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But what social networks do folks here use? Is there a good one that offers the benefits of a Facebook or Myspace, while being less superficial and spammy?

Yeah: Facebook or Myspace.

Translation: DON'T ASSOCIATE WITH SUPERFICIAL PEOPLE AND YOUR MYSPACE EXPERIENCE WILL REFLECT THAT

I don't know why this is such a difficult concept for people on Slashdot to grasp. It is barely any different from real life. Every day, at the grocery store, at your job, at school, at church, there are people all around you who are superficial or otherwise undesirable to you. The entire world we live in is like that. The trick is that you don't fucking hang out with people like that. Problem solved.

If you don't like 'emo' kids, don't add any to your friends list. If you don't like 'whores', don't add any to your friends list. If you don't like teen-agers in general, don't add any to your friends list. Your experience on MySpace will be interesting and constructive if you surround yourself with interesting and constructive people.

In the end you may have some other reason for disliking MySpace, of course, but the Slashdot line that MySpace is populated solely by angst-ridden uneducated children is bull shit. You would have the same impression of Earth if you were looking at it from the outside. But if you actually use the superior intelligence that you imply you possess, you will discover that there are many people on MySpace who do not fit your caricature.

Or, you know, you could just use it to communicate with people from real life, the way i and everybody else i know do, and not even worry about how the rest of the world behaves on MySpace.

I wish I knew where the quote came from, but it reminds me of a caricature of the Vietnam war: the US is a sledgehammer, and the insurgents are pieces of cork floating in a tub of watter. We can keep at it as long as we'd like, but we're not fighting the same kind of war they are.

How do you recommend it should be done then? Tell kids to believe in something because I say so? If that's the case, how do I prevent children from being told a lie?

You didn't notice the irony. I wasn't talking agains it, but for it. The current educational system doesn't teach logic before submitting children to specific subjects. It drops the children directly into the subjects themselves, and hope they'll "grasp" how it's done by magic. The medieval educational method is far better.

I'm not familiar with the disputatio. Can you point out how what I wrote relates to it, and why, as you seem to suggest, it's a bad thing?

I'm not suggesting it's a bad thing. Quite the contrary. This is how a disputatio works: first thing, you define a subject that will be analyzed; then you go search all that has been said about the given subject, listing and numbering each and every answer already given; in the end of the list, you write your own answer to the problem; and then you go through the whole list again, answering to all the answers in it one by one, explaining in detail why and how they're wrong, and why and how yours is better.

The Summa Theologica is entirely written in this way. For each of the hundreds of subjects it analyzes, Thomas Aquinas collects everything that has beens said on the subject, offers his own answer, and then confronts this answers to the collection. There's literally thousands of citations there, and to each one Aquinas offers a detailed reply. And that's not specific to Aquinas. All thinkers of the time did the same thing. Occam's PhD thesis (the same Occam from the razor), made when he was in his 20s, has 12 volumes. And it's just the first of his works.

By the way, you know Occam was a Franciscan monk, don't you? ;)

Science has accepted the fact that our view on the universe is a limited one, and doesn't state something as "fact" or "fiction." Thus you are correct about the "phenomenon" observation, and scientists do indeed follow Instrumentalism today.

It's end goal, however, is to draw out reality for what it actually is. It's openness to question itself is a quality seen in no religion I'm aware of (perhaps Buddhism is an exception).

That's because you never studied any religion in depth. Only the discussions among the Christians of the first 4 or 5 centuries fill a library. Not to mention Jewish rabbinical debates, or Islamic ones, able to fill 10 or more. Your concept of what religions are is caricatural at best. Since you mention born-again Christians as your point of reference, I guess that explains from where such a misunderstanding arises. They're far from the best example. Actually, they're far from even the worst. They're no example at all.

It seems to be winning ideology for the time being, when you look at what it has accomplished in the recent 100 years (computers, rocket ships to the moon, medicine, etc...). Religious ideologies have been praying for centuries, but it has been scientifically shown that the power of prayer to be bogus. Their credence is much less.

Your suppose technology and science come from the scientistic world view. It does not. It has been shown, more than once, by lots of philosophers, that the scientific method has no dependence whatsoever to scientistic beliefs. They're completely unlinked. You can replace scientism with anything (Christian philosophy, Buddhist philosophy, no philosophy, whatever), and the scientific method still works. Furthermore, there's no philosophy that can be derived from the scientific method. No political philosophy, no religious philosophy, no world view, nothing. The scientific method is a philosophical subject of study, never a source for any philosophy.

