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US Slips Again In Freedom of the Press Ranking
npwa writes to tell us Reporters Without Borders has released their annual worldwide press freedom index. While developing nations like Haiti and Mauritania continue to gain ground developed nations like France, Japan, and the US continue their downward spiral. From the article: "The United States (53rd) has fallen nine places since last year, after being in 17th position in the first year of the Index, in 2002. Relations between the media and the Bush administration sharply deteriorated after the president used the pretext of 'national security' to regard as suspicious any journalist who questioned his 'war on terrorism.' The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media's right not to reveal its sources, even threatens journalists whose investigations have no connection at all with terrorism."
This post has been censored.
http://twitter.com/onion2k
10 reasons why the US are is hated.
1. The US has started (and "encouraged") more wars and murdered more
humans in a 50 year period than anyone else before in recorded
history.
2.The world constantly watches images of starving children whilst in
the US people are dying of over eating.
3. The US boasts that it has spent billions on being able to bomb
anyone, anywhere on the planet. Meanwhile starvation, and premature
death continue to affect millions of people worldwide whose only crime
was being born where they were.
4 The US makes virtuous speeches about fairness, liberty and justice
then continues to enact policies designed to keep a third of the world
in a state of constant starvation. For example, The US purposely
stopped the supply of cheap non-brand Aids drugs to Africa just to
placate the drugs industry. As a result millions will die who could
have been saved.
5. The continual support by the US of regimes that oppress their
people so that other US parties can gain an economic foothold.
6 The American belief that profit is all. People don't count.
7. American hypocrisy. ( I feel most of us in this NG could write a
book on this one but I'll keep it short)
Virtue, honesty, truth. None of these mean anything when US economic
advantage is at stake. We have watched the US invade and murder
thousands all in the name of "regime change" or "protecting US
economic interests" in various countries. If they haven't been there
pulling the triggers you can be sure they paid for one sides (or both)
weapons.
There isn't a continent on this planet that the US aren't killing
people directly or indirectly. Even their own yet the US tells the
rest of the world that they cannot have weapons that kill
indiscriminately. ( the US has once again refused to stop using
cluster bombs and uranium tipped shells) and is the only country to
have used nuclear weapons and poison gases to kill thousands of
people.
8. The continual military support of Israel and it's attempted
genocide of the Palestinian people. Once again, humans die to protect
US economic advantage.
9 The insane belief that most Americans in this NG espouse that we
(the rest of the world) are jealous. That somehow we are not affected
by the murder and slaughter committed by US troops all over the globe.
That somehow, other humans , i.e us, should not criticise the US govt
for the same reasons Americans don't. WRONG. We are not blinded by
your flag If anything the US has taught us a lot about the dangers of
blind loyalty backed only by a flag. Your govt kills innocents then
hides behind the flag and you idiots buy it all.
10. The worst criminals in all this are the US electorate because they
are the only ones who can stop this slaughter but they refuse to
acknowledge their govt has done any wrong. Even with 90% of the world
screaming for the US to stop killing , the electorate do nothing. You
just sit there, hiding behind the flag or using any excuse your govt
has given you to justify the continual slaughter of innocents.
So don't ask me why America is so hated. I find it more interesting
to know how the world will respond eventually to a country that is
nothing but evil. And respond we will.
Hm, well this isn't from Fox News, so it's blatantly just not true.
I only accept news from reputable, unbiased news sources.
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
This just in: Journalists complain about the USA.
Thanks for the news. I'll be looking forward to your stories about the sun coming up and water running down hill asa the morning progresses.
This post has definately not been censored by anyone, especially anyone in government.
P.S. I love America.
#1 non-European country baby! ...er.. yeah :)
Where the fuck is Irland?
Am I the only one that finds their entire ranking system a bit nebulous? Countries get low scores when a "reporter" is arrested for not releasing information when subpoenaed by courts, etc. Are they wanting reporters to be above the law or what? What does that have to do with their freedom to publish what they want? Do they feel reporters should be extended the same privileges as the attorney / client relationship? If so I don't agree with that, because the press is not (strictly speaking) a necessary part of the court system.
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
The fact that you can complain about it here like the above says we're not *that* bad yet. If you stop seeing anyone complaining at all, then you know things are REALLY bad... those people are being censored/arrested/etc.
stuff |
And where the hell is "Irland" (3)? You would think they know how to use a spell*&*&&!@# .... never mind,I figured it out.
Too bad there isn't an "Editors Without Borders". The countries are rank (excuse the pun) with errors.
I wonder if they take into account such matters as government presence and control in media (since this is inversely proportional to how free the press and media are). It's kind of high in the UK (BBC) and kind of low in the US (as indicated by the low ratings of PBS and NPR, and how nobody really knows about VOA).
Finland, the #1 country, actually has strong government-controlled media (with government radio making up 61% of listening time).
Where were you when the voynix came?
The problem with RSF ranking of countries is that it does not make a difference between institutions (basically, the government) threatening journalists and individuals or groups not linked to the government. So if some islamist group threatens, say, danish journalists/cartoonists, the ranking of Danemark will go down. That does not mean Danish journalists are not free to report on whatever they want. So what you see in this country ranking is that countries that are not involved in "world affairs" have a high ranking, while countries that are rather large, with numerous minorities and a voice in world affairs are lower. I think RSF (which has an important role to play) should provide a more sophisticated ranking than this all-in-one rubbish.
I'll do it for cheesy poofs.
I think they lost an 'e' and a 's' in there. Maybe i'm wrong, but I dont think the english spelling of said countries is quite like that?
Sure we all typo, but in a 'big' position statement like this, by an organization composed of folks who presumably contain writers and editors....
Although givin my 1337 typo skillz, I shouldnt be the one arguing this, but it did jump out at me...
</end rant>
Huh? Theres millions of Americans with the viewpoint that we do TOO MUCH for other countries. It gives you a warm and fuzzy feeling to help others, sure. The rest of the world isn't our problem though.. IMO the problem is they need to focus more on American citizens and less on being big brother to the rest of the world.
Since Slashdot is a web-based news site and forum, and not a newsgroup, I have to ask: which newsgroup did you copy this post from, and who was the original author?
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
FTFA:
``Denmark (19th) dropped from joint first place because of serious threats against the authors of the Mohammed cartoons published there in autumn 2005. For the first time in recent years in a country that is very observant of civil liberties, journalists had to have police protection due to threats against them because of their work.''
I don't see how this is supposed to work. These threats didn't come from the government (at least, it seems that way); in fact, the government _protected_ the journalists. And now, for thanks, they get a worse rating?
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
May I have a sip of your coolaid?
That's not a bit of yellow-yournalism is it? The examples they give are very different than what the above sentence says, in fact they don't give any examples of reporters being treated suspiciously for merely questioning his "war on terrorsim", they do give examples of other things that are bad.
By tring to throw in a completely un-needed "soundbite hook" like that they really do a disservice to their report, and it makes it look like they are doing a biased hatchet job than rather than a real report. That sentence does nothing for their report at all, other than give an opportunity for people to dicredit it.
It is interesting that both France and Germany are ahead of the US. Apparently being jailed for questioning the Holocaust is not considered an issue for press freedom. And how about stories that criticize Islam? Oh yeah, Denmark is at #19 where the Mohammed cartoonists are still hiding! And the Netherlands is at #1 where a film producer was murdered for making a film critical to Islam.
This entire report is BS. I only hope that some day they realize that actual censorship, murder, and jailing of journalists is more significant that a bloviating President.
I may not agree with a lot of that this organization says but.... The US makes a lot of noise about the importance of Freedom while at the same time fostering a system that is steadily eroding individual liberty. Just look at the size of the prison population and count how many police you pass on your way into work each day. Then ponder how many laws you are unintentionally breaking right now. A system where anyone can be nailed at anytime if they upset those in power (or are able to play the system).
:Freedom is the right, or the capacity, of self-determination,as an expression of the individual will.
Freedon
Liberty: Liberty, or freedom, is a condition in which an individual has immunity from the arbitrary exercise of authority.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
Did anything in it advocate the common ownership of the means of production? Or a centrally planned economy? Or high taxation of the rich to fund a comprehensive welfare state and public services?
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
from bias are the most enslaved to bias.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
In the Netherlands...the government doesn't kill journalists, people do. Alright, so Theo van Gogh wasn't a reporter, but he wrote columns.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
In other words:
The US defends itself when attacked.
The US system allows prosperity whereas the totalitarian systems in other countries cause starvation.
The US is capable of defending itself when attacked.
The US defends the property rights, including intellectual property rights, that are necessary in order for prosperity to be possible.
The US enacts foreign policy that supports its own interests.
In the US, it is possible to make money.
Everybody in the world, including the US, preaches the value of self-sacrifice on behalf of others. But when other countries actually practice it, they starve; the more consistently and thoroughly they practice it, the more they suffer. The US cheats on it, and thereby survives. (Something must be wrong with self-sacrifice as an ideal. Too bad even the US doesn't challenge it.)
The US supports freer countries, such as Israel, which are free enough to produce wealth and actually offer value for trade, as opposed to dictatorships like the Palestinian authority, which demand unconditional obedience at gunpoint from their own people, and produce nothing.
The US defends itself when attacked, sometimes even against regimes that use their own people as human shields, such as by putting a biological weapons lab in a hospital, or a weapons cache in a school.
The US people support the US, and the ideas -- life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness -- that make it possible. (However, they do support it more or less on an emotional level, whereas American intellectuals actively oppose it.)
America is hated because it stands as a reproach to the rest of the world (and to its own intellectuals): freedom and prosperity are linked, and can work.
That's why America has such a problem with immigration.
I mean think about it, how are you truly supposed to measure freedom of the press? If the media was being censored, then how are you supposed to hear about it? Through unconfirmed rumors or something? Honestly.
I would think that if you are able to hear about certain things such as gag orders, without knowing what the gag order actually contained (and IMO a gag order morally makes sense in order to protect the accused and allow for a fair trial, and protection from the government in itself is yet another liberty) then you probably have freedom of the press. Freedom of the press strikes me as something you either do or you don't have, and nothing in between.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
11. Americans abroad are patronising and arrogant in other countries, and look down on local customs and mores as being inferior, quaint, and/or silly - and make this opinion obvious and loudly
12. Americans are blind to many of their own people who live in poverty and without access to decent health care, and their gov't ignore their plight even when a disaster unfolds which attracts the attention of the world
13. American's espousal of greed and selfishness exudes from many TV programs whilst their gov't takes the moral high ground
14. The war in iraq, the prison camps, the secret flights carrying prisoners to countries where they can be tortured, the gov't ignoring the Geneva Convention and even making torture perfectly legal...
15. The trampling of their own citizens rights as corporations bribe their way into positions of influence
May Peace Prevail On Earth
I'm not sure I agree with your view of the BBC. Yes, it's funded in part through a form of taxation, but it's hardly a spokesobject for the administration. On the contrary, it's often the government's biggest critic among popular media, and it has a good reputation for accuracy and impartiality, even when reporting on itself. It seems closer to the case in Finland than you're giving it credit for.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
what's your real name cause i wanna enter you in the "douche-bag of the universe" award.
the only reason america is hated is cause of jealousy. we do more for more nations than any other country could dream of.
people love success, but despise the successful. that's just the way it goes.
Huh? Theres millions of Americans with the viewpoint that we do TOO MUCH for other countries. It gives you a warm and fuzzy feeling to help others, sure. The rest of the world isn't our problem though..
trouble is USA doesn't "help" anyone without huge caveats for themselves, want that food aid ? then you have to do [insert corp agenda here] first, like the bilateral warcrimes agreements (no aid if USA commit war crimes and you might prosecute us) or abstinence instead of condoms in Africa to stop AIDS, people see these all underhand dealings and see the "help" offered for what it really is
and the rest of the world is your problem, that is if you want to stop them wanting to fly airplanes into your assets
Nothing wrong with self-sacrifice. But there is nothing inherently wrong with making money for yourself, your family, and others either.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
May Peace Prevail On Earth
1. The US has started (and "encouraged") more wars and murdered more humans in a 50 year period than anyone else before in recorded history.
Which period is this? Are you thinking of the period from 1850 to 1900, with the Civil War and the wars against the Indians? It certainly can't be 1950 to 1900, when the Soviets and Mao's Chinese killed many millions.
"2.The world constantly watches images of starving children whilst in the US people are dying of over eating."
And guess which country gives the most in money and food aid to feed those children...
"3. The US boasts that it has spent billions on being able to bomb anyone, anywhere on the planet. Meanwhile starvation, and premature death continue to affect millions of people worldwide whose only crime was being born where they were."
There might be a point there to discuss if you could connect the two unrelated sentences.
"4 The US makes virtuous speeches about fairness, liberty and justice then continues to enact policies designed to keep a third of the world in a state of constant starvation. For example, The US purposely stopped the supply of cheap non-brand Aids drugs to Africa just to placate the drugs industry. As a result millions will die who could have been saved."
From 2000 to 2003, the amount given by the US government specifically for AIDS relief in Africa increased from $118 million to $285 million each year. How much is the country you live in giving on this?
"5. The continual support by the US of regimes that oppress their people so that other US parties can gain an economic foothold."
We'll leave this for a time when you can provide specifics.
"6 The American belief that profit is all. People don't count."
Nice simplistic slogan. However, realize that all profits are made by people.
"7. American hypocrisy....."
"There isn't a continent on this planet that the US aren't killing people directly or indirectly."
First, a grammar correction. The United States, as it is one country, is a singular entity. The correct grammar would be "...the US isn't...". To deal with the point, there are only two continents where this is going in: Asia (Iraq and Afghanistan) and North America (where the US applies the death penalty for convicts).
"the US.... is the only country to have used nuclear weapons and poison gases to kill thousands of people."
One correction here: several countries have used poison gas in warfare.
"8. The continual military support of Israel and it's attempted genocide of the Palestinian people."
That is a GOOD THING. The only attempted genocide is that by the Palestinians and Arabs against Israel. Either you know little about the conflict, or you are antisemitic. So, basically, the US is "hated" because it refuses to stand by and let Hamas/etc carry out its planned extermination of the Israelis.
"9 The insane belief that most Americans in this NG..."
I will leave this until you spell out NG.
Where were you when the voynix came?
mod parent up.
Yes, america does too much for other countries... like take their oil, kill their people, take their resources, emit greenhouse gasses...
I can see 11, 12, 14, and kinda 15... but 13 cracks me up... because, everyone knows TV programs are an accurate portrait of reality. *yawn* If you're short on reasons to hate America, think for a few minutes instead of pulling random crap outta thin air.
> 13. American's espousal of greed and selfishness exudes from many TV programs whilst their gov't takes the moral high ground
Shadus
Honestly? If you really believe these things to actually be true, then we don't want you in this country anyway.
You just sit there, hiding behind the flag or using any excuse your govt has given you to justify the continual slaughter of innocents.
Those are called laws, as in, the electorate votes the way the people vote. Nice job criticizing free speech (another one of those law things) then saying we should ignore them here, in between which you called us hypocrites.
The US has started (and "encouraged") more wars and murdered more humans in a 50 year period than anyone else before in recorded history.
We also were fundamentally successfuly to the world not being overrun in WW2, which was just slightly worse, more destructive, and more important than any other war in the time frame you mentioned. Nice job picking a time frame that ignored that though. Thats like mentioning terrorism in the US starting the discussion on 9/12.
The world constantly watches images of starving children whilst in the US people are dying of over eating.
Oh, so now we can "interfere" with the world's business? Got it. This quote of yours is laughably bad. Nice try though.
It ranks India 105, mainly because it thinks one big Govt of India banned or censored the publication of the Danish Mohammad cartoons. What really happened was real vote bank politics very familiar to most Americans. India is a democracy with about 85 Hindus, 12% Muslims and the rest Christians and other smaller minorities. The Muslims vote as a block and all the political parties fall all over themselves, including the ruling Congress Party [*] to get that vote block. Hindu vote is split midway and the Muslims form the swing vote minority. State governments would routinely ban anything that offends Muslims and Christians. Or anything the self proclaimed leaders of Christians and Muslims declare that offends them. There is open season on Hindus. India should rank much closer to USA in this respect.
If you look at the way Indian media portrays Hindus, Hindu deities and Hindu practices, something startling will emerge, which is again familiar to most Americans. Lurid details about financial, sexual and criminal activities by Hindu holymen is order of the day. A Muslim painter painted Hindu goddess of learning in the nude and all these reporters staunchly defended the freedom of expression of the artist, much like they defended the disgusting portrayal of Christ in a dirty bodily fluid in USA. Infact the mainstream Indian media's treatment of Hindus identical to the mainstream American media's portrayal of Christians in USA
As for exposing corruption of the politicians, they record politicians taking bribes in hidden camera and broadcast it in National News. The only difference between India and USA is that, in India there is no Fox News for Hindus. But rest assured, it will come soon. Robert Murdoch owns quite a few networks there, and there is this seething discontent among the Hindus for being constantly portrayed negatively. It is a free market there. Someone is bound to serve that market.
PS: The ruling party Congress is headed by a Roman Catholic Italian woman, widow of an assassinated ex Prime Minister. The President of India is a Muslim, nuclear/rocket scientist nominated to that office by the previous government largely declared to be a Hindu nationalist party. The previous defence minster was George Fernandes, a Christian. A country of 1 billion, 85% Hindu, 12% Muslim routinely elevates microscopic minority people (present Prime Minister is a Sikh) to the highest offices. When you despair about democracy, take heart. If Democracy can thrive in such a poor country like India, it can thrive anywhere.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Since the report was recently released (yesterday), I wonder if the US' ranking includes the fact that habeas corpus has more or less been abolished for any US citizen that the president deems to be an "enemy combatant"?? I'm guessing that after the election, there are going to be journalists who will be shut down (read: vanish) on the grounds that they are undermining the War on Terror(tm) by vocalizing criticism of administration policy.
Then again, as a journalist, I'm a little bit biased in favor of the first amendment (for everyone, not just my viewpoint).
Transistors and Beer!!
even threatens journalists whose investigations have no connection at all with terrorism.
:o
Look at my shocked face
-Grey
Silver Clipboard: Time Management Tips
Not only is is this offtopic, it's a copy-and-paste job that has appeared numerous times before on slashdot. In other words, it's no different than a troll post that would automatically be modded -1 Troll in no time.
Yet, this post as been receiving insightful mods. Truly a sickening job by the moderators to push their agenda and ignore all responsibility to moderate right.
This place has really become an extension of kos. Nothing but US and Republican-bashing when it comes to politics.
Translated:
11. "I heard this story about an American who visited once and was rude and didn't differ to our local customs. We don't pretend to like their local customs in America, but they should pretend to like ours."
12. "Someone told me there are poor Americans. They didn't tell me that even poor Americans live relatively well compared to the worldwide average or the US historical average."
13. "I get my info from watching bad TV shows. Americans are exactly like those people on TV."
14. "America defends itself when attacked"
15. "I read too many left-wing web-sites like Slashdot and I actually believe all the anti-corporate BS from 17-year-old complainers who post there."
You can see freedom of the press right there. It is the Fox News of the liberal agenda. I don't see anyone censoring that paper. CNN is very liberal. Dan Rather can go on air with a false story showing the president in a bad light and he didn't go to jail. How the US can be 53rd in the world is beyond me.
...115 to go before you reach the goal -- North Korea! :-)
``They don't rank the government. This rank mostly shows how safe it is to be a reporter in that particular country.''
I know, but shouldn't Denmark rank higher for protecting these cartoonists than, say, the Netherlands, in which Theo van Gogh was _murdered_ for what he wrote?
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Let me demonstrate the difference in what I know about.
10 Hungary 3,00
What does it tell you? It would be wrong to assume that the press is great in Hungary. It only means that the press is not physically threatened. That is freedom of journalism.
Freedom of press also means that there is no outstanding bias in either way, which is simply not the case in ex-communist Hungary. Most of the press has been privatized into the hands of ex-communist businessman, so currently the press shows around 80%-20% bias towards the socialist side.
The hungarian "public" tv is called state tv for a reason, even by European media experts, in contrast for example the BBC which does a good job at maintaining balance and trying not to be too biased to either side. That is freedom of the press.
So yeah, you're free to write about what you want in Hungary, but informed opinion is hard to be established for the common people, because most of the domestic media is so biased. It is not even free market, when the government while doesn't jail journalists they don't like, but they do fund news sources they like (by advertising only in those papers for example) and boycott the ones they don't.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Many (most? all?) people who can watch "images" of starving children probably are well-fed themselves. Those who aren't, well, let's just say they have more important things to worry about than US obesity epidemic.
The rest of your arguments can grouped into two categories:
1. Problems with capitalism
2. Problems with countries at war
No. 1. is an inherent problem with many countries. But we ignore them, right? Anything to go after the perceived "authority figure". No. 2. is more serious and unique to the US.
The real problem here is not that your arguments are invalid (some are), or that your arguments are reptitive (most are), it's that you refuse to see anything good about the US. No-one is perfect. Hell, I bought this computer and am buying this bandwidth from my ISP at the expense of some poor starving African Kid. I give to charity, but I don't go overboard. Does buying my computer and my internet access define "me" (or even my capacity for charity)?
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
Our (I'm dutch) newschannels aren't owned by multimillion dollar corporations, whose main agendapoint will always be (intricate part of any large corporation) how to make more money.
Unbiased news is sadly not the way to make the most money. Unbiased news takes a lot of research, which costs a lot of money. Writing what your audience wants or expects to hear makes more, and costs less.
This will probably be a large factor in how the list is set up.
Also, there is a reason why reporters were only allowed to follow the army "guarded" by a military representative, and I assure you, his safety wasn't the reason.
So much happened in Iraq and Afghanistan that wasn't on any of the major newschannels over there. Also, reporters being tapped and followed by the NSA when they report something critical about the "war on terror", or how about a reporter that dares to explain what communism really is *shiver* (real communism is not that which stalin and mao etc do. that's dictatorship with just a slight whiff of communism. (okay, granted, that's less of an issue now, but that's only a recent change. You're still frowned upon if you mention *the c-word*)
Really, that "American Freedom" all americans talk about may have been a fact in earlier times, but the presidents in the last century have been slowly but steadily diminishing that.
