I'll bet my life savings that you wouldn't be so gung-ho if it actually really happened.
But keep up the facade, obviously you've fooled a few people to get to +5.
It's that sort of bullshit arrogant 'superior to the dirty masses I don't care about life, science at any cost' juvenile attitude that feeds the anti-science movement in the wider population. Especially concerning the LHC.
Of course it's completely fake and you just like the dirty uneducated masses hold onto your own insignificant life as vigorously as you can.
There's people here arguing and showing the science and using rational discourse to display why the LHC is not and will not be a problem. That is the correct way. It maybe slow, it maybe tedious and difficult but it's the high ground and will work to keep the wider population at ease.
Telling everyone you're happy for them to all die because you want to advance *your* cause and don't care about your own life is the incorrect way. It's the religious zealots way, and the average person doesn't appreciate being told that they and their families may die for something that's really not that important to them they but should be happy about it because it's for someone elses 'greater cause'.
You dont "recall", well that's a shame. Good thing about the internet, people like you can no longer revise history and muddy the waters after a large event happens. Five seconds of research shows that you're quite simply a reactionary apologist.
There was no shortage of scientists and doctors at every level willing to promote the ridiculous message that mass pandemic was imminent.
Here's a few examples from five seconds on google proving that your assertation that "only the media said we would all die of bird flu" is at best ignorance, at worst a bold faced lie:
"The chief avian flu coordinator for the United Nations, Dave Nabarro, said last fall he was "almost certain" a bird flu pandemic would strike soon, and predicted up to 150 million deaths. The U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, Mike Leavitt, advised Americans to stockpile cans of tuna fish and powdered milk under their beds in case of an outbreak. Renowned flu expert Robert Webster has said society needs to face the possibility that half of the population could die in a bird flu pandemic."
Nice weasel words there by the way "non-medical scientists" lol so medical scientists opinions on a medical issue are irrelevant? How convenient, lets ask some geologists then and perhaps an astronomer too, it's they who have the 'real' insight.
I think it may be you who is lacking in understanding of the scientific method.
Rule number one, never make an assertation without a shred of evidence.
Three years ago, all the top scientists, institutions and their worshipers here and in the media screamed, wailed and hollered in a global circle jerk for six months that 50% of us would be dead from the Avarian Bird Flu by now. Skeptics were modded down, out argued and the fact that there was 'scientific consensus' was used as irrefutable evidence that they were right. A hundred million birds were uselessly slaughtered, economies around the world were damaged and families and communities decimated on the sage and infaliable advice of the leading 'scientists' in the field.
Who was anyone to argue with 'scientific consensus' their worshipers cried.
And of course 'scientific consensus' was 100% completely and utterly wrong.
Do we ever hear a peep about that? Did anybody every stand up and say they over stated the case? No.
Was anybody fired, did anybody lose tenure or was anybody publicly shamed for acting like hysterical fools? No.
They just moved right back on to their old favorite, Global Warming..errr...Climate Change.
You say "we" too much, especially given that your obviously not a parent and so aren't actually in a position to say much at all, when you become a parent, you may try and raise your children as you see fit. Oh I know you'll whinge and whine and nash your teeth "see THIS is the problem with "parents" (as though people who have a child are a borg collective) they think they know everything". To which I say right back at ya but I'm not presuming to know more than you about how to live your life. We also know, that until you have one, you really know very little them (really).
You or whoever "we" is and I'll assume you're not using the royal "we" have nothing to do with my kids. Your input is (to be honest) intrusive, unwanted and more than a little presumptuous and if all you see around you are terrible parents that says more about your social circle than anything else.
I do agree wholeheartedly with exactly what you're saying btw, but ironically you are actually part of the problem. Using "we" assumes that you or anyone else have any business in the upbringing of *my* children. You may think your on the right end of the stick, but guess what? There's a whole heap of people who believe the exact opposite of you, that parents *shouldn't* be bringing up their children and that it's the job of pseudo-scientists and public servants. Those people also use "we" when talking about other peoples children, in fact they have the exact same attitude as you. That they know better than a childs own mum and dad and that one size fits all. As though they have some sort of stake or ownership in someone elses child (lol).
For years these people were called meddling busy-bodies and rightfully ostracized from society. Unfortunately at the moment they've managed to gain position in western society and are now trying to force their (rather twisted) ideals on other peoples children.
You're right and I think we have an extremely good system here in Aus, a unique mix of the US and Westminster systems. We have the safety of federalism and a Senate but also a house of commons (lower house) and prime minister rather than a king...err 'president'. It's good in that there's two majority parties in the lower house (Labour and Liberals) and a handful of others who hold a couple of seats. So legislation can actually be drafted in a reasonably efficient manner.
Then in the senate it's much more diverse, where nobody currently holds power and the bickering that you mention takes place. The senate is where the excesses of the government can be and is often stopped in its tracks. The government can do nothing without the Senates approval. And if the government really really wants to get a piece of legislation through it can call a double dissolution, which causes an election where both houses of government are up for re-election. This is rarely used, in fact I think it has only been used once in our history as Aussies tend to hold the senate in a higher respect than the government and if the government tries to basically 'overthrow' the senate to pass a bill people generally will turn on them unless the senate are just being total bastards.
And oh how the respective governments *hate* the senate. Which is exactly how it should be.
The government wants to dictate how we parents raise our kids AND ALSO censor the internet.
Don't you see how that works? It's exactly the same thing.
It's called Totalitarianism.
