eddhead

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the fact of the matter is the comments on the US' willingness to " amend the constitution when it suits the" and over the perception we are not capable of public discourse on the issue were very inflammatory and like Chieftang, I take issue with them. Morevoer, if you really can't figure out why it is so objectionable for Iran of ALL countries to possess a nuclear weapon than you are not paying attention. You are talking about a country headed up by a maniac who denies the holocost ever happened. He is a true sociopath. I do not know where you live, but I hope you never need to second guess yourself on that one. p.s. please do not ever put me in the position to defend the bush administrations foreign policy again.. it does not suit me as i am anything BUT a fan of presidend sh!t for brains. but that does not take away from the previous points raised.

I think you are oversimplifying a very complicated stance of the US citizenry on this issue , and underestimating our capacity for deep thought on the matter. Frankly, I am increasingly finding this kind of generalization of the US by our European friends to be prevelant on this board and that disturbs me.. but that is perhaps a subject for another thread. It is simply not true that all americans support gun ownership. the issue really is that gun laws in the US are within the juristiction of state and local govts rather than the the federal govt and as a result, are inconisistently legislated and applied from a national perspective. So for instance while gun laws in states like Virginia and Texas are rather lax, New York State and especially NYC have very restrictive gun control laws.. more restrictive perhaps than a number of non-US countries that are considered to be strong gun control advocates. In the city, it is almost impossible to legally own a handgun. The issue in NY, Chicago and Philly is similar to what has previously been described with respect to the availabity of guns in the UK. Gun laws in surrounding states are very accomodating to owners and it is very easy for someone to buy a gun from a neigboring state and illegally resell it to someone else who than files out the registration number and transports it accross state lines. That is why gun crime is so high in Philly and Chicago for instance. BTW, it is also not true that Americans are willing to frequently amend our constitution "when it suits us.." the last constitutional amendment was enacted some 80 odd years ago with the abolishment or prohibition. This is a serious document in this country a national treasure in fact, and is not trifled with without a great deal of forethought. Your comment would suggest we take such actions frivolously and that is simply not true. I would appreciate a bit more sensitivity to this matter on your part. And once again, I will make the case that the the argument that the constitution protects the rights to bear arms outside of the context or arming a militia is at best unclear.

.. and kill with great efficency which is really the point. You could never do the amount of harm with a knife that you can do with an automatic weapon. I am not familiar with any instances where a knife wielding lunatic went nuts and stabbed 33 random people to death within the span of a couple of hours. And saying explosives would do the trick only means we need better control over explosives... i am just sayyyyinnn'... still i go back to my previous point about taking moderate stances to solution what is more and more becoming a really tragic societal issue. I am past the poing of trying to a make policy stance here.. there is too much at stake. At this point I would absolutly settle for having a well thought our national discourse with serious minded pragmatic moderates who are more focused on getting to a solution than they are with taking a stand. Excellent point.

I think that is debatable. The historical context of the second amemdment was national and state defense. The Constitutional Congress' 's armed forces were chiefly comprised of individual state militia made up of personel who used their own weapons. This is why the amendment begins with a conditional preamble around the need to maintain an armed militia as a justitificaton for bearing arms.

