StrangeSox

4 Remaining Militants Tell OPB They Are Ready To Leave Refuge

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 28, 2016 -> 01:01 PM) Not the same thing. When presented with two choices, of course most will lean one way or the other. You seem to be conflating independent with moderate. Furthermore, if one has views that are, let's just say, 60% one party, 30% another and 10% not in line with either... that's an independent in my view. But if that person still votes for Party A 90% of the time because they more closely match their viewpoint, then for all intents and purposes they're no different than a self-identified Party A partisan if we're discussing openings for some 3rd party candidates.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 28, 2016 -> 12:35 PM) Because many are. Most independents reliably vote for one party or the other almost as much as self-identified partisans.

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Jan 28, 2016 -> 11:11 AM) I'm pretty sure Hillary gets to 270 in that situation. In most states, all you need to do is win the state to get all the electoral votes, and I think she wins enough. I also don't think Bloomberg even gets in the race unless it looks likely that Bernie is the Dem nominee. That's true. Cruz and Trump might end up splitting EV's, but I can't imagine what states Bloomberg would pull enough votes from Hillary to cause her to lose.

They're expecting it to travel to everywhere in the Americas except Chile and Canada (they don't have the carrier mosquitoes there).

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 28, 2016 -> 10:38 AM) This is true but also would be where we see the electoral college actually act as the electoral college where the electorates throw their votes. I guess if it led to the abolition of the EC, that'd at least be something positive. Otherwise, it'd probably just mean the Republican Congress chooses the Republican candidate for President, just like the Republican SCOTUS chose the Republican candidate in 2000. Wouldn't exactly scream "beacon of representative democracy."

Three or four candidates roughly splitting the votes means that nobody will reach 270, which means the House gets to elect the President. That sounds pretty awful to be honest.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Jan 28, 2016 -> 07:49 AM) Ammon Bundy told the remaining people to go home, we will see if they do Three more surrendered last night. It's not clear how many may be left at this point, but it can't be more than a few. They also have already gotten all of the kids out of their.

Here's the initial charging document: http://res.cloudinary.com/bdy4ger4/image/u...ndy1_kkivkn.pdf More charges will probably be added as they build their case, so it's hard to say what sort of sentence they're potentially looking at. If convicted, the federal judge also has the discretion to make the sentences run concurrently or consecutively, so the range is probably anywhere from ~5 years to dozens of years. I'd imagine there are various state laws that they could be charged with separately as well.

If the FBI's plan was to lure them into a sense of complacency and impunity, get the neighboring county's Sovereign Citizen-friendly sheriff to invite all of the leaders over, and then arrest them all at once leaving the people back at the refuge directionless right when the FBI starts with shows of force (MRAPs, flying black helicopters overhead), it seems pretty damn brilliant. Unfortunate that the tarp guy had to die rather than be arrested with the rest of them, and hopefully the rest of this wraps up without any more bloodshed, but it's nice to see something actually being done about this. FBI statement from this morning:

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 03:13 PM) By a DA who serves on the board of the PP that was in the video. No conflict of interest there. Actually, no! They were charged by a grand jury convened by a Republican DA at the request of a Republican governor. So, so far, every single planned parenthood affiliate that has been investigated has been cleared of any wrongdoing, and the only people found to have committed criminal acts were the people that put the videos together.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 12:50 PM) "patriot sympathizers" How is this possibly a title being applied. our political discourse is garbage, not sure why people actively touting armed insurrection and the theft of federal lands get called "patriots" here's what one of the roadblocks looks like: they also have BLACK HELICOPTERS at the Burn airport https://twitter.com/bethnakamura/status/692...src=twsrc%5Etfw

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 12:33 PM) The way it was taught to me was the exact opposite of this statement, that Lincoln was as far from radical reconstruction as possible, but I'll admit this is one I haven't followed. He wasn't a radical reconstructionist, but Johnson deliberately sabotaged it e.g. he opposed the 14th Amendment. It's a very low hurdle to clear.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 10:35 AM) But he would have had the entire south and every racist northerner gunning for him for four years. Sure, but the other option was what we ended up getting--Reconstruction starting strong and empowering black people both politically and economically before petering out and then about 80-90 years of white supremacist rule.

