Jake

Thank you Trayce for one good month of MLB hitting

If we're giving up Micah/Montas/Trayce/May for Frazier/Ethier, I'm very happy even if we're taking on all of Ethier's salary.

I somewhat agree with Jenks as far as the NRA goes. I don't think it's so much their immediate and deliberate influence that shapes gun policy, though it very well could play a larger role than I think it does. It's moreso the groundwork they have done over decades to reframe the debate on guns, doing things like funding legal scholarship to make the 2nd amendment seem unambiguously supportive of unimpeded home ownership of guns, creating alarm over things like gun registries (which in turn makes so many gun control policies difficult), and things like this. They have created a relatively coherent set of arguments that are easy to understand and repeat and are often highly logical (who is to argue that a gun won't save you in one of many contrived situations in which a gun is obviously an advantage?), which has led us to a point now where the pro-gun base is loud and effective. The gun rights crowd can relate to people and themselves on several levels that are very closely tied to deeply held beliefs. Historically, they can talk about founding fathers (2nd amendment), even if the truth of history is far less clear. Another historical angle is the idea that guns were crucial in the revolution (what war doesn't require guns?), thus making a provocative correlation of citizen gun use with freedoms. Ideologically, they can talk about government control and interference in lifestyles, something lots of people don't like in the abstract. Culturally, guns can be a symbol of a certain identity, whether that's the country/rural person or a Southerner or vigilante badass, etc. And logically, it is easy to imagine yourself in a situation in which a gun is probably your best chance at survival. Most people aren't able to think that their personal ownership of a gun can have a negative effect on the world, but it's easy to think about how it can help you or some other innocent person. Those talking about gun control usually have to get people thinking about society-wide phenomena and things like this that just aren't so easy to grasp and aren't worth the effort for someone who already finds guns appealing.

Seems to me that it's time to raise the rates, would be great if we could manage our federal budget in such a way to counteract some of the short-term negative impacts of the rate "hike."

The problem Rose faces beyond all the double vision, ouchie this and that stuff is the missed time. MVP Rose had been playing relatively uninterrupted basketball for a decade. Missing a year was going to put a dent in that, then big surprise another year. Then last year he misses a lot of time, sprinkled throughout the season so he never gets a rhythm. Another strike comes in the preseason this year, which people were just discussing. It's really difficult to make up for time you spent physically inactive and what he desperately needs is a run of play without any meaningful injuries. I don't know if he'll manage it. I'm sure the time away from the game makes him even more prone to injury, not to mention the wear and tear from over the years and from managing the injuries themselves.

Let's be real, the Samardzija/Russell trade was absolutely fabulous for the Cubs. Only thing that rivals it in terms of A's stupidity is trading away Donaldson that offseason.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Nov 17, 2015 -> 01:03 PM) I would argue players completely underuse the backboard. That shot is easier using the glass and he was extremely effective with it. I hope he uses it more. Especially when he shoots line drives like that.

Hard to believe TheoHoyer would part with a first rounder for Alex Gordon

QUOTE (Eminor3rd @ Oct 29, 2015 -> 12:05 PM) I thought Dan Jennings was like 34 Nah, just a name that sounds like it belongs to a 34 year old

Re: Reinsdorf and the spending limits, let's be clear that the way the Cubs and some others are doing it is not cheating. Breaking the rules implies that they have acted against them. The Cubs and their ilk are acting within the rules, which specify various consequences when you spend beyond the limit. They think it is better to do it this way and the rules allow them to. Jerry can do this as well and I would imagine the reason he doesn't do that is because it is very expensive and very risky, two things he really has never supported in terms of amateur players.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Oct 6, 2015 -> 12:35 PM) From what I read if the people responded 'Christian', he shot them in the head, others he shot more to wound. if that is the case, they yeah, he singled out Christians. I thought it was impossible to shoot to wound, that's why police officers always kill people who they are moderately afraid of

IIRC, Carson got the first question at the first Republican debate. It was from Megyn Kelly and it was devastating in terms of the way it questioned his raw competence to be POTUS. I thought he looked uncomfortable when he answered it and assumed he'd fade away shortly thereafter.

Last I looked, BA had him outside of the top 15 players from Cuba, so it isn't as if the hype is unanimous

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 7, 2015 -> 01:15 PM) If all you're doing is "reporting" rumor, you're not better than any regular joe who reads/listens to random people talk about basketball. "I'm hearing Rose is going to return early!" ESPN has a problem with this reporting stuff. Broussard and SAS are notorious for throwing stuff against the wall, hoping it will stick. I guess if you're right 1 out of 10 times, you can always point to that one time you're right, but at some point you lose credibility and people will tune out. Sadly, there's a decent size chunk of this country that finds SAS and Bayless entertaining enough to watch on a daily basis. I don't know who these people are or what sort of IQ they have, but they clearly need help/need to get a life. Well there is a thing called hate-watching, which is almost certainly a big driver of that show's ratings. People just wanting to get pissed off about the stupid things those two say

It is probably far easier to hire a part-time guy if he doesn't have to travel. From the Sox perspective, this is probably a lot better deal than Scully's arrangement with LA

QUOTE (bmags @ Oct 2, 2015 -> 04:06 PM) Untouchable? It's a penalty if you touch him

Let's all remember that the second amendment was written to simultaneously allow governments to form militias while still giving them the privilege to restrict civilian ownership of guns. http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/th...ntrol-amendment I especially like that thought experiment—if the words "well-regulated" weren't in the amendment now and someone proposed adding them, what would the reaction be? What would the right say the consequences of that phrase's presence would be?

