BJean

I believe that DownIn has it right. People don't really understand the term socialism. They toss it around trying to insult the president, but it only serves to make them look irrational.

I'd like to know why Beth isn't being jumped on for not answering the question and not citing specifics. Hmmmmm? She quite often uses the term socialist in the same sentence with the word president. Someone tries to get her to say exactly why, what particular action on the part of the president, makes him a socialist. So far, nothing but conjecture and opinion.

Plain: "That's funny that you're equating being "politically correct" with lying." Is that what you do when you are trying to appear unbiased? Or don't you ever have the need to stay out of the critical limelight? Being politically correct does not mean lying. It means that they're being politically correct, you nut ball. In other words, they aren't saying anything that would be considered controversial. They keep their friggin' yap shut. They play nice. They try to stay above the smell of the crowd and the roar of the grease paint (to quote a politico). Man, I sure am getting tired of having to straighten you out. If you'll quit picking on me, I won't have to do that so much.

I just noticed that you two are at about the same place in your lapband journey. Good for both of you. Impressive weight losses. I've had a recent setback and it gives my morale a boost to see people who are doing so well. :crying:

Stocks drop on economy worries - Stocks & economy- msnbc.com Been there, saw that. What's your point? I don't really understand how that relates to what I've been lambasted for. But maybe, unlike Beth, the economy is not all about me.

The thing about economics is you typically don't know much about whether something's going to work until you try it and it does or it doesn't. It's not an exact science due to all the variables that are at stake here -- one of which is simple human nature. That seems to me to be the most level-headed thing I've seen you post, Beth.

trell, I'm not sure that public speaking and beauty pagents go hand in hand. Public speaking is difficult and an acquired art. Most of the focus in beauty pagents is beauty. Hence the fake hair, boobs, tans, etc. But the one who is crowned is expected to be able to not embarrass herself or her sponsors. Doesn't look like Prejean was up for that.

plain: "Unlike BJean, I think Prejean was right to state her opinion." I don't really think she was wrong to state her opinion. What I said is that if she wanted the crown, she needed to be politically correct. She should have known the game by now. She should have wanted the crown if she was going to go to all that trouble. She probably knew that a question like that was going to be asked and that it might be asked of her. She either thought about it and decided that stating her opinion was more important than the crown, or she was just plain dumb. I don't think you all really read my posts. I think you probably scan them and come up with what you think I mean. I can't say as I blame you. I tend to do that with long posts too - either that or I ignore them altogether. Or were you just trying, once again, to get me to sound off plain? I know how much you enjoy reading my pearls of wisdom. :crying:

gadget: "Knock yourself out." There have been times when you only used part of what I said to make it look like I said it differently. You did it more than once with the same quote. All of the following posts have contained words that were incorrect or designed to characterize my post in a way that suits you and it wasn't fair. 3440 horrible evil bush - as if that is something I said. 3448 you never responded to the question about your professionally presented, comprehensive sex ed classes. 3442 didn't play fair 3435 quoted me out of context, obviously intentionally to make your point 3470 more of the same You do it all the time to anyone who doesn't share your views. You exaggerate to make your points. You characterize people's posts to make them sound much worse than they are. You just don't play very fair most of the time. If you're feeling benevolent, you can be very kind. If the posts are going your way, you are a very nice person. I don't know why you have to drag things down to that level, but after such a long time of sharing this thread with you, and other threads, I guess I just got a little sick of it. Especially when we were talking about trying to come up with positive ideas about sex education in public schools that might really make a difference and you post some gawd-awful crap that has no relevance but that makes sex ed look bad. But I'll get over it. I have before and so have you.

Then I have faith that you will make it happen!

DownIn you're like a breath of fresh air!!! You do my heart good.

I'll bet that more than anything your mom wishes she had her arms around you and you could lay your head on her shoulder and cry together. There's something about a mother and her daughter; mom's empathize and want to protect their daughters when it comes to something this important and this physical. It's frustrating that there's not a darned thing that we can do to change what happened to our daughters. I am glad that you're getting to go be with them soon. Maybe that will be about the right time for you to be ready to talk about it with them. My daughter has gone through so many tests to find out what went wrong. She lost her baby, Jake, when she was nearly ready to go into labor. The next one that she lost was when she was about 3.5 months along. They believe now that she has some kind of deficiency in being able to metabolize folic acid. Even that was not proven without a doubt. It is so freaking frustrating to not know when something like this happens. If we had all the answers (knowledge) it would be easier to understand and then process. You are such a beautiful and loving mother. It would be great if at some point in time you are able to conceive and carry another child. I will tell you though, that my daughter has become very happy with her one little girl and she is satisfied that she has a perfect family, the one that she was meant to have. I wish that kind of peace for you, whatever happens in the future.

you're so funny gadget. ok so no, in that particular instance maybe you didn't. Do I have to go find them all to prove it to you? I'm pretty sure you would rather that I not do that.

Rodriquez, sometimes it is good therapy to post on forums. Do what makes you feel best. It just might be a worthwhile diversion. Especially if you feel that you have understand friends here.

Amen DownIn!!!

Beth, do you really think this is about "robbing Peter to pay Paul"? If that is your assessment, I doubt that you and I have anything to talk about regarding the economy. I must say though that I not so secretly enjoy the fact that I'm entertaining for you. I certainly try. Although I realize that most of the time when I am trying to be humorous, people just think I'm being mean. I obviously don't have your gift. There have been many talk shows and discussion groups televised where prominent economists have backed up the president's plan of action. They have said over and over that the steps he has taken have been necessary. And they have also said, on many shows, that the leading economists all agree on the necessity of taking the action that the president has. If you haven't heard it, it sure isn't my fault that you haven't been listening to the same broadcasts. I have also seen shows where the occasional economist has said that there may have been better ways to bring us out of the recession. None of them has ever come up with a viable plan. Or any alternative, for that matter. Now I know we were talking about taxes in the beginning, but the president's approach and his plans all involve taxes and the recession is a big part of that. I was speaking to the recession when I said what you consider to be wrong about economists having backed the president's plan to get the country back on sound footing. But as far as I am concerned, from everything I have gleaned from news sources, including a couple of newspapers, what I stated is fact. If you have factual data that suggests otherwise, then I think it is incumbent on you to prove me wrong. Wouldn't that be a lot more productive than you whining about what I do?

LOL yeah, and a lousy governor at that luluc. No one in his right mind ever predicted that George W. would be able to win an election of this kind. Not even his mother, or so they say. Of course there has always been a lot of questions about whether he really won the election or if it was stolen.

I don't know what to say. I am so very, very sorry. I have been through similar things twice with my daughter and I know how awful it is. It is hard to console someone who has gone through it, the pain is so raw. I hope that if you want to, you and your husband will be able to work on increasing the size of your family again sometime in the future. My heart goes out to you.

I believe that anytime any kind of sex ed or video on menstruation or male puberty in public school has always been an optional thing that parents are able to decide whether to involve their children or not.

rodriguez, you okay?

I agree that you can show people respect even if you don't agree with everything they do. I also have trouble believing that some people aren't just paying lip service because it sounds politically correct, but that they have pretty deep-seated bigotry at their core.

Sorry about your head rodriguez. You're young. Maybe when you're my age, you'll get like me and flat out enjoy this kind of discussion instead of finding it painful. I used to hate debate of this kind. I've seen too many injustices and witnessed too much intolerance. And I've seen ignorance cause so much trouble in the world. So, like you, I'm a big proponent of education and knowledge. Fear of the unknown causes a lot of grief for people. If a person is smart and well-educated, they can read a book and put it in the proper context. If people are uninformed and ignorant, they may not be able to figure it out and might take the book at face value only. That's why people at one time, hopefully in the past, had book burnings. And why some people can't look at a painting and understand why the artist may have chosen to paint something that they find objectionable. An in your one sentence you said it better, knowledge is power.

Very good point rodriguez! In fact, it wasn't until I was preggers with my dd that I read up on and became informed about all the things that could go wrong. Both environmentally and genetically. Also, I never learned until after I was married that women have all the eggs that they're ever going to have and that a lot of our own behavior can cause problems with producing a healthy egg. Like using drugs and alcohol. I never knew what all the side effects could be from birth control pills or those heavy duty patches or IUDs. These are all things that would help women when they consider whether to have sex and whether to have children. And some of those decisions come when girls are teenagers. Another aside, just to clarify: not using a condom is not the same risk factor as not using a condom properly. And not using a condom is not figured into the stats for the percentage of condom failure. If a condom didn't enter the picture, how could it fail?

gadget: "My objection is to subjects and/or methods that encourage sexual activity. "That being said, presumably there are a lot of topics that are educational but many would say are either out-of-line or not the appropriate venue for schools. "Would you agree that schools should be required to give gun training courses? After all, it's educational, and suppose they don't learn this information at home? Where are they going to get the correct information? "What about requiring schools to give information about hair coloring? Or torture methods? Or embalming processes? Or plumbing repair? "Yes, I am deliberately being random with the above examples. The point is, there is potentially an educational aspect to everything we discuss in life. Yet there are also both proper and improper venues for which these topics should be discussed and for which they should be required." BJean: Sorry gadget if I thought you might be a little disengenous about your claim of supporting comprehensive sex education classes in public schools. I probably was reading way too much between the lines in your posts. It was not my intention to make you look any different than you really are. Referring to a different post, gadget said: " No idea at all what that means. " BJean: Oh sorry, I'll explain. You consistently put your own characterization on my posts. You even go so far as to claim that I said something that in fact, I did not say. And that has been true in several instances during this line of discussion. So, frankly it made me think of someone who is, well, showing their ass to people. (As opposed to their good side.) If I did the same thing to you, then I guess I've bared mine ass well.

Btw Beth, not that you deserve a reponse from me, but for the record, when I post things here they are my opinion. They are what I believe to be factual, although I do not print a disclaimer at the bottom of each post saying that if something I've said is not factual, you can shoot me. Um kay? :crying: