CalicoPenn

PABill - I'm with you - it's great to have facts. Just make sure that what you get really is fact. Basement insists that what he saw on the lads social media page is enough to convince him the Scout was unscoutlike - of course, you can't see the page anymore since it's been taken down but you or I might very well have had a completely different opinion. Basement has decided that the father is wealthy because he owns a property management firm in San Francisco - one that manages 2,500 apartment units and about 1 million sq. ft. of retail and commercial space but he has no idea how much the company earns every year, what the company's margins are, what the owner of the company takes home every year. Apparently anyone who owns a company must be rich. Maybe the company is worth a few million, maybe the father has socked away a couple of million - or maybe the company has been struggling with the economy as much as everyone else has over the past few years and he's put a lot of money back into the company to keep it going - maybe he has two mortgages on his house - we don't know, but I suppose we must take Basement's opinion as fact. Basement has decided that the family must be wealthy because they have a fireplace in their house with stuff on the mantles (yes, Basement, I looked at it - I saw a lot of family photos framed in Hallmark frames, a couple of sconces worth maybe 30 bucks each, a big vase that looks like it came from Cost Plus for 150 bucks), and a rather cheaply done fireplace too - when a fireplace mantle is painted white to look like Marble, it's not expensive, and the infill tiles look like something you can buy at Lowes. Why, there's even a Baby Grand Piano - which may have been inherited from a relative, but no, we need to assume that they must be rich because they have one and have the room for it. It's not unusual for modern suburban houses to have a family room and a living room - heck, most of the solidly middle class houses in my town have both - but no, they just must be rich (why, they're so rich that they jumped right into the wood floor craze and changed out the cheap vinyl tiles in the room when they had the chance - oh, wait - no they didn't - they have the same tiles in the room from the time the lad was a Cub Scout to when he was a Life Scout). But hey, don't think that what I'm saying is all fact either - it's just an alternative view of what might really going on - just an opinion like Basements, just without jumping to conclusions without thinking through all the possibilities and giving complete strangers I know nothing about the benefit of the doubt. So yes, make sure you have the facts - just make sure you're repeating facts and not someones biased opinion - and do understand, Basement has shown time and again he's got a real chip on his shoulder about class issues. Given his statements in past forum posts that gay boys should never get Eagle because they shouldn't be in the Scouts, and given the question he's now asking, it really makes me wonder if he would be beating up on this kid and his parents if the kid was from the projects.

Partial mea culpa then Eagle732 - their website does say "one of San Francisco's largest local property management companies", but you are the one that changed that to "the largest property management firm in the San Francisco Bay area". I'm sure they would have appreciated the promotion - but of course it still isn't true. And them claiming to be one of the largest LOCAL property management firms is, once again, busines hyperbole - I can prove they're not the largest property management firm in the San Francisco Bay Area (heck, they don't even make Crain's top 25), but as soon as they start using the modifiers "one of" and "local", the criteria change - do they mean the entire bay area is local or do they mean they're one of the largest in their bay area town? Maybe, if all the national and big regional firms were pulled out of the criteria, they might make the top 25 - but based on what measurement? There is a local "boutique" apartment property management firm with 16,000 units under management but they only have 25 employees - under units, they beat out this firm, but in number of employees, they're smaller - so what's the criteria Meanings of words change as phrases and words are added and subtracted. I'm sure when you just doubled down and said they are one of the largest companies in the SF area, you didn't really mean to suggest that they are that big - maybe if San Francisco was a small town in Wyoming, but a major metropolis like San Francisco, the notion that a 75 employee firm is one of the largest is a bit absurd. There are retail stores that have more employees than that. It might put them in the middle tier somewhere, but it certainly doesn't put them in the one of the largest categories. Basement - I don't see a mother trying to buy her son the Eagle Scout Award - I see a mother fighting to see that her son got the Eagle Scout Award that he EARNED.

I've been to one "beading" ceremony - my father's. It was at a Troop Court of Honor and took all of 1 minute - he was called up, congratulated, had the beads slipped over his head, shook a couple hands, and sat back down. OGE - in this case, I suspect "bobbled" might just be the right word. I'm surprised it took 30 minutes for the Packs to start leaving. I'm surprised it took so long for someone to talk to the camp director. I'm surprised the camp director let it go on beyond the 10 minute time limit. I know some Cubmasters that would have started up a round of John Jacob Jingle Heimer Schmidt with their Pack about 12 minutes in that would soon overtake the entire audience.

You can do what Beavah suggests - be a supportive friend and mentor to a Scout you might know while hypocritically feeling free to excoriate a lad not in your council who you've never met and who lives hundreds if not thousands of miles away from you and of whom you share information with a parent in order to show that Scout bad, Boy Scouts good. Or you can do what Merlyn suggests and that's be true to the attitude towards gay scouts you've continually posted in the forums and toss the lad out on his ear. You've already made it quite clear in the forums that Scouts that are gay or who might question God should not be members of the Boy Scouts - and now you're asking what you should do? Why the sudden crisis of conscience? As for anyone else, you do what Beavah suggests and that's be a supportive friend and mentor to the Scout and let him know he can trust you. The first thing you do to keep that trust is NOT have a talk with his parents in confidence - You may think you know those parents well but the lad has lived with them everyday of his life - he may have a pretty legitimate fear of speaking to dad or mom about this. A former Scoutmaster I know still lives with the guilt of a Scout of his that committed suicide after he (the Scoutmaster) had a quiet, confidential talk with the Scout's parents over the Scout's questioning of his faith over one he was more interested in - the parents made the kids life miserable for a couple of months before throwing him out of the house. The last person the lad spoke to was his Scoutmaster before he hung himself in his neighbor's garage. Is that something you want to live with for the rest of your life? (This message has been edited by calicopenn)

Tomorrow isn't the last meeting for the Merit Badge, is it? Keep the "find a new MBC and Troop" in your quiver and don't show it - for now - and if all of the folks coming to tonights MBC meeting were committed to go to the camporee and didn't attend, then have a group SM session, rather than individual - that way everyone gets the same meassage - you don't have to repeat yourself and risk saying one thing to Billy and another thing to Johnny. Take the time out of tomorrows MB meeting - 15 minutes or so - just tell them straight up what the consequences were for the camporee (defintiely toss in some guilt, bit at the grubmaster, and at the rest for failing to be there to mentor their new SPL) and could be for the Troop's future - make sure to let them know they are looked up to by the younger Scouts (by all means, repeat what the 12 year old SPL said with emphasis on the "Cool, Older Scouts"), that one of the reasons you're taking on SM is the opportunity to help them turn the next batch of 11-13 year olds into them (it is one of the reasons). By all means let them know you're disappointed, but you also want to help them take the next steps needed for Eagle Scout but need them to start bringing their A-game again - that they may no longer be able to commit to everything because of new commitments outside Scouting but that they need to honor those commitments they do make - that it sets the right example for the younger Scouts that they may soon be asking to commit to time for their Eagle Scout projects. You might even want to take a little time to ask them their opnions on what could be done better for them - it's not unusual for 15 year olds to start getting bored with the program if it's the same old same old everytime - now might be a good time to suggest that they think about putting together a couple of senior scout only trips that might be a bit more adventurous. And make sure you get a commitment from the grub master at least (if not the others) to apologize to the SPL for leaving him in the lurch with a promise that it won't happen again. Then move on to personal management.