Every parent that I know at my boys primary school are uncomfortable to angry with the level of (sometimes disturbing) 'morality' and uuuuultra left wing ideals being forced down our kids throats each day. And I say this as a left leaning moderate. Mostly it's completely at odds with the way any reasonable and average people bring their kids up, hell most of it's completely at odds with the way the real world works in any way, shape or form E.g there is no such thing as being 'naughty' being one example our 7 year old boys and girls were taught, not simply told but *taught*, as in they actually had lessons on it. Now most of us aren't particularly political we just want to raise our kids in a decent normal middle class fashion. But to try and teach a bunch of 7 year olds that nothing that they do is ever wrong including maliciously hurting others is complete and utter insanity.
Believe me, nobody I know wants, nor asked the government to take over our role. And it bothers the vast majority of us quite a bit as they do it at the expense of actually teaching the things we send our kids to school to learn.
Also if you believe that 'parents' can in any way shape or form be lumped into one consolidated group of people you have some sort of mental deficiency. Sorry it's harsh but true. Go talk to some parents you'll find out the reality of the situation very quickly.
Now I don't think you're malicious just ignorant of what the reality is. 'Parents' are biologically driven to raise our kids and it seems a little hard to believe that all of a sudden a billion people the world over just decided to ignore our primal instinct. Anymore than it's possible to one day just decide to stop breathing.
Australia's internet is not in any way, shape or form censored.
There is a minister (Chris Conroy) that's trying to but he's got no majority backing in the senate and therefore no chance of getting his legislation through (thank god for the power and diversity of our senate, imagine the Greens and Liberals agreeing on something...amazing!). Let alone the opposition from the major ISPs and then the courts if it does somehow magically get through parliament. Not to mention the government just pissed off the largest telco big time by kicking them out of the tender to roll out the national fibre infrastructure so there is no way Telstra will give any help either.
Without Telstra and Telstras ISP arm Bigpond as a political ally they don't have a hope in getting anything happen nationwide regarding telecommunications.
We're one year into the sitting governments term, we have elections every three years (give or take). It'll be another year before this goes anywhere and by then it'll start becoming an election item. The Liberals (traditional conservatives) and Greens don't support it at all.
Chris Conroy was hung out to dry on this one. Simply so Labour could say they're holding true to their election promises and win the support of the single independant christian fundy in parliament who sometimes holds the balance of power.
Yeah damn those evil TV stations, evil UN safe houses, evil electricity sub-stations and evil 'bad guy' bridges. The 'bad guys' (grow up) should know better than to have those things in built up areas.
If *you* can simply dismiss the innocent being killed because you want to wage war against a tiny fragment of their neighbours as 'collateral damage', then by that exact same logic, all of the dead on 9/11 can simply be dismissed as collateral damage too.
But then logic nor emotion enters the world of the chicken hawk...until it's their own neck on the line and then raw emotion *must* be dished out in spades.
"Yeah, if your caught on a battlefield while engaged in hostilities against US forces. Do you have a single citation for that happening to somebody at the border or are you just blowing smoke?"
Lol "battlefield", is that what they tell you?
"Maher Arar, a Syrian-born dual Syrian and Canadian citizen, was detained at Kennedy International Airport on 26 September 2002, by US Immigration and Naturalization Service officials. He was heading home to Canada after a family holiday in Tunisia. After almost two weeks, enduring hours of interrogation chained, he was sent, shackled and bound, in a private jet to Jordan and then Syria, instead of being extradited to Canada. There, he was interrogated and tortured by Syrian intelligence. Maher Arar was eventually released a year later."
On 17 February 2003, Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr (aka "Abu Omar") was kidnapped by the CIA in Milan (Italy),[40] and deported to Egypt. His case has been qualified by Swiss senator Dick Marty to be a "perfect example of extraordinary rendition".[29]
"In October 2001, Mamdouh Habib, who lives in Australia and has both Australian and Egyptian nationality (having been born in Egypt), was detained in Pakistan"
"but our entry/exit requirements still aren't that onerous compared to other countries I can think of"
My (ex) mother in law, an Aussie girl through and through, traveled across Europe with a couple of girlfriends as a twenty year old in 1973. Part of the trip was traveling through Soviet Russia and various parts of the Eastern Bloc. They searched her bag at each border, required to a see a passport, asked some questions, granted temporary visas and that was that. Having her bags opened and searched by a stranger openly wielding an automatic rifle was seen as quite disgustingly 'totalitarian' at the time.
The US is far more locked down to foreigners than the menacing and "evil" totalitarian state of Soviet Russia was in 1973.
Accepting it and making excuses ensures that it will continue on its path to the inevitable end.
Fifteen years ago massive government fingerprint databases were purely the domain of ranting conspiracy nuts...oops.
Ten years ago the idea that everyone entering the country would be fingerprinted was absolutely laughable...oops.
And yet here we are. So whats next on the list to be excused away?
This rubbish 'security theatre' (when did totalitarianism get such a cute name?) is something that's sweeping across the western world and it needs to stop. It really does, because we (average, reasonably people) are losing ground rapidly and very soon if it continues at this rate a lot more of this bullshit is going to start having an negative effect on the average man on the street. Once that happens there's no going back.
"Please explain to me which law of physics would cause an ABS engaged car to stay afloat on top of slush. "
By keeping the tyre rolling, preventing it from locking and digging down into the slush causing a lot of drag and slowing the car down?
Simple.
