OT. GM fuel mileage overstated

You repugnant racist fat white mormon bigot

Reply to
clare
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We have a family friend at Subaru of America and I discussed such durability problems with him.

Pleased with CVT and find it very smooth. See it is available on a lot of cars so hopefully it will hold up.

Reply to
Frank

You appear to have reading comprehension problems. I've described the African Tribe approach, and the white European approach. However, you've not read (in this post) the Stormin Mormon approach. How might you get all that descriptors from what I quoted from others? I think you still lack enough information to be calling me names.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

Just your way of describing it pretty much indicates your leanings.

You ever been there? Ever worked with those people? Ever actually SEEN how they live??? Well I have. Both central/eastern and West Africa.

You get a different outlook when you see it up close and personal. Particularly when it is not just short term visits. 2 years in east/central southern Africa makes you think.

Reply to
clare

this thread is screaming for your elaboration.

Reply to
Taxed and Spent

So, lets see if I get this right. An experienced Africa visitor is flaming a guy who is doing his best (with what he knows) to gently and accurately describe a situation he's never seen? Some people would use this as a gentle teaching moment. Chance to bring some wisdom and undestanding. Perhaps even encourage someone to help with the problem. But then, there's Clare who chooses to kick an honest man in the balls.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

Hey, tell me what you believe about Mormons. I am feeling like a chance to kick you in the balls.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

The four indented text (top line) is likely to be as educational as we will read from Claude.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

perhaps Clare can help

Reply to
Taxed and Spent

You call this "gentle"?

"...feed the stick figures so they can grow to puberty and make more stick figures for us to feed."

No one that is trying to "help" refers to those being hurt as "stick figures" and then says "for us to feed".

You've shown your bigotry many times in the past and you are simply doing it again.

...snip...

Clare: Don't even bother defending yourself against this racist idiot. He's the worst kind. He won't even admit what his words truly show.

Reply to
DerbyDad03

To be clear, I am not suggesting you rebut anyone else's posts, but I would be interested in your perspective given your time in Africa.

Reply to
Taxed and Spent

Hang on while I hide under the bed and cover my balls. Let me know when it's safe to come out.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

What I believe about Mormons as a whole has nothing to do with THIS. I have ni idea what makes you think it does.

Mormon, Catholic or Lutheran (or jewish,, muslim, SDA, hindu,nhillist or buddist, or anything else) makes no difference to me - I've known and worked with several Mormons over the years, and I respected them for living their beliefs, even though I didn't agree with them theologically.

Some of my best friends would describe themselves as "heathen". They respect me for my beliefs - and none of them are fanatical atheists. We have "theological" discussions on a fairly regular basis - and they are never initiated by me. I get asked what I believe - sincere questions - and we talk. I'll never make Christians out of them - but God might.

One thing I CANNOT stand is a racist - of any colour - and particularly one who is too ignorant? to know he is one.

Reply to
clare

Man up and come on out. I'd never kick a man while he's down, and the only way I'd be able to kick that high is if you WERE down.

and in case you didn't catch the symbolism - White Fat is in contrast to the black "stick figure" starving Africans.

Even the poorest, most government-put-on American trailer trash is a millionaire compared to the average tribal african - because he has HOPE. There is a CHANCE he and his kids can get ahead.

Not born into a world of Aids, chronic Malaria, Bilharzia and starvation - and born of a malnourished mother. Not born with at least

4 strikes against you in a world where it's "three strikes and you are out" In a world where unless someone gives you a "leg up" you are down for the count. Where there ARE no government service (that you cry about costing you too much)

And all YOU can do is bitch and complain about YOUR Government.

You are one pittiful excuse for a human being. Man up and do something to make the world a better place instead of just wasting space and oxygen.

Reply to
clare

Dunno. When I think about the design, it reminds me of turning the steering wheel while fully stopped -- it just seems like it is "brute-forcing" the change in pulley ratios.

The drive was... "interesting". You expect the little "hesitation" as an automatic slips from one gear to another and keep waiting for it -- but it never comes.

Reply to
Don Y

On Tue, 17 May 2016 15:55:23 -0700, Taxed and Spent wrote:

OK.As a young single man 21 years of age - a licenced mechanic with some teaching experience - I applied to CUSO (Canadian University Service Overseas) - similar to the US Peace corp or the Brittish VSO - a purely secular organization . I was posted to the Kabwe Trades Training institute in Kabwe (Formerly Broken Hill;) in the northern CopperBelt area of Zambia, but before I arrived they re-posted me to the new Livindston Trades Training Center in Livingston - right down within a few Km of the disputed borfer between Zambia and the then Rhodesia (Now Zimbabwe) and also very close to the warring Mozambique and Angola. A few weeks before I arrived several tourists on the Rhodesian side, including 2 Canagian girls who's home was less than 50 miles from mine, were killed by Zambian soldiers shooting across the border below Victoria Falls. I was to set up and teach the Agricultural Mechanics program - but my shop was being used as a warehouse and there wa NO equipment. My first job was to travel by lorry (a 15 ton Mercedes truck) on a route through all the other trades training centers to pick up un-used and surplus equipment for the shop. Lusaka, Luansha, Kabwe, Lukasha, and a few others I've forgotten, from one end of the country to the other, over roads ranging from quite presentable blacktop 2 lane, to the roughest dirt roads you could imagine - hot and dusty and ROUGH. When I returned to Lusaka after 2 weeks I headed for Livingston. I was told I would get an allowance equivalent to what they would have to pay a local with the same qualifications to do the job - and as a Class A auto mechanic in Canada that was equivalent to the British City and Guilds Engineer designation. I had borrowed money from home to buy a vehicle - I had my eye on a rebuilt R4 Renault that ended up not being available so I spent half as much for a used Peugeot instead and drove with everything I owned to Livingston - down the Great North Road. When I got there I put together a list of additional equipment necessary to start the program and sent it to Tech Ed headquarters - and waited for my first pay., and for further instructions. I had my car wrecked within a few weeks of arriving and spent my time getting it back together with no money while waiting for further instructions. - and my first pay. I had arrived in country in July - it was early November and I was still doing nothing - living off the money I had NOT spent on the car. Ends up they couldn;t figurenout what my classification was and I fdinally ended up being paid as a fresh highschool graduate with no experience - about 15Kw atcha a week plus a roof over my head. A Kwatch then was equivalent to a SA Rand - vert close to a British pound - about $1.65 Canadian. and a liter of regular (about 81 octane) gas was a Kwatcha. I still was not working so I put out some fealers. MCC (Menonite Central Committee) the service branch of the Mennonite and Brethren inChrist churches had an opening I could fill in southern Botswana so I told Cuso that if they did not have work for me by Christmas I was crossing over to Botswana where MCC would give me work. I shortly got the word I would be starting to teach in the automotive mechanics shop with a fresh intake of students - so I stayed. Half my students were older than I was. One was an "old man" of 37. Some were fresh out of the "bush", and all, unlike my highschool students in Waterloo, were VERY eager to learn.

They started out with 3 strikes against them. Any intellectual deficits they had were due to health issues - chronic Malaria and Bilharzia, combined with chiuldhood malnutrition had had serious results in some cases - but they worked their tails off and after 4 semesters I'd made respectable mechanics out of at least half the class..

The situation in Livinston at this time was quite severe. We were at the end of the road, so supplies were sporadic and scarce. Tourism at the Victoria Falls was next to non-existant. At night I often heard gunfire across the border. There were reugees from Angola, Mozambique, Namibia and even from Rhodesia. A few of my students were refugees.

The British had left the former Northern Rhodesia with a decent infrastructure after independence about 10 years earlier, but they had not trained administrators etc to take over - so a lot of things didn't run too smoothly, Everyone was learning on the job - and they had inherited the worst of British Colonial Buerocracy - yet compared to the portugese colonies of Angola and Mozambique they had the world by the tail.

Yes, there was always a low undercurrent of corruption - a few Kwatch here or there could often get things done faster - but compared to Zaire (Congo) it was nothing - and under the former freedom fighter Kenneth Kaunda, the political situation was relatively stable. Like everywhere else in the world there were the just plain lazy - but they were outnumbered by those who had just given up hope, and those who tried their best and couldn't get ahead.

The tribal and extended family structure contributed to some not making too much effort to "get ahead" because if they had money and the rest of the family didn't, the rest of the family was on their doorstep, and pretty soon nobody had any money anymore.

There really was not a whole lot of incentive to try harder - but it wasn't their faukt, when you got right down to it - and it wasn;t a genetic lack of smarts.

One thing that DID make things worse, in my opinion, was the way "aid" was applied. I found my being there working for next to nothing as a teacher didn;t give any incentive for their own to get into teaching. If they were good atb what they did, they could make good money in the coppermines or the sugar plantation or private business - why should they teach for a public servant'd pay if Msungu was stupid enough to come over and do it for nothing. What I call the "welfare mentality"

- if it doesn't cost something it has no value. The fault of the way "development" was done.

