http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/mma/news/20131229/chris-weidman-tko-anderson-silva-broken-leg-ronda-rousey-meisha-tate/

One individual expressed disappointment for missing the fight saying "the best fights are when people bleed or break"

Is this not the same mentality exhibited by the ancient Romans?

One difference perhaps is that many of the gladiators were criminals anyway who were at least given a fighting chance instead of being summarily executed.

UFC fighters are consenting adults, but do they really understand the risks?

In my country, the United States of America, we Americans tend to (arrogantly) believe we are the Rome of the modern age.I'm not kidding when I say this-from English class discussions on William Shakespear's Caesar, to Civics and Government to even World History, almost every time Rome is being discussed, we American students are often told that America is the "New Rome".I'm serious,teachers I had from my English teacher(when we were reading Caesar) to even my P.E. Teacher, have stated that America is the "Modern Rome".General History books(even Roman books do so occasionally) and even books not related to history such as business books make reference to America as the Rome of recent times.

In fact right now within my country, conservatards and Patriotards are all criticizing the American people, saying that U.S.A. will fall for the same reasons the Romans did-we Americans are spoiled,selfish,undisciplined,lazy, and unpatriotic and unwilling to sacrifice for the "State"

I too used to believe this BS. In fact several years ago,when I only knew Rome based on School Library Books and documentaries, I wrote this highly inaccurate post on Yahoo Answers!.I literally thought it was so true I published it multiple times.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AiSHIAOyLgBa9hw_tfNkHeMjzKIX;_ylv=3?qid=20090813103911AAU8uV0

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AvFwtltEh1V3kIPqw.qhsNsjzKIX;_ylv=3?qid=20090813104020AAbajBr

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=ApNdnKeBCBFeXtrKF0LWTbsjzKIX;_ylv=3?qid=20090813103801AAbZBgN

After joining UNRV and getting deep into Roman history(thanks to the experts of this forum),looking back I can't believe I ever wrote this stuff and LITERALLY believed this BS

Whats your thoughts?BS that America is the modern Rome?While I would have been blinded to accept this years ago,I now know better and can say that the notion America is the Modern Rome is absolute BS!

I actually was going to discuss this on a previous thread about the Roman Legion I made but its just so ludricous that I feel its worthy of discussion in its own thread.Here's the link:

http://community.discovery.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/9741919888/m/19419892201

IMO the Roman Legion has no chance of winning, this is overkill! The Civil War soldiers would definitely defeat the best Legions.The gap of technological and tactical/strategic differences are just way too great to even make it appropriate to compare two armies that are thousands of years apart in doctrine and weaponry!

What's your opinion on the matter?

so instead - of never`s to be in r?r?r?rals i had a funny f?lign that i `n - eve%r

"Article 1 - Creating a secret propaganda campaign to manufacture a false case for war against Iraq."

Additionally, Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL) became the first member of Congress to co-sponsor Rep. Dennis Kucinich's resolution calling for President Bush's impeachment.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2008/...crat-files.html

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/11/kuc...=rss_topstories

In the opinion of many Americans, the representative's resolution was long overdue.

My cat is getting old and peeing everywhere. grrrr!

I need to remove cat pee odor from a carpet. Does anyone no a good product or household remedy to remove cat pee from carpet?

thanks in advance.

charlie

Some thoughts and perspective:

There are a couple of things we know for certain that will bring down the price of gasoline and gasoline related price increases:

Increased supply of oil and gasoline

Less demand for oil and gasoline

Politicians (in their current dramatic high profile hearings in the US Senate and US House) admit that greater supply of oil (and energy) would bring down prices, while on the other hand diminished supply of oil (and energy) acts to raise the price American pay.

Ten years ago US oil companies were making 10 cents a gallon on gasoline and are now making about 4 cents per gallon. For perspective US taxes on that gallon are more than 18 cents and state taxes are on average even more throughout the country.

Virtually all of the profits US oil companies earn not paid as dividends to stockholders are reinvested in exploration, and for research and development of future energy capacity. This is not necessarily true of foreign oil companies either corporate or national in type.

30 years ago the US used about 18 million barrels of oil a day.

Today the US uses about 18 million barrels of oil a day.

Yet we are told we are doing nothing about our demand for oil.

Since that time 30 years ago China and India have become huge in their demand for oil as their economies have come into global play. They will only become greater. China has almost all (92%) of their rivers dammed for hydro-electric power. When they are no longer able to tap that resource, or they decide the cost of damming rivers is too great as their capacity for river transport is lost, or seismic activity in that region raises questions about the efficacy of that source of power, as pools are drained to allow for repairs, their demand for oil will grow apace. Presently China is drilling for oil less than 90 miles from Miami, while we ban much such drilling. Both of their oil/energy needs will drastically increase and they will become more aggressive in pursuit of their own sources of oil.

The high price of oil provides more capital for and encourages development of new energy sources and exploration, if not here in the US then outside the US.

Some indications of the burden of high prices (among many others are)

A one dollar increase in the price of gasoline will add $166.00 to the cost of 3,000 mile road trip vacation for an American family. (Is that prohibitive?)

Shipping cost of freight in a tractor drawn Semi Trailer, capable of hauling more, but only loaded with 25,000 pounds driving 2,000 miles to deliver that freight, at 4 miles per gallon, with a fuel increase of $2.00 per gallon might increase the cost of shipping, if calculated proportionally, only by about four cents a pound; a 100-pound product about $4.00 for fuel alone. (One must consider how important getting that 100 lb delivery made is)

Far more drastic: false starts in solutions like (American) government mandated and subsidized ethanol is resulting in food riots, hunger, death, and hardship overseas and even in this hemisphere by taking food grains off the market, decreased efficiency in fuel usage, and increases in air pollution. (not even taking into account the subsidies)

Are any of the solutions of the recent (109th

I find this rather disgusting, myself.

http://thinkprogress.org/2009/01/16/abstinence-clown/

Watch this documentary to learn the truths about who holds the worlds dept ... the money changers.

