Thursday, September 18, 2014

SCOTS WOO HOO.

I know less about British politics than [George Costanza pause] anyone in the world, but ignorance has never stopped me before, so I hereby declare myself in favor of Scottish independence, mainly because the worst people on earth are against it. For example, David Frum, whose "five important ways" in which "a vote in favor of Scottish independence would hurt Americans" are so poorly cobbled together that they actually reduce my opinion of him, which I never thought possible. Get a load of this:
Second, a ‘Yes’ vote would lead to a longer-term decline in Britain’s contribution to global security. The Scottish separatists have a 30-year history of hostility toward NATO. They abruptly reversed their position on the military alliance in 2012 to reassure wavering middle-of-the-road voters. But the sincerity of this referendum-eve conversion is doubtful. Even if it was authentic, the SNP’s continuing insistence on a nuclear weapons-free policy would lock U.S. and U.K. forces out of Scotland’s naval bases.
What if ISIS attacks the Isle of Man while the UK's moving its rockets to Berwick-Upon-Tweed?
The SNP’s instincts are often anti-American and pro-anybody-on-the-other-side of any quarrel with the United States, from Vladimir Putin to Hamas.
Gasp! The Union of Scottish Socialist Republics will become the Anglosphere's Cuba, or at least its Berkeley! They may have to set up a blockade. (I think these guys are up for the job.)

But here's the convincer:


I mean, come on, wouldn't it be worth it just to see their faces the morning after? Tell me I'm wrong in comments.

UPDATE. Or tell me jokes! keta tells a good one in comments. I'm not sure this one I heard Tom Conti tell in Whose Life Is It, Anyway? is supposed to be about Scots, but what the hell: Two Scots are in Vatican City, thirsty. They go into a trattoria, order two pints of ale. They are informed there's no ale, no lager either. "Well," says one, "what's yer Pope drink?" Benedictine, he is told. "Right," says the other Scot, "two pints of Benedictine." In short order the two men are legless. "So this is what yer Pope drinks?" says one; "Christ, no wonder they're always carryin' him about in a fookin' chair then."

UPDATE 2. A commenter notes that Dave Brockington of Lawyers Guns & Money has made what he or she reads as a fair argument for Better Together. I see it as more mixed, but Brockington does make the good point if Scotland leaves it will make the rest of the UK  totally nuts politically (or as Socialist Cubone puts it, "UKIP with nukes").

We've also taken on more jokes in comments, and I appreciate Muriel Volestrangler hooking us up with Billy Connolly's version of the Vatican joke, which is terrific.

Oh by the way, no exit polls, so we'll just have to wait for a result. I expect to be disappointed, as usual.

UPDATE 3. Ah bollocks. Catalunya, you're my only hope!

172 comments:

  1. Can we get this kind of movement started right here in these United Snakes? I can think of a few "regions" that need to be free of the rest of you.


    Totally in favor of any & everything being busted up, from chiffarobes to bullshit "nations"!

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  2. Purely selfishly, I hope the "No" vote prevails. "Yes" would hurt funding for the BBC and really imperil it over the years (the Tories always want to kill the BBC anyway). The BBC is the best broadcaster in the world. It's made for my personal benefit as an American, too.

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  3. This Scottish bloke goes on a skiing holiday to Canada.

    After a hard day on the slopes he retires to a bar at the bottom of the mountain.

    After about five or six whiskeys, he looks up and notices a stuffed animal with antlers on the wall.

    He asks the barman, "What the fuck is that?"

    The barman says, "It's a Moose."

    The Scottish chap says, "Fuck me! How big are the cats?"

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  4. randomworker1:57 PM

    Let's just not try to bribe Mississippi into staying this time.

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  5. No, Roy, you're not wrong.

    And if David Frum is opposed... well, "enemy of my enemy" and all that, but if it'd piss Fum off I have a moral obligation to support it.

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  6. montag22:08 PM

    If the Irish are the world champions at holding grudges, the Scots have to be in second place.

    The British have been going balls to the wall on implied threats, cajoling and "promises" that have likely only pissed off the diehards among the Scots, and, if anything, will probably tilt the vote in favor of independence. I suspect that the "news" that RBS would leave the country if independence were affirmed only prompted a "good riddance to bad rubbish" response among the Scots.

    What's in back of all this is oil. North Sea production is declining quickly, but the Brits are getting the benefit of it because of Scotland. Scotland's northern coast abutting the North Sea is what gives the UK rights to some of that oil. The oil makes land on Scottish territory, and it's refined on Scottish territory. Much of the proceeds from that would likely change with independence.

