even more quiddities and agonies of the ruling class - a new rolling new york times thread

so happy i still have both role models from hollywood video and a shot at a fulfilling and long-lasting partnership.

my college-related debt has crossed the crushing event horizon and now i don't even know what it is.

yeah to be honest it's been so long since i've given serious thought to the size of my college debt. it probably hasn't figured into my day to day worries for about seven or eight years now. and considering i feel like i'm living in a modern-day steinbeck novel most days i figure i've got more pressing concerns than paying back loans for my worthless uncompleted education.

thankfully no one's asked me "so who do you identify more with, jay gatsby or tom joad?" on a date lately.

otm. and they're actually pretty nice about it, which i majorly appreciate, even though when and how and how much and how long it will fuck me is still in play. xp

It is documented on this board somewhere, but a few months I decided that I needed to stop being in denial about my loans and actually look at how much they are and how long it will take me to repay them. So I did, and then I went into the bathroom at work and cried for awhile.

the last time i looked it was in the $25k to $30k range. which isn't TOO terrible. i guess. but i doubt it's gone down much since then. and that was...a while back.

Oh that's cute.

i look at it this way: it's like i bought a cute little starter home, the repayment plan is super flexible, and i never have to live there! xp

it even has a garage

for the car i already sold

to get a sweet credit score for my future love

Eh, I wouldn't scoff at anybody's student loans.

you'd scoff if you knew what i spent that relatively piddling amount on.

No way.

I have almost-a-bachelor's degree, and almost-law-school debt. And I've been single for 11 years. Coincidence?

I know someone who broke it off with a guy she loved over massive debt, and later regretted it.

maybe the dumbest NYT op-ed i have ever seen (and that's saying something):

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/31/opinion/lets-give-up-on-the-constitution.html?ref=opinion&_r=1&

but how could a 21st century democracy operate w/o a magic piece of paper written by gods

That op-ed piece was far from stupid. It's entirely true that when it came to actually governing the USA, the constitution was seen as non-binding by the people who helped write it, not because they didn't respect it as a necessary guide for the conduct of the government, but because circumstances kept forcing them to either supercede it or else ignore the urgent needs of the country.

That the author of the piece concludes that we should ignore it is a questionable conclusion, but only because the odds are we'd get through the present 'crisis' okay if the needs of the moment were given precedence over the weird kludges we all must live under, but we'd live to regret it later as those in power became more and more arbitrary.

I am more in favor of fixing things under at least a fig leaf of constitutional justification. The most obvious one would be changing the internal rules of the Senate, which are entirely outside the constitution and totally under the control of each new session.

arguing that we should ignore the law whenever it suits us is stupid. it has nothing to do with any strawman arguments about our 'perfect' framers, et al.

funny how fast the constitution went from being a precious thing that we must all cherish and uphold when a republican pres was enthusiastically shredding it to a lame outdated unworkable product of white male elitists (who owned slaves, remember) now that a democratic pres is enthusiastically shredding it.

I for one have never cherished the constitution

good for you

i use it to wipe up my dog's leavings.

I print out a copy every morning and then burn it

it is the worst document in human history

you forgot 'just a goddamned piece of paper.'

i'm sure there'll be a const-conv p soon. we can't even raise taxes on richies.

if only there were other countries that had human rights w/o this one magical piece of paper but alas we are the country w/ human rights, and it's all thanks to our magical piece of paper. we really do have the best magical piece of paper, even though it mostly just constrains our government in stupid ways and ensures a horribly nonrepresentative voting system. why don't other countries model their magical piece of paper on our magical piece of paper? it is a mystery.

what is it with you and pieces of paper lately

it is time to embrace the digital age

i don't always shoot paper, but when i do it's the constitution

I agree with iatee to an extent. Right-wingers are not entirely wrong when they argue that judges distort the constitution (in order to give us rights that almost anyone today would agree should never be infringed -- the right to have children, to marry someone of another ethnicity, etc.). They have to do so, because the constitution is not so hot.

the left doesnt have much to gain from romanticizing rules written during a period of v. limited government. constitution should be treated like a vestigial organ not 'the source of our liberties' etc.

god is the source of our liberties

usa has daddy issues

the Soviet Constitution also "guaranteed" Soviet citizens lots of wonderful civil rights and liberties. just sayin'.

yeah what kind of fool would 'romanticize rules' like freedom of speech, assembly, et al.

http://yatf.org/images/EagleCrying.GIF

http://youtu.be/saCtEfDetCw

The sons of a noted former NYT writer profiled in the NYT. Yes of course.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/fashion/nathaniel-and-simon-the-brothers-rich.html

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-txO_g8rU5X0/T87AtwV6FTI/AAAAAAAAAlk/OppdqukN96M/s640/Gladiator.gif

Joaquin should just go around doing that in real life.

Aspiring writers from Peoria might roll their eyes, of course.

Oh, maybe more than just that group are rolling their eyes.

That may explain why “dates” among 20-somethings resemble college hookups, only without the dorms. Lindsay, a 25-year-old online marketing manager in Manhattan, recalled a recent non-date that had all the elegance of a keg stand (her last name is not used here to avoid professional embarrassment).

After an evening when she exchanged flirtatious glances with a bouncer at a Williamsburg nightclub, the bouncer invited her and her friends back to his apartment for whiskey and boxed macaroni and cheese. When she agreed, he gamely hoisted her over his shoulders, and, she recalled, “carried me home, my girlfriends and his bros in tow, where we danced around a tiny apartment to some MGMT and Ratatat remixes.”

She spent the night at the apartment, which kicked off a cycle of weekly hookups, invariably preceded by a Thursday night text message from him saying, ‘hey babe, what are you up to this weekend?” (It petered out after four months.)

the end of courtship?

whiskey and boxed macaroni and cheese

People who know how to live . . .

I'll bet if you poured whiskey on some mac and cheese powder you could start a really, really big fire with it

"said Anna Goldfarb, 34, an author and blogger in Moorestown, N.J. "

"A fancy dinner? You’re lucky to get a drink."