Two facts invalidate your (weak) points: Israel has no legitimacy, and it has no right to exist. The Holocaust did not give Zionists a right to create a country were other people were already living. The Gypsies were slaughtered by the Nazies with equal enthusiasm, but they never recieved a homeland. Palistinians do not want to see the death of all jews, they want their land back - an entirely reasonable desire. Israelies are living on stolen land. Until they make serious concessions, like returning to 1967 borders, giving Palistinians real water rights, and granting the Right of Return, they will not have security, nor will they deserve it.
Yes, 9/11 is largely attributed to an intelligence breakdown of great proportions. Intelligence analysts failed to connect dots and various forms of law enforcement agencies never shared their intelligence with one another.
Yes, and the greatest failure sat in the White House. Bush was warned that Al Qaeda was determined to attack the U.S. and might use hijacked airplanes to do it. He could have warned the FAA to watch out for suspicious activity. He could have told NORAD to scramble some fighters when planes started to disappear. Upon hearing news of an attack, he could have called his two time Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfield, his Vice President and former SOD Dick Cheney, or hell, he could have even called his dad. Instead, he responded to the briefing by saying "All right, you've covered your ass" and then read My Pet Goat twenty minutes after being told the country was under attack. And then he has the balls to demonize others for being "weak on defense", and the media has let him get away with it.
First of all, diseases were the primary cause of the "downfall" of native americans.
Really, I didn't know it was disease that forced the U.S. government to break damn near every treaty they ever made with Indian tribes.
I doubt you can show me a link were there is a U.S. president STATING that we must kill all native Americans.
Nah, they didn't say it, they just went and forced tribes off their lands (Trail of Tears) and forced them to convert to Christianity.
The Spaniards weren't very nice to native americans either.
And...? 1) the U.S. wasn't run by Spaniards and 2) I don't see to many Spaniards riding around on high horses, bleating about being a beacon of rights and democracy while ignoring their own very dirty hands.
While creationists and christian fundamentalists annoy the hell out of of me, they aren't killing me because I don't hold the same beliefs as them. I can't say the same for Islamic fundamentalist and other middle-eastern fundamentalist movements.
Yes, because when Christians kill people - mudering abortion doctors, killing homosexuals, assasinations and civil wars, genocide in the Balkans and in Rawanda - it's never because they are Christians, it's for other reasons. Whereas when people who happen to be Muslim kill people, it's always because of their religion, never for other reasons.
Ask yourself this: I the Arab world is so concerned about the welfare of the Palestinian people, why did they turn them away when they needed places to go after their fellow Arabs turned them out? I know, you won't actually think about that, since it goes against your bigoted beliefs, but the world would be better off if the real facts were known.
For the same reason the U.S. doesn't let just anyone into its borders? Why should other Arab countries make up for Palistinian land stolen by Zionists? Any more bullshit Zionist propoganda you'd like to share with us today?
That's not to say Hezbollah is blameless, their idiotic soldier-kidnapping stunts caused the war, although the response was completely absurd compared to their response in the past.
They wanted to use the soldiers in a prisoner trade, for Arabs kidnapped by the Israelies. Opps, I'm sorry, I forget when the Isrealies do it, it's called "arresting", not "kidnapping". Much like when they assassinate suspected militants and bomb houses, it's "appropriate military action" rather than "terrorism".
Separating Zionism, Judaism and Jews in the minds of non-Jews is a great accomplishment by the anti-semitic (for the absence of a better word) propaganda.
Wow, way to take the truth and spin it 180 degrees into straight bullshit. The truth of the matter is that equating any criticism of Israel or Zionist expansion with anti-semitism is the greatest success the Zionists have had with their propoganda.
You need to know very little about Judaism to understand how inseparable the land, the faith and the people really are.
