Andy9o8

Oh BTW, in New York State, the Supreme Court are what New York calls its trial-level courts, not the highest-level appellate courts in the state. (Don't ask me why.) So this ruling was by a trial-level judge.

frankly the democrats are counting on this. they'll raise the front end fees so much that they hope to make ownership unaffordable. Which they think will mean people will give up their guns, but in reality will just drive everyone underground. LOL, what on earth makes you think you're qualfied to speak for what "Democrats think"?

Straight lines for about 5 one-liners. But this isn't Speaker's Corner, so I'm muzzled.

I'm too tired to look it up now, but I seem to recall some court rulings that there's a certain zone (I don't remember how it's defined) near, but not necessarily at, the border, where immigration checks are tolerated, basically as a second line of defense against illegal immigrants (and smugglers? not sure) who manage to get past the first line of defense at the border. (I can't remember more right now, and I'm done for the night.)

In fairness, I need to stand partly corrected for using imprecise language that I now realize may have given a mistaken impression. In the US, the laws that enable DZs to use signed waivers to defend themselves against lawsuits are the various states' contract laws (which don't allow minors to enter into binding contracts, including waivers), not any federal laws. However, I'm not aware of any federal law, or any state law (although there are 50 states, each of which have their own laws) that set a specific minimum age for skydiving. I also don't think there are any federal regulations that do so; and I'm unaware of any state's regulations that do so (although, again, there are 50 states, each of which has its own regs.) So technically, AFAIK, there's nothing specifically unlawful about a child skydiving in the US. Apologies to anyone if my earlier language seemed to be suggesting anything other than this.

There are, but there are also some that say we have only ever had one fatal tandem incident and that was over 20 years ago, so I for one am happy with those stringent rules. Do you really believe that, without them, some middle-aged tandem passenger in the UK would otherwise likely have died of medical causes on a jump? Do I believe the rules we have in place reduce the possibilty of fatalities happening? I didn't ask you that.

Draconian, over-the-top measure based on 19th Century Dickensian ethics. Shame on us as a 21st Century society.

Whilst good intent... just creates a black market of sales for cash to purchase drugs. There will always be abuses in a system of welfare, but the best prevention is in educating the next generation on what opportunities they have and the path to get there. Maybe so, but if they're already drug-addicted they're going to get the money to buy drugs one way or another. I'd rather it be via purchasing re-sellable goods from legitimate merchants, which contributes to the main-stream economy, rather than by stealing things to sell, which is mostly a drain on the main-stream economy, or by whoring themselves and/or working as low-level drug dealers themselves, which just perpetuates the social blight.

Yes, you are, or evading it with misdirection like this: I'm done with our silly dance.

Really? Are you old enough to have a personal memory of race riots, civil rights demonstrations and protests about the Vietnam War and the draft in the 1960s? Malcom X, black Muslims and Black Panthers? The Weather Underground? The "police riot" at the 1968 Democratic Convention? Students shot to death at Kent State and Jackson State? Well, I am. A lot of people wanted to attack soldiers and LEOs about those things. Don't be so fast to cavalierly dismiss the scenario. Yet even though you and your contemporaries lived through all of this you still passed the Iraq Resolution based upon the OBVIOUSLY HOLLOW issue of WMD's without remembering the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. But I have no idea what I'm talking about, right? I've never been in Congress, and I didn't help pass anything. Yes, some Dems took Colin Powell at his word and voted yes, while some Dems voted no. (BTW, I'm a moderate, so nothing was done my "my team", either.) Personally, I was always opposed to it, because I understood the lesson of histroy from the Tonkin Gulf Resolution. Nonethless, you are misdirecting; and I stand by my post in response to your post.

Well, there's a bit of misdirection by omission in that statement being out there, without context: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2012/09/romney_says_47_percent_of_americans_receive_direct_government_assistance_is_that_true_.html

That sounds too much like Eugenics, most of it tacitly (if not openly) ethnically discriminatory; and that makes me want to invoke Hitler.

It's not likely that this cohort of people can afford drugs via much legitimate income in the first place. They get the money by hustling - stealing, whoring and lowest-echelon drug dealing. Done right, a sensible protocol (freeing-up the money, as you put it) would likely result in less petty criminal activity to fund the drug buys. Win-win, on balance, IMO. ok, off to work.

If the proponents were intellectually honest, they'd simply insist that all welfare be paid in debit cards that can only be used by the named recipient, and can only be redeemed for reasonably-defined food and clothing items, rent and utilities, lawful medication, etc. That can be done, and some states are already well on their way to doing just that. But instead, they use the issue to back-handedly attack an entire class of people, under the guise (and that's all it is) of social engineering to promote a healthier lifestyle. I'm all for preventing welfare funds from being used to buy non-essentials, alcohol or illegal drugs, luxuries, etc. But if a person otherwise qualifies for aid to put food in his mouth (which is a separate issue), being a drug user shouldn't disqualify him from eating it to keep himself alive. ETA: @davjohns: You're referring to what's often been called "Workfare". The devil's in the details, of course; but in basic concept it's a great idea.

