The massive and sustained effort by the Church to conceal pedos until they are outed by others is noteworthy. The Church promotes pedophilia by requiring celibate priests, then hides the outcomes, and finally pays off to cut the publicity.
The rest of the Church aided and abetted them by shuffling them around, and there is no telling how many escaped being outed.
When the Church instantly feeds their pedos to the cops, in public, and assists law enforcement personnel in busting pedos then it might not merit the label of pedo farm it currently deserves.
Roughly a BILLION dollars in pedo payoffs worldwide make that post a candidate for Funny, not Flamebait.
From rescuing Nazis (not to mention largely ignoring the Holocaust, if THAT wasn't worthy of excommunication what is?) in Operation Ratline after WWII to playing hide-the-pedo across international borders, the Vatican has forfeited any respect except by its own brainwashed flock.
Russia is just following its normal course, nothing to see there and nothing new to expect.
"anyone foolish enough to actually believe that any nation's history is glorious needs a mental health professional and a lot of appointments."
Glory isn't neat and pretty and seemless, but it certainly exists.
Consider the Soviet soldier, who despite being horribly treated by his own government contributed more than any other group to destroying the Wehrmacht. Stalingrad and the many other brutal battles like it indeed had "glorious" outcomes, for glory is when man triumphs over such terrible adversity even it comes from other men.
BTW one thing the Commies got right is war memorials that reflect the sacrifice of their people. Contemplate Mamayev Kurgan sometime...
That's called "churning", and many employers do it because workers are simply not valuable. New trucking school students are treated the same way.
"Kids buy into the myth of 'work hard, play hard', don't know what quality of life is, and haven't yet had a shitty work experience to stand up for themselves."
They have nothing to stand ON, they can be replaced by those willing to compete. Until they acquire value, acting as if they have it is a (nice if you can pull if off) bluff.
The only way our labor will become competitive is after a collapse resets labor AND commodity costs.
Americans cannot afford to work for Chinese wages unless we reset to conditions like those of China. Some things will have to go, and that means a willful and deliberate rollback of the benefits workers are used to having, a destruction of entitlements, and social conditions that coerce people to work for prevailing wages instead of getting government handouts.
Competition means competing, it is required by inevitable and natural market forces, so position YOURSELF as best you can and Cthulhu take the hindmost. The post-WWII boom is over, the world learned how to make stuff, and America can't boast its way or shoot its way to the top of the heap. Americans are going to have to suck it up and get an old school work ethic, including willingness to suffer in return for money. Those old farts of the so-called Greatest Generation were hardened by hard times. We don't have hard time yet by comparison (note that our poor are fat as hogs and if they were any lazier they'd stop breathing), but they are coming.
Some things aren't worth the application of "massive" resources on one project to the detriment of others...
Manned spaceflight is a tremendous barrier to actual _exploration_ of space because it is so expensive to use humans for a job where many, many more remotely-manned systems could do a better job.
Manned exploration at this primitive stage of unmanned and remotely-manned supporting technology just gets in the way and provides drama for those who enjoy it. Were we really interested in exploration and the power to act off-world, we'd build systems to do that. Once perfected, human passengers can be an afterthought. It is not a matter of choosing BETWEEN manned and remotely-manned missions, but doing them in the most useful order.
We already use robotic and remotely-manned systems for many tasks on Terra from mining to undersea exploration to IED disposal. I argue that current manned programs are a hangover of Cold War penis-waving. Want to EXPLORE space? Wait for the vast tech base of seemingly unrelated supporting technology on Earth to improve while building the (required either way!) unmanned/remotely-manned systems first.
The problem that would be solved by paying other countries to fly missions is that we overvalue astronauts to the point where protecting them has made _using_ them prohibitive.
We cheerfully drive cars that kill tens of thousands in the US every year, and accept lots of other deathy/woundy/cripply outcomes as the cost of doing business. We can do that with astronauts if we get NASA and government out of manned launches thus ending public expectations of perfection.
