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You can actually get hold of foie gras that isn't produced by force feeding -

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/18/wfoie18.xml

I read somewhere that if you put the goose in a pen next surrounded by food it will eat continuously. The end result is the same as gavage, it just takes longer and needs more space. Foie gras produced this way costs about 50% more but if you can afford foie gras you can probably afford the extra 50%.

In most countries force feeding is illegal, so the only way to produce foie gras is like this. France requires food described as foie gras be produced by force feeding though.

The climate models that the global warning industry rely on, are not accurate now and will not be accurate for a very long time ahead. Its all sheer speculation and money making. Earth atmosphere is simply too complex to be modeled accurately with the current state of computer technology and climatology.

Those folks who tell you their models are accurate should be asked to prove it. They won't as they know it is a snake oil.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/11/04/eaclimate104.xml

Up to 7200 passengers/hour per lane, the equivalent of a 3 lane highway. Uses 50% less energy per passenger km than "light" rail, 66% less than a car. Cost per vehicle is £22k and each can replace up to 40 road vehicles. Real estate required is no more than the width of a footpath per lane.

Currently being implemented by BAA at Heathrow Airport... The busiest international airport in the world.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/10/20/npods20.xml

HTH.

How on earth could the article have missed off Rod Stewart. This Telegraph article tells that he was recently featured on the front page of Model Railroader.

That's way too geek for me.

Compared to the competition, Stallman seems relatively sane...

How could they not have realized that we've actually travelled in "Hypertime" and all their measurements from 25 years are all vaild ?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/10/10/scitime110.xml

Exactly.

It seems Oasis and Jamiroquai are to join the label free trend.

Article.

This leads to heartbreaking legal situations. A mother applied for welfare benefits. When they did DNA testing to make sure the kids were hers, DNA testing showed half were not, and they took half her kids away. Her obstetrician and her husband testified under oath that they had observed the kids birth, but to the bureaucracy, DNA was incontrovertible. Years later, a doctor interested in chimerism noticed her case, took multiple DNA samples from many locations, and showed that she had 2 major and one minor DNA profile. The minor was her mother, the 2 major profiles were her and her fraternal sister. The embryos had merged, and half her eggs were one DNA and half her sisters (or vice versa - it's hard to say if it's her or her sister).

A winning athlete was accused of blood doping (blood transfusion before the competition to increase stamina) and lost his medal, despite medical testimony that he was a chimera, and had two types of bone marrow DNA, and hence two types of blood.

Well you admitted that it's mostly about power and money, so why did you bring those cases up? We're talking about religious violence.

It's also a matter of proportion. Polls like this show that significant minorities of Muslims support terrorists striking against innocent civilians (not just military targets like you might expect them to support against Israel).

So as for religious violence, can you find some parallels to the Muslim actions in Africa? How about a practice similar to "honor killings" in Islamic countries? Or how about a major religion that threatens death against those who convert to another religion?

"Saudi Arabia has $800bn (£400bn) in their future generation fund, and the entire region has $3,500bn under management. They face an inflationary threat and do not want to import an interest rate policy set for the recessionary conditions in the United States" ...
"why bear the risk in these dramatically changed circumstances? We think that a fall in dollar to $1.50 against the euro is not out of the question at all by the first quarter of 2008," he said.

"This is nothing like the situation in 1998 when the crisis was in Asia, but the US was booming. This time the US itself is the problem,"

The Sub-Prime Market imploded, which has been very bad for US banks, like NetBank (which was just shut down by the FDIC).

The budget defecit swelled to 117 billion dollars in August. For those keeping track, that's up 80% year over year, with spending up 30% month over month.

Oh, and for icing on the cake - it looks like housing sales in some areas are down 46% year over year, or 25% month over month.

So, please, we have enough problems - let's not go deliberately taunting the biggest superpower in the world (at least any more - with our 9 trillion in debt, we're not going to be the "world police" much longer.) Also, the "but our GDP grows faster than our debt" argument doesn't cut it when the GDP is shrinking, the currency is in the toilet, and we still get to pay the interest on all that debt.

