Cynique

The subject most recently capturing headlines has been the locating and rescuing of the Thai soccer team and their coach, who were trapped in a cave they were exploring when heavy rains prevented their exit. For 10 days these 12 young boys were isolated without food or any accommodations, left with nothing but each other to get through this ordeal. When divers finally located them, and cameras recorded the situation, the most striking thing was how calm and composed these kids were, no hysteria or panic, all of which later contributed to their being able to do what they had to do in being led out of the most perilous conditions by the rescuing divers.( i can't imagine children raised in America remaining as composed as these boys.) There was great fear that they would never get out alive because of what was required of these youngsters, none of whom could swim or were familiar with scuba gear. Yet everybody made it out safe after an arduous trek thanks to the tremendous effort from sources through out the world. (This universal response temporarily renewed my faith in humankind) I read on FaceBook that the Thai soccer coach was formerly a Buddhist monk, and kept the spirits of his charges up by conducting meditation exercises and leading chants. Of course, Christians are taking credit for the "miracle" escape which they attribute to their "prayers and thoughts". Black folks tend to look to Jesus for their salvation, rather than relying on their inner strength to lift them up. Their spirit has been broken but they continue trying to repair it by embracing the religion of their oppressors, looking to the hereafter for their rewards. There is nothing exemplary about the state of Asian countries in the world today. They are mostly under the iron rule of dictators. But their stoic collective consciousness apparently gets them through. White supremacy endures and it's debateable as to why this is the case.

What we do know for sure, is that violence can be hazardous to one's health, and if one values one's life, an alternate way should be sought to settle a dispute. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand this, - yet violence is a common occurrence and prisons are filled with its perpetrators.

@DelYou act as though Republicans feel obligated to adhere to the rule of law. You have too much faith in a System which Trump and his cronies are steadily eroding. His latest nominee for the Supreme Court has stated that he favors legislation which exempts a sitting president from being prosecuted while in office, - that a president is above the law. With a Supreme Court majority and a Senate majority, Trump can call all the shots and remain in office, and do so with the approval of half the population who make up the red States which are also the majority. That's why the situation is so crucial, why the other half of the population is tearing its hair out.

My late husband didn't think so. @Pioneer1Definition of a liar: Someone who makes things up. Now we know.

If Trump's Supreme Court nominee is approved by the Senate, 45 will have paved the way for him to circumvent the law, and avoid any attempt at impeachment . Famed ACLU attorney, Alan Dershowitz, says that even if the president is guilty of collusion, this does not meet the standards of breaking the law; it just exposes Trump as being unscrupulous, and that the only thing his sexual escapades prove is that he's a sleaze ball. Liberals have made the mistake of thinking that Republicans care about ethics and morality. They don't, and they will do anything to achieve their goals, which currently are to institute a Conservative agenda that will swing this country to the far right. Naive Dems are in for a long haul, and gearing up for beating Trump at the polls seems to be their only viable course of action.

Yep, that's ol Cynique over 20 years ago, fulfilling a dare. I don't know what Pioneer has been smoking but it apparently causes hallucinations which enhance his tendencies to make up things and then incorporate them into a little world inside his skull where he reigns supreme. Which is to say, that i have never sent him any pictures of myself and i wouldn't do so even if i did know who he really is and how to reach him. I don't who that is in the picture he posted and so blatantly lied about. Here is a "respectable" picture of me taken during this same time period back in the '90s.

Humor is an art. The trick is for it to contain a smidgen of the truth, otherwise it falls flat. "Yo Momma" jokes are remarkably creative but hardly credible, all of which makes them easier to dismiss as street wise buffoonery not to be take seriously. Some bypass this code of the jungle when they feel the line gets crossed. And asses get kicked. Such is life.

Just for the record, the long-nosed woman in the picture Pioneer posted is not me. Guess he chickened out and decided not to accept my challenge to come up with a phony photo shopped picture. However i have found the racy picture of which i spoke and may very well post it. Stay tuned...

