PN-G bamatex

  Careful. You might be told that it "doesn't make sense" or that you're just "too stupid to understand" or that "you're a liar," my personal favorite. You know, typical troll responses.

  Yeah, and I'm sure the Democrats were just so hesitant to take those checks.

  You and I both know that's just the narrative they want to sell you. Have you seen how much GE donated to the Obama campaign? They don't want to give that up, they just want moderates, independents and libertarians, who generally all hate big corporate donations, to think they want to give it up.

  Because they know there's no chance it will pass now, and it gives them the opportunity to revive the Republican big business narrative. The Democrats are masters of controlling the narrative.

  I don't think occupying it until eternity is a necessity. The long term strategy in the region needs to be aiding in the establishment of secular governments, economic development and education. Terrorist movements like Al Qaeda and ISIS find ripe followers by virtue of the fact that the part of the world they operate in is filled with poverty and ignorance. That's why initiatives like PEPFAR are so important.

  Agreed. The fact that it was left out means he either doesn't want to talk about it or doesn't see the relationship between the two issues. I'm honestly not sure which is worse.

Oh, and I'm glad he actually used the word "terrorist." That was a welcome change.

A few notes.   First, I can appreciate the refusal to commit American troops to combat duty on the ground. Given the circumstances surrounding the situation, I think that's probably the right move. That said, those circumstances are a direct result of our actions. In my opinion, the critical, and seemingly ignored, fact is that ISIS would have never existed had we not first pulled out of Iraq way too early with no effective security strategy, and then utterly failed to handle the situation in Syria correctly.   Second, while I understand that the president wants to work through international institutions to find solutions to these kinds of problems, I think that's a totally ineffective strategy. Working with Arab partners to increase security is a great idea. I'm glad to see him do that. Requiring the Arab nations to take certain steps on their own as a condition for American support is also a great idea. I personally really like that. Convening the UN Security Council to assemble a longterm strategy, though, is a joke. It's time we face facts and acknowledge that the UN is nothing more than a forum, and typically a great way to throw up a roadblock in responding to anything. If we want international cooperation in getting this done, we set up our own coalitions with our own rules and get it done. The countries that are committed to a solution will get on board and the countries that want to fuss and fight will stay in UN meetings so they can fuss and fight.   Third, and most importantly, this speech completely and totally ignored the threat here at home. I didn't hear anything about border security, which is now an even more critical issue given that some reports have ISIS agents crossing the border to conduct strikes here in the US. The president had a golden opportunity to call for expedited, bipartisan immigration reform as a matter of national security. Granted, that may have served to mire the issue more, but it may also have served as an opportunity to get something real done about the border and actually give him a real legislative win to go on his record, if he played his cards right.

  If I had it all to do over again, I would be a double major in political science and one of three things: business, journalism or criminal justice. I actually started as a double major in political science and civil engineering, and then spent two years finding out the hard way that I didn't want to be an engineer or anything close to it. So, I dropped engineering and transitioned to majoring in political science with minors in math and Computer-Based Honors. I do, however, write columns for UA's student newspaper and a few other publications.

  As the original poster, I have to admit that you were never one of the posters I had in mind when starting this thread or listing those criteria, and that this move is unexpected. However, I can't characterize it as anything less than admirable, and it sets an example a poster or two on this part of the board would do well to follow.

My major is political science.

  He's alright when he isn't arguing with Nash or smitty.

The first poster I would nominate is Big girl. I think she fully demonstrates the criteria under (1), (2) and (4).