The degeneration of Rome occurs for a number of reasons. Foreign influence for instance. Although foreigners were quick to adopt roman customs if they wanted social acceptance (and people generally do) they also introduced their own slant on things to the extent that influential people deliberately adopted foreign customs and manners in the search of individualism (a factor in increased prosperity) and relative sophistication. There is also a decline in standards over time. Civic duty in republican times was considered important, but by the late empire it was undesirable - an obstruction to getting on wit things considered more important. The wealth of earlier times had been frittered away, spent on spices, silks, animals, and riotous living, not to mention a legion or two. We see the emperors of the later empire adopting an oriental stance (ie - the Dominate) to impress their subjects with their magnificence, which suggests the magnificence was not by that time something considered normal. So instead of the display of wealth in a secondary sense (lifestyle, property, generosity) it had become importat to impress people directly, with opulence in their face. This indicates a change in social strucutre thats very important. The leaders of the roman world no longer had the sort of respect that they once commanded from their ublic, and resorted to displays of exclusivity, to effectively distance themselves from their public, and therefore the all-important client-patron relationship upon which roman society functioned had been weakened. The bonds of loyalty and obligation were not being reinforced by the great and good, becoming ever more dependent on symbolic representation. Given that the empire had to pay for its armed forces, which in itself had become unreliable and open to bribery, almost a necessity for imperial longevity, the increasing pay scales to ensure military loyalty shouldn't be suprising. But that wealth had to come from somewhere, and that meant tax. Higher taxes to support the military and the displays of opulence at Rome had weakened the bond with the rural population, who no longer saw the roman legions as a desirable career choice and who went to some lengths to avoid it in the late empire. Indeed, the ruaral population of the late empire was beginning to find ways to avoid the onerous taxation they had to suffer. So, although the pressures of external competition should have in theory brought the roman world together and provided that regenerating factor, it was out-balanced by the diminishing sources of finance, diminishment of roman culture, and the dimiminshment of roman military readiness. The romans were victims of 'victory disease', and at the height of their empire, the pax Imperium, remained essentially an inward-looking state bound by a haughty disregard for alien societies and concern for their own lifestyles. True, there were campaigns conducted in later times, but these were more often 'security' issues rather than simple conquest, the idea being to protect roman terrritory against incursion rather than to extend it. Trajans conquest of Parthia was more to do with trade issues and preventing Parthian incursion than any grandiose motive, and even he was sensible enough to withdraw when the impossibility of securing these new territories became obvious. To do so would have required more legions - who was going to pay for those? Where were the troops to come from? In the late empire, its apparent that the romans increasingly used foreign tribes as mercenaries to provide security and military capability rather than the time-honoured legions, who were themsleves (as Vegetius hints at) not the legions they once were. peace had made the roman army lazy, its structure had been changed to compensate for the weakened conditions following the civil wars that brought Constantine to power. The roman administration had become bloated with inefficient bureacracy. Where once Augustus was able to rule an entire empire comfortably, Diocletian was forced to subdivide his authority to provide a more local control, only to fall prey to the usual roman ambition for power in his successors which did nothing to reinforce imperial authority beyond the capitals. Whereas in the earlier republic the nation was smaller, focused, intensely proud of its defiant republicnism and military virtue, the later empire was bloated, inefficient, over-extended, and had lost that sense of community. That I think is the most important factor. For national competition to have a positive regnerating effect, it requires a community with a sense of purpose. The dilution of latin culture and breakdown of social bonds that once made the empire a force to reckoned with and even a desirable entity to be part of was to become exactly what the romans had originally sneered at, a weak 'effeminate' oriental potentate, but one dependent on foreigners for its own security and ultimately those same foreigners were the ones who exploited that weakness to gain their own prosperity from an empire unable to prevent it.

"On a sunny May morning, six plainclothes police officers, two uniformed policemen and a trio of functionaries from the state prosecutor's office closed in on a small apartment in Amsterdam. Their quarry: a skinny Dutch cartoonist with a rude sense of humor. Informed that he was suspected of sketching offensive drawings of Muslims and other minorities, the Dutchman surrendered without a struggle.

"I never expected the Spanish Inquisition," recalls the cartoonist, who goes by the nom de plume Gregorius Nekschot, quoting the British comedy team Monty Python. A fan of ribald gags, he's a caustic foe of religion, particularly Islam. The Quran, crucifixion, sexual organs and goats are among his favorite motifs.

Mr. Nekschot, whose cartoons had appeared mainly on his own Web site, spent the night in a jail cell. Police grabbed his computer, a hard drive and sketch pads. He's been summoned for further questioning later this month by prosecutors. He hasn't been charged with a crime, but the prosecutor's office says he's been under investigation for three years on suspicion that he violated a Dutch law that forbids discrimination on the basis of race, religion or sexual orientation.

The cartoon affair has come as a shock to a country that sees itself as a bastion of tolerance

Tim was one of the few moderators of the type of Meet The Press who worked to curb the usual personal party bias by posing tough questions to members of the political classes, regardless of their party. He did not always

Mother Teresa already gets more attention that she deserves. She was a pious stooge for god who thrived on the exploits of the impoverished. No one who denounced abortion while simultaneously denouncing condoms in AIDS ravaged Africa should appear on such a list. Ever.