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FRIDAY OCTOBER 12 2012 2:30 AM

Tactical Animal: Democrats, You Can Dry Your Cryin’ Eyes Now

Submitted by ChrisSick

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Blog, Politics, Presidential Debates, RNC

by ChrisSick

[Source: Mashable]

Hey there, lil' tyke, wassa matter? Did the President let you down? Break your heart when he blew away his five-point lead in ninety minutes of sad-ass debate performance last week? Well, guess what, your uncle Joe is here to cheer you all up, he's got a treat for you and its called FACTS.

For the last week I've endured nothing but endless triumphalism from the Right and sky-is-falling inanity from the Left. Following President Obama's lifeless (and bloodless, by comparison) debate performance against Gov. Romney, the polls favored the challenger for the first time since he captured the nomination in June of this year. This resulted in a brutal media cycle that asked such important political questions as “Does the President even give a shit?” and “How bad will a Romney presidency be?”

Joe Biden emailed me, personally — along with every one else on the Obama 2012 mailing list — to ask for money and promise me that he had one job tonight:

“I told Barack I have one mission tonight: tell the truth and stand up for what we believe in.”

Well, according to a quick scan of Politfact's instant debate factcheck, he pretty handily accomplished that. In fact, if all you're looking for is a quick summary of the debate, here it is:

“BIDEN: Those are the facts, right?

RYAN: This is what politicians do when they don't have a record to run on...”

Ryan read prepared (and well-worn) attack lines straight from his stump speeches, while Biden laughed himself sick every time Ryan opened his mouth and once actually rubbed his hands together in anticipation of responding while Ryan was speaking. Biden seized FACTS as punctuation for all his points early in the debate, and after looking a little shaky on the Benghazi Embassy debacle, pretty much bludgeoned Ryan to death with them from there on out.

I knew the debate was won by Biden forty-five minutes in as I watched all the conservative Twitter accounts I follow harp on #Bidengrin, which quickly got seized upon by liberals (and myself) as a triumphant tag, so they quickly switched to #Bidenunhinged. Harping on the oppositions facial expressions during the debate is usually a sign that you've ceded the salient point ground.

But for a second, let's talk about this and — hopefully, in the process — put both the debates into perspective. You judge the winner of a debate in one easy way. You turn off the sound and watch the body language and facial expressions. Fucking tragic, I know, that such an analysis matters more than any actual points that get stated or rebuttals delivered, but there it is. As a smarter man than me once opined — the game is the game.

And by such a metric President Obama lost the first Presidential debate about as badly as Congressman Ryan did tonight. Joe Biden was relaxed, comfortable, confident, and seemed to be enjoying himself, while Ryan looked overly-serious, humorless, stiff, more than a little disturbingly dead-eyed.

I spent most of the week following the Presidential debate patiently — okay, not so patiently more than once — explaining to dissatisfied liberals why their firm conviction that Mitt Romney did nothing but lie through his perfect teeth didn't matter even a little bit. Because the correct response to such a tactic isn't to stare at your note cards on the podium, it is to do precisely what Joe Biden did tonight, hammer on the facts, corner your opponent in their own words, and never let up.

You don't win debates because Politifact says you told less lies after the fact.

And despite Biden's emailed promise to tell the truth, he really only had one job tonight, and that was to create a new media narrative. If early indications that I'm seeing are any sign, he's successfully accomplished that. Conservatives will tell you — and anyone who will listen, much less believe them — that the moderator was biased (because the President attended her wedding twenty years ago as a guest of her now-divorced husband), that the Veep debate was a draw (already seeing this on TwitteR), or that it doesn't matter nearly as much as Obama's performance.

But, an interesting fact is that the initial polling that included post-debate reaction didn't show a substantial bounce for Romney. The media and most viewers were in agreement that the President lost, and badly. In fact, by the largest margin in history. But it didn't shift the polls very quickly. The massive shift didn't take place until after the media narrative coalesced. And you can forget all that “liberal media bias” horseshit. The media doesn't love a liberal half as much as they love a dogfight race.

Expecting the Veep Debate to change the stakes and dramatically shift the needle in the polls is wishful thinking, at best and outright liberal delusion, at worst. But what Biden may have accomplished tonight is to staunch the bleeding, and — more importantly — change the narrative. The next few days will be highly instructive but thus far, anything is possible as the debates have broken most of the historical precedents for affecting a race.

Related Posts
Tactical Animal: Round One
Tactical Animal: Let The Presidential Debates Begin
Tactical Animal: On Politicking Cont…
Tactical Animal: On Politicking
Tactical Animal: Regarding The Pain Of Being Right…Or More Reasons Mitt Romney Will Never Be Your President
Tactical Animal: Have You Got Yourself The Belly For It?
Tactical Animal: Sorry Folks, Election’s Over, Donkey Out Front Shoulda Told Ya
Tactical Animal: Politics In The Post-Truth Era
Tactical Animal: Now We’ve Got Ourselves A Race

commentary
THURSDAY OCTOBER 11 2012 9:02 PM

SuicideGirls Group Therapy: Ryker On The Kitchen

Submitted by Ryker

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: All Things SG, Blog, Food & Drink

commentary
THURSDAY OCTOBER 11 2012 10:27 AM

Ur W33K 1N G33K (October 3-10)

Submitted by Saccora

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Blog, Comics, Entertainment, Gaming, Geek, Internuts, Movies, TV, Comic Con

A.J. Focht

Avengers 2 has started casting and Emily Blunt and Ruth Wilson are both up for the new female role. The current rumor is the part will be Ms. Marvel, the Marvel movie universe’s first ‘super powered female’ (as Black Widow was just a master assassin). While the Marvel movie properties are currently divided between several companies, the X-Men producer would love to see a compromise made between Disney and Fox so the X-Men and the Avengers movies can crossover.

Iron Man 3 has resumed production in Miami, Florida. With only about seven months left until its release, the first trailer will premiere on the internet on October 23. Iron Man 3 will be the first of the movies in Marvel’s phase two, premiering on May 3, 2013.

Guardians of the Galaxy will be the next franchise Marvel launches into its cinematic universe. One of the most recognizable characters from the series is a fury little fellow with an affinity for explosions, Rocket Raccoon. Michael Rooker, who plays Merle in The Walking Dead, has tossed his name in the hat for the role. He pitched his case in a recent interview, having experience both doing motion capture and working with director, James Gunn.

Amazing Spider-Man 2, has already begun casting, and it looks like the part of Mary Jane Watson is up for grabs. Shailene Woodley is currently in talks to play Spidey’s girl next door. The movie is set to hit theaters on May 2, 2014.

Mary Jane isn’t the only important comic movie roll rumored to be filled. The Justice League may be set to feature Armie Hammer as the next Batman. The movie will supposedly start off a few years into Batman’s crime fighting career and is looking to be in theaters sometime in 2015.

The first look at Deadshot from the new TV series Arrow based on the Green Arrow has hit the internet. Unlike the loose take used in Smallville, it looks like Arrow’s Deadshot is going to be sticking with a more comic look. Arrow premiered this week on the WB.

Dr. Horrible 2 is moving forward. Maurissa Tancharoen Whedon gave an update saying they intended to finish the script and everything else this year so they can start shooting next year. There is no current release date set for the second movie, although the TV debut of Dr. Horribles Sing-Along was on the CW this week.

This Sunday October 14, The Walking Dead premiers its third season on AMC. The newest trailer has turned up the action, and sets a promising tone for the new season. The Walking Dead magazine will debut later this month. Check back in a few weeks for more coverage and review of the first issue.

Last week, I reported the NBC Munster’s remake, Mockingbird Lane has been put on ice. That might not be entirely the case. NBC is now trying to salvage the $10 million put into the project and they are looking at a made for TV movie.

Some legal issues in the comic world, Stan Lee’s former company, Stan Lee Media, Inc. has filed a claim against Disney for rights to some of the Marvel characters. It’s not clear yet what properties are tied up in the mix, the statement given mentions hundreds of characters created by Stan Lee:

“Defendant The Walt Disney Company has represented to the public that it, in fact, owns the copyright to these characters as well as to hundreds of other characters created by Stan Lee. Those representations made to the public by The Walt Disney Company are false.”

Source: CBM

A new web series, Batgirl: Spoiled premiered its first webisode this week. The series is a fan web-series not affiliated with DC or Warner Bros. at all. It follows the adventures of Stephanie Brown Batgirl, and her life in Gotham after a close call and a falling out with Oracle and Batman. The first episode is a great watch that I’d highly recommend you view.

feature
THURSDAY OCTOBER 11 2012 8:00 AM

SuicideGirls Timeline: Luscious

Submitted by Jessytai

Edited by Jessytai

Tags: Timeline, Tattoo Girl, Tattooed Girl, Pierced, Naked Girl, Nude Girl, Punk Rock Girl, Glam Girl, luscious

Some SuicideGirls have been modeling for the site for 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, or even 10 years. We thought it would be fun to show you a look back and some of the SuicideGirls throughout the years.  

This week we bring you Luscious! 

Luscious has been a SuicideGirl since 2007 and she has 14 strikingly sexy photo sets. Enjoy this gorgeous look back at the stunning Luscious…  

From her first photo set Industrial Strength shot by Alissa in 2007:

She shot The Clarendon with Taye in the middle of the biggest road trip of her life in 2008:

Luscious says it's 40oz to Freedom in this sexy set shot by Alissa in 2008:

She is true Heavy Metal in this awesome set shot by Alissa in 2008:

Luscious is one with the wilderness in Moribund Meadow shot by Alissa in 2008:

Her beauty is Eternal in this stunning set shot by Alissa in 2009:

She says being creepy is something that comes naturally to her in the set Creep shot by Alissa in 2009:

She celebrates Halloween in this fun set shot by Shazzy in 2009:

She teaches us to dance in Dark Mother shot by Alissa in 2009:

Luscious is an Afternoon Delight in this stunning set shot by Alissa in 2010:

She's dark and mysterious in Grime shot by Alissa in 2010:

Luscious cools down in Aquifer shot by Alissa in 2011:

She's a wild child in The Moor shot by Alissa in 2011:

Ohio SuicideGirls have a Slumber Party in this set shot by Alissa in 2011:

Hope you enjoyed the lovely look back at the gorgeous SuicideGirl Luscious! Be sure to keep an eye out for a new set coming soon to member review!   Become a member TODAY for only $4 a month (if you sign up for a year) to see all 14 nude pin-up photo sets of Luscious - http://suicidegirls.com/join/ 

commentary
WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 10 2012 9:03 PM

Brad Warner’s Hardcore Zen: Buddhist Superstition is Just As Much Bullshit As Any Other Kind of Superstition

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

by Brad Warner

Recently someone sent me the following email:

I have a question – what’s your impression of The New Kadampa Tradition and the practice of “worshiping” or “venerating” Dorje Shugden? Is this all hogwash, or is there something of value in Geshe Kelsang Gyatso’s teaching or is he just another charlatan?

I replied:

I’ve heard the name New Kadampa but know absolutely nothing about it. It’s something Tibetan, I guess. I have no idea who or what Dorje Shugden is or was. “Worshiping” and “venerating” are words that make me a little nervous.

He sent the following back to me:

Thanks for replying, it’s appreciated. I’ve done some digging and it seems that Geshe Kelsang Gyatso is regarded by the NKT followers as the “one true Buddha alive today” and his teachings (and only HIS teachings) are not to be questioned, lest ye be banished (seriously). Other teachings are “deceptive and evil” including the teachings of the Dalai Lama, it seems, who Gyatso openly opposes. Opinions of the Dorje Shugden thing seems to vary from him/it being incarnated in the 17th Century and is a “Dharma Protector” or even a “demon” – there is even an NKT Survivors forum on Yahoo, so I think I’ll steer clear of the whole shebang, as consensus seems to indicate that the NKT should be regarded alongside the likes of the “Dark Zen” crowd. Ugh.

