taks

maybe, maybe not. i agree it is a HUGE conflict of interest to conduct secret meetings among heads of state without any public oversight. also, the mere fact they get together in such a manner is indeed a manipulation of the democratic process. unfortunately, the world has become so large, and political parties so strong, that they are otherwise untouchable as a group (as well as their dominant members individually). i do not have a solution to this apparent problem. also, is it good, or is it bad? know way to know that either. secrecy is usually bad, IMO. taks

based on what i've read, that position is difficult to support. he's a typical republican, though he's pro-choice which seems odd. he is very smart, and very knowledgeable on affairs both domestic and foreign. oddly, his line of questioning in the watergate trial is probably what led to nixon's downfall. either way, not that full laissez-faire capitalism is a good idea, less government involvement in corporate affairs is. take away the incentive to buy politicians and it won't happen. taks

what's interesting, btw, is that neither reagan nor GWB are on the list of CFR members. i believe any president is an ad-hoc member, though that is only supposition. in both cases, however, the majority of their respective staffs _were_ in the CFR. reagan's was not until he added bush sr. to his ticket, but much of GWB's staff was prior to his campaign. this is all off of memory as i have not put any effort into researching the conspiracy in quite some time. mostly out of boredom with the topic. dig into any large organization that seemingly has control of the reigns and you'll find connections and otherwise suspicious circumstances. taks

you're missing the entire point, and function, of the concept of checks and balances. the way it is set up, no one branch _can_ do other than what they are allowed. congress can't "reign in" bush because that is not their mandate, they can attempt to pass laws that do so, and the "check and balance" bush has is veto, and, barring that, the "check and balance" of the supreme court can void the law if it is deemed unconstitutional. likewise, bush cannot dictate law, nor affect the supreme court's decisions on law, nor dictate the machinations of congress. you seem to think that just because various factions of government, be they SCOTUS, the president or congress, are doing things that disagree with your ideology, they must be wrong. that's simply not the case. that's also why i repeat my challenge to you to actually educate yourself on the matters. the only thing worse than a leader that doesn't understand the constitution is a regular citizen that doesn't. if the latter never happened, we'd never have the former. taks

oh, keep in mind, journalists and other influential folks are members of the CFR as well, not just politicos (peter jennings is the primary example i remember). taks

the conspiracy theory view of _world_ politics, not just those in the US, is that the CFR and several related entities actually "choose" our leaders. while it is true that those named above are members, what is not known is to what extent they participate, and how much influence the CFR and other organizations actually play in election outcomes. it could just be that they "knew" clinton was going to get elected so they added him to the roster. how did they "know" clinton was going to get elected? the same way the rest of us did, it was obvious. the CFR's purpose is to promote open discussion, without fear of any sort of retribution, among world leaders. there's good and bad in that. certainly open discussions are welcome and positive. however, any time all of the world's most powerful leaders assemble in one place without public scrutiny, there's a potential for abuse. in fact, it can be argued that any US leader participating in secret discussions such as these is a violation of the constitution, as he is "hired" by the people to represent them, which also implies they should be in the know on any relations with foreign countries, at least at a high-level (certainly the mantra of "national security" is meaningless when the president is speaking to every other foreign government in a single venue, he's actually the one treading on a violation). taks

unfortunately, the information age can also be dubbed the "mis-information age" in the same stroke of the pen. many uneducated, biased, and otherwise agenda driven opinions are out there, and they only serve to confuse the issues (just 'cause <insert favorite blog name here> said it don't make it true!). taks

in the theater of the war, yes, but domestically, that line becomes very blurry. also, the president can never technically "go outside his constitutional bounds," as such cases are otherwise bounded by the constitution. finally, iraq is not technically a war as congress made no formal declaration (though they did approve unlimited military response simply by approving funding for such a thing). realistically, the whole mess is a blur of various powers, and will probably be analyzed to the point we all scream in the coming decades. taks

or the new evidence is overwhelming. taks

yes, though not often. if you manage to convince the prosecutor something is afoul it can happen. rare at best, but so is the death penalty to begin with. the problem with reading a news article on such a subject is that you have no idea what _all_ the other evidence is. a judge will weigh that in his decision, because he gets to see it all. if he determines that the primary reason for the conviction was actually otherwise not dependent upon the testimony, it won't get overturned. he may also decide that perhaps the witnesses changed their stories because of a guilty conscience, or pressure from anti death penalty groups, etc. that's why original testimony is deemed "correct" vs. later recants (remember, 12 people heard the evidence and testimony and ultimately had to decide its truthfulness before the conviction in the first place). judges are loathe to tell juries that they were wrong. taks

darque, i admire your courage for posting that in here... hehe. taks

nwn2 ran fine on my 6800 vanilla (with extra pipes turned on). better on my 7900gs and i have yet to try it out on the 8800gts. taks

actually, _new_ evidence is required, and it needs to meet a pretty stiff standard to qualify as necessary and sufficient. typically, witnesses recanting their testimony is not considered either. if the prosecution felt the recant was legit, however, and pursued another suspect, trying and then convicting said suspect, that may qualify. grommy probably has a better read on such situations. taks

a form of birth control i suppose. anyway, though i have not purchased a copy of dragon in probably 20 years, maybe longer, i wouldn't get too upset at this. speaking as someone that gets a lot of trade rags in the mail, i'm to the point now that i'd way rather have an electronic version. i get piles of mags every month and the clutter is getting hard to deal with. taks

unbearably tiny. i haven't played with all the options. oh, btw, i'm not certain the "16-bit" thingy did the fix. there's also a button for "press if your system displays anomalies in the graphics" or something. i clicked that and it solve the problem now that i recall.. taks

i lied. the autoresponse message changed. this is the original taks

if you click on the blue light, an email will pop up. send it and you'll get an auto response that gives you the clues to solve all the puzzles. the 5th is the hardest. the word for the 2nd is contained in the email response. i cheated on a few (found a walkthrough) since i don't have time to play (much). i signed up to be "reminded" of the continuation of this pseudo-ARG game, which occurs on august 1. taks

what's a "smoke monster?" taks

plenty o mod tools out there to do whatever you want with the characters, stat changes, race changes, etc. ^wistrik the game just seems sluggish, and it may simply just be a perception problem biased from so many campaigns through BG2. it's not bad enough to be too annoying, however (the frame rate actually seems rather high). also, since my native resolution is 1600x1200 (21" LCD), the 8800GTS is getting a workout converting to full-screen at 640x480, i'm guessing. taks

well, slusho.com, purported to be one of the actual websites involved in the viral marketing campaign, is a japanese oddity. perhaps this is yet another gawdawfulzilla movie? taks

i got the first one... but neither could i get the 2nd. must be some trick and i don't have time to fiddle with it. what's the purpose of this movie supposed to be? looks like some sort of munster attacking the city, but you can't see it in the video at 1-18-08.com. taks

what the??? taks

yup. fascism and communism actually sort of "meet" in many respects w.r.t. actual political beliefs, right at a point called "collectivist." taks

i'm playing BG as well, and i have reinstalled IWD. someone's suggestion to switch to 16-bit in the configure screen to solve the blocky fog of war problem worked like a charm. anyway, some interesting notes on things i forgot about the game... first, i have what is by all accounts a fairly high-end computer. core2duo e6600, 8800gts vid card, 3.0 gb SATA drive, 4 GB of mammaries and an audigy 2 sound card. is it just me, or was BG _always_ this laggy? it just seems sluggish. next, i forgot how annoying the pathfinding is. crap it is, even with the number of nodes cranked (which i've turned down again). characters regularly get stuck on each other in battles, failing to simply walk around. it's almost silly. that characters cannot push others out of the way is also a pain, and i remember that was one of the top gripes fixed in BG2. overall, as simplistic as the AI is, i prefer it to many of the problems i had with NWN2. at least everyone doesn't come running to the currently selected player every round, meanwhile getting bashed in the head by some miscreant. why o why is there not a free attack when something runs away. if they're faster than whomever you have in pursuit, you have to wait till he turns back to red and rejoins the fight. sometimes, if you aren't paying attention, your moron in pursuit will open up areas that you aren't ready to clear, bringing the hordes with him upon his return, or dying in the process. the game is actually rather challenging to play at low levels. a 1st level mage is useless without the ring of wizardry. minsc cannot hit the broad side of a barn. danged rangers. i'm doing him with a bastard sword and shield this time, rather than the stock two-handed sword. why does khalid only have a 15 STR as a fighter? at least with jaheira it makes sense because she's a druid and needed to spread her stats out. she's really my best fighter at the end of the day. i now remember why khalid was killed for BG2. once the majority of your dudes are above 3rd level, the game gets much, much easier. i had forgotten how easy it became as the game progressed. taks

thus proving that any ideology is, at its heart, corrupt. throwing bricks? yeah, them's some better folks than the ones marching. taks