> And your gun will do what, exactly, against tanks and choppers?
You might want to ask a veteran of the Russian adventure in Afganistan how he feels about it. Yes, small arms vs a modern mechanized army will be a very asmetrical affair but as others have posted ya can't sit in a tank forever. And with a few small arms you have a much better chance of getting yer hands on some more fun toys.
But more important is the mental attitude. Armed men are citizens, disarmed ones are subjects. There is a reason every oppressive government makes removing arms from the civilian population it's first order of business from Stalin all the way back to ancient China.
> There probably aren't many people running an outdated desktop linux disto > who want to try out new alpha web browsers.
Not a good assumption. There are good arguments for a STABLE load on a machine you depend on. For example, I have tried updating that machine to Fedora 9 but I get subtle file corruption when reading files on the RAID array.
But the bigger point is I'm sure I;m not alone in tiring of this attitude that if you aren't running sid or rawhide you can't be a developer. You should only be running those if you are developing packages destined for inclusion in a distro downstream from one of those.
And this Windows Treadmill attitude is widespread. Flash 10 just came out. So of course Flash 9 disappeared from Adobe's yum repo. So now if you are running RHEL3 or RHEL4 you are SOL, everything has to be upgraded all the time. When the hell does any actual work get done during this continual update, debug, repeat cycle?
And debug is the word here. Has anyone actually done a distro upgrade on a heavily used and customized (lots of out of distro source packages carefully ported in, built and installed, stuff just installed via make install, etc), machine that didn't lose a few days productivity? Not to mention learning to cope with the ever higher levels of braindamage in GNOME an upgrade brings.
And of course a RHEL4 desktop won't run it, wrong glibc version. When will people learn, either package it properly for a small set of distros or static link everything like netscape used to do.
> ANYTHING that Windows wants to do to improve sucks and linux has already > done it, done it better, cured cancer, etc.
Actually.... Linux hasn't done it YET but almost certainly will before Microsoft can ship this idea. This all started with the embedded Linux distros to get around the long boot times for Windows (and most current Linux distros, lets be fair) and Microsoft now wants to play "me too!" but Linux is already moving on to solve the actual problem. Fedora demoed an Asus EEEPC booting to a full desktop in five seconds flat recently. To make netbooks and small form factors (PDA, smartphone, etc) viable candidates for Penguin domination the boot time problem is going to get solved.
So again, Microsoft will be pushing a me too clone to yesterday's problem while the penguin army will be moving onto bigger and better things. Who will want a crippled up raggedy assed mini-me Windows when a full Linux desktop can load in the same couple of seconds? Unless Microsoft wants to chase taillights they need to get their full OS booting in a couple of seconds. It should be possible.
> This means that we have the potential to repair neural damage, potentially severe damage as well!
And paraplegics will get to walk again.... no stem cells required. Ok, that is an offtopic troll, but it just needed sayin.
If this story turns out to be the real deal it is going to be major world changing stuff. Imagine the possibilities! Implant a few sensors or better yet refine our ability to pick up on these signals without poking wires into brains and remotely control all sorts of things.
> I guess Steve really is pushing those memory-card HD cameras.
Nope. Steve figures if you can afford a camera with a firewire port you will spring for the MBP. You might piss and moan but in the end you will pull out the credit card. It's all about the money.
I notice that you didn't care to dispute anything I wrote. Neither did anyone else. So let me be even more blunt:
Have you bothered to do even the most elementary research on the teachings of Black Liberation Theology?
Do you agree with Black Liberation Theology?
Do you dispute that BHO sat in a 'church' based on Dr. Cone's BLT for twenty years, considered Wright and Phlager to be mentors and titled his 'autobiography'[1] based on a sermon by Wright that was overtly racist?
Do you believe Mr. Obama first met William Ayers in 1995?
Do you actually believe that Mr. Obama didn't know Ayers was a radical? Until the last few months it appeared to be impossible to get Ayers to stop talking about his past to the media. Is it reasonable to believe that neither Ayers nor anyone else close to Mr. Obama told him about Ayers past life as a fugitive? No press clippings on the office walls? No copy of his wife's FBI Most Wanted poster as a treasured relic?
Do you believe Mr. Ayers, who wrote the grant proposal for the CAC would have permitted an unknown person to gain control over the biggest chunk of cash Ayers was ever likely to get his grubby communist hands on? (Note, Ayers described himself as a 'small c communist'.)
Do you believe Mr. Obama could have such extensive ties to ACORN and not know the sort of old retread ex SDS radicals that ran the place? He was hired by precisely such a person as a train the trainers teacher to teach the Alinsky methods of 'community organizing'[2]. Do you actually believe he didn't know that ACORN basically did three things; street theatre, election fraud and subprime mortgages? Mr. Obama lead Project Vote[3] in IL for a time. Election fraud was his JOB description.
And finally, a question I have neen asking Obama supports all year and never get an answer to:
Most candidates for POTUS have done something noteworthy, something to stand out from the run of the mill political type. Name ONE major accomplishment for Senator Obama that recommends him to high office. Hint: getting elected to the Senate against Alan Keyes doesn't count, I could do that and so could you. HIs whole pitch is he is going to totally change everything. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Show me.
[1] There is serious doubt as to whether there was a ghostwriter involved. Nothing Sen. Obama was written since exhibits the quality and/or writing style of his first writing effort.
[2] Community Organizer in the Alinsky school of thought isn't some nice little old lady working a soup kitchen at a homeless shelter. Communist street agitator is closer to the mark.
[3] Project Vote was a wholly owned part of ACORN. Radicals love to create dozens of front groups to keep the ordinary folk from connecting the dots.
> You seem to be a single issue person yourself, and that issue is "who is the Republican candidate?"
No, you seem to be confused as to the function political parties play in the functioning of our Republic. The parties have fairly well known and consistent positions on most issues. I have voted Republican since 1984 because I agree with their position to a greater extent than I agree with the Democrats. This year being something of an exception due to McCain. Had the Democrats nominated a more moderate candidate I'd have seriously considered him/her over the Oath breaking McCain. McCain/Fiengold means I can never vote FOR McCain but I am forced to vote against Obama.
> Are you still operating under the assumption that the HIV virus cares if you're gay or a junkie?
Only three ways to get infected with HIV and we have had the blood supply fixed for decades. I don't share needles and don't take it in the pooper so the odds of my catching AIDS is close enough to zero for me to not care much about the disease. Should we continue to research it? Yes, but the level of funding vs the levels for diseases we are all much more likely to get is totally out of proportion.
> Incorrect, unwarranted homicide is not beneficial to the general population, and > there are scientific explanations for that.
Nope. You can make very scientific arguments for lots of killin'. A certain fellow I won't name for fear of invoking Godwin's Law comes instantly to mind. But it doesn't stop there. I suspect science could field a really strong case for abortion and/or infanticide to control 'undesirables' on purely evolutionary grounds. Euthanasia for the infirm, elderly and sick? Pure cost/benefit problem, especially once we have Socialized medicine. You see, the problem is your 'unwarranted' qualifier. Once you get beyond a simple "Thou Shalt Not Murder" things get kinda fuzzy.
> Also, science identifies incest as being dangerous to the gene pool...
Oh no, you don't get off that easy. Science tells us that inbreeding is indeed very dangerous but that it can also be VERY useful if used correctly. Consult any book on animal husbandry or even one on breeding plants. Once you discard the universal social stigma against the practice as religious based or just old customs where is the science based moral argument against using it in a carefully run human eugenics program?
