Mickey

You guys act like mathews is some sort of mystery, he isn't, he sux. The whole league knows that which is why he was there for us to sign when JP was hurt. The first thing a fan who knows nothing about football says when his team is losing is to bench the QB. Drew had maybe two or three passes all day that he missed, that was it. There were more dropped passes than that. We were playing the best team in the league and gave them a good run. If we had maybe only 200 yards in penalties instead of 300, we had a shot at beating them. Rather than recognizing that, you guys are blaming the whole freaking game on Drew. Please.

"very good" is overstating the matter. They didn't totally stink is more of a realistic assessment. Smith's holding call on 3rd and 1 in NE territory was just ridiculous and had nothing to do with any one getting injured. Often enough, it was the scheme. On one sack, we had Henry and Willis in and they both hit a guy that would have had a sack if they didn't but there was a third guy who was untouched at the line and he got Drew. If they are bringing that many guys, you have to play max protect even if it means only one or two guys in the pattern. The advantage is that there can't be many DB's back there so even if there is only 2 guys running patterns, you still have man to man coverage because the Defense is sending so many.

So what if he is? What possible diff. does that make? The choice is Drew or Shane Matthews. That is an easy choice. Carping on Drew might make sense if JP were around but he isn't so why all this heavy breathing? God couldn't QB this team with that line. I will say this though, if Drew played absolutely perfect without even a hint of a mistake, we might be 1-2, maybe.

Idiot. Bruschi came up the middle on that play totally untouched and we had either a broken play or a play action, either way, by the time the fake (or Henry going the wrong way) was done Bruschi was right there on Drew's shoetops. One jail break after another, the result of losing Teague and Jonas, neither of which are much good to begin so imagine how bad the guys behind them are.

Here we go again, the democrats are "fading into irrelevance" right? The margins in the House and Senate are very close and the Democratic candidate received the most votes in the last three Presidential elections and this election, regardless of outcome, will be pretty close either way. Were the Republicans irrelevant during those 50 years of being in the minority in the House? Seems to me both parties are pretty healthy and on some levels, more like one another now than ever before. You have to dig up fringe issues like abortion and gay marriage to try and show sharp differences between the two. Frankly, I think one of the problems the democrats have is that they have won so many of the battles on issues over the years that they don't have much left. The issues that could be used to keep voters from even considering to vote republican are gone, there are no republicans holding those views anymore. By the same token, there are issues the right used against the left that are also beginning to fade. Take welfare reform for example. Democrats fought it for years but the party realized, with help from new leaders, that it had to be done. Look at the current President, on many levels he acts like a democrat or at least the type of democrat the right so often complains of, ie, spending like a madman to curry favor with the voters. The prescription drug benefit would be a pretty good example. If a democrat has to act like a republican to get elected and a republican has to act like a democrat to get elected, aren't we moving closer together as a nation? If national elections are historically close, doesn't that mean that our views as a people on the issues are also historically close? The issues that divide us are not "core" issues, they are distant branches we have had to track down to find something to argue about. Really, homosexual marriage? Is the health of the Republic going to be dramatically enhanced or brought to utter ruin if the relatively small number of gay couples living together have or do not have a marriage certificate stuffed in a drawer somewhere? The fact that republicans are doing better now than they have in the past is more evidence of just how out of it they were as a result of the depression and the Roosevelt era than proof that they are on the verge of utter domination in American politics. Really, this is what is normal historically, the situation from 1932 until the late 1980's is what was an aberration. It only took the Republican party 48 years or so of moving to the left to get back in the game.

Okay, that has to be one of the most tortured analogies I have heard in awhile. I am not saying I don't agree, I think I do actually, but still, I am not sure what that was about. You see this with the right alot. They take things literally and either ignore or are unable to appreciate subtext. Case in point: My sister was at the Moore thing and got in the paper when she won a 12 pack of "slacker" toilet paper in a tounge in cheek trivia contest Moore held as a gag. Moore declared himself to be a life long slacker and invited others of the persuasion up to the stage. It was a college campus so you know there were plenty of slackers in the audience. Well, a right wing-nut writes in to the paper joking that Moore insulted his audience by calling them "slackers" and they were just too stupid to realize it. She just couldn't understand or ignored the fact that this was toung-in-cheek, self deprecating humor on the part of Moore who invited the audience to participate in the gag. Idiot. They do the same thing with Kerry's vote on the authorization to use force in Iraq. They take it at face value, ignoring context and then define it to mean what they want it to mean for their own purposes. If you listen to what he said when he voted and what he has said ever since, it is perfectly consistent.

