confused04

American tabloids tend to just be hilariously dumb and rarely touch on real stories... Now you can argue that FOX news fits this bill ( I certainly would). But tabloids, in the strictest sense, in America are exclusively entertainment based or highly satirical. FOX news is an interesting case as, just like the Daily Mail, Daily Express, and whatever portray themselves as legitimate news source, its hard to say they are completely without merit. If you read the above headlines as objectively as possible, you might not see the inherent bigotry and racism that many others can see. Although tabloid in nature, they are trying to expose alternate point of views. As much as the BBC is viewed as unbiased, no such thing exists. All journalism and research is analyzed through different paradigms and approaches and these tabloids may be the only venue of alternative points of view. Millions of readers might read that "trash" because they don't share the exact view point of "traditional" news sources.

Might as well take advantage of being awakened by my roommates who have told me the Castro has indicated that he is stepping down. BBC CNN Guess it could be a good thing...could be a bad thing... could be a "doesn't change jack" thing...

As much as we'd like to think human nature isn't a part of our policy making process, it is. There is such thing as political psychology and often analyzing how politicians think and interact will determine the course of events. As idealistic and rosey as it sounds to make our decisions based exclusively on policy matters, its not how things work. If a guy can't work with Congress, do they deserve to be President? If a leader is culturally insensitive or dimwitted, should they be president (we know the answer to that one for sure)? Separating character and policy completely is often an easy way to get an ineffective or down right dangerous politician into office.

I'm definitely not saying the U.S.'s health care system is something we should be proud of, but its still better than Cuba's. Most of the US's health care problems are not based upon the system itself, but on life style choices.

I'm just getting kinda fed up with the whole "Cuba's healthcare system is teh roxxor and pwns teh wurld!" A) Cuba was reported to have a much lower infant mortality rate. Fact: Cuba was also reported to have a much much much higher abortion rate for "high risk", determined by the state of course, pregnancies. I.e. lets abort them and claim that they don't die at birth. Many of these abortions are not voluntary. B) Cuba's healthcare is cheap, reliable, accessible and successful. Its focus on preventative medicine and removal of corporate greed makes it superior. Fact: Cuba's healthcare system is WORSE in terms of corporate greed than the US. Their ENTIRE health care system is built on bringing tourists in to prop the economy up. There are two types of hospitals, those for the tourists and those for general public and they are NOT the same, nor anywhere near the same. Those accessible by the general public often lack ANY records (hmm... wonder why), lack supplies, are more importantly, are not sanitary. Cuba has a reason to lie if its health care system is trying to pander to the tourists. They claim to be capable of assisting in ailments that they cannot. Cuba's health care system is not a bastion of communist pride. Just like the cake in Portal, its a lie.

Sometimes all you need is just a perfectly timed entrance confused04 i had a bizarre dream scififan68: scififan68: I hate those psycho_teddy: confused04: Do teel psycho_teddy: tell* scififan68: install faster :@ psycho_teddy: scififan68: XD scififan68: I got go soon :@ confused04 I had a dream that hym was looking for someone to work at the same hotel he does psycho_teddy: scififan68: Its 4GB nerd scififan68: LOL psycho_teddy: confused04: LOL confused04 so i became a laundry boy at the same hotel psycho_teddy: confused04: Omg you are too obsessed with ST chat scififan68: LOL confused04 and like, on my first day i brought my own clothes to do laundry psycho_teddy: confused04: XD confused04 but hym was like...a jerk to me scififan68: loo scififan68: lol confused04 he was supposed to give me a ride home confused04 and he left early without telling me so when I called him scififan68: tell him about it hym joined the room. confused04 omg scififan68: hey hym confused04 THATS CREEPY! psycho_teddy: confused04: LOL PERFECT TIMING hym: Hey all. confused04 holy crap confused04 hey hym confused04 long time no see :\ scififan68: confused04: tell him hym: What? psycho_teddy: XD toki.s: ) confused04 i had a dream you were in hym scififan68: ) confused04 and I was JUST talking about it hym: I was in a dream of yours? confused04 and scifi said "you should tell him" confused04 and what happened... confused04 YOU walked in confused04 lol... perfect time hym: Hey, it's happened before. hym: Tonkso once said, "SC4Meister, go forth." and less than 10 seconds later, guess who entered the room? confused04 hym: lol, well, I had a dream that you needed another coworker at a hotel laundry room so you somehow got a hold of my number and asked me so I said yea psycho_teddy: hym: ) confused04 so I worked at the same hotel where a bunch of people from Nip/Tuck also worked... scififan68 left the room. (Logged out) confused04 but like, on my first day, I brought my own laundry to do confused04 for some reason... confused04 and hym... you were a jerk to me on my first day hym: Must have been someone else then. confused04 you were supposed to give me a ride home and you went home early to play the new james bond game hym: Definitely not me then. confused04 and when i called you said... "i was really looking forward to it confused04 and i still called you "hym" even in real life psycho_teddy: Too much ST chat for Kenny ) confused04 hym: the city that we worked in was bizarre

