The maximum from the IBC is not an upper boundary on deaths, it's an upper boundary on reported deaths. This is from the "quick FAQ" from the IBC site:
It is likely that many if not most civilian casualties will go unreported by the media. That is the sad nature of war.
So even if we only look at the IBC, the estimate is at least twice as high, i.e. 100000. Surely anybody understands that not every death is reported by the media.
The Hindu has some more data from the Lancet study:
The study, however, shows that 31 per cent of the excess deaths since the invasion were directly caused by U.S.-led coalition forces. [...] Gunfire remains the most common cause of violent death (accounting for 53 per cent) followed by car bombs or other ordinance (18 per cent) and air strikes (12 per cent).
The problem is that the Germans at the time weren't that different from us, so we are susceptible to the same social forces. You seem to imply that they were a different species or something similar. And at least I have promised that something similar to what happened in Nazi Germany will never happened again. Have you made a similar pledge? Or have you forgotten so quickly?
Upgrading in Ubuntu has never worked well for me. I used Ubuntu quite a lot from Hoary->Breezy->Dapper and upgrades almost always left X unusable. I don't think I've ever had a problem with the kernel though. Ubuntu doesn't seem to test upgrades very well.
I haven't had these types of upgrade problems with Debian, but that could be because they release so seldom.
The 640x480 videos, which people have to pay for even though they've bought the 320x240 version, are identical to the 320x240 videos because they have been upsampled from that source. Do you understand this complex news item now?
A new PS2-game costs $75 in Sweden. Who cares if the actual console costs $400, $500 or $600? Why isn't the gaming community "reeling" from the high cost of games? The games also are usually not fun to play for more than an hour or so.
The game (and music and movie) industry is bizarre, deal with it. If the PS3 is fun and gets a sexy reputation, then people will buy it. If people think it's lame, then they won't buy it. I don't think the price has very much influence.
For me, the fact that they added "motion sensing" at the last minute sounds much more worrying for Sony. It sounds like they realized the Wii was going to beat the PS3 and they had to copy it. I think I will get a Wii, not because it's cheap, but because the controller has great potential for fun gameplay.
Then that should be true of all commodities. Let's say that the average person in the US or Europe makes 20 times as much as the average Chinese. Should a car of the same quality be 20 times more expensive in the US or Europe? And should I then be prevented from buying it in China and selling it in the US/Europe?
Either you accept a free and global market, or else you don't. You can't just support a free market when it benefits you, and then oppose it when it doesn't.
Perhaps you should have invented your own language before you made statements like this. Why are you writing in English? Did America invent English, or did it augment an existing language?
Ok, great that you can admit that the text is not followed to the letter.
I personally don't think it's a good model to treat a constitution as a religious document, and treat the "founding fathers" as some sort of gods who's will has to be figured out. Since America is a deeply religious country, I guess this model is more natural, the constitution is treated more as a bible than as a legal document. Sweden is secular, and therefore we want our constitution to be explicit instead of trying to divine what was meant when it was written.
I think your definition of "hate speech" is too coarse. I don't have a problem with the crime of "incitement against an ethnic group" (or whatever group, such as homosexuals), which is just a logical extension of "incitement to murder". This does not mean ideas cannot be discussed. It just means I cannot call for the extermination of an identified group of people, just as I cannot call for the murder of an identified individual.
I used to like America, and its stance on freedom of speech was a strong contribution to that, but right now America has problems which are far more serious than freedom of speech. And it's not so simple as to blame the Bush administration. Guantanamo Bay had existed for a long time when Bush was re-elected. Iraq had already been attacked when Bush was re-elected. Democracy means rule of the people, and it also implies a responsibility of the people. It's the American people who have chosen this path, and unfortunately I think the consequence is that the American people have lost any semblance of being "the good guys". The American people accept and support torture, this is something the rest of the world will never forget.
International war crimes cases have historically only been brought against captured or deposed leaders as far as I know. There will probably be attempts, but my guess is that the US administration will be well protected by the US military.
America could try the administration itself though. Maybe you should ask yourself why the American people are not demanding this.
That's not really relevant though. In both cases it's very clear that the supreme court is not following "shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech". Do you seriously claim that America has no laws restricting speech? The fact that I cannot get any of you Americans to admit this is very bizarre, it's like you're in denial.
I think it's very bizarre that you won't admit that America doesn't follow the text of the first amendment. It's like denying that the Holocaust took place in the face of overwhelming evidence or that the sky is blue.
