Slashdot Mirror

According to GW Bush, "They hate our freedoms." I guess he figures if we get rid of our freedoms, they'll quit hating us. Nothing else makes much sense.

THE VICE PRESIDENT: Well, some of us didn't. I think there are -- there's been a debate, obviously, and we've got a lot of folks who don't believe that there was any kind of a relationship there between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. I think the record is abundantly clear that Saddam Hussein was, in fact, a prime sponsor of terror.

"I am becoming more convinced that people watch series like 24 or The Unit and are mistakenly under the impression that they are accurate representations of US capability."

There's nothing wrong with people thinking that the US has these capabilities. Ususlly. It's when the wrong people believe these fairytales that the real harm is done.

Hello, King George III, Beast of Yale..

Praising people who regularly jail dissidents for loving freedom just makes my stomach turn.

Yeah, mine too.

Praising people who regularly jail dissidents for loving freedom just makes my stomach turn.

Yeah, mine too.

I hear what you're saying (although I think it's a bit pessimistic -- just a bit), but I shudder to think of how we're going to solve global problems of the type of "tragedy of the commons". If you're right, we're never going to stop global warming, for example, because its solutions might run counter to "... complying with those mandates would have a negative economic impact, with layoffs of workers and price increases for consumers." (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/06/2 0010611-2.html).

A search for Ford should yield Ford Motor Co., as the correct first answer, Wales said.

Why are companies more important than people?

Why not a page about former U.S. President Gerald Ford as the 'correct first answer'?

Or a page about actor Glenn Ford as the 'correct first answer'?

Aren't people more important than companies which are nothing more than legal constructs created by people to facilitate commerce amongst themselves?

Anyway, I belive a 'fair' search engine would not use linking to determine popularity and authority. The 'spamdexing' and 'Googlebombing' of Google proves that is possible.

Why not have the results page return 10-30 links at random from all the available links for a given search term entered by a user?

On top of that, use people (not software algorithms) to prune out all the spam pages submitted to it. This could be done with editors who visit submitted pages before adding them to the search engine (time consuming, can be 'gamed'), or accept ALL links and us a 'thumbs up/down' method to inform the user how useful the link is (also time consuming, can be 'gamed').

You must not have got the letter from the White House. Even Bush now claims he has been saying global warming not only exists, but man is contributing to it, ever since he took office.

Also, the author really need to learn what the word "average" means. He sounds ridiculous making statements like - "So one awkward question you can ask, when you're forking out those extra taxes for climate change, is "Why is east Antarctica getting colder?" It makes no sense at all if carbon dioxide is driving global warming".

Maybe what makes it an awkward question is his limited understanding of simple scientific concepts, and common word meanings?

See this Yahoobomb, which faithfully links to the world's number one mostest miserable failure of all time.

Microsoft's search offering (a Billbomb?) only comes up with Jimmy Carter and Michael Moore, at places two and seven respectively, with the rest of the results being links to stories about the Googlebomb as it pertains to that miserable failure .

See this Yahoobomb, which faithfully links to the world's number one mostest miserable failure of all time.

Microsoft's search offering (a Billbomb?) only comes up with Jimmy Carter and Michael Moore, at places two and seven respectively, with the rest of the results being links to stories about the Googlebomb as it pertains to that miserable failure .

Decide for yourself if the government has been straight with us, look at this 2001 testimony from the director of the National Climatic Data Center:
"Some greenhouse gases are increasing in the atmosphere because of human activities and increasingly trapping more heat."

link

Here's George Bush, circa 2001, on the topic:
"There is a natural greenhouse effect that contributes to warming. Greenhouse gases trap heat, and thus warm the earth because they prevent a significant proportion of infrared radiation from escaping into space. Concentration of greenhouse gases, especially CO2, have increased substantially since the beginning of the industrial revolution. And the National Academy of Sciences indicate that the increase is due in large part to human activity."

link

Seems like the cat's out of the bag on this one.

The Union of Concerned Scientists politicizes science, and they lean pretty hard to the left. I take what they have to say with a big grain of NaCl.

To back up an assertion that George Washington held the first office of POTUS and that George H. W. Bush held the 41st, we can cite a page on whitehouse.gov. If someone later discovers whitehouse.gov to be unreliable, the article remains open to competing sources added to the article or (in cases of the most often vandalized articles) to the article's talk page.

