80 Comments on “Today’s Quick Answers to a Bunch of Stuff I’ve Been Asked About Recently That I Feel Like Addressing Briefly Because, Hell, Why Not”

1. Sir, do you really feel that sea lions add nothing to society? Sir?

2. Well, one of the “perks” of being a celebrity, is that people think that your opinion matters more than the rest of us mere mortals. Somehow, being well known equates in people’s minds as to having some kind of divinely blessed wisdom that somehow the rest of us lack. Good luck trying to deal with that!

   However, as an AUTHOR, who has an incredible talent for conveying your thoughts in print, you DO have the ability to communicate in a way that is more coherent, and more logical, than most people. You also have a platform here (and on other social media) which people do read and do pay attention to. You have the power to affect things…things that matter…simply by having the audience, by having the power to be HEARD! THAT being said, I think it’s kind of intrusive how people nag you to share your thoughts…as if you are obligated to provide them with your opinion. It’s a position I don’t envy you in the slightest! It’s nice having the ability to participate in the discussions here, and it’s nice feeling that we all have some connection to a famous author who provides us with entertainment…but sometimes I feel that some fans take this type of communication for granted…again, I wish you luck in navigating this!

   As for myself, I appreciate the interaction you provide here, and the sharing of your thoughts on things. However, I do disagree with you one one tiny thing…I think Bernie Sanders WILL be our next President! :) Everything else though, I think is spot on…especially the Hugo controversy being “boring as shit”! Also CATS!

3. Some cat named Ariana is licking the greece off of Donald Trump’s Chinese donuts and thus threatening Hillary Clinton’s bid to elected as the new flag of South Carolina.

   Got it.

4. I just came here to see the outcry over saying Sanders can’t be president, then realized I’m here too early.

   I’ll come back later.

   (For what it’s worth, I think the “Never gonna happen” mindset is too dismissive regarding Sanders. A lot of his supporters are stuck in an echo chamber and overestimate his current reach, but his campaign *is* growing faster than I would have expected. Personally, I think that “He’s great, but he doesn’t stand a chance” is a self-fulfilling prophecy. That is, it’s that attitude that will ultimately cost him the election, which would be a shame.)

5. RE: Sanders. I’m reasonably sure he won’t be the nominee, but I still support him while he is in the running. For context I voted for Ralph Nader all three times he was the Green Party nominee.

6. A lotta people thought Obama was never gonna be President either. Hillary was a shoe-in in 2008 too.
   I’m excited to see how far Sanders can take it, and should he somehow win the primaries, I’d say he has a decent shot of winning over some middle-of-the-road undecideds.

7. Agreed on most points. Hope you’re wrong about Sanders — would LOVE to see him in the Oval — but suspect you’re right. At least he’s putting some balance into the election.

   And I don’t know who Ariana Grande is, but licking donuts seems an odd hobby.

   And my Feline Overlords instruct me to say … “Yes. Cats. Definitely.”

8. I realize Bernie’s chances aren’t good(though they seem to be getting better by the day), but neither were our current President’s 8 years ago. I still have hope!

   Also, did the last Presidential campaign start as early as this one seems to be doing?

9. I would feel the same way about Sanders, except that Obama has already demonstrated Clinton’s ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. On the plus side, most (all?) of her high campaign staffers are different people this time around. If I see Mark Penn or that Rothschild creature hanging around, I’m gonna get worried.

10. I absolutely second you Woot! about the women’s world cup.

    And I agree about Sanders, which is a shame because I really like him. I will support him until it is no longer an option.

11. Wait! You forgot one MAJOR topic. And it’s about space and spacecraft and cool sci-fi stuff like that… the best 3 minutes EVER!

12. I think Sanders is still a longshot, albeit one I support – but then again, at this time in 2007 I would have bet money Barack Obama’s campaign was a no-hoper. So – who knows…?

