willard

On the rare occasions I go into a McD's or similar I have never tipped, inside or at the drive thru. I do go to a drive-in for coneys, like an A&W. In fact, it used to be an A&W. I tip the girls who come out to take my order and bring it to my car, rain or shine. Usually a buck or two, that's about it since they make a little over minimum. The tip just gets me faster service when I go and an occasional free rootbeer float

Only low thousands? How many do you think we should allow to die because somebody can't drive? 10k? 20k? 100k? Driving on our nations highways is a privilege not a right . Along with that privilege comes the responsibility to not unnecessarily place others at risk. There are any number of activities that are much more dangerous than a drunk driver and are still legal, even if regulated to some degree. Yet all these have one common thread-the majority of the risk is to the participant, not to an unsuspecting bystander who has the right to assume they aren't going to be slammed in the side and forced into oncoming traffic. We, as a society, cannot, and maybe should not, always protect the individual from theirself. But we have the responsibility to protect our members, to the best of our ability, from the pointless endangerment by others.

The subject of who should give credit to whom came up several posts before I added to the current discussion. If you are offended by this then I offer my most sincere apologies. If, however, you were offended because I didn't offer a line or two of slanderous remarks I will again apologize. You seem to have a good fundamental understanding of the use of profanity and I felt you do not need assistance in that area. The only other thing I can figure pissed you off was that I didn't attempt to defend President Bush. I usually try to avoid political discussions since nothing ever becomes of them. But, just to show I am capable of contributing to your, (ahem), "discussion" , I'll leave you with these couple tidbits so you can rip on me and feel good about yourself for a little while. -I voted for Bush in 2000 -I voted for Bush in 2004 -I have no regrets in my choices and am proud to say so.

I have to agree with that. As cars have become more and more advanced so have the requirements for a competent mechanic. Not that they aren't out there, it's just that a dealership knows your car inside and out, has up to date training and equipment, and wants to keep you "in the fold".

Ditto for me. I've only run into that situation once or twice, but pausing and letting it load helped. I'm not a comp wiz, so I have no idea why it worked.

That is sooo not right!

Looks like a failed government attempt to take down a tree.

Sometimes being a cop is a "damned if i do, damned if I don't" job. Case in point being the small town of New London, Ohio. App. 8 to 10 years ago they were hosting a weekend festival for volunteer firemen from around the state. The town cops had been under fire for being over zealous in their ticketing of drivers and DUIs in particular. If they smelled alcohol, you got a free ride to that station regardless of the breath test results. One night during the festival they stopped a fella on a motorcycle. He admitted to have had "a couple" but passed a field test. They gave him a break and let him go on his way with a warning. Guess who died in a motorcyle crash less then 15 minutes later? Yep, and the guys family brought suit against the village and the cops.

no, in my hypothetical, Mr. O gets cited for the accident AND Tipsy may also be subject to additional trouble for contributing to the accident due to his "condition" - perhaps the additional trouble would be significant. Mr O does not just get off for the traffic violation, he clearly contributed more to the accident than tipsy. I want Mr O to be responsible for his actions (running the light and causing and accident) I ALSO want Tipsy to be responsible for his actions (driving drunk and contributing to an accident as a result) I like how Tipsy has lost the 'respect' to be called "mr" in our posts. I have even less respect for those that drive under the influence and try to rationalize it. I'm on your side, but I don't want to swing so far that I ignore the other issues. We do appear to be in agreement, at least 90%. This demonstrates the problems that come up when states try to revise something as simple as traffic laws. Imagine the discussions when the doors are shut!

You are correct, Sir.

Exactly my point. Our presence there invites violence. Yes, and the presence of provocatively dressed women invites rape. No, it's more like swimming with sharks. Do it long enough and things will get real ugly real quick.

Scenario - Mr. Oblivious runs a red light and smashes into Mr. Tipsy McDrunk It seems you'd want to coddle Mr. O.... (I consider him to ALSO be a threat to society even if you'd let him off.) IMO... Mr O caused the accident and is also responsible for the violation of running a red light. Tipsy is responsible for DUI and perhaps some additional share for the accident depending on the circumstance. Perhaps the DUI combined with the accident would even have a increased responsibility. But in no way would I let Mr O off the hook. it's not hard No solution is perfect, but in your hypothetical case Tipsy gets cited for DUI and causing the accident, and Mr.O gets cited for running the light...the same thing he would have been cited for if Mr. Policeman saw him and Tipsy had stayed off the road. As you can probably tell I have absolutely no sympathy towards people driving while under the influence.

Exactly my point. Our presence there invites violence.

If I may, Bill, I would respectfully add that a contributing factor in Iraq is the multitudes of foreigners who have traveled to Iraq for the sole purpose of killing Americans soldiers. Addded to the poor planning and it is easy to see why things have turned out the way they did. The American Civil War (I assume you are referring to the second one, during Lincoln's administration) was far from over when Lee surrendered his forces to Grant. It was months before the rest of the Confederate forces were disbanded, and fighting between the southerners and the northerners sent south went on for decades. As I heard on the History Channel the other night, "The Union won the War of the States, but the South won the war of reconstruction." I fear that we have only seen the beginning of the fighting in Iraq.