I do a lot of 4wding, the ABS equiped 4wds ALWAYS have a tougher time slowing down when we get off the tar. In fact I've been in a Suzuki with ABS where we desperately needed to lock the wheels to stop on an extremely greasy and steep descent and the ABS kept kicking off preventing it. We ended up accelerating out of control down the hill foot jammed solid on the brakes, but thank god the wheels weren't in danger of locking! Cars aren't supposed to accelerate when being told to stop. And it would have stopped except for the ABS blindly deciding that it knew better. The two old beater 4wds that came down straight after without ABS didn't have a problem at all. When they got a bit out of control a jab on the brakes would lock the wheels then they'd start to dig in and bring themselves under control.
Or when a nice new Nissan Patrol with ABS smashed into the back of an old POS Landcruiser without ABS on a highspeed loose gravel over hard base road, The Landcruiser hit the anchors hard ('roo jumped in front of them) locked up and stopped very very much quicker than the Patrol physically could thanks muchly to the ABS. We who were following the Patrol in an old Hilux (no ABS) didn't have a problem stopping in time and we were alot closer to the Patrol than the Patrol was to the Landcruiser.
So yes, there's many many situations where ABS is not just useless, but dangerous. But don't worry, that multi-million dollar techonology is *magical* and has no limits, drawbacks or negative affects in any conditions.
Keep telling yourself that and hope that thick blanket of smug protects you if you ever find yourself in one of the large number of edge cases where ABS is at best, useless.
Girlintraining you're trying to hard to fit into the boys club here.
More than likely one day you'll be a mother, then you'll have to become a hypocrite at least once or twice. You're not perfect and there are times and situations that will arrive where you must feed baby *now* and you wont be prepared, I assume you would let it starve?
Not to mention you're ignoring one thing: personal responsibility, if you don't like it don't look, that's your responsibility.
I'd wager a guess 70% of the people on this site are disgusting to look at but *they* aren't shunned into backalleys and toilets.
Trying to force a breastfeeding mother and child out of sight as though they're disease carrying lepers is the only immoral action here.
Plus you'd be first to complain if the child was screaming.
Such incredibly selfish juvenile beliefs here these days, who are your parents and wtf did they do to you all to hate parenting so much?
Yes actually, the "big three" do have problems competing outside the USA, for example here in AUS, there's almost no native US cars, Chrysler is non existant here, GM is non existant here, they have a subsidary called Holden that designs and builds it's own, and Ford - we design and build our own. US designed cars are big ugly hulking piles of unreliable shit. So straight off the bat you're talking rubbish.
Oh and the poor "big three" who are so innocent and vulnerable, definately no match for those "greedy" (lol class warfare at its finest) mean nasty workers.
Big threes multi-million dollar mid and upper level "management" negotiated contracts with those workers.
If the big threes "management" offered to pay too much and offered to many benefits then it's "management" who fucked up, not the workers. It's funny that when it comes to the average man on the street, the mantra and "rules" of freemarket capitalism (greed is good!) are conveniently turned around and it becomes "oh those greedy workers! Looking out for themselves first?! Who would have thought they're so evil and bad!"
What the hell happened to the whole "personal responsibility" BS that gets thrown around here whenever it's the worker getting hamstrung by a company? If the big three don't like it then FIRE THEM AND HIRE NEW WORKERS, oh they can't survive without their labour? Well good thing we live in a freemarket system where workers are payed according to their value to the company (as we keep being told about 30 million dollar+ packages for management". Management signed contracts giving them pensions? Then TO BAD, personal responsibility BS goes both ways it doesn't just apply to the peasants. Though many around here seem to believe it does.
Class traitors; people who hate themselves and their own and have allowed the middle class which they inevitably belong to, to be decimated for 30 years.
History is *littered* with conspiracies, just do a bit of reading on the British and Russian (and in 100 years the US) empire to see what sorts of insane schemes a handful of men in power can quietly organise. In fact that's what makes history history, a bunch of men organising with each other to do things out of the ordinary...conspiring together if you will.
Anti-Conspiracy theories are comforting because they let people think that world events *aren't* under anyones control, even if it is with (obviously) malicious intent. Unfortunately, the unpleasant truth is that there generally is a conspiracy even if it's only between 2 men, and world events unfold largely due to various leaders and groups of men, spurred on by ignorance, incompetence, and general bloody-mindedness organising and using money and power and influence to advance their own agendas.
Sure there's no single one "conspiracy" but to say that there never is, or even most of the time there isn't is to be equally as naive and dunderheaded as those who find conspiracy in everything.
There are men with the will, money, power and the means to change the world.
And sometimes things that happen really are just a coincidence.
Sounds just like every single western country from 1800-1930.
My grandfather was telling me about his father many years ago...
"He was working in a quarry and a hundred men were swinging pickaxes, my old father included. Up on the ridge there was a hundred unemployed men sitting down watching. If you stopped swinging your pick, even for a moment, even to stretch your back the foreman would nod his head in your direction, his offsider would yell at you to drop your pick, give you money owed and that was it, you were replaced.
Part of a rock wall fell on a man while he was working and a group of men quickly ran over to help. They pulled him out and took him off to the nearest hospital, when they came back a few hours later they all no longer had a job. The company didn't pay the injured man a red-cent, his kids ended up in the poor-house"
What's funny is there's a bunch of unfit, lazy, socially inept middle class boys here on the internet, who for some insane reason, think that those times were better and strangely believe that it wouldn't be them who would be sitting up on there on the ridge.
Well not totally sonless, but many more girls are being born into rural areas than two generations ago.
I come from a long line of farmers, though my fathers side got out in the '50s my mothers side all still own/run farms. We're not talking little hobby farms either. I spent a lot of time on those farms in my childhood and one thing I always remember was the massive sheds full of drums of toxic chemicals for use in various sheep and cattle dips, pesticides and vaccines. We're talking industrial scale with thousands of litres a year being used. Not to mention the big piles of petrochemcal fertilizers, lime and other bits and pieces laying around in the open.
