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Rick - Michele and I are so sorry to hear about your loss. You and your family are in our thoughts and prayers. If there is anything we can do, don't hesitate to call.

Most under-rated post of the week. Good Show!

I like Tech's classic All Black unis, from say the late 90's. All black, block letters in White and Red. Love to see that done with White and Green.

Some sort of football into, with on the field sounds, with some "Game Time" chant right before the guys run out... as they run out, the beginning of Tom Sawyer by Rush. ...hey, it worked in Waterboy.

I hope he makes a full recovery. He was so great for UNT, and I wish him the best.

I'm totally excited about the season.. I really am... I REALLY think we're going to improve - ...but can we stop talking about being bowl eligible? You're gonna jinx the whole damn thing.

"the Sunbelt with Snow" is the best description of the WAC post Boise I've heard yet!

Big XII lite is not going to add Houston or TCU. Why would they? They already own the Texas media markets. I agree that the Texas + 9 Conference will either have to add two teams in the near future, or it will be a VERY short term conference. TCU doesn't help add a new market. Boise is too far off the beaten path. Those are really the only two non BCS teams worth pursuing for any of the larger conferences (with the exception of Utah, which is already headed to PAC10 land) Any other addition really weakens the conference, because it will have to come from a non BCS conference and won't do anything for the strength of schedule argument. I think they have sort of painted themselves into a corner with this move. Like it or not, UNT is where we are. In this current conference shuffle, we can only do what is best for us as it comes available. We don't really have the power to be a player unless we are asked to be. I trust that the AD will do what he can to push our program forward in all of this back and forth, but for now we're going to have to take what comes our way, and continue to focus on what we CAN work on. Better faclities, better funding of athletics, and putting a better product out to watch. The rest will take care of itself over time. ...we just got an AWEFULY late start on the whole thing.

That makes the argument based on the current PAC 10 and current SEC.

This should really be a non-issue. Was it politically smart for this President who, right or wrong (not a debate we're having here), is generall considered weak on defense and military issues? Probably not. ...but there is no prescident that a sitting President MUST attend the ceremony. They often do, and no President has totally ignored Memorial day. ...but taking a family vacation over the Memorial day weekend when it is already an issue your political opposition beats you over the head with is probably not the best political move. ...but for all the things I fault this President for (and you all know the list is long) this isn't one of them. He attended a Memorial day Ceremony and the Vice President did a wonderful job delivering a great speach on the President's behalf at Arlington.

Valid point... ...but you've never seen me at a baseball game, either. LOL!

Soccer - the only sport where a score of 1 - 0 is found exciting by its fans.

Yup... this.

I'd like to beat down TCU and UTA when we play them in any sport, but I don't hate them. ...SMU, because of the direct history we have with them AND based on the fact that what little greatness they had came as a result of cheating - I hate. It has nothing to do with them being "rich". ...sayin'.

Dead on right. ...Stebo, there are many things that can be done in reforming the system to help close the loopholes in the system you have lived through and witnessed that doesn't include the Government managing 1/6th of the American Economy. As we've come to find out if you've bothered to pay attention, all of the things that we were screaming to high heaven about this bill including a direct course to a one-payer system like in the bankrupt EU, rationing and "death panels" which make decisions about treatments based on their cost effectiveness, and what patients have the best percentage of such effectiveness are real. ...all of that, and the cost - oh, yeah, that's way higher than the CBO estimated too. All the stories about how the health care system screwed you or anyone else aside - this country is in debt that it can never repay. The social programs in place now that are a fraction of the cost of this thing are all failing, bankrupt or both. How, in the name of God, can anyone support this thing with the economic weight of it? ...the country can't afford the tax-payer provided health-care it provides today, how can we possibly take on more? We can't without ever higher taxes and rationing care, and even then, if Europe is any example, we still won't be able to afford it as the negative impact of a tax system to support this type of Health Care system on the Economy will be too great to overcome. 66% of Voters support a repeal of this law for a reason. It isn't because they don't all think we need health care reform - you'd have to be blind to see that the system doesn't need work - but this reform that is currently law is not the way to solve the problem, and the majority of the country can see that clearly.

Based on the market for lawyers, why would you pursue that career anyways? UNT Law won't always be a start-up either.

From the outside looking in it is hard to make any prediction other than the one he made. I personally expect to see a huge amount of improvement, but even if we hit the 6 or 7 win mark, will it be enough for a bowl in a conference where on paper many teams seem to be considerably better than us? I doubt it. ...we'd have to have a real break-out year on the scale that even the most die-hard kool-aid drinker on these forms would find a bit outlandish. I'm not saying it can't happen, but it will take a year where all of our expectations are blow to shreds in order for it to happen, IMHO. Thanks for the link, MG61!

School boards don't RUN the schools any more than a Board of Directors RUN a company. They set policy and then have non elected staff implement that (often very vague) policy as they interpret it. For someone who's a teacher, are you not offended when these stories come out about having to lay off more teachers, but the staff in the administration building remains safe? I know we are when we hear about it. Layers and layers of administration at so many of these school districts, most of whom are lifers. These is the bureaucrats who I talk about, and the staff that works for the local and state school boards who aren't moved as a result of election.

