pirana

I suppose it depends on what you consider intrusion versus protection. We obviously are OK (I hope most people are OK) with laws that make it illegal to shoot someone, even in a private establishment. Yes, that is an exteme example, but clearly there is not a priciple that we adhere to that says you can do whatever you want in a private establishment. Same with building codes. It is illegal to lay 220 volt 200 amp bare wires across the floor; even though people are free to spend their money elsewhere. Same with food preparation. It is against code to store raw meat at room temperature. Buyer beware is not enough protection in many things. Smoking is a definite health risk with serious consequences. Nothing wrong with rules about these kinds of things. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Good post with lots of information. One thing not mentioned, that I read somewhere years ago, dealt withan additional factor - the likelihood of a vehicle to be involved in a crash in the first place. Smaller more nimble cars win that one hands down. You are less likely to crash a mid-size or smaller sedan or sports car because they handle better and provide the driver more "feel." (You can tell what the car is doing before it is too late for corrective action). " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Hmmm. Replying to my ownpost. Work IS boring today. Dolph, just wanted to say I liked your earlier post. People are for the most part what they want to be. If a person is OK with their physical self, who am I to criticize. I have no beef and do not disrespect people because of their body. (Depending on the person though, there could be a certain amount of, um . . . admiration). The thing I do get tired of is whining without action. That does not apply to the few million with medical conditions. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

I'm not nearly that strict. 2 or 3 hours of exertion daily is good for the body and the soul. And I'd let you outside the perimeter once a week or so for a movie or something. No butter on the popcorn though. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

It kind of got hidde in my sinature line. A. They're accepting applications

What does it mean when the Post Office is flying their flag at half staff? Now accepting applications. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Recent headline: World Mortality Rate Holds Steady at 100% " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

This is simply wrong. rl It would be far more accurate to say most obesity is not the result of a medical disorder. And some medical disorders are easily treated. But there are some nasty and complicated conditions that are very difficult to control. It is a very small proportion of the population that suffers from them, but those people are totally exempt from simple laziness being the cause of their problem. I do not have exact numbers, just going on the word of friends in the business. Just to be clear too, having a metabolism on the low end but within normal parameters, is not a medical disorder. Serious thyroid or other endocrine disorders are. The endocrine system with all of it's hormones and catalysts and enzymes and other glandular secretions is a very convoluted web of dependencies and triggers and blockers that does not lend itself to easy solutions. It's why almost all drugs have such a littany of side effects. A little change in any one part of the system can spin off all kinds off seemingly unrelated effects. So the initial statement is simply wrong. It's true that a high percentage of obesity can be addressed with diet and exercise, but what's left ARE the medical problems, and though they can largely be managed, some are a constant ongoing battle with no guarantee of success. One of my favorite articles from The Onion: Scientists Discover Gene that Causes People to Eat the Whole Damn Bag of Chips. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

It also requires a drive through, a deep fryer, paper hats, argentinian beef, soy, soy and more soy, and partially dyhodregenated wigglydumps...... So does expelling the waste products resulting from a drive through, a deep fryer, paper hats, argentinian beef, soy, soy and more soy, and partially dyhodregenated wigglydumps WIGGLYDUMP!!!!????? And you chide me for Monkey-Fart. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Let me re-write it so that you'll see how prejudicial your comments are. If you said the following: I'm not so stuck up that I think that color or skin tone is the only, or even a large, factor in someone's personality. Many of those that are white have their own problems or hangups. No, I don't look away or sneer when a "nigger" walks by. I do judge, though, and that's not changing. It's what makes me more perceptive, and I'm usually right. Not always, I understand, but enough. As I said, I'm just calling this as I see it. Here's what I can't seem to understand, however: If a large amount of crime is caused by factors other than skin color, why is it that no other country I've been in, which is quite a few, has as large of a number of victimized people? " Et cetera. Look. Prejudging on anything is wrong. Believing your perceptions are accurate because that's what you think, in face of other evidence (both anecdotal and scientific), is either ignorant or arrogant. Do I believe you to be either? Despite what you've posted, because I don't know you, I can't say I do believe you to be either. And rest easy, it takes a whole lot more to offend me than someone showing me that they're prejudiced in one way or another. Thanks for sharing your thoughts...I disagree with them wholeheartedly. Ciels- Michele That is totally illogical. The analogy is completely irrelevant. No person exerecises any amount of choice in their skin color. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Depends on how much that "same amount of exercise" is. If it is a pitiful or mediocre amount, sure, you'll get some distribution. But I guarantee you that if those 100 people came out to my farm, and I put them to work doing the "same amount of exercise" as I normally get - there will not be any fatsos for long. If any are really obese it might take some time due to the large amount to lose and the fact that a person in horrible shape needs to work up to what I call rigorous exercise. There's my challenge. Come on out. I'll feed you well, and put you to real work. I guarantee you will lose weight, and gain strength. You definitely hit on a key point there with the "average amount of discipline." My contention is that the average amount of discipline is pretty low. If a person has some sort of low metabolism, and they know that, then act accordingly. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

