Texsox

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 05:35 PM) Actually he doesn't, if you actually read his comment he calls it "moral", because he doesn't believe. I'm sorry if this isn't clear enough for you. He also sends his children to a Catholic school. Face it you pulled a s***ty example out of your ass that supports my argument.

Care to tell me why religion is keeping you from making charitable donations? Care to explain to me why anyone is stopped from doing that? ou say nature abhors a vacuum and other will rush in. Why would people suddenly start donating who don't do so now?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 05:30 PM) No. It as actually meant as a joke, it's good to see you could see past those religious blinders and see the joke. Oh, wait. As stated, if the churches weren't stealing money from old people with false promises, that money would still exist and possibly be used even better. Keep spinning. Face it you gave the worst possible example. Bill Gates donates because of his religious beliefs. As do a lot of other people. Who has blinders on?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 05:25 PM) Bill Gates. Are you referring to the billionaire Bill Gates? Thank you! from wikipedia.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 04:17 PM) Edit: Post removed, I'm done with this conversation, and it cements my feelings on religion and how useless it is. If all religion disappeared tomorrow the world would be a better place, not to mention more intelligent. Who will do all the charity work that churches do around the globe? You are totally dismissing all of that. We will also be better off when non religion is removed from the world. That would be the 388 murders that you non religious types committed in Chicago last year.

I tend to agree with you. But without knowing the prices, the store location, there could be other factors at play. I'll bet more graffiti artists buy their paint at WalMart than some local store. Does that mean WalMart knowingly allows them to buy paint, or they just sell a crap load of paint? Regardless, my main point stays, punish criminals not honest citizens. And criminals in this country must be convicted of a crime. I'm not really comfortable with closing companies down with anecdotal evidence, no matter how compelling.

And those sales can be traced to the original buyer and those straw buyers need to be prosecuted.

