No one ever gave Ron Paul much air time to begin with, and we all know it.
Ron Paul was the 'star' of many of the major Republican debates. I've seen far more stumping, advertising, and grass-roots efforts on behalf of Ron Paul than I have for any other Republican candidate. People just didn't buy his message. Most people aren't Libertarians and don't believe in libertarianism.
Claiming that Hillary's wins last night were the result of insincere Republican voting is the height of spin
It's not that far-fetched. Certainly some of her support came from Republicans. Rush Limbaugh is Hillary Clinton's most visible campaign supporter at the moment. He thinks Republicans will get blasted if they try to hit Obama, so they'll let Hillary fight it out with him instead. Though really, they'd deserve a blasting if they pulled another Swift Boat maneuver.
"RUSH: No, the strategy is... Yes. The strategy is to continue the chaos in this party. Look, there's a reason for this. Our side isn't going to do this. Obama needs to be bloodied up. Look, half the country already hates Hillary. That's good. But nobody hates Obama yet. Hillary is going to be the one to have to bloody him up politically because our side isn't going to do it. Mark my words. It's about winning, folks!" Rush Limbaugh's theory.
if i were to say that an authoritarian police state acts like an authoritarian police state? why is this such an emotional point for you? it sems like something academic and obvious to me. and you come at me like i'm a neocon propagandizer. why is this the tone you take with me about what is pretty stone cold obvious truth?
Because he's also a propagandizer, and a propagandizer is not allowed to expose any weakness in the armor. For example, not allowed to acknowledge Cuba's human rights record as an especially big problem. Instead, when faced with such a situation, he's willing to argue success on a very small point (the 'cuban arrested for posting on Internet') while ignoring defeat on the far far larger issue (Cuba's terrible record on freedom of speech/press). When ignoring the bigger issue is no longer possible, the propagandizer simply claims victory over the minor issue and ends the discussion.
A good portion of political debate ends up in such arguments these days.
And that's why your flamebait-modded comments are modded that way.
And that is my main point... slashdot is full of people who really aren't that bright. They are the target "lowest common denominator" demographic of most of the rhetoric coming from people like Castro, Chavez, et al, as well as their cheerleaders like Michael Moore.
And there's another reason. Not only are they generalities, inaccurate ones no less, but they are insulting ones as well.
Unfortunately, most people want a leader. Most people want to delegate the responsibility of thinking onto another person, so that when the shit hits the fan they can say, "Don't blame me, I was just following orders."
Isn't that sortof the logical outcome of a representative democracy, though?
I don't care if you're for gay marriage. If you use the federal government to force your values on everyone, you're no better than a Mike Huckabee who would use the same government to shove a ban on gay marriage down everyones throats. Let the states decide, and things will naturally work themselves out. This has nothing to do with the Civil war, see if you can knock off the straw man arguments in your next reply.
As long as the federal government continues to treat single people, unmarried couples (gay marriage?), and married couples differently, mostly though not exclusively related to taxes, then it will be a federal issue and not one that can be completely decided by the states.
The main use of condoms within a marriage is birth control. So that you can plan the number and timing of the children you have. But the church is against this. It would instead see husbands and wives only have sex as many times as they want children. However that completely ignores the human drive to have sex and the unhappiness that people feel if they don't have sex.
That's why you don't go to the church for scientific or medical advice. The church has authority over religious morality issues (well, Catholic religious morality). According to their dogma, condoms are not to be condoned, because sex is for one purpose and one purpose only -- for procreation between two married people. The "human drive for sex" is suppressed, and in their religion, that's actually a good thing. In the church's point of view, the ends (lowering the spread of disease) does not justify the means (extra-marital sex), and having the church promoting condom use would corrupt their message.
Again, that's why you only look to the Catholic church for religious dogma, not scientific or medical advice.
Also not sticking to the conspiracy's script is Valerie Plame, and her husband.
As a quick note about Valerie Plame, the scandal involving her didn't require a conspiracy. At the heart, it really only required two people -- a leaker, and an ethically-corrupt journalist.
By no means am I implying that government doesn't deserve scrutiny... but I do believe that when scrutiny become skepticism it is not productive (or is rather adverse)
Actually I would say that skepticism is very healthy. Paranoia isn't.
Of course in hindsight, we now recognize that bombing suspected Al-Qaeda targets was probably a good idea. Not that we believed so at the time.
As a president, Clinton was hamstrung at that time. Everyone was so focused on "the trial" that any good action he took would automatically come under the Wag the Dog accusation.
Leaders don't tell people where to go. They listen to where people want to go, and tell them how to get their.
No, that is facilitating. Granted, there's a lot of facilitation in leadership, but it's not the be-all, end-all. Sometimes leaders need to take people in a direction they initially don't want to go, and hopefully it's through convincing the people being led that the leader's vision is the best way.
Really? JPII... held 2 worldwide ecumenical prayer services at assissi where he let pagans sacrifice a chicken on one of the altars at St. Claire's basilica...
Uhh.. really? That I'd like to see a reference for, as that sounds.. well, I'd say that would even be considered anti-Christian. I'm not saying it didn't happen, just that it's a pretty wild story, even for this non-Christian to swallow.
