Rex Kickass

It's a serious of semi sci-fi books that are pretty funny. I think when the cheesiness that's inherent in the books anyway is lost in the movie, the movie will not be good.

QUOTE(santo=dorf @ Feb 20, 2005 -> 03:09 AM) That place sucks. Yesterday I had Papa Del's for dinner, then I got a slice at Bonnie Jean's with a ton of Red Peppers on it coming home from the bar. I'm a little scared that you were able to decipher this.

QUOTE(Cerbaho-WG @ Feb 19, 2005 -> 06:44 PM) Sam Watterson is obviously the problem here! As a reader of The Nation, this doesn't surprise me at all. But to Fox's defense, I don't recall seeing any ads for The Weekly Standard on CNN or MSNBC. But I haven't been watching much TV lately, so I might be wrong. If the Weekly Standard wanted to run ads on CNN - the network featuring the traitor Bob Novak and Lou Dobbs, I'm sure they'd have no problem. And considering MSNBC did put Michael Savage, Alan Keyes, Joe Scarborough and just tried to hire Tucker Carlson, I'd say there would be no problem there.

QUOTE(TheBigHurt35 @ Feb 19, 2005 -> 03:16 PM) I'm not. I'm blaming him for doing next to nothing after the attack that occurred only a month into his first term. After the Oklahoma City and Centennial Park bombings, Clinton allowed Janet Reno to stifle the FBI in their attempts to conduct wiretaps on suspected terrorists (something that they could already do with domestic organized crime members) under the guise of "protecting civil liberties." Airport security was also allowed to remain woefully inadequate. Clinton's "sanctions" against countries who did petroleum-related business with terrorist-aider Iran were a complete joke. Billy Boy put a "loophole" in that deal where he could executively decide to forego these sanctions when in it was in the country's "national interest" (a decision he made on his own). The result was that these sanctions were never implemented and countries like Russia, France, and Germany continued to do business with Iran. Clinton didn't even bother pressuring the Saudis into allowing the FBI to question the suspects in the Khobar Towers bombing (where over a hundred of our troops were murdered). Apparently the Saudis had something to hide... one of their own citizens (some guy named Osama bin Laden) was behind it. The Saudis simply asassinated the culprits so that the FBI couldn't get any damning information out of them. Clinton's actions towards fighting terrorism in the '90s were woefully inadequate. One can argue that other Presidents also ignored the issue but, by the mid-90s, all the signs pointing towards 9/11 were there. More should've been done. I actually agree with you on this one. The Israelis are certainly not without significant blame. As I've told you before, I have a Palestinian friend from Ramallah and know all-too-well the injustices committed by the Israeli army. Our government needs to take a more "fair and balanced" approach to dealing with both sides. Airport security remains woefully inadequate. 95% of air cargo flown out of our nation's airports remain uninspected. 95% of sea cargo enters our ports uninspected. Unfortunately what you forget about is in order for common sense measures to be taken to prevent crisis like 9/11, funding is necessary. The Republicans saw no reason to support Clinton's actions against terrorism in 1998 or 1999. The same party that refused to support increased funding for counter terror measures as late as September 10, 2001 when Don Rumsfeld said that a presidential veto would come down on a defense appropriations bill helping to create a missile shield program if money to increase counterterror operations were tacked on. There's plenty of blame to pass around. Maybe the worst of it comes around to a party that tried to handcuff a President's foreign policy because they were too busy trying to get him impeached for a blowjob.

QUOTE(TheBigHurt35 @ Feb 19, 2005 -> 03:26 PM) That's funny, then why did the Clinton Administration have to come to an "agreement" with North Korea all the way back in 1994? And why did this agreement involve "internationally-monitored containment and eventual rollback" of its nuclear capability (Washington Post, 10/19/94, p. A22) if they were 8 years away from having a weapon? Sounds to me like they were pretty damn close in '94. In late 2001, the CIA reported that North Korea had likely had one or two nuclear weapons back in the mid-1990s. Hell, they already had a functioning nuclear reactor way back in 1989! There are multiple ways to acquire a nuclear weapon. For the most part North Korea was not seriously in weapons production mode for the bulk of the rest of the Clinton administration. Part of our deal was to build nuclear reactors that could not be used for uranium enrichment, helping North Korea fill its peaceful uses for nuclear energy without allowing it to develop weaponry. However, because of a Republican Congress blocking implementation of the agreed framework, it never came to pass. The agreement with North Korea came in 1994 because the Korean peninsula was on the brink of war. If you want to blame the Clinton administration for doing nothing, you could. But at least the Clinton administration sought to actively engage the North Koreans and warm relations enough to slow the building of nuclear weaponry and reduce the chance of any offensive action on their part. The Bush administration has been actively ignoring the situation for nearly 3 years now and North Korea has now declared itself a nuclear state.