A true scientist is acceptant of perfectly reasonable counter-arguments. Those arguments will have to offer proof, and be held accou

Nothing of what you say is wrong. We were instructed to be good stewards of this earth. And I think that suffices to answer the caricatures you felt the need to introduce.

It's just not a black or white issue of being either for "saving the planet" or against it. There will be no saving the planet because God will destroy it. And He has the right, because He created it in the first place. Don't cling to the earth, cling to God. It's a question of priorities. And magnitude of consequences. The #1 goal is to get yourself and others saved. The consequences of this last far longer than any earthly matter.

I'll close with offering a phrasing of a proverb, from a "translation" of ill-repute that I had as a kid, that I found to be very succinct and profound nonetheless: "Remember, no matter how long you live, you'll be dead much longer."

      Anonymous Coward

I stopped playing the franchise very soon after X came out. I heard 11 going MMO, and decided I was quits from Final Fantasy for awhile. I was almost disgusted when I heard about X-2. I envisioned Square as another of of EA's drooling lap dogs and almost swore off not only the Final Fantasy series but the company in general.

That is until I heard about what they did with XII.

Picked it up, I thought maybe it could possibly have some redeeming qualities that could perhaps restore my faith in Square. I was very pleasantly surprised to find out the entire game was a redeeming quality. It hit on every level a Final Fantasy is supposed to hit on and even accomplished some things that none other had. The most important is the story. Final Fantasies are operas, let's not kid ourselves. FFIV, VI, VII and VIII are very popular examples of this, empires are rising and falling, romances flourish and are tragically ended. Armies clash, the alliance and enslavement of great and powerful beings to aid or detriment the protagonist are occurring, you are affecting change on a world-wide level. The way in which XII tells its story is classic, classy, and every bit as intrigueing as a Grecian Epic.

Even the music lets on to the scope you are supposed to be on, deep and heart-wrenching. Bass kicks in when you're in danger, treble when you're coming out of a situation the victor. The music is supposed to make you feel as if the whole world depends on your actions, as the world DOES depend on you. They made a wise move by letting the music fade to the background a little and let the sound effects, the ambient sounds of the world around you help do the job. It's alot like the Rise of the Valkyries is heard softly in the distance as you hear the gnashing and clangs of combat, the entire Division of Imperial swordsmen draws near as klaxons sound.

Another level that this particular installation hit home on was showing you just the level of scope you're dealing with. In previous installations, you didn't particularly get a feel for just how menacing your foes are. Behemoths seemed to be caricatures, your party merely felling another foe as you continued on your path. The genious of the battle system they are implementing (Which is from KOTOR, BTW) is that now you know JUST how menacing a behemoth is. He's huge, he makes your party look like stick figures. Demon Walls are now exactly as their name implies, and actually seem capable of crushing the party to death if you don't defeat it in time. Espers are giant, their weapons mighty and powerful, seemingly appropriate for the amount of damage they do. The legendary weapons you procure that somehow have to justify the vast differential in damage output now do so graphically. Of course the Zodiac Spear is going to hit hard, look at the damn thing! You're seeing both the weapon and how it is used now, in previous installations you merely saw your party line up side by side, with your opponent in the distance. Now you see actual combat, not some spikey haired blonde with an emo outfit disappearing in midair and materializing 5 feet over an enemy with his sword pointed downwards. A man with an affinity for the deadly arts charges, raises his weapon and brings it down with devastating affect.

In all, FFXII got back to FF's roots. Telling an epic story, and getting you involved. Something I hope will be SOP for Square-Enix for the foreseeable future.

It takes two to tango, but only one to wage war. If one side of the conflict simply refuses to recognize the other's right to exist, then war is forced upon the other side, regardless of how much creativity and intelligence it might have. If you think I'm exaggerating or caricaturizing the Palestinian position, just google for information about their elected government, its current openly declared position (no recognition, even symbolically, of Israel) and similarly openly declared plans for the future (destruction of Israel). Israel has no choice.

Actually exceptional could be a deaf person learning to play a musical instrument becoming a medical doctor. When a character is a caricature instead of a person it is not "aspiring to be more." I think you missed my point. Cheers, Cally

Guys like you make it damn hard for me to argue against Republican caricatures of the left - your delusions and ignorance, mixed with the amazing ability to ignore facts that show you to be wrong (30 years of f**king up the country for Repubs? Um... they balanced the Budget under Clinton, amongst other things), mark you as a self-blinkered raging fanatic. Every bit as nasty as those whom you purport to hate. You demonstrate that you have chosen to define yourself by what you hate.