This is one reason the Daily Show is so popular as a source of news. Because they are a comedy show, they are not afraid to call bullshit on bullshit and speak frankly. In fact they have to, because a waffled punchline is not funny.
Usually. There are some causes that are mostly based on bullshit that the Daily Show has given equal time to, though I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and say that they might not have known that the cause was BS. For instance, when RFK Jr came onto the Daily Show and repeated his lines about how Thermasil causes autism and how the pharmaceutical companies have prevented any information about this from getting out because.. well.. you know, they're evil, he got a very sympathetic ear from John Stewart who didn't challenge him on any of his assertions that the mainstream medical community disagreed with. So the Daily Show has its faults too, though they can always fall back on the claim that as a comedy show, they don't need to be accurate.
You forget about the incessant spam and hacking attempts. Blizzard has 9 million players to help them report spammers, and still can't get those IP addresses banned from the game and official forums..
With a game as ubiquitous as WoW, how do you ban a dynamic IP (what most home IP addresses still are) without banning a large number of innocent subscribers? You really can't. You can ban accounts though, and require that any interaction with the game or the forums require a valid account, and that is far easier to enforce and eliminates most of the collateral damage.
Easiest way to deal with that kind of Turing test is to make your bot extremely antisocial. Example: Someone chats to the bot, bot replies from list of responses including "STFU n00b!!!!!", "how i mine 4 fish???", and something in a fairly obscure foreign language.
Even that is easy to figure out. And, in most peoples' eyes, using a foreign language is a strike against you. They'll assume that you're a gold farmer living in another country. Unless the language is, say, French or Spanish, they're usually right, too.
It's been a while since I've been playing, but have you seen the number of autoleveling bots every time they open up a new server? It's a joke. I spent a couple of hours one night killing an ally priest who was doing the level grind with a bot. (I quit after something like 40 kills... very boring). Screenshots, appeals - no actions by a GM. Saw the same guy a night or two later at a much higher level. Same with speedhacks.
One thing I've found is that, unless the offense has to do with personal harassment or something else that MUST be taken care of that minute, people rarely get banned at the moment that Blizzard is aware of the offense. Even if they're running hacks that scan the map, automate movement, etc. Instead they get added to a ban list that is purged, oh.. once a month. So happy grindy priest might make it to level 62 before finding his account banned.
Odd that the demands made to reporters are to find an emotional appeal, and coincidentally enough that's also the same thing you would look for if your goal was to manipulate people. Hmm, what are the chances of that? And how we love our entertainers! The doctor who cures cancer is going to be a rather anonymous figure one month later, but if someone can sing and dance and act we need to know every last detail of their personal life.
Old comment! I believe the reason for this is that people, in general, love to watch other people destroy themselves. "The fall from grace" has been a popular topic throughout history, and the celebrity worship is just the modern-day update. Not a lot of attention is paid to the celebrities who have their act together, but lots of time and photos are paid to "X caught cheating on Y," "disasterous plastic surgery photos," "Celebrity Z caught driving drunk," "look who is checking into rehab," and general leering at extravagance. You'll have the occasional "let's do some stories on that nice British royal," but in generous, celebrity news focuses on the negative.
Ditto. I bet she's a fuckin' tiger in the sack, especially after a could of good bong rips.
I really doubt it now. Every action she takes says she thinks she's unworthy, she hates herself, she has no self-esteem. Her recent musical performances have been "lazy." (She sometimes doesn't even bother lip-syncing to the pre-recorded music, just sortof shuffling around on stage). I'd think she'd be pretty lazy in the sack as well. Not worth the effort.
Slashdot Mirror
My guess is Russert felt a little bit of a sting from the Clinton/Obama SNL videos.
Ron Paul was the 'star' of many of the major Republican debates. I've seen far more stumping, advertising, and grass-roots efforts on behalf of Ron Paul than I have for any other Republican candidate. People just didn't buy his message. Most people aren't Libertarians and don't believe in libertarianism.
The grandparent's point was that no candidate deserves that line of questioning, not just Obama.
It's not that far-fetched. Certainly some of her support came from Republicans. Rush Limbaugh is Hillary Clinton's most visible campaign supporter at the moment. He thinks Republicans will get blasted if they try to hit Obama, so they'll let Hillary fight it out with him instead. Though really, they'd deserve a blasting if they pulled another Swift Boat maneuver.
"RUSH: No, the strategy is... Yes. The strategy is to continue the chaos in this party. Look, there's a reason for this. Our side isn't going to do this. Obama needs to be bloodied up. Look, half the country already hates Hillary. That's good. But nobody hates Obama yet. Hillary is going to be the one to have to bloody him up politically because our side isn't going to do it. Mark my words. It's about winning, folks!" Rush Limbaugh's theory.
I still listen to his weekend tech/gadget radio show. Great guy, always interesting.
