"DCI" wrote in message
...
On Jul 17, 10:10 pm, "Leroy N. Soetoro"
wrote:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123146363567166677.html

Some years ago when I worked at the libertarian Cato Institute, we used
to label any new hire who had not yet read "Atlas Shrugged" a "virgin."
Being conversant in Ayn Rand's classic novel about the economic carnage
caused by big government run amok was practically a job requirement.

Ayn Ryan was full of herself.

DCI

And Cato can't even field a decent softball team. My son's team played them
a couple of weeks ago in the "think tank league" in D.C., and beat the hell
out of them. And my son's team is mostly girls. He says the Cato types are
pretty strange. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress

On Jul 18, 3:34*am, "Ed Huntress" wrote:

And Cato can't even field a decent softball team. My son's team played them
a couple of weeks ago in the "think tank league" in D.C., and beat the hell
out of them. And my son's team is mostly girls. He says the Cato types are
pretty strange. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress


Another put down by Ed. He probably thinks it is important to field a
decent softball team and that it is relevant to this discussion.

Dan

wrote in message
...
On Jul 18, 3:34 am, "Ed Huntress" wrote:

And Cato can't even field a decent softball team. My son's team played
them
a couple of weeks ago in the "think tank league" in D.C., and beat the
hell
out of them. And my son's team is mostly girls. He says the Cato types are
pretty strange. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress


Another put down by Ed. He probably thinks it is important to field a
decent softball team and that it is relevant to this discussion.

Dan

Hang on, Dan. Gunner will come to your rescue any minute. The official RCM
bull**** artist and right-wing invective-slinger will put his arm around you
and give you one of those big, rightard hugs.

That ought to give you confidence that you're on the right track. You're
their kind of guy.

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/18/2011 5:00 AM, wrote:
On Jul 18, 3:34 am, "Ed wrote:

And Cato can't even field a decent softball team. My son's team played them
a couple of weeks ago in the "think tank league" in D.C., and beat the hell
out of them. And my son's team is mostly girls. He says the Cato types are
pretty strange. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress


Another put down by Ed. He probably thinks it is important to field a
decent softball team and that it is relevant to this discussion.

Dan



Some of us like to call a spade a spade. I'm sure that bunch over at
Cato is a bunch of weirdos. I know who Steven Moore is. He's on TV all
the time. He used to be the president of the Club for Growth. He's a
right wing shill. And rather nerdy too.

But this is just more of the right wing propaganda we're constantly
bombarded by from the right wing think tanks, which Cato is one. Once
again a severely biased right winger like Ayn Rand is held up as some
kind of model for how we should think. Why I can't imagine. As a child
in Russia she saw the worst kind of totalitarian government calling
itself communist, and from then on never saw a flaw in any right wing
idea from then on. In other words she was blind to anything wrong with
the conservative ideology from a young age.

What you don't get is that some people and ideas deserve nothing but
scorn and denigration. I think your problem is you don't seem to know
who deserves praise and who should be denigrated. For example you praise
Gummer and denigrate Ed. See, you have that backwards.

Hawke

On Jul 18, 3:34*pm, Hawke wrote:


What you don't get is that some people and ideas deserve nothing but
scorn and denigration. I think your problem is you don't seem to know
who deserves praise and who should be denigrated. For example you praise
Gummer and denigrate Ed. See, you have that backwards.

Hawke

You are right. I do not think that people should be denigrated in
the snide way that Ed does it. If the ideas are bad, then argue how
the ideas are bad, do not make jokes about necrophilia. Or refer to
Gunner as Gummer, as you do.
It just shows you as being a small minded person.

Now how about showing me where I praised Gunner. I might have said
that at least he does post about metalworking some of the time, but do
not think you will find where I praised him. But calling Ed out for
making remarks about people instead of remarks about why their ideas
are wrong seems reasonable to me.

Dan

On Jul 18, 10:02*am, "Ed Huntress" wrote:

Hang on, Dan. Gunner will come to your rescue any minute. The official RCM
bull**** artist and right-wing invective-slinger will put his arm around you
and give you one of those big, rightard hugs.

That ought to give you confidence that you're on the right track. You're
their kind of guy.

--
Ed Huntress

Yet another attempt to put me down by implying that I need anyone to
come to my rescue and that I fit into a crowd. When you try to put
me down, it gives me confidence that I am on the right track. Why do
you not explain why it is important that Cato field a good softball
team?

Dan

wrote in message
...
On Jul 18, 10:02 am, "Ed Huntress" wrote:

Hang on, Dan. Gunner will come to your rescue any minute. The official RCM
bull**** artist and right-wing invective-slinger will put his arm around
you
and give you one of those big, rightard hugs.

That ought to give you confidence that you're on the right track. You're
their kind of guy.

--
Ed Huntress

Yet another attempt to put me down by implying that I need anyone to
come to my rescue and that I fit into a crowd.

Hey, did you forget? You're the one who keeps commenting about other people
agreeing with you about my comments.

See, you're right. Gunner does. 'Course....oh, well....

When you try to put
me down, it gives me confidence that I am on the right track.

Well, then, Dan, keep making remarks about what's wrong with me and I'll
keep shooting back at you. As long as you keep it up, I will, too. I've
changed my ways and you're not getting away with it anymore.

Why do
you not explain why it is important that Cato field a good softball
team?

It's not. See "Smothers, Dickie."

I'll spell this one out for you. If you pay attention to the pile-on
methodology of the right wingers here, you would recognize my comment as a
parody of their style. It's a joke about the whole course of conversation,
or what passes for conversation, once a winger enters the conversation and
starts piling on with nasty, silly, irrelevant, meaningless remarks.

There's nothing important about it. There isn't even anything relevant about
it. To even imagine that it was intended as an important issue is almost
beyond belief.

--
Ed Huntress

Dan

On 7/23/2011 5:16 PM, wrote:
On Jul 18, 3:34 pm, wrote:


What you don't get is that some people and ideas deserve nothing but
scorn and denigration. I think your problem is you don't seem to know
who deserves praise and who should be denigrated. For example you praise
Gummer and denigrate Ed. See, you have that backwards.

Hawke

You are right. I do not think that people should be denigrated in
the snide way that Ed does it. If the ideas are bad, then argue how
the ideas are bad, do not make jokes about necrophilia. Or refer to
Gunner as Gummer, as you do.
It just shows you as being a small minded person.

You prefer the way Gummer denigrates those he doesn't agree with? I
don't. The fact of the matter is that Ed is smart, and educated, and
thinks before he writes. He doesn't act like a teenager calling people
school ground names. Sure, sometimes he's critical of people as well as
their ideas but what's wrong with that? It's like criticizing people who
are holocaust deniers. You think they should be treated nicely? I don't.
If someone is an asshole I say kick them in the teeth. But hey, that's
just me. In my view Gummer is a dick so I treat him like one.




Now how about showing me where I praised Gunner. I might have said
that at least he does post about metalworking some of the time, but do
not think you will find where I praised him. But calling Ed out for
making remarks about people instead of remarks about why their ideas
are wrong seems reasonable to me.



I'm saying that you're harder on Ed than you are on Gummer but I'm not
going to research it to prove it. I call Gummer that name because it's
more appropriate than Gunner, and because he's earned my disdain. He's
lied so many times it's not even funny. He's a mean, nasty, ignorant,
right winger in my opinion. He treats people worse than anyone else
here. To me, he's a class A jerk so I treat him with no respect. I don't
know your opinion of him and don't really care. You're free to like him
all you want but that would affect my opinion of your judgment. Ed can
be a smart ass sometimes too but the difference between him and Gummer
is night and day. You can have a discussion with Ed. It's impossible
with Gummer. He's like a little kid. And a nasty one at that.

Hawke

Dan

On Sat, 23 Jul 2011 17:37:07 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On Jul 18, 10:02*am, "Ed Huntress" wrote:

Hang on, Dan. Gunner will come to your rescue any minute. The official RCM
bull**** artist and right-wing invective-slinger will put his arm around you
and give you one of those big, rightard hugs.

That ought to give you confidence that you're on the right track. You're
their kind of guy.

--
Ed Huntress

Yet another attempt to put me down by implying that I need anyone to
come to my rescue and that I fit into a crowd. When you try to put
me down, it gives me confidence that I am on the right track. Why do
you not explain why it is important that Cato field a good softball
team?

Dan

Dan hardly needs me to polish off Ol Fast Eddie.

