The unimportant news thread

[Todd]

From The Graun: Pentagon awards $10bn cloud computing deal to Microsoft, snubbing Amazon

Poor William Randolph Bezos; how will he get by now?

I like how the Feds came up with a profoundly witty acronym: Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI. 

[Florestan]

Women cannot be forced to wax your balls in Canada.

https://nationalpost.com/news/trans-activist-jessica-yaniv-filed-genital-wax-complaints-as-means-of-extortion-rights-tribunal-rules

Or at least not in one province of Canada.

British Columbia 1 - Texas 0

[Todd]

Women cannot be forced to wax your balls in Canada.

https://nationalpost.com/news/trans-activist-jessica-yaniv-filed-genital-wax-complaints-as-means-of-extortion-rights-tribunal-rules

Or at least not in one province of Canada.

Here's a sentence I can honestly say I never thought I would read: "...the tribunal found the respondents did not offer scrotum waxing to anyone..."

Perhaps there's a burgeoning market for home scrotum waxing kits.

[Florestan]

Perhaps there's a burgeoning market for home scrotum waxing kits.

[Ken B]

Here's a sentence I can honestly say I never thought I would read: "...the tribunal found the respondents did not offer scrotum waxing to anyone..."

Perhaps there's a burgeoning market for home scrotum waxing kits.

So I looked at Amazon ... https://www.amazon.com/Fresh-Balls-Lotion-Solution-3-4oz/dp/B0725Y1K2L/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=Scrotum+waxing&qid=1572117991&sr=8-4

And ...  https://www.amazon.com/LionGothic-Grabber-Piercing-Stainless-Steel/dp/B07B7QMK17/ref=sr_1_7?crid=62I024YUWZJ9&dchild=1&keywords=prince+albert+piercing&psc=1&qid=1572118215&sprefix=Prince+alber%2Caps%2C198&sr=8-7

[Todd]

So I looked at Amazon ... https://www.amazon.com/Fresh-Balls-Lotion-Solution-3-4oz/dp/B0725Y1K2L/ref=sr_1_4?keywords=Scrotum+waxing&qid=1572117991&sr=8-4

And ...  https://www.amazon.com/LionGothic-Grabber-Piercing-Stainless-Steel/dp/B07B7QMK17/ref=sr_1_7?crid=62I024YUWZJ9&dchild=1&keywords=prince+albert+piercing&psc=1&qid=1572118215&sprefix=Prince+alber%2Caps%2C198&sr=8-7

Both helpful, but not for waxing.  I can vouch for the lotion.

[Andante]

Seen on a notice board in Sydney Airport :

New Zealand sucks

Next day underneath was the message

Australia Nil 

[Todd]

Bill to ban the B-word heard at State House

Massachusetts Democrats are especially stupid.  Thank goodness one isn't running for president, or anything.

[Ken B]

Bill to ban the B-word heard at State House

Massachusetts Democrats are especially stupid.  Thank goodness one isn't running for president, or anything.

Massachusetts got 99 problems ...

[Florestan]

When words lose their meaning, people lose their freedom - Confucius

It might very well be apocryphal, but then again:

Se non è vero, è ben trovato.

[Todd]

When words lose their meaning, people lose their freedom - Confucius

It depends upon what the meaning of the word "is" is.

[Florestan]

Quote from: President William Jefferson Clinton

    It depends upon what the meaning of the word "is" is.

"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."

[drogulus]

     In Massachusetts a legislator will file a bill from a constituent. This Boston guy filed such a bill and stupid legislators won't vote for it, or will knowing it will fail.

     Massachusetts laws are for the most part just like the laws in other states. In one import respect they differ, and that is the noncompete clauses in employment contracts are legal here, and illegal in California. By divine right Silicon Valley should be in Boston/Cambridge.

     

[Florestan]

     In Massachusetts a legislator will file a bill from a constituent. This Boston guy filed such a bill and stupid legislators won't vote for it, or will knowing it will fail.

     Massachusetts laws are for the most part just like the laws in other states. In one import respect they differ, and that is the noncompete clauses in employment contracts are legal here, and illegal in California. By divine right Silicon Valley should be in Boston/Cambridge.

   

Although English is not my mother tongue, I concur with Todd: your syntax is completely unintelligible, especially so for a non-English mother tongue speaker (pun!).

[drogulus]

Although English is not my mother tongue, I concur with Todd: your syntax is completely unintelligible, especially so for a non-English mother tongue speaker (pun!).

      It's a skill I practice assiduously. I'm too impatient to order my thoughts into long paragraphs, which I don't like anyway, so I use extreme compression and only correct obvious grammar mistakes. Also, I don't speak trollese, a limiting factor.

      Is there anything in particular you find unclear?

[Florestan]

           Is there anything in particular you find unclear?

I find most of your posts particularly unclear.

[Florestan]

      I'm too impatient to order my thoughts into long paragraphs, which I don't like anyway

Oh, no, you're wrong. Your "thoughts" are usually long-winded, unintelligible paragraphs.

[drogulus]

     Well, that's all right then. You had me worried a little.

Oh, no, you're wrong. Your "thoughts" are usually long-winded, unintelligible paragraphs.

     In Massachusetts a legislator will file a bill from a constituent. This Boston guy filed such a bill and stupid legislators won't vote for it, or will knowing it will fail.

     Massachusetts laws are for the most part just like the laws in other states. In one import respect they differ, and that is the noncompete clauses in employment contracts are legal here, and illegal in California. By divine right Silicon Valley should be in Boston/Cambridge.

     

     This is the example you gave.

[drogulus]

     I went back a ways past some typical short comments to find this one:

     The problem with ethnic states is there's no universalist argument for them, and no universalist argument to destroy them. All of the arguments must presuppose the possibility of agreement, the recognition of a form of superseding principle such as those governing open societies with rights that don't depend on ethnic or religious identity. If that is deemed unsuitable it's a matter of might makes right. The possibility of settlement by common values is rejected in favor of non-negotiable claims.

     One hopes people decide on pragmatic grounds to adopt identities flexible enough for government work, keeping religious and ethnic identities under control. Jews and Muslims do that in the U.S. and elsewhere without abandoning their identities. So do Christians. It's common for people to have multiple identities running at once. I'm only an atheist when I want to discuss it, the rest of the time I maintain recognizably human form. Sometimes I'm an American in the English language philosophical tradition. I live a few miles from where the American branch was born.

   

     That's long for me. I like it, I don't think it needs revision.

[JBS]

Let me step in to clarify.
Massachusetts's method of honoring the right to petition for redress of grievances is to allow induviduals to draft a proposed law and give it to their representative in the state legislature, who must file it for them as a proper bill in the state House, no matter what the legislator thinks about the bill.
The legislature is not obliged to actually do anything further, not even hold hearings, vote to table the bill, or anything else.

The b banning bill is one such bill.