Initial polls show Kerry with a significant win tonight 45-36 on ABC and about the same on CBS. I think the way Bush kept getting angry and asking for extra time from the moderator, someting I don't think Kerry did even once, hurt him. I've never seen Bush so angry. If you have to tell people you are a "calm guy", you aren't. It was obvious that Kerry was getting to him. On the other hand, Kerry kept cool the whole time. Bush certainly didn't look or act like a man on the verge of a landslide.

The whole flip flop stuff is just plain stupid to begin with. "Staying the course" is great but not if you are the skipper of the Titanic and have received warnings of icebergs ahead. "Staying the course" when disaster looms just ahead is lunacy. When it makes sense to change directions, iron resolve becomes pig headed stubborness. The relevant questions for those more interested in policy, issues and facts rather than name calling are far more complicated than this flip flop glop.

The agreement was more between Kerry, the gentlemen, willing to have a real debate and Bush, a wuss who needed all sorts of artifices devised by his handlers so that he doesn't come off looking like an idiot before he would agree to show up for the debate. It would be like Ali telling Frazier he wouldn't show up for the fight unless Frazier agreed not to use his left hand.

I don't really care all that much who he is but I do find his argument to be sound. Clinton tried to and largely succeeded in pulling the democratic party back to the middle. It is time now for the Republican party, which has now had its own radical phase, to move back to the middle. It is just a question of when the electorate will force them to do so. Their problem isn't that they are losing Eisenhower's son, it is that they may soon lose many, many republicans just like him.

I was unaware that you were looking to enter in to a debate over all aspects, good and bad, of the life of Jimmy Carter. Silly me, I confined my remarks to the issues you raised, ie, his recent critique of electon procedures and your slam on HFH. Perhaps after taking a beating on the bogus complaints you raised your only way out wat to bring up a whole new critique of Carter with the remark about the Shah. Lets go back to your original comments shall we? Although the default rate in Detroit is 20%, it is less than 1% nationwide so your comment that their default rate was 50% "only" overstated the facts by 49. Some would call that a lie but I'll be charitable and assume you were simply too lazy to bother checking whatever right wing nut job spoon fed you that factoid. As for the rare defaults that do occur, the housing goes right back to HFH who then finds another deserving family who makes better financial choices so ultimately, the housing goes to people who care enough to keep it. Your hatred of Carter is so deep that you couldn't even resist going after his support for this charity which, by virtually all accounts besides your own, does good work for good people. It is the very kind of charitable program that most right wingers applaud as the viable alternative to government programs for the poor. All I can tell, from your initial post anyway, is that Carter at one time "certified" an election in Venez. He now raises some issues with regard to the patchwork of election laws and procedures in the US. It appears that you then combine these two facts in your head to reach all sorts of conclusions about Carter's position on elections in the US. Has Carter ever said that elections are more fair in Venez? Has he been asked to "certify" the results of an election in the US and because of the procedures refused to do so? If the answer to those questions is "no", upon what do you base your assertions about Carter thinking that elections in Venez are better? While we are at it, what in the world do you know about election laws and procedures in Venez. that you are so sure it is absolutely impossible for them to have a pretty decent system or at least one that might be a smidgeon better than the one in Florida? In your head you seem to think this is a contest of patriotism, that if I love my country I can't possibly consider even a remote chance that another democracy may have stumbled on a better way to count a vote than squinting at hanging chads. Your party, for the most part, has absolutely nothing good to say about the government's ability to accomplish even the simplest task. Why then is it so unpatriotic to consider that maybe we should put "counting votes" on the long list of things the government doesn't do very well?

Maybe it was the lack of rabid, paranoid fundamentalism that helped. What is it the Greeks said, "nothing to excess"?

Yeah, Habitat for Humanity sux. All those poor people getting houses, how terrible. Can our nation get any lower? By the way, rather than rely on your "belief" I ran a quick search, Habitat for Humanity has less than a 1% mortgage default rate: HFH Mortgage Rate Below 1% Default rate in Detroit is 20% but less than 1% nationwide HFH default rate in US is .7% Also, the mortgage is held by HFH so that if there is a default, they get the house and sell it to another qualifying family. Did you know that HFH families are taken off the HUD list? This is one of those terrible, terrible situations where volunteers come up with a program that works better than the government program and saves tax dollars. I can see why you are so eager to slam it. I hear Carter also likes apple pie, must be something wrong with that too. As for the elections, is Carter wrong when he says that we have inconsistent procedures from state to state and county to county? Has he been asked to "certify" any elections in the US and refused or are you just assuming that since he pointed out the very real problems in our system and since he ok'd elections at one point in Venez. then he would therefore not certify, if asked, an election in the US?

