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Wrong on every point. My reference is not to emotion but to fact.

Ok, let's go to the Merriam-Webster and look at your use of the word "fact". The closest definition to what you're describing is as follows:

Fact - a piece of information presented as having objective reality.

This means that most rational people will view a "fact" as unvarying from person to person. "The sky appears blue on a clear day in most of the world" would be a factual statement. However, you didn't assert what many would call "fact". Here, let's look at your original post a line at a time.

This is likely to be an extremely unpopular view but there are very legitimate reasons for a state to seek limits in the distribution of news, and limits to what its citizens communicate to outsiders.

Why, sir, would a government seek to deny simple truth to those under its control? We're talking about factual occurances here, not gossip mags or celebrity gossip. If 100 people die on a bridge because the officials in a certain province have been lax in bridge inspection, it would stand to reason that they may have failed to inspect OTHER bridges in that province. If citizen safety is TRULY the aim of a government, then why not warn those citizens if a hazard exists?

As for communicating with outsiders, can you be more specific on what subjects would be better held from "outsiders"? Other than military secrets, I'd be interested to find what information you feel would be SO hazardous to the citizens {not the government} that outsiders shouldn't recieve it.

Using the bridge example above, do you believe that information should be suppressed in order to maintain civil order? If you do, can you accept the idea that many other people would not consider your view to be "objective reality", if just for the fact that a large majority of people would disagree?

Those of you raised in the west or who have lived your lives mostly in the west may not understand or remember the reality of living in weaker states.

Can you please define "weaker states"? If you mean militarily, Switzerland spends less than Vietnam does, with a total population of 7.6 million. Vietnam, on the other hand, has ready for military service more than DOUBLE the population of Switzerland. That's right, the Vietnam military has more people available to it than the population of Switzerland. Even Vietnam's present standing force of 500,000 is more than the entire population of Luxembourg, and FAR larger than Luxembourg's army of 800.

...and yet Switzerland's Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of information for each citizen. They spend less on the military than Vietnam, have fewer people available for the military, and enjoy more freedoms. Same with Luxembourg. Are they somehow less "safe" than the Vietnamese? If you think so, why?

Not all states are the same, and not all populations are the same. Conflicts are everywhere.

While arguably "fact", it in itself doesn't seem to universally justify censorship. Wisdom is the answer to conflict... wisdom that might be hard to gain without access to all available information.

You're getting the reactions here about censorship because most of the world's population disagrees...which might not make your assertation of "fact" as convincing as you'd hoped.

...like making false claims perhaps? The United States only has "the best health care outcomes" if you can afford it, and the vast majority of us cannot so we get whatever we can afford or if we're one of the fortunate ones with insurance we get whatever insurance will cover. HMOs are designed to make money so cross your fingers if you need a costly procedure because they may very well drop your coverage.

U.S. healthcare system ranked #37th http://www.photius.com/rankings/healthranks.html
24th in life expectancy http://www.who.int/inf-pr-2000/en/pr2000-life.html
37th in infant mortality http://www.geographyiq.com/ranking/ranking_Infant_Mortality_Rate_aall.htm

etc. etc. etc.

That "poverty level" is by U.S. standards, which means USD 4700 per person per year. That seems pretty low, but consider that most of the world is at approximately USD 700 per person per year.

Without factoring in how the cost of living varies between countries, a comparison of dollar figures is meaningless.

Fact is, 16% of families with children in the USA don't manage to feed themselves adequately. Tens of millions of people seek emergency food assistance from charities every year. 46% of African-American children are chronically hungry.

Also, starvation is virtually impossible in the U.S., even for homeless people. In fact, the very poor are one of the most likely groups in the U.S. to be grossly overweight.

Yes, malnourishment can kill via obesity and diabetes as well as via starvation. That doesn't mean it's not a problem, though, does it?

Infant mortality rates for the US are worse than those of practically every industrialized nation. Cuba has better infant mortality rates than the USA. And remember that if you're black in the USA, the rate is 3x higher...

Hello

According to CDC, about 23% of all deaths are due to cancer, so I don't understand your comment.

Eventually everybody dies and is so subjet at some point to some pretty catastrophic health problem. The objective of a "civilised" society should to be able to treat everybody for every condition with the best care available. This is an ideal of course, but your proposal seems to me like "Sorry dear sir/madam, you've got some pretty serious condition. We could treat you and you would have some chance of recovery, but you can't pay for the care and it is not covered by insurance or health care. You can now go home to die".

To me that sounds pretty unacceptable, given that some nations seem to be able to cope with the problem with a better approach than the US.

This country is ranked something like 43rd in rate of infant mortality. That's bad. If you want national pride, how about pushing that infant mortality rate up?

Actually, the United States is ranked 36th in infant mortality. As for using that metric as a gauge of poverty, it's ludicrous. Cuba is ranked higher than the United States! Ooh, can't wait to move to Cuba so that I can live in that prosperous nation where I can finally earn a decent wage and get out of poverty.

Why can't we be better than other countries by having a lower infant mortality rate?

You just proved parent's point completely. Morons won't let anyone do anything until all of the world's problems have been solved. "What are we doing with space travel? There are babies dying. Someone think of the children!"

Hell, we don't even have to go back 100 years. Today, the rate of infant mortality is about 8 per 1,000 live births. In the 1940's, just 60 years ago, it was nearly six times that.

According to the above link, there are 40 countries doing better than 8 per 1000, the US being ranked number #35 with 6.75/1000, just ahead of our brutal regime neighbor to the south, Cuba (at #37 with 7.15/1000). (Japan is #1 with 3.30/1000 and Sweden #2 with 3.42/1000. Afghanistan is #205 with 142.48/1000, Mozambique #208 with 199.00/1000)

So in this world, which is the mortality rate?

US infant mortality: 6.69 deaths/1,000 live births. Canada: 4.95 deaths/1,000 live births.

http://www.geographyiq.com/ranking/ranking_GDP_p ur chasing_power_parity_dall.htm .. Rankings > GDP - purchasing power parity (All Descending).

Somehow I don't picture solar energy working very well in the UK. I would think their high degree of cloud cover and rainy days would put a damper on such a project. Are there any existing (and reasonably efficient) solar plants in the UK?

Given their island nature, wind power might be reasonably useful. Current windmills in the UK seem to be bringing in 2MW per turbine. Of course, this is small in comparison to the 38GW that's currently being consumed by the UK. (Wh / hours_per_year)

Divide it out and they need only build 19,000 wind power turbines to power the country's electricity needs.

There is certainly value in installing as many affordable renewable energy sources as possible. However, for general purpose usage in all countries, the world's energy needs won't be solved before commercial fusion is available.

Samrobb wrote:

Nothing seems to indicate he's moved elsewhere. Still working in Australia, heretic?

But he said he was in a "small western nation". Austrialia is so far east it's approaching the International Date Line. It also is over 7.6 million square kilometers, the sixth largest country in the world; I wouldn't call it small.