    I will say I’m sick of My Fine Liberal Friends shoving “Hillary Clinton is REALLY a Liberal!!! No, honestly – look at these specious proofs to see how LIBERAL Hillary Clinton really is!” down my throat. Apparently my saying I’ll hold my nose and vote for that opportunistic NeoLib if she’s the Democratic nominee, because at least she isn’t Quite As Bad As The Republican Klown Kar (though unlike my FLFs I wouldn’t swear there’s much distance policy-wise!), isn’t enough for them….

    Who is Ariana Grande, and WTF is she licking doughnuts anyway?

    Must suck for those County Clerks and JPs to have to abide by a law they don’t agree with – I feel the same way about the PATRIOT Act and the DMCA.

    Never been to San Diego ComicCon, even though my family lives there. They keep threatening to invite Tammy, but never do – NYC ComicCon, though, has had her several times! :)

    Good for Greece and the US Women’s Soccer Team – and yes, the women deserve to be paid the same as men, and would even if they weren’t kicking ass and taking names while the men’s team just keeps faltering.

    Cats? We have eleven of them, all rescues. That doesn’t count the two living in my office, the dozen or so revolving crap game that eat in the shack we laughingly call a “garage”, nor the feral kittens that apparently have taken up residence in the neighbor’s garage but come by to eat…..

13. It’s good to know that you are pro-cat. Now I don’t have to boycott you.

14. Mr. Scalzi, you can’t dodge the sea-lion issue forever!

15. I’m seriously disappointed that SDCC’s policies haven’t been updated. That seems like a major oversight on their part. Do they just not care or something? This seems like a pretty big thing to ignore.

16. Ah, but what about VD and his super secret behind-closed-doors meetings with Very Important Executives at Tor/MacMillian about how everyone is going to get fired and Patrick Hayden is going to take you to another publisher? What about that, huh? I know it has to be forefront in your mind. ;-)

17. Now you’re all set for your new sideline of writing postcards and aphorisms.

18. I still would like to know the effect of Kate Sagan’s Ghost Brigade past on her mental and emotional state when raising her new baby, especially since she killed an infant in “Ghost Brigades”. I have been curious about that for some time.

19. Back when gay marriage was first legalized here, currently employed clerks were offered a choice — they initially could decline to officiate a same-sex wedding, but only if there was at least one clerk working in the same office who would. If there weren’t, they weren’t allowed to decline.

    This grandfather clause only applied to clerks who had been hired before the ruling was handed down; the amended hiring contract/oath of office explicitly does not allow them to decline.

    Most clerks were already onboard with gay marriage, the ruling allowed the remainder a graceful exit without inconveniencing the people who wanted to get married, and natural attrition eventually made the issue a moot point.

20. Sealions > Cats. Although they smell worse (usually).

    Also, SDCC – I’ve lived in San Diego for 12 years, and am a bit of a geek (OK, a lot) but… looks like hell on earth to me. The local paper is showing pictures from preview night which involve an unfeasibly large number of people crammed into a small space, plus people sitting in line for Hall H already. It doesn’t look much fun to me, but more power to those who go. I may wander down the hill to look at some costumes and associated crazyness.

    I guess I am more of a lit geek so don’t get too excited about movies/TV/Comics. Hope everyone attending has an awesome time, it’s just not my idea of fun.

21. I love it when you quote Mr. Trump about “the kind of people Mexico sends us”. That’s because I’m pretty sure that “Mexico”: (the country and the government) actually send us only Ambassidors & similar Diplomatic Officials. I’m waiting for Mr. Trump to cite any rape or murder committed by any of them. Personally, I figure that the Mexican Government picks the best people it can find to deal with its most Powerful neighbor & trading-partner.

    As for the people who come to the U.S, from Mexico — we either invite them, as Green-Card/Guest-workers at minimum wage, or … ummm… kinda allow them to sliip in illegally, to work at (most often) less than minimum wage, exploiting them to our benefit. *shrug*

    And yes, of course a few of the thousands of these are rapists, thieves, or even murderers. Does anyone really expect this not to be the case? (And there seem to be Reports that some number of the U.S. Border Guards are in the habit of raping the Mexican women in their custody, but I’ve been unable to find any Official Investigations of this.)

