December 14, 2016

The Alt-right quickly explained

December 5, 2016

How to Tell If You're in a Catholic Church in Korea

For those who have never been, just arrived or are visiting and want to attend a Catholic Church in Korea here are some tips to know; I've been in Korea for a decade and been to many different ones. Though these may not apply to Church's that cater to the western Community

1. Look at that Board. As that Korea's Most Wanted?
No, it's the Church Council Board. The Church Council covers a wide range of jobs that are filled by the religious and the laity. Aside from the priest and nuns who have specific duties, there is a Council President, vice President, leaders of special duties, like funerals, announcements, children's issues, the sick, the elderly, maintenance, planning for the present and future, collections, women's auxiliary, men's group and so on.
Parishes usually have a very active membership.
The Church I am at right now, is in fairly small community, but there are probably 60 lay positions (minimum) that are filled by the 1300+ families in the parish.

2. No wonder I can never find a Nun when I need them back home, they're all in Korea.
Many parishes have 3 sisters on assignment; an older, a middle and a younger nun. They handle Kindergarten, CCD, weekday church services, etc. The most common ones I've seen are the Society of Mary, a Korean religious order, they all wear a dark grey. In Seoul I have been to services where the nuns wear white (I don't know the order).
Two of the Sisters work each mass, rotating between the services. In addition to playing organ for the singing, the deliver communion and make sure everything is ready before mass and clean up after
They are also Korean. Except for maybe Seoul or Busan (I've never seen one), there aren't foreign nuns working in Korea.

3. Is this a Hillary Clinton Convention or a Church?
Dresses are seldom seen on women at church, even the very elderly women usually wear pantsuits. Girls often wear jeans, a skirt-jean (which is a skirt attached to a pair of jeans), sometimes shorts, sometimes cargoes, etc. It is odd for a woman or girl to show up in a dress or a regular skirt. Even the alter serving girls wear jeans.

4. White is in Fashion before, during and after Labor Day.
Everyone who has a job at mass wears a white robe; the alter servers wear white robes, the gift bearers wear white robes, the lecterns wear white robes, etc.

5. The Mass took less than an hour? Did someone die?
Mass on Sundays is usually over an hour. People often get to Mass twenty-to-thirty minutes early to prepare for the days readings, go to confession, practice the songs and pray. The Mass itself lasts between 60 and 70 minutes and then the Priest goes over the main announcements in the bulletin (Mass Schedule Changes, funerals, baptisms, canceled events, etc). It's not uncommon for people to spend almost 2 hours of their Sunday in Church.

6. The Priest didn't understand a word I said
80% of priests aged 35 and over speak only Korean. It is Korea, learn the language or just get over it.

7. Are those children orphans or something?
In Korean Churches, the children usually sit in a special section (usually to the Priest's left). They often come from CCD, and even when they aren't, they sit with their friends, not their families.

8. Is there a problem in the family or something?
In line with number 7, many middle aged and elderly couples don't sit together at Mass; people often sit with friends, co-workers, etc during service. This is true for men and women. Mass is as much a social event as a religious one, so people often sit with friends and go home with their loved ones.

9. How did they get that all the way up there?
It is not uncommon for the area where Mass is held to be on the 2nd floor. The 1st floor is administration and you walk up stairs to go to Mass and do confession. I don't know why they do it this way, my guess is to corral people after Mass for lunch. Many Churches in Korea have lunch once or twice a month after the main Mass has ended. On the other weekends they serve coffee, tea and cider. It's all free

10. There's no collection plate? It's a box.
They don't come to you, you go to the box for collection. While the choir sings, people get up and walk to a box and put money in, even children. This probably raises the amount of money the parish makes every week - though some people fake it and pretend to put in money

11. You won't find many Trump supporters here.
Though it's been around for over half a millennia, the Catholic Church's modern growth can be attributed to the pro-Democratization movement of the late 70's and early 80's. Cardinal Sin, then the Cardinal of Seoul and other Cardinals and Bishops supported the Democracy Movement against the military government. Cardinal Sin often housed people wanted by the military for participating in and/or supporting the democratic movement in the Cathedral at Myeong-dong in Seoul.
Most Catholics are members of the Democratic Party of Korea, the People's Party (A mostly centrist, slightly left technocratic party) and the Justice Party (a small, yet somewhat influential leftist party. Sometimes referred as the New Justice Party)

November 7, 2016

Reince Priebus... In case you didn't notice.

