jcd11235

Son, no matter how far you travel, or how smart you get, always remember this: Someday, somewhere, a guy is going to come to you and show you a nice brand new deck of cards on which the seal is never broken, and the guy is going to offer to bet you that the jack of spades will jump out of this deck and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not bet him, for as sure as you do you are going to get an ear full of cider. –Sky Masterson The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown by Damon Runyon Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

When the (dry) ice caps on Mars evaporate, what gas do you suppose is released? Hint: Dry ice is the frozen form of what compound? Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Actually, it is. The earth is closest to the sun in January and farthest from the sun in July. "Earth moves in an elliptical orbit," says George Lebo, an astronomer at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. "We make our closest approach to the Sun (147.5 million km) in January -- that's called perihelion. We're at the greatest distance (152.6 million km), or aphelion, in July." Of course, if you don't think climatologists are more qualified than you to make accurate predictions about climate, then you might be reluctant to believe a NASA astronomer is more qualified than you to comment on astronomy. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

So when are you gonna stop jumping? In late 2005, when I came to the conclusion that I could be a good (university) student or a good skydiver, but not both simultaneously. I also stopped driving (with two isolated exceptions) a couple years later (and rarely ride in motor vehicles since) in favor of walking and, more recently, bicycling. The probability is very high that I will return to one or both activities eventually, but for the time being, my carbon footprint is reasonably small. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Have you ever taken a Trigonometry class? What about a Physics class that covered light and optics? I think you would find that there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for higher temperatures in California in July than in January, despite the earth being slightly farther from the sun. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Is that what your position is now? So I guess you no longer believe that global warming ended in 1998, right? For the record, I agree. It's not a done deal. Anthropogenic global warming will continue until we humans make sufficient efforts to stop it, and perhaps only then if we do so in a timely manner. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

I see you conveniently ignored the newer image. According to your linked source, "The new version extended the data range through 2007, and was based on a revised analysis that included better inter-calibration among all the satellite records that are part of the time series." Edit: D'oh! Quade beat me to it. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

$99.99 plus shipping to them (Return shipping included in price.) I've utilized TechRestore twice previously, and have been satisfied with the results. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

How so? Such an implication was not intended, w/r/t this topic. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Maybe, maybe not. I haven't seen any explanation of what, precisely,the phrase "come from the United States" actually means. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

For many of the same reasons most people buy most things from middlemen. Accessibility, ability to purchase desired quantity (as opposed to having to place an order for at least x items), not having a point of contact with the (hypothetical) Russian dealer, etc. Heck, the Russian dealer himself would be a middleman if he didn't manufacture the guns. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Does it even mean that much? To me, all "coming from the U.S." implies is that prior to being in Mexico, the guns were in the US. I don't assume legal ownership in the U.S., and I don't assume legal U.S. manufacture. All I get from the phrase is that the United States was a waypoint somewhere/anywhere between the guns' manufacture and the guns' recovery from a crime scene in Mexico. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Do you have any examples of articles in which such an argument is presented by a Mexican or American official? "Coming from the USA" does not imply that the guns are being purchased legally from gun stores in the USA. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Obviously, we don't have access to the trace info. Given the repeated usage of the term 'assault weapons' and the concurrent images in the news interviews, I am reasonably sure they are NOT talking about my brother's deer rifle. Grenades, fully-automatic M16s and M203's aren't exactly spilling off the shelves in gunstores. The idea that these weapons are being bought in the US and brought into Mexico is, frankly, ludicrous. Class III weapons aren't sold without a huge amount of paperwork, and the ATF keeps a VERY tight supervision on Class III weapons. Hypothetical situation: An illegal Russian arms dealer sells 1000 Soviet era AK-47 automatic rifles to an illegal arms dealer in San Diego, California. That arms dealer, in turn, sells 200 of those rifles to a member of a Mexican drug cartel, who subsequently smuggles (successfully) the rifles into Mexico. Did those 200 rifles in Mexico come from the US? Could the ATF trace them to the US, given the opportunity? Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Yes, that is a correct interpretation of what I wrote. That's an order of magnitude discrepancy. Not necessarily. The two numbers may not be related. From previously in the article, "But in those same two years, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered at crime scenes." I read that as the 29,000 guns were recovered from crime scenes (over two years), while the 730,000 annual figure comes from failed smuggling attempts and/or legitimate imports that did not have proper documentation (or were rejected for other reasons), and may not be considered to be "recovered from crime scenes" by the Mexican government. I don't think the two numbers are directly comparable with only the information in the article. We don't know from the article what proportion of guns used during the commission of crime are ultimately recovered by the police/government. We also need to be careful so that we don't assume that all guns in Mexico that are imported from the US are going to be used to commit other crimes. Good point, and well said.

Bullcrap. The trace goes from the manufacturer, to the distributor, to the gun shop who looks it up in their bound book. If it came up negative on a trace, it wasn't sold in the U.S. and it came from somewhere else. Nothing in my post disagrees with that. To put it another way, if pollsters used the logic of the article, then after polling 1000 people, if 750 supported candidate A, then that would indicate that, out of the entire population, only 750 people support candidate A. They incorrectly assume that every single gun that came from the US was traced back to the US. The data do not support that assumption. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

WELL, there you have it then. All them there guns came from the US. You claim crap and then you print crap. Talk about a stretch. You say someone cant prove there point and then turn around and say YOU dont need to Got me goin this AM

Agreed. I don't own a television, so I sometimes forget that not every TV news show sucks. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

The present Oval Office occupant notwithstanding, since he hasn't been in office long enough to demonstrate competence or incompetence, I would say it was Clinton, at least w/r/t the budget and economy. I would also suggest that the Republican sweep of Congress in the 1994 elections set him up for his best years by creating such an adversarial environment between those two branches of the federal government. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

I'd be surprised if it's even listed in there. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Obviously, spending the money on guns and ammo is the more responsible choice. Everyone knows that a college education would only serve to turn your kid into a pinko commie faggot whose two priorities in life will be to ban guns and undermine marriages between straight partners. The problem with this country is that our youngsters are being exposed to too much book learnin'; we don't need more of it! Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

The government is not a business, and should not be run like one. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

The article is crap, and draws conclusions not supported by the data presented. The authors either lack an understanding of basic statistics, or they are intentionally trying to mislead readers by making a false assertion and using smoke and mirror tactics in attempt to support it. From the article: In 2007-2008, according to ATF Special Agent William Newell, Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF for tracing. Close to 6,000 were successfully traced -- and of those, 90 percent -- 5,114 to be exact, according to testimony in Congress by William Hoover -- were found to have come from the U.S. But in those same two years, according to the Mexican government, 29,000 guns were recovered at crime scenes. In other words, 68 percent of the guns that were recovered were never submitted for tracing. And when you weed out the roughly 6,000 guns that could not be traced from the remaining 32 percent, it means 83 percent of the guns found at crime scenes in Mexico could not be traced to the U.S. Out of 29,000 guns recovered from crime scenes, 11,000 were submitted to the ATF for tracing attempts. We cannot assume that none of the 18,000 guns that were not submitted for tracing did not come from, or even could not be traced back to the US. In fact, without knowing how the 11,000 guns that were submitted were selected (i.e. were they selected randomly?) from the 29,000 guns recovered from crime scenes, we can't say much of anything about the other 18,000 guns, except that they were not submitted for tracing. (Note that 11/29 = 37.93%, not 32%, as the authors claim.) Of the 11,000 guns that were submitted, nearly 6000 were successfully traced. We cannot assume that none of the 5000 guns that were not successfully traced came from the US, nor can we assume they came from the US in the same proportion as found in the 6000 guns that were successfully traced. Of the nearly 6000 guns that were successfully traced, 5114 traced back to the US. This is figure, 5114/6000, or ~85.23%, is a meaningful statistic, albeit not a very useful one. It tells us that, out of approximately 6000 guns recovered from crime scenes in Mexico and submitted to the ATF (of the US), and subsequently successfully traced, during the two year period of 2007-2008, 5114, or over 85%, of those guns were traced back to the US. Without knowing why the ATF received the sample they received, or without knowing the reasons (as they relate to the the different sources of guns recovered from crime scenes in Mexico during 2007-2008) why ~45% of the submitted weapons were not traceable, we cannot draw conclusions about the source of the ~24,000 guns that were not successfully traced with any reasonable level of confidence. Clinton and others were wrong to claim that 90% (note that 85.23% rounded to one significant figure rounds to 90%) of the weapons used to commit crime in Mexico came from the US. On the other hand, the authors La Jeunesse and Lott are also wrong claiming that "83 percent of the guns found at crime scenes in Mexico could not be traced to the U.S." There is an important difference between could not be and were not. Given the data referenced in the article, we only know that about 20.3% of the guns could not be traced to the US. It's important to also note that an inability to trace a gun to the US does not necessarily imply that the gun definitely did not come from the US. Clinton's 90% claim assumes that Mexico randomly selected from 29,000 recovered guns the 11,000 guns submitted to ATF. It also assumes that, of the population of 11,000 guns submitted to ATF, the ~6000 that were successfully traced were effectively a random sample from that population. It is highly unlikely that either assumption is correct. At the opposite extreme, La Jeunesse and Lott's 17% figure (which should actually be 18% if proper rounding is performed) assumes that, of the 18,000 recovered guns that were not submitted to ATF, none came from the US. It also assumes that, of the ~5000 guns submitted to ATF that could not be traced, none came from the US. It is highly unlikely that either assumption is correct. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Try here, where the story's introduction is often as in depth as the entire story as reported by other mainstream media outlets. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!

Can you have Fred PM me? That would depend, I suppose. Fred really is a hypothetical wholly fictitious character. While I do know of a few people with similar problems (w/r/t listing skills on a resumé without drawing attention to a specific job), to the best of my knowledge, none of them know much about cigars or smuggling. If you have insight to share, it would be greatly appreciated, and I'm sure a PM would be possible. If you're looking for genuine Cuban Cohibas, "Fred" isn't likely to be of much help. Math tutoring available. Only $6! per hour! First lesson: Factorials!