You know, for most of the last two years I thought the Republicans kept bowing to Democrats pressure because they were spineless, but now I'm not so sure. I think now the entire Republican Party is shifting further to the left and filling the vacuum left by the Democrats, who have been shifting even further to the left. A 1970s (or even 1980s) Democrat would be almost indistinguishable from a modern Republican. The so-called conservatives have taken over the party. Meanwhile, true conservatives have no voice in government anymore.
Fixed it for you.
But seriously, I've heard your exact argument from the other side of the aisle. If anything I think both parties have shifted into the center. Perhaps the talking heads have moved further to the extremes, but the actual politicians have not.
More engines mean a lot of things. Generally it means the fighter is faster (and speed kills in air combat) and more survivable as it can lose an engine and still fly. The larger size means it has the potential to carry a greater payload, meaning it can have more missiles and fuel. Both of those are advantageous because that means it can use its afterburner longer, stay on station longer, have a longer range and kill more enemies.
What I'm most interested in is its stealth capabilities. To date no one else has been able to match the US's stealth capabilities, if the Chinese have somehow figured it out that would be interesting. While the F-22 is extremely advanced, since we have so few of them their only real advantage is their stealth capabilities. Stealth allows a smaller force to defeat a much larger force. If the larger force also has stealth, then the F-22 can no longer engage them at range, it would have to engage much closer. Conceivably, if the stealth of both sides is good enough, missiles would be out of the question and it would turn into a dog fight. That would reduce the F-22s survivability which makes having so few much more dangerous.
This is all speculation of course so take it with a grain of salt. Its quite possible the Chinese stealth tech is not good enough to hide these fighters from US missiles, or that the J-20 is a shiny looking piece of junk. It does raise questions about the F-22s future though.
Sorry to interrupt all your Orwellian doom and gloom speculation, but Amazon.com is a private company. They can ban what they damn well please and its not an infringement of anyone's rights. Don't like it? Then don't shop there.
Someone claims that a private company might be banning certain books from its shelves and slashdotters get more hysterical than young earth creationists over teaching evolution in schools. Seriously you guys.
My first car was a 94 Ford Tempo coupe. I hated that thing, it got worse fuel efficiency than my mom's Caravan, had a terrible transmission, and leaked just about every fluid it had. Changing the coolant was a pain, you needed three buckets cause there was a bar right beneath the drain that the coolant would run along and spill out in three places. On the bright side it did teach me how to repair cars. I must have replaced every component in the engine over the four years I drove it. Started died twice, Oxygen sensor died, had to replace the transmission fluid pan, belt wore out, alternator died. Replaced the gas tank once, the entire muffler system twice, the stupid automatic seat belt motor twice! The car finally died when the rear shock broke off its mounting and punched through the trunk.
I swore I'd never buy a Ford after that.
Fast forward to 2010, and Ford refuses to take bail-out money, earning them some respect in my book. Then I hear about Ford's SYNC and think, "Wow, that is really cool." Then my Suzuki Aero decides to take a dirt nap. I end up buying a 2010 Ford Focus SE. I love this car, its the sportiest thing I've ever owned, gets good fuel economy and SYNC is just amazing. And Ford is updating SYNC to be able to control applications on your phone soon.
Ford has turned itself around in my opinion. They are actually innovating, and so they have won me over, even after the nightmare that was my Tempo. Congrats Ford.
Is there a PURPOSE to the Constitution and what IS the purpose? Isn't the purpose of the Constitution to LIMIT the gov't in what it can do?
The purpose of the constitution is clearly outlined in its preamble:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
I suppose one way to paraphrase that would be to say: "We the people, in order to get along and not mess with each other, and protect ourselves when necessary, establish this Constitution so we have an orderly way to resolve conflict."
If the commerce/welfare clauses allow the gov't to do whatever it wants, what is then the real purpose of the Constitution and why not just say: gov't can do whatever the fuck it wants and be done with the pretenses?
That's just the thing isn't it? The commerce clause doesn't give the government unlimited power, it has however been twisted and bent and used by the government to justify assuming more than its Constitutionally granted power. It is entirely our fault as citizens though. The US, at least for now, is still a government "Of the People, for the People and by the People." We got what we voted for, sure we were lied to, but we didn't care enough to take action. Its much easier and more entertaining to watch our favorite sports team or cheer for our favorite American Idol contestant.
At the end of the day the Constitution is just a piece of very old paper. It only has power if We the People enforce its rule, by force if necessary. I think we could still turn things around without violence, for now.