All pre-astronaut models of Terran exploration understood that people are cheap and wrote off lots of them. The bravery of those who succeeded met with public praise, a reasonable reward for the right sort of fellow. We forget the legacy test pilots, but those guys knew the risk, thrived when challenged, and accomplished great things. Get manned missions out of NASA, use NASA for science instead of tourism, and learn about the universe instead of wasting limited resources.
IMO it's time to offload manned missions and stick to actually _exploring_ space with probes and rovers and other remote-manned tech. Manned missions have created a burden that sucked other programs dry, but the lust of those who want to play in space can make commercial outfits viable.
We don't _need_ people in space before we perfect exploring it with the remote-controlled systems we absolutely require anyway to interact with an utterly hostile environment. Development cycles for remotely-manned vehicles can be much shorter (avoids the decades-long burden of old Shuttle tech) allowing "launch early, launch often".
Slashdot Mirror
"By keeping it locked down like that, they have severely limited the appeal of this thing"
to an insignificant number of customers.
Religion says (unrationed) sex is bad and violence spreads faith. In that Christianity resembles Islam.
If _eBikes_ are the way forward, no big auto makers need be involved in their production.
There will always be masses of poor in order that wealth may be concentrated for purposes good or ill.
Maybe it is more the natural state of affairs than an actual "problem" for the human race.
They'll bust the stupid ones, but there are plenty of Americans who understand how to employ camo and concealment.
For that much I'll beat off on video!
When they are done with yours they can eat mine, which will be nice and warm courtesy of my effective heater.
I'm an experienced mechanic and regard any potential wear from idling as a trifle. Set the idle properly if required, end of story.
"What exactly is the point of ideals if you don't stand up for them?"
Host the content yourself if you are so ready to expect sacrifice of others.
The massive and sustained effort by the Church to conceal pedos until they are outed by others is noteworthy. The Church promotes pedophilia by requiring celibate priests, then hides the outcomes, and finally pays off to cut the publicity.
The rest of the Church aided and abetted them by shuffling them around, and there is no telling how many escaped being outed.
When the Church instantly feeds their pedos to the cops, in public, and assists law enforcement personnel in busting pedos then it might
not merit the label of pedo farm it currently deserves.
"that the fall of the bible from a carefully-guarded source to something that the entire internet can pick apart contributed to the rise of atheism."
Easy to see why Scientologists want to restrict access to THEIR doctrine...
Accountability is an uphill battle.
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/
Religion should be scorned and ridiculed, since the only way to free the world from the oppression of superstition is to weaken it.
Roughly a BILLION dollars in pedo payoffs worldwide make that post a candidate for Funny, not Flamebait.
From rescuing Nazis (not to mention largely ignoring the Holocaust, if THAT wasn't worthy of excommunication what is?) in Operation Ratline after WWII to playing hide-the-pedo across international borders, the Vatican has forfeited any respect except by its own brainwashed flock.
Enjoy!
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/
Justice, courtesy of another inmate:
http://www.boston.com/news/specials/geoghan/
Some fangirl support:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/11/23/coakley_details_her_role_in_1995_probation_deal_for_geoghan/?page=3
"I hope he warns them about FBI posing as 13-year-old choirboys."
With current priestly pedo payoffs worldwide at roughly a (B)illion dollars (hundred of millions in the US alone) he would be wise to do so.
"It's amazing how so many people who never passed a high school science class "
Why bother with science when superstition answers all?
"Sounds like a great scam for the artist."
It doesn't beat this classic:
http://www.pieromanzoni.org/EN/Gallery_en/pop201.htm
Russia is just following its normal course, nothing to see there and nothing new to expect.
"anyone foolish enough to actually believe that any nation's history is glorious needs a mental health professional and a lot of appointments."
Glory isn't neat and pretty and seemless, but it certainly exists.
Consider the Soviet soldier, who despite being horribly treated by his own government contributed more than any other group to destroying the Wehrmacht. Stalingrad and the many other brutal battles like it indeed had "glorious" outcomes, for glory is when man triumphs over such terrible adversity even it comes from other men.
