Jenksismyhero

QUOTE (knightni @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 03:31 PM) The bottom line is, that Republicans are more concerned with removing ACA because it came from Obama, than they are about actually fixing the healthcare system. This is what's wrong with the bipartisan political system in this country. Nah, it's a fundamental disagreement about what government should provide and who should pay for it.

QUOTE (knightni @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 10:56 AM) In essence he was the Jackie Robinson of presidents. Bill Clinton was treated the same way by his opponents. As was Bush. As is every President. And frankly, Obama has been given serious passes for major f*** ups too, like the VA scandal (still ongoing!), Fast and Furious, Libya, the continuation of Gitmo and the drone program, etc. etc. Yeah, he had to deal with the birther nosense, and that's fair, but I think that's about the only race/religion specific crap he had to deal with.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 10:42 AM) Why are we going to war with China? Seems like a bad idea in my opinion. We're not. The economies of the world won't allow for it without some country taking a massive economic hit. Never say never, but it's hard to believe having a moron spout dumb things over social media would really escalate anything to that degree.

A buddy of mine bought an Oculus and I got to mess around with it this weekend. I can see the excitement for VR and where gaming is headed in the future, but I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed in it. He had a really nice computer running the thing, but the two games I played were graphically on par with the N64 or maybe ps1. It's definitely not close to being at current-gen level. The immersion is amazing. The controls were pretty intuitive. I never got sick and I was "in" for 30-40 minutes at a time. But I dunno, still a good 5 or more years away before I'd pull the trigger on a VR set. On of the biggest hurdles they're going to have to figure out is movement. I played a demo game that was stationary and allowed you to interact with objects while you stood in one position. That was awesome. I played another game that was more about exploring a world and killing zombies, so you had to travel around. The movement system was basically pointing to an area in front of you and then you teleported 5-10 feet ahead. If you wanted to turn around, you had to do an old school movement where you hit the joystick left or right twice, each moving your field of view 90 degrees. It was all very clumsy and frustrating. Shooting zombies as they ran towards you was awesome. But getting to them or running away from them was an awful experience. Also, the bigger problem is whether the Oculus/PSVR is really the future. You're so closed off. You can't talk with your friends or engage with anyone else. I think they need to make a set that can be closed off like that when you want it, but also have it be more open...more of an augmented reality. So you can hang out and interact in your real environment. Microsoft had a trailer for its VR and the NFL, where you could "throw" the game on a wall and view replays in a VR 3D display on your coffee table. That's where the real draw would come in. Not sure the strictly gaming thing will ever catch on.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 16, 2017 -> 10:16 AM) The thing that's still the most confusing to me is getting rid of all of that...to what end? What does the US possibly have to gain by blowing up many of its existing alliances in order to capitulate to a second-tier economic country run by an autocrat who isn't actually offering anything in return? If you follow his logic from the campaign (ha!) this is all positioning his administration to obtain better leverage/bargaining power when it comes to his later demands. I think with those military alliances he's looking to cut costs/get paid for our involvement, which in theory isn't a bad idea, but he's Trump so he goes about it in the absolute worst way possible. Also re: Russia, at least if we're going to war with China it'd be nice to have Russia as an ally. Problem is, who knows how long that alliance lasts, if it ever starts.

I was referring to the hearing room lights. And I was mostly kidding. I think it would be impossible to hack a single room of lights.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Jan 12, 2017 -> 04:54 PM) Hackers? If so, then that's a damning indictment on Obama's admn for allowing Russia to literally take control of our federal government's operations.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jan 12, 2017 -> 03:39 PM) Yup. Sitting by yourself drinking until the wee hours is usually a warning sign. I will say my weekends are much more productive. I still budget a day a month to go out and feel like s*** the next day, but thats about it. The summers are harder for me with golf and lake living and stuff, but I'm hoping I lose my appetite a bit for it. I drink probably 3-4 nights a week. 1-2 drinks max, with maybe 1 night a month where I go out and drink more. I just can't do hangovers anymore. It got to the point with kids that dealing with the following day, with the lack of sleep and feeling like ass for another 24 hours, just wasn't worth it. New Years this year my wife and I had a few drinks and made it to 12 and it felt like we cured cancer or something. It was a major achievement.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jan 12, 2017 -> 03:01 PM) So, nanny update. She'll be released next Thursday. Giving her two full weeks' worth of pay as a parting gift. The new one starts next Friday (had to give a week's notice). I went into my QuickPay activity just to see the recent trend to make myself feel better. In 11 of the 27 weeks since January (including tomorrow's payment) she has received less than full pay for various reasons. Now, some of the weeks included multiple absences (and two we entire weeks off 1 for vacation and 2 for bereavement). Holy s***, in 40% of the weeks in the last 6.5 months, we've had to figure out alternative childcare. BOOM we are making the right decision. Can't believe we put up with it for so long. Any excuse to miss work was taken, and we were too close to realize it. How did she take it?

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jan 12, 2017 -> 01:20 PM) So confession time. Today is day 52 of my sobriety. Some random combination of an always-brewing controlled alcoholism plus lots of nights where wife and kid were in bed nice and early had me drinking like a mad man. I came to a point where it just had to stop yay those days ago, and needless to say life is pretty good. Anyone else out there ever struggle with booze? I just always wanted 10 after I had one and kept finding reasons to have that one which led to the 10 and so on. While I was a high-performing gentleman prior to quitting drinking, I think I'm only now starting to realize the very real benefits of not drinking the massive amount of booze I was consuming on a most-of-the-time nightly basis. I'm pretty stoked. Anyway, likely TMI for an internet message board, but y'all's my peeps! Kudos man. 52 days is an amazing achievement.

Don't forget to buy worker's comp insurance (if they work more than 30 hrs/week, state law) and up your personal liability policy too just to cover yourself in case she trips/falls somewhere and breaks a bone.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 11, 2017 -> 02:46 PM) man, child care costs are outrageous. What's fun is when you start going to kids birthday parties, and you start talking to parents. It inevitably comes down to just b****ing about how much day care costs. I've had the same conversation probably 15 times over the last year. I know two dads that have 4 kids under the age of 7-8, each have 3 kids in day care at the moment. That's 55-60k/year. Just to take your kids somewhere to be watched for 8-9 hrs a day.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Jan 11, 2017 -> 02:43 PM) $95/day + $70/week to clean the house $545/week total Ugh, with cleaning too. That's a nice deal. Did you guys use one of those online listing sites to find her?

Out of curiosity, what do you guys pay for your nanny? We've got 2 kids, a 4.5 year old and a 7 month old. Debating #3 in the next year. We've been discussing the nanny route simply for the ease of travel - she can play taxi for the kids for school, daycare, practice, etc. We pay about 36k a year for 2 in daycare. I assume a nanny would be more but we haven't gotten that far. The convenience of the nanny has always been offset by the structure/school environment/socialization provided by the daycare.

QUOTE (joejoedairy @ Jan 11, 2017 -> 10:52 AM) Did anyone watch Taboo? I love Tom Hardy and FX has a pretty strong track record but I don't know if I'm ready to commit to this one. I added it to my list to get to eventually but the reviews have not been good. "Too far up it's own ass" seems to be the general consensus.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 11, 2017 -> 11:20 AM) It's pretty amazing that anyone could look at how Trump has conducted himself over the past two months, let alone the last few years, and think "Yes, this is good. This man is fit to be the President." What kills me are the people who think he's smart and a nice guy. Someone you'd want to grab a beer with. Like, Obama I would love to shoot the s*** with. I disagree with him on the vast majority of his policy positions, but as a person he seems like a very likeable dude. He's not someone i'm embarrassed to have as our representative. He doesn't say dumb things every time he opens his mouth. Trump is the complete opposite. The next 4 or god forbid 8 years are going to be an absolute s*** show. And what's funny is the economy will probably do well just because of the nature of the cycle so he will get praised for it.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Jan 11, 2017 -> 09:53 AM) There's nothing that makes your last claim inherently true, though. It's entirely possible for a political party to be worse than another political party on ethical and moral standards. Making that claim would let whatever major party was actually acting in unethical and immoral fashion get away with it because of silly, mindless "both sides!"-ism. edit: hell, there are right now legitimate concerns that rise up to the level of treason and being subserviant to foreign powers surrounding one party's President Elect. Maybe it's not an immutable fact, but it seems sort of easy to claim that one party is actually worse than the other right now, given who they nominated, elected and are rallying behind? The nature of the system makes it true. These are professional politicians/parties. They've sold their souls to be in the positions they are in. They have no morals or ethics. There are more likable figures than others, that's absolutely true, but all make decisions based on their own self interests, all are inconsistent in the positions they hold, and all make whatever promises or statements they think will get them elected. In the case of Trump, yes, he's abhorrent and certainly worse than anything the Dems have right now. But that's right now, in this moment, as the election just ended. I'm just over the "the GOP is so much better with scare tactics and getting dumb people to vote for them." Democrats play the same game (Wall Street! Racists! Homophobs!) to the same dumb voters.

Illinois with a chance to start 2-2 in the Big Ten with a win tonight. I honestly thought 0-4 was a possibility and 1-3 was likely. Sadly, the program has fallen so f***ing low, I would gladly take 2-2.

QUOTE (caulfield12 @ Jan 9, 2017 -> 07:28 PM) Right, it's 100% a perception/framing problem. The Republicans (more specifically, their corporate lobbyists) have been MUCH better at scaring people. We'll see how well the Dems can do in terms of their own scare tactics defending ObamaCare. If the GOP succeeds there, history has shown they'll overreach (see 1995-1996, or 2006) and try to privatize Social Security or Medicare/Medicaid and get slapped back down. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. I've read this line before. Most recently it was 2000, then again in 2004. Every time a Republican wins it's "oh because they scare dumb people the best!" That s*** is done by both parties. That's why our system sucks and is broken. For every "omg the gays are coming!" there's "omg they want to rally up every brown person and put them on a boat!" Trump has certainly made it easier to make the case, but it's still an idea (using fear) that's been around since our democracy was founded. No party is better than the other.

QUOTE (Leonard Zelig @ Jan 9, 2017 -> 10:23 AM) I mentioned that in post 11 of this thread. No comments. Lol, I was afraid of that but was too lazy to look back. Good recommendation! People really should check it out.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Jan 9, 2017 -> 09:15 AM) You simply cannot miss on 5 of 6 recruiting classes and keep your job. Bruce Weber begs to differ.

www.mydadwroteaporno.com Maybe the funniest podcast i've ever listened to. My wife and I were laughing out loud listening to the first few episodes on a car trip this weekend.

QUOTE (KagakuOtoko @ Jan 6, 2017 -> 12:17 PM) It's a big deal and it's disingenuous of him to think otherwise. Nah, it's really not. My wife and I are near that joint income range and an extra ~1600 bucks over the course of the year is not a huge deal in the grand scheme of our budget/financial plans. Would I like to have that money instead of paying that in taxes? Sure, absolutely. But it's not debilitating to my family's lifestyle. And if he's going to increase other tax incentives or credits, like child care credits, as he said he would, it ends up being a wash anyway. That doesn't mean I agree that a married couple making 225k/year should pay more than a married couple making 1.5 million a year. That's just dumb. And I've said before the right's protection of the rich in this country is nonsensical. I've always been a conservative, even a fiscal conservative, who isn't concerned with more taxes on the rich. I'm also not under the delusion that taxing the rich is going to solve our economic problems and I still think the middle class to lower upper class pays far too much. edit: and i guess more to the point, using someone making 130k/year or a family making 225k/year paying .05% of their annual salary more in taxes as the "victim" isn't going to win you many PR battles.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Jan 5, 2017 -> 03:58 PM) If they can get a Carmelo to NYY type of return for Jimmy, I will drive him to the airport. The moves that netted Denver three first round losses and three no playoff appearances in the 6 seasons since. No thanks.

QUOTE (Chisoxfn @ Jan 5, 2017 -> 03:50 PM) I never said the roster constructed was good and I don't recall saying we should go after Wade, I believe I touted that since we got Wade, I hope it is a sign that we can recruit and he can help us recruit. My view for things to work is we do need to get one, if not two, good size free agent signings over the course of the next two years (ideally, another one next season). But I also said we couldn't be a total dumpster fire this year, as that could really hurt the odds of signing a free agent. I do think it will be interesting to see what the Bulls do with some of the guys who probably aren't back next year (most notably Niko and potentially Taj) as they'll need to ensure they have cap space. The "Wade/Butler convince someone like Chris Paul to come as a FA next year" plan is a better option than "completely tank, get a couple of lottery picks that have a 10% shot at working out" plan. Do people not remember Elton Brand or Ron Artest or Darnel Fizer or Eddy Curry or Jay Williams or Captain Kirk or Ben Gordon? All lottery picks except for Artest (16). Brand has had the best career and was probably a franchise-worthy player, but the rest are good role players at best. None approached Jimmy's level. Why on Earth give up on that sure thing?