Note from the Glibertarians.com editing staff: Here at Glibertarians.com, we are constantly searching for new features. We noticed a niche in our features was lacking: macroeconomic analysis. Because of this, we reached out to Yaron Brook of the Ayn Rand institute. Unfortunately, that guy wants to get paid for his work. So we found the next best thing:
Winston’s Mom.
First thing I want to say is, hi Winston, Mom got a new gig!
Now that we got thst out of the way, let me begin here,
In 1961, America faced what conservatives considered a mortal threat: calls for a national health insurance program covering senior citizens. In an attempt to avert this awful fate, the American Medical Association launched what it called Operation Coffee Cup, a pioneering attempt at viral marketing.
Here’s how it worked: Doctors’ wives (hey, it was 1961) were asked to invite their friends over and play them a recording in which Ronald Reagan explained that socialized medicine would destroy American freedom. The housewives, in turn, were supposed to write letters to Congress denouncing the menace of Medicare.
In 1961, I recall a doctor that would send his wife down to Biloxi, MS with her girl friends. He was into fisting for some reason but that didn’t stop him from penetrating everything. He was a lousy (((tipper))) as I recall.
What do Trump’s people, or conservatives in general, mean by “socialism”? The answer is, it depends.
Sometimes it means any kind of economic liberalism. Thus after the SOTU, Steven Mnuchin, the Treasury secretary, lauded the Trump economy and declared that “we’re not going back to socialism” — i.e., apparently America itself was a socialist hellhole as recently as 2016. Who knew?
Ever try telling the lady at the methadone clinic you’re on Medicaid? What a bitch.
Other times, however, it means Soviet-style central planning, or Venezuela-style nationalization of industry, never mind the reality that there is essentially nobody in American political life who advocates such things.
That broad from NY, always on TV, always smiling with her squeaky voice. Whats her name?
Trump’s economists clearly had a hard time fitting the reality of Nordic societies into their anti-socialist manifesto. In some places they say that the Nordics aren’t really socialist; in others they try desperately to show that despite appearances, Danes and Swedes are suffering — for example, it’s expensive for them to operate a pickup truck. I am not making this up.
What about the slippery slope from liberalism to totalitarianism? There’s absolutely no evidence that it exists. Medicare didn’t destroy freedom. Stalinist Russia and Maoist China didn’t evolve out of social democracies. Venezuela was a corrupt petrostate long before Hugo Chávez came along. If there’s a road to serfdom, I can’t think of any nation that took it.
Who was it that wrote that book and who was he writing about anyway?
So scaremongering over socialism is both silly and dishonest. But will it be politically effective?
Probably not. After all, voters overwhelmingly support most of the policies proposed by American “socialists,” including higher taxes on the wealthy and making Medicare available to everyone (although they don’t support plans that would force people to give up private insurance — a warning to Democrats not to make single-payer purity a litmus test).
On the other hand, we should never discount the power of dishonesty. Right-wing media will portray whomever the Democrats nominate for president as the second coming of Leon Trotsky, and millions of people will believe them. Let’s just hope that the rest of the media report the clean little secret of American socialism, which is that it isn’t radical at all.
I do have a story from 1973 about a Danish john named Viggo. We bargained a bit, but he started small. First he asked how much to finger my ass, so I said 5 Kroner, and when he said he had real money i said $5. Then he asked how much to finger his ass and I’m all well the first one is free dear, but the second will cost another $5. One thing lead to another, and eventually we built up a lather using the hotel soap and I had an bottle of vodka in his ass while I was rubbing him out. Doesn’t seem so weird now, but back then I might not have opened up the bottle and taken a swig after the fact.
What were we talking about? Right, slippery slopes. It starts small but if you keep slipping, it might net you $58 in the end.
Thanks Winston’s Mom. I think that was the first time I read something by Krugman that didn’t make me want to hit myself in the head with a hammer.
It usually makes me want to hit Krugman with a hammer.
I suspect you hammer will take damage.
He didn’t say hit Krugman in the head.
Ah, point well taken.
Poor Krugman’s pussy.
So Socialism bad and Winstons Mom is the One True Tupla?
I’m wondering if on today’s episode, Winston’s Mom is being played by Sally Kellerman?
Oh, C’mon! Sally Kellerman was 70’s hot like Karen Black or Shelly Duvall.
You don’t think that the “somehow less wrong” photo above isn’t Sally Kellerman? I’ve got 58 kroner that says it is.
Joanna Lumley – Patsy on Ab Fab
I’m gonna watch who I piss off around here a little more closely !
Unless the running joke is rooted in some real event, I don’t see the problem and Winston handles it exactly the way it should be handled. That being said, the unending “Libertarian moment!” thing is about a fresh as his mom’s breath.
Yeah! My original comment stuck, I did read the article
You get points for persistence.
You can’t fool me, that is SugarFree in drag. He’s on the left, right?
Only if hokey pokey is invoked, or the Time warp, again
That’s what it’s all about.
I look more like a fat Krugman, but without the tardeyes and bored out throat from sucking Democrat dick.
So…Republican dick?
*scampers off into dark alley*
Silence, tuber.
Watch it with the tuner hate, aspartame.
Tuber. Time for another drink.
I beat you to it.
*guzzle*
My money is on you as the ghost-writer for WM. She has your joie’de’vivre.
You’d lose that money. I’m really more of a mail tamperer.
She’s more of a male-tamperer.
[Andrew Dice Clay “OH!”]
Good thing I only bet small denomination bills of Zimbabwean dollars. You know, a trillion or two.
My money is on you as the ghost-writer for WM. She has your joie’de’vivre.
For shame, darling. I’m not Sugarfree.
You know that moment wherein the protagonist enters the parlor at The Bates house and gently turns the chair?
Since I already commented on this a while back (even though it does not show here…): Why Roller Coaster Track is Filled with Sand
That was interesting. Thanks.
Other fun sand fact: Locomotives pour sand on the track ahead of the drive wheels to provide traction and reduce wheel slippage.
Same as when I use cat litter to free my car from snow and ice. ///jk
Ugh. DO NOT USE the clumping variety. Daughter #1 learned to her detriment.
I use the cheap Dollar Store litter for that. My cats get TidyCats.
I have questions of a somewhat meta nature.
Question the question and speak with an Up-talk?
Reach out to me, Winston’s mom. The manner in which you have been slandered on this site is unacceptable. We have requested that Glibertarians.com retract their allegations that you approached that Indian. The video clearly shows him voluntarily fingering your anus. Being a woman of the night does not make you a public figure. It only makes you a public utility.
We look forward to our face to face.
Yours Truly,
L. Lin Would.
The standard service is fellatio, then nuts, taint, top of the crack. $2500 and you’re on the hook for the room.
You can’t handle me, darling.
I picked the wrong week to stop sniffing glue.
No Shit…
Do you also have a drinking problem?
/dumps beer over his shoulder
“/dumps beer over his shoulder”
That’s misdemeanor alcohol abuse, dude.
Depends on what beer was dumped.
/currently drinking a Dogfish Head the Perfect Disguise
Justice is blind.
“Paul Krugman has been an Opinion columnist”
That’s like your opinion, Man.
I’d invite Mr Krugman to take a survey of the VA hospitals, ask those captive patients that traveled 150 miles, if they’d prefer hometown treatment if they could afford it or VA? There are some good reviews but percentage wise I daresay not too many. Ask the Glibs here that qualify for VA if they would rather go there for free or to their own doctor even though they have to pay for it with insurance or out of pocket.?
Your just old man, go away….
