StrangeSox

QUOTE (Texsox @ Aug 11, 2008 -> 11:29 AM) Let's see, based on Filibuster debates, people driving 70, while stoned, are the safest drivers. 20% of the drivers, by your numbers, are following the law. Are they following the law because A. They have the capacity to follow the law, the other 80% cannot help themselves. B. They are more comfortable at those speeds. What I wrote. In Texas we have wide shoulders and people move over to the shoulder to allow faster cars to pass. On four lane highways, we move over again to allow cars to pass. Driving "friendly" as the bumper stickers say. I've never seen that in Illinois. In Illinois cars stop faster at 70 then 55 -- making it safer In Illinois drivers react quicker at 70 then 55 -- making it safer You are extraordinarily obtuse. I've provided some information that increasing speed limits to reasonable levels does not lead to more accidents or more serious injuries. Do you have anything showing why 55 MPH on all interstates is a good idea? It doesn't save gas, it doesn't save lives, and it wastes monumental amounts of time.

Some of these "great" camera systems have given people two red light tickets at the same time on opposite sides of a town. These are seriously, seriously flawed and it isn't easy to fight them. With the cameras, you're perceived guilty until you prove your innocence, and you can't exactly face your accuser in court.

He's got a really, really sweaty back in the picture.

QUOTE (Texsox @ Aug 11, 2008 -> 07:13 AM) Not implying that at all, I certainly do not speed 80% of the time. In Texas we drive friendly, and when a quicker car comes up behind, we'll move over and allow the person to pass, even on two lane roads. Our shoulders are extra wide to accomodate that. So I doubt that 80% of the drivers are speeding here. Any statistics to back that up? Again, source for those numbers? People have always sped. It doesn't make sense that there would be less speeders 15 years ago (during the nationwide 55 MPH) than now. Here's a NYT article about 70+% of people in NJ speeding 17 years ago. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html...752C0A967958260 Well, if the current law is good for nothing but revenue generation and doesn't do a damn thing to actually help people, why should it exist? What's the justification for current speed limits?

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Aug 11, 2008 -> 05:11 AM) What does that even mean? What happened? Over half of the field swam faster than the old World Record. The Americans broke it by close to 4 seconds.

Tex, you've really missed the point. Is a law a good law and a just law if it A) doesn't protect anyone and B) 80+% of people disobey it? We shouldn't just throw out laws/ limits/ restrictions because a majority of people don't follow them, but on the other hand, we do need to examine them to make sure they make sense. Since the only thing they're good for is increasing police revenue and wasting people's times, I don't see why we need or why there should be 55 MPH speed limits on most of the highways around Chicago. And, as far as "once they're used to 70 they'll drive faster," that has not been the case in the places with higher or no speed limits.

Just watched "The Sting" again this weekend. Newman is one of my favorite actors.

That opening ceremony was great. Sports start on NBC at 9 AM CST today.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 03:10 PM) I think you are missing part of my point here. What people "want" to drive should be irrelevant. A speed limit isn't arbitrary, its based on road factors. Just because people want to drive 70, doesn't mean they should. This is what I mean when I say the argument is hollow. You are basically saying that, because some people want to speed, the laws should change. I disagree. I think speed limits should be based on conditions, and if people speed, they should be penalized. That would change behavior, and eventually, most people would be "comfortable" at the lower speed. That all said, I do think that Illinois staying at 55 or 65 on open, rural highways is arbitrary, so I agree in that case the speed limits should change. On the open road, 75 seems very reasonable. You're right, I wasn't exactly clear. Road conditions (another major difference between US highways and the Autobahn!) definitely should be a major consideration. So also should the natural flow of traffic. If road conditions support 75 and traffic naturally wants to flow that high, there's no reason for limits to not be that high. I just wish that they'd actually complete and follow the traffic surveys they're supposed to do before setting arbitrary limits. I really took this thread on a tangent, so maybe it'd be better to move these posts into a separate thread? Edit: thanks. You can also re-title the thread "SS's crazy rants" if you want

