Slashdot Mirror
Vice President Gore Writes for Slate
calibanDNS writes "Slate Magazine (owned by Microsoft) is running an article by VP and presidential hopeful Al Gore. In the article he downplays tension over the recent 'Findings of Fact' and suggests a crucial issue for voters: 'Whose finger do you want on the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE button?' He also talks about the features of Win 2K. The article has the normal Gore tone to it, but it gives us a good idea of what Gore's policy on monopolies and dealing with them is." All in all, a surprisingly decent article. Really. Sure wish we could get VP Gore to do a Slashdot interview, but every time we ask we get fobbed off on a different campaign staffer. Oh well.
"Sure wish we could get VP Gore to do a Slashdot interview, but every time we ask we get fobbed off on a different campaign staffer." And put how many sleep-deprived /.'rs to sleep? #RIT can put you know what you know where
I am, therefore you think.
Beautiful. You think he'd know that, having invented the Internet and everything. Or is it a subtle joke?
"Those who would give up essential liberty for temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety" - Benjamin Franklin,
That the guy who invented the internet thought he had to be physically present at an office to write an article, don't you think?
(Just to illustrate the kinds of questions we'd be likely to see moderated up to 5... No wonder he keeps saying no. :) )
"The wages of sin is death but so is the salary of virtue, and at least the evil get to go home early on Fridays."
I know a lot of geeks are going to hate Gore for his constant use of the term "Information Superhighway" and his more recent comments that as a United States Senator he "took the lead in creating the Internet," but whatever you politics, I urge you not to be hasty. Don't reject Gore because of his occasionally boneheaded remarks. I think he actually has a relatively good grasp of technology issues (certainly more so than Mr. Bush).
I'm sure there are a host of sound reasons not to vote for Mr. Gore, but please don't let offhand remarks be the reason. Dig in before you decide!
Paid for by the by the Tweedledee for Ratcatcher Committee. All rights reserved. Some restrictions apply. Offer void in California, Rhode Island, and the Domincan Republic...
Or his speechwriter does. Either way, that was my favourite part of the article. :) And, I'm even a George W. Bush supporter.
On the whole, it was a lot better than I expected. Perhaps Gore isn't the most technologically astute person, but he at least expresses opinions (his own or otherwise) well.
Wonder if he's studying the names of Justice Department heads around the world... :)
--------------------
I still say Bradley...
He's not a career politician, he's in it for the people, he's not juat a "jock", he's a Rhoades scholar...
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
I'm curious, but how many of your would actually say "ALT-CONTROL-DELETE"?
normal pronunciation, correct me if I'm wrong, would be "CONTROL-ALT-DELETE", wouldn't it? Don't most people, in the instances when they have to, go from left to right? And wouldn't you say it aloud the same way that you normally hit the buttons?
now try doing it the way Gore suggested.
ALT CONTROL DELETE
go on. try it with me.
sorry about that, I really wanted to see how many of you almost rebooted your computer
cannot comprehend how some can argue that hate crimes are no different from all other crimes.
Umm...well...how about...
Murder is murder?
Yes, you're still just as dead whether you're white, black, Filipino-American, Korean, gay, or straight.
Mr. Vice President, if you hadn't spent so much time inventing the Internet, you might understand this.
--
Pretend there is some witty statement here.
Rant+++
I used have a great deal of respect for VP. Gore. Before he started this campaign I was very pro-Gore (even having been pro-Gore when he ran in '88)
He may even get my vote this time, I'm not sure yet. But he has really gone down in my estimation. Between declaring his webpage "open-source," and claiming he "invented the internet." And then defending the claim with bald assertions.... I mean if he'd said "Well I was instruemental in getting the intial funding passed," that would have been fine, but saying "VP. Gore stands by his statement."
I guess what I'm trying to say is: "Hey, Al your handlers are making you look like a fool. Quit trying to be cool and be yourself... one of the most intelligent and thoughtful Democrats around. You do that, and you may actually make it to the election."
Sigh,
Rant--
RobK
Myddrin
Slate has its own thread of comments on the article that can be seen here. There are several good comments and A LOT of flames. Maybe they should impliment a moderation system over there.
~Caliban
You should ask Al Gore if he has found any good interns yet? #rit could provide some excellent secretarial skills. Most of us can type with just one hand quite skillfully
I cannot comprehend how some can argue that if someone murders me, or my wife, or my niece, in any of the same ways that Al listed (prior to the quoted line), the murderers should be treated less harshly simply because the three of us chose not to lead an openly gay lifestyle.
I don't even see why our racial heritage would enter into it, so I don't get that aspect of hate-crimes legislation either. Ditto gender, religion, etc.
We can protect minorities of all types from oppression and hate using our most valuable resources -- love, charity, respect -- all we should ask from our government's court system is fairness, which, in setting punishments, should be as blind to the things that differentiate us as possible.
Practice random senselessness and act kind of beautiful.
A friend has a keyboard that actually has a single key labeled "alt-control-delete". I wish I could find one; I understand they were made for the ubernewbie. Rumor has it that it also has an "any" key. Shouldn't there be a test or something to weed out those users out? Goodness.
The Good Reverend
What the hell is the Alt-Control-Delete button? Is that some strange euphimism for the big red button President Clinton has on his desk that he uses to nuke the Godless Ruskies? Is this a thinly veiled threat from the democrats who are planning to shutdown -r now the USA? My god, what could they be up to? Perhaps they plan on logging into America's root! Or maybe President Gore will fsck America and send all the homeless into concentration camps! The possibilites are horrifyingly endless!
spoo
Al Gore says "And to me, in a year when Matthew Shepard was crucified on a split rail fence because of his sexual orientation; when James Byrd was dragged to his death because of his skin color; and both a Filipino-American and a Korean graduate student were murdered because of the shape of their eyes--I cannot comprehend how some can argue that hate crimes are no different from all other crimes. That is why we need tougher laws to prevent and punish them."
Two of the killers of Byrd have already been given the death sentence, the third is still on trial.
The killer of Matthew Shepard avoided the death penalty because the family did not seek it, but he will still face life behind bars.
How, exactly, could "hate crime" legistlation possibly affect these crimes?
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
I suggested that one crucial issue for voters to ponder is this: Whose finger do you want on the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE button?
Is that the button I keep hitting by mistake, giving me a BSOD?
(I guess by this that Al Gore claims to have invented the keyboard, too)
Certified Microsoft Notworking Specialist
Its good to know that Al Gore is just a whore for Microsoft. Thanks for taking the side of consumers Mr. I invented the Internet.
no they were not!!! i hate you guys!
Ok.. so was there a point to his article? It appeared to me that he just rattled on. I felt like I was reading his journal about what he did for the day. There were words on the page, but there was no meaning. Did I miss something besides some PR for himself and MS?
"Where's the beef?"
"Anyone who can't laugh at himself is not taking life seriously enough." - Larry Wall
Guys, I work on Capitol Hill, and can assure you that Al Gore did NOT write the article. A staffer did. Vice-Presidents, Presidents, and Congressmen do not have time or inclination to do this, especially when they are campaigning. Everything is written and edited by staffers and looked over (sometimes) by the politician.
I can think of only a handful of exceptions to this. Nixon was the last President to write a significant number of his own speeches. Ronald Reagan was the only President to write a book while in office (It was a short book on the subject of abortion). Al Gore actually was one of the few to write a book himself while in office (the execrable Earth in the Balance), but a few of his Senate staff did most of the research. Anyway, Senators serve six-year terms, and have more time on their hands. Almost any other example I can think of was ghostwritten.
When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood.
-Tom Jones
I don't think I want Al Gores finger on the alt-control-delete button. I wonder if he knows what that means? Hey, the guys from #rit want other channels to start posting crap too. Shot out to my boys positive, geo, aphecks, and intensify
Disclaimer: Gore has always rubbed me the wrong way. A lot of what he says strikes me as silly -- and particularly annoying because it's said in that technocrat, poli-sci-as-science tone.
...I cannot comprehend how some can argue that hate crimes are no different from all other crimes."
Which brings me to "And to me, in a year when
Now, I'm not especially opposed to hate crime legislation, but I'm ambivalent about it, because it punishes thought rather than actions, and especially because it diminishes the rights of the individual (my right not to be assaulted) in favor of group rights (a group's right not to be targeted).
I'm supposed to be impressed that Gore can't comprehend why people might disagree with him? I'd be a lot more impressed if he said, "I understand people's concerns but here's why I think what I do."
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Just because Gore happens to be a robot doesn't mean that all of us technology enthusiasts should rush out and support him. In my mind Bradley is the better candidate. Too bad most of America has no idea who he is, even though he has had an amazing career so far.
...Whose finger do you want on the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE button?
It's Control - Alt - Delete!
And what the heck is that supposed to mean, anyway? What does the president conceptually have the power to "reboot"? It sure isn't the economy, or any industry. Maybe education? Or maybe he's referring to "logging on", NT-style.
I bet some staffer just came up with a phrase that sounded sort of techno-power-cool and seemed appropriate for Microsoft (snicker), and didn't bother to define it, or even think very hard about it. And Gore just spouted it off.
Azog the Goblin
Torrey Hoffman (Azog)
"HTML needs a rant tag" - Alan Cox
due to the Bush debacle where he couldn't name 4 leaders, could we do a Gore trial and give him 4 terms and see how many he can identify?
lets try...
1. GUI
2. BIOS
3. system bus
4. OS
bets are he ties Bush and gets one right...
It doesn't matter whose fingers are on the button if you are bluescreened and forced to do it.
one of your skr1pt k1dd13z just showed how clueless he was on MTV, you mean. you irc packet-warrior niglets really need to get some sort of a life....
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
That was one of those completely unilluminating and hackneyed pieces that politicians write when they know they're writing for the public. Hillary's columns are run in the same condescending style. Besides learning that Gore isn't the smoothest or most eloquent of writers, one learns, well...nothing. Articles like this are worthless. Couldn't Al have resisted, just once, writing crap like "[the need for] more discipline and values in our schools, to more self-restraint in the use of gratuitous violence in the entertainment media, to more parental involvement in the lives of our children..." Can Al even write a truly personal article or has any true sense of self simply evaporated into that of the stereotypical politician?
That's what gets me about the whole "hate crime" thing; we're talking about stuff that is already a crime, for crying out loud. Is killing somebody due to prejudicial hatred really that much more heinous than killing them for money, or because they didn't empty the register swiftly enough, or because Mommy and Daddy gave her more attention, or . . . If anything, I would find it significantly more disturbing if those guys had killed Matthew Shepard because of how much they loved him. -- Pete B.
The way Gore said it-- "...be worth *two* trillion dollars..."-- makes it sound like Gates is worth *one* trillion right now.
Dan Quayle may need some spelling lessons, but Gore needs a lesson in basic mathematics-- perhaps he could use a refresher course on scientific notation... Or counting, since CTRL-ALT-DEL is a *three* key combination, last time I checked...
Then again, he said that the whole "creating the Internet" thing was due to a "lack of sleep". Perhaps he'll finally fess up and attribute these screw ups to "lack of clue".
...of the English language disturbs me. "Ergonometric" isn't a word (according to www.m-w.com). It's ergonomic, you twit!!! What is it with our recent VPs anyway?
Eric
yeah, it gives us a VERY good idea his
"policy on monopolies and dealing with them".
He will "deal" for the biggest payoff from them
he can get,to leave them alone
Whose finger do you want on the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE button?
Sorry to say this, but I would feel much safer with the government looming over my computer's shoulder than some multi-billion dollar mega-corporation. At least with the government, I have some recourse should my rights be violated.
Obviously, though, the best answer to this question is ME which can easily be achieved - by using linux instead. :)
Man's unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.
72656B636148206C72655020726568746F6E41207473754A
Back when Wired was still worth reading, they ran a pretty good article called "The Making of the President 2000" (which is archived for free browsing on their Web site) comparing Al Gore's and Newt Gingrich's efforts to position themselves as the tech-savviest politico in preparation for the 2000 election. Of course, the article, which originally was published in the December 1995 issue, is a little dated; remember, this was back in the full flush of the Republican Revolution, when Gingrich looked like a revolutionary conservative leader and not a broken, slightly pathetic figure. But it's still worth reading for anyone interested in how Gore's ideas about tech developed to where they are today.
-- Jason A. Lefkowitz
Read my blog.
Ordinarily, a Senator will assign some (hopefully) bright staffer to write the foreward and then signs his or her name (Kay Bailey Hutchison probably needs help with that, too). To my friend's surprise, Senator Gore made time to meet with him and discuss the paper. Gore asked a series of increasingly deep technical questions and when he felt he understood the contents of the paper, he wrote the foreward himself. In addition, it was insightful.
My friend has been a staunch Gore supporter since.
You may now continue with your regularly-scheduled episode of "Slashdot posters bash Gore."
I read the article and am left wondering why this is newsworthy? Basically, we have Gore making an appearence on an Internet forum, but saying little of substance. This is the Internet equivalent of a photo-op. The impression I get is Gore's campaign staff saw this as an oportunity to make him seem more 'hip', more Internet-saavy. On that, he kind of blows it (it's Ctrl-Alt-Delete, or is this another pronunciating war?). Also, emailing his article to Slate should not surprise someone so intimately familiar with the Internet! :)
Anyhow, I'm not a Gore fan, but neither am I an attack dog. Gore fans will generally like the piece, his detractors won't care for it. My main point stands: There's just not much significant or new that he says in his article. Kind of a non-event, IMHO.
--
Instead of trying to press with it at the same time on a unorthodox sequence of keys or an unheard button, try inserting it on your anus.
What I was surprised by was how tongue in cheek and ironic Gore was in the letter. The "Sonics" bit, the reference to Dubya's failed pop quiz -- I think it's part of a direct effort to seem hip and in touch, to reach the politically cynical and doubting tech crowd. Rather strange for a politician -- a fair bit more subtlety than I expected out of Gore.
