If you need a really small httpd, you might want to consider one of the options from ACME Labs Software. I've used mini_httpd and found it to work quite well. It can be compiled with SSL support, if you need that. Disk image is about 42k dynamicly linked, so if FLASH space is important, you might consider it. Its RSS is more like about 670k as configured on my system, but IIRC, that's with SSL support.
If you need to get really small, and don't need much by way of features, micro_httpd, but that's probably overkill (underkill?)
I had thought all TrueMobile chips were Broadcom....
To the best of my knowledge, all but the 1150 are. And the 1150 is only available via Dell spare parts (small business section of their web site, IIRC). They probably wont sell you one any other way.
If you want to stick with Dell hardware, you have another option: you could order a TrueMobile 1150 miniPCI from Dell spare parts. Last I checked it was about $50. It's based on the Orinoco chipset, probably the most completely supported chipset under Linux.
Yes. Change Walmart to Microsoft, and you can make the same arguement for why the US antitrust case against MS was wrong, BTW.
Yup. And I have.
In fact, there are significant parallels between the two companies. Both are targeted by whiners that are afraid of the challange of a free and open market. Both are very successfull. Both peddle crap, for the most part, with the occasional good value. I find buying from either distatefull. Both have done things that are worthy of legitimate attention by law enforcement. Both have done things worthy of inclusion in business text books as both positive and negative examples.
Now let me state right off that I don't shop at Wallmart, with one exception: we buy our dishwasher detergent powder there because their cheap house brand works better than anything else on the market. So, we go once in a great while and buy a few boxes. The less time I have to spend in that store, the happier I am.
That being said, the whole "We don't want WallMart here because they'll kill off our local stores" is bullshit. If people really would rather shop at small locally owned shops, they would, and WallMart would close up shop and move on. Instead, the very same people protesting the new WallMart are right there in line for the cheap crap they sell.
Can a small local store compete directly with WallMart? Of course not. Simple economics will tell you that. On the other hand, WallMart, because of they way they are run, cannot compete directly with small shops, either -- they sell different stuff in a much different environment. The problem really is, shoppers are willing to belly up to the WallMart trough -- simply put, they prefer cheap crap as long as the price is lower.
So, if you don't like what WallMart has to offer, shop elsewhere and encourage others to do so as well. Stop bitching about how WallMart "push[es] local businesses out of business" -- I've never seen WallMart logo wearing storm-troopers crashing through the windows of local shops and gunning down the shopkeepers, nor have I seen them herding shoppers into their stores at gunpoint.
Though I personally prefer page layout languages, when I have to use a WYSIWYG word processor, I find them all to be lacking compared to Word. Yes it's sold by the source of all evil, yes it's got that lame Clippy thing (first thing to turn off, of course), but I like it because of exactly what your father wants: keyboard shortcuts for every damn thing.
Well, perhaps not everything, but pretty close. And the dialogs are all easily navigable via the keyboard. Once basic ideas like accelerator keys vs. hotkeys are understood and basic navigation ideas like when to tab vs. arrow, select via shift, etc. are under his belt, he should seldom need to touch the mouse.
I wish OpenOffice did nearly as well. Or that Microsoft would release a Linux port of Office. I don't know that I'd purchase it personally, but my office would certainly get it for me in a heartbeat. Now, if only Word could import LaTeX and groff files!
Lots of commedians (and quite a few editorialists) called him that, most notably David Letterman. 'course Dave's faverite name for Pres. Clinton was "fat-boy", but that's just Dave.
I doubt it's the Ethernet NIC. My money would be on the screen. Both LCD adn CRT make some level of noise and that noise alters during display refreshes.
I was right there with you until your comment about burger flippers. Anyone working is helping, to some degree, to keep the economy flowing. Does that mean they should get health care for "free"? no. But a person is not a "low life" for working a menial job.
If you really think that, then all I can say is "dude... stop being on my side".
Thanks for the tip to check out the HPaq business line... I did that for Dell (the D600 is on my short list). You said ACPI is a bitch, but does it work once you've got everything patched and configured? Also, how is the XFree support?
