Search results

  1. W

    The polls were biased...in Romney's favor

    I did some checking of the results against the polls. They turned out to be biased in favor of Romney to a moderate degree. Here are the results against the RCP pre-election poll averages. I am using RCP because they used raw averages rather than adjusting pollsters based on past accuracy...
  2. W

    Post your personal 2012 election predictions here!

    This is just for fun to see who can come closest to predicting the outcome. Let's keep arguments about polls to any of the several extant threads addressing those issues. Here, you can post predictions about POTUS and/or Congress. You can just pick a winner, or indicate popular vote margins...
  3. W

    14 year old Pakistani peace activist shot by Taliban

    This is a heart breaking story here. Summary: 14 year old Pakistani girl, who wrote a blog chronicling oppressive life under the Taliban, is pro-western and pro-peace, won a children's peace price for her blog. Was shot in the neck and the head by the Taliban. Two other young girls were also...
  4. W

    Movie theater patron files lawsuit over Colorado shooting

    Article: http://www.examiner.com/article/james-holmes-lawsuit-filed-man-blames-theater-doctors-and-warner-bros Summary: A patron in the theater who was not injured but whose friend sitting next to him was killed is suing 1) the theater, 2) the shooter's physicians, and 3) Warner...
  5. W

    Wireless connection issues

    So I bought this new router, an Amped RG1000, because the old router has a weak signal and I can't get a decent connection with my BluRay player which is fairly distant from the router. Anyway, I can't get a single wireless device to connect to this router. One Ipad and 3 Iphones, and it's the...
  6. W

    Need recommendation for new enclosure

    My Antec P180 that I've had for 5 years is starting to fall apart so I'm looking for a new enclosure. Needs to be fairly large to accomodate several drives and big video card. I know nothing about enclosures. Is there anything good out there in the $75-$100 range?
  7. W

    Catholic School Teacher Fired For Getting In Vitro Fertilization

    Several articles on this today. Here's one: http://content.usatoday.com/communities/ondeadline/post/2012/04/catholic-school-teacher-claims-she-was-fired-for-using-ivf/1 Bullet point summary: Married woman is teacher at Catholic school for 7 years; She and her husband want to have another...
  8. W

    Poll: how biased are you?

    I'm curious about peoples' subjective assessments of their degree of bias. A few things to understand before answering the poll. 1. A bias isn't a viewpoint. It is the tendency to be resistant to changing your position in the face of facts and logic to the contrary. It's a psychological...
  9. W

    Eurozone back in recession - will the US economy go down with it?

    Bottom line, Greece is closer to default than ever, and possibly of greater importance, the total Eurozone economy contracted in Q4 '11: http://money.msn.com/market-news/post.aspx?post=aca2d15f-ecba-4554-9111-004f44de7038 I realize that the stock market can overreact to this kind of news, but...
  10. W

    Computer freezing up

    I get these 10-30 second lockups on my computer, both during game play and on the desktop (only the cursor will move). This has been going on for about 6 months. Two months ago I got an SSD and installed Win7, whereas before I used an HDD with Vista. Still the same problem, crossing two...
  11. W

    Gingrich PAC uses class warfare to attack Romney

    I heard about this on the radio this morning, then found it on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_evS-T-c35M&feature=player_embedded For those who can't get youtube, here is the summary: Romney is attacked for being a "greedy" "corporate raider." For taking over companies and...
  12. W

    Top 10 news stories of 2011

    AP released a "Top 10 News Stories of 2011" list. It is based on a survey of news editors in the US. Looking over the list, 2011 strikes me as quite a momentus year: 1. OSAMA BIN LADEN’S DEATH 2. JAPAN’S TRIPLE DISASTER 3. ARAB SPRING 4. EU FISCAL CRISIS 5. US ECONOMY 6...
  13. W

    Should I upgrade my router?

    Hi, I know next to nothing about networking so bear with me. I have an e2000 router. I recently hooked up a Panasonic BluRay with Wifi to stream Netflix. It is all the way across the house from the router. It tells me the signal is weak (2 bars out of 5). The performance while streaming...
  14. W

    Forbidding unions and corporations from spending money to influence elections

    I am interested in how each political bloc answers this question if it is framed as including both unions and corporations. Any ban would be done by Constitutional amendment, so there is no need to discuss the Constitutionality of this idea.
  15. W

    EU moves closer to total integration

    This strikes me as the most important news story of the day: http://money.msn.com/business-news/article.aspx?feed=AP&date=20111209&id=14603606 Summary: The EU nations have now all agreed to submit their budgets to a central authority for approval, giving up much of whatever sovreighnty...
  16. W

    South Carolina Public School Hosts Evangelists at Assembly Who Preach to Students

    This story is from September but I didn't see anything posted about it. Summary: South Carolina public middle school invites a "Christian rapper" and other evangelists for school assembly. Students are preached at and asked to sign up for church membership on school grounds. One evangelist...
  17. W

    Israel trades 1000 Pal prisoners for 1 soldier

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44861388/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/ Cliff's note: Netanyahu made a deal with Hamas to release Gilad Schalit, IDF soldier held by Hamas for years, in exchange for releasing 1,000 Palestinian prisoners, including hundreds serving life sentences for murder...
  18. W

    Amanda Knox Conviction Overturned, Set Free

    I haven't thoroughly reviewed what happened in this appeal as yet, but I will say I had read up on this case at some length and my feeling was that she was about 80% likely to be guilty. Right on the cusp of reasonable doubt...
  19. W

    PLO envoy to Washington: no Jews allowed in a Palestinian State

    Article: http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/story/2011-09-13/palestinian-israeli-jews-future-state-israel-PLO/50394882/1 Summary: The PLO's representative in Washington said at a press conference this week that a Palestinian state would be free of Jews, stating "After the experience of...
  20. W

    Senator Kyl: I'll Walk if any Defense Cuts are Proposed

    General summary: Senator John Kyl (R), Arizona, a member of the deficit reduction Super Committe, threatened to walk from the committee if there is talk of any defense cuts whatsoever: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111904103404576558993243510256.html Several salient points...
  21. W

    Teens kills parents, has party...

    Taking a break here from the depressing debt ceiling threads to post about something truly repulsive which perhaps will remind us that there are a few things we can agree on: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/sns-rt-us-florida-killingtre76i74x-20110719,0,609291.story Cliff's...
  22. W

    Build critique gaming rig

    Building a rig for a friend of mine, budget is more or less $950 with a little wiggle room. Don't need monitor, keyboard or mouse. Below is what I have so far. I want feedback on these choices. Also looking for recommendations for a good chassis in the $80-100 range and an SSD in the...
  23. W

    Pakistan arrests CIA informants

    This is really something else: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/43404265/ns/the_new_york_times/ Summary: Certain Pakistanis assisted the CIA in affirming that Bin Laden was in the compound. For example, one was a Pakistani military officer who tracked the license plates of cars going into the...
  24. W

    Should the dead pay back their medicare bills?

    Here is an idea for Medicare reform which ought to be controversial: http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2011/05/why-not-let-dead-pay-medicare In a nutshell, the idea is as follows: During the time you use Medicare, you receive bills for all services paid for. You do not have to pay...
  25. W

    Harddrive disappearing

    I just purchased a new WD 1.5 TB HD to use as a storage drive. Installed it, recognized in BIOS fine, formatted it in Vista, drive appears just fine. THe trouble is that if I leave the computer on long enough, the drive eventually disappears from My Computer. In fact, it disappeared once...
  26. W

    Need help with likely video card problem

    So I got a new MSI 5850 delivered today. I removed the old card (8800 GTS 320), and seat the new card properly. I connect the two six pin supplemental power cables to the card. I start the computer up. It is really slow to even bring up a cursor but finally does. I am on a dual boot with 2...
  27. W

    Help with new gaming rig build

    I am building a new gaming rig. I already ordered a Radeon 5850 (super hot deal at the Egg). I haven't been following the CPU market that closely for the past couple years, less so the motherboard market. Looking for recommendation for CPU/Mobo/RAM. I want to spend about $350 total...
  28. W

    Where were you when...

    OK this is intended as a fun and perhaps apolitical thread. The topic is which historical events had enough impact on you that you remember exactly where you were and what you were doing when it happened. Most people who were alive seem to remember where they were when they heard that Kennedy...
  29. W

    Poll: Prostitution, should it be legal or not?

    For purposes of this poll, "prostitution" is assumed to mean what is generally and already illegal in the vast majority of the U.S. (most of Nevada excepted), i.e. an explicit agreement to exchange sex for money, not the implicit sort of agreement which may occur in ordinary "dating" situations...
  30. W

    Two year old killed by a pack of pit bulls

    Sad story, happened yesterday just 30 miles from where I live, and is all over the local news: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1297053/Toddler-mauled-death-FIVE-pit-bull-terriers-horrific-attack.html On the same Google search, I found another story of a 2-year old killed...
  31. W

    U.S. Economy Gains 290,000 jobs, 231K from private sector

    Looks like a great jobs report today. Best monthly report since early 2006. I'm surprised that it beat the prediction by a full 121K, and that the private sector accounted for almost 80% of it. Unemployment rate went up to 9.9% because more people are now looking for jobs...
  32. W

    Birther army officer court marshalled for refusing to deploy to Afghanistan

    So this army Lt. Colonel is refusing orders to deploy because he believes the orders are illegal since, according to him, Obama was not born in the U.S. This reminds me that irrational beliefs are not all just play acting, rhetoric, fun and games for the internet. Sometimes people make...
  33. W

    Karzai blames "the west" for fraud in Afghan elections

    Ok, this seriously pisses me off. This fuck wouldn't even be in power if it wasn't for "the west." Maybe we should just pull the 130,000 troops we have out of there, not to mention the billions the world community is feeding into his corrupt government, and GTFO. After which his head will be...
  34. W

    US/Russia Nuclear Arms Reduction Treaty

    So it looks like we have a treaty with Russia to reduce nuclear arsenals by 25%. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/36050902/ns/world_news-europe/ I can see some value in this from the standpoint of improving our overall relations with Russia. However, I have never quite understood the point of...
  35. W

    Should don't ask, don't tell be repealed?

    It appears that Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen have come out in favor of repealing it. http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/02/02/gates-backs-repeal-dont-ask-dont-tell/ http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35197645/ns/us_news-military Thoughts? - wolf
  36. W

    9/11 trial to be moved out of New York

    Looks like it will be a civilian trial, but held on a military base somewhere where security will not be an issue. I think this is the right move. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35132816/ns/us_news-security - wolf
  37. W

    Report: AQ will try big anthrax attack by 2013

    This new report says there will be a WMD attack from AQ, probably by 2013, suggesting a large scale attack with anthrax as the most probable vehicle: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35072269/ns/us_news-washington_post/ It seems that every year or so there is another new report on terrorism and...
  38. W

    What Does a Bi-Partisan HC Reform Bill Look Like

    There is widespread talk among opponents of the HC bill the democrats have failed to approach HC reform in a bi-partisan manner. So my question to opponents of the current bill is, what sort of bill would you approve of? To make this easier, here is a recap of the elements of the current...
  39. W

    Tiller shooting - justifiable homicide?

    Apparently the judge is going to allow Scott Roeder to argue that the killing of Dr. Tiller was mitigated by his belief that he was saving unborn children. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34810725/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts Quoting the relevant portion: "But what had been expected to be an...
  40. W

    Campaign finance

    Rather than being a post about a specific current event, this is a position statement of mine, and I am curious who agrees or disagrees with it. I want to see all special interest money taken out of our political system. That means corporate money, big insurance, big pharma, big oil, and all...