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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[Sheb]

She's right about the protections though, look at all the pains the US government is taking to prevent Manning from hurting herself!

[nenjin]

The equation seems pretty simple to me. Definitely do jail time in a Federal Prison in the US for the rest of your life, or ? in Russia.

[mainiac]

I think it's a sad reflection on any nations' prison system when a person would prefer a life in Russia to a life in prison.

[Zangi]

I think it's a sad reflection on any nations' prison system when a person would prefer a life in Russia to a life in prison.

Now you jest.  There are worse places to be.

[SealyStar]

Somalia, to my understanding, is basically like American prison multiplied by Mexican prison to the power of Russia

[FearfulJesuit]

Now, come come, people. I'm going to be studying abroad in Russia the year after this coming one.

(To be fair, that's in St. Petersburg, not nowheresville in Siberia...)

[nenjin]

I think it's a sad reflection on any nations' prison system when a person would prefer a life in Russia to a life in prison.

I'd like to think it's more poetic than that. That to come back to America and get a life sentence would be like admitting he'd committed a crime, which he doesn't believe he did.

[Culise]

Somalia, to my understanding, is basically like American prison multiplied by Mexican prison to the power of Russia

Depends on where you go.  Downtown Mogadishu on the front lines, sure.  Outside of that, people make do, and by the time you reach Puntland or the Republic of Somaliland (recognition pending), you actually get something that starts to vaguely resemble a state. 

[misko27]

Somalia, to my understanding, is basically like American prison multiplied by Mexican prison to the power of Russia

Depends on where you go.  Downtown Mogadishu on the front lines, sure.  Outside of that, people make do, and by the time you reach Puntland or the Republic of Somaliland (recognition pending), you actually get something that starts to vaguely resemble a state.

...I'm pretty sure I have an atlas from the previous century with Somaliland. I had to go and look them up and I found that: a) they've been independent since the 1991. b) No one, no one at all, recognizes them (A lone Owlbread stands on a highway and sheds a tear), and c) I still don't know what up with that name. I can't get over how weird that name is, it's like a Disneyland but for, Somalia?

[LordSlowpoke]

land of somalis

this makes very good sense if you have a decent understanding of how german naming of countries works

[misko27]

land of somalis

this makes very good sense if you have a decent understanding of how german naming of countries works

Not just german. -Stan means "land of". So why not Somalistan?

[Descan]

Because Somali don't speak the language that "-stan" comes from?

It'd be like asking why we don't call German, "Germanistan".

[misko27]

Because Somali don't speak the language that "-stan" comes from?

It'd be like asking why we don't call German, "Germanistan".

Right, because that's Persian. Which is mostly spoken in, surprise surprise, Persia, which is notably not any of the 'stans. Which means it makes equally little sense.

More research tells me that Somaliland thinks that it is the successor to British Somaliland, which refers back to when Somalia was divided into the French Somaliland, British, Italy, etc, none of which, I feel the need to point out, are Germany. However I will concede there is more logic in that it is a British name, but damn, they are isolated as hell in their quest for independence. In that they are functionally independent but it's irrelevant because no one cares.

[Descan]

I don't know why you felt the need to point that out, considering I just used "Germany" as an example of a country that does not speak Persian and has no real connection to Persian, like Somaliland :v

[Culise]

Because Somali don't speak the language that "-stan" comes from?

It'd be like asking why we don't call German, "Germanistan".

Right, because that's Persian. Which is mostly spoken in, surprise surprise, Persia, which is notably not any of the 'stans. Which means it makes equally little sense.

More research tells me that Somaliland thinks that it is the successor to British Somaliland, which refers back to when Somalia was divided into the French Somaliland, British, Italy, etc, none of which, I feel the need to point out, are Germany. However I will concede there is more logic in that it is a British name, but damn, they are isolated as hell in their quest for independence. In that they are functionally independent but it's irrelevant because no one cares.

Persia has been the cultural epicenter for its region since Neo-Assyria and Babylon fell; it's had a wee bit of time to leave its mark on the Turkic peoples, in the Caucasus, and along the (modern) Indian hinterland.  It's rather unsurprising that most of the -stans thus exist in the regions culturally tied to Persia (or the regions where these peoples migrated), from Pakistan and Rajasthan in the east, on north to Kazakhstan and Bashkortostan, over to Tatarstan, Hayastan (Armenia), Dagestan, and Kurdistan.  By contrast, Arabs had their own cultural epicenter for much of this period in Arabia and Egypt; that's why you won't see nearly as many nations comprised of Arabs or those who existed within the Arabic hegemonizing influence using it.  The only odd part about Somaliland is that they actually transliterated it back into Somali, but even that's not that surprising when you consider that there was no real independent, unified power that dominated the region, but rather a succession of independent minor sultanates that were subsumed by the Ottomans, Egyptians, and eventually the British.  Any native name would favour individual clans, and of the non-native options, the British are the most recent and most prosperous, not to mention the most distant.