“Shocked shocked! I tell you”

(I’m sorry, I know its lame but I just couldn’t help myself)

I apologize for this off-topic comment, but for several weeks I have not received any response from FDL regarding my membership questions. So I will post my latest message here as well as members@firedoglake.com. I hope that a moderator will catch this and possibly forward it to somebody that will respond to me…

Why does nobody answer my emails? Is there a technical problem, or is members@firedoglake.com the wrong email address for my membership questions? If not, as someone who has provided significant financial support to FDL and its causes over the last several years I am terribly disappointed by your failure to respond. I had always assumed that the FDL support staff, even though they are volunteers, would recognize how essential it is to conduct business in an impeccably professional manner, or risk being dismissed as just a bunch of hippie dreamers with no grasp of how the real world operates.

For a long time, I was fooled into imagining that you guys actually had your act together. (Or maybe that’s just how I wanted to imagine it to be). I am desperately disappointed now to realize that my contributions have been so misguided. Keep my $1000. Do not bill me next year. If you do I will have my credit card company dispute the charges. I dont know why I expected better, I am usually pretty cynical about everything. Still a sucker after all these years. Is there some type of therapy for people who never learn from each pathetic disappointment?

You know, if he just gets his students to THINK he has performed a miracle. It really doesn’t matter what they thought, just that they had one is remarkable these days.

Chekhov?

… than anyone since the country’s FIRST fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini.

Thanks TalkingStick. But I’m OK now. I was able to deal with it (after a while) because I was an adult when it happened and I could make more sense of it (and I didn’t get HIV, which did worry me at the time). I was just angry, but it didn’t mess up my emotional development. That’s the real damage I think.

Actually – the most horrible ways to kill him that I could conceive of. (As far as I know, he still lives).

LOL. Everyone at PSU is in CYA mode now.

Having been an angst-ridden young adolescent male and later butt-raped as an adult, it’s terrifying to consider how devastating it must be for a 10-13 year old.

Blair, sorry.

And now he is a Catholic. Who would have thought?

Sandusky is a pervert, but it doesn’t seem like he was insane. So why did he take the boy to the PSU football team’s showers to rape him? Predators like him do tend to plan ahead to some extent, so presumably he could have found somewhere more private.

Unless the boy (or the experience) was to be shared with others?

I would like to help. How can I contact you? I can’t do Facebook and the like. I can do email. FDL presumably has mine – and its OK to use it.

It’s never too late for Plan B.

Happy,

I realize there is probably no point in providing you with an honest and considered response, but just on the small off chance you might stop to think about things:

I am (now) the 1%. In fact more like 0.25%.

But I started as a fruit picker. Moved up to dishwashing. Candy vendor. Next a factory job — moved up to QA. Then a supermarket shelf-stocker – worked up to inventory manager. Then to College, PhD in Bioengineering, Medical School, Post doc — Asst. Prof — Assoc Professor in Surgery at a Major University. Founded a Medical Device Company, now worth $100M+, currently employ 100 people.

The point is – for two significant periods of my life I was completely dependent upon welfare. Receiving welfare is quite an experience – I don’t know if you have any idea? Like any citizen and (previous) taxpayer, you should at least be entitled to a certain statutory amount depending upon your circumstances, no?. So you would think, but in fact, they don’t ever actually provide even that small amount – ever. And you won’t receive shit until you have been suitably ignored, abused, disrespected, harassed, and personally insulted by staff far too stupid to hold down a job in any other department. Eventually they get you to the point where you will accept even their (deliberate?) inability to use a simple 4-function calculator, and thank them for whatever demeaning pittance they deign to provide. And beware – should you ever (correctly) question their math – you will invariably be reassessed at a lower amount each and every time. But be careful not to become irritated (they really enjoy this) and ask for a supervisor. Whoa! Might as well hang yourself immediately, because you are now officially gonna be f’d over for life!

I can assure you that I would not have survived without even that meager assistance. And please do not try to argue that I had any choice but to submit to that miserable humiliation. You don’t know.

I suspect that you may never have found yourself in a similar situation. Once you have been there — it becomes much more difficult to judge others (if you are capable of being honest with yourself.)

I was lucky to be born very smart. Smarter than you most likely. Not everybody is so fortunate. And thanks to my wit, and a meager handout, I was able to become successful. But the truth is – everyone deserves the right to basic living standards, health care and education. Even those who are disadvantaged. Why the hell would you suggest otherwise?