Oh goody, in your world the government is controlled by market forces and voluntary participation. That means I can choose not to pay taxes or follow the laws if I don't like them.
You pinhead.
The system is for government employees. Surely you can decide if you want to become a government employee or not?
Chirac is pretty much the pinnacle of the Continental hypocrisy: a sanctimonous, arrogant denunciation of America's sanctimonious arrogance. Phrases like "France is an ancient civilization", intended to highlight France's wisdom in affairs of state, convey French paternalistic disdain for "the big child" even more than the routine denunciations from the left, precisely because they were well-intentioned. Why this should so irk the nationalist right in America should be obvious.
As for the left, people are more forgiving, but still. In the pre-war period every time Chirac or de Villepin opened their mouths, war support in the US and Britain jumped another two points. Chirac seemed far more focused on laying out his grand vision than on stopping the impending disaster in Iraq. Was his quest for French relevence worth that? The Russians managed to oppose the war without generating the same blowback. Unfortunately, the cool, hard-nosed realistic critique of Bush's war policy coming from Moscow was drowned out by Chirac's dreamy fantasies of multipolarity and Papa France.
To my mind, the clumsy, blind, dogmatic diplomacy of Bush and Chirac were the perfect mirrors of each other. The resulting chill between the two populations is the depressing, though predictable result.
I would rather have multiple cores than a faster processor. The combined clocks of my old dual processor system ran just over half that of my current (similar core) processor, yet the feel of it on the desktop was far better. None of the little hitches, glitches and rogue processes that plague me on the uniprocessor system. I'm very curious to see how these dual cores stack up against dual processor systems in terms of cost and power consumption, as those are the factors keeping me from going back to a dual proc system.
You are right that many individual applications would not benefit from the additional core but for overall system performance, the dual setup can't be beat.
RFID is sending out a number only. It is the serial number of your passport. The reader would then have to look this number up in a database for any info. RFID does not and can not send "name, age, photo and home address".
FTFA:
The RFID passport works like a high-tech version of the children's game "Marco Polo." A reader speaks out the equivalent of "Marco" on a designated frequency. The chip then channels that radio energy and echoes back with an answer.
But instead of simply saying "Polo," the 64 Kb chip will say the passport holder's name, address, date and place of birth, and send along a digital photograph.
While none of the information on the chip is encrypted, the chip does also broadcast a digital signature that verifies the chip itself was created by the government. Security experts said the U.S. government decided not to encrypt the data because of the risks involved in sharing the method of decryption with other countries.
If you refuse to show it, you're detained. Then, they open up your wallet/purse and look. All you did was delay everyone somewhat and create trouble for yourself with no real difference between they're waving you over or pointing a device.
Oh really? If you refuse to show it at the hotel? In the cab? In a restaurant? At the movie theater? There is no technical reason anyone can't set up a reader anywhere they want to snoop.
When I travel, my passport never leaves me. It's such a comfort to know it will be singing out my name, age, photo and home address to anyone who's curious. I feel safer already.
Of course, this will all seem very odd to Americans, because you're not used to the idea of TV that has no political or advertising association.
I hate to undo my moderation, but how could you have missed PBS? It's got loads of high-quality, commercial-free programming. Some of it is coproduced with, or even purchased from the BBC, and it's free and available everywhere.
As for FOX, why do you compare it with the BBC, rather than Murdoch-owned press in the UK? Talk about a straw man.
Sure, your facts are technicaly correct, but would *you* volunteer to be an election observer in Fallujah? I wouldn't either, and neither would the UN. Nobody wants to stand there for twelve hours waiting to get blown up. Lots of people are "listening", but nobody has a solution.
I believe the US invasion was utter folly, but it was utter folly because the problems it raises cannot be solved by hand waving and finger pointing. Election security is a real, fundamental problem and is not based on how the US "feels" about the issue. I wish it was, but the situation sucks more badly than your simplistic analysis admits.
And the problem with the "how many people use those features" argument is that while almost nobody uses all of them, many people use one or two of them. I make do with OOo, but if I did a lot more word processing, I'd probably spring for word and that crossover thing to run it.
I accept that your interpretations are widely held in Europe, but you must admit the parent has a point. There has always been a core of anti-Americans in Europe who never got over their resentment that the Soviets didn't reach them first at the close of WWII. Well, since Bush proved all their doomsaying right, they've gained a huge number of converts, and the level of righteous sanctimony coming from the European left approaches, or even exceeds, that coming from the American right. For many of us, both are equally aggrivating.