    So, it's not exactly as if Scotland becomes an impoverished little cast-off of the former British Empire if it says, "fuck off" to the hated Tories in London. Beyond that, Scotland's on track to be 100% electrically independent by 2028, and England's not even close, so staying tied to England is just a drag on that goal. (I suspect that defense spending and the MoD are big issues as well, since there are a number of joint US-UK bases in Scotland, and the tax load caused by the UK's rapidly expanding defense budget after 2001 has been onerous to the Scots, who basically have only had one natural enemy in the last eight hundred years, and that's the British.)

    So, David Frum's whining notwithstanding, there are plenty of good reasons for the Scots to effect a divorce, and official US opinion on the matter--which certainly mirrors that of our "special relationship" cronies in London--isn't going to count for fuck-all in Glasgow and Edinburgh.

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  7. Bizarro Mike2:08 PM

    It's hard for me to take this too seriously. On the rational level, I think independence won't help Scotland. They have a pretty decent deal in the union. However, disappointing Cameron has to have a pretty big appeal. I imagine that more than a few folk are fantasizing about giving the post-poll interview on TV where they say "Well, I would have voted no, if only David Cameron would have done more." Just to twist the knife.

    The idea that because the nationalists carry the day today that Scotland will follow their ideas of government is pretty dumb, even for Frum. This is some recycled red scare garbage. There are some scary nationalists, but also a majority of center-left liberals. They could join the EU. Or they could encourage Wales to become independent and then form a Celtic union with Wales. The latter option, again, would be done just to tweak the Tories.

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  8. nevermind this vow thing, i want to hear more about this free litre of milk.

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  9. Hopefully, independent Scots will chuck out all of the "peers" as their first move. Get out from under the thumb of a monarchy- the last decent king in Scotland was Macbeth.

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  10. Wouldn't you rather buy a cow?

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  11. Fee Fi Fo Fum ... Must be the blood of an Englishmana Canadian who left home for the big colonial power to Canada's south. Why's he against Scotland leaving then?

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  12. "Family Dairy" means it's human milk!!

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  13. bekabot2:27 PM

    I'm agin it, because I don't see any sign that the Scots have been canny enough to get their currency under their own control, or that they're ready/willing to build their own roads or bridges or finance their own schools or subsidize their own infrastructure or get ready for prime time in the number of other ways which would show that they're poised to go it alone and quit depending on the bigger coffers of a bigger country. (But then I'm no less ignorant than Mr. Edroso is, probably more so.) Absent all these things I'm afraid that Scotland will turn into another teensy nation whose fate is to get stomped by bigger nations, and 1) we've already got plenty of those and don't need more, and 2) Scotland already has a harsh and grievous history and doesn't need more pain. JMO.

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  14. Helmut Monotreme2:27 PM

    only if we bust up monopolies and oligopolies first.

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  15. Socialist Cubone2:33 PM

    More important than what secession does for Scotland is what it does to England. Three words:


    UKIP with nukes.

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  16. You can't really call them grudges when the grievances are real and relatively recent.

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  17. If independence succeeds, "Saturday Night" by the Bay City Rollers would become the national anthem.

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  18. montag22:50 PM

    No doubt, but the real and recent ones are piled on top of some that go centuries.

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  19. Cervantes2:51 PM

    Scotsman's walking home at night in the dark, slips on a cowpie and lands on his back pocket. He feels something trickling down his leg and he says to hiimself, "Ooh God, I hope it's blood."

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  20. mgmonklewis2:57 PM

    If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly.

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  21. mgmonklewis2:58 PM

    No media representation, and yet the race is down to the wire.
    It's like the rare times a Democrat has a chance of winning a race in South Dakota.

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  22. mgmonklewis2:59 PM

    We call those "family reunions."

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  23. mgmonklewis3:00 PM

    I'd pay cash money to see David Frum in the Axis of Snivel after losing the vote.

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  24. Jay B.3:06 PM

    Everything Frum wrote sounds like a reason that I, as an anti-Imperialist, anti-nukes, pro-nice, American should support them in their independence. It's actually rather amazing that he thinks these would be persuasive points in favor of keeping the union.

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  25. You forget to establish he has a "wee dram o' scotch" in his hip pocket.

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  26. Cervantes3:15 PM

    I thought I'd let you figure that out.

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  27. vicomtepicabia3:20 PM

    I think that was already established with the word "Scotsman."

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  28. Muriel Volestrangler3:24 PM

    The 'pope drink' joke might be properly credited to Billy Connolly - his slightly longer version (with added bonus for anyone who remembers Hughie Greene) starts about 4:30 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njB_t6Wd79A , and a transcript here: http://www.ibras.dk/comedy/when_in_rome.htm . I think I remember this from the late 70s (and it could be older than that). Though he may have got it from the play and expanded it, I guess. But that would definitely make it Scottish. And worth listening to him tell it, anyway.

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  29. Henk Tobias3:24 PM

    I am sorry I don't have time to read Frum, can someone tell me if he lists as one of his reasons that these Scottish assholes kicked poor Donald Trump to the curb when all he wanted to do was build one of signature, low profile, subdued, projects in their back yard?

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  30. Spaghetti Lee3:31 PM

    So this American is vacationing in Scotland. He goes into the local pub and says "I hear you Scots know how to hold your liquor. Well, I've got a hundred American dollars for the first man who can do ten shots of whisky back to back."

    No one takes him up on his offer. One man even gets up and leaves. About ten minutes later, he returns and says "Is your bet still good?"

    The American says yes. The bartender sets up the shot glasses and the Scot downs them all back to back. The whole bar cheers and the American sheepishly hands over the money. "If you don't mind me asking, where'd you go for those ten minutes?"

    The Scotsman says "Ach, I went to the pub down the street to make sure I could do it, first."

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  31. Hot potato, orchestra stalls, Puck will make amends!

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  32. Spaghetti Lee3:35 PM

    It's probably not a good idea economically, but then neither is my half-baked plot to support myself drawing fetish porn on commission now that I got laid off. If Scotland and I go down the tubes, we go down together!

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  33. redoubtagain3:35 PM

    America has to get its < a href="http://uscatfish.com/">farmed catfish from somewhere.

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  34. "the worst people on earth are against it."

    Dave Brockington is hardly one of the worst people on earth.

    http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2014/09/thoughts-scottish-independence-referendum-iii-ramifications

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  35. Derelict3:40 PM

    Or, you could go hit one of Cliven Bundy's cows out on the interstate.

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  36. Actually the yes proponents are reassuring the wee aul' folk that they will still have their Queen.

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  37. Mr. Wonderful3:41 PM

    Haven't heard this in probably 30 years. Maddy Prior's voice cuts through like a razor. Terrific.

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  38. Spaghetti Lee3:41 PM

    Yeah, I think in general the consequences of kicking a big left-wing bloc out of Britain could be troublesome (IIRC, there were big street parties in Glasgow and Edinburgh when Thatcher died). If I was a left-wing English person, I might be opposed for that reason.

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  39. Quebecois go to Scotland in effort to glean tips on how to secede.

    Which is moronic-ironic considering Scots think a tip is a rubbish bin and Quebecois think it's the front end of a ski. I mean, two more miserly groups would be hard to find.

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  40. Derelict3:43 PM

    I think we've established that there is a market for Yeti porn. Perhaps you and Jenn can team up for a, uh, erm, uh graphic novel?

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  41. They dont have any borders eith anyone but england--who is going to stomp them? And do you think all the roads and infrastructure were built by the brits and not by locsl workers?

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  42. Spaghetti Lee3:47 PM

    Is that really Nick Clegg's signature? Looks like a pile of hamster poop.

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  43. They're referring to Freddie Mercury.

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  44. smut clyde4:09 PM




    the Scots have to be in second place

    That's so not true. I mean, my family allowed my sister to marry a Campbell.

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  45. smut clyde4:10 PM

    I cannot read that joke without hearing the words "Green hewie" in Connolly's accent.

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  46. Yet another story from the Iraq Clusterfuck that never made the papers;

    A vehicle containing recon troops in the run to Baghdad was captured by the Republican Guard. A Scotsman, an Englishman and an Australian were all brought in handcuffs to Saddam Hussein himself, who told them, “You are all prisoners of war but before we lock you up you’ll each receive fifty lashes for being imperial dogs. But I’m
    not a cruel man, so you may each chose to wear whatever you want on your back to defend against the blows.”

    The Australian is first and asks for the finest kangaroo hide to cover his back. This is granted and he receives his fifty lashes. He’s bloodied and his hide is in tatters, but he survives the flogging.

    Next up is the Englishman who says in his most haughty manner, "I will take it as it comes as an Englishman never asks for quarter.” His wish is granted and he receives his lashings, leaving his back a mangled, bloody horror with bits of backbone poking through the mess. He doesn’t look to make it.

    The Scots is the final victim and is asked what he chooses to put on his back to mitigate the punishment. Without a moment’s hesitation the Scotsman says, I’ll have the Englishman.”

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  47. TGuerrant4:41 PM

    Well I'm not waiting tables for either lot then. They probably don't know how to use ketchup properly anyway.

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  48. montag24:42 PM

    Mmm. Steak on the grille.

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  49. Spaghetti Lee4:43 PM

    An American, and Indian, and a Scotsman are all having dinner together at a fancy restaurant. They all decide to order salmon. The maitre'd tells them "I apologize, but there's a shortage of salmon at the moment. If you like, we'll substitute in steak instead, and if you do not wish to tip after this error, I understand."

    The American goes red-faced and yells "Shortage!?" The Indian, equally angry, yells "Steak?!" The Scotsman is the angriest of all, grabbing the maitre'd by the lapels and going "Tip?!"

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  50. TGuerrant4:44 PM

    Oh, yuck it up. But you KNOW South Carolina is now going to want to do this, too - and they aren't going to be letting us vote even though just the prospect of cutting off Sen. Jowl Wobble's federal salary would guarantee a win.

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  51. Hey, wait 'til I move back up north, willya?

    I don't want to be trapped down here!

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  52. M. Krebs4:47 PM

    No we don't.

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  53. montag24:48 PM

    Secession Central is welcome to try again. We won't need a civil war. We can just stand on their border and laugh at them.

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  54. tigrismus4:49 PM

    a vote in favor of Scottish independence would hurt Americans

    Well gorsh, I hope he got this article to them in time so they'd know.

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  55. Warren_Terra4:51 PM

    The thing that really gets me about these promises from the heads of the three major UK parties, contingent of course on the Scots propping up the existing government, is that I can remember 2010.

    In 2010, in order to form a government, the Conservatives needed the Liberal Democrats to enter a coalition. So: they promised the Lib Dems various things to secure their support. And, since coming to power, they have utterly betrayed everything the Lib Dems ever claimed to stand for, with the result that the Lib Dems are despised across the UK for their pusillanimity and for their betrayals (tuition fees most prominently, but also the Conservatives' undermining of the Lib Dems' hopes for electoral reform). The result has of course helped Cameron, but it's been an unmitigated disaster for those to whom he made promises.

    And now, just four years later, we've got a close parallel: various goodies are being promised to Scotland if they'll just vote as needed to keep Cameron at Number Ten. All the Scots have to do is ignore recent history. And it's hilarious that the Lib Dem leader is alongside Cameron for this offer - surely he knows that history better than anyone!

    For whatever it's worth as a distant foreigner far from the people whose lives will be intimately affected I happen to support a continued and reformed UK, because whatever it means for Scotland I think England would be greatly the worse without them (and once it loses Wales too the world will be stuck with a permanently Wingnut rump UK). But the best argument for Independence has always been the wankers running the UK, and this last appeal shows that more than clearly.

    PS have I mentioned lately how much I loathe and despise Disqus?

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  56. montag24:51 PM

    Always an exception proving the rule.

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  57. David Derbes4:51 PM

    I lived in Scotland 1975-79. I had good friends (and one roommate) deeply involved with the Scottish Nationalist Party. I don't know if this vote will win Scotland its independence, but this I am sure of: It's inevitable. If it doesn't happen this time, Cameron et al. will renege on their promises, and those who voted No will be very regretful. The next time around, Yes will carry in a landslide. This isn't going away.

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  58. Derelict4:52 PM

    I got it with an '06!

    "Winchester?"

    No, Buick.

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  59. If it's not a Scottish Yes! vote, it's crap!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=seN7AKSwMFU
    ~

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  60. Senator Who?
    http://youtu.be/oY6GsCw7LFg

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  61. TGuerrant4:58 PM

    Just slide into the slip stream of the convoys rolling away from Beaufort, Parris Island, Fort Jackson, Shaw, and Joint Base Charleston…

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  62. M. Krebs4:59 PM

    Regardless of the outcome of all of this, being reminded of the Proclaimers has already made it all worthwhile.

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  63. satch5:00 PM

    Y'know... I tried to make the point that we should have let the confederate states go when they wanted to and leave them to the mosquitoes and the snakes, and got roundly pilloried for it. NOW will you listen?

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  64. TGuerrant5:01 PM

    And I waited through that whole thing for Peter Capaldi. Jah Wobble!

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  65. TGuerrant5:02 PM

    Yes.

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  66. Och, 'oo gives a shite?

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  67. M. Krebs5:03 PM

    This. You'd think that, after seeing what a clusterfuck the euro has turned out to be, they wouldn't even think of independence without their own currency.

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  68. satch5:03 PM

    Shorter David Frum:

    "Whatever happens in the rest of the world, it's really all about US."

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  69. M. Krebs5:07 PM

    Danny Boyle should have retired after that one.

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  70. tigrismus5:07 PM

    Bones and mud can be added to just about any fish.

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  71. Nah, first I time I encountered it was in some underground comic (Maybe Gilbert Shelton?) X yrs. ago. No Scotsman, just a wino.

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  72. edroso5:10 PM

    In the same mode, but with different national stereotypes, an old version: A global poll begins with this question: "Excuse me, may I ask your opinion about the shortage of meat?" To which all the Americans respond, "what's a shortage?" -- all the Russians respond, "what's an opinion?" -- all the North Koreans respond, "what's meat?" -- and all the Israelis respond, "what's 'excuse me'?"

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  73. It is, however, difficult to get the phony whisker dealies to stay on.


    P.S.: That ain't "mud."

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  74. montag25:11 PM

    "... Brockington does make the good point if Scotland leaves it will make the
    rest of the UK totally nuts politically (or as Socialist Cubone puts
    it, 'UKIP with nukes')."

    This might well be true, but it's still an argument directed at Scotland to do what's in England's best interest, which seems to be the backdrop to every argument Cameron, et al, have been making, let alone every British imperialist for the last four hundred years.

    While their situations are not precisely analogous, I doubt seriously that either American Indians or blacks in this country believed this "you don't know how good you have it" routine when they were presented with it any more than the Scots do.

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  75. tigrismus5:11 PM

    When they weep bitter tears and wipe their eyes with their kilts you will. Oh yes.

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  76. satch5:11 PM

    I will hear NO MORE of this calumny!

    www.dailymail.co.uk/.../Scots-revealed-generous-people-North-...Daily Mail

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  77. Spaghetti Lee5:14 PM

    I've also heard my version done with a Texan, a Californian, and a New Yorker/New Jerseyan. And of course any booze joke can be retrofitted to the Irish, the Russians, the Germans...

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  78. “What spoilt, selfish, childlike fools those Scots are ... They simply don’t have a clue how lucky they are,” sneered Melanie Reid in the Times.

    If FAUX ever needs a London correspondent, I know who to recommend to them.

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  79. montag25:21 PM

    And there's a very good reason for the tune being a funeral dirge.

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  80. Glock H. Palin, Esq.5:22 PM

    We could always buy it from somewhere with better regulations and product safety standards. Like, oh, anywhere.

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  81. Glock H. Palin, Esq.5:27 PM

    "If Scotland and I go down the tubes, we go down together!"

    Well, there's always a market for that.

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  82. AlanInSF5:29 PM

    Wait a minute! Are you saying the Lib-Dems ever stood for something?

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  83. AlanInSF5:32 PM

    Brockington is laying out all the reasons why independence will be a huge challenge, not arguing against it. He also makes the point that England will have a very difficult time delivering on its promises of increased devolution.

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  84. AlanInSF5:34 PM

    If the Proclaimers are for it, does anyone else's opinion even matter? Do they even need to hold a vote?

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  85. halfkidding5:36 PM

    If London was Kiev and Scotland eastern Ukraine no vote would be recognized and bombs, mortars and shells would be reigning down on Glasgow. Well no need for that as there is no possible close vote that won't go the way that power wants it to go. Don't bother with suspense about the outcome. No is a done deal.

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  86. AlanInSF5:36 PM

    No true Scotsman would have allowed it.

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  87. montag25:40 PM

    I'm surprised it took this long for someone to plug that into this particular thread.

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  88. AlanInSF5:42 PM

    Kindred souls at last! We are three...surely there must be more of us out there. #PleaseJustGo

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  89. Then UKIP spokesman Christopher Monckton said that the intention of a proposed United Nations climate treaty was to "impose a communist world government",[131]
    and stated that UKIP was the only option for those who disbelieve in
    climate change as "all the major parties have decided to sign up to the
    eco-fascist agenda".[130]


    Sounds familiar somehow.

    so I heerd u lik UKIPs...

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  90. montag25:49 PM

    So true. I'm sure that Frum is weighing the horrible consequences of us losing a few air bases near the Arctic Circle and those lost opportunities to more efficiently bomb the Soviet Union Russia.

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  91. Spaghetti Lee5:50 PM

    Can't trust Greenland, man. Any day now, those walrus-eaters will be after our womenfolk.

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  92. Spaghetti Lee5:50 PM

    Are they basically a bunch of British Thomas Friedmans or something?

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  93. montag25:52 PM

    British or no, multiple Thomas Friedmans is a terrifying thing to contemplate.

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  94. smut clyde5:52 PM

    Yeah, I am not really convinced that it's the responsibility of the Scots to stay in the union just to occasionally rescue the Brits from their own masochistic voting patterns.

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  95. smut clyde5:53 PM

    bombs, mortars and shells would be reigning down on Glasgow.


    Why waste the ordinance?

