Isoroku

Another gal on the rep forum? ooh...maybe I should stop by more often!

Me thinks I shall...

Too bad I missed this thead's hey-day

When someone comments, I typically just say "thanks"...I am generally disinclined to discuss the authenticity. What good can come of it?

Happy B-day Pho....I miss our debates!

I concur with your assertion. Long time, no see By-Tor.

After all several years, I'm still a Panerai fan when it comes to men's watches. I used to try to get away with it, but it's too bulky for a woman's wrist and people seem to not think it's as cute as I did. Just IMHO....

I was a WWII history buff, and Isoroku was the name of a conflicted Japanese Admiral...studied at Harvard, loved cards, and oversaw the event that brought the U.S. into the war. Hello everyone.....

I know it has been a long time...I very much miss my time on the forums. I am here because I have exhausted all possible options for me. I am trying to locate my husband's old friend...he is Japanese and lives in Tokyo. I have tried to hire a private detective in Tokyo (Galu agency), but they wanted $20,000 to look into it and there is no garauntee that they will be able to find out anything....and my fortunes are not what they were a few years ago. If anyone in here is fluent in Japanese (I can only speak very elementary Japanese), perhaps live, or have connections in Tokyo, please pm me.... I do have some decent into to go on, and any help will be very very much appreciated. Thanks so much! Iso

I think that interview could have been entirely different. I think the content of Clinton's response was quite logical and reasonable...Essentially : " We did everything that made sense at the time with the knowledge available...." Indeed, bin Laden was not a well known figure until the late 90's, and attributing the Somalia-debacle with bin Laden's comment about it showing our weakness isn't a fair connection of dots to Clinton. I think if he would have packaged that response in his normal cool, intelligent demeanor that he could walk away from that interview knowing that his perspective was clearly conveyed and his global initiative would have been discussed more thuroughly. Instead, his lapse of calm very much shrouded his (in my opinion) justified response. If I had read his non-tempermental lines of his response on paper, like how no one heard to UBL at the time, and that the FBI and CIA wouldn't certify the intel...I would be inclined to agree with him..... But with his "All YOU right wingers did this....and all the republicans did that!" and other martyrdom-like slogans made him look incredibly partisan and robbed his response of some credibility. Whenever anyone bunches a group together (like when he said "all the conservatives are this and that") it very much turns me off. I believe there are good, competent forces on either side of the aisle, and I would never say "all democrats are" anything...because I have always been drawn to the likes of Obama, Lieberman, Beareaux, etc....just like I am to McCain, Gulliani, etc. He had a perfect oppurtunity to go into enemy territory and convey his message to a viewing audience that statistically doesn't support him and his party and lay out a clear explaination and conveyance of what, to me, seemed like reasonable job done as president in that regard, given the resources, limitations, and intel he had. But instead he made himself look like a died in the wool, archetype liberal throwing a fit because he got asked a touchy question and was tricked....causing right wingers to cheer about him losing his cool and sounding less like his normally super-cool self, and that he had good reason to be defensive...and leftists cheering becuase the smack down with a FNC reporter. I don't see how anyone could claim a victory there. It seemed to me like a waste of time and a lost oppurtunity to give attention to a great cause that Clinton is doing alot to advance. One question and he went on a tangent for several minutes at the cost of discussing something alot more worthwhile than what happened in Somalia over a decade ago. Shame on Fox for getting on that topic...shame on Clinton for staying on it.

