a buck or two? try $10-$15. and they use shitty electronics that fail more often than not. even if every incandescent was replaced with cfl, we'd still need a nuclear program.
You're lying. They don't cost anywhere near that much unless you're buying very specialized bulbs.
What brand are you using in your bathroom? I've been trying to use a mix of incandencent and CFLs in my light bar. I've tried every CFL brand I could find locally and they all suck. Most of them have had a shorter lifespan the the incandencents that they are right next to. They also take forever to warm up, and their light ouput drops off after about a month.
You shouldn't use CFLs in places where you turn the light on and off frequently, especially if it's often on for less than 15 minutes. So bathrooms, closets and the like are not good candidates for CFLs, as such use will dramatically reduce their lifespan. Use one of the newer, more efficient incandescents for those fixtures.
Also, the north is having a problem with the ban on incandescent light bulbs. Did you know that the heat from those things melted the snow from things light light posts and traffic lights? Yeah, LEDs don't. Kind of sucks not knowing who has the green light...
Was the snow hurting the light post? Are incandescents banned from use in traffic lights or street lights? What is your point?
Instead of banning incandescent bulbs because they are inefficient, why not simply ban inefficient bulbs? If incandescent bulbs can be made more efficient, it'd be silly to have to repeal or modify a law later.
That's exactly what they did. Guess who's lying to you...
Allow me, tender age of 31 with a case of old-man-itis, to show the superiority of the wrist watch.
--snip--
Well, you've shown that is can quickly inform you of the time. Bravo. I don't see the argument for its superiority though. Especially when I can pull my Evo out of my pocket while simultaneously pressing the power button, glance at the lock screen to see the time, and then place it back in my pocket. Not a terrible hardship there.
Oh, and I can also make phone calls, send email, check in for a flight, browse the net, read a book, find nearby places to eat, etc., all within seconds too. Let me know when your watch can do any of that. Unless your old-man-itis makes it undesirable to have a pocket device that does all that and more... I'll just get off your lawn now...:)
I've always worn a watch, never saw the point of lugging a cell phone around just to know the time,
Cell phones are known for having other functionality as well as being able to tell the time. I've never seen the point of strapping a somewhat functional piece of jewelry to my arm when I have a small device in my pocket that tells the time, as well as doing a hundred or more other things that I find useful.
In Switzerland there are 4.1 million employees (students and pupils should also be counted). Let's make the conservative assumption that 11 % of them have to assist to PowerPoint* presentations on a regular basis. In that context we will assume that the presentations take place twice a week on average and have an average number of 10 participants (in big companies and institutions like ABB, Novartis, the Army, and universities⦠. The average number of participants may be umpteen times higher). Let us further assume that not all but only 85 percent of the participants find that the presentations are killing motivation. We will then consider the Swiss average hourly rate of 56.30 CHF. These assumptions will give us an annual monetary destruction of
2.1 billion Swiss Francs!
I'm going to start a new party too! I'm calling it the Anti-Numbers-Pulled-Directly-From-Asses Party (ANPDFAP). Really, they aren't even trying here. Slide-show presentations aren't the problem. Poor management, research, writing and speaking skills are surely problems though. Unfortunately those are more difficult to address and don't lend themselves to easy scapegoats. These people need to find something more useful to do with their efforts.
Then again, maybe it's all just a big marketing ploy to sell this book.
Where will we get the gold (or other metals) after having thrown it all away? Mining landfills?
Seems inevitable. Of course by the time it's worth doing, we will have come up with ways to do it more efficiently than we do today. Probably a combination of bacterial, chemical, and mechanical processes to extract the usable stuff.
Being from Texas as well, I have to say that the parent post is seriously over-generalizing about the state. He uses the phrase "our culture" as if there is just one culture in Texas. That's not remotely the case. The culture and beliefs can vary wildly from town to town, and quite a bit within parts of the larger cities. For every laid-back, non-judgmental group you find, you can find another that will happily persecute the hell out of anyone who doesn't look, act, or believe exactly as they do. It's not the libertarian utopia that he makes it out to be.