Cheers,
dandre
Were there any /.ers at the Gore/Microsoft rally? I was wondering if there were any shouts from the audience along the lines of "You didn't create the internet, WE DID!"
1) its not just one button
2) its CONTROL-ALT-DELETE not ALT-CONTROL-DELETE
3) dude... I can't think of any better guy than the man who made Al-Gore-Ithms and invented the internet to have his fingers on those buttons... good thing it ain't Al Gore eh?!
4) He may be illiterate but I'm voting Bush. Aw, wait, DAMN, I'm only 17! Oh well.
5) Don't go to #rit because the spammers who put that shit up here are nothing but piles of rotton horse feces who enjoy picking their noses. I fart in their general direction.
If you think you know what the hell is really going on you're probably full of shit.
If you think you know what the hell is really going on you're probably full of shit.
jdube is who I am.
Does he know that the magnification for the people who have a hard time seeing and the feature where a voice reads the screen for people who cant see are not new? Any one heard of Apple Easy Access?? Been there sence MacOS 6 i believe, possibly earlier. The voice part i dont think was added until 7.5 but it is still not very new. Damn micro lacky
Can I Play With Madness?
I like his swipe at Bush...
So I obviously spent too much time in advance preparing for a pop quiz about CEO's of software companies from hot spots around the world.
What about a mail bomb?
Gore has no substance, no personality. I think anything from "him" is really just from his staff of writers. Gore is about as far from President material as Clinton is from religious material.
Fook
The price we pay for immortality... is death. Narnia The Great Fall
I can see it now. It is the day after the election. The Democrats lost horrendously cause Al didn't even get one vote. Then the President Elect steps up to the mic
"Ladies and gentlemen. I would like to introduce to you the newest member of the GOP." Pyro goes off, Rock and Roll music starts, and out comes Al Gore, who takes the mic
"I would just like to say, that I am tired of Bill Clinton getting all the women, and as far as I'm concerned the Democrats can SUCK IT! And now that I am certified to represent the G-O-P, we will insure that the common man is forever opprosed by the wealthy. And leading the charge as head opproser I would like to introduce....Heir Gates!"
Bill Gates comes out to some really lame music and takes the microphone.
"From now on all computers will run Windows. Running Linux will result in the death penalty. And that's the bottom line cause Bill Gates said so!"
*Sigh* Oh well if we are lucky maybe we will see Bill Gates powerbombed through a table by some irate democrats. hehe.
In The Form of A Debate I Answer Al Gore
;)
I cannot comprehend how some can argue that hate crimes are no
different from all other crimes. That is why we need tougher
laws to prevent and punish them.
Because Murder is Murder, hate is an emotion, we should not be punished
for emotion, rather we should be punished for actions ( in this case Murder )
Another person asked me how we can make our schools
safer in the aftermath of tragedies such as Columbine. I said
that I believe the solutions range from tough measures to get
guns away from kids and criminals, to more discipline and
values in our schools, to more self-restraint in the use of
gratuitous violence in the entertainment media, to more
parental involvement in the lives of our children--which of
course means we need to give working parents more help in
balancing work and family.
How about we value differences, How about we let faith take the forefront
in daily lives, how about we teach our children rather then control them, and
how about teaching that it's OKAY for a mother to stay at home, that it's OKAY
to spank a child who's misbeahving? What about that Mr. Gore?
Of course, I feel it's important to point out to America's young people: If
Bill had not dropped out of college, he'd have a chance at
being worth two trillion dollars.
A bald faced Lie, Gates would have missed the Computer Revolution by a year or two
and never would have gotten started, in this Moore's Law world we need Better, Faster
schools for the Techs out there, or some kind of Fast-Track equivlant degree, Being in
the IT field i've learned that if you have a degree you're probably a year obsolete at least
Everything else in this article is Pro-Microsoft we like 'em so should you sop. I wonder
if Bill Gates is a big Campaigne Contributor?
PS. Please forgive my spelling, one of my faults i'm afraid
PSS. BTW I agree with all the ALT-CONTROL-DELETE comments
See my anecdote.
To add another conspiracy twist to this, Gore's oldest (and ugliest) daughter used to (or perhaps still does) work for Slate. She was like a managing editor at one point. Hmmmm...
I'm glad that Al Gore invented in the internet. I suppose that he'd better hurry up and file his patent...
What disturbs me most?
That Al Gore appeared at Microsoft, ostensibly to make a "courtesy call," and spoke at length to a group of particularly wealthy Microsoft executives?
That Al Gore fumbled through a couple of questions about the Jackson findings of fact
That Al Gore got to write a self-serving "I love me, and you should too" piece in Microsoft's E-zine, Slate.
That the putative reason for letting Gore write the piece was the fact that his daughter Karenna interned at Slate.
That none of the other candidates has demanded equal time (we know at least that Steve Forbes can write)
But I will say this...
If Al Gore can a finger (he used the singular) on the ALT-CTRL-DELETE button (he used the singular again), he's probably capable enough to have invented the Internet.
I may not be the biggest fan of Algore or even any of his opponents, but I wonder if Slate is going to let the rest of them have a chance to post equally blatant campaign stump speeches under the guise of "trip reports"?
The fact that Microsoft owns a publication like Slate really blurs the line between corporate PR and independent media. It's not hard to envision a scenario by which Microsoft offers Gore the free chance to spout his vote-for-me schtick in exchange for subtly favorable treatment if and when he becomes President.
Slate appeals to current-events junkies who also happen to spend a lot of time online. These are people likely to be quite knowledgeable about the DoJ vs MS case, and they also happen to be a key demographic Gore would like to reign in.
I don't like it, it's corporate-sponsored campaigning. Microsoft should definitely stay the hell out of presidential politics.
-Sharv
Did he "invent the internet" it, as so many people pretend he claimed? No. Was he relevant to its beginnings? Yes.
Find something else about him to criticize, preferably something real. There must be something.
I eagerly look forward then to the Vice President's plans both on allowing opt-out of Social Security and also school choice - two current monopolies of the US Government in which the current administration is more than willing to use the power of "heavy-handed government" to "stamp out competition".
The problem I see with hate crimes is best exemplified in this comic.
Honor Frank Zappa's memory. Keep Tipper Gore out of the White House.
he didn't say anything productive, anything educational, anything at all for that matter. Al what was your position on software patent law? truthfully, I don't care to know. I'm just glad that he's so out of touch with whats really going on - that way we can be reassured that won't get involved enough to screw it up. PS. is there any way I can put my money in digital cash so I can tell uncle sam to screw off??
Well, I've read the article and I can safely say that AL Gore has successfully written a rather nice piece on non-talk. That is to say, He said nothing....
Well Done Al... (this is one of the few times I'm glad I'm a Canadian... oops.. Never mind, the Rt. Hon. Jean Cretien just opened his mouth again...)
some karma... and kinda lukewarm about it.
Uhm, sorry for the blatant self-promotion, but if you want to know how political speeches are being written today, go visit the Phrasemonger. Thank you.
