You can find a number of Apple II emulators for Linux at ftp.apple.asimov.net/pub/apple_II. However, the IBM PC style 360K floppy drives physically cannot read Apple formatted 5.25" disks, as PC's use MFM encoding and Apple used GCR. Not to worry though, because most of the popular stuff has been put into disk file images that are also available for download. Unfortunately though, I didn't see Oregon Trail on that site, but maybe someone will upload it.
C, while extremely fast, is a bear to code threads
Eh? While I would agree that Java makes threads really simple, I wouldn't say that threads are necessarily that hard to deal with in C, at least not POSIX threads. Now if you are talking Win32, then you are right, those are a bear. The real hassle with C is that you have to code threaded code totally differently on *nix and Win32, while in Java you can just move byte code for a threaded app between those two without even recompiling and it will work (at least I have been able to do that).
and tedious for networking.
If you write directly to the Berkeley Sockets interface, that may be true, however just about everyone I know quickly develops (or buys/borrows) their own set of libraries and/or C++ wrapper classes which greatly simplify network programming. Again, the hassle is usually if you want to write a portable networking app, Win32 has unfortunately greatly diverged from the standard sockets interface, so you are back to lots of ugly ifdefs or some other way to handle the differences while with Java you can usually just move the byte code across and it will work.
Just think, now they can avoid all those Y2K-hungry lawyers looking to get bug fixes
Well, lawyers don't want bug fixes, they want big legal fees...:-) But in all reality, it is probably too late to avoid the Y2K vulture lawyers if InterBase has any Y2K problems. At any rate, if it isn't too late, they had better hurry up, because Y2K is only TWO days away!:-)
Libertarianism says that what the US Government is doing with M$ is wrong
Don't confuse Ryndianism with Libertarianism. Not all Libertarians think what is happening to Microsoft is wrong.
We don't give absolute power to government, we shouldn't give absolute power to business, either.
That is almost exactly how I feel about it. The thing that Microsoft has done wrong is that they have conspired to infringe on all of their competitor's rights to compete fairly. While we should legislate as little as possible, if a given market has continuously proven that it cannot correct itself (which generally only seems to happen when one company resorts to anti-competitive measures such as Microsoft has been found to), then unfortunately the government may not have much choice but to act to help restore a balance.
If Microsoft had really gotten their monopoly position through building a better product, doing a better job of marketing or distributing it, etc, then I'd be against breaking them up. Unfortunately, it seems indisputable that their reliance on dirty tricks and anticompetitive behavior has at least as much to do with their financial success as anything else.
When I can vote, you can bet it won't be for any politicians. I'll be writing in people I know and trust
While a somewhat noble jesture, it is essentially throwing your vote away unless you can convince a lot of other people to write in your choice. I don't like voting for the lesser of evils much either, and I have occasionally written in someone when I absolutely couldn't stomach any of the candidates running (usually someone who is running unopposed), but it is not something I make a standard practice of. Unfortunately that often does mean that I am voting for someone I don't like very much in favor of someone I really dislike.
May I suggest that perhaps you would be better off trying to convince those people you know and trust to seek the nomination for offices for which they might be able to make a difference in? If they can't find an established party they can live with, candidates can usually be put on the ballot by means of gathering enough signatures on a petition. A candidate even without a party has a much better chance of getting elected if they are on the ballot instead of a write in. Even minor party candidates generally get far more votes than do total independants on the ballot. And the unfortunate reality is that most of the time, one or the other of the major party candidates will be the one that gets elected. I'm not saying that there isn't a reason for people to run for office even
One thing I'd really like to see is a requirement that a candidate has to get more than 50% of the vote to get elected (even in a 3-way race). I am a bit torn between forcing a run-off between the top two vote getters or whether we should do something like have an option for 'none of the above'. If none-of-the-above won, then all of the current candidates on the ballot would be disqualified and we'd have to have a new primary to select new candidates. I think that might allow us to get rid of some of the real turkeys by forcing the parties to give us candidates that don't totally suck.
No, he is a Mexican citizen, and therefore not elegible to run for the office of President of the United States. In fact, even if he were to become a naturalized citizen of the US, he still could not become the US President under the rules which state you must be born on US soil in order to be President.
They forgot to include the rights of unborn babies
In my book unborn babies shouldn't have any more rights than do dogs and cats (and before someone flames me, I am not a PETAphile err... animal rights nut). We put hudreds unwanted dogs and cats to sleep every day. Nobody likes doing that, but it is an unfortunate reality. Let me ask you this: Would you send a baby home with someone who wants to abort it? I think maybe abortion is the more humane things. Be realistic, what every baby deserves is to have parents that want it and can take care of it, can support it and can do what is necessary to bring it up to be a good and productive member of society. Abstinance is a religious nut's pipe dream. It just isn't going to happen. Birth control of course is what really should happen -- but of course it isn't 100% effective, and sometimes people don't use it when they should (again I ask, should we send home babies with people with judgement as bad as that?) Adoption is a valid option in many cases, but it isn't the right thing for every situation of an unwanted pregnancy. Not to mention that many babies are essentially unadoptable (those that aren't white healthy newborns are unfortunately unlikely to get adopted). I don't see why it is a good thing for every baby that would be born with birth defects, drug addicted or AIDS infected to be forced to be carried to term.
