2005: The End Of The Coma

CB, it was really a trio of females that destroyed the year long gloat of RW trolls screaming about controlling all three branches of gubbiment.

Teri
Katrina

and

Cindy Sheehan.

It was schiavo, dammit, I said it at the time, this is it, people be disgusted now.

Shrub has already shown great powers of instrospection by questioning whether he should have landed the plane.

Answer: No.

Settles that. Next issue.

So funny, I had completely forgotten about Che Sheehan and her travelling carnival of professional leftists, the true original libtard, the left’s sarah palin.

@nojo: All of his regrets were matters of political or public relations strategy, never the policy. He is a sociopath. “Well, maybe I should have used a silencer on the gun when I killed the baby, that way I would not have got caught, I guess you could say I wish I had brought my silencer.”

ManchuCandidate: See, me and Cindy have issues.

She hooked into a crowd that, as a whole, were more annoying than [“IMPEACH!”] helpful. And there are elements within the anti-war movement that want [“IMPEACH!”] to make everything into simplistic catchphrases and proxy fights about Palestine. And thus she became totally ineffective, even though she actually had a story that could, if used right, have been useful in changing policy. I mean, after Camp Casey and other tactics, did Bush turn the humvees around? No. In fact, he escalated Iraq.

See, e.g. the family of Pat Tillman. Dude was the all-American hero but, through the fevered mind of the Pentagon, became the subject of a concocted story. Their pressure and follow-through led to Congressional hearings that actually uncovered some useful hard facts that materially damaged the PR machine. Cindyists and Code Pinkers went to Congressional hearings and engaged in guerilla theater that would make college sophomores queasy. There’s a difference.

But: credit where due — before she went round the bend, she did focus some attention on the sacrifice of military families. The residual effect of that was useful, to some small degree.

Anyway.

@Prommie: Remember the extremely brief moment when Cindy was legitimate? Lasted about as long as a hoagie within Michael Moore’s reach.

One more point of comparison, now that you mention it: Shrub didn’t interrupt his vacation for Katrina. Took a couple of days to convince him anything was wrong.

After which he rushed to the aid of Trent Lott.

nojo: I’m offended.

It’s a grinder in front of Michael Moore.

Take it back. Now.

@chicago bureau:
@nojo:

Exactly. That brief moment when her broken hearted protest actually made sense.

@chicago bureau: Actually it’s a sub, but I was being polite towards the East Coast crowd.

DEVELOPING HARD: Sen. Burris sworn in, causing giant rip in time-space field; potentially disastrous damage to continuum repaired by insertion of giant hoagie grinder sub Chicago deep-dish pizza.

@nojo: @nojo: Speaking of sandwiches – damn I love dis place: http://99milestophilly.net/

You know something, though? If a Code Pink type managed to sneak into the East Room tonight of all nights, as an undercover “courageous American” selectee, and to interrupt the hagiography-in-progress by unleashing a torrent of anti-war sloganeering? That might be one of the 50 best things, like, ever.

Sadly — that would never happen. The crowd tonight has to probably be on the level of party members living in the poshest reaches of Pyongyang, in terms of unquestioned loyalty to the cause.

@chicago bureau: If they do a wide shot, look for shoes.

@chicago bureau: And they must all wear the “O” pins.

TJ: Terrorist geese down an Airbus A320 into the Hudson River. Wolf Blitzer disappointed that he’s not seeing a bunch of floating corpses (sounds like most everyone got out ok).

Srsly, that would be a fucking horrible way to go — drowning in the cold cold Hudson.

@rptrcub: This will now completely overshadow Shrub’s farewell pity speech. What a shame.

rptrcub: Fortunately, today was the day that the flight-attendants decided to repeat the “in the unlikely event of a water landing” safety briefing, for emphasis, and forced passengers to put down reading materials and to switch off electronic devices in order to drive the point home.

(Srsly: will never joke about “unlikely event / water landing” again. Also: Pilot was all heart today. Dude managed to ditch the plane in the drink without have the plane break apart. Snaps.)

SanFranLefty: Concur in part, dissent in part. Pilot competence > Dubya competence. There’s a teachable moment here.

This is gonna go down as one of the most amazing crashes in history, people, as far as everyone making it, this is miraculous.

Lots of planes wind up in Buzzards Bay after overshooting the runways at Laguardia, people mostly live, but those planes never got airborne. This motherfucker took off and flew over Manhattan, and apparently JUST made it over, and then the pilot put it down softly in the drink? Thats fucking miraculous. Seriously.

@chicago bureau: Sorry, I forgot to sign “/sarcasm” after “What a shame.”

I concur that I am so impressed by the landing skills.

@chicago bureau: Probably the reason he never said anything to the passengers until “prepare for impact” was because he was way busy being a hero. I betcha they hit the geese going up, and he sorta just lofted up over manhattan and down into the Hudson, holy shit, is what I say.

By the way, DO NOT inflate your life vests inside the plane.

Prommie: If it were me, I’d want all the buoyancy I could get, and thus would manually blow into the tubes like there was no tomorrow.

No snark, no joke: US Airways Pilot = Player of the Week.