------------------
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You may like my a cappella music
IANAL, but I believe 1st-3rd degree murder is primarily based on heat of the moment vs. premeditation, with intent to kill thrown in there somewhere.
What I don't understand is why should the particular reason you hate someone make a difference in the punishment. I agree that "hate crimes" are absolutely deplorable. What I don't feel comfortable with is legislating people's feelings. The crime is not hating someone, the crime is killing someone.
A quick dejanews search turns up a good number of people calling the key combination that, and without getting called a moron for their trouble. Honestly, this is as bad as usenet spelling flame wars. Anyway, for a more challenging vulcan nerve-pinch, you could try starting the debugger on a box running netware. left ctrl+right ctrl+alt+esc, and sometimes (if your lucky) you don't have to undislocate your fingers afterwards!
(... the group's feeling that no inappropriate compromise on the issue of choice should be accepted) ...[snip]... I cannot comprehend how some can argue that hate crimes are no different from all other crimes. That is why we need tougher laws to prevent and punish them.
Because any crime is a hate crime, Mr. Gore.
It's just bad principle to say that a crime's motivation (separate from its intentionality)
supercedes its damages.
If I write a bad check to buy groceries, and I know it's a bad check, is that less of a forgery than if I write one to buy beer? Medicine? Clothing?
If I kill someone for his Nike's, is he less dead than if I killed him for his goose down parka?
The law can't be made to distinguish these fine points, or it ceases to have meaning.
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
The article comments on the inclusion of a screen reader in w2k. Another case of Microsoft stealing their ISV's bread and butter, or a welcome addition ?
..)
I vote for the latter : I think it's despicable that companies sell screenreaders to blind people for large numbers of $$$. And worse if they charge high prices because government/insurance companies are paying.
Is there a screen reader for X ? Or does it need to be a window manager function to be reasonably intelligent ?
artg (login doesn't work
ITS "HASH" #
YOu can call it HASH or OCTOTHORPE not pound.
pound is £ (squiggly L (from the latin for pound) with a horizontal line through it)
$ is dollar
not "string"
What I care about is the fact that Gore obviously thinks Microsoft is a wonderful company staffed by great people and run by a real swell guy.
That actually wouldn't bother me too much if it wasnt announced (tv news, last week or so) that the white house would be involved with the DoJ's decision making on what to do with Microsoft.
$5 says MS gets a slap on the wrist (which, for a company like MS, is a $$ fine of any amount). Nothing is gonna happen, its all a joke.
'Suprisingly decent', roblimo called it.
Rob, you're off my Christmas list. And here I was going to send a case of Guinness.
The article was.. something. But like most AC postings, lacking in meat and content. I'm inclined to agree that Gore himself didn't actually write it. Even if he did, it's lacking. Through the article, he basically staked out a few political issues, pointed at them, and said "I'm thinking about these." Not too much mention of what his actual ANSWERS were.
The offhand comment about the current DOJ administration.. specifically:
Even though the Justice Department makes its own independent decisions in such matters without input from the White House, its leaders -including Joel Klein -are appointees of the current administration. For that reason, I couldn't comment on the decision that was clearly on many people's minds on the Microsoft campus today.
If you couldn't talk about the decision, or answer to speculation about the outcome, why go? Why visit a company with thousands of employees, who would be out of their gourds to not be worrying what is going to happen to their employer, and not be able to answer their concerns? I've never really though of MS as a target political demographic, but those people are voters too, and they have families. Were I an MS staffer, I'd be pretty irate for that kind of tease.
The school thing is simple enough, if not controversial. School uniforms, and no book bags.
Slow down, put the chair down. That's an expensive monitor, most likely, and while beating it may make you feel better, it won't affect me in anyway.
The Columbine shootings, as well as others, stem from a single socialogical foible: Classism. It's just like racism, but can be applied to anyone. Classism, like racism, springs from the basic human nature of the need for community, and is then corrupted by the innate human fear of things not understood. That done, it's sparked by an individual pointing out or making light of the differences, and then mimicked by other members of the community as acceptable behavior.
Everyone familiar with the five ape theory of behaviour? I'm not sure who coined it, but I'll paraphrase it here.
Place five apes in a cage. In the center, a set of stairs, with bananas at the top. An ape climbs the stairs to get the bananas, but as soon he touches them, the rest of the apes are sprayed with cold water. Over time, the apes will learn that going after the bananas results in being sprayed.
Remove one ape, and replace it with a new one. Not knowing of the water, he'll attempt the bananas. The other apes may simply block him, or go so far as to assault him to prevent it, but the new ape doesn't know WHY. Over time, he simply accepts this behaviour.
Repeat the cycle. Replace one of the remaining four original apes with a new one. The three original apes, as well as the first new ape, will repeat the prohibitive behaviour.
Continue the process until all five original apes are replaced. Now, you have five new apes, who won't climb the stairs, but don't know why.
Now apply this to the 200 years of greed, war, and strife that our country is built on.
I'll happily quote Kaa's Law, at this point, in that within an sufficiently large enough group of people, most are stupid. If someone has theory on mob/herd sociology, I'd love to hear it.
So, why do I suggest school uniforms? Again, the core of the problem is classism. Like racism, it stems from SURFACE PERCEPTIONS. As you strip those away, you have less resistance to solving the more basic problems inherent in human nature.
But.
It's a band-aid. It's a scotch-tape patch to a gaping hole in the American psyche that's defined by 400 years of questionably acceptable behaviour spawned by the greed of what was probably one man's idea.
Tougher laws aren't going to help it. Legislating a 'hate crime' isn't going to stop it. It's not going to go away with a single election. It's a frame of mind, and it's got to start with the people. I plan to have kids some day, and I plan to raise them in an environment of diversity. I'm proud of the person I've become, because I had a solid guiding hand during the important formative stages of my life (Hi Dad!).
One thing 'Gore' touched on, I fully support, and that's encouraging parental involvement. Someone should poll this, but for those of you still living at home, or better, with kids in your home, how much time on average do they spend by themselves? Is there a computer in their room? A TV?
A lesson I learned recently, having two roommates, each of us with our own computers, is that bedrooms aren't living rooms. Moving my computer into the living room has dramatically improved the inter-personal relations in my household. Now, all machines are in the 'living room', which is what it really is. I fully intend to continue this trend as I get older, and I hope it catches on.
As far as the rest of the Internet, the porn, the warez, the hate.. It's not going to go away until people change. Politicians can't change people. People can change people. It starts in the home. Now go out and club your neighbors into submission with kindness.
- billn
So, please ask yourselves why you would support a man for President who cannot even comprehend someone like me, when y'all have no problems doing so, no problems treating my posts with respect!
Don't we deserve a President who is at least as respectful of disagreements as y'all are?
(Do we even have such a candidate? GWB seems to tolerate disagreement better than most anyone in the present White House, but his mockery of Carla Fay Tucker struck me as unworthy of a Presidential candidate. Then again, I'm using Reagan as a standard, not Clinton, which is hardly fair!)
