SarasotaSabre

hey-o .... I took a 3 day sabbatical and found myself missing all the banter, excitement, and back & forth zingers. In the words of an infamous ex-President, I am tanned, rested, and ready. In all seriousness, just a brief respite was very helpful. Thanks to all who suggested I chill for a bit and come back engaged. I just finished one of the greatest weeks of my life; an unexpected new job opportunity fell into my lap which involved me flying out to San Jose for all day interviews, taking a red-eye back, arriving back in ATL @ 6:15a, giving myself a birdbath in an airport restroom and changing clothes, then driving 2 hours for all day customer meetings last Wednesday. I did receive a written offer Friday which I just accepted today. Life is great all the way around with a huge opportunity in front of me in the tech space. I took the liberty of sharing this good news amidst all the rancor on this Political thread, and I apologize to anyone here who cannot indulge me. After last week's RNC clown car episodes, I thought the DNC would have a red meat opportunity to swing things back their way after a temporary Trump bump. Then the DNC email/DWS fiasco ensued which 60 minutes conveniently omitted to last 2 minutes of the most critical, direct question asked of HRC; did she know of this chicanery and how could she not know about it? She claimed, with wide eyed horror, to not know anything about such a campaign to derail Sanders. Scott Pelley went on to say in his 25 yrs covering HRC that he had not seen her speak with such conviction. Totally rigged for Sanders to fail; he got jobbed. And what was up with the DNC's decision to have DWS open & close the convention before being booed mercilessly and escorted out by security. Maybe HRC should have deleted the DNC emails and this may not have happened. Day 1 of what looks to be a very fun week. Can't wait to see this week's circus play out after last week's.

N.B. : I AM NOT POSTING :w00t: , JUST LINKING SOMETHING FOR A HUMOROUS BREAK RELATIVE TO THE BOLDED ABOVE:

I absolutely accept your apology w/out reservation and I sincerely appreciate the gesture. My intention was not to make some type of grand announcement of my temporary exit stage left, please understand that. I was literally wearing myself out getting caught up in the pettiness and personal stuff that was getting thrown at me. I should have been bigger and better than that, but it's my Achilles heel in that I can't process what I see sometimes as intellectual dishonesty, hypocrisy, and/or double standards. And I was only continuing to post b/c I felt (rightly or wrongly) that I was getting baited to respond, and I fell for that. A classic case of Id vs. Ego, if you may. I agree that some time off will be good and I hope my participation, as Whiskey so kindly pointed out, makes this a better place. On an unrelated note, this looks like a funny but kind of scary film, based on a true story (directed by the Hangover trilogy) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2005151/

My last response, which you have forced, is that sympathy/attention have nothing to do with it. Get off your high horse - you don't know me from Adam nor do you understand my motivations for going AWOL, which I have already spelled out. So glad you can seek refuge here as opposed to "that outlook" in DFW.

+1

thanks Whiskey, I really appreciate your kind words. I thought the worst in people's behavior was limited to those public mobs shouting at each other in front of TV cameras, but I have been proven wrong. This behavior has descended to some on this Board. I was very much looking forward to commenting with sincerity & logical thought about what will be presented at the DNC, but I am really done with stepping on land mines here and getting blown up with alot of impunity and ill will. It really does seem like a twisted sport for some of you.

you just reaffirmed my belief in the utter depravity and uncivility displayed in spades here by those who habitually display nothing but ill will by those who you disagree with. You have a great night Mr. Robin.

PM me please so I can assess your level of sincerity, perhaps there is a side of you I'm just not seeing; I don't want to appear thin-skinned and sensitive but I also don't have any appetite for getting embarrassed on a freaking Internet fan site by what appears to be nothing but gratuitous snark. Just one more reason I am going AWOL. Carry on amongst yourselves to continue the banter.

sounds like a plan; I would be glad to offer more suggestions

cut the sh*t Joe, you are really becoming quite the keyboard jockey. I asked a legitimate question about maintaining intellectual honesty and you continue to lower the bar with you gratuitous sarcasm.,

someone please step up; I have taken an indefinite leave of absence from the last 2-3 days of activity here. I got to a point where I knew I could not reason with certain people and/or certain opinions. My parting comment is that I sincerely hope the left side of this Board offers as rigorous of efforts to point out the flaws, mistruths, and pure theatre of the DNC while maintaining a modicum of intellectual honesty. I am pretty much certain my hope will not be recognized.

