Meme through jnala and others
#1 US


#1 UK


#1 Germany

(It's a cover of a Petula Clark song)


And all records under 3 minutes !

played with 2 $5 blinds, ante rising constantly.
I haven't folded to $5 and $10 since hand 10.
10/33, 27 in the money

PL Omaha just started. I'm in.

History Quiz here


1) Where did the Vandals settle?

The province Andalucia, Spain. At least that's what my history teacher told us 30+ years back. Looks like the view on that has changed. Nonetheless, that period is a very fascinating time, seeing many peoples moving all across Europe.

2) Name some European regions where the official language isn't the native language.

Guess this one was to open a question. Technically, Kurdistan isn't in Europe but in Asia, but it is far from being an official language in Turkey. It's rather oppressed. As for some regions:

They speak German in Romania and Hungary. They moved in after a war left the area nearly uninhabited. There was a similar region in Russia.
Slovenian and Albanian is spoken in some parts of Italy.
There's a danish minority in Northern Germany.

3) Germany is a federal republic consisting of 16 states. It has been a confederacy before the 20th century. Of how many states did it consist of?

More than 100 states in an area of maybe twice the size of today's Germany. My hometown was an part of a state consisting of 5 towns and actually separated from the other 4 towns. For hundreds of years ALL male decendants of a King inherited an equal piece of the Kingdom. Eventually laws got changed and only the eldest inherited the entire Kingdom. After the Napoleonic wars in 1806 Germany consolidated somewhat into 39 states.

4) There was a time the catholic church had two popes.

Avignon. In the early 14th century France was very influential and a series of popes where french, which made them move to Avignon. At the end of the 14th century 2 additional subsequently established themselves again in Rome, while the influence of the popes in Avignon shrunk.

Constantinople was a good second guess, but I understand it was more a political split than a religious one.

Channelling jpmassar Here's a quiz: European History

1) Where did the Vandals settle?

2) Name some European regions where the official language isn't the native language. Extra credit if you know why.

3) Germany is a federal republic consisting of 16 states. It has been a confederacy before the 20th century. Of how many states did it consist of?

4) There was a time the catholic church had two popes. One with seat in Rome. Where did the other one reside?

Last ditch effort to sell more vaccine?

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN1521475420100115

Chipleader in the $11 HORSE
in the money in the $11 NL
burning candles at both ends

US
U.S. Struggles Anew to Ensure Safety as Gaps Are Revealed
By ERIC LIPTON
Published: December 29, 2009
The Department of Homeland Security is struggling to strengthen an aviation security system it has spent $40 billion rebuilding since 2001.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/us/29screening.html

Extra teams of specially trained security officers have been roaming airports looking for tells among the passengers — furtive glances or people who nervously open and close bags repeatedly.

and

Hundreds of additional canine teams are in place at some of the nation’s 450 commercial airports, and nearly 2,900 of the transportation security officers have been assigned to so-called behavioral detection teams that observe passengers headed to flights for possible hints of terror plots, a strategy adopted from Israel.

I flew back from Austin yesterday. The security wait was surprisingly short, only 15 people or so ahead of us. I didn't see anything special in the actual screening. However, a uniformed TSA officer walked along the roped line of people waiting for the ticket check and greeted everybody. A friendly how are y'all doing? He even handed out police badge stickers to the kids.

I am sure that this was the psych corps at work. Or I should start joining some conspiracy theory mailing lists.

Since we are on a Christmas trip about to fly back home I actually switched on the TV and watched some news. A quick sweep across the news channels / morning news produced 5 out of 5 reports about the bomb scare and how we all now have to sit on our hands during the last hour of the flight. Most of them ignoring or only casually noticing that this is meant for international flights. And most recent news actually say that it was never meant that way, only that people are supposed to stay seated upon the flight crews direction.

I am sick and tired of the daily scares being hyped up by the news shows. It is one of the things were the cure is worse than the disease. So many self fulfilling prophecies. You can't even watch the weather reports anymore, since they all are named extreme weather report.

Here's a start: http://www.dotmed.com/news/story/11136/
, development of test programs on medical liability tort reform alternatives,

I know it's only a test program, but better than nothing. Just like everything else in the health care bill.

