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I have no idea what you're talking about now.
McCoy, I think you've won the bet.
Well yes, but they cover lot's of the outer boroughs and Westchester where that isn't true.
~190,000 Con Ed customers lost power, but ~150,000 are back. That seems like a lot higher rate than LIPA is managing.
There's also nothing stopping LIPA from burying its power lines if this is a major ongoing issue.
Don't know for sure - but it just doesn't seem like there is enough man-power on the ground right now...I've obviously had limited exposure...but since the storm I've had to move back and forth between Yaphank, Port Jeff, and Massapequa a couple of times, and through that fairly large triangle, I've seen many, many more Verizon and Optimum trucks out on the roads - doesn't mean LIPA is sitting on their asses, from what they say they've restored something like half the people who were out, but of for no other reason than to lift my spirits, I wouldn't mind seeing a LIPA employee somewhere in the vicinity of the tree that knocked out my power, or came down on my in-laws truck...
Money?
On the subject of vastly more important things, Vera Farmiga is probably going to be the Meryl Streep of her generation. I'm watching Quid Pro Quo, in which she plays a wanna be paralytic. She's absolutely convincing as someone who can float all around without ever touching the island of sanity. Last week I saw her play the closed-off Captain in Source Code. Amazing range.
I'm sympathetic. By the way, for those of you who are pro-gouging, I look forward to being in the audience at your liver transplant, when the doc says as you're about to go under the knife, "We need to talk. My fee? Well, here's the thing..."
Yup. They're amazing little devices. I was given as a present a lantern that operates on this principle. Great for camping, bright enough to read by, and for someone with kids such as bbc makes perfect sense to be able to light a room adequately to navigate without risk of the little ones knocking over something with a flame going on it. I can recommend them unequivocally.
I think the last awful river cresting was tonight, so maybe tomorrow we can better assess.
But possibly the worst weather event ever in a region that has had many bad ones.
I do realize that it doesn't matter, because some wound up being not affected and therefore not terribly inconvenienced.
As opposed to dying while on a waiting list?
Boy, live a few days without any electricity/ability to read BBTF, and one gets to miss a little casual anti-Semitism to go with economic illiteracy!
Spare me your faux political correctness, Miss Rand. Shylocks come in all creeds, and they all don't live in Venice, either.
I glossed over this when you posted it as well, but I shouldn't have. Shylock is an offensive, derogatory term. You sound like an old man stuck in his ignorant ways.
Presumably one would agree on a fee before they were on the table and had the ability to negotiate with many doctors.
Gee, nobody's offended that I also referred to a clearly heterosexual male as "Miss Rand"? How did that sexist slur manage to slip under y'alls' sensitive radar?
I'm sorry if people want to read inferences in "Shylock" that weren't intended, as should have been clearly seen from the fact that it was used to describe Arab oil sheiks. But now if you'll excuse me, I'll go back to listening to Tannhauser and curling up with my prized first edition of Alfred Rosenberg's memoirs. Can't wait for that Bund rally tonight, and I've got to be prepared.
Funny in the sense of humorous and absurd.
Funny in the sense of humorous and absurd.
Well, if you can think of a better word than "Shylock" to describe a group of oligopolistic price gougers who take full advantage of the situation when they have the world over a barrel (no pun intended), as they did during the two oil crises of the 70's, I'd sure like to know what that word might be. The prejudices of Shakespeare's 16th century England perhaps compelled him to depict a Jewish moneylender in his play, but Shylock himself is a universal human type.
I'll bear that in mind.
Useful market participants.
But that's three words.
Helpers?
The oligarchs of the 70s oil crisis were price fixers, not price "gougers." Price "gouging" isn't necessily oligopolistic; referring to some random NYC bodega owner as an "oligarch" is positively absurd.
Thus missing Zach Britton's performance against the Yankees, plus a walk-off win yesterday.
American
Americans sell stuff?
I can think of lots of phrases that aren't anti-Semitic slurs to "describe a group of oligopolistic price gougers who take full advantage of the situation when they have the world over a barrel." (Moreover, "Shylock" doesn't even make any sense in that context. Shylock was the moneylender, not the eponymous merchant, in the play. And OPEC were not "price gougers" at all.)