1.) I don't think just being alive entitles one to health care. Put in in perspective. Americans over eat more than anyone. We are making ourselves fat, sick, and incredibly unhealthy. WE ARE DOING IT! Maybe we should throw a fit because we are sick and the Europeans aren't helping Americans pay for our quadruple by-passes because we can't stay away from Double-Quarter Pounders with cheese. Hey, Europeans are more healthy than Americans 2.) You are half right. Able bodied 27 year olds should be able to pay thier own way. ( Assuming a reasonably affordable health care system is in place, which I admit is not always the case) Universal health care or no, there will always be people unjustly dying. 3.) Fit and healthy paying for the sick? Then why be healthy if someone is gonna foot my Gastric Bypass? Seriouslym though....I have problems for the hard-working healthy and fit paying for the lazy healthy. Why is it my responsibility to help someone who doesn't want to help themselves when I have two little ones I am already repsonsible for? If a sick person cannot provide for thier own health care, then yes....but if some guy in his late 20's just doesn't feel liking getting a job needs to see a doctor, then that's on him. The thing in Europe is that there are fewer people who abuse the system. Perhaps a cultural thing....from what I gather from friends who live across the pond. Universal health care without restrictions would be a disaster in the U.S. There is no way our society could handle that responsibly. Those who don't or haven't lived here must realize that this nation lives in a state of excess....we don't order hambuger, small fries and a coke once a month. We go a few times a week and get the Double Quater Pounder with Cheese Meal and Super-size the Mo-Fo....and EASY ICE! We use our homes as ATM machines to buy plasmas and [censored] we can't afford otherwise. We finance cars for 72 months or lease them for 60 months so we can have that 550i BMW even though we can only really afford a nice loaded Camry. Universal health care works under the assumption that the citizenry isn't hell-bent and having over 80% of it's population OBESE by the year 2025 and absolutely refusing to exercise more than the few calories burned by posting on forums.... think of it this way, if you would: Take Johnnyboy (an icon of fitness if there ever was one) and make a 300,000,000 person nation of all johnnyboys.... Take someone who is overwieght, eats like [censored], smokes, and gets little to no physical activity everyday...and make a 300,000,000 nation out of a bunch of him(s)... I can assure you that one of these two scenarios will be a viable successful universal health care system...the other will go bankrupt yesterday.

I bet a transition from a two party system would do wonders for the whole right vs. left thing. To think that Clinton Admin. didn't have a heapin' helping of responsibility in not taking oppurtunities on Osama and Al-Qaida is absurd. 9/11 happened about 8 months after Bush took office ( it is not a inconsiderable period of time, nor is it alot). That being said, the CIA offered various reasons for not capitalizing on the oppurtunities on Osama & Co. Among those reasons are collateral damage/civilian casualties....and sometimes the reliability of the source of the information that lead them there. Most who know me from the original RWG days think that I usually adhere to a more conservative perspective....which is true in terms of fiscal policy and foriegn policy....and I have long since lost faith in Bush, whom I voted for twice. To think that one party is the "good guys" is ridiculous...Two parties, and a gentlemen's agreement. As long as there are only two, they are virtually garaunteed taking turns running the executive branch, always having at least some sway in the legislative, and take turns leaving long-term impacts on the juducial. To the liberals, I say become a political capitalist, and the same to right-wing zealots. If the only two choices were Ford and Chevy, we wouldn't have the two best sedans on the market (Accod and Camry) I say offer real choice and apply market priciples to politics like the Europeans do : Offer numberous parties that more accurately represent the demographic make up of a nation, that will not only offer an alternative to two BIG parties sharing power and wasting resources, but also have to REALLY compete for you vote. Who should I vote for? I believe in the right for gays to marry (from a constitutional perspective), universal health care for children (not able bodied adults), and pro-active environmental legislation with real teeth....I also support for a, as Bush put it, "forward leaning" foriegn policy. That means lock n' load if they other guy doesn't wanna play ball. I believe in modest tax (preferrably flat across the board) levels for all Americans, rich, middle class, small business, etc. I have disdain for those who care more for the rights of violent criminals than the rights of the victim... So who should I vote for? Neither of the two parties in our two party system represents me nor do they represent many others. By the way....Bush using the 9/11 dead, if true, is quite dispicable...but I'm willing to bet that Democrats wouldn't do anything differently. If the Democrats were as much sheep as liberals say, there is no way they would survive in Washington. Michael Moore is a socialist weasel, who would certainly capitalize on any deaths/suffering/misfortune/ etc. that Bush would if he thought it would get him any attention. Heat is my favorite movie.

Thanks rek.... Yes, that's him. He has been a close friend for 9 years.... I bumped into this....wondering if it's him: www.sakamoto-koei.co.jp His name is Koei Sakamoto.....I know that Sakamoto is a very common name in Japan....but I don't think Koei is...

Thanks so much... My friend is Japanese, so he wouldn't have registered with the embassy....I'm almost to a point of hiring a private detective in Japan to find him......I don't know what is going on with him....I have two cell numbers, and they both still ring... but never answered. So someone's paying the bill.... I dunno.

A dear friend has not been heard from for almost 6 months....Seems to have disappeared! Is there anyone here who lives in or around Tokyo and is familiar with Setagaya area? Please pm me or email me! Thanks so much!