Wikipedia doesn't give a d*mn about truth. The goal of an encyclopedia is collection of verifiable information. For instance, the scientific theories of aether, phlogiston, and heat as a fluid are no longer considered "true", but it is verifiable that at one time, those theories were widely accepted.

Re:Why haven't these fascist assholes been impeached

The only crime that I know of that the Constitution expressly spells out is the crime of Treason. It's definition wouldn't include the holding to idiotic interpretations of the Constitution itself, alas.

You can't be serious. It's like shooting fish in a barrel. Watch.

From the US Constitution:

Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

From Our Wartime President Himself:

Americans are asking, why do they hate us? [...]They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other. [...] These terrorists kill not merely to end lives, but to disrupt and end a way of life [...] They are the heirs of all the murderous ideologies of the 20th century. By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions -- by abandoning every value except the will to power -- they follow in the path of fascism, and Nazism, and totalitarianism.

And finally, From TFA:

Gonzales argued that the Constitution doesn't explicitly bestow habeas corpus rights; it merely says when the so-called Great Writ can be suspended.

"There is no expressed grant of habeas in the Constitution; there's a prohibition against taking it away," Gonzales said. [...] "The Constitution doesn't say every individual in the United States or citizen is hereby granted or assured the right of habeas corpus. It doesn't say that. It simply says the right shall not be suspended" except in cases of rebellion or invasion."

"You may be treading on your interdiction of violating common sense," Specter said.

While Gonzales's statement has a measure of quibbling precision to it, his logic is troubling because it would suggest that many other fundamental rights that Americans hold dear also don't exist because the Constitution often spells out those rights in the negative.

Applying Gonzales's reasoning, one could argue that the First Amendment doesn't explicitly say Americans have the right to worship as they choose, speak as they wish or assemble peacefully. The amendment simply bars the government, i.e. Congress, from passing laws that would impinge on these rights.

There, that wasn't so hard, was it?

--MarkusQ

Public Relations is all about bias. You're paid to be biased and to spin things your employer's way. Indeed they are just doing their job, I assure you that Apple's PR people do the same thing. Tony Snow is paid to tell us that George Bush was not saying mission accomplished from the deck of the aircraft carrier (3/5th down) and he has to do it with a straight face. His job description didn't change much from his days at Fox.

But the point is, that's what PR is all about. If you don't want to have to lie for a living, then don't get into PR.

Microsoft's (international) revenues are less than a third of a percent of US GDP. Check, that's true.

Adding Microsoft's revenues to those of two other companies can total *almost* one percent of GDP. Check, I can believe that too. Not sure why you picked 3M and P&G -- too lazy to search for a relationship. Therefore I'm simply going to assume that you picked two other decent sized but not huge companies (Microsoft is only 48th on the Fortune 500; Exxon Mobil is first with profits of about $36 billion -- i.e. almost the size of Microsoft's revenues; at #13, Berkshire Hathaway is more than twice as big as Microsoft). Combined, your three companies are smaller than Citigroup (8th on the Fortune 500). Not sure what your point was. Why combine those three companies? Is there some reason that breaking up the Microsoft monopoly would automatically affect the other two?

See http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/ full_list/index.html for Fortune 500 data.

If Microsoft's revenues went to zero, it would significantly harm the US economy. Basis? I don't believe that. Consider that defense use to make up about 6% (6.2% in 1986) of US GDP. It dropped from 4.8% to 3.7% between 1992 and 1995. In general, those were considered to be good economic years. From 1995 to 1999, it dropped a further .7% to 3%. Yet somehow, despite this, those were considered to be great economic years. The 1992-5 era is especially interesting, as spending dropped from 297 billion to 259 billion. That's about 38 billion dollars. I.e. roughly the same magnitude as Microsoft (albeit in more valuable 90s dollars rather than the relatively depreciated 2005 dollars). In other words, the defense shrinkage from 1992 to 1995 was actually larger in magnitude than Microsoft's revenues. Yet somehow the economy not only survived but prospered.

Of the twenty-nine agencies and departments listed in the 2005 federal budget, thirteen are larger than Microsoft's revenues.

Defense % of GDP from http://www.truthandpolitics.org/military-relative- size.php
Historical budget numbers from http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/ (in particular, http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/pdf/hi st.pdf ).