Useful market participants.
But that's three words.
Helpers?
First time I've ever heard those words used to describe a bunch of mideastern oil barons, but maybe that's because I don't travel in your interesting circle.
----------------------------
The oligarchs of the 70s oil crisis were price fixers, not price "gougers."
In this case, it was a distinction without a difference, as they increased the price of a barrel of oil by 70% in one day.
Price "gouging" isn't necessily oligopolistic; referring to some random NYC bodega owner as an "oligarch" is positively absurd.
Obviously there are degrees of price gouging, with OPEC's actions in 1973 and 1979 being on the extreme end of the spectrum, and I don't think I was using that term to describe any specific act of temporary price spikes on items like batteries or Ray's Wonder Bread. At worst I'd call the latter actions mild moral misdemeanors, and I certainly wouldn't call them "oligarchs".
I like how Andy tops off his anti-Semetic slurs with one of those, "I'm sorry you were stupid enough to be offended" non-apologies.
Shylock is a well-known literary reference that describes a universal human character type. "Jew him down" is a common playground slur. Of course there's absolutely no difference between the two.
I can think of lots of phrases that aren't anti-Semitic slurs to "describe a group of oligopolistic price gougers who take full advantage of the situation when they have the world over a barrel."
But apparently you can't come up with any, probably because you identify with the Arab Shylocks and see them as being among Ray's "helpers". Talk about spinning.
(Moreover, "Shylock" doesn't even make any sense in that context. Shylock was the moneylender, not the eponymous merchant, in the play. And OPEC were not "price gougers" at all.
Keep spinning along, David. Perhaps if they'd jacked up the one day price of oil by 770% instead of 70% you might consider reconsidering. But on second thought, you'd probably call us all a bunch of suckers for not having invested in oil stocks.
Not stupid, just straining to hammer a round peg into a square hole, as usual. I wouldn't expect anything different either from them or from you.
If you don't know or can't see the difference between price fixing and price "gouging," I can't help you.
Obviously there are degrees of price gouging, with OPEC's actions in 1973 and 1979 being on the extreme end of the spectrum, and I don't think I was using that term to describe any specific act of temporary price spikes on items like batteries or Ray's Wonder Bread. At worst I'd call the latter actions mild moral misdemeanors, and I certainly wouldn't call them "oligarchs".
OPEC's actions weren't price gouging at all. They were price fixing. And you did use the term "gouging" to describe "temporary price spikes on items like batteries or Ray's Wonder Bread"(**) -- naturally, since "Should store owners be allowed to raise prices to keep their shelves stocked?" was the only context in which it was being discussed. That was followed up by a gentlemanly retreat, in which you first distinguished OPEC and battery merchants, subtly buried within a much longer recitation.
(**) Quite angrily, if memory serves.
Shylock himself is a Jew, you can't just take that out of the equation. It's not like the word existed before Shakespeare and he just applied it to the character. This is one of those times when you should just acquiesce and maybe not use the word in a derogatory tone anymore instead of digging yourself into a hole while claiming to be misunderstood* and the subject of vicious attacks by a cartel of Ray, David, and one or two others**.
*it's all posted upthread, I've said it before in different words, I am not going to say it again damnit
**the 'others' change periodically, but they are always there, watching...
locust
parasite
price gouger
carpetbagger
shark
swindler
profitmonger
And it is also funny how the person who argued that "states' rights" was anti-black code wording sees no harm in using the word "shylock".
But the owners didn't have to raise prices in order to keep their shelves stocked. They saw an opportunity and took it with what could have been necessities. It wasn't a run on beanie babies.
*it's all posted upthread, I've said it before in different words, I am not going to say it again damnit
**the 'others' change periodically, but they are always there, watching...
jacksone, if I'd been applying the "S" word to Jews and Jews only, you'd have a point. But AFAICR, whenever I've invoked Shylock in this thread, it hasn't been in reference to a single Jewish person. You have to really be looking to be offended not to notice a simple fact like that. I'm not claiming to be the victim of any "vicious attacks" by anyone, but neither am I leveling any "anti-semitic" attacks on anyone. I'm sorry if you can't recognize that.
