Maybe we should think a little bit more about what it really means for news and information to be "unbiased". The most you can do to avoid "bias" is to present an unfiltered stream of disconnected facts and events, devoid of interpretation and historical context. You cannot reach any coherent understanding of the meaning and importance of things without some organized framework with which to interpret them, and that immediately implies bias.
That's why most of the "unbiased" mass media in the U.S. has devolved into little more than uncritical "he says / she says" reportage that conveys no real understanding of what's going on, or how it reflects a bigger picture. If you want a deeper understanding, it's surely better to sample the different interpretations (biases) you can find and synthesize something out of that.
The rest of us belive that NPR is liberal due to it's liberal bias, not its intellectual content.
And anything that promotes understanding of anyone or anything outside your own narrow experience is "liberal bias", right? If Mom didn't serve it, it ain't food. Give me some specific examples of what you consider to be liberal bias on NPR, and I'll bet that's exactly what it boils down to.
This is a common charge coming from conservatives, and I've always been puzzled by it. It would be interesting to sit with you through a few episodes of Morning Edition or All Things Considered, simply to learn what specifically you are finding there that you consider to be "liberal bias". You might learn something from such an exercise yourself.
In my experience, conservatives are quick to cite as "biased" any information or insight suggesting that the world is a larger and more diverse place than the little cultural boxes they grew up in, especially if presented in a nonjudgemental way. Stories about the lives and problems of migrant farm workers, or families with no medical insurance, or teenagers in Afghanistan... merely touching subjects like these is indicative of "liberal bias", isn't it? All the more so if any deeper understanding is actually communicated. If that's the real crime (and I suspect that it is), then indeed NPR is guiltier of it than most other news outlets.
I was thinking along those lines as well. It's likely that the people at the top have very mixed feelings about agents communicating via email. Part of that certainly has to do with secrecy and accountability, but they may also be worried about potentially subverting the chain of command. There are always people in any organization who build their power around hoarding information and controlling its flow.
Not to beat a dead horse, but after 9/11 it came out that there were FBI field agents who were going nuts about groups of Saudi immigrants learning to fly commercial airliners (and skipping the "landing" part). Alarm bells went up the chain of command, and all it probably took was one person near the top to silence the issue. Was that person incompetent, or was a conscious decision made to let the plot continue? That's one for the conspiracy theorists, but it's likely that if there was a more robust communications network things would have worked out much differently.
Google's minimalist, to-the-point search page is one of the things I like best about it. I wonder how successful they would have been if it was as busy and cluttered as most of the others?
What I was doing was simply pointing out calling censorship "right-wing Republican bullshit" is just being ignorant; your left-wing heroes are notorious for free speech violations.
My left-wing heroes? You mean Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot? So who's drawing your caricatures of "the left" for you these days - Rush? O'Reilly? Puleeeze.
I'm an American and it's my solemn duty as a citizen to oppose incipient tyranny in America first and foremost. The fact that you can find historical figures in the world that were arguably greater evils than what the Republican party is serving up in the U.S. today is irrelevant.
I was looking for a laptop on Ebay a while back and it's true that the ones that come with a recent version of Windows cost more than those that come with no OS at all (which is what I was looking for, since I planned to install Linux on it). The problem was that the "clean disk" laptops were few and far between; I finally settled for one running an older version of Windows that bidders weren't willing to pay a premium for. Of course, I would never trust any OS that came installed on a used laptop, so it's going to get wiped regardless.
It's not necessarily just the low end of the market that can get picked off this way, either. Corporate and institutional customers of proprietary software are subject to very intrusive audits by vendors and the BSA (Business Software Alliance), often with expensive outcomes. A couple of those and you'd be negligent not to consider FOSS alternatives.
I don't recall anyone here defending or excusing the tyrants that you mention here. The fact that you cite them as Bush's peers speaks volumes, though. Maybe it's you that needs to re-examine the worthiness of your heroes.
If you don't like the rules, then contact your congressman or congresswoman.
I've always liked that argument. In fact, I'd love to get the chance to repeat it to you the day they finally get around to hauling your sorry ass away on some idiotic pretext. Oh, you think that being a bootlicking sycophant to the authority of the hour is all the protection you'll ever need? You think you can always land on the winning side of every issue? Well, good luck with that.
I know, and it's depressing. The repubs are like the bully down the street that beats up the little kids on the block and steals their lunch money, and (most of) the dems are the older kids who watch in dismay but do nothing but offer their sympathy afterwards.
It just might cause an ad broker to pop a relavent one in front of me leading to buy something and boost my quality of life.
