all the drug traffickers had penises this big! Before we knew all about Maine Gov. Paul LePage, we just sort of thought of Maine as Mostly Harmless, home of Hawkeye Pierce, L.L. Bean, and semi-incomprehensible fishermen. Who knew that such high levels of dickbaggery ran through the blood of ... Maine-ites? Maine-ains? ... that they could have managed to elect such a human stain like LePage. You have to hand it to the guy, though. He really works hard to keep topping his own previous near-superhuman levels of awful. And he has to. When your previous achievements include
We had the same thing happen with a bike trail that runs through my neighborhood. A few people were convinced that the only thing keeping the criminal hordes at bay was a lack of eco- friendly transit options.
We had the same thing in Missouri back in the 80's. There was a movement to convert the MKT railroad, which runs all the way across the state, into a hiking-biking trail. Major hysteria ensued from neighboring landowners, but now, 40 years later, it is hugely popular, and greatly increased property values of said landowners.
To illustrate his point, and introduce his proposed solution, LePage then showed the crowd The Birth of a Nation noting, "It's like history written in lightning."
Northstar, CEPR estimated just the mis-marketing of one drug, oxycontin, as only mildly habit forming, at costing us $102 billion already. Our regulatory system to help rentiers conceal evidence on drug [in]effectiveness and patient harm, and mismarket drugs, just for 5 drugs CEPR toted up from 1994-2008, cost us $382 billion.
Socializing the costs, of legally mismarketing just these 5 drugs, while privatizing the profit, exceeded all pharma spending on ALL research for the same period.
All this is just a fraction of what helping rentiers is costing us, economically and socially, and we've long known what would work better (it's only a mystery to big donor elected representatives, corporate news media, the best funded think tanks, most voters, and war-on-drugs profiteers).
It's insane, I've seen people make the same complaint about proposals to extend sidewalks and improve walkability. Complaining that if people can walk by their house they could walk up to the house and look in the windows and maybe decide to break in and steal stuff. Because that's how crime works, one moment you're out for an evening stroll and the next you're committing a smash and grab and carrying off your neighbor's TV.
Americans have this crazy Pioneer Mentality where they think they are Kings of their Little Castles and nobody else has the right to touch one square inch of their little white-picket-fence American Dream. And then along comes a state highway department wanting to build an interstate across your little plot, or a city wants to build curbs and storm drains, and you find out what Eminent Domain and Public Easements really means, and that you have been living with an illusion all your life. People can't stand to have their illusions destroyed.
Forty-five years ago my home town got a big state grant to install wheelchair ramps on all the corners of all the city sidewalks all over town, and people actually complained about this quite fiercely. Yes, it's insane. Some people can't stand to see a public benefit given to any minority group that they, themselves, are not a member of.
Because public transit is totally every criminal's favorite mode of transportation. Not only do they carry lock pick kits but transit timetables.
Well good luck to the criminals because I couldn't even lift my 26" Sony tube TV, let alone carry it on the subway.
And just their luck, the train will be late...
We had the same thing happen with a bike trail that runs through my neighborhood. A few people were convinced that the only thing keeping the criminal hordes at bay was a lack of eco- friendly transit options.
Or share videos!
Lots of Mel Brooks up in this thread.
"get really vulgar and drop the n-bomb." - Cliven Bundy did that in 2014, though it was the "prettified" n-word.
They chose LePage as their leader; is Maine-iacs too on the nose?
Pretty sure it's "Maine-iacs".....
We had the same thing in Missouri back in the 80's. There was a movement to convert the MKT railroad, which runs all the way across the state, into a hiking-biking trail. Major hysteria ensued from neighboring landowners, but now, 40 years later, it is hugely popular, and greatly increased property values of said landowners.
To illustrate his point, and introduce his proposed solution, LePage then showed the crowd The Birth of a Nation noting, "It's like history written in lightning."
Northstar, CEPR estimated just the mis-marketing of one drug, oxycontin, as only mildly habit forming, at costing us $102 billion already. Our regulatory system to help rentiers conceal evidence on drug [in]effectiveness and patient harm, and mismarket drugs, just for 5 drugs CEPR toted up from 1994-2008, cost us $382 billion.
Socializing the costs, of legally mismarketing just these 5 drugs, while privatizing the profit, exceeded all pharma spending on ALL research for the same period.
All this is just a fraction of what helping rentiers is costing us, economically and socially, and we've long known what would work better (it's only a mystery to big donor elected representatives, corporate news media, the best funded think tanks, most voters, and war-on-drugs profiteers).
http://cepr.net/press-cente...
The LePage Award ... a special category of the Legislative Shitmuffin of the Year.
It's insane, I've seen people make the same complaint about proposals to extend sidewalks and improve walkability. Complaining that if people can walk by their house they could walk up to the house and look in the windows and maybe decide to break in and steal stuff. Because that's how crime works, one moment you're out for an evening stroll and the next you're committing a smash and grab and carrying off your neighbor's TV.
Authutic "Shifty" dialogue: "Young man, I am very strung out and as a totally hip and with it chap, am in need of a reefer."
Americans have this crazy Pioneer Mentality where they think they are Kings of their Little Castles and nobody else has the right to touch one square inch of their little white-picket-fence American Dream. And then along comes a state highway department wanting to build an interstate across your little plot, or a city wants to build curbs and storm drains, and you find out what Eminent Domain and Public Easements really means, and that you have been living with an illusion all your life. People can't stand to have their illusions destroyed.
Forty-five years ago my home town got a big state grant to install wheelchair ramps on all the corners of all the city sidewalks all over town, and people actually complained about this quite fiercely. Yes, it's insane. Some people can't stand to see a public benefit given to any minority group that they, themselves, are not a member of.