Ah! And here I was worried that two-and-a-half hours had gone by without a single word. Pardon me while I go slip into something conspicuously less comfortable and more akin to a hairshirt... (Oh, don't worry, I've missed you too, Adam. At the very least you have a philosophical and intellectual consistency other MeFi-ers couldn't even dream of!)
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 9:44 AM on March 15, 2002

I'm sorry, but I simply do not believe this is about other nations who "hate" the US for it's prosperity, it's freedom or, thank you holgate, it's innovative coffee-flavored drinks. This is about a group or groups who believe that the there are no barriers to establishing an Islamic theocracy across the entire Middle East. Stop twittering about and stay focused. I have nothing but intuition and the events of the past ten years to support me, but I believe yesterday's events will prove to have... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:05 AM on September 12, 2001

... and kill millions of persons that have no clue about who Osama, Bush, or m.polo is. By doing that the US would not be defending itself against terror but committing an even more heinous act of terror than Bin Laden. It is exactly this total disrespect for the lives of innocents that characterizes a terrorist's mentality.

So, tell me, talos, where do I sign up? I honestly and sincerely don't give a flying fuck whether "millions of persons" have "no... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 10:26 AM on September 12, 2001

Lia - a polite and heartfelt, Fuck You. When you have had dozens of friends killed, the two largest buildings in one your largest cities demolished and several hundred passengers aboard aircraft used as material mass for destruction, you may come back here and I will listen to you. I'm so happy that from the now comparative safetry of the Phillipines, you feel free to lecture us on how to respond to a deadly, coordinated attack on our nation.

My point was a simple one... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 11:13 AM on September 12, 2001

You're wrong, and a bloodthirsty barbarian besides.

Why, thank you. It must be so nice to sit so far away and pass judgement like this on a people who have just been subjected to the most horrific terrorist attack in this century or the last. Who needs a grieving process when we have interventionist little fuckwads like you to police our thoughts on MeFi? You almost make me hope that Manilla is next, you arrogant pice of shit.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 12:10 PM on September 12, 2001

I suppose you think that by tossing the "almost" into that sentence, it magically becomes inoffensive. It doesn't. That's about the shittiest thing I've read all day, m. polo, and in this thread, that's something special.

m.polo: your words are as revolting as anything I've seen in the past 24 hours.

Good. GOOD. You are starting to get how this feels (I'll overlook that some of you have... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 1:23 PM on September 12, 2001

If you read a little more carefully, talos, the spokesman for the Taliban does not say they will extradite bin Laden. They say they will consider any evidence the United States can gather to present to them. In a "second phase," they would decide about any kind of "handover." This same article (admittedly, using unnamed sources), claims that the Taliban consider it a mark of honor to have bin Laden in their country... Hardly sounds like a group offering to turnover a local hero.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:10 AM on September 12, 2001

This was an engaging link, holden. I for one appreciate having my attention absorbed by something else for the time I spent on that site. Thanks.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 2:57 PM on September 11, 2001

In Mississippi, however, officials at the state's economic development agency said they must seize 23 acres in the hands of African-American hold-outs to prove to Nissan that they can.

Why did you neglect to mention that these black families has been offered significantly more money to move than neighboring white families, and they still held out for more? Why did you neglect to mention that the price is roughly ten times what the land is worth?... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:07 AM on September 10, 2001

Pardon, M.polo, but I didn't say it had anything to do with race. It doesn't even have anything to do with the money. My point was that the state plainly said they don't need the land, the company will move in with or without the land, but the state is STILL going to enact eminent domain.

Except that you specifically cited the race of the property owners in your posting, pulling that detail from any number of others you might have... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 11:32 AM on September 10, 2001

Hrm. I think the 'woman' logo they used is still culturaly based. Women don't ware dresses everywhere, and in some places men where kilts and stuff like that.

That may have been true when they were first developed, but I've been in airports and hotels and used public transportation all over the world, and these symbols are pervasive. Where these types of signs are likely to be found, women are jsut as likely to either dress in a Western fashion or be... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:18 AM on September 10, 2001

And we're celebrating this achievement instead of questioning his sanity because... ? This would rank pretty high on my list of things too pointless to even contemplate.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:05 AM on September 10, 2001

People paid $2500 for this.

Like hell, they did... Not one of the celebrities mentioned by name in that article paid a cent to "appear," onstage or in the audience, I'll lay you odds. As of the beginning of last week, there were LOTS of seats still available for the "paying public," who appeared to be pretty much staying away in droves...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 3:22 PM on September 9, 2001

Whether the guy who filed the lawsuit likes it or not, his suit already has no merit and the Japanese government will, quite rightly, not even respond: the San Francisco treaty between the USA and Japan specifically agreed that there neither country could be sued by citizens of the other for actions that took place during World War II. He may get an apology - that strikes me as a particularly Japanese response - but he won't get a cent.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:57 AM on September 7, 2001

I just keep wondering why Nader can't at least be amusing, like Ross Perot... He's so godawful dull, I could drift off to sleep just thinking about him. I don't mind a third party, but I absolutely demand that they be entertaining - where's that damned Jesse Ventura gotten to, anyway?
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:16 AM on September 6, 2001

50 bucks says m. polo hasn't read the books. Seriously though, what warrants the level of extreme contempt some people have for these books? I'd like to hear from someone who has read all the books all the way through and still hates them so much.

Feel free to drop that 50 bucks in the mail to me at any time, chrisege... (This is MeFi, why would I even bring this up if I hadn't read them?!)

I've read all four, the first one... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 4:38 AM on September 6, 2001

"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."

- Albert Einstein, stand-up physicist and general genius
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:17 PM on September 5, 2001

Boy, it's hard to pick a side to root for in this fight.

Yeah, because it's impossible to actually a shit about either one of them... As if MTV or Britney Spears needed any more hyping for their "event," or PETA needed another opportunity to demonstrate how deeply reality-impaired they are.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:14 PM on September 5, 2001

While reducing payroll costs without canning folks entirely is a goal we totally support, we're a little hung up on the name.

$100 (American) says the snotty bitch over at Salon doesn't speak German... The only infantalizing thing about this is her inane inability to see past the English translation of a policy that deserves more attention than apparently she's capable of giving it.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 11:16 AM on September 5, 2001

The British (English? British? victim... err... "graduate" of American schools here...) system is so different at higher levels than the public education system in America, it's difficult for me to compare them. On the surface though, the government appears to be (short-sightedly?) advocating these specialist schools without really taking into account that some of the schools "specialize" in segregating their students based on religion or some other cultural criteria from those that don't meet... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 6:45 AM on September 5, 2001

CNN can change their language - but the truth is already well known and the 50 year "pass" the genocidal Zionists have received in the popular conciousness has all but expired. Stories like the one related by tamim above only serve to reinforce the daily news that makes me and formerly non-partisan Americans like me into full out supporters of the Palestinian Arabs. I'd be very, very happy to see Israel compressed back to its 1948 borders with a United Nations Peacekeeping Force keeping the two... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 4:52 AM on September 5, 2001

The Treasury Department has once again proven it has no clue, or is it just out to make money?

Actually, it would appear that the Treasury Department is simply enforcing the law. Perhaps you have a problem with the law that prevents Americans from making business transactions in Cuba, but surely you don't expect the Treasury Department to do something about that, do you?
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 10:50 AM on September 4, 2001

What I didn't get from that article was how specifically the protest group was violating Huntingdon's copyright - simply by using Huntingdon's name? What about the activities of the protest group is the DCMA prohibiting?
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 4:25 AM on September 4, 2001

I typically loathe "me, too" posts, but in this case I can't help but jump in. I've been an avid reader of Ms. Kael's for... well, as long as I can remember. Even when I have disagreed with her assessments, I have always respected her intellligence, her wit and her obvious love of film. I for one will miss her work.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 6:53 PM on September 3, 2001

I guess I just have a more classical (or, to head you off at the pass, mundane) definition of "art," because I expect art to tell me something about the artist and his/her worldview. Without that deeply personal, completely unreproducible aspect - you ain't got art, you got craft... "Myst" is pretty, involving, even intellectually challenging - but to say that it's art is to place it on the same shelf with the "Night Watchmen" and "Long Day's Journey Into Night" and Beethoven's Ninth Symphony... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 8:27 AM on September 3, 2001

tj, it wasn't just the cost of the license - it was the actual threat that Microsoft wouldn't allow the OEM to use Windows on any machines if they co-installed a competing product. To address paddy's point, that's is why it's monopolistic - it prohibits not only consumer choice but vendor choice as well.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 12:50 PM on August 31, 2001

Am I the only (web) developer who's tired of the whole .NET/future of XML issue?