There is a strong disconnect in America between what is stated and reality. America proclaims itself as the world leader in democracy and human rights. But as has been so clearly demonstrated in the last couple of years, its actions are on the level of many dictatorships, such as Egypt. I think your attitude is very unhealthy and it's certainly not helping your country.
"[our] decisions have fashioned the principle that the constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action."
The Court, by a 9-0 vote, upheld the conviction and Justice Sanford, for the majority, invoked the Holmes test of "clear and present danger," but went further. The state, he declared, has the power to punish those who abuse their rights to speech "by utterances inimical to the public welfare, tending to incite crime, disturb the public peace, or endanger the foundations of organized government and threaten its overthrow." In other words, if words have a "bad tendency" they can be punished.
Both of these decisions are clearly in support of "abridging the freedom of speech". As has been shown in the case of the Soviet Union constitution, just because something is in the constitution doesn't mean it's going to be reflected in the society. America clearly has limitations on the freedom of speech, which is counter to that passage in the constitution. Why can't you admit that?
Also, as I mentioned, if the government can put you in jail indefinitely without a trial and torture you, it doesn't reallt matter what the constitution says. Why didn't you comment on that? Is that not important?
You're so frantic in trying to prove the superiority of your own country that you can't see the forest for the trees.
America's constitution only says that "congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech". But yet, America clearly has laws against certain types of speech. For example, it's illegal to utter a death threat. Isn't that to "abridge the freedom of speech"? I could quote to you American supreme court decisions where they state that freedom of speech may in certain cases be restricted, but I'm sure you're familiar with those cases already.
Isn't it better to instead state clearly in the constitution (as Sweden does) that speech may indeed in certain cases be restricted? I think it's much more confusing to have wording in the constitution which says that no speech may be restricted, and then have laws which do (and thus clearly violate that part of the constitution), but which people accept because society would not function otherwise.
Also, America has clever ways around its constitution. For example, it's enough to declare that someone is an "enemy combatant", then that person is no longer protected by the constitution (or by any other law), and the American government can do whatever they want to him.
I think this shows pretty clearly that America is inferior in terms of its legal system. Sweden does not jail people indefinitely without trial or torture them. America does.
I know that such a right in Europe is more of a matter of legislative tradition than constitutional law.
In Sweden it's part of the constitution. I don't think your statement is true for the majority of states in the EU, so your statement can probably be considered wrong.
When a normal person doesn't follow the law, then he's "breaking" the law. When the government doesn't follow the law, then it's "ignoring" the law. Why isn't the same word used in both cases?
Almost the exact same thing happened in America 1.5 years ago, and still probably happens all the time, though we don't hear about it. The broadcasters of the Howard Stern show were fined $495,000 for violating decency laws in America.
I think both the Belgian and the American laws on broadcasting are crappy, but it's really painful to see Americans here falling over themselves posting about how superior free speech is in America compared to Europe.
Perhaps these Americans should focus on trying to uphold their own constitution (*cough*NSA*cough*) before they start criticizing other countries for their legal systems.
However, at this time classical information cannot be transmitted through entanglement faster than the speed of light.
So what I asked for, i.e. sending Morse code through the states of entangled particles is not possible. This means that the term "action at a distance" is misleading, you cannot actually instantaneously change the state of entangled particle B by changing the state of entangled particle A. I'm sure Bell's Test demonstrates something, but it doesn't demonstrate "action at a distance".
Slashdot Mirror
The Hindu has some more data from the Lancet study:
Many of these deaths are by the US military. Any more misinformation you'd like to share?
The problem is that the Germans at the time weren't that different from us, so we are susceptible to the same social forces. You seem to imply that they were a different species or something similar. And at least I have promised that something similar to what happened in Nazi Germany will never happened again. Have you made a similar pledge? Or have you forgotten so quickly?
I haven't had these types of upgrade problems with Debian, but that could be because they release so seldom.
So eh.. isn't it faster to MMS my friend directly instead of MMSing Veeker, then waiting for them to forward it to my friend?
The 640x480 videos, which people have to pay for even though they've bought the 320x240 version, are identical to the 320x240 videos because they have been upsampled from that source. Do you understand this complex news item now?
The profit is from the games. The consoles are usually sold at a loss as far as I know.
The game (and music and movie) industry is bizarre, deal with it. If the PS3 is fun and gets a sexy reputation, then people will buy it. If people think it's lame, then they won't buy it. I don't think the price has very much influence.
