wyderp

i'm trying to find out what "down time" was like for army soldiers who were at FOBs -- how much time off they got, how often, on average, and what they did on days they didn't go outside the wire.

i heard sometimes there was nothing going on and it was complete boredom. did you have entire days off? several days? or was it tons of PT, cleaning CHUs, s**t burning, pulling security, etc.

i'm sure it may depend on which FOB, and that is fine.

feel free to write as much as u like. thanks

what is a typical breakfast, say, served at a CASH

suppose for whatever reason they are cut off from their squad and are pinned down and all they have is cell phone. can they just call the FOB or something?

or am i imagining this?

is there a good way to tell if a database had performance issues during a period of time in the past? aren't there some kind of logs or some query you can run that will tell you what time it started bogging down, and what time it came back to normal? i need either a) a file i can parse, or b) a sql query i can run

not sure what this would mean, but the Spanish Court has decided to push for criminal charges against bush and other officials on violation of international law regarding torture at Gitmo.

bush apologists, we all know you will ignore the question and say this is silly, frivolous, blah blah.

but for you "balanced" individuals out there: do you think this will happen? what will it mean? will it prompt US courts to do the same?

http://www.globalpolicy.org/intljustice/universal/...

i know my image of what it is like in iraq is totally skewed. i picture m.a.s.h, green tents, stupid stuff like that. dead wrong.

so what IS a typical day like? do they wake you up at 0500 for PT, is there a strict schedule? when/how do you get briefed for missions? is there a set time when you go to chow hall? apparently the trailers don't get inspected (i've seen youtubes, damn).

describe a typical day at the fob. p.s. i've seen/read plenty about rolling out/cordons/etc

i know the vehicles have a radio, but what about during cordon and searchs or civilian checkpoints, do you all communicate via hi-tech headset radio or is it the old-fashioned radio set like in vietnam?

i have an HDTV that supports both 1080i and 1080p. i have cox digital cable box that shows "1080i" on the LED display. both have HDMI and component cable connections. it seems that if the cable box only supports up to 1080i then HDMI would not buy any more resolution over component cables. is this true?

FYI, the HDTV only has 1 HDMI input and it's being used already

Oct 21: Palin was asked by a third grader what the Vice President does, and she said the VP is in charge of the Senate, which is (for her 4th time now) very incorrect.

Does it matter to you that after months to study up on a question she bungled months ago, that she STILL does not know what her position responsibilities would entail if she were elected?

i've done some searches and all i can find is a ton of videos showing how pathetically easy it is to hack the Diebold AccuVote-TS (electronic or DRE) machines that are being used in a lot of states.

have these machines been fixed? To be safe would it be better to use the optical scan machines (the ones with the fill in the bubble forms)?

please include links/references. thanks

Just before the debates last night i heard McCain got free cell phone towers from both Verizon and AT&T installed at his ranch, because he works on the commission overseeing the FCC plus some of his staffers are lobbyists for the phone companies. Sounds like same old same old typical Washington corruption to me for McCain to get free cell towers and not at least have to pay for it.

Reception sux near my house, does this mean I can get free zillion dollar personal cell phone towers installed in my back yard? What are Verizon's / AT&T's rules about guaranteed coverage for the average Joe who owns a cell phone?

Today Obama said McCain was too much of a puss to spout smears at Obama to his face. sounds like he was taunting McCain. do you think he'll have the cohones to bring up ayers and the other b.s. in the debate?

A friend of mine told me McCain got a D on a report card that the veterans group IAVA gives to all members of congress for support for our troops. Why did he get such a low score? Is this even true?

You have to admit, Governor Palin was pretty smooth last night. She used all the right catch phrases, threw in the you-betchas and gollys that connect to the average joe, she rattled off her memorized lines so well that you could almost not tell she knows very little about her subjects. she sounded confident, bubbly, optimistic, pleasant

but the question is, how phony did she seem to you? was she the worst sleaziest car salesperson you've ever seen or was she blunt and honest like a New Yorker. what exactly was the disingenuous factor? is she incredibly qualified to run the country (thus her confidence) or does she not know jack about anything and a complete farce?

Senator McCain said he was suspending the campaign to deal with the economic crisis. Critics say this was a "hail mary" political move to make him look like he cares more for America than winning an election. It would seem that if you're a political candidate, the very act of announcing such a thing is by definition a calculated move -- that even showing up to these meetings injects politics into the process.

Seems like McCain should at the very least be aware that people may be suspicious of his move and he would be ultra careful to keep as low a profile as possible (e.g. don't even appear on camera, just quietly help out with the bailout in any way he can). And what makes it harder to believe is that there is very little McCain could do showing up at the very end when they were about to strike a deal and he was not up to speed on any of the negotiations.

Obviously I am leaning a certain way, but I really don't know for sure. Do you believe McCain? Is he really suspending the campaign?

my republican neighbor said she heard McCain had cheated on his first wife carol who'd been disfigured in a bad car accident and married cindy mccain before he divorced carol, and now my neighbor won't vote for mccain. she's an older woman, voted for bush twice, seems like a died in the wool conservative

is this important enough to you to not vote for mccain?

i fact checked the story and found the following:

- carol was injured in a severe car accident in 1969 and was disfigured

- mccain admitted to having extramarital affairs during his marriage to carol shepp

- he courted cindy mccain for 6 months in 1979 while still married

- some mccain's old friends have portrayed him as a self-centered womanizer

- carol has nothing against him today and even endorses him

- he filed for divorce from her February 19, 1980

- the divorce was finalized April 2 1980

- he claims the divorce was final in February

- court documents said mccain stated he had cohabited with his wife until Jan 7th

- mccain obtained a marriage license (for cindy) March 6th

- mccain stated recently that the blame for his divorce was "entirely mine"

- carol has stated "the breakup of our marriage was not caused by my accident or vietnam or any of those things"

- she also stated: "i attribute it more to john turning 40 and wanting to be 25 again"

- a rumor is going around saying carol had cancer and he left her while she was in the hospital -- this is FALSE

http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/did_john_mcc...

http://www.snopes.com/politics/mccain/carol.asp

the day the stock market nosedives almost as much as 9-11, huge banks are filing chapter 11 right and left, and mccain stands up and says the economy is 'strong'?!! i heard on the news last night he has said the economy is strong over 20 times just this year. Granted by his own admittance he is not good at economics but if you aren't good at something the safe thing to do is rattle off headlines, not say the exact opposite of the obvious. What could make him say something like this other than some kind of age-related mental thing?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic...

i know it is cliche to say our media asks inane non-substantive questions and get all pissed off at ABC and demand they resign etc. but hey, we all know they are simply the deep dark truthful mirror, reminding us that yes, average America really IS that dumb and actually prefers tabloid issues.

question is, is there a way to ban idiots like gibson and steph and blitzer from these debates and demand we have hosts that will ask intelligent insightful and pertinent questions?

on linux there can be up to 32k processes; does that mean PID width will never exceed 5?

since linux does not always use the next available sequence number, theoretically there could be a PID of 32001, and for that matter there could be a 6 digit PID. this would seriously mess up my day