If you don't believe in DNA evidence, then you're a stupid contrarian.
You better be pretty damn sure that someone is guilty if you're going to execute them for a crime, and if valid and trustworthy DNA evidence to the contrary doesn't lead you to have a "reasonable doubt" then you are not a reasonable person.
The two things that I've paid more attention to than when I first saw it: in Boundin' when the snow falls, the rattlesnake freezes. Cute. And the goldfish in the background when Edna talks to Helen were absolutely amazing.
Oh, and remember the genocide of the Native American? The one where we used biological warfare (smallpox-ridden blankets?)
Outlawing abortion over religious beliefs isn't the right thing to do.
Increasing the share of taxes paid by the Middle Class isn't the right thing to do.
Using crappy evidence to justify a war isn't the right thing to do. (Yellowcake, aluminum tubes.)
I'm not one of the "Blame America First" movement, as you might like to call me. I'm one of the "Ignore History At Your Own Peril" guys.
We have severely fucked people in the past, and we will severely fuck people in the future. It's important to figure out who's going to get screwed and how hard.
If you take parenting seriously, you should have kids. We could use the help. And if you actually do a good job, we could use your kids' help, too. See, if people who take parenting seriously outcompete parents who don't take parenting seriously, that will be good.
To respond to your implicit charge, I think my job is pretty important; I try to improve the quality of health care (and decrease the cost).
This isn't some corporate agenda. This is a group of people trying to have fun together.
I am thinking long term - that's why I think people who take parenting seriously need to have children. I think you're making a mistake, and not thinking long term.
Wow, I didn't realize what an asshole you are, or I wouldn't have bothered responding to you.
Parents need to spend time with their kids. A parent who uses the logic, "Well, we went fishing last year" is an idiot. Parents should be making time to be near their kids, so they can be around when the kid needs them. A child doesn't know how to ask for help - it takes an observant parent to notice when a child has problems. Maybe you were talking about teenagers. A 5-year-old doesn't resent their parent's time, as long as they're given their own room and time and space as well.
The vast majority of aspiring authors never write a single novel. So, I disagree with your assertion that "they write one, and it's not so great."
This is a voluntary, fun idea for people who probably have NOT already written that first idea as you describe.
You've never had a deadline at work? Your job must be pretty menial - the kind that robots will be doing some day.
It doesn't cause harm to encourage people to be creative. Someone who thinks this way clearly has no creativity.
It's kind of like parenthood: QUANTITY TIME is far, far better than QUALITY TIME.
A lot of people tell themselves that they're good parents, but never spend any time with their kids.
A lot of people tell themselves that they could write a great novel, but have never actually done it. I think this is a great idea, and if it weren't for the fact that November is the Absolute Worst Month at my job, I would be participating for sure. As it stands, I'm still thinking about participating.
"I wrote a novel, it just hasn't been published yet."... filled the last chapter with "lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu" to meet the word count.
Funny that you should mention "lu lu lu," as ANYONE can publish on Lulu.
So, do you set yourself a words-per-day quota, or just think of it in pages-per-day, or do you spend a certain amount of time every day working on it, or do you have an outline that you try to get through one subsection each day, or...?
I'm asking about you, Kibikitour, personally - what do you do?
Take a Software Engineering course. Seriously, I had a Software Engineering course where there was a team of three people, and we had to write BUCKETS of code in a quarter. The idea was that it would be so had to write it all, that you would HAVE TO cooperate, and that by following a Software Engineering practice, you could each write your code to spec, and have it all Just Work at the end of the quarter.
Well, when I took the course, I was working full time. I knew the quarter was going to be just AWFUL for me at work, but that first weekend after the assignment, I was totally free. And unfortunately, we HAD TO write our code in C++, but at the time I was kind of lacking in C++ skills, but an expert Borland Pascal user. So, I told the two guys on my team "If I write it all this weekend in Pascal, will you translate it to C++?" They laughingly agreed.
They stopped laughing on Monday morning as I handed them a HUGE pile of code. They literally spent the rest of the quarter translating to C++. And they kept making dumbass mistakes like writing pointers to disk, and then reloading the pointers into memory, and as they described it "that works MOST of the time." *shudder* If they had actually literally translated my code almost word-for-word into C++, they would have been fine.