Too damn bad for them. Holy sites are every bit as important to Muslims as they are to Jews, and modern Muslims were there long before modern Jews were. Furthermore, the Gypsies were slaghtered with equal enthusiasm by the Nazies, why don't they get a nation of their own? Starting with whatever neighborhood you happen to live in?
You have links to back this stuff up? I've long been a supporter of the Palistinians, but it would be nice to have more info of how the founding of Israel was bogus in the first place.
We're now well into the third, sometimes fourth generation of people who have made it their home, irrigated it, built their cities and lives here in the face of tremendous adversity.
There are plenty of Palistinains who still have keys to the houses they were forced out of. And the cause of all that "tremendous adversity" is the formation of Israel and the Israelies themselves.
I double-dare you to walk into this country and try 'n' move 'm.
Moving them at this point would be a bloody waste of time, literally. What should be done is the return of the 1967 borders, real water rights for a Palistinian state, reparations made to the Palistinians, and Right of Return for refugees to return to the homes they were forced out of. Until this happens, Israel will not have, nor will it deserve, security.
At some point, I personally just gave up. It's impossible to get the facts
If you're too damn lazy to do 2 seconds of Googling, maybe.
Take the question "Were WMDs found in Iraq?". The answer is, not the WMDs that were promised, not the massive stockpiles and the laboratories, not the nuclear weapons, but there were some short-range chemical and biological warheads found.
No, there were no WMD's found, period. If there was, don't you think the Bush Administration would have been crowing about it from the rooftops years ago? There were some old stocks found, but chemical and biological weapons degrade over time. A drop of gas that might have killed you in 1985 might give you a rash in 2002. It's not a weapon of mass destruction if it's incapable of causing mass destruction. But even if they had found a dozen new sarin gas warheads under a sand dune after the Iraq invasion, it wouldn't change a thing. The rational for the invasion was not the possiblity that Iraq might have some WMD's, but that they possessed so many and were so close to getting a nuke, that we had no choice but to invade.
That's true in a court of law, but why should it be true in the court of public opinion, or for that matter, how does it enter into what is or is not right?
Because it makes a huge amount of real world difference, as any boob would know. There is a night and day difference between Be trying to sign OEM's to exclusive contracts and Microsoft doing the same. What is just plain compeditive behavior when you're one player in a compeditive market becomes anti-comeditive behavior when you're a monopoly.
Are you proposing that we should accept bad behavior from Apple simply because they are not a monopoly?
First, I'd be more impressed if this inane analogy wasn't trotted out just for Apple discussions. Secondly, I'd also be more impressed by this argument if Apple was actually in the wrong. And usually, like right now, they aren't. Apple currently has 0% cell phone marketshare. You want an open phone, then don't frikkin buy an iPhone. It's that simple. Go get a Treo or something. If Apple gets 95% marketshare, and developers have little to no choice in developing for the iPhone, then we'll talk.
Finally, I always find the group-think of Slashdotters who accuse others of pro-Apple group-think, reguardless of the story or the comments. Like when Apple removed all Wiley books from Apple Stores after they released iCon, you still had "now if this were Microsoft..." trolls popping up despite the fact that many of the highly rated comments said that Jobs was a consumate asshole.
Microsoft is a convicted monopolist when it comes to PC operating systems, not everything they make. For example, the XBox is a fancy computer that's heavily locked down like the iPhone, but Microsoft gets a free pass with it for the most part. What's your point?
Because they use one of their products as leverage to boost another product, obviously. It's how they became a monopoly in the first place, along with giving discounts to OEM's who would ship all their computers with Windows. And once they have a monopoly with one product, their actions with other products deserve more scrutiny - obviously.
I'm not interested. Microsoft locks you out of your computer a tiny bit with TCPA and everyone screams. Apple locks you out of a computer and iFanboys make endless excuses for Apple.
Every time Apple does something somebody doesn't like, some yahoo has to pop in with a lame "now if this were Microsoft, you'd all be up in arms" completely forgetting that Microsoft is a convicted monopolist, and convicted monopolists are held to a much higher standard.