I wouldn't say it hasn't made a difference. It's just that security is a never-ending job. It's not a problem that you "solve", any more than most other human problems. It's a problem that you have to continuously harp on, while trying to improve it from the technical side as well. And aside from infrequent anecdotes, I'm not aware of any studies indicating that throwing peoples information out in the clear is more effective than notifying companies.
Many of the flaws that were exploited were so basic, and have been known about for many years, that it's inconceivable that any serious thought was put into security. Yes, security a continuous process, but if you haven't even bothered to address the basics, then you are certainly to blame when someone takes advantage of that.
Those two statements are indeed different in theory. I have yet to encounter a difference when dealing with real live atheists. I am more interested in practice than in theory.
I happen to be a real live atheist. I put deities in the same category as unicorns or the Loch Ness Monster. Some people believe in it. I don't. I'm not saying that they certainly don't exist though. I'm simply saying that I have seen no convincing evidence of their existence. I know plenty of others that feel the same way. I'm not sure where you've gotten your understanding of atheist beliefs, and I understand that not all atheists believe exactly the same thing, but I think you're seriously overgeneralizing about the beliefs of that particular group.
I have nothing against anyone recording anything they want. I fail to see why anyone would have a problem with recording anything in that takes place in public. However, I do have a problem when people use unsupported accusations and anecdotal evidence to brand a large group of people as corrupt or dishonest. We tend to use the extremes on both sides of any argument to make a point while disregarding the large number of balanced opinions that actually represent the true will of the majority.
The extremes are often the issue though. The fact that police abuse is known to occur, in extreme cases, is exactly the reason why we need the ability to record the police. Maybe 99% of police interactions are above-board and in accordance with the law. When they aren't, though, the victims need to have the ability to defend themselves.
Given the apparent lack of training and knowledge of the law that has been displayed time and time again by police officers who attempt to prevent recording by citizens, or who abuse those citizens doing the recording, or who try to destroy the recordings, it's quite obvious that we have good reason to need the protection of recordings. We've seen similar training issues regarding laws in other areas, such as armed civilians, bicycle riders, etc. If the law is too difficult for the police to know and understand, how the hell is the public supposed to be accountable for knowing and understanding the law?
If you had an accomplice, it is likely that his name and phone number will be in your phone. Maybe the name and number of your fence. I'd say that there was sufficient probable cause for a warrant to search your phone. After all, they're also going to get a warrant to search your house for stolen property.
I didn't see anything said about getting a warrant before searching the phone for apps or anything else. Did you?
Dunno. Why are you making this assumption? The article talks about preserving potential evidence after an arrest but before the warrant is issued. You'll also lose your wallet and other contents of your pockets when you get booked, why would you think a phone would be exempt?
Confiscating the phone, and searching it for apps or recordings, etc, are two very different things. If you understand that, then I have no idea why you'd make that remark.
You don't watch the news much, then. Or you can't recognize cuts when you see them.
Provide some evidence to back up your claims. Spotting edited videos is usually not that hard, especially amateur videos.
It's sad that you think that there is no possible way that any YouTube video could have been edited, even as simple an edit as to forget to post the first ten minutes of the cop/citizen interaction. You know, the part where the citizen is actively resisting arrest or doing something else violent, while the cop tries less physical means of dealing with it. You think that the interaction started with the citizen in a choke hold being handcuffed, because obviously the citizen could never have done anything to merit such treatment, and obviously the interaction began at that point in time and could not possibly have started before that.
How is this an argument for preventing video evidence? You could say the same thing about video from a police camera. If the video doesn't show the start of the interaction, then it's pretty obvious that things could have happened before the recording started. At that point we're back to witness testimony. More video evidence is better. Doctored video can be easily detected.
If you're in public, especially in a public job interacting with people, you shouldn't have any expectation of privacy. If I'm out in public, anyone can record me too. If I'm recorded breaking the law, I can be arrested. I don't see why it should be any different for the police. If anything, they should be held to a higher standard because of the authority and powers that they have in their jobs.
