Originally Posted by playwrite

And a number of folks here are stuck in some parody of what came 20 or so years later -


Please just stay away from guns. Or, it could just be sayounara for you!

Hey, see if you spot Justin and Rani in the video!

Hey how did the girl scouts get in? I was stuck arguing with the doorman about why 10 year-olds should be allowed at the show.

Weird Al: Great boomer, or greatest boomer? I'll let you decide while he rips on the nerdy civic archetype as ruthlessly as he can with any other:

Originally Posted by The Rani

This entire election is nihilistic claptrap.
You are most definitely "in ...

Claptrap, certainly. Nihilism seems to be tilted to the GOP side this time. Until the last week or two, the Dems main problem was nacrolepsy.

So the Dems are waking up, the Reps are working on buring it all down, and the rest is al talk.

Now you seem to be in the GOP-Nihilism group, whether you favor them or not is beside the point.

Originally Posted by Chas'88

I disagree with the classification of both Boomer and GI for JPT. If he is not acting as an Xer (which I believe he quite is), then I would say he acts more like a Lost than any other generation. Except he seemingly has no Little Orphan Annie Greatest cusper to melt his Warbucksian heart. Who knows though, he might just find one... tomorrow! (Hint: Boomers, find a 2000s cohort orphan that needs a home and find some way to indoctrinate her and get JPT to adopt her)

I guess that just about does it for this little satyr play.

~Chas'88

Sorry, I also had Lost relatives I knew well as a child. JPT is not in that camp either. He's way too dogmatic.

Originally Posted by playwrite

Is that what attracted you?

If not, then maybe an occasional paragraph or two from you would reveal your true purpose here.

I'm naturally attracted to personal challenges that involve taking on and/or beating significant odds. My purpose here is and has been to keep the liberal blue reign (liberal crohnies) in check.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Claptrap, certainly. Nihilism seems to be tilted to the GOP side this time. Until the last week or two, the Dems main problem was nacrolepsy.

So the Dems are waking up, the Reps are working on buring it all down, and the rest is al talk.

Now you seem to be in the GOP-Nihilism group, whether you favor them or not is beside the point.

Why is it that government should remove more from them and those like them and give more to us and those like us not viewed as nihilism?

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

I'm naturally attracted to personal challenges that involve taking on and/or beating significant odds. My purpose here is and has been to keep the liberal blue reign (liberal crohnies) in check.

by cloning yourself? because now it's just double the crap.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

Aside from the fact that he's obviously a cusper (which you are, too, by the way), why doesn't he count? What characteristics would you expect a real Xer prez to have?

Rani, a cusper? Wasn't she born in the mid-1960s (somewhere between 1965 and 1967, IIRC)? That's pure X territory, albeit early wave.

Originally Posted by playwrite

... and I can't think of a better accomplishment - it will open doors to bigger and better things like the realization that coordinated/cooperative efforts are at least as important for a vibrant society as individual effort. At the heart of it, that was what was truly lost by the 3T (govt is the problem) conservative moment.

I wouldn't mind also comprehensive immigration fix that would seal the deal of a waning GOP. I think that is a real possibility in Obama's second term.

Before we get all giddy, let's keep in mind the limitations of the Presidency and how they affect this President. If anything, the game just moved to the Dome ... especially the House. Revenue bills have to originate there, and the Tea Party may still rule that roost through 2014 ... or even longer.

Remember, NO is much easier than YES, and those guys are happy with NO most of the time..

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

Rani, a cusper? Wasn't she born in the mid-1960s (somewhere between 1965 and 1967, IIRC)? That's pure X territory, albeit early wave.

November 1966. I guess I was considering anything within five years of the start/end date of the generation a cusper. Maybe that's too wide a margin in your opinion.

One important question regarding the next four years is how much of the Republican foot-dragging we've seen was political strategic calculation designed to kill Obama's reelection chances. In his second term that won't be an issue, so any political as opposed to ideological obstructionism should disappear.

Originally Posted by annla899

My dear sir, I have known GIs, I was raised by GIs, taught by GIs, worked with GIs. You are no GI.

Gee, everyone is channeling Lloyd Bentsen here.

Originally Posted by B Butler

Well, a break for a little snark seem appropriate before we go back to declaring how various conflicting magic pony pastures are due to spontaneously materialize in November. While vaguely optimistic, I'm still not foreseeing any regeneracies.

Bob, if FDR didn't have the balls to use his power and Veto his crohnies, do you actually believe the United States as we see it and know it today would still be together.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

If it turns out that the Repubs end up wiping the floor with you guys, how much crow are you willing and able to eat?

Not going to happen.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

Romney is the perfect candidate to show the people just who benefits from the trickle-down policies that conservatives and libertarians favor: people like him. He is the poster boy for the fact that the rich are the only beneficiaries of the libertarian economic policies that they favor and impose on us. If more people get this, thanks to his living example, there is a chance for them to wake up from this ideological delusion.

This is almost true, but you failed to add the sycophants who make it possible for the plutocrats to move about in society. And credit where it's due, Ann Coulter looks great! You can't even see the horns ... or the tail.

Originally Posted by Brian Rush

November 1966. I guess I was considering anything within five years of the start/end date of the generation a cusper. Maybe that's too wide a margin in your opinion.

Yes, because that would be a 10 year cusp (5 years before and 5 years after). I think of a cusp as 2-3 years before and after. That's just me, however.

Originally Posted by The Rani

Oh man ... I finally figured it out.
You're Charlie Sheen!

Did you want to audition for one of my goddesses?

I'm okay with older women.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

....
So the Dems are waking up, the Reps are working on buring it all down, and the rest is al talk.