I am going to stay away from the last couple of sentences....

Balanced the budget why yes they did.... when they had control of the Legislative branch, and not anything else BUT as soon as they had control of a majority of the "three" branches of government what the fsck happened? Record deficits, loss of constitutional rights, an unconstitutional war, i.e. according to the constitution it takes 218+50 or 51 members of Congress to actually vote for the commencement of hostilities to be an actual war.
Enough of that lets get to something more important.....

POWER CORRUPTS AND ABSOLUTE POWER CORRUPTS ABSOLUTELY!!!!
That is what the Republicans have had for the last 6 of 12 years that they were in power....
I would consider the Supreme Court to be a minor player when it comes to the so called Checks-and-Balances our founding fathers envisioned because by the time they take up an issue it is probably already too late or moot as the damaged has already been done.

IMHO EVERY Bill proposed/passed by Congress should pass inspection from the Supreme Court before it is made the "Law of the Land". The President is only one man and if he doesn't like something about the bill he can wield veto power but that is only one man's opinion while the Supreme Court being 9 members has a chance of having more wisdom as to what is better for the country.

With the only exception of the Budget concerns of the country no bill should have another bill attached to it... And the only exception to a budget bill would be to either add or subtract what we and or the government is finding ways to pay for it. For example there have been horrendous admendments attached to say Budget bills that it would be political suicide to vote against but have been attached where you are 100% opposed to the attached bill but have to vote yea because it is a larger issue that affects the well-being of our country. What is a Congress-critter supposed to do?

This BS about having a "Fourth-Estate" namely the Press is a bunch of hooey also.... the Press has really no power... they can rile up the voters and such but by the time they do the damage has already been done.

The founding fathers had a IMHO very good understanding of human nature and left us with enough rope to hang ourselves, which I believe that we are tying the noose unless saner heads prevail.

I don't consider myself Republican, Democrat,Green,Libertarian or whatever I consider my self an
American Citizen.

Love your sig "Be A Patriot Murder a Republican" /sarcasm

Inciting to murder you political opponents, even in jest, reveals a lot about you and the fascist mentality you express. You're no better than Pol Pot on the left or McVeigh and the whackos on the right with that sort of a saying.

Guys like you make it damn hard for me to argue against Republican caricatures of the left - your delusions and ignorance, mixed with the amazing ability to ignore facts that show you to be wrong (30 years of f**king up the country for Repubs? Um... they balanced the Budget under Clinton, amongst other things), mark you as a self-blinkered raging fanatic. Every bit as nasty as those whom you purport to hate. You demonstrate that you have chosen to define yourself by what you hate.

Might want to check the mirror first when you ask what's wrong with this country (all of us should). I think your hatred of the Religious Right has blinded you. You live on hatred every bit as much as those "God Hates Fags" people do, you guys deserve each other - leave the rest of us the hell alone.

Stop with the hate, enough already.

Anyway, this has basically become quite dull. Like most hypocrites, you can't even consider the possibility that you may be wrong. Like most irrational people, you never under any circumstances question your assumptions. Like most self-righteous people, you assume that anyone who doesn't believe as you do must be evil and wrong. If you can't consider the possibility that you are mistaken, if you can't consider what an alternate viewpoint would be like, why bother having discussions at all? I walked your path for 24 years with all the diligence and faithfullness that I could, until doubt and real world evidence showed me that I was wrong. Seeing christians, ministers and reverends even, advocating murder and execution and the abandonment of homeless to their ultimate deaths ... how could I possibly think that religion had any positive effect on their behaviour whatsoever? Meanwhile, the people that were fighting for Human rights, opposing war, and encouraging love and acceptance of all people were mostly atheists. The people who tried the hardest to help me were not people of faith. If want to be taken seriously, try walking my path. Try to consider life from the eyes of the faithless -- for real I mean, not your caricature of them. Try to actually empathize with them and understand why they feel the way they do. Try questioning your assumptions and circular reasoning. See if doubting God's existence makes you suddenly feel open to commiting rape and murder. I'll wager that you'll find that you retain your disinclination towards harming others, regardless of whether you believe in invisible judges.

Also, an important note: the bible doesn't say anything about heaven or hell. It says that when you die, you're dead. God may raise some people on judgement day, but the rest just stay dead. That's why the bible says that Christ saves you from death, not hell. That's why Jews don't drone on and on about hell and demons and Satan being out to get you. Hell is mostly something that later Christians dreamed up to scare people into converting. It isn't much better than conversion by the sword, if you think about it.