I quoted all that just to say: WHAT A CROCK OF SHIT! The dad and columnist belong together. Funny thing is, no discussion of what the ignorant redneck dad's child-rearing approach has been. I'll bet it would be an eye-opener. Maybe like Forest Gumps girlfriend; who for some reason never wanted to be at home much. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Intake and excercise apear to have been controlled for. Hmmmm. So they've proven that there are chemicals that can cause weight retention. Doesn't convince me of anything - especially when injecting adrenovirus into chickens. Like I said, if you have body chemistry issues then you need to act accordingly. I wonder if they put the chickens on a corrective plan after turning them into fatties. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

I wasn’t going to pick on you until you said always. There are cases where people according to every scale are considered obese but other then that they are in great health. Diseases are funny things (funny wierd - not funny ha-ha). Yes, you might dodge the bullet, just as not all smokers get cancer. But the odds are stacked against you in direct proportion to the level of obesity. There is diabetes, circulatory problems, ankle/knee/hip disorders, and a whole host of other goodies that can jump up and bite you while celebrating the anomaly of being obese and healthy. Saying a person is obese and healthy is like saying they are hypoglycemic or have hypertension and are healthy. It's a contrdiction in terms. The problems may not be obvious and may not manifest themselves for years, but they are lying in wait. I'll give you that a person can be obese, but healthy in all other ways. BTW - some of the weight charts out there are very misleading. When I say obese, I mean more than just a few pounds to shed. My definition of obese is that a person is overweight to the point of being at imminent risk for weight related health problems. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

It's logically possible that 2 lbs of food could lead to more than 2 lbs of additional body weight. Imagine eating 2 lbs of food then having those nutrients trigger formation of tissues that retain the next 2 lbs of water you drink, leading to 4 lbs of weight gain. Think of fertilizer and plants. Milligrams of "food" cause kilograms of new growth. I don't know if this happens in human bodies, but it's not the logical absurdity you seem to think it is. No, not logical. Those extra pounds of tissue do not materialize from nowhere. Materials to build the tissue must be brought in. The plant analogy is no good either. Plants are constantly pulling nutrients from the ground (as well as the mass of the fertilizer you mentioned). Water also needs to be carefully considered. It can be used to cheat both sides of the equation. It is how most of the trendy diets work. They depend on shedding water weight for the initial dramatic losses. The whole diet industry is pretty much a scam. If they can get a person to permanently change their behavior, so be it. Good for them. But you do not need the gimmickry of things like Atkins, South Beach, etc. to be successful. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

More than sometimes - more like most times. Can you point to some authority that has data or studies on gaining more weight than the weight of the food eaten. A friend of mine who is an exercise physiologist and former Olympics trainer says it's calories in minus calories burned minus calories excreted equals weight change. I find it hard to believe that adding a little O2 changes that, especially since while taking in the O2 we're exhaling CO2. Metabolism plays a part but the range of people's efficeincy at burning calories is not nearly wide enough to account for all the obesity. The number of people with bona-fide medical issues (such as thyroid problems) is a small fraction of the obese population. People who have medical conditions or metabolism know this (or should know this) and should act accordingly. If they do not have the strength or will power, that is a different story. The brain is hungry, the body is not. It's called addiction and they should get professional help. Unless a person is totally oblivious to their state of being, they must recognize that the choices they make put them where they are. It may not be easy to change, but so what? Just because something is difficult is not license to act like a victim of circumstance. If the pain of making changes is more difficult to bear than the pain of the current state - then a choice has been made to remain as is. Free will isn't free - it takes work to change, sometimes hard work. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Logic will get you nowhere with the conspiracy-theory, end-of-the-world, illuminati-r-us, planet-X, doomsday crowd. The fact that about 100 of these things came and went during the 20th century without their prophesized calamities coming true doesn't register with them at all. They are like vampires; they look in the mirror and see nothing. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

