illinilaw08

Griffin simply turns the ball over too much right now and isn't making shots. It's a process with FR - balancing playing time and game reps vs. completely destroying them when they aren't ready for the minutes yet. Tevian Jones was suspended for those games. I agree that the development of those two is key to this thing working out. But Rome wasn't built in a day... After last year, this thing was really basically pulled back to the studs. It's a really, really young roster that had a brutal schedule, so I'm not really looking at wins/losses when comparing this year to last. KenPom thinks they are basically the same overall today as they ended last year which I would argue IS progress considering how much offense comes from Giorgi - a nothing recruit, and Ayo. There are definitely concerns with BU, and even with Kofi in the fold, I'm pessimistic this works out. But the fact that this team is bad after losing their best player from last year (Black) and relying on an unranked FR for the majority of the big guy minutes isn't surprising...

Meh, there's nothing in those tweets about hunting midrange jumpers late in the shot clock. If "grind it out" means do what Memphis is doing offensively this year, that's fine (ie, maybe you are passing up a good shot for a great shot). Efficiency and getting the right shots - which includes getting to the line - is the way to win in the NBA - and that mindset could really help the development of guys like Lavine.

No doubt. If you aren't a blue blood (and even them - see Doherty, Matt), you are looking for one of those unicorn coaches that develops under recruited talent, or recruits at such a high level that the coaching side doesn't matter. Those guys don't grow on trees.

I also think it's important to note that he intentionally excluded gun deaths by suicide on the other side of the equation. From Harvard - attempted suicide by gun is effective 82.5% of the time. Drugs and cutting are each effective less than 2% of the time. I will shout from the rooftops about how that stat matters any time someone seeks to exclude those deaths... https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/case-fatality/

Ayo looks good. Trent is definitely good. Feliz looks like he can play. I feel like this roster is a rim protector, and a 3 and D wing (Jordan isn't that guy; Kipper Nichols might get there if he wasn't so inconsistent) away from being a tournament team now. But the absence of the rim protector is massive. Georgetown was something like 20-21 at the rim on Tuesday. You can't win games where the other team shoots 95% at the rim. Mediocre team this year with a tough non-conference schedule. Next year is the line in the sand year for BU...

Seriously. And at this point last year, everything was sunshine and roses in the basketball program. Mark Smith had just dropped 21 on DePaul. The bigs were experienced and could score. And Tejon Lucas was a solid starting PG. By the end of the season, Smith was leaving for Mizzou, Black to Europe, Finke to Grand Canyon, and Lucas to Milwaukee. BU underperformed expectations last year. He remade the roster this offseason. I don't think he gets to remake the roster again. The group that is in the building now needs to be able to play, and needs to stick around. I'm generally optimistic here - and I think the expectation this year should be 16-15 and an NIT berth, with a tournament berth in 2019 (this roster is too young, and too short on bigs to be anything better than that this year). To Greg's question, the why is important here, and Russ largely hit the nail on the head. When Lon Kruger took over IL basketball from Henson in late-90s, the program was DOA in Chicago. A talent-rich half decade downstate (Griffin, McClain and Frank Williams from Peoria, and Brian Cook from Lincoln) formed the nucleus for a strong roster. And when Kruger left for the NBA, Self was able to sell a strong basketball program both locally and nationally. Bruce Weber wasn't a good enough recruiter for the job, and Groce wasn't a good enough coach for the job. Best case scenario with Underwood is that he's IL's Beilein - he shows that he can win with largely lower ranked recruits, and then winning leads to better recruits, which leads to winning at a higher level. On the football side, part of it is a lack of investment in the program (as Russ noted, that's changed). Part of it is that they don't have a reliable base of talent to recruit from - the best kids in the suburbs tend to go elsewhere. Part of it right now is that the Tim Beckman hire was so staggeringly bad that it set the program back by years. There's a window where Lovie Smith gets the program on solid, sustainable footing. I think he has - generally - elevated the talent in the program, so if wins don't come in '19 - and the kids in the program stay - maybe hypothetical new coach has greater early success...

We kind of do know that's not a viable solution though. There's a reason this stuff happens in the US with the frequency it does, and not anywhere else in the developed world - and the answer is access to guns. We also know - based on the number of service members who have been killed by friendly fire - that even in the best trained hands, in high stress situations, mistakes happen. It's a fantasy that everyone with a firearm turns into John Rambo the second a shooter appears. Now, I agree - guns are a Pandora's Box that was opened a long time ago, and it's not getting closed. Simply banning guns is not a viable solution at any level. I'm not anti-gun - I see their value as a tool for hunting, it's fun to go to a range and shoot. But the national dialogue on guns has to change (so I definitely agree with your last line).

You made a blanket statement that democrats spend states broke. I gave you Colorado. SB gave you California. I would assert, Rabbit, that the burden is on you at this point to prove that Democrats categorically spend states broke. It's not on me to continue proving the statement incorrect.

Definitely not the case in Colorado, which is pretty blue at this point and in quite a good position fiscally.

Jenks, IF the Senate is designed to give each state the same voice in one chamber, thereby increasing the rural voice and diluting the urban voice, then shouldn't the House be an actual proportional representation by population? As things currently stand, urban areas vote overwhelmingly Democrat, and rural votes overwhelmingly Republican. Yet in the House - which is designed to give proportionate representation to each state - the Democrats need an 8% edge nationally to win the House. https://www.vox.com/2018/11/6/18068792/midterm-election-results-winners-and-losers It seems like we can't change House districts - because won't somebody think of the rural areas. We can't change the Electoral College - because won't somebody think of the small states. When do urban areas get a voice proportionate with their population?

