gjhdiver

Well call you old bud here when you decide to do stuff. I build the damn things as a hobby, and I can point you in the right direction for cams, hop ups, custome goodies, that sort of thing. Here's one that I built for the wife, back when I had one. You can't see it in the pictures, but that paint job is really cool. It's brandywine over gold metal flake, with blue ghost flames in the clearcoat. It really comes alive in the light.

Ugh. Congrats, Seb. At least it's a motorcycle. Ahh jealousy. Remember the old adage. If you want to do the quarter mile, ride rice. If you want to go cross country quickly, ride a BMW. If you want to get laid every time you stop, get a Harley.

Hey!! I've ridden this bike!!! :) Very gingerly as I recall

Ha, newfangled rubbish. This is my new bike, it's near on 30 years old. My old bike is 60 years old. You should ride out to Byron sometime, there's a lot of use HD riders there. We usually hit up the Mountain House bar on the ride home.

The first s is silent dopey.

Relax, you'll bust a gasket. The law is the law, and these people have had their voting rights restored, therefore, they should be allowed to vote. It's not a left or right issue, but simply one of illegal disenfranchisement. If you are allowed to vote, you should be able to. If you don't want ex felons to vote, then change the law that allows them to regain those rights. Fairly simple really.

Not this time around, but later. She'll run when she has the best chance of winning the nomination. I'd like her run just to watch the far right implode with apoplexy, but then I'm like that. I'd vote for her.

Nice rig.

What a great looking rig. Someone very special and fragrant must have designed that black and flame rig. Sure a prince amongst men etc etc (cont P 94)

Good. Leave Deuce alone.

It doesn't prompt people to learn, grow, get better, or anything of the sort. It just prods us to seek pleasure, or "do our own thing". Inadequate, presuming you expect to exist forever. Nope. Physics is it really. We're living in a closed system. If you can't understand something about it, inventing imaginary outside forces to explain them away isn't faith, it's superstition and lazy thinking. Ancient cultures thought the sky moved on a great wheel. It doesn't as we are well aware. We became educated and more aware, as we do so, we reject the idea of a god more and more. This can only be a good thing IMHO, YMMV etc etc. Evolution is proved beyond any reasonable doubt, to all execpt those that would use "faith' to deny iy. It's not my problem. If you're going to argue with science, you better have a better rebuttal than magic. As for the Wiccan Rede, you're free to grow as much as you feel you want to. If I live a life of pure pleasure, and harm no-one, who's to say that I haven't got out of the game on top ? A peculiarly American and puritanical thing, this uneccessary self denial of innocent pleasure.

Amazing how that just randomly happened, ain't it?

You're setting up a strawman argument here, so I'll ignore that part. If you want correct figures on uninsured children, the governemt accounting office itself supplies them. That means that they have no access to care, not that they are starving and covered in flies, as I suspect you well know. Just because I don't have kids doesn't mean that I am indifferent to others children. Kaiser themselves have done some pretty unethical things in their business, such as terminiating the coverage of some of their oldest members because it wasn't cost effective to keep them covered. This health care system works fine,as long as you can afford to buy into it. As nicely pampered professional, middle aged white males, we get to see the nice side. The situation is completely differnet for those that can't afford to partcipate. Ask the guy who picks your food how good his health care options are. Here's a little anecdotal tale about another countries health care. Julie gets her arm dislocated in Sweden, gets an ambulance ride, top flight attention, hospital stay, equipment, therapy and medication. She has no insurance that covers her abroad. Total bill to her - $60. I get knocked off my bike in San Francisco. I get an ambulance that I didn't call for. They get me to sign a waiver saying I didn't call them and don't want them. They leave, and I get a bill for $579 for the call out that I am liable for. My insurance doesn't cover it. I know which system is the most ethical. If you're happy with your coverage, just enjoy it, and be thankful that you're able to have it, but don't pretend that becuase you are fortunate, then every one else should be grateful for your opportunities.

Because as you told me yourself, you don't have to pay for health insurance for you and your family, your retirement/disabilty takes cares of it for you. If I had that deal, I'd think it was all fine too. Now place your family in the position of you not having had the career that you had, and not having any affordable healthcare at all. Your kids are sick, you still have a disablity, and you're faced with mounting medical bills that you just can't pay. There's a huge amount of uninsured kids in this country. Now, although you like to poke fun at the land of my origin, if you were in that position there, you and your family would get taken care of. Sure, you might not be able to get a nice private room with a color TV, buy you would be looked after, and you wouldn't be bankrupted as a result.

That's because there's not enough choice in the poll. I'm neither.

Fuck that. We're meat that thinks, period. When we're gone, we're gone. Try to have fun on the ride, because once it's over, you return your constituent elements to the system. If there is one "religious" tenet to live by, then it's the Wiccan rede. "Be it harm none, do what thou wilst shall be the whole of the law" Pretty much sums it all up don't you think ?