Now the interesting thing, 90% of my cousins on my mothers side are female. And I have a LOT of cousins. In fact both of my mothers brothers had four girls and only one boy EACH (8 girls to 2 boys). Now two data points does not mean much, but the thing is this is now extremely common out there and most of the families that I know of in the district now have families where daughters vastly outnumber sons. It's widely known and occasionally discussed, and it's only become so since my mothers generation. In her fathers generation it was a roughly even split. The general consensus is it's the toxic chemicals that gained popularity in the 50's that farmers are regularly exposed to (read drenched in).
I remember when I was about 13 helping to dip sheep for the first time (kills all the bugs in the wool, basically the sheep get a high pressure shower with some sort of chemical concoction). Well for that whole week anytime I was anywhere near the spray, when I got even a whiff of the overspray if I was lucky it'd just be burning eyes, if I got a good dose I'd be running for the toilet, it was literally that toxic. The men operating the machine were drenched in it.
I don't understand how one can seriously believe that it's the workers who are to blame for American car companys completely disastrous mismanagement.
Here's a tip for you. In the rest of the world, American cars are a small portion of the market. Would you like to know why? Because compared with Japanese and Euro cars American cars are absolute fucking garbage, decades behind in every area. It's only Americans hubris, ego and enourmous tariffs on foreign cars that have propped up those companies for so long.
For decades they didn't have to innovate, they didn't have to do better as they had almost no competition. They kept shoveling out the *exact* same shit year after year. That's a MANAGEMENT problem.
The 'big 3' are failing because they sell shit products that less and less people want.
That's the problem.
Trying to blame the workers for decades of managements lack of vision and innovation truly is unfathomable.
"Actually this is about the fucking Marxists who believe in unions, who believe in a socialized banking system."
What the hell are you talking about? Bush, Bernanke and the elitists in the finance industry are marxists? The CEOs are going to be shot and replaced with workers representatives? Right.....You really have no clue what the fuck is going on do you?
You're a blind zealot and it's people like you who are letting your idols get away with the greatest heist in the history of the world while blaming it on those they're robbing.
Americans like to think about things in a grand dramatic fashion. I doubt they even know what a pragmatist is.
Everything's a great and powerful struggle between good and evil and the roving hoardes that make up the "rest of the world"TM are sharpening our knives just HUNGRY to get some of that magical 'American Life'. We should be so lucky when they stoop down to grace us with their presence.
Half a century of indoctrination from a US TV mono culture has buried the vast vast majority of American minds in layers of this disturbing narrative.
I will say one thing though. We in the "rest of the world" as alien to each other as we are and can be, can all look to that one country and the comments we read here and all over this internet, the statements of "fact" so easily made but *so* bizarre, that are made again and again about things like communism and cubans and socialists and all sorts of batshit insane rantings by masses of Americans and think...
It seems to me, and I might be wrong (I'm not)....
That John Mcain, a Navy brat, turned lifetime public servant who has had "socialist" government provided healthcare for his entire 72 years on this planet. Probably doesn't know sweet FA about an the average persons health care, outside of what he reads and the health insurance lobbyists tell him.
It's kind of ironic that the guy who's suckled at the government teat for his entire life, calls other people socialists.
Has he even ever been to a job interview? Or even had to ring an insurance company to get cover?
Here in Aus we have both nationalised AND privatised healthcare. Yes we are the country of moderation, never going to one extreme or the other.
I've made use of our public hospitals in my life for: 1. A severely broken leg (emergency). 2. A radio frequency ablation (serious but not urgent) in and out in a day, by one of the leading heart specialists in the world. 3. My sons birth...single room for the Mrs, very quiet, great midwives and a nice experience. Funnily my other half is from the UK and MUCH prefers our system and hospitals. Though more stuff is covered over there apparently.
All of these cost me nothing up front, service in all cases was great.
That includes the midwives, the bulk billed GP visits, etc.
Now the cost. I pay ~$600 a year on the 'medicare levy', that's how much it costs me in taxes. That's full cover (except dental, public doesn't cover most of that) for $600 a year for top notch service. There's more than that, but as a tax paying citizen, I'm happy for a portion of my taxes to be alloted to public healthcare.
My mate pays a little more than that for private health insurance. He fell off his ladder a few years ago and totally mangled his wrist, nasty business, many breaks. After years of putting into his private insurance...he ends up in the public system anyway. There was nobody available to operate on him in the private hospital we took him to. Total waste of money.
My father had his ankle fused in the private system, his treatment was no better than the public system. Except he got to pay a $3000 premium for the effort.
I'm happy to pay ~600 a year to the government for 'health insurance', it's money well spent.
I hear of Americans paying in the thousands a year for cover, I have to ask...why? Surely your hospitals can't be that inefficient, or are you all just very sick?
I like our system, it works well. You can have the best of both worlds if you find the right balance point, going to one extreme or the other with total nationalisation or total privatisation seems silly.
Slashdot Mirror
I'll bet my life savings that you wouldn't be so gung-ho if it actually really happened.
But keep up the facade, obviously you've fooled a few people to get to +5.
It's that sort of bullshit arrogant 'superior to the dirty masses I don't care about life, science at any cost' juvenile attitude that feeds the anti-science movement in the wider population. Especially concerning the LHC.
Of course it's completely fake and you just like the dirty uneducated masses hold onto your own insignificant life as vigorously as you can.
There's people here arguing and showing the science and using rational discourse to display why the LHC is not and will not be a problem. That is the correct way. It maybe slow, it maybe tedious and difficult but it's the high ground and will work to keep the wider population at ease.
Telling everyone you're happy for them to all die because you want to advance *your* cause and don't care about your own life is the incorrect way. It's the religious zealots way, and the average person doesn't appreciate being told that they and their families may die for something that's really not that important to them they but should be happy about it because it's for someone elses 'greater cause'.
That's called religion.
You dont "recall", well that's a shame. Good thing about the internet, people like you can no longer revise history and muddy the waters after a large event happens. Five seconds of research shows that you're quite simply a reactionary apologist.
There was no shortage of scientists and doctors at every level willing to promote the ridiculous message that mass pandemic was imminent.
Here's a few examples from five seconds on google proving that your assertation that "only the media said we would all die of bird flu" is at best ignorance, at worst a bold faced lie:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4346624.stm
http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,345165,00.html
http://www.satyamag.com/feb06/greger.html
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/03/17/the_cost_of_bird_flu_hysteria/
"The chief avian flu coordinator for the United Nations, Dave Nabarro, said last fall he was "almost certain" a bird flu pandemic would strike soon, and predicted up to 150 million deaths. The U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, Mike Leavitt, advised Americans to stockpile cans of tuna fish and powdered milk under their beds in case of an outbreak. Renowned flu expert Robert Webster has said society needs to face the possibility that half of the population could die in a bird flu pandemic."
Nice weasel words there by the way "non-medical scientists" lol so medical scientists opinions on a medical issue are irrelevant? How convenient, lets ask some geologists then and perhaps an astronomer too, it's they who have the 'real' insight.
I think it may be you who is lacking in understanding of the scientific method.
Rule number one, never make an assertation without a shred of evidence.
Three years ago, all the top scientists, institutions and their worshipers here and in the media screamed, wailed and hollered in a global circle jerk for six months that 50% of us would be dead from the Avarian Bird Flu by now. Skeptics were modded down, out argued and the fact that there was 'scientific consensus' was used as irrefutable evidence that they were right. A hundred million birds were uselessly slaughtered, economies around the world were damaged and families and communities decimated on the sage and infaliable advice of the leading 'scientists' in the field.
Who was anyone to argue with 'scientific consensus' their worshipers cried.
And of course 'scientific consensus' was 100% completely and utterly wrong.
Do we ever hear a peep about that? Did anybody every stand up and say they over stated the case? No.
Was anybody fired, did anybody lose tenure or was anybody publicly shamed for acting like hysterical fools? No.
They just moved right back on to their old favorite, Global Warming..errr...Climate Change.
And here are.
Tell that to Fidel Castro 638 foiled attempts - http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/aug/03/cuba.duncancampbell2
You say "we" too much, especially given that your obviously not a parent and so aren't actually in a position to say much at all, when you become a parent, you may try and raise your children as you see fit. Oh I know you'll whinge and whine and nash your teeth "see THIS is the problem with "parents" (as though people who have a child are a borg collective) they think they know everything". To which I say right back at ya but I'm not presuming to know more than you about how to live your life. We also know, that until you have one, you really know very little them (really).
You or whoever "we" is and I'll assume you're not using the royal "we" have nothing to do with my kids. Your input is (to be honest) intrusive, unwanted and more than a little presumptuous and if all you see around you are terrible parents that says more about your social circle than anything else.
I do agree wholeheartedly with exactly what you're saying btw, but ironically you are actually part of the problem. Using "we" assumes that you or anyone else have any business in the upbringing of *my* children. You may think your on the right end of the stick, but guess what? There's a whole heap of people who believe the exact opposite of you, that parents *shouldn't* be bringing up their children and that it's the job of pseudo-scientists and public servants. Those people also use "we" when talking about other peoples children, in fact they have the exact same attitude as you. That they know better than a childs own mum and dad and that one size fits all. As though they have some sort of stake or ownership in someone elses child (lol).
For years these people were called meddling busy-bodies and rightfully ostracized from society. Unfortunately at the moment they've managed to gain position in western society and are now trying to force their (rather twisted) ideals on other peoples children.
You're right and I think we have an extremely good system here in Aus, a unique mix of the US and Westminster systems. We have the safety of federalism and a Senate but also a house of commons (lower house) and prime minister rather than a king...err 'president'. It's good in that there's two majority parties in the lower house (Labour and Liberals) and a handful of others who hold a couple of seats. So legislation can actually be drafted in a reasonably efficient manner.
Then in the senate it's much more diverse, where nobody currently holds power and the bickering that you mention takes place. The senate is where the excesses of the government can be and is often stopped in its tracks. The government can do nothing without the Senates approval. And if the government really really wants to get a piece of legislation through it can call a double dissolution, which causes an election where both houses of government are up for re-election. This is rarely used, in fact I think it has only been used once in our history as Aussies tend to hold the senate in a higher respect than the government and if the government tries to basically 'overthrow' the senate to pass a bill people generally will turn on them unless the senate are just being total bastards.
And oh how the respective governments *hate* the senate. Which is exactly how it should be.
The government wants to dictate how we parents raise our kids AND ALSO censor the internet.
Don't you see how that works? It's exactly the same thing.
It's called Totalitarianism.
Every parent that I know at my boys primary school are uncomfortable to angry with the level of (sometimes disturbing) 'morality' and uuuuultra left wing ideals being forced down our kids throats each day. And I say this as a left leaning moderate. Mostly it's completely at odds with the way any reasonable and average people bring their kids up, hell most of it's completely at odds with the way the real world works in any way, shape or form E.g there is no such thing as being 'naughty' being one example our 7 year old boys and girls were taught, not simply told but *taught*, as in they actually had lessons on it. Now most of us aren't particularly political we just want to raise our kids in a decent normal middle class fashion. But to try and teach a bunch of 7 year olds that nothing that they do is ever wrong including maliciously hurting others is complete and utter insanity.
