Domain: americanthinker.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to americanthinker.com.
Comments · 214
-
Yawn.
Imagine a new line of German schnaps being promoted with those crossed symbolic fasces. It would -- understandibly -- cause an outrage.
Understandably. And stupidly. The delusional mass hysteria facing the swastika (and indeed all things supposedly-Nazi) is one of the more disheartening symptoms of the prevailing hypocrisy and idiocy of the hoi polloi in western society.
But new Russian vodkas continue to proudly display the murderous Red Star, and the above mentioned tools.
-Glee -
Re:"illegal invasions" clarified
You're correct. The Iraqi surrender apparently resulted in a cease-fire agreement, not a peace treaty.
What is in dispute here? That Iraq surrendered and agreed to a cease-fire?
That Iraq subsequently violated the cease-fire? (Note that the coalition commanders claimed that the squashing of the Kurdish uprising was also a violation of the cease-fire agreements.)
It's a pity I'm not easily finding any good, detailed reports of Iraq's actions against US/UK aircraft patrolling the designated "no fly" zones, but I highly doubt that was ever in question.
Or is it the fact that the US grabbed the UK and went off to clean up its mess without the agreement of the toothless UN (reminds me of the League of Nations, honestly)? I'll admit that could be an issue for the lawyers - I don't know.
If anything, the real item the disgruntled folks should be focussing on is the reason the war was sold to the general public: that Iraq had or was going to have nukes/WMD, and we need to do something now-now-now! Then again, since "intelligence" is, by nature, uncertain, that ultimately wouldn't get you very far, either. -
Re:It's great! (with political comment)At the risk of being marked OffTopic and burning a little karma:
Now you know how we feel in the US...wait nevermind, we dont care that they do that with our flag.
Sure, we're usually with you. Personally I opposed the Iraq war, as democracy is difficult to install by sending the army. But now we're in, Denmark has boys on the ground as well, and I support them staying until the job is done. The war has attracted a lot of the people who want to defeat democracy and install the Caliphate instead, and it's an OK place to encounter them.
On the other hand, I do *not* believe GWB comprehends the depth of this mess. He stands up for freedom, but routinely absolves Arab dictators and other leaders, and refuses to look in detail at the context that brings up almost all terror attacks (and we're talking thousands since 9/11).
Finally, I'm disappointed that the US has not stood up for a little, faithful ally. Am glad to see web sites organizing (here American Thinker) "Buy Danish" campaigns to compensate our economical losses, and point out that we're spearheading a battle for freedom that the US should support.
OK, mod me down at will
:) -
Re:47%?There is one sense in which the president deserves what has happened to him: He and his political allies are the people who made it possible, who created the legal mechanisms by which his private life became a matter of public, legal record.
There's an important lesson there.
The Republicans who approve of the current eavesdropping without judicial oversight shouldn't. Even if it's not being abused by the current president, what about possible future presidents you don't like(eg - President Hillary Clinton, President Al Sharpton, President John Kerry, President Al Gore, etc.).
http://americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id =5150
...Even as the Times defended Echelon as "a necessity" in 1999, evidence already existed that electronic surveillance had previously been misused by the Clinton Administration for political purposes. Intelligence officials told Insight Magazine in 1997 that a 1993 conference of Asian and Pacific world leaders hosted by Clinton in Seattle had been spied on by U.S. intelligence agencies. Further, the magazine reported that information obtained by the spying had been passed on to big Democrat corporate donors to use against their competitors. The Insight story added that the mis-use of the surveillance for political reasons caused the intelligence sources to reveal the operation."The only reason it has come to light is because of concerns raised by high-level sources within federal law-enforcement and intelligence circles that the operation was compromised by politicians--includingmid- and senior-level White House aides--either on behalf of or in support of President Clinton and major donor-friends who helped him and the Democratic National Committee, or DNC, raise money."
So, during the Clinton Administration, evidence existed (all of the information used in this article was available at the time) that:-an invasive, extensive domestic eavesdropping program was aimed at every U.S. citizen;
-intelligence agencies were using allies to circumvent constitutional restrictions;
-and the administration was selling at least some secret intelligence for political donations.
These revelations were met by the New York Times and others in the mainstream media by the sound of one hand clapping.... -
Re:Bad distributor. No donut!
Music distributors are providing a service not mentioned here. They're providing the service of selection, helping customers avoid wasting their time by pre-screening the artists for them. Their model was to find artists that were professionally worthy early on, sign them and help get their music out to consumers while rejecting thousands of not-so-good artists.
The model works well when you don't have a good way for consumers to discover new artists on their own or just don't have the time and interest in doing it themselves. While a mainstream news journalist will argue, they're essentially doing the same thing. They are locating the news, selecting only what they think is of value to the consumers, and distributing it. Except in both cases of mainstream news and music distribution, they let the editorial process of filtering content get out of control. Both have decided to let other things besides the consumer drive their business. Newsrooms have developed an extreme editorial slant and facts are no longer necessary, such as today's New York Times lie of the day. Both will keep cranking out crap because they are no longer in it to help their consumer. It's all about them and their power now.