The US government as it is today is not the government that is outlined for us in the Constitution. It is vastly more powerful, you are right. As it is today the government can basically do what it wants. I hope we stop distracting ourselves long enough to fix that.
Fire them all. How can we expect 20 and 30 year incumbents to represent anything other than the political elite? After 30 years in office they have no idea what normal life is like. Heck, there's at least one congress critter who admitted that he's never used an ATM!
Honestly we need two major reforms. The first being term limits for both houses of congress. The second would be to repeal the 17th amendment. The reason for repealing the 17th amendment is to give the states some representation in the federal government again. When the states have no representation the Fed over reaches, which is what we have today.
I don't know about that. Microsoft is being pretty strict on the hardware requirements for WP7. While they aren't controlling the actual hardware like Apple they are dictating things like the screen size. That alone is a huge improvement over the Android ecosphere. Here is a list of minimum specs.
Seems to me that WP7 is taking a good middle ground, though I'm not sure about its reliance on Silverlight. I'd rather see a straight C# API (other than XNA for game development that is)
FTFA: The Green Flight Challenge, he explained, is just the first step in NASA’s plan to develop a new aviation infrastructure, in which quiet, auto-piloted aircraft would deliver people and goods on a point-to-point basis, within communities.
The soccer moms aren't flying. The hillbillys aren't flying. Everything is very automated, there probably isn't even a traffic controller. Obviously to achieve that level of automation weather will have to be taken into account. Maintenance for such an automated system would also be taken into account. Heck my car emails me when it needs its oil changed (Ford's SYNC) if my car can keep track of its own maintenance I'm sure these planes could do so with much greater accuracy and reliability. You'll also notice that there are two more challenges to be held, one in 2013 and one in 2015.
I don't know how you got modded +5 insightful, all you did was show you didn't read the article while displaying your incredible hatred for people you consider inferior.
Actually, it's very simple: Blowing up innocent people, just because you can, is terrorism.
I would make one amendment to your statement. Intentionally blowing up innocent people, just because you can, is terrorism.
You should not lump an Apache pilot who mistakes a broom for a RPG while in a stressful situation into the same category as a terrorist who calmly spends time and money planning and executing an attack. It sucks but mistakes happen in war, that doesn't make it an act of terror.
Behavioral profiling, such as what is practiced by the Israelis, is both cheaper and more effective than searching for weapons. If we adopted behavioral profiling, screened all baggage for explosives and ran passengers through the air-puff chemical sensors we'd have a system that protects travelers privacy much better, is much more effective and significantly cheaper than our current system.
Explosives are the real threat anymore. A few terrorists wonldn't be able to take over an airplane, not now that the passengers will fight back and the cockpit doors are reinforced. Preventing passengers from bringing things like nail clippers is just asinine.
And by "push their own religious ideas" you mean "force people to attend their theme park"? I'm sorry but they are getting help with construction, the government will make its money back on the taxes the park brings in. I don't think this is a violation of the separation of church and state principle. This seems more like an economic decision more than anything else.
Now if next week some Muslims wanted to build a park and the government refused to offer them similar help with the construction, then there would be ground for a lawsuit. As it stands this seems pretty innocent. Its not as if the government is sponsoring field trips for grade schoolers to the park.
I for one applaud PayPal. Don't get me wrong, I am all in favor of government accountability. I am sure that there are some classified things that the public should know about, however, information such as the identities of informants is not of that category.
I had hoped that WikiLeaks would serve as a tool to hold governments accountable, and to shine a spotlight on illegal or immoral activity. Unfortunately it has turned out to be little more than Assange's personal attack on the US, much of it uncalled for, unhelpful and recklessly endangering of other people's lives. As such it should be shut down.
There is a difference between being a whistle blower and behaving irresponsibly.
How do you regulate the action of the mafia or the triads ? How do you apply a treaty onto an individual ?
Perhaps a clause guaranteeing the extradition of a private entity who engages in an activity that falls under whatever the parties to the treaty define as "cyber-warfare" would solve that problem. Perhaps not. Its definitely something that nations should be discussing.
I know its off topic, but I'd love to see a remake of the X-Wing and TIE Fighter games. Those games were so fun at the time, they'd be beautiful to see with modern graphics and physics.
That law also applies to original creditors now. I'm no expert, but I did recently take Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class and he had a lesson on how to deal with debt collectors. They can contact relatives, but they can't mention that they are debt collectors, only that they wish to get in touch with you. I'm pretty sure she would have a legal basis for suing them.