In recent weeks, there have been repeated warnings from moderators and administrators on this site about the state of discourse in this particular forum. Certain posters in particular have been repeatedly warned about their incendiary, intentionally provocative posts aimed at specific members, which typically serve no legitimate purpose and do not add anything to our discussions. It has also been stated that if such behavior does not cease, this board will be deleted and political discussion on SETXSports will come to a halt altogether.   To me, this would be a gross overreaction, and one that thankfully has yet to come to fruition. To the site's personnel, however, it must seem perfectly reasonable, given the number of times things have gotten out of hand in this particular forum. In fact, to some, I'm sure this seems to be the only reasonable solution that the moderators can implement. That does not, however, mean it is the only solution.   I think it's time that the individual posters on this board took some measure of responsibility for the board's condition. Thus, I'm proposing an officially unofficial "troll list," or, more explicitly, a list of posters who we, the individual users of this site and not its administrators, have collectively chosen not to respond to, because we feel that further discussion with them does nothing to further legitimate discourse on this board.   Several individual posters have already implemented this system to some degree for themselves. The different threads on this board have numerous posts indicating that their posters have made a personal vow not to respond to or hold communication with a given username. However, individuals doing this individually, and not collectively, effectively renders the vow useless. The posters we don't wish to continue communication with still find several others willing to further their petty exchanges and give them more than enough ammunition to troll with. The only way to ensure that the "trolls" truly feel the consequences of their actions in any substantive way is to implement our bans at a collective level, and not on an individual basis.   To be perfectly fair, we can't allow this to be a McCarthy style blacklist we can turn to any time we get tired of a particular poster, or a particular group of posters, or something we can use to enforce unfair punishments for slight infractions. This needs to be a list of last resort, designed for only the most ignorant, abrasive and offensive of posters, who have committed just enough transgressions to significantly detract from the board's condition, but not quite enough to warrant a ban by moderators. Therefore, I would like to set out some objective criteria. Posters nominated for this list must demonstrate:   (1) repeated offensive, accusatory or inflammatory behavior, commensurate of what would generally be considered "trolling" by typical internet standards, (2) total disregard for the demonstrated veracity of another user's posts, (3) behavior intended to sow discord among other posters, or manipulate other posters into an emotionally compromised position, (4) repeated use of extraneous and irrelevant information in threads with the intention of moving the thread off topic, or (5) a stubborn commitment to or refusal to discontinue behavior generally considered disruptive by others, regardless of the intentions behind said behavior.   To identify said posters, all a user would need to do is nominate someone they believe to be guilty of one of the above criteria under this thread. We could discuss it and, if everyone is agreeable, add that poster to a list of trolls kept below.   Posters Identified as Trolls:

[Hidden Content]   I can't find any reports about this from a more well known news source, which makes me skeptical. But the seriousness of the situation also makes it something I can't entirely ignore, either.

  That's a good point. Maybe that's something we need to discuss on the state level.

It's on the SEC Network.

Game was called early due to lightening. Ironically, it poured at the stadium and there hasn't been a drop at my apartment a mile away. 41-0 Alabama (F)

You mean a Longhorn game isn't on the Longhorn Network?

Believe it or not, my apartment in Tuscaloosa actually gets the Longhorn Network, so I'll be watching this.

  Man, first y'all wanted our coach, and now y'all want one of our players? Is burnt orange the new color for envy?  ;)   To his credit, Coker seems to have have settled down some in the second half. But there are still issues.

I think it's obvious who will be the starting QB. I only stuck around for the first half, but Coker needs to work on his arm. Very mobile, though.

  Exactly.   The states are caught in a catch-22. Every time they stand up and do something to deal with the immigration crisis and its numerous consequences, this administration comes in claiming it's a federal responsibility (which is true) and that it should be left to the feds to enforce the law (which is arguably half true). But when the states leave it alone, the fed does nothing, and occasionally even does worse than nothing by picking and choosing which laws it will and will not enforce or loosening its policies to open up major holes in the system.   I personally think the Democrats want it that way. Ronald Reagan was onto something when he said that Hispanics are really Republicans deep down and just don't know it yet. When you look at polls regarding the individual issues, Hispanics almost always side overwhelmingly with what would generally be identified as the Republican side. They don't like taxes, they don't like abortion, they generally don't like regulations, they don't like big government and they're generally pro-business. The single issue where they side overwhelmingly with Democrats is immigration, and that one issue is so influential in the Hispanic community that it almost singlehandedly keeps the Hispanic vote in the Democrat column. If we dealt with that issue, the Democrats would almost assuredly lose that vote, and they are scared to death of that. Thus, keeping the system broken, and keeping immigration a headline issue, becomes the politically logical thing for the Democrats to do.

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  You are absolutely right. And that's one mistake I won't be making again.