Bandit99

Ditto^

Lets all read a poem on this pre-election night 'Twas the night before elections And all through the town Tempers were flaring Emotions all up and down! I, in my bathrobe With a cat in my lap Had cut off the TV Tired of political crap. When all of a sudden There arose such a noise I peered out of my window Saw Obama and his boys They had come for my wallet They wanted my pay To give to the others Who had not worked a day! He snatched up my money And quick as a wink Jumped back on his bandwagon As I gagged from the stink He then rallied his henchmen Who were pulling his cart I could tell they were out To tear my country apart! 'On Fannie, on Freddie, On Biden and Ayers! On Acorn, On Pelosi' He screamed at the pairs! They took off for his cause And as he flew out of sight I heard him laugh at the nation Who wouldn't stand up and fight! So I leave you to think On this one final note- IF YOU DON'T WANT SOCIALISM GET OUT AND VOTE !!!!

While Jon Stewart may have shown that Biden was an idiot, he didn't help his own cause either. I mean come on with all your writers and research team you have for shows like this, they should of at least found out that Beretta makes shotguns and damn fine ones at that.

I know fellas....It was a joke....LOL

it does say above - All clans wishing to be a part of this thread will NEED to have participated in at least ONE Urgent Fury tournament, up to and including the current UF: Black, and still be an active clan here in the UF community.

Your tag says RVN, so why would you be doing that fo SHO? Do you moonlight as a product tester for them or something?

Yeah, your still to young to know about the good pie.

Yes even with a Dremel it can be challenging. As stated before I find new ways of doing things easier and better every year. A few examples are: 1) Before buying a pumpkin, chose what design or designs you are wanting to make. 2) When choosing your pumpkin, keep your design in mind. Chose the shape of the pumpkin based on what best suits your design. 3) Also when choosing your pumpkin, be sure to look at as many pumpkins you can, even if you have already found the perfect one for your design. You are looking to see if any other pumpkins show signs of spoilage. If any do, that means your pumpkin was picked at the same time and may not make it til Halloween. Make sure all the pumpkins in the patch or store show no signs of spoilage. 4) In my opinion the pumpkin should be purchased about 2 weeks out. This will also help with your spoilage issue. 5) Wait to carve your pumpkin. Do not carve as soon as you get it. This will also make you pumpkin last. 6) Carve pumpkin a couple of days before you want to display it. After you have carved it, let it sit for 24 hours and then details carving area. The pumpkin has been exposed to the air which will firm up the inner flesh. This will allow for better smoothing of the carving. Make it more detailed. Now a trick I came up with this year to using a template. Wash the outside of the pumpkin real well right before you want to carve. Now in the template kits, they tell you to tape template to the pumpkin and then use the poker to poke holes in your pumpkin along the outlines of your template. They then say to remove template and then use a crayon to connect the dots to form the object. When doing more elaborate pumpkins, this is a pain in the ass. Once you remove the template, your pumpkin has more little holes than the universe has stars. Keeping track of connecting the dots can be a real pain in the ass. This brought me to my new trick this years. I went to the local office supply store and bought some transfer paper/ carbon paper. I taped the carbon paper to the back of my template and then taped them to the pumpkin. You then trace over the template and then it is transfered to the pumpkin. Make sure to press hard and trace over at least twice. When you remove the template your image is on your pumpkin, ready to be cut. I then use an engraving bit to trace the image. this tool will just cut through the skin of the pumpkin giving you a well defined outline. I do this for one reason. It acts as a guide so that I don't go off the line when actually carving all the way through with a spiral bit. You still have to go slow and be careful, but it is easier to do it this way to prevent the spiral bit from cutting through where yo do not want it to go. Just a few hints. These are things I have learned over the last few years. These things have made my pumpkins both easier and faster to carve and give me better results every year.

Thanks Hippie....You can pick up a Dremel for as little as 25 bucks. They have a kit just for pumpkins: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002V3CNO Then you can go buy a regular Dremel if you want for as little as 40 or as much as 100. All depends on how much you think you will use it.

Yes Street, this year I did use a dremmel. This is the 3rd year I have carved out elaborate pumpkins and the first 2 years I used just a knife. Using just a knife is well challenging and takes a lot longer. The first year which I don't have pic on this laptop was a creepy graveyard scene. It took me 2 pumpkins and over 3 hours to make it. Last year i did Elmo with just a knife and it took me over 2 hours and 2 pumpkins...lol...Sometimes you slip and cut the wrong spot and well your image falls....lol......Here is Elmo: Again he was done with just a knife and scraper. Every year I come up with new ways and tools to make it better and easier. This years efforts took just 2 pumpkins to make the 2 pumpkins...LOL no pumpkins were lost. It also took under 3 hours to do both.

Do you know what the word innuendos mean? You made those then and you have made the same to Hog about his views and Dubya and his views. As I stated, I have and will not discuss the candidates or my opinion of them individually in this forum. Both have pros and cons. To have an open discussion that is healthy, you have to be objective. This has become nothing more than a, my candidate is better than your candidate thread. There was at one point in this thread, a somewhat healthy discussion going on here. Then it became a pissing match.

