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I always assumed it was British, and that it was indicative of the kind of things Brits thought were "funny".

British humour does seem to either be amazing or terrible, so its certainly a possibility.

As it turns out, it is in fact Scottish.  Its a good thing the creator has been dead 19 years, or else I was going to email his address to Frankie Boyle.

Well, basically, my understanding is this:

the former President passed a change in constitution last year which would allow him to serve beyond the minimum two terms - indefinitely in theory.  However, the high amount of votes in favour of this (90%, at a time when a lot of people are getting poorer and there are various armed rebellions against his rule) seems untenable, and the opposition party have vigorously accused him of fraud.

The Niger Supreme Court ruled this ammendment and expansion of his powers was unconstitutional, so in return the President dismissed the entire Court.  The west African economic bloc suspended Niger because it said its last election was marred by corruption and fraud. America suspended aid packages last year, it was so concerned about the situation.  And then the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy came along and did their coup.

France is butthurt because its likely the socialists in Niger will win the next election now, which could threaten their foreign investments in the country, including uranium (second biggest uranium mine in the world is currently being built there).  Various international financial groups are also worried because while Tandja didn't give a shit about his peoples poverty, he was very good at paying back Niger's large loans.

FUCK YOU, IMMA GOD!  I'M TRIPPING BALLS ALL THE TIME CUZ IMMA GOD!
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The most hilarious part about that is in WWI and II most officer training courses in France, Germany, America and the UK used almost exactly the same methods anyway.  WWI was a slaughterhouse that was won through attrition and WWII was lost because, essentially, Hitler was insane.  There was no tactical or strategic genius on any side, it was either squandered or purposefully kept out of any theatre of war which might matter.  Sun Tzu is spinning in his fictional grave.

Moral of the story: DO NOT ATTEMPT TO FUCK ANGELS, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE.

My view is that while living in a state is not necessarily better than living in anarchy, the opposite is also true.

Also, reading from the Asia Times http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/LB20Df01.html  This is a very good piece about the institutional fascination of the American military with German methods of waging war, despite their utter uselessness.  The German school of thought is ultimately codified Napoleon, whose own innate brilliance came from the fact he couldn't be entirely codified and was actually rather unpredictable on the battlefield.  Subsequent German military forces and current American forces are the modern day equivalent of the Prussian Army at the battle of Jena-Auerstedt - so caught up in their rational and codified military procedures they lose the very flexibility they think they possess, allowing them to be beaten by numerically and technologically "inferior" (for a given value of inferior) forces.

Somewhat ironically, given the OP, in Islam Lot's name is used as a nickname for homosexuals because while, according to the Koran, he didn't sleep with his daughters, he did give the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah a Fred Phelps type sermon on their wicked and carnal ways.

Also, Lot's daughters weren't even that hot.  Well, compared to angels at least, which may be somewhat unfair.  But still, a crowd of lusting men refused to do them.  So double ew.

See, Neocons, this is what toppling an evil dictator (in the making, in this case) is all about.

Also, srsly, the guys who led this coup are pretty cool.  They pulled off another coup in 1999 - that time against a military dictator - and took him out behind a shed somewhere and executed him for crimes against the people.  They then handed power over to civilian authorities, only a few months after the coup, and let a totally free and fair election take place.  Unfortunately, the guy who was elected was the guy they are now overthrowing, but such is life.  Also, the French are pissed, because now they may not get sweet, sweet uranium, and the Chinese are worried for their oil contracts.

All in all, this counts as a win for everything I like in the world: freedom, deposed tyrants and upset geopolitical actors.

Teddy Roosevelt: big government socialist

In an apparent reference to John McCain, Beck condemned a "guy in the Republican Party who says his favorite president is Theodore Roosevelt." He then read disapprovingly the Roosevelt quote that "we grudge no man a fortune in civil life if it is honorably obtained and well used . . . so long as the gaining represents benefit to the community."

"Is this what the Republican Party stands for?" Beck demanded. He was answered with boos and cries of "no!" "It's big government, it's a socialist utopia and we need to address it as if it is a cancer."

Now to be fair, Teddy was probably the only man to shake a fist in J. P. Morgan's face and not end up face-down in a ditch anywhere, but I remember only a few years ago some major league wingnuts were swooning over Teddy due to his macho foreign adventurism.  The appeal is pretty obvious, once you read a bio of the man: he was a priggish, sheltered, fat nerd who overcame all that by a nearly Nietzschean Will to Power which made it impossible for him to stand down from any percieved threat.  But anyway, TR is out.  Who is next for a chop from wingnut mythology?

Glenn Greenwald is a little naive even on his best days (he seems to think that erosion of civil liberties is like, something that didn't happen until a decade or so ago, and as such Is Ignorant Of History), but when it comes to Bayh he pretty much has him dead to rights:

It's impossible to find a more perfectly representative face for the rotted Washington establishment than Evan Bayh.  He is the pure expression of virtually every attribute that makes the Beltway so dysfunctional, deceitful and corrupt.