/sarc
I think Ive posted before that I have few bad things to say about my VA, however I’m only there for maintenance and some joint issues (currently). However….for the 2nd time now, my doc has ordered labs from a blood draw, I present myself to have it done, and then learn 10 days after that the lab only performed some small portion of what was ordered. So its one more trip…
Awhile ago as a student, I clerked for an EEOC Administrative Judge. Most of his cases involved claimed discrimination at either the Post Office and the VA. One thing those cases all demonstrated was how absolutely fucked up both of those bureaucracies are and how much time and money we spend as taxpayers on the WORST Employees, who should never have been hired at all, but when they are so lousy they finally get fired, they *still* get to take about twenty bites of the apple. It was absurd.
Our much vaunted public health care system leaves much to desired. I was having some serious issues last summer and finally got bullied into seeing a Doctor. He talked with me for about ten minutes (after an hour wait), took my blood pressure (Oooo, Impressive!) and then sent me for blood tests and a referral for a butt-scope. I heard nothing back for 6 months and by then I seemed to have cured myself. No contact and they wanted me to go get scoped. No info on the blood tests, just sign up here to get rammed up the dirt-chute. It’s a scam. Referrals are the G.P.’s cash cow. I’ll never see another doctor again unless I break something or need to be dragged in by the heels.
That was my experience when I worked at a state prison for 15 months. The AFSCME and SEIU ensure that only the worst possible offenses can get you fired. Almost nobody gets let go for simple incompetence or absenteeism, and as a result, people figure out that attendance and performing your duties are optional most of the time. Meanwhile, there is a small handful of good workers who try to do a good job, but they get tired of picking up the slack for these other layabouts and eventually become lazy themselves or get another job where their work ethic is better appreciated.
One of the best people I ever worked with was an administrator there. Super funny guy who had a sixth sense for detecting when someone was having a really shitty, stressful day, at which point he would tell you to “sit down and take a load off”. He got let go (forced to retire, pretty much) for some personal, petty bullshit with the state-level bigwigs. I’m not 100 percent sure what happened, but I heard from a pretty reliable source that he was bringing issues to his bosses’ attention and they weren’t doing shit about it, so he went over their heads in an attempt to get it resolved, and they took personal offense. I know this shit probably happens in any large organization, but it’s particularly frustrating that he was the rare government employee who put out an honest, exhaustive effort to make sure the prison policies were enforced without trampling on the inmates’ rights.
I would die in the gutter before becoming a VA patient.
You might after, too.
Dog with rythym,
https://photos.app.goo.gl/J99xMmD7ZixPRkFRA
Belly
HEY YUFUS !
Sup Tres!
Error occurred. Problem on my end?
Doesnt Japan viewing need to convert to cats instead of dogs ?
See what I mean? I get the tentacle porn/panty vending machine thing, Pie gets the vampire thing etc. We just don’t empower each other with love and support around here.
Throw together some tentacle/vampire porn and you might see your fortunes change.
Get this man a Nobel prize!
You do you. Go girl. *Snaps fingers*
Years ago the Russkis couldn’t move potatoes from 30 miles out of town into Moscow. They were amazed to see that the farmers here had pick up trucks busy moving produce around are required.
In “The Russians” (circa 1975) the author describes talking to a woman who was selling melons on the street in Moscow Melons were impossible to find in stores and he wondered how the woman came by them.
Seems she lived in an outer provence and grew the melons on her allotted plot. She carried them herself to Moscow on the TU-144 supersonic transport (the Soviets Concorde). The tickets were stupid cheap as Aeroflot had no need for evil profits. The return on the melons more tht made up for the plane tickets and in fact provided a decent living.
One old woman could do what the entire Soviet Command Economy couldn’t – make fresh melons available in the nation’s capitol.
MELONS. *lights the Q signal*
( . ) ( . ) 4 Q
/further illuminates Q signal:
http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/ban-on-baring-of-female-breasts-is-likely-unconstitutional-10th-circuit-rules?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=ABA+Journal+Top+Stories#
The ones we want to see are never the ones that are bared in public.
*sigh*
It all depends on where you’re hanging out.
What you did there, was noted.
Flap-jacks and wubblers.
That’s a great (if dated) book. The only problem was Hedrick Smith was a typical leftist journo, and he often ascribed to Russian culture things that were obviously a result of their economic system
Yeah, I read it when it first came out and it convinced me their system was doomed. Smith’s inability to see what he was describing also convinced me leftists were hopeless.
The melon story is the one specific thing that stuck with me. The Soviets could build an SST (even if it was a death trap) but couldn’t get produce to market.
This is true. However, Botswana has managed being a resource provider pretty well.
“Botswana’s impressive economic record has been built on a foundation of diamond mining, prudent fiscal policies, international financial and technical assistance, and a cautious foreign policy. It is rated as the least corrupt country in Africa by international corruption watchdog Transparency International. By one estimate, it has the fourth highest gross national income at purchasing power parity in Africa, giving it a standard of living around that of Mexico and Turkey.[14]”
Also, get this: “The government has consistently maintained budget surpluses and has extensive foreign-exchange reserves.[13]”
So should we trade in jerks like Krugman for some Botswanese(?) economists? I’m thinking yes.
Look I like to slander economists as much as the next guy, but Krugman quit the econ-biz even before he joined the NYT – you know when he was a mouthpiece for Enron.
I doubt that we’d much trade in on Paul. However, there may be another nearby country that could use him. Zimbabwe may be short a Nobel Winner in Economics.
And like the points on Who’s Line Is It?, the value of their money doesn’t matter
Pretty sure he was already working with them, and I’ve got 13 trillion reason to believe that.
Could you put up a Photoshop image for that?
I was wrong – it was actually 180 trillion, leading with this piece of Monopoly money, one of these, and a 20 and 10 T denomination.
They actually would’ve been great for board games.
I only have $110 ZMB
*$110 trillion ZMB
Haha, UCS! Mine is worth $.05 US, while yours is only worth $.03 US!
Zimbabwe forecasts a big zero shortage.
The “Kill Whitey” index is through the roof, though. Always bet on black.
Maxim Model Speaks Out About Her Support For The President ///
subtlehotnessShe’s beautiful and seems like a nice lady. Wishing the best for her.
Hard-hitting journalism at its finest. Thanks, WInston’s Mom. Hope to hear more from you later.
If the redhead on the front page is Winston’s mom, then I apologize to Winston. Because if it is, then I just rubbed one out looking at Winston’s mom.
If the redhead on the front page is Winston’s mom, I’m booking a flight to Canada.
Who gives better advice: Winston’s Mom, or ZARDOZ?
Me waiting on a cal..
Zardoz’s Mom?
Need pics.
No luck yet with Zardoz’s mom, but I think I found his dad.
Ya want to give that another shot?
“Error 404”
http://www.geologypage.com/2018/04/20-strange-geological-formations-on-earth.html
#12
Alright, several candidates in here, enjoy.
1 and 4 = Zardoz’s Mom front and back hole?
This subthread sure went to the dogs.
Stop it, dude. You’re barking up the wrong tree.
For advice on making more brutals in the world, Winston’s Mom. For advice on eliminating brutals, ZARDOZ.
Mahan Khalsa, let’s get real or not play, a great business book, red flags…
Lou Holtz, what can I do for YOU
“Who was it that wrote that book and who was he writing about anyway?”
Do you know who. . .
Oh, never mind.
Learn to code?
I already know how.
Anyway, since you are here. I need to put in a new AC/heat pump system this year. Any advice?
Check the thermostat.
It was a serious question. What I have now is so old it isn’t worth putting more money in repairs every year to keep it running.
Anyway, new thermostat comes with a new unit.
I’m sure it is, but I’ve got nothing. Too cold here for that particular tech.
No problem. I figured I’d ask Yusef since he’s an HVAC guy.
Yeah, it was in the low 80’s here today. Had to put on the AC.
Jiggle the handle.
HATE CRIME COURT with Steven Crowder and Owen Benjamin
Why does the judge sound like Dr. Phil?
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D0DiKbEXcAEU9y6.jpg:large
LOLOLOLOL
That is some fine gun control right there.
