Actually the USA is not particularly corrupt. According to transparency international, only a few countries (Canada, some small northern European countries and Australia) are less corrupt than the US. Your story about Congressmen being paid to work for a company while passing legislation to help that company would be a severe breach of ethics and they would be ripped to pieces by their opponents., not to mention investigated by the ethics committee. I'm sure they get away with bad behavior, especially those with guaranteed seats (Corrine Brown, Charles Rangel etc) but that behavior is known and they still get elected so it's their constituents fault.
If we treated foreign immigrants like Japan does you would call us fascists. With aging population Japan desperately needs workforce and still it refuses to allow almost any immigration through pure xenophobia and racism.
It's amazing what a bad job our schools are doing in explaining the basics of free market economy. Free market is nothing like jungle. In the jungle the you survive through physical force, in the free market you survive by serving your customer better than the other guy. The "power" Amazon has comes from serving A LOT of customers who voluntarily give it their money. They do it not just because of the price, but also because of selection and convenience. If people wanted to buy from French book stores, they wouldn't need taxpayer subsidies and laws passed to protect them.
When regional players cannot compete even with taxpayer support (as these french bookstores are), then they should go out of business. Who says brick and mortar bookstores need to exist and we all need to pay higher prices for books in order to keep then artificially alive?
First of all, Israel is conducting large scale state terrorism basically since it exists.
Israel was granted its existence by the UN in 1947. The problem with Middle East is that Arabs have never been able to accept that because they don't like Jews. If Israeli Jews were Muslim, the problem wouldn't exist, simple as that. The expansion of Israel's territory since then came in my view in a fair way, as they won one after another defensive war against attacks by vastly superior Arab forces.
Second, some of the worst dictators in the Middle East have been explicitly supported by the US government
So what. It was right to support them when it suited our interest and there was a greater danger to us and to the word to worry about (USSR - the most evil empire in the 20th century). As far as I'm concerned, dictators are a fair game to support or to depose according to our interests and once we defeated the Soviet Union, we are now knocking them out one by one. Saudi royal family has a special deal with the US that temporarily keeps them in power because of oil but as soon as that reason is behind us they will be next in line.
Also, it would perhaps also be a good idea to get a clue at the size the "islamic world" you're talking about, because you talk an awful lot as if it was confined to the Middle East.
And it would be a good idea for you to get some perspective of what a total failure Islamic civilization has been. There is no progress at all of any kind, technological, political or otherwise that happened in any Muslim country in hundreds of years. 2 Nobel Prizes in science by Muslims compared to over 100 by Jews! The best university in any Islamic country (in Turkey, among the least Islamic of the Muslim countries) is not even in the top 200 in the world. Democracy has either failed or been under attack by Islamists in just about every Muslim country. Every border where Islamic civilization meets a non-Islamic one there is trouble, just look at the world map. Israel has shown how to turn a backward desert wasteland into an advanced 1st world country in less than 50 years. Why can't any Muslim country do the same? I think it is obvious to anyone but Western cultural relativists that the reason is Islam.
Maybe West should be alienated from the Islamic world. The status quo seemed to be that as the rest of the world was progressing towards democratic governments, the Middle East (apart from Israel) would be the sole remaining black hole for democracy and human rights, run by a bunch of dictators like Saddam, Assad, Gaddafi, Mubarak etc, not to mention Taliban. Islamic world sucks in every department and maybe it's in our interest not to let it go on like that for the sake of few more years of peace.
So a post saying CIA wanted 9/11 to happen so it's budget would be increased gets modded "Interesting". You mods really need to hang out more on conspiracy nut message boards, you'll find a lot more "interesting" stuff there.
Are we supposed to be happy that the blood, sweat and tears of the thousands of developers who gave their time to an ideal of free software are now being used by the world's favorite rogue state to bring death and destruction to far flung corners of the globe?
In addition, I heard that missiles fired from these ships will feature a penguin logo, and that the military contractor who made millions from the work of "thousands of developers who gave their time to an ideal of free software" likes to wipe his ass with printouts of the kernel source code. Makes you sick, doesn't it.
With any luck, our government will also tax our gas to the point where paying $10 to wait for a bus in the rain and then ride in it with random strangers for an hour all over the town will make more sense than driving directly there in comfort of your own car in 15 minutes. And who says innovation comes only from the private sector!
