Sorry but there aren't any white people left in Texas not anymore. White is now the minority in Texas yet Hispanics and African Americans still get all the minority benefits here. This is a little off topic but it's also the sad and honest truth. I can't even get food stamps here in Texas because I'm white, it doesn't matter that I was hurt and can't work for the next 6 months, I'm the wrong skin color to receive any help from the Texas government. Yet I know plenty of Hispanic friends of mine that have never been turned down once for help even though they all own homes and drives low riders with gold rims. They still qualify for $1000 a month in food stamps. Even when I brought them proof of my injury and my old tax returns showing I've been working steady till the accident and that I don't have any bank accounts, I don't own a home, or even a car. They only offered to give me $10 a month in food stamps. I was floored I told them they could keep their lousy $10. You can barely buy one meal with that. Fucking ridiculous. Texas couldn't give a flyin fuck about White people. Unless your a rich politician.

>> ^gwiz665:

His name is Perez, and she's an angry childless white woman, who goes to church every day and knows she's going to heaven. Connecting those dots aren't hard.
"Get off my lawn and into my jail!" sigh
Texas, once again the flagbearer for justice and honor for white folks.

>> ^jonny:

Was just about to leave the exact same comment. Cast iron pots and pans rule. Pot roast in a cast iron dutch oven > lousy sex.
>> ^probie:
I must be the only person left on Earth that still prefers bacon from a well seasoned cast iron skillet.


Plus it helps season your skillet.


>> ^MonkeySpank:

Forget Bacon! Somebody post a video on how to make the perfect canna-butter or canna-oil. I've been trying to master the perfect canna-oil for a year now.


Low boil/simmer canna, butter, alcohol (ever clear or whatever), and water for a while (I don't know, a couple hours or so?). Afterwards, drain through a cheesecloth into a glass mixing bowl to remove canna material (trust me you don't need it, just try and wring out whatever you can). Put the bowl into fridge until you have a floating berg of green, delicious rendered butter on top. 7g (well ground) to a stick of butter should about do you right proper. Use the butter as directed in recipes. We usually make about 24 cookies. Be careful. Trust me. None of this "it isn't working yet, I should eat another 3." It's a rookie mistake. 2 for n00bs, 3 for vets. Our cookies come out visibly green, and they ain't pistachio. This can also work well and be a good use for larger quantities of trim ;-).

Here's a good resource: http://www.amazon.com/The-Marijuana-Food-Handbook-Connoisseur/dp/0914171992

Was just about to leave the exact same comment. Cast iron pots and pans rule. Pot roast in a cast iron dutch oven > lousy sex.
>> ^probie:

I must be the only person left on Earth that still prefers bacon from a well seasoned cast iron skillet.

>> ^EvilDeathBee:

But... but... they CREATE jobs!


I know you're being sarcastic (thanks little pastel coloured box!), but I'm starting to think this might be one of the core issues with the economy.
We've always had a rich elite, but at least they used to be industrialists. Yeah, they paid people a lousy wage for awful and dangerous working conditions (despite the fact that "union" seems to be a dirty word these days, where do you think you got sick leave, holiday pay or even weekends?) but at least they employed a lot of people.

It seems to me that these days there's a whole sub class of the wealthy that make money just pushing money around in ways like this. Their profits are huge and they employ comparatively few.

Got a whole bunch of people who are defending Zimmerman not because they feel he's innocent, but because he used a gun

There may be those out there who are only interested in defending Zimmerman because he had a gun. Just like there are those out there who are only attacking Zimmerman because Martin was black. It'd be nice if such slimeballs didnt' exist - but whaddya do? All you can do is point it out, condemn the bums, and encourage others to ignore them. Personally, I'm not defending Zimmerman because he used a gun. I'm simply not willing to just assume he's guilty based on hyped up misinformation (see CNN, NBC, CBS, etc...).

Self Defense claims tripling should be indicative that you got some problems on your hands.

I tend to agree. The SYG laws - like most laws - has fundamental flaws. The "Pro Martin" version of the story is that Zimmerman was following Martin with a deliberate attempt to provoke a confrontation and kill him in "self defense". If that's true, such a use of SYG is sleazy and wrong. But - what if the "Pro Zimmerman" version is true? What if Zimmerman was just following what he thought was a suspicious person, began to head back to his car, got attacked, and shot in self defense? In that case then the SYG sounds OK - or at worst its applicability is fuzzy.

And that really is the problem, isn't it? Laws are usually passed in an attempt to fix a "problem". In some states, there was a "problem" with bad guys who would PROSECUTE people who defended themselves. That's obviously a lousy situation. You don't want criminals using the law to get rich by suing innocent citizens who just wanted to defend themselves from a crime. You also don't want innocent citizens being too scared to defend themselves from criminals for fear they are going to get thier asses sued off. People could die because of that kind of crap.

