Immigration Policy
Abortion/Reproductive Rights
Seperation of Church and State
Globalisation
Surveillance
Iraq
North Korea
Iran
Israel-Palestine
"War on Terror"
"War on Drugs"
Strong feelings on both sides of the issue. Rational thought and mutual respect for both sides . . . probably never existed at all. But the moderates and undecideds seem to be garnering much more vitriol than before.
Hmm. What else am I missing?
-murmur
Ah! Original Battlestar Galactica vs. New Battlestar Galactica.

For my Poli Sci class, we have to write a 10 page paper, the prompt of which is "what is at stake in this conflict and in what sense is the conflict in the Middle East* a conflict between traditional and modern forces? If those categories aren't a useful way of thinking about the conflict, why not?"
* Iraq basically.
I'm not actually done with it yet (9 pages atm...!), but I'm wondering if people would be interested in reading it and giving me comments when/if I post it up. Due to the nature of the prompt, it'll be fairly limited in terms of scope, but I'd be glad to engage in a discussion regarding the issues at stake.
In particular, I have a problem with not explaining what's in my head onto the paper. So, sometimes I think I clearly explain a point when to everyone else it's all gibberish.
Thanks to anyone willing to do this!

Hey, Bob?
We know that one song can affect another, at least in the case of 'Play for You'. While there might be meta-songs that affect a wide variety of other songs, have you considered whether or not there are songs that affect only one other song, possibly granting it power that it might not usually have?
The reason that I'm asking is due to my mind being sick and twisted. Because my brain is absolutely INSISTING to me that playing THIS:

Amoeba Hop
Words and Music by Christine Lavin
Just a little puddle of muddy water
Left there after the rain
I got down on my knees
I looked close
I saw things I couldn't explain
There was all those itty bitty
Teeny weeny little tiny creatures
Swimmin' and sloshin' about
I put my ear down to that puddle
I could hear one of them shout
We're goin' to the Amoeba Hop
Everybody's gonna be there
Got my eye on a cute paramecium
You know the one with the wavy hair
Rockin' and rollin' shakin' our cells
and flappin' our flagella all over
Well the good times don't never gonna stop
When you go to the Amoeba Hop
(That's what I heard... I mean it! I mean it!)
Then I spied a shy protozoan
Swingin' all by hisself
He was lookin' for a partner to shake a leg with
But everyone was dancin' with everybody else
So he was so lonely till Mother Nature
Showed him what to do
He boogied down he did a little binary fission
Split his-cellf in two (and now he's got a partner)
For the Amoeba Hop
Everybody gonna be there
My, oh my, of nucleoli
Have you ever seen such a perfect pair?
Rockin' and rollin' shakin' their cells
Slappin' their cilia all over
Well, the good times don't never gonna stop
When you go to the Amoeba Hop
Good times don't never gonna stop
When you go to the Amoeba Hop
Some folks that one-celled animals
Don't know how to swing
People who say that... are wrong
'Cause I saw a band of algae
Get up there and sing:
"When the red red robin comes
bob-bob-bobbin' along"
But to them it's a monster song!
Oooh the puddle was jumpin'
So was I
I guess I lost my head
In my excitement I splashed it dry
Oh my god I thought they was dead!
But no! They just come splashin' down
Right here into my hand
And sure enough I could still hear
That swingin' algae band Sayin'
We're going to the Amoeba Hop,
Everybody gonna be there,
Got my eye on a cute paramecium,
Look at the hair girls! Look at the hair!
Rockin' and rollin' shakin' our cells
Slappin' pseudopodia all over
Well the good times don't never gonna stop
When you go to the Amoeba Hop
Good times don't never gonna stop
When you go to the Amoeba Hop-hop hop bada
Good times don't never gonna stop
When you go to the Amoeba Hop!

...followed by THIS:
When the Red, Red Robin comes Bob, Bob Bobbin' Along
written by Harry Woods
part of "The Jolson Story", and recorded by Al Jolson
has also been recorded by Mandy Patinkin
When the red, red robin comes bob, bob bobbin' along, along,
There'll be no more sobbing when he starts throbbing
His own sweet song.
Wake up, wake up, you sleepy head,
Get up, get up, get out of bed,
Cheer up, cheer up the sun is red,
Live, love, laugh and be happy.
What if I've been blue,
Now I'm walking through fields of flowers,
Rain may glisten, but I still listen for hours and hours.
I'm just a kid again, doing what I did again, singing a song,
When the red, red robin comes bob, bob bobbin' along.

...yields a kaiju-class robin redbreast that might consider Mothra a healthy dinner, with leftovers.
Silly, I know, but I HAD to post it to get it out of my head. And I wanted to see if you had considered other song combinations like this before. Thoughts?
-Feinan

Starscream looked down at the human in amusement. "You think you can stop me, fleshling? I'd like to see you try."
Doug smirked back "Well, if you insist.
___________________________
"I've always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific." - George Carlin

Politics and Other Fun.
Please post all threads with primarily political content there from now on.
Thanks.

-- Bob
---------
For Jor-El so loved the Earth, he sent his only begotten son...

Use this area to explore political issues, in particular differences in political opinions. While a certain amount of vitriol is to be expected -- and higher amounts will inevitably be found in this forum than are seen in the others -- outright flaming will not be tolerated. Of course, this can be a subtle judgment call, but I trust both my members and my own subtle judgment.

-- Bob
---------
For Jor-El so loved the Earth, he sent his only begotten son...

Iran Plans
Military Realities of Iran
Implications
For the latter two links, I'm not sure how credible you could consider them, but they seem fairly credible. Top one by Seymour Hersh.

Because dammit, it makes a certain amount of horrible sense:

What do you think, sirs?---
Mr. Fnord
Raving blogger
http://www.jihad.net/
"when edison thinks down pipes into special Future Death Machine, in 21st Century another teenager on MySpace gets hit by a car." --Warren Ellis
Mr. Fnord interdimensional man of mystery

FenWiki - Your One-Stop Shop for Fenspace Information

"I. Drink. Your. NERDRAGE!"

Well, see, I followed a link that led to a site with more than a little bit of fan-created In Nomine materiel. My mind working the way it does, I promptly found myself struck by an Idea, despite knowing no more about the system that I'd been able to glean from online sources.
It starts with a demon. Name of Elisabeth. Not impressive enough for a demon? Add the surname 'Bathory'. Andreaphlus wanted impressive, she gave impressive. But that's not the point.
Maybe she's a Lillim, maybe not. Either way, early on in her career she took a look around and decided that this 'ambition for its own sake' thing wasn't near what it was cracked up to be - so she set her sights someplace moderate and started working towards it. Calmly, conservatively, patiently. She's immortal, after all. No need to hurry.
She took up a hobby, to kill time until she got there. Music - hey, don't laugh. It was occasionally useful on the job and it kept her working efficiently in the meantime, and that was the point. Sometimes, humming a pleasant little ditty wasn't appropriate to the situation, so she also took to keeping a little list of those who had gone to particular lengths to irritate her, and idly thinking up punishments and vengences against same.
Nothing too out of the way, especially for a demon.
Then she saw a Prince she was temping for hand out some rewards one day and noticed that Capital-'S'-Songs were, in fact, music. And she was good at music.
So she started looking into the idea of - perhaps, eventually - figuring out how to create new Songs, herself. From scratch.
Hey, it was a way to kill time, which was the point.
Then she ended up working for Belial. She refuses to talk about the experience - forcefully, if neccessary - and he likely doesn't remember at all. By the end of it all, though, she had a much bigger grudge against him than is wise for anyone to hold against a Prince - for comparison, she hates him worse than a fanatic Narn hates the Centauri. By a large margin.
Being neither stupid nor suicidal, though, she simply gritted her teeth and got clear of Infernal Fire. Working for Gluttony wasn't much better, mind, but at least Haagenti wasn't... *snarl* Never. Mind.
Serendipity struck again. One particularly stupid demon did something to irritate the Prince, and found himself slowly ripped apart and eaten one Force at a time... savoring the meal, as it were.
And Elisabeth had an Idea.
Not that anyone noticed, of course. She was careful not to let it show. After all, it's not wise to let someone know you're planning to kill them, and any Prince - even one as agressive as the title of Infernal Fire implies - has a long, long ear.
So she bounced around hell for a while, going here and there and always being careful not to become too much of a go-to girl. Then she noticed that the more studying she did on the Symphony to try and figure out how to work her Idea, the more it started looking like everything was connected. Like everything fit[.
Well, it wouldn't do to let something unexpected crop up in the way of her revenge, so she followed the thread up... and came to a conclusion.
Heaven was going to win. Sure, humans were inherently ugly and corrupt and all that, and sure, all cooperation boiled down to enlightened self-interest in the end, but the goody-goodys were, well, good at it. All that sugary pap really did seem to help them coordinate better... and coordination, as she'd had personal reason to find out, was the basic requirement for victory, and, ultimately, survival, which was the point.
Well, okay then. She definitely wanted to be on the winning side, and, since it actually wasn't an emotional question (yet), could afford to wait for the best opportunity.
Then she stopped thinking small. After all, why limit herself to just one Prince? Having them all gone would certainly benefit Heaven, and the Universe in general, truth be told, and, since she was a part of that same universe, her as well.
And that was the real point.
======================================
A GM who wants to use Elisabeth in his campaign is going to have to make one choice right at the start: Is he or is he not going to allow her to stick a TacNuke up the collective ass of the status quo, then take her thumb off the deadman's switch?
If not, well, the Game comes sniffing around her haunts fairly regularly - no one who smiles like that can possibly be trusted - but up until this point she's either charmed her way around them (she's notably good at that, even for a Lillim) or fed them a completely logical and consistent line of reasoning that would leave someone who believed it no choice but to be loyal to Hell, so long as they accept the basic premise that strength is inherently an individual trait. The fact that they keep falling for it is one of the main justifications for her opinion that most demons are fundamentally stupid. Eventually, though, one of her interrogators is going to be very, very smart or very, very perceptive, and will try and call her on it - and she's not quite done with her Project yet.
That poor unfortunate will promptly find its component bits spread across every available wall, along with those of any unfortunate colleagues it brought along. Elisabeth's main distinguishing power is that she can create Songs - to whatever purpose she needs. If she doesn't mind being a bit random and never being able to repeat the effect, she can even improvise on the spot. To back this up, she's also got a truly stunning amount of reserve power stored, just in case of that rainy day.
Once the hunt is on, she'll trigger the deadman charge hidden under her Heart - destroying the thing - then head for the nearest Tether. Anything short of a Superior that gets in her way is likely to end up a splat mark.
Once she makes it to the corporeal world, she'll make a beeline for the nearest Angel of Flowers... and give herself up as a candidate for Redemption.
The survival rates for real independants suck, you see.
PCs might be involved in this in one of three ways - one, they're demons, charged with - somehow - stopping this unbelievably dangerous rogue. Two, they're angels assigned to getting her to Heaven with skills, knowledge, sanity and willingness to cooperate all intact. Three, they're angels assigned to make sure that the crazy demon doesn't send everything collapsing into chaos and destruction... Naturally, the difficulty of any of the above options can be adjusted by simply scaling exactly how much power she has left after shooting her way out of Hell.
The other course - the 'Let's make this Universe REAL Interesting' option, is that she's got her Project Finished. What does it do? Well, it creates a spell form that latches onto a Celestial. Permanently. Then it starts sucking them dry, force by force. Until... *pif* Did I mention that the thing is, as far as anybody short of Lucifer or The Man Upstairs is concerned, it's absolutely indestructable? If Haagenti swallows it, frex, it just shreds him from the inside out.
There is a cure, or more precisely, a vaccine, which will prevent a Celestial from ever becoming infected in the first place - after all, she's quite well aware that letting her name be associated with an unstoppable one-shot-kill Song is not likely to be conductive to her long-term survival, and has been very careful to make it easy to counter for someone who knows what they're doing and can work ahead of time. It just needs to kill the one Prince - Belial - and that's the only real point.
Elisabeth's priorities are actually fairly simple - she wants to survive, she wants to join the winning side (ie, Heaven), she want's Belial's screaming carcass rotting to death in the hot African sun (but will settle for just his death), and, if she can, she'd like to convince Mom to make the same decisions she did... and certainly would rather avoid killing her.
But she wants to survive first and foremost - that is the point of all this, after all...
Anyway, what about high-change campaigns?

===============================================
"Puripuri puripuri... Bang!"

Again, just putting up the thread, not necessarily writing it.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll