Jenksismyhero

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 17, 2015 -> 12:03 PM) If your goal is to train people to fly, your problem is not with your training system when they are unable to fly. Witnessing an event and recalling that memory is not an impossibility. SOME specifics and SOME recollections might be faulty, not EVERYTHING that someone sees. Eye witness testimony can be unreliable and sometimes inaccurate. But not ALL eye witness testimony.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jun 17, 2015 -> 10:35 AM) I'd recommend the Animal Kingdom. I would think the 20 month old would enjoy animals a lot. I haven't taken my daughter (22 months) to the zoo yet, but she goes bonkers if we stop at a pet store, etc. We took her to the acquarium once and she loved it. Their animal kingdom is pretty cool and lots of animals to see (including like a "Disney" safari). Haven't been to Universal but if it is anything like the universal out in LA, I'd suggest you spend your time at the Disney parks vs. Universal. Very few rides at Animal Kingdom though. And while the safari is cool, that's really all a 20 month old will be able to do there. They have a Finding Nemo stage show that was good. And there's a dumbo-like dino ride. But that's about it. For the adults though, the roller coaster there is the best Disney offers.

QUOTE (SnB @ Jun 17, 2015 -> 10:31 AM) My folks won a free trip to Orlando and we're going this week w/ my 20 mo old. Any recommendations/must do's? Anything my toddler would really be interested in? Doing 1 day at magic kingdom and 1 day at universal. The rest will be relaxing at the resort. We did Disney last summer with our then-2 year old. He had a blast and it was great. Magic Kingdom has enough kid rides (the carousel, dumbo, little mermaid, peter pan, aladdin's carpets, maybe pirate of the Caribbean, people mover, etc). Make sure you utilize the fastpasses and the disney app for wait times. One issue you'll have is nap time. Luckily for us our son tired out in the middle of the day and took 1-2 hour naps in his stroller while the wifey and I rotated on roller coaster rides. And if your kid loves disney characters, try to get a character dining experience. Reservations are a must. Try to go through your resort desk if you can't get them online. The restaurant in the Beauty and the Beast area was good if you can't get in anywhere else. It's insanely busy and overpriced, but at Downtown Disney there's a dinosaur-themed restaurant that my son loved (https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/dining/downtown-disney/t-rex/). There's a "meteor shower" every 15 minutes or so and all the dinos (animatronic, and there are a lot) move around and roar. 20 month might be to young if he/she scares easily though. Reservations are also key or you'll wait forever. Never been to Universal. Seemed to be geared more towards adults than kids.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jun 17, 2015 -> 11:48 AM) "common sense" usually means "unsupported assertion/assumption" Who's going to take the time to do a study on that? Why don't you think that's a logical assumption? Cops are trained on how to deal with emergencies, are they not? They're trained on the best way to analyze situations as they come upon them and/or as they happen, are they not? You don't think it's a logical assumption that that training would make them better equipped in those situations than everyday Joe Schmo? I'm not talking 100% of the time, i'm talking generally. Let's put it this way, if cops aren't better, we have a serious issue with our training practices. They absolutely should be given that criminal convictions are predicated on their reports and recollections and testimony in court. That's a fundamental aspect of our judicial system.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 11, 2015 -> 05:18 PM) By that utilitarian (the greatest good for the greatest number) type of argument, almost any cop can justify not intervening in any particular situation to save one specific individual. But what if the guy was threatening EVERYONE in the whole subway car with his presence? Or, by not intervening (allowing the suspect to kill the heroic guy), everyone else was consequently put in danger as a result? Sounds like something that a bunch of insurance companies and lawyers developed to protect cities from civil litigation. It's most certainly a defense so that cities aren't sued daily for failing to act. Normally I'd agree with that in most situations. However in this case, I dunno. It's certainly willful and wanton behavior on his part. It's not like he failed to act by accident (e.g., not knowing the mad man was on the train, trying to help one person while another was hurt, etc.). If the guy can bring a suit and i'm on the jury, i'm finding against the city. And the cop should be fired immediately regardless.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 04:40 PM) Why is it fair to assume that? Repetitive stress can permanently affect your mind. I wouldn't be surprised if it makes you less reliable over time, but I'd say find out what the research says instead of blindly assuming. Because it's common sense and proven in every other area of life? When you do things repetitively, you tend to be better at them. Practice makes perfect and all that.

I'll go with "other."

