Pajiba

Up until the last episode I would have loved to see a second season of Rubicon. But I have the distinct feeling that the writers knew there would be no second season before they filmed that last ep because they really just threw in the towel.

I know Jon Stewart it a guy, Butch Madcow is questionable in the gender department. Yikes, she is disturbing to watch.

I actually like the movie reviews and the fact that you guys put of reviews of films that don't seem to show up anywhere else.
Dustin, I didn't know one of the requirements to visit Pajiba was to agree with liberal politics.

Dustin, why are you threatened by people who have a different politcal opinion of you? Do you only want to hear the bleeting of other sheep? While I do so enjoy riling people, it's hobby, it's not the only reason I come here.

yes scully because we don't change our mind, we clearly don't understand. Despotism is no way to run a website.

Dustin didn't tell anyone to leave. He asked a simple question. When your every single comment is seemingly to start some kind of flame war it has to be asked - Why?

Yeah common sense don't call her gender into question! Only people on Fox news and conservatives are fit to be made fun of.

Although I would never compare Maddow's "reporting" with a sonnet, your point is taken.
And BigTodd and I were just making fun of her, I do it with Olbermann as well from MSNBC. Their version of "reporting" seems to be checking HuffPo, DU or Kos and spewing whatever is the hate of the day directed towards anything conservative.

Thank you. I actually agree with Jon - there's bias on both sides.

Does anyone else find it funny that the liberal/conservative divide they were talking about in the interview is surfacing in the comments? There's too much assumption on both sides and not enough thoughtful debate.

But you can do it for me - it's like four in the morning where I live.

She scares you because she reported on the creepy tendency of disconnected feet to wash ashore in Vancouver?

Who kills the spiders at your house?

kitkat, you're absolutely right and I try not to be a part of the problem but it's so hard sometimes. I'll try harder.

I think it's only half a good interview, because Jon Stewart has started to become just a little jumped up in his efforts to impose so-called 'fair' comment on America's media, and he needs to be called on some of his less well-thought out positions. Trouble is, he's usually the person calling people out, and so it's hard to find someone to do it. Maddow certainly shouldn't have let her obvious admiration for him cloud the interview, and should have taken him to task for drawing an equivalence between leftwing and rightwing media in the States.

MSNBC has nothing on Fox News in terms of the broadcasting of pure opinion, and I'm astounded Stewart is taking that position. Does he really think that Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly aren't completely partisan? Does he really think that they call Republicans out on their actions? It's a completely false analogy, and one that is giving Fox too much leeway.

As for this business about calling George Bush a war criminal, I understand that things have to be put into perspective and that there are ways of presenting things that are better than others. But Stewart himself put the accusation of being a war criminal into thunderingly poor context when he evoked Roosevelt, whose actions that he cited were clearly wrong but surely have to be set in the context not only of his time but also in the wider context of Roosevelt's excellent leadership on the economy and liberation of Europe. Bush didn't 'liberate' anyone, and conditions for many in Iraq have actually worsened for many people, so it's fair to view Bush's sanctioning of torture, in his illegal war, as evidence of war crimes.

It's extremely unhelpful to any efforts to build a strong leftwing if right-minded people like Jon Stewart start questioning the very basis of leftwing examination of politics.

Hey Casper when was the last time you were in Iraq to check on the conditions?

Do you think it was better when you got tortured for simply losing a soccer game? Being murdered because Saddam took an interest in your wife? Was it better when they weren't allowed to vote? Or when they were unable to get enough food to live while Saddam traveled from palace to palace. Let's not forget the good old days when you got gassed because because you were a Kurd instead of a Sunni.

Yes it was an illegal war that the majority of Congress agreed to. Were questionable interrogation techniques used on people that wanted to kill you? Yup. What would you recommend instead? Since you are a military genius and all.

Sorry for getting off topic. People who say things like that, without backing it with facts piss me off.

Ha! Trick question. No spiders are killed in my house. I'm a bleeding heart liberal, and besides, they keep the mosquito population down. Spiders are carefully escorted outdoors on a paper towel. Which is then recycled.

The "Oh, and Congress agreed to it" part of your argument is weak at best, BT.

Imagine the following, if you will. Your boss tells you that all the employees need to smash up a competitor's computer network because they snuck into the office at night and stole the payroll money. You're pissed off at the thought of not getting paid, and worried that it could happen again, so you go along with the plan. Later you find out that this was a lie and your boss had other motives for trashing the equipment. Maybe they were good and maybe they were bad motives, but they weren't what he stated.