You'll find lots on the net about this. It's the kind of stuff that drives the conspiracy goofs into an absolute frenzy. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Thanks for confirming, and I suppose most of what we disagree on is a matter of degrees and perspective. I can asure you I am not anti-Semitic, or anti-Palestinian. I don't think Israeli's deserve to be the target of terrorists, but I also don't think the Palestinians deserved to have their country yanked out from under them. Just wanted to add that I don't think this problem will go away anytime soon - at least not until Israel acknowledges the rights of the people they pushed off the land. Seeking to understand the core of the problem is the only thing that will ever lead to resolution, and at that core is that someone was already calling it home before the powers that be at that time gave the Jewish people license to move in. At the time of the Balfour declaration (eve of WWII), Arabs outnumbered the Jewish by about 10 to 1. Another way to look at it. What if a foreign population that had moved to the US suddenly got a powerful friend to force us to give them half the country. That's a little simplistic, but is pretty much what happened. Do you really expect the Arabs to ever let this go? Would you? " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Humanity may wipe itself out. The world will survive. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

How little you know about the history of Israel, when it was founded. OK I only know a little, but what I know is precise. Israel was born of a strategically motivated partition orchestrated by Britian in 1947, with the US pulling the strings behind the scenes. The 2 semi-autonomous states almost immediately went to war. The Arabs saw the partition as extremely unfair because the partition gave 1/2 the land to a group of people that only owned 8% of the land. What group would not have been upset to be treated so shabbily in a thinly veiled political land grab. Independence by Israel was formally declared in 1948. The Arabs were well on their way to ridding themselves of the problem, but made some crucial tactical errors, primarily the granting of a truce that allowed the Jews to rearm. Without the help of their allies, the history of Israel would have been a very short one. Even with that help, if the surrounding Arab countries would have coordinated their efforts they would have run over all of Palestine in very short order. Wars subsequent to 1948 were only won by Israel with money and weapons supplied by outside parties in their effort to maintain influence in the region. This possibility remained an option for the Arabs right up until the time Israel aquired nuclear capability. The population imbalance between the Arabs and Jews (currently about 160 million Arabs live in the 6 countries closest to Israel, whose population is just over 6 million) meant the Arabs could have rolled over Israel in no time flat had they ever organized their efforts (again and of course, pre-nuclear). Oh yeah, you were going to tell me about when Israel was founded? (Since you didn't seem to think I knew). Curious, since you do not know me, what made you assume that I did not know when Israel was founded? They only have the capability to defend themselves because 1) the Arab countries know the US would retaliate, and 2) because of their nuclear capability. A hostile neighbor negates #2 if that neighbor acheives nuclear capability and is willing to use it despite annihilation of both sides. Granted, the above 2 paragraphs are just the opinion of one student of geography and politics; but they are largely seen as a plausible assessment of the situation by most people in the know. I suppose you could go farther back to the Balfour declaration if you wanted to debate the growth of the Zionist movement, and back to the Crusades to examine the hostility between the Judeo-Christians and Muslims, or all the way back to the earliest known history of the area to get completely grounded; but I think 5/14/1948 as the day they declared the State of Israel to be an independent and soveriegn entity to be pretty clear cut. I mean, where would you draw the line? OK, your turn. Tell me when Israel was founded. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Thw world just refuses to cooperate with all the idiots predicting it's end. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

I'd agree that they may promise to not target Russia, but wouldn't trust them farther than I could throw them to keep their word. Israel exists only because the Allied powers supported them post WWII. British & French support soon became just icing on the cake as the US became so dominant and ensured Israel's existence through the 50's and until they gained nuclear capability of their own. Bottom line is that Israel came into existence, and continues to exist, as essentially a US outpost in the region, politically and militarily. Without US support (money and weapons) they would have been ground to dust decades ago. They still do not have the ability to defend themselves other than the threat that they could take their enemies to the grave with them. The only thing that keeps the surrounding Arab world from rolling over them by sheer volume of numbers is that the US and others would retaliate. Which is why there is a new urgency in the land - because there might now be rulers in the region willing to sacrificee themselves and their entire country for the sake of destroying Israel. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Reading your post (a good one) reminds me of how I feel when I read passages from the Bible. I am at once very appreciative of the quality of the stories as a means for conveying the lessons it does for living an effective life; and at the same time disgusted that such a large portion of our population can even entertain those stories as some sort of factual account of history. I wonder what portion of people with an IQ over 80 really believe that 2 people named Adam & Eve spawned the entire human population? It's a story folks, learn from it, but don't be duped into thinking it is documentation of history. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

Ah yes, the bottom line tool of Christianity - declaring us all sinners, then claiming to have the only cure. Dominance via a combination of guilt and withholding the antidote. I'm a Catholic boy, I was redeemed through pain and not through joy. - Jim Carroll Of all the BS peddled by organized religion, the one about some roving vagrant philosopher from 2,000 years ago claiming to die for MY sins - Puuuuuhleeeeease!!!! Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine. - Patti Smith I'll die for my own sins thank you. " . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley