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Jimidan
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 11:08 am: | 
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Blake,
I want to apologize to you for pulling the plug on my participation in this "debate", as I just don't have the energy or time to really do the research (I encourage you to look it up though, if you really want to know...NOT!) and plus, I promised myself I wasn't going to get sucked back into these politically charged issues on Badweb. And here I am getting sucked back into it...I am such a ho, but I will try to do better.
You are a really smart guy and great debater, and I can see that this may seem like coitus in·ter·rup·tus here (sorry about the blue balls there bud), but like I said above, you guys would not believe me if I had video of the acts themselves, so really, what is the use?
It all just gets sooooo condescending with comments like, "You can always count on Jimi for an anti-American slant on just about any topic." (Dissent is very American and patriotic), or "WTF are you smoking?", or "Do you ever read some of the stuff you post. Some of it is very unfortunate stuff." , or "Words have meaning. We should choose our words very carefully." or, "Jimi should leave the US if he has any integrity at all. How can someone live in such an immoral and disgusting country?" Jeez, love it or leave it...I have been hearing that since the first Viet Nam War. The endless patronizingly superior attitude gets really tiresome too!
You guys have fun and I will stick to the bike related topics like I promised when I got back on here. I have an S1RR to finish building, and I am not getting it done wasting all morning on here arguing these points. Don't be sad, there are plenty of folks on here (and in the USA...maybe we will see just how many Nov. 7th) who seem to think a lot like me so you will still have them to play with!
jimidan
(Message edited by jimidan on October 19, 2006) |
Jimidan
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 11:34 am: |
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Diablobrian sez:
"Jimi you missed my point. I was saying that the punitive taxation is non-sense and
that the government needs to get off the back of companies involved in LEGAL activities.
If the government was genuinely concerned they would focus on the either the cause, or the effect. Not the income they can generate or campaign contributions they receive from the tobacco lobbies."
Jimi:
I agree with you about punitive taxation and getting the government off of our backs (in the bedroom, bloodstream and private conversations via telephone). However, consider again what you are saying about getting the government off the backs of companies involved in LEGAL activities.
Take for instance the restaurant industy...it is a perfectly legal activity serving a perfectly legal product to the public. Would you propose that this industry not have to meet any health standards? Is it such a bad thing for them to be subjected to random government inspections of the kitchens where they prepare food for the public (you and your family)? Should the only controls on this industry be left up to the unfettered economy? I would not want to eat in a place like that...would you (or your family)?
That is just one example of many where some regulation is needed. Would you want to put your kid in a daycare where they didn't regulate for health and safety issues, or didn't do background checks on those working there to see if they were sexual predators? Me neither.
jimidan |
Blake
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 11:48 am: |
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Jimi,
I for one don't want you to leave America.
I don't discount your views. I simply find some of your statements horribly negative, way out of line and contrary to the preponderance of evidence that shows the true high character of America.
I guess my view can be summed up rather simply. No matter what kind of miserable bastards we might think our fellow Americans might be, when the Indains attack we still circle the wagons and join forces to fight those seeking to murder us. The time for partisanship and hyper-self-recrimination is not now. In my view it's time to circle the wagons. That in no way precludes disagreement or thoughtful debate. It does preclude derision, divisiveness and national recrimmination.
United we shall stand. Divided we shall fall.
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Blake
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 11:58 am: |
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The government is on our backs in the bedroom and in our bloodstream?  Please explain.
You forgot one key phrase in your comment there too. Here, I'll fix it for you.
"I agree with you about punitive taxation and getting the government off of our backs (in the bedroom, bloodstream and private conversations between terrorists via telephone)."
There, now its accurate. |
Eboos
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 02:02 pm: |
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If the government were listening to my conversations on the phone it would sound something like this:
"Hi mom, how are you? I'm fine. Umm umm, well I'll talk to you later."
Or
"Hey Dave, do you have whatever part? Cool, can you hook me up?"
Nither very interesting, or important to national security. Fortunately for all of us THIS ISN'T HAPPENING! |
Jimidan
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 08:42 pm: |
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Blake sez:
"The government is on our backs in the bedroom and in our bloodstream? Please explain.
You forgot one key phrase in your comment there too. Here, I'll fix it for you.