It's also worth noting that no one is talking about sending Microsoft's revenue to zero. In fact, because of the way monopolies work, the normal result would be to *increase* revenues while decreasing profits. A monopoly only produces up to the point where marginal revenue (from sales) exceeds marginal cost (of production). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly -- in particular, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/e/e f/Monopoly-surpluses.svg/250px-Monopoly-surpluses. svg.png

The green line represents marginal revenue. The red line represents consumer demand. The blue line represents marginal cost of supply. Note that marginal revenue is positive for at least part of the distance between the monopoly quantity produced and the competitive price. Also note the yellow region. This is the area where the economy *gains* as a result of switching from a monopoly to a competitive market. It comprises the benefits of increased production minus the costs. The blue rectangle (i.e. the part above the Pc line) is gain shifted from producer (Microsoft) to consumers.

To reiterate:

1. Microsoft is not really that big a part of the US economy in terms of revenue.
2. Even if it were, no on is seriously argui

Microsoft's (international) revenues are less than a third of a percent of US GDP. Check, that's true.

Adding Microsoft's revenues to those of two other companies can total *almost* one percent of GDP. Check, I can believe that too. Not sure why you picked 3M and P&G -- too lazy to search for a relationship. Therefore I'm simply going to assume that you picked two other decent sized but not huge companies (Microsoft is only 48th on the Fortune 500; Exxon Mobil is first with profits of about $36 billion -- i.e. almost the size of Microsoft's revenues; at #13, Berkshire Hathaway is more than twice as big as Microsoft). Combined, your three companies are smaller than Citigroup (8th on the Fortune 500). Not sure what your point was. Why combine those three companies? Is there some reason that breaking up the Microsoft monopoly would automatically affect the other two?

See http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/ full_list/index.html for Fortune 500 data.

If Microsoft's revenues went to zero, it would significantly harm the US economy. Basis? I don't believe that. Consider that defense use to make up about 6% (6.2% in 1986) of US GDP. It dropped from 4.8% to 3.7% between 1992 and 1995. In general, those were considered to be good economic years. From 1995 to 1999, it dropped a further .7% to 3%. Yet somehow, despite this, those were considered to be great economic years. The 1992-5 era is especially interesting, as spending dropped from 297 billion to 259 billion. That's about 38 billion dollars. I.e. roughly the same magnitude as Microsoft (albeit in more valuable 90s dollars rather than the relatively depreciated 2005 dollars). In other words, the defense shrinkage from 1992 to 1995 was actually larger in magnitude than Microsoft's revenues. Yet somehow the economy not only survived but prospered.

Of the twenty-nine agencies and departments listed in the 2005 federal budget, thirteen are larger than Microsoft's revenues.

Defense % of GDP from http://www.truthandpolitics.org/military-relative- size.php
Historical budget numbers from http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/ (in particular, http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/pdf/hi st.pdf ).

It's also worth noting that no one is talking about sending Microsoft's revenue to zero. In fact, because of the way monopolies work, the normal result would be to *increase* revenues while decreasing profits. A monopoly only produces up to the point where marginal revenue (from sales) exceeds marginal cost (of production). See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly -- in particular, http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/e/e f/Monopoly-surpluses.svg/250px-Monopoly-surpluses. svg.png

The green line represents marginal revenue. The red line represents consumer demand. The blue line represents marginal cost of supply. Note that marginal revenue is positive for at least part of the distance between the monopoly quantity produced and the competitive price. Also note the yellow region. This is the area where the economy *gains* as a result of switching from a monopoly to a competitive market. It comprises the benefits of increased production minus the costs. The blue rectangle (i.e. the part above the Pc line) is gain shifted from producer (Microsoft) to consumers.

To reiterate:

1. Microsoft is not really that big a part of the US economy in terms of revenue.
2. Even if it were, no on is seriously argui

First, the chunk of the federal budget that NASA "eats up" is minuscule. $16.8 out of $2656.0 Billion in 2007.
I don't think handing that money over to Congress will lead to anything tangible for you or I.

Second, think about the peripheral benefits of everything NASA has done, not just the pretty pictures. Subtract the Voyager probes. The science section at Barnes and Noble is a whole lot thinner ehh? How many books have been published, how many scientists have been educated, how many television shows have been produced based on what those two probes discovered? Suddenly, we know virtually nothing about the moons of Saturn and I don't get to wonder if there is life under the seas of Europa.

Subtract some rocket science that was pioneered by NASA and the Soviets during the space race. Perhaps your cell phone can't call Australia anymore, hurricanes give us less warning and HBO does not have quite as many options. I doubt private industry would be quite so far along in communication satellite technology were it not for the feasibility of such demonstrated by NASA.