22. Mike J:

    Kate?

    DangerKitty:

    I’m not exactly staying up nights, no.

23. So I got bored recently and Googled Holtzbrinck, owners of Macmillan which owns Tor. Macmillan had revenues of 721 MILLION EUROs! [insert Doctor Evil laugh]

    Does anybody really think an executive at a company of that size would even notice a boycott? Or would return Vox’s calls?

24. My $0.02
    I -highly- doubt Sanders’ ability to sway the non-Democrat/GOP vote. After eight years of rallying against a pretend crypto-Muslim Socialist Kenyan, there’s no way an -actual avowed self-described- Socialist would be any different, Black or White.

25. Chris

    I think you need to bear in mind the fact that VD has very little idea of how businesses work; this demonstrates itself in just about everything he does. Conversely John does understand, which is why he really doesn’t give a toss about VD making such an idiot of himself in terms of his own career.

    Equally, as long as VD and his pals strive to screw up Worldcon we all have something at stake, but that’s rather different…

26. Yes, why are there no sea lions in the Old Man-verse? Is there something you’re not telling us?

27. A Ghost Brigade squad needs to steal a Consu ship so they can travel back in time to kidnap a sea lion, bring it back to the present/future to deal with the Conclave so that Humanity will make amends with the Colonial Union.

    I hope I didn’t spoil too many things from The End of All Things: The Voyage Home. I know it is the extra that has been teased.

28. The Chinese stockmarket is by far the most interesting issue John brought up. It will be very interesting to see what kind of affect China’s economy has on the rest of the world. It will also be interesting how much the government spending to buy stocks helps…

    I think the analysis of this is horrible. I see the press talking about well the ‘chinese stockmarket is still up 74% this year’ or something like that. That is the problem. Its a bubble. In theory assets value is supposed to be based on current earnings and what you think the future earnings are going to be for the customer. Thats the theory… with this many people its never works out that way exactly. Its why we have bubbles and crashes.

    There is no way the current and projected profits of all these companies increased by 74% this year.

    Problem with a bubble: Hard to tell when you are in one. When you crash you know. Even harder for government to take action to purposefully STOP the bubble to avoid the crash. The crash is worse than the bubble because if you buy low and sit high, you have not received actual cash returns yet if it crashes. Its just your ‘perception’. If you buy low and it crashes, that is money people and businesses can spend. So the crash is way worse.

    This could very well affect the world economy. I just dont know. Really annoyed with the horrible reporting on this. Its garbage across the board on all networks (fox and cnn).

29. Stevie:

    “I think you need to bear in mind the fact that VD has very little idea of how businesses work”

    Well, specifically, he has very little idea of how my business works. I went over to his site and saw his latest bit of fiction involving me. It is, to put it charitably, laughably stupid and wrong. But he’s not well-known for having a good relationship with truth, so.

30. I would have liked to see a little more “0” in that w00t, to be honest, but it’s your opinion. I’m not judging much. I won’t go on here about the WWC (did that on MeFi,) but I rate it Three Stars!

    I won’t ask you for your stance on cats licking donuts, because, well, we don’t get a vote on that, because they’re cats. They lick what they want to. I did once see a cat lick a lemon, and the look on that cats face was priceless. “You betrayed me! You utterly betrayed me!” And then the cat *licked it again* and got the same look.

    Cats. Either really dumb, or strong supporters of the scientific method, and that’s not an exclusive or.

31. –Ariana who?

    –Donald Trump’s hair is a bad joke, and Trump himself is a spectacularly bad joke.

    –I want Sanders but he has no chance, which is unfair.

    –Cats are good.

    –RSHD is a stupid, worthless asshole. This has been established for years. He is in what I call the “Louie Gohmert Club” of truly terrible people who are also overpoweringly stupid. So let’s just ignore the sad little monkey-boy as he hoots and jumps up and down and hollers in an attempt to get our attention.