Believe me, nobody I know wants, nor asked the government to take over our role. And it bothers the vast majority of us quite a bit as they do it at the expense of actually teaching the things we send our kids to school to learn.
Also if you believe that 'parents' can in any way shape or form be lumped into one consolidated group of people you have some sort of mental deficiency. Sorry it's harsh but true. Go talk to some parents you'll find out the reality of the situation very quickly.
Now I don't think you're malicious just ignorant of what the reality is. 'Parents' are biologically driven to raise our kids and it seems a little hard to believe that all of a sudden a billion people the world over just decided to ignore our primal instinct. Anymore than it's possible to one day just decide to stop breathing.
Australia's internet is not in any way, shape or form censored.
There is a minister (Chris Conroy) that's trying to but he's got no majority backing in the senate and therefore no chance of getting his legislation through (thank god for the power and diversity of our senate, imagine the Greens and Liberals agreeing on something...amazing!). Let alone the opposition from the major ISPs and then the courts if it does somehow magically get through parliament. Not to mention the government just pissed off the largest telco big time by kicking them out of the tender to roll out the national fibre infrastructure so there is no way Telstra will give any help either.
Without Telstra and Telstras ISP arm Bigpond as a political ally they don't have a hope in getting anything happen nationwide regarding telecommunications.
We're one year into the sitting governments term, we have elections every three years (give or take). It'll be another year before this goes anywhere and by then it'll start becoming an election item. The Liberals (traditional conservatives) and Greens don't support it at all.
Chris Conroy was hung out to dry on this one. Simply so Labour could say they're holding true to their election promises and win the support of the single independant christian fundy in parliament who sometimes holds the balance of power.
Yeah damn those evil TV stations, evil UN safe houses, evil electricity sub-stations and evil 'bad guy' bridges. The 'bad guys' (grow up) should know better than to have those things in built up areas.
If *you* can simply dismiss the innocent being killed because you want to wage war against a tiny fragment of their neighbours as 'collateral damage', then by that exact same logic, all of the dead on 9/11 can simply be dismissed as collateral damage too.
But then logic nor emotion enters the world of the chicken hawk...until it's their own neck on the line and then raw emotion *must* be dished out in spades.
"Yeah, if your caught on a battlefield while engaged in hostilities against US forces. Do you have a single citation for that happening to somebody at the border or are you just blowing smoke?"
Lol "battlefield", is that what they tell you?
"Maher Arar, a Syrian-born dual Syrian and Canadian citizen, was detained at Kennedy International Airport on 26 September 2002, by US Immigration and Naturalization Service officials. He was heading home to Canada after a family holiday in Tunisia. After almost two weeks, enduring hours of interrogation chained, he was sent, shackled and bound, in a private jet to Jordan and then Syria, instead of being extradited to Canada. There, he was interrogated and tortured by Syrian intelligence. Maher Arar was eventually released a year later."
On 17 February 2003, Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr (aka "Abu Omar") was kidnapped by the CIA in Milan (Italy),[40] and deported to Egypt. His case has been qualified by Swiss senator Dick Marty to be a "perfect example of extraordinary rendition".[29]
"In October 2001, Mamdouh Habib, who lives in Australia and has both Australian and Egyptian nationality (having been born in Egypt), was detained in Pakistan"
Many many more here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition#Example_cases
Yes, "battlefield", that's it.
"but our entry/exit requirements still aren't that onerous compared to other countries I can think of"
My (ex) mother in law, an Aussie girl through and through, traveled across Europe with a couple of girlfriends as a twenty year old in 1973. Part of the trip was traveling through Soviet Russia and various parts of the Eastern Bloc. They searched her bag at each border, required to a see a passport, asked some questions, granted temporary visas and that was that. Having her bags opened and searched by a stranger openly wielding an automatic rifle was seen as quite disgustingly 'totalitarian' at the time.
The US is far more locked down to foreigners than the menacing and "evil" totalitarian state of Soviet Russia was in 1973.
Accepting it and making excuses ensures that it will continue on its path to the inevitable end.
Fifteen years ago massive government fingerprint databases were purely the domain of ranting conspiracy nuts...oops.
Ten years ago the idea that everyone entering the country would be fingerprinted was absolutely laughable...oops.
And yet here we are. So whats next on the list to be excused away?
This rubbish 'security theatre' (when did totalitarianism get such a cute name?) is something that's sweeping across the western world and it needs to stop. It really does, because we (average, reasonably people) are losing ground rapidly and very soon if it continues at this rate a lot more of this bullshit is going to start having an negative effect on the average man on the street. Once that happens there's no going back.
What the hell?
You know it was communists and socialists who were the FIRST globalists?
"Workers of the *WORLD* unite"
It was the dream that each region produced only exactly what it was good at and exported that to other regions around the globe.
Get it?
How do people become so confused? Do you even know what you believe?
"Please explain to me which law of physics would cause an ABS engaged car to stay afloat on top of slush. "
By keeping the tyre rolling, preventing it from locking and digging down into the slush causing a lot of drag and slowing the car down?
Simple.
