> It still has what one slashdot poster called 'the stench of microsoft' on it.
Yes, there will always be that. And it has some validity in that Microsoft will be the only one driving changes to the platform.
But if they really follow through on this thing we pretty much have to accept it. A lot of people think 'managed code' is so wonderful they are willing to ignore the so far unsolved problems with it. A couple of years ago the choices were Java, ruled with an iron fist by Sun and Mono ruled by FUD from Microsoft. So along with the technical issues were legal problems as well, yet thousands of programs were being stuffed on sourceforge in both language/platforms. After years of false starts and promises Java is now Free. If Microsoft actually follows through (and that is ALWAYS a big IF) Mono will also be Free.
We will have to be careful not to use anything outside of the license but with the Mono team already working to split the Free from the free that should not present undue problems.
> Your out of the loop.. Android phones are going to be hitting the market big in the next few months..
You are ignoring the difference. Most Android based products will be open enough that if the bundled browser isn't up to scratch users can just download a better one. So Google's preferences in the default browser aren't a problem. And besides, while preferring h264 they will probably support both. If enough demand is present vendors will eventually add hardware support.
And for the other reply above about the stupid iPhone, screw the idiots who bought an iPhone knowing it was a totally locked platform that would never support a complete browsing experience. Should they find that their chains do not sit lightly upon them that is their problem, they have no place in the councils of Free People.
> why Apple/Google favor H.264 is because their current products have H.264 hardware encoders
I think we can ignore the gPhone so that only leaves Apple. They have never supported an open standard until they had to or could use it for a tactical advantage. They are, if anything, worse than Microsoft with their closed tech silo. So why do they, with their single digit share of the browser market[1], get to veto standards? Standardize on Theora and anyone who wants to watch a video has a free browser available to watch it with. Go with H264 and that isn't true. Sounds like a no brainer if the point of standards is to make content widely available.
[1] Remember that Apple can never have >10% of the market for long and that a good number of those Apple users ditch Safari for Firefox anyway.
> the idea that the environmentalists are Soviet-controlled sounds rather suspicious, as well as out of date
They aren't Soviet controlled anymore since the Soviet Union fell. But Communism didn't end and the failed religion still has many followers, plenty of money and a will to regroup and triumph over their foes.
> you should call them terrorists instead.;-)
Nah. Besides, it wouldn't be correct. The terrorists are a totally different problem. Frightening in their decentralized nature and utter lack of moral restraint but less of a longterm danger compared to Communism. In the end the terrorists are stuck in the 6th Century with their deranged religion.
Terrorists, if someone else gives (they can't make much of anything themselves) it to them, can use an airliner or a nuke to at most destroy a city. At some point they anger us enough to go Ann Coulter[1] on their asses and it's over. Communists are a different animal entirely, burrowing into a civilization and corroding it from within. Communists are attempting to destroy our entire civilization and to date have been winning. Occasionally our team gets a Reagan who slows the losses for a time but even their team's loss of the Soviet Union has failed to slow their relentless march through OUR institutions. A disciple of Saul Alinsky and William Ayers has now marched all the way to the White House. So who is in a position to do more damage, UBL in his cave or BHO with a pliant fillibuster proof Congress?
> the Sovs didn't exactly consider pollution a problem, and were quite anti-environmentalist.
Agreed. All the more reason to subvert western environmental groups by their lights. Groups they controlled could be depended upon to help hide the ecological horrors going on behind the Iron Curtain. And they were very useful tools to attack the economic vitality of the West.
Note the same pattern with "Human Rights" Organizations. For some reason most seemed to be obsessed with real and imagined defects in various Western (but usually the US) societies and almost totally oblivious to the brutal oppression happening behind the Iron Curtain. And even today the pattern goes on. Hugo Chavez is shutting down the last TV outlets not under his control and exactly how many "Human Rights" Organizations are raising Hell over it? A few can muster the courage to denounce some of the misfits in the Middle East for their more barbaric practices but they are notable for the exception. Communists have no use for "Human Rights" themselves, it being an alien notion, but that doesn't stop them from seeing the utility in gaining control of organizations devoted to them for use as both cover and a weapon.
[1] In case you don't know, Ms. Coulter lost a close friend on 9/11/01 and so on 9/12 wrote in a 'controversial' (even by Ann Coulter standards) column that we should "Invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity."
> You make too many assumptions. Increased freedom does not equal increased wealth.
You can argue a theory, but history teaches that to date there has yet to be a case of increasing liberty not being accompanied by an increase in wealth. The inverse also has quite a bit of evidence behind it, that increasing wealth tends to lead to demands for liberty. So yes, it might be possible to rig a political scenario where it would be possible to have a free people remain poor but it almost certainly would be an unstable political situation that would eventually either devolve back to tyranny or burst out into wealth creation. Capitalism is the only fit economic system for a Free people and capitalism creates wealth every time it is tried.
> Yet restrictions on the movement of people is a restriction of freedom. > Just wanted to point out the contradiction in your argument.
At the happy extreme, yes. When we finally perfect Libertarian theory and can found and actually run a society on its principles the idea of the Nation State and thus borders vanish. But we aren't anywhere close to that. Even in the lost Republic our forefathers gave us border control was not seen as very important. In a Welfare State bordering on outright Socialism such as we currently live in border control is critical. As we shall likely see soon, not only will we control inflow we will be controlling OUTFLOW of capital and people just like every other socialist pesthole.
> I think you are about fifty years late with your McCarthyist red scare tactics, son.
And I know you are a product of government schools too young to have any direct knowledge of the events you speak of. And almost everything you were taught is wrong.
The Cold War was real. The Soviet Union was the focus of evil in the modern world. Their intelligence agencies were very active and very effective. Many overeducated blueblood twits were all too happy to enlist in the service of evil. Joe McCarthy's only mistake was in totally underestimating the enemy he challenged, which was what lead to his utter destruction. All right thinking people believed Communism was the future. The left believed this in Hope for the Change that was goingto come and did everything in their power to bring it about. Classical liberals believed it and despaired. But everyone believed Truth Justice and the American Way was on the way out, which was probably a motivation behind the huge number of traitors we had in our midst.
Until Ronald Reagan finally broke the ultimate taboo that had been silently and insidiously inserted into our psyche. That it was dangerous and even somehow low class to speak one key truth in public, that the other side was EVIL. Once he made that infamous "focus of evil' speech the firestorm of condemnation from all 'right thinking people' couldn't prevent the speech's intended goal: forcing the public apologists for the Soviets to deal with the questions it raised.
Before you could handwave the moral problems away and speak of realpolitik, of improving relations with the Soviets being more important than badgering them about human rights, and anyway morality was relative and who were we to judge? You really saw appoligists basically (i.e. layered under tons of obfuscating weasel words) saying "Sure they have a few concentration camps, but look at their literacy rate!" No, after the speech you had a few choices. You could disagree with the argument that they were in fact evil. But the hundred million bodies Communism left in it's wake and the whole Iron Curtain business made that argument impossible for most to even attempt. So that left either declaring your allegiance to the Dark Side or opposing Evil. Thus the Pro Soviet politicians that infested Europe for example, quickly lost their mojo. You probably were never taught that in the darkest days France, Greece and even Germany were close to outright switching to the Soviet side.
But all this history has for the most part been thrown down the memory hole. Just like every other inconvient Truth goes down said hole. But the fall of the Soviet Union didn't end Communism.
Which brings us back to the topic at hand. The Communists used the greens as a weapon against their enemies. The fall of the Soviet Union didn't change that, it only changed the command structure a bit. The Communists wanted to cripple the economies of the Western world both to harm us and to make the unfavorable comparisions between our economic systems less apparent. The greens wanted to end industrial civilization in general for reasons of their own. So the green organizations push for policies which advance both of their agendas. Which explains why green groups NEVER criticized environmental disasters in Communist countries, because it doesn't advance BOTH agendas. They don't advance many schemes which only help the environment, preferring ones that are the most economically damaging or that also enhance the State. Cap and trade as it is currently proposed is all damage and glorification of the State so Greenpeace isn't for it. Again, a policy has to advance BOTH goals.
> That problem is overpopulation. massive overpopulation.
Nope, you are looking at a symptom not the cause. The problem is the uneven distribution of capitalism and liberty. Go look at the numbers. There is an unmistakable link between freedom, wealth and birth rate. The link is even better if you assume a two generation lag on the birth rate vs the other factors.
The solution is thus simple, bring the blessings of liberty to the huddled masses yearning to breath free. Help them establish a solid rule of law and watch them become quickly become prosperous. Yes their population will spike as improved conditions permit a population boom, but that will soon stabilize and begin to decline. The US is the only thing resembling an exception to this rule and our population would also be in decline without illegal immigration.
> In fact, most of the science points to a rapid change in CO2 being the causal agent for climate change.
No, the fact is that the link between CO2 and global temp is a theory. With some pretty good evidence in the historical record to show a link but the big question the ice cores and other evidence aren't precise enough to answer with certainty is which forces the other? Does CO2 (absent human activity) rise with temp or does it work the other way around. Or do they interact in ways we don't yet understand, perhaps in combination with several other factors.
Fact: CO2 levels have risen over the past decade. Human activity is highly likely to account for much of it.
Fact: Solar activity (sunspots) and solar output (light, especially UV) is down over the past decade.
Fact: Global temp has fallen over the past decade.
Can a conclusion be drawn from those three facts? No. But it certainly doesn't make the arguments for AGW stronger.
If the goal is 'saving the Earth' Europe's carbon tax isn't working very well. But if the goal is raising taxes and growing government control then it is a success.
So it should come as no surprise that the US is eager to emulate the success of Europe's 'cap and trade' regime. The green movement is basically a watermelon, enviro green on the outside and red communist inside. The green movement was subverted and taken over back in the Soviet days when almost every group that didn't take overt efforts at resisting such a takeover was borged and used as a front.
But to their credit even Greenpeace was against the atrocity the House just passed. Because they still have enough true believers in environmentalism left that understand what the cap and trade plan moving through Congress really is. Any benefit to the environment will be a happy accident. They give away almost all of the credits in the short and medium term to political allies to allow them to pollute all they want. The point is to slowly gain CONTROL over vast swaths of the American economy.
If we really want to control carbon emissions a huge new government structure that will always throw 'free credits' out anytime there is real pain (i.e. enraged ratepayers, a plant about to close, a huge sack of campaign cash offered, etc.) so there won't be much real reduction.
No, just put a straight TAX on energy sources that you want to discourage. Personally I'm not a believer in AGW but I could get behind such an effort on the grounds of reducing our dependence on oil form countries that want us dead. But I can't support cap and trade because a) it won't work and b) is a solution worse than the problem.
> This is really just FUD aimed at MS, using 2001 "MS is insecure" arguements which are no longer true today.
Totally man, we haven't had a Windows malware event so bad broke out into the mainstream media in years.
Oh sorry, my bad, we have. The patches fly out at about the same pace as they did in 2001. Different subsystems get targeted as the cat and mouse game goes on but since Windows is still a big blob of poorly documented, closed source and for the most part insecure code the game isn't likely to end soon.
That said, had a look a major Linux distro's errata firehose lately? So lets not get too smug. Yes I realize a Linux distro covers a much larger universe that includes server software, office suites and development tools. But compare apple to apples, say Firefox to IE and we still have work to do. Which is currently safer? Well I'm not posting this from Windows.
> The thing is, it's hard to spot them in the hour or so that's available in a typical > interview, and a large number of IT managers don't know how to spot them once they've got the job.
That second part is the problem because if the Manager had a clue he could indeed spot the ones that only have paper in lieu of actual skills. It isn't that hard to ask a couple of real world questions. It isn't that much harder to set up a real world test. Seriously, if I were tasked to hire admin types on a regular basis I'd cook up a set of virtual images and keep em stashed somewhere. Put a couple of non-obvious problems in that virtual net based on things that have actually happened in my setup and see if they can really fix them. Total open book test with Google allowed since they can have those on the real job. Total worst case cost, even if the task gets delegates to minions who pad the time is a few thousand in labor. Avoid hiring one idiot and you are in the black on the investment.
> I meet your cost and raise you the cost of regular hardware upgrades necessary to continue running Windows.
Sorry but our side pissed away that advantage years ago. Now it takes as much hardware to run a current Linux/UNIX desktop as it does to run Windows Vista. OO.o is a total pig and Firefox gobbles RAM like popcorn. The current desktops chew through CPU cycles like they assume everyone has a multi-core monster and 3D is rapidly going from cool eye candy to required. Think I'm joking? GNOME is working on remaking the desktop with clutter, a GL based system.
If anything Windows XP is the option to keep old hardware in service these days.... that is until errata stops. But at least errata IS still available for XP, try to find a linux distribution that is still issuing bug fixs for a version old enough to run on the machine you were talking about, a Pentium 3 667Mhz with 256M memory. RHEL 2.1 would have run fairly well on that machine but it is EOL. RHEL 3 will install on that machine but you won't enjoy running Firefox or OO.o on it unless you add memory. But you better enjoy it fast because it goes EOL next year. I am aware of no other major distribution still in errata support that will run on that machine. The current versions of the popular (Ubuntu, Fedora, etc.) ones won't even install.
Had we kept the focus on small and nimble we would have had a much better shot when our chance for a major breakout finally came in the form of the netbook. But we had no hardware advantage and Microsoft was willing to take a hit on the license fee to eliminate that advantage.
Know what is even funnier? I saw this one Friday afternoon. On a political humor blog no less; and the punch line is Frank J. pointed the link at newscientist directly. Here on News for Nerds we get the blog pointing to blog version days later.
> An enforced secret ballot (in the voting booth) hasn't exactly forestalled vote buying, or tomb-stoning.
If the secret ballot isn't enforced it is almost useless as a protection. And voting in person in a booth can in theory prevent both problems whether mechanical or paper votes are cast. Online voting is an open invitation to both problems exploding into major problems because the fraud isn't even possible to stop in theory.
Work it through. If non-secret voting isn't considered the normal way of voting anyone opting to vote in secret has something to hide. And as long as large numbers aren't voting in secret there are large numbers of votes available for purchase.
The problems with our current system are solvable.
1. Make absentee voting rare enough that it won't be likely to be abusable by making the process more difficult.
2. Get serious about checking photo ID and purging the registration rolls by cross linking databases to get rid of duplicate registrations and dead people.
As for low turnout I don't see a problem. For years I have held the position that if you aren't willing to invest the time to be up to speed on the basic issues and candidates the best service you can render the Republic is to stay the hell out of a voting booth.
> GNU and GCC are just as much open source implementations of proprietary technology...
A couple of important differences.
1. The patents have long since expired on the core ideas in UNIX. we are rapidly approaching the point where Linux has existed longer than a US patent is allowed to exist and BSD embodies almost all of the user visible APIs and goes back even longer.
2. C is an ANSI Standard that again is older than any patent could threaten from. C++ is more recent but was developed by real standards bodies vs ECMA, thus any IP issues would be out in the open.
3. C#, the CLR and the rest of Mono/.Net/etc are the sole creation of Microsoft Corp. Any changes can only originate from them, the tech is new enough to have patents pretty much anywhere and by their sole control of the language the can introduce whatever they want and we get to chase their tail lights because they won't have to disclose any of the new bits until they ship production code.
So yes, had the GNU Project been operating in the toxic software patent environment we now have it is doubtful they would have been able to release GCC when they did, instead being forced to wait out the patents, but history is what it is.
> IS the goal to create a useful system or a pure system?
Until now Debian has been clearly in the pure camp. Debian, moe RMS Pure than RMS over the GNU FDL. Debian, endless wanking over whether firmware blobs have to get yanked for two major releases. And so on. Now suddenly they are taking the Novell "Mono is just another managed code environment licensed under the GPL, nothing to fear here" position. when everyone else DOES see something to fear even if they ship Mono/Tomboy. Fedora is planning on tossing Mono out of the standard install and RH has never shipped it in RHEL because their lawyers are uneasy.
In the end, if the system isn't fairly Pure it isn't ultimately going to be useful. Patents exist, FUD attacks work.
Basically the only sensible way to treat C# is like Win32. It is OK to import Windows applications using Mono or Wine but basing core parts of the Free World on such apps is unwise. If for no other reason than basing our application stack on APIs controlled by people who want to destroy us is about as wise as the Western world basing our economy on oil imported from the Middle East. An argument can be made that we have little choice regarding oil but we most certainly do regarding Mono as we didn't creep into a dependency over decades we are being asked to walk into this trap with our eyes wide open.
> Well if you don't have 10.5 already then Snow Leopard is $120 for the non-upgrade FULL VERSION pricing.
I'm really tired of that bullshit line. If the boxed copies of OS X were "non-upgrade FULL VERSION" then Apple wouldn't have a case against Pystar. It really is time for Apple and you fanbois to stop trying to have it both ways. Either the "non-upgrade FULL VERSION" is what it says or it is just an upgrade that will upgrade an older version than the $30 upgrade does. But being able to run around saying OS X is less expensive than Windows (see the $130 FULL VERSION") yet launching lawyers at anyone who actually believes it is dishonest to the core. Decide one way or the other and live with the consequences.
> So if they amended the constitution, you'd suddenly feel like > it's the kind of thing that IS the government's business?
