These are all offered by the Scandinavian countries, and we tend to be doing quite well.
Yeah, but for how long? Are the scandinavians generally a decade or two or three into their socialized healthcare plans? Soviet Russia lasted 70 years. I wouldn't be so quick to call the scandanavian plan much better just yet.
Two or three generations in and then we'll see if it's got better staying power. I'm guessing from the plummeting birthrates of highly-socialized nations that the system will be in grave danger within two generations. Demographics is destiny, and with birthrates around 1.7-1.8 (summary from some google search) the system can't continue forever. You'll get too many old people who need healthcare, and not enough young people to pay for it in taxes or even provide the labor for it.
WHEN will humanity FINALLY end this BLACK-WHITE thinking? "opponent" is a medieval word. It should have been left at the door of the 21st century. Even in the EU we have trouble laying down our weapons. *sigh* back to the shelters.
Hey.. uh... I'm not sure if you've ever heard this one before, but despite all the touchy-feely instruction you recieved in your various levels of education, there are good reasons to stand in opposition (aka be an opponent) to something.
There is good, there is evil, there is better, there is worse. There are cultures, behavoirs, and attitudes that are inherently destructive towards the purveyors and their fellows, and there are traits that are beneficial to their purveyors and those around them.
You may find it laudable to bare your neck to people and cultures who would slit your throat for fun- I, however, do not. There are things worth fighting, killing, and dieing for.
I imagine you've probably spent your life in a great deal of comfort relative to the historical human norm of poverty, misery and oppression. That's the only way I can imagine you could spout off some trite kum-by-ya soundbite and be serious about it.
It's quite clear that several mods have also grown up so sheltered, else you wouldn't be so highly rated.
There is darkness in the hearts of men and women, and it cannot be allowed to rule- it must be fought. Darkness and corruption, by nature, won't lay down just because you ask nicely.
*This post makes no reference to any particular political stance or culture- only that faux-sophisticated "everything is shades of grey, it's all cool, man." thinking is deeply flawed.
I work at a school district. I see 17-year-olds all the time. Yes, they are children. They act without considering the consequences to themselves or others. They are irresponsible and generally stupid, with a few exceptions.
Could that have something to do with the fact that we neither expect nor demand better of them?
Or that we basically prohibit them by law from assuming any responsibilities of consequence?
Methinks this entire 'adolescence' concept is a failed idea that needs to die.
"North Americans plant billions of trees each year. There is no reason why the rest of the world can't do the same."
This somehow remembers me some cute Maire Antoinette saying on pre-revolution days: "if there's no bread, let them eat cake!"
Please, remember how Marie Antoinette ended.
Clever, but a non-sequitir. I imagine your +4 rating has more to do with your historical reference and playing to the anti-american-they'll-get-theirs-someday crowd then you actually having a point.
Trees are a renewable resource that can be predictably grown and harvested- it's just that the season isn't months, it's decades. I see no good reason that we can't expect the rest of the world to act accordingly when it's something we do routinely in the US.
Unless, of course, your opinion is that the rest of the world is too stupid and impatient to treat wood like any other crop.
From what I understand, it was because the voters of Texas outright hated him and not even Johnson's voting fraud buddies could be counted on to keep things in line. He was there to try to gin up some good will.
Of course, his assasination was the biggest boon to his legacy ever.
He was actually a horrible president with a self-centered high school mentality, put in place by the political mechanations of his father and the Daley's in Chicago. Lyndon and Kennedy actually hated each other, and he was only brought onto the ticket to deliver Texas- fraudulently. JFK's only real gift was charisma, and that's all he needed to win given his father, the Daleys, and Johnson.
If he wasn't assisinated his presidency would have been nothing more than a painful, distant memory by now.
Those green energy certificates are great.... for states bordering those who require them.
Massachusetts recently required that all power companies in MA had to produce a certain portion of their electricity renewably. Of course, MA also has ornerous restrictions on actually building new power plants or changing anything. The power companies could meet the requirement by buying certificates or paying the state a substantial amount in lieu of certificates or generation.
So what happened? Public Service of New Hampshire built a wood burning plant. They sell the electricity, and then the sell the certificates which go for about the same price as the electricity. Wood is too expensive per BTU to be a viable fuel without the certificates, but with the certificates it's pretty profitable.
End result: Massachusetts Rate payers subsidize PSNH's bottom line and NH ratepayers. Oh yeah, and they burn some wood in a high-tech boiler. Is it 'greener' then before? Maybe it is. Does it F*ck MA ratepayers to the benefit of NH ratepayers and PSNH shareholders?