It's perhaps time that some new rules should be added to who can be president there. Perhaps presidents should have a Bachelor or higher university degree, and have no more than twice the average assets, be it in investments or raw money. Nor the president or his family or friends should have any bonds with any company worth over $ 1,000,000.
Funny how this argument comes from Europeans, Canadians, etc. that spend all their time telling Americans that their culture is crap, their entertainment is crap, they're fat, they're stupid, they're too religious, they have too many guns, they're too prudish when it comes to sex and too liberal when it comes to violence, we need to provide universal health care, etc. In other words, we need to be more like European countries, because they have everything figured out and do everything the right way.
But we're the ones who aren't accepting of other people's culture and way of life...
IMO the problem is they need to focus more on American citizens and less on being big brother to the rest of the world.
I agree. And I'm quite sure, a LOT of countries all over the world will agree, too.
Especially countries that have been "helped" recently.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Hate to be the one who tells you this, but your assessment is only accurate for non-muslim countries. Islam by its very definition is going to hate us based on the fact that the Koran teaches violence against infidels (someone who doesn't believe in the same god you do)on nearly every page. And yes, most people believe that it is the actual factual word of Allah and that every word is to be followed literally. Its not extremists, its the norm, moderates in Islam are a rarity outside the US. Second, if you compare the US freedom of press to ten years ago, we have significantly dropped. Ignore some ridiculous international survey that makes guesses based on things that really don't matter. Base it on the fact that the government told the New York Times to not publish a story because it was in the interest of national security. Of course, it was a story that the government is spying on us with out warrant. This should not happen in this country. We should not have a government deciding what we should read about when it involves us. If it really involved national security, then a warrant should have been just fine to spy on our phones lines. Wait, warrants require evidence of some kind, which they didn't have! Ooops! So thats why the NYT reported it! And the government supressing that kind of information is why we keep dropping in the index, and why we should be worried.
"The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media's right not to reveal its sources"
There is no such right, even though journalists love to pretend it is etched in the First Ammendment or something. And even if there were such a right, any responsible journalist wouldn't rely on anonymous sources anyways. They are notoriously unreliable (at least with a named source you can go back and verify what they said, and investigate how they know what they said they know). If I wrote "an anonymous official deep within the WhiteHouse said the other day that the Bush Administration only went to war in Iraq to get oil", that statement has no credibility. Yes, my "anonymous official" may have been Karl Rove himself, but it is just as likely (if not much more likely) that it was a janitor. I have essentially told you nothing while still making an attention grabbing headline.
Many like to point to Watergate as an example where anonymous sources (Deepthroat) broke open a case, but that is just not true. Neither Woodward nor Bernstein wrote about something simply because Deepthroat told it to them, instead they used his information as a guide as they sought independent confirmation. Had they written about some anonymous source named after a porno flick who told them the president had broken the law, they would have been laughed out of Washington. Though I'm not sure if that would have happened today now that the public's expectations in terms of evidence seems to have been lowered to the point where any scandal becomes instant credible news.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
US seems to be more of a dictatorship than a free democracy to me so im not surprised the dictator can lay down rules to keep the power
The media has self-created the right to anonymous and unchallenged sources, and it's something that I find incredibly damaging. There are literally thousands of daily reports that rely on 'unnamed sources'. The incredible power the media wields is often done without the burden of transparency. They can make wild accusations, attribute them to some unnamed source, and pass their reporting as fact. The public is left to either simply trust them, or disregard the news completely.
I beleive that the 'right' to protect sources is a fundamentally flawed one. It's always funny to read a story about the lack of transparency in the Bush administration, with a unnamed administration official happy to corroborate it (the irony!). The media has the luxury of shifting the burden of proof from themselves to the accused. Since the journalist doesn't have to name their source, one must prove their innocence simply because some journalist pointed the finger.
All of this really points to a much larger problem, the press is accountable to no one. They have succeeded in creating a culture in which the media gets to play judge and jury, all while operating under a veil of secrecy. They swarm on stories like locusts, and when they've sucked the life out of people they simply move on. Facts don't seem to matter, and they certainly aren't interested in accepting responsibility for their mistakes.
For example, the University of Colorado football team was embroiled in a scandal a couple of years ago. Accusations of rape, sex for recruits, and general nastiness was levied against the program. Sports Illustrated ran a story which largely relied on highly questionable (although the article convienently left that out) and unnamed sources. The only problem? A series of subsequent investigations by both the state of Colorado, local police, and the University itself found little to no evidence to corroborate any of it. The whole thing turned out to be little more than a bunch of college kids attending college parties. Did the media stick around to report that? Nope, they had already long packed up and moved on to the next media dog-pile in hopes of ruining a few more lives so they could make a few more bucks.
It is this lack of accountability that disturbs me. A free press is great, but we need to find some way to hold journalists accountable for what they report. The problem is, any attempt at accountability is seen as a threat to that freedom surely knocking the U.S. down a few more spots. Yet it's something that is absolutely needed. The Watergate story served as a water-shed moment. Journalists now aspire to BECOME the news (see the celebrity Woodward and Bernstein enjoy now) and in doing so they hold themselves to a lower standard of reporting as long as the gravity of the story is sufficiently high. It seems that anything goes in journalism, as long as you didn't plagarize anything.
So my question is simple: How do we balance freedom of the press with a need for a truly accountable one?
Turn s60 photos into awesome videos with mScrapbook for all S60 3rd edition phones!
Based on per-capita giving, America is almost dead last among first-world nations.
While the blurb headline may be construed as US-bashing, TFA does nothing of the sort, and shows that RSF has made a serious effort to measure freedom of the press. Also, the article merely confirms what everyone's been able to observe over the past few years. I see no FUD here, just a statement of fact.
One correction here: several countries have used poison gas in warfare.
Now, come on. We're all geeks here, we know our Boolean logic. The statement was quite correct, although misleading. The US is indeed the only country to have used nuclear weapons AND poison gas. Many countries have used nuclear weapons OR poison gas, but that's a very different statement.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
What I find the most amazing here is that you americans are bitching about how the ranking is made, but not stuff like this:
:)
Freelance journalist and blogger Josh Wolf was imprisoned when he refused to hand over his video archives. Sudanese cameraman Sami al-Haj, who works for the pan-Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera, has been held without trial since June 2002 at the US military base at Guantanamo, and Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein has been held by US authorities in Iraq since April this year.
Land of the "free" eh?
Anyways I'm proud to be finnish, we've been #1 since the first index was made in 2002
I won't comment on being arrested for questioning the Holocaust, but in the other cases you pointed out (Denmark and Netherlands) the oppression is not caused by the government of those countries, but rather by people from a faith that doesn't believe in individual freedom.
Stupidity is an equal opportunity striker.
Fellow slashdotter Bill Dog
Second, it is pure hypocritical whining to expect favorable treatment from those you criticise -- especially if loudly, selectively and occasionally inaccurately. The press has been after Bush since 2000, especially compared against Clinton.
Third, it is diningenuous to compare "loss of access" suffered by US/F/J/EU? reporters with the outright assaults suffered in far less free countries. None of West/J has content laws (other than against hate crimes), but that doesn't mean the leaking or publishing state secrets should be legal. It isn't in most places, and for good reason.
"Based on per-capita giving, America is almost dead last among first-world nations."
And based on the total amount, is it #2, or #1?
Where were you when the voynix came?
all comes down to money
Take CNN, they have an advitiser (big car maker) that is in bed with big oil, big oil does not want you to know that they are making $2 million a week in proffit. So when CNN is about to air the story of how much big oil is making, big oil calls big car maker and big car maker calls cnn and says "You air that and I will pull my $35 million ad campaign." now we the public never here that story.
Another thing that happens,
Say you are in the White House press core
You have dirt that will rock the Nation, now you go to your boss with the story, he says run with it but you be be reassigned to the South Pole next week. You cant go anywhere else with your story do to no compete clause in your contract. Thus it is never told.
Sensorship, ya we have it bad.
We can say things like Damn and God but not God Damn
We are not allowed to say "Mohammad is the Devil" (i don't believe that he is).
We can say Ass, as he got shot in the ass.
We can say hole but not ass hole
Freedom of speach
Yes we believe in it, Yes we have it, as long as it does not offend you.
--
My right to offend you is more important than your right to not be offended.
--
as the sign at my gate says
"if you can read this, you are in range"
-- I am the NRA, enough said...
If you want to make blanket statements about a country, you have to base it on its people, since it is they whon constitute it. Therefore, per-capita aid is the best way to claim that America as a whole is or isn't generous.
I've seen some silly analogies, but this one looks pretty good: comparing cat ownership to government control of media that is to be "independent" by charter.
Where were you when the voynix came?
That's how it's done. You create enough laws that anyone, absolutely anyone, can be put in jail for breaking a law. Thus you keep your population under control and nobody dares speaking up against you. Because everyone's breaking the law, and everyone knows that he should actually be doing time.
That's how you keep people in check and off the road. Yes, of course you have the right to demonstrate and the right to express your opinion freely. But would you dare, knowing that if they only dig a little they just might find out what you did last Summer?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Beneficial or not to other countries the US is using American Citizens' money to meddle and it needs to stop. The people flying airplanes into our assets need to die, not be liberated or whatever..
The fact that Denmark's cartoons caused the country to fall from shared #1 to #13, even though the cartoons have been published and laws allowed them to be, should be a clear sign that laws were not taken into account when compiling the list.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Relations between the media and the Bush administration sharply deteriorated after the president used the pretext of 'national security' to regard as suspicious any journalist who questioned his 'war on terrorism.'
I should take this article seriously with lines like that one? It's only Bush's war? Why the scare quotes around war on terrorism and national security? America is at war with an evil sect of Islam and it is everyone's war, not just "his war".
You're right about that. I have asolution to that then, let's stop giving aid to other countries and pass laws forbiding anyone in America to give food and to anyone that is starving in other countries and billions of dollars to help other countries. We have people that are starving here in America, so I guess we Americans should go by the old saying "Charity begins here at home"
Who, while they're making said arguments, are watching American TV programs, listening to American music, surfing American websites, eating at American fast-food restaurants, etc. This is especially pronounced in Canada. The hypocracy is galling, and I say this as a Canadian who got tired quite some time ago of my country's wholly undeserved chip on its shoulder when it comes to our American neighbours.
It's not funny, it's democracy. The world has voted, and on balance, US culture loses.
Just do as we say goddamnit, your not even 600 years old yet, you should listen to your elders.
:)
kids today
The media has self-created the right to anonymous and unchallenged sources, and it's something that I find incredibly damaging. There are literally thousands of daily reports that rely on 'unnamed sources'. The incredible power the media wields is often done without the burden of transparency. They can make wild accusations, attribute them to some unnamed source, and pass their reporting as fact. The public is left to either simply trust them, or disregard the news completely.
Substitute media with government and this statement makes just as much sense.
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
Kosovo, Somalia. Care to explain those? I know you can't, but try to explain where's the US's hidden agenda was on those interventions?
I just destroyed you.
That's what they do. They are called suicide bombers for that reason.
Earnestly: There are still more U.S. citizens dying because they choke on a fishbone (about 2500 each year) than because of terrorism. Puts things to perspective, doesn't it?
just a few corrections:
1. Prove it. Lenin and Stalin during there time killed more of their own people than any direct action of hte US can be linked to. Hitler put to death 6 million Jews and started a war that killed quite a few more. Now lets try to actually use something that is factual.
4. No person can be saved by AIDS drugs!!! AIDS is a terminal illness. If you have it, it will kill you. So what you are saying is the US has decided to not prolong the life of terminally ill patients in the name of placating an industry. I'm not saying its better or worse, just the truth.
8. Name one genocidal event that Israel took part in in the last 16 years. I knwo you will just call me ignorant of what is right in front of everyone elses face, but all I see is a group of Palestinians that keep being given things by Israel and then continue to purposefully pick a fight. So give me something. Some proof of a general attempt to exterminate the Palestinians.
What I find far more incredible that no one says "Hey, look at Israel economically helping a group of people that continue to launch attacks on its civilians. They collect taxes for the government and have even transferred money to it. I wonder why they would do that?" You might want to ponder that before you go and claim genocide.
Now previous to 16 years ago, you can claim a great deal of bad things were done by Israel. But the funny thing is, they were always precipitated by far worse from the Palestinians. So at worst you can say they responded in a measured manner.
I suppose we're up for another healthy round of "bash Americ(kkk)a"? Please folks let's just give it all a rest.
Let's see what we've got - the most egregious case of a reporter being prosecuted for refusing to reveal a source was the now infamous Plame "outing". Do I need to bother pointing out that it was the media's incessant demands for an investigation that led to this in the first place?
Maybe we should instead look at the NYT's public editor's recent mea culpa where he admitted that the NYT shouldn't have broken the story about the SWIFT monitoring? Turns out that the program was secret, effective, and *gasp* legal. Oh well, NYT and the LAT got their scoop, secrets be damned.
If we want to talk about press freedom how about we get worked up about the cartoon drawers who have had to go into hiding? How about the newspaper editors who have been killed? How about the riots that emerge anytime anyone even breaths something that could be misconstrued as insulting to Islam.
Here's your press freedom quiz:
1) You're reporting on riots caused by the release of some political cartoons. Do you show the cartoons?
2) You're reporting on Iraq and you receive an obvious propoganda video of sniper shooting, do you show the video?
CNN's answer was No and Yes, you can guess which order those were in.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
I remember reading several articles that were later removed under the guise of not going with the president... These articles were on yahoo, google, msn. Some of them listed such subjects such as The US has killed more iraqi's than the Saddam did. But regardless these articles were removed. This is something worthy of noting. But because it didn't follow what the Bush administration wanted to say to the public.... It was removed. Sometimes when the news is censored.... We don't even know it.
how would you explain european (and euro-like countries like Canada) and also some poor countries are ahead of the ranking than US?
oh, but you forget. America its the biggest so we should give up all personal fun and give everything we have to the poor people around the world. /sarcasm
My outlook is this: I will only listen seriously to someone who actually does it. The poster doesn't even stand a shot at naming a single country that gives everything it could to the poor countries around the world. But it is really fun to pick on someone(anyone) else than admit you are just as guilty.
There's a marked difference between bias and propaganda.
Here, you make the call, is this bias?
When Rep Foley was being scandalized by the press, Fox News' label of party affiliation on day 1 was D (that's for Democrat, just in case you only watch Fox News)
That's one incident in a whole slew of incidents of propaganda. Not bias. Not letting preconceptions color their news reporting, but outright blatant lies and manipulation for the Republicans' gain. Attempts to mislead and misinform.
It's more dangerous and subversive than anything Abbie Hoffman printed, that's certain.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
Is this due to journalist anger about having to disclose sources when a court is about to convict someone based on journalist testimony? As I understand it, most journalists are miffed about having to disclose their source in a trial. Doesn't seem like a loss of freedom for journalists. Seems like a protection of those who are inncoent until proven guilty... but what do I know? I am just one of the people... who the government is of, by and for.
that comment pretty much summed it up. any further comment should be a reply to it.
Sadly, this country has been hijacked by those that use knee-jerk reactions and fear as their tools to stay in power, and those of us who can think logically about the rather small threat that terrorism presents are seen as "pro terrorist" since we don't want to give up the ideas this country was founded on, in order to have the illusion of safety.
I don't like either party all that much, but since I know they're not going to go away, can we at least go back to the system where repubs had the house and dems had the senate (or vice versa) so they'll simply spend all their time arguing and none of their time doing things that take away my rights or otherwise hurt me?
Most people can't tell the difference. Just because you may say what you want and tell "the truth" doesn't mean you must do it.
In a twisted sense, I somehow envy the people of oppressive regimes. At least they know that they shouldn't blindly believe what they read. We "free" people usually do. Because, hey, after all they may tell us "the truth", why shouldn't they?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
12. Americans are blind to many of their own people who live in poverty and without access to decent health care, and their gov't ignore their plight even when a disaster unfolds which attracts the attention of the world
This is stupidly false and I am not sure why people continue to believe it. The federal government runs a Medicaid system that assists in health care related issues. I for example, as a college student, have no income at all, and yet I have full health care coverage. How? I am on a program called AHCCCS (google that term.)
Again let me restate that. My income is zero, and I have full and complete health care coverage that costs zero. The government is paying for it. And unlike the broken health care coverage seen in countries that have so called "universal health care," my coverage goes through the private health care system, which doesn't put you on hold for two years before you can have any surgery. And I can see an actual doctor any time I want to for free unlike these other countries. My prescription drugs are also covered 100%, and thus I pay nothing for them, which is more than you can even say about Canada for you Michael Moore fans out there.
Google AHCCCS and you can learn more about what I am talking about. This program, and many like it in other states, has existed for decades and yet for whatever reason everybody keeps saying that poverty stricken people in the US have no health care, which is an outright lie. The fact is that those who don't have it either don't apply for it or they just don't care. Either that or they are illegal immigrants.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
Does anyone else see the irony (or idiocy) when the press starts reporting on an investigation of who leaked something to the press? How can they make story after story out of something that they probably know the answer to.
Or, what's to keep them from just making up a story and then never having to reveal their "confidential source". Not that I'm for always making them reveal sources, but it often seems that the press is making the news, not reporting it.
13. American's espousal of greed and selfishness exudes from many TV programs whilst their gov't takes the moral high ground
This comes from America's founding by crazy Protestants. The basic concept is that God rewards the good, so if someone was wealthy they are therefore being rewarded by God and therefore good.
The entire obsession in America with material goods comes from that concept that wealth and status are God-given. The often-repeated "American dream" is also a direct reflection of that concept: if you work hard enough, God will reward you with prosperity.
So in America, wealth is seen as proof that the individual is a morally upstanding individual, as God is good and would only reward the righteous with prosperity.
This has a side effect, of course:
12. Americans are blind to many of their own people who live in poverty and without access to decent health care, and their gov't ignore their plight even when a disaster unfolds which attracts the attention of the world
Since wealth is by American definition a sign of moral superiority, poverty is therefore the opposite. Those in poverty are assumed to be punished by God and are therefore immoral and not worthy of being saved. If they were worthy, then God would provide for them.
Americans ignore the poor and worship the wealthy, as part of their general faith in God.
Any "system" that allows CNN to shows enemy snipers picking off our troops, all to CNN's delight, can't be ranked that low.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
Your comments are legitimate. But you also need to consider that one of the US' greatest exports is its media -- music, books, magazines, movies. The US State Department is VERY aggressive at making sure all of its trading partners have open markets to US product. Unfortunately most of the rest of the world doesn't consider culture = product. When there's a KFC 100' from the base of the pyramids, I think the world has just become a slightly less interesting place.
In canada we have an anachronistic, painful, paternalistic system called CANCON (canadian content) which mandates various %s of broadcast media/sales must be Canadian originating. Its an ugly system, but living so close the the US (and being so similar) its necessary to give some market niches breathing room. In music, alot of groups get a good starting base in Canada and then go onto larger fame, unlike 30-40 years ago when Joni Mitchell and Neil Young HAD to go to the US if they wanted to pursue music.
I think the bigger issue is that with the US national media being so insular, that when (many) americans travel abroad they're not appreciative of the differences between themselves and others. Its not that US is better or France is better, its that France does things differently and that's okay too.
And for the record, I've seen Canadians act like drunken idiots abroad and make me cringe, and German tourists are a species unto themselves.
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
lol, you're right, but don't get too riled up about it. In Europe, complaining about people from other countries (mostly neighbouring countries) just happens all the time, a bit like complaining about the weather. You are fully expected to mock us back :-). In reality we really love you, though ;-).
People around the world need to realize that US Citizens and the US Government are two different things. Ideally the US Citizens should control the US Government, but realistically we don't. If you think it is so easy, then become a US Citizen or better yet a US Politician and help change it. By the way millions of US Citizens help people in other countries all the time, but without the help of our government it makes the process take longer.
Can I bum a sig?
If we're dead last, then if we just plain stop, it won't matter at all.
No, per-capita is not THE way to look at it. It's one way, but it is by no means 'The One True Way.'
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
So, if you're going to play the per-capita card, I believe I'll play the cost of living card.
Yes, everyone in the US is absolutely rich, and we have streets of gold and pay people to wipe our arses for us. Would that were true - the reality is, the US is not the cheapest place in the world to live. However, the per-capita card never seems to take that into account.
ERROR: Stack overflow
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Ok, I'll take the troll. And the parent post is flamebait.
When will you people learn that people don't hate Americans because they "envy your freedom". They hate American because its foreign policy directly affects their lives. Badly. They don't give a toss about your freedoms, their care about theirs.
Right: I'll answer point by point:
1. US doesn't defend itself; it massively over-reacts and goes on a killing spree.
2. The US may allow prosperity, but it doesn't guarantee it. And not every other country is totalitarian.
3. I'll agree: the US can defend itself. And how!
4. Irrelevant.
5. Yes, the US enacts foreign policy in its own interests. And it dicks on the world in so doing.
6. Yes, I'n the US it is possible to make money. But again, that's no guarantee that you will.
7. The whole self-sacrifice thing is falacious and irrelevant to the discussion.
8. Israel? free? Tell that to the guy who blew the whistle on their nuclear programme. Prosperous? It couldn't survive without hand-outs from the US. Palestine isn't trading because Israel blockades it.
9. So, you're saying that it's ok for the US to kill innocents if they're in the way? So, next time, Dirty Harry should shoot the hostages and then deal with the villain?
10. The US is its own religion. It brainwashes each morning with the pledge to the flag. The worst thing you can do is be 'un-american". THAT's why you have a problem with immigration.
Many countries have used nuclear weapons? If your a geek, your not a very knowledgeable one. As for the US nuking of Japan, it was certainly justified.
Wow. Where's Bin Ladens head on a pike displayed on the White House lawn ? I don't see it. I did see him featured in a campaign ad, however. Wonder why this is so ?
Cheers, Chris
The U.S. is much cheaper to live in than northern European nations, where high taxation and simple inflation means that many things cost considerably more than in the U.S., though salaries are about the same. And yet, those nations give more per capita.
"Either you know little about the conflict, or you are antisemitic."
As always, if you criticize Israeli politics, you are antisemitic. Grow up, please!