Of course not! I'd argue until I was blue in the face against the Amendment granting the unlimited powers the Federal government currently wields. But if we had that argument out and I lost I'd have to either accept the outcome or grab the sporting goods and launch a revolution because it would then have been done proper. We would have swept away the last vestiges of the Old Republic and the Empire would be official.
My problem is that by ignoring the Constitution it creates problems greater than the specific problem under discussion because decades of doing it has turned our country from one where the Rule of Law was supreme to one where the Rule of Men holds. There is no certainty in the law because the words are meaningless since all three branches of government now feel free to just yank whatever they want out of their butts. Contracts aren't worth the paper they are written on any more.
> Oh, and management willingly signed every contract that holds provisions in it your find repugnant.
Interesting definition of 'willing' you have there. Places like Detroit aren't in 'right to work' states so once a shop goes union you basically have two choices, sign the contract or close the plant. And you are sitting at the table with a Federal negotiator with unappealable powers to impose 'binding arbitration' so closing the plant is only an option if HE says it is and HE is a political appointee who answers to elected officials much more beholden to the union that management's campaign contributions.
> But yet, it's all the workers fault, and the management that signed these contracts and directly > managed the company into the ground is blameless.
Blameless? Did I say that? Not only did they give in to suicidal demands they made so many other blunders space doesn't permit a full venting.
But the overriding problem currently facing the US auto makers is the UAW and a real bankruptcy is the only viable way to opening up those contracts. All of the money we are pouring into those companies until that happens is wasted and that is exactly what this is all about, preventing the UAW from taking a reality check. To prevent that centuries of contract law are being shredded, billions of taxpayer dollars wasted, etc. All because the UAW is what is 'too big to fail' but even Obama doesn't have the political capital to actually SAY that. The actual automakers are already valueless so allowing them to fold wouldn't cause much of an economic dislocation beyond what has already happened when the stock and bond holders were left with nothing. The corpse of GM is essentially being used to launder money to the UAW.
The whole house of cards should be allowed to collapse. Management and the investing world would learn the important lesson that taking the easy way out and giving in to insane demands eventually has a price. The unions would learn that excessive greed kills the golden goose. The total collapse of the Michigan political establishment would be a good thing for the state. And everyone would learn that NOBODY is 'too big to fail.'
One question. If the 'general welfare' clause were intended to be as open ended as you guys believe it to be, why did they feel a need to carefully enumerate the powers and limitations in the lines directly under that header?
So we have two competing theories:
1. The 'general welfare' clause, along with the other all purpose commerce clause, grant unlimited powers to the Federal government making the 9th and 10th Amendments (passed as Amendments btw which can override the original document) null and void.
2. The words 'general welfare' appear in the section heading describing the general flavor of the more specific defined powers granted in the section which taken together define the limits of Congress's powers to 'provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.'
But since you posted as an AC it is doubtful you will man up and even try to answer.
Was it? Everybody said that..... but 'everybody' seemed to be the ones either handing out the money or the politically connected people who were lining up to take the money. And then they didn't even spend most of the money to solve the 'toxic asset' problem that we were assured was going to bring on a depression. No, they nationalized banks, insurance companies and automakers with most of it and show every sign of keeping any money that does get paid back as a giant off the books slush fund.
Not the only one who is starting to smell a giant rat. Seeing the same 'masters of the universe' types moving seamlessly between Wall Street, the Bush administration and now the Obama camp spending Sagans of cash that was called into existence from nothing to bail out old money companies who did stupid things because they were afraid of being called names by Democrats.
It must be great to be young and naive. You probably think the TARP money will be paid back too. It will only be paid back if Tesla makes a crapload of profits instead of losing their ass on the deal. But if it was a sure fire moneymaker they could have raised the money on the private markets. Even in a recession and credit crisis there is venture capital looking for places to park. SO we must assume it is a high risk investment being financed with a very sweetheart low interest government loan. Essentially a gift to Tesla of the spread between the low rate the government loaned at vs the higher rate the open market would have charged for the risk.
Must be great to own a Congressman or Senator. Does it make me a bitter old cynic to just assume the facility in the "SF Bay area" will be in Speaker Pelosi's district?
> If you have such a problem with half a billion dollar loan, I'd hate to see how > you'd react to the $5.9 billion loan Ford just got from the same program.
I'm pissed off about that too. I'm pissed off at the money we are pissing away on the auto bailouts in general. We spent all that money.... and they went bankrupt anyway. But since they cheated and didn't let them do a proper bankruptcy it's going to be f&%king Groundhog Day in Detroit for the next 3 1/2 years as they keep going bankrupt over and over again and the US taxpayer keeps stuffing money down the UAW rathole and relaunching the zombie automakers.
> I know. Just like those silly Interstate highways
Roads are specifically mentioned in the US Constitution. Pass
> the US Marine Corps
A Navy is specifically mentioned. The Marines are a sub unit of the Navy. Pass
> the US Postal Service that'll deliver
Postal service is permitted. Pass. But note that most packages use private carriers these days, the postal service is mostly for bills and junk mail.
> and those terribly inefficient and socialized Firefighters and that neo-communist socialized Police Department
Those services are not provided by the US government. Federal money for those purposes are unconstitutional. Good luck getting enough literate Supremes to be able to figure that out any time soon.
US Taxpayer money to a private automaker? Fail. Unless you can point me to the clause I missed that specifically grants the US government that power the 10th Amendment forbids it. Again, good luck finding five Supremes who can read.
In other words the taxpayers just had half a billion stolen from them and given to some idiot Californicators to waste on building overpriced cars that will only sell if they are subsidized with yet more taxpayer dollars.
Seriously, if these cars were such a great moneymaking venture I don't think California is lacking in venture capitalists even in a recession. You only go to the government with hat in hand if you know it is a losing idea but can be made politically appealing anyway. These days you just have to say "green!" to crack open the piggy bank.
Slashdot Mirror
> It still has what one slashdot poster called 'the stench of microsoft' on it.
