Most Libertarians I've spoken with do NOT think citizens should be able to have their own nuclear weapons, as such weapons are not defensive in nature.
Any argument you make for weapon X I can make for nukes. It's only a question of scale. How is a rifle any more defensive than a nuke?
The typical Libertarian response to any sort of weapon argument is, "who are YOU to decide whether I can own weapon X or not?" I need my nuke to protect myself against government corruption.
If you don't think nukes should be allowed, then exactly how should it be defined what is allowed and what isn't? Oh, you mean, we need weapon control laws?
I notice you didn't comment on the nuke issue. It's insightful because these are idiotic things that Libertarians believe. I didn't even get into some of the wackier ones I've heard.
Do you really think it would be in the interest of either society or the private FD (who will obviously be employed on a contractual basis) to let fires spread ? Do you think a company that doesn't do its job will get paid ?
You don't get it. Many Libertarians think that fire departments should be COMPLETELY paid by private citizens. That means that if no one in a poor neighborhood as fire protection, the fire continues to burn, and can grow OUT OF CONTROL, heading into the neighborhoods that did pay for it. It's stupid to not just put out a fire as soon as possible, wherever it occurs.
You're only attacking the lib't party but not offering an alternative. What is the alternative - what you see today in the USA
Ah yes, the ol' "ANYTHING has to be better than what we have now!!" argument. Well, anything is NOT better than what we have now, certainly not the Libertarians, because they have no common sense.
I like a lot of the Libertarian's ideas, but they are incapable of seeing past the fact that society doesn't reduce easily to their gross oversimplifications.
One of the reasons I've never been able to even consider a Libertarian are some of the, frankly, wacky beliefs that many Libertarians hold, such as that private citizens should be able to have their own nuclear weapons (obviously a bad idea), completely private fire departments (fires SPREAD), etc.
First, do you believe in this sort of "purity", and if not, how can the Libertarian Party distance themselves from these people in order show yourselves as more practical? Right now, I think Libertarians are seen as ivory tower-ites who worship at altars of theory, while ignoring real world practicality.
Nope, absolutely untrue. I was there and remember it vividly. After Star Wars proved so popular, he announced that he was going to make it nine movies, then later changed it to six. It was never the plan to make a trilogy, much less prequels.
I posted this the last time this subject came up, but it's so funny that it deserves repeating. JK Rowling's hilarious offhand comment about George Lucas:
Q: Will there be a book about Harry's Mum and Dad, about how they became friends and how they died?
A: So it would be "Harry Potter: Episode One". [Laughter]. No, but a lot of people have asked that. It is all George Lucas's fault. You won't need a prequel; by the time I am finished, you will know enough. I think it would be shamelessly exploitative to do that. I am sure that Mr Lucas is doing it only for artistic reasons, but in my case I think that by the time you have had the seven books you will know everything you need to know for the story.
I wasn't even really speaking of the Democrat party, I was speaking of leftists. The subject was Michael Moore, after all. The radical leftists sabotage the Democratic party. The people in the party are (usually, but not always) smart enough to not go overboard in their rhetoric.
Look at any of the recent political posts on Slashdot, and read some of the idiocy against Bush. People accuse Bush of EVERYTHING. I mean, stupid stuff, like he only invaded Iraq for the oil, so he could make money in some grand conspiracy.
Hell, look at Michael Moore's own idiocy, where he throws out innuendo that some tenuous tie to bin Laden's family means that Bush is somehow responsible for bin Laden's actions.
It's obvious stupidity like that that alienates the middle.
I can't prove this, but I highly suspect that Michael Moore has gained Bush more votes than he has cost him.
People generally hate obviously unfair propaganda. Michael Moore has done more damage to the left than anything the GOP could have done.
What I always find interesting about the left is how they sabatage themselves. Look at all the ridiculous things they say about Bush... comparing him to Hitler, saying that he's out to kill as many people as possible, that he wants to poison everyone, on and on. I remember exactly the same thing happening with Reagan. The things they were saying about him were insane. (Literally, saying things like, "He WANTS a nuclear war!!").
The left seems to do this far more than the right. The naive left starts believing all this weird crap and alienates the middle. Of course, the GOP has the religious right spouting weird nonsense, but not nearly to the degree that the left does.
