BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 May 12 - 06:29 PM

In the UK forces maybe. It was saltpeter in the US Army, high school, etc. over here.

No matter, it didn't work.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 08 May 12 - 05:34 PM

Bremen is in Germany. Bromide is what got fed to servicemen as a sexual suppressant.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: CupOfTea
Date: 08 May 12 - 04:53 PM

Spaw-

Ok, I'm in awe of your small-town-downsmanship. You win! However - the friend who lives in Carlisle is a native of South Bass Island ( He was valedictorian of a class of 5- it was a big year) which has no stop lights. one gas station, two grades in one classroom, two churches and about two dozen bars. The major smaltowness of it is, being an island with no bridges to the mainland, getting off island in the winter is costly and weather dependent and in the summer is impossible 'cause everyone is working the tourist industry.

Sheet, tho. tha's a SERIOUSLY small place in the middle of Back of Beyond in "one of those square midwestern states that begins with a vowel" where you live, dude!

Joanne (who now feels terribly pfisticated livin' in one of them thar inner ring 'burbs)

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: gnu
Date: 05 May 12 - 02:16 PM

"Folks, we gotta stop taking everything so fooking serious."

Ooo you bin angin out wit? >;-)

Say "hi" for me eh.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 05 May 12 - 10:10 AM

Saltpeter (a/k/a "saltpetre" and "potassium nitrate" and "KNO₃) is harmless (well, you could take too much and mess with your heart rate, I suppose, but that goes for a lot of other things). It is a diuretic, but it will not suppress sexual feelings, urges, or actions.

The rumor goes back to at least WW1.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 05 May 12 - 09:29 AM

lol...Geeziz Neil, I AM losin' it! Watching baseball all my life and was evening listening the night Haddix pitched 12 innings of no-hit ball and lost on the error!

Shoots my theory all to hell.......LOL


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,999
Date: 05 May 12 - 12:45 AM

The saltpeter thing is myth. BUT, the damned joke is funny, no?

Folks, we gotta stop taking everything so fooking serious.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Neil D
Date: 04 May 12 - 11:51 PM

Spaw, I agree with you on the disparity of Ohio's cities, there's definitely a North/South polarity to the state. But when did the Pirates join the AL?

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: frogprince
Date: 04 May 12 - 11:00 PM

I served a four year navy hitch, and was well aware of the lore about saltpeter, but I don't think I ever considered for a moment whether the stuff was supposed to surpress your inclinations, or your ability to do something with them. I think I assumed it was the latter. Does anyone have any idea how old that lore really is? Is there any possibility whatever that anyone ever actually believed it, or that any military administered it?.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 04 May 12 - 10:36 PM

When I was in the Army they gave me so much saltpeter (usually in the mashed potatoes) that one day I lit a cigarette and blew myself up.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,999
Date: 04 May 12 - 10:20 PM

Terrorism my ass. I received the following from a good friend today and have to pass it on.

Two old fellows sitting on a park bench a few weeks back. One says, "Do you remember that stuff they gave us aboard ship, the stuff that made us stop thinking sexual thoughts?"

"You mean saltpeter?"

"Yes. Well, I think it's starting to work!"

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: gnu
Date: 04 May 12 - 10:07 PM

Better coin than you can make on your life savings at the bank. The fuckers don't pay any interest to speak of and the cost of goceries and the gas to get to the store make petty crime viable.

I understand why they are pissed off.

Not condoning it, but understanding it.

They need to focus and vent their frustrations in constructive ways by... oh, what am I saying? That crowd looks like they really want to blow shit up.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 04 May 12 - 06:39 PM

And, like Tim McVeigh, they end up being executed. I wonder if McVeigh would be a martyr if he blew up a federal office building now?

Four guys broke into a library where I worked. They pulled an armored file cabinet out of a row under some cabinets and used a long-handled screwdriver to level it open. Estimated time: 4 hours of fairly heavy work. Take: $98. $98/4 guys = $24.50 each/4 hours work = $6.13 per hour. They were captured two weeks later. Not a good return on your time, and that's not including the time it took to break in in the first place.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 May 12 - 05:45 PM

Of greater interest to me is the absolute separation of these people from any love of their country.