Anyway, there's my story. Thought you might enjoy it.
The Right Stuff was one of the greatest movies of my childhood. I really enjoyed Hanks and Spielberg's From the Earth to the Moon, but I'll always have a special place in my heart for The Right Stuff.
Just a quick question: how many Americans have gone into space alone since Gordo, now?
The two guys from SpaceShipOne, right. Anyone else?
have faith in the leaders of our country or be labeled unpatriotic
"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."
-- Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
Scary, huh?
By the way, the intelligence agencies should never present a position paper to the administration. They should always report on intelligence and the best estimation of the meaning of that intelligence. A position paper specifically ignores contradicting evidence, as you point out, and is therefore wildly inappropriate to present as the result of the labor of the intelligence community - especially if, as in this case, the best experts that you have disagree the most with the opinion presented.
Again, I refer to my England/India/Pakistan analogy. England held them together and they hated it - with England gone civil war resulted, and the world was launched into another non-ending cycle of hatred and escalation.
It turns out that a secular tyranny is pretty effective at stopping holy wars. And we just decapitated the tyranny. I really fear that we will create a three-way war in present-day Iraq.
But in Bush's case the "new decision" is to do the exact opposite of what he said he would do, based on the "new information" that stopping things like the Department of Homeland Security and the 9/11 Commission would result in an angry mob on the front lawn of the White House.
I said it in jest, but I kind of mean it: what "new information" could he have possibly gained about 9/11 Commission and the Department of Homeland Security, other than for instance bad polling numbers?
I don't object to the belief that we can do a reasonable job one way or the other. What pissed me off was your pretend logic:
"If something is binary, weapons or no weapons, it can be proved one way or the other."
'Cause that just ain't so.
Oh and see the other responder who brilliantly retorted on the issues of nessy, santy, monkey, and E.T.
It is extremely difficult to prove a negative, that was my entire point. You glibly indicated that it was just as easy to prove a negative as a positive, and you're wrong. Admitting it is the first step, dude.
Oh and by the way, you can't go back in time. Don't make me PWN3D you again, 'cause then it will be a whole big thing, and you'll look dumber and dumber and dumber. Get out while you can, dude.
What? You're the one who basically said, if it doesn't involve the US then I don't care.
"so it doesn't matter if the us is center of pure evil in the world or the us is a beacon of good, all that matters is that the us is a target. and its also pretty obvious that the us is the only one who's going to do something about it." (As if there was no response to Chechnya. Holy crap.)
"no really: stack up everything you've said, and throw in a few more anti-american sentiments. i am honestly responding: who cares. really, why should the us care what anyone else thinks? can you give me a solid, justifiable reason why anti-american sentiment should matter when confronted with a world environment that creates something like 9/11?"
"in other words, you show me indications that the us is unpopular in the world due to it invading iraq. well, 9/11 says to me that that the us has larger problems than a popularity contest. so invade iraq, and to hell with what you think, really. you're not helping us, so please, be my guest: go sit in a corner and talk abotu how evil americans are. so what? what can you offer me? you can't offer me any help, so i don't care what you think of me."
Now, you are the one who is freakishly centered on the U.S. You are interested in the world in only two divisions 1) those who attack us, 2) those who can help us kill them.
By ignoring everybody else, you are making more of Category 1, and ruining any chances of finding anyone in Category 2.
You're the one who said that if they don't directly relate to us, they don't matter. I was indicating that everything relates to us, in an attempt to prove to you that we need to pay more attention to what the world thinks, not less. I've focused on that one and only one point, because your first post was so blatantly "Island-Fortress U.S." that I felt I needed to show you the error of your ways.
If you want to criticize me, that's fine - but this laser-like focus that I've shown on How Things Affect Us was in direct response to your irrational argument that "the us not respected or liked, doesn't matter at all".
YOU TYPED THOSE WORDS. I've spent all of my effort on that one issue.
So your psychobable (It's "maladaptive", by the way), is understandibly predicated on the false belief that I only care about how things affect me; you seemed in your first post on the subject to be freakishly unaware of how the rest of the world affects you.