http://villagevoice.com/blogs/pressclipsex...fox_money_i.php

QUOTE(TheBigHurt35 @ Feb 19, 2005 -> 11:44 AM) Yeah, no kidding! Clinton did nothing after al Qaeda blew a five-story hole in the bottom of WTC Tower 1 in early '93 (he didn't even visit the site afterwards), so giving him "credit" for addressing terrorism is nothing short of laughable. And let's not forget how he allowed North Korea to run an underground (literally) nuke program under cover of the fake "agreement" bartered by Jimmy Carter, of all people. Clinton did a good job of balancing the budget and was instrumental in welfare reform, but he was more or less illiterate in the field of foreign policy. Agreed that Reagan and Bush probably should've done more, yet both had to deal with the Soviets. However, Reagan did bomb terrorist-enabler Ghadaffi into submission. Actually most political analysts with any expertise on the Korean peninsula that I have read have said that N Korea started its Uranium Enrichment program in earnest in 2001. The "Agreed Framework" that you malign was never actually ratified or funded because the Republican Congress blocked it over and over again. I'm not getting into the timeline of events between 1993-2001 in any great detail, but there was a massive investigation over how WTC bombing one happened. And it was done immediately. Our current president took nearly a year to agree to an investigation over the September 11th attacks and then stonewalled the commission for nearly a year, keeping it from doing its work on time.

Shut up, that's why!

Less filling! See, I had ten and I'm still thirsty!

That Bin Laden story is entirely an urban legend.

I can't see no damn rose.

I don't insult anyone's music tastes because mine have crystallized over the past few years. Sort of like an alcoholic who only drank fine wines and single malt whiskies for the last five years and now things rubbing alcohol is a suitable replacement. Pretty much anything works for me these days.

Man if I could have found one of those in pristine condition, I might have just bought it and moved in!

I think the reason is that since we have national elections, we ought to have a national election standard of who can and can not vote. If there is one standard applied equally to every federal level election, irregularities would be easier to find, police and avoid.

The mark of a good foreign policy is one that is able to identify future threats and pitfalls while dealing with the current tasks at hand. Many political scientists were already saying that Transglobal Terror would hit us eventually and that it would only be a matter of time. But we ignored it through the Reagan administration and the Bush administration and even partially through the Clinton administration (although, Clinton did awaken to the threat late in his presidency and begin to put together a strategy which was promptly shelved in late January 2001.) When the end result of not paying attention to the threat cost 3000 American lives in one day, there's no way to phrase it other than negative.

Just so you know. 49 states and the District of Columbia allow voting rights to be restored to ex-cons. 15 states have a specific process for it, and some of those states permanently disqualify specific people from be able to vote in their state again. Florida suspends all of your civil rights and you have to apply for them all, including your right to vote, after your sentence is completed. The only state in the Union that doesn't allow convicted felons to vote again is Alabama. The same state that rejected throwing out language that support segregationist policies in its state constitution last November. What the Democrats are asking for seems pretty simple. Create a national standard that does pretty much what 98% of the states in this country already do. Allow ex-cons to vote.

Our president was convicted of a DUI. He just nominated someone to a federal judge post who has been practicing law in Utah for the last four years without a license. He belongs to a party that recently ran a pardoned felon for Senate in Virginia. And a party who's newest Senator from Oklahoma admitted to sterilizing teenage girls without their consent as a doctor and billing Medicare/Medicaid for it. But somehow they're the ones to protect you from those voting criminals. Fair enough.

QUOTE(CubKilla @ Feb 18, 2005 -> 11:45 PM) They have the right to vote until they commit a felony and are convicted in a court of law. It is generally accepted that when you commit and are convicted of a FELONY, you have given up your right to elect the future law makers of America. Excuse me as a moderate if I don't shed a tear over the rights of burglars, armed robbers, child molesters, drunks that kill people other than themselves driving home from the bar, convicted murderers, gangbangers, etc., to vote. And, quite frankly, I wouldn't want to side myself with a party worried about the rights of felons over the issues concerning law-abiding citizens. So instead you side with a party that tried to refuse to hold its leadership responsible when they've been charged with a felony. Fair enough.

QUOTE(whitesoxfan13 @ Feb 18, 2005 -> 10:07 PM) Whatever you say. I have nothing against old school country, just not my cup of tea. "Real" is a subjective term. Country music has definitely evolved within the past 15 years, and the days of Conway Twitty are long gone. That doesn't mean that new country =/= real country. It's not meant to be an insult. I just don't think that "new country" deserves to be in the same genre as "old school c&w." Garth Brooks has more in common with P. Diddy than Johnny Cash.

Well, Democrats in this board seem to generally agree that all men are created equal - and should be given the right to vote, even if they are an ex-con. Republican in this board seem to generally agree that ex-cons are not equal and would rather deny them the rights that they have given to them as American citizens. Democrats here care about these Americans. The Republicans who have voiced their opions here don't. Sorry if it isn't sugarcoated enough for you.

QUOTE(TheBigHurt35 @ Feb 18, 2005 -> 10:30 PM) Why wouldn't they want to? At the very least, it'd keep organizations in their country from funding terrorist organizations. Or is the French government not concerned with fighting terrorism? This is classic French appease-the-enemy-and-hope-they'll-spare-Paris-when-they-try-to-take-over-the-world logic. It didn't work with Hitler and it won't work with al Qaeda/Hammas/Hezbollah. I agree that the French have undertaken some positive work in fighting terrorism within their own borders, but allowing France-based charities to fund Hezbollah is a big step backwards. Also agree that Imus is an asshat. Years of drug and alcohol abuse have clearly turned his brain into mush. Classic! Sometimes, the smartest move is to let them continue to fundraise. Watching the money rather than stopping it can be an incredibly effective mechanism to unravel the scope and players of a particular organization. I have no clue why Chirac won't put Hezbollah on the blacklist there. It may have something to do with the history of Israeli occupied Lebanon and the role that Hezbollah played to allow Lebanon a greater degree of self-determination - although Syrian influence is still rather overwhelming there. Oh and if you want a history lesson on democracy in the middle east, look at Lebanon. They had one, back before 1975. I'm not an expert on France's counter terror efforts at the present moment but I will say that they have been fairly aggressive towards it when it affects French nationals especially. I will also say that they have a much different take on how to fight the spectre of transglobal terror. I get the impression, they see it much more as a war on crime rather than a couple loosely affiliated networks of people out to do ill will. As a result Paris has been largely spared of mass scale terror attacks. They seemed to have learned their lessons, as well as the rest of Europe, in the 1980s when bombings were relatively commonplace. Terrorism is not a new phenomenon for France, Germany or many other European countries. They've been fighting this battle on a smaller scale for decades. You just didn't hear about it because the US put their heads in the sand for nearly thirty years. Only after TWA flights got hijacked and Pan Am flights blew up did we even consider the possibilities. And it took the death of 3000 Americans to wake us up to do more. Unfortunately the path we've blazed has been one of curtailing freedom without making long lasting steps to make terror more difficult.

QUOTE(TheBigHurt35 @ Feb 18, 2005 -> 10:36 PM) Not that I necessarily disagree, but then alcohol ads would have to be pulled as well. Why?

They oughta pull em off direct marketing though. I got a problem with the advertisement of prescription medication to mass markets. If you can't advertise tobacco, you shouldn't be able to advertise a product with a potential side effect of kidney failure if taken in recommended doses.

So lets be clear, you like watered down rock n roll. Not real Country and Western music.

They can still operate here on the blacklist. My guess is they can't do nearly as much undetected over there. In 2003, four Islamic clerics were held in a Paris jail for a couple weeks because they knew people that knew people that had terror ties. France pursues terrorists much more aggressively than you might imagine. But Chirac is still an asshat. And so's O'Reilly. And you can also throw in Don Imus. Cause I never liked him much.