What special responsibility do African American entertainers have to speak out about what happened in the Sudan 4 years ago that the rest of us do not have? I am Sicilian, do I have a special responsibility to speak out against the role played by Sicily in international drug smuggling? When was it that Whoopie Goldberg was elected spokesperson for African Americans so they are now responsible for what she says? I know she is black and they are black, is that all the connection that is needed to make an entire nationality responsible for the actions of one? Have you scanned every article, every report and every public record of 4 years ago to see who said what about this event so that you can honestly say that no African Americans spoke out about this? Why wouldn't whites or even white entertainers have a responsibity to speak out? You people really need to stop your babyish whining and crying over Whoopie Goldberg making obscene jokes about the President's name. Is it really all that shocking that a comedian who has used blue humor her whole life did so again? Do you really think that this was the first time a comedian combined blue humor and politics? How many cigar jokes and chuckles over Monica's thong have we had over the years? The right needs to let go of it's dainty skirts and feigned shock over a couple of cracks on Bush. Every President in the modern era has has been the target of political humor, cartoons, bad jokes and the like. Stop your wimpering over Bush being treated like every other American President. Drawing a connection between off color jokes by a comedian at a political fundraiser and death in the Sudan 4 years ago is so much of a stretch that I have to wonder at the mind that came up with it. You apparently have been thinking on over time to try and twist this into a slam against African Americans. Do you seriously think there is some sort of conspiracy among African American entertainers to keep silent about human rights abuses in the Sudan? Is anyone who is either unaware of these events or who has not commented publicly about them not allowed to be critical of the President? Are they allowed to as long as they don't use humor? Blue humor?

You sir, are a liar. That is not what I said and as for what I actually did say, it was replete with smiley faces: Va Bills: He read that but he ignored you. He is from the Bush bad, anyone else crowd. Mickey: A crowd which is far better dressed and infinitely more eloquent than the Kerry bad, Bush good crowd. Buffaloborn1960: Typical Arrogant, Elitist, know-it-all response we have grown to expect from the Kerry crowd.... might be one of the reasons he is not doing better.. RabidBillsFanVt: HAHA!! A witty comeback, and it is automatically arrogant and elitist! Hey Mickey, maybe you should have said: Typical hotpocket response. OR Lemming! OR Flightsuit! Then you would have looked FAR less arrogant and elitist!!! Mickey (to RabidBillsFanVt): The republican party has always been anti-intellectual but it has only recently become pro-stupid. From Ike to Richio. Oh how the reasonable hath fallen. Mickey (to Buffaloborn1960): I am sure that to you, any person who has more than a rudimentary grasp of language appears to be "elitist". To appear not so, we on the left would have to display the same stumbling, fumbling, burbling inability to express a coherent thought as your leader, the great "Unificator". How do I count the lies? Where is it that I mentioned the "Neocons"? Where is it that I said that the intellectuals can only be found on the liberal side? The whole exchange was meant in good humor and it was Buffaloborn who first personalized it by calling me an elitist. If Bush can poke fun at his struggles with language, why can't I? First you take what is clearly meant as a joke seriously and then you lie about its contents. Well done.

I am sure that to you, any person who has more than a rudimentary grasp of language appears to be "elitist". To appear not so, we on the left would have to display the same stumbling, fumbling, burbling inability to express a coherent thought as your leader, the great "Unificator".

The republican party has always been anti-intellectual but it has only recently become pro-stupid. From Ike to Richio. Oh how the reasonable hath fallen.

