Mace,

hah. A medium range escort can make $200 (the fair market value) in 15 minutes. She will probably say $200/hour, but in practice few will stay that long with her. They can make an upper middle class income by just seeing two clients a day.

Of course, different story if they work on the street or are coerced by pimps. But at the same time, I don't consider the line of work as being inherently low - we get that belief from our barbaric past.

Nem, I agree it's a violation to the person and it's bad. But my point is that these archaic beliefs, imo, also make people very sensitive and more likely to consider an act rape when it's not.

Exactly.

Iraq proved that the US may not rule the ground

But the US does rule the waves and the sky!

Any game where archers pwn like they do on AOE I and II is not worth my time.

Bummer. Can't find anything big that happened in Germany in 1872, other than the Society of Jesus was outlawed lol - and on July 4th!. But, California had a 7.2 earthquake, and the Mormon leader Brigham Young was arrested for having 103 wives.

No it was not. Bush was a n00b who did not have the slightest understanding of strategy, and it was a fortunate thing that a coalition quickly developed to limit his power. Sadly, I fear that Obama is another poor strategist who is making hasty and foolish decisions, and I see a coalition forming from both parties to limit his power as well.

A lot of these sentiments that favor the woman's side on this issue are a result of the archaic belief that a woman is exploited or even corrupted when a man has sex with her outside of marriage, which has now been expanded to include a relationship. It is implicitly assumed by many that no woman would choose to have sex outside of a monogamous relationship without peer pressure, intoxication or coercion, and that belief is all a load of crap that should be dismissed as an artifact of our barbaric past. This mistaken belief is also the reason why prostitution is considered menial.

I think that the prison system should aim to execute repeat criminals.
Israel is a strategic ally of the US
There should be no housing grants. Free market economics all the way!

> sKoE )= wrote:

I'm willing to bet that a significant portion of Americans want more action on "Global Warming" too. Should American policy and laws be based on this fanatical and faith-based hype too?>

Yes, completely ignore my point that it may be wrong to deny homosexuals equal rights to the formality of marriage, but it is a costly fight that is only driven by ideology and offers little, if any, practical benefit.

Edit: I think it's safe to accuse the side of favoring homosexual marriages as being ideologues. You are more concerned about satisfying your abstract ideas like equality in frivolous places than considering the public utility of your proposals.

Skoe,

Well, point taken on slavery. But, I am not going to endorse a costly policy to satisfy a small group's desire to participate in a formality. I don't care about the values you espouse with freedom and such. I don't see the right to marriage as having any value. To me it makes about as much sense as making a huge investment in a security that I know will yield no return.

As for whether it would offend half the population, ok I don't know that. But I can tell you that 37% of Americans want evolution replaced with creationism and 2/3 want it taught alongside creationism.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/22/opinion/polls/main657083.shtml

I think that at least suggests you would be ticking off a significant percentage of Americans.

> Noir wrote:

> It boils down to the fact that it is noones business to exclude two loving human beings from marrige. Religion should really know its place>

Maybe so. But my point remains. It is too costly to tick off half the population for something as minuscule as a formality.

> Simon wrote:

Cool, if I understood that correctly, then that seems to be a nifty change in game play ^^>

Yuppers. In Rome and Medieval II, replenishing your troops in a city requires that the city they are garrisoned in has the facilities to produce the troops you want to replenish. If you want to replenish Urban Cohorts, then the city must have a Urban Barracks. That's not the case in Empire, because you can replenish any type of troop in any city. That combined with the "you can usually find a high-quality city nearby" and the ability to train many (I've seen up to seven) troops in one turn in a city, I think your irritation with Rome shouldn't be a problem in Empire. fyi, the feature that allows many troops to be trained in one turn is also available in Medieval II.

Also, there is a battle screen for navy battles! You no longer have to be limited by auto calc at sea.

> Simon wrote:

> As Rome in Rome Total War, I hate having to use lower tiered units in under developed barbarian lands. Does that occur in Empire?>

Yes, in some cities you can not build higher quality units. However, you can replenish an army in any city. So suppose you have a large army of professional troops and they are stationed in a low-quality city, you can replenish your losses while they are garrisoned there.

Also, I have not had a problem with raising an army far away. Though there are locations with many low-quality cities, they have at least one high quality city nearby where I can raise a professional army. For example, after I had lots of cash as Britain by conquering America, I was able to quickly conquer India by landing one army and raising 3 others with the few cities I conquered there within 5 turns.