The mayor of Arlington, TN posted on his facebook:

http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2009/dec/04/mayor-fires-at-obama-online/

In the opinion of Arlington Mayor Russell Wiseman, President Barack Obama's speech on Tuesday night on the war in Afghanistan was deliberately timed to block the Christian message of the "Peanuts" television Christmas special.

and our muslim president is there, what a load.....try to convince me that wasn't done on purpose

"you know, our forefathers had it written in the original Constitution that ONLY property owners could vote, if that has stayed in there, things would be different........"

Working hard on making schmengie become a soccer fan.


see more Epic Fails

If he gets desperate enough over the exerted pressure, he might move to Minnesota and vote Al Franken.

Here's one for schmengie, since he likes the sport so much.
Raids Expose Soccer Fixing Across Europe
German law enforcement officials arrested 17 on Friday in connection with what was described as the biggest match-fixing scandal yet uncovered in European soccer.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/21/sports/soccer/21fix.html

Since everybody's doing it, here's my leet table selection fro WRGPT. I have seen swedish sounding names in this tournament, and I do know a Bob or two.

+-+----------------------------+--------+--------+------+----+--------+
|#|   Name                     |Bankroll| Action |Status|Pot#|Pot Size|
+-+----------------------------+--------+--------+------+----+--------+
 1|D  Heckler                  |  29700 |    300 |folded|    |        |
 2|>  Alan Gopin               |  19950 |  10050 |      |    |        |
 3|   night owl                |  29900 |    100 |folded|    |        |
 4|   Jupiler                  |  30000 |      0 |folded|    |        |
 5|   Per Landberger           |  30000 |      0 |folded|    |        |
 6|   LVglenn                  |  30000 |      0 |folded|    |        |
 7|   Capitalist Swine Flu     |  29700 |    300 |folded|    |        |
 8|   Joesr                    |  29700 |    300 |folded|    |        |
 9|   Bob                      |  29700 |    300 |folded|    |        |
10|V  Late Entry 7             |  30000 |      0 | NoSho|    |        |
+-+----------------------------+--------+--------+------+----+--------+

And I know how to use the html "pre" tag.

Don't know where I got the reference from, perhaps some LJ user, but here's a

mathematical model to survive a zombie attack


“Only sufficiently frequent attacks, with increasing force, will result in eradication, assuming the available resources can be mustered in time,” they concluded.

3 times

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/23/business/economy/23leonhardt.html

Very factual article about:
* the minuscule amounts of actual malpractice awards compared to total healthcare cost
* huge amounts of unrecognized malpractice
* lots of money spend on defensive medicine

Many claim that a huge part of health care cost comes from patients and their lawyers suing the pants off the health care providers. Here's my suggestion: Why not take that out of the equation by following the example of the car insurance companies: "No fault". Damages caused by accidents during medical treatment, poor workmanship, and even malpractice are paid up for by the insurance companies through a simple assessment, without looking for guilt or punishment. Awarded damages can be reviewed periodically and adjusted accordingly. You can only sue over the most egregious misconduct, criminal intent and similar categories.

Wouldn't that make things a lot cheaper? Insurance companies are certainly able to assess the risk of accidents and put a proper price tag on it. A price certainly lower than having to pay lawyers and experts on both sides of a lawsuit. There is certainly a chance of abuse, misjudgement and other bad decisions, but with a system to appeal decisions many problems can be eliminated or limited. Also, I believe many victims would be just fine with some kind of lower compensation, when compared to long drawn out and risky processes.

Here's a little piece talking about poll numbers juggling which ties in with jpmassar's post: http://jpmassar.livejournal.com/195027.html

It says that polls are misleading because they often are to broad. A 50% disapproval rating of Obama on health care includes the disapproval of people further left who want to have a public option and lumps them together with Tea Baggers. Also, a larger number of disapproval comes from the left, unhappy about how much is given up in order to make the right happy. http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2009_08/019592.php

schmengie sent me to http://newsbuster.org the other day. Let me send you to the Huffington post for balance. It makes you ask for more people like Al Franken in the house and senate Franken Calms Down Health Care Opponents (VIDEO)