Yep.
This is from the same state whose congressmen killed a perfectly good wind project (cape wind IIRC) because it would mess up their views.
Yeah, I'm glad I live in New Hampshire. At least for the moment. MA residents are moving in, and some of them are trying to institute the same nonsense that drove them out of MA.
The simple fact is that inkjet printing is just a bad idea, no matter what the costs are. It can't compete in any way with laser printing technology, except by using marketing to take advantage of peoples' stupidity and shortsightedness.
Coming from someone who has a color laser printer at home and loves it, I can't fully agree.
I may well buy one of these new kodak printers just for printing photos. I'm currently under the impression that you can't get good photo-paper prints from laser printers because they typically melt the glossy emulsion.
The printer I have is the Okidata 5500 . It cost $400 after a $200 mail in rebate (which I did get back in a month or two) and I haven't had to replace a toner cartridge yet*.
They are 'starter' cartridges but I've gone through two or three reams so far on them. Anyway, it can't be beat for copy paper printouts. I just want to print out photos for framing on occasion inkjets seem to do that better.
Kodak's little program here may mean I actually buy one instead of hitting the kiosks at Walmart or a photo store.
*Not counting that messy incident when I realized that the toner cartridges are two seperate pieces, and that the 'lock/unlock' switch didn't lock it in the printer, but locked the halves together. That cost me $120 and an hour of cleanup.
I've never heard of anyone in the workforce telling me to give 80% to 85% effort, why should school be different? And if the schoolwork really is too simple for your beautiful mind, then you should be getting the A's and doing extracurricular projects with ease. These half assed attitudes toward education are exactly the problem.
I'm sure you're familiar with the principle of diminishing returns, no? As you approach the limit of your performance, each additional input of effort yields an ever-shrinking gain.
There is such a thing as 'good enough', and there's enough different markets out there that the folks who call 60-70%(Walmart) 'good enough' AND the folks who call 99.99% (Rolls-Royce)'good enough' can profit.
Now, the more effort you put in, the more options you have- a 99.99% engineer could get a job at Walmart upon graduation, or he could take a job designing cars for Rolls-Royce. A 60-70% engineer can only get a job designing Walmart trash.
You get the picture. Saying 80-85% is 'good enough' is a viable strategy, but going for 100% will give you more options.
This is beginning to get scary: serious political discussions on Slashdot, what is the world coming to!
Sadly I'm not sure there's much more to discuss.
You seem to be of the opinion that no one should ever have to lay anything on the line for their principles. In this I disagree with you, and it is the basis for our disagreement.
It appears you want limitless freedoms without a chance of any associated cost. Things don't work that way, nor should they.
I've bought Intel motherboards (and of course processors) for my last three computers, and they've been pretty rock solid.
Perhaps they think it wise to sell products that can be used even if their competitor gets a few bucks- until today didn't they effectively yield the floor for AMD motherboards to other companies?
In order to decided which freedom takes priority, you must ask which way would compel an action, and which way wouldn't.
If you compel the president to associate with those he doesn't want to, then he has no freedom of association. He would be compelled to associate. Compel != freedom.
If a reporter chooses to self-censor about a marginal but potentially important subject, it is still his, the reporters, choice.
Free people making decisions in their own interest does have it's occasional downsides. In the aggregate it's a lot better than any other system. You can't change the rules every time you suspect a bad outcome. That's the price and the very definition of freedom.
We cannot endlessly make rules and guidelines to cover every situation in the pursuit of some mythical perfect outcome. The chase would fruitless and the end result totalitarianism of one stripe or another.
I think it's better than the alternatives. Freedom asks alot of those who would drink heartily of it. Are you up to it? __________________________________________ (PS)It's a valid point that the US operates more by seduction than by coercion. Our vapid pop culture spreads like a virus throughout the world not by the barrel of the gun, but by folks eating it up willingly.
Then could you explain what the difference is between censorship laws and censorship by the back door because the press don't want to loose their privileged access to the president? At least with censorship laws you know that you can't trust the press. I find the voluntary censorship of the US press far more insidious.
I think the need to explain the difference shows how warped your world view is. Even the President has freedom of association, and he can use that freedom to not invite or stay away from members of the press who piss him off.
'Freedom of speech' does not mean 'free from all consequences of speech.' It only means freedom from prior restraint, from imprisonment for protected speech (not firing and inciting a riot), and freedom from polonium 210 posioning if your speech is critical of the government.