Your critique of foreign policy I'll ignore, since I despise Bush as well. But does the rhetoric from Europe make my job easier? Hell, no. I assume you're British ("laddie"). Remember how effective Chirac's diplomatic offensive was at stopping the war? He probably boosted support 15 points in the UK and 10 points here with his arrogant paternalism. When Europeans who claim to want the same things from the US that I do act in a way that makes it more difficult to achieve, it does seem like they enjoy hating the US more than they would enjoy seeing it follow their stated course.
On your final point, you may be surprised that this has been suggested, reasonably, by some high-level Washington wonks. The idea is to create a third house of Congress with an exclusively international vote and some balance of power with the other two. Naturally, other countries would be outraged at this development ("OOH! The arrogance!"), but I bet the voter turnout would be pretty high...
What always confuses me, as an outsider, is why so often in discussions about the political system in America, the opinions of the 'founding fathers' are invoked as a standard by which the current situation can be gauged in terms of its democratic legitimacy.
Well, what a lot of outsiders miss (and what tends to greatly disturb them if they see), is that America is an ideological nation state -- perhaps the only one left in a world of ethno-linguistic entities.
We quote the founding fathers the way the Soviets would quote Lenin or Chinese would quote Mao before they mostly gave up the idea of communism and became more simple Russian and Chinese empires. The reason our British/Scottish enlightenment values have proven more robust than Marxism (intrinsic considerations aside) is that they contain an essential kernel of pragmatism that promotes -- indeed, demands -- ongoing adjustments.
Thus your point about the "practice of democracy only got off the ground in..." is moot. Maxwell's equations form the basis of 20th century physics, both quantum mechanics and relativity. Does the fact that Maxwell himself did not see the implications of his own theory invalidate him as a source? Of course not. The founders and later practitioners of qm and relativity gush over Maxwell's genius and reexamine him again and again to see what other treasures might be lying there.
Similarly, the failure of the founding fathers to recognize the full implications of their rhetoric is not a stain on them. Again and again we apply their framework beyond what they envisioned, and again and again it proves successful. As with Maxwell, this looks very much like confirmation, rather than refutation.
Who are these "real" Chinese that you speak of? All Chinese citisens have the power to execute a revolution, and that nation has done it before; your problem is you dont like the way it has all turned out. You cant concieve of a billion people all wanting to be communists, well, sorry to burst your bubble, but they DO want to be communists, and not you or anyone else has the power to stop them from being communists.
Heh. Pipe-toking. That's pretty original.
China is about as "communist" as Industrial Revolution Britain. Visit sometime. You'll also find plenty of chinese who criticize their government. By whispering to you in loud public places. I wonder why they do that? I've also met a few Tibetans who will be very pleased with your moral support. I'll see if I can't find my old address book so I can write and let them know they can just "execute a revolution" and you'll be right there with them. That's just super.
So you side with the Chinese censors, I side with the Chinese scholars. Yet you seem to feel only the censors represent Chinese culture, and those who disagree are imperialist pigs and their lackeys. Sorry to burst your bubble, but your pose of neutrality is phoney.
Sanctimonious euro rant
The only way that comment makes sense is if the only options in the world are invading Iraq or pretending there was nothing wrong with Saddam Hussein. That's almost dumb enough to make me support the war.
Why? Because you merely believe that they should have access to the same type of sources that you do? That is not a reason why a culture should be changed via pressure from a company based in another jurisdiction.
You fool, they aren't choosing it -- it's being chosen for them. That is the point. I'm all for letting the Chinese choose not to visit sites.
You, apparently, believe that Chinese culture was fixed by God at the moment of creation only to be touched by the lucky few appointed guardians in the party. Why not let real Chinese people decide for themselves? Because it might upset your paternalistic, ultraconservative culture zoo? In your grovelling before authority, you have arbitrarily selected a handfull of Chinese whose opinions you will hold as sacred, discounting all others. Do you count Chinese who don't like the censorship as some kind of sellout race-traitors?
And your 911 example has been rebutted, by the way. See google for the story.
And as for this "false picture" being presented to the Chiese by their government, your time would be much better spent correcting those people that think, for example, that Saddam Hussein had something to do with 911
Actually, I can just tell them to google Saddam 9/11 -- all the arguments on both sides are right there.
But what do I do with the people whose news really is censored?
That is disappointing. I bet getting rid of that ban wouldn't result in one more German Nazi, but it seems I have more faith in Germans than they do in themselves.
