So, as I would looking through some of the other message boards out it occurred to me how much I like this one...

First, the core group of posters here is large enough that we get a wide sample of opinions without posts being 27 pages long.

Second, the majority of us have been here since the beginning and those who haven't have come on slowly so that we get to know them a little bit at time. Some of the other boards just are so overwhelming in the sheer number of posters.

Thirdly, and most importantly, I just like talking to you guys...

Any thoughts? Would you like to see more posts and posters? Do you like it the way that it is? How do you feel D~?

PUMA

I HATE YOU ALL...









...slightly less than most people. :)

It's a nice message board. Everybody can take a point and logically defend it, and for the most part, everyone is open to criticism and persuasion. I like it here as it is.

I love this board. I wish I had more time to post. I look forward to it every day, when I am in front of a computer.

I think a lot of people are on vacation, which explains a lack of activity. It will heat up if and when the Orioles make some roster moves before the trading deadline.

Keep on keeping on!

Of course I love the board but a few more posters would help (even 10 more members would make a difference)

Aside from badmouthing Gibbons and discussing how lucky we are to have Guthrie, there isn't much to talk about right now.

BoP is a cozy board with good folks.

it is open and one gets the range of opinions and insights, and often more, that one would get elsewhere.

there isn't much, if any, cockfighting or catfighting, and if there is, it's usually entertaining and short-lived.

the format is not burdensome.

it's like that small bear's porridge, bed, or volkswagen. just right. :P

Couldn't agree more. I like it the way it is although 5-10 more posters would be great.

Interesante...

I too, like this board.

I could've sworn I saw Goldilocks driving a Hummer...

Rumor has it Goldilocks was giving a hummer in a volkswagen.

Another 20 posters would be great.

More opinions from more informed people.

And the return of Jack would be good.

andrew

so, why isn't jack around much anymore?

i'm still on vacation -- i have some thoughts, will post em when i get back

go O's!

Wow, checking in while on vacation. That is dedication...

Enjoy your time.

PUMA

as promised, my thoughts on your post, Puma170....and it's pretty stream-of-consciousness; that's as good as it's gonna get at this hour :D

first, if all you're asking is whether i think it would be good to have more posts or posters, the answer is of course i would

the question is what makes that happen

word of mouth? spread the word, invite your friends, whatever. i've invited some of my friends - not a hell of a lot of success. my orioles die hard fan friends are here already (actually, the reason i came here was because i had no one else to talk Orioles with), and the yankee fan's tenure was, um, entertaining but short-lived :P

advertising? i aint got no money for that, but i could start adding the url to all of my sigs on other boards i post on i guess...tho i dont post much anywhere else.

i could ask the admins of those other boards if they'd add the url in links to O's related sites. i'll see about doing that this week. don't know what kind of success that will have, but won't know til i try.

you guys could do the same - add the url to your sigs on whatever other message boards you post on, if any. do any of us post anywhere else?

jack used to personally invite people here from the mlb forum. i dont read the mlb forum. is there anyone there (or on other boards/blogs/sites) to invite?

someone start bugging purplephenom to come back and post. someone tell Hal that Jack's not posting here anymore, so it's safe to come back and not feel attacked. (jk Jack!!) surely Jack hasnt really stopped posting here for good, has he??? and someone get dogg-will-hunt-with-a-bag-on-his-head to relax and rejoin the hunt - i miss his posts bad.

there are a whole bunch of threads that could be started if we all put a little effort into it. the other day i read a list of links to sites that someone had put together, all of which had articles of one sort or another about Cal's induction. one post, but it was packed full. that's just a for instance. Jack used to do projects where he'd sort through stats that he'd acquired for the season and then started a discussion about some aspect of the game that way. i miss those. is anyone else up for something like that? or is that an off-season thing only?

of course i enjoy thoroughly the daily (weekday) discussions that get going between you and career and jmk (with the occasional chiming in by szekely and bark and ...)