I didn't see the lads facebook page - wouldn't have looked at it anyway. Without any details, some who say they looked at it say he was unscoutlike. I'm not ready to accept that the lad was unscoutlike based on biased and incomplete reviews of the lads page by folks on an internet thread. The "I saw it and he was unscoutlike" argument just isn't enough. I sincerely doubt you would trust my judgment without question if I had said I saw it and saw nothing in it that was unscoutlike. I've still not seen any proof that he didn't meet the Duty to God parts, either - we have a National/Council claims one thing, Lad and family say the complete opposite. My opinion is that the BSA realized they were stpping in it and pulled a desperate Hail Mary pass out of their arsenal hoping folks would bite - and it appears that some did. I'm still floored by the assumptions about this lad and his family - but concede that part of it could be from folks not being on the same page as to what wealthy means - to someone living in a working class suburb or impoverished urban area, someone living in a suburb with a median income of $116K could be wealthy. I think that's part of the whole raise taxes for the rich debate - we can't agree on what is wealthy. $250K sounds right but living in a suburban area where folks making $100K plus per year isn't unusual, one sees how even those folks live from paycheck to paycheck - admittedly from the same kind of bad choices that folks that make less money make - but it's a pretty fine line. But I guess that since we can now judge people by their possessions, it's fair to go into Basement's negighborhood and deny food stamps and financial assistance to impoverished people if they have flat screen televisions, or go on trips to Disney World, even if they once had jobs that once allowed them to afford those things and now they don't? There are also so-called "facts" being bandied about which just aren't. No where on the father's property management firm's website does it say they're the largest in the SF Bay area. At 7,500 (apartment) units and about 1 million square feet of retail and commercial under management, they're no where close. The largest commercial management firm in the SF Bay area is CBRE with close to 40 million square feet under management. The largest apartment manager in the SF Bay area is a firm called John Stewert with around 30,000 units under management. The website say's they are one of the most respected (business hyperbole - try and prove them wrong) and touts an award they got, it appears to be from 2010, saying they are the #1 Property Management Firm - #1 and Largest is not the same thing (another assumption, I take it?). Interesting that the assumption is made that because the guy owns what is essentially a small business (75 employees isn't that many), that he's a millionaire. Now it's possible, perhaps even probable, that cumulatively over the years, he has managed to sock away in savings and investments a few million dollars - but you have no idea what kind of salary he takes per year, or how much he takes out of equity every year. For all we know, he could be like many small business folks - struggling but putting up a good facade while dumping personal funds back into his business. You just don't know, but you'll swear by your assumption. Finally, I'm perplexed by the following: "why does this kid need eagle????? He had got the world by the throat.....No problem with food on the table....college is a given.....probably a trust fund when mom and dad pass....... Kid probably has more in his checking and savings account than I do......" Is this advocating making a change to the rules so that Eagle Scout is awarded on a "needs-based" system, because that's what it sounds like. Sorry, Suburban Scout whose daddy makes $116K per year, we know you went through a lot (even perhaps a decade - yes, I'm including the Cub Scout years as part of the trail) and think you've earned the Eagle Scout rank, but you're daddy makes a lot of money so we've determined that you don't "need" to earn Eagle Scout rank so we're going to go ahead and deny it to you. The question should never be "why does this keed need Eagle" but if asked, should be answered "Because he EARNED it". I'll say it again - it doesn't matter what the insiders think anymore - what matters is public perception - the BSA keeps getting black eyes over this issue and the issue is not ever going to go away. It's not going to be one grand moment that sways either the BSA or the public one way or another - it's going to be a series of moments, which is what has been happening. The "Three G's" issue is chipping away at the mountain that is the BSA, and it's eventually going to be changed.

The assumptions being made about this lad and his family is amazing. Nothing in the articles suggests, as OGE does, that the lad is sexually active. Based on a statement from the BSA that appears not to be very accurate, we have folks like Basement accusing him of not being honest when saying the oath starting from age 12. We have folks claiming this is all a media stunt. Someone has made tha assumption that the family is "wealthy". And now we have people assuming folks in Central and Southern US are somehow more prejudiced than people from elsewhere in the US. Has anyone read the ABC article? If true, it makes the BSA look even worse - that lad had left Scouts for a time due to bullying and was convinced by his Scoutmaster, after informing his Scoutmaster he was gay, to come back and go for the Eagle Scout rank and not let the bullies win. This weekend, I purchased popcorn from Cub Scouts from three different packs (in three different councils no less) because I believe in the program. One of the adults took me aside and thanked me for brightening up his lads day because they were getting very discouraged because they were outside a very busy store for over an hour and no one would buy the popcorn and that a lot of folks said they would have except that the Boy Scouts won't award a gay kid his Eagle Scout. He said he tried to explain that they didn't support that policy and that it was in a council across the country but people just didn't care. What made it worse for him is that some of these folks are his neighbors - people he sees all the time, and a couple of them asked him if he was a homophobe. Yeah, for all those stories of people saying "keep up the good work", are stories of people saying just the opposite. How many of these black eyes must the BSA endure before it finally drags its head out of the sand and realizes they're rapidly becoming a dinosaur. I said this was another black eye for the Boy Scouts. Go ahead and defend the policy all you want - most people don't look at a 17 year old boy and think hes some awful monster because he's gay. People are interacting with more and more families with same-sex parents and aren't seeing those parents as boogeymen anymore.

Google is also warning that the site may be harmful to your computer. Checking the details, they mention an issue from September which was cleared and say there were no current attacks, which makes no sense - if there were no current attacks, why warn now?

Ok - clumsy description, single gay men

"Legislating common sense...." If people truly had common sense, the BSA wouldn't have to issue these warnings now, would they?