When FB did one of their “no images of guns” things, I changed my pic to an assemblage of cartridges depicting a one finger salute.
Beautiful, I forgot that was actually a thing FB had.
In Spud’s honor, I’m cooking Chinese tonight. He’s not Chinese, he doesn’t cook Chinese, but he has a certain Chinese feature.
A fondness for cabbage?
Tiny penis?
Tundra is a wise Tundra.
That’s the Japanese, dumbass.
Yeah, I know. “They all look alike to me”.
according to some random site the Koreans are smallest.
Hot, spicy and addictive.
/Sichuan
Tiny penis?
How did
Brettthe Irish get into this?Damn it. Someone with a computer fix my HTML.
Please.
I got you, bro.
I’m still not sending you dick pics.
What if he sends you dick pics?
I’ll let my wife have them. She’s the one who appreciates dicks in my house.
How many?
I’m still not sending you dick pics, again
Actually. I’m not sure I’ve seen your dick, Brett. We should fix that. Add yourself to the vault.
Say what you want, but Zhang Zongchang had a 9 inch penis.
He also wrote some of the best poetry of all time.
An unholy sense of avarice? Oh wait, that’s (((you))))…
OT: Alright Glibs, I’m looking for a recommendation. I’m looking to spend some of my recent bonus on liquor (like you wouldn’t do the same). What’s a recommended bottle at around the $100 mark? I’m already contemplating the Redbreast 15 or the Glenlivet 18.
Redbreast 12 Cask Strength. You will thank me.
Or a gram of coke and a pretty good bottle of champagne.
That actually sounds pretty good…
High blood pressure pretty much makes coke a bad decision for me. But I’ll be looking for the Redbreast 12 Cask Strength (if it’s sold in Ohio).
Cardhu.
Srsly?
Medley’s mellow bourbon. It’s been keeping lachowskys soused for 4 generations.
Not sure how much it runs in your neck of the woods, but Blanton’s is mighty fine if you are in the mind for bourbon.
Not sure if you’re still on, but I just saw your post on the links. I have no clue, but my mother has been an administrator for a long term care facility/ rehab center/ nursing home for the last three decades and my dad was a psych nurse. Between the two of them I will bet they’d have some advice. You can drop me an email at gwynapnaud@gmail.com if there are any extras details you think might be relevant and I’ll ask them tomorrow when I see them.
*sniffles*
This is what makes Glibs great.
*Hugs Swiss*
You’re absolutely right, Swissy*
*Hugs Swiss for an uncomfortably long time*
https://5newsonline.com/2019/02/22/search-warrant-leads-to-400000-marijuana-bust-in-charleston/
Fucking asshole cops bragging about busting a friend of mine for something that is legal in half the country. Prices. The guy they busted is a good dude that I have worked with for years.
Reposting from the last thread because I hit it late and I’m still pissed about it. Fucking drug warriors are scum.
Something to help you relax.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YyzLbQ7hjP4
Police: We need to search your house.
Me: No, no search without warrant.
Police: She’s my cherry pie, Cool drink of water, Such a sweet surprise, Tastes so good, Make a grown man cry
Me: Oh fuck, go ahead.
I truly believe that at some point in the future, the DEA and other drug warriors will be considered to be no better than concentration camp guards or Einsatzgruppen troops.
“Just following orders” and “just enforcing the law” doesn’t cut it morally.
Not a stretch. Gunning down innocents, stealing shit and facing zero repercussions. I don’t understand how they can do it.
Same reasoning that leads to destroying a village to save it.
It’s at the point where doctors are being ridiculous with pain medication.
I mentioned in the last thread that both my mom and MIL have benefitted greatly from CBD and THC. So tired of these motherfuckers.
I currently have a sprained neck from a knock on the head I took at work a few weeks ago. Its painful as hell.
It would hav been nice to have a script from the doc for a bottle of hydros. Doctors are too scared to give those out now because of drug warring assholes so I’m dealing with a shot load more pain than I should have to. Fuck drug warriors.
Insurance claims for opioids are a fucking pain in the ass, too. The insurers (including Medicaid) basically have some metric to determine how much you “should” receive during a given period, and they won’t pay for any more. They constantly reject for a “refill too soon”. It usually ends up getting billed to the patient at full cost when this happens. If they’re on Medicaid, the facility where they live has to eat the cost (since Medicaid patients generally aren’t supposed to get bills) and this of course contributes to the increase in the cost of healthcare services.
There’s obviously a shitload of red tape involved with getting those meds – even if it’s just a couple pills to get the patient through the night until the doctor can see them in the morning and write a script. Patients end up screaming in pain all fucking night because of holdups with controlled med paperwork.
The drug war is evil.
Agreed. I was at my doctor today. She told me about someone she knew who completely shattered the bones in her arm. The ER sent her home, to wait for reconstruction surgery, with only ten pills of tramadol for a week’s worth of pain management. Obviously, she wasn’t someone who was just looking for drugs. Anyone could see there were multiple fractures just from glancing at the X-ray.
Shit, I think I had more tramadol for my dog when he had his surgery. That’s fucking sick.
It’s beyond parody at this point.
This is why I keep my tramadol. They gave me 6, I still have 4.
And they do stupid shit like this:
https://youtu.be/jCxMEjpX6K8
Really? Tightening up prescriptions to the point where someone is intentionally injuring themselves is better than just giving a junkie a script? You’re fucking proving our point, drug warriors.
That touches on something that I’ve thought about a lot with regards to the drug war:
As it is right now, opioids are difficult to get. A lot of people suffer through needless pain because they can’t get them. And we’re told that this is simply how it must be to prevent junkies from getting opioids.
But why is the welfare of junkies elevated over the welfare of patients who have suffered accidents or diseases that are not their fault? Drug addiction is something that you get yourself into.
It’s not the job of society to give up their rights because some people will exercise those rights in self-harming ways.
The thinking is that it will turn every single legitimate patient into a junkie.
Really? Tightening up prescriptions to the point where someone is intentionally injuring themselves is better than just giving a junkie a script? You’re fucking proving our point, drug warriors.
Rubbing alcohol in most of the world is cheap ethyl alcohol. Not tasty, but no more toxic than high proof vodka. In the US it is much more toxic, and is called denatur . Why you ask? Prohibition I answer. The United States deliberately poisoned thousands of its citizens because it had banned alcoholic beverages and people were drinking rubbing alcohol. To solve this problem, they made rubbing alcohol poisonous, deliberately requiring manufacturers to add toxins, or to use methy, or other non-potable alcohols…
QFT.
My dad has had a chronic illness my whole life. He used to get 500ct bottles of Vicodin in the mail. The last time he asked if he could get a new script for the pain, the doctor gave him a script for 30 pills and told him never to ask again. That doctor retired within a month of that appointment and sent a letter to all his patients telling them why, It essentially said that he can’t help them and its too heart wrenching to keep watching them suffer. Some of that was the he was in a fields that can’t really cure people, but I’m sure not being able to alleviate their pain didn’t help his desire to keep working.
Also, new treatments have made it so my father doesn’t need near as much pain medication as before. But, he’s told me if that pain ever comes back, he’ll be looking for a heroin dealer or will commit suicide, He won’t just live with the pain, and I don’t blame him. This really is one of the most evil campaigns in existence.
That’s just fucking wrong.
FUCK DRUG WARRIORS
Sounds like me me with my anxiety meds, if I take too many they won’t refill them, so most of my big panic attacks come from trying to decide if the panic attack I’m having is big enough to take the meds.
In late, but I just wanted to add a hearty “screw you” to the stack of enmity being hurled at the drug warriors. I’ve already regaled this group with the story of going without pain medication after surgery and the doctors telling my 6th grade son that he’d just have to suck it up and live with the pain for a few days when he suffered a possible broken arm, so I won’t bother with more detail on that front. Suffice it to say I have a personal stake in this too.
