Guard Dog

Did you? Through most of my time at FAU I was notorious for showing up only on test nights.

Sadly true. There is little wisdom to be found in the halls of power between Baltimore and Arlington.

Yessssss! Packer win! Way to go baby! Not that I give a hoot about the Pack but it makes me very, very happy that Dog-Killer and the Eagles lost.

After 9-11 a considerable number of Washington liberals spent a lot of days naval-gazing in wonder as to why the jihadists hated America. They wanted to understand why they are so angry. Isn't it a wonder they have never spared a moment to wonder why the American people are angry? Why do conservative talk show hosts resonate so well with so many? I mean we're are talking about tens of millions of people. Those talk shows would not exist let alone be so fabulously succesful without that audience. Instead of lamenting how nasty the politcal dialogue has become why does no one ever ask why it has come to be like this? Perhaps the Washington "ruling class" should be wondering if they are antagonizing the people into anger rather than disparaging the folks who are saying aloud what most people seem to be thinking. Apparently they did not learn the lesson of the 2010 election. Hopefully they will get a refresher in 2012. Now here I go posting about politics in a thread about an instance that has nothing what so ever to do with poitics except that the victims were at a political function. But I do think Greasy is right about one thing, the knee-jerk government reaction on an incident like this is to go ape**** and crack down on everything in sight. That would be the worst thing they could do in a tense political climate.

Great opinion piece from he Telegraph on paople trying to maske poitcal hay out of a tragedy http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tobyharn...na/#dsq-content

And the winners are.... Seahawks & Jets? WTF?

Don't fight it Krook, you've got the "kavorka"! Kudos to anyone who gets that reference!

Well, if we must get into politics about this (since this tragedy was NOT politically motivated in ANY way) no, there is NOTHING you can do about the rough political discourse in the country today. You do not strip the rights of and silence millions of Americans because to the actions of a lone nutjob in Arizona who never had a politcal position to begin with. You WILL be courting a civil war then. What disgusts me the most was MSNBC and CNN reporting this guy as a disillusioned military vet. All false but actual facts have never mattered to those two networks. Especially since it plays into the current liberal groupthink that military vets are a bunch of dangerous rabid dogs that are particulary contemptable because they tend to vote republican by and large. Personally I think politics stopped the moment this jackass picked up his gun. It does not matter what politcal party any of those people belonged to, thye were good, descent people who did not deserve what happened to them.

Absolutely horrifying. My thoughts and prayers are with her and the others and the family of judge Roll and the poor nine year old girl. Apparently the shooter was a real nut job. He believed the government was trying to use mind control on him. He tried to enlist in the army and was rejected for psyc reasons. He also had a number of arrests with a few convitions so I wonder how the heck he got a gun? Probably stolen. http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/01/08/shoot...-youtube-video/

This is just plain wrong

Too early for the annual baseball thread but I've been ranting on boards all day about the Rays trading Matt Garza to the Cubs for a slice of deep dish pizza and a small grape soda. Actually they did not even get that much back. What the hell are you THINKING Andrew Friedman?

That does it! http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2011/01/04/a...w-kind-of-high/ I will only look at houses in Virginia now!

I wish Law and Order had been given one more season, I really liked BSG but could never get into Caprica, the last Sci-fi show I thought was any good was DS9 but Voyager & Enterprise did have their moments. The rest of the crap on SyFy is just garbage. I only follow two shows regularly and those are Southland (glad to see if found a home on TNT) and The Dog Whisperer on NGC. Other than that I only watch sports, mainly just football, baseball or hockey, but only if the Preds are playing.

Totally agree with this post. Especially that last part. Fortunately NetFlix has a big collection of MST3K that can be viewed on line.

Very cool story! да поможет вам Бог

Thank you all for the encouraging words. The job will be managerial, in short the responsibilities include reviewing the design plans of people like me, and submitting the package for FCC (or FAA with regard to physical tower construction) approval, and dealing with each agency ias the need arises in day to day operations. Basicly I'd be one of the people I always complain does not know their head from their...well, you get the idea. The dogs are my biggest concern. I have nine now ( a few of the elderly ones have passed away recently) and the are all fairly old and large so an apartment is not really a consideration. Apparently the "housing crisis" did not hit the DC metro area, I've gotten sticker shock looking on realtor.com for houses with land. I'd like to keep my place not but it has a pretty hefty mortgage, I don't think I could handle two of them. The other thing is I've got a side business going that i starting to do pretty well and I really enjoy it. I could take it with me easily enough but I'd need a house that could accomedate it, which means privacy, a little land and no pesky zoning questions. Enoch, how bad would the commute be from Pax River to Wheaton/Aspen Hill? That where the office is. I know Pax River a little bit, around the Navy Base at least, there are some nice rual areas out that way.

I recieved an unsolicited job offer yesterdy It's with the same comapny I've been with for a year and a half now, but it is a big step up. Instead of designing radio networks and tower mounted assemblies in the mid-south region this would be a national job dealing with FCC compliance and spectrum planning for the whole comapny. It's a pretty big raise too. There is just oe problem, and it is a big problem for me, the job is in Washington DC. Yep. Mordor-on-the-Potomac. I'd have to sell my house and move. I'm not sure I want to do that. They agreed to give me some time to think it over. It's going to be a long weekend.