As exemplified in this post, this is a very emotinal issue in the US. On one side we have Gun Owners who claim an absolute consitutional right to own fire arms based on the second amendment. On the other, are the gun control advocates who believe the context for the second amendment was to provide armed militia, a concept that has become obsolete with advent of the Federal Defence structure of the active armed forces and the reserve guard. This group tends to be as absolute in their convictions as the gun advocates are in theirs. In the interests of full disclosure, Ifall into the gun control bucket. Nevertheless, irrespective of your position on this issue, I feel that generally, there is some middle position between the two extreme sides that can be arrived at if we can just take some of the emotion out of the discourse. For instance perhaps if gun control advocates like myself would give a bit on non-automatic personal weapons, and guns rights advocates would give on assault weapons and assault ammo. we can at least mitigate the potential for harm. Unfortunetly, I just do not see it happening.. .the NRA is too hardcore on their positon of absolute right to ownership and politically this is a non-starter for the left wing. In fact you could argue that the advocacy of stonger feder gun control laws cost Al Gore Virginia in the 2000 presidential race and by extension, cost him the presidency. The irony I am sure is not lost on people like me who support this initiative. Some observations: - Although I favor strong gun control laws, believe it or not, I at least try to be objective when discussing the issue with folks who have views that are different than those of my own. I know there are people out their who justify the right to own a personal firearm, and while I do not agree with them, i get their point and understand the position. I can understand why a single woman living alone, or a man with a family might want to purchase a weapon for personal or family protection. To me the compromise here might be more constraints around concealed weapons permist. If you can go along with that, I can agree to disagree with you nd still have a good day. But I do not get people who are so wrapped up in what they preceive to be their absolulte right to ownership that they decry ANY responible attempt to put up some restrictions around who can own a gun, what type of gun it can be, and where they can take. Let's face facts people.. The VA Tech assaulant went into a gun shop in the morning and walked out with an automatic weapon and assault amo less than an hour later. There are not a lot of places in the US other than Virginia where you can do that. No cooling down period, very limited background check. I mean, there just has to be someway we can prevent psycologically unbalanced people from getting their hands on guns... for the sake of the public good. It just strike me that any nut job with a license and no criminal record can get their hands on a gun in Virginia. It is not a conincidence that this happened in a state that has perhaps the least restrive gun control laws in the country, anymore than that "Beltway Sniper" incidents of 2002also occured in the Virginia area is. -There are entirely too many incidents of mass, random muders occuring in recent years and by that I mean 20 years or so. UTEP, Columbine, Beltway, VA Tech... this is not something we can close our eyes to and do nothing about. - Were we able to reach the middle ground decribed above, VA tech would have still had casualities... maybe 2 instead of 33. Hence my remarks about mitigating the loss. - As I mentioned above, I may not agree with personal fire arms advocates, but I get it. For the life of me, I cannot understand the justification of owning assault weapons or assault ammo. If you are a collector, and are concerned about your hobby, I would put to you that the interests of public good FAR out weigh the personal satisfaction you get from persuing this hobby. If you do not see that, you are probably to far over the top to discuss this issue with. - People who advocate arming the citizenry as a means to disincenting armed crimes scare the sh!t out of me. This is exactly why people who live overseas think the US is still like Dodge City in the late 1800's. If you are advocating frontier justice, or even suggesting that if everyone owned a gun we would experience LESS armed crime, please do not come near me, because I am frightened of you. Really. - Of course I realize that tighter arms control does not prevent bad guys from hijacking planes and flying them into buildings. But that argument is a red herring.. it is irrelvent. The fact is, stricter guns control laws would prevent or at least mitiate the occurances of random mass murder in places like Columbine and UTEP and VA Teck. And that is the point. - Politically, Federal gun control is dead in the water, period. I am sorry but that is just the way it is. the NRA is just too strong a lobby group, they spend too much money, and the political hacks on the left (and i am by the waya lefty but these people REALLY ARE HACKS) just do not have the guts to take a positon that is consistent with thier ideological views. . Democratic politicians have absolutely no courage to their convictions, and I say that as a registred democrat. It digusts me. Any chance the left had to inact federal gun control died with Clinton and Gore.

Well sometimes they do.. but this guys spots are indelible.. after all that bs this is really hard to believe.

this probably does not qualify as my favorite album but I gotta tell ya, I listened to London Calling last night.. first time in a couple of years.. wow.. that record kicks a$$

OK, since I am going to Hong Kong at the end of the week I gotta at least ask if you know where in Hong Kong the watch was purchased and where I can shop. Thanks.

wow, dems some nice pics!!

Hey, I think we are related!!

Some of the best Pizza I ever ate was on the north shore of Staten Island. Personal faves Deninos, Joe and Pats, and the Broccol Rabe pie at the Roadhouse. Hard to beat!!

