NJCubScouter

I don't know enough about Wesley Clark yet to have any idea whether he is qualified to be president, or whether he has any realistic chance of winning. Nor have I really seen much about his positions about any issues other than the war in Iraq. I saw where his position on the economy is basically that he needs to study it, which does not seem like a very auspicious beginning. But I personally am giving him a chance. I do notice that the conservative/Republican pundits on radio and on the Internet are going into fits of apoplexy over this guy, dredging up quotes from old military rivals

Let's see if I can do this quickly and from memory. First of all, there have been 41 presidents before George W. Bush; the reason he is counted as the 43rd is that Grover Cleveland is counted as both the 22nd and 24th because his terms were not consecutive. The truly one-term presidents (became president by election, served one full term) were John Adams, lost to Jefferson; John Quincy Adams, lost to Jackson; Van Buren, I believe lost to WH Harrison; Polk, did not run again; Pierce, I don't think ran again, Buchanan, same (would not have been re-elected anyway; only president to ente

Packsaddle, when I look at this thread it has 2 pages. The second page is formatted the same as every other page in this forum. On the first page, however, the "message screen" -- the actual block where the messages appear -- is about twice as wide as it usually is. It is so wide that on my monitor, the right-hand edge of each message is not visible. The column that usually appears on the right side of the screen -- with Join Scouter.com, Site News and the drawing of Baden-Powell -- is not visible at all unless I scroll over to the right, in which case I of course lose what is on the left

NW, on your historical rundown, I suppose it's all in how you look at it. Five presidents died during their first term and therefore never had an opportunity to run for a second (WH Harrison, Taylor, Garfield, Kennedy, Harding.) Five were never even elected president once, having moved up from V.P. to president due to death or resignation (Tyler, Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Arthur, Ford.) Of those five, Ford is the only one who even ran for his own term, or at least is the only one nominated by his party for a term as president -- the rest were either seen as caretakers or for some other reas

Thanks DS, that is good to know.

But TwoCubDad is also right, the "if nominated I will not run" etc. line was not spoken by Johnson. I have seen film clips of his speech, I believe what he said was much more mundane, "I will not seek the nomination of my party for another term as president" or something very close to that.

OGE is correct, Lyndon Johnson was the last president to decline to run for re-election. However, he did not do so because he had decided he did not want to be president any more. He, and/or Democratic leaders at the time, realized that due to the controversy over the Vietnam War, he faced an uphill battle to get re-elected, and he withdrew in order to allow another Democrat to have a chance of winning the general election. A little-remembered fact is that at the time LBJ withdrew, Eugene McCarthy had already placed a close second in the New Hampshire primary, making clear how much difficul

Thanks, DS, I thought that was the rule. There have been some discussions here (and elsewhere) from time to time of what to do in rare cases where there is a legitimate reason why a boy might be involved with two troops (such as he spends part of each year with each parent, who live in states far enough apart to make it impossible to travel back to the "home troop" on a regular basis.) I don't remember the answer. Apparently there were ways to do it. But short of that there doesn't seem to be any good reason to have a boy registered in 2 troops. I have been wondering about this lately

DS, after I thought a bit more about your statement about GWB, it occurred to me that I thought he had made it pretty clear that he was going to run, though perhaps not with a formal announcement. Certainly every media outlet and politicians from both parties seem to also be under the assumption that he is running. That made me wonder, if he has not started raising money, he would be at a huge disadvantage. Here's the answer: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/05/24/politics/main555427.shtml This is a story from May of this year entitled "Bush Jumpstarts '04 Fundraising." He

Merlyn, I suppose that part of my earlier post was not very well written on my part. Maybe the fact that I put "solution" in quotation marks should have been a clue. It also does not excuse your twisting and chopping the words of my later post (which I do stand by completely) to try to make them mean something they don't mean. I'll let someone else argue with you now.

Merlyn, contrary to the impression created by your slicing and dicing of my words, not once in this thread have I said what any government should do. Never did I suggest that the "middle ground" should ignore the rights of atheist kids. I frankly don't know what the middle ground would be. I just wish there were one. I'll pick out one example of your mischaracterizations: You seem to think that, if the BSA changes its policies to agree with what you consider to be the "true principles of scouting", that such government support should be allowed, even if your "true principles" stil

TwoCubDad, right on the money as usual. I did a Yahoo search on "laser firearm" (in quotes, because without quotes I got exclusively laser-sighting devices for real guns in the first few hits.) I get 2 sponsor hits, both of which are for laser-sighting devices for real guns, and the other 8 hits are a mixed bag, most of which appear to be training devices for law enforcement. I think all this proves the point that the definition of what is prohibited must be improved. The average reasonable person who does not spend hours reading posts on the Internet, who is sitting there reading

CubsR, sorry, I'm not sure exactly where that is. I looked at Mapquest and it does not seem to be right in the downtown "office building area" so it might not be the most expensive area in the city, but it may still be a valuable property. I am sure that regardless of the area, it's going to be fairly expensive, because remember the council would have to pay for the not only the land, but the building it already paid to build. I was at least half-serious, though I said it sort of jokingly, when I said other councils should chip in and pay for the rent (either at this building or elsewhe

TwoCubDad says: I also agree with NJ that this is an area where the language needs to be fairly lawyerly (although I'm sure someone will point out that a concise, lawerly document is an impossibility). I don't think the G2SS necessarily needs to be any longer than it is now. I have not read the whole thing with an eye toward whether I think the language is sufficiently precise, I am just looking at this particular sentence. (And if "sufficiently precise" seems like an oxymoron, it isn't. Covering every possible situation and conceivable "what if," and defining every single term in

Hey, why is everything so w i d e for this thread?

Oops. I mean, no possibility that he will NOT run. I am overrun with negatives, and I left one out. It's a bad thing. Let's try this again: He will run for re-election. There's no doubt about it.

DS, are you seriously suggesting that there is some doubt that GWB wants to run for a second term? I don't think there is any possibility at all that he will run. I don't think I have ever even heard or seen anyone suggest this before.

Well Merlyn, I didn't figure you would agree with me. In fact, the next sentence of mine after what you quoted was: "And I imagine that my "solution" won't sit well with many on either side of these issues." You were the main person on one side of the "issues" who I had in mind. What can I say. Being a moderate in this world is becoming increasiningly difficult...

Acco says: When not in field uniform but in an activity uniform most of the boys (Boy Scouts in particular) salute with the arm parallell to the ground, elbow bent, hand palm down touching the chest. I am sitting here trying to follow these instructions, and the result is something I have never seen or heard of in my entire life. If it is the right hand and the palm is FLAT against the left side of the chest, that is just a hand over the heart. But palm down? That's a new one on me.

Rooster, I can agree that we have beaten the subject into the great beyond. I think the subject of religion in Scouting is one that continues to be worth discussing, but probably in the Issue and Politics section, and not right at the moment.

I have always shied away from discussing my own political and ideological views on here, except for the subjects we discuss directly, because I think it can only detract from the discussion of Scouting. But if we are being asked just to make a prediction, regardless of our own feelings as to who should win, mine would be that President Bush will probably be re-elected. Nobody in the Democratic field really has the combination of charisma and name recognition needed to overcome the advantages of incumbency -- including having won two wars. (But that's assuming that the second one still l

I hope this does not come as a surprise to anyone. I would have been surprised if the result were anything else. I would also say that the BSA has no room to complain, as it has brought this problem on itself... ...well, I would say that, if the only issue involved were the ban on avowed gays. But I see that this time, the ban on avowed atheists is part of the city's reasoning as well, which sort of puts me into a quandary. While (as I have said many times) I believe the anti-gay policy goes against the true principles of Scouting, it would be difficult to ignore "duty to God" and

Rooster says: Nevertheless - NJ, my point seems to have escaped you. Perhaps. It has been a bit of a challenge to follow what your point actually is, since you have stated it several different ways. Be that as it may, we'll go with how you say it this time. My contention was that troops (via their adult or boy leadership) should not force Scouts or Scouters to pray these prayers routinely and/or prohibit any other kinds of prayer simply because they are not generic and/or standard. So maybe there is no problem at all. I am not aware of troops "forcing" Scouts to do anyth

Mark, I was going to make the same point in response to FatOldGuy, but since you have made it, let me just add an example that is near and dear to my heart since I have had some real-life "discussions" (read: near-arguments) over it. I mentioned it earlier in this thread. The G2SS says that boating on flowing waters (I forget the exact terminology) is not an approved Cub Scout activity. So, what happens if a family with a boy of Cub Scout age (let's say he's 10 years plus 364 days) decides to go canoeing on a reasonably mild, wide, slow-moving river, with no other Scouting families? D

Bob, I do think you misunderstood my post. I understand what the intent behind the (apparently) new policy language is. I think it is a good thing. I am pleased that the BSA is attempting to prohibit, in your words, "activities where guns are pointed at people regardles of what comes out the barrel, bullets, paint, or laser." The problem I have is with the language used. I'm going to make a statement that is derived from the "the law" but it also is applicable to all rules, regulations, policies etc. of any group or entity. That statement is this: A rule should be phrased in a way t