COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Thursday, December 27, 2012

Bad terrorists and acceptable terrorists: Who do you believe the Obama Administration or the Russians?




America’s Hype over WMD: Five Invasion Plots, Three Continents, Identical Lies
From Panama to Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya and Syria


“I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas. We have definitely adopted the position at the Peace Conference of arguing in favour of the retention of gas as a permanent method of warfare…. I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes.” (Winston S. Churchill, 1874-1965, from War Office  minute, 12th May 1919.)
As the sabre rattling against Syria gets ever louder, the allegations ever wilder and double standards, stirring, plotting and terrorist financing (sorry: “aiding the legitimate opposition”) neon lit, it is instructive to look at the justifications presented by US Administrations for a few other murderous incursions in recent history.
This month is the twenty third anniversary of the US invasion of Panama on 20th December 1989, as Panamanians prepared their Christmas celebrations. A quick check reminds the late Philip Agee recalling President George H.W. Bush telling the American people that the threat from Panama (pop: 3,571,185 – 2011) was such that: “our way of life is at stake.” Agee referred to this in his aptly named talk “Producing the Proper Crisis.”(i) Apt then as now. Nothing changes.
The aim of the invasion was to capture the country’s leader General Manuel Noriega and, of course, to: “establish a democratic government.” Regime change.
With the approaching transfer of control of the Panama Canal to Panama (originally scheduled for 1st January  1990) after a century of US colonial stewardship, America wanted to ensure it was in the hands of malleable allies.
Noriega a CIA asset, since 1967 (ii) who had also attended the notorious School of the Americas, at Fort Benning, Georgia, came to power with US backing, but seemingly his support for the US was cooling. To encapsulate a long story, the US kidnapped him and sentenced him to forty years in jail.
Plans to invade were called: “Operation Prayer Book.” It was later re-named “Operation Just Cause”, with General Colin Powell commenting that it was a moniker of which he approved as: ”Even our severest critics would have to utter ‘Just Cause’ whilst denouncing us.” (Colin Powell, with Jospeh E. Persico: “My American Journey”, 1995.)
All military marauding should simply be called: “Operation Silly Name 1, then 2,3,4” etc., until the numbers finally run out.
Twenty seven thousand US troops backed by Apache helicopters decimated much of the small country, with a defence force of just three thousand. George Bush Snr., said he was removing an evil dictator who was brutalizing his own people  (sound familiar?) and that the action was needed to:” protect American lives.” It was also to: “defend democracy and human rights in Panama” – and to “protect the Canal.” Surprise, eh?
Manuel Noriega was released from US jail in 2007, extradited to France which had awarded him the country’s highest honour, The Legion d’honneur in 1987. He remained in jail in France until December 2011, when he was returned to Panama, where he is still imprisoned.
In the near forgotten Panama decimation (unless you are Panamanian) the densely populated, poverty stricken neighbourhood of El Chorillo was incinerated by American actions to such an extent that it became named “Little Hiroshima.”
One woman charged that: “The North Americans began burning down El Chorillo at about 6.30 in the morning. They would throw a small device in to a house and it would catch on fire – then they would move to another, they burned from one street to the next, coordinating the burning on walkie-talkies.”
A US soldier was recorded stating: “We ask you to surrender … if you do not, we are prepared to level each and every building.”

“Everything that moved they shot”, said a city resident.
The dead were consigned to mass graves with witnesses stating that US troops used flame throwers on the dead, noting the bodies shriveling as they burned. Others were bulldozed in to piles.(iii)
There was worse. As the current self righteous, if contradictory statements flow from Washington and Whitehall about Syria’s unproven chemical weapons, proven facts relate to America’s.
“From the 1940s to the 1990s the United States used various parts of Panama as a testing ground for chemical weapons, including mustard gas, VX, sarin, hydrogen cyanide and other nerve agents in … mines, rockets and shells; perhaps tens of thousands of chemical munitions.” (William Blum: Rogue State, 2002.)
Further, on departing Panama at the end of 1999 they left: “many sites containing chemical weapons. They had also: “conducted secret tests of Agent Orange in Panama …” In the 1989 invasion, the village of Pacora, near Panama City: “was bombed with (chemicals) by helicopters and aircraft from US Southern Command, with substances that burned skin, caused intense pain and diarrhea.”
Many analysts felt that Panama was the testing ground for Iraq.

Nine months after the poisoning of Panama, on Hiroshima Day 1990, the strangulating US-driven embargo on Iraq was enforced by the UN, after the US Ambassador to Iraq, April Glaspie had given the green light for Saddam Hussein to invade Kuwait, after Kuwait’s considerable provocation and financial and geographical destabilization.(iv.)
The hype over chemical and other weapons went in to overdrive, leading Saddam Hussein to comment: “I am afraid, one day, you will say ‘You are going to make gunpowder out of wheat.’ ”
Thirteen months after Panama, America led a thirty one country coalition to “reduce Iraq to a pre-industrial age.” The only chemicals released from Iraq were the poisonous mix from the bombed pharmaceutical and fertilizer factories, the car manufacturing plants and the factories of Iraq’s entire industrial base, including the compounds holding the chemical and biological substances, including medical ones, sold to Iraq by the US, UK Germany and others over the previous decades, sales ironically, still ongoing at the time of the onslaught. (v.)
Highly toxic and radioactive substances were introduced into Iraq however, in the form of up to seven hundred and fifty tonnes of chemically toxic and radioactive depleted uranium munitions (DU) which have a toxic “half life” of 4.5 billion years. Iraq’s litany of deformed, still born, aborted babies, infants born with cancers, the tiny graves, silent testimony to weapons of mass destruction of unique wickedness. Iraq was bombed for forty two days and nights.
The hyped chemical weapons alleged to have been manufactured by Iraq were, of course, never deployed.
On 24th March 1999, NATO began to liberate Kosovo from Serbia. (US Silly Name: Operation Noble Anvil) Kosovo had an estimated ten trillion dollars worth of “inexhaustible” minerals in the Trebca mines.
The “liberation” was seventy eight days of relentless bombardment, including use of depleted uranium weaponry. Twenty thousand tonnes of bombs were dispatched. Destroyed systematically were communications centres, fuel depots, airports, traffic communications, trains, markets, the Chinese Embassy – China was against the attack, NATO, resoundingly unconvincingly, said they had the wrong map. And of course, the media centre. Murdering journalists is now another routine, unaccountable war crime.
Before the attack, the Pentagon stated that the Army of Yugoslavia possessed at least two kinds of poisonous gasses, with the facilities to produce them. The US Department of Defense warned Slobodan Milosevic the General Staff of the Yugoslav Army : “If Belgrade uses poisonous gasses sarin and mustard gas against NATO, the response of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization will be devastating.”
Oddly, after the air strikes began, NATO mentioned not one word to indicate that it was attacking Serbia’s US-stated capacity to produce chemical weapons. (Zagred Globus, 16th April 1999, pp 18-19.)
The industrial scale destruction, however, left the Trebca mines unscathed.