I doubt you would accept any argument or proof showing all police officers are rights violating abusers of innocents. You, like a lot of people on this thread assume all police officers are corrupt liars and then base your comments from that starting point.
Not all police officers, but enough of them that the public has reason to want protection for themselves. Funny how the cops' cameras always seem to malfunction when someone claims that they were a victim of police brutality or other abuse. Suddenly they can't retrieve the video from the car's camera. If they can't even keep their damn cameras working properly, they should be thanking us for providing that service for them with our own cameras. If they wish to counter our video evidence, perhaps they should fix their equipment so that they can present their own evidence. I'd rather see both sides in court. The more evidence we can look at, the better.
The biggest problem with these limits is the 50 item backpack. There's way over 50 non-stock weapons so you can't have all the variety of a Premium account with a free account.
If it's that important to you, then spend a couple bucks and get a premium account. Problem solved.
The only things you can buy in-game is stuff that you can earn with enough gameplay.
Besides, all of those items have trade-offs versus standard kit. It's not like you can buy a gun for each class that clearly bests anything else.
Don't really agree with this. There are some weapons that are just clearly better. The Dead Ringer and Your Eternal Reward are clearly better than the default spy weapons. Same with the Backburner and Axtinguisher for the Pyro. There are other examples as well, but the list would start getting long. Bottom line is that there are plenty of weapons out there for some of the classes that make the default weapons seem pretty useless.
Being an atheist is not a form of belonging to any group. Being a Christian is. In fact, being an atheist is a form of abstaining from participating in a certain category of groups (those based on faith).
Semantics. Does it matter? It's a personal decision that many Christians will bash you for. It doesn't matter whether a lack of belief in gods makes you a member of a formal group or not. That personal belief is enough to earn you ridicule from all sorts of religious-minded folks.
Oh, yeah, I forgot: Christian-Bashing is the last acceptable and politically-correct form of prejudice and ignorant hatred.
Hardly. Quit crying until Christians quit bashing atheists or pagans or anyone else they feel is a godless heathen. You're not even remotely close to the bottom of the pile.
Judging by the last attempt, even those politicians who will get re-elected for supporting nationalized healthcare are incapable of doing it sensibly.
The problem with the dems is that they seem completely incompetent when it comes to framing debates and negotiating with the minority party. They could have pushed for, and likely gotten, a much better piece of legislation than what we got. Taking single-payer off the table before even getting started was just stupid beyond belief. Instead we have this thing that has almost as much bad stuff as good stuff in it. They left too many things as the status quo, and caved to the insurance industry far too cheaply and easily.
Certainly it can get better. The main point, however, was that the "free market" does not exist in the insurance industry. Not even close. It's like blaming Lichtenstein for the way our government runs. It's a complete non sequitur.
The main point is that we, as a country, have determined that health care is a right. We don't turn people in need of care away from the emergency room. We treat them in the most horribly expensive and inefficient way possible, and pass the costs on to the insurance companies and the government, who pass it on to their customers and taxpayers respectively, so if you're a taxpaying insurance company customer, you're really getting screwed. If we would just go ahead with a universal health care plan that actually makes sense, instead of the ridiculous way we do it now, we could save a ton of money and end up with much better outcomes.
I have a feeling you have a difficulty of discerning between being discriminated upon due to being in a group AND being in a group due to disability of some kind.
Correlation does not a causation make.
I have a feeling that you think that being in a group because you are disabled, and being discriminated against are mutually exclusive. They aren't. Every one of the groups you listed have experienced discrimination on a wide scale.
I have a feeling you have a difficulty of discerning between terms like "good" and ones that mean "easy" and "quick".
I have a feeling that you don't understand that your supposed centuries-hence solutions don't do anything for those who are being discriminated against today, and are therefore not good for those people. It is a massive injustice to allow that to continue without doing something to compensate for it.
There is no "country".
That's an imaginary distinction applied on a geographical area, a product of treaties and agreements - while the problem is actually of psychological and sociological nature of the humanity as a whole, and of every single person as a part of the said humanity.
