VicMan

Lunatic, about the Israel wiping off map thing... * The New York Times states that what Ahmedinejad said is disputed: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/11/weekinre.../11bronner.html Then there's the Holocaust stuff. I have a book on Iran called The Ayatollah Begs to Differ by Hooman Majd (from the Texas Book Festival) - Somewhere (I forget what page) he talks about how a few very conservative members of the Iranian government had a fixation on Holocaust and denial; either Majd or someone else thinks of that as really strange since Iranians thought that the Holocaust had nothing to do with them. Also I think somewhere the book says that Iran took in Jews who were fleeing from the holocaust and the Iranian government had documents to prove it! Majd talks about Ahmedinejad (Majd worked as Ahmedinejad's translator) and the Holocaust stuff here: http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6585810.html "I don't think that he doesn't believe it happened. I think it's this obsession that he has with being seen as a Muslim leader standing up to Israel and Zionism. He's not a historian and his view is sophomoric—the first time he expressed it, he said it in a very Persian way. He said, “If it happened, why do Muslims have to pay the price?” In Farsi when you say “if,” it doesn't necessarily mean that you're questioning what happened; it's a rhetorical question. I said to one of his top aides that Ahmadinejad's biggest problem was that he said “if.” If he'd said, “It happened, but why do the Muslims have to pay the price?” it would have been much more difficult to criticize. I'm not defending him; his obsession with the Holocaust is crazy, anyway. Ahmadinejad hasn't mentioned the Holocaust for at least a year now, and I'm convinced—not that anybody would admit it—that the Supreme Leader told him, “Back off. If you want to talk about Israel and Zionism, go ahead, but leave the Holocaust out of it; you're embarrassing us.”" Majd also said, about Ahmedinejad: " And I don't believe that he really believes a lot of the things he says." Then remember that Iran is still suffering the aftereffects from the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s; however there was a big baby boom since the revolution, so there are lots of people despite the fact that Iran suffered a lot of casualties in the war.

I think Galveston will be revived. Houstonians need a place to play, and Galveston will be it. This will also further push the poor out of Galveston and into La Marque, Hitchcock, and Texas City. Galveston ISD should focus on turning Ball High School into a magnet to get more out of district people. It should also aggressively promote Austin Middle School (now a 5-8 magnet). BTW do you guys feel that the county seat should remain in Galveston? Or should it move inland?

Lunatic: Being anti-PLO is one reason, but the ONLY reason? 1. The Shah was clearly a UK and US favorite, as the US overthrew Mossadegh in the 1950s - If you want I could pull up a news article about Western interference in Iran 2. The Iranians had been invaded by Arabs in past decades - AFAIK there is still hostility towards Arabs 3. Source for "all of them hate Jews?" - And what about people who dislike the State of Israel but do not hate Jews in particular (they might even support Jews who are against Israel, i.e. Hasidic groups in New York - If you have read The Chosen by Chaim Potok you will see the dynamic here) 4. The Shah was also very secular, I must add - The Islamic fundamentalists were in total opposition to him I understand some Iranians did not like how the Shah supported Israel; I read Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis. Satrapi came from a fairly well off family and attended a secular French school until the revolution. Satrapi's dad said that both the Shah and Egypt "betrayed" the region's countries by making a pact with Israel (Page 43 in the English complete edition). Yet the family is friends with the Baba-Levys, a Jewish family who stayed in Iran after the Revolution (they were killed in the bombing during the Iran-Iraq war). And, by the way, events like the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s and the bitter infighting in Iraq today means that you should care whether groups are allies or enemies or somewhere in between. If they fight each other, how are they going to effectively harm Israel? There is a saying "United We Stand, Divided We Fall" - there are so many divisions in the countries that have frigid relations with Israel. As for Hezbollah, it didn't exist until around the 1980s (The Shah was gone by 1979). Wikipedia has a section describing how governments agree and disagree about which parts of Hezbollah are terrorist: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hezbollah#Des...stance_movement - this section is heavily sourced, so you will find the sources if you want to see them - It's not unanimous like with Al Qaeda. EDIT: Plus, regarding the Iran-Iraq War, Satrapi's Dad said that the war ended up becoming a ploy by the West to destroy the armies of both Iraq and Iran; Iran had the largest army in the Middle East and Iraq's actually presented a threat to Israel. See, this is why you should care about alliances. Both countries had chilly relations with Israel, but the Iran-Iraq War made them neutralize each other.

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/...1858079,00.html This TIME article explains the failures of Circuit City.

But I want him to find a way to stay diplomatically kosher while doing so. We should try to get Iran to cooperate with us against Al Qaeda instead of making Iran feel threatened and therefore taking anti-US actions. This game is a mix of brawn and brains.

TJones, the person who makes Claim A has the burden of proof of proving Claim A. What the articles say is that he hasn't *decided* what decisions to reverse and when to reverse them.

Wunsche, already open, is a magnet school. The "zoned" schools in SISD are Spring, Dekaney, and Westfield. BTW I think the area south of Cypress Creek that is indicated in the five year plan as being zoned to Spring HS should be zoned to DeKaney HS instead.

1. If the wording was confusing, then another lawsuit can be filed and... 2. I don't understand how that is allowed - I have a feeling some federal law is being violated, but I am not sure what. We need to go after the solidly anti-gay marriage counties (other than Orange County, as I don't think this plan will work there) in California and buy out property to raise the taxes sky-high. While the lawsuits fly, punish the people who wish to deprive others of their rights by raising their taxes to the max.

While the legal wrangling continues, do we have a list of counties that voted overwhelmingly for the ban? Maybe pro-gay rights movie stars or other influential folks could buy property in those countries to deliberately raise prices of housing and convince people to move to Nevada or Arizona.

I ultimately voted for Obama because I considered the candidates' messages and their actual records. McCain's votes were closely aligned with Bush, while Obama had a boost from several bills in the Illinois senate having his name attached to them (There is a Houston Press article about this) - While I knew TX would go McCain, I really wanted to oppose Culberson. Unfortunately he won anyway.

CNN is now reporting that the California bill is likely to be defeated: http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/04/state.laws/index.html

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/04/state.laws/index.html Arizona banned same sex marriage. California is still counting its ballots.

Even if this passes, the California pro-gay groups could deliberately stymie additional anti-homosexual efforts, convince anti-homosexual people to move to Arizona and Nevada, and then vote on the issue again once there are fewer anti-homosexual people in California. I hope this amendment fails. Even if it passes, CA should try this formula above and ruin the population that supports this amendment.

Did you vote against all of the local politicians in power? It is difficult to properly express specific interest articulation with the Presidential Election, BUT it is easier to disapprove of the local government by voting out all of the locals. Were there any reasons particular to the U.S. Presidential debate which persuaded you to vote McCain? IMO this would be a better justification for voting for McCain, while being against the local politicians would be a good rationale for voting against all of the incumbents.

As of April 2008 Democrats were evenly tied with Republicans in the Senate, as per Snopes: http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/votedforchange.asp As a note, Bastrop, the Snopes article I mention stated that many of the problems afflicting the US are not so much subject to the will of the Congress to begin with. The one problem I had with Pelosi was the anti-Turkey bill, which caused unneeded ruckus.

This is why I sometimes ask people to define words they use. The question forces the people to explain what they really mean. I.E. if I hear "I don't want this program because it's socialist" I would ask the person to define socialist.

Spring ISD is building even more schools. http://www.springisd.org/default.aspx?name=oct08.ground2 - The district broke ground for three elementary schools: * 2200 Wittershaw Drive * 16855 Sugar Pine Drive * 15252 Grand Point Drive All are in the south of the district All three are to open in August 2009 - http://www.springisd.org/default.aspx?name=oct08.boundary Some of the options for the new boundaries are here http://www.springisd.org/default.aspx?name=boundary.feedback - Compare to the current boundary setup here: http://www.springisd.org/docs2/attendance/AllElem.pdf -- All three attendance boundary plans would alter the boundaries of Bammel, Beneke, Clark, Cooper, Heritage, Meyer, Ponderosa, Reynolds, Thompson. Spring ISD also created a five zone high school boundary map projection. By 2015 the district predicts that it will build two new high schools, with one in the south of the district and one in the north of the district: http://www.springisd.org/images/5zone1.jpg -- The district predicts there will be 3,000 students per school http://www.springisd.org/images/5zone2.jpg - A district release about this plan is here http://www.springisd.org/default.aspx?name=feb08.5zone

I don't think HISD is going to build a new HSPVA campus at this rate.

The ironic part is that Republican pressure made Bill Clinton pass a third revision of a bill that ended unconditional welfare. Now people are put on welfare time limits from the federal side, and only under certain conditions.

In that case the Obama campaign should cave in like the NFL did. It is one thing to offer something *extra*, but one shouldn't be forced to pay for journalistic access for an event being held in a public park.

In all seriousness, HPL could open an Express branch in Midtown (It did so in Discovery Green), but I'm not sure if that is feasible.

This one is my first presidential election in which I can vote.

I wasn't necessarily meaning a dictionary definition, I was meaning when Guy A calls Candidate A Marxist, what does Guy A mean by that? It's not a matter of "I don't know the definition" so much as "What rationale is Guy A using to describe the candidate as a Marxist?"

IMO we should try to define words when using them. I.E. if one uses "Marxist," ask what that means. Anyhow, Mather said "Vic, what I was saying in my sleep deprived / alcohol induced post on Wednesday night was that a vast majority of income taxes in the US are paid by a minority of taxpayers (25% of taxpayers pay 86% of taxes and 10% pay 70% and so on... link), so explicitly promising to raise taxes on the minority to share with the majority is a can't lose proposition for politician who only needs a majority of the votes." * Aah, I see. Mather said: "This is why our federal government is so big these days, because people tend to vote for who promises to give them more, with promising to pay for people's health care next on the list, couched in words like "access" and "availability." Health care is already accessible and available in the United States to every single person, but it is not for free. What people are asking for - and what the government is fighting itself over how to structure - is for SOMEONE ELSE TO PAY FOR IT." * And I believe someone else should pay for it - I want the best option out of the following: ** Federal and/or state government-funded private health care system (and control of the private health care system - i.e. health care provider rates are fixed and under most circumstances people CANNOT be denied health care) ** A Canada-style state-based health care system ** A federal health care system The status quo has a serious problem since private health care costs rose. The feds need to control the system (spending does not necessarily have to be raised for this) - We need to specifically find a way to combat health care lobbyists to prevent them from influencing politicians (legally I do not know how, but maybe we could list names and have people protest outside of their homes) I am open to any system that offers universal health care coverage via any means (either through regulation of private health care providers OR through an actual government system)