This is absolutely insane. As things stand now, I could not in good conscious ask my girlfriend (haha, i know, a slashdotter with a girlfriend) to fly out to visit me. I'll be flying to her for the time being.
For you US slashdotters, the Senate Committee on Transportation is having a TSA oversight meeting TOMORROW. Here is a link with the contact information for the Senators on that committee.
When was the last time you bought a gun? Every time I've bought a gun, after filling out the paper work and waiting for the instant background check to be approved (which is not instant by the way, you get to stand around feeling awkward for five minutes while the salesman gets to wait on hold after giving your information to whoever is on the other end of that phone) I've been given the gun, usually either locked in a case or locked with a trigger lock and immediately escorted out of the store.
Some places I went to won't even sell you ammo the same day! How annoying is that? I just want to go home and plink some pop cans with my new gun!
Without government regulation, there is nothing stopping corporations and other powerful players from using extra-market forces to skew the market in their favor.
Stop buying from them. Out of control corporations are only a problem when people buy products from these corporations despite knowing that the corporation is a problem. The days of the company store are long gone, no one is forced to spend their money at only one company. Have a problem with Wal-Mart? Document what it is they are doing wrong, and start a viral campaign. Even Wal-mart would go out of business if people stopped shopping there.
Government is not evil.
True, but it is organized force. At the end of the day the government takes your money by force and spends it. This is not theory, there are people in prison right now because the IRS didn't like how they kept their books. Not criminals mind you, people who made an honest mistake. John Carmack wrote about someone he knows personally who is in that situation.
I like John Carmack's analogy: what do you care about strongly enough to feel morally justified making me pay for it by pointing a gun at me? In my opinion, much less than the government is doing now.
Slashdot Mirror
I wonder what else we'll get to witness in our lifetimes?
I'm getting my laser eye installed next week.
You know, for most of the last two years I thought the Republicans kept bowing to Democrats pressure because they were spineless, but now I'm not so sure. I think now the entire Republican Party is shifting further to the left and filling the vacuum left by the Democrats, who have been shifting even further to the left. A 1970s (or even 1980s) Democrat would be almost indistinguishable from a modern Republican. The so-called conservatives have taken over the party. Meanwhile, true conservatives have no voice in government anymore.
Fixed it for you.
But seriously, I've heard your exact argument from the other side of the aisle. If anything I think both parties have shifted into the center. Perhaps the talking heads have moved further to the extremes, but the actual politicians have not.
More engines mean a lot of things. Generally it means the fighter is faster (and speed kills in air combat) and more survivable as it can lose an engine and still fly. The larger size means it has the potential to carry a greater payload, meaning it can have more missiles and fuel. Both of those are advantageous because that means it can use its afterburner longer, stay on station longer, have a longer range and kill more enemies.
What I'm most interested in is its stealth capabilities. To date no one else has been able to match the US's stealth capabilities, if the Chinese have somehow figured it out that would be interesting. While the F-22 is extremely advanced, since we have so few of them their only real advantage is their stealth capabilities. Stealth allows a smaller force to defeat a much larger force. If the larger force also has stealth, then the F-22 can no longer engage them at range, it would have to engage much closer. Conceivably, if the stealth of both sides is good enough, missiles would be out of the question and it would turn into a dog fight. That would reduce the F-22s survivability which makes having so few much more dangerous.
This is all speculation of course so take it with a grain of salt. Its quite possible the Chinese stealth tech is not good enough to hide these fighters from US missiles, or that the J-20 is a shiny looking piece of junk. It does raise questions about the F-22s future though.
What do you mean by decently powered PC? I'm running a machine that still uses DDR1 memory and I can run BF:BC2 on medium settings no problem!
Sorry to interrupt all your Orwellian doom and gloom speculation, but Amazon.com is a private company. They can ban what they damn well please and its not an infringement of anyone's rights. Don't like it? Then don't shop there.
Someone claims that a private company might be banning certain books from its shelves and slashdotters get more hysterical than young earth creationists over teaching evolution in schools. Seriously you guys.
