@notquiteme: I'm not sure why the whole Arab shenanigans kept on going on since the Crusades, but I think it's way too long ago to keep harping over it. @fancydude: For decades the official policy of the most of their governments, printed for all to see was the destruction of Israel! What are you talking about? Israel was under Muslim control for centuries, then colonial powers stepped in and eventually proclaimed that Israel was no longer under their sovereignty. There was no self-determination at all– wouldn't you be a bit angry if someone walked into your house with a gun and forced you to sign over the deed to your home to some third party? Of course you would! I respect the Israeli claim to the area, however, it cannot be denied that the creation of an Israeli state was based on sympathy from the world powers after the holocaust. That, however, is not justification for entitlement. Although they may have been in control millennia ago, there has to be a limit to how long a claim can continue to be valid without actively pursuing rectification of it. Both of these things have basis in US law-- "Coercion", "Theft" and the "Statute of Limitations". All of this said, anti-Islamic sentiment is far from being relegated to a few sporadic cases. In 2009, over 1000 cases of discrimination of Muslim persons were reported to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (source: http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-201_162-615196.html). This is surely only a small subset of all such cases– I feel it is unlikely that most people report such things. I don't report small instances of discrimination against me for being gay, for instance. Simply because we don't burn Saudi flags in the street doesn't make it any less true. Especially after the 9/11/2001 attacks, and the resulting wars and threats towards various Islamic nations, many Americans have come to associate persons who look ethnically Arab as being Muslim, only making the matters worse. We are looked at as the "bully" of the world, and we sort of are. We push our personal beliefs down on other nations, by force if needed, hardly heeding international law when doing so. We foment hate in other nations because of this, and then wonder why a few zealots attempt to retaliate against our aggressions. I don't approve of the actions of many Islamic nations, but the US and Israel are far from being righteous in their discourse on the subject.

[image: fvethirtyeight-0420-ssm2011-blog480.jpg] We've passed the point of no return: the inflection point (the spot where the red and blue lines meet) starts off at (A) opposition of gay marriage softens and becomes less popular, which leads to (B) it is no longer politically advantageous for candidates to oppose same-sex marriage, which brings (C) they will disengage from the issue, which in turn brings us back to (A) softening of opposition. The trend accelerates, creating a sort of progressive feedback loop.

When blacks and women were allowed in the military, they screamed social engineering.  Now no one questions it.

Agreed. There's a whole world of difference between pirating for your own use and pirating for profit. The odd thing is he is a Tea Party member and one of their platforms is special rights for businesses, including extremist anti piracy laws.

simple. he who endorses gay marriage will lose the votes of all the blind sheep.

It must be really hard to walk with her head stuck up her ass lol  :zing:

i just don't believe that they've fully understood what it is that actually makes paddling effective.  administrators need to determine what really motivates behavior.

I'd like to hear his justification for the Willie Horton ads.  And I wonder if he will be doing the road trip with his "husband" assuming he has one.  Probably should adopt some kids just to be "All American". (I'm joking about the last part about adopting kids.)  I've heard the argument about "change from within" but the Log Cabin folks haven't accomplished much.  I still think no matter how nice people are to your face, you just don't know what they say when the 'fag' leaves the room.  Then again, I never thought we'd have a black president or same sex marriage at all in my lifetime either.

maybe people don't care who sits on top, because it is temporary anyway?

kind of funny how it all ends up, isn't it?

Raphjd - That article is hard to read !  Well, I read it for the third time and it says the Bishop of Exeter and three colleagues were paid for 665 slaves - but I didn't see any mention of WHO paid.  But you are a good source of information - so I'll take your word for it that the gov't paid.  64 Billion pounds  (almost 90 billion in USD) seems like an incredibly huge amount of money though.  In US dollars - Many people earn less than 30,000 a year here - and work 30 years - so they have made less than a million for their entire lifetime.  So 665 people earn 665 million and the same slaves are worth 15 times that?  Yeah, I realize slaves worked from sun up to sun down, not 8-5 etc. Still…... Not only that, 13,000 pounds for that time in history - an incredible amount of money!  Think about this - a friend of mine had a house in an historic district along THE main street in a major city.  In 1910, houses in the first block (prestige was a big factor) were selling for $3,500, second block $2500, and third block 1500.  Of course, the further away you got, there were less features - (leaded glass by the fireplace, built in book cases etc) still these were all 2 story brick homes with at least three bedrooms.  (Henry Ford's model T plant was about 2 miles from there, and he was offering the unheard of wages of $5 a day (which most people didn't know included benefits- that was not cash in your hand)...... So a slave was worth 1/665th of 90 Billion USD?  The math or conversion figures must be wrong somewhere.  A spool of thread in 1885 was 2 cents.  How could a slave (or anyone else's)  productivity be worth that?

I wouldn't vote for him solely on the basis of his verbal show of support for gay rights.  I will, however, vote for him if he is consistently displaying a mind of his own and not just what the rest of his party are saying.  This means he will attempt to look at each question from different perspectives before making his stand. Here in our country, we see gays everywhere (literally) but it's still kind of taboo in conservative families.  And the reputation of gays is terrible.

i wonder if anyone who does prostate examinations does it because they're gay

@uwsguy102: …The whole exchange with him and Mike Myers was cringe-worthy... I love the look on Mike Myers and Chris Tuckers faces after Kanye said it….just priceless. :rotfl: Here's the clip if you haven't seen it. hxxp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIUzLpO1kxI

I never really thought of it that way, but that does make sense