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The Off Topic Topic

Started by Korea, March 10, 2009, 06:24:26 AM

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Habbaku

The medievals were only too right in taking nolo episcopari as the best reason a man could give to others for making him a bishop. Give me a king whose chief interest in life is stamps, railways, or race-horses; and who has the power to sack his Vizier (or whatever you care to call him) if he does not like the cut of his trousers.

Government is an abstract noun meaning the art and process of governing and it should be an offence to write it with a capital G or so as to refer to people.

-J. R. R. Tolkien

Razgovory

I've given it serious thought. I must scorn the ways of my family, and seek a Japanese woman to yield me my progeny. He shall live in the lands of the east, and be well tutored in his sacred trust to weave the best traditions of Japan and the Sacred South together, until such time as he (or, indeed his house, which will periodically require infusion of both Southern and Japanese bloodlines of note) can deliver to the South it's independence, either in this world or in space.  -Lettow April of 2011

Raz is right. -MadImmortalMan March of 2017

Tonitrus


Eddie Teach

To sleep, perchance to dream. But in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

Tamas

Quote from: Ideologue on November 14, 2011, 10:36:56 PM
Well-funded government spending is the cornerstone of growth. :bowler:

more like cornerstone of tyranny and corruption

Josquius

Civilization is all about a bit of tyranny. Afterall, total freedom sucks.
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Tamas

Quote from: Tyr on November 15, 2011, 04:35:13 AM
Civilization is all about a bit of tyranny. Afterall, total freedom sucks.

Yes. There are no steps between overtaxation and total chaos.

Syt

Quote from: Tamas on November 15, 2011, 04:38:04 AM
Quote from: Tyr on November 15, 2011, 04:35:13 AM
Civilization is all about a bit of tyranny. Afterall, total freedom sucks.

Yes. There are no steps between overtaxation and total chaos.

Now you're starting to grasp party politics.  :thumbsup:
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
—Stephen Jay Gould

Proud owner of 42 Zoupa Points.

Ideologue

#11678
Quote from: Tamas on November 15, 2011, 04:38:04 AM
Quote from: Tyr on November 15, 2011, 04:35:13 AM
Civilization is all about a bit of tyranny. Afterall, total freedom sucks.

Yes. There are no steps between overtaxation and total chaos.

You're the one who said government spending automatically equated with tyranny.

Or maybe only spending based on debt doesn't lead to tyranny in your philosophy?  That's worked out great.
Kinemalogue
Current reviews: The 'Burbs (9/10); Gremlins 2: The New Batch (9/10); John Wick: Chapter 2 (9/10); A Cure For Wellness (4/10)

Sheilbh

Only slightly related to Japanese debt, but I just read that before interest payments, Italy has a surplus :mellow:
Let's bomb Russia!

DGuller

Quote from: Habbaku on November 15, 2011, 12:56:44 AM
Quote from: Tyr on November 14, 2011, 11:19:44 PM
No money=ineffective government that can't do much

What a shame that would be.
Yes, historically, ineffective governments is what led to prosperity of successful societies.  :rolleyes:  Really, the one thing that might truly sink American dominance is the insanity of a large proportion of its citizens.

PDH

Thank goodness that the rest of the world also has so many idiots in it!
I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
-Umberto Eco

-------
"I'm pretty sure my level of depression has nothing to do with how much of a fucking asshole you are."

-CdM

Razgovory

Quote from: Tamas on November 15, 2011, 02:59:53 AM
Quote from: Ideologue on November 14, 2011, 10:36:56 PM
Well-funded government spending is the cornerstone of growth. :bowler:

more like cornerstone of tyranny and corruption

If Somalia is any indication, you don't need a government at all for that.
I've given it serious thought. I must scorn the ways of my family, and seek a Japanese woman to yield me my progeny. He shall live in the lands of the east, and be well tutored in his sacred trust to weave the best traditions of Japan and the Sacred South together, until such time as he (or, indeed his house, which will periodically require infusion of both Southern and Japanese bloodlines of note) can deliver to the South it's independence, either in this world or in space.  -Lettow April of 2011

Raz is right. -MadImmortalMan March of 2017

Syt

Quote from: MadImmortalMan on November 14, 2011, 04:47:42 PM
The goal is to get to where it's not considered distinctive or whatever, so.....good!

LGBT won't have been fully accepted by society until one gets elected on a platform of traditional family values.
I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.
—Stephen Jay Gould

Proud owner of 42 Zoupa Points.

MadImmortalMan

What do banthas eat, anyway? I mean those things are big. Bigger than elephants. They have to need hundreds of pounds of food in a week. Where does it all come from on Tattoine? The place doesn't exactly teem with vegetation. Are they indigenous to the planet, and if not, do the Sand People import hay for them or what?
"Stability is destabilizing." --Hyman Minsky

"Complacency can be a self-denying prophecy."
"We have nothing to fear but lack of fear itself." --Larry Summers