Here's another courtesy of the freepers

[LittleClarkie]

http://tinypic.com/18heyu

They think he's saluting wrong handed. I bet he wasn't saluting at all.

[WildEyedLiberal]

1. He's probably shielding his eyes from the sun

Or something. The army dude isn't standing at attention, so yeah, I doubt that was a "salute."

Stupid freepers. Hot Kerry pic though, thanks.

[ginnyinWI]

2. looks like a reversed shot

easy to do--I think it's really his right hand.

[LittleClarkie]

3. I thought of that, but his part's on the correct side here

Unless I was high last night.

I agree more that it was just his hand next to his face, probably shielding his eyes.

[ginnyinWI]

4. Yeah you're right--

I agree, it seems to be just a random hand movement--pictures can lie so much better than a video can.

[TayTay]

5. I have a good 'freepers' story.

Or at least a good story about them that fund RWers.

My daughter's high school has some pretty conservative teachers and they have access to some offsite programs that are funded by conservative groups. Every year these groups hold a series of education (indoctrination) camps for teaching Economics to High Shoolers. It's all packaged up nicely as a schloarship type program, it isn't until you read the fine print that you see it's funded by The Heritage Foundation, The Cato Institute and such.

Two years ago my daughter brought home one of the handouts and asked if she could go. I took a real good look at it and noticed the fine print. My daughter asked me why I was smiling. I didn't answer her then. All we had to pay was $100 for the fee, which we would get back and we had to pay our own airfare to the offsite. I said she could go, but she would have to explain what they taught her to me and submit herself for deprogramming afterwards. It was agreed.

She went off to the seminar and had a great time. The RW think tanks paid for everything and had access to the youth of America in the summertime when their shields are down and indoctrination must be most effective. These people have all the money in the world, so they have probably funded studies about when kids are most susceptible to going over to the Dark Side. My daughter had a great time, then I made her tell me what they spewed at her and I depgrogrammed the worst of it. (No taxes are not always bad, no the Free Market is not a god-sent force, no government is not in the way, etc.)

She had a reunion last year and it must have been very frustrating for the organizers. My daughter said that 3/4 of the returnees were supoorting Kerry. I made my daughter go with me to see Fahrenheit 911 before she got on the plane for the reunion. Kind of like getting an inoculation. Once again, RW money used to fund a nice democratic vacation.

[WildEyedLiberal]

6. That's always fun

I don't think I was ever invited to any of those. Hell, the Hertiage Foundation probably doesn't have any use for country bumpkin kids like me - after all, my lower middle class classmates are just cannon-fodder for their imperialism. Seriously, I know five or six people in Iraq now. No one I'm incredibly close to, but all the same, I hope they all stay safe.

[TayTay]

7. Actually, they go to the sticks

for people. I am actually outside of Boston, and live in a town of about 11,000. That's where the pickings are good.
My husband and I chlked it up to crossborder contamination from NH.

[WildEyedLiberal]

8. You're still not from the good ol heartland

Everyone in my town, by virtue of being from the hinterlands, is not intelligent enough to understand the finer points of laissez-faire economics. Thus, we are good for brainwashing and military deployment. That's 'bout it.

[TayTay]

9. Economics gives me the itchies.

I hate economics. But I understand enough of the basic to refute what my daughter was taught.

Is this another NorthEast vs. Wisconsin thread? Cuz if it is, I want some cheese first.

[WildEyedLiberal]

10. NO

I'm from Illinois!

Geez.

I know you're, like, a duchess from Massachusetts and all that, but please DO learn to differentiate between the different dinkum flat farming states, thanks.

No cheese for you. We've got a lot of soybeans, though... want some tofu?

:P

[TayTay]

11. A duchess, hahahahahahaha!

No, not hardly. I still have relatives in double-wides on Route 1. I was one of 8 kids and we had 1 bath growing up and so forth. I do now live in the land of the big houses, but I got there honestly. I married up.

I am sorry. I must be tired. I knew you were in Illinois, cuz the part of it that you are in is flat and you thought the Chicago area was prettier. I remembered. (Proof I am tired, I have lost the ability to spell. Or proofread.) (But not, apparently the ability to include parenthetical asides, thank heavens!)

I will now go and write on the blackboard 50 times, WEL is from that other flat state, not Wisconsin. And she likes Soy beans.

And don't tell anybody about the double-wides. Bad for the tourist image.

[WildEyedLiberal]

12. There are trailers in Massachusetts? SCANDAL!

That's almost as audacious as saying there are intelligent people in the boondocks!

Hah, but seriously, I'm not a fan of soybeans. Have you ever smelled soybeans being processed? They REEK. BAD. My hometown is close to Decatur, which is the place to go if you want to, you know, see a movie or do anything, ever (my town's too small for even a Wal-Mart). Anyway, Decatur is a big industrial manufacturing town, and two of the factories there, Archer-Daniels Midland and Staley's, manufacture soybeans. And it SMELLS SO BAD. Decatur is the rankest place I've ever been.

Yeah, some people even go to college around here. Weird, huh?

[TayTay]

13. I'm sorry about Decatur.

When I was a kid I used to hang out in Gloucester and that place stank of fish. (I detest seafood. The smell makes me gag.)

