steve_miller_5

What experience have people had with www.resortstayvouchers.com, which is being offered through Groupon? They are selling $399 (total price) for one week at a Mexican resort. But the site won't identify the specific properties, and I'm sure the catch is that resorts only release their unsold inventory at the last minute. I am concerned that there will be nothing but a handful of inferior resorts to choose from.

So, I'm looking for how many "stars" their available resorts have, and how good the selection is -- once you have your voucher and can see the deals.

Thanks.

I just bought a new AV receiver, a Yamaha RX-V465. (http://cdn.cnetcontent.com/0b/09/0b09df1d-678f-4d8...

My first attempt here is to use the receiver to connect my Comcast HD cable box to my TV.

The TV (Phillips 50PF7321D37, about five years old) has an HDMI connection on the back, and so of course I connected an HDMI cable from there to the "HDMI Out" connection on the back of the receiver.

Now for the cable box. It does not have an HDMI port, so that's out of the question. There is a row of jacks that has a Red/White pair labeled "Audio Out", and then a set of Green/Blue/Red jacks labeled "Video." I was thinking that was the way to go in connecting to the receiver.

The receiver has an input area called "AV1" with Component Video inputs (green/blue/red), and I plugged those three into those jacks. Elsewhere, it has an input area called "Audio" with a red/white pair of jacks, to which I connected the remaining two leads from the cable box. (I have also tried this with a different input area on the receiver "AV5", which has the red/white jacks, plus a yellow jack. This alternative made no difference.)

So I have everything connected as described above. When I select the "AV1" input on my receiver, the message on the front of the receiver comes up "Decoder Off". I have no idea what that even means. The TV has different inputs to select, and I have set it for HDMI. (There are set up settings for the TV, and I have tried changing the "HDMI" setting to "HD," "Cable, "and "Other" -- all with no effect.)

Bottom line, there is no video or audio feed to my TV. HELP!!!

Our daughter is fifteen, a high school sophomore. She is highly responsible... good grades, good kid, good friends, no trouble.

Her curfew is 11:00 p.m. on weekends. She has asked to be allowed to stay out until very late. The plan is to go to a friend's house to watch the complete Lord of the Rings DVD marathon -- 12 hours of movies starting mid-afternoon. These are good kids, and I have no trouble with the group she hangs out with.

What I do have trouble with is being out until that hour. She's too young to drive, and I wouldn't want her driving at bar-closing hours anyway. So either she has to get a ride from somebody, or we have to go fetch her at the wee hours of the morning. She even volunteered to walk home after the movies -- an idea which honestly did nothing to reassure me she is fully equipped to make responsible decisions.

My decision has caused a huge amount of commotion around here. Much crying and theatrics, even a facebook pasting of song lyrics laced with obscenity and suicide themes. She's not a troubled kid, so I take that at a 15-year-old-unchecked-emotions level of seriousness, but she is clearly upset.

I am looking for parents' and kids' answers to whether the curfew (11pm) itself is appropriate; and whether there is any good reason to make an exception for this one outing. Does it make any difference that this is at a boy's house?

Thanks.

My house has separate furnace and air conditioning systems. The second floor thermostat is the older kind that you have to set to either "Heat" or "Cool" plus dial it to the desired temperature.

I would like to replace this with thermostat where I just set the temperature -- and the heat or A/C comes on automatically as needed.

Is that a simple wire-for-wire swap that I can do myself? Thanks.

Shoving a $50 billion rescue package into Detroit does nothing to address the fundamental problem: the uncompetitive position of GM, Ford and Chrysler. They'll be right back flat on their backs in a couple of years.

On the other hand, the domestic auto industry employes about 1.1 million people. What if our government offered jobs to 250,000 of their workforce? This would enable the companies to quickly shed unneeded capacity and get down to a proper fighting weight, so to speak.

The government could pay these $250,000 people $40,000 per year for three years, and that would total only ("only"!!!) $30 billion. Barely half the bailout cost they're talking about now. And all of those people could help America rebuild its roads and bridges and fix schools and a thousand other valuable things.

I realize that is a slightly unrealistic solution, but fundamentally,

Regarding the recent White House meetings called by Pres. Bush to decide what to do about the financial crisis, Joe Klein of Time Magazine reports: "One prominent Republican told me that McCain was 'the least creative person in the room at the President's White House meeting. He simply had no ideas. He didn't even have any good questions.'"

Coming from a "prominent Republican," do you think this is a meaningful insight into McCain's economic policy knowledge?

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,185...

McCain wants to continue the Bush tax policy, in which 33% (the current marginal tax rate) of the income of higher income individuals is redistributed to those who are less well off. Up until recently, he favored redistributing 39% of their income, the same policy that Obama advocates. (He initially opposed Bush's tax cuts.)

If Obama's tax policy is socialist, isn't McCain's also? Or somehow is redistributing 33% of a person's income not socialst, but redistributing 39% is?

Where is the cut-off?

... of the opposite party's presidential candidate you wish your guy would support?

Please post only if you have a serious answer. No "The other guy is 100% BS" answers.

Is it as simple as greed -- people just want more money? As a citizen, do you feel an obligation to fund our government's spending? Does it bother you that future generations -- my kids and yours -- will have to fork over their dollars to cover our excesses?

Thanks.

http://www.politico.com/convention/swingstate.html

http://electoral-vote.com/

270 electoral votes are needed. Right now, Sen. Obama tracks to 286; Sen. McCain to 252. McCain's states already include Ohio, Florida and Indiana.

I have three questions directed to those who believe McCain will win this election:

(1) What states where Obama currently leads do think McCain will end up winning?

(2) Why do you think the voters in those states currently favor Obama, and

(3) Why do you think they will change their minds by election day?

Thanks.

This is an exact quote from the Republican Party's platform, adopted just three weeks ago in St. Paul:

"We do not support government bailouts of private institutions. Government interference in the markets exacerbates problems in the marketplace and causes the free market to take longer to correct itself. We believe in the free market as the best tool to sustained prosperity and opportunity for all."

How would you square this statement with what is going on the past week or two in Washington, including Sen. McCain's acquiescence that some sort of government intervention is needed?

Maybe party platforms are just an exercise to give delegates something to do?

http://www.gop.com/2008Platform/Economy.htm

Sarah Palin was on record as favoring the infamous Bridge to Nowhere until 2006 -- True or False?

Congress killed the appropriation for the infamous Bridge to Nowhere BEFORE Gov Palin "refused" the money -- True of False?

After the Bridge to Nowhere project was killed, Alaska received the federal money of $233 million, and spent it on other transportation projects? -- True of False?

No opinions please; this is not a place to state whether you like or dislike Gov Palin. I am just curious what the level of accurate information is out there.

... then why is McCain qualified at all?

This is a serious question. How do Republican advocates parse the experience question? Please spare me the customary rhetoric.

This comes from the website, http://electoral-vote.com./ What do you think?

"Most reaction to Palin was predictable. Republicans see her as a staunch conservative, a fresh new face, a reformer from outside Washington, and someone with executive experience, which neither Obama nor Biden have. Furthermore, as a woman, a mother with five children, and a moose hunter (and life member of the NRA) she will appeal to women, moderates, Westerners and cement the GOP base. She even rides a motorcycle, which working-class men will applaud. A brilliant pick. But even among dyed-in-the-wool conservatives there were some dissenters, like David Frum.

"Democrats don't quite see it like that. They say she is a featherweight who is completely unprepared to be commander in chief. Her executive experience is primarily 21 months as governor of a state with a quarter the population of Brooklyn. She is strongly antiabortion, not exactly what the disgruntled Clinton supporters are looking for. In short, a disastrous pick for the GOP.

"Most neutral observers are scratching their heads. McCain's strongest argument against Obama is that he doesn't have the experience to be President. How can his first major personnel choice be someone with demonstrably less experience than Obama (6 years as mayor of a village with 5400 people and 21 months as governor vs. 8 years in the Illinois state senate and 3 1/2 years in the U.S. Senate)? Doesn't that undermine his whole campaign? With so many solid choices available like governors Romney, Pawlenty, Sanford, and Ridge, why a total unknown who is being investigated by her own (Republican-controlled) legislature for possible ethical violations. What is McCain thinking?"

Based on current polling, Obama holds strong leads in WA, CA, HI, NM, MN, IA, WI, IL, ME, VT, MA, CT, RI, NY, PA, NJ, MD, DE and DC. He has smaller leads in OR, NV, CO, MI, IN and NH. These states total 289 electoral votes -- 19 more than is needed to elect.

McCain leads strongly in ID, WY, UT, AZ, NE, KS, OK, TX, LA, AR, MO, MS, AL, TN, KY, GA, FL, SC and WV. He holds smaller leads in MT, ND, SD, OH and NC.

VA is too close to call.

http://electoral-vote.com/

My question is, if you think McCain is going to win this election, which of the above-listed Obama states do you think he will wrest from him? Why do you think that?

Please, this question is not for you to tell me who you want to win, or that you hope either candidate will win. Just if you think McCain will end up winning, which states will flip?

Let us extrapolate a little bit, and assume that an end to the insurrection in Iraq is near at hand... that a military victory is within sight. All of which seems plausible. Three questions:

Firstly, in your opinion, what will the US have gained from that war? (I am not asking what the Iraqis did or didn't gain -- just the US.)

Secondly, based on your answer to that, if in 2003 you had known that would be the outcome, would that have been enough to earn your support for the war at the time?

Finally, would your second answer be any different, if you had known in 2003 that there were no WMD, that Al Qaeda was not present in Iraq, that Iraqi oil revenues would not pay for our expenses, and that the war would carry on this long and cost this much in terms of lives and spending?

I posted this reply to another question dealing with being scared of having a Muslim President. At last check, I had 8 thumbs up and 7 thumbs down. I would appreciate hearing from any of the 7 thumbs-downers, indicating what they found wanting in my answer.

Here was my reply:

==========================

• Obama favors the death penalty for OBL

• Obama has consistently reiterated his agreement with the US's support for Israel. This is a direct Obama quote from 2004: "'Our first and immutable commitment must be to the security of Israel, our only true ally in the Middle East and the only democracy."

• In 2006, Obama Cosponsored and passed the "Palestinian Anti-Terrorism Act"

People should read the Fact Check section of Obama's website. It is hard to come away from a serious reading of that without realizing the extent to which Obama's record has been distorted.

http://factcheck.barackobama.com/