I've watched the first two and it's so....corny. And not very accurate historically. I mean "things" that happened, happened, (the Alamo, Goliad, etc.) but the random people thrown in really throws it off. The New Orleans woman, Ray Liotta's character, etc. Also Paxton's southern accent is terrible.

QUOTE (Iwritecode @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 01:25 PM) No. They are just as human as us "normal" people. QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 01:36 PM) Memory actually becomes less reliable in tests during high-stress situations so it might even be that they're less reliable than a randomly chosen witness. Who is more likely to be accurate, the person that is in high stress situations frequently or the person who is doing it for the first time? I'm not saying that officers are going to be 100% accurate, but I think it's entirely fair to assume their ability to recall and restate facts accurately is better than your standard eye witness because of their experience. And again, they go through training on how to remain calm, keep an eye out, survey the scene, etc. Joe Schmo doesn't. Joe Schmo just happens to see something during his everyday life experience.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 01:08 PM) Unless I misread, you asked specifically if we apply the same standard of "witnesses being unreliable" to the cases where African Americans wind up dead while unarmed. My response is...yes we do. The problem is we apply that to the police officers and to the other witnesses too, whereas the people who want to justify killing whoever was killed cannot apply that standard to the police officer because then they'd have to admit that the police officer's testimony (given weeks later after coaching) is equally unreliable. That admission would then require a full investigation by some sort of independent prosecutor in many cases whose job it is to filter through conflicting testimony to come up with a narrative for what they believe happened based on the available evidence. That would be a much more troublesome situation than assuming the officer's testimony must be correct as is typically done. You don't think that cops have a better memory or a better ability to process memories than normal people? That's their job. They train for it and experience it everyday. Regular people don't.

Jesus, now being transracial is a thing? This country is becoming The Capitol from The Hunger Games. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/...today-show.html

QUOTE (Iwritecode @ Jun 16, 2015 -> 08:46 AM) Eye-witnesses are notoriously unreliable. I don't know about this particular case but a lot of them would pass a polygraph with flying colors because they truly don't believe they are lying. They honestly believe they saw something completely different than what really happened. The human mind/memory can be a messed up thing. 10 feet vs 3 feet in distance sure. Holding a flag harmlessly vs beating a cop no. That's just a straight up lie.

QUOTE (bigruss22 @ Jun 15, 2015 -> 04:05 PM) Did anyone else notice the raven hanging around Dany and Drogon? Bran watching the world. Can he do that? I thought he was limited to weirwood trees now?

QUOTE (Quinarvy @ Jun 14, 2015 -> 02:33 PM) I think he might get a max deal. Hard to tell. Not a lot of people think he's that great. He's kind of a dick on the court and in pressers. I definitely sports hate him, but I respect him off the court. Just on the court with the flopping, the whining, the dancing vs. the Bulls years ago, "not 1, not 2, not 3", mocking Dirk's illness, attacking the media, Rome wasn't built in one day, etc. He plays a very unlikable best player on the planet style of basketball. Probably the worst ever.

I'm confident if this guy had said something racist the same group would be 100% behind him, right?

I'm sure that hurt, but he us such a drama queen about everything.

QUOTE (Alpha Dog @ Jun 11, 2015 -> 04:45 PM) http://nypost.com/2013/01/27/city-says-cop...subdued-killer/ Go ahead and read that Greg. But you might want to sit down first. That's messed up.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Jun 11, 2015 -> 03:50 PM) These police incidents are causing riots which threatens my life and others. Wait til one of these hits in Chicago. Do you want looting all over downtown Chicago and Chicago itself? Lol, Greg, the king of overreaction.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jun 11, 2015 -> 09:23 AM) It's a great show -- on and off. The last season stretched reality a bit and had a rushed ending, but it was -- overall -- a really amazing police drama. Whenever McNulty checked out and made infrequent appearances throughout the show, I felt the show went from an amazing show to a boring, clumsy, plodding nightmare where I was simply wading through garbage until McNulty got interested again, and the second it happened, bam, the show was good again. Best characters in that show were Stringer, McNulty and Omar. Marlo is great too. I just finished my second rewatch a couple of weeks ago. I watched the show when it was airing. I watched them all again probably 6-7 years ago, and then I watched all 5 seasons slowly over the last few months. I've always maintained that season 1 was the best and season 2 was the worst, but for some reason I always gave season 5 a pass. This time around, i'd rank them as follows: Season 1 Season 3 Season 2 Season 4 --huge gap-- Season 5. Holy s*** what a terrible final season. The entire McNulty storyline was moronic. Really disappointing. The newspaper angle could have been handled better. Season 4 wasn't very good because it was mostly about the kids and the election with very little McNulty. Season 2 is actually not bad, not as bad as I remember anyway. I just hated Ziggy (and still do). Season 3 has the best ending. And season 1 is maybe the most perfect season of tv ever. Everything is so...crisp? I dunno the word. Ideas that are introduced in the first episode or two pay off in the last episode or two. The pacing is wonderful. The characters are great. It's a pure cop drama but without the network tv procedural crap bringing it down. My favorite scene in the whole show is Bunk and McNulty at a murder scene, saying nothing but the word "f***" as they figure out what happened.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jun 10, 2015 -> 11:12 AM) Why the bad guys are winning in Baltimore.... http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/10/us/baltimore...view/index.html Are you saying that sarcastically? Or do you think that's a legit reason crime is up?

QUOTE (ChiSox_Sonix @ Jun 10, 2015 -> 08:23 AM) The East was like 75 games under .500 vs the West this year. How were they over rated? The bottom is clearly better, but I still don't think the top was so far ahead of teams like Cleveland or a healthy Atlanta. Was Houston really that good? Memphis? Hell, even the Clippers? And now you have one of the supposed greatest teams ever losing 2-1 in the Finals to a team without its 2nd and 3rd best players, relying on stiffs like Mike Miller and James Jonse to make plays, and an undersized dude with an 800k salary making circus plays against the league's MVP. Was the West better than the East? Sure, absolutely. Vastly better to the point that we really need some massive conference realignment? I don't buy it.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 9, 2015 -> 06:20 PM) That's his police chief describing his actions while announcing his resignation. For actions that were "indefensible" this thread has a lot of defense. No political angle to this at all right?

QUOTE (Boogua @ Jun 9, 2015 -> 09:58 PM) How many teams have won a championship without an inside presence? The Warriors have nobody on their team that can get an easy basket right now. Nobody that they can just dump it down in the post to. This is the analytic guys' wet dream team too. I still say they were overrated, as was the West this season.

QUOTE (illinilaw08 @ Jun 9, 2015 -> 02:33 PM) Isn't this the crux of the issues we've seen played out in the media lately? A cop going too far with a non-compliant (and non-violent) person can end up with that person being seriously injured or dead. To me the fallout of all these incidents should be (1) body cameras for officers; and (2) a greater emphasis on non-lethal force with suspects. 1) The non-violent part really isn't relevant. If you have cause to arrest someone and they resist non-violently, at the end of the day you still have to effectuate the arrest. If all we had to do was resist peacefully and cops wouldn't be allowed to get physical, then everyone would resist and no one would be arrested. I still don't get the issue with Eric Garner in that respect. He was resisting arrest. Peacefully, yes, non-violently, yes, but he wasn't going to let them arrest him so the cops had to get physical. We can debate whether chokeholds should be used, but regardless there was going to be a physical altercation there because he resisted. 2) Body cameras would have done nothing here. We have video and we still differ on what is/is not acceptable behavior. 3) I don't have a problem with this as a general principle, but I'm going to give great deference to a cop in a situation that's playing out in seconds v. me analyzing the situation by watching a video at my desk. Yes, cops should be trained not to use lethal force if at all possible. Non-lethal force and/or protection should be taught more and more. Cops should also undergo "get that stick out of your ass" therapy. I wish it were 100 times easier to fire a cop for being an asshole and/or worthless. Nearly every single cop encounter i've had personally, the guy has always been a complete dick because they think they wield some awesome power. That's a problem. But I have friends who are cops in dangerous areas of the city. And I don't really want to go to a funeral one day because the guy was ordered to not protect himself over some fear of a PR backlash.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jun 9, 2015 -> 02:42 PM) Do people have a right to defend themselves from cops if the cop acts aggressive towards them and they have previously done nothing wrong? Depends on the context, but I'd say yes, you do. If you feel your life is being threatened. But if you rush a cop you're inviting a response. Much like the stand your ground laws, you can't invite the response and then claim you're a victim. It's just stupid to rush at a cop while he's trying to arrest someone. Doing so is not defending yourself, it's an assault and it opens you up to being shot.