Nope, N810 can also act as a (non-powered) USB host, and also has Bluetooth (I'm quite confident, since it talks to my Bluetooth keyboard pretty darned well:-).
N810 has a single rather than dual SDHC slot (the N800 had dual slots, not sure why they dropped that in the N810), slide-out keyboard (rather than clamshell design), and same resolution screen, but lacks the gaming controls and DSP.
N810 runs Maemo Linux (with GTK+ graphics), though I believe a port of Ubuntu is available or in-work, and is about the same price. Looks about the same size.
Biggest difference to me (other than N810 being a third generation device shipping in volume) - N810 has an official Palm Garnet emulator that runs all those games I bought in my Treo days. It'd be a Good Thing is Access would port that to Pandora as well.
They look pretty similar to me. N810 topped Amazon's Electronics best seller list a while back. If Pandora is well-implemented and can get some marketing behind it, it could do well. I hope so - Choice Is Good.
It may not have worked for you, but I went through three Treos (100, 300, and 650), and every one of them served as my daily alarm clock with no surprises. Played a mean game of Hexwar, too (have to rely on the Garnet emulator on my N800 for my Hexwar fix nowadays).:-)
Wouldn't the contents of the Weekly World News challenge your world views
Look, you needn't be so open-minded that your brain falls out. WWN (may it rest in peace) was a delightfully farcical tabloid intentionally written as humor; it wasn't intended to be taken seriously. If you're seriously comparing the WWN to Fox News, then you're so far too the left that everything looks like a vast right-wing conspiracy.
"Seventy percent of those surveyed gave CNN the highest rankings for believability, the most for any broadcast or cable news network, according to the Pew Research Center, followed by MSNBC at 63% and Fox News Channel with 59%."
Of course, surveys have their limits - "just 20% [of Americans] know that the Democrats have a majority in the House of Representatives", a common problem among "8 disastrous years of Republicans" Slashdotters.;-)
I don't watch news for the same reasons you complain about ABC (which apply to all news outlets).
And in that parenthetical, I suspect, we do agree. They're all necessarily biased in some way. Though I don't watch news very much at all, I do read news - a lot of news - and rather than read sources that conform to my world view, I actively seek that which challenges it from all political ends. It's the best way to understand those with whom I disagree. And occasionally, I actually change my opinion as well.
Your choice of analogies is delightful. If Fox's New York evening sky line were a lovely shade of pink, and your California afternoon sky was bright blue, I suspect from the tone of your post you would claim, "Fox lied AGAIN!"
When your world view is challenged, you can respond with protectionism - or you can examine your world view from a different perspective and perhaps learn something. The original article, I think, states that most people respond with protectionist zeal rather than an open mind, and that makes changes to their way of thinking rather rare. More's the pity.
(That said, of course, I'm now driven to go watch Fox News a couple of nights and see for myself what their approach is. Something else to take me away for what I really want to do.)
Fox has sued to be able to present known lies as fact during TV broadcasts (and it won)
This was an interesting and rather serious accusation. I wasn't familiar with the lawsuit (I don't care much about TV news), so I looked up the appellate court decision. The decision describes the basis of the lawsuit as:
Each time the station asked Wilson and Akre to provide supporting documentation for
statements in the story or to make changes in the content of the story, the reporters
accused the station of attempting to distort the story to favor the manufacturer of BGH.
I don't know Fox, but the appellate court seems to have found that the news director insisted that the reporters provide a basis for their assertions, and failing to provide them, demanded that the story not include them. (Fox won on a different point, though - you can't sue under "whistle blower" statutes unless an actual "rule" was violated.) Your interpretation of that legal determination as "Fox has sued to be able to present known lies" indicates one heck of a lot of bias!
