The Frankish Reich

Classic stupid question. From the National Institute of Aging’s definition of dementia: ”Dementia is the loss of cognitive function—thinking, remembering, and reasoning—to such an extent that it interferes with a person’s daily life and activities.” My parents are elderly. I’ll be the first to admit that they’re not quite as quick as they used to be. Sometimes I have to ask a question or repeat a series of instructions a couple times in order to make sure they understand. But they live alone, pay their bills on time, never have problems requiring special assistance in their day-to-day lives, etc. In other words, they are not suffering from “dementia.” Just some typical old age slowing down. Should they be President? No. I mean, not at 80-something. My dad used to run a complex logistics operation. Should he try to do that today? Of course not. Is he demented? No. There’s a reasonable answer to a stupid question. Feel free to solicit my opinion on the other members of our gerontocracy or gerontocracy in exile.

Because it’s still a federal crime, and being convicted of it has some major consequences: eligibility for student loans, subject to drug testing not related to job performance (eg, not drug testing a truck driver or pilot entering on duty, but randomly drug testing an accountant or prospective federal employee). If we are not enforcing the law by charging a crime, we need to go the next step and make it not a crime at all.

Thanks. I had forgotten about that. People often mention Rich Gannon as a late bloomer, which is true in that his best seasons (by far) came in his mid-30s, but he did have some modestly effective seasons with the Vikings long before that. Whereas Geno was pretty much trash until this season. I keep waiting for the bubble to burst, but …

As I’m sure everyone’s seen, there are precisely ZERO persons now in the federal pen for “simple marijuana possession.” I support federal legalization. Not just “decriminalization” but actual legalization. With a regulatory system similar to alcohol. I also support pardons/expunging the criminal records of many convicted of marijuana crimes. On the federal level, think “caught by a Park Ranger with weed in a National Park.” Seriously, that’s what simple federal MJ possession charges often are. What I don’t support is the wholesale pardoning of ALL simple possession offenses. Historically, many were pleaded down from more serious trafficking offenses. This takes us further down the silly road where we’re talking about giving a preference in getting legal weed distribution licenses to those who previously had weed convictions—in other words, since you have experience in circumventing the laws we should especially trust you to comply with all the new rules in the highly regulated legal industry. It is idiocy, but today people have a hard time drawing the obvious lines.

Up until last month I was ready to take on all comers who wished to debate me over my proposition: that time has proved that EJ Manuel was, in fact, the best QB available in the 2013 draft. I stand corrected. All we needed was Geno + 9 years of patience, thereby depriving Buddy Nix of his one claim to Bills draft fame.

Please do this Panthers. Why the hell not? At least you get someone other than the opposing team’s fans to pay attention to you for one sports news cycle.

November 17, 2009 - January 4, 2010. More of a Perry Fewell epoch. But what a memorable epoch it was.

Well, there was that. But if that was Josh he’d be trying his hardest to fake his way back into the game too. I never want to gloat over a team’s misfortune caused by a potentially serious injury. (Brady’s knee injury excepted, of course)

Funny, yeah, opening the thread to see that banner. But I do feel a little bad about laughing since it’s three concussions to two QBs that got them to this point. Are you certain we would’ve beaten the Jets with a QB signed off the street if Allen and Keenum went down? (I’d feel pretty good if Matt Barkley could be signed off the Falcons practice squad though)

But with that one … maybe he is?

I imagine there’s a lot of gentlemen’s agreements out there — you’ll agree to take a spot on the PS, and if we don’t elevate you by [date] we won’t get in the way of you finding another home. And maybe even give you a good rec…

Rather than being somehow better suited to the left side in the abstract, I’d guess that Bates benefitted from playing next to a really good LT (Dawkins) rather than a still-developing RT (Brown)

Thank you for reminding me of the bad old days. The chaplain who was consulted on 4th down decisions like he was more of a voodoo priest.

I love it. And if Daboll/Dorsey did it you'd love it too.

I think it's actually calculus. You need to find all those inflection points: - Tampa vs. the Jets. Is it o.k. for me too root for the Jets to beat Brady? They are no threat to us, so I guess that's o.k.? - Tampa vs. the Raiders. A very minimal threat. O.K. to root for the Raiders? That feels o.k., but I'm not sure. - Tampa vs. the Chargers. Now it's getting complicated. Or maybe we can just enjoy a damn football game and not have someone telling us how we're supposed to feel when we're watching it.

My wife loves the look of the Stelvio. I've been the boring husband blabbering on about reliability issues. What's your experience?

Silly fanboy stuff. The same stuff we dealt with a generation ago with Kelly is better than Marino and Elway. Two future no doubt Hall of Famers, we've got one of 'em, and people still have to find a reason to split hairs.

Well that's it then. This no doubt caused Brady to realize that he should've signed with the fins.

You mean the world is indifferent to which team I root for on my basement couch? Why didn't you tell me this years ago. Think of all the wasted hours! All the unnecessary beer and wings!! You mean NONE of it mattered?

Don't sell yourself short. If there's a Tech Sales GOAT, my money's on TheCockSportif.

Right. Being too locked into Bills fandom can take the fun out of watching other games. Kind of like the gambling obsessive who always has to have some extraneous "action" going on instead of just enjoying the game.

Because sometimes people watch football games because they just enjoy watching football. And having villains is part of that. Not everything is long game strategy. Sometimes a game is a game, and a football fan is a football fan, not just a Bills fan.

Cook needs to run like Pacheco, given that he was drafted about 130 spots higher.

Exactly. Not every great QB we can't seem to get past is despicable. I have no issue with Mahomes as a player or a person. He's incredibly talented and entertaining and the Allen-Mahomes rivalry will be legendary by the time both are done.

It just comes later for Tommy.