"I agree with you about punitive taxation and getting the government off of our backs (in the bedroom, bloodstream and private conversations between terrorists via telephone)."
There, now its accurate."
Jimi:
Not exactly...in fact it is a myth that this is merely a "terrorist surveillance program." In reality when there is evidence a person may be a terrorist, laws already exist that authorize eavesdropping. The NSA program violates the Fourth Amendment and Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and allows electronic monitoring without any showing to a court that the person being spied upon in this country is a suspected terrorist. These warrantless wiretaps could never happen to you? Without court oversight, there is no way to ensure innocent people's everyday communications are not monitored or catalogued by the NSA or other agencies. Trust me, I won't c*me in your mouth! Not a chance.
Bloodstream equals War on Drugs (warrantless search and seizure of property, no-knock laws), Drug Testing in the workplace and schools without probable cause, Ban on Federal Financial Aid for students with drug convictions and medical marijuana.
Bedroom equals reproductive rights, marriage and civil unions for same-sex couples, gay rights, sodomy laws.
These are all Big Brother issues where the government is needlessly on our backs.
That is my final answer.
See you on the bike related topics though!
jimidan |
Jimidan
| | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 08:52 pm: |
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Blake sez:
"I guess my view can be summed up rather simply. No matter what kind of miserable bastards we might think our fellow Americans might be, when the Indains attack we still circle the wagons and join forces to fight those seeking to murder us. The time for partisanship and hyper-self-recrimination is not now. In my view it's time to circle the wagons. That in no way precludes disagreement or thoughtful debate. It does preclude derision, divisiveness and national recrimmination."
Jimi:
I agree, that is why we should have pursued bin Laden and his ilk to the furthest reaches of the world...even if it meant invading Pakistan's western tribal lands. I would have volunteered for that mission myself...if they would have upped the age limit a bit (like to 57). Iraq wasn't even on the map.
One man's debate is another's derision, divisiveness, and national recrimination.
jimidan |
Blake
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 06:02 am: |
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Jimi,
I wonder if you want to also require warrants before our soldiers take down an al qaeda safe house in Iraq. You can say the program is illegal, that doesn't make it so. The President was afforded authority to prosecute the war, and like all Presidents before him is using that authority to root out our enemies. We are at war. The jihadi-fascists are resolved and determined to perpetrate more acts of mass murder and destruction against us. They reside within our country and abroad. We need to spy on their communications. It would have been optimum if they didn't know we were spying on their communications. Now, due to a leak of a top secret national security program, they all know that their communications are being monitered at every turn.
Our constitution is not a suicide pact.
I fail to see how abortion or homosexual marriage have anything to do with the government invading our bedrooms. Pretty sure the federal government has no laws concerning concentual sodomy. Pretty sure such laws on a state level have been struck down whenever they are contested.
So please explain again how our government is on our backs in the bedroom? Or just admit the truth, that you overstated that point.
On one hand you support government intervention to protect folks via restaurant health inspections but on the other are against their efforts to protect folks via drug screenings? News flash, it is corporations who are free to demand random drug testing and pre-employment drug testing. The government is not doing this, the corporations are. This especially helps prevent alcoholics and drug abusers from working as airline pilots, bus drivers, taxi drivers, crane operators, and all manner of workers who if under the influence of pot or alcohol or other mind altering drugs would present a serious danger to others.
"One man's debate is another's derision, divisiveness, and national recrimination."
Wrong! Debate is thoughtful and respectful and focuses on the issue(s); debate avoids ad hominem. It is most always those who have lost the debate of ideas who resort to the miserableness.
On further thinking, I find it horribly disingenuous and irresponsible to on the one hand accuse America of slaughtering people who disagree with our policies then excuse oneself from providing any evidence to support that unfortunate claim.
They guy who is going around telling folks that President Bush perpetrated the 9/11 and all other recent jihadi-fascist terrorist attacks uses that same tactic laced with hearsay and junk science.