The "dog whistle" again?
"Shylock" in its purest sense means "Usurious Jew." It's barely budged from that meaning since the age of Shakespeare. There's nothing "coded" about it.
So much irony; so little awareness.
Well, sure I called him a bunch of homophobic slurs. But it's cool; he's not actually gay.
locust
parasite
price gouger
carpetbagger
shark
swindler
profitmonger
Some of which I've used in this thread and others, and will likely use again, to the chagrin and objection of most everyone here who seems to see them as some sort of economic "helpers".
And it is also funny how the person who argued that "states' rights" was anti-black code wording sees no harm in using the word "shylock".
I think I can safely say that I could produce a lot more evidence, both testimonial and material, that I've never been an anti-semite than Jesse Helms or Strom Thurmond could have produced that they weren't racists of highest order.
** which I doubt, but whatever
andy is a criminal and a communist and an anti-jew.
- but birds of a feather i guess because i taped all the astros games in the 05 playoffs and have watched them more than once and not erased them. and i think people who charge 50 bucks for a bag of ice with power outages/storms are teh sukc
- and i learned 2 new words "usurer" which i didn't know was jewish and "shylock" which i always thought was sherlock only not spelled/pronounced right
i guess all this shylock usurer stuff goes back to the bad reps from the moneylenders in the temple that jesus chased out
In other words, saying, "You greedy Jew!" is not less anti-Semitic because it's applied to someone who isn't Jewish.
(For the record, I don't think that Andy is an anti-Semite; I think he mindlessly used an anti-Semitic phrase, and refused to back down.)
Now he's issued a non-apology apology.
No, he's just a stubborn prick who refuses to admit that maybe, just maybe, he said something he shouldn't have.
Put aside any anti-Semitism* for a moment. It's not a very good reference. Shylock was much, much more than price-gouger. He charged unreasonable prices not because simply because he was greedy, but because he wanted Antonio to suffer. It's about a lot more than just Antonio lending without interest. It's about his daughter leaving him with Antonio's friend, and her stealing his money. Shylock isn't just greedy, but spiteful.
Even if you see it all about money and greed, the appropriate use of the term is to represent "loan shark."
Modern interpretations often emphasize that Antonio is a pretty serious scumbag. He spends the first part of the play mocking and abusing Shylock, and then comes begging when his situation is desperate. They've moved away from Shylock as being "a Jew, what do you expect from that sort of person" to someone who is seeking revenge (not enough to justify the cruelty, although certainly enough to justify the dislike).
*I don't believe that every reference to Shylock is, on its face, anti-Semitic, and I'm fairly certain that Andy didn't mean it that way at all. I'm not sure even Shakespeare was anti-Semitic (although Antonio certainly was). There's enough right in the text to offer a sympathetic reading. The other characters are not noble and not sympathetic, and Shylock is only defeated by a sham trial and given a brutally unfair sentence, including forced conversion.
Just as I'll defend you and others against charges of racism when you pretend to believe that "states' rights" wasn't used as a euphemism for "keep the nig***s down". And just as we both defended that Fed Ex worker with the noose when he was being dragged through the mud on totally unproven charged of racism. People can have differences of interpretation about word usage and symbolism without having to hear that sort of crap.
----------------------------------------------
Now he's issued a non-apology apology.
That's a fairly accurate way of putting it, but the bottom line is that I'll revert to "price gougers" in the future, so that hopefully your return rhetoric will revert in turn to that of the oil sheiks, rather than that of Norman Podhoretz.
----------------------------------------------
No, he's just a stubborn prick
Now that's something I'll always admit.
I'm not much of an acting critic, but I will note that she was absolutely delicious in Up in the Air. (One of those performances that left me completely infatuated with her character, something that was also true of Emily Blunt in The Adjustment Bureau.)
