SirRiff

because its a known fact that in war some people MUST die on each side. the problem is how to reduce that number. however, since we know in war zones that some people WILL die, we send soliders to reduce the numbers, while KNOWING that still some will die. it is a job of soldiers to die so others dont have to. if you dont want anybody to die, dont send anyone. because having the best trained men there assures that the least number of people die that are needed to get the job done. its the ugly part of war, adn why it makes it important that wars are as ethical as possible, ie, doing the most good with the least bad. SirRiff

we all agree that isreal was born of terrorism too right? its not like the israeli borders were drawn by the hand of God or anything, they fought for thier land too. SirRiff

you might also note most of the richest nations like the US and Canada have never had a modern war on thier soil. the UK got it bad in WWII, but have had peace ever since. the middle east isnt like that. it has a history of being part of the foundations of modern culture. too many different peole in once place, endless wars and violence and infighting. the middle east is old world, highly overpopulation, not like canada and the US which have only been nations for about 200 years anyways. north america and the UK are protected by oceans, most of the world is sinking in poverty and overpopulation, but not us. to think that only modern economic stats reflect the secret of successs is nonsense. geo-politics screwed over many nations 1000 years ago. the US has EVERY geographic and ethic advantage. founded by europeans, the native americans were few enough to be wiped out, the mexians were weak enough to be killed off and rich land taken, and imported blacks to do the hard work. canada too, we have an oasis in the world compared to india, or egypt, or turkey. they have been fighting poverty, war and overpopulation for hundreds of years, before north america was ever "discovered" by europeans. we got the best of the lot, the middle east got the worst. most things today are a reflection of that. SirRiff

U.S. drug czar says Canadians ashamed of PM WASHINGTON - The White House's drug czar lashed out yesterday at Jean Chrétien for relaxing marijuana laws and said Canadians are "ashamed" at the Prime Minister's recent jokes about smoking pot when he retires... ...Canada is "the one place in the hemisphere where things are going the wrong [way] rapidly," he added. "It's the only country in this hemisphere that's become a major drug producer instead of reducing their drug production."... http://www.nationalpost.com/home/story.htm...41-F8622EAEF154 so let me get this straight... the US leads (by far) all first world nations in gun deaths.. has among the highest incarceration rates for drugs, especially low income blacks.... still looses thousands of lives from alcohol and tobacco EVERY YEAR... almost 40,000 americans die on highways everyyear... AND DECRIMINALIZING WEED IS A PROBLEM???? as far as i know no Canadian OR american has ever died from smoking weed. who the hell does this guy think he is? we can save millions in $$ by not treating pot smokers just the same as rapists and murderers, and put that towards real practical solutions in health care and education. american lecturing canada on culture and society is like saddam lecturing on democracy or osama on the geneva convention. its sickening. as we have seen in some european nations, weed is HARMLESS compared to handguns, alcohol and tobacco. we will only become a better nation by discouraging but not incarcerating every kid with a joint. my god, the ignorance of someone to say that. especially speaking on behalf of CANADIANS!! look in your own backyard first moron, tally up the deaths from guns, alcohol and tobacco and compare them to weed overdoses. talk about out of touch policies. some middle aged white guy can guzzle pills from a bottle and its a medical problem, some young black smokes a joint and its right to jail beside violent criminals? nope, doesnt make sense. SirRiff

no no no! he was invited, not demaned to appear. it was up to him obviously. it would be a courtesy from one nation to another to do it as a show of how good allies we are. BUT, considering post 9/11, the normal "protocal" has changed. the US deported one of our citizens on little if any proof. even syria is baffled by the so called 'evidence'. they deported him to syria even though he has hasnt lived there in 15 years, adn they didnt even notify the canadian gov. the only civil thing would be for the US ambas to politely explain the actions of teh US, that is the entire reason for his job. otherwise, this insulting action will only cause Canada again to reexamine how much we can trust the US to act in a civil manner towards us. and considering the need to cooperate on things like border security, and afganistan, its in nobodies interest to have relations further weaken. its insulting that the ambassador couldnt just show up and say somthing to explain or defend US actions. screw protocol. if you want to talk about protocal, i would say invading iraq pretty broke the mold on that one. well KK, thats true, but as i said before, talking about border security, sharing threat information, and so forth in this so called WAR ON TERROR, they are forced to work with us if they want to remain hyper-prepared as they do. its insulting for our so called ally not even to present an ambas to explain thier unfounded actions in deporting one of our citizens. we have soliders fighting in afganistan in the so callled war on terror. harassing Canadian citizens isnt acceptable. SirRiff