Beyond that, it is so frustrating to hear the machinations that they go through to justify themselves. At least my anesthesiologist just told me straight-out that he would have put me on a morphine drip two years earlier, but the Feds would come after his license if he gave me appropriate pain medication now. My son’s doctors were seemingly all-in on the anti-opiod war. It was as if they believed that two days on hydrocodone would make you into a lifelong addict.
Which brings up the real evil of the drug war: the puritanical obsession with other people getting high. If we could just kick our habit of reviling other people’s desire to get high, maybe we could make some progress.
Because as it is, you can’t make a product that is simply designed to get people high. That’s why marijuana supporters had to go the ridiculous “medical” route. They should have been able to say “we like the mj high, and it should be legal.” But we can’t because any hint that you like getting high is evil. That’s why you can have Kamala Harris joking about “trying” pot while still crowing about putting people in jail for possession.
But if it was legal to make something to get high – and the standard was “safe and effective”, maybe we’d have something better by now. Something with dosages that are easy to titre, like alcohol. Something that is really hard to overdose on, like pot. Something that gives a nice euphoria without other side effects. And something that has a reliable quality and consistent dose – like prescription drugs.
Then we could all buy our fun at Walgreens or CVS or the ABC store. A whippit can that has the proper oxygen to laughing gas mix so you can’t asphyxiate. Or a fast-acting cocaine derivative that has a 15 minute half life and isn’t addictive. Whatever – I’m sure our chemists and pharmacists can come up with all kinds of wonderful and safe things if given the chance to properly ply their trade.
And then the folks who want to get stoned can do so safely, and the next time I need some pain relief, I can get the proper drugs for the proper pain relief.
Or we can keep going down this path and eventually some pain-crazed cancer patient is going to shoot up the FDA.
Even in folklore who the hell pulls for the Revenue Man rather then the Shiner?
https://youtu.be/xvaEJzoaYZk
Yeah that’s a good tune.
I would have never tagged you as an optimist before.
That isn’t optimistic – that reckoning only came after their entire govt was collapsed, and the victors frog-marched them into the Nuremburg courts.
I truly hope you are right SF. the drug war is failure and has been since it was first instituted. It’s a futile effort that is counterproductive and has ruined many more lives than the drugs that it wars against.
Its adherents are morally reprehensible for their destructive beliefs.
“Won’t somebody please think of the children?” Granted, I could have done way less drugs when I was a pup but I turned mostly alright. It wasn’t the pot or the acid or the shrooms or the coke or the who knows-what that got me, it was the fucking booze.
True. Pot can make some people lazy, but you aren’t going go looking for fist fights.
Unless there are two or more people and only one taco left.
My niece was more pissed off that her mom yelled at her for smoking pot then she was for learning that her mom smoked pot when she was a teen. I had to explain that the reason her mom was upset was the penalties if my niece had gotten caught with anything in her possession.
What did the knockwurst say to the bavarian cream?
“I was merely following hors d’oeuvres”
*Turns away. Shuns Tres*
*narrows gaze*
Fucking Chinese hag is having a conference call on her computer at the coffee shop. Loud as hell. All the Japanese customers are pretending to ignore her, but I’m pretty sure I know what they’re thinking.
Rape of Nanking ?
At least they’d be admitting it happened.
*snort*
Is it just my ears, or are Chinese twice as loud as Japanese?
Dunno. I actually like the sound of Mandarin Chinese, but you gotta read the room lady.
Northern or southern accent?
Cantonese is Southern, no? I’ve met quite a few people from Beijing (exchange students and govt workers), and they don’t sound as abrasive as the people from HK.
Nah, Cantonese is a separate dialect like Hokkien/Taiwanese. Northern Mandarin is the Beijing accent with lots of harsh jowling arr sounds. Southern accent would be like Shanghai (distinct from Shanghainese which is another dialect) or Guangzhou without that harshness.
https://youtu.be/zfNbq3s_51o
Now I see what you’re saying. Unfortunately I can’t tell the difference in those dialects.
Cantonese is considered a separate language, actually. It’s more-or-less unintelligible to Mandarin speakers without at least some training.
Also, I think Chinese intonation plays a much greater role in Chinese than it does in Japanese. Must make whispering difficult.
Same thoughts as to why Chinese is so much louder.
I have lots of Chinese speaking friends, but I don’t particularly care for the sound of tonal languages.
Don’t they use the same (alphabet) syllabary? Although if you’re right, CP, they don’t use the same volume. My experience kind of matches with yours, although it’s rather limited.
Japanese uses Chinese characters but no hiragana or katakana in Chinese. If only someone had written a piece on this very subject.
Well technically the hiragana an katakana came from the Chinese…
Or Korea. Debate!
After the struggle I’ve had learning kanji I’m all for some Japanese version of hangul!
Yeah, formal Japanese, right? I recognize katakana script (no idea about hiragana), and if you’ve written a piece about it,
my most humble apologies, straffinsan and senseisan. 私の最も謙虚な謝罪
Japanese uses all three writing systems. Doesn’t really matter what level of formality.
Very young children learn hiragana and quickly add katakana. After that they soon start learning kanji (Chinese characters). Any normal writing contains a combination of all three.
It’s why I have the reading and writing level of a a middle school child, but can carry on a conversation at a much higher level. I’ve only memorized a fraction of the kanji required.
I really admire our Glibs here who live and function in Japan.
Are they used interchangeably? In different types of communication?
I see adults using hiragana when they forget the kanji. It’s doubly embarrassing when a foreign devil shows them how to write it. Happened t me yesterday.
Yes, like this:
https://www.jreast.co.jp
Any word written with kanji can be written out in in hiragana. But in normal adult writing you’d use the kanji.
For example train stations in Japan use kanji for the place names, hiragana for people who may not know the kanji, and finally English for the tourists.
Japanese also learn English letters so they can romanize Japanese with no issues. So essentially interchangeably. There are oddities from history. Early telegrams and PCs used only katakana.
Katakana (syllables): used for foreign words imported into Japanese
Hiragana (syllables): used for “spelling” (“syllabling”?) Japanese words, grammar conjugation
Kanji: Chinese symbols imported into Japan (along with Japanese made symbols) and usually have multiple meanings/pronunciations grouped into Chinese or Japanese readings.
The Chinese ones are supposed to be the Chinese sound when kanji was introduced (so diverges from modern Mandarin or others). Hirigana can be used to make clear which pronunciation/meaning is being used. Or context can also tell.
Romaji: This is Japanese written in the Latin alphabet.
のもな – all hiragana BP!
From our conversation of a few weeks ago. If you want to see some A5 Kobe beef…
https://youtu.be/MWOwEWMquP8
Alright, I’m repaying your food porn with
https://youtu.be/Ot8bgC19V80
Grey haired chap running the customers through like a ringmaster can be seen doing his signature seating by stabbing pointing at 0:22.
I would stack bodies like Stalin for a plate of that right now. Cabbage refill included.
I love a good tonkatsu! I’ve been lucky enough to get a few goods ones in NYC.
You haven’t heard loud until you live on the Rez. All that pent-up whilst living around White-eyes goes out the fucking window. Screetching and hollerin’ for no good reason.
In my experience, along with input from buddies who have lived in China for decades, Cantonese is the loudest language. I’m not sure if it has something to do with having more tones than most other dialects, thus requiring more volume to make them distinct when talking where background noise might cut in.
You got any time for a beer sometime next month?
Beer Summit!
Yes, I believe I will.
Tell me if you don’t see my e-mail message…
Folk psychoacoustics suggests that a tonal language is always going to sound “louder” than a pitch language.
I don’t know about all of that, but the Chinese lady who used to work for me sure got loud when she yelled at her husband.