Well, Bruce, its not just an absence of love for their country, but a disdain for and fear of their government. A fear somewhat purposefully engineered.

You can chalk that up to stew of A. Mitchell Palmer, the John Birch Society and Tailgunner Joe McCarthy. Throw in the nutcase fringe libertarians, the Posse Comitatus, various other survivalist nut job groups, the Freedon Foundation, the current manifestation of the NRA, and such like. Then, for good measure, give it main-stream sanction, in the person of "Government Is The Problem" Ronnie Reagan and his acolytes & devotees in the present-day U.S. - and there you have it.

Greg
********

Queen of Fools turn around, life will be your folly
Wave your wand at those who will waste away and worry
Play them for the fools they are and make their steps up for them
A clock that's shaken hard enough, it cannot stay in rhythm.

Sing to me, sing to me, a tune that's made for dancing
For I must do the dance of death for all the people watching.

    - Patrick Sky
(c)Rabelaisian Music, Inc.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 04 May 12 - 03:28 PM

LOL....Okay Joanne......Listen I can out bumpkin the hell outta' Carlisle! Karen and I live in BREMEN.....

Now this is not NEW Bremen which is far larger. No, we're only about 1600 or so population with maybe 25 streets including the alleys. Covers less than a square mile......We have no stop lights but we do have a few 4 way stops and ONE one-way street. Mind you the one-way street is only a block long but we got one! On the other hand, it is a real throw-back community where our streets are still mainly brick and few folks lock their doors. We get 350+ kids at Halloween, mostly with their parents....all polite! I was born in a similar town over in Tuscarawas County but grew up in the Columbus 'burbs.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: gnu
Date: 04 May 12 - 02:46 PM

9... great post.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: CupOfTea
Date: 04 May 12 - 02:08 PM

Spaw-

Nice concise summation of some of the notable midwewestern cities - I've spent some time in all of 'em. Chicago is my third heart home (after the Heights and PutInBay) from my time living just that tantalizing two hours away in DeKalb. I've worked in Columbus and caroused in Cincy, which is the closest big city to the ACTUAL Bumpkinland where my best friend lives (Look up Carlisle, Ohio under definition of small).

So, to the coastal folks are we still "fly over" land? Metro Cleveland, but Chicagoland even more so, seems to be spreading like an oil slick and paving over lush farmland, planting McMansions and OneMoreEnormousOfficeComplexShoppingMallHospitalCampus. I wonder where these idjits come from anyhow...I'd look for links to that area between Akron and Cleveland...seems like a very high number of whackadiddles come from there, and still a tiny bit of country that isn't Metro or National park. (Jeffrey Dahmer isn't the only Revere High alum to make folks nervous)

I really fear for the future of Country Bumpkins as objects of ridicule - what'll we do when all our idjits are suburban or urban?

Joanne (one word) in Cleveland, who enjoys Joann (no E) out west of Chicago and Jo Ann(two words) up in Michigan

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,999
Date: 04 May 12 - 11:25 AM

Of greater interest to me is the absolute separation of these people from any love of their country. As Greg just said, ". . . sometimes, if only due to pure luck, thay manage to succeed."

This is sidetracking a bit but not all that much. I had a conversation with a fellow who was serving lotsa years in a maximum security prison. I had to find a way to teach percentages for that part of the math course. I used drug sales and terms like supply, demand, mark-up, transportation costs, etc. Anyway, I later asked him what his best robbery haul was. He said he and two guys did a bank and got away with a little over $18,000 in the days before exploding ink cartridges, etc. He got 7 years for that because weapons were involved. We did the math on that and determined he was being paid something like $4.00/day for that. He'd never looked at it that way before.

It seems we're spending lotsa money keeping people in jail who would have stayed out if they'd earned $2000 a month. And please don't get me going on bastards who rape the world, its children and their futures. So-called 'white collar crime' costs countries more fucking money than drug dealers and bank robbers (pension robbers, etc).