I simply enjoy stomping on the little ****head when he twitches in my
direction. The sound reminds me of kicking a watermelon while wearing
steel toed boots. That echo and the THUMP! as the melons guts squish
away and bounce around inside that largely empty space sounds rather
cool!

But..small things amuse me. Shrug.

Gunner

--
Maxim 12: A soft answer turneth away wrath.
Once wrath is looking the other way, shoot it in the head.

On Jul 23, 9:00*pm, "Ed Huntress" wrote:


Hey, did you forget? You're the one who keeps commenting about other people
agreeing with you about my comments.


I do not remember commenting on other people agreeing with me about
your comments. I do admit thinking that other people must be
agreeing, but think that hardly anyone has commented either way.



Well, then, Dan, keep making remarks about what's wrong with me and I'll
keep shooting back at you. As long as you keep it up, I will, too. I've
changed my ways and you're not getting away with it anymore.


I'll spell this one out for you. If you pay attention to the pile-on
methodology of the right wingers here, you would recognize my comment as a
parody of their style. It's a joke about the whole course of conversation,
or what passes for conversation, once a winger enters the conversation and
starts piling on with nasty, silly, irrelevant, meaningless remarks.


That might explain it. The truth is that I do not read most of the
messages by people that use anonymous nyms. I think they are beyond
help. You on the other hand are capable of good logical arguments and
I think should be above personal attacks when you can argue with
facts.

I should in fairness attack all the people who make nasty irrelevant
remarks. But then I would have to read all that crap, and life is too
short.

Dan
Ed Huntress

On 7/23/2011 6:33 PM, Gunner Asch wrote:

Yet another attempt to put me down by implying that I need anyone to
come to my rescue and that I fit into a crowd. When you try to put
me down, it gives me confidence that I am on the right track. Why do
you not explain why it is important that Cato field a good softball
team?

Dan

Dan hardly needs me to polish off Ol Fast Eddie.

I simply enjoy stomping on the little ****head when he twitches in my
direction. The sound reminds me of kicking a watermelon while wearing
steel toed boots. That echo and the THUMP! as the melons guts squish
away and bounce around inside that largely empty space sounds rather
cool!

But..small things amuse me. Shrug.

Yeah, we know, things like your dick.


Hawke

On Jul 23, 9:08*pm, Hawke wrote:


I'm saying that you're harder on Ed than you are on Gummer but I'm not
going to research it to prove it. I call Gummer that name because it's
more appropriate than Gunner, and because he's earned my disdain. He's
lied so many times it's not even funny. He's a mean, nasty, ignorant,
right winger in my opinion. He treats people worse than anyone else
here. To me, he's a class A jerk so I treat him with no respect. I don't
know your opinion of him and don't really care. You're free to like him
all you want but that would affect my opinion of your judgment. Ed can
be a smart ass sometimes too but the difference between him and Gummer
is night and day. You can have a discussion with Ed. It's impossible
with Gummer. He's like a little kid. And a nasty one at that.

Hawke


You are right. I am harder on Ed than I am on Gunner. My view of
Gunner is that he is not serious about a lot of the things he says. I
can not imagine anyone taking the bit about the " Great Cull "
seriously. As I see it he just uses that to get to some people like
you. It is a running gag. And it is hard not to have a little
sympathy for someone living in Taft, California. I have sympathy for
anyone living anywhere in California, but a bit more sympathy for
those in Taft.

Dan

On Sat, 23 Jul 2011 19:28:29 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On Jul 23, 9:08*pm, Hawke wrote:


I'm saying that you're harder on Ed than you are on Gummer but I'm not
going to research it to prove it. I call Gummer that name because it's
more appropriate than Gunner, and because he's earned my disdain. He's
lied so many times it's not even funny. He's a mean, nasty, ignorant,
right winger in my opinion. He treats people worse than anyone else
here. To me, he's a class A jerk so I treat him with no respect. I don't
know your opinion of him and don't really care. You're free to like him
all you want but that would affect my opinion of your judgment. Ed can
be a smart ass sometimes too but the difference between him and Gummer
is night and day. You can have a discussion with Ed. It's impossible
with Gummer. He's like a little kid. And a nasty one at that.

Hawke


You are right. I am harder on Ed than I am on Gunner. My view of
Gunner is that he is not serious about a lot of the things he says. I
can not imagine anyone taking the bit about the " Great Cull "
seriously. As I see it he just uses that to get to some people like
you. It is a running gag. And it is hard not to have a little
sympathy for someone living in Taft, California. I have sympathy for
anyone living anywhere in California, but a bit more sympathy for
those in Taft.

Dan

VBG

But I am rather serious about the pending Great Cull and I stated why
some months ago. But..I really hope it doesnt happen.
Enslaving the Leftwingers would be a better use for them.

Gunner

--
Maxim 12: A soft answer turneth away wrath.
Once wrath is looking the other way, shoot it in the head.

wrote in message
...
On Jul 23, 9:00 pm, "Ed Huntress" wrote:


Hey, did you forget? You're the one who keeps commenting about other
people
agreeing with you about my comments.


I do not remember commenting on other people agreeing with me about
your comments. I do admit thinking that other people must be
agreeing, but think that hardly anyone has commented either way.


Well, then, Dan, keep making remarks about what's wrong with me and I'll
keep shooting back at you. As long as you keep it up, I will, too. I've
changed my ways and you're not getting away with it anymore.


I'll spell this one out for you. If you pay attention to the pile-on
methodology of the right wingers here, you would recognize my comment as
a
parody of their style. It's a joke about the whole course of
conversation,
or what passes for conversation, once a winger enters the conversation
and
starts piling on with nasty, silly, irrelevant, meaningless remarks.


That might explain it. The truth is that I do not read most of the
messages by people that use anonymous nyms. I think they are beyond
help. You on the other hand are capable of good logical arguments and
I think should be above personal attacks when you can argue with
facts.

We could, but that has no effect on the level of noise or the level of
discourse. They're immune to facts. That's not a dismissive remark; it's
literally true. They're just spouting off baloney based on their
ideology/philosophy, and they grab at any straw that appears to support
them, while ignoring the rest.

Partly. But, often, they're just using their skills at being contemptuous
bullies, to pump up their own egos and self-esteem.. Gunner has honed it to
a blunt, but broad edge. They don't listen to reasoned, evidence-based
discussion. It's all about bluster and bullying, finding and accusing
scapegoats, dredging up biased or twisted arguments on the Web that they
don't really understand and pasting them here, and avoiding responsibility
for their own circumstances. Central to their approach is demonizing anyone
who doesn't reinforce their self-justification and excuses.

I should in fairness attack all the people who make nasty irrelevant
remarks. But then I would have to read all that crap, and life is too
short.

g I would not recommend that anyone try improving their discourse by
reason alone. That's a waste of time. Many people have tried.

Dan, here's how I see it: Those guys have turned most of Usenet into a
pesthole. This place has survived better than most. You have the
nym-shifting, anonymous, cross-posting cowards, like Hammy and his numerous
aliases, and the blunt bullies, like Gunner, and a few other types. They all
have one emotional problem or another and the chances of changing them are
slim.

Usenet has become their playground because it's perfect for the
courage-challenged to blow off vituperation, trying to convince themselves
of their superiority by being the nastiest prick on the hill. They ignore
the obvious complaint that they are cowards of a pretty low sort; they've
tuned that out by ignoring it and by focusing on their strengths, which are
bullying and intimidation.

You've commented that you don't take Gunner seriously, so you pretty much
give him a pass. But the seriousness is the effect he has on honest
discourse, not his loony provocations. He now has a completely split
personality here, if you've noticed, and half of it is devoted to hammering
away at scapegoats for the numerous mistakes he's made in his life.

The irony here is that his mistakes and misinformation are not at all the
reason he's attracted so much antagonism. That half of him is fun and a real
contribution to the discussions here -- even his preposterous, tall tales.
g. It's the scapegoating and trashy vituperation that represent the other
half that have made him such a target. He'd get along fine being his jolly
self if he didn't try to put others down in order to make his own failings
seem less important.

I was gone from here for six months and I got several e-mails telling me how
far the discourse had shifted to the right. It's more evidence of how the
dynamic of this thing works: silence is taken as tacit acceptance, and a
lack of counterpunching is treated as weakness. Say nothing, and they breed.