Warpig, the longer this thread has gone on, the more fanatical you have become. There is not one thing wrong with being passionate about something, but one can take that passion to far to where it becomes an obsession. You are at that point. I remember a couple dozen or so pages back, you ripped McCain supporters for their words they cast about Obama at a McCain rally. You tried to paint them as rednecks and racists with their actions, but yet here you are basically saying and acting the same way. Hypocritical if you ask me. You once were a intellectual player in this discussion, but once you made the above statement, you lost all credibility.

Damn deja vu and you spelled it wrong again....LOL

My daughter chose these for me to do this year.

Did you not even read what you just posted? Look at the table. The first 6 brackets show a tax cut. Now look at the 7th bracket: $226,919-$603,402. Does not $250,000 fall into that range? So actually it is everyone making over $226,919 will see an increase. Every one below will see a cut. So as it reads, those taxes being cut are being paid for by those making over $226,919

Glad to hear all the positive feedback. Great opening night.

Well I look at this sentence they posted: "Fixed many issues which would cause the game to crash, hang, disconnect and exit to the PS3 XMB. " Maybe the are using the word hang instead of freeze.

We are just under 10 mins. before the kickoff of Black. Good luck to all clans involved. I ask all or you to remember, this is an evaluation tournament. Play hard, but above all, play with honor and dignity. Respect your opponent.

Same here....Good luck all and have fun.

So War pig, I just want to make sure I read you right. It appears as though through your posting, that you are a free thinker or want us to believe that. Yet wouldn't a free thinker be rooting for individuals they feel best suit them. People they feel are best for the country and not vote along party lines? I mean come on. It appears with your last few post you are a follower of the party, and not individuals and what they represent? Am I missing something? I am most assured you will indeed tell me I am. I can only look at all that has transpired here and I would venture to guess that many would call it the same way, that you are not being an independent thinker here but a champion for the Democratic party as a whole?

