By lambert strether
Why wood pulp is world’s new wonder material New Scientist (RM)
Most Mutations Come from Dad: New Insights Into Age, Height and Sex Reshape Views of Human Evolution Science Daily
Empire State Building shooting: Workplace dispute leaves 2 dead, 9 bystanders injured (VIDEO) Newark Star Ledger
Footage shows gunman Jeffrey Johnson’s last moments after fatally shooting ex-colleague Steve Ercolino; nine others injured by police gunfire in shootout near Empire State building amid Midtown Manhattan morning rush New York Daily News. Trigger warning: Graphic content.
Key voice urges China to gird for tough times Vancouver Sun. People’s Daily, front page.
China’s Slowdown May Be Worse Than Official Data Suggest Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
Fed Chief Makes Diplomatic Visit To Econopolis America’s Finest News Source
Looking for a Good Job? Don’t Get Your Hopes Up In These Times (CB)
Household income fell more in recovery than during recession WaPo
Big Income Losses for Those Near Retirement Times
Payday Lenders Using Courts to Create Modern-Day Debtors’ Prisons in Missouri, Critics Say ABA Journal
“Mother” of All Bank Frauds Shocks and Awes Regulators, As LIBOR Victims Seek Justice Angry Bear
HSBC in Settlement Talks With U.S. Over Money Laundering Bloomberg
Fed Sends Taxpayer and Business Money to Banks Via Interest Rate Swaps Masocchio, FDL (CB)
Empire State Building IPO challenged by tangle of legacy holders Stamford Advocate
The Downsizing of the American Butler CNBC
TV station pays up after using journalist’s video without permission Romenesko. Digital sharecroppers take note.
Jury awards $1bn patent victory to Apple FT
Samsung Has Several Avenues of Appeal WSJ
Apple vs. Samsung: the jury’s final verdict form shows the breadth of Apple’s win The Verge. Gallery of verdict or PDF.
What the Apple v. Samsung Verdict Means for the Rest of Us Wired
Apple-Samsung Jury May Have Leaned on Engineer, Patent Holder Bloomberg
Apple v Samsung jury validates American patent system, raises new questions for the future of tech Apple Insider. Design patents were Apple’s big win.
Apple, Samsung Both Violated Patents: South Korean Court Information Week. Back at ya.
Top 10 Lies Told by Monsanto on GMO Labeling in California EcoWatch
Tootsie’s Secret Empire Wall Street Journal
The New Statesman must correct its error over Assange and extradition Greenwald, Guardian
Julian Assange arrest plan revealed accidentally Guardian. If you believe in accidents.
“clearly we definitely could be clearer if there is so much confusion” (How Twitter backed away from a platform strategy) Digitopoly. Important.
An American in Barcelona: Walkability, Streets, Squares, Public Art. Eschaton’s beat.
Is Harry Reid’s Bain-Investor Friend the Gawker Leaker? Angry Bear
The Monkeywrench Wars Archdruid Report. Like torture, drones aren’t a war-fighting technology but a war-losing technology.
* * *
D — 16 and counting*
“Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language.” –Ludwig Wittgenstein
Montreal. Strike: “The student movement’s focus will be on the [UQAM] on Monday, after two of its largest faculties decided to continue their boycotts and teachers voted Thursday to cancel classes in cases where they deem conditions won’t allow them to teach.”
RNCon. Hurricane, Weather Underground watch: “I put the odds of a mass evacuation being ordered for Tampa during the convention at 1%.” (Yesterday: 3%.) … Hurricanes, snark watch: “So if Obama’s FEMA arrives, politely say, ‘No, I am waiting for a free-enterprise market solution to my gaping head wound.'” … Biden: “Due to disaster preparedness and local security concerns, Biden’s trip to Tampa on Monday has been postponed.” … Drones: “This will mark the first time unmanned aerial vehicles will patrol the skies over a national convention, according to [Curt Winter, an engineer with United Drones in Naples] that builds and will operate the drones. United Drones will operate several unmanned ground vehicles, called Wraiths, [which] can travel up to 65 mph ‘and climb just about anything.'” Anything? (“All RNC Delegates Get In Free!“) … Drones: “Seventy-five protesters gathered outside the local production plant of Raytheon on Thursday, denouncing the defense contractor for its role in drone warfare.” … Surveillance: “I’d really hate if any of you war-mongers subsequently had your careers ruined because of out-of-control surveillance capturing you while you’re partying.” (just me) Might I suggest masking? … Ron Paul: “Using a mix of charm and procedural hardball, Romney and the RNC have ensured that the TX congressman will neither speak nor be formally nominated at next week’s convention.” …. Ron Paul: Paul will, however, get a non-prime time video tribute. … Marching: “In 2010, Forbes ranked Tampa dead last out of 60 metro areas for commuting. Transportation for America declared it the second most-dangerous city for pedestrians. And a 2007 survey of 30 metropolitan areas found exactly one with no walkable destinations: Tampa, FL.” … Protests: “The demonstrations constitute one of the largest protest actions FL has seen in years.”
DNCcon. Police state: “Hundreds of NC National Guardsmen will be sent to Charlotte to provide security at several ‘critical infrastructure’ sites around venues for the Democratic National Convention.”
CO. Extractive economy: “The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) moved for a ‘voluntary remand’ of three oil and gas drilling projects in Garfield County CO. The three projects represent only a few examples of a broader practice in which BLM has approved at least 33 drilling projects–involving thousands of wells–with no air pollution analysis.”
FL. Legacy parties: “Rivera [R] still hasn’t answered, in any language, how he got access to Sternad’s [D] amended financial reports before they became public record. Nor has he said why his lady friend Ana Alliegro, a self-described ‘R political guru’ just happened to be the campaign manager for Sternad the D. ”
GA. Drought: “Gov. Nathan Deal is asking the EPA to suspend the federal requirement to add ethanol to gasoline, joining livestock and poultry farmers and several other governors who’ve made similar requests because of the price of corn.”
LA. Corruption: “Businessman Aaron Bennett pleaded guilty last fall to bribery and is helping the government in the case against the former mayor. But just a week before he was charged he took $600,000 from his construction company — money that came from the Corps of Engineers to pay for storm-proofing work on three New Orleans pump stations — and gave it to his fourth wife’s film production company.”