Best summary I've seen of this 4T!

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Whatever you thought you were back then doesn't matter because we live in the now and you're being judged in the now.

A commentary on your commentary:

Originally Posted by Paul Krugman in his NY Times blog

Same As It Ever Was

FT Alphaville went trawling through the New York Times archives to look at what people were saying about monetary policy in 1929-33, and produced a wonderful piece that’s both deeply reassuring and deeply frustrating.

The thing that’s both reassuring and frustrating is how much it sounds just like the discussions and debates we have today.

OK, the reassuring part: as a card-carrying model-building economist, my justification for existence relies on the belief that the issues and fundamental stories in economics are fairly stable over time. Not completely stable — I don’t think you want to apply modern Keynesian theory to the Roman Empire under Diocletian — but stable enough that, say, major financial crises generations apart share many of the same features, that a liquidity trap in the 1930s is recognizably the same kind of animal as a liquidity trap in the 21st century.

An alternative view would be that everything depends on the specifics, that our modern service-dominated economy, with globalized manufacturing and the Internet and all that, is nothing like the economy of our grandfathers, and all the rules are different. And over long enough stretches that is true — as I said, Diocletian’s economy, or indeed any economy dominated by agriculture, probably was completely different. But Keynes’s and FDR’s economy, it turns out, was enough like ours that the same stylized models still apply.

Now the disturbing part: since we’ve seen this before, since we have models that are good enough to make sense of both the past and the present, it’s a huge failure of economics as a practical discipline that we’re hashing over the same debates our grandfathers had (and making many of the same mistakes). Some of this reflects the refusal of policy makers to listen to what we know; but regular readers won’t be surprised when I say that a lot of it reflects the deliberate forgetting of many economists, and the resulting lack of any clear professional guidance.

And so, having refused to learn from history, we are indeed doomed to repeat it.

the source material at the link

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

I'm naturally attracted to personal challenges that involve taking on and/or beating significant odds. My purpose here is and has been to keep the liberal blue reign (liberal crohnies) in check.

Then step up your game.

You haven't yet earned the credentials for 1-liners and name-calling. If its all you do early-on, you get labeled early-on as a troll.

There's still time to recover.

Let's see some well thought out opinions and analysis. I fully expect them to be preposterous, but at least it makes you more interesting which will then lead to the better snark all around.

Originally Posted by Classic-X'er

Why is it that government should remove more from them and those like them and give more to us and those like us not viewed as nihilism?

Maybe you can start with translating this to us lesser mortals and fleshing it out a little?

Originally Posted by the bouncer

by cloning yourself? because now it's just double the crap.

Exile won't be submitting posts anymore.

Originally Posted by JustPassingThrough

My grandparents were GIs, and in many ways I had more in common with them than with my parents, who are Boomers. Note that I do not hate my parents, and I get along with them quite well. When I make comments about Boomers, it's referring to the generation as a whole. There are many exceptions. I'm also a later Xer, so I have a few things in common with Millenials. The difference between Xers and Millenials is that Xers have some connection to the pre-Boomer-dominated world, while Millenals do not.

The GIs were not perfect. They were not very well-educated, and they were not deep thinkers. But when it comes to the "Generation Gap" and the conflict between the Boomer world view and the GI world view, I'm 90% on the side of the GIs. Which is what I meant by my comparison.

You were never part of the generation gap, so that cncept has to be foreign to you. It was a case of two generations talking past one another on all levels, until both decided to throw in the towel. MY GI parents wanted the best for me, and they exactly what it should be. Have your Boomer parents told you what they expect of you in excrutiating detail? Do you feel free to say you have other plans? Are you prepared to act that way toward your own children?

To this day, the GIs are proud of what they did, have a sense of entitlement for having done it, and expect to be given all consideration in all things they consider within their purview. A bit stifling, don't you think?

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

Before we get all giddy, let's keep in mind the limitations of the Presidency and how they affect this President. If anything, the game just moved to the Dome ... especially the House. Revenue bills have to originate there, and the Tea Party may still rule that roost through 2014 ... or even longer.

Remember, NO is much easier than YES, and those guys are happy with NO most of the time..

I'm not off in magic pony land, but I do see some big political opportunities.

I think Obama's got some advantages in his hands such as the "fiscal cliff." Sure, if we go over (and more importantly, stay over) the cliff it will impact his popularity but why should he care - four years from the next Prez election that he can't even run for. I'm pretty sure, given the T-party idiocy, that if we go over, they will be the ones to be severely punished in less than 2 years with the mid-terms.

The other is immigration reform. The GOP gets in way of that freight train, they will near instantaneously a regional political party.

The most important thing, however, I'm banking on is Obama 2013 is not Obama 2009 - way too many scares. He no longer has delusions of kumbaya . I think he, Reid and Pelosi will all be on the same page of ripping the GOP a new one every which way they can - and, unlike the GOP scorched earth of the last 4 years, the Dems doing it will be very very good for the country.

Oh, one last thing - just by winning in Nov, Obama will have sealed in place his likely longest legacy of healthcare. Immigration may come close to that - we'll see (I hope ).

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

This is almost true, but you failed to add the sycophants who make it possible for the plutocrats to move about in society. And credit where it's due, Ann Coulter looks great! You can't even see the horns ... or the tail.

I do see the Adam's Apple and if you look real close at that dress you'll see....

Originally Posted by The Rani

Jesus H. Christ, if I wanted my birthday posted on this forum, don't you think I would post it myself?
Asshole.

That was very very wrong on a number of levels. As a gentlemen, my apologies for my gender.

The upside is we are all now thinking what to get you in November!