Right, so: In order to defend your Right to Profit, we're all expected to let you do whatever the fuck you want to do
Straw man.
If you don't like the rules, don't play the fucking game.
The game is rigged, jackass. Shop owners aren't wanting to get away with "whatever the fuck" they want to do, they just want to take entirely reasonable measures to protect themselves since they have to eat the cost of any fraudulent transactions. If Visa/Mastercard don't like this, then they can assume part of the risk, or go fuck themselves. And until you've given up your means of employment, been the victim of identity theft, or been a shop owner and lost a few thousand dollars on stolen credit cards because the credit card company wouldn't let you check for id's, you can join them.
contagious diseases depend upon population density.
Bad analogy. There are more Mac and Linux boxes now than there were Windows machines when the first Windows viruses came out, so there's more than a critical mass for malware. No, the amount of malware depends on the design decisions that were made for the operating system, not based on how much marketshare it has.
What's unreasonable is that people like you think that it's okay to break your word because it's too hard to keep it.
Bullshit. If you own a small business, say a shop of some kind that depends on drop in customers, you have no choice but to support either Visa or Mastercard. And you also have no choice in terms because both groups offer the same sort of contracts. And if there is a chargeback, you, as the merchant, have no choice but to eat all of the cost. It is in no way unreasonable to break totally unreasonable terms of a contract made under duress. If Visa/Mastercard refuse to let merchants check for ID, then they should eat part of the cost of fraudulent transactions.
If you want to pissed at anyone, be pissed at Visa/Mastercard for being a cartel. Be pissed at them for trying to prevent merchants from taking simple steps to protect themselves without taking on any of the risk. Or, put it another way: how many movies have you seen where the hero heroically stands up to the little guy?
Let me know what businesses you own so I can avoid them.
I own a large multinational corporation that fronts many businesses around the world. Coincidently, the corporation owns a controlling interest in every store within 100 miles of where you live. Feel free not to shop at any of them. Asshole.
Still nice, but far from a killer feature. To be clear, I meant it to mean a prime motivator for a significant number of buyers. I wonder if anyone took a survey of people asking if they were excited about the iPhone and if so, what about it excited them. I doubt more than a few percent would have said visual voicemail.
Even if you get a normal amount of messages, I suspect visual voicemail is going to be one of those features that once you get used to, you never want to go back. Sort of like how your 15" monitor was just fine in 2002, but now that you have a 24" widescreen lcd you couldn't imagine going back. Or if you live in a cold climate and get used to having an auto-start in your car....
Why is it that living up to a signed contract is such a big deal these days?
Because you have no choice but to sign one of those contracts, and you have no choice in contracts, dumbass. Unless you consider going out of business and declaring bankruptcy to be a valid choice.
Both of those things are a violation of your agreement, you can't require ID and you can't arbitrarily refuse my card. Why is it so hard to live up to what you've agreed to?
Because it's virtually impossible to survive as a business without accepting credit cards, and if all credit cards have the same bs terms....
Just one general comment: Anyone who talks about "credit card companies" doesn't know what they're talking about.
Um, no. Are they companies? Yes. Are they offering credit cards? Yes. So...they're frikkin credit card companies. More so since all credit card companies might be banks, but not all banks offer credit cards, anymore than all banks offer brokerage services or insurance.
And the idea that Apple has so much clout is laughable.
"The idea of the Boston Red Sox winning the World Series is laughable"
0xdeadbeef on October 28th, 2004
In case you aren't a baseball fan, the Sox won the series on October 27th, 2004. The point is that Apple has already proven their clout by getting Cingular to change their network (visual voicemail) and change the business method that every carrier in the U.S. runs under: disabling features built into the phone so they can nickel and dime their customers to death.