Your view of Republican party seems to be influenced more by the (unfortunately very successful) efforts by the left and their media to discredit it, than by reality. Yes, there are nuts on the right but there are also nuts on the left, it's a matter of whom the media chooses to emphasize or hide in the corner. Fox News plays the same game by constantly mentioning one or other leftist politician/activist/professor who says particularly nutty things and then presents them as views of the entire left. As for the things you say matter to you:
1) I support abortion (in libertarian way though - the right to life does not apply when you live inside another person's body) but I would never vote for a candidate who doesn't care either way about it. It shows how far you are gone to the other side of the religious right, that you don't apparently even recognize the moral issue involved.
2) Hardly anybody claims that. There are genuine differences in what the causes of it are and what the response should be. I would equally call it crazy to automatically support something like carbon tax, or sign up to various treaties (which invariably tax the developed countries disproportionately) without having any idea (since nobody does) whether this will have any impact on global warming.
3) Agree with that one.
4) Are you kidding? Apart from the fringe of the right which has been trying (unsuccessfully) to introduce something like intelligent design or whatever, it is the left that interferes FAR more with what is thought in schools and how. Political correctness alone has introduced far more deliberate falsities into the curriculum than religion. Not to mention that politically, left want more uniformity in what is thought (right would leave more of it to states and local), supports teachers unions which honest people can plainly see negatively impacts the "how" part.
5) This is one area where there is a PERFECT bi-partisan agreement. Show me how Democrats are not supporting Military-Industrial complex?
There is no such thing as what "silicon valley wants". It's not even a valley and it is definitely not made of silicon. But, that's beside the point. He basically makes it sound as if everybody there is libertarian without mentioning the word, but it is far from the truth. People who matter are involved with the government up to their necks, including all the things he says silicon valley is against: eavesdropping, subsidies, protectionism, non-free internet. All major tech companies maintain nice and expensive lobbyists in Washington. Not that I blame them, they have to live in real world and deal with the biggest and most powerful gorilla in the jungle and that is the government. And it's getting bigger.
|Congress controls the spending. Btw, "Bush's wars" propaganda is getting boring. Democrats overwhelmingly supported them (unanimously in case of Afghanistan) and it was Clinton admin that set the stage for Iraq war with regime change policy (Iraq Liberation Act 1998). You can argue whether it was right or wrong but you can't blame just one side for it - they all had the same intelligence. Same applies with the current administration. Would they really cut the spending if Republicans weren't fighting for it all along.
Looks great to me but that's subjective. However, 300 mile radius v 208-265 comparison is irrelevant. One can be refueled everywhere in 5 minutes for another 300 miles, the other takes 8 hours unless you find one of the supercharging stations which are still very rare. That is a HUGE difference for anybody who needs to drive that distance occasionally (say LA-Bay Area or LA-Vegas).
China doesn't have anything close? Maybe not yet, but surely it will pretty soon, not to mention that they have more military age males than the entire population of the USA. We might need some robots.
Programs like this need to incorporate things like comfort, convenience, price, durability etc., you know, things we all look for when buying stuff, that are comparable with or superior to the current norms, and not just energy efficiency. It is easy to make things more energy efficient; we can all live in huts, give up our cars for bicycles, throw out our washing machines, driers and air-conditioners, drink filtered rain water and grow vegetables in our backyards. But we don't want to give up things which make our life easier, safer, more pleasant and convenient, that's what civilization is all about.
Except that GCHQ cost £337 million. Is the Apple building really expected to cost $5B? It is not mentioned anywhere in TFA. Seems excessive even for Bay Area , where fixing up half a bridge costs $6.3 billion.
You don't understand Ran'd philosophy (even if you had read her books, which I doubt) and you cannot explain why reading them would make you a emotionally stunted. Yet you claim that you can. That's dishonesty and, by the way, your dumb 'jokes' are not succeeding in covering up your ignorance.
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Actually the USA is not particularly corrupt. According to transparency international, only a few countries (Canada, some small northern European countries and Australia) are less corrupt than the US. Your story about Congressmen being paid to work for a company while passing legislation to help that company would be a severe breach of ethics and they would be ripped to pieces by their opponents., not to mention investigated by the ethics committee. I'm sure they get away with bad behavior, especially those with guaranteed seats (Corrine Brown, Charles Rangel etc) but that behavior is known and they still get elected so it's their constituents fault.
If we treated foreign immigrants like Japan does you would call us fascists. With aging population Japan desperately needs workforce and still it refuses to allow almost any immigration through pure xenophobia and racism.
It's amazing what a bad job our schools are doing in explaining the basics of free market economy. Free market is nothing like jungle. In the jungle the you survive through physical force, in the free market you survive by serving your customer better than the other guy. The "power" Amazon has comes from serving A LOT of customers who voluntarily give it their money. They do it not just because of the price, but also because of selection and convenience. If people wanted to buy from French book stores, they wouldn't need taxpayer subsidies and laws passed to protect them.
When regional players cannot compete even with taxpayer support (as these french bookstores are), then they should go out of business. Who says brick and mortar bookstores need to exist and we all need to pay higher prices for books in order to keep then artificially alive?
The system has failed because a business charges lower prices for the exact same product than other businesses?
Annual per taxpayer cost of healthcare in the UK (NHS budget/number of taxpayers) is higher than the average health insurance cost per year in the US.
First of all, Israel is conducting large scale state terrorism basically since it exists.
Israel was granted its existence by the UN in 1947. The problem with Middle East is that Arabs have never been able to accept that because they don't like Jews. If Israeli Jews were Muslim, the problem wouldn't exist, simple as that. The expansion of Israel's territory since then came in my view in a fair way, as they won one after another defensive war against attacks by vastly superior Arab forces.
Second, some of the worst dictators in the Middle East have been explicitly supported by the US government
So what. It was right to support them when it suited our interest and there was a greater danger to us and to the word to worry about (USSR - the most evil empire in the 20th century). As far as I'm concerned, dictators are a fair game to support or to depose according to our interests and once we defeated the Soviet Union, we are now knocking them out one by one. Saudi royal family has a special deal with the US that temporarily keeps them in power because of oil but as soon as that reason is behind us they will be next in line.
Also, it would perhaps also be a good idea to get a clue at the size the "islamic world" you're talking about, because you talk an awful lot as if it was confined to the Middle East.
And it would be a good idea for you to get some perspective of what a total failure Islamic civilization has been. There is no progress at all of any kind, technological, political or otherwise that happened in any Muslim country in hundreds of years. 2 Nobel Prizes in science by Muslims compared to over 100 by Jews! The best university in any Islamic country (in Turkey, among the least Islamic of the Muslim countries) is not even in the top 200 in the world. Democracy has either failed or been under attack by Islamists in just about every Muslim country. Every border where Islamic civilization meets a non-Islamic one there is trouble, just look at the world map. Israel has shown how to turn a backward desert wasteland into an advanced 1st world country in less than 50 years. Why can't any Muslim country do the same? I think it is obvious to anyone but Western cultural relativists that the reason is Islam.
Maybe West should be alienated from the Islamic world. The status quo seemed to be that as the rest of the world was progressing towards democratic governments, the Middle East (apart from Israel) would be the sole remaining black hole for democracy and human rights, run by a bunch of dictators like Saddam, Assad, Gaddafi, Mubarak etc, not to mention Taliban. Islamic world sucks in every department and maybe it's in our interest not to let it go on like that for the sake of few more years of peace.
So a post saying CIA wanted 9/11 to happen so it's budget would be increased gets modded "Interesting". You mods really need to hang out more on conspiracy nut message boards, you'll find a lot more "interesting" stuff there.
Are we supposed to be happy that the blood, sweat and tears of the thousands of developers who gave their time to an ideal of free software are now being used by the world's favorite rogue state to bring death and destruction to far flung corners of the globe?
In addition, I heard that missiles fired from these ships will feature a penguin logo, and that the military contractor who made millions from the work of "thousands of developers who gave their time to an ideal of free software" likes to wipe his ass with printouts of the kernel source code. Makes you sick, doesn't it.
Sorry, did you just ask what's the purpose of building ships when they can be sunk?
He founded a shitty .com company and sold it for billions back in the day. So I guess that's why.
With any luck, our government will also tax our gas to the point where paying $10 to wait for a bus in the rain and then ride in it with random strangers for an hour all over the town will make more sense than driving directly there in comfort of your own car in 15 minutes. And who says innovation comes only from the private sector!
