NorthSideSox72

QUOTE (The Beast @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 04:09 PM) As someone who once was curious about the field of journalism, and believe in what NorthSideSox72 has said, what are you intending to do with your journalism degree? I found out that I hated reporting, designing, taking pictures, deadline pressure among other things. This is why I'm completing a degree in another field. OK, hold the phone. I wasn't saying bmags wouldn't like it - that wasn't my point. And, I have to ask... if you hated all those things, why did you choose Journalism at all?

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 05:08 PM) I think people are starting to figure out that we're screwed - this whole "recovery" is a gigantic, government caused bubble. Batten down the hatches. No, they've figured out two things. One, there is a recovery (as was priced in), but its not strong enough to build serious job-creating momentum. And two, the markets priced in a recovery such that they are priced out 2 years or so, which is way to far - so they are edging back.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 02:35 PM) So, instead of winning with players built for the Metrodome, they're instead stockpiling really good players and planning to win that way. I'd call that a good plan. I agree.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 02:16 PM) I am very interested to see M Knight out of his element. And I already like the dark tone of the movie in the commercials What movie is he directing? I've said before, I think he's a phenomenal director, and just needs to get away from his own writing for a while.

QUOTE (Thunderbolt @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 02:15 PM) I think the Hardy, Thome, and Hudson moves are an example that they're not comfortable relying on the Arena-Baseball mentality that carried them in the MetroDome. They're taking some great measures towards the future. Those help, no doubt. But the whole team has to make changes. 50% of their games will now be a different sort of game. I just think the chances of them thriving in that transition are low, even with some positive changes.

QUOTE (Thunderbolt @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 12:55 PM) Looks like the Hudson to the Twins deal is just about done. In other news, congrats go to the 2010 AL Central Champion Twins, either that or KW can get off his ass and make a damn move for a DH. Let's see how they do when they have to play baseball, instead of roller derby.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 02:07 PM) Great. First poll out. Good. I'm not exactly a Kirk fan, but I'd rather have his relatively moderate stances and professionalism, over someone who looks to me like they are exactly what has been ruining Congress for a while now. I think Kirk has a far greater chance of being something useful than Giannoulis does.

QUOTE (bmags @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 01:44 PM) Exactly, one thing that pissed me off to no end was I had to take 3 extra hours of ANYTHING (meaning 1000 level courses) because I had taken too many journalism classes. I was a journalism major. It was the stupidest s*** I've ever seen. When you get out into the full time working world, you will find why this is done. A lot of people end up going into a job that is not exactly what they thought they'd do while an undergrad. Its just what ends up happening. And a field like journalism, where the job market is so bad, that will be amplified. So, its important to get some diverse background while in school. In my view, it makes a ton of sense. If people are too specialized, they play themselves out of too many jobs, and it makes people less able to do something different.

QUOTE (Chet Kincaid @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 01:44 PM) Looks like the twins about to lock up Orlando Hudson. Should we be worried? Twins were already the biggest hurdle for the Sox in the division, so we should have been worried to begin with. I think the new stadium throws off their playing style, which will hurt them. I still think, even as currently tooled, that the Sox are in pole position. But not by much.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 4, 2010 -> 10:37 AM) World's First Light-Powered Circuit Created That is some cool stuff.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 3, 2010 -> 02:27 PM) The best part is following the link and reading all of the lobbyists who are running Obama's government. http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/lachlan-m...-lobbyists-top- This is among my top frustrations with Obama. Not only did he promise to keep certain rules intact regarding lobbyists, which he then broke over and over again... his administration is still touting their supposed work in this area. No, dude, you either lied through your teeth during the campaign, or you later realized it was impossible and are now lying through your teeth to make it look better. Either way, B.S.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Feb 3, 2010 -> 02:16 PM) Powell probably promoted it as a practical matter at the time, not because that's what he actually wanted. McCain is just being a hack... again. (everyone already knows this, just saying though) I believe he said at the time, the military wasn't yet ready for full acceptance. Basically, he saw it as a bridge policy. Now we've crossed the bridge.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 07:03 PM) Clearly defense spending isn't going anywhere, but there are costs that can be cut within the defense/security budget. You hear stories all the time about the Pentagon ordering up planes/weapons that are never going to be used. Absolute waste. Which Obama has proposed to cut, with the agreement of people at the Pentagon even, and the same Republicans in Congress complaining about government spending make a stink about it.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 02:41 PM) I'd like to open a business but I don't have enough capital and banks aren't lending to anyone. Politics aside, its never true that they aren't lending to ANYONE. Its just harder. It wouldn't hurt you to look into it, before being sure its not possible.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 11:42 AM) LINK Yeah, the AMT part is wrong as well, they already passed the patch. That article was truly garbage.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 11:38 AM) What are you waiting for? Good stuff. Just need to find time. Having a young kid makes that a bit difficult at times. So does having a wife who refuses to see violent films. I'll just have to buy it on Blu-Ray later.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 10:06 AM) LOL at the premature Drudge bait. Figures. As I pointed out, it contained at least a couple, and maybe many, factual errors. It was also highly slanted. It was basically an editorial piece.