My first car was a 94 Ford Tempo coupe. I hated that thing, it got worse fuel efficiency than my mom's Caravan, had a terrible transmission, and leaked just about every fluid it had. Changing the coolant was a pain, you needed three buckets cause there was a bar right beneath the drain that the coolant would run along and spill out in three places. On the bright side it did teach me how to repair cars. I must have replaced every component in the engine over the four years I drove it. Started died twice, Oxygen sensor died, had to replace the transmission fluid pan, belt wore out, alternator died. Replaced the gas tank once, the entire muffler system twice, the stupid automatic seat belt motor twice! The car finally died when the rear shock broke off its mounting and punched through the trunk.
I swore I'd never buy a Ford after that.
Fast forward to 2010, and Ford refuses to take bail-out money, earning them some respect in my book. Then I hear about Ford's SYNC and think, "Wow, that is really cool." Then my Suzuki Aero decides to take a dirt nap. I end up buying a 2010 Ford Focus SE. I love this car, its the sportiest thing I've ever owned, gets good fuel economy and SYNC is just amazing. And Ford is updating SYNC to be able to control applications on your phone soon.
Ford has turned itself around in my opinion. They are actually innovating, and so they have won me over, even after the nightmare that was my Tempo. Congrats Ford.
If you checked out the full article there's a link to the builder's blog. He runs the oil through a radiator. His temps looked pretty good
Really liked the oil cooled case. Oil cooling always intrigued me. Would be fun to try someday.
The Cray 1 was classic.
Is there a PURPOSE to the Constitution and what IS the purpose? Isn't the purpose of the Constitution to LIMIT the gov't in what it can do?
The purpose of the constitution is clearly outlined in its preamble:
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
I suppose one way to paraphrase that would be to say: "We the people, in order to get along and not mess with each other, and protect ourselves when necessary, establish this Constitution so we have an orderly way to resolve conflict."
If the commerce/welfare clauses allow the gov't to do whatever it wants, what is then the real purpose of the Constitution and why not just say: gov't can do whatever the fuck it wants and be done with the pretenses?
That's just the thing isn't it? The commerce clause doesn't give the government unlimited power, it has however been twisted and bent and used by the government to justify assuming more than its Constitutionally granted power. It is entirely our fault as citizens though. The US, at least for now, is still a government "Of the People, for the People and by the People." We got what we voted for, sure we were lied to, but we didn't care enough to take action. Its much easier and more entertaining to watch our favorite sports team or cheer for our favorite American Idol contestant.
At the end of the day the Constitution is just a piece of very old paper. It only has power if We the People enforce its rule, by force if necessary. I think we could still turn things around without violence, for now.
The US government as it is today is not the government that is outlined for us in the Constitution. It is vastly more powerful, you are right. As it is today the government can basically do what it wants. I hope we stop distracting ourselves long enough to fix that.
You can acquire whatever material objects you want with a sufficient amount of cash and/or explosives.
Fire them all. How can we expect 20 and 30 year incumbents to represent anything other than the political elite? After 30 years in office they have no idea what normal life is like. Heck, there's at least one congress critter who admitted that he's never used an ATM!
Honestly we need two major reforms. The first being term limits for both houses of congress. The second would be to repeal the 17th amendment. The reason for repealing the 17th amendment is to give the states some representation in the federal government again. When the states have no representation the Fed over reaches, which is what we have today.
I don't know about that. Microsoft is being pretty strict on the hardware requirements for WP7. While they aren't controlling the actual hardware like Apple they are dictating things like the screen size. That alone is a huge improvement over the Android ecosphere. Here is a list of minimum specs.
Seems to me that WP7 is taking a good middle ground, though I'm not sure about its reliance on Silverlight. I'd rather see a straight C# API (other than XNA for game development that is)
FTFA: The Green Flight Challenge, he explained, is just the first step in NASA’s plan to develop a new aviation infrastructure, in which quiet, auto-piloted aircraft would deliver people and goods on a point-to-point basis, within communities.
The soccer moms aren't flying. The hillbillys aren't flying. Everything is very automated, there probably isn't even a traffic controller. Obviously to achieve that level of automation weather will have to be taken into account. Maintenance for such an automated system would also be taken into account. Heck my car emails me when it needs its oil changed (Ford's SYNC) if my car can keep track of its own maintenance I'm sure these planes could do so with much greater accuracy and reliability. You'll also notice that there are two more challenges to be held, one in 2013 and one in 2015.
I don't know how you got modded +5 insightful, all you did was show you didn't read the article while displaying your incredible hatred for people you consider inferior.
Actually, it's very simple: Blowing up innocent people, just because you can, is terrorism.
I would make one amendment to your statement. Intentionally blowing up innocent people, just because you can, is terrorism.