I wouldn't write Obama off. "Being too liberal" is not considered a death sentence when many people are angry at neo-conservatives. I don't think its a blatantly obvious that Obama is gonna lose. Conservative voting block is severely demolished and when the economy is in such a downturn, it'll be hard to justify another 4 years in the Whitehouse. For 4 years now, polls have shown that a generic democrat vs a generic republican would result in a Democratic White House. Right now, polls where it is Obama versus McCain show an even larger gap than even this "nameless" polls have. I see know logical reason for saying "Obama is gonna lose". Its not always the evangelical voters that decide elections. Bush took independents in both elections. Right now, its Obama that polls well with independents over McCain. I personally predict Manticorefan, that you will be wrong in 2008. America is angry, and demographic shifts have led to even more states jumping into battleground territory (Nevada, Colorado, Arizona, Missouri just to name a few). McCain's appeal would be much stronger if it weren't for the abysmal dissatisfaction and against a someone (Obama) who has strong appeal.

I'm noticing a common point that is coming up time and time again about Obama's fairly cursory stump speeches and lack of specific details. 1). Read his 64 page platform on his website (or any candidate's website) 2.) If you somehow haven't downloaded acrobat reader or are lazy... cnn has an abridged platform with details in their issues section in Election Center 2008 And the biggy... 3.) Since when has ANY candidate ever given specifics and WON. People find details "boring" and "stiff". It doesn't mesh with the public and never has. Elections have ALWAYS been about rhetoric and probably will be for ages. I mean... Huckabee has ads playing saying he's gonna abolish the IRS... Obviously playing the "lower taxes" card without giving any strong details on how he's doing it or how the national retail sales tax would work. Look at our own president... he's never been strong on details ... ever. He won because America thought "wouldn't he be nice to have a beer with" not because "hey, I like point 15 of his 2000 and 2004 prospectus outlining..." Its a joke to even suggest the general public listens to these kinda things. Thats why campaign ads work. We are a gullible public. Until there's a fundamental change in the electorate that demands details, rhetoric will rule. And to add to possible presidential match ups... Polls have indicated a STRONG lead for Obama over McCain. Obama has widespread appeal by the critical independent voters which will aid him over a demoralized conservative electorate who's turnout will likely not be has high unless... Its Hillary and McCain where they are in a statistical tie. Clinton has widespread appeal in her party but is virtually hated or viewed unfavorably by about half the population. If she gets the nod, then this might galvanize the evangelical voters.

Originally posted by: Palpatine001 Again girls, you industrial made lipstick is not extactly helping the whales herequote> They ceased that form of production when whaling became inefficient and in too low of quantities for mass marketing. Generally its been moved to other forms of wax. I'm actually quite neutral on this matter... the biologist in me of course screams the typical environmentalist rhetoric. But that same side tells me that despite their size, their impact is limited. If anything, it could create a boon for other fish populations as krill will be more available, not that this has been too much of a problem, but surplus foods lead to population growth. My only concern is the loss of whale fall habitats. I'm not sure how many of you realize what happens to a whale after it dies.... It creates an ocean floor oasis that allows gene transfer between isolated sea floor communities such as hydrothermal vents. If this culling is long lasting and inappropriately managed, than yes, there is a severe risk of loosing these "whale fall" habitats which are amazingly diverse. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale_fall There's a nice little bit of info, pretty cursory, but it gets the job done.

Originally posted by: MrCinatit Sorry to go off tangent here, but I had to look up something to cure my curiosity, and came up with some mildly interesting but completely inconclusive conclusions.I had been wondering this: While we know the winners of each party, which party has garnered the most interest? Are more people voting in the Democratic primaries, or the Republican primaries? The below is extremely unofficial. The totals only reflect the total votes of the top vote getter per party in each primary. In addition, I am only counting states which have had both primaries. For instance, West Virginia has had the Republican primary, but the Democratic primary is not until later. SO: State dem rep MO 405,000 194.000 AK 301 5.000 CA 2,132,000 985,000 AZ 201,000 227,000 TN 332,000 189,000 UT 70,000 255,000 CO 79,000 33,000 MN 111,000 25,000 CT 179,000 78,000 GA 700.000 326,000 ND 11,000 3,000 NJ 602,000 310,000 MA 704.000 255,000 AL 302,000 230,000 OK 228,000 122,000 NY 1,003,000 310,000 DE 51,000 22,000 AR 206,000

Originally posted by: krbe Originally posted by: Duke87 And even then, I'd argue that anyone should be allowed to build whatever the hell they want to on their property so long as it's safe and isn't a nuisance to those nearby. Want to put up a 60 story tower in a neighborhood full of nothing but row houses? Go ahead. Your property, your call. No stupid zoning regulations should stop you. Just make sure the building meets the code.quote> A sixty-story building in your backyard would generally be considered a nuisance to those nearby in a row-house neighbourhood.quote> I don't think New-Urbanists would support that kinda errant construction. There are zoning restrictions in both Minneapolis and Portland, Oregon despite instituting New Urbanism concepts. I'm sure they'd rather place a park to separate the 60 story building AT WORST, if they even allow it. Minneapolis restricts buildings by the river and in the North Loop to match the neighborhood.

I know this is kinda old but I found an excellent documentary that explains America's current situation, the (in my opinion) hope for American Cities with the rise of New Urbanism /Traditional Urbanism (call it romanticizing of the pre WWII if you wish), and even give you cultural insights to America. Inner City Blues Documentary It is FREE to watch by the makers and it even briefly mentions Minneapolis . I agree whole heartedly with this documentary and I have even seen the revitalization of Minneapolis over parking lots, which kinda makes me crint at your #11 assessment funkalunatic. New Urbanism significantly decreases visible parking areas... I have no problem with that. I've seen this in many cities now and I'm convinced that if American cities have any hope in creating a decent urban feel and create efficient spending practices, new urbanism is the way to go. As a tax paper and an urban dweller, I loathe the fact that my tax dollars are going to building roads more than 50 miles away. Current state budgets essentially subsidize people to move further away. If those people had to pay the true cost of moving to the suburbs, every city in America would be much denser. But... anyway, enjoy the documentary and cringe at how racist we once were. The only significant downside to new urbanism is gentrification but I'm sure we can work out a solution.

The vast majority of local elections (county, congressional, and municipal) are very predictable, I agree with that. These swings can be attributed to people NOT voting purely on party lines. If that were the case, split government would never exist. People swing based on the issues, not the party. Thats how Maryland voted in a Republican governor back in 2002 despite being amongst the bluest of states. I don't think that most people vote based on parties, I just think that about 1/2 of voters are pretty solidly one side or the other purely by beliefs.

Regarding "Two Party System"- This one irks me just a little. Just because we have two broad parties, that doesn't necessarily mean that our choices are limited. The American system ESSENTIALLY has multiple parties, but they are smaller segments of the two fundamental views of government. You have Blue Dog Democrats, Liberal Democrats, Moderate Democrats, Stonewall Democrats, Progressive Democrats and Log Cabin Republicans, McCain Republicans, the oh so familiar Neo-Con Republicans and etc. The broad parties can be deduced to two fundamental points of government which are generally more/less government (but thats overly simplified). Europeans have loved to deny this but Party loyalty is so strong that it would appear that a party is pretty much uniform, obviously not true in the US. That is why pundits in 2006 saw the "Democrat Sweep" as bitter sweet. Blue Dog and conservative democrats lead the wave thus not being entirely against many Republican ideals. There are many times when people split from the party. Another reason why McCain is so popular for his liberal views that make him a rogue among his party, and perhaps why he has such mass appeal now. Voar_Tok: People generally don't vote on party lines. If so, we wouldn't have wild swings in government make up. There are bound to be people who just can't vote for a party because they are on the far side of the spectrum. The middle half of voters regularly swing to different sides leading to split governments and even split control between their state and the federal government. There have been many times where a district will vote for a republican mayor, a democratic governor, a republican Rep, a Democratic Senator, and a Republican President (thats what my county did in MD i think back in 2002, but I don't remember exactly).

Just breaking news, Heath Ledger Found Dead in Manhattan Apartment. No information available at the time... I actually liked this actor and he seemed like a clean guy... what a bummer.