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 02:58 PM) I think that argument is hollow. The face fact, that speed differentials cause problems, is certainly true. But to use that as an excuse to raise the speed limit makes no sense - people's "comfort" is based on habit. If people obeyed the speed limits for a while, they'd get comfortable with it.] Based on the evidence for everywhere that has had unrestricted or high speed limits, that simply is not true. People drive 70-75 in a 55 around Chicago because they want to go 75, not 20 MPH faster than the limit. Raise the limit to 65 and they wont' start going 80-85 or 90. Please explain how arbitrary limits set at 55 MPH save any lives or prevent any accidents. There are plenty of studies to the contrary. Just to be clear, I'm not advocating 70+ around Chicago, or no speed limits in rural areas. I don't drive very fast myself (60-65 in a 55) and don't have any tickets. I just want limits that make sense. 55MPH on the south part of the enw 355 extension makes zero sense. There's just no traffic and few exits/ entrances down there. Here's Purdue's: http://www.purdue.edu/uns/x/2008a/080623ManneringSpeed.html I'd agree that German driving laws and training are about thousand times better than over here. Still, it shows that higher speed limits don't cause more accidents.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 02:38 PM) Yeah, those numbers scream polluting factors to me. Its pretty clear that if cars are going faster, if all else is equal, there will be more fatalities and injuries. Its just physics. Unless there's less accidents because the flow of traffic is more uniform, which is exactly what happens. Also, the Purdue study says otherwise. This article references it. http://www.popsci.com/cars/article/2008-06/american-autobahn Speed differentials cause problems, not speed. Again, look at the autobahn. People don't drive with their foot to the floor. They drive at a "comfortable" speed, which, for most people, tends to be in the 70's or 80's. The traffic flows smoothly, everyone passes on the left, and there aren't huge issues.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 02:27 PM) But, that's being superimposed on a nationwide trend of fewer automobile fatalities stretching back decades as safety standards on automobiles have tightened up and other laws (DUI's, seatbelts) have been more stringently enforced. It was '95 (during 55 MPH) vs. '97 (post-55 MPH), not decades-long trends.

QUOTE (Flash Tizzle @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 12:44 PM) If someone had a gun onboard this may never have happened. Ha, no, in one of my undergraduate criminology courses there was a case study on an apartment complex where a sizable number of occupants (~15) witnessed the assault and eventual murder of a young woman. It occured at night, in a sparsley lit area. No one came out to help, and -- perhaps more astounding -- not one 911 call made during the time this crime took place. The overwhelming opinion of many was someone else would assist the woman or contact the authorities. What this suggested to me is, even physically distanced from a violent act such as this, people will think about their own well-being. I'm sure there are many more examples of people avoiding confrontation when, to someone observing from an outside perspective, more could have been done. In this circumstance, you have to ask yourself what is the most anyone could have hoped for? The attack was too sudden for anyone to anticipate it, so saving the victim is out of the question. Is it worth risking your life to fend off an attacker, in the closed confines of a greyhound bus, to save a corpse from being defiled? That's a really well-documented occurrence. People do just assume that someone else will help. When you have first-aid training, they heavily emphasize giving specific people a specific task. If you just say "someone call 911!" no one will.

QUOTE (Jake @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 10:54 AM) Agreed. However, I wasn't there, but it seems as if it would be difficult to know if he intended on being finished killing after the first kill. Which, again, is why they removed themselves from danger and barricaded him inside. Attacking him wasn't going to do anything at all, except maybe get another person stabbed. One victim was already dead and the attacker was more or less contained with no one else to attack. 9/11 analogies make no sense because there was no one else to protect. Everyone left the bus, and he wasn't about to drive the bus into someone or some thing. That's not at all like being trapped on a plane and realizing that they're going to plow it into a building.

QUOTE (bmags @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 11:39 AM) I'm fairly certain that when the national speed limit was 55 mph, they saw a dropoff in highway fatalities while a negligible decline in gas. First year only. After that, it was back to normal. And, when the national limit was repealed and 33 states increased their limit, fatalities went to record lows. http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=1205 Fuel savings were .5% to 1%. http://www.heritage.org/Research/SmartGrowth/bg532.cfm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Maximum_Speed_Law Look at the non-compliance section and tell me that these speed limits were safe and well-thought out. When well over half of people are driving faster, I really don't think you can say that the limits were set based on solid traffic flow studies instead of just arbitrary limits.

QUOTE (Texsox @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 09:52 AM) Changing laws because some people ignore them is an interesting concept. No, the concept is to change a law because it is ineffective, inefficient, and does not benefit the public. Some might, sure. When people are given high or no limits, they tend to settle on a speed in the 65-80 MPH range. Its not like everyone drives with their foot to the floor on the unrestricted parts of the Autobahn in Germany. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html...751C1A963958260 They just built a nice new extension for I-355. At night, you might not see another car for a few miles. Yet the limit is 55. Tell me on what world that makes sense. Why? There's no an inordinate amount of accidents and the accidents occur for the same reasons as on any other road - not paying attention, blowing red lights, drunks, etc. It's a nice fat revenue stream because they made bad laws and collect money instead of doing actual police work. Set it based on realistic traffic studies based on what speed the majority of drivers would choose to drive. That's how its supposed to be done, but rarely is.