I don't consider the anti-abortion stance to be consistant with conservatism either, at least not fiscal conservatism. It is much more cost effective to abort a baby than pay for 18 years of welfare for mother and child followed most likely by a lifetime of either welfare or incarceration for the kid who is likely to have grown up neglected and/or abused. Sure, that doesn't always happen, but unwanted kids usually grow up (or sometimes don't) with two strikes against them from the beginning.
Call me a cold hearted, callous person (you wouldn't be the first one), but I am unappologetic about looking at this from what I would consider to be a calm and rational viewpoint.
I think it is better to concentrate on taking care of the children that are already born before we worry about the rights of the unborn.
Oh, so now you DO have socialized health care? I'm glad to hear that.
Not really. I don't have to deal with any of that system because there is a private system for most people. The point is that you can have a 'safety net' type welfare system without having to socialize the whole health care system as some politicians here have been trying to do. The good thing for me is I can choose which doctor I go to, which hospital I go to and I don't have to deal with government waiting lists like I hear about in some places that have socialized health care.
Even if people in your area have it so well,
I don't live in a particularly prosperous part of the country. The area I live in is notable mostly for its averageness. Things aren't really that much different anywhere else in the US for that matter.
I doubt you have seen how all people in the US have it.
No more than you can say you've seen how all people in Sweden have it. That being said, I have traveled around the US enough (I've been in at least 17 of the 50 states within the past year) to feel comfortable saying that I have a fair knowledge of what is going on around the country. I've visited Europe as well, but I wouldn't say I know it with the level of detail that I do the US. I get bombarded with news from around the country, but generally only major news items from outside the country make the news here. I suspect (and having perused the news coverage when I was in Europe it seems to hold true) that the same things hold true in reverse.
For instance, isn't something like 10% of young black men in jail? Don't they count?
You'll be happy to know that prisoners get free health care. And of course they don't count, felons can't vote. As for the number of minorities in jail it is largely because those people choose a lifestyle (gangs, drugs) that leads to incarceration. I know many black people who are hardworking decent people that don't choose to buy into the 'gangsta' lifestyle. It is a choice, it is not something that is forced on them. It is kind of ironic that you bring up problems of racial diversity when you don't have to deal with that issue nearly as much in most European countries.
Also I believe the US rates quite low if you compare global numbers on literacy, vote participation, crime rates, infant mortality rates, pollution, number of psychopaths per capita, teen pregnancy, etc etc.
Some of those things may be true, but yet people still bang on the doors to get in here? Why is that? I don't think you've given me much evidence that in things that those people care about that the bottom 10% seem to think that they are treated that badly in the US. Until you've been here and seen how the bottom 10% really live, you are just operating on hearsay evidence.
Ok, then I guess I'll just have to leave the high horses and snide innuendos to you...
Whatever. Like you have a lot of room to talk there either. I never claimed to be a nice person, did I?
If someone broke into a bank safe by logically figuring out the combination, can he say it's just a simple "math problem" and walk away scott free?
That is a terrible analogy, in order to 'break into' a bank, requires physical trespass. Cracking an encryption code does not require any sort of physical entry. Despite all of the mumbo-jumbo on license agreements, most people who buy CD's, videotapes, DVD's, etc, believe that they physically own the media when they buy it. Telling people they can't do a brute force crack of encryption keys on a DVD they own is like telling someone who buys a bank building that they can't open up the bank vault.
Your analogy is also weak by the point that if someone physically removes valuables from a vault, the owner physically loses them. In the case of DVDs, if someone cracks the code on a DVD they own so that they can view the contents, it is not denying the owner of anything. The owner would only lose if someone who owned a DVD gave a copy of the contents to someone who would otherwise have paid for them. While cracking DVD encryption may technically make that easier, it certainly is not a necessary outcome of it, nor is it the only way that such a 'theft' can occur.
And on another point... Inprise is presumably looking to make money.
They may also be looking to save money. If Inprise can save money by getting open source developers to take over some or all of the load for new development and support for InterBase, it may be a win for them. A penny saved is a penny earned.
Your vote doesn't earn them dollars...
Perhaps not directly, but it does get them publicity, developer and user mindshare, and perhaps sales of other commercial products. Perhaps even sales of commercial or shrinkwrap boxed versions into some sites.
a pledge to purchase their commercial development tools would help, maybe.
If people are using their database, presumably they will be more likely to buy their development tools, especially if they offer features in their development tools that make it easier to develop for InterBase.
Two items I can see that I would configure differently right off the bat.
Mouse -- I'd pick a Logitech Mouseman 3-button mouse. Much better for X usage than a two button mouse like the one they have selected.