Whosoever pisses off the president and gets kicked off the whitehouse correspendant list can still go on national TV and say pretty much whatever the hell he wants.
He just has to make a choice- does he want the prestige of being in the whitehouse press corp, or does he want to say what his conscience dictates?
That's a pretty easy choice for any man or woman with a shred of character, and in the US it doesn't end with you being posioned at some foriegn hotel with some 'hot' tea.
...When you can't buy anything flame resistant or UL listed. Or anything, for that matter. Is Washington a big enough state to overcome the costs associated with a differentiated product line? Will companies even make things that can't cost-effectively comply with other regulations and industry liability practices that require flame resistance?
Diesel-electric locomotives have no direct mechanical linkage from the hydrocarbon-fueled engine to the wheels on the track. This is exactly the kind of car I am waiting for. I'm a EE, so I like the idea of electricity as the main transport of energy in a car. And the hydrocarbon engine plus generator could be replaced in the future by better technology. So IF someone made an inexpensive, reliable fuel cell, it could take the place of the engine.
I saw the same pattern with reagan's true believers.
Funny thing is the Reagen presidency is nearly universally well-regarded two decades after the fact. He also had liberals (k, maybe/maybe not libertarians) who hated him every bit as much as folks now hate Bush.
Incidentally, I'm a nuclear power plant operator so I've got a pretty good idea of how things go in the nuke industry. In general things go as slow as molasses. Had he the power, Bush could have funded & fully authorized a nuclear power plant his first day in office in 2001, and it still wouldn't be generating electricity.
Well, there's a lot more layers to it. Killing a mugger is actually a very rare thing and a poor example. It's more typically a home invader that gets gunned down, for reasons you hint at- the homeowner has a chance to arm themselves.
If you're going to carry concealed- I have the license to do so but I do not- responsibility demands you maintain enough awareness of your surroundings that a threat won't sneak up on you.
Criminals of all sorts do select victims that look easy to victimize, and someone who is keeping keenely aware of his/her surroundings will probably get passed up for an easier mark.
I've obviously simplified the entire topic of being capable of meeting criminals with force and the circumstances where such confrontations are likely. I can point you to much more in-depth discussions if you like.
Respond to words with words, to actions with actions. In our subject matter, this would mean taking a violent criminal at his word. Not necessarily a wise choice.
To be honest, if I let a mugger get the drop on me there's a reasonable chance I would just give him my wallet. There's a million what-if's buried in that sentence that could only be worked out on the fly.
The best thing to do is to keep aware of your surroundings and present the persona that you are not to be screwed with. That will keep you safe and with your wallet in most cases.
How's that Bush Derangement Syndrome working out for you?
Look, I have my own problems with GW Bush, but there are thousands of folks like you who take it to the psychosis level. It's quite clearly a searing hatred that's doing more damage to it's bearers than anyone else. It causes one to look at everything through an anti-Bush lense with no true historical perspective applied.
Actually discussing anything Bush has done, might do or could theoretically do is pointless. It'll never be good enough, you'll say it's evil, you'll say he a good thing for sinister reasons, or you'll find some way to move the goal posts entirely.
He's got less then two years left. The burning anger carried by you and your fellows towards GW Bush hasn't done anything in the last 6 years. Why don't you give it a rest for a while and focus on what you can change? Get some hobby besides reading DailyKos or the DU forums, it'll do you good.
20 minutes between the story going live and someone blaming Bush.
You're slacking. Any story that has any possible negative angle on it needs to be blamed on Bush within 5 minutes.
/sarcasm off
For your information the NRC is working on streamlining it's approproval process for new plants. Further,the feds have low-interest loans and/or regulatory loss gaurantees* for the next 8 gigawatts electric of nuclear power to be built. That's not nothing, but it does diminish your ability to blame everything wrong with the Universe on G W Bush.
*I believe the program is this: If plant construction/generation is held up by regulatory agencies/processes for too long, the feds pay the power companies for lost revenue. Search google for the precise effects.
The Ground will be broken for new nukes in a couple years, they'll be running by 2017, and then the flood of new nuke plants will start in earnest.
You seem to think there is a moral problem with killing someone who is clearly threatening your life and making unlawful demands of you.
I do not. Someone who tells you "Your wallet or your life" has already decided that your life isn't worth the contents of your wallet. That was the mugger's decision. By killing him, you're abiding by his decision.
Moreover, you're saving future victims of this clearly violent criminal.