No, that is why I used the phrase, "continuing to pursue" which refers to their actions since those statements were made. I don't agree that since they have tried to get nukes periodically since the Shah, it was hopeless from the git go so there was no harm in irresponsible rhetoric. Sorry Tom, I just think that bragging and threatening and posturing is not good diplomacy. Really, think of the world leaders in the past who have made such public threats along the lines of "We will crush you". Remember, Bush himself said that he wants to see what can be done diplomatically first. Taking him at his word, that there is a chance for diplomacy to work, I think it foolish for him to say, "and if it doesn't work we will attack you". Now, any step back from the brink the Iranian's might want to take will appear to be a concession to a threat of force making it far less likely that they will step back. Therefore, Bush's statements make it more difficult to achieve his stated objective: a diplomatic solution that prevents Iran from obtaining nukes. Of course, his concern for diplomacy could be feigned made just so that he looks like he is leaving war as a last resort. Even if that is the case, what does he gain with a threat like that? The only way that could possibly be of advantage is if one thinks that Iran will be frightened into giving up its nukes by a little sabre rattling. Wouldn't they want to accelerate their plans in the face of such a threat, figuring that we will not invade a nuclear armed country?

We agree on that. Pakistan is much more dangerous and much more volatile. Musharraf is on the thinnest ice there is.

Tell me what evidence you have that the people of Iran are "insane"? If we are going to embark upon WW III based on that assessment, I think we need to review the evidence. I don't think the hostages from 1979 that were all released healthy and alive would be proof of that. I don't think their support of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, the same group we allied with, would prove their insanity either. I also don't think that the long and terrible war they endured with Saddam, the one Iraq started and the one in which we supported Saddam would constitute proof of their insanity either. They remained neutral in the Gulf War so that would not be proof of insanity. They have remained neutral in the Afghanistan war after 9/11 so that wouldn't be proof of insanity. They have stayed out of the current Iraq war so again, that would not be proof of insanity either. I am not trying to pick on you Richio, I just think you should be specific when you are talking about going to war with Iran because they are insane and therefore must be kept from getting nukes at all costs, even world war. Anti-American demonsrations wouldn't be enough in my book as they have had numerous demonstrations in favor of democracy. Actions would be the key. Especially since 9/11, I am not all that sure that there is a record of Iran being that dangerous.

A crowd which is far better dressed and infinitely more eloquent than the Kerry bad, Bush good crowd.

Even I understand that one bib. The question is whether our survival is enhanced or eroded by such an excursion at this point. I don't care about rights. Any way we can foment a war between Iraq and Iran? Let them fight eachother, things were so much simpler when they were at eachother's throats rather than ours. I have had enough of dividing our friends and uniting our enemies. I'd like to see some of the reverse.

Iran supported the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, you remember them? They are the same guys we relied on in that war. Iran also remained on the sidelines during Persian Gulf War I. It remained on the sidelines in the Afghanistan war. It has remained on the sidelines during the Iraq war. How many nations has Iran invaded? Zero. How many terrorist activities have been linked to Iran since 9/11? What threat do they represent that justifies a world war that threatens our survival as much as theirs? How hard will it be for UBL to sell his "crusade" argument to the rest of the muslim world if we invade Iran? Maybe the only thing scarier than Iran having nukes is the alternative, a world war. There has been no national discussion of any of these issues. I think that you have to at least consider the security implications of both confrontation and detente. Attacking Iran might well result in the long anticipated middle east wide Islamic Revolution that has been Iran's goal since 1979. What do you think would be the result of a revolution in Saudi Arabia on our oil supply? Our security situation could easily be worse if we attacked Iran than if we dealt with them the same way we deal with other nuclear powers such as Pakistan. There is also a pretty healthy block of moderates in Iran. In fact, there has been a long struggle between the clerical theocratic rulers and the moderates seeking more political freedom. Their police had to break up a protest for more democracy recently (Police brake up protest) I can't think of a better way to drown those moderates and their movement than to unite all Iranians against us by threatening war so that their nationalistic spirit trumps their political differences. What is the basis for believing that Iran would be any less responsible with nukes than China and the old USSR has been? If you are really worried about terrorists getting nukes, Pakistan is of more concern than Iran. Pakistan has them now and strongly supported the Taleban and AQ for years. Although their government has changed its tune, their people have not. The assassination attempts on Musharraf shows that we are a bullet away from disaster there.

Why won't Israel be around? They have nukes as well. It is a mutual assured destruction scenario. Iran would have to decide that destroying Israel is worth destroying itself first. Pakistan has them and by and large they are more radical and inclined to jihad and foreign military adventures than Iran.

But certainly they played a role in Iran continuing to pursue nukes and their apparent jugment that the risk they were taking in doing so was a risk they had to take. Again, how could a diplomatic mission succeed when you have a President making public cracks about an axis of evil. That is why you "speak softly."