Guard Dog

Took another day off work (does it show I'm starting to hate my job?). I finally installed the new thermostat in my spa. It's been sitting in it's box in the kitchen for 6 months. I finally got around to it. I'm filling it up now.

While I certainly do not rule out the possibility of alien life, I seriously doubt the have been paying us much if any attention. Ans I certainly do nor believe we have a crashed spacecraft in any secret bases in the desert. To back that uo I would simply point out that if there were such a thing: 1) Short of killing everyone involved there is no way to keep it secret. Something like that will get out. (I use the same argument on those who claim the Apollo moon landings were faked) 2) Evidently they do not have their best and brightest working on it because there have been no "giant leaps" in the progress of science and technology. Every development or advancement for th last 100 or more years has been predicated on the one before, there have been no sudden depatures on the path of progress to suggest knowledge has been gleaned from an alien source.

To speak of only situations where criminal intent is absent is to artificially limit the scope. To represent the population, it would need to include situations where someone wasn't intending to commit a crime and situations where crimes where intended but not carried out. Because you are a single person. Your liklihood of playing tennis is binary. You either play it (1) or you don't (0). There's no likliehoods involved because it's either 100% or 0%. If we get a 100 people like you who don't like to play tennis, give them a tennis racket, and if some of those people turn around play tennis with it, and if the number of people is significant, we can abstract that to the population to say "people, who don't like tennis, if they have access to a tennis racket, are more likely to turn around and play tennis." But, you're again going back to talking about intent (if I don't like tennis). How much of gun crime is domestic? How much of it is relatively spontaneous? Your notion of intent flies straight out the window in crimes of passion. These typically fall back to the weapon most available to them. The hands. But, if those aren't available (the victime is fleeing), the available weapon capable of the crime would be? So where I went wrong here was to try and apply linear reasoning to a scenario to complex for it.

You'll like this. I totally disagree with your first assertion because I totally agree with your second.

I'm trying to debunk the notion the access alone absent any other criminal intent makes gun use in a crime more likely. What I was getting at was if the majority of guns are legally owned by people with no criminal intent, and there was a clear link between access to guns and gun violence does it stand to reason that a greater percentage of gun violence would be comitted with legally owned weapons? I know that was not what you said but you refrenced a study to that point and I've heard the argument thrown around here before. Put another way, if I don't like tennis, having a racket in the closet will not make me more likely to play.

Tale, your expertise on psychology far outweighs mine (obviously) but it just seems unreasonable to me that simply having a gun makes you more likely to use it. To back me up on this I'd point out that in the US around 80% of gun crime is committed with illegally obtained weapons. If we can take for granted that there are far more guns legally owned than illegally owned that statistic undermines the premise of the study.

Very well stated Azarkon. And a perfect argument for why Iraq should have been broken up into ethnically homogeneous and autonomous states. And a very good explanation as to why it was not done. One of the failings the US has shown over it's history s that we fail to take a long term view of geopolitics/economics. I guess our short election cycles discourage leaders from doing what is best in the long term and instead rely on short term victories hoping to translate them into electoral successes.

Of course! The real blame for the problem must lie with an inanimate object. You know, firearms have been in the western world since the late 15th Century and they have never been harder to come by than they are right now. This phenomenon of children killing their classmates just sprung up about 15 years ago so it is a tad illogical to claim guns are part of the cause since they have been there all along. I think is it MUCH more important to concentrate on the why and forget the how because as someone else correctly pointed out, if it was not a gun he used, it would have been something else.

Ummmm, that is not quite what I said or where I was going with that.... Actually I disagree with you here. The "surge" has militarily suppressed a lot of the insurgency so I would argue it is because of the expanded US presence that sectarian violence has dropped.

Going OT here for a moment. What Sand said here perfectly encapsulates the entire debate on stem cell research (which is NOT illegal and IS happening without bilking taxpayers for it) and abortion between religious and secular viewpoints. My Christian belief tells me that all human life has a divine spark (or soul if you will) and therefore has value and that creating a human life for the sole purpose of destroying it is morally wrong. The same with abortion. I can understand in the cases of rape, incest, severe birth defects, or the health of the mother abortion is an appropriate choice. But when it is done for the convenience of someone to cover their irresponsibility, that is morally reprehensible to me. Now if you take Sands view that there is no spark or soul, and human life does not have some great value, then why not destroy it to further the interests of other humans. Now despite how I feel personally about such things, what I think about the legality of such things I have made clear on these boards many times. And I think most of you agree with my conclusions if not the logic I used to come to them. Back OT. I agree with Wals that one of the big problems with Iraqi unity is that the nation of Iraq is an artificial construct itself and the individula ethnic communities do not owe it any alligence. There is no strong national identity. This is the point where I break out the argument that is they should have been broken up into it's three original pre WWI territories. But you have all heard it before. Heck I could cut and paste it from a dozen past threads but it would just give everyone deja vu.

Thank you Sand. I thought I had missed something here.

Gaider was a Travel Lodge manager?

Everybody, let's jump in the time machine with Sand! Seriously, if all the Americans left Iraq right now, it wouldn't be Iraqis determine the fate of Iraq. Yup, totally agree. Whatever the reasons for the war, right or wrong, they make exactky zero difference now. The choice is success or failure. I vote or success. If we abandon Iraq now not only will everone who died there died in vain, I guarantee we will be back there in another war (probably after another 9-11 type attack) within 10 years. That is exactly what we all said as we were packing up to leave in 1991. We were right.