You have *thought* in scare quotes as if you have any business second-guessing people who have lawfully gunned down criminals. You don't. When someone threatens your life there is no time to go through a checklist of the criminal's motivations, desires, and life story. You take his threat seriously, deal with it, and let him be an object lesson to his fellow crooks- if you don't want to get shot, don't mug people.
Being a violent criminal isn't a legitimate career choice. The consequences of going down such a path should be dire.
In the moment you might have a point, but in the long-term pre-emptive strikes work against you. Now the rest of the world/society/town knows that you might just attack them because you *think* they are up to something. This will affect how they discuss issues with you, and you might well become MORE exposed to a pre-emptive strike from one of many other people!
We could go into various layers of dimplomacy and resulting effects, but that was not my desire. There are other rational predictions of the effects of a pre-emptive policy that differ from yours, but I care not to argue them. My point was this:
There are situations where it is both moral and legal to kill someone before they have actually inflicted personal harm. By extrapolation it would make sense that pre-emptive strikes are the correct thing to do in certain situations internationally.
For example, had France taken one step towards preventing Germany's re-militarization of the rhineland, WW2 would have never happened because Hitler would have been disposed of by his own generals. It was incidentally France's obligation to prevent the re-militarization of the rhineland.
They don't have the same religion as us, but you write as if Christianity isn't firmly based on Judiasm. Past that, Israel is a pluralistic democracy. This is not the case with Russia or Iran.
Russia-yes, they do have a christian base. However, calling them a pluralistic democracy is a bit of a stretch, no? Communism was just a phase in Russia's long and continuing history of autocracy. They also have a problem with delusions of granduer-they want their old role in world affairs when they have the GDP of Italy and crashing demographics.
So back to Israel- there is a similar political basis and a similar religious basis. Combine that with the view of some American evangelicals that Israel will be vital in the second coming of Christ, and you've got a firm basis for an alliance.
What's your alternate explanation for the Israel-USA alliance? The protocols of the elders of zion or something?
As for whether or not the US should be the world's policeman- I think we should only get involved in the disputes of minor nations when US interests are at stake. There's no other justification for risking the lives of our soldiers. Let barbaric cultures slaughter each, maybe air drop some guns for the folks we like but that's about it. Protecting US interests will keep us pretty busy anyway.
You know there are 300 million of us, right? And over 500+ people at the very highest level of our government? And most of those people face elections every two to six years?
That might be relevant when trying to assign individual psychological disorders to a nation, so I figured I'd point it out.
Why get involved then if Israel is just another pissant ME country?
Because Israel isn't just another pissant ME country. It is a close ally, based on similar cultures and values. It shouldn't take much thought to realize why the USA and it's citizens values a westernized Jewish nation more than the other ME nations. I'll get you started, though: The USA is a westernized Judeo-Christian nation.
As for being the world's policeman, that's a problem unique to the United States. No other country has ever had the capability to project overwhelming force anywhere in the world in combination with a distinct lack of desire for a bonafide empire. It is a role we'll still be carving out for ourselves for sometime.
Are they? Let's reduce the scope to the personal level for a moment.
In several (if not most)states you can use deadly force if reasonably believe you are at risk of death or great bodily harm. The accepted wisdom in these numerous states is that a law-abiding citizens should not be required to recieve an injury before lawfully protecting themselves against a clear threat.
These states also have no law stating that you must comply with the demands of the criminal. IE, if a criminal says "Give me your money or I'll kill you", and you feel the threat is credible, you may lawfully kill him if you have the ability. This is the law in Florida, Texas, and several other states. Some states have a qualifier that says "no escape is safely and readily available," and the interpretation of that clause varies from state to state as well.
In any case, on the personal level, pre-emptive strikes are quite legal and rational. Allowing yourself to get injured first before reacting may result in your death or the completion of the crime and the escape of the criminal to continue his 'work.'
Given that on the personal level it is acceptable, legal, and rational, can you not conceive of any instance on the international scale where 'pre-emptive strikes' would be clearly justified?
You seem to be under the impression that the arab/jihaadist sort treats negotiations seriously. Any serious review of the Israel-Palestine problem or Muslims Warfare in general will reveal that they don't negotiate in good faith, and use cease-fires & summits as an opportunity to re-arm. As soon as they're ready again, they attack. Why even bother entering into negotiations with that sort? It makes sense to set the bar really high like we have- because if they meet our prerequisites, it'll show they are actually serious. History has shown that getting a jihaadist leader to sit at a table and talk is no indication of seriousness at all.
You believe that Iran has grievences that can be satisfied on conditions acceptable to us, and that the rulers of Iran are interested in settling things calmly if only given the chance. This is a very western view and not a universal human attitude. There are utterly different mindsets out there that you don't seem to understand.
Western societies become great by this basic tenant: mutually agreeable transactions (of any sort- economic, political, etc) make all participants better off. That's my mindset, that's your mindset, that's what makes the west so great. In the middle east we're most often dealing with the "Thar" mentality. I suggest you read up on it and realize there are non-western schools of thought out there.
Anywhich way, I'm sick of the attitude that the US is always wrong, so the US must capitulate or accomodate belligerents. There are well over 100 countries on this planet today, and in any given year, 99.8% of them aren't on the list of "Who might the US blow up next?." Staying off this list doesn't require much.
Maybe Iran should start asking itself "What are all the other countries in the world doing differently to stay out of America's cross hairs? What can we do to change?"
Of course, only the USA/westerners do evil, right? So only we should ever have to change our position- is that what you're getting at?
Slashdot Mirror
These are all offered by the Scandinavian countries, and we tend to be doing quite well.
Yeah, but for how long? Are the scandinavians generally a decade or two or three into their socialized healthcare plans? Soviet Russia lasted 70 years. I wouldn't be so quick to call the scandanavian plan much better just yet.
Two or three generations in and then we'll see if it's got better staying power. I'm guessing from the plummeting birthrates of highly-socialized nations that the system will be in grave danger within two generations. Demographics is destiny, and with birthrates around 1.7-1.8 (summary from some google search) the system can't continue forever. You'll get too many old people who need healthcare, and not enough young people to pay for it in taxes or even provide the labor for it.
WHEN will humanity FINALLY end this BLACK-WHITE thinking? "opponent" is a medieval word. It should have been left at the door of the 21st century. Even in the EU we have trouble laying down our weapons. *sigh* back to the shelters.
Hey.. uh... I'm not sure if you've ever heard this one before, but despite all the touchy-feely instruction you recieved in your various levels of education, there are good reasons to stand in opposition (aka be an opponent) to something.
There is good, there is evil, there is better, there is worse. There are cultures, behavoirs, and attitudes that are inherently destructive towards the purveyors and their fellows, and there are traits that are beneficial to their purveyors and those around them.
You may find it laudable to bare your neck to people and cultures who would slit your throat for fun- I, however, do not. There are things worth fighting, killing, and dieing for.
I imagine you've probably spent your life in a great deal of comfort relative to the historical human norm of poverty, misery and oppression. That's the only way I can imagine you could spout off some trite kum-by-ya soundbite and be serious about it.
It's quite clear that several mods have also grown up so sheltered, else you wouldn't be so highly rated.
There is darkness in the hearts of men and women, and it cannot be allowed to rule- it must be fought. Darkness and corruption, by nature, won't lay down just because you ask nicely.
*This post makes no reference to any particular political stance or culture- only that faux-sophisticated "everything is shades of grey, it's all cool, man." thinking is deeply flawed.
I work at a school district. I see 17-year-olds all the time. Yes, they are children. They act without considering the consequences to themselves or others. They are irresponsible and generally stupid, with a few exceptions.
Could that have something to do with the fact that we neither expect nor demand better of them?
Or that we basically prohibit them by law from assuming any responsibilities of consequence?
Methinks this entire 'adolescence' concept is a failed idea that needs to die.
"North Americans plant billions of trees each year. There is no reason why the rest of the world can't do the same."
This somehow remembers me some cute Maire Antoinette saying on pre-revolution days: "if there's no bread, let them eat cake!"
Please, remember how Marie Antoinette ended.
Clever, but a non-sequitir. I imagine your +4 rating has more to do with your historical reference and playing to the anti-american-they'll-get-theirs-someday crowd then you actually having a point.
Trees are a renewable resource that can be predictably grown and harvested- it's just that the season isn't months, it's decades. I see no good reason that we can't expect the rest of the world to act accordingly when it's something we do routinely in the US.
Unless, of course, your opinion is that the rest of the world is too stupid and impatient to treat wood like any other crop.
From what I understand, it was because the voters of Texas outright hated him and not even Johnson's voting fraud buddies could be counted on to keep things in line. He was there to try to gin up some good will.
Of course, his assasination was the biggest boon to his legacy ever.
He was actually a horrible president with a self-centered high school mentality, put in place by the political mechanations of his father and the Daley's in Chicago. Lyndon and Kennedy actually hated each other, and he was only brought onto the ticket to deliver Texas- fraudulently. JFK's only real gift was charisma, and that's all he needed to win given his father, the Daleys, and Johnson.