Personally I'm an agnostic, but I'm also rational enough to look at the historical record and observe that every society to date that has been run on 'scientific' principles or Athestic philosophical systems have been places I'd rather not live in. Yes Marx was probably on to something with his Opiate of the Masses stuff, but on the other hand we have plenty of examples of religious people forming societies that promote values we both agree are good. Maybe we will eventually develop workable moral codes that don't have a religious basis, but we haven't managed it yet. For now it appears Religion is one monkey we need to carry around a little longer because quitting cold turkey brings a Hell on Earth.
> Trust me, you had no idea who she was before that.
Wrong. The Right side of the Web had been buzzing about Palin as a dark horse pick since McCain locked up the nomination. I was hoping McCain would have the stones to go there, and for once he actually threw the base a bone. We ordered our yard sign the day of the announcement. Apparently I wasn't alone since the backlog took two weeks to clear. Still refuse to donate cash though, to McCain or the RNC. I'll hold my nose and push the bastard's button but Party loyalty has its limits. Gave to locals instead.
> AIDS did break out into the general population in some countries. USA is not the only > country with a "general population".
Dig deeper. There are still only three known ways to spread the HIV virus, shared needles, blood products/transfusions and taking it up the pooper. The higher incidence of AIDS in Africa is explained by their differing customs. Since our blood supply is now well tested that only leaves two methods for us to worry about and 90-95% of the US population has no chance of contracting the disease.
> Please source the information on polar bears.
This isn't Wikipedia, the 'citation needed' BS is beyond old here. Google is yer freaking friend. "polar bear population statistics" and follow the first link. Yes it's probably biased but click out from it. Or try this one since I'm feeling generous:
> Why is it I have to support what I regard as your parties evil positions. But yours are sacred?
Cpngratulations, you have just taken your first small step towards discovering the joys of Federalism. And I agree that we shouldn't be bailing out banks, giving special tax breaks to oil companies (as opposed to a general reduction in corporate taxes, oil companies as corporations included equally), picking winners and losers amongst the drug companies, airlines, etc. The federal government shouldn't be doing 90% of the things it currently does. Most shouldn't be done by government period, while others should go to the state and local governments.
The Irag War is a different matter though, War is rightfully a Federal issue and everybody did have a say in the matter and our elected Reps did their duty, etc. Some things do have to be done, even in the absence of a 100% consensus. But do remember that at the time of the vote the consensus was a hell of a lot higher than abortion or stem cell research have ever seen. And once a nation does declare War there are no takebacksies. And to Hell with Obama's 'end the war' crap, that is bogus. All Wars end but history records them as Win/Loss and losing would be a disaster. We should be very careful in getting into a War but once in we should be hellbent on winning. Disent in the runup to a War is not just patrotic but keeping your reservations private is borderline treason. After the shooting starts though the exact opposite is called for. Spreading doubts about the eventual victory, undermining troop or civilian morale, adopting the enemy's talking points, etc. are all treason. War is more about breaking the enemy's will than about breaking his things and killing his soldiers, every word uttered that gives the enemy hope means they fight longer and kill more of our people. Too bad we don't prosecute for that stuff anymore.
> Yes Palin has excellent people skills and she's attractive. But she's a consistent liar > (Bridge to nowhere, plane on ebay) those are not qualities I'm looking for.
All politicians massage the facts a little, some of it is just a product of having to explain a complex topic in a two minute reply. The bridge business is a bit fuzzy. Yea I suspect she turned against it when it became clear it was fast becoming a symbol of the evils of pork. Having just taken out an incumbent Republican gov she probably wasn't too keen on totally pissing off the Party establishment again by taking on Sen Porker himself. until she realized the politics had changed drasticly. The plane is a different thing entirely. She did indeed 'put it up on eBay.' While it attracted bids it didn't sell and was eventually sold through different channels. But the basic point was still valid, upon assuming the office she was trying to cut the excess crap, the eBay line was an excellent way to express that notion in a short soundbite.
> That's like saying because I hang out with a guy who was thought to be a serial killer, I must be bad...
Not at all. If you hung out with someone you knew to be a serial killer it would say something about you. If you hung out with a guy who had killed in the past and was still an admitted "small c communist" it would say something about both your judgement in friends AND you political outlook. If a terrorist and communist operative scored 150 million and picked you to help make sure as much as possible went to funding anti-american radicals it says he trusts you to be one of his kind of guy. When you actually DO spend so much of the money funding crackpots, crazies, bigots and marxists that you have to issue a final report saying the 150 million had "no measurable impact on education." then what was your question agian?
> but I don't believe in guilt by association.
First off, who you associate with IS a valid question. But with Ayers it is guilt by being a co-conspirator. With Wright (crazy marxist pretening to be a Christian) it is guilt by alliance. WIth Phlager (crazy marxist pretending to be Catholic, part of an unholy trinity with Wright and Farrakan (crazy marxist pretending to be a Muslim)) it is guilt by alliance. With Michelle (angry bitter race hustler) it is guilt by marriage. With ACORN it is guilt by participation. With the Chicago Machine it is a political deal with a crime family. Being a third generation socialist is an association by family. So by family, personal life and political ties he is bound to a failed political philosophy that has ended with prison states and mass graves anytime it has attained sufficient political power.
Except most scientists aren't. Remember your basic RAH, "Most scientists are button sorters and bottle washers." And science today is more politicized than at any point in history. Sorry, the same new deal nostrums delivered by some twit in a lab coat don't do it for me.
Scientists are people too, and subject to all the defects that come with it. Plus the all too common defect of thinking expertise in a narror area is applicable to topics far outside. Mr. Cerf is a good tech guy, but if he is actually voting based purely on net neutrality (which I don't believe for a femtosecond) he is a bigger fool than the single issue pro lifers.
> As Colbert said, they make facts based on decisions.
You mean like politicized scientists do? AIDS is going to break out into the general population any day now, you just wait! Breand name scientists told us that fairly tale back in the 1980s when you could at least argue they were just being cautious but they haven't stopped to this day to flog that story to keep the FUD levels up and keep the funding flowing. The best science available tells us the population of the polar bear has never been higher, but 'scientists' insisted it be classified as threatened for purely political reasons having nothing whatsoever with the polar bear. Riddle me this; if the polar bear is threatened by having record population what ovjective criteria will be used to determine it is no longer threatened? Yea, now the picture comes into focus.
> So we hear people saying that science is just another religion, and they say that like they really believe it.
Science by itself isn't a religion, but too many scientists seem to believe it is. Listen, science can't answer any of the important questions, life the universe and everything, WHY? etc. By definition it can't probe beyond the big bang, as far as science is conserned, beyond here be dragons is as good an answer any. It can't answer a single moral question. So why do scientists think otherwise? Why do they think being 'men of science' makes them qualified to expound of matters their training has left them totally unequipped to deal with? Once you try to extend 'science' to a total worldview that offers answers to "why" you have a religion. Religions don't have to have a "God" you know.
> And we can only speculate on what medical advances we could be benefiting from right now if only stem cell research hadn't been suppressed.
By suppressed you mean no government funding. Kinda says volumes about your world view now doesn't it. Private entities are unfettered in what they can do in this area, and the lack of federal funding for embyronic stem cell research has driven a multitude of new interesting options. You might not have a moral problem with it but millions and millions of taxpayers did. You might believe they are all ignorant hicks but in our Republic they do still get a vote. It would be just as wrong to seize their money and use it for things they consider an abomination than it would be to seize yours to build churches. You inability to see that makes you unfit to hold any public office.
