Lobowolf

North cashed 3 clubs to start, and declarer got the diamonds right, scoring 2 top spades, 4 diamonds, 2 clubs, and the ace of hearts.

They're not trying to pass a sin tax; they're trying to pass a sin ban.

2♣...the missed 4-4 heart fit is pretty rare. The "why" is mostly that I consider it the least of evils. Rebidding a ratty 5-card diamond suit is ugly (and doesn't necessarily avoid missing the heart fit). Rebidding 1NT with the singleton solves the dilemma between the minors, but creates another - does partner with 5 spades rebid them, which could lead you out of an 8- or 9-card fit in one of the minors and into a 5-1 spade fit, or does partner pass the 1NT rebid, when you might have a 5-3 spade fit?

hard to believe calif is in financial trouble, eh? why not just allow the consumer to choose? THanks for reminding me...I have to get to Best Buy soon.

You did get the version of the Truscott book that had the pictures, right? ;) I don't know about "necessarily" proving things; barring syllogisms or tautologies, you pretty much have confidence levels. But in my view, the word "naive" best describes the position that they weren't cheating, in view of the photos. And that's not considering the alleged deciphering of the signals. The argument that the information wasn't put to very good use doesn't explain away the photos. On a number of hands, information might not be relevant to the hand, or it might have been conveyed by a legitimate auction, or it might be too hard to take advantage of by giving the show away. It's like looking at 200 hands of blackjack played by someone who's counting cards. On 195 hands, maybe it doesn't affect his decisions at all. Are you going to conclude definitively that he's counting because twice he took insurance when the count was high, and 3 times he stood on 16 against a 10? Pretty unlikely. The blind test would also suffer from different systems, partnership styles, etc.

Hey, the Raiders have won a game, scored 50% more points, and allowed 10% fewer. Besides, Al Davis has to die SOMEDAY. Doesn't he?

And, conversely, some people of all wings and the middle talk a great game when it comes to helping the starving poor, but don't contribute any of their own money to doing so. Rand is a bit extreme as an example, though; I think that most peope who aren't a part of the "everyone" aren't opposed to it, per se, but are apathetic. Sounds like a nice idea, but they don't actually do anything to effectuate it.

what? was this sarcasm? mike can speak for himself, but i think he was serious... i don't know anybody who is *not* for helping the starving poor (or young, or old, or anyone else) You mean, as long as it doesn't cost money? Or are you in favor of raising taxes? I hear tell that some folks give money directly to organizations that help the starving poor, without the government's involvement at all. And yet there are still lots of starving and poor around. I guess if a problem is more than 0% solved the government should stay out of it? I didn't suggest anything of the sort. The comment I was responding directly to split the question of helping the starving and poor into two: 1) Don't do it if it costs money; or 2) Raise taxes. There's plenty of room to support spending money to help the starving and poor, including primarily 3) Private charitable contributions; and 4) Supporting the existing levels of government spending. In particular, 4), above, doesn't involve the government staying out of it. Although helping the starving and poor without spending money (directly) on it has some merit as well, i.e. reducing unemployment.

what? was this sarcasm? mike can speak for himself, but i think he was serious... i don't know anybody who is *not* for helping the starving poor (or young, or old, or anyone else) You mean, as long as it doesn't cost money? Or are you in favor of raising taxes? I hear tell that some folks give money directly to organizations that help the starving poor, without the government's involvement at all.

Actually, this example is one that makes hate crime legislation plausibly reasonable. Killing the person who killed your wife wouldn't subject you to hate crime legislation, because it wasn't motivated by animus toward a targeted demographic group. Hatred of individuals doesn't count. So the guy who goes around killing gay people because he hates homosexuality is more likely to kill again than the guy who revenge kills a particular individual, and this distinction could conceivably merit disparate sentencing.

Any football fans on the thread? You can't construct a hand (errrr situation) wherein someone would want to play for the Rams less than is the case now.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. I agree with this. I just think that the appropriate treatment for beating someone to death because he's gay is the same as the appropriate treatment for beating someone to death in general.

