I think people sell the resiliance of the American system of government way too short. Back in the day it was Mccarthyism, the Witchunt for Communist and so forth. The technology has changed, but the situation really hasn't. While politics and security may wander to either extreem, the US has always survived and prospered because of it's inherent stability. People have a voice in this government and that's why it works. You can say it's corrupt and all, but if it didn't work, we'd have been well on our way to a dictatorship or monarchy a long time ago. Fight for your rights all you want, but at the same time, have a little faith.
Never plan for the future with optimism. Assume the worst, because it eventually will happen.
Yes, "we" survived McCarthyism -- because we weren't alive at the time! A lot of people didn't survive the insanity of the witchhunts. Lives were destroyed, and the press was whipped into silence because NO ONE wanted to be branded a traitor.
And the great Soviet threat that we thought was so omnipresent turned out to be a paper bear. But since to analyze the analysis of the great enemy would label the questioner as a commie, no one ever pointed out that the SU was a hapless giant.
LOL... When has the democratic party ever been terrified to speak? You're too much, man ^__^ If I remember correctly, their accusations that Bush knew of the 9/11 attack before hand were recently all over the news. Oh, wait.. That was a different Democratic party, right? LOL!
An utter, directed lie that was premptively floated by Ashcroft before anyone had a chance to utter a word. "Damn those Democrats! I warn them not to take political advantage of this utter failure on our team's part!"
The thing is, not a single member of the Congress had said a word. It was a nasty strike designed to smear anyone daring to speak out against the president. Once someone actually spoke, they had to defend against "partisan" alegations.
The things is, it is a hoax. NO ONE accused Team Bush of knowing about the attacks beforehand. NO ONE, damn it. What was said was muted and responsible -- that the investigation into the attack, usually a normal procedure, had been blocked since 9/11 by Bush -- and it seems now obvious that they blocked the process because they had known parts of the puzzle, and had failed to act.
As for "Democrats" being in attack mode, horse#$%@. If Clinton had been president on 9/11, the hounds of Fox News and friends would have run impeachment charges and removed him by now. Imagine Clinton blocking the investigation into 9/11! Can you IMAGINE the frothing rage and revolution by the right-wing of the nation?
The Demos, to their credit, pledged allegiance to the President, with not a whimper of protest against the Partiot Act, apparently a right-wing wish-list compiled for years. At least three amendments of the Constitution are essentially repealed, the debt is skyrocketing, we're in Eternal War, evironmental issues are dead, the President and his records are now sealed off from historical review... and barely a peep from the only group big enough to oppose, because attacking the Bush is TREASON, Don't You Know There's A War On, You Traitor?
Lord God, IMAGINE if Clinton demanded silence and acquiesence from the right wing under these circumstances! Imagine the 24/7 coverage on CNN and MS-NBC and FOX concerning his criminal behavior.
But Bush, a man not even elected, but appointed by the Federalist Society, more or less, has had, until the 9/11 leaks, abject adjulation (read: not much hard questioning) from a press corp that spent 8 years on Clinton's zipper.
The Demos had their cojones cut off when Gore won, and any chance that they could be sewn back on expired on 9/11 when the nation went ultrapatriotic.
As I recall, back in 1984, the FBI and CIA identified and tracked terrorists trying to detonate a truck full of explosives at the World Trade Center. The thwarted plot involved toppling one tower into it's twin.
The thing is, as in 2001, the agencies were on the ball, and the messages heeded. In 2001, tho, idiots were in charge.
The chief idiot was on a four week vacation when the warnings were given. Not that he would have heard about them. He insisted on a three-page-a-day synopsis of everything he needed to know. Not a great reader, apparently.
Let's not forget the Osamawatch, meticulously maintained by Clinton, was shut down as a Bad Clinton Idea. And Ashcroft didn't really care much about the terrorist problem up til then -- his staff told a senator(I believe) that he would hear her urgent plea about potential attacks... in six months. Smirk. Get out of our office, liberal.
The communications and intel were absolutely perfect. The failure was at the top level - the White House. The blaming of "communication" and "organization" is nonsense. Everything worked, except the analytical skills of the current boys in charge.
Re:If you don't want it known, don't do it in publ
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Surveillance Update
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· Score: 2
The thing is, if you have no expectations of being left alone in public, your effective world will become your apartment.
With your voice and data communications monitored there, of course.
There will be nowhere left to live free. And our kids will never know what that means, and be happy with their imprisonment.
If you want to live a safe life, live in a prison? Waitaminute -- prisons are pretty bad, aren't they, if the wardens and guards don't like you?
ALL badthinkers won't be on that database
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Surveillance Update
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· Score: 3, Interesting
All criminals/badthinkers won't be on that database. Somehow I don't think that white collar scum like Kenny-Boy Lay and all the other Enron and Anderson thieves will ever be blacklisted. Steal ten dollars, and you go on the list. Steal ten million, and you'll be invited to join the board of directors.
Seriously now. This is without a doubt the worst news I've heard all year, and I've heard a lot. This database will be a tool of very powerful and opinionated people to destroy the financial lives of people that disagree with them. And let's not even think about how Nixonian politicians or well-connected cults will manipulate that database to brand people "terrorists".
That word, "terrorist", mark me here, is the shiboleth of the 21st century. It will be used by very motivated political interests to annihilate "enemies", i.e. anyone who opposes their policies. And opposition will be forever muted, because people will learn not to make waves, else be spied on by the world cops, and marked "verboten" for financial dealings by the financial world.