I suspect Fox leans right in the same way that ABC (for example) leans left. The day Palin was selected, I listened to ABC News for 45 minutes (as well as about 10 minutes each of Limbaugh and Hannity, whom I could only describe as "giddy"). The remarkable thing about ABC was that, for 45 straight minutes, they had nothing positive to say about Palin at all. She may not be your favorite candidate, but she does have several assets as a Republican VP pick along side McCain (executive rather than legislative experience, a record as a maverick and reformer even against her own party, a clear dedication to the core values that Republicans tout such as "life"). To not find one positive thing to say on a newscast of that length strikes me as just as biased as you claim Fox News to be. Of course, you didn't dispute that, so perhaps I'm only assuming you believe non-Fox networks are fair and unbiased, and perhaps you recognize bias in all media.
In any event, since TV news has limited time, some type of bias (ahem, criteria) is pretty much required to fit the news into 30 minutes. I think having newscasts with a range of criteria is a Good Thing. As long as you characterize the perspective of your news sources, and keep them varied, you'll be ahead of the "most people" in the original study.
So you're saying that the other network news shows are basically a version of Ted Rall, who last week seriously advocated that the government forcibly abort any babies carried by women under 25 years old? (You needn't answer, I'm sure you don't - you just left the impression too strongly not to comment.)
And I suspect my "good point of reference" is quite different from yours. I tend to oppose a large federal government and powerful corporations, and strongly support personal responsibility and liberty. D's tend to favor a large federal government; R's powerful corporations. And you? What's your bias?:-)
Not a'tall. Rather, simply recognizing your own biases enables you to better evaluate the biases of others. The OP addresses Fox News bias as if he had the one true, clear, unbiased view. That's incredibly naive.
For example, the OP and you would probably assert that the lack of a successful terrorist attack on US soil in the past 7 years is proof the terrorist threat is over-stated, and criticize the President for infringing on our liberties unnecessarily.
Fox News would probably take the view that the same events demonstrates that the President's actions were both warranted and successful.
Both assertions are biased by world views. But you needn't lose track of reality at all - REALITY is that we haven't had a successful terrorist attack on US soil in the past 7 years. Whether the President's actions are to credit or beside the point is an exercise eventually left to the electorate and historians.
As an amusing aside, I see that I have finally drawn the wrath of the Obama Death Squads, as evidenced by the crush of Overrated mods drowning out the Interesting and Underrated ones. Although I'm much more Libertarian that Republican, it's always the zealot Democrats with their "Equal Access" and "Hate Speech" laws that most credibly threaten free speech in my experience. Just my $0.02. Mod away.
I found your post Interesting as well, but probably for different reasons than many others.
TV news has a mandate to be unbiased
What is "unbiased"? TV news is constrained to a few stories briefly presented relative to other sources such as the Internet. Given few stories of few words, the choice of those stories and words must necessarily reflect a bias of some type. The news organizations call it "criteria", though, since it sounds more palatable.;-)
It so over exaggerates the current level of the "terrorist threat" to America
Where would I find the scientifically verifiable, unbiased model that accurately portrays the threat of a terrorist attack against Americans? Without such a model, how do you know that Fox is exaggerating the threat? Historians will render a verdict eventually, but we're too close to events to make such a call independent of our biases.
emotional rhetoric deliberately aimed at misinforming the viewer
How do you know it's deliberate? Is your anti-Fox emotional rhetoric aimed at misinforming your reader or at pointing out a very real problem - and doesn't your answer to that question reflect your own biases?
level of dishonest manipulation
Your choice of words - "dishonest", "misinform", "emotional" - demonstrates that Fox News is causing you some serious cognitive dissonance. I think if you honestly assess your post, you'll recognize that your world view was challenged, and you clung with great determination and emotional verbiage to what you previously believed.
In other words, your post proves the validity of the article.:-) That's interesting!
(Disclaimer: I don't watch TV news, and I read Ted Rall and Ann Coulter and everyone in between just to keep my cognitives well-dissonanced. Perhaps that explains my quirky world view!;-)
Facts are what they are, only "stupid" if you hate the implications. All of your caveats were in my original post. I'm reporting the numbers from their income tax returns, which must be accurate under penalty of law (from which rich people aren't excluded, just ask Spiro Agnew).
