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I still think that they are useful for stopping low level crime if they are linked to a national register of fingerprints and DNA

The police take a DNA sample from everyone they question. They keep this on record whether or not it leads to a charge. So they already have a very, very big database with DNA and fingerprints of all the usual suspects and then some.

It's worth remembering that the the ID card scheme was one of Mr Blunkett's pet ideas. Every gov't job he gets he seems to feel he has to do something which leads to a Captain Chaos string of pointless projects.

The ID card scheme is the ultimate pointless project. The Home Office keep changing their justifications for it because its only value is to control freaks in the HO who want to know where everyone is every minute of the day. Fortunately the House of Lords may have put the brakes on. They've added an amendment to the bill, not yet agreed by the Commons, that the project cannot proceed until a full account of the costs had been produced. That would be embarassing.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/07/25/id_card_go es_icao/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2006/01/28/nid28.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/01/28/ix home.html
http://management.silicon.com/government/0,3902467 7,39131459,00.htm

I suspect this will apply to the US version too we'll have to see. Politicians are very cagey about this one for obvious reasons.

The findings prove that the world experienced a Medieval Warm Period between the ninth and 14th centuries with global temperatures significantly higher even than today. They also confirm claims that a Little Ice Age set in around 1300, during which the world cooled dramatically. Since 1900, the world has begun to warm up again - but has still to reach the balmy temperatures of the Middle Ages. The timing of the end of the Little Ice Age is especially significant, as it implies that the records used by climate scientists date from a time when the Earth was relatively cold, thereby exaggerating the significance of today's temperature rise.

Can you show me any short paragraphs or excerpts from your well documented evidence? Or will it be a link to a 5 page article full of vague accusations?

A few minutes with Google provides more than enough citations, even after excluding those from lefty publications:

CBS News says "Mr. Bush appreciates loyalty above all."

In Military Week, Lt. Col (ret) Karen Kwiatkowski lays it on the line: "George W. Bush and Dick Cheney habitually reward cowardice and incompetence. They continually place political loyalty above ethics and loyalty to country."

The British Guardian quotes Michael O'Hanlon saying "I certainly think Bush values loyalty above all else."

Time Magazine says "For a President known to prize loyalty above most else..."

The Washington Post says: "But on a matter of first-order significance to many conservatives, the president let personal loyalty override what had been a central tenet of his political strategy."

The St. Cloud Times says: "George W. Bush's particular brand of immoderation lies in the premium he places on trust and loyalty". It goes on to cite Alberto Gonzalez, Karen Hughes and Don Evans as examples. Of course we can add Harriet Meiers and Michael Brown to that list.

In a Newsday story, James Klurfield writes "What's going on here, folks, is that loyalty to the president is being rewarded above all other values, including competent performance."

The Council on Foreign Relations has an entire article called Loyalty as Foreign Policy

The New Republic says "...Moreover, both Johnson and Bush have been known to place a high premium on personal loyalty."

You can look at the whole of a Knight Ridder wire article entitled Bush's Loyalty Raises Doubts About His Political Judgment.

The British newspaper The Telegraph says "...Mr Tenet, who, like President Bush, prizes loyalty above most other virtues..."

I think I've made my point. You can find more for yourself with minimal effort if you care to.

Yup, and they just started building a European office as well...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/m oney/2006/01/29/cngoog29.xml&menuId=242&sSheet=/mo ney/2006/01/29/ixcitytop.html

Google, the giant internet search company, is to lead industry opposition to new proposals from the European Commission to regulate online content.

Here's an interview with the writer/director, Graham Linehan, published yesterday:
http://telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2 006/01/28/btvline28.xml

According to this and this and the list goes on, OGLE-2005-BLG-390Lb is five times the mass of Earth. That may be closer in mass to Earth than, say, Uranus (14.5 Earth masses), but it's a far cry from Earth-like as we know it.

According to this and this and the list goes on, OGLE-2005-BLG-390Lb is five times the mass of Earth. That may be closer in mass to Earth than, say, Uranus (14.5 Earth masses), but it's a far cry from Earth-like as we know it.