Slashdot Mirror
Two facts invalidate your (weak) points: Israel has no legitimacy, and it has no right to exist. The Holocaust did not give Zionists a right to create a country were other people were already living. The Gypsies were slaughtered by the Nazies with equal enthusiasm, but they never recieved a homeland. Palistinians do not want to see the death of all jews, they want their land back - an entirely reasonable desire. Israelies are living on stolen land. Until they make serious concessions, like returning to 1967 borders, giving Palistinians real water rights, and granting the Right of Return, they will not have security, nor will they deserve it.
What kind of moron to you have to be to equate anything critical of Zionism as anti-semitism?
Exactly. Because Iran was then, and still is busy funding and arming some of the worst terrorist groups in the world.
Only to counteract one of the other "worst terrorist groups": Israel.
Yes, 9/11 is largely attributed to an intelligence breakdown of great proportions. Intelligence analysts failed to connect dots and various forms of law enforcement agencies never shared their intelligence with one another.
Yes, and the greatest failure sat in the White House. Bush was warned that Al Qaeda was determined to attack the U.S. and might use hijacked airplanes to do it. He could have warned the FAA to watch out for suspicious activity. He could have told NORAD to scramble some fighters when planes started to disappear. Upon hearing news of an attack, he could have called his two time Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfield, his Vice President and former SOD Dick Cheney, or hell, he could have even called his dad. Instead, he responded to the briefing by saying "All right, you've covered your ass" and then read My Pet Goat twenty minutes after being told the country was under attack. And then he has the balls to demonize others for being "weak on defense", and the media has let him get away with it.
First of all, diseases were the primary cause of the "downfall" of native americans.
Really, I didn't know it was disease that forced the U.S. government to break damn near every treaty they ever made with Indian tribes.
I doubt you can show me a link were there is a U.S. president STATING that we must kill all native Americans.
Nah, they didn't say it, they just went and forced tribes off their lands (Trail of Tears) and forced them to convert to Christianity.
The Spaniards weren't very nice to native americans either.
And...? 1) the U.S. wasn't run by Spaniards and 2) I don't see to many Spaniards riding around on high horses, bleating about being a beacon of rights and democracy while ignoring their own very dirty hands.
While creationists and christian fundamentalists annoy the hell out of of me, they aren't killing me because I don't hold the same beliefs as them. I can't say the same for Islamic fundamentalist and other middle-eastern fundamentalist movements.
Yes, because when Christians kill people - mudering abortion doctors, killing homosexuals, assasinations and civil wars, genocide in the Balkans and in Rawanda - it's never because they are Christians, it's for other reasons. Whereas when people who happen to be Muslim kill people, it's always because of their religion, never for other reasons.
Ask yourself this: I the Arab world is so concerned about the welfare of the Palestinian people, why did they turn them away when they needed places to go after their fellow Arabs turned them out? I know, you won't actually think about that, since it goes against your bigoted beliefs, but the world would be better off if the real facts were known.
For the same reason the U.S. doesn't let just anyone into its borders? Why should other Arab countries make up for Palistinian land stolen by Zionists? Any more bullshit Zionist propoganda you'd like to share with us today?
That's not to say Hezbollah is blameless, their idiotic soldier-kidnapping stunts caused the war, although the response was completely absurd compared to their response in the past.
They wanted to use the soldiers in a prisoner trade, for Arabs kidnapped by the Israelies. Opps, I'm sorry, I forget when the Isrealies do it, it's called "arresting", not "kidnapping". Much like when they assassinate suspected militants and bomb houses, it's "appropriate military action" rather than "terrorism".
Separating Zionism, Judaism and Jews in the minds of non-Jews is a great accomplishment by the anti-semitic (for the absence of a better word) propaganda.
Wow, way to take the truth and spin it 180 degrees into straight bullshit. The truth of the matter is that equating any criticism of Israel or Zionist expansion with anti-semitism is the greatest success the Zionists have had with their propoganda.
You need to know very little about Judaism to understand how inseparable the land, the faith and the people really are.