Paranoid, you say? [bang head on wall].
It's already happening. Democratic party members are already terrified of speaking out because they WILL be branded traitors and terrorist sympathizers. The WTO protesters are already being labelled premptively as violent criminals wherever they show up -- and you can bet that is because of the influence wielded by the those they oppose. Oh, and did you know that protestors against Bush are not allowed within miles of the Great Man? They are bussed to cordoned-off "First Amendment Zones" miles away, and penned there by local cops until the Leader is gone, free of protestor taint. Of course, pro-Bush people are allowed to swarm the Bush -- this is democracy???
And to forestall any more "paranoia" strikes -- the use of lists and secret monitoring against political adversaries was used extensively by Nixon -- and a lot of the same moral-free characters than ran his culture war in their youth are now happily and ruthlessly slamming around the Constitution in pursuit of money for their peers and political control for themselves. I've never seen a press corps so utterly whipped.
1. How would handle the problem of reciprocity against testifying witnesses?
How have we handled it for the last 225 years? Is this a new problem requiring the suspension of the U.S. Constitution? And that was not a reason given for the secret tribunals by Bush.
2. How would you handle the damage done to our intelligence gathering apparatus when the identities of the witnesses are revealed?
The damage is done when the suspect is taken off the street and disappeared. Do you not think that 1000+ people disappeared and no one noticed, especially the few (or none) that really are terrorists?
3. How would you plan to subpoena witnesses when they are likely to be foreign nationals and indeed, are likely to be penalty of perjury?
We seem to kidnap them. If we can disappear them from U.S. streets, I guarantee CIA cowboys are yanking people into vans all over the world.
The realistic answer to all of this is if we adhere to the constitutional process of citizen trial, the prosecution simply not occur. The offenders would have to go free...
Wow. In that case, we need to end this farce called a constitutional government. Anoint the Holy Bush, selected by God Himself (according to the right wing clergy), Dictator for Life, with the power of high and the low justice. At least for darkies. Dispense with the rule of the unwashed, uneducated masses, and we'll finally get things done!
Alleluyah!
Probability of a mod up on a post supporting military tribunals on Slashdot? 0%.
Damn straight, fascist.
Re:Really sad that /. readers are cheering PROC
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China Plans Moonbase
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After having read many a Heinlein novel, I'm surprised that you seem to think it's OK for the Chinese to continue status quo and enslave their people, as long as they develop space travel. Are you hoping for a free ride (read free lunch)?
Yep, I've read them all, at quite a young age, and they influenced me mightily. But the Old Man wasn't always right, and had many blind spots.
Do I think the status quo of slavery should be maintained so that space travel can finally start?
Well, let's look at the assumption in that statement. Are the Chinese slaves to their goverment because it is (in name) communist?
Firstly, you are assuming they are communist, with all the baggage thereby. This is false-to-fact. They are a civilization that started as a royal bureaucracy, transformed into a dictatorship, then underwent poor leadership that eventually fell to superior military forces that eventually resolved themselves into an ideological fascism. Their xenophobia was their undoing, but that was reinforced by the hated intervention in their affairs by the enlightened West -- remember, the original Drug War was fought in China by the British -- to MAINTAIN British company's profits generated by the opium trade. Their experience with Western-style capitalism was at the point of a cannon.
The nation has been evolving into a vibrant capitalist society -- in their own way. Like many things, this takes time. But the fascistic urge that permeates the government there is not "communistic" in nature -- it would exist regardless, for it is in their culture, not their economic system. And more to the point, we have no problem with governments with social controls as powerful and repressive as China's -- as long as our companies make money there. Hell, we are currently exporting our manufacuring to China -- I don't see anyone complaining about the free ride that corporations currently get by slashing their payrolls by 90+ percent. Thankee, Tovarisch! Money beats freedom hands down in a truly free market. Hell, the shirt you wear right now could have been made by a political prisoner in the Hunang countryside. How's your free ride doing? Actually, the manufacturer's ride -- you probably paid the same amount, adjusted for inflation, for the Chinese Communist Prisoner shirt on your back as for the locally-made one you bought fifteen years ago. The money just went to the corporate bank account, which was used to buy other companies -- 'cause dividends are bad.
If a free ride for all the U.S. corporations and Wall Street is okay as long as they make money, I'll be as "moral" and hope the Chinese can use their strategic planning advantage to at least get a working space-based economy in place because the classic Heinlein-based capitalists can't do it.
Think they would lift anyone who isn't a good trustworthy comrade?
For money, hell yes they will. Lots and lots of money.
As for CAPITALISM and morality (I didn't say BUSINESS and morality) you need to do a quick check of ``Moon is a Harsh Mistress". I'm a Randite. My pursuit of happiness is my moral imperative. I'll have every right to kill the next guy who takes away mine to get his!
As a professed Heinlein fan I'm shocked to see you let the True Believers own the word "moral".
I developed my world view from that book.
Heinlein considered Ayn Rand to be a liberal. She didn't go far enough, in a rare interview I once read.
Heinlein started out a "liberal", which is to say someone other than a far-rightist. Like Hubbard, he considered himself a social scientist using the techniques of General Semantics.