That would be my guess as well. Although it could be equally valid to write that "Straw buyers are walking into that store and purchasing their guns there because of price, location, . . . " You wrote it in a very pejorative manner. I believe, perhaps naively, in the American right of innocent until proven guilty. Even when it is inconvenient.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 03:38 PM) I'm pretty sure I'm the one saying "The huge majority of the Islamic community are denouncing these attacks so it's silly to say that they're not", are you crossing me up with the other people here? Oops sorry, I was. And it seemed strange. Which is why I went back. Sorry.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 03:31 PM) Actually with the recent Dallas ones we're not 100% sure. According to multiple reports there are no active pumping operations in the area of the epicenters of those recent quakes, which makes connecting to them tenuous. There are plenty of other ones directly connected to wastewater disposal and now a few directly connected to fracking as well. There's no need to exaggerate. You're painting all earthquakes with the same broad brush. You can paint all people with the same brush but not this? Come on Brian. I believe we can't paint anything with the same broad brush. Not religions, not gun owners, and not earthquakes. Especially people.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 02:10 PM) By your rational, nobody should have to take responsibility for anything, ever, be it religious or otherwise. Wrong. So very wrong. Just the opposite. All law abiding persons should denounce all criminals. It shouldn't matter if the criminal identifies some group you happen to belong to. Your rational is only denounce those criminals that self identify with something you believe in. Other than that, it's cool. No need to get involved. Let someone else get involved.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 02:03 PM) Actually a very apt comparison. The fact that you make that statement without finding out what I've actually written and said about the subject is not an indictment of me, it's an indictment of you. I was assuming you would be in the anti-fracking community or I have your beliefs way wrong. But should you be tainted with the same broad stroke since you are all geologists? There are classrooms all over that believe fracking is OK. Come on, you must really believe that it's ok. Did you publish that in the past couple days after the Dallas tremors? You must denounce it daily and if the leaders of geology don't also do that, you should consider a different way of life.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 02:54 PM) Because they're selling guns and there's virtually no level of carnage that will cause a gun dealer to be shut down. And if we could get rid of a lot of that trash, it would literally save thousands of lives per year and it'd leave me a lot less to complain about. I could find ways to be ok with that. But if all people give me is the choice between the lunacy we have right now and banning outright, I'm going to pick the one with hundreds of thousands fewer corpses. So, when I hear "this is too complex" as a reply in some form, my answer is going to be "ok, here's the simplest way to do it." So this dealer is making thousands of illegal sales and no one will shut them down? Wow. Any other criminal enterprises on that level operate in the open and don't get shut down?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 02:14 PM) Easy. With things that are specifically designed to kill and have no other purpose. And IMO, anyone who "doesn't want to live in a society because they don't have a gun" has bigger problems than not having a gun...and probably isn't the best person to have a gun. At least 99.99% of the shots I have taken in my life were not to kill anything. In fact, I don't know anyone who hasn't shot hundreds or thousands of times without killing anything. Would you care to back up your first opinion with some facts? I love shooting clays and skeet. Plinking with a .22, I'm just not into killing anything. I prefer someone else kill my food and leave it at the supermarket for me. It makes me feel morally superior than killing it myself.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 01:52 PM) Point 1: if your argument is that it's too difficult to regulate them, then let's ban them. f*** it, they kill tens of thousands of people per year. Half a million dead people in 15 years is a bigger deal than people being unable to hunt. 2. You want a gun? You have a certificate saying you passed a background check. Put it in families too, these things are tools for killing. We should act like it. Try to give your child a car, doesn't the government have to know about it? 3: 20% of guns used in crimes in Chicago are purchased at 4 stores. 4. Most stores in the area on average have 3 guns tracked to crimes in Chicago over a 4 year period. One store had 1516. One single store sold guns used in one thousand, five hundred, sixteen crimes in Chicago in 4 years. If 1516 people living next to any kind of factory got cancer over a 4 year period when a normal area saw 3, we'd do something about that. We'd declare, accurately, that factory to be killing people. Point 1. I'm not saying it is too difficult in regulating them, I am saying that to regulate them to the level you want creates a police state that I am not comfortable with. We both have spoken out through the years about privacy concerns for honest citizens. I believe that applies to honest gun owners as well. I'm not a fan of open carry, I never had guns in my home when the kids were growing up and will not have any here when the grandkids are visiting. Point 2. I agree. Point 3. It shouldn't be too tough to find illegal sales at those stores and shut them down. Why haven't they? Using the factory as an example, we'd find out how they are polluting, if it was legal, we would work to find a solution. We have earthquakes near fracking fields, let's shut the companies down and put hundreds of thousands of people out of work, then find out if that is really the cause or not. You don't seem to mind punishing law abiding people. I do. Punishing anyone for following the law seems strange. We punish people who break the law.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 01:42 PM) And if many of them are doing exactly that but you don't see them or choose not to see it happening, what does that say about you? Should you be excused from doing less? Geologists are pumping fracking chemicals into our watershed, destroying it and causing earthquakes. But that is your responsibility to denounce, not mine. I'm not a geologist.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 01:33 PM) I think it's a bit more complicated than this, but as a whole I'd say I agree with a lot of what you said here about faith, religion and science. However, I think Islam has a bit of a unique problem in the modern world. I don't think random acts of violence should be attributed to the whole...but when your religion [islam] actually has sects that have buildings/places/countries where they teach a corrupted version of your faith, THEN I believe you, as a Muslim, absolutely have the responsibility to denounce that "version" at every turn, and the leadership of said religion, whoever they may be, must do so on a daily basis...INCLUDING turning them in to authorities, instead of harboring them (which a LOT of those Muslim countries are doing). They know who they are, they know WHERE they are, and they hide them/harbor them, and in some instances, these are LEADERS of that faith. The Catholics have their own modern issue with protecting child molesting priests by trying to cover it up...and it's ONE of the many reasons I distanced myself from said religion...the fact that goes on, and the fact that it's been shown the LEADERSHIP has helped cover it up in some instances means I needed to reevaluate and walk away. But then it is no longer your faith, it is as you described a corrupted version. Sorry, using your own example the church can't allow you to just walk away. The Catholic church is still responsible for you no matter what. Even if you leave to practice a corrupted version (or no version) you believe the church leaders and practitioners such as myself, should still have responsibility for you. So how can the church prevent you from committing a crime? You want the mainstream church to be responsible for anyone who claims to be part of that church, even those who leave to practice a corrupt version. That just doesn't make sense to me.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 12:36 PM) I'd love to make guns harder to get! Thanks for finally agreeing that part of our problem is way too many guns in this country. Now let's start with some basics, basic background check for all sales, requirement that stores register their guns so that we know which ones are being lost/stolen/sold off the books and can recognize which stores are major suppliers for weapons used in crime and close them as nuisance businesses. I usually agree with you but . . . Background checks are required in all states to buy a gun from a dealer. Private sales are not included. How are you going to regulate private sales? What penalties will you impose? Stores are required to track all guns in their inventory by serial numbers. ATF regularly audits stores for compliance. A couple years back I can remember Glick Twins and Academy Sports, one a local sporting goods store, the other a regional sporting goods store, were both fined for having missing guns. Both stores claimed they were stolen by employees or "customers". Are you going to close them down, putting thousands of employees out of work because they were victims of theft? You seem to also be suggesting that a store who legally sells guns that are later used in a crime should be closed. Legally sold. The buyers passed the state background check. Based on a legal transaction, approved by the government, a store owner would be forced to close? Would every WalMart have to close or just the store that had the high rate? Isn't bankruptcy a cruel and unusual punishment for someone who completed a legal transaction and later the other person committed a crime? Moat of the guns used in crimes have passed through multiple hands, why ruin the life of the original dealer?