Subtract some planetary and atmospheric science regarding Venus. The Global Warming theory suddenly has holes in it's foundation and we couldn't have half the arguments we do on Slashdot.

Subtract Hubble. Suddenly the official stance of the Vatican's is that we are at the center of the universe, we have a few million less interesting web pages and my desire to learn more and educate myself regarding astronomy are greatly diminished.

Despite NASA's budget being slashed and despite their priorities being subject to the whims of politicians, they've done quite well in educating and inspiring all of us who care to pay attention.

Lots of comments from people saying that Google can't or shouldn't be censoring their imagery. In case you weren't aware, they already are.

Here's a Google Earth KMZ file that will show you the US Naval Observatory, in Washington, DC. Zoom in on it and you'll notice that all the territory within a set radius of the observatory has been pixellated out of the otherwise clear image.

Why? Because the Vice President lives at the Naval Observatory.

There are other obscured sites in DC and other places too; I'll leave finding them as an exercise for the reader. But the point is that they are already hiding some sensitive locations from users, so it's not unreasonable for people to ask what the criteria are, or why military bases shouldn't be included.

like his Address to the United Nations justifying the war on Iraq

I tracked that down back when Bush was trying to deny he went to war because of WMD's - to prove to anyone who would listen that Bush was blowing smoke out his ass. The more I looked, the more I found intelligent, coherant speeches outside of the electoral spotlight. It was then that it dawned on me what a cleverly deceitful man Bush is, and how he'd been faking the idiot-speech the entire time, for our benefit.

He also does it to throw folks like you and I off, thinking that nobody so idiotic could possibly be a threat, so we dismiss him, giving him freedom to, say, authorize the openning of our mail without search warrants.

The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection.

The specific wording is not contained in the article.

The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection.

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/016398.php

for a lawyer's view of the signing statement.

The actual signing statement is here:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/12/20 061220-6.html

The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection.

"The [Bush] signing statement claims authority to open domestic mail without a warrant, and that would be new and quite alarming," said Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies in Washington.

"You have to be concerned," a senior U.S. official agreed. "It takes executive-branch authority beyond anything we've ever known."

I think it's important that we research potentially dangerous theories like this. The US has a bad rep as war mongers but so has every superpower in history. I'm not arguing how valid that may be, just saying. Part of a good defense is a good offense, but also a good defense is just knowing more about everything than the other guy. That's why the DoD funds some crazy projects. The million bucks sounds like a lot but not so much compared to the huge budget. Also, in true /. form, I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't some other initiatives included in the study that aren't as well documented.

we were part of the solution the last time such REAL nasty people took over Europe with plans of conquering the rest of the world

"We"? I doubt that you were there, I know your president wasn't (he was born in 1946 (source)), and I very much doubt that any serving member of your government or armed forces were.

Past deeds by one set of people do not preclude (or excuse) present or future misdeeds by another group, even if they happen to live in the same geographic area.

You put it that way and it sounds peachy, only two items in the list named people, so the rest must apply to cans of pepsi or something. They all affect people, you and me whether Slate names them or not.

"Only for Extraordinary Rendition can even one actual instance be named. For the rest, we are to take the fact that despite the extraordinary scrutiny this government's every move seems to come under"

So you believe there is only 1? Even Bush admits 14 people. Now if only we could explain how 1400 rendition flights of medium sized passenger jets were used to fly a mere 14 people around we'd be laughing. Remember we know how many flights from the flight logs. We're talking thousands of people and potentially lots of Americans too. What you think Padilla is the only one?

Says 14 rendition people transferred:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,1947647,00. html

The aircraft involved:
http://www.airliners.net/search/photo.search?regse arch=N368CE&distinct_entry=true

Can you name the 14? No? That's the secrecy for you, no names, no nationalities, no details, no lawyers, no trials. If you can't name them how can Slate? What about the rest? We haven't even got a real number yet.

As Bush put it:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/12/20 061229-15.html

"Today, Saddam Hussein was executed after receiving a fair trial -- the kind of justice he denied the victims of his brutal regime...Fair trials were unimaginable under Saddam Hussein's tyrannical rule."

Wow hypocritical or what? He's a slimeball, the worst US leader ever, and if it turns out he's locked up a bunch of Americans and tortured them, then he and the people who worked for him should hang too. No different from that slimeball Sadam.