I've created a journal entry for this discusion so we can take it out of this thread. Feel free to wander over to continue this if you get a chance.
Heh. Maybe I should send in an ask slashdot, eh? In fact, I think I'll do a search to make sure three wasn't a recent one (there I go again... I'm going to lose my short UID that way) and if not, submit one. This is a perinial problem, and as good as Linux on Laptops is when you are researching a specific machine, there's no "what won't suck" section. Actually, what would rock is a review site that does both the current kind of reviews (preview and detailed review) along with stealing from the auto industry and doing "long term" livability tests. In the auto world, long term can be up to a year, as cars don't change much from year to year most of the time. Long term for laptops would be more like 4 to 8 weeks of being used as someone's primary machine. Might shake out some of the Dellisms.
Shite. I was looking at a T40 with the 9k video in it, as I want the SXGA+ display (at least... again, the Dell 1920 x 1200 WUXGA looks sweet, on paper anyway) and, though I don't game now, I want at least reasonable 3D acceleration for the future. The best I've had in the past is the Mobility Radeon in the Toshiba 1905 I gave my wife, so the 7500 in the other T40s would be a step up, but not a huge one I don't think, and I don't think the T40 w/7500 can be had with anything but the XGA screen. I've not seen any other complaints on the net RE: the issue you mention -- perhaps it's just your machine? OTOH, I'm not done researching, and the T40 just got added to my list the other day. It's more expensive than I want to spend, but the 8600 fully loaded and with said 3yr warranty got pretty damn close, so I figured I'd throw the T40 into the mix and hope SWMBO is cool with the extra expense.
Your comments about Dell are why I wouldn't consider getting one w/o a long warranty. Your last comment (runs Linux surprizingly well) is why I'm still considering them.
Actually, the company I work for offers employees two year interest free financing for 90% of the cost of a computer system, so financing isn't the issue -- amount spent is. We have our first little one on the way, my wife's car lease is up next month (so we'll be buying a car), etc., so I don't really want to tie up any more money that I need to, ya know?
Yeah, the T40 looks like rocks, but it's $200 to $500 more than the 8600 (depending upon how I spec each). My past experience tells me they're built to last, and the fact that IBM has a page devoted to Linux on ThinkPads is a plus!
OTOH, the 8600 seems like it fits my needs perfectly; I use my laptop as my primary machine at home. Most of its travel will be from my office to the living room to the bedroom to the dining room, etc. Several times a year I'll need to travel with it for real. Besides, the wide format UXGA screen and Radeon 9600 Pro make me drool a bit, even if I'm not a gamer right now (unless you count Angband, that is).
My current machine is about the same weight as the 8600 (7# +/-), even though the 8600 will obviously be bigger. I had a Sony Z505 a couple years ago -- it rocked for air travel, but XGA just doesn't cut it any more.
Gotta fish or cut bait soon here -- I'd like to place an order tomorrow or the next day. Biggest problem for me is that I've never owned an HPaq (of either HP or Compaq variety) or Dell laptop, so I don't have personal experience with 'em. We use Dell at work, but my machine is a Precision workstation, not a laptop. The laptops seem kinda clunky; sort of Chevy to the ThinkPad's BMW (or whatever). I've used Compaq servers in the past that didn't suck. Every HP I've used sucked since I sold my HP41CVX, but I haven't owned any laptops from either.
As long as we're waaaayyy off topic here, any other ideas for Linux friendly laptops that don't suck and aren't over priced (ThinkPad is expensive, but not necessarily over priced, if you see what I mean)?
According to the text of the third link (I know, I know, WTF am I doing reading the links? And I'm not even new here), it appears that DriveLock must be enabled.
1.
