My first outdoor festival, the Tibetan Freedom Concert when I was 16, I found myself on my back in the dirt, surrounded by a forrest of stomping boots. It was dusty, dark, and surprisingly less noisy. Before I could realize the seriousness of my predicament, some dude grabbed me by the armpits and yanked me back to me feet. He gave me nod that seemed to say “dude, try not to fall down and are you OK?” at the same time. I yelled a thanks and went on rocking.

Good post. My wife and I are not vegetarians but have started incorporating some vegetarian meals into our rotation. We first started to do this when we lived in Europe and meat was prohibitively expensive. As we were doing this, we read a Michael Pollan book and realized that this was probably not a bad idea for other reasons too.

So now we are back in the states. We started experimenting with tofu, mostly in asian style stir fry. This was good for a while but there was a certain point where I just couldn’t take it anymore. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get the tofu to taste any different than wet cardboard. So, we’ve gone away from that. We also tried some “Tofurky” Italian sausages in red sauce. These I also thought had a poor taste despite all the spices and flavorings and we haven’t done it again.

I guess that is the point that I was trying to make. You can’t conclude that it does deter just as you can’t conclude that it doesn’t. Because it’s just so uncertain, I don’t think the deterrence argument can be used to justify it’s existence.

This works both ways. Saying that is does deter is just anecdotal as well.

Fair enough. I’ll reply with the fact that West and Central Europe have the lowest homicide rate by region in the page you cited. You’ll reply that Honduras and Venezuela have by far the highest and they do not have the death penalty.

I think this just reinforces the fact that the death penalty is not a reliable indicator of crime rate. Countries, states, etc., can have high or low crime rates regardless of whether or not the death penalty is in effect. Therefore, the statement that the death penalty deters crime loses strength.

I think everyone so far has just assumed that the death penalty succeeds at deterring crime. There is a lot of information out there that is worth looking at. None of it is a “smoking gun” proving the death penalty does not deter crime. However, I haven’t found any data that really supports the theory of the death penalty as a deterrent. For instance, a lot of states that rigorously enforce the death penalty have relatively high crime rates compared to those that don’t.

Other change items not included in that list:

Today: Slope to totalitarianism officially slippery-ized.
2010: Country becomes more like Europe, and not in the good way, like topless beaches, but in the bad way, like socialists.
2011: Plug pulled on Grandma.
2012: Medical opportunities, lives ruined for most Americans.
2013: Title of doctor handed out to highest campaign donors.
2014: Obama actually paints face and performs witch-doctoring on a few people, but stops short of growing a Hitler mustache.

I agree about ice dancing. I think that anything that involves a costume should not be a sport. It can still be competitive, just not a sport. Are they going to put ballroom dancing in the summer games? I don’t think so.

So…are we talking like, she’s not 18 yet? Now, I’m no hater, but that sounds like a pretty risky path to go down no matter what you’re intentions are. At any rate, you should watch the movie “Blame It On Rio.” It’s awesome any you may be able to relate.

Right. So, my comeback was from 2nd grade. Now that I am all growns-up, I understand there are times when you cannot, in fact, do what you want. However, in this circumstance I thought that it applied.

To summarize one of my favorite 2nd Grade comebacks – “it’s a free country, I can do what I want.”

I agree, if they want to spend the money to put an ad out, fine. Maybe pro-choice groups could put out an ad about how even if there were no restrictions on abortion, Tim Tebow would still have been born in all his glory because pro-choice is not pro-abortion. And then maybe give real-life examples of mom’s who have died because they carried babies to term. I think pro-life crowds often assume pro-choice crowds want babies to be aborted. At the same time, I don’t see what is that offensive about the Tebow ad. Isn’t it a success story? Although, they could throw in a disclaimer stating that while this is cool, most moms who keep babies that could threaten their own lives don’t end up with Heisman trophy winning quarterbacks.

Everyone can now exhale. A new article in Time titled “Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin,” has claimed that contrary to what we all think, exercise can make you fatter.

The author, John Cloud, makes the point that because exercise makes you hungrier, you end up eating more than the calories that you burn. According to him, people working out can’t help but be consumed by the “lip-licking anticipation of perfectly salted, golden brown french fries after a hard trip to the gym.” He argues that because exercise makes you hungrier, you start to view food as a reward for doing it and later on, you are so exhausted from doing it that you just sit around. For instance, if you go on a 20 minute run and slam a 32 oz. Gatorade afterwards, you’d be better off from a weight loss standpoint just “sitting on the sofa, knitting.”

Well, Sarah Palin has done it once again. Last summer when I woke up and checked the news to discover that she was now the Vice Presidential nominee, I was stunned. Whatever you think about her, it was a bold move. Now, another bold move.

I am wondering, along with the rest of America, what this means for 2012. Will she run? What will her angle be if she does? Will Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, and Tim Pawlenty put up with it? Or is she simply taking her toys and going home?

The Dallas Morning News is reporting a story of a high school girls basketball team, Covenant, that recently beat another team 100-0. As a result, the coach of the winning team was fired.

Some statements from Covenant’s website regarding the game:

“The Covenant School, its board and administrators, regrets the incident of January 13 and the outcome of the game with the Dallas Academy Varsity Girls Basketball team. It is shameful and an embarrassment that this happened. This clearly does not reflect a Christ-like and honorable approach to competition.”

An AP report on Monday showed that the Republican Presidential ticket has been the butt of 7 times as many jokes on late-night TV than the Democratic ticket. Furthermore, a lot of the Obama jokes are pretty tame. This is probably not a surprise to most. The question is whether or not McCain-Palin have deserved the massive imbalance (or maybe have Obama-Biden deserved the inattention)? After all, some of the Democratic slip-ups have been overlooked. So, is the late-night media biased towards Obama or are they just acting in their self-interest in trying to attract the most viewers? If they are biased, what is the fix?

I bought an iBook G4 in 2005 and got AppleCare for an extra $250 that seemed from the salesman (or should I say "sales-highschoolkid") that it was a sort of insurance plan should anything ever happen. So, I didn’t read the fine print, which I should have because now that there is an issue (cracked screen), I learn that "accidents" are not covered under AppleCare. All that AppleCare seems to be after reading the official terms, is an extension of some lame warranty, which is usually on 1 year.