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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>>…</span></b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>] <b>On Behalf Of </b>Adrian Tymes<br><br></span><o:p></o:p></p><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal>>…Spike, are you empowered as moderator to keep people on the question when they keep running away from it despite being asked to focus on and answer the question?<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>Well, perhaps, but as a libertarian I disdain the notion of being empowered.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>I see plenty of advantages in our quadrennial civics lesson Americans are compelled to undergo, and the freeform discussions that tend to cluster around those periods of symbolic riot. My request is that we clearly label these discussions, for it doesn’t apply to a lot of us here. I can imagine it would be interesting to expatriates and world citizens, in the sense of watching two lions fighting at a near distance or watching a bubbling volcano: dangerous but interesting.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>We have plenty of reasons to be optimistic. In times past, times still more benighted than the present, there were few instances of symbolic chaos and riot; they were far too literal. Plenty of the Monte Python hilarity revolved around the insanity of battling knights, which involved actual death and dismemberment.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>I personally do not consider the risk of nuclear warfare high even now, but I do worry about conventional warfare a lot. That feels worse now than in the past 30 yrs.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>There are no rules against annoying our own friends. I have seen some personal attack and I do urge us all to eschew it, but what I have seen is mostly fair game. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>Play ball!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:14.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>spike<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div></div></div></div></body></html>