FBI tells Oregon refuge occupiers to leave as authorities set up roadblocks

The political spoils system was pretty dominant up through the Gilded Age. It wasn't until around the turn of the 20th century that the large-scale civil service reforms were put in place. Lincoln wouldn't have hanged every last one of the treasonous leaders of the Confederacy as should have been done, but I'm pretty confident that he would have pushed Reconstruction a lot harder than Johnson did.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 10:08 AM) Yeah, I look at this from the opposite perspective. I WISH I could negotiate the price of everything. My little brother tries this. It doesn't work always, but he does have success sometimes and as he says, "what's the harm in asking? the worst they do is say 'no.'"

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jan 26, 2016 -> 01:14 PM) Welp...picked up the car on Saturday (exactly as negotiated and thankfully extremely hassle free). So this time was a little different, since my other car wasn't operable, I didn't get to do my usual longer process to purchase (I enjoy going to auto shows, etc, to research all the different vehicles I'm deciding on and than ultimately conclude on what I'm going to pick). My first starting point was reading the various write-ups, looking at specs, going through the online brochures, etc. Understand pro's and con's of vehicles (roominess, turning radius, horsepower, MPG, etc). From there I than go to the various dealers based upon my write-ups, having came up with a prioritization based upon what I've seen, although my view is to go into the whole process with an open mind...in fact, when I started this process (before online research) I'd have pretty much guaranteed anyone I would have went with a 2016 Pilot EX-L with sensing or Highlander XLE. When I go to the dealer, I told every salesperson that came near me that I am looking at the cars, doing my research, and am not buying anything today under any circumstances. Helps ensure there guard is down and you can just enjoy looking at the cars, taking cars you want on a test drive, etc. Now given I'm not buying that day, I also tell salesman to help someone else if it is a potential buyer and ask them to open up some cars and really let me wander around. Than I take the cars on test drives, etc. Usually in this process, I'll ask the sales people questions, really to figure out if they know anything about the vehicle at all. If they pass my initial test questions (i.e., answer them truthfully), than I'll have them dig in and ask them other questions (as they have passed my smell test). From there I've usually narrowed things down, but want to sit on things for a little bit just to ensure that I'm 100% on my decision or have at least gotten to where it is one of a few cars. At that point, I focus on price to see what the various cars go for. I leveraged truecar and carguru to give me solid "ballpark" estimates of the actual price you'd pay for the vehicle and in this case, my finalist were three options...Pilot, Highlander or Sonata Hybrid. Absolutely loved all three vehicles (Note: My wife disallowed me from considering a minivan....too young for one...blah blah blah). Given our other vehicle is a 2012 Highlander, we had flexibility to go with a car and I happen to do a lot of city driving and have always though a hybrid might be fun (i.e., trying to get the best possible gas mileage during my daily commute gives me something to at least enjoy while sitting in bumper to bumper), but could never get the pricing to make financial sense. Anyway, given the difference between Sonata and the SUV's, I finally decided 100% to go with the car. Ultimately decided I'd rather save the cash for kids 529 or our next house downpayment. Now lets discuss actual pricing process. So I did a 4 process plan, 3 of which are extremely easy. I used Costco, TrueCar, and CarGuru to select the specific vehicle and put me in contact with select dealers in the network, who would than give me there initial pricing (knowing that TrueCar had rough data on what cars had sold for in my area, etc, esssentially giving me my ceiling...meaning I would never pay more than those prices). From there, I also contacted other dealers in the area (going to there websites and requesting quotes from there internet / fleet people). This all was done in a matter of an hour while watching the 1st round of the NFL playoffs from my couch. Over the next day or two, calls and emails would come. None of which I answered. I waited till I had the data (roughly 10 dealers or so) and than once I had the pricing, I gave each one of them a call up, indicated I was gathering pricing, finding out specifics (any differences in the car, hidden fees, exact options / packages, to make sure i had apple to apple basis). As I went through the process, I worked from the highest priced dealers to the lowest priced ones, telling the highest price dealers that they were much higher than my other offers . Some of them claimed other dealers were liars, but I gave each of them my simple pitch, every dealer I've asked, I told them my plan was to finalize my purchase price and pick up the car in a week, but if it didn't work and I didn't get my