BagBoy

Not me. I'm totally psyched about this thing and can't wait for it to start. Not sure about the Team Europe/Team North America thing, but I can live with it. Games (at least those with Canada, Team NA and USA) will be packed and on at "normal" times. Korean Olympic games will have 12 people in the stands and will be played at the crack of dawn or before when converted to our time.

I can't stop watching this. https://twitter.com/NBCOlympics/status/765641483806400512?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Jackson really was a psychopath, not much doubt about it.

And the response would be Penny Oleksiak won 4 medals in swimming. Canada has 1/10th the population of the US. That's like her winning 40 medals with my twisted logic. She is a total rock star in Canada, arguably for the rest of our lives, and she's only 16, so she's not done by a long shot. You gotta admit. even if she was American, 4 medals is pretty damned impressive.

So the joke in Canada now is... "How are the Dallas Stars going to fit "Penny Oleksiak's Brother" on the back of Jamie Oleksiak's jersey?"

Agreed - especially when they bought it with the proceeds of the sale of a house that was handed down to his wife from her family.

Same for me. 30+ years ago when I read them, but they are excellent. Read them all, WC. You'll be glad you did. I'm reading "Crooked" by Austin Grossman right now. Can't decide if it's twistedly delicious or deliciously twisted. It's a first person account of Richard Nixon's career. In this alternate reality (I hope it's an alternate reality), there are all kinds of strange occult things going on, and the biggest threat to mankind is not the Soviets by any means. It is the Dead. Not the Grateful Dead, but dead people. Dead people don't care if the US and USSR have a nuclear war - in fact, that's apparently that's what they want. This is a fun book.

In the 80's the blue laws had "evolved" for lack of a better term to where we could buy beer in NC on Sundays, but not until 1pm. Being in our 20's at the time, my friends and I never planned ahead for football Sundays. This meant we would show up at the convenience store nearest to us at 12:45 and try to talk the middle-aged lady into selling us beer a few minutes early so we wouldn't miss the kickoff. She would have none of it and who could blame her? We continued to show up there at 12:45 every football Sunday, so we could get the beer ASAP and miss the minimum amount of football. We really enjoyed hanging out with her those 15 minutes each week, and I think she did, too. Eventually she got a portable TV and brought it to work so we could actually watch the kickoffs which was really cool. Then when the whistle blew after the kickoff, we were then allowed to buy our beer. Good times.

Channel 29... Using the Beta Capsule, Hiata becomes ULTRA MAN !!!! I remember I was playing outside when they landed on the moon, so my dad told me to come in and watch it. I was only 5 and didn't care. I stuck around for 5 minutes and then asked him if I could go back outdoors. Anyone remember the Tarzan guy at the Aud? If the game was late in the 3rd period and the final outcome was not in doubt, some guy in the stands would do an awesome Tarzan yell. It got to the point that in games like this, everyone would get really quiet in anticipation. I also remember the figure skating ladies who came out on the ice before the players and refs did when the game was ready to start. There were 2 of them in silver spangly costumes and they both had two sabres. They would wait for the refs to skate by the nets and then they would throw the sabres toward the refs, narrowly missing them and sending the sabres into the nets.

Just playing devil's advocate here (and parroting Haidt), but there is moral capital in the institution of marriage. Same sex marriages may have unforeseen consequences for all. Children of same sex marriages can only be either 50% or 0% of the gene pool of the parents. Who knows what downstream changes come as a result. Or maybe same sex couples don't want to have children like traditional married couples. I have no problem with gay marriage myself, and anyway I don't see anything changing the fact that some people want to be in same sex relationships, regardless of what anyone wants to call these relationships or what legal status they can attain.

I haven't been reading the footnotes/sources, but I tend to agree he should present more data in the text. He is a self-proclaimed lib, though.

Agreed, and I saw the guy's data about Senate seats getting more polarized. No way to stop that. I live in NC where we have GOP super majorities in both chambers and a GOP gov, and they have gone ape- with illegally re-drawing districts, illegally repressing voter registration and that dumbass bathroom bill. I get that we would have the GOP gov and GOP majorities in both chambers regardless, but NC voted for Obama in 2008, and is going for Clinton in the latest polls. We are not an ultra-red state, but we have an ultra-red state Congress due to gerrymandering. It hits home harder for Dems in NC than it does for most other people.

Good article with lots of good points and ideas, but I think there are many cases where gerrymandering does indeed reduce the vote. If I know my choice for House is going to lose 60/40, and then the kids get sick or the car breaks down or the dog gets loose or anything else, I will be much more likely to say screw voting. If it's looking like 51/49, then nothing is going to keep me away from the polling place.

The Righteous Mind is well worth the time it takes to read. I'll be finishing it today. Its goal is not to make people more capable of independent thought, but rather to explain how/why we think like we do, with the explanations going back to even before we had language. It is not a political book. It's sociology/psychology/moralism, etc.

Yes, thanks d4rk for that link. I agree with the guy overall, but given his premise (and the bolded quote), I don't understand why he is poo-poo'ing the impact of gerrymandering in getting us into and keeping us stuck in this partisan quagmire. Fix gerrymandering and things will not be magically cured, true. But things will be a heck of a lot better when Representatives know that they can't win an election 51/49, then go hyper partisan and expect to win next time around.

It was a known issue, but Brazil promised to have it fixed before the games begin.

Absolutely hilarious! I'm crying with laughter!

This is a pretty good summary. I'm here in Ontario now and just asked around for specifics. The main thing I would keep in mind is the bolded. Darn near all of the horror story things we in the US heard about the Canadian system from opponents of ACA back in 2008-9 were completely false. There is also a lot less malpractice litigation in Canada, and doctors' salaries are much more reasonable. These 2 points are largely due to the presence of government in the process, something to consider when using the free market argument to resist the benefits of universal healthcare. Taxpayers pay for this program, yet in general taxes are no more in Canada than in the US. Canada is paying for healthcare. The US is paying for military. This is why it's not much different. Provincial taxes tend to vary more by province than state taxes do by state. Some are much higher than any state, but I think Alberta and Ontario are lowest in Canada.

I'm sure TreuBlue can make this point better than I can, but what really matters is on a state by state basis. I have followed this site for the previous 2 (maybe 3?) prez elections, and they have done a pretty good job of being correct. http://www.electoral-vote.com/

Yeah, I'm kinda worried this Olympics might not go very well. Hope I'm wrong, but lots of stuff still isn't finished, there have recently been gun battles in the streets, the Olympic Village is a nightmare... I like the winter Olympics better, but the men's and women's gymnastics is always nothing short of amazing to me.

I couldn't agree more about conventions. I don't watch any part of any of them. They are like infomercials for politicians, two things that are unpleasant enough on their own, but when you roll them together? None for me thanks.

Very well stated, We've. Same for your post Whiskey. Just a matter of making these ideologies (for lack of a better word) mesh.

Check out this gaffe by the NC GOP. https://www.rawstory.com/2016/07/nc-gop-wigs-out-after-mistaking-tim-kaines-marine-pin-for-honduras-flag-and-hilarity-ensues/ Tim Kaine was shamed by the North Carolina Republican party for promoting the interests of a foreign government last night, after the GOP misidentified a pin on the VP-candidate’s lapel. [He] wears a Honduras flag pin on his jacket but no American flag,” the NCGOP wrote. “Shameful.” More research would have revealed that his son, Nathaniel Kaine, is a lieutenant in the United States Marine Corps, and the blue star pin is a recognized symbol for the “Blue Star Families” — those with loved ones who are deployed abroad.

It's not whether or not he can have the procedure, it's whether the gov. will pay for it or not.

Sarah Palin sure as heck didn't sound like she knew it.