There most certainly are countries, often with their own distinct cultures, prejudices and groups against whom they discriminate. Those who are discriminated against in one country may be of the same group as those who are discriminating against other groups in another country. Those that are discriminated against, may also discriminate against others. It varies from place to place and culture to culture.
As for the people who end up responsible for the global problems we're experiencing - they don't spend their free time twirling their mustache dreaming up evil schemes and plans how to kill Superman.
The most tragic thing is they are actually trying to help and make things better most of the time
Some of them are probably genuinely trying to do the right thing. Many are just seeking power though. Those who lack empathy tend to be quite good at climbing the ranks. You seem to have forgotten how many people have done so much to fight against equal rights and treatment for others. They feel that by allowing others to advance and succeed, it lowers their own chances of success, or they just don't like people who are different. These people were not trying to make things better for us as a whole, but only for themselves and those that they feel are like them, and they select leaders that do the same.
It's just that they are doing their planing and executing their actions based on faulty data, bad ideas, wrong assumptions and plain old wishful thinking and arrogance combined with the need to fix everything instantly.
You know... like in the next two years at the most, cause they will need next two years of their term to campaign for the next term.
And cause the public wants it all done yesterday. With no effort or responsibility on their part.
No, some of the public wants it done, others don't want it done. Failure to recognize that fact will lead to failure to predict and plan for the roadblocks that will be erected by others to prevent any plan from succeeding. I agree that short-term solutions are not going to solve the problem, but I think that they are a necessary part of the long-term solution. Denying people justice now, and possibly for decades or centuries to come, is no way for a society to behave, and will only lead to further problems stemming from the discontent of those being discriminated against.
While the short-term solutions may not solve the problem, they can at least remedy some of the symptoms of the problem until a long-term solution has obviated the need for such short-term solutions. Kinda like taking medicine to control your symptoms while you're waiting for your body to fight off an illness.
There ARE solutions but they are VERY hard and none
Slashdot Mirror
a buck or two? try $10-$15. and they use shitty electronics that fail more often than not. even if every incandescent was replaced with cfl, we'd still need a nuclear program.
You're lying. They don't cost anywhere near that much unless you're buying very specialized bulbs.
What brand are you using in your bathroom? I've been trying to use a mix of incandencent and CFLs in my light bar. I've tried every CFL brand I could find locally and they all suck. Most of them have had a shorter lifespan the the incandencents that they are right next to. They also take forever to warm up, and their light ouput drops off after about a month.
You shouldn't use CFLs in places where you turn the light on and off frequently, especially if it's often on for less than 15 minutes. So bathrooms, closets and the like are not good candidates for CFLs, as such use will dramatically reduce their lifespan. Use one of the newer, more efficient incandescents for those fixtures.
Also, the north is having a problem with the ban on incandescent light bulbs. Did you know that the heat from those things melted the snow from things light light posts and traffic lights? Yeah, LEDs don't. Kind of sucks not knowing who has the green light...
Was the snow hurting the light post? Are incandescents banned from use in traffic lights or street lights? What is your point?
Yes there is. The "standards" were made up so that the incandescents would fail.
There are incandescents on the shelf today that meet the standards. Try again.
Instead of banning incandescent bulbs because they are inefficient, why not simply ban inefficient bulbs? If incandescent bulbs can be made more efficient, it'd be silly to have to repeal or modify a law later.
That's exactly what they did. Guess who's lying to you...
Allow me, tender age of 31 with a case of old-man-itis, to show the superiority of the wrist watch. --snip--
Well, you've shown that is can quickly inform you of the time. Bravo. I don't see the argument for its superiority though. Especially when I can pull my Evo out of my pocket while simultaneously pressing the power button, glance at the lock screen to see the time, and then place it back in my pocket. Not a terrible hardship there.
Oh, and I can also make phone calls, send email, check in for a flight, browse the net, read a book, find nearby places to eat, etc., all within seconds too. Let me know when your watch can do any of that. Unless your old-man-itis makes it undesirable to have a pocket device that does all that and more... I'll just get off your lawn now... :)
In addition, having a watch during a meeting is a-ok. Having a cellphone turned on is being an ass.
Having an un-silenced phone may be being an ass, but I've never seen anyone bothered by someone just checking the time.
I've always worn a watch, never saw the point of lugging a cell phone around just to know the time,
Cell phones are known for having other functionality as well as being able to tell the time. I've never seen the point of strapping a somewhat functional piece of jewelry to my arm when I have a small device in my pocket that tells the time, as well as doing a hundred or more other things that I find useful.
From the APPP site:
In Switzerland there are 4.1 million employees (students and pupils should also be counted). Let's make the conservative assumption that 11 % of them have to assist to PowerPoint* presentations on a regular basis. In that context we will assume that the presentations take place twice a week on average and have an average number of 10 participants (in big companies and institutions like ABB, Novartis, the Army, and universities⦠. The average number of participants may be umpteen times higher). Let us further assume that not all but only 85 percent of the participants find that the presentations are killing motivation. We will then consider the Swiss average hourly rate of 56.30 CHF. These assumptions will give us an annual monetary destruction of 2.1 billion Swiss Francs!
I'm going to start a new party too! I'm calling it the Anti-Numbers-Pulled-Directly-From-Asses Party (ANPDFAP). Really, they aren't even trying here. Slide-show presentations aren't the problem. Poor management, research, writing and speaking skills are surely problems though. Unfortunately those are more difficult to address and don't lend themselves to easy scapegoats. These people need to find something more useful to do with their efforts.
Then again, maybe it's all just a big marketing ploy to sell this book.
Where will we get the gold (or other metals) after having thrown it all away? Mining landfills?
Seems inevitable. Of course by the time it's worth doing, we will have come up with ways to do it more efficiently than we do today. Probably a combination of bacterial, chemical, and mechanical processes to extract the usable stuff.
Being from Texas as well, I have to say that the parent post is seriously over-generalizing about the state. He uses the phrase "our culture" as if there is just one culture in Texas. That's not remotely the case. The culture and beliefs can vary wildly from town to town, and quite a bit within parts of the larger cities. For every laid-back, non-judgmental group you find, you can find another that will happily persecute the hell out of anyone who doesn't look, act, or believe exactly as they do. It's not the libertarian utopia that he makes it out to be.
[Citation Needed] for pretty much everything you said.
I wouldn't say it hasn't made a difference. It's just that security is a never-ending job. It's not a problem that you "solve", any more than most other human problems. It's a problem that you have to continuously harp on, while trying to improve it from the technical side as well. And aside from infrequent anecdotes, I'm not aware of any studies indicating that throwing peoples information out in the clear is more effective than notifying companies.
Many of the flaws that were exploited were so basic, and have been known about for many years, that it's inconceivable that any serious thought was put into security. Yes, security a continuous process, but if you haven't even bothered to address the basics, then you are certainly to blame when someone takes advantage of that.
Those two statements are indeed different in theory. I have yet to encounter a difference when dealing with real live atheists. I am more interested in practice than in theory.
I happen to be a real live atheist. I put deities in the same category as unicorns or the Loch Ness Monster. Some people believe in it. I don't. I'm not saying that they certainly don't exist though. I'm simply saying that I have seen no convincing evidence of their existence. I know plenty of others that feel the same way. I'm not sure where you've gotten your understanding of atheist beliefs, and I understand that not all atheists believe exactly the same thing, but I think you're seriously overgeneralizing about the beliefs of that particular group.
I have nothing against anyone recording anything they want. I fail to see why anyone would have a problem with recording anything in that takes place in public. However, I do have a problem when people use unsupported accusations and anecdotal evidence to brand a large group of people as corrupt or dishonest. We tend to use the extremes on both sides of any argument to make a point while disregarding the large number of balanced opinions that actually represent the true will of the majority.
The extremes are often the issue though. The fact that police abuse is known to occur, in extreme cases, is exactly the reason why we need the ability to record the police. Maybe 99% of police interactions are above-board and in accordance with the law. When they aren't, though, the victims need to have the ability to defend themselves.
