JohnRich

I think you should make your own decision, and not ask us what is best for your life. When you have a parachute malfunction, there won't be anyone there to ask what you should do - you'll have to handle it all by yourself. So start making your own decisions right now.

I was married with a one-month old baby when I got my draft notice, so marriage didn't make you exempt. Therefore, his divorce should have had no bearing on the reason why he was drafted. I was also in college but dropped out to work and support the wife and kid. As long as I was in college, I was safe. When I dropped out, they snagged me. That story doesn't add up compared to my experience. I don't know what the explanation is for that...

Thank you, Marcello, I knew I'd forget to mention something...

The first murder in recorded history was when Cain slew Able, as told by the Bible. Since guns had not yet been invented, that murder might well have been commited with a rock, just like the news story in this thread. Thousands of years have passed since poor Able's death, and there's still no effective rock control laws to stop this slaughter...

Don't know about signs, but here's the policy: http://disneyland.disney.go.com/faq/parks/#parks-q12 Absolutely no guns, pogo sticks or string bikinis!

Nice! Where does this Lori Steffen chick jump?

I estimated a whopping 400 to 500 people in attendance at the funeral. I've never seen so many people at a funeral before. The attendees included family, and friends from church, work, the military, and skydiving. Dan had an amazingly wide circle of friends, all of whom held him in great respect. Skydivers were present from Skydive Houston, Skydive Spaceland and Skydive San Marcos. At the guest book sign-in, orange and white ribbons were available to be pinned to shirts - those were Dan's skydiving jumpsuit colors. It was a full three-hour service, and no one who attended could help but be emotionally moved by it. It started with a Catholic mass service, with waving of the smoke pot, taking of bread and wine, singing of hymns, saying of prayers, etc. The priest spoke at great length about his personal experience with Dan, such as the day he fixed a breakfast for everyone when the church was under construction. Pictures of Dan looked down upon us from big screen TV's mounted high on the front walls. About a dozen people stepped forward to give personal testimonials about Dan. Both of Dan's daughters spoke, Samantha struggling through tears which made me cry for her pain, and Vanessa who was amazingly composed. Vanessa used to come to the drop zone with Dan and hang out with us. She said later she's planning on making a jump. Two of the testimonials were from skydivers: Marcello Garcia and John McDonald, and both were well done, spot on and very touching. A number of talks were given by Dan's Navy Seal friends. One asked all the Seals in attendance to stand, and about 30 men stood up. There were about 10 in uniform who were located by his casket, and who also served as his pallbearers. Another dozen or so sat together up front in civilian dress, and then another couple of handfuls were scattered randomly throughout the crowd. One Seal speaker had everyone shout out a traditional "Hooah Dan Potts". With that done, Dan's casket was wheeled to an outside courtyard and an American flag was draped over it. A bagpiper played. Seals stood in formation at attention. Two crusty old Veterans wearing white removed the flag and folded it into a triangle. The flag-folder had an interesting technique where he would manipulate the folded flag triangle, flipping it in all directions in his hands, examining it from every angle to make sure it was absolutely perfect. The Vet marched over and handed the flag to a Seal, and the Seal in turn marched over and presented the flag to Dan's wife. The casket was wheeled away, and everyone gathered in a reception hall for snacks. The skydivers moved around to different groups to chat with friends, some of whom haven't been seen in a while. After a while, we departed, and I ended up with a small group at a bar and grill, where more talk of Dan took place. Many people were deeply moved by this service and the examination of Dan's life, and have taken it as a motivation to lead their own lives by the example in which Dan led his. There was a theme that Dan led his life "out loud", but I didn't really see him that way. He was a quiet and humble man. He didn't brag about his Seal service, didn't talk about his time in Vietnam or his brushes with death in combat, didn't push his religion on anyone - he just led his life, leading by example, treating people with respect, honesty and friendliness. It was only about three months ago that I did a demo jump with Dan, which he organized for a benefit to raise funds for Wounded Warriors. He collected about six military veterans for the dive, and we were all honored to do it with him, and for the cause which meant so much to him. I never imagined that just a few short months later, that the roles would be reversed; that Dan would be gone, and it would be us now paying homage to him. Goodbye Dan. You are greatly loved, and will live on in our memories.

Something seems fishy with that story. If you were in college, that kept you out of the draft. Being married did not disqualify you from the draft. So getting divorced should have had no effect on his draft status. And being in college should have made him exempt from being drafted.

Two words: "iron sights".

Great stuff! Quote: "...background noise from cars, birds and traffic all register above or near air traffic noise and in some cases are even higher."That report would seem to put the complainers in their place as having no leg to stand on, either legally or factually.

Just a herring? Heck, I'll give a red whale! This whole debate is based upon judgements made by the Souther Poverty Law Center about groups of people, derived mostly from just web sites. And based upon that, they brand 300,000 Americans as "terrorists" simply because they don't like paying taxes? There's the whale for you. But none of the liberals seem to have any problem with that giant red whale. They're only response to people who protest high taxes with civil disobedience is "shut up and pay". Thank goodness our founding fathers didn't just shut up and pay. At some point when taxes get so high, that a large proportion of the population refuses to pay, then a tipping point will come in which something drastic will have to happen. We'll either shut up and pay whatever the government asks for and have oppressive despotism with prisons full of tax protestors, or we'll go the other way and once again have a representative democracy that serves the people's will. And since so far presidents and legislatures don't seem too willing to voluntarily cut the tax burden, it seems every more likely to me that civil disobedience will continue to rise. That doesn't make them terrorists. It makes them tax evaders, and scofflaws, but not terrorists. By ratcheting the language up against them that far, all it does is make things worse, and hurries the onset of violent responses. Shame on the SPLC for stooping to such tactics.

