jasonxctf

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Jan 26, 2007 -> 04:44 PM) And why did John Kerry win Iowa? His wife infused his campaign with a s***load of money and inundated the state with his campaign ads. It would have still been a much more interesting primary season if the rebel yell never took place. actually this is not true. Kerry won Iowa because he was endorsed by the Govenor of Iowa's wife who took a liking to him. The newspaper endorsements didn't hurt either. http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles...9/19point.1.htm above is a link to a 34 page article on how Kerry actually ended up winning Iowa. It had nothing to do with his wife's $.

how do i know if I am better filing as married jointly or separately??? i make about 6 times more than my wife but all of our additional income and expenses (interest, stocks, property taxes, mortgage interest) are on joint accounts. Help!!!!!

good point. is it that the country is so fed up with politicians that they are more apt to support those who have been removed from the immediate process for a while? shoot, you can even include Obama in that reference. Maybe even Hillary. The only one with lifelong, in-the-spotlight political experience is McCain.

The top 3 polling on the Dem side are Clinton- who will have 8 years of senate experience by 2008 Obama- who will have 4 years of senate experience by 2008 Edwards- who will have been out of politics since 2004. The top 3 polling on the Rep side are McCain- who will have 22 years of senate experience by 2008 Guiliani- who will have been out of politics since 2002 Gingrich- who will have been out of politics since 1999 anyone notice something similar about 3 of the Top 6 polling candidates????

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 21, 2007 -> 11:41 PM) Hm. On the one hand, looking at this and the linked articles, I don't see a whole lot to be concerned about. The only reported news I see, from the Free New Mexican, talks about "poking" or wrestling around that doesn't really concern me. On the other hand, that is not "Presidential" behavior. Kind of like Obama's smoking. Not something you want to linger. If, as Richardson shows up more often in the national media, he continues to show those little less-than-Presidential behaviors, that could be all that is needed to knock him out of the race. less than presidential behaviors.... you mean like DUI's on your record, being an Alcoholic until 40 and snorting coke???

theres a Von Maur in St. Charles too. Nice store. Reminds me of what Marshall Fields used to be. They offer free gift wrapping for all orders. Clean store with employees available to help at all times. not sure about the $185 jeans though. We just bought a $60 money clip.

i'd guess that a majority of the 18-25 yr olds in the military today have grown up with openly gay people in their schools, health clubs, workplaces, sports teams, etc and would be more acceptable in serving side by side with an openly gay person. how is an openly gay person any different than men serving next to a woman? straight man wants to bang the woman gay man wants to bang the straight man

agreed. eliminate the policy and let openly gay soldiers serve. easy fix. it's not 1945 anymore.

maybe its because i'm a no-good city slicker, but does this make sense to anyone else??? http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070112/ap_on_re_us/wolf_hunting

actually the market slump over the past year caused me to take a steep decrease in my sale... however it was fun turning the tables on the purchase of my new home.

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 8, 2007 -> 06:45 PM) So, Bush is going to give a speech on Wednesday evening setting out a "new plan" for Iraq. Here are some discussion questions... --Will you watch the speech? --What do people think it will include and not include? --Which of those things do people think will be effective, if any? --If you were him, right now, what would you do for Iraq? Watch the speech: No. Include: More BS on how we must win this war to protect America from terrorism. Not Include: A timetable for leaving or any comment stating that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 as well as that Saddam and Osama hated each others guts before our invasion. Effective: Short term bump in approval rating for Iraq and about 3 more months of US citizen's patience. If I was Him: I'd take my ball and go home. You can't force something onto people who don't want it in the first place. Admit our gigantic mistake (like a man) apologize and move on.

QUOTE(southsider2k5 @ Jan 8, 2007 -> 01:56 PM) There is a crazy circle going on down there. Business will not reenter until people come back. People won't come back until there is infrastructure/business. There won't be infrastructure until there is an organized rebuilding. The politicians don't want to do any organization of rebuilding because they don't want to go in and tear down peoples house, because they throw a fit when it happens. its a crazy circle. its like playing Sim City... you have to build the infrastructure first, then put in the police, fire, school, hospital, etc and then start building those green, blue and yellow boxes. QUOTE(Texsox @ Jan 8, 2007 -> 01:57 PM) Which comes first, a population that needs a McDonalds, or the McDonalds? That one I have to side with Corporate America on. But which comes first, a population that needs electricity or electricity and that one has to fall on the government. But having said that, does the government (local, state, or national) have a responsibility to bring services to wherever someone wants to rebuild? I don't think so. A plan to offer utilities in a sequential order works for me. One person building a mile from the nearest working grid, shouldn't happen and slows down the rebuilding efforts. We probably need to buy some people out, a hopscotch pattern of rebuilding and providing utilities is wasteful. but in all fairness, those businesses did have property insurance. most of the houses in that area did not. So corporate america took the insurance $ and ran rather than use it for its designated purpose of rebuilding. speak of the devil, look what just popped up on Yahoo's front page. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070108/ap_on_...katrina9th_ward

