As the good folks at Archer might say. “Phrasing!”
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I forget that rich people’s cars are probably well-maintained and aren’t blowing power steering fluid everywhere. otherwise - yuck.
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So, wow.
Threatening vehicular homicide
Assaulting the cameraman
Claiming ownership of what I assume is a public road
Unless they’re actually on a private road. Is it marked as private? Was the photographer actually blocking the guy’s driveway and we just don’t see that? Regardless, I’ve never met anyone who drives an Excursion who isn’t an asshole.
EDIT: Might be mentally unstable, because apparently there’s no driveway there. http://www.cbs8.com/story/32411922/caught-on-camera-heated-confrontation-between-driver-photographer
These are the jerks who, as we get closer to the election, road-rage my little hybrid because it’s a little hybrid because fuck libruls.
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It seems that particularly the Chinese don’t want to rent them out because then they will need periodic redecoration, it’s easier just to have them cleaned periodically.
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I’m just a random bot posting stuff on the Internet, no names. Even if I had a name - which I don’t - do you really think I would be foolish enough to spell it out? If you hang around Hampstead or Chelsea and see the oligarchs out with their bodyguards, you would think twice too. (As well as the muscle they all have cyber-muscle.)
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I got a first generation Prius, super early adopter here. Before they were common, I got a fair number of insults and complaints at stoplights, and I got coal-rolled several times before I even knew it had a name (I was calling them “black smokers”).
I find that the most effective tactic is to smile cheerfully and wave and mishear everything they say as congratulatory. When being coal-rolled, cheer and pump your fist and shout, “WHOOO-HOOO! BURN IT UP!” Sometimes you think they might have an aneurysm on the spot, if you play the clueless librul hard enough. 
Similarly, when people would congratulate me on my virtue for owning the same car, I’d always tell 'em my other car was an SUV (which it was - a very efficient small one, but still an SUV). 
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92.3% related to your choice of animated GIF. Her angry mouth movements made me moody…man.
Otherwise why does anyone care what these rich fuck sticks do with their money.
Time for buttered popcorn…well maybe tonight.
From the always funny Portandia Battlestar Gallatica sketch.
Because in the case I was responding too, buying up real estate at exorbitant rates has real world consequences for the rest of us, including driving up the costs of city living in ways that their fellow human beings can’t afford. And then not living there. It’s nothing more than a self-absorbed status symbol (“I have a place overlooking central park”) and a means of hoarding wealth. The working and middle classes are being driven out of cities like NYC and San Fransisco, and that’s happening everywhere. It means that places and institutions that once supported communities (especially marginalized communities) are being shut out for privatized, money-centric places - or as we know it, gentrification. It brings with it an entire mindset that’s about the self and ignores the fact that we are at our most human when we relate to those around us.
This might help you to better understand my point - it’s mostly about NYC and the gay community during the AIDS crisis and how that literally cleared out neighborhoods for a wave of gentrification and privatization, but it speaks to the nature of gentrification and the mindset that goes along with it (which some might call the neo-liberal imagination):
TL;DR: people who do things like buy upscale apartments that drive up the costs of city living and then don’t even live there are of a rather myopic and self-centered mindset.
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Wow, thanks for posting that link. When I watched the initial video, I assumed the camera crew was just parked in the edge of this guy’s driveway or something and he was just overreacting (and a jerk, of course.) Knowing that there’s not even a driveway there for them to block … well, it’s still a bit incomprehensible to me, but hopefully he’ll get some lovely anger management therapy while he’s in jail.
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Grew up in Portland so the show resonates deeply with me. (BSG was fun too but I skipped some chunks in the middle).
I knew exactly why you were upset. I’m an openly practicing arsehole and was poking you with a stick. O_o #Immadickandhashtagssuck
With each subsequent election cycle I resign myself to not giving as many fucks as I had in the past. Kicking against the pricks is a tiresome endeavor.
The political and financial elite of the world have long been consolidating power, wealth, control into their sweaty, greedy little palms.
The private drive ways in NYC is just another example.
I apologize for having imposed my dim worldview of not giving fucks and I applaud your enthusiasm to raise your voice in disapproval.
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It goes in cycles. I once had a 1BR in SoHo for $800/mo. Rent used to be higher but I got it after Dinkins had screwed up the city. Price has since gone up but could go down again too.
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Are you serious?
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What goes up must come down
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Sure. And it will, if there are political pressure to make sure that affordable housing exists within the city limits, and to make sure families who have been living inside the city for decades get priced out of their homes. Watching the situation here in Atlanta, as suburanites move back into the city, especially around the beltline has convinced me that this isn’t some autonomous market forces that can’t be interfered with. Many of the intown neighborhoods here have seen a wave of gentrification, which has pushed up prices and sent lower income residents out to the suburbs. And of course, Atlanta is not like NYC with regards to public transit that reaches out to the suburbs. The westside is currently on that gentrification cusp and there are attempts on the table to control housing costs (the Westside land trust is one example). But the city needs to put pressure on builders to include mixed income housing in their developments.
I guess I’m arguing for city level housing policy that takes human beings into account instead of just the bottom line of developers.
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That hasn’t worked so well in San Francisco. Many of the processes are so bad that they take years and the developers still don’t get approval, causing many folks to just walk away or build something else. I mean, yeah, gentrification is bad on some levels (I don’t want people forced out of the cities any more than anyone else) but more regulations and requirements can, in practice, also backfire. I’ve seen developments in Berkeley where people bent over backwards to do the right thing get picketed and then just collapse, with the developers deciding to walk away and not build anything at all.
The general story about the London “iceberg houses” has been covered here on BB, though the bit about the buried diggers appears to not be true:
The story about someone losing his garage to the Crossrail project might be undocumented (but is very plausible), but they’ve been finding other fun stuff, like mass graves of black death victims.
And don’t even get me started on what they found while excavating for the Hobbs End station.
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There are some mixed income developments here in ATL, including one near campus… so far, it seems like a mix of low income families (and it’s right near a Marta station so that’s helpful) and students. It’s only been open for… 2 or 3 years maybe? We’ll see how it looks over the long run, though. The last section 8 housing was closed down here in town not too long ago. Just like the section 8 projects proved to be problematic, I’d guess as mixed income developments become more common, we’ll see what the problems are and if they can be worked out between residents, developers, landlords, and cities.
I agree that regulation can backfire at times, no question. But not doing anything won’t help either. To me, it seems like a major part of the problem is that housing, a basic necessity, is a commodity. I keep circling back around to this notion that goods we need to sustain life probably shouldn’t be commodities on an open market - or at the very least, some portion of that shouldn’t be.
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For anyone curious, the assaulter here (Mark Gordon of Ramona, California) pleaded guilty to 3 misdemeanor assault charges to get out of felony assault charges. I don’t know if the sentence included removing the “No Hillary” bumper sticker from his SUV.
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[quote=“MikeTheBard, post:43, topic:88163”]
The Steve Jobs’ and Elon Musks and Sergey Brins of the world- People who start from little or nothing, have great ideas, work hard, and earn their fortunes by advancing the rest of the world- I’m perfectly happy to let them enjoy whatever luxurious indulgences they can afford.[/quote]
What about their children and grandchildren? Fred Koch, the father of the Koch Brothers, was an engineer who made his fortune by coming up with a process that made it possible for small independent oil refineries to compete with the conglomerates.
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And if my experience in SoCal is any indication, they’ll use the parking space for something else and still complain that no one else should be able to park in front because that’s their spot.
