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Baseball Primer Newsblog— The Best News Links from the Baseball Newsstand
Wednesday, October 31, 2012
Come next Tuesday night, we’ll get a resolution (let’s hope) to a great ongoing battle of 2012: not just the Presidential election between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, but the one between the pundits trying to analyze that race with their guts and a new breed of statistics gurus trying to forecast it with data.
In Election 2012 as seen by the pundits–political journalists on the trail, commentators in cable-news studios–the campaign is a jump ball. There’s a slight lead for Mitt Romney in national polls and slight leads for Barack Obama in swing-state polls, and no good way of predicting next Tuesday’s outcome beyond flipping a coin. ...
Bonus link: Esquire - The Enemies of Nate Silver
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Typical Sam Hutcheson: Can't ever win an argument with his philosobabble, so it's straight to the ad hominem and the crap-flinging. Same old, same old.
The idea that the Second Amendment either protects the right to own nuclear weapons or the whole Second Amendment is little more than a whim that's subject to legislative or judicial rescission at any time is utterly absurd. Putting aside the sheer lunacy of such a position, the primary purpose of the Second Amendment is to guard against government tyranny, specifically *U.S.* government tyranny. In what scenario would a private U.S. citizen have reason to deploy tactical nuclear weapons on United States soil? The whole idea is absurd.
Yes, yes, you're the only person smart enough to figure out that either the Second Amendment protects the right to private possession of nuclear weapons or the whole Second Amendment is a sham. Consider this a pat on the head.
Let's start at the beginning.
What is the text of the 2nd Amendment and what does it mean?
If the point of the 2nd is to guard against government tyranny, and the potentially tyrannical government has access to nuclear weapons, then the only means to combat that tyrannical government would be "MAD" via citizenry held warheads.
Compare this with current Supreme Court views the copyright clause. Despite increasing the protections to in some cases 120 years, the Supreme Court seems to have said that "for limited times" apparently means what ever Congress wants it to mean. So there is current support for this concept that you find utterly absurd on its face.
And pretty much everybody is on board with restricting explosives.
Well yes. *Of course.* Anyone who spends even a nanosecond thinking tactically about the problem of preventing tyranny via the 2nd, in the modern world, must fundamentally agree that in order to prevent a government that has access to ####### DRONES THAT CAN BLOW UP HOUSES FROM TWO MILES HIGH becoming tyrannical, a resistance movement is going to need something more than a 9 mil with an extended clip.
There's no evidence anywhere that the Founders were OK with the possibility of "well regulated militia" being turned into "no militia" by judicial fiat or legislative rescission, and the fact no one attempted such a thing for generations after the Constitution was ratified is instructive. (And anyone, such as Sam, who claims the professional U.S. military that came later would have been seen by the Founders as less of a reason to have a citizen militia — or a reason to disband the militia entirely — rather than more of a reason, is incredibly uninformed.)
For the record, when I say things like 'you're stupid' what I mean is exemplified by this, where you show a complete inability to read for comprehension. Did you fail 5th grade, by chance?
I don't even think you'd get much pushback on automatic weapons, which are pretty much minimally required for any insurgency. I don't find Sam's take logically flawed at all - every rational person supports controls on both the classes of arms that can be privately owned, and the classes of people that can own them.
No, I didn't.
As to your complaint, you just said this a few minutes ago:
I guess you do have plausible deniability here, since you phrased it as a hypothetical, but I'd be surprised if it was truly divergent from your position on the matter, given all of your other claims and rantings and "logic."
There is no evidence that the Founders (putting aside the idea that we can devine the understanding of the 55 drafters and 13 state leaders that ratified) thought that 120 years was reasonable, yet here we are.
My point is only that we have current case law that seems to effectively read out a clause in the Constitution. The idea is not as absurd as you seem to think.
I think only one* country has ever developed nukes in order to threaten and hold hostage it's own citizenry- South Africa- but the idea was too nuts even for them - and hence SA became the first country t voluntarily relinquish nukes. Nuking youself is kind of self-defeating...
*I suppose the Government of North Korea would give serious consideration to nuking one its own provinces if such province was in open rebellion... but even in the case of North Korea- if you are facing a widespread and diverse rebellion- what good are nukes?
Among other examples, several people here have claimed the D.C. and Chicago gun bans were simply "regulation."