Because he's also a propagandizer, and a propagandizer is not allowed to expose any weakness in the armor. For example, not allowed to acknowledge Cuba's human rights record as an especially big problem. Instead, when faced with such a situation, he's willing to argue success on a very small point (the 'cuban arrested for posting on Internet') while ignoring defeat on the far far larger issue (Cuba's terrible record on freedom of speech/press). When ignoring the bigger issue is no longer possible, the propagandizer simply claims victory over the minor issue and ends the discussion.
A good portion of political debate ends up in such arguments these days.
And that's why your flamebait-modded comments are modded that way.
And that is my main point... slashdot is full of people who really aren't that bright. They are the target "lowest common denominator" demographic of most of the rhetoric coming from people like Castro, Chavez, et al, as well as their cheerleaders like Michael Moore.
And there's another reason. Not only are they generalities, inaccurate ones no less, but they are insulting ones as well.
nobody gets a 10. ever.
Then what is the point of having a 1-10 scale? You can't have that if nobody can reach 10. Instead it just becomes 1-9.
Isn't that sortof the logical outcome of a representative democracy, though?
As long as the federal government continues to treat single people, unmarried couples (gay marriage?), and married couples differently, mostly though not exclusively related to taxes, then it will be a federal issue and not one that can be completely decided by the states.
or "Break Like the Wind" by Spinal Tap.
That's why you don't go to the church for scientific or medical advice. The church has authority over religious morality issues (well, Catholic religious morality). According to their dogma, condoms are not to be condoned, because sex is for one purpose and one purpose only -- for procreation between two married people. The "human drive for sex" is suppressed, and in their religion, that's actually a good thing. In the church's point of view, the ends (lowering the spread of disease) does not justify the means (extra-marital sex), and having the church promoting condom use would corrupt their message.
Again, that's why you only look to the Catholic church for religious dogma, not scientific or medical advice.
As a quick note about Valerie Plame, the scandal involving her didn't require a conspiracy. At the heart, it really only required two people -- a leaker, and an ethically-corrupt journalist.
Actually I would say that skepticism is very healthy. Paranoia isn't.
Of course in hindsight, we now recognize that bombing suspected Al-Qaeda targets was probably a good idea. Not that we believed so at the time.
As a president, Clinton was hamstrung at that time. Everyone was so focused on "the trial" that any good action he took would automatically come under the Wag the Dog accusation.
No, that is facilitating. Granted, there's a lot of facilitation in leadership, but it's not the be-all, end-all. Sometimes leaders need to take people in a direction they initially don't want to go, and hopefully it's through convincing the people being led that the leader's vision is the best way.
Uhh.. really? That I'd like to see a reference for, as that sounds.. well, I'd say that would even be considered anti-Christian. I'm not saying it didn't happen, just that it's a pretty wild story, even for this non-Christian to swallow.
Why is it I never see these posts I want to mod up when I actually have mod points?
Usually. There are some causes that are mostly based on bullshit that the Daily Show has given equal time to, though I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and say that they might not have known that the cause was BS. For instance, when RFK Jr came onto the Daily Show and repeated his lines about how Thermasil causes autism and how the pharmaceutical companies have prevented any information about this from getting out because.. well.. you know, they're evil, he got a very sympathetic ear from John Stewart who didn't challenge him on any of his assertions that the mainstream medical community disagreed with. So the Daily Show has its faults too, though they can always fall back on the claim that as a comedy show, they don't need to be accurate.
With a game as ubiquitous as WoW, how do you ban a dynamic IP (what most home IP addresses still are) without banning a large number of innocent subscribers? You really can't. You can ban accounts though, and require that any interaction with the game or the forums require a valid account, and that is far easier to enforce and eliminates most of the collateral damage.
Even that is easy to figure out. And, in most peoples' eyes, using a foreign language is a strike against you. They'll assume that you're a gold farmer living in another country. Unless the language is, say, French or Spanish, they're usually right, too.
One thing I've found is that, unless the offense has to do with personal harassment or something else that MUST be taken care of that minute, people rarely get banned at the moment that Blizzard is aware of the offense. Even if they're running hacks that scan the map, automate movement, etc. Instead they get added to a ban list that is purged, oh.. once a month. So happy grindy priest might make it to level 62 before finding his account banned.
Old comment! I believe the reason for this is that people, in general, love to watch other people destroy themselves. "The fall from grace" has been a popular topic throughout history, and the celebrity worship is just the modern-day update. Not a lot of attention is paid to the celebrities who have their act together, but lots of time and photos are paid to "X caught cheating on Y," "disasterous plastic surgery photos," "Celebrity Z caught driving drunk," "look who is checking into rehab," and general leering at extravagance. You'll have the occasional "let's do some stories on that nice British royal," but in generous, celebrity news focuses on the negative.
Not according to the crazy lady who sat next to me on the bus. She liked to yell (not talk, yell) about how the jews at the bank stole all her money.
I'm not joking about this or exaggerating. AC Transit sucks.
I really doubt it now. Every action she takes says she thinks she's unworthy, she hates herself, she has no self-esteem. Her recent musical performances have been "lazy." (She sometimes doesn't even bother lip-syncing to the pre-recorded music, just sortof shuffling around on stage). I'd think she'd be pretty lazy in the sack as well. Not worth the effort.