The Cyrillic alphabet was the only one I really ever learned that wasn't based on ABC, etc.

I have buds from VN that learned Mandarin as it is spoken by the "iron triangle" peoples (actually all of SEA) more than any other language (as a commonality) as opposed to the bastardization by the french of the vietnamese language to make a tonal language boiled down to a 26 letter alphabet!

If you speak Mandarin Chinese you will have a better chance of being able to communicate with someone in Laos, Cambodia, or even Burma than any other language.

They can send me emails to this day with phonetic mandarin and I can speak them to VN peoples that I know and they know what they are saying! To me that is amazing!

I knew enough vietnamese to interrogate someone - ladai, cam ong u lumh, lu dahn, didi mau, mot, hai, bom. lam, nam, sau, tam, tin. mui, caca dau, etc.

But the real co. linguists could make those dudes really cough up.

I suppose there's a lesson there too.

go to belarus... you'll have a ball.....just gird your loins (liver) for the wodka!

RF, at one point I thought my Russian would be useful. By the time I worked into a position where it might have been I was sent to Africa. Where they spoke French.

I then was immersed in French before being posted to South America

And it wasn't even the Bush Administartion!

and RF, the most conservative free market capitalists I worked with in Europe would be flaming socialists here.

I know form where you speak

I know RF, I was "Berlitz Immersed" when I got out of service and finished college.

For some reason. I was thinking of Charles Bronson (Danny the Tunnel King) when I typed that, actually.

Yes, Edwards may be the closest of the "Trio" to a classical socialist but the other two aren't pikers in that regard.

Interesting addendum is that Obama may wind up with more delegates from Nevada when everything is worked out.  Something like how the popular-vote loser won the Presidency in 2000 by a single vote.

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The same arcane rules diminished Edwards' final tally, although he was probably supported initially by around ten percent who were forced to settle on their second choice.  Although ten percent isn't in bragging territory either.

Chico, you must know there are no socialists among the top, oh, dozen or so Democratic Party candidates.  Heck, there are damned few Democrats in it.  The closest one scares the corporate media so much they've already cut him out of the top three.

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By European standards, this country's Democratic Party is extremely right-wing.  Oh, and that word is closer to "tovarishch," despite the Claudette Colbert film.  Russian has a consonant something like the middle letters of "fresh chex."  Ma eto nyichyievo.

and TomW

"adding anything" is by your playbook

fortunately for you the literary lightweights at TBC agree with you

must be nice

smooth slimy socialistic sledding statist sybarite

i've already said who I support

I just don't need a socialist feeding frenzy to reinforce it

Hillary is white?

I didn't know that

I thought her coloration was somewhere in the vicinity of  "roots de pancake makeup"

Isn't that an ethnicity in and of itself?

And when her husband is widely and profusely known as the "first black POTUS"

I wouldn't be so quick to categorize her as "white"

A *SECOND* remake of "The Manchurian Candidate?"  Will Hollywood *NEVER* learn?

Tom, I don't think that's the reason the media has ignored Edwards.  He's threatening to the big-corporation owners of the media, who've had the rails greased for them in recent years.

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But I'm also disappointed in the Nevada results (though it's a small state.)    If Obama offered him the VP slot I'd jump to that campaign in an instant.  No chance that Clinton will do that.  I expect she'll go for Clark as her VP if she gets that far.

moonbats over my hammy

this blog is like a socialist far leftist feeding frenzy

except they "self-chum"

Nah.  I get all of it I need off the internets, complete with interlinks to relevant additional information.   In many cases I get it a day or two ahead of the standard media. 

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And of course, let's not forget Olbermann (blest be his name).

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Of course it helps my TBC boycott.  Newspaper advertising rates are not much supported by their web presence, they are based upon the number of regular, paid subscriptions.  In addition, they don't get my 50 cents newsstand contributions either.

Gee, will *NO ONE* speak up for "things are pretty good as they are"?

http://www.youtube.com/watc...