    –In keeping with the spirit of the above sentiments, I have two cats, one of whom thinks that he’s a dog and the other of whom is approximately spherical. I do love them so.

32. So, now I know who Ariana Grande is. (Spoiler: Almost certainly a nicer person than Tea Reader, but occupies a similar niche.)

    Also… what about the sea lions? Why have you not yet addressed the issue of sea lions?

33. Cats YES. All twelve of mine certainly say so. Also, DangerKitty, I love that avatar.

34. The sea lions have been scrupulously polite to our host. I think he’s ignoring them out of spite. But what do I know? Until recently, I thought our host was actually a cat sock-puppeting as a middle aged Ohioan.

35. Ok, I bit the bullet, did the decent thing and went to read it myself. I don’t propose to comment on his delusions about our host and his career, other than to agree that these are indeed delusions, but I will note, for the benefit of anyone who may otherwise assert that silence implies consent, that his claims about the attitudes towards longstanding Jewish communities here in England are both ignorant and nonsensical.

    Last Saturday a group of neo-Nazis proposed to march through a suburb of London which has a Jewish population of around 40%, in the hope of intimidating people in their homes. We take that sort of thing seriously, and therefore the police acted in support of their democratic right to protest by scheduling a static demonstration in Whitehall – the heart of Government – for an hour, and provided a large police force to separate the 20 or so neo-Nazis from the much, much larger numbers of people holding a counter-demonstration.

    Apparently all this passed VD by, but then a lot of facts pass VD by; prior to the demonstration a self-proclaimed ‘white rights supporter’ who wished to organise, via his blog, the burning of Jewish sacred texts was arrested and charged with the offence of inciting racial hatred. As I said, we take that sort of thing seriously; I suspect that VD hasn’t a clue just how much hatred of the Nazis who bombed parts of London flat is burned into our communal memory. When we say ‘never again’ we mean it…

36. RE: confederate flag

    So, I emailed the rep for one of the Dukes of Hazzards to see how much it would cost to get him painting over the General Lee as discussed in the last couple paragraphs here. Thought maybe I’d make it a kickstarter, but I’d need a base number to shoot for.

    The answer came back they’re not making public appearances at this time.

    Ah well.

    You’ve got infinite power and influence, Scalzi, maybe you could make it happen.

37. @A Different Daniel, in the 2012 election that got him into the Senate, Sanders got 71% of the vote. Granted, Vermont leans Dem, but that was several percentage points better than Obama.

38. Any word on an audible’s release date????

39. Hi, I just finished redshirts and wanted to say I love it.

40. Dangerkitty : Ah, but what about VD and his super secret behind-closed-doors meetings with Very Important Executives at Tor/MacMillian about how everyone is going to get fired and Patrick Hayden is going to take you to another publisher? What about that, huh? I know it has to be forefront in your mind. ;-)

    This is the same VD who swore he was a-gonna sue the SFWA into oblivion for kicking him out (had a lawyer lined up and everything), and has been bragging about the gladiator game he has coming out anymomentnowreallytrulyguys for the last, oh, six or seven years now?

    My, however will Mr Scalzi sleep at night?

41. And, come to think of it, wasn’t the LAST time that VD mentioned his ohsoclosetobeingreleased game just after, um, Scalzi announced the Alpha of Midnight Star?

    Morning Star was released Feb 5 2015.

    VD’s game – well…

42. The sea lions are in league with the hyperintelligent bees. You think they’re gonna blow their cover by communicating? (And, oh God!, now that I’ve told you this, I have to change my name, swap out my DNA, get —

43. Your honest opinions are refreshing, thanks!

44. I can’t remember where I read this (probably Twitter), but someone said, of Trump, “your crazy uncle’s email forwards have crawled off the screen and are running for President.”

    Apt.

45. As someone who occasionally dabbles with alternate history, I find the idea of inquiring about Scalzi’s opinion on the Sea Lion</a< issue positively hilarious.