Many places are like that. It's somewhat of a philosophical idea, that if the person breaking the law had instead obeyed the law then the accident would not have happened. Many area also share the blame in percentages, with a judge or jury deciding who carries how much of the blame. A common theme to this is if someone fails to yield the right of way. I know the other guy pulled out in front of you, but did you do everything within reason to not hit him? In this instance one is expected to make a reasonable attempt to avoid the collision, and if impaired then that person cannot react the same and therefore carries a higher share of the blame. IMO, any time a person is driving under the influence and is involved in an accident, he/she should be held 100% liable regardless of who's fault it was. It's time to stop coddling these people and start treating them like the irresponsible threats to society that they are.

You copied the text and included it in work done by yourself without giving due credit to the original author. You did it twice in this thread, first with your original post then again with "The Idiots Are Taking Over". Whether intentional or not, whether an action of malice or of complete ignorance of the law, you did, in fact plagiarize. A student in college doing this on a report or term paper would face certain disciplinary action, acedemic probation at the minimum and possibly expulsion. But, since this is an informal forum, most likely nothing will ever become of it. In most cases here simply putting quotation marks around any non-original parts of your postings to show that they are indeed from another author will suffice, such as I did in my sig line.

What bothers me is the obvious influence they flaunt over OUR government. Obviously, if you have bought into the 'War on Terror' you will be very happy that we are about to destroy another country and this fact will be minimized. But if you have an ounce of REAL Patiriotism in you (not the yellow magnet patriotism) it should piss you off that a small country of sefl rightious individuals that have elevated themselves above everyone else, and expect us to continue to keep prtecting them from their created boogymen. That's how little countries get big countries to help them out. Back in the 18th century our little group of colonies did almost the exact same thing with France to get them to come over and help fight the British.

Cooper had trouble winning against Mich and in bowl games, Lloyd has trouble against OSU and winning bowl games. Time will tell.

BTW, most Buckeye fans driving to Arizona this week are taking extra BBQ sauce and charcoal....they say 'gator tastes just like chicken!

As a Buckeye I was watching with joy as USC kicked butt. Yes, maybe now Michigan will accept the fact that they don't belong in the championship game this year. The way they played today they didn't deserve to be in the Rose Bowl. Young team that they are, maybe next year. USC played a fine game, with the only exceptions being a couple times when the USC receivers taunted the Michigan defenders after a good catch. One taunt while running into the endzone resulted in a much deserved late hit. Those couple instances were uncalled for and totally classless on both sides of the ball. O-H! I-O! GO BUCKS!!

It's such a pretty bottle though, and I'm not even sure I like whiskey And yes, the seal is still in place. Nothing wrong with saving it. I have a bottle of Mezcal that is nice to look at, so I just keep it on a shelf. The two worms in it make for great conversation and I'm not sure I would care for the taste.

As long as the bottle was kept sealed you should have no trouble arising from the consumption of this fine beverage. Enjoy!

It was I. It wasn't that difficult you know. Just had to find a few people willing to fly the planes into the towers under the assumption that the majic gell I gave them would save them from harm. Then, while the pilots were training, me and my guys snuck a few tons of high explosives inside and, working under the cover of cloaking devices, tore out walls, fireproofing, etc. and positioned these explosives to take out the main columns. Everything went ok until the dumbasses flying the planes missed their mark by several floors and knocked most of our pre-positioned charges from their mounts. (Damn it's hard finding good, well trained suicide pilots!) Then, since almost any explosive will burn and not explode when in a fire, most of the remaining charges were incinerated . Not that it mattered, most of our hard wiring was destroyed at the moment of impact. Once it was obvious that our charges had failed I sent my crews back in (had to pay the lazy SOBs overtime) with more explosive to rerig the entire blast sequence, only now at a different level because the stupid pilots couldn't hit a bull in the ass with a scoop shovel and we had to make the collapse look good.

"And to make matters even worse, we, big strong stocking men, able to fight our own battles, are put to shame by those middle aged women with three kids that are being deployed to Iraq to fight "our battles", making us all out to be a bunch of Tampacs who ought to be wearing the panties and high heels. So American men wear the panties, act like sissies, and cower at home while their women go to war to fight their battles. Makes you proud to be an American, doesnt it? " Where did you come up with the idea that American men act like that? From some Jihad extremist propaganda? I have friends who fought in Iraq, some were wounded there. Maybe you should tell them to their face that they are cowering behind a woman's skirt, but somehow I don't think you have the balls to do that. All of them are better men than you can ever hope to be. Not because they went and fought, not because of their political beliefs, and not because of any bullshit our own military recruiters told them. It is because they felt they can make a little difference in the lives of people half a world away and were willing to risk their lives doing it. If you want to speak out against the war, then do so. If you want to walk the streets carrying a sign protesting the war, fine. But don't ever suggest our troops over there or the ones here who have already served are anything less than brave. If anyone is a sniveling coward it is you. Hell yes I'm proud to be an American! And I am proud to call these veterans of the war in Iraq my friends.