Thing is that it seems inevitable that under capitalism democratic government will be for sale to the higher bidder. Laws and even Constitutions are ignored, judges are bought off or just flaming partisan shills. Perhaps a benevolent dictator would work but as history shows they are rare and eventually get replaced by a non-benevolent dictator. It seems to always come down to the no true Scotsman argument, and fails whether talking about Capitalism, Communism or other isms and reality is what we have.
How so? Someone postulated a designer as the answer of where life came from and I pointed out that only raises more questions. Of course the idea that any of our religious books is an accurate description of a designer is even more far fetched though the traditions about the trickster almost make sense as if we're the result of a designer, it was inept, an arsehole, or making a horrible joke.
There are other types of evolution then Darwins, eg a persons morals may evolve with experience. In religion Gods do evolve, look at Christianity where a typical petty desert god evolved to creator of everything I do agree that it is a philosophical question that currently has no connection to any science.
When there is an election on the horizon it seems that that should be the first option. If elections are cancelled like what happened in Nazi Germany then it's time to think about violence.
The bad old days of being attacked by Germany or further back, being attacked by France. You really can't blame them for getting paranoid about a superpower spending billions in a neighbouring country to overthrow the elected government, a country that is in the process of putting missile defences on its borders as well as having missiles very close to its borders. You can imagine if the roles were reversed and Russia was spending money like crazy in Mexico to incite the population to overthrow their government and become Russia's ally. Actually you can look at history and the present to see how America reacted to Cuba and continues to react.
What makes you think that the current simplest life form is close to the original? There isn't much evidence left over from 3-4 billion years ago but there is some that the Earth had liquid water prior to the late heavy bombardment (LHB) and that the LHB sterilized the surface of the Earth, perhaps multiple times. Only takes a 100 mile asteroid hitting hard to sterilize the surface. This would leave only a few organisms living under ground to repopulate the Earth and who knows how thy may have changed in a few 100's of million years before the sterilization. Seems more likely that life appeared spontaneously then Coyote created it for a joke and some of the newer religions are even more unlikely though they do seem like what a jokester might invent.
Evolution says nothing about how it all started so even if there was an intelligent designer it doesn't matter as far as theory of evolution is concerned. What it does do is raise the question of where the intelligent designer came from and how it evolved.
Around here the "running TV tally" is actual polling stations reporting in. Starts almost as soon as the polls close and usually within a couple of hours it is usually obvious who the winners are in most ridings. Counting paper votes as the above poster said, is fast. Helps to vote for specific things as well rather then everything from the head of state to dogcatcher at once.
IIRC you'd need a blunt 4' long and 18" across to get a buzz from hemp, and you'd die from smoke inhalation first.
All depends on the variety with modern hemp strains bred for low psycho-activity to make it more acceptable. That along with allowing the males to flourish and fertilize the females produces hemp that won't get you high. Hemp is a wonder plant, the fiber is very useful, the plast left over from extracting the fiber also has numerous uses including plastic like. The seeds have a high oil content, a very high grade oil useful for industrial uses, as well as for food containing all the essential oils and the seeds are one of the few sources of complete proteins, much like soybeans. Basically you could live a long time on nothing but hemp. Then there are the recreational and medicinal uses of the psycho-active strains.
You can trash the US all you want, but there are a limited number of countries in the world that would even allow a conference like Def Con or Black Hat.
Many totalitarian governments like to get all the dissidents together in one easy to manage group. Show up and get entered into the database for extra scrutiny plus having all those dissidents in one group makes doing intelligence on them much easier. Always a good chance of hiring some too.
In America you might be able to do that with a sign that says "abortion is bad" but if you have a sign that says "abortion is fucking bad" you'll quickly find the limits of American free speech. In some States having a picture of a healthy baby feeding will also show you the limits of free speech in America. Then there is the difference between showing a real beheading to someone giving head. Different cultures have different ideas of free speech.
It's not so much the low wages but being in-servitude. Employers love having workers who will do anything they're asked and that they don't have to worry about them complaining about things like working conditions or going to work somewhere better.
As the AC says, it was very advanced but killed by pressure from the Americans who didn't want a neighbouring country to have a better plane then they could make and also needed expertise to work with their Germans and build a space ship to go to the Moon.
The government has a long history of protecting the people from threats like the other party, dissidents, and other politically undesirables. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C... for one example.