46. For context I voted for Ralph Nader all three times he was the Green Party nominee.

    Great. So you’re the one we can blame for that moron W. getting elected?

    No, Sanders – a fellow graduate of my high school (though years earlier), along with Chuck Schumer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Judge Judy and Andrew Dice Clay – has no chance because he only appeals to the far left of the party, has little ties to moderates or independents or black people, and is just going to do well in states that don’t matter, like New Hampshire.

47. Flag 150 years late, but better late than never.
    Trump How can you take seriously a man named after a fart, especially one who looks like he’s never let one escape? Romney got 20-some percent of the Hispanic vote; I suspect the Repubs will look wistfully back on that figure, whoever gets the nomination.
    Sanders As an outsider, I’d love to see him get both the nomination and the White House. Even if he doesn’t, I think he’s got enough popular support to pull the Dems leftwards, and that’s all to the good. And you’ve got to give him points for consistency: he’s been saying the same stuff for decades, not blowing with the wind like most pols seem to.

48. Wait, RSHD takes Operation Sealion seriously?

    AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!

    *breath*

    AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAA!!!!!

    That’s the most ridiculous BS I’ve ever heard! Sealion is like the FIRST thing they politely tell you not to mention on AH.net because taking it seriously is the mark of a complete n00b.

    Here, I’ll even provide a link: http://wiki.alternatehistory.com/doku.php/pods/sealion

49. Oops, sorry. I meant Jane. I should have confirmed the name since I had not read Ghost Brigade in a couple of years.

    That scene sticks in my head because I did not understand the brutality of the scene until I became a father last year.

50. Having been concom on four different conventions and helped write the anti-harassment policy for one of them…. SDCC’s sexual harassment policy will never meet your standards. The only way they will change their policies is if they stop believing in all of the five geek social fallacies. http://www.plausiblydeniable.com/opinion/gsf.html

51. Granted, Vermont leans Dem, but that was several percentage points better than Obama

    “Vermont leans Dem” is the understatement of the thread. Obama’s margin of victory there in 2012 was the highest in the country, excepting DC and Hawaii.

    That Sanders is doing in New Hampshire isn’t a surprise, but he’s not doing well in Ohio (Clinton 60, Biden 13, Sanders 10); Florida (Clinton 60, Biden 9, Sanders 8), or Pennsylvania (Clinton 53, Biden 13, Sanders 10). Those are states that are going to be critically important in the 2016 general, and Sanders isn’t doing well in any of them (insert caveat about these numbers being Dem v. Dem matchup rather than Dem v. GOP).

    http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/2016-presidential-swing-state-polls/release-detail?ReleaseID=2235

52. Greg,

    Regarding Dukes of Hazzard and the General Lee, you might find this interesting:
    http://espn.go.com/golf/story/_/id/13190780/bubba-watson-paint-confederate-flag-general-lee

    Sadly, but not surprisingly, Bubba was excoriated on Twitter as a result.

53. I’m not sure how I’d feel if the primaries end with both Trump and Sanders winning. One the one hand you might end up with Sanders as president, which would be amazing, on the other hand you might end up with Trump as president, which would be terrifying.

54. I agree.

55. @Scalzi

    “I think you need to bear in mind the fact that VD has very little idea of how businesses work”

    “Well, specifically, he has very little idea of how my business works. I went over to his site and saw his latest bit of fiction involving me. It is, to put it charitably, laughably stupid and wrong. But he’s not well-known for having a good relationship with truth, so.”

    Complaining about you is his business. Are you sure he believes what he writes? Complaining about you is marketing to drum up page views and sell his products. If it works for him, its a smart marketing campaign. If I ever publish a novel, my #1 priority will be to either make John Scalzi or Larry Correia my nemesis and use that as a marketing tool.

56. It’s rumored that Scalzi privately stated: “Sea lions have legs, but they aren’t using them. Why should proper land mammals be forced to associate with them?” Does anybody have a source confirming Scalzi’s denial of his controversial statements?