So to fix that "problem", some states have passed these SYG laws as a means of shielding innocent citizens from prosecution by sleazy criminals who got a boo-boo when the uppity citizen defended themselves. Well - as you observe - now they have a whole NEW problem... Criminals who deliberately provoke a fight and then kill the people who defend themselves! Now you're right back where you started.

This shows how hard it is to write a good law. The conundrum is that you need to write a law that sleazeballs can't mis-use to thier advantage. But it is the bad people that are the most skilled and practiced at finding ways around those protections, while the good people hardly ever think about it. The end result is that the "Bad People" are experts at the law, and the "Good People" know jack-all about the law. So you still have a population of "Bad People" who are figuring out ways to screw over the "Good People" - only now they can do it in the courts if they fail to do it in the streets. Throw in all the Shysters and stand back.

Aaaaand yet one more further detail on the level of media irresponsibility on this whole thing...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YOt1wEDy0SI

So far we have three news outlets (NBC, CBS, and CNN) who have all had to either retract blatant falsehoods they reported or correct misleading reports they previously made. In all three cases, the corrections have had to admit that things that were SAID to be evidence of racism turned out to be either gross exaggerations, or outright falsehoods. This is starting to sound like the Duke LaCrosse case all over again.

Zimmerman instigated the situation from the start. Even if you're right and Martin jumped Zimmerman on his way to the car, Martin was provoked by Zimmerman following him in the first place.

This statement is asserting that the act of following someone to see what they are doing gives the person being followed the legal right to commit an assault. However, if someone is following a suspicious person and the suspect begins an assault, the follower is NOT allowed to defend themselves. Just wanting to be clear on this point, because it sets a rather fascinating legal precedent where you can beat up anyone you think might be following you around and they aren't allowed to fight back.

If SYG applies, it sets a horrible precedence. You can instigate a fight, let the guy pound on you, and viola, you're free to kill

You may not like it, but Vaire is factually incorrect. Your sentence would be more accurate if it said, "It HAS SET a horrible precedent". This isn't some weird issue that's never happened before in the history of US legal jurisprudence. There are Stand Your Ground laws in a half-dozen states, and this kind of "turn around and kill your attacker" problem has been SUCCESSFULLY used to defend multiple of the world's Zimmermans. There are dozens of pages out there arguing this exact issue. Here are two...

http://www.slavinlawfirm.com/lawyer-attorney-1687102.html
http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2012/03/trayvon-martin-and-the-initial-aggressor-issue.html

The argument that you and Vaire should be making is that there is DEBATE in the legal community about these SYG laws. And that's true. There are a butt-ton of legal arguments taking place in which it is argued that SYG laws are not "designed" to allow a person to instigate an attack and then kill the person who responds.

But to come out and say that SYG "did not apply" to Zimmerman is simply untrue. Any lawyer could very easily make that case. To say that there is "no way" a laywer could do that for Zimmerman is just plain flat-out-like-a-lizard-drinking wrong. They will do that. They HAVE done that. There are successful cases in precedent that codify it.

You can say, "We should change the law!". You can say, "It's a lousy law!". You can say, "That's totally unfair!". You can say, "That's stupid and they need to fix it." But you can't say, "It doesn't apply" because it does. As far as the Zimmerman case is concerned, there is no clarity on what happened yes. That's what the investigation is for. If - however - the investigation concludes that Zimmerman was justified by the SYG law then that's it. Boom. He'd be immune to both civil and criminal prosecution.

>> ^daxgaz:

i would like to see the sword fighting choreography that could hold up to this level of scrutiny.

Any choreography that would involve the defender to actually have to block/dodge the attacking sword would do.

Anyway - the Jedi, with lousy lightsabre skills, are still more dangerous than the chronically myopic stormtroopers.

You know the way doctors are the worst patients? Talk show hosts make lousy guests...

The latest instant-powdered viral controversy that has the whole world a-Twitter. People end up overthinking something that happened thousands of miles away to someone else, as if it really matters. "He should have donated the laptop", "he's a lousy parent" blah blah blah, it all strikes me as forced controversy.

If I ever walk a mile in his shoes then maybe I'll have an opinion.

>> ^Pantalones:

religion: a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
Interesting. Since the second part is an example, Atheism would seem to fit into this definition.

Do you believe a unicorn created the universe? Not believing would seem to fit into your interpretation of the definition of religion.
>> ^shinyblurry:

of all choices, atheism requires the greatest faith, as it demands that ones limited store of human knowledge is sufficient to exclude the possibility of God.
francis collins human genome project

This makes faith sound cheap, not to mention a lousy tool for assessing truth.

Yeah I got to wonder about this one, the way it's presented is odd. If it were me I would have included the original audio and done a second pass showing an unedited zoom in of the action outside. And not made the music and cut-aways to the text as the dominant features in this clip.

But maybe it's real and he's just a lousy editor.