Turnout in Minnesota SMASHED the previous turnout record for caucuses in the state. The last time turnout was even comparable was back in 1972 when approximately 80,000 people participated in the DFL (Democratic-Farmer-Labor, our branch of the Democrats) caucuses.... Last night Obama drew AT LEAST 140,000 votes ALONE. Turnout for the DFL caucuses was a ridiculous 200,000 last night more than doubling the all-time record and 4x the 2004 primary. Most precincts in the state ran out of ballots. In fact, I only know of three people who even saw a ballot at all. I wrote on a piece of cut blank paper. I stood in line for 45 mins to vote. Significant saying that the door was only open from 6:30 to 8:00 pm (as long as you were in the door by 8, you got to vote). Apparently there appears to be a problem with the count because despite closing earlier the western states, the count has stopped at 81% of the precincts reporting. Even CA who's polls closed two hours later has counted about 95% of their precincts. My Precinct Results St. Paul District 66B W4 Precint 14 Barack Obama - 369 Hillary Clinton- 84

You love the vikings NMUspidey ... that rocks... I support them even if they suck. They are the hometeam after all. Anyway, I thought the Pats would win though I was supporting the Giants and I'm so happy that the Giants won!

Regarding Americans being the worst offenders of Native American treatment,... how can you say that any particular nation is worse than another for the systematic annihilation of an entire demographic? So what if Americans are the "most oppressive" of native Americans, its not like every other western nation is clean of this. Its like saying... man, Pluto is worse in terms of temperatures than Neptune.... they are both frigid and inhospitable for humans. I think its silly for one person to say "my nation has committed less crimes" when hundreds of millions have been killed. Specific to the Native American oppression dealio.... You can't say "The Americans treated the Native Americans worse" when 250 years of European immigration devastated their populations, and it was the white European superiority view that was imported to the United States. We ARE very European in culture. As tonks put it with the UK, why are we Americans suddenly made to look horrible for something my ancestors did so long ago. Here I am ready to caucus for either a female or a black nominee, but I'm still some type of hater?

Although the size of this oil reserve is staggering, it pales in comparison to the oil shale reserves, that if harnessed, could make the US an EXPORTER of oil and put the entire middle east to shame. The Green River basin has over 1.4 trillion barrels of oil locked away and as gas prices increase and technology improves, the extraction of oil from shales can become even more economically possible. Still think that it would be best to avoid using oil all together and avoid biofuels (i.e., electric cars with the entire grid based on renewable energy). Second... The loss of oil can actually be quite easily remedied in terms of making plastics. Technology is already in place to turn biological products into plastic. Corn has already been turned into plastic and if money were to be invested into creating plastic efficiently through bioproducts, it might be economically feasible in the future. Third... I have a beef with plant fertilizers anyway as farmers apply them too liberally where more than 60% is washed away immediately into water ways creating massive dead zones in vital water ways such as the Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. Although petroleum has been used to create fertilizer, it is not the only thing that may be used to create fertilizers. The only reason why everything depends on petroleum is its relative ease. Given plenty of time and research, other products can be used to replace petroleum. Right now its not economically feasible because petroleum is that easy. Eventually, our economy will not depend on petroleum, it physically cant, but I don't think that its doom and gloom if we forgo this discovery and move towards alternatives.

http://www.airlinequality.com/2005/airport-05-ent.htm According to this.... the best airport is Hong Kong International. A link at the bottom of this page ^ (which I myself have linked below) says that the United States Airports have fallen in service and do not crack the top Ten. Fortunately we do crack the top 20... I present to you, North America's #1 Airport... Minneapolis-St.Paul International just a few miles south of my location. I love the airport, especially its shopping concourse and its connectivity to the Mall of America via light rail. Very comfortable and pretty simple airport. http://www.forbes.com/business/2005/04/07/cx_ld_0407bestairports.html

Originally posted by: GingerBlokey Very sad of course but it does pay to remember that he was just one of thousands who died today and just because he is famous doesn't make his life worth more than an old woman in Tibet, a child in Rwanda or a middle-aged man in Blackburn. This is how I always feel when I read about celebrities dying.quote> No need to put yourself on any sort of moral high horse... thats not the point. This is a current event and his impact on the world of entertainment is rather large. Not everyone is created equal, therefore the response is not going to be equal. If the Queen died, I'm sure many people here in the US would not really give a hoot (many more would care) where the people in the UK would, certainly their right to mourn/grieve/be in shock. Theres a difference between statistics and familiarity. The Rwandan or the man from Blackburn are statistics in the news, its the people that we can relate too and see on TV that affect us. Just because a lot of us are in shock, don't try and make it sound like we are insensitive to the less fortunate or the unknown who die. Everyone has death in their life, when one of my family members die, I wouldn't expect you to care, to you, they are just another statistic. I personally believe that this was an accidental overdose, this happens to everyone. My mom did it not long ago on painkillers and luckily she worked at the hospital (not as a doctor or nurse) and was given immediate medical care just floors above her. We don't even know what pills they were. I did not know he was bi-polar. If this turns out to be a suicide, that adds to the tragedy in the sense that even though it seemed to us he had it all, he was torn asunder. His role in Brokeback Mountain was actually really acted well and it put homosexuality in a somewhat different light than before in entertainment. Although this was mostly Ang Lee's brilliance, certainly didn't hurt that Heath Ledger was a good actor.

