Believe me, I know the original Nazis. I was born in Austria in 1947, shortly after the Second World War, and growing up I was surrounded by broken men; men who came home from the war filled with shrapnel and guilt, men who were misled into a losing ideology. And I can tell you that these ghosts that you idolize spent the rest of their lives living in shame. And right now, they're resting in hell." ~ Arnold Schwarzenegger
Quote of the Day
Nothing makes Trump supporters angrier than when you directly quote something he said." ~ @allenthelaz on Twitter
Quote of the Day
Libraries literally aren't just a place to obtain books for free. They're one of the few public spaces left in our society where you're allowed to exist without the expectation of spending money." ~ Amanda Killian
Quote of the Day
If you truly believe America is it's people, not it's politicians, then stop treating your vote like you're supporting one person or another. You're voting for the ideals and beliefs of opportunity, fairness, compassion, equality, for yourself and your friends, family, and community." ~ Sassybear from Idle Eyes and a Dormy
Quote of the Day
Just think, that this race of Black men, today our slave and the object of our scorn, is the very race to which we owe our arts, sciences, and even the use of speech!" ~ French historian Count Constantine de Volney after traveling to Egypt in the late 1780's
Quote of the Day
It's like Ronald Reagan got AIDS." ~ Dan Savage
Quote of the Day
If you've built a personality around gleefully 'offending liberals," here's what you need to know: we aren't offended. You haven't hurt our feelings or made us cry. You sound like children to us, and we're sick of responding over and over to your infuriatingly stupid talking points, but we keep doing it because people's lives might literally be at stake if the wrong kind of idiocy is allowed to spread too far. You're not erudite debaters 'owning the libs." You're the rotten, annoying little kids kicking the backs of our seats while we're trying to keep the car on the road." ~ Jesse Adams
Quote of the Day
Bittersweet October. The mellow, messy, leaf-kicking, perfect pause between the opposing miseries of summer and winter." ~ Carol Bishop Hipps
Quote of the Day – As Timely As Ever
I hope you enjoy carrying your rape baby to term, you can name it Jill Stein." ~ Bill Maher, on 2016 third-party voters
Quote of the Day
The core Trump dissonance is that he's an elderly man who possesses the outward appearance and trappings of adulthood—and who occupies the public role we most strongly associate with adulthood—but who is on the inside predominantly infantile.
The president, if anything, exhibits a characteristic inability to see much beyond his own ego preoccupations. He appears to have no real friendships, habitually belittles those he sees as weak while denying any weakness of his own, and is perennially insecure, desperate to bolster his ratings, numbers, and stats by bending the facts to assuage his fears; he has little demonstrated capacity to joyfully laugh at himself (or laugh at all), and has professed to being uninterested in self-reflection and insight; the only problem he seems genuinely interested in (and truly capable of) solving is the chronic threat of his own waning relevance, and his guiding moral principle is that whatever works to make him 'win' is the right thing to do.
Trump's cognitive and psychological maturity deficits explain much about the jarring effect of his appearance and the strong reaction he provokes. Thus, beyond the dissonance and shock of witnessing someone so childlike in a position of truly terrifying and awesome power, the underlying fascination and dread of Trump's presidency emerge not merely from our sense that we don't know what he will do tomorrow, but also from the sense that he doesn't know that, either."
Quote of the Day
A koala has a better chance of giving birth to an octopus than Lindsey Graham has of doing the honorable thing." ~ @middleageriot on Twitter
Quote of the Day
In your life, you meet people. Some you never think about again. Some, you wonder what happened to them. There are some that you wonder if they ever think about you. And then there are some you wish you never had to think about again. But you do." ~ C.S. Lewis
What you of the CHOAM directorate seem unable to understand is that you seldom find real loyalties in commerce. When did you last hear of a clerk giving his life for the company? Perhaps your deficiency rests in the false assumption that you can order men to think and cooperate. This has been a failure of everything from religions to general staffs throughout history. General staffs have a long record of destroying their own nations. As to religions, I recommend a rereading of Thomas Aquinas. As to you of CHOAM, what nonsense you believe? Men must want to do things out of their own innermost drives. People, not commercial organizations or chains of command, are what make great civilizations work. Every civilization depends upon the quality of the individuals it produces. If you over-organize humans, over-legalize them, suppress their urge to greatness—they cannot work and their civilization collapses." ~ Attributed to The Preacher, DUNE MESSIAH
Prophetic
I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance." ~ Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World
Quote of the Day
If Iranian hackers want to pull off some big-dick energy shit, they should wipe out US Student Loan debt. Poof! Make it disappear. If the debt disappears, the US will lose this debt as leverage to recruit for the military." ~ Unknown
Quote of the Day
In WW2, Londoners were asked to black out their homes at night so the enemy bombers wouldn't see the lights and know ehre to target. No Londoner said, "It's my right to have lights on," because others would say, "Your light endangers the rest of us." Substitute "light" for "mask." Now argue." ~ Jason Alexander
Quote of the Day
In the end, Trump did what he said. He built a wall around America and made the world pay for it. He just never told Americans they'd be stuck inside." ~ @indica on Twitter
American passports are—for the moment—absolutely worthless.
Quote of the Day
The taverns are full of gadabouts making merry this eve. And though I may press my face against the window like an urchin at a confectioner's, I am tempted not by the sweetmeats within. A dram in exchange for the pox is an ill bargain indeed. " ~ Diary of S. Pepys, Great Plague of 1665
Quote of the Day
Here's the truth: Trump's supporters don't measure his success by what he does for them, they measure by what he does against people they don't like. That's why they see him as being "successful," and why they will never abandon him. His tormenting of the "others" sustains them." ~ Corey Reynolds via Twitter.
Quote of the Day
Never trust any ruler who puts his faith in tunnels and bunkers and escape routes. The chances are that his heart isn't in the job." ~ Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
Quote of the Day
There's a reason you separate military and the police. One fights the enemies of the state, and the other serves and protects the people. When the military becomes both, then the enemies of the state tend to become the people." ~ Edward James Olmos as Admiral William Adama, Battlestar Galactica
Quote of the Day
I am an infectious diseases physician. Let's be clear about masks. I wear a mask to protect you. You wear a mask to protect me. That's how it works, and it's simple. Without your mask, you are telling me and everyone around you that you don't care about others. And that's not how we get through a pandemic." ~ Stan Schwartz, M.D., Tulsa
Preach.
Quote of the Day
The best thing any of us can do until we vote this imbecile out of office and into jail is stay safe. Wear you mask, practice social distancing, and decontaminate and we will outlive both these dinosaurs and the faltering economy." ~ Dave at Riding On
Quote of the Day
What is it about President Obama that really gets under your skin? Is it because he's smarter than you? Better educated? Made it on his own; didn't need daddy's help? Wife is more accomplished? Better looking? I don't know, what is it? What is it about him? That he's a black man that's accomplished, became president? That he punked you on the whole birth certificate thing? What is it about him? Just wondering…" ~ Don Lemon
Quote of the Day
Let me explain why I like to pay taxes for schools even though I personally don't have a kid in school. It's because I don't like living in a country with a bunch of stupid people." ~ John Green
I Think We Can All Relate
I am so happy you are proud of me, although I don't know what for. I am just surviving.
Martha Gellhorn, from a letter to Ernest Hemingway c. July 1941 (via violentwavesofemotion)
Just Putting This Out Here
Being a photographer is making people see what I want them to see." ~ Ruth Orkin
I'm not saying the City is totally deserted as this video would have you believe, but unless I hear differently from someone with actual boots on the ground, I'm taking this with a small grain of salt.
Quote of the Day
In the rush to return to normal, use this time to consider what parts of normal are worth rushing back to." ~ Dave Hollis
Quote of the Day
"I cannot remember a time when the world saw the United States this unsteady, adrift, corrupt, or incompetent." ~ Dan Rahter, 3/21/20