And the source of Mrs. McCain's income is irrelevant - if they file separately, then all of their income and charitable giving is reported separately as well. That's the law.
Actually, I though Obama's giving was pretty reasonable in 2006 and 2007, especially relative to Democrats like Al Gore. The average American gives about 3.5%, so it's above-average. As a self-described Christian, I would have expected him to give at least 10%, but that's between him and God. I was just responding to the OP's claim that McCain wasn't charitable.
McCain's numbers are his own, from his tax return. His wife's income and charitable giving are excluded, because she's not a candidate for public office and thus not required to release her personal records.
No games, just the numbers to which both candidates are legally obligated to report accurately upon penalty of the Wrath of the IRS.
And if you think you will get *any* change from an old man who has been in Office 30 years...
In the past two years, Senator and Mrs. McCain have contributed $340,323 to charitable causes, according to their tax returns (they file separately). Senator McCain's giving constituted about 28 percent of his income for each of those two years.
From 2000 through 2004, Senator Obama and his wife contributed less than $3,500 a year in charitable donations -- about 1 percent of their annual earnings (they were paying off student loans according to their spokesman). In 2006, however, that total jumped to to $60,307 (6.1 percent) and to $240,370 (5.8 percent) in 2007. (Sorry, couldn't find their tax returns on his website - anybody got that link?)
McCain earned $396,527, paid $118,660 (30.7%) in taxes,and gave $105,467 (27.3%) to charity.
Obama earned $4,139,965, paid $1,396,772 (33.7%) in taxes, and gave $240,370 (5.8%) to charity
I'm not criticizing either candidate here, just pointing out the facts.
No top secret military data. But if people were disappearing to some secret US military installation for unspeakable torture, wouldn't their friends or relatives notice?
But then, you're admitting it's an irrational fear. So's my claustrophobia. Who am I to critique?:-)
I'm a lot more scared of being abducted and held without trial by my own government than dying in a tiny terrorist attack; this is no more or less rational than someone with the opposite fears
I find this an interesting assertion. Are you claiming that we have no statistics on the risk of dying in a terrorist attack or the risk of unconstitutional incarceration in the USA? Or have you just not checked the statistics?
(I haven't checked the statistics myself; but of course, I'm not the slightest afraid of either.:-)
Despite the ad-selling headlines you've apparently been reading, the "current condition" of the United States is neither desperate nor hopeless.
We have a stable republican government, a massive GDP, an industrious and reasonably well-educated work force, solid infrastructure (utilities, transportation, commerce, etc.), a strong university-based R&D system awash in basic science available to exploit, and a long tradition of creatively overcoming both internal and external challenges.
The financials have been rocky of late, sure, which makes this a great time to invest (remember, it's buy low, sell high - now is "low" relative to last year (though not 2006), so I'm buying). I sold Lockheed Martin stock in February at just over $110 a share, and it closed today slightly higher than my selling price. Darn it.
What is irrational is your belief that the USA is suddenly unable to operate all of the successful space missions that we are currently operating.
My DVD drive came with decoder software and a codec license. The XP software immage that came pre-installed on the salvaged machine (and is still set up as dual boot) had DVD codecs licensed. How many dang codec licenses do I need before they stop trying to slap a patch on my eye and a sword on my belt?!?
Hmmm... could be. But with the current of those voters all headed in the right direction (from McCain's point of view), it still looks like a brilliant selection from the usual "What can I do to get elected?" perspective.
Actually, a surprising (to me) number of Hillary supports are switching to McCain / Palin - for example, this Washington Post - ABC News poll records an 18 point swing among white women after Palin was selected by McCain. (I'm surprised, because Clinton and Palin are almost 180 degrees apart on so many issues.)