If you want to try to turn the tables here, then please go back and read this post of yours again. You sounded absolutely fricking nuts in it.
Ah yes, and before you get too far on that, remember that the current intelligence estimates are "best case: more of the same; worst case: civil war."
Civil war in Iraq will completely destabilize the region.
It's very similar to England withdrawing from India, actually. (Pakistan and India aren't very good friends, if you didn't notice.) We could very easily end up with a 3-way civil war in Iraq.
Also, I just want to point out that just about every Middle Eastern country is still technically at war with Israel. Attacking an enemy of Israel (Iraq) goes a long way towards making those nations feel that we are an enemy of theirs.
How in the world do you believe that "invading iraq" will somehow solve "the islamic world's problems"?
You would literally have to kill every Palestinian man, woman and child, for starters. (Or at least, you'd have to kill the 50% of them who currently believe that terrorist attacks on Israel will destroy the Israeli state, and remove it from the face of the earth, restoring Palestine to the Palestinians.)
Do you want to kill 2,311,204 people living on the West Bank, as your first step?
No?
Then tell me how anything that we're doing now in Iraq will "[solve] the problems we are confronted with"?
(I've connected the dots from Iraq to Palestine, because Saddam Hussein dreamed of destroying Israel, and perceived U.S. aggression against Iraq will fuel the fires of hatred towards the U.S. by the Palestinians - in addition to every other Islamic fundamentalist with a grudge.)
It's kind of like you're thinking is (to steal the Slashdot joke):
1. Invade Iraq 2. ??? 3. Proffit from Peace in the Middle East!
What's step 2? Because I can honestly tell you that invading Iraq moves you away from peace in the Middle East, not towards it.
al qaeda is not the ghost of us cold war sins past
Apparently, you are unaware of the fact that Al Qaeda is literally "the ghost of U.S. cold war sins past." We armed them to fight the Soviet Union. This pretty much decapitates your entire argument.
"orginal sin"
9/11 was not "original sin." These people hated us, and they thought they had a pretty good reason to do it.
if the us turned into a lake tomorrow, al qaeda would not celebrate and become pastoral sheep farmers. they would go right on with their agenda: bali, chechnya, madrid. capisce?
Well, first, they would celebrate - and second, the next stop on their list is Israel.
I think we should work towards a peaceful Middle East. Going to war in the Middle East will result in more basket cases, and breeding more terrorism, as increasing casualty rates in Iraq indicate.
9/11 says to me that that the us has larger problems than a popularity contest
You have presented no basis for why the 9/11 attacks occured. In fact, you've dismissed as irrational the belief that they attacked us because they didn't like us. So, what? They attacked us because they love us?
Even the most simple-minded terminology, such as "they don't like us" seems to be lost on you, and you attack me with "high school" criticism.
Idiot: I'm using dumbed-down terminology, and you can't even understand that.
Al Qaeda hates the United States and Israel, and pretty much everyone who doesn't believe in all power residing in the hands of their religious leaders. The U.S.'s perceived interference in Palestine was a major cause for the 9/11 attacks. The teachers of hatred are beginning their lessons when children can barely walk and talk. When we invade an Arab nation, unfortunately we will fuel their hatred. Does that mean we should never do it? Of course not. But we have to understand the issues. And when you start off this whole conversation by stating that "the us not respected or liked, doesn't matter at all", I call your argument BULL FUCKING SHIT. That is precisely the problem - these people hate us and want us to die. Can you explain it better? No? Then shut the fuck up.
Slashdot Mirror
If you don't believe in DNA evidence, then you're a stupid contrarian.
You better be pretty damn sure that someone is guilty if you're going to execute them for a crime, and if valid and trustworthy DNA evidence to the contrary doesn't lead you to have a "reasonable doubt" then you are not a reasonable person.
Let the nerd-dom begin.
;-)
I've seen it three times, so far.
I'm its Biggest Fan!
The two things that I've paid more attention to than when I first saw it: in Boundin' when the snow falls, the rattlesnake freezes. Cute. And the goldfish in the background when Edna talks to Helen were absolutely amazing.