Too damn bad for them. Holy sites are every bit as important to Muslims as they are to Jews, and modern Muslims were there long before modern Jews were. Furthermore, the Gypsies were slaghtered with equal enthusiasm by the Nazies, why don't they get a nation of their own? Starting with whatever neighborhood you happen to live in?
So far every time we hear about "anti-Zionism", it usually boils down to killing Jews in the end.
Stop listening to bullshit neoconservative propoganda and maybe you wont hear that anymore.
You have links to back this stuff up? I've long been a supporter of the Palistinians, but it would be nice to have more info of how the founding of Israel was bogus in the first place.
We're now well into the third, sometimes fourth generation of people who have made it their home, irrigated it, built their cities and lives here in the face of tremendous adversity.
There are plenty of Palistinains who still have keys to the houses they were forced out of. And the cause of all that "tremendous adversity" is the formation of Israel and the Israelies themselves.
I double-dare you to walk into this country and try 'n' move 'm.
Moving them at this point would be a bloody waste of time, literally. What should be done is the return of the 1967 borders, real water rights for a Palistinian state, reparations made to the Palistinians, and Right of Return for refugees to return to the homes they were forced out of. Until this happens, Israel will not have, nor will it deserve, security.
At some point, I personally just gave up. It's impossible to get the facts
If you're too damn lazy to do 2 seconds of Googling, maybe.
Take the question "Were WMDs found in Iraq?". The answer is, not the WMDs that were promised, not the massive stockpiles and the laboratories, not the nuclear weapons, but there were some short-range chemical and biological warheads found.
No, there were no WMD's found, period. If there was, don't you think the Bush Administration would have been crowing about it from the rooftops years ago? There were some old stocks found, but chemical and biological weapons degrade over time. A drop of gas that might have killed you in 1985 might give you a rash in 2002. It's not a weapon of mass destruction if it's incapable of causing mass destruction. But even if they had found a dozen new sarin gas warheads under a sand dune after the Iraq invasion, it wouldn't change a thing. The rational for the invasion was not the possiblity that Iraq might have some WMD's, but that they possessed so many and were so close to getting a nuke, that we had no choice but to invade.
That's true in a court of law, but why should it be true in the court of public opinion, or for that matter, how does it enter into what is or is not right?
Because it makes a huge amount of real world difference, as any boob would know. There is a night and day difference between Be trying to sign OEM's to exclusive contracts and Microsoft doing the same. What is just plain compeditive behavior when you're one player in a compeditive market becomes anti-comeditive behavior when you're a monopoly.
Are you proposing that we should accept bad behavior from Apple simply because they are not a monopoly?
First, I'd be more impressed if this inane analogy wasn't trotted out just for Apple discussions. Secondly, I'd also be more impressed by this argument if Apple was actually in the wrong. And usually, like right now, they aren't. Apple currently has 0% cell phone marketshare. You want an open phone, then don't frikkin buy an iPhone. It's that simple. Go get a Treo or something. If Apple gets 95% marketshare, and developers have little to no choice in developing for the iPhone, then we'll talk.
Finally, I always find the group-think of Slashdotters who accuse others of pro-Apple group-think, reguardless of the story or the comments. Like when Apple removed all Wiley books from Apple Stores after they released iCon, you still had "now if this were Microsoft..." trolls popping up despite the fact that many of the highly rated comments said that Jobs was a consumate asshole.
Microsoft is a convicted monopolist when it comes to PC operating systems, not everything they make. For example, the XBox is a fancy computer that's heavily locked down like the iPhone, but Microsoft gets a free pass with it for the most part. What's your point?
Because they use one of their products as leverage to boost another product, obviously. It's how they became a monopoly in the first place, along with giving discounts to OEM's who would ship all their computers with Windows. And once they have a monopoly with one product, their actions with other products deserve more scrutiny - obviously.