Ethernet card -- I'd pick an inexpensive Tulip (or PNIC) based card like the Bay Networks Netgear FA310TX, the LinkSys EtherFast 10/100 PNIC based card or the D-Link DFE500-TX. Not only are they cheaper, they are faster than the lackluster 3C905B according to what I've read.
Other than that, about the only thing major I would do differently is I'd seriously consider AMD CPU's.
I have news for you - people are clamoring to get into all western countries, including Canada and Europe.
That doesn't seem to support your point though. If people were clamoring to get into Canada and Europe and not the US, then you'd have a point that socialized medicine was preferred by recent immigrants, but that doesn't appear to be the case.
Strawman alert. No one said welfare was for the lazy. It is you who assumed people in trouble are lazy.
People in trouble? Oh please. I live in a marginal neighborhood. I see all the 'people in trouble'. I'm sorry, but I have trouble feeling sorry for people who spend their welfare checks on lottery tickets, cigarettes, booze, drugs and junk food while their children live in filth and squalor. Welfare, at least the way it is implemented here just doesn't work.
That's because we western nations fuck their countries every day, for instance by keeping them permanently in debt,
The US gives all sorts of foreign aid to other countries, both by the government (generally of course that has political strings attached) but also from charities. I've got nothing against charities, if people give willingly, that is their business. I don't like some of the charities' methodology of course (sob stories and guilt trips). As for keeping foreign countries in debt, I would prefer that we cut off governmental foreign aid to the third world. Unfortunately, we can't really control what the big corporations do overseas, and they are probably worse than anything that governments do.
and paying them peanuts to dump our trash there.
And what examples can you give of the US dumping trash in foreign countries? I've heard of european countries sending huge barges of trash to third world countries, but I have yet to hear of the US doing that. Frankly, it is probably because of the fact that shipping costs would make it unattractive more than anything else, but I don't see how you are going to make me feel guilty over that one.
Please read my previous post, and the one you answered before. You said you thought your way was better, we said we though our way was better. We didn't try to force you to do anything.
I just reread the original Canadian fellow's post. It appears that you are wrong. He was the one who was critical of the US's non-socialized health care system. I said I was happy with the way things are here.
I'm afraid I don't know what SOL means. "Stupid or lazy"?
That is actually kinda funny. It really stands for 'shit out of luck', however. What I meant by that is no matter what, the bottom 10% will always be the bottom 10%. The fact that most of them are either stupid or lazy or both is of course a contributory factor. Unfortunately, what is really the problem is the fact that most of them are uneducated, and the system encourages them to be dependant rather than forcing them to make an effort. At any rate, you can come to where I live and watch the bottom 10% with sattelite dishes wired to multiple TV's in dumpy old 14x70 mobile homes. They of course are the ones wearing $40 Tommy Hilfiger shirts, 14 karat gold chains around their necks, toting a cell phone and a beeper and driving a car up to the mini-mart to buy a 40 oz of Olde English 800. Now what was it about the bottom 10% in the US having it so bad? Oh -- and get this -- they do get free health care. It's called Title XXI, medicaid or other welfare programs. That and the country hospital system. Sure, they aren't quite as good as the private hospitals, but they are free for the people who qualify.
Oh good, we agree on something! Now you can call me a naive, bleeding heart communist and then we are even.;-)
Hey, thanks, spelling flames against someone writing in a foreign language. That's brave.
Eh? Now you are accusing me of spelling flames? Frankly, I could care less. My spelling is bad, and I don't really care. At any rate, when I start posting in Swedish on a site hosted in Sweden, then maybe you have a point.
Let me start off by saying that my first exposure to *nix was 4.2BSD on a VAX-11/780 back in 1985. I spent the remainder of the 1980's using 4.2, 4.3 and 4.3-Tahoe on various VAXen as well as SunOS on Sun 3's. While I also played with other UNIXes such as Ultrix, HP/UX, A/UX, Xenix, Venix and AT&T SVR2 and SVR3 in those days, BSD was my primary platform. In the early 1990's I spent a lot of time with various SVR3 derived commercial UNIXes including Motorola's SVR3 on 88000 machines and AIX on RT's and RS/6000's. While still *nix, I pined for a lot of things that were missing compared to BSD. By late 1992 I was back to SunOS 4.1.x on Sparc which was more to my liking. The main reason I chose Linux over *BSD is back in 1993 when *BSD and Linux were first coming to my attention and I was able to scrape together enough cast-off parts and $$$ to hack together a decent enough box (a 386DX-20) to run them, I couldn't get *BSD to run on the junk hardware I had. Linux, on the other hand worked. With the olvwm window manager I was astounded how well it made a clunky PC look and act like a SparcStation running SunOS. Nowdays I use Solaris on Sparc at work (and some at home, although my primary home platform is Linux and my home SparcStations are all old and slow models) and I could afford to run *BSD as well as Linux at home (I've got dozens of machines), and I do occasionally load one of the *BSDs onto a box to see how things are coming along. I really have nothing against *BSD. If Linux didn't exist, or if it ever somehow falls apart, I will certainly look at switching to one of the *BSDs. But I have to say that Linux for me has the comfort level now, after six years, I've spent more time with it than any other *nix family. Every time I have tried the *BSDs lately, I just haven't been able to find a compelling reason that would lead me to pick one of them over Linux. Linux still seems to have a better combination of hardware support, easier installation and wider software availability. Mind that the *BSDs aren't really that far behind, but without any real compelling advantage, it is just enough of a subtle turnoff to keep me complacent.