It was hilarious because they had been here long enough to start to actually think in English, so when she got heated she’d bark at him in Mandarin, but every sentence or two a few English words would slip in. It was fun to try and piece together why he was in trouble. (she had 3 kids, so 3 periods of pregnancy-induced anger for her husband, which made it particularly entertaining to try to decipher. Sometimes that can be tough even when your pregnant woman is only speaking one language)
A Perfect Circle ‘Judith’ Drum Cover ///subtlehotness
I can play this song too, but no one wants to watch me.
I hate Maynard James Keenan’s voice and song writing style nearly as much as I hate Serj Tankian. But, hey, apparently there’s a few million people who disagree with me, so…you know.
I used to listen to Syndrome of a Down when I was in 8th grade or so, but I grew out of it very quickly. It just seems like they have an odd mixture of serious and non-serious music. One second, he’s singing angrily about some real-world issue, then he’s making goofy noises the next. That and the tendency to throw in a bunch of silly, nonsensical lyrics finally drove me away from them.
“System”, but yeah. They make good music, instrumentally. But Serj’s voice shenanigans are just too much.
Gorgeous woman, but she needs to work on her left.
You know who else had to work on their left?
Chuck Liddell?
Rick Allen?
Damnit, Rocky had to work on his right, so I can’t make that joke…
James Braddock
Braddock.
Bradock
Pepe.
I wonder what it is like to have the super-power of being an young and hot woman. … Reality is completely distorted for hot 19 year old chicks.
If I had an aspiring rock band and I needed a drummer, I’d give her a shot. She’s good enough that she could grow into the role, and she’d have stage appeal.
You don’t look like that. Also, A Perfect Circle ripped Tool’s style.
Or what MikeS said.
That’s because the “talent” behind both bands is the same guy; MJK.
Also, It’s fucking “Maynard”. Or “James”. Why does he use both? It doesn’t roll of the tongue like Kenny Wayne Sheppard; or William Jefferson Clinton; or John Wayne Gacy…
/rant off…for now.
Would bang
Would pound the skins; IYKWIMAITYD
I see what you did there.
Hush https://g.co/kgs/Bhqsq4
Maynard was fighting for free speech in the early nineties.
My old roommate, a drummer, was adamant that women couldn’t play drums well “because they’re not strong enough”.
He was a dumb-ass. Also, a drummer, so that’s probably a redundant statement.
I’m a drummer and anecdotally most women drummers I’ve known can’t just “wing it” or “go with the flow” very well. They tend to play more structured and every move they have is planned. They play the part as written and have trouble improvising. But then, once in a while, one shows up to play at a bar and blows the narrative out of the water. So it’s certainly not a steadfast rule.
All that being said I have no idea why strength would play any factor whatsoever, unless your friend is in a Nirvana or Dying Fetus cover band. Drumming is much more about finesse than strength.
The irony was that he was a short pudgy white guy (sort of like myself, TBF). He was hardly a pillar of strength.
Some googling shows he’s a professional touring drummer now, so I shouldn’t bust his chops too much.
Who needs elections when you have judges.
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article226652589.html
A judge has just thrown out two amendments to the North Carolina Constitution that voters approved in November.
One of the amendments was to implement a voter ID requirement, and the other was a cap on the state income tax rate.
The North Carolina General Assembly is so gerrymandered that its members don’t truly represent the people of the state and thus should never have proposed constitutional amendments in the first place, Wake County Superior Court Judge G. Bryan Collins wrote in his ruling that was issued late Friday afternoon.
But they were proposed and accepted by the people of the state within the previously accepted/legal redistricting system. This judge is out of line. Virginia is currently experiencing a similar sort of issue.
Yeah, out of control.
Well that judge better turn back in all of his pay since the budget must not be legit either.
I got my cool job! Start Tuesday, get my van and credit cards Monday, I’m real happy, no red flags
Congrats! Check lots of thermostats !
That’s great, Yusef. What job? I’ve been away for a bit.
This shop does EMS, but don’t know how to integrate Hvac syztems, so they want a training course and I still go fix shit
Congrats, Yusef!
I hope you succeed yugely!
I will excel,thanks!
Congrats!
Hooray!!!!
Good luck, Yusef.
This is the biggest job I have ever tried, they want me to control the entire state of Cali, oh fuck……
Turn the dial hard right
Go big or go home, right?
Go big!
Nice! Good luck!
New start! Go get’em.
That’s awesome Yusef!
Awesome! Did you get guarantees or are you just high on the change?
Congrats!
Congratulations! Everybody should get a new job they like. Better still, everybody should still be in the job they like 2 or 3 years down the road.
Congratulations, darling.
Fantastic, you russian troll.
Now go make people comfortable while working in the heat.
Congrats Yusef!
And thanks Glibs, you light up my life,
You give hope,
To give me hope….
Wut?
That song came out when I was in kindergarten. Apparently, I would just walk around singing it, constantly. I guess I’ve always been an optimist at heart.
(points at Mike) *Secret Christian. Add him to the list.*
*hides Stryper CD*
Stryper.
OMG.
They have a new album out.
“Ode To My Middle-Aged Pubes”
I larfed.
“God Damn Evil”
Apparently they identified a suspect in the Berkeley student attack. However they won’t name the suspect. Sounds like the police don’t want to solve the crime…
Interesting.
We started out by not naming people who come forward and say they are sexually assaulted. And now we’ve moved on to not naming people who have leftist political leanings?
Germans shocked by Danish declaration of war.
You know who else…hey, wait a minute?!
Wifey brought home a jumbo jar of kimchi from Costco. Since I have the palette of a five year-old since they took my chompers away I will eat nary a bite.
I like kimchi.
Five years ago I would probably agree with you. The oral surgery really fucked with my sense of taste and smell. Food is for eating. I’m like Mo, if I didn’t have to I wouldn’t bother.
XX’s birth fucked up mine. While I was pregnant, I couldn’t stand the smell of red meat (for a carnivore low-carber yet!) After she was born, chocolate, apples, and my favorite perfume all smelled rancid. That went on for about 5 years. She’s almost 16 and apples still don’t taste quite right.
Now I have phantom smells very often. Usually, it’s strong stale cigarette smoke. Lately, it’s been something different but no less annoying.
I used to eat peanuts by the pound but now they taste oily and the texture is just off. That surgeon done Lovecrafted my mouth, everything’s non-Euclidian. Can’t stand take-away Chinese and don’t get me started on pizza…
I had a head concussion back in my late teens and it jacked up my taste horribly for several years. I couldn’t eat meat because it tasted rank. About the only thing I could eat was potatoes. I ate potatoes everyway you could. It sucked. I talked to some old dude that said the same thing happened to him and it had eventually gone away which gave me hope and of course it did. Doctors had no clue.
She also bought me a vaper which kind of pisses me off. I don’t buy her horse tack or photography equipment.
I had dental work done yesterday, and they clipped the tongue nerve when giving me the shot. So, I got the big electrical zap in my tongue and I swear I still have a weird, metallic taste in my mouth. I think it tastes like ozone smells.
As long as you don’t smell burnt toast, you’re fine.
What if I burn the toast?
That is a very good question. Seek medical attention if you smell it for more than 4 hours?
I know what caused this, fumble fingers dentist, so I’m not worried about the weird taste or smell. If it happened and I hadn’t been to the dentist, I actually would go to the Dr.
Uvula cancer.
Ray of sunshine in a dreary thread.
Not many cancers can be cured by a tonsillectomy.
https://youtu.be/YE5mlNCRe9A
This seems like a good Glib song, maybe a little soft for some but the lyrics fit.
What do you think?
Oof. I made it half way through, which is probably the most I’ve ever listened to of that…song. I’d be open to giving it a chance if someone with a penis did a cover of it.
I was pretty sure the music was a little soft for most of the people here but the youtube description had the lyrics and I figured if you couldn’t stand the music maybe you could read the lyrics.
I know. I was just being Glib.
But I was serious about it being a good candidate for a cover song.
It would be cool if Izzy would do an electric version, but this is a start.