Practice random senselessness and act kind of beautiful.
So tell me, Al, how much work did your 'ergonometric' keyboard measure? Thank goodness for third-party candidates and copy editors.
Did you remember to include the promise of a fat campaign contribution?
You can bet that Microsoft didn't forget!
Quite right.... Obviously he has decided to take the threat of George W. Bush seriously; he's fighting fire with fire.
From what I read, both front-runners(Gore and Bush) are mac users. Its interesting Al Gore is familiar with the button combination "alt-control-delete." Well from what he wrote, he was not quite familiar since he called this combination a "button." If I had to guess, a staffer must wrote this article...not him.
First of all, I sincerely hope /. isn't becoming a forum for siding with certain political ideologies. I'm perfectly happy reading about something like this every so often, but it seems pretty obvious that /. has been generating some pro-democrat propaganda lately. When it comes to politics, only democrats have been mentioned so far.
/. article posters? (Or is it just one guy who keeps posting things about this particular candidate?)
/. since I was pretty sure that there is a bit of anti-MS sentiment here... and therefore trying to cover up for Gore is like trying to cover up for MS.)
/. should be politically indifferent, because everyone who reads /. surely has differences of opinions when it comes to politics.
Secondly, I want to know why?! It's pretty interesting to note that Gore was basically saying that he *agrees* with Microsoft (whether that's because they're going to pay him or what) and his daughter worked for their subsidiary and that he just wrote an article for them!
So why the sudden hypocracy of the
Shouldn't the article mention the oddness of this? Questioning whether Slate's going to pay Gore, questioning why Gore decided to use Slate to announce his opinions (odd? I think so.), questioning whether Gore is bowing to MS because his daughter once worked there, questioning why Gore left obviously open an escape path so that he can come out and say later that MS is great and therefore the DOJ should stop trying to "hurt" the industry, questioning why Gore even mentioned that the government should keep their fingers out of this one (while at the same time saying that monopolies are wrong and then again saying that he isn't saying MS is one, which obviously means that he's setting it up so that he can say they aren't, but not until he gets a feel of how strong public opinion is in one direction or the other.), and even questioning why Gore said the Whitehouse was going to get involved in the final stages of the trial (punishment), how he could justify that, and why it should, and obviously if it is going to get involved that then that must mean they don't agree with the DOJ? All of these questions are good ones, but they take Gore's action in a negative light and so the person(s) submitting these things about Gore's visit have avoided them strangely.
Others have had talks with MS too and they didn't follow up on that. I'm not sure if this is good or bad, but it seems as if the poster is trying to convince us (if you've been reading the previous article including this one) that Gore is on our side (or rather, not against us) when in actuality he's rooting for MS while *trying* to seem neutral... strange this would be on
IMHO
Perhaps this sort of thing shouldn't have even been reported on if the author couldn't have looked at both the positive and the negative aspects.
I don't mind if the submitter was a democrat, as long as he keeps himself aware of groupthink and it's side effects.
Those are my thoughts.
"God prevent we should ever be twenty years without a revolution." -- Thomas Jefferson
This article is just more evidence of how useless Al Gore is.
I could see right away that Microsoft was home to a great deal of talent and creative drive. That may be why, according to certain projections, Bill Gates may be worth a trillion dollars some day. Of course,
Or, had he picked up a newspaper, or read the findings of fact, he might well realize that the reason that Bill Gates "may be worth a trillion dollars some day", is because he built Microsoft by destroying his competition, and building a huge, repressive monopoly.
I feel it's important to point out to America's young people: If Bill had not dropped out of college, he'd have a chance at being worth two trillion dollars.
Oh, Please. If Gates had stayed in college, he'd have been studying for exams instead of stealing Basic and CPM, porting them to the 8088, and landing a one-sided contract with IBM to supply software for IBM PCs.
I feel it's important to point out to America's young people when politicians demonstrate their ignorance.
Vandalism is a serious crime and it's always meant to intimidate. A vandal will paint shwastikas on temples, pentegrams or KKK on chruches, etc. Everyone has their favorite fears and it's frustrating trying to punish offenders. Everywhere in my town, I see more evidence of Negro gang vandalism. Spoon and other such shit. The hatred behind the spray paint is real, as is the random violence that follows. Finding that crap on my front door would be just as threatening to me as a cross on the lawn. The crime should be punished for what it is.
Obviously, such crimes are already punished in a dissimilar fashion. The hate crime crowd just wants to solidfy the new American caste system, with themselves crowned as the special top. It's bigoted from the ground up.
Such an article would give the Vranesevich interview stiff competition as the most useless expenditure of disk space on Slashdot.
In fact, the sheer wooden superficially of this stump-speech cum article he wrote for Slate makes me believe he DID write it himself.
(Crashing? Puh-leeze. For maybe five minutes, MAX - and this assumes he actually tried to TAILOR content, and not just cut and paste from his campaign website.)
And if his daughter was any less of a fluff generator than he, it doesn't surprise me at all that she rose no higher than Editorial Assistant.
No, what's really sad is that it's 85% likely (according to the last turnout statistics) that of Karenna's "friends and former colleagues" that Dad chatted with in Slate breakroom, none of them gave the slightest shit about him or anyone else involved with making and administering the laws that govern them, enough to drag their ass three blocks to a polling center on Election Day.
I'll say it 'til I'm #0000FF in the face - laws that govern the Net are and will continue to be written by people with big egos and woefully insufficient cluons, until people who care stand up and vote them out of office.
Al Gore, who helped enable the CDA, Echelon, the consideration of wiretap tech built into IP, ADA restraints on web publishing, and every other recent evil thing that's happening on the policy side of tech, is not sufficiently different than Jesse Helms or James Exon in this respect.
That he didn't address this in his puff piece for Slate is only the latest proof of that.
_____
_____
The antidote to bad speech is not censorship, but more speech.
Top Ten Anagrams for "Information Superhighway"
10. Enormous, hairy pig with fan
9. Hey, ignoramus -- win profit? Ha!
8. Oh-oh, wiring snafu: empty air
7. When forming, utopia's hairy
6. A rough whimper of insanity
5. Oh, wormy infuriating phase
4. Inspire humanity, who go far
3. Waiting for any promise, huh?
2. Hi-ho! Yow! I'm surfing Arpanet!
1. New utopia? Horrifying sham
Joke or not, here's my answer to the question "Who's finger do you want on the ... button."
MINE
That is to say, I want to be in control of what my computer is doing - I do not want that control to be in the hands of some megacorp run by a megalomaniac who's motto sounds like "Where do you us to let you go today?"
Did anyone notice the following response posted in Slate's "The Fray" - supposedly from Linus Torvalds:
:)
---
Subject: My Visit to Microsoft by Al Gore
From: Linus Torvalds
Host: karta-exc-int.karta.com
Date: Wed Nov 17 14:18:10
What a dweeb......
Is Al Bore for real?.....
Does he really expect to be president?....
May god help us......
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So, aren't there laws about assuming someone else's identity?