If he wasn't assisinated his presidency would have been nothing more than a painful, distant memory by now.
Those green energy certificates are great.... for states bordering those who require them.
Massachusetts recently required that all power companies in MA had to produce a certain portion of their electricity renewably. Of course, MA also has ornerous restrictions on actually building new power plants or changing anything. The power companies could meet the requirement by buying certificates or paying the state a substantial amount in lieu of certificates or generation.
So what happened? Public Service of New Hampshire built a wood burning plant. They sell the electricity, and then the sell the certificates which go for about the same price as the electricity. Wood is too expensive per BTU to be a viable fuel without the certificates, but with the certificates it's pretty profitable.
End result: Massachusetts Rate payers subsidize PSNH's bottom line and NH ratepayers. Oh yeah, and they burn some wood in a high-tech boiler. Is it 'greener' then before? Maybe it is. Does it F*ck MA ratepayers to the benefit of NH ratepayers and PSNH shareholders?
Yep.
This is from the same state whose congressmen killed a perfectly good wind project (cape wind IIRC) because it would mess up their views.
Yeah, I'm glad I live in New Hampshire. At least for the moment. MA residents are moving in, and some of them are trying to institute the same nonsense that drove them out of MA.
The simple fact is that inkjet printing is just a bad idea, no matter what the costs are. It can't compete in any way with laser printing technology, except by using marketing to take advantage of peoples' stupidity and shortsightedness.
Coming from someone who has a color laser printer at home and loves it, I can't fully agree.
I may well buy one of these new kodak printers just for printing photos. I'm currently under the impression that you can't get good photo-paper prints from laser printers because they typically melt the glossy emulsion.
The printer I have is the Okidata 5500 . It cost $400 after a $200 mail in rebate (which I did get back in a month or two) and I haven't had to replace a toner cartridge yet*.
They are 'starter' cartridges but I've gone through two or three reams so far on them. Anyway, it can't be beat for copy paper printouts. I just want to print out photos for framing on occasion inkjets seem to do that better.
Kodak's little program here may mean I actually buy one instead of hitting the kiosks at Walmart or a photo store.
*Not counting that messy incident when I realized that the toner cartridges are two seperate pieces, and that the 'lock/unlock' switch didn't lock it in the printer, but locked the halves together. That cost me $120 and an hour of cleanup.
I've never heard of anyone in the workforce telling me to give 80% to 85% effort, why should school be different? And if the schoolwork really is too simple for your beautiful mind, then you should be getting the A's and doing extracurricular projects with ease. These half assed attitudes toward education are exactly the problem.
I'm sure you're familiar with the principle of diminishing returns, no? As you approach the limit of your performance, each additional input of effort yields an ever-shrinking gain.
There is such a thing as 'good enough', and there's enough different markets out there that the folks who call 60-70%(Walmart) 'good enough' AND the folks who call 99.99% (Rolls-Royce)'good enough' can profit.
Now, the more effort you put in, the more options you have- a 99.99% engineer could get a job at Walmart upon graduation, or he could take a job designing cars for Rolls-Royce. A 60-70% engineer can only get a job designing Walmart trash.
You get the picture. Saying 80-85% is 'good enough' is a viable strategy, but going for 100% will give you more options.
This is beginning to get scary: serious political discussions on Slashdot, what is the world coming to!
Sadly I'm not sure there's much more to discuss.
You seem to be of the opinion that no one should ever have to lay anything on the line for their principles. In this I disagree with you, and it is the basis for our disagreement.
It appears you want limitless freedoms without a chance of any associated cost. Things don't work that way, nor should they.
I've bought Intel motherboards (and of course processors) for my last three computers, and they've been pretty rock solid.
Perhaps they think it wise to sell products that can be used even if their competitor gets a few bucks- until today didn't they effectively yield the floor for AMD motherboards to other companies?
Freedom's a bitch, ain't it?
In order to decided which freedom takes priority, you must ask which way would compel an action, and which way wouldn't.
If you compel the president to associate with those he doesn't want to, then he has no freedom of association. He would be compelled to associate. Compel != freedom.
If a reporter chooses to self-censor about a marginal but potentially important subject, it is still his, the reporters, choice.
Free people making decisions in their own interest does have it's occasional downsides. In the aggregate it's a lot better than any other system. You can't change the rules every time you suspect a bad outcome. That's the price and the very definition of freedom.
We cannot endlessly make rules and guidelines to cover every situation in the pursuit of some mythical perfect outcome. The chase would fruitless and the end result totalitarianism of one stripe or another.
