December 29, 2009 08:30 PM
Open Thread
Today is "Good Riddance Day" in Times Square, New York City, where people are invited to write down what they wish "good riddance" to for 2010 and put it in a very big, very public, shredder.
I wish rather than hope we can say good riddance to this recession.
What do you wish "good riddance" to? (Keep it clean, thanks.)
Open Thread below...




People who get some sort of adrenaline power surge by reporting very bad news, especially if it isn't true. The song "Dirty Laundry" describes that well.
"Courtesy is owed. Respect is earned. Love is given." --Unknown author, found in Guide to Texas Etiquette by Kinky Friedman
Fear is its own cottage industry.
"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow
man, and I hate people like that! " ~ Tom Lehrer (1928 - )
People "react" to bad news.
Here's some bad news for dittoheads - Rush Limbaugh is in 'serious' condition in hospital. Speaking of good riddance. One may hope...
Alan Grayson for President, Elizabeth Warren for Vice President, and Paul Krugman for Secretary of the Treasury!
Looking forward and trying to stay positive.
Good riddance to GWB - he was still in office until the 19th of Jan 2009 or there about.
"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow
man, and I hate people like that! " ~ Tom Lehrer (1928 - )
Still good riddance to GWB, Cheney and all neocons-- evermore.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Ya, definitely 'Good Riddance' to that Bush League President.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
Better get used to this for about the next 10 years.
Just about everything which evaded fate via gamed numbers, budgets, and balance sheets in 2009 seems destined to hit a wall in 2010.
Wh Karl Rove granted divorce in Texas. Another family values hypocrite. His second wife has battled cancer by the way.
Thanks to buzzflash for the quote
Politics is for the present, but an equation is for eternity. Albert Einstein
may they rest in pieces.
WORD!
"I know that there are people who do not love their fellow
man, and I hate people like that! " ~ Tom Lehrer (1928 - )
yep.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
1. George W. Bush
2. Richard Cheney (when will this guy check out, anyway?)
3. Sarah Palin
4. Glenn Beck
5. Bill O'Frikkin'Reilly
6. Osama bina Badboy (aka Osama Bin Missin)
7. My creditors
8. That singing guy from FreeCreditReport.com (it's getting old, dude)
9. There is NO #9.
10. Orly Taitz
Joe Lieberman
Joe Wilson
Joe the Plumber
Joe Scarborough
and Joe McCarthy apologists
MOVE YOUR MONEY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Icqrx0OimSs&fm...
Good riddance to The Mr.Potter type banks!
I'll second that for ya. Click and have a watch!!
People are getting on board with the idea.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
HuffPo's bumped it to the top; send it around
Corruption favors the wealthy.
take your money out in cash and watch them crumble!
As a matter of fact I took both mine and my wifes 401Ks from merryill lynch. Mine nearly 4 years ago and my wifes just over a year ago.
We don't get much back where they are but at least we are not losing it!
Stockmarket is a ponzzi scheme!
It only got worse under republicans and worst of all under the bush/chenny cabal.
Take it out let's give these sorry greedy scum what they really deserve!
Radical Russ, subbing for Bill Press is covering this as I type.
Until you respect the citizenship of those with which you disagree, you're not a true American.
to the good riddance to republicans. May they find the warm spot in hell.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSIgC1GWC38
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okd3hLlvvLw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qn85BeeiwZo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Op9-D3kdBiw&fe...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GmVajkqLNU
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=6a3NcwfOBzQ
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Please?
NOBODY 2012
o Blackwater/Xe/Triple Canopy and other mercenary corporations from the face of the Earth
o Americas Health Insurance Plans
o The Health Care Legislation that passed the House and Senate
o U.S. military imperialism anywhere in the world for the sake of over-throwing elected governments "the shadow elite" don't happen to like, or for the purpose of stealing natural resources
o Israel's "We Are the Chosen People of God" 'meme". The historical truth regarding the Israeli/Palestinian conflict would serve everyone very well and might well be the key to the human race beginning to understand the path to true "Peace on Earth".
o Israel's silence regarding their possession of over 200 nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them within the Middle East
o the American public's apparent lack of knowledge and ambivalence related to climate change, U.S. imperialism and the general power of "the shadow elite" who control our elections, media, economy and governmental leadership.
