Who smokes the blunts? We smoke the blunts.

[cyrano]

Making more curry--updates on that later, I'm certain.
Silent Bob is also thwarted by my lack of sneakers.
LJ user phillipalden posted this article from News Day about a terrorist attack on a building in Iowa that didn't make the news. I sure didn't see anything about it, anyway. These are people who hate us, who want to see us dead. They have organized, in the name of a bloodthirsty violent god, to commit violence and threaten violence in order to intimidate or coerce a civilian population. There is no reasoning with them. According to my government, this means that I am not just authorized but downright morally obligated to bring that violence back down upon their heads.
But I'm probably not going to go out and buy a gun so that I can put a bullet in Clayton Waagner's twisted and unChristian brain. I will instead rely on the laws upon which this nation was founded and which give this country the potential to be a pillar of freedom, democracy and liberty to arrest him, try him in a court where he is presented with the evidence and testimony against him, allow him to testify in his own defence and dig himself into a giant hole, and then convict him and put him in a small metal box for the rest of his life.
I guess that makes me a cowardly CutAndRunoCrat.

EDIT:
Edited to add a link to phillipalden's next post in which he writes his own words about the future. He has a lot more faith in it than I do, but I hope he's right and I'm wrong.

Comments

back up two spaces and lose your turn

[miss-friday.livejournal.com]

Since 1977, casualties from this war include seven murders, 17 attempted murders, three kidnappings, 152 assaults, 305 completed or attempted bombings and arsons, 375 invasions, 482 stalking incidents, 380 death threats, 618 bomb threats, 100 acid attacks, and 1,254 acts of vandalism, according to the National Abortion Federation.

I stand in opposition to EVERYTHING the anti-abortion movement stands for, and I do it proudly yet, I stopped reading after this paragraph. Why? Blatent misuse of the word casualty. Writer needs use the dictionary as God intended.

I also question your assertion whether anti-abortionists want those who have nothing to do with abortions dead. Maybe the balance of the article expounded on this.

Sorry Silent Bob didn't work out. I guess Jay was out of the question?

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[phillipalden.livejournal.com]

Keeping in mind I did not write this article - What exactly is wrong with the use of the word "casualty" in this story? I'm just looking for a little clarity behind your statement.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

I don't think many of the later elements on the list can really be classified as 'casualties'--a bomb threat, for instance. The time lost in dealing with it, the sense of safety lost, the effects of the bomb threat could be. But I do agree that the word was ill chosen.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[phillipalden.livejournal.com]

I agree the article was badly written - but I'm really curious about WHY "miss_friday" dislikes the word in the context of the article.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[miss-friday.livejournal.com]

See response below.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

Yes, this journalist goes for the sensational word over the correct word. But there is some information in there as well.
Hrmmm. "Since 1977, ....effects of this war include"? I'd probably have to rewrite the whole sentence to get that to read properly.

"It doesn't matter to me if you're a nurse, receptionist, bookkeeper, or janitor, if you work for the murderous abortionist I'm going to kill you." --Clayton Waagner
I imagine it depends a lot on how you define 'nothing to do with abortions'. Does the guy who does groundskeeping for the doctor work for the murderous abortionist? According to Clay, he possibly does. Does the woman at the laundry service who washes towels and lab coats? Quite possibly. The clinic that car ran into does not provide abortions. It does provide birth control, which is considered baby killing by some extreme elements of the anti-abortion movement. And the Pope.
Jesus has said (according to Luke) 'he who is not with me is against me'. The fact that I don't shoot doctors or drive cars into clinics would, by that logic, make me a baby killer. I don't trust guys like Clayton to think rationally. I don't trust Muqtdada al Sadr to think rationally. I think that religion, much like recreational drugs, is something that can be misused to make people do amazingly stupid things.

And Jay's pretty much out of the question. (: I can't do skinny and blonde that easily. But since I was working Saturday and am working Tuesday (the two big party days) I don't figure I have much to worry about.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[miss-friday.livejournal.com]

Wasn't it Stalin who said that religion was the opiate of the masses? Probably the only thing he and I will ever agree on.

You, and likely the author of the article, are right. Loonies have a way of twisting words and stripping away context to make religious texts say whatever it is they want them to say. I don't doubt this has happened since the (Insert Religious Text of Choice Here) was new. Nut jobs happen everywhere. As my oral composition teacher always said: "A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing."

I don't argue with the information, although I'm taking it with a grain of salt. But sloppy writing, in my experience, is a clear sign of sloppy thinking. I abhor both. And in answer to "phillipalden", I have neither the time nor the patience deal with either. (In the adult world, mind you; my students need all the help they can get to prevent them from traveling that same highway.)

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

Stalin wasn't much of an idea guy. That was Marx, I think in 'Das Kapital'. You might agree with him a little more often, but he was a theory sort of guy and didn't have to work with the practical aspects.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

Correct phrase is "a litle learning is a dangerous thing."

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[(Anonymous)]

I think Clay Waagner did the right thing. He shut down a lot of babykilling abortion mills and saved a lot of babies from being murdered. I don't know how you can support the murder of innocent children and then act so proud like you have some sort of moral high ground. You support of the babykillers makes you culpable as well in their deaths.

Re: back up two spaces and lose your turn

[cyranocyrano.livejournal.com]

So is there a good benefits package in being a troll? Because I certainly could use a new job.

Ahem. It's "back up two spaces and lose your FUCKING turn".

[eyelessgame.livejournal.com]

This objection rubs me the wrong way.

It's a little like all the folks who decide they won't consider what any blogs have to say because blogs sometimes use dirty words. "Yes, I'd agree with you, BUT you used that word. I can't listen any more, because you used the wrong word, so nothing else you say could possibly matter."

"Casualty" continues the metaphor of "war". You can quibble with the use of metaphor in the article, but once you accept that the author calls this a "war", those injured by the prosecution of the war (and a bomb threat is an injury by any reasonable definition of the word) are casualties.

Stopping reading just because a metaphorical "war" has metaphorical "casualties" smacks of wanting an excuse not to listen. Maybe that's not who you are -- but the dismissal of an article on the basis of one word used to extend a metaphor? Did you vote for Nader? :) :)