Fortunately there's no reason to fret. Both industries are struggling. People that are power hungry are rarely operationally efficient. They require all the perks and refuse to work hard to make a decent product. That combination takes a few years but almost always kills the company. -
selective memory
This link might help a little. Short version: Bush didn't establish this policy, it is not without precedence and executive orders legally permit this sort of thing.
-
Re:Where the heck is Kansas?
If you say anything critical of darwinian evolution around on
/. - you'll oft be modded a troll, for example linking the fossils that appear to challenge the darwinian evolution timeline
http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v18/i4/di nosaurs.asp
http://www.bible.ca/tracks/tracks.htm
Darwinian evolution is supposed to be a well grounded theory on origin, not a philosophy.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/20 05/05/01/evolutionary_war/
The rise of ID or creationism, can be seen as a challenge to the humanist/atheist adoption of darwinian evolution.
Merely giving a voice to ID supporters, can be dangerous to your career in the scientific community.
http://www.rsternberg.net/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic le/2005/08/18/AR2005081801680.html
http://www.opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=110006220
There are arguements to be made in favor of teaching ID
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?articl e_id=4761
I take a more dialectic approach, instead of one based on censorship or herd mentality. -
This is false
"There exist outrageous levels of crime that create a powder keg every time the police isn't controlling the streets."
This is not correct. The crime rate in the U.S. has been declining since 1993:
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance.htm#Crime
And the reporting of violent crimes in New Orleans is mostly devoid of facts (i.e. sensationalism):
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?articl e_id=4797
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/ 2002520986_katmyth26.html
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/20 05-09-29-after-further-review_x.htm
"Did you know a typical Chinese peasant now lives longer than a US citizen? (Bet they don't mention facts like that on Fox)"
That's an interesting theory, but not proven by sources. A typical Chinese citizen lives just under 71 years, but a typical US citizen lives just under 78 years.
http://www.china-club.de/english/chinaguide/ueberb lick.htm
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_1741500824_4/U nited_States_(People).html#p73 -
Re:Why?
We support corrupt leaders in Saudi Arabia and in teh far east... We ignore the wish of most people in the near and middle east. And we negate their culture and try to encourage them to use our.
Do you know anything of Muslim history over the last few 100 years, let alone since the birth of their so-called pirate "religion"? Of the call for warfare, rape, and plunder against everyone who does not submit to their so-called "faith" and the complete political tyranny it entails?we negate their culture and try to encourage them to use our? Do we shove Coca-Cola and BigMacs down their throats? Do we force them to go to our movies and listen to our music at gun-point? Or do you think maybe they do it out of their own free will, because they actually like our culture, because they find it liberating and exciting? Negation of culture? PUH-LEEZ. Islam is nothing but the negation of other people's cultures till they all bow down in the direction of Mecca, speak Arabic, and think that everything that happened outside of 7th Century Arabia- whether it's the poetry of Persia, the monuments of Egypt, the spirituality of India- is worthless trash. Come back to us when you can tell us something about the complete destruction of Buddhism in Afghanistan, of Zoroastranism in Persia, of Christianity in Iraq, Egypt, and North Africa, Hinduism in Western and Northern India and every other culture unforutnate enough to live along one of Islam's bloody borders. Come back to us then, when your mind is free of the ignorance, hypocrisy, and/or self-hatred so ambly disabled in your post.
-
Re:Solar Radiation quite calmAs a coauthor of that paper, I must agree that the press release was dumbed down quite a bit. Unfortunately, it has to be that way in order to get any widespread attention by the media. So be it.
These press releases are always indecipherable. Which is frustrating, because we're not all scientifically dumb and some of us would like to know what's going on. You also have to be very careful when writing a press release on a topic like this. Soon we'll be hearing over and over how CFCs have been vindicated, all ozone loss was the sun's fault all this time, etc. Although I don't know how you'd really be able to prevent that in this case. There are just too many people who are eager to misinterpret what you're saying. Maybe as the authors of this paper you could put up a page somewhere debunking the misinformation that people will spread about it, so we don't go blue in the face explaining ozone chemistry to people.
The problem I have with the /. article here is that the submitter tries to tie the changes at high altitude seen last year to the current problem over northern Europe which is caused by the formation of a significant ozone hole over the Arctic. These are completely different phenomena and unrelated.
That's not the impression I got from RTFA:Charged particles from the storms triggered chemical reactions that increased the formation of extra nitrogen in the upper stratosphere, some 20 miles up. Nitrogen levels climbed to their highest in at least two decades.
