Taro T

Counter point (by point(?)) - I remember seeing a few years back that only about 10 of the teams in league have winning all-time records, so being 1/2 game under 500 each year on average isn't that horrible. - I could just as easily skip over the team's 1, 2, and 4 win seasons and show how the Bills actually have a great winning percentage and make the playoffs at a much better pace than once every 3 years. Removing data that doesn't support your case does not make the case stronger, it typically renders the argument kind of silly. - I can't dispute this, but I don't fully see the point of it. Do you expect to see the Maple Leafs or Black Hawks take down their championship banners because they only came in 6 team leagues? - Oh my gosh, he has a losing record against ALL the AFC east teams except the Jets? You mean all 2 of them? That truly is horrible, especially when you consider the Bills are a full 5 games under 500 against the Pats. - Has a losing playoff record? 12 teams make the playoffs each year. 1 team will go 3-0 or 4-0, the rest will lose somewhere along the way. At MOST 6 teams can have a winning record in the playoffs and typically only 4 will have a winning record. By simple arithmetic, most teams will have losing playoff records. - I will give you he has only chosen a handful of good GM's through the years, but since the mid-80's he has done better than in his 1st 20 years. - Yeah, he gave Donahoe an extension. He failed to give Polian and Butler extensions before their final seasons in Buffalo and the Bills paid for it both times. By giving Donahoe an extension, he is minimizing the incentive to Donahoe to do things that are not necessarily in the Bills best interest. - Not exactly true. Polian has done a great job at it (he hasn't won the Superbowl, but the Colts win games and manage their cap well), he just didn't get a chance to do it in Buffalo. Also, Donahoe is still 10-9 in the Mularky era, so given time his record may end up on the right side of 500. - I have little faith that he will bring in a stud to replace Donahoe, that is why I think people calling for Donahoe's head should think long and hard before requesting that. If the Bills miss the playoffs again, should the Bills think about firing Donahoe? yes. Should they do it? Only if they see a candidate that is available that they believe will do better than Donahoe has done. - If Ralph goes, I am very concerned that the Bills will too. Apologies if your post was written in sarcasm. From reading the thread following it, I got the impression that the original post was serious. Dave.

YOU can't be serious. The banning of capital punishment for people younger than 18 was based on INTERNATIONAL opinion, per Judge Kennedy; NOT on the merits of US Constitutional Law. Scalia was in the minority on that one. Also, my comment was referring to the words and actions of the Senators from the Democratic Party. They state that they are afraid of putting a justice on the court who is an idealogue, but yet when a QUALIFIED jurist is brought before them they vote against him simply because he is not a leftist. Roberts had 22 votes against him. That is more than twice the number of votes against Ginsberg and Breyer combined. You can't honestly tell me that Republicans were happy with either of those two. But the simple fact of the matter is that those two (although oftentimes misguided ) are qualified and were confirmed overwhelmingly. For all the bellowing from the left about how the Republicans are strictly partisan and idealogues all the while the left would simply never be partisan nor idealogues, the majority of Republicans did the right thing at the end of the day by voting yes on Ginsberg and Breyer whereas half of the democrats put partisanship first and said nay to Roberts. Dave.

The DirecTV customer service rep I spoke to is supposed to give me an update on the status on Monday. If I do hear from DirecTV, I will post what they say. Dave.

As I mentioned above, while MSG is currently shown on DirecTV there is currently no agreement between the 2 for MSG to provide a backfeed for people in Buffalo and Rochester. A lady with the Sabres said DirecTV and MSG are negotiating and she HOPED they would have something resolved before the season started. I spoke with a customer service rep from DirecTV last night for a LONG time. She had no information about Sabres games becoming available in WNY, but would try to find out more information for me. As I also mentioned in my post above, if you live in WNY and have DirecTV, CALL THEM AND LET THEM KNOW YOU WANT TO WATCH THE SABRES. If they get enough feedback I expect that they will get something done with MSG. I currently am very nervous that although I have Center Ice I will not be able to watch the Sabres because the NHL will consider where I live to be Sabres territory and black out the game in my zip code on CI but DirecTV considers where I live to be MSG/NY territory so my MSG won't show the game. Dave.