Kudos to DeadGuyKai at Crooks and Liars
Remove the vowels from Reince Priebus and You get
RNC PR BS

Just a thought

November 1, 2016

You know they're getting ready to lose when this becomes a talking point

A significant number of people who are voting for Clinton are doing it because they hate Trump

Uh... yeah. And there are people who are voting for Trump because they don't like Clinton
and some people voted for Romney or Obama in 2012 because they didn't like the other candidate
Same in '08, '04...

When Reagan won in 1980, he probably got a sizable number of votes from people voting against Carter

So what?
Happens every election
They're desperate to try and make her victory seem illegitimate

November 1, 2016

Could be bad News for Republicans in Indiana

According to friends in Lake County, polls and surveys show the number of people planning to vote in this election is pretty large
Lake County sits in the northwest corner of Indiana, it has voted for the Democratic nominee in every Presidential election since at least 1960
It has a high Hispanic population
Lake County came out big in 2008
Il Douche may hold on to Indiana, which is fine I guess
But it has to make HRC pretty happy nonetheless
And it has to make Evan Bayh smile broadly

Hopefully Black Oak stays home -- Picture the Hill Country in Kentucky

October 26, 2016

Sorry Luntz, but it's not Il Douche Herr Gropenfuror that's the problem

Frank Luntz is still pushing the idea that this was a 'slam dunk' year for the Republicans
Yes, folks! A slam dunk. And it seemed so much a slam dunk too.
A slam dunk in the same sense that this 52-year old 5'8" person could slam dunk over LeBron James.
Slim... None... Slim Left Town

Trump is just the climax of this 30+ year show the Republicans have been running and this year wouldn't have been a slam dunk even if everyone left the court and gave the fictional Republican candidate a ladder to climb to drop the ball in the basket

Here's why. The numbers do not add up
For the most part, the Republicans have won about 22 to 24 states over the past decade-and-a-half (please note, most part. I realize Obama won NC and Indiana once). It's not a bad number of states, but here's the problem, when you remove Texas, Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina, Missouri, Indiana and Tennessee from the list, none of the other states have more than 9 electoral votes. Total EV 115
5 of those states (MT, WY, SD, ND, AK) have only 3. Idaho has 4 and Nebraska and West Virginia have 5.

Even if the Republicans were to win all 24 of those states, that's 206 EV

Let's say they hold all those states and win Iowa and Ohio (that's about as rosy a picture as they can get) 230 EVs

The Democrats have won CA, NY, NJ, IL, PA MI, WI, MN, WA, MA and MD in every election this century (4 to be exact).
Every one of those states has double-digit EV: Total 207. Pretty hefty number against your 115
Throw in Hawaii, Oregon, Colorado, NM, the entire northeast and DC that's 254
Now, only Florida, Virginia and Nevada are left
Nevada become irrelevant as it doesn't push either over the top

But if the Republican wins all 3, he has 281 EVs. That's 9 more than he needs to win. 3 states that voted Obama both times.
But, your guy has to win both Virginia and Florida to win
Unlikely at best

Even without Trump at the head of their ticket; Cruz, Kasich or Bush, would be a very tall order for them to win the White House and it would be by a very narrow margin at best.
Sorry, Mr. Luntz, with or without Trump, your party would get a slam dunk the same way you'd get one in a 1:1 vs Charles Barkley or Stephen Curry

For thirty years you catered to a dwindling demographic and now, you're in very deep trouble

October 21, 2016

Il Douche Fires What is Preventing Him from Winning

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October 20, 2016

How a non-loser reacts to losing

Letter from George Bush I he left in the Oval Office for incoming President Bill Clinton
Could you see Il Douche losing the same way

on note: I am not and was never a supporter of the Bush's. But, Bush I has more class in his fingernail that Trump could ever have

October 20, 2016

Pretty Much explains Herr Gropenfuror

Clinton brought up that when the FBI said there was no case, Trump said the FBI was rigged. When he lost the Iowa caucus, he said that was rigged. When he lost the Wisconsin primary, he said that was rigged. When he got sued over fraud for Trump University, he said the court system was rigged. “There was even a time when he didn’t get an Emmy for his TV program three years in a row, and he started tweeting that the Emmys were rigged,” Clinton said.

October 20, 2016

The Ultimate Apocalypse Grifter is still doing his thing

Not Il Douche but Ron Paul

I see he's pushing economic Armageddon, the collapse of the US economy, economic martial law, etc
Though all of that was supposed to happen on Sep 30
The guy will let anyone use his name to support their imbecilic, panic driven drivel about the economy going bust soon... Soon... SOON.... SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON!

Oh... and buy gold quickly before it happens -- that's something that also always seems to be included