I'd have a very Happy 2010 if we could just achieve the above. It's good for a start.....
"The US has an army of 90,000 soldiers in Afghanistan and is spending $100bn a year, but has still been unable to defeat 20,000-25,000 Taliban who receive no pay at all." - Patrick Cockburn
Good one!
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
Good riddance to the lame excuses to go around like barbarians killing people around the globe. Good riddance to the shining city on a hill, white man's burden, american exceptionalism, manifest destiny, and were "fighting" them over there so we don't have to fight them here.
Politics is for the present, but an equation is for eternity. Albert Einstein
to drama.
And ndow so you don't I'm growing soft on you:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5GEg0D0ZY4
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=SO9DxmLPncU
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zynkGg88zKc
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
I likey ;)
Thanks, but I meant to link it with:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPvk0dbkh4Q
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Courtney and Alice performing together would be mighty fine!
Thanks for the great tune :)
Actually I flinch at the song Nothern Song. I wish Cooper could help Love.
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Miss Sarah....and the moose she rode in on!!!!
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPvk0dbkh4Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VHdrjy2Czg&fe...
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=OX8hzcb7ySY
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
I enjoyed them very much.
Goodnight and sweet dreams to all!
U2. Hope you're not freezing up in the far north. Brrr.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Putin will work with us to reduce nukes if we tear down our missile shield. Outback's forced to pay $19 million for gender discrimination. Here comes the moon. One guy turns in 58 guns to a gift exchange. Time-Warner vs. Fox. Whoever wins, we lose. This new family had a rocky start to the New Year. Avatar hasn't saved the economy. Unlke Dumbya, Obama's not afraid to admit the buck stops with him on the bomb plot.
...the spiritual malaise that seems to keep us all focused on self-interest (or at best family-interest) and makes us unable to think in terms of our species' survival and advancement.
Happy New Year everyone at C&L!!!!
Good riddance to 2009. The year of the Rahmabama coup of the democratic mandate.
It was also the year democrats sold out the American people just as badly as the republicans did under GWB, and the year where the corporate fascist robber barons openly bribed our bluedogs right before our eyes, so they would torpedo the wishes of 75% of the people.
In fact, good riddance to the entire decade of republican malfeasance and criminality, and democratic co-conspiracy and duplicity.
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
Good riddance indeed!
To that sick, unamerican 20-something percent of the country that does not believe in church/state separation or the right to pursue happiness -- that gaggle of goons who protest with misspelled signs against anything Democrats do (even if it's the same thing as Republicans do) -- to you, Know Knothing Knation, good riddance.
Please go away.
Everyone is equally entitled to the pursuit of happiness. Wasn't that once self evident?
If only we really could be rid of them.
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
So Palin is a vindictive person. Big surprise, huh.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
. . . to this f*ckin' guy:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/03/magazine/03...
Yeah. I've sat in that fuckin' guy's office. He's a surprisingly nice fuckin' guy, and always said he was impressed with my legal arguments, even if he disagreed with me. And yeah. Good riddance.
You know, Prof. Yoo, I don't think you have the slightest clue what the framers wanted. (Not that I blame you. We're left with their words, not their many and varied states of mind. Why is your ilk so invested in imputing your views onto them?) They sure as hell didn't write anything about the president's powers changing with changing situations (which, incidentally, sounds a lot like the "Living Constitutionalism" you don't like).
Surely you jest, but you're still offensive. Berkeley's students are not the Stasi, and you are not oppressed because of your views. So, please, go fuck yourself.
Well, at least you're honest about what a conservative is: Someone who makes prejudicial judgments based on a person's funny outfits, and thinks that speeches are dumb even when he can't understand the words. What a ridiculous statement.
Good riddance, Yoo.
Everyone is equally entitled to the pursuit of happiness. Wasn't that once self evident?
Exactly the same quotes jumped out at me when I read this interview.
What struck me is Yoo's sense of victimization - how he sees himself as an oppressed right-thinking conservative among liberal lefty yahoos.