To which I said:

OH RIGHT! THAT STUFF! I’d forgotten about it. Stephen Batchelor mentions it in his latest book. Yeah. That’s all superstitious nonsense. I don’t know why anybody believes that garbage. It’s like thinking the Earth was created 6000 years ago and that dinosaurs died out in the Great Flood. There is no difference at all in those kinds of beliefs. They’re all 100% arbitrary products of human imagination.

I am so not interested in this stuff that I had totally blanked out on what the names Dorje Shugden and New Kadampa Tradition meant even though I read the story just a few months earlier. In my mind it was all lumped in under the category of “Superstitious Nonsense That I Don’t Need to Bother With.” If you want to read something truly moronic about this subject, go to dorjeshugden.org/. Anyhow, there’s Dorje’s picture up on top of this post. He’s wearing a fireman helmet.

There are some fictional stories I know very well, that I find interesting and that I continue to follow from time to time. I know the difference between Captain Kirk (cool) and Captain Picard (often cool in his own way, but not as cool as Kirk). I know why Hayata can use the Beta Capsule to transform into Ultraman. I know what Tatooine is and what the Death Star is.

I know some of the religious fictions that are part of my culture. I know that Noah built the Ark, that Moses brought the tablets down from Mt. Sinai, that Jesus died and rose again on the Third Day. I don’t actually believe any of this stuff. But it’s useful to know the stories. I know the major fictions of a few other religions. I know that Krishna could fuck a million girls all at once and I know why one of Ganesh’s tusks is broken (he broke it off and used it as a pen to write the Vedas). I know the basic story of Mohammed (Peace Be Upon Him, not that any of that is fiction, of course, please don’t kill me).

I know most of the fictions that Zen people find comforting. I know that Bodhidharma stared at a wall until his arms and legs fell off. But I don’t believe that actually occurred. I know that Buddha supposedly confirmed Mahakashapa’s enlightenment and that this has been passed on in an unbroken succession for 2500 years. I don’t think that really happened either. But I led the congregation in chanting the list of names of the men and women who got it a few times last month in Tassajara.

But if I tried to memorize everybody’s superstitions, I’d never get to the end of it. In the final analysis, superstition is superstition, whether it’s Buddhist superstition or anyone else’s superstition. I can find no more compelling reason to believe in some spiritual entity named Dorje Shugden than to believe in Zeus or Apollo. It’s silly and useless. In fact it’s more useless to study Dorje Shugden than to study Zeus and Apollo because so few people give a shit about Dorje Shugden. At least if you know about Zeus and Apollo there is always a chance that knowing a bit about classical literature might get you laid by some cute librarian in a pair of horn-rimmed glasses and a turtleneck sweater. Will knowing about Dorje Shugden get me laid? Not likely. Or if it did, I would really have to go out of my way to find a girl who cared. So that’s the end of my study.

For reasons that are difficult for me to fathom, though, a lot of people who ought to know better seem to think that exotic superstitions might be more true than the plain old superstitions we’re familiar with. But why bother? If you’re thinking about putting your faith in Dorje Shugden, why not just make life simpler and put your faith in the Tooth Fairy or the Easter Bunny? At least you know those superstitions already. There’s not so much need to study up on them. Santa Claus is a good one to believe in because he might bring you stuff. Personally I have way more faith in Santa Claus than in any supposed Buddhist “guardian spirit.”

***

Brad Warner is the author of Sex, Sin and Zen: A Buddhist Exploration of Sex from Celibacy to Polyamory and Everything in Between as well as Hardcore Zen, Sit Down and Shut Up! and Zen Wrapped in Karma Dipped in Chocolate. He maintains a blog about Buddhist stuff that you can click here to see. You can also buy T-shirts and hoodies based on his books, and the new CD by his band Zero Defex now!

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commentary
TUESDAY OCTOBER 9 2012 9:10 PM

NEW Interview: Greg Palast – Billionaires And Ballot Bandits

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Activism, Blog, Books, Politics, Billionaires And Ballot Bandits, Greg Palast, Interviews, vote suppression

by Steven Whitney

From 2000 onward, intentional (and criminal) voter suppression has altered the political landscape on every level – local, state, and national. But from the 2000 Butterfly ballots in Florida that handed Bush the election, the Ohio locked-door counting of votes in 2004 that defeated Kerry, to the approximately 5.9 million votes lost (or stolen) in 2008, the problem has been more insidious and widespread than most of us realize. Most tragically, this happened in America – the country that invented modern democracy, but a nation in danger of becoming a plutocracy in which only money rules.

Just in time for our 2012 elections, award-winning investigative journalist Greg Palast – arguably the foremost expert on voter suppression – has released a new book that offers prescriptive solutions to the gravest threat our democracy faces: the suppression and outright theft of votes across the United States.

As the title implies, Billionaires and Ballot Bandits exposes the billionaires (including the infamous Koch brothers) and bandit operatives (like Karl Rove) behind the various plots to reduce minority participation in all elections, from local dogcatcher races to national Presidential choices. These crooks are – as Robert F. Kennedy Jr. writes in his brilliant introduction, A Hostile Takeover of Our Country – committing treasonous actions that are subverting both the intent and reality of our democracy. So in the book Palast tells you who does it, why they do it, where they do it, who they do it to, the 9 different ways they do it, why they get away with it, and, importantly, what you must do to make sure your vote counts to stop the wholesale theft of up to ten million votes in the coming election

As an added treat, Ted Rall, one of America’s top political cartoonists, has contributed a 48 page comic book insert – Tales From the Crypt of Democracy – that is hilarious, shocking, and right on target.

These scandalous shenanigans are much worse than Watergate – they are the worst political crimes of our era precisely because they aim to steal the most precious commodity Americans possess – their votes.

Read the interview, then get Palast’s ground-breaking expose on the real voter fraud taking place all across our country. You’ll not only be buying an important book, you’ll be making a vital investment in our democracy.

Steven Whitney: Let’s start with the most famous example in our history: Florida, 2000, Katherine Harris and the Butterfly Ballot. Everybody knows about that, but didn’t the Florida election officials do lot of other shady stuff even before the election?

Greg Palast: You hear about Butterfly Ballots because it’s rich, white folks in Palm Beach with their summer homes that lost their ballots to the butterflies. That’s unusual – they aren’t used to having their votes flushed down the toilet. They aren’t used to getting their chads hung. It’s usually the poorest, blackest folk in Florida. Before the 2000 election, before the butterflies, 94,000 mostly black folk – were targeted as felons, wiped off the voter rolls by a computer drone system. They were accused of being illegal voters. In fact, every one of them was guilty of Voting While Black. The number of actual illegal voters on the list of 94,000 turned out to be exactly zero. None. That’s what elected your President – a program of lynching by laptop, an electronic program against black voters.

Now, of course, things have changed since those dark days. They’ve gotten darker. This year, the felon purge is back, it’s black, it’s nasty. The Republicans have gone back in with the same game. How do they do it? For example, this time around, you’ll see in Billionaires and Ballot Bandits that a Robert Moore commits a crime. Common name, but sneaky Robert Moore changes his name to Bobbi. So Bobbi Moore, a registered voter in Florida, loses her vote. You’ll notice I said Robert Moore/Bobbi Moore loses her vote – so, obviously he had a sex change. Not only that, since he committed the crime in the future, according to the records, it’s a very sophisticated computer program, which seems to knock out black and blue-ish voters, you know, Democrats.

SW: Was it possible back then in 2000 that the Butterfly Ballot became a ruse to distract from all the other purging that Harris and Jeb Bush did?

GP: Not at all. No one gives a flying fuck about black people, especially in the white press. As far as they were concerned, the only thing that ever mattered in that whole race was the Butterfly Ballots...See trophy wives losing their votes is an issue. Black people in Gadsden County, who lost their votes through machine manipulation ...Here are the numbers by the way: 178,000 votes were spoiled, that is cast and not counted in Florida. According to the Civil Rights Commission, if you were black, the chance your vote will be lost is 900% higher than if you’re white, and it ain’t just whistling dixie, that’s all over the United States. Officially we had 1.5 million votes cast and not counted in the last election, spoiled as they say. And overwhelmingly, it was a majority black, Latino and hugely, this is an interesting one, Native American. Overwhelmingly Democratic group, concentrated in swing states, there’s nothing new under the sun. America has progressed—our manifest destiny is to fuck the hell out of the Indians.

SW: Well, I think they were born in Kenya, weren’t they?

GP: Yeah, exactly. I wouldn’t mind a Muslim President from Africa because we’ve had these white Christian pricks for so long fucking it up, let’s give someone else a try.

SW: Didn’t John Kerry lose the election in 2004 because of an imminent terrorist attack on an Ohio courthouse?

GP: That was one of the games that was played. And, by the way, remember the kid who was zapped with the taser in Florida — you know, “Don’t tase me, bro!” He was holding up my book. He said, by the way, that he never let it hit the ground even though he was being tased — it was like the flag. And he was yelling at Kerry, “Why did you give up when this author, Greg Palast, said you won?” And by the way, Kerry said, “Yeah, I read the book, Palast is right.” No one got that answer. And, yes, one of the biggest ways that Kerry lost is a rotten piece of shit trick, in other words, something from Karl Rove, called caging. It’s one of the nine ways they steal votes that we have in the book.

Here’s the quick game on CAGING, and what happened to Kerry, and what happened again in Wisconsin with the Scott Walker recall, is that Karl Rove’s operation – and I’m not guessing here – sent out letters to soldiers, to students at black colleges in August, and to Jewish voters in Miami who are snowbirds and go north in August. The letters said on the outside “Do Not Forward.” So the letters came back, that is they’re caged, and then the Rovebots challenge the voters as voting from fraudulent addresses.

If you look in Billionaires and Ballot Bandits, you will see these caging lists. One is nothing but soldiers from the Naval Air Station in Jacksonville. Now Mr. Rove, or “Turd Blossom” as George Bush called him, it was his nickname, Mr. Blossom, why wouldn’t a soldier be at their home base where they’re registered? Well, Afghanistan is one answer.

By the way, if you’re a soldier you’re allowed to vote from under your Humvee. But when those soldiers and those students and the elderly of Zion sent in their absentee ballots, they didn’t know that those ballots were under challenge and that they were thrown in the garbage. Go to Afghanistan, lose your vote, mission accomplished. You like that? That’s what the Rove Operation was doing. I’m not guessing because I have the actual caging lists…It’s not that Rove sends me his confidential evidence of felonious criminality, it’s that we had a friend of mine who owned a website – RepublicanNationalCommittee.org – and because they misaddressed the stuff, the stuff came right into him and he passed it to me. And as Bobby Kennedy, a Professor of Law who wrote the introduction and looked over the evidence, says, this is a “go to jail” crime. These people should be in prison.

SW: Why aren’t they?

GP: Because, it’s a lot easier to break into the vault when you’re the cops. For example, the guy that actually sent out the caging list is a creepy little shit named Tim Griffin who is Turd Blossom’s right claw. Griffin sent out the emails, which is a federal crime — several federal crimes as a matter of fact – and then when a US prosecutor began to grumble and complain, Rove had him fired and Griffin, the prime suspect, the guy who did it, he was named the new Federal Prosecutor. So you literally took the criminal and made him the lawman, gave him the badge. Fired the good guys. And, by the way, I got that information from a Republican Prosecutor, David Iglesias. The reason there’s a picture of Tom Cruise in the book is that in A Few Good Men the Tom Cruise character is based on David Iglesias. So they just got the wrong guy. They got a good man who wouldn’t go along with their racist scam.

SW: In Colorado, when Donetta Davidson removed almost 20% of the voters, how did she do it? And if we can’t put these people in jail, why can’t we make examples of them? Air an ad every day in Colorado informing people that Donetta stole their vote.

GP: [laughs] Why don’t the SuperPACs bust the Ballot Bandits? Because they are the Ballot Bandits. That’s why we called it Billionaires and Ballot Bandits. It didn’t say Billionaires versus Ballot Bandits, it’s Billionaires AND, or I should’ve really said Billionaires ARE Ballot Bandits. The guys who run the super duper PACs like Americans for Prosperity, the Koch Brother’s SuperPAC, and American Crossroads, that’s Turd Blossom’s operation, the two organizations together have over half a billion dollars. No one can put in full-page ads every day except for them. They’re not going to bust themselves. They’re not going to say, here’s the crimes we’ve committed, we just thought that you should be an informed voter and know all about it.