Now since this topic is about our choices, here's mine:
McCain/Palin with a clothspin on my nose. But no money. Bad Republican, no check. Not only do I have the usual Republican objections to McCain for his RINO traits, McCain Feingold is the deal breaker for me. Void the 1st Amendment and I remember it forever. If he needed to atone for his minor role in the Keating Five he could have resigned or hell, go out back and shoot yerself if that is what ya gotta do but damned if I can see how totally violating one's Oath of Office redeems your Honor. So I can never vote FOR McCain.
Even though I have an unbroken record of voting for Republicans going back to Reagan in '84 I would have considered a Democrat vs McCain had they picked a sensible one. But the progression isn't promising now is it. Arkansas Horndog, Green Pope, Traitor and
> Except of course that the securities were in no way goverment backed.
Even though I hate the socialists who did this I have to admire the scam on it's artistic merits.
Had the securities actually been government backed the calls for oversight would have been too loud to keep quiet and the scheme would have failed. But without the implicit promise of a bailout implied by Freddie and Fannie being Government Sponsored Enterprises nobody would have bought their paper without a lot higher risk premium and again, ACORN's scheme would have failed. So everybody could believe what the wanted when they needed to. And in the end it is going to be bailed out by the taxpayers regardless who wins the election. McCain has already promised to tax those of us who bought wisely to bail out the people with NINJA loans and while Obama is saying he won't everybody knows he will since it is at its heart a redistribution of wealth scheme.
> but I'm doubtfull that Fannie Mae is an example of marxism.
But it is. Most people knew nothing about Freddie and Fannie until a few weeks ago. They are old New Deal relics that won't die. They were created to help the 'poor' get a home loan. Right before they blew up they were involved with almost half of home loans. Now either that is a hell of a mission creep or half of America is in poverty. What they were doing is buying up paper from banks and packaging them as 'mortgage backed securities' and reselling them. The magic they were performing was due to their being government enterprises, thus the securities were government backed and nobody bothered to look at the underlying assets since Uncle Sugar was supposed to cover the bet.
I won't repeat all of what others have said better in other places but basically Freddie and Fannie distorted the entire market with their antics. Because they accounted for so much of the market their rules came to dominate even transactions that didn't eventually get sold to them. And increasingly Freddie, Fannie and the Democrats in Congress[1] were pushing the notion to give anybody who wanted one a home loan, after all Freddie and Fannie would buy the loan from ya, sprinkle some taxpayer insurance on it and resell it as a Mortgage Backed Security and everybody wins. Right up until everybody lost when Freddie and Fannie went under and people quickly realized even Uncle Sugar couldn't possibly cover all the bets.
> Even if it is, it's my understanding that it was private banks which gleefully picked up > the home loans, for some reason assuming it was a good investment. Correct me if I'm wrong, > but isn't the lesson here, if anything, that private enterprise and government enterprises > don't always interface well?
Remember the part about the securities being government backed? They were supposed to be as safe an investment as treasury bills so of course everybody was happy to buy them. But I couldn't say it better when you note government enterprises and private enterprise don't work well. They don't and that is what conservatives have been saying since the New Deal. The solution here is obvious but politically impossible; wind down Freddie and Fannie. Yes this will mean people who used to get NINJA loans will remain renters, this is life. If we leave em around this situation will recur in 10-20 years as Democrats decide votors have forgotten this time.
> It seems unjustified to me to say it was the government half of the equation that was the > entire problem, not at all greed and carelessness on the other side.
Granted that individuals should have either known or consulted someone with a clue before signing a balloon mortgage, bankers should have had sense enough to know this scam would eventually burst and raised holy hell... assuming any MSM outlet would give them airtime even if they bought it.... But the root cause was Freddie and Fannie encouraging banks to give loans to anyone regardless of creditworthiness and to then sell them the paper.
> I also don't know much about the previous depression, but I was under the (quite possibly mistaken) > impression it was because of a lack of government controls.
Yes there was some pretty obvious problems in regulation. A Free Market does need regulation to ensure transparency and protect investors against fraud. Even Libertarians are generally in favor of the Government maintaining the Rule of Law. But it was FDR's New Deal experimentation that made the Depression Great. Go look at the historical record. The Depression threw the whole world into a major slump but while everyone else recovered it took a World War to finally snap the US out of it.
> Anyway, for most of us, "marxist" is not an insult
Because you live in academia where the reality of marxism is carefully suppressed. Marx's ideas have lead to prison states and mass graves each and every time they have been allowed to be fully implemented. Zero ex
> You don't trust wiki or the articles it cites but you DO trust a guy who has devoted his life...
Nope, Wikipedia is broken by design. But it probably has enough right in this case to say Luskin proabably has more of a life than just his running feud with Krugman.
> You're right, the current economic crisis clearly proves that bankers, presidents with MBAs, and > other people who have actually done "things" know economics much better than nobel laureates.
Yup. The current crisis is a result of marxism, not a failure of capitalism. The "President with an MBA" warned of the danger Freddie and Fannie posed to our economy repeatedly and loudly. Hell, even the 'ol Arkansas Horndog tried to reign em in. The normally Democrat loving McCainiac signed onto an effort to stop the ACORN inspired madness going on. Freddie and Fannie are government creatures having nothing at all to do with a free market economy. And since this bailout didn't disolve Freddie and Fannie we will be repeating this crisis in a decade.
> Also, "marxist" as an insult? Really? Get with the times, the cold war is over.
No it isn't over. Reagan defeated the Soviet Union but he didn't get a chance to finish the War. The War isn't over until we face up to and defeat the 5th column still working it's way through American Society spreading rot and ruin behind it. ACORN, most of academia, most of the higher echlons of the Democrat Party most certainly including (just listing the ones most responsible for this crisis as examples) but not limited to: Barack Obama, Charlie Rangel[sp], Barney Frank, Chris Dodd. All these people knew they were creating a disaster and didn't care.
> "These are the same forward thinking people who awarded Al Gore a prize for his > important work raising awareness of the dangers of global warming."
He made a documentary. And a bad one full of factual errors at that. For that he gets a Nobel Peace Prize? President Reagan defeated the Soviet Union with but a word, freeing millions from slavery and tyranny without a single shot fired. Al Gore => Ronald Reagan? On Peace? We obviously aren't on the same planet.
>..the guy cited bashing Krugman apperantly is something of an anti-krugman fanatic, > is a college dropout, has won no awards, and is a worthless pundit.
Normally I recommend against trusting Wikipedia but since the origional guy cited it I wonder if he can read since when I read it it tells me Luskin could probably BUY the NYT if he really wanted to and just fire Krugman.... except of course you can't actually buy it because of the family trust and it's preferred stock. Somehow I trust somebody talking about economics who has actually DONE things more than a crazy old marxist ranting tired old BSD drivel in a dying (Netcraft confirms it!) newspaper.
Real economists seem to agree Krugman did worthwhile work long ago, but his mind has long since withered away. No sane person believes the Nobel Committee made the award based on his previous economic work vs his contemporary political ravings. This is the same bunch of useful idiots who gave a Nobel to Al Gore after all.
> You, citing intellectually decaying National Review (just hounded out a Buckley, didn't it,
Because on the Right we don't go much for pedigree. Bill Buckley was an intellectual giant but it is painfully obvious he failed to impart the importance of intellectual rigor to his son. Go read his endorsement of Obama if you don't believe me, there ain't a shred of rational argument in it. All emotion and feelings, i.e. left. We think, you guys feel. It's why NR is such a hotbed of reasoned but passionate debate over ideas and the huffington post is a bunch of vacuous twits pretending to be intellectuals. Which is why Christopher Buckley had to go be with his own kind. Perhaps age will bring him wisdom.
