Tired_Old_Man

The only thing that has changed is that technology has made it easier for the few to fool the many into thinking that their goals are shared.

I looked at the test without really reading your opening paragraph. I was shocked at the test being so hard. After re-reading the intro, I realized that many of the questions are no longer applicable to this century or the second half of the last either.

All it would take is to stop trying to define family so narrowly. Also, as long as the lower middle-class, the group that is most hurt by lack of health insurance/coverage can be convinced that government provided health-care is an evil socialist plot to take away our freedom, we will have these predicaments. What would be worse: No medical coverage or limited choice of doctors?

Sunta: Has someone been watching "South Park"?

Doesn't your DH's firm allow multi-gender polygamy?

Let another couple move in to your home and claim the female as your DP and the male as you DH's DP. Problem solved. :faint:

As does this one:

Sorry This Picture disagrees:

If the Republicans get creamed in this election, expect to see a purge of Gays that would make Lenin and Stalin envious.

First class is worth it if you want to "put on the dog". If you have tons of money or are a non-rev, then going first class is a good idea, but for the avarage person: NO WAY. I don't know what prices look like now, but years ago this was a typical set of prices. JFK to LAX round trip First Class: $3000 Regular Coach: $1400 Discount Coach: $400 Only last minute coach bookers paid the $1400. Most people reserved three weeks in advance, stayed over 7 days, etc., etc. to get the discount price of $400. A little aside: Did you ever see the Polaroid commercials by James Garner and Mariette Hartley? One of the prizes for buying the product was a 50% discount on some airline. Of course, when you read the fine print, it was 50% off the regular coach price. In the example above that would be 50% off $1400 or $700. You could have paid $400 without the prize.

I am always amazed that people can always be fooled by an argument which might sound logical, but is inherently evil. When I went to college, my Economics 101 professor required two text books. One was written by a typical Keynesian economist (the prevailing theory of economics at that time) and one by Milton Freeman (who later shaped much of Ronald Reagan's economic strategy). One of the more vivid examples of Mr. Freeman's the smaller the government the better attitude, was that regulation the fire-proofing and fire retardation of infant's pajama were not the function of government, but of the market place. He basically said people should not have to be forced to buy fire proof or fire retardant pajamas for their infants, that if people wanted fire proof or fire retardant pajamas, then they should make the decision themselves. If people do not want fire proof or fire retardant pajamas for their infants they should be allowed to buy pajamas that catch fire easily. It is a market choice. Of course, then only the poor will have to make that choice. They had the same battle here in Florida before Hurricane Andrew hit. The elected officials on one side of the aisle wanted higher hurricane protection standards and the elected officials of the other party claimed that it would cause the prices of homes to go so high that no one could afford to live in Florida. As soon as Hurricane Andrew devastated Florida, enough of the officials dropped their concern for Florida's growth and passed tougher housing codes, and even stiffer codes have been passed at least 3 or 4 more times since then, as Florida's population has been one of the fastest growing of all the states in the USA. Yes, it is a logical argument to let the people have the freedom of choice to decide on pajamas for their infants which will either protect the child from burning to death or allow the child to be burned and to have the freedom of choice to decide to live in houses that will either collapse or withstand hurricane's winds. But is it a humane argument? Are we not leaving something out of the debate? Think about the unsaid premise that is being left out. If you are a Democrat (or Liberal) you may have an easy time seeing it. If you are a Christian, you should have an easier time seeing it. Many Republicans will miss it. How can that be?

It was well known that the "O-rings" were low temperature sensitive. The issue that I raised was "Why was that rocket booster design chosen?" when other designs did not have the "O-ring" problems with their inherent potential for disaster? As soon as the Challenger crashed, the booster rockets were redesigned to remove the "O-ring" problem. Why couldn't the redesign have been accomplished before the tragedy? Those are two questions that the NASA administrators, the NASA engineers, the Morton Thiokol corporate hierarchy, the Morton Thiokol engineers and the mystery woman who was at the center of the contract award decision debacle will have to life with forever. I wonder; “How many of them sleep well at night?”

An argument can be logically true and factually true. An argument can be logically true and factually false. An argument can be logically false and factually true. An argument can be logically false and factually false. Many might say that I should have stated the above in a different manner such as: An argument can be logically valid and factually true. An argument can be logically valid and factually false. An argument can be logically invalid and factually true. An argument can be logically invalid and factually false.

I have quite a few posts that were e-mailed to me because I am subscribed to the threads. I was thinking of reposting what I have, but I was also fearful of stepping on people's toes.

Some people think in concepts and logic, while others only deal with emotion. If I explain to a person working at Wal-Mart the logic of keeping the estate tax exclusion from becoming too high, including that "it siphons money from the tax system to the benefit of only the 1/2 of one percent of the richest people in the USA, it hurts the churches and other charities, because people who used to give money to charity rather than keep it to be taxed, now keep it and also that it inhibits (or at least slows) the formation of a permanent aristocracy", they respond with, "but a 'death tax' ain't right" or “I'm tired of high taxes and now they want to tax me twice”. For years I have said that there should be two concepts under law: One would be for Matrimony performed by the church where the Federal government and all states would recognize than union as legal for the purpose of all regulations and laws like Social Security, probate, health-care, etc. The other would be unions performed my the state/government which would carry all the same benefits and rights as the first, but would not have anything to do with religious organizations.