It doesn't matter what the insiders in the BSA think - what matters is what the general public thinks - and I suspect this is going to be yet another public relations black eye to the Boy Scouts because of their policy. Its one thing to have the policy and repeat it consistently - in the abstract, folks get it - it's quite another when the rubber hits the road, so to speak and the policy is invoked. When the BSA was using the policy to keep unmarried men out of the leadership positions, there was a lot of support - when they used the policy to boot out the mother of a tiger cub, they lost a lot of support. Now they're going to deny a 17-year old boy Eagle Scout after he's completed a project on, ironically enough, diversity. The public doesn't really give a rats patootie about those high minded "duty to God" statements - what many will see is the BSA bullying a high school student and certainly, many will see the statements by Deron Smith as being self-serving and not verifiable. We know the lad came out - he's verified that - we have no verification from anyone about the "duty to God" stuff, yet. I checked out the website of the sponsoring organization - a Presbyterian Church - they're currently in the midst of a Pastor search. It would be interesting to follow up in a few months after the new pastor has been installed to see if this has had any affect on the unit at all.

Are you going to be backpacking? Then the camping quilt in place of a lightweight sleeping bag makes sense. Are you car camping? Why spend the money on either a sleeping bag or a camping quilt. Chances are you've got all you need sitting on a bed at home right now. I don't get moderate temps year round - it can get downright cold (aka below zero) some nights when I camp. I have not used my sleeping bag in years. I have a twin size sheet folded in half lengthwise and sewn up at one end and along the side that my sleeping pad slips into (I just don't like sleeping directly on my pad). In the summer, I use another twin sheet (I also don't like sleeping without some kind of cover, even if it's lightweight). When it gets a bit cooler, I use a fleece blanket - the kind you can get at wally world or k-mart for 5 bucks. Sometimes, I use 2. If I need more than 2, it's cold enough for a nice wool blanket in place of the poly blankets - you can still get army surplus wool blankets cheap, and if you have them nearby, check out a couple of mountain man rendezvous - sometimes you find folks selling Hudson Bay blankets fairly cheap. Pendleton has some nice ones as well - they may be more pricy than the camping quilt, but you're more likely to use it at home as well as at camp too. On really cold nights, a sheet and two wool blankets is usually all I need.

"I have often wondered what would happen if there weren't any training requirements to be a doctor, lawyer, banker, teacher, etc." You get people like Abraham Lincoln becoming President of the United States. We shouldn't be going down a path where we start to compare the training needed to serve in some professions with people just wanting to volunteer for their son's Packs, Troops and Crews. I have no issues with requiring everyone who wants to be a volunteer to take youth protection training online - I'd even be fine with it if it were an annual requirement rather than an every two year requirement. I'd even be fine with the BSA creating required online courses that all need to take (depending on the level) within 2 months of registering: Fundamentals of Cub Scouting, Fundamentals of Boy Scouting and Fundamentals of Venturing/Sea Scouting that give an overview of what the program is all about, and breaks down the roles - without going into minute detail. Beyond that? Except for certain specialty training needs, the rest of the training should be highly encouraged but still optional. Does every SM/ASM really need IOLS? No, not really - in a lot of cases, it is a waste of peoples time - thats not to discount those who found benefit to it, but if the SM you're bringing on board has an undergrad degree in Outdoor Adventure Education, is it really worth the money and time to send him/her to IOLS? Just as the lads learn by doing, so do most adults - those ASMs are going to learn a lot more about outdoor leadership skills from working with an experienced Scoutmaster, other ASMs and the Scouts, then they will from a weekend man scout camp. I know some of the argument for mandatory training is so that people will learn best practices and to help deliver a more consistent program but the training is really only as good as the trainers and many of us have horror stories of trainers either droning on from a syllabus or going far off the ranch because the way he's always done it is better than what the book says. Lets face it, in an outdoor situation, who is going to be listened to first, the new ASM who has just gone through IOLS or the grizzled old Scouter who never had anything near an IOLS course but has 30 years of outdoors experience? So far, Councils have been getting the compliance they've gotten because there are folks in the units like Seattle who have been herding the cats to get the charters through. What would happen if all the units in a district of 50 units turned in their charters without all the mandatory training? Does anyone really think a Council is going to deny all of those charters? (This message has been edited by calicopenn)