Most norwegians like me, hate the US involvement around the world to protect american business' interest with destruction, killing and support of a selection of the right and rich dictatorships. That doesn't mean we are "anti-some-american-race" just as little as being negative to the aggression of the Israeli government means that we are anti semitic.
Dude, how many employees of CIA, or so called ex-cia employees, or
'friends' contractors of CIA work for CNN/Fox?
Their attitude is, "we studied years in yale and cambridge, we are above the dude who works at Burger King, we know all and are ELITE"
Say it with me, GOVt is the modern MAFIA
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Shouldn't that be the US attacks sovereign nations when its economic interests are threatened? In the context of direct military intervention when was the last time the United States was attacked by another sovereign nation?
and I hope it's not me. Whenever I've been abroad, I've always been treated well by the natives (even when I don't speak the language), whether I'm in urban areas or in rural areas (although in rural areas, it's definitely a good idea to speak the language). Rarely do I see behavior from my fellow Americans that make me cringe (it happens, but is more the exception than the rule), and similarly rare is behavior from tourists from other countries that is cringe-worthy. We get a fair number of tourists here in Charlottesville (home of Monticello and Jefferson's University), and I can't think of a single instance when those tourists have acted obnoxious.
Maybe it just takes more to make me cringe. (German tourists are a species unto themselves?!? I've known a few German tourists and honestly have no idea what you're talking about. Of course, I've been known to have a German bias.)
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
No, it only show that laws are not the only thing taken into account. Go take a logic course.
sudo ergo sum
"Per-capita" spending is meaningless to the people who are in need to help. The starving kids and people who receive the aid don't care how the aid breaks down by the country's per-capita giving.
In other words, the US is so fucking rich, it can afford to help the most while giving the least per capita. God bless America, we have it so good. Don't be so jealous.
SWIFT was not legal in EU *and* US jurisdictions. Over here, we take our privacy rights more seriously, and this is why, for example, for example the Belgian Data Privacy Commission and the Swiss Federal Data Protection Commissioner have denounced the scheme. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/17/swiss_swif t_transfers_illegal/
Oh, and by the way, the July 2005 bombings were carried out with only £3000. And Muslim terrorists use the hawala system to move money around without alerting banks, so its effectiveness is moot. Please tell me of a case where this data helped to catch a terrorist. Oh no! Wait, you can't tell me, because it's not just the detainees and the charges but the evidence that's secret.
The scheme certainly was secret, though, even from those government departments whose remit is cross-border data transfer.
Tom
Probably not, but if it's against censorship, I guess it has to be "leftist propaganda".
At least if you watch and learn from the Bush administration...
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Ahh yes, I remember that statistic. It was based on per capita giving by governments. Americans have a long history of charitable donations given privately to non-governmental charitable agencies.
This tradition wasn't counted in the per capita donations. Case in point:
The actress Sandra Bullock. After the 9/11 attack she wrote a check out for $1 million and gave it to one of the foundations set up to help.
After the 2004 tsunami, she did it again. What made her a class act was the fact she didn't publicize it. The information on her donations was released by others, and as far as I know she hasn't said word one about it.
She put her money where her mouth was. Of course, since she isn't a government, her donations don't count in the statistics.
That dork Leonardo DiCaprio found out about the second donation and wrote out a check for the tsunami relief as well. Of course he was blowing his own horn all over the place trying to show what a great person he is.
However, he did donate to the relief funds, and again it wasn't counted.
Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are setting up foundations and endowing them with billions of dollars. Regardless of what you think of them and the reasons they are doing it, they are giving away their money. Again it won't be counted in the per capita stats.
I also donate what I can to private organizations. I like to know that most of what I'm giving will go to those who need it and not to some fat cat UN bureaucrat slurping at the public trough.
I would also remind you that some of the first responders in 2004 was a U.S. navy battle group on it's way to the gulf. Would you care to hazard a guess on what that cost? Helicopters, pilots, maintenance crews, medical personal, engineers, etc aren't cheap.
just my $0.02
Tied with Botswana, Tonga, and Croatia! Alriiiiiiiiiight!!!
"The US State Department is VERY aggressive at making sure..."
"Its an ugly system, but living so close the the US (and being so similar) its necessary to give some market niches breathing room."
Chicken, meet egg.
"Its not that US is better or France is better, its that France does things differently and that's okay too."
Uh, not according to the French, who want to suppress everything from the US.
I have a decent job, and good health care where the employer pays 75%. Just because they take that 25% directly out of my paycheck doesn't mean that I don't pay for it.
The fact is that health costs in the US are outrageous. The Canadian government pays less per person on Health Care than does the US government. Something is seriously wrong with the system here.
I also think that not having Universal health care stifles free enterprise.
I think entrepreneurs and small businesses are what keep the economy going.
I would like to start my own business, but my one biggest concern it the cost of health care.
In Canada, I don't have that concern.
"I heard this story about an American who visited once
I have travelled to 25 countries round the world, to USA many times, spanning four continents. I many many cases I have seen people treat Americans obsequiously, in a transparently patronising manner, because of their wealth, and yet the moment the American is gone the hatred is clear. In one country, I was with a group of tourists, with an American party, and only once I said I was English not American did the non-Americans even acknowledge my existence. I have noticed Canadians explain the same and seen an instant change of attitude.
If you're American, and offended, don't be - just remind yourself that yours is NOT the only way of life, and that the people who represent you both formally and informally on the world's stage do NOT give a very good impression, and that maybe it's about time you made your gov't accountable to the people, and put a stop to the corruption and crap dished out. Even Condy Rice admitted that the USA's stance on Iraq has been a disaster.
Theo van Gogh was also offered police protection.
sudo ergo sum
Honestly, why would the US *not* be dropping in the ratings? This administration has truly increased government secrecy. And I don't think they would deny that, either, they are proud of it, because they sincerely believe that handing more power to the executive will provide the highest security.
You're right. America's culture just isn't up to par with the rest of the world.
Erm. I think you need to go back to math class. What you were trying to say was:
In other words, the US is so fucking populous, it can afford to help the most while giving the least per capita
Or maybe you need to go back to Latin class ? "per capita" literally means "per head", aka "relative to the number of people". Not relative to the GDP or some other money-related indicator.
Oh well. Thanks for serving as an example for typical negative American stereotypes.
No, European gov'ts are also crap, and we have also had much of the liberty-stealing rules foisted on us too - but often because the USA has pushed them into it to protect their business interest.
US television programs dominate programming because the programs are cheap to buy... just as cheap cartoons dominate children's TV. That's why I don't have a TV! Oh, and for any people in the UK who are getting smug, the BBC is noticeably biassed and quality of reporting is quite poor these days - but that might be because they (and they admit this in their own reports) have a real dearth of reporters with scientific backgrounds - they're all graduates with art and other soft subjects.
We're also getting just as fat and unhealthy. Gun crime and drug-related is rising. So, we have nothing to be proud of - but so far we can say at least we aren't (yet) as bad as the USA.
As far as I could read it, only the indirect results of law were taken into account, not the laws itself.
The difference is that a country may have very strict laws which aren't really enforced or, as in the case of the USA, have seemingly free laws which are then abused and taken to extremes to stop press.
It may seem like a subtle difference, but as is evident in the list, it is in fact a very big difference.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Wow. Where's Bin Ladens head on a pike displayed on the White House lawn ? I don't see it. I did see him featured in a campaign ad, however. Wonder why this is so ?
You haven't seen the latest GOP ad, have you....using fear mongering with Bin Laden and others just to scare people into voting for "republicans" who are supposedly better at protecting the Americans from terrorists.
If they were so much better, then 9/11 wouldn't have happened in the first place, you dickhead.
Really!
Boy! Is 'Bin bin'' hiding in Mexico then?
Just look at what Ed Bernays did with his "Middle American News Bureau" when he :-=
... especially today.
2 379575.html
faked all the phony news reports about Guatemala. The Father of Spin indeed
With US-Opinion that accessible to the elites, I must saz America has indeed the
freest press in the world...
FYI:
http://gsn.civiblog.org/blog/_archives/2006/10/2/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/new s/news.html?in_article_id=411846&in_page_id=1770
rather telling...
I think most of the larger news orgs are controlled, one way or the other, even if they give the illusion of being less than biased or more biased or whatever. I say as a default they all are, you just have to figure out which way and when and why..making it sporting I guess.....
The real importance of the censorship debate is how and when and why articles are massaged for propoganda purposes, and when important news stories are minimized or ridiculed. For example, I would say the bulk of the large news orgs are all covering up the 9-11 and 7-7 attacks, because the overwhelming evidence so far points to a rather large amount of governmental inside knowledge and involvement. both those attacks had wargame "drills" being run simultaneously with the attacks, following the same guidlines setup in the drills. This is a coincidence??? I doubt it... WTC building 7 fell from very little damage and minimal fires, and is almost completely ignored in the 9-11 commission whitewash report-yet none of the major news orgs-including the BBC-covered that little gem much. The sin of ommission is just as much censorship if the *critically important* news serves to educate the public.
The BBC is just as bad in this regard going way back. They also went along with the UK government being inside the IRA (having actively working agents who participated in assassinations and bomb making for instance) and keeping that quiet for years, and it is only relatively recently that any of that knowledge came out. They are tools of the monied establishment, never forget that. Propoganda works.
To which democracy do you refer?
I agree the US can go a long way to improve its image, but to suggest that we have some kind of global democracy voting on a country's approval, comes across as obtuse.
An important change for education.
I agree. Let's talk about the actual per-capita. That would include charitable giving, chum. Per-capita is not just governmental aid. We still come out well.
Most of your 'points' have been answered by others, I'll just pick numbers 8 to 10 to show how silly your post is..
8. The US supports freer countries, such as Israel, which are free enough to produce wealth and actually offer value for trade, as opposed to dictatorships like the Palestinian authority, which demand unconditional obedience at gunpoint from their own people, and produce nothing.
Israel produces wealth? Lets see how long their economy survives without help from the USA, shall we? At the very least they do not create enough wealth to keep their own country running.
Also, you may not like the outcome, but the Palestinians had elections which are generally considered to have been open and fair. If you have proof that they were not you have some reason to claim what you did, but so far such proof is non existant.
Last but not least, 'forced at gunpoint'.. if you really believe that then I'd say.. pot, meet kettle. (and no, it is not forced at gunpoint in the USA, it is forced by threat of infinite detention without right on due process').
9. The US defends itself when attacked, sometimes even against regimes that use their own people as human shields, such as by putting a biological weapons lab in a hospital, or a weapons cache in a school.
Which attack were you talking about? When did Iraq actually attack the USA?
10. The US people support the US, and the ideas -- life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness -- that make it possible. (However, they do support it more or less on an emotional level, whereas American intellectuals actively oppose it.)
First of all, you are forgetting one of the most important 'ideas'.. equality of all people for as far as the law and state are concerned.
But lets see about the rest...
Life: Obviously the idea of 'life' depends on nationality, non citizens definitely have less of a right on it...
Liberty: You mean like infinite detention without right to due process?
Pursuit of happiness: see previous two points.
Acting to support those things would be a lot more helpfull in getting your point across, but for now it is words with actions opposing what you are claiming. Don't be surprised when others don't believe you.
You also seem to have a major issue with 'intellectuals', but then, you respond emotionally, and it has been known for a long time that a very succesfull way of controlling the people is to "make them feel so they don't think". If you weren't arguing that you hate actual thinking, then maybe you need to revise your opinion on intellectuals, they are usually the people who think about stuff, and they obviously do a much better job at it then you. But then, I assume you also don't believe in this idea of defending someone's right on free speech even when disagreeing with that person eh?
Fallout from the row over the "Mohammed cartoons" Denmark (19th) dropped from joint first place because of serious threats against the authors of the Mohammed cartoons published there in autumn 2005. For the first time in recent years in a country that is very observant of civil liberties, journalists had to have police protection due to threats against them because of their work.
So a country can slip for things that the government of the country isn't responsible for or don't even happen in the country? I seem to recall that a number of the threats were from non-Denmark citizens as well.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
What idiot modded this one Insightful? Does Noam Chomsky have a slashdot ID now? Murdered more humans than anyone in history? What about a certain Georgian (and I don't mean Jimmy Carter) megalomaniac and his Austrian counterpart? Or a pair of Asians named Tojo and Mao? Idi Amin? Pol Pot? The US has done its share of killing but compared to all of recorded history, it's not even in the major leagues.
The other points aren't QUITE as stupid, but that's only because the first one sets such a monumentally high bar.
I'm not an expert on the Koran but I think you might just be talking out of your arse. I am fairly sure the Koran actually teaches that violence should not under any circumstances be commited against civilians. Nontheless I think most religeons teach that if you don't believe you're gonna get smoten or struck by lightning or have a shitty time in general. Its the fundamental dogma thats gotten people to believe for centuries.
The government is allowed to kill you.
"The US State Department is VERY aggressive at making sure..." "Its an ugly system, but living so close the the US (and being so similar) its necessary to give some market niches breathing room."
Chicken, meet egg.
NO. The difference is that many countries are trying to preserve elements of their own culture. The US is using diplomacy and trade to EXTEND their own culture. I have no problems with numerous film/music/tv imports coming into the US and failing miserably -- survival of the fittest. Hollywood has alot of money, and also attracts alot of foreign talent; I don't have a problem with that eiter. What I have problems with the US dictacting to other countries how they should regulate their media, based on their own commercial interests. We're not talking even talking about tariffs on US media; the US invokes various levels of trade sanctions if a country subsidizes their own arts & culture. THIS is ridiculous.
Given nipple-gate, the FCC, and reality TV, the US has no moral authority to dictate cultural expression abroad!
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
It is a difference to make fun of someone or saying something, like some Europeans sometimes do to the USA. Any decent person (american) should be able to take such things without being upset. If you get upset then you have bad self-confidence and may think that your way perhaps really is wrong.
On the other hand, USA are not just making fun or say things, they actually threat and interfere outside of their borders, sometimes with and sometimes without the willing of the country.
So, the "federal" Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS) program is providing universal health coverage to all American students?
You might want to actually learn something about the universal health care in countries to which you've never travelled before you proclaim your system to be so infinitely better. Listening to "conservative" pundits complain about a system that works pretty damn well won't teach you anything real about it.
There are approximately 46 million Americans without health care coverage (16%), why do they not have coverage? Is it because they're lazy or illegal immigrants? Well the National Coalition on Healthcare has this to say:
* Millions of workers don't have the opportunity to get coverage. A third of firms in the U.S. did not offer coverage in 2004 (2).
* Nearly two-fifths (38 percent) of all workers are employed in smaller businesses, where less than two-thirds of firms now offer health benefits to their employees. (4)It is estimated that 266,000 companies dropped their health coverage between 2000-2005 and 90 percent of those firms have less than 25 employees.
* Rapidly rising health insurance premiums is the main reason cited by all small firms for not offering coverage. Health insurance premiums are rising at extraordinary rates. Over the past five years the average annual increase in inflation has been 2.5 percent while health insurance premiums for small firms have escalated an average of 15 percent annually (2).
* Even if employees are offered coverage on the job, they can't always afford their portion of the premium. Employee spending for health insurance coverage (employee's share of family coverage) has increased 143 percent between 2000 and 2005. (5)
* Losing a job, or quitting voluntarily, can mean losing affordable coverage - not only for the worker but also for their entire family. Only seven (7) percent of the unemployed can afford to pay for COBRA health insurance - the continuation of group coverage offered by their former employers. Premiums for this coverage average almost $700 a month for family coverage and $250 for individual coverage, a very high price given the average $1,100 monthly unemployment check (6).
* Coverage is unstable during life's transitions. A person's link to employer-sponsored coverage can also be cut by a change from full-time to part-time work, or self-employment, retirement or divorce (7).
* About 58 percent of uninsured adults report having changed or lost jobs in 2003. "Job lock" keeps others in positions they might have left if not for fear of losing coverage. Job mobility of husbands is 25 percent to 32 percent lower when their wives do not have employment-based health insurance (7).
Funny, I don't see "ignorance of the available opportunities", "illegally resident in the country", or "couldn't be bothered to apply for it" listed there.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
11. "I heard this story about an American who visited once and was rude and didn't differ to our local customs. We don't pretend to like their local customs in America, but they should pretend to like ours."
I have lived in the USA, and did not like the local customs. I do however respect them and make sure that I do not insult people over them. Your country, your rules.
What GP was asking for is respect, not agreement.
12. "Someone told me there are poor Americans. They didn't tell me that even poor Americans live relatively well compared to the worldwide average or the US historical average."
Go read the CIA world fact book, it will tell you that you are in fact wrong.
13. "I get my info from watching bad TV shows. Americans are exactly like those people on TV."
If you export your culture (ie, TV, movies etc), don't be surprised that others judge your culture by what you export. Are they wrong in believing it represents US society? Definitely. It would help to stop giving such an absurd picture of yourself if you don't like this however.
14. "America defends itself when attacked"
When and where did Iraq attack the USA?
15. "I read too many left-wing web-sites like Slashdot and I actually believe all the anti-corporate BS from 17-year-old complainers who post there."
It is a better idea to start watching, listening to, and reading fox news, because they are simply the best and completely without bias.
When you want to know why people respond as they do, you should start with what effect your actions have on those people.
It's one thing for locals to complain amongst themselves about outsiders. It's another thing entirely when everyone in the restaurant, town center or plaza can tell that, invariably, the load, obnoxious tourists are Americans.
SWIFT was not legal in EU *and* US jurisdictions. Over here, we take our privacy rights more seriously, and this is why, for example, for example the Belgian Data Privacy Commission and the Swiss Federal Data Protection Commissioner have denounced the scheme. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/17/swiss_swif t_transfers_illegal/ Oh, and by the way, the July 2005 bombings were carried out with only £3000. And Muslim terrorists use the hawala system to move money around without alerting banks, so its effectiveness is moot. Please tell me of a case where this data helped to catch a terrorist. Oh no! Wait, you can't tell me, because it's not just the detainees and the charges but the evidence that's secret. The scheme certainly was secret, though, even from those government departments whose remit is cross-border data transfer. Tom
It's not because it ruffles some feathers that it isn't true that the US knowingly trampled on EU laws. And it won't be soon forgiven.
This answers all your questions:n s/browse_thread/thread/a466622fd192c7b1/1f3ec1ae30 9f0690#1f3ec1ae309f0690
http://groups.google.co.uk/group/talk.politics.gu
If our elders could go more then 50 years without initiating a devastating world war, ruining tens of millions of lives, we might take them more seriously. ;)
*Sarcasm*
Now here comes the partisan bickering....
[Posting openly]
Documentation (and I mean real documentation).
And post it openly, not anonymously.
We (the United States) are certainly not perfect, but stack up our accomplishments and charity against anyone!
Look Out Above!
Parent is right.
Judging from the comments, there seems to be some kind of prevalent idea in the US that being free press means beeing biased towards the liberals/democrats/whatever-you-call-them. I'm wondering if there will ever be a moment of "D'oh, how could we be so stupid" in the US? Why are you seeking political bias in everything?
mod parent up.
In other words, you'd prefer that everyone else use a method that makes you look better.
Per capita is the best method to use, a country of 1 million can hardly be expected to give as much in absolutely terms as a country of 100 million. However, it would perfectly fair to expect 100 countries of 1 million to give as much as 1 country of 100 million. Hence, why the figures are always compared per capita.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
There is no such right. Nobody has any inherent right to be able to speak publically but anonymously, thus not taking responsibility for their words, through a third party. Having said that, I can see a governmental interest to protect or reward such speech in certain circumstances, such as with wistleblowers. However, such protection, under our Constitution, should come from the legislature, not the Courts.
how about 10 or 20 ? http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/eco_eco_aid_don
enjoy
12. "Someone told me there are poor Americans. They didn't tell me that even poor Americans live relatively well compared to the worldwide average or the US historical average."
I think most people believed this, until Katrina hit NO. It truly shocked the world to see the mass of refugees that were too poor to find a way out of a sinking ship. The sinking ship analogy has many connotations, if you think about it. Rats and cockroaches are the last to abandon a ship they did not realize was sinking.
I realize that New Orleans is probably only second to Detroit in poverty, but it opened the eyes of many worldwide that maybe the "American Dream" (TM) is not all that it's cracked up to be.
Yes, everyone in the US is absolutely rich, and we have streets of gold and pay people to wipe our arses for us. Would that were true - the reality is, the US is not the cheapest place in the world to live. However, the per-capita card never seems to take that into account.
According to many, cost of living in the USA is cheaper then say most of north-west Europe. This is also my experience from having lived in both the USA and the EU. Despite that, per-capita spending on support for developing nations in the EU is higher then in the USA. Conclusion can only be that while your argument makes sense at first glance, reality shows it wrong.
Until the Windows/Gates/Balmer lovers feel comfortable expressing their devotion on Slashdot without fear of reprisal or ridicule, Slashdot will rank very very low.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
I actually prefer Netherland over Netherlands. We've been a unified country for over 200 years now. And Holland is only 2 of our 12 provinces, and "Dutch" is a downright medieval word.
The English language would do well to update to the 19th century at least.
I've travelled quite a bit and lived abroad for a year, and I can say that wherever I go I get along great with the locals. You know why? Because I don't have a bad attitude. I try to learn at least a few words of the local language. I take an interest in local culture. But mostly I interact with people as if we were all just, you know, people. People seem to like that. People don't like people who think they are superior.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
But why should this hurt only Denmark in the rankings? If, for example, the cartoons had been published first in the Netherlands , they would have been on the receiving end instead. I think journalists world wide learned a lesson from the cartoon incident -- they're not safe from fundamentalist islam anywhere. So, if the threat exists everywhere, it shouldn't have changed the order in the rankings.
However, as an organizing principle for the world, cultural relativism has become yet another excuse to believe without thinking. It's all good, so long as you are not the one being hurt by "different" meanings of the term "freedom" or "torture" or "following the law" (see: signing statements) or different ideas about the level of violence, repression, and mutilation which should be allowed to be inflicted by your "culture" on your daughters. Such cultural "traditions" are most often "practiced" ostensibly to support "religious beliefs" but isn't it interesting how they typically also serve to keep a tiny brutal minority in power and opulence while you suffer in this life, awaiting the next? Yes, that's right, I'm suggesting that the atheistic (scientific) notion of cultural relativism has escaped from the utility of thought experiment and runs rampant now as dogma and that among other things it has become tangled in the meme framework supporting theocratic oppression. Let's talk about that over a beer some time.