It's also somewhat amusing that the number one result in the American search says:
Stormfront White Nationalist Spanish Language Section Has Moved
I guess they could be after Spaniards, but still...
I ran some numbers a little while ago. Given 100% efficient solar panels getting a full 12 hours worth of noon-day sun at the equator, 365 days of the year, you would have to cover the entire state of Texas to produce enough solar power to fill current US electrical needs.
I think your math is wrong.
Texas is 700,000 square km, or 700,000,000,000 square meters. Current US electrical production capacity is on the same order -- about 850 gigawatts, but 100% efficient solar panels produce 1000 watts per square meter, not one watt.
So you'd really need less than 1/500 of the state of Texas. Spread this out over the whole country and the picture is less bleak than you paint.
I watched the stolen versions of the DVD and it convinced me to buy the trilogy.
When the SE came out, I was so agitated by Greedo shooting first and the distracting eye candy that I didn't even go to see Empire and Jedi on the big screen. The eye candy is still there but the Greedo scene passes muster with me.
In this version, they shoot almost simultaneously (boys, boys), so close that Greedo's first shot could be a mere relativistic side-effect of photons crossing at a certain angle.
Empire seemed pretty straightforward. I had heard there weren't many changes in the SE, and didn't see many other than too much wampa.
Jedi made me wish I still did acid, but I don't think that was due to the alterations. That Chewbacca-Tarzan thing is just too weird. Jubjub indeed.
And you are right about the film quality -- it kicks my videotape's ass. And the colors are greatly enhanced, but don't pop like technicolor, they're still balanced and realistic. More like moving from 16 to 24 bit color.
I recommend any fan give it a look before absolutely deciding against buying.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh goody, in your world the government is controlled by market forces and voluntary participation. That means I can choose not to pay taxes or follow the laws if I don't like them.
You pinhead.
The system is for government employees. Surely you can decide if you want to become a government employee or not?
Eventually theres so many penguins, the crowd accidently pushes one happless penguin into the water.
I wish it was always so innocent...
No, he's right -- 1000 watts is the standard value used for direct sunlight. 1300-1400 watts is the value outside the atmosphere.
The 250 watt figure for New Mexico is averaged over 24 hours. The parent is only using six hours.
The classic rating number is 1000W/m^2 for 100% efficiency.
So at 7%, this would be 70W/m^2.
Chirac is pretty much the pinnacle of the Continental hypocrisy: a sanctimonous, arrogant denunciation of America's sanctimonious arrogance. Phrases like "France is an ancient civilization", intended to highlight France's wisdom in affairs of state, convey French paternalistic disdain for "the big child" even more than the routine denunciations from the left, precisely because they were well-intentioned. Why this should so irk the nationalist right in America should be obvious.
As for the left, people are more forgiving, but still. In the pre-war period every time Chirac or de Villepin opened their mouths, war support in the US and Britain jumped another two points. Chirac seemed far more focused on laying out his grand vision than on stopping the impending disaster in Iraq. Was his quest for French relevence worth that? The Russians managed to oppose the war without generating the same blowback. Unfortunately, the cool, hard-nosed realistic critique of Bush's war policy coming from Moscow was drowned out by Chirac's dreamy fantasies of multipolarity and Papa France.
To my mind, the clumsy, blind, dogmatic diplomacy of Bush and Chirac were the perfect mirrors of each other. The resulting chill between the two populations is the depressing, though predictable result.
I would rather have multiple cores than a faster processor. The combined clocks of my old dual processor system ran just over half that of my current (similar core) processor, yet the feel of it on the desktop was far better. None of the little hitches, glitches and rogue processes that plague me on the uniprocessor system. I'm very curious to see how these dual cores stack up against dual processor systems in terms of cost and power consumption, as those are the factors keeping me from going back to a dual proc system.
You are right that many individual applications would not benefit from the additional core but for overall system performance, the dual setup can't be beat.
RFID is sending out a number only. It is the serial number of your passport. The reader would then have to look this number up in a database for any info. RFID does not and can not send "name, age, photo and home address".
FTFA:
The RFID passport works like a high-tech version of the children's game "Marco Polo." A reader speaks out the equivalent of "Marco" on a designated frequency. The chip then channels that radio energy and echoes back with an answer.
But instead of simply saying "Polo," the 64 Kb chip will say the passport holder's name, address, date and place of birth, and send along a digital photograph.
While none of the information on the chip is encrypted, the chip does also broadcast a digital signature that verifies the chip itself was created by the government. Security experts said the U.S. government decided not to encrypt the data because of the risks involved in sharing the method of decryption with other countries.
