ROK Drop Open Thread – March 6, 2011

Tags: Open Threads

• setnaffa
  12:44 am on March 6th, 2011 1

  Michael Moore says your money is not your money, it belongs to the government. And you should praise Obama for allowing you to keep any of it.

  That's the attitude that changed my attitude. Read John Locke, a major influence on the Founding Fathers: http://www.constitution.org/jl/2ndtreat.htm

  We certainly must pay taxes. How much and how they are legitimately spent is the debate. Moore says there is no private property; but what happens if the government takes him up on his rhetoric and confiscates 50% of his money? You think he would dispute that? 75%? 90%?

  I think folks who want to live in that type of country should move to Cuba, North Korea, Venezuela, or Zimbabwe…

• setnaffa
  12:52 am on March 6th, 2011 2

  Public Employee unions have gone from parasite to malignant tumor. It's time to do some major surgery. I don't care about the private sector unions–in fact I want all of my competitors to join a union!

  With greater than 10% unemployment in many areas–and an additional 10-20% suffering from underemployment–States should give union members 24 hours to leave the terrorist unions or be fired for cause and prosecuted under RICO.

  I'm afraid there just isn't enough backbone among our elected officials. But there are elections coming up. And we remember.

• charliemarlow
  1:15 am on March 6th, 2011 3

  Michael became nationally known with his movie Roger and Me. The point of that documentary is that General Motors walked out on employees and their communities in an unfeeling quest for profit, leaving them destitute while CEO Roger Smith and the corporation went on to greater things.

  Moore lived in Flint, Michigan, which was in very bad straits because of factory

  closings.

  The Rest of the Story: Before Roger and Me, Moore published an "underground" paper, printing his views under the name Rivethead. After Roger and Me's success, the Flint Jourhal, the daily there, went to talk to people from Moore's paper. It turned out that Moore had gone into the paper's office one day and announced, without warning, that he was now going to make movies, so the paper was closed, effective immediately. He then walked out on his employees.

  Beyond irony.

• Liz
  2:07 am on March 6th, 2011 4

  Egypt reverts back towards tribal justice and perhaps religious pogroms in other news
  http://www.aina.org/news/20110304222016.htm

  A mob of nearly four thousand Muslims has attacked Coptic homes this evening in the village of Soul, Atfif in Helwan Governorate, 30 kilometers from Cairo, and torched the Church of St. Mina and St. George. There are conflicting reports about the whereabouts of the Church pastor Father Yosha and three deacons who were at church; some say they died in the fire and some say they are being held captive by the Muslims inside the church.

  Witnesses report the mob prevented the fire brigade from entering the village. The army, which has been stationed for the last two days in the village of Bromil, 7 kilometers from Soul, initially refused to go into Soul, according to the officer in charge. When the army finally sent three tanks to the village, Muslim elders sent them away, saying that everything was "in order now."

  A curfew has been imposed on the 12,000 Christians in the village.

• ChickenHead
  3:12 am on March 6th, 2011 5

  On an important note… an interesting look at K-pop vs J-pop.

  http://the-diplomat.com/new-emissary/2011/03/01/k…

  Now what's all this about some kind of kerfuffle in the Islamic world?

• kushibo
  4:07 am on March 6th, 2011 6

  setnaffa in #1, got a link to the Michael Moore quote?

  I do agree with you about the parasitic unions. After causing the economic meltdown, they deserve to be stripped of all their retirement benefits, starting with health care benefits. If they die earlier, then what pension they have left be curtailed and we can balance the budget!

• Fullslab
  5:39 am on March 6th, 2011 7

  "In Mongolia, sex tourism by S. Korean males…"
  http://english.hani.co.kr/arti...

• Retired GI
  5:59 am on March 6th, 2011 8

  In Philippines, sex tourism by S. Korean males

  http://www.stopdemand.org/afawcs0112878/ID=149/ne…

• Zilchy
  7:00 am on March 6th, 2011 9

  At #7 and #8

  Why are so many of these males going abroad for a broad? Could it be that the problem starts in their own country?

• tbonetylr
  7:52 am on March 6th, 2011 10

  Retired GI,

  Can't you do better than that, your link is a bit old(2005). However, I'd be surprised if anything has changed given their current action in Mongolia.

• Teadrinker
  8:44 am on March 6th, 2011 11

  "but what happens if the government takes him up on his rhetoric and confiscates 50% of his money? "

  Ironically, your government already does that. It's called taxes.

• Teadrinker
  8:54 am on March 6th, 2011 12

  8,

  Every single tour I took from a Korean tour company had a stop for "massages". I strongly recommend opting out from the massages if you're traveling with kids. Sure, legitimate therapeutic massages were offered, but other "more specialized" services were also offered in the same establishments.

• Teadrinker
  9:01 am on March 6th, 2011 13

  Blame the unions all you want, they are saving the government money. My father is a prime example of this. He lives in a nursing home. His pension is large enough that he's classified as a private payer, which means that he receives no government subsidies for the cost of living in the nursing home. Once the home is paid, all he's left with is the magnificent sum of 100$ per month.

• setnaffa
  9:54 am on March 6th, 2011 14

  #6, http://www.michaelmoore.com/

  "America is not broke. Not by a long shot. The country is awash in wealth and cash. It's just that it’s not in your hands. It has been transferred, in the greatest heist in history, from the workers and consumers to the banks and the portfolios of the uber-rich … The only thing that's broke is the moral compass of the rulers. And we aim to fix that compass and steer the ship ourselves from now on."

  – Michael Moore in Madison, Wisconsin on March 5, 2011

  http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/mikes-letter/th…

  He removed "The Ass-Kicking President" column from his website; but he talked about Obama like he was the Progressive Messiah all during 2008, 2009, and half of 2010…

  The Ass-Kicking President | MichaelMoore.com
  http://www.michaelmoore.com (Jun 7, 2010)

  ‎"… I don't sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar, we talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick." – President Barack Obama

• setnaffa
  10:25 am on March 6th, 2011 15

  #13, TD, I want all my private-sector competition to join unions. But public-sector unions are like a metastasizing cancer of the tender-bits… Untreated they get bigger and destroy everything…

• kushibo
  10:56 am on March 6th, 2011 16

  setnaffa, I'm not sure how you're getting your comment in #1…
  

  Michael Moore says your money is not your money, it belongs to the government. And you should praise Obama for allowing you to keep any of it.

  … from what you quoted in #14.

  The MM quote is saying that corporations and the rulers in their employ have stolen from you. That's a far cry from how you should praise Obama for letting you keep whatever you do have.

• GI Korea
  10:58 am on March 6th, 2011 17

  The problem is with public unions. They collect mandatory dues that they than use to help get union friendly politicians elected who hook them up with ever sweeter pay and benefits through collective bargaining. A private company would go out of business with such an arrangement but with government it just raises taxes. This is no way to run a government.

  The federal government does not have collective bargaining for these very reasons. These state governors should have argued from the start that they are trying to get their state unions to have the equivalent power of the federal government union.

• kushibo
  11:02 am on March 6th, 2011 18

  GI Korea, you make some fair points, but I'd say the problem then is not in collective bargaining itself, but in the way we allow our election campaigns to be run through the collection of large donations from corporations and unions that inevitably are paid back in some form of quid pro quo.

  Anyway, there still is a check and balance available: the voters can send home someone of either party who fails to balance the budget. It doesn't require stripping away collective bargaining rights in order to that. It doesn't require slicing away someone's retirement plan.

• Tom
  12:44 pm on March 6th, 2011 19

  #7,#8,#9, so you want to talk about who is the biggest sex tourists to the Philippines according to the Philippine government? It's not South Koreans. It's the Americans, followed by the Australians. LOL.

  By the way, you white guys also lead with child sex tours. You guys also like having sex with 8 year olds.

• Retired GI
  12:54 pm on March 6th, 2011 20

  Nice try tom. So Koreans are #3. You can't even win at sex trade.

• Tom
  12:57 pm on March 6th, 2011 21

  #20, nice try Retired G-aye. Koreans are not #3. Number one is Americans, number two is Australians, and number three are the white guys.

• Retired GI
  1:34 pm on March 6th, 2011 22

  Here ya go: http://immigration.gov.ph/index.php?option=conten…

  Koreas have the sex trade down to a science. But of course Koreans being gready by nature started cheating and black mailing his korean customers.

  So sad. No loyality to his customers

• Tom
  1:39 pm on March 6th, 2011 23

  The page you are trying to access does not exist.

  Please select a page from the main menu.

  LOL. Nice try, Hill Billy.