When they came for the knee-jerk libertarian computer geeks on Slashdot, there wasn't anybody left to defend you from the jack booted thugs. So sorry.
Stop accepting the dogma of cultural relativism blindly, and start thinking. It's definitely not all good.
Learn about the Founding Fathers. They warned us about compromising the democratic ideals given to us in The Constitution of the United States of America, a freely-licensed open source design pattern for democracy. Take a couple hours some evening to read and contemplate the document and the amendments, particularly the Bill of RIghts. You won't regret those hours. Consider them an investment in our common future.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
"In other words, you'd prefer that everyone else use a method that makes you look better."
I think that's the idea on your side, as well. You're assuming that there is no additional cost incrued by being a larger country. I'm sure our per-capity government overhead is higher than many others as well. This is a business management concept, but it applies to military and government, too.
No, per-capita is also not a fair assessment.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
"As always, if you criticize Israeli politics, you are antisemitic"
Not always, but quite often.
"just as little as being negative to the aggression of the Israeli government means that we are anti semitic."
Since the Israeli government has never engaged in aggression, what is your reason for lying about it? Are you one of those who was not aware that the recent big conflict was caused when Lebanon (once again) invaded Israel? Grow up and let go of your hatred of the "fiendish Jew".
Where were you when the voynix came?
and the rest of the world is your problem, that is if you want to stop them wanting to fly airplanes into your assets Oh, and it's ALL our fault that someone got a bug up their ass about the US being "Satan" and in "defending the muslim world" decide to slam planes into building killing thousands of people. I'm sure the next thing you will say is that we brought it on ourselves for not buying off the pooer countries in the world.
Cliff Claven
K.E.G. Party Chairman
Founding Leader of: Koncerned for Egalitarin Governance
it's that you refuse to see anything good about the US. No-one is perfect.
I think that that is a response to how many an American deals with any form of critisism whatsoever. If you are not perfect, thats fine, thats just human, and no different from the rest of us. The issue is that the first thing you should do when you realize that you are not perfect is to start listening to others who do see the imperfactions.
As it is however, pointing out any imperfections of the USA gets you a combination of the following:
- being dismissed as anti-american.
This is really stupid, your enemies won't point out your mistakes, they will abuse them.
- screaming and raving about the imperfection not existing.
No chance on fixing anything when you refuse to see it
- pointing at others who make similar or at times even unrelated mistakes.
A strawman argument, someone elses mistakes don't justify your own mistakes.
The problem is you feeling attacked instead of taking note and trying to improve.
BTW, on point #15 - the reason there is so much anti-corporate sentiment expressed is because most non-US (and non-British, and a few other countries) corporations really are evil like they say. I recently listened to a presentation on the pitfalls you can encounter in joint ventures in other countries, and in many countries the corporate structure really is used to keep everyone down and keep the wealthy in power.
The easiest measure of corporate structure abuse is the ratio of startups to mature companies - because mature companies represent the opressors, and startups represent the opressees.
while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
Per-capita giving doesn't mean shit. The US is one of if not the least taxed of the first world nations. Per-capita income is the amount of income the THE PEOPLE make, not the government.
And why we're on the subject...US citizens are among the most benevolent in the world. Following the Asian Tsunami tragedy, private US citizens shelled out $1.78 billion dollars for aid -- far more than any other single government donated. This is what private doners gave, not the US government. This is the way it should be done.
The government (IRS) pointing a gun at your head and saying "give me your money, we need to help some people" is not benevolence.
You need to spark up a doob and get laid, buddy.
Fortunately, instead of spreading votes around equaly to all countries (I mean really, who would want to bend to North Korea's opinion on anything!) we give votes based on previous sharing of resources or accomplishments. The system deciding the voting structure is incredibly complex, but relatively fair - we call it money...
while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
Many countries want the US to go away...until they want something from the US.
"Funny how this argument comes from Europeans, Canadians, etc. that spend all their time telling Americans that their culture is crap, their entertainment is crap, they're fat, they're stupid, they're too religious, they have too many guns, they're too prudish when it comes to sex and too liberal when it comes to violence, we need to provide universal health care, etc."
I don't see why this contradicts the charge of Americans being 'patronising and arrogant'.
You can be patronising and arrogant AND have crap culture, be fat and stupid, too religious etc.
If want an example of this, look at America.
I was not aware that the majority of the House and Senate were made up of non-citizens.
Shall we discuss the total amount given to other countries. U.S. is at the top. One other point: Why is it that the U.S. has a problem with too many trying to immigrate? If you live here, you have a better chance of success. If you live elsewhere you have less. The only people who complain are those who have less and don't want to work hard enough to have more or aren't smart enough to know how to work hard. Sorry, but that is the whole truth.
Athiesm is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
What I find far more incredible that no one says "Hey, look at Israel economically helping a group of people that continue to launch attacks on its civilians. They collect taxes for the government and have even transferred money to it. I wonder why they would do that?" You might want to ponder that before you go and claim genocide.
1. Palestinians in occupied territory pay taxes as well, but have no representation in Israel.
2. Israel as occupying power has responsibilities under international law, if they don't like those, then stop the occupation
3. Israel refuses to compensate people for very substantial losses resulting from the founding of Israel. Don't be surprised about those people being upset about this.
No, I do not agree with palestinian suicide bombers and attacks on civilians within Israel. I do however agree that the palestinians have some very good reasons for fighting against Israel, and that Israel's army, and EVERY ISRAELI in occupied territories are legitimate targets there. (please note, according to international law, civilians placed in such occupied territories are not protected because they are an instrument of occupation and thereby a military target)
And they do that before knowing anything about the Americans in question (who mostly, BTW, ain't so stupid as to not know what's going on). The term is "prejudice", and it's not the Americans who are guilty of it in your example.
So the US has been rigging such democratic vote since the '50s.
Honestly, the people who really are seeking to bury the US (read terrorists), have our number. They understand that if you fight the US to a stalemate, use our liberal press to spout out all the bad things the US is doing and show how oppressed people over there are, the US citizens will tire of the fight. American's don't like losers or stalemates. And with the Press tying the Preisdent's hands by revealing classified programs that are LEGAL(and then the terrorists adapt), all we can do is fight to a stalemate.
Cliff Claven
K.E.G. Party Chairman
Founding Leader of: Koncerned for Egalitarin Governance
"3. Israel refuses to compensate people for very substantial losses resulting from the founding of Israel. Don't be surprised about those people being upset about this."
Why should they pay war criminals for self inflicted losses? The largest "loss" was, when at the time of the founding, the allied Arab powers decided to launch a "final solution" to push Israel into the sea. Large numbers of Palestinians left their homes to clear the battlefield: thus participating in attempted genocide.
" I do however agree that the palestinians have some very good reasons for fighting against Israel"
Name ONE. First and foremost of the reasons for the Palestinians NOT to engage in aggression against Israel is that it has forced Israel to occupy the West Bank and Gaza, and has caused casualties as Israel is forced to fight back.
Where were you when the voynix came?
Without differing, can you cite any proof of this, beyond an article in the Boston Globe about the tsunami (only 5 days after it happened)?
I believe from things I've seen in the past, that as a percentage of our GDP, we're lower than most other nations... but as a percentage of income that goes to charity, we're in line with places like UK, France, etc. We just happen to currently be a more efficient nation, so GDP comparisons aren't all that fair.
Anyway, if there's some concrete evidence of this out there, I'd love to see it.... I know Turbo Tax has told me that 10-12% is what most people claim to give to the IRS. Considering the savings rate in this country, all that giving is fairly impressive.
...Let me help you cut your list down a little... ...Everyone outside of Rome hated Rome... but everyone wanted to be Rome, with their power and influence. Let's face it, most of the developed world buys our goods, absorbes our culture, and learns our language. If they were on top, we would feel the same about them.
Reason why the rest of the world hates the U.S.;
1. They are not the U.S.
I don't mean to say that what we do is right... I am simply saying that your 'reasons' are too complex. If we hated those who slaughtered innocents we would all hate the majority of Africa... for starters, and them move on to the rest of the world. No one's record is clean, not the U.S., not anyone's, but as much as you malign the U.S. record, we aren't doing that bad. The number of wars since the U.S. took a center seat in international politics, (as opposed to western European powers), are far fewer and less destructive than the centuries before under european power. (Even some of our 'wars' were a direct result of european influence; ie - Vietnam - a result of our ties to France and their sluggishness to give-up colonialism after WW2.)
Again, the U.S. in not perfect... far from it. But we are not horrible compared to the current alternatives. They want to be in power, not the U.S., and that is why they don't like the U.S.
The world is still young and stupid. Everything boils down to the bickering of children over who is in charge. Would you prefer Chavez?
"Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to govern any other" -John Ada
I'm sure a lot of people will disagree with this rating that puts the US below Tonga in freedom of the press. They will point to the unfettered access to the internet, the newspaper that is printed in their city (probably there's only one) the TV news channel that they occasionally watch, and the web pages that they skim for news. 'How could there be any restrictions on the press?' they might think. News is the access to information about things that are happening and that access is much more controlled and restricted than it used to be. In fact, 100 years ago there wasn't even any such thing as 'access' which was just expected and assumed. (No one would have even dared to tell a newspaper guy in World War I that he couldn't go somewhere.) As a result, most of the national and international news originates from a very small handful of people working for a few large media companies who are 'given' access to people and places where things are happening. We know less than we used to about what is really going on in Iraq or Haiti or Venezuela or China and instead we just get the 'official' line mixed with a lot of spin and opinion. Bloggers can write about anything they want but, unless someone gives them a tip (which the government would want to later know the identity of), they have no better access to information than you do.
Judged per capita of the U.S., the number is low. But that's stupid because the aid is not going to those people.
Judged per capita of the nations actually receiving the aid, the U.S. ranks quite a bit higher against other nations providing aid to the same capita.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Hey skip, I've got an idea: how about you read the books you're commenting on before trying to bullshit everyone on things you're "fairly sure" about?
Why should they pay war criminals for self inflicted losses? The largest "loss" was, when at the time of the founding, the allied Arab powers decided to launch a "final solution" to push Israel into the sea.
The largest loss within the official borders of Israel result from the founding of Israel. Sure, the war directly following on that helped quite a bit as well, but the problem was that when Israel was founded, they effectively controlled about 50% of their territory at best. The remainder was in Palestinian hands, and that needed a 'fix'.
Large numbers of Palestinians left their homes to clear the battlefield: thus participating in attempted genocide.
Yes, they should have stayed where they were and get killed, sounds like a better solution indeed.
Lets just try a bit of a thought experiment...
A couple hundred years ago, New York was actually Dutch territory. How about the Dutch buying half of the property there, and then declaring it independent from the USA, meanwhile confiscating th eother half of the property there? The rest of the USA would not accept this? Why the hell do people in the USA expect the palestinians to accept something similar?
Israel collects the taxes, this does not mean they then timely transfer those funds to the Palestinian Authority, most doctors and teachers in the west bank have not been paid in months. Israel may, eventually, if it feels like it, transfer that money back to the people it was taken from, however if it does it a year late the damage has alrdeay been done, kids have lost a year of school, hospitals have closed, people have died from curable injuries, etc. Israel regularly denies work/study visas to palestinians and, with the completion of the wall, will basically cordon off that region from the rest of the world. At the same time anyone wishing to permanently leave the region and settle in Jordan or Egypt can freely do so.
Isreal is not commiting genocide, it is simply attempting to make life in the west bank sufficently unbearable that most of its current occuptanst will leave. Occasional (and largely ineffective but headline-making) terroist attacks aside Israel is having great success. That these people get transfered to refugee camps and create dense pockets of poverty and desperation, people with nothing to lose, and are then used as cannon-fodder by terrorist and paramilitary groups is just one of the defects in this policy.
Finally, and to get atleast slightly on-topic, the us' continued subsidizing of the israeli forces is one of the (many) foreign-policy fuckups which cause the us to be viewed so poorly.
"Why the hell do people in the USA expect the palestinians to accept something similar?"
They should be lucky to get even that after wholeheartedly engaging in a war of extermination against the Israelis.
Where were you when the voynix came?
2.) You can't guarantee it. To guarantee it, you have to have socialist/communist theory that actually WORKS.
3.) Agreed
4.) More or less, but a valid point
5.) And everyone else would do the same to the US if they were in the same position.
6.) See #2
7.) neither here nor there
8.) Ummm... State secrets tend to be punished harshly when revealed... regardless of the right or wrong. Ask Sadam's leaders what happens if you reveal a state secret
9.) No, that's not what he said. Although, the US does take the UTMOST care not to kill civillians. Otherwise, we'd just have carpet bombed Afghanistan/Iraq in the general areas where our targets were. No missing people by just a few minutes in that case.
10.)Actually, the pledge is completely voluntary. And name another country who doen't indoctrinate it's children to it's views. Also, that indoctrination you speak of starts at home with the parents talking to their children about what is right and wrong (despite what the far-left people want... hint, they want to indoctrinate the children WITHOUT the parent's consent.)
Cliff Claven
K.E.G. Party Chairman
Founding Leader of: Koncerned for Egalitarin Governance
"Vietnam - a result of our ties to France and their sluggishness to give-up colonialism after WW2."
At the time of US involvement, the colonialism involved was entirely that of the USSR. And their effort turned out to be entirely successful.
Where were you when the voynix came?
seen any native americians lately?
I am all in favor of freedom of the press, and stand by journalists who are willing to even be jailed to protect their rights.
The grey area for me, at least, is when they are informed of something that is illegal to be told to anyone. Something classified, for example. The law says "this cannot be told to anyone", someone tells a journalist, and suddenly there are two classes of "anyone" - a journalist, and everyone else in the country. Suddenly it is alright to tell the journalist (since he/she has freedom of the press, and should not be compelled to reveal their source), but not anyone else (since they do not enjoy the same "freedoms").
Suddenly we are equating "freedom of the press" with freedoms above and beyond what normal citizens get.
I am not saying I agree or disagree with that statement, but then let me ask one more thing.
Where does "being a journalist" start? Surely someone writing a column for the New York Times is a journalist. Someone writing for The Greenville (Ky.) Ledger is, as well. Surely Drudge could be considered a journalist. What about someone who keeps a political blog? What about someone who writes about politics in their LiveJournal on occasion? Someone that posts to Slashdot?
Where does that line begin and end? If we are going to guarantee additional freedoms for "the press", we have to have a clear definition of what constitutes "the press", and I do not currently see that definition anywhere.
I do believe that we need to get to the heart of some of the problems we have had recently - this Presidential Administration needs to be a lot more forthcoming in its actions, even if it just informs the Legislative Branch more fully. It seems that, to this Administration, "oversight" is evil, and should be avoided at all costs.
- (c) 2018 Hank Zimmerman
Can someone post a copy of the linked article. It's blocked in China and I can't read it. I'm not kidding.
LS
There is a fine line between being a cultivated citizen and being someone else's crop. - A. J. Patrick Liszkie
Forgot my source: http://www.aafrc.org/press_releases/index.cfm?pg=t rustreleases/tsunamigifts.html
When you are criticising someone's country, especially their citizens (let's not forget point number 10), it helps to be a bit constructive with the criticisms. Rather than say "I hate the US because they blah, blah, blah...", say "I don't like the way the US handles this, and would rather them handle it this way". Anti-Americanism can often be hating America for hating Authority's sake. They export the culture, we get resentful of it and blame them for more than they deserve. So when you start to rant on about everything you hate about them, people shut it out. They've heard it all before, and they know that as soon as they point out anything good about their country or something bad about your's (whatever that is), they've fed the troll and all they'll get is accusations of changing subject or ignoring problems. What exactly do you expect them to do? Rise into a revolution?
One of your biggest problems is that you launched right in to criticise America without considering that not everyone shares your values. If everyone did, why are so many countries trying to keep good relations with the US? They obviously value the power that the US has, that the US has amasses with its current attitude to defense and the poor starving people in Africa. Don't forget that a significant portion of Americans support the war in Iraq. They obviously value the lives of the people potentially killed by terrorism over the lives of those who died or will die in Iraq. And don't forget that America isn't the only country that supports the war in Iraq. I don't think you can claim that "everyone hates America".
If America instantly listened to criticism, they would have to deal with every single knee-jerk reaction. They would have to deal with the consequences of other people with other viewpoints complaining about the changes. That's why the government is left in office for four years. So that people get a chance to choose someone with their values and not have to have the constant swing. Little do you seem to know, but Americans do listen to (constructive) criticisms, and they will affect how they vote.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
In Europe is freedom after press.
Sorry, I couldn't help writing this, but I fear it's turned true.
Seems irellevant to me. I'd rather be a reporter here, where I can run a story attacking the president of the country based on fabricated evidence and walk away with a pink slip rather than a country where my house will be firebombed by a bunch of people who are pissed off that a drew a cartoon.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
They should be lucky to get even that after wholeheartedly engaging in a war of extermination against the Israelis.
You are confusing cause and effect here.
The order of events:
1. Israel is founded, at the expense of territory in Palestina. Substantial parts of the territory are bought, but an about as substantial part of the territory is confiscated.
2. Neighbors of Israel try to drive it into the sea.
Since 2 came after 1, it is pretty silly to argue that it is the cause of 1
"seen any native americians lately?"
Many. Both personally, and in a general national demographic sense. Their numbers are growing. Anyone who participated in the genocide against them is very long dead. That problem is a situation with what America was, not what America is. In this, America is not unique. It is in a company with every country in the world, where the current inhabitants blissfully walk over the graves of the victims of their long-ago ancestors' crimes.
Where were you when the voynix came?
You're quite right, this doesn't make much sense at all - the Danish newspapers could only have published the cartoons in a country with excellent freedom of the press. The only way I can see this making any sense is if they're suggesting that the Danish press is now more likely to self-censure because of threats from Muslims (bless their cotton socks). Mind you, how many countries in the world had the guts to republish the cartoons? Not many.
Yes, you should. Please do. Seriously.
The atrocities and extermination attempts against the Jews in that area were going on long before the founding of Israel. Check into the Hebron pogram and the actual alliance between the pre-Israel Palestinian government and Nazi Germany. In fact, if not for the interminable harsh treatment, the Jews might not have even felt it necessary to establish some sort of "reservation" (Israel) where Jews would be free from the routine atrocities.
Where were you when the voynix came?
In my original post I explained why people hated the americans, in this more recent one I was answering someone else's posting that said I was merely posting 3rd party hearsay, so I responded with my first-hand witness.
Forget for a moment that most /. readers are above-average in many ways - IQ, education, world-knowledge. Consider the huge numbers of dumb people you know. Consider how your gov't presents itself to the world. We humans have a lot to be ashamed about.
Here's the thing: would you just hand cash over to the bum who is pan-handeling outside a liquor store, knowing full well that he's just raising cash for another bottle? Or do you set conditions for yourself (thereby imposing your conditions on the begger) before you give out aid? If you had an alcoholic family member that was constantly getting himself in trouble, would you just keep helping him ou of a jam, over and over as the years go by? Or would you set conditions before you helped? Like you say, the rest of the world IS our problem, in the same way that the alcoholic family member is, and it's perfectly all right to say that we sometimes set conditions that are way out of line, but the real reason that a lot of these third world countries continue to have problems (in spite of our most persistant efforts) is because we don't frame our arguements sensibly before we "help" them.
Thats true, i reside in a country which is not america, and i am pledging my help to you americans stuck in your represive country, if you would like to take me up on my offer see how you can make a difference for your own people on Anonet.
Yes, it is obvious you are not an expert on the Koran. There are no statements in the Koran preaching the sparing of civilians, or basically anyone other than Muslims. Basically as far as Islam goes if it's good for the religion, it's ok. Non-Muslims, according to the Koran, are not considered innocent civilians. They are "guilty" of disbelief (45:31, 83:29) - the worst crime. The Koran says that non-Muslims are against Allah (25:55); on the side of the Satan and are fighting for him (4:76-77); "evil" (16:27, 2:91, 2:99); the "wrong-doers" (2:254, 5:45); the "enemy" and "perverted" (63:4); "wicked" (80:42, 9:125); hypocrites (4:61); "unclean" (9:28). As for whether non-Muslims are civilians, the Koran is not even clear that non-Muslims are fully human. Instead, the disbelievers are the "worst of created beings" (98:6); "miscreants" (2:99, 24:55); "the worst beasts in Allah's sight" (8:55), "apes" and/or "pigs" (2:65-66, 5:58-60, 7:166), and so on. Verse 60:4 says followers of Allah will hate the disbelievers forever, unless the disbelievers come to believe in Allah only. Basically anyone who disagrees with Mohammed/Islam/Allah is deemed anti-Islam and is not considered a civilian but an enemy. However you are right about non-believers having 'a shitty time in general' as Islam teaches Muslims to wage Jihad against non-believers until they are all either 1. Converted, 2. Subjugated, humiliated, stripped of rights and taxed, or 3. Dead. This is not fundamentalism, or extremism, or radicalism. These are words from the "prophet's" mouth, supposedly received directly from Allah. If you don't believe all of it, or disagree with any of it at all you are defined as a hypocrite and are as 'guilty' as the non-believers. The people we call fundamentalists and radicals are simply the people who follow exactly what is taught, instead of conveniently ignoring it, like Christians do today re. eating meat on Fridays and working on Sunday. However, not many Muslims actually understand the contents of the Koran. The Koran is in classical arabic and prayers are done in this language, which most non-arab Muslims can't read and for the most part don't learn to! If you don't believe me (which I encourage you not to and to find out for yourself) read the Koran and the Hadith.
The US wouldn't be such a shit-hole if it didn't spend so much money on making better ways to kill people.
Concerning point 11:
I'm not American.
One of my best friend is American. We know each other for 10 years. He lives here in Brussels. He is one of the niciest guy I've ever met. Extremely open, well mannered and funny. A good man.
You can critize as much as you want their government. But these pompeous over-generalizations over 200 millions human beings are nothing but stupid xenophoby.
So what you are describing is endemic and globe-spanning racism?
