champu

What's incredibly ironic about this whole voted measure, is that the underlying concern is one of muslims coming into the country and taking over with sharia, etc. What is done in response to that? We're going to still allow them to immigrate here and keep their religious beliefs, but we're going to snipe at their traditions with a simple majority vote to ban minarets... ...thus demonstrating just how easy it would be to move into Switzerland and impose sharia with a simple majority vote. I'm not suggesting that's necessarily the intent of muslim immigrants in Switzerland, but if that's what you're worried about, why don't you make some tweaks to your system of government to protect your constitution a little better.

I made a reference to this a little while ago. It has virtually no chance of passing, and that's the point. It's not really a joke so a much as move to point out the hypocrisy of prop 8.

Curious - how do you (or anyone else) differentiate the relatively harmless 'nut jobs' from the not-so-harmless ones? /Marg I rewrote the last two paragraphs of that post a few times before submitting it, so it's safe to say I'm still working out details and implications of what I wrote myself. I don't really have an answer to your question, but I think one lies at the boundary of words and actions. Or in the case of proselytism, advocacy of ideas vs. advocacy of actions. Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire actually blurred the line between words and actions, making for an even more complicated problem. Also to be considered, is advocacy of ideas combined with tacit approval of actions tantamount to advocacy of actions? And how does one determine tacit approval?

I think a lot of people are talking past each other in this thread. Islam is not synonymous with modern Sharia nor militant fundamentalism. Minarets are associated with the former, not specifically with the latter. Human rights violations are associated with the latter, not necessarily the former. Therefore... It's entirely possible to simultaneously abhor human rights violations, and not support a ban on minarets. They are not coupled closely enough for such a combination of opinions to present an insurmountable struggle within one's identity. Those who favor this ban should understand that of its critics. However... There ARE symbols out there that are very tightly coupled with human rights violations and/or advocacy thereof that continue to enjoy protection as forms of free speech only, imho, because of the general irrelevance that groups displaying them have brought upon themselves through the exclusion they practice. If, however, such groups rose out of irrelevance then fewer people, again imho, would argue these symbols were deserving of such protection. In other words, if the Westboro Baptist Church wants to make signs/symbols professing that "God Hates Fags" and "Thank God For IEDs" and carry them in protest at funerals of soldiers then people generally say, "I don't agree but I support their right to free speech." They say this and then think to themselves, "...they're too crazy for anyone to actually listen to anyway..." Which is something that I think people hang their free-speech hat on, that nut jobs will always be seen as exactly that.

It's WIDELY known that there's no gravity in space. Even sixth graders know that. And there's a guy who commented in a thread on digg.com who's getting a PhD in combustion who will back that up. ...a PhD! ...in COMBUSTION!

FTW.

I did too, especially since there was just an article in the Economist about the French marketing naval vessels to Russia. I was actually expecting a cake in the shape of an aircraft carrier with cookie airplanes on it... ...and I don't even have a sweet tooth.

Tell me a reason why should I fly ant sub 70 sq ft canopy. I got enough wing load even with a 105 anyway. You shouldn't. I'm saying that flying canopies smaller than about 70 sq ft constitutes more of a stunt than anything. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

how can you tell!? By discernment of the spirit. I originally grew up in a town called Medinah. It wasn't called that because it was Islamic by any stretch of the imagination, but because about 100 years ago some Freemasons that had co-opted Arabic styles after seeing a silly show put on by a diplomat decided to build golf courses in the area and whimsically name the whole place after a holy site on the Arabian Peninsula. The accompanying temple in Chicago maintains its original architecture, but is now a Bloomingdales. Later in life I went to a university whose sports mascot was supposed to represent a Native American from the Illiniwek but wore an outfit from the wrong tribe (Lakota/Sioux) and performed a dance based loosely on... another wrong tribe (Kiowa.) ...so... ...what if the national value system is total bastardization of other national value systems?

Haha, well until they add the "surviving excessive wingloadings" event to swoop comps, I think most people will pass over canopies smaller than about 70 sq ft.

Update: Yesterday the cost of the jumps we didn't do was refunded. Kudos to Spaceland.

It would appear the average plan values provided by employers stay a decent bit away from the "excess coverage tax" of the new bill, so I wouldn't expect employer options to change much. These numbers are, however, a few years old, and don't appear to include vision or dental costs, or HSA/HRA contributions, which all may go towards the threshold. These numbers are moving a lot in the different versions of the bill, so we'll have to wait and see where they land. Well now, let's think about that situation for a minute. If, after a grace period once a public option is provided, a person shows up in a hospital and can't demonstrate that they have some form of coverage, or can pay for treatment themselves, or are in the country on some form of visa and therefore can't necessarily be expected to have medical insurance, why should the hospital treat them? Situations where the patient isn't stable and thus waiting for verification would be deleterious notwithstanding, why would we continue to force hospitals to treat people who can't be bothered to obtain something that's free?

http://xkcd.com/37/

Here's the text of that section: And here's the section of IRC1986 that this is talking about: All of which is just changing what information will show up on your W-2... not all that interesting... Why they are now including this information is because of section 9001, which has a tax on "excessive coverage" Which all basically says that if health insurance companies charge more than $8,500 per person, per year then 40% of what they charge over that will go to the government... which means your employer will pay 167% of what it used to for anything over $8,500 of coverage... which means your employer will probably drop that coverage option from the menu.