Do you REALLY want someone who has exhibited such POOR JUDGEMENT as to be a J-E-S-T, Jest, Jest, Jest fan on the Supreme Court???? I didn't think so. Dave.

Now, don't get me wrong, because I am not necessarily defending FEMA and Carnival, but isn't FEMA now getting criticized for doing what its critics asked it to do; i.e., do something NOW? It sounds like this contract was worked out in less than a day. Within that time, Carnival had to estimate how much money it would lose from cancelling / rebooking (I thought I read in the article) 100,000 vacations. When doing the back of the envelope calcs, if I'm Carnival, I am going to go conservatively high on how much lost future business this will cost me, as I am certain a lot of those passengers will no longer want to do business with Carnival. The cost to Carnival to do this contract is much higher than a normal cruise because of the potential lost business of repeat customers. Also, how exactly is FEMA supposed to get multiple bids on something like this IN LESS THAN ONE DAY? This isn't like deciding you need 3 air conditioners and check at Home Depot, Lowe's, and Sears for the prices. This is hiring out 3 full cruise ships for several months. Due to the logistics and the timing, there probably wouldn't have been a lot of Cruise line companies that even would be willing to bid on such a project much less that had the resources to pull it off. As an aside, I also would be interested in how the fares on Cruise ships are effected as you have now reduced the supply of available rooms by (I would imagine) a fairly significant amount. I've never taken a cruise, so I don't have any idea if there are 100 or 10,000 cruise ships in the particular region that these sailed, but 3 full cruise ships sounds like a significant number. Dave.

I have to agree, this is one of the most assinine ideas I have heard of in a long time. A major reason I give to charities is I feel they perform necessary services more efficiently than the government does. This makes about as much sense as government creating VOLUNTEERS of America and then PAYING the volunteers. Dave.

I spoke with the Sabres about this this morning. I was told that DirecTV does not currently have an agreement with MSG but they are in negotiations. The person I spoke to did not know when or if a deal would be reached but was hopeful for a deal. Call DirecTV and let them know you want to see the Sabres. If they think enough people will switch to DN or cable, they will get a deal done. Dave.

How about Joe Dorenbos to get Moorman out of his funk? According to ESPN's website, nobody picked him up. Several teams have carried 2 place kickers (one for FG's and one for kickoffs), if they can tie up 4 roster spots with special teamers what's the difference. Moorman's play seems to have severely deteriorated since Dorenbos left, so why not? With Dorenbos, Moorman was the best punter in the league in my opinion, absolute minimum he was top 5. I expect that Moorman will get used to the new guy fairly soon and will return to top form when that happens, but how long will that take? Bring Dorenbos back. Yes, I am serious. Dave.

Depends on how many are getting in. Dave.

Mickey, what you consider a moderate and I consider a moderate probably are not the same beast. You are also right that Bush followed the Clinton script, Bush met with most of the democrats before nominating Roberts and Roberts met individually with most if not all of the Senators. The White House gave Congress thousands of pages of requested documents, the few they held back were withheld with the blessings of the living past Attorney Generals (dem and rep) due to executive priviledge reasons. Heck, even Pat Leahy voted to send Roberts' nomination to the full Senate. That being stated, I see no valid reason for Schumer to have voted no on sending the nomination to the full Senate. Dave.

That reminds me of the time I went to a Clean Air Act conference back in the early 90's. Two things during that conference struck me as horrible examples of what was wrong with the media back then, and I imagine it has only gotten worse since. The 1st was at lunch on the 2nd day, at my table was a mid to high level guy from EPA and a lady reporter who had recently switched to covering a DC beat from Cleveland. She was whining to the EPA guy about how much harder it is to report in DC vs Cleveland; because when she was in Cleveland, if something happened she could call the mayor and he would give her the story. Now that she was in DC, people wouldn't answer all her questions, heck, they'd sometimes even mislead her. I was just sitting there listening to her dumbfounded. It just didn't seem fair that she might have to do some investigating to be an investigative reporter. Oh, well. The other event was a news conference with the head of EPA and his Mexican counterpart. There was a nice little 1 page press release that went with the press conference and about a 5-10 minute speech. There were about 25 reporters in the room, and when they were allowed to ask questions, 8 people asked the EXACT SAME QUESTION just worded a little differently and it had nothing to do with what the news conference was supposed to be about. The EPA administrator avoided the question all 8 times, and then the "reporters" packed up their stuff and left. I guess that experience was the root of my "anti-media bias". Dave.

