Jenksismyhero

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 03:07 PM) If his son didn't take over, the place would collapse into chaos. Honestly though, assume that happens and for 5 years there is chaos. That would be approximately a gazillion times better than what they have now. Though I suspect that the global community could come in, or even locally South Korea could come in, and keep things steady while they figure it out. Again, absent Kim Jong Il and some military supporters, I don't think there's much animosity towards the south or the rest of the world. Of course that's me making a huge assumption. Maybe they truly do believe the crap he's been brainwashing them with for decades.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 01:26 PM) The problem with taking him out is that, if the people truly do believe he's some sort of deity or something, then they're not going to take very kindly to the people that did it. Seemed to me that most of that was out of fear, not love or admiration. I'm sure he has some followers in the military, but not anywhere else. The bigger problem is what to do with China and Russia. You'd basically have to get their approval before doing anything.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 01:32 PM) Hector "Tio" Salamanca on Twitter Lol, that's awesome

I think the Big Ten is going to be interesting this year. Lots and lots of questions for a pretty mediocre conference. Ohio State is clearly ahead of everyone else. Wisconsin will be solid again. Michigan State is a wild card, same with Illinois. Not really sold on Michigan. I felt like a lot of the big games they won last year came at the perfect time. Purdue is going to depend on Hummel's health, though I wonder how good that team can be with him as their best player. He doesn't have JJ and EM to spell him from bad stretches. The rest of the conference is pretty meh.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 01:00 PM) "We have a f***ing coach. Go away." "No need to curse. I find that anger is the enemy of instruction."

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 12:48 PM) Yeah I saw that. It's really crazy. It's a total authoritarian nightmare. "1984" playing out for real.

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 12:52 PM) There was a similar NatGeo documentary following a doctor giving cataract surgery and teaching NK's doctors on how to perform it. Malnutrition is rampant and many people get them at a young age. Ha, yeah.

QUOTE (GoSox05 @ Oct 28, 2011 -> 12:41 PM) I'm suprised Kim Jong-il didn't just invite them people back and then kill them. I wonder how far off a country like North Korea is from revolution. I think they have a while. He's got that country on lock down. I just watched a NatGeo documentary about NK with Lisa Ling from 2007. It was amazing the amount of brainwashing/fear those people have for him. The entire documentary was "covering" an eye doctor's treatment of thousands of north koreans suffering from cataracts. There's a scene where the bandages of various people are removed in a big group setting. The first thing these people do after getting their eye sight back is to rush over to a picture of Kim Jong-Il (which is everywhere, including everyone's home) and start praising him. Just screaming and crying out of love for the guy. It was incredibly disturbing. If there was a way to assassinate the entire leadership of NK in one swift move, i would be all for it.

QUOTE (fathom @ Oct 27, 2011 -> 09:03 PM) I still have no idea what is supposed to be interesting/funny about James Spader character on The Office. Can't believe how terrible the casting decisions were of him and Ashton Kutcher on Two and a Half Men. After last nights episode I'm officially done with The Office. I can't believe the writers f***ed up so bad. I get that Michael Scott is not a replaceable character, but there are strong enough secondary characters to make a decent show (See: Parks and Rec). But EVERY episode has been the exact same. Andy is worried about X event. Spader comes in as some terrible soothsayer supervisor, Andy continues to be worried, the rest of the gang does something uninteresting, Andy freaks out more, Spader reassures him, end episode. Not a single funny joke in the entire half hour. f***ing terrible.

I'm very curious to see how they're going to fit an 82 game schedule in. Honestly I'd prefer it if they dropped to 62, give everyone an extra 2 weeks of camp, a week of exhibition games, and then start the season. The first few weeks of this "regular" season are going to be brutal.

I'm finding it odd that people are concerning themselves with rebel justice when they killed a guy that was straight up bombing civilians to quash a rebellion against him. Are they really expected to take him alive and hold him to a trial and trust that the "leaders" of the country couldn't be swayed or bought to let him free?

