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sherpa

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Everything posted by sherpa

  1. I used to fly there all the time, all over the Caribbean, and vacation there as well, but take my view for what it's worth. I've provided this same recommendation to others, including my son. The bottom line is what facility you stay at, and what they provide. Beaches are beaches. If I had to choose, I'd choose Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic. I would avoid Jamaica or anything in the US Virgin Islands. Jamaica is the least "revisited" island destination. But again, if you found the perfect situation, who knows?
  2. I believe life starts at conception. Not that I want to write laws regarding that, but I know that my wife and I, and everyone else I know that has children, considered my children's lives as starting the second we learned they existed. We certainly behaved that way.
  3. It must be outside. People have them inside their houses because they don't use them, but like the way they look. The concept of spending the money needed for a decent telescope, and using it in the house is crazy. You would have no night vision and the window glass would screw it up. I keep mine on the porch, covered. When I need to use them, and cannot spot what I want from the porch, I move them down on the lawn, usually in the afternoon when I know it will be a good night for viewing. It must be done early to accomodate for the temp issue of causing condensation on the optics. You can get a decent telescope for $300+, something that will easily spot the rings of Saturn. Nowhere near what they used to cost, but where you live re light pollution and access to the night sky not obscured by trees are important issues before spending money.
  4. I've got two telescopes and I use them frequently, an 8" Dobsonian mount that wasn't too expensive, and a 10" Schmidt Cassegrain on an equatorial mount that was kind of pricey. You can pick one up fairly cheaply with the advances in optics, but it really helps if you know what to look for. My wife got me Celestron binoculars and I use those as well. They are great for basic planet stuff, or sighting something before putting the t'scope on it. There is a great free website that will show the night sky from your exact location and time. You can slew the view around 360 degrees and vertically as well. You can also change the time if you wish. https://stellarium.org/ At the bottom there is a taskbar that allows you to display all kinds of things. I often use the option that draws the constellation lines and the option that labels them. It's quite nice.
  5. This is a post that demonstrates that its author has absolutely no idea of this issue. Absolutely no idea.
  6. I thought the Milky Way Galaxy was named after the candy bar.
  7. "71. That was my first year on the job. Bad year for libraries. Bad year for America. Hippies burning library cards. Abby Hoffman telling kids to burn books. I don't judge a man by the length of his hair or the kind of music he listens to. Rock was never my bag. But you put on a pair of shoes when you walk into the the New York public library fella."
  8. I've been there a lot. If you have specific questions pm me.
  9. We've used VRBO a bunch of times in Europe. No problems. Used AirBnB twice in the US. No problems with any, but AirBnB piles on the service charges at checkout. The listed price is just a start.
  10. I don't think anybody's "going crazy" about it. It's just getting the usual "what?" response. Steve Bannon wasn't a Congressman. The worst justification for taking people's money is the claim that it only applies to few. It's quite easy for "the few" to become "the none." CNBC was just talking about this proposal. They also mentioned that Canada raised the marginal rate on it's top 1%, expecting to raise 3b, but instead it resulted in a 4.6b revenue decrease. Source not provided, but they're almost always accurate on these matters.
  11. Because in a great deal of instances, infinitely more than what was available in the 50'60's boom years in the US, the business environment is such that a great deal of that personal income can be duplicated abroad. A good deal of income from many operations is ultimately taxed at personal income levels. I know of bunch of people who do just this, offshore. Extremely uncompetitive rates also discourage off shore entrepreneurs from locating in the US, a source of job creation we have really benefited from.
  12. "We" don't need to discourage them, the market will. "We" need to let them make their own decisions. Any idea what property taxes and insurance rates are in those areas? California is a bit unusual because the effects of Prop 13, eventually the market corrects. In fact, "we" (gov intervention), have encouraged them by racing FEMA down there everytime there is an incredibly predictable weather disaster. I hope nobody takes that as an objection to humanitarian aid, because it isn't. It is simply a claim that "we" do silly things with counterproductive results, and jacking marginal tax brackets to 70%, as proposed by this goof, has already been tried, rejected and adjusted to more reasonable levels. TO do so to fund an evolution to a no fossil fuel economy in twelve years is the stuff of folks who just don't understand the situation worldwide.
  13. It didn't "discourage me." I lived there for 12 years, seven spent serving as a Navy pilot, though a good deal of that time was spent out of the state on aircraft carriers, met and married my wife there, had two children, and I used my "God given feet" to leave there, just as I used my "God given feet to leave your state. It certainly isn't "whiney" to make decisions based on what is in the best interest of your family. We don't "need to discourage people from the coasts," anymore than we need some inexperienced Congresswoman proposing idiotic tax policy to fund impossible and ridiculous fossil fuel policy. You should stop giving advice. It isn't sought nor valuable.
  14. What a silly post. By the way, I "got over it" when I moved from California. My wife and I "got over it" when she gave up her nursing career because our federal burden and that state's tax burden, combined with child care costs would have netter her about 43 cents on the dollar to work as a nurse. For that 43 cents, we would have given up our kids for eight hours per day to someone else. Tax burdens have consequences, and it is much easier now to opt out of any countries' tax burden if it is judged confiscatory. 70% is absurd, and her scheme to swipe that money so that we can be fossil free in twelve years is the stuff of morons, as is silly name calling.
  15. Such a cost for the "services" the victims of such a confiscatory tax policy would likely cause many actions not benefitting our little experiment here, and there is a reason such tax policy has been rejected and changed in the past. I always find it amusing when past growth rates are connected to old days tax rates, like in the 50's, where they were outrageously high. To draw such a conclusion is ridiculous. The world was vastly different in the 50's. Europe was still trashed for the war. China was still in an ancient economic state, Japan in infancy and still not recovered from the war. The USSR was taking out all of eastern Europe as a viable competitor, and South Central America had no exportable products except raw materials which took months to get to North America and in the chain. In short, there was no competition, and the percentages are distorted because of a vastly different base. It makes as much sense to say that our '50's smoking rate of about 45%, or the fact that there were no seatbelts in cars of that era were responsible for the US growth rate in that time.
  16. 70%? Ya "Her way of thinking," which is taking other peoples money, has been around for years. She is not an original, and it is called stealing.
  17. Her 70% idea is to fund her "green deal," which is all fossil gone and no carbon emissions in 12 years. We can use all of our airports as wind farms and solar fields, since there sure isn't going to be any air transport industry.
  18. To be accurate, its a revenue shortfall, meaning sales. Not profit.
  19. I want to be the first person to make the "I'll leave the country" promise.
  20. I'd be surprised if the OP wasn't arrested by tomorrow.
  21. Am I the only one that thinks this five screen thing that ESPN is running for the ND Clemson game is idiotic? It looks horrible.
  22. You should have raised every penny possible and bought as much of 1960's Ormond Beach as possible.
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