You seem to be mistaking Europe for one country with a single education policy. I believe the only country in Europe with a full universal voucher system is Sweden, with the Netherlands also having a more limited system. I'm not an expert though, I may be wrong.

Also, using Sweden as an example for policy is a bit tricky, as the center left goverment there has managed to create a comprehensive social welfare system and a rapidly developing economy, seemingly at the same time. It has many unusual policy features that work together, and probably would not be easily transposable elsewhere.

The Telegraph has an opinion piece with Swedens system and US Charter schools, although as it seems to concetrate more on the US side it might not be what your after.

The French economy grew 0.7 percent in the 2005 third quarter. There were WEEKS of riots. A horrible attack on a passenger train on new years, etc etc etc (no one on the train put up a fight in their own defense, you can keep your gentler society) Real kind and gentle: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id= 30&objectid=10362567

More of that wacky kinder society, this time from the United State's dear friend Sweden: http://fjordman.blogspot.com/2005/12/immigrant-rap e-wave-in-sweden.html

The EU countries can be more socialist and build these "kinder and gentler societies" because they outsourced their defense to the United States. I, as a tax payer over here, pay for these gentler nations defense as well as their scorn and condescension. The United States fucked up badly in two ways after WWII. 1. The Marshall Plan (I.e. we should have let Europe starve) 2. If we had to have a Marshall Plan we shouldn't have provided for Europe's security against the Soviets. If Europe had to pay for its own defense the nanny states would never have been born, birthrates would be high, and the west would not be in decline.

How's the birthrate amongst non-immigrants in Europe? Take a look. These wonderful kinder and gentler nations don't reproduce. Never a good sign... How about that work week? 35hours to create jobs doesn't spell success to me. It spells -quagmire- one of economy at least. How's Germany doing now that they switched to the Euro? That's right, non stop recession as they connot lower interest rates. What's France's government spending per GDP? Ya, in the range of unsustainable. How about the pensions?

Europe won't be gentle for long. People go to jail for having the wrong political beliefs. People go to jail simply for annoying other people. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2006/01/12/nsacr12.xml

So genetle in fact that the EC isn't answerable to the foolish electorate. More fun is guaranteed given that fact. Let's check back w/ one another in 20yrs. It'll be a hoot.

The official message of many nuke-tenants is "nuke will solve the greenhouse-gas problem". This is pure BS, as a lab shows it right now. The lab name is 'France', where approximatively 80% of the electrical (grid power) is produced by nuclear plants.
Guess what? France missed by far the Kyoto objectives of greenhouse gas (and among them CO2) reduction, and those objectives were not ambitious (Details).

Moreover we discover, in another "lab" (England), that, in addition to all the known problems (waste, disaster...), any nuke plant dismantling produces a huge amount of very 'hot' (radioactive) crap, as revealed by the corresponding costs (always rising) and planning (delay: 100 years, and counting).

But all this information is not propagated as well as the usual pro-nuke BS.

Nuclear-vendors propagate the usual "nuclear power if safe, pigs can fly" crap ("nuke is the solution for greenhouse gas reduction", "production of clean energy producers cost most energy thant they will produce", "the Chernobyl disaster killed 4000 persons"...). One can understand that. But I wonder why some theoritically neutral (are they?) people relay it!?

This idea has been the basis for concept cars for the past 15 years. The main advantage is that it would eliminate the injuries caused by drivers being impaled by the driving column/steering wheel.

And it also benefits people with spinal injuries.

The UK government has recently tried to restrict the right to trial by jury; it has detained people without charge or trial in Belmarsh prison; it has placed control orders on people who have not been convicted of any offence; it has announced plans to track every car journey and record the details for 2 years; it has pushed through an EU data retention directive that will force ISPs and other telecoms providers to store logs for 2 years to allow security services to perform traffic analysis; it has allowed the creation of a massive police DNA database; it is attempting to introduce compulsory national ID cards with a central register which will record every occasion on which a card is used.

You are correct that video surveillance is not our primary danger, but independent media and democratic systems are doing nothing to prevent the UK from turning into a police state.

Daily Telegraph article link, contains the map.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/11/26/war26.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/11/26/ ixportal.html

Apparently the main outrage comes from ICAAN reassigning control of the little used .iq Iraq domain from two Palestinian immiagrants living in the US, currently in jail after being convicted on a variety of charges resulting from their supporting terrorists organizations, and giving control to the Iraqi government (which just had an electionwith unexpected support). This seemed to have fairly strong support on Slashdot just a few months ago. It was viewed as a positive thing in Iraq.

I'm finding it difficult to get worked up about this.

No, most bars in the US (at least in the dozen states in which I've frequented bars) do not use them. In fact, I think most Americans resent them. My personal opinion is that I want the bartender to have the discretion to make me a strong drink if he or she wants.

My general feeling from the bars I've been to is that the drinks are poured on the generous side. If a bartender consistently pours a weak drink, people will remember and won't go back to that bar. On the other hand, if the bartender likes you (and I'm a very likeable guy, which may account for my opinions on this matter) he can pour you a good one. I once had a vodka and cranberry poured for me in a pint glass with just the faintest whisper of pink cranberry juice added.

In other words, not having specific measures will usually benefit you in all but the crappiest bars. And it is usually, in fact, the crappy bars that resort to using optics (I have never heard of that word for it, by the way, before you used it).

There is one state in the US that, until recently, had an odd law. South Carolina law said that all liquor had to be poured from mini-bottles (like you get in airplanes or hotels). Article here.

http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/n ews/2005/12/26/wrobot26.xml

Wakamaru is a bit friendlier than tank and acts as a security guard.

And just to chime in: although I love the print and web edition of The Guardian (clean, crisp layout, great content is even more an attraction then the "Berliner" format they keeping boasting about). I'm not overly fond of the way information is organised on the BBC's site and subsites, but they are fascinating to page through endlessly.

And, aside from that damn Java headlines thing on the front page, I do tend to give The Telegraph's site marks over The Times (which used to be only partially accessible from outside Britain) and Independent (and damn their crappy "portfolio" pay to read nonsense - wonder where the NYT got the idea) sites. Although the Telegraph's Opinion page is silly Tory at times, their features reporting is superb.

Evidence for global warming may have been exagerated by up to 40 %?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2001/01/14/wglob14.xml/
http://www.sitewave.net/news/s49p1354.htm
http://www.cgfi.org/materials/articles/2005/jan_10 _05.htm

or google for yourself.

Actually, ship's records are no good either. Sea bouys in North pacific have proved that:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2001/01/14/wglob14.xml

Check it out:

All over the United Kingdom, right now, real crimes are being committed: mobiles are being nicked, front doors are being kicked in, bollards are being lobbed through bus shelters - just to name some of the lighter activities that add so much to the gaiety of the nation. None of these is a "priority crime", as you'll know if you've ever endured the bureaucratic time-waster of reporting a burglary.

So what is a "priority crime"? Well, the other day, the author Lynette Burrows went on a BBC Five Live show to talk about the government's new "civil partnerships" and expressed her opinion - politely, no intemperate words - that the adoption of children by homosexuals was "a risk". The following day, Fulham police contacted her to discuss the "homophobic incident".

Isn't socialism a wonderful thing?

Not every system that is "not run by US" is "encouraging bureaucracy". However every day are popping up informations suggesting that US is not to be trusted any longer.

Ok, that's done.

Sun to Blame for Global Warming

A False Consensus On Global Warming

Facts disprove warnings about global warming

Global warming claims 'based on false data'

The United Nation is not a for-profit organization? Really?

were arrested over bribery involving millions of dollars

in which one U.N. staffer, Alexander Yakovlev, was convicted in a Manhattan federal court this past August

step down from his post Monday amid allegations that he and the governing

Bailey's Compass Sacks Three Execs In UN Scandal

Germany Shocked by Damning Report On UN Scandal

More?

I hadn't heard that Goldy refused to play by the rules from the Google founders. The rules were typical Google: no backroom deals that favor big institutional investors over smaller investors.

