He's got two, count 'em, two black parents.  That's like the square root of Bar(eb)ack.  

I met Colin once at a book signing in San Francisco back in the late nineties.  Our eyes met, I walked forward and held out my copy of his bio.  He reached forward and signed it.  Passed it back to me.  I now keep it in a U-haul cardboard box in the attic.  But it will be on eBay as soon as he is nominated VP.  We had something something special together, but life goes on.

honest man - CP.  It took an honest man to do what he did... quit a corrupt POTUS and tell it like it is....   and yea... the "surge worked" - but the minute we're otta there.... well, what do you think Iran is gonna do?  

Has anyone ever heard the expression "powder keg?!"  

But why would ne not run?  cause of the Shredding of one's dignity  - and if they can't get you... they go after the wife or the kids... course in Hillary's case...  Bill comes out 'a swingin'!  

just a sad sad state of affairs when decent folk shy away from public office - due to the poor state of our society.

CP's star, alas, has certainly waned in my eyes based on his term as Secretary of State for Bush.  No, i think that service has effectively finished him off in any political role except perhaps 'elder statesman."  In many ways, quitee a pity.

he just could not stomach the lies... and therein lies his greatness; an honest man.  but therein also lies his weakness; an honest man.

No, BSD, he stayed his full term, possibly with the hope that he could prevent bush and company from screwing up worse in his absence.  He left very quietly at the conclusion of Bush's first term.  alas, apparently fiendship with the elder Bush may be keeping him from any critical comment.

to run for national office. If he wanted to run, and was willing to suffer the slings and arrows of partisan politics, he could have thrown his hat into the POTUS and probably would have come out on top.

bright enough to ask, "where are we going with this?"

But I am amazed daily how stupid people can be, despite their level of responsibility and education.

Eg, yesterday I was talking to chief of a local medical dept, and made the comment that a certain hypothesis was not falsifiable, nor the results reproducible.

He was puzzled, and said, "so what?"  Here's a fellow with a grad degree and high level of responsibility in an allegedly scientific area, who is simply unfamiliar with basic scientific method.  I went on to discuss, obviously embarrassing the hell out of him, and confirming that he never stepped back and asked what was going on.

I think people get caught up and invested in situations.  Powell could not reasonably have avoided thinking about his experience in Vietnam, and how that might apply in Iraq.   But you sure wouldn't know from watching.

I think the answer is that you can't trust anybody.  You have to do it yourself, and you can't take your eyes off for a second.

To me, the critical error in Iraq has nothing, ZERO to do with justice or wisdom, and everything to do with thinking in advance about what our goal was, what was likely to happen, and whether we could manage the situation - the secondary issue was internal, ie whether the American public was sold a bill of goods.

Of course, these are now obviously rhetorical questions.

I agree with Quad, Bush is likely to get a monument, now that we have taken to enshrining our disasters.   He'll probably be 1st inductee into the Alfred E. Newman Titanic memorial.  "It's an iceberg!  We'll show them who's boss!!"

As a sideline, I have no belief that Obama knows squat, or can do squat.  The only thing he has going for him is critical, and that is, he has the least association with one of the biggest political blunders of American history - Iraq is not a military problem, but a political one.  The troops just happen to be paying the price.

What troubles me most, is the desire of most people of character, discipline and honesty to stay out of politics.  While our fearless (and combat untested) leaders have failed to remember most about Vietnam is the impatience of the public with policies that are based on falsehood....   Sheese... telling us about the domino effect... like we were gonna fight the Viet Cong in California... well it has been decades since the dudes whopped us... and guess what - not one single ship of invaders from Vietnam has landed in CA.  HOWEVER, we ARE being invaded and our impotent leaders do nothing...  

Oh sure, Arlen Specter and the other half-wits in the Senate can run an investigation on the use of steroids in baseball but talk tough to the Mexican government??   no way....  To say nothing of the slimeball Kennedy.  I mean look at our leadership - I wouldn't let them watch my kids for 5 min while I run across the road to get a loaf of bread... let alone run a country.

Bush - a monument?  sure - why not?  At least the pigeons will pay appropriate homage.  As to Obama... he a guud speaker... to bad he says little when he talks.  And while Clinton scares the hell outta me, at least she is smart enough to know that getting elected ensures you a place in the history books and you need to serve without fucking it up too bad....  McCain - while I am respectfull of his service - he looses it too quickly to have his finger on the football.... just too much anger in him.

yea... we got what we deserve when most in this country (and I fear that includes our president) cannot put their finger on a map and tell you where Bosnia or Morocco is.  

So analyze away - I will probably agree with some of what is said, especially if it is critical of the thought process exhibited by our leadership.

doesn't show ability to use them - much less does it show the ability to understand that facts are often slippery.