There are, but there are also some that say we have only ever had one fatal tandem incident and that was over 20 years ago, so I for one am happy with those stringent rules. Do you really believe that, without them, some middle-aged tandem passenger in the UK would otherwise likely have died of medical causes on a jump? I'm all in favor of, for example, ramp checks, etc. But the BPA has no concept of balance; in the ostensible name of "safety" it regularly seems to want to reduce risk to the point of zero. Can't be done, and all they're doing is chasing jumpers out of/away from the UK. Oh, well, Empuria's gain, I suppose.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/04/20/2758871/floridas-welfare-drug-tests-cost.html http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/us/no-savings-found-in-florida-welfare-drug-tests.html 108 of 4,086 is "a lot"? That's 2.6% by my math. I'll grant you that 2.6% is "a lot" in certain circumstances (manufacturing error tolerance, for example) but in this case, seems pretty darned low. But it's a good thing the good taxpayers of Florida aren't subsidizing those drug users anymore. It's definately a higher percentage than the number of homicides done with an AR15, and we're trying to ban them! I was wondering who'd be the first to turn this into a gun thread. Here we have it.

Side note - you're referring to the Smith Act, one of the most egregious federal statutory violations of the First Amendment to exist since the Alien and Sedition Acts, at least until the so-called "Patriot Act came into being. Unfortunately, although the Supreme Court has, from time to time, declared some of the Act's application to be unconstitutional, the Court (or at least a majority bloc on it) hasn't, yet, had the political guts or intellectual honesty to declare most if not all of it unconstitutional on First Amendment grounds. As long as it continues to exist, it will stand as a shameful stain on the law of the land.

Really? Are you old enough to have a personal memory of race riots, civil rights demonstrations and protests about the Vietnam War and the draft in the 1960s? Malcom X, black Muslims and Black Panthers? The Weather Underground? The "police riot" at the 1968 Democratic Convention? Students shot to death at Kent State and Jackson State? Well, I am. A lot of people wanted to attack soldiers and LEOs about those things. Don't be so fast to cavalierly dismiss the scenario.

Hello.... it's 6 days on and you still haven't answered the question: what type of insurance are you referring to? We can't help you if you don't speak up.

Agreed. And no special treatment for one source of income over another (like hedge fund managers only pay 15%). agreed - flat rate, starting at dollar number 1. all income is income. You'll never get widespread agreement to that. Paying 20% on $1 million/yr still leaves you with.. uh... ... $800k left over to buy that summer home and 4th car with. In the real world, the family of 4 collectively earning $40k/yr is hammered a whole lot than Biff and Muffy are more by 20% coming off their income. So the lower-middle class is going to insist on keeping the graduated tax rate; and the GOP won't have enough votes to kill that. So, the GOP will insist on keeping the bargain-basement rate on capital gains, and the Dems won't have enough votes to kill that.

All the better to cook and eat him.

http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Budget-Battle/2013/02/26/id/492022 Good. Our bloated military is not defense, it's offense, a giant swinging dick, if you will (apologies for the crudeness), that is orders upon orders upon orders of magnitude more than is necessary to keep our daughters safe in their beds. I don't know about you, but I'm more than a little sick of providing the security umbrella for the NATO countries so they can give their citizens national health care while laid-off workers in the US go uninsured. I'm sick of paying for Belgians' health care so that we can pretend we have "defense". Hmmm When I first started reading your reply the hair on the back of my neck started to rise but I went through it a couple more times and well You make some valid points For you and I it would come down to what degree But that might be a long long thread You see, Marc, the national health care of 100 million Europeans and other US allies is being subsidzed out of YOUR WALLET! Because for every buck of YOUR taxes that covers the US contribution to the security umbrella over the home of someone living in Brussels or Tokyo (what the hell do you think our aircraft carrier task forces are for?), that's one buck of their own tax money the Belgians and Japanese DON'T have to pay for their own defense, so that Belgian or Japanese buck is freed-up to be invested into a National Health Care that EVERY SINGLE ONE of our allies has, but the US does not. Belgians and Brits and Aussies and Japanese don't lose their family's health insurance when they get laid off at age 45; only Americans do. And this is why.

Andy's wife: "Welcome to a woman's world."

http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Budget-Battle/2013/02/26/id/492022 Good. Our bloated military is not defense, it's offense, a giant swinging dick, if you will (apologies for the crudeness), that is orders upon orders upon orders of magnitude more than is necessary to keep our daughters safe in their beds. I don't know about you, but I'm more than a little sick of providing the security umbrella for the NATO countries so they can give their citizens national health care while laid-off workers in the US go uninsured. I'm sick of paying for Belgians' health care so that we can pretend we have "defense".

It's been done. How about a medal is the shape of a red "A" for Air drones? Done, too. Well, scarlet, at least.