MD. Mass incarceration: “We have a school-to-prison pipeline operating in Baltimore and other cities across the nation where young people believe, with some good reason, that their destiny lies behind bars and they too will become members of the under caste.”
ME. Public goods: “New federal data show more ME parents are choosing not to vaccinate their children. [As] students prepare to go back to school, ME has recorded 411 cases of whooping cough this year, nearly five times the number of cases reported at this time in 2011.”
MI. Occupy Detroit: “Occupy protesters from across the Midwest are in Detroit this weekend for a regional conference aimed at thinking of practical ways to help urban areas. Workshops include sessions on urban farming, solar panels, housing, political protests, and banks. Today, Occupy members protested against Fannie Mae over housing issues and against the state’s emergency manager law.”
MN. Police state: “After breaking down doors and shooting the family dog, a drug task force forced handcuffed children ‘to sit next to the carcass of their dead and bloody pet for more than an hour,’ and kept searching even after they knew they were raiding the wrong house, the family claims in Federal Court.”
MT. Land: “What [Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks biologist Jay Kolbe] and others find so alarming isn’t that Plum Creek is selling its land. It’s that the latest crop of sales appear larger than anything the company has executed in the past, and they worry that such sales could open the way to subdivisions that may not be compatible with wildlife.”
NC. Money: “NC — one of nine states won by President George W. Bush in 2004 that shifted to Obama four years later — is home to one of [Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity’s] busiest state chapters with nearly 140,000 activists.”
NY. Corruption: “Brooklyn Assemblyman and county D power broker Vito Lopez is being roundly punished by Assembly Majority Speaker Sheldon Silver over some blatant instances of sexual harassment.” … Homelessness: “Rats are coming through the walls and worms infest the bathrooms at city’s homeless shelters. But Mayor Bloomberg says they’re so pleasurable that no one wants to leave” (that’s a Daily News headine). … Homelessness: “The city requires newly homeless people to solicit at least three bids from storage companies, which can be an onerous process for someone in crisis.”
PA. Charters, Will Bunch: “But activists said that last Friday’s surprise announcement that Gov. Corbett had named the Rev. Joe Watkins – an MSNBC pundit who headed the Students First PAC, the pro-voucher group that’s dumped millions of campaign dollars on Corbett and other pols – as chief recovery officer to run the Chester Upland schools in Delaware County marks a tipping point.” … Fracking: “In late July, hoping to keep drillers at bay, Fujiko Miller placed bags filled with her ancestor’s ashes on fence posts [where Chevron needed to come through]. The Millers were given 48 hours. The bags came down and they were compensated for giving access.” … Fracking: “State shale gas production during the first six months of 2012 more than doubled compared to the same period last year despite drillers’ efforts to curtail the rapid growth because the abundance of gas has depressed prices.” … Fracking: “From July 2009 to June 2012, over $8 billion worth of natural gas was extracted from PA’s share of the Marcellus Shale. The Commonwealth would have collected more than $500 million had we had WV’s natural gas tax in place. Instead, we got $0.”
TX. Corruption: “Close observers of how powerful interests control policy in TX will perhaps not be surprised by the [Texas Public Policy Foundation’s inadvertantly published] funding sources.”
VA. UVa: “[Houston beer distributor John L. Nau III] of the University of Virginia board of visitors paid [Hill+Knowlton Strategies’s] bill [for handling] the backlash from the board’s attempt to fire the president.” … UVa: “The UVa has declined a request from Obama’s re-election campaign to hold an event on Grounds next week due to the ‘extraordinary disruption’ it would present early in the school year, UVa announced Friday.” On the second day of class? What was Team Obama thinking? … Power: “[T]his new enthusiasm [for renewables] has run headlong into the immovable force known as Dominion Power. Dominion blocked a [Power Purchase Agreement] at Washington & Lee University last fall, and its threat of legal action has kept other non-profits from moving forward with plans for solar installations.”
Outside baseball. Roediger’s Wages of Whiteness: “The Communists subsequently gained a wide degree of acceptance and indeed cooptation within the New Deal coalition, Roosevelt’s famous ‘troika,’ — big city political machines, the labor movement, and the avowedly white-supremacists in the ‘Solid South.’ The price paid, unfortunately, was the abandonment of the centrality of the struggle against white supremacism within the working class.” … Legacy parties: “The two parties, at least in VA, literally swapped philosophies when it came to the issue of race. And if pandering to racists was the path — after all, Ds had done it for years — then, by golly, why not? Winning is, after all, the most important thing.” … Legacy parties: “[Politify (here) has] produced a killer site which actually ‘visualizes’ [via ‘Net Change to Income] how both [sic] candidates would affect American voters — individually, by region and by state — using what they say is ‘one of the most advanced models of the U.S. economy ever made public.'” There’s an app for “you’ve got no place to go.” … Legacy parties: “[USA Today/Gallup:] For the first time at this point in at least six elections, voters are inclined to see both the Republican and Democratic parties unfavorably.” … Charters: “If unions were ‘the problem,’ we would expect to find high performance in right to work states. But we don’t.” … Provenance: “A very popular and well known porn star was able to escape under the radar by being allowed to show a director a copy of their test scores on their cell and not on paper or through digital copy.” Like e-voting, eh? … Normalizing disemployment: “[CBO: ] Unemployment would stand at an unhealthy 8% or so when 2013 comes to a close.”
The trail. Swing states, First Draft: “1. NC 2. IA 3. FL 4. CO 5. VA 6. NV 7. OH 8. WI 9. NH.” Nice knowin’ ya, PA. … Tea party: “Though the Akin controversy shows experience is no guarantee of success, the fact that more elected officials are running under the Tea Party banner is evidence of the movement’s growing influence. The Tea Party is quickly moving toward the power center of the Republican Party.” … Charlie Cook: “[T]his race shouldn’t be as tight as it is. Incumbents generally don’t get reelected with numbers like we are seeing today. Romney may still win this election. It’s awfully close. But if he doesn’t, the knives will be long, sharp, and unforgiving.”