I do a lot of 4wding, the ABS equiped 4wds ALWAYS have a tougher time slowing down when we get off the tar. In fact I've been in a Suzuki with ABS where we desperately needed to lock the wheels to stop on an extremely greasy and steep descent and the ABS kept kicking off preventing it. We ended up accelerating out of control down the hill foot jammed solid on the brakes, but thank god the wheels weren't in danger of locking! Cars aren't supposed to accelerate when being told to stop. And it would have stopped except for the ABS blindly deciding that it knew better. The two old beater 4wds that came down straight after without ABS didn't have a problem at all. When they got a bit out of control a jab on the brakes would lock the wheels then they'd start to dig in and bring themselves under control.
Or when a nice new Nissan Patrol with ABS smashed into the back of an old POS Landcruiser without ABS on a highspeed loose gravel over hard base road, The Landcruiser hit the anchors hard ('roo jumped in front of them) locked up and stopped very very much quicker than the Patrol physically could thanks muchly to the ABS. We who were following the Patrol in an old Hilux (no ABS) didn't have a problem stopping in time and we were alot closer to the Patrol than the Patrol was to the Landcruiser.
So yes, there's many many situations where ABS is not just useless, but dangerous. But don't worry, that multi-million dollar techonology is *magical* and has no limits, drawbacks or negative affects in any conditions.
Keep telling yourself that and hope that thick blanket of smug protects you if you ever find yourself in one of the large number of edge cases where ABS is at best, useless.
Girlintraining you're trying to hard to fit into the boys club here.
More than likely one day you'll be a mother, then you'll have to become a hypocrite at least once or twice. You're not perfect and there are times and situations that will arrive where you must feed baby *now* and you wont be prepared, I assume you would let it starve?
Not to mention you're ignoring one thing: personal responsibility, if you don't like it don't look, that's your responsibility.
I'd wager a guess 70% of the people on this site are disgusting to look at but *they* aren't shunned into backalleys and toilets.
Trying to force a breastfeeding mother and child out of sight as though they're disease carrying lepers is the only immoral action here.
Plus you'd be first to complain if the child was screaming.
Such incredibly selfish juvenile beliefs here these days, who are your parents and wtf did they do to you all to hate parenting so much?
Yes actually, the "big three" do have problems competing outside the USA, for example here in AUS, there's almost no native US cars, Chrysler is non existant here, GM is non existant here, they have a subsidary called Holden that designs and builds it's own, and Ford - we design and build our own. US designed cars are big ugly hulking piles of unreliable shit. So straight off the bat you're talking rubbish.
Oh and the poor "big three" who are so innocent and vulnerable, definately no match for those "greedy" (lol class warfare at its finest) mean nasty workers.
Big threes multi-million dollar mid and upper level "management" negotiated contracts with those workers.
If the big threes "management" offered to pay too much and offered to many benefits then it's "management" who fucked up, not the workers. It's funny that when it comes to the average man on the street, the mantra and "rules" of freemarket capitalism (greed is good!) are conveniently turned around and it becomes "oh those greedy workers! Looking out for themselves first?! Who would have thought they're so evil and bad!"
What the hell happened to the whole "personal responsibility" BS that gets thrown around here whenever it's the worker getting hamstrung by a company? If the big three don't like it then FIRE THEM AND HIRE NEW WORKERS, oh they can't survive without their labour? Well good thing we live in a freemarket system where workers are payed according to their value to the company (as we keep being told about 30 million dollar+ packages for management". Management signed contracts giving them pensions? Then TO BAD, personal responsibility BS goes both ways it doesn't just apply to the peasants. Though many around here seem to believe it does.
Class traitors; people who hate themselves and their own and have allowed the middle class which they inevitably belong to, to be decimated for 30 years.
Otherwise known as lickspittles.
What a lot of rubbish.
History is *littered* with conspiracies, just do a bit of reading on the British and Russian (and in 100 years the US) empire to see what sorts of insane schemes a handful of men in power can quietly organise. In fact that's what makes history history, a bunch of men organising with each other to do things out of the ordinary...conspiring together if you will.
Anti-Conspiracy theories are comforting because they let people think that world events *aren't* under anyones control, even if it is with (obviously) malicious intent. Unfortunately, the unpleasant truth is that there generally is a conspiracy even if it's only between 2 men, and world events unfold largely due to various leaders and groups of men, spurred on by ignorance, incompetence, and general bloody-mindedness organising and using money and power and influence to advance their own agendas.
Sure there's no single one "conspiracy" but to say that there never is, or even most of the time there isn't is to be equally as naive and dunderheaded as those who find conspiracy in everything.
There are men with the will, money, power and the means to change the world.
And sometimes things that happen really are just a coincidence.
Sounds just like every single western country from 1800-1930.
My grandfather was telling me about his father many years ago...
"He was working in a quarry and a hundred men were swinging pickaxes, my old father included. Up on the ridge there was a hundred unemployed men sitting down watching. If you stopped swinging your pick, even for a moment, even to stretch your back the foreman would nod his head in your direction, his offsider would yell at you to drop your pick, give you money owed and that was it, you were replaced.
Part of a rock wall fell on a man while he was working and a group of men quickly ran over to help. They pulled him out and took him off to the nearest hospital, when they came back a few hours later they all no longer had a job. The company didn't pay the injured man a red-cent, his kids ended up in the poor-house"
What's funny is there's a bunch of unfit, lazy, socially inept middle class boys here on the internet, who for some insane reason, think that those times were better and strangely believe that it wouldn't be them who would be sitting up on there on the ridge.
Well not totally sonless, but many more girls are being born into rural areas than two generations ago.
I come from a long line of farmers, though my fathers side got out in the '50s my mothers side all still own/run farms. We're not talking little hobby farms either.