@Pioneer1Yes, you are a loser. And a liar. (And very transparent in your desperate attempt to create an opportunity to advise me to ignore your nonsense and move on as per the advice i gave you when it came to Kalexander.) Anyhow, put up or shut up. We await an entire photo of me taken over 20 years ago with an 89 year old man dancing around in the back ground. And since you're a loser and have no life, I'm sure you'll have plenty of free time to photo shop something, between fantasizing and jackin off. Poor ol Pioneer

@Pioneer1, BLAH, BLAH. YADA, YADA, YADA Troy got it right. You still can't see past your nose.

Educated leaders don't go to war. They send lesser educated people to be their cannon fodder.

@Pioneer1Inasmuch as I know nothing about you, your name or where you are located, - thanks to your obsession with anonymity, there's no way i could or would send pictures to something like you. So dream on, loser. You're the joke. Barf!

@Pioneer1There is nothing vague or blanketed about the word "loser". It is concise and complete unto itself and it is what it is. You are the one wants to bend it out of shape with all of what i already referred to as "extenuating circumstances". i never said that being a loser was a permanent condition, but it aptly applies to down-and-out people who at any given time in life have not overcome their obstacles for whatever reason. (When you asked my opinion on whether handicapped people were losers, I said "Not if they were able to neutralize their physical infirmities by being so mentally and intellectually capable that they are able to triumph over adversity and be financially independent.") What did i say in any of my posts about the word "loser" that contradicted the definitions i supplied?? You, however, disagree with my stand by re-cycling things i said, crafting them to be your position when they simply echo what i already said. SMH If you had your way, there would be no such word as "loser" because you want to blur reality by making excuses for losers, all of which is an example of your inability to be objective about the word. Oh puleeze, who tosses around any more generalizations than you??? What "We" need to be careful about is to respect language enough to adhere to the meaning of words instead of tailoring them to fit an agenda. This offense certainly contributes to all the fake news out there today. It also contributes to the lack of communication between people. Alas, I prefer to paraphrase The Bard: "What's in a name? A loser by any other name would be just as defeated".

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@Pioneer1No. my definition is too exact, in your opinion. You, as usual, want to adopt the word,put it through the pioneer wringer, and paint it with your brush, creating little pictures that you've made up in your mind, adding your captions to them, using adjectives to try and change the meaning of the noun "loser", co-opting the points that i already made about the "types" of losers . Next, you supply your synonyms for the word "loser", all of which are inaccurate. All of which is the typical way that you process things in the world according to Pioneer. And then have the nerve to call other people crazy. Git outta here. i don't know how long you labored over your mawkish little essay but it's bunch of blather that defines extenuating circumstances; not the word LOSER. A loser is the opposite of a winner. (There's probably a good reason for why you think you're an authority of the word "loser", - an explanation which would fit the definition of the word "rationale".) MERRIMAM WEBSTER DICTIONARY loser: 1: a person or thing that loses, especially consistently. 2: a person who is incompetent or unable to succeed. OXFORD DICTIONARY: loser: NOUN 1. A person or thing that loses or has lost something, especially a game or contest. 2. A person who is disadvantaged by a particular situation or course of action. URBAN DICTIONARY loser – n. A person who has fallen off the social ladder, climbed down the social ladder, jumped off the social ladder, or just never bothered to climb the social ladder in the first place. And, of course, you'll come up with your usual whining about accepting the words of white men, sulking because i don't accept the definition of a black man who writes '"ect." instead of "etc." and who, by his own admission, is not the smartest person in the word. You can say that again!

I never said anything about you being "weak" or "soft". I concluded that since this exchange between you and Kalexander took place on-line, there was nothing you could do about his ridiculous comments and this included extracting an apology from him, but that you could nullify his remarks by simply blowing them off and moving on. That seems to be what he did in regard to what he considered insults that you hurled at him.

89?? A "boy toy" is the play thing of a "cougar" and has to be at least 15 years younger than her. Even when you're "joking", you're off the mark.

Ummm. i don't think so. All my female friends tended to be like me. Our tough bitchy facades were almost a litmus test. If a guy could hold his own with us, we'd let down our guards and be nice and sweet. Unfortunately, i think more flunked the test than passed it. We were in the vanguard of ball-bustin' black sistas. (Something I'm not particularly proud of.)

That picture might be in AALBC's archives. i think i posted it here once when i was involved in one of my feuds with another poster. (Carey?)