57. Guess:

    “Are you sure he believes what he writes?”

    That’s neither here nor there as regards his relationship with truth.

    Crafting one’s novel-writing career by opposing someone else isn’t a good strategy. It doesn’t appear Beale makes any significant amount of money as a writer (or as anything else; he by all reports lives off family money), and other people trying to boost their profile by being the “anti-Scalzi” haven’t seen doing so boost their sales significantly, from what I know. I would suggest instead, Guess, that you actually try to write a novel worth reading.

58. But Guess, now that you’ve revealed your plan, will it still work?

59. I am thoroughly disappointed at Sanders having even a trifling of a shot at the White House.

    Is world history no longer taught in colleges these days?

60. Ben (re the Ghost Brigade going back in time to fetch a sea lion to placate the conclave):

    Curse you! I was waiting for the release of the entire The End of All Things rather than reading it piecemeal, and now you’ve given it away. But I have only myself to blame as I invited the spoiler.

    That plot device sounds awfully familiar. Could OGH be recycling old SF TV/movie tropes? Naaah.

    PrivateIron:

    I know of no such denial. There is clearly something fishy (heh) going on here.

61. Guess

    Having ploughed my way dismally through the Hugo contenders this year I have concluded that VD can’t write and can’t edit, as evidenced by the garbage presented in the Hugo packet.

    I have every sympathy for those decent writers who lost their shot at a Hugo in the qualifying period because of the Sads and Rabids, those who declined when they realised that they had benefitted by the slates, and those who were unwittingly slated because they haven’t a clue about the Web and the slimeballs who lurk therein; in that last category I include Sheila Gilbert.

    Sheila is, along with Betsy Wollheim, the co publisher of DAWs; the Hugo package includes sample chapters of the books she edited last year, along with one she co-edited with Betsy, 17 books in all. She has been editing for 45 years. My only reservation is that those sample chapters are too enticing, I’m buying too many books. I shall be voting for her as best editor long form.

    Compare and contrast with the Baen editors who just refer people to the Baen website, where it’s impossible to find who ‘edited’ what. Admittedly, Jim Baen’s motto was ‘Thou Shalt Not Edit’, so I’m somewhat baffled by people nominating Baen Editors for Hugos in the first place, but these were slated deliberately. Frankly, I felt the failure to include anything at all which would help the voters demonstrated an attitude verging on contempt for those voters, but I suppose that’s unsurprising given that the slates themselves showed contempt for the voters….

62. Re: Trump. What I’m concerned about is he’s making an appearance in Phoenix tomorrow and has invited Joe Arpaio to join him.

63. Scalzi:

    Here are a couple of odds and ends I never got around to posting.

    Odd the first:

    I read Agent to the Stars a month ago. It seemed pretty typical Scalzi: some interesting ideas (e.g. new horizons in olfactory communications), snappy/snarky dialog, a few well-turned phrases that repaid lingering attention, and bits of unexpected depth snuck in amongst the lightheartedness. I enjoyed it.

    Then I read the afterword, in which you said that this was the practice novel which you wrote to see if you had it in you. Now *that* is a plot twist. Never saw that coming.

    There was a predictable/forced plot point [which I won’t describe out of consideration to people who have not yet read this] but it didn’t make me say “Aha! Early Scalzi” and it didn’t make the book less enjoyable.

    End the second:

    I knew of you as a blogger before I knew of you as a fiction writer. Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded was pretty well-known in geek circles and I’ve been checking Whatever occasionally since then.

    When Redshirts came out, I read the first four sample chapters and said “meh.” When it won a Hugo, I would have agreed with someone citing this as evidence of the decline of the Hugos.

    Then I read Old Man’s War. Which inevitably led to reading the first couple of sequels. Which led me to read all of Redshirts. The book itself was a fun read: an inside joke with a bit of depth. But the codas took it someplace much more intense. One thing that makes a book or story Hugo-worthy to me is that something about it stays with me and surfaces occasionally. Redshirts definitely qualifies.

