Hurlshort

The Arab Spring? Only Tunisia has really seen a positive change, but you've got to start somewhere. (I am sure someone will argue that is political and not religious, but I fail to see how you can separate the two at this point. If the end goal is to have a separation of religion and state, instituting democratic ideals would seem to be an important step.)

They are following Martin's template, so I don't think you can JUST blame the writers.

Antiquity? Hardly. The recently resurgent KKK loves to spout their Christian beliefs. There is no doubt in my mind Islam is in desperate need for reform. I'm not arguing that Islam (or any other religion) are somehow perfect. Religion is much like human nature. They are tied together and they've evolved over time. I just don't accept the idea that one religion is permanently stuck in some sort of medieval barbarism while the other has outgrown that. There is always room for reform. We also need to be careful to hold historical figures against modern lenses of morality. Mohammad was a product of his time, he was still a man. Jesus has benefited from a lack of a strong historical record, making him more malleable (hence the white European guy in all the churches.)

Much like the Bible, the Koran is subject to interpretation. If Islam really all about fanaticism and war, as teknoman2 is arguing, we'd have a much bigger issue in this world, given that there are 1.8 billion Muslims out there. In reality it is more like redneckdevil is saying, most just want to be able to practice their religion and be neutral. These are the 5 pillars of Islam: Faith, Prayer, Charity, Fasting, and a Pilgrimage. Doesn't say anything about killing non-Muslims.

It was a good speech and hopefully the follow-through will be effective. That, of course, is the tough part.

Congratulations, you made me look for the entire video just so that I could confirm that the world is cruel place. You could have posted something funny or uplifting but instead I saw a leopard eat a newborn impala. Hey, you are the one that brought the cruel reality here. I watched it and figured it played out like a Disney movie, and the Cheetah raised the young Impala as his own.

Appease who? And why is the choice appease/drive out? You are simplifying a very complex situation with gross generalities.

I also sport the same haircut. Seems to be the Obsidian Forum cut of choice.

Yeah, it was a pretty big jump to get a raven to Dragonstone, and the a dragon to north of the wall in a matter of hours. Kind of ruins the whole idea of distance. But hey, plot over logic, and all that. The whole mission made little sense, to be fair. Let's send the king of the north off to capture a wight with a bunch of people with questionable loyalties. It made sense when he was just a grunt in the Watch, but not so much now.

Looked at the sun, didn't lose my eyesight, so it was a good day.

I am a bit surprised, and this isn't just for Trump, that there isn't more oversight and approval needed for travel when it comes to people under the Secret Service umbrella. For example, a business trip that doesn't involve state business should probably be at least partially covered by the business itself, and there should be some sort of cap when it comes to vacation travel, or at least a percentage that is put up by the private party. I do remember what a hullabaloo was raised over Obama's Hawaii trip. Funny how those sources are probably all pretty quiet now.

No. Who is arguing for that?

A lot of your examples seem to imply that there is one set law for both the Islamic world and the Western world. They vary tremendously all over the place. edit: To elaborate, I'd say society constantly has to push for progress, no matter what the dominant religion is. The idea that western society has protected the rights of gay people is a fairly new one. Heck, you don't have to go back very far to find a time in Western society where women and children had few rights.

Wait, are you implying that the Spanish Inquisition wasn't as fun as Monty Python made it out to be? Heretic!

kill them no, but if they want to live their lives with a medieval mentality, they should do it in their homelands instead of coming here and expecting us to bend the rules for the sake of their culture A lot of this comes down to economics as much as culture. That is why so many of these extremists are often second generation immigrants that have been radicalized. They are vulnerable BECAUSE they lack a real understanding of their culture and they feel disenfranchised in their Western home country.

That's just the thing, you could have made the same statement about Protestants and Catholics a number of centuries ago. There are 1.8 billion Muslims in the world, we'd better hope we can find a way to co-exist.

Seems like the game has been out long enough to not expect more content though.

Sorry to hear that Bart.

I've really caught the Lord of the Rings Online bug. The storytelling in this game has always been a notch above other MMO's for me, and after I got over my dislike of the mounted combat, I'm enjoying my time in Rohan and looking forward to moving onto Gondor soon. My captain just hit level 88 and is an inspiration for all these gloomy Rohim.

WoD, I'm curious who you think is in the right here (if the quote is accurate.) Bannon or Trump? I'd probably agree with Bannon myself in this scenario. I'm not sure I'd word it the same way, but the Trump White House does seem to be completely disconnected to the Republican party at this point.

That's commitment to the craft, that amount of sheet cake can't possibly feel good to eat. I'd be hurling.

Wow, Bannon out. Is there any precedent for this type of turn over? After the election I was like, "Ok, gotta give the guy a chance to do his stuff." But it just seems to be getting worse and worse every week. How about just stopping with the tweets? That would seem to be an easy first step.

I'm the first to complain when history textbooks get politicized (interestingly enough, California and Texas tend to be the worst offenders in regards to this.) I'd even go so far as to say I'd vote against removing the statue of Lee if I sat on the city council (I'd suggest alternative ways to change the message of the memorial.) But I don't live in Charlottesville, and I'm not on the city council, and if they want to change their public parks, that is their right. And honestly I have a very similar view of the Berkeley protests against conservative speaker. The difference is I'd say the Berkeley protesters (Black Bloc excluded) seem to not understand that they are increasing the exposure of the speakers by trying to shut them down, and the alt-right seem to be more interested in attention than the actual cause.

Well said GD. I find it interesting that all the people defending Lee's statue seem to know nothing about the guy.

My attention span is about 3 weeks and caps out around 40 hours.