its a no win situation. the entire job of a soldier is to die and fight so the rest of us dont have to. they are put in high risk situations because they are teh best trained to do it. in peacekeeping, the risk is that its NOT a war zone, and you cant just kill from afar. you have to walk down streets, and patrol in open vehcicles. there are no tanks to fight in afganistan, just landmines and AK's, which make it all the worse. SirRiff

this is just fantastic, our 'closest ally' wont even tell us why Syria cant even find dirt on this guy. pathetic. this is just common decency betwen 'allies in the way on terror'. SirRiff

anybody recall they are peacekeepers and want to be seen by the locals? if we wanted them completely unharmed, they should never leave canada. even anti tank mines are designed to be tank killers. peacekeepers must put themselves more out in the open then high tech warfare. SirRiff

FastNed i did seem to loose track of your post after me and hugo got to debating gay death statistics and the CDC. apologies well lets just explore this for the sake of clarity so we understand each others meaning. the genetic term for a "primary" gene is just "simple dominance". which means when two diffference versions of one gene (two "alleles") are present, the physical manifestation ("phenotype") will be that of the dominant gene alone and the other will be unseen in effect. thus, there is a gene for eye color. there are several difference alleles (versions) of this eye color gene. each allele encodes for a slightly different protein. any particular protein folds into a slightly different 3D molecular shape, distributes it electrical charge slighly differently, and can have different reactive chemical groups attached to it, etc... if the allele for brown eyes is B, and the allele for blue eyes is b, and if brown eyes display simple dominance over blue eyes, then the following genetic combinations (genotypes) would result in the following physical manifestations (phenotypes) BB= Brown eyes Bb= Brown eyes bB= Brown eyes bb= blue eyes obviously, each particular B or b were inherited from each parent this model is the classic genetic example of gene interactions. however this only really works for simple one -to-one mapping of genes and protein products, like a simple pigment for eye color. the eye color can be completely attributed to the presence of the pigment, the presence of one pigment (brown) completely masks the presence of another (blue). thus brown is dominant, blue is recessive as you said. HOWEVER, this model is so usefull because of its simplicy. as you can see from above, each parent would HAVE to have one of each allele ("heterozygous") for the above distribution of genes to take place. THUS the above classic model of gene action ONLY occurs in "hybrid" offpring, resulting in a cross specifically between Bb and Bb parents. Lets say that for evolutionary reasons, brown eyes gave a small advantage when our ancestors were hunters. then brown eyes would be very popular (men with brown eyes would hunt better, bring home more food, thier mates would be healthier, and have more children who survived), and blue eyes would be rare. In this case, most of the parents would have brown eyes, mostly BB but also some Bb genotypes (both have a brown eyed phenotype because of simple dominance). so if you cross these parents you would get BB= Brown BB=Brown Bb=Brown Bb=Brown you would not "see" any of the recessive genes, as they would be masked by the more frequent. how would a recessive phenotype be exposed? only by the mating of two relatively rare Bb parents. there is an simple equation ("the hardy-wienberg equalibruim equation") that describes the relative contribution of two genes in a population (and also how they would balence if things were to change) P^2 + 2PQ + Q^2=1 where P and Q stand for any two alleles generalized. so lets say that the brown allele, being prefered by evolution via natural selection, is far more dominent then the blue allele. so if we catalouged all the ALLELES in the population, we would find that the brown allele accounts for 82.7% of all alleles . the blue allele (assuming only two alleles for this simple trait) would account for the remaining 17.3%. (exactly how these were distributed about the population would depend on exactly what balence of cost/benetif ratio the recessive allele brought) according to hardly-weinberg, the normal distribution of the alleles at equilibrium would be B(0.827)^2 + Bb(0.827)(0.173) + bb(0.173) = 1 0.684( + 0.286(Bb) + 0.03(bb) = 1 thus the number of offspring in each generation having two copies B ("homozygous") and having Brown eyes would be 68.4%. the number of offspring having one copy of each B and b (heterozygous), but still having brown eyes would be 28.6%. and the number of offspring having two copies of the recessive allele b, would be 3%. (homozygous recessive) this examples illustrates that the rarity of a recessive gene that is harmlessly carried in the population can maintain its recessive phenotype in the overall population at a low rate like 3%, even though the proportion of offspring born JUST to hybrid carriers alone would be 25%. ========== now there actually are examples of "co-dominance", where BB could be brown, bb could be blue, YET Bb was green. this occurs because the products of each allele interact to produce a phenotype unique to that combination. flow color is a very codominant trait, as is the human blood group system. you can have A, B, or AB blood group. obviously the numbers get very complex when you are dealing with additional factors above 2X2 crosses. this is why they dont make good models for simple traits, the influence of each allele could be unequal, or they could be based in time or temperature, or there could be 5 alleles involved. ============== now we need to realize the magnitude in difference between simple physical traits and human behaviors we are now talking about complex human behavior, not just eye color. eye color is just the presence of a protein which reflects some part of teh visible light sprectrum and absorbs the rest. different foldings and charges will reflect different parts of the