Gromnir

show a pictures o' churchill and dumbledore, side-by-side. school kids in uk is told to label which individual is historical and which is fictional. +30% english school kids choose dumbledore as historical. *shrug* HA! Good Fun!

and in "not funny" nfl news Antonio Brown released by New England Patriots amid NFL investigation https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/27662788/brown-pats-cut-wr-amid-field-allegations after the second recent accusation o' sexual assault, seems were too much even for the patriots. any chance the chiefs or cowboys make a grab? HA! Good Fun!

https://www.buzzfeed.com/robinedds/happy-thanksgiving-we-are-very-sorry for comparison. not claiming validity btw. HA! Good Fun!

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1577511/Winston-Churchill-didnt-really-exist-say-teens.html spent time teaching in europe and gonna suggest the claims 'bout comparative deficiency o' US education, particular University level, is in our experience... amusing. HA! Good Fun!

https://www.msnbc.com/the-last-word/watch/laurence-tribe-on-trump-s-desperate-legal-filing-and-whistleblower-69435461887 the suggestion the President can't even be investigated for a state criminal proceeding is... am actual unable to describe the disquiet am feeling. is hard to imagine history will look back with sympathy and understanding if we as a people allow this kinda executive excess to continue.

greeks were a little less fatalistic, which am sposing were result o' mediterranean climate and general abundance compared to conditions further north. "capricious" would be understatement for greeks. clash of the titans movies left out the story o' how zeus and danaë met, and for good reason. we do recommend https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37903770-norse-mythology prose and poetic edda is kinda brutal reads. @smjjames keep in mind the valkyries would pick warriors who died in battle to go to valhalla. is actual only a single line which describes method o' choosing, but die in battle gets possible valhalla, while die o' sickness or old age gets hel. odin don't care if you were greatest warrior all-time. don't care if you won wars and battles too many to count. is not a war god in traditional sense. is the death which surrounds war, is the carrion o' the battlefield which is odin's purview. admitted, is not easy to pigeonhole odin. magic and runes and wisdom and carrion and... whatever. HA! Good Fun!

that is one o' the main messages o' the book. fed being hands off with state jury trials led to more or less liberty for the folks on trial in hundreds (thousands) o' cases similar to moore v. dempsey? freedom for one man is tyranny for another. turn a blind eye to such is not increasing liberty but is in fact reducing. pretend as if there were good old days is only possible if gd ignores red summer and ocoee and wounded knee and st. landry parish and tulsa (1921) and... *shrug* as gd is no doubt aware, there weren't a mechanic for the Court to punish the guilty related to moore v. dempsey. woulda' required a much more hands-on fed. regardless, as flawed as is the Constitution, am glad the Court cannot seek out guilty for punishment. in spite o' our fondness for bill of rights, separation plus checks and balances were the real genius o' the Constitution. HA! Good Fun!

not just 'cause o' ravens. wolves and ravens were chosen symbols 'cause they were the critters which would pick over the corpses o' battlefields. odin were god o' all kinda stuff, but most especial carrion. read your prose and poetic edda. ain't like comic book odin. gaiman actual does a fair job. odin were a bad dude. HA! Good Fun!

positive side is that sometimes the Court got it right. regardless, when folks get all misty and nostalgic 'bout how much better and more free were US back in ______, we cannot help but wonder when such were the case. not 1919, that is for sure. HA! Good Fun!

always liked the following image for odin/othinn/grimnir/whatever god of carrion for President? why not? no $1000 or tax-the-rich nonsense. run on a simple platform: "i want your corpse, and no matter what you do, i am going to get it. i would prefer that you die in agony, but it doesn't matter in the end. vote republican? doesn't matter. vote democrat? doesn't matter. don't vote? doesn't matter. i only promise death, but under my administration you will have an opportunity to live and breed and suffer. give me suffering and you will prosper. give me death and you will prosper. let's make valhalla great again." HA! Good Fun!

worse case scenario for trudeau is he photoshops in a confederate flag or two behind him in those pictures and after moving to alabama or mississippi and meeting residency requirements he runs for state office. becomes representative or even senator. problem solved for trudeau... and kanada. HA! Good Fun!

