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I believe you got it correct and I learned what "no true Scotsman" means. Thank you. I have run into this before. I had a friend that was always preaching to me. He told me once that I must truly believe in Jesus because I am a nice person and helped other people along the way. No matter how many times I told him I did not believe in his religion. The message I got was for him no one cold be moral except through faith in a supreme being. The last straw was when he was at my house and I had the daily paper sitting on the table and the top story was something about the foster care system in Florida deciding if gays should be allowed to be foster parents. His tirade about turning kids gay, blah blah blah really showed how much hate he has in his heart. So I pointed out what good parents my lesbian friends are and how great their kids turned out and I cut ties.

Matrix was way more believable though.

Matrix series made $1632 million. Same story, interestingly.

" Just go somewhere and believe at your own expense and leave the rest of us alone, please. " THAT is the persecution. The christian attitude of superiority. They are blinded to the persecution they spew. Daily. To everyone who isn't godly in their eyes. When they are the truly blind ones. They reap what they sow. All because some lady got knocked up by someone other than her husband, and somebody stole a dead body. It's never even been movie worthy.

I'm not sure where you've been, but in case you haven't noticed, our material is doing just fine. I mean it's survived almost 2000 years of persecution - the harder you fight the stronger we get, thanks be to God. The bigoted principles of atheism failed the soviets even when accompanied by force, and they will fail again under today's more passive approach, finally liberating atheists from delusions of some kind of atheist utopia. In fairness the persecution hasn't gone on uninterrupted. You boy's have had your turn at bat on more than a few occasions. And your material isn't doing just fine, and you well know that. Nothing in the Bible has been proven by archeology. In fact, much has been disproven by a lack of evidence. Maybe Haldane said it or didn't but there have been no rabbits found in precambrian deposits. In fact, rational, logical and scientifically sound discoveries only strengthen the fact of evolution every day. I won't go down the list, you don't care. You'd rather believe in Noah and his Ark. The truth is that your material is a proven falsehood except to you and your mutual validation society. And to be clear I do not give a shit what you believe. I do give a shit that you persist with your woe is me persecution narrative which is foundational to the Christian claims that go from your silly War on Christmas to your tax exemptions. Just go somewhere and believe at your own expense and leave the rest of us alone, please.

Ground hungry... I wouldn't list the Spectra as being a particularly ground hungry canopy. There are certainly other canopies out there that are steeper trimmed. Keep in mind that any canopy that is designed to land easily and be forgiving on the flare will have to have an excess of flare authority. It has to be trimmed a little steeper to have the ability to increase it's CL to give you that powerful flare. If you were to fly a flatter canopy, one with a flatter glide, less ground hungry, you would find that the flare is some what less forgiving. I actually prefer flatter canopies and the way you generally land them is with a little extra speed. Even just a bit of front riser, so in a since you trim it more nose down, ground hungry, to get an easy landing out of it. One thing that was noticeable about the specter, is the way it pitches front to back. It was noticeable on landing as you descended in to the stiller air near the ground. When you passed through a wind shear between two layers. Think end of the day as the ground cools off and the ground winds die but the wind is still blowing a couple hundred feet up. Well there is a wind sheer as you drop from one layer to the next. Some of your airspeed goes away. Interestingly the larger the canopy is for you the more noticeable this is. 5 knts is a larger percentage of your air speed and when that head wind dies you are 5 knts slower. The canopy wants to correct that. It wants to speed up. It feels like it takes off surging forward and down toward the ground. Flaring dosen't seem to help because the canopy is pitching forwards and can not make lift to support you till it pitches back above your head. The larger the canopy and the longer the lines the more dramatic this can be. You see it with student canopies. They induce it all the time. If you make a small turn with a break, the canopy pitches back and then when you let up on the toggle the canopy surges forward. Not a lot but enough to ruin your flare. Worse is the student that flares high and then decides to let up because miss judged it. When he tries to flare again the canopy is well in front of his body. These are more dramatic examples but the same thing happens when you come in to land. If the wind drops off you get a surge in the canopy. Some canopies do this more then others. Line length is one factor but I think the airfoil also plays a part in it. It really depends on the pitch stiffness of the canopy. I don't understand all of it. But it's noticeable in the specter. You might try a Triathlon. They are not as prone to this. Back when these canopies came out they were neck and neck and we had jumpers that went back and forth between the canopies. It was the same market. They loved the specter but had noticeable more trouble landing them under some conditions that they had no problem landing their Tri in. I would not categorize a specter as a bad canopy you just need to learn to land it. Under those conditions I like to carry a little extra speed, front risers, or a small turn but hook a bit high. The idea being to to have a bit more speed when you enter that still air. You could also barrow a saber 2 from some one and give it a try. They also have a forgiving flare. Or go up a size. But with the specter I think it may just be a mater of learning to reconise the wind conditions. Or just use it as an excuse to hook that bitch down wind on the last load of the day. That way the wind sheer acts in your favor. Or at least that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. Lee

She's referring to Tulsi Gabbard. It's been the subject of a lot of discussion for a while now. The theory (insofar as I understand it) is that Tulsi would be the weakest of the current Dem candidates in the general election against Trump, and therefore if she was the nominee, that would help Trump, since Trump is a Russian asset (and not as useful if he's out of office).