As long as it is technically possible to meet some standard of accessibility to the IDs, we won't care about how much it changes from one year to the next or how likely it is that people know what they're supposed to do

I'm happy enough with my AT&T cell phone plan, partially because I'm on a business plan which seems to get you a far better level of customer service. I signed up for AT&T U-verse a year or so ago and it was a freaking catastrophe. They show up and say that I don't have the connections necessary in my neighborhood for the level of speed for internet that I chose (their systems were wrong about what was available at my address). I say okay, just give me whatever I can get. The tech isn't allowed to hook me up with anything but what I've signed up for. He leaves. I call them, wait for an hour, then talk to someone. I say please lower my speed and send another tech. They say okay, your new plan will be [whatever my old plan price plus $40/month was]. I say wait a minute, I'm asking for less service. Well, we can't help you. Let me send you to another CS person. Okay, wait another 30 minutes, go through the entire explanation and they offer the same high price. Nope, that's not what I want. They send me to another person who may have the ability to make this change. Wait an hour. This person is helpful, has to get permission from manager who is out to lunch. They will call back. No call back, ever. I call back, they can't find any record of any of these conversations, so I redo that entire process. They finally manually change my plan and allow me to schedule the installation for 5 days later (I was in a new apartment with no TV, no internet). 5 days later, nobody shows up. I look at my online account and there's an alert that says my appointment was cancelled because I signed up for an internet speed that is not available in my location. I at this point just called and cancelled, which took a while of course as they tried to sell me a mobile hotspot plan. They were still generally courteous, no Comcast horror story in that sense. As soon as I hung up with AT&T for the last time, I signed up for TWC online, drove to their local retail location, and picked up the equipment and hooked it up. No problemo.

QUOTE (Brian @ Oct 2, 2015 -> 04:59 AM) MSNBC interviews someone who was concealed carrying, or whatever the term was. He said he was afraid to pull out his gun in fear of getting shot. Wrong! It's easy to tell who the good people with guns are

Allowing some simple things like using government funds to study gun violence and punishing FFL/gun dealers who sell large amounts of guns that are later used in crimes. Back when the government was allowed to look into these things, they found that nearly every metro area had just a few gun shops where the vast, vast majority of guns used in crimes were sold. Then too much talk about gun control and registries and the right made sure nobody was allowed to look into these things anymore.

I would like to see Democrats counter the talking point that Republicans have used for several years about the federal budget. They go crazy about budget deficits, etc. and how it should be treated like a household budget. But if the budget being balanced was really your top priority, you would never decrease your income. The truth is that most of both parties are comfortable running a deficit, but they disagree over what makes a deficit productive. Democrats feel that government spending is morally important and stimulates the economy in such a way that leads to longterm solvency since more people will earn a living and pay taxes. Republicans feel that lowering the tax burden will stimulate the economy and ultimately lead to more people making more money who will make up for the lower rates. What's really going on is the Republicans both want to cut taxes out of some economic concern—and, to be sure, to please donors and be consistent with their worship of successful businesspeople—but also want to cut spending because they have moral or other disagreements with what the spending is for. Regardless of the purposes, though, you can't with a straight face say that you care about the budget being balanced while you decrease your income. Any business owner would know that too, since they like to compare it to real world budgets; you would never cut your business's earnings on purpose, but you might increase spending (investment) even if it cost you debt.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Sep 30, 2015 -> 10:55 AM) NBC Chicago Pope Francis supposedly had an important message for Kim Davis, so important that attorneys for the Kentucky county clerk say he delivered it in person ----> http://nbcchi.com/i9QRKP7 It's not implausible, but I'd wait till I hear it from someone other than her

Looks like PFF did a write-up about Rodgers's grade. https://www.profootballfocus.com/blog/2015/...negative-grade/ Basically, 1. They say not to automatically take any number that begins with a minus to mean "bad." They say it's really more like average when it's that near to zero. 2. His fumble cost him. 3. He threw multiple TDs to Randall Cobb that were basic out routes that Cobb turned into touchdowns. 4. He threw what should have been an interception for TD if not for a bad non-catch by the DB. Because Rodgers did his job badly on that play, he gets downgraded. So does the DB for dropping it.

QUOTE (bmags @ Sep 29, 2015 -> 09:45 AM) PFF seems to mainly function to confirm your biases when it shows it and ignoring everything else. PFF routinely rates Matt Forte as like, the worst Bears offensive player. Bill James said something to the effect that a given statistic isn't worthwhile if it doesn't surprise you sometimes. That doesn't mean every stat that is counterintuitive is automatically good, but the whole point of PFF is to give you information that isn't in the box score. You can't refute it with the box score. Their system could also be bad or wrong under certain circumstances or it's totally right and we aren't appreciating that Rodgers was carried by his teammates. I don't know.