Liam

Perhaps you'd prefer the US method since it's unlikely you'd be found on the receiving end of that torture, whereas it's just slightly more likely that you (and people of your kind) could find yourself on the receiving end of an Islamist's electric cattle prod?

I had to vote for Clinton as having the more effective administration. I despised the guy by the end of his term, but even with Congress held in the hands of the opposing party, there's no doubt the guy got plenty of bipartisan legislation through. Bush has been the poster boy of bad governance and incompetence, of betraying fiscal conservatism and overemphasizing social conservatism. His administration is filled with cronies and incompetent b00bs, none of whom could work their way out of a paper bag if they needed to.

There's one big difference -- big enough to drive a Mack truck through: time. I love how Bush defenders bring up Clinton's belief that Iraq had a WMD program to excuse Bush's incompetence in the war. Desert Fox was in, what, 1998? So you're saying that the situation on the ground in Iraq was the same on the eve of the latest Iraq war in 2003 as it was five years earlier? That conditions are static? Bush had a duty to make sure the intelligence on Iraq was solid prior to going to war. There's ample evidence to show that Bush was more interested in fixing intelligence to fit the policy. In any event, if you think it's fair to justify Bush's war in 2003 on Clinton's actions and intelligence in 1998, I've got some tech stocks for ya that re about to take off. Interested in buying?

It's not a 1st Amendment issue -- the 1st Amendment restricts government's ability to limit speech, it has nothing to do with private parties' and their right to speak, create works of art or make likenesses of other things (real or imagined). In terms of the paintings, themselves, it's not like Bobby Orr actually posed for the painting and this guy is selling it without Orr's permission. And it's not like the guy snuck a camera into the locker room at the Boston Garden and snapped some clandestine photos of his hero. The fact that the subjects of these paintings are nude is no different than if he painted Bobby Orr in action in his Bruin's uniform, or if he painted Bobby Orr wearing a suit of armor or dressed as Tarzan. In each case (well, maybe not the Bruins uniform), the scene is entirely the creation of the artist's creative mind and not meant to portray reality. I see little basis for suing the artist on the basis of embarrassing Orr since it is known that the artist has never seen him naked. I could, however, see a suit against the artist for appropriating Orr's likeness (similar to how Bette Midler sued Ford for using a sound-alike singing one of her songs in an ad for the Ford Taurus years ago).

Bangladesh and India are pretty religious societies, yet get ravaged by monsoons and floods every year. India also occasionally suffers horrible earthquakes and other natural disasters. No one can say that Iran is a secular nation, yet it gets rocked by quakes worse than any seen in California. The Caribbean is a very conservative, Christian part of the world, yet gets hammered by hurricanes each and every year. Likewise, Africa is much more conservative and literal in its religious expression, but no one can say they have it easy from a natural disaster standpoint. For someone to say that natural disasters are related to one's piety (or lack thereof) is simply looking for some link to justify a preconceived notion.

Is that really what the hard left is saying? That we deserve to be hit with terrorist attacks or are they saying that terror attacks are the result of our foreign policy? There is a staggeringly huge difference between "deserve" and "the result of". I've seen things like, "you can't expect any result other than an attack when you do [X]," or "why are we surprised?" and "if the US acted less like a global bully, such things wouldn't happen..." I'm paraphrasing, of course. I'm not defending either side of the political argument, but I have never seen a quote by anyone from the hard left saying we deserve to be attacked.

I can't watch the video while at work, but will try to remember to watch it at home sometime. For some people, being large is not a choice -- some people are just endomorphs and a small percentage of people have glandular issues that cause them to weigh more. But one's weight is a choice for the vast majority of people. I don't mean that some people choose to be fat, though some may, but people make thousands of choices in their daily lives which will either result in being healthy or being unhealthy. Each of us can decide what to eat, when to walk or when to drive, when to turn off the TV and get some fresh air, how much water to drink, and when to push that extra serving of pasta away. Some people do have less self control than others, but no one is entirely powerless in the face of temptation.