> or Krugman for liking science fiction.
No. I was criticizing his choice of science fiction. See the difference? Scoialists see the Foundation series very differently than people like me. I found them disturbing, socialists tend to see a positive vision of the future in them.
> The foundation series, and the robot series as well, both have this nasty premise > that people should be manipulated by the characters that Asimov considers superior.
Asimov was a socialist. Of course this was from a time when all right thinking people believed socialism was the future, but he never appears to have totally freed his mind from many of the basic assumptions that underlie the system of ideas we lump under the word. In his case the notions behind 'scientific socialism' seems to have been deeply engrained into him. The idea that scientists and assorted elite intellectuals were the rightful ruling class; that under their enlightened rule the lot of the masses would be improved was pervasive during his formative years and carried over into much of his work. It doesn't take much imagination to see how the idea of the new soviet man morphed into the all knowing benevolent rule of the robots in his later works. It became obvious to all thinking creatures that no human could know enough, be just enough, etc. to actually be entrusted with the sort of absolute power fascism/socialism/communism implied, thus his later works substituited robots.
Notice how his later books reveal the robots to have absolutely taken over all important aspects of human society, but that we are told that this isn't a totalitarian distopia, nay the future projected in the book is virtually a utopia. We are carefully lead to believe we are still in control because we have a need to believe we are free people who are in control of our destiny, but that it is a carefully maintained fiction,
More importantly, a careful reader can see that the whole system is already blowing itself to hell. The robots have already discarded the laws of robotics, substituiting for them a notion that they should generally follow the laws in terms of protecting humans as a group if not as individuals, but hey! ya gotta break a few eggs to mame an omelette. They allow humans to die, both by acts of omission and commission in the name of their new greater mission to serve humanity by ruling them. Where have we heard that crap before?
And doesn't it make perfect sense that this assclown puts such stock in Asimov's Foundation books? A fictional story that makes zero sense unless one postulates a totally hypothetical science that allows sociologists to acually make valid predictions about human behaviour. That was what the books were about, an exploration of the consequences that would follow from such a discovery, i.e. it was typical of most hard SciFi then and now in that it postulates some new thing and explores the consequences.
Too bad a large portion of the left believes that it possesses the ability to do the sort of micro control today that would in reality only be possible after Hari Seldon created the tools.
> Well, some of us live in a Country that just celebrated "Columbus Day" when Christopher Columbus "discovered" America.
Well allow me to help fill in the gaps your education apparently left. You see, once upon a time we were all part of something called Western Civilization.
History, as it was taught and once generally thought of in the lands of the West, was the story of a great Civilization coming up from the muck to finally stand upon the threshold of space. It is a great story, full of mighty deeds, terrible mistakes, great men and the most horrible villians. It is the story of the rise of science and reason and of the religious and philosophical ideas that made science and learning seem worthy things. It is the story of the rise of capitalism and the madness of the failed experiment of fascism and communism since both spring from the Western tradition. It is the story of the birth of ideas such as individual liberty whose logical consequences lead to the West ending slavery, the rule of law instead of the whim of kings which has allowed us to govern ourselves in peace and prosperity.
Now we face our greatest challenge. Will we throw off the rot within which seeks to destroy our civilization; and thus regaining the confidence of old prove worthy to take our place in space or will our civilization fade away in a fog of post modern doubt. We get to live in most interesting times. We get to see one of the greatest struggles of all time play out. Real history is more exciting than even JRR Tolkien's fiction if ya know how to approach it.
From the perspective of Western Civ, Columbus indeed 'discovered' America in that he introduced the 'New World' into the story. That there were primitives already here didn't really matter in the bigger story. And they didn't, they are little more than local color in any serious history. Their culture was so far below the Europeans they simply ddin't stand a chance. Not passing judgement here, not saying whether it was 'right' or 'wrong', just that it is what happened. Now by modern (and especially post modern...) notions of morality what happened was wrong. But remember that ideas of right and wrong have been evolving almost as fast as science and tech and it is just as important to view the past through the lens of the morals of the day as it is to take into account their lack of modern tech.
> As others have indicated, first find a project that interests you - don't work on something simply to get it > on your resume, but work on it because you find it useful and interesting.
Actuall'y I disagree. I am recommending doing this precisely to put it on a resume so go at it purely selfishly and pick for maximum benefit. In the real world of corporate software development you don't get to pick your project, you generally don't get exciting things that will change the world. So pick projects to demonstrate the things you want to show an employer. Do it as self directed education, not a hobby. If you want to specialize (generally a bad idea though) pick projects in the area you want a job in, but if you want to show how well you can tackle anything and adapt to change pick a widely spread set.
So go put a new device driver into OpenBSD (and thus demonstrate you can also deal with difficult personalities) go find the wish list for some web framework and add one of them, contribute a major set of features to an up and coming open source game, etc. Don't be limited to one language, version control, etc.
Remember this thread is supposed to be advice for someone with a CS degree. If the paper is actually worth a damned the person knows lots of theory but hasn't yet done a lot in the real world, which is why the problems getting hired. In this economy nobody wants to pay to finish somebody's education so you need to show you are ready to hit the ground running. Not say, show.
Unless you had a very good program in school, odds are you haven't actually written many real world programs. The stuff in school usually isn't finished programs, just enough to demonstrate the concepts being discussed.
So join an open source project and do some real world programming. Learn how to finish the job, catch those return codes, use a version control system, track down bugs in non-trivial programs, work on getting the documentation to actually match the program, etc. Learn how to work in a real team. Be a big enough contributer that you can rightfully claim to be a major contributer so when a prospective employer follows up by looking at the credits, commit logs and mailing list traffic you aren't seen as inflating the record.
> There is, of course, mention of "investment opportunities".
Yup, these investor scams show up like clockwork on slashdot these days. One week it is a solar energy scheme that doesn't pass the smell test, some weeks it gets all the way to perpetual motion scams making the front page but lately there does seem to be a need for a green angle being pitched to make slash.
This one is almost certainly a scam. No mention of an energy source is the giveaway. You can't use a catalyst to add energy to a reaction even if you toss the bio- prefix into the ad copy. The diagram on the page does at least have something that looks like tanks but you aren't likely to collect enough solar energy to offset much of a power plant that way. Just feed the CO2 to real biology,,,, like plants, alage, etc. if you want to convert sunlight + CO2 into complex hydrocarbons.
The light part would remain, to tell YOU the guy in front is braking. But now imagine that every light on every vehicle were also beaconing a unique identifier along with current speed and acceleration. You car would notice a car in front of you (because it has been seeing it with the front mounted sensor for a bit, thus it has to be in front and it could likely even know it is in the same lane) just started drasticly slowing down and you haven't hit your brakes. So it does something, hopefully themeable. Imagine the possibilities. Or fear them as the case may be.
> I bought a Sansa E280 the other day...Once I put Rockbox (!) on it, I can play flac, ogg, avi.
You lose because you didn't read the rockbox webpage. No current production mp3 player can load rockbox. Unless that player has sat on a shelf a LONG time (hint: only one top of the line at the time Sansa came with 8GB Flash) it is based on a totally different chipset and isn't supported.
Slashdot Mirror
> And your gun will do what, exactly, against tanks and choppers?
You might want to ask a veteran of the Russian adventure in Afganistan how he feels about it. Yes, small arms vs a modern mechanized army will be a very asmetrical affair but as others have posted ya can't sit in a tank forever. And with a few small arms you have a much better chance of getting yer hands on some more fun toys.
