Texsox

ChiSoxFn will be jealous, usually it is Jas will a shop job that good

A young minister was asked by a funeral director to hold a grave-side service for a homeless man, with no family or friends, who had died while traveling through the area. The funeral was to be held at a cemetery way back in the country, and this man would be the first to be laid to rest there. Here is his story......... As I was not familiar with the backwoods area, I became lost; and being a typical man I did not stop for directions. I finally arrived an hour late. I saw the crew, eating lunch, but the hearse was nowhere in sight. I apologized to the workers for my tardiness, and stepped to the side of the open grave, where I saw the vault lid already in place. I assured the workers I would not hold them long but this was the proper thing to do. The workers gathered around, still eating their lunch. I poured out my heart and soul. As I preached, the workers began to say "Amen," "Praise the Lord," and "Glory," I preached, and I preached, like I'd never preached before: from Genesis all the way to Revelations. I closed the lengthy service with a prayer and walked to my car. I felt I had done my duty for the homeless man and that the crew would leave with a renewed sense of purpose and dedication, in spite of my tardiness. As I was opening the door and taking off my coat, I overheard one of the workers saying to another, "I ain't never seen anything like this before . . . and I've been putting in septic tanks for twenty years.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 04:09 PM) First of all...you know very well I don't believe those "Hovering at 5% unemployment rates" since they exclude the long-term unemployed and a wide variety of others who are classified as "out of the workforce" despite the fact that they may well be actively looking for a job. But related to that...I still am unconvinced that there really is a lack of people willing to do manual labor jobs here in the U.S. If I had no position right now, I'd do it quite willingly. The problem is...I wouldn't be willing to do it for $2 an hour when I could earn $6 an hour at McDonalds somewhere by being documented. Through the fact that they're undocumented, they have no workplace protections, and employers can pay them whatever they want and bury the corpses when something goes horridly wrong, and no one can say a thing. I don't view this as a way to fill in gaps created by the lack of Americans to do the work...I view it as far more an effort by employers to avoid having to spend the extra effort and money required to follow U.S. laws. In that 5% are people collecting unemployment who really don't want to work, so I think there is some balance. And illegals won't work for $2 per hour either. They have to buy food, pay rent, and all the things citizens do. I know a few people down here who employ undocumented workers and are paying $5 to $7 per hour. They are in agriculture, construction, and manufacturing industries. Take the migrant farm workers. Live in one place for 2-3 weeks, then move on. How much would you want to make? You need temporary housing, a vehicle, and you are never assured of working. Do you think that there are plenty of Americans willing to take that life?

QUOTE(NUKE_CLEVELAND @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 03:57 PM) Funny you should mention Nissan America when the Japanese automakers are creating jobs here in the US while the "US" automakers are taking jobs to Canada and Mexico. Hurray for the jobs, I was pointing out those that complain about some worker sending money abroad is like complaining about someone spitting on a sidewalk during a hurricane. BTW, those jobs are a small way of saying NAFTA works, and isn't the giant sucking sound that Kap's fellow Texan, Ross Perot theorized.

QUOTE(Balta1701 @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 11:49 AM) Picture @ the left = me watching the first of this show, whenever it becomes available. http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/TV/01/25/t...reut/index.html this is his next step in world domination . . .

QUOTE(mreye @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 01:51 PM) Tree-hugger - fine. She's a flat out hater of the Bush family in general. I perfer to call it the Bush Family Dynasty of BFD for short . . .

QUOTE(mreye @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 10:41 AM) I used to wear shorts all winter long. I still do.

QUOTE(NUKE_CLEVELAND @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 11:57 AM) Thats why I like that new immigration law thats working its way through Congress right now. It would impose stiff fines against businesses who hire illegals. Most businesses that hire illegals would hire legal workers if they were available and willing to work. What we need, is what Bush proposed, a guest worker program. There are not enough Americans willing to do the manual labor jobs in the US. As Bush supporters have pointed out, our unemployment rate hovers at 5% and under. So it doesn't appear as if these workers are displacing anyone. Check http://themonitor.com a border newspaper and see all the job offers for migrant labor and meat processing plants. And finally, there are sizable communties of retired Americans liuving in Mexico. They take their Social Security checks and adios across the border for sun, surf, and cheaper living. So illegals aren't the only ones taking US dollars and spending them abroad. We also allow stock ownership overseas, so even more money is flowing out of the country. Which is worse, illegals sending $100 south or Nissan America sending their profits to Japan?

QUOTE(YASNY @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 10:52 AM) If, and only if, they want want a high quality job done by skilled craftsmen. Otherwise, not so important. Are you refering to the homeless being better picketers or the union carpenters being better skilled? Either way, I agree with you. If you take all the Union guys in one group and everyone who claims to be a carpenter in the other, I'll take the average of the union group before the average of the non-union group. Evil, that's not to say that there aren't some very excellent carpenters and other tradesmen without a union card.

I hope he has nice legs. BTW, shorts and flip flops are the clothing choice of many at my kid's High School.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 10:35 AM) Conversation over. Sorry, that should have been in green. My bad.

QUOTE(Soxy @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 10:32 AM) depends--do they wear bikinis? A woman on Northwestern's winning lacrosse team wore flip flops and ignited a mini-controversy last year.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 10:31 AM) Of either party. I think it's a great tradition. But is there a limit? How about a sports heroes day and have them all show up?

QUOTE(mreye @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 10:28 AM) Just think of how much heat the President would get if he stopped this tradition. That's the problem, or if he stopped granting clemency to a turkey, etc. But the women's volleyball championship team had a visit. Hasn't it gone too far?

