Eric, Eric, Eric … you can take the columnist out of the Tribune, but it seems you can’t take the smarminess out of the columnist can you? The “Mueller Report” - which apparently Mueller not only didn’t write but also didn’t read -documented lots of Russian efforts to interfere with the 2016 election - including anti-Trump
Rallies, by the way; read to the end - but failed to establish that it did so in coordination with the Trump campaign. And the job of a special prosecutor - any prosecutor, really - is to determine if sufficient evidence exists to indict someone for a crime, not to “exonerate” anyone, because - get this - we have a Constitutional presumption of innocence in this country. As it turns out, though, the entire investigation was based on a lie by an FBI director who then fed it to the press to justify an investigation fed by disinformation paid for by the Clinton campaign, aided and abetted by FBI agents who knew it was disinformation but were determined to see that Trump not become President in the first place. If you want to put your faith in such people, well then bless your little heart, but I think I’ll continue to reserve judgment.
As for the Presidency of Donald Trump, who achieved energy independence and a record stock market before COVID-19 shut the world down, kept Little Rocket Man in line, deterred Russia from invading Ukraine on his watch, and enabled private industry to bring a COVID-19 vaccine to market in record time, he is not my “Dear Leader.” Like it or not, he is the duly elected forever 45th President of the United States and - unless you’ve declared your independence from the USA - that makes him your former president as well. Compared to record inflation, higher taxes, a “not quite yet” recession (how we keep redefining terms to cover for Biden failures), an effectively open southern border, and record crime under the current “Big Guy” whom even Democrats don’t want to see run for re-election, I’d say that’s quite an accomplishment, especially given all the hurdles put in his way.
By the way, Buckley’s response was “cancel your own goddamn subscription.” (If you’re going to quote the master then please do it correctly.). But really, blaming voice to text transcription for capitalizing your vulgar choice of words is pretty lame. Don’t you even read what you write? (It’s called editing.) Or is this like the Mueller Report?
After all, some of us pay good money to support this forum/publication. Please pay more attention in the future.
One view I have of #45 is that he lies so much he’s like the Boy Who Cried Wolf. If he complains that we don’t believe something he says it’s because he has done too much to make us doubt him.
Your wedding speech reminded me of a rather obscure film "Sliding Doors" starring Gweneth Paltro (who should have gotten some kind of award for worst fake British accent) and John Hannah that examines how life can turn in totally different direction in a nanosecond when you zig vs zag. It's pretty much a crap shoot as to how and where you land in this life and with whom.
The more I look up "Occam's razor" the more confused I am. I think many subscribers here may be a lot more "smarty pants" than I am, but I'll keep at it.
I agree in essence with Steve R. and David L. (although Steve’s reaction amounted to a way out of proportion hissy fit). I know that the Picayune Sentinel is your own publication and you’re free to employ whatever syntax you like, but I’ve always admired your keen intelligence and thoughtfulness, and no matter how you justify it, resorting to profanity diminishes the value of what you have to offer, if only in a small way. It’s the same reason that I’m always a bit more put off by swearing when (prepare to let the accusations of chauvinism fly!) it comes out of the mouths of women and young girls than those of men and boys; simply put, I hold some people to higher standards than others. None of this is to say that I’m prudish or easily offended. The Big Lebowski is my favorite movie of all time, William S. Burroughs is one of my favorite authors, George Carlin my favorite stand up comic, and so on. The point is that I think that profanity has it’s place, but I think that a journal as august as PS is not one of them (no way am I going to cancel my subscription, though!)
Have to admit that I laughed out loud at the Motley Crue tweet, that was very funny. From the reports I'm hearing Vince's voice isn't sounding so good after all these years. That's too bad.
One off topic comment: It's disappointing that John Williams almost always only posts the speed jokes segment from his Monday show and not the time you are on. At least that's my experience getting podcasts from iTunes. I can get you on the Joan Esposito show every week if I miss the live broadcast, it would be nice if John could do the same.
Mark Twain wrote something along the lines of There is a comfort in profanity denied even to prayer
Ok, yes, but the comfort depends on using the profanity really, really sparingly. Otherwise it just becomes part of ordinary discourse, losing its shock value (or at least its value for extreme emphasis), and then what do you have to fall back on in emergencies?
I don't like the profanity, but I've learned to accept it as another form of emphasis. Considering how profane the cult leader of the Republican party is known to be, I don't understand how any of his apologists are offended here.
Too bad about Steve R’s decision to split, especially for such a frivolous reason. The participation of voices that proffer differing opinions is one of the best things about PS, along with Eric’s willingness to take on challenges and argue as convincingly and persuasively as he does, his response to David A’s comment today being a prime example. One needn’t look any further than Every Goddamn Day to see the pitfalls of a different approach; as talented a writer as Neil Steinberg is, I find it increasingly difficult to make it through his comment boards without squirming, since they’ve become one big gooey love fest of boot licking obsequiousness.