Canada's current government is also pretty pro-USA and would deliver Assange instantly even if illegally. They've already done it with others such as Marc Emory, a seed seller who the Americans really wanted and is now sitting in an American jail even though legally he should not have been extradited as selling seeds in Canada is good for a couple of hundred dollar fine at the most and extradition is supposed to be for comparable crimes and punishments.
You do know that the Communist Party of China has liberal and conservative wings and power swaps every 8 years between the wings. Other wings can also rise up through the Communist Party (which is actually more fascist then communist now). It's much like America except they don't have a popularity contest to change leaders but go more for merit and debate occurs more behind closed doors. In a functioning democracy the tea party would have been a separate party rather then having to work in the confines of the existing party and if actually popular would have won seats in government.
Has there ever been a successful conservative who wasn't a statist? The left has actually produced successful non-statists though not in the Americas. Gandhi, Mandala, and the Dali Lama are some examples of leftists who were not statists.
Some words should just be retired as they mean so many different things to different people, especially true with politics where the only truth is that they're all liars.
Some engines are more efficient at high rpms and some at low rpms, it would have been interesting to repeat the 55mph test in a lower gear. Then there is the average thing, do most vehicles get the best mileage at 55 or 75? Back in the day of large V8s and limited gearing 55 was probably the most efficient, now I have no idea. I like the autobahn where they have minimum speed limits in each lane and enforce them.
My right wing provincial government introduced the carbon tax along with jacking up various other gas taxes so gas is currently the most expensive in N. America at $1.50 a liter, the next Province over who are really right wing also has a carbon tax. My right wing federal government also taxes the tax. The whole idea is to reduce income taxes and make up the money other ways so they can run on a platform of low taxes. Gas taxes just go into the general fund rather then being earmarked for certain uses. The left might have introduced the idea of clean air but the right has really run with it along with lots of other less obvious taxes, fees etc. Unless you're in the 1% taxes go up with a right wing government, but they do do a good job of cooking the books to pretend the budget is balanced.
Huh? I live in a monarchy, it is still voted on by elected representatives who are the government. The head of state then rubber stamps it. There are republics that are dictatorships as well, no elected representatives or sham ones.
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Thing is that it seems inevitable that under capitalism democratic government will be for sale to the higher bidder. Laws and even Constitutions are ignored, judges are bought off or just flaming partisan shills. Perhaps a benevolent dictator would work but as history shows they are rare and eventually get replaced by a non-benevolent dictator.
It seems to always come down to the no true Scotsman argument, and fails whether talking about Capitalism, Communism or other isms and reality is what we have.
How so? Someone postulated a designer as the answer of where life came from and I pointed out that only raises more questions. Of course the idea that any of our religious books is an accurate description of a designer is even more far fetched though the traditions about the trickster almost make sense as if we're the result of a designer, it was inept, an arsehole, or making a horrible joke.
I don't have a problem with an imaginary designer outside the Universe and any other designer such as ETs still came from somewhere.
There are other types of evolution then Darwins, eg a persons morals may evolve with experience. In religion Gods do evolve, look at Christianity where a typical petty desert god evolved to creator of everything
I do agree that it is a philosophical question that currently has no connection to any science.
When there is an election on the horizon it seems that that should be the first option. If elections are cancelled like what happened in Nazi Germany then it's time to think about violence.
The bad old days of being attacked by Germany or further back, being attacked by France. You really can't blame them for getting paranoid about a superpower spending billions in a neighbouring country to overthrow the elected government, a country that is in the process of putting missile defences on its borders as well as having missiles very close to its borders. You can imagine if the roles were reversed and Russia was spending money like crazy in Mexico to incite the population to overthrow their government and become Russia's ally. Actually you can look at history and the present to see how America reacted to Cuba and continues to react.
Are you talking about the country with over a million people in jail due to plea bargaining?
What makes you think that the current simplest life form is close to the original? There isn't much evidence left over from 3-4 billion years ago but there is some that the Earth had liquid water prior to the late heavy bombardment (LHB) and that the LHB sterilized the surface of the Earth, perhaps multiple times. Only takes a 100 mile asteroid hitting hard to sterilize the surface. This would leave only a few organisms living under ground to repopulate the Earth and who knows how thy may have changed in a few 100's of million years before the sterilization.
Seems more likely that life appeared spontaneously then Coyote created it for a joke and some of the newer religions are even more unlikely though they do seem like what a jokester might invent.
Evolution says nothing about how it all started so even if there was an intelligent designer it doesn't matter as far as theory of evolution is concerned. What it does do is raise the question of where the intelligent designer came from and how it evolved.