The thing is, he developed first principles that were his own prejudices rather than "law" and then developed a pitiless view of world politics that became more and more diamond-hard-right. At the end, he was snarling at Arthur Clarke at a conference because Clarke wasn't entitled to have an opinion in the discussion because he wasn't an American. He became didacticly monomaniacal on some subjects -- because he believed that his opinions, however worthy, were unassailable because they were "scientific" -- like quantum mechanics, the speed of light, chemistry. The thing is, he was as scientific as Elron Hubbard. What he was doing was not SCIENCE, because subjective opinion of social mores and such is not valid observation in the scientific sense, and cannot be used to create a "science".
Ayn Rand's "moral imperative" to pursuit of happiness is nothing but selfishness dressed up as morality. For us to survive as a species, you and I have to have responsibility to the world as a whole, not just ourselves. Objectivists reduce the world to a Tribe of One.
And NO, you do not have the right to kill anyone blocking your happiness. I think that is the very definition of evil, and it departs from Heinlein's view of morality. Heinlein believed in DUTY to OTHERS as a prerequisite to morality. A man who loved the Navy, he almost always defined the duty as military, but I have reinterpreted such duty as one to the world as well. Because we are going up or down together -- not by ourselves.
"True Believers" are Marvel Comics fans. There aren't any more Communist "True Believers" left in China. It's a capitalist economy overlaid with a cultural fascism run by an elite Party. And I never let them "own" the term, or connected "moral" with China. Non sequitur.
The hope of getting off this planet doesn't lie with Comrades or Blessed believers. It's with geeks scratching out a living developing technology for profit and/or enjoyment. We'll lift without NASA, ESA, or China and without doing it on your dime.
Geeks, of which I have been one myself, like to develop tech, but the profit therein isn't as stable as you'd like to think. Profit can be made on the entrepenurial level -- until a major corporation takes your business one way or another. And the development of space travel has been tried for years -- the DC-X (Delta Clipper) and the Rotary Rocket company tried, and had working tech.
But the Delta Clipper project died because the only people willing to finance it was NASA -- which killed the funding eventually because of budget cuts and the disapproval of Lockheed/Etc. corporation which wanted a hugely expensive winged craft which would make major bucks. Lockheed's project died because of it's greed and overdesign, and it took the geek-designed viable DC-X SSTO vehicle with it. Not because the government was stupid, or the design bad - but because capitalism wouldn't support it. Everything has limits, and space travel exceeds capitalism's at the moment.
To beat this, geeks will have to develop cheap anti-gravity generators that can be built in a garage. Failing that, a long-term goverment program is the only option, and China is the only one with the right goals: manufacturing, colonization, and making money. The U.S. is obsessed with Mars for some bizarre reason, and the world's democracies are voting against funding for space development.
If it's going to be the Red Flag, then that's the way it's gotta be. No one else will do it.
And what's wrong with mining resources? Do you use 100% recycled products?
Agree with mining for resources, but I prefer to do it on the moon, or from an asteroid in the far future. Mining on Earth damages the area ecologically, which is OK with a couple of billion people's needs. But postulate TEN billion or more, and the our planet's going to look like a golf course with a gopher invasion.
The moon is rock and vacuum. Strip mine away!
Capitalist NATIONS don't take huge percentages for GDP in taxes to go in search of the raw materials for production. Instead, CAPITALIST individuals (or their legal constructions) take personal risks to later return a profit.
The thing is, that used to be true, as far as personal risk. But now with a corporate structure, individuals take no risks in enterprises such as space flight - legal fictions do, as you say. But this means that the classic penalties for failure or malfeasance -- penury or jail -- are now erased. But more on point, a corporation simply cannot take the risks an entrepeneur can take -- such as a twenty year plan to build lunar mines and an orbital industy to compliment it.
Another point: corporations darn well use huge chunks of the GDP -- it's called defense spending. And other things. Remember Ross Perot? He hates government spending -- but doesn't want us to remember that EDP, his fortune, was made off of goverment contracts.
If a CAPITALIST has the means to launch a moon-mining project (including obtaining some precedent for mineral rights on Luna) and the fervent belief that they will make money (BENEFIT). This is all well and good and moral, and all who contribute do so voluntarily.
Except that these capitalist individuals aren't lifting us into space. Neither are corporations. The thing is, corporations must make a profit quarter to quarter -- quite large ones, or Wall Street has a meltdown. And space development is a decades-long process with no profit to be made until major components are complete -- a cheap launch system, a lunar base with mass-driver complex to lift the materiel, an orbital system to capture the materiel, smelters, factories, orbital stations/colonies, lunar-terran shuttle systems, on and on. Probably trillions in capital outlay before one penny in steel/aluminum/titanium deliveries, or a decent capability to accept colonists in numbers. No corporation can do this because no shareholder will accept it.
The words "moral" and "business" are not connected. Do not confuse religious and moral issues with business practices -- such confusion is dangerous and intentional. Businesses are not human and their procedures are not moral in any way. HUMANS behave in a moral fashion. BUSINESSES are amoral contructs run by morally-shielded humans. Businesses should never claim a mantle of holiness, and I will not let this meme start without a fight. Thought we didn't catch that, hm?
I'm a Son of Heinlein myself, which means I can smell a dead semantic herring in my underwear drawer.
Frankly, if the Chinese are going to go to the moon on the backs of the Chinese workers it will almost certainly hasten the demise of their non-free (non-free as in speech and as in beer) regime. [See Heritage foundation freedom index. ] [heritage.org] That will benefit humanity.
I'll skip the Heritage Foundation. Sadly tho, if the regime falls before the benefits of space development roll in, the Chinese people will get McDonalds, cars, traffic jams, and corporate control -- and the world loses because the last hope for getting off this planet dies.
I'll hope that democracy develops in China, but that somehow this amazing development continues somehow despite taxpayer protests -- because it really is the last real hope for the human race to spread off this planet before we turn into a race of suburban tax haters who think everything is fine the way it is.
Re:"For the benefit of humanity"
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China Plans Moonbase
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· Score: 5, Insightful
Well, they are going to the moon to build a mining station, and our national capital seems to be fleeing to off-shore tax havens with the blessings of the administration.
For sheer results for monies spent, they seem to be gaining on us. Perhaps to build a space-faring civilization, at least at current levels of technology, a nation needs a dictatorship, or at least a permanent government capable of making plans for period greater than four to eight years.
This is NOT what the future was supposed to be.
And are we living in a democracy anymore? Sigh. Looks more like a plutocracy installed by any means necessary.
Oops, there's a knocking outside my door.
"Sir, are your papers in order? There have been questions about comments you have made about the president on the Internet. If you could answer some questions?"
...
"Please come with us. No, you cannot have a lawyer. No, your family cannot be called. No, we decide when you leave. --taser him, he's running for it...!"
TZZZZZZZZ drag drag drag
[The preceeding wasn't funny, and can now happen in the U.S.A. Remember kids, questioning those in power is unpatriotic, and treasonous! All stand now and drown out the traitors on our Permanent War on Terra with the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance...]
Anyone notice Carter's demonstration of the insanity of "miltary tribunals" in which the accusers are also the judges?
Not a coincidence that it maps closely to the current "fry 'em in the dark" policy instituted by Bush and company. Detention in secret, no contact with relatives or lawyers, disposition a secret as well -- hell, Mulder got better treatment at his "trial" than someone held under the current "emergency".
I think Chris Carter was trying to not so subtly draw attention to our new system of "alternative" justice.
I'd cut the chip out of the book. Track my reading, will ya?
One other thing: if the chip's memory is capacious, it occurs to me that you could put the e-text of the book itself in there. Which kind of raises the question: why print the book if you can release it in e-format?
Um, no, not nearly. maybe a ton, maybe two. YMMV, they've upped him to ten tons lately, which I think is getting a bit silly.
He can toss a car, not a bulldozer, and at that he can only toss the car a little way.
But he's strong enough to keep his arms attached to his bod when he's pulling tens of G's.
His passengers should be broken bags of protein, tho. I'd expect he'd take care to make really really short swings if he's carrying his girlfriend.
Re:"Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex" not right
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Comic Book Physics
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· Score: 2
"Also, Superman is not a total idiot, so he'll undoubtedly be watching a pregnant wife very closely for possible complications from a super-fetus (X-ray vision's better than ultra-sound!). And take action at the first sign of a problem. It's not like they don't have an inkling that it's a high-risk pregnancy. "
I have this vision of Supes shrinking himself to about half a centimeter in size, and... taking action. Does he tell Lois to lie back, then flies his mini-self into her uterus? Hand to hand with the fetus until it calms down? He's gonna be a busy hero for nine months.
The MPAA is going to get its way regardless of what the EFF does, sad to say. Whether or not AOTC is downloaded, the judges are heavily weighted in favor of business rights due to two decades of conservative stacking. And that isn't a Republican slam, tho surely they are the heaviest proponents of the biz sector. This is about money and power, and no argument is going to stop the judges from stopping the "criminals".
As to the argument copying=stealing, I'd say that anyone willing to spend the days or weeks necessary to download the AOTC is fan enough to have bought several tickets to see it in the theaters anyway. The MPAA will lose nothing; neither will Lucas.
This forum is reduced to children screaming epithets at the unpopular guy as they steal his shoes behind the gym.
I expect this from the acne-ridden Talkback recluses at Aint-It-Cool-News that Kevin Smith slaughters so effectively in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, but from grown professionals? How old are you people, 12? 13?
"Is this what happens when you give one company a license to print money?"
Um, YES!
Free markets are wonderful, up until a supplier gets a monopoly. Or collusion starts up. Then the lovely free market rapidly turns into a bloodsucking operation.
This, kids, is why we have "government". It's sort of this organization we collectively create to protect our national interests. It requires politicians and statesmen, not business majors, to review markets and issue controls.
We are now commencing a wonderful experiment in government by anti-government zealots. Watch what happens... inflation, monopoly, and control of markets by people who don't have our national interests at heart.
Um, yes you can sail towards the sun, by tacking against the sunlight to reduce orbital velocity around the sun, thus dropping steadily towards the sun. Um, think of a shrinking spiral.
Reverse the process by tacking to increase orbital speed, and you move away in an increasingly large spiral.
Um, we have a shiny new 100 billion dollar deficit, a neverending "war" on a common noun that gives an administration carte blanc to imprison whomever they want for eternity, a destroyed retirement system, annihilated environmental oversight, corporate takeover of every significant oversight agency, the Christian Right trying for its final takedown of our culture, a President who's predicating his foreign policy on Armaggedon after Israel's ascendancy, a thorough takeover of the most influential popular press by the same people who brought us Whitewater, Foster, Travelgate, and all the other lies, a White House press corps who will not do their job, a "war" where more journalists than soldiers are dying because the administration is openly hostile to their operations and are refusing transport and succor -- hell, let's just call it a little private war, no records allowed, a president who has sealed his own records and all other presidential records (except Clinton's -- of course!) for all eternity, an Attorney General who 1) breaks the law by pronouncing guilt on Walker, ruining the case 2) decides God triumps the voters in Oregon, and 3) is running his own Biblical agenda on America, and last but not least, a president who was selected by Federalist Society judges who are running a very active war to change America into their own concept of a Christian conservative state. And no, Bush was not elected. The NYT story and most of the others that reported that Bush won the recount were extremely erroneous. Frankly, if you exclude the military vote illegally cast after the election was over, Gore would have won. In the majority of the scenarios, Gore won. If the election officials had been allowed to do their job in Florida, the overvotes would have been counted, and those alone would have overwhelmed the "undervotes" and given Gore the election.
So, to sum up; 8 years of prosperity and peace, with a healed Social Security system, gone. Presently, a President selected into office by a dirty network of far-right wingers, including 4 on the SCOTUS, has declared the Forever War, knocked out at least three articles of the Bill of Rights, sealed his records so no one can see what he's done, and give the foxes the keys to the henhouse corporatewise. And to top it off, he's a bloody idiot who can't even speak without a speech written by his handlers. We're governed by a fool controlled by smart amoral men.
Slashdot Mirror
Ashcroft did not float the "Democrats should not dare to say we knew about 9/11 in advance" lie -- it was VP Cheney.
Never plan for the future with optimism. Assume the worst, because it eventually will happen.
Yes, "we" survived McCarthyism -- because we weren't alive at the time! A lot of people didn't survive the insanity of the witchhunts. Lives were destroyed, and the press was whipped into silence because NO ONE wanted to be branded a traitor.
And the great Soviet threat that we thought was so omnipresent turned out to be a paper bear. But since to analyze the analysis of the great enemy would label the questioner as a commie, no one ever pointed out that the SU was a hapless giant.
An utter, directed lie that was premptively floated by Ashcroft before anyone had a chance to utter a word. "Damn those Democrats! I warn them not to take political advantage of this utter failure on our team's part!"
The thing is, not a single member of the Congress had said a word. It was a nasty strike designed to smear anyone daring to speak out against the president. Once someone actually spoke, they had to defend against "partisan" alegations.
The things is, it is a hoax. NO ONE accused Team Bush of knowing about the attacks beforehand. NO ONE, damn it. What was said was muted and responsible -- that the investigation into the attack, usually a normal procedure, had been blocked since 9/11 by Bush -- and it seems now obvious that they blocked the process because they had known parts of the puzzle, and had failed to act.
As for "Democrats" being in attack mode, horse#$%@. If Clinton had been president on 9/11, the hounds of Fox News and friends would have run impeachment charges and removed him by now. Imagine Clinton blocking the investigation into 9/11! Can you IMAGINE the frothing rage and revolution by the right-wing of the nation?
The Demos, to their credit, pledged allegiance to the President, with not a whimper of protest against the Partiot Act, apparently a right-wing wish-list compiled for years. At least three amendments of the Constitution are essentially repealed, the debt is skyrocketing, we're in Eternal War, evironmental issues are dead, the President and his records are now sealed off from historical review... and barely a peep from the only group big enough to oppose, because attacking the Bush is TREASON, Don't You Know There's A War On, You Traitor?
Lord God, IMAGINE if Clinton demanded silence and acquiesence from the right wing under these circumstances! Imagine the 24/7 coverage on CNN and MS-NBC and FOX concerning his criminal behavior.
But Bush, a man not even elected, but appointed by the Federalist Society, more or less, has had, until the 9/11 leaks, abject adjulation (read: not much hard questioning) from a press corp that spent 8 years on Clinton's zipper.
The Demos had their cojones cut off when Gore won, and any chance that they could be sewn back on expired on 9/11 when the nation went ultrapatriotic.
What is "agrivation"? Notice the question mark.
As I recall, back in 1984, the FBI and CIA identified and tracked terrorists trying to detonate a truck full of explosives at the World Trade Center. The thwarted plot involved toppling one tower into it's twin.
The thing is, as in 2001, the agencies were on the ball, and the messages heeded. In 2001, tho, idiots were in charge.
The chief idiot was on a four week vacation when the warnings were given. Not that he would have heard about them. He insisted on a three-page-a-day synopsis of everything he needed to know. Not a great reader, apparently.
Let's not forget the Osamawatch, meticulously maintained by Clinton, was shut down as a Bad Clinton Idea. And Ashcroft didn't really care much about the terrorist problem up til then -- his staff told a senator(I believe) that he would hear her urgent plea about potential attacks... in six months. Smirk. Get out of our office, liberal.
The communications and intel were absolutely perfect. The failure was at the top level - the White House. The blaming of "communication" and "organization" is nonsense. Everything worked, except the analytical skills of the current boys in charge.
The thing is, if you have no expectations of being left alone in public, your effective world will become your apartment.
With your voice and data communications monitored there, of course.
There will be nowhere left to live free. And our kids will never know what that means, and be happy with their imprisonment.
If you want to live a safe life, live in a prison? Waitaminute -- prisons are pretty bad, aren't they, if the wardens and guards don't like you?
All criminals/badthinkers won't be on that database. Somehow I don't think that white collar scum like Kenny-Boy Lay and all the other Enron and Anderson thieves will ever be blacklisted. Steal ten dollars, and you go on the list. Steal ten million, and you'll be invited to join the board of directors.