When the DriveLock function is enabled and the User Password is forgotten, the device can be unlocked using the Master Password. [first footnote, first page, emphasis mine]
If anyone has evidence that HPaq sells laptops with DriveLock permanently enabled, I'd love to hear about it, as I'm shopping for a new machine. (OT, but currently my short list is down to the Dell Inspiron 8600 or the IBM ThinkPad T40, but I'm considering HPaq as a budget alternative, as both of the above are a bit more than I really want to spend)
A documentary does use a series of clips and interviews pasted together in a way to show a point of view. However, that's not what BfC does. It has a "speach" supposedly given by Chuck Heston. It is a speach he never gave. It is instead bits and pieces of other speaches, taken out of context, pasted together and presented as if it were an actual speach he gave.
So, one of two things is true: BfC is fradulent or it is intended to be a fictional story. Perhaps about real people, groups and ideas, but fictional. Unforch, "documentary" implies non-fiction (not non-biased, mind you), and BfC is being passed of as a documentary, ergo it is fraudulent. It may resonate with your fear of guns, but just because it happens to match your world view doesn't make it true.
And I was designing a new feature for the sotware I write for a living, not cleaning guns. My guns are clean and put away safely and have been for some time, as work has kept me busy, so I've not had time to get to the range. Thanks for your concern, though. Quite touching.
wow. Impressive. Four sentances, and the only one with no lie in it reads "So what?".
Violent crime is down in the U.S. in the last several years. Very few people have ever even seen a gun pulled in Real Life (but for the record, a growning number of responsible people are carrying in the U.S., ready, willing and able to use their gun in self defense. As it should be.).
As for "Bolwing for Columbine" being a documentary -- it's no more a documentary than Armegeddon was a documentary about Bruce Willis saving us from death by asteroid. It was presented as a documentary, it is flogged by the press and other liberals as a documentary, but a documentary doesn't take clips of speach from over a period of several years, paste them together to give the message you want (completely different than the original message of the speaker) and present it as a speach that actually happened.
Why wouldn't you think that a company that owns a technology might, once it decides it is worth their time to do so, choose to charge for it? The patents were there in the database for all to see. With the GIF issue, there wasn't as easily searchable a database, so it would have been harder to find the patents.
As for why VFAT became popular, it had nothing to do with being free... it was the FS that the most popular OS used and it was simple... *those* are the reasons why it became popular for uses outside Windows itself. Many of these devices will not be affected by this situation, or at least need not be, as they could easily use simple FAT-12 or (assuming it isn't covered... I confess to still not having time to read the four patents) perhaps FAT-16, since most don't need or use the features of VFAT.
As your Esperanto example, if patentable features were added to the language, I see no reason that said liguist shouldn't be able to license the new language technology. People are free to choose not to use those features, either by replacing them with others, or doing withought. And as much as it pains me to defend Billy & Co., your charge per book would have to be more like $.10 or so to make it anywhere near analogous.
You may find these things to be "not acceptable", but since the technology in question isn't yours, and the US patent system allows for ownership of these technologies, so it's not your call. Now, if you want to put your (IMHO misplaced) indignation to work, perhaps a better target would be the Patent system that has spun out of control.
Regardless, you are set in your mind, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.
No, my respose was right on point. If I own something, it should be up to me whether or not I charge for it. As well, I don't see any reason why I shouldn't be able to give it away as long as I don't think I can get any money for it and switch to selling it once I do. It's not much different than turning a hobby into a business, in that way. By your logic, if I spent years cooking gormet meals for my friends and then one day decided to open a resteraunt and start charging them money for said meals, I would somehow be doing something dishonest.
Now, the issue of whether or not I think they should be able to own what they claim to is a different one, as is the issue of whether or not this is the proverbial camel's nose in the tent or not. I'm, in general, opposed to software patents and I don't trust MS half as far as I could throw their entire campus. But software patents are currently legal, and this act by MS isn't, all by itself, evil. Annoying? Sure. But it seems to me that it's well within their rights under the law.
How or why is it dishonest an unacceptable to start charging (quite reasonable) fees for something that now has value. To have real value, a fs must have something that others do not. In VFAT's case, that something is ubequity. I don't see the issue.