I didn't link to Mike's post. I linked to your post. The one where you stated that, as you expected, no one answered your questions. Then you called everyone either stubborn or dirtbags (the construction of the two statements makes it hard to tell which.) This post was 11 posts after I attempted to address your questions. You apparently ignored that post. And Marg wasn't name dropping, she was stating that there are different flavors of deterrence theory as recognized by different people in the field, some of which have the problems you pointed out, some of which address those problems. You ignored that aspect of what she was saying. I posted a link to a collection of papers on deterrence theory later in the thread (some of which were written by those Marg mentioned) and you ignored that saying, nope it's hopeless to try and deter AQ, we need to be like Sweeden 'cause they don't mess with people. I responded to that statement of yours too, and you ignored that. Anyone who has hopes of changing the thoughts you bring with you into a thread is deluding themselves.

No you don't... or you don't try very hard. You engage in Tazmanian Devil style, limbs flying out of a tornado, tooth and nail arguments and when someone steps in to address your actual questions you stop the fight, tip-toe around that person, and continue the tornado with someone else on the other side. ...or you walk right past that person and proudly state that no answers could be given ...or you accuse Marg, of all people, of name-dropping People remember things like that. This posting style is pretty common on the internet, and the question of why people continue to respond to it is interesting to me. I think I do because I see it as a challenge in communication. If getting your point across wasn't difficult it wouldn't be worth doing. But if someone's attitude makes communication impossible, it isn't worth doing either.

Ah banners... sometimes things go great... sometimes you get the attached. By the way, attaching tubes and banners to your feet is not easy to do safely. I would stick to a two person hand-hold, keep it fairly short, and get a rigger involved as soon as you can. /edited to add... I can picture where you're going with the pegs and pvc idea. It's going to shake your feet around and you're going to lose it right out the door. If you make the pegs long enough such that you can hang on to it, you're going to be clamping it with your heels and the body position you're going to end up in is going to make it really difficult to follow you and get the picture you're looking for.

Well, in fairness to whoever you were jumping with, you are terrible.

http://tinyurl.com/ycevsyl

It's not that much of a stretch to group forms of government assistance that reach the end user as US$ and call it all "welfare". Unemployment, Social Security, corporate bailouts, they're all "welfare". Section 8 and food stamps are... really really close in my opinion. Because food and shelter are basic necessities, one could argue that if a person makes 5 dollars on their own, and they need 4 for rent and 1 for food, then there's little difference between me covering their rent and food versus just giving them 5 more dollars in cash. Regarding the other comparisons you and Kallend made... Governments buy roads, schools, fire departments, etc. and continue to own that infrastructure. Paying teachers salaries and subsidizing tuition for higher education can be thought of as buying a smarter population, which is just another infrastructure investment. Now... "welfare" as described above can be considered an investment in the infrastructure that is "masses of un[der]employed people that are living, breathing, consuming, and not much else." You'd be right to point out the alternative (i.e. "letting people rot in a gutter") is less conscionable, but when people complain about the general plight of the impoverished and how a culture of big companies and consumerism keeps them where they are, their solution is often programs that appear to just cement the situation further.

With the foam/cork you're kinda damned if you do and damned if you don't. If you're careful and don't compress the foam very much it probably means you're not achieving a very good preload on the bolt and you the risk of the camera rocking forward to back and stressing the tab out that way. (...or of the bolt coming out ) If you mount to something like carbon fiber with a hole just big enough for the bolt (as Matt was saying) and throw a strap over the top that will probably be the most durable.

Maybe fine to you, but giving an interest free $1000 loan to Sacramento is not cool to me. It also does nothing to solve the problem - just puts off the bill till the next year. And let's not forget the IOUs given last year - interest free loans don't work well for us if they won't pay. I should clarify, I don't care about half a point over the next month and a half of this tax year. It will probably mean I'll be settled up with the state for 2009. I'll just have to do the math again and adjust my state withholdings for next year. I may buy a place next year, so I'm going to have to do that anyway. /edited to add: and the rest of your post I agree with, as I noted in the rest of my last post.

Planetary protection is something COSPAR takes seriously and NASA/JPL are continuously improving upon. The fact of the matter is that there is little or no hope of finding life on the moon.

In your "parts together" image, is there anyway to reinforce that side of it? It won't hurt to do what you did, but that will help more in a situation where the housing is getting pushed into the camera. The bolt housing tab is shearing because the thumbscrew is drawing the housing out the bottom of the camera. Preloads on bolts like this could easily draw the housing out of the epoxy too (epoxy is much better at preventing something being pushed through it than it is at preventing something being pulled out of it.) /edited to add side note: this effect is made worse by the use of foam or cork under the camera body because it creates a gap between the bottom of the bolt housing and the next hard surface it is being drawn to. That's why it's better to rely on registration pins/plates or straps/boxes to keep the camera straight. None of that changes the fact that Sony dropped the ball here by only mounting a tripod bolt housing on one side.

What The Fu- oh wait, I read that wrong... They're not talking about going from 6-9% up to 16-19%, but rather 6-9% up to 6.6-9.9% respectively. I don't really care that much about half a point... I usually owe California a few bucks at the end of the year anyway. It's less scary from a, "I can't believe they have the power to go and do that," standpoint and more scary from a, "I can't believe that's their plan," standpoint.