Casurf1978

Aren't you two jumping to a conclusion a bit soon. Did a quick search and came up with these studies on alcohol abuse in California and Utah. Keep in mind that Cali has 36M people while Utah only has 2.2M. http://www.usnodrugs.com/statistics.htm?state=Utah&cat=alcohol http://usnodrugs.com/statistics.htm?state=California&cat=alcohol

"I do not now believe that any one of the hundreds of executions I carried out has in any way acted as a deterrent against future murder. Capital punishment, in my view, achieved nothing except revenge." Albert Pierrepoint

I really think you need to spend more time in the sport and at tunnel locations. The tunnels I've been to here are all very social settings. Skydivers come in and it's almost like being at the DZ. IMO tunnels will help out our sport in the long term. Here in so cal your looking at spending $2500 plus to get your 'A'. And that's it if you dont fail any levels, which are like $200 a pop. Now you can take those $200 and spend 10 min in a tunnel which will help you out or spend it on another aff jump. After my first jump in my AFF I did 15 min tunnel time which helped me out tremendously in passing the AFF course. I also know a few jumpers who have hurt their necks or back and cant jump due to the opening shock of the canopy. The doc wants them to wait at least 6 months. Guess where they are 'jumping' now...at the tunnel. I know of another skydiver who is very frustrated on his belly, he wants to compete in rw. Guess where he is refining his skills...at the tunnel. Tunnels are great tool and will never replace the feeling one gets when you jump out of a plane.

Oh yeah those doctors are bastards. Like the one who performed one on a women who had conjoined twins that had only one set of lungs and one heart, or the woman who had metastic melanoma and needed immediate chemo, or wait how about the one where the fetus had a three-chamberd heart and would never live. Yeah, the doc that performed all these is in the same class as this guy. Argumentum ad ignorantiam plain and simple.

Americans want more bang for their bucks. If you could get a round trip ticket from LA to NYC for 500 or 850 which one would you pick. You want cheaper prices, well there is a cost that comes along with that. I agree with Walberg though. I like Jetblue and love their cheaps prices. If I have to put up with more advertisements then so be it. I know what I'm getting into. If I wanted to travel and be pampered then I would buy a first class ticket.

It's obvious that you dont see the big picture. Certain issues need to presented to kids even if their parents dont know about them. I'm sorry if I think that sex-ed and free condoms should be offered to kids. I'd rather have 16 year practicing safe sex than having them think 'pullin out' is 'safe sex'. Read up about teenage pregnancy and then get back to me.

It's not a freaking disease nor liberal BS like you implied. Open your freaking eyes and realize that kids now a days are exposed to more sex than any other time in history. Just turn on MTV and watch 20 min of it, or open up any magazine. So you think its liberal BS that a 16 wants to learn about STDs but is too scared to ask a parent and should be denied access to information on safe sex and VDs just because he or she is under 18. Hell with your thinking we should deny sex-ed and leave it to the parents. Wake up to the 21rst century. KIDS ARE GOING TO HAVE SEX and YES I think we should teach them about SAFE SEX and STDS even if they are under 18. Hell, we teach them about drugs why not about sex. An unplanned pregnancy at 16 can ruin several lives. I really dont understand why Americans are so scared about sex.

Margins all across the board have gone up and I don't see any price stabilization. Speculators have always driven the markets, stock and future markets. Oil is also going up because of the weak dollar too.

Excellent post. I too doubt we would ever admit that as a nation we make mistakes, huge mistakes sometimes. It would take a real leader and I don't see one in either party.

Have you tried putting it on Ebay. Since you couldnt find anything at Best Buy try selling it on Ebay.

I agree that tigers should not be behind bars. But the truth is that they are safer in zoos than out in the wild. There are only about 4500 Bengal Tigers in the wild. Pretty sad that these animals might be extinct within the next 50 or so years.

They might be building a boatload of windtunnels. In all seriousness, I have no problems with Iran building nuke power plants as long as they abide by the NNPT and are open to inspections. Oil is a finite resource and will run out one day. Look at how the UAE is moving away from an oil based economy to one based on tourism, mainly targeted to the mega wealthy. Secondly, the less oil Iran consumes domestically the more they can sell abroad. With China being a close neighbor and it's appetite for energy growing on par with it's economy it's a no brainer for Iran to look at ways to feed China's energy needs. I would be more worried about Iran setting up a euro based international oil-trading mechanism than anything else.

I agree with you. Don't you think that most people knew about this and just turned a blind eye. I'm not a huge sports fan, but I saw the size of some of these guys and knew they had to be on something and it wasn't just creatine.

It's not as simple as you make it sound. From what I've read it would be an ARM freeze on homeowner who are current and meet certain criteria. Also what many fail to see is that the financial system is so interconnected. Mortgages are sometimes sold to investment firms, who then cut them up and sell them to as instruments based on risk. Then you have hedge and pension funds come in and buy these up. It doesnt stop there either. Sometimes these loans are bundled up and sold to investors all over the world. Now our subprime crisis has turned into a global problem that will impact markets from Asia to Europe. In the past, gov has bailed out other industries. There was the S&L of the late 80's, and the airlines a few years ago. Sometimes a bailout is necessary to ensure the overall health of the economy. Such is the case right now. You have to look at the overall picture not just focus on the micro level.

Our reserves might be, but you have to look at the whole picture. Sometimes it's too costly to tap into those reserves with the current technology.

Good point and those savings are passed on to the consumer who demands cheaper prices. Check out your local Walmart and look around to see how many products are made in China. Bottom line is that consumers could careless if a Chinese person gets paid piss poor wages, as long as you can buy cheap products. That's all most people care about.

I see your point, but dont be pissed off at the illegals. The ones you should be pissed off at and go after are the people that hire them. They are the ones that are screwing you over and breaking the law. If they followed the law you wouldnt be competing against very cheap illegal labor. There are two sides to this issue and everyone is focusing on only one.

This has never happened to me. Don't get all pissed off at the illegals, what about the people that hire them. It's simple supply and demand. There is demand for cheap labor and the illegals supply it.

It's already $4+ at some gas stations here in So Cal. What many also fail to see is that oil is traded in USD and with a weak dollar the price per barrel goes up. It's a vicious cycle. Vanity Fair did an excellent article the consequences of Bush and his economic policy. It's going to take decades to fix what W did.

I remember that too. People didn't mind back then. It's sad that it had to escalate to this for people to start taking some action against the WBC.

Give SF a freaking break. It's not the only city that is doing this. Parts of Long Beach here are doing it too. http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-10-30-Halloween_N.htm Over 200,000 people were expected in the Castro. There comes a point where you cannot provide adequate security for so many people and have to make a decision.

It is a choice for many people. Just live within your means. Right out of college I wasn't making a lot of money, yet still I put money aside in a 401k, savings and managed to save enough for a down payment on a new car. It's all about living within your means and making sound financial decisions.

Not nearly as scary as these. http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/blbushdumbquotes.htm

Read up on how the Japanese defended the islands of Okinawa. More than 10,000 Americans died and over 1/3 of the islands population perished. This was for a small piece of land. Now lets talk about the mainland invasion of Japan. Our generals estimated that over ONE MILLION Americans would be killed or wounded and god knows how many civilians would also die. Also remember that the mainland was NEVER successfully invaded in Japan's entire history. We had the option to end the war in days not years and save hundreds of thousands of lives on both sides.

Maybe it'll piss off the parents into doing something. Hell we should do that here in the states. Just look at the following data from the CDC: http://origin.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/obesity/economic_consequences.htm