Now, Donetta Davidson, I call her the Purge’n General. Yeah, she got rid of 20% of the voters of Colorado, which just made Katherine Harris green with envy. Well, she was already kind of greenish, but green with envy instead of rot. And, Donetta Davidson, instead of being read her rights and marched off to the federal penitentiary for this crime, Bush appointed her as Chairwoman of the US Elections Assistance Commission. They made her basically the Purge’n General in charge of elections nationwide. So that was the example, you steal enough and you get the reward. It’s a sick, sick system.

SW: What happened with the Scott Walker recall in Wisconsin this summer?

GP: I was just up in Baraboo, Wisconsin this week, and in Baraboo Obama won by 28%. That’s a crush, right? And yet, in the recall vote, Scott Walker won it big time. Now, come on, how does that happen? Well, let me let you in on a little secret. The secret is called Themis. Themis is the Koch Brother’s magical vote munching machine. It’s a data mining operation. It does two things. It’s capable first of something that’s creepy but legal. They fill out ballots for their own voters, mail them and tell them to sign it. It’s all perfect so they’re beyond challenge. So their voters are all taken care of basically, they’ve already been voted for if they sign.

Then, the Themis machine is capable of doing all the caging, all the challenging, the purging, and the blocking at the polls to keep away the voters. For example, if I went by the Brennan Center numbers, and these are experts and therefore no one listens to them, but if you do listen to the screaming, screeching, buried experts, 97,000 Wisconsinites, almost all of them students, were barred from voting because they lacked state ID. Even though they had state student ID, that’s not state ID.

But that wasn’t enough for the Themis machine. The Koch Operation, Americans for Prosperity, had its Chief set up a front called United Sportsmen of Wisconsin. United Sportsmen of Wisconsin, which appeared and then instantly vanished after the recall vote, using the Themis machine, were able to identify likely Democratic absentee voters in key recall areas. Because there were also votes, by the way, on legislatures. The Themis machine was able to get the United Sportsmen of Wisconsin to identify Democratic voters, send them letters saying here’s where you mail in your ballot, and here’s the deadline. The address was a phony, it was their own, and the date was after the legal date for submitting an absentee ballot. So, either way, you were fucked like a duck. The Sportsmen basically were hunting Democrats. That’s how it worked. And again, as Bobby Kennedy says – he’s Dean of Law School at Pace University – this is a crime. And it’s a double crime when you add in the fact that most of this is racially targeted.

SW: How many people do you think are going to lose their right to vote this November nationwide?

GP: I can give you the exact number for 2008 which was 5,901,814 — in fact, if you look in the book you can get the real serious point-by-point break down.

SW: Yeah, I’ve got the same numbers for 2008 and 2010.

GP: Here’s the deal, for 2012 we’re looking at double to triple the loss. And it will be highly targeted. We’re going to go from 488,000 absentee ballots, which were cast and not counted in 2008, to having 2 million absentee votes thrown in the garbage…and it will occur, of course, in very targeted areas. The magnitude of the steal in America is very large because we have an electoral system and of course, don’t’ forget, we have something called the United States Senate. Heaven help us. And not my numbers, but the University of Minnesota says that seven Republicans are sitting in the Senate not because they were elected, but because they didn’t count all the votes. So I see that magnified. I can see a complete shoplifting of the US Senate. So how many more than 6 million votes lost this time? I can only guess. My numbers are more conservative than the experts at the Brennan Center, so I’d say 10 million. They would have the number much, much higher.

SW: Will most of those be in the swing states?

GP: Most of those will be in the swing states, but the key thing is that most of those will be in the non-billionaire community. [It’ll be in areas where] the 47% of the lazy ass, dependent skivers that are sucking off the government’s tit – democrats – live. Remember vote theft is class war by other means. I mean, there’s this whole ugly Ku Klux Klan counting system we have, but it’s really about class.

In fact, my studies were showing that the worst vote theft in some states is actually of the poor white voter. And while it will be in swing states substantially, it’s also because that’s where the congressional and senate races are hot. Like Missouri, like Ohio, that’s where you’re going to see it. Not even so much to swing the presidential election but to swing those congressional and senate seats.

SW: Could you explain what overvotes and undervotes are?

GP: That’s a fancy ass term for getting jacked on your ballot. For example, an overvote is where you vote twice, by accident supposedly, or often by deceptive ballot design, or someone has a reason to cut out your vote. I give an example, a true example, in which I saw ballots when I went down to Florida where in the Black community of Gadsden the ballot said: “write in candidates name.” So people wrote: “Al Gore.” But they also voted for Al Gore by punching the ballot.

Now, according to Katherine Harris, that someone voted twice. The old rule was that the voter’s intent counted. So like, excuse me, can you figure out the voter’s intent if they punch Al Gore and write Al Gore? Is that difficult to figure out their intent? But no, it was thrown out saying they can’t figure out the intent, overvote, it’s out.

Undervote works the other way. You didn’t vote enough. For example, and literally, two old people I know, two elderly people, my parents, okay — they wrote in a candidate’s name, a Democrat, Donna Frye, the surfer chick of San Diego.

SW: I remember her.

GP: And Frye won by a couple thousand votes for Mayor of San Diego in a write-in campaign. But then, after the fact, they disqualified 4,000 ballots, including my parents’, because while they wrote in Donna Frye, they didn’t blacken the bubble next to her name that said that they were writing in her name. Now, one way to figure out whether they wrote in her name was that they wrote in her name, but again, the new trickery that’s being done, now computer aided, they called that an undervote and it was thrown out. This was the problem. So Jesus Christ, don’t fucking go postal on me. Do not mail in your ballot. Shove it down their throats. Walk in with your ballot, even if you have an absentee ballot, take it to your Board of Elections and make sure there’s no problem.

SW: How do these officials get away with it? As I recall, the Voting Act of 1965 is all about the intent of the voter?

GP: Yes.

SW: How do they get around that when the intent is so clear?

GP: How do these guys get away with it? One, they fire the cops and they give themselves the badges, as we saw with creeps like Rove’s right hand man, Tim Griffin.

SW: Right.

GP: Two, one thing about stealing an election is that you basically steal a police department. You’re the cops. There’s no enforcement because you steal the badges. You’re now the Justice Department okay? There’s a couple of other elements too. The Democrats have their hands dirty in this shit too. They’re not nearly as good, but they’re dirty enough, that they’ve got shit stains in their party underwear.

SW: Especially in New Mexico, right?

GP: Especially creepy things like in New Mexico, where you have this massive wipeout of the poor Hispanic voter. A wipeout. Purges, blocking, registrations thrown out, Native American registrations dumped in the garbage, provisional and absentee ballots thrown out. An entire precinct of Native American and Hispanic soldiers, where they claim that there was not a single vote for President of the United States. All these games, pulled off, all that vote blocking done against Hispanic Democrats, by Hispanic Democrats, by the elite. Again, this is a class war issue. People like Bill Richardson — do you know a lot of William Richardson’s who are Hispanic? So you figure that one out. And the Secretary of State, who I’m glad to say is on trial and hopefully on her way to prison for these games, that’s rare, but she couldn’t just steal the vote, she had to steal the money from the voting machine companies as well.

The thing is, the Democrats have their hands dirty, but the victims are always the same. You’ll notice that the Democrats go after Democrats and the Republicans go after Democrats, so it’s always poor defenseless voters who get it in the rectum.

SW: In the book, you detail the nine ways that are most commonly used to purge votes. We talked about caging, you defined that. Didn’t caging begin as a direct mail tool?

GP: What’s interesting is Rove & Company is a direct mail operation, which is why they used the term caging, because that’s used in direct mail. Usually, when people send back checks in the mail the letters usually have to be opened inside a metal cage, literally. That was one of the hints to me that Rove was in the middle of this.

SW: Rove made his fortune in direct mailing.

GP: Yes, and not only that, but the guy who sent the emails, believe it or not, the little criminal Tim Griffin – who by the way is not in jail, he’s in the U.S. Congress right now – I’m the only guy who actually believed [Griffin] when he said he didn’t know what he was sending out. Because Rove doesn’t have his own computer — Rove is a whiz kid with computers. He was the first guy to use computers in elections, which he did for Richard Nixon. While the rest of us were protesting the war, he was wearing a clip-on tie, a white shirt, and with his small, soft hands had all these computer tapes rolling to figure out who to electronically zap.

SW: He was mining databases back then?

GP: Yeah, the first guy to do it...and then working as a protégé to Richard Viguerie, a right-wing freak show [and the pioneer of political direct mailing]. Rove hasn’t denied it and Rove reads all my stuff carefully. I know because the Justice Department got his files and made them public. I said clearly Griffin has said that he didn’t know what caging is and his boss [Rove] doesn’t have a computer, so who sent out those caging lists? Well, golly gee, you figure it out. Now, it could’ve been Griffin’s assistant, a guy named Matt Rhodes. He’s not in jail either, he’s now the Campaign Chairman for Willard Mitt Romney.

SW: What a coincidence. Okay, tell me what TOSSING is.

GP: That’s tossing of absentee ballots. We mentioned that. If you mail in your ballot like my parents did, they throw it out because they didn’t like the size of your ballot, your postage is due, or you didn’t lick it correctly – I kid you not – you wrote the different name on the outside of the envelope than you did when you signed it on the inside, suspect signature. Now who’s suspect in America? And who suspects us? This is the game that’s played. Like I said, officially 488,000 absentee ballots were tossed out on the most cockamamie reasons and 2 million are going that way this November.

SW: Okay. How about computer hacking?

GP: What I call PRESTIDIGITIZING, because while hacking is an issue, I’m not an expert at that. I wanted people to focus on the other problems of computer voting, which is if you want to steal a vote by computer, the easiest thing to do is unplug it…And a favorite in places like Florida is to not give black poll workers the passwords to open the machines. So votes lost in computers, that’s a lot easier than when they play the game of supposedly switching your vote, which is complex and difficult. What’s real easy is for the machine just to go bluey and not record.18,000 votes went bluey in Democratic precincts in a congressional race in which a Republican won by only 500 votes. Katherine Harris’ old Sarasota District. All those votes just disappeared. “Gee, there was a glitch, what can we tell you? They just didn’t show up.” And, go ahead, try to find the fingerprints on that fucker.

SW: Is Diebold still in the middle of this or are there other manufacturers of electronic voting machines that are in on it?

GP: There’s plenty of operators in on the game. Like I say, they were bribing Secretaries of State like the Becky Vigil-Giron of New Mexico. The bribery is rampant and the games are rampant, but like I said, the big thing is the machines not working. Hugo Chavez’ buddies bought one voting company hoping to correct our elections, figuring [Chavez] had a better chance if Americans actually had their votes counted. But again, once they get the machines, they go zap. All they have to do is screw them up so that the votes do not appear. That’s the biggest thing. Precinct after precinct where you see zero votes on hot key offices. Zero votes. And, they go well, “What can we say?” There is simply no way to trace it back.

SW: What about SPOILING?

GP: In Gadsden, Florida, for example, where I saw these wonderful optical reading machines, that’s the best thing you could have, paper ballots that are optically read. In white rich areas, every precinct had its own little reader. If you make a mistake, and you accidentally add an extra mark or forget to vote for an office, you will get a message and you get to revote, correct your ballot, whatever. But in poor black areas, Hispanic areas, Native American areas, where they put in optically read balloting, these areas don’t have the money, just like they don’t have money for good schools, they don’t have money for good hospitals, they don’t have money for good voting systems, and everyone knows it. The ballots go to a central reader and if there’s an error, the ballot simply gets tossed out.

Now spoiling is no joke, we have nearly a million and a half votes spoiled every presidential election. A million and a half, and the chance of your ballot spoiling is 900% higher if you’re black than if you’re white. 500% higher if you’re Hispanic than if you’re white. And it’s statistically insane for Native Americans, how high the spoilage rate is. I have a chapter called “Indians Spoiled Rotten” because their ballots spoil all over the place. Again, because of the crap machines that they’re given, not because they don’t know how to vote.

