OT Follow the money
 

Wolfgang wrote:

"JR" wrote

So let's list everyone's contributions to all organizations on the
internet.
.............
Maybe their bank and credit card statements, their tax returns.

Well, this IS fun but, before we continue, I was just wondering; do you have
ANY idead what Bob's point was.......or mine?

Well, I always have a good idea what Bob's points are, but then he
always has one. :)

.........
If you like, I'll send you copies of my monthly
bank statements, income tax records, receipts for books (I prefer to buy
books rather than borrowing from the local library), and whatever else you
might find of interest.

And permission to post them on the internet?

.......
'Course, then the rest of us would have to be content with minding
our own business.

Like answering questions directed to someone else, eh?

Another Usenet prohibition I've shot all to hell? :(

And yet I don't believe I attempted to answer any question. I responded
to an exchange, the last post of which was yours responding to Bob's,
which ended, as I recall, with a question directed to snakefiddler. G

JR

OT Follow the money
 

"JR" wrote in message
...
Wolfgang wrote:

"JR" wrote

So let's list everyone's contributions to all organizations on the
internet.
.............
Maybe their bank and credit card statements, their tax returns.

Well, this IS fun but, before we continue, I was just wondering; do you
have
ANY idead what Bob's point was.......or mine?

Well, I always have a good idea what Bob's points are, but then he
always has one. :)

Pretty restricted way to live, if you ask me. But then, asking me would be
intrusive.

If you like, I'll send you copies of my monthly
bank statements, income tax records, receipts for books (I prefer to buy
books rather than borrowing from the local library), and whatever else
you
might find of interest.

And permission to post them on the internet?

Sure.

'Course, then the rest of us would have to be content with minding
our own business.

Like answering questions directed to someone else, eh?


Another Usenet prohibition I've shot all to hell? :(

Not my area of expertise.

And yet I don't believe I attempted to answer any question.

No? Interesting. Not true, but interesting nevertheless.

I responded
to an exchange, the last post of which was yours responding to Bob's,
which ended, as I recall, with a question directed to snakefiddler. G

Ah! Comprehension begins to dawn. Well, sometimes it takes me a while but
I am nothing if not dogged......persistence usually pays off. So, you were
telling Bob that he should mind his own business, huh?

Meanwhile, life is full of odd little coincidences. Not ten minutes ago, I
was sitting on the front stoop, taking a short break from chopping down the
last remnants of last year's flower gardens when I spied a couple and what
are presumably their young sons walking up the street toward me and all
carrying plastic bags. One of the boys broke away from the pack, walked up
our driveway and handed me a bag, muttering something about "food for
families", and "we'll be back next Saturday". I'd guess he's about seven
years old. I didn't have the heart to tell him that he should mind his own
****ing business. :(

Wolfgang

OT Follow the money
 

Wolfgang wrote:

Ah! Comprehension begins to dawn. Well, sometimes it takes me a while but
I am nothing if not dogged......persistence usually pays off. So, you were
telling Bob that he should mind his own business, huh?

Persist.

Meanwhile, life is full of odd little coincidences .......

..... and of charming, feeble non sequiturs.


--not worth the candle. EOST for me.

JR

OT Follow the money
 

"JR" wrote in message
...
Wolfgang wrote:

Ah! Comprehension begins to dawn. Well, sometimes it takes me a while
but
I am nothing if not dogged......persistence usually pays off. So, you
were
telling Bob that he should mind his own business, huh?

Persist.

Meanwhile, life is full of odd little coincidences .......

.... and of charming, feeble non sequiturs.


--not worth the candle. EOST for me.

Surrender accepted. Go forth and sin no more.

Wolfgang
magnanimity, like most virtues, gets easier with practice.

OT Follow the money
 

"Wolfgang" wrote in message
...

"Bob Weinberger" wrote in message
...

By your reasoning above, if I was your employer and found out that you
were giving money to a candidate that I do not support or worse detest,
I
should deny you any raises or even fire you.
In "at will" states I would have that option (though I'd probably have
to
give another reason). It may be legal, but is it "right"?


--
Bob Weinberger
La, Grande, OR

Hm.....so, if you find out that one of your local shopkeepers contributes
regularly to the White Aryan Resistance, do you make a point of
patronizing
his or her establishment in order to protect all of our rights?

Wolfgang
and lest anyone should protest the use of a violent extremist group for
illustrative purposes, i'd bet a shiny new nickel that he or she was not
vacationing in or near baghdad a year ago today.

Maybe I should be flattered that you seem to have taken my statement and
question above as some sort of ACLU type stance of "champion the rights of
even the most unpopular among us to protect all our rights". Though I can
understand and empathize with that position, alas I am not principled
enough or morally rigid enough to actually adhere to it.
Also, making "a point of patronizing his or her establishment" would simply
be the flip side of withholding your patronage to make a political point.
No my far less lofty point is simply, if its OK for you to use the power of
the purse to try to influence (or punish) others for the political causes
that they support, it can with equal legitimacy be used against you, and
don't be surprised if it happens. I see that stance as considerably
different ( and yes probably more cowardly)than taking an active role to
protect "all our rights".


--
Bob Weinberger
La, Grande, OR

place a dot between bobs and stuff and remove invalid to send email

OT Follow the money
 

"Bob Weinberger" wrote in message
...

Maybe I should be flattered that you seem to have taken my statement and
question above as some sort of ACLU type stance of "champion the rights of
even the most unpopular among us to protect all our rights".

Well, maybe, but I don't think so. Even if that were what I had in mind, I
can't think of any good reason that you should be flattered by my taking
note of it.......um......or are you trying to flatter me? I mean, if that
is the case, I certainly don't have anything against a mutual admiration
society but I'd like to suggest that each of us could probably find a more
worthy icon.

Though I can
understand and empathize with that position, alas I am not principled
enough or morally rigid enough to actually adhere to it.

I guess I'm a bit more sanguine about your principles than you appear to be
but, obviously, I don't know you as well. At any rate, adherence to the
precept that all of us have some defensible rights doesn't require a great
deal of principle. Common sense will do well enough for those possessed of
a reasonable measure of it.. Reason is even better. Force of habit will
suffice for some. Others might require an occasional reminder from an
outside source, while others still may (at least theoretically) make do with
any number of other inducements.

Moral rigidity certainly could cause one to cling to a particular position
but, in this case at least, it is absolutely the wrong reason. Morality, by
virtue of the complexity of the human ladscape, requires a degree of
flexibility......what's right in a particular situation or context is not
necessarily so even in another very similar one. This, of course, bears
strongly on the question you raised in responding to Snake and which I
addressed in my earlier reply to you......and I'll get back to that in a
moment.

Also, making "a point of patronizing his or her establishment" would
simply
be the flip side of withholding your patronage to make a political point.

No, it's not quite that simple. Not all opposing points are of equal
intellectual, political, or moral value. Giving money to the American Nazi
Party is by no means simply the flip side of giving money to B'nai B'rith.

No my far less lofty point is simply, if its OK for you to use the power
of
the purse to try to influence (or punish) others for the political causes
that they support, it can with equal legitimacy be used against you, and
don't be surprised if it happens.

Forgive me; I mistook your question, "...is it 'right'?" for a serious (if,
perhaps, rhetorical) one. Had that been the case.......well, speculation on
what might have been......

I see that stance as considerably
different ( and yes probably more cowardly)than taking an active role to
protect "all our rights".

Stance? I see a banal observation in the sentence beginning, "No my far
less lofty point...", but no indication that anyone has taken a stance on
anything.....quite the contrary. You certainly appeared to be taking a
stance earlier but, as is so often the case here (as elsewhere), when
someone pointed out that what you were standing one was your dick, you
hastened to assure anyone who might be reading that you weren't standing on
anything at all, an observation that is no less ironic for being absolutely
true.

Wolfgang

OT Follow the money
 

"Wolfgang" wrote in message
...

"Bob Weinberger" wrote in message
...
snip

Also, making "a point of patronizing his or her establishment" would
simply
be the flip side of withholding your patronage to make a political
point.

No, it's not quite that simple. Not all opposing points are of equal
intellectual, political, or moral value. Giving money to the American
Nazi
Party is by no means simply the flip side of giving money to B'nai B'rith.
snip
Wolfgang

Wolfgang,
While I obviously don't always do the best job of making my points clear, I
find it hard to believe that someone, such as yourself who places great
emphasis on reading comprehension, would infer that my above statement in
any way implied that all opposing points are of equal intellectual,
political, or moral value. In case my assesment of your understanding of
what I meant to say is wrong, and you didn't use the statement simply as an
opening to make a separate point of your own, here is an amplification of my
statement in an attempt to make my point clearer:
Trying to protect all of our rights by making a point of patronizing an
establishment who's owner supports an unpopular cause, is the flip side of
withholding patronage from that establishment because you disagree with a
cause that he/she supports, or of patronizing that establishment solely
because you agree with the owner's politics ( OK, so its a 3 sided coin ).
These approaches involve using tactics that impact the owner's livelihood
solely for reasons that may or may not have anything to do with the business
itself.

While some causes are so repugnant to me that I will avoid doing business
with those who actively push those agendas, in my view at least, that is a
far cry from basing my purchasing decisions solely on whether or not the
business owner gave a few thousand dollars to a political party or candidate
other than the one I may support. And while others' MMV, I am somewhat
uneasy that such information is readily available.

For that matter, I have yet to find a candidate at the national level of
either party that I could enthusiastically support, or find enough real
difference between them that I could honestly say that I believed that one
was a measurably bigger threat to the country than the other. Don't give any
of them money, it only encourages the *******s.

Enough of this BS. Fishing conditions are starting to get prime, and as far
as I can tell, the fish don't care what our politics or philosophies are.
BTW, I'll be in the Twin Cities for a week or so sometime in July. Is a
Clave in the driftless zone of SE MN or SW WI for that apporoximate time
still being considered?


--
Bob Weinberger
La, Grande, OR

place a dot between bobs and stuff and remove invalid to send email

OT Follow the money
 

"troutbum_mt" wrote in message
t...
B J Conner wrote...
I hope you find plenty of Coors beer and Walmarts over there. Everybody
votes for and with their pocketbook. Some people donate large amounts
in
order to get what they want. I spend mine to keep them form getting
what I
don't want. Lots of the $ 2,000 donars want to see the snowmobiles in
Yellowstone, clearcuts, cynide leach mines etc. They can do it without
my
help. I just canceled a LL Bean credit card because it's issued by MBNA
who
gave Shrub $200,000.

You don't spend much, do you? I mean Bush has raised over $100 million
more than Kerry from not only the SAME contributors, but others as well.
Yeah, that's right. Many of Kerry's contributors gave MORE money to
BUSH and Bush collected from MORE contributors as well. I realize that
you are too stupid to realize that, but pointing it out never hurts.
--
Warren
(use troutbum_mt (at) yahoo to reply via email)
For Conclave Info:
http://www.geocities.com/troutbum_mt...nConclave.html

Thanks for all that information. We're talking about MY money, not someone
elses, Bush don't get any of mine ( or as little as possible ). It's my
money and I'm not so stupid to know where and with whom I can spend it. I
though they taught you guys which turnips had blood in them but I didn't
know they taught that you were authorized to tell everyone how to spend
their money. I only see a lawyer when I need to, thanks for pointing out
to me that I also need one to tell me how to spend money. Are you
available? if so I could consult with you before spending amounts over $20,
$ 50 , $2K?
On second thought if I was too stupid to spend my own money I should get
someone smarter that myself to hellp me. I'll just continue to use the one
I have on retainer, she is not cheap but she is very good.

OT Follow the money
 

On 19 Mar 2004 14:50:59 -0800, (Jonathan Cook)
wrote:

Ken Fortenberry wrote in message om...
This is kinda cool

http://www.fundrace.org/neighbors.php

I plugged in my zip code, 61801, and found that all my neighbors

Am I the only one who finds this a little scary???

Y'all rail about the patriot act, but this little piece of
big brother you're fine with?

Sheesh.

Jon. (bigbrotherisms don't have to always come from the gov't)


It's the law that all donations over a certain amount (seems to be
$500?) have to be available to the public. It has been for years.
Something to do with campaign fund chicanery. Not that this will stop
it. I'm sure there are ways around it for the really big players.

Anyone who doesn't want their contributions known simply shouldn't
make them. Can I use that as a reason I don't contribute? Nah. Weak
and spurious reasoning. But almost cute.

BTW, my neighborhood is 8 to Bush, 6 to various Dems (2 to Kerry).
Considering that they took my whole zip code, I think that my
neighborhood shares my attitude to contributing by an estimate of
about at least a hundred to at most a thousand fold over the
contributors.
--

rbc:vixen,Minnow Goddess,Willow Watcher,and all that sort of thing.
Often taunted by trout.
Only a fool would refuse to believe in luck. Only a damn fool would rely on it.

http://www.visi.com/~cyli

OT Follow the money
 

wrote in message
...
On 19 Mar 2004 14:50:59 -0800, (Jonathan Cook)
wrote:
It's the law that all donations over a certain amount (seems to be
$500?) have to be available to the public. It has been for years.
Something to do with campaign fund chicanery. Not that this will stop
it. I'm sure there are ways around it for the really big players.

I think it's $200. The FEC has been collecting this information for a long
time, and anybody who wanted to walk in their front door could access the
reports on fiche and could copy pages for $.05 per page. When they first
put the information into computer storage, they sold access for $20 per
hour. They still do that for near-real-time data, but also let you download
summaries for free. (I found this all out at www.fec.gov). I'm happy this
information is now being distributed for free on the Web - remember this has
always been available to people with enough money to buy the computer time
and staff...