I left my body to science, but I'm afraid they've turned it down...
...if it hasn't already. We're all affected by laws, especially Internet laws, and by direct association, the political leanings of *anyone* attempting to be the person who writes/signs/enforces them.
As for impartiality, we're dealing with precisely this aspect at an organization I pay dues to, who is currently considering an offer for certain candidates for President to speak at one of their events. We're a tax-exempt non-profit, which as an organization is required to remain non-partisan. The way we figured it out is that if we invited every other (Presidential) candidate to speak at us, we could remain non-partisan. Or noone running for President could speak to us at all.
Slashdot (assuming it's non-partisan to begin with) could do likewise, and still remain non-partisan. Slashdot doesn't control the political thoughts of its posters in any meaningful direction, and in essence, that's the key to it.
_____
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The antidote to bad speech is not censorship, but more speech.
Why are cop murderers more likely to face the death penalty than someone who drives a cab?
:o)
Probably because being a cabbie isn't a felony (although in New York, it ought to be
It should be:
certain candidates for President
that'll teach me not to verify hyperlinks.
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The antidote to bad speech is not censorship, but more speech.
He never claimed to have "invented the Internet". Just because lying republican/nazis can repeat a lie over and over does not make it true. Read the Gore story in the latest issue of Wired.
Looks like another election year with no real options for voters.
So we might as add another unreal candidate.
Write in TUX!!!
No doubt a ghostwriter would have written a more substantive and compelling piece, but Al certainly deserves the credit for doing his own work (however incredibly boring it is).
How could you possibly think that a ghostwriter would have mis-ordered "Control-Alt-Delete"? Is that a dig at Gore's staff?
For someone who spends every day saying the same innocuous things again and again (say, during a campaign), the excercise of putting a few of them in writing (as in this article) doesn't take long. Anyone who works "on Capitol Hill" should know that.
Much stroking of all sorts of non techical but trendy political hogwash ensues.
AlGore: "I'm going to reboot microsoft! What's that key stroke? Just kidding guys, I know it's Alternate Control Deficate your pants now bitches! Ha Ha Ha, sometimes I kill my wooden self. Actually I love that keyboard thingy that Bill gave me, and Microsoft is a great company to have over a barrel. Now write all that hot button crap for me" Even more stroking ensues.
Slashdot covers the most un nerdly article and Al gets off!
1) A jilted lover plans to kill his ex-girlfriend and does so.
2) A white racist plans to kill a black and does so.
Most people (including me) would say these two crimes deserve the same punishment.
Do you have statistics to back that up? I for one would be surprised to hear that most people feel the punishment should be identical. The second crime not only harms the obvious victim, but an entire segment of the population. What is more, it harms our entire society by tearing at the social fabric and stirring up hatred between the races that could, if unabated, lead to America resembling Kosovo or Bosnia. Based on the added threat to our society that hate crimes represent, versus similar crimes without the "hate" aspect, it is not unreasonable that the punishment is harsher.
This is easier to see if you consider crimes less drastic than murder, such as, say, intimidation, assault, or vandalism. Burning a cross does allot more than deface one's yard -- it terrorizes an entire household, a neighborhood, indeed (with enough press coverage) an entire segment of the American public. Not quite the same as a couple of malicious kids who light a bush on fire playing with matches because they don't like the old lady who won't let them eat her apples, nor should it be treated the same.
If motiviation is truly irrelevant, than one should have identical punishments for all murders (for example), whether deliberate, accidental, premiditated, or spontaneous. As another noted, the difference isn't in the act, but in the degree of thought that went into it. I leave it as an excersize to the class to recognize the aburdity of that approach.
On the other hand, if motivation is relevant, the motive of terrorizing an entire segment of the population (be it based on race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender, or whatever) and the associated social and cultural damage that does to our entire society as a whole, must be taken into consideration, which is precisely what hate crime legislation does.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Pressing the Ctrl & Alt keys activates the missiles. Pressing the Delete key under the desired country sends them to that country and deletes it.
"I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
"I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
These words were spoken by Martin Luther King Jr in August of 1963. His dream has been largely ignored and misunderstood.
When a company hires a black man in preference to a more qualified white man because they must meet their diversity quota, they are being forced to judge men based on the color of their skin, and not the content of their character.
When a judge varies the harshness of a sentence according to the race of the person murdered, he becomes a minister of arbitrariness, not justice. He effectively places the worth of one race above the worth of another race.
What was that? I heard someone further up complain that such inequality exists already; that in the courts, murdered cops are already valued more than murdered cab drivers; that we are "looking for equality in a system where none exists." It therefore makes sense to this person that we legislate more of this nonsense in the name of fairness.
Sir, Martin Luther King Jr looked for equality in a system where none existed. I do too.
So-called "Hate crime" legislation would not be merely meaningless. It would be unjustice.
JD
His appearance of caring for others almost covers up for his blatant self promotion. Wouldn't 'shutdown -r now' be better than CTRL-ALT-DEL? It's nice to know that the father of the internet is just now learning the function of email. Despite everything else I do have to give him props for poking fun at Bradley at the end.
There is a new ergonomic keyboard from Microsoft. Look at http://pes.internet.cz/obr/1103m_b.jpg
Lets think about this for a moment... When you kill someone.. are you not commiting a hate crime ?? I think it unwise to start any legislation that would apply race or ethnicity to a crime. Can you imagine the BS that would take place in the court rooms? Like there isnt enough now... This is the kind of legislation that is touchy feel. It sounds good on paper ( like most of the democrats legislation ) but in practice it stands to divide us further....
Bill Gates may be worth a trillion dollars some
day. Of course, I feel it's important to point out
to America's young people: If Bill had not dropped
out of college, he'd have a chance at being worth
two trillion dollars.
So, is he trying to be funny for funny's sake or consciously mocking education. No one can possibly think that Gates' education had anything to do with his monetary success. The courts are finally bringing out the truth: that Gates built his empire on underhanded business practices instead of sound products. I think Gore's statement makes him seem quite shallow, or misguided at best.
Question: does Microsoft make campaign contributions? (I'm not sure about regulations on such things, etc.) Might be interesting.
um... have you ever read Gore's quote?
Al Gore said "During my tenure in congress, I took the imitative, and invented the internet",
Now, I don't know what version of the English language you use, but to me when some one says they invented something it means that they invented it(note that he did not say that he helped invent the internet) or at least that they think they did. Not that they 'helped open it up to the public' or some other idiotic partisan spin-doctoring.
You're the ones who look like fools after awhile. Little retarded kids who repeat the same joke over and over and over again.
No, you do. Al Gore said he invented the Internet. He said it unequivocally.
And, by the way, if he thinks he helped open it up to the public, he's wrong. Gore worked on a couple of bills that provided funding for super-computer research funding, and not much else (wired did a report on what he said) He's also a staunch supporter of the Clipper chip, and encryption export controls
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"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
I find some humour in using Mills' Utilitarianism ethical philosophy to promote a view and a law that favors the few and not the many. Utilitarianism says that the choice that helps the most people or hurts the fewest is the best choice. Hate crime legislation helps the _minorities_ while hurting the _majority_ by excluding crimes against them from the scope of the law. Hate crime legislation is in fact contrary to Utilitarianism. I have a hard time reconsiling hate crime legislation with any theory of ethics though.