Certainly you are better than that. |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 11:09 am: |
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Communism.
ding ding ding ding we have a winner!!!!! |
Bomber
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 11:21 am: |
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wow -- what a funny thread -- US laws wrt to banning tobacco ads on race machines is labeled communist on the one hand, and other's deriding the governement that enacted those laws being derided on the other -- yin/yang, pot/kettle . . . .
chuckle
t'ain't communistic at all at all -- legally elected representative of the people enacted this legislation, and there has been no hue nor cry loud enough to ask em to repeal it . . . . .
it's as democratic as any other law
course, if I was a sponsor, I likely woulda seen it coming, but I'd still not like it -- but our government's relationship w/tobbacco is weird in the extreme --
democracy is wonky, but it's the best yet devised
btw, I dig some grafitee and some rap -- |
Blake
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 11:41 am: |
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What happened to that pesky "freedom of speech"?
Democracy? What democracy? We ain't got no stinkin' democracy. |
Jimidan
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 12:10 pm: |
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I keep trying to excuse myself from this political debate with you, but you insist on calling me out in a rather rude manner, so here goes...one last time!
Blake: "I wonder if you want to also require warrants before our soldiers take down an al qaeda safe house in Iraq."
Jimi: That would be ridiculous...it is a war zone. Now there probably a lot of Iraqis who would think that that is a good idea.
Blake: "You can say the program is illegal, that doesn't make it so. The President was afforded authority to prosecute the war, and like all Presidents before him is using that authority to root out our enemies. We are at war. The jihadi-fascists are resolved and determined to perpetrate more acts of mass murder and destruction against us. They reside within our country and abroad. We need to spy on their communications. It would have been optimum if they didn't know we were spying on their communications. Now, due to a leak of a top secret national security program, they all know that their communications are being monitered at every turn."
Jimi: I am not the one who said it...the courts have declared it was illegal and the Congress backed it up. Are we a nation of the rule of law or not?
Judge Anna Diggs Taylor's decision in ACLU v. NSA: "It was never the intent of the Framers to give the President such unfettered control, particularly where his actions blatantly disregard the parameters clearly enumerated in the Bill of Rights." Judge Taylor ruled that the program violates the First Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The President pushed the 109th Congress to pass legislation that would have ratified the illegal actions after the fact but it never even went to the floor.
Blake: "I fail to see how abortion or homosexual marriage have anything to do with the government invading our bedrooms. Pretty sure the federal government has no laws concerning concentual sodomy. Pretty sure such laws on a state level have been struck down whenever they are contested.
So please explain again how our government is on our backs in the bedroom? Or just admit the truth, that you overstated that point."
Jimi: OK, I will try and 'splain it to you. "Bedroom" is a euphemism for any laws regarding consensual sex between adults. These laws are primarily intended to outlaw homosexual acts and are usually a matter of state rather than federal jurisdiction. Sex in the euphemistic "bedroom" between a man and a woman can result it unwanted pregnancy.
I looked up sodomy laws and as recently as 2003 the Supreme Court ruled against Texas to strike down its sodomy law. There are still 3 states with sodomy laws in place. I agree with the late Barry Goldwater that government has no place in our bedrooms...period. The religious right would like nothing more than to reinstate these laws, and the threat of that happening is very real. No overstatement here, boss.
Blake: "On one hand you support government intervention to protect folks via restaurant health inspections but on the other are against their efforts to protect folks via drug screenings? News flash, it is corporations who are free to demand random drug testing and pre-employment drug testing. The government is not doing this, the corporations are."
Jimi: Restaurant health and safety issues are important to assure public health, random drug testing without probable cause is not. The federal government requires all of its employees and any of its contractor's employees to be subject to random drug screens. The military is in that boat. Many state and local governments have followed suit with their employees and requiring testing of welfare recipients. Many schools have jumped on this band wagon requiring testing of students. And like you said, many private companies require drug screens of their employees.
I used to work with labs and testing protocols and understand that, at best, drug testing is an inexact science. False positives and false negatives are very common using the drug testing hardware manufacturer's OWN technicians. Unlike drinking and wastewater water labs, the drug testing labs are totally unregulated and hire less than minimum wage techs to run the samples.
Drug testing is unnecessary. During my entire career, we seldom had an employee come to work impaired. More commonly it was chronic absenteeism. The problems were almost always alcohol related. Everyone knew who the problem employee was without expensive drug tests because when you work with someone every day you can easily tell when they are high, regardless of the drug.
A report released by the ACLU, "Drug Testing: A Bad Investment," summarizes 10 years of studies showing that drug testing does not lower absenteeism, productivity or improve workplace safety. This is no surprise as the tests mainly detect marijuana metabolites that can be in the blood stream a month after exposure, when it is not an indicator of impairment.