Mind you, the patents they were granted may or may not be good (I haven't read them yet). But the basic act of licensing VFAT now that it's ubequetous seems reasonable. I'm frankly surprised they didn't start doing so a few years ago. It might, as some here have suggested, be because they want to discourage its use. If so, I would expect that either the real price will go up over time (standard EOL procedure) or they will be more obvious about suggesting the use of WinFS (or whatever).
Just becasue something is popular doesn't mean that it should be free. BigMacs are very popular... go ask for one free. Or, more appropriatly, Two Towers was very popular... are you saying that it should therefore be able to to copied free!? Or pay per view sporting events... the normal events are televised on (free) network TV, how dare those bastards start charging for more popular events.
As for IBM's cross-licensing, they probably have license to distribute, not grant further license, but obviously I don't know what arrangement they have with MS.
All in all this seems like one of the more reasonable moves by MS... at least so far. I won't be at all surprised if this is the opening move for something that is unreasonable, dishonest and unacceptable.
Perjury before a grand jury is covered by a special statute with odd features. If one lies before a grand jury and then recants--tells the truth--before the grand jury or the prosecutor is aware of the lie, the witness has a defense to a perjury prosecution. In some perjury prosecutions a witness tells one version in the morning of his appearance before the grand jury and tells a different version in the afternoon. The grand jury perjury statute states that the government can make out a case based on the contradictory testimony itself. It need not prove which statement was true and which statement was false.
I should have stopped responding to the former message after my third interruption. Finishing up in a hurry leads to looking like an idiot. Oh well, nothing I haven't done before.
While I'm not a Republican, I do most often vote Republican, so since no one else has had the poor sense to do so (at least at the time of this writing), and though you are very obviosly a troll, I'm off today, so WTF, I'll reply. I suppose I could make a similarly jaundiced list of items about Democrats, instead I think I'll just be lazy (I did say I was on vacation) and respond to your list.
o Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a conservative radio host. Then it's an illness and you need our prayers for your recovery.
Being a drug addict may be an illness, I don't think we have proof of that yet, and it depends somewhat upon how far you are willing to stretch the definition of "illness". Addiction can also be a moral failing, in the case of relapse, especially if going back to the drugs will hurt others (e.g. you are a parent). It is not, of itself, a crime. It can be related to a crime, if crimes are comitted because of the addiction. Since you're referring to Rush's case, I assume, I'd say it's possibly all three; there just isn't enough information to know for sure.
Personally, I don't think drugs themselves should be illegal at all, but rather, users should be held fully responsible for any crimes they commit under the influence.
As for the prayers, I'm an apathetic agnostic (I don't know and can't be troubled to try very hard to find out), so I'm not qualified to speak to that issue.
o The United States should get out of the United Nations, and our highest national priority is enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iraq.
Wow, what incisive insight! Or it could be the case that you are intentionally conflating the group of people that thinks the former, but still thinks it was a good idea to kick Saddam's ass, with the latter, who just think it was a good idea to said ass kicking.
Personally, I think the U.N. is not withought value, but is secondary to our own laws and interests. As is probably obvous from my cavalier attitude, lack of spelling ability and strength of convictions that I'm willing to back up with serious arguments rather than empty retoric, I'm an Amarican conservative. However, in this context "our" means "the interests and laws of any given soverign nation". Of course, sometimes those iterests conflict. In those cases, the U.N., or some other vehicle for diplomacy, can be usefull. If that route doesn't work, however, M1A1s, A10s and F18s are the appropriate vehicles.
o Government should relax regulation of Big Business and Big Money but crack down on individuals who use marijuana to relieve the pain of illness.
Yeah, that's a problem. I (and many independant conservatives) think that government should relay regulation on Big Doobie as well. Big Eco-Terrorism, however... well, reference previous comment about A10s.
o "Standing Tall for America" means firing your workers and moving their jobs to India.
Hmmm... not sure how that is a Republican thing. Sounds like you just pulled that one out of your ass, frankly.
o A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation.
