Aux Armes, Grognards, Aux Armes!!!

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday September 29, 2010 · 1:43 PM PDT

2010/09/29 · 13:43

My French isn’t all that great, but the title means "To Arms, Grumblers, To Arms!!!" Grumblers??? Yes, grumblers. Grognards is the nickname cum official term for Napoleon’s Old Guard. These were the guys who marched through Italy and the Germanies (there were a lot of them in those days, not just one), into Russia and back. All the way, they bitched and they moaned about rations, equipment, and living conditions. And if you know anything about history, you know that Napoleon relied on them when the battle hung in the balance. They were the most loyal and fiercest troops he had. In all those years, they only broke once, at Waterloo. Below the fold, I’ll try to prove how this is relevant.

Poll

24 votes Show Results

For the next five weeks, I will

24 votes Vote Now!

For the next five weeks, I will

Smile as I campaign for Democrats

8 votes

Grumble as I campaign for Democrats

3 votes

Sit on my hands and let the GOP win

9 votes

Get an early start on my holiday grumbling

3 votes

Get ready to eat Grumble Pie

1 vote

BREAKING: DADT Filibuster Holds

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday September 21, 2010 · 12:19 PM PDT

2010/09/21 · 12:19

Well, folks, DADT lives to oppress another day. The vote to break the filibuster failed to get the 60 votes needed. MSNBC reports "Two Arkansas Democrats, Sens. Mark Pryor and Blanche Lincoln, voted with Republicans to block the measure, which was attached to a military spending bill.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., also voted 'no' for procedural reasons. The final vote was 56-43."

Reid voted "no" so that later he can ask the chamber to reconsider. Still, Pryor and Lincoln failed us.

This probably doesn't count as a diary, but dammit, if you want to fight and die for my right to sit here and bitch, sleep with whomever you want.

And We’re Running out of Helium

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday August 24, 2010 · 1:10 PM PDT

2010/08/24 · 13:10

It’s one of those days where I am completely disgusted by the inability of America to walk and chew gum at the same time. People are annoyed that a mosque might be built a block from New York Dolls (a topless bar) when we haven’t built anything three blocks down where the WTC used to be in almost 9 years. The left can’t appreciate the most progressive president in a generation, whose staff in turn can’t appreciate that when you have the votes you run up the score. We have people complaining that getting criticized for racial epithets on the radio is denying them freedom of speech. And we’re running out of helium.

Poll

165 votes Show Results

What do you use helium for?

165 votes Vote Now!

What do you use helium for?

Deep-Sea Diving

4 votes

Making Fibre Optics

5 votes

Cleaning Out My Rocket (which sounds really rude)

10 votes

Funny Voices

37 votes

Children's Balloons

17 votes

Cooling MRI Magnets

20 votes

Nothing, it's a by-product of my basement fusion reactor

48 votes

Making the World's Lightest Pie

24 votes

The Parable of the Two Brothers

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday July 27, 2010 · 1:21 PM PDT

2010/07/27 · 13:21

With apologies to Jesus of Nazareth (who deserves better followers than he seems to have attracted over the years), I offer a parable. Once, there were two brothers who were fishermen. They worked together on a modest boat, and their catches were adequate to support themselves. As they grew older, they acquired wives and children and homes for them. Yet, their catches didn’t grow as quickly as their financial obligations.

So, they went to the moneylenders and borrowed to keep up with their responsibilities. Yet, every time they borrowed, more and more financial demands arose. Houses needed to grow as their children did, dowries were needed to marry them off. But the moneylenders never told them "no" because they always made their payments – even if they had to borrow from one to pay the other and even if some of the money was spent foolishly.

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday July 01, 2010 · 11:41 AM PDT

2010/07/01 · 11:41

I realize that not everybody took Econ 101. And most of the people on the right who did, forgot everything in the Samuelson text. But here’s the deal; there are five (count ‘em – five) factors that you use to calculate Gross Domestic Product (for those of you over the age of 35, this is more or less what we were taught was Gross National Product). There are just five factors in determining whether we are starving or rolling in dough.

Poll

73 votes Show Results

The government needs to spend

73 votes Vote Now!

The government needs to spend

21 votes

1 vote

8 votes

9 votes

13 votes

Pie

21 votes

BREAKING -- BP Will Suspend Dividend Says BBC

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday June 11, 2010 · 11:11 AM PDT

2010/06/11 · 11:11

I took a break from World Cup Soccer (Bafana Bafana!) long enough to run across a BBC report that the dividend payment BP is due to make to its shareholders around June 26 is going to be suspended. On Monday, the board of BP will meet to formalize this. And the Beeb is saying that US government pressure brought this about.