I'll give you my opinion on this question. First off McCain probably wont win. There are numerous reasons why. Reason 1: Bush! Simple enough reason. People want to sit back and play Monday morning quarterback. Am I a real big Bush fan? Well actually no. I voted Gore during his first election. I was then a little upset over the whole voting scandal that took place. The people and not the courts should decide who the president is. I also am not a big proponent of the electoral college. The popular vote is a better representation of what the people want. Anyhow Bush was given the Presidency. Okay, now lets see what he can do? We were then attacked on 9/11. Wow what a turn of events. The country had been attacked at the World Trade Center once again by terrorists. Unlike the first time where it was a botched attacked, this time they succeeded in bringing down both towers. Now as president he has to make some decisions. Some tougher than others. First was to attack on Afghanistan. That one was an easy decision. Go after Osama Bin Laden. Then came a real tough decision. To attack Iraq. We all can sit here till we are blue in the face, but we will never know all the intelligence that was provided, for the decision to be made to attack. The reason given was WMD (Weapons of Mass Destruction). So we attack and we never do find WMD. People now want to cry that this is an oil issue as we did not find WMD. Oh great call. Again it is easy to sit back and cry foul now, however some very respected people were in on the decision as to attack or not based on the intelligence that was being received. More on that to come. So here we have a President starting their Presidency under very trying circumstances. It appears at the time a lot of Americans seen this as when it came time for the next election, he was voted in again. This may have also been because the Democratic party had nothing. John Kerry? Hell, you could have a more entertaining conversation with a 12 year old. His personality did him in so people voted Bush in again. So what was the deal breaker for the second term? The effects of the previous Democratic Administration start to really show it's ugly head. While the intentions of homes for every American was noble, it is not a right. You should still have to earn the right to own a home, not have the rules changed so you can have one. That is where we are at today. Mortgage defaults are at a all time high. Is this a lower class or middle class issue alone? No! When the rules for qualifications were changed to allow more people to secure loans and the mortgage companies and banks were forced to find ways to secure loans for those who previously would never qualify, creative mortgages were brought to the forefront. ARM's which have always been an option, where sudden given to those who could not qualify for a conventional mortgage. These people were not, as in the past, instructed of the dangers involved with ARM's. They also pushed interest only loans. Okay I can pay only interest which will lower my payment. The problem is the name interest only loan is not accurate. There is a term limit for this interest only. Usually 3-5 years. Then it becomes the type of loan it was packaged with and that is ARM. Oh darn that dreaded ARM. Adjustable Rate Mortgage. So you get all the house you can get, then the rate goes up and damn, you can't afford the payment. What happens then? Foreclosure! As I stated previously, it was not just the lower income people who were at fault here. Yes the minimum requirements for home loans were lowered so that all Americans could buy a home. This provide a short term boom in housing. Almost anyone could buy a home now. Business was good. Home prices shot up. Now here came the greedy people. Big corporations wanting to cash in on the market. Buying up properties right and left. Individuals trying to get rich quick with flipping houses. Then it happened. The bottom fell out. Home prices fell just as fast as the oil prices have recently. That began the crisis we are at now. Home prices fell. Interest rates increased. Now we have people who have houses that are not worth what they paid for them and are costing them more in mortgage. They are defaulting on loans. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac who pushed banks to write these unsafe mortgages, were now in possession of the packages of mortgages they bought from the banks. In other words they reap what they sow. They forced garbage loans and now they have foreclosures out the ass. Going bankrupt until the government has to bail them out with 750 billion dollars. Now how does this pertain to why Bush won't win. People are ill informed. They feel that since this is happening and since he has been in Office for the past 8 years, it is his administrations doing. As I previously mentioned, it is not this administrations doing as it was the Clinton Administration that pushed for what is the cause of what is happening now. The only thing the Bush Administration is at fault for is not continuing to try and put a stop to it. I use the word continue because they did recognize the issues and tried to fix it, but the Democrats blocked them in their efforts. This is just another reason why Bush will lose. People not knowing what has transpired. Reason 2: A snake oil salesman. The second coming according to many followers. Here comes a man at the right place and time. A man who is a smooth talker. A used car salesman. A man who says all the right thing to his target demographic. His biggest words are "I will save you". I will use the hard work and money of others to rid you of your despair. Why? America is the land of opportunity. Opportunities are abound for everyone. It is those who want to put the hard work in at an opportunity, who bear the fruits of their labor. In my opinion America has to many on the opposite ends and not enough in the middle. We have way to many who want things given to them. They don't want to work for it. They feel entitled to it. Then on the other end of the spectrum is greed. Those who want to prey on the weak. Those who choose to find any means to grease there palm, no matter who they may hurt in the process. Then in the middle, you have those who are realists. They do what they have to to be comfortable. They make a hard honest living. They care about their fellow man. They don't look for handouts. They feel a sense of pride of their own accomplishments. So yeah, Obama will probably win as he is in the right place at the right time. You have a target demograhic, looking for handouts, not answers. They do not have the education to see the big picture. No I am not saying this about all Obama supporters. I would say however that the percentage of voters who have no idea what is going on. Have no clue as to issues and or history. Have no clue as to what Obama's stance is on the issues, will be voting for him, just because he is a different face, smooth talker, not a republican, a snake oil salesman. Oh and War Pig, you used a name in this post as if it were your ace in the whole. I made the following statement earlier in this post "Again it is easy to sit back and cry foul now, however some very respected people were in on the decision as to attack or not based on the intelligence that was being received. More on that to come." Since you brought him into this as your Ace in the hole, Colin Powell who you are happy than a pig in shit to have now endorsed Obama, was one of the people instrumental in the decision to attack Iraq. He made recommendations to attack based on intelligence he felt was accurate. As I sated previously, I have no dog in this fight. Personally I don't like either parties nominations. I do not have a party affiliation, so I am unable to vote in the primaries. I am telling you this as I am not a part fanatic. I vote on my own education of the candidates and issues. In the last 2 elections of 2000 and 2004 I have voted for a different party for President. 2000 I voted Gore and 2004 I voted Bush. This time I am probably going to abscond my vote. I am having a hard time seeing anything I like and for numerous reasons. Hopefully in this last week, which I doubt it will happen, I can find something to get excited about with one of these candidates. I do not like voting for the lesser of 2 evils and it appears at this point, that is all I have in my opinion. Voting in America has become like jury duty. People do not take it serious. It is a duty to your country. A duty that should be taken serious. If you vote, you should do it, with as much education you can. Not base it on how one talks. Not on how one looks. You should educate your self on things that matter to you. Not your party affiliation. Not as a fanatic, but as an educated voter who looks at things objectively.

Thank you for what you do and have a safe return.

Everyone here needs to remember another facet of putting on this tournament and that is timing. Everything has it's place and time it needs to happen. When they do, things will run smoothly. The post for rosters needing to be submitted was up for a whole week. That is 168 hours in which everyone needed to have their rosters submitted. When given this amount of time and as much as it was announced, UF has no idea as to anyone's situation and or intent. UF has no idea if they changed their mind and decided to not play. They have no idea if it is just a life issue. They have no idea if their internet went down. There is no way to know what is going on unless it is communicated to us. That being said, we can't assume, give them a few more minutes, hours or days and maybe they will reply. If UF did that and had no reply, we would be scrambling at the last possible moment to fill the spot. Why should that be the scenario. Why should we put ourselves under very tough circumstances, when we do not need to. We had several teams who were wanting to play this tournament. Why not get a hold of them ASAP to see if they were willing to fill the void. Try and get a replacement ASAP before they committed somewhere else. That is what happened here. We wanted to field a 32 team tournament and since we acted promptly, we were able to secure a spot. It is unfortunate for FBR that there were issues, however UF must continue to do what it needs to do to provide the community a great tournament. Again while it is unfortunate for FBR, there will be other tournament just around the corner. We wished they could have been a part of this tournament but it just didn't work out that way. I am sure we will see them in the very near future as a team in a UF tournament.