Microsoft: "Let's add a browser to the operating system."
Netscape: "But that would put us out of business!"
----
Apple: "Your O/S license is hereby yanked."
Clones: "But that would put us out of business!"
----
Repeat with AT&T, IBM, Standard Oil, Newspapers, employment offshoring, or anything else that puts people out of business.
Am I the only one who thinks its utterly bizarre that we have so many people on Slashdot who mindlessly think that putting someone out of business is always a good thing? Do these people not have jobs?
And you know what REALLY pisses me off? When the computer magazines I read come with computer ads. And when I read Slashdot, I get geek ads. How dare they presume to know what I like and target ads at me?
[end sarcasm]
If I'm going to read ads anyway, I'd personally rather have them actually be interesting rather than be about, say, feminine hygiene products.
Sure, marketing people never get carried away. I'm sure that all the drivvle to come from Dell, Gateway, NVidia, ATI, VIA, AMD, Intel, and Microsoft is perfectly accurate, and never EVER stretches anything.
Sure, other companies stretch things. But NO ONE flat out lies like Apple. "Twice as fast" ring any bells? They used the word "unparalled", implying that they are better than everyone else. That is a flat-out lie.
Please find me a marketing quote from one of those other companies that lie as much as Apple lies. They usually say something like, "Great performance at a great price". No one lies like Apple.
The last 20 minutes of A.I. are incredibly misunderstood. What's key to understand that is that it was/not/ a happy ending per se. Monica did not come back to life -- the advanced robots created Monica and lied to David, so that he could resolve his programming.
Watch the ending again from that point of view and question what exactly "compassion" means when one set of robots do that for another robot.
Well, to put this in context, since Kieren O'Shaughnessy says Linux doesn't exist, IBM lawyers should respond to all the lawsuits as 'What Linux?'
Amusing post, but you missed the entire point. SCO's response to that would be:
SCO: "Your honor, since IBM has now admitted that Linux does not exist, and thus have now admitted that only SCO's Unix exists, we request an immediate judgment in our favor."
Judge (looking at IBM's lawyers like they're idiots): "So ordered."
As if she's all high and mightier than Lucas. Its been out in the public since the late 70s that Lucas envisioned the Star Wars saga to consist of AT LEAST 9 films. He had first said 12, and then scaled it back to 9. At the beginning of the Prequels, he pared that down to 6 because he didn't think he had it in him to do 6 more Star Wars movies. So the whole idea of extra Star Wars movies in addition to the original 3 is not something new so JKR has nothing to scoff at.
Oh, please. I was there, you were clearly not. George Lucas did NOT conceive of Star Wars as more than one film. And he NEVER has mentioned 12 (WTF?). After Star Wars came out, he announced that he was going to do nine movies and renamed the original to "episode 4". Later on, he decided not to do the sequels, but just the prequels.
Lord knows that she wouldn't even have this successful series without Star Wars being out before it.
Now you have truly gone off the deep end into insanity. Are you seriously suggesting that George Lucas invented fantasy??
Q: Will there be a book about Harry's Mum and Dad, about how they became friends and how they died?
A: So it would be "Harry Potter: Episode One". [Laughter]. No, but a lot of people have asked that. It is all George Lucas's fault. You won't need a prequel; by the time I am finished, you will know enough. I think it would be shamelessly exploitative to do that. I am sure that Mr Lucas is doing it only for artistic reasons, but in my case I think that by the time you have had the seven books you will know everything you need to know for the story.
My favorite for these will always be the Japanese Department Store that crucified Santa Clause. Unfortunately, it's probably an urban legend. But it's one of those things that's so good it should be true...
Show me what has been stolen if I copy a song I was not going to pay for regardless? You cant.
Two things to say about this.
1) You took something of value, that obviously had value for you (since you copied it). You just didn't like the price, or the effort it would have taken to pay for it. So to say you wouldn't pay for it is wrong. If you want it, then you'd have been willing to pay some amount of money for it, if you were forced to. It's just the fact that you're able to steal it with no repercussions.
In any case, it doesn't matter what YOU personally do (which I don't believe anyway, but I digress), it's what everyone does on the average, and an emormous number of people do download music that they would otherwise buy for full price.