Romney. Nooners: “Obama can’t stand to be made fun of [but see this essential post from Stoller]. His pride won’t allow it, his amour propre cannot countenance a joke at his own expense. If Mr. Romney lands a few very funny lines about the president’s leadership, Mr. Obama will freak out. That would be fun, wouldn’t it?” … Birtherism: “Romney made a joke that relies on a debunked conspiracy theory about the president–a theory especially popular with people who don’t like blacks and foreigners. Romney’s crowd cheered.” … Birtherism: “Somewhere, Orly Taitz is smiling.” … Birtherirsm: “Ironic post-birtherism.” … Birtherism: Romney walks it back. Shorter: “Hey, where’s your sense of humor?” … Stenography: “It’s the sort of statement that leaves journalists slack-jawed: ‘The one stipulation to the interview was that I not ask him about abortion or Todd Akin.'” …. Ryan: Brown-noser? That’s not the half of it (Monkey Cage). … Data: “[Romney’s Buxton project] combines marketing data with psychographic data analysis. An early test analyzed details of more than 2 million households near San Francisco and elsewhere on the West Coast and identified thousands of people who would be comfortably able and inclined to give Romney at least $2,500 or more.”
Obama. Razor-thin margin: “[Obama’s] pointillist approach has been on sharp display in recent weeks, as he has alternately tailored his campaign speeches and his ad campaigns to women, older voters and, most recently, new young voters who may not have been old enough to cast a ballot four years ago.” Visionary minimalism.
Akin flap. “Backward”: “[Via Nicholas Culpeper’s 17th century midwife manual:] If both husband and wife were not properly in love and enjoying sex, conception would fail because ‘the woman, being averse, does not produce sufficient quantities of the spirits with which her genitals should normally swell.'” Shades of Dr. Slop, the man-midwife…
* 16 days until the Democratic National Convention ends with shark fin soup for everyone on the floor of the Bank of America Panther Stadium, Charlotte, NC. Louis XVI was the last Bourbon king of France.
* * *
lambert here: When I was in Thailand, Furzy Mouse took me to see the elephants, but first we stopped at a roadside stand to buy them some snacks. Watermelons:
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Re: the MN police state case where a family was terrorized for hours, even after the cops realized they had raid the wrong house–
Can someone tell me the difference between how Americans are treated by domestic police forces and how our military treats the unfortunate residents of our many occupied countries? There may be a difference of degree, but not of kind.
Police now attack with overwhelming force whenever they are under the slightest risk of injury. The possible impact on innocent citizens whom they are supposed to protect is of no consequence. The most recent example, where the NYPD turn a one-on-one killing into a mass shooting, is illustrative.
It is . . . remarkable that having fired only sixteen bullets, several of which certaintly struck the malefactor, the police duo in question managed to injure nine bystanders. But while I’m no defender of guncockers and seldom quick to take the side of those with police power, I don’t see this particular incident as a good one to pile on to the Blue Meanies. They guys were summoned to pursue a certain murderer, known to be armed, and it being their job and their duty they closed on that party not knowing who or how many the individual might harm or endanger. He drew on them, and it was kill or be killed. I mean, those are the material facts no one is really disputing. Put yourself in the position of the officers for once in making the critique, and think if you would do better; seriously. It is unfortunate that so many were in the line of fire. It is extremely fortunate that none of them were fatally injured. I didn’t watch the vids (not my kind of kick), but I’ll say that anyone near by who didn’t instantly kiss the pavement the second they heard shots or “Gun” needs to reassess their survival skills and planning: you go down, fast, and stay low. That’s not to blame anyone, it all came down in a blink.
The NYPD (amongst too many others) has an evil record of shoot-to-killing _not indentified_ individuals in panic mode because they have a ‘shield law.’ But this just doesn’t seem to be one of those cases. If the dude with the .45 was drawing down on a crowd that had your personal person in it, tell me again what you would want the cops to do, folks. It’s just bad that we, in our society, program so many distraught and disturbed individuals to go out with a *bang* for their fifteen secons of (in)fame(y). Because the coverage of all this does program those disturbed, who are more suggestible than your average sort. Just a bad scene . . . .
You have placed your own feelings in the way Richard. You describe your fear and intentions. Not those of a supposedly trained person. They shot bystanders because they were what exactly? Fearful, unorganized, without fear of retribution?
I believe that, in the articles, one of the bystanders wasn’t sure what the noises were: Shots, or random street noise. Manhattan is noisy and croweded, no?
* * *
Does anybody have examples of police procedures that would have yielded a better outcome? [Ruling out a priori the idea that arming every civilian in New York would be a good idea, because next, body armor, and so on up the arms race ladder…]
“If the dude with the .45 was drawing down on a crowd that had your personal person in it, tell me again what you would want the cops to do, folks.”
Well, I wouldn’t want them to shoot me so he doesn’t have to.
That defeats the whole purpose of this sort of Johnny-on-the-spot justice that is an NYPD specialty.
I’ve never been involved in a gunfight, nor am I any expert on guns, so perhaps I am missing something, BUT…..
Two cops shot 16 bullets at the suspect from an 8 ft distance and hit 9 bystanders????? Why are these guys carrying guns if they don’t know how to shoot? Okay, a couple of stray bullets you might understand, esp. in a crowded place and on the move. Maybe…. maybe…. even three or four. But more than half? From 8 ft? That’s terrible!
To obtain one’s concealed carry license one must hit the torso of a target 40/50 shots from 21 ft. to pass the shooting test. Granted, nothing is moving which lessens the difficulty, but most people from what I’ve heard only need 40 bullets to finish the test. It took me 41 bullets and it was the third time I’d ever shot a gun. Most bullets were within 6 inches of the bulls eye. I don’t think I have any particular aptitude (stunk at sports) though recoil doesn’t affect my accuracy (I’m told this is less problematic for women??).
Of course police should have guns and of course they were justified in shooting when they saw a gun aimed at them. However, guns are lethal weapons and deserve a healthy respect. If one can’t steer to avoid hitting other cars, one shouldn’t be driving. If one doesn’t have control over their weapon, one shouldn’t be carrying. Betcha Jamie called up Mikie and requested “the cops that know how to aim” be assigned outside JPM.
TV news reports also glossed over the “technicality” that the bystanders were wounded by the police and not the shooter, mentioned elsewhere. Initial reports were clear about the bullets coming from police then abruptly the reports changed to more vague reporting that allowed for assumptions that the gunman had shot all the victims. Apparently a memo was sent out. By whom?
The military has done extensive research on the adrenal gland trigger finger.
Skippy… They decided to take full auto off most M-16’s, etc. Full auto is available to only maybe 1 or 2 individual per squad. Caveat this may have changed, collateral damage is A-OK these days…. IE people just doing their thing in the wrong place and time thingy.
It’s my understanding that, in the heat of an armed confrontation such as the Empire Stata Building embroglio, active participants (cops and shooter) are likely saturated with adrenaline such that fine-point discrimination and collected thinking completely disappear, replaced by the chemical impulse to shoot, and keep shooting until the gun empties, and “aim” only in the loosest sense of the term. That is, IMO, one of the dirty little secrets that the “guns for everybody” crowd prefer nobody knew, the idea that (unlike what we see on teevee), in mortal-stakes situations adrenalin takes over and people tend to shoot rather indiscriminately, from the reptile side of the brain. Police are usually woefully undertrained to operate in an adrenalized state, and civilians DEFINITELY are; that more hapless bystanders aren’t killed in these kinds of situations is a miracle.
The MN cops are an example of the immature, childish, thugs who wear the badge. After establishing they have the wrong house, they continue with their antagonisms. Why? To cover their coward asses, that’t why. Rather than admit the error and suffer the legal and social consequences, they continue their rampage in the hope that SOMETHING can be found that may be used as justification for their incompetance and illegality.
It’s Monsters InCorporated [including the judiciary and prison industry here too]. Nothing less.
Proof is that whistle blower cops are severely antagonized, and that there are soooo few cops who are willing to, even internally, out the illegal behavior.
why do they always kill the pets …not just dogs — filthy cops have butchered cats and even birds in these raids… they shot a parrot for gods sake!!!
twisted sickos… i find myself rooting for the cop killers.
i have no use for para military types… got no use for em
I suspect cowardice is the root cause. A coward makes up for lack of bravery against a dangerous opponent with brutality against the harmless.
What say ye skippy? Youse has been in combat, ain’t ye?
There is a great distance between police and the people I worked with, fail rates through progressive schooling, to the point, where your – asked – and not submitting applications. That was then, I know not the finer details these days, as the need for quantity has increased and the extended duration one must operate under.
That was primarily why I left, I saw what laid at the end of that road… oblivion… regardless of the justification[s, ie. gawd and country.
So to answer your not so veiled question, attempt to paint me in a bad light, score cheap points… yes… I’am a Murder and never will wash my self clean. It cannot be undone. The best I can do is inform others of my folly and hope they don’t go down that road too.
Skippy… stressed out cops? (everyone COULD BE a cop killer thingy), culture (pop a bad guy bolo badge), top down institutionalism (see white shirts in NYC during protests), shock and awe (total spectrum domination was good enough for operation freedom its good enough for everyone), its a long, long list… this is just a taste.
PS. If you support the currant military, you are, by opinion, an accessory to murder. That’s what army’s do, murder humans into compliance. What would you do if the dead littered your street?
PS. Have a nice day! Because your not in the stans or some place whacking folks, to keep you safe from their jealousy… of america’s dream….
No skippy, I was not attempting to paint you in a bad light or call you a murderer. David killed quite a few in his day and apparently even Canaanite women and children. Yet he wasn’t called a murderer to my knowledge until he killed Uriah the Hittite.
I was just inquiring about cowardice in combat. But I now realize that at the level you operated (dedicated professionals) that that wasn’t something you encountered, at least with your own men.
“Come now, and let us reason together,” Says the LORD, “Though your sins are as scarlet, they will be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they will be like wool. Isaiah 1:18
“What say ye skippy? Youse has been in combat, ain’t ye?” – beardo
Youse has been in combat, ain’t ye?… Had you uttered those words at the wrong place and time in the past…. the next sensation you would have felt, as described by color, would have been white.
“I was just inquiring about cowardice in combat. But I now realize that at the level you operated (dedicated professionals) that that wasn’t something you encountered, at least with your own men.” – beardo
Skip… your ignorance is profound… The word cowardice is a tool of the people that sit around a nice meal and fine drink and make plans. Wonder why the troops are so unmotivated to kill, THEIR ENEMY’S, with the sociopathic zeal they project.
There is only – THE FEAR – of your own demise and those around you. All the training you receive is directed at modifying this base instinct and improving your skill set[s, whilst under it. The stick is your impending doom or diminishment, the carrot is the feeling of *superiority*, by over coming that possibility.
Personally… I found Cusacks portrayal and aplomb delivery most apropos, with regards to myself.
Mr. Newberry: Did I have you figured wrong?
Marty: I don’t know – I mean, I hope so.
Mr. Newberry: I visualised you in a haze as one of those slackster, flannel-wearing, coffee-house misanthropes I’ve been seeing in Newsweek.
Marty: No no no, I went the other road. Six figures, doing business with leadpipe cruelty, mercenary sensibility. You know… sports, sex, no real relationships with anyone. How about you, how have the years been treating you?
Mr. Newberry: Well, you know me, Martin. Still the same old sell-out, exploiting the oppressed…
Marty: Sure.
Mr. Newberry: “Ah, what a piece of work is man, how noble…” ah, fuck it. Let’s have a drink and forget the whole damn thing.
Mr. Newberry: Did I have you figured wrong?
Marty: I don’t know – I mean, I hope so.
Mr. Newberry: I visualised you in a haze as one of those slackster, flannel-wearing, coffee-house misanthropes I’ve been seeing in Newsweek.
Marty: No no no, I went the other road. Six figures, doing business with leadpipe cruelty, mercenary sensibility. You know… sports, sex, no real relationships with anyone. How about you, how have the years been treating you?
Mr. Newberry: Well, you know me, Martin. Still the same old sell-out, exploiting the oppressed…
Marty: Sure.
Mr. Newberry: “Ah, what a piece of work is man, how noble…” ah, fuck it. Let’s have a drink and forget the whole damn thing.
Marty: A thousand innocent people get killed every day! But a millionaire’s pet gets detonated, and you’re marked for life.
Marty: Hi. I’m, uh, I’m a pet psychiatrist. I sell couch insurance. Mm-hmm, and I – and I test-market positive thinking. I lead a weekend men’s group, we specialize in ritual killings. Yeah, you look great! God, yeah! Hi, how are you? Hi, how are you? Hi, I’m Martin Blank, you remember me? I’m not married, I don’t have any kids, but I’d blow your head off if someone paid me enough.
Debi: You’re a psychopath.
Marty: No, no. Psychopaths kill for no reason. I kill for *money*. It’s a *job*. That didn’t come out right.
Mr. Newberry: What have you been doing with your life?
Marty: Uh… professional killer.
Mr. Newberry: Oh! Good for you, it’s a… growth industry.
Skip… have a peruse:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119229/quotes
Skippy… This stuff is far more healing than the mind fook you offer, hell it was part of the problem from the start!
FYI… I’m with the forensic archaeologists, your mob just makes stuff up, sort of like miasmatic theory. Its all so self serving… barf…
Thank goodness for J. Cussack.
PS… Cats… and Martin…
Debi: So, is there a Mrs. Mysterio?
Martin Q. Blank: No, but I do have a very nice cat?
Debi: Not the same.
Martin Q. Blank: Well, you don’t know my cat, it’s very demanding.
Debi: It? You don’t know if it’s a boy or girl?
Martin Q. Blank: I respect its privacy.
This stuff is far more healing than the mind fook you offer, hell it was part of the problem from the start! skippy
Well, if you’re in pain then why not end it all? Because you’re afraid it wouldn’t really be the end?
Understanding acts committed and acerbated by and in the name of cortex injected herd control mythos, mostly from birth, does not denote manic depression. But thanks for going there any way, classic conservative self hater tactic.
Actually the – real pain – is watching others dragged along, sucked in, stripped of their metal facility’s… cough confused. And so it goes form history’s inception…
Jerkass Gods
This is the story of a time long ago, a time of myth and legend, when the ancient gods were petty and cruel, and they plagued mankind with suffering.
— Hercules: The Legendary Journeys
These gods aren’t lazy, but you really wish they were.
Perhaps they view all of life as a cosmic game, with humans as mere pawns and tools. Perhaps they’re hungry for worship, either literally or figuratively, and are willing to resort to manipulation to get it. Maybe they’re just keen on Disproportionate Retribution (a very common trait in religions throughout history). Maybe it’s the age old adage “power corrupts”, or maybe they’re just trolls, but whatever the case, the deities are just jerks. They view human life as a source of entertainment, or an inconvenience.
This trope is Older than Dirt. The (literally) Ur-example might be Inanna, Sumerian goddess of getting laid and ultraviolence. As might be expected from someone of that description, she took exception to being spurned by the hero Gilgamesh and summoned a heavenly bull to go on a rampage through his city. It did not help that as he turned her down, he listed all her exes and how she arranged their terrible deaths.
Compare and contrast Abusive Precursors, and for cases where Jerkass doesn’t really cover it, God of Evil, and God Is Evil. Anyone playing Religious Russian Roulette with a Jerkass God probably won’t like how it ends. In video games, where you are the god, see Cruel Player Character God. For the inversion, see God Is Good.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/JerkassGods
Smite Me, O Mighty Smiter
“Fine! The gloves are off pal! C’mon, lemme see a little wrath! Smite me, O mighty smiter! You’re the one who should be fired! The only one around here not doing his job is you! ANSWER ME!!!”
—Bruce Nolan, Bruce Almighty
Our character has had a bad — really bad — day/episode/life. Things keep going wrong, ranging from a bad day of training to failing to stop The End of the World as We Know It. It seems like nothing can help them short of a great Deus ex Machina, but it’s failed to come. They’ve already kicked in a few doors, punched a few walls, had their fit of Unstoppable Rage, and told everyone to Leave Me Alone.
They’ve been patient and persevering long enough. Now they break down, turn their face to the sky, and unleash all their frustration and anguish at the highest up of the Powers That Be, most easily interpreted as God, demanding an answer. “Is that all you’ve got? Come on, I can take more! Smite Me, O Mighty Smiter!” Twice as likely to occur along with pouring rain, thunder, and lightning.
Sometimes, they get an answer. Sometimes, they’ll wish they hadn’t. Sometimes, no answer makes for more drama than any answer could.
A notable subtrope is when the character involved is implied or explicitly an atheist and they refer to this fact pretty much in the same sentence. A Sister Trope is Religious Russian Roulette, where the character instead threatens to become an atheist unless God/whoever gives them an answer.
Indiscriminate by time, culture, religion, and even age demographic.
We’ve all had one of those days. See also Clifftop Caterwauling, Crisis of Faith, Rage Against the Heavens.
God of Evil
Elevating Evil to a century spanning art form.
“I am called a villain, but mine is a doctrine reflected in the unspoken truths behind all other philosophies. Recognize that truth, my child: Strife is the single element most essential to meaning and existence. Without conflict, without struggle, all of creation might as well be so many unmoving, unfeeling stones. Without me to hate, who would have cause to call themselves holy or just?”
— The Book of Charnel, Sacrifice
In a polytheistic religion each God and Goddess serves a specific role and fills a certain niche: love, life, war, death, and everything in between; be it Aardvarks or Zebras. One such incredibly vital purpose, believe it or not, is Evil.
Please allow us to play as (uncomfortably) literal Devil’s Advocates. On the one hand, the Balance Between Good and Evil must perforce have Evil to balance Good, lest the latter become an intolerant conformist theocracy. Likewise, it also serves as a definition of what not to do for worshipers of all the Good and Neutral gods. Most importantly for purposes of this Wiki, it also serves as an excellent plot enabler and antagonist for the heroes and forces of good to fight against.
Being the absolute apex of the Sliding Scale of Villain Threat, The Chosen One can spend an entire series fighting their way up from the Religion of Evil, the Black Pope, its Dark Messiah, and then fight the God Of Evil itself… or at least enable a good god that was a Sealed Good in a Can to do so.