QUOTE(NorthSideSox72 @ Jan 7, 2007 -> 09:07 PM) There is also of course the fundamental problem of having a city in New Orleans at all. its a sub-sea level flood plain (part of it anyway). I sure as heck hope we take this opportunity to NOT rebuild residences and businesses in those lower areas, and instead, make those open spaces, parks, gathering spots, etc. that can flood to no great damage. Otherwise, we're just asking for it to happen again. i guess we shouldnt have rebuilt any of the areas here in tornado alley (plainfield, ottawa, etc) because that will happen again as well. I just got back from spending time there over the holidays. while most of the city looks ok, the lower 9th and Chalmatte look horrible. you can still see the markings on the houses showing how many dead bodies were found inside. The surprising thing to me was that in Chalmatte (upper lower income/middle income area) the place is a ghost town. All of the items that would be covered by Federal Tax Dollars (street signs, stop lights, roads, power lines, etc) still look the same way they did shortly after the storm. Businesses such as McDonalds still have their windows blown out and stores abandoned. So while everyone likes to make a stink about the general population not rebuilding, tearing things down etc... corporate america and the government hasn't done its part either.

QUOTE(Felix @ Jan 5, 2007 -> 10:47 PM) f***. By that logic, they are each on par with Ozzie Smith and his career .978 fielding percentage. Solid work there. f-off. point being, uribe isnt as great of a defensive SS as you think and Cintron isnt as poor. Offensively Cintron is far superior to Uribe. im not saying that fielding % is the only gauge of defensive skills, however from a fielding % comparison they are equivilent. QUOTE(santo=dorf @ Jan 5, 2007 -> 10:03 PM) Just how many times do you plan on getting shot down on the FLD% argument? how many times have I been shot down with it so far???

Uribe's career fielding percentage is .975 Cintron's career fielding percentage is .974 in 2006, Cintron's (SS) fielding % was .973 in 2006, Uribe's (SS) fielding % was .977 in 2005, Cintron's (SS) fielding % was .966 in 2005, Uribe's (SS) fielding % was .977 in 2004, Cintron's (SS) fielding % was .972 in 2004, Uribe's (SS) fielding % was .983 in 2003, Cintron's (SS) fielding % was .979 in 2003, Uribe's (SS) fielding % was .972 so for every 600 fielding chances (approx Juan's amount last year) Alex would have made approximately 2 more errors all season. while at the same time, Alex would have had 23 more hits all season and would have been on base 26 more times than Juan all season.

i'd do it in a heartbeat. a 1 year stopgap before these youngsters are anywhere close to being ready makes perfect sense. but i'd only do it if New York picked up 1/2 his salary. Thus the Sox would be responsible for $8 million or so (Freddy Garcia savings). 17 wins in each of his past 2 seasons aren't bad. He had a poor 2006 with a 5.00ERA, but he'd still be our #3 or #4 starter.

QUOTE(Jordan4life_2006 @ Dec 24, 2006 -> 08:54 AM) Good lord is Brandon McCarthy overrated on this site. And I was a big fan of the guy. here's the follow up question. Ted Lilly was worth 4 years and $40 million in the open market. Assuming that McCarthy is a step below Lilly, did we just get $25-30 million worth of talent? That is what we just gave up. McCarthy could have easily performed as a #5 starter. Right now, we don't have anyone who has proven that they can do that. So we are either (a) going to overpay for a 5th starter if we are in any type of contension at the break or (B) struggle with an automatic loss every 5th day as we rotate through Haeger, Floyd, etc as we did in 2002-2004 or © hit lightening in a bottle like we did with Loaiza a few years ago. In addition, we are now assuming that Vazquez is a legitimate #4 starter... which last year he wasn't.