Yes, there will always be that. And it has some validity in that Microsoft will be the only one driving changes to the platform.
But if they really follow through on this thing we pretty much have to accept it. A lot of people think 'managed code' is so wonderful they are willing to ignore the so far unsolved problems with it. A couple of years ago the choices were Java, ruled with an iron fist by Sun and Mono ruled by FUD from Microsoft. So along with the technical issues were legal problems as well, yet thousands of programs were being stuffed on sourceforge in both language/platforms. After years of false starts and promises Java is now Free. If Microsoft actually follows through (and that is ALWAYS a big IF) Mono will also be Free.
We will have to be careful not to use anything outside of the license but with the Mono team already working to split the Free from the free that should not present undue problems.
> Your out of the loop.. Android phones are going to be hitting the market big in the next few months..
You are ignoring the difference. Most Android based products will be open enough that if the bundled browser isn't up to scratch users can just download a better one. So Google's preferences in the default browser aren't a problem. And besides, while preferring h264 they will probably support both. If enough demand is present vendors will eventually add hardware support.
And for the other reply above about the stupid iPhone, screw the idiots who bought an iPhone knowing it was a totally locked platform that would never support a complete browsing experience. Should they find that their chains do not sit lightly upon them that is their problem, they have no place in the councils of Free People.
> why Apple/Google favor H.264 is because their current products have H.264 hardware encoders
I think we can ignore the gPhone so that only leaves Apple. They have never supported an open standard until they had to or could use it for a tactical advantage. They are, if anything, worse than Microsoft with their closed tech silo. So why do they, with their single digit share of the browser market[1], get to veto standards? Standardize on Theora and anyone who wants to watch a video has a free browser available to watch it with. Go with H264 and that isn't true. Sounds like a no brainer if the point of standards is to make content widely available.
[1] Remember that Apple can never have >10% of the market for long and that a good number of those Apple users ditch Safari for Firefox anyway.
> the idea that the environmentalists are Soviet-controlled sounds rather suspicious, as well as out of date
They aren't Soviet controlled anymore since the Soviet Union fell. But Communism didn't end and the failed religion still has many followers, plenty of money and a will to regroup and triumph over their foes.
> you should call them terrorists instead. ;-)
Nah. Besides, it wouldn't be correct. The terrorists are a totally different problem. Frightening in their decentralized nature and utter lack of moral restraint but less of a longterm danger compared to Communism. In the end the terrorists are stuck in the 6th Century with their deranged religion.
Terrorists, if someone else gives (they can't make much of anything themselves) it to them, can use an airliner or a nuke to at most destroy a city. At some point they anger us enough to go Ann Coulter[1] on their asses and it's over. Communists are a different animal entirely, burrowing into a civilization and corroding it from within. Communists are attempting to destroy our entire civilization and to date have been winning. Occasionally our team gets a Reagan who slows the losses for a time but even their team's loss of the Soviet Union has failed to slow their relentless march through OUR institutions. A disciple of Saul Alinsky and William Ayers has now marched all the way to the White House. So who is in a position to do more damage, UBL in his cave or BHO with a pliant fillibuster proof Congress?
> the Sovs didn't exactly consider pollution a problem, and were quite anti-environmentalist.
Agreed. All the more reason to subvert western environmental groups by their lights. Groups they controlled could be depended upon to help hide the ecological horrors going on behind the Iron Curtain. And they were very useful tools to attack the economic vitality of the West.
Note the same pattern with "Human Rights" Organizations. For some reason most seemed to be obsessed with real and imagined defects in various Western (but usually the US) societies and almost totally oblivious to the brutal oppression happening behind the Iron Curtain. And even today the pattern goes on. Hugo Chavez is shutting down the last TV outlets not under his control and exactly how many "Human Rights" Organizations are raising Hell over it? A few can muster the courage to denounce some of the misfits in the Middle East for their more barbaric practices but they are notable for the exception. Communists have no use for "Human Rights" themselves, it being an alien notion, but that doesn't stop them from seeing the utility in gaining control of organizations devoted to them for use as both cover and a weapon.
[1] In case you don't know, Ms. Coulter lost a close friend on 9/11/01 and so on 9/12 wrote in a 'controversial' (even by Ann Coulter standards) column that we should "Invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity."
> You make too many assumptions. Increased freedom does not equal increased wealth.
You can argue a theory, but history teaches that to date there has yet to be a case of increasing liberty not being accompanied by an increase in wealth. The inverse also has quite a bit of evidence behind it, that increasing wealth tends to lead to demands for liberty. So yes, it might be possible to rig a political scenario where it would be possible to have a free people remain poor but it almost certainly would be an unstable political situation that would eventually either devolve back to tyranny or burst out into wealth creation. Capitalism is the only fit economic system for a Free people and capitalism creates wealth every time it is tried.
> Yet restrictions on the movement of people is a restriction of freedom.
> Just wanted to point out the contradiction in your argument.
At the happy extreme, yes. When we finally perfect Libertarian theory and can found and actually run a society on its principles the idea of the Nation State and thus borders vanish. But we aren't anywhere close to that. Even in the lost Republic our forefathers gave us border control was not seen as very important. In a Welfare State bordering on outright Socialism such as we currently live in border control is critical. As we shall likely see soon, not only will we control inflow we will be controlling OUTFLOW of capital and people just like every other socialist pesthole.
> I think you are about fifty years late with your McCarthyist red scare tactics, son.
And I know you are a product of government schools too young to have any direct knowledge of the events you speak of. And almost everything you were taught is wrong.
The Cold War was real. The Soviet Union was the focus of evil in the modern world. Their intelligence agencies were very active and very effective. Many overeducated blueblood twits were all too happy to enlist in the service of evil. Joe McCarthy's only mistake was in totally underestimating the enemy he challenged, which was what lead to his utter destruction. All right thinking people believed Communism was the future. The left believed this in Hope for the Change that was goingto come and did everything in their power to bring it about. Classical liberals believed it and despaired. But everyone believed Truth Justice and the American Way was on the way out, which was probably a motivation behind the huge number of traitors we had in our midst.
