foxbat

By your own article, I, of all people, am aware that there is some irony that I am leaving while a man who has bragged on tape about his history of sexual assault sits in the Oval Office, and a man who has preyed on underage girls is running for the Senate with the full support of his party," Franken, D-Minn., said in emotional speech on the Senate floor. His blasting was not blaming the GOP for his ouster, but instead calling out just what I posted as well. If you are going to shout from the other side of the aisle that Franken should go, you shouldn't have to yell over the Access Hollywood tape to do it. Is there anything incorrect in what he said about the President in that situation? Also, the Democrats also pushed Conyers to retirement as well over sexual misconduct issues. Honestly, what would it take for the GOP to decide to do the same for the President? The answer is, nothing because it isn't going to happen. Matter of fact, just look at the responses that folks in Alabama had about Moore when they made statements to the effect that, even if Moore did what he was accused of, it didn't matter because you can't have a liberal elected Senator in Alabama. That's pretty much the same issue at play here with where the GOP is today on tariffs, trade, debt, deficits, swampism, embracing strongmen, and a whole bunch of other "shifts" in the party platform based on the current President.

No, not at all. Your idea, not mine. Purging can come from any direction. Can certainly be based on racist, misogynistic, etc. activity, but could certainly be as simple as purging the old rolls to make room for newer blood or shifts in ideology. The President is working on purging his party over ideology and opposition to himself. Again, my point was actually looking at both parties over similar issues and merely observing that Franken was forced out mainly due to calls and push from his own party. Similarly, if Biden goes, it'll likely be from push of his own party. That has not been seen, on this issue, from the GOP side ... especially in the case of the one guy who actually has cases lining up waiting the go ahead. As for Clinton, I see him as irrelevant to the situation at hand unless he's planning to run in the upcoming race. It's been a couple of decades since he's been in the mix, but if the issue is pointing to Clinton then that kind of just shores up the issue with the GOP as they took the moral high ground that he was "diddling" around and used that as a rallying cry to gin up, specifically, the Evangelical base, so that should also have them in the position of purging their own too a couple of years ago ... but that didn't happen and won't happen either.

Ask Al Franken.

Here's a journal article specifically concerning attitudes, reasons for, reasons, against, etc. windpower in three Indiana counties: Benton, Boone, and Tippecanoe. https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/75d4/1e29fbea231623c8fe6139a52dac7c549ad0.pdf As for my belief, I've got a whole bunch of other things on my plate that are within my pay grade that need more immediate attention, so a complete and final solution, from my perspective, will most likely be a future endeavor.

So, realistically, if this is an issue for Biden, shouldn't it also be a problem for the President as well? Or is it only a problem because Democrats see it as a problem and the Moral Majority/Evangelical, GOP base doesn't anymore? Frankly, I think that may well be what the issue is. Democrats are willing to perhaps purge their own over an issue like this, whereas Republican backers don't necessarily care anymore unless it can end up on a flyer or commercial. The only problem is that it also tends to creep ... see other issues such as tariffs, debt/deficit, tolerance of strongmen, swampiness, etc.

I think they make sense provided that they make sense in more than just a single way including monetary cost/benefit unless balanced by non-monetary benefits that are meaningful, environmental impacts, citizen impacts, etc. I'm more a proponent of looking for balanced solutions whenever possible. By your definition and push then, anytime someone says no its NIMBYism ... which isn't the way it works.

Might well be able to take him to court. Depending on your lawyer, you may prevail too. Yes, I'm well aware of what NIMBYism means. You also probably understand that they idea of NIMBYism often has degrees of unreasonableness attached to it when objection is made. It's not a general term, it often has context.

No, not NIMBYism. Don't know about peer reviewed studies, I merely reported what the point was stated by the folks making their decisions. Not sure that you need a peer reviewed study in many cases. If I put up an observation tower in my backyard blocking the sunlight in my neighbors backyard pool area and encroaching on his privacy, I'm not sure that there would be a need for a peer review study in him taking me to court. Of course, if you want to go with peer review studies, one of the other reasons cited by the council/commission was not enough info based on potential negative impacts at this time to leap headlong into unrestricted implementation. Their current actions are to get ahead of things more so than to say no completely.