• White House on Pandemic Flu
• PandemicFlu.gov
• FluWikie

Ok. I know that this issue has been discussed to death, and it's hard for people to think rationally about it. But bear with me for a moment.

Sadam killed everyone in Iraq...everyone that stood against him. Terrorists, Muslims, Christians, football (soccer) players, left handed people, right handed people, . So what exactly is your point?

Saddam Hussein was a secular leader who kept a lid on the power of the religious radicals in the country. He fought a war against the Islamic fundamentalist government of Iran. During this time, he received funding and military backing from the U.S. government.

Whatever other terrible things he did, Saddam was NOT a terrorist or Islamic fundamentalist. That's the point.

Bush never said Iraq was behind 9-11, he said that Iraq had weapons of mass distruction like 50 million times and said places like Iraq were part of the Axis of Evil (Iraq, Iran, and North Korea).

According to president Bush himself, 9/11 was the justification for attacking Iraq. (Thanks to theskipper for finding this.)

Bush lumped together many unrelated countries in his "axis of evil." The Big Lie of the Bush administration is the idea that the war in Iraq somehow advances the cause of national security. Do you remember Bush repeating this lie over and over throughout the last 7 years?

It's become obvious even to the average voter just how silly it is to keep pissing away resources in Iraq. I think the people who opposed Iraq from the beginning deserve at least an "I told you so." Too bad we can't get that trillion dollars back, though.

If you want to know why Bush really brought us into Iraq, read up on "The Project for a New American Century." This is the stuff that makes some people hysterial-- the "neoconservative" ideology. Generally speaking, neocons favor U.S. military hegemony, free trade, and the establishment of western-style republics throughout the world.

Ironically, the US is the country with the most to lose in any war, because we have the most money and the most political power. By overextending ourselves, we have actually weakened our position across the board. Try as they might, China, Afghanistan, or Iraq could never have done the United States a more grievous hurt than G.W. Bush has in the last decade.

But, per President Bush himself, one event (9/11) was directly responsible for the second (attacking Iraq).

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20 030319-1.html

Seems black and white, no?

The White House directive applies only to laptops (and presumably desktops) that (1) store or process "personally identifiable information" and (2) are used outside an agency's security perimeter. The memorandum from the Office of Management and Budget to all U.S. agencies also outlines additional requirements that are intended to reduce the risk that Social Security numbers and other sensitive personal information are compromised by the physical loss of a computer and to better control external access to such information.

A committee in the UK to decide whether or not robots should get rights: Probably less than $1,000,000
Paying religious organisations in the US to tell people not to have sex: $50,000,000

Let's take a fun legitimate site like, oh... Wikipedia:

# Folks get annoyed when VfD discussions end up the number 1 google hit for
# their name. See bugzilla bug #4776
# en:
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia%3AArticles_for_deletion/
Disallow : /wiki/Wikipedia:Votes_for_deletion/
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia%3AVotes_for_deletion/
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia:Pages_for_deletion/
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia%3APages_for_deletion/
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/
Disallow : /wiki/Wikipedia%3AMiscellany_for_deletion/
Disall ow: /wiki/Wikipedia:Miscellaneous_deletion/
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia%3AMiscellaneous_deletion/
Disallo w: /wiki/Wikipedia:Copyright_problems
Disallow: /wiki/Wikipedia%3ACopyright_problems

Let's see, what are some other sites? Ooh. Take a look at Slashdot's robots.txt! (disallows a variety of fun pages.) Microsoft's? How about whitehouse.gov? Google?

And the person who wrote that response probably either lives or works here

User-agent: whsearch
Disallow: /cgi-bin
Disallow: /search
Disallow: /query.html
Disallow: /help
Disallow: /sitemap.html
Disallow: /privacy.html
Disallow: /accessibility.html

http://www.whitehouse.gov/robots.txt

Thanks for giving me the benefit of the sanity doubt. :-)

If we go to the extreme end of technology and we have enough smart and flexible robots that they can build and do everything for us, we still have limited energy (maybe) and raw materials (definitely). The cost of any service would be nothing, but goods would still have a cost. How do we handle that? I dunno; but we're a long way from that. Any discussion about what we do now need not take such a scenario into account. Note that when I say that capitalism has done the most good for people, I'm using the past tense (or perfect tense, if we want to get really pedantic :-) . In recorded history, it's done the best. We haven't progressed technologically to the point that we can toss it out.