Seriously now. This is without a doubt the worst news I've heard all year, and I've heard a lot. This database will be a tool of very powerful and opinionated people to destroy the financial lives of people that disagree with them. And let's not even think about how Nixonian politicians or well-connected cults will manipulate that database to brand people "terrorists".
That word, "terrorist", mark me here, is the shiboleth of the 21st century. It will be used by very motivated political interests to annihilate "enemies", i.e. anyone who opposes their policies. And opposition will be forever muted, because people will learn not to make waves, else be spied on by the world cops, and marked "verboten" for financial dealings by the financial world.
Paranoid, you say? [bang head on wall].
It's already happening. Democratic party members are already terrified of speaking out because they WILL be branded traitors and terrorist sympathizers. The WTO protesters are already being labelled premptively as violent criminals wherever they show up -- and you can bet that is because of the influence wielded by the those they oppose. Oh, and did you know that protestors against Bush are not allowed within miles of the Great Man? They are bussed to cordoned-off "First Amendment Zones" miles away, and penned there by local cops until the Leader is gone, free of protestor taint. Of course, pro-Bush people are allowed to swarm the Bush -- this is democracy???
And to forestall any more "paranoia" strikes -- the use of lists and secret monitoring against political adversaries was used extensively by Nixon -- and a lot of the same moral-free characters than ran his culture war in their youth are now happily and ruthlessly slamming around the Constitution in pursuit of money for their peers and political control for themselves. I've never seen a press corps so utterly whipped.
Um, the writer was responding to an ad hominem attack against "Greenies".
For your argument ("Greenies" are ad hominem thugs!) to make sense, one requires instant amnesia.
We bring you back to the Rush Limbaugh Show, already in full ad hominem progress...
Wait a little longer for the AGP version. Perfection is nigh.
How have we handled it for the last 225 years? Is this a new problem requiring the suspension of the U.S. Constitution?
And that was not a reason given for the secret tribunals by Bush.
The damage is done when the suspect is taken off the street and disappeared. Do you not think that 1000+ people disappeared and no one noticed, especially the few (or none) that really are terrorists?
We seem to kidnap them. If we can disappear them from U.S. streets, I guarantee CIA cowboys are yanking people into vans all over the world.
Wow. In that case, we need to end this farce called a constitutional government. Anoint the Holy Bush, selected by God Himself (according to the right wing clergy), Dictator for Life, with the power of high and the low justice. At least for darkies. Dispense with the rule of the unwashed, uneducated masses, and we'll finally get things done!
Alleluyah!
Damn straight, fascist.
Yep, I've read them all, at quite a young age, and they influenced me mightily. But the Old Man wasn't always right, and had many blind spots.
Do I think the status quo of slavery should be maintained so that space travel can finally start?
Well, let's look at the assumption in that statement. Are the Chinese slaves to their goverment because it is (in name) communist?
Firstly, you are assuming they are communist, with all the baggage thereby. This is false-to-fact. They are a civilization that started as a royal bureaucracy, transformed into a dictatorship, then underwent poor leadership that eventually fell to superior military forces that eventually resolved themselves into an ideological fascism. Their xenophobia was their undoing, but that was reinforced by the hated intervention in their affairs by the enlightened West -- remember, the original Drug War was fought in China by the British -- to MAINTAIN British company's profits generated by the opium trade. Their experience with Western-style capitalism was at the point of a cannon.
The nation has been evolving into a vibrant capitalist society -- in their own way. Like many things, this takes time. But the fascistic urge that permeates the government there is not "communistic" in nature -- it would exist regardless, for it is in their culture, not their economic system. And more to the point, we have no problem with governments with social controls as powerful and repressive as China's -- as long as our companies make money there. Hell, we are currently exporting our manufacuring to China -- I don't see anyone complaining about the free ride that corporations currently get by slashing their payrolls by 90+ percent. Thankee, Tovarisch! Money beats freedom hands down in a truly free market. Hell, the shirt you wear right now could have been made by a political prisoner in the Hunang countryside. How's your free ride doing? Actually, the manufacturer's ride -- you probably paid the same amount, adjusted for inflation, for the Chinese Communist Prisoner shirt on your back as for the locally-made one you bought fifteen years ago. The money just went to the corporate bank account, which was used to buy other companies -- 'cause dividends are bad.
If a free ride for all the U.S. corporations and Wall Street is okay as long as they make money, I'll be as "moral" and hope the Chinese can use their strategic planning advantage to at least get a working space-based economy in place because the classic Heinlein-based capitalists can't do it.
For money, hell yes they will. Lots and lots of money.
I developed my world view from that book.
Heinlein considered Ayn Rand to be a liberal. She didn't go far enough, in a rare interview I once read.
Heinlein started out a "liberal", which is to say someone other than a far-rightist. Like Hubbard, he considered himself a social scientist using the techniques of General Semantics.
The thing is, he developed first principles that were his own prejudices rather than "law" and then developed a pitiless view of world politics that became more and more diamond-hard-right. At the end, he was snarling at Arthur Clarke at a conference because Clarke wasn't entitled to have an opinion in the discussion because he wasn't an American. He became didacticly monomaniacal on some subjects -- because he believed that his opinions, however worthy, were unassailable because they were "scientific" -- like quantum mechanics, the speed of light, chemistry. The thing is, he was as scientific as Elron Hubbard. What he was doing was not SCIENCE, because subjective opinion of social mores and such is not valid observation in the scientific sense, and cannot be used to create a "science".