Answer: The minute you (Holder) learn that the CIA's mistress was in possession of classified information, inform the President, who should then decide whether to at least temporarily relieve the director of his duties, pending the investigation. Suspending the Director would of course be a public action. And short of that, the public at least had a right to know that the CIA director's mistress was found with classified documents, and the President had decided not to suspend him.
As it turned out, Petraeus resigned, largely for reasons of protocol (i.e. his officers' code) and embarrassment more than anything else. He could have continued in his post on the substantive merits of the case; it's not as if once his indiscretion was discovered internally there was any chance of blackmail.
What you simply won't acknowledge is the likelihood that since the investigation had already determined that no threat to national security was involved, there was no reason at that point to take it up the ladder, and no reason to make public what turned out to be a matter of no great importance to anyone but Petraeus, Broadwell, and Mrs. Petraeus. I'm not sure why the public has to be breathlessly informed about every possible security breach, when the possibility has been investigated and found not to be a reality.
You still haven't opined on why Cantor kept quiet, if this was a matter of such great importance that it had to be aired in public immediately. Was the GOP House leader part of a Democratic conspiracy?
And you also haven't addressed the question of what should be done with an FBI agent who bypasses his chain of command, and takes it upon himself for political reasons to send information to an opposition party congressman. Should he not have to answer for his actions, or do you look upon him as some sort of a whistleblowing hero?
Well, Joe, you can continue along this path of making up #### that you think I probably believe, using your secret X-Men powers to read minds over the internet, or you can have a conversation with me and the things I actually say in this forum. Your choice. I have little faith you will go with the rational, logically sound one, to be perfectly honest.
Thank you. The point isn't nukes, per se. It's *arms.* Nukes are arms. Under no rational interpretation of the term "arms," which is a shortening of "armaments," can nukes not be considered "arms. The text of the second protects the right to keep and bear *arms.* As such, unless you are restricting the right to bear arms, you must not restrict the right to bear nukes. So, if someone wants to defend the unlimited, unregulated right to bear ARMS they must defend the right to bear NUCLEAR ARMS. If they want to defend the right to bear SOME ARMS but not NUCLEAR ARMS then they must explain, in some rational detail, why their choice of arms is necessary and proper while artillery, or Predator drones, or nuclear suitcases are not.
The point is that pretty much everyone, including 2nd Amendment "absolutists" like Joe, draw a line in the sand that says "well, no, not ALL ARMS; clearly nukes and B1 bombers aren't open game for everyone." But at that point, you've already given up the universal "right to bear arms" as a human right that shall not be infringed. You've already said "I'm okay with infringing the right to bear arms in the case of nuclear arms." And at that point, you have to explain why your arbitrary decision to limit arms to not include nukes is fine and good, while Bill Bradley's arbitrary decision to limit arms to not include nukes, "assault rifles" or 9mm handguns with extended clips is tyrannical.
The tangent about "defense from a tyrannical US government" isn't a direct line descent from this argument. But as you say, and as anyone with any basic ability to think through the problem will certainly agree, if all you're protecting via the 2nd is the right to keep and bear handguns and scoped hunting rifles that have stocks modeled to look like AK-47's (so-called "assault rifles") then you're not really protecting the ability of the citizenry to deter a potentially tyrannical government.
If you have a rifle, a 9 mil and a box of bottle rockets and Barack Obama has a ####### squadron of Predator drones, you're not going to win your "defense against tyranny" engagement.
Sam Hutcheson is complaining about others' ability to have a pleasant, "rational" conversation. That's rich.
Except for that pesky "well regulated" part, which liberals typically accuse conservatives of ignoring. And except, of course, for the fact that no U.S. citizen would ever have a reason to deploy tactical nuclear weapons on United States soil.
Except that no non-delusional person has ever claimed the Second Amendment is "absolute" for all people and/or all arms.
Well, among other reasons, when the Second Amendment tells us we have the right to "keep and bear arms," and then some liberal comes along and reduces the list of acceptable functional firearms to zero or nearly zero, the problem is self-evident (or should be, at least to anyone who isn't a dishonest gun-grabber).
You're a ####### idiot.
Are we still having a "conversation"?
US citizens have had reason to bomb buildings on US soil and done so. To think that no one would use a nuke if given the chance is naive.
Well, since you asked, let's examine it closer. But first, let's do this:
I want to make it clear that these comments are based on speculation regarding what the Attorney General may have done. I am not implying that this is what the AG did; I am not saying that there is evidence indicating that this is what the AG did. I am examining the possibility that this may have happened; and, if it did, why I labeled such activity as I have.