2) This whole argument is irrelevent. The point is that the person who CREATED THE WORK doesn't want you to copy it. It's intrinsically immoral to say "F*** YOU" to the artist and take their work when they specifically tell you not to.
Just out of curiosity, do you think the GPL should also be unenforceable and that Microsoft should be able take anything they want from the Open Source community?
You'll teach your kids that it's okay to break the law, steal music and rip-off the work of others?
Oooookay.
Personally, I teach my kids to respect other people's property, and respect their wishes. No one says you have to listen to copyrighted music or watch copyrighted movies. If you don't like the copyright that's on it, then don't listen to it.
Yeah, yeah, I know. Morality is so last century. It's the age of "I should be able to do what I want even if it hurts others, especially when I can do it and no one will catch me."
I'm not going to go through that point-by-point (In fact, I'm pissed at myself for letting myself post in the first place), but you're a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Your views are incredibly ignorant and one-sided.
Here's just one thing to ponder. Can you really, really not see the potential benefits of a free Iraq? The potential of having a free country in the middle of that region is unbelievable. If there will ever be a World War 3, it will begin in the middle east, and we may have just changed history enough to prevent it.
I usually pass these kind of comments by, but for some reason I'm motivated to post. And this is absolutely non-partisan.
Do you realize how ignorant those sort of statements make you look? And I would say the same thing to someone making the same statement about Kerry.
The surest sign of political ignorance and naivete is the "anyone but [blank]" statement. It's so obvious that you have no clue about the issues and their complexities. Every policy -- and everything Bush has done so far -- has positives and negatives. The fact that you can so stridently be against Bush means that you are not looking at big picture.
Stop listening only to the Moore-ites and their ilk and think for yourself.
Rings fly out of the engine and they aren't too worried? They think rings may be loose but they expect them to squash down to interference fit again? Words fail me.
This is why Carmack is flying real, honest-to-goodness rockets (did you see how stable that thing was before the failure?) and you're not.
Apparently you think the whole train should stop every time something goes wrong. He obviously knew it was a problem, and probably had ideas for the next generation of engines to take care of it. But he decided to take a risk that it was a problem they could test around, so they could gain more knowledge.
No one's life was put at risk, here. It's called incremental improvement... continue testing, learn new things, improve the next generation.
Frankly, the whole "we must figure out every single damn variable and do one test a year" thinking is what's holding us back. Why run endless simulations when you can launch the damn rocket and see what happens and get REAL data?
How do you think that a small, part-time staff with one genius has been able to do so much more than the supposed "professionals"? It's through the mentality of try lots of things, do lots of REAL testing, launch REAL rockets, and see what happens.
Sheesh, man, are you saying stupid mistakes never happen to "professional" people? *cough*metric/english conversion*cough*
Did you see how dead stable that rocket was going up into the air? That was an amazing achievement for a group of part-time people.
Sure, it's easy to criticize after the fact, but there is no complex system that doesn't suffer from the occasional stupid mistake. It's in the nature of human beings to not be able to catch every obvious thing. There are far too many details.
Slashdot Mirror
Most Libertarians I've spoken with do NOT think citizens should be able to have their own nuclear weapons, as such weapons are not defensive in nature.
Any argument you make for weapon X I can make for nukes. It's only a question of scale. How is a rifle any more defensive than a nuke?
The typical Libertarian response to any sort of weapon argument is, "who are YOU to decide whether I can own weapon X or not?" I need my nuke to protect myself against government corruption.
If you don't think nukes should be allowed, then exactly how should it be defined what is allowed and what isn't? Oh, you mean, we need weapon control laws?
I notice you didn't comment on the nuke issue. It's insightful because these are idiotic things that Libertarians believe. I didn't even get into some of the wackier ones I've heard.
Do you really think it would be in the interest of either society or the private FD (who will obviously be employed on a contractual basis) to let fires spread ? Do you think a company that doesn't do its job will get paid ?
You don't get it. Many Libertarians think that fire departments should be COMPLETELY paid by private citizens. That means that if no one in a poor neighborhood as fire protection, the fire continues to burn, and can grow OUT OF CONTROL, heading into the neighborhoods that did pay for it. It's stupid to not just put out a fire as soon as possible, wherever it occurs.