But more important is the mental attitude. Armed men are citizens, disarmed ones are subjects. There is a reason every oppressive government makes removing arms from the civilian population it's first order of business from Stalin all the way back to ancient China.
> There probably aren't many people running an outdated desktop linux disto
> who want to try out new alpha web browsers.
Not a good assumption. There are good arguments for a STABLE load on a machine you depend on. For example, I have tried updating that machine to Fedora 9 but I get subtle file corruption when reading files on the RAID array.
But the bigger point is I'm sure I;m not alone in tiring of this attitude that if you aren't running sid or rawhide you can't be a developer. You should only be running those if you are developing packages destined for inclusion in a distro downstream from one of those.
And this Windows Treadmill attitude is widespread. Flash 10 just came out. So of course Flash 9 disappeared from Adobe's yum repo. So now if you are running RHEL3 or RHEL4 you are SOL, everything has to be upgraded all the time. When the hell does any actual work get done during this continual update, debug, repeat cycle?
And debug is the word here. Has anyone actually done a distro upgrade on a heavily used and customized (lots of out of distro source packages carefully ported in, built and installed, stuff just installed via make install, etc), machine that didn't lose a few days productivity? Not to mention learning to cope with the ever higher levels of braindamage in GNOME an upgrade brings.
And of course a RHEL4 desktop won't run it, wrong glibc version. When will people learn, either package it properly for a small set of distros or static link everything like netscape used to do.
> ANYTHING that Windows wants to do to improve sucks and linux has already
> done it, done it better, cured cancer, etc.
Actually.... Linux hasn't done it YET but almost certainly will before Microsoft can ship this idea. This all started with the embedded Linux distros to get around the long boot times for Windows (and most current Linux distros, lets be fair) and Microsoft now wants to play "me too!" but Linux is already moving on to solve the actual problem. Fedora demoed an Asus EEEPC booting to a full desktop in five seconds flat recently. To make netbooks and small form factors (PDA, smartphone, etc) viable candidates for Penguin domination the boot time problem is going to get solved.
So again, Microsoft will be pushing a me too clone to yesterday's problem while the penguin army will be moving onto bigger and better things. Who will want a crippled up raggedy assed mini-me Windows when a full Linux desktop can load in the same couple of seconds? Unless Microsoft wants to chase taillights they need to get their full OS booting in a couple of seconds. It should be possible.
> This means that we have the potential to repair neural damage, potentially severe damage as well!
And paraplegics will get to walk again.... no stem cells required. Ok, that is an offtopic troll, but it just needed sayin.
If this story turns out to be the real deal it is going to be major world changing stuff. Imagine the possibilities! Implant a few sensors or better yet refine our ability to pick up on these signals without poking wires into brains and remotely control all sorts of things.
> I guess Steve really is pushing those memory-card HD cameras.
Nope. Steve figures if you can afford a camera with a firewire port you will spring for the MBP. You might piss and moan but in the end you will pull out the credit card. It's all about the money.
> You are pathetic.
I notice that you didn't care to dispute anything I wrote. Neither did anyone else. So let me be even more blunt:
Have you bothered to do even the most elementary research on the teachings of Black Liberation Theology?
Do you agree with Black Liberation Theology?
Do you dispute that BHO sat in a 'church' based on Dr. Cone's BLT for twenty years, considered Wright and Phlager to be mentors and titled his 'autobiography'[1] based on a sermon by Wright that was overtly racist?
Do you believe Mr. Obama first met William Ayers in 1995?
Do you actually believe that Mr. Obama didn't know Ayers was a radical? Until the last few months it appeared to be impossible to get Ayers to stop talking about his past to the media. Is it reasonable to believe that neither Ayers nor anyone else close to Mr. Obama told him about Ayers past life as a fugitive? No press clippings on the office walls? No copy of his wife's FBI Most Wanted poster as a treasured relic?
Do you believe Mr. Ayers, who wrote the grant proposal for the CAC would have permitted an unknown person to gain control over the biggest chunk of cash Ayers was ever likely to get his grubby communist hands on? (Note, Ayers described himself as a 'small c communist'.)
Do you believe Mr. Obama could have such extensive ties to ACORN and not know the sort of old retread ex SDS radicals that ran the place? He was hired by precisely such a person as a train the trainers teacher to teach the Alinsky methods of 'community organizing'[2]. Do you actually believe he didn't know that ACORN basically did three things; street theatre, election fraud and subprime mortgages? Mr. Obama lead Project Vote[3] in IL for a time. Election fraud was his JOB description.
And finally, a question I have neen asking Obama supports all year and never get an answer to:
Most candidates for POTUS have done something noteworthy, something to stand out from the run of the mill political type. Name ONE major accomplishment for Senator Obama that recommends him to high office. Hint: getting elected to the Senate against Alan Keyes doesn't count, I could do that and so could you. HIs whole pitch is he is going to totally change everything. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Show me.
[1] There is serious doubt as to whether there was a ghostwriter involved. Nothing Sen. Obama was written since exhibits the quality and/or writing style of his first writing effort.
[2] Community Organizer in the Alinsky school of thought isn't some nice little old lady working a soup kitchen at a homeless shelter. Communist street agitator is closer to the mark.
[3] Project Vote was a wholly owned part of ACORN. Radicals love to create dozens of front groups to keep the ordinary folk from connecting the dots.
> You seem to be a single issue person yourself, and that issue is "who is the Republican candidate?"
No, you seem to be confused as to the function political parties play in the functioning of our Republic. The parties have fairly well known and consistent positions on most issues. I have voted Republican since 1984 because I agree with their position to a greater extent than I agree with the Democrats. This year being something of an exception due to McCain. Had the Democrats nominated a more moderate candidate I'd have seriously considered him/her over the Oath breaking McCain. McCain/Fiengold means I can never vote FOR McCain but I am forced to vote against Obama.
> Are you still operating under the assumption that the HIV virus cares if you're gay or a junkie?
Only three ways to get infected with HIV and we have had the blood supply fixed for decades. I don't share needles and don't take it in the pooper so the odds of my catching AIDS is close enough to zero for me to not care much about the disease. Should we continue to research it? Yes, but the level of funding vs the levels for diseases we are all much more likely to get is totally out of proportion.
> Incorrect, unwarranted homicide is not beneficial to the general population, and
> there are scientific explanations for that.
Nope. You can make very scientific arguments for lots of killin'. A certain fellow I won't name for fear of invoking Godwin's Law comes instantly to mind. But it doesn't stop there. I suspect science could field a really strong case for abortion and/or infanticide to control 'undesirables' on purely evolutionary grounds. Euthanasia for the infirm, elderly and sick? Pure cost/benefit problem, especially once we have Socialized medicine. You see, the problem is your 'unwarranted' qualifier. Once you get beyond a simple "Thou Shalt Not Murder" things get kinda fuzzy.
> Also, science identifies incest as being dangerous to the gene pool...
Oh no, you don't get off that easy. Science tells us that inbreeding is indeed very dangerous but that it can also be VERY useful if used correctly. Consult any book on animal husbandry or even one on breeding plants. Once you discard the universal social stigma against the practice as religious based or just old customs where is the science based moral argument against using it in a carefully run human eugenics program?
Personally I'm an agnostic, but I'm also rational enough to look at the historical record and observe that every society to date that has been run on 'scientific' principles or Athestic philosophical systems have been places I'd rather not live in. Yes Marx was probably on to something with his Opiate of the Masses stuff, but on the other hand we have plenty of examples of religious people forming societies that promote values we both agree are good. Maybe we will eventually develop workable moral codes that don't have a religious basis, but we haven't managed it yet. For now it appears Religion is one monkey we need to carry around a little longer because quitting cold turkey brings a Hell on Earth.
> Trust me, you had no idea who she was before that.
Wrong. The Right side of the Web had been buzzing about Palin as a dark horse pick since McCain locked up the nomination. I was hoping McCain would have the stones to go there, and for once he actually threw the base a bone. We ordered our yard sign the day of the announcement. Apparently I wasn't alone since the backlog took two weeks to clear. Still refuse to donate cash though, to McCain or the RNC. I'll hold my nose and push the bastard's button but Party loyalty has its limits. Gave to locals instead.
> AIDS did break out into the general population in some countries. USA is not the only
> country with a "general population".
Dig deeper. There are still only three known ways to spread the HIV virus, shared needles, blood products/transfusions and taking it up the pooper. The higher incidence of AIDS in Africa is explained by their differing customs. Since our blood supply is now well tested that only leaves two methods for us to worry about and 90-95% of the US population has no chance of contracting the disease.
> Please source the information on polar bears.
This isn't Wikipedia, the 'citation needed' BS is beyond old here. Google is yer freaking friend. "polar bear population statistics" and follow the first link. Yes it's probably biased but click out from it. Or try this one since I'm feeling generous:
Science Daily: Federal Polar Bear Research Critically Flawed, Forecasting Expert Asserts
> Why is it I have to support what I regard as your parties evil positions. But yours are sacred?
Cpngratulations, you have just taken your first small step towards discovering the joys of Federalism. And I agree that we shouldn't be bailing out banks, giving special tax breaks to oil companies (as opposed to a general reduction in corporate taxes, oil companies as corporations included equally), picking winners and losers amongst the drug companies, airlines, etc. The federal government shouldn't be doing 90% of the things it currently does. Most shouldn't be done by government period, while others should go to the state and local governments.
The Irag War is a different matter though, War is rightfully a Federal issue and everybody did have a say in the matter and our elected Reps did their duty, etc. Some things do have to be done, even in the absence of a 100% consensus. But do remember that at the time of the vote the consensus was a hell of a lot higher than abortion or stem cell research have ever seen. And once a nation does declare War there are no takebacksies. And to Hell with Obama's 'end the war' crap, that is bogus. All Wars end but history records them as Win/Loss and losing would be a disaster. We should be very careful in getting into a War but once in we should be hellbent on winning. Disent in the runup to a War is not just patrotic but keeping your reservations private is borderline treason. After the shooting starts though the exact opposite is called for. Spreading doubts about the eventual victory, undermining troop or civilian morale, adopting the enemy's talking points, etc. are all treason. War is more about breaking the enemy's will than about breaking his things and killing his soldiers, every word uttered that gives the enemy hope means they fight longer and kill more of our people. Too bad we don't prosecute for that stuff anymore.
> Yes Palin has excellent people skills and she's attractive. But she's a consistent liar
> (Bridge to nowhere, plane on ebay) those are not qualities I'm looking for.
All politicians massage the facts a little, some of it is just a product of having to explain a complex topic in a two minute reply. The bridge business is a bit fuzzy. Yea I suspect she turned against it when it became clear it was fast becoming a symbol of the evils of pork. Having just taken out an incumbent Republican gov she probably wasn't too keen on totally pissing off the Party establishment again by taking on Sen Porker himself. until she realized the politics had changed drasticly. The plane is a different thing entirely. She did indeed 'put it up on eBay.' While it attracted bids it didn't sell and was eventually sold through different channels. But the basic point was still valid, upon assuming the office she was trying to cut the excess crap, the eBay line was an excellent way to express that notion in a short soundbite.
> Archaeology [Science?] is the search for fact... not truth.
Oh damn! How did I miss that one. Thank you for catching that obvious one.
> That's like saying because I hang out with a guy who was thought to be a serial killer, I must be bad...
Not at all. If you hung out with someone you knew to be a serial killer it would say something about you. If you hung out with a guy who had killed in the past and was still an admitted "small c communist" it would say something about both your judgement in friends AND you political outlook. If a terrorist and communist operative scored 150 million and picked you to help make sure as much as possible went to funding anti-american radicals it says he trusts you to be one of his kind of guy. When you actually DO spend so much of the money funding crackpots, crazies, bigots and marxists that you have to issue a final report saying the 150 million had "no measurable impact on education." then what was your question agian?
> but I don't believe in guilt by association.
First off, who you associate with IS a valid question. But with Ayers it is guilt by being a co-conspirator. With Wright (crazy marxist pretening to be a Christian) it is guilt by alliance. WIth Phlager (crazy marxist pretending to be Catholic, part of an unholy trinity with Wright and Farrakan (crazy marxist pretending to be a Muslim)) it is guilt by alliance. With Michelle (angry bitter race hustler) it is guilt by marriage. With ACORN it is guilt by participation. With the Chicago Machine it is a political deal with a crime family. Being a third generation socialist is an association by family. So by family, personal life and political ties he is bound to a failed political philosophy that has ended with prison states and mass graves anytime it has attained sufficient political power.
> Science is all about the truth.
Except most scientists aren't. Remember your basic RAH, "Most scientists are button sorters and bottle washers." And science today is more politicized than at any point in history. Sorry, the same new deal nostrums delivered by some twit in a lab coat don't do it for me.
Scientists are people too, and subject to all the defects that come with it. Plus the all too common defect of thinking expertise in a narror area is applicable to topics far outside. Mr. Cerf is a good tech guy, but if he is actually voting based purely on net neutrality (which I don't believe for a femtosecond) he is a bigger fool than the single issue pro lifers.
> As Colbert said, they make facts based on decisions.
You mean like politicized scientists do? AIDS is going to break out into the general population any day now, you just wait! Breand name scientists told us that fairly tale back in the 1980s when you could at least argue they were just being cautious but they haven't stopped to this day to flog that story to keep the FUD levels up and keep the funding flowing. The best science available tells us the population of the polar bear has never been higher, but 'scientists' insisted it be classified as threatened for purely political reasons having nothing whatsoever with the polar bear. Riddle me this; if the polar bear is threatened by having record population what ovjective criteria will be used to determine it is no longer threatened? Yea, now the picture comes into focus.
> So we hear people saying that science is just another religion, and they say that like they really believe it.
Science by itself isn't a religion, but too many scientists seem to believe it is. Listen, science can't answer any of the important questions, life the universe and everything, WHY? etc. By definition it can't probe beyond the big bang, as far as science is conserned, beyond here be dragons is as good an answer any. It can't answer a single moral question. So why do scientists think otherwise? Why do they think being 'men of science' makes them qualified to expound of matters their training has left them totally unequipped to deal with? Once you try to extend 'science' to a total worldview that offers answers to "why" you have a religion. Religions don't have to have a "God" you know.
> And we can only speculate on what medical advances we could be benefiting from right now if only stem cell research hadn't been suppressed.
By suppressed you mean no government funding. Kinda says volumes about your world view now doesn't it. Private entities are unfettered in what they can do in this area, and the lack of federal funding for embyronic stem cell research has driven a multitude of new interesting options. You might not have a moral problem with it but millions and millions of taxpayers did. You might believe they are all ignorant hicks but in our Republic they do still get a vote. It would be just as wrong to seize their money and use it for things they consider an abomination than it would be to seize yours to build churches. You inability to see that makes you unfit to hold any public office.