i think everyone here is drinking too much eggnog. i hope i'm wrong, but this team has 3rd or 4th place written all over it.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16301099/ Fifty lessons for the political soul The 2006 midterm elections offered a lesson from every state in the union By Chuck Todd WASHINGTON - Trying to come up with a final column of the year to sum everything up is never easy. Sometimes, I've gone the "awards" route, and in other years, I've looked to the future. But this year, I thought I'd experiment with a tribute of sorts to Paul Simon's "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" with the twist, "50 ways I learned from 2006." Attention media elitists: Alabama may be home to former state Supreme Court judge Roy Moore, but that doesn't mean state Republicans bring God with them to the voting booth. Alaska wanted change, but not the past -- former Democratic Gov. Tony Knowles. It wanted the future -- Republican Gov.-elect Sarah Palin. A lesson for legacies running in '08? Although Arizona is filled with swing voters, they won't buy into a candidate who says he's "independent" but whose previous job was state party chair. Democrats should still believe in a place called Hope, because Arkansas is still bluer than the rest of the South. It's a pretty simple formula for statewide success in California: The moderate Democratic general-election nominee will always triumph. Congrats to Arnold Shriver. Democrats ought not get cocky in Colorado. Their recent success has everything to do with the party nominating more centrist candidates. Sen. Joe Lieberman's (I/D) victory wasn't so surprising. In the end, he became an outsider -- and in Connecticut, just like everywhere else, voters deemed the outsider more interesting. To paraphrase the great ?90s philosopher Wayne Campbell, "Hi, this column is now stuck in Delaware." Sorry, I couldn't find much wisdom in Beau Biden's (D) victory in the attorney general's race. When will Democrats ever learn re: Florida? By writing it off in '06, they've only made winning the state in '08 close to impossible. Watch out, South Carolina. Georgia may very well be the reddest state in the South by the end of '08. Imagine if outgoing Rep. Ed Case (D) had run for the Senate as an independent? Hawaii general election voters probably would have sent Daniel Akaka (D) into retirement. Republicans looking to figure out their libertarian issues ought to study Idaho before it's too late even there. Sometimes a party's problem in a state is self-fulfilling. The GOP's troubles in Illinois aren't nearly as bad as the recent results indicate -- the party just needs to purge itself of its current elected leaders. Although Indiana may have lost a favorite son in the presidential race with Sen. Evan Bayh's (D) decision, GOP Gov. Mitch Daniels had better hope he didn't gain a new, tough, potential foe. As Republican pollster Glen Bolger told us months ago, when Republicans have a cold nationally, Iowa Republicans usually have the flu. What's changed more: Kansas' ideology or the Republican Party's? What if it isn't just the grass that's blue in Kentucky? We'll know in 10 months just how many Democrats Louisiana lost. If outgoing Sen. Linc "My Name Is Gold" Chafee ® couldn't survive in Rhode Island, how is someone like Sen. Susan Collins ® supposed to in Maine? Kathleen Kennedy Townsend is proof positive that a Democrat literally has to run a campaign into the ground in Maryland to lose. The two biggest signs that this country has moved beyond race: Tennessee Rep. Harold Ford Jr.'s (D) surprising 48 percent in his Senate race and incoming Bay State Gov. Deval Patrick's (D) ability to carry South Boston. What Jim Rice wouldn't give to wear a Red Sox uniform in this century's Massachusetts. A state Democrats haven't lost since '88 will be more in play than ever before in '08: Michigan. Since outgoing Rep. Mark Kennedy's showing was the worst for a Senate-seeking Republican in Minnesota in a half-century, GOP Sen. Norm Coleman might want to see if he still has Democratic credentials stashed away in storage somewhere. Not only can I spell Mississippi without any eyes, but I can still spell it without any "D"s. I've been a believer that Missouri was on its way to permanent red status, but given the current governor's '08 vulnerabilities and the effective populist message incoming Sen. Claire McCaskill (D) sold, the state showed me it's still the country's bellwether. Attention White House Democrats: Looking for one way to make liberal bloggers swoon? Propose Montana's Gov. Brian Schweitzer as a running mate. Does Sen. Ben Nelson's (D) blowout win prove the more conservative candidate always wins in Nebraska? When will Senate Majority Leader-to-be Harry Reid (D) make it his responsibility to rescue the Nevada Democratic Party from its current funk? Is New Hampshire simply a suburb of Boston now? Sen. John Sununu ® says no, but we'll find out in 2008. It's going on 20 years since the last time a Republican presidential candidate received more than 50 percent in New Jersey. The most underrated swing state in the country is New Mexico. Incoming Gov. Eliot Spitzer has toned down his Wall Street bashing, which is odd since that's now all the rage in the Democratic Party. Spitzer will be an interesting non-player in these New York-heavy presidential sweepstakes. Just asking: Could a populist like John Edwards get elected in the new economy-succeeding North Carolina? Some day I'll understand exactly what happened in the Dakotas that caused the North and South to split. While Missouri may be in play for '08, Democrats should examine those House race losses in the 1st and 15th districts and realize Ohio will be no easier to win in '08 than it was in '04. The sooner we finish this sentence on Oklahoma, the faster we'll finish this column. Someday Republicans will figure out why they can't win anymore in Oregon. You read it here first: Republicans will not seriously contest Pennsylvania in 2008. I'm already tired of the Whitehouse-White House jokes in Rhode Island. South Carolina is getting so conservative that it may just pull a Kansas. What does that mean? A Democrat will only win statewide when the GOP nominates someone too far to the right. South Dakota is determined to be the center of our congressional-control universe. Tennessee is not racist for not electing Harold Ford Jr.; they just elected the candidate that most reflected their values. If Ford gets married, he'll be a senator. Most underreported story of 2006: the surprising weakness of the GOP brand in Texas. For you "Fletch" fans out there, the story is Utah, Frank. Do you realize that no Democrat has held the Senate seat Bernie Sanders (I) is about to hold in Vermont... ever? On Nov. 8, 2006, the Commonwealth of Virginia officially seceded from the Confederacy. As long as the war is the issue, the Washington GOP ought to go on sabbatical. How do the Democrats get their populist gene back and then not seriously contest West Virginia's lone GOP house seat? If there's one state John Kerry won in 2004 that is teetering more than Wisconsin in '08, I don't know what it is. Wyoming? Why not. Thanks for indulging me this year. If this column was a bit too much to digest, realize that you have an extra week to read it. See you in January.