Drug testing is expensive. Based on results from the federal government's drug testing program, it spent $11.7 million to test 29,000 employees, only 153 of whom tested positive. This amounted to a cost of $77,000 to detect each putative drug user...most of whom were occasional pot smokers.
Drug testing is an invasion of privacy. Many testing protocols require that the hapless worker has to pull down her pants in front of a lab technician or attendant and then pee in the presence of that forbidding audience. This is not a medical procedure but a rite of humiliation, designed to send the employee the message: "We don't trust you. We own you, all of you, and our ownership extends way beyond 5 p.m.". This would be considered "torture" according to the McCain torture guidelines. Why should the vast majority of innocent folks who have never had any problems at work be subjected to this needlessly?
It's odd, given employers' lack of concern about the rest of their employees' private lives, that they take so much interest in the off-hour consumption of drugs. The members of the employing class, after all, don't care whether their potential employees spend their weekends watching kiddie porn or abusing their pets. Nor do most employers show the slightest concern about the adequacy of their employees' diets and housing arrangements, or after work alcohol and tobacco consumption.
Convinced? I didn't think so.
Blake: "On further thinking, I find it horribly disingenuous and irresponsible to on the one hand accuse America of slaughtering people who disagree with our policies then excuse oneself from providing any evidence to support that unfortunate claim."
jimi: Horribly? I just don't feel like playing for the reasons I have stated over and over. The reports and books I have read are a bit dated since I really haven't been keeping up so much with the drug war and quite frankly I don't feel like looking them up. It is very depressing. My prerogative as a debater, I guess you could call it. Look it up yourself if you want to. During the Noriega fiasco 82nd airborne helicopter gun ships made mincemeat out of a village where they thought he was hiding, killing many innocent women and children (some reports were as high as 2,500 dead). Because of the secrecy of the operation and the Administration's efforts to hide the truth, the mainstream press really didn't get into the story until months later, and then it was woefully inadequate. But it was the belated topic of many editorials and some reporters revealed what really happened, and you didn't see it on FOX news, fer' sure.
These reports were substantiated to me by my nephews who were both in the Air Force and stationed in Panama immediately after the attack. It was so bad that they couldn't leave the base except in armed convoys because of the families of the deceased wanted to kill them for revenge.
Around the same time, there was a best selling book "Deep Cover" that told us all about the ruthlessness of the DEA and American military forces in South America...where they had no jurisdiction. It was only one source, among many.
If it will make you feel any better,I will give you this one. I am sorry that I ever accused America of slaughtering people who disagree with our (drug) policies then excuse myself from providing any evidence to support that unfortunate claim. But just like torturing prisoners in secret prisons around the world, I still believe it happens though.
Blake: "They(sic) guy who is going around telling folks that President Bush perpetrated the 9/11 and all other recent jihadi-fascist terrorist attacks uses that same tactic laced with hearsay and junk science."
Jimi: Cheap shot, or cheapest shot? If I am so far out there...how come Barry Goldwater professed many of the same concepts and ideas that I have expressed here? (Don't answer that, 'cuase I am not going to respond!) I am a Goldwater conservative.
Further the affiant sayeth naught.
jimidan |
Chainsaw
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 02:12 pm: |
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...but more interesting is that Dianese's Rossi replica suit has the same "Team" logo on it and is labeled as "Debranded
A few years ago, the NHL All-Star Game was held here in Denver in the Pepsi Center. Coke is the official sponsor of the NHL, to they 'debranded' the facility that was built with Pepsi's money for the game. IIRC Coke had to pay Pepsi a large ransom for the privilege. If I were a Pepsi Exec, I would have told them to shove it. (No offense Glitch) |
Swampy
| | Posted on Friday, October 20, 2006 - 11:23 pm: |
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Nextel, Levitra, Cialis and all the others
Gives them a chance to get some reasonable exposure and Hob Nob with the celebrities.
What a deal!
But Blakes right....Communism!
Sick and tired with the man telling me what I can and cannot do, what I can and cannot watch, what I can and and cannot eat.
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Opps! I'm one of them.....LOL!