I can say without fear of contradiction: No, you are not.. I can almost as assuredly guarantee you that, like Whiner, no one who gets all wrapped up in this religious mania has a real job. This is what they do: they make this stuff up, they argue about it, they treat it as if the creation of whatever the current fad might be is actually the end game. The... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 8:07 AM on August 31, 2001

So, she didn't go to school with quote-unquote-normal-kids where she could at least develop some social skills and then they set her loose in a college dormitory?! I'd say the parents should be first kicking themselves and then thanking God the kid's still alive...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:55 AM on August 31, 2001

18 out of 50...

I guess I don't understand the inclusion of San Francisco, a city I certainly like well enough, but to do so when neither Rome nor Athens is on the list? The other omission (IMHO) was Stonehenge from the World's Wonders list...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:00 PM on August 30, 2001

gay men will think I'm gay trying to look straight

No, actually, gay men will think you look like a guy in an A&F t-shirt and then will decide based on how attractive you are whether you are worth approaching or not...

One the things that I've found interesting about the A&F trend is the shift in attitudes it may be signifying (at least, anectdotally): my sixteen year old (straight) nephew wears their stuff; he mentioned that... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 4:45 PM on August 30, 2001

A parody like the Royal's might have seemed funnier were it a little more timely... Even as lame as it it, it might have provoked a better response than the mild sort of, "Who? Oh yeah, that Toph guy..." At this point, with Dave's fifteen minutes already twenty minutes over, who really gives a shit?

Because after all, there's really only one Dave Eggers joke, and that's one he will be reminded of each time he... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:40 AM on August 30, 2001

Quicktime is another example. The browser plug-in, I mean. Frequently closes all browser windows without warning.

I'm curious - platform specifics, specific sites? We recently put QuickTime on our approved list because it seemed to be pretty well-behaved, as browser plug-ins go, so I'd like to know under what circumstances you see this "misbehaviour"...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 10:05 AM on August 29, 2001

I didn't do as well as I thought I might - I've done business in Tokyo and in Hong Kong a fair amount, and was fairly certain I could "recognize" the difference between Chinese and Japanese faces (as someone pointed out above, Koreans are far closer ethnically to the Chinese, so I was prepared to get them mixed up...). Even allowing for that, I still only got 5 out of 12 right. I'm not sure where or when I'd ever be in a situation in which this kind of misidentification would be an issue, but it... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 9:15 AM on August 28, 2001

The Israelis are not an occupation force. This is their country, in both the secular and religious sense.

This would only be true if you accept that "their country" is one they seized through military force and that is being built on a foundation of ethnic cleansing that's starting to make Milosevic look as harmless as Captain Kangaroo.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 12:27 PM on August 27, 2001

Dave's spouting some sexist drivel on his site today, which I'd point you to but he's removed most of it.

Meg says he's whacked the naughty bits; anybody have a copy of the original? (Not because I care so much, but just to judge how deep is the hole The Whiney One has dug for himself...)
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 8:40 AM on August 26, 2001

I'm not so sure that representing Nazis as madcap, nutty chuckleheads is any more disingenuous than representing the entire Germanic population of Europe as sadistic, anti-Semitic monsters, but that doesn't stop anybody either. At least in the first instance there's a laugh track so you can be sure not to take it all too seriously...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 8:34 AM on August 26, 2001

I don't play myself, but come from a family of golfers (including not a few women) and my first thought on hearing about this was precisely what Mark just brought up: "Wow, you mean a course where you don't spend at least half again as long playing a round of nine holes because you're behind a four of female players as you would if the flights ahead of you were just men?!" Maybe in our rush to make this a all-too-transparent plot on the part of (white) men everywhere to exclude (insert minority... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 4:29 PM on August 25, 2001