There have been many great thinkers in this world. One transformed a country that had lost all hope and turned it into a great power although he himself was small in stature. By the will of his imagination and his insight into the depths of the hearts and minds of man, he turned a society into his image of greatness. Luckily the USA had the industrial might to put an end to his dreams before they became a never ending nightmare for the world.

You are right. I meant to say slacks for men and slacks, dress or skirt/blouses for women. I guess non-jeans, non-shorts could also have covered it.

As a Steeler Fan and a Dog Lover, I wish both you and "Steelah" the best.

We have a wonderful organization where I live call DOGS & CATS FOREVER. :clap2:

As someone who has flown as a "non-Rev" for 40 years and had to conform to the dress code, I am also glad that they have eased up. For coach, regular shoes and no ragged clothing. First class still requires slacks for men and dresses or skirts/blouse for women.

They want you to believe that BuSh never did Coca Cola (with a straw), I guess!

The purpose of the E-mail being circulated is to get people angry at the "Trial Lawyers" who sue for damages and at the Government Regulations, which are meant to protect us, but that some see as infringing on our freedoms, and which are usually pushed through by Democrats. Here is my reply to an E-mail that is very clever and a political ploy: ******************************* E-MAILED STATED: TO ALL THE KIDS WHO WERE BORN IN THE 1930's 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's !! First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us. MY REPLY: And a lot of those kids have learning disabilities and attention deficit disorder * E-MAILED STATED: They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes. MY REPLY: But today, diabetes is rampant in grade-school children. * E-MAILED STATED: Then after that trauma, our baby cribs were covered with bright colored lead-based paints. MY REPLY: A lot of those kids are mentally damaged by the lead in paint and some of them are those "Lazy homeless bums" that we avoid on the street. * E-MAILED STATED: We had no child-proof lids on medicine bottles, doors, or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets, not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking. MY REPLY: And many of those kids are suffering from the consequences or are dead (while their parents suffer from the consequences and guilt for not protecting their children). * E-MAILED STATED: As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags. MY REPLY: Again, not all of us are around to talk about it. Many are either dead or brain damaged for life. Which is worse: death, brain damage or having to buckle up? Why does the author glorify injury to children? * E-MAILED STATED: Riding in the back of a pick-up truck on a warm day was always a special treat. MY REPLY: Unless there was an accident. Why do people love risking the lives of their children? Is it a parent's right to risk the safety of his children? I don't think so. * E-MAILED STATED: We drank Water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle. MY REPLY: But drinking from a garden hose is hard to do at the mall. And it is not as chic. Garden hose water is just as good, and sometimes better than bottled water, but people today like to wear their labels on the outside to show-off. Many designer clothes are made in the same Chinese factories as Wal-Mart bargains, but many people would rather be caught dead than not have Gucci's label showing. This complaint does not belong in this E-mail. It has nothing to do with lawyers or government regulation. As a aside: BuSh is now calling for more mine regulation, but it was BuSh's government agency that gutted safety regulations in 2002 that might have prevented the two recent West Virginia mine tragedies. * E-MAILED STATED: We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and NO ONE actually died from this. MY REPLY: Again, does not belong here because it has nothing to do with lawyers or government regulation. People don't share drinks today because they have enough money to burn. * E-MAILED STATED: We ate cupcakes, white bread, and real butter and drank soda pop with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because...WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!! MY REPLY: In the poor black neighborhoods, the majority of children are not overweight. The basketball parks are still full. It is the White kids who have computers and game consoles who are fat. And then there is BuSh's "No Child Left behind" program that forces schools to cancel recess and PT in order to tutor kids to pass statewide tests like the FCAT. Today's children are out of shape and they know nothing except how to pass the FCAT (if they even know that). * E-MAILED STATED: We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on. MY REPLY: See above & it has nothing to do with lawyers or government regulation either. * E-MAILED STATED: No one was able to reach us all day. And we were just fine. MY REPLY: Again, it has nothing to do with lawyers or government regulation plus: White people's unrealistic fear. We live in probably the safest times in the safest country in the history of the planet, but the news focuses on crime. When I listen to the local news, all I hear about is crime, crime and more crime. Every "Coming Next" starts with "Local man..." or "Local woman...", but our "Local TV stations are in West palm Beach about 60 miles away and they consider everything local from about 25 miles South of WPB to 50 miles South of Orlando as long as it is on the Eastern side of Florida. That is almost 200 miles of "Local". Check the FBI crime stats. * E-MAILED STATED: We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem. MY REPLY: Glorifying injury to children again. The guy that wrote this is sick. Besides, today's kids would not be caught dead in a soap-box car. They want motorized (and illegal) cars that can be souped up to do 50-60 miles an hour. Have you ever encountered one on a street while driving. They have no insurance, so if they hit you, you are stuck with the bill, but if you hit them, they are still considered a pedestrian and you are at fault. Same would go for a non-motorized go-cart. * E-MAILED STATED: We did not have playstations, intendos, X-boxes -- no video games at all -- no 99 channels on cable, no VCRs or DVD