Now since this topic is about our choices, here's mine:
McCain/Palin with a clothspin on my nose. But no money. Bad Republican, no check. Not only do I have the usual Republican objections to McCain for his RINO traits, McCain Feingold is the deal breaker for me. Void the 1st Amendment and I remember it forever. If he needed to atone for his minor role in the Keating Five he could have resigned or hell, go out back and shoot yerself if that is what ya gotta do but damned if I can see how totally violating one's Oath of Office redeems your Honor. So I can never vote FOR McCain.
Even though I have an unbroken record of voting for Republicans going back to Reagan in '84 I would have considered a Democrat vs McCain had they picked a sensible one. But the progression isn't promising now is it. Arkansas Horndog, Green Pope, Traitor and
> Except of course that the securities were in no way goverment backed.
Even though I hate the socialists who did this I have to admire the scam on it's artistic merits.
Had the securities actually been government backed the calls for oversight would have been too loud to keep quiet and the scheme would have failed. But without the implicit promise of a bailout implied by Freddie and Fannie being Government Sponsored Enterprises nobody would have bought their paper without a lot higher risk premium and again, ACORN's scheme would have failed. So everybody could believe what the wanted when they needed to. And in the end it is going to be bailed out by the taxpayers regardless who wins the election. McCain has already promised to tax those of us who bought wisely to bail out the people with NINJA loans and while Obama is saying he won't everybody knows he will since it is at its heart a redistribution of wealth scheme.
> but I'm doubtfull that Fannie Mae is an example of marxism.
But it is. Most people knew nothing about Freddie and Fannie until a few weeks ago. They are old New Deal relics that won't die. They were created to help the 'poor' get a home loan. Right before they blew up they were involved with almost half of home loans. Now either that is a hell of a mission creep or half of America is in poverty. What they were doing is buying up paper from banks and packaging them as 'mortgage backed securities' and reselling them. The magic they were performing was due to their being government enterprises, thus the securities were government backed and nobody bothered to look at the underlying assets since Uncle Sugar was supposed to cover the bet.
I won't repeat all of what others have said better in other places but basically Freddie and Fannie distorted the entire market with their antics. Because they accounted for so much of the market their rules came to dominate even transactions that didn't eventually get sold to them. And increasingly Freddie, Fannie and the Democrats in Congress[1] were pushing the notion to give anybody who wanted one a home loan, after all Freddie and Fannie would buy the loan from ya, sprinkle some taxpayer insurance on it and resell it as a Mortgage Backed Security and everybody wins. Right up until everybody lost when Freddie and Fannie went under and people quickly realized even Uncle Sugar couldn't possibly cover all the bets.
> Even if it is, it's my understanding that it was private banks which gleefully picked up
> the home loans, for some reason assuming it was a good investment. Correct me if I'm wrong,
> but isn't the lesson here, if anything, that private enterprise and government enterprises
> don't always interface well?
Remember the part about the securities being government backed? They were supposed to be as safe an investment as treasury bills so of course everybody was happy to buy them. But I couldn't say it better when you note government enterprises and private enterprise don't work well. They don't and that is what conservatives have been saying since the New Deal. The solution here is obvious but politically impossible; wind down Freddie and Fannie. Yes this will mean people who used to get NINJA loans will remain renters, this is life. If we leave em around this situation will recur in 10-20 years as Democrats decide votors have forgotten this time.
> It seems unjustified to me to say it was the government half of the equation that was the
> entire problem, not at all greed and carelessness on the other side.
Granted that individuals should have either known or consulted someone with a clue before signing a balloon mortgage, bankers should have had sense enough to know this scam would eventually burst and raised holy hell... assuming any MSM outlet would give them airtime even if they bought it.... But the root cause was Freddie and Fannie encouraging banks to give loans to anyone regardless of creditworthiness and to then sell them the paper.
> I also don't know much about the previous depression, but I was under the (quite possibly mistaken)
> impression it was because of a lack of government controls.
Yes there was some pretty obvious problems in regulation. A Free Market does need regulation to ensure transparency and protect investors against fraud. Even Libertarians are generally in favor of the Government maintaining the Rule of Law. But it was FDR's New Deal experimentation that made the Depression Great. Go look at the historical record. The Depression threw the whole world into a major slump but while everyone else recovered it took a World War to finally snap the US out of it.
> Anyway, for most of us, "marxist" is not an insult
Because you live in academia where the reality of marxism is carefully suppressed. Marx's ideas have lead to prison states and mass graves each and every time they have been allowed to be fully implemented. Zero ex
> You don't trust wiki or the articles it cites but you DO trust a guy who has devoted his life...
Nope, Wikipedia is broken by design. But it probably has enough right in this case to say Luskin proabably has more of a life than just his running feud with Krugman.
> You're right, the current economic crisis clearly proves that bankers, presidents with MBAs, and
> other people who have actually done "things" know economics much better than nobel laureates.
Yup. The current crisis is a result of marxism, not a failure of capitalism. The "President with an MBA" warned of the danger Freddie and Fannie posed to our economy repeatedly and loudly. Hell, even the 'ol Arkansas Horndog tried to reign em in. The normally Democrat loving McCainiac signed onto an effort to stop the ACORN inspired madness going on. Freddie and Fannie are government creatures having nothing at all to do with a free market economy. And since this bailout didn't disolve Freddie and Fannie we will be repeating this crisis in a decade.
> Also, "marxist" as an insult? Really? Get with the times, the cold war is over.
No it isn't over. Reagan defeated the Soviet Union but he didn't get a chance to finish the War. The War isn't over until we face up to and defeat the 5th column still working it's way through American Society spreading rot and ruin behind it. ACORN, most of academia, most of the higher echlons of the Democrat Party most certainly including (just listing the ones most responsible for this crisis as examples) but not limited to: Barack Obama, Charlie Rangel[sp], Barney Frank, Chris Dodd. All these people knew they were creating a disaster and didn't care.
Try this if you really want to be scared:
Barack Obama and the Strategy of Manufactured Crisis
> "These are the same forward thinking people who awarded Al Gore a prize for his
> important work raising awareness of the dangers of global warming."
He made a documentary. And a bad one full of factual errors at that. For that he gets a Nobel Peace Prize? President Reagan defeated the Soviet Union with but a word, freeing millions from slavery and tyranny without a single shot fired. Al Gore => Ronald Reagan? On Peace? We obviously aren't on the same planet.
> ..the guy cited bashing Krugman apperantly is something of an anti-krugman fanatic,
> is a college dropout, has won no awards, and is a worthless pundit.
Normally I recommend against trusting Wikipedia but since the origional guy cited it I wonder if he can read since when I read it it tells me Luskin could probably BUY the NYT if he really wanted to and just fire Krugman.... except of course you can't actually buy it because of the family trust and it's preferred stock. Somehow I trust somebody talking about economics who has actually DONE things more than a crazy old marxist ranting tired old BSD drivel in a dying (Netcraft confirms it!) newspaper.
Real economists seem to agree Krugman did worthwhile work long ago, but his mind has long since withered away. No sane person believes the Nobel Committee made the award based on his previous economic work vs his contemporary political ravings. This is the same bunch of useful idiots who gave a Nobel to Al Gore after all.
> You, citing intellectually decaying National Review (just hounded out a Buckley, didn't it,
Because on the Right we don't go much for pedigree. Bill Buckley was an intellectual giant but it is painfully obvious he failed to impart the importance of intellectual rigor to his son. Go read his endorsement of Obama if you don't believe me, there ain't a shred of rational argument in it. All emotion and feelings, i.e. left. We think, you guys feel. It's why NR is such a hotbed of reasoned but passionate debate over ideas and the huffington post is a bunch of vacuous twits pretending to be intellectuals. Which is why Christopher Buckley had to go be with his own kind. Perhaps age will bring him wisdom.
