Pattern Ghost

Luke, Misty, Shades, and of course Claire Temple were all great.

There'd be less deaths if they quit cutting the children in half!
 
:puts on reading glasses:
 
Ohhh . . . nevermind.

There'd be less deaths if they quit cutting the children in half!
 
:puts on reading glasses:
 
Ohhh . . . nevermind.

IMO, they should go more cosmic for Phase 4. Get out into space, using GotG and Captain Marvel as the new anchors. Moving to mostly space-based with the occasional Earth-based story might give the franchise some staying power. Plus, the space/cosmic stuff is some of my favorite bits of Marvel.

I think the difference between the Vietnam era and today is the rapidly growing divide between rich and poor and the commensurate immiseration of the working class. In the Vietnam era there was at least some realistic hope of economic security and that your children would have a better life than you have enjoyed.  That's all gone now, especially since the Great Recession and in the face of environmental degeneration, an ever-growing refugee crisis, automation, the dissolution of real journalism and the ascendance of propaganda-laden Internet trash journalism.  I think the world looks a lot more like it did in the 1930s following the 1929 stock market crash, minus the vast unused productive capacity that era had waiting in reserve.  As the election of a kleptocratic porn-president demonstrates beyond reasonable doubt, the world is being strip-mined of its moral capital as thoroughly as its natural capital.  
 
For a long time liberal democracy seemed to be the best political environment for capitalist expansion, but the Asian models strongly suggest that isn't the case anymore.  If anything resembling an equitable and democratic social order comes out of this, it will be due to forces outside the limited boundaries of my intellect and imagination, because I just can't see it right now.
 
On the bright side: thank God for effective anti-depressants.  My apologies for my preceding histrionics: I was in a deep depressive state and I wasn't thinking rationally.  Sorry for subjecting all of you to that.

@Enforcer ... Good to hear! Tell her I said "Hi," and I'm glad she's feeling better.
 
@ Xavier... Ouch! My sympathies. Hope you get a good resolution.
 
@ tkdguy... Valid crankiness! The downside to the wonder of ordering stuff from the internet is the damned shipping. Hope it gets to you.
 
@ Hermit ... Hope the disturbance to your Hermitage ends soon.

She's bouncing back pretty well. She works child care so insurance was a fear. But her employers have been very fair and adore her (Ayr's mom is her backup when she misses time) It sounds like she's going to be fine.
But yeah, the bleeding always worries me. 
 
Oh and she thanks you guys for the well-wishes and is embarrassed I shared  

Sounds like they're charging for access to their Roku app. That's not quite the same as charging for not renting their equipment. It's just giving two options . . . OMFG, I just defended Comcast. Send the men with the big butterfly nets to pick me up!

I do.  In fact - if it's not a sandwich (sandwiches include hamburgers and hot dogs in my reality) or doesn't come on a stick I prefer to use a utensil (whenever possible - I'm not going to hyperventilate at a party if I can't find a fork for my potato chips).
 
I just prefer to not touch food - no matter how many times I've washed my hands (and I carry baby wipes in my backpack to wash my hands just in case I am offered food).
 
It's not hypochondria - I have no problems changing my kids diapers or grabbing hold of a sweaty or even lightly bloodied Olympic bar to deadlift. People are weird. 

On the plus side the Lego Batman movie should be good.

It does look promising
 
Should be interesting if it is a success if  that drives the 'fun is okay' message home to WB?

I'm trying to see how that would be a negative.

Disney will be able to finance their Marvel TV shows just from the sale of Baby Groot merchandise.

Indeed, "rich kid returns" and "the Chosen" are pretty much staples of the genre. Like "murdered parents" and "bad person seeks redemption." Comics would be pretty thin if everyone with those origins was eliminated.

Magic is like porn: We know it when we see it. And it may involve waggling fingers.

I'll let Ayre know you guys are thinking about her

Actually, Arya Stark is wearing Ashildr's face.

On the contrary, banning 220 million Muslims is still banning Muslims, if not all Muslims. No one is under the impression that Trump has managed to ban all of them, though I'm sure he would if he thought he could get away with it. That doesn't lessen the outrage at all. There's no other criteria for denying them entry other than that they share a religion with a handful of bad people in other countries.
 
