the IDIOT

anytime you see someone asserting “the law of x” is a good time to get skeptical. art carden:

The law of comparative advantage shows us that people can consume more than they would be able to produce on their own. […]

ugh. this law of x formula’s a fallacious crutch. he should simply write, “Comparative advantage shows us”, or similar. as noted here, referring to a “law” explains nothing. so why is he even calling it a law? because it’s a tradition from economics (and other) blowhards. it’s a tradition because it’s normally the fallacy of argument by authority. should be tossed in nearly every case, including probably every time i ever did it.

reading this article linked from LvMI, it’s almost shocking how infantile is the “mainstream” view of economics in the goonited states. pushing aside the buzzwords, it comes down to this plea:

“please, great demigods calling yourselves the federal government, say something to me. grant me the blessing of your declaration. create economic miracles with your tongues and pens.” [and guns] (more…)

was stunned yesterday reading this accurate headline, rare for its construction:

Daughter urges Okla. voters to not vote for father

most self-styled grammarians leap to their “look at me” buzzers and nearly trample one another to be the first to smooge, “forsooth, a split infinitive. oh dear.” (more…)

chris manion’s apparently lost it. this post is worse than on its face, for he used to know aristotelian logic.

Pride Goeth Before The Fall

Posted by Christopher Manion on May 16, 2010 02:42 PM

The word “tragedy,” properly employed, denotes a particular genre of drama or literature that features a main character defined by one dictionary as a person “impelled by moral weakness or psychological maladjustment” – or hubris — “exaggerated pride or self-confidence.”

So I find it interesting that a Detroit police chief calls the shooting of seven-year-old Aiyana Jones by a SWAT team member “a tragedy of unspeakable magnitude to Aiyana’s parents.”

So Aiyana’s parents are the ones “impelled by moral weakness or psychological maladjustment… and exaggerated pride or self-confidence”?

(more…)

as the dude would say, it’s fucking interesting that anyone opposed to the chief narcissist/jackal/occupier is excoriated for even the slightest opposition to opposition of things such as mythical “states’ rights” (state-apologist dodge of individual rights — the only kind) or confederate flags, yet his holiness may without popular detraction refer to a confirmed slaver as an authority on “democracy” (ha!) — democracy, of course, being merely code for mob rule.

[...] Obama argued that from the days of the pioneer politicians who founded the United States, until the modern day, education and knowledge had been the key to progress and US democracy.

He drew a line between Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence, and today’s challenges.

“What Jefferson recognized… that in the long run, their improbable experiment — called America — wouldn’t work if its citizens were uninformed, if its citizens were apathetic, if its citizens checked out, and left democracy to those who didn’t have the best interests of all the people at heart. [...]

nice piece of psycho projection there. big finish: (more…)

normally, people calling themselves libertarian writers/educators completely screw in at least two major ways the beginning of the battle for freedom. not through mere coincidence, these are typically the same fucks yammering about “credibility” and other such generally illogical rot (given undisputed premises, credibility is wholly irrelevant in a logical argument). they’re the same type who right now are thinking, “he just said ‘fucks’”, as if it matters.

line it up, dumbasses. first, fundamental rights (those usually being discussed) cannot be “taken away”. any language to the contrary is simply brainwashed gibberish you’re re-spewing reflexively from an overdose of “good citizen 101″. do not, as jim fedako just did, refer to “additional loss of property rights”. it’s the language equivalent of spreading your legs and begging a rapist to take it easy on you. do not say, “our rights are being clipped one by one” or similar filth.

why? (more…)

the clods are eventually going to get what they’re yapping for with this “net neutrality” (bullshit term, of course) scam, and they aren’t going to like it. if you want to find the stupidest, most narcissistic motherfuckers in the room, just poll on so-called net neutrality. those in support of this monstrous property usurpation mark themselves loudly. i avoid writing about it most of the time, because it’s so disgusting how easily people are wooed by this connivance with the odd mix of subtle and brutal. my comment against a typical wanker going off about “monopoly”: (more…)

i’ve had temporarily acquaintances who balked at the recent increased use of the term “socialism”, almost to the point where they deny that socialism exists in the goonited state — especially regarding medicine.

if state control of private individuals and their groups isn’t socialism, what is? control is ownership. karen de coster: (more…)

though a welcome deviation from the cauterizing “nationalization”, even “seizure” doesn’t true up the action of the state to the action of unofficial criminals:

CARACAS (Dow Jones)–President Hugo Chavez ordered Sunday the seizure of a French-owned retail chain on accusations that it raised prices after Venezuela devalued the currency by half.

“Until when are we going to allow this to happen?” Chavez asked during his Sunday television program in reference to the alleged price hike by Almacenes Exito SA (EXITO.BO), headquartered in Colombia and controlled by French retailer Casino …

the noive of those rat bastard producers! take your raping like a… like a…

note chavez’s feigned-incredulity routine, a nearly obligatory element of official banditry. the most effective (with morons) defense of coercionism is an early and big incredulity performance.

sad that so few get the importance of straight language in politics. today LRC links to an AP article quoting vermont secession advocate peter garritano:

“The only hope is to just say, ‘Look, this isn’t working for us. We want to start fresh again, with a real democracy,’” Garritano said. “I think that’s the answer. Hopefully, it won’t take another horrible economic breakdown to realize that the people running things don’t look out for the little guy, or us, or the soldiers. It’s all about profit and getting the last drops of oil on Earth and trampling people’s rights.”

so long as fools in the goonited state use “democracy” as an essential good, they’re going nowhere but worse. (more…)

surprised to see the usually superior manuel lora (of LRC/LvMI) today fall into the language of statists, ending a blog post with, “I’m sorry to inform you, Mr. Perry, that you have no rights.” (more…)

two of my favorite subjects, slammed home by susan hogarth today at LRC:

The most common refrain from the war-crazed Clinton/Bush oligarchy these days is (as Hillary Clinton most recently expressed it) “We cannot take any option off the table in sending a clear message to Iran that they will not be permitted to acquire nuclear weapons.”

No options off the table. Truly?

If eviscerating her daughter in public would send a clear message to Iran – and surely it would send a blazing telegram of deadly seriousness – would she consider that to be an option on the table? I always wonder about the minds of people who can make this sort of pronouncement. If destroying an entire city by bombing – and make no mistake about it, this is what she and others are referring to in this latest round of bomb-rattling – is an option to send a message, then wouldn’t simply murdering her own daughter be an improvement? After all, think of the lives saved! As for messages – what could possibly send a stronger message to the world that a person is serious (or crazy, which in the political world comes to the same thing) than that she would willingly sacrifice her own child for peace? There’s even biblical precedent for such an option. [...]

man, is it sad to watch people with no first principles wallowing in their stupidity projection. hey, if they’re stupid, everyone else must be too, right? the painfully stupid ezekiel emanuel:

Nearly two decades after the West’s victory over communism, one might have thought it possible to discuss reform of the health-care system without invocations of the old saw “socialized medicine.” But no.

is that kinda like the “old saw” where you call somebody who murders someone a “murderer”, ezekiel dumbshit?

but i spoke too soon! he has an explanation: (more…)

neocons, like all political bullshitters, anchor their indefensible crap in language distortion. any rational observer knows this, yet the crazy “let’s push this beyond the limit” choices of the nitwits can sometimes surprise regardless. wasn’t until this morning, arguing with some in-denial YouTube clod, that i took a serious look at a major dictionary’s definition of insurgent. what. the. fuck. (more…)