On 14th August 2000, nine hundred heavily armed British, French, Italian, Pakistani and KFOR troops were landed from helicopters at the mines. Managers and workers tried to fight them off and were beaten, tear gassed with plastic bullets used. The resisting staff were arrested.
UN papers described the action as: “ … induction of democratization in Kosovo.” The attack in fact, paved the way for selling of the mines -containing “the inexhaustible” estimated 77,302,000 tons of coal, copper, zinc, lead, nickel, gold, silver, marble, manganese, iron ore, asbestos and limestone “to name a few” – to private foreign groups. (News reports, websites.)
The  “Kosovo Liberation Army” had been: “ … trained for years and supported with millions of US dollars and German Marks … through the CIA and BND” (German Intelligence) “for this war, misleadingly called a civil war”(vi) by NATO governments and spokespersons.
DU’s chemical and radiological properties were rained down throughout former Yugoslavia too. By 2001, doctors in the Serb run hospital in Kosovo Mitrovica stated that the number of patients suffering from malignant diseases had increased by two hundred percent since a 1998 survey.
A 2003 study by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) found drinking water and air samples contaminated in Bosnia Herzegovina. There was, of course: “no cause for alarm.” Pekka Haavisto, former Environment Minister of Finland, Heading UNEP, called for a wide and thorough scientific investigation to establish the full extent and hazards of the contamination. The US – cited as the only country to use DU weaponry in that conflict – blocked the request. (vii.)
However alarm was raised in Europe when Italian, Portuguese, Belgian and French peacekeepers in the region developed cancers, within a matter of months, a high proportion of those diagnosed died. Norwegian peacekeepers refused to be deployed.(viii.)
“Less than a month after the war in Yugoslavia ended in 1999, the British National Radiological Protection Board warned British citizens about the dangers from staying in Kosovo because of the contamination of its territories by D.U. weapons.”
The peacekeepers, of course were there for just weeks or months, the people of the region live there, the plight of their health and that of future generations ignored and forgotten by their “liberators.” They had other “tyrants” to topple, other populations to relieve of their lives and limbs and livelihoods.
Iraq, had again been bombed by the US and UK during the Christmas season of 1998, four months before the assault on Yugoslavia and had been back on the invasion radar ever since. The lies were familiar – and relentless, a currently topical example, one of of countless:
“2nd September 2002: Experts: Iraq has tons of chemical weapons.
“As some in the Bush administration press the case for a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, weapons experts say there is mounting evidence that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has amassed large stocks of chemical and biological weapons he is hiding from a possible U.S. military attack.
“Washington’s concern is that Iraq could supply those weapons to terrorist groups …  ‘If we wait for the danger to become clear, it could be too late’ said Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Delaware, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.”
With Biden now Vice President, it is impossible not to wonder whether he has any input in to the Syria spin, with its uncannily similar words.
“Jon Wolfsthal, an analyst with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said Iraq’s inventory is significant: ‘Iraq continues to possess several tons of chemical weapons agents, enough to kill thousands and thousands of civilians or soldiers’, Wolfsthal said.” (ix)
Further: “U.N. weapons experts have said Iraq may have stockpiled more than 600 metric tons of chemical agents, including mustard gas, VX and sarin. Some 25,000 rockets and 15,000 artillery shells with chemical agents are also unaccounted for, the experts said.
“The concern is they either have on hand — or could quickly re-create the capability to produce — vast amounts of anthrax, tons of material”, was Wolfsthal’s additional spin.

“Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld” asserted :“… Iraq has mobile biological weapons laboratories, which would be nearly impossible for U.S. forces to target.” The lives of thousands of people were at stake, he said. Indeed, since the invasion, Iraqi deaths at American and British hands or that of their militias, and imposed puppet government, are nothing short of holocaustal.
According to Jonathan Schwartz, who revisited General Colin Powell’s pack of lies on Iraq to the UN on 5th February 2003 : “ My colleagues, every statement I make today is backed up by sources, solid sources. These are not assertions. What we’re giving you are facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence …”  Powell is now regretful.
Schwartz is unsympathetic. On the  fifth anniversary of Powell’s misleading nonsense, 5th February 2008, he commented: “As much criticism as Powell has received for this – he calls it ‘painful’ and something that will ‘always be a part of my record’ – it hasn’t been close to what’s justified. Powell was far more than just horribly mistaken, the evidence is conclusive that he fabricated evidence and ignored repeated warnings that what he was saying was false.”
The entirely illegal invasion of Iraq, based on a trans-Atlantic pack of lies had commenced just forty five days later. Operation Very Silly Name? “Operation Iraqi Liberation”: OIL.
The lies over Libya – which under Colonel Quadaffi came top of the Human Development Index for Africa – are of recent memory. Nevertheless a few reminders:
CIA paid Quislings abound in the above invasions and others over many decades. Meet General Abdul Fatah Younis, Colonel Gaddafi’s Interior Minister, who “defected to the opposition” – wonder what his price was – and became chief of staff of the insurgents: “ … he pleaded for NATO allies to arm the rebels with heavy weapons, including helicopters and anti-tank missiles, to defend the besieged city of Misurata.. He predicted the dictator  … would be ready to use chemical weapons in a last stand against rebels or the civilian population.” (Amazing, words straight out of the current Syria “opposition” check list.)
“Gaddafi is desperate now. Unfortunately he still has about 25 per cent of his chemical weapons, which he might use as he’s in a desperate situation. …”
“Col. Gaddafi is known to have around ten tons of mustard gas remaining from stocks that he had been destroying under the supervision of a United Nations body, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.”(x.)
In context, back in 2002, Neil Mackay, multi-award winning investigations Editor of the Sunday Herald explained that: “Driven by greed and a profound lack of morality, the British government violated the Chemical weapons Convention by selling chemicals “that could be converted to weapons of war.”
Countries benefiting from UK sales, Mackay stated, included Libya, Yemen, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Cyprus, India, Kenya, Kuwait, Malaysia, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Turkey and Uganda, a charge the Department of Trade and Industry “clearly admitted.”
After Tony Blair’s embrace of Colonel Gaddafi in March 2004, the British government announced plans to send their experts to Libya to destroy the chemical weapons they had sold, stating that Colonel Gaddafi had mislead Blair over their existence. That they had the remittance documents seems to have escaped them. Identical to UK duplicities over Iraq.
Between the start of Libya’s destruction on 19th March 2011 and NATO taking over on 31st March 2011, the US and UK dropped one hundred and ten Cruise missiles on a country with a population of under six and a half million. When NATO assumed command of the “humanitarian intervention” they assaulted this minimal population with 26,500 bomb- releasing sorties. There were, of course no Presidential tears for Libya’s lost children, whose demise would have been preceded by unimaginable terror, in an onslaught which had two Silly Names, one for the US: “Operation Odyssey Dawn” and one for NATO: “Operation Unified Protector”, the latter, comment defying.
Quadaffi himself lost three small grandchildren and three sons. In 1986 in another US bombing, he lost a just toddling adopted daughter.

Moments after she learned of his terrible death at the hands of a rabid NATO “protected” mob, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appeared on television laughing as she said: “We came, we saw, he died.”
What an age since she said: “I really believe that it takes a village to raise a child.” Now her beliefs are apparently to wipe out the village, its children, parents and lynch the village elder for a tele-opportunity of raucous mirth.
On 4th December 2012, Clinton warned that Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad may be moving, guess what – a “chemical weapons stockpile.”
“We have made our views very clear.This is a red line for the United States. I’m not going to telegraph in any specifics what we would do in the event of credible evidence that the Assad regime has resorted to using chemical weapons against his own people, but suffice to say we are certainly planning to take action if that eventuality were to occur,” she said at a press conference in Prague.
Weapons of course:  “could be used to contain sarin gas”, according to another U.S. official. Another added:  “ … we are concerned about any move that might signal that they are somehow ready to use those chemical weapons on their own people.” (xii.)
“Déjà vu all over again”, as the saying goes.
Syria responded on 6th December: “Syria stresses again, for the tenth, the hundredth time, that if we had such weapons, they would not be used against its people. We would not commit suicide,” Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Al Maqdad told Lebanon’s Al Manar television …”
“We fear there is a conspiracy to provide a pretext for any subsequent interventions in Syria by these countries that are increasing pressure on Syria.” Indeed. It would hardly be a first.
In late October US troops arrived in Jordan for a major joint exercise near the Syrian border. Operation Silly and Childish Name: “Operation Eager Lion.” Al Assad in arabic translates as: the lion.
Ironically the first allegation of Syria having chemical weapons would seem to have come from John R.Bolton, alleged by Congressman Henry Waxman to have persuaded George W. Bush to include the fairy story of Iraq purchasing yellow cake uranium from Niger in his 2003 State of the Union address.The allegation is unproven, however, since the documents are still classified.
Bolton is involved with a plethora of less than liberal organizations, including the Project for the New American Century, The Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) and the currently in the news, The National Rifle Association.
Relating to Syria, it should also be remembered that the country has been under increasingly strangulating sanctions since 2004.
Former Chief Weapons Inspector in Iraq, Scott Ritter has written that: “chemical weapons have a shelf life of five years. Biological weapons have a shelf life of three.” They also give off an “ether”, say experts, which can be picked up by satellite surveillance, which Syria, as Iraq before it is certain to be comprehensively subject of.
Heaven forbid Washington, Whitehall, Tel Aviv and the coalition of the coerced are crying “Wolf!” again. Heaven help anyone who believes them.
Notes


114 comments:

  1. http://frontpagemag.com/2012/frontpagemag-com/beck-obama-may-go-to-prison/?utm_source=FrontPage+Magazine&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=e0b082295b-Mailchimp_FrontPageMag

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    1. Beck: Obama May Go To Prison


      17 minutes of Glenn Beck

      video

      New documents, he claims, and other stuff.