And Andy, I don't think you are anti-Semitic at all, just predictable when arguing a losing battle.
Put aside any anti-Semitism* for a moment. It's not a very good reference. Shylock was much, much more than price-gouger. He charged unreasonable prices not because simply because he was greedy, but because he wanted Antonio to suffer. It's about a lot more than just Antonio lending without interest. It's about his daughter leaving him with Antonio's friend, and her stealing his money. Shylock isn't just greedy, but spiteful.
Even if you see it all about money and greed, the appropriate use of the term is to represent "loan shark."
Modern interpretations often emphasize that Antonio is a pretty serious scumbag. He spends the first part of the play mocking and abusing Shylock, and then comes begging when his situation is desperate. They've moved away from Shylock as being "a Jew, what do you expect from that sort of person" to someone who is seeking revenge (not enough to justify the cruelty, although certainly enough to justify the dislike).
*I don't believe that every reference to Shylock is, on its face, anti-Semitic, and I'm fairly certain that Andy didn't mean it that way at all. I'm not sure even Shakespeare was anti-Semitic (although Antonio certainly was). There's enough right in the text to offer a sympathetic reading. The other characters are not noble and not sympathetic, and Shylock is only defeated by a sham trial and given a brutally unfair sentence, including forced conversion.
Now that's the sort of response that's fair, informative, and totally in context. I was using the term as a shorthand for "greed to the nth degree", but now that you've refreshed my memory of the play's details (it's been exactly 50 years since I last read it as a senior in high school), I can see that I used it in too broad a sense. I have no problem in admitting that with no qualification, and again, in the future I'll stick to "price gougers" to describe actions that I see fitting that description.
I agree an in-depth reading can lead to this understanding, but to most casual observers who have heard the word before I stand by Shylock being a derogatory term for a Jew.
You do realize that there are things other than flashlights that use batteries, right? Including stuff that might be handy or just pleasant to have working during a blackout?
Portable DVD players and...?
Damnit Andy, stop being reasonable. Bet you still can't agree with Ray on something!
What term would you use to describe the "powers ... reserved to the states," expressly and in those words, by the 10th Amendment? I'll happily sign the "Andy's not an anti-Semite" petition that seems to be all the rage, but equating "Shylock" and "states' rights" is absurd.
Nobody's cellphone or tablet or laptop runs on AA's. ;)
I think Ray and I would agree that I'd clean his clock in pool and that he'd leave me catching my breath in tennis. You might have to give me a week to think of a third thing.
This, of course, is completely wrong.
The absolutely delicious character in Up in the Air was Anna Kendrick's character.
What term would you use to describe the "powers ... reserved to the states," expressly and in those words, by the 10th Amendment? I'll happily sign the "Andy's not an anti-Semite" petition that seems to be all the rage, but equating "Shylock" and "states' rights" is absurd.
It's absurd to equate "Shylock" in its worst possible interpretation with "states' rights" in its literal (and decontextualized) form, but it's not at all absurd to compare the use of the two terms as they were invoked by real anti-semites** and by politicians like Helms and Thurmond. We're not exactly talking about the racial equivalent of Shakespeare scholars.
**who always used "Shylock" when referring to Jews, and Jews only
Stipulated. I can probably see better than you, too, even if I'm half blind myself.
That's fine, we'll match up well as wingmen then. EDIT: I found her cute, sweet and naive (as she's mostly supposed to be), but that doesn't get my juices going like sexy and self-aware does.
You clearly didn't click on my link...the crank LED flashlight is also a phone charger. And radio, so don't say that either.
Huh, reminds me of Danica Patrick.
Blast! :)
Up in the Air was a terrible movie. Nobody's character was delicious.
Well, I am surprised you haven't heard of the crank LED/charger/radio, after all it's production facilities have put Brockway, Ogdenville, and North Haverbrooke on the map.
Stipulated. I can probably see better than you, too, even if I'm half blind myself.
Well, thanks to lasik I've got 20/20 if I use both eyes, and on a good night I can cut the paint off a nine ball, but OTOH I can only see at all out of the bottom half of my left eye and about 90% of the right one. I've always wondered why nobody caught Kirby Puckett's glaucoma before it was too late to do much about it, especially since it takes about a two second self-examination to see if you're likely to be a candidate for it.** And Michael Douglas's throat cancer could have been nipped in the bud if he'd even bothered to get a routine exam when his symptoms began, and look where that poor guy is today.
**Which I hadn't known at the time, although now it's under control.
Loaded with money and married to Catherine Zeta-Jones?
EDIT: "Worst possible interpretation"? Shylock was a Jewish character who possessed the stereotypical qualities of Jews. Nobody is arguing that "loan shark" or "moneylender" or any of the words McCoy used in 840 are anti-Semitic merely because Jews have occasionally been associated with those professions or that behavior. Shylock, though, is an explicitly Jewish reference.
EDIT 2: Nor am I claiming that, e.g., "shyster" is anti-Semitic; some have mistakenly associated it with "Shylock" because of the similarity, but there's no similarity in derivation.
Well, I have a small pepper mill that requires no less than six (6) AA batteries in order to operate. If the power remains off for long enough that pepper mill could easily move from the luxury category to the necessary; it all depends on much you need to disguise the taste of food that has started to go a little "off".
Which tells me only that I watch far too many movies.
I read that he did go to get checked out, and they couldn't find the problem. Took them months to find it.
Though he seems to be doing ok now. Apparently one of the rags caught him smoking recently and snapped a photo.
She was the officer in Source Code that Gyllenhall (however you spell that) was communicating with.
She's apparently the new "in" actor. Matthew McConaughey was at one point, also. Who knows why these things happen.
Andy, WHERE WERE YOU on November 22, 1963??
(Seriously, if he would just concede the obvious from the beginning in these discussions, they wouldn't go on for several hundred posts.)
He must be galactically stupid.
"Wasn't used" when? I agree that the phrase may often have been used to signify racism.
David, that's the first time I've ever seen you admit that in any forthright way. To the extent that you ever did before this, it was always laid exclusively on the "Dixiecrats" (which of course I've never denied) and never their Republican successors, Helms and Thurmond in particular. If just once you'd admitted that Jesse Helms was a flat out racist rather than some sort of disinterested constitutional philosopher, you could have spared us all a lot of energy.
I just didn't agree that the phrase always was used that way, in every context. And moreover, I strenuously object to the idea that the concept of "state's rights" -- as opposed to the phrase -- is "racist." When someone from Mississippi was whining about Brown and citing "state's rights," that's one thing; when someone from Wyoming was complaining about the federal government's environmental regulation, that's quite another.
"States' rights" divorced from race is a political philosophy which can be discussed on its independent merits, like the whole question of the size of government in general. The question is when it can be divorced from the race question. The further back you go in history, the harder it is to do so, and the closer you approach the end of the 20th century and move into the 21st, the less stigmatized by association the concept becomes.
It's absurd to equate "Shylock" in its worst possible interpretation
"Worst possible interpretation"? Shylock was a Jewish character who possessed the stereotypical qualities of Jews. Nobody is arguing that "loan shark" or "moneylender" or any of the words McCoy used in 840 are anti-Semitic merely because Jews have occasionally been associated with those professions or that behavior. Shylock, though, is an explicitly Jewish reference.
EDIT 2: Nor am I claiming that, e.g., "shyster" is anti-Semitic; some have mistakenly associated it with "Shylock" because of the similarity, but there's no similarity in derivation.
I guess to me it depends much more on the context of who's using these varying terms, whom they're being directed against, and to what extent they're used by the person using them. In truth I've heard "loan shark", "moneylender" and "shyster" used as obvious code words for Jews more often than not, but the reason I thought that was because I knew it from the past histories of the people who were using them. It's the same way I distinguish your use of "states' rights" from the many times it was used by the Dixiecrats, Helms and Thurmond. You don't have any history of racism, but they do, and hence the different presumptions of innocence.
--------------------------------------------
And Michael Douglas's throat cancer could have been nipped in the bud if he'd even bothered to get a routine exam when his symptoms began, and look where that poor guy is today.