I'm not interested. Microsoft locks you out of your computer a tiny bit with TCPA and everyone screams. Apple locks you out of a computer and iFanboys make endless excuses for Apple.
Every time Apple does something somebody doesn't like, some yahoo has to pop in with a lame "now if this were Microsoft, you'd all be up in arms" completely forgetting that Microsoft is a convicted monopolist, and convicted monopolists are held to a much higher standard.
Right, so: In order to defend your Right to Profit, we're all expected to let you do whatever the fuck you want to do
Straw man.
If you don't like the rules, don't play the fucking game.
The game is rigged, jackass. Shop owners aren't wanting to get away with "whatever the fuck" they want to do, they just want to take entirely reasonable measures to protect themselves since they have to eat the cost of any fraudulent transactions. If Visa/Mastercard don't like this, then they can assume part of the risk, or go fuck themselves. And until you've given up your means of employment, been the victim of identity theft, or been a shop owner and lost a few thousand dollars on stolen credit cards because the credit card company wouldn't let you check for id's, you can join them.
contagious diseases depend upon population density.
Bad analogy. There are more Mac and Linux boxes now than there were Windows machines when the first Windows viruses came out, so there's more than a critical mass for malware. No, the amount of malware depends on the design decisions that were made for the operating system, not based on how much marketshare it has.
What's unreasonable is that people like you think that it's okay to break your word because it's too hard to keep it.
Bullshit. If you own a small business, say a shop of some kind that depends on drop in customers, you have no choice but to support either Visa or Mastercard. And you also have no choice in terms because both groups offer the same sort of contracts. And if there is a chargeback, you, as the merchant, have no choice but to eat all of the cost. It is in no way unreasonable to break totally unreasonable terms of a contract made under duress. If Visa/Mastercard refuse to let merchants check for ID, then they should eat part of the cost of fraudulent transactions.
If you want to pissed at anyone, be pissed at Visa/Mastercard for being a cartel. Be pissed at them for trying to prevent merchants from taking simple steps to protect themselves without taking on any of the risk. Or, put it another way: how many movies have you seen where the hero heroically stands up to the little guy?
Let me know what businesses you own so I can avoid them.
I own a large multinational corporation that fronts many businesses around the world. Coincidently, the corporation owns a controlling interest in every store within 100 miles of where you live. Feel free not to shop at any of them. Asshole.
Still nice, but far from a killer feature. To be clear, I meant it to mean a prime motivator for a significant number of buyers. I wonder if anyone took a survey of people asking if they were excited about the iPhone and if so, what about it excited them. I doubt more than a few percent would have said visual voicemail.
Even if you get a normal amount of messages, I suspect visual voicemail is going to be one of those features that once you get used to, you never want to go back. Sort of like how your 15" monitor was just fine in 2002, but now that you have a 24" widescreen lcd you couldn't imagine going back. Or if you live in a cold climate and get used to having an auto-start in your car....
Why is it that living up to a signed contract is such a big deal these days?
Because you have no choice but to sign one of those contracts, and you have no choice in contracts, dumbass. Unless you consider going out of business and declaring bankruptcy to be a valid choice.
Asking you to abide by terms of a contract you signed, is an unreasonable thing?
It is if the contract is totally unreasonable and you have to either sign the contract of go out of business.
Both of those things are a violation of your agreement, you can't require ID and you can't arbitrarily refuse my card. Why is it so hard to live up to what you've agreed to?
Because it's virtually impossible to survive as a business without accepting credit cards, and if all credit cards have the same bs terms....
Just one general comment: Anyone who talks about "credit card companies" doesn't know what they're talking about.
Um, no. Are they companies? Yes. Are they offering credit cards? Yes. So...they're frikkin credit card companies. More so since all credit card companies might be banks, but not all banks offer credit cards, anymore than all banks offer brokerage services or insurance.
Visual voicemail a killer feature? You're the first person I've seen get excited about it.
Must not know many people who get a lot of voicemail then.