Ayn Rand's "moral imperative" to pursuit of happiness is nothing but selfishness dressed up as morality. For us to survive as a species, you and I have to have responsibility to the world as a whole, not just ourselves. Objectivists reduce the world to a Tribe of One.
And NO, you do not have the right to kill anyone blocking your happiness. I think that is the very definition of evil, and it departs from Heinlein's view of morality. Heinlein believed in DUTY to OTHERS as a prerequisite to morality. A man who loved the Navy, he almost always defined the duty as military, but I have reinterpreted such duty as one to the world as well. Because we are going up or down together -- not by ourselves.
"True Believers" are Marvel Comics fans. There aren't any more Communist "True Believers" left in China. It's a capitalist economy overlaid with a cultural fascism run by an elite Party. And I never let them "own" the term, or connected "moral" with China. Non sequitur.
Geeks, of which I have been one myself, like to develop tech, but the profit therein isn't as stable as you'd like to think. Profit can be made on the entrepenurial level -- until a major corporation takes your business one way or another. And the development of space travel has been tried for years -- the DC-X (Delta Clipper) and the Rotary Rocket company tried, and had working tech.
But the Delta Clipper project died because the only people willing to finance it was NASA -- which killed the funding eventually because of budget cuts and the disapproval of Lockheed/Etc. corporation which wanted a hugely expensive winged craft which would make major bucks. Lockheed's project died because of it's greed and overdesign, and it took the geek-designed viable DC-X SSTO vehicle with it. Not because the government was stupid, or the design bad - but because capitalism wouldn't support it. Everything has limits, and space travel exceeds capitalism's at the moment.
To beat this, geeks will have to develop cheap anti-gravity generators that can be built in a garage. Failing that, a long-term goverment program is the only option, and China is the only one with the right goals: manufacturing, colonization, and making money. The U.S. is obsessed with Mars for some bizarre reason, and the world's democracies are voting against funding for space development.
If it's going to be the Red Flag, then that's the way it's gotta be. No one else will do it.
Agree with mining for resources, but I prefer to do it on the moon, or from an asteroid in the far future. Mining on Earth damages the area ecologically, which is OK with a couple of billion people's needs. But postulate TEN billion or more, and the our planet's going to look like a golf course with a gopher invasion.
The moon is rock and vacuum. Strip mine away!
The thing is, that used to be true, as far as personal risk. But now with a corporate structure, individuals take no risks in enterprises such as space flight - legal fictions do, as you say. But this means that the classic penalties for failure or malfeasance -- penury or jail -- are now erased. But more on point, a corporation simply cannot take the risks an entrepeneur can take -- such as a twenty year plan to build lunar mines and an orbital industy to compliment it.
Another point: corporations darn well use huge chunks of the GDP -- it's called defense spending. And other things. Remember Ross Perot? He hates government spending -- but doesn't want us to remember that EDP, his fortune, was made off of goverment contracts.
Except that these capitalist individuals aren't lifting us into space. Neither are corporations. The thing is, corporations must make a profit quarter to quarter -- quite large ones, or Wall Street has a meltdown. And space development is a decades-long process with no profit to be made until major components are complete -- a cheap launch system, a lunar base with mass-driver complex to lift the materiel, an orbital system to capture the materiel, smelters, factories, orbital stations/colonies, lunar-terran shuttle systems, on and on. Probably trillions in capital outlay before one penny in steel/aluminum/titanium deliveries, or a decent capability to accept colonists in numbers. No corporation can do this because no shareholder will accept it.
The words "moral" and "business" are not connected. Do not confuse religious and moral issues with business practices -- such confusion is dangerous and intentional. Businesses are not human and their procedures are not moral in any way. HUMANS behave in a moral fashion. BUSINESSES are amoral contructs run by morally-shielded humans. Businesses should never claim a mantle of holiness, and I will not let this meme start without a fight. Thought we didn't catch that, hm?
I'm a Son of Heinlein myself, which means I can smell a dead semantic herring in my underwear drawer.
I'll skip the Heritage Foundation. Sadly tho, if the regime falls before the benefits of space development roll in, the Chinese people will get McDonalds, cars, traffic jams, and corporate control -- and the world loses because the last hope for getting off this planet dies.
I'll hope that democracy develops in China, but that somehow this amazing development continues somehow despite taxpayer protests -- because it really is the last real hope for the human race to spread off this planet before we turn into a race of suburban tax haters who think everything is fine the way it is.
Well, they are going to the moon to build a mining station, and our national capital seems to be fleeing to off-shore tax havens with the blessings of the administration.
For sheer results for monies spent, they seem to be gaining on us. Perhaps to build a space-faring civilization, at least at current levels of technology, a nation needs a dictatorship, or at least a permanent government capable of making plans for period greater than four to eight years.
This is NOT what the future was supposed to be.
And are we living in a democracy anymore? Sigh. Looks more like a plutocracy installed by any means necessary.
Oops, there's a knocking outside my door.
"Sir, are your papers in order? There have been questions about comments you have made about the president on the Internet. If you could answer some questions?"
...
"Please come with us. No, you cannot have a lawyer. No, your family cannot be called. No, we decide when you leave. --taser him, he's running for it...!"
TZZZZZZZZ drag drag drag
[The preceeding wasn't funny, and can now happen in the U.S.A. Remember kids, questioning those in power is unpatriotic, and treasonous! All stand now and drown out the traitors on our Permanent War on Terra with the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance...]
grr
Anyone notice Carter's demonstration of the insanity of "miltary tribunals" in which the accusers are also the judges?
