Chilly

I hear ya, yeah I totally agree on a lot of those guys, which is why I love Sirius NFL Radio.

I take it you've probably never listened to Sirius NFL Radio. The analysts there do a great job covering the Bills (and all the teams). If you listen to Adam Schein's interviews with Ryan Fitzpatrick over the past couple of months, you can tell he knows what's going on with the team, and that he hopes Fitzpatrick succeeds. Lots of people hate Adam Schein for his over-the-top, enthusiastic style, but he's absolutely knowledgable.

No ****. Either he doesn't know how to use a computer, he's lying to promote the Religion of Apple, or both.

I haven't seen Clayton's article yet, but I had him pegged right around 21/22 when I did this.

Setting up for a June 7th announcement?

This thread is awesome. Thanks for trolling Apple lovers, Mr. Blackhole. Thanks for being the typical Apple douche,stevestojan. /This coming from a guy with a MacBook Pro as his primary real work pc.

This is what fails you at a company like mine. This is what gets you a job.

Wait, people don't think Alex Jones is legit? wtf? That being said, I just took training here in Austin for the last week - professor reminded me of Frank Caliendo doing an impression of George W Bush, and was a huge Alex Jones fan. He obviously knew his **** in his field, but good lord it further reinforces the point that people can be really smart about one thing, yet rather stupid at the same time.

+1... but I'm not sure what I was on when I saw it, lol.

Is this a Charge Card or a Credit Card? Do Amex's policies differ?

Not only may we never have the data, but we won't have the data. As I said previously, historically, with low turnout elections, it's more about driving out your hardcore base than it is winning moderates or defections. That may not have been the case in this election, but it's possible. I agree, it's pretty ludicrous to say that it didn't have an effect. It's also ludicrous to say it was the driving reason behind the election. It's all speculation because we don't know. It most likely did have an effect, but we don't really know how much. The absolute greatest predictor of votes is Party ID. The Ryan plan probably had some effect on driving out and suppressing votes, but it's impossible to compare that to the split that occurred with Davis. Thanks for admitting you don't have any proof.

No, I'm saying you need a helluva lot more of information than "this district has always gone to the Right" to arrive at "this election was about the Democrats winning independents and some defections".

Can you point out the historical data you're comparing this election with to formulate this conclusion? Thanks.

I'd argue that it means the constituencies' priorities are wrong.

Not the "easy and lazy" thing, but the thing that has the highest correlation to getting them re-elected.

Got proof?

That Slate article doesn't tell us much. There's tons of unanswered questions: - What's the Party ID makeup of registered voters in this county on a 7-point scale? - What's the Party ID makeup of voters in this election? - What is the normal defect rate in this district? - What was the driving issue for defectors for each party? - What was the driving issue for weak partisans and leaners for each party? - What was the driving or suppressing issue for hardcore partisans for each party? - What's the historical defection rate for this district? - What's the historical Party ID turnout for this district? I only found information on the past 9 election cycles for the district (to be fair I only did a quick search), but based off of those last 9, the results are pretty darn close for the Democrats. The mean result for Democratic elections over that time period is 45.3%, and this result was 47%. For Republicans, the mean result is 51.42%, and this election was 43%, so there was some difference there. However, we don't really know what it is. Note that neither of these results were outliers. We can speculate based off of known trends (history shows us that typically mostly hardcore partisans show up to low-turnout special elections, thus meaning it's likely that Corwin didn't drive out her base well enough), but without the additional data, there isn't a good way to know. Without that information, it's all guessing based off of people's preconceived ideas about what was important in this election.

Heh, I didn't vote in the Gov race. Rick Perry does some hypocritical crap (like the bill you posted), Bill White had some horrible positions (like his plan to de-centralize transportation in Texas and let local cities handle it), and Kathy Glass was a nutcase.

I like all of the political analysis going on about this with absolutely no exit poll data or even data on the makeup of the constituency.

Aren't we geologically blessed? How are we broke and in rough shape then? And I don't think we're "broke" or in "rough shape", but we are in a tough spot to have to make a budget for the next two years. To understand how Texas' Government works fiscally, you need to understand the state's tax structure. We have no state income tax, and most government revenue is brought in through property taxes and sales taxes. While property values and property taxes have remained relatively stable (although they have taken a hit in some areas), sales taxes dropped sharply due to the decline in the economy. Sales tax income had dropped steadily in late 09 and most of 2010 when people reacted to the economy and cut spending. We make our budgets every two years, so right now they're working to make the budget for 2012-2013. They use the current spending patterns to predict how much revenue they'll have over the next two years and the rate of growth, and then base the budget on those numbers. According to the levels of spending last year and early this year, there was going to be a 26 billion dollar shortfall. However, revenue is already growing at a faster rate. The comptroller raised the state budget predictions by $1.2 billion last week, because sales tax income is increasing faster than expected. The state also has a rainy day fund of $10 billion dollars saved up to cover periods of economic downturns. To balance the budget for the next two years, they're spending $4 billion from the rainy day fund and they have $15 billion in spending cuts. The rainy day fund is funded by taxes on oil & natural gas revenues, where a certain amount of money always goes to the rainy day fund first, and then the rest into the general revenue stream. Did we have to change a lot to make sure the budget for 2012-2013 was balanced? Absolutely. Did they have to cut a lot of stuff? Yes. However, as spending increases the state's revenues will start to grow again. It'll just take time.

While I think Rick Perry's done a lot of good for Texas, it's crap like this that kept me from voting for him in the election.

That's because you're not drinking good beer. When Beer is cold, it suppresses the taste of it. That's a good thing for the little amount of flavor that's in beers like american lagers, but it can be a huge detriment to some styles of beer.

Yeah, we are talking about the same show. They don't do it every episode, but they've done it some. There were a few episodes this season where it was starting to turn for me, because they stopped it, but then they brought it back. When they do it, they usually have one of the characters act as narrator for a bit at the end and sum up the events with a life lesson while showing some other clips, and then they all feel good about themselves and each other and the show ends. As a viewer, I hate getting slapped in the face with crap like that. I don't want a feel good happy ending with someone telling me how life is.

It's the whole, "lets wrap our writing up into what we think is a profound higher meaning and spoon feed it to our audience by adding some serious music and having our narrator talk about it" routine that I hate.

Funnier Shows That I Like To Watch: - 30 rock - Daily Show - Colbert Report - Parks & Rec - Office - South Park - Community - Archer