I often try to increase my quality of life by buying stuff, but usually my purchases fail to do so in any meaningful sense, or for any significant length of time. A friend of mine claims that I will never find happiness this way, and should seek other ways to improve the quality of my life. He is a Buddhist, though, and I am an American. I am also a consumer, and what is my destiny if not to consume? Clearly if I am consuming and yet remain unfulfilled, my failure must be in the consuming itself. My other friends, who are Americans and not Buddhists, suggest that I am perhaps not buying enough stuff, and that if I strive to consume more I can eventually find happiness. Perhaps these "targeted ads" of which you speak are just the thing to show me the way to more and better consumption?
Given their history of suing friend and foe alike, were I an IT executive I think I'd be a little nervous about doing business with SCO (or allowing their software on any of my servers)...
There is an obvious difference: stealing a CD deprives the store of a physical object they bought and owned. Copying data deprives no one of anything.
(Arguing with myself here...) It does diminish the market value of that CD, however, which is why it may feel like theft to the producer and the store owner. On the other hand, so would competition. You could argue that because prices of CDs are determined by a cartel and not a competitive market, the existence of unauthorized copying merely brings (average) prices more into line with what they "should" be in the absence of the cartel.
For better or worse, consumer expectations and perceptions of value have changed. Many people now expect to be able to have access to (and an awareness of) a wide range of music, something that simply isn't feasible if it costs $18 a pop to check out every new or unfamiliar artist. This broadened consumer awareness and choice is something greatly feared by studios that base their success on being able to predict (and to a large extent control) what will be a "hit" and should therefore be locked up under contract.
Way too many people just assume that the government (or some other 3rd party) will protect them from fraud on the net, which IMHO is just plain foolish.
These days, it's foolish to expect the government to protect you from anything, unless you're paying into the campaign funds of the "right" people...
The snow in Buffalo falls mainly in the... "Southtowns". That's where the lake effect snow comes off of Lake Erie, and they get absolutely dumped on every winter. Several good ski resorts there, though, so it's very nice if you're into that sort of thing. They're also pretty good at removing the stuff from their roads; I've seen 4 inches of snow cause more panic in D.C. than two feet in Springville, NY.
I grew up in Buffalo and still visit occasionally. You're right: The place really does potentially have a lot going for it. Unfortunately, it also has city and county governments that have not been able to hunker down and make the decisions that need to be made to overcome its problems and get things moving in some coherent direction.
It's sad, really, because 100 years ago Buffalo was arguably the most technologically advanced major city in the U.S., largely because of its proximity to hydroelectricity from Niagara Falls, Great Lakes shipping routes, and the Erie Canal. A lot of industry built up there for those reasons, and unfortunately the area has thus suffered disproportionately during America's industrial decline. They still have the Niagara riverfront and the Erie lakefront, though, and if they can transform those resources (like some other rustbelt cities have done), there may be hope for them yet. Or so I'd like to think.
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That's why most of the "unbiased" mass media in the U.S. has devolved into little more than uncritical "he says / she says" reportage that conveys no real understanding of what's going on, or how it reflects a bigger picture. If you want a deeper understanding, it's surely better to sample the different interpretations (biases) you can find and synthesize something out of that.
And anything that promotes understanding of anyone or anything outside your own narrow experience is "liberal bias", right? If Mom didn't serve it, it ain't food. Give me some specific examples of what you consider to be liberal bias on NPR, and I'll bet that's exactly what it boils down to.
This is a common charge coming from conservatives, and I've always been puzzled by it. It would be interesting to sit with you through a few episodes of Morning Edition or All Things Considered, simply to learn what specifically you are finding there that you consider to be "liberal bias". You might learn something from such an exercise yourself.
In my experience, conservatives are quick to cite as "biased" any information or insight suggesting that the world is a larger and more diverse place than the little cultural boxes they grew up in, especially if presented in a nonjudgemental way. Stories about the lives and problems of migrant farm workers, or families with no medical insurance, or teenagers in Afghanistan... merely touching subjects like these is indicative of "liberal bias", isn't it? All the more so if any deeper understanding is actually communicated. If that's the real crime (and I suspect that it is), then indeed NPR is guiltier of it than most other news outlets.
That's because its leaders (and their supporters) are mentally retarded children who respond in the same way, regardless of simulus...
Note added in proof: Just after posting the parent, I went over to Google news and found this. It will be interesting to see where it all goes.
Not to beat a dead horse, but after 9/11 it came out that there were FBI field agents who were going nuts about groups of Saudi immigrants learning to fly commercial airliners (and skipping the "landing" part). Alarm bells went up the chain of command, and all it probably took was one person near the top to silence the issue. Was that person incompetent, or was a conscious decision made to let the plot continue? That's one for the conspiracy theorists, but it's likely that if there was a more robust communications network things would have worked out much differently.
Me too, but unless there's something you really need in FC5, why bother? FC4 isn't going to stop working on you.