I only caught the initial story — but are we sure everyone’s safe? Don’t want a late-breaking development to spoil the fun.

…and if everyone is safe, cue up the Airplane! references.

@nojo: NYT sez all passengers and crew accounted for. Amazing.

Check out msnbc.com, video, the people all walked out onto the wings and stood there, but the wing is under water, looks like they are walking on water, and ferry boats immediately converged and started picking them up.

@nojo:
Shirley you can’t be serious.

@SanFranLefty: In which case: Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue.

@Prommie: I just saw the headline and the photo, and initially thought “wow, there are survivors!?” I always bought the line (was it from “Fight Club”?) that there are no survivors of water crashes, but I guess this was a water landing – not a crash.

Oh yeah, and with FC it was the oxygen masks.

Pilots (there are at least two, right?) get mad props. Two shots for Bush’s first mention of the pilot as a hero, empty the bottle if he turns out to be a vet.

Damn, he done good, ya know, like, that plane was in full takeoff screaming for altitude, it only travelled 2 – 3 miles, then lost power, he got it high enough to clear Manhattan and then landed from all accounts perfectly. That must have been a very intense 90 seconds.

Kinda like sex for me. Ba-dump bump.

@SanFranLefty: In a way, I believe that the noodly appendages of the Flying Spaghetti Monster protected both the plane passengers & crew from death by drowning, and the nation from death by exposure to more toxic bullshit.

Perhaps, too, a harbinger of teh Hope (TM)?

@Prommie: Don’t know if you’re familiar with my neighbor the Sandy Eggo Airport, but it’s in a bowl between two hills — planes have to descend very low over the zoo to land, and they have to clear a small range when taking off.

Usually they take off towards the ocean, but in my sevenish years here, nobody’s had to ditch off Ocean Beach.

nojo: That US Airways pilot engaged in a different kind of flying, altogether.

[Everybody: “That US Airways pilot engaged in a different kind of flying.”]

/TJ

Ah, Stinquers, what a night I had last night! I won’t go into the details, except to say that it involved the family dog, an emergency visit to the vet, and some awful thing called “canine bloat syndrome”. Can’t hang out too much today, as I actually have to work to make up from the time I took off this morning.

Suffice it to say, if your medium-to-large size dog puffs up like a balloon, go to the vet IMMEDIATELY.

@chicago bureau: Just put up a photo/thread. FAA says everyone is OK/got off – couple cases of hypothermia.

@Tommmcatt Yet Again: Oh noes!!!

@rptrcub:

Oh Noes Indeed!

@Tommmcatt Yet Again:
That’s what my last family dog died of. We didn’t know until it was too late.

@Tommmcatt Yet Again: A friend’s dog died from that. Very serious. Hope the pooch is on the mend.

@ManchuCandidate: @SanFranLefty:

Yeah, we were very lucky and got him to the vet in time. He’s up today already after the surgery, and they say he walked a little bit. So we’re past the worst part…..

@Tommmcatt Yet Again: Glad you were able to get treatment for the puppeh in time. Bunnies are very susceptible to that too–I actually keep simethicone (baby gas medicine) on hand for emergencies.

@Tommmcatt Yet Again: Oh, Catt! I’m so glad the doggeh is doing okay. Kiss the baby for me.

@Tommmcatt Yet Again: Damn. Must have been scary. One of our dachshunds inflated himself once after I gave him warm milk as a treat (I know, dumb) but he farted all the way to the vet and was OK. But I’m glad to know about this and sorry you had to learn the hard way.

@Tommmcatt Yet Again:
do you feed him on a dish on the floor? this is what i’ve been told how large dogs get bloat–which is very seroius. you got lucky. i feed sergio in a raised feeder, about 2 feet above the floor. or put his food bowl on a chair seat, we do that too.

good luck sweetheart, hope all turns out well. are you using a raised feeder? if not, start right away!

@nojo: On final descent into San Diego, you can just about read the emails on the monitors of office workers ABOVE YOU in the buildings next to the runway.

@Dodgerblue: Years ago I was apartment-hunting in that neighborhood. When I discovered I could see pilots from the street, I scratched it off my list.

@Tommmcatt Yet Again: How terrifying. Glad puppy is OK.
Anyone know if kittehz can get this and how to prevent?

@baked:

Wow, that is a great tip…we will certianly get one this weekend.

@Mistress Cynica:

I didn’t ask about cats, oddly enough, but the Vet did tell me that this only occurs in medium-to-large size dogs, due to the fact that their body cavity is very large and thus the stomach has room to flip over (this is what happens when the animal fills up with gas and fluid). So it seems pretty likely that a cat wouldn’t get it- they have pretty narrow chests and waists. Although I might have said the same about rabbits, and flippin eck says that they get it, so I would ask your vet to be sure.

Thanks for the well-wishing, everybody.He’s doing great today, and even ate a little, so we are heartened.

Oh, and P.S.- it’s good to hear from you JNOV. We miss you lots…hurry back when you are ready….

@Dodgerblue: I think they have to get ex-Navy carrier pilots for that run to thread the needle.

@redmanlaw: More true than not, from what I’ve heard — some kind of special certification is required to land in San Diego without clipping an apartment building in Hillcrest.