This God(dess) Of Evil can take any shape or form… not just as a master tempter and deceiver, but because evil includes a heady and large portfolio. As Characters they can have as varying a range of personalities as any normal villains.
Here are a few popular variants: Standard Gods Of Evil can take after Satan, being rebels from The Light and tempting peasant and king alike. Kind of a non-denominational counterpart of Crystal Dragon Jesus. However, most aren’t futile rebels; they are very real and threats often motivated by goals other than rebellion for its own sake. The Grim Reaper is at times represented as a God Of Evil, wanting nothing but the death of every living thing, and the protagonist in particular. War too may be shown this way, desiring to bring about a world where Asskicking Equals Authority and the weak are killed just for being weak… which does raise the question of whether or not it’s ironic for heroes to vanquish them by fighting. If they have any philosophy, ethos, or commandment, it’s usually that Might Makes Right, that ethics and morality are mere shackles for The Fettered masses of Muggles, and that Evil represents the path to power.
Not surprisingly, they tend to be cruel, dominating and treacherous. If there is more than one God Of Evil in a setting, they usually engage in Eviler than Thou, betraying each other before any lasting headway against the forces of good can be made. Their metaphysical home, where worshipers and non-worshiping sinners end up, is usually akin to Hell. Given the above, why would anyone worship them? Well, they usually offer worshipers power in life via a Deal with the Devil, fine print and afterlife be damned (literally). Plus, just because they’ll go to hell if/when they die, doesn’t mean they’ll be tortured souls… they might become the torturers. Provided they don’t fail their dark lord first, that is. And of course, most gods of evil are worshipped out of fear of what would happen if they stopped worshipping. Is it any surprise their pawns in the Divine Chessboard are usually unwitting or unwilling?
Their followers include Cults, the Religion of Evil and Path of Inspiration. Necromancers and Infernalists usually get their powers by worshipping them. Expect them to forge many an Artifact of Doom as a source/repository of their power. When they or their agents are actively recruiting, expect them to be The Corrupter. Sometimes the God Of Evil is also literally Evil. Likely candidate for Ultimate Evil and As Long as There Is Evil. A theocracy to one of these is probably The Empire. May be creator of an Always Chaotic Evil race. May have a court of Demon Lords and Archdevils, or if they exist at all these may be upstarts or otherwise in opposition. Gods of evil may have the Legions Of Hell at their command.
Contrast Eldritch Abomination, which, as horrifying as it may be and act, is completely amoral and not malicious. Compare God Is Evil and Everybody Hates Hades. If a God of Evil exists in a setting where the Big Bad who actually drives the plot is a mortal, they’ll be the Bigger Bad. May overlap or also be a Mad God.
The Good Counterpart to this trope is the God of Good.
To avoid Flame Bait and Edit Wars, note that this trope isn’t about gods who simply are evil, it’s about gods of evil. Jerk Ass Gods that are petty, vain, or prone to Disproportionate Retribution do not qualify. If the god in question has, on at least one occasion, shown mercy or helped a mortal for ostensibly benevolent and non-Evil Plan related reasons, they don’t qualify.
God Is Evil
“I grow weary of you, my son.”
The supreme deity of a given setting is not just a mere jerkass — he is actively malevolent, a callous, sadistic, tyrannical monster who created the world or universe to be a miserable sack of crap.
The classic problem of evil tends to be invoked in this trope, along with the irrationality of religious extremism. People foolish enough to try a Religious Russian Roulette to get a god like this to answer their prayers are unlikely to like the result.
In some works, this being is the supreme deity of a Fantasy Pantheon, while in others, the being is a powerful monotheistic deity, with some works casting the Big Guy himself — or his nearest fantasy analogue — in the role. Sometimes, the being calling itself a god … isn’t. Its powers are just so close to omnipotent that it makes no difference.
In settings that take the controversial stance of God being evil, it is not uncommon for his opposite to be good. This isn’t strictly necessary, however, especially in darker Crapsack Worlds whose authors take a more humanistic stance on things.
Ninety-eight times out of one hundred, where an evil supreme god is in charge of things, you will also find a Knight Templar. Whether or not that person (or group) follows this evil supreme deity is entirely dependent on the Knight’s alignment.
This trope can also be called dystheism, or maltheism. These are beliefs that a monotheistic god is (respectively) lazy or evil. This trope is often found in Rage Against the Heavens plots (and will likely invoke misotheism — hatred of God or the gods), and is a common belief of Nay Theists. Compare and contrast with Gnosticism*, Everybody Hates Hades, God of Evil, God Is Inept and God Is Flawed. The flip side is Satan Is Good. See Also: Devil but No God, Neglectful Precursors, Jerkass Gods for when the deities are not really evil but just neglectful. Definitely the polar opposite of God Is Good.
Skippy… it was a play… bit of theater… and now… TV Tropes…
PS. These folks seem your type. Why not congregate?
http://patriotslament.blogspot.com.au/2012/07/god-demands-child-sacrifice.html
these incidents are growing exponentially because police work is what vets are coming home to. these a psychopaths on our streets…. and its condoned by government – who is now more our enemy than friend.
this is the opinion of a 64 yr old college educated, self employed female with NO criminal record.
the police are not our friends… they are an occupational army of miscreants and sadists – back from wars on other innocents.
there is no glory in the ‘services’ — all enforcement work is now just a magnet for those ill equiped to do the work.
no tears here when aome citizen takes one out… they all deserve the gallows … i trust the local gang members over our police here in colorado… neo nazis every one of em.
“Armed Mercenaries Revolving Door” — U.S. Armed Forces “educated” and trained/experienced at We the People’s expense, to find greener pastures with:
“Blackwater du Jour” et al. – Consultants + trained troops for ad hoc “work” known/unknown
“Black Ops” special teams for looting, assassinations known/unknown
“Defenders” of State Department folks on missions known/unknown
“Protectors” of M.C’s and “diplomats” on missions known/unknown
World Police by any name to protect .01%+.99%agency “interests” known/unknown
“Other”
If it’s true that the NYC police managed to shoot nine bystanders, shouldn’t Bloomberg be charged with gun crimes?
d, Bloomberg as Mayor: for negligent homicide? manslaughter? negligence?
