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At first I thought, who cares about what you think about the VP choices. The important thing is that they get out the message. Both seemed to do a good job of hammering home their parties' respective stances: Edwards: Bush screwed up in Iraq. We're going to clink our ruby slippers together and get other nations interested in getting their young people killed in our fucking stupid war. Cheney: Kerry is a girly man. But...then I thought about it and with the country so bitterly divided, with people road raging others because of their bumper stickers, it wouldn't surprise me if either of the prez's had an attempt or two on their lives (domestic terrorism! ). Plus, Cheney's co-president already. So anyway, what a choice! A guy who definitely knows his way around Washington and politics, but is evil incarnate, versus a guy who, though he is 51, looks like he's about 10 years old, and has minimimal experience. Oh crap! Still, if you take "we got new ideas, here they are" versus "four more years of the same" at face value, it's a pretty easy decision. With respect to factcheck.com versus factcheck.org(the org one is the non-partisan link). factcheck.org seems to be down right now!!! Some evil Rovian plot? You can check out factcheck.org by looking it up on google and looking at the cached version. You'll find that it states Cheney does not profit from Haliburton, but it doesn't discuss all Edwards's other allegations such as Haliburton getting a sweet deal for a company currently under investigation. You'll also see that the majority of articles are articles debunking deceptive Republican attack ads. You gotta wonder if maybe Cheney got that URL wrong on purpose.

Shouldn't it be "easier for your heir to replace the broken cord"?

Slings: Lighter. Will not get those annoying prickly frayed wires. Can clip rope directly to sling with less worries. Wires make the hexes easier to place and to clean.

Other than the obvious aid-climbing answer I've found a daisy useful when rapping multiple pitches and when climbing with three people where you end up switching ropes a lot. In both of these cases anchoring with the rope is not in the cards. Yes, you can anchor with a sling, but it's not as convenient (length is not adjustable) and unless you're carrying a sling especially for anchoring yourself (in which case you might as well be carrying a daisy) sometimes you end up at an anchor without a sling. Also, if climbing with just one rope, the daisy makes a convenient second tie-off. If I'm climbing with two people, with two ropes, and there's not going to be 10+ raps to get off the thing, or in some alpine situation where every bit of weight is important, I won't bring my daisy. Otherwise, it can come in handy.

REally Iain! I thought you were more attentive than that! push

Makes no sense at all. Either it's a completely made-up newsstory, or the story the man told is bogus, covering something up. Gives new meaning to that age-old excuse, "the dog ate it".

My knees have been asking me to invest in some hiking poles this summer. The dog-deterrent value may give me the excuse I need to finally buy some of those dorky things.

Hey! This thread isn't about mean ol' conservatives, it's about liberal thugs. Greg "sock full o' batteries" W is feeling oppressed and depressed by the fact that we have become a nation of thugs. I think you could be polite enough to at least stick to his topic. If you want to yammer on about how fucked up the republicans are, you can start your own thread. I'm sure you would get many takers.

ride the rollercoaster

I'll bet Clinton, Carter, LBJ and Roosevelt did that stuff too! But seriously Greg, if you think you can stomp out road-rage and violence by putting a sticker on your truck, then sounds good to me. Go for it. I'm happy you have chosen a non-violent means to fight those thuggish liberals.

That's f'n hilarious. Greg_W reads a probably made-up story probably originally from a righty blog (or Fox News) about one crazy guy assaulting someone allegedly over a Bush/Cheney sticker, and decides that liberals need to be taught a lesson so goddamnit he's putting a sticker on his truck!

Since everyone is getting so lovey-dovey here, let's ask some tougher questions. 1. What if a party (who seems faster) pulls up behind, asks nicely to pass, and the route you're on is notorious for rockfall (Dragontail, Infinite Bliss, Chair Peak, etc.)? 2. What if a party does come up behind you, but just doesn't seem to be that much faster than you? (example: many easy pitches then a hard pitch that slows you down temporarily which lets other party catch up). If they ask nicely to pass, do you let them?

Don't know what happened with the six-year old, but if the dog was leashed (which I doubt, but it was leashed after the incident), it was leashed right in a trail intersection. As for the other dog that came after me, it and the others were off their leash, on the trail, no way to avoid them. I guess according to JJD I should have beat up the women who were with the dogs.

Makes no sense at all. Either it's a completely made-up newsstory, or the story the man told is bogus, covering something up. Gives new meaning to that age-old excuse, "the dog ate it".

The dog that bit the child yesterday did not look the dangerous type. And no dogs seem dangerous to their owners. They'll tell you with a straight face that their dog is very friendly and never bites even when it's got a piece of your arm in its mouth. For the record, one party I passed on Saturday had a dog off the leash and the minute they saw me ran up and held their dog. I guess that's good, but it makes you wonder why exactly they felt compelled to do that?

Since the exciting threads today are about whiners at Smith, I thought I'd do a little whining of a well-known vintage. Saturday, I'm walking down the trail, this medium dog comes around the corner. I stop, try to be friendly, and it starts barking and dashes back around the corner. Then comes this more scary-looking pit-bullish type of dog and it's looking pretty growly. Owner rushes up and works at getting first growly dog, and of course says about the pit-bully type dog that, "He's very friendly. He never bites". This dog is snarling at me, and I put the back of the hand out to it to let it get a sniff and it tries to take a chunk from me. Dog is corralled and leashed and I move way out into the bush to get by as the mutt snaps at me. Then yesterday, we were up at Three O'Clock Rock with a couple of families, and some dog bit one of the six-year olds in the face! The party with the dog were hanging out right at a trail intersection. PoS dogs! Sorry to say it, but the only solution is the final solution.

But how do you feel about people talking on cell phones up on Mt. Hood? Sometimes you just can't have your rules whereever you are. It's tough cohabitating with other humans. Nice poll by the way, in terms of the way you made three fairly reasonable options.

As a general rule, I think, if you are going to bolt to make the climb safe, the defintion of "safety" ought to be for someone climbing at their limit on the crux of your route. Thus, a 5.4 route (if you really needed to bolt it) should probably protect a 5.4 leader. Conversely, a 5.10 route shouldn't need bolts right next to every 5.7 move. Oh...and I'll go way out on a limb here and agree with Bug saying no bolts right next to protectable cracks. Uhh...um...except to rapell from like on top of Prusik Peak. I think that's OK if those bolts are next to cracks.

Are you saying we should encourage (or at least not discourage) death threats? What about mere threats of vandalism of a project that one has put a lot of work into? Remember that we are communicating in a virtual world, a discussion board. Threats and intimidation sadly may get things done in the real world, but on a discussion board they tend to limit the only use of a discussion, the exhange of ideas. I understand that some may enjoy watching the spectacle of death threats and the like, and discouraging that will certainly step on some toes. But, whatever I'm puzzled by this digression into whining about board policies. It seemed like your discussion about bolting was going pretty well.

They had all the passions and feelings of a lynching party. Captivating perhaps, but encouraging discussion? You say you want a discussion, but all you're really doing with this post is voting, by standing up on a big soapbox and flashing your ass. "YOU SUCK" "NO, YOU SUCK" "I"M CHOPPING YOUR FUCKING ROUTE" .....silence...

To answer a question (?) with a question. Why does the choice of tool affect your decision? I totally agree with the "carefully placed" part, but don't quite get why power drill makes it evil. Often the ease of the power drill can remove "carefully placed" from the equation, and I can totally understand that reasoning. There's also the fact that power drilling is illegal someplaces, and GOD KNOWS I would not condone anything against the law! But suppose we're talking about carefully placed bolts only? Are they bad or good depending upon the tool used? In the eyes of the law, the answer is often yes! We could leave it at that I guess. But debating the ethical goodness beyond what our statutes tell us is often an interesting diversion.

I hope it's fake!

Image -> adjust -> color balance ? something like that. give it a try

Remember that one the next time you call for banning of handguns or snowmobiles.

It will obviate carrying an extra rope for descent!