On the other hand, "we don't need no stinkin facts" is even more obvious bullshit, and far too common view in the US today.   Sometimes you find it in the academic schools, but the place you find it most is in churches (and I use the term loosely, because many of them are practically speaking PACs) and it's a built-in part of any ideology - "we already have the truth, don't bother us with facts".

them... it is appalling to see what passes for knowledge in the teacher ranks at your local high school.... appalling.

my current hardon is for MDs as I happen to have a range of different issues with several of them.

Here are mother-fuckers with graduate degrees in an alleged science and not hurting for money or perogatives, and often come up with more moronacy (TM) than a HS teacher could ever imagine.
Quotations available.

there seems to be a glitch that says posted, but shows no post; then doubles up when reposted.

-- Modified on 2/21/2008 8:16:36 AM

How did you Mofos take a post dedicated to Colin Powell and turn it into a diatribe against physicians .. among other things.

there is no monopoly on stupidity - for me... it is in the halls of academia... and I'll bet you your current magnet for your hardon is an academic physician....   they seem to be the worst...  but I digress....

Supidity and moron like reasoning are rapant in lazy and complacent folks... All I can say is deal with more than yourself and you will find that many miss the forest for all those damn trees... from where I sit - most actually believe their BS.  sadly - so do I....

the environment responds to your GHG emissions differently than all the 'lil' folks' GHG emissions... it just sorta happens.

psych dx.

Some of the MDs I have issues with are the ones in depos who are so fucking stupid that for one example, they think it's cool to lie their asses off about what's in their records in the courthouse across town; for another example lying about what they have to know is in the record in the case in front of them.  Fucking amazing.  They're so used to people sucking their shit that they think there are special rules for them, and you'd be surprised how much people defer to them.

Other MDs are ones who try to explain psych issues to me.  Just one conversation: "Q:  You can't describe what you think the problem is here; you said this 6th grader tests as less depressed than 85% of the general population walking down the street, yet you want to treat her for depression.  Is that because you know the name she calls you?  Is there anybody you will NOT treat?   A: (none)"

Other MDs piss me off about other issues, which stories will go untold to protect their guilty asses from identification.  

But no, these are not academic people.

I think, if I were to marry again in another life, it would probably be the RN who gave the best hand jobs.


Oh, here's a favorite story - "Dr MD, what have you done to comply with this subpoena?  
"Well, I went down to Home Depot and hired a couple, of what do you call them, to help me go looking for my records.
"So you went down to Home Depot and hired a couple of mojados to help you go looking for your records.  Let me guess, they didn't know where your records were, either?
"No, they didn't."

An Obama-Powell ticket would be interesting but I agree with the other posts. Powell would be better as a Presidential candidate and he's just not interested and you can't blame the guy.

a Powell-Obama ticket, but any ticket that has Obama as POTUS will never get my vote.

studies has a vested interest in the company who is the sponsor of the study... now how do ya think the data will turn out?!  and that harms more folks that the one-offs.

"clinical studies".   The problem is, there's no real market for intellectual discipline, but there is an incredible market for shucking & jiving.   So the academics who make a living are the ones who don't have a salesman's people skills.

You can pick up your local free paper and find whole pages covered with ads for "clinical studies" to establish conditions you never heard of.  Who do you suppose is bankrolling that?  Who do you suppose will answer the ads?

just because he accepted somebody's bribe was no indication it influenced his decision.

We should only have such characters around today.  Now all we have are weak-kneed idiots.

Actual verbatim conversation:  "Doctor, isn't your method logically impossible and unexplainable?
A:  "I'm not a logician."

Fucking frightening.

cannot explain what I am doing, it's bad business to put it on the street, because these other folks will see the poor quality.

But I never learn.  There aren't 2% who can reverse engineer a product.  If you can make the sale, getting money for calling shit shinola, you're golden.  You can always call the buyer an asshole, and he probably is.  Getting the $$ is the deal, and look at TV, which sells more than anything......

I am amazed how poorly many/most MDs grasp the distinction between cause and correlation.

I would not be surprised if a study showed that being alive was a MAJOR risk factor in some disease.

So I was talking to this dept chief the other day, and commented that his diagnosis was not falsifiable, and then I had to explain the significance.

Shee-it!  The more I deal with allegedly responsible "leaders", the more I realize that BenD is right, we are both doomed AND fucked, and not in any good way!

Even an arthritic old fart can figure out that all sorts of data can be dredged up in seconds via Google; and I am beginning to think that professional responsibility in ANY area  requires at least a quick Google search of the issue - because if your pre-teen daughter can figure it out, there's not much excuse for a licensed pro, eh?