You're only attacking the lib't party but not offering an alternative. What is the alternative - what you see today in the USA
Ah yes, the ol' "ANYTHING has to be better than what we have now!!" argument. Well, anything is NOT better than what we have now, certainly not the Libertarians, because they have no common sense.
I like a lot of the Libertarian's ideas, but they are incapable of seeing past the fact that society doesn't reduce easily to their gross oversimplifications.
First, do you believe in this sort of "purity", and if not, how can the Libertarian Party distance themselves from these people in order show yourselves as more practical? Right now, I think Libertarians are seen as ivory tower-ites who worship at altars of theory, while ignoring real world practicality.
Nope, absolutely untrue. I was there and remember it vividly. After Star Wars proved so popular, he announced that he was going to make it nine movies, then later changed it to six. It was never the plan to make a trilogy, much less prequels.
Q: Will there be a book about Harry's Mum and Dad, about how they became friends and how they died?
A: So it would be "Harry Potter: Episode One". [Laughter]. No, but a lot of people have asked that. It is all George Lucas's fault. You won't need a prequel; by the time I am finished, you will know enough. I think it would be shamelessly exploitative to do that. I am sure that Mr Lucas is doing it only for artistic reasons, but in my case I think that by the time you have had the seven books you will know everything you need to know for the story.
"Artist reasons" -- She is hilarious.
Right next to the checkbox for, "I'd like to apply for a Darwin Award."
Look at any of the recent political posts on Slashdot, and read some of the idiocy against Bush. People accuse Bush of EVERYTHING. I mean, stupid stuff, like he only invaded Iraq for the oil, so he could make money in some grand conspiracy.
Hell, look at Michael Moore's own idiocy, where he throws out innuendo that some tenuous tie to bin Laden's family means that Bush is somehow responsible for bin Laden's actions.
It's obvious stupidity like that that alienates the middle.
People generally hate obviously unfair propaganda. Michael Moore has done more damage to the left than anything the GOP could have done.
What I always find interesting about the left is how they sabatage themselves. Look at all the ridiculous things they say about Bush... comparing him to Hitler, saying that he's out to kill as many people as possible, that he wants to poison everyone, on and on. I remember exactly the same thing happening with Reagan. The things they were saying about him were insane. (Literally, saying things like, "He WANTS a nuclear war!!").
The left seems to do this far more than the right. The naive left starts believing all this weird crap and alienates the middle. Of course, the GOP has the religious right spouting weird nonsense, but not nearly to the degree that the left does.
Netscape: "But that would put us out of business!"
----
Apple: "Your O/S license is hereby yanked."
Clones: "But that would put us out of business!"
----
Repeat with AT&T, IBM, Standard Oil, Newspapers, employment offshoring, or anything else that puts people out of business.
Am I the only one who thinks its utterly bizarre that we have so many people on Slashdot who mindlessly think that putting someone out of business is always a good thing? Do these people not have jobs?
[end sarcasm]
If I'm going to read ads anyway, I'd personally rather have them actually be interesting rather than be about, say, feminine hygiene products.
Sure, other companies stretch things. But NO ONE flat out lies like Apple. "Twice as fast" ring any bells? They used the word "unparalled", implying that they are better than everyone else. That is a flat-out lie.
Please find me a marketing quote from one of those other companies that lie as much as Apple lies. They usually say something like, "Great performance at a great price". No one lies like Apple.
Watch the ending again from that point of view and question what exactly "compassion" means when one set of robots do that for another robot.
They didn't say that the software didn't exist, they said that LINUX doesn't exist.
Amusing post, but you missed the entire point. SCO's response to that would be:
SCO: "Your honor, since IBM has now admitted that Linux does not exist, and thus have now admitted that only SCO's Unix exists, we request an immediate judgment in our favor."
Judge (looking at IBM's lawyers like they're idiots): "So ordered."
Oh, please. I was there, you were clearly not. George Lucas did NOT conceive of Star Wars as more than one film. And he NEVER has mentioned 12 (WTF?). After Star Wars came out, he announced that he was going to do nine movies and renamed the original to "episode 4". Later on, he decided not to do the sequels, but just the prequels.