i count on scuff doing occasional game-threads-that-arent-really-game-threads that are more concise and humorous and have those great sweepers whenever we can muster such a thing.

stanhouse is exceptional at posting great photo posts now and again, on any number of subjects. some of my favorite threads, by far.

i'm hoping against hope that escambia hasnt given up the periodic (if no longer weekly) minors updates. i eat those up.

justin's insider stuff cracks me up. and is intriguing at the same time. nothing like a little eyebrow-raising stuff to spice things up.

its the trade deadline. should i make a new forum for non-Orioles topics again so people get a nudge to talk about whats going on in the game as a whole? seems that died out when a) the spammers killed that forum, and b) when roar had to leave us.

i mean if we just wait for people to talk about the Orioles - well, if we can't even get anyone to complain about the wretched state of things in today's game, nor about their experiences watching Cal's induction....then maybe there's just nothing to post and we should all go away until Angelos sells the team....

i never intended to have this be "my" message board tho. i can't get away from that even when i try, and sometimes just the opposite, i go over some invisible boundary that people have in their minds of what an admin should or shouldn't do. but i really don't think it's up to me to start all the threads, right?? (well, i havent in a long time, but that's kinda been intentional!)

perhaps there are some ideas here that you guys can follow up on. i'll do what i can too.

and if it's good just like it is, well, i aint in any rush to change anything either...:)

~d.

One of the things that keeps me coming back here is not just the people (who I respect greatly), but also the quality of the opinions that are expressed here.

Anybody can watch a game and then hop onto the mlb.com Orioles message board and pop off about fairly obvious points, talk about Brian Roberts' underwear or propose ridiculous one-sided trades that inevitably have the O's unloading their trash for another team's likely first ballot hall of famer. In general, none of that is what happens here. I see this message board as not just a place for Orioles fans, but a board for intelligent baseball fans. It is a unique place and I'm not sure there is another one quite like it.

The reason I say all this is just as a reminder and caution that the wider the net you cast, the more likely you are destroy the things that makes this message board so special.

You might accidentally catch a couple of dolphins with the bigger net. Then again, tuna tasted much better before it was dolphin safe.

I'd invite people to discuss the Orioles here, but unfortunately most of the Orioles fans I know aren't big on forums.

Career200 eloquently avers...

Unequivocally precise.

I guess this gets to the point that I was wondering about when I started this thread...

I would love to have 20-30 new posts every time I sat down to read but I just love the mix that we have here now. If we add more posters does it dillude the mix? Just curious and I appreciate all the responses.

PUMA

PS: I got moved... COOL!!!

Late to this thread..I'd like to see new posters, I have no idea how to get them over here, and I'd probably be annoyed with them if they get here. So don't listen to me :)

Maybe next year..when our starting rotation is the best in the League..new posters will find their way here :P </stops dreaming>

I think I'll come back... Not that anyone will care, but I'm offically annoucing my return... Wait, I actually never left, just got caught up with life-type stuff.

Anyway, consider this my press confernece announcing my return. I haven't found Jesus, I'm not facing federal prison time, and I'm not worried about my future in the NFL. I'm just a New Yorker, who loves the fine American League Franchise in Baltimore.

D- You should worry about being in first place in the BOP2 league. This "Wild Card" team is on the rebound, and will start chipping away... :point:

Oh, and Dave Trembley needs to lose the comb over...

i didnt think you were *ever* coming back! you, jack, dogg, the whole morning crewe, and i've missed you all bad...

are you staying in NYC then? no philly? we gotta get you to the next NYY series 9/17-19!!

and as for the wild card team - i really was talking about Lackey taking it to the Mariners, honest :biggrin:

I have a couple of shirts that need pressing. I doubt Vick has found Jesus yet, an overwhelming amount of sightings
have him in prison.
You deserve ribbing for thinking A.Jones is as good as Beltran, but certainly not prison time. Then again, if you want to find Jesus....
All seriousness aside, welcome back!