No, what it means is that there isn't specifically a "one-size-fits-all" approach to the implementation. Part of the argument tied to population density, by the way, is a very libertarian ideal of minimized impact against non-participants. That's harder to pull off in higher population density areas. Also, part of the issues, at least in Tippecanoe County, that were discussed are tied to the size of the turbines. Earlier consideration was based on turbines that had smaller footprints, but the current turbines have increased in height 50-100% since the original ordinances were devised. That pretty much wipes out setbacks and impact originally looked at by the county. Progress in the area may well end up seeing turbines that have smaller footprints and better efficiency that may have less impact in higher-density areas which would allow for a revisiting of the general ordinance. Incidentally, the CityBus terminal in Lafayette has had three turbines in use since 2011. They are smaller footprint than the ones you see in Benton County; roughly 60% of the size, and are part of the cities efforts to produce cleaner energy use in transportation including some of the city's natural gas buses.

Don't know about the others, but Tippecanoe is tied to population density as well as as the growing size of the structures. BC tends to have just a bit over 21 people per square acre while TC has over 350 per square mile. Hamilton is denser than that. The density also makes it more likely to encroach/impact on folks that aren't involved than in a place BC. Tippecanoe County will still allow for private turbines, just not industrial.

Do it! It's amazing when the bacon's done right, but it tends to be inconsistent in the texture ... when it's crispy it is very good.

You tout this often, but I'm not seeing voting third-party as somehow being a magic bullet to the woes of a mainly two-party system. It makes a very big leap to assume that because someone doesn't have a D or R behind their name that they are somehow all of a sudden pure political moralists. As Lord Acton was quoted, "Power tends to corrupt ..." We already have evidence of folks who are third-party or third-party relativists and they are often considered extremists. Recall that Sanders is an independent, but I don't see third-party folks here on GID jumping to support his views in total. AOC is similar in the sense that she's even further away from mainstream Democrats and so might also be considered a third-party-lite person too. Rand Paul is third-party-lite, but he's not exactly been the poster guy for third-party support. I mean Romney has a better record voting against Trump than Paul does and Romney's mainstream GOP. About the closest one to being more third-partyish might be someone like Angus King from Maine. Also, given that third-party candidates come in all flavors, voting third-party in general "just because" seems almost as flawed as voting straight ticket. It would seem similar to voting for someone from Texas when the current White House occupant is from New York because Texas and New York are different. I've voted third party before, but it didn't have much to do with the idea that the person wasn't D or R; it was tied to the person. Similarly, I've voted R before too. Again, in the analysis of doing so, it was tied to the person and not the letter behind their name.

I understand the concern, but they aren't replacing the Whopper, just giving another option. They already had a veggie burger on the menu for a long while now, so it's not surprising that they'd also move to a Whopper version since it's the most popular item.

This isn't a meme ... but it needs to be.

Not sure how entertaining it will be. We are already seeing that play out with the GOP over the last three years. Remember that, if you had mentioned to any dyed-in-the-wool Republican, prior to the end of the primaries, that their idea of being anti-Russian, anti-free-trade, debt-lowering, deficit-lowering, pro-Evangelical, and anti-North Korea, among others, would be completely abandoned by 2016 election night you would have been laughed at as a liberal operative trying to spread a fantasy narrative. Again, watching a party shift direction quickly has already been seen ... of course, with the Democrats, they've always been in this position ... with the GOP, not so much in the past 50 years until the last few.

I'm glad to see these men freed from a wrongful conviction, but as you said, how do they not have a thorough enough investigation into this ... especially when someone else came forth more than 20 years ago to plead to the crime? 40+ years is a long time to rob from an innocent man. I've got to admire the men's optimism in looking forward and their, seemingly, lack of bitterness. Unfortunately, the system failed these guys and there will likely be little accounting for it other than maybe a monetary settlement from the state ... but seriously, how do you compensate someone for four decades of their life?

Sure ... https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/kansas/articles/2019-03-21/aclu-seeks-probe-after-black-man-detained-in-kansas-home

Would be a nice agricultural expansion for farmers interested in doing a bit of diversification.

