lookin

What the hell?? I sure hope those are coffee beans!

That's my take also. Trump is an authoritarian leader and there are more waiting in the wings when his time has passed - always have been, always will be. Our problem, in my opinion, is authoritarian followers. Rather than comparing Trump and Hitler, I've long been more interested in comparing Weimar Germans with today's U. S. citizenry. And it's pretty clear that, like a sizable portion of Third Reich Germans, our citizens today are willing to follow someone who does their thinking for them and will promise them protection from outside forces: the "other". The more their fears of the "other" are stoked, the more tightly they'll cleave to their "leader". And they will act - and vote - against their own interests. You can see this pattern repeated under Hitler, who had loyal followers even as firestorms swirled around them. You can see it in the bodies on the ground in Jim Jones' Guyana. And you can see it in the Trump followers voting to do away with their own health insurance. As far as I can tell, there's a genetic component to authoritarianism, in addition to learned behavior. I believe this because of its historical persistence in the human race, and its appearance in many other social species. And I believe that there are times in the evolution of the human species when human survival may depend on the willingness of large parts of the species to blindly follow an authoritarian "leader". From what I've read, there's a persistent 30% - 40% of humans who are hard-wired to be unquestioning followers. And I believe that's why Trump has such a persistent base. His authoritarian followers want things made simple, they want to be protected from the "other", they want to "believe", and they will sacrifice their own interests to do so. I also believe that, while the Republican party, as currently constituted, may attract more than its share of authoritarian followers, the Democratic party has some too. My bet is that some of Sanders' most loyal supporters fit the mold, in particular the ones who would rather vote for Trump than for Biden or Warren. I've posted about some of these beliefs elsewhere, and I'm still trying to learn everything I can about these folks. I think that, while authoritarian "followers" may be necessary at certain times in human evolution and the gene will persist, this is not one of those times. There are more important human qualities that are needed now - some also with genetic components - such as altruism, empathy and compassion. How to help bring these qualities forward, while pushing authoritarian obedience to the background, is what takes up much of my attention these days. Sorry for the rant, yet thanks for the opportunity to do so.

Has anyone seen RockHard? He left early this morning In a little dinghy And with two of the cabin boys He said he was homesick for his villa David better check the silverware I'll go tell AdamSmith Where is he? Up on the poop deck, where else?

Just so! Seems like 90+ percent of the comments on weight issues have to do with food and very little with burning off what we eat through physical activity. As far as I know, they're two sides of the same coin and I wonder why we don't talk more about ramping up exercise instead of cutting down on what we eat. Maybe it has to do with time commitments. It would take me less than a minute to avoid that Big Mac, medium fries and medium Coke. But, if I ate it, it might take me three hours and ten miles to walk it off. That's if I burned 100 calories a mile, which I think is about average. But I don't think it would take that long in practice. Every few months, I go to A&W on a Tuesday when the special is two huge Papa Burgers, two orders of fries and two big root beers. I think that's pretty close to two thousand calories and, theoretically, I'd have to walk twenty miles to burn that off. I'm good for two or three miles most days and it seems like the weight falls off in a few days. So, as @AdamSmith says, I think exercise is as fruitful a way to control weight as dieting, which has rarely been successful for me. Even a small amount of dieting makes me feel deprived whereas a modest amount of exercise doesn't. If I do ever diet again, I'd wait till I hit the lottery and indulge my long-held fantasy of a personal chef. As luck would have it, I came across this guy (so to speak) a couple weeks ago. If I could afford him, I could take care of my diet and exercise in one fell swoop. In fact, I'm feeling a bit exercised right now.

Happy landing! No one will ever find you over here. Even Jimmy Hoffa posts once in a while.

Not to mention a fundamental lack of support.

They'll get a push if Prop D passes. Under Proposition D, storefronts that remain empty for six months or longer will face a tax of $250 per linear foot the first year, increasing to $500 in year two, and $1,000 every year after. The tiered scale is designed to encourage landlords to fill the spaces with new tenants faster.

No wonder I've been getting all those coupons.

He entered the contest emboldened and proud And he gave it no less than his best Yet he earned the support of just half of the crowd While he urned the support of the rest

And perhaps with one more recess to look forward to.

You must be RockHard Calvin’s taking a nap but I’m not busy

Now that this thread is well and truly highjacked, can't help noticing that "sillinesses" is more than a third "s" 's. My previous standard for sibilance had less than a fifth, including a digraph. And thanks for indulging mine.

Exactly what a star would do. I'd love to see a Starwood Do!

Sounds like I may have glossed over my first encounter with Andre. Pathetic may not be pretty, but it brings home the bacon. And props to the OP and fellow posters! Nice to see a five-pager take shape in little over a week.

Do you get the wind up when the organ plays?

You rang? As a paleo-poster on both sites, I've seen them both go through a few eras. Chances are, they'll both continue to evolve. As will we. Through the years, I've only been able to infest one site at a time but try to check in on the other every few weeks. The draw is always the individual posters and it's too bad all my faves don't work out of one location. But I guess it's human nature to want to choose a side. Reminds me of this old wheeze: A guy is shipwrecked and decides he may be stuck for a while. So he uses what he can find to build a house, a small palapa and two synagogues. At long last, he's rescued by a passing boat and, as he's leaving the island, the boat captain asks him why he needs two synagogues. The guy says, "Well, this one here is my synagogue and the other one I wouldn't be caught dead in." PS: In addition to the funny, diverse and knowledgeable posters who hang out here, another nice thing about this site is the excellent collection of smilies. No matter where I'm posting I often link back here for the perfect emoji. OZ sure knows his customers. And, happily, vice versa.

Well, gentlemen, I’ve reviewed all your suggestions, run them through the Research Department, considered things from every angle, completed the financial analysis, weighed all the pros and cons, and reached a final decision: I’m not budging.

International House - 1933 (pre-Hayes Code) - Professor Quail descends in a hot-air balloon Hey! Where am I? Woman: Wu-Hu . . . Woo hoo to you sweetheart. Hey, Charlie, where am I? . . . Man: Wu-Hu (removes boutonniere) Don’t let the posey fool you!

Not sure how I missed hearing about the Telharmonium all these years, but I guess better late than never. Also called the Dynamophone by its inventor, Dr. Thaddeus Cahill, this early electric organ is considered the first electromechanical musical instrument. Cahill invented it in 1897, before vacuum tubes were used to generate electrical waveforms and, in fact, before vacuum tubes themselves were even invented. It used a “tonewheel” mounted to an electric motor to generate a waveform in an adjacent electromagnetic coil. The number of nubs on the wheel and the speed of the electric motor determined the frequency of the waveform generated by the coil. While the principal was pretty straightforward, the implementation was not. It took some fairly heavy-duty gear to generate a single frequency. And, since a large number of individual frequencies were required - simultaneously no less - to produce a tune, it makes sense that the Telharmonium was a large device by any standards. The first model that Cahill constructed - the Mark I - weighed seven tons! By the time he got to the Mark II, the beast weighed in at over 200 tons and required 670 kilowatts of electricity to operate! Obviously, Cahill couldn’t easily move it around to find his audiences, and amplifiers hadn’t been invented yet, so his idea was to transmit the sound produced by the Telharmonium over the telephone system which was just getting going around this time. There weren’t any loudspeakers then either, so Cahill figured he’d send a full ampere of current down the line to each telephone and get the earpiece vibrating so loudly that the listener didn’t even need to pick it up to listen. This, of course, begat its own set of problems, crosstalk in particular, so that early telephone users would sometimes hear strange musical sounds interfering with their voice calls. One story has it “that a New York businessman, infuriated by the constant network interference, broke into the building where the Telharmonium was housed and destroyed it, throwing pieces of the machinery into the Hudson river below.” For a while, around the turn of the century, Cahill leased a space at 39th and Broadway and gave live performances of his invention, while sending the music down the telephone wires to those who were interested in hearing it, as well as to some who were not interested in hearing it. Sadly, no recordings of the Telharmonium exist today and Cahill’s brother scrapped whatever remnants of the device remained in 1950. But the tonewheel mechanism and Cahill's designs formed the basis for the original Hammond organ four decades later. By that time, vaccuum tubes, electronic amplifiers and loudspeakers had been invented and Cahill’s original ideas lived on and thrived. By the way, a two hundred ton instrument would be about the equivalent of a hundred Honda Civics in mass. Dr. Cahill was nothing if not committed to getting his music out to the public.

Good thing too. There have been a number of Major Assholes over the years, but they seem to get drummed out of the corps before they ever make it to Colonel. I dimly recall a Brigadier General Asshole who served briefly on the Southern flank, but he was such a raging bottom that OZ had to cashier him before all his troops deserted. If we ever do manage to attract someone with more than one star, you can be pretty sure he’ll pop up in the Politics Forum, so check there when you find yourself ready to deal. In the meantime, please feel free to send me a private with any other asshole-related questions.

Also useful when shifting positions.

Loved him then, loved him now. One of my favorite songs on that album is My Home Town. Though I've heard minor variations of the fifth verse. In the clip above, it's That fellow was no fool Who taught our Sunday School And neither was our kindly Parson Brown (We're recording tonight so I'll have to leave this line out) In my home town But, on the album, the fourth line changes: That fellow was no fool Who taught our Sunday School And neither was our kindly Parson Brown (I guess I better leave this line out just to be on the safe side) In my home town I guess it's possible that Lehrer never wrote a fourth line and left it up to the listener to imagine the kindly Parson's particular perversion. But I've always wondered if he had described some distinct depravity in his original lyrics. If I recall, AdamSmith, you yourself once hobnobbed with Lehrer and stood inches away while he sang. Do you happen to know if there is indeed a fourth line, and recall what it is? A long shot, I know, though it can't hurt to ask.

It takes me so long to come up with a couplet I can’t pay the rent on this lousy old sublet I need something catchy that’s better than prose Some sort of a gymmick where anything goes My friend AdamSmith says a slant rhyme will do With a hit or miss rhythm up which one cannot screw I think he may have it, I’ll give it a try If he’s right, I’ll be faymous long after I dye