Regarding the nano-cellulose from wood pulp, the potential is interesting if the manufacturing functionality is as alluded to; that’s often the rub. But is so . . . Canada is the next ‘Saudi Arabia’ of structural materials, hey?
Consider that along with the liquified silicate developed in Turkey mentioned not so long back in links here at NC and we see the elephant of the future which present stakeholders are desperate to keep under any wrap. Innovation is not, fundamentally, hard or expensive to do relative to the material base of our contemporary society. We could effectively replace our toxic, plutocrat-monopolized, material society with regimes of new materials and manufactures which do less harm, and more good. I don’t want to go all utopian on you folks, but really the potential is there. But we don’t because a) wealthy stakeholders do all in their power to keep production fixed in processes and regimes they currently control and profit from, and b) most of us care far more about today than the day after tomorrow. If we fail and rot ourselves out as a society and a species (real potentials within our material capabilities over the last three generations), if won’t be due to inherent deficiencies in our material regimes but due to social and psychological inability to cooperate in a mass society in ways necessary to contain, sustain, and explain it amongst ourselves.
Material problems: These can be meaningful addressed, as we see from innovation now. Social problems: It doesn’t look on present evidence that we are holding onto the sense we were born into. Hey, it’s all fun and games until someone loses the Greenland Ice Sheet. Once the Dieback begins, innovation goes out the window, and Mammon money switches from bonds to bullets . . . . Still knowing that we _could_ have lived in a better world may be of some comfort to the survivors, what?
RE: Regarding the nano-cellulose from wood pulp
… it is made from a tightly packed array of needle-like crystals…
In some undisclosed product liability attorney law firm
Eureka!.. Gentlemen we have the ideal follow on for flagging asbestos and crystalline silica fiber class action suits! the firm is saved!
Canada or Maine…
* * *
Of course the potential is there…. if one bothers to look for it.
We hear that we can never meet our energy needs with renewable energy sources. Well duh, not with current technology. And we’ve slashed funding on r&d. Fifteen years ago, the US was investing two or three times as much money in renewables as China. Today, China has surpassed the U.S. to dominate the market. I don’t understand. There is talk of the need to restore our manufacturing base. Renewable energy is hot, everywhere except here. What is not to like about it? Even if we didn’t use it and only sold to other countries?
Romney’s plan calls for energy independence by 2020. If we put the same amount of time and money into renewables, we could be energy independent and well on our way to sustainable. If I understand correctly, solar tech has made great strides in terms of efficiency. I still think we aren’t much more than a decade away from bringing nuclear fusion (NOT fission) to the commercial grid. Nope, we’re going to drill, baby, drill and turn some more mountains into permanent moonscapes. If miners don’t want to get black-lung, they can damn well find another job. There’s plenty more waiting to take the job. The coal plants can’t afford emissions regulations but the cost of health expenses for respiratory disorders among neighboring residents caused by those emissions, mostly borne by government/taxpayers (poor people live near coal plants, not gated communities), are many multiples of the cost of compliance. Climate change doesn’t exist. Evolution is fake science. Cutting taxes creates jobs. Women who are legitimately raped don’t get pregnant. If you let women who are raped get abortions, women will be filing false rape reports en masse (or waiting until the 8th month and making fake health claims….. devious creatures we are). If you don’t like the facts, make up your own.
Mittens promises he’ll bring gas prices down. Would it be too much to hope that we could stop offering defense subsidies to the oil industry?
Here’s a document from a Samsung-hired expert witness (Nicholas Godici) in the Apple/Samsung case, showing drawings from the design patent nos. 677, 087 and 305 on which Apple won infringement judgments:
http://docs.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/california/candce/5:2011cv01846/239768/940/10.pdf?ts=1337348061
One can’t fail to be impressed by how utterly trivial are the differences among various Apple design patents, as well as Apple and Samsung patents compared side-by-side (page 28).
A former patent examiner himself, Godici finds apparent errors in the Apple design patents, such as the inconsistent use of dashed lines in contravention of USPTO requirements.
Although Godici doesn’t come out and say so, one could infer from his written statement that the patent review system itself is deeply flawed, as Apple was granted successive patents for designs so simple and trivial (e.g., a rectangle with one circle and one square inside it) that there obviously was no patentable difference between the two.
Draw your own conclusions — in the rough justice of the jury chamber, every layman’s a newly-minted expert.
For me, this judgment confirms that Apple has replaced Microsoft as the new bullying Evil Empire. A company that resorts to the courts to crush competitors has lost its edge.
We have a houseful of Apple products — desktops, laptops, displays, wireless hubs — but that’s it for me. No more iShit. Screw the bully from Cupertino.
So Jim, you really don’t get it do you? Recall, since you don’t, that Microsoft went from rich and ugly to The Engulfing Blob when it stole Apple’s interface design and nearly killed the company and the judge back then didn’t get it either. The interface _is_ the essential component in computer electronics, the heart of ‘the product.’ Apple learned, and ‘patented’ trivialities because that was the only way it could protect its interface this time around from similar predators.
There is absolutely NOTHING stopping Google or Samsung or anyone else from innovating the damnedest tech, interface, art design, holographic personal communicationr, whatever—but that’s hard, expensive and risky. It’s much easier and more profitable to simply pop out something as close as conceivabley possible to a _prior_ desigh + tech creation wildly popular with the public because a superior piece of work. Apple isn’t just better because of marketing, it’s better because the product was MADE better. Samsung and Google have done their best to siphon off someone else’s enterprise, and the former lost in court, deservedly, while the latter will take its hit in time.
Yes, between the mountebank and the thief, it _is_ hard to choose. I can’t see choosing the thief, though, and it doesn’t impress me that you do. Bully? Not if they did the work and somebody tried to fake the sale out from under them.
Microsoft didn’t steal the interface from Apple. They both stole it from Xerox.
Not true.
An essay discussing where the Mac user interface came from
http://folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=On_Xerox,_Apple_and_Progress.txt
I remember the original article in Byte magazine describing Xerox’s PARC “Alto” computer. Gates read it too. So did Jobs.