Bayh wants to send other people into every proposed war he can find and keep them there forever without ever bearing any of the costs himself -- not in military service for him or his family nor even in higher taxes to pay for his glorious wars.  Sacrifice is for everyone other than Evan Bayh and his friends.  He runs around praising himself as a "deficit hawk" while recklessly supporting wars and indefinite occupations that the country can't afford and which drive us further into debt.  He feigns concern over the "deficit" only when it comes time to deny ordinary Americans benefits which he and his family already possess in abundance.  He is a loyal servant to the insurance and health care industries over his own constituents -- as his wife sits on the Boards of numerous health care giants, who, right when Bayh became a Senator, began paying her millions of dollars in cash and stock.  And this Sermonizer of Personal Responsibility is the ultimate by-product of nepotism, following faithfully and effortlessly in the footsteps of his Daddy-Senator, whose seat he now occupies.  The fact that he's a Democrat -- and was Obama's close-second choice for Vice President -- just underscores how bipartisan these afflictions are.

When the sad and destructive history of the U.S. over the last decade is written, the coddled, nepotistic, self-serving face of Evan Bayh should be prominently included.  It embodies virtually every cause.

Also, the WaPo, amazingly, defied conventional DC wisdom and called Bayh out on what he was really doing - flouncing from the Senate:

Commentators are being much too gullible about Senator Evan Bayh's reasons for not running for re-election. Eugene Robinson writes, "He probably could have kept his seat if he wanted it, but he decided, basically, that serving in the United States Senate was a waste of his time. . . . It is incredible that a U.S. senator believes he can be of more service to his state and his nation in some other role — running a business, leading a university. Wow."

I'm shocked, too–that Robinson believes this piffle. Bayh's announcement came days after former senator Dan Coats, a Republican, said he would challenge Bayh's re-election. Which is more plausible: that Bayh suddenly noticed that Congress has a lot of partisanship, or that he decided he didn't want to go through a tougher Senate campaign than he has ever had before?

Ruth Marcus, meanwhile, quotes Bayh pining for the days when Republican and Democratic incumbents helped each other get re-elected. That sounds awfully cozy. But what's in it for the public? The chance to have the service of Senator Bayh forever?

Bayh may be a nice man who has sincerely sought to serve the public interest, but he is not some great legislator the like of which we will never see again. He has changed the outcome of no debate. He has taken none of the risks of leadership on any issue. His decision to leave the Senate is not a tragedy.

And that, my friends, is the smell of pwnd DC gossips masquerading as journalists.

Stack's manifesto reads like a mildly retarded rant by Jim Hightower.

Also, that looked like a controlled demolition to me.  Has anyone sought Alex Jones for his expert opinion?

Ron Paul was endorsed by Ann Coulter.

The Congressman for Porksville has officially been co-opted, at least on a rhetorical level, by Movement Conservatism,

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/feb/17/china-sells-us-treasury-bonds?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

China sold $34bn (£21.5bn) worth of US government bonds in December, raising fears that ­Beijing is using its financial ­muscle to signal that it has lost confidence in American economic policy.

US treasury figures for the period ending in December 2009 show that, following the sale, China is no longer the largest overseas holder of US treasury bonds. Beijing ended the year sitting on $755.4bn worth of US government debt, compared to Japan's $768.8bn.

Since the sub-prime crisis that began on Main Street USA grew to engulf the global economy, China's leaders have repeatedly expressed concerns about US policy. December's $34bn sell-off made only a tiny dent in Beijing's total holdings of US assets, which amount to well over $1tn when stakes in American companies, as well as treasury bills, are taken into account.

But the news intensified concerns about China's appetite for bankrolling ever-widening American deficits. Premier Wen Jiabao told reporters last year: "We have made a huge amount of loans to the United States. Of course we are concerned about the safety of our assets. To be honest, I'm a little bit worried."

When Timothy Geithner, the US treasury secretary, visited China last summer, he sought to reassure his hosts, using a speech to promise that "the United States is committed to a strong and stable international financial system. The Obama administration fully recognises that the United States has a special responsibility to play in this regard, and we fully appreciate that exercising this special responsibility begins at home."

But Allan Meltzer, an economics professor at Carnegie Mellon University, said China's bond sales should be a wake-up call for Washington. "The Chinese are worried that we have unsustainable debt levels, and we do not have a policy for dealing with it," he said.

China's sales contributed to a record drop in foreign holdings of short-term treasury bills in December: in all, net overseas holdings of short-term bills fell by $53bn. The previous record was $44.5bn in April last year.

There's that too.

I am also of the opinion torture should be banned simply so bed-wetting pansies like Bruce Anderson keep needing to buy new underwear.

UK torture porn dissected here http://alamut.wordpress.com/2010/02/17/torture-porn-uk-edition/

I would c+p, only I don't feel well and that sounds like effort.