You had to bring up AJones... Ouch... so what if he's batting .205... I'd still take him over Carlos Beltran! He still has some power...

Still looking at Philly. I have some interviews lined up, so we shall see. We're trying to hold off until October, so my wife can get through a few of her events...

Are you coming back up for that series? My dad called me yesterday and got tickets for the Tuesday game (I think it's the Tuesday game).

Sure... Remember, Wild Card teams have been known to win the World Series...;)

He still has some power...

Some believe Benny Hinn has power.



http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt...l%3Den%26sa%3DN

Is Benny Hinn still around? I remember when I lived in Florida, I heard about him a lot, but up in the North East,he don't get much play...

He got in some sort of trouble sometime back, don't recall just what. More than likely just revealed as bullshit.

Benny Hinn is still a player in the "Christian Right." He was prominently featured in American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War On America by Chris Hedges. An interesting book with an interesting thesis.

Chris Hedges skewers James Dobson, Pat Robertson, and the late pompous Jerry Falwell, among others who would exchange the freedoms given us by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution for the moral and intellectual straitjacket of a "Christian" nation as those nitwits understand the term.

This great nation was never conceived to be a "Christian" nation and the blessed Founding Fathers tried to ensure that that would remain true with the separation of church and state. The nation was founded basically by a bunch of Deists and/or Masons, as I understand it, who, for the most part, were neither practicing nor professing "Christians." They believed in "God" as a creator who created this whole lash-up, put it in motion, and then when off to do other "godly" things and left us to figure it out.

well, kids, didn't we have fun this weekend.

i invited two women i know who are die-hard oriole fans to check out the board this weekend and see what they thought and register if they were interested.

guess my timing was a bit off. they're now seriously wondering what the hell i'm doing. gotta say i'm kinda wondering myself.

guess there's good reason that hottubman doesn't allow his 10-year-old anywhere near the board.

a half-thread concerning the wonders of "shit" followed by one post that uses the word five times and has a link to it in large letters. one thread that says "shut the fuck up" in multiple posts, kinda like a 3-year-old who's just learned a dirty word. same thread starting to go into racial slur territory. and a video about vomiting.

yikes.

i know we're a really intelligent group. you know it. we all know it. good thing we're not looking for new members tho....

Wow, I apparently missed alot by not checking often over the holiday weekend...

That will learn me.

PUMA

I'm sure you and the esteemed ladies recognized the that the quotes were from a classic movie, "The Big Lebowski" and that they were in keeping with the context of the tumbleweeds theme for OPCY and the opening of "The Big Lebowski" movie which featured tumbleweeds.

If ladies can cover sports' clubhouses and compete in the market place then they should be able to handle references to really good movies...no one even mentioned the line about a certain service which Bunny offered Dude for $1000.00!

Could that have been a lewinsky? A grand? that sucks...

You got it Milt! I guess we could bowdlerise the posts and make them insipid to protect the more delicate sensibilities of our lady guests. Or as our esteemed leader, ~d, says we could "stir the shit" and have a lot more fun. :)

Hi Jack and Milto:

Here is my take on the founding fathers. I think I am right, but the supremes disagree and you are free to also.

There was a large contingent of Christians among the foundering dudes. But they did not want to have any state religion established. Hence, the no establishment clause.

And they understood you should not have your government too actively policing individual practices, so they added the free exercise clause.

There was NO desire to put up a wall of separation between religion and the government. They felt the government operated under the sovereignty of God, so they were not uncomfortable about religious interaction of some general sort taking place.

Jefferson wrote a letter from France in which he coined the phrase (or at least that is the earliest known use of the phrase) of a wall of separation. Now, we have the supremes using that phrase and we have a less than faint antagonism by government against religion, or perhaps, against most religious activities. Still, it could be worse. It could be better.

The Supremes basically say strange things in Lemon and Kurtz (not lemon and curds--or tea and crumpets) about the government being estranged from religion. Or religion being fostered in any way by government.

