Disqus - Latest Comments for CraigHickman

Re: Sunday Open Thread

CraigHickman — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:43:59 -0000

I see the the First Couple will attend the memorial in Texas. I suppose they have to, but I don't want them anywhere near Texas, what with its magic bullets and all that. Especially in this environment.

If any harms befalls either one of them while they're there, then I'll know why this entire tragedy, and all of its shoddy and irresponsible reporting and the important details that don't add up, rubbed me the wrong way from the get go.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 23:04:37 -0000

Isn't he the one who said that the quickest way to get a school yard bully to back down is to stand up?

Democrats need to stand up.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 22:46:02 -0000

Good luck with that.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 22:39:48 -0000

I'm planting 200 bulbs this weekend.

Re: Nidal Malik Hasan: The Madness Time

CraigHickman — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:36:37 -0000

Thank you for the context, for the analysis, for the food for thought. But mostly, thanks for the great writing.

Re: Cleveland, You Know You F&@ked Up, Right?

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:20:05 -0000

I'm from Milwaukee. So much of this story reminds me of the crimes of Jeffrey Dahmer.

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:35:10 -0000

That's the most curious thing I've read so far.

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:34:03 -0000

They can't. But they prop them up anyway.

Journalism is dead.

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:18:39 -0000

I turned off the TV. What are these "family members" saying?

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:03:57 -0000

Military officials are giving out confidential information?

He was promoted to Major this past May?

How poor could his performance have been?

What constitutes poor?

Isn't it easy to create a profile of the dead who have no opportunity to defend themselves?

And since he was single and had no children, who can vouche for him?

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:12:49 -0000

There's a whole lot about this shooting that isn't adding up.

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:00:43 -0000

The man's name was actually Nidal Malik Hasan.

Stupidass media.

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 18:17:49 -0000

Lord have mercy.

Re: Amazing and disturbing tweet from Fort Hood area. Now with ebonics translation

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:44:00 -0000

Malik Nadal Hasan.

So that will automatically make this a terrorist attack even if it wasn't.

Here. We. Go.

Re: Responding To The Progressive Obama Haters Not Quite One Year Out

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:57:53 -0000

Obama is never above criticism, and he's received a lot of mine. But he has not flip flopped on DADT. He was against it during the campaign and he still is.

Congress will have to overturn it.

Re: Gay Marriage: Maybe I’m Crazy Pills

CraigHickman — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:45:43 -0000

Turnout wasn't the problem. It was very high, across all age groups and regions. Higher in some places than election 2008.

Here's the poll I want to see: How many gay voters don't actually give a shit about gay marriage one way or the other and simply stay home or skip the question entirely when these referendums are on the ballot?

The "movement" has made an (erroneous?) assumption that all GLBT citizens care about marriage, which is, at the end of the day, a picket fence issue for the community. Yes, it's about equality and creating legal family units, as I've argued before, but many GLBT people simply can bring themselves to care. And I'm not suggesting this is wrong. But I'd like to know, as all these "gay leaders" blame other groups and politicians, how much of the "blame" lies right at the doorstep of citizens, no matter their sexuality, who have no interest in marriage as an institution at all.

Re: Gay Marriage: Maybe I’m Crazy Pills

CraigHickman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 17:36:45 -0000

Great post. Your definition of law sums it up nicely.

Re: Responding To The Progressive Obama Haters Not Quite One Year Out

CraigHickman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 17:35:31 -0000

Good post.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:49:43 -0000

We know what the real enemy is -- religious fundamentalism. But GLBT leadership won't touch it in any real way because they're too afraid of the fundamentalists calling them exactly what they're calling them anyway. Until our leaders are willing to take this on unabashed and unapologetically, we will keep pointing fingers at other historically oppressed groups oppressed by religious fundamentalism and keep falling up short at the ballot box.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 07:57:52 -0000

Democrats are going to ensure Obama is a one-term president.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 07:55:20 -0000

I had to laugh at Mixner's "analysis." It's become farcical to blame "non-white" people for the failure of citizen initiatives. Maine is the whitest state in the Union. Does he even know what people consider themselves "non-white" in Maine? I bet he doesn't. I'll tell him - a slew of French Canadians who were called niggers when they first emigrated across the border and their ancestors.

Lewiston, one of Maine's population centers, is almost entirely French-Canadian and Catholic. It voted Yes by a 60-40 margin.

Blame the Catholics, Mixner, if you need to blame somebody.

If you don't, then consider this:

The weather yesterday was sunny and warm. The rural vote made the difference. Many rural and small-town precincts had higher voter turnout than for the presidential election.

High turnout worked against No On 1 because the campaign figured that so many folks from my area and above wouldn't show up at the polls and the population centers would provide enough cushion against those who did.

Blame the weather.

Re: Evening Open Thread

CraigHickman — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 07:45:11 -0000

Rutabagas. I had the audacity to plant turnips and call them turnips. But Mainers call rutabagas turnips. So all my turnips are going to rot in the root cellar because I didn't know this bit of quirkiness about my state.

Yep. It's all my fault, but it had nothing to do with butterbeans.

(smile)

Re: Afternoon Open Thread

CraigHickman — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:58:36 -0000

Williams Tennis Association

So.

Serena and Venus Williams were in the championship caliber group for the second-year running, but this time, they both emerged, battered and bruised, to contest the final final of the WTA.

(I don't count that other event. I consider it an exhibition of mediocrity. It has no place whatsoever on the tour's calendar.)

I'm writing this before their doubles effort after "suitable rest" because I expect Spain to take that match. But the sisters will take the court and give the fans a semifinal.

And they will not retire.

Serena's left leg is mummified with Kinesio tape and heavy strapping. As though the injury that kept her from defending her title in Miami and interrupted her preparations for Roland Garros has returned. Venus is without mummification (yet), but her back and her knee are not up to snuff.

Neither sister can serve. Neither can run with any confidence. Changing directions looks painful even on the television screen. And yet here they are in the singles final of the season ending championships. The oldest in the field with bodies slowest to recover. Arguably the two best players on the tour -- still -- they've given their naysayers and the propagandists (far too often one and the same) heartburn. I would imagine a couple are choking on their own bile right about now.

Some of the propagandists give the sisters little to no credit, no benefit of the doubt, no matter what they do. The sarcasm that flooded Twitter and the forums after Serena announced her pullout from Fed Cup was quite catty. Any opportunity to pounce, the propagandists take it, and they don't back down.

They're more like the sisters than they care to admit.

Read the rest...

Re: Wednesday Open Thread

CraigHickman — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 15:49:43 -0000

Wow. What a breath of fresh air in the midst of so much putridity.

I told a friend that I found it very curious that all of a sudden Clinton loyalists have been all over the television crapping all over Obama of late. She thought I was about to start ripping into the Clintons again (she loves them both but isn't a loyalist, so she can be persuaded) and told me to give it up. I told her the only thing worse than the Clintons are their blind followers who seek to take down anyone who has ever done their king and queen any wrong. As they perceive it, of course. They smile in your face and stab you in your back. All of them can jump into the fire pit.

When Lanny Davis showed up on the Ed Show, I knew it was time to turn off politics again.

Re: Saturday Open Thread

CraigHickman — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 10:08:33 -0000

Unless I missed it, I've been holding my breath waiting for one of the "responsible" broadcast journalists to ask their right wing liars this very same question.