price, I had time (letting them know I'm a real customer and can be converted, but, don't think I don't have options). I also told them if anything differs one iota from what we discussed when I come in to buy, I'll immediately leave and put up a negative review on your yelp page. During this process, a few dealers that were fraudsters, you could tell, they'd waver, try to force you in, and I'd just tell them no, I'm not and for those dealers, I knew I was ultimately going to stay away, but to the extent they gave me better prices I leveraged them. I should point out, along the way, I always haircut what my lowest price was so that every dealer I called during my initial process got a slightly lower offer than my real offer. After the initial round, I had a pretty good idea of pricing and already knew a rough target price (thanks to TrueCar's data). From there, I waited another day or day and a half (as they were all calling back..again, let the initial calls sit) and than called back saying I was busy at work (which was true) and went through another round or two of discussing back and forth and narrowing price. I also had asked dealers what other benefits they had / could offer (free services, etc). At some point, once I got to where no dealer was moving or only one dealer would go (and they stopped trying to beta a price or refused), I knew I had hit my point and then figured I could at least get some free services out of the deal as well. I than had my preferred dealer the whole time (and I had told him he was that) and thankfully they beat the lowest price I had and after beating, no one else would touch the price (finally one company matched but I didn't care...once you get to where no other dealers are going there, you figure you have done pretty good). From a finance perspective, can't provide much feedback here, I despise the finance people like the plague (so much worse than salesmen) but I wasn't financing so I could give two craps. They gave there song and dance about the warranty and I wasn't interested (you can buy after, so if you want a warranty, don't do it when you are in the room, you can search the car forums and find a dealer who sells the factory extended warranties for practically cost). They also lied about the warranty and I called them on it. (like I said, in general, in the 5 or 6 times I've bought a car in my life, I've never not been lied to by the finance person....its disgusting how they try to screw people who don't understand how credit works or any of this thing works). Anyway, that was my process. If it seems like a lot of work, I honestly don't think I spent more than 2-3 hours (spread out over time...internet helps so much) from a pure negotiation perspective and a lot of it was while watching football. All the rest of my time was researching / checking out cars, which I enjoy. And at all points, I had the upper hand in the process and was never backed in a corner. Key concepts (while are fairly obvious), know what you want going in, understand what the right price is, and get multiple offers. Never buy on the spot without having done your diligence. You should also make sure you understand what incentives are out there (rebates, etc, as you want to make sure you get every penny you can get...also know the incentive expiration dates). Also, make sure you negotiate the price and you don't let anyone run your credit prior to reaching a total agreement (if you are financing, you know your credit situation going into things....they want to back you in that corner and run your credit for everything...but none of that crap is necessary...obviously you aren't going to quality for 1% interest if you have a 400 fico score, but if you have strong credit, you'll get whatever the best credit is and you should understand what your credit union is offering, etc, so you have a concept). Ended up paying about 24K for a car with an MSRP of 31,120. Oh and again, never go in and negotiate by monthly payment. You need to already know what you can afford, but if you go in and are focused on monthly payment, you are a hosed. The payment is just math, you focus on the cost of the vehicle. And if you lease, again, you focus on the cost of the vehicle and the money factor. As far as the car, given I was coming from driving the Highlander (and the Pilot before that), it has been a slight adjustment, but it drives really nice, is super quiet, and is very roomy. The whole hybrid thing is fun. I used to be into fast cars, but eventually decided those were worthless, cause you can't actually use the speed (unless you take it to the track), but the whole fuel efficient is kind of fun, cause you can actually try and drive and test your limits (all while helping your bottom line) and actually do that on the road. We'll see how long that lasts. Hopefully the car lasts a long time as my MO is to buy and own for a while (expect to hold onto this for 10+ years). My kid are lucky as it probably won't be quite old enough for them, that they'll probably end up with whatever we replace our Highlander with in 4 or 5 years. Over the next 4 or 5 years, instead of making a car payment, I just pay myself the funds, which are set aside for our next car. Ugh why does buying a car have to be so awful.