Yeah, and the abortion issue is just that issue. The way both sides of that issue disingenuously oversimplify makes me sick. I don't see how anyone can support abortion in the third trimester, especially in the last six to eight weeks; with modern technology the baby is often able to be saved, virtually always in the last month. OTOH, in the first weeks of pregnancy, I don't see how the blob of cells can be termed a "human". If we just knew for sure at what point sentience is awakened, this would be a much simpler issue.
As for multi-nationals, if they break laws or cause real harm to people through their action or inaction, they should be whacked with the largest of c
Slashdot Mirror
If you need to get really small, and don't need much by way of features, micro_httpd, but that's probably overkill (underkill?)
If you want to stick with Dell hardware, you have another option: you could order a TrueMobile 1150 miniPCI from Dell spare parts. Last I checked it was about $50. It's based on the Orinoco chipset, probably the most completely supported chipset under Linux.
In fact, there are significant parallels between the two companies. Both are targeted by whiners that are afraid of the challange of a free and open market. Both are very successfull. Both peddle crap, for the most part, with the occasional good value. I find buying from either distatefull. Both have done things that are worthy of legitimate attention by law enforcement. Both have done things worthy of inclusion in business text books as both positive and negative examples.
That being said, the whole "We don't want WallMart here because they'll kill off our local stores" is bullshit. If people really would rather shop at small locally owned shops, they would, and WallMart would close up shop and move on. Instead, the very same people protesting the new WallMart are right there in line for the cheap crap they sell.
Can a small local store compete directly with WallMart? Of course not. Simple economics will tell you that. On the other hand, WallMart, because of they way they are run, cannot compete directly with small shops, either -- they sell different stuff in a much different environment. The problem really is, shoppers are willing to belly up to the WallMart trough -- simply put, they prefer cheap crap as long as the price is lower.
So, if you don't like what WallMart has to offer, shop elsewhere and encourage others to do so as well. Stop bitching about how WallMart "push[es] local businesses out of business" -- I've never seen WallMart logo wearing storm-troopers crashing through the windows of local shops and gunning down the shopkeepers, nor have I seen them herding shoppers into their stores at gunpoint.
Well, perhaps not everything, but pretty close. And the dialogs are all easily navigable via the keyboard. Once basic ideas like accelerator keys vs. hotkeys are understood and basic navigation ideas like when to tab vs. arrow, select via shift, etc. are under his belt, he should seldom need to touch the mouse.
I wish OpenOffice did nearly as well. Or that Microsoft would release a Linux port of Office. I don't know that I'd purchase it personally, but my office would certainly get it for me in a heartbeat. Now, if only Word could import LaTeX and groff files!
Lots of commedians (and quite a few editorialists) called him that, most notably David Letterman. 'course Dave's faverite name for Pres. Clinton was "fat-boy", but that's just Dave.
You were probably thinking of Dubya.
Why can't you Euros keep this stuff straight? It's almost like the US doesn't exist to you guys!
... ;P
Um
I doubt it's the Ethernet NIC. My money would be on the screen. Both LCD adn CRT make some level of noise and that noise alters during display refreshes.
If you really think that, then all I can say is "dude ... stop being on my side".
I've started a journal thread to continue this, as you've suggested. Join in if you find the time.
I've created a journal entry for this discusion so we can take it out of this thread. Feel free to wander over to continue this if you get a chance.
Shite. I was looking at a T40 with the 9k video in it, as I want the SXGA+ display (at least ... again, the Dell 1920 x 1200 WUXGA looks sweet, on paper anyway) and, though I don't game now, I want at least reasonable 3D acceleration for the future. The best I've had in the past is the Mobility Radeon in the Toshiba 1905 I gave my wife, so the 7500 in the other T40s would be a step up, but not a huge one I don't think, and I don't think the T40 w/7500 can be had with anything but the XGA screen. I've not seen any other complaints on the net RE: the issue you mention -- perhaps it's just your machine? OTOH, I'm not done researching, and the T40 just got added to my list the other day. It's more expensive than I want to spend, but the 8600 fully loaded and with said 3yr warranty got pretty damn close, so I figured I'd throw the T40 into the mix and hope SWMBO is cool with the extra expense.
