BS: Popular views on Popular views threads

Subject: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 14 Sep 08 - 07:31 PM

There have been a series of "Popular Views" threads going on this forum for some time, mostly because of Amos. Here's how they stand at this moment:


1. Popular views on Obama - 2910 posts

2. Popular views on the Bush Administration - 1480 posts (most of them by Amos) ;-)

3. Popular views on McCain - 473 posts

4. Popular views on Chongo - 167 posts

5. Popular views on cheese - 65 posts


The level of interest in John McCain is apparently so weak that he is not all that far ahead of an ape and a dairy product! LOL!

A similar "Popular views" thread on Sarah Palin would have probably garnered well over 1,000 posts already, judging by all the threads going about her. Hell, maybe 2,000...and it's only been, what? A week?

This tells you something. Without Sarah Palin, where would the hell would McCain be right now? Very few people can be bothered to even talk about him much if these thread counts are any indication.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 14 Sep 08 - 09:53 PM

"The insightful and widely applauded "Popular Views" threads, concatenating some of the best public commentary on a range of political personalities and issues, are the brainchild of an obscure Himalayan Bigfoot in exile who goes by the name of "Amos" No-one knows much about him, aside from the fact that he spent twenty years attaining enlightenment in a remote Nepaesel monastery, and was the original model after whom the popular ballads "John Henry", "The Wreck of the Old Ninety-Seven", "He Came From His Castle So Grand", "Billy Budd, Foretopman", ""The Highwayman", "Ghost Riders in the Sky", "The Ballad of Davy Crockett:", and more recently "I'm Just a Lonely Boy" were written. THe threads have begun a groundswell of acclaim from bloggers all over Western civilization, and in the United States are responsible for a remarkable backlash against hypocrisy, newspeak, corruption, and political dishonesty. So great is the emotional fervor of this wave that it is likely to guarantee a win for Barack Obama in the forthcoming American elections. (...) " (NYT)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 14 Sep 08 - 10:27 PM

LOL!

Man, what an imagination...

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:06 AM

As far as I can tell, the Popular View, as expressed within the threads themselves, seems to be that they ain't as Popular as you might think from the Titles .... :-P

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 12:28 PM

It could be argued that the difference between the number of "popular views" of MCain and Obama are a little exaggerated, as in order to get a more accurate picture you might need to deduct the "unpopular views" of Obama and Palin first.

Perhaps the fairest thing to do would be to create "unpopular views of Obama/Palin" threads and transfer any such posts across.

Then you can compare the remainders.

just a thought ...

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 12:33 PM

We should also have threads for people who don't give a flying flip either way....just so they don't get left out. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 12:43 PM

Tgis just in from Salon.com:

Sarah Palin Endorses Popular Views Threads!

"In a surprise move, VP wannabe Sarah Palin has spoken out forcefully in defense of the surprisingly famous "Popular Views..." threads appearing on a local blues and folk music forum.

"Whoever is behind those threads is brilliant," Palin commented. "They are exactly the kind of threads I like to read. They tell you all the news on a given subject, but only after it has been carefully filtered to remove the contaminated information of contrary viewpoints and false assertions from the moonbats at either end of the spectrum. I wish I had someone to write threads like that for the conservatives, because even a fair-minded, honest, intelligent, articulate moderate like that Amos fellow who claims credit for these threads is a little too liberal for my tatstes. I need an Amos Barbie Doll wearing an American Flag Bathing Suit". That's the kind of guy I want to get my claws hands on...".

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:11 PM

Amos,,

"They tell you all the news on a given subject, but only after it has been carefully filtered to remove the contaminated information of contrary viewpoints and false assertions " is all you need to say.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:31 PM

Heh! This is getting pretty good.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:45 PM

Hmm. I can shorten it even more...

"They tell you all the appropriate news on a given subject, but only after it has been carefully filtered to remove the contaminated information of contrary viewpoints and assertions."

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:48 PM

Sounds like the sort of thing government spokesmen and political party spokesmen do...

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:52 PM

Amos is in practice for the Dept of Appropriate Information for the Obama Administration.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 01:55 PM

And you're there for the same job if McCain wins, BB... ;-D

You guys are the Yin and Yang of American politics, I swear. Put the two of you in a blender, turn it up full for 3 minutes, and you'd have a 100% American smoothie.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 02:05 PM

My view of Wall Street http://usera.imagecave.com/donuel/bloodmoney.jpg

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 02:07 PM

Nope- I don't want the pay cut.


I would rather do something useful with my time.


Just think, when McCain wins, and then resigns a day before his term ends, Palin gets to be the first woman president. And run as the incumbent... Good for two terms, afetr McCain's one term. So, 12 more years of Republican Presidents, and Democratic Congresses. That should be enough to keep ANY major changes, one way or the other, limited to ones that both sides want.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 02:26 PM

Why would he resign? He could just retire at the conclusion of his first term (if he makes it that long), and then Palin could take his place, couldn't she? But I guess they'd have to go through the whole bla-bla of primaries then, wouldn't they?

I take some comfort in the thought that I may not live long enough to see the entirety of that 12 years of Republican administration you describe, BB. On the other hand, I might live that long.

Oh woe! ;-D The travails of Earthly existence...

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 02:55 PM

If Amos and bearded bruce were truely opposite, then they would have opposite occupations.

Lets do an im possible thought experiment...

so lets suppose Amos is now working for a firm that depends on defense contracts, and bearded bruce is working for a publisher.
Would they still be themselves or would they politically gravitate to their polar opposites?

no

It goes deeper than that. It goes to the parents and each person's identity as working toward some learned common good.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:14 PM

Sorry, D.

I am presently a subcontractor to a company that

1. Builds, launches and runs spacecraft for NASA (SMEX seris- GALEX and IBEX that I am working on)
2. Builds, launches and tests geosync spacecraft for television and communications worldwide ( Indonesia, Australia that I have worked on)
3. Builds and tests vehicles for DoD, including SDIO ( BMDO) experiments, and the present installed ABM in Alaska ( I only worked on MUBLCOM and DART)

My income is actually greater when the DoD is NOT the prime user- Most is NASA money, or Commercial ( foreign) Space.


Now, what does Amos work on?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,beardedbruce
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:18 PM

LH,

If McCain did not resign, and let Palin be President, Hillary could run against her in 2012 and still try to be the first woman President. By resigning one day beore the end of his term, Palin gets to be the 1st EVEN IF HILLARY WINS!

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:28 PM

Ah, yes, I see...

That is a critical distinction, isn't it? No wonder Hillary has been in such a lousy mood lately. She won't even return my calls.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:35 PM

I currently work for a company that invents, develops, and manufacturers sophisticated instruments for locating, tracing and identifying underground utilities, and inspecting the interior of pipes, all of which is mission-critical to keeping our basic infrastructure in place and operational. Purely peacetime applications, although they could be used as mine detectors easily, if anyone wanted to clean up the land-mines of the world.

I used to work for the DoDE, too, also as a subcotnractor's employee, but the simple fact was that I got so sick of waking up thinking that the very top of my command chain was Rumsfeld that I was delighted to leave the industry.

It pays less, or did originally, than my DoD job, but that's a little price to pay for the relief of getting out from the military industrial environment.





A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:51 PM

Wall Street Journal:

"Mysterious Hairy Biped Starts Internet Frenzy"

"New York, Spet. 14th, 2008--Internet analysts are bewidlered and bemused by the soaring popularity of a series of insightful, sharp-tongued, controversial internet messages comprising the "Popular Views" series of forum threads at an obscure folk music forum. The creator and developer of the threads, who goes by the handle "Amos", has been hailed by bloggers, web-page editors, and newsrooms as the most refreshing voice in politics since Sarah Palin blogged about losing her virginity. Although he has been reported to be a Nepalese Bigfoot living in exile, rumors have been surfacing since the astronomical growth in popularity of the series that the author is actually a seventeen-year-old brunetter sophomore coed at Vassar.

But whoever he or she is, there is no question, though, that the "Popular Views" threads Amos started have become a phenomenon, stirring up enough ebnthusiasm to possibly sweep Barack Obama into the White House all by themselves."

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:55 PM

(sigh) He's slowly sliding into a complete fantasy world, peopled with bizarre and unlikely animal characters.

You'll never see me do that.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 03:59 PM

HEy, man, I just report the opinions I find in the popular press.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 04:06 PM

"Hmm. I can shorten it even more...

"They tell you all the appropriate news on a given subject, but only after it has been carefully filtered to remove the contaminated information of contrary viewpoints and assertions." "

Hey BB - you lengthened it from the previous time you quoted it - by adding the word "appropriate" ...

lox ( ... whistling nonchalantly and hoping that isn't a barbed hook attached to the bait he has just swallowed ... )

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 04:11 PM

BB,

Well, I am glad your sensors are subtle enough to realize the profound, decadent, self-serving hypocrisy in every singhle post in those threads. It restores my faith in humanity to know you can see through such shenanigans.



A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,lox
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 04:42 PM

sensors?

censors?

popular census?

Consensus?

now I'm being pretentious

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 04:55 PM

Oh, heaven forfend!

;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 05:02 PM

"don't shoot until you see the red in their eyes."
Capt. Frenzee
(when confronting a legalize pot demonstration)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: maeve
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 05:10 PM

Finally a thread about which I can say, "Read it and laugh" rather than "Read it and weep".

Gentlemen, I salute you!

maeve

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 06:02 PM

TIME Magazine:

Manic Thread Fans Demand 'Man of Year' Status for Internet Unkinown!

" Our editorial offices have been deluged with letters as our annual "Person of the Year" Award deadline draws closer. Our email inboxes are so full our IT personnel are working double-shifts to prevent the servers from crashing. Our Facebook, Jott, Twitter, and MySpace pages are swamped by frenzied demands. Not since Elvis hot Ed Sullivan has mass popular opinion been so heavily leveraged to try and sway our editorial decision making process.

No, it's not a demand for Sarah Palin's pickled feet, nor yet a demand that we stop admiring John McCain's crusty, snowy skullcap.

The subject of this unprecedented and phenomenal fervor is to name as Man of the Year an alleged person. His name (according to some) is Amos--at least that what he says--and he is the web genius behind o series of massively popular forum threads called the "Popular Views" threads, all of which have been established on an obscure internet forum called Mudcat. The threads have proven so insanely popular that te site is threatening to banish the alleged Amos for overwhelming their servers as well.

All this would be well and good except for the strange fact that some people believe AMos is not a normal citizen at all, but a Bigfoot from the snowy mountains of Nepal, living in exile in a rundown 19th century British army barracks deep in the interior of India, where he allegedly composes threads and studies Kipling on a wireless laptop. ANother contingent insists he is the anti-Palin, an inspired Esquimeau warrior from just past the Arctic circle determined to fo something effective about the horrific potentials of the current aspirations of the Republican party, a lonely man tucked into a far-away igloo who only wants to defend his people and his land from the invasions of the wrinkled old white people and their moose-hunting doppelganger5s.

Whoever he or she is (some say she is a young New Orleans debutante who got bored with the ruffles and white gloves of high society and decided to do somethign menaingful with her life) this "Amos" character has caused the biggest uproar of general public approbation this office has ever seen...according to some experts he or she has single-handedly tilted the scales of public opinion irrever4sibly in favor of Candidate Obama...it is a phenomenon of telling and unheard of proportions."

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 06:08 PM

It's actually a room full of chimpanzees at Penn State who have been typing madly on word processors 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

They were put there several years ago by scientific researchers intent on seeing if the old adage about "if you put a bunch of chimps on typewriters they would eventually reproduce all the works of Shakespeare" is correct...

Sadly, it isn't.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Ed T
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 06:10 PM

I just had an..."out of popular views" experience.


It was right after "me new spitt'in lama underwear bound me up, by cracky."

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: PoppaGator
Date: 15 Sep 08 - 10:20 PM

How 'bout some unpopular views? I'm sure there are plenty to be had!

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: beardedbruce
Date: 16 Sep 08 - 02:24 PM

Lox,

1st :""They tell you all the news on a given subject, but only after it has been carefully filtered to remove the contaminated information of contrary viewpoints and false assertions " is all you need to say.

2nd :""They tell you all the appropriate news on a given subject, but only after it has been carefully filtered to remove the contaminated information of contrary viewpoints and assertions."

See? 15 charecters and 4 spaces shorter.


Amos,

Glad to help, anytime.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 16 Sep 08 - 02:45 PM

Obama Endorses "Popular Views" Threads

In a completely unprecedented move, candidate Barack Obama gave a shout out in the middle of a critical campaign speech in Dunskirque, New Mexico, to a relatively unknown Web author who founded the now-infamous series of threads known as "Popular Views".

Few who strive behind the scenes of a national campaign receive the thanks they deserve, but I would like to take a moment to pass on a word of thanks to the obscure web author called "Amos". While little is known about him (or her) it cannot be gainsaid that he has singlehandedly brought the important issues and insights of this campaign to the foreground, cutting through distractions and chaff and focusing on the critical issues with a laser-like intelligence. No-one has done more to help us win this terribly important election, and thus indirectly, he has revealed him-or-herself as a real patriot--unsung, unknown, but ashowing the real courage and clarity of voice that is the hallmark of American greatness throughout our history as a nation."

Network gurus have been scrambling since the speech to discover the location and nature of this web wizard. Some claim to have found him in a madrass in the mountains of Pakistan; others claim he is a 30-something disowned heiress who forsook her father's billions to take a job as a caretaker for a remote chateau in southern Portugal. Still others have forwarded the rumor that he is actually an Abominable Snowman in exile, living in the foothills of the Himalayas. But none of these stories have been substantiated by the individual himself. And no matter how many contradictory tales arise about him, there is no question that his "Popular Views" threads have had an amazing and important impact on American political thought, and elevated the appreciation of American integrity and character in nations abroad who had long since given up hope."

(CNN "Around the Nation" news program)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 17 Sep 08 - 01:01 AM

Li'l Hawk, You are the most temperate, level headed and funny Catter.

Forgive me it I tease about Canaduh occasionally.

On the other end of the spectrum are two BSAs that I will not name. They are Li'l Hawk wannabes.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Sep 08 - 01:28 AM

Yeah, you really got me upset about something one time, Sawzaw...(smile) You pushed one of my buttons.

Well, that can happen. No big deal in the long run. The river flows on, right?

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 17 Sep 08 - 11:01 PM

Sawz:

Kindly pull thumb out of rectum, old chap.

I endorse the threads as reflecting various popular points of view on their topic.

I even endorse some of those views as matching my own.

Some do not. So do somewhat.

Why not get real, here? Why so bitter all the time?


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Sep 08 - 11:34 PM

By his occupation I see Amos is more than familiar with Americium.
An all american element.
Probably rubs shoulders with Bechtel as well.

Still he and BB are surprisingly similar being situated in highly technical endeavors while their views on econlmy and religious and social engeneering are totally divergent.

In short I am a bit surprised that I was so off base in my "mudcat based" assumptions about Amos.

And to you Sawz, here is a generic boot to the head:::P   ;?/ oooh

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 12:23 AM

Don:

Nothing to do with Bechtel, and as far as I know we don't use Americium in any processes. We make high-tech instruments.

Swaz:

No oxymoron about it--you sound bitter ot me, frequently, and a bit savage, also. My apologies if I am wrong about it.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: GUEST,Sawzaw
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 08:57 PM

"Kindly pull thumb out of rectum, old chap."

"Why not get real, here? Why so bitter all the time?"

I do not tell people to pull their thumb out of their rectum and call them bitter. I politely ask them to exlpain things they post that seem to be in conflict.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular views on Popular views threads
From: Amos
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 01:31 AM

You don't answer the question about your own bitterness, though, which is manifest in many of your posts.


A