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User: Zachary+Kessin

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  1. Re:Another way of tallying on 2000 Election with Proportional Electoral Votes · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Before the civil war a few states picked their electors by a vote of the state legislator. By the 1860's this had mostly died out, but I'm not sure of exactly when or how this went away.

    I must say I live in a country with a proportinal system (Israel) and I have to say it sucks rather badly. The parties are all corupt as all hell. It creates a very different dynamic, but not better.

  2. Re:He isn't all their on Senate Candidate Wants to Ban Polling · · Score: 1

    Well then what about a couple in their 60's getting married (say after their first spouses had passed on). Now if they are both past 60 they won't have kids. But it should still be a joyfull occation that they got married and will (we hope) be happy together. Jewish law would definitly aprove of such a match.

    Actually some neighbors of mine are in a very similar position. The are both about 60, she was married before with kids, he was not. The have adopted 2 very sweet girls with down syndrom. Which is a wonderful thing, but not something I would want to do.

  3. Re:As someone who actually used it... on The Voice Over IP Insurrection · · Score: 1

    I have a vonage line. Its got its plusses and it minuses. The major plus is that it gives me a New York City phone number despite the fact that I live in Israel. The major minus is its not real reliable. If my net connection goes down or I loose power i loose the US line. Now both of those things happen to me on a regular basis due to the fact that I live somewhere a bit remote. Also if we are downloading stuff it can kill the quality of the sound, since DSL here is has very limited upload speed.

    But the having the US line is still very nice and makes the $16.50/month worth it.

  4. Re:And what would you do.... on US Candidates Ignore Looming Debt Crisis · · Score: 1

    There is that, but if you can keep a productive economy it should work out. The problem is that to be a functioning country you need a working labor force. If your birth rate is too low (in some places in Europe its as low as 1.2 births per woman) pretty soon you have big problems.

  5. Re:you're on slashdot and on PayPal to Fine Gambling, Porn Sites · · Score: 1

    I was webmaster of an ISP in those days and we did cut off porn sites from time to time, as everytime a new one opened up they would suddenly suck up all the ISP's bandwidth and then all the other customers weren't able to get anything done. If you want to use that much bandwidth you should find a hosting provider who's ok with the bandwidth usage and pay for it. This was the old 10mb with a dial in connection kind of deal. We didn't really care if it was porn per se, just how much bandwidth it used.

  6. Re:Why? on IBM to Open Voice Recognition Software · · Score: 2, Insightful

    What he said, plus this gives IBM a few other things for not much money. First of all having one OS for all of their platforms is very useful. The fact that linux comes with so much software already makes it even better. IBM has wanted a comon OS for years I bet, now they have one.

    The other thing is that they like the idea of having one very common OS, like windows is. But with windows someone else controls it. With Linux IBM can go where they want, even if Linus wants to go somewhere else. Now I imagine IBM is pretty good at getting Linus et al to do the things that they consider very important when they need it. They seem to have figured out how to play in the free software game better than most.

    Like the parrent said IBM never really made money on AIX, I'm sure it made a profit for them, but they mostly did it because they needed it to sell services etc. being able to do it with linux means that they can cut out a lot of costs in several places.

  7. Fertility is an Issue on US Candidates Ignore Looming Debt Crisis · · Score: 1

    There are many parts to this problem, but birth rates are a large part of it. When the baby boom starts to retire the ratio of workers to people getting social security will shift. Even if we change the social security rules it won't matter much. There will be fewer people running the economy as a percentage of the population. This will be even worse in Europe were pretty soon there will be more people collecting benifits than paying taxes.

    The USA needs to raise its birth rate in a major way. If each woman in the USA went from 2.x kids to 3.x it would at least in the long term solve some of these problems.

