Guard Dog

Enoch is correct. In Florida for example a three year difference of age will not lead to statutory rape so long as a) the act was consensual b) One of the parties was at least 16. However the age of consent by law remains 18 so go figure. The reason that child porn is so heinous is that the child in the photo is being exploited because they can not consent. I did some looking and in Florida any one who knowingly receives or transmits child porn is looking at a class C felony and we have sentencing guidelines here and class Cs will get you 36 months in State Prison plus a truckload of fines and registration as a sexual predator. FL is harsher than most states. Of course it is on the state to prove the "knowingly transmitted or received" part. On the larger issue I'd agree that compelling him to reveal a password should certainly be DOA in any court as a 5th amend violation. Furthermore, I would challenge the validity of the search as unreasonable under the 4th amendment based on the following: What was the agent looking for? Terrorist info? State secrets? The law requires the searching authority to look for just what they are charged to look for. They do not get to fish around and act on whatever they find. Additionally, is the DHLS allowed to search the data on the computer of just the physical device itself? I really suspect it would be the latter. In either of those cases the whole thing should be dropped as an illegal search. If I am interpreting correctly. I am not a lawyer but I believe that is correct reasoning.

Yeah I think that is the most likely place. They need help at middle linebacker and he would make an excellent short term solution. BTW Kelverin, it's about time to fire up the NFL 2008 thread.

Panthers get a BIG 4-2 win against the Caps. Overchkin gets no points. I was pissed when Luongo was traded but Vokoun makes it the pain go away. Next up is tonight at Carolina. Where Panthers go to die. But 2 points tonight will put the cats in 1st place (Thank You Atlanta!). GO PANTHERS

= Message to the voters: *Haha* *nee-ner* *nee-ner* Here i actually agree on one thing that Mike Gravel said: "By negating the people a candidate that speaks for them, the government commits the worst political sin to its people, they create a generation a cynics." I've said all along Hillary will not go down gracefully. If the election results went against her she would beg, bribe, or threaten the supers to her side. If that fails she will probably sue the DNC to get the Michigan and Florida delegates seated because that would be enough. Her lodestone is the personal gratification in the power of the Presidency. If you listen to her on health care it should scare the bejesus out of any red blooded freedom loving American.

You really would not want JQA back. He was a pretty ineffective caretaker president. Besides being John Adams son he wan't known for much. His best accomplishments came after he left office.

Just a few corrections, With JFK they did not tell the whole story. The island he led his men to was held by the Japanese and he had to keep them hidden for 3 days before rescue. Badass! Andrew Jackson was call "Old Hickory" because he was inflexible in mind and opinion. Once he made up his mind what he was going to do you could just go to hell if you did'nt like it. Teddy Roosevelt was the greatest President this county has ever had and is in my opinion the quintessential American. I wish we had him today.

The Marlins are getting a new stadium:Marlins Stadium Agreement Reached They are putting it on the location of the old Orange Bowl. There is a reason why the Orange Bowl game, the Dolphins, and the U of M all left that place, the location sucked. It's six blocks west of I-95 and Downtown Miami. There is one exit off I-95 to reach it. It's about eight blocks (1 mile or so) south of the Dolphin Expressway and the entrance ramp from 7th Ave (that runs by the OB) is west bound only. The area is dirty, run down and so high in crime that it is often featured on the A&E series "The First 48". Traffic will be a nightmare beyond imagining and there is a fair chance you will be robbed and killed for your trouble anyway. Miami can have them. Besides I've had more fun and spent less money going to Jupiter Hammerheads Class A games anyway.

No, no no. Did you read anything I said?

Election news of small import: Romney Endorses McCain. He should have done that last week. Why delay the enevitable. Election new of big import:Democratic Nomination For Sale Election News of BIGGEST import:Dems Fear Superdelegates Could Reverse Election Results I must admit I am salivating over that last one. I would love Love LOVE to see Obama win the elected delegates and have Hillary buy, beg, or threaten enough supers to reverse the vote and grant her the nomination. That would set a fire in the tinder for real and give us dicsussion fodder for YEARS to come.