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  96. Derelict5:58 PM

    That's all SC needs is this Marine training base. And this army base. That's all SC needs.
    And this joint operations base. This Marine training base, this army base, and this joint operations base is all SC needs. And this logistics terminal. That's all SC needs. It does need you!
    And this Navy base. The Marine training base, the army base, the joint operations base, the logistics terminal, the Navy base. And the federal highway funds, and that's all that SC needs.

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  97. Och, looks a wee bit rough ootside. Better get me mac.

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  98. montag26:00 PM

    Fundamentalist Greenlanders.

    Now, there's a concept.

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  99. What would Huckleberry Graham do if he couldn't go on TV every few days and screech about foreign policy, i.e. who we need to bomb and haven't yet?

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  100. Derelict6:02 PM

    have I mentioned lately how much I loathe and despise Disqus?

    Disqus ain't good, but it's a damn sight (site?) better that FYWP.

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  101. montag26:02 PM

    Maybe he's a pointillist, and you have to stand far, far back to see the whole thing. Or, maybe it's his way of telling me people to go away.

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  102. Derelict6:04 PM

    who is going to stomp them?

    And, more importantly, will it be on pay-per-view?

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  103. montag26:05 PM

    Oh, I'm sure SC has a long list of targets it would like to bomb, except that they're all local.

    Wouldn't stop ol' Huck, though. As far as he's concerned, any bombing will do.

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  104. montag26:07 PM

    Wouldn't BMW be shocked to wake up and find that they're still manufacturing cars for the U.S. market in a foreign country?

    And Boeing had to pay import duty on their fuselages.

    Most amusing.

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  105. Derelict6:09 PM

    Oh, he'd still be on TV every few days screeching about foreign policy. Only now it would be appearances on cable local access channel 146, and he'd be yelling about the dangers of all those incursionists coming down I-95 to force everyone to drink lattes.

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  106. Derelict6:11 PM

    BMW exec: "And we took a pass on building this plant in Alabama!?!?!?"

    Boeing exec: "Miss Phips? Get Senator Shitstain on the phone, and warm up the bribe-mobile!"

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  107. montag26:16 PM

    "Senator Shitstain? Which one? There are thirty-nine of them."

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  108. whetstone6:26 PM

    I know less than Roy about this, but I was wondering that: how much of it boils down to David Cameron being a dick? I really don't follow British politics, but when I notice it it's because austerity policies screwed someone and David Cameron was being a dick about it.


    Irvine Welsh was interviewed on NPR a couple days ago, and he ended it by calling the British political leaders "toffs," which also seemed like an indicator.

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  109. whetstone6:27 PM

    Also Stuart Murdoch of Belle & Sebastian. Sold.

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  110. cleter6:32 PM

    Raining. Raining down. You only use the word "reign" if the subject of your sentence is a monarch of some sort.


    Sorry. Pet peeve.

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  111. cleter6:35 PM

    Actually, there is a Boeing plant in Alabama.

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  112. montag26:38 PM

    They must be in charge of engineering in the defects produced at the plant in SC.

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  113. Socialist Cubone6:40 PM

    I should specify that my point was that the consequences of a wing nutty England will probably extend far beyond its borders.

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  114. montag27:13 PM

    Understood. But, equally, is that good reason to sign up with them in their suicide pact? And the wingnut flavor has been around a lot longer in Britain than just since 2010.

    Certainly, a truly right-wing government would have some effect here (an ever more incestuous "special relationship" appeals to some), but I doubt it would have big doings in Europe. The only people in Europe who still hear echoes of "Britannia Rules the Waves" are Britons.

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  115. Mr. Wonderful7:15 PM

    Jeez, I just remembered a Baltimore dairy's jingle of the early 1960s: "If you don't own a cow/Call Cloverland now/It's North 9-2222."

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  116. Cloverland Dairy - milk from contented giant monsters

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  117. M. Krebs7:28 PM

    Actually, I also need to know what Liz Fraser and Robin Guthrie have to say.

    http://youtu.be/alQUyaybZgo

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  118. who is going to stomp them?I suspect bekabot meant "economically." You know, the way Greece and Ireland have. The SNP's current plans for Scotland's currency are to stay on the pound until they can oin the EU, so that their monetary policy can be run by German neoliberal austerians instead of English neoliberal austerians. Also, corporate tax cuts.

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  119. LittlePig7:35 PM

    There're worse ways to go than death by Lagavulin.

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  120. M. Krebs7:38 PM

    Also, "the worst people on earth are against it" is not the same as "the people against it are the worst on earth."

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  121. LittlePig7:39 PM

    Never been anywhere near Baltimore, but that's a great jingle. I miss those innocent days, when a local chain called the Mad Butcher would proudly proclaim 'You can't beat the Mad Butcher's meat!".

