StrangeSox

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Nov 9, 2007 -> 04:53 PM) Yea, the AMT has never been indexed for inflation. They're f***ing idiots, and none of them give a s***. Who's brilliant idea was it to leave that little bit out way back in the late 60's?

QUOTE(retro1983hat @ Nov 9, 2007 -> 12:07 PM) Ahh yes. Let's not pay the people that are teaching kids more money. Makes sense. Nearly every 211 teacher has a Master's Degree. Compare that with an Engineer who has been in their field for 20 years with a Master's Degree. I am sure they all make good money. I find it interesting that when people see what someone makes, they judge it by their own salary. Like how can anyone make more than me. They are just teachers. Imagine someone with knowledge in a specific subject, running an all seminar for adults in calculus, science, etc ...... They would make $100 an hour. Teachers deserve whatever they can get. Their job is far more important than some sales rep or auto worker. JMO. And, no, I am not a teacher. I'd agree with that entirely. Teachers, in general, are poorly compensated and they're one of the most important professions in the country. I still don't support them refusing to educate their students.

I hate teachers' strikes and those that participate in them. It just comes off as EXTREMELY selfish and makes it seem like they couldn't care less about those they're supposed to be educating, as long as they get their 20% raises.

QUOTE(Jenksismyb**** @ Nov 8, 2007 -> 04:50 PM) I'll take a stab - Would you understand if a loved one died in an incident where the US held someone who had the information that could have stopped the event, but couldn't because their hands were tied on how they could get information out of the suspect? - Depending on the "hands were tied." If water-boarding would have gotten the information out, then yes I would have been pissed. If the interrogation would have required the use of bamboo near the finger nails, than no. I think the whole torture issue is hysterical, only because of the context - a major argument is always that are enemies could use it against us. Well guess what, terrorists don't torture, they just chop off heads. I think its a bit naive to think that tortuturing Muhammed Ahkbar is really going to detter Muhammed Aekban from doing something bad to one of our troops. Of course torture is bad and should never be done, but no matter what techniques are used there's always going to be a thin line between acceptable and not acceptable. In the same situation as if the suspect were a non-citizen, should a request for legal representation be allowed, even if it potentially allows an attack to occur? - IMO no, unless the legal representation would be to stop an execution or something as serious. If you had the ability, could you represent that person knowing that your actions could allow that same potential attack to happen? - No. There's not way I could be impartial and represent them to the best of my ability. I've heard stories of guys who represent detainees at Guantanamo. They are torn daily helping people who literally pray for the death of all Americans. Would you protest to protect the speech rights of someone who was saying something that absolutely disgusted you to your core? What is the worst speech you could consciously protect? Sex? Religion? Pornography? Child Pornography? Unfortunately yes, though if I would try to create exceptions. For example the recent funeral protests. Some have argued it's their right to say it. I'm on the side that they're infringing on a private moment, even if they are technically on public land. IMO such a situation could create a limited and narrow exception to the general rule of free speech - at a cemetery, during a funeral. There's no long-term detriment to the right to speak freely. And I don't think its the words that are spoken mostly, it's in what context they are spoken. Would you allow your minor children to be exposed to any of the previous things to protect the freedoms of speech of others? Probably not no - I'm only 25 and don't plan on kids for another couple of years, but I'm already terrified of what my kids will be exposed to. I think this question would be answered solely on the factual setting. If the US had intelligence on where someone like an Osama Bin Laden what level certainty would they need before you would be OK with them launching an attack based on that intel? 50%? 75%? 100% What about if there were civilians around him that would probably die in said attack? How about if one of the civilians was a family member? No civilians - 50%, Civilians - 95%, unless we have firm evidence that he's got the only key to a nuke that's pointed towards Chicago (or any other American city). If my family member is present - I'd defer my decision to some other disinterested person, but obviously my answer would be 100% certain and even then there better not be an alternative. That sounds very reasonable, I and can agree to most of it. However, with regards to the bolded part: It won't stop Muhammed Aekban, who's already a fanatic, but it will tarnish America's image that much more for the millions of other Muhammeds who aren't yet radicalized. It seems like the cost-benefit ratio is way off on techniques like waterboarding, which sound horrible to most people and aren't even very effective at producing reliable intelligence.