    Anyway, thanks for writing stuff worth reading.

    This doesn’t get you off the hook for sea lions though.

64. That was fun! Mayhap this could be a monthly addition to Whatever, a quick topical lauding/skewering of current events?

65. Stevie: It makes me very, very happy that whenever the racists march in the UK, they’re surrounded by crowds at least 4 times as large, refusing to let them be seen as anything other than the miniscule minority they are. I’ve been in those crowds myself, here. And I love that Golders Green was full of strong messages of “Fascists out” from Jewish and non-Jewish people alike. People can lie about the UK all they like from the other side of the Atlantic, but the truth is pretty damn clear.

66. Sarah

    What struck me was that VD’s blog is registered in the UK, which I hadn’t realised before, and which might make people believe that he is resident here and reporting from here.

    He isn’t.

    Furthermore, it’s important to realise that there are neo-Nazis, who really are neo-Nazis as opposed to right wing, but they are small in number and protected by the same laws which they do not wish others to benefit from. We don’t always get on with our neighbours, but when push comes to shove we remember that they are our neighbours, and unite around that fact…

67. If I ever publish a novel, my #1 priority will be to either make John Scalzi or Larry Correia my nemesis and use that as a marketing tool.

    It’s a crowded market niche there, Hoss. Perhaps you should choose someone else?

    I understand that lemon-sucking simonist Bujold is available…

68. For your amusement: I was on a delightful FB thread today, in which we considered the possibility that the Donald’s hairpiece might itself run for president. Important questions included whether the Rug and the Donald would share a ticket, or compete against each other; if they DID share a ticket and get elected, would the Rug remain loyal to Trump’s head or would it make a play for the Oval; and if they were indeed elected, would they only require one security detail, since they’d be unlikely to do appearances without each other.

69. Make Bujold your nemesis? You get a miniature hyperactive git on your case then…

    (character Miles Vorkosigan, not author. LMB has been extremely nice to be around in person at cons.)

70. A more important question, is there any word at all on progress with any TV/movie/mini-series based on OMW or other Scalzi works? Anything? Or is this all so secret as to make D-Day look like a tabloid feature?

71. @Luna: Well… John is too laid back for it to work on him and he makes too much money now for it to be practical for me to pay him. If I ever decide to move to Ohio, run for office on a tea party slate, and John’s books all get turned into TV shows so he is like famous , famous, I might ping him about paying him to be my nemesis. He is a business man after all. I could start a PAC and use it to pay him as a consultant.

    Correia is the better target. He has a need to respond to comments about him all the time and he posts links to peoples sites. Then his friends feel the need to defend him. To be fair most of what he responds to are ignorant comments and he is defending himself(sad puppies is stupid, I mean all the other stuff)… but it shows that he is an easy target. John just ignores it or responds without telling us who it is. I could pull a Larry Flynt on Correia (google it not posting what I mean), that would definitely get a response and that Supreme Court case proves he can’t sue me. Then pull a Rachel Dolezal and identify as some female transgendered bisexual minority to get support from the left on twitter.(not attacking trans or gay people. Chill. This is business). Writing something worth reading is hard. Maybe Ill just code some generic pay to win click game and then do this. I can do that, but then change zombies, etc… into social justice stuff when you click the button. Like a pay to win cookie clicker for social justice.

    You guys realize this is tounge and cheek and I write this to mock all the writers who can’t get along iwth each other like rational adults.

    How do you guys tell how much money VD makes?

72. @Elizabeth McFadden — Donald Trump is doing the world’s worst comb-over, along with enough hairspray to launch a thousand potato cannons to hold it in place. Even borrowing one of Shatner’s toupees would be an improvement over what he’s got.

73. Yeah, Shatner’s toupees laugh amongst themselves at Trump’s comb-over. All that hairspray and orange dye for so many years can’t have helped Trump’s rationality. Those chemicals have been demonstrated by actual (not pseudo) science to be harmful in large quantities over long periods. I mean, sure, he’d be batshit insane anyway, but they may have added that extra fillip of wingnuttery.