I remember that tune from when I was a tad. Pretty fitting. Good pull, NAE!
Are we in the Hands of an angry God?
Speaking of sappy music, I heard this the other day and it gave me ear worm all damn day. Lol.
https://youtu.be/94bdMSCdw20
I’m Canadian so I’m supposed to have a Joni shrine somewhere accessible on the property but no, no I never got the fascination. I’ll just burn my passport now and become stateless.
Dude. Day’s Inn?
https://www.foxnews.com/us/la-news-anchor-died-from-meth-overdose-during-sexual-encounter-at-hotel-autopsy-reveals
That was a man who lived life to its fullest.
To the end.
I think you mean “in the end”.
https://youtu.be/JSUIQgEVDM4
Crack in the crack is wack.
Sugar Shack.
Truth, Jack.
Uffda
Yeah, way to bury the lede.
He is survived by his wife and a daughter, 9.
Fucking hell.
Yeah, sucks big time for the kid because every other kid is going to know about it. Downside of the information age.
Why is this news? And why national news? This is plain old gossip fodder being reported as news. Shameful, really.
Yeah, major “news” outlets have become The National Inquirer.
The people have a right to know! I don’t understand why they have that right with regard to anyone other than government officials, and I don’t understand why we have a press that reports who was fucking whom but ignores blatant betrayals of their oaths to uphold the Constitution by elected officials, but I am assured we have a right to know.
On the average day I can scan the “headlines” on any news website and only see 2 or 3 stories that actually could be news. Most of it is re-hash of something already being beat to death, celebrity twaddle, emotional animal story, or really low-grade clickbait.
Was Ed Buck the other party present?
I’d just like to thank Winston for being a good sport of about the whole thing. Many people, possibly myself included, would have flipped out long ago at the constant mom jokes.
Truth.
Dude has either a tortoise-thick skin or is so Aspie that he doesn’t get it. I’m betting he’s made a pact with himself to not retaliate and now its his thing and there’s no backing away from it now. I drink a lot, I’d lose it.
I think you’re all, deservedly, on a list.
#metoo
I like how he just completely ignores the whole thing. At least, I’ve never seen him ever acknowledge it.
Well it started out with a simple your mom and gradually took a life of it’s own. I actually think he gets a kick out if it which is cool.
Maybe she’s actually a dirty whore. Has anyone considered that possibility?
If I believed that I wouldn’t make the joke.
One of the more musically inclined Glibs should do a cover of Fountains of Wayne, you know with some changes.
I was telling “your momma” jokes to my six year old last week. He thought they were hilarious.
He had the best comeback ever though. He said, “my momma is your wife.”
Keep an eye on that one, Lach.
Then this happened.
“Wifey brought home a jumbo jar of kimchi from Costco.”
I love kimchi. You know what kimchi I’m not eating?
What you think Costco rots their cabbage wrong?
Does it rhyme with “tossed ho”?
If cabbage isn’t rotted properly, it isn’t worth eating. It’s next up on my fermentation list.
Do chemicals found in a calf’s ass factor in?
I’ve made dozens of gallons of sauerkraut. We have a huge crock just for that purpose. As noted above, everything tastes off to me now.
Coming this fall. Jessie’s Lie.
https://youtu.be/tEpZzvSzYfI
Jussie
He’ll plea down and six months from now it will be as if nothing happened at all. His career will take a turn to the Evangelical but he’ll still make a comfortable living.
There’s always reality TV with Danny Bonaduce and Tonya Harding.
“Progressive” left misdeeds always get memory-holed whether it’s a hate crime hoax, false rape accusation, massive corruption, or racist statements. They’re always blown off with a number of excuses such as:
– “It’s the conversation about this issue that’s important”
– “That’s old news now; can’t we just move on to more important issues?”
– “Those statements were taken out of context”
– “That video footage was selectively edited”
Meanwhile, if a non-Democrat did any similar misdeeds, it’s almost like the media-political complex sticks it in a big scrapbook and recounts it as frequently as possible.
And it’s never OK to make broad judgements of the Democrat Party based on their misdeeds, but it’s always OK to do it with Republicans. Every Republican misdeed is just one more indicator that they are the party of racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-science meany-butts.
“Macaca”
Welcome to America!
It’s all projection.
If we hadn’t exhibited so much glee, they wouldn’t have had to forgive him.
But he didn’t drop the sandwich.
He might have a future as a Subway spokesman. They’ve been looking for a new one.
On that note. Sometime in the last few weeks there was a thread on Jared. I was reading it after it was long dead, so I didn’t weigh in. But I’ll just note that during high school a large chunk of his extended family lived in my neighborhood . This was about the time he was first getting famous. His cousin rode my bus to school and always told us that he started walking to Subway because he got a DUI and that was the closest restaurant. I don’t think it was true, but that’s what she always told us.
Was his cousin an older guy who just liked riding on the school bus even though he wasn’t in school anymore?
It was a chick . . but on second thought, she could be a man. She was fairly masculine (except for having huge boobs). But she’s the type that I’m sure she’s yuge now and not in a good way.
So, she was either a victim, or this is her.
wow . . she’s fared better than I thought
No, that was Jared that liked riding the school bus.
This.
To be honest, even though it smelled fishy, I was kind of hoping it was true so I could write an episode where MAGA Prime tries to explain why he took a trip to Chicago.
https://www.out.com/nightlife/2019/2/19/lesbian-bars-LGBTQ-women-spaces
“It’s not the business, it’s the neighborhood that’s changed,” Frayne says. “When I moved into the neighborhood [over 20 years ago], there were a lot more lesbians and people who could afford to live there. Because of gentrification, there’s been a lot of change in the community.” She implies that the shifting demographics of the neighborhood coincide with a shift in the neighborhood’s atmosphere. “Now there are more people coming [to patronize Ginger’s] from the suburbs.”
Gentrification is killing our lesbians.
“The old days were better” is supposed to be the rallying cry of the Republicans, did she end up on the wrong cheer squad?
MAVA hat. Seriously, does anybody actually GAF what bar lesbians set up? I’d think they’d be tourist attractions.
It’s not they don’t get business, it’s just not the ‘right’ business. Sounds very discriminatory to me. But I just read the quote, and the writer distilled an entire conversation into quotes, so maybe it’s just a game of telephone.
“nobody goes there any more, it’s too crowded.”
“The dank, Moe! Think of the dank!”
That’s come up before.
You won. You don’t need special bars to go to anymore because you shifted public opinion. It’s churlish to complain that your demimonde is shrinking because you’ve accomplished your goal of making your lifestyle mainstream.
The tone of that article is so ridiculous I can’t even.
Yeah, chasing away everybody who doesn’t live up to your high-and-mighty politics is a great strategy. Keep it up.
“No more wars to win, no more battles to be fought…”
Incidentally, I always thought the vanguard of gentrification was gay dudes, not lesbians; a pair of young, fit dudes with no kids to worry about were more likely to take a chance on an iffy neighborhood in order to get that old brownstone at a great price.
Then the lesbians, then the singletons, then the stroller-patrol.
The only bad thing about Gentrification, as they complain about it, is how it intersects with government. Taxes going up, codes being enforced…but they don’t ever connect those dots.
“Brownstone”.
More like ‘Black Face’ Stone, am I right?!- bad comedian.
As I’m typing that, I’m thinking “huhuhuhuhuh”.
I’d like one.
That would be lovely out in the countryside on about a quarter section.
That’s what your weekend place is for, a little elbow-room.
‘Murica, Fuck Yeah! Looks awfully close to sea level, though.
I never got how you can own something that is connected to something else on the structural level. I mean, if you demolish it to build something else that affects the integrity of the neighboring building…or, that’s why leftists love them…
Leftist – “All of your feeling are belong to us now!”
It’s basically joint-ownership of the “party wall” – you can’t demolish it w/o the say-so of the other owner. You’re both also on the hook for 50% repairs, etc.
