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Well, the 6-degrees of separation thing is a continuing source of curiousity for me (from the mole. biol. perspective). But, recently I responded to a "friendster" request and wouldn't ya know it, somebody named Trogdor popped up in my network. (very humiliating, though I'm not sure that Trog is this forum's Trog unless he's some kind of burninator fellow with one plump bicep)
Anyhow. One day it dawned on me after a lunchtime political discussion that I was 3 steps away from Saddam Hussein (transient contact, not deep relations) and this seemed curious.
Anyone know of distant seemingly unrelated people they might be "linked" to via a short chain?
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<-- can link to pretty much any major world leader in two, and the rest in three -- because of the ones @ 2 of course -- , links.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Hmmm. I've met John Howard, Tony Blair, Cherie Blair and Princess Margaret.
I guess that means I can do most world leaders in two or three.
Edit: On the entertainment side, I'm two away from Heath Ledger (he went to school in my very clique-y city) so that gets me into the Hollywood circles.
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My family has a connection with Joeseph Goebbels and a few others from Germany's dark times. Our branch left Germany before World War II, as the rising political storm frightened and appalled them. On reaching the US, they split the family name in two and assimilated as quickly as possible into Midwest farmlife.
I've grown up with this sense of debt for what we left behind, rather than worked actively to change. The family rarely discusses it, but the legacy of shame is there.
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Yeah, I think I can do most World leaders in 2 or 3 as well. But that's only because my dad, my aunt and my uncle are in foreign affairs.
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I attended a political rally to see George Bush Sr...does that link me to Dubya, and would y'all count him as evil?
I could hypothetically be linked to any number of people through my Aunt Danita and Uncle Gary, who have been missionaries in Yugoslavia (when that's what it was) and in Russia, but I have no idea who they might have met.
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I can link to Adam Sandler in 3, David Spade in 4, and Ben Stiller in 4. Based on most of their movies, I'd say they fit the criteria.
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I have nothing, except my dad used to run at the same gym as W. They weren't friends or business associates, though (my family doesn't run in that kind of circle). Does that count?
If it does, I'm to Bush in one, and it goes from there.
*thinks* My stepmother's brother is close, close friends with a governor of a province in Germany. I wonder if that's anything?
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Well, I've talked with TheodoreGeisel, who was intimately connected with Dr.Seuss, a known associate of the Grinch.
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I shuck hands with VP Bush back in the early 80's. If he wasn't evil enough, he went to war against Saddaam, and his son is George W and he was defeated by Clinton.
One of those you must consider Evil.
If not, he was head of the CIA, and new plenty of Evil people (I'm sure he was Boris and Natasha's other arch nemisis)
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Does shaking hands with someone count? I always thought you had to at least be acquainted with the first link.
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Hey Mabus, I haven't met your aunt and uncle but they've been through here in the last several years. Several of the missionaries and members here know them, including our member from Irkutsk. Aren't they going to China soon? I heard a rumor like that.
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Well, I spent an hour with Dan Rather, so that connects me with anyone he knows or has interviewed. He also knows Mike Wallace, who I don't think of as evil, merely vile.
But then again, I yelled at Wallace on a previous occasion from about 20 feet away when he was speaking.
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I'm two from Gorbechav, Yeltsin, probably three from Putin.
If simply having been a liason to the KGB means you're evil, then I'm married to Evil. Otherwise, I'm two or three degrees from all the evil in the KGB. This same Evil also had dealings with the 'gray market' in the former Soviet Union, and he has had friends killed because of Mafia dealings. So I am also two or three degrees from the evil in the Russian Mafia.
You may ask how a good Mormon girl became so closely associated with someone so closely connected to evil. That is not my story, but his.
All of this probably puts me at three or four degrees from Saddam Hussein, though.
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Kat - I caught the typo before your post came through. Honest. As a matter of fact, it looks like you were still typing your post when my edit cleared.