You should not lump an Apache pilot who mistakes a broom for a RPG while in a stressful situation into the same category as a terrorist who calmly spends time and money planning and executing an attack. It sucks but mistakes happen in war, that doesn't make it an act of terror.
Behavioral profiling, such as what is practiced by the Israelis, is both cheaper and more effective than searching for weapons. If we adopted behavioral profiling, screened all baggage for explosives and ran passengers through the air-puff chemical sensors we'd have a system that protects travelers privacy much better, is much more effective and significantly cheaper than our current system.
Explosives are the real threat anymore. A few terrorists wonldn't be able to take over an airplane, not now that the passengers will fight back and the cockpit doors are reinforced. Preventing passengers from bringing things like nail clippers is just asinine.
And by "push their own religious ideas" you mean "force people to attend their theme park"? I'm sorry but they are getting help with construction, the government will make its money back on the taxes the park brings in. I don't think this is a violation of the separation of church and state principle. This seems more like an economic decision more than anything else.
Now if next week some Muslims wanted to build a park and the government refused to offer them similar help with the construction, then there would be ground for a lawsuit. As it stands this seems pretty innocent. Its not as if the government is sponsoring field trips for grade schoolers to the park.
I for one applaud PayPal. Don't get me wrong, I am all in favor of government accountability. I am sure that there are some classified things that the public should know about, however, information such as the identities of informants is not of that category.
I had hoped that WikiLeaks would serve as a tool to hold governments accountable, and to shine a spotlight on illegal or immoral activity. Unfortunately it has turned out to be little more than Assange's personal attack on the US, much of it uncalled for, unhelpful and recklessly endangering of other people's lives. As such it should be shut down.
There is a difference between being a whistle blower and behaving irresponsibly.
How do you regulate the action of the mafia or the triads ? How do you apply a treaty onto an individual ?
Perhaps a clause guaranteeing the extradition of a private entity who engages in an activity that falls under whatever the parties to the treaty define as "cyber-warfare" would solve that problem. Perhaps not. Its definitely something that nations should be discussing.
I lost all respect for her when she quit the governorship of Alaska.
Political beliefs aside, if she can't finish out her term as governor why should I think she can handle a full term as president?
I know its off topic, but I'd love to see a remake of the X-Wing and TIE Fighter games. Those games were so fun at the time, they'd be beautiful to see with modern graphics and physics.
I imagine its my mistake then. Dave Ramsey knows his stuff.
That law also applies to original creditors now. I'm no expert, but I did recently take Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class and he had a lesson on how to deal with debt collectors. They can contact relatives, but they can't mention that they are debt collectors, only that they wish to get in touch with you. I'm pretty sure she would have a legal basis for suing them.
This is absolutely insane. As things stand now, I could not in good conscious ask my girlfriend (haha, i know, a slashdotter with a girlfriend) to fly out to visit me. I'll be flying to her for the time being.
For you US slashdotters, the Senate Committee on Transportation is having a TSA oversight meeting TOMORROW. Here is a link with the contact information for the Senators on that committee.
Call and voice your opinion!
When was the last time you bought a gun? Every time I've bought a gun, after filling out the paper work and waiting for the instant background check to be approved (which is not instant by the way, you get to stand around feeling awkward for five minutes while the salesman gets to wait on hold after giving your information to whoever is on the other end of that phone) I've been given the gun, usually either locked in a case or locked with a trigger lock and immediately escorted out of the store.
Some places I went to won't even sell you ammo the same day! How annoying is that? I just want to go home and plink some pop cans with my new gun!
Without government regulation, there is nothing stopping corporations and other powerful players from using extra-market forces to skew the market in their favor.
Stop buying from them. Out of control corporations are only a problem when people buy products from these corporations despite knowing that the corporation is a problem. The days of the company store are long gone, no one is forced to spend their money at only one company. Have a problem with Wal-Mart? Document what it is they are doing wrong, and start a viral campaign. Even Wal-mart would go out of business if people stopped shopping there.
Government is not evil.
True, but it is organized force. At the end of the day the government takes your money by force and spends it. This is not theory, there are people in prison right now because the IRS didn't like how they kept their books. Not criminals mind you, people who made an honest mistake. John Carmack wrote about someone he knows personally who is in that situation.
I like John Carmack's analogy: what do you care about strongly enough to feel morally justified making me pay for it by pointing a gun at me? In my opinion, much less than the government is doing now.