hardly. were not necessarily fbi. in fact, probable weren't fbi. were a leak to nyt, likely by admin. trump admin. even so, is a reason we left off manchester at end of our post "regardless, am thinking it would be foolish to assume trump can't be involved in the leaking o' vital intelligence... seeing as how similar has happened at least a couple times previous. if we know 'bout sub location snafu and the oval office blunder, is hard to imagine those were only such intelligence missteps by trump. both involved details." if removal o' manchester as certain helps, feel free to do so. we weren't wholly convinced either, which is why we left absent in closing. absence o' manchester doesn't change fact trump personal has divulged intelligence in the past. 'course blunt folks often miss forest for trees. am thinking we had this discussion a few posts previous. clear ain't making progress. HA! Good Fun!

like we said, 2009 there were discovery o' water on moon. lunar surface as well as belief o' sub-surface water. however, the amounts o' surface water is extreme small. the crater ice which is mentioned is typical in the couple gallon range and scattered 'cross large areas. subsurface ice is still more guestimate than anything, and scheme to access and process a largely unknown source nevertheless precludes real plans. water is a real issue. HA! Good Fun! ps one reason why discovery that martian subsurface ice is a bit more widespread than previous thought were such big news is 'cause while is plenty o' ice at mars poles, poles is not where a base would be, at least initial. no doubt is a similar issue for moon. minimal lunar polar water is less helpful than one might hope. pps am avoiding double-post, so excuse late edit. regardless, arguable biggest hurdle for a moon base has been recent democrat Presidents. george w. bush (hate him if you will) committed relative big money and were pushing for a 2020 moon return. bush push for moon were in part a response to significant nasa cuts by clinton. obama kinda gutted nasa and helped set off the privatization o' space travel movement. if mccain had been elected instead o' obama, maybe you get at least see the necessary return trip which is required before any serious talk o' bases. the soviets were much ahead o' the US in the space race, until the US devoted billions o' dollars amounting 'tween 2% and 5% of total fed budget over the course o' a decade. keep in mind, soviets had all the important firsts in space. current total US defense budget relative to overall fed budget, depending on maths, is 'round 5%. getting to moon was mind blowing expensive, and arguable the most meaningful reason why we got no moon base or trips to mars and whatnot is 'cause US functional won the space race and then efforts to block soviets shifted when were clear the soviets were throwing in the towel on continuing to one-up US space efforts. perhaps make china a real threat and maybe you see spending needed to achieve bases and travel and whatnot?

"water" is a word that comes up frequent as to why we haven't seen efforts to create an enduring moon base. the moon is dry (understatement) and while there may be more water on the moon than believed previous to 2009, is still a major hurdle to overcome. plans to transport water to moon in sufficient quantities kinda ends discussion save for scifi and far-future kinda discussions. HA! Good Fun!

yeah, trump revealing intelligence details would be completely out of character. oh, wait... Exclusive: US extracted top spy from inside Russia in 2017 location o' nuke submarines off coast o' north korea shared with duterte, and details 'bout manchester bombing in 2017 is the kinda out-of-character stuff which couldn't possible happen. intelligence folks tell trump important stuff, and while he no doubt ignores most, he is also a braggart. what little sticks in his memory in spite o' his extreme short attention span is in danger o' being spewed out at any time. am suspecting is akin to celebrity name dropping? gets on the phone (or into the freaking oval office) with ________ and he needs impress on 'em how important he is. am doubting xi or putin is gonna be moved by trump sharing the names o' models he pu$$y grabbed, so he tailors to his audience? regardless, am current having no certainty 'bout the nature o' the info revealed, but by necessity, the number o' persons the whistleblower complaint could apply to is small, and the individuals who could have authority over the dni so as to prevent him from complying with the statute reporting demands is even smaller. fact dni is withholding from Congress complete (no attempt to tailor info so as to comply with statute and protect sources) is unique. and what constitutes possible intelligence which would be o' an urgent nature from ig perspective and coulda' been mishandled by somebody not under the authority o' the dni is necessarily disturbing. regardless, am thinking it would be foolish to assume trump can't be involved in the leaking o' vital intelligence... seeing as how similar has happened at least a couple times previous. if we know 'bout sub location snafu and the oval office blunder, is hard to imagine those were only such intelligence missteps by trump. both involved details. HA! Good Fun!

yeah, needs be urgent and credible. also, seeing as the director of national intelligence identified "privileged communications" as a reason for withholding info from Congress while simultaneous stating he were acting on behalf o' a "higher authority" by refusing to follow whistleblower reporting requirement law, and list o' possibilities for who is the target o' the whistleblower's concerns shrinks and becomes inherent alarming. thank goodness the ig is doing job, but willingness to do so tends to suggest the magnitude o' urgency and credibility is significant. gonna risk political suicide over marginal calls? who gots authority 'bove director and who could possible exercise privilege? subject o' the complaint can't be anybody whom dni intelligence has authority over while nevertheless relating to intelligence matters. ig wouldn't have directed dni to report to intelligence committees if weren't intelligence related. axiomatic. so who could possible set off an ig finding o' urgent and credible related to intelligence matters who is outside and above the dni authority? necessarily talking 'bout an exceeding small group o' people. have no certainty at this point 'bout nature o' the incident which caused whistleblower concern save is intelligence related, but as you observe, can't be siberian forest fires. is hardly realm o' conspiracy theory to look at venn diagram o' potential persons and possible events and be concerned. in fact, to ignore what facts is known is to be requiring a level o' willful obtuseness which is dangerous. aside: kinda ironic, but if ig hadn't found credible and urgent, the whistleblower could go direct to Congress and would be protected by statute. however, 'cause ig finds credible and urgent, the whistleblower is stuck in legal limbo. is dni job to report findings, but acting dni won't. unknown territory as the notion o' the dni not reporting at all after ig finds urgent and credible no doubt never occured to authors o' statute as being a possibility. HA! Good Fun!

mentioned earlier that a whistleblower situation were getting far less attention than it deserved. folks is starting to take notice. Trump’s communications with foreign leader are part of whistleblower complaint that spurred standoff between spy chief and Congress, former officials say is similar front headline stories at cnn, msnbc, wall street journal and everywhere o' note... save fox. at fox the headlines is 'bout a homeless man biting a shopkeeper, comey done-bad, grizzly bear attack, and a restaurant in baltimore being targeted for its "racist" dress code which prohibits baggy attire. couple other stories. HA! Good Fun!

only listened to a minute 'fore losing interest. kept saying state school. somewhere later in the video is name o' the school provided? state school would necessarily preclude catholic here in the states. as an aside, we had a professor ask a similar question in a lower division psych class at Cal. am doubting our experience were unique given how a few o' the big names in sex has suggested variations on the theme that the only unnatural sex act is not having sex. challenge such a position by using a widely is known and universal despised proclivity doesn't surprise us. regardless, if somebody thinks the question is new or representative o' some kinda cultural shift, then we will disabuse; advantage o' being old. can say with certainty that the pedophillia as an orientation as 'posed to disease were a topic o' discussion in university (state university) fumbduck psych classes as far back as the late 80s. HA! Good Fun!

we wouldn't be bothered by a film which draws heavily 'pon Princess Bride, but is not a remake. release a film in 2020 or beyond which clear is homage to princess bride is fine, 'cause am understanding how as much as we love the film, is not fitting with many current notions o' gender and class roles. we got nothing 'gainst making a movie where a buttercup (not named buttercup 'course... buttercup is the name a pre-teen girl gives their horse in a book circa 1950) needs save her westley and she is perhaps deaf or dyslexic or something. large % o' movie has folks insisting not-buttercup will fail 'cause she is a girl (even after they see her do stuff which would require superhuman ability) but not-buttercup ignores 'em all and ends up saving the day and kissing the girl. have knockoff version include characters which is obvious homage to the goldman book/movie? didn't mind sir alec guinness playing merlin in star wars. homage is fine. need more characters o' color and a few more female characters would be welcome. am not certain how to do a homage to carol kane w/o having carol kane, but we leave that aside. if somebody wants to do a film for 2020s that millennial moms will be proud to show their daughters and will recall the whimsy o' princess bride, then sign us up as a supporter. we can be as grimdark as the next guy, but we adored the princess bride book and movie. somebody manages to do movie with similar fun and equal dialogue, then am 100% in favor. if is simply a remake with a few minor changes to make acceptable to 2020 audience, then am adamant opposed. do something new or don't do at all, 'cause original don't need the inevitable "improvements" it would receive. HA! Good Fun!

again, missing the point. lack o' real investigations means we never know truth. keyser and ford could both be telling truth as they recall, but w/o investigation we are stuck with competing recollections o' decades old events. could both be lying? sure. you bring up such stuff is MORE reason for investigation and not less. duh. *zoom* not surprised point is missed. keyser threats, 'ccording to keyser family, were rather vague and amorphous. "behind-the-scene" "pressure." your assumptions 'bout the nature o' threats and political power leveraged is based on what? conspiracy talk show hosts? conjecture? not being dismissive o' threats, cause such stuff shoulda' been INVESTIGATED. no doubt the threats were, at the least, troubling. 'course you can't possible count monica mclean as a person with political power, or is that something you read at breitbart? a friend o' ford and keyser who vague pressured keyser, which mclean denies (so who is lying?) is maybe not gonna be convincing as the kinda pressure you suggest. more than a few o' the threats to kavanaugh witnesses were quite personal and not just phone calls or radio shows or Congressmen making thin-veiled threats 'bout witnesses who were not truthful. etc. violence and death threats. and again with the leftist bit. undermines your concerns. conflicting recollections in a decades old situation is common. if everybody had exact same story and all details lined up same, then Gromnir would be concerned 'bout lying. ford, btw, passed a polygraph. her psychology background somehow makes her an expert on beating polygraphs? *chuckle* not like tv or movies, polygraphs is a very good device for testing honesty, just not so good for testing truth. reason somebody fails can be myriad and may not be 'cause o' deceit 'bout specific questioned event. similar, a person may be telling truth but still be wrong. regardless, ford passing a polygraph is objective and is a more reliable test o' ford's honesty than is gonna be any source blunt folks attempt to imagine. but an ex-boyfriend o' ford's s'posed heard her coaching somebody regarding how to pass a polygraph... *groan* all the more reason to do real investigations. every conspiracy-fueled bit o' nonsense you raise, intermixed with a few real facts, does no more than fuel the argument that a real investigation were warranted, but you don't see it... can't see it. HA! Good Fun! ps @Malcador am suspecting much o' the executive branch feels like they is being held hostage, so perhaps is an ideal selection.

blunt instrument as usual. but yeah, book does treat fair. ford testimony weren't necessarily false 'cause keyser don't recall, but is true keyser don't recall as does ford and keyser did get threats. 'course ford and ramirez and folks even suspected o' possible testifying 'bout kavanaugh got threats. if is blackmail and threats which somehow prove truth o' a statement, then kavanaugh is surely damned by such. would be unfair to make such a silly assumption, no? there were folks on left and on right who weren't particular interested in truth. some such persons seem to be active today. again, fbi believed ramirez to be credible, but her claims were dismissed w/o any real investigation. had a list o' 25 people willing to corroborate ramirez story and fbi spoke to none of them? investigation o' claims should not have been left up to reporters after the fact. Justice is lifetime appointment and is not elected. as such, as uncomfortable as a real investigation woulda' been, am not seeing a valid excuse for being dismissive o' otherwise initial credible complaints. unfortunate, folks will, just as with the hearings, take away from book whatever they want to w/o recognizing the real fail. perhaps after real investigation, there still wouldn't be certainty as to whose recollections were true. then again, perhaps, unlike mueller report, investigation exonerates accused. won't know now 'cause no investigation happened. did kavanaugh deserve to have name dragged through mud if the accusations were false? don't care. again, this is Justice to the Supreme Court of the United States. not elected. lifetime. can sympathize with kavanaugh if he were false accused, but given the nature o' the office o' Justice, due diligence were required to make certain kavanaugh were competent, qualified and worthy o' the office. didn't happen 'cause some blunt folks didn't care 'bout truth. and yeah, such obtuse folks who had already made up mind and were only looking for evidence to support their conclusions rather than being interested in truth were gonna be found attacking kavanaugh as well as supporting. bad leftists doesn't make accusations less true and it sure doesn't mean investigation were unnecessary. missing point as usual. HA! Good Fun! ps has been noted many times by us how left and right don't have much value insofar as Justices is concerned. what is political left and right only has ill-fit overlap with what folks think o' as liberal and conservative for Court. am personal not concerned with left and right silliness insofar as Court is concerned. competence and character is what matters. we supported Gorsuch we woulda' supported merrick. Scalia actual recommended Ginsburg for the Court and he were ecstatic, as were Gromnir, by appointment o' Kagan. am offended by kavanaugh presence on the Court and has nothing to do with left or right for us. can blunt say same?

well, yes, thank goodness. The Press (*eye-roll*) caught the mistake by nyt and the opinion piece 'bout a book release were corrected in less than 24 hours. if not for other press outlets checking nyt sources, the misleading information woulda' stayed unchanged for one may only guess how long. so yeah, nyt opinion piece makes an omission o' highly relevant info regarding a book 'bout kavanaugh. the book itself is hundreds o' pages long and details just how sloppy were the investigation o' numerous claims regarding J. Kavanaugh's behaviours. the event which is toughstone for the current media hurricane is addressed complete and brief in less than a full page o' the book in question. however, thanks to the slipshod editorial actions at the nyt, folks won't be talking 'bout how the fbi were seeming falling all over themselves trying to not investigate. instead, we got the short-attention span folks who is now gonna dismiss entire book 'cause nyt editor in an opinion piece were an arse jack. oh, and again, the misinformation were corrected in less than 24 hours. compare https://www.cnn.com/2019/09/17/politics/fact-check-trump-makes-at-least-26-false-claims-at-new-mexico-rally/index.html how many wh corrections so far? so yeah, thank god for press. the press caught nyt blunder and they has been mercilessly going after the times and their recent series o' opinion piece blunders. weren't some kinda backpage retraction nobody ever hears 'bout. the retraction has been at least as big a story as were the original opinion piece fallout. sad part is the book findings is gonna be largely dismissed 'cause o' the fail o' a single deputy editor. once again, the enemy of the people and fake news is gonna be the real story for the fox news crowd. mistake by the editor were the best thing that coulda' happened for kavanaugh 'cause now folks got what they believe is a legit reason to ignore the findings o' a book they didn't wanna read and woulda' need work hard to pretend didn't exist. HA! Good Fun!

read our ps 'cause am sensing point got lost. Court do not equate free speech with money, literal or effective or figurative. the Court is dismissive o' money. money is incidental and only has import when it touches 'pon some other fundamental right. can't cherry pick decisions as you read 'em w/o understanding the reasoning behind those decisions. can read "Congress shall make no law..." in 2019 so that there is an exception for super pacs? 'course super pacs didn't exist in madison's time, but neither did airports or smartphones. is an intellectual dead end to ask what were the realities in 1787 or 1866. thankfully, the Court don't do that. regardless, the text o' the first Amendment, read in 1787, 1866 or 2019 is broad, unequivocal and offers little in the way o' exception. change the meaning o' the Constitution everytime culture or technology changes would make the Constitution meaningless as a document o' guiding principles and enduring law. HA! Good Fun! ps 1866 is a relevant date 'cause is arguable the first amendment only applied to the Fed until the reconstruction amendments were written/adopted. 'course we haven't had much luck explaining incorporation in the past, so is probable best left for another post or thread.

if any arguable authority figure does something vol don't like, is getting the nazi label. nazi is vol's board kink. HA! Good Fun!

this is complete wrong, but the misunderstanding is easy to arrive at given cases such as citizens united. commercial speech gets a lower standard o' review than ordinary speech. furthermore, the Court has always taken a rather jaundiced view o' money when is time for the government to explain how their response to speech limits is appropriate-- cost, even exorbitant amounts, don't sway the Court. that said, political speech is the one kinda expression where the Court has defended speaker rights perhaps to the point o' functional violating voting rights. the Court doesn't care 'bout money, to the point they is often willful dismissive o' the import o' money, when fundamental rights is at issue. if a union wants to spend their money supporting a candidate by buying tv commercials or print ads, so be it. from a Constitutional perspective, how is different if one guy advocates with his money as 'posed to a union? 'course we got pacs and super pacs and lobbyists and... elizabeth warren, for all our recent criticism, has advocated a Constitutional Amendment which would put limits on political spending, and we agree such is desirable. the bipartisan campaign reform act o 2002 were needed in 2002 'cause spending were getting outta control and 'cause o' the disproportionate influence o' various sources o' media has on the political process, media which is most immediate accessible through money. such a law is even more necessary in 2019. unfortunate, the text o' the Constitution is unambiguous and is hard to argue the Court is churning out bad decisions in support o' political speech. am avoiding addressing minutiae related to polling place or day-o'-election restrictions on political speech as it unnecessarily confuses the topic. nevertheless am mentioning 'cause the Court does restrain even political speech in limited situations. however, is never 'bout money from Court pov, which is kinda an antiquated and borderline obtuse perspective given realities o' today. regardless, number's observation is either wrong or a gross oversimplification, which makes it wrong in either event. HA! Good Fun! ps we reread and am realizing main point may have gotten lost. Court doesn't equate money and free speech. commercial speech exception is only possible 'cause Court is so dismissive o' money. the Justices, as improbable as it may seem to most folks, do not see money as a particular important factor in Constitutional jurisprudence. money is only consequential when it affects other fundamental rights.