Balta1701

QUOTE (Chicago White Sox @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 02:22 PM) I honestly wouldn't be surprised if smoking too much weed during the lockout has had some effect on him so far. I'm just not seeing anything physically wrong with him that would explain his problems this season. He's pretty much just the same Noah we saw last year post-hand-injury, except now Asik is playing better and so Noah's moving to the bench more often.

Iran has *Not* yet decided to undertake a program to build a nuclear bomb. That was the conclusion of the National Intelligence Estimate a few years ago, and it remains true today. They have infrastructure that could be developed to allow them to do so over a 3-5 year period, if they chose to do so. Just as has been the case for the last 15+ years. If they chose to do so, then 1 of 2 things will happen. Either the IAEA will come screaming out of there that Iran has begun producing weapons grade material, or Iran will kick the IAEA inspections out permanently (and they still might well start screaming that Iran is producing weapons grade material, just from other measurements). Until one of those 2 things happens, Iran is not developing a nuclear bomb.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 02:11 PM) The thing that really bothers me is that if someone goes on Welfare or UE, and they get a very low paying job, it works out worse for them than if they stay at home. I honestly don't know what the best solution to that is, but it is not a good model. Also, I agree with others that if a person is on UE, after some period, they should be required to do work FOR the government in some capacity. Part time would be best, so that they can continue their job search. Well, on point 1, yeah it's a problem, but as you admit, there's really no good solution there other than raising the minimum wage to the point where a person could live on it. Point 2, I'd think that's a great idea, but then again I want the government to build stuff anyway.

Anyone want to bet the extra C is supposed to be an R?

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 02:05 PM) Thornton having 4 blown saves last year is pretty amazing honestly. That means he blew one lead late, the entire rest of the season, after leaving the closers role. And what, at least 2 of those were directly, 100% caused by the existence of "Juan Pierre", right?

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 02:00 PM) I think that's hilarious. I sure as Hell don't. If what the video appears to show is actually what happened, American soldiers will die because of this.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 01:34 PM) The most reliable setup man in the league might blow what, 3 games a year? You Put Rivera in the 8th inning and he'll still blow 2-3 games a year. However, he won't get any opportunities to close. Thus, his blown save total will be 3, and his total chances will be maybe 4-5, thus he'll have blown 60% of his save opportunities. This is the reason why you simply cannot use blown saves to evaluate a middle reliever. They get credited with a blown save if they lose the lead, but do not get credited with the save if someone else finishes the game. I will give a more concrete example. In 2003, Brad Lidge was a Setup Man for Billy Wagner. It was his first full season. He had 1 opportunity to actually close a game. He got that save. However, that season, his save %age was 17%. He blew 5 saves. Those 5 blown saves were games where he came in to pitch the 7th or 8th inning with a lead of 3 runs or fewer (he pitched in 78 games that year, so he did that a lot) and he lost the lead for whatever reason. 17% was his save percentage. The next year, he took over as closer. In 2004-2005, he saved 71 games, had an ERA of 2.05, and a save %age of 90%.

Meanwhile, I guess we're going to have to await an investigation on this. Because it really doesn't look that good.

I'd like to point out...the New York Times public editor actually wrote this. And treated it as if it were an open question. This is not something from the Onion.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 01:34 PM) Could a minority party hold things up in committee still? Obviously, if there's a D in the WH and an R Senate, they can just vote his appointments no if they so choose. There's political and philosophical reasons not to, but they could. But when there's a minority with 40-45 seats, could they really hold up nominees like that? It also seems like giving the Senate a bit of a pass by pointing out how many more people they need to confirm. It's not like it's just taking them a long time to vet and confirm, they're completely stopping the process. Absolutely. A single Senator can pretty much shut down the Senate if he or she chooses to do so. If one Senator makes it clear they will not let a candidate come up for a vote, that candidate will not come up for a vote any time in the near future.