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 01:01 PM) Ok, to be serious and NOT play devils advocate...I grew up Catholic. Baptized, etc...and I know there is a part of me that still believes in something, and as I stated in a previous post, I've come to call my "God" that prime mover, whatever that is or was, be it a being, or an event. I don't know what it is or was, but I believe in it, so that's my faith, and therefore, that's my "God". Many things made me fall out of favor with that religion [Catholicism], and the older I got the more I came to despise some of it's teachings, AND the being they tell us to praise throughout the Bible. And the same can be applied to any/all other 'written' religions. I have no issues with spirituality or faith, but I do have a problem with people following something created by men thousands of years ago and just 'accepting' it. Feel free to believe in something higher than us, or better than us, or that steers you in a way to better yourself and those around you ... but whatever that thing is, it's not what they wrote about in that book. We all "just accept" something, that's part of faith. Even science in this debate requires you to accept something. Usually we believe for something to be scientific fact we should be able to recreate it in an experiment, independent of anyone else. We can't do that with the origin of life. There is a theory that a never to be duplicated event happened on this planet and life began. I find that believable. If we believe that our universe has boundaries, that it doesn't go on for eternity, we accept that there is something on the other side. Is it bigger, smaller, the same? Does it have the same rules of physics? Carbon based life? Water? Gravity? We will probably never know. People that never ponder questions like this, are "just accepting" a scientific theory which also cannot be proven. I find religion as is practiced here, to have value in my life. Others do not. I believe in equality for both groups. This argument stems from whether I should have some additional responsibility to stop everyone who may commit a crime and do that in a religion's name. That is not equality. That is one group of people, naively believing that everyone in a church thinks and acts the same. That a religious leader has complete control over anyone in the world who may say they belong to that religion. Based on the comments here, if you committed some heinous crime and claim you did it because you were Catholic, the church automatically becomes responsible for your actions. I believe you are responsible for your actions. Everyone should denounce those actions. And with all the crime in the world today, some just don't have twenty-four hours a day to denounce all crimes. Instead, as a Catholic and Christian I practice my beliefs and speak out on issues that are important to me. If they aren't the same ones that you care about, why am I wrong?