Well, there it is, just one person's opinion. Take it for what it's worth and with a grain or three of salt.
The wealth of a society should not be measured by how the top 10% live, it should be measured by how the bottom 10% live.
I'm what would be considered middle to lower middle class where I live. I am hardly part of the "top 10%". I was never 'priviliged'. My dad was a 40 year middle-level civil servant. I never had anything handed to me on a silver platter. I've got what I do because I have worked for it. I've worked since I was a teenager and I will probably be working until I am an old geezer. As for being young, I am in my mid 30s. Welfare should only be for those who have a legitimate medical reason they can't work. I've got no time for the lazy -- and nobody would have time for me if I was.
From what I've seen, the top 10% will be what they are, and bottom 10% are going to be SOL no matter what. At any rate, if the bottom 10% were doing so badly in the US, then I can't figure out why so many people from outside clamor to get in here.
What it comes down to is I am tired of hearing people from other countries who have socialist medicine telling us over here we need it. If we wanted it, we'd have it. We don't.
Geez... I and thought that typing fetchmail followed by pine was easy enough.
I use fetchmail, but I have never cared much for pine or elm (I use the good old fashioned command line mail reader). The other thing I use yahoo mail for occasionally is reading email when I am on vacation and happen to be able to find a kiosk with a web browser. I did that at EPCOT this spring when I was vacationing in Florida. Now that I have DSL I will probably set up my own webmail access on my local web server, but I haven't gotten around to that yet.
Webmail is so slow anyhow. I don't know why people bother.
I use yahoo mail mostly so I can have an email address that isn't so easily traceable directly to me like if I gave out my pop box at my ISP or an email address to one of my home boxes on DSL.
It's not any easier that configuring fetchmail and pine, which is probalby quicker than signing up for crappy webmail service, and the only limit on your mailbox size is your HD.
I've never had problems with filling up my yahoo mail box, then again, I don't use it for a lot of really important stuff.
Flipping web mail. Educate people so they can run their own MX if they want. Long live DSL! Long live Sendmail! It aint that hard, honest guv.
It's not easy/hard that is the deal for me. Web mail fills a certain set of niches that are different from what I use my local mail service for.
Not only am I happy to be Canadian, but also happy to have paid health coverage,
Strange, I am a U.S. citizen, and I've got medical insurance, most of which is paid by my employer. The small part I pay is paid before taxes. Around here, just about all employers provide access to cheap medical insurance. Given that unemployment is under 3%, nobody who is even half way competent at anything should think they have to work for an employer who doesn't.
and the chance at a good life in Canada.
And what makes you think it is that different than the US? Or that you wouldm't have a chance for a good life down here? As many Canadians as have moved down here to work under NAFTA, it makes me wonder where the 'good life' is. I've got nothing against Canada, but I am sick and tired of the whining about the lack of socialist medicine in the US. That is a good thing if you ask me.
In the US, however, fear accompanies sickness because of the bills that will follow the treatment.
I have the choice of four different health plans where I work. All of them cover just about everything. I'd rather pay a little in insurance premiums than a lot in taxes. I'm glad I don't have to deal with rationed health care and government control. I've actually heard a fair number of Canadians complaining that access to healthcare in Canada isn't what some people would have you believe. It is interesting too, that northern US health care centers like the Mayo Clinic (Rochester, MN) get a fair number of Canadians coming down because they would prefer to pay for their care than deal with the government, or because they don't like to wait.
Pretty sad if you ask me.
Its pretty sad you are so uninformed at how things really are down here.
Lawyers are not in the legislative branch that makes the laws.
Actually that is not true. Most politicians in the legislative branch are in fact lawyers (even Bill Clinton is (was) a lawyer). I've heard a figure of 80% of the US house and senate are lawyers, but I can't say how accurate that is. The representative from my district is a doctor, however both of my state's senators are lawyers (or former lawyers).
No, Caldera is still privately held, and is owned largely by Ransome Love and the Noorda family trust. There have been rumors of a Caldera IPO floating around by haven't heard any particular date or price mentioned.
Actually, you are wrong, the USPS is only a quasi-governmental agency. Legally they are allowed and encouraged to make a profit. Its just that the profit goes to their 'owner', the for-loss US gov't.
Slashdot Mirror
Weird Stuff Warehouse
YES! I remember that place from when I lived out in the Bay Area like years and years ago... Incredibly cool stuff there.
I believe you can find a shrinkit archive of Oregon Trail here
Check the file list, and search for oregontr.shk and you should be able to find it.