It's funny to note the liberal responses to voter fraud by a Democrats here, and compare it to the other voter fraud case posted here recently (Republicans tough on voter fraud) in which voter fraud occured by a Republican. My oh my, what a difference a party affiliation makes. Just as I suspected.

Um, shouldn't that be 4-inches from the link? 5 lbs. X 4 inches = 20 inch-lbs, right? 5 X 6 = 30, which is the maximum they say not to exceed. So shouldn't we be shooting for the 20 that is recommended, rather than the maximum? And it's human nature that once you've reached the recommended force setting, to give it just a nudge more for good measure. So if you go to 30 and you nudge it, or if you're off a little, you're likely to exceed the maximum. So I would think that 20 would be the better target, and then a little nudge more doesn't hurt you, because you're still within the acceptable range of 20 to 30.

So THAT'S the design inspiration for propeller spinners!

News:Felons Favor Democrats "A new study by the Minnesota Majority found that at least 341 convicted felons in heavily Democratic Minneapolis-St. Paul who voted illegally in the 2008 Senate race. And it looks quite likely that felons gave Franken his narrow Senate victory..."Full story: Fox News

Thanks for throwing that out there. I started to respond in detail to all the things that were wrong with his post, but it would have just taken too long, and gone off in too many other directions. And the idea of his claim that he is "more sensible", implies that the rest of us are "less sensible", and was just more of the usual insult stuff, and based upon his own incorrect understanding of the facts. Sheesh.

Congratulations on your purchase. I'm glad you weren't able to shoot anyone during your waiting period. It's not an addiction - guns are like tools, and you need different tools for different purposes. In your tool box you have a hammer for driving nails, screwdrivers for screwing screws, and wrenches for wrenching bolts. In guns it's nice to have a handgun for short range shooting, a .22 plinker for cheap short range practice, a .30 caliber rifle for longer range shooting, and a shotgun for aerial moving targets. And if you find something you really like, you can start collecting different variations of that one thing, and so on.

All right, one third of the people here say they are left-handed. However, in society in general, only 10% of people are left-handed. So, what does this mean? That left-handed people crave high risk sports more than right-handed people? And if so, why?

Why do you want to copy that? I've always considered that a really bad idea. They're called quick ejectors because when you pull on them it ejects the attachment ring from the hook, and your leg straps fall off. Do you really want something hanging from them that could catch on something and cause them to quick-eject accidentally?

I hardly understand why someone would do such pointless things but that's due to cultural differences, I guess. Saluting a bundle of light projected on a screen is just too.... unpragmatic for my taste, I guess. So when you watch movies you're just like a robot, and are never moved by emotions, or feel any twinges of grief, excitement, sympathy or joy? And if so, what's the point in going?

So is it cheesy to laugh at a movie? How about if they cry, but remain sitting - is that cheesy? What about people who cheer when a good guy gets the bad guy, or the hero gets the girl? Is it only the act of standing up that makes it cheesy? And if so, why is standing up so essential to your definition of cheesy? See message #25.

So when you complain, against the war in Iraq, airport security and the Patriot Act, then that makes YOU a "subversive"? Do you really not see a diference? Yeah, some people are all talk, and others are brave enough to put their money where their mouth is. The American Revolution was fought by people who who were willing to put their lives and fortunes at risk to fight against unjust laws. Where would this country be if everyone were just mindless sheep that meekly went along with whatever the government tells us to do, as you imply we should? Those sheeple who blindly follow without question every new government law - they are the biggest threat to freedom in America.

Feel free to send out hordes of federal agents to create more Ruby Ridge's and Waco's, in order to round up these heinous miscreants who flaunt the law by printing their own license plates. How dare they! They must be taught a lesson! My way of handling it would be to just give them a traffic ticket when caught on the public roads. To each his own. Even the FBI recognizes that the large majority of them are harmless, so they side with my view on this.

So when you complain against the war in Iraq, airport security, the Patriot Act, and BATF regulation of rocket motors, then that makes YOU a "subversive"? Was Rosa Parks a subversive for sitting in the white section on the bus? Was Martin Luther King a subversive for marching without a permit? Were the four black college students in Greensboro subversive for sitting at a whites-only lunch counter? Were the citizens of Lexington and Concord subversives in 1775 for refusing to surrendur their arms? Was Henry David Thoreau a subversive for not paying his taxes? Was Mahatma Ghandi a subversive for his "salt march" against the British? Be careful what you wish for... I'm thankful that people are brave enought to be "subversive" in protest of unjust laws.

So you're in favor of repealing the laws which prohibit a person from buying a firearm from a state other than his own state of residence? And you want to repeal the law which prohibits importation of firearms from other countries unless they have a "sporting purpose"? And you would repeal state laws which ban .50 caliber rifles, since they're legal under federal law? And since there is an instant criminal background check, you would repeal 15-day waiting periods present in some places? And you would repeal state laws which ban the use of hollowpoint ammo for self defense, since most states don't do that?