I read that he did go to get checked out, and they couldn't find the problem. Took them months to find it.
Possibly so, but my own throat doctor told me that throat cancer is one of the easiest types of cancer to catch early on, and has one of the highest success rates of remission if so caught. He brought up Michael Douglas as an example of the importance of not ignoring early warning signs, which he said that Douglas must have done in order for his cancer not to have been so detected.
Though he seems to be doing ok now. Apparently one of the rags caught him smoking recently and snapped a photo.
It's his life and his lungs, and I hope he beats what's got to be overwhelming odds.
--------------------------------------------
So we have now succeeded in convicting Andy for (1) copyright infringement, and (2) using an anti-Semitic word and then being slow to back away from it. I'm reminded of Tom Cruise's snide observation in A Few Good Men re Demi Moore's strategy of going after Jack Nicholson: "If we work hard enough, maybe we can get him charged with the Kennedy assasination."
Andy, WHERE WERE YOU on November 22, 1963??
Just finishing up a gym class at Duke when I got the news. Nobody who was over the age of five could ever forget that day.
(Seriously, if he would just concede the obvious from the beginning in these discussions, they wouldn't go on for several hundred posts.)
That's a rather tempting straight line, but I'll leave it alone. If God doesn't approve of sarcasm, I don't want Him to take it out on the Yankees.
My office is right up the hill from Paterson, and that is one brutal ride downhill. Not sure why they don't just shut the city down, or parts of it. President Obama is going to visit there on Sunday. A lot of cities/towns hit are poor like Paterson, a lot are middle-class, and some are upper-middle class. Irene doesn't care - she'll take any destruction she can get. And she's gotten plenty.
The stock market keeps rising, the more that New Jersey drowns. Typical New Yorkers, celebrating Joisey's suffering.
And no, I don't mean that seriously.
Doctor, heal thyself.
Great analogy; I was drawing a blank yesterday when trying to come up with an analogy to what Andy was saying. Indian giver is completely a slur, for exactly the same reason. It isn't "used more generally" in the sense of being unrelated to Indians; it's used more generally in the sense of saying that a non-Indian is acting like an Indian by exhibiting this behavior. That's not any less offensive than directly saying that an Indian is doing it. (Except for, if anybody watches the show Psych, it led to one of the funniest lines ever.)
Huh. I seem to have had the meaning "Indian giver" exactly reversed.
I thought it meant "acting like a person who gives (gave) to the Indians" - as in, white people giving land and eventually taking it right back.
Still, I enjoy the song, in both the 1910 Fruitgum Company and Ramones versions.
It's impossible not to notice that the clowns jumping on Andy are the first to start whining whenever anyone remotely suggests that a careless use of language is surely meant derogatorily towards some group or other. Isn't one of their favorite whines about those dreadful pc police who terrify goodhearted righties into silent submission regarding any improper use of language?
Hilarious.
This is such complete nonsense that I guffawed. To know that Shylock was a Jew requires familiarity with the source. Americans don't know Shakespeare except in the vaguest sense. The percentage that would know that Shylocking relates to usury is pretty small. The percentage of that small percentage that would be aware Shylock was a Jew is much smaller. The percentage of that much smaller percentage of a small percentage that would know there was something antisemitic about the terms is miniscule.
And 849 is great, up there with the Keefe posts.
Don't be a dolt. One is an actor. The other is a photogenic surfer. I realize you can't tell the difference, but I assume even you must have lines you know you shouldn't cross. For shame, DiPerna. For shame.
I did not know that. Bless you, my son. I will look it up.
Hint: whether one is familiar with the source material is irrelevant to whether the word is used as a slur. Do you think many people have actually read Uncle Tom's Cabin? Does that mean that if they call someone an "Uncle Tom" it has no derogatory content?
It still qualifies as bigotry anytime you apply a stereotype to an entire group, regardless of whether the stereotype is positive or negative.
Right, like if I decline to enter a mathematics competition by saying, "The Chinese always win." That's both a positive and a bigoted comment.
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