spectrum and thus will look like different colors. however the basis is just the presence of the protein, in terms of color, the protein doesnt really have to DO anything, just be there. behavior is exponentialy more complex then that and I obviously dont have true authority on it like real researchers, but there are many simple biochemical interactions that biologists study as models, and can reasonably be used as models for complex behaviors. yes, now we know from discussions above, that a recessive trait/behavior is just the same as any other behavior, only it will be masked by a dominant trait. OFTEN in nature this applies to harmfull mutations that have been sidelined by evolution over billions of years because they reduce the success of organisisms with thier phenotype (having both recessive copies), BUT most recessive traits can be CARRIED by organisms without harm (hidden by the dominant trait providing any crucial functions). this is how harmfull recessive traits stay in populations, by the heterozygous carriers, generally not by the afflicted (who are unlikely to reach sexual maturity, and whos offspring are likely to suffer a disadvantage and not reproduce themselves.) to further reference yoru quote there are obviously genes that "prime" advanced animals to develop social networks and interpersonal interactions. the amount of stuff that a baby monkey, or dolphin, or human has to learn as it grows is astonishing. i read an article that say a newborn babies field of vision is operational only at about the 12 inch range. why? they think it is because that is the distance a mothers face is while she nurses her child, and it would serve the baby to learn her face as a bonding mechanism. animal mothers lick thier newborns clean, which is a great opportunity for scent exchange, especially when both baby and mother and hormonally primed to learn a new scent, ie after birth. almost all mating rituals (including humans) include some sort of instict supression behavior. take lions. if any animal were to come up behind a lioness it would react by instinct (not just choice) to lash out in a evolutionily protected "fight-or-flight" responce to all threats. well how do males get close enough to mate then? there are specific scents (pheramones released in urine), sounds (roars, rumbles, cries), movements (dances, postures), sensations (rubbing, grooming, bites) that specifically supress the very powerfull instincts of both sexes so they can come together and mate without killing each other or running away as thing instincts command them. as you can see by watching the natural channel, this suppressions last just long enough to mate over a period of just a few hours or days depending on the animal. now, these mating behaviors need to be identical accross all members of the species at the same time. that is the only way a population of sucessfully interbreeding organisms (the very definition of species) can exist. if there is variation in the population with these behaviors they will loose thier effectivness to supppress powerfull animal instincs and could drastically reduce the sucess of the population. how does all this exact uniformity over millions of years occur? mostly by genetics i would argue. there is no other way to assure the continuation of just precise and repeated behaviors which are so crucial to survival. PS- all this must be true of the physical side of mating too. i spend a month once studying the genetic mechanisms for keeping every sperm in a population capable of fertalizing every egg in that popluation. there is a whole subscience that studies mating barriers in all stages, from behavior, to design of sex organs, to the uterous/womb environment, to the physical penetratoin of sperm into egg, to the mixing up of both sets of genes, to the expression of those genes and making the primary axis of an embro and starting growth. at EVERY stage mentioned genetic systems must keep the entire population synchronized over millions of years and massive numbers of organisms. this is where we actually come to the real behavior-via gene theory. it is reasonable to presume that say in complex social animals, such as primates, that we have many genes reponsible for social behaviors. some might be for mother-child interactions which is very imporant, some for males determining dominance, some for grooming and bonding with other non-related tribe members, some for cooperative foraging and hunting in packs, and many more i cant think of. this is where the whole gay gene theory comes from. a gene that can influence gayness, may not have been designed for that at all. in fact, the "gay" gene may be a general social bonding gene, that allows the brain to imprint new behaviors towards non related individuals through certain universal hardwired activities such as grooming. it may be how it maintained itself in the population, way back in the first animals. it became specialized and populations of the first animals and allow them to survive better. most likely one gene was a general bonding gene. this gene was copied in the genome a few times, and each copy became slightly more specalized in the process in influenced. (this is how all of our genes evolved we think) it did this by letting them learn to supress territorial instints so multiple familty units could travel together and sharing grazing land which would help them defend against preadors or hunt. it did this by maybe reducing the infighting between related males by allowing them to imprint each other as related as youth and reducing unessessary deaths over fights for availble females. it did this by allowing altruistic behavior of females that would continue to contribute resources to other females offspring without its own. (this is witnessed in some insects and gopher populations but is very contraversial) it did this by allowing two subpopulations of a species to recognize each other as similiar species and integrate more easily into larger populations. in general, a family of genes who allowed the hardwiring of certain intra species behavioral to allow the population as a whole survive better. in short, the individual benefits if the entire population