I do not think puppets are allowed citizenship.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Heh. Those damn conservative pundits. I thought our token canadian coworker was just canadian, now I find out that he's not only canadian but also a conservative pundit, despite his voting record. I should get his autograph.
>>>
3000+ dead in the span of a few hours and we OVERREACTED?
Well the US certainly managed to kill way more than 3000 invading a country that had nothing to do with the Sept 11 disaster and didn't even have the WMDs the US "knew" they had.
Worse still, Bush and the other oil-hungry cowboys haven't even been held to account for killing literally tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians on a false, perhaps deliberately false, premise.
The moral of the story is this: if you act like c***s overseas then people are going to strike back at you however they can. Even if it means flying a plane into a building.
Looks to me like americans need to stop relying on other people to get their healthcare. You think I'm kidding, but think about it for a moment. I pay a little over $14 a month for healthcare with no deductable and $5 copays on EVERYTHING. The reason I pay so little is because my employer pays the other $80/ month. The trick is, I could also aford to pay $84 / month for the same coverage if it was availible to me. But at $84 / month, the best I can find is a 10% plan with a $1,000 deductable. Why can't I find better? Because there's no market for it. There aren't enough people buying individual health care to create any sort of demand for low cost individual plans. Everyone expects their employers to pay it. Just look at the report you quoted, you can see the expectation there too. Why should health care be something a business provides it's employees? Sure it's nice if they do, but the expectation that they should is just driving everyone elses costs up. And because it's the businesses financing it rather than the individuals, the companies can keep jacking their rates knowing the businesses will pay it all along.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
I don't mind striking back, but it has to stay somewhat in proportion. Assuming Bush was right about Osama being supported by the Taliban, what is the appropriate response for 3000 dead in the WTC? Invading the country and toppling their government?
Yes I think so, but that should be enough. If you turn it into a worldwide "War On Terror", you will step on a lot of people's toes who really had nothing to do with September 11th, and create a lot of new terrorists in the process.
Thus I was (despite some doubts) in favor of taking out the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. But the invasion of Iraq is an unmitigated disaster.
C - the footgun of programming languages
Whoa, whoa, whoa! Slow down with the finger pointing! I'm not American, and I'm guessing you're not either. Can we carry on a little more civilised?
Maybe slow down with your conclusions, I did respond to a very specific part of your post, and I am not the AC who posted those 'original' 10 points. Don't act as if I did, or as if I would agree with all of them please.
When you are criticising someone's country, especially their citizens (let's not forget point number 10), it helps to be a bit constructive with the criticisms. Rather than say "I hate the US because they blah, blah, blah...", say "I don't like the way the US handles this, and would rather them handle it this way".
Like.. if someone disagrees with you, I'd really prefer you considering that he might have some actual reason for disagreeing instead of assuming that he is out to destroy you?
I believe that was pretty much what I was doing in my post...
Anti-Americanism can often be hating America for hating Authority's sake. They export the culture, we get resentful of it and blame them for more than they deserve.
Speak for yourself and not for others please. I don't blame them for exporting their culture, I blame them for supporting a government that is failing to live up to their own standards, yet attacking anyone else who they can claim to not comply with those standards. And obviously I only blame those who actually do this, not every American out there.
So when you start to rant on about everything you hate about them, people shut it out.
If you take a closer look at my post (or many other posts I made about this subject) you might just see that that is not what I am doing.
They've heard it all before, and they know that as soon as they point out anything good about their country or something bad about your's (whatever that is), they've fed the troll and all they'll get is accusations of changing subject or ignoring problems.
Yes, and rightly so. When you mess up something, you need to address what you messed up, not point at entirely unrelated things you did well, or at others who mess up other things.
When we are discussing the good and bad sides of say the USA compared to other countries, then it would be a good idea to bring up such points of course, but that was not exactly the case in this discussion.
What exactly do you expect them to do? Rise into a revolution?
Vote in a more sane government maybe? No, it won't be perfect either, big deal.
You have one very important and valid point: being rude about this serves no purpose whatsoever, it is insulting and not going to convince anyone of anything. However, jumping to conclusions is about as bad as being rude, and that really does include jumping to the conclusion that everyone who disagrees is automatically an enemy.
http://www.cato.org/pubs/efw/
-dt
With an opening like that you both sound a little threatening as well as if you are trying to ridicule your opponent in lack of other valid counter arguments ("ad hominem"). I hope that is not your intention.
This argument appears to be a bit shallow. How much effort have have you put down in reaching this conclusion? If you set up a general problem solving matrix with the following four coloumns
- What is the problem?
- What is the cause?
- What can be done to solve it?
- Who should do that?
it looks to me that you only would end up with this:What is the problem? USA is hated
What is the cause? Jealousy
Are you really sure that this is all there is to the issue? I most certainly think the reality is much more complex than that with many other factors, where jealousy not necessarily plays an important role. But of course I might be wrong. Maybe the world is as simple as you describe. I would appreciate if you could educate me in what ways my current view is wrong. Being able to change one's mind from time to time is an important property (I do), so if you present some convincing arguments I might end up agreeing with you. Please try.
While there absolutely is some truth in this, it is not universally so that all people in all situations always despise the successful. I am no expert in psychology so I can not deepen under what conditions this is applicable, but this argument appears to be a faulty generalization.
PS
Useful links for arguments: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_fallacy, http://www.logicalfallacies.info/.
When you are sure of something, you probably are wrong (search for "Unskilled and Unaware of It").
I'm sorry, I completely stopped reading your post after the first point. That is patently ridiculous. You ever hear of the Nazis? Crusaders? Inquisitors? Mongols? Khmer Rouge? Roman Empire? Aztecs? Egyptians?
Mankind's violent history has gone on for millenia. While the U.S. has done a lot of bad things in the past 50 years, lets keep things in perspective here.
The last five or six years has been a increased intensity of the last 30-40. As time goes by things keep getting more upside down. Bush is a terrorist (though it's Saddam that has ravines full of 400,000 people and Bush can't get a break in the media) America is the terrorist (Though we liberated a BILLION people last century, and because of liberals owning public schools no one today remembers).
In this country the New York Times presented information about the money flow overseas, tipping off terrorist backers. Now, they say they're patriotic, they believe in America, etc.....but if they were FOR the terrorists, what would they do different? And doesn't it scream out loud when American reporters can release information tantamount to treason....several times...and they don't go to jail?
America's less free. Bullshit. I'm so sick of this relativism, this political correctness, and other fallacies I could just spit. Isn't it astounding how many people have lost just who the bad guys are...and just what bad guys do? Insane.
--- For a good time mail uce@ftc.gov
Giving aid without asking for something in return wouldn't be very Christian of us, now would it?
Many of my fellow Americans lack self-confidence in their own country, that they feel a need to whine about the Europeans criticizing our culture.
It seems to me that if someone accuses you of being fat, the best response is not to prove them right by eating a bag of oreos. But that is the response of someone with low self confidence.
You have no language of your own - that's why it's called English.
Sometimes the worst punishment of all, is for people to get what they wish for.
When is Europe going to send the bulk of the troops on UN missions? When is Europe going to develop a blue water navy? When is Europe going to start doing any of the hard jobs that nobody wants to do, but absolutely need to be done?
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Through brutal, stupid, and exploitive foreign policies - the slave trade, imperialism, covert operations, proxy wars - the U.S. and other imperial powers caused or encouraged many of the problems suffered by the rest of the world. It is just that we and those nations other make restitution.
Peace and stability is in our national economic and security interests. Many problems don't respect national borders: disease, weapons proliferation, climate change. It's thus sensible and prudent that we invest in some amount of foreign aid in support of those goals.
Unfortunately, current foreign aid policys are largely opposed to these goals.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
I think he meant Korea, but IANAHM (Hist. Major)
Sucks to be not American
Another near disaster has been averted! Thank you AC-man! Thank you!
A goal is a dream with a deadline
Do you even know who De Gaulle was?
Reason why the rest of the world hates the U.S.; 1. They are not the U.S. ...Everyone outside of Rome hated Rome... but everyone wanted to be Rome, with their power and influence. Let's face it, most of the developed world buys our goods, absorbes our culture, and learns our language. If they were on top, we would feel the same about them.
I can buy American goods, absorb your "culture", and learn "your" language without ever having to set foot in the good old US of A. And that's a fucking marvelous thing. Every time I really stop and think about all the things that are totally fucked up with the "The Greatest Nation on Earth" it just makes me more and more happy to live in a small and insignificant European country.
...The U.S.S.R. was only half... or less... of why we were involved in Vietnam. We backed the French effort to re-establish their colonial power in Vietnam directly after WW2, to the tune of millions of dollars... even though 'uncle Ho' was already in power by then, with a U.S. supportive, (though communist, it was originally pro. U.S. - Uncle Ho even quoted the U.S. constitution and declaration of independence in an effort to show the U.S. that he was supportive), stable, and largely accepted native government - which is what FDR wanted in Vietnam anyway. But, pre-WW2 Vietnam was French colonial, and they wanted it back. So to get France 'on board' with the U.N. and in agreement with European trade, (not to mention the acceptance of West Germany into a trade agreement), the U.S. and other allies allowed France to re-enter Vietnam on the caveat that they would leave in a decade. Needless to say, France had to nearly invade Vietnam to enter again, and since they didn't have the economic structure or industrial ability to wage even a small war, the U.S. supplied them with $$ and arms. There is open war between France and 'uncle Ho' by 1947. At the end of 1950 the U.S. is supporting French colonialism to the tune of $33 Million. ...our international antagonism of the U.S.S.R. (full blown cold war) didn't start until around 1948, when we realized that the soviets were not fulfilling their agreements of the Potsdam conference, (keeping occupying soldiers past removal dates), and we were supporting, as did the UK, French colonialism long before that. It started IN the Potsdam conference... when the cold war was not anticipated by US leaders. Either way you look at it, France pulled the US off 'the fence' on Vietnam... what we did after was worse... but France and European politics pulled us off the fence.
"Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to govern any other" -John Ada
And we need to translate "not revealing their sources" into what it really means. In areas where keeping silent is legal, something is not being said. A lawyer is not revealing what his client told him, a person is not forced to testify against himself, a priest doesn't violate the confessional. No lie is being said. The truth merely can't be discovered by a certain path because it would violate principles that are very important.
But a news media that can conceal their sources is a news media that can (and clearly does) broadcast their lies to tens of millions of people. It's a license not to keep silent but to lie on an enormous scale and not be held accountable by revealing a source whose credibility we can then judge. That's foul and that's precisely why the media wants this right. They want to conceal often dubious sources from us.
CBS Memogate is a good example. Thanks to a fax number printed on the alleged memos, Internet blogs were able to track down the source. Dan Rather had told us his source was "highly credible." He turned out to be someone who'd been under psychiatric care, someone with an ugly vendetta against Bush, and someone so screwed up, the Texas Democratic party didn't want to have anything to do with him. That is why "we the people" need to know these sources. We can never, never trust the news media's claims about their sources. When it suits their purposes, they lie.
We also need to get one thing very, very clear. Our freedoms, our rights, our liberties do not depend on on the mainstream press or professional journalists. Many of them lack the objectivity, the integrity and often the intelligence to give us the news fair and balanced. The more power they get with exceptions from legal responsibility, the less safe we are as citizens. They can and do distort the political process, searching after dirt on people with one point of view, while concealing the serious crimes of those whose politics are different. Justice Clarence Thomas, a black conservative, was ruthlessly pursued because of poorly supported allegations that he talked 'potty mouth' on a few occasions. Highly credible charges by a woman (and a Democrat) who ran nursing homes that Bill Clinton raped her were dismissed and got little play.
That is the press that in this country has such an inflated opinion of itself and that wants "rights" against criticism and legal accountability that are denied to the rest of us.
--Michael W. Perry, Editor of The School of Journalism by Joseph Pulitzer
Essentially yes. Money is actually a good way to make decisions if you want the most stuff possible done (you can argue that this is not ideal, of course). Basically, the people that get things done are rewarded with the ability to get more stuff done.
Of course most of the world has huge inefficiencies in the distribution of money - either they hand it out to everyone, giving the same power to people regardless of their ability to use it; or they allow consolidation of power to just a few people that are chosen by bloodline or politics, rather than ability to create stuff. That stuff gives money a bad name - but money in and of itself still works pretty well.
while (sig==sig) sig=!sig;
Not to detract from the importance of the issue of a free press - but I really don't understand what this has to do with "news for nerds". There are many venues of discussion in which this sort of conversation is apropos, but it's not what I envision slashdot being for.
ah, now you're trying to twist the subject. The people of the USA have allowed their gov't to trample over the lives of many people... and you expect them to welcome you with open arms?
You're all getting very defensive/aggressive, which is the usual state of people in denial.
Before you think you're alone in this, consider... the Dutch are not exactly loved in Indonesia. The English are hated in parts of Northern Ireland. The Red Cross is a potent and hated symbol in Arabic nations. Welcome to the club - the USA now has a history.
Reporters should report the news, not be the news. This reeks of left-wing propaganda.
Left-wing? What's that, other than a quick label to slap on something with which you don't understand or agree?
From what I've seen of the news media, it's generally propaganda, pure and simple. There's no information like disinformation, no matter which side of the partisan street it walks.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
People around the world need to realize that US Citizens and the US Government are two different things.
That's as maybe, but the same applies to a lot of US citizens who railed against the French for their criticisms of Gulf War 2 ("freedom fries", anyone?), etc. Speaking of a country (or indeed any group of people) as though everyone in it holds identical viewpoints is hardly a solely non-American trait.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
I've wondered why Americans appear obnoxious for a long time, and have recently decided it's all about their attitude to communication.
For Americans, the point of speech is to get your intended message across to the other party, while revealing as little as possible about yourself by choice of words.
One would imagine this would lead to languge becoming more terse and pointed, but strangely it has lead to sentences where the few meaningful parts are surrounded by redundant meaningless words and neologisms.
This happens because the exact meaning of the words are irrelevent to Americans, the message is all. It is not helped by the desire of Americans to talk continuously, even when they have nothing to say.
So for instance, in America a politician disscussing issues can make up convincing sounding words and terms, as long as they appear to support the message. Whether the terms mean anything or not does not matter.
It's a little like russian orthodox prayer, in the almost hypnotic way sentances will loop back on themselves:
"God the father, our God and Father and almighty, Almighty father who is God the ruler and creator of the earth, hear the prayers to the almighty god, father and almighty ruler of the heavens and earth..."
Is a little like the imaginery Americanese:
"We must win the War on terror, a war that has to be won, though at great cost... in the fight to win against terror, no cost must be considered, as this is a fight that must be won as it is a war, and I mean war, which must be against terror."
(It helps to imagine the above being spoken rather slowly, but with great conviction, by G.Bush.
All utterly meaningless, but strangely compelling to the listener.)
So an American seeking assistance (to lift an item of luggage) lets out a semi-continuous babble like this:
"Could you help me lift my bag, yeah that bag on there, ahh up onto there with the bag, yes that's lifting it, lifting that bag good onto there...."
In European cultures it's often considered quite rude to talk to someone when you have nothing further to say. As by talking you are demanding their attention and wasting it on trivialities.
It's also considered rude to ignore someone when they are talking.
Americans are happy to ignore each other after the MESSAGE or information has been communicated. They will continue to talk though, but it's just background noise after that point.
So a European person will just stare politely at Americans as they babble on. The American will consider this an invitation to try and get the MESSAGE across at greater length, as because the European is not ignoring them they assume the European has not understood them.
The European cannot ignore them as it is considered impolite, so they assume the American is being obnoxious and loud mouthed by continuing to talk.
People around the world need to realize that US Citizens and the US Government are two different things. Ideally the US Citizens should control the US Government, but realistically we don't. If you think it is so easy, then become a US Citizen or better yet a US Politician and help change it. By the way millions of US Citizens help people in other countries all the time, but without the help of our government it makes the process take longer.
Really is this a problem? Even when someone is trying to kill you doesn't mean they hate you. It just means that they see you as a threat. And even if actions of the US government are not representative of the intentions of most Citizens, we are still a threat to others because we are the ones that are paying taxes and implementing US policies. Hate is overrated as a reason to kill, more often than not people harm others out of fear based on reasonable assumptions not because of hate.
And we seem pretty satisfied when our government leaders promote the idea that the US has a representative democracy, even when most elections go uncontested. So, is it the rest of the world's confusion or our own that is the problem?
dude8151, it is very obvious you know nothing about the quran. all the verses you made reference to have particular contexts eg. war time. and were addressed to particular people. and does not represent the teaching of the quran concerning non-muslims.
the quran is actually clear about relationship between muslims and others and it is not war or fighting.
Yep once again, it's all America's fault!
Cliff Claven
K.E.G. Party Chairman
Founding Leader of: Koncerned for Egalitarin Governance
When I was in Australia, people definately brightened up and became more friendly when they found out I was Canadian, rather than American. It's a funny thing though, since most of the Americans that I would regard as arrogant idiots don't travel all that much, and those that due usually hit the usual destinations (a sunny spot or a short cruise). In Canada though, the Americans are regarded as roudy (partly because the liquor laws here are 18+ and they're under 21 so not legal at home, and thus get piss drunk), but tend to be pretty good tippers when they hit the sports bars etc.
Apparently being jailed for questioning the Holocaust is not considered an issue for press freedom.
The theory behind it being a crime to deny the Holocaust is that by doing so, you are in effect calling all Holocaust survivors liars (as it never happened, so they must be lying about what they saw/did). That would be libel or slander, a civil crime, *except* that in this case it is felt that the survivors have already been through enough, and should not have to defend themselves in court, hence it is a criminal matter, so the state can do it for them.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Chip? what chip? We do in three downs what takes them four. That makes us better.
Well, one of those is 100% realistic and the other is not... And I think you know which is which.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
A lot of people use this freedom of speech to call eachother asshats, promote racism, speak lies, misinformation and nonsense
Yes, but that's where you run into the laws that curb in. In many non-US coutries you have the hotly-debated hate-speech laws. In most including the US you have laws that protect against libel, slander and such (telling unsubstantiated lies against a person or entity), as well as laws to protect against false advertising (companies lying to the public/consumers) and purjury (lying under oath, etc).
As for calling each other asshats. I can say so in many places, but if I sat on a street corner yelling out "person X is a *#$!#$!" I would probably be arrested for something such as disturbing the peace.
So really, which speech in general is protected, there are a lot of laws that do still restrict what and how you can say such things.
The rest of the world isn't our problem though.
You think so? Wait for the consequences of this spree of violence and borrowing to come out in the wash. I think you will find that we, the Non-Americans, who make up over 90% of the population of this world, are going to be a growing problem to you.
America doesn't have the hardest workers. They're actually rather lazy, with a sense of entitlement compared to most cultures.
America doesn't have the smartest workers. Between the propaganda, the terrible education system and the Fundamentalists, they're rather provincial and stupid and going further that way as time progresses.
America owes more than they've got. Way, way more. They're the rich neighbours with a big house, no furniture and a mortgage the size of the sun. They're the ones that lord it over you till the bank comes to take their house.
America has used up their goodwill. They're not that nice nation that helps people, they're that crazy nation that goes around helping people then having a mood swing and shooting at them.
America is a land of LIES and propaganda. They're news shows are like spoof shows, and none of them care. Their leaders lie and cheat and steal and kill, and they're still respected.
Finally, and above all else, America is a land of selfishness and evil. Systematically motivated to be shortsighted, selfish and amoral so they can be easily led around like little fools.
Americas problem isn't terrorists attacking their government with a "win or die" philosophy. It's the lack of Americans doing it.
You think you've got problems now? You piss EVERYONE off. These terrorists aren't the worst, they're just a few guys. Wait till you've got a bunch of nation states rising up against you.
When WWIII hits, it will be the united world against the Fascist Americans and their cronies, and you'll all be wishing that the terrorists had won your fight for you before it was too late.
Yes, the press is the enemy. The greedy idiots in charge will save us from evil! USA USA USA
You are so silly, You don't really understand that your country is broke! You debt is sky rocketing and soon Huge Depression will come. Your country will become a poor third-world country as it should always have been. Remember you are not Europe, so you don't have any rights really, so shut up and eat it.
Well after reading all the comments about how the rankings work, it would seem you are #1 only because the thing most feared by reporters there is being eaten by a polar bear or bitten by a moose. Having a country that doesn't publish anything people threaten you over is nothing to be proud of.
I say read the press from whomever is at the bottom of the list, they must have some interesting things to say!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So yea I'd say the current state of Iraq and the minimum 44,000 or half million that wouldn't have died without the war is the US's fault.
Impartial? Not according to the BBC.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
"the only reason america is hated is cause of jealousy."
You may feel that because it is convenient to you, but it is hardly true.
To summarize, I believe in the right to bear arms, but lets do away with the fiction that legal firearms will protect us against a government that spends more than every other nation combined on defense.
I think you mean "against a government that spends over twice as much as the rest of the world combined."
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
It's possible to be biased and factual. The Economist does pretty well at doing both.
If somebody tells only one side of the story and does it *truthfully* then we're better informed after reading them.
Way too simplistic and wishfull thinking I would say. Not that I hate USA (but I do have objections about the treatment of human rights), but I prefer to live in a calm small european state. Whether the US is more successfull is a subjective thing, I have no desire to live in a more "superior" state.
Any "press ranking" list that places Bosnia and El Salvador higher than the United States, has a pretty obvious agenda that has little to do with improving freedom of the press and all to do with pushing a personal vendetta against the hated single superpower.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
1) There are riots caused by the release of some religious cartoons. The story shows Muslims negatively. Do you report on the riots and their cause?
2) Iraqis insurgents start using sniping as an efficient weapon against US troops. The story shows US troops negatively. Do you report on the sniping and their effect on US troops?
CNN answered Yes twice. Fox answered Yes and No, you can guess which order those were in.
Oh, and by the way, the SWIFT monitoring stuff was originally released by the Wall Street Journal and was not legal. Seems like it's more fashionable to bash the NYT.
Oh, and if you care to read the summary of RSF's report, you'll realize that they talk a lot about the Muhammad cartoon stuff and this is the reason why countries like Denmark and Netherland lost ground in the ranking. Yeah, that's called objectivity. Putting blame where it belongs. You should give it a try some time.