I did:Don Black It's no joke, that's him. Thats credible enough for me. BTW, I forwarded that on to some other people I know who are still involved in politics. On quick aside, you continue to quote the National Review as some kind of authoritative voice in conservative thinking. It really is not though. Journalisticly speaking it lumped in with News Max, World Net Daily, Mother Jones, Salon.com, and others as a politically slanted fish wrap/blog passing itself off as a news source. Real news with a conservative slant can be had from Forbes, Washington Times, WSJ (those are what I read) and I've heard Townhall.com, capitolhillblue.com and American Spectator are pretty good. Anyway, in the sources I read RP never comes up since he is not taken seriously. And true, he does have money and no votes so what does that tell you? The Repubs won't have him. He is not one of them. He sure is heck is not one of the Libs either. Thats really what I'm getting at here. I'm trying to convince you and everyone else that you can not take an extreme example of any group and use them to paint the entire group. Its a self defeating argument in any case because the left certainly has no lack of kooks and fools that can be trotted out for the same treatment. In summation, you are right, he is an ass. I am right, he is an aberration not representative of the group. Agreed? No but I've been out of politics for some time and the political boards I frequent would probably ban one of them the moment they popped up. After reading about him I'd be afraid if one of them bit you you would turn into one.

Just so long as I get to be Spock!

No argument there, that is not libertarian at all. But a bill to protect another bill from judicial scrutiny is like saying "ain't" is a word. Such a bill would be open to overturn itself, which leads to overturn of the fist bill. I think you might have misremembered that second one. But that

Pop, you started out good today and actually had me agreeing with something you posted, which is a big change for me. But you just shot off high and left of the target with this one. First of all Ron Paul is neither conservative nor republican despite his party affiliation. And judging by the amount of support he has gotten from rank and file Republicans I would think that would be self evident. He does appeal to the kook fringe and I assure you EVERY political faction in America (and everywhere else) has them and they never make common cause with the mainstream in any school of politcal thought. To paint repubs and libertarians with a broad brush because a handful of nuts exist within those two parties is at best disengenous, and worst out right B.S. By the same logic i could claim the democrats are all communists simply because the US Communist Party has endorsed the democrat candidate for president in the last 2 elections. It is true but it does not mean the dems are ALL communists. See what I'm getting at here? You are correct about one thing, the average libertarian party member shudders at the thought of RP attempting another presidential run with the LP because you are right, he does not represent the LP line. You posted earlier that libertrians run for govenment office in order to use the position to "destroy" government. That is completely inaccurate. The Libertairan ideal is to keep government reigned in to the scope of it's power as defined by law. Be it the US Constitution, the Constitutuon of a state, city charter, whatever. Here is an example. I ran for the Florida State House as a Libertarian. One of my campaign platforms was to propose and pass a law which made it illegal for the state to sanction governing bodies other than those of incorporated townships, municpalities, or counties. We have homeowners assosciations down here and not just in jointly owned properties such as condos or townhomes but single family homes. That state sanction gives associations the power to "tax" community residents and it allows them a terrible amount of power over residents including the power to lein homes. At the same time it protected the assosciations from lawsuits brought by residents for bad business practice, etc. I argued and still believe that State sanction is a violation of Article 2 sections 3-4 of the 1968 State Constitution. So I wanted to remove an oppressive local government by forcing the state government to behave within the constraints of it constitution. That is the essence of what modern libertarian thought is all about. It is not all kooks who think 9-11 was an inside job. Or that we must close all foreign bases and abrogate all treaties and build a wall around America. We understand that some government regulation of buisness is right and necassary and the constitution allows for that very thing. BTW, in 1911 the Republicans were led by Teddy Roosevelt and were quite liberal compared to the much more conservative democrats.

That may have been true for the last 20 years or so but it is absolutley trending away from that. For example, ballot intiatives banning same sex marriage and abortion have been soundly defeated in six southern and republican dominated states (FL, AR, AL, TX, GA, NC all old confederate states) in the last 4 election cycles. The current crop fo GOPers including the President have been tried and true on social conservatisim since the 2002 elections and have utterly abandoned economic conservatisim with the exception of tax cuts. And you will note that they are so out of favor with rank and file republicans that most stayed home in 2006 and allowed the dems to sweep into congress. The social conservatives are becoming a small albeit vocal minority without the votes to actually influence an election. It is economic conservatisim that motivates republican voters. That is why the repubs are so out of favor with their base. The average american conservative thinker does not give a damn who marries who but gets very agitated when the federal govenment begins to suffocate the economy with taxes and regulation or tries to commit economic suicide by cutting taxes without fiscal discipline. McCain has a very conservative voting record on most social issues including favoring banning PBA, flag burning, and gay marriage. But he is also a Rockafeller-esqe "government is here to help you" type. THAT is why he is out of favor with the base. And that is why those who will vote for him (like me) will do so only because the alternative is so much worse.