That's not at all what it sound like to me.
If you refuse to show it, you're detained. Then, they open up your wallet/purse and look. All you did was delay everyone somewhat and create trouble for yourself with no real difference between they're waving you over or pointing a device.
Oh really? If you refuse to show it at the hotel? In the cab? In a restaurant? At the movie theater? There is no technical reason anyone can't set up a reader anywhere they want to snoop.
When I travel, my passport never leaves me. It's such a comfort to know it will be singing out my name, age, photo and home address to anyone who's curious. I feel safer already.
Of course, this will all seem very odd to Americans, because you're not used to the idea of TV that has no political or advertising association.
I hate to undo my moderation, but how could you have missed PBS? It's got loads of high-quality, commercial-free programming. Some of it is coproduced with, or even purchased from the BBC, and it's free and available everywhere.
As for FOX, why do you compare it with the BBC, rather than Murdoch-owned press in the UK? Talk about a straw man.
Can't agree with you there, jd.
Sure, your facts are technicaly correct, but would *you* volunteer to be an election observer in Fallujah? I wouldn't either, and neither would the UN. Nobody wants to stand there for twelve hours waiting to get blown up. Lots of people are "listening", but nobody has a solution.
I believe the US invasion was utter folly, but it was utter folly because the problems it raises cannot be solved by hand waving and finger pointing. Election security is a real, fundamental problem and is not based on how the US "feels" about the issue. I wish it was, but the situation sucks more badly than your simplistic analysis admits.
No Viagra, but Sarin came in at number 17.
Somebody should tell Bush. I hear he's been looking all over for this guy.
Which features?
And how many people actually use those features?
Outline mode! That floating navigator is lame.
And the problem with the "how many people use those features" argument is that while almost nobody uses all of them, many people use one or two of them. I make do with OOo, but if I did a lot more word processing, I'd probably spring for word and that crossover thing to run it.
I accept that your interpretations are widely held in Europe, but you must admit the parent has a point. There has always been a core of anti-Americans in Europe who never got over their resentment that the Soviets didn't reach them first at the close of WWII. Well, since Bush proved all their doomsaying right, they've gained a huge number of converts, and the level of righteous sanctimony coming from the European left approaches, or even exceeds, that coming from the American right. For many of us, both are equally aggrivating.
Your critique of foreign policy I'll ignore, since I despise Bush as well. But does the rhetoric from Europe make my job easier? Hell, no. I assume you're British ("laddie"). Remember how effective Chirac's diplomatic offensive was at stopping the war? He probably boosted support 15 points in the UK and 10 points here with his arrogant paternalism. When Europeans who claim to want the same things from the US that I do act in a way that makes it more difficult to achieve, it does seem like they enjoy hating the US more than they would enjoy seeing it follow their stated course.
On your final point, you may be surprised that this has been suggested, reasonably, by some high-level Washington wonks. The idea is to create a third house of Congress with an exclusively international vote and some balance of power with the other two. Naturally, other countries would be outraged at this development ("OOH! The arrogance!"), but I bet the voter turnout would be pretty high...
What always confuses me, as an outsider, is why so often in discussions about the political system in America, the opinions of the 'founding fathers' are invoked as a standard by which the current situation can be gauged in terms of its democratic legitimacy.
Well, what a lot of outsiders miss (and what tends to greatly disturb them if they see), is that America is an ideological nation state -- perhaps the only one left in a world of ethno-linguistic entities.
We quote the founding fathers the way the Soviets would quote Lenin or Chinese would quote Mao before they mostly gave up the idea of communism and became more simple Russian and Chinese empires. The reason our British/Scottish enlightenment values have proven more robust than Marxism (intrinsic considerations aside) is that they contain an essential kernel of pragmatism that promotes -- indeed, demands -- ongoing adjustments.
Thus your point about the "practice of democracy only got off the ground in..." is moot. Maxwell's equations form the basis of 20th century physics, both quantum mechanics and relativity. Does the fact that Maxwell himself did not see the implications of his own theory invalidate him as a source? Of course not. The founders and later practitioners of qm and relativity gush over Maxwell's genius and reexamine him again and again to see what other treasures might be lying there.
Similarly, the failure of the founding fathers to recognize the full implications of their rhetoric is not a stain on them. Again and again we apply their framework beyond what they envisioned, and again and again it proves successful. As with Maxwell, this looks very much like confirmation, rather than refutation.