But Goldy wanted to get some easy money, they got caught and shut out of the deal. That makes my night. If you've dealt with bankers (esp. "New York" bankers), you'll know why.

Here's a nice article on this.

Perhaps this also explains the "Google will fail" articles that appeared before the IPO; the powers-that-be were peeved that Google did the IPO their way, and wanted it to fail.

Green fuel plan 'will destroy rainforests'

Forests paying the price for biofuels

Careful what you wish for.

Last January news.telegraph had an article about this that featured kind of a map on how the mirrors will be positioned.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessio nid=PTQL4SD1HOROZQFIQMGCFFOAVCBQUIV0?xml=/news/200 5/11/15/nct15.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/11/15/ixport altop.html

Both sites are asking for public help processing the data, via a special screensaver called Einstein@Home.

--Greg

China has always been a poor farming country until recently.

Poor farming countries tend not to be able to carry out voyages with a fleet of over 300 ships of which some are the size of a small aircraft carrier, halfway around the world (and some say all the way around the world) nearly 100 years before Columbus.

In the case of the De Menezes execution, the police actually shot him in the head an amazing seven times and not five as initial reports suggested.

http://news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=1794292005

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/08/17/nmenez17.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/17 /ixnewstop.html

That police activity has been considerable. Since September 11, 2001 to the end of last year, 701 people have been arrested under the Terrorism Act 2000, which requires only "reasonable suspicion" to arrest. Most have come from various branches of the Muslim community - either North Africans, who were the subject of most arrests in the immediate post-September 11 period, and Middle Eastern Muslims, or British-born suspects of Pakistani origin.

However, only 119 of those arrested were charged under the Act. Of those, 45 were also charged with offences under other legislation. A total of 135 others were charged under other legislation, including charges for "terrorist offences that are already covered in general criminal law such as grievous bodily harm and use of firearms or explosives". There have also been a number of fraud cases.

Of the rest, about 60 were transferred to immigration authorities and 351 were released without charge. Only 17 individuals have been convicted of offences under the Terrorism Act and there have been "lesser" convictions, either Irish-related or as a result of membership of proscribed terror groups.

There have been no convictions of alleged Islamic fundamentalist terrorists for the kind of readily understandable "direct" terrorist offences, such as bombings, shootings or possession of explosives and guns, which characterised the years when the Provisional IRA attacked the mainland.

Not all players on RP servers are asshats, but the RP tag seems to draw asshats to them like moths to a lightbulb. I'm sure Blizzard gets flooded with GM Tickets from humorless and over-sensitive Comic Book Guy types over every other name they come across because it simply isn't medieval enough, and it's simply easier to force a name change on the player than continue to listen to the whining.

Oldie but goodie

does this http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/n ews/2004/09/26/nnuke26.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/09/26 /ixhome.html help with the waste storage problem? The main issue with conventional nuclear plants is not the initial cost, or even the safty of the plants, but the de-commissioning. This really does push up the cost of providing energy, but maybe we should just accept that energy costs will have to rise unless we all fancy going back to the stoneage and do without it. By thinking carefully about energy conservation (better cars, insulation in buildings, more efficient air-con, different lightbulbs, etc) we could absorb the higher costs of nuclear energy. it seems to me that most people say they care about saving the planet, global warming, etc but if solving these problems means dipping into their pocket then things suddenly look different.

It's always interesting to hear how stories are covered in different parts of the world. I mean, my job has me reading the websites of the BBC, the Guardian, the Independent, and the Telegraph on a daily basis, but I find that the stories covered on news websites and the stories covered on TV and print news (even if its they're both run by the same people) are often markedly different.

The whole deal with the UN's "peacekeepers" being portrayed as a good thing does seem to be quite common on the television news (its true here in the US, and in Canada, and apparently its true in the UK as well). The stories of UN peacekeepers, however, intentionally killing civilians in Congo, or complicity in similar actions in Haiti, or (and this one is actually from the BBC) sexual abuse of women and underage girls are things that can't just be ignored, even if a big deal is not generally made of them by the broadcast media.