Your comments about Dell are why I wouldn't consider getting one w/o a long warranty. Your last comment (runs Linux surprizingly well) is why I'm still considering them.
Decisions, decisions.
Thanks for the tip, though!
OTOH, the 8600 seems like it fits my needs perfectly; I use my laptop as my primary machine at home. Most of its travel will be from my office to the living room to the bedroom to the dining room, etc. Several times a year I'll need to travel with it for real. Besides, the wide format UXGA screen and Radeon 9600 Pro make me drool a bit, even if I'm not a gamer right now (unless you count Angband, that is).
My current machine is about the same weight as the 8600 (7# +/-), even though the 8600 will obviously be bigger. I had a Sony Z505 a couple years ago -- it rocked for air travel, but XGA just doesn't cut it any more.
Gotta fish or cut bait soon here -- I'd like to place an order tomorrow or the next day. Biggest problem for me is that I've never owned an HPaq (of either HP or Compaq variety) or Dell laptop, so I don't have personal experience with 'em. We use Dell at work, but my machine is a Precision workstation, not a laptop. The laptops seem kinda clunky; sort of Chevy to the ThinkPad's BMW (or whatever). I've used Compaq servers in the past that didn't suck. Every HP I've used sucked since I sold my HP41CVX, but I haven't owned any laptops from either.
As long as we're waaaayyy off topic here, any other ideas for Linux friendly laptops that don't suck and aren't over priced (ThinkPad is expensive, but not necessarily over priced, if you see what I mean)?
A documentary does use a series of clips and interviews pasted together in a way to show a point of view. However, that's not what BfC does. It has a "speach" supposedly given by Chuck Heston. It is a speach he never gave. It is instead bits and pieces of other speaches, taken out of context, pasted together and presented as if it were an actual speach he gave.
So, one of two things is true: BfC is fradulent or it is intended to be a fictional story. Perhaps about real people, groups and ideas, but fictional. Unforch, "documentary" implies non-fiction (not non-biased, mind you), and BfC is being passed of as a documentary, ergo it is fraudulent. It may resonate with your fear of guns, but just because it happens to match your world view doesn't make it true.
And I was designing a new feature for the sotware I write for a living, not cleaning guns. My guns are clean and put away safely and have been for some time, as work has kept me busy, so I've not had time to get to the range. Thanks for your concern, though. Quite touching.
Violent crime is down in the U.S. in the last several years. Very few people have ever even seen a gun pulled in Real Life (but for the record, a growning number of responsible people are carrying in the U.S., ready, willing and able to use their gun in self defense. As it should be.).
As for "Bolwing for Columbine" being a documentary -- it's no more a documentary than Armegeddon was a documentary about Bruce Willis saving us from death by asteroid. It was presented as a documentary, it is flogged by the press and other liberals as a documentary, but a documentary doesn't take clips of speach from over a period of several years, paste them together to give the message you want (completely different than the original message of the speaker) and present it as a speach that actually happened.
As for why VFAT became popular, it had nothing to do with being free ... it was the FS that the most popular OS used and it was simple ... *those* are the reasons why it became popular for uses outside Windows itself. Many of these devices will not be affected by this situation, or at least need not be, as they could easily use simple FAT-12 or (assuming it isn't covered ... I confess to still not having time to read the four patents) perhaps FAT-16, since most don't need or use the features of VFAT.
As your Esperanto example, if patentable features were added to the language, I see no reason that said liguist shouldn't be able to license the new language technology. People are free to choose not to use those features, either by replacing them with others, or doing withought. And as much as it pains me to defend Billy & Co., your charge per book would have to be more like $.10 or so to make it anywhere near analogous.
You may find these things to be "not acceptable", but since the technology in question isn't yours, and the US patent system allows for ownership of these technologies, so it's not your call. Now, if you want to put your (IMHO misplaced) indignation to work, perhaps a better target would be the Patent system that has spun out of control.