You can find a number of Apple II emulators for Linux at ftp.apple.asimov.net/pub/apple_II. However, the IBM PC style 360K floppy drives physically cannot read Apple formatted 5.25" disks, as PC's use MFM encoding and Apple used GCR. Not to worry though, because most of the popular stuff has been put into disk file images that are also available for download. Unfortunately though, I didn't see Oregon Trail on that site, but maybe someone will upload it.
:-(
Damn, I should have previewed.
You can find a number of Apple II emulators for Linux at . However, the IBM PC style 360K floppy drives physically cannot read Apple formatted 5.25" disks, as PC's use MFM encoding and Apple used GCR. Not to worry though, because most of the popular stuff has been put into disk file images that are also available for download. Unfortunately though, I didn't see Oregon Trail on that site, but maybe someone will upload it.
C, while extremely fast, is a bear to code threads
Eh? While I would agree that Java makes threads really simple, I wouldn't say that threads are necessarily that hard to deal with in C, at least not POSIX threads. Now if you are talking Win32, then you are right, those are a bear. The real hassle with C is that you have to code threaded code totally differently on *nix and Win32, while in Java you can just move byte code for a threaded app between those two without even recompiling and it will work (at least I have been able to do that).
and tedious for networking.
If you write directly to the Berkeley Sockets interface, that may be true, however just about everyone I know quickly develops (or buys/borrows) their own set of libraries and/or C++ wrapper classes which greatly simplify network programming. Again, the hassle is usually if you want to write a portable networking app, Win32 has unfortunately greatly diverged from the standard sockets interface, so you are back to lots of ugly ifdefs or some other way to handle the differences while with Java you can usually just move the byte code across and it will work.
Just think, now they can avoid all those Y2K-hungry lawyers looking to get bug fixes
:-) But in all reality, it is probably too late to avoid the Y2K vulture lawyers if InterBase has any Y2K problems. At any rate, if it isn't too late, they had better hurry up, because Y2K is only TWO days away! :-)
Well, lawyers don't want bug fixes, they want big legal fees...
Why the hell are we paying for 'non-critical' portions in the first place? If they aren't important, lets just cut them out permanently.
Libertarianism says that what the US Government is doing with M$ is wrong
Don't confuse Ryndianism with Libertarianism. Not all Libertarians think what is happening to Microsoft is wrong.
We don't give absolute power to government, we shouldn't give absolute power to business, either.
That is almost exactly how I feel about it. The thing that Microsoft has done wrong is that they have conspired to infringe on all of their competitor's rights to compete fairly. While we should legislate as little as possible, if a given market has continuously proven that it cannot correct itself (which generally only seems to happen when one company resorts to anti-competitive measures such as Microsoft has been found to), then unfortunately the government may not have much choice but to act to help restore a balance.
If Microsoft had really gotten their monopoly position through building a better product, doing a better job of marketing or distributing it, etc, then I'd be against breaking them up. Unfortunately, it seems indisputable that their reliance on dirty tricks and anticompetitive behavior has at least as much to do with their financial success as anything else.
When I can vote, you can bet it won't be for any politicians. I'll be writing in people I know and trust
While a somewhat noble jesture, it is essentially throwing your vote away unless you can convince a lot of other people to write in your choice. I don't like voting for the lesser of evils much either, and I have occasionally written in someone when I absolutely couldn't stomach any of the candidates running (usually someone who is running unopposed), but it is not something I make a standard practice of. Unfortunately that often does mean that I am voting for someone I don't like very much in favor of someone I really dislike.
May I suggest that perhaps you would be better off trying to convince those people you know and trust to seek the nomination for offices for which they might be able to make a difference in? If they can't find an established party they can live with, candidates can usually be put on the ballot by means of gathering enough signatures on a petition. A candidate even without a party has a much better chance of getting elected if they are on the ballot instead of a write in. Even minor party candidates generally get far more votes than do total independants on the ballot. And the unfortunate reality is that most of the time, one or the other of the major party candidates will be the one that gets elected. I'm not saying that there isn't a reason for people to run for office even
One thing I'd really like to see is a requirement that a candidate has to get more than 50% of the vote to get elected (even in a 3-way race). I am a bit torn between forcing a run-off between the top two vote getters or whether we should do something like have an option for 'none of the above'. If none-of-the-above won, then all of the current candidates on the ballot would be disqualified and we'd have to have a new primary to select new candidates. I think that might allow us to get rid of some of the real turkeys by forcing the parties to give us candidates that don't totally suck.
is he an American citizen?
No, he is a Mexican citizen, and therefore not elegible to run for the office of President of the United States. In fact, even if he were to become a naturalized citizen of the US, he still could not become the US President under the rules which state you must be born on US soil in order to be President.