10 Things I Hate about you as well... BTW, The Black Knight (where he plays Joker) is in post-production according to IMDB which normally means filming is complete. Although most movies require call backs to redo scenes and such. I guess they'll have to live with what they got. Apparently he died of a suspected a drug overdose.

The Feds had an emergency interest rate cut in the US dropping it to 3.5%. Ironically, I just read an article that says how wrong that is by causing massive inflation. The fear of going into recession is so strong that the feds try to wipe out the immediate risk of recession only to create a long term risk of a much worse recession. http://money.cnn.com/2008/01/18/news/economy/cure.fortune/index.htm Anywho. I do not think its doom and mega gloom right now, the media is for sure making this out worse than it REALLY is. As bad as the situation is, this is not as bad as 9/11 when EVERY sector (other than defense) was devastated beyond imagination. In order for us to fall to post 9/11 lows, we'd have to drop to 7286. 27 on the DOW JIA. We'll have to see if it drops near there, but its pretty hard to see us dropping that much. Its bad, don't get me wrong, but nothing we can't easily trudge through. Besides, the average person will not notice a HUGE difference. Most of people don't feel differences between times of boom and bust because of the nature of our jobs. Its just that because we have such a huge population, a change in the economy can affect 5% of the population and thats 15 million people. We'll weather this like every other one. My family doesn't change its spending habits during times of boom and bust so it won't be "crampin our style." I was reading an article about how the culture of my area actually prevents it from promoting itself as the strong relocation destination as it truly is. The Star Tribune says that the non-confrontational humble nature "practically ingrained in our genetics" makes it impossible for us to brag and show off the numerous high rankings that Minneapolis-St.Paul receives and that we deserve EVEN more business than we receive. The ironic thing is that this very nature may actually help this area survive the storm quite nicely as our spending practices are quite conservative compared to those on the Coasts and particularly in California.

Originally posted by: football_fever Palpatine001: The reason we don't do that is because we as a populace have horrible logic. We eat up reality TV and celebrity gossip, but ignore important issues. Politics here (I don't know about elsewhere) is based on emotions rather than logic. Half of Bush's presidency has been based on fear. And by half, I mean...7/8. Rather than talking about logical things that NEED fixing like roads, bridges, education, health care, etc, we talk about which candidate has better hair, who's smile is more genuine, who "hates America", who's more optimistic, and so on. Dennis Kucinich may have good viewpoints, but he's too short...that's a good one. The best political conversation I've ever heard was about who we pay attention to as voters. The presidential elections are huge ordeals that eat up months of national coverage, millions of dollars, and massive road campaigns, but really have very little affect on our daily lives. He said if we really want to be educated voters, get to know who our soil and water people are, who's on the city council, the state representatives, transportation commissioner, police chiefs...they're the ones that really affect our way of life. They're not as glamorous as the big national presidential or US Senate races, but they're SO much more important. The important stuff gets overlooked while the flashy glamourous emotional stuff sits in the spotlight.quote> For the first time in history, the presidential race will top $1 billion dollars this year and one high end estimate is $3 billion. 2004 was just shy.

Originally posted by: El Burro Originally posted by: football_fever We've gotten used to it, but it's still pretty hard. It really can't be stressed enough how major of a bridge and highway this is. People from other cities that ride in my car are amazed at how many highways we have, and how much we use them. It's the busiest route in the entire city. I think once it opens traffic is going to be fantastic. 35W south of Minneapolis has been under construction this whole time too, so those of us that can have been using alternate routes.quote> I acctually just looked at the area on Google Earth... the bridge is still there in the pictures... shows you how much they update doesn't it?! Gotta be thankful for the 10th Avenue bridge, it'd be quite a detour without it... bet its gridlocked to hell though.quote> Interesting that you bring up Google. Like many other major metropolitan areas, Minneapolis has been photographed by Google for Streetview. This happened to be around the time of the bridge collapse. Photos confirm this as there are pics on the bridge, but some pictures around it show the collapse. On the bridge July XX, 2007 : Here After the bridge collapsed August 1, 2007: Here Just thought it was interesting.