Anyway, my comment never mentioned his shenanigans. By "his legacy" I was referring to his awful record as a President. What is his political legacy? Name one serious poilitical accomplishment of his, besides getting himself elected. Name one significant piece of legislation he got passed.
With respect to your comments about Bush and Reagan, everybody is welcome to their ignorance. You just got a bigger helping.
When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood.
-Tom Jones
I don't think I could vote for a Fundementalist like Keys, Don't know much about bradly, so he's better in my mind then Gore...
I'm intrested to see who the 3rd party throws out, right now it looks like it could be ether Donald Trump, or neo-nazi Pat Buchanen. This election could really suck...
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"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
If you were going to be president, wouldn't you want to get a VP so horrible that noone would DARE
try to assassinate you for fear of the VP becoming president?
Actually, I think most people psychotic enough to assassinate a president wouldn't give a rat's ass about who would succeed him...
The REAL reason is "Impeachment Insurance" (Similar concept.) Regan did it with the Shrub, The Shrub did it with Quayle, and Clinton does it with Gore..
You think it was an 'accident' all those republicans suddenly had a change of heart at Clinton's impeachment hearing? Hell no... Billy just told Gore.. "Hey Al, can you go talk to those republicans? Just tell them how excited you are that you could be the next president..."
By the way, you overestimate the abilities of staff who ghostwrite articles and op-eds for politicos.
When I'm singing a ballad and a pair of underwear lands on my head, I hate that. It really kills the mood.
-Tom Jones
Your response is quite simply dumb. Please actually read what you are blabbering about next time, and don't post anonymously if you want me to bother making a real refutation of your points, or exmplaining things to your idjit mind.
ALT - CONTROL - DELETE
:P
It's also the order in which the keys are arragned on the keyboard.
Ofcourse it won't be if you're one of those lame people who use two hands for A-C-D
Democrats, republicans. you both make me sick.
"Rah! Rah! My team is better to sit around and do the same thing then your team is!!"
"No, My team is! You smell like farts!"
"What! I don't smell like fats, you just think that because your perception is distorted by the fact that your mother is a whore!"
You said that the gulf war was 'idiotic', does that mean that the war in Serbia was idiotic as well? Of course not! The war in Kosovo was about people the war in the gulf was about Oil. And of course, Kuwaitis aren't really people, because they're not white...
Now, we all no the real reason why you think one was ok, and the other wasn't (or at least the prototypical republicrat) was because Clinton was in charge of one, and Bush was in charge of the other. When facts are twisted in newsgroup postings about FreeBSD vs. Linux, or Sony vs. Nintendo, it bothers me, when its done about real issues, that effect real people, It makes me sick.
Think about how many problems this country has (drug use, high crime rates, poverty levels, etc, etc, etc) that could have been solved by now if the parties would work together instead of fucking up so that they can blame each other. Oh, but I forgot it's all party 'A's fault, Party 'B' is trying to fix it, and party A is standing in the way, my mistake...
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"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
I've always said alt+ctl+delete, and damnit, all you people are saying it wrong!
I've always done it one handed, so for me it's alt+ctl+delete. Interestingly, I'd never actualy noticed that people were saying it, and writing it diffrently untill someone pointed out that I was saying it 'wrong'.
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"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
in detention?
In ether one of those cases, the people are both dead. There both premeditated, There really isn't any more 'risk' involved. what about a black person killing a white person? is that a hate crime to??
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"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
No, I haven't read ALL of Mills' theory, but I have studied Ethics theories, including Mills. If Utilitarianism is something other than what I stated then please enlighten me. If you don't want to make a logical refutation or explain that is fine. However don't fall back on an Ad Hominem attack in place of a refutation.
I'm a Canadian trial lawyer ten years since graduation from Dalhousie, a Canadian law school founded by Harvard. In British Columbia (the province north of Washington state) a group of four thugs beat a Sikh temple worker to death for no other reason than they wanted to kill a non-white person. This wasn't a random killing in the sense that they got into an argument - they deliberately targetted someone at a Sikh temple parking lot at six o'clock in the morning. The defence lawyer complained when the only "repentant" killer got 12 years in the federal prison system, and said that his client was being punished for his "odious" (repugnant, disgusting, Republican) views. Exactly! The murder was motivated not by what Mr. Singh had done, but rather by what he was - not white. If a group of black teenagers had killed a white grandfather solely because of his membership in an identifiable group (whites), or a group of women killed a victim chosen only by his gender, then in Canada hate crime legislation makes the penalty greater than for a victim who provoked the party, such as someone who starts a bar fight. That seems like a good idea to me here in Canada, where this year Chinese just replaced French as the second most widely spoken language after English: discourage racism, religious intolerance or sexism and lock up longer those who engage in murder or assault strictly on those bases. It may not change views, any more than making crimes using guns more onerous than those with other weapons, but it can alter behaviour - or at least keep such people in jail longer. And no - I don't do criminal trials as I don't believe in the system. Instead, I work in the area of civil trials, seeking damages for victims of assault, sexual assault and mental anguish for making threats. In civil law, raping someone because of their race or religion is grounds for greater damages. Madam Justice Louise Arbour, now of the Supreme Court of Canada has been the UN investigator on the use of mass ethnic raping in the former Yugoslavia as a war crime. You better believe that murder isn't just murder - circumstances such as choosing your victim on the basis of race, religion or sex can be a hate crime worthy of additional penalty the same way that that well-known American liberal Ronald Reagan passed federal legislation in the US making crimes with a gun more serious than crimes with other weapons. Yes, you can kill with a spoon, but not at a distance nor in rapid succession. If we pinko Canucks can agree with the Gipper on this one, maybe you should rethink your opposition to hate crime legislation.
With Windows I distinctly remember having to press ALT first in some combinations. Specifically, if I create a keyboard shortcut to launch the command prompt with Ctrl+Alt+D, pressing it in that order does not always work. Because the Alt key is a toggle, it sometimes is ignored. Has anyone else experienced such a problem?
But this ironic thing is that they are both deadheads, and he's not as boring as we think. There are reported incidents of tray surfing on Air Force two during the climb to flight altitude...
Gore - Pro MS (reason: this article)
Bush - Pro MS (reason: has spoken against FoF)
So I've eliminated two possible voting choices, does anybody know what the other serious (non Trump) candidates think of the anti-trust deal ? Is there hope ?
- sigs are for wimps.
Whether the crime is a hate crime or not does not depend on the race of the victim alone. A lynching with overtly racist motives ( ie a clear act of terrorism ) is different to quietly stabbing someone in a dark alley.
I'd take this comment more seriously from someone who knew the plural of "screw up" is "screws up" the same way the plural of "spoonful" is "spoonsful". The point is still valid, though, although I thought on Bill's best day he was really only worth less than $0.1 trillion US.