They forgot to include the rights of unborn babies
In my book unborn babies shouldn't have any more rights than do dogs and cats (and before someone flames me, I am not a PETAphile err... animal rights nut). We put hudreds unwanted dogs and cats to sleep every day. Nobody likes doing that, but it is an unfortunate reality. Let me ask you this: Would you send a baby home with someone who wants to abort it? I think maybe abortion is the more humane things. Be realistic, what every baby deserves is to have parents that want it and can take care of it, can support it and can do what is necessary to bring it up to be a good and productive member of society. Abstinance is a religious nut's pipe dream. It just isn't going to happen. Birth control of course is what really should happen -- but of course it isn't 100% effective, and sometimes people don't use it when they should (again I ask, should we send home babies with people with judgement as bad as that?) Adoption is a valid option in many cases, but it isn't the right thing for every situation of an unwanted pregnancy. Not to mention that many babies are essentially unadoptable (those that aren't white healthy newborns are unfortunately unlikely to get adopted). I don't see why it is a good thing for every baby that would be born with birth defects, drug addicted or AIDS infected to be forced to be carried to term.
I don't consider the anti-abortion stance to be consistant with conservatism either, at least not fiscal conservatism. It is much more cost effective to abort a baby than pay for 18 years of welfare for mother and child followed most likely by a lifetime of either welfare or incarceration for the kid who is likely to have grown up neglected and/or abused. Sure, that doesn't always happen, but unwanted kids usually grow up (or sometimes don't) with two strikes against them from the beginning.
Call me a cold hearted, callous person (you wouldn't be the first one), but I am unappologetic about looking at this from what I would consider to be a calm and rational viewpoint.
I think it is better to concentrate on taking care of the children that are already born before we worry about the rights of the unborn.
Oh, so now you DO have socialized health care? I'm glad to hear that.
Not really. I don't have to deal with any of that system because there is a private system for most people. The point is that you can have a 'safety net' type welfare system without having to socialize the whole health care system as some politicians here have been trying to do. The good thing for me is I can choose which doctor I go to, which hospital I go to and I don't have to deal with government waiting lists like I hear about in some places that have socialized health care.
Even if people in your area have it so well,
I don't live in a particularly prosperous part of the country. The area I live in is notable mostly for its averageness. Things aren't really that much different anywhere else in the US for that matter.
I doubt you have seen how all people in the US have it.
No more than you can say you've seen how all people in Sweden have it. That being said, I have traveled around the US enough (I've been in at least 17 of the 50 states within the past year) to feel comfortable saying that I have a fair knowledge of what is going on around the country. I've visited Europe as well, but I wouldn't say I know it with the level of detail that I do the US. I get bombarded with news from around the country, but generally only major news items from outside the country make the news here. I suspect (and having perused the news coverage when I was in Europe it seems to hold true) that the same things hold true in reverse.
For instance, isn't something like 10% of young black men in jail? Don't they count?
You'll be happy to know that prisoners get free health care. And of course they don't count, felons can't vote. As for the number of minorities in jail it is largely because those people choose a lifestyle (gangs, drugs) that leads to incarceration. I know many black people who are hardworking decent people that don't choose to buy into the 'gangsta' lifestyle. It is a choice, it is not something that is forced on them. It is kind of ironic that you bring up problems of racial diversity when you don't have to deal with that issue nearly as much in most European countries.
Also I believe the US rates quite low if you compare global numbers on literacy, vote participation, crime rates, infant mortality rates, pollution, number of psychopaths per capita, teen pregnancy, etc etc.
Some of those things may be true, but yet people still bang on the doors to get in here? Why is that? I don't think you've given me much evidence that in things that those people care about that the bottom 10% seem to think that they are treated that badly in the US. Until you've been here and seen how the bottom 10% really live, you are just operating on hearsay evidence.
Ok, then I guess I'll just have to leave the high horses and snide innuendos to you...
Whatever. Like you have a lot of room to talk there either. I never claimed to be a nice person, did I?
If someone broke into a bank safe by logically figuring out the combination, can he say it's just a simple "math problem" and walk away scott free?
That is a terrible analogy, in order to 'break into' a bank, requires physical trespass. Cracking an encryption code does not require any sort of physical entry. Despite all of the mumbo-jumbo on license agreements, most people who buy CD's, videotapes, DVD's, etc, believe that they physically own the media when they buy it. Telling people they can't do a brute force crack of encryption keys on a DVD they own is like telling someone who buys a bank building that they can't open up the bank vault.
Your analogy is also weak by the point that if someone physically removes valuables from a vault, the owner physically loses them. In the case of DVDs, if someone cracks the code on a DVD they own so that they can view the contents, it is not denying the owner of anything. The owner would only lose if someone who owned a DVD gave a copy of the contents to someone who would otherwise have paid for them. While cracking DVD encryption may technically make that easier, it certainly is not a necessary outcome of it, nor is it the only way that such a 'theft' can occur.
And on another point... Inprise is presumably looking to make money.
They may also be looking to save money. If Inprise can save money by getting open source developers to take over some or all of the load for new development and support for InterBase, it may be a win for them. A penny saved is a penny earned.
Your vote doesn't earn them dollars...
Perhaps not directly, but it does get them publicity, developer and user mindshare, and perhaps sales of other commercial products. Perhaps even sales of commercial or shrinkwrap boxed versions into some sites.
a pledge to purchase their commercial development tools would help, maybe.
If people are using their database, presumably they will be more likely to buy their development tools, especially if they offer features in their development tools that make it easier to develop for InterBase.
Other than that, about the only thing major I would do differently is I'd seriously consider AMD CPU's.
I have news for you - people are clamoring to get into all western countries, including Canada and Europe.
;-)
That doesn't seem to support your point though. If people were clamoring to get into Canada and Europe and not the US, then you'd have a point that socialized medicine was preferred by recent immigrants, but that doesn't appear to be the case.
Strawman alert. No one said welfare was for the lazy. It is you who assumed people in trouble are lazy.
People in trouble? Oh please. I live in a marginal neighborhood. I see all the 'people in trouble'. I'm sorry, but I have trouble feeling sorry for people who spend their welfare checks on lottery tickets, cigarettes, booze, drugs and junk food while their children live in filth and squalor. Welfare, at least the way it is implemented here just doesn't work.
That's because we western nations fuck their countries every day, for instance by keeping them permanently in debt,
The US gives all sorts of foreign aid to other countries, both by the government (generally of course that has political strings attached) but also from charities. I've got nothing against charities, if people give willingly, that is their business. I don't like some of the charities' methodology of course (sob stories and guilt trips). As for keeping foreign countries in debt, I would prefer that we cut off governmental foreign aid to the third world. Unfortunately, we can't really control what the big corporations do overseas, and they are probably worse than anything that governments do.
and paying them peanuts to dump our trash there.
And what examples can you give of the US dumping trash in foreign countries? I've heard of european countries sending huge barges of trash to third world countries, but I have yet to hear of the US doing that. Frankly, it is probably because of the fact that shipping costs would make it unattractive more than anything else, but I don't see how you are going to make me feel guilty over that one.
Please read my previous post, and the one you answered before. You said you thought your way was better, we said we though our way was better. We didn't try to force you to do anything.
I just reread the original Canadian fellow's post. It appears that you are wrong. He was the one who was critical of the US's non-socialized health care system. I said I was happy with the way things are here.
I'm afraid I don't know what SOL means. "Stupid or lazy"?
That is actually kinda funny. It really stands for 'shit out of luck', however. What I meant by that is no matter what, the bottom 10% will always be the bottom 10%. The fact that most of them are either stupid or lazy or both is of course a contributory factor. Unfortunately, what is really the problem is the fact that most of them are uneducated, and the system encourages them to be dependant rather than forcing them to make an effort. At any rate, you can come to where I live and watch the bottom 10% with sattelite dishes wired to multiple TV's in dumpy old 14x70 mobile homes. They of course are the ones wearing $40 Tommy Hilfiger shirts, 14 karat gold chains around their necks, toting a cell phone and a beeper and driving a car up to the mini-mart to buy a 40 oz of Olde English 800. Now what was it about the bottom 10% in the US having it so bad? Oh -- and get this -- they do get free health care. It's called Title XXI, medicaid or other welfare programs. That and the country hospital system. Sure, they aren't quite as good as the private hospitals, but they are free for the people who qualify.
Oh good, we agree on something! Now you can call me a naive, bleeding heart communist and then we are even.
I'll leave the name calling to you, thanks.
Hey, thanks, spelling flames against someone writing in a foreign language. That's brave.
Eh? Now you are accusing me of spelling flames? Frankly, I could care less. My spelling is bad, and I don't really care.
At any rate, when I start posting in Swedish on a site hosted in Sweden, then maybe you have a point.
Let me start off by saying that my first exposure to *nix was 4.2BSD on a VAX-11/780 back in 1985. I spent the remainder of the 1980's using 4.2, 4.3 and 4.3-Tahoe on various VAXen as well as SunOS on Sun 3's. While I also played with other UNIXes such as Ultrix, HP/UX, A/UX, Xenix, Venix and AT&T SVR2 and SVR3 in those days, BSD was my primary platform.
In the early 1990's I spent a lot of time with various SVR3 derived commercial UNIXes including Motorola's SVR3 on 88000 machines and AIX on RT's and RS/6000's. While still *nix, I pined for a lot of things that were missing compared to BSD. By late 1992 I was back to SunOS 4.1.x on Sparc which was more to my liking.
The main reason I chose Linux over *BSD is back in 1993 when *BSD and Linux were first coming to my attention and I was able to scrape together enough cast-off parts and $$$ to hack together a decent enough box (a 386DX-20) to run them, I couldn't get *BSD to run on the junk hardware I had. Linux, on the other hand worked. With the olvwm window manager I was astounded how well it made a clunky PC look and act like a SparcStation running SunOS.
Nowdays I use Solaris on Sparc at work (and some at home, although my primary home platform is Linux and my home SparcStations are all old and slow models) and I could afford to run *BSD as well as Linux at home (I've got dozens of machines), and I do occasionally load one of the *BSDs onto a box to see how things are coming along. I really have nothing against *BSD. If Linux didn't exist, or if it ever somehow falls apart, I will certainly look at switching to one of the *BSDs.
