• pinkpantheroz : Pity this post isn’t avail Fridays all day. I live in a time zone 19 hours ahead of PST! It’s 23.54 Friday evening here now, 0454 local. so I’m gonna miss out!

  • AdLib : Thanks pal, back at ya!

  • KillgoreTrout : Sweet dreams my friend.

  • AdLib : Saw it KT, looks great! See you tomorrow!

  • KillgoreTrout : Thanks Ad. The music thread is done. I hope you like it.

  • AdLib : Guests are just our faithful readers who aren’t logged in.

  • KillgoreTrout : OK Ad, who are the three “guests?” Just kidding. I never knew just what a “guest,” here implied.

  • AdLib : Well KT, looks like it’s about that time to lock up the Vox liquor cabinet. Have a tall one for the road and I’ll see you on the music thread tomorrow!

  • AdLib : Murph – Great. Use every possible angle when it comes to your health.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Thanks for the good words and kind thoughts KT and Ad Lib. Will do as you suggest.

  • KillgoreTrout : Murph, take good care of yourself. It might not be a bad idea to get a second opinion. The country and the larger world needs people like you. Far too few Americans understand that democracy is participatory. Sleep well, my friend.

  • AdLib : Take care, Murph. Hoping you feel better this weekend and that the docs figure things out quickly to get you back where you should be.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : AND with that, I bid you all adieu!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : KT Infallibility only applies to limited dogmatic statements. There have been few in history but I agree the papacy has carried that patina…this guy seems ready to set it aside.

  • AdLib : Murph – Such a cool story! Only attests to the fact that no matter how horrible a minority of people are, there are still people who quietly exemplify the love and compassion that we are supposed to recognize in each other. Very affirming story.

  • KillgoreTrout : Murph, but it is Catholic dogma that every pope;s word is infallible. That’s just how they enumerate the power structure. I just can’t buy into that. I would also like to see the pedophile priests and the higher ups who protected them actually be arrested and tried for their most heinous crimes. people generally say, don’t dare accuse the church, that is blasphamy, but the crimes and the cover-ups are real and cannot be swept under some theological rug. That may seem harsh on my part, but it IS reality that should never be ignored.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Continued…I got to talk to the “Dad” He and his wife can’t have kids so they are foster parents who take in kids no one wants and they keep them- literally until they are grown. They have been doing this for years and have a bunch of grown kids. The dad works in a garage, the mom does telemarketing and they build lives. They inspired me. I was with four members of the coop I help lead. We decided to buy a costco gift card for a couple of hundred dollars and give it to them….Even here in Missour GRACE GROWS!

  • AdLib : KT – Those guys did contribute a lot to the web but it was started by the U.S. government and scientists. The very government that the Repubs attack for incompetence and failure. Well…the internet seems pretty successful to me.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : A closing story….I was at CostCo a few days ago and saw what seemed to be a large family….mom, dad, a bunch of kids…but all boys from mid teens to about 9 and mixed racially…then I realized that the kids all seemed to have special needs.

  • KillgoreTrout : Ad, we’d be locked into the same old illness that pervaded US principles and social lack of healing that existed before Steve Jobbs and is partner Wosniack had their tremendous vision and drive.

  • AdLib : Murph – And I don’t see any RWs refusing their SS or Medicare even though they are socialist programs that they claim to fervently oppose. “Socialism is the enemy of all Americans…unle ss it benefits me, that part’s okay but the rest is unacceptable!”

  • MurphTheSurf3 : KT…I don’t expect Francis to make any infallible statements….no t his style and seems contrary to his understanding of the RCC in terms of other of other faith gatherings.

  • AdLib : KT – Yep, Network is amazingly prophetic and wise. News has become a total circus now and the people have never been less informed by what they watch. Thank goodness for the web! Can you imagine where we would be today if everything was as it is today but there was no internet?

  • KillgoreTrout : Take care Sabreen, I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Ad Lib…I think you are correct…think of the GOP who condemned handouts while taking millions in farm bill money. No problem. From their point of view, they deserve it.

  • AdLib : Take care, Sabreen! Have a great weekend!

  • KillgoreTrout : Murph, I think the new pope IS a breath of fresh air. I just can’t but into the belief that he, a mortal ma, is infallible. That just seems completely ridiculous to me. Given the CC’s recent past crimes, I don’t hold much respect for such an institution. The hierarchy is a power structure that should not be.

  • AdLib : Murph – Considering the built0in hypocrisy of RWs, I fully expect many of those howling about the ACA to sign up and insure themselves and their families because, of course, they need insurance and now they can afford it. Total disconnect, they need to hate something they need to have that will help them.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Good night Sabreen.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : ALL…we are speaking of a number of the reasons I really like Al Jazeera American AND also why it is failing to gain an audience.

  • Sabreen60 : Well good folks, I outta here :D It’s been great and hope to see you here or somewhere else on the intertubes.

  • KillgoreTrout : No doubt about it Ad. None what-so-ever. The man. the supreme journalist, Walter Cronkite warned us of the dangers of mixing real journalism with entertainment. Today’ 24/7 cable news is not much more than entertainment for the masses. I know you are very fond of the film Network. That film was very prophetic.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Ad Lib…another conversation early in the week was with a young man, 31, who wanted to fight with me about “NobamaCrap” and he ended up with his computer open and walking through the website and looking at his options….he does not take much to do this….just point out the need and ask if he is interested in filling it.

  • AdLib : Sabreen – That is so true. MSNBC just sells chocolate ice cream for chocolate ice cream lovers but they are in the business of making money and if anything disrupts that, they won’t hesitate to cut whatever throats they need to. MSNBC is NOT Progressive, they just exploit Progressives to make profits. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t hosts there taht are genuinely Progressive but it’s all just a machine to make Comcast and their shareholders richer.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : KT..one of the things I admire about Francis is that he seems to be in touch with the spirit of what you are saying….but he is shackled by his own history and the context in which he stands…still it is good to hear a church leader speaking so plainly of the gospel.

  • Sabreen60 : Also, RWNJs including Palin have no problem in comparing any and everything to slavery, but they wouldn’t dare compare anything to the Holocaust. That nut Santorum compared Apartheid to Obamacare. Just disgusting.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Sabreen…the Comcast connection worries me a lot….I see it in Morning Joe in particular…I really dislike Scarborough and the cast of go-alongs to get along characters that inhabit the show…Mika is weak tea.

  • AdLib : KT – It’s hard to find real honest journalism anymore. This equivocation thing, presenting “both” sides of an argument as if they are two equal and valid views when they clearly aren’t, is a betrayal of journalism. And Chuckie Todd blew the game when he obliviously explained that his job isn’t to present the truth, it’s just to present whatever political jerks are saying and let the public figure out what to believe. He and so many others are such hacks!

  • KillgoreTrout : Murph, these are many paralells between Christ’s teachings and Lao Tsu’s 81 ideograms. my problem with orthodox Christianity is all the stricture and dogma that were not part of Christ’s actual sermon on the mound. The length of Christ’s teachings is about a half an hour of dialogue. The reast was written by man, men with an agenda beyond the simple and pure ideology of Jesus.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Ad…and while this young lady, a waitress, cannot spell out the tactic as you have, she knows what’s up and her plain talking nails it.

  • Sabreen60 : Oh really AdLib. I didn’t know they did that. I rarely watch Morning Joe so I didn’t know. I listened to and read what Bashir said and it didn’t rate a suspension. However MSNBC is owned by Comcast, right? The CEO of Comcast is a RWNJ. Comcast is the bed with ALEC. MSNBC was there purely for the profit motive. There is no loyalty to progressive views.

  • AdLib : Murph – It’s that old Atwater/Rove trick of trying to accuse the Dems of what they’re guilty of. Repubs have passed laws forcing women to have invasive exams when they seek an abortion that they’re legally entitled to, Repubs literally are forcing Uncle Sam to violate them and they think an ad showing Obama is doing that by providing health insurance makes sense? No way, it is a total fail.

  • KillgoreTrout : Ad, MSNBC does that, just like FOX in the attempt to appear “fair and balanced.” How can such a numbing of Americans be a good thing. News is NOT supposed to be fair and balanced. It’s a travesty of real journalism.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : KT…I am a Christian Humanist…which means that I can take the feel, the tempo, the environment that surrounds Taoist/Buddhist thought and blend it with the philosophy of Yeshua and his first generation of followers quite comfortably.

  • AdLib : Sabreen – MSNBC gave Halperin a time out for a few weeks then happily let him back on their channel. But then he’s a RW so the rules of decency and principle don’t apply to him.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Ad Lib..agreed…sh e was really livid…asked me about that commercial with the giant Uncle Sam Mascot Head and forceps. Her quote: Christ, it’s the GOP that’s staring up my privates not the Dems. Fuck!” Gotta Mo. plain talk.

  • AdLib : What would Sean Hannity or Bill O’Reilly have to say to be kicked off their shows and haven’t they already said it?

  • Sabreen60 : Murph, AdLib, Halperin called PBO a “dick” on Morning Joe and nobody said a word.

  • KillgoreTrout : Murph, I think the real sadness that accompanies death is felt by the the loved ones we leave behind. I love the Taos desciption, or “idea,” of death as a simple returning to the source of all things. Very mysterious and, IMO delightful. If mankind came to know everything ther is to know, how boring life might be then. I think human beings are meant to constantly inquire. To constantly seek new knowledge. I see it as a mental evolution and an emotional one as well.

  • AdLib : Murph – I’ll take anti-GOP any day! No vote for Repubs is one less vote Dems need. And it is such an asinine campaign, trying to tell young people who are already cynical about being told what to do, that they should give up protection to help the wealthy advance their agendas. Glad to hear it’s backfiring.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Sabreen…just the kind of thing the young need to know.

  • Sabreen60 : We had to come out-of-pocket with $8500 when my son broke his finger (he needed pins) and didn’t have health insurance. This was several years ago. It would have been more than that, but he had a great surgeon who wouldn’t take the entire fee from us.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Ad Lib…yes, Bashir is a scapegoat…..I like the man very much.

  • AdLib : Sabreen – Fox News people can spew racism, support rape and the killing of innocent teenagers who happen to be black…and on Fox, they earn their own shows for doing so. Bashir says something rude and he has to quit. I think he needed to apologize as he did and that should have been that. Why is it that the moderates and liberals have to play by one rule and the RW don’t have to play by any rules?

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Sabreen…I wrote a strong letter to MSNBC about Bashir…I HATE what they did to him….Hate it…

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Ad….I spoke with one young lady today who railed and ranted about assholes who are trying to tell her that she does not need health insurance……t horoughly GOP in her family, but THAT tactic has turned her into an anti-GOP though not yet Dem.