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You're forgiven. It's possible my reputation for good and evil at Hatrack will survive one crazy post.
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I'm one degree from Peter Singer - who certainly meets my "vile" standard. (3 LONG hours with him)And that puts me two degrees from lots of other vile people as well.
(As an agnostic, I grapple with the idea of evil and do find I accept the label, but save it for really exceptional cases.)
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Fugu: Americans loved Gorbachev. Russians hated him. He and Yeltsin both were given plans that the top economists of the country had devloped for how to change the market from being government controlled to become a free market without collapsing the economy and they BOTH ignored it.
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I'm not saying he's the greatest thing since sliced bread, I'm just saying evil's probably too strong a word.
'sides, notice that Bush has been given plans by major economists on both the conservative and liberal (well, liberal for an economist) sides to fix the economy, and he's ignored both, hence the low rating of his fiscal plans from both liberal economists and conservative economists.
Yet I don't here you lumping him in with evil .
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Lissa? We're on speaking terms again? I really am sorry about the troubles we had before. (And I know you aren't on here all that much and probably didn't stay mad at me that long.)
I really have not heard where my aunt and uncle are going next. The last I had heard, they were planning an extended stay in his home state of Texas, but I have not heard from them lately. I'm glad to hear that you have heard them well spoken of. I don't always agree with every word, but I admire them greatly.
[Addit: It just occurred to me that you might not have realized I changed my nick. I'm the same fellow as Maccabeus.]
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I suspect I could get back to Hitler or Stalin in three or four people. But I don't really know exactly who my grandfather was talking to when he was wandering around East Germany after WWII and during the cold war either... it's all kinda classified.
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Mabus, we weren't speaking? I suppose you could say we weren't speaking in the same sense that I'm not speaking with most of the people in the world at the moment... *grin* I stopped being irritated as soon as you stopped making categorical assumptions about groups I belong to. And I genuinely appreciated it.
And I read a lot more than I post, so I did know who you are. Read the landmark. Liked it. Posts: 2762 | Registered: Sep 1999
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Lissa, I can be bad about that sometimes, especially when I've spent a lot of time thinking alone. When I don't have enough people to discuss with, or sometimes for other reasons, I sit down and start working out in my own mind just how the bits and pieces could fit together. Sometimes I forget which bits are straight out of the Bible, which are from authors like Campbell, and which are mine. Then when I have people to talk to again it gets messy. I'm glad I've stopped irritating you.
And thanks for the compliments. Posts: 1114 | Registered: Mar 2004
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I'm two degrees from George Lucas, if that counts. My dad went to college with him as a fellow cinematography student.
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One of my ancestors was supposedly a cousin of Jefferson Davis, but that's probably too many steps. Not to mention, ol' Jeff is practically a hero in some parts of the country.
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But your Dad probably didn't see to much of him, as as far as I can tell Lucas didn't go to class . . . Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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Does this mean that Amka and I are closer through Russian statesmen than we are through other chains? I think it would be 6, so I suppose being LDS would bring us into a shorter chain...
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dangermom, if your ancestors are from Utah, we are probably blood related closer than six degrees.
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I shook Clinton's hand during his '92 campaign, which means I'm just a step away from... oh, f@#k.
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I'm two steps from Justin Guardini, the guy from American Idol Season 1, and three steps from Kelly Clarkson. Are they evil enough?
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I played guitar with someone who played guitar with someone who played piano with the Beatles. Not that they were evil.
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Our branch left Germany before World War II, as the rising political storm frightened and appalled them. On reaching the US, they split the family name in two and assimilated as quickly as possible into Midwest farmlife.![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Aren't they going to China soon? I heard a rumor like that.
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You're forgiven. It's possible my reputation for good and evil at Hatrack will survive one crazy post.
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I really am sorry about the troubles we had before. (And I know you aren't on here all that much and probably didn't stay mad at me that long.)![[Evil]](graemlins/evil.gif)
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