I can't believe this thread is still going strong. Even I lost interest about a week ago.

In general, and not specific to the Sox visit, but these things are so stupid. There are so many people I'd rather any President visit with than the NCAA winning Lacross team. I know it's a silly little tradition, but I'd love to see some President stop it. And this is the same for any President and any sports team, college or pro, domestic or international competition, Democrat or Republican.

I love those ironies when the parties switch sides and don't even blush. Bush 1 vs. Clinton: GOP-Clinton's lack of military service is a problem, Dem-no it isn't. Bush 2 vs. McCain and later Kerry: Dem-Bush's lack of military service is a problem, GOP-no it isn't. The business of politics is just so wrong, so often. I can't believe some of the crap is slung without blushing.

QUOTE(NUKE_CLEVELAND @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 09:28 AM) Im not for cutting off immigration as Tex suggests but rather to control it. As long as we know whos coming in and going out then Im ok with it. We cant, however, have people running willy nilly across the open border as is the case now. And I agree with Nuke except fix the labor problems first, stop the inequities between countries in immigration (any Cuban reaching the beach gets in for example), before we hurt ourselves by blocking all immigration. The dependency on foreign food gets no thought in this country. That is scary.

Getting back to the topic, I was thinking if I was to lecture on what "Classic Rock" was and try to explain why hundreds of millions of albums were sold of that genre, these would be, with maybe one or two changes, the albums I would play for people that never heard "classic rock". Mainstream, popular, selections. If you were trying to lecture on the best works, of the pinnacle of artistry, there are better examples.

BTW, the 9/11 Terrorists came in through Canada, why aren't we discussing a wall across the Canadian border?

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 08:48 AM) You seem to have made an assumed bridge between securing the border and preventing immigration. I am not suggesting that at all (not sure about Nuke). If the economic factors dictate that the country can handle (or needs) X number of unskilled labor in the work force, then allow for more visas. That's the way the system should work. That AND a secure border is a much better solution for many reasons than a porous border and undocumented, inhumanely treated workers, and hundreds of dead bodies along the border. But so far we have been unwilling to increase those Visas. When Bush suggested a guest worker program, he was slammed by everyone from Rush to the Unions. Whenever there is a general amnesty, again, the President gets slammed. BTW, the highest percentage of aid we give Mexico is for drug enforcement. We are asking Mexico to stop dealers from getting to their customers in the US. If the US didn't have a usage problem, Mexico wouldn't have a dealer problem. How will cutting their aid help?

What first has to be answered is how we will feed ourselves without the use of immigrant labor. Learn about the life of an illegal, migrant farm worker. Figure out who will work in an area for two weeks, them move on, and follow the crops north and south for $5 per hour. What happens next, is farmers will have to pay higher and higher prices to get their crops picked and processed. When US grow food is too costly, consumers have proven they will buy the cheaper produce, then we will import even more food from outside the US. Currently, we cannot feed ourselves with 100% US produced food, our dependency will get even worse. You think dependency on foreign oil sucks, what will we do when we have to import 50% of our food? There have been more terrorist attacks committed in this country by Americans than Mexicans. Cut off aid to Mexico will decrease their standard of living and force more humans north, and the Mexico government will have less money to fight the problem and more reasons not to. People are risking their lives, literally, to bus your tables, pick your tomotoes, cut your beef, and clean your mess. Figure out who is going to do those jobs, then secure the border.

The comparison is giving clean needles to addicts to save lives. We also need to clean up the drug usage problem in the US so Mexico isn't spending so much of their GNP on trying to stop South American drug dealers from getting to their customers in the United States.

QUOTE(kapkomet @ Jan 24, 2006 -> 10:38 PM) The reason for that is, if Bush does something, it's usually evil and has 'power trip and ego' written all over it. Clinton could do the same thing, and it was 'presidential perogative'. It shouldn't be that way. Clinton would do something and it was an impeachable offense. In the search for liberal bias, the right will point to a couple articles and try to claim a more widestream bias. If neutral is 50, it seems that GOPers reject all media reports if the story is written at a 49 or 51. They use it as an excuse to deflect all criticism of Republicans, which is exactly why the RNC strategy has been so effective. All the GOPers here will argue the other, but from reading SL&P the past couple years, all media stories critical of the President are quickly labeled as unreliable and biased. Perfect if you are in the business of needing votes. Since Republicans can't trust the media to report the "truth" where do they turn? Sources that are favorable to the GOP. Brilliant! You have to admit, the GOP has hit a huge homerun by smearing the media at every turn. How many times a day does Rush say, this is the leftist media . . . Now the Soviet Union had a great system. The government ran the media, so you knew you were getting the truth and only the stuff that was fit to print and wouldn't compromise any missions. Isn't that what the RNC wants to get to? A White House controlled media?

QUOTE(EvilMonkey @ Jan 25, 2006 -> 07:05 AM) I generally have problems with most 'performance art'. Why is someone walking backwards in a circle for 8 hours considered art? There was a guy whose performance art consisted of keying cars in the parking lot, and he had some 5 paragraph explination on how this was artistic. That's not art, that's just stupid. In the end, though, I think most people in general don't mind art, and to some point don't mind funding it, but when things like the Piss Christ pop up, it just turns most people to the other side. ^^^^^^^ Agree As soon as you start drawing lines, the problems kick in, but not drawing lines, also creates controversy. To me it's like Masterpiece Theater vs. Dukes of Hazzard. Which one had/has hgher ratings? So the public really wants to fund Dukes, but most will say M-T.