It would be nice to be sure of anything the way some people are of everything.
Nixon resigned before he was impeached (but after it became inevitable). Which is a nitpick that has nothing whatever to do with your point, but if I can't do that here, where can I?
More whining reporters. No reporter is required or forced to reveal their sources. However, that doesn't absolve them criminial investigation or other consequences. Freedom is not free. Sometimes that price is jail time.
I'm tired of reporters thinking their press pass makes them immune to the law. These are the same people chiding government officials and businesses for doing the exact same thing.
I had one person in Europe ask whether I was English. He said "You're too polite to be an American".
I didn't have the heart to tell him I'm neither, but actually a castaway from the planet where logic works.
only once I said I was English not American did the non-Americans even acknowledge my existence
This is becasue of the stereotype associated with a typical American. Basically it is as follows:
"Americans are the best hosts in the world, however they make the lousiest guests"
And it's a stereotype that persists because it is largely true. I have travelled the US extensively and can say first hand that American people treat visitors like their own families (perhaps even better). Hospitality and service is second-to-none. The food is delicious (and big....y'all have REALLY BIG FOOD in most of the US...and not very heart-healthy....but it's very tasty). People are very knowledgable about their locality and will not hesitate to offer you their assistance in making your stay an enjoyable one. Contrast this level of hospitality and service to what is offered in "friendly Canada". Service and hospitality in Canada is utter crap in comparison...service is polite and friendly but not considerate---tourists have to ask for help even if it is obvious by their appearance. People do not know their own back yards, there is no attention to detail and not the level of pride in their homeland as compared with the US. It is quite a noticeable difference in culture given that these two countries share the same language and land mass and have so much culteral cross-pollination.
The case of a US tourist in another country is the exact opposite situation. The US Tourist sees himself as an HONOURED GUEST. They expect (some would say demand) the same kind of treatment that they would give to an honoured guest back home. "Heck, we liberated your continent you should at least show your respect" some might be thinking as they travel Europe (never mind that the British Commmonwealth just kinda-sorta helped out with that liberation-of-Europe thing too). When in Canada the American Tourist gets annoyed at the lack of consideration, attention-to-detail and so on. In some parts of Europe, where offering a modicum of hospitality is seem as some great favour, it gets even worse--the American Tourist gets angry. Not only are the locals offended by the thought of having to bow down and treat the American Tourist as royalty, they are also afraid of the consequences--they don't want confrontation. Thus, the poor American Tourist is simply avoided entirely by the locals whenever possible.
Canadians aren't THAT much different culturally from the Americans, but as is the case with how each country treats its tourists, Canadians behave much differently as tourists. This is where the "quiet, polite, friendly-but-boring Canadian" stereotype comes from. As a guest, the Canadian feels grateful for being accomodated and doesn't want to put the host out. The Canadian Tourist says "sorry" for the slightest inconvenience put upon the host, and "thank you" for the slightest little favour. And to one degree or another many other cultures are the same. This is why a tourist with a Canadian flag is catered to much more warmly overseas...they are simply great guests. That above all (including current and past foreign policy) has to do with how tourists are treated.
I do agree with the parent poster here...to the American Tourists out there, remember that not everyone shares your way of live, nor wants to...and when you are a guest in another nation do try to be a GOOD guest and leave a good impression. I'd like to add to that however--TO EVERYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD: Americans may have a brash way of living but they have a level of civic pride that is sorely lacking in the rest of the world. Take your own advice, live and let live. Furthermore, visit the USA and learn what it is to have real pride in your homeland and HOW TO BE GOOD HOSTS.
If we simply learned more from one another then the world would be a much better place. After that things like foreign policy in the middle east and institutional reform in government would work themselves out much more smoothly as well.
I'd rather have the current "greedy idiots" in charge than hand the USA over to Socialism.
Although I must say, as a side note, Australians in Indonesia (esp. Bali) tend to be at least as bad. Going to a relatively conservative country and walking around bare chested (the men) or dressed like prostitutes (the women), acting like you are still in Australia, and treating the locals like servants doesn't bring about feelings of good will.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
watching American TV programs
not really. i don't watch much TV, though my favorite shows are Canadian-made (Andromedia (made in toronto) and Corner gas (made in Rolleu(SP? i usually mispell it, even though it's only a couple hundred miles from here),SK and also in Regina, SK)
listening to American music
somewhat guity, though mostly indenpendant label artists and my favorite band is british
surfing American websites
guilty. most of the sites i visit are based in the US, or the servers are anyway.
eating at American fast-food restaurants
not really. i'm trying to lose weight here. i tend to frequent family-run resteraunts when i do go out to eat. not to say i don't goto McDonalds every-so-often, but it's pretty rare.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
I think the UN should cease ALL of the HOLY sites there. Create a sections around all of them (jarusalem, dome of the rock, the holy mount, all the rest of tehm) and make an area that is under UN control. People may visit to worship. All people/cars/trucks/bags/everything is searched to guns/bombs/stuff that hurt other people. This zone is gun free and people are allowed to visit and no one is allowed to shoot/kill/maim other people in this zone. The area is under the controle of no one country/poeple and all countries/people have the right to visit it.
If this was done, no one would be owning these areas, all could do their religious things there. Everyone just needs to get over the "we have to control" the holy land. This area should be available to all who wish to visit. No matter what religion you follow.
Personally I think no one should be allowed to live in this zone, but there are some religiuos things where poeple stay for a while.
flame on
I'd like a citation or reference for the fish bone choking stat you provided. Are there other weird causes of deaths in that document?
Please don't use "umm" or "err" or "erm".
I agree there, but that doesn't mean I have to like the current bunch of greedy idiots.
He was that guy who claimed he led a french resistence in WW2 when in fact there was no such thing. He was the one who rode America bashing to the top of the country. He was the guy invading the mideast back in the 50's.
Yeah, I know a lot of De Gaulle.
how can this be considered valid by anyone who's paid attention to what type of vultures the american media has become? it's the media that is changing their position and their outlook more than anything else.
case and point: recently I had seen where a reporter claimed his ability to report a story was being "interfered" with. The "interference"? The people he wanted to interview were trying to get to a local hospital to look after their family member who was the subject of the story.
Only in the media's eyes could going to the aid of another person be looked on as "interference".
fuck them.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
mod parent up. I think that this is a very good point. IMHO the press should be required to reveal all sources to the public as well as refrain from stating opinions not directly supported by the evidence present in the article. enforcing this properly would be a major problem.
CNN never showed the Mohammed cartoons.
The DID show the sniper snuff film.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Wow....thats the first time I've been lumped in with the loony left. Somehow I'm even more insulted than most people throwing me in with the whacky right.
I'm not a "hate Bush, blame the US for all of the worlds problems" type person. I don't even have that much I dislike about Pres. Bush. I don't like the people he's chosen for various posts -- specifically his choices for AG. I disagree with picking people who think they're on a mission from god, and who try to enforce a far-right version of morality on the rest of us.
Knee-jerk reaction is the constant cries for more power for the government. As a so-called "conservative" the administration should be for LESS government, not more. I don't care about bank records, or phone calls -- they've always been able to get that information. I'm even OK with them using a court thats sworn to secrecy to get them. Knee-jerk is expanding their power to gather that information without warrants. To be blunt, the court is basically a rubber-stamp anyway, but at least it was there.
As for doing something about people dying in this country because of terrorism, is it worth giving up rights for an illusion of safety? Because thats ALL thats being accomplished, giving the masses the illusion that they're safe from the big bad terrorists. Take off your shoes before you get on the plane. No liquids on the plane. Keep everyone scared of the terrorists!
I think this argument was easier to make before we re-elected Bush in 2004. His majority victory, albeit a small one - Diebold or otherwise, shows that enough US citizens supported his actions that they too are culpable for the actions of the government.
___________
I always post cowardly during political discussions.
So, the "federal" Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS) program is providing universal health coverage to all American students?
Where did I say AHCCCS was federal idiot? God damn, read what I type instead of making these half assed assumptions. I said Medicaid was federal, and it funds every state. AHCCCS receives funding from both Medicaid and additional state revenues. Hell, who am I kidding, you probably don't even know the difference between Medicaid and Medicare, its all just one big government coverup to you. AHCCCS is the manifestation of Medicaid in Arizona. Other states have equivalents with different names.
You might want to actually learn something about the universal health care in countries to which you've never travelled before you proclaim your system to be so infinitely better. Listening to "conservative" pundits complain about a system that works pretty damn well won't teach you anything real about it.
I don't know which "conservative pundits" you are referring to because I haven't heard anything about this from any pundits. I hear this from both Canadians themselves and medical personell who have moved from Canada to here because here they earn much more money in their field and their income taxes are much lower. In fact most competent doctors who earn their degrees in Canada move to the US because there is no possibility of advancement in Canada. The same thing happens with doctors in the UK. In fact I happen to be friends with two such people who came here with the specific intent of advancing beyond a social system that was essentially holding them back.
There are approximately 46 million Americans without health care coverage (16%), why do they not have coverage? Is it because they're lazy or illegal immigrants? Well the National Coalition on Healthcare has this to say:
I don't know where those figures came from, but the data they gathered was probably intentionally misinterpreted for who knows what assanine political agenda. My parents for example just started a small business and the government even provides them with subsidized health care under a plan called Care1st. It subsidizes all small businesses with less than 50 employees in both the state of Arizona and the state of California. In Arizona this plan works under AHCCCS and Medicaid. Again, other states have varying plans that are unique for that particular state.
You know how much my health care costs the state of Arizona every month? The underwriters bill the state $450 a month for my particular plan (called Health Choice AZ.) Now in the UK somebody with equivalent coverage is going to pay roughly $650 a month in taxes just for the health care, and the care they receive won't be anywhere near the quality of care I receive, and they also have to pay for their prescription meds whereas I don't. You know who told me this? A doctor who left the UK.
Arizona is not a rich state either mind you. Our average income and GDP is very low compared to the rest of the US. And on that same token, people in the medical field earn more money than any other career in the state of AZ by far. So we aren't some one in 50 aristocratic state that can have free health care for everybody.
Now here is my question to you, how come your NCHC website doesn't mention anywhere that plans like AHCCCS even exist? I know for a fact that these plans exist in far more states than just Arizona, if not all 50 states, yet that website makes no mention of this fact anywhere.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
Why not believe both sets of numbers? The first was about economic aid to poor countries, and the second counted all volunteering and giving. Donating money to the ACLU, or to Pat Robertson, is not likely to help poorer countries, so would be counted in the second set of statistics, but not the first. Right?
The press openly disagrees with the president's policies, and this is a sign of reduced freedom of the press?
Hate to say this but its 2006, so thats more than 50 years from the last one...
Exactly. They're completely different statistics. Parent + Mod -> Up
"the quran is actually clear about relationship between muslims and others and it is not war or fighting"
Sure, the options are:
1) convert and become muslims
2) submit and pay tribute etc as dhimmis (not all qualify to be dhimmis e.g. polytheists).
3) fight
4) remain at peace until the muslims are in a strong enough position to win.
Go look it up yourself.
It is obvious that most muslims "know nothing" about the Koran either.
The ones saying the Islam is a peaceful religion and the ones that say "Submit or Die", or "God is Great! Die Infidels!" can't all be right.
Muslims should stop wasting time telling non-muslims that Islam is a peaceful religion. Talk is cheap.
They should spend time convincing the violent muslims that Islam is a peaceful religion.
But they better be careful too - because they may then be considered apostates and be killed soon after. After all are you sure you know your Koran and Hadith better than the violent ones? Maybe you are wrong about the Koran and they are right.
If someone said Buddhism/Buddha encouraged violence, people would just laugh. If someone said Islam encouraged violence, some muslim will try to prove it the next day, if not within the hour. This has happened time and time again.
So what do you expect us to believe? Your words or your actions?
I'm posting this anonymously for obvious reasons.
> Thus I was (despite some doubts) in favor of taking out the Taliban regime in Afghanistan. But the invasion of Iraq is an unmitigated disaster.
Sorry to disillusion you, but things are not going well in Afghanistan. Very good, the govt. was toppled and a new one put in. Unfortunately, that doesn't by default leave things in a stable condition; in fact things could be worse than they were before in the future.
Sure staying the course might help - but it is untenable to do so, the more soldiers die. It is unlikely to be so very long now before the British are forced to withdraw; and this is partly *because* they have put more troops in and made a huge effort. There have been a lot (as far as the UK are concerned) of British soldiers dying in Afghanistan in the last while. And other countries are having a tough time and didn't even want to put more troops in.
Pakistan is right to be worried about the Taleban just coming back in again, stronger than ever.
You can't just go around the world willy-nilly toppling governments by force just because they are awful govts, or allow a base of operations for terrorists (poor/unsupported govt. or lack of govt. allows this too). And it for sure is not Christian (look up Christian teachings on govt. and authority - or just look at Jesus' take on the Roman occupation of Israel) - which is ironic considering Bush and a particular segment of his support.
-- *~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...
I'd say the number one reason is because the rest of the world knows that we don't really care what they think of us. For those who spend the time coming up with lists like this, that must be really annoying. So go ahead, keep on hating, and we'll keep on not caring.
Similarly it is fair to say not many Christians actually understand the contents of the Bible. There's nothing in the Bible against eating meat on Fridays. It appears to be a Catholic tradition.
As for working on Sunday, if Sunday is regarded as the first day of the week (in many countries it is), then Saturday should be the rest day.
The main thing is that the 7th day be a day of rest, and that Jesus still did stuff during the sabbath - things that were regarded as work by the Jewish leaders, but obviously not by him. (My thinking: if you did something for someone you love, it is often not considered work, but don't forget Christians are supposed to love God above all else).
When did Iraq actually attack the USA?
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
Remember, there was a war and a "ceasefire" that included no-fly zones, economic sanctions, and 17 UN resolutions that were all violated. Every year since the ceasefire Iraqi military forces attacked American military forces tasked with maintaining the peace. Iraq also supported international terrorist groups including Al Qaeda, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Islamic Brotherhood. Iraq disregarded the economic sanctions and refused to honor it's disarmament agreements. It violated the ceasefire repeatedly, attacking not only American and other coalition forces, but it's own citizens repeatedly. And it still had chemical weapons and had trained Al Qaeda operatives on the use of chemical weapons.
The best defense is a good offense. It's only too bad the US can't unleash its full fury of its mighty armed forces and weaponry because it is so compassionate to their enemies.
By the same leftists count, Saddam Huessein would have killed more than half a million Iraqi civilians in the same amount of time if he had stayed in more under the sanctions regime.
In fact, according to the USA, attorneys, evidence of wrongdoing or limits on time of detainment are also non-essential.
Watch for attorney-client privilege to disappear for american citizens in the name of the war on terror very soon.
The USA has the oldest government in existance. If you count England's transition from monarchy to parliament, they'd outdo us by a few years. But the governments of France, Germany, Spain, Russia, China, Canada, and everywhere else are mere infants in comparison to the good old U. S. of A.
The many competent doctors who look after me and my family in Canada would be surprised by this quite ludicrous comment.
What was once true, is no longer so
My point is that when you take charity as a whole into account, Americans are among the most generous people in the world. If you want to say that's because they're all giving to Pat Robertson rather than a "worthwhile" charity I'd like to see some evidence of that.
Just as likely, they're British, New Zealander, or Italian tourists, and the ignorant Europeans can't tell one foreigner from another.
I do know that the Department of Homeland Security was created under completely false pretences though. Is that the kind of thing youre talking about?
"People around the world need to realize that US Citizens and the US Government are two different things." Very true. No one equates Saddham Hussein's action woth the entire population of Iraq. Maybe the world needs a meta-superpower to depose Bush and liberate the American people?
Well, the fact is that doctors and nurses have the highest migration rates of any other profession in Canada. That is, migrating from Canada to the US.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
When a publication as... how to put this nicely... oh well, can't, ALWAYS SENSATIONALISINGLY WRONG as the Daily Mail can be published and distributed widely, then you know there must be a certain freedom of press at least. The right complain the BBC is too left, the left complain its too right, it's sometimes a bit of both. It gets it wrong from time to time, but there is no systematic bias within the BBC, one look at the variety of writing styles and opinions shown on their website proves this.
Millions of Americans, including both myself and Bill Gates, do no have healthcare coverage. Why? Because we don't want to pay for insurance that costs more than the same treatment would cost if we paid cash. Many of us would even rather pay steep interest on medical bills for years rather than pay the ridiculous premiums on insurance that will be refused when we actually need it, or at the very least, cost us thousands of dollars and years of litigation to obtain the payments from the insurance companies that refuse to honor their contracts.
This is not a particularly accurate analogy. First of all, the UN partition plan never involved the confiscation of land; it only involved the governance of that land. I realise that people accuse the Israeli forces of driving out the Arabs, but based on the evidence I have seen (the public statements by Arab leaders asking civilians to leave so that the Arab armies could move in, the large number of Arabs who didn't flee and still live in Israel today) I don't believe this happened on a large scale.[1]
Secondly, the creation of a Jewish state did not remove Palestinian rule over anything. This is simply because the Palestinians have never had self-rule[2]. The Palestinian Arabs only gained power and land under UN partition plan. Yes, the plan was probably slanted towards the Jews and the Holocaust was probably the influencing factor. But the Arabs certainly had more constructive options than attempting to drive the Jews into the sea.
[1] An interesting, but somewhat tangential question. If an Arab family fled their land because of urging from their own leaders rather than any actual threat to them, do they deserve reparations? If not, how do you distinguish between people that deserve reparations and those that don't?
[2] AFAIK. My knowledge of the history of the region is not encyclopaedic.
Don't you hate meta-sigs?
I haven't traveled anywhere near as much as you have, but I have been to China a couple of times. I don't speak the language, but I didn't try to make myself understood by speaking slowly and YELLING AT THE TOP OF MY LUNGS.
:)
I just did my best and let the nice lady who is now my wife do all the talking. I was also quite willing to make a minor fool of myself when needed. Case in point. When I met my wifes family for the first time it was at a big dinner they threw for me. Of course there were no forks.
When it came time to use the chop sticks, I hesitated a bit just as everyone else made ready. I do know how to use them, but I noticed the looks in everyone's eyes.
"Let's see how the silly American uses proper eating utensils"
Being a "Typical arrogant American", I took one stick in each hand, grinned madly and drove them into a bowl of rice.
That basically broke the ice. I showed I was willing to be silly and not be an ass.
Only once was there a point that could have been a problem. One of my hosts started asking why Bush wanted to invade Iraq.
(This was just before we went in and removed that genocidal maniac and his sadistic offspring)
Being a guest in that country, I didn't want to get into debates about politics. I replied that it was a family tradition. A Bush becomes president, and then invades Iraq. This generated a few good natured chuckles and let them know I wasn't going to talk about politics, ours or Chinese.
Oh yes, the food was terrific too!
Are you sure your employer is only playing $80/month for your health care plan? Because according to one of the articles I linked above, the average cost for continuing health care for a family was $700/mo and for an individual it was over $300/mo. That indicates there should be about $206 a month missing from that equation somewhere. There are only a few possible reasons:
1) Your numbers are wrong.
2) Your employer is subsidized by the government.
3) The Health Insurance company dramatically reduces their price for employers (66%) versus individuals.
A) Could be based on government regulation
B) Could be the Insurance Companies routinely charge much more for individuals
I) Because they don't like dealing with individuals (higher cost of customer support)
II) Because individuals may have higher average health care costs than employee groups
Fanatically anti-fanatical
I'm not saying that censorship is good, or anything like that, I just strongly doubt the importance of any information their reporters report. Meaning, you can't really compare journalism from a 'developing nation' to such a larger and more influential one. There are nations that actually have IMPORTANCE that are very free in press, I'd think emphasis on those nations would make the point more clear.
Last time I checked, the only thing developing in Haiti were rafts to be used to land in Miami. Two-hundred of them running through the streets, right off their 'boats'...oh man, what a terrifying sight it was. I admit I understood and enjoyed Vice City's "KILL THE HAITIANS" mission after that, and am very glad we have freedom of violent video games. For now. :(
And yet it's not the Balinese complaining. It's some Australian liberal.
Most Americans believe that US government is FAR more generous with international aid than they really are.
Second,VAST MAJORITY of charitable giving in US if for US citizens. 9/11 funds and Katrina funds raised billions... all for us. There are not that many BIG TIME charitable organization that target overseas (Gates Foundation being one prime example of the few). And must of the percentage includes giving to the local church, which as you probably know, in US comprise a significant majority of charitable giving.
But surely any civilians that died as a result of santions would have been us punishing the Iraqi population because Saddam wouldn't play ball.
How much was done by the U.S., and how much was done by imperialist states like Britain, Spain, France, and Portugal (who basically divided up the Americas, Africa, and Asia with almost complete disregard for the civilizations which already existed there).
The U.S. has interfered in world affairs quite a bit since WWI, but I think putting them in the same category as those who spread "western civilization" throughout the globe in the 15th-19th centuries is a bit much...
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
So ANY attack is justfied in you world? I mean, c'mon, ANY nation can claim grudge against ANY other nation.
Free press is about reporting facts ...
... if a journalist can't assure his sources anonymity, some won't talk, and the press is matter of fatly gaged.
:-)
Given that anonymity encourages exaggeration, political opportunism, or outright lies this is probably not a very good argument for you to make. Consider a right that actually appears in the constitution, the right to face your accuser, it exists for this very reason.
A gross exaggeration, the press merely has to work harder without such sources. Also, the constitution does not guarantee journalists sources of information any more than it guarantees authors readers. You have the right to voice your opinion, you have the right to voice what you learn, but you do not have a guarantee to learn anything that you care to. Hey, that almost sounds like checks and balances.
Just google "Sami al-Haj"
Remember, there was a war and a "ceasefire" that included no-fly zones, economic sanctions, and 17 UN resolutions that were all violated.
You have a point there. but this does not actually constitute an attack on the USA, it does constitute an attack on allied (including USA) forces that were there, see below also.
Every year since the ceasefire Iraqi military forces attacked American military forces tasked with maintaining the peace.
Ceasefire is not the same as peace. It may be a step towards peace, but it is no more then stopping hostilities for the time being. Also, there were quite a few American military there, but they were definitely not alone. Where are all the others claiming that Iraq was attacking them?