QUOTE (bmags @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 09:31 AM) I don't know about you guys, but this is pretty close to what I learned. Grant was a corrupt, ineffective president. Lincoln knew the country had to be magnanimous and Johnson continued Lincolns path (!) which is why he was so unpopular. That is seriously what I learned in a suburban high school in Illinois. The honors US history classes learned differently. But yeah, I specifically remember the teacher talking about the courage of the senator who voted not to impeach Johnson. It wasn't until college that I started to read more about Grant/Johnson and that being flipped. Yeah, the Dunning school was pretty dominant among historians for about a century, and then that stuff takes a while to trickle down to elementary school textbooks. There's been a lot of push back against that sort of (bad) history by historians like McPherson (Battle Cry of Freedom, probably best book on the Civil War) and Eric Foner (tons of great civil war/reconstruction books). I honestly don't recall what I learned back in high school except one passage about carpetbaggers, but "it was about States Rights!" and "Reconstruction was just so terrible!" were the dominant history taught throughout the country for a long, long time. IIRC Grant is still viewed as ineffective but not personally corrupt--his ineffectiveness let other corrupt people do what they wanted.

Hillary talking about Reconstruction in the south was pretty damn terrible Hillary Clinton Goes Back to the Dunning School Notably absent from it is the fact that Lincoln was killed by a white supremacist, that Johnson was a white supremacist who tried to curtail virtually all rights black people enjoyed, that the “hope” of white Southerners lay in the pillage of black labor, that this was accomplished through a century-long campaign of domestic terrorism, and that for most of that history the federal government looked the other way, while state and local governments were complicit. Yet until relatively recently, this self-serving version of history was dominant. It is almost certainly the version fed to Hillary Clinton during her school years, and possibly even as a college student. Hillary Clinton is no longer a college student. And the fact that a presidential candidate would imply that Jim Crow and Reconstruction were equal, that the era of lynching and white supremacist violence would have been prevented had that same violence not killed Lincoln, and that the violence was simply the result of rancor, the absence of a forgiving spirit, and an understandably “discouraged” South is chilling.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 27, 2016 -> 08:18 AM) So, they guy who kept saying he'd die to avoid jail, was shot and killed. The lesser Bundy brother was wounded. The Bundy brothers and six others arrested, for now on interference charges, which is light. And LOL at the Oregon assembly member tweeting out things she has no idea are true to make out someone to be a martyr. The pieces are finally moving. Blaine Cooper is still at the refuge with several other militia members and he's vowing to 'stand his ground' Grabbing most of the leaders when they were away from the compound was a smart move.

QUOTE (farmteam @ Jan 24, 2016 -> 11:09 PM) IIRC wasn't it a Snyder buddy who made the switch to Flint River water in the first place? Snyder had appointed an Emergency Manager to run Flint. Voters in Michigan had repealed the previous Emergency Manager law, but Snyder and the Republican legislature passed a repeal-proof version of the bill almost immediately after that.

Charges related to the videos were filed today. Against two of the people responsible for making the videos.

Leader of armed takeover at Oregon refuge meets with the FBI The FBI is allowing these clowns to freely come and go, destroy public and private property, and threaten the local community.

QUOTE (The Gooch @ Jan 22, 2016 -> 10:53 AM) Kratz also made a point after the documentary of saying that he was specifically requesting her. What he didn't mention was that she was the only Auto Trader photographer in Manitowac County. As for the separate trials, but I don't think the theories were that contradictory. Steven's trial didn't focus on Brendan's involvement, but were there other major differences? His closing statements in Steven's trial included (paraphrasing slightly) "only one man did this. one." They also dropped the false imprisonment and sexual assault/rape charges from Steven's trial.