... just proof that there are crazies on both sides of the issue. Whether or not the soldier's story is true or the sargeant's will come out eventually.

My G_d. Will all of you just LET GO.

I am sure there are many people who don't know I'm gay and many more who don't care. I merely provided that info with respect to this thread to add a basis to my position on Vitter's anti-family posturing. Nope, I'm not a victim at all. I am not oppressed. I am an attorney, live in a gorgeous home, am well within the top 5% of wage earners in the US, am an active donor to political causes, have a wonderful group of friends, and two fantastic kids. I like being gay and couldn't imagine the sad, grey life I'd live if I was stuck in the straight world. Bad clothes, bad haircuts, terrible pot bellies. Yeesh, you can have all that and more. What I object to is people who, like you, wish gay people would either just go away or accept the crumbs of inequality you want to dole out. I'm very comfortable, but that doesn't mean that social injustice doesn't bother me. As I said, I only mentioned my being gay to explain why Vitter's comments, like those of countless homophobes, bug me so much. (For the record, I don't know who on this site knows my story, but, ScottSA, I'll consider you one who is, strangely, interested. Clearly, you do care where I whet my whistle, but I shan't mention it in your presence again.) In terms of "lifestyle choice", if "lifestyle" is a choice, can you tell me when it was that you decided to be straight? Seriously, if orientation is a choice, then we each reached a point where we decided to go one way or another. If you think I reached that point and went one way. Tell me about your choice and how you decided you wouldn't be gay. ...Or not. I frankly could not care less about who you schtupp in the privacy of your home and it's fully within your rights to boast over a beer about the hot babe you bagged. Furthermore, it's fully within your rights to not like people like me. I wouldn't dream of asking you to change, you're more than welcome to co-exist in my world. Frankly, I don't give two sh*ts whether you or Vitter think I ought to co-exist in yours. I and people like me already live in your neighborhood. Get used to the idea that your kids will grow up in world more open than you've shown them.

I would be superhuman for someone to never utter a hypocritical statement, I agree. Everyone is human. The problem I have is when someone takes an iron-clad stance on an issue, to be a warrior on some topic (and to demonize those who don't meet his or her standards) only to be later discovered to engaging in the very acts which stand in direct contradiction to his public persona. I don't care if the guy is a Republican or a Democrat. It just so happens that this guy is another "family values" cretin who is anything but what he says. I'd feel the same if some liberal human rights activist was discovered to be profiting from sweat-shop child labor overseas. (Actually, though, I think Vitter has earned just a little bit more of my scorn since and I do take his statements quite personally. I am gay and he went out of his way to cast people like me as the enemy of "the family". Little does he know how many people there are like me: single gay parent raising a couple of kids on his own. Yeah, we're such a threat to all that is good and decent and he is such a model citizen, cheating on his wife while paying cash for hookers and all.)

I had to say No based on how the available options. I think an actor ought to need to go beyond mere negligence to be liable for infecting another. I think the standard has to be willful disregard. I think if someone who knows he has a highly infectious case of TB gets on a plane and infects other passengers, or someone who knows he is HIV+ deliberatly hides his status before engaging in unsafe acts, he should be found liable if he infects his girlfriend. Certainly, there are circumstances, like the STD-infected call girl scenario where I would not assess liability. STDs are, for the most part not life-threatening illnesses and are typically cured with a single dose of medicine. Besides, in the call girl scenario, as with bungee jumping or diving with sharks, the actors ought to own some of the risk and take responsibility for some of the consequences.

Bush's entire m.o. is to only say what he thinks will further his position of the day. I really don't think the man is open to pursuasive arguments based on facts. If he wants to believe al Qaeda is stronger one day, he'll say they are stronger and that we need to renew parts of the Patriot Act, or whatever. If it benefits him to go on the stump and say that al Qaeda is weaker, he'll do so and take credit for the policies that weakened them. One more point on the topic -- if al Qaeda is as strong as they were before, how soon will it be before it becomes Clinton's fault? *LOL

You assume way too much about my position. Here's a Republican's take on this, which I agree with: http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/07/hypocrisy_all_around.php Key quote: "I will say to my Republican friends that it does no good to whine about double standards. You’re going to have to concede the hypocrisy point to our Democratic friends on this one. If you’re going to lecture people about the sanctity of marriage as it relates to banning gay unions or campaign on a platform stressing “family values,” it would be best if you didn’t go whoring around on your wife, wetting your wick at $300 a pop."

You never once recited in Mass: "the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church"? That's saying it is THE one.

Don't most religions claim to be the one true path to salvation? I don't see what the fuss is all about.

Hiring a male prostitute is relevant... why? Was that an attempt at some homophobic remark? Having lived a less than perfect life does not disqualify anyone from anything, IMO. St. Augustine lead a life of debauchery, drinking, prostitution, fornication, yet is one of the most revered of all saints. Why? Because he genuinely walked away from his life of sin, but he never claimed to be what he wasn't. Vitter frequented hookers and cheated on his wife while claiming to be a paragon of virtue. In addition, he tried to burnish his own image by casting others as threats to the very institution he, himself, was trashing. You can keep making apologies for him, but it won't make him any less of a hypocrite.

Au contraire, Pierre. I firmly believe in the strength of family and there absolutely need to be paths, regardless of the fact that people sometimes stray. In the case of Vitter, the man was an insulting homophobe and a hypocrite who campaigned on a platform that positioned him as someone who embodied traditional values -- meanwhile, he's being unfaithful to his wife (a moral shortcoming) and paying hookers (a crime last time I checked). When someone like that puts himself out there as a powerful symbol and is shown to be the exact opposite of what he claims to be, he's a hypocrite. Do you think the man is not a hypocrite?

I am not taking a position either way, but if the underlying premise is false, why don't you show us how it is false rather than just stating that it is?

Because I have a variety of interests, spirituality being one of them. Does every thread, particularly one titled "The Power of Prayer," need to devolve into personal insults and acrimony? Maybe it's naive of me to think it need not, or perhaps its just more cycnical of the people who think it must.

I've grown completely tired of these ridiculous debates between atheists and believers. Neither one of you is ever going to convince the other that you're right, so just shut up about it and let the other believe what he wants. Cripes.

Yet another "family values" hypocrite. He's done more damage to marriage than the gay folks he fought to ostracize ever could.

I suppose there is nothing wrong with it if you also believe that Hitler was right about the Jews..... Your bigotry is pathetic. What is worse that some of the morons around here share the same view. In no way do I condone racism. But I stand resolute in my belief that people who emigrate to the US or Canada have to learn to fit in. I don't care what skin color they are or what their religious beliefs are. They are coming to our countries to take advantage of better living conditions and among those better living conditions is that we live in a free and open society wher people are owed rights and afforded privileges. If they want to live under sharia law, they should stay at home. If they never want to speak a language other than Spanish, they should stay home. I could not imagine ever emigrating to another country (Japan, for example) and expect all government forms to be printed in English for me or that I could demand a judge to base my case along the traditional law I lived by back at home.

No, but calls for fatwas against political cartoonists, desecrating Jewish cemetaries and insistence on practicing sharia law might be a decent start.

I agree that this is a major, major concern for those of us in the west. It's less of a matter here in the US as people are told that they ought to assimilate (e.g., the melting pot, which is more like a stew pot today). In the US, our major immigrant groups are Latinos and much less likely to import "alien" cultutral beliefs than, say, Pakistani immigrants in Toronto. Canada is proud of its mosaic, but I think the mosaic approach is wrong. I think a strong central core of beliefs is essential for national cohesion. I think people who move to another country have to adapt to their new surroundings. For me, that means that you leave the old country at the border. How tolerated do you think you'd be if you emigrated to Saudi Arabia and insisted on wearing a halter top to the grocery store? Why should we demand less of people who come here? Is our way of life less valid than theirs?