SW: How about REJECTING?

GP: Oh excuse me, I’m sorry, I reversed these. Rejecting is disallowing absentee ballots. Tossing is throwing out provisional ballots. So just to get the terminology right here. Now what is a provisional ballot? As Lee Camp said in his SuicideGirls rant based on the book, when your name is purged or some bullshit, or you don’t have the right ID, they’ll say, “Oh, take this provisional ballot and we’ll count it later.” No they won’t. Lee said, filling out a provisional ballot is like voting on a fart, okay. It’s gone. Because whatever knocked you out in the first place stays knocked out. If they say you’re a felon, you have a felony record. And in Colorado, they removed all these people with felony records, despite the fact that in most states, including Colorado, you can vote with a felony record. But, forget all that, if they have it dead wrong and they give you a provisional ballot, they’re not going to count that vote, they’ll just say that they can re-register you next time. It’s a placebo ballot. They throw them out. I think it’s going to be big this time because when people go in with the wrong ID they’re going to be handed these provisional ballots so they don’t bitch. So, 767,023 provisional ballots were knocked out last time. Three quarters of a million — watch that double.

SW: Okay. How about ERRORS? Now, you talk about government clerks making mistakes. Is some of this intentional and some of it just human error?

GP: The answer is yes. It’s what I call vulture opportunism. I think 1 in 12 names are input wrong. You know, you fill out those forms and some knucklehead has to read it, you have sloppy ass handwriting, so they get your name wrong when they input it. And, it turns out that it’s especially unusual names like Mohammad or, in California, a lot of Filipino names and hyphenated names and Hispanic names with the funny accents on them and stuff. So they get it wrong. But they know who’s getting fucked on these errors and they don’t notify anyone. You don’t know until you show up that you lost your vote or that your ID doesn’t match the name they inputted. I mean, in Arizona we had Juarez spelled with a ‘W’ so people lost their votes because you know, their ID didn’t say Juarez with a ‘W’…I mean Paul Maez, his name was knocked off and he’s the Elections Supervisor in Santa Miguel County, which is a very poor Hispanic area. I asked why that happened and he said, “The answers on the down low.” That’s all he would say.

SW: What is EJECTING?

GP: We have a chapter called “Nuns on the Run” where I go through the case of the 10 nuns who didn’t have their driver’s licenses in Indiana, which has the worst ID law. It’s a good thing they didn’t because one of them was 98 years old. They’d been voting in the same place for decades. I understand this ID law is to prevent voter fraud, however, there has not been a single case, not one, of a nun or anyone else voting fraudulently, stealing someone else’s ID. See, the whole point of ID is to say, “I’m the person whose name is listed there.” No one does that crime because you absolutely get caught, you absolutely go to jail. You’re insane to do that to vote for a school bond or even to vote for Hillary Clinton or Ron Paul. No one does it. That’s why we don’t have those cases.

SW: On August 12th, the Carnegie and Knight Foundation report was released. After examining thousands of documents from 2000 to 2010, and looking at 600 million votes, they found only 10 cases of alleged in-person voter fraud. Those were just alleged and no there were no convictions. So, these two very bi-partisan foundations together said that voter fraud is virtually non-existent.

GP: As I point out in Billionaires and Ballot Bandits, Tova Wang, who’s from the Century Foundation, was asked by the Elections Assistance Commission to analyze voter fraud and she found only 6 cases a year. 6 million voters are knocked out a year to stop 6 cases of voter fraud a year! So she says you’re more likely to get hit by lightning. I actually calculated that you’re 60 times more likely to get hit by lightning then commit voter fraud.

SW: Okay, how about STUFFING?

GP: I left stuffing to Bobby Kennedy. That chapter is written by the Professor. He goes through the good old-fashioned stuff of cranking in the votes after the election is over to change the outcome. He just took a simple case, Don Siegelman of Alabama. By the way, most times it’s paper but sometimes, like in this case, it’s by computer. That’s very helpful because then there’s no trail. Don Siegelman was reelected Governor of Alabama by several thousand votes. Then, in a Republican area, the courthouse was sealed. They said a mistake was made, they had a recount of votes and they got something like 8,000 votes that they suddenly found overnight that had switched and Siegelman lost. There was no record of how this happened. No one was allowed to observe this so-called computer recount, or question why it took all night. Just a bunch of Republican officials locked in a room. And when Siegelman bitched, which you’re not supposed to do... Siegelman decided to scream bloody murder, and so he was arrested and today he’s in a federal penitentiary. Because they always have files on these guys. Everyone has a file, and they pulled it out on him. He still refuses to concede. He says, “I’m Governor. I was elected. I’m not giving up.” ….So what happened is, they kept him out of office by good old-fashioned stuffing.

SW: Okay, now. Where does lying come in? I’m talking about trying to convince ex-cons that they aren’t allowed to vote when in fact they are.

GP: The ex-con con is what I call BLOCKING. It’s part of the stopping of registration of legal voters. You know, one way is to make it illegal by simply arresting members of the League of Women Voters for having clipboards in public or something, which, basically, Florida tried to do. It was very effective. Black and Hispanic registration has dropped in America by 2 million since the last election. 2 million fewer black and Hispanic voters. Because we know fewer Hispanics have come in to the country and fewer are becoming citizens, is that right? No.

So, what’s happened? One way to block voters is to convince them, and even some minor officials, that they can’t vote when they can. The biggest unrepresented vote in America is not the youth vote, it’s not the Hispanic vote, it is the ex-felon vote. If you served your time in the United States of America, except for six old Jim Crow states, in 44 states, if you served your sentence, you can vote. You don’t become a non-citizen. You have to basically be in jail or under probation to have your vote removed in most states, and in most states even not on probation. You have 16 million ex-cons in the United States for committing crimes like doing a little blow and being poor. Obama did a little blow but he wasn’t poor. Or having a little J but not inhaling. That’s Clinton because he was at Oxford, so he’s got the Oxford elite exemption. So, remember, we’re not talking about people who have committed crimes, we’re talking about people who’ve been caught comitting in crimes in America, and those are two different categories – 46% are black and a lot are Hispanic, and that’s knocking out 16 million voters.

Here’s the interesting thing. Something the Democratic Party never mentions, and they should, which is that 88% of voters who go to prison come out Democrats. 88% come out Democrats. It’s16 million voters, you do the math. If the Democrats would stand up for these voters, they could never lose an election, but they won’t. In fact, it’s the opposite. They will take anyone that looks like a felon, in other words, black, BLA as they say on the Florida Voter Forms, and the Democrats let them be labeled felons and whistle at their shoes. It’s sick….And Obama, by the way, has nothing to say about that.

SW: We covered the nine ways they suppress the vote, could you go through for me the seven prescriptive solutions that voters can do?

GP:Yeah. One is don’t go postal. I just told you, they throw the crap in the garbage. I mean, you think these guys even want your vote, a bunch of partisan sharks and you’re going to mail it to them? Come on, get real. Second, vote early because when they fuck you around and say that Steven is a criminal, you can go back and say, well I served my time so I can still vote. Three is register and re-register. I know you think you’re registered. You voted last time, what’s the problem? The answer is, don’t be a schmuck. They’ve knocked out 22 million people in the last 2 years. Let me repeat that: 22 million people purged. That means you better get online and check if you are still registered. County Clerk or a Secretary of State’s office, get your name and get your address and make sure that your name is not spelled with an ‘F’. Okay.

SW: Right.

GP: Number four, vote unconditionally, not provisionally. Don’t take one of these placebo ballots. Don’t vote on a fart. Five, occupy Ohio, invade Nevada. What I mean by that is, get your ass in gear, okay? Show your shit, do your thing. Martin Luther King took a bullet for the vote. You can take a bus. You can do something valuable. The revolution will not be digitized. Go to where the votes count. If you’re in a non-swing state, though look at those congressional districts, it’s not just about the presidency. And I don’t care whether you’re for Obammy or Mitt Romney, this is not a partisan issue, this is about protecting ourselves from the Ballot Bandits. Number six is date a voter. As I say, voting, love and bowling should never be done alone. There’s all kinds of reasons for that including when they jack you around that you have people with you. It’s always easier to stand up when you’ve got people watching your back. Because sometimes people complain and they get busted. And also convince your friends, your frienemies, whatever, to show up and vote.

I don’t want to hear any crap about it doesn’t matter, they’re going to steal my vote. Fuck you, okay? I’d take your name off my list, don’t read my books, you’re not getting a ride in my car – I’m not going to let you date my ex-wife. I don’t want to hear from you with that crap. It’s not about the candidates. It’s about this thing that we have fought forever for. As Jesse Jackson said, “Marched too long, worked too hard, died too young.” If you haven’t put those three things on the line, then you definitely don’t have no right to talk about whether we should vote or not.

Seven, make the democracy demand no vote left behind. The election is November 6th. I want to see your ass at BallotBandits.org on November 7th, because we’re going to review whose vote was stolen where. Even if they reelect Obama, that’s not the issue, you need to know which votes were stolen and believe me, how many congressional and senate seats were swiped, whether or Obama wins or not.

When Obama won in 2008, it doesn’t matter when 6 million votes are stolen. That’s sick business, and it’s got to stop, and we have to demand that the votes be counted. If Don Seigelmen is ready to go to jail because he said the votes should be counted, shit let’s do it. We saw this in Serbia, we saw this in Peru, we’ve seen people in the Ukraine, people stand up and say, you can’t steal the fucking election, not from me. That’s it. So, we have to stay with it. That’s the Seven Demands, that we don’t shrug our shoulders and do an Al Gore.

Visit BallotBandits.org to buy the Billionaires & Ballots Bandits book and/or download the 7 Ways to Beat the Ballot Bandits poster for free.

commentary
TUESDAY OCTOBER 9 2012 9:05 PM

A Guy’s Perspective: Falling in Love (And Other Deadly Sins)

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

by Symbol

[Bracket in Heart In Cage]

Life is short: Be respectful. Take healthy risks. You only have one life to live…

I seem to have lived life as a serial monogamist. I'm not sure how, or why, this has happened. Anyone who knew me in my sexually "formative" years, would probably have voted me most likely to be non-committal – a perpetual bachelor.  

But the truth of it is, shortly after my explosive "experimental" phase (which is a very polite way of saying "when I stopped being a slut") I got roped down, tamed and branded into a series of perpetually never-ending longterm relationships; Eight, actually. Eight longterm relationships, two engagements, though I never married.   

I think, for me at least, love strikes when least expected. I can't actually remember ever thinking, "Okay, today I'm going to go out and find someone to fall in love with." I mean, sure, we all go out looking, right? But it's still a surprise when it actually starts to happen.  

There's really nothing sadder to me though, than when you fall in love alone. I have several friends who seem to perpetually carry torches for other people who will, let's be honest, never return their affections – at least not at a comparable level of intensity.  

Keeping yourself in check, at least to some degree, is definitely a skill set that they don’t teach you in high school. When I fall for someone, and that is rare, I fall hard and fast. I fall like someone who thought they were going sky-diving and accidentally packed their laundry instead of a parachute.  

Intensity like that can be really scary for someone new and finding matched intensity is always preferable. But chemistry like that doesn’t work or happen for everyone. That’s why we develop phrases and codes that we use to communicate to one another – in part to spare each other’s feelings.  

I had a friend recently tell me that she “can’t” say no to guys when they ask her out, she just feels too bad. No matter how disinterested she might be, she is willing to go out (at least for coffee) with anyone brave enough to ask. This kind of boggles me, because I’m far pickier about who I will entertain.  

Even though I’ve been a serial monogamist, I’ve had an unreasonably high number of relationships in my lifetime. I think, however, this enables me to really quickly process what I am, and am not, interested in – with reasonably decent accuracy. It also means that when things aren’t right I don’t fuck around, I bail.  

I find myself barreling towards the end of the year – rapidly living out the last days of summer, awaiting the oncoming winter and all that that entails. I’m finally in a place where I love my job, I have a reasonably enjoyable life, too many side projects to possibly handle at one time – and a hole. 