I will now ask a very difficult question that you right wing nuts will struggle with (apparently), but here goes: why does he break into your house and steal your stuff? Remove the incentive and he won't. Amazing, isn't it? The truth is mkreku, there are some people who simply do not or will not conform to civilized society. Stealing is easier than working with higher reward and if there is risk to it then that olnly adds to the appeal. Like it or not there are really some evil people out there. I don't think we should be killing them but I do believe it is reasonable to warehouse them in prisions somewhere they can not harm innocent people. On another note I heard somone suggest that judges who parole prisioners should be imprisioned with them if they re-offend. Not going to happen obviously but it is a nice thought.

Let's see, State Controlled News/Media: Check History of mistreating non-slavic/minority ethnicities: Check Planned Economy: Check History of Human rights abuses: Check Anti-Semetic leadership: Check Majority of land owned by the state: Check Yep, sounds like your kind of place LoF In all seriousness, if the voters in Belarus want Lukashenko, they can have him. The US does, unfortunately, have a history of denouncing (and even overturning or meddling in) elections that do not turn out the way the administration of the day likes. Vietnam & Chilie come to mind right off the top. James Monroe was a wise man, if only we'd listened. On topic I vaugely remember talk on the BBC radio news of unifiying Belarus & Russia back when Putin was in charge (heh, as if he still isn't). I wonder whatever happened with that.

Well, I do like Christmas. Amazon has taken care of the gift giving for me. I mean how cool is it to buy everything on one site and have it sent directly to the recipient gift wrapped with a card? I don't have much in the way of family these days. My ex-wife and I have not spoken in years, both of my parents have passed away over the past year. My brother and his family are on the other side of the country and while we speak three or four times a month, I don't forsee any visits anytime soon. I don't keep close friends, just the occasional girlfriend and the old drunks down at the VFW. But that dosen't bother me much. I have a bunch of elderly dogs living with me and I like making treats and stuff for them for christmas. I'll probably spend tomorrow morning drinking coffee on the porch reading a book and watching the dogs do their thing. It's raining now and it's supposed to snow tomorrow, I hope it does. I'm totally at peace with where I am in life now. I wish some things had turned out differently but I've done well with what I had. I'm going to the Toys for Tots party tonight. That is the only military thing I'm still involved in (unless you count American Legion & VFW) If you give at the silver level (more than $5k per year) you get an invite. The lady I'm taking has never been to one before so it should be fun.

I am obliged to be consistent here. As much as I respect the value of life, I believe everyone should be free to live it with the maximum amount of liberty and autonomy. That includes ending it in a manner of their choosing. So no it should not be illegal. Krez is right about the socialisim bit though. Socialisim takes choice away from people, the socialist response to euthenasia would be to either ban it all together or do it even aginst someone's will. As for suicide being illegal, how the heck does one prosecute that particular crime? Assuming it was unassisted and succesful. Speaking of which, how must it feel if you try and fail? Not only do you have all of your original problems, you've just discovered something else you suck at.

GD, the new Commandant is a pilot so there is hope for women to some day lead the Marine Corps. Also, I'm a bit saddened that the Marines were the branch most opposed to the repeal. Yup, sure enough. Gen James Amos was a winger (slang for Marine Air Wing) his whole career. I did not know that. Apparently he is the first. I guess they have done away with the infantry service prerequisite at some point. Most of my time was under "Big" Al Gray. He was a grunt at heart, but one of the most popular commandants. I was a winger myself for my whole tour and I hated having to do the "grunt bull s**t" as we called it. But it was necassary. We had a saying back then: Every Marine Is A Rifleman First. I guess we can have a female commandant. I know there are at least two or three female general officers. As for his resistance to removing DADT, there is going to be some of that, but over time it will fade away. Five or ten years from now no one will remember that there was once a ban on gays.

One intersting story though. The women often posted higher aggregate rifle range scores than the men did in Boot Camp. I always wondered why until a former shooting instructor from the MCRD in San Diego explained it to me. Most men by the time they joined (between ages 17-21 typically) had had some exposure to shooting firearms. The M-16A2 (no longer in use but that was what we had at the time) does not shoot like "your daddys huntin' rifle) as my Drill Instrctor used to say. So the male recruits had to unlearn some bad habits to become proficient with the M-16. The women by and large had never fired a rifle before so they learned how to do it right the first time with no bad habits to break. The guy who got the highest range score in my boot camp platoon had lived in Boston his whole life and had never shot a rifle before enlisting. Interesting stuff.

I would never agree to allowing women to serve in the infantry or armor. Physically they just cannot do it. Yes some can, 98% can not. I had a discussion with a femal Marine i served with about that. She was insistent that a woman could fight as well as a man. I told her I'd agree if just one time she could finish a run. In the Marines the whole unit does PT together 4 days a week. Usually it's the daily dozen exercises (push ups, mountain climbers, bend & thrust, etc) followed by a 3-4 mile run in formation. Behind the formation there is a safety vehicle (pick up truck, hummer, whatever) with a corpsman and some other stuff in it. Well, there were eight women in my unit and not one of them, not a single one, ever finished a run in the formation. Every one, every time, they fell out and finished the run riding in the back of the truck. In the marines, every man had to pass the combat PFT every year, that included a six mile run in full uniform & 782 gear (pack, flack jacket, web gear, rifle, & magazines) rope climb in full uniform, and 100 yrd firemans carry in full gear with the "wounded man" in full gear. This is along with the rgular PFT everyone takes (Women are exempt from the Combat PFT). I have never met a female Marine who COULD do that. Now don't get me wrong, they can serve and excell in every other capacity including tactical command and fighter pilots, but not as infantry. That is one glass ceiling that should not be shattered. And yes, I know that means there will never be a female Commandant of the Marine Corps since infantry service is prerequisite.

Yep, and Yep.