Hixter

My neighbor was in Santa Rose yesterday and mailed me 12 bottles of Pliny the Elder. Shipping was $90. That's what I call a friend.

Should federal law always trump state law? I'm not so sure about that, or we'd have the DEA raiding cannabis dispensaries in Denver, etc.

Reposted from Facebook:

I think the Chevy Volt has an all-electric range of about 40 miles, so I suppose that may be true. The more popular Tesla's get more than 200 miles per charge, so I doubt they affect anyone's driving habits except for when it comes to cross country trips.

Looks like North Korea has conducted their first successful test of a hydrogen bomb. It's a good thing for the rest of the world that they don't have a history of developing ICBMs and selling sensitive technology to the highest bidder. http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/05/asia/north-korea-seismic-event/index.html

It seems like the most realistic alternative to drilling mile-deep holes in the ground and then transporting the contents halfway across the planet.

As long as the sun is shining.

As far as reducing gun crime? My first suggestion would be more cops on the street. Fine with me. I just can't think of any other feasible source of vast amounts of energy that works 24/7. Renewables are fine, but we'll always need a backup source for cloudy days, calm days, etc.

Lots of trash that people painstakingly sort into recycle bins ends up in landfills because there's no market for it. Aluminum, yes, but glass and paper are not in much demand. Electric cars are cool, but if they're powered by electricity generated by fossil fuels, what's the point? Solar power and wind turbines are nice, but they are an unreliable source of energy. There should be a worldwide Manhattan Project II to develop a cheap, safe nuclear power plant design that can be built everywhere without serving as a vector to obtaining nuclear weapons.

I'm quite certain that a team of lawyers spent months ensuring that the actions were within the scope of the law. But that doesn't necessarily mean they're a good thing. From what I've seen, they'll likely prove to be completely ineffective in reducing gun violence. But they'll inconvenience law-abiding gun owners and cost them some money and that's essentially what most new gun legislation has been all about. The rest is theater. Of course, but would it be any different if the head of the NRA got all teary eyed on national television at the grave of a young child who was killed at a school

Invoking anger, sadness and dead children are among the oldest tricks of the propaganda trade. The president scored a hat trick at today's gun control event.

By "taking down" do you mean killing him or just arresting him? If you're talking about shooting him, it would be unlikely unless he pointed a gun at someone else. If you're talking about storming the building to arrest him, there would typically be no rush to do so. If there are no threats to anyone's life, the cops would try to talk him down or wear him down until he surrendered. Any attempt to storm the building would be put off until there was no other option and the cops would spend quite some time coming up with a detailed plan of action. (In the Oregon case, it appears that the men are

I haven't paid much attention to the story, but they sound like a bunch of attention seekers intent on making the news. The jailed(?) ranchers say that they're unwelcome and presidential candidates are calling for them to stand down and obey the law. The administration is following a smart policy that realizes that making martyrs of them would only fan the flames, so I expect a peaceful resolution. It's in everyone's best interests. Topics like this keep the really important and tricky subjects out of the news and I think both parties like it that way.

We need a Politics 2016 thread.

Nels and his twin brother, Alex, are 60 today. Happy birthday, fellas.

I think it was the third song and it was in Austin.

It's only on Twitter at the moment, but it appears that Lemmy has passed away.

Merry Christmas, one and all. And peace on Earth, of course.

My grandfather let me puff on a White Owl cigar when I was about ten years old. Cool grandpas have existed for a long time.

If you play a Replacements album on the way back from seeing Star Wars, your 4-year-old grandson might start singing "Gary's got a Boner." I figured he'd forget it, but 10 minutes later I asked him what Gary had and he replied correctly. I'm a bad grandpa.

The monster!!!

Of course the writer was herding the answers to be either positive or negative. The question asked was "Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion of the Islamic religion?"

Not sure what this has to do with my NRA comments that you quoted? Negligent discharges are always going to happen, even when you're dealing with highly trained police officers and soldiers. I remember reading an article that said that armed cops in the UK negligently discharged their weapons more frequently than they were intentionally discharged. Sorry, but the figures cannot be discounted just because 25% of respondents had no opinion. The poll was a Huffington Post project and they are decidedly not right wing, but that didn't stop them from leading their story with this line: A maj

Looks like your friend resigned his ACLU position over his Facebook post. http://gazette.com/aclu-board-member-resigns-after-facebook-post-about-shooting-people-who-would-vote-for-trump/article/1565495 I'm worried that we're on the road to becoming like the UK where an offensive statement is grounds for arrest. Hate speech is ugly, but there's this whole first amendment thing...