You have to wonder why he's still at Berkeley. Given his prominence in the Bush administration and his credentials as a committed conservative, he surely would have had offers from conservative law schools - or from prominent law firms. Maybe they didn't offer enough, or, like Alberto Gonzales, he's spoiled goods.
Heh, he's lying. Or he's delusional.
I graduated from Boalt (Berkeley's law school). He's hardly the lone conservative. In fact, there are plenty of conservative professors at Boalt. So many of them, in fact, that it drove me up a wall. I'm sure he's perfectly happy to be on tenure track (if not already fully tenured) there. It's not just a high profile law school, like all top ten law schools, it's very conservative.
One of the weird things about it, is that Prof. Yoo was probably one of the most open-minded and polite of those conservative professors when I challenged him. I actually liked going to his office and chatting with him. Some of the other conservative professors there would just condescend to me, and send me on my way. Prof. Yoo would actually engage me in productive conversation. I appreciated it, even if he is a dangerous nutball in the political arena. :)
Conservatives love to play victim. But to say he can't find a job in legal academia because he's a conservative has about as much truth to it as the "liberal media" garbage conservatives spew when they say they have no voice on radio or tv.
Everyone is equally entitled to the pursuit of happiness. Wasn't that once self evident?
..he'll come quietly when arrested for his war crimes?
Mickey: "It was an epiphany. Do you know what an epipany is?"
Keoni: "NOT NOW MICKEY!"
i hate that commercial...especially since the charity is a scam
and i hope twitter goes bye bye
You have no idea what kinf of whacked-out commercials I see in Korea!!!! The Koreans are nice people, but they put together some freakin' weird shit.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Good riddance to anyone that thinks killing/abusing/torturing/harassing people you don't understand, or who are different from you, is a good idea and ought to be promoted. And the equally twisted notion it will somehow make you safer.
Good riddance to the kinds of people that are stupid enough to think (and protest) "Youth in Asia" are after Granny.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
--the fee-based method of turning a profit (or surviving): checked-baggage fees, ATM fees, minimum-balance (or excessive monthly repayment fees) on credit card accounts, "court-cost" fees on citations and such, "911-surcharge" fees on airline tickets, early-termination fees on cellphone contracts, etc, etc, etc.
--the continued assault on our citizens by both church and state for "crimes" or perceived "deviations from the norm"--from smoking pot in private or cigarettes in bars, to holding protests outside of designated areas, to gays marrying, to trying to mitigate global warming's effects through individual effort. There is still far too much effort by a relatively intolerant few, especially in such tough economic times, to cite (at ever-increasing rates) or jail for minor offenses or deny rights to groups who don't vote. worship, party or fuck like they do.
And the privatization of law enforcement/jails/court services only ensures that those not heeding the corporate line will continue to be further marginalized.
--Octo-mom and other such "breeders" who think that the best way to ensure their longevity is by their copious copulation. This ain't the Stone Age, though a return to similar-appearing times may not be far off...
--Of course, others here have enumerated the too-voluminous tally of 'Thug practitioners and apologists (who have sought to keep the sheeple ignorant and themselves spoiled) for whom a Vermeer BC2100XL is at best, only a partial solution.
______
I end this year like I do every other--hoping (and working toward it being) better than the previous one, but not ever expecting it to be markedly different. And as I get older, I suppose that I don't work as hard to improve things like I did in my youth; rather, I rant about the "good ol' days" just like generations before me did.
And while the future's there for anyone to change, still you know it's seems
It would be easier sometimes to change the past...
-Jackson Browne
Or, "Hey you, get off my driveway!!" (The lawn is dead; can't afford to water it these days...)
-John McCane
Happy New Year to all. Avoid being hit by falling ammo. (Oh yeah, good riddance to those who fire off guns in celebration without comprehending physical laws!)
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
A 9th Circuit Court said that officers can be held liable for taser-related injuries.
The whole thing turns on balancing acts set out in judge-made law regarding the Fourth Amendment. Scalia and gang hate balancing acts in the law. And the Roberts Court, like the Rehnquist and Burger Courts before it, is the Fourth Amendment's enemy.
So, yeah. There's a good chance the Supreme Court will overturn it. (In fact, they could do even more damage by deciding that the officer is actually immune from suit altogether, which is another issue in the case.)