I think it's better than the alternatives. Freedom asks alot of those who would drink heartily of it. Are you up to it?
__________________________________________
(PS)It's a valid point that the US operates more by seduction than by coercion. Our vapid pop culture spreads like a virus throughout the world not by the barrel of the gun, but by folks eating it up willingly.
Then could you explain what the difference is between censorship laws and censorship by the back door because the press don't want to loose their privileged access to the president? At least with censorship laws you know that you can't trust the press. I find the voluntary censorship of the US press far more insidious.
I think the need to explain the difference shows how warped your world view is. Even the President has freedom of association, and he can use that freedom to not invite or stay away from members of the press who piss him off.
'Freedom of speech' does not mean 'free from all consequences of speech.' It only means freedom from prior restraint, from imprisonment for protected speech (not firing and inciting a riot), and freedom from polonium 210 posioning if your speech is critical of the government.
Whosoever pisses off the president and gets kicked off the whitehouse correspendant list can still go on national TV and say pretty much whatever the hell he wants.
He just has to make a choice- does he want the prestige of being in the whitehouse press corp, or does he want to say what his conscience dictates?
That's a pretty easy choice for any man or woman with a shred of character, and in the US it doesn't end with you being posioned at some foriegn hotel with some 'hot' tea.
me:
Is Washington a big enough state to overcome the costs associated with a differentiated product line?
You:
(five paragraphs)
You know, you could have just said "I'm guessing yes."
...When you can't buy anything flame resistant or UL listed. Or anything, for that matter. Is Washington a big enough state to overcome the costs associated with a differentiated product line? Will companies even make things that can't cost-effectively comply with other regulations and industry liability practices that require flame resistance?
I'm not sure but I guess we'll find out.
Is 2010 close enough?
I saw the same pattern with reagan's true believers.
Funny thing is the Reagen presidency is nearly universally well-regarded two decades after the fact.
He also had liberals (k, maybe/maybe not libertarians) who hated him every bit as much as folks now hate Bush.
Incidentally, I'm a nuclear power plant operator so I've got a pretty good idea of how things go in the nuke industry. In general things go as slow as molasses. Had he the power, Bush could have funded & fully authorized a nuclear power plant his first day in office in 2001, and it still wouldn't be generating electricity.
Well, there's a lot more layers to it. Killing a mugger is actually a very rare thing and a poor example. It's more typically a home invader that gets gunned down, for reasons you hint at- the homeowner has a chance to arm themselves.
If you're going to carry concealed- I have the license to do so but I do not- responsibility demands you maintain enough awareness of your surroundings that a threat won't sneak up on you.
Criminals of all sorts do select victims that look easy to victimize, and someone who is keeping keenely aware of his/her surroundings will probably get passed up for an easier mark.
I've obviously simplified the entire topic of being capable of meeting criminals with force and the circumstances where such confrontations are likely. I can point you to much more in-depth discussions if you like.
Respond to words with words, to actions with actions. In our subject matter, this would mean taking a violent criminal at his word. Not necessarily a wise choice.
To be honest, if I let a mugger get the drop on me there's a reasonable chance I would just give him my wallet. There's a million what-if's buried in that sentence that could only be worked out on the fly.
The best thing to do is to keep aware of your surroundings and present the persona that you are not to be screwed with. That will keep you safe and with your wallet in most cases.
Yawn.
How's that Bush Derangement Syndrome working out for you?
Look, I have my own problems with GW Bush, but there are thousands of folks like you who take it to the psychosis level. It's quite clearly a searing hatred that's doing more damage to it's bearers than anyone else. It causes one to look at everything through an anti-Bush lense with no true historical perspective applied.
Actually discussing anything Bush has done, might do or could theoretically do is pointless. It'll never be good enough, you'll say it's evil, you'll say he a good thing for sinister reasons, or you'll find some way to move the goal posts entirely.
He's got less then two years left. The burning anger carried by you and your fellows towards GW Bush hasn't done anything in the last 6 years. Why don't you give it a rest for a while and focus on what you can change? Get some hobby besides reading DailyKos or the DU forums, it'll do you good.
You're slacking. Any story that has any possible negative angle on it needs to be blamed on Bush within 5 minutes.
For your information the NRC is working on streamlining it's approproval process for new plants. Further,the feds have low-interest loans and/or regulatory loss gaurantees* for the next 8 gigawatts electric of nuclear power to be built. That's not nothing, but it does diminish your ability to blame everything wrong with the Universe on G W Bush.