I haven't seen Hurt Locker, but of the ones I've seen on that list, Up in the Air was the best.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 09:32 AM) If you make more than $250K I can't say I feel sorry for you. Problem is, if that article is right (which I am not sure of), the tax increases will effect people way below that as well.

QUOTE (Jenksismyb**** @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 09:28 AM) Well this is great. Good thing we increased our spending to record heights to "save" this awesome economy. Good thing we wasted tens of billions to auto companies that still went bankrupt. Good thing we bailed out the financial industry so they could hand out record bonuses. And good thing Obama continues to ignore his campaign promises. I'm going to enjoy paying more, how about you? http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100201/bs_nm/...t_backdoortaxes Hm. Seems odd, some articles are saying only the top two tiers of income tax (effecting those with income over 250k/family) are reverting (which is just fine as far as I'm concerned), but this one says the middle brackets are as well - not sure where the truth lies. And the cap gains increase is small enough to not have large effect on anyone other than huge investors, and the estate tax isn't something that effects many anyway. The thing that does alarm me in there (other than the middle bracket income tax increases, if that is true), is the massive increase in dividend taxes - from 15% to 39.6%. That is a MASSIVE jump, and will surely have a significant effect on the markets, and thus everyone's investments, including 401k's. That has danger written all over it. It also has a side effect of forcing slides in buy-and-hold stock trading and mutual funds, away from value-based names, to more speculative ones - thus making the markets far riskier and less stable. One thing in the article looks blatantly wrong - the removal of the $4,000 deduction for college tuition, which is being replaced by a much larger one, from the articles I read yesterday. I think they just missed the boat on that one. Anyone have any good confirmation on which income brackets are truly changing? Since there is conflicting information out there?

QUOTE (Soxy @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 09:25 AM) Unrelated: but those missionaries that tried to take those Haitian children make me really upset. Throw the book at them. I read an article recently about a lot of people having the best of intentions, but actually doing more harm than good - they go to Haiti unprepared without supplies, and end up having to use people's time and supplies that is meant for the Haitians. People just up and go, and then get there and say, OK, what can I do? Not helpful. But in this case, looks like they don't even fall into that category - looks like they were over the line and blatantly ignoring the law.

Manned mission to the moon sounds cool, but we just can't afford it right now. Its that simple, to me.

Its a pretty small issue really, who goes 1 versus 2. But the closer to the top you are, the more likely you are to get more starts in on the season. Therefore, it only makes sense to go with Peavy, both for getting him potentially an extra start, and also potentially for MB to have one less.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 07:54 AM) Mauer has had documented health problems for a long time now. That's why I specified lower body issues that are specific to catching. Fisk had knee issues. As I recall, Mauer has had back and wrist issues. Both those effect catching of course, but they'd also be serious detriments, if not more so, at 3B or 1B. That's the point I was making. Moving Mauer makes sense if they think catching, specifically, is causing health issues. Otherwise, at this stage in his career, it doesn't.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Feb 2, 2010 -> 08:03 AM) Natural Gas, yeah, I'll agree that's a core climate solution, and it will in the end likely be necessary to keep a few natural gas plants around even after shifting to 100% renewable to meet demand at times when the weather just doesn't cooperate. Saying "there's only so much of it installed" however is not an argument for why more can't be installed right now if we set our minds to it. In particular with wind, less so but still somewhat with solar, the lack of wind generation right now is directly related to the rapidly changing regulatory scheme at the national level here; one year there would be subsidies for wind development on par with what is there for fossil fuels, then the next year those subsidies would disappear, the companies would go bankrupt and all the employees would be out of work, then the next year the subsidies would reappear again but whole new companies would have to be created to make use of them. If we really put our minds to it and put money on the order of the stimulus plan into it, we could have a nearly-carbon-free electricity generation and distribution system within about 10 years based solely on the technology we have right now. Wind power generation domestically the last few years (between stimulus dollars and a non-hateful regulatory environment in 2009 and the fossil fuel price spikes from 2007-2008) has grown at over 40% a a year for the past several years. Solar, likewise. I'm not going to directly argue against nuclear. I will note a couple things; first, the U.S. government on its own subsidizes the nuclear industry to the tune of $1 billion a year in direct cash payouts because the government promised to find a place to store the waste and has yet to do so. Even with that subsidy, nuclear power keeps having a nasty habit of already being vastly more expensive per KWH than renewable or gas generation, because the startup costs are so giant. Here's an example; San Antonio keeps wanting to install 2 new nuclear reactors, but has so far balked because the costs keep going up ($20 billion/reactor and counting). They've proposed a 10% electricity rate hike before the things are even built/on line in order to pay for them. It's difficult to get an exact price per kwh out of the nuclear industry right now, but on average, the quoted rates wind up being 1.5 to 2x the current electricity rates for most of the U.S. Renewables typically can beat that easily. There is of course one way to get around this discussion entirely and to make it much, much clearer which way is the right way to go long term. Put a significant price on carbon, stabilize the regulatory environment for everything, cut out the oil and coal subsidies, and let things sort themselves out. I remember seeing a study, not too long ago, showing how if they took the $1.2T spent on the Iraq War, we could be energy independent within 10 years, and have a large swath of our energy be from sustainable sources as well. Does anyone really think that the Iraq War was worth more than that?