Sorry, I lack the power of selective mindreading or whimsical interpretation. I responded to what you wrote. Maybe you'd be better off indicating you are speaking figuratively instead of pointing the finger at me for "taking everything I read so literally". You seem to be a smart enough guy- this is the downfall of a conversation not held in person but virtually. So know we're left with Melaniagate? :doh: oh yes quite a national emergency. But then again I could just be taking things too literally....

what happened is that Obama used that to convey a message that he'd be a change agent for healing the racial divide in our US and A (as Borat would say). Some would justifiably say he might have said this merely to get elected, and that is a point to be argued. The reality is that his actions as President have been the polar opposite of his pre-election rhetoric. EVERYTHING now is defined by color in not-so-subtle words & actions, both of which only serve to divide us and bring out the worst among the lowest common denominators.

I'm saying that I do agree her speech should have been properly vetted to avoid this type of canard/snafu, but I don't agree with the citation of sources suggestion as if this was a piece of published research in JAMA. And your suggestion that it is an insight into how a Trump presidency would operate is highly speculative, IMHO. My main point, if you could indulge me, is that in the grand scheme of things with our current global & domestic chaos, this episode seems petty and benign.

seriously, as if this was a piece of published research in the sciences? guys, take a look around; with the chaos & insanity going on globally, the Melanie speech faux pas seems like drivel to me. If we are going down this slippery slope, I'd wager the DNC will give us plenty of fodder to critique. That said, I do wish her speech was devoid of any suggested overlap with others.

per the bolded ...."practice? who the hell needs practice?"....))

Capped and bolded per my suggested caveat - to refine what could be construed as a gross overgeneralization.

N'eo: any sarcasm aside, you are not far from the truth with the bolded. I picked up on Eisenhower's legacy from the Hellstorm book with his intentional brutalization of German POWs; they were literally open-air death camps. Very few Americans are aware of this side of Eisenhower. To wit: http://www.rense.com/general46/germ.htm http://truedemocracyparty.net/2014/01/german-holocaust-german-genocide-9-to-15-million-germans-killed-1945-1953-the-morgenthau-plan-eisenhowers-death-camps-a-forgotten-genocide/ http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v10/v10p161_brech.html

speaking of Dresden, I would highly recommend this book titled "Hellstorm" by Thomas Goodrich https://www.amazon.com/Hellstorm-Death-Nazi-Germany-1944-1947/dp/1494775069/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1468892700&sr=1-1&keywords=Hellstorm I have read it and never have I come across anything which details the horrors suffered by common German citizens from 1944-1947. It's a dirty little secret.

our uniter-in-chief at it again ...... http://www.mrctv.org/blog/obama-police-can-make-job-being-cop-lot-safer-admitting-their-failures IMHO, totally inappropriate, and I am fully expecting to be pilloried for my opinion. Inappropriate just like Obama's invocation of BLM at the Dallas memorial service. I'm sorry, but this guy cannot resist a chance to politicize even the most tragic events, and is oh so quick to jump in with a judgement before all the facts are in. Like the GEICO opinion, "it's what you do..."

on the heels of playing in my favorite annual golf tournament and watching an epic heavyweight British Open between Stenson & Mickelson, my day was severely dampened by the news of the Red Stick (Baton Rouge) shootings; consider these poignant comments: Joycelyn Jackson was already sitting in church when she found herself needing God most. She hadn’t yet learned that her little brother Montrell Jackson was among the three officer killed in Baton Rouge when her pastor asked the congregation to send prayers to her family. “I didn’t want to break down in church but it was just something I couldn’t hold,” Jackson, 49, of Lake Charles, Louisiana, said. “He was a wonderful person. A wonderful person.” Joycelyn Jackson said she understands the anger behind the movement Black Lives Matter but that “God gives nobody the right to kill and take another person’s life.” Montrell Jackson, 32, was married in the last few years and had a baby boy he adored, she said. “It’s coming to the point where no lives matter,” she said, “whether you’re black or white or Hispanic or whatever.” In an emotional Facebook post on July 8, Montrell Jackson wrote that he was “tired physically and emotionally.” “I swear to God I love this city but I wonder if this city loves me,” he wrote. “In uniform I get nasty hateful looks and out of uniform some consider me a threat…These are trying times. Please don’t let hate infect your heart. This city MUST and WILL get better.” Truly sad indeed.....I do not remember a more volatile/chaotic time around the world in my lifetime, and I think the only thing I can do better is be nicer, more tolerant, and loving to others.

That's due in large part to the distinct ethnic identity of ATL being largely African American, the cradle of the civil rights movement, and a meeting pot that largely knows how to get along. I think you might be getting a little hyped up about the type of weaponry possessed by police forces as they have been forced to deal with much more robust criminal challenges; as Pasta stated multiple times, it is force commensurate with the weaponry brought by criminal elements. Sorry to break it to you, but the days of the popgun .38 specials are long gone. A standing army also has SLIGHTLY different rules of engagement against a different enemy altogether (caps added for sarcastic effect)

Sorry, that's a gross overgeneralization.....

Hear hear .....))