I had noted in my post that the AG had stated (in simplified terms) that relaying the facts of an investigation to anyone outside the FBI (be they Congress, the President, the Press, etc.) prior to the conclusion of the investigation, was forbidden under standard operating procedure. The AG's exact quote was:
"We do not share outside the Justice Department, outside the FBI, the facts of ongoing investigations."
According to the timeline on CNN.com that Mefisto so graciously provided in post # 8768, the President was informed on Thursday, Nov 8, two days after the election, of the investigation. Quoting from there:
White House spokesman Jay Carney says later: "The president was certainly surprised when he was informed about the situation regarding General Petraeus on Thursday."
Now if (and again, very heavy emphasis on the if, because we are just speculating) the investigation should and could have concluded on an earlier date, but did not, due to deliberate "delays" (for want of a better word) by the AG, for no other purpose than to keep the news from the President (and, in turn, the American public) until after the election; then that means that the AG deliberately gamed the system in order to:
1) Shield the President from responsibility regarding any potential fallout from the investigation;
2) Keep the facts of an investigation regarding a high ranking government official from the voting public prior to an election;
3) Delay the appointment of a replacement for Petraeus as head of the CIA.
For those reasons (among others) I label such activity, if it has occurred, as shitty.
Of course, shitty is in the eye of the beholder. Perhaps there are some who don't see deliberate deception as shitty behavior. As has been pointed out by several others, such behavior is quite common by politicians (a point with which I agree). Perhaps to some its frequency of occurrence lowers its level of shittyness. To others, gaming the system may merely be nothing more than how these things work, and therefore not at all shitty. As with all things shitty, your mileage may vary.
Now, as regards your other questions:
They create the impression that you're really not understanding what's being said. But then, that's just my opinion.
DB
No one has ever claimed the Second Amendment, or just about any right, is absolute. If rights are absolute, then, e.g., prisons are unconstitutional because they deprive prisoners of "life, liberty," and/or "pursuit of happiness." No serious person would ever make such a claim.
The debate here is regarding the specious claim that the "well regulated militia" can be disbanded by judicial fiat or legislative whim without violating the rights inherent in the Second Amendment.
***
I thought "legal reason" was implicit in my comment above, but I guess I should have made it explicit.
Were private citizens allowed to own cannons and other similar weapons in 1800 or whenever? I'm sure local militias or people like privateers could, but they would generally have government permission to have them; could some random rich guy go out and buy a cannon keep it for personal use? I'm sure was completely impractical to do so, but the same goes for many modern weapons as well.
Generally speaking the types of weapons militia guys used then are the same weapons the vast majority of gun owners use now, weapons that have fairly common, legal civilian use, handguns as personal defense weapons and rifle/shotguns as sport/hunting/varmint weapons. I think laws try to limit these types of weapon are mostly pointless because so many are in circulation and are also illegal as they are the types of civilian weapons the founding fathers had in mind with the second amendment. Generally bans on fully automatic weapons are trickier, unlike a grenade launcher or flame thrower, you can reasonably use something like a fully automatic AR-15 for legal activities, although it doesn't give you much real benefit over the semi-automatic version.
As far as fighting tyranny goes, nobody is going to be fighting the army head on, but accurate semi-auto rifles are likely fine guerrilla weapons, as are improvised explosives made from many items that would be unlikely to ever be illegal.
You're going to have a hard time finding legal uses of weapons to end government tyranny.
In the service of fighting tyranny, the benefits of automatic fire would become readily apparent. That said, I do take the point of your post, and found it very thought provoking, but the issue I was getting at was that if regulation of firearms is permissible under the 2nd, you can't very well limit it without making some assumptions about the language - something "originalists" usually cringe at (not that I am associating you with that group).
The Founders didn't think so. They declared independence in large part over tax rates.
You might be better shielding it with the First Amendment rather than the Second Amendment.
No, I've grown tired of attempting to educate your idiot ass.
The CIA's mistress was in fact a former Army intelligence officer, a counterintelligence reservist, and apparently held a high security clearance, until it was revoked. To this day, there does not appear to be any evidence that these were not document to which she would have access, and I don't know that it was even established that she got them from Petraeus.
That security clearance has now been revoked for, among other reasons, the cavalier way she stored/treated these documents. I don't know how common these Sandy Berger incidents are, but I would be very surprised if it does not happen a hell of a lot more than we hear about, especially as computers, thumb drives, pdfs, etc., have made them so portable.
Now that's impressive. Do you know how many people work in Langley alone?
DOD is a fairly large employer where I live. Folks I know who work at the DIA tell me that you can lose your clearance just for bringing an ipod on site.
The word "regulate" was also used in the commerce clause and the coinage clause, where it certainly did not mean "well-trained". In general at that time, the verb "to regulate" meant that a superior prescribed a rule or order for the management of some affair (close paraphrase of the 1771 Encyclopedia Britannica).
They may say it, but I don't know if I buy that it has that much of an effect. There are just too many damn leaks of classified material, and too many damn places to run into other, other than the Pentagon building itself.
No, it probably doesn't have much effect on people who are motivated to leak classified documents. But it definitely has an effect on honest, mid-level analysts who are motivated to keep their jobs.
"Well-regulated" is an adjective, not a verb.
It's easy to find references to well regulated in 19th century writing. Here's the search on Google Books which finds well regulated clocks, well regulated minds, well regulated passions, well regulated workhouses, well regulated gas lights, and so on, in many context that can't possibly be referring. I'm fairly certain that well regulated passions doesn't refer to the US government's cockblocking department.
"Well trained" is wrong, but from usage, well ordered was frequently the clear context in many uses of well regulated. But, of course, orders from superiors is in fact one way to create a well ordered army, so that doesn't leave any nice bright lines.
The 19th century Progressive Dictionary of the English Language (in that list) has well-ordered as "having good regulations; well-ordered; as, a well-regulated mind" is similarly unhelpful as it leaves both interpretations intact as well.
So in the end, it would have been nice if they had cleaned up the language on that particular amendment. Yeah, you can't envision stuff like the word "gay" having such a large change in meaning over the centuries, but you can avoid having clauses in sentences possibly contradict each other. If I write "The Orioles needing an ace in the rotation, Baltimore needs to sign Jeff Francis," I know my editor's going to IM me and say "what the #### is that all about?"
At ESPN? Maybe not.
Nice being a chemist.
A ludicrous statement by Holder. One so cartoonish that it's hard to conceive that anyone could take it seriously.
Are we to believe that Clinton wasn't kept informed as to the progress of the Oklahoma City bombing investigation? Just to name one obvious example that should immediately beam people up from fantasy land.
And I saw an interview with former AG Alberto Gonzales today. He said he wouldn't have felt bound by protocol to tell the President. Yes, yes, dismiss his statements because he was appointed by Bush. Whatever. He was in the job.
As to the politicizing by politicians, I continue to - as my good friend Steve Treder would say - marvel at the insistence of people that this couldn't have happened. To take one example, Obama just admitted yesterday that he basically sent a naive Susan Rice out as a patsy to spread false information to the public on the Sunday shows back in September, when she was shoveling that BS about the Benghazi attack being the result of a protest over a video rather than a terrorist attack. For what conceivable reason I do not know, other than to pretend to the public that he had terrorism under control in advance of an election. So let's not pretend that Obama is above it all.
(Moreover, Obama's condescending chivalry towards Rice ("Don't blame her. Blame me."), which he would never have said if Rice were a man, should have gotten easily-offended leftists and feminists in hysterics. But, alas, we have heard nary a peep from them.)
Also, this statement is demonstrably false, as this investigation is indeed still ongoing - just this week they were taking boxes of evidence from Broadwell's house - and yet Holder shared it with Obama.
Is the standard "ongoing investigations" or is it "threat to national security"? Holder has said both, and yet these are in conflict.
That's not an argument, at least not unless there's some consequence to the fact that they're different parts of speech.
All of those seem perfectly consistent with the definition I gave.
Agreed.
I'd like to think that the awkwardness of of the wording was intentional, that is that the amendment itself is just deliberately vague. But ultimately I'm not sure it really matters.
The practical interpretation of the Second that we are living is that people are allowed to bear arms without having to join any militia, but their access to arms is regulated, which includes some bans. It's neither of the absolutist interpretations, so neither side is happy with it, but the non-deranged don't get their panties in a bunch and it mostly seems to work. What stops it (and many other issues) from working is that the absolutist fix disrupts from developing sensible regulations, as evidenced by the political silence on the issue and the "conversation" that just transpired.
Love (love) the use of "patsy" there, and "naive" is a nice touch.
This is like watching a recording of you talking into a mirror.
Oh, they've been peeping. They've been on TV telling us that those that criticize Rice are 'racist' and/or 'sexist.'
Even worse. The clear message is that she is too delicate a flower to handle criticism because she is a woman.
Yeah. What a horrible disservice these people are doing to minority women as a whole. "Hire them, they're just as qualified for these jobs as men -- but if you criticize them it is because you are racist/sexist."
"Ideal for home defense". Love that line.
I may be in the minority, but not accidentally killing guilty people makes it more than a fair trade.
Hell, yes, but then again a home invasion, at night, into a locked, dark house (didn't Spike imply the shotgun would be by his bed?) probably necessitates being extremely drunk or high, so who knows what the response would be. In addition to screaming in pain and moving like hell away from the source of the blast, if one were able, I mean.
Not a gun owner, but know my share of hunters. Neither my wife nor my mother would ever want one in the house. I respect their judgment.
Personally know of two suicides by gun. One might have been hastened by proximity to a gun. The other one, it wouldn't have mattered. Also had a relative paralyzed in an accident with a gun.
Never in my life have I ever been close to wanting one for personal protection. Meaning there was never an incident where it even seemed like a remotely good idea. They are untrustworthy, dangerous tools.
It is different in the country. There are more guns, meaning they're easy to come by, even for people who shouldn't have them, and the only patrolling cops do are on the highway and state routes, for speeders. There's also the occasional prison escape, which is local high drama, and within the last five years cops with long guns have twice gone strolling through my parents' corn field looking for escapees.
If you've ever get shotgunned by any sort of load, even rock salt (remember Kill Bill 2?) at close range, you will in fact stop. It probably won't kill you, but it would feel like a literal sledgehammer to whatever it hit, and leave a nasty bleeding wound.
I do understand others feelings about if you are going to do it, then turn it loose. As I said, it's predicated on my particular choice being quite capable of emptying a 15 round magazine (the other big advantage to semi auto over pump) in under 10 seconds. Sorry for the boring tactical digression.
OK, then, who was the government superior who issued a rule causing a mind to be well-regulated? Or passions? Or a clock?
I view this as an extremely convincing way of telling the intruder that you have a gun.
I'm much more concerned by the apparent lack of warrants involved in looking into emails in the Petraeus case than I am Ray (RDP)'s ranting about Obama The Bad Witch and his Secret Knowledge.
Same here. I get that not having SWAT teams makes a cop's life a hair more dangerous. I'll venture that by making arrests more prudently and without a paramilitary arm, though, a combination of fewer police and fewer citizens will be killed overall.
Rickey, some of the videos are surreal. Wish I had the link, but I remember one vividly where the cop knows he's being videotaped by the car's driver, and he keeps 'inviting' the passenger out of the car. The passenger keeps asking the cop if that means he HAS to get out of the car, or whether he can lawfully refuse. For something like 10 minutes the cop repeats variations of 'Sir, I'd like you to step out of the car. Now.' The guy keeps asking if he has to get out, or can decline to get out. He's not being a wise guy, either, and takes pains to make that clear. He just doesn't know what his options are. After the 30th repeat of the exchange the cop, who has the tightly wrapped demeanor of Micheal Biehn's marine in The Abyss, loses it and grabs the passenger and pulls him through the car's open window.
I wish I knew how that one turned out.
Don't the rules of debate require Joe to specify (4000 posts ago, but small steps for little feet) where he'd draw the line? "No personal nukes, no private grenade launcher, no _____?"
Among the things you don't get to say are "No personal nukes, no private grenade launchers, but those don't count as regulating the right to bear arms because they just don't and you're an idiot for thinking otherwise because."
This is lawyerly horseshit, as though everybody doesn't lie. Cops lie. Prosecutors lie. Judges lie. Defendants lie. Witnesses lie. "Ooh, ooh, so-and-so lied, we can't trust anything he ever says ever" may fool a naive juror, but c'mon. The great thing about the internet is we can pretend we're grown-ups.
No, especially since the main part of the debate was whether a flat gun ban was constitutional.
Since I never said that, I guess I'm in the clear.
I view this as an extremely convincing way of telling the intruder that you have a gun.
Honestly, I think the answer to the question is an absolutely certain, resounding yes. The question in fact seems pretty ridiculous.
In other words, all the ones who don't like sports.
Clown show, indeed.
This sounds right. I'm also often surprised by the care with which police procedure is discussed in documentaries, books, histories, and films from forty and fifty years ago. Even before Miranda cops didn't just lay on the nightstick whenever they felt like it. There was substantial regard for the rights of the accused. More, it seems, than today.
The reason for that Andy of Mayberry image was simple: The violence that police perpetuated 50 years ago was off camera and directed against people that most Andy Griffith Show watchers never paid any attention to, and before TV came along it was even worse. If Rodney King had happened before the age of home video, there's not a chance in hell that more than a handful of white people would ever have believed that a cop beat the tar out of him, and there's absolutely no way that any policeman would ever have faced trial. Unlawful official violence today can often get out of control, but it's also monitored and exposed so much faster in the 21st century than it ever was before. It can seem to be more ubiquitous, but this is one of those cases where we really are better off than we used to be.
I'm much more concerned by the apparent lack of warrants involved in looking into emails in the Petraeus case than I am Ray (RDP)'s ranting about Obama The Bad Witch and his Secret Knowledge.
Ray's still never addressed the question of what should be done about that shirtless wonder who seems to think that a Republican congressman is the head of the FBI, and acts accordingly. Talk about a clown show.
The definition didn't require that the superior be a government. In the case of a clock, the "superior" would be the clockmaker. In the case of the mind, that would be the exercise of rational control rather than the passions.
In the case of the militia, the Constitution expressly gives power to the states and to the federal government "To provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress".
But we've discussed the Romney campaign in depth on this thread.
The Founders didn't think so. They declared independence in large part over tax rates.
Oh sure, rates. The objection was because of rates. Remember the Founders' slogan: "No Taxation Without Reducing the Top Capital Gains Bracket."
Well, my wife and I are going up to visit our son. He works at the Kendall Square Cinema 'til midnight on Thanksgiving so I think we'll spend Thanksgiving night watching free movies. I can ask if you can be "Uncle Lassus" for a night if you want to join us. :)
He already "answered" it in 8793, in pretty priceless fashion:
God forbid we embark on something that might require debate; let's just keep arguing against strawmen...
That was the part of the debate where you were arguing with yourself. The rest of us were leading you to the self-awareness that you are in fact OK with some weapons bans, and then a discussion of what weapons should be banned and what other regulations should apply, which you so kindly declined.
Because idiots and deranged people are obviously very, very different things. C'mon Jack, pay attention!
wait wait wait. Arn't ALL the amendments 'subject to the whim of'? See: Presidential assasinations of American citizens, 'free speech zones', warrantless searchs within 100 miles of any border?
Bottom line with Rice: I wouldn't confirm her as town dog catcher at this point. She allowed herself to be utterly duped by the administration, when even a modicum of skepticism, intel, and sense would have told her that it was probably a terrorist attack.
Obama used her, to her great detriment. Way to treat a minority woman in your administration.
We'll start seeing more and more of these type of races in California, with Democrats trying to get the Republican/Conservative vote, and going after each other which has a lot more repercussions for them than in a standard two party race. Sherman's won the race, but he's going to be the guy looking from the outside in, and with little political juice or power to change things.
Who knows more about feminization than a man with bosoms?
I think a more proper term would be War because of oil, but even that is a bit simplistic, but as Morty reminds us, even the war hawks claimed that we would recoup any losses with future Iraq oil revenues. That just turned out to be yet another thing they got disastrously wrong.
The L.A. Times Op Page calls for Sarah Palin to run in 2016
I also endorse the Nats trading Bryce Harper for Lucas Duda, and the Braves trading Jason Heyward for Jordany Valdespin.
Jack, thanks for your response. Most of my hunting relatives are people who grew up in small towns or on farms but now live in bigger cities. So the hunting land is away from their primary residence, and the arms are as well. Different situation for rural residents.
She read her CIA briefing, followed the briefing and stressed the investigation was still ongoing and not everything was known. Scandalous. Sigh.
What sort of stuff you like, Lassus? And where you coming from?
'Zop - Oh, you know, off-the-beaten path museums or historical locations. I doubt there will be many concerts, but that I can check on as far as classical music. Honestly, I'm really just looking for random interesting crap to look at, experience, see. I'm not all aggro about it, it's going to be a laid-back weekend, but people here usually have good ideas. I'll be driving in from northern NY, about a 4.5 hour trip.
Oh god, a Palin candidacy would be the most awesome thing we could ask for. As far as her "gay fanboy base", I'm not really sure whomever wrote that article understands the attraction.
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