There are a couple problems with the current system nationally. First, a lot of American citizens don't have a voice in the Senate, period (see D.C. and Puerto Rico) because they are not states. Second, the system provides a lot of checks on the entire nation if political parties aren't monoliths. But they pretty much are (with a couple outliers in either party). Why is coal policy a national issue? Because states with large coal industries are important political votes for Republicans. We don't see votes at the national level divided by region. If we did, you would see more Republican reps from Florida cross the aisle on climate change, and more Democratic reps from Colorado cross the aisle on oil and gas issues.

The bolded is very true. As of 10/24 in Colorado, there were 115,168 early ballots cast by people 71 and older. And 16,790 from people 18-25. People in that age range are really in their careers, or still in high school and college. For most of those kids, life hasn't happened yet.

I obviously lean left, but in addition to NPR, WaPo, NYT and WSJ, I read about policy on Vox as well. They usually do (IMO) a pretty good job of explaining the basis for policy in relatively concise articles. Not sure what the Conservative version of that would be.

Short videos/TV can't possibly actually inform you on issues though. The economy and world events are complicated and nuanced. You can't actually understand an issue via a short video. You can't both complain about headline journalism and then ask for journalism to be distilled into short videos...

1) I think it's impossible to debate the validity of Trump's attacks on the media without accounting for where he directs those attacks. He says "fake news" but it's not "24-hour reporting is bad and misleading" - it's "reporting of me in a bad light is bad and misleading." 2) I think you would find that Democrats would kindly point to Fox News' reporting on the Obama administration as evidence that aspects of the 24-hour news cycle were throwing out bad and misleading reporting prior to Donald Trump. If the 24 hours news media is, in fact, partisan, it didn't start with the coverage of Donald Trump. 3) I think we can agree that the 24-hour news cycle is a bad thing generally. But I'd just be cutting and pasting what bmags said above.

Except the President uses one of those 24 hour companies as his primary source of news. I haven't heard him complain about Fox News being "fake news." There's a pretty obvious pattern to which media POTUS has decided is "fake news."

Definitely should be a playoff team this year - they've missed by a single game each of the last two. Also added IT (who can definitely carry bench units when he gets healthy) and Porter (really interesting potential piece long term once he gets healthy). Point in all this being that the NBA has some really, really fun teams outside of Golden State and Houston. Yeah, they might not be title contenders, but they play some entertaining basketball anyway.

Definitely. I picked up a partial season ticket package for the Nuggets this year. Yeah, they aren't going to win a title, but they are just a really fun roster to watch.

Yeah, with Jenks on this one. I have no kids (and no plans to have kids), and the wife and I are comfortable, but until I'm out of student loan debt, I could't even consider retirement in my future (no idea how people have both student loan debt and children). I'm planning to retire as early as I can (and I think our society puts far too little emphasis on work/life balance), but retiring in my 40s is a flat out impossibility.

Rabbit, I'm glad that we agree on a lot of the bad positions Kavanaugh holds, but the only reason that this came close on confirmation was because of the sexual misconduct allegations (that's why Murkowski did not vote in favor). The Democrats didn't have the votes to stop confirmation, Kavanaugh was on a fast track to confirmation prior to the allegations, and each of those bad positions are kind of Republican talking points right now. TL;DR - it's certainly not the fault of the left that Kavanaugh is currently a Supreme Court Justice (unless we're talking about why Donald Trump was in a position to appoint Kavanaugh in the first place). If you disagree with that point, please show your work...

We've talked about this before, but there are lots of proposals on healthcare and education that actually propose both the cost of the project and the funding necessary to make them happen.

That's an intentionally absurd example. Obviously you need a very specific and technical background to be a nuclear engineer. Just like you need a law degree to be a lawyer. And you need a science background to be a geologist. All those are technical fields where your schooling gives you the backdrop that you need to do the work. But there are plenty of entry level jobs that require a college degree generally, and don't require specific technical expertise...

2 votes, no? Senate is 51-49 at the moment, and Pence breaks a 50-50 deadlock.

Except here one side does seem to want to work through the issues in a sexual assault allegation, and the other side, to quote Mitch McConnell: “Here’s what I want to tell you,” McConnell said Friday morning, according to The Washington Post. “In the very near future, Judge Kavanaugh will be on the U.S. Supreme Court. So, my friends, keep the faith. Don’t get rattled by all this. We’re going to plow right through it and do our job.” http://fortune.com/2018/09/21/mcconnell-kavanaugh-confirmation/ When Al Franken was accused of sexual assault, the Democrats pressured one of their own to resign. When Kavanaugh was accused, the Republicans want to just get their guy on the Supreme Court. That's not "politics" - that's pointing out the reality of how each side has been handling this issue.

What's happening to Ford is the fault of shitty people doing this to Ford. And if her allegations are true, it's the fault of Kavanaugh. Feinstein appeared to do everything in her power to NOT release the letter from Ford. It leaked, but Feinstein - to my knowledge - merely referred the letter to the FBI (happy to be proven wrong here).