here is the shocker of the article for me.... Virginia Rep. Virgil Goode, a Republican

yeah why would you want a guy who's hit .273 with a .323 obp and a .997 fielding percentage over the past 4 years when you can have a guy who's hit .225 with a .290 obp and .994 fielding percentage instead???

Denver. The southwest has to be the big target of the party. Growing population= growing electoral votes. Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado... go get 'em!

DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) -- Sen. Sam Brownback, who wants to champion social conservatives in the presidential race, said Tuesday he wants a Senate panel to re-question a judicial nominee who attended a same-sex union ceremony. Brownback, a Kansas Republican, said he wants Michigan state judge Janet Neff to testify about her role in the 2002 Massachusetts ceremony, her legal views on same-sex unions and her ability to be impartial if called upon to rule on such cases. Neff's nomination to a federal district court is among a dozen or so now stalled in the Senate, a logjam in part due to Brownback's questions about Neff's attendance at a lesbian commitment ceremony. The Senate Judiciary Committee has already approved her nomination. Neff was traveling outside the country and could not immediately be reached for comment, said Chris Bockheim, her judicial assistant. Earlier this month, Brownback, a prominent opponent of gay marriage who is exploring a presidential run in 2008, said he would lift the hold he put on Neff's nomination if the judge agreed to withdraw from ruling on any court case involving the legality of same sex unions. In Iowa on Tuesday to meet with GOP activists, Brownback said he wants only a chance to question Neff about her role in the 2002 ceremony. Brownback also wants a recorded vote in the Senate. "I am not opposed to her getting a vote," Brownback said before a lunch with potential donors and supporters in Davenport. "I would like her to come back through committee so she can testify what took place, factually ... her legal views on same-sex marriage and her ability and willingness to be impartial." Neff has said she attended the commitment ceremony as a friend of one of the two women, a longtime neighbor. She insisted in an October 12 letter to Brownback that the ceremony had no legal effect and would not influence her ability to act fairly as a federal judge. Brownback also has been criticized for his proposal that Neff be required to recuse herself from gay marriage cases. Legal scholars said such a deal would infringe on the separation of the legislative and judicial branches of government. But Brownback said it was simply a last resort to put her nomination forward. "If we don't testify on her views on same-sex marriage legally, then the only way I can see fit to do this is to have her recuse herself from a class of cases," Brownback said. "Then others stepped in and said, 'You can't do that.' Well, that's the only option I had at that late hour." so let me get this straight, we are withholding federal judical nominee appointments (given under a Republican administration none the less) now because they were in attendance at their neighboor's committment ceremony???

just like in '92 when a dark horse came out of nowhere, Richardson will emerge with the nomination. He will then choose former VA Govenor Mark Warner as his VP after Hillary turns down the offer. on the republican side, Mitt Romney will win the nomination and select John McCain as his VP to off-set Richardson's southwestern draw and to keep AZ in the republican column. a tight presidential race follows but Richardson pulls it off with a 290-248 electoral college vote win. Changes from the 2004 race include... * New Mexico from Republican to Democrat * Nevada from Republican to Democrat * Colorado from Republican to Democrat * Wisconsin from Democrat to Republican * Ohio from Republican to Democrat * Virginia from Republican to Democrat * New Hampshire from Democrat to Republican Romney/McCain also win close races in held-states Iowa, Arizona and Florida Richardson/Warner win close races in held-states Minnesota, Washington and Maine. now that 2008 is done, should we start working on '12???

personally, i like john edwards. I think he is a great guy. I just don't think he has enough experience in order to be President. (ditto Obama) he'd be a great guy to lead Secretary of Housing and Urban Development or Labor for example.