Until Ronald Reagan finally broke the ultimate taboo that had been silently and insidiously inserted into our psyche. That it was dangerous and even somehow low class to speak one key truth in public, that the other side was EVIL. Once he made that infamous "focus of evil' speech the firestorm of condemnation from all 'right thinking people' couldn't prevent the speech's intended goal: forcing the public apologists for the Soviets to deal with the questions it raised.
Before you could handwave the moral problems away and speak of realpolitik, of improving relations with the Soviets being more important than badgering them about human rights, and anyway morality was relative and who were we to judge? You really saw appoligists basically (i.e. layered under tons of obfuscating weasel words) saying "Sure they have a few concentration camps, but look at their literacy rate!" No, after the speech you had a few choices. You could disagree with the argument that they were in fact evil. But the hundred million bodies Communism left in it's wake and the whole Iron Curtain business made that argument impossible for most to even attempt. So that left either declaring your allegiance to the Dark Side or opposing Evil. Thus the Pro Soviet politicians that infested Europe for example, quickly lost their mojo. You probably were never taught that in the darkest days France, Greece and even Germany were close to outright switching to the Soviet side.
But all this history has for the most part been thrown down the memory hole. Just like every other inconvient Truth goes down said hole. But the fall of the Soviet Union didn't end Communism.
Which brings us back to the topic at hand. The Communists used the greens as a weapon against their enemies. The fall of the Soviet Union didn't change that, it only changed the command structure a bit. The Communists wanted to cripple the economies of the Western world both to harm us and to make the unfavorable comparisions between our economic systems less apparent. The greens wanted to end industrial civilization in general for reasons of their own. So the green organizations push for policies which advance both of their agendas. Which explains why green groups NEVER criticized environmental disasters in Communist countries, because it doesn't advance BOTH agendas. They don't advance many schemes which only help the environment, preferring ones that are the most economically damaging or that also enhance the State. Cap and trade as it is currently proposed is all damage and glorification of the State so Greenpeace isn't for it. Again, a policy has to advance BOTH goals.
> That problem is overpopulation. massive overpopulation.
Nope, you are looking at a symptom not the cause. The problem is the uneven distribution of capitalism and liberty. Go look at the numbers. There is an unmistakable link between freedom, wealth and birth rate. The link is even better if you assume a two generation lag on the birth rate vs the other factors.
The solution is thus simple, bring the blessings of liberty to the huddled masses yearning to breath free. Help them establish a solid rule of law and watch them become quickly become prosperous. Yes their population will spike as improved conditions permit a population boom, but that will soon stabilize and begin to decline. The US is the only thing resembling an exception to this rule and our population would also be in decline without illegal immigration.
> In fact, most of the science points to a rapid change in CO2 being the causal agent for climate change.
No, the fact is that the link between CO2 and global temp is a theory. With some pretty good evidence in the historical record to show a link but the big question the ice cores and other evidence aren't precise enough to answer with certainty is which forces the other? Does CO2 (absent human activity) rise with temp or does it work the other way around. Or do they interact in ways we don't yet understand, perhaps in combination with several other factors.
Fact: CO2 levels have risen over the past decade. Human activity is highly likely to account for much of it.
Fact: Solar activity (sunspots) and solar output (light, especially UV) is down over the past decade.
Fact: Global temp has fallen over the past decade.
Can a conclusion be drawn from those three facts? No. But it certainly doesn't make the arguments for AGW stronger.
If the goal is 'saving the Earth' Europe's carbon tax isn't working very well. But if the goal is raising taxes and growing government control then it is a success.
So it should come as no surprise that the US is eager to emulate the success of Europe's 'cap and trade' regime. The green movement is basically a watermelon, enviro green on the outside and red communist inside. The green movement was subverted and taken over back in the Soviet days when almost every group that didn't take overt efforts at resisting such a takeover was borged and used as a front.
But to their credit even Greenpeace was against the atrocity the House just passed. Because they still have enough true believers in environmentalism left that understand what the cap and trade plan moving through Congress really is. Any benefit to the environment will be a happy accident. They give away almost all of the credits in the short and medium term to political allies to allow them to pollute all they want. The point is to slowly gain CONTROL over vast swaths of the American economy.
If we really want to control carbon emissions a huge new government structure that will always throw 'free credits' out anytime there is real pain (i.e. enraged ratepayers, a plant about to close, a huge sack of campaign cash offered, etc.) so there won't be much real reduction.
No, just put a straight TAX on energy sources that you want to discourage. Personally I'm not a believer in AGW but I could get behind such an effort on the grounds of reducing our dependence on oil form countries that want us dead. But I can't support cap and trade because a) it won't work and b) is a solution worse than the problem.
> This is really just FUD aimed at MS, using 2001 "MS is insecure" arguements which are no longer true today.
Totally man, we haven't had a Windows malware event so bad broke out into the mainstream media in years.
Oh sorry, my bad, we have. The patches fly out at about the same pace as they did in 2001. Different subsystems get targeted as the cat and mouse game goes on but since Windows is still a big blob of poorly documented, closed source and for the most part insecure code the game isn't likely to end soon.
That said, had a look a major Linux distro's errata firehose lately? So lets not get too smug. Yes I realize a Linux distro covers a much larger universe that includes server software, office suites and development tools. But compare apple to apples, say Firefox to IE and we still have work to do. Which is currently safer? Well I'm not posting this from Windows.
> The thing is, it's hard to spot them in the hour or so that's available in a typical
> interview, and a large number of IT managers don't know how to spot them once they've got the job.
That second part is the problem because if the Manager had a clue he could indeed spot the ones that only have paper in lieu of actual skills. It isn't that hard to ask a couple of real world questions. It isn't that much harder to set up a real world test. Seriously, if I were tasked to hire admin types on a regular basis I'd cook up a set of virtual images and keep em stashed somewhere. Put a couple of non-obvious problems in that virtual net based on things that have actually happened in my setup and see if they can really fix them. Total open book test with Google allowed since they can have those on the real job. Total worst case cost, even if the task gets delegates to minions who pad the time is a few thousand in labor. Avoid hiring one idiot and you are in the black on the investment.
> I meet your cost and raise you the cost of regular hardware upgrades necessary to continue running Windows.
Sorry but our side pissed away that advantage years ago. Now it takes as much hardware to run a current Linux/UNIX desktop as it does to run Windows Vista. OO.o is a total pig and Firefox gobbles RAM like popcorn. The current desktops chew through CPU cycles like they assume everyone has a multi-core monster and 3D is rapidly going from cool eye candy to required. Think I'm joking? GNOME is working on remaking the desktop with clutter, a GL based system.
If anything Windows XP is the option to keep old hardware in service these days.... that is until errata stops. But at least errata IS still available for XP, try to find a linux distribution that is still issuing bug fixs for a version old enough to run on the machine you were talking about, a Pentium 3 667Mhz with 256M memory. RHEL 2.1 would have run fairly well on that machine but it is EOL. RHEL 3 will install on that machine but you won't enjoy running Firefox or OO.o on it unless you add memory. But you better enjoy it fast because it goes EOL next year. I am aware of no other major distribution still in errata support that will run on that machine. The current versions of the popular (Ubuntu, Fedora, etc.) ones won't even install.
Had we kept the focus on small and nimble we would have had a much better shot when our chance for a major breakout finally came in the form of the netbook. But we had no hardware advantage and Microsoft was willing to take a hit on the license fee to eliminate that advantage.
Know what is even funnier? I saw this one Friday afternoon. On a political humor blog no less; and the punch line is Frank J. pointed the link at newscientist directly. Here on News for Nerds we get the blog pointing to blog version days later.
> An enforced secret ballot (in the voting booth) hasn't exactly forestalled vote buying, or tomb-stoning.
If the secret ballot isn't enforced it is almost useless as a protection. And voting in person in a booth can in theory prevent both problems whether mechanical or paper votes are cast. Online voting is an open invitation to both problems exploding into major problems because the fraud isn't even possible to stop in theory.
Work it through. If non-secret voting isn't considered the normal way of voting anyone opting to vote in secret has something to hide. And as long as large numbers aren't voting in secret there are large numbers of votes available for purchase.
The problems with our current system are solvable.
1. Make absentee voting rare enough that it won't be likely to be abusable by making the process more difficult.
2. Get serious about checking photo ID and purging the registration rolls by cross linking databases to get rid of duplicate registrations and dead people.
As for low turnout I don't see a problem. For years I have held the position that if you aren't willing to invest the time to be up to speed on the basic issues and candidates the best service you can render the Republic is to stay the hell out of a voting booth.
> GNU and GCC are just as much open source implementations of proprietary technology...
A couple of important differences.
1. The patents have long since expired on the core ideas in UNIX. we are rapidly approaching the point where Linux has existed longer than a US patent is allowed to exist and BSD embodies almost all of the user visible APIs and goes back even longer.
2. C is an ANSI Standard that again is older than any patent could threaten from. C++ is more recent but was developed by real standards bodies vs ECMA, thus any IP issues would be out in the open.
3. C#, the CLR and the rest of Mono/.Net/etc are the sole creation of Microsoft Corp. Any changes can only originate from them, the tech is new enough to have patents pretty much anywhere and by their sole control of the language the can introduce whatever they want and we get to chase their tail lights because they won't have to disclose any of the new bits until they ship production code.
So yes, had the GNU Project been operating in the toxic software patent environment we now have it is doubtful they would have been able to release GCC when they did, instead being forced to wait out the patents, but history is what it is.
> IS the goal to create a useful system or a pure system?
Until now Debian has been clearly in the pure camp. Debian, moe RMS Pure than RMS over the GNU FDL. Debian, endless wanking over whether firmware blobs have to get yanked for two major releases. And so on. Now suddenly they are taking the Novell "Mono is just another managed code environment licensed under the GPL, nothing to fear here" position. when everyone else DOES see something to fear even if they ship Mono/Tomboy. Fedora is planning on tossing Mono out of the standard install and RH has never shipped it in RHEL because their lawyers are uneasy.
In the end, if the system isn't fairly Pure it isn't ultimately going to be useful. Patents exist, FUD attacks work.
Basically the only sensible way to treat C# is like Win32. It is OK to import Windows applications using Mono or Wine but basing core parts of the Free World on such apps is unwise. If for no other reason than basing our application stack on APIs controlled by people who want to destroy us is about as wise as the Western world basing our economy on oil imported from the Middle East. An argument can be made that we have little choice regarding oil but we most certainly do regarding Mono as we didn't creep into a dependency over decades we are being asked to walk into this trap with our eyes wide open.
> Well if you don't have 10.5 already then Snow Leopard is $120 for the non-upgrade FULL VERSION pricing.
I'm really tired of that bullshit line. If the boxed copies of OS X were "non-upgrade FULL VERSION" then Apple wouldn't have a case against Pystar. It really is time for Apple and you fanbois to stop trying to have it both ways. Either the "non-upgrade FULL VERSION" is what it says or it is just an upgrade that will upgrade an older version than the $30 upgrade does. But being able to run around saying OS X is less expensive than Windows (see the $130 FULL VERSION") yet launching lawyers at anyone who actually believes it is dishonest to the core. Decide one way or the other and live with the consequences.
> So if they amended the constitution, you'd suddenly feel like
> it's the kind of thing that IS the government's business?