Everyone is equally entitled to the pursuit of happiness. Wasn't that once self evident?
See Video:
Ben Stein, Apologize to Ron Paul for your Vicious Attack: the "anti-Semitic argument"
http://www.YouTube.com/RepresentativePress
As if "anti-semitism" actually had anything to do with the causes of terrorist attacks. There's a Sunni-Shiite war going on in Yemen, just as there has been in the area for more than 1000 years. Iran/Iraq war was one, too. How come we are giving any sort of aid to one religious group over another? For that matter. why are we giving so much aid to Israel... wait, I can answer that.
"Courtesy is owed. Respect is earned. Love is given." --Unknown author, found in Guide to Texas Etiquette by Kinky Friedman
Ok, so, I'm watching Larry King part 2, continued from yesterday-- Christmas underwear bomber. It's hosted by Candy Crowley-- (A.K.A. "Is this Obama's Katrina?")......... and it's "comedy gold" (yet disturbing).
What a bunch of asshats. Ben Stein (again)-- We're at WAR with psycho, crazy, bad, evil people. The bureaucracy is in charge and it's broken: the same bureaucracy that's going to be running Healthcare and Cap and Trade and the rest of you life and, and, and.....zzzzzzzzz
Please Mother Earth, open up and swallow these horrible people.
I hardly ever watch the teevee news any longer. I know why.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
..let me add:
individuals who feel entitled to..everything. Its their GREED that got us where we are today. F them and b'bye!
Mickey: "It was an epiphany. Do you know what an epipany is?"
Keoni: "NOT NOW MICKEY!"
Good riddance to wasting paper, and to irony.
christmas never lived up to all the hype and when I moved to Europe in 1991, I made a strong conscience decision that I would never again celebrate or acknowledge christmas. It was a decision that I have never regretted or recinded from. I neither dislike or play the part of Scrooge ... I just simply choose not to partake in any shape or form (and it doesn't hurt that my family and I are not really close and christmas always had far more heart-ache than happiness.)
There is a lot of peace-or-mind and happiness for my decision. I now want to simply and publicly re-affirm my 18-year commitment.
Thanks for the comment. Xmas has been building up worse and worse as a holiday for me. This year I did not even give cards or make calls. I just feel like I give to my family and help them out all year long and don't like having it summed up by one forgettable present and some $5 hallmark sentiment written by someone else.
I dispensed with Christmas this year too - more as a result of circumstance than choice. I don't think I want to make it a lifelong habit, but wasn't a big deal.
James Howard Kunstler: The Long Emergency is underway, here
He is not trained in those things of which he writes, but he does give a good talk.
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Free broadcast TV to be ended soon
I felt it was a scam when they sold the analog signals and made everyone pay for conversion antennas. This took away a potentially vital lifeline for many isolated people and could be compared to charging people to receive an emergency broadcast message.
Well, after putting $600 million in the stimulus package to help consumers buy more conversion antennas, they are going to stop the signal, making your antennas obsolete. No more free TV, and un-equal access to stations across cable providers.
ABC, NBC, FOX and CBS will become cable channels that charge for content.
even more irrelevant than it currently is...
"Parachutes are allowed in checked or carry-on baggage, but may not be worn in flight."
---Southwest Airlines
Why doesn't C&L have a story about the White House admitting they majorly F'd up on this Detroit plane thing?
Because they F'd up so many things already. Why beat a dead horse?
Rush Limbaugh is what a smart person thinks a stupid bigot sounds like.
Yes the same way the bush administration came on and told everyone how badly they fucked up?
Let me see. They said no one could have imagined that they would fly airplanes into buildings!
Is that the type of admitting you are looking for?
What a joke!
If we can't catch a Nigerian with explosives in feminine underpants, whose father alerted the U.S. embassy, whose ticket was bought in cash, who didn’t check bags, whose visa was denied by the UK, who studied in Yemen, whose name was on a watch list, who can we catch?
Imaginary terrorists and imaginary bombs only exist in the imagination of the imaginer.
Their neo-con overlords taught them how to "let" a terrorist attack happen and they couldn't even get that right.