"Saudi Arabia has $800bn (£400bn) in their future generation fund, and the entire region has $3,500bn under management. They face an inflationary threat and do not want to import an interest rate policy set for the recessionary conditions in the United States" ...
"why bear the risk in these dramatically changed circumstances? We think that a fall in dollar to $1.50 against the euro is not out of the question at all by the first quarter of 2008," he said.

"This is nothing like the situation in 1998 when the crisis was in Asia, but the US was booming. This time the US itself is the problem,"

The Sub-Prime Market imploded, which has been very bad for US banks, like NetBank (which was just shut down by the FDIC).

The budget defecit swelled to 117 billion dollars in August. For those keeping track, that's up 80% year over year, with spending up 30% month over month.

Oh, and for icing on the cake - it looks like housing sales in some areas are down 46% year over year, or 25% month over month.

So, please, we have enough problems - let's not go deliberately taunting the biggest superpower in the world (at least any more - with our 9 trillion in debt, we're not going to be the "world police" much longer.) Also, the "but our GDP grows faster than our debt" argument doesn't cut it when the GDP is shrinking, the currency is in the toilet, and we still get to pay the interest on all that debt.

The Vatican has been a very important centre for astronomical research since well before the space race. A Catholic priest developed the Big Bang theory. The Vatican accepts the reality of evolution and has criticised the American movement to teach "Intelligent Design" in science classes.

Things have changed since 1633 you know (and no, I am not a Catholic.) Maybe you thinking of some other denomination?

As to India or China "surpassing" the US, what does that mean? Surpassing the US in what? Manufacturing? Good! That's economic specialization that creates efficiencies for everyone. Not only is talk of "surpassing" mere economic scare-mongering (did we learn nothing from such silliness when the Japanese were supposed to "surpass us" in the 1980s? Where are the Japanese today? Economic stagnation), it makes erroneous straight-line projections that ignore very important long term considerations of demographics and other factors. The US economy will be a large and important factor in the global economy for the foreseeable future. But the global economy continues to grow and evolve and the US economy continues to change from its post-WWII dominance (unsurprising since it was the only intact industrial economy on the planet) to an important player in a dynamic specialized global economy.

Simply, you're fooling yourself. All it's done is given China a huge reserve of foreign currency which is can use to threaten foreign markets to force them into turning a blind eye to their excesses.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/08/07/bcnchina107a.xml

"The imperialists are so hungry for profits that they will sell us the rope with which to hang themselves." - V. Lenin.

No. Really!

Oil is denominated in US dollars. It means the whole world has to buy and hold USD reserves. This increases the demand for dollars more than other currencies and keeps it artificially strong. If you compare the salaries you'll see approximately where the dollar is heading if the oil link is broken.

The title "PC users still prefer Windows to Vista" from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/09/24/cnpc124.xml
The title really doesn't make any sense..

I was completly unaware that windows was not vista, and someone needs to let MS know, as their packaging is wrong too (it still says Windows Vista)..

I haven't found the "New Scientist" reference this article cites, but I did find another, better article on the subject: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/09/21/sciuni121.xml

They all apply to Mother Teresa.

Susan Shields was one of her sisters for 9 1/2 years and writes "Three of Mother Teresa's teachings that are fundamental to her religious congregation are all the more dangerous because they are believed so sincerely by her sisters. Most basic is the belief that as long as a sister obeys she is doing God's will. Another is the belief that the sisters have leverage over God by choosing to suffer. Their suffering makes God very happy. He then dispenses more graces to humanity. The third is the belief that any attachment to human beings, even the poor being served, supposedly interferes with love of God and must be vigilantly avoided or immediately uprooted. The efforts to prevent any attachments cause continual chaos and confusion, movement and change in the congregation. Mother Teresa did not invent these beliefs - they were prevalent in religious congregations before Vatican II - but she did everything in her power (which was great) to enforce them. Once a sister has accepted these fallacies she will do almost anything. She can allow her health to be destroyed, neglect those she vowed to serve, and switch off her feelings and independent thought. She can turn a blind eye to suffering, inform on her fellow sisters, tell lies with ease, and ignore public laws and regulations. "