Which Catholics am I responsible for? Ones who were never baptized but their parents were Catholic and if asked will check off Catholic? The ones whose parents baptized them in the church and they have not been back, but check off Catholic if asked? The ones who registered once and haven't been to church in years and years? Catholics that only attend mass on Easter, Christmas, or when convenient? Catholics who attend most of the time? Those who attend all of the time? Those that agree with 75% of the doctrine but not all? Those that call themselves Catholic but have been kicked out? All Christians no matter what denomination? I need to know who to denounce. It seems by your rules as long as they say Catholic, it is my fault.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 12:05 PM) You're responsible if you look away and never put a stop to it, or denounce it in a VERY loud, very official manner, repeatedly. Killing in the name of Islam isn't some fringe thing where a few guys get the wrong message carried out some heinous acts...they are literally TEACHING that s***, and certain countries around the world are KNOWN to harbor these "cells" where they're teaching/training/brainwashing people to think exactly that way. If the Catholic church had an evil faction spun off of it, and little cells of Catholic hate started popping up at random places of the world teaching that bulls***, the Vatican sure as hell has the responsibility to do something about it, and so does EVERY follower of that religion. And if you can't put a stop to it, then maybe you have to reevaluate your religion as a whole. Thank you. SPUN OFF OF IT. What does off of it mean to you? To me it means not on, not a part of, it is off not on. Hmm, why would they spin off of it? perhaps IT isn't preaching what they want? So you believe that 1.3 BILLION people on the planet, 23% of the world's population, are being taught weekly to kill non Muslims and to perpetrate this acts of terrorism? Wow, how do you sleep at night? And if churches are responsible for every act of their members, even ones that spin off, who is responsible for the non religious and what they do? Or do you get off without any responsibility? Where do the non religious learn to kill and commit acts of terrorism? How about everyone is expected to not look the other way and to denounce it? Why is that my responsibility and not yours? We can't put a stop to gang violence in this country, maybe we should reevaluate our citizenship as a whole. Stop criminals? Seriously? You are kidding right? Name when that has ever happened by anyone? And you expect a religion with 1.3 billion followers to do that? Wow.

QUOTE (Reddy @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 11:14 AM) Your arguments are way off base, but I'll humor you to show you the glaring difference. If Whitman did that in the NAME of the Boy Scouts, or Ligue did it in the NAME of all Sox fans, then those groups have a responsibility to publically say that they do NOT support or condone those actions. This isn't terrorism from people who just happen to be Muslim, it's terrorism in the NAME of all Islam. Therefore it's the leaders of Islams' responsibility to refute their actions. Listen, a couple of young girls tried killing a friend because of their belief in slenderman. Again, we know that is crazy and there was something wrong with them. If they said they believed in Jesus, why would you think they were sane and the responsibility of the church? http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/slender-man-stabbing

QUOTE (Reddy @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 11:14 AM) Your arguments are way off base, but I'll humor you to show you the glaring difference. If Whitman did that in the NAME of the Boy Scouts, or Ligue did it in the NAME of all Sox fans, then those groups have a responsibility to publically say that they do NOT support or condone those actions. This isn't terrorism from people who just happen to be Muslim, it's terrorism in the NAME of all Islam. Therefore it's the leaders of Islams' responsibility to refute their actions. Allow me to try a different way. John Hinckley tried killing Reagan in the name of Jodie Foster. Any sane person understands that Jodie Foster didn't have anything to do with it, yet if he said he did it for Jesus Christ or Mohammed you want everyone of that faith and every church leader to condemn the attack?! It's the same s***. The people are crazy, the misinterpret a religion, use it as an excuse, whatever, that shouldn't taint the rest of the people in that church. Anymore than any other group. Boy Scouts, Elks, Masons, Democrats, Republicans, all have a shared set of beliefs, something that binds them, if someone says they are killing someone because of a group like that we all understand that isn't the case, they are just crazy. But if they say a religious group, BOOM! everyone on the group is wrong. Why can't we accept that crazy people do crazy s*** and try to justify it by many different means. Why the f*** an I responsible for something someone does just because they claim to believe the same thing I do, when in fact they do not? If some crazed individual falsely believes the Catholic faith requires him to kill abortion doctors, why am I responsible? You are taking a tiny minority of people and insulting the rest of us. These people who commit these crimes are bat s*** crazy and you want to lump me into that group?! Can you see why that is insulting? While they may claim to be Catholic and following Catholic doctrine, they are not. I don't share any of their criminal beliefs. But you want to tell me to find another life? Why? These people are f***ing crazy.

Has anyone read Feinstein's The Punch? Seems like an interesting NBA read and Feinstein is probably an author I should cover.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Jan 11, 2015 -> 07:05 AM) As soon as you help me take illegal guns out of the hands of people who get arrested multiple times and shoot young black kids for no reason whatsoever, while "keepin' it real" livin' the thug life, yo! Doesn't reducing the supply of guns do both? When something is cheap and plentiful, everyone can have one.