Artysim

Reply to Why do I Hate Going to Church So Much? in Religion JoeUser Forums

[quote]If God is anywhere, it is anywhere. So why waste your time in church?[/quote] A) Because communion with God is far too important and complicated for the average person to ever try on their own. If they do, clearly they will screw it up, and quite often start having these crazy pipe dreams about actually loving your fellow man and giving up a life of materialism. The church makes it easy! They take away the burden of having to think for yourself by telling you wha

Reply to So do any of you use Twitter? in Blogging JoeUser Forums

I'm a facebooker myself. kinda strange when your folks join and can see all the photos of drunken escapades you never thought they'd know about :)

Reply to Government Regulation is Necessary in Politics JoeUser Forums

cacto- [quote]Of course you can. You can take nearly any government decision to the courts, and mostly you won't even have to pay for it. You can also change a government decision via the media, or via lobbying representatives directly. It's much harder to affect the course of a corporation. [/quote] bingo! Nitro [quote]Oh and let’s give them an hourly wage, not to exceed the average amount in the state they are supposed to represent. Maybe that would cut

Reply to Would Everyone Prefer I Just Left JU? in Blog Communities JoeUser Forums

I would like to second Dr Guy. I generally disagree with most of the fine folks here on most of the topics discussed. But I thoroughly enjoy the discourse and feel no enmity either way. If things really do start bugging you Erathoniel, there is a handy feature called a blacklist. If I might offer some advice, don't take things to personal. It's just the internets after all :)

Reply to Government Regulation is Necessary in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote] WHen they do not (as is the case in all governments today), they become abusive and anti-freedom. Governments by definition ARE the antithesis of freedom.[/quote] I'd rather be screwed over by big government than a corporation. Big government screws you over, there are all sorts of official channels and means of addressing your grievances. Corporation screws you over, they will deny any wrongdoing on their part as long as possible. Once a court case begins, they will draw

Government Regulation is Necessary in Politics JoeUser Forums

Many folks like to harp against the evils of big government and how all it does is create a stumbling block for industrious private business with endless reams of red tape, taxes and laws. In some regards, these complaints are entirely valid. But government organizations play a crucial role in our society. They exist to ensure the protection and best interest of the public, both physically and financially. This necessity exists for a simple reason- someone's gotta be the traffic

Reply to Happy Mayday, Comrades! in Misc JoeUser Forums

[quote]Hamas, Hezbolah, Army of God, and all the rest show the Muslim world how much they care about them by killing them by the thousands[/quote] Well for one, most of those organizations actually provide social services, electrical generation, potable water and trash collection in communities that the 'official' government ignores their even existence, due to cultural differences, corruption and a whole host of factors. This was why Hezbollah's popularity in Lebanon was significantl

Reply to Happy Mayday, Comrades! in Misc JoeUser Forums

Big Fat Daddy- I love reading your articles, you should write a book (if you haven't already) [quote]Call me crazy, but it's the enemy-you-know- versus- the- enemy- you- don't- know thing. No wonder so many people are having the yawns trying to keep up with this war. A lot of people are still denying there really IS a war (there is, by the way). The only thing the Radical Islaamic Jihadist Fundamentalist whoevers have in common with the Soviets is their love of the AK47 and the fact t

Reply to There is No Oil Shortage in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]BUT NOW I SEE THE LIGHT. National Debt kills our economy by devaluing our dollar...which means on a personal level I have to shovel out more dollars to keep status quo.[/quote] Bingo! Not meaning to be smarmy to prove my point (although as a liberal it's in my contract) yesterday the value of the U.S dollar actually rebounded a bit. As the value of the dollar rose, lo and behold the cost of oil fell considerably. Fix the problems with the dollar, fix the oil

Reply to ANWAR, Nukes, Democrats, and Reality in Democrat JoeUser Forums

[quote]The price of a commodity is based on supply and demand. The demand for oil is high while the supply is limited. Therefore, the price goes up. Inflation isn't some magical fudge factor. If you want oil prices to come down, you have to increase the supply of energy. Period.[/quote] Yes, I agree 100 % on the basics of supply and demand. What I'm saying is that presently there's a surplus of supply that out-strips demand considerably. Going by the numbers, most economists agree the

Reply to There is No Oil Shortage in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]I will show him this article. I think you made some good points. I really hope the market corrects itself....but the way to do that is going to be bite the bullet and start paying down our national debt. Which will mean cut backs everywhere else.[/quote] Thanks Tova, maybe you could get him blogging on JU! In regards to the debt, I fear they will simply raise the ceiling on acceptable levels for as long as the foreign creditors will allow them to. Dr Guy- [

Reply to There is No Oil Shortage in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]It's times like this I understand why I'm so wealthy. If this is a sampling of the economic understanding of the typical person, it's clear why there's such huge gaps between the wealthiest and the poorest.[/quote] The proof is in the numbers and those numbers currently say that oil should be about 60-70 dollars a barrel, instead of the 119 or so we're currently paying. Those numbers are based on the amount that's available, future estimated production versus demand, produ

Reply to I Believe God Maintains The Universe in Pure Technology JoeUser Forums

"I believe that there is no mass (or else God is the mass), and God is holding the universe together with his wonderful salvation giving hand." erathoniel, is this your way of saying that you think God is massively overweight? I mean, I know he's God and all but 90-95 % of the mass of the universe is indeed quite a bit (maybe someone's been consuming too many galaxies in one sitting? I dunno) I think you should submit this theory to the astrophysics department o