Actually, I believe the Zimmerman incident with Germany and Mexico had more to do with the US entering the war than the Lusitania. Prior to the end of WW2 the US was phobic about not involving ourselves in European affairs (I am sure I am not the only one who wishes that were still true). But Germany was trying to keep the US out of the war by creating a war on our back door step. That is the kind thing that has never failed to anger Americans. Had they left alone the US may well have stayed out of it. What effect that might have had is anyones guess.

The idea that '80s culture is worth revisiting makes me feel ill. When it's done I'll post pics. It'll be cool, you'll see.

A spent all day working on my new secret project. It is going to be extremely cool once it's finished. I converted my garage into a TV room last year and I've been trying to decorate it in a retro 80s theme. Anyway, I've got the perfect thing for it and anyone who was a teen ager in to 80's is going to LOVE this. What is it? I can't show because it's not working yet. But it will be cool once I repair/refubish it.

I have been getting into this a lot lately. I have had pretty good results with Sony Vegas Movie Studio and Sony DVD Architect . They are packaged together and cost around $59.99 to $79.99 US. The only big flaw is that if you need to crop or mix audio you need a seperate editor to do it. And it is not terribly user friendly but it pretty powerful once you learn how to use it.

I remember the day I scored high enough to roll the Asteroids game over. And it was on the hard setting where the UFO was invisible and the asteroids went diagonal as well as up and down. I was in a zone! It was the greatest accomplishemt in the nine years of life I had lived! Hmmm based on how my life has gone, maybe it still is.

No it has a faux wood front. It was plastic with an aluminum frame. Remember is was made in the 70's, they thought fake wood grain was cool back then. They also thought the Beejees and Donnie and Marie were cool too so you have to make allowances. The amazing thing is this system has less computing power than a cheap microwave oven. It got very hot too if you played it too long.

Excerpt, link to original:Sun Sentinel This is so cool. I still have mine and I pull is out every once in a while for some nostalgic space invader zapping. If you ever owned one of these what were your favorite games? For me is was Tanks, Outlaw, Asteroids, and Star Raiders.

In 1939 the French based all of their defenses on static fortifications. In other words they were preparing to fight WW1 over again. They were not prepared for the mobility of the German blitzkrieg. A fortification is useless if you can get around it, and the Germans did that by attacking through The Netherlands and Belgium something the French did not consider. Where they did give battle they were hopelessly outclassed. It was not fair to say they did not fight hard to repel the invasion, they were simply overwhelmed. However, when the armistice was signed in June 1940 over 70% of the French armed forces were still intact and for the most part they meekly obeyed the order to cease fire. And of course there is the despicable Vichy faction who surrendered without firing a shot. And worse they began to actively aid the Germans. I can not imagine a US military that is 70% intact to stop fighting an invader simply because Washington DC fell and a President was forced to capitulate. It would never happen. American history has many examples of our tenacity in war. At the Alamo they fought to the last man rather than surrender. At Wake Island every single able defender died fighting off the Japanese despite numerous calls to surrender. When the Corregidor fell and Wainwright ordered all US forces in the P.I. to surrender most went into the hills to fight as guerrillas. During the revolution the Continental Navy fought the Battle of Valcour Island literally to the last ship to prevent or delay a British landing in North Carolina that may have won the war for Britain. The 101st Airborne was totally surrounded at Bastogne and outnumbered 10 to 1 by the Germans. When asked to surrender and save his men Gen McAuliffe answered "Nuts". They fought for two days and held the Germans out until Pattons 3rd Army broke the siege. There are many many more examples. Heck was the war of 1812 over when the British captured Washington DC? No! The point I'm trying to make here is that it is not fair to say the French did not fight back, but it is fair to say they gave up pretty easily once the capital fell. That is a big reason why so many speak of the French with disdain. But that is not deserved either. Most of the French today never surrendered to anyone.

I forget where I read this. I think it was in Kissingers book Diplomacy. French antagonisim of the US actually began in the height of the Cold War before and leading up to the Berlin Air lift. The French were taking a more concillitory tone with the Soviets. They argued more for accomedation rather than confrontation. But the rest of NATO decided to side with the US and take a more confrontational track with the Soviets. It seems the county that suffered greatest in WW2 did not learn the lessons of it.

Well my favorite by far is not actually from a game but a mod of a game. The soundtrack to the Rome: Total Realism mod for Rome: Total War is simply outstanding. Far better than what actually is in the vanilla game. If you want to give a listen check out the mod here. http://www.rometotalrealism.org/ If you download the mod it's easy to poke around in it and extract the audio files. I don't remember what format they are in but they convert to MPEGs easily enough. I also loved the soundtrack to the original Medieval Total War. The new one, not so much.

It's almost 1 AM here in South Florida. I've just made a drink (Wild Turkey and Dr. Pepper), I've got a Stone Coyotes CD playing (Church of the Falling Rain) and I'm heading out to the back porch to enjoy the peace and quiet. Life is good! Hmmm I may call in sick tomorrow.