It's cases like this that bring out my worst, knee-jerk "Eye for an Eye" feelings... Perhaps the advertising revenues from her being thrown publicly from the marquee of the Marquis Theatre, flogged and set afire in the middle of Times Square on "The Today Show" could be shared with the marshall's family...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 11:55 AM on August 23, 2001

Who said Hornby was "cool," for God's sake? Hornby is an intelligent and witty writer with well-known interests in popular music. The "guys at the New Yorker" certainly know that much, or they wouldn't have commissioned this piece from him. You're entitled to your opinion about High Fidelity, but it takes a little more than "it sucked" to convince anybody you really have anything to say.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:16 AM on August 22, 2001

Having lived long enough to have seen several waves of this conflict ebb and flo, I think it's interesting that the former mainstream view - "Israel gooooood... PLO baaaaaad..." - espoused by people like Kelly and ParisParamus is being actively opposed in public, and by someone other than the unfairly maligned Vanessa Redgrave.

If one concentrates only on the past 10 months, or the past two years, or since 1980-something, it's relatively easy to adopt that mainstream... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 6:54 AM on August 22, 2001

Just out of curiosity, where in the shows did the "blip" happen? I watched both episodes last night off of a DirecTV feed of HBO East at 8 CDT and didn't see it. We don't have TiVo, so I can't go back and check... I usually catch stuff like this but didn't see this one. Anybody see this on the East feeds as well?
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 12:42 PM on August 21, 2001

Sorry, but if the title of a television program is all we have to worry about these days, I'd say we have too much time on our hands... Wishing that the discussion of "biology vs. choice" was closed once and for all doesn't just make it so. Even those of us who well and truly believe that we were "born this way" are being disingenuous at best - and intellectually dishonest at worst - when we resort to initimidation and temper tantrums to decree that there are no valid... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 8:39 AM on July 27, 2001

Quick, somebody see if Patty Duke is available to play the old-but-still-hip Mom or something...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:51 PM on July 27, 2001

I don't know why Burton is raving about the Internet ruining his movie when nearly every "professional" movie critic in the nation summarizes the whole movie in every review.

I believe Burton's point, precipice, is that film critics wouldn't actually give away the ending in their reviews, even if they had summarized the entire plot, if the twist or unexpectedness of the ending were an integral part of the enjoyment of the film. It's part of being a... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:34 PM on July 27, 2001

aramaic - WTF? Did you forget your meds this morning? Or still bitter because you couldn't get in to the AP classes? Advanced placement education is one of the few ways we still support our kids, by allowing those who actually want to learn something - instead of just showing up to be baby-sat 8 hours a day - get some value out of public education.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 9:26 AM on July 26, 2001

I was with you, dreama - up to that last phrase. While I concur that this was negligence of the grossest kind, to say it wasn't an accident implies the reverse: that he guy did it willfully and with malice aforethought (or... something...). You're saying he drove up to the house, stopped the car, thought to himself, "Hmm, two, maybe three hours, kid oughta be done to a goldeny brown crunchiness by then," got out and went to hoist a few... The fact that the San Jose Police are... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:58 AM on July 25, 2001

I hear your passon on this dreama, but even those examples don't sound like they are different things... I maintain that difference between an Accident and Everything Else is that an Accident is something You Don't Plan To Do But Happens Anyway. If only... he hadn't left the kid in the car? OK, if only you'd been more careful when you reached across the table... if only you'd been driving a safer speed on that ice-covered road... I'm not saying... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 9:49 AM on July 25, 2001

Anybody got a link to a 'net version, or at least a clip of it? I'm a big Walken fan, but I'll be damned if I'm going to suffer through all that crap on MTV in hopes that I might see this (and no, I have neither a VCR or Tivo)...
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 7:53 AM on July 25, 2001

(Damn, whaddid I do to that...?)
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:13 PM on July 24, 2001

Actually, I hope she does run... I'll bet we can't even imagine all the slime the "liberal media" (yes, we'll be back to that tired old phrase...) will be digging up on the Dragon Lady of the Southeast.
posted to MetaFilter by m.polo at 5:12 PM on July 24, 2001