      Delete
    2. Clinton's hurty head deal is now being called "The Immaculate Concussion"



      Republican senators will refuse to confirm Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., as Secretary of State until the nation’s current top diplomat, Hillary Clinton, testifies about her handling of the Benghazi terrorist attack.

      “The Senate is expected to take up Kerry’s nomination in early January, but multiple Republican senators have already said they won’t agree to a vote on Kerry’s nomination until Clinton testifies about the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi,” The Cable’s Josh Rogin notes.

      Clinton backed out of testifying at a congressional hearing last week after fainting and suffering a concussion. She was the first cabinet-level official to acknowledge that terrorists played a role in the assault on the U.S. mission in Benghazi.


      http://washingtonexaminer.com/report-gop-senators-wont-confirm-kerry-until-clinton-testifies-on-benghazi/article/2516877?custom_click=rss#.UNxiV6ycu1t

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  2. “chemical weapons have a shelf life of five years"

    Isn't that after they are mixed? And isn't that what they have been doing, mixing and loading?

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  3. Regarding Ash's comments from the previous post. The newspaper published a list of those who have gun permits. Perfect, now the criminals know who NOT to rob and assault. I wish the Dallas newspaper would do that.

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    1. Ash find an ally in an unsuspected place.


      :)

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    2. .

      It also tells the perps which houses to stake out and hit if they want to pick up weapons.

      Since the info is public property, I doubt there is any legal recouse but it shows that the newspaper's management are dicks. It is similar to gays outing other gays because for their own reasons they refuse to come out of the closet. Privacy only applies if it supports some left-wing agenda. Typical of the liberal/PC types. Some (most?) may even consider it funny. They are all dicks.

      .

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  4. This article fails to make anything out of the Liberation of Grenada, Operation Urgent Fury.

    "We got there just in time." Ronald Reagan

    Media outside the U.S. covered the invasion in a negative outlook despite the OAS request for intervention (on the request of the U.S. government), Soviet and Cuban presence on the island and the holding of American medical students at the True Blue Medical Facility......Grenada gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1974. The leftist New Jewel Movement seized power in a coup in 1979 suspending the constitution. After a 1983 internal power struggle ended with the deposition and murder of revolutionary Prime Minister Maurice Bishop, the invasion began on 25 October 1983, less than 48 hours after the bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Grenada

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    1. Another one of our finest moments, the first war that we won since WW2. We lose troops in Lebanon and attack Grenada. Reagan makes Bush look like a genius. Jihaddiis trained in Afghanistan attack New York and we attack Iraq. At least Bush had his continents right.

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    2. Urgent Fury. Pentagon Poets.

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  5. :) As in all matters there is selective indignation. All murdered children are not equal. An insane man with a stolen weapon killing children is horrifying to all. A far larger number of children killed by US or Israeli missiles are collateral damage, hardly worth mentioning.

    There is group guilt for all gun owners as a result of the slaughter in Newtown, but no guilt for the US politicians that have US troops scattered across the planet and the daily killing going on there.

    We have special treatment for foreign children that get across US borders because they are special.

    People, educated in the government schools are fed so much bullshit from the government, the media, the corporations, they don’t know truth from fiction.

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  6. Oh, praise the Lord for the Supreme Court: Some babe gets boinked without a back-up plan and we have group responsibility to intervene, with our money of course.

    WASHINGTON (AP) -- Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor has denied a request to block part of the federal health care law that requires employee health-care plans to provide insurance coverage for the morning-after pill and similar emergency contraception pills.

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  7. Which would be cheaper? Plan B? Or, the alternative?

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    1. Classic Rufus. Thinking money. No ethical issue involved.

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    2. Moral issue? For a six hour old clump of cells? That's fucking looney-tunes.

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    3. Totally expected you to feel that way. No ethical issue involved.
      The Pope however and millions of others do still feel differently, despite your certitude.

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    4. I like plan C. Pay for a DNA test and hold all benefits till Jill flips Jack and make Jack pay for the first 21 years. Jack does not get a job, give him one, form a corps or 50 of them, call it Ameridads.

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    5. The "Pope" can blow me. And, give all the little boys a break.

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    6. Sounds a lot easier, and cheaper to pay the five bucks for the pill.

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    7. Gross and totally uncalled for, Rufus.

      You continue to insist that your 'insights' be the rule for all others, even though it violates the deeply felt religious conscience of same.

      Plan C has merit.

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    8. "Deeply felt religious conscience" can blow me.

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    9. .

      At your age, Rufus, you'd do better with a Hoover.

      .

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    10. While boobie does not have a m.oral issue aborting Black fetuses.

      He has greater moral issues to deal with, than hating Black babies

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  8. From the Tyler Durden thread:


    The best once can do is come up with an idea to protect your wealth, be right, do it, and do it before everyone else gets the same idea.

    Any suggestions?

    Looks like you might be "related" to the tall willowy blonbd downthread.

    It's been obvious to me for awhile that some of the debt has to be - and likely will be - written off, here and abroad. USA can start with the ($1.4T??) it owes to itself as per Ron Paul.

    I hate to say it because I love the modern urban environment but the chicken shit farm and Opie-ville are probably the best places to weather out the coming Times. Small Towns USA are little more than incestuous cesspools of bored old people. Maybe some influx of youth would "democratize" the profile and, like, you know, enhance the quality of life. Adviseable, I think, if you have the money. If you have serious money, out of country would be better.

    If a "macro approach" emerges, it will be because the Republicans have a collective "come to Jesus" moment of personal epiphany as the Jaws of Life pry their cold rigid hands from their pocketbooks and portfolios. It's all about the numbers, pious proselyting notwithstanding. What's Hollande doing in France? 75% tax rate last I heard. USA is hung up in fainting spells by half of that.