Lord knows that she wouldn't even have this successful series without Star Wars being out before it.
Now you have truly gone off the deep end into insanity. Are you seriously suggesting that George Lucas invented fantasy??
Oops. corrected link.
Q: Will there be a book about Harry's Mum and Dad, about how they became friends and how they died?
A: So it would be "Harry Potter: Episode One". [Laughter]. No, but a lot of people have asked that. It is all George Lucas's fault. You won't need a prequel; by the time I am finished, you will know enough. I think it would be shamelessly exploitative to do that. I am sure that Mr Lucas is doing it only for artistic reasons, but in my case I think that by the time you have had the seven books you will know everything you need to know for the story.
"Artist reasons" -- LOL. I love JKR.
My favorite for these will always be the Japanese Department Store that crucified Santa Clause. Unfortunately, it's probably an urban legend. But it's one of those things that's so good it should be true...
Two things to say about this.
1) You took something of value, that obviously had value for you (since you copied it). You just didn't like the price, or the effort it would have taken to pay for it. So to say you wouldn't pay for it is wrong. If you want it, then you'd have been willing to pay some amount of money for it, if you were forced to. It's just the fact that you're able to steal it with no repercussions. In any case, it doesn't matter what YOU personally do (which I don't believe anyway, but I digress), it's what everyone does on the average, and an emormous number of people do download music that they would otherwise buy for full price.
2) This whole argument is irrelevent. The point is that the person who CREATED THE WORK doesn't want you to copy it. It's intrinsically immoral to say "F*** YOU" to the artist and take their work when they specifically tell you not to.
Just out of curiosity, do you think the GPL should also be unenforceable and that Microsoft should be able take anything they want from the Open Source community?
Oooookay.
Personally, I teach my kids to respect other people's property, and respect their wishes. No one says you have to listen to copyrighted music or watch copyrighted movies. If you don't like the copyright that's on it, then don't listen to it.
Yeah, yeah, I know. Morality is so last century. It's the age of "I should be able to do what I want even if it hurts others, especially when I can do it and no one will catch me."
No, I said my point was non-partisan, and it is. If you think an administration is all negative or all positive, then you are ignorant.
"Moore-ites and their ilk". Yup, absolutely non-partisan!
If you have any positive feelings toward Michael Moore and/or his movie, then you are by definition politically ignorant and naive.
I have my issues with Bush, but Moore is an atrocity to the whole concept of truth and honesty.
Here's just one thing to ponder. Can you really, really not see the potential benefits of a free Iraq? The potential of having a free country in the middle of that region is unbelievable. If there will ever be a World War 3, it will begin in the middle east, and we may have just changed history enough to prevent it.
Do you realize how ignorant those sort of statements make you look? And I would say the same thing to someone making the same statement about Kerry.
The surest sign of political ignorance and naivete is the "anyone but [blank]" statement. It's so obvious that you have no clue about the issues and their complexities. Every policy -- and everything Bush has done so far -- has positives and negatives. The fact that you can so stridently be against Bush means that you are not looking at big picture.
Stop listening only to the Moore-ites and their ilk and think for yourself.
This is why Carmack is flying real, honest-to-goodness rockets (did you see how stable that thing was before the failure?) and you're not.
Apparently you think the whole train should stop every time something goes wrong. He obviously knew it was a problem, and probably had ideas for the next generation of engines to take care of it. But he decided to take a risk that it was a problem they could test around, so they could gain more knowledge.
No one's life was put at risk, here. It's called incremental improvement ... continue testing, learn new things, improve the next generation.
Frankly, the whole "we must figure out every single damn variable and do one test a year" thinking is what's holding us back. Why run endless simulations when you can launch the damn rocket and see what happens and get REAL data?
How do you think that a small, part-time staff with one genius has been able to do so much more than the supposed "professionals"? It's through the mentality of try lots of things, do lots of REAL testing, launch REAL rockets, and see what happens.
Did you see how dead stable that rocket was going up into the air? That was an amazing achievement for a group of part-time people.
Sure, it's easy to criticize after the fact, but there is no complex system that doesn't suffer from the occasional stupid mistake. It's in the nature of human beings to not be able to catch every obvious thing. There are far too many details.