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Sportsman
| | Posted on Saturday, October 21, 2006 - 12:56 am: |
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I don't check in here much, found a new hobby but still want to see what's going on and still a Bueller. I have missed the enlightened debates and think they serve a purpose. Keep up the honorable work. It's cool nobody has said Jimi is wrong because he isn't, there is differing opinions on priorities. Tip of the hat to you both.
PS: lawyers getting rich and more powerful at the common mans expence is the root of this topic as I see it. |
Blake
| | Posted on Saturday, October 21, 2006 - 03:15 am: |
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Jimi,
Judge Anna Digs Taylor is a shill for the ACLU and not many doubt that her legislation from the bench will be swiftly reversed in appeal.
You've convinced me on the frug thing. I was pretty ignorant of the situation. Didn't know students are subject to random drug testing and didn't know they made people pee in front of a witness. Didn't know that sub-minimum wagers were performing the testing either. If all that is true, then I agree, it is bullshit and I am with you. I do still recognize some need for drug testing though. Look what athletes go through these days. Seems justified on the steroid and doping issues in order to protect the integrity of the sport.
"some reports were as high as 2,500 dead"
Right, propaganda funded by the America-haters. There will always be grossly inflated propaganda. It is impossible to cover up something like that; the press would have been all over it.
I guess you forgot who broke the George W. Bush DWI story? It was FOX News. I don't understand the bias some have. FOX News, their actual hard news reports are excellent and they don't pull any punches on ideological lines. They were rated the fairest hard news network on television by a non-partisan analysis at one of the liberal universities, UCLA was it? I don't recall. I know not having the left propped up by the news media is disconcerting to some, but there is no evidence to support that Fox News reporting is biased.
It doesn't take mass murder to enrage anti-American types. Just printing a bogus story about flushing a book down the toilet is enough for some. Suggest you try to step back with an objective analytical view instead of jumping on the "blame America first" bandwagon. Seriously.
You've recanted on the "America slaughters those who disagree" point and I respect that a lot. Good on ya. That demonstrates the good character, which I always knew you had. 
Let's pick up where Sportsman left off. I abhor the mongo class action suits where upon settling, the thousands of people represented in the "class" each get a dollar fifty while the attorneys take a windfall in the MILLIONS.
The credit card companies are another pet peeve of mine. I recently swapped cards and I thought I had paid off and ceased to use the old card. Bad assumption. I should have not let their notice languish at the bottom of the "pile." It turned out that I still owed a small amount due to a charge that posted late, a paltry amount under $100. But on top of the expected interest charges, they tacked on a $39 late fee! I telephoned them and they did agree to waive that fee which equated to something way over a 100% annual interest rate, but good grief! I wonder how much they rake in with that little scam? It is usury disguised. |
Blake
| | Posted on Saturday, October 21, 2006 - 03:17 am: |
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Not "frug", I meant "drug."  |
Blake
| | Posted on Saturday, October 21, 2006 - 05:08 am: |
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Another excellent example of riotous behavior stemming from much much less than the slaughter of many people...
quote:Next Friday is the one-year anniversary of the electrocution death of two teenagers as - rumor had it - they were running from the police in the Paris suburb of Clichy-sous-Bois.
The tragedy triggered three weeks of violence in which rioters throughout France torched cars, trashed businesses and ambushed police officers and firefighters, plunging the country into what President Jacques Chirac called "a profound malaise."
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Eboos
| | Posted on Saturday, October 21, 2006 - 01:24 pm: |
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http://www.superbikeplanet.com/2006/Oct/tb/061021x.htm
"It would appear that the JTI group, who's Camel branding has adorned the Yamaha factory bikes this season, are about to finalize their departure from MotoGP, leaving Lin Jarvis on the hunt for a title sponsor for 2007.
It has long been rumored that JTI would remove their financial backing from the works squad running Valentino Rossi and Colin Edwards, and the word from Europe is that it is no longer just a rumor. JTI's investment -- thought to be in the region of 12 million Euros for one season -- would be difficult to justify to the members of the board with the branding not on show for a bulk of the season due to restrictions on tobacco advertising in Europe. That would effectively leave the bikes plain in color with no company identity on the fairings, something the Phillip Morris Group (Marlboro) will have to swallow next season with Ducati in MotoGP and Ferrari in Formula 1."
Sorry to have to bring this back to the original topic. |
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