• setnaffa
  2:00 pm on March 6th, 2011 24

  #16, MM removed the quote I needed about praising Obama from his web page (I guess he changed his opinion of the President or realized what he was saying was more fatuous than normal)… But he said it…

  He's still preaching all your base are belong to Uncle Sam…

• Retired GI
  2:23 pm on March 6th, 2011 25

  Hate it when that happens.

• Glans
  2:25 pm on March 6th, 2011 26

  setnaffa 1, please provide the link to Michael Moore saying your money is not your money, it belongs to the government.

• ChickenHead
  3:34 pm on March 6th, 2011 27

  What he said was that those with VERY large amounts of money, meaning companies and their government-connected rulers, are under some obligation to return some of that money to American people by creating jobs or supplying easier credit rather than moving this "national resource" overseas. They also need to be taxed at a more correct rate.

  He said nothing about the little guy's money… or even rich guys like him.

  Ignore the lying headlines and watch the video. Not everything he says is wrong… and to not recognize this is foolish.

  Right now is a dark time for capitalism… as big government sociialists support and enable all its worst aspects while they regulate and discourage its best parts… and then point their fingers at its failure.

  http://www.theblaze.com/stories/really-rich-dude-…

• kushibo
  3:34 pm on March 6th, 2011 28

  Glans, it's not there. And that could only mean it was up but was taken down, not that setnaffa misremembered what he saw or misinterpreted something else or is actually thinking of a right-winter's self-serving paraphrasing of Michael Moore.

  Seriously, though… If Michael Moore really did say that (and I have not discounting the possibility that he did), then surely a screen grab or a quote of that quote should be somewhere else. After all, that's a golden quote if it really happened.

• kushibo
  3:38 pm on March 6th, 2011 29

  Thanks for the link, Chickenhead. It sounds like, judging from his comment about the banks sitting on money instead of lending it out, he's not talking about profit or some rich guy's income, but rather, stimulus money or something like that.

• Glans
  8:18 pm on March 6th, 2011 30

  Meet Aung San Suu Kyi, the woman the world looks up to.

• ChickenHead
  10:29 pm on March 6th, 2011 31

  Glans,

  Ling's interview questions sounded like she copied them from a high school newspaper…

  …oh, gosh, what was it like to use a cellphone for the first time?

  Not exactly hard-hitting journalism.

  This was a filler interview by a "reporter" who is worthless for anything except stirring up a bunch of fat, uneducated, couch potato housewives and promoting herself.

  BTW, here is a real woman to look up to.

  http://www.onlineweblibrary.com/blog/wp-content/u…

• Fullslab
  12:02 am on March 7th, 2011 32

  Tom,

  Of course Korea is a leader in prostitution, worse yet is slavery. And of course S. Korea is another leader in that billion dollar industry. Sucks don't it, or maybe you don't think so? If you actually lived in S. Korea or knew much about it you might just walk by a slave on the sidewalk and not even know it. But if you looked closely, you just might be able to tell…
  http://www.freetheslaves.net/Page.aspx?pid=375

  You'd think that S. Korea would've learned something from the U.S. given how Koreans usually condemn America any chance it gets on its slave history. But, of course no history lesson seems to help anyone in S. Korea. Shame on you S. Korea for jumping on the SLAVE BANDWAGON of today.

• Fullslab
  12:48 am on March 7th, 2011 33

  I'll be waiting for "freetheslaves.net" to actually come to S. Korea and do a freakin report on the S. Korean Hillbillies/Farmers and their S. Korean partners in crime who treat people as a comodity. I'd like to know what the heck they've been waiting for, or have I missed something?

• Tom
  4:41 am on March 7th, 2011 34

  LOL. A crackpot blog of a website, is that all you got, white man ESL teacher with a chip on his shoulder? LOL. You can do better then that by googling. LOL.

  Slaves, you should be an expert at it since you're white and your ancestors were experts at it. lol.

• Glans
  7:22 am on March 7th, 2011 35

  ChickenHead 31, yes, the interview suct. But what does Laura Ling have to do with couch potato housewives? And I hope you're not letting your disdain for her affect your attitude toward Aung San Suu Kyi.

• Glans
  8:05 am on March 7th, 2011 36

  Here's some background on state budgets and pensions.

• Glans
  9:09 am on March 7th, 2011 37

  Read George F Will on birtherism, Huckabee, and Gingrich. And then read Somerby on Rachel Maddow's fake discussion.

• Glans
  10:12 am on March 8th, 2011 38

  This one's for Tom.