I understand the situation in Texas - my wife is a teacher here. In fact Unions ARE a factor in how the state and local ISD's run schools. While it is true that they don't have direct contracts here, they do have political power, they do exist in Texas and until yesterday, they have been able to confiscate money from teachers in this state and funnel it to whatever cause, political party and politician they saw fit - and it is these politicians that make up the Texas Legislature. The Texas Attorney General's office has released an opinion this week (GA-0774) that prevents school districts from implementing automatic payroll deductions as directed by teachers unions from the paychecks of teachers for union spending on political action committees. Here's the most relevant paragraph as it appears in the summary at the end of the decision: "Because the Legislature has not expressly or impliedly authorized school districts to process payroll deductions for contributions to political committees such as TSTA-PAC and NEA-Fund, Texas laws prohibits school districts from processing such contributions." So teachers unions in the Lone Star State will no longer be allowed to forcefully remove money out of teachers' paychecks to that they can spend it on left-wing political causes. This decision will not prevent teachers from individually sending their dues to political causes nor will it prevent unions from spending on PACs and political causes but it will prevent the schools from using school resources to make the deductions and for using school accounting departments to keep track of those deductions. By its very nature this will take a big bite out of the millions that teachers unions have available to spend on left-wing causes because teachers will have to expressly provide for unions to spend that political money instead of having it simply taken without their ability to direct it personally. For teachers like my wife who have no use for unions or their political agenda, this is a huge victory. Naturally, the unions are crying foul saying that Texas is somehow stepping on people's right to "political participation" which is obviously absurd. Or take the case last year in Houston when the HSID's raise program wasn't adequate to Union leaders who threatened to sue the district To pretend that the teacher's unions have no power in this state simply because they can't directly ram contracts down the throats of the ISD is to wholly understate the case. To state that bad teachers don't usually last is laughable, as the results speak for themselves, and I hear the stories every day from my wife and her friends and fellow teachers. ...but all of this talk of unions ignores the real point of my argument. The Federal Government, the layers and layers of waste and red tape and additional funding that has been thrown at education in the last 25 years in this country have done nothing to improve the situation - it has simply made it worse. A lack of funding or attention from the federal government is NOT what is wrong with our education system - in fact, it is what is wrong with it. To bring this around full circle, socialism in education hasn't made it better. Socialism in health care hasn't made it better (see how efficiently run the VA and Medicare are?) Socialism in retirement hasn't made it better. (Social Security is broke and has no chance of survival unless we just print money and make the program worthless in the process). We don't need more Government - we need less.

I don't believe teachers are paid too much; I AM disgusted by teacher's unions who take actions to protect teachers who shouldn't be in teaching, and who have been a part of building pension programs that are unsustainable instead of securing more cash pay for teachers and letting them invest in and for their own futures and retirement. ...you rail against the pay for teachers being artificially low - and I agree 100%. ...now ask yourself why that is. If someone can go to college and go into a private career and make more than they can teaching, what does that tell you about the public school system? Teacher's pay isn't the problem with our education system. ...the fact that our education system is run by bureaucrats and that a teacher's pay is set by a scale insured by the union and not based on excellence and achievement is a huge problem with education - but it isn't the only problem. Sorry to confuse.

There is oversight - legitimate oversight, and then there is bloated bureaucracies that manage this oversight inefficiently and often with a political agenda. You bring up Education, so let's look closely at that. We spend more per child in this country by a long shot on education than other countries which quite frankly are kicking our ass in that same effort. There are far too many layers of crap between the taxpayer and the student in our system and as a result the actual dollar getting spent ON each child is a very small portion of the huge number that gets spent PER each child. Too many layers of administrators, and debt due to unsustainable pension programs (teacher's unions have done the same thing to the Public School system that GM and the other car guys let unions do to them. When it happens to GM, people call it bad management. When it happens to levels of government, no one is blamed, but our taxes just go up to compensate.), programs designed to get students to pass standardized tests instead of actually learning and wasteful spending are the biggest factors in the waste in the public school system. I notice in a time when teachers are being laid off we never hear news stories of Teacher's unions offering to do more for a little less for the good of the system and the children and families they serve. I never hear about Administrators getting laid off. Your argument about the police limiting your freedom wins the strawman of the year award. Conservatives depend on the rule of law as the foundation of our belief system. We are not anarchists. Roe vs. Wade is far from settled law. In fact, constitutionally speaking, it is bad law, and is a perfect example of legislation from the bench. In this case, a constitutional right to privacy was made up out of thin air so that the court could side with the Pro Abortion side of the case. Roe vs. Wade should be overturned by the courts and the issue should return to being a states rights issue, OR a constitutional amendment put in place, which would be the two lawful ways to regulate a medical procedure. ...and lest you blast me as a neanderthal pro-life Christian who doesn't like your statement because you "don't go to the right church", I'm personally pro-choice. ...but my political opinion doesn't change the constitution. I think the argument being made here is that there is a happy medium. Public Hospitals are fine so long as they aren't abused and taxed beyond their limits by folks who are abusing the system or here illegally (or neighboring counties who won't spend their money to take care of their citizens) - but Private ones are too and if folks want to make their own health care decisions without input from Washington they should be allowed to. The FDA is fine, but it isn't efficient, and if a private company let as much tainted food on the market they would be hauled up to capital hill and grilled like BP was last week, but the FDA is given a pass. The reason you're hearing socialism so much right now is the hard swing that this administration and congress has taken in that direction. We've been moving further and further in that direction for decades (since the early 1900's) but now all of the sudden we're adding spending and social programs and making more people dependent on the federal government for their very lives at an astounding pace, and bankrupting us in the process. We need to tax our people less, give them incentive to depend on themselves and not government and get the hell out of the way of the hard working people and businesses that have made this country great. Giving huge new entitlements to more and more people who don't contribute (either by choice or by situation) is not how we get this economy on solid ground and will only take us deeper into debt and further from a point where we can turn it around.

Academics don't matter. It's all about the dollar, folks.

I'm actually at a loss for words.

Agh... The Rangers suck again! ...things are as they should be.

Hey, I appreciate it, but all I did was answer a few questions. I'm glad I could be of some help. I enjoyed reading the paper; I'm sure you'll get a good grade! Anything to help a fellow ESM major!