... y'all know the rest.

So I will keep posting here despite the loss of one of the last "best and brightest" as of yesterday.

And perhaps it will be clear now why I ride Urqel so hard. His stuff isn't any more reasoned or nuanced than the stuff the idiots post .. it just has a shinier wrapper.

And it therefore actually encourages the bush-league to post here.

At least I think that's how that quote ends. It's been a while since I heard it. Something about Jewish bankers always screwing things up. Beanie-wearin morons.

Anyway, I've got to go handicap a singularly uninspiring Derby. The favorite's name is Big Brown. Which is more of a description than a name. At least Rock Hard Ten was a cool description. Big Brown, not so much.

...all this dire moaning about the death of the Fray--you know, the moaning that has been going on for at least the four years I've been coming here--is finally coming true. There is no editing, and the Rules of the Road are ignored by users and editors. Perhaps the powers-that-be think they're promoting perfect democracy or freedom of speech, but what's happening insted is that the Fray has turned into nothing more than a wall for graffiti. Yes, sometimes graffiti can be artful. More often, it has exactly the same purpose as a dog urinating on a stump. And the same smell.

It could also be a noun. A euphemism, I would suppose. Ask not what your Brown can do for you, ask what you can do for your Brown.

I agree - i've never seen it this bad.

Can you imagine what it could have been if they had given the job to IOZ instead of Geoff? (I honestly think he wanted it and left because he didn't get it - I have no inside info about this but I think it's true.)

With someone like IOZ at the helm, this place could have been the Beirut or Saigon of the web (circa 1950 of course.)

Now, it's the Beirut or Saigon of the web circa 1971.

I dunno - I woulda thought you'd like "Big Brown".

Didn't you do the original voice-over for "Mr. Hinky" on South Park?

... had some relevance, that was intimidating to those who would control the framing necessary to defeat all opposing opinion.

This place went from being a vital part of the 'common' to being a backwater totally controlled by private interests, and populated more and more by yahoo's.

Every 'improvement' has been a diminishment from the perspective of the 'common good'.

Someday we will look back on the years 1995-2005 as the decade of internet freeedom, then came big-brother and the wave of attendants, clever, verbally agile butt kissers who sold out their fellow man for the right to be 'in charge'.

But there were, and occasionally still are, some brilliant folks showing up here. And honestly, I don't care that there are some doofuses around, as long as they show a modicum of politeness--as is so often pointed out, one doesn't have to read every post here, so if I think someone is not worth reading, I can ignore them. But lately it seems as if one or a group of posters gets it into their tiny minds to go "invade" a different board, and to make it unusable for the regulars. It really is as if a gang of toughs has invaded a favorite park. Yeah, you could hang around and try to defend the place, or you can go try to find somewhere else to play.

All it would take to keep the place usable would be a light touch or two by the editors. If such people exist.

But ya know - it's not the yahoos who bother me so much ... they're like static on the line.

It's the bevy of posters now here who post nothing but mediocre commonplaces and think they're making some kind of contribution.

As I just said to w4b - I disagree about the importance of editors from a "control" point of view ... a good editor is needed to set the tone for the place and to re-foster the kind of cache and panache this place used to have ...

Here is no water but only rock
Rock and no water and the sandy road
The road winding above among the mountains
Which are mountains of rock without water
If there were water we should stop and drink 335
Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think
Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand
If there were only water amongst the rock
Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit
Here one can neither stand nor lie nor sit 340
There is not even silence in the mountains
But dry sterile thunder without rain
There is not even solitude in the mountains
But red sullen faces sneer and snarl
From doors of mudcracked houses
If there were water 345
And no rock
If there were rock
And also water
And water
A spring 350
A pool among the rock
If there were the sound of water only
Not the cicada
And dry grass singing
But sound of water over a rock 355
Where the hermit-thrush sings in the pine trees
Drip drop drip drop drop drop drop
But there is no water

... meets the deliberations of your average student council prom commitee.

But ya know, the Yahoos are singing in harmony, while the council members couldn't carry a tune to save their life.

... meets the deliberations of your average student council prom commitee.

Man, does that nail it!

But if by yahoos you mean the right-wingers, then I think you're narrowing the target too tightly.

Who's also killing this place are non-right-wingers like LAM, Schmutzie ... as I said - all those who merely iterate commonplaces that can be gleaned anywhere ...

Pick a topic, Nairobi.

Any topic.

And I'll gladly have a civil debate with you. But I won't always agree with you. If you're looking for a pissing contest though, thats all you'll get. If you're looking for a room where everybody already agrees with 95% of what you have to say, try Kos or the DU......

As I said - I don't mind you - you are what you are.

But the fact that I don't mind you doesn't mean that I have to waste my time with you, or anyone else who thinks that the frame of legitimate political discouse in this country should exclude folks like Wright and Farrakhan on the "left" and the Posse Comitatus on the "right".

Some suckers are born every minute, some are made suckers every minute, and some achieve suckerdom every minute on their own.

Believing in the myths of US Capitalism as you do, I am sure you are of the third-kind - a "self-made" sucker.

In other words, you're one of those who wouldn't put "left" and "right" in quotes in the first paragraph of this post. And that's why you're a waste of time. You've bought into the elite's definition of legitimate political discourse, and for that reason, you're as much of a fool as your counterparts here who are agonizing over Clinton vs Obama.

I'm not sure it's the job of the editors to set the tone. When I first showed up around here, you had to be careful what you posted. Say something stupid, and ghost or Gregor would be all over you like stink on shit. That was the only control that was necessary. There was plenty of fighting, and flaming, and so forth, but it was self-regulating, and fun. The editors basically were around to pick up the trash and keep people from killing each other. No more. Now posters are free to do whatever they want--make IRL threats, stalk other posters, try to intimidate them off the boards. Everybody's all libertarian and democratic, and that's fine, but neither of those systems work without a little basic rule of law. Which doesn't exist around here.