John Adams

Agreed. We can only hope the long term effect is as promising as people hope.

OR choice. Or for kids, parenting. I recently heard a mom say that she couldn't afford a V-chip TV (BS), and she couldn't watch their kid all the time. I said to her, "Why not throw out your TV?" She looked like she saw a dog talk.

Tell that to the Conservative FCC thought police, who think that showing side-al nudity could start mass orgies in the streets.

And if the market tanks? Then what?

This makes no sense to me. Your theory makes the soldiers sound like mindless robots. I have, and have had, relatives in the military. They are smart enough to both follow orders, AND (not publicly) question the value of their depolyments. It seems to me that a good soldier follows orders, but he doesn't turn off his brain. I'm sure a lot of soldiers in Iraq are risking their lives despite their internal misgivings about the cause. They can understand that the citizens of the US can support them but not the cause, because some soldiers undoubtably do not support the cause as well. Soldiers are more effective when they are following orders AND support a cause, but that's not always the nature of being in the military. I'd be curious for our vet's views on this.

Really? I support AIDS funding in third world countries? Boy, you are outdoing yourself in your ignorance.

LOL. You want to support every country in the world's fight against oppression? Please send your tax dollars, and your children's, and your children's children, at a rate of about 80%.

Thank you for your recognition. At least you're making progress. Point out where I said my tax dollars should be funding third world countries, their healthcare, or even their food supply. Also point out where I said that countries shouldn't fend for theirselves. I'll be waiting.

How thin do you want to stretch our military? You want to tangle with China?

How's the sense of humor, Gallagher? You made your stance on AIDS clear: AIDS is a "blessing," and to babies born with AIDS, "life's a B word."

That's beautiful. The >90K crowd would instantly be paying more... a LOT more. That seems fair. So a person who makes 150K would be paying almost double in SS taxes as they pay now. Good or bad for the economy? If you picked bad, you picked right. That 150K bump would be the largest tax increase ever, and the United Socialist States would probably not be too upset, because hey, who cares if the people who actually earned their way to the top get screwed. Eventually, those people- the engines of the economy- will either move or be taxed to the point where they refuse to participate in the system, ala Atlas Shrugged (a bizzarre, but also amusing premise for a book). This makes me ill. If they lower this social security boom only on the people who make more than 90K, I will be sick, but not suprised. [EDIT] I just stumbled on this proposal from another of the class-warfare based Republicans. It may be the most likely scenario yet. It creates a "donut hole" in social security where the people from 90K-300K get a break from SS taxes, but at 300K, people start paying on top of the 300K. According to "Conservative" Graham, this creates a break for the middle class. (Since when does the middle class make 90-300K, I have no idea). Graham's Plan

Or leaks to the son-in-law.

I heard Travis Henry had one of the worst Wunderlichs ever. Can't find a source for that now.

And who cares about the babies being born into AIDS in Africa. It's their parent's fault, like you said above. Besides, it's only 2,000,000 or so kids you can easily write off. About 2,000/day in 2003. Eff them, right? Not your family, so who cares?

Holcombe is clearly the best available for us. Here's a guy who can flat out play. http://www.nfl.com/players/playerpage/1624 He's also well-liked by his team. I actually thought he would make a nice starter this year to let Losman grow another year. Don't be shocked if he wins the job in camp. He is that good.

Yeah. Killing babies and innocent people is a "blessing." It's also a blessing that AIDS is everywhere, and killing everyone... even people who don't live in Africa. And there are those other blessings, like the new variants of AIDS that are drug resistant, the possibility of other AIDS variants that could be even worse. Oh, how about the blessings of how much it costs you to support all the people with AIDS? I won't think of you as "cold," just a self-absorbed ____.

My reply was directed at JimBob (I'm trying to reason with a JimBob?!?). I like your idea a lot... not from the perspective that it changes anything, but because that would make people understand how much the government steals from them.

Except that the premise of the income tax is this: "You work hard and get paid for it. Therefore the government gets some of money." If you can't follow the logical progression, good for you. The consumption tax at least gives some small possibility of a choice. For the several people who are concerned that the government will have a hard time budgeting, how about this novel premise: the government would have to curb its spending to make sure it didn't hit budget shortfalls. Ahh, who am I kidding. The Republicans will do what they always do if there is a shortfall. Borrow borrow borrow. Why stop spending?

Do you really not see how giving the government control over the marionette strings of behavior is a bad thing? You do, of course, agree with everything the government mandates be taught in schools then. And will mandate in the future? I mean, that's all moeny driven- teach this or get no funding. They're just trying to elicit certain behaviors from people. Can't be anything wrong with that right? I ask again: can't you manage yourself? You would trust the government to program behaviors- that is frightening, but it's your desire, not mine.

You believe in government babysitting of all these behaviors, because people can't be trusted... and somehow think of yourself as something other than socialist? The road to hell is paved with good intentions: when you start giving the government control over people, it never ends. Why do we need education breaks? To encourage people to get education? Why do we need mortgage interest deductions? Because we want people to have homes. Why do we restrict gun ownership? Because we don't want people to shoot each other. Why do we make sure no one sees a naked butt? Because people will go out and start raping each other if we don't. And on and on.

Umm. And? How about we take the drastic step of not putting the government in charge of babysitting you. Can you take care of yourself or not? My god. You want the government building in all these nanny-functions for you? Is it the government's job to wetnurse? If you think so, you have a terrible view of people, and a scary view of the government. Good gracious: since when is giving back more power to the people a "drawback." LOL. You must be a Democrat or socialist or something; do you trust anyone?

This reminds me of one of my fovrite legal quotes regarding setting up a jamming device to stop Betamax's from copying coipyrighted material. This is from a Judge Ferguson. "As sure as you or I are sitting in this courtroom today, some bright young entrepreneur, unconnected with Sony, is going to come up with a device to unjam the jam. And then we have a device to jam the unjamming of the jam, and we all end up like jelly."

This is a tough question. There's definitely a time when it would be wrong to execute a child for committing a murder. At the same time, plenty of murderers under age 18 deserve to die. The American people refuse to trust judge's judgement in sentencing criminals (see minimum sentencing guidelines). To me, this is another step along that line of thought. Apparently, judges can't be trusted to figure out what "kids" deserve to die, so we have to draw an arbitrary line. I found it interesting that the opinion was so influenced by world standards. The Court gives a lot of weight to international law on this one.

Never saw it, but I like the line. In modern porn, the women have more hair than the men. It's quite odd.

I go to bed at 9 or 930, so I'd prefer the hardcore stuff a little earlier, in case there were too many hairy butt shots.