Good riddance to all those with press credentials who believe the goal of journalism is ambivalence.
I would simply love to see a majority of the American People exercise their TV-addled brains enough to notice that the country has fundamentally changed so that it no longer resembles the US we used to know:
1. We are a torturing nation now - and few seem to care
2. We have been in an illegal war for 6+ years, and our former administration members are war criminals - and few seem to care
3. Our civil liberties have been stolen as a result of the neocon response to 9/11 (itself an event that is as yet unexplained) - and few seem to care
4. Organized religion rules more than half of the country, and threatens to take us back to the Dark Ages - and few seem to care
5. Corporations, and the top 1%, control the vast majority of our politicians, and our legislative processes - and few seem to care
6. The middle class is shrinking at an alarming rate, and are losing jobs, homes, healthcare and hope - and few seem to care
7. Obama has turned out to be a continuation of bush, albeit a "more thoughtful, more engaged" version - and few seem to care
8. As a country, we are in deep shit without a shovel right now - and few seem to care
9. ad nauseum...
Instead:
1. Tiger Woods has been revealed to be cheating on his wife - and everyone seems to care
2. The Gosselin's marriage is over - and everyone seems to care
3. ad nauseum...
I have hope for the future, but it will require action by those who do care about the items in the first list above.
and. . Lady Gaga . . . GA GA
No one on here has said it better.
As an exPat living abroad (18+) years, everytime I return home the change and apathy is very apparent to an almost overwhelming and shocking amount. If you live within the realm of America you will never notice it ... I call it "goldfish syndrome": you have to leave the fish bowl and view the whole picture from outside to really understand what is trully happening in America ... and it aint pretty.
Each time I return to America for a visit the words I continue to utter like a mantra: "god help us 'cause this can't go on like this forever". And nothing proved this more than when the bubble burst during the financial crisis at the end of Bush's term ... and no one, especially the banks and Wall Street are willing to admit the truth nor that things will never ever return to what they were like 10 years ago.
Truer words were never written ... kudos for having the wisdom and knowledge to say and feel what so many of us living outside the US know to be facts. Thank you.
(ps. I had to google "Gosselin" to find out what that was all about.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Icqrx0OimSs
As an expat (from Canada) for 13 years, I say the same thing. I still don't think Canada has got nearly as bad as the USA, but what I see is still alien to the place I left.
"If the US government enforced its banking laws like it did its park regulations, we wouldn't be
in this damn park in the first place." OCCUPY.!!
Corrections:
1. We have been a torturer for longer is generally understood. See #2
2. Since the National Security Act of 1947 the United States, which is the foremost sponsor of State terrorism in the world has overthrown, covertly or overtly, 50 democratically elected governments and suppressed 30 liberation movements.
3. It is not only the neo-cons at work but also the neo-liberals. Clinton started Carnivore which was an illegal surveillance program which Bush continued.
4. Organized religion has been around since the Dark Ages, it never left.
5. No argument but I would suggest many people do care.
6. I point out repeatedly that between 62% and 80% of the population are best described as working class. This is based on their power to determine the nature of their own work and not necessarily on income. Calling them middle class plays into the hands of the RULING CLASS, the 1%
The working class is being driven into the mud. The actual middle class, the Doctors, Lawyers, middle managers on whole are not doing so badly and I am not worried about them.
7. Obama is Bush III, and I care.
8. We are in deep doo and the Government is undertaking a program of EXTEND and PRETEND, that will keep kicking the can down road and talk happily as if there will be a recovery, until they can't.
9. ETC ETC
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
Sample Case #505,000 . .
NEW YORK – Tavern on the Green, once America's highest-grossing restaurant, is singing its culinary swan song.
The former sheepfold at the edge of Central Park, now ringed by twinkling lights and fake topiary animals, is preparing for New Year's Eve, when it will serve its last meal. Just three years ago, it was plating more than 700,000 meals annually, bringing in more than $38 million.
But that astronomical sum wasn't enough to keep the landmark restaurant out of bankruptcy court.
to America's failure to prosecute war of aggression and torture.
I wish good riddance to fear and insecurity. To quote the great FDR, "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself." Of course, an end to fear and insecurity without warring tactics.
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