Gloucester was the place to go to get someone's car torched to collect on insurance. You would put it under this bridge and then this other guy I know would 'steal' it and then have it torched. Ah, those were the good old days. I have reformed.

Yes, there are trailers in MA. They are just nice trailers and they have a no pickup in the yard rule that goes with them. Geez, woman, get it straight. No cheese for you.

There are plenty of intelligent people in the midwest. And great universities too. Like, ahm, the one you go to. It is obvisouly donig it's job and producing smart saucy wenches by the basketful. They put our little mudpiles of academic backwaterness to the shame. You rock, we suck. (Have I grovelled enough yet? Geez, one little cheese remark and I'm Ms. stuck-uppity.)

[WildEyedLiberal]

14. Ha

Actually, it's called the University of Illinois. Tough to remember, I know. It's two more words than Harvard! ;)

Or you can call it UIUC for short. (The UC being Urbana-Champaign, the lovely little twin cities. Seriously, they're the best places to live in Illinois outside of Chicago, I say not without predjudice).

Heh. Allright, you've groveled enough. All is forgiven.

Making fun of the MSM stereotypes is loads of fun. Too bad someone here doesn't live in the Deep South so we could throw some real white trash stereotypes around. Ah, politically correct I am not. :evilgrin:

[TayTay]

15. If we had more people from the South here ...

They'd be playing 'Hail to the the Chief' next week for the tall lanky guy instead of the tiny fiddle rendition of 'Sometimes it sucks to be me.' Cie la gare. We'll get 'em next time.

I work with a woman who came here from Alabama. Her daughter decided to go back home to attend college. When the Alabama registrar was reviewing her transcript to see where to place her in the first year courses (advanced or regular) the registrar remarked that "You're from Up North. They are really stricter about teaching the basics than we are so you are getting automatic placement in advanced math classes."

That was horrifying. How can anybody be better just based on where you went to school. I think the woman I work with thought I would laugh (condescendingly.) I was too shocked to laugh. What a thing to say. How weird.

[WildEyedLiberal]

16. That is odd

The one thing I've noticed about regional correspondence to school test scores and grades is that the division tends to be more economic than anything. Poorer school in poorer areas perform worse than wealthier schools in upper class towns. So, I think a lot of the "intellectual elitism" junk that gets thrown at New Englanders is a bit class based, since the area tends to be more high-income than the South (or even most of the Midwest).

This, to me, speaks to the great failure of the public school system to adequately educate lower income students. You can't blame it all on the schools, of course - there's just a real sense of hopelessness when you get down to the poverty level, a sense that there is no better way. It's really very sad. There are people from my school whose only amibition in life is to have a full time job that pays at least 8 dollars an hour. How sad is that?

[merh]

17. Is the Mississippi Gulf Coast deep enough in the South to

matter? My home is the Red Neck Riveria, the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

[TayTay]

19. Ooooooh, I always wanted to visit there

You are on the coastal area? I heard that it's beautiful. Did you guys take a big hit from the Hurricanes last summer? I saw the pictures and it looked like some of the coastline was devastated. (If so, I'm sorry.)

Actually, the gold coast would be one stop on my trip. I also wanted to see the Delta area and see where the Blues originated. I am such a history geek, I would want to know what it looked like 150 years ago, what the people were like, what the social strata was, how has it changed and who still lives there. Who left and came back. What did they sound like, how did they live. I really want to see and then pause and see it now. My idea of a good vacation.

I think my favorite origin city in America is New Orleans. It's so different from the dry old Puritan thing that we in NE have. The stories about how the French got people to move to Louisiana, how the city was a real red light district at first and such. Sigh, when you go on vacation with me, you are going to be spending some time in the 'local' history section of the bookstore. Sigh!

[merh]

21. We were blessed, the hurricanes hit the Alabama/Florida coast

and missed us. We used to be a quaint area, surviving due to the seafood industry, but along came casinos. They are trying to make us the Las Vegas of the South. I don't mind since it is a tax base that brought work to the area (the seafood industry has been hurt by the foreign imports). The only problem is the law that allowed for casinos required that they be dockside, they are built on barges and ships that are moored to the the land. Just imagine what will happen to them when a hurricane hits! We have not lost too much of our beautiful coast line to them (not like Floriday where condos consume the beaches). The beach is the longest man made beach - 26 miles of public lands that are white beaches. No one can build on the beach, so for now, we are safe.

You would love our history. We had the fat cats that owned and operated the seafood businesses that paid next to nothing for folks to pick and clean crabs and oysters and shrimp. They let their employees live in company housing and buy from the company store. Yugoslavians and Polish and French immigrants were the majority of the workers at that time and I believe the Polish and Yugoslavian immigrants are the ones that built the Air Force base.

Yes, we have a varied history. Let me know if you ever want to journey this way, I will get your some info on our history.

[whometense]

18. Wow. Never heard of such a thing.

What a conscientious mom!!! :-)

I don't think they bothered to come around to our high school. I live in one of the leftiest towns around, and they probably figure our kids are a hopeless cause.

[TayTay]

20. It's real, check this out

http://www.fte.org/

Check out that header: Is capitalism good for the poor? Not a bad question, sounds like it could be in depth. I already know what their answer is.

[whometense]

22. What's with that

creepy broad on the front page? :scared: