Slashdot Mirror

The Washington Times has a slightly better writeup. Not exact but way better than that poor link.

By the way - to the editors.... It's Winnie not Winny.

I posted about this on my blog earlier today. The article from the Washington Times, "Lawmakers slam FTC for video game actions contains the following quote:

Rep. Jan Schakowsky, Illinois Democrat and ranking member of the subcommittee, criticized Wal-Mart for the ease with which consumers under age 17 can buy explicit games on its Web site simply by checking a box certifying they are the proper age.

"That age verification is a joke," in an era when 13-year-olds can be issued credit cards and other children have access to their parents' cards, she said.

Wow, I know that if I were under 18 and had a credit card that the first thing I would buy online would be violent videogames. Because we all know that there isn't any pornography online or anything or even places where you could buy things you could use to commit real violent acts if you wanted to. Besides videogames the internet is all rainbows and puppies...

Such statements indicate that Rep Schakowsky is either totally clueless and incompetent or just fear mongering and will say anything to look "pro-family" and not at all concerned with real problems.

Rep. Jan Schakowsky, Illinois Democrat and ranking member of the subcommittee, criticized Wal-Mart for the ease with which consumers under age 17 can buy explicit games on its Web site simply by checking a box certifying they are the proper age.

"That age verification is a joke," in an era when 13-year-olds can be issued credit cards and other children have access to their parents' cards, she said.

Aaaaaah! Panic! Global cooling is BACK!!!!!

Time,
Newsweek,
etc.

-Peter

No World Police? What's the UN supposed to be then?

Well, right now they are too busy trading food for sex with young children. Link:

http://washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20060509-090826-9 806r.htm

The U.N. is a corrupt cesspool. I have no interest in annointing those thugs as "world police". And the U.S. went to war after Iraq ignored the U.N. resolutions, and the U.N. refused to enforce them.

Isn't Syria on the Human Rights Commission? Wow. I can't believe anyone takes that organization seriously. I would evict those deadbeats from Manhattan in a heartbeat, and cut U.S. funding.

Link: http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/2/chrmem.htm

You're right. The muslims don't want to turn us into Muslims.

They want to rape our women in Sweden. http://fjordman.blogspot.com/2005/12/immigrant-rap e-wave-in-sweden.html
They want to burn our cars in France. They don't like trains either. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2 &objectid=10362567
They don't like tall buildings. http://www.terrorism-victims.org/terrorists/wtc-pe ntagon/3trade-towers-collapse.jpg
They want Sharia law in Indonesia. http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20041022-1 01916-3985r.htm
Forget discos. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Bali_terrorist_b ombing
They want Sharia in the UK. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ne ws/2006/02/19/nsharia19.xml&sSheet=/portal/2006/02 /19/ixportaltop.html
Oh crap, no more political cartoons. (I think you know of this one)
No, they don't want a Caliphate. Oh no. http://www.khilafah.com/home/index.php (wish I still had the pic of the guy protesting in canada w/ sign asking for Caliphate)
What does that sign say? Oh, it only says to massacre those who INSULY Islam. Nothing in it about conversion. http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30100-135019 17,00.html

You're right. 100% spot on. We need to fear the Christians.

Can't wait till a company gets so desperate it sues itself. (I bet it's already happened and I get lots of links).

Privatization of schools would give people a CHOICE as to where they want to send their kids. If they wanted their kids to have a Mormon education, they could send them to a Mormon school. Or a Jewish family could send their kids to a Jewish school. This can work for Baptists, Catholics, atheists, Muslims, or whatever.

The school would be more accountable and could taylor its education program to its students better than a general government school can. Also results have shown that private school students tend to test better. If private schools aren't that great, why are public school teachers twice as likely as other parents to send their children to one? (ref: David T. Kearns and Dennis P. Doyle

Bottom line is that private schools have to compete to stay in business. Competition always brings about progress. Education, like any other service, is best provided by the free market, achieving greater quality and efficiency with more diversity of choice.

One private institution specializes in students who are about to drop out and boasts an 85% graduation rate. Not bad, considering that none of these students were likely to graduate otherwise (ref: Carolyn Lochhead)

-----
Government school teachers are putting their kids in private schools at rates far higher than the general public according to a new study by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, based upon 2000 census data.

21.2 percent of urban public-school teachers send their children to non-government (private) schools. That's almost 75 percent higher than the national average of 12.2 percent of families. That's also much higher than the national urban family rate of 17.5 percent.

But that's just the start. Where government schools are worst, far larger numbers of teachers send their kids to private schools. An incredible 44 percent of public-school teachers in Philadelphia sent their children to private schools. Other figures: Chicago, 39 percent; Baltimore, 35 percent; San Francisco/Oakland, 34 percent; New York/Northeastern New Jersey, 33 percent; Boston, 28 percent; and 27 percent in Washington, D.C.

The study also found that "even when the financial sacrifice required for private education is greater, urban public-school teachers still choose private schools for their children at higher rates than urban families with similar incomes."

Teachers and others may be able to afford alternatives to government schools, but those with lower incomes or less resources don't have that same freedom of choice. They're prisoners of failing government schools, thanks to anti-school-choice laws -- laws strongly pushed by the labor union a majority of teachers belong to.

The 2.7 million-member National Education Association (NEA) -- the nation's largest labor union -- says it opposes "tuition tax credits for elementary and secondary schools; the use of vouchers or certificates in education; [and] federally mandated parental option or 'choice' in education programs."

Whatever the NEA's intention, the result is that, while most NEA members can escape failing government schools, a large enough number of less fortunate children are kept as captives in those same schools to supply jobs for teachers who would never send their own children there.

Source: Washington Times
http://washingtontimes.com/op-ed/20041002-102019-6 379r.htm

This includes things like "we are investigating a known terrorist, and since you just published his face in the paper he went so far underground he won't even be able to find his asshole to wipe it after he takes a dump"...

That's it!

The real threat isn't coming from the tens of thousands Islamist extremist terrorists trained in Afghanistan by Al Qaeda, in Saddam's Iraq, and their associates (minus the captured ones). No!

The 9/11 attacks, the attack on the USS Cole, the Bali bombings, the Madrid bombings, the London bombings, the shoe bomb attempt, the US embassy bombings in Africa, the attacks and bombings in Saudi Arabia, the bombing in Jordan, the attacks in the Philippines, the Beslan attack, the dirty bomb plan, the plan to attack the soccer stadium in the UK, the plan to attack Heathrow, the 19 person ring just broken in Michigan, the hundreds of Hezbollah operatives in the US, including the recent Hezbollah Mexican border smuggling ring broken, and the rest all show its not the terrorists that are the problem!!

The real threat is that *cough* fantasy *cough* cabal in the White House which the "insiders" on Slashnut know are secretly planning to ignore the next election with mass destraction. (How this will actually work, nobody explains. The Constitution limits the term in office and provides for succession.) Meanwhile, outside Mom's basement (or with more meds), the rest of us see them trying to detect and stop the next terrorist attack, prefereably before they can use a salvaged anthrax or chemical weapon from Saddam's discards, or maybe even start a nuclear Jihad with a little help, or simply send a suicide bomber to a crowded mall.

Lets reach over into one of the Evolution v. Creation debates and grab Occam's Razor. Which way do you think it cuts here?

I think I understand the impulse behind William F. Buckley's statement that he would rather be governed by the first 2000 names in the Boston phone book than by the Harvard faculty. It seems to require a certain degree of sophistication to engage in certain forms of idiocy.

Don't look now, but such a repeal has already been proposed.

Now, this seems to be a fairly standard thing, actually. Someone seems to propose the elimination of term limits every administration or so, but these are truly unusual times...I wouldn't be at all surprised to see this proposed again and ratified in the hysteria following another 'terrorist attack'.

The day this passes is the day I either join the Michigan Militia or move to Canada.

Not that I have the time, but let's us address your questions:

is the u.s. trying to capture territory?

Capture vs. control... it's one thing to fly the US flag, it's another to own the government that runs a country, especially one rich in desired fossil fuels. Do you see much of a difference?

is the u.s. actively and methodically commiting genocide?

Not really, but neither were the Nazi's for the first few years. Although never as blatant, I can see the US falling into a pattern of eugenics.

is u.s. military action taken with the belief of safeguarding national interests (whether real or perceived)?

Yes, and so was Germany's. At least to the people. After the fire at Reichstag, Hitler declared that the Poles had invaded and started the fire. Terrorism, he called it. Did people percieve the invasion of Poland as safeguarding national interests? You bet.

would concepts such as diversity, human rights, and multiculturalism exist if hitler had not been confronted and allowed to dominate the entirety of europe and asia?

Yes. This issue was being pushed long before Nazi Germany, starting early with slavery, then a series of suffrage movements in the US. To assume that the issues of multiculturalism would not exist without WWII is a pretty thin argument.

does the u.s. system have safeguards not allowing any individual to retain too much power?

In theory, but the Patriot Act is just the first in a series of laws passed that do indeed shift the balance of power towards the executive. With the judicial scared to step up and reject the "State Secrets" privledge, and Congress voting strictly upon party lines, the balance of power is quite obviously not working the way it was supposed to.

will the u.s. have a new leader in 2008?

One can hope - will that leader still be in the same pocket that GW Bush is? That remains to be seen.

will new congressmen be elected prior to that?

Sure. Will the balance of power shift? If all new congressmen were elected but the Republican party remained in the majority, nothing much would change at all.

are people leaking national security information being executed?

Yes and no. Leaking information when a government employee with security clearance is considered treason and is punsishable by death. Executions have been carried out in this country. And for the first time ever, normal citizens are being prosecuted under federal espionage acts for recieving leaked information. See this.

what about the outspoken 2 star generals?

For now, we still retain a degree of free speech. Besides, they're not saying anything that anyone didn't already know.

what particular, concrete examples can you provide of u.s. citizen privacy rights being infringed by government excess?

Illegal wiretapping, prosecuting citizens under the Espionage Act of 1917 (which will chill free speech and freedom of the press if won.) There are two. How about this story? CAAPS? Carnivore?

for all the hubub of late, there has not been one specific report of actual, identifiable privacy infringement.

Bullshit. FBI retrieval of airline information after 9/11, NSA boxes in AT&T POPs, etc., etc., etc. Check the ACLU website (of which I am NOT a member) for a whole series of lawsuits against illegal government action against its citizens.

Look, the point is, the US is heading in the wrong direction, at almost blazing speed. The US tries to hold countries accountable for human rights violations while explicitly exempting CIA agents from the same rules. This is why the international community is becoming more and more careful about what US actions it backs.

Current direction = BAD. Not a whole lot of argument to be made against that.

The press has "battered" President Bush this election season, according to a Project for Excellence in Journalism analysis of 817 print and broadcast stories that ran between Oct. 1 and Oct. 14.
        Mr. Bush "suffered strikingly more negative press coverage than challenger John Kerry," according to the study, which will be released today.
        "Overall, 59 percent of Bush-dominated stories were clearly negative in nature," while "just 25 percent of Kerry stories were decidedly negative," according to the study.

That so many Americans believe that the occupation of Iraq is going very badly -- far worse than is the case -- undoubtedly has something to do with consistently negative press coverage. As this essay is written, insurgent attacks have dropped by one-third to one-half in the past month, and, according to Lawrence Kaplan,3 Coalition and Iraqi forces have captured and killed "scores of insurgents in lopsided battles." For some months, Iraqi civilians have been reporting arms caches and insurgent activity to U.S. and Iraqi forces, and more recently some have even taken up arms against insurgents in their midst.

Allow me to quote more shocking statistics from that report. Namely, " the American Red Cross estimates that nationally, the risk of a blood donor having antibodies to Chagas or being infected with the disease is 1 in 25,000. The risk is 1 in 5,400 in Los Angeles and 1 in 9,000 in Miami. The Red Cross says it will begin screening donors for Chagas, once a suitable test is found ." Chagas is a fatal disease that has no known cure. Due to the presence of Mexican illegal aliens (of whom about 10 percent are infected with Chagas), if you live in Los Angeles, you are 5 times more likely to die.

" Federal data suggest that as many as 10 percent of the approximately 1,000 Mexicans who emigrate to the United States daily probably are infected with Chagas, said Dr. Louis V. Kirchhoff, a Chagas specialist and a professor at the University of Iowa's medical school. "

Now, let's move onto tuberculosis. " The report found that people from outside the United States accounted for 53.3 percent of all new tuberculosis cases in this country in 2003. That was up from fewer than 30 percent in 1993. In 2003, nearly 26 percent of foreign-born TB patients in the United States were from Mexico. " Note that 0.3 * 0.533 = 0.1599. In other words, about 16% of all new tuberculosis cases in the United States is due to Mexicans aliens.

The attitude expressed by alienw (585907) is widespread in Mexico and other failed societies. alienw (585907)'s kind of attitude is precisely the kind of attitude that has destroyed the society of Mexico. alienw (585907), Mexicans, and Indians reject science in favor of racist bigotry and race "power". What matters to alienw (585907) and his ilk is espousing raw racist bigotry in the name of "Hispanic Power".

The author the report further states, " In 2003, nearly 26 percent of foreign-born TB patients in the United States were from Mexico ".

The author also warns, "Federal data suggest that as many as 10 percent of the approximately 1,000 Mexicans who emigrate to the United States daily probably are infected with Chagas , said Dr. Louis V. Kirchhoff, a Chagas specialist and a professor at the University of Iowa's medical school". Chagas is fatal and kills you via a set of debilitating chronic conditions which manifest themselves decades after initial infection.

Wow! I bet they have a lot of terrorists to show for all that work. Right...?

You mean like these recent convictions, arrests, or indictments? Hamid Hayat, Abu Ali, and Sayed Ahmed, Shahawar Matin Siraj, Ehsanul Islam Sadequee, and these 19?

Maybe your memory is fading, or you don't pay attention, but there have been plenty of others over the last few years.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, at least in Nevada.

You wouldn't be refering to Petey Hoekstra, who just last July participated in a secret Parisian ménage à trois with Congressman Curt '007' Weldon, and an agent of known prevaricator, and conman to the reagancomics, Manucher Ghorbanifar?

House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Peter Hoekstra and Rep. Curt Weldon met secretly in Europe last week with an Iranian exile who CIA officials charge has passed worthless or bogus intelligence to the United States, current and former U.S. government officials said.

The Paris meeting appears to be the latest in a string of incidents in which players outside the intelligence community try to affect American foreign policy by highlighting threats that the CIA and other agencies find dubious.

[. . .]

Weldon, R-Pa., claims in a new book that the Iranian exile, whom he calls "Ali," told him of dramatic Iranian-sponsored terrorist plots against the United States.

But the CIA says that it has wasted hundreds of hours checking the claims of Ali - whose real name is Fereidoun Mahdavi - and that they are a mix of fabrications and embellishments of press reports, according to a letter from the CIA to Weldon.

The meeting was disclosed by current and former U.S. officials who requested anonymity because they said they did not want to anger Weldon or Hoekstra.

Mahdavi is a longtime associate of Iranian arms merchant Manucher Ghorbanifar, the officials say. Ghorbanifar, a key figure in the 1980s Iran-Contra scandal, has had two CIA "burn notices" issued on him, meaning agency officers are not to deal with him.

Warren P. Strobel, "Lawmakers met with Iranian exile scrutinized over intelligence", Knight Ridder Newspapers, July 20, 2005

The same Hoekstra who was part of the GOP House leadership that greenlighted LtCol Anthony Shaffer's motor mouth?

House Republican leaders approved in advance plans by a military intelligence official to go public with details of a top-secret Pentagon project code-named Able Danger.

Army Reserve Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer says the data-mining project identified Mohamed Atta and three of the other September 11 hijackers as members of an al Qaeda cell more than a year before the attacks.

"I spoke personally to Denny Hastert and to Pete Hoekstra," Col. Shaffer said. Mr. Hastert, Illinois Republican, is speaker of the House, and Mr. Hoekstra, Michigan Republican, is chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

"I was given assurances by [them] that this was the right thing to do. ... I was given assurances we would not suffer any adverse consequences for bringing this to the attention of the public," Col. Shaffer said.

Shaun Waterman, Colonel got permission to disclose pre-9/11 data", UPI/WashTimes, August 22, 2005

That's right citizens, move along...nothing to see here...Congressman Hoekstra is on it...