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Oct 27, 2011 -> 11:15 AM) Iraq produces ~ 33% more oil than Libya, not 100%. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_count..._oil_production As an isolated move, Iraq stopping oil production could be compensated for, since oil production was depressed for years after the invasion. http://www.indexmundi.com/energy.aspx?coun...raph=production http://warandpeaceinthemiddleeast.com/2011...oil-production/ According to this Iraq is up to 2.9 million, and I assumed Libya was still around 1.7, so "about" two times as much. And yes, Iraq stopping production COULD be compensated for, but look at recent examples with Egypt and Libya. It's down now, but 6 months ago oil prices were going up, up, up because of the fear of that lost production.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 27, 2011 -> 10:56 AM) I'd argue the opposite. On the list of countries that posed a threat to the US at the time that war started, Iraq wouldn't have cracked the Top 10. Neither would Libya though. There were very few benefits of invading Iraq. The main goal of BushCo in that war was two-fold... 1. to bring the War on Terror to a central location to be fought militarily, and they realized that Afghanistan wasn't going to work well enough that way. And 2. The neo-con idea that they could somehow change the terrain in the Middle East by creating a nexus of democracy in action. #1 didn't really work, since AQ and other groups still operated all over the globe, and in fact were simply given more reason to exist in Iraq. And #2 is a disgusting example of the OPPOSITE of what conservatives are supposed to stand for... plus it didn't work either, because they had no plan for state building, so after 10 years you might maybe have a Democratic Iraq, but that certainly hasn't caused anything positive in the region. I just said you could make the argument, didn't say it would be a good one Though I do think that since Iraq produces about 2 times the the amount of oil per day as Libya, with a much higher overall capacity, Saddam could have inflicted some massive economic damage if still in power. Obviously that was not as big of a danger in 2001 as it is today, but i'd imagine defending those oil fields was an objective and an important consideration for the future.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 06:24 PM) Comparing Iraq to Libya is just... lazy. It's not comparing bad to worse, it's more like comparing Wasilla to New York City. I didn't agree with intervening in Libya and I'm not going to hypocritically pretend like I supported it the whole time now that it's been a successful operation, but terms of time, cost, and resources, Iraq was several orders of magnitude bigger than Libya. Iraq took over 8 years, took 3000+ American lives and far more than that permanently disabled, overall cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and had strategic consequences that would take too long to detail here, whereas Libya took a few months, took 0 US lives, and cost like a billion dollars. Also the US did almost everything in Iraq alone with the Brits helping out as much as they could and others lending token help while Libya had the French and British doing a lot of the heavy lifting. Of course you could argue the long term benefits and specifically the particular interests of the West in Iraq were much, much larger.

QUOTE (Steve9347 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 12:21 PM) A source has reportedly told Ken Berger of CBSSports.com that the owners and players are "inching closer to a deal." Meanwhile, a source tells Sam Amico of FOX Sports Ohio that the two sides "are very determined. They're close." We've seen signs of optimism before only to have them squashed, but we'll be watching the aftermath of Wednesday's meeting very closely in hopes that something positive will come out of it.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 11:45 AM) I also love that Paul Allen is on the list of small market owners griping about unacceptable annual losses when he's worth more than the rest of the list put together. Seriously, he could probably cover the losses from money he finds in his couch. How many years worth of losses would it take to equal what he spent on that massive yacht of his? The biggest problem is not that the players are paid too much, the biggest problem is that the money is handed out in an extremely stupid manner. Instead of Lebron or Wade getting $25 mil, you have players that make no real impact on the team's success making $7 million-plus. Just look at the Bobcats; Corey Maggette, Boris Diaw, Tyrus Thomas and Desagana Diop will make a combined $33 million for a team that might not win 20 games. You can maybe handle one deal like that, but not four, and someone like Antawn Jamison getting $15 mil is just as painful. THAT is your main problem. The middle class of players (for these purposes that will be defined as everyone between $7 mil in salary and the top-20 players) are consistently getting about $4 mil more than they should. I love the idea that Mark Cuban may/may not have suggested: get rid of the salary cap but have a super-high tax at certain levels. That way the respective teams can spend what they want to spend, player movement will be a bit more fluid, and a fair amount of money will get funneled to the bottom tier teams. It seems to work reasonably well in baseball: the awful contracts are mostly grouped on major market teams that can absorb them more easily. Of course it would work even better if they simply contracted a few of the teams that can't turn a profit anyways, but the NBA will never admit defeat like that. I thought they've made it known that contraction is an option they're willing to negotiate? Maybe that was just a talking point though. BTW anyone listen to Billy Hunter on Simmons' podcast? At the beginning he comes off really good and states a decent case. But the longer I listened the more his arguments seemed really strained. But he did say some interesting things, like the fact that Stern approached him years ago to extend the deal with a percent drop in BRI every year (probably the best solution), but the players said no. Also Hunter said the players are willing to do a short-term deal of a couple of years with an opt out for the owners if things aren't working (what Simmons' has been advocating - split all difference right in the middle for 2 years while you continue working out the long-term issues). but the owners balked. Both sides are spinning so much bulls*** though it's hard to tell who's telling the truth. What kills me is that it sounds like they were pretty close to a deal but the BRI thing was obviously getting in the way. The players wanted 53% or so, but owners wanted 50/50 minimum. I thought Hunter said that equates to about 170 million a year difference. Which is the amount of money the players are losing every week that they aren't playing. So by Christmas they'll have lost more money by not playing than a 50/50 split on the BRI would have gotten them over the course of this next deal. Again, who knows if that's all true or if that's someone fudging the numbers in their favor.

QUOTE (illinilaw08 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 10:07 AM) http://www.ed.gov/blog/2011/10/ed-working-...t-loan-website/ Department of Education's "Everything is Ok!" statement about the new site. Good to read if you are planning to use the new Direct Loans site. Some very, very angry comments in the comments section. I guess I should consider myself lucky that I can access the site at all.