Given the apparent lack of training and knowledge of the law that has been displayed time and time again by police officers who attempt to prevent recording by citizens, or who abuse those citizens doing the recording, or who try to destroy the recordings, it's quite obvious that we have good reason to need the protection of recordings. We've seen similar training issues regarding laws in other areas, such as armed civilians, bicycle riders, etc. If the law is too difficult for the police to know and understand, how the hell is the public supposed to be accountable for knowing and understanding the law?
If you had an accomplice, it is likely that his name and phone number will be in your phone. Maybe the name and number of your fence. I'd say that there was sufficient probable cause for a warrant to search your phone. After all, they're also going to get a warrant to search your house for stolen property.
I didn't see anything said about getting a warrant before searching the phone for apps or anything else. Did you?
Dunno. Why are you making this assumption? The article talks about preserving potential evidence after an arrest but before the warrant is issued. You'll also lose your wallet and other contents of your pockets when you get booked, why would you think a phone would be exempt?
Confiscating the phone, and searching it for apps or recordings, etc, are two very different things. If you understand that, then I have no idea why you'd make that remark.
You don't watch the news much, then. Or you can't recognize cuts when you see them.
Provide some evidence to back up your claims. Spotting edited videos is usually not that hard, especially amateur videos.
It's sad that you think that there is no possible way that any YouTube video could have been edited, even as simple an edit as to forget to post the first ten minutes of the cop/citizen interaction. You know, the part where the citizen is actively resisting arrest or doing something else violent, while the cop tries less physical means of dealing with it. You think that the interaction started with the citizen in a choke hold being handcuffed, because obviously the citizen could never have done anything to merit such treatment, and obviously the interaction began at that point in time and could not possibly have started before that.
How is this an argument for preventing video evidence? You could say the same thing about video from a police camera. If the video doesn't show the start of the interaction, then it's pretty obvious that things could have happened before the recording started. At that point we're back to witness testimony. More video evidence is better. Doctored video can be easily detected.
If you're in public, especially in a public job interacting with people, you shouldn't have any expectation of privacy. If I'm out in public, anyone can record me too. If I'm recorded breaking the law, I can be arrested. I don't see why it should be any different for the police. If anything, they should be held to a higher standard because of the authority and powers that they have in their jobs.
I doubt you would accept any argument or proof showing all police officers are rights violating abusers of innocents. You, like a lot of people on this thread assume all police officers are corrupt liars and then base your comments from that starting point.
Not all police officers, but enough of them that the public has reason to want protection for themselves. Funny how the cops' cameras always seem to malfunction when someone claims that they were a victim of police brutality or other abuse. Suddenly they can't retrieve the video from the car's camera. If they can't even keep their damn cameras working properly, they should be thanking us for providing that service for them with our own cameras. If they wish to counter our video evidence, perhaps they should fix their equipment so that they can present their own evidence. I'd rather see both sides in court. The more evidence we can look at, the better.
The biggest problem with these limits is the 50 item backpack. There's way over 50 non-stock weapons so you can't have all the variety of a Premium account with a free account.
If it's that important to you, then spend a couple bucks and get a premium account. Problem solved.
The only things you can buy in-game is stuff that you can earn with enough gameplay. Besides, all of those items have trade-offs versus standard kit. It's not like you can buy a gun for each class that clearly bests anything else.
Don't really agree with this. There are some weapons that are just clearly better. The Dead Ringer and Your Eternal Reward are clearly better than the default spy weapons. Same with the Backburner and Axtinguisher for the Pyro. There are other examples as well, but the list would start getting long. Bottom line is that there are plenty of weapons out there for some of the classes that make the default weapons seem pretty useless.
Being an atheist is not a form of belonging to any group. Being a Christian is. In fact, being an atheist is a form of abstaining from participating in a certain category of groups (those based on faith).
Semantics. Does it matter? It's a personal decision that many Christians will bash you for. It doesn't matter whether a lack of belief in gods makes you a member of a formal group or not. That personal belief is enough to earn you ridicule from all sorts of religious-minded folks.
Oh, yeah, I forgot: Christian-Bashing is the last acceptable and politically-correct form of prejudice and ignorant hatred.
