Yep dogs are amazing that way. My brother and his wife came down to visit last week and my dog who hates strangers in the house remembered them and went nuts after seeing them again for the first time in years.

Given some of the other bands he mentioned, he'll probably be blown away by Prophets of Rage as well.

And I'm with @ChaosEngine on this, that we should be mad that things are worse now...

Short of lying, how can somebody like Paul Ryan claim to be a fan of the band, and be the way he is. Of course, having been on the far right myself for the first 30 plus years of my life, that one just closes one's ears. You put blinders on, and above all don't vet, you just rely on shallow Google searches that show you are still on the correct side.

Did you fall on your head as a child? Those people taking a knee aren't bashing America. They aren't bashing the flag, the troops, or anything like that. They are peacefully protesting injustice.

As has been pointed out by many many people, Rosa Parks wasn't protesting public transpiration, the Greensboro sit-ins weren't about Woolworth's dominance in retail at the time... they were all protesting injustice. How can that really simple little fact be ignored by Trump and his supporters? Are they so brain washed by him, that they'll believe every little pile of shit that comes out of his mouth. Do they want to suck his cock that bad? They need to fucking learn to think for themselves. Learn to vet information... and actually vet, not just find the first couple Google answers.

Somehow it is okay for a bunch of white Nazis to protest, and that is fine, and free speech, but the instant a black man protests injustice, suddenly he's an ass hole who needs to be fired? Over 400,000 Americans died fighting Nazis, but now according to Trump, Nazis are "very fine people". No they are not. Not a single person who's a Nazi, KKK member, white nationalist, or would march with them are very fine, or even fine, or even good. They are all evil.

The fact that most on the right think Jesus would side with a Nazi over a black man's protest of injustice (because, if you are a Christian, then every thought has to be what would Jesus do in that case) just goes to show how evil, and horrible the right's Jesus is. It's why I'd rather me and my children burn in Hell than be around people like those Nazis, and that Jesus who'd love them more than the black man protesting the injustice his people still endure to this day. I'll do everything in my power to insure my children hate the Jesus that the right promotes. No wonder Christianity is loosing numbers, it's a faith about hatred and bigotry, the love that Christ promoted in the Bible, is no longer there. They may think they show love, but I can 100% assure them, from the outside looking in, all anyone sees from that form of Christianity, is hatred and bigotry, and as it is the dominant form of Christianity in America, it is all anybody ever sees. I hope there is a Heaven and Hell, and I hope that God points to the millions of souls burning in Hell because of their bigotry and hatred... I'd love it if for the first 20 billion years they had to live outside the gates of Heaven, or in the slums of heaven, hearing the torrents of those of us in Hell, knowing they personally are the reason we are there, that we were all turned off Christ because of the way modern Christians act.

...but that eternity with God is spent 24/7 praising Him for all He has done for us... basically being a slave... or doing what the angles did before one of them thought he deserved the praise (which proves angels have free will despite what some Christians seem to think) and a third of all the angles thought that was a right good idea, so God punished them and tosses them from Heaven. Then God decides to make people, so He'd have others who'd "choose" to love Him... of course for the first 4,000 years of this time with people He'll be a racist dick and have a "chosen" people.... then He'll open it to all people if they accept His Son and His sacrifice... As a reward for those who follow Him and His command to accept Jesus, eternity, thanking Him for sending Christ to save us from the Hell He created to punish those who don't accept Jesus... Meanwhile, Hell, is eternal separation from God, which is likened to a fire pit... which most Christians take as a literal place of torment (some have Satan/the Devil in charge, though it was created to be a punishment for him, not for him to rule over... what sort of punishment is being given your own kingdom?) and others take it to be the more interpretative idea of what is like to have no God around at all...

So yeah, eternity as a slave praising God for saving me from the hell He created to punish those angels who dared not praise Him and focus on one of them, or eternal separation from said God... I think I'll chose that eternal separation. Better to be free and tormented, than a slave without will.

And wow... Shiny came out... haven't seen them for awhile... now we just need whomever it was with that Mr T avatar... and of course Bob...

Anyhow, nice to see the debate go, which I figured this would do... then again I took the video to be more about discrimination against Atheist by the US and the world at large more than the subtitle about being good without God, and figured that was where the talk was going to go.