Regardless, you are set in your mind, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.
Now, the issue of whether or not I think they should be able to own what they claim to is a different one, as is the issue of whether or not this is the proverbial camel's nose in the tent or not. I'm, in general, opposed to software patents and I don't trust MS half as far as I could throw their entire campus. But software patents are currently legal, and this act by MS isn't, all by itself, evil. Annoying? Sure. But it seems to me that it's well within their rights under the law.
Mind you, the patents they were granted may or may not be good (I haven't read them yet). But the basic act of licensing VFAT now that it's ubequetous seems reasonable. I'm frankly surprised they didn't start doing so a few years ago. It might, as some here have suggested, be because they want to discourage its use. If so, I would expect that either the real price will go up over time (standard EOL procedure) or they will be more obvious about suggesting the use of WinFS (or whatever).
Just becasue something is popular doesn't mean that it should be free. BigMacs are very popular ... go ask for one free. Or, more appropriatly, Two Towers was very popular ... are you saying that it should therefore be able to to copied free!? Or pay per view sporting events ... the normal events are televised on (free) network TV, how dare those bastards start charging for more popular events.
As for IBM's cross-licensing, they probably have license to distribute, not grant further license, but obviously I don't know what arrangement they have with MS.
All in all this seems like one of the more reasonable moves by MS ... at least so far. I won't be at all surprised if this is the opening move for something that is unreasonable, dishonest and unacceptable.
To quote from the second source:
yeah that.
I should have stopped responding to the former message after my third interruption. Finishing up in a hurry leads to looking like an idiot. Oh well, nothing I haven't done before.
Being a drug addict may be an illness, I don't think we have proof of that yet, and it depends somewhat upon how far you are willing to stretch the definition of "illness". Addiction can also be a moral failing, in the case of relapse, especially if going back to the drugs will hurt others (e.g. you are a parent). It is not, of itself, a crime. It can be related to a crime, if crimes are comitted because of the addiction. Since you're referring to Rush's case, I assume, I'd say it's possibly all three; there just isn't enough information to know for sure. Personally, I don't think drugs themselves should be illegal at all, but rather, users should be held fully responsible for any crimes they commit under the influence. As for the prayers, I'm an apathetic agnostic (I don't know and can't be troubled to try very hard to find out), so I'm not qualified to speak to that issue.
Wow, what incisive insight! Or it could be the case that you are intentionally conflating the group of people that thinks the former, but still thinks it was a good idea to kick Saddam's ass, with the latter, who just think it was a good idea to said ass kicking. Personally, I think the U.N. is not withought value, but is secondary to our own laws and interests. As is probably obvous from my cavalier attitude, lack of spelling ability and strength of convictions that I'm willing to back up with serious arguments rather than empty retoric, I'm an Amarican conservative. However, in this context "our" means "the interests and laws of any given soverign nation". Of course, sometimes those iterests conflict. In those cases, the U.N., or some other vehicle for diplomacy, can be usefull. If that route doesn't work, however, M1A1s, A10s and F18s are the appropriate vehicles.
Yeah, that's a problem. I (and many independant conservatives) think that government should relay regulation on Big Doobie as well. Big Eco-Terrorism, however ... well, reference previous comment about A10s.
Hmmm ... not sure how that is a Republican thing. Sounds like you just pulled that one out of your ass, frankly.
Yeah, and the abortion issue is just that issue. The way both sides of that issue disingenuously oversimplify makes me sick. I don't see how anyone can support abortion in the third trimester, especially in the last six to eight weeks; with modern technology the baby is often able to be saved, virtually always in the last month. OTOH, in the first weeks of pregnancy, I don't see how the blob of cells can be termed a "human". If we just knew for sure at what point sentience is awakened, this would be a much simpler issue. As for multi-nationals, if they break laws or cause real harm to people through their action or inaction, they should be whacked with the largest of c
Naw, Tux should fill in for a week some time when Opus take a vacation.