Surely the OP doesn't believe that an intelligent being almost creating life is somehow threatening to those who believe life was created by an intelligent being?
I think science should also try and database as many species as it can especially since many species are dying off before they're being cataloged.
Perhaps saving a healthy sample set of DNA would enable future advances to recover them from extinction? (I'm not a biologist, but I certainly enjoyed Jurassic Park.:-)
Bingo, because you're asking for a load of new government regulation to "save" us. The problem with that "solution" is that it's government regulation and subsidies that screwed up the US transportation system in the first place.
Howzabout we kick the government out of the transportation sector entirely (except for safety and consumer protection roles) and let the travelers select the best options with their own dollars?
And Biblically illiterate. (Though perhaps you didn't realize it is a Biblical allusion?) Anti-Christians are particularly fond of quoting that phrase out of context, as if it prohibits Christians from discerning and advocating what is morally right, or participating in political debate.
1"Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
3"Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.
It's a condemnation of hypocrisy, not a prohibition against discerning morality or participating in politics. Pretty humorous, too, that image of an ophthalmologist with a 2x4 stuck in his eye trying to remove a spec of sawdust from someone else's eye.:-)
When you support abortion for any and every reason, it's pretty hard to buy your contention that you value prenatal life. But if you insist that you simply value it less that the mother's right to end it, I'll accept you at your word.
Finally, your analogy of the transcontinental railroad as an example of government-funded research similar to embryonic stem cell research was particularly apropos, given that it is often accused of fostering a form of genocide against the native population (are embryos the new "native population"?). More apt than you perhaps realized.;-)
If any of this offended you as well, then my regrets as that is not my intent. We have very different views on the value of life, and we won't convince each other with well-worn arguments over the point at which a baby's right to live trumps a mother's right to kill it. But thanks for the debate; I always learn something.
Slashdot Mirror
Nope, N810 can also act as a (non-powered) USB host, and also has Bluetooth (I'm quite confident, since it talks to my Bluetooth keyboard pretty darned well :-).
N810 has a single rather than dual SDHC slot (the N800 had dual slots, not sure why they dropped that in the N810), slide-out keyboard (rather than clamshell design), and same resolution screen, but lacks the gaming controls and DSP.
N810 runs Maemo Linux (with GTK+ graphics), though I believe a port of Ubuntu is available or in-work, and is about the same price. Looks about the same size.
Biggest difference to me (other than N810 being a third generation device shipping in volume) - N810 has an official Palm Garnet emulator that runs all those games I bought in my Treo days. It'd be a Good Thing is Access would port that to Pandora as well.
They look pretty similar to me. N810 topped Amazon's Electronics best seller list a while back. If Pandora is well-implemented and can get some marketing behind it, it could do well. I hope so - Choice Is Good.
It may not have worked for you, but I went through three Treos (100, 300, and 650), and every one of them served as my daily alarm clock with no surprises. Played a mean game of Hexwar, too (have to rely on the Garnet emulator on my N800 for my Hexwar fix nowadays). :-)
Do you read the Weekly World News?
I already said I read Ted Rall. Same thing. :-D
Wouldn't the contents of the Weekly World News challenge your world views
Look, you needn't be so open-minded that your brain falls out. WWN (may it rest in peace) was a delightfully farcical tabloid intentionally written as humor; it wasn't intended to be taken seriously. If you're seriously comparing the WWN to Fox News, then you're so far too the left that everything looks like a vast right-wing conspiracy.
If you're that bad off, you might want to try a little statistics to gain some perspective.
"Seventy percent of those surveyed gave CNN the highest rankings for believability, the most for any broadcast or cable news network, according to the Pew Research Center, followed by MSNBC at 63% and Fox News Channel with 59%."
Of course, surveys have their limits - "just 20% [of Americans] know that the Democrats have a majority in the House of Representatives", a common problem among "8 disastrous years of Republicans" Slashdotters. ;-)
Those took place in September / October 2001. It's now September 2008. That would be... 7 years?
I don't watch news for the same reasons you complain about ABC (which apply to all news outlets).
And in that parenthetical, I suspect, we do agree. They're all necessarily biased in some way. Though I don't watch news very much at all, I do read news - a lot of news - and rather than read sources that conform to my world view, I actively seek that which challenges it from all political ends. It's the best way to understand those with whom I disagree. And occasionally, I actually change my opinion as well.
Weird, I know. Go figure.
if he were watching and it said the sky was pink
Your choice of analogies is delightful. If Fox's New York evening sky line were a lovely shade of pink, and your California afternoon sky was bright blue, I suspect from the tone of your post you would claim, "Fox lied AGAIN!"
When your world view is challenged, you can respond with protectionism - or you can examine your world view from a different perspective and perhaps learn something. The original article, I think, states that most people respond with protectionist zeal rather than an open mind, and that makes changes to their way of thinking rather rare. More's the pity.
(That said, of course, I'm now driven to go watch Fox News a couple of nights and see for myself what their approach is. Something else to take me away for what I really want to do.)
Fox has sued to be able to present known lies as fact during TV broadcasts (and it won)
This was an interesting and rather serious accusation. I wasn't familiar with the lawsuit (I don't care much about TV news), so I looked up the appellate court decision. The decision describes the basis of the lawsuit as:
Each time the station asked Wilson and Akre to provide supporting documentation for statements in the story or to make changes in the content of the story, the reporters accused the station of attempting to distort the story to favor the manufacturer of BGH.
I don't know Fox, but the appellate court seems to have found that the news director insisted that the reporters provide a basis for their assertions, and failing to provide them, demanded that the story not include them. (Fox won on a different point, though - you can't sue under "whistle blower" statutes unless an actual "rule" was violated.) Your interpretation of that legal determination as "Fox has sued to be able to present known lies" indicates one heck of a lot of bias!
I suspect Fox leans right in the same way that ABC (for example) leans left. The day Palin was selected, I listened to ABC News for 45 minutes (as well as about 10 minutes each of Limbaugh and Hannity, whom I could only describe as "giddy"). The remarkable thing about ABC was that, for 45 straight minutes, they had nothing positive to say about Palin at all. She may not be your favorite candidate, but she does have several assets as a Republican VP pick along side McCain (executive rather than legislative experience, a record as a maverick and reformer even against her own party, a clear dedication to the core values that Republicans tout such as "life"). To not find one positive thing to say on a newscast of that length strikes me as just as biased as you claim Fox News to be. Of course, you didn't dispute that, so perhaps I'm only assuming you believe non-Fox networks are fair and unbiased, and perhaps you recognize bias in all media.
In any event, since TV news has limited time, some type of bias (ahem, criteria) is pretty much required to fit the news into 30 minutes. I think having newscasts with a range of criteria is a Good Thing. As long as you characterize the perspective of your news sources, and keep them varied, you'll be ahead of the "most people" in the original study.
So you're saying that the other network news shows are basically a version of Ted Rall, who last week seriously advocated that the government forcibly abort any babies carried by women under 25 years old? (You needn't answer, I'm sure you don't - you just left the impression too strongly not to comment.)
And I suspect my "good point of reference" is quite different from yours. I tend to oppose a large federal government and powerful corporations, and strongly support personal responsibility and liberty. D's tend to favor a large federal government; R's powerful corporations. And you? What's your bias? :-)
Not a'tall. Rather, simply recognizing your own biases enables you to better evaluate the biases of others. The OP addresses Fox News bias as if he had the one true, clear, unbiased view. That's incredibly naive.
For example, the OP and you would probably assert that the lack of a successful terrorist attack on US soil in the past 7 years is proof the terrorist threat is over-stated, and criticize the President for infringing on our liberties unnecessarily.
Fox News would probably take the view that the same events demonstrates that the President's actions were both warranted and successful.