benfits. this is the predessessor for any concept of a gay gene i think. just like numberous other human genes, most notably the immune system, this primative set of a few genes, would by duplicated and specialized and increase in number nad complexity to cover alot of the intricate human behaviors we now use as the most highly social and intelligent creatures on eath. it has obviously benefited us to be able to interact in so many ways. well yes, but as i said earlier, CARRYING a beneficial gene would be good for the population. because the social genes for a modern human would be VERY complex there could be duplicates and failsafes, we dont really know. however, if there were a few genes that primed people for nuerological sexual development (mating behaviors, sex drive, and so on), and there were rare alleles ("mutants") of these genes that produced relatively extreme behaviours, then these genes very well could have a huge influence in the behavior we call gay. it would just be the way you learn about the sexes, the way you are primed to respond to sex drive, the way you imprint sexual signals and stimulation, the way your brian is hardwired to catagorize the M and F sexes relative to ourself, the way that your neurons create nueral nets as you learn about your identity. a few rare alleles could influence each of these important and highly conserved pathways, the result of which could be a huge change in a persons behavior using this ancient systems. your example of a dead end is correct only if we are talking about pure instinct. in ancient times, the genes may have been very narrowly expressed as part of a very rigid social system, the instinct part of the brain would still have been very strong and primative and a small genetic difference would not have made any real difference to mating behaviors as the genes were just "extras" to the core group of genes that controlled life. as the genes got more specialized, and social behavior got more complex with mammals, the hunting instinct would have to share its existance with the instincts of complex social interations, and there would be "wiggle" room in social behavior, since it would not likely get you killed like wiggle room in huting. thus the first effects of recessive individuals could have been less specific sexual attraction, trying to make with males too, or a slightly less strong attraction to females. thus the recessive individuals may have well suffered, but the population as whole would have still greatly benefited from having more traditional versions of the genes. even then, as i said above, there would be no harm in a large subsection of the population carrying alternative versions of the genes. each gene may have only played a small part in the whole. as early primate intelligence and creativity exploded as we developed into truely social animals and were about to walk out of africa half-monkey half-man, it was more and more intelligence that was the determining factor in survival, over brute strength or size as in other animals. this was an opportunity for the first true complex societies to develop, with many familes traveling together, complex languange and social bonding and so on. our brains had been expanding so fast that our potential for social compexity far exceeded our use. geneticists predict that primative humans from many millenia ago, would develop JUST LIKE modern children if placed in a modern house. genetically we have been "modern" for a relatively long time, as the evolutionary explosion of our brain size and complexity moved much faster then our behavior. SO NOW, as modern humans have existed fort 10+ thousand years, as we were no longer slaves to our instincts and as the amount of development we require from bith is massive, NOW the same genes that were once general social bonding genes, are specialized and open for interpretation from our complex. thus genes can now change the direction of our sexual prefernces and identity that we learn and develop from our environement. this goes back to my basic premise. that ANY behavior gene was created in ancient times because it would benefit populations at that time. a "mutation" in that gene would have been highly suppressed by our powerfull instincts as animals. however, there would be little if any harm in populations carrying versions of social behavior genes as masked by instinct or dominant genes. also because there would be no loss of a crucial function as we see in malaria or cancer genes. as our genome duplicated and specialized itself, and as our social behavour got more complex, multiple genes were responsable for different behaviors, each probably having a small individual contribution (codiminance most likely) now in modern times, a little bit of social variation is not supressed by instinct as much, nor does it cause death. any lose of reproduction in gay individuals can be made up for by far by the role of allele in combination with other genes in "normal" individuals. the gay gene may be a specific combination of genes that only a few people show. or it may be a few mutant genes. or a few hyperactive genes. i dont know for sure. but i belive it would be part of the social network of genes that hardwire loose instincts of bonding behaviors that have been crucial in the past, and thus carried forward in evolution. they have specialized and compartmentalized in modern times. some variation in some people is tolerated and this manifests in what we consider gay behavior. i wouldnt get too hung up on the 3% figure, any figure could be explained depending on the frequences of the allele and how it interacted with ther genes. some mutations will kill you and some wont, so that makes it hard to spot the peope who died because of genetics and realize the gene was at work there. but the bigger problem i believe is explaining how the behavior would be tolerated through evolution, how it would come to be, how it was carried to modern times, and why it would exist now or then. all of which i have tried to explain above. warning: spellcheck was not used in the making of this document. infact no proofreading of any kind was used. some rambing may exist. SirRiff

