Azalin

Hey Einstein - note that 'creator' is not necessarily a synonym for 'God'. Read a book, for crying out loud.

92% Republicans 89% Constitution Party 86% Libertarians 56% Democrats *************************************** 87% Scott Walker 86% Rick Perry 86% Marco Rubio 86% Rand Paul 85% Rick Santorum 82% Ted Cruz 82% Jeb Bush 81% Donald Trump 80% Ben Carson 76% Bobby Jindal 76% Mike Huckabee 74% Carly Fiorina 72% Lindsey Graham 68% Chris Christie 65% John Kasich 51% Hillary Clinton 36% Bernie Sanders 27% Martin O'Malley

Isn't that pretty much what our traditional nomination process already is?

There's an impressive amount of stupid squeezed into that one sentence. Is that what you actually believe, or just a random regurgitation of words spilling from your perpetually open mouth?

They come from our creator, and are protected by we the people. I find it difficult to believe that even you could be so obtuse.

It's good to hear that things have been getting consistently better in WNY. I have a lot of fond memories of back home. Good food, great people. I hope the prosperity continues.

I had to look that up.

Should we not simply leave public schools to the local municipalities as they are now?

I think the fact that so many Latinos want to leave their countries to come here completely contradicts everything you just said.

I understand what you're saying, and I agree with you for the most part. The rhetoric has indeed reached a caustic level, but part of the reason it's become that bad is because of a legitimate frustration felt by many Americans. You know many Cuban Latinos, and I know many Mexican and Central American Latinos, and we're both aware that they have the same desires and needs as anyone else does. I don't know how many people in the general public know about our policy toward Cuban immigrants, but as I understand it, it's entirely different from the rules we have for anyone else immigrating here from any other nation around the world. People from all over the world would love to come here, but we obviously can't let everyone in. That doesn't mean we can't streamline the immigration process, but whatever we wind up doing is going to have to take careful planning and a lot of thought will need to go into any such decisions we make in changing our policy. I've heard some good ideas as to how we can accommodate immigrants wishing to gain citizenship, but nothing has been done by those who have the power to do so. Deporting several million people is completely out of the question. Building a wall is ridiculous. What, then, do we do to curtail the flow of foreign nationals across the southern border? Granted, there are less coming across than there were a few years ago, but that's due to a slow economy and less work than there once was. That will change when the economy picks up again, and we start seeing more people coming across the Rio Grande. I've already stated my opinion regarding the lack of assimilation, so I don't need to reiterate that. Regardless, our society is made up of people from many other places, and aside from the occasional Chinatown here & there, we've amalgamated into a diverse, yet reasonably homogenous culture, bound largely by a common language and sense of nationalism. I can't speak to the Cuban-American sub culture, but the low-income Latino culture here in Texas is primarily that way due to their lack of integration into our society. They rely very heavily on subsidies, they have children while so young that we even have some middle schools here locally that have child-care facilities so the underage teenage mothers can attend classes. Needless to say that the high schools have an even greater need for in-school child care. Some of these schools don't even offer classes in English. People see this every day, and are frustrated by the (perceived or real) lack of interest in being part of the larger community, and when someone like Trump comes along and says that we're going to build a wall and deport them all, they hear someone echoing their own frustrations, and it resonates with them. For the record, I am not in agreement with them. I have my own frustrations with our immigration system, but they're personal, and it's something I deal with nearly every day. One of the reasons that the rhetoric is getting so bad is because the issue itself is getting bad. The national media reflects that. When joe blow white guy gets drunk and kills a family because he plowed into them after drinking 35 beers, it only gets reported locally. When someone does the same thing and they happen to be here illegally from Guatemala, it gets national attention. It's more than a handful of people seeking the presidency that are making this the issue that it is, they're just fanning flames that have been smoldering for a while now. There's no question that a solution is needed, and rounding up millions of people and putting up a wall ain't going to do it. However, the issue isn't going to just go away, and people are not going to stop coming over here. We need to come up with an effective way to prevent the flow of people coming here illegally, and we need to find a way to bring those that are already here fully into the fold, so that they are Americans first, and Latinos second.

Wishing the injured a full and speedy recovery.

the audio kind of sucks, but it's still a classic

Cruz is sharp, make no mistake. I think he needs more experience before he tries for the presidency, but I see him as a formidable contender in the future.

I've think that the majority of Americans would be much more receptive to the idea of retaining most illegal aliens if there was more integration and assimilation into our culture on their part. That's where I believe the resolution to the issue lies. Most people understand the need and desire on the part of those jumping the border to have a better life, but they're obviously limiting themselves by not assimilating. A certain amount of that is due to the fact that they're here illegally, and remain 'hidden' within their communities so that they don't get caught, but a lot of it is due to a stubborn streak many have (and I have seen this many times myself) to retain their Latino heritage. I believe we could make major headway on resolving the issue if we could find a way around that stumbling block. It's obviously beyond impractical to deport several million people, and it's pointless with the ease that many would have in returning anyway.

You need to keep a close eye on her, then. Years ago, I had a gray tabby named Claude, who would lay on the floor and watch the sunlight reflected off of my glass end table as it slowly moved across the ceiling and then down the wall. As soon as it got within 6 feet of the floor, Claude would attack it. Then again, I also watched him stalk a burrito once, so his cunning had its obvious limits.

I don't know, but whatever controls them, I sure hope that control doesn't extend to rectal thermometers.

Hydrodynamics? You mean it it's attracted by, and tries to swat running water from the faucet?

This may be old news to some of you, but I found a democrat that I might actually be able to vote for, or at least one that I'd vote for before any of the announced democrat candidates. Limberbutt McCubbins: http://www.limberbutt2016.com/

Damn! I've heard of smart thermostats before, but I never realized the technology had advanced to include thermometers as well.

My response was tongue-in-cheek, but the essential point of it was valid. You said: "Thermometers around the world have apparently settled on July being the hottest ever..." If I was to rephrase my question to make it simpler: Does that mean that thermometers around the southern hemisphere registered the warmest winter in July, or are you only taking the northern hemisphere readings into account? If you'd posted a link to your source, then we'd be able to read it for ourselves. Do you have any idea how ridiculous it sounds to say that thermometers around the world have settled anything?

That sounds really good. Like many people, I was reluctant to try octopus at first, but it's really good, isn't it? I learned how to prepare pulpo ala vinagreta, a cold, salad-type of dish made from diced octopus, red onions, tomato, and red bell pepper, chilled and marinated in a light, Italian-style dressing. It's delicious. You can also substitute shrimp for the octopus, but the octopus is actually better. I made it using frozen, sliced octopus. I had to boil the sh%t out of it to make sure it was tender, but it's very easy to make. I first had it as tapas with our 2nd round of beer at a little bar in Madrid.

It depends on what the meaning of 'is' is.

It's the classic never answer coherently when a little onomatopoeia will suffice.

Better yet, stock the Rio Grande with Piranha, and then double up on border guards at the bridges.