The last Roe decision was 6-3. Roberts is replacing one of the 3. Even if O'Conner gets replaced by someone that does not support RvW, the RvW side still wins 5-4. Notice prior to Ginsberg getting on the Court it was 5-4. As I mentioned, I don't like Ginsberg or Breyer; but they should be on the SC. They are the nominees that Clinton wanted. He won the election. Most of the Senate (90+) voted for them, even though I know that a lot of the "yea" votes knew that they would not agree with the justices on many issues. Many on the left claim that they are worried about Roberts becoming or being an idealogue. However, the only idealogues on the SC issue I see are coming from the left. When left leaning judges were nominated to the SC and came before the Senate, they were confirmed overwhelmingly. Just saying "I don't like your views" does not make that nominee unqualified, much as I might have liked it to back in the mid-90's. Dave.

Clearly, they couldn't know whether the 10,000 dead was correct or not. However, darn near every major news channel had a TV crew right outside the Superdome. Do you think it may have been possible for ONE of the talking heads to poke his head inside and see that a full scale war with hundreds of rapes and murders was NOT taking place AND then report that "This reporter braved the depraved conditions personally, and while I will admit there is quite a stench, I could not find HUNDREDS OF DEAD BODIES LYING AROUND nor did I hear a constant barrage of gunfire. Nor could I personally witness young children being raped." The reporters were right there at the source. They could have looked for themselves. That however would have either been too difficult for them or it would not have fit in with their preconceived notion of how this was absolutely a horror show (most likely caused by the uncaring Bush administration) and that they were in line for major kudos and awards for their bravery if they could just convey the utter depravitiy of the whole situation. Neither scenario portrays the media in a particularily good light. They could have been reporters, but instead decided to be gossip columnists. Dave.

There was nothing brought up before or during the hearings that showed he shouldn't be confirmed. The fact that Schumer is left wing and Roberts is conservative does not mean that Roberts is not qualified. Schumer appears to be in a snit because he didn't like the way Roberts answered his questions. In the little bit that I saw of the hearings, Roberts sounded extremely well versed in past Court cases and came across as intelligent, thoughtful, and well spoken. Roberts was following Ginsberg's lead in how to answer questions before the committee - a nominee does not speak directly about cases that he may have to judge. (I'm not a lawyer, obviously, so maybe you can fill me in on the details of why that is.) Ginsberg made it out of committee with 0 votes against her. Breyer was also recommended to come up for a floor vote with no votes against him. Roberts should have received the same. I saw nothing in the hearings and read nothing about them in the papers that indicated Roberts should not have received a full Senate vote. I was not happy with Clinton's choices to the SC, but I don't think either should have had as many "no" votes in the full Senate as they did. While I disagree with several of their rulings, I realize that the guy that's in the White House gets to choose who he wants. As long as there is nothing that turns up to disqualify the person, the President should get to choose who he wants. That is a big part of the reason I voted against Gore and Kerry even though I live in a state where my vote had no chance of being in the majority. In my opinion, Roberts is well qualified to be on the Supreme Court. Dave.

