241172011-12-16T08:47:00.000-05:002011-12-16T11:09:55.391-05:00

why are my echo comments in reverse order all of a sudden? does anyone know how to fix it? [never mind! i should have looked at my archives before i asked. apparently echo pulls this shit every year] this was the year i was finally going to ditch this comment system by not paying the annual fee. yeah, i know i always say that. so realistically, i knew i might not ever get around to it. then i

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-33947819600619071552011-12-16T06:28:00.002-05:002011-12-16T06:28:00.942-05:00

as kakatown celebrates its bidecennial (and quarter-century anniversary of the zheltoqsan massacre), we are celebrating the first anniversary of noz jr's homecoming day (and the second anniversary of our leaving-without-a-clue-of-what-we-were-getting-into day). but tomorrow, we will do the bidecennial. they are having a thingy at upenn. said thingy is open to the public, so local philly pholks

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-35633500355505153272011-12-15T08:27:00.003-05:002011-12-16T09:58:30.120-05:00

caves! caves, everywhere! i guess i should console myself that the democrats managed to not cave for about a week before they started caving now. so they beat the spread! i'm sure that will make me slightly happier when the military comes to detain me indefinitely. ...and everyone should read charlie pierce's post.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-44779880544117229432011-12-14T17:55:00.000-05:002011-12-14T15:45:23.657-05:00

fox news really doesn't like mittens.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-35513244309341079532011-12-14T17:46:00.001-05:002011-12-14T14:48:02.461-05:00

noz jr's daycare is having a "winter festival" party this afternoon. another victory in the glorious war against christmas!

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-10575181306313327422011-12-12T17:49:00.001-05:002011-12-12T16:10:17.476-05:00

so basically, gingrich is arguing that while he might be an asshole for taking $1.6 million dollars from freddy mac when he has said that people who took money from that organization should be thrown in jail, romney is a just-as-big-or-bigger asshole for all the money he made acquiring companies and firing a bunch of employees, and then trying to pretend that experience taught him something about

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-90832731503893601042011-12-11T08:10:00.001-05:002011-12-11T08:11:14.921-05:00

the NYTimes runs a puff piece about how mitten, while being filthy rich, doesn't casually toss his filth around, the morning after mittens casually offers to bet rick perry $10,000 on national tv.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-52075044315841372262011-12-10T14:53:00.004-05:002011-12-10T15:10:10.791-05:00

putting aside the palestinians well-justified (IMHO) concerns, why does it matter whether a nationality is "invented" or not? i mean, they are all "invented", aren't they? nationality is a purely human construction. at some point a group of people decide that they are different from those barbarians over there and so they give themselves a name that they can all identify with. some nationalities

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-28976562804916655582011-12-09T17:36:00.001-05:002011-12-09T15:37:12.746-05:00

avoid castrating lambs with your teeth. use someone else's teeth! or maybe a knife or something. you heard it here, um, second!

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-49169906301531288822011-12-09T08:46:00.002-05:002011-12-09T11:03:40.083-05:00

i've been thinking along those same lines. if no country is ever allowed to default no matter what, even if it means strangling its own economy and impoverishing its citizens to avoid it, then why doesn't every government bond have a AAA rating? investors have no risk, only the pensioners and other citizens of the bet-upon country do. the system lets investors make bets on economies that they are

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-63271974900946093802011-12-09T08:16:00.002-05:002011-12-09T21:39:44.440-05:00

a small detail in the drone wars: Iran also said it had formally protested what it said was the drone’s violation of Iranian airspace. Because Iran and the United States have no direct diplomatic relations, Iran summoned the ambassador from Switzerland, which manages American interests in Iran.i wonder how often the swiss ambassador gets summoned by the iranian government to be yelled at for

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-60606889617685220742011-12-07T17:21:00.004-05:002011-12-07T20:47:59.912-05:00

i think this is just newt's attempt to compete in the pam atlas primary. of course, newt fucked it all up, both by forgetting to ask bolton ahead of time and by possibly breaking federal law in making the announcement. UPDATE: good news for newt! he won't be going to jail after all (or at least he won't for the Bolton announcement). also good news for the rest of us, as newt's campaign won't

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-8880925603966475012011-12-07T08:50:00.015-05:002011-12-07T10:55:45.526-05:00

why do politicians ever go with the strategy of presenting themselves as the inevitable nominee? that was the cornerstone of the romney campaign and now he is being forced to do something else as newt gingrich is making it clear that he is far from inevitable. four years ago, the clinton campaign also presented itself as the inevitable nominee, and then had to retool itself when barack obama took

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-68825156906513295242011-12-06T08:41:00.006-05:002011-12-06T13:03:54.810-05:00

this article mentions that the new belgian prime minister took his oath of office in "French, Dutch and Flemish" which confused me because i thought that flemish was the dialect of dutch that is spoken in belgium. but if that's all it is, then by saying he took the oath in flemish and dutch, wouldn't that mean that he took it in the dialect of dutch spoken in belgium and the dialect of dutch

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-5945655878557553612011-12-06T08:23:00.002-05:002011-12-06T09:42:51.126-05:00

i'm not saying anything new here, but the reason that newt is getting his surge is because he is perceived by the republican electorate as being strongly disliked by liberals. that's it. it's not because they agree with his views on issues any more than any of the others. it's not because they are looking for an "intellectual" to lead them after experiencing a parade of dunces. it's because they

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-63899836656934845082011-12-05T08:48:00.002-05:002011-12-05T11:36:00.517-05:00

on its merits, i believe that former president bush should be arrested for the torture he ordered. but unless the u.s. ceases to be a super-power during bush's lifetime, it will never happen. if, for example, zambia had heeded amnesty international's call, can you imagine the resulting shitstorm? members of congress would be introducing legislation to cut off all aid to that country, and

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-75011634858781941552011-12-03T16:07:00.003-05:002011-12-04T07:47:58.607-05:00

i saw the descendants this afternoon and i believe it is the second major motion picture that uses the rule against perpetuities as a plot device. the RAP is infamous for torturing generations of law students, even though it won't ever come up in their post-law school careers for the vast majority of those tortured students. anyway, the first RAP film is body heat. but that film got the rule

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-46043919123890879092011-12-02T20:54:00.004-05:002011-12-02T21:02:54.603-05:00

jon huntsman's rsvp after being invited to the trump debate:Lol. We look forward to watching Mitt and Newt suck-up to The Donald with a big bowl of popcorn

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-12494262835129285292011-12-02T13:38:00.003-05:002011-12-02T20:22:58.334-05:00

trump!

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-53080170470586813242011-12-01T21:22:00.001-05:002011-12-01T21:22:17.591-05:00

if retail politics is dead, then there's no reason to give privileged positions during the primary/caucus season to low-population states like new hampshire and iowa. the only coherent justification i have ever heard for giving the residents of those states more of a say in the choosing of the president than anyone else is that their small towns and low population keeps up ye olde style retail

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-85386811348962820292011-12-01T17:39:00.003-05:002011-12-01T16:46:01.345-05:00

i think the overreaction is a generational thing. "x sucks" has been a fairly common, if informal, way of expressing disapproval for most of my life. i remember using the phrase as far back as at least middle school, probably earlier. i still use it regularly in informal speech without much thought. except that a few years ago i used it in front of my mother-in-law and discovered that she thinks

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-29869506450605762962011-12-01T08:53:00.006-05:002011-12-06T10:23:31.389-05:00

how did donald trump become the guy whose ring every republican presidential candidate has to kiss? i realize trying to make sense of the modern republican party is a fool's errand, but why trump? there are other birthers out there. surely, there is at east one who isn't already on record being pro-choice and supporting a single payer health care system. the modern republican party is a really

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-6064710172137604332011-12-01T08:41:00.002-05:002011-12-01T11:27:18.293-05:00

finally, the path is wide-open for the beshparmak craze to sweep this nation.

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-57692773931245372632011-11-29T17:50:00.000-05:002011-11-29T13:20:40.431-05:00

it's rare that i read a story about the gun-nut subculture in this country without wondering "what the fuck is wrong with these people?"

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-70954520692246467042011-11-29T17:32:00.003-05:002011-11-29T12:58:47.986-05:00

no one tells his campaign that he is "reassessing" whether he will continue to run for president unless he intends to stop running for president. at least that's how it works for a regular candidate. i guess there's a possibility that cain isn't regular. he certainly hasn't followed the usual script on other matters. but i am still fairly sure this means cain is done. so unless i'm wrong, there

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-831592805047980132011-11-29T08:39:00.002-05:002011-11-29T09:47:17.051-05:00

what happened on the afghan-pakistan border last weekend makes no sense. this wasn't just a stray bomb hitting pakistani forces, it was a sustained two hour attack against two different pakistani military posts that continued even after the pakistanis sent news of the assault up their chain of command. in other words, it doesn't look anything like a mistake. on the other hand, attacking pakistan

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-68462516636118314222011-11-28T17:49:00.001-05:002011-11-28T16:35:26.416-05:00

this is the best graphic representation i've seen of it yet! check it out as the anti-mittens bulge moves from bachmann to perry to cain and now to gingrich. the only question is where it will go when newt does his usual newtering. will it continue down the line to santorum? (let's face it, it will skip paul) or will it loop back to give bachmann, perry or cain another moment in the sun? the

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-13120139679571639082011-11-28T06:45:00.001-05:002011-11-28T08:40:58.881-05:00

it's nice to have a birthday that is only twenty-four hours long. previously: [41], 40, 39, 38, 37, 36, 35, 34

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-83498386470158278122011-11-25T15:16:00.001-05:002011-11-25T15:16:23.621-05:00

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-89029920147670978312011-11-25T09:00:00.002-05:002011-11-25T09:00:45.160-05:00

so how do people in other countries know when to start their christmas shopping mania?

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5451099.post-61093335268617329442011-11-23T08:25:00.010-05:002011-11-23T10:23:08.767-05:00

"hamas and hezbollah", it just seems to roll off the tongue of a lot of american politicians. it comes up all the time whenever they want to evoke a scary-sounding terrorist organization, even though the two are much more anti-israeli than anti-american. (hamas, as far as i can tell, has never acted violently against americans. hezbollah has not in at least a quarter century) so the next time an

upyernozhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13468075957480441353noreply@blogger.com