When people feel disenfranchised or that their voices are not heard, what do folks expect? When ya got nothin', ya got nothin' to lose, and so it goes. As long as we have tremendous discrepancies between punishments for 'common' bank robbers and 'white collar' bank robbers, we will nurture pissed off people, mostly of the 'common' variety. As for the white collar crooks, instead of gang wars they start real wars to move their businesses along, and ya know what? People don't give a shit. Our governments buy into it, and because we elect the same shit from generation to generation we end up being just as complicit in the crimes. There is no difference between a bridge in the USA and a bridge in Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. Just one gets knocked down buy a few people with explosives and the other gets knocked down with jets, missiles and laser targeting. End result? The small group of guys are terrorists and the big group of guys are working for 'national interest', whatever the hell that means. IMO

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Greg F.
Date: 04 May 12 - 10:44 AM

"...they will fuck it up 100% of the time..."-

Not quite 100% - sometimes, if only due to pure luck, thay manage to succeed.

And that's a bit worriesome.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Bobert
Date: 03 May 12 - 08:49 PM

Gotta love these rednecks...

Very entertaining and like Wylie Coyote, they will fuck it up 100% of the time...

B~

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 03 May 12 - 08:44 PM

Having had training in explosives and demolitions, I wouldn't trust any of those fellas with a roll of paper caps. In fact, I wouldn't trust them with a rubber spoon.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 03 May 12 - 07:58 PM

Have we all seen these guys? If not, here they are......obviously all of them are former neurosurgeons at the Cleveland Clinic. Sadly they couldn't find other jobs and worked for a year as tackling dummies for the Browns. They were released when the NFL declared the entire Browns roster as tackling dummies.


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 03 May 12 - 09:29 AM

Yesterday's Kansas City Star newspaper carried an AP article about the attempted bombing. U.S. Attorney Steven Dettelbach said, "They talked about making a statement against corporate America and the government as some of the motivations for their actions."

It's hard to understand how blowing up a bridge paid for by taxpayers and killing random passerbys would hurt corporate America much. Corporate America would eventually make money replacing the bridge. No, the political talk is just rationalizing.

I think the real thing is that it's a bridge 'linking two wealthy Cleveland suburbs.' Jealousy was behind it. Jealousy probably plus alcohol, meth, marijuana, (or similar).   Add slick political rhetoric and stir.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,crazy little woman
Date: 03 May 12 - 08:47 AM

Rap: you're right.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 02 May 12 - 08:58 PM

When I was a kid we had this great joke, at least for kids.......

Q: How do you spell Philadelphia?
A: P-H-I-L-D-E-L-P-H-I.......
Q: What happened to the A's?
A: They moved to Kansas City


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 May 12 - 08:40 PM

Spaw, where I come from "Dodgers" means Brooklyn, "Giants" means New York, "The As" means Philadelphia, "Braves" means Milwaukee, and "Browns" means St. Louis.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 May 12 - 08:25 PM

Suppose, CLW, that you HAVE made the rifle or bow you use for hunting, as I have....

In "imploding" structures there is a great deal of engineering knowledge and, yes, finesse in doing something like this. Those yahoos in Cleveland were hardly on the same planet, much less in the same league, as those who REALLY know how to use explosives.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 02 May 12 - 05:59 PM

AND.....note that Chicago has both an AL and an NL team!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 02 May 12 - 05:58 PM

HEY JoAnne!!!

The 3 major cities in Ohio could not be more different. Columbus even bills itself as a cowtown (home of Cowtown Guitars) and grew from the flatlands as a center for trade and also the University (biggest college town around). Cleveland like Detroit and Pittsburgh grew with industry and their ethnicity is great. They built a factory and the latest immigrants lived around it and worked there. In those cities there used to be(and are still but to a lesser degree) easily identifiable neighborhoods. Cincy is more like St. Louis than either Columbus of Cleveland and Columbus bears more resemblance to Indy. Chicago sort of combines all three of them and I have now concluded it is NOW all about baseball.