http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/shields_18_1.html

From Wikipedia: The Telegraph, an Indian daily, has referred to her as "the Saint of the Gutters", also mentioning calls for "Rome to investigate whether she did anything to alleviate the condition of the poor or just took care of the sick and dying and needed them to further a sentimentally-moral cause".

"In 2002, the Vatican recognized as a miracle the healing of a tumor in the abdomen of an Indian woman, Monica Besra, following the application of a locket containing Mother Teresa's picture. Monica Besra said that a beam of light emanated from the picture, curing the cancerous tumor. Some of Besra's medical staff and, initially, Besra's husband insist that conventional medical treatment eradicated the tumor."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/10/05/wteres05.xml&sSheet=/news/2003/10/05/ixworld.html

Dr. Aroup Chatterjee is the author of the book Mother Teresa: The Final Verdict. http://website.lineone.net/~bajuu/index1.htm
http://www.meteorbooks.com/

Letters written my Mother Teresa doubting the existence of God: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119059822005736983.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Many attempts have been made to get information about how and where money is spent to CURE people of various diseases or just WHERE it all goes. Tell me, why would an organization that accepts so much in donations not want to proudly show how it's being used to do 'good work'?

http://finance.yahoo.com/currency/convert?from=USD&to=EUR&amt=1&t=5d
http://finance.yahoo.com/currency/convert?from=USD&to=GBP&amt=1&t=5d

I'm just wondering how much faith the Japanese, Chinese and Saudis have left. The Saudis have just unpegged their interest rates...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/09/19/bcnsaudi119.xml

Is Bernanke really, truly going to make the US pay it's debts? It's like watching train wreck in slow motion. Fascinating and horrifying at the same time.

We all know what happens when we replace cameras with people we get useless puppets like these PCSO'S http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/22/ndrown122.xml/

Slashdot readers interested in the news that the NYT is "free" might be interested in other free as in beer newspapers. Who could possibly resist the temptation to visit the best newspaper in the English language - The Sun. http://www.thesun.co.uk/
You can check out if it is going to be a Zoe McConnell day, which legend has it, augurs good luck.
The Miami Herald http://www.miamiherald.com/ is free too and available in a Spanish edition. Speigel (the English version) http://www.spiegel.de/international/ is free too, and the Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/ and the Telegraph http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ are also free. Oh and the Independent http://www.independent.co.uk/ which could once claim to be the finest newspaper in the English language is free also. Robert Fisk appears in that one, I believe he finds some sympathy with some slash dotters. Private Eye http://www.private-eye.co.uk/ remains annoyingly non-free for cheapskates like myself and neither is Viz http://www.viz.co.uk/- which used to be funny once. Top Tip number eleven is quite funny. A very brief trawl of the internet should probably result in an appropriate newspaper for every possible shade of opinion.

Unfortunately, I do believe education is being dumbed down for traditional HARD subjects... for full article read the URL, but there's a bit of it:

The new GCSE science curriculum has been branded "sound bite science" which takes a back-to-front approach.

Sir Richard Sykes, rector of Imperial College London, is among the scientists to attack the core qualification, in which pupils discuss topical issues.

He warned a "dumbed down syllabus" may stop those who did not study chemistry, physics and biology individually from getting into good universities.

The Department for Education said the new GCSEs did involve academic rigour.

In recent years most pupils have studied a "combined science" double GCSE, rather than separate science subjects which are largely confined to grammar and independent schools.

But from this September, most are taking a GCSE in "scientific literacy for the 21st Century" - covering issues including global warming and mobile phone technology.

The expectation is they will also do an Additional Science GCSE - either "general", with a more factual basis, or "applied", with a more practical focus.