"what they don't have is the right to redefine terms to make them apply to them" Yes, we should all be opposing the attempt to redifing marriage from "Marry the person you love" to "Marry a person of the opposite sex"

"* A two-finger "come here" wave at me as he looked at me and said, "Hey, come here a minute"." So how did you deal with this? I've had Scouts do that to me and I just looked at them, and with a smile on my face, said "I don't respond to "Hey" but I will respond to Mr. Scoutmaster and Please" then walked away and they figured it out (but it's also contextual, on hikes, when a Scout is looking at something exciting to him and he says "Hey, come here a sec", I'll come over and look at what they want to share with me). "* Not being "hungry" during his patrols breakfast on get-away morning, but his dad needing to make "a couple of stops" one their way back home." I dont see this as being that unusual for a boy on his first campout when Dad is along - its the next campouts, when Dad isn't driving, that matter - if he isn't hungry then, whoever the driver is just doesn't make any stops at Mickie D's along the way just because the lad has suddenly gotten hungry - he'll figure it out. "* When they were ready to leave and go home, him looking at his dad and saying, "Dad get in the car. Let's go." And dad obediently following direction." I have to say I chuckled at this one because I'm not sure this is really a bad thing - There were quite a few adults in my Scouting youth that were notorius for hanging out at the end of camporees jibber-jabbering away as most folks were leaving - my father was one of them - there were quite a few trips to district events where dad drove me and my brother home from the outing and we didn't leave until a couple hours after our Troop had already left - I sure wish I could have trained my dad to get in the car when it was time to leave :-) . I don't think it's a matter of "breaking him" - I think it's more of a matter of him getting used to your Troops conventions, and you getting used to him.

I wonder how the guard would have reacted if a squirrel bounded through the area.

Scientific laws are not theories that have been proven. All scientific laws are is a description of how nature will behave under certain conditions. The Law of Gravity is very simple - In Earth's gravity, nothing falls from Earth, everything falls to Earth - or to simplify, what goes up, must come down. But the Law of Gravity, while describing what happens, doesn't explain how it happens. The explanation for how gravity works is a scientific Theory. Scientific theories are well-confirmed explanations of how nature works. Hypotheses are empirically testable conjectures - they may lead to a new Theory or they may work to verify or falsify an existing Theory. Laws = what happens Theory = how or why it happens Hypotheses = tests of how or why More than differing philosophies, it's language that hangs folks up. In the case of the word Theory, there are a few different meanings depending on the context. The way we use the word Theory most of the time refers to philosophical theory, similar to the scientific hypotheses in that they are conjecture. But in scientific terms, hypothesis is conjecture, theory is beyond conjecture and is considered true. The problem is that we are letting people get away with saying things like "The theory of evolution is just a theory" as if its just philosophical conjecture instead of scientific truth. Perhaps its time to come up with a new word to describe Scientific Theory. I'm thinking something like Scientific Maxim.

Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl - banned in some places because of sexual content and homosexual content. Mirriam-Webster Dictionary - banned in some California elementary schools for it's definition of oral sex. Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See (a children's book), banned by the idiots on the Texas School Board because the author has the same name as an obscure Marxist theorist.

"Why would the WH drop a case against the Black Panthers for intimating voters? They had been found guilty and the case was at the sentencing stage when Holder and the WH dropped it?" Originally, the DOJ, under Bush, filed a criminal complaint - they dropped it before the year was out. A few days before the inauguration, the DOJ filed a civil complaint. The defendants never appeared in court. Before a hearing where the lawyers that filed the complaint thought they would get a default judgment, the AG's office pulled back, dropped the civil complaints against three of the parties and narrowed the complaint against one of the parties, which they pursued and got a default judgment. It is a bald-faced lie to say that they had been found guilty and the case was at the sentencing stage. One, you aren't found guilty or not-guilty in a civil trial - and this was a civil complaint, not a criminal complaint. Two, the DOJ dropped the civil complaint before a default judgment was issued so the case wasn't at the "sentencing" stage. You really should take a far more critical look at your sources to see if they're lying to you before repeating their lies elsewhere.

(double post)(This message has been edited by calicopenn)

What's your role with the Pack? I ask because if you're the Cubmaster or Committee Chair, as much as I'd be wondering how to handle this, I'd be wondering if I could trust any of the leaders that was on that event that didn't take action then and there. It seems to me you need to get all your leaders on the same page when it comes to things like this so there wouldn't have been any question that someone wearing a leadership patch from the Pack stepped forward without any hesitation.

I thought this might be interesting to spin away from an I&P thread as we delve beyond the topic. "I found my Kindle very helpful at summer camp for reading stories to the boys at bedtime. Cub Scouts or Boy Scouts? Just off hand, reading a story to Cub Scouts before lights out at camp seems like a great idea. Reading a story to Boy Scouts sounds rather surprising if that happened. With Cub Scout camping, I generally tell Scouts they can stay up talking as long as they want, secure in the knowledge that ten minutes after they get in bed they will all be asleep! Sounds like a charming idea, but I'm guessing it would need to be a short story if you wanted them to hear the end of it! Cub Scouts or Boy Scouts? Cub age boys (I'm not affiliated with the BSA). Jungle Book stories and the like. Yes, I agree - not a great idea for Scout age boys." The gyst of the exchange as I read it is the Kindle is good for being a source of stories to tell at campfires but seems to imply that story time of this sort - where it's read rather than recited from memory perhaps - is much more appropriate for Cub Scouts and not Boy Scouts. I'd like to suggest that story time is good for every age - whether it's a story being read or recited. The right person, with the right timbre of voice, can captivate a campfire surrounded by teenagers and adults reading Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven" or Robert Service's "The Cremation of Sam McGee". I've had 16 and 17 years olds listening intently as I read The Lorax by Dr. Zeuss. I think its a matter of picking the right material, and reading it in a way that makes it compelling. So what are other folks experiences - have you read stories to your Boy Scouts and if so, which ones? Are there any that have been more successful than others? Or are your Scouts more impressed by hearing a memorized tale? What about to Cub Scouts? Any stories that work well with a "mixed" crowd (like the aforementioned The Lorax)? Or is this just something you don't do because its something that hasn't been done and you're not sure how the Scouts will react or because you aren't a good story teller?

When I go to Barnes and Noble, there is always someone right in front of the door at the big Nook display asking if I'd be interested in buying a Nook. My response is always the same: "If I wanted to buy electronics, I'd go to Best Buy".

"Actually, the american people have spoken on gay rights repeatedly. 30 something states have voted on gay marriage and every time its voted down. Why cannot people accept the it." How about because the Constitution of the United States is partly designed to protect people from the tyranny of the majority. Or would you prefer to live in a country that allowed the electorate to willy-nilly choose who gets rights and who doesn't because while voters may be passing referendums to prevent gay marriage, the margins are getting smaller and smaller every year as more old folks die and more young folks, who have a completely opposite perspective start to vote. Perhaps you're more than willing to let those younger voters decide in about 10 to 15 years, that people older than 65 will no longer have any rights and will have to face "carousel" - go find the movie Logan's Run and tell us you want the kind of future for you and your family. As to the original post, I've heard an interesting blend of reports from folks on show and sells - they've had folks come up and say that they're glad the BSA is holding firm, they've had others say they won't buy becuase of the policy, and still others who donate directly to the unit without buying popcorn because they know the unit isn't at fault but they won't support the pros because of the policy. But most people either just ay no thanks, or I've already bought, or walk past without a word and some folks just buy. Yesterday, I bought another tin of caramel corn (darn cub scouts!) - and I was flabbergasted when one of the Cubs, with no prompting from anyone, started complaining that the product was too expensive to try to sell. Oh, and I recall in one of the threads someone bemoaning the loss of the tins - I live close to the border of two councils - one has the tins, one has the bags. The bags are from Trails End. The tins are from Pecatonica River. I've tried both and I prefer the caramel corn from Pecatonica River. If you used to have tins and now have bags, ask your council why they switched suppliers.

You know, for all the ink given to Chiago election shenanigans in 1961, no one has ever proved it to be true. Even now, 51 years later, it's all still just alleged. Heck, even the Illinois Election Board back in 1961, with 4 Republicans and 1 Democrat, unanimously voted not to accept the challenge to the results by the Republican party because they couldn't provide any proof. The real story is that the worse that can be proven is that Cook County delayed providing their results until the results from the rest of the state came in (and that was the source of the scurillous slurs against Daley and Chicago, that Daley must have been holding up the results so they could figure out how many new votes they needed to create in order to tip the balance - an accusation with no proof - in fact, I'd say it was a preview of the kind of "some people say" reporting garbage that Fox News is a master of) and there was no crime in that as the results were posted on time.