uh, i dont think this cknykid post is racist. considering Isreal is occupying arab land and killing people on a daily basis i dont think some harsh words are unfounded. not to say its one sided, the same could be said of the arab terrorists. but either way, when people kill each other constantly for years, some harsh words pale in comparison. its funny that some people are bashing the hate speech bill on another thread, then telling cknykid he is racist for what he says here. SirRiff

uh, ahhnold admitted some of the accusation were true several times. he also said he would talk in detail about them when the campaign was over. fat chance. the liberals made him do it!! SirRiff

greetings, Fastned are you a lawyer? i specifically recall someone saying you are. i think i may actually appy to law school.i got a mouth for the profession. ANYWAYS, i aint a lawer, but considering this part of the law i think its obvious that the law is specifically intended to protect minorities from actual discrimination, intimidation, and persecution, and not from criticism. just like the canadian constituation, if it was interpreted verbatum the powers are way out of whack, with teh senate, and queen, and all the bizarre leftover. however, due to custom and convention we moderate the powers and we voluntarily dont screw ourselves. same with laws, every cop doest charge you with jaywalking, every judge doesnt give the maximum sentance, any everyone who says homosexuality is wrong will not be prosecuted. in fact, judging by how Canada operates, i doubt this law will be accepted by the public except for teh worst cases. thus based on every practical precident of canadian behavior, this whole law is a non-issue. as long as you dont incite a criminal act, dont intimidate by fear or similiar unacceptable acts, nobody is going to bother you. sifRiff

i appreciate your honestly, and not to be an ass, but i did spot that one right off the bat and i think that lends a little bit of credabilty to my "doubts" and "common sense" i will read up on the other ones SirRiff