Yoda and Old Ben had to go underground.
Heck, the Samurai were real-life superheroes who were outlawed by their government.
This is not a new theme.
Economically, we absolutely do annex countries.
We also prop up dictatorships.
And arm rebels.
Oh, and remember the genocide of the Native American? The one where we used biological warfare (smallpox-ridden blankets?)
Outlawing abortion over religious beliefs isn't the right thing to do.
Increasing the share of taxes paid by the Middle Class isn't the right thing to do.
Using crappy evidence to justify a war isn't the right thing to do. (Yellowcake, aluminum tubes.)
I'm not one of the "Blame America First" movement, as you might like to call me. I'm one of the "Ignore History At Your Own Peril" guys.
We have severely fucked people in the past, and we will severely fuck people in the future. It's important to figure out who's going to get screwed and how hard.
Palestinians? Screwed.
For the honesty you showed, I thank you.
If you take parenting seriously, you should have kids. We could use the help. And if you actually do a good job, we could use your kids' help, too. See, if people who take parenting seriously outcompete parents who don't take parenting seriously, that will be good.
To respond to your implicit charge, I think my job is pretty important; I try to improve the quality of health care (and decrease the cost).
This isn't some corporate agenda. This is a group of people trying to have fun together.
I am thinking long term - that's why I think people who take parenting seriously need to have children. I think you're making a mistake, and not thinking long term.
Everyone knows that any deep and lasting work of art takes an entire month to make.
Yeah, but unfortunately, the NaNoWriMo guys are wrong on that one: Picasso did it.
He painted the 55-x-38 inch oil on canvas in a single day, December 10, 1938.
(It sold for $50 million at Sotheby's.)
Wow, I didn't realize what an asshole you are, or I wouldn't have bothered responding to you.
Parents need to spend time with their kids. A parent who uses the logic, "Well, we went fishing last year" is an idiot. Parents should be making time to be near their kids, so they can be around when the kid needs them. A child doesn't know how to ask for help - it takes an observant parent to notice when a child has problems. Maybe you were talking about teenagers. A 5-year-old doesn't resent their parent's time, as long as they're given their own room and time and space as well.
The vast majority of aspiring authors never write a single novel. So, I disagree with your assertion that "they write one, and it's not so great."
This is a voluntary, fun idea for people who probably have NOT already written that first idea as you describe.
You've never had a deadline at work? Your job must be pretty menial - the kind that robots will be doing some day.
It doesn't cause harm to encourage people to be creative. Someone who thinks this way clearly has no creativity.
I think you need a Time Out.
It's kind of like parenthood: QUANTITY TIME is far, far better than QUALITY TIME.
A lot of people tell themselves that they're good parents, but never spend any time with their kids.
A lot of people tell themselves that they could write a great novel, but have never actually done it. I think this is a great idea, and if it weren't for the fact that November is the Absolute Worst Month at my job, I would be participating for sure. As it stands, I'm still thinking about participating.
Go pee on someone else's parade, orpx.
"I wrote a novel, it just hasn't been published yet." ... filled the last chapter with "lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu lu" to meet the word count.
Funny that you should mention "lu lu lu," as ANYONE can publish on Lulu.
So, do you set yourself a words-per-day quota, or just think of it in pages-per-day, or do you spend a certain amount of time every day working on it, or do you have an outline that you try to get through one subsection each day, or...?
I'm asking about you, Kibikitour, personally - what do you do?
Take a Software Engineering course. Seriously, I had a Software Engineering course where there was a team of three people, and we had to write BUCKETS of code in a quarter. The idea was that it would be so had to write it all, that you would HAVE TO cooperate, and that by following a Software Engineering practice, you could each write your code to spec, and have it all Just Work at the end of the quarter.
Well, when I took the course, I was working full time. I knew the quarter was going to be just AWFUL for me at work, but that first weekend after the assignment, I was totally free. And unfortunately, we HAD TO write our code in C++, but at the time I was kind of lacking in C++ skills, but an expert Borland Pascal user. So, I told the two guys on my team "If I write it all this weekend in Pascal, will you translate it to C++?" They laughingly agreed.