Hardly. Quit crying until Christians quit bashing atheists or pagans or anyone else they feel is a godless heathen. You're not even remotely close to the bottom of the pile.
Judging by the last attempt, even those politicians who will get re-elected for supporting nationalized healthcare are incapable of doing it sensibly.
The problem with the dems is that they seem completely incompetent when it comes to framing debates and negotiating with the minority party. They could have pushed for, and likely gotten, a much better piece of legislation than what we got. Taking single-payer off the table before even getting started was just stupid beyond belief. Instead we have this thing that has almost as much bad stuff as good stuff in it. They left too many things as the status quo, and caved to the insurance industry far too cheaply and easily.
Certainly it can get better. The main point, however, was that the "free market" does not exist in the insurance industry. Not even close. It's like blaming Lichtenstein for the way our government runs. It's a complete non sequitur.
The main point is that we, as a country, have determined that health care is a right. We don't turn people in need of care away from the emergency room. We treat them in the most horribly expensive and inefficient way possible, and pass the costs on to the insurance companies and the government, who pass it on to their customers and taxpayers respectively, so if you're a taxpaying insurance company customer, you're really getting screwed. If we would just go ahead with a universal health care plan that actually makes sense, instead of the ridiculous way we do it now, we could save a ton of money and end up with much better outcomes.
I have a feeling you have a difficulty of discerning between being discriminated upon due to being in a group AND being in a group due to disability of some kind. Correlation does not a causation make.
I have a feeling that you think that being in a group because you are disabled, and being discriminated against are mutually exclusive. They aren't. Every one of the groups you listed have experienced discrimination on a wide scale.
I have a feeling you have a difficulty of discerning between terms like "good" and ones that mean "easy" and "quick".
I have a feeling that you don't understand that your supposed centuries-hence solutions don't do anything for those who are being discriminated against today, and are therefore not good for those people. It is a massive injustice to allow that to continue without doing something to compensate for it.
There is no "country". That's an imaginary distinction applied on a geographical area, a product of treaties and agreements - while the problem is actually of psychological and sociological nature of the humanity as a whole, and of every single person as a part of the said humanity.
There most certainly are countries, often with their own distinct cultures, prejudices and groups against whom they discriminate. Those who are discriminated against in one country may be of the same group as those who are discriminating against other groups in another country. Those that are discriminated against, may also discriminate against others. It varies from place to place and culture to culture.
As for the people who end up responsible for the global problems we're experiencing - they don't spend their free time twirling their mustache dreaming up evil schemes and plans how to kill Superman. The most tragic thing is they are actually trying to help and make things better most of the time
Some of them are probably genuinely trying to do the right thing. Many are just seeking power though. Those who lack empathy tend to be quite good at climbing the ranks. You seem to have forgotten how many people have done so much to fight against equal rights and treatment for others. They feel that by allowing others to advance and succeed, it lowers their own chances of success, or they just don't like people who are different. These people were not trying to make things better for us as a whole, but only for themselves and those that they feel are like them, and they select leaders that do the same.
It's just that they are doing their planing and executing their actions based on faulty data, bad ideas, wrong assumptions and plain old wishful thinking and arrogance combined with the need to fix everything instantly. You know... like in the next two years at the most, cause they will need next two years of their term to campaign for the next term. And cause the public wants it all done yesterday. With no effort or responsibility on their part.
No, some of the public wants it done, others don't want it done. Failure to recognize that fact will lead to failure to predict and plan for the roadblocks that will be erected by others to prevent any plan from succeeding. I agree that short-term solutions are not going to solve the problem, but I think that they are a necessary part of the long-term solution. Denying people justice now, and possibly for decades or centuries to come, is no way for a society to behave, and will only lead to further problems stemming from the discontent of those being discriminated against.
While the short-term solutions may not solve the problem, they can at least remedy some of the symptoms of the problem until a long-term solution has obviated the need for such short-term solutions. Kinda like taking medicine to control your symptoms while you're waiting for your body to fight off an illness.
There ARE solutions but they are VERY hard and none