My morality does pre-exist me and will exist when I'm gone -- it's encoded into our genetics. Altruism is a natural consequence of being a social species, and evolutionary psychology has made very strong arguments about that. So yes, morality can be pre-existing, fairly universal and consistent, and I can simply KNOW it. That's the hallmark of instinct, not magical flying men that smite babies for no reason.

Oh, and did you read the "Know Your Bible" page? Good stuff there, good stuff. I suppose you're off to Iraq now to murder some children of Babylon? That is what is demanded of you, after all. Not that you follow a bible -- the bible commands you (a woman I presume based your ID) not to teach (1 Timothy 2:11). Yet here you are, violating the word of god and trying to teach me about the nature of faith. For shame, sinner.

In other news today, Swift advocated cannibalism as a solution to poverty in Ireland. What a monster.

Seriously, you're missing the point here entirely. The way Ali G and Borat work is by simultaneously making fun of the ignorant bigotry of the characters themselves, and also taking advantage of liberal tolerance of them. Thus Ali G is in the first place a straightforward parody of middle-class white English kids who ape American gangsta culture, but is also a vehicle by which Cohen can entrap public figures into making fools of themselves: they try to seem tolerant and accepting of what they take for a representative of Contemporary Youth Culture, and end up walking straight into it.

Unfortunately, Ali G ended up being adopted as an icon by middle-class white English kids who ape American gangsta culture and who didn't quite realise that half the joke was on them. Thus, after selling out spectacularly and milking the character for all he was worth, it was time to bring Borat to the fore.

Borat is a more sophisticated caricature than Ali G. He's a mish-mash of Slavic and Eastern European stereotypes, and bear in mind that what with the Iron Curtain and all, stereotypes about Eastern Europe are decades out of date, going back to before the Holocaust made anti-Semitism unspeakable. Stereotypes rooted in a nasty past of peasants and pogroms. Borat is a fossil out of this past. In the name of tolerance to a different culture, the people Borat meets will bend over backwards not to give offence, and then the fun lies in finding out just how far the faux-Kazakh guy can go and get away with it, and how hypocritical we're prepared to be in tolerating Borat's intolerance. And, for that matter, in finding out just how different to our ignorant peasant forebears we Western urban sophisticates really are, beneath the surface.

The only concern I really have is about how it all reflects on Kazakhstan itself. From what I've heard, though, they've caught on that the joke's not on them at all, that it's rather a good joke, and that there's no such thing as bad publicity. At least now we've heard of Kazakhstan...

I haven't seen Borat's film - I'll be seeing it on Friday, and I'm very much looking forward to it. I was never inclined to see the Ali G film, but Borat I think has a lot more potential.

Buffalo is a great example. Nearly wiped out and then buffalo bill pushed for conservation. If he had not done that, they would be gone forever.

The Buffalo were not 'nearly wiped out' due to the recklessl whim of the White Man.

There was a fundamental incompatability with huge county-sized herds of buffalo and a transcontinental railway. When a big buffalo herd comes your way it grinds anything in it's path into the ground.

So the railroads could not have been built if the buffalo were not (nearly) exterminated. The stories one reads of men shooting buffalo from railroad cars has nothing to do with sport. It related to maintaining the railroads.

Arguements that the railroad should not have been built should be addressed on the merits of the topic, not made into a caricature about 'stupid man wiping out those majestic buffalo herds.'

I agree. The problem is not so much with the basic concepts than with the application.

Remember Winnie the Pooh? In the books, there is a weird bunch of diverse creatures called Rabbit's friends and relatives. No one exactly knows how many there are (except that there are MANY) and what is the whole point of having them around.

The IP system as it is now is plagued with the same Rabbit's friends and relatives typically passing as lawyers, producers, Second Assistants of the Marketing Director etc. If there was a way to cut down on these and reserve the benefits to the authors only (and not their third generation descendants as it is with the U.S. Copyright now), it would help to keep the system from becoming its own caricature as it is now.

Or we can go on with the current system and find one day that no one takes it seriously any more.

Just my two cents worth of opinion...