Both assertions are biased by world views. But you needn't lose track of reality at all - REALITY is that we haven't had a successful terrorist attack on US soil in the past 7 years. Whether the President's actions are to credit or beside the point is an exercise eventually left to the electorate and historians.
As an amusing aside, I see that I have finally drawn the wrath of the Obama Death Squads, as evidenced by the crush of Overrated mods drowning out the Interesting and Underrated ones. Although I'm much more Libertarian that Republican, it's always the zealot Democrats with their "Equal Access" and "Hate Speech" laws that most credibly threaten free speech in my experience. Just my $0.02. Mod away.
I found your post Interesting as well, but probably for different reasons than many others.
TV news has a mandate to be unbiased
What is "unbiased"? TV news is constrained to a few stories briefly presented relative to other sources such as the Internet. Given few stories of few words, the choice of those stories and words must necessarily reflect a bias of some type. The news organizations call it "criteria", though, since it sounds more palatable. ;-)
It so over exaggerates the current level of the "terrorist threat" to America
Where would I find the scientifically verifiable, unbiased model that accurately portrays the threat of a terrorist attack against Americans? Without such a model, how do you know that Fox is exaggerating the threat? Historians will render a verdict eventually, but we're too close to events to make such a call independent of our biases.
emotional rhetoric deliberately aimed at misinforming the viewer
How do you know it's deliberate? Is your anti-Fox emotional rhetoric aimed at misinforming your reader or at pointing out a very real problem - and doesn't your answer to that question reflect your own biases?
level of dishonest manipulation
Your choice of words - "dishonest", "misinform", "emotional" - demonstrates that Fox News is causing you some serious cognitive dissonance. I think if you honestly assess your post, you'll recognize that your world view was challenged, and you clung with great determination and emotional verbiage to what you previously believed.
In other words, your post proves the validity of the article. :-) That's interesting!
(Disclaimer: I don't watch TV news, and I read Ted Rall and Ann Coulter and everyone in between just to keep my cognitives well-dissonanced. Perhaps that explains my quirky world view! ;-)
Facts are what they are, only "stupid" if you hate the implications. All of your caveats were in my original post. I'm reporting the numbers from their income tax returns, which must be accurate under penalty of law (from which rich people aren't excluded, just ask Spiro Agnew).
And the source of Mrs. McCain's income is irrelevant - if they file separately, then all of their income and charitable giving is reported separately as well. That's the law.
Actually, I though Obama's giving was pretty reasonable in 2006 and 2007, especially relative to Democrats like Al Gore. The average American gives about 3.5%, so it's above-average. As a self-described Christian, I would have expected him to give at least 10%, but that's between him and God. I was just responding to the OP's claim that McCain wasn't charitable.
McCain's numbers are his own, from his tax return. His wife's income and charitable giving are excluded, because she's not a candidate for public office and thus not required to release her personal records.
No games, just the numbers to which both candidates are legally obligated to report accurately upon penalty of the Wrath of the IRS.
In the past two years, Senator and Mrs. McCain have contributed $340,323 to charitable causes, according to their tax returns (they file separately). Senator McCain's giving constituted about 28 percent of his income for each of those two years.
From 2000 through 2004, Senator Obama and his wife contributed less than $3,500 a year in charitable donations -- about 1 percent of their annual earnings (they were paying off student loans according to their spokesman). In 2006, however, that total jumped to to $60,307 (6.1 percent) and to $240,370 (5.8 percent) in 2007. (Sorry, couldn't find their tax returns on his website - anybody got that link?)
Here's the numbers for last year:
McCain earned $396,527, paid $118,660 (30.7%) in taxes,and gave $105,467 (27.3%) to charity.
Obama earned $4,139,965, paid $1,396,772 (33.7%) in taxes, and gave $240,370 (5.8%) to charity
I'm not criticizing either candidate here, just pointing out the facts.
If you believe our government is unstable, then you have my sympathy.
No top secret military data. But if people were disappearing to some secret US military installation for unspeakable torture, wouldn't their friends or relatives notice?
But then, you're admitting it's an irrational fear. So's my claustrophobia. Who am I to critique? :-)
I find this an interesting assertion. Are you claiming that we have no statistics on the risk of dying in a terrorist attack or the risk of unconstitutional incarceration in the USA? Or have you just not checked the statistics?
(I haven't checked the statistics myself; but of course, I'm not the slightest afraid of either. :-)
Despite the ad-selling headlines you've apparently been reading, the "current condition" of the United States is neither desperate nor hopeless.
We have a stable republican government, a massive GDP, an industrious and reasonably well-educated work force, solid infrastructure (utilities, transportation, commerce, etc.), a strong university-based R&D system awash in basic science available to exploit, and a long tradition of creatively overcoming both internal and external challenges.
The financials have been rocky of late, sure, which makes this a great time to invest (remember, it's buy low, sell high - now is "low" relative to last year (though not 2006), so I'm buying). I sold Lockheed Martin stock in February at just over $110 a share, and it closed today slightly higher than my selling price. Darn it.
What is irrational is your belief that the USA is suddenly unable to operate all of the successful space missions that we are currently operating.
My DVD drive came with decoder software and a codec license. The XP software immage that came pre-installed on the salvaged machine (and is still set up as dual boot) had DVD codecs licensed. How many dang codec licenses do I need before they stop trying to slap a patch on my eye and a sword on my belt?!?
Hmmm... could be. But with the current of those voters all headed in the right direction (from McCain's point of view), it still looks like a brilliant selection from the usual "What can I do to get elected?" perspective.
Actually, a surprising (to me) number of Hillary supports are switching to McCain / Palin - for example, this Washington Post - ABC News poll records an 18 point swing among white women after Palin was selected by McCain. (I'm surprised, because Clinton and Palin are almost 180 degrees apart on so many issues.)
Of course, it's 7 weeks until the election...
Surely the OP doesn't believe that an intelligent being almost creating life is somehow threatening to those who believe life was created by an intelligent being?
Perhaps saving a healthy sample set of DNA would enable future advances to recover them from extinction? (I'm not a biologist, but I certainly enjoyed Jurassic Park. :-)
Bingo, because you're asking for a load of new government regulation to "save" us. The problem with that "solution" is that it's government regulation and subsidies that screwed up the US transportation system in the first place.
Howzabout we kick the government out of the transportation sector entirely (except for safety and consumer protection roles) and let the travelers select the best options with their own dollars?
No, it's "Vista is like taking a shower with your clothes on". Pretty accurate analogy, come to think of it.
*shrug*^2 You're easily offended.
And Biblically illiterate. (Though perhaps you didn't realize it is a Biblical allusion?) Anti-Christians are particularly fond of quoting that phrase out of context, as if it prohibits Christians from discerning and advocating what is morally right, or participating in political debate.
Here's the full passage, from Matthew 7:
It's a condemnation of hypocrisy, not a prohibition against discerning morality or participating in politics. Pretty humorous, too, that image of an ophthalmologist with a 2x4 stuck in his eye trying to remove a spec of sawdust from someone else's eye. :-)
When you support abortion for any and every reason, it's pretty hard to buy your contention that you value prenatal life. But if you insist that you simply value it less that the mother's right to end it, I'll accept you at your word.
Finally, your analogy of the transcontinental railroad as an example of government-funded research similar to embryonic stem cell research was particularly apropos, given that it is often accused of fostering a form of genocide against the native population (are embryos the new "native population"?). More apt than you perhaps realized. ;-)
If any of this offended you as well, then my regrets as that is not my intent. We have very different views on the value of life, and we won't convince each other with well-worn arguments over the point at which a baby's right to live trumps a mother's right to kill it. But thanks for the debate; I always learn something.
And you are waiting... why?