Reply to There is No Oil Shortage in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]There is no rhetoric about it, it's just fact. We would be in much better shape if we did these things years ago, but of course, democrats have blocked this type of action for years[/quote] That's exactly what I'm disagreeing with here. The cost of oil currently has very little to do with the amount that's available. There's more than enough to meet demand right now. The reason why it is so expensive is because the dollars buying power has been reduced by inflation. ANWAR

Reply to There is No Oil Shortage in Politics JoeUser Forums

Sorry, I also forgot to mention in this article that we're seeing examples in the last few weeks of tipping point in other countries- in the last few weeks there have been riots in Egypt and Haiti over food and gas prices. And this is just the beginning!

There is No Oil Shortage in Politics JoeUser Forums

There is indeed no oil shortage, nor is there a food shortage. Global demand for both food and energy has been regularly outpaced by the supply but prices on both commodities have skyrocketed. Despite political rhetoric about needing to produce more oil and build more refineries domestically, that will not change the price, nor will any refineries come online anytime soon. All of those "solutions" will take years and cost a lot of money. Besides, here in Canada we're

Reply to ANWAR, Nukes, Democrats, and Reality in Democrat JoeUser Forums

The inconvenient truth of the matter is that energy production is not an issue. We already are producing more than enough oil to meet our needs. The reason why it is so expensive is due to inflation, so increasing oil production will not have an impact. See article to be posted shortly.

Reply to Democrats fear Fox News in Democrat Stardock Forums

Moderateman, The democrats turned down a debate on FOX news, because FOX news is unabashedly aligned with the republican party. They give no counterbalance to liberal views, nor are they anything even close to "fair and balanced". They have true geniuses like Bill O'reilly who cuts off the mike of guests who disagree with him They give airtime to folks like Ann Coulter who SHOULD NOT be allowed to spew her hate to such a large audience Ahh yes, and Sean Hannity too

Couldn't Have Said it Better Myself in Politics JoeUser Forums

Excerpt from an article on the current state of the Union- http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/14046 “By virtually any measure, the United States is the least progressive nation in the developed world. It trails most of Western Europe in poverty rates, life expectancy, health care, child care, infant mortality, maternity leaves, paid vacations, public infrastructure, incarceration rates, and environmental laws. The

Reply to When Will Iraq's Tet Offensive Begin? in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]The lefty press has become the intelligence department of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. They question every word Prs. Bush says, but fall over themselves trying to trumpet anything an Al Qaeda leader spews.[/quote] Ahhh yes, the great and expansive evil left wing media machine, funded directly by the shadow politburo that is still secretely operating in the basement of the Kremlin. I knew it was a vast left wing conspiracy! Never mind that papers like the Washington Post were founde

Reply to When Will Iraq's Tet Offensive Begin? in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Ok, so you blindly believe a far left propaganda machine like MSNBC but you don’t believe the president or his staff or other public statements to the contrary[/quote] Ha ha ha ha ha!!!! That's real rich. MSNBC is not a "far left propaganda machine" at all. In fact I consider it rather right wing. Of course I don't believe the president. He lied to get your country into a completely unnecessary war that had absolutely nothing to do with defense. I DO believe senior m

Reply to My Religious Views On Cloning in Religion JoeUser Forums

[quote]I never said cloning was playing God, only cloning of sentient life falls into the intended category.[/quote] I guess you need to define what playing God means. Personally, I'm not a big fan of the idea of cloning. I DO think that one day we will have the means to make a copy of the mind and download it to a machine body or virtual world (or keep it as a backup copy in case the real you dies) While being able to accomplish this is beyond the scope of our present technology I thin

Reply to When Will Iraq's Tet Offensive Begin? in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Oh please. This is such simplistic thinking. Iraq has 3 different groups with very divergent goals and that doesn't count Al Qaeda. [/quote] You're exactly right. But so many folks seem to equate the situation in Iraq as the even simpler "Good Guys vs Terrorists". When dealing with that kind of mentality you have to speak in generalities. In truth Iraq has many, many different groups and tribal sects right now, so much so that saying "Sunni, Shiite and Kurd" would be innacu

Reply to When Will Iraq's Tet Offensive Begin? in Politics Stardock Forums

[quote]Funny you should say that, the only governments opposed to what we are doing is Iran, France was against us but they elected a pro American president and that opposition is over, Germany was against us but they elected a pro American chancellor and that opposition is over, Russia was against us but have been quiet since they started having the same type of attacks we were suffering prior to 9/11 and Spain changed its mind and is still being attacked by home terrorist. Keep in mind that

Reply to When Will Iraq's Tet Offensive Begin? in Politics JoeUser Forums

[quote]Ok, when I was in the corps we had 190k active duty marines, when I got out Mr. Clinton was president the numbers had dropped to about 150k troops depending on if you include non-combatants such as women in the service. Even if the Corps dropped to 80k it would still be enough to play in Iraq with a little help of the Army. In the real world unlike the one you are in, “The United States Marine Corps, with 186,342 active duty and 40,000 reserve Marines as of November 30, 2007,&rdq