?

I'm seeing a lot of questions today back and forth: Bush got into Harvard because he was a Legacy. Obama got in because of Affirmative Action. Blah, blah, blah.

Does anyone here comprehend the real difference? Harvard is a PRIVATE school. They should be completely free to set whatever admissions policies they choose. They have to live by the reputations of the men and women who graduate and the quality of education they provide, so they can only hurt themselves by setting arbitrary admissions criteria.

Personally, I don't care if they gave extra weight to legacy applicants, people with long hair, better hygiene, or whatever other superfluous, non-academic criteria they choose. That's their right to do so. And yes, that *includes* their right to discriminate along racial or gender lines. I find all the the above to be stupid and despicable in the latter case, but I recognize their *right* to do so.

However, Affirmative Action is *not* an instance of a private organization exercising their right to set admissions criteria. It represents the *loss* of that right. AA involves an outside entity *forcing* a school to adopt an arbitrary admission criteria.

So, yes, both admissions policies are totally arbitrary. However, for those of you that are equating them to each other, can't you see that the difference is freedom?

With Bush, love it or hate it, our foreign policy was clear and consistent. Now, I'm not so sure. What exactly IS our foreign policy, what is its philosophical foundation, and how closely have we adhered to it?

I'm not looking for condemnations of the president here (either of them), I'm looking for anyone who can summarize this for me in a concise fashion.

Results of a recent Pew Research Center poll:

• 49% of _________ say Islam plays only a "small role" in public affairs [...], while 95% prefer the religion play a "large role in politics."

• 84% favor the death penalty for people who leave the Muslim faith.

• 82% support stoning adulterers.

• 77% think thieves should have their hands cut off.

• 54% support a law segregating women from men in the workplace.

• 54% believe suicide bombings that kill civilians can be justified.

• Nearly half support the terrorist group Hamas.

• 30% have a favorable opinion of Hezbollah.

• 20% maintain positive views of al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden.

• 82% of ___________ dislike the U.S. — the highest unfavorable rating among the 18 Muslim nations Pew surveyed.

When then CBO predicted the health care bill to be deficit neutral, you waved it in everyone's face. Later, they backpedaled, acknowledging accounting trickery and estimating real costs saying that a repeal would actually save $540B.

Now, CBO Director Elmendorf has announced that he estimates that the health care law will destroy 800,000 jobs over the next ten years. Bear in mind, that you were the ones reminding us of how non-partisan the CBO is...

So, in light of the $540B price tag and the 800k job losses, how do you still stand behind Obama and defend this bill?

http://www.speaker.gov/Blog/?postid=224598

If we accept the premise that talk radio *caused* this political assassination attempt, and we use the accepted legal definition of causation:

1. "Cause" and "Effect" must have a statistically significant correlation

2. "Effect" must not occur without the presence of "Cause"

Then, in order to say that conservative radio *caused* this event, you would have to deny that political assassinations occurred before Rush went on-air.

So, what really happened to Lincoln, Garfield, Goebel, McKinley, Kennedy, etc.? Or, is this just another example of liberals distancing themselves from logic?

Seriously. Conservatives are ardent supporters of the Constitution--you know, that document that *establishes*, not rejects, a government. How does not wanting the government to reach it's tentacles into all aspects of our lives considered "anarchy?"

And yet, I've seen at least five questions tonight complaining about this nonexistent complaining? Are libs really running out of stuff to complain about, cause I've got a few ideas that will really boil their blood...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40194328/ns/us_news-li...

Seems to make as much sense as any other regulations/licensing requirements I've seen...

I'm seeing a lot of questions here from the left standing up for the guy accused of rape. What gives?

I've got a 1-1.5 hour one way commute every day. I'm trying to find something productive to do with my 2-3 hours a day that I spend staring at someone's bumper and listening to the same news headlines and traffic reports on infinite loop.

Having recently moved into a largely Spanish-speaking neighborhood, I'd like to take up learning the language. Can anyone recommend a series of language-learning CDs that I can work on in the car? It's ok if there's accompanying software or workbooks, or whatever. I can do those at home, but I'm really looking for a way to make better use of my commute time.

Thanks!

The other day, I came home from lunch and let my dog out as usual. When I went to bring him in, I found him tossing a squirrel around the back yard like one of his plush toys. I brought him inside, euthanized the squirrel and disposed of the carcass.

I checked the dog for any scratches and the squirrel for bite punctures. I didn't see any, but I'm still worried about parasites or other nasties that he could have contracted orally from the squirrels coat. He's going into the vet soon for a regular vaccine update. Anything specific he should be checked for?

Thanks

We put an offer on a house in foreclosure a week ago. Two days later, the bank (seller) stated that they had another offer and were entertaining final and best offers until the end of the day. We put in what we felt was a very strong offer: we offered the list price, and we have no home-to-sell contingency.

The contingencies that we do have are a termite inspection (about $50, seller's responsibility by law), septic tank inspection (seller), assessment (VA provided), home inspection (our responsibility) and a seller contribution of $4k (we put $6k in the offer).

Today (5 days since the "final and best" offer), they informed us that our offers are still very close and are looking for anything that could move up the closing date or "clean up" the contract. We already have a pretty aggressive closing date, and our mortgage company may not be able to do anything faster. As far as contingencies go, we will not waive a home inspection, the VA requires the assessment. I could care less who pays for the sewage and termite inspection.

Our agent is going to tell the listing agent that we don't feel it would be responsible to move up the closing date and that we will consider negotiating contingencies if they isolate specific contingencies that are problematic for them. We are very motivated to buy this house, but it feels like they're just putting a feeler out there to see if they can sweeten the pot any. I'm not convinced that we haven't already significantly surpassed the other bid. On the other hand, our offer is still about 15% lower than recently sold comps in the area.

What do you think? Did we do the right thing here? Advice?