Science is going to be relegated to the position of Latin and Greek and will only be taught in the independent schools Baroness Mary Warnock.

However, Sir Richard told BBC News: "If you wish to have a dumbed-down syllabus for the general population that's fine. But for those who really want to go on and study a subject in depth, and particularly go to a good university like Imperial, then they'll never get there unless they study the individual subjects and take A-levels in these individual subjects."

He believes the new GCSEs will make it harder for pupils from state schools to study science at top universities as science departments prefer more traditional courses.

Crows and Ravens aren't impressed. They can solve novel(to them) logic problems:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?view=D ETAILS&grid=&xml=/earth/2007/08/17/scicrow117.xml

Ravens can also remember and recognize other individuals, and do stuff like creating fake food caches. There was a good article in Scientific American a few months back.

I wish you were right but I think support for terrorists is more widespread than you think. Don't you remember this poll that said something like 6% of British Muslims (nearly 100000 people) fully condoned the London tube attacks? And another 20% or something had at least some sympathy for them? And that was very soon after the attacks, when 99.9% of British Muslims should have been wanting to distance themselves from a statement like that (and indeed, I'm sure the actual number is higher than reported since there's gotta be some fear of retaliation when saying something like that).

Civil liberties campaigners and MPs have raised doubts about the national DNA database after the Home Office confirmed it contained more than 500,000 false or wrongly recorded names.

Suspects arrested over any imprisonable offence, including rape and murder, can have their DNA held even if they are not charged or are acquitted.

The database, the biggest in the world, contains about four million names.

But it has been dogged by problems. Statistics released by the Home Office show it contains around 550,000 files with wrong or misspelt names.

Lynne Featherstone, a Liberal Democrat frontbencher, told The Daily Telegraph that she wanted a full parliamentary inquiry into the "shocking" number of errors.

*shrug* Prehaps you can do a bit better then a strawman/ad hominen attack?

How about actually read the current news? Rather then a book written in 1776?

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/art icle600750.ece

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/08/21/america/wea lth.php

http://news.independent.co.uk/business/analysis_an d_features/article2891171.ece

http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/article_38 43.shtml

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2007/08/08/cnchina108.xml&CMP=ILC-mostviewedb ox

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2007/08/07/bcnchina107a.xml

Big companies like Lenovo being bought out by China, or more recently the US government blocking China from buying Unocal (US blocking on average 10% of US companies being bought up by China).

*shrug* Prehaps you can do a bit better then a strawman/ad hominen attack?

How about actually read the current news? Rather then a book written in 1776?

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/art icle600750.ece

http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/08/21/america/wea lth.php

http://news.independent.co.uk/business/analysis_an d_features/article2891171.ece

http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/article_38 43.shtml

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2007/08/08/cnchina108.xml&CMP=ILC-mostviewedb ox

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2007/08/07/bcnchina107a.xml

Big companies like Lenovo being bought out by China, or more recently the US government blocking China from buying Unocal (US blocking on average 10% of US companies being bought up by China).

will stupidity allow the MS camel to insert its nose into the open source tent?

What's the worst that could happen?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2F news%2F2003%2F04%2F06%2Fnclim06.xml

Read on that for a start.

Hmm... an argument to every point except the erosion of freedom in America... Well, I'll at least address your arguments as they stand.

"Well, first, I don't know where you got the idea that the interest on our debt is compounding. It is straight simple interest. Somebody buys a new security from the treasury, and the government pays him fixed interest payments every six months until maturity, at which time the principle is paid off. It never compounds.

Of course deficits add to the debt. The question is, as long as the economy is growing, why do we need to pay the debt off at all?

Yes, Social Security will be underfunded starting in about 40 years, but that has absolutely nothing to do with intragovernmental debt. Just like any treasury security that you or I buy, the securities held by the Social Security trust fund are backed by the full faith and credit of the US government, and have the same 0% chance of being defaulted on. No, Social Security's problems are more systemic with it promising more benefits to more retirees, but fewer workers are paying into the system to fund the benefits.