Not so different than living in a condo.
I don’t get Condos either, same thing. If I won it, I can destroy it. That’s what ownership is.
er, if I own it.
The deed is very specific about what you own – ISTR it’s on the order of “from the interior face of the studs, in” or something like that.
Oh, an the rest is it own thing; my 2 unit condo actually has 3 “owners” – me, my neighbor and the ‘condo association’, which covers the common bits of the building. The two owners control that condo association, but it’s a separate thing (insured separately too).
Ok, if I’m going to wake up for work this’ll be my last beer. Here’s a song I like. Here’s a song I’ll probably play at work tomorrow, just because it makes me think about Doctor Who.
Title or something else?
This reminds me of 80’s Doctor Who and that synth sound.
https://youtu.be/BW6XDU96KI0
Let the excuses begin: https://pagesix.com/2019/02/22/jussie-smollett-claims-he-has-an-untreated-drug-problem/amp/
Let me share a couple of little stories about Scandinavian paradise.
I lived in Sweden from 1997-1999. I was part of a pilot program at the Royal Institute of Technology to award Master’s degrees in various engineering fields to international students whose education programs followed the British (and American) system of Bachelors (4-5 years), Masters (2 yrs), PhD (??). The Swedish (and most of continental Europe) have a different structure: 2 years gets you what we might call an Associate’s Degree, and a total of 5 years and a Thesis gets you what we might call a Bachelor’s plus a Master’s degree—they don’t have an equivalent for a Bachelor’s degree. In engineering, they called it a Civilingeneursexamen. Something like that anyway. The International Master’s Program accepted foreign students with Bachelor’s degrees from British style degree systems, including the US, South America, much of Africa, Turkey, Greece, China, etc.
So here I was, going to a foreign country with a bunch of “ethnic” fellow students in the first year of the program. The Royal Institute (Kungliga Tekniska Hogskolan, or KTH) put us all in housing in a southern suburb of Stockholm called Alby, where the predominant language was Turkish. It was a ghetto, and I absolutely hated it. I talked to the KTH program coordinator and pointed out that part of the purpose of the program was to learn Swedish culture, but that wasn’t happening in that ethnic enclave. The continental European students at KTH through the Erasmus program were all in central Stockholm student housing—why were we in the ghetto? She said that they hadn’t intended to put white people in Alby; they didn’t know they’d get any Americans in the program. She offered to move me to the Erasmus housing. After I got her to admit that it was only me who’d be allowed to go, I refused.
BTW, the Swedes think Americans are racist (largely due to exaggerated editorials written by US journalists), but the US has nothing on these Swedish Aryan MoFos.
Point two: “Free” medical care. TINSTAAFL.
My friend (young, healthy) had an odd growth spontaneously on his hand, on the palm side just where the ring finger meets the palm. In horses, we’d call it Proud Flesh. It just stands out and grows, as a benign but super annoying tumor of sorts.
He called the State Healthcare Service, described the problem and asked for an appointment. In Sweden, you don’t get to schedule one that works for you; you ask for one and they write you a letter a couple of weeks later telling you when it’s going to be, whether you like it or not. So his appointment was set for a few months out. Meanwhile, his hand growth got bigger and crazier and would bleed when tweaked so he had to bandage up his hand to protect it and then couldn’t type well or anything.
He got to his appointment and the doc looks at it and says, “ Whoah, the roots of this thing are pretty deep by now; it’s gotten big. You’ll have to see a hand surgery specialist.” So a couple of weeks later, he gets a new letter about his new appointment, which would be in 6 months.
Exasperated, he asks colleagues at KTH, “How do you Swedes [He is German] get timely healthcare?” They said “Oh, you have to go to the Emergency Room.” He asked them “Where do you go when you have a no-shit, life-threatening, medical emergency then?” They said “To the emergency room.” So off he went and finally got it extracted.
I also had a much more minor medical deal in Sweden, but still had to wait forever.
The janitor who cleaned my professors’ offices made almost as much as they did. Same with doctors. Why would a person go to college and residency when he could make the same mopping floors? So yeah, there’s a doctor and nurse shortage.
Canada isn’t anywhere near as socialist as Scandinavian countries, but note that Canada has fewer MRI machines than the state of Minnesota.
When I had a seizure (my first and only “big one”) on a Friday, I was cat scanned that day to make sure I didn’t have a brain tumor or swelling. Monday I had my MRI, Tuesday my EEG. Wednesday my doctor had results and prescribed a medication, and I’ve been fine ever since. I went on some epilepsy forums and read about Canucks who’d had their first seizure and were reasonably angsty about what to expect, but they had to wait 6 months for the dang MRI!!!
My podiatry surgeon did a guest stint in Finland and saw a very interesting case. He remarked to the Finnish surgeon that he’d love to be around for the patient’s corrective surgery. The Finnish doc laughed and said that guy wasn’t going to get his surgery for 3 years at the earliest.
So yeah, you can keep your Scandinavian paradise. You know not of what you speak.
Great stories, thanks for posting.
Interesting stories. “Healthcare is a human right” sounds pretty good to many who don’t look at the costs and the shortages that would inevitably happen. Unfortunately we are on the slow march to what you experienced in Sweden I think. Lots of people are easily fooled that healthcare costs and provision can only be ensured by the benevolent hand of government.
I’d be curious what your feelings are about the surveys that put Scandinavians as the happiest, it’s obviously a subjective, but I would tend to doubt that from hanging out with them. Evenkeeled would be a better descriptor.
If I may butt in here and offer my unsolicited opinion: Whenever people bring this up with me, I always point out that happiness is not something that can be easily quantified between different individuals. Maybe it’s easy for you to say that you’re more happy or less happy than you were last year. But how do you compare those happiness rankings between people? You might get people to self-rank their happiness on a scale of 1 to 10, but still, how do you know that each person is using the same scale? Maybe Person A has never known true happiness and has a very low bar while Person B has had a particularly joyful time in their life and has a very high bar.
It gets even murkier when you start comparing “happiness studies” between different cultural/linguistic groups that may have different conceptions of happiness and the words used to describe it.
True that.
Also, people in societies where uniformity is highly valued (looking at you, Japan and Sweden) don’t tend to give any survey answer that would be an outlier or show dissatisfaction.
Swedish happiness…hmmm
That’s a tough one to crack but I will try to provide my insight backed up by some anecdotes.
Swedes want to avoid conflict at all costs. ALL costs. When I was there as a post grad, some little logistics/technical/strategy issue came up that needed resolving. I suggested and scheduled a meeting amongst the affected parties (grad students, staff). I said in the email invitation that the point was to meet and discuss the factors involved and try to come to a consensus on the path forward.
Following my email invitation, a Swedish grad student came to me and wanted a pre-meeting meeting of just the students to make sure we all had a consensus before we even sat around the table to chat! It was nuts, because it wasn’t really a big issue, and the professors were cool guys who’d have totally listened to the healthy debate. But Sven there couldn’t deal with us not going in lockstep.
Similarly, women in Sweden are way effed up. There would be a new fashion: a new style of shoe or boot, a new dress or hairdo, or a new coat. I’d hear these Swedish chicks call each other on the phone and coordinate that they’d all do the new style the same day because they didn’t want to risk sticking out from the crowd. Pathetic even then, but now it’s awful because there’s pressure on Swedish women not to “stand out” by reporting harassment and rape by “migrants”.
I strongly suspect there’s cultural pressure to claim happiness in Sweden just not to rock the boat.
Remember in WWII, Sweden was “neutral” which meant they didn’t fight, but they did let planes emergency land. If it was an Allied plane, they’d let the pilots and crew leave, but ground the plane. If it was a Nazi plane, they’d fix it and send the crew and plane back to battle. Neutral, my ass. Sweden also opened its borders for Germany to march straight through and conquer Norway. (Norwegians have not forgotten this, BTW. )
A few Swedes told me tales of how the annual tax bill was so bad that some people were taxed in a year for more than what they’d earned!! They said there was a reform for improvement afterwards, but one trick Sweden pulls is not giving you a W2 that shows just how much you paid to state, fed, medicare, SS, etc.
