Just_A_Guy

I dunno. Sounds to me like one or two months of utter coolness--and then the novelty wears off, and you resign yourself to twenty-two months of rejection.

I recall reading accounts from wivesofjosephsmith.org where they women talked about basically having to sneak around with Joseph behind Emma's back. Emma's antipathy towards polygamy is pretty well-known--and, IMHO, hard to explain if she didn't suspect Joseph was having marital relations with at least some of those women. Apologies; I should have been more clear. I didn't mean to suggest that Joseph never practiced platonic polygamy--only that the people who argue that all of Joseph's polygamous relationships were platonic have the weight of evidence stacked against him. I'm sure you're very well aware that just because a couple never has children, doesn't mean they never had intercourse.

Yeah, but that was back when I was trying to talk you out of following Lucifer. Don't tell me you've forgotten it all?

Most women, I understand, are only fertile for about three--maybe five--days per month. Considering that Joseph's visits to his other wives were scheduled around Emma's generosity (or lack of vigilance) more than his wives' own biological clocks, I think the lack of children is perfectly understandable. Frankly--we've got sworn statements from women claiming they had sexual relationships. We've got Joseph Smith teaching, in essence, that polygamous males should have sexual relationships with their wives (it isn't only the Book of Mormon that associates polygamy with child-bearing; Joseph himself drew the connection repeatedly). It seems to me that the onus is now on the (for lack of a better term) "platonic-polygamy" theorists to demonstrate that Joseph did not have sexual relationships with women besides Emma.

Your question being, in response to my use of the term "holy flip", the following: And, dagnabbit, you're right. It was indeed a disguised way to curse. And I am very, very threatened by that--so much so, that I deliberately dodged the question and engaged in the red-herring tactic of pointing out that you had made a bald-faced misrepresentation of another one of my posts, which observation I otherwise never would have made. I am so ashamed of myself.

I agree that it's not easy to go through the hoops imposed by local and federal governments in order to get aid. A significant part of my pro bono practice is helping people seeking various state benefits navigate the bureaucracies involved. But it's just plain wrong to act as though the programs aren't in place; and complaining about the massive red-tape involved only begs the question of how an even larger, more bloated federal program would be an improvement over the status quo.

Honest questions? Sure, if you have any. But if you think you've got some inalienable right to make nonsensical posts and have them go unrefuted or (in egregious cases) unmocked, you've got another thing coming. And this: is nonsensical as written. Egregiously so.

I've known a couple of rape victims, and their lives were messes even (in one case) fifteen years after the event. People need to know that you can recover from the mental trauma of sexual assault and live a normal life, and I'm willing to forgive Ed Smart a little self-aggrandizement as he gets that message out.

You honestly don't know the difference between being accused of being dumb and being accused of playing dumb? Really?

Have you checked out Mormon Times, Splashboy?

I wonder about this. The power of Dresden and Hiroshima wasn't that we were destroying what our enemies considered "holy ground"; it was a signal that "we can do this anywhere within your borders and there isn't a darned thing you could do about it; and you could be next". I'm not convinced that signal could be sent as clearly to a non-state actor; nor am I convinced that the global Muslim community would--or could--forgive the deliberate obliteration of their most sacred sites.

It was supposed to be deadpan humor, based on the notion that he'd "sold out" on health care reform. Should have added a smiley.

Keep playing dumb, Thews. Maybe someone will buy it eventually.

I'm glad your husband got good care, MsQwerty, but the fact is he was in a prospective life-threatening situation and were he in the US he would have gotten the exact same treatment (minus, perhaps, the lunch) regardless of his ability to pay. A more probative anecdote would be if you or your husband had gone seeking care for a non-life-threatening situation without the supplemental insurance that (per Wikipedia, anyways) nearly 43% of your countrymen feel compelled to purchase. We Yanks are not living in a Monty Python movie, and we do not have people who come by every morning to scrape corpses off of emergency room doorsteps. Do we have problems? Absolutely. But we are not at "crisis stage", no matter what our Dear Leader tells you.

Holy flip.

Good on her.

Actually, I just lost a lot of respect for O'Reilley . . .

And yet Mormons do accept the NT, and they still aren't Christian per your reasoning. Does it include St. Augustine's doctrine? Martin Luther's? King Henry VIII's? John Calvin's? Ellen White's? It's becoming patently clear that your litmus tests for "Christianity" have been developed for the sole purpose of excluding the Mormons from that umbrella.

FWIW (which probably isn't much) - technically, that kind of thing is reportable as income on your tax returns. Without quibbling about the idea of tithes upon tithes (which I haven't researched), it appears that the Hebrew term in the OT used for "tithing" (and the Greek equivalents as used in the NT), by definition, meant one-tenth.

Indeed. (with tongue planted firmly in cheek!)

Revocation of the Church's tax-exempt status would be a problem, and I think it would be grossly unfair. But, no; I don't think we're straying onto breach-of-first-amendment territory. At its good pleasure, government provides tax exemptions to a variety of individuals and organizations for behaviors and activities that government deems socially desirable. It is certainly within government's right to revoke those exemptions for individuals and organizations that are fostering "bad behavior", as defined by the will of the people through their duly elected representatives.

I wouldn't remember it myself, but I just worked through McCullogh's biography of the man.

Yes, if a) the system is indeed unnecessary; b) the savings represent a significant contribution towards health care; and c) the "health care" provided under any serious plan currently under consideration would be an improvement over the status quo. Personally, I'm agnostic on a), unconvinced on b), and most exceedingly doubtful of c).

What was John Adams, chopped liver? :)

. . . story here. I pray the President knows what he's doing. I don't think he does, but I would be very happy to be proven wrong in this instance.