I assume from your attitude that you don't know anyone that might be affected by this personally, so it might be pretty abstract to you. But I assure you that this unconstitutional order is causing a lot of real trouble for a lot of innocent people. And it's a recruiting bonanza for ISIS and AQ as well, so don't kid yourself that this has anything to do with making America safer. It's only about making America whiter. That's the only purpose it could possibly serve.

Ok let's try this again. Both have been accused by women of sexually assaulting them. Neither has been found guilty. Clinton had an Affair with an Intern. Trump has had affairs while married. He has 5 children with three women. 
 
So "One actually Did it" isn't accurate, as Clinton's sex scandal wasn't assault. I will be the first to admit Trump might have been bragging while he had nothing to go on...it seems to fit his profile as a prolific liar. But Both have been accused by multiple women neither has been found guilty. 
 
So your statement is incorrect. But both men are horrible champions of fidelity. 
 
 
Second, you're correct. And it was my fault for lumping all of women's health issues into "Choice." So let me correct my misstatement and expand on the issue. The Right to Choose isn't the only issue here. It's more broadly an issue of women's health as well as reproductive rights. Planned Parenthood which may or may not be under fire spends 0 federal funds on Abortion. They are not allowed to. [http://www.factcheck.org/2011/04/planned-parenthood/] so removing their funding does nothing to stop the 3% of their operating costs that goes to abortion service; rather the 97% that goes to testing, screening, birth control, and STI/STD testing and treatment, and Vasectomy procedures. The largest portion of their clients are the young and the poor. Who don't have a wealth (get it?) of care options even if they want to have children they rely on Planned Parenthood for prenatal care. 
 
The Gag Order Reinstated by Trump prevents American funding for any health organizations that provide abortion information (not even abortions, just information) on an international level. So any health organizations that deal with women's services can't receive funding from the US.. Which means that such services will be less able to provide the afore mentioned screening, prenatal, post natal, pediatrics, testing, screening, contraception, and STD/STI services. 
 
This isn't about women "taking responsibility for getting their bits out." (There is some of that, of course. Abortion rates go down when contraception is available, however. Which in your over-simplified drinking analogy is calling a cab after having a few too many.) It's about women dying from treatable cancers and suffering from STD/STI and passing that on to men, it's about starting out families who don't have the money or soon the insurance to ensure healthy children. 
 
For some reason; allowing women, particularly young and poor women, to have some sort of agency in their reproductive rights beyond "No Sex for me, thanks." is an anathema to some people. 

I don't quite follow that analogy. It seems to me the more apt analogy would be, "Hey, this kid likes to torture and kill small animals and pets, he's likely to grow up to be a serial killer."

I don't quite follow that analogy. It seems to me the more apt analogy would be, "Hey, this kid likes to torture and kill small animals and pets, he's likely to grow up to be a serial killer."

1. Trump's ban went after legals. People who'd been vetted and had green cards. That's not the same as deporting Illegals. That's rounding up Foreigners.
2. Clinton's sex scandals and Trumps sex scandals aren't different. They both show signs of men of power treating women like objects. Clinton's cigar antics however were - as far as we know, consensual where as Trump bragged about sexual assault. Both have been accused of the latter and both are poor examples of humanity. Trump is looking to further the GOP backed initiative of telling women how to reproduce so that's something more than Clinton ever did to women. 
3. so both sides do the same thing, and? Is it only wrong with the other side does it? Because the same people angry now for the Lefts actions were doing the same on the right an this isn't even an argument. It's just noting that the ability so say the exact opposite thing you did when the tables were turned is a political tactic long used by both sides.
4. Yates was doing her job. She was following the constitution. Clinton was doing her job she was a defense attorney. Yates's job is not to do what the President Demands. Which is what Senator Sessions questioned her about during her confirmation hearings in 2015. She was asked if she could do her job despite pressure from the President (At that time the other team) to do otherwise.

I recently finished Working for Bigfoot by Jim Butcher. It's a collection of Dresden shorts. The tone in these tends to be on the lighter side, and the stories seem relegated to the sidelines of the Dresden universe, at least for the time being. The price is a bit high for the page count, so might be worth trying to borrow rather than buy unless you're a completionist.