For me, the fact that they added "motion sensing" at the last minute sounds much more worrying for Sony. It sounds like they realized the Wii was going to beat the PS3 and they had to copy it. I think I will get a Wii, not because it's cheap, but because the controller has great potential for fun gameplay.
The word you're looking for is "waive" not "wave".
Either you accept a free and global market, or else you don't. You can't just support a free market when it benefits you, and then oppose it when it doesn't.
Vad snackar du om? Fattar du inte vad jag säger?
It would be good to define what ODF (Open Document Formay) means somewhere. It's not defined in the Slashdot article or in Perens' article.
Perhaps you should have invented your own language before you made statements like this. Why are you writing in English? Did America invent English, or did it augment an existing language?
I personally don't think it's a good model to treat a constitution as a religious document, and treat the "founding fathers" as some sort of gods who's will has to be figured out. Since America is a deeply religious country, I guess this model is more natural, the constitution is treated more as a bible than as a legal document. Sweden is secular, and therefore we want our constitution to be explicit instead of trying to divine what was meant when it was written.
I think your definition of "hate speech" is too coarse. I don't have a problem with the crime of "incitement against an ethnic group" (or whatever group, such as homosexuals), which is just a logical extension of "incitement to murder". This does not mean ideas cannot be discussed. It just means I cannot call for the extermination of an identified group of people, just as I cannot call for the murder of an identified individual.
I used to like America, and its stance on freedom of speech was a strong contribution to that, but right now America has problems which are far more serious than freedom of speech. And it's not so simple as to blame the Bush administration. Guantanamo Bay had existed for a long time when Bush was re-elected. Iraq had already been attacked when Bush was re-elected. Democracy means rule of the people, and it also implies a responsibility of the people. It's the American people who have chosen this path, and unfortunately I think the consequence is that the American people have lost any semblance of being "the good guys". The American people accept and support torture, this is something the rest of the world will never forget.
America could try the administration itself though. Maybe you should ask yourself why the American people are not demanding this.
That's not really relevant though. In both cases it's very clear that the supreme court is not following "shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech". Do you seriously claim that America has no laws restricting speech? The fact that I cannot get any of you Americans to admit this is very bizarre, it's like you're in denial.
There is a strong disconnect in America between what is stated and reality. America proclaims itself as the world leader in democracy and human rights. But as has been so clearly demonstrated in the last couple of years, its actions are on the level of many dictatorships, such as Egypt. I think your attitude is very unhealthy and it's certainly not helping your country.
Both of these decisions are clearly in support of "abridging the freedom of speech". As has been shown in the case of the Soviet Union constitution, just because something is in the constitution doesn't mean it's going to be reflected in the society. America clearly has limitations on the freedom of speech, which is counter to that passage in the constitution. Why can't you admit that?
Also, as I mentioned, if the government can put you in jail indefinitely without a trial and torture you, it doesn't reallt matter what the constitution says. Why didn't you comment on that? Is that not important?
America's constitution only says that "congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech". But yet, America clearly has laws against certain types of speech. For example, it's illegal to utter a death threat. Isn't that to "abridge the freedom of speech"? I could quote to you American supreme court decisions where they state that freedom of speech may in certain cases be restricted, but I'm sure you're familiar with those cases already.
Isn't it better to instead state clearly in the constitution (as Sweden does) that speech may indeed in certain cases be restricted? I think it's much more confusing to have wording in the constitution which says that no speech may be restricted, and then have laws which do (and thus clearly violate that part of the constitution), but which people accept because society would not function otherwise.
Also, America has clever ways around its constitution. For example, it's enough to declare that someone is an "enemy combatant", then that person is no longer protected by the constitution (or by any other law), and the American government can do whatever they want to him.
I think this shows pretty clearly that America is inferior in terms of its legal system. Sweden does not jail people indefinitely without trial or torture them. America does.
When a normal person doesn't follow the law, then he's "breaking" the law. When the government doesn't follow the law, then it's "ignoring" the law. Why isn't the same word used in both cases?
I think this is the best comment I've read on Slashdot, ever.
I think both the Belgian and the American laws on broadcasting are crappy, but it's really painful to see Americans here falling over themselves posting about how superior free speech is in America compared to Europe.
Perhaps these Americans should focus on trying to uphold their own constitution (*cough*NSA*cough*) before they start criticizing other countries for their legal systems.