But I think government should encourage all citizens to practice their beliefs. The vast majority of people are better for their religious practices. Just as long as no single religion is promoted (with the Bush admin, you could see this happen) and no single religion is really harmed. Of course, we are all glad there is no Aztec virgin sacrifice or Babylonian sacrifice to Molech. So we all agree there must be some curbing of some religious practices.

And there you have it. And I could be wrong.

Cheers. And I wonder if our visiting guests would prefer this post to those about dookie (or the Big LeDookski.)

Unless they were "The Church Ladies"...well, isn't that special (Dana Carvey)

I don't disagree with your analysis. I just get very exercised about what I perceive as self-serving attempts by certain Christian leaders to make this a Christian country. I think the US was conceived to be a Godly country certainly...there is much evidence of that in mottos, public utterances and writings of the Founding Fathers etc.

I tend to agree with you, Jack. In evaluating the Establishment Clause, I think one has to keep in mind of the fact that many of the first colonists pre-Revoluationary War came from sects deemed heretical in Europe. Thus, as a result of their experience with monarchies interefering with religious affairs, there was an overwhelming desire to keep the new Govt's mitts off church affairs. You can even see this when the colonists wanted their own Anglican ministers rather than imports from the UK.

This, to me, helps explain the somewhat pleasant paradox that, extremists aside, while the US is actually one of the more religiously observant countries on earth, disputes, including that about the Establishment Clause, are resolved via reference to secular law. And (as the NY Times Magazine cover story observed not long ago) that is rather unique in this world, and fragile.

Thus, I always invest my own intellectual capital with Hobbes rather than Rosseau on these matters. Religious fanaticism suggests that's a wise investment.

My forebear was a Huguenot indentured servant who came here for the reasons you cited.

My understanding is that the Anglican Church here in the US, after the revolution was essentially cut off from the Church of England (Anglican). The Established Church (Anglican) in England refused to assist in the ordination of bishops in our new republic so the Anglican Church here turned to the Scots who were only too happy to tweak the nose of the Archbishop of Canterbury and they gladly provided the necessary Apostolic Succession laying on of hands to deserving US Anglican priests in their ordination as bishops here.

The Anglican Church in the US became the Episcopal Church. The Episcopalians enjoy a tenuous link with what is called the Anglican Communion. The Episcopal Church of the US is in trouble with the world body for having ordained an openly gay man as bishop (Gene Robinson) and for having elected a woman as Presiding Bishop (president/head) of the Episcopal Church of the US. I am an Episcopalian and very proud of the ECUSA for having the guts to make public a gay bishop...there have been gay clergy...bishops, cardinals, probably Popes for centuries. There also is the probably mythic woman Pope, Joan of the early church...before 1000 CE. She probably wasn't a reigning Pope but the story persists.

This is undoubtedly more than you wished to know about Episcopalians but it is somewhat related in that "established" churches are scary things.

P.S. While I am a a proud Episcopalian I am somewhat abashed to acknowledge that Sammy Sosa is also an Episcopalian.

When you consider the goofballs who most push what is easily considered a "Christian" nation concept, it is frightening. But what if you got "reasonable and charismatic" types who promoted the idea? Still frightening, and perhaps more so, as there would be more people drawn in by the idea and it might have a greater chance of success.

We are better off with a strong high wall betw church and state, even if that is not the correct interpretation of the establishment clause, than if there ever was a real threat that we would be guided by religious leaders as government leaders. The other side of this is that most of the religious leaders do not understand how to bridge the gap with people not of their persuasion.

Jack--thanks for your bold re-entry on the board. You have certainly stirred the ____________________ (fill in your own object--and please do not insult anybody or say something that requires a disclaimer).

So you would have me be speechless then? I can take a hint.

Andrew have you read "American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War On America" by Chris hedges? Interesting book, not especially well written, sometimes seems to have been cobbled from some of his previous writings, but worthwhile nonetheless.