I’m not a codependent person, far from it. I’ve taken care of my own needs for longer than I haven’t in life, but I think I tend to notice things like my “hole” far more readily when things are good, than when they are bad. When I’m happy, it’s natural for me to want to share that happiness and watch it spread.  

When you’re single, it’s a very different dynamic – sharing happiness. You trickle it out, piece by piece, to those who you’re closest too, but never really share it the way you might with someone you truly love. I don’t mean to imply that you can’t love your friends – I just mean it’s a different type of love.  

Near the end of the summer I “met someone.” Of course I wasn’t expecting too, I wasn’t prepared – I certainly wasn’t looking. There’s massive chemistry there for me, which is scary; scary because although I know she’s interested – it still feels a little like a one-sided romance.

She’s told me she’s not ready.  Not ready to me means a variety of different things. They each reflect a different level of ego and/or confidence, I suppose. I won’t go into great detail, I’m sure you can project your own perspective on that phrase – but it leads to a three-way conflict of possible behaviurs, each with their own dangers.  

The first choice, the most obvious, is patience. The danger in this option is reflected in the phrase “waiting in vain.” What exactly are you waiting for? Things to suddenly become right? Moons to align? A change in the stars? For them to wake up one morning and go, “Ooooooh. I get it now”?  

Waiting may work for some, and if it does, great! But life experience tells me that, for most, the longer you wait the more danger rises – danger of falling into the “friend zone,” danger of either parties meeting someone else, danger of interest shifting and missing out on the chance for something at all.  

The second choice, which I really don’t recommend, is to push. By this I mean simply acknowledging that the person isn’t ready, but forging ahead anyway as though they were. I’ve never seen this work. I’ve only ever seen it backfire, and I’ve seen it countless times. Be really careful, consider this a warning.  

Sometimes it’s okay to push a little, especially if the intended party isn’t very forthright in communicating whether they’re honestly interested or just keeping you around until something more ideal comes along. But as soon as you get a clear idea of that, it’s best to change to a more respectful strategy.  

The third choice, which most of you won’t like, is simply to bail. If you, like me, don’t have time to wait around for someone, or for them to come around to your way of thinking, then it probably wasn’t mean to be in the first place. The best love, the strongest, should burn brightly, from both sides.  

Ask yourself one simple question: If the roles were reversed, how would you feel? If your answer is, honestly, “This wouldn’t bother me at all.” So be it. But if you get even remotely squiggly about being treated the way you’re acting towards someone else? It’s time to reconsider your behavior.  

For many, a balanced approach of all three is usually what happens. Thought problems arise when people get tired of one and switch to two – or when they can’t seem to accept that maybe it’s time to switch to three.  

But in the end, if you really are interested, then you really are going to be waiting. Waiting for trust to grow, waiting for whatever gives them pause to transform – maybe even vanish – waiting for them to realize that they do, in fact, like you as much as you like them. And that that’s okay.  

Unless you know, for certain, what their reasons are (and realistically, I'm not sure how you could possibly know that since I've never met anyone who was that transparent and open with their feelings, especially to someone new, that they're interested in) you're waiting. Patiently or impatiently, is up to you.  

So back to me. As I said, I met someone. Boom. Head-shot. Caught me completely unaware. It's that "brand-spanking-new-want-to-see-them-all-the-time" sensation, butting up firmly against a "whoa-things-are-moving-too-quickly-wall." At this point I'm just lucky that I've met her, and that she likes me.  

So I’m waiting, for now. I’m taking the time to fully determine if what I’m feeling is infatuation, or something more. If that bursting sensation, the one I can barely contain sometimes, is something that will fade with time, or if it will consume me. I’m waiting, and hoping, that she'll realize it's worth the risk.

commentary
TUESDAY OCTOBER 9 2012 12:15 AM

Dear Republican Friends: Regarding Your Candidate

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Activism, Blog, Politics, Debates, Healthcare, Mitt Romney

by Sandor Stern

Dear Republican Friends,

Regarding Your Candidate...

I know that following the first presidential debate you are feeling pretty good about your candidate. He won hands down on style and energy, but as for substance? If you are a conservative who followed Romney through the Republican Presidential debates where he touted his belief in all of your policies and positions, were you not alarmed over his new declarations? Perhaps you have become inured to the constant shape shifting of your candidate. In 1994 when he ran against Ted Kennedy for the senate, he was a moderate in a state that has always supported moderation in its candidates. He even supported Roe v. Wade. He was still a moderate when he ran for governor of Massachusetts in 2002. He even promoted and signed into law the state's Healthcare Act. Perhaps you can forgive him for that because it was being promoted by your own conservative think tank, The Heritage Foundation. And perhaps their support for that private insurance plan was motivated by the fear that a Massachusetts legislature that was dominantly Democrat might veer towards a universal public health care plan. But the plan signed by Romney stands as the model for "Obamacare" – a plan anathema to your core beliefs (which have apparently changed since 2002). So the question to be answered is this: was the Romney who debated Obama, the ultraconservative you nominated? And, if so, will he remain in that guise through a presidential term in office? For you moderate Republicans who would savor a shift towards your position, will he actually make that shift if elected?

In judging a person running for President it seems paramount to view substance. In this case substance encompasses words, deeds and party platform.

As for words: following the debate, fact checkers logged 27 lies in Romney's 40 minutes of speaking. That's a lie in less than every 2 minutes. That's astounding even for a man who has demonstrated an enormous appetite for lies throughout the course of his political career. Even back in 2002, when he ran for Governor of Massachusetts and was required by law to be a resident of the state, he lied until confronted by evidence that he lived and paid taxes in Utah. This man has flip flopped more times than a trout in the bottom of a fishing boat. Here’s just a few examples culled from the many:

On January 4, 2009 he supported the stimulus package but on September 28, 2011 he said he never supported it.

In 2009 he said that President Obama was copying his healthcare ideas and he was glad to hear it, but on October 18, 2011 he said Obamacare is bad and he will repeal it.

In June 2011, he said "I believe the world is getting warmer and humans contribute to that," but five months later in October, 2011 he said, "We don't know what is causing climate change."

In March, 2002, he said he would not sign a "no tax" pledge, but in October 2007 he said he was "proud to be the only candidate for President to sign the tax pledge."

In December, 2009, he said TARP ought to be ended, but in June, 2010 he said "TARP kept the financial system from collapsing - it was the right thing to do."

In January, 2008, he said, "I'm not willing to sit back and say too bad for Michigan, too bad for the car industry" but in June, 2011, he stated, "That's exactly what I said - let Detroit go bankrupt."

As for deeds: Romney had a political life of four years. Although he touts his success as Massachusetts Governor, the facts don't support him. His one major success or failure (depending on the political points he can score) was the healthcare plan. More than two thirds of voters are happy with the plan, yet for most of the Republican nominating season, Romney shied away from the topic. It wasn't until the Presidential debate that he crowed about how he worked with Democrats to pass the legislation. With a legislature heavily stacked with Democrats who wanted healthcare legislation passed, how hard was his path? But kudos, it was passed under his governorship. As for bipartisanship, Democrats, who were legislators during his term, tell a different story. Romney used a bully pulpit approach towards promoting his agenda, staging well organized media events to appeal directly to the public rather than pushing his proposals in behind-doors sessions. Though he rails against tax hikes, during his tenure fees were raised for driver's licenses and gun licenses. Cuts in spending put pressure on localities to raise property taxes from 49% to 53% of revenues. Cutting $140 million in state funding for higher education led state run colleges and universities to increase fees by 63%. The combined state and local tax burden rose during his governorship. By the time his term was over, Massachusetts ranked last among the 50 states in job creation. He left office with an approval rating of 34%, ranking 48th of all U.S. governors.

As for party platform: I assume you are happy with your party platform of 2012. Or have you read it? Let me refresh your memory.

It will ban abortion even if pregnancy is the result of rape or incest. That includes opposition to government funding of abortion and contraception, opposition to embryonic cell research and cloning.

It strongly opposes any affirmative action to bring more women into the workforce and opposes women in combat.

It strongly opposes same-sex domestic partnership benefits, defines marriage as between one man and one woman and seeks a constitutional amendment banning same sex marriage, opposes homosexuals serving in the military, believes states should not recognize gay marriages from other states.

Strongly opposes more federal funding for health coverage and favors the repeal of Obamacare.

Strongly favors privatizing Social Security, and wants to give workers the choice to invest their payroll taxes.

Strongly favors reforming Medicare with a voucher system.

Strongly favors teacher-led prayer in public schools, limiting the role of federal government in education, favors parents choosing schools through vouchers and promoting school choice and home schooling.

Strongly favors the death penalty, mandatory three strikes sentencing laws with harsher sentences for serious crimes and an absolute right to gun ownership, including the right to obtain and store ammunition without registration and no gun licensing.

Strongly opposes replacing coal and oil with alternatives.

Strongly opposes making taxes more progressive, favors tax cuts including corporate tax cuts and repeal of the inheritance tax.

Strongly opposes illegal immigrants earning citizenship, favors making E-verify mandatory nationwide and opposes any amnesty.

Strongly opposes stricter limits on political campaign funds, favors repealing McCain-Feingold, favors no contribution limits and favors photo ID in order to vote.

This is the platform of a party that cries out against big government. If you know and accept it then I assume you don't see nor care about the hypocrisy. You want the government out of your lives in the essentials of health and ageing and education but you have no problem with the government in your bedroom or your house of worship. And this is the platform you believe your candidate will stand upon if elected President. Will he? Should he? And given what we know of him through his words and deeds and his acceptance of this platform, is this the character of a man you really want presiding over this country?

Just asking.

Your inquisitive friend,

Sandy

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commentary
SUNDAY OCTOBER 7 2012 9:04 PM

Got Problems? Sex, Love and Relationship Advice From SuicideGirls’ Team Agony

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: All Things SG, Blog, Love, Relationships, Sex, advice, Posted In All Things SG, Problems, sex, SGmember:Yulia, Society

by SG's Team Agony feat. Yulia

Let us answer life's questions - because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls.

[Yulia in Don't Panic]

Q: Last summer my wife and I split up simply because she felt lonely, which is my fault completely. We did end up getting back together, but my problem is sex, which was once great has died away. She never feels like having it any more. She doesn't even want oral sex either. Sex is not the most important thing to me, but I feel it is definitely hurting the relationship. I have tried everything in and out of the book, but have come up empty and am having thoughts about exploring my options. Is there anything I can do to restart my sex life back with my wife? I miss the fun we had.

A: Kudos to you for recognizing that your past behavior may have caused or contributed to your current situation. It's also very brave of you both to give your relationship a second chance. This shows you each recognized a strong connection and believe it's worth saving.

Since you say you're not having much sex anymore, I'm going to assume you had sex more regularly pre-breakup. Your wife may be concerned that renewing your sex life together will begin a slippery slope back down to the loneliness she felt before your time apart. I don't know how long you two have been back together, but even if it's been months, you may still be rebuilding trust. Because sex is the most intimate act, it can be easy to assume that just because you're sleeping with someone you know them well and are spending quality time together. And you are, but it's often not enough. I have friends I've never kissed that I know more deeply than people I have slept with. It's likely that this is the level of connection that your wife wants, and she may be trying hard to build a strong foundation first before she will let loose.

You need to make your wife feel special and special to YOU, like you want her and not just sex, period. But don't just treat her to the traditional stuff (flowers, and restaurants), try branching out and giving her quality time where you can enjoy each other's company as well as each other's bodies.

Most of all, be patient. Your wife wouldn't have gotten back together with you if she didn't hope to rekindle the old fire. She might just be trying a different method this time to see if the bond will be stronger.

Best of luck.

