AdamSmith

I was in NO 2 days before Katrina! (On a bidness conf but entertaining evenings a gorgeous lil Latino who was days into becoming a Latina. Nights of heaven.) G** saved us all in the event.

He will not win. Then we eat our losers. Can't wait to see how this plays out. He was a good gov over me and mein in MA. But now in the national crucible we begin to see who he truly is. These latter days one is starting to read Eckhart Tolle and, more seriously, the Vedantas from which he took his material. And beginning to see we truly are consumed by what we are. Or conceive that to be.

Good interview with Gabe Kaplan, from 1996. http://dailyuw.com/news/1996/jan/25/welcome-back-kaplan/

ROFL They are on the edge of imputing to Obama and the NHC that power over hurricanes that we thought was the exclusive preserve of Pat Robertson!

Aha! Got it now. So Apple is turning into AOL, morals-wise? Wonder what the business thinking behind this stance? Seems as you say that just marking off an adults-only section would be enough. And would yield a larger total market.

Is this enforced?! If so -- how?

Their sourcing it to the BLS is priceless. So the CPI is actually the Cock Price Index!

Thank you! Ok, master narratives of societal decline can get old quick. Nonetheless, the civic ignorance that pervades today seems quite actual, and as such a real & present risk to the continuance of democratic civic governance. The framers premised the whole shebang on an, on the whole, informed and discerning polis. Which, today, we just ain't got. Arresting to read Tocqueville noting way back when that in his travels into the remotest hinterlands of the young republic he found, in contrast to the peasant ignorance so often encountered in Europe, a local newspaper in most every rude cabin filled with cosmopolitan news of the national civic issues of the day. And the farmer citizens avidly engaged in debating same at the town store or saloon, with sharp apprehension of the meanings and implications thereof, both local and national. Ach.

JK (pls take this in the lightness of being. Not to say loafers )... Yr reply of the latest inst. above: (1) takes us off-topic here (as my group shrink said, correctly, of some hobbyhorse of mine that I got off on the other day) &, more to the point, (2) FTTs!* * Feeds The Tr... (expletive deleted! Foreshortened, rather.) But your substance is gravely accurate. Would you re-post verbatim in a new thread? This pathological nonsense that you rightly denounce bears repeated rebuttal and correction. We are where the sainted Gertrude Stein called it, so presciently, way back in 1945: "We get so much information all day long that we've lost our common sense." And our wretched so-called press has done likewise. The friction from Th. Jefferson spinning in his casket in disgust must be burning up the grounds of Monticello these days.

You taught me to see the good in everyone.

The Palace is getting better and better at PR these days. Now that it has some material to work with again. And we know She who directs everything that really matters there. That sly old fox!

You will just have to become the mistress instead. But remember who gets the pleasure without the burden of all that work of public appearances blah blah that comes with being married to one of the Royals. ...unless you are really just a gold-digger? P.S. These pics are nice. Harry may be the least insane of the Royals. Wills too. But he knows he has to put on that slightly scattered who-gives-a-fig air to be accepted by his varied constituencies. Mind both of them know how to fly pretty mean-fucking helicopters, and do it more than competently. Which finicky and temperamental aircraft do not tolerate fools gladly, and eliminate same from the gene pool rather efficiently.

Thank you. The thinking man's Andrew Sullivan.

Then they ARE doing something productive!

Mencken, again: Democracy is the theory that the people know what they want -- and that they deserve to get it, good and hard!

As would any legitimate rapist. He (& his ilk) almost make one pine for such a thing as retroactive abortion...

Hauntingly beautiful. thk u

My reaction too. Thought Gates was shrewder and saw more clearly. But that he couldn't or wouldn't see Ballmer as Not The Right Guy sure comes out blindingly. Coincidentally tonight just started reading Larry Bossidy's book Execution. Sort of reinforces (not by direct reference, but principle) and elucidates something Jobs was quoted in the article as saying about Gates -- that he portrayed himself as a product guy, but really cared far more about the business strategy and results than the product. Just look at most any one of them, really -- until the game box, so many were crappy and/or late but Gates had figured out and implemented one or another unbeatable business model powerful enough to overcome the crappiness (DOS precursor QDOS -- "Quick and Dirty Operating System." Etc.) and/or lateness. Anyway, to some of Bossidy's points, the boss must not disdain direct engagement with what he identifies as the 3 keys to execution: people, strategy and operations. Gates made a huge (so to speak ) people error in letting Ballmer succeed him, long loyalty or no. Gates WAS engaged in strategy very deeply. (Arguably some big errors here too eventually. But as Stanislaw Lem's GOLEM XIV put it, to elaborate those here would tear my local argument apart, from sheer length & depth of divigation required. ) But then again disengaged in the area of operations. As, for example, TY points out, in for example putting up with shipment of products that were so brittle on launch, or superficially implemented compared with what had been touted, or etc. etc. etc. And moreover, of course, as this article documents, in being blind (or uncaring) about such a counterproductive corporate culture developing as the organization grew and "matured." ...OK, clearly the world's richest guy did not get completely everything wrong. But Jobs was also right in saying Gates should have (and, in this remark, generously implying that Gates could have succeeded in having) tried for bolder products. Except he had not sufficient liberal-arts component in his soul.

Odds that any real man would get preggers on me?

True. You advocating that, or jes sayin? I know from my consulting biz so many MS execs over the past like dozen years who as the article says "succeeded" thx to their skill at bureaucratic infighting, not much else. Same rot that killed DEC, Apollo, almost IBM til Gerstner who knew the score came in and did major surgery to save it, etc.

EXPAT, the clips are divine. (One only wishes the View doyenne could hush themselves a little bit so the precious guest could get a word or two out.)

Comprehensive vivisection of how Microsoft got the way it is today. I had seen bits and pieces of this in other places, but nowhere as complete or synthesized: http://m.vanityfair.com/business/2012/08/microsoft-lost-mojo-steve-ballmer

First, I trust TY and OZ with my life & soul (assuming such latter in fact exists). So revelation of said IP address I discount. Second, ... Well, given MsGuy's sage counsel, what second is there?

Guardian's coverage of the Pussy Riot business is invaluable. http://m.guardian.co.uk/ms/p/gnm/op/sdTTPxZwmFHgPSkOd_cicLg/view.m?id=15&gid=music/2012/aug/17/pussy-riot-trial-verdict-live&cat=most-read

Image shows fine (directly, no need groping the URL) on my iPhone & laptop. No idea what in our friend's config may be the blocking agent. The guy is gorgeous. Thk u for the image, his performance issues notwithstanding.