    (Trumpster’s a lot like Teddy — lives off Daddy’s ill-gained money and has an equally high opinion of himself, despite being demonstrably bad at business. Bloviates, is a racist… has anyone ever seen them together?)

    I think we’ve got our sea lions mixed up here (although there are certain parallels). There’s AH Sealion (No, the Germans couldn’t have invaded England that way, you git), and there’s general web-talk Sea Lions, which is when Puppies/dudebros/MRAs/other assholes come flomping into a discussion and DEMAND you talk about their issues and won’t. shut. up. First appeared in the comic Wondermark, IIRC. http://wondermark.com/sea-lion-verb/

74. Paul Spencer: “the General Lee”

    Good for him!

    I don’t know if I’m getting senile/forgetful, but it feels like things like this are transitioning a LOT faster than they used to. I don’t know if its because many of the old bigots have died off and kids aren’t adopting the old bigotry, so it just switched because of demographics, or if its social media.

75. From what I understand, that flag isn’t the official confederate flag. It’s a flag that represented a Tennessee infantry unit.

    However, how ’bout your opinion on the knee jerk reaction that some companies/people are doing/did in regards to the Confederate flag, i.e. Apple removing Civil War games and not bringing them back until the game creator removes all the flags from the game? And how ’bout the double standard that seems to apply at some companies, i.e. Amazon, when it comes to the Confederate flag and other items about people who 100 times worse than having a Confederate flag?

    And finally, would we be having this discussion if the shooter wrapped himself in say, the American flag or some kind of other flag?

76. G.B. Miller:

    “that flag isn’t the official confederate flag.”

    You know, I find the “that’s not the official flag” notation a little silly. It was a flag used in the Confederacy, and for the last several decades at least it’s been emblematic of the Confederacy, and has been used as such. Type “Confederate flag” into Google, and this is the image that pops up first, and the most. It’s the Confederate flag, all right, or the official flag of Confederate fetishists, which is close enough.

    My own personal outrage needle doesn’t move much when I see the Confederate flag in video games, particularly as they relate to the Civil War, but of course Apple et al are private companies and have a right to dictate what they find acceptable in the marketplaces they run, or people taking their business elsewhere if they don’t approve.

    “would we be having this discussion if the shooter wrapped himself in say, the American flag or some kind of other flag?”

    We would be having different discussions, to be sure. Which does not mean this discussion is not relevant, or worth having. Implicit in the phrasing of this question (intentionally or otherwise) is the suggestion that if we weren’t have the same discussion under different circumstances involving different symbols, that this discussion is somehow existentially invalid. It’s not.

77. Lurkertype: All sea lions suffer from a campaign of disinformation, particularly when it is veiled as a campaign of no information in the first place. If Sea Lions talk about invading Britain and subjecting its human population to kipper mining, but were never serious about, like you know, actually doing it, somehow they are just like Hitler now? Way to Godwin the thread.

78. “That’s not the real Confederate flag” also conveniently ignores that the second and third flags of the CSA incorporated the battle flag as the canton. The rest of the 2nd flag was white, to symbolize white supremacy (no, not so subtle). The third and final flag had a vertical red stripe added to the fly so it didn’t look so much like a surrender flag.

    The modern resurrection of the battle flag dates to its adoption of it by Strom Thurmond as a symbol for the State’s Rights (aka segregation) party.

79. Greg: “I don’t know if its because many of the old bigots have died off and kids aren’t adopting the old bigotry”

    The monster who shot up the 9 people in Charleston was in his early 20s so I don’t know about kids not adopting the old bigotry. And don’t forget the racist tweets from what appear to be teenagers when the first first Hunger Games movie came out:

    http://jezebel.com/5896408/racist-hunger-games-fans-dont-care-how-much-money-the-movie-made

80. “It’s unsanitary! / Please don’t make me kill you.”
    Also generally unsanitary (with a few notable exceptions).