Your request is self-defeating. I am a de-facto sysadmin for most of my friends and family, and I can summarize their stance on security in a few bullet points:

1). Security is not important. Only computer geeks worry about it. I just want to browse the web, send email, and play games.
2). Viruses happen to other people. I have nothing special on my machine, thus virus writers don't care about me, thus there's no need to worry.
3). I don't know what spyware, trojans, backdoors, or keyloggers are, and I don't care (see (1)).
4). I will not do anything, or install any software, that requires me to take any additional actions whatsoever, no matter how rarely (see (1)).
5). If my computer is not working properly, the likeliest cause is that all the security software (antivirus, spyware scanner, etc.) is messing things up. The obvious solution is to disable it.
6). There's no reason for me to learn about security by reading books or articles, because I already know all I need to know (namely, (1)-(5)).

You may think that I am caricaturizing the views of non-technical people, but, rest assured, I am not. This is literally how people think. Thus, showing them security guides etc. is useless, because they won't read them. It also means that whatever antivirus software you install has to be completely invisible, or they'll remove it. Most unfortunately, when they do get infected with some horrific trojan, they will neither understand not care about what happened; if it becomes too much of a problem, they will either call you in to "make my computer fast", or they'll buy a new PC.

I think the reason for this is that non-geeks think about computers in a completely different way from geeks. Non-geeks do not know, or care to know, how the computer works. To them, the computer is a monolithic tool, sort of like a fork or a spoon or a TV or a car. It does what it's supposed to do. It doesn't have any user-serviceable parts. Messing with it is for special people who like to mess with things, such as car mechanics or computer engineers.

Keep in mind that most geeks also feel this way about various objects. Can you claim the same level of understanding about the food you eat, or the car you drive, or the airplane that takes you to DefCon, or even your microwave oven, as the understanding you have about your Linux distro ? Most people cannot.

So, it is not the case that end-users are especially stupid, or especially lazy. It just means that human nature itself prevents computer security from becoming an end-user concern.

Which has always amazed me about the name sticking so long. Within six months of "Pulp Fiction" being released, a conservative Catholic woman of my acquaintence made the statement, "you used to be able to stop at people's house and ask to use the phone if you had car trouble, but now you don't know if they've got a Gimp in the basement or what!" At that point, any lingering questions about whether they were making fun of the disabled, or trying to make people squirm with that name, were pretty much settled.

I've really wondered about all the coy denials, attempts at cute mascots, etc, over the years, (such as Wilbur, the doggish icon), and why they didn't just roll with what they'd started. They could put up a leather-and-zipper logo on the home-page, or a caricature of Mappelthorpe with the bullwhip. Or they could change it to "Gnu Raster Image Processor", or follow the lead of the Squid team and just name it "Calimari".

Of course, if I have to make a choice, I'd still rather they added adjustment layers and 16-bit support rather than changed the name, but that's one more for the bug queue.

I disagree with the idea that it is impossible to be fair and balanced. It is impossible to be completely objective, and the very terms by which one characterizes any situation usually smuggle in a distinct point of view. (Whether it is to described people as "terrorists," "insurgents," or "militias," or to describe people in a regions as "Iraqis," "Sunnis", "Arabs," or to use some other definition - we tend to think in terms of set containers with national boundaries as the most important membership, but that itself is a way of presuming that nationalism is "natural" and/or the rational end-state of social development - it's a Hegelian hangover, really, to assume that, but that is a digression.)

But all that said, it is possible to select those facts which have the least baggage. It is clear to me that "terrorist" has a lot more baggage that "insurgent" does, that "occupation" is far more neutral than either "liberation" or "US imperialist invasion." To be fair and balanced is to eschew hysteria or theatrics, to consider the credibility of sources, to avoid caricature. As news reporting has turned into a kind of theatre of emotion, by which viewers have their worst prejudices pleasurably confirmed, this isn't even sustained as a goal.

History proves you wrong. The BSD license is less successful than GPL for anything but essential infrastructure projects. BSD seems, to me, especially ill suited for applications. Which is where the next battles will be fought.

Red Hat is profitable. JBoss was profitable prior to being bought by Red Hat. MySQL is profitable. Profitable businesses can be built under the GPL. Perhaps not with the gargantuan profits a monopoly would get. I guess they shall have to settle with being millionaires instead of billionaires.

There are many 3rd party distros based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux already. CentOS is used by many telecoms operators. Scientific Linux is used at many research facilities. Yet Red Hat the company has prospered. Red Hat persists because of certifications and presumption of neutrality. Oracle has neither advantage. I suspect their distro will either prove to be an abortion, or merely used for Oracle providing their own wholly vertical software stack niche.

Why the heck should corporate clients get miffed from having extra choice in vendors? The only people with a problem here are the incumbents: Red Hat.