I was somewhat bemused by the emailers who were clutching their pearls about the use of the word “fuck.” My late mom was a devout Catholic, and when I was younger often heard her say that cursing was a sign of a limited vocabulary. That being said, later on in life (she died at 91) she was known to toss the F bomb around herself, albeit sparingly.
Let me further suggest that Occam's Shaving Cream -- wet, messy, covering up stubble -- is the most likely case when you're talking about what governments do.
It seems to me that the FBI search at Mar-A-Lago is perfectly legitimate; regardless of what they found. But I would not be surprised if the Top Secret/SCI files have nothing to do with nuclear secrets but are related to spying on foreign leaders. There was earlier reporting about a Macron file. I recall during the Obama Administration there was a big hooha over NSA 'tapping' of the cell phones of European leaders, including Angela Merkle. This caused lots of political blathering and apologies and 'compromised sources' yak. But I doubt that the spying stopped. But I can see how the agencies would have increased the security level, and that it is the kind of stuff Trump would take home. We may never know.
The problem with conspiracy theories and the erosion of trust in government is that they are frequently based in facts and actual events. The FBI is no stranger to controversies regarding activities - Hoover collecting political dirt, NIxon (and others?) targeted enemies, spying on left wing groups, spying on anti-war groups, spying on civil rights groups, spying on Muslim groups, spying on black activists, spying on environmental and animal rights groups, spying on right wing groups, white supremist groups, etc. And the FBI is happy to brag about their ability to infiltrate groups with agents and informants when they think it is politic. Their leadership always believes they are serving the nation's interests. Their critics in the media and targeted organizations proclaim them to be an over-reaching, scary, threat to democratic freedom with the ability to hide their actual motives and actions. Defenders proclaim the FBI to be the heroic defender of individual and national security. Politicians raise legitimate issues and also pile on to their own advantage. There is plenty of meat for legitimate concerns, as well as the fever dreams of conspiracists and those that exploit controversy. The challenge is how we can assess each event and filter out the truth.
Eric, Eric, Eric … you can take the columnist out of the Tribune, but it seems you can’t take the smarminess out of the columnist can you? The “Mueller Report” - which apparently Mueller not only didn’t write but also didn’t read -documented lots of Russian efforts to interfere with the 2016 election - including anti-Trump
Rallies, by the way; read to the end - but failed to establish that it did so in coordination with the Trump campaign. And the job of a special prosecutor - any prosecutor, really - is to determine if sufficient evidence exists to indict someone for a crime, not to “exonerate” anyone, because - get this - we have a Constitutional presumption of innocence in this country. As it turns out, though, the entire investigation was based on a lie by an FBI director who then fed it to the press to justify an investigation fed by disinformation paid for by the Clinton campaign, aided and abetted by FBI agents who knew it was disinformation but were determined to see that Trump not become President in the first place. If you want to put your faith in such people, well then bless your little heart, but I think I’ll continue to reserve judgment.
As for the Presidency of Donald Trump, who achieved energy independence and a record stock market before COVID-19 shut the world down, kept Little Rocket Man in line, deterred Russia from invading Ukraine on his watch, and enabled private industry to bring a COVID-19 vaccine to market in record time, he is not my “Dear Leader.” Like it or not, he is the duly elected forever 45th President of the United States and - unless you’ve declared your independence from the USA - that makes him your former president as well. Compared to record inflation, higher taxes, a “not quite yet” recession (how we keep redefining terms to cover for Biden failures), an effectively open southern border, and record crime under the current “Big Guy” whom even Democrats don’t want to see run for re-election, I’d say that’s quite an accomplishment, especially given all the hurdles put in his way.
By the way, Buckley’s response was “cancel your own goddamn subscription.” (If you’re going to quote the master then please do it correctly.). But really, blaming voice to text transcription for capitalizing your vulgar choice of words is pretty lame. Don’t you even read what you write? (It’s called editing.) Or is this like the Mueller Report?
After all, some of us pay good money to support this forum/publication. Please pay more attention in the future.
“Smarty pants” indeed!🙄
One view I have of #45 is that he lies so much he’s like the Boy Who Cried Wolf. If he complains that we don’t believe something he says it’s because he has done too much to make us doubt him.
The bicycle clips speech is lovely. I'm glad it was still in the archives.
My mission is to introduce use “smarty pants circles “ in a sentence every day for a month. I love your choice of words, Eric.
All the visual tweets were my favorite this week.
Your wedding speech reminded me of a rather obscure film "Sliding Doors" starring Gweneth Paltro (who should have gotten some kind of award for worst fake British accent) and John Hannah that examines how life can turn in totally different direction in a nanosecond when you zig vs zag. It's pretty much a crap shoot as to how and where you land in this life and with whom.