Iraq also supported international terrorist groups including Al Qaeda, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and Islamic Brotherhood.
The USA supported Saddam for a long time because of a few reasons, one being that they did not want the USSR to have too much influence over him, the other is that he has always been strongly opposed to Islamic extremism. There have been many rumors about him supporting the groups you mention, but those come from the expectation that your enemies would support eachother, and have very little if any basis in reality.
Iraq disregarded the economic sanctions and refused to honor it's disarmament agreements.
Yes, and around 1995 would have been a nice time to deal with that. Bringing it up over a decade later however is a bit silly.
It violated the ceasefire repeatedly, attacking not only American and other coalition forces, but it's own citizens repeatedly.
Just for the record, I come from a country that contributed to those coalition forces, and some of my friends have been there.
We knew that they were attacking their own civilians, we encouraged those civilians to stand up against Saddam and then left them hanging.
And it still had chemical weapons and had trained Al Qaeda operatives on the use of chemical weapons.
So where are those weapons? despite all the 'smoking gun evidence' presented, no actual chemical weapons were found after invasion other then remains of weapons that predate the first gulf war, and those remains were in a pretty much unusable state.
Second, training Al Qaeda operatives on the use of those weapons? Disregarding the strong dislike of islamic extremists, which would have made this extremely unlikely, how to train people on the use of weapons without having those weapons?
So.. lets see, there are actually multiple valid arguments one can make to justify the Iraq invasion, but those were not used at the moments where they were relevant. Sad because it would have made a big difference in the kind of support that the USA would have gotten.
Hey I just realized that I'm not perfect. Maybe everyone else is and I should listen to them. Or maybe it's only a few manifest failures full of their self importance despite being repeatedly proven wrong who think they're perfect and want me to only listen to them.
Do you have any more specifics? I'm curious as to when are the closest dates before and after 9/11/2006 that Saddam Hussein ordered his terrorists to attack American peacekeeping patrols.
Where were you when the voynix came?
...The U.S.S.R. was only half... or less... of why we were involved in Vietnam The other half was China, the traditional colonial overload of Vietnam.
"Israel produces wealth? Lets see how long their economy survives without help from the USA, shall we? At the very least they do not create enough wealth to keep their own country running."
It's hard to devote your country to peaceful pursuits when you constantly have to fend off attacks from neighboring countries that are so ill-minded that extermination of the Israelis is a top foreign policy goal. They recently had to spend a lot of money to fend off an invasion by Lebanon a few months ago. The Palestians, in a "fair and open" election, recently affirmed that wiping out 5 million Jews was "Job One". Even "peaceful" Dubai still states it wants this.
Where were you when the voynix came?
"The U.S.S.R. was only half... or less... of why we were involved in Vietnam The other half was China, the traditional colonial overload of Vietnam."
The USSR was all of it, as they had Ho as their colonial general. Mainland China was not actually involved in Vietnam. They made their presence known a little later by instituting the Killing Fields in Cambodia.
Where were you when the voynix came?
Per capita, the USA is dead first, no matter how you slice it. By state-only donations, by federal donations, by private individual donations, by religious donations only, by corporate donations only, internal only, external only, time, money, property, and people -- each of these sectors, per capita, is responsible for more giving than any other country in the world, and that's a fact. No matter what list you post. The US government pays 22 percent of the UN budget, and 27 percent of the peacekeeping budget (as well as supplying the bulk of peacekeeping men and equipment for free) More than all of Europe and Canada combined.
I shouldn't feed the blatant troll, but oh well.
I don't hate anyone.
But I dislike Ashcroft because of the damage he did while he was working for Missouri, both at the state level and while a senator. I will never trust that man to do anything to benefit anyone other than himself. He is a hypocritical man craving power, and does't care who he steps on to do it.
I really only have one complaint about Gonzales, and that is his statements in support of removing court oversight from the "war on terror", and his attempts at trying to expand police powers through the "war on drugs", although this isn't unique to him.
The usual difference between the 'speech' term in 'hate speech' laws and such in 'freedom of speech' must be considered.
The idea in the first depends more on the speech being inciteful of violence towards some group. It depends on it being an actual threat towards some group. It's not the speech that is being limited, but the threat. It just so happens that the speech is an instant of the threat. It's like in the United States -- this is commonly brought up here on Slashdot, though usually totally misunderstood -- you cannot lawfully yell "Fire!" in a movie theatre when you know there is none. The law prohibiting you from doing that is not prohibiting the speech per se, but the mischief and damage that you are seeking to cause; its not a law limiting speech per se. It just so happens that in that case your mischief is caused by the speech. This is the same with hate speech laws. Its not your speech being limited per se, as you can actually say "All Jews must die; Hitler was great," all you want in France if its not intending to incite hate as a threat against the group and can reasonably be understood not to be doing as much; as for demonstration such as what I just did. The idea being that saying something like that in many cases poses an actual threat to that group of people, and threats are barred.
I mean, if you're saying much of Europe is limiting freedom of speech by those hate speech laws, then I would say that the United States is limiting speech by outlawing threats that come in the form of speech. You can'tlawfully say "I'm going to kill you!" when there's a reasonable expectation that you will be believed to be sincere. And that's not infringing your right to freedom of speech. But if my brother comes to my house and drinks my beer and I tell him "I'm going to kill you!" in the same intonation and anger, I probably wouldn't be prosecuted because of the relationship I have with my brother and our discourse would make it clear that that would not be a threat but merely an expression of anger, assuming I could demonstrate as much in court.
>> ...wherever I go I get along great with the locals. You know why? Because I don't have a bad attitude.
>> I try to learn at least a few words of the local language. I take an interest in local culture.
>> But mostly I interact with people as if we were all just, you know, people. People seem to like that.
BINGO. I've traveled to Europe, Asia (Japan and China), and even South America. In each case I try to learn at least a little bit of language, and use that, not minding that I might sound stupid. Nowhere have I been treated rudely, except by occasional individuals - and anyone can have an off day (or be a jerk) at times. Even in Paris, where Americans always joke about being treated snottily, I found that if I only tried to say a few words in struggling French, people smiled hugely and were more than happy to help and talk to me. Act humble, be genuine, be interested in others as much (or more) than in just yourself, and people will like you and be friendly. Act like a superior jerk, and they won't.
Actually, you wrote that there was a federal program that provided health care to all Americans. You then specified that the program you were on was AHCCCS. The conclusion that you were implying that AHCCCS was available to all American students comes directly from your sloppy writing. And despite your insistence that Medicaid provides health care to everyone, there's still 46 million Americans without health insurance. Even in Arizona, apparently, 18.7% of the population doesn't have health insurance. Oh, and here's a demographic breakdown of the people without insurance.
Furthermore, you don't seem to know the difference between "anecdotes" and "evidence". Your friends, money-driven nice-people that they may be, are going to be pretty self-selectingly biased. You would only meet nurses and/or doctors who decided to emigrate. Beyond that, you're just plain wrong. Every study I've ever seen on the issue has agreed with one fact: The U.S. pays a higher percentage (16%) of it's GDP for health care than any other country in the world. FYI the number is 9.7% in Canada. Thus, your UK doctor friend is simply wrong.
As for why they don't mention AHCCCS, I would hazard a guess that they don't mention the existence of those plans for the same reason they don't enumerate the private plans that exist, the annual budget of NASA, or the percentage of people who drive cars. It's not actually relevent.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
Or maybe it's only a few manifest failures full of their self importance despite being repeatedly proven wrong who think they're perfect and want me to only listen to them.
That is a problem in and of itself, and those people better learn they are not perfect themselves.
If you mean to apply this to many a European being critical of the USA and its foreign policies however, it would be a nice time to dig into how they deal with such situations. You may not be aware of this, but treating our own government in the same way is rather the norm here, and being critical of what our societies do? Well, in case of the society I am part of, we are indeed still dealing with the consequences of what we did during colonisation for example. We know we are not perfect, and we'd rather prefer learning from past mistakes.
Well, everyone wants the us to solve the AIDS pandemic, and that's the on FUCKING SURE WAY TO DO IT!
First of all, thanks for your serious reply, you bring up some good counter points.
This is not a particularly accurate analogy. First of all, the UN partition plan never involved the confiscation of land; it only involved the governance of that land.
That land had been part of the Ottoman empire untill it collapsed. Then it became a Brittish mandate, but when that happened, somewhere at the end of the first world war, there was a conference, where it was decided that among other things, states for Kurds, Jews and Palestinians were needed. This predates the UN by a few decades.
During their mandate, the Brits made a terrible mess in what is now Palestina, contributing substantially to todays problems by for example promising the same things to both sides and not being able to keep those promises.
The partitioning plan was an attempt to catch up with the reality that was developing on the ground, but it caught up with a reality from a few decades ago.
I realise that people accuse the Israeli forces of driving out the Arabs, but based on the evidence I have seen (the public statements by Arab leaders asking civilians to leave so that the Arab armies could move in, the large number of Arabs who didn't flee and still live in Israel today) I don't believe this happened on a large scale.[1]
There are a few issues here.
First of all, for what I understand, you are right, it was Arab leaders calling for people to leave their houses. The scale on which this happened is somewhat obvious from the scale of refugee camps inmediately afterwards.
Second, those who stayed have been treated as second class citizens, often being confronted with distrust, and having fewer rights. Quite a few of them left due to this.
Third, this in no way changes Israel's obligations under international law when looking at territories they are occupying.
The question you ask is an interesting one, should people be compensated for the loss of property when they listen to their own leaders and leave their property behind?
The counter question is: Can you confiscate the property of people who fled from what they knew to become a war zone?
The answer to the first is not entirely clear, as in, it is not clear to me to whom they can go for compensation. That they should be compensated for their losses however is beyond questioning for as far as I am concerned.
The answer to the second one however is contained in both the geneva conventions and the founding charter of the UN, to which Israel is a member, and it says that no, you cannot do that, EVER.
You can BELIEVE that I am talking out my are all you want. Or you can do like me and READ IT YOURSELF before opening your mouth to defend it again! No, it most certainly does not teach against violence. There are all of two scriptures that teach against suicide and violence compared to the MULTITUDE that speak of your rewards if you kill yourself in defense of the faith. Those are used to kill us because we are against nearly every priciple of Islam. Moderates who don't interpret it as literal are rare and mostly found in the US and other western countries. If any of you really wants to know why they try and kill us, just read the Koran, dying killing an infidel is THE way to skip judgment and go straight to Allah's garden and bring 70 people of your choosing with you, 70 virgins and such, blah blah blah. Hating us, the infidel is taught, encouraged, and rewarded, period. Its in the book. Like christians, but much crazier, their faith leads them to hate us and want to kill us. Of course, this was easy to know since in the last five years Bin Laden has issue three calls for us to convert to Islam, the standard issue procession to infidels before killing them! He is going by the book this time, and faith is driving him and his following!
It's terrifying to them that we know the rooster has been let out of the bag. You can't shove the shit back into the horse, so instead, they're going to try to ignore the smell and beat down anyone who complains about it while clogging the horse with a industrial sized buttplug.
Problem is, every time they put the sucker in they get kicked and the moment the horse gets constapated, it blows back into their face.
Actually, you wrote that there was a federal program that provided health care to all Americans.
No, I did not, I didn't even say anything close to that, here is exactly what I said:
The federal government runs a Medicaid system that assists in health care related issues.
How do you get "provides health care to all americans" out of the word "assists?"
The conclusion that you were implying that AHCCCS was available to all American students comes directly from your sloppy writing.
No, I said I am a student, and thus I have no income. How do you get "available to all American students" out of that when I specifically mentioned that I have no income? Didn't you at least think for a second that the key words are "no income?" FWIW I have yet to receive any grade less than an A on any paper that I have ever written since starting college, and I have been going to college for almost four years now. I think you are just retarded as a reader.
and despite your insistence that Medicaid provides health care to everyone, there's still 46 million Americans without health insurance. Even in Arizona, apparently, 18.7% of the population doesn't have health insurance.
I can't answer about the 46 million figure because I honestly don't know and I haven't looked at it. But I can tell you this: I've already shown you that AHCCCS covers people who can't pay for health insurance in Arizona, and even includes small businesses with less than 50 employees regardless of their income. But here is the best question: Why exactly do they not have health coverage? Whatever the answer is, being too poor can't be included into that figure. Maybe some of them just don't give a damn? Who knows. But that 18.7% figure proves my point either way, because if those 18.7% were simply unable to afford health care, they could always use AHCCCS, as it is made specifically for them.
And that said, another thing to consider is that if your income is above $50k, then depending on where you live (Arizona would count, but some place like New York wouldn't,) you make enough income that health insurance isn't terribly important for you, and you'd rather just spend as the expenses come. This would especially apply if you were self employed, and that could very well be a significant number of that 18.7%.
Furthermore, you don't seem to know the difference between "anecdotes" and "evidence".
I know the difference, but unlike you I don't have time to spend looking up websites and then individually inserting each URL into HTML code just to try to one up some person I don't even know on slashdot. But I can type very fast, therefore I'll just tell you what I know, and what I know for a fact is that people who are impoverished have plenty of health care options available in the US, which is a direct contradiction to the excerpt I was replying to. My example of AHCCCS, combined with your 18.7% figure, is proof that these numbers you are flashing around don't mean a whole lot.
The U.S. pays a higher percentage (16%) of it's GDP for health care than any other country in the world.
Interesting, but if this is true then doesn't it seem a bit unlikely that we would have the highest number of people who simply can't pay for health care at all?
As for why they don't mention AHCCCS, I would hazard a guess that they don't mention the existence of those plans for the same reason they don't enumerate the private plans that exist, the annual budget of NASA, or the percentage of people who drive cars. It's not actually relevent.
Oh come on. They are doing a study related to health care and poverty, and they don't include health care plans that are specifically setup for this category in their research? That is a very stupid and irresponsible thing for any competent researcher to do.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
Who said anything about socialists ?!
;-)
Why is everything always left or right in the USA ?
Being with the USA or against the USA ?
The Capitalists or the commies ?
Life brings a lot more diversity than just Republicans and Democrats....
We can have different views from the current "US Reperesentatives and leaders"
and still not have ill will towards them....
But don't tell anyboday else ok ? wouldn't want to get shot over here....
Gotta catch a plane back to Canada now
Cheers !
End of Line.
This was squarely on topic, addressing it more directly than perhaps you are comfortable with.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
It's all about finding better ways
Right, i've watched quite some american news programs, most prominently fox news and cnn. I saw them while i was in havana, i came down with a flu due to the over effective air conditioner so i had nothing better to do than watch american tv (Since i cannot speak/read spanish cuban tv wasn't my cup of tea so to speak)...And i got the impression that it was like a circumcised male organ. It was free, but cut :) The news reported on basically anything, as long as it was kept under 2 minutes or so. And thats a problem in itself, noone gets to elaborate fully, explain properly, problematize or explore a subject. Just "Ablabla blala freedom, bla terrorism bla, we'll be right back after these messages"....After a while it wasn't so enlightening, it felt repeating...I kept asking my gf when the real programs starts, surely these are just trailers or appetizers? But they weren't, i'd have to suffer from ADHD or some attention deficiency to keep up with reporting that severed and cut-up.
Because at the moment, third party choices don't stand a chance.
Because the loony far-left and the whacky far-right are so vocal that everyone else gets drowned out.
I agree about having different views than the current admin without having ill will towards them -- I don't have any particular fondness for them, but I don't have a gut-wrenching hatred of them either. But those like me are being outshouted by the far-left and the far-right, mostly because we refuse to play their game.
Enjoy Canada. Nice place to visit, though I'm not sure I'd want to live there -- too cold for too long, though I've heard that some places near the pacific coast aren't too bad. And unless you're in DC, that nice safe city that has no guns, you're actually not all that likely to be shot -- worry more about 80 year old drivers near farmers markets.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
You missed a few words in the first sentence. It should read: The best way to need a good defense is a good offense.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
That may be true, I don't know. But it's not really relevant except to say that Americans would probably give more to foreign aid if that were true and they knew.
Second,VAST MAJORITY of charitable giving in US if for US citizens. 9/11 funds and Katrina funds raised billions... all for us.
I don't know about "vast majority". From what I can find approximately 1.4 billion was donated to 9/11 charities and $3.1 billion to Katrina/Rita charities.
In contrast $1.78 billion (more in raw dollars than anyone else) was donated to tsunami relief, which is more than 9/11. Those stingy Americans gave more to foreigners on the other side of the globe than to the victims of what was a defining event in history. Americans also gave $78 million to Pakistani earthquake victims, which is a significant amount of money for a relatively quiet news item. What may be becoming obvious is that Americans give when they know there's a specific need. That's the main reason for what imbalance there is. Lack of awareness, not desire.
Even if Americans DID give the "vast majority" of charity domestically that makes them less generous how? Individuals giving money with no benefit to themselves to those who need is it charitable giving no matter if the needy person is in the inner city or a Mexican barrio.
And must of the percentage includes giving to the local church, which as you probably know, in US comprise a significant majority of charitable giving
What's wrong with that? Those donations are used to run shelters and soup kitchens. That's not charitable?
damiangerous wrote:
>
> Volunteering and giving as a share of GDP by country, including gifts to religious worship organizations
The second half of that sentence makes for a rather interesting caveat, don't you think? It's pretty obvious that Americans give a lot of money to its indigenous religious nuts. But whether that makes the donors suckers, theocrats, or philanthropists is up for debate.
Also, you might want to note that the CIA World Factbook numbers which you contest are about giving money to other countries, not your own country. In contrast, the numbers you quote don't seem to discriminate between money being spent to help other countries or to help American groups. The impression I get is that it's the latter.
Of course, there's also the issue of who the money given to other countries actually winds up helping, which simple statistics like this are very bad at illuminating.
It's hard to devote your country to peaceful pursuits when you constantly have to fend off attacks from neighboring countries that are so ill-minded that extermination of the Israelis is a top foreign policy goal.
Definitely, but the consequence is that they cannot produce much wealth. That they are capable of it in theory, sure.
They recently had to spend a lot of money to fend off an invasion by Lebanon a few months ago.
Opinions on that action differ.. Doesn't matter for the issue you are pointing at however. Yes, they definitely have trouble with (part of) their neighbors, and as things are, constantly live with either open war or the threat of war.
The Palestians, in a "fair and open" election, recently affirmed that wiping out 5 million Jews was "Job One". Even "peaceful" Dubai still states it wants this.
Two issues here.
First of all, Hamas has this as a stated goal, but that does not mean that the majority of palestinians voted for them because of this. Rather, Hamas does make a noticable change to their daily life by providing things like support for the poor, healthcare and education. This is a lot more then basicly anyone in charge of their territories has done for them in decades, and is the primary reason why Hamas won the elections.
Then, there are a lot of places in the middle east that want Israel gone, that is simply a matter of fact. This includes many of the supposed western friendly countries there as well indeed.
Israel found itself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Politically and socially the middle east did never recover from the decline and collapse of the Ottoman empire, and Israel is an easy way of distracting attention away from their internal problems. Solving the remaining issues in Palestina itself will not change this directly, but it will make it more difficult. This however does not mean that the issues in Palestina are not worth solving.
When having large groups of poorly educated people and adding social injustice together with oppressive and unstable governments, and you have a very nice explosive mix. Europeans who know a bit about the history of their continent may recognize some of the ingredients. Arguing that a specific religion is causing this? well, it is an often used tool in such situations, but not the cause.
They do have to reveal felons, as in classified document leakers.
The US does not have an Official Secrets Act. Leaking classified information can get you fired, but not prosecuted by itself. Spying is something different, as is outing CIA agents.
Classification is an executive branch administrative tool, not US law.
damiangerous wrote:
>
> In contrast $1.78 billion (more in raw dollars than anyone else) was donated to tsunami relief,
> which is more than 9/11. Those stingy Americans gave more to foreigners on the other side of the globe
> than to the victims of what was a defining event in history. Americans also gave $78 million to Pakistani
> earthquake victims, which is a significant amount of money for a relatively quiet news item.
Um...
Indian Ocean Tsunami: 186,983 dead
Pakistani earthquake: 74,500+ dead
9/11: 2,973 dead
Hurricane Katrina: 1,833 dead
I'm not even going to start on which victims were more destitute or more in need of help... those of third world countries (and third world-like conditions in New Orleans) or those living and working in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in Manhattan.
I wasn't referring to you specifically. But nevertheless, that's what they do. Whether it means exporting their entertainment culture, or exporting their conservative war culture, the world gets fed up. That's why so many people dislike the US. If they weren't so dominant, people wouldn't care. It doesn't matter if it's a country, a person, a religion, if it's constantly in the spotlight, there will always a culture against them.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
I apologise. I honestly thought you were the AC who posted the 10 reasons. I find that people so have such a strong opinion about things (read: they are rude) need a strong reply.
:)
Apologies accepted
I also think you misread my tone somewhat.
Maybe.
I wasn't referring to you specifically. But nevertheless, that's what they do. Whether it means exporting their entertainment culture, or exporting their conservative war culture, the world gets fed up. That's why so many people dislike the US. If they weren't so dominant, people wouldn't care. It doesn't matter if it's a country, a person, a religion, if it's constantly in the spotlight, there will always a culture against them.
In my native language (Dutch) there is a saying about high trees catching lots of wind.
Yes, being in the spotlights makes that you get talked about.
If you give lots of cause for talking good about you and little cause for talking bad, then being in the spotlights may still get an anti culture, but you give them little to prey on.
The problem in case of the USA is that their foreign policies over the last few decades at least give quite some food for bad talk, and give quite some food for an anti culture.
Accepting this because you get an anti culture anyway is not right I believe.
Minor correction they're paying $60 / paycheck or about $120 / month, so a little bit more. Even still the point remains the same. And I very highly doubt my employer is government subsidized, we're just a very large company.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
damiangerous wrote:
>
> From what I can find approximately 1.4 billion [newyorkmetro.com] was donated
> to 9/11 charities and $3.1 billion [opinionjournal.com] to Katrina/Rita charities.
>
> In contrast $1.78 billion [wikipedia.org] (more in raw dollars than anyone else) was donated
> to tsunami relief, which is more than 9/11. Those stingy Americans gave more to foreigners on
> the other side of the globe than to the victims of what was a defining event in history.