Main point is, Microsoft didn’t steal the interface from Mac. They stole it from Xerox.
Apple is no innocent victim in the cellphone patent infringement game. Jobs was very lucky that Nokia decided to settle for a price that was in hindsight far too low.
JH, re patenting “trivialities” — imagine Apple in the shoe business: no more rounded toes EVAH.
From an NYT article this morning:
Exactly as Microsoft did in its early days — buy out, co-opt, or crush every competitor to create a quasi-monopoly.
Another resemblance: Apple’s OS, like Microsoft’s, is a ‘closed garden’ over which it exercises proprietary control. Android is open-source.
Open-source Linux has not achieved enough market share to seriously threaten Microsoft. But Android, as noted in the excerpt above, is already kicking Apple’s ass.
From a forum post this morning by ebworthen:
One never knows.
One day, you might a merger and the whole world is owned by Apple-Google, possibly renamed ‘Appoogle’ or ‘Goopple.’
Snacks! Nice
VA: UVa.: Hill & Knowlton-xref. Tavistock Agenda. Is VA, the U.S. ‘Security State” par excellence, the property of the House of Windsor, its people their subjects?
See: “ATLAS OF THE TRANSATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE” by David Elits and David Richardson (New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 2010) for “triangulation” of the Ties That Bind.
Re: HSBC in Settlement Talks With U.S. Over Money Laundering
The Money Quote: “Bad conduct was going on for years undetected.”
PLEASE, don’t get me started!
re Payday Lenders Using Courts to Create Modern-Day Debtors’ Prisons in Missouri, Critics Say:
But skippy, he say that a universal bailout of all debt is just “varnishing the problem” (I forget his exact words) cause it doesn’t punish sociopathic billionaires. But that can be done later, eh? With confiscatory taxation? Meanwhile, let’s save the innocent?
Ah, but who’s innocent? What about the deadbeats and moochers? (I believe Keen’s jubilee proposal answers this.)
Since “credit creation” is a form of counterfeiting (“loans create deposits”) that drives people into debt then ALL credit debt is morally invalid.
But credit creation cheats non-debtors too so a universal bailout (similar to Steve Keen’s proposal), including non-debtors, is more appropriate.
As for deadbeats, “God’s rain falls on the just and the unjust” and who knows for sure who is which till it’s all said and done?
For gawds sake…. Don’t give the starving kid a sandwich… until the commercial is a wrap!!!
Skippy…. Thank gawd those cops killed that murder (how many did he kill?). The general public is MUCH safe now!!!
I am not sure how this will work.
Does it mean you can manipulate the happiness gene of a woman but men are ‘immune?’
The 0.01% would want more manipulatable women workers.
And the 51% want to be happier. And have men stop deciding for them what they can do with their body. At least include some women in the discussion, peut-etre?
No birth control? Think of all the children. And with any luck, 40 hrs work. And housework. And no more sex because we’ll be too tired and the last thing we’ll want is a seventh child. Women will need something to keep them happy. These women married to conservative men should be giving their husbands a preview of sex for procreational purposes only.
Again, Romney has got to be trying to throw the race. All he has to do is make it to the finish and he’s trying to tackle the other competitors.
Mz. Lucy;
The leading cause of young and ‘middle’ aged womens’ deaths before the ‘modern’ medical age was, if my memory serves me well, childbirth. Thus, there was always a ready and ‘willing’ crop of undereducated young women to supplant their departed sisters. Most men who reached middle age could talk with almost chilling dispassion about wives who died before them. So, not only do our modern Patriarchs have to restrict a womans’ access to contraception, but they also have to degrade the womens health care.
When men exalt power above love, they lose the right to be called men.
China’s slowdown.
While we have been on a Long March to nowhere, and without a great Helmsan to lead us, China has been through the not-enough-credit, too-much credit and not-enough-credit cycle a few times, like a car skiddig out of control on an icy road, first this way, then the opposite way.
Empire State: Obscurist MSM states: “shoot out”. Fact checking discovers “shoot at”
A Chinese key voice urges hard times ahead…
I wonder if that’s why Chinese antique prices are soaring. $26 million for a Ruyao bowl?
Does that mean that we are no longer living in Interesting Times but, that now,it’s Hard Times. I read that book! One of Studs’ best.
Antidote.
I think the elephant is making an ‘enso’ sign.
Elephants are so enlightened.
I’m in NC. I’d agree NC going to Romney is pretty well a given here. I’m surprised about IA. I thought they had a lot of seniors on SS and Medicare, and I would think they would be more worried about Ryan’s proposal. Or are seniors buying the meme that their “entitlements” won’t be touched if Romney/Ryan are elected?
Charles X was the last Bourbon King of France.
Ron Paul: “Using a mix of charm and procedural hardball, Romney and the RNC have ensured that the TX congressman will neither speak nor be formally nominated at next week’s convention.” …. Ron Paul: Paul will, however, get a non-prime time video tribute.
Even the “non-prime time video tribute” has led to hysteria among Jews living in the United States. One can only imagine their response if Dr. Paul were allowed to speak.
“Jewish Democrats Slam Ron Paul Tribute”
http://forward.com/articles/161715/jewish-democrats-slam-ron-paul-tribute/
“Ron Paul’s Convention Tribute Could Bring Israel Problems For GOP”
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/08/ron-pauls-convention-tribute-undercuts-gops-israel-message.php
Ex, and Koch re “the Jewish community” – Is this a MONOLITH? Please define.
See, Poland is part/parcel of the Anglo-American Establishment MI5.6.CIA team:
1939 – The United Kingdom and Poland entered into a military alliance for mutual assistance in case of military invasion by “a European Power”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page — “On This Day”
It’s possible that Rothmuller”s Papageno at Covent Garden met Patzak’s Pamino onstage in 1938.
Edit: Tamino
“…we are trained how to get around the Geneva Convention in the army…” (min.30, Video)
“Permission to Engage” by filmmaker Shuchen Tan
Victims’ families and an ex-US soldier unpick the film that showed US forces killing Iraqi civilians in 2007
http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/witness/2012/08/2012823616123717.html
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