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  122. M. Krebs7:43 PM

    What Alabama is paying for with those tax incentives -- although they don't know it -- is not jobs, but a modicum of gene pool diversification.

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  123. Scottish author Ken MacLeod, old lefty internationalist that he is, is a No, and thinks that some of his peers on the left are indulging in a bushel of wishful thinking.



    Paul Krugman is a "Scotland, WTF?!?," because he's been beating the drum for years about how awful the euro has been from a Keynesian point of view.



    Oh, also, a joke:


    Q: What do you call a country joining the race to the bottom for who can cut their corporate taxes for the most, and which has no control over its own monetary policy?


    A: A social democratic utopia.

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  124. M. Krebs7:53 PM

    Fuck js-kit!


    That seems so weird now.

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  125. LittlePig7:53 PM

    so I heerd u lik UKIPs...

    The 4chan is strong with this one...

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  126. LittlePig7:54 PM

    Still beats the hell out of 'O, Canada'

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  127. M. Krebs7:59 PM

    Jeez, these Scots are fookin' slow at countin' votes. I guess they're too stingy to buy our fancy electric voting machines.

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  128. FlipYrWhig8:01 PM

    "The Scot who couldn't control his currency" has to be either a setup or a punchline.

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  129. Spaghetti Lee8:13 PM

    ...Amongst the things SC needs are such diverse elements as...

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  130. Spaghetti Lee8:18 PM

    "You know. The old guy who cheated on his wife and still ran on a family values platform. No, the other one. No the other other one."

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  131. Scottish author Ken MacLeod, old lefty internationalist that he is, is a No

    Well, HIS opinion, I respect.

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  132. Diebold - We count the votes BEFORE they're cast!

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  133. Derelict9:05 PM

    Maybe buy 'em off with some muk-tuk?

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  134. Derelict9:05 PM

    And yet it was so common back then!

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  135. Derelict9:13 PM

    I'll just leave this here:

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  136. smut clyde9:23 PM

    That which fails to kill me, usually results in a terrible headache the next day.
    Ah, Ardbeg.

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  137. SqueakyRat9:37 PM

    If you didn't know that, you must learn something new every few seconds.

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  138. halfkidding9:57 PM

    For the sheer fun of it of course. But most Brits probably don't feel like killing Scots anymore. Those days are long past but could come round again. One never can tell who the hated enemy may be in the future.

    Wasted ordinance is not an issue. We dropped 8 million tons of bombs on Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos and nobody who is anybody ever used the word waste about it.

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  139. ckc_not_kc9:57 PM

    ..plausible deniability

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  140. "You can lick our chops, but you can't beat our meat."

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  141. I can't decide if I should call Smut on "ordinance" (Cast out thine "i", it offends me.) or if he was somehow making fun of "reigns."

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  142. smut clyde10:39 PM

    That is as may be, but who will notice the difference?

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  143. I'd like to think that somewhere out there, there's an ammo dump with a sign on it that says, "God's holy ordnance."

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  144. Scotland should secede because the United Kingdom doesn't take


    the extraterrestrial threat

    seriously.How soon they all forget Prime Minister Harriet Jones.

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  145. Yes this is the argument our scots/british freind (a life peer made by the labor party) made during a public debate on the topic:stay and help fight.

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  146. bekabot11:50 PM

    I think there are ways for a bigger nation to squelch a smaller one while — officially — respecting its borders. Germany isn't fleecing Greece by invading it physically. The last time that was tried it didn't work out so well, so now the attempt is being made by means of money instead of munitions.


    One of the ways to do this is to get a small country into debt or to make sure it's obligated financially in some inescapable way (like obliging it to repay loans which were forced on it) then lower the austerity boom. (No pun intended.) That wrecks the small country's economy, of course, which opens it up to economic raids. Wreck a small economy, get the smaller country into a position where it has to sell off its assets to keep itself going, then get its people to pay you a tithe to use the stuff they used to own. Easy peasey lemon squeezey.


    (This stunt isn't limited to smaller countries; we've seen a lot of similar stuff pulled in the United States; but the US is still a big country with a big economy and mucho military power, so there's — still — a limit to the extent to which it's people can be aggressed against economically ["held economically accountable" would be the way the austerity fans would phrase it]. There's still a limit to the amount of baksheesh Americans are expected to pay to inhabit what used to be called the public sphere — so far.)


    And that's only one example; there are others.


    I don't think all the roads/infrastructure/etc. were built by Brits, especially since Scots historically have made such fantastic engineers. But we've learned during the last few years that it doesn't matter so much who built the roads (or bridges, or docks, or mines, or whatever). What matter is who owns them.