QUOTE(watchtower41 @ Nov 8, 2007 -> 11:46 AM) Anybody hear Hunter this morning on Silvy and Waddle? Sure it may be a pep rally, especially considering the way Torii tends to run his mouth. Surprised this hadn't been mentioned yet, but he seems like he really wants to come here. He will be meeting with KW on Sunday, and wants to play for a big market like Chicago. He also mentioned that the Dodgers and Nationals seemed to be interested off the bat, but would like to finish his career with this contract. Has always loved to play at the Cell, knows he has hit well there, loves to play D in CF there, and mentioned the grass is true. (thank u Sodfather) Also stated that he has always been fond of Ozzie since he was young playing spring training through minor leagues, he's always made him laugh, and he'd really like to play for him someday... he is now just realizing that this might become a reality and "you never know" Silvy brought up the Jamie Burke incident, and Hunter said he actually got a couple death threats about that, but people joke about that with him all the time in Chicago now. He basically stated it was a gut reaction and a litt'l ghetto came out of him... but a good play nonetheless, just something Sox fans were obviosuly not happy with at the time. He would welcome coming to Chicago, he had a lot of family and freinds here, and is not scared of the way the media and fans treated Jacque Jones on the North Side. "We are two completely different people, I like to be out in the streets and be social." 5 years might be rough... but damnit, I want him. He also said that he cares more about winning and having fun than making the absolute top dollar at this point. He knows he's going to be very wealthy no matter where he goes, so he might as well have fun doing it. And he'll never play somewhere that he can't rob homeruns.

More bloodletting today, it looks like. Is major inflation on the way?

QUOTE(BigSqwert @ Nov 7, 2007 -> 02:27 PM) From everything I've read it's quite inefficient. It's not bad if you've got the right crops for it (Brazil has success with sugar cane), but its very inefficient with corn.

QUOTE(Gregory Pratt @ Nov 7, 2007 -> 05:56 PM) Here's a controversial statement: cheating is good. Getting caught is bad. Getting caught because your whiny former assistant, well, whined is embarrassing and bad but not necessarily a knock on you. That's what every Coach in the NFL understands: that's why the Ravens embarrassed Mangini the very next week. Ethics be damned!

QUOTE(mr_genius @ Nov 6, 2007 -> 11:22 PM) wouldn't want to participate in that study. "ok, we're gonna torture you for a while then you fill out this questionnaire. "

2007: The Year Chicago Sports Teams Fell Off A Cliff

QUOTE(Texsox @ Nov 6, 2007 -> 05:51 PM) If you were being tortured, wouldn't you make up anything to make it stop? While the reasons are compelling, the whole save a million lives kind of thing, but bottom line, the information at best gives a false sense of accuracy to someone's already formed idea. Study after study shows this to be true. Information gained under extreme duress is not even remotely reliable.

QUOTE(Shadows @ Nov 6, 2007 -> 01:55 PM) Yes, I don't know how many times I have to say this.. we can play basketball And yes, they are inferior because they are women.. hence why I KNOW that we could beat them You honestly think you and four of your buddies are more talented than professional basketball players? How many of you even sniffed a scholarship offer?

QUOTE(Shadows @ Nov 6, 2007 -> 12:55 AM) Im not just some guy who is spouting off claims.. I have a legit 5, not just a group of my buddies I just wrangled up.. One of the guys is 6'7 and glancing over their roster they don't even have a player to stop him alone.. also considering one of the other guys was one of our better players on our high school team and has good size himself.. As for the other three, I never played basketball in high school because football was my love, but we aren't just five guys who think we can walk out onto a court and beat anyone.. I love it when some guys, who are mediocore at best, think they could beat a team of professionals just because said professionals are (obviously inferior) women. You have one guy who is tall...great. Is he good at basketball? Can he handle the ball? Play great defense? Being "one of the better players" on a HS team isn't saying too much, either. Did he play in college? Get recruited at all? If not, he's not that great. It'd be a rout. As for the poll, I voted "no" because my friends and I all suck at basketball.

Saw the Darjeeling Limited. Not my favorite Wes Anderson film, but it was pretty good. Theater was empty though, maybe 5 people total on a Friday night.

