Noumenon72

Reply to Does anyone still like Bush? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Gideon -- I don't see a lot of evidence that Bush is intentionally trying to undermine the Constitution. It seems like the damage he does is really from not understanding anything about the Constitution except free speech and the vote -- separation of powers, freedom of the press, federalism. Compare Bush to Dick Cheney, who does seem to be intentionally trying to undermine the Constitution at times. Cheney leaves fingerprints all over the pl

Reply to Does anyone still like Bush? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Oh, I had hatred. it has decreased in intensity the more everyone else has turned against Bush, though. I hate thinking that everyone is just blaming him for Katrina, I don't like seeing him hobbled and forced to apologize for things. Maybe I just hated the fact that he was winning, or as I would say, "getting away with it."

Reply to Does anyone still like Bush? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Ooh! Has there ever been a multiple suicide pact on JoeUser? I've read about them, but I've never been involved in one before! How exciting! I don't know about throat slitting, though. I always thought the appropriate way for discussion board posters to go would be by repeatedly banging our head against a brick wall until we suffered brain damage...

Reply to Does anyone still like Bush? in Politics JoeUser Forums

27% of the people still like Bush and always will. Link

Reply to How dumb is Michigan's state government? in Current Events JoeUser Forums

This is the same story from April. It isn't actually going anywhere, is it?

Reply to Beekeeping in Michigan - Getting Started in Beekeeping JoeUser Forums

For some reason I missed this post or it is showing up below the other one with pictures of your building that I commented on. Anyway I hope your bees are as docile as you say they are and your employees are smart enough not to whack the hives with sticks -- I just think I'd be worried if there were bee hives outside my work. Anyway the reason I came in here was to say that I was reading the lolbees livejournal (an offspring of the whole lo

Reply to Sunny days and game development in GalCiv Journals JoeUser Forums

But you may understand the issue: If I save a game where the AI has already taken their turn, load up the game and the AI gets to take another turn, you've got a slight disavantage for the human. Does everybody realize how small a deal this is compared to the way it used to be when you would lose an ent

Reply to Are you a conservative or a liberal? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Oh by the way -- if I took the test the way it was written... -5. So I guess I had to come up with my own version or adjust my entire self-image.

Reply to Are you a conservative or a liberal? in Politics JoeUser Forums

I was gonna post another image of the test with your answers plotted on the graph and say, "See, those are all libertarian answers!" But when I actually looked at them, answer #2 is Republican, 3 is capitalist, 5 is centrist, and only 1 and 4 are libertarian. So I guess you covered the spectrum of conservative pretty well.

Reply to Are you a conservative or a liberal? in Politics JoeUser Forums

I think your changes reflect more of how a liberal views conservatives than anything else. Hey, I pride myself on being sympathetic enough to conservatives to not misrepresent them on something like this, accidentally or on purpose. If there's bias in it it's from my libertarian side. The way

Reply to Are you a conservative or a liberal? in Politics JoeUser Forums

Here's how I'd do a second draft of the test, separating out "libertarian" from conservative. What are you now? (I skipped question 2 because it was too confusing for me). 1) Do you believe that the best way to have a safe society is... A] Reduce the number of fire arms floating around in our population [+1 liberal] B] To encourage lawful citizens to possess fire arms [+1 libertarian] C] To provide more firepower to t

Reply to Brad the bee keeper: Learning the basics in Pets & Nature JoeUser Forums

Since honey production isn't really our main focus (we just want to take care of bees mainly at first) it's not too important if we are able to get honey at the end of the day (though it would be nice) I knew it, I knew this wasn't about honey. This is about Galactic Civilizations in your back yard. Y

Reply to PC Gamer's GalCiv II War Report in GalCiv II News JoeUser Forums

OK, there are three people who can write GalCiv walkthroughs. Brad. Sirian. And this guy. Totally different styles. So hilarious. They opened negotiations and suggested I donate 132 billion credits and the Universal Translators technology in exchange for my 'continued existence'. I ammended the terms of the deal to

Reply to Tax loopholes in Business JoeUser Forums

Your theory explains too much. Why, if we eliminated Social Security, the only thing that would happen is that they would spend more on pork! If we borrowed more money instead of paying off the debt, the only thing that would happen is that they would spend more on pork! If we raise taxes or if we cut them, the only thing that happens is that they spend more on pork! The United States paid its bills for many years, and it could happen aga

Reply to Tax loopholes in Business JoeUser Forums

(sigh) If only they'd left the taxes and used the money to pay off the debt. Then we could all imagine that we were going to share equally in the eventual tax cut, once we freed up that $400 billion we're spending on interest. How good would it feel to pay your taxes knowing we were finally digging out of our debt hole? It would have made me proud of us as a generation.

Reply to Tax loopholes in Business JoeUser Forums

Uh, Genius, did you check out what the top 10% pay of the total taxes (income)? Let me clue in the clueless one - 70% That's actually exactly right, if you check with the CBO tables Link . But Gene's not totally wrong. The top

Reply to Tax loopholes in Business JoeUser Forums

Top bracket for 2005 is 35% for income above $326,450. The President's salary is $400,000. Both those numbers are higher than I thought. He also gets another $250,000 or so in taxable interest income. He donates about $75,000 a year to charity. His tax return and Cheney's are available at this Link .

Reply to A more diplomatic AI in GalCiv Journals JoeUser Forums

Civ 4 basically doesn't have diplomacy at all. It won't trade most techs and won't go to war for anything. GalCiv is much more fun even if it is cheatable.

Reply to Tax loopholes in Business JoeUser Forums

You sound like someone who's read David Cay Johnston's Perfectly Legal , which is all about the two separate tax systems we have: one for wage earners, and one for the rich. Unfortunately I haven't read it yet, so I can't back you up the way I'd like.

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

For anybody who's on my side in this thread, this Link is an article by Heather MacDonald that might help you understand Brad's side better.

Reply to The Only Way to Win The War In Iraq and the War On Terror in War on Terror JoeUser Forums

(double post)

Reply to The Only Way to Win The War In Iraq and the War On Terror in War on Terror JoeUser Forums

If WWII had been fought like this war (and Vietnam for that matter) has been fought, we would have lost and would have all been Germans by now. Note that the Germans fought World War II in Russia exactly the way you want -- no mercy for the civilians, burn the whole town for one act of resistance, no i

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

The war on (disfavored) Drugs seems to be pretty co-ordinated to me... I had already brought up the Holocaust by that point, so that gives "co-ordinated" a whole different sense. The war on drugs isn't co-ordinated intentionally to round up African-Americans. It's just that a co-ordinated eff

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

What exactly is that situation that a black criminal might be in but a white criminal is not? If I answer this you'll be getting a thirdhand description from an article I read which was probably already slanted by the reporter. It's really more about class than race, people who aren't participating in

Reply to Disecting "What the US can learn from the rest of the world" in International JoeUser Forums

Oh, I get what you were saying now, Andrew. I'd like to know what laws you think African Americans would get rid of. Noumenon, do you really think there are unusal laws in the United States that criminalize things that are much different than in Europe or Asia? I think African-A