I don't like him, but plan on voting for him for one simple reason - seniority. The longer he is in office, the more seniority he will have and, theoretically, the more spoils he will bring back to NY. (Yes, I realize that is a HORRIBLE reason to vote for the guy; but until the pork fest gets scaled back, I'd rather have him in there trying to get what he can for NY rather than a Daniel P. who stood on principal and let NY take it up the backside or the other one who I can't honestly believe gives a rat's butt for NYers.) I think NY screwed up royally voting him in and Senator Pothole out, (ooooh, we don't like him; he's a politician (and the other guy ain't?!?!?!?!?)) but considering the damage is done; I'd say keep him and hope for the best. He, unlike the other one, actually does try to do well for NY. While his views oftentimes clash with mine, I think he is better than the alternatives (especially when the Republicans won't bring a legitimate candidate to challenge him). Plus, I REALLY don't like the thought of the other one being my senior senator. I don't agree with a lot of Schumer's views and am embarrassed that he voted against Roberts but I do believe that in some warped way he does have NY's best interests in mind. Dave.

You are missing my point. The point is, right now there are a lot of people posting that Donahoe should be gone. Without a plan to bring someone better than him in, the Bills are setting themselves up for even worse problems. As for your question about how does one consider replacing him? Well, Donahoe has put together a team that I think looks good on paper these last few years, even with the offensive line woes. (It doesn't look like my opinion is shared nationally as most preseason publications have tended to have the Bills finishing 3rd or 4th in the division typically.) However the team has not performed up to the preseason expectations. I still think that this team can make the playoffs (even with Takeo's injury). But if they don't, maybe I've overestimated how good a job Donahoe's been doing. Donahoe's performance should be evaluated just like any of the players or coaches regardless of how the Bills do. Donahoe right now is in an elite region of league GMs; his team is one of only 4 or 5 to have missed the playoffs for the last 4 years running. I give him a pass on the 1st 2 years because of the salary cap issues he inherited. Eventually though, you reach a point where you have to perform. How could you possibly not even CONSIDER the possibility of replacing a guy who has not gotten the job done for 5 years (assuming they miss the playoffs again). At what point in time do you start to consider replacing him? At 6 years, 8 years, 20 years, never? Dave.

I can't say that I disagree with this, IF the Bills do in fact miss the playoffs again this year. My question is: who do you bring in to replace him? I am sure that there is a better football mind out there somewhere, but I don't know who that will be. Ralph Wilson does not have a stellar record hiring people to run the organization. Since the leagues merged, you basically have his decision to hire Stu Barber and Chuck Knox and then Bill Polian who brought in Marv. Everyone else that he chose to hire has been horrible to adequate (again, assuming the Bills miss the playoffs again - which is not a given). If the team does miss the playoffs this year, I would not be adamant about not firing Donahoe, but I definitely want the Bills to have a plan for who they will bring in before getting rid of Donahoe. On paper, even with essentially a rookie quarterback, this team should be challenging for a playoff spot. If they get there, Donahoe is definitely back; if not, unless the team feels reasonably certain that they can hire someone who will do better then I guess the Bills enter year 6 of the 3 year plan. Dave.

I'd be shocked if they go to the 3-4 with their 2 best linebackers being nowhere near 100% (Spikes out, Fletcher playing hurt). Dave.

Not true. Retatta goes (and I do mean GOES) well with a fine Thunderbird - preferably of a Thursday vintage. By the way, you are supposed to be starting your 3rd bottle before easing into the nuanced taste of the Retatta. Dave.

How does being injured affect JP's ability to learn from someone else? He did have a 1/2 season that he couldn't line up in practice, but he could still watch film and watch what the #1 guy was doing while his leg was in a cast. Dave.

Even with those 2 calls, the Bills have to hold Atlanta on 3rd down and convert the good field position into a touchdown, not just 3 points. Dave.

I still think this team can make the playoffs. They SHOULD beat San Antonio next week. They can beat Carolina at home (I don't know that they will, but they should and can). They should sweep the fish and split with the Pats and Jets. If they split with the Chargers and Raiders and sweep the Broncos and Chiefs at home or split those 2 and beat the Bungles they are 10-6 and should make the playoffs with that record, considering 2 losses were out of conference. Dave.

The refs definitely did not help the Bills, but they didn't beat them either. The Bills have to be better in the Red Zone on offense and better on 3rd down on defense. Until they do improve in these areas, they won't make the playoffs. On the plus side; although you never want to lose at home, at least it was out of conference. Dave.

You have a problem with this?????? Dave.