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Christian Science Monitor has good Iraq coverage as well.

The GOP thread, on the other hand, is a bastion of pure political discussion on Obama's issues.

this is bad baseball. I'm not really enjoying this.

plus it's the Orioles.

I thought it was funny.

again, no way in hell Gore would become VP. Would he become 'special advisor to the president' or something? yeah, but right now he's allowed to do whatever he wants and probably has more influence.

Mp3 and iPod for me. I mainly get to listen to music when walking to class/work, running and driving. I don't have much of a system. I have grand ambitions for one though, boy howdy.

So...wednesday Night I don't believe qualified as horrible baseball, we were down 5-0 and battled back to win. What's wrong with that? sometimes we will lose. For goodness' sakes. After every loss this place is like a morgue. NOBODY THOUGHT WE'D BE THIS GOOD. Enjoy it while it lasts.

On the other hand, I'm a bit apprehensive. The income tax is so clearly progressive, that it was a nice counter argument to have when people say 'only rich people pay taxes' that payroll taxes were very much regressive. With a larger percentage of their income with the SS taxes than those making more, because of the 103?,000 tax cap.

QUOTE (Rex Kicka** @ Jul 12, 2008 -> 01:03 AM) If we were realistic, it would because we would stop using the Social Security trust fund to make our deficit less severe than it really is. ahh, the glory of the government IOU..when the U is the people.

okay, so Hagel agrees with Obama on one thing, the war, and is adverse to him on everything else. Find someone else please.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Jul 11, 2008 -> 03:52 AM) I'm afraid nuclear would become a crutch if we used it as a short-term solution, but I don't see any other way. It's the best option right now, but it's far from perfect. What trips me out is that on all 3 of the energy options (more drilling, solar/wind expansion, nuclear) there is no consensus on any of them, and they all have somebody blocking them. Come on, what gives? We're just going to run in place indefinitely? I applaud aggressive funding of alternative energy but we need to quit using this as a political football and start getting serious. And soon. the reality is it should be a combination of all three, in the dakota's, wind power is a fantastic option. In more southern areas and areas with more desert climate, solar is a great option. And there are places where nuclear would be more beneficial than either of these two. I'm for building some more nuclear plants, but I don't think America should look to nuclear to be our whole power like it is in France (some 80% there).

I disagree. Her questions were good, but she set herself up in her voice as it being okay not to get an answer back.

I think it's especially funny because the reporter seems especially passive and accommodating in her questions.

QUOTE (LosMediasBlancas @ Jul 11, 2008 -> 08:42 AM) I haven't seen Batman Dark Knight yet, but there is already Oscar talk for Ledger. Let me phrase this tactfully, I find it interesting how artists (musicians and actors) suddenly become brilliant after their deaths. Especially if they died young and suddenly. Sometimes it even stinks of shamelss promotion. The Joker is such a great character to begin with, I'm trying to think if I've ever seen anyone play him poorly. Maybe all the hype is valid, but I'll wait and see for myself. to be fair, it's not like his jump was from ten things I hate about you to the dark knight. He had oscar performances before in Brokeback mountain, and even in a short role you could see the shift to serious actor in Monster's Ball. And, I think Ledger's performance might be a little better than cesar romero's performance.

QUOTE (FlaSoxxJim @ Jul 11, 2008 -> 03:28 AM) There sure are. We used to call them joints.

aren't there fake cigarettes?

The allgemeine zeitung is an incredible paper by the way. An inspiring model for what I hope can happen here. The papers are much more national over there. BUt they are run by a foundation that keeps all business and advertising separate from the editors and paper. They never here a word. It generates revenue obviously but gets funding from many places and donors.

for instance, FISA passed! YAY AMERICA!/green

Especially since I'd love to know how many people polled could even name a single piece of legislation that's passed in the last 4 years. Since the modernization of the President, Congress isn't covered, the President is.

and, you still will have your U.S. representatives and equal representation in the Senate.

you know what's also fun? Ask them what they think of THEIR representative. Generally pretty high! Oh, everyone else is self-serving and shallow, but our guy/gal? Totally rep'in our interests!

QUOTE (vandy125 @ Jul 9, 2008 -> 05:25 PM) As a citizen in a small state, I really dislike the idea of getting rid of the Electoral College. If that happens nobody will care about what is needed on our farms and away from the cities. Those all become fly over areas that the candidates will not care about. I disagree.

nytimes finally starts saying "hey, McCain's plans are kind of whacky" http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/09/us/polit...9health.html?hp yesterday had a classic look at his "balance the budget by 2013!" talk. You know how he plans on doing it? Why, of course, because we're going to win the war, so that'll give us a bunch of money, because we can scale back operations. Since we aren't spending money that we thought we would be, it is therefore revenue! It's kind of thinking like this! I want to buy a 93 million dollar house. Instead I buy rent for 300 a month. Therefore, I have 93 million to spend!!?! right?!?!

So much was thought about protecting the small states rights. Perhaps because they were safeguarded, but in history I just haven't seen much of an issue b/w big vs. states. Theres been north vs. south, east v. west, most of the problems have been regional, not due to population.