I spent a lot of time on those farms in my childhood and one thing I always remember was the massive sheds full of drums of toxic chemicals for use in various sheep and cattle dips, pesticides and vaccines. We're talking industrial scale with thousands of litres a year being used. Not to mention the big piles of petrochemcal fertilizers, lime and other bits and pieces laying around in the open.
Now the interesting thing, 90% of my cousins on my mothers side are female. And I have a LOT of cousins. In fact both of my mothers brothers had four girls and only one boy EACH (8 girls to 2 boys). Now two data points does not mean much, but the thing is this is now extremely common out there and most of the families that I know of in the district now have families where daughters vastly outnumber sons. It's widely known and occasionally discussed, and it's only become so since my mothers generation. In her fathers generation it was a roughly even split. The general consensus is it's the toxic chemicals that gained popularity in the 50's that farmers are regularly exposed to (read drenched in).
I remember when I was about 13 helping to dip sheep for the first time (kills all the bugs in the wool, basically the sheep get a high pressure shower with some sort of chemical concoction). Well for that whole week anytime I was anywhere near the spray, when I got even a whiff of the overspray if I was lucky it'd just be burning eyes, if I got a good dose I'd be running for the toilet, it was literally that toxic. The men operating the machine were drenched in it.
Fever is a known side effect of many vaccines, they tell you this when you go in.
I don't understand how one can seriously believe that it's the workers who are to blame for American car companys completely disastrous mismanagement.
Here's a tip for you. In the rest of the world, American cars are a small portion of the market. Would you like to know why? Because compared with Japanese and Euro cars American cars are absolute fucking garbage, decades behind in every area. It's only Americans hubris, ego and enourmous tariffs on foreign cars that have propped up those companies for so long.
For decades they didn't have to innovate, they didn't have to do better as they had almost no competition. They kept shoveling out the *exact* same shit year after year. That's a MANAGEMENT problem.
The 'big 3' are failing because they sell shit products that less and less people want.
That's the problem.
Trying to blame the workers for decades of managements lack of vision and innovation truly is unfathomable.
"Actually this is about the fucking Marxists who believe in unions, who believe in a socialized banking system."
What the hell are you talking about? Bush, Bernanke and the elitists in the finance industry are marxists? The CEOs are going to be shot and replaced with workers representatives? Right.....You really have no clue what the fuck is going on do you?
You're a blind zealot and it's people like you who are letting your idols get away with the greatest heist in the history of the world while blaming it on those they're robbing.
A useful idiot to be sure...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Ryan
Don't get much more decent and upstanding than that.
Few and far inbetween though, but it's no different anywhere in the world.
It seems the decent and upstanding ones tend to get shot.
That's a really damned good post. Probably the best I've ever read on this site and I've been here for about 8 years now.
Well done.
Americans like to think about things in a grand dramatic fashion. I doubt they even know what a pragmatist is.
Everything's a great and powerful struggle between good and evil and the roving hoardes that make up the "rest of the world"TM are sharpening our knives just HUNGRY to get some of that magical 'American Life'. We should be so lucky when they stoop down to grace us with their presence.
Half a century of indoctrination from a US TV mono culture has buried the vast vast majority of American minds in layers of this disturbing narrative.
I will say one thing though. We in the "rest of the world" as alien to each other as we are and can be, can all look to that one country and the comments we read here and all over this internet, the statements of "fact" so easily made but *so* bizarre, that are made again and again about things like communism and cubans and socialists and all sorts of batshit insane rantings by masses of Americans and think...
WTF.
It seems to me, and I might be wrong (I'm not)....
That John Mcain, a Navy brat, turned lifetime public servant who has had "socialist" government provided healthcare for his entire 72 years on this planet. Probably doesn't know sweet FA about an the average persons health care, outside of what he reads and the health insurance lobbyists tell him.
It's kind of ironic that the guy who's suckled at the government teat for his entire life, calls other people socialists.
Has he even ever been to a job interview? Or even had to ring an insurance company to get cover?
Here in Aus we have both nationalised AND privatised healthcare. Yes we are the country of moderation, never going to one extreme or the other.
I've made use of our public hospitals in my life for:
1. A severely broken leg (emergency).
2. A radio frequency ablation (serious but not urgent) in and out in a day, by one of the leading heart specialists in the world.
3. My sons birth...single room for the Mrs, very quiet, great midwives and a nice experience. Funnily my other half is from the UK and MUCH prefers our system and hospitals. Though more stuff is covered over there apparently.
All of these cost me nothing up front, service in all cases was great.
That includes the midwives, the bulk billed GP visits, etc.
Now the cost. I pay ~$600 a year on the 'medicare levy', that's how much it costs me in taxes. That's full cover (except dental, public doesn't cover most of that) for $600 a year for top notch service. There's more than that, but as a tax paying citizen, I'm happy for a portion of my taxes to be alloted to public healthcare.
My mate pays a little more than that for private health insurance. He fell off his ladder a few years ago and totally mangled his wrist, nasty business, many breaks. After years of putting into his private insurance...he ends up in the public system anyway. There was nobody available to operate on him in the private hospital we took him to. Total waste of money.
My father had his ankle fused in the private system, his treatment was no better than the public system. Except he got to pay a $3000 premium for the effort.
I'm happy to pay ~600 a year to the government for 'health insurance', it's money well spent.
I hear of Americans paying in the thousands a year for cover, I have to ask...why? Surely your hospitals can't be that inefficient, or are you all just very sick?
I like our system, it works well. You can have the best of both worlds if you find the right balance point, going to one extreme or the other with total nationalisation or total privatisation seems silly.