• GI Korea
  11:48 am on March 8th, 2011 39

  @18 – In regards to corporation giving money to politicians they are at least not using taxpayers money to do so. Same for the private sector unions. The public unions are funded by taxpayer dollars that are in turn used to elect politicians that they collectively bargain with for increased benefits. What kind of bargaining is going on when you are bargaining with the person you elected? That is why I have no issues with collective bargaining with private sector unions because they don't have the ability to appoint executive leadership at a company.

  If collective bargaining is such a right for government workers than why aren't all these protesters rallying in front of the White House instead of Wisconsin to demand President Obama to oppressing all the federal government workers and give them their rights?

  As far as retirement benefits the federal government workers have great retirement benefits without collective bargaining.

  In fact government workers have such great benefits that it is causing increasing resentment with many Americans.

• Leon LaPorte
  12:15 pm on March 8th, 2011 40

  #38: There you go.

• Glans
  5:54 pm on March 8th, 2011 41

  Did you know that Peter King, now investigating Islamic extremists, was a terrorist sympathizer?

• Glans
  6:01 pm on March 8th, 2011 42

  The Republicans will need a strong candidtate in 2012. How about Newt Gingrich?

• Glans
  6:10 pm on March 8th, 2011 43

  The new Japanese foreign minister is Matsumoto Takeaki.

• Glans
  7:13 pm on March 8th, 2011 44

  General Petraeus is doing well.

• Glans
  9:40 pm on March 8th, 2011 45

  Somehow this story escaped my attention last October, but it's back in the news.

• Fullslab
  12:31 am on March 9th, 2011 46

  Tom,

  "LOL. A crackpot blog of a website, is that all you got…"

  It's certainly better than the website S. Korea fed to Westerners(New York) in the name of "Tourism"…
  http://www.forthenextgeneration.com/

  In the southern part of S. Korea, SE Asian women are practically sold as a comodity through public street banners — advertising("Match Makers" WTF?), the price is given or stated on signs. It won't be hard for CNN's "Freedom Project" or "Freetheslaves" to pick up on this and tell the story.

  Heck, I think I'll tip them off, what are going to do about it? Check out the 10 points/bullets, especially the last or 10th and the colored "Interactive Map." The area in RED has the most Modern-Day Slaves which you'll find S. Korea…
  http://www.freetheslaves.net/Page.aspx?pid=375

  S.Korea, Japan, China, SE Asia, and India are the LEADERS in Modern-Day Slavery. That area is much smaller than N. America, Europe, and Russia, yet it still has more slaves( 5+ million slaves ).
  http://www.freetheslaves.net/Page.aspx?pid=375
  Congrats, Tom! But the question remains, what are you going to do about it?

  I'll be waiting for CNN to go visit the S. Korean Farmers/Hillbillies
  http://thecnnfreedomproject.blogs.cnn.com/2011/02…

• Dragonfly
  6:53 am on March 9th, 2011 47

  This doesn't have anything to do with what's being discussed here, but it's something I got on an e-mail and think it should be passed on.

  You're a 19 year old kid.

  You're critically wounded and dying in The jungle somewhere in the Central Highlands of Viet Nam .

  It's November 11, 1967.

  LZ (landing zone) X-ray.

  Your unit is outnumbered 8-1 and the enemy fire is so intense from 100 yards away, that your CO (commanding officer) has ordered the MedEvac helicopters to stop coming in.

  You're lying there, listening to the enemy machine guns and you know you're not getting out.

  Your family is half way around the world, 12,000 miles away, and you'll never see them again.

  As the world starts to fade in and out, you know this is the day.

  Then – over the machine gun noise – you faintly hear that sound of a helicopter.

  You look up to see a Huey coming in. But.. It doesn't seem real because no MedEvac markings are on it.

  Captain Ed Freeman is coming in for you.

  He's not MedEvac so it's not his job, but he heard the radio call and decided he's flying his Huey down into the machine gun fire anyway.

  Even after the MedEvacs were ordered not to come. He's coming anyway.

  And he drops it in and sits there in the machine gun fire, as they load 3 of you at a time on board.

  Then he flies you up and out through the gunfire to the doctors and nurses and safety.

  And, he kept coming back!! 13 more times!!

  Until all the wounded were out. No one knew until the mission was over that the Captain had been hit 4 times in the legs and left arm.

  He took 29 of you and your buddies out that day. Some would not have made it without the Captain and his Huey.