Around here the "running TV tally" is actual polling stations reporting in. Starts almost as soon as the polls close and usually within a couple of hours it is usually obvious who the winners are in most ridings. Counting paper votes as the above poster said, is fast. Helps to vote for specific things as well rather then everything from the head of state to dogcatcher at once.
IIRC you'd need a blunt 4' long and 18" across to get a buzz from hemp, and you'd die from smoke inhalation first.
All depends on the variety with modern hemp strains bred for low psycho-activity to make it more acceptable. That along with allowing the males to flourish and fertilize the females produces hemp that won't get you high.
Hemp is a wonder plant, the fiber is very useful, the plast left over from extracting the fiber also has numerous uses including plastic like. The seeds have a high oil content, a very high grade oil useful for industrial uses, as well as for food containing all the essential oils and the seeds are one of the few sources of complete proteins, much like soybeans. Basically you could live a long time on nothing but hemp.
Then there are the recreational and medicinal uses of the psycho-active strains.
Yes, America has inverted the normal definition of totalitarian to pretend they're the opposite. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
You can trash the US all you want, but there are a limited number of countries in the world that would even allow a conference like Def Con or Black Hat.
Many totalitarian governments like to get all the dissidents together in one easy to manage group. Show up and get entered into the database for extra scrutiny plus having all those dissidents in one group makes doing intelligence on them much easier. Always a good chance of hiring some too.
In America you might be able to do that with a sign that says "abortion is bad" but if you have a sign that says "abortion is fucking bad" you'll quickly find the limits of American free speech. In some States having a picture of a healthy baby feeding will also show you the limits of free speech in America. Then there is the difference between showing a real beheading to someone giving head.
Different cultures have different ideas of free speech.
It's not so much the low wages but being in-servitude. Employers love having workers who will do anything they're asked and that they don't have to worry about them complaining about things like working conditions or going to work somewhere better.
As the AC says, it was very advanced but killed by pressure from the Americans who didn't want a neighbouring country to have a better plane then they could make and also needed expertise to work with their Germans and build a space ship to go to the Moon.
The government has a long history of protecting the people from threats like the other party, dissidents, and other politically undesirables. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C... for one example.
Canada's current government is also pretty pro-USA and would deliver Assange instantly even if illegally. They've already done it with others such as Marc Emory, a seed seller who the Americans really wanted and is now sitting in an American jail even though legally he should not have been extradited as selling seeds in Canada is good for a couple of hundred dollar fine at the most and extradition is supposed to be for comparable crimes and punishments.
You do know that the Communist Party of China has liberal and conservative wings and power swaps every 8 years between the wings. Other wings can also rise up through the Communist Party (which is actually more fascist then communist now). It's much like America except they don't have a popularity contest to change leaders but go more for merit and debate occurs more behind closed doors.
In a functioning democracy the tea party would have been a separate party rather then having to work in the confines of the existing party and if actually popular would have won seats in government.
Has there ever been a successful conservative who wasn't a statist? The left has actually produced successful non-statists though not in the Americas. Gandhi, Mandala, and the Dali Lama are some examples of leftists who were not statists.
Don't finance the cops and towns with the fines.
Some words should just be retired as they mean so many different things to different people, especially true with politics where the only truth is that they're all liars.
Some engines are more efficient at high rpms and some at low rpms, it would have been interesting to repeat the 55mph test in a lower gear. Then there is the average thing, do most vehicles get the best mileage at 55 or 75? Back in the day of large V8s and limited gearing 55 was probably the most efficient, now I have no idea. I like the autobahn where they have minimum speed limits in each lane and enforce them.
My right wing provincial government introduced the carbon tax along with jacking up various other gas taxes so gas is currently the most expensive in N. America at $1.50 a liter, the next Province over who are really right wing also has a carbon tax. My right wing federal government also taxes the tax. The whole idea is to reduce income taxes and make up the money other ways so they can run on a platform of low taxes. Gas taxes just go into the general fund rather then being earmarked for certain uses.
The left might have introduced the idea of clean air but the right has really run with it along with lots of other less obvious taxes, fees etc. Unless you're in the 1% taxes go up with a right wing government, but they do do a good job of cooking the books to pretend the budget is balanced.
Votes by elected representatives = Republic
Huh? I live in a monarchy, it is still voted on by elected representatives who are the government. The head of state then rubber stamps it. There are republics that are dictatorships as well, no elected representatives or sham ones.