I tried lemons in the ground here....it lived almost 3 years, but never had a lemon.
I have peach, nectarine, and plumbs in 1/2 barrels now, doing OK, but the peach and nectarine could use more room, they're both around 8-10 ft tall. The nectarines might need more cold than we get to bear fruit, but it's happy so far a year in.
I also started a trio of Asian pears in a 1/2 barrel about 10 years back, twisted together in a spiral, then planted the whole thing a few years ago, barrel and all (with the bottom pulled out). A year later I pulled all the staves and hoops up and it's been pretty happy ever since. I've had hit and miss luck just planting smaller trees directly in our ground, so I try to get the trees pretty established these days before putting them out.
If I try an orange tree, I'll probably put it in a 40 gallon pot (I like the air pots now over 1/2 barrels, they seem to make a difference in growth speed and are far cheaper) and move it inside during winter for at least the first 4-5 years, and definitely bonsai it to keep it around 8 ft.
I have a small orchard of apple trees now....around 30, and a few other fruits. At least I know they do great in our climate.

EDIT: We have had years with over a week at 20°F in the past, so I'll definitely have to cover an orange tree at times once I put it outside. If I keep it small, no problem.

Terrorist attacks are more multifaceted.

First, they are an opportunity to generate work for the defense industry.

Second, they are usually for a reason. Often some angst over our own actions in foreign countries. For example, the news says AQ is a bunch of crazies that hate freedom, however AQs demands prior to 9/11 were to get our military out of the holyland. While that's not an offense that deserves blowing up buildings, it is definitely not the same as some banal excuse like hating freedom.

Thirdly, they are often perpetrated by some persons/groups that we had a hand in creating. We install the mujahedin in Afghanistan, knowing full well what they'll do to women, and then use their treatment of women as one excuse to later invade. Saddam worked for us, was egged on to fight Iran, was egged on to suppress insurgents (the 'own people he gassed'), and we later used his actions as one excuse to invade.

At the time, the mujaheddin was useful for fighting Russia as a proxy. At the time, Saddam was useful for perpetuating a war where we sold arms to both sides. Afterwards, they were useful for scaremongering so we could perpetuate war when otherwise things got too quiet and folks would ask about why we're spending big $$$ on defense.. (In the mean time hand-waving the much more direct 9/11 Saudi connection).

... Plus if on the off chance things do 'settle down' in areas we invade, that creates new markets for US companies to peddle their wares. You can reopen the Khyber pass for western land trade with Asia, you can build an oil pipeline, and you can prevent a euro based oil exchange from opening in the middle east. All things that benefit our industry.

So in practice, as far as big industry is concerned, there's a utility in 'fighting terrorism' (and perpetuating terrorism) that just doesn't exist with internal shootings. As such, unless another 'evil empire' shows up, the terrorism cow is gonna get milked for the foreseeable future.

Sure, there's a rhetoric about preventing terrorism, but our actions do nothing to that effect. It's just a statement that's useful in manufacturing consent.

There's a particular irony, though. That is, that while such behavior is 'not very nice' (to put it mildly), it does however provide for our security by keeping our armed forces exercised, prepared, and up to date - such that if a real threat were to emerge, our military would be ready at that time. While that seems unlikely, when you look back in history at previous major conflicts, most were precipitated rather quickly, on the order of months (it takes many years to design and build equipment for a military, and the first ~half a year of any major war has been fought with what was on hand). So in a round-about, rather evolutionary way, perpetuating threats actually does make us safer as a whole.

To clarify the word 'evolutionary' : Take 10 microbes. All 10 have no militant nature. None are made for combat. It only takes 1 to mutate and become belligerent in order to erase all the others from existence. If some others also mutate to be combative, they will survive. The non combative are lost, their reproductive lines cut off. As there's always a chance to mutate to anything at any time, eventually, there is a combative mutation. So, all life on earth has a militant nature at some layer of abstraction - those that exist are those that successfully resisted some force (or parried the force to its benefit. Like plants that use a plant eater's dung to fertilize the seeds of the eaten fruit).

The relationship holds true at a biological level, interpersonal, societal, national, and international level. Societies that allow the kind of educational and military development that leads to victory, are those that have dominated the planet socially and economically. For example, Europe's centuries of infighting made it resistant to invasions from the Mongols, Caliphates, etc, and ultimately led to the age of colonialism. For the strengths built with infighting, are later leveraged for expansion. As such, the use of "terrorism" to perpetuate conflict, is ultimately an exercise in developing strength that can later be leveraged.

Our national policy is largely developed in think tanks, and those organizations are planning lifetimes ahead. So these kinds of considerations are very relevant.

TL/DR : Yes, agreed, the terrorism thing is B.S. on many levels.

-scheherazade

I'm sure in many instances you're correct about his garden. It can be incredibly hard to grow things outside their native areas/environment. I try to do it myself, and it does take longer and more work to get them to fruit (I have some loquats and Asian pears growing here in N Cali, outside their preferred zones. The loquats fruited for the first time this year, after 8-10 years in the ground. The Asian pears are even older, and have yet to bloom. I hope I have better luck with my new nectarine tree.)

I just thought that finding out about these odd plants, finding where they might be, and collecting the seeds would be incredibly difficult for him, even with help. Also, he seemed to have quite a collection of seeds, I'm guessing some of them haven't been planted yet.

They all are indeed very well preserved, some of them must be witches (somebody ate Mr. Belding though).
(first episode 25 years ago in fuzzy-vision: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6WXBQN823s )

Another thing that's unchanged: They still can't act.

Man, what a great choice! Thank you loads, I'm listening to it for the first time in years

Who is this crackpot? This is the first time in years I felt like screaming at the stupidity of other people and I've worked a lot with people with severe disabilities. My weirdest dreams make more sense than this.

Sorry you felt so betrayed and that this was my response to your first submission in years, but my being an admin does not exclude me from having or sharing an honest opinion.

I wasn't expecting any kind of physical assault, and if there was any I would've down-voted rather than abstained.

It comes down to a simple matter of opinion. In mine, there wasn't anything said that was clever or witty or poignant or a real potent zinger. He didn't shut her down, he just kept trying and failing to give her a good tongue lashing and she still kept right on yelling back. (Being shut down requires a person to desist.)

While he was digging for something good to say I kept watching and listening and waiting for him to hit paydirt and finally put her in her place, but it never happened. I think it's a matter of managing expectations; perhaps if the title didn't mislead me into expecting her to really be shutdown I would have been more neutral about his failed attempts to shut her down (though I still wouldn't have voted).

Just looked up my first sift. "6 years 4 months 2 weeks ago", and I was lurking before that.

Hell of a ride.

Interesting. I've got a semi-relevant story, but I get long winded so feel free to skip to the next comments if you like.

My wife (Thai) and I (American) had our first daughter this year. When she first got pregnant, one of the doc's first priorities was to get us both tested for "Thalassemia", which I had never heard of before. Apparently it is a blood disorder that affects hemoglobin production and therefore red blood cells -- if both parents carry the (rather rare) recessive gene, it can be a pretty bad deal.

It turned out that my wife is in the 1% or so of Thais that carry the gene (but she doesn't express / suffer from it, it is recessive and she has the dominant gene also). I had to get tested as well, but they said it would be incredibly unlikely that I'd be positive and I wasn't. So, our daughter has a 25% chance of being a carrier like my wife but zero chance of suffering from the effects of it.

Anyway, I was curious about the disease and asked the doc why it is a big deal here (every pregnant couple MUST get screened for it here when getting hospital/prenatal care) but I'd never even heard of it in the US. It turns out that the disease / genetic mutation arose only in places with high rates of malaria. As it happens, the genetic effect on your blood cells that the mutation has makes you more resistant to malaria -- full-on exhibitors of it (two recessive genes) are far less likely to die of malaria than people that don't have the gene. That is, assuming that you don't have the extreme variants of it that make it very unlikely to survive early childhood. Basically, if you have the disease and yet are healthy enough to survive to adulthood, you're close to malaria immune (that's overstating it, but ballpark). The malaria parasite can't survive and reproduce properly on your funky Thalassemia-affected red blood cells.

I thought that was a pretty interesting evolutionary response that must have arisen from some populations being pretty much decimated by malaria back in pre-recorded history. Current carriers like my wife are probably the descendants of lucky folks that survived a deadly outbreak in history by virtue of having a disease/mutation that is, under normal circumstances, slightly or even extremely bad in species survival / reproductive fitness terms. I thought that was kinda cool -- but I'm glad that neither my wife nor my daughter are/can be full-on expressors of the gene.

The X1 allows you to transfer the license once (borrow or sell the title) to a friend that's on your friends list for 30 days.

Select partners (Gamestop obviously) will be able to resell used games, I'm sure they have some huge massive contract with MS for this.

The big kicker is the online requirement, the system will check authentication once every 24 hours or once per hour if you're on your account but not on your machine. If you fail the check (internet goes down etc) you're unable to play any games, although the Bluray and media center functions remain unchanged.

Overall Microsofts policy and lackluster handling of the situation and info has been terrible overall. For the first time in years (since ps1 gen 1) I'll be getting a Sony system to pair up with my PC for games/entertainment.

You have been awarded 1 Power Point for fixing the embed code for Dead Pool video Wonder Years - The First Kiss. Thank you for helping maintain VideoSift's reliability.