Ty Cobb being a racist has nothing to do with Ty Cobb setting baseball records. Bonds has admitted to taking steroids unknowingly. I think that's BS and he knew 100%, but that's besides the point. He still gained an unfair competitive advantage. He still cheated.

QUOTE(29andPoplar @ Nov 4, 2007 -> 02:15 PM) Mackowiak was a better bat and the plan all along was to get him in there to shield Anderson from certain tough pitchers. It was not as if he was suddenly inserted in the lineup as soon as Anderson started hitting better. It was the plan all along. Should they have had a better CF candidate, absolutely yes. One could argue Mackowiak helped with the bat as much as he hurt defensively, but why get into that debate? You will have your pro-Anderson stance and I will have my Anderson is not a good player stance. That would be nice if it were true, as the Sox may have been playing in the '06 post-season. But it wasn't even close to true. Mack wasn't accomplishing much at the plate and was horrible in the field. For someone to argue that Mack helped with his bat as much as he hurt defensively, he would have had to hit about .350 with 20HR's in the 2nd half.

QUOTE(Felix @ Nov 4, 2007 -> 02:37 PM) I haven't seen the new episode yet, but I was told it was bad. It wasn't laugh-out-loud funny, but it was extremely-awkward funny. It reminded me of watching a Wes Anderson film or "the graduate."

Just heard on ESPN1000 that he's out for half the season next year.

QUOTE(NUKE @ Oct 31, 2007 -> 10:52 AM) With todays inventory report it shot right back up to those levels. Oil doesn't trade according to fundamentals, it trades based on speculation and fear and has done so for a long time now. The top economist from the Soros foundation said that the fundamentals indicate oil should be around $65.

QUOTE(Tony82087 @ Oct 30, 2007 -> 11:51 AM) Ya, thats exactly what the wants to do. Please. He is going to get paid a pretty good sum to have Foxsports weed out thousands of emails with decent questions, and will probably answer 7 or 8 softball type questions. The guy came off as a complete tool, and was not only being ripped apart be the MEDIA, but also the fans calling in. If I was Urlacher, I would be firing all my media relations personal, as they are doing a terrible job advising him on how to act. Urlacher's good buddy at Foxsports.com insisted that Urlacher wasn't getting a dime for this today.

QUOTE(Rex Hudler @ Oct 29, 2007 -> 11:01 PM) Forgive me for thinking the current status of "news" today blows. We don't really have news, we have rumors that spread at lightspeed. The 24-hour news cycle forces reporters to come up with stories and to jump on new information without much regard of its truth. Most people read a headline on the internet, hear something about it on tv and their friend talks about it and all of a sudden they are an expert on the situation, when in actuality they don't know s*** about it. Fact checking? Vetting information? In-depth reporting? Who need it!? It's all about 10-second sound bytes and "sources say" speculation and rumors! The way reporting should be! I agree with Rex that this is a non-story at this point.

QUOTE(Jenksismyb**** @ Oct 29, 2007 -> 10:20 AM) what did he say? Nothing. His answers to every question were: "Don't know" or "Maybe." Oh, but he'll be generous enough to answer some softball questions from fans on foxsports.com.

Anyone going to see QOTSA tonight?

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Oct 25, 2007 -> 02:35 PM) It depends on what exactly he is talking about... Is he talking about giving more to teachers, police, firefighters, social workers etc? How about professions like medicine which require a whole lot more college years, and leave the students with a huge pile of debt when they are done? If that is the case, what is so bad about that? With the low pays that lots of societitally beneficial positions have, there are chronic shortages in those areas (think teachers and nurses for example) what would be wrong with encouraging those nobel fields? Teachers and nurses are pretty clear-cut beneficial degrees. The problem comes in discouraging any field not viewed as "useful" by the government. Should we cut aid for fine arts? Sociology? Philosophy? Theoretical physics? Who determines what's useful, how useful they are, and how much money they get? As NSS pointed out, it would set up a permanent struggle for funding and defining these extremely large and subjective fields.

Romney wants to set federal student aid based on how useful your degree is to society. http://www.bostonherald.com/news/national/...ticleid=1038792 Seems like the worst idea, by far, from any of the candidates, and a lot of dumb s*** has been floated already. It would just result in colleges pumping out corporate drones and nothing more.