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    1. Small Towns USA are little more than incestuous cesspools of bored old people.

      Heh

      That's not really been my experience, but there is a lot of gossip in some of them. And a lot of drinking in the town's only bar. Nez Perce, Idaho comes to mind. What incestuous relationships there are must be kept in the family, cause I didn't hear about any.

      How did you come by this certain knowledge, if I may ask?

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    2. Maybe some influx of youth would "democratize" the profile and, like, you know, enhance the quality of life.

      Given the 'profile' of youth today, I got my doots.

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    3. Figuratively speaking, personal space is sacrificed; although I estimate at least half the whispering circles around the s-word.

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    4. Small towns are full of the most ignorant motherfuckers on planet earth.

      They are, also, expensive, and inefficient places to dwell. Unless you can come up with One Really Good Reason to be there, stay in the City.

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    5. Given the 'profile' of youth today, I got my doots.

      Given the profile of old people today, it can't hurt.

      (I joke of course. Partly.)

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    6. Don't worry, the old will soon be dying out at an accelerated rate. Then the yoots about whom I've go my doots will own the day.

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    7. The only way "youth" ever enhanced the quality of life, anywhere, is if you were looking to get laid.

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    8. Grocery prices are higher in small towns, and gas. Other than that I don't see a cost issue. Rents and home prices are surely less. You can always stock up on groceries on the monthly trip to town.

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    9. re small towns vs cities

      Some resolution may be required.

      Small town: <100,000
      City: >2,000,000

      Speaking of inefficiencies, the older cities, such as Philadelphia and NYC have huge infrastructure problems - aging utilities and subway systems. Messy and expensive stuff to design engineer around.

      And the smaller cities are expensive but the gangs, drug routes and terrorist dreams tend to cluster in most profitable locations.

      My optimum size is 500,000 to 1,000,000 which is size of many suburbs.

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    10. Real estate taxes are lower.

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    11. 1,000,000 is the size of a properly inhabited large state. A 'small town' is less than a 1,000.

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    12. .

      Optimum size: 500,000 to 1,000,000


      Detroit, population 750,000, ideal.

      .

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    13. Down from a peak of just under 2M (1.8M) which began in the 1950's.

      But point taken: population is not the singular determinant of livability.

      I have lived in Seattle, Denver, San Diego and Phoenix. All different but good. Municipal government seems key.




      Not to distract from the thread subject which is a good one but simply to note that there will be debt forgiveness in the future - for whom and how much TBD.

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    14. And Philadelphia, and southern LA.

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    15. Detroit, population 750,000, ideal.


      :):):):)

      I've lived in Seattle too but it has spread out so much now I hardly recognize the place.

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    16. I've lived in Nez Perce, McCall, Worley, Harrison and Genesee. All the same but good, and none of them even had a municipal government, except McCall, and they didn't ever do anything.

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    17. On the subject of municipal government, I personally favor sending some government power back to states, and cities. The Feds are too involved in too many areas best handled at some lower level. Start with the Big Two - education and energy. Corruption at state and municipal level is just as nasty but they can't do quite as much damage. I also suspect (raw speculation) that the fraud meter is slightly lower because the constituents are slightly closer. So there was a point. Thank you for not noticing.

      And one doesn't "live" in <1000; one waits for the messiah bearing gifts of nirvana and hopeful visions of the next life, or for the wind to blow one into oblivion.

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    18. vis a vis Deuce's contention that no "macro solution" for fiscal imbalance seems plausible at this point: shrink the beast, whether Detroit or the budget; the Optimal Size corollary to Too Big To Fail.

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    19. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    20. Get back when I decide to give a shit.

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    21. .

      My. My.

      Didn't get that Furby you asked Santa for?

      .

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    22. State Legislators teaching "Intelligent Design" can Blow Me.

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    23. My glitter pony can kick your Furby honor student's ass.

      (And I have no clue what a Furby is but my GP is a proven product.)

      Delete
  9. Serbian NATO ambassador dies for unknown reasons
    cc. On 6 December “International Herald Tribune” reported that Serbia’s ambassador to Nato in Brussels, Branislav Milinkovic, had leaped to death from a multi-storey car park. Milinkovic, the newspaper reported, had been a distinguished diplomat, a jurist and an intellectual. Milinkovic had been the Nato ambassador for his country since 2009. Serbia is not a member of NATO; it is however among the countries which co-operate with NATO.
    Representatives of the Serbian government declared that their late ambassador had been about to receive a visitor’s delegation from Serbia. The motives for a possible suicide were puzzling. The incident was investigated in more detail. The Belgian police would also investigate, but they were assuming a suicide so far. The foreign minister of Serbia expressed, his colleague had been a “skilled diplomat, an intellectual and a noble man”. Other officials who were staying in Brussels during the ongoing conference of NATO foreign ministers were somewhat shocked about the death of their colleague.
    Officials of NATO emphasized the Serbian ambassador’s achievements and praised his human qualities and his considerable reputation. According to the NATO spokesperson, Milinkovic had played a major role in building bridges between Serbia and NATO.
    Serbia had been bombed in 1999 by NATO during several weeks and had been forced to withdraw its troops from Kosovo which belonged to the Serbian Republic. At that time Milinkovic had been part of the opposition against Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic. After Milosevic’s downfall Milinkovic first worked as the ambassador for Serbia and Montenegro to the OSCE in Brussels. •

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  10. .

    All military marauding should simply be called: “Operation Silly Name 1, then 2,3,4” etc., until the numbers finally run out.

    Naw, if they did that people would too easily recognize these operations for the Monty Python skits they actually are.

    .

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    1. I'll always remember how that 'medical student' from Grenada got off the plane and kissed the sacred American earth, and said, "God Bless the USA, and Ronald Reagan". He meant it too. Much seems to depend on whether one is a hostage, or not.