  8. Re:Compromised ballots? on No Secret Ballot for Military Personnel? · · Score: 1

    Just because I may be willing to tell you who I voted for does not mean that I don't care. If I have a sign of my lawn saying "Vote for X" it will be pretty clear who I am going to vote for. On the other hand I want the right to keep it to myself. If I chose to tell you thats fine, but its my choice.

  9. Re:Great for Terrorists... on FAA Approves Sport Pilot License · · Score: 2, Insightful

    not to mention that if you can afford to buy a nuke you can afford something better than a 2 seat aircraft to deliver it with, say a Ryder truck.

  10. Re:Yes, sort of on Abbreviating Name on Official Documents? · · Score: 1

    well at the moment its not even worth it for me to have that in the USA. While I have a Mass drivers licence I livin in Israel and visit the US about once a year. I don't (yet) have an Israeli licence, at some point I will get one though.

  11. Re:Yes, sort of on Abbreviating Name on Official Documents? · · Score: 1

    What about people who don't own a car. I have a licence but have not had a car in about a year. I know many people who live in places with good transportation that don't bother to buy a car, but may want a licence so that the few times a year that they want to drive they can rent a car.

  12. Re:419 on 419ers Diversify Into Assassination Threats? · · Score: 2, Funny

    I sometimes ask them to send me a car as sign of good faith. So far no car has shown up. I'm not holding my breath.

  13. Re: VoIP Questioned on VoIP Questioned · · Score: 1

    I have a vonage line here in Israel with a New York number. (I also have an israeli line on the same phone) Its great! My friends and family back in the usa can call me for free or close to it and I can call them for free. And it gets over the mental block of "Gee I have to call another country, which must be expensive."

    The only problems are sometimes sound quality is iffy if I am downloading stuff. And once in a while I get a wrong number at 2:00 which is ofcourse 7:00 pm New York time.

  14. Re:A more realistic challenge on Can Your Car Get 1,700 MPG? · · Score: 1

    Well at the moment I live in a large city with good bus service. And in Israel cars are very expensive, so for now I can't afford a car.

  15. Re:A more realistic challenge on Can Your Car Get 1,700 MPG? · · Score: 1

    If you look at fuel usage as a function of cost you have to ask yourself this...

    Is the money I'm going to save by using less gas more than I loose by buying a more expensive car. SO some of the really high mpg cars 60+ cost a lot more than say a saturn that will give you 35mpg. So you use more fuel, but what price does the fuel have to be to save you money if you are making a bigger car payment.

    Personally I don't have a car and I take the bus.

  16. Re:Green Indeed on Green Energy From Manhattan's East River · · Score: 1

    The USA and Israel are allies and have been for some time (at least since '73). There was never a state of war. Israel and Iraq are I belive still at war as no treaty of peace between the 2 countries has been aggreed. The only Arab countries that Israel has relations with are Egypt, Jordan and I think Maritania.

  17. Re:Green Indeed on Green Energy From Manhattan's East River · · Score: 1

    It wasn't. Which is why it was bombed when it was. Israel had very solid reason to belive that Sadam was trying to build an atomic bomb, and would use it on us when he got it. So the Israeli government decided to blow it up before it was operational as so not to spread radioactivity all over Bagdad.

    It should be pointed out that Israel was legally at war with Iraq at the time, as Iraq decared war on Israel in '48 and no peace treaty was ever signed.

  18. Re:or you could do this on Slashback: Wireless, Gasoline, Prevarication · · Score: 0, Redundant

    You have to remember the tempurture variations do matter here. If you buy a gallon of gas on a hot day and then its cold the next day you wil have less than a gallon. You will have the same weight in gas, and it will let you drive just as far, but it will have less volume. In a 5,000 gallon storage tank that can be quite a lot of difference.

    This is why jet aircraft messure fuel in weight.

  19. Re:Hmm on The Trillion-Barrel Tar Pit · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The thing is that for all we bitch about oil it does its job quite well. Oil and derived products (gas, jet fuel, Disiel fuel, heating oil etc) have several things going for them:

    1) They have a high energy density. The fact is you can get a lot of useful work out of a gallon of auto gas.