players or the movies that went into them, no Surround-Sound, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat-rooms -- we had FRIENDS and we went outside and found them. MY REPLY: Again, not the fault of lawyers or government regulation. Just lazy parents who have to spoil their children with materialistic goods in place of love because they are so busy keeping up with the Jones'. TV's and the PC's have told us that unless we have 3 cars, 5 TV's, multiple DVD's, etc, we are failures. So parents work two jobs to have things that they do not need and then have no time to play with these toys (because they are too tired after work). And the children demand more games and toys so that they can stay home and get fat. The amount of love a parent has for his child is not directly related to how much money that parent spends on the child. * E-MAILED STATED: We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and --there were no lawsuits from these accidents. MY REPLY: Glorifying injury to children again. The guy that wrote this is sick and thinks everything is the fault of lawyers. * E-MAILED STATED: We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever. MY REPLY: Does not belong here. Nothing to do with government regulation or lawyers, but why does the author like to see children doing things like that? * E-MAILED STATED: We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and although we were told it would happen, we did not put out very many eyes. MY REPLY: "We did not put out very many eyes?" HOW MANY IS TOO MANY EYES? The guy that wrote this is sick and maybe his eyes were put out, because he is obviously blind to the pain of children and their parents. * E-MAILED STATED: We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house, and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them! MY REPLY: Does not belong here. Nothing to do with government regulation or lawyers. * E-MAILED STATED: Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! MY REPLY: Does not belong here. Nothing to do with government regulation or lawyers. But it has to do with the parents who can't deal with their children's disappointment and have no time to teach their children how to play. My son had no time (and not much knowledge) to teach my grandson how to pay baseball and football, but with my coaching, he became the star of both his baseball team and football teams. He had talent, but because he didn't know how to play the sports, he didn't even want to play the games. My coaching and his latent talent made him an avid participant. * E-MAILED STATED: The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law! MY REPLY: Does not belong here. Nothing to do with government regulation or lawyers. Bad parenting. Many parents want stricter teachers until it's their child's turn to be disciplined. * E-MAILED STATED: This generation has produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors ever! MY REPLY: Does not belong here. I doubt either Bill Gates or Warren Buffet did anything dangerous while growing up, so what does it have to do with lawyers and regulations? * E-MAILED STATED: The past 50 years have been an explosion of innovation and new ideas. MY REPLY: See above: Does not belong here. I doubt either Bill Gates or Michael Dell did anything dangerous while growing up, so what does it have to do with lawyers and regulations? * E-MAILED STATED: We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL! MY REPLY: Nothing to do with government regulation or lawyers. * E-MAILED STATED: And YOU were one of them! MY REPLY: If you are alive and able to read this, then, yes you were one of them. But each person who was killed before these regulations were passed was also "one of them", though not able to read the E-mail and those who were brain damaged, were also "one of them" and both groups were also part of the reason why regulations changed. This author forgot to bring up that many of us wore infant's pajamas that were neither fire proof nor fire retardant. I wonder why? I guess that would have been harder to be cute about. And that is all the E-mail was: a way of being cute to show you that the Republican way of "let big business regulate themselves" and to "put trial lawyers out of business" is the correct way. The author misses some important points: #1. Many were maimed before these despicable laws were passed #2. Big business cares about money first, safety second and as long as government fines are only 5% to 10% of the profits, they don't change, but when lawyers win multi-million dollar lawsuits, the products get safer. #3. Big business uses trial lawyers too. Why are the trial lawyers (who represent grieving parents or widows) low-life scum, but the trial lawyers who work for large corporations depicted as knights in shining honor? #4. Aren't you glad that your child was saved from brain damage from lead paint ingestion and brain damage, injury or death by concussion because of seat belts and safety helmets? My son, when 6, spent two days in the hospital after being knocked off his bike unto his head and suffered from a concussion. It was not pretty. I wish that he had a helmet on that day. * E-MAILED STATED: CONGRATULATIONS!!! You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good. And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were. Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it?! MY REPLY: If you really want to run through the house with scissors, I think you need some counseling. The author was very clever in the way he mixed lawyers, government regulation and other things which annoy many people, but which have nothing to do with lawyers and government regulation. He gets the average reader all worked up and then puts the blame on lawyers and government regulation. Very clever. Very Republican. Not lies, just spin.

I read the story in the NY Times when it came out. If you want to pay the fee or if you subscribe to the NY Times, here is THE LINK.

I can't speak for Poodles, but I would bet my next meal, that she was trying to Open your eyes and mind, and only used a printout in BLACK AND WHITE to prove her point.

You are putting us on, right? The Prince is not the Prince of darkness, but there is not that much difference. Most people would be insulted if compared with Machiavelli or if their policies were called Machiavellian. If you are not putting us on, then would you agree that Karl Rove is a Machiavellian character?