>> ^gorillaman:
>> ^oohahh:
The Jews have as much of a right to the land as anybody that's called Israel home in the past 5769 years.
Are you really going to rate millenia-old hereditary land claims equally with the contemporary claims of living people, actually living on the land at the time? No, Israel is a stolen country, but as I said, you can't blame the present generation of Israelis for the crimes of their despicable parents. Their own crimes are ample enough, of course.


Well, to be perfectly honest, Moses and co. took it off the heathens at the time (you know, the promised land), so even removing all selective time clocking and going back to ancient beginnings, the Jewish people never owned that land.

Seems sad that from 700 AD through to about 1890, the Jewish/Arab relations were relatively cordial. Jews were not considering equal per se but faced far less harsh restrictions than say non-Christians in the dark ages of Europe.

Last night our local weatherman, Bob Breck, was showing historical paths of hurricanes that followed the route Gustav is taking. The majority of them either hit Texas or Florida. There were two that hit Louisiana - one going back to 1890. I found Bob Breck's Your Weather Authority Blog.

Complete this thought, if you please, for shits'n'giggles (apologies to non-Americans):

In today's American culture, gays are being treated similarly to blacks of which time period?

1890's
1910's
1930's
1950's
1970's

The people who downvoted this sift did so because they are the segregationists of yesterday: separate drinking fountains, waiting areas, bus seats, etc. But here's the rub: the segregationists of yesterday were in the majority at the time (read: in the right). Just like today with gays. It's accepted that gay people should not have certain rights that straight people have.

There are those of you "heads of knuckle" who will try to claim that I'm saying you believe gays should be segregated. No. That's not what I'm saying. I'm talking about the likelihood that you would consider a gay person to be as much of a human being as a straight person.

You're free to dispute my premise but the fact is that public opinion changes very slowly. For instance, the American south is still wary of "northerners" because of the civil war and I'm not sure that'll ever go away.

During the Philadelphia Convention of 1787, it was decided, for enumeration purposes regarding both the distribution of taxes and the apportionment of the members of the United States House of Representatives, that slaves would count as three-fifths of a person.

So, to the downvoters, what ratio would you assign to a homosexual?

"plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose"

"the more things change, the more they stay the same"
-- Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr (November 24, 1808 – September 29, 1890)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alphonse_Karr

Transcription of the recording (1890):
"America Centre of equal daughters, equal sons, All, all alike endear'd, grown, ungrown, young or old, Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich, Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love..."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaves_of_Grass
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Whitman

Jeez. What a mess this case is. Illegals shot in the back on neighbor's property.

Times change, and ending a criminals life is no longer an acceptable act unless in perceived self-defense. In my opinion, he should have fired at the ground.

(if it were 1890 and this old man lived in Arkansas, he'd likely be hung for murdering these men; a nice run-down of early self-defense Supreme Court cases here; http://www.davekopel.com/2A/LawRev/Self-Defense-Cases.htm )

The victims of this sh-tbag more than grimaced a little when "Angel" shot them or hacked them to death with a machete.

"If we are to abolish the death penalty, I should like to see the first step taken by my friends the murderers."
-- Alphonse Karr (1808-1890)

Mercy toward the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.
--Adam Smith

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. -- Seneca the Younger 4 bc- 65 ad

With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion. -- Steven Weinberg

Men never commit evil so fully and joyfuly as when they do it for religious convictions -- Blaise Pascal

Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet -- Napoleon Bonaparte

I still say a church steeple with a lightning rod on top shows a lack of confidence -- Doug McLeod

The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never worshipped anything but himself. -- Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890)

The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason -- Benjamin Franklin