Does your boss become LESS culpable because you went ahead and did that wrong-headed thing, too?

I wish Eep and commadaddy and a couple of our more libertarian regulars were weighing in here to lend the following a bit more weight, but for the sake of Butthole Day, I'll try anyway:

BigTodd and Common Sense, take a second to look at the leap you took. Please understand that Pajiba, while fostering a healthy liberal population, actually does demonstrate some interesting variance in the political spectrum and when that variance is examined in a respectful manner, we get some pretty deep and interesting debates going on here.

Dustin is not pointing out that you don't belong because you don't swing liberal - please believe that. He is pointing out that both of you, especially recently, have made a habit of jumping in with intentionally inflammatory and divisive comments that belittle your opposing side, which makes us assume that you are, for all intents and purposes, total buttholes.

Ask Pookie, he'll be the first to tell you that if you act like a relentless butthole here, you'll be ostracized, but when you chime in with something funny, clever, or well-informed, you'll be embraced. Todd, your other comments didn't get ridiculed not because they weren't political, but because they passed the "funny and clever" measure. Scroll through some of our politcal debates and look for posts by "," or some of our other outspoken non-liberals - you'll find that there are plenty that a "liberally biased" site would disagree with, but we love them because they are funny and clever.

We like new folks. We like opposing opinions. We don't like it when it feels like you've dropped by our favorite bar just to throw a flaming bag of poo at our bartender.

So sit down, have a drink and JOIN the conversation, instead of shouting at us or vying for attention. We'd love to hear what you have to say; but we'd like it best if you heard what we have to say, too. Conversation is a two-way street.

I find it quite convenient when people embarrass themselves with their own actions and comments. It saves me the trouble of doing it for them, and I no longer feel the need to assign meaning to their words.
How I read Pajiba:
Scroll Scroll Scroll, OOOh Looky! Someone awesome has something to say! I will read that instead. {Hilarity ensues}
Anyway, there is a Zen saying: like pebbles in a bag, we polish one another.
Also: BUTTHOLE

Ummm, has anyone thought that when peeps like BigTodd and Common Sense make deliberately inflammatory comments, we should all just ignore them, denying them the satisfaction of getting everyone all pissy-like? Something I've always loved about this site is that, despite all of our varying opinions, we politely disagree instead of acting like agressively opinionated douches. No one changes anyone's mind by acting like a dick.

Let's take the high road, my friends...roll your eyes and disregard them like some drunk frat boy in a bar who insults your girlfriend just to get a rise out of you.
Just a thought.

I have to agree with Jessie, though I sympathize with Dustin's expressed frustration. Some people have personalities that lead them to be purposely provocative. It's not something that one can usually successfully argue against because arguments/reactions just feed the fire.

Do we really need to coddle Dustin? Have his testicle run off somewhere? I'm not sure "being nice" to him should be a priority for any of us. If he says something we like, we should say, "Oh, hey -- good observation. I would like to enrich this conversation with my own related experiences and thoughts." If he says something we don't like, we should say, "Respectfully, I don't agree and here's why." And maybe if we're lucky, we'll pick up new and interesting ways to call each other "dicks" in the meantime (please note, I mean this in terms of on-site interactions only -- if you have interactions with him outside of the posts and comments, you should probably just be nice to him because he's a human-being).

I don't see how BigTodd is any different from the many voices that populate the site. Certainly, his grammar is a little poorer and his ideas are a little less fresh (everything you have to say seems like a weak regurgitation of conservative values rather than an idea you have bothered to cultivate and refresh with constant scrutiny), but he has no less to offer than anyone else here. Certainly we shouldn't just be ignoring him out of hand.

*HEADBADGER*

Fuck's sake, people. FOR FUCK'S SAKE JUST DON'T RESPOND. JEEBUS'S BUTTHOLE.

tiny bieber buttholes.

One of these days, Todd, I'm gonna give you a spanking.

Lick it, Buttholes!

Rubicon definitely wasn't worth it thanks to the shitty last episode. I'm really disappointed that they didn't get another season to rectify it. And I'll look forward to Rob Thomas' new show, even though it'll probably be canceled too.

I don't mean to completely skip over the comments, but BiggTodd, last I heard nine feet had washed ashore. Seven in BC and another two in Washington State. Most of the reports claim that they're unrelated incidents. If it is a serial killer, nobody is letting on. And there's already a serial killer in northern BC who has been active for at least two decades that they have yet to catch.

Now I'm going to go and watch that Maddow interview.