They stopped laughing on Monday morning as I handed them a HUGE pile of code. They literally spent the rest of the quarter translating to C++. And they kept making dumbass mistakes like writing pointers to disk, and then reloading the pointers into memory, and as they described it "that works MOST of the time." *shudder* If they had actually literally translated my code almost word-for-word into C++, they would have been fine.
Anyway, there's my story. Thought you might enjoy it.
And when you're done with your novel you can publish it on Lulu. I think Lulu is a fantastic idea, and I hope they don't go out of business.
This was the second space-reaching flight of SpaceShipOne. I'm sure Gordo knew about the first one.
The Right Stuff was one of the greatest movies of my childhood. I really enjoyed Hanks and Spielberg's From the Earth to the Moon, but I'll always have a special place in my heart for The Right Stuff.
Just a quick question: how many Americans have gone into space alone since Gordo, now?
The two guys from SpaceShipOne, right. Anyone else?
have faith in the leaders of our country or be labeled unpatriotic
"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."
-- Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials
Scary, huh?
By the way, the intelligence agencies should never present a position paper to the administration. They should always report on intelligence and the best estimation of the meaning of that intelligence. A position paper specifically ignores contradicting evidence, as you point out, and is therefore wildly inappropriate to present as the result of the labor of the intelligence community - especially if, as in this case, the best experts that you have disagree the most with the opinion presented.
Brilliant post. Kudos.
Thank you for your post.
I'm so sorry about your partner's friend.
Well said.
Again, I refer to my England/India/Pakistan analogy. England held them together and they hated it - with England gone civil war resulted, and the world was launched into another non-ending cycle of hatred and escalation.
It turns out that a secular tyranny is pretty effective at stopping holy wars. And we just decapitated the tyranny. I really fear that we will create a three-way war in present-day Iraq.
I know I shouldn't sink to the challenge...
But in Bush's case the "new decision" is to do the exact opposite of what he said he would do, based on the "new information" that stopping things like the Department of Homeland Security and the 9/11 Commission would result in an angry mob on the front lawn of the White House.
I said it in jest, but I kind of mean it: what "new information" could he have possibly gained about 9/11 Commission and the Department of Homeland Security, other than for instance bad polling numbers?
I don't object to the belief that we can do a reasonable job one way or the other. What pissed me off was your pretend logic:
"If something is binary, weapons or no weapons, it can be proved one way or the other."
'Cause that just ain't so.
Oh and see the other responder who brilliantly retorted on the issues of nessy, santy, monkey, and E.T.
It is extremely difficult to prove a negative, that was my entire point. You glibly indicated that it was just as easy to prove a negative as a positive, and you're wrong. Admitting it is the first step, dude.
Oh and by the way, you can't go back in time. Don't make me PWN3D you again, 'cause then it will be a whole big thing, and you'll look dumber and dumber and dumber. Get out while you can, dude.
Good 'un!
A | !A is of course true. D'oh!
What? You're the one who basically said, if it doesn't involve the US then I don't care.
"so it doesn't matter if the us is center of pure evil in the world or the us is a beacon of good, all that matters is that the us is a target. and its also pretty obvious that the us is the only one who's going to do something about it." (As if there was no response to Chechnya. Holy crap.)
"no really: stack up everything you've said, and throw in a few more anti-american sentiments. i am honestly responding: who cares. really, why should the us care what anyone else thinks? can you give me a solid, justifiable reason why anti-american sentiment should matter when confronted with a world environment that creates something like 9/11?"
"in other words, you show me indications that the us is unpopular in the world due to it invading iraq. well, 9/11 says to me that that the us has larger problems than a popularity contest. so invade iraq, and to hell with what you think, really. you're not helping us, so please, be my guest: go sit in a corner and talk abotu how evil americans are. so what? what can you offer me? you can't offer me any help, so i don't care what you think of me."
Now, you are the one who is freakishly centered on the U.S. You are interested in the world in only two divisions 1) those who attack us, 2) those who can help us kill them.
By ignoring everybody else, you are making more of Category 1, and ruining any chances of finding anyone in Category 2.