Oh, and these intragovernmental debts are not at all hidden. The Treasury Dept includes them in their published numbers."

What you say is true only if the government is not also borrowing money from you to pay me the interest and will in turn have to borrow still more from me in order to pay you interest... ad nauseam. Besides, if the government gives me my money back and it's worth half as much as it was when I put it in... I've lost money. I believe in charity, but let's call it what it is. As to current valuation of the dollar, are all media outlets including (probably your favorite) FOX wrong when they report the dollar to have dropped "dangerously close to historic support value"? And the figures are hidden because they are not discussed because both parties want to spend like it's going out of style.

"I've happily poked my head out from under my rock, and I see that inflation is still low, the market-determined yields on US Treasury securities are still below historical averages (meaning the market still considers them very low risk), and although the value of the dollar is off from its peak, the dollar is still stronger today than it was 10 years ago (trade weighted currency index of 103 this month compared to the Jan 1998 baseline of 100). I also see that our currency has appreciated significantly over the past 3 years compared to 2 out of our 4 top trading partners. Again, where is your fear of impending hyperinflation coming from?"

Remember the S&L collapse during the 80s? Our current debt/financing of mortgages combined with a similar arrangement in "Private Equity" is deeply reminiscent of the debt for investment trends in the 1920s that the Great Depression was blamed on and which led to the creation of the SEC. Tell me, why should I personally be unable to borrow more than a certain percentage of the money I invest when a publicly traded "private equity" company can do so? http://money.cnn.com/2007/08/06/markets/privateequ itybubble.fortune/index.htm

"The Chinese currently own about 4% of our debt (source). They aren't even the biggest foreign holder of US debt. They could probably do some damage to our currency if they liquidated all of their dollar holdings, but there is no way that would hurt us more than it would hurt them. In the meantime, lets be happy that they are helping to subsidize our low tax rates and helping our economy."

The Wall St. Journal and other media outlets seem to think your source underestimates the debt holdings. Their estimates run in the $1-1.3 Trillion range. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2007/08/07/bcnchina107a.xml My guess would be that they only consider the govern

Sure, China might take a hit on their huge USD reserves, but in the mean while, they have built hundreds of factories, infrastructure and acquired real skills and real wealth. McDonalds recently announced a 30% pay raise for its employees in China. When was the last time that happened in the US?

They are also gaining political influence in countries with rich natural resources, such as in Africa and the Middle East. That influence would remain long after the dollar loses its reserve currency status. Their stockpile of dollars is also being used to threaten the US itself.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/08/07 0806-humans-asia.html

Breathe a sigh of relief! Europeans aren't descended from filthy niggers but intelligent and cultured Asians who have no compunction about devaluing the dollar by liquidating their foreign assets 900 billion of which are USA money.

Not world-wide, but surveys of British Muslims:

40% Want Sharia Law
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2006/02/19/nsharia19.xml&sSheet=/portal/2006/02 /19/ixportaltop.html

30% Prefer Sharia Law
28% Hope U.K. Becomes Islamic State
68% Support Arrest of British Who "Insult Islam"
62% Deny Free Speech to Anti-religious Speech
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/08/14/opinion/ main1893879.shtml

38% foreign Muslims who incite hatred should be ... allowed to live in the UK
4% acceptable "for religious or political groups to use violence for political ends"
5% 7/7 bombings and future attacks justified
13% future attacks on U.S. justified
http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/483

When you say killed, didn't you mean "died"? Because dying and being killed are two different things. If not, we are underestimating the power of footwear.

Your way of live is under threat. According to the article linked, 1 in 4 Muslims are sympathetic to the motives of the terrorists.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/07/23/npoll23.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/07/23/ ixnewstop.html

That sounds like a threat and a real danger to a peaceful society.