Yulia

***

Got Problems? Let SuicideGirls’ team of Agony Aunts provide solutions. Email questions to: gotproblems@suicidegirls.com

commentary
FRIDAY OCTOBER 5 2012 10:55 AM

SuicideGirls Group Therapy: Yesenia On Cute Overload

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

commentary
FRIDAY OCTOBER 5 2012 10:20 AM

Ur W33K 1N G33K (September 26 – October 2)

Submitted by Saccora

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Blog, Entertainment, Gaming, Geek, Internuts, Movies, TV, Comic Con, Comics

A.J. Focht

CW’s show Arrow based on the Green Arrow from DC comics will be premiering next week on October 10. Before it premiers, catch a first look at the story of Oliver Queen’s return after five years exiled on an island. There is also a first look at Kelly Hu as China White. Jessica de Gouw, who is playing The Huntress, talked about the difficulties with the role, citing she researched the comics for her role.

Thor is Marvel’s premier fantasy based title. The movie blended the fantasy element with reality, and the sequel, Thor: The Dark World, is set to delve even deeper into the fantasy side. It has recently been announced the film will take place across all nine realms, not just Earth and Asgard. Producer Kevin Fiege hopes the studio’s choice to go with Game of Thrones director Alan Taylor will pay off in bring out the fantasy element. Thor: The Dark World is scheduled for November 8, 2012.

Superman is returning to the silver screen on June 14, 2013 in Man of Steel.

“What Christopher Nolan and I have done with Superman is try to bring the same naturalistic approach that we adopted for the Batman trilogy. We always had a naturalistic approach, we want our stories to be rooted in reality, like they could happen in the same world we live in. It’s not that easy with Superman, and actually this doesn’t necessarily mean we will make a dark movie. But working on this reboot we are thinking about what would happen if a story like this one actually happened. How would people react to this? What impact would the presence of Superman in the real world have?” – Collider

A few months back, I reported there were talks of remaking The Munsters into a new show called Mockingbird Lane. It’s sad news with Halloween around the corner, but it looks like the series will not happen after all. The pilot was directed by Bryan Singer and starred Jerry O’Connel, Portia de Rossi, and Eddie Izzard as the Grandpa. NBC axed the show reportedly due to its ‘high-concept premise.’

On a final note, Stan Lee, in an effort to be more like Tony Stark, has had an electronic pacemaker put in. Lee took a short break from his convention schedules last week, and announced the news on Twitter. Lee comments that the pacemaker is “to insure that he’ll be able to lead thee for another 90 years.” I for one am glad the Generalissimo is doing well, and hope that whatever incidents that led to this (besides wanting to emulate Tony Stark) are now all fixed.

commentary
THURSDAY OCTOBER 4 2012 12:00 PM

Debate 2012: What The Hell Happened?

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by SG_Blog

Tags: Activism, Blog, Favorites, Politics, Bill Clinton, Billionaires And Ballot Bandits

by Greg Palast

What the hell happened? Did Barack have a fight with Michelle? Was it nicotine withdrawal? Do really rich guys just scare you, Mr. Obama?

Dear Mr. President: As a journalist I don’t take partisan sides, but I do take America’s side. And as Commander-in-Chief, you simply cannot fall asleep in the saddle.

I mean Commander-in-Chief in the Class War. The war of the billionaires against the rest of us.

You were asked, “What is the role of government?”

You seemed stumped. Lost...

When Mr. PBS Bumblebrain asked you the difference between your views and Gov. Romney’s on Social Security, you said, “You know, I suspect that, on Social Security, we’ve got a somewhat similar position.”

Really, Mr. President, REALLY?

Romney says that if you’re 38 or 54, it doesn’t matter that you’ve paid into Medicare and Social Security all your life, you don’t get the insurance you paid for. You get some stinking voucher, some coupon that says, “Here’s a hundred bucks kid, go buy a gold watch.”

Who exactly is going to take a voucher to provide health insurance to a 72-year-old with asthma, in a walker and prostate problems?

Governor Romney said, with that smirky, smarmy grin, “I’d assume I’d rather have a private [health] plan.” Gee, Mr. Romney, could you give me the number of your insurance company and tell them to take my “voucher”?

Mr. President, you gabbled on about the Cleveland Medical Clinic and its “best practices.” Who the hell cares, Mr. President? There are people bleeding out here, LITERALLY BLEEDING, who now can get health coverage because of ObamaCare. For all its failings, it saves lives, saves homes from foreclosure caused by insane medical bills – only recently, the number one cause of foreclosures in America.

Can’t you even defend the one thing that’s worth a damn and has your name on it?

Romney’s wife has MS. That’s sad. But what’s tragic is that there are millions in America with MS who couldn’t get insurance because they have this prior condition—and are not married to an investment banker demi-billionaire.

I don’t care that you couldn’t seem to defend yourself tonight, Mr. President. That’s a Democratic Party headache. What I resent, what gets me furious and angry, is that you didn’t defend ME. Me and my family.

When Romney says he defends small business, let me tell you, I have a small business. I don’t need a tax break – hell, like most small businesses, we don’t make money. We need health insurance. We need government loans.

When Romney says government never does anything cheaper than the private sector, Mr. President, don’t you know that it was government mortgage agencies that funded America’s middle class homeownership? That’s what government did – and licked Hitler to boot.

When mortgages were privatized, we were thrown at the mercy of the Banksters.

(And why the hell did you, Mr. Obama, bring up that right-wing canard that banks just gave out mortgages to people who couldn't afford them – blaming sub-prime predatory mortgage crimes on the victims. Sounds like you agree that 47% of Americans are leeches.)

Maybe it’s true that you, Mr. President, are actually just a hollow man, a creation of PR consultants and rich donors, a Ken-doll of repeating lines about “Hope,” “change” and “this country thrives when the middle class thrives.”

The truth is, you were ready to raise the retirement age for Social Security and cut back-room deals with drug companies. Maybe in the end, progressive policies are just a marketing niche you’ve found to cover aimless ambition and a yearning to compromise.

If someone drilled a hole in you, could we blow in and play you like a flute? Or is there some substance, some hard core of principal that couldn’t break out tonight because it was imprisoned by advisors who told you to play it safe, play it in a coma?

Mr. President, if you can’t explain why you are the Commander-in-Chief in this class war against the billionaire bandits attempting to seize our government, then get off the horse and let someone in the saddle who can ride.

***

A version of this story originally appeared on the The Mudflats.

Greg Palast is the author of the recently published New York Times Top 10 Bestseller Billionaires & Ballot Bandits: How to Steal an Election in 9 Easy Steps, which is available via Barnes & Noble, Amazon and Indie Bound. Author's proceeds from the book go to the not-for-profit Palast Investigative Fund for reporting on voter protection issues.

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commentary
THURSDAY OCTOBER 4 2012 12:52 AM

Life Beyond the Bar Scene: Rescued

Submitted by Laurelin

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: All Things SG, Blog, Booze, Food & Drink, Love, Relationships, Sex, Society, sex

by Laurelin

I remember that I used to go to his bar after we had broken up. I had always gone there, why should I change anything just because my life as I knew it was over? Besides, I was fine. I would do my hair differently, a different style, parted to another side. And I’d wear a little black dress because I was on my way to a fancy event that once he would have also been invited to. I was okay, and he would see that.

I wasn’t okay, I was drunk. Lines blurred and people stared, and when I fell backwards off my barstool he came running to help me up. I screamed that I didn’t need his help anymore, that I was fine. Our friends shook their heads and saw me home, and I knew that I was far from fine. That night would replay a couple of times a week; a different dress, the same sad looks. And always I would cry when I thought no one was looking, even though everyone was. He must have been horrified.

Three years later, I watch him walk drunk into my bar regularly. He has his head held high, but I can always tell that something is wrong.

After the scene unfolded for the first time, I leant over to one of our friends and said, “This is what it was like all those years ago when I used to go into his bar, isn’t it?” Our friend nodded his head, and I felt impossibly sad.

I would rather have nights of my own endless heartbreak than know I’m causing someone else to ache like that. I don’t know what’s happening, and I am powerless to stop any of it. I have my own problems and having front row seats to his makes me feel guilty for being annoyed, but I am.

“I just miss you,” he says, reaching for me. I turn away, just out of his reach and I want to cry, but I don’t. Not until I was telling someone else the story later did my eyes fill with tears. “You’re happy now,” he had slurred and I wanted so badly to shake him and tell him that I was anything but happy; I was still always being let down, the only constant in my life was our sad city bar scene. But he didn’t need to know that. If he thought I was happy and that made him sad, it wasn’t my place to let him know that I really did want to be rescued – just not by him anymore.

It’s raining outside today, and I can’t bring myself to get out of bed. I don’t feel like drinking, I don’t feel like talking, texting, writing, eating. I feel sad, alone, heartbroken. I have to be at the bar in one hour. As shitty as I feel I know, I’ll get up, I’ll add some color to my pale cheeks and I’ll fake a smile, and while some people will know, others won’t. I’ll be okay. Maybe he’ll call and maybe he won’t, and no matter which “he” it is, I shouldn’t answer the phone, because nothing is right.

I have to be at the bar in one hour, and the mere thought of lifting my face off this pillow is enough to make me turn to ashes.

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Life Beyond the Bar Scene: Liquid Running
Life Beyond the Bar Scene: Anger and Other Mostly Useless Emotions
Life Beyond the Bar Scene: One of the Guys
Life Beyond the Bar Scene: A Case of the Crazies
Life Beyond the Bar Scene: Unsettled
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Life Beyond the Bar Scene: Getting Naked With Laurelin
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commentary
WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 3 2012 9:48 PM

Tactical Animal: Round One

Submitted by ChrisSick

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Blog, Politics, Presidential Debates, RNC

by ChrisSick

Mitt Romney loves Big Bird. He likes coal. He doesn't like expensive things. They hurt families.

This is what passes for substance in a Presidential debate. By the fifteen minute mark I felt as bored and listless as President Obama looked, and was mostly focused on trying to figure out what drugs he was taking and pondering how hard it would be to acquire some for myself, because by the half hour mark I was clearly more upset with how poorly he was doing in the debate than he was.

If you want the conventional wisdom take you'll be seeing over the course of the next seven days before the VP debate takes place on October 11, it can be boiled down to Mitt Romney won and Jim Lehrer should've just stayed the hell home.

Every time the President smiled while Romney was speaking, it was because Lehrer was making a “talks too goddamn much” sign with his hands while slugging back from the flask he had in his jacket pocket. It was a pretty embarrassing show for everyone involved, honestly, except for Mitt Romney, who has no shame.

It only took fifteen minutes into the debate for Governor Romney to reverse himself completely on his tax policy. When pressed on the analysis by the non-partisan Tax Policy Center that says he couldn't possibly implement his proposed 20% tax cut and not add $5 trillion to the deficit without increasing taxes on the middle class by closed deductions he happily pointed out that he has studies that show otherwise. And the President has studies. We all have studies, but Mitt Romney likes JOBS.

It was a stunning display of politics in a post-partisan era and Obama seemed slow to respond to it. Analysis from Jon Lovett (no, not that one) at The Atlantic sums it up well:

“In many ways, this election is a referendum on whether or not Mitt Romney's kind of politics is effective. People can argue about the president's policies, but he has always been honest about our fiscal situation; he has always been honest about gimmicks -- whether it was cutting earmarks four years ago or cutting PBS today -- which will do almost nothing to lower our debt. Mitt Romney believes he can get by without the numbers adding up. He can be for deficit reduction while being against cutting taxes, entitlements, and military spending. He can promise more education funding to some audiences; more NASA funding to Florida; more health-care funding to seniors; and 'Oh by the way, I won't accept any deal that raises even meager revenues when compared to budget cuts.' It's BS. It's nonsense. It's obviously not true. But he has not only embraced this idea, he's embraced its cheerleader in the Congress, Paul Ryan.

So anyway, that's frustrating.”

By the halfway mark the President was finally beginning to wake up, successfully laying traps for Romney that put him on record supporting Medicare vouchers, saw him stumbling through a populist style attack on big banks, and trying to explain away Romneycare/Obamacare, which one of the advisors who helped draft the two laws says “it's the same fucking bill.”

But Obama continually failed to capitalize on these attacks and build any momentum. By 9:50 PM EST, it was clear to most people that Obama wasn't going to pull this one out, despite getting a few good jabs in. Republicans, of course, had been claiming victory for at least thirty minutes by that point. One thing Republicans aren't shy about, it's claiming victory.