The more I look up "Occam's razor" the more confused I am. I think many subscribers here may be a lot more "smarty pants" than I am, but I'll keep at it.
Loved all of the visual tweets this week. and I loved all of the last set of political tweets you posted.
Eric: I had to vote for the avocado tweet because that just happened to me. But I hope the Pope and his cone of shame wins.
I agree in essence with Steve R. and David L. (although Steve’s reaction amounted to a way out of proportion hissy fit). I know that the Picayune Sentinel is your own publication and you’re free to employ whatever syntax you like, but I’ve always admired your keen intelligence and thoughtfulness, and no matter how you justify it, resorting to profanity diminishes the value of what you have to offer, if only in a small way. It’s the same reason that I’m always a bit more put off by swearing when (prepare to let the accusations of chauvinism fly!) it comes out of the mouths of women and young girls than those of men and boys; simply put, I hold some people to higher standards than others. None of this is to say that I’m prudish or easily offended. The Big Lebowski is my favorite movie of all time, William S. Burroughs is one of my favorite authors, George Carlin my favorite stand up comic, and so on. The point is that I think that profanity has it’s place, but I think that a journal as august as PS is not one of them (no way am I going to cancel my subscription, though!)
Have to admit that I laughed out loud at the Motley Crue tweet, that was very funny. From the reports I'm hearing Vince's voice isn't sounding so good after all these years. That's too bad.
One off topic comment: It's disappointing that John Williams almost always only posts the speed jokes segment from his Monday show and not the time you are on. At least that's my experience getting podcasts from iTunes. I can get you on the Joan Esposito show every week if I miss the live broadcast, it would be nice if John could do the same.
Mark Twain wrote something along the lines of There is a comfort in profanity denied even to prayer
Ok, yes, but the comfort depends on using the profanity really, really sparingly. Otherwise it just becomes part of ordinary discourse, losing its shock value (or at least its value for extreme emphasis), and then what do you have to fall back on in emergencies?
I don't like the profanity, but I've learned to accept it as another form of emphasis. Considering how profane the cult leader of the Republican party is known to be, I don't understand how any of his apologists are offended here.
Too bad about Steve R’s decision to split, especially for such a frivolous reason. The participation of voices that proffer differing opinions is one of the best things about PS, along with Eric’s willingness to take on challenges and argue as convincingly and persuasively as he does, his response to David A’s comment today being a prime example. One needn’t look any further than Every Goddamn Day to see the pitfalls of a different approach; as talented a writer as Neil Steinberg is, I find it increasingly difficult to make it through his comment boards without squirming, since they’ve become one big gooey love fest of boot licking obsequiousness.
I was somewhat bemused by the emailers who were clutching their pearls about the use of the word “fuck.” My late mom was a devout Catholic, and when I was younger often heard her say that cursing was a sign of a limited vocabulary. That being said, later on in life (she died at 91) she was known to toss the F bomb around herself, albeit sparingly.
Let me further suggest that Occam's Shaving Cream -- wet, messy, covering up stubble -- is the most likely case when you're talking about what governments do.
It seems to me that the FBI search at Mar-A-Lago is perfectly legitimate; regardless of what they found. But I would not be surprised if the Top Secret/SCI files have nothing to do with nuclear secrets but are related to spying on foreign leaders. There was earlier reporting about a Macron file. I recall during the Obama Administration there was a big hooha over NSA 'tapping' of the cell phones of European leaders, including Angela Merkle. This caused lots of political blathering and apologies and 'compromised sources' yak. But I doubt that the spying stopped. But I can see how the agencies would have increased the security level, and that it is the kind of stuff Trump would take home. We may never know.
The problem with conspiracy theories and the erosion of trust in government is that they are frequently based in facts and actual events. The FBI is no stranger to controversies regarding activities - Hoover collecting political dirt, NIxon (and others?) targeted enemies, spying on left wing groups, spying on anti-war groups, spying on civil rights groups, spying on Muslim groups, spying on black activists, spying on environmental and animal rights groups, spying on right wing groups, white supremist groups, etc. And the FBI is happy to brag about their ability to infiltrate groups with agents and informants when they think it is politic. Their leadership always believes they are serving the nation's interests. Their critics in the media and targeted organizations proclaim them to be an over-reaching, scary, threat to democratic freedom with the ability to hide their actual motives and actions. Defenders proclaim the FBI to be the heroic defender of individual and national security. Politicians raise legitimate issues and also pile on to their own advantage. There is plenty of meat for legitimate concerns, as well as the fever dreams of conspiracists and those that exploit controversy. The challenge is how we can assess each event and filter out the truth.