You're the one who said that if they don't directly relate to us, they don't matter. I was indicating that everything relates to us, in an attempt to prove to you that we need to pay more attention to what the world thinks, not less. I've focused on that one and only one point, because your first post was so blatantly "Island-Fortress U.S." that I felt I needed to show you the error of your ways.
If you want to criticize me, that's fine - but this laser-like focus that I've shown on How Things Affect Us was in direct response to your irrational argument that "the us not respected or liked, doesn't matter at all".
YOU TYPED THOSE WORDS. I've spent all of my effort on that one issue.
So your psychobable (It's "maladaptive", by the way), is understandibly predicated on the false belief that I only care about how things affect me; you seemed in your first post on the subject to be freakishly unaware of how the rest of the world affects you.
If you want to try to turn the tables here, then please go back and read this post of yours again. You sounded absolutely fricking nuts in it.
Ah yes, and before you get too far on that, remember that the current intelligence estimates are "best case: more of the same; worst case: civil war."
Civil war in Iraq will completely destabilize the region.
It's very similar to England withdrawing from India, actually. (Pakistan and India aren't very good friends, if you didn't notice.) We could very easily end up with a 3-way civil war in Iraq.
Also, I just want to point out that just about every Middle Eastern country is still technically at war with Israel. Attacking an enemy of Israel (Iraq) goes a long way towards making those nations feel that we are an enemy of theirs.
How in the world do you believe that "invading iraq" will somehow solve "the islamic world's problems"?
You would literally have to kill every Palestinian man, woman and child, for starters. (Or at least, you'd have to kill the 50% of them who currently believe that terrorist attacks on Israel will destroy the Israeli state, and remove it from the face of the earth, restoring Palestine to the Palestinians.)
Do you want to kill 2,311,204 people living on the West Bank, as your first step?
No?
Then tell me how anything that we're doing now in Iraq will "[solve] the problems we are confronted with"?
(I've connected the dots from Iraq to Palestine, because Saddam Hussein dreamed of destroying Israel, and perceived U.S. aggression against Iraq will fuel the fires of hatred towards the U.S. by the Palestinians - in addition to every other Islamic fundamentalist with a grudge.)
It's kind of like you're thinking is (to steal the Slashdot joke):
1. Invade Iraq
2. ???
3. Proffit from Peace in the Middle East!
What's step 2? Because I can honestly tell you that invading Iraq moves you away from peace in the Middle East, not towards it.
al qaeda is not the ghost of us cold war sins past
Apparently, you are unaware of the fact that Al Qaeda is literally "the ghost of U.S. cold war sins past." We armed them to fight the Soviet Union. This pretty much decapitates your entire argument.
"orginal sin"
9/11 was not "original sin." These people hated us, and they thought they had a pretty good reason to do it.
if the us turned into a lake tomorrow, al qaeda would not celebrate and become pastoral sheep farmers. they would go right on with their agenda: bali, chechnya, madrid. capisce?
Well, first, they would celebrate - and second, the next stop on their list is Israel.
I think we should work towards a peaceful Middle East. Going to war in the Middle East will result in more basket cases, and breeding more terrorism, as increasing casualty rates in Iraq indicate.
9/11 says to me that that the us has larger problems than a popularity contest
You have presented no basis for why the 9/11 attacks occured. In fact, you've dismissed as irrational the belief that they attacked us because they didn't like us. So, what? They attacked us because they love us?
Even the most simple-minded terminology, such as "they don't like us" seems to be lost on you, and you attack me with "high school" criticism.
Idiot: I'm using dumbed-down terminology, and you can't even understand that.
Al Qaeda hates the United States and Israel, and pretty much everyone who doesn't believe in all power residing in the hands of their religious leaders. The U.S.'s perceived interference in Palestine was a major cause for the 9/11 attacks. The teachers of hatred are beginning their lessons when children can barely walk and talk. When we invade an Arab nation, unfortunately we will fuel their hatred. Does that mean we should never do it? Of course not. But we have to understand the issues. And when you start off this whole conversation by stating that "the us not respected or liked, doesn't matter at all", I call your argument BULL FUCKING SHIT. That is precisely the problem - these people hate us and want us to die. Can you explain it better? No? Then shut the fuck up.