SoTier

I'm not going to pretend to have a crystal ball with these QBs, especially Wentz. I think that a significant amount of any QB's success stems from his situation, which is why I picked Stafford, Wentz, and Fitzpatrick. They are all in situations where they're set up for success with quality teams around them, but Wentz is the one with the big question marks. If he can't return to recover his early career form on a talented team with a quality coaching staff like Indy, then there's no excuses for him. Indy is a good QB away from being a serious SB contender.

/thread over

How is this all that different from all the fan comments and op-ed pieces on Bills fan sites and in the Buffalo media trashing former Bills players who were traded/cut/not-resigned during the last decade of Ralph Wilson's ownership, especially when Russ Brandon ran the team? Between 2001 and 2018, under GMs Tom Donahoe and Russ Brandon, the Bills regularly shed of most of the good/excellent players they developed early in their careers, generally by letting them walk in FA but sometimes by trades. Bills fans generally turned their anger towards the players who were gone, not at the team that got rid of them. During that period, the Bills only made the playoff once (2017) and only had winning seasons twice (2004 and 2017) but they traded away 2 future All Pro (Jason Peters and Marshawn Lynch) and let another future All Pro (Stephon Gilmore) walk in FA. Peters, Lynch, and Gilmore as well as some others, notably Willis McGahey, were all vilified by Bills fans on this site and others as well as sometimes in the Buffalo media. It's tough for fans to see good/great players go elsewhere and shine while their own team treads water and struggles to win enough games to make the playoffs. defending the Bills

I didn't vote because I wasn't comfortable with the choices. I'm not worried about either QB much but I'm not willing to predict that both will bust. From past drafts, I expect that 1 QB from the 5 who were drafted in the first round will turn out to be a franchise QB for most of his career. I think that probably another 1 or 2 others will become competent NFL QBs for at least part of their careers. It's likely 2 or 3 will be, at best, disappointments if not outright busts. As Bills fans, I think we can see first hand that sometimes the QB who looks like the least likely to succeed can turn out to be the best of his draft class while the most highly touted QBs in a draft class can crash and burn even before the end of their rookie contracts.

I guess you're butt hurt because he didn't just call you a plain old ordinary racist, which would have been accurate. FTR, when asked in an interview recently if he thought America was a racist country, he said he didn't. The story has been on national and local news media since late last week. Maybe you should get your news from an actual news source rather than wacky right wing propagandists.

👍 +10

I think that the future oriented aspect of the draft is the most impressive part. It's easy to improve a poor team through the draft with competent talent evaluation. It's a whole lot harder to maintain, much less improve, a very successful team over the long term. That's what separates teams that are almost always "in the hunt" like NE, KC, Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Seattle, etc from most other franchises that look great for a season or two and then disintegrate. I think that Atlanta and Philly are perhaps the best and most recent examples. This is why I'm not all that dismayed that the Bills didn't take any CBs. Teams regularly find decent CBs among UDFAs than decent edge rushers or OLers. Without the Combine, there are a lot of unknowns among the late round prospects this year, especially those who attended schools that didn't hold pro days.

Your concern for the super wealthy is soooooo heart wrenching. Let's do some math ... the current estate tax exclusion is almost $23 million. Somebody who leaves and estate of $50 million would owe tax on $27 million, which at 40% would be $10.8 million, leaving the heirs $39.2 million. If the estate exclusion was lowered to $10 million, the tax on $ 40 million would be $16 million, leaving the heirs a paltry $34 million. If the estate exclusion was lowered to $3 million, the tax on $47 million would be $18.8 million, leaving the heirs in poverty since they would only get $31.2 million. Cry me a river. You wouldn't have money to save if the government didn't provide an environment where business and commerce flourish, not the least of which is a stable government itself.

That's what estate planning is for. If the children are "deeply involved in that business", then why don't they have ownership stakes?

The average net worth of the top 1% of Americans is $10.8 million. The average net worth of the top 2% of Americans is only $2.4 million. I think excluding the first $10 million is ok. I don't think it's fair since the median net worth of American households is $121,700, but I would be ok with it because it would put the exclusion just below what it was before before Trump doubled it in 2018.

Less than the $22.36 million it currently is.

Cry me a river for the .1% of Americans who are rich enough to have their estates subject to estate taxes.

I know that, but RochesterRob claimed otherwise so I pointed out two infamous examples that cost people their lives. Coming from you, that's a compliment. Thank you. We're talking examples of quality. You claimed that quality in the past was better than today using Levis as an example even though you don't have first any first hand knowledge of that because you "stopped buying Levi's many years ago" . I disputed your assertion with two infamous examples from the past. My two examples were not only pulled from the market but the manufacturers were held liable for damages.

The old "everything was soooooo much better a few decades ago because it was made in the US" line. It wasn't. Among the most egregious examples of the quality of American made products include the Chevrolet Corvair and the Ford Pinto.

When the hell have conservatives EVER been friendly to labor??? Cotton producers, yes. *****, never.

I don't know if this is practical but it might be worth looking into. American LEOs seem to use deadly force much more frequently than in most other First World countries. Posters have "jumped" on it because it's simply untrue. The basic rule of gun use is to know what you're aiming at and then make sure you hit it. That's why you aim at the center of any target. Missing your target can have deadly consequences. Several years ago in my area, some dumbass deer hunter missed his buck and bagged a school bus traveling along a road about a quarter mile away. Luckily neither the driver nor the school kids were injured, but it could have been a tragedy. I watched the video from Columbus, and the scene was chaotic with multiple people involved. The officer had to make a split second decision. If the officer had aimed at a leg and missed, he could have hit a bystander or the bullet might have entered a home and hit someone . Training would help but I think that we have to take a hard look at current and future police officers. Current police officers who have a history of excessive force complaints -- Derek Chauvin is a perfect example -- need to be evaluated for their suitability to do their job. IMO, if Chauvin had been seriously penalized for his bad behavior, perhaps even fired, it would have been better for everybody involved. For prospective police officers, there needs to psychological evaluations to keep individuals prone to violence off police forces in the first place.

Excuses, excuses, excuses. Wrong. The courts threw out the suits because the complaintants had no relevant evidence to present, ie, actual proof of voter fraud. All they had was suppositions and conjectures ... the same bull manure you're trying to peddle in this thread. Wrong again. The courts threw out the suits because the complaintants had no relevant evidence to present, ie, actual proof of voter fraud. All they had was suppositions and conjectures ... the same bull manure you're trying to peddle in this thread. Ah, yes, the big bad federal government has always sought to impose cultural regimentation on the American people! Just imagine! The big bad feds forced an end to the quaint southern customs of lynching, racial segregation, disenfranchisement of black citizens etc. The evil feds also outlawed public schools promoting Christian religion by requiring students to recite daily prayers and threw out state "blue laws" that required stores to "keep the Sabbath" by staying closed on Sunday. The feds also protect the rights of women, gays and lesbians, the disabled. The feds perniciously provide a basic income and affordable health care for most senior citizens. Undoubtedly, the United States would be sssssoooooooo much better if only healthy, straight, white Christian men ran things like they did back in the 1950s. Save your crocodile tears. You are doing the very thing that you are accusing "the Left and the Media" of doing. Children kill other children with depressing regularity in the US. These killings only make the national news when they are particularly heinous or violent.

Fixed it for you ... The problem with these Roof and Rittenhouse clowns is that they are being hailed as heroes by the right rather than the racist bigots they are. The right truly believes in their minds that Roof and Rittenhouse represent all the people they love, the right, trumpers, white people, christians, and anyone else who embraces fascism, racism, and gun violence. They want anybody, especially black or brown people, who disagrees with their agenda jailed or dead, asap.

^^^ Actually, I think that there's some evidence that connects the amount of violent realistic video games as well as violent movie/tv content individuals play or watch to their likelihood for violence. Notice I said "connects" not "causes". It may be that people who are prone to violence are drawn to violent entertainment content.

Another mass shooting, the 47th since March 16, 2020, occurred early this morning in a Kenosha, Wisconsin tavern. 3 dead, 2 injured. The shooter is still at large. Authorities believe it was a targeted shooting not a random one.

It's generally been illegal for civilians to own fully automatic weapons since the 1930s IIRC. Why is that? Because back in the 1920s gangsters, bank robbers, and other assorted criminals were using them to kill bystanders, LEOs, rivals, and just about anybody who crossed them, and Congress did the responsible thing and banned them for most civilians. This was at a time when gun ownership among Americans was significantly more widespread than it is today. The 1930s laws didn't stop the criminals from killing people but it lessened the carnage. It's time for Congress to do its job and at least lessen the carnage.

Does anyone know what “immediate detention mental health temporary hold” actually means? Does it mean that if he underwent a background check to purchase a gun that he'd be denied? I saw a report that the police or the FBI confiscated the gun he owned in 2020, but he obviously acquired a new one.

Partly true. An experienced muzzleloader user can get off maybe 2 shots in a minute. A lucky shooter with a semi-automatic rifle can get off 20-30 rounds in a minute. An experienced shooter can reload and get off many more shots. Limiting the types of guns civilians can own won't stop the entire problem but it can certainly lessen the carnage.

Thank you for delineating what needs to be done, because you are one of very few on the right on PPP who supports sensible restrictions on the people who use guns. The general mindset of many conservatives -- and certainly the political stance of almost all Republican politicians -- remains the NRA goal of insuring that any nut can acquire as many guns of any kind that he/she can amass. They hollowly offer platitudes like "thoughts and prayers" but do nothing. They don't even try. My only difference with your suggestions is that I would ban the military style semi-automatic rifles for civilian use, which are not sporting guns -- unless you consider killing people a "sport". There are semi-automatic shotguns and rifles used for hunting and target shooting which should be allowed. We need to come up with a legal definition that separates sporting guns from the people killers, which has been an excuse for doing nothing about these most lethal weapons for decades.