omg...i hope i am not right.... ok the International Journal of Epidemiology statistical modelling of HIV life expectancies found at http://ije.oupjournals.org/cgi/reprint/26/3/657.pdf tables the "life expectancy....at exact age 20 for gay and bisexual men in all vancouver" the live expectancy at age 20 is either an additional 34, 42.6, or 46.3 years depending on the modelled gay population. which is an average of 34+42+46/3= 41 years. is this where people get the 42 life span numbeR?? because it would be stupid to do so. that is the expected age from age 20. not the total life span. one HUGE thing not mentioned in the paper is that vancouver has a MASSIVE drug problem. this study was done from data on 1987-1992 numbers so we have a massive heroine problem in vancouver targeted to who? young males. we also have the aids explosion of the 80s targeted to who? young males. so the conbination of the greatest AIDs explosion ever, not to mention a institutionalized dirty needle problem in vancouver int he 80s would definately shorten the lifespan of a gay man. they actually mentioned they picked vancouver because it has among the worst AIDs rates in Canada, no doubt from all the dirty needles through the 80s and 90s (i hear they made a big effort to clean up lately with safe injection sites) so by those numbers, the WORST HIV city in Canada, and the WORST drug city in Canada both during the late 80s, they predict by modeling the average life expectancy of a gay man (average of all 3 population models) is about 61 years, compared to 74 years for all men. so in a city with the highest AIDS rate, and with the worst drug problem, both of which target primarily young men, the average 20 yr old gay male will unfortunately loose 12 years of his life due to premature death. i would say that is pretty reasonable. but then again HUGO, if you slept with prostitutes in down town vancouver and were a drug addict, you wouldnt live very long either now would you? this is worst case scenario stuff, but we could go to the poorest city in the US, with the highest gang violence rates, and model the age and incarceration rates of young black 20 yr old males and come back with the worst case numbers- is that an argument against blacks? i think this study shows that high risk behavior is more likely to kill you. simple as that. i recall wilt chamberlin (sp) (the basketball player) saying he had sex with 17000 women during his career and gene simmons (of KISS) saying thousands and thousands. what does this prove? given the opportunity, MOST MEN will have massive amounts of sex. the limited facter in most mens # of partners is the willingness of females. a women can go to a bar and have sex 100 times, a man might get lucky once (if he is lucky). thus it is pefectly reasonable to presume that two men who lack the hesitations of women will be more sexually agressive then a man and women. so really all this talk about gay parters is just about the matching of sex drives. a high sex drive women will likely harm her health just like a high sex drive gay man. why? becuase both will have multiple willing partners. it is no more the fault of gay men acting like men then it is the millions of yougn men at bars every night acting like men. if tomorrow morning every women became a nymphomaniac, we would see pregnancies skyrocket and disease transmissions hit the roof. why? because men act like men. so why is it immoral for a gay men to have sex like a man but a hetero man not to? the only differnce is that straight men dont have near as receptive partners as gay men. the sex drive is the same in both, and the risks if thier targets were receptive would be the same too. also, i think its reasonable to presume that after the drugs raveged through vancourver, and AIDs ravaged the gay community, and that safe sex education has started, that people (other then junkies) take far more precautions now then in the 80s. i think the numbers would have come down in 2003 for non drug users. if AIDS had started at Woodstock 1969 we coudl have make the same argument against the "free love" hippie chicks there. so we know; drugs are bad unsafe sex is bad for anybody its obvious most men would be promiscuous given the chance (equally willing partners) AIDS kills you early you males are the most risk taking demographic anywhere i dont see how a the normal male sexual behavior of high sex drive, high risk behavior of young males in general such as drug abuse, or the localizing of healh problems to a subpopulation such as smokers or alcoholics, makes homosexuals immoral. everything is as natural as anybody else to me. the only legitimate question is: On what criteria can soceity say the actions of a subpopulation constitute a threat to the health and wellbeing of society as a whole? now THAT is teh question. SirRiff i will look at some of the other quotes you put up there, but i still cant find the 42 year# anywhere else, and i hope that some moron didnt take remaining life expectancy and confuse it with total life expectancy and post it all over th web.

is this a study? or book excerpt? or what? i cant find this anywhere on the CDC site. i dont know where it came from SirRiff

i think that concept of survival came way back in teh 60s and 70s when the idea that the baby could survive away from its mother was an easy way to label it viable. obviously the viability of a baby has increased and increased to the point that premature babies can be saved many weeks earlier. not to mention we can see babies now. but the concept was seperate from its mother, not in need of medical care, because many babies and infants get advanced medical care in modern times, its routine. SirRiff

what about secretly funding rebels/terrorists, sponsoring coups in south america and around the world, sending weapons to among others afganistan/iran/iraq during the 80s, and supporting dictators who kill thier own citizens? would a nation that did that be considered corrupt and evil and needing to be removed? SirRiff

you think citing the family research council is legwork?? thats like me citing GLAAD. my god man, i havnt seen anything in the entire thread referenceing a primary scientific source, nothing at all. im confused about all these sources you cited because the latest one is which is odd, because its just a copy and past of a section of a book by a right wing guy who doesnt like gays. you call that support for heath data on gays? you are the one that says gays are "thousands" of times more likely to get AIDS, you are the one who says the average life span of gay men is 42 years. all i am asking is that if you expect anybody to take those two very alarming numbers seriously, that you actually reference a primary study or organization. CDC, a hospital study, a public medical association, an international academic paper, SOMETHING of substance where scientists (not religous/policy people just claims) cite thier methods, subject themselves to some sort of peer review, and present thier data in scientific form. not just saying "we looked at newspapers and found this". that is NOT sciencie. I will give you an example. The Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) http://www.pipa.org/ they state who they are they state methodology they produce raw data state their funding and sampling biases the result of this particular study was... i havnt seen anything cited (that i recall seeing) ANYTHING that is scientific, independant, credible, verifiable, or unbiases such as the CDC, or other sources i listed above. these are the only kind of oraganizations that would be able to produce real numbers on this kind of health study. so i dont think you are doing any more work then me when i point out the absolute nonsense of the 42 year number when citing the family research council who lack any of characteristics of scientific study. yes i agree the CDC website is hardcore, but that is 'Proof" if you want to claim proof. just like the PIPA study is "proof" that misinformation bias can be matched to news source. i'm just saying, the person who claims proof of something like gay men living half as long and having thousands of sex partners should be too surprised when challenged to produce a credible source. i recall writing a paper on historical observable mutation rates of the human X chromosome, and the days and weeks of research on international genetic databases that were required just to confirm and cross verify your conclusions, not to mention the detailed referencing and sourcing you need to do for some complex data. this is how truly scientific knowledge is vetted and eventually accepted. SirRiff

well if there entire basis for the 42 figure is those family councils, there is nothing to contradict. i actually dont know what hte life span for a gay man is, i will look around for some credible numbers, but 42 is just as arbitrary as 64. and those CDC statements are from the same guy who cited the 42 number. generally if you are stating a CDC study you can cite the study name or link to the results. what are you quoting when you say "thousands of times more likey"? its not in the original book quote. people with obvious biases need to do more then just say the Family council says this or the CDC says this. the CDC publishes its work and its very easy to reference. nothign in that quote is easy to believe to me. those numbers seem manipulated i think. especially considering the 42 number that is arbitrary at best. i dont know where the CDC says gays are thousands of times more likely to have AIDS. none of this stuff is solid when you consider how high the numbers are claimed SirRiff

if all it takes is third world technology and accusations of intent, there are about 30 nations that could be invaded right now. any high school lab in a major city can make dangerous germs. its easy. any nation will have the ability to make basic chemicals. saddam has been sitting on his ass for 12 years with his country under no-fly getting bombed. the hasnt moved or attacked anyone. so he obviously has no intent to start a war. was his intent to spray someone with germs?? how long is his plan going to take? he has put off his programs for years now, he is not getting any younger, he has no means to deliver WMDS EVEN if he had them, and doing so with a rocket or plane would demand a complete US retalization. saddam was content to sit on his ass and live out his days. there was no WMD threat, and predicting a future intent is laughable. if the US can predict the future intent of saddam now, why couldnt they predict osama? why couldnt they predict sadam when they were supporting him? or iran? pathetic. SirRiff