Of course not! I'd argue until I was blue in the face against the Amendment granting the unlimited powers the Federal government currently wields. But if we had that argument out and I lost I'd have to either accept the outcome or grab the sporting goods and launch a revolution because it would then have been done proper. We would have swept away the last vestiges of the Old Republic and the Empire would be official.
My problem is that by ignoring the Constitution it creates problems greater than the specific problem under discussion because decades of doing it has turned our country from one where the Rule of Law was supreme to one where the Rule of Men holds. There is no certainty in the law because the words are meaningless since all three branches of government now feel free to just yank whatever they want out of their butts. Contracts aren't worth the paper they are written on any more.
> Oh, and management willingly signed every contract that holds provisions in it your find repugnant.
Interesting definition of 'willing' you have there. Places like Detroit aren't in 'right to work' states so once a shop goes union you basically have two choices, sign the contract or close the plant. And you are sitting at the table with a Federal negotiator with unappealable powers to impose 'binding arbitration' so closing the plant is only an option if HE says it is and HE is a political appointee who answers to elected officials much more beholden to the union that management's campaign contributions.
> But yet, it's all the workers fault, and the management that signed these contracts and directly
> managed the company into the ground is blameless.
Blameless? Did I say that? Not only did they give in to suicidal demands they made so many other blunders space doesn't permit a full venting.
But the overriding problem currently facing the US auto makers is the UAW and a real bankruptcy is the only viable way to opening up those contracts. All of the money we are pouring into those companies until that happens is wasted and that is exactly what this is all about, preventing the UAW from taking a reality check. To prevent that centuries of contract law are being shredded, billions of taxpayer dollars wasted, etc. All because the UAW is what is 'too big to fail' but even Obama doesn't have the political capital to actually SAY that. The actual automakers are already valueless so allowing them to fold wouldn't cause much of an economic dislocation beyond what has already happened when the stock and bond holders were left with nothing. The corpse of GM is essentially being used to launder money to the UAW.
The whole house of cards should be allowed to collapse. Management and the investing world would learn the important lesson that taking the easy way out and giving in to insane demands eventually has a price. The unions would learn that excessive greed kills the golden goose. The total collapse of the Michigan political establishment would be a good thing for the state. And everyone would learn that NOBODY is 'too big to fail.'
One question. If the 'general welfare' clause were intended to be as open ended as you guys believe it to be, why did they feel a need to carefully enumerate the powers and limitations in the lines directly under that header?
So we have two competing theories:
1. The 'general welfare' clause, along with the other all purpose commerce clause, grant unlimited powers to the Federal government making the 9th and 10th Amendments (passed as Amendments btw which can override the original document) null and void.
2. The words 'general welfare' appear in the section heading describing the general flavor of the more specific defined powers granted in the section which taken together define the limits of Congress's powers to 'provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.'
But since you posted as an AC it is doubtful you will man up and even try to answer.
> the TARP thing was needed.
Was it? Everybody said that..... but 'everybody' seemed to be the ones either handing out the money or the politically connected people who were lining up to take the money. And then they didn't even spend most of the money to solve the 'toxic asset' problem that we were assured was going to bring on a depression. No, they nationalized banks, insurance companies and automakers with most of it and show every sign of keeping any money that does get paid back as a giant off the books slush fund.
Not the only one who is starting to smell a giant rat. Seeing the same 'masters of the universe' types moving seamlessly between Wall Street, the Bush administration and now the Obama camp spending Sagans of cash that was called into existence from nothing to bail out old money companies who did stupid things because they were afraid of being called names by Democrats.
> It's not a handout. It's a loan.
It must be great to be young and naive. You probably think the TARP money will be paid back too. It will only be paid back if Tesla makes a crapload of profits instead of losing their ass on the deal. But if it was a sure fire moneymaker they could have raised the money on the private markets. Even in a recession and credit crisis there is venture capital looking for places to park. SO we must assume it is a high risk investment being financed with a very sweetheart low interest government loan. Essentially a gift to Tesla of the spread between the low rate the government loaned at vs the higher rate the open market would have charged for the risk.
Must be great to own a Congressman or Senator. Does it make me a bitter old cynic to just assume the facility in the "SF Bay area" will be in Speaker Pelosi's district?
> If you have such a problem with half a billion dollar loan, I'd hate to see how
> you'd react to the $5.9 billion loan Ford just got from the same program.
I'm pissed off about that too. I'm pissed off at the money we are pissing away on the auto bailouts in general. We spent all that money.... and they went bankrupt anyway. But since they cheated and didn't let them do a proper bankruptcy it's going to be f&%king Groundhog Day in Detroit for the next 3 1/2 years as they keep going bankrupt over and over again and the US taxpayer keeps stuffing money down the UAW rathole and relaunching the zombie automakers.
> I know. Just like those silly Interstate highways
Roads are specifically mentioned in the US Constitution. Pass
> the US Marine Corps
A Navy is specifically mentioned. The Marines are a sub unit of the Navy. Pass
> the US Postal Service that'll deliver
Postal service is permitted. Pass. But note that most packages use private carriers these days, the postal service is mostly for bills and junk mail.
> and those terribly inefficient and socialized Firefighters and that neo-communist socialized Police Department
Those services are not provided by the US government. Federal money for those purposes are unconstitutional. Good luck getting enough literate Supremes to be able to figure that out any time soon.
US Taxpayer money to a private automaker? Fail. Unless you can point me to the clause I missed that specifically grants the US government that power the 10th Amendment forbids it. Again, good luck finding five Supremes who can read.
In other words the taxpayers just had half a billion stolen from them and given to some idiot Californicators to waste on building overpriced cars that will only sell if they are subsidized with yet more taxpayer dollars.
Seriously, if these cars were such a great moneymaking venture I don't think California is lacking in venture capitalists even in a recession. You only go to the government with hat in hand if you know it is a losing idea but can be made politically appealing anyway. These days you just have to say "green!" to crack open the piggy bank.