Likely not if they are more interested in trying to keep Hillary from being president. I'm sure she'll still be part of the campaign shtick. Seriously, there will be some, but realize that we've seen fiscal hawks vote for a tax cut that added to the deficit and the debt. We've seen defenders of free trade sit idly by and allow these very tariffs to be imposed with no real reasoning and no real research done. We've seen Evangelicals that were fire and brimstone in the past decide that it's all good to give lip service to faith. We've had had folks that are so anti-government who are more than OK with the folks setting themselves and their friends up at the expense of the country and adding to "the swamp." We have fiscal conservatives comfortable with the likes of someone like Moore being nominated for the Fed board ... and worse if he gets confirmed. We have folks who are more that happy to overlook why someone is protesting by kneeling and just make it a narrative of disrespecting the troops, but are pretty quiet watching the Commander and Chief tear apart a deceased POW. We have folks who are dead set against figuring out how to normalize relations with Cuba who just stand by as sanctions are waived off for Russia and North Korea without a single concession on their parts. We have a First Lady whose signature platform is anti-bullying online, yet the most famous of the online bullies is her husband. And these are mainly from the GOP leadership ... many of the folks on the street will just continue to follow that lead. Recall that there were folks who voted for Trump, or more specifically their families voted for Trump, who were then deported. This time around it'll be the folks who lost farms or who are close to losing them that will believe that they aren't "the bad hombres."

Additional unforeseen consequences ... https://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/story/news/2019/03/18/tariff-loophole-blamed-in-40-million-olive-lose-in-tulare-county/3194735002/ FTA: Your Lindsay Olives won't come from Lindsay anymore. Tulare County olive growers are reeling after Bell-Carter, a major California table-olive processor, terminated contracts to buy fruit from orchards across the state without notice. Up to 4,500 acres of Tulare County olives will likely go fallow this year after the company canceled all but seven of its contracts with growers in the region. That represents a significant chunk of the total 10,000 acres of olives planted in Tulare County last year, according to an Ag Commissioner's report. "This termination is effective immediately and we will not receive your harvest in 2019," Bell-Carter wrote in a letter to growers. Growers estimate 31,500 tons — 63 million pounds — of Tulare County olives will not be harvested and brought to market this year as a result. That amounts to a $40 million loss in gross revenues in Tulare County alone, and industry leaders say tariffs are to blame. http://fortune.com/2019/03/21/midwest-flooding-farmers-trump-china-corn-soybean-tariffs/ FTA: A week after it began, major flooding continues to impact millions of people in states including Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Dakota. ... The flooding is also particularly devastating to farmers in the region during a time of increased volatility due to President Donald Trump’s ongoing trade dispute with China, which have resulted in agricultural tariffs on corn, soybeans, and wheat. By the end of February, the U.S.-China trade war had already cost more than $40 billion in lost U.S. exports. Reuters reports that many farmers were stockpiling corn in anticipation of prices rising as much as 10 cents a bushel, worth a potential few extra thousand dollars. But now, federal regulations require that some crops tainted by flood waters must be destroyed. That doesn’t even take into account the obvious losses of livestock and other agricultural products many farmers will simply be unable to recover. As of December, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) data, producers in the flood-impacted states, as well as several other neighboring states, had 38% of the nation’s supply of corn, soybeans, and wheat stored on their farms, about 6.75 billion bushels total.

The same way that the police may find nothing in your home with a search warrant, but if you refuse them entry with a warrant, then you are obstructing justice. Or, they have a search warrant for drugs, you refuse them entry and the reason for refusing them entry isn't because you have drugs in the house, but instead have a kidnapped child down there. No drug crime, but another crime you were trying to conceal and you stood in the way of that warrant.

Recent opinion piece from NYT about car ownership in the future. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/22/opinion/end-of-cars-uber-lyft.html We discuss this in class and, one of the biggest items driving personal ownership is "on-call" availability of a vehicle. Once you have more automated cars, there will be less need for taxi drivers while allowing for even more availability of vehicles "on call." Toss in a system of data analytics that allows vehicles to be "in the area" based on your regular schedule or even less-regular schedule, and the idea of on-call becomes more possible. The necessity for parking garages in business districts and downtown areas would decrease. The same would also be potentially true of most retail establishments too since people would be dropped off rather than parking a vehicle there. This in turn would reduce costs for businesses who wouldn't necessarily need the zoning capacity for parking spaces for their establishments. Think about homes in the future that would no longer need garages or could select the garage as a garage ... for folks who still want to own a car ... a semi-finished storage area or a more finished living area. To some extent, the Bird scooters are a foray into this idea for transportation, except that, in the case of the autonomous cars, there would be less of the issue of the scooters causing the problems of just being left everywhere. Those cars would drop you off and then go to pick up other passengers or return to the station for maintenance or charge.

Heard a joke on Bob and Tom the other day that you'd probably enjoy ... Bono and The Edge walk into a bar. The bartender says, "You two again?"