In fact, Refugees International just recently released a report on the culture within UN peacekeeping forces showing that these are no isolated incidents, but rather endemic.

I guess the argument could be made that recent US aggression is liable to lead to an increase in attempts to control the internet, but personally I tend to see it as the exact opposite case: that they're too busy trying to conquer the world and reshape the middle east in their own image to really tackle any serious curbs on the internet. Indeed, I think that the seperate nature of the UN might make it appealing for the US to pursue an agenda of censorship of the internet that runs afoul of their own laws since its done under the auspices of "global control". I'm also concerned that an organization that has nothing better to do than make Smurf-bombing fanfics is liable to be more proactive.

If I had my way, I'd keep both of them and every other government entirely out of the internet.

> Section 107 contains a list of the various purposes for which the reproduction
> of a particular work may be considered fair, such as criticism, comment, news
> reporting, tea

Yes, but he's admitted to being in contact with someone who admits to breaking the law. Is he not worried about being told to reveal his sources?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/07/07/wpress07.xml

...in yesterday's Telegraph, following the use of more technology in the recent cricket "rest of the world vs arguably the best in the world" series.

One of them by Mark Nicholas:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?view=D ETAILS&grid=&xml=/sport/2005/10/18/scnic218.xml/

and also in the main "review" of the recent 6-dayer. I can't help thinking that they'd have been a bit more positive if the rest of the world hadn't played so abysmally throughout.

The Telegraph being the Telegraph, they didn't miss the opportunity for "Rudi Coatstand" jokes, either.

I'm pretty sure you've got that backward. France had previously sold Exocet to Argentina, when the war broke out they provided us with inteligence to help sabotage them - see this artical: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2F news%2F2002%2F03%2F13%2Fnot13.xml

Given that this can't have helped France's reputation as an arms manufacturer, we owe them a large favour.

He/she is making a reference to the unicef smurf villiage bombing commercial.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2004/07/18/wsun18.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/07/18/i xnewstop.html

http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/1997/11.06/Bri ghteningSuni.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/56456.stm

Well, UNICEF took out the Smurfs just to be safe. read about it here.

Do they have some way to recycle all this plastic? We're entering the biggest petroleum crisis in history,

Problem solved!

Talk about self-defeating logic. You say it's not then lead into this next sentence:

"The mostly Arab fighters who inhabit the Iraqi battlefields use whatever Islamic mythology suits them at the moment, be it Mongol, Moorish, or Arab."

So which is it? They are culturally influenced or are they not? Secondly, what has this to do with combative methods and strategic thought? You have failed to elaborate about this mythology makes the bound from myth to combative action.

"Of the 50% of them who can read, I doubt they know who Sun Tzu is other than an infidel."

How does this refute my point? I said they were culturally influenced and they are. Look at the history. Much of the chinese classicists writings on warfare spread throughout the silk road from as far south as Indonesia and as far west as Turkey. Take a look at this map of the silk road. The methods of Middle Eastern fighting stem from Eastern fighting methods that had its roots in a mix of the Steepes people and ancient chinese strategists. For proof of this read up on Thomas X. Hammes, Van Creveld, Keegan , and most importantly Poole.

Oh, if you don't believe that middle eastern groups are not reading current strategy you are entirely mislead. Here is an up-to-date news article from a Kurdish website that analyzes Turkey's war against extremist groups and quotes the American strategist John Boyd Boyd. His material is based on a lot of Sun Tzu. It states that what Turkey is doing is what Boyd has suggested all along, which suggests that the cultural influence of Chinese military thought holds true.

"Furthermore, if what you say is true, then the 'insurgents's support base would be much larger. They would be winning after all."

How did you come to that conclusion? Do you know how large the insurgents support base is? There is suggestions that is up to 184,800. And that is just the Sunni insurgency and support base. That doesn't count the influence from the Iranians .

Nobody remembers this now, but Harvard University was founded by a bunch of evil white puritan dudes so that their evil white puritan spawn could be taught to read the New Testament in its original Greek, without all the overhead of the {Greek -> Latin} and {Latin -> English} interventions.

As an aside, the word in question here is porneia, and there's a great deal of controversy about what it might have meant to the first century ear. One theory is that porneia meant "abomination", so that a man and a woman were not to divorce unless they came to discover that their marriage was an abomination - for instance, if they were to learn, after marrying, that they were in fact half-brother and half-sister. Cf Pierre Jourde's Lost Land, or - SPOILER ALERT - John Sayles's Lone Star, or, of course, Sophocles's Oedipus Rex.

Finally, while we're on the subject of Harvard, you might be interested in her motto, Veritas, or "Truth":

For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.
http://www.bartleby.com/108/43/1.html#S1

And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.
http://www.bartleby.com/108/43/3.html#S10

Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
http://www.bartleby.com/108/43/8.html#S33

Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do: he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it. And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not. Which of you convinceth me of sin? And if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me? He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.
http://www.bartleby.com/108/43/8.html#S34

Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way? Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
http://www.bartleby.com/108/43/14.html#S58

If ye love me, keep my commandments. And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.
http://www.bartleby.com/108/43/14.html#S59

But this cometh to pass, that

and yet you lot still do not get it... bush is still there, getting worse every day.

Obviously, you are the one who doesn't "get it" and those who both modded you up and those who agree with you. The terrorists who staged the 9/11 attack were in the US and training for the missions for YEARS before Bush was ever even a presidential canidate let alone a president. Bush was in office for less than 8 months at the point of the attacks. You can not seriously tell me with these facts in mind that you think the attacks were put in motion based on Bush? That's the most foolish thing I've heard aside from the tin foil cap kids who think that Bush somehow controls the weather.

Infact, if al-quada, an Afgan based entity, had any cause at all to attack the US it was because of Clinton bombing Afganistan!. But to even try to end the blame there is short sighted.

I can only dismiss you as another person who has zero clue in these matters and somehow got modded as "insightful" over what is simply a knee-jerk reaction post.

I bet you're such a sensitive sitzpinkler, too.

Wuss.

PS - it's up to +5 now. Ha ha.

PPS - Fuck you and all the twits who think like you.

"make Israel safe by killing all Muslims."

The difference between what I wrote and what you wrote is that one of them is based in reality.

Reality: For years the Foreign Ministry in Tehran was draped with a 40-foot banner proclaiming that "Israel must burn."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2005/08/12/wiran12.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/08/1 2/ixportaltop.html

Reality: America has millions of peace-loving Muslims living in our country, many are citizens.

Reality: We have only used nuclear weapons twice, both in Japan, to end World War II.

Now try to present any facts to back up your point of view. You cannot do it, because your point of view is illogical. We are targeting insurgents and terrorists. Obviously many of them are Muslims. That does not mean we are targeting Muslims. To say we are is to use a logical fallacy.

Atefeh Rajabi appears to have been a fairly normal 16-year-old: sulky, disobedient, and eager to have sex. In London, those attributes earn lectures from parents and teachers on the importance of acting responsibly and not being offensive. In the city of Neka in Iran, where Atefeh Rajabi comes from, they get you hauled up in front of a judge.

Atefeh's typical teenage behaviour meant that she was charged and found guilty of "acts incompatible with chastity". The judge in the Islamic court ruled that the appropriate penalty was death. That's right: death. Her sentence was confirmed by Iran's Supreme Court!

Two weeks ago, on August 15, the 16-year-old girl was _hung_from_a_crane_in_the_main_square_ of Neka, in full public view, in order to keep "society safe from acts against public morality"!

I don't know, maybe being 32, I am "out of touch"? I just never though I would see _any_ society would think it OK to kill a child for doing things a child does such as being curious. I am not extending my emotions to a 17 year old kid who rapes, or kills. To me there is a HUGE difference between a kid who has some experimental sex/drugs/stupidity or is a _little_ rowdy vs. a 16/17/18 year old that KILLS.

How can _any_ human out there defend killing a child for making an innocent mistake like sexual curiosity? Oh, and the guy involved with here received "75 lashes". So the guy get a couple of licks while the girl gets death?