Who are these "real" Chinese that you speak of? All Chinese citisens have the power to execute a revolution, and that nation has done it before; your problem is you dont like the way it has all turned out. You cant concieve of a billion people all wanting to be communists, well, sorry to burst your bubble, but they DO want to be communists, and not you or anyone else has the power to stop them from being communists.
Heh. Pipe-toking. That's pretty original.
China is about as "communist" as Industrial Revolution Britain. Visit sometime. You'll also find plenty of chinese who criticize their government. By whispering to you in loud public places. I wonder why they do that? I've also met a few Tibetans who will be very pleased with your moral support. I'll see if I can't find my old address book so I can write and let them know they can just "execute a revolution" and you'll be right there with them. That's just super.
So you side with the Chinese censors, I side with the Chinese scholars. Yet you seem to feel only the censors represent Chinese culture, and those who disagree are imperialist pigs and their lackeys. Sorry to burst your bubble, but your pose of neutrality is phoney.
Sanctimonious euro rant
The only way that comment makes sense is if the only options in the world are invading Iraq or pretending there was nothing wrong with Saddam Hussein. That's almost dumb enough to make me support the war.
Why? Because you merely believe that they should have access to the same type of sources that you do? That is not a reason why a culture should be changed via pressure from a company based in another jurisdiction.
You fool, they aren't choosing it -- it's being chosen for them. That is the point. I'm all for letting the Chinese choose not to visit sites.
You, apparently, believe that Chinese culture was fixed by God at the moment of creation only to be touched by the lucky few appointed guardians in the party. Why not let real Chinese people decide for themselves? Because it might upset your paternalistic, ultraconservative culture zoo? In your grovelling before authority, you have arbitrarily selected a handfull of Chinese whose opinions you will hold as sacred, discounting all others. Do you count Chinese who don't like the censorship as some kind of sellout race-traitors?
And your 911 example has been rebutted, by the way. See google for the story.
And as for this "false picture" being presented to the Chiese by their government, your time would be much better spent correcting those people that think, for example, that Saddam Hussein had something to do with 911
Actually, I can just tell them to google Saddam 9/11 -- all the arguments on both sides are right there.
But what do I do with the people whose news really is censored?
That is disappointing. I bet getting rid of that ban wouldn't result in one more German Nazi, but it seems I have more faith in Germans than they do in themselves.
It's also somewhat amusing that the number one result in the American search says:
I guess they could be after Spaniards, but still...
I ran some numbers a little while ago. Given 100% efficient solar panels getting a full 12 hours worth of noon-day sun at the equator, 365 days of the year, you would have to cover the entire state of Texas to produce enough solar power to fill current US electrical needs.
I think your math is wrong.
Texas is 700,000 square km, or 700,000,000,000 square meters. Current US electrical production capacity is on the same order -- about 850 gigawatts, but 100% efficient solar panels produce 1000 watts per square meter, not one watt.
So you'd really need less than 1/500 of the state of Texas. Spread this out over the whole country and the picture is less bleak than you paint.
From your link:
SOURCE:NBC
Somehow I don't feel censored. Looks like somebody just bought limited distribution rights, that's all.
They will if someone complains about a specific instance.
You didn't ask if they would, you asked if they should.
And google is not a content provider, either. And the content being filtered is "just discussing" as well. This is the qualitative difference.
Of course google shouldn't censor underage porn. Should your ISP have blocked your post because you talked about underage porn?
That is why the difference is qualitative, not merely quantitative.
Consider that sky-diving can also offer you zero-g styled environment
Not really, because in skydiving the local atmosphere is not falling at the same rate as you. I would expect the sensations to be very different.
I watched the stolen versions of the DVD and it convinced me to buy the trilogy.
When the SE came out, I was so agitated by Greedo shooting first and the distracting eye candy that I didn't even go to see Empire and Jedi on the big screen. The eye candy is still there but the Greedo scene passes muster with me.
In this version, they shoot almost simultaneously (boys, boys), so close that Greedo's first shot could be a mere relativistic side-effect of photons crossing at a certain angle.
Empire seemed pretty straightforward. I had heard there weren't many changes in the SE, and didn't see many other than too much wampa.
Jedi made me wish I still did acid, but I don't think that was due to the alterations. That Chewbacca-Tarzan thing is just too weird. Jubjub indeed.
And you are right about the film quality -- it kicks my videotape's ass. And the colors are greatly enhanced, but don't pop like technicolor, they're still balanced and realistic. More like moving from 16 to 24 bit color.
I recommend any fan give it a look before absolutely deciding against buying.
Anyone got a torrent?