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday May 27, 2010 · 12:29 PM PDT

2010/05/27 · 12:29

The first duty of any sovereign political entity is the protection of its citizens from external attack. To articulate how it does that, the US government produces every so often a "National Security Strategy" document. In 2006, the Bush administration announced in its NSS that the war against "radical militant Islam" was the single defining factor in US security policy. The NSS released this afternoon defines that war much more narrowly and places it in a context of a less Manichean world. In short, the grown-ups who know something about the world are back in charge.

Cross posted at The Kensington Review.

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday May 25, 2010 · 6:33 AM PDT

2010/05/25 · 06:33

I guess my green credentials are pretty second rate. Don’t get me wrong; I care about the petrocano erupting at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. I feel for the boat captains and crews who are facing bankruptcy through no fault of their own. I am upset that brown pelicans that just got off the endangered species list are covered in crude oil. Tar balls on beaches suck. Forgive me, though, for saying that that’s all pretty secondary to the fact that 11 men are dead, and no one is even talking about homicide.

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday May 21, 2010 · 12:42 PM PDT

2010/05/21 · 12:42

When I started this series, I had hoped to use the British general election to extract some lessons for us radical, progressive Americans. Different electoral systems and all that notwithstanding, I was convinced that a watershed election in one nation could provide valuable insight into another country’s vote. The fact is that there really isn’t as much to learn as I had hoped. There are some lessons, but by and large, my ambition here hasn’t panned out. I consider it a failure despite some of the kind words and comments those of you have sent about understanding the British system -- it's a failure because the premise was wrong, not because we (I) did anything to undermine it.

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday May 12, 2010 · 11:01 AM PDT

2010/05/12 · 11:01

It’s been quite a week in British politics. Last Wednesday, we were all wondering if the Labour Party would have enough popular votes to finish second and whether the Tories would scrape by to secure a majority in the House of Commons. Yesterday, the politicians there settled the matter while the TV showed a close-up of the teal colored door of 70 Whitehall, the Cabinet Office. The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats have formed the first peace-time coalition government since the 1920s, Gordon Brown has taken his leave of Number 10 Downing Street, and Tory leader David Cameron has become the youngest Prime Minister since Lord Liverpool in 1812. At the core is the Liberal Democrats’ deal with Mr. Cameron’s people. That falls into two sections: who got what job, and what policies will they collectively pursue?

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday May 11, 2010 · 11:21 AM PDT

2010/05/11 · 11:21

Gordon Brown has just said he's resigning as Prime Minister. David Cameron will be PM after a quick visit to the Palace to see the Queen. After several days’ of negotiating, the deal is done. The Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats will enter into a coalition government in Britain. While many LibDems are breaking out in hives over the prospect of getting into bed with the Tories, the truth is that the Conservatives’ offer isn’t a bad one, and there never was a realistic alternative based on the number of MPs each party won on Thursday.

Vinlander

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday May 07, 2010 · 12:44 PM PDT

2010/05/07 · 12:44

Just before 5 pm British Summer Time today, the last seat to be decided in the General Election was announced. The Conservatives held West Devon and Torridge, giving them 306 seats. Labour has 258, the Liberal Democrats 57, Democratic Unionists (a protestant bloc in Northern Ireland) won 8, the Scottish National Party 6, Sinn Fein (Irish republicans) 5, Plaid Cymru (Welsh Nationalists) 3, Social Democratic & Labour Party (Irish Catholics) 3, Greens 1, Alliance (anti-sectarian Northern Irish) 1, and House of Commons Speaker (technically neutral) 1. Owing to the death of a UKIP candidate on the ballot, voting for the seat for Thirsk and Malton will happen in 3 weeks. In short, everyone lost except the Greens, who have their first ever British MP.

Newer
Older

RSS

Aux Armes, Grognards, Aux Armes!!!

BREAKING: DADT Filibuster Holds

And We’re Running out of Helium

The Parable of the Two Brothers

What Part of C + I + G + X − M = Y Don’t You Get?!?!?

BREAKING -- BP Will Suspend Dividend Says BBC

America's New "National Security Strategy" Breaks with Past

Somebody Got Murdered

Brit Vote 2010 – Lessons Learned

Brit Vote 2010 – Behind the Teal Door

BREAKING: BROWN QUITS, CAMERON TO BE PM

Brit Vote 2010 – Everyone Lost, Except the Greens