I saw Clapton play maybe 15-16 years ago at Shea Stadium with Elton John. Terrific show.

I agree. The members I dealt with on the member board were honorable people who provided more than fair value. Not only that but I had the opportunity to develop relationships I might not have otherwise. Finally one thing about trading with members you know... you know you are getting what you paid for and you know the product works the way it is supposed to. Not to take anything away from the dealers but not all of them inspect the goods before they are drop shipped. When dealing with a member you know and trust QC becomes a non-issue.

No, I live in mid-town manhattan. Can't beat Pastosa's home made ravioli though!

So I hear. Thanks, I stand corrected. Still, the the pretinent point of my post still remains... dealer sponsorship is not a good thing Thanks again.

bad idea. creates potential conflict of interest issues (real or preceived) and undermines the credability of board as non-biased. It will make us appear as though we only recommend dealers who contribute. This is the problem with RWI 2 in my view.

i have them all. that 10,000 maniac's album is extremly underrated.

Freak! yeah but how many people can possibly do better than the top .1% there is something very odd about this.

Arcadia Garders II. It is a pretty nice little building.. I owned a 1 BR there for a while which I rented out.. had very good luck with tenants, the last of whom purchased the apt. If you need a broker,PM me.. i know a good one in SI.

Those are both great albums.

I also used to own a condo in staten island which i rented out.. .over by forest ave, rite accross the street from clove lakes park. If I can help, let me know.

By Tor's DMB tribute inspired this post. So here are a few of mine,not necessarily in this order Traffic - Live at the Canteen Who - Live at Leeds CSNY - 4 way street Allman Bros - Live at the Filmore East The Band - Last Waltz Talking Heads - Stop Making Sense Neil Young - Live Rust Stehen Stills- Stills Live. Nirvana- Unplugged Ok, so I am old.

got mine from PT... took a bit longer to arrive, but it was not drop-shipped and was QC'ed... I recommend him.

Hi Ed, I am an Ed too. I live in a condo in NYC which i purchased after first shopping for co-ops so I think I can help you out. Basically when you buy a co-op you are buying shares of a a private incorporated company that owns the building you plan on living in. The purchase comes with a proprietary lease on the apt you plan to live in that never expires. So you don't own the apartment per se, but you have have an ongoing lease that is collateralized by your shares in the building. So your mortgage is for the shares, and the lease. Your common charges include all the building maintenance charges as well as a portion of the mortgage on the building itself. Therefore a portion of your common charges is tax deductable.. the portion that relates to the mortgage on the building. With a condo you are buying your apartment.. the building your apartment is in has already been paid for by the developer. Your common charges are strictly against the upkeep of the common areas and the amenities.. there is no mortgage payment to the building. Your mortgage payment is against the purchase price of the condo itself. So you own the unit. Condo's tend to be priced higher than co-ops by 25% or more depending on the builiding, age, location, etc.. In a condo becasue you own the unit, you have more flexability. Generally, you do not require board approval to purchase, sell, or rent, and you require board approval for only the most extensive renovations. In NYC condos tend to sell for between $1000 and $1300 per sq foot. Co-ops are priced lower but have higher maintenance fees because a portion of those fees is used to pay off the mortgage on the building itelf.. that is the portion that is tax deductable. Generally you need board approval to buy, sell, and rent your unit out. When you sell, you have to pay a sellers tax to the coop board. And all renovations require approval. Co-op boards can be very inflexible and unwieldy.. most will not allow you to rent out ur apt. When I was shopping for coops, you could get a nice one id a decent area for about $700-900 sq ft. In terms of resale, I think that is more dependant on location than anything else. The NYC market remains surprisingly reslient and strong although not nearly as stong as it used to be. Here is an excellent link to a report on current real estate in Manhattan: http://prudentialelliman.com/NYCPhotos/ret...rts/mmo1q07.pdf Finally, I am not sure where you are shopping, but if you found a 950 sq ft apt in manhattan for $179K i would venture to guess there was a typo someplace... they just do not exist. Good luck, and let me know if i can help further.