tvashtarkatena

Don't beat yourself up too much over it. It's probably nobody's fault. You do the best you can at the time with the information you've got, shit happens, then more shit happens, but probably better shit at this point. And look at the bright side: Replacing a remote is cheap.

Shit, I'm gonna have to give you a day's hall pass from abuse. Even longer, maybe. I like a man who puts his money where his mouth is. Yours will be well spent. Thank you on behalf of the Borg.

The question isn't so much why we climb as why we come back down again.

That's our spiritual leader you're talking trash to.

God, Rudy, I feel like you just ate my chickens....

I tried that and an unleashed dog ate my chickens, seriously. Although in my case, the chickens took it upon themselves to wander out of the yard onto the trails. Shit, this thread is fkin GREAT.

Damn. Another good one.

OK, that was a good one, too.

Fkn hilarious!

That's what I was just thinking. Why don't the OP, trasshie & boner all pray to Jesus for better climbing for a month or three and see what happens. Seriously, don't knock if you aint tried it... To make it more like a real religion, I'll pray to whatever you want for as long as you want for an appropriate fee.

The No Fly List issue and others like it are often framed in terms of 'anything goes' versus 'the totalitarian state', but its a bit more complicated than that. When thinking about No Fly Lists, it might be helpful to ask a few questions about the policy and the system and implements it: By what statutory authority is this system being administered? The State often pursues actions without any democratic (statutory) authority, in addition to actions that are outright illegal. What is the purpose of the system? The DOJ and others often cite 'terrorism', but more often than not, these new powers are used primarily for the War on Drugs and other purposes having nothing at all to do with national security. That's fine...if the public gets a chance to weigh in on that debate. It often doesn't get that chance. Is the system effective, or is it, in fact, a waste of finite resources that could be better used for public safety in another way? Many 'we've got to do this' arguments assume infinite resources with no opportunity costs. Is effectiveness of the system even tracked, nevermind reported, and if so, how, and to whom, and how often? Who gets access to this reporting? The public? How does one get on, and off, a No Fly List? Is there an appeals system? Who decides? By what authority? Is it applied fairly or arbitrarily? What is the potential for abuse (against lawful political dissenters, as has so often been the case) or excessive use of the system (giving Grandma a cavity search)? How accurate is the system? How many people get burned because of mistakes? So far, the government has failed miserably in this area regarding No Fly Lists. How is private information safeguarded? Is it given or sold to private corporations. Often, private contractors handle large parts of such systems, and there are few or no policies pertaining to what they can and cannot do with the information they collect and store. They often sell it to other corporations. Finally, might the existence of a No Fly List lead to a No Bridge Crossing, No Train Riding, No Ferry Boarding, No Employment, No School, and other lists that would effectively destroy someone's liberty entirely? Does such a system jibe with our fundamental values of freedom: freedom of movement, freedom of association, dissent, to pursue happiness and a livelihood?

You don't want to give any money to me; it'll go right into some crack ho's faux Louis Vuitton. Go to ACLU of Washington . There's a 'donate' link and 'legislative action network' link on the home page. Our legislative action network is arguably the best in the state. We are one of 4 state chapters nationwide to have staffed, funded Technology and Liberty Projects. National has one too. The surveillance camera issue is already huge, and growing. Britain has half a million such cameras already, and we're following suite. It is, however, only one aspect of the total surveillance society we're creating. It's not just the State, either. Sprint is making money selling customer information to law enforcement. ATT has huge contracts with the NSA to filter all of our fibre communications, which is pretty much all of our communications. We're the heavy hitter against all this shit, although we work with other organizations as well. If you care about taxes, and I share that concern, then you must care about where tax money goes. Let's talk criminal justice system and War on Drugs. Yeah, that's one expensive publicly funded toy. We're also working on reclassifying pot as a misdemeanor as a first step towards building down this incredibly bloated system to more reasonable levels and restoring and reducing the human cost of such policies. That, and a bunch of other stuff you probably would find interesting, even if you don't agree with all of it.

And I responded to that short sighted post. Keep up. Speaking of 'up', you might try dragging your ass up IB sometime before commenting on it's 'style of bolting'. More cred that way. Oh, and Darrington rocks. To the first ascenders out there: great job in a great area that know one would even know existed without your decades of hard work.

1 - We're talking local politics here TTK. Try to keep up. 2 - Do you honestly believe one dime of these fines reduce taxes? 3 - 85% of the red light fines are for passing the stop bar on a free right turn. Municipalities have shortened the yellow-light timers from 4 seconds to 3.5, or, in some cases, 3 seconds. Cha Ching. I'm referring to the Technology and Liberty Project of the Washington State chapter, which monitors and acts on the use of surveillance cameras, such as Medina's new license plate cameras, among a host of other surveillance issues, all of them local to WA. Or WSDOTs extensive highway camera system, which can and does track the movement of individual license plates. Currently, this information is used only for traffic loading analysis, but one subpoena could change that right quick if proper safeguards aren't put into place. Might I suggest becoming more educated on the issues you care about most?

Perhaps we should send the towel heads to the moon. I'm all for space exploration, but the moon mission was a corporate welfare pork barrel boondoggle pipe dream that would have eaten the funding for most of the remainder of NASA's truly awesome robotic missions, much to the detriment of doing actual science. We'll actually launch more high value exploratory missions because of this decision.

Feck clearly stated his point: there are much bigger fish to fry as far as environmental issues are concerned. Actually, there isn't a smaller fish to fry than the 'bolt pandemic'. One might choose to, say, fight mining interests, for example. Lost on some, but a well punctuated point, nonetheless.

Phoenix will have to absorb these extremonauts.

The ban on bikes in many areas is most likely tribal; hikers versus bikers, horse people versus bikers, hunters versus bikers. It's probably 99% perceptual and 1% reality based...like most issues. Unlike any other human activity in the wilderness, bikes (can) move fast. People are, frankly, jolted by them and at times afraid of being hit by them. Horses can produce similar fears, but horses have the historical and political benefit of being there first (the PCT was originally made for them, for example), plus the whole iconic American romanticism cowboy myth...despite the fact that nothing fucks up a wilderness area faster than a pack train. None of it's logical (it's not like the super logical bolting debate), but there you have it.

My stance on bolting is been made pretty clear (as if anyone actually cares): I don't care. From an impact standpoint, and I include pure visual aesthetics here, it's simply a non-issue. There is no real impact to any amount of bolting as compared to any other human use one can think of. I therefore see it as a dilettante's issue; if one were really an environmentalist per se, one would always choose to focus on any other environmental issue out there rather the one that is really a question of personal preference and sensibility and not much more. That's not to say I think that Whitelaw and company's efforts are in any way ridiculous because they eschew battery powered bolting. They are following their own personal ethics, its their business, and I appreciate the work they've done putting up some of the best routes in WA. If they'd used power drills I'd feel exactly the same way. The non environmental issues associated with bolting; retro bolting, for example, are a different matter; one of etiquette. I think it's important to observe generally established etiquette in any discipline as a matter of courtesy and respect to those who have pioneered an area before you. Conflating this issue with an environmental one, however, to me, is a stretch, considering the impact that hunting, logging, mining, grazing, fire (mis)management, and motorized recreation, to name a few, have on these very same areas.

The red light camera thing sprung forth from the law and order(Nixon)/zero tolerance(Reagan)/surveillance(Bush) culture like so much explosive diarrhea; you're just failing to celebrate your own political victories. Furthermore, they reduce taxes by providing other revenue streams for the state; ditto on my first comment. Don't like surveillance cameras? Don't run any red lights. Or join the ACLU and actually do something about it. Or continue whining to a smirking online audience. Your choice.

Except that gold mining wasn't done that way. Prospecting was. Once gold was discovered, highly destructive placer mining was usually employed. My point is; bolting regulation should be just that. Banning battery operated devices would, of course, have to include the other common devices I mentioned. This is all recreational bickering, of course. I don't give a shit about the bolt issue one way or the other.

You're exactly right. The issue, from an impact standpoint, is whether or not to allow tree cutting or bolting, not what device is used to do it.

I call on those who believe in the banning of battery powered (versus) manual drills in wilderness areas to also leave their altimeters, cell phones, GPSs, headlamps, PLUs, and iPods home before their next trip out. Get real. The distinction of how the bolts are placed is patently ludicrous.

It's been painstakingly well established that I'm an expert on everything, but my knowledge of Buddhism is mostly confined to the Zen variety, and it's a bit rusty. From what I recall, however, the teachings are definitely non-theistic, but do not preclude deism. Once you're happily one-leg-skipping down the Eight Fold Path, however, it would be hard to imagine what value or purpose any deism would add to your journey. And Zen is pretty clear on the whole life after death thing: Don't worry about it, you're not dead yet.

I'm not sure 'incomprehensible' constitutes a reason for banning.