> Americans also gave $78 million to Pakistani earthquake victims, which is a significant
> amount of money for a relatively quiet news item.
Indian Ocean Tsunami: 186,983 dead
Pakistani earthquake: 74,500+ dead
9/11: 2,973 dead
Hurricane Katrina: 1,833 dead
I'm not even going to start on which victims were more destitute or more in need of help... those of third world countries (and third world-like conditions in New Orleans) or those living and working in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in Manhattan.
Forgive me if I am wrong, but don't you vote your government in?
meh
You do realize that infidels don't include Christians or Jews don't you?
Basically if you accept the Bible then you are not an infidel but instead a people of the book with the same God
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
Wow that's ignorant (not necessarily stupid, just ignorant). One fact, and one question:
Fact -- On 9/11/01, an organized multinational terrorist group attacked the World Trade Center in New York, killing thousands of Americans and citizens of other countries.
Question -- Would you use your same argument against the UK for defending itself against the IRA?
The people I voted for didn't win.
Can I bum a sig?
1. The US has started (and "encouraged") more wars and murdered more
humans in a 50 year period than anyone else before in recorded
history.
(yeah we murdered Nazis and others out to rule the world and oppress the less fortunate innocent,sorry if it saddens you)
2.The world constantly watches images of starving children whilst in
the US people are dying of over eating.
(If the rest of the world were doing more than watching,perhaps they'd rid themselves of communism,socialism and other forms of government that keep the people down and starving.emulating the successful instead of whining that everything isn't handed to your lazy ass)
3. The US boasts that it has spent billions on being able to bomb
anyone, anywhere on the planet. Meanwhile starvation, and premature
death continue to affect millions of people worldwide whose only crime
was being born where they were.
(redundant whining,see #2)
4 The US makes virtuous speeches about fairness, liberty and justice
then continues to enact policies designed to keep a third of the world
in a state of constant starvation. For example, The US purposely
stopped the supply of cheap non-brand Aids drugs to Africa just to
placate the drugs industry. As a result millions will die who could
have been saved.
(partially redundant whining see#2 for the rest of it,did you figure out why the drugs were stopped or just regurgitate some media factoid? you're nothing but a mindless tape recorder)
5. The continual support by the US of regimes that oppress their
people so that other US parties can gain an economic foothold.
(silly,vague,regurgitation sounds like democrapic "talking points")
6 The American belief that profit is all. People don't count.
(oh, I get it this is an imaginary america,like in a comic book, well,glad I live in the real america and not there.)
7. American hypocrisy. ( I feel most of us in this NG could write a
book on this one but I'll keep it short)
Virtue, honesty, truth. None of these mean anything when US economic
advantage is at stake. We have watched the US invade and murder
thousands all in the name of "regime change" or "protecting US
economic interests" in various countries. If they haven't been there
pulling the triggers you can be sure they paid for one sides (or both)
weapons.
(yeah,wanna keep them nazis and south american drug cartels in power,dumbsh*t,saddam is your daddy,no?)
There isn't a continent on this planet that the US aren't killing
people directly or indirectly. Even their own yet the US tells the
rest of the world that they cannot have weapons that kill
indiscriminately. ( the US has once again refused to stop using
cluster bombs and uranium tipped shells) and is the only country to
have used nuclear weapons and poison gases to kill thousands of
people.
(LOL,now I can see,you are just like a little kid scared of something seen on television,that is where you got your education,isn't it? Are you scared of us?
if so,don't be an enemy or a supporter of an enemy and don't support those who are,
either way if you listen to television and honestly believe anything on it is real you really aren't going to get any facts.also it really isn't importan if we kill w/cluster bombs,nukes or throw rocks, no diff,not important,use raid if we could)
8. The continual military support of Israel and it's attempted
genocide of the Palestinian people. Once again, humans die to protect
US economic advantage.
(gimme a break there is no such thing as a palestinian only the wreched refuse from the arab emerates that THEY won't support.Why the hell wouldn't we support Israel as we have from the beginning.Oh of course your poor displaced rejects never did anything to Jews.I see now,Arafat is your daddy.Economic advantage? surrrre,Israel is a big money maker,don't be a chump)
9 The insane belief that most Americans in this NG espouse that we
(the rest of the world) are jealous. That somehow we are not affected
by the murder and slau
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Given that the imposed rules of the Holy Market say that money is everything and then some, such expansion is an unsurprising development. Just please do not ask to be loved for that, nor claim it is a proof how much you are liked in the world. You can buy market share. You can't buy love.
To add a minor insult to the injury, there is no lack of better alternatives in large areas of the US itself, both of eg. smaller fast food chains and products (Jack in the Box onion rings, anyone? Or cream soda?). However, they tend to be too small to be able to expand globally. Therefore only the crappiest of the crap is being aggressively marketed and exported worldwide, unfavorably distorting the US perception in the world by the means of bulldozing over often better local products by the sheer economy of scale, ruthless marketing, and exclusive partnerships.
To give the credit where it belongs, this is not as much a problem with the US itself as with the now-transnational megacorporations originating from there.
Which particular civilian targets are we talking about here? Did I miss something on the news?
There they are a conga line of suck holes. On the conservative side of Australian politics. - Mark Latham
I really only have one complaint about Gonzales, and that is his statements in support of removing court oversight from the "war on terror", and his attempts at trying to expand police powers through the "war on drugs", although this isn't unique to him."
What I have against Gonzalez is this 50 page memo, written by Gonzalez as Counsel to the President. It is filled with legal perversions to justify torture and use of any means short of causing 'organ failure or death' as interrogation methods.
Hmmm. Lets see, attempting to remove court oversight from the 'war on terror', attempting to expand police powers, and justifying torture. This is why the thought of this man as a Supreme Court Justice is so scary. Read the memo. Its a real eye-opener.
There is nothing so powerful as an idea whose time has come.
The UK does not allow freedom of speech let alone freedom of the press. I am outraged that someone (a 14 year old girl) in the West could be arrested for the following: The teenager had not been in school the day before due to a hospital appointment and had missed the start of a project, so the teacher allocated her a group to sit with. "She said I had to sit there with five Asian pupils," said Codie yesterday. "Only one could speak English, so she had to tell that one what to do so she could explain in their language. Then she sat me with them and said 'Discuss'." According to Codie, the five - four boys and a girl - then began talking in a language she didn't understand, thought to be Urdu, so she went to speak to the teacher. "I said 'I'm not being funny, but can I change groups because I can't understand them?' But she started shouting and screaming, saying 'It's racist, you're going to get done by the police'." Codie said she went outside to calm down where another teacher found her and, after speaking to her class teacher, put her in isolation for the rest of the day. A complaint was made to a police officer based full-time at the school, and more than a week after the incident on September 26 she was taken to Swinton police station and placed under arrest. "They told me to take my laces out of my shoes and remove my jewellery, and I had my fingerprints and photograph taken," said Codie. "It was awful." After questioning on suspicion of committing a section five racial public order offence, her mother Nicola says she was placed in a bare cell for three-and-a-half hours then released without charge. I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP. This actually occured in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Island. Read the article here: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-2337062 3-details/Schoolgirl+arrested+for+refusing+to+stud y+with+non-English+pupils/article.do
Does God treat us as servants or friends? Check my homepage.
If you love freedom, and label THE GOVERNMENT as bad for doing things that are illegal and unconstitutional, you get modded up. Plus, you get the extra joy of knowing that you're not a cowardly traitor.
The fact that you can't tell the difference between America and the GOP is sad and pathetic. The fact that you can't tell the difference between someone making a joke and someone making a serious claim is sad, although tragically common. Are you really surprised when someone making a political joke gets modded up, and someone not getting that joke is modded down?
You're aware that terrorism kills fewer Americans than autoerotic asphyxiation, right? Fewer people than food poisoning. That more Americans die every year in preventible automobile accidents that were caused by someone else, than have been killed by terrorism in all of American history?
Seriously -- if you want to kill people who crashes things into our assets, you should set up a road block and put a bullet in the brain of any driver that smells of alcohol or pot, is holding a cell phone, or is older than 70.
Hell, you could protect yourself much more effectively by slipping a plastic bag over the head of anyone who comes to work with the flu, and suffocating them before they can spread their disease. The flu kills far, far more people than terrorism, and people coming to work while sick is one of the biggest vectors by which the flu spread.
that'll be because the Balinese are too polite to complain publically, and probably need the money too much.
Question -- Would you use your same argument against the UK for defending itself against the IRA?
I said the US has attacked other states when its economic interests are threatened. Now for some reason you've gone all lazy eyed and started talking about terrorism and 9/11? How exactly does that relate, but while were on the subject how exactly has the US defended itself in response to 9/11.
For the sort of thing I was referring to please see; Vietnam, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Panama for direct action then the rest of the developing world for covert subversion of elections.
As for the Northern Ireland situation, if we had tried to carpet bomb the IRA then i might have cited it as a similar example.
Based on per-capita giving, the United States is nearly first among all nations.
U.S. Giving Routinely Underestimated
The difference in individual giving between Americans and Europeans is striking:
The inadequacy of the counting of American contributions, and the various reactions to it, is further demonstrated by part of the relief assistance to the Indonesian tsunami victims. The US sent an aircraft carrier to assist. The result? Very different reactions by the survivors, the Indonesian government, and no doubt, most Europeans.
And the Europeans? I'm sure there were many converstaions like this, except most of them didn't have the American & Hindi present.
I wonder how much that aircraft carrier, the sailors and marines that worked from it, the supplies it caried, the services it performed, and the facilities provided, the helicopters that did such service, counted as a contribution? Well, it isn't really cash being paid through the UN, is it? I guess it probably doesn't count.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Yeah, I agree. I'm not christian, and I don't understand the Bible much at all (couldn't read past Genesis, too boring). The meat on friday and work on sunday were just examples of how once-common practices are being ignored in modern society by today's followers.
so when does the territory become Israel's? How many times do they have to fight off agression from the middle east and just keep letting them near their borders? even beyond that, why is it you seem to think the palestinians didn't have a choice. Many of those tax paying, unrepresented palestinians(well, now their parents) were given the option of full citizenship in Israel proper in 1948 and almost all turned it down. You reap what you sow. The Palestinians gambled that the Arab coutries would destroy Israel and take that land (notice I didnt' say take back the land, as they have no claim to it under international law).
I don't feel sorry for a gambler who loses everything in a casino. I see no reason to shed these tears on Palestinians that were gambling on something much worse happening when they had the option of full inclusion into the Israeli state.
Now what losses are you talking about again? Next time you play poker, give the loser back his money(or better yet, ask for yours), I bet someone will get a laugh out of it.
Hrrrm... abstinence seemed to do well enough for most people I know that actually did it..
But, that's not the point I was making. I said abstinence is 100% effective and should be taught, but the practical application(sorry) of relatively "safe" sex should be taught as well. I've never had a problem with teaching about healthy sexual practices, I just think we shouldn't dismiss abstinence from being taught because it's "impractical".
As a side note... I know I hit a nerve when I see my rating swing from +5 insightful to -1 troll in a few minutes.
Cliff Claven
K.E.G. Party Chairman
Founding Leader of: Koncerned for Egalitarin Governance
"But, that's not the point I was making. I said abstinence is 100% effective and should be taught"
It's certainly not 100% effective. There is a certain matter of sexual assault. When this happens, the victims' choices of abstinence aren't taken into account, are they?. There have been numerous studies done about this, and the percentage numbers vary from 10% to 25%. Here is a typical one from Texas: "More than 12 percent of Texans have been sexually assaulted."
Where were you when the voynix came?
"For the sort of thing I was referring to please see; Vietnam, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Panama for direct action then the rest of the developing world for covert subversion of elections."
You will have to come up with better examples than that. The USSR invaded the first four countries you named. It actually succeeded in taking over 3 of the first 4. The US merely helped the nationalists throw out the colonialists. Panama, the last country you named, is interesting to name in a sentence with "subversion of elections". Noriega lost the election there, but with the help of Cuba (Soviets) he held on to power. The US intervened on behalf of the election winners.
Where were you when the voynix came?
Ouch. Hadn't seen that one. Guess the guy was worse than I thought.
It's an estimation I made from the fact that the 80 mio Germans suffer 700 deaths each year from fishbone chokes. So I estimated the 300 mio U.S. americans being roughly at the same risk, thus having about 3.75 * 700 = 2625 ~ 2500 victims of the dreaded fish.
The number 700 in turn was taken from "Die Pommes-Panik" (the french fries panic), which dealt with the risk of different food types to your health. There was a food chemist quoted about bovine spongioform encephalitis (BSE, mad cow disease) who said: "Since the discovery of BSE, there were 91 reported deaths worldwide because of a new form of Creutzfeld-Jacobs' disease [the suspected human form of BSE]. There are 700 deaths each year in Germany alone from choking on fishbones."
So even though the number 2500 might be wrong for the U.S., just ask the Census Bureau for other statistics. There have to be hundreds of risks more dangerous than Terrorism. Normal flu for instance kills about 10,000 people each year in Germany.
Lately there was a study published in Great Britain, where hundreds of deaths each year were attributed to understaffing in hospitals because of money saving.
If that's true, that's pretty good, though the numbers I've seen don't support your assertions. I'm not really arguing whether the U.S. is doing a good or bad job, just arguing that per capita is the most appropriate way to measure it.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
I know the difference, but unlike you I don't have time to spend looking up websites and then individually inserting each URL into HTML code just to try to one up some person I don't even know on slashdot.
No, I think you've just already made up your mind that you are correct, and no amount of evidence to contrary will change it. I salute you as a shining example of American ignorance.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
so when does the territory become Israel's?
Depends on what territory you are talking about. That which lies within the internationally recognized borders of Israel is theirs, but none of the occupied territories will ever become theirs for as long as they are a party to things like the Geneva conventions and the UN founding charter.
How many times do they have to fight off agression from the middle east and just keep letting them near their borders?
This is why occupation of neighboring territories is in their case legitimate. This does not mean that annexation of those territories is legitimate however. Also, occupation comes with obligations.
even beyond that, why is it you seem to think the palestinians didn't have a choice. Many of those tax paying, unrepresented palestinians(well, now their parents) were given the option of full citizenship in Israel proper in 1948 and almost all turned it down. You reap what you sow. The Palestinians gambled that the Arab coutries would destroy Israel and take that land (notice I didnt' say take back the land, as they have no claim to it under international law).
And neither did Israel have a claim on that land. That it was intended to be used for the creation of a state of Israel does not change this, their declaration was unilateral, and not recognized initially.
Many of the people who decided to stay and become citizen are second class citizens, I suggest you go look in Israel today and go roam the country with some citizens of Arab origin and you will understand why I say that. Alternatively, go get yourself informed from the many sources available on the net and otherwise.
You also simply ignore the pleight of individuals involved over an extremely one-sided view of what is 'right', but forget that it is those individuals that cause much of the direct attacks on Israel now.
It was land that people were living on, and that land was taken from them. Regardless of international law, this is simply a sure way to get people upset and a very sure way of having trouble with those people for the forseeable future.
I'll ask you, if people who lived in part of your country a long time ago would return there now, start buying up as much property as they can with the intention to declare their own state, what would your response be? Just let them do it and move away yourself? Become part of it?
Before you go off on a rant about 'gamblers' I'd seriously consider such things. You have zero chance of understanding the situation, let alone of having a founded opinion, if you don't consider all sides of the issue.
I don't feel sorry for a gambler who loses everything in a casino. I see no reason to shed these tears on Palestinians that were gambling on something much worse happening when they had the option of full inclusion into the Israeli state.
Of course you don't. You never even tried to understand the other side of this issue.
I suggest you get interested in solving things instead of putting blame squarely on the party you don't like, at least if you want to have some meaningfull discussion here.
According to you, what makes someone a journalist is their willingness to tell a secret to everybody rather than keep it to themselves. Does this mean that gossips are also journalists? In fact your defintion completely nullifies the concept of a secret, since anyone who decides to give out the secret has automatic permission to do so as long as they tell everybody.
I believe, and I'm sure you agree, that it is right and proper for the citizens of a democracy to debate what should and should not be kept secret. But the need for secrets does exist; when our elected representatives decide that some activity needs to be kept secret from potential enemies what gives unelected "journalists" the right to decide it shouldn't be?
Otherwise, why don't we just forget all this election stuff and let the New York Times run the country?
The U.S. Constitution is the "Law of the Land" and applies to all U.S. citizens. No law passed by the Congress or the States can supercede the protections of the Constitution. Period. Hence a citizen's right of Habeus Corpus cannot be abrogated except in certain instances, spelled out in the Constitution.
The President does not determine who is an enemy combatant, nor does the FBI, rather a military tribunal does--as has been the case since World War II. Since the military does not have jurisdiction on U.S. soil (ever hear of non posse committatus?), the only way a U.S. citizen can be deemed an enemy combatant, without recourse to U.S. courts, is if they are captured outside the country, or on a battlefield.
Really? They seem fairly cogent to me.
The US merely helped the nationalists throw out the colonialists.
Actually in Vietnam it was the Soviets that helped the Vietnamese throw the European colonists out in the first Indochina War. They never invaded merely provided aid as you put it. So because the Communist bloc supplied aid to these countries the actual military invasion by the US, deaths of millions and displacement of tens of millions is justified? And thats just Vietnam.
As for the Panamanian elections it's also interesting why Noriega lost the elections. How could the population have voted any other way with the economic and military might of the US bearing down on them. It was basically throw Noriega out or you all starve.
Coincidently Panama still annually commemorates the invasion by the US, as the National Day of Mourning.
The Daily Mail, with their 'leaked account' of a 'secret meeting' - so secret it had been publicly streamed over the internet. Read about what actually went on if you like.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
"Actually in Vietnam it was the Soviets that helped the Vietnamese throw the European colonists out in the first Indochina War"
Nicely overlooked was that the Soviet Union was a European colonial power that took possession of North Vietnam and later South Vietnam.
"So because the Communist bloc supplied aid to these countries the actual military invasion by the US, deaths of millions and displacement of tens of millions is justified?"
The invasion and deaths of millions and the displacement by the USSR (not caused by the US, actually) was not justified. This atrocity actually excelerated once the Soviets controlled the entire place in the mid 1970s. After the US left, you had the "boat people" crisis, and many hundreds of thousands of South Vietnames killed in reprisals.
Where were you when the voynix came?
Where's censorship when it's truly needed?
Karma: Bad is the liberal way of saying this guy won't drink the kool aid here on slash dot. I wear my Karma with pride
No, I think you've just already made up your mind that you are correct, and no amount of evidence to contrary will change it. I salute you as a shining example of American ignorance.
No, I think the problem is I've proven to you that poverty stricken people here have health care options available, and your numbers couldn't prove otherwise so your only option left was to call me ignorant.
But I think the teapot is calling the kettle black here. If we really wanted to change our system in the US, we would have done so, but we aren't terribly interested in it. You just don't like the fact that America is different from everybody else, and therefore you immediately want to view us as being somehow inferior. That makes you ignorant.
Careful with names containing L slashdot.org/~AiphaWolf_HK slashdot.org/~AlphaWoif_HK slashdot.org/~AiphaWoif_HK
infidel /nfdl, -dl/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[in-fi-dl, -del] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
-noun
1. Religion.
a. a person who does not accept a particular faith, esp. Christianity.
b. (in Christian use) an unbeliever, esp. a Muslim.
c. (in Muslim use) a person who does not accept the Islamic faith; kaffir.
2. a person who has no religious faith; unbeliever.
3. (loosely) a person who disbelieves or doubts a particular theory, belief, creed, etc.; skeptic.
-adjective
4. not accepting a particular faith, esp. Christianity or Islam; heathen.
5. without religious faith.
6. due to or manifesting unbelief: infidel ideas.
7. rejecting the Christian religion while accepting no other; not believing in the Bible or any Christian divine revelation.
8. Also, infidelic /nfdlk/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[in-fi-del-ik] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation. of, pertaining to, or characteristic of unbelievers or infidels.
You do realize that the Christian god is Yahweh and the Muslim god is Allah right? So yes, my nearly every Muslims standard, every non-muslim is an infidel. Thus the reason for most of the crusades, the conversion of the unbeliever of Allah.
Please, you can't sit here and seriously argue that Islam is not a religion of extremist who hate us due to the very faith they proclaim. The very fact that Osama Bin Laden has given the standard call for us to repent and turn to Islam, the accepted prelude to Jihad (the struggle against the enemies of Allah). Give me a break, stop the silly politically correct crap and speak the truth. The war on terrorism is a duck and and the emporer is naked!
Is it me, or are claims that Iraq supported Al Qaeda necessarily followed by a blinding lack of evidence?
But it is exactly (this) anger that will not give the poor and starving one morsel of bread.
To raise just one of your points, go and find out who in 1948 told the people of Palestine to leave their homes!
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Of the two, promoting condoms is far more effective.
Because of the U.S. government's general tendencies, the Islamist firebrands have a very easy job. As for producing the terrorist leaders (you know, the ones who get others to blow themselves up instead of doing it themselves), I doubt U.S. policy has much effect on them.
"The use-mention distinction" is not "enforced here."
Some of you only look inward and don't ask the right question. That question is, "What motivates non-americans who feel bitter and angry against the United States, to want to commit suicide attacks?"
As a non american looking at the situation from the outside. the view is that american business finds a strong individual(s) in a country, makes deals with him/them, to the very significant betterment of americans, without giving two hoots about any of that countries profits trickling down to the population.
So, american companies come in, they obtain monopolies on oil energy and whatever, with no benefit being equitably shared. You could say that the non-american countries find the USA greedy.
Big business runs the government, it is government by the businesses, and not government by the people for the people, by the people.
I feel that americans should look at their standard of living and then ask, why do their trading partners not share the same one.
If you answer that question, you will answer the origin of the hatrid, jealousy and desire to destroy as a form of showing anger.
Do you think a possible reason for things not going well in Afghanistan might have something to with the US's resources being stretched in Iraq?
And? I can still generalise that most Americans voted your current government in.
meh
Condoms?
Because AIDS can be spread by methods other than sex, believe it or not.
You don't even need to be homosexual to get it.