QUOTE (sunofgold @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 01:27 PM) That is true. However, if you are blowing saves as a setup man, why should I believe that you won't blow saves as a closer? Actually, I take back my statement to see Crain as a closer candidate. His career stats for saves is even worse than Thornton. Wow, Addison Reed is our only real closer option. The most reliable setup man in the league might blow what, 3 games a year? You Put Rivera in the 8th inning and he'll still blow 2-3 games a year. However, he won't get any opportunities to close. Thus, his blown save total will be 3, and his total chances will be maybe 4-5, thus he'll have blown 60% of his save opportunities. This is the reason why you simply cannot use blown saves to evaluate a middle reliever. They get credited with a blown save if they lose the lead, but do not get credited with the save if someone else finishes the game.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 01:22 PM) Right, you don't want to remove or cripple the Senate's ability to actually advise and consent on a nominee. At the same time, something is clearly broken when a minority can refuse to confirm any nominee until substantial legislative changes to the department are made. Maybe the long-needed reformation of filibuster rules would be all that's needed. No, because the Senate can still delay the process of bringing guys through committee. The real problem is that under Kennedy, there were about 300 positions requiring Senate approval. Now there are about 1200. It's not just the directors, there are literally over a thousand everyday positions that require Senatorial consent. On top of that, there are about 3000 officer positions in the military which also require Congressional approval. There's just too much there for the Senate. Everyone realizes it, but it can't even get moved forwards when the 9/11 commission says "Streamline the process for this because it contributed directly to the worst terror attack on U.S. soil". Even bills to reform the process only do so piecemeal. The Senate likes it this way, and they're not giving that up.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 01:14 PM) http://espn.go.com/chicago/nba/story/_/id/...lls-joakim-noah Scoop Jackson taking Joakim to task Good. Somebody needs to.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 12:31 PM) This is the slippery slope argument, and it does have merit. Where do you draw the line? My personal view is, the drug testing for welfare may make sense on the surface, but the cost would be massive. I'd rather see tougher guidelines (and just plain better ones) on how working and striving towards working come into play, and let the private businesses who hire people sort out whether or not they care about drug testing. But that is just my view. Just out of curiosity...How do you think the current rules for job-hunting while on unemployment are inadequate?

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 01:09 PM) Does anyone have a good proposal for reforming this sort of Congressional sham of refusing to advise and consent on Executive appointments (yes, it goes both ways)? The few I've seen raise significant problems of their own and limit the ability of the Senate to actually advise and consent. Any proposal that would actually be effective seems to me to involve Congress giving up a substantial fraction of their power in order to make the executive branch run more smoothly. I can't foresee any case where that will happen.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 10:52 AM) Just want to interject here, mostly at Balta... Iran Iraq. Two very different circumstances. Yeah. Military action against Iran is a lot riskier and much more foolish.

New U.S. intelligence assessment on Afghanistan. Basically reads...not a **** thing has changed since the last one.

Newt's 1/2 hour anti-Mittens attack ad is now on the Youtubes.

Link. Having the guy in the press box but not listing him as a guest? That seems...odd.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 10:10 AM) I'm glad you are 100% convinced we know everything about what is going on in every square mile of Iran. I'm not. You're the one who always uses the Bonds analogy about being willing to cheat at one point, and assuming they are willing to cheat more. That would be a reasonable assumption had I not been able to fire back the mountains of evidence that the inspectors actually worked incredibly well in Iraq and North Korea. The NPT framework worked perfectly. North Korea was able to develop technology that it never deployed, in conjunction with the Khan network. They then built a bomb once they withdrew from the NPT, and the international community was able to sit around knowing that the plutonium reprocessing was happening almost to the day. The inspections in Iraq worked wonderfully, and the cost in lives and treasure from when we decided not to believe that is catastrophic.

Headline that got an 8:30 a.m. snicker out of me.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 10:00 AM) Well all except for when countries hide facilities away from inspectors. Which, I already noted, Iran has in fact done...but the IAEA has managed to get into those facilities (the key one was in fact revealed when the Khan network was taken apart), and again verified that there has not been production of any weapons grade highly enriched material. Going past what the place they just opened is designed to do...that's the point of no return. But it's a point that Iran hasn't crossed yet, it's a point which they know will provoke a military response, and it's a point that will go screaming to the IAEA when it happens.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 10:00 AM) I was talking about youngsters in their first (playable) years in the NBA. CP3 obviously already had a defined game. But there's still plenty of damage that can be done.

QUOTE (Felix @ Jan 12, 2012 -> 09:57 AM) Very true. But why wouldn't he try to develop an actual post game as a young post player BEFORE trying to expand his range to the three point line? It's mindboggling. Because the only thing that contracting VDN makes him do is make whatever incredibly athletic play is available to him. Since there's no structure or coaching whatsoever in a system suffering from VDN, Griffin just does whatever seems right to him at the time.