It's well-known that the Chinese government has an active computer warfare department. A botnet on this scale is way beyond anything needed for mere industrial blackmail. But if you wanted to bring down large chunks of some nation's Internet quickly, without the attack coming from an obvious (and blockable) source, this would be a great weapon. Let's say you wanted to disable the Internet in Taiwan, or South Korea, or Japan, or all three, just prior to military action. Or let's say you wanted to disrupt financial markets to be sure that your intentional crashing of the dollar had maximal effects.

"Read these eye witness accounts reported by the BBC and decide for your self."

You really haven't been paying attention have you? Notice that both of these articles are from the first day of the shooting, where the media was full of misinformation. Both of the articles you list are full of "facts" that are now heavily disputed and is completely at odds with the findings of the independent police complaints commission.

See the Wikipedia article or this article in the Torygraph.

1. De Menezes was wearing a light denim jacket.
2. He was given no warning that an innocent man could understand. From the IPCC commissioner: "There is no action he could have consciously taken that would have saved him".
3. De Menezes passed through the barrier normally using his pre-paid Oyster card. He did not run or jump the barrier as some eyewitnesses had claimed.

I think that I'd love to see frictionless bearings and hoverboards as much as any slashdotter, but I am afraid that I'm just far too much of a skeptic to buy that a magic lens can produce long-range matter repulsion.

Indeed. Even if you are a tramp wandering the streets, you are not safe from the invasive internet scourge !

By protesting this legislation the experts are effectively asking for political power since the politicians are only clarifying their natural position in regard to experts. I would rather the experts didn't have such power, even if I don't much like politicians.

Further, if you believe in democracy (and there are plenty of mathematical reasons not to - 'arrows' theorem) then the opinion of the experts needs to be tempered either by subjecting the experts to direct democratic process, like politicians, or having politicians.

So effectively the experts in this case are indirectly calling for a tyranny, ruled by themselves.

The mark of a politician/ruler who has sold out to a lower authority is that who "accept all the recommendations" of the experts. It happens in the UK all the time. In the UK we are becoming a nation of slaves to these experts. And in addition we have the bane of secret courts on our own soil. Tyranny is already upon us.

The only defense I can think of for the scientists/experts to insist on such power is that science gives objective truth. However in the first place that is highly improbable (ref: Karl Popper: falsifiability etc) and in the second, even if 'science' holds objective truth, 'scientists' don't: they are as prone to pride and bribery as anyone.

The USSR backed the Angola rebels, otherwise I don't recall them being that active in coups, revolts or the like.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Terror_(Ethiopia)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6171429.stm

You're right, apart from the 8.5 million Ethiopians who died in the Red Terror and government created famine, Soviet foreign policy in Africa was pretty benign.

What did China do in Africa that compares with any of the others?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/04/23/wsud23.xml

Funny how dictatorships consistently put their economic interests ahead of stopping genocide in far away places.

Have you been to America lately? The only thing you would be watching here is a BBW walking sideways just to fit down the aisle.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2007/07/19/wfat119.xml

This is absurd to concern oneself with anyway since the death rate for commercial air travel is around 0.14 per billion miles. The death rate for automobile travel is 11,350% higher.

http://www.dallasfed.org/fed/annual/2001/ar01f.htm l

A quick google turns up 1.1 million links for the phrase "chinese exploited workers"

Ah, I see the first link is to Canada Tibet Committee. I agree Tibetans are being exploited and persecuted by the Chinese. Because Tibetans aren't Chinese. The sovereign nation of Tibet was invaded and conquered by Mao's army in 1959. Free Tibet!. Now change "Chinese" to "United States" and the number of results increases from 1,160,000 to 1,770,000, an increase of more than 500,000. Does that mean there are more workers exploited in the US?

Go take a gander at Frontline's Is Wal-Mart good for America video

Walmart doesn't just buy from China to sale in the US, Walmart also has stores in China. In the not too distant future China will be Walmart's biggest market. It is partnering or buying Chinese retailers, Wal-Mart plots bid for Chinese retail giant. Chinese employees of Walmart are even unionizing.

Chinese who are employed in one of these factories make more than those who can't get a job at one

That doesn't mean they aren't being exploited. Work & safety conditions play a large part. Ask a coal miner.

You're right it doesn't mean they aren't being exploited, but if they are fighting to get those jobs I'd say they are very willing work and accept the work conditions, thus they aren't being exploited.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070711/ts_nm/russia_m ammoth_dc_2

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/e arth/2007/07/11/scibaby111.xml

US health care system is similar to their economical system - it is easy to find dramatic and glaring cases of failure but overall it provides better care than for example EU or UK.

For a "broken system" these are pretty darn good statistics.
To summarize them, if you suffer from a serious illness , you are better off in USA than practically anywhere in the world, REGARDLESS of your income.

I am not going to comment on sicko because it brings nothing new to the table - it is simply a clever compilation of cherry picked examples of failures in US vs idealized "theoretical" status quo in EU.

As someone who emigrated from EU to USA I will tell you that in my case, the reality looks much more different than presented in Sicko.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2007/05/10/ncancer10.xml

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_3 07614.html

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/abstrac t/106592618/ABSTRACT

http://www.startoncology.net/capitoli/interno_capi toli/default.jsp?menu=professional&ID=67&language= eng

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4155/is_20 030914/ai_n12516915

http://cmbi.bjmu.edu.cn/news/0503/151.htm

http://gut.bmj.com/cgi/content/abstract/54/2/268?c k=nck

certain aspects of human behavior are indeed malleable. other aspects are completely unchanging, across all time and all cultures. such as cheating

there was just a study showing that we begin lying at age 6 months. so things like slavery, racism, sexism: yes, as you indicate, these things can be changed. there is such a thing as social progress in this world. but these phenomena are of a higher level of social indoctrination. something we learn later in our development. in other words, put a bunch of toddlers together of various races and racism will not occur at all. we are born racially enlightened, we are born seeing people of other skin colors equally. racism comes from idiotic and retarded influences and trains of thought later in life. racism is learned

however, amongst those group of toddlers, amongst any group of toddlers, you will find cheating and lying. these negative qualities are a much more basic building block of essential human character. lying, cheating: people will ALWAYS be doing these things. you can expect such behavior for all time, from all cultures, from all religions, from all races, from all socioeconomic groups: no matter what the level of social progress. it's just part of human nature, it's basic set of unalterable good, bad and ugly qualities

Just a few more years.

e.g. FOPP
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2007/06/24/cnfopp124.xml

Why would any artists care about music stores these days anyway? Oh they have gone into administration btw, just announced on the news 22 seconds ago.

Airbus have been doing it for some time now. From The Telegraph

"The entire wing structure of the Airbus A 350 is made of carbon fibre and the same material will account for 50 per cent of the Boeing 787, which its manufacturers say will be the most fuel efficient and environmentally friendly aircraft in the air."

Creating the problem enables the solution. This was so with 9/11 and is so with terrorism and torture. This is why al Qaeda is blamed for all iraqi resistance these days, despite US generals telling they had no significant part not so long ago. "Al Qaeda" became part of the solution when Negroponte set foot in Iraq and took the reins. Death Squads soon appeared. Holy mosques were bombed by SAS and US special ops teams, laying the blame on al Qaeda and arabs, that set the scene for sectarian violence among population that had lived together in peace during Saddam. Divide et Impera, straight from US war criminal Negroponte's repertoire. Neocon plan for control over strategic oil resources as stated in Project for New American Century requires US to set up permanent bases in Iraq. Terrorism creates the need to stay. Directing iraqis to fighting others saves american lives and keeps them from uniting and coordinating actions against US troops.

American intelligence services have been importing stolen cars from the US to use in alleged "suicide bombing" in Iraq.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12 802.htm

SAS man sets up Sunnis to take on al-Qa'eda
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2007/06/16/wirq116.xml