Ahh I see. Standard boilerplate political reply when asked about these things. You'll see every pol from either side do this. Ones that are running for the party's nomination for president say they would never accept a VP position, and senators say it because they don't want to spoil their chances of re-election should a job offer not materialise. Basically, they are all as honest as their options. If the job gets offered, then don't be surprised to see a change. Now on another note, whilst dear old Hillary seems to provoke the same emotions as her husband in the staunch conervative base, she's actually viewed very favorably amongst Democrats (obviously) and independant swing voters, and polls consistently highly amongst them. She probably has the best chance of becoming the first first female nominee for president, and very possibly the first female president. Remember that by the time that she could conceivably run, her husbands presidency will be probably 12 or more years in the past, and in all probability viewed with some nostalgia. She'll never be palatable to conservatives, but I doubt that that's a section of the electorate that she cares about attracting.

Er, I don't understand the question. Do you mean on an independant ticket, or as a vice presidential choice for Kerry ? I don't see either as a possibilty if that's what you mean.

Couldn't care less. Some of the best riggers and pilots I have worked with partook. The big difference was that all of them without exception, didn't partake whilst working. I have, however, seen riggers, pilots, and on one occaision, an AFF instructor, so drunk that they couldn;t walk a straight line during the working day.

Ooo boy. Fox News. Now there's a good unimpeachable source. Again, I point you to the "Associated Press" by-line in the header of the article. For all the "FoxNews" bashers, noting the by-line will help you, as in my observation, about 75%+ of the headlines they feed through are either direct AP feeds, or have AP contributions in them (which would be credited at the bottom of said article). It lends quite a bit of transparancy to their content. Compare that to CNN.com. I don't have anything in particular against Fox News. They put their spin on the source Associated News material the same way CNN do theirs. The trick is to follow the source back to it's origin wherever possible, and make your own mind up.

That's not really my issue. The pont I was making is really this. Job A does not = Job B. If you lose your six figure tech job to a guy in Bangalore, and wind up working a shift in Kinkos, followed by a second job on the swing shift at Burger king, the net result is one job created. It's also probably counted as a manufacturing job becuase you've constructed a burger there. Now, it all looks nice and rosy on paper, but then we all know how statistics lie, and if it was you, you probably wouln't be singing the praises of the administration. The other point I was making was that the current administration has to carry the states where the loss of long term manufacturing jobs has been the greatest. Some of these communities have relied on some industires as almost single providers for whole economies for several generations. The roll over effect of long term losses there are devasting on the whole economy. What John Kerry would or would not do as president is moot. If he gets elected, he's going to have his hands full trying to reduce a crippling deficit. That alone will curtail most plans for any extravagent social spending.

Wait until you're legally allowed to sign the waivers youself. No reputable drop zone or instructor is going to expose themselves to that kind liablity. I didn't make my first jump until I was 28. You've got plenty of time, and hardly any time to wait. In the meantime, lurk here, and learn what's happening in the sport, and maybe buy some vidoes and Skydiving magazine to whet your appetite.

Yep. many times. Some take it to heart and go bowling, some don't. Of the ones that didn't two died skydiving, and others were seriously injured. I don't give that talk to anyone lightly, and never for just being a shitty skydiver. That can be changed with training and willpower and application. I give it to those who have just the right combination of arrogance, recklessness, stupidity and hubris, that they present a clear danger to anyone around them.

Well, it is true that flying and blowjobs are two of my favorite things. However, we have different rules for recall of servicemen in the UK. I won't be getting called up anytime soon, as I'm far too old for active flying now. Mind you, I could still do the whisky drinking and watching soccer in a nice warm quonset hut, whilst thinking of menial taks for the enlisted chaps that consumed most of our time before. And don't lie to me porky. The Marines would only have you back if they ran out of inflatable landing craft.

Well we all know you wouldn't have to due to your being a native of the quick witted dry humor, but do you really think people should breadk their promisis, and go back on their word, just because they feel like it? Actually, I could have been drafted as a resident alien, but I am now, and have been for some time, a US citizen. It may be because I come from a climate where civil dissent is more recognized as a form of politcal discourse, but I regard it as every citizen's duty to closely watch the actions of their government. If they ask me me to do something rephrensible or illegal, it's my duty to refuse to do that, no matter what consequences may befall. Abu Ghraib os a good example of this. The soldiers there agreed to serve, but they should have refused orders that instructed them to abuse detainees. This isn't just any conflict. The populace was lied to in order for the US to invade a sovereign nation, and we still haven't been told why we went there. Like I said, I'll sight up for this one, right after the Bush twins do.