Oh, and the sickness of Islam doesn't end there. Two teenage boys - one under 18 - were publicly hanged by Iran for being gay! (Note: I am not gay, but come on now, killing someone just because they are gay? How sick of a "society" do you have to be to do something like that?)

"Depends on where you are looking for consensus. Oreskes (Science 2004 (vol 306, p1686), studied 928 peer-reviewed papers on climate change published between 1993 and 2003, and found "near universal" consensus. In the specialist community, there really is no dispute, global mean temperatures are rising, and anthropogenic sources of C02 are a likely major contributor to this.

Of course once you enter the world of politics and ideology such consensus is a little more difficult to find. On the other hand if you want to find folks with their heads in the sand, you'll be in luck. "

But if you read this...

The controversy follows the publication by Science in December of a paper which claimed to have demonstrated complete agreement among climate experts, not only that global warming is a genuine phenomenon, but also that mankind is to blame.
The author of the research, Dr Naomi Oreskes, of the University of California, analysed almost 1,000 papers on the subject published since the early 1990s, and concluded that 75 per cent of them either explicitly or implicitly backed the consensus view, while none directly dissented from it. ...Dr Benny Peiser, a senior lecturer in the science faculty at Liverpool John Moores University, who decided to conduct his own analysis of the same set of 1,000 documents - and concluded that only one third backed the consensus view, while only one per cent did so explicitly.

So two "researchers" looking at the same data set came to very different conclutions. Very different from your '"near univeral" consensus'.
And while some rile (possibly rightly so) against the Bush admin for "altering data" or "looking for favorable interpretations"; here is what this Science publication is accused of doing...

Dr Peiser is not the only academic to have had work turned down which criticises the findings of Dr Oreskes's study. Prof Dennis Bray, of the GKSS National Research Centre in Geesthacht, Germany, submitted results from an international study showing that fewer than one in 10 climate scientists believed that climate change is principally caused by human activity.
As with Dr Peiser's study, Science refused to publish his rebuttal. Prof Bray told The Telegraph: "They said it didn't fit with what they were intending to publish."
Prof Roy Spencer, at the University of Alabama, a leading authority on satellite measurements of global temperatures, told The Telegraph: "It's pretty clear that the editorial board of Science is more interested in promoting papers that are pro-global warming. It's the news value that is most important."
He said that after his own team produced research casting doubt on man-made global warming, they were no longer sent papers by Nature and Science for review...
In January, Dr Chris Landsea, an expert on hurricanes with the United States National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, resigned from the IPCC, claiming that it was "motivated by pre-conceived agendas" and was "scientifically unsound".

So it is clear that the world of politics has already entered the debate and is firmly entrenched on one side. It is sad because it concerns a very important matter, but when one side stiffles the research and findings and the promotes only a single view, it deminishes the entire body of work.

Dr Peiser said the stifling of dissent and preoccupation with doomsday scenarios is bringing climate research into disrepute. "There is a fear that any doubt will be used by politicians to avoid action," he said. "But if political considerations dictate what gets published, it's all over for science."

How is that for political ideology?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne

And that makes them not innocent HOW? They were UNARMED. Um, yeah, one of them was a friend of ours. He was a Hollywood Stuntman!!!!!!!! What part of mercanary is that? Those men were trying to feed their families after having been out of work for 9 months to a year. They were working on schools and oil derricks and the like... again, they were UNARMED. Look it up if you like... Here's a quote: "The man then began dismembering the corpse with a shovel and body parts were strung by a wire from a telephone cable. At least two bodies were tied to cars and pulled through the streets, witnesses said." http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2004/04/01/wirq01.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/04/01/i xhome.html

That doesn't change the fact that what they did was cowardly, brutal and inhuman.

And to think, our soldiers willing give their lives to protect all of us. Whether you support the cause or not, whether you believe or not. Sorry lot this world has become. *cry*

Jho - still giving it up for HER loved ones bleeding our blood in a foreign land for her children's freedom.