So, when I have time, I counterpunch. As our old friend Jim Rozen once said,
I'm a gentleman. g I realized he actually was pointing out my problem and
I fixed it. Now I'll counterpunch. No more consistent gentleman. Not on
Usenet. It can get you killed. d8-) But never, ever, without provocation
coming from the other side first. And it takes a consistent level of
provocation, or a particularly egregious one, to get me started.

Whether it's worth it is kind of moot; I just resent that kind of behavior.
I can be cranky, mistaken, and have big memory lapses. I'm just average in
the human departments. The only edge I have is that I never, ever bull****.
That's stopped a few particularly egregious threads. Not that another one
doesn't crop up right behind it. It's their method.

Ignore it, or contradict it, or whatever. I'm just not going to give tacit
approval to it by ignoring it. At least, until I've had enough of it and
start spending my time more usefully. There are still some good discussions
here and I'm trying to make time for them when I can.

--
Ed Huntress




Dan

"Gunner Asch" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 23 Jul 2011 17:37:07 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On Jul 18, 10:02 am, "Ed Huntress" wrote:

Hang on, Dan. Gunner will come to your rescue any minute. The official
RCM
bull**** artist and right-wing invective-slinger will put his arm around
you
and give you one of those big, rightard hugs.

That ought to give you confidence that you're on the right track. You're
their kind of guy.

--
Ed Huntress

Yet another attempt to put me down by implying that I need anyone to
come to my rescue and that I fit into a crowd. When you try to put
me down, it gives me confidence that I am on the right track. Why do
you not explain why it is important that Cato field a good softball
team?

Dan

Dan hardly needs me to polish off Ol Fast Eddie.

I simply enjoy stomping on the little ****head when he twitches in my
direction. The sound reminds me of kicking a watermelon while wearing
steel toed boots. That echo and the THUMP! as the melons guts squish
away and bounce around inside that largely empty space sounds rather
cool!

But..small things amuse me. Shrug.

Gunner

The RCM welfare queen does love his fantasies, doesn't he? Bluster isn't
going to compensate for your many mistakes, Gunner. Only you can do that,
and you keep blowing off opportunities to do so -- starting with Tawwwm's
offer to give you a real job.

Maybe you should turn some of that fantasy imagination to figuring out what
to do about your situation, rather that blaming it on everyone else. You
should use some of that IQ for a productive purpose -- what is it, 154? g
If you're that smart, you should be figuring out what to do with your piles
of money instead of figuring out how many Mountain Dew cans it will take to
patch your muffler.

--
Ed Huntress

On 7/28/2011 9:33 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
"Gunner wrote in message
...
On Sat, 23 Jul 2011 17:37:07 -0700 (PDT), "
wrote:

On Jul 18, 10:02 am, "Ed wrote:

Hang on, Dan. Gunner will come to your rescue any minute. The official
RCM
bull**** artist and right-wing invective-slinger will put his arm around
you
and give you one of those big, rightard hugs.

That ought to give you confidence that you're on the right track. You're
their kind of guy.

--
Ed Huntress

Yet another attempt to put me down by implying that I need anyone to
come to my rescue and that I fit into a crowd. When you try to put
me down, it gives me confidence that I am on the right track. Why do
you not explain why it is important that Cato field a good softball
team?

Dan

Dan hardly needs me to polish off Ol Fast Eddie.

I simply enjoy stomping on the little ****head when he twitches in my
direction. The sound reminds me of kicking a watermelon while wearing
steel toed boots. That echo and the THUMP! as the melons guts squish
away and bounce around inside that largely empty space sounds rather
cool!

But..small things amuse me. Shrug.

Gunner

The RCM welfare queen does love his fantasies, doesn't he? Bluster isn't
going to compensate for your many mistakes, Gunner. Only you can do that,
and you keep blowing off opportunities to do so -- starting with Tawwwm's
offer to give you a real job.

Maybe you should turn some of that fantasy imagination to figuring out what
to do about your situation, rather that blaming it on everyone else. You
should use some of that IQ for a productive purpose -- what is it, 154?g
If you're that smart, you should be figuring out what to do with your piles
of money instead of figuring out how many Mountain Dew cans it will take to
patch your muffler.


Funny how some folks see themselves. I'm sure that Gummer see's himself
as some super capable, super smart person. I see him as Jethro Bodine, a
stumble-bum, uneducated, hick. I bet my view is the closest to reality
of the two.

Hawke