> or Krugman for liking science fiction.
No. I was criticizing his choice of science fiction. See the difference? Scoialists see the Foundation series very differently than people like me. I found them disturbing, socialists tend to see a positive vision of the future in them.
> The foundation series, and the robot series as well, both have this nasty premise
> that people should be manipulated by the characters that Asimov considers superior.
Asimov was a socialist. Of course this was from a time when all right thinking people believed socialism was the future, but he never appears to have totally freed his mind from many of the basic assumptions that underlie the system of ideas we lump under the word. In his case the notions behind 'scientific socialism' seems to have been deeply engrained into him. The idea that scientists and assorted elite intellectuals were the rightful ruling class; that under their enlightened rule the lot of the masses would be improved was pervasive during his formative years and carried over into much of his work. It doesn't take much imagination to see how the idea of the new soviet man morphed into the all knowing benevolent rule of the robots in his later works. It became obvious to all thinking creatures that no human could know enough, be just enough, etc. to actually be entrusted with the sort of absolute power fascism/socialism/communism implied, thus his later works substituited robots.
Notice how his later books reveal the robots to have absolutely taken over all important aspects of human society, but that we are told that this isn't a totalitarian distopia, nay the future projected in the book is virtually a utopia. We are carefully lead to believe we are still in control because we have a need to believe we are free people who are in control of our destiny, but that it is a carefully maintained fiction,
More importantly, a careful reader can see that the whole system is already blowing itself to hell. The robots have already discarded the laws of robotics, substituiting for them a notion that they should generally follow the laws in terms of protecting humans as a group if not as individuals, but hey! ya gotta break a few eggs to mame an omelette. They allow humans to die, both by acts of omission and commission in the name of their new greater mission to serve humanity by ruling them. Where have we heard that crap before?
Of course others differ in their opinion of Krugman....
Krugman's Posthumous Nobel
And doesn't it make perfect sense that this assclown puts such stock in Asimov's Foundation books? A fictional story that makes zero sense unless one postulates a totally hypothetical science that allows sociologists to acually make valid predictions about human behaviour. That was what the books were about, an exploration of the consequences that would follow from such a discovery, i.e. it was typical of most hard SciFi then and now in that it postulates some new thing and explores the consequences.
Too bad a large portion of the left believes that it possesses the ability to do the sort of micro control today that would in reality only be possible after Hari Seldon created the tools.
> Well, some of us live in a Country that just celebrated "Columbus Day" when Christopher Columbus "discovered" America.
Well allow me to help fill in the gaps your education apparently left. You see, once upon a time we were all part of something called Western Civilization.
History, as it was taught and once generally thought of in the lands of the West, was the story of a great Civilization coming up from the muck to finally stand upon the threshold of space. It is a great story, full of mighty deeds, terrible mistakes, great men and the most horrible villians. It is the story of the rise of science and reason and of the religious and philosophical ideas that made science and learning seem worthy things. It is the story of the rise of capitalism and the madness of the failed experiment of fascism and communism since both spring from the Western tradition. It is the story of the birth of ideas such as individual liberty whose logical consequences lead to the West ending slavery, the rule of law instead of the whim of kings which has allowed us to govern ourselves in peace and prosperity.
Now we face our greatest challenge. Will we throw off the rot within which seeks to destroy our civilization; and thus regaining the confidence of old prove worthy to take our place in space or will our civilization fade away in a fog of post modern doubt. We get to live in most interesting times. We get to see one of the greatest struggles of all time play out. Real history is more exciting than even JRR Tolkien's fiction if ya know how to approach it.
From the perspective of Western Civ, Columbus indeed 'discovered' America in that he introduced the 'New World' into the story. That there were primitives already here didn't really matter in the bigger story. And they didn't, they are little more than local color in any serious history. Their culture was so far below the Europeans they simply ddin't stand a chance. Not passing judgement here, not saying whether it was 'right' or 'wrong', just that it is what happened. Now by modern (and especially post modern...) notions of morality what happened was wrong. But remember that ideas of right and wrong have been evolving almost as fast as science and tech and it is just as important to view the past through the lens of the morals of the day as it is to take into account their lack of modern tech.
> As others have indicated, first find a project that interests you - don't work on something simply to get it
> on your resume, but work on it because you find it useful and interesting.
Actuall'y I disagree. I am recommending doing this precisely to put it on a resume so go at it purely selfishly and pick for maximum benefit. In the real world of corporate software development you don't get to pick your project, you generally don't get exciting things that will change the world. So pick projects to demonstrate the things you want to show an employer. Do it as self directed education, not a hobby. If you want to specialize (generally a bad idea though) pick projects in the area you want a job in, but if you want to show how well you can tackle anything and adapt to change pick a widely spread set.
So go put a new device driver into OpenBSD (and thus demonstrate you can also deal with difficult personalities) go find the wish list for some web framework and add one of them, contribute a major set of features to an up and coming open source game, etc. Don't be limited to one language, version control, etc.
Remember this thread is supposed to be advice for someone with a CS degree. If the paper is actually worth a damned the person knows lots of theory but hasn't yet done a lot in the real world, which is why the problems getting hired. In this economy nobody wants to pay to finish somebody's education so you need to show you are ready to hit the ground running. Not say, show.
Unless you had a very good program in school, odds are you haven't actually written many real world programs. The stuff in school usually isn't finished programs, just enough to demonstrate the concepts being discussed.
So join an open source project and do some real world programming. Learn how to finish the job, catch those return codes, use a version control system, track down bugs in non-trivial programs, work on getting the documentation to actually match the program, etc. Learn how to work in a real team. Be a big enough contributer that you can rightfully claim to be a major contributer so when a prospective employer follows up by looking at the credits, commit logs and mailing list traffic you aren't seen as inflating the record.
> There is, of course, mention of "investment opportunities".
Yup, these investor scams show up like clockwork on slashdot these days. One week it is a solar energy scheme that doesn't pass the smell test, some weeks it gets all the way to perpetual motion scams making the front page but lately there does seem to be a need for a green angle being pitched to make slash.
This one is almost certainly a scam. No mention of an energy source is the giveaway. You can't use a catalyst to add energy to a reaction even if you toss the bio- prefix into the ad copy. The diagram on the page does at least have something that looks like tanks but you aren't likely to collect enough solar energy to offset much of a power plant that way. Just feed the CO2 to real biology,,,, like plants, alage, etc. if you want to convert sunlight + CO2 into complex hydrocarbons.
> Dude aren't those called brake lights?
The light part would remain, to tell YOU the guy in front is braking. But now imagine that every light on every vehicle were also beaconing a unique identifier along with current speed and acceleration. You car would notice a car in front of you (because it has been seeing it with the front mounted sensor for a bit, thus it has to be in front and it could likely even know it is in the same lane) just started drasticly slowing down and you haven't hit your brakes. So it does something, hopefully themeable. Imagine the possibilities. Or fear them as the case may be.
> I bought a Sansa E280 the other day...Once I put Rockbox (!) on it, I can play flac, ogg, avi.
You lose because you didn't read the rockbox webpage. No current production mp3 player can load rockbox. Unless that player has sat on a shelf a LONG time (hint: only one top of the line at the time Sansa came with 8GB Flash) it is based on a totally different chipset and isn't supported.