But I have to say that Linux for me has the comfort level now, after six years, I've spent more time with it than any other *nix family. Every time I have tried the *BSDs lately, I just haven't been able to find a compelling reason that would lead me to pick one of them over Linux. Linux still seems to have a better combination of hardware support, easier installation and wider software availability. Mind that the *BSDs aren't really that far behind, but without any real compelling advantage, it is just enough of a subtle turnoff to keep me complacent.
Well, there it is, just one person's opinion. Take it for what it's worth and with a grain or three of salt.
The wealth of a society should not be measured by how the top 10% live, it should be measured by how the bottom 10% live.
I'm what would be considered middle to lower middle class where I live. I am hardly part of the "top 10%". I was never 'priviliged'. My dad was a 40 year middle-level civil servant. I never had anything handed to me on a silver platter. I've got what I do because I have worked for it. I've worked since I was a teenager and I will probably be working until I am an old geezer. As for being young, I am in my mid 30s. Welfare should only be for those who have a legitimate medical reason they can't work. I've got no time for the lazy -- and nobody would have time for me if I was.
From what I've seen, the top 10% will be what they are, and bottom 10% are going to be SOL no matter what. At any rate, if the bottom 10% were doing so badly in the US, then I can't figure out why so many people from outside clamor to get in here.
What it comes down to is I am tired of hearing people from other countries who have socialist medicine telling us over here we need it. If we wanted it, we'd have it. We don't.
Perhaps I am callous, so be it.
Geez... I and thought that typing fetchmail followed by pine was easy enough.
I use fetchmail, but I have never cared much for pine or elm (I use the good old fashioned command line mail reader). The other thing I use yahoo mail for occasionally is reading email when I am on vacation and happen to be able to find a kiosk with a web browser. I did that at EPCOT this spring when I was vacationing in Florida. Now that I have DSL I will probably set up my own webmail access on my local web server, but I haven't gotten around to that yet.
Webmail is so slow anyhow. I don't know why people bother.
I use yahoo mail mostly so I can have an email address that isn't so easily traceable directly to me like if I gave out my pop box at my ISP or an email address to one of my home boxes on DSL.
It's not any easier that configuring fetchmail and pine, which is probalby quicker than signing up for crappy webmail service, and the only limit on your mailbox size is your HD.
I've never had problems with filling up my yahoo mail box, then again, I don't use it for a lot of really important stuff.
Flipping web mail. Educate people so they can run their own MX if they want. Long live DSL! Long live Sendmail! It aint that hard, honest guv.
It's not easy/hard that is the deal for me. Web mail fills a certain set of niches that are different from what I use my local mail service for.
Don't you watch Who wants to be a Millionaire?
Can't say I ever have. I actually have pretty much quit watching network television since I got a DSS dish.
25 of of the forty odd US presidents have been lawyers.
That is roughly 60%, which seems reasonable.
Not only am I happy to be Canadian, but also happy to have paid health coverage,
Strange, I am a U.S. citizen, and I've got medical insurance, most of which is paid by my employer. The small part I pay is paid before taxes. Around here, just about all employers provide access to cheap medical insurance. Given that unemployment is under 3%, nobody who is even half way competent at anything should think they have to work for an employer who doesn't.
and the chance at a good life in Canada.
And what makes you think it is that different than the US? Or that you wouldm't have a chance for a good life down here? As many Canadians as have moved down here to work under NAFTA, it makes me wonder where the 'good life' is. I've got nothing against Canada, but I am sick and tired of the whining about the lack of socialist medicine in the US. That is a good thing if you ask me.
In the US, however, fear accompanies sickness because of the bills that will follow the treatment.
I have the choice of four different health plans where I work. All of them cover just about everything. I'd rather pay a little in insurance premiums than a lot in taxes. I'm glad I don't have to deal with rationed health care and government control. I've actually heard a fair number of Canadians complaining that access to healthcare in Canada isn't what some people would have you believe. It is interesting too, that northern US health care centers like the Mayo Clinic (Rochester, MN) get a fair number of Canadians coming down because they would prefer to pay for their care than deal with the government, or because they don't like to wait.
Pretty sad if you ask me.
Its pretty sad you are so uninformed at how things really are down here.
Lawyers are not in the legislative branch that makes the laws.
Actually that is not true. Most politicians in the legislative branch are in fact lawyers (even Bill Clinton is (was) a lawyer). I've heard a figure of 80% of the US house and senate are lawyers, but I can't say how accurate that is. The representative from my district is a doctor, however both of my state's senators are lawyers (or former lawyers).
No, Caldera is still privately held, and is owned largely by Ransome Love and the Noorda family trust. There have been rumors of a Caldera IPO floating around by haven't heard any particular date or price mentioned.
Actually, you are wrong, the USPS is only a quasi-governmental agency. Legally they are allowed and encouraged to make a profit. Its just that the profit goes to their 'owner', the for-loss US gov't.