Here’s another “fun fact”: The Swedish government owns all apartments/flats. If you want to rent one, you apply to the government and wait. So what happens is people who have one of the precious rental agreements (which can be passed down through families—for now) sub-let apartments to others, thus depriving them of renters’ rights or complaints. I sublet from a pensioner when I left the ghetto on my own volition. Homeownership from scratch in Sweden is a fairy tale that few achieve.
Hmm… What else? Oh, yeah. You Glibs will love this. The Swedish national government owns ALL the liquor stores, Systembolaget. You go in, take a number from the reel, DMV style. Grab a clipboard and check off all the specific bottles of beer, wine, liquor that you want. Then you hand in the clipboard and sit in the waiting room while they fill your order. Feel like browsing around and picking a bottle on a whim? WELL TOO BAD. In the past, the Swedish “There should be a Law” Puritans decided to cut back on alcoholism, so they made a limit so you could order only 1 liter of hard liquor per month. Then people would buy a liter on the 31st, and another on the 1st, and get totally shit-rocked. Even the nannys had to admit it was a bad idea so they abandoned it.
Seriously, did all the Vikings migrate to America or something? These remaining folks are just not right.
So, Yeah, I pulled a Pope John Paul II and kissed the ground when I came back to the USA.
(Disclaimer: Sweden is still a great place to visit for a couple of weeks or even a few months. But for the love of all that’s holy, don’t move there.)
Related: Norway and Sweden both want to become cashless societies so that they can track how much you spend on what.
So if they see what you eat and drink, and they also “own” your healthcare costs, what could possibly go wrong??
I have seen numerous comparisons of Japanese socialized medicine to the system in the US which always show how much cheaper it is in Japan. For a lot of routine stuff this is somewhat true but there are lots of non-parallel issues.
For most medical and dental treatments there is a ceiling amount that the doc can be reimbursed. So for something that might be a single treatment in the US a Japanese doc will generally drag it out over a number of visits before the procedure is done.
And if you have to go under the knife for something really significant (cancer, for instance) it is unwritten but expected that you give the surgeon a cash gift. My MIL gave the sawbones the equivalent of US $30k in cash under the table in addition to what the system said she had to pay for a mastectomy.
I meant to state “there is a ceiling amount per visit that the doc can be reimbursed”
So for the same treatment which might be done in one or two visits in the US, in Japan that might take 4 or 5 visits.
That is becoming the norm in the US as well. They have “codes” that determine what they’ll be paid. And the insurance companies and government keep reducing what they’ll pay for specific codes….. So they have a secondary skill of breaking something out into all of the appropriate codes in order to get properly compensated.
Some of that might mean 3 office visits instead of one, just so they can collect an extra $75 to make up for what they didn’t get paid. Which means in addition to the hidden cost of the extra paperwork, there’s the hidden cost of people having to schlep over to the doctor a few extra times – which probably exceeds the cost of the visit by a wide margin.
That is a bit chilling. Thanks for sharing HS.
Did you wind up getting a degree?
Yup, a Master of Science with Specialization in Electric Power.
It has served me well, mainly because rubes see “Royal Institute of Technology” and think it sounds fancy.
To be perfectly fair though, the quality of the university lab resources and professors was outstanding. The International Master’s degree program they kicked off was because (sadly) not enough Swedes were signing up for it anymore due to income “equality”. Worked out for me though.
Congrats and Nelson laugh at the program.
Hurry up and die seems to be the overarching ethos of a socialist health care system.
See: Charlie Guard.
It creeps me out that the more “socialist” a country is, the more they abort Down Syndrome fetuses. The pro-abortionists point out what a drain they’d be on the system, and the abortion rate for DS fetuses in Europe is vastly higher than that of American DS diagnosed fetuses.
Having known several Down Syndrome people of widely varying functionality in society, I have to say that they have all enriched my life. I can’t imagine that any of them would have “deserved” to be executed.
So when Progressives advocate for aborting Imperfects, they basically imply that older or handicapped, “non-productive” people have no value to the state and should go away.
So “Pro-Choice” becomes “Pro Abortion” and then “Pro Euthanasia”.
Fuck off, murderous slavers.
You are on fire tonight.
I have a friend who was told repeatedly to abort his baby a few years back. His wife was dead set against it, and yet it was pushed by a few doctors who told her she would have a stillborn or a baby that would die within a week. Their daughter is 4 years old now. She has a few developmental issues, but is a walking, talking little girl that her parents love.
Thanks.
Great story about your friends’ daughter. Wishing good things for all of them!
Why I’m on fire is because I am damned tired of people who claim that “Democratic Socialism, like in Scandanavia” is paradise. They have no idea what they’re on about.
I think a good indicator of “Citizen Confidence” kind of like “Consumer Confidence” is that societies that sense they are dying have birthrates that drop below replacement rates. This ( I believe–correct me if i’m wrong) applies to all of europe and Great Britain and Japan. When individuals and couples lose hope for the future, they don’t want to bring more children into it.
America continues to make babies at a growth rate. We have to keep it so that they can thrive and grow!
Humans aren’t done being amazing yet, unless we let our bitter envious types behave like the crabs that keep that one crab from escaping the bucket.
Some years ago I woke up unable to move my left arm. Wifey freaked out and insisted I go to the hospital. Cat scan revealed nothing so they admitted me and I was promptly forgotten about for four fucking days. I was discharged only after Wifey made a fuss. She overheard the neurologist say something like “If he’s well enough to go out for a smoke why is he taking up a bed?” I would have still been there for days if we weren’t proactive. A few days later I went to his office and he informed me that it was just a pinched nerve and asked if I’d fallen asleep in an awkward position. I said no and showed him the bruise on my inner arm where I’d been bitten by a 300 lb flat pack in the warehouse the Friday before the adventure. He made a few notes and I was on my way, out a week of work, my own home and bed for four nights and a feeling of shame that I had wasted everyone’s valuable time and energy. I got laid off two weeks later. Do not go to the hospital unless you are clearly broken! I can’t stress this enough!
Yeah, I avoid hospitals when possible. But I’ve learned to be my own advocate and will not hesitate to grab a doctors lab coat and lock eyes when I want to say something important.
I’m really digging Kaiser Permanente here in San Diego. Certainly helps that they are trying to outshine their competitors.
If the gov’t runs it all, what’s the incentive to excel??
Diane Feinstein did the right thing. I must be drunk.
https://twitchy.com/gregp-3534/2019/02/22/this-video-of-dianne-feinstein-lecturing-kids-on-aocs-green-new-deal-is-freaking-hilarious/
“Senator, the cost of NOT taking this action will be higher than the cost of what the Green New Deal will be.”
Citation needed.
Also, hilarious video. I actually grudgingly like Sen F a bit more now.
Shamefaced #metoo.
Exactly. It’s all propaganda and even the good senator knows it. I’m impressed she didn’t pander.
She has her marching orders. I’d like to peer into Pelosi’s cold, dead heart when she thinks about Karla Marx. “Mirror, mirror on the wall Who is the butchest one of all?”
Fuck Feinstein. She birthed those ideological children. The Party elite are always outraged when the Red Guards knock on their door.
This I cannot personally vouch for, but it’s worth reading, viewing.
https://www.therebel.media/katie_hopkins_tells_mark_steyn_43_per_cent_of_rapes_in_sweden_happen_to_children
Late tot his but I just want to say Krugman has an empty conscience like progressives tend to have.
Plus he cynically preys on the ignorance of his progressive base.
Also late to the party, but this is a tour de force.
Thanks, Winston’s Mom, whoever you are.