    2) They are reasonably stable at room tempurture. Yes they will burn but they won't explode for no reason (which some things will).

    3) We have an infrastructure for them. From the drill to the pump a lot has been invested in making oil avalable.

    4) We have a huge knowlege base. There a lot of people out there who know how to do a lot of useful things out of petro chemicals. From roughnecks to chemical engineers a lot of folks know how to do useful stuff here.

    There is a lot of oil in the world. Right now there is a lot of oil that we know about but like the Canadian tar we haven't bothered to go after it because its a lot cheaper to get oil some where else. If for every $100 of oil it costs you $3 in Saudi Arabia but $60 in Canada to extract it which would you use? As the oil that is easy to get to is used up we will get creative about how to get the other stuff.

    I imagine the fuel of the future will be Eathanol. You can make it by fermentation of sugars in plant products. But this also has problems, in that corn used for Eathanol can't be used for food or other things.

    There is this myth that there is some perfect source of energy out there and if we would only spend 5 minutes looking we would find it. I wish it was so but I'm kind of skeptical. I mean if you did find it you would get quite rich. But so far its not happened. Other energy sources have problems as well.

  20. Re:we're supposed to be grateful? on Digital Praise Takes Up Christian Gaming Cause · · Score: 1

    Trust me I don't want to be hit over the head with the jesus stick any more than you do. As I think I said I'm not a christian, and don't want to be one. I am very much a religous person, (I moved 6000 miles to a country where I don't speek the language for relgious reasons). I will say that I don't really care what a bunch of christians in the US do or don't do with computer games. But I support the idea of reacting to things you don't like by building something you do.

    The question in my mind is are these games that are specificly Xtian games (and what version of that) or are they games like say a tux racer where there is little or now sex/violence etc. There have been many games over the years that have been quite enjoyable without sex and violence, tetris and sim city jump to mind.

    I don't play computer games for other reasons (mostly I have other things I would rather spend my time on) but thats just my taste.

    All I am saying is that a group of people found some games to not be acceptable for their own reasons, so are writting their own. Thats fine, will I let my girls play these games, probably not. But I'm not threatend by the fact that they exist.

  21. I think this is a positive thing on Digital Praise Takes Up Christian Gaming Cause · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Here are a bunch of people who are saying we don't like the current crop of games for a number of reasons. So instead of protesting and trying to make it so that others can't play they are going to make their own games. In a free country this is exactly what people should do. One of the points of free software is that people can take it and make it better, for whatever value of better they happen to want. Even if its something that is totally un insteresting to you and me.

    If these folks want to make their games power to them. Remember in the USA fundemtalist christains are a very large number of people.

  22. Re:Still 62% willing to fly? on SpaceShipOne Flight Not as Perfect as it Seemed · · Score: 1

    i imagine they will pick the 2 lightest people they can find on their staff. Why send a 200lb man when you can send a 120lb woman? There may be a rule about that in the x-prize rule book.

    But I would be happy to fly in it as well. Even if it would give my fiance a heart attack.

  23. Re:WiFi and Property rights on The State of Urban Wireless · · Score: 1

    Well one difference with this is that in theory the airport has a contractual relationship with the airlines. In theory they can put a clause about WiFi in that contract. Of course they may not have thought of it at the right time.

  24. Re:Jerusalem on The State of Urban Wireless · · Score: 1

    Cool, I've yet to really try that. The only reason that I know about that one hot spot is that they had a sign out. Actually my laptop needs to be taken in for repairs. I don't see the point of a wireless card in my desktop.

  25. Jerusalem on The State of Urban Wireless · · Score: 2, Informative

    I know of at least 1 hot spot in Jerusalem, "Caffit" on Rehov Emek Rafaim in the German colony. To bad its a resturant I really don't like. I think the King David hotel has wireless but its not free.

    I would love to know of more in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.