Not a coincidence that it maps closely to the current "fry 'em in the dark" policy instituted by Bush and company. Detention in secret, no contact with relatives or lawyers, disposition a secret as well -- hell, Mulder got better treatment at his "trial" than someone held under the current "emergency".
I think Chris Carter was trying to not so subtly draw attention to our new system of "alternative" justice.
I'd cut the chip out of the book. Track my reading, will ya?
One other thing: if the chip's memory is capacious, it occurs to me that you could put the e-text of the book itself in there. Which kind of raises the question: why print the book if you can release it in e-format?
Um, no, not nearly. maybe a ton, maybe two. YMMV, they've upped him to ten tons lately, which I think is getting a bit silly.
He can toss a car, not a bulldozer, and at that he can only toss the car a little way.
But he's strong enough to keep his arms attached to his bod when he's pulling tens of G's.
His passengers should be broken bags of protein, tho. I'd expect he'd take care to make really really short swings if he's carrying his girlfriend.
"Also, Superman is not a total idiot, so he'll undoubtedly be watching a pregnant wife very closely for possible complications from a super-fetus (X-ray vision's better than ultra-sound!). And take action at the first sign of a problem. It's not like they don't have an inkling that it's a high-risk pregnancy. "
I have this vision of Supes shrinking himself to about half a centimeter in size, and... taking action. Does he tell Lois to lie back, then flies his mini-self into her uterus? Hand to hand with the fetus until it calms down? He's gonna be a busy hero for nine months.
I gotta draw this...
The MPAA is going to get its way regardless of what the EFF does, sad to say. Whether or not AOTC is downloaded, the judges are heavily weighted in favor of business rights due to two decades of conservative stacking. And that isn't a Republican slam, tho surely they are the heaviest proponents of the biz sector. This is about money and power, and no argument is going to stop the judges from stopping the "criminals".
As to the argument copying=stealing, I'd say that anyone willing to spend the days or weeks necessary to download the AOTC is fan enough to have bought several tickets to see it in the theaters anyway. The MPAA will lose nothing; neither will Lucas.
This forum is reduced to children screaming epithets at the unpopular guy as they steal his shoes behind the gym.
I expect this from the acne-ridden Talkback recluses at Aint-It-Cool-News that Kevin Smith slaughters so effectively in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, but from grown professionals? How old are you people, 12? 13?
If you do it in self-service, and they catch you, you will be tossed into the street.
Nope. Just displays the source.
Um, YES!
Free markets are wonderful, up until a supplier gets a monopoly. Or collusion starts up. Then the lovely free market rapidly turns into a bloodsucking operation.
This, kids, is why we have "government". It's sort of this organization we collectively create to protect our national interests. It requires politicians and statesmen, not business majors, to review markets and issue controls.
We are now commencing a wonderful experiment in government by anti-government zealots. Watch what happens... inflation, monopoly, and control of markets by people who don't have our national interests at heart.
If it's anal-retentive to insist on spelling a character's name correctly, then I'm sure John Cats would point it out...
Solar sails use photons primarily for propulsion, not the solar wind, tho it is indeed a factor. I know, I'm quibbling, but it's fun.
Um, yes you can sail towards the sun, by tacking against the sunlight to reduce orbital velocity around the sun, thus dropping steadily towards the sun. Um, think of a shrinking spiral.
Reverse the process by tacking to increase orbital speed, and you move away in an increasingly large spiral.
Um, we have a shiny new 100 billion dollar deficit, a neverending "war" on a common noun that gives an administration carte blanc to imprison whomever they want for eternity, a destroyed retirement system, annihilated environmental oversight, corporate takeover of every significant oversight agency, the Christian Right trying for its final takedown of our culture, a President who's predicating his foreign policy on Armaggedon after Israel's ascendancy, a thorough takeover of the most influential popular press by the same people who brought us Whitewater, Foster, Travelgate, and all the other lies, a White House press corps who will not do their job, a "war" where more journalists than soldiers are dying because the administration is openly hostile to their operations and are refusing transport and succor -- hell, let's just call it a little private war, no records allowed, a president who has sealed his own records and all other presidential records (except Clinton's -- of course!) for all eternity, an Attorney General who 1) breaks the law by pronouncing guilt on Walker, ruining the case 2) decides God triumps the voters in Oregon, and 3) is running his own Biblical agenda on America, and last but not least, a president who was selected by Federalist Society judges who are running a very active war to change America into their own concept of a Christian conservative state. And no, Bush was not elected. The NYT story and most of the others that reported that Bush won the recount were extremely erroneous. Frankly, if you exclude the military vote illegally cast after the election was over, Gore would have won. In the majority of the scenarios, Gore won. If the election officials had been allowed to do their job in Florida, the overvotes would have been counted, and those alone would have overwhelmed the "undervotes" and given Gore the election.
So, to sum up; 8 years of prosperity and peace, with a healed Social Security system, gone. Presently, a President selected into office by a dirty network of far-right wingers, including 4 on the SCOTUS, has declared the Forever War, knocked out at least three articles of the Bill of Rights, sealed his records so no one can see what he's done, and give the foxes the keys to the henhouse corporatewise. And to top it off, he's a bloody idiot who can't even speak without a speech written by his handlers. We're governed by a fool controlled by smart amoral men.
And we're better off? HOW???