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More song lyrics!!! #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9 #9

So if they force "climbers" to pay for their rescues, will they force everyone to pay (i.e. those that are not really climbers, but considered climbers because they are somebody who needed rescuing out in the wilderness)? If not, all you would have to do after you were rescued is to just say you were fishing or glacier crabbing, or that you were lost.

So are you saying, like global warming, that this "crisis" of a large number of Americans not being able to afford adequate healthcare is just partisan rhetoric? I seem to remember a certain program championed by Hillary during Clinton's second administration that was defeated by the Republicans. Perhaps the left was not criticizing the spending plans of that administration because they were actually trying to do something about it! Maybe there's a link on that costs of war that would show how much Americans like you (and/or your children) could save on your tax bill if we weren't pouring money into a dumb war. Perhaps that would interest you a lot more.

Now who's engaging in cheap rhetorical tricks? You seem to be implying that there is no substantive difference in funding outlays between this administration and the previous!

I think the lesson from Iraq is that wars can be quite costly. If you're going to start one, then there should a better reason than, "it'll be easy, so what the fuck?"

OK, point taken. Lower my estimate to only 80 million kids who could be supplied full healthcare.

Calling an entire religion nutty because of riots and protests over desecration of their sacred book seems a bit farfetched coming from somebody who supports an invasion based on false pretenses that has killed more than 100,000 people!

I agree with JayB here. There's nothing new about a White House using its bully pulpit. They get a juicy one like this, they're gonna use it to their advantage. These guys play for keeps. We (the opposition) just gotta hope that the press plays hard too. It all depends on your POV. The right-wing nutcases are gonna gobble this up and indignantly blame Newsweek for all that's wrong in the world. The wacko lefties are gonna be pissed that the politicians in power are being hypocritical . I am a bit confused by everyone (even the lefties) saying that Newsweek bungled. They sent this to the military first for comment ferchristssake! Definitely seems less shoddy than Rathergate.

Well, I believe that if we did "nothing" in Iraq we would be much better off today not even considering the monetary repercussions.

This deserves it's own thread: Cobra Commander wrote For the cost of the Iraq War (so far) we could give every child in US full health coverage for a year, probably more ( > 100 million child-years of health coverage).

Sort of coincidence, I just read "The Dog Fighter" by Marc Bojanowski. Cool book.

Glad this isn't France

Are you gonna live out the rest of your days there?

This whole thing seems pretty sad. I don't think most of Newsweek's readers give much of a shit about whether or not a Koran got flushed. That probably didn't add effectively to the story. However, it sure pissed off a bunch of other people in a bad way. I'm thinking Newsweek might've thought this out a bit more. That said, trashing them for printing what they believe (and probably) is the truth; i.e., doing an important job in a democracy, is fucked up, and obviously a ploy to focus dumbass right-wingers away from the carnage that is Bush's Iraq (and weaken the voice of dissent, bonus!) What really made me sick was seeing Rumsfeld on TV last night looking all stern and condescending, railing on Newsweek for their part in the death of 17 people in riots, where this guy has the deaths of more than 100,000 people on his hands. Fucking sickening.

I thought you were supposed to use a blunt needle so as not to damage the sheath fibers, but just weave in between them. And use the mint or cinnamon dental floss. That way you still find the middle of the rope via taste if it's dark and your fingers are gloved or frostbitten. Distinctly colored nail polish is commonly used for marking metal gear (carabiners, cams, stoppers, etc) as an ownership indicator. I've never heard of using it for middle-marking a rope. Perhaps you got two threads mixed up.

I really liked climbing the N Ridge of Stuart, NW Corner NEWS, GM -> Heart of the Country, Rock On->SquamButt a lot. Probably better than, say, Diedre or Canary. What about you?

Interesting ambiguous misspelling!

I think he's just saying this!

Taking one from the book of Peter Puget!

"Manufactured Outrage While it's certainly a problem that Newsweek appears to have rushed the Koran story, it seems to me that the real problem, the problem much harder to fix and face up to, is the fact that the story was so believable in the first place. It doesn't take a big stretch of the imagination to conclude that an Administration which would sanction this, would also condone desecrating the Koran. And while it might be easier for certain persons on the Right to blame Newsweek for "ruining" America's image in the Muslim world, it's absolutely ridiculous to pretend as though our image wasn't already ruined because of previously proven abuses of power and a demonstrated insensitivity towards Muslims." link ""So now there's a bunch of right-wingers who are pitching the desecrated Koran riot story with the line "Newsweek Lied, People Died." Get it? It's funny, because it's making fun of what all the anti-war people said when 1,700 Americans were killed based on lies they were warned about but didn't listen to. What, don't you have a sense of humor? This isn't even not caring. It's beyond not caring. It's taking pride in not caring.... how the hell do people like Glenn Reynolds and Jonah Goldberg sleep at night?" link Both links from here

I agree that my WMD's case is greatly bolstered by perfect hindsight, as is the view of the quagmire that has become Iraq. Normally I wouldn't make such an argument but JayB put up the challenge with "Given what is now known about..."

I don't have a lot of time to write a big long post here, but I think, given hindsight, it is rather easy to defend the position of not invading Iraq. Starting with the obvious hindsight of not spending hundreds of billions in the lethal money pit of the current Iraq, not having to worry about non-existent Iraqi nuclear weapons, not getting 1600 US soldiers and tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis (the ones we are there to save from Saddam) killed. Then moving on with rosy projections that we would have found out about the oil for food scam anyway, I think it's pretty easy to say that we (the US) would have been better off just sticking with the old embargo. Now, if you're thinking from the point of view of a defense contractor, a republican riding the wings of the Saddam-Al Qaeda connection to office, one of the many Iraqis who were being persecuted by Saddam but are not yet killed or imprisoned, an Iranian, North Korean, or Saudi Arabain leader/monarch/politician, or a recruiter for Al Qaeda, then I'd have to agree with you. In hindsight, sanctions would not have been better than the current situation.

The Big Time is sorta sucky (IMHO). But on the bright side, Wednesday night is NOT String Cheese Incident Night! Such a negative post! But it just shows how much I'll go through to meet the wonderful people that make CC.com what it is!

Yep. People would much rather hear about Jacko or some dumbass who almost got his ass shot down by an F-16 than "I told you so".