HUGO a scientific source is the primary souce. the actually study from some sort of respected instituation. i did a quick search and found a many links that repeated the 42 yr life span number. here is one; here is another; again and again they cite these family research institutes, and councils studying some # of obituaries. well i went to FRI website and they pretty much hate gays in every way possible. they are not a legitimate scientific institute. they publish policies based on religous values, they are not scientists, they dont publish methadology, and they dont subject their findings to peer review. all basic requirements of real science. some of their thier "reports" are titled; The Plague, SARS, and Gay Rights Homosexual Rape and Murder of Children Gay Foster Parents More Apt to Molest How Much Rape is Homosexual Rape? Mental Health of Homosexuals Christianity in Crosshairs of CDC? Mental Health Professionals Endorse Pro-Gay Propaganda Stopping Gay Parents: The Ammunition is There they have no evidence of being anything more then a "traditional" values organization that publishes anti-gay literature. thats it. they are not scientists or independant in anyway. they obviously detest homosexuality and publish opinons to that effect. no intelligent person would consider thier "study" of obituaries to be credible. a real study has a defined methadology that is peer reviewed. the CDC is respected. if THEY did a study on gay lifespans i would believe it. thus when i asked you for a source for the 42 year life span, it was not that i wasnt paying attention as you put it, i realize anybody can post crap, but i was asking for a link to a government organization, or a medical advocacy group, or something with independance and credibility. if you know an independent scientific study that suggetst a 42 yr life span for homosexuals, please post the link to the study. otherwise, i think its obvious that specific claim is completely unproven. SirRiff

why are you talking about france? the Us is the occupying force, france has nothing to defend, let them say whateve they want. the nation that attacks first, and is the occupier is the one that needs to defend its action. nobody cares what europe says. when you are dropping bombs and occupying a sovereign nation, you alone bear the responsibility for your actions. if saddam was such a crazy maniac why has he been sitting like a bitch for 12 years getting bombed every day under no fly? why hast he charged into isreal or kuwait? because he is a middle aged man who loves his cigars and palaces, he is not a suicide bomber. iraq is a third world nation, and any WMD that they may have had a decade ago are uselsss and non threatening to the US. any move he would make would require a full US realiation adn he knows it. he was content to live out his life in luxory obviously. the WMD argument was all a lie, they claimed they knew all this shit about where they were adn so much of the intel turned out to be false, now there is nothing but angry iraqis and a big international problem. SirRiff

two things people tend to over look.. whatever weapons the iraqis may had had were primative and useless in any real war. any nation has the capability to acquire or produce simple germs and rockets. we cant go around the world invading every nation with a high school biology program. technology has advanced and starting wars to make you safe is just as likely to destroy the world given enough time. now, you just cant hide a ton of WMD in the ground in a garbage bag then dig it up again and throw it at someone. without the technology to use WMDs effectively the nobody can kill lots of people. iraqs weapons are so out of date and ineffective they could only be dangerous to teh civilian kurds who have nothing. it would be impossible for iraq to emply WMDs on the scale the US fears. they are a third world nation. saddam could only threaten local areas, not even regional and certinaly not international. and he was obviously a survivor, not a suicide bomber, he liked the good life and was not crazy enough to attack israel or kuwait knowing it would require a full US retalization. he was contained, there was NO WMD argument to be made. it was all just hysteria on 9/11 fears. the USs danger from iraq was no more then any of us face going through day to life life. car accidents, crazies with guns, all kill people every day. a humanitarian case could have been made ethically and morally, but Bush knew his people would never go to war just for a war and fuzzy feeling. so he hyped it up. SirRiff

look at the mountains of evidence that shows how the US knowingly exagerated WMD claims. its insane. no reasonable person can claim there was an immediate threat from WMDs. just didnt exist. not to mention they claimed they knew all sorts of secret locations from all sorts of intelligence sources and would reveal the truth and such. they have found nothing, becuase they never knew anything at all before the way. it was all a lie to satisfy some neo-con strategic policy. the bush admin lied to the world about WMDS while trying to capitalize on 9/11 sympathies. they deserve no trust from anyone. SirRiff

any satellite region of a nation feels anger at what it perceives as being ignored, or undervalued, or whatever. it happens all throughout history, it happens in provinces, hell it happens in families and businesses. its natural. but its just the way people create psychological scapegoats for the vague feelings of injustice that we all have. whether its minorities blaming "the man" or the poor blaming wall street tycoons, people need some foreign force to lump together the less definitely injustices they feel. BC is Canada. Canada is BC. SirRiff