  Medal of Honor Recipient, Captain Ed Freeman, United States Air Force, died last Wednesday at the age of 70, in Boise , Idaho

  May God Bless and Rest His Soul.

• GI Korea
  2:09 pm on March 9th, 2011 48

  Democracy has prevailed in Wisconsin:

  The Wisconsin Senate succeeded in voting Wednesday to strip nearly all collective bargaining rights from public workers, after Republicans outmaneuvered the chamber's missing Democrats and approved an explosive proposal that has rocked the state and unions nationwide.

  "You are cowards!" spectators in the Senate gallery screamed as lawmakers voted. Within hours, a crowd of a few hundred protesters inside the Capitol had grown to several thousand, more than had been in the building at any point during weeks of protests.

  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_wisconsin_budget_un…

  I find it interesting is that the protesters are calling the Republicans cowards when it was the Democrats that fled to Illinois to hide. I'm still waiting for the Wisconsin protesters to march on the White House and occupy the US capitol to demand collective bargaining rights for all the oppressed federal workers.

• Glans
  9:58 am on March 12th, 2011 49

  A New Hampshire Republican state representative thinks "all the defective people, the drug addicts, mentally ill, the retarded" should be sent to Siberia to die.

  US Republican representative Michelle Bachmann thinks the battles of Lexington and Concord were in New Hampshire.

  A tip of my hat to Talking Points Memo.

• GI Korea
  11:57 am on March 12th, 2011 50

  Glans you can do better than these two links. The first link is a 91 year old guy that I wouldn't be surprised was a bit senile. Hardly someone we should take seriously. The 2nd link is a simple confusion on her part considering that there is a Concord in New Hampshire. Need I bring up Joe Biden and President Obama gaffes?

• Glans
  6:55 pm on March 12th, 2011 51

  OK, GI Korea 50, how about this link?

• kushibo
  7:03 pm on March 12th, 2011 52

  The 2nd link is a simple confusion on her part considering that there is a Concord in New Hampshire.

  Being from OC, I always thought the Battle of Concord was in California.

• Sure
  8:39 pm on March 12th, 2011 53

  @ fullslab 46

  Instead of just throwing up this link:

  http://www.freetheslaves.net/Page.aspx?pid=375

  You should have actually clicked on the Asia part of the interactive map. You might have learned something.

  "The largest number of slaves in the world live in Pakistan, India and Nepal, where as many as 18 million are held as slaves – working for generations to repay loads. "

  Trying to take a swipe at South Korea by lumping it in with that group because of geography makes as much sense as lumping the USA, Mexico, Columbia, Brazil, and Argentina into one group and calling the USA the one of the epicenters of Narcotics.

  If you really are interested in cleaning up human exploitation and trafficking, you might want to clean up your back yard first.

  http://www.kansascity.com/trafficking/day1/

  http://monthlyreview.org/0107vogel.htm

  http://theundergroundsite.com/index.php/2010/05/h…

• GI Korea
  11:23 pm on March 12th, 2011 54

  @51 – This is once again simple politics being played here. The tsunami warning system isn't being cut, the National Weather Service and NOAA are being cut:

  The budget, which proposed about $60 billion in budget cuts, would slash funding for the National Weather Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). That would potentially cripple the effectiveness of the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii, which issued a series of warnings over the past several days regarding the situation in Japan, where an 8.9 magnitude earthquake triggered a massive tsunami along the nation's east coast. http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20042264-5…

  NOAA just like many in the government is facing budget cuts and they are pushing back. The tsunami was actually something very beneficial for them to claim the Republicans want people swept away by tsunamis which is hardly the case.

  NOAA can continue funding the PTWC if it so important and cut back on other areas instead.

• ChickenHead
  12:43 am on March 13th, 2011 55

  Funny, there is never a cut on global warming "research"… which reminds me, what the hell does NASA have to do with global warming? Shouldn't they be building rockets or something?

• Glans
  10:08 am on March 13th, 2011 56

  Sure 53, the USA is a great center of narcotics demand.

  GI Korea 54, it's not so much that Republicans want people swept away as that they don't want to do what's necessary to prevent it.

  ChickenHead 55, NASA works with satellites, which are useful for climate studies. Also, liberal scientists force government schools to tell our children that the Earth is a planet.

• Glans
  10:11 am on March 29th, 2011 57

  GI Korea 48, republican democracy is still in effect.

 

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