AMEN. Think abouth this, since 1980 there has been either a Bush or a Clinton running for President. 28 f'ing years with either a Bush or Clinton in power. Most of the posters on this board are younger than that. Enough is enough.

Not so fast. McCain is not poular in the Southern states and pro-business democrats can do well there. Contrary to what many people think (especially non-Ameicans I'm noticing) the south is not made up of "gun-totin, confederate flag wavin, beer-swillin, trailer dwellin, nascar lovin rednecks". The old confederate states have as a group the most rapidly growing poulation, the largest middle class by percentage of population, the lowest state tax rates, the largest by percentage contribution to the US GDP, and the lowest unemployment rates. It would be inaccurate to make statements like "The white republican will win the south because he's white" (not saying that is what you said Mes). LIBERAL candidates will do poorly in the south because by and large high tax big government policies are not popular here. The vast majority of voters no longer care what race you are, or what gender you are. The 1960s are over.

I did not disagree with his point about winner-take-all elections, just that third paty candidates can't win on a local level. It is fairly common for third party and indepedant candidates to win majority vote elections in state houses, and even state executive level offices such as Attorney General (in states where such are elected positions). It is extremely uncommon for them to win nationally because of the points I made and because he is right about our election system. I think it's safe to say I'm something of an expert when it comes to third party politics.

Well, the NFL season is over and we are all sad. The NHL holds my interest a little so long at the Panthers are playing. But today Major League Baseball (the sport we sort of follow between football seasons) begins it's spring training. Any thoughts of how YOUR team will do this year? Who is your team for that matter? Is base ball still relevant in the US and the world? Will the cloud of performance drug abuse affect the season? This year is the 100th year since the Cubs last won a championship, will the drought end? Discuss! http://mlb.mlb.com/spring_training/y2008/index.jsp?c_id=mlb

Pop you win this thread. Everything you said was completely correct except one thing: I would interject that third parties work ONLY at the State and Local levels. On a national stage they have no voice. There are two big reasons why third parties fail nationally: 1) As a rule they appeal only to single issue voters. That is voters who only care about one issue, environment, taxes, drug legalization, whatever, and nothing else. You cannot build a coalition around such people since there is no unity of purpose. 2)Since they are small, not well funded, and therefore advertise poorly if at all, most average people know nothing about them and have little inclination to learn. Now on a state and local level it requires much less effort (meaning money) to reach out to voters since there are fewer of them and chances are the name recognition will be greater for the candidates. Also some parties platforms (particularly the Libertarian Party) apply better to local issues than national ones. That is why there are over 400 Libertarians holding office in State and Local positions through out the country but not one in any national office like Congress.

The pigs are fueled and moving onto the landing strip! BTW, did anyone see Terry McAuliff (a Clinton operative) discussing Obama being Hillarys running mate on CBS News Sunday? How arrogant is that? Obama is winning. Mark my words, this will get seriously ugly. Hillary will not take losing gracefully. Watch for an attempt to peel off the super delegates despite election results.

2 Canadiens Players Arrested WTF? Does Montreal not pay their players enough?

More info on Zedniks injury. It was even worse than is sounded. Scary stuff. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/hock...ex.html?cnn=yes

You are right about clark now that I think of it, the Clintons own him. And now that I think about it, Richardson would be a wasted choice because McCain is going to win his home state. Vislak would be an olive branch to the center of the party that has consistently voted against Obama plus that would put Dean on his side in truth as well as name. Daschle would be a solid choice except he does not bring any electoral votes with him. Obama will not win South Dakota. Ditto for Sebelius, Obama will not win in Kansas. Plus I doubt he is bold enough to pick a woman as VP, even if she would be a solid candiate. What about Max Cleland?

I seriously doubt it will be Edwards. Obamas whole message is "change" and trotting out a tired and continual candidate like Edwards only undermines that. Elections are like chess games, you have to think tactics. He has lost to Hillary in both the northeast and southwest so his weaknesses are there. He will choose a running mate from one of those two areas. He is a Senator so his running mate will probably not be (A senator-senator combo has not won in over 100 years) so we are down to a US Rep, Governor, or political icon not in office. He will not concern himself with ideology since this is a "democrat year" so he will feel comfortable choosing another liberal. Since he is young he will probably take someone older with real stage presence. My guesses are: Bill Richardson, Wesley Clark, Tom Vislak, or possibly Michael Bloomberg (that would be a bold choice).

This was just awful. I was listening to this game on the radio, really sacry stuff. At least Zednik will be alright. Hockey can be a really f-----g danerous sport. Zednik Stable after Freak Injury