Pittsburgh, Detroit, and Cleveland are in the American League, Cincinnati and St. Louis are both National league while Columbus and Indianapols have AAA minor league teams.   I'm not sure what this says but somehow it seems meaningful..............

As far as "Bumpkinland" goes, I think to many folks over on the east coast everywhere to the west that isn't BosWash is Bumpkinland. Like Lenny once said that if you live in Boise you're goyish even if you're Jewish and if you live in New York you're Jewish even if you're a Catholic!


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,crazy little woman
Date: 02 May 12 - 01:09 PM

Someone who has come to the stage where they have located a seller of explosives and has the money ready to buy them is seriously interested in blowing something up and killing other people in the process.

I have no qualms about their getting nabbed.
===========
There's something we need to work on as a society. We need to negate the idea that the man who destroys something is as capable, intelligent and co-operative as the men (and women) who built it.

The one who blows up a skyscraper has done something that is nowhere near as complicated, useful and beautiful as those who designed it, tested it, and built it.

The punk who squirts his graffiti on a stone wall is nowhere near as competent as those who quarried it and built it.

Finally, the man who goes out with a rifle he could never have crafted and shoots a beautiful wild animal with it does not acquire the virtues of the wild animal, not even if he stuffs it and mounts it over his wet bar.

I figure this applies to that beautiful, high-rising bridge as well. It wasn't easy to build, I'm sure. The crude act of blowing it up will not shed glory on these vicious fools, but they probably think it will.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: SINSULL
Date: 02 May 12 - 12:58 PM

I half expected to Paw and the Reg Boys when I saw the article. Terrorism isn't funny but that group of lulus is.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 May 12 - 12:56 PM

Well, some one else might do it first and then where would you be? Think of your 15 minutes of fame going to someone else! You wouldn't want THAT to happen, would you?

Actually, these fools probably put out the word on the street that they wanted some explosives and a friendly local happened to mention that this guy was looking for explosives so, after checking them out (e.g., past criminal records and such) the Fibbies set 'em up. No entrapment, because THEY went to the undercover cops, the cops did not force or coerce them into anything.

Works that way with most of these things. The REAL bad guys keep their mouths shut and don't trust nobody nohow.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: meself
Date: 02 May 12 - 12:38 PM

"They also seem not to have a clue about anything else, including why it was so easy to find someone to sell them high explosives."

I'm always just a little uneasy about these kinds of cases, where authorities get involved in 'setting up' the perps. Sometimes I wonder if there ever would have been a crime if they had been left to their own hare-brained devices, or if their enthusiasm would have fizzled out as the practicalities - such as how to get 'high explosives' - intervened. Similarly, some cases where a person is charged with hiring a hit-man, who turned out to be an undercover cop. Is there any reason to think the perp would have found much less hired a real hit man? On the other hand, you don't want to wait for a bridge to be blown up or someone to be murdered-for-hire .....

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 02 May 12 - 10:51 AM

Oops!

"No wonder what whacky motive these Ohio bombers think have they have"

should have been "no matter what whacky motive these Ohio bombers think they have..."

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 May 12 - 10:23 AM

THAT bridge! Okay, I've even driven over it.

But it wouldn't be hard to take down, unless you also wanted to blow the abutments -- dropping the deck or just making it unusable for a spell wouldn't be difficult. I won't go into details, except to say that these partial-wits wouldn't have a clue about how to do it.

They also seem not to have a clue about anything else, including why it was so easy to find someone to sell them high explosives.

Joanne -- I worked in Burton for 12 years and got my graduate degree from CWRU.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Will Fly
Date: 02 May 12 - 08:20 AM

An electronics engineer I once knew - a real genius - used to say, when discussing a new project, "It doesn't have to that simple..."

Nice bridge, by the way - anyone who wants to blow it up, or think it's worth blowing up, is a fuckwit.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Wesley S
Date: 02 May 12 - 08:06 AM

My favorite quote along those lines is - "Just because you can - doesn't mean you should".

