Recent Comments

1. 7 days ago on Pearls Before Swine

   >> If an organization says they’re doing something on principle they’re lying.

   > What if what’s involved is a principal balance that’s owed

   As much as I like English in general; that’s a major difficulty: we have a lot of words that sound alike (homophones), but have little or nothing to do with each other. I believe “principle”, meaning guiding idea, and “principal”, meaning most important or (by extension) an amount owed on a loan, are one such pair.

2. 8 days ago on Pearls Before Swine

   Whenever some organization says they did something on principle, they’re not telling the truth. Also applies to individuals in positions of power, 95% of the time. And the 2 major political parties 100% of the time.

3. 11 days ago on Overboard

   Differences between Liberal and Progressive and Conservative approaches to a problem:

   A Liberal will propose a “solution” that is theoretically doable, makes them feel good, and does nothing to actually fix the problem.

   A Progressive will propose a solution that would actually address the problem, maybe even fixing it, and is impossible to implement.

   A Conservative will deny there is a problem.

   And they wonder why so many smart people think we’re doomed.

4. 11 days ago on Overboard

   No-one here has yet mentioned that many of the biggest companies on Earth make plastics. They lobby and persuade and do any number of things, in any number of ways, to keep us using it as much as possible. Maybe it’s a coincidence that Astroturf is plastic.

5. 11 days ago on Doonesbury

   I don’t know where you are, but around here (big city in the South, a few blocks from a college campus), there’s a lot of mini skirts.

6. 11 days ago on Dog Eat Doug

   Wow! That’s the first time I’ve heard someone say something good about PETA in . . . actually, I have no idea how long it’s been.

7. 11 days ago on Dog Eat Doug

   Ah, cosmologists, bless their heart. Once upon a time, I got a degree in Physics, and even took some Astronomy. But I couldn’t bring myself to take cosmology much more seriously than evolutionary psychology. They both seem to me like the same pseudo-scientific soup of untestability, vague assumptions, huge houses of cards built on speculation from tiny bits of actual data. Not really better than Freud, IMHO. Granted, evolutionary psychology is even worse than cosmology, but still…

8. 12 days ago on Overboard

   Well, since (s)he had it pointed at the ground, it is possible they were trying to make a point, very loudly and dramatically, that it was loaded and the owner was an idiot. But unless it’s a Glock, you are (also) an idiot if you pick up a gun lying around and just pull the trigger without at least asking the owner about its condition. It could be damaged and blow your hand off.

   (I excepted Glocks because they’re commonly believed — with some evidence — to be roughly as reliable as darkness at midnight, and just about guaranteed to work unless there’s very obvious damage, and to often work even with obvious damage.)

9. 12 days ago on Doonesbury

   Given GBT’s history with quoting politicians (and maybe especially DJT), probably all, or at least most. In the past, GBT has even provided footnotes. But I’m guessing that with Claudine Gay’s recent debacle, there are some calling footnotes racist these days.

   (Full disclosure: I’m one of those annoying people who thinks that most of what Dems say about Trump is probably true, and also that most of what Repubs say about Biden is probably true.)

10. 12 days ago on Doonesbury

    As long as we’re wishing, how ’bout a JFK approach to governing, with a BHO approach to “private life”?