      That 'medical school' in Grenada is probably churning out unqualified doctors to this day, who might yet find employment in NoCareWhoCares?NobodyCares somewhere.

      Delete
    2. Medical students from Grenada can Blow Me.

      Delete
  11. Despite Americans’ willingness to strengthen gun laws in the wake of Sandy Hook and other deadly mass shootings, Gallup finds public opposition to a broad ban on the possession of handguns at a record-high 74%. Conversely, the 24% in favor is the lowest recorded since Gallup first asked the question in 1959.

    http://hotair.com/archives/2012/12/27/gallup-opposition-to-handgun-ban-hits-all-time-high/

    ReplyDelete
  12. Agee referred to this in his aptly named talk “Producing the Proper Crisis.”(i) Apt then as now. Nothing changes.

    "Crisis management" being a tool of both Left and Right.

    Noriega a CIA asset, since 1967 (ii) who had also attended the notorious School of the Americas, at Fort Benning, Georgia,...

    Desert Rat's alma mater, is it not, where he learned to fence.

    .......

    As Jenny noted previously, military now mobilizing for northern Africa. Troubled times. I agree with the BC consensus that nuclear "events" are in the future, within my lifetime, I expect, and likely stateside. Another (compelling) reason to avoid the urban areas. (I find myself wondering if someone like Nate Silver has modeled the odds. But I'm sure someone at Rand has done some math.)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. In 1967 the SoA was not at Benning, but at Fot Gulick, Canal Zone.

      Noriega was an alumni.

      Delete

    2. Desert Rat's alma mater, is it not, where he learned to fence.

      Now that is adorable, seething and steamy.

      Delete
  13. Two places you can definitely cross off your list of possible places to live - Deetroit and Mississippi.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Neither were ever on my list.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Farm boy started it.

      Anyhoo, the top 50 livable cities list (aside from including some "anomalies" like NOLA!!) seem to hover around 500,000 population I almost whipped out my calculator but had a fainting spell before I could get across the room so the guess is eyeball.)

      Delete
  15. I'm waiting for the paper to print the addresses of people who have illegal guns.

    I believe we'll also soon see the mapped residential locations of everyone on the offending paper's management staff.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Bashing people of Faith is so cool and tony these days. What it really does is show how narrow minded and ignorant you are.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 2 fuck yous and a blow me. that's good Rufus. You are really on top of your game. By the way, that wasnt directed at you, but since you responded, I can always repost it and put your name in front of it if you like.

      Delete
    2. Fuck you in the ass, and blow me twice.

      Delete
    3. Go save the lives of a few more people with your insurance policies, you will feel better.

      And lay off the hair tonic. It's making you null and void.

      Delete
    4. .

      One key reason why drugs should remain restricted.

      Some guys just can't handle their viagra. Mix a Pabst Blue Ribbon with a little blue pill and them Cherokees go nutz.

      No one is safe, man, woman, nor snake.

      .

      Delete
    5. To claim that John Cleese is "bashing people of faith" is stupid. Profoundly so.

      Delete
    6. Fuck John Cleese.

      And, his brother, Blue Cheese.

      Delete
    7. And, his sister, "pretty please cheese."

      Delete
    8. Rufus - what is the population of your current residence?

      Delete
    9. One brain stem and 12 empty beer cans.

      That'd make it 13.

      Delete
    10. I hate to say it, but Bob's pretty close on this one. Fuck him.

      Delete
    11. Rufus, partly rational to the very end.

      Delete
    12. Then Rufus you need to get out. Those small small places are soul killers.

      Delete

    13. Rufus to Manhattan. He will fit in there.

      Delete
    14. Yes. He will.

      (more in defense of Manhattan than Rufus.)

      Delete
  17. Replies
    1. That's a good question but I was thinking that the paper can't print the names and addresses of guns that they don't know about. They stupidly exposed law abiding citizens. They would also dearm the law abiding while leaving the bad guys armed. This kind of knee jerk liberalism is dangerous.

      Delete
  18. Here is what the lovely Ms. Feinstein wants to do in 2013. I have never met any one from California who didnt have their head up their ass.

    In January, Senator Feinstein will introduce a bill to stop the sale, transfer, importation and manufacturing of military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition feeding devices.

    Following is a summary of the 2013 legislation:

    Bans the sale, transfer, importation, or manufacturing of:
    120 specifically-named firearms
    Certain other semiautomatic rifles, handguns, shotguns that can accept a detachable magazine and have one military characteristic
    Semiautomatic rifles and handguns with a fixed magazine that can accept more than 10 rounds
    Strengthens the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban and various state bans by:
    Moving from a 2-characteristic test to a 1-characteristic test
    Eliminating the easy-to-remove bayonet mounts and flash suppressors from the characteristics test
    Banning firearms with “thumbhole stocks” and “bullet buttons” to address attempts to “work around” prior bans
    Bans large-capacity ammunition feeding devices capable of accepting more than 10 rounds.
    Protects legitimate hunters and the rights of existing gun owners by:
    Grandfathering weapons legally possessed on the date of enactment
    Exempting over 900 specifically-named weapons used for hunting or sporting purposes and
    Exempting antique, manually-operated, and permanently disabled weapons
    Requires that grandfathered weapons be registered under the National Firearms Act, to include:
    Background check of owner and any transferee;
    Type and serial number of the firearm;
    Positive identification, including photograph and fingerprint;
    Certification from local law enforcement of identity and that possession would not violate State or local law; and
    Dedicated funding for ATF to implement registration

    ReplyDelete
  19. The "Pope" can blow me. And, give all the little boys a break.

    Sounds a lot easier, and cheaper to pay the five bucks for the pill.

    "Deeply felt religious conscience" can blow me.

    The only way "youth" ever enhanced the quality of life, anywhere, is if you were looking to get laid.

    State Legislators teaching "Intelligent Design" can Blow Me.

    Medical students from Grenada can Blow Me.

    Fuck You.

    Fuck you, too.

    Blow me.

    Fuck you in the ass, and blow me twice.

    Make that "three times."


    Is there a hooker in the house?

    This man needs some relief.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just lean over that table, right over there.

      Delete
    2. Oh, and Anon, even though I'm 80% sure you're Farm boy Bob, and even though I don't do food fights, I stake my claim with Rufus on the subject of religion (and its first cousin, birth control.) A "closed system of thought" is a nasty thing indeed, and in word and thought.

      The multitudinous scope of Politically Correct thinking extends into the space of religious "belief."

      Delete
    3. That's Farm Boy Bob, adorable, seething, steamy, thank you. And I didn't start anything.

      Delete
  20. I'm a whore and Iconsider anything but it gonna cost you to do that man he loco take up a pool of your money on the bar make an offer and Ill consider it

    Slinkeva

    Slinky

    ReplyDelete
  21. A U.S. official says retired Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, who commanded the U.S.-led international coalition that drove Saddam Hussein's forces out of Kuwait in 1991, has died. He was 78.

    ...

    He lived in retirement in Tampa, where he had served in his last military assignment as commander-in-chief of U.S. Central Command. That is the headquarters responsible for U.S. military and security concerns in nearly 20 countries from the eastern Mediterranean and Africa to Pakistan.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Now, that I'm sorry to hear.

      Delete
    2. You no wanna pay good?

      Slinky

      Delete
    3. Then go join Secret Service, Rustic.

      Slinky

      Delete
  22. That said, rebel commanders have previously broken promises to stop advancing in their attempts to overthrow President Bozize, who came to power in a 2003 rebellion. He has won two subsequent elections but has repeatedly relied on foreign intervention to fend off rebel attacks.

    ...

    While the government and rebels busy themselves with military and political manoeuvring, Unicef is exploring several options to transfer the rescued children from their emergency home in the Unicef compound to secure specialised residential centres. There the children will continue the delicate processes of psychological rehabilitation which must follow their physical demobilisation.

    As soon as the security situation stabilises they will be returned to school or vocational training. Later they will be reunited with their families or resettled with foster carers as part of the extended Unicef programme to restore their stolen childhoods.

    ReplyDelete
  23. National Rifle Association President David Keene said Thursday that NBC host David Gregory shouldn't be prosecuted for displaying an empty high capacity magazine on "Meet the Press," even though it may have violated Washington, D.C. law. Gregory held up the magazine Sunday during an interview that was taped in Washington with NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre.

    ...

    "No, I don't think so," Keene said in the interview Thursday on CNN when asked whether Gregory should be prosecuted. "There are two lessons for him there. One, don't ask the government what's legal and what isn't legal because half the people you ask don't know. And secondly, that's a silly felony.

    ReplyDelete
  24. A strong national defense is not something that Americans are ready to sacrifice. Even looking at this issue politically reveals that independent voters were greatly troubled by the lack of security at our government facility in Benghazi and that risked becoming a tipping point issue in the campaign.

    ...

    When a progressive friend asked me how I felt following the election and I shared some of this, he said: “You are an unrepentant conservative.” And so I am.

    Conservatives will make a big mistake if they think only of going wide and shallow, seeking more votes at the topsoil level of politics. First they need to go deeper, and sharpen the core values and principles which many Americans do share, and if sacrificed on the altar of politics leaves conservatism one more loud voice merely seeking votes.


    Extreme Makeover Not Needed

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. First they need to go deeper, and sharpen the core values and principles which many Americans do share, and if sacrificed on the altar of politics leaves conservatism one more loud voice merely seeking votes.

      Self-reliance, hard work, family, a sense of right vs wrong: you betcha.

      Reproductive nazi's and Christian dogmatists: not so much.

      And the odds are that the Pubbies will "reconstitute" their "core values"?

      It's not attitude so much as a crucial dividing line: Glenn Beck vs [pick your moderate Republican, say, John Boehner.]

      Fool me once ..................

      Delete
    2. I have been reading this book called The Biology of Transcendence, and it is a sad read. The author sees our country going down the tubes at a rapid rate. One of his ideas is that our modern mobility is a real problem. With mobility the extended family breaks up, and as the extended family is necessary to the proper functioning of the nuclear family, it in its turn breaks up as well. We see this all over the country now. With dad gone, mom has not the resources to handle it all, and no grandma or grandpa to take up some of the slack. He does not know what to do about this, other than offer some vague idea about letting the women run the asylum, which in a way they are already trying to do.

      He brought out this sad fact, if it is a fact - he claims that the average high school student of a generation or two ago had a working vocabulary of around 25,000 words, and now it is down to around 8,000-10,000. No idea if this is anywhere near correct though.

      If you want to stay cheery this Holiday Season, you might put this book off until later.

      Delete
    3. It seems to me that it is this type of situation that the Republicans are, perhaps unconsciously, focusing upon, while the Democrats mostly don't seem to give the idea a hoot.

      Delete
    4. .

      Modern Mobility is a real problem?

      Lord.

      Our problem as a nation is that we have become self-satisfied and self-indulgent. We're self-centered and contented, some might say decadent. Why worry about drones and torture in countries far away. Why worry about the taking of innocent lives here. Why worry about the poor or the drive-bys in the inner city. It doesn't affect us directly. Out of sight, out of mind. We live in an age of rapidly expanding moral relativism. The only thing that shakes us from our dolorous unconcern is when someone or some group threatens our 401k or that car we planned on buying for the kid.