HRC is out claiming that one of the current females running for President will be a Russian supported third party candidate in key states. Can she feel that bad about hosing Biden and the Nation last time around? Hmm.. as everyone knows, a socialist is simply a communist who denies being a Russian. I wonder who she's trying to submarine?

Over the weekend, State and Energy Dept officials were quietly reviewing plans for evacuating 50 nuclear weapons that the US had long stored, under American control, at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey. I don't yet know how many insane POTUS threads we have, need, or understand how to even consider sorting them. So I started a new one. Until this reckless disaster of a human landed in DC, I had never feared for our country and humanity. I have always felt safe here. I no longer do. The current administration is fully invested in destroying the great nation, while lining their selfish pockets.

Tried hitting their website over the weekend - got "Error establishing a database connection" Tried sending messages here to their listed contacts - rejected that the individual can't receive messages. Anyone have more/better/additional means of contact (I don't have their phone# here)? Or did something happen to them that I missed?? JW Yes, I know there are many opinions on the Racer/John/PLinc/etc... Just a rigger trying to do his job.

Lee, I really appreciate the analysis. I was thinking about a Triathlon but wanted softer openings. Somebody told me that Tri's with the 5.0 mod open better. Is that true? Again, thanks for the info...and I will take all of this into consideration before switching canopies. Cheers!

2000 years of persecution? On what planet? Constantine converted around 300 AD, in case you missed it. The resulting Christian governments covering pretty much the whole of Europe have spent most of the subsequent 1700 years persecuting absolutely everyone else. Most especially those of different denominations. For Christ's sake, if you're going to claim that Christianity has been persecuted for 2000 years then do you want to know who to blame for the vast majority of that persecution? Christians. Bigotted, violent Christians who failed in ethnically cleansing their way to the utopias they wanted.

Good on you. There's a time for political correctness and a time to stand up for what you know is right. But there should be no time for the slandering of our LGBTQ brothers and sisters by the willfully ignorant.

I bet he's not a true Scotsman, either.

Given that she accurately predicted trump's servitude to Russia, it might be worth listening to her on this one.

So Stein became a Urologist?

Only very marginally. Like 1%. There is no noticeable difference. For example, ULPV mains out there still have a logo. The Epicene has a logo and I dont know of any canopy that packs smaller.

And still there are some who think atheist's are insensitive to their victims.

Well...I'm not sure the Spectre 135 was the best choice for my old body. It is really ground hungry and requires a 2-stage flare, which I found out the hard way. Of course, my landing phobia has come back with a vengeance - I had a couple bad landings in the military which required surgery. Might have something to do with my age. I went many, many years without landing fear. Anyway, I might be putting an almost new Spectre 135 up for sale if it doesn't suit my needs after a few more jumps. Oh well, I have the off season to decide.

The system in the UK is fundamentally different to that in the US. Judges are appointed by the Monarch on the advice of the Lord Chancellor (High Court Judge Appointment). They're independent from the political process and have fought to maintain that independence against political interference. They occasionally make bad decisions but generally they try to uphold the laws (statute and common). The other difference is that we don't elect a head of state. Every constituency in the UK (roughly 650) elects a local MP and the party that wins the most seats forms the Government. Sometimes this necessitates forming a coalition with one or more of the minority parties (SNP, Plaid Cymru, Green, DUP etc). Whoever happens to be the leader of the party with the most seats (including coalition partners) becomes the Prime Minister. There are several ways to terminate a Government. The first is to force a vote of no confidence (VONC) which is hard to do against a party with a solid majority, but against a minority government or one with a very slim majority it can be effective. The second is to vote down the legislative program put forward by the Government in the Queen's Speech. The result is the same in that the Leader of the Opposition meets the Queen and is invited to form a new Government. They then have 14 days to demonstrate that they can command the respect of the House. If they can't then a General Election is called.

Ok....anyone know where I can find the anti-venom for a Gaboon Pit Viper. Again, asking for a friend.

So does that mean I don't need to kill a human to leave the church? And to clarify, I'll need to know this before sunset today. Asking for a friend.

Since I'm the person who is the subject of this conversation regarding how I went from a rather Agnostic upbringing to becoming a Christian and believing in Christ and the religion of Christianity and then ultimately leaving it when I grew older I can assure you that I did not kill any children and swear myself to Satan in order to leave the Christian faith.

You might try their rigging school, Parachute Rigging Institute: http://www.parachuterigginginstitute.com/14.html --Mark

Hi Skwrl, Other than Joe's post said: 'Russian supported third party candidate' Jerry Baumchen PS) And I would not put it past HRC to try for the nomination again.

Yep, I read that, too. But with Clinton I always wonder what she's up to.

How do your “Christian” buddies feel about Trump’s betrayal of the Christian Kurds to the Muslim Turks? Seems like the action of a Judas to me, with his business interests in Turkey counting as the pieces of silver.

Atheists are better christians than evangelicals.

Given that it is used to disseminate white supremacism, racism, anti-Semitism, and child pornography, I hope not. It's also been used as a place for mass murderers to post their manifestos, as Patrick Crusius (the El Paso shooter) did. I have no problem inconveniencing murderers and child pornographers.

Well, it would appear that he is as stupid about insults as he is about everything else. Amazon hasn't been on here for some time, but I think she would put it something like: Awwwww. The poor widdle orange man got his feewings all hurt.