QUOTE (illinilaw08 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 09:56 AM) Yes. It is terrible. I was on automatic withdrawal and it took them until after my payment was due to update (fortunately, I did my homework ahead of time - the DOE said that all payments will be retroactivley applied to the date it should have been pulled). Most concerning to me, however, is that they haven't pulled your payment history from the old site. I assume that this will happen eventually, but it's disconcerting that those records could have been lost (note, that I am hopeful that those records will eventually make their way over to the new site). Poor job by Direct Loans. Yeah I had the same issue. 2-3 days past my due date the loans for both me and my wife had not yet been deducted. Then they eventually did. And yes, it's incredibly s***ty that my payment history is now one payment from this month.

QUOTE (NorthSideSox72 @ Oct 26, 2011 -> 09:31 AM) If you know your term, your current balance, your most recent payment principal/interest and your rate, you can use an online calculator to show you the payoff curve. The problem is I have about 12 different loans (grouped together as three groups of loans) at varying interest rates. On top of that i'm in a graduated payment schedule so every two years I pay a little more. Unfortunately all of that stuff was sent to "me" electronically via my online account's message system, which is now all gone. So now I don't know what that info is.

On a similar note, anyone else been to the new Direct Loan servicing page? They completely f***ed it up. I used to have all my prior e-correspondence, payout schedules and summaries of my loans (letting me know, ya know, when I'm expected to finish paying these things) and now all that s***'s gone. It's the most basic "here are your loans and how much you owe" web page. I can't believe it. I essentially have zero paperwork now for what I owe and what I owe in the future.

Wonder if this will happen: http://news.yahoo.com/obamas-student-loan-...Y3Rpb25z;_ylv=3

QUOTE (StrangeSox @ Oct 25, 2011 -> 09:05 PM) The loan originators were making a quick profit by reselling the mortgage or chopping it up themselves. They weren't in it for a 30 year long haul. Well that's true, but that's mortgage brokers, not banks. I don't think Chase was handing out mortgage loans and then selling them to other people. It was the independent mortgage broker shops that were doing that. But that's still the negligence/ignorance of the subsequent owner for not doing their homework. And btw, not all of those mortgage shops are bad. That's how we got ours, and they were consistently beating the major players (BofA, Chase, etc) by a good .25-.5% with about a third of the costs. Interesting too since my mortgage ended up being purchased by BoA.

QUOTE (Middle Buffalo @ Oct 25, 2011 -> 02:31 PM) I'm in a similar situation. I can make my payment, but I'd like to get a better rate and lower my payment. Can't refinance without an appraisal, though. And my house won't meet the current regulations. What doesn't make sense to me is that I know that Chase didn't sell my loan, yet they won't refinance me because the house is underwater. If I owe them $300K, and I'm current on my payment, and I'm not looking for relief from the principle owed, why won't they refinance my loan? I'm willing to pay the full amount, I just want to get the lower interest/payment. The really bad thing is that the banks were committing fraud when they loaned money to people in 2007-08 before the meltdown. They knew that there were thousands of houses that were going to be foreclosed, and these foreclosures would drive down housing prices, yet they still accepted the appraisal values on new houses. So, if my house was bought for $350K, but the foreclosures were going to make it worth $280K 9 seconds after I closed on it, they shouldn't have loaned the money. They were greedy, yet we bailed them out. I dunno that this is true. The bank doesn't typically loan out money when it knows it'll lose money. If they loaned you 300k knowing the house would be worth 280k the next day, they've just lost 20k or more. If anything they might have been dumb to not realize what they were doing would create a huge gigantic problem. But I don't think they did this intentionally.

I love that the average middle class American, the people most in need of assistance in this s***ty, s***ty economy (and who are probably the key to getting us out of this mess) are being nickle and dimed by little bulls*** taxes and fees to cover the failures of government, all while gigantic corporations and industries in general are being provided with tax relief and business incentives (if not straight up cash payments) to stick around and/or stay in business. Makes total sense.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Oct 25, 2011 -> 09:53 AM) It's easy for people like Preckwinkle to increase fees and taxes since they make 125k+ per year (if not more), on top of their endless perks and massive pensions. What baffles me is how users on this board are ok with it, and worse, DEFEND it...because obviously they must be rich or something and it doesn't affect them. *Every year* taxes and fees of some form or another have gone up -- hell, what's tax on a cell phone bill these days, approaching 20%? (Yes, TWENTY percent, you read that right). Yet in light of that, budget holes CONTINUE to get bigger...somehow. It's absurd. In a time when the cost of living is skyrocketing, payrolls are down, inflation is increasing at a higher rate than standard pay raises to keep up with it...they add taxes and fees on top of other taxes and fees, because you know..."f*** the people...after all, most of them are so dumb they'll just reelect us anyway". Maybe if they hadn't hired 1000+ people they didn't need in the first place, we wouldn't have to worry about making up for the money they lost over the last X years. Amen.