      The poem, Complicity by Jon Snow printed at the following link kind of expresses it nicely

      Who's not complicit?

      .

      Delete
  25. Everyone go diddle themselves; I'm goin' back to bed.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You couldn't perform anyway Im wasting my time here.

      Slinky

      Delete
    2. You couldn't perform either magician.

      byebye darling

      Slinky

      Delete
  26. In my role as a talk show host, I have been approached by individuals who claim to have “insider information” about what is coming, and according to these individuals, what is coming is very bad. Most credible sources demand complete anonymity.

    ...

    In a December 9, 2012 interview on The Common Sense Show, Jim Marrs discussed how approximately 400-500 top level bankers have left their positions and have gone into seclusion. Marrs reminded my listening audience of how the elite have developed seed vaults for which they only have access to.

    ...

    When government officials, from the various alphabet soup agencies, retire en masse, it is not necessarily a noteworthy event. However, when the same officials retire en masse and then relocate to form their own survivalist enclaves, then this is something that we should all sit up and take notice of especially when we are seeing the same behavior on the part of Wall Street executives.


    Going Into Hiding

    ReplyDelete
  27. On the frontlines of the Ameriya neighbourhood, south of Aleppo, we met Abara and his men.

    ...

    Now, he said, in order to regain the lost territory he would have to fight house to house. "Why should I, when the rest are looting?"

    He added wearily: "One day when the war against Bashar is over, another war will start against the looters and thieves."


    Spoils Of War

    ReplyDelete
  28. On this day in 1932, Radio City Music Hall opened its doors for the very first time in New York City.

    ReplyDelete
  29. DDR he she it whoever you are if you think I was referring to Clease, you're as brain dead as Rufus.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Have I expressed my desire, recently, that you should go fuck yourself, GR?

      Delete
  30. Now that Rufus is bedward for beauty rest, I can post this without fear of further profanity -

    Mr. Obama has sunk billions of tax dollars into a scandal-ridden swamp of other energy deals that were crafted and promoted by administration business cronies who also were among his biggest fundraisers.....“Overall, the Post found that $3.9 billion in federal grants and financing flowed to 21 companies backed by firms with connections to five Obama administration staffers and advisers,” the newspaper reported at the time....What has come to light so far as part of a congressional investigation is the administration’s willful order to approve a bad loan, despite dire warnings from a number of federal officials that California-based Solyndra was in deep financial trouble.


    Etc,etc,etc.

    This is called 'theft'.

    http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/dec/26/obamas-dirty-clean-energy-deals/






    ReplyDelete
  31. Authorities in China's political and financial capitals plan crackdowns on companies that violate food-safety regulations, after scrutiny of drugs given to locally served chickens.

    ...

    In a statement posted on its website and dated Thursday, the Shanghai Municipal Food Safety Committee said food companies found engaging in any of 11 types of harmful food-safety practices would be blacklisted ...

    ReplyDelete
  32. What caused me to chuckle was the equivalence of gun owners and sex offenders by way of the interactive map. Nothing more nothing less.

    ReplyDelete
  33. 2020.06.11前新北市議員李婉鈺日前在節目中透露酒店小姐的基本介紹跟工作內容,她30歲時曾和一名斯文富二代有過婚約,當時我在酒店上班的日子已經認定彼此是要走一輩子的人,沒想到訂完婚後,對方卻背著她把酒店小姐帶回新房過夜,事後連一句道歉也沒有,讓她對這段感情心死,決定解除婚約。 李婉鈺在節目《不敢來酒店上班-酒店打工的原因單身行不行》透露,她30歲時曾經訂過婚,男方是一名大她9歲的富二代,從事酒店上班-酒店兼職-兼差如何達成人生的第一桶金建築室內設計方面的工作,事業穩定且家世相當好,兩人認識3個月就決定結婚。當時男方很貼心地把求婚及結婚的東西都準備好,不僅安排酒店兼差不是一個複雜的工作環境?楊凡導演幫忙拍攝照片,就連婚紗也是用知名品牌,所有東西都選最好的,她什麼事都不用操心,職場須知 【酒店PT 】只要人到場就好。李婉鈺說,兩人訂完婚後,某次男方說要去酒店參加朋友替他舉辦的告別單身派對,而她也沒有多想,很放心地讓對方出門。沒想到隔天送養肝茶給男方喝時,對方卻一直不開門、也不接電話,讓她越想越不對勁,於是乾脆站在門口守株待兔,從早上等到傍晚,直到外傭回來幫忙開門,一個女生突然從屋子裡衝出來,把她撞開後迅速離開現場,她才知自己被男方背叛,對方居然把酒店小姐帶到兩人的新房過夜。 李婉鈺透露,當時男方沒有解釋、也沒有感到抱歉,只是站在屋內對著她說「妳到底想要幹什麼?」讓她瞬間崩潰心死,什麼話也沒說就轉身離去,「哀莫大於心死,我覺得已經沒救了」,之後她也把婚戒退還給對方並解除婚約,放棄了這段感情。 李婉鈺說,「我後來輾轉知道他晚上都玩得很瘋狂,我就去拜託他身邊的好朋友,說拜託你們帶我去他常常去的酒店,然後叫他常常叫的酒店小姐出來,我想要知道她們到底哪裡好,我為什麼比不上她們」。事後還有媽媽桑向她透露,男方是酒店的常客,每次一定會帶一個女生回去,酒後還會做出失控舉動,讓李婉鈺不禁直呼,「很慶幸我那時候還沒有踏入婚姻這一步,就只是訂婚而已」。

    ReplyDelete