Romney wandered into a few traps that will work well for future Obama ad-buys, and spawned at least one new Twitter account (@FiredBigBird), but he did his job reasonably well, and kept the President listless and defensive. I found myself not being sold by Obama's liberal ideals that I already agree with.

From Jon Lovett, again, an instructive bit to the secret of Mitt Romney's success:

“Though I forgot about this from the primaries: Mitt Romney's skill in debates is speaking with great conviction about matters on which he's held like seven positions. He's no longer cutting taxes? Come on. He didn't propose tax breaks for the wealthy? But he says it like he's actually taking offense. It's stunning.”

And that is exactly what made him so successful tonight. This is the brand-new-and-improved Mitt Romney, the reboot that finally actually took. For the first time since the last time, Mitt Romney finally got his chance to introduce himself to the American people without any media bias bullshit. This was Romney unfiltered, and he would not be denied by some bullshit moderator.

Romney talked about the things he likes (coal!) and the things he loves (Big Bird!), instead of accusing Obama of being a secret Muslim socialist. He was hopeful, upbeat, and present in a way Obama just couldn't be bothered to be. Hell, even the campaign email I just got from Obama was subjected with a sad-ass “hey.” As in “hey, buddy, you still with me?”

So round one goes to Romney. What to watch for over the next few days:

* Will the Right excoriate their guy deviating from party orthodoxy, or be too busy taking victory laps now that Romney's finally won one to notice?

* The polls were narrowing earlier in the week, expect them to narrow even more after the President's poor debate performance. Will the Right finally start to believe in polling again, provided they show their guy has a lead?

* How fast and how many attack ads will the candidates various positions spawn over the next seven days alone?

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feature
WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 3 2012 8:00 AM

SuicideGirls Timeline: Clio

Submitted by Jessytai

Edited by Jessytai

Tags: Timeline, Tattoo Girl, Tattooed Girl, Pierced, Naked Girl, Nude Girl, Punk Rock Girl, Glam Girl, clio

Some SuicideGirls have been modeling for the site for 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, or even 10 years. We thought it would be fun to show you a look back and some of the SuicideGirls throughout the years.  

This week we bring you Clio! 

Clio has been a SuicideGirl since 2006 and she has 14 strikingly sexy photo sets. Enjoy this gorgeous look back at the stunning Clio…  

From her first photo set Moonlight Shadows shot by Cherry in 2006:

From her Soledad set shot with Lavezzaro in 2006:

She's sexy in Homestead shot by wwwmarkmnl in 2007:

Clio Loves You to Death in this from 2007 shot by Cherry:

She says her faith runs thinner than water in Downpour shot by DiazArri in 2008:

Clio draws a heart around the name of your city in Tiki Gods shot by Brooklyn in 2008:

She's smokin' hot in Destroy shot by Brooklyn in 2008:

Clio is dark and sexy in Black Heart shot by Cherry in 2009:

She gets scrappy in Fight Club shot by Cherry in 2009:

Clio is a sexy vampire in True Blood shot by Alissa in 2009:

She's one of Dracula's new brides in Killing Vampires shot by Cherry in 2009:

Clio was Born Into A Light in this sexy set shot by Brooklyn in 2009:

She says Save a Place For Me in her set from 2010 shot by Albertine:

From her most recent set Magica Sexualis shot by Albertine in 2011:

Hope you enjoyed the lovely look back at the gorgeous SuicideGirl Clio! Be sure to keep an eye out for a new set coming soon to member review!  Become a member TODAY for only $4 a month (if you sign up for a year) to see all 14 nude pin-up photo sets of Clio - http://suicidegirls.com/join/ 

commentary
TUESDAY OCTOBER 2 2012 9:05 PM

Non-Chemical Dependency

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by SG_Blog

Tags: Activism, Blog, Politics, Society

by Steven Whitney

When Mitt Romney recently declared that 47% of us are “dependent on government,” he made it sound like a bad quality – starkly un-American, as if we were all addicts smoking the administration’s crack pipe.

Yet dependency in and of itself is neither a good nor bad attribute – it’s just a part of who humans are on the most basic biological and anthropological scales. We are a social species – it’s in our DNA – and everything we do that has any meaning is dependent on social interaction, whether it’s buying and selling to make a living or profiting emotionally by just hanging with friends and loved ones.

No one exists in a vacuum. We live in families and tribes and cultures, and sub-tribes and border cultures – whether it’s surf bums or car enthusiasts or school parents or Wall Street self-proclaimed “Masters of the World” – we are all dependent on some grouping that sustains us emotionally, psychologically, and often financially. We seek out others who share our interests, passions and values to give us a sense of belonging, precisely so we don’t feel isolated and alone as we float down the river of life on something akin to Sartre’s ice floe.

This is the most basic concept of what it means to live and work in a community. And, with the freedoms America offers, it’s normally a community of our own choosing – be it a church, a bowling league, a book club or rotisserie league, or even a political party.

As a devoted acolyte of the self-interest rationalization (objectivism) of Ayn Rand, Paul Ryan can be excused for not knowing this simple human truth. But Romney should. Whatever their faults, Mormons famously take care of their own – perhaps to the exclusion of those outside the Latter-Day Saints circle, but Mormons comprise a real and ongoing community.

But just maybe the extremely insular nature of the church has impacted Romney more than its communal practices. As Romney has shown almost every day of the campaign, he is uncomfortable with and wary of outsiders, or “the other,” a trait commonly found in minority sects that robs them of any real sense of either a national or global community.

Mormons make up just 2% of our population – yet as a group they are so tight-knit that the other 98% have become “those people.” Ann Romney is afraid of giving “those people” tax returns they might use as ammunition, and Mitt said his job is not to worry about “those people.” So one has to wonder if it’s a lack of empathy or social skills on their part or an extreme level of xenophobia – but none of those can or will play well on a world stage that foreigners and all sorts of “those people” inhabit.

As time (and the song) has shown – people need people. The well-being of every person on earth – and every nation – begins and ends with dependency on our social and professional interaction with other people, for companionship, for work, for sex, and for love. We cannot be free or happy if we are imprisoned in our own solitude.

Indeed, study after study shows that prisoners in solitary confinement inevitably suffer from schizophrenia and other serious mental disorders. Free in society, those who isolate themselves are prone to paranoia, obsession, depression, agoraphobia, pre-senile dementia, and early onset Alzheimer’s.

Many experts in the mental health field define true madness as the loss of self. If they’re right, and madness ensues from extreme isolation, then it follows that we lose at least a part of ourselves – of who we are – when we forego social interaction, when we lose our connection to other people. The “other,” then, becomes not only necessary for our optimal survival but must also be an integral part of each of us. Who of us, for instance, does not carry inside someone living or dead – a parent, a lover, a friend, or mentor – who in some way changed the course of our life and helped make us who we are?

Even higher education – colleges and universities – was originally conceived not only as a venue of advanced learning but as a necessary social and psychological bridge from narrow adolescent groupings to the larger adult society.

Especially in democracies - which are by definition created “of the people, by the people, and for the people” – we are dependent on other people in every aspect of our lives.

But Romney and Paul Ryan are distancing themselves and their party from the immutable truth of community and what it means by adopting a by now all too familiar “I did it all by myself” stance.

First because it’s not true – both Romney/Bain and the Ryan family have depended greatly on government contracts, subsidies, and corporate tax exemptions. Romney often puts forth his involvement in Staples as proof of his extraordinary skills as a businessman. But one of Staples’ biggest clients is the Department of Defense – our military – with $13 million in orders. And in the second quarter of 2011, Staples received a $21 million tax refund through a special exemption. As for Ryan, his grandfather built the construction company that has provided for three generations of privilege on the back of government highway contracts.

Secondly, it’s just too much too bear from the neo-Gatsbys of Massachusetts and Wisconsin who were more than a tad bit dependent on the rich families that gave them a leg up. Someone has to explain to these two the old axiom that if you’re born on third base you did not actually go to bat and hit a triple. They did not build lives of privilege and elite schools and exceptional opportunities all by themselves. They had help from their DNA, those who loved them, and many others. To be successful, it does indeed take a village.

Mitt and Paul and all of us are dependent on workers who make furniture, who build houses and apartment complexes, who labor on the assembly lines, who pack our microwave lunches, and who make with their hands all the things the rest of us need. And yet, like the soldiers in Afghanistan, Mitt didn’t find them worthy of even one mention during his convention address.

Dad works two jobs, Mom works one and takes care of the kids, and this family has the temerity to feel they’re entitled to food or to some kind of basic housing? A soldier in Iraq gets his legs blown off and now expects healthcare? A senior citizen who paid into Social Security every two weeks for more than fifty years now has the balls to demand the government fork over a check every month? What an outrageous lack of personal responsibility!

More than 400 years ago, John Donne wrote an elegant prose section in Meditation XVII that he later turned into a poem.

No man is an island, entire of itself;
every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. . .
any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind,
and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
it tolls for thee.

Still, when referring to 47% of our population in what was supposed to be a top secret briefing to financial backers, Romney says: "My job is not to worry about these people."

That doesn’t cut it – a President’s job is to represent and worry about all the people – the richest and the poorest, the healthiest and the most infirm, the overworked and the unemployed, and everyone else. You cannot lead if you do not care for all the people.

So for Mitt and Paul – and all the rest of the rugged Republican individualists who built everything by themselves with absolutely no help from others, all of them who are not in the least involved in mankind – the death knell of the upcoming Presidential election tolls for thee...and, hopefully, for your sociopathic mindsets as well.

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Gotcha!

commentary
TUESDAY OCTOBER 2 2012 2:31 PM

The Propaganda Film You Probably Don’t Know You’re Watching

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Activism, Blog, Entertainment, Movies, Politics, #OWS, Food & Drink, Occupy, Occupy Wall Street

commentary
TUESDAY OCTOBER 2 2012 12:07 AM

Tactical Animal: Let The Presidential Debates Begin

Submitted by ChrisSick

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Activism, Blog, Politics, Presidential Debates, RNC

by ChrisSick

It's very early in the morning here, well past my weekly deadline to bring Tactical Animal, first, to my editor, then to all you fine people. There have been significant travails in the Sick Cave of late, and many more yet lay ahead. I won't bore you with the largely irrelevant details, just suffice to say, I blame Ed Gillespie. As ever.

Moving on, as I'm sure you — patriotic and well-informed citizen that you surely are — are aware, there's a debate a'coming. This Wednesday, October 3rd the first of three Presidential Debates will be held. The topic — domestic policy. The format — six topics covered in fifteen minute segments, each candidate will have two minutes to respond to the opening question with the balance of the time used to more thoroughly explore the issue. The host — Jim Lehrer, whom my entirely made-up sources assure me will not be moderating the debate while drunk. Quite a bold move on Mr Lehrer's part.

But! I foolishly promised you observations didn't I? Yes, I am almost positive I was foolish enough to do that. Well, let's stop wasting time and get right into it.

Observation the first: The best way to win is to tell every one you're going to lose.

“First, just as he was in the primaries, we expect Mitt Romney to be a prepared, disciplined and aggressive debater. Governor Pawlenty said Romney 'is as good as it gets in debating. He is poised, prepared, smart, strategic.' We expect that Mitt Romney to show up in Denver.”

—David Axelrod, Obama for America press release

“Given President Obama's natural gifts and extensive seasoning under the bright lights of the debate stage, this is unsurprising. President Obama is a uniquely gifted speaker, and is widely regarded as one of the most talented political communicators in modern history.”

—Beth Meyers, strategy memo to Romney/Ryan surrogates somehow “obtained” by CBS News and National Journal

This is the nicest these campaigns will ever be about their opposition until they're drafting concession speeches. Because modern political debates aren't about, say, thoroughly exploring issues in a deeply meaningful way with great respect given to the context and nuance necessary to understand complex political, social, and economic problems. They're basically about doing your best not to create a photo opportunity like this:

[Image:Democratic Undergroud]

And to that end, it’s all about lowering the bar to the point where the pundits are impressed by your ability to speak in complete sentences, Sarah.

Observation the second: If you haven't gotten the drift yet, this is all pretty meaningless theater.

The debates are, at bottom, good television – in that they're entertaining. Granted, that's mostly because hardcore political junkies generally turn them into drinking games (drink every time Mitt Romney says 100%, drink whenever Obama blames W.). Which is, in large part, why the media hypes them up so much. But as Gallup bluntly put it in the title of an article, “Presidential Debates Rarely Game-Changers.”

“Gallup election polling trends since the advent of televised presidential debates a nearly a half-century ago reveal few instances in which the debates may have had a substantive impact on election outcomes. The two exceptions are 1960 and 2000, both very close elections in which even small changes could have determined who won. In two others -- 1976 and 2004 -- public preferences moved quite a bit around the debates, but the debates did not appear to alter the likely outcome.”

—Lydia Saad, Gallup Politics, 25 september, 2012

Ms. Saad does go on to say that in close elections — specifically citing Kennedy/Nixon and Bush/Gore — debates may influence the race, because a percentage point or even two might matter. Of course, good political junkies already have a deep and abiding interest in those two races, due to allegations and accusations of fraud in both races, and contentious court battles that ultimately either re-affirmed — as in 1960 — or de facto appointed the President.

The Gallup article also posits that it’s not unlikely this debate could have a significant impact on the election, due to the overall tightness of the race. However, they also note that it’s nearly impossible to tell — given all the factors of any election — how much changes in the polling are due to debate performance. After all, there aren't many historical polling models for a candidate standing up and saying that he doesn't even care about 47% of the electorate.

Final observation: The polls are not wrong.

“You may remember a week or two ago I noticed a bounce for the Democrats due to the DNC . Well, good news, that bounce has now evened out.”

—Dick Morris, Twitter update, 25 September, 2012

“I saw Dick Morris on the 'Hannity' show last night. He wasn’t just saying Romney still has a chance; he was saying it’s a toss up, which I don’t quite believe. It’s getting a little more ridiculous the more polls that come out. But he was saying, 'I think Romney will win by four points. I think he’ll win Pennsylvania and would be competitive in Michigan.' You have to be totally delusional to think that. Is he out of touch with reality? Or is he lying?”

— Nate Silver, Nate Silver: The Polls Aren't Wrong (Salon.com interview), 29 September, 2012

In my last column I mentioned the emerging talking point from the right that the polling data showing Mitt Romney losing is unreliable because...well, because so many survey respondents insist on self-identifying as Democrats, and pollsters insist on not ignoring them. The talking point has now been forcibly mated with Gallup results showing a sharp decline in trust in the media:

“The press’s job is to stand in the ramparts and protect the liberty and freedom of all of us from a government and from organized governmental power. When they desert those ramparts and decide that they will now become active participants... they have, then, made themselves a fundamental threat to the democracy, and, in my opinion, made themselves the enemy of the American people.

— Pat Caddell, speech to Accuracy in Media's Conference, Obamanation: A Day of Truth

Note the wild hyperbole, the sky-is-falling dementia, the pounding-the-fist-on-the-table insistence that — at any minute — the Republic will fall apart thanks to the efforts of yellow-bellied “journolists” who carry the President's water and don't report how Mitt Romney is really going to steamroll over him come November.

All of which, I'm just guessing, is primarily in service of ensuring the Pat Caddell always has a home — and a paycheck from — Fox News and other reliable right wing media centers that learned long ago there's more money to be made in telling their audience comforting lies than any disquieting truths.

Caddell contrasts the findings in the Gallup media poll, which shows that only 26% of Republicans have “a great deal/fair amount” of trust in the media with the 58% of Democrats who express the same trust to “prove” that the media is liberally biased. I, on the other hand, would like to suggest an alternate hypothesis: Maybe Democrats aren't so shit-scared the media is lying to them because they don't have shrill cunts like Caddell shouting it at them constantly.

Here's a collection of headlines from just this past week to underscore the point:

1. “Bogus Polls and Declining Dem Registrations,” Powerline Blog
2. “The Media's Fatal Slide Continues,” Washington Times
3. “Democrat Delusions Driving Pro-Obama Polls,” Washington Examiner
4. “Juiced Media Polls: The Newest Negative Ad,” Big Government
5. “Is This The Most Corrupt Press In History?,” National Review Online

Lest I be accused of being a partisan hack, let me point out: I've seen headlines that similarly constructed alternate realities and boggled my head from leftwing journalists — EJ Dionne sticks out in my mind — before, as well. In the last forty-five days before the 2010 midterms, many Democratic talking heads and pundits were clinging to the idea that the coming battering of Democrats in the midterms wasn't going to happen.

Wanting to stick your head in the sand and ignore an uncomfortable reality isn't a uniquely partisan emotion. However, one key difference here is that those liberal pundits who were insisting that the Tea Party wouldn't be able to deliver electoral defeat to Democrats weren't attacking pollsters as corrupt, or claiming that Fox News was an existential threat to American Democracy, or saying that we were witnessing the end of accuracy or honesty in media.

They weren't arguing — to their audience, a large segment of the population —that if their candidate(s) lost, it would be because of a willful and deceitful conspiracy that joined “mainstream” media with one political party for the purposes of subverting the will of the electorate.

Because that job was, and apparently still is, fully staffed by a voracious shadow media that makes its living scaring the living shit out of white people, many of whom are heavily armed. Sleep well on that one tonight, friends.

Finally, my big-time, fake-political-pundit-style prediction, just for you:

Next week's debate?

Won't matter a bit.

Romney's bleeding percentage points daily and he's too risk-averse by nature to try anything major to “shake up the race” and under far too much pressure to execute a risky maneuver well should he be convinced he has to “go for it.” The President will primarily be playing defense, bobbing and weaving around questions about his record while directly challenging Romney to call him a liar to his face, a strategy that he hopes leaves Romney no place to go — forced to either back down from previous attacks, or defend them to both Obama and Lehrer with little substance to them.

It won't upend the polls, and it won't be pretty, that's for damn sure. You're probably better off just skipping them all together, not bothering to come up with a complicated drinking game, and just heading straight to the bar.

The election is 36 days, 2 hours, and 26 minutes away. After that? I'll meet you there.

Related Posts
Tactical Animal: On Politicking Cont…
Tactical Animal: On Politicking
Tactical Animal: Regarding The Pain Of Being Right…Or More Reasons Mitt Romney Will Never Be Your President
Tactical Animal: Have You Got Yourself The Belly For It?
Tactical Animal: Sorry Folks, Election’s Over, Donkey Out Front Shoulda Told Ya
Tactical Animal: Politics In The Post-Truth Era
Tactical Animal: Now We’ve Got Ourselves A Race

commentary
MONDAY OCTOBER 1 2012 1:57 AM

Sons of Anarchy: “Damon Pope Is a Different Kind of Monster”

Submitted by SG_Blog

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: Blog, Entertainment, TV, DAMON POPE, Sons of Anarchy

by Damon Martin

Over the past four seasons, Sons of Anarchy has been a show that has developed its cast along with its storylines. Creator Kurt Sutter has always created formidable villains inside and outside of the outlaw motorcycle club, but for Season 5 he upped the ante when introducing all new big bad Damon Pope.

Described as the biggest gangster in Oakland, Pope's name was first introduced at the end of Season 4 when enforcer Tig Trager took out his daughter accidentally when gunning for the leader of a rival gang. Now, Pope wants payback and he's getting it with devastating results, with all of the members of SAMCRO falling victim.

Veteran actor Harold Perrineau, who portrays Damon Pope, has worked for some of the best show-runners and directors in all of Hollywood, but he knew he had to be ready when stepping onto a set headed up by someone with the presence of Kurt Sutter.

"I've been saying this all along that I need to show up and know my lines because Kurt Sutter, he writes the shit out of that show. I'm really glad everybody really liked it, but that first episode Damon Pope is no joke," Perrineau said in a recent interview with SuicideGirls.

The first episode officially put a face to the name Damon Pope, and his reaction when coming head-to-head with the man who killed his daughter was nothing less than incendiary.

With his enemy Trager tied up in chains, Pope revealed that he had kidnapped his daughter and put her in a pit alongside several other victims. After dousing her with gasoline, Dawn Trager awoke, but only for a few seconds, before Pope stared at her father and said, “Know my pain,” as he tossed his lit cigar into the pit, burning the young girl alive.

In his veteran career, Pope had seen a lot and acted in some very tough and even disturbing scenes, but even he was taken back when he read the script to the first episode he would appear in as the ominous Damon Pope.

"Kurt and I had the conversation after I got the job, and he said 'listen, your character's going to do some heinous things. Don't judge it, hopefully just go with us.' I was like, 'I was in prison in Oz, on Lost on the island, you probably couldn't scare me with anything,' and that first thing I was like 'Oh my god!'. I was flipped out as soon as I read it. I was like here we go," said Perrineau.

We’re now well into Season 5, and Pope hasn't slowed down with his systematic destruction of the Sons of Anarchy. Perrineau promises that burning a girl alive may seem harsh, but that's nothing compared to what's ahead.

"Without giving away anything, he's definitely a different character. It was really interesting when I got the gig, and people asked me if I knew how to ride bikes, and if I looked really cool on a bike. I said 'You won't see Damon Pope on a bike.’ When you do see Damon Pope you'll know why," Perrineau stated. "So this is a different kind of monster for SAMCRO and it's going to be tough for them to deal with him. All I can say after the first episode is it just gets worse."

Related Posts
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SG Interview: Kurt Sutter and Katey Sagal

commentary
MONDAY OCTOBER 1 2012 1:32 AM

Got Problems? Sex, Love and Relationship Advice From SuicideGirls’ Team Agony

Submitted by Leandra

Edited by nicole_powers

Tags: All Things SG, Blog, Love, Relationships, Sex, Society, advice, Problems, sex

by SG's Team Agony feat. Leandra

Let us answer life's questions - because great advice is even better when it comes from SuicideGirls.

[Leandra in Verdugo]

Q. Basically my boyfriend never wants to have sex and it confuses me. I wear sexy outfits, corsets, thongs, nothing but a skirt, fish nets stockings, but nothing works. I rub on him, even give him head, but he still doesn't want to have sex with me. I don't know what to do!!! Any tricks you could teach me?

A: Firstly, you need to know it's NOT you. Wearing sexy outfits, lingerie etc., will only do so much. I am sure you look amazing!

It sounds like you have a real problem in the relationship here, I don't think trying any tricks will help. How long has he been this way? Has he always been less sexual than you? Sometimes guys just are not sexual, despite the stereotype.

The first thing I think you should do is confront your boyfriend on this issue, but be kind and be gentle, this is a sensitive subject. I know this is frustrating and can do serious damage to your confidence and self esteem, but please try not to take it personally and please don't think you're not hot enough and can't "do it" for him.

He should be willing to go to a doctor and have a few tests done, he may have a medical problem. He may have low testosterone, (you might want to Google that and see if he has other symptoms). He may have erectile dysfunction, which he can get pills for (Viagra and others). There may be a lack of blood flow to his penis, etc. It's important to rule any physical factors out for his health.

Once you have ruled out anything physical, author possible causes could be emotional or mental. Has there been a change in the relationship or a change in his life? Could he be stressed, tired or overworked? Are you guys okay besides this sex problem? It may help him to talk to a therapist. You guys could even consider going to couples counseling together.

Basically, this doesn't usually happen for no reason. Sure, some men and woman are just not very sexual, but there is usually a reason beyond that, especially if it hasn't always been this way. You need to work together to get to the bottom of it, and you need to be supportive as I'm sure this is going to be a little embarrassing for him.

If he is not willing to seek any kind of help, you need to decide if you will be happy spending the rest of your life in a sexless relationship. Personally, I wouldn't be so hurt that my boyfriend wasn't having sex with me, I would be much more hurt if he wasn't willing to try and do something about it.

Good luck!!!

Leandra
xXx

***

Got Problems? Let SuicideGirls’ team of Agony Aunts provide solutions. Email questions to: gotproblems@suicidegirls.com

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