QUOTE (Texsox @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 06:52 AM) Tough to argue against lower limits. Saves energy, saves lives. Not saying people will not try to argue, just saving that's a pretty solid argument on the other side. Energy, maybe (depends on where each car is most efficient -- some cars will get slightly higher MPH at a little higher speed due to gearing). Lives, no. Artificially low speed limits cause greater speed differentials on the highway since some people will drive at or near the limit and others will still go 10-15 MPH over. That creates a much more dangerous situation than everyone just cruising along at 70 MPH or so. http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/24/2442.asp http://www.popsci.com/cars/article/2008-06/american-autobahn We could lower them all the way to 40 MPH because some people say it "saves energy, saves lives." But its still an arbitrary limit and a nice, fat revenue stream for the police. I'm not talking about a rural highway. I'm talking about streets in the suburbs which are full of shops/ homes and see thousands of cars a day. They have the same speed limit as 3-lane, divided-by-concrete-barriers Interstates around Chicago.

Artificially/ arbitrarily/ retarded low speed limits + cameras = giant revenue stream. It's only a matter of time. I'd really like for the people that set speed limits to explain why the speed limits on three- or four-lane interstates is the same as a one-lane (each way) non-divided road. Or why people in Michigan and Indiana can drive 65 or 70, but we're apparently incapable of that around Chicago.

QUOTE (Jake @ Aug 8, 2008 -> 06:11 AM) No I'm with you here that the victim couldn't have been saved. However, fear or whatever you would have called I thought would have driven the passengers to get the guy under absolute control because just because he takes out one doesn't mean he's done. I would have hoped a group would have tied him to a seat and perhaps beat the s*** out of him. And how do you do that without putting yourself in great danger? If he was going after anyone he could slice at, it'd be a different scenario, but in this case, he was focused solely on the one guy. They all got off the bus and barricaded him in. He was essentially "under control" at that point and wasn't a threat to anyone else. And what do you restrain him with? Do you carry rope around with you, or rolls of duct tape?

QUOTE (LosMediasBlancas @ Aug 7, 2008 -> 10:55 PM) Try to save yourself, that's what you would do. He stabbed that kid how many times before he started taking him apart? That kid was done, there weren't gonna be any heroes. I'd be thankful that he decided to spend all of his time on that one kid instead of slashing a few other throats, including possibly mine. Don't they have the same kind of security screening to get on a bus as for a plane?? How the ef did he get a knife on the bus? ......and if he was able to saw through someone's neck bone, it couldn't have been a tiny swiss army knife on a key chain either. Think people will be dozing off on the bus any more? Nope. Something like that would be impossible with how Greyhound operates. There aren't mega-terminals like at airports. Many of the pick-ups and drop-offs are just in gas stations or parking lots. It's hard to screen everyone in that case. QUOTE (Jake @ Aug 7, 2008 -> 11:12 PM) I'll be honest, I'm fairly surprised the guy wasn't apprehended by the passengers. Maybe it's the Canada factor. What was it, 37 passengers? 5 of them against the one man and knife probably would have ended quickly and without additional harm. No way do I let that motherf*** go. They didn't let him go. They barricaded him in the bus and let police apprehend him. If they tried to do anything, someone else was bound to get stabbed. The only way someone should have confronted him is if they were carrying a concealed firearm. And, even in that case, the victim didn't really stand a chance no matter what happened.

Javy is not a good pitcher.

Here he is throwing out the first pitch before Game 2 of the 2005 ALCS

QUOTE (lostfan @ Aug 6, 2008 -> 10:21 AM) I don't have the answer to that question, hence the caveat. I scoff at people who think the environment isn't a big deal though and I ask them if they've ever been near somewhere that oil is being drilled, or a refinery (I have, overseas). If it's possible to drill without living in a Soviet-style industrial wasteland, I'm all for it. And if people that live in those areas are ok with turning their land into that, I guess I can't disagree with them either. Lemont has a big Citgo refinery. It smells bad sometimes if you're right next to it, but other than that it isn't bad. On the other hand, the old Texaco site down the street in Lockport was a Superfund site until recently.

http://www.obama-mccain.info/index-obama-mccain.php "unbiased" side-by-side comparison of both candidates. I put "unbiased" in quotes because I haven't thoroughly read through it to see if it really is.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7542507.stm Body parts in his pockets. I'm not sure how, but this story continues to get weirder.