What's that stupid smiley good for!

@MrMalachiCrunch:

Garg, you can do a google search on just about anything and get a hit.

If you google aliens impregnated Richard Nixon you get over a 1/4 million hits.  Of course if you put it in quotes for the exact phrase you get no hits.

In WWII, do you think any of the weapons sent to covert agents found there way to the Germany military?  Since that possibility could not be reduced to zero, do you think the logical conclusion was to then offer zero support to covert operations in case the bad guy gets some of your goodies?

I think NATO did the right thing in Libya.  Do I think there was zero chance of support falling into the wrong hands, of course not.  Was the risk worth it?  I think so.

So, if one wants to help anti-Assad forces one will take the risk that some of that support may fall into the wrong hands, I am sure some of it will.  Do you offer zero support because a rifle might end up in the hands of Al-Qaeda?  Yeah, I don’t think flooding the area with stinger missiles is the thing to do either.

Garg, if the current US president is not familiar with the concept of blow-back then god help us all!

There is history here, though.  The Taliban was essentially trained & funded by the CIA.  Of course at the time they were devoid of precognition, so didn’t think it would come back to bite them in the ass.  Iraq is similar but not exactly the same, as well as Noriega.

But either way, what Garg quotes is a Tennessee Senator fearing that Al-Qaeda will end up with the support given to Assad opposition groups (which apparently some oppose, probably for their own power).

The kicker is this, though: there was no poop actually in the toilet bowl. Everywhere else, but not there. What WAS in the toilet was his soiled underwear that he had abandoned.

FYI I just about died of laughter after reading this LOL

It sounds like to me he flushed the toilet first, and then must have left the underwear in there after.

LOL… that said never leave an underpant behind!

They don’t make donkey shows like they used to anymores in TJ.  Thats why now I only go to Panda shows.  Sometimes it gets difficult cause the Panda bear doesnt want to co-operate, but when it gets started……its hawt.  8-)

The worst invention in my opinion ever invented would be Video games. Talk about a waste of time and money for kids. About 99.5% of all video games may bring joy, but do nothing for the people plying them. They spend hundreds of hours playing them only to end up with NOTHING in the end. Nothing!

Not to mention it is the universal agreement between these companies to continue upgrading as fast as they can to get new systems to the market. It’s like they can’t wait to make these machines obsolete and squeeze another 300-400 bucks outta some family.

Oh, ……and I think Nuclear Weapons is a dumb invention also. I see many people already said this one. Good for all of you.  :-D

Hard to say. A large part was that I identified so much with one of the main characters, Larry. Not so much in his appearance, personality, or relationships with people (though one relationship he had in particular I saw as very similar to one of mine), but more in his character, his interests, his motivations, and his mannerisms. I saw a lot of myself in that (and I make that evaluation without considering it either inherently good or bad), so a lot of his experiences and choices in the book resonated with me, and made me consider my own. Additionally, the manner in which much that happened in the book was regarded by the author (who is, incidentally, the narrator), I found very appealing, and agreed with it to a substantial degree. It wasnt even that this led to an outright challenge to my previously held beliefs, just that they offered such a fresh new way of looking at things (from my perspective anyway), that I was struck with how simple and reasonable these opposing ideas seemed.

My thoughts and prayers go out to the Dungy family.  Really tragic.

I hadn’t heard anything about a suicide till seeing those links.
I thought I read something about no foul play earlier in the day.
I suppose it could have been accidental, maybe he mixed the wrong type of stuff???
I suppose it could have been drug related, but everything I’ve heard and read would seem to negate that.
And there are instances of young people having heart problems or something.

At this point there is too much unknown for me, I’ll just wait for the coming reports.

In any case, what a tough situation, and right around the Holidays too.  Really really sad.   :cry:

Today is one of those days that makes me glad I have an office Job.

It will be passing 100 Degrees here in a few minutes and is suposed to get to 108 today. :o

But thank god it’s 75 at my desk. :D

I think most of the backing came due to two facts:
(1) the USSR needed reforms, that was obvious.
Still, they probably wanted a long term leader that could be influenced => a younger one, after the two short reigns of Andropov and what-was-his-name… Probably, the influentials wanted some change, but surely not that much that it would threaten their power-base, one of the reasons for the coup that failed due to Jelzins help for Gorbachev.
(2) The general secretary and all the other positions he fills made him the most powerful man in the USSR. Probably, whoever put Gorbachev into place, underestimated him. Pretty much the same underestimation that Hitler faced when he was appointed Chancellor, but luckily Gorbachev used that to reform positively, and i consider the new freedom of information, the right to ask wether the party is right and that the crucial reform.

So, I don’t think that there was “real” backing, i believe Gorbachev was kind of a compromise candidate, kind of a makeshift. Of course, once he was into power, you ccouldn’t remove instantly, that would have meant that the party made a mistake (which was not “allowed” before Gorbachev). And he was clever enough to stay into power, and use his popularity at the beginning (which soon, after the economy started to collapse openly, was reduced to more or less nothing) to enforece the reforms.