Your view of Republican party seems to be influenced more by the (unfortunately very successful) efforts by the left and their media to discredit it, than by reality. Yes, there are nuts on the right but there are also nuts on the left, it's a matter of whom the media chooses to emphasize or hide in the corner. Fox News plays the same game by constantly mentioning one or other leftist politician/activist/professor who says particularly nutty things and then presents them as views of the entire left. As for the things you say matter to you:
1) I support abortion (in libertarian way though - the right to life does not apply when you live inside another person's body) but I would never vote for a candidate who doesn't care either way about it. It shows how far you are gone to the other side of the religious right, that you don't apparently even recognize the moral issue involved.
2) Hardly anybody claims that. There are genuine differences in what the causes of it are and what the response should be. I would equally call it crazy to automatically support something like carbon tax, or sign up to various treaties (which invariably tax the developed countries disproportionately) without having any idea (since nobody does) whether this will have any impact on global warming.
3) Agree with that one.
4) Are you kidding? Apart from the fringe of the right which has been trying (unsuccessfully) to introduce something like intelligent design or whatever, it is the left that interferes FAR more with what is thought in schools and how. Political correctness alone has introduced far more deliberate falsities into the curriculum than religion. Not to mention that politically, left want more uniformity in what is thought (right would leave more of it to states and local), supports teachers unions which honest people can plainly see negatively impacts the "how" part.
5) This is one area where there is a PERFECT bi-partisan agreement. Show me how Democrats are not supporting Military-Industrial complex?
There is no such thing as what "silicon valley wants". It's not even a valley and it is definitely not made of silicon. But, that's beside the point. He basically makes it sound as if everybody there is libertarian without mentioning the word, but it is far from the truth. People who matter are involved with the government up to their necks, including all the things he says silicon valley is against: eavesdropping, subsidies, protectionism, non-free internet. All major tech companies maintain nice and expensive lobbyists in Washington. Not that I blame them, they have to live in real world and deal with the biggest and most powerful gorilla in the jungle and that is the government. And it's getting bigger.
|Congress controls the spending. Btw, "Bush's wars" propaganda is getting boring. Democrats overwhelmingly supported them (unanimously in case of Afghanistan) and it was Clinton admin that set the stage for Iraq war with regime change policy (Iraq Liberation Act 1998). You can argue whether it was right or wrong but you can't blame just one side for it - they all had the same intelligence. Same applies with the current administration. Would they really cut the spending if Republicans weren't fighting for it all along.
Looks great to me but that's subjective. However, 300 mile radius v 208-265 comparison is irrelevant. One can be refueled everywhere in 5 minutes for another 300 miles, the other takes 8 hours unless you find one of the supercharging stations which are still very rare. That is a HUGE difference for anybody who needs to drive that distance occasionally (say LA-Bay Area or LA-Vegas).
has no taste for putting their own lives on the line
Really? I though that a large majority of coalition troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are the US military.
the other side doesn't have anything close
China doesn't have anything close? Maybe not yet, but surely it will pretty soon, not to mention that they have more military age males than the entire population of the USA. We might need some robots.
Everybody is working on military robots, not just the US.
Programs like this need to incorporate things like comfort, convenience, price, durability etc., you know, things we all look for when buying stuff, that are comparable with or superior to the current norms, and not just energy efficiency. It is easy to make things more energy efficient; we can all live in huts, give up our cars for bicycles, throw out our washing machines, driers and air-conditioners, drink filtered rain water and grow vegetables in our backyards. But we don't want to give up things which make our life easier, safer, more pleasant and convenient, that's what civilization is all about.
A single room mud hut is good for the environment too. How about a net-zero house that normal families would actually want to live in?
Except that GCHQ cost £337 million. Is the Apple building really expected to cost $5B? It is not mentioned anywhere in TFA. Seems excessive even for Bay Area , where fixing up half a bridge costs $6.3 billion.
You don't understand Ran'd philosophy (even if you had read her books, which I doubt) and you cannot explain why reading them would make you a emotionally stunted. Yet you claim that you can. That's dishonesty and, by the way, your dumb 'jokes' are not succeeding in covering up your ignorance.
So your understanding of Rand's philosophy is that it is immoral to do something unless you get paid for it?