There will always be more users than developers : the users are the masses here. In the long term the masses will get their fair deal as usual. The present situation regarding proprietary software is insanely tilted to the developer side. Worse: I believe it hampers progress, by leading to corporate inertia and outsourcing. Quark Inc. is a caricature of this world view.

The GPL existed before Linux and I suspect it will outlive Linux in some form.

Your post makes little sense to me. I doubt Oracle will make major inroads with their version of Linux. Red Hat shall survive in some form because they add value to Linux which no one else does.

Hmm. I see someone else modded this post insightful, which is interesting. I would have modded it funny; the essay didn't really go anywhere so I can't see how it was meant to be anything but a satire of the attitudes of men who lack the backbone to define themselves however the hell they want and instead must cling to "safe" ideas like the manly man.

And then I start surfing the rest of the site, and it becomes clear to me that this guy might be serious. But I really can't tell. Everything seems like a caricature of the archetypical man-child, but nothing goes quite overboard enough for me to be entirely sure.

But I think I'm going to stick with thinking this is really meant to be a joke. Or maybe Kim du Toit isn't joking, just pretending. He wants us to take him seriously, because he's trying to ride on Ted Nugent's coattails.

Why does this shit always get modded up? Be more of a stereotype, please. Bush's rise, and abuse, of his power is hardly a novel thing in American history. Creating an enemy and then using it to shape political policy is not new, and while Bush has made some startling alterations to the law, this has all been done before. And guess what? It's never lasted. People pay a lot of attention to our dear George W., and laws like this will not remain in effect for long.

Two things are required to make a dictator:
1. The People, offering him support and control over them in exchange for security and success.
2. Followers who protect him and support him regardless of his actions, hoping to gain a portion of his power once he's become unstoppable.

Bush isn't exactly popular anymore. Have you taken a look at the polls recently? The vast majority of the country is dissatisfied with Bush's handling of the War, which is the single biggest issue of his presidency. The most people are dissatisfied with his performance altogether. The upcoming elections are not looking to be a kind one to the Republicans, and more Republicans are opposing Bush's policies then ever before. If Bush is making a bid for a dictatorship, he's doing a piss-poor job at it. Hitler was far more charismatic, expedient, and successful then Bush could ever hope to be, and had a damaged and hungry country to support him. Don't even try to compare Modern America with Post-WWI Germany... our country is hardly in the kind of state necessary for a dictator to take power.

Comparisons between Bush and Hitler are not only weak, but they damage the dialogue within our country, and by extension, our country itself. When you tell people that Bush is comparable to Hitler, how can you expect them to take you seriously? Let's assume you're not talking to people who agree with you. How do you propose compromises? How do you find results that transcend the "us-against-them" mentality that's paralyzing our politics? If you honestly believe that one side of our political spectrum is evil and bent on domination, how can you possibly have a productive relationship with them? I have bad news for you- this is real life. Our country is populated by real people, not caricatures that make morality black-and-white. In reality, issues have far more complex then most people want to think they are. In reality, people don't always fall into your neat little boxes and labels. And while there are definitely evil people in our government, I'm tired of seeing one side demonize the other; all they're doing is dulling your brain to make you think that there's only two sides of an issue, and you're fighting for the morally righteous one. This doesn't accomplish anything. Well, it does make people feel good about themselves, that's for sure.

What a tool. If you can make such sweeping generalizations, then you're far too gone to rationalize with. This kind of thinking is bad for America. This kind of thinking is making this country sick. Being critical of our government is absolutely necessary to keep it in balance, but polarizing our politics is damaging what little open-discourse we still have.

I hope you're proud of yourself: you've joined the other flock of sheeple plaguing American politics.

Name me one Western society that isn't having problems due to Muslim demands? I'd *love* to see the reaction in Medina if a bunch of westerners showed up and demanded churches, set up the Christian Parliament of Saudi Arabia, the Christian Council, demanded non halal meat, insisted on leaving work on a Sunday for church, insisted on banking with interest, insisted on bringing in their own brides from the west, all the while refusing to integrate, crying discrimination and pushing for a Christian state within Saud. How about if the Saudi government said anything against Christianity? Yeah that's right the Christians should take to the streets burning the Saudi flag, burning cars, damaging property, etc. Caricature of the pope? Yep, time for some death threats and rioting.

Wake up limp wrists in power! Islam is the problem like it always has been. I'm not surprised the Dutch are fed up with it. Theo, Pim, etc knew what was up and have already paid the price.