Google's minimalist, to-the-point search page is one of the things I like best about it. I wonder how successful they would have been if it was as busy and cluttered as most of the others?
The latest and greatest on a dialup connection, no less...
Imagine that. Wanting their phone to act like a phone. They sound like perfectly intelligent people to me...
I don't even see how that's possible. They must've been throwing some pretty good parties for the dev team...
My left-wing heroes? You mean Stalin and Mao and Pol Pot? So who's drawing your caricatures of "the left" for you these days - Rush? O'Reilly? Puleeeze.
I'm an American and it's my solemn duty as a citizen to oppose incipient tyranny in America first and foremost. The fact that you can find historical figures in the world that were arguably greater evils than what the Republican party is serving up in the U.S. today is irrelevant.
Sounds like a good time to try Linux, if you're feeling a little adventurous...
I was looking for a laptop on Ebay a while back and it's true that the ones that come with a recent version of Windows cost more than those that come with no OS at all (which is what I was looking for, since I planned to install Linux on it). The problem was that the "clean disk" laptops were few and far between; I finally settled for one running an older version of Windows that bidders weren't willing to pay a premium for. Of course, I would never trust any OS that came installed on a used laptop, so it's going to get wiped regardless.
It's not necessarily just the low end of the market that can get picked off this way, either. Corporate and institutional customers of proprietary software are subject to very intrusive audits by vendors and the BSA (Business Software Alliance), often with expensive outcomes. A couple of those and you'd be negligent not to consider FOSS alternatives.
I did both of those things back when I used to run Windows, and my copy was perfectly legit.
I don't recall anyone here defending or excusing the tyrants that you mention here. The fact that you cite them as Bush's peers speaks volumes, though. Maybe it's you that needs to re-examine the worthiness of your heroes.
I've always liked that argument. In fact, I'd love to get the chance to repeat it to you the day they finally get around to hauling your sorry ass away on some idiotic pretext. Oh, you think that being a bootlicking sycophant to the authority of the hour is all the protection you'll ever need? You think you can always land on the winning side of every issue? Well, good luck with that.
I know, and it's depressing. The repubs are like the bully down the street that beats up the little kids on the block and steals their lunch money, and (most of) the dems are the older kids who watch in dismay but do nothing but offer their sympathy afterwards.
I often try to increase my quality of life by buying stuff, but usually my purchases fail to do so in any meaningful sense, or for any significant length of time. A friend of mine claims that I will never find happiness this way, and should seek other ways to improve the quality of my life. He is a Buddhist, though, and I am an American. I am also a consumer, and what is my destiny if not to consume? Clearly if I am consuming and yet remain unfulfilled, my failure must be in the consuming itself. My other friends, who are Americans and not Buddhists, suggest that I am perhaps not buying enough stuff, and that if I strive to consume more I can eventually find happiness. Perhaps these "targeted ads" of which you speak are just the thing to show me the way to more and better consumption?
Given their history of suing friend and foe alike, were I an IT executive I think I'd be a little nervous about doing business with SCO (or allowing their software on any of my servers)...
(Arguing with myself here...) It does diminish the market value of that CD, however, which is why it may feel like theft to the producer and the store owner. On the other hand, so would competition. You could argue that because prices of CDs are determined by a cartel and not a competitive market, the existence of unauthorized copying merely brings (average) prices more into line with what they "should" be in the absence of the cartel.
For better or worse, consumer expectations and perceptions of value have changed. Many people now expect to be able to have access to (and an awareness of) a wide range of music, something that simply isn't feasible if it costs $18 a pop to check out every new or unfamiliar artist. This broadened consumer awareness and choice is something greatly feared by studios that base their success on being able to predict (and to a large extent control) what will be a "hit" and should therefore be locked up under contract.
These days, it's foolish to expect the government to protect you from anything, unless you're paying into the campaign funds of the "right" people...
The snow in Buffalo falls mainly in the... "Southtowns". That's where the lake effect snow comes off of Lake Erie, and they get absolutely dumped on every winter. Several good ski resorts there, though, so it's very nice if you're into that sort of thing. They're also pretty good at removing the stuff from their roads; I've seen 4 inches of snow cause more panic in D.C. than two feet in Springville, NY.
It's sad, really, because 100 years ago Buffalo was arguably the most technologically advanced major city in the U.S., largely because of its proximity to hydroelectricity from Niagara Falls, Great Lakes shipping routes, and the Erie Canal. A lot of industry built up there for those reasons, and unfortunately the area has thus suffered disproportionately during America's industrial decline. They still have the Niagara riverfront and the Erie lakefront, though, and if they can transform those resources (like some other rustbelt cities have done), there may be hope for them yet. Or so I'd like to think.