BTW one thing the Commies got right is war memorials that reflect the sacrifice of their people. Contemplate Mamayev Kurgan sometime...
That's called "churning", and many employers do it because workers are simply not valuable. New trucking school students are treated the same way.
"Kids buy into the myth of 'work hard, play hard', don't know what quality of life is, and haven't yet had a shitty work experience to stand up for themselves."
They have nothing to stand ON, they can be replaced by those willing to compete. Until they acquire value, acting as if they have it is a (nice if you can pull if off) bluff.
The only way our labor will become competitive is after a collapse resets labor AND commodity costs.
Americans cannot afford to work for Chinese wages unless we reset to conditions like those of China.
Some things will have to go, and that means a willful and deliberate rollback of the benefits workers are used to having, a destruction of entitlements, and social conditions that coerce people to work for prevailing wages instead of getting government handouts.
Competition means competing, it is required by inevitable and natural market forces, so position YOURSELF as best you can and Cthulhu take the hindmost. The post-WWII boom is over, the world learned how to make stuff, and America can't boast its way or shoot its way to the top of the heap. Americans are going to have to suck it up and get an old school work ethic, including willingness to suffer in return for money. Those old farts of the so-called Greatest Generation were hardened by hard times. We don't have hard time yet by comparison (note that our poor are fat as hogs and if they were any lazier they'd stop breathing), but they are coming.
Some things aren't worth the application of "massive" resources on one project to the detriment of others...
Manned spaceflight is a tremendous barrier to actual _exploration_ of space because it is so expensive to use humans for a job where many, many more remotely-manned systems could do a better job.
Manned exploration at this primitive stage of unmanned and remotely-manned supporting technology just gets in the way and provides drama for those who enjoy it. Were we really interested in exploration and the power to act off-world, we'd build systems to do that. Once perfected, human passengers can be an afterthought. It is not a matter of choosing BETWEEN manned and remotely-manned missions, but doing them in the most useful order.
We already use robotic and remotely-manned systems for many tasks on Terra from mining to undersea exploration to IED disposal. I argue that current manned programs are a hangover of Cold War penis-waving. Want to EXPLORE space? Wait for the vast tech base of seemingly unrelated supporting technology on Earth to improve while building the (required either way!) unmanned/remotely-manned systems first.
The problem that would be solved by paying other countries to fly missions is that we overvalue astronauts to the point where protecting them has made _using_ them prohibitive.
We cheerfully drive cars that kill tens of thousands in the US every year, and accept lots of other deathy/woundy/cripply outcomes as the cost of doing business. We can do that with astronauts if we get NASA and government out of manned launches thus ending public expectations of perfection.
All pre-astronaut models of Terran exploration understood that people are cheap and wrote off lots of them. The bravery of those who succeeded met with public praise, a reasonable reward for the right sort of fellow. We forget the legacy test pilots, but those guys knew the risk, thrived when challenged, and accomplished great things. Get manned missions out of NASA, use NASA for science instead of tourism, and learn about the universe instead of wasting limited resources.
"ain't nobody gonna go to space if dying has to actually be considered."
The people who deserve to go will brave the risk and move things forward, no one else matters. So what if the timid don't go early?
Cowards can stay on the ground.
NASA clingeth mightily to its rice bowl...
IMO it's time to offload manned missions and stick to actually _exploring_ space with probes and rovers and other remote-manned tech. Manned missions have created a burden that sucked other programs dry, but the lust of those who want to play in space can make commercial outfits viable.
We don't _need_ people in space before we perfect exploring it with the remote-controlled systems we absolutely require anyway to interact with an utterly hostile environment. Development cycles for remotely-manned vehicles can be much shorter (avoids the decades-long burden of old Shuttle tech) allowing "launch early, launch often".
"but arable farming uses an unholy amount of petrochemicals. "
Begging the question of what is a "holy" amount of petrochemicals....
"I'm having that "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" moment that I really didn't want to have."
I already had the one I expected.