StevenSeagal

Me, I prefer a system where people keel over in the waiting room of the ER and lie on the floor for an hour while staff members hang out 20 feet away, shooting the shit. And then falsify the reports only to forget to destroy the time coded security video of the waiting room. It's obvious that greed is the only motivation anyone would have for providing a quality service; so let's let the free market do it's work or we're all gonna die!

Maybe someone should remind them that Kerry was supposedly the antichrist back in 2004. Although I guess Satan can possess anyone he wants. But only the antichrist would instill people with hope and enthusiasm and urge them to get involved. How arrogant! I'm going ® because they're straight talkers; I can count on them to tell us how awful and scary the world really is and help keep us in our place!

If on your descent you discovered the ladder gone, I would hope that you'd have the resourcefulness to figure out another way around the obstacle, as well as to evaluate the ladder's integrity in the first place.

I've seen plenty of times where the efforts and accomplishments of porters, and especially the Sherpas, are either minimized or not reported at all while we get breathless reports and book deals about some guided clients "conquest" of some Himalayan peak, which little did we know, was made entirely possible by the real climbers working behind the scenes. By the way...You sure you haven't seen a single instance of a porter or Sherpa death minimized? What was the name of the Pakistani porter who fell to his death? I can't seem to find it in any of the press. I also can only find the names of the European climbers- the Koreans were just named as "Koreans". Right now I can only envision some hapless, nameless, expendable brown skinned guy dressed in goat skin clothing sliding past all the colorful down suited white people. Does this Pakistani have a name, address, and family information? That might make him human.

Yep, well said. All you hikers out there who don't hunt, shut the fuck up because hunters accidently shooting hikers on popular trails doesn't concern you and you're opinion has no value!

Not making any judgments here, SS, just pointing out the facts. Any chance then that the shooter on Sauk has a history of torturing small animals? I have no idea, nor any idea why you think I would know that. Non sequitor. Well it is supposed to rain on saturday. Duh. You forgot to correct non sequitur! No, I was deferring to you for that. But I also notice that the way it's written is a fragmented sentence. Tsk-tsk, sobo.

Bend over. Let's find out!

Not making any judgments here, SS, just pointing out the facts. Any chance then that the shooter on Sauk has a history of torturing small animals? I have no idea, nor any idea why you think I would know that. Non sequitor. Well it is supposed to rain on saturday. Duh.

Zod kind of resembles a bear... Ursa is my honey. Ursa means bear for you uneducated types. Go away. To a galaxy far far away. Jerkoff.

Not making any judgments here, SS, just pointing out the facts. Any chance then that the shooter on Sauk has a history of torturing small animals?

I5OmGGl8kpg

Wow, a hunter who beats his wife- imagine that!

I'll bet he hunts more than you climb, douchebag.

If that thing comes with crampons it could lead WI6!

If that kid mistook a human for a bear, what do you suppose he would have seen in this? The future of hiking companions

Then there was this: Wisconsin

Somebody make up another batch of popcorn so we can better enjoy this rarely seen right winger ghey beyotch slap fight.

Hai! Guns don't kill people. Hunters kill people. Thank you for allow buddhist to post!

No offense, but I can't help drawing a comparison between this mindset, and that of an adherent to any organized religion. In that light one might consider Kerry and his post service criticism of the war as the equivalent of a Christian who chooses not to go to church on sundays. Some would say there's no harm in this, while other Christians would find that repugnant and blasphemous to the "law" of the system.. In either case, personally I've never seen these entities as anything but a surrendering of one's personal free will and ability to expression in the supposed trade off for a "greater good"- as dictated by somebody else and which has endlessly ambiguous interpretations. I suppose it is this "greater good" that I am not convinced is what it seems or what those in charge would have us all believe. Being that I am not, and never have been, a man of faith, that may be what prevents us from having reconciled views on the subject.

Oh I agree with you on this point- Kerry was much preferable to Bush- but for some other reasons I also don't think he would have been a particularly good president. And he wasn't a very good candidate, obviously, since he allowed the Rove machine to tear him to pieces without really putting up an effective response- this is one thing that Obama has mostly managed to do and largely take the high ground in doing so. And I think it's a damn shame that Kerry lost the election less on his modern politics, or even his post war criticism, but on a smear campaign regarding his military service record while active in Vietnam. I sort of agree with you here, but then again, the phrase "nice guys finish last" just about sums up American politics. There are notable examples of congressman and women who have maintained their integrity- good on them. But to be president in this country- seems to have come to require that one be an expert in double talk, shifting values, pandering, and raising insane amounts of funding. While there's a lot I appreciate about Obama, he's a great example of how good intentions have to be morphed into all out douchery in order to advance one's political power in this country. While I wouldn't discourage someone with good and honest intentions from believing they can change things by entering politics, really who among us cannot see that nice guys won't get very far? I believe that Obama and McCain both have a fairly high level of integrity compared to more recent presidents, but I don't believe either of them entered politics with wide eyed naivity that they'd be able to keep their values iron-clad. In the end I think either candidate will be an improvement on what we have "enjoyed" the past 8 years, but it remains hard for me to get excited about any candidate produced by an inherently corrupt structure. :yep,cynicism, but not necessarily apathy, mattp:

Fair enough. Though I'd reiterate that simply by entering politics, one nearly relinquishes their honor and starts fresh. Since we're on the subject. John Kerry- who by the way I think would have been a shitty president (but with GW as the alternative, an improvement)- had his presidential campaign hugely undermined by the Swift Boat thing. Now here's a guy who volunteered for combat in Vietnam, and one way or another appeared to have sustained injuries. The Bush people brilliantly orchestrated a story that would have us believe that Kerry deviously and with forethought planned out his whole tour of duty in 'Nam so that 40 years in the future he'd be a war hero and a shoe-in to the White House. You want to attack the guy on his politics and on modern issues, fine. But apparently in some instances it's honorable to attack a guy's military service record, as much as it's acceptable to trot it out as a virtue, if it wins you an election. Some say there was no honor in his criticism of the Vietnam War after the fact; if there's one thing I do believe it's that the opinion of a soldier about a particular conflict, who has been on the ground in that conflict, has some weight to it, even if you don't agree with that assessment. Just like Iraq, there were a lot of soldiers who thought what we were doing over there was totally bogus. Kerry was a poor candidate, but I think this issue lost him the election as much as anything- that and his lack of response to it. Soldiers who speak against their orders are called "traitors" and "cowards", while those who obey are called "honorable". Civilians are called "unpatriotic" and "unsupportive of the troops" if they don't support the government's policies and deployment of the troops. You're a soldier, right? So with all this bullying and stigmata built into the social structure of how we view the place of our military in our society, where is the accountability for our presidents and congressional leaders? Seems like soldiers and civilians alike have surrendered their voices to give free reign to these people to pursue whatever selfish ends they may deem fit irregardless of the carnage, and with all of us living in dutiful complicity.

So your analysis is that if I have a different view on the matter, I'm either egging you on (), or I'm stupid. That's deep, Einstein. But I'm glad that I'm still above kevbone on the food chain.

I agree. People are capable of amazing things when they are put into true survival mode. You and I can't fairly speculate what others, or even ourselves, would do. Everyone has a different coping mechanism but it comes down to survival. In any case, it does not surprise me that a soldier being held prisoner would cling onto his training and code of honor as a means to keep his shit together, even if survival was uncertain. Surely McCain surviving what he did says something about his character and will. On the other hand, the fact that he is- as is Obama- a politician, also says something about his character. And that concerns me much more than his demonstrated fortitude in battle 40 years ago might have impressed me.