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  147. bekabot11:56 PM

    Yeah, but when I size up the competition on this board I decide leave the the jokes to the pros.

    ReplyDelete
  148. Can we please rein in the pedantry?!

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  149. DocAmazing1:32 AM

    That letter "i" just keeps jumping in and out...

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  150. BadExampleMan1:32 AM

    PJ O'Rourke once referred to Germany as "the country where the Israelis learned their manners, in more ways than one."

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  151. BadExampleMan1:36 AM

    They have lots of oil. I can already hear Dick Cheney slithering out of his hole.

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  152. DocAmazing1:48 AM

    M'm! M'm! Good!

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  153. montag23:16 AM

    Apparently, it did not happen this time. "No" gets ~ 55%. So, we now have to see if Cameron's gang renege on all their last-ditch promises in order to preserve the Island Union (the excuses will be creative, even if the policy isn't), and if there are regular assessments of British treachery, will the independence vote become an annual affair until it's successful, or will it become a ritual humiliation of the SNP?

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  154. gocart mozart4:26 AM

    https://twitter.com/finansakrobat/status/512710415164256256/photo/1

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  155. NonyNony7:41 AM

    But that means that Cameron made the right calculus - he bet that the LibDem pols were a bunch of empty suits who would sell out their grandmother for a mess o' pottage and he was right. It isn't like the LibDems did anything to push back when it became obvious that Cameron was going to screw them.

    Scotland's quite a bit different, in that the vote turned out so close and the voters aren't going to be bought off like LibDem pols were. The Scots aren't the LibDems and if Cameron reneges the separatists will use that as a reason to demand a new vote on a "see we told you the English were going to screw us" platform and try to sway that last 6% to their side.

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  156. redoubtagain8:10 AM

    Well, field artillery is known as the "king of battles". . .

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  157. I'll bet he took some shit for that.

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  158. Halloween_Jack10:37 AM

    Scotsman visiting America goes to his first baseball game. His American host is trying to explain the rules to him, which is surprisingly difficult, but eventually the Scot gets that the goal of the batter is to try to run the bases. Then the man at bat gets his fourth ball and starts walking to first. The Scot stands up and screams, "Run, man, run!"


    The American says, "No, he doesn't need to run, he got four balls."


    The Scot hesitates, then screams, "Walk with pride, man, walk with pride!"

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  159. catclub12:03 PM

    Actually, no. Vietnam and shrimp apparently means slave labor. See LGM

    Bon Apetit!

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  160. Who gets the nukes, tho?

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  161. Warren_Terra12:43 PM

    1) The Scots have limited ability to punish Cameron. They can't vote against the Tories more thoroughly than they already do (well, there is I think a single Scottish Tory MP). This referendum was couched by the SNP (let alone anyone else) as being a once-in-a-generation thing; it would be difficult to hold another in Cameron's political lifetime. Clegg by contrast could have punished Cameron, if he'd any self-respect.
    2) It's not really clear Cameron wants to keep Scotland. Sure, he doesn't want to be "the PM who lost Scotland", but in a whole bunch of ways he's better off without them, if he can avoid being blamed for the loss. He's certainly better off being yelled at by them.

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  162. I tried to make the point that we should have let the
    confederate states
    go when they wanted to and leave them to the mosquitoes and the snakes,
    and got roundly pilloried for it.If it'll make you
    feel any better, I've also pilloried all those Scottish leftists who decided
    that their working-class comrades south of the borders could just fuck
    off and die in Toryland. And all so that they could have a new nation
    built on lower corporate taxes, promotion of the banking industry, a currency
    controlled by London or Berlin, and fossil fuel extraction.

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  163. smut clyde3:43 PM

    I stole the 'i' from 'waives'.

    ReplyDelete
  164. You mean, who possesses them, or who gets them, but good?

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  165. cleter11:47 PM

    Nope. If we could post videos I would put up that clip from Star Trek: First Contact where Picard shouts "THE LINE MUST BE DRAWN HERE!" and then goes bonkers and starts wrecking his office.

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  166. The grip of lutheran fundamentalism in Greenland is well known.

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  167. billcinsd11:13 AM

    you mean like the 1950s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and 2000s? SDs congressional delegation was even or majority Democratic from 1971-2009, except for 1981-87 and has had a Democrat in its Congressional delegation since 1957 except 1961-1963

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  168. mgmonklewis2:39 PM

    True, but I was thinking more of the past 20 years or so — The Janklow/Thune/Noem-skull era. You can barely hear a peep about Rick Weiland's Senate campaign, despite the corruption scandal swirling around the former Accidental Governor, Mike Rounds. It's even worse for state-level races.

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