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Fossil
Date: 02 May 12 - 12:59 AM

Leenia, fabulous quote! "There's always a reason, but it's never good enough".

I think I shall adopt it. Foster it. Give it a good home.

Great.

Thanks!

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,999
Date: 01 May 12 - 11:27 PM

Richard, that is bee-eut-iff-ull. I always have liked you.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 01 May 12 - 09:50 PM

Some Bridges are lovely, you know. Just not me...

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 01 May 12 - 09:07 PM

Hi, Spaw.

I was just reading a mystery story featuring Milt Kovak, Sheriff of Prophesy County, Oklahoma. Milt is a pretty good guy. One day he was mulling a recent homicide, and wondered why anybody would do such a thing. Then he thought to himself, "There's always a reason, but it's never good enough."

I like that so much I'll repeat it. "There's always a reason, but it's never good enough." No wonder what whacky motive these Ohio bombers think have they have, it's not good enough.

It's a lovely bridge.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 01 May 12 - 06:35 PM

Hi Bob.....Yeah, I used anarchist simply because I was looking for a word to portray them and the "association" of the fizzling black bomb sorta' fit these guys. I was reminded of the group that assassinated Archduke Ferdinand. I had a college prof who spent an hour telling that tale one day of misfires and screwups. He had most of us laughing which isn't always easy in a history class.


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: CupOfTea
Date: 01 May 12 - 06:18 PM

I think the folks in Brecksville might take exception to "Bumpkinland" - most of the country out that ways tends to be MetroPark land. To find a gen-u-ine country bumpkin, you have to go a WHOLE lot farther afield (so to speak) than ya used to just to find country.

Now, you wouldn't have been confuzzling Cleveland with Columbus, a NOTORIOUS cowtown?
Unlike Cleveland, they have cow pastures within the city limits of Columbus.*

'Course we have ijits & morons right here in the city too, in Cleveland, and not all of them work for the government.

Joanne native Clevelander (and friend to a son of the guy who caught the Cuyahoga River on fire in 1969)


*ok, so they belong to OSU's school of agriculture, I'm just sayin...

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 01 May 12 - 05:26 PM

Dumber and Dumberer strike agin.

SSssssssspit.................ting!   Dagnabit Musky, move that goldurn spittoon a mite closer!!

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: GUEST,Songbob
Date: 01 May 12 - 04:54 PM

They were at an Occupy event, and left in a huff when the Occupy folks wouldn't get violent. So their connection is tenuous at best.

They don't sound all that bright, and, as "anarchists," could easily be mistaken for libertarians, what with their distrust of government and authority. I think they're from that part of the circle where the left and right loonies* meet. 180 degrees out of sync with reality, for sure.

Bob

* Have you noticed that the Left just ignores its loonies, but the Right runs 'em for high office? Interesting, that.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: frogprince
Date: 01 May 12 - 02:35 PM

Oh, please, don't let these yahoos make some claim to be "occupy" people. A few weeks ago, someone I was sitting around with brought up Timothy McVeigh and the Tulsa bombing. Within a few phrases he came out with, "Just like the Occupy bunch". I couldn't even get up the heart to try to respond to that.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Megan L
Date: 01 May 12 - 01:54 PM

I thought we had inbreading on the islands but you beat me there Spaw Kin folk

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: catspaw49
Date: 01 May 12 - 01:33 PM

Cletus just dropped by and asked if I knew about this. I was surprised HE knew about it but it turns out that one of the guys is his cousin......also his uncle........and his brother-in-law.....................Don't ask.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Wesley S
Date: 01 May 12 - 12:35 PM

Glen Beck was going on and on about these guys and their connections with the Occupy Wallstreet movement on his show this morning.

Subject: RE: BS: Terrorism Comes To Bumpkinland
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 May 12 - 12:10 PM

This sounds sort of like what Shane and Don McBride would do if they had any political motivations. They do have grievances, mind you, but they're a bit unfocused at this point...