Callie

I have a good ethernet connection, although on occasion it doesn't work for a few hours. Because all of my homework assignment are posted on the internet, having no connection is a problem. I can't get Wi-Fi in my room because I'm up against a thick wall. The signal is strong if I walk out into the living room though.

I would be unsurprised if there were chess tournaments of longer duration. It's a game that people can play by correspondence after all.

I'm not sure exactly how results should be posted so I'll just follow Trenton's example. [Event "WebChess Board #63"] [site "WebChess"] [Date "2012-11-10 17:55:01"] [Result "1-0"] 1. h4 e5 2. d3 Nc6 3. Rh3 a5 4. c4 Bb4+ 5. Bd2 Nf6 6. a3 Bc5 7. b4 Bd4 8. Bc3 Ng4 9. f4 Bf2+ 10. Kd2 exf4 11. Bxg7 Nd4 12. Ra2 f3 13. exf3 Ne3 14. Qc1 Nb3+ 15. Ke2 Nxc1+ 16. Kxf2 Nd1+ 17. Ke1 Ne3 18. Ne2 Nxa2 19. Kd2 Nxf1+ 20. Kc2 Qe7 21. Rh1 Qxe2+ 22. Kb3 a4# 1-0

I should be available Friday afternoon and all of Saturday and Monday.

Well, what are all the Arizonans staring at so much that it requires a law?

Eh, custom titles seem to be a lot more common than I remember. Granted, when I first joined only the admins could grant custom titles.

I am interested, even though I probably suck at it.

I look so dashing in that photo.

The concept of Alorael throwing a temper-tantrum is pretty humorous. And even if he did it would be eloquent temper-tantrum, which almost sounds oxymoronic.

In other news Puerto Rico has voted 54-46 that it does not wish to maintain its current status. Puerto Rico's nonvoting commissioner will introduce legislation in Congress to admit the territory as a state. Obama has said he will support statehood, and I would be surprised if any significant opposition occurs in the House of Representatives. There's some problems with the way the referendum works, so who knows what will happen? You should be able to find the results from your secretary of state's website, along with all other results in your state.

As of right now Politico does not have a check because the official result hasn't been called. Is it different for the mobile version? In regards to marijuana in Colorado and Washington: the bigger problem is the conflict with state and federal law. Marijuana is a Schedule I drug at the federal level and the DEA has raided quite a few medical marijuana dispensaries. It will be interesting to see how the justice department responds.

The Associated Press has called the election for Obama.

As it turns out, I never actually uploaded it. Flickr has defeated me.

My Macbook

Oh, the election in the US hasn't happened yet; I just posted the poll a bit prematurely.

All votes are anonymous. Unfortunately, this poll isn't of the incredibly comprehensive variety, but I wanted to keep it simple. I thought about having different answers for those that did and did not vote, but I doubted the benefit of any added complexity. I could have added other meaningful questions, but I felt that any of the questions I thought of had been adequately covered in other threads. And of course, feel free to discuss the results of the election.

<3 As long as the government allows people to define contracts different than its default presumption. Oh wow, I forget I've been around that long. Well, this thread has plenty of Leviticus in it.

How is it determined that certain relationships are important and others are not? Marriage, whatever that means, seems like a rather arbitrary distinction and its definition in democratic societies is subject to the whims of the majority. Is it more advantageous than allowing people to define their own similar contracts? you should read some of my old posts on ppp

I agree with this entirely, and yet, I'm not convinced that it automatically amounts to bigotry. I would reserve accusations of bigotry toward those who attribute non-heterosexual behavior to evil or any comparable accusation of immorality.

I don't think people with conflicting religious beliefs are inherently bigoted, maybe misguided, but I don't think that being misguided automatically amounts to bigotry.

I've tried to leave parts of the ballot blank before, but the electronic booths I've voted at don't allow it.

It functions as a protest vote. Instead of voting for candidates you really don't like, you can say "I dislike all of these candidates" instead.

The reason for opposing LGBT rights is often attributed to hatred and/or ignorance by those who support it, but that's an unfair generalization. Although homophobia certainly exists and is prevalent in everyday society, most of the people who show up at the polls in opposition to gay marriage don't think of themselves as opposing civil rights and are legitimately concerned about altering an institution they consider sacred. It's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that people with opposing political beliefs are like the pundits and politicians we see on TV, but the vast majority of people are far more agreeable than political pundits. They're everyday people who might very well be picking their children up from soccer after they vote. There's a debate because there's disagreement about the issue, and usually people are more receptive to other people's opinions than you might think. We just tend to remember the disagreeable or vocal people we've had conversations with, but there's plenty of others who are courteous about debating or might not even wish to express their opinion at all. The internet provides a place for those loud, disagreeable people to be anonymous, and that really doesn't help our perceptions of others. (Full disclosure: I support gay marriage rights, but I think limiting marriage to two people is still too restrictive and that the government shouldn't be in the business of defining marriage at all)

I hope that's sarcasm there, but even if it is, it's pretty alarming. Insisting that your political opponents "[desire] to push [the country] back 50 years into the past" is old, tired rhetoric and is really just divisive.

That actually happened in a 1976 party primary for a congressional race (None of These Candidates won 47% of the vote). The law states that the actual candidate with a plurality of votes wins regardless. The Republican National Committee felt that the option would draw votes away from Romney in Nevada, so they filed a constitutional challenge to the law. The district judge sided with the RNC, but we still get the option in this election. The ruling is being appealed, though. I was under the impression that the Senate race in Montana is at least somewhat competitive.