Please don't forget that he had them and used them. It's what's unknown is whether he still had some prior to the invasion.
Since there is now evidence that he had detailed intel about the invasion - it lies easily within the realm of possiblity that he arranged to have his remaining stockpiles moved out of the country. There is now some indication that Russian troops were involved in moving weapons to Syria (though only conventional weapons are mentioned).

I don't think there are a lot of people that still consider Jimmy Carter representative of a concensus in the Democratic party, but I could be wrong. Whatever the reason, the idea that democrats are weak on national security is pervasive, and I don't think concentrating on distancing themselves from Carter's rantings is going to make much headway in changing that perception.

Here's some further reading for you to consider:

• Terror war stance hurting democrats
• Our National Security Challenge
• Democrat's security dilemma

She's horrible on all the issues I care about.

She's in favor of that quagmire in Iraq

In favor of getting us into a losing war with Iran

Pro-Patriot Act(and probably brewing her own "improved" version in her cauldron as we speak)

anti-immigration

pro-banning video games...

I hate the woman. Ditto for Joe Lieberman. (Mega-Dittoes to Joe Lieberman.... heh... heh... heh...)

I don't think Lieberman (or any government official) is for fascist measures because they are cowards (though cowards they may be). I think they are after power, and they mean to get it, and 9/11 was a gift from God to them.

By the way, I don't think your post is off-topic at all. This is all about Hillary and Joe, I wouldn't be surprised if he was her running mate or Secretary of Defense or something. This anti-video game legislation just one part of a tapestry of misery they will weave in office.

*sigh* We go through this with every NYT article. The standard journalistic practice is to introduce a Statesman with their title, and then refer to them by Mr. for the remainder of the article. The reason is that "Mr." takes up fewer column inches than "President". It has nothing to do with respect or disrespect. I'd like to point out that the Washington Times does the same exact thing.

http://www.cnn.com/US/9607/29/clinton.terrorism/in dex.html

"The [Islamists] call Jews and Christians inferior, and we say they're just exercising their freedom of speech... Islamists don't allow their critics the same rights... After the West prostrates itself, the [Islamists] will be more than happy to say that Allah has made the infidels spineless...the mighty American media doesn't want to think itself spineless. So they close their eyes, rationalize their fear and call it the responsible thing to do.

I think it will be a long time before we will be able to view these events with any clarity or impartiality. But just to provide a counter point for the discussions here are three articles that site sources that support the claim the contraband weapons did exist and explains what happened to them.

NY Sun article
http://www.nysun.com/article/26514

Middle East Forum
http://www.meforum.org/article/755

Washington Post
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20041028-1 22637-6257r.htm

Iran has expressed that they wish to possess nuclear weapons.

And what falsehoods would those be? Oh, I know 99% of /. believe that "Bush lied about WMDs." But that's just not the case. Even assuming that Saddam had decommissioned his WMD collection (of which there is little evidence), and not shipped them off to Syria (of which there is some evidence), then we are still stuck with the matter of whether that's a "lie" or not. I submit that at worse, it's a mistake, a misconception.

Keep in mind, I hope the WMD are gone, and gone for good, not just to Syria. But the question remains, Saddam did have and use them - where are they now? Maybe he used up his stockpile.

I'm sure you have other examples of "lies" though, so feel free to vent.

I think umbelical stem cells have more potential then you give them credit for. Not only are they showing promise in spinal tissue, like the previous article I posted, but also some blindness, tons of blood problems, Leukemia, immunodeficiencies, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, and more.
Link about treating blindness:
http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20050212-0 14544-2811r.htm
Link about current and future treatements:
http://www.corcell.com/expectant/diseases_treated. html

Luckily, bugs are just fine if you happen to run a company that builds voting machines, such as Diebold. And if you think that elections aren't in the same category as air traffic control, I suggest you take a tour of Iraq. Elections are very important for your continued existance upon the earth.

Has the Bush administration actually invoked FISA as their legal basis? If so, I missed it. And, from what I've heard, it wouldn't fit. AFAIK, FISA requires either a warrant or only monitoring where no US person is likely to be involved (see Q18 in the EFF writeup).

Carter and Clinton both issued executive orders authorizing FISA monitoring, but specifically quoted FISA regulations to be followed. I haven't seen a similar order from Bush, and even according to legendary conservative Rush Limbaugh, the FISA courts were bypassed. Limbaugh's take on it was that the unprecedented denials and modifications of Bush's FISA requests forced him to go around the process.

In short, the President is not asserting legal authority under FISA. According to the Attorney General, his authority hinges (PDF) on his "inherent authority" as Commander-In-Chief, and Congress's Use of Force Resolution.

Of course, in my strict interpretation, I missed the part of the Presidential Oath, Constitution or the above resolution that grants him any power over surveillance. And, according to Daschle (partisan to be sure, but you'd think records of this kind of stuff would be easily checked), Congress specifically rejected the administration's request for having the resolution cover actions in the US.

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20050420-1 25927-9641r.htm

Anyone who reads my post's knows I'm pro MS, but I don't belive for a minute that MS sites have almost double Yahoo. The MS sites get about 114 million, not over 180 million like this report says. If that report were accurate, combined with the AOL deal, MS would have the most lucrative Advertising network the internet has ever seen.

This report also contradicts some stats (that I think are more inline with the truth) published by the NY Times and Associated press for the month of september.

Here are the numbers:
Yahoo = 123 million
AOL = 119 million
Microsoft = 114 million
Google = 87.6 million

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/11/06/business/ao l.php [iht.com]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/07/technology/07aol .html?hp&ex=1131426000&en=ca8853d306a6b3e5&ei=5094 &partner=homepage [nytimes.com]

http://washingtontimes.com/business/20051113-11344 1-2245r.htm [washingtontimes.com]

http://www.smartmoney.com/stockwatch/index.cfm?sto ry=20051115 [smartmoney.com]

Well my ankle grabbing fan-boy friend you are a fool. I will concede his numbers weren't 100%, but his point was. And realistically his numbers were close enough. Google is still dwarfed by the big boys, as you will see when I post the numbers below.

For the record he didn't say "search" he said "visitors". Advertisers don't just care about search cowboy. We are talking about revenue streams and market sizes. AOL may be 3% of the search market (according to your numbers) but they are 12% of Google's revenue (according to the links below). Looks like search isn't the end all and be all is it cowboy?

I'm just so sick of you cocky little troll like fan boys thinking you know something, but all you really know is how to download porn in your mom's basement.

Here are the numbers:
Yahoo = 123 million
AOL = 119 million
Microsoft = 114 million
Google = 87.6 million

Here is the math for ya:
AOL + MSN = 237 million
Yahoo = 123 million
Google 87.6 million

My sources are abundant from New York Times, Associated Press, to international papers. Here are 4 for you to check out, but there are PLENTY more.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/11/06/business/ao l.php

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/07/technology/07aol .html?hp&ex=1131426000&en=ca8853d306a6b3e5&ei=5094 &partner=homepage

http://washingtontimes.com/business/20051113-11344 1-2245r.htm

http://www.smartmoney.com/stockwatch/index.cfm?sto ry=20051115

You may think they check everything, but I have it on good authority that they don't check your pants.

This is not about Muslim poverty (the Islamist terrorists who hit London all had good jobs. Mohammed Atta, who struck us in New York, was well-born and came from a prosperous family.) It is about radical Islamist self-confidence and contempt for the West. And, it is about Western weakness.

Just go visit Democrat Underground or Daily Kos. You will find many articles that discuss violence against authority and the death of our President and Vice President. Heck Air America Radio between fundraising breaks and stealing money from poor children has had several commentators advocate the assassination of our President.

I am always amazed at the shouts from the left that they are being "oppressed" in this country. I am going practically deaf from their oppression. Its like a Monty Python sketch. If you want to see truly speech oppressive societies, just look at Europe and their numerous speech codes/laws.

Women have gained a tremendous amount of rights and freedoms? Oh really? How about the right to EXIST? China's One Child Policy results in more female babies being aborted or drowned than in most of the rest of the world combined (except India, perhaps).

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTI CLE_ID=39475

Wanna know what the murder of girl babies in China has resulted in?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/omicinski/069 .htm
http://www.washingtontimes.com/world/20040308-0926 32-4101r.htm

Free trade with China makes ALL of us responsible for this tragedy. But hey, as long as your DVD players cost $50 or less, you can argue that that's not true, I suppose.

Quite a few people have appealed being forced to go to an AA class and won. I don't have any sources but I did see it on Penn and Teller's Bullshit!

I've seen that show, I don't remember any stats, but I'd be very surprised if as much as five percent of AA coercees have challeneged their coercion.

Here's yet another fine forced-attendee of AA who didn't know it's unconstitutional:

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20050409-1 04138-6583r.htm

I love that show.

I've only seen that episode and some clips from the sho.com site, but I liked everything I saw.

Unfortunately, you can't just go by news reports. You have to look at MOTIVES behind people's actions.

1) Why does the US want to maintain control?
2) Why does the UN want to take control?

The answer to the first one is usually first given as a rather selfish "it's ours, we invented it" answer. The answer to the second can be deduced if you look at who are the biggest proponents of the UN take-over: China, Brazil, India, Russia and Saudi Arabia (Source). Once that is established, the answer to the first question changes, and rightfully so.

The other reply to your polite request was a bit rude, so here are some useful links:

http://www.nola.com/weblogs/print.ssf?/mtlogs/nola _tporleans/archives/print082732.html
http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20050928-1 21515-2539r.htm
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la- na-rumors27sep27,0,5492806,full.story?coll=la-home -headlines

Another thing you might want to do is read every original transcript of everything Pres. Bush has said since 9/11. You'll never trust a newspaper again.

Another thing that works well is to compare newspapers against themselves six months later. You'll never trust a newspaper again.

God I hope the media don't get any sort of protection. I can't think of many groups that would deserve it less.

...We could talk about the erosion of civil liberties -- I am astonsished to hear government lawyers argue before the court that the President can say someone is an "Enemy Combatant" and on those grounds alone they can be jailed indefinitely without a right to confront their accusers, dispute the claim, or even see a court or a lawyer!

Don't forget sending a dual Canadian/Syrian citizen to Syria without informing Canadian officials, then using "state secrets" to argue that they can't release any information about why he was detained to the courts when he sues.

No. Why do I say that? Because even countries like China, as bad as its rights record is, is seen as more popular and less of a threat to world peace than America. (especially check out that second poll - it really drives home what the world thinks of uss)

We all like to think of ourselves as the good guys. Most of the rest of the world doesn't see it that way.

I think the real issue here is that people like to know how they rank compared to others, and reality is way to gray for that black & white approach.

While true, this reminds me of that study they did recently where they showed that peoples' happiness was more based on relative income than absolute income. Though it should be job satisfaction and the other things you mentioned that really count.

You should learn to use news.google.com

http://washingtontimes.com/national/20050831-12135 9-6837r.htm

"But according to a bulletin displayed in all capital letters last night on the Web site of New Orleans TV station WWL, "all residents on the East Bank of Orleans and Jefferson remaining in the metro area are being told to evacuate as efforts to sandbag the levee break have ended."
        About "9 feet of water is expected in the entire East Bank," meaning all of New Orleans, "within the next 12-15 hours" because the pumps keeping the below-sea-level city dry even under normal circumstances, are expected to fail soon."

From an article in the Washington Times this morning (8/18/2005). (http://washingtontimes.com/national/20050818-1248 38-8998r.htm)

      Josh Donlan, a graduate student at Cornell University and one of the plan's co-authors, concedes that skeptics may worry more about the people on the Great Plains who could become extinct at the mercy of the lions.
        "Obviously, gaining public acceptance is going to be a huge issue, especially when you talk about reintroducing predators. There are going to have to be some major attitude shifts. That includes realizing predation is a natural role, and that people are going to have to take precautions."

Meanwhile, here's an analysis by an oil industry think thank that points to the actual cause of inflated oil prices (tight supplies, shortages in non-OPEC production, combined with fears of supply interruptions due to terrorist activity).

Most Japanese (2/3) have a favorable opinion of the United States and Americans. Maybe we should drop a few more nukes to boost our popularity?

On 19 June, 2005, Oregon's Mail Tribune reported that in a recent survey of 419 media outlets, nearly one-fourth of editors said they have banned the use of anonymous sources entirely -- a good start. Yet most members of the press still claim they cannot manage their self-appointed duty as the "watchdog of government" without using anonymous sources.

One must ask, then, how the scientific community manages so well using only verifiable sources? No scientific journal editor would even consider allowing a reference to an anonymous source.

Thomas Henry Huxley defined science as "nothing but trained and organized common sense." Scientific method might be similarly summarized as simply "telling the truth." Science makes rigorous efforts to prevent self-interest, conscious or unconscious, from distorting the truth. In studies testing new medications, neither the physician giving the drug nor the recipient of the drug know whether the medicament being evaluated or a placebo is being given. These double-blind studies prevent distortion resulting from bias. Richard Feynman wrote of "learning how not to fool ourselves" and of having "utter scientific integrity" as being part of "our responsibility as scientists." Scientists are trained to understand how deceptively easy it is to believe what they want to believe and to recognize that they must constantly be on guard against allowing this form of bias to compromise the integrity of their work.

How much a given field of knowledge values the truth can be measured by the attention it gives to methods attempting to preserve the truth.

The steady stream of high-profile scandals in the mass media over the past several years -- ranging from forged documents to trying to pass off fiction as news -- indicates that media methods need some serious scrutiny. First, consider my title, Anonymous sources: A license to lie. I don't mean to imply that reporters lie every time they cite an unidentified source. But consider: an anonymous source could mean no source at all -- material simply made up by the reporter. A more widespread concern, however, is that human communications are rarely perfect. Did the reporter's interpretation accurately portray what his source said? Or did he hear what he wanted to hear? Or did he paraphrase; allowing his bias to alter the meaning? The only way to know is to ask the source. That is why our legal system has cross-examinations; and why the accused is guaranteed the right to face his accuser. The use of anonymous sources almost guarantees that the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth will not be transmitted with accuracy and precision.

As a scientist, I suggest that considering themselves the "watchdog of government" invalidates the media's credibility by any objective scientific standard. It injects a massive anti-government bias that overwhelms the media's well-known liberal bias. As the "watchdog of government," the media needs to find government impropriety -- or make it up if they can't -- to justify their existence. Such a bias would not be tolerated in science, in law or in any other honest field of human endeavor.

A profession considering itself the "watchdog of government" is an excellent example of the mass media fooling itself, believing what it wants to believe. I recall well when our media acted as the ministry of propaganda for the North Vietnamese: The media told the American public that the Tet Offensive of 1968 was a North Vietnamese victory. In fact, it was an unmitigated military disaster for the Communists. Our media repeated that lie incessantly until, finally, the American public believed them, lost patience and stopped supporting the Vietnamese conflict.

In World War II we had censorship of the media. We won that war. In the Vietnam conflict we suffered the consequences of allowing our mass media unrestricted access to flood our homes with grisly scene

...just take a look at Texas and watch all of the Democratic districts disappear...
Those voting districts were revamped by Republicans.

First of all I don't necessarily think it was "staged". Although that might be the case, "staged", means they took part in setting it up. Even though there has been evidence of the gov and/mil wanting to stage FAKE incidents in the past, personally, I tend to lean more toward "They let it happen.". Whatever the case, I thought the latest was to keep the Brits involved and on the ground in Iraq. Especially seeing as how more and more of their citizens, as well as their military officials, are becoming increasingly fed up and want out of Iraq. Looks like not only that they will stay (and quiet some of the protest) but we get the added bonus of renewing the Un-Patriot Act without much coverage (since the focus is on London) and they get more inertia behind enacting their own version of the Un-patriot Act.

This is all well aside from the fact that it helps take some of the focus away from Libby and Rove as well; one or both of which may in the future be charged with perjury, obstructing justice and/or making false statements to an FBI agent.

Remember when we had all kinds of officials running around saying, "We never would have thought about someone using a plane as a weapon"?What about Sam Byck(1974)? What about all the communications between the (g hadists)? What about the daily briefing What about the FBI memo? What about the CIA memo (even the washington times covered that one)?

"Coincidence is like a rubber band. Stretch it too far and it snaps." - Roger Zelazny
"If you do something once, people will call it an accident. If you do it twice, they call it a coincidence. But do it a third time and you've just proven a natural law." - Grace Murray Hopner