I left with the fear that "African Development" might just be a bigger oxymoron than "Military Intelligence" but I also felt I had done something of value - if only in the lives of my 17 students.

I returned home to Canada in 2015 several thousand dollars in debt and 2 years behind my compatriots in earnings, pension contributions, etc but it was 2 years well spent.

I say it was all good experience, although not all A good experience.

I could say a lot more - and although it's been 41 years since I came home, sometimes it's like it was just yesterday.

A few years after I came home I met and married my fine wife - just celebrated 35 years of marriahge last week.

We raised 2 daughters - one of whome inherited the "Africa Bug" and has spent the last 12 years or so -how time flies - working both in Africa and in Canada with World Vision and working on her Masters degree in International Development. She has worked and lived in South Africa, Rwanda and Burundi and is currently living a few miles from Mom and Dad working as a project manager on several projects in West Africa (Mali, Mauritania, Senegal etc ) as well as some overlap into east Africa. The projects encompass health education, sustainable food programs, nutrition, microfinance for developing small enterprises. etc.

In 2000 I spent a month in Burkina Faso - West Africa wotking with friends who are linguists working with the Turka tribe, who were returning to country after a sabatical - about 15 years or so into the project. I went over to chjeck out and repair their vehicles - Toyota Prad and a couple motorbikes, and set up the solar electric system in their house in the village compound - about "a mile past where the dirt track ends" in Fabedougo district. Part of the job was also removinf a year's accumulation of "sub sahara" from on top of, in, ans around everything they had lect in the house, repairinf screening etc, and rebuilding the water storage system.

25 years after leaving the former British colonies of east/central Africa - even afyer having travelled through a bit of the former French Zaire - I was somewhat unprepared for French West Africa,

The French has not built the infrastructure the British had, and didn't leave a lot behind, other than a history of slave trade - and Burkina didn't have a primary industry like the copper mines - which even with abysmal world copper prices, stillm provided some revenue for Zambia. Burkina is one of the lowest income countries in the world - right down there with Haiti, yet the people have a drive to makes SOMETHING of themselves and their country.

Like Livingston of years ago, NOTHING is readilly available. To get a few pieces of plumbing we required meant searching numerous little shops -to find not what we were looking for, but something we could make work.

Fixing vehicles meant making something from another vehicle fit, or patching what you had,

This is not due to any inherent lack of intelligence of the people, or a lack of drive - but I still almost dispare of EVER seeing a marked improvement in the lot of the people.

Sometimes I don't know how my daughter does it - and with groups like Boka Haram, ISIL, and other radical terrorist groups, it just gets harder - and DON'T blame it on "religion" It's a political power struggle, born in part out of hopelessness and anger, maquerading as Religion.

And if the opportunity came up, I'd do it again.. I almost went back to Zambia in February to help fix the water system at the Macha Hospital in Zambia - home of the Macha Malaria Institute and Aids centers - world leading centers for research in Malaria and HIV treatment out in the"bush" but arrangements could not be made on time.

Mabee some day, if health permits as age advances.

Reply to
clare

One thing I cannot stand is a person who assigns a bunch of characteristics to others without really knowing. Which is one definition of racist. "You have this or that quality because you are a member of a certain race." Well, you did much the same to me. Assigning certain bunch of characteristics to me. You've not met me in person, nor seen how I treat people of different groups. All you have is some text on the screen. So, from a distance, you know more than I do about my self. (You suggest that I'm ignorant, and therefore you are knowledgable.) Pot, kettle, black.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

You are one judgemental and ignorant person. Or, maybe you're two persons. One of which is judge- mental, and the other one is ignorant. You have little or no knowledge of the ways I do make the world a better place, some times many occasions each day. As for now, I'll just leave you to be judgemental and ignorant. I doubt there is much hope that (even with descriptions and evidence) you might be able see clearly.

Reply to
Stormin Mormon

On Wed, 18 May 2016 07:35:49 -0400, Stormin Mormon wrote in

Most members of different "races" have certain racial characteristics in common. Black people with certain face and hair characteristics are considered part of the black race. There's nothing wrong with those classifications. It's how you act toward the race and for what reasons you do so that matters IMO.

There is nothing wrong with inferring personal characteristics based on what a person writes when expressing his opinion.

Reply to
CRNG

Oh, the irony.

Reply to
Scott Lurndal

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