Basically, for a sequence (or interior sequence), you want it headed by an honor, and against NT, it should be a 3-card sequence (or 3-card broken sequence, but broken at the bottom, not the top (e.g. top 2 cards touching)). So: KT97 but AJ98

This is one of those reasonable rationales I meant. The other is this: I think it's reasonable to believe there's a higher potential for recidivism for bona fide hate crime activities. May not be true, but if I had to guess, I'd think so. "Anger management" is probably easier to accomplish when it's not accompanied by that inherent hatred. But when I think of the more notorious "hate crimes," like Matthew Shepard, who was totured, tied to a fence with skull factures and brain damage, and left to die; or James Byrd, who was beaten unconconscious and dragged from a pickup truck by his neck, as horrifying as these cases are, there's still a big problem to me in singling them out and calling them hate crimes. And the problem is this - when you designate something as a "hate crime," you're invoking stronger punishment via sentencing enhancements, or federal laws that now apply to what would have been a "regular" state law crime. You're treating it "more seriously" than otherwise, in effect. And that means, by definition, you're treating the exact same act, minus the "hate crime" motivation, less seriously. You're saying that if Matthew Shepard had been a straight guy who was robbed, pistol-whipped, and left to die with multiple skull fractures, or if other black guys has tortured and killed James Byrd, somehow, it wouldn't have been that bad. We can take a little off the top of our societal disapproval of dragging an unconscious person from a truck by the neck until he's dead (and then dragging him some more). And even though I see a couple of reasonable rationales for that argument, I can't get on board with it.

Another good time for a plug for Mike Lawrence's "Opening Leads." Pretty comprehensive, and he goes into the rationales behind different leads in a clear and fairly comprehensive way. To the extent that you can picture what declarer's going to do, your defense (including but not limited to opening leads) will improve. Obivously, that's easier to do after you see dummy, but even before - picture...you have a good hand with long trump, and dummy's got a good passed hand with a 5-card side suit (at least). There's a really good chance that the suits you're going to want played (as declarer) as soon as possible are spades and hearts - draw trump and set up the side suit. So most of the time, those won't be the right suits for defenders to play.

It is the little things ignored that lead down the slippery slope. Massive cultural change is not usually accomplished with a single upheaval, but incrementally, little by little. ... The point is to make certain the U.S. government remains secular - allowing Christian symbols as Federal markers adopts Christianity as the officially approved religion. It's been a slippery slope the other way, actually. It hasn't been a matter of the government "remaining" secular, with respect to interpreting the Establishment Clause; it's been a matter of the government becoming secular, at least in the 20th century. Joseph Story put it pretty well: “Probably, at the time of the adoption of the constitution and of the amendment to it, now under consideration*, the general, if not the universal, sentiment in America was, that Christianity ought to receive encouragement from the state, so far as was not incompatible with the private rights of conscience, and the freedom of religious worship. An attempt to level all religions, and to make it a matter of state policy to hold all in utter indifference, would have created universal disapprobation, if not universal indignation.”8 The object, then, of the religion clauses in this view was not to prevent general governmental encouragement of religion, of Christianity, but to prevent religious persecution and to prevent a national establishment. * - The First Amendment. Quoted Text = Joseph Story - Harvard Law professor, Supreme Court Justice for about half his life, and one of the most preeminent legal writers and constitutional scholars of his day (or anyone's). His day, btw, was in the mid-19th century. The other text is from the Legal Information Institute's "Annotated Constitution," via Cornell University Law School. Having said all that, let me say that I'm in agreement with most on this thread as far as what a cross is, what it represents, and how it should be treated with respect to First Amendment issues. But having said that, I also recognize that in adhering to that belief, I am embracing a FAR different, and far more secular, interpretation of the First Amendment than envisioned by the founding fathers. In my view, it's a preferable one, but it's unquestionably a different one. Winston, I don't mean to attribute any notions to you that aren't yours; your comment brought to mind a viewpoint that I've heard espoused often - that a sharp, black-letter demarcation between all things religious and all things governmental has a long-standing historical validation. That's just not the case. The ACLU-style separation between church and state is a 20th century creation. Again, a good one, in my view, but a recent one. The founding fathers would have laughed themselves silly at the notion that the First Amendment would be construed to mean you can't have a cross as a war memorial on federal land. One valid reaction might be, "Who gives a rat's ass what the founding fathers thought about it?" And with respect to some matters (slavery is an obvious example, but I think this one's ok, too), I agree with that. But I think it's at least important to be aware of that position before disregarding it (certainly with respect to constitutional analysis). Scalia isn't veering away from a 230-year old tradition. He's veering away from, say, a 75-year old tradition that in turn veered away from a longer standing one that was, in fact, closer to his view than to most people's. I agree that he's doing it disingenuously.

While I agree it is shady, I believe he has the right to ask the question. Any inference you take from him asking the question is at your own risk although I think it is clear he was trying to induce you into leading the suit. He doesn't have the right to ask the question simply to fool you when the answer makes no difference to him! You can ask questions about holdings you know the opponents can't have (such as whether they have shown/denied the queen with their keycard response when you hold it because you need to know what they knew when they chose the contract) but only if you need to know the answer for bridge reasons! You take inferences at your own risk, but in this case declarer should get his score adjusted, which I have rarely if ever believed should happen in cases like this. By the way, this is your second post lately that shows you think it's ok to do anything to fool anyone at any time as long as your intent can't be proven. You might want to rethink how you look at this game... I see! I am not allowed to have my own ethical standards I have to have yours? As far as this hand goes it wouldn't even occur to me to ask but thanks for the vote of confidence. <_< I think you can have whatever standards you like! But if you ask the question declarer did when I'm directing, you're probably going to be on the wrong end of an adjusted score per 73F(2). "If the Director determines that an innocent player has drawn a false inference from a remark, manner, tempo, or the like, of an opponent who has no demonstrable bridge reason for the action, and who could have known, at the time of the action, that the action could work to his benefit, the Director shall award an adjusted score." You draw inference at your own risk when the other side had a legimate reason for the (whatever it was) that led to the inference.

It's "about" motivation, but I don't think it works as an analogy; I think it's more reasonable to treat "lack of intent" vs. "intent" differently than it is to distinguish between different intents.

If American citizens were subject to a hostile atmosphere in Europe because of who the President was, perhaps a European leader or two needs to step up and earn himself a peace prize.

DING DING DING (that is what he meant). LoL. Maybe right-siding the contract is too old-fashioned? The hand is misprinted. Opener's minors were actually: ♦AKQ ♣9762 After the contract was right-sided, an opening lead through the ♣Kx scuttled it.

Not a big fan of the whole "hate crime" deal. I can see a couple of reasonable rationales, but ultimately, they don't persuade me. I think that violent crime should be proscribed just as vehemently when not motivated by demographic animus.

I thought *I* was the Mad Balancer. White at matchpoints, I'm all over it. Red at IMPs, not so much.

I can't wait 'til Winston gets here.

Declarer generally pitches his losers, ruffs them, or eventually loses them. We know dummy has at least 5 hearts, so if declarer did have heart losers, they wouldn't have gone anywhere. He can't ruff them in dummy, and it's unlikely that dummy has a second suit to pitch them on. Getting the hearts set up, though, by cashing whatever winners you do have in the suit, can provide a vehicle by which Declarer might get rid of losers in the minors.

Thought process - A lot of defense is dependent upon identifying and countering declarer's plan. Very often, declarer's plan is highly dependent on the assets that dummy provides. Here, dummy has a long side suit (at least 5 hearts). Declarer has extra strength, from the jump. Declarer also has extra length in spades, and thus fewer potential side suit losers. Generally, that means that declarer is likely to have enough tricks, if given time to get them. Declarer's plan might very likely be something like: 1) Draw trump 2) Set up and cash whatever heart tricks are available, pitching minor suit losers. Therefore, I'd rule out hearts and spades right away. That leaves the minors, and there's nothing in the auction to distinguish between clubs and diamonds; therefore, my choice between the two will depend entirely on my holding in those suits. As a general rule, leading suits headed by ace-empty, against a suit contract, is not a good idea. That's an immediate strike against diamonds. The fact that it's a doubleton maybe means that effect is somewhat mitigated, as I can pick up a ruff, but there's no guarantee that's the case (notice - I have a pretty good hand, and the opponents bid straight to game; partner is likely to be short on entries). Leading aces sort of puts a lot of our eggs in one basket. The old cliche is that aces were made to capture kings. When you lead them, they capture 2's and 3's. Next to clubs - Not a great holding, but not a bad one, either. I have a 2-card honor sequence, at least. The standard lead is the queen. If partner has the king, the queen sets up as many tricks as I can cash before declarer ruffs in. If partner has the ten, I at least won't blow a trick (and if he also has the king of diamonds, I have trump control, so I have time to get in and switch to Ace, then a small diamond, hopefully picking up the setting trick via a 3rd-round diamond ruff). If partner has the ace of clubs behind the king, that's great. If declarer has the king behind partner's ace, we were only ever entitled to 1 club trick, anyway. So on the auction, minors are definitely preferable to majors; on my holdings, clubs are preferable to diamonds. There are various circumstances that might persuade me to lead a non-standard card, but none of those circumstances is present here, so I'll lead the queen of clubs. Generally, honor sequences are a pretty good blend of aggressiveness and safety. Other possibilities would be the ace of diamonds or a non-standard club, but I don't think there's a close second choice. If Q♣ is a 10, I don't think there's anything as high as a 6.