WannaGo

I know a bar in Juarez where getting an electric jolt will cost you $20 American.

Doing stupid things in the hopes of getting laid is just part of the male condition. We all suffer from it.

You guys ever read the book "Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets" by David Simon? It's about a reporter from the Baltimore Sun who spent a year with the city's homicide squad and wrote about the cases they worked (the book was the basis for the show Homicide: Life on the Street). In the book, Simon recounts this case in which the teenage suspect would not admit to a shooting...so the cops told the kid their copier was a lie detector, and made him put his hand in it. They'd ask him questions, then hit "copy." If I remember right, they'd pre-loaded it with sheets of paper that had the word "Lie" written on them. After a few rounds, the kid got so flustered, he finally gave it up. One of my favorite dumb crook stories ever.

Wow...turns out the average life expectancy is 70...only about 7 years less than in the US.

Man, I wonder what the lung cancer rate is in the country.

Just doesn't have the same panache.

I bet you could make a fortune in Thailand with an Enzyte franchise. I'm sure these guys would rather take a pill than shoot themselves up with beeswax. Of course, once they started catching on you were selling snake-oil, you'd have to leave the country.

The switching back and forth seems a little pointless...maybe we should just switch and stay there.

The Wall Street Journal had an interesting piece predicting that Thaksin's move in Cambodia could cost him support even among his own allies. BANGKOK -- Since Thai leader Thaksin Shinawatra was forced out of power in a military coup three years ago, he has made a show of traveling the world to keep in the public eye back home. But his latest gambit -- taking up a role as economic adviser to Thailand's neighbor and rival, Cambodia -- threatens to backfire and jeopardize his standing in the country he still hopes one day to lead, analysts say. More

Any government controlled by the military has a serious credibility problem. If they truly were serious about securing the country's future, they would restore civilian rule.

Um, no, I was being sarcastic. The country is run by warlords and religious militants, there is little or no semblance of civilization, and they've managed to kill almost 20,000 of their own people in the last two years. Yet, the people in this article are blaming mobile phones for eroding their good ole-fashioned values. It's absurd...arranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

He's been released for the holidays (bail was $1.5 million), but is to be sentenced in February. The judge told him "it's a mortal lock that there will be jail time at the end of this," according to MSNBC.

I wonder who won?

Hahaha...you obviously have seen the same ones I have.

I wouldn't want her in my class...I'd never hear a word the prof had to say. There are so many rednecks where I live, the bailiffs had to put up a sign at the courthouse warning people they could not enter if they weren't wearing shoes or shirts.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Maybe somebody stole all the copper out of the power lines?

It must screw kids up when you push them to be adults before they've even finished being children. Not just the little bodybuilder, but like you said, the athletes, beauty pageant queens and little geniuses, too. Parents have to stop using their kids to achieve what they couldn't themselves.

LOL. Yeah, it does kind of have that feel, doesn't it?

Florida has an infamous mental hospital called Chattahoochee (they made a movie about it, starring Gary Oldman) not too far from where I live. Used to be that a person could get sent there for little reason and just disappear, but the abuses there caused changes in state law, and it's been cleaned up some since then. Still, I've been up there a few times, and parts of it still haven't changed much since the '50s. Can be kind of spooky. A local cop is suspected of murdering his ex-girlfriend on the grounds a few weeks ago. There's a difference between insanity and stupidity.

Seems like a pretty good clue as to why they did it. Can't imagine that it would be too comfortable on the package, either.

I'm guessing there will be a lot of posturing and gas-baggery, maybe some tit for tat economic measures, and not much else.

Wouldn't be hard to prove that a person knew that he/she was infected, since state health departments keep records of people who test positive.

The US did it briefly during the First World War, then resumed during the Second World War. Supposedly, it was to conserve energy and increase daylight working hours. From what I understand, the EU and several dozen countries around the world practice some variation or other of DST, but I'm not sure which ones and how they do it.

Hillary's starting to put the pressure on Myanmar now, too. I know it's the language of diplomacy, but it all this talk about "internal dialogue" sure seems...inadequate. SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday urged Myanmar to begin planning for its 2010 elections and said Southeast Asian nations could play an important role in ensuring the vote is "free, fair and credible." Clinton, speaking at a news conference on the sidelines of the APEC meetings in Singapore, said Washington would like to see the reclusive military-led government of the former Burma begin internal consultations soon about the country's political future. "We're seeking ... a process inside Burma that would inspire a dialogue among all of the stakeholders so that there could be a growing consensus within Burma itself about the way forward," she said. Clinton's remarks came a week after U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell traveled to Myanmar on Washington's highest-level visit to the country in 14 years... ...U.S. officials said they hoped Myanmar's leaders would begin a dialogue soon with internal groups that have an interest in the country's political future. "That dialogue has to be an open dialogue that includes internal stakeholders," one State Department official said. "We would very much like to see ... not just the handpicked parties of the government, but also the ethnic groups, the NLD and the so-called third-way groups." The official said the United States had begun consultations on Myanmar with India, China, Thailand and other neighboring nations with an interest in Myanmar's stability. The official said Washington hoped China would encourage Myanmar to launch an internal dialogue. "China has a powerful interest in ensuring Burma remains a stable country," he said. More