My understanding would normally be that the Arctic hole was related to the formation of ice crystals conducive to ozone breakdown via chlorine. And what changed at high altitudes was increased NO generation. But the article then implies the NO got into the stratosphere via normal weather patterns over the Arctic. (This doesn't necessarily involve the hole, although both things are happening in the same place.) Did I decipher this incorrectly?
A massive low-pressure system that confines air over the Arctic then conspired to deplete ozone. Upper-atmosphere winds associated with the system, called the polar stratospheric vortex, sped up in February and March of 2004 to the fastest speeds ever recorded, the new study found. The spinning vortex allowed nitrogen gas to sink from the high stratosphere, some 20 miles up, to lower altitudes. The nitrogen gas is known to destroy ozone.
Depending upon how old you are and how quickly methane increases over the next few decades, you will probably live to see ozone recover to very near its historical norm.
The point I wanted to make was that the solar effects from NO production will have a shorter half-life than the chlorine effects, which you might see go down "depending on how old you are". With chlorine we have to wait for a reserve of stable atmospheric CFC to decay via chlorine to HCl. I may have Googled up the wrong half life for that process. -
Re:All for it...Yes. Remember, as K said in MIB, "a person is smart. People are stupid." Or something along those lines.
I agree that the voice of a crowd tends to the most common opinion, no matter how wacky the one side is or how reasonable the other side is. The "easy to understand" way, whether right or wrong, tends to become the norm.
Power plants in general have dangers. Nuclear power is arguably more or less safe, depending on where you stand in the crowd. The bad that can happen is terribly bad, but the safety put in place is much more robust to help avoid the bad.
Undeniably, nuclear power is not oil. If the people could understand the risks and benefits without falling into mob mentality, unless the mob gets with the program, then we can begin moving forward.
Put the power plants far enough away from the people to make them comfortable. Heck, surround them with military bases to make them safer. Put 'em in the deserts or far out in the fields, away from the cities, if that's what it takes.
Chuck the waste into space. Launch it toward the sun 'cause I'm sure it wouldn't mind, or into deep space if there's fear of something bad inside the solar system. Use the space elevator if there's fear of a rocket explosion...
An aside, since I realize the article is about nuclear power, is what about other renewable sources? How about putting wind generation in every cloverleaf on the freeway to power the nearby street lights? How about putting more than one dam on a river for hydro-electric, or just more dams in general? Why not replace those massive refineries with huge farms of wind and solar power generators?
Why not make hybrid cars the norm? Subsidise consumers for buying them, or companies to help make them inexpensive. And why not make them so they can use ethanol? Less than 1/3 the oil consumed per gallon, and lots more miles-per-gallon on top. Even if they have to be the size of SUVs to make Americans happy, the bulk of commuters don't use the power in the gasoline engines anyway; as long as they can be modified to still provide exciting car chases...
I think once we start moving in that direction, dependency will drop, and the rising market will, like elsewhere, reduce prices and increase productivity.
-
Re:Stop the Press!
But its all bananna's to monkey boy.
Ok, let me see if I understand you correctly. You cannot properly spell 'banana', and you think Bush is a moron? Mr. Bush is the first president to hold an MBA from any school, let alone from Harvard.
Bush's SAT scores were higher than Kerry's too. I bet both candidates are very aware of the DARPA Net derived Internet, Internet2 and many secret things that we will never even see. Neither John Kerry nor George Bush got where they are today without being both intelligent and politically savvy. -
Re:Good news
You didn't even bother to look up the quote, yet you imply that I am lying and that I will not respond. At least I am logged in when I post.
Coward.
http://www.google.com/search?lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 &q=%22I%20took%20part%20in%20search%20and%20destro y%20missions%2C%20in%20the%20burning%20of%20villag es%22
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?articl e_id=3798
MR. CROSBY NOYES (Washington Evening Star): Mr. Kerry, you said at one time or another that you think our policies in Vietnam are tantamount to genocide and that the responsibility lies at all chains of command over there. Do you consider that you personally as a Naval officer committed atrocities in Vietnam or crimes punishable by law in this country?
KERRY: There are all kinds of atrocities, and I would have to say that, yes, yes, I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other soldiers have committed in that I took part in shootings in free fire zones. I conducted harassment and interdiction fire. I used 50 calibre machine guns, which we were granted and ordered to use, which were our only weapon against people. I took part in search and destroy missions, in the burning of villages.
All of this is contrary to the laws of warfare, all of this is contrary to the Geneva Conventions and all of this is ordered as a matter of written established policy by the government of the United States from the top down. And I believe that the men who designed these, the men who designed the free fire zone, the men who ordered us, the men who signed off the air raid strike areas, I think these men, by the letter of the law, the same letter of the law that tried Lieutenant Calley, are war criminals. -
Re:Bush is threatened by smart people
It takes a mature individual to recognize and take council from people smarter than themselves. You may not agree with their politics, but Bush has surrounded himself with outstanding people.
Here's an article by someone who actually attended HBS, and his opinion of GWB.