As for American capitalism not making you happy, remember. Only you can make you happy. :-) Seriously, though, that's more a philosophical point. I don't think any economic system can make people happy, but there are certainly some that can make people unhappy. At least, the ones without the swords.

As to letting people die for lack of health care, I never said we should have no charity. I only said it isn't the government's job and nobody should tell me how much to give or to whom I should give it. I've given thousands to various charities since I graduated, and I'll keep giving.

And about how much we spend destroying life vs saving it; 2005 defense spending was less than just Social Security spending, not including Medicare, Medicaid, welfare, housing assistance, social programs, education, etc. There just isn't enough tax money out there to give every citizen best-in-class medical care, even if you thought it were ethical to use tax money to do so. Check out this budget info from whitehouse.gov, page 58:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2007/pdf/hi st.pdf

If you do get that time machine worked out, let me know. I'd like to take my money out of Lucent in late 1999. :-)

Have a great day. It's been good discussing this with you.

NSF Budget

2002 - 4.774 billion
2003 - ?
2004 - 5.118 billion
2005 - 5.641 billion
2006 - 5.666 billion

http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2006/nsf.ht ml
and others

You hear about spending cuts all the time. But the spending in programs that were "slashed" is always higher from year to year.

The phrase "spending was cut" is simply a lie. It may be true once for every 1000 times you hear it.

I stand corrected. Everything else is legal.

You cannot claim the executive order stopped all research in that direction. California has put tons of money into new stem cell lines, without federal money. This is totally legal. Other countries have done so as well.

You are not being honest by calling this a ban on stem cell research, or even a ban on embryonic stem cell research. This is just a ban on federal funding using new embryonic stem cell lines.

Just because you don't like the result does not mean you should mislead people.

And remember, W was the first president to fund stem cell research.
      http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/07/20 060719-6.html

I think it's interesting that the 9/11 Report recommended that United States agencies such as the DoD, CIA & FBI learn to share information more freely to overcome terrorism and now they're turning to internet community applications to accomplish that."

They will be sharing more internally, cutting across organizational boundaries and through previous barriers, and not necessarily with the outside world.

We will often never hear of their successes, even when some of them are readily available. I'm astonished how often you read comments denying that there have been any terrorism arrests or convictions, and acting as if it was all made up*.

* And this doesn't even get into the fringe ideas worthy of debunking.

I wish I could say that I've seen it in person, although from the pictures it doesn't look like anything I would go out of my way to see. It does look rather ugly. :)

I also won't argue that the situation isn't a pain. I hope that improvements in design, materials, engineering, and the security situation will eliminate the need for those measures. I will say that the US has, regrettably, accrued a certain amount of experience with what happens to poorly protected buildings when targeted by truck bombs. I will also say that if the US embassy is an unappealing target due to the protective measures, the people in all of the buildings around it will probably benefit in the long run. (Al Qaeda has called off attacks before when they had doubts about killing enough people for it to be worthwhile to them. They prefer for both the attacks and body count to be rather spectacular. The simultaneous bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania killed 258 and wounded more than 5,000. I would hate for a similar attack to occur in Canada.) I hope Canada will not find it necessary to take such measures, but it may be coming.

Cheers

• George W Bush is the only president with a criminal record
• Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton were impeached, but not convicted
• Richard Nixon was set to be impeached, but had the brains to resign first
• Thomas Jefferson had 187 slaves
• Franklin Roosevelt was a cousin-fucker
• John Tyler was a Confederate and the only president to become a sworn enemy of the Union

The only explanation is that this "leaked" information, much of which is reportedly classified, is intentionally leaked.

Wrong. "A person is guilty of an offense if he intentionally engages in electronic surveillance under color of law except as authorized by statute." If you think Bush's surveillance is authorized by statute, please look the statute up and quote it to me.

Good luck, since the President's own Attorney General acknowledged that the law requires warrants:

Now, in terms of legal authorities, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act provides -- requires a court order before engaging in this kind of surveillance that I've just discussed and the President announced on Saturday, unless there is somehow -- there is -- unless otherwise authorized by statute or by Congress. That's what the law requires.

"We've got Bush" (*sob*)

The reason for that is not because the degree is worth less but because there is less opportunities to go around. Our whole economy has been sold off to the god of "global free trade." Of course there is nothing free about it, it's just a catchy name.

Uh huh. Try looking at some silly things called facts

Real median income has been on an almost uninterrupted ride up since 1967. Meaning, if you took every person in America and lined them up from poorest to richest, and then followed the guy in the exact middle for 40 years, and adjusted his salary for inflation, he'd be better off to the tune of $10,000 a year.

This is despite the fact that the "middle" keeps changing. There are an estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the United States - do you think they're pushing median income DOWN (they're making LESS than the average Joe) or UP (they're making MORE than the average Joe)? Not to say that immigration is good/bad/indifferent/whatever - point is that the middle is consistently better off, despite pressures that keep pushing the middle back down.

The actual number of "opportunities" went up by 92,000 in October, and there are 6,800,000 more jobs today than there were in 2003.

Doesn't exactly seem like there's "less opportunies to go around."

As for "free trade", the "free" part is "free as in speech." It refers to trade being "free" from restrictions like tariffs and subsidies - it's not "catchy", it's perfectly accurate.

Trade can be "free" in the other sense, too. Simply put, some countries just make things better - the U.S. can produce a ton of grain for a lot less cost than Japan can. Japan can make a ton of semiconductors cheaper than the U.S. can. By trading grain for semiconductors, the U.S. gets semiconductors at the price of its cheaper grain, and Japan gets grain that would have cost more than the semiconductors it traded for them.

Although a simple example, it's how trade works - you trade what you can make cheapest (relative to other things you make in your country) for things that cost more to make in your country.

Two hundred years ago, when that thing called the "Industrial Revolution" took off that made possible the existence of the computer you're whining from, it was called "division of labor" or "specialization." This is the same concept, but on a global scale.

But, then again, "Dey turk mah jugh!"

[Bush] didn't ban anything

To start the hunt, "Buffalo Runners", young men trained in animal behavior would entice the herd to follow them by imitating the bleating of a lost calf. As the buffalo moved closer to the drive lanes the hunters would circle behind and upwind of the herd and scare the animals by shouting and waving robes. As the buffalo stampeded towards the edge of the cliff, the animals in front would try to stop but the sheer weight of the herd pressing from behind would force the buffalo over the cliff.

-Buffalo hunting

I'll avoid any commentary about which agency is getting the short end of the stick, they're both worthwhile programs and IMHO good uses of tax dollars. I just want to make the facts clear.

Can you explain how VA benefits to provide health care to veteran's injured in Iraq is not a military expense? If you use the figures from the offical U.S. Budget, you get 20%. However, the war on Iraq is not included in the budget and is funded through a special package. The funding has to be borrowed, and just like when I borrow money from the bank to buy something I cannot offered (like a house) I have to include the interest costs of borrowing this money in my accounting of its costs. Federal deficit costs that came from the wide variety of military actions we have been involved in since WWII, from Korea to Iraq to Nicaraqua (the first "War on Terror") to the funding we gave Hussien before he stopped following our orders. All of this costs money and should appropriately be assigned to military spending.

The flaw in your old saw is that you make the error of assuming the budget actually covers everything and that it properly categories expenses. All you have to do is think about how much is being spent in Iraq to get a sense that there is a serious flaw in your argument. Add in the money being spent on "Homeland Defense", Veterans Affairs, NASA, Department of Energy, that are primarily related to the military, and you have a lot more than 20%. Can you point out why you take the official numbers and cannot bring yourself to admit that there might be some bogus accounting going on here?

          Eight years ago, scientists believed fetal tissue research offered great hope for cures and treatments -- yet, the progress to date has not lived up to its initial expectations. Embryonic stem cell research offers both great promise and great peril. So I have decided we must proceed with great care.

          As a result of private research, more than 60 genetically diverse stem cell lines already exist. They were created from embryos that have already been destroyed, and they have the ability to regenerate themselves indefinitely, creating ongoing opportunities for research. I have concluded that we should allow federal funds to be used for research on these existing stem cell lines, where the life and death decision has already been made.

          Leading scientists tell me research on these 60 lines has great promise that could lead to breakthrough therapies and cures. This allows us to explore the promise and potential of stem cell research without crossing a fundamental moral line, by providing taxpayer funding that would sanction or encourage further destruction of human embryos that have at least the potential for life.

          I also believe that great scientific progress can be made through aggressive federal funding of research on umbilical cord placenta, adult and animal stem cells which do not involve the same moral dilemma. This year, your government will spend $250 million on this important research.