I think Gore was referring to that new scientific discipline of measuring ergs (a unit of energy) with a meter stick, equally as useful as measuring daylight with a barometer. Now we know what Vice-Presidents REALLY do.
as a so-called 'minority', if someone killed me because he wanted my car or if someone killed me because of the color of my skin, i'd still be dead and it would suck. the thing that stands out about the byrd case and also that gay fellow was that both were tortured before being killed. i think that the torture, not the fact that they were killed for being minorities, should count for harsher punishment than normal murder. but agreed, hate crime legislation is just stupid.
As for the Gore article, I thought it was pretty crap. He came off like someone's mom trying to sound hip when she walks in on her kids' conversation. He should stick to what he knows - kneepads and spotted owls.
I think the notion that Gore is a techno-whiz is a load. The most complicated thing he's ever done is use MS Word, not that any of the other candidates are any better. We should just stop kidding ourselves by thinking he knows what he's talking about when he say "ALT CONTROL DELETE."
Drop the
I'm frankly more concerned with who has their finger on the Stop+A buttons.
--
"L'IT c'est moi!"
Being in the IT field i've learned that if you have a degree you're probably a year obsolete at least
If you're a year obsolete after graduating from a BS in something like CS, you went to a bad school that was teaching the latest technology (languages, specific OSes, specific programs) instead of the principles of CS (algorithms, Software eng, Automata Theory, Principles of Operating Systems, Computer Architecture, etc).
If you're half decent at the basics (theory), when encountering new stuff never taught at your school, all you need to do is pick up a book and fly. If they thought you VB and HTML, you're DOOMED because getting married to technology will always make you obsolete by definition.
- sigs are for wimps.
I could go on, but see if you can figure out for yourself how the argument follows in this case.
Note that I did not just say Utilitarianism, the philosophy, in my original post, nor did I mean that. I meant the text of the essary "Utilitarianism" written by JS Mill. Mill is most certainly not a strict Benthamian Utilitarian. That is why I say that you have not read the book, which you admit.
Do that first. Then you may reply.
Hypertext Webster Gateway Error
No match found for ergonometric
What a chump. And he wants to be President? Yeah, right...
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"Rex unto my cleeb, and thou shalt have everlasting blort." - Zorp 3:16
Sacred cows make the best burgers.
it continues to absolutely amaze me how much slashdotters whine and complain and argue about stupid things like this! i started coming here to read relevant and intelligent debate on subjects concerning the computer industry but lately i realize that i am using up precious bandwidth doing so... most of the debates raging here are mindless and just plain stupid!
Personally, I think if Bill had stayed in school and not grabbed the brass ring when he saw it, none of us would probably have even heard of him.
He was really in rare form I thought. For example, to protect kids in school we need to:
1: "tough measures to get guns away from kids and criminals"
Translation: More gun control that ensures that only criminals and disturbed kids have guns.
2: "more discipline and values in our schools"
Translation: More activism on the Political Correctness front in the schools.
3: "more self-restraint in the use of gratuitous violence in the entertainment media"
Translation: Censorship. (Remember, his wife is Tipper Gore!!). Of course countries like Japan have considerably more violence in many of their shows, but almost no violence...
4: "more parental involvement in the lives of our children"
Translation: He actually got it right on this one. Of course there is nothing he or government can do about this.
I could go on, but what is the point? The whole article was such a lump of half-masticated pap. Gore needs to update his android brain for one that doesn't require vacuum tubes and alligator clips.
So, I am still wondering what Mr. Gore is referring to here. This reminds me of a scene from "Austin Powers 2"; I can just see a confused politician saying scratching his head and saying "What button?". What are we rebooting? Civilization? (Is he talking the big red "nuke" button which is in the hands of Russia, and to a lesser extent China, India, Pakastan, and other nuclear capable nations?) Does China have its collective finger on their "Alt-Control-Delete" button, and Al wants to return the control of the button to us? That was just a lame statement, all in all. I suppose he could have been talking about information warfare, but still -- lame.
What about the free speech argument? Aren't you impeding their right to free speech to send a message with their crime?
The crux of the matter is that you are now extending the toxic bubble of legislation into the ream of thought. Certain thoughts are now illegal. Certain thoughts have more legality than others. Perhaps they should just ordain a Ministry of Love to ensure that everyone only has constructive thoughts to our collective benevolent protectors.
If you had the technology to limit human thought, would you?
.
Don't give too much flack for this one... the ctrl-alt-del allusion refers to *one* decision, a big red shiny button (or series of access codes, what have you) in a briefcase if I remember correctly.
At least he's trying to care, even if his feeble mind can't grasp the complexity of the microchip.
No, I am not. This kind of "message" is a threat, and making threats is not protected under the banner of "free speech". In many cases, making threats carries criminal penalties, especially if you make it clear that you are not making an idle threat.
At least one famous Al was able to get it right:
If I ever meet you, I'll control-alt-delete you
-- Weird Al
Does anyone else think that Weird Al would make a better President than Al Gore??
Read the subject.
Most regular people think of this phrase as almost a mental model of the net. Most geeks think of this phrase and cringe. But in defence of Algore (can't believe I just said that) he was drawing an analogy between the federal investment into the road superhighway system and the "information" superhighway system. You know, like "We should invest as much money in the information superhighway as the the road superhighway system."
It is mainly the press's fault that this term has gotten into common misappropriation.
But I'm not about to defend the "inventing the Internet" bit. I have no idea what neuro-alchemical disaster occurred in the White House to cause that meme to spawn.
Why wouldn't you? seriously, can you answer the question?
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"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
...the richest person in the world is a college drop out.
I might be a little nuts and have a problem with the way people view colleges as the answer to "wealth" but I simply don't see how completing college would have helped Bill Gates.
Say he finshed college and revieced all the crap taught to him from the ages. What would he be? Would he have reliezed that the contracts of MS DOS would be the key?? What bill gates has done is damn near as close as you can get to busseness genuis as it could possiably get. There is not a college in the world that would teach him what he knows.
Al Gore also wrote...
we need tougher laws to prevent and punish them.
Limited thinking at it's best. In american, laws
MarNuke
RH is still the most SysV-like...and that's a good thing.
crap
MarNuke
It makes me sick too. When I try to explain myself to partisan demobots and republicobots they stare at me in disbelief and say "Well, how about party A's policy on this or that? Doens't that bother you?" It is a two-way street people!
It is disgusting to see a whole country play games like this... A good example of the behavior is in sports, root for your team! Your team RULES and your rival sucks. In fact, the rival plays dirty and usually pays off the officials or something to win.
It is all bullshit!
I could bitch about this forever, but I am too busy trying to think of a solution instead.
His boneheaded remarks don't bother nearly as much as his boneheaded policy. I'd trust someone who was just evil (like Clinton) over someone genuinely gullible (like Gore) any day of the week.
Indeed, "hate crime" legislation is one of the few examples of our government truly policing thought rather than expression.