The Agitator Link

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Cop murders drunk person, other cop makes statements incriminating killer cop, killer cop gets vacation with pay. Best part is incantation of “wanting his Garrity”, a Supreme Court ruling which says cops can’t be held criminally responsible for any statements after invoking their Garrity.

It’s easy to be certain that calorie posting laws don’t work when you ignore the more comprehensive study that shows otherwise. Out of 13 NYC chains, 9 showed a decrease in calorie ordering per person, and 4 were statistically significant (Au Bon Pain, Starbucks, McDonalds, KFC). 4 chains showed increases, but only Subway and its $5 footlongs marketing campaign was statistically significant.

Generalize much? If they don’t even “look for what is better for them”, how can they possibly decide? It follows that we should be doing more of that deciding for their own good. Something like banning fast food restaurants in their neighborhoods.

Sheesh!

Because they’re interesting stories. Dead crack whore — boring.

Its a little amusing to me that your post exemplifies the problem I’m talking about. There are far more dead crack whores (of any race) than missing white women in this country, but you wouldn’t know that from watching the news. I mean your own post shows that you won’t care about the crack whore, her death bores you. In your mind, even if she was murdered, she’s still not a victim. Its passive aggressive clasism.

The DC sniper quit being a front page story because he was caught.

Ted Kaczynski was caught. Jeffery Dahmer was caught. Most serial killers or mass murderers are major news throughout their trial and even incarceration. But the DC sniper dropped off the map. Do you even know his name without googling it? That’s how quick the news media forgot about the story.

(before responding, please consult a dictionary) … And I have more than my fare share

Spell check can be a friend and an enemy.

I know of people who were anally probed by martians. Call it even.

And you accuse me of trying to be the comedian. All I am saying is that there is huge discrepancy in the treatment of people in this country based on race, classism plays a part but race issues are far more prevalent than most people want to admit. Clearly my experience on this is different than yours, but that doesn’t make it a joke.

For the folks like you and your friends, you *can* look on the websites. You *can* look at the chart next to the door at McDonald’s. And you can tell the restaurants that don’t post them somewhere why you’re not going there, and they’ll probably post the information somewhere for folks like you.

As for the ‘guilt’ aspect of it, wanting the information posted on the menu to shame them from ordering something they know they shouldn’t have? Well, that’s a really really crappy reason for a law.

#24 Alex
Dave,
I don’t see your point. Sex offenders are one tiny step below murderers on the scale of despicable humans.

Oh? Do you really think victims of sex offenders would prefer to be dead? Almost all victims of sex offenses have no permanent physical injuries. And, like it or not, much of the fear, degradation, shame, and long term psychological suffering associated with sex crimes are a product of our culture. In fact, the mere assertion that sex offenders are worse than murders is a prime example of the distortions caused by society’s hypersensitivity to all things sex related.

I don’t care about their inconveniences if there’s any chance it could (oh noes, I’m about to do it) Save Just One Child.

The perfect example of my point that sex offenders are fair game. I’ve not heard a shred of evidence that herding sex offenders into a holding pens during Halloween would save any child from injury. But it fits in nicely with the barrage of warnings about candy laced with razor blades, poison, and broken glass so common during Halloween. Only the sleaziest of hero wannabes manufactures or inflates a threat just to save the public from it. After a while you’d think the public would scoff at government fear mongering, but they never seem to tire of it.

By the way, if saving “just one child” is the new threshold by which we justify all government behavior, then nothing is off-limits to government control. Just the idea that all sex offenders pose a risk to children is preposterous.

Is the real beef the extent to which minor age/nudity infractions are often treated equal to rape-rape*? If so, I’m completely on board. But if it’s just a matter of “they did the time,” fuck that.

If the justice system is to have any integrity at all, you can’t change the penalty after a defendant has already been convicted and sentenced. Secondly, it’s just sheer idiocy to presume that subjecting someone who lives in your community to persecution and torture, while completely extinguishing any hope they may have for a better life, is going to make us safer. That would be a bit like repeatedly poking a dog with a stick to make him leave you alone.

Concerning the calorie postings on menus. The study from the NYT that you link to is as biased as Rush Limbaugh or Keith Olberman. It was specifically designed to prove that menu calorie postings are ineffective.

The study was conducted in “poor neighborhoods of New York City where there are high rates of obesity.” I’d like to emphasize the poor neighborhoods part. Poor people don’t look for what is better for them because it’s usually more expensive. We’re probably talking about people who hold down two jobs just to be able to pay the bills. In that case, the $1 value menu items are king. I used to live paycheck to paycheck so I’m talking from personal experience. My friends and I would eat as much as we could off the value menu at Wendy’s ($1 bacon cheeseburgers and fries, with a cup of water) because we were more concerned about not being hungry than about getting fat.

Contrast that to my life now. I like to eat out two or three times a week. It gives me a break from the office (I normally bring my lunch) and I can get out and get some fresh air or it allows me to run my errands and still grab a bite. My wife and I have looked over most of the fast food websites and now know, more or less, what to order to stay below our 2000 calorie budget. How many calories an item has heavily influences our decisions.

Because of this, we enjoyed being able to just walk into a restaurant we haven’t frequented in the past (like Taco Bell or KFC) in NYC and make our decisions there. We didn’t have to find a computer and calculate our caloric intakes, we were able to do it right in the restaurant.

Now, people here will thumb me down because libertarianism calls for as little government intervention as possible. I agree with that premise, which is why I read your site. However, this is one of the very few exceptions as it really isn’t that costly to businesses (with over 20 establishments) to do and it really simplifies my fast food experience.

BTW, maybe it’s the area where I live, but most of my friends are also in favor of having the calorie counts on menus. Not for other people’s benefit, as liberals claim, but for their own.

All men created equal

But after that…

Of course they could always legislate that cops are exempt. But they wouldn’t do that would they? All men created equal and all.

http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1245

UK Deports Cartoonist (Almost)

higher police:civilian (before responding, please consult a dictionary) ratios in affluent suburbs. And I have more than my fare share

Well, don’t boast about it.