Again. Pioneer can maintain his privacy by using a symbol, instead of hiding behind the picture of a famous person! And if somebody really wants to hack your privacy they could do it through your e-mail I never get up tight about my privacy on the Internet. I don't sweat it, because i don't have anything to hide. I reveal a lot about myself on FaceBook and so do all of my "friends". Circulating out of there in cyberspace is one racy picture of me taken about 20 years ago and in it I'm straddling a chair, wearing black lingerie, fishnet stockings and high heel shoes. i really don't care if anybody sees this or prints it. i did it as a joke and it's still a joke. Everyday, i spend about 5 minutes deleting all of the Spam i get which is mostly the result of my going to different sites who automatically put me on their mailing lists when i visit them to look up different things. A simple task. i do worry about identity theft so of course i never give out my full SSN and when i occasionally order something on line i have a special credit card for this purpose which never has more than 200 dollars on it. But, - that's just me...

Sara and Kola were two different personalities. Kola was a diva with a vulnerable streak; Sara was a devious wanna-be. Kola's scathing insults were always aimed at me but never at my family, and a lot of times they were tongue-in-cheek. Sara was vicious, and thought that my age was my Achilles heel. But picking on an "older" person about being old didn't work for Sara because it was an attack on all the "Madeas" so affectionately regarded in the black community. In any case, i have a thick skin. Neither one of these "cunts" bothered me because i didn't have a lot of respect for their opinions. (I am guilty of liking to argue, and i never met a cat fight i didn't want to scratch my way into) The exchanges between Pioneer and Kalexander were just petty tit-for-tat. Nobody believed any of the things Kalexander was saying about Pioneer's family, but Pioneer played right into Kalexander's hands by giving weight to his outlandish attacks.There's absolutely nothing he can do to make Kalexander retract his words, so he should just blow him off and move on.

All these things are a strategy that keep his cause alive, keep his name in the news and make him a sympathetic underdog in the David vs Goliath saga. I don't think he's passionate about the game any more and would probably be surprised if a team signed him, something which would put him in the position of being "booed" by thousands of indignant white fans in stadiums all over the country every time he touched the ball. His battle with the NFL could almost be considered a draw; he came off as the good guy and they as the greedy fence sitting bad guys. Their ratings dropped, he got a lucrative book contract, all kind of accolades and is financially secure.

Well, a winner is never a loser whether he has good character or not. He can become a loser when his circumstances change, but he can't be a winner and a loser at he same time because the word loser means that in the game you were playing, you lost. And, the word "loser" doesn't mean that you are a bad person; it just means that in a particular set of circumstances, you did not defeat adversity. The terms "winner" and "loser" have nothing to do with the kind of person you are, they just describe your "rank". Other adjectives, however, can be used to describe the kind of winner or loser that you are. You can be a "sore" loser, or a "cocky" winner, or a "courageous" loser and a "gracious" winner.

How does a winner with bad character lend to the negativity of being a loser? Harvey Weinstein, the recently disgraced sexual predator and poster boy for the #Me, too movement was a winner in every sense of the word. He was a big player in the film industry, rich, powerful and famous. But he was also an arrogant, lewd, cruel, egocentric misogynistic creep, all of which contributed to his eventual downfall, leaving him to be what he presently is: a loser whose career is in shambles. Donald Trump was victorious in his bid for president, but he is an unscrupulous, inept, lying, narcissistic, pussy grabber, basking in the highest office in the land. Ol Bernie Sanders is an over-the-hill loser but many hold him in high esteem. It is, what it is. They do say "everybody loves a winner". Vince Lombardi noted that "winning isn't everything; it's the only thing". And that's the name of the game in this dog-eat-dog world, where millions daily go about their hum drum routines, managing to keep their heads above water, philosophically reminding themselves that "you win some, - you lose some." And, so it goes...

@harry brownWhile all of the things you describe are going on amongst black folks, white people are at odds about what this country is supposed to stand for, and emotions are running so high, that if Trump is proven guilty of Mueller's charges, his supporters will protest any attempt to remove him from office. Those who want him out might be fed up enough to rebel against this affront to the rule of law. What ensues could result in a revolution or second civil war.