*I believe the program is this: If plant construction/generation is held up by regulatory agencies/processes for too long, the feds pay the power companies for lost revenue. Search google for the precise effects.
The Ground will be broken for new nukes in a couple years, they'll be running by 2017, and then the flood of new nuke plants will start in earnest.
You seem to think there is a moral problem with killing someone who is clearly threatening your life and making unlawful demands of you.
I do not. Someone who tells you "Your wallet or your life" has already decided that your life isn't worth the contents of your wallet. That was the mugger's decision. By killing him, you're abiding by his decision.
Moreover, you're saving future victims of this clearly violent criminal.
You have *thought* in scare quotes as if you have any business second-guessing people who have lawfully gunned down criminals. You don't. When someone threatens your life there is no time to go through a checklist of the criminal's motivations, desires, and life story. You take his threat seriously, deal with it, and let him be an object lesson to his fellow crooks- if you don't want to get shot, don't mug people.
Being a violent criminal isn't a legitimate career choice. The consequences of going down such a path should be dire.
In the moment you might have a point, but in the long-term pre-emptive strikes work against you. Now the rest of the world/society/town knows that you might just attack them because you *think* they are up to something. This will affect how they discuss issues with you, and you might well become MORE exposed to a pre-emptive strike from one of many other people!
We could go into various layers of dimplomacy and resulting effects, but that was not my desire. There are other rational predictions of the effects of a pre-emptive policy that differ from yours, but I care not to argue them. My point was this:
There are situations where it is both moral and legal to kill someone before they have actually inflicted personal harm. By extrapolation it would make sense that pre-emptive strikes are the correct thing to do in certain situations internationally.
For example, had France taken one step towards preventing Germany's re-militarization of the rhineland, WW2 would have never happened because Hitler would have been disposed of by his own generals. It was incidentally France's obligation to prevent the re-militarization of the rhineland.
They don't have the same religion as us, but you write as if Christianity isn't firmly based on Judiasm.
Past that, Israel is a pluralistic democracy. This is not the case with Russia or Iran.
Russia-yes, they do have a christian base. However, calling them a pluralistic democracy is a bit of a stretch, no? Communism was just a phase in Russia's long and continuing history of autocracy. They also have a problem with delusions of granduer-they want their old role in world affairs when they have the GDP of Italy and crashing demographics.
So back to Israel- there is a similar political basis and a similar religious basis. Combine that with the view of some American evangelicals that Israel will be vital in the second coming of Christ, and you've got a firm basis for an alliance.
What's your alternate explanation for the Israel-USA alliance? The protocols of the elders of zion or something?
As for whether or not the US should be the world's policeman- I think we should only get involved in the disputes of minor nations when US interests are at stake. There's no other justification for risking the lives of our soldiers. Let barbaric cultures slaughter each, maybe air drop some guns for the folks we like but that's about it. Protecting US interests will keep us pretty busy anyway.
You know there are 300 million of us, right? And over 500+ people at the very highest level of our government? And most of those people face elections every two to six years?
That might be relevant when trying to assign individual psychological disorders to a nation, so I figured I'd point it out.
Why get involved then if Israel is just another pissant ME country?
Because Israel isn't just another pissant ME country. It is a close ally, based on similar cultures and values. It shouldn't take much thought to realize why the USA and it's citizens values a westernized Jewish nation more than the other ME nations. I'll get you started, though: The USA is a westernized Judeo-Christian nation.
As for being the world's policeman, that's a problem unique to the United States. No other country has ever had the capability to project overwhelming force anywhere in the world in combination with a distinct lack of desire for a bonafide empire. It is a role we'll still be carving out for ourselves for sometime.
Pre-emptive strikes are for the morally bankrupt.
Are they? Let's reduce the scope to the personal level for a moment.
In several (if not most)states you can use deadly force if reasonably believe you are at risk of death or great bodily harm. The accepted wisdom in these numerous states is that a law-abiding citizens should not be required to recieve an injury before lawfully protecting themselves against a clear threat.
These states also have no law stating that you must comply with the demands of the criminal.
IE, if a criminal says "Give me your money or I'll kill you", and you feel the threat is credible, you may lawfully kill him if you have the ability. This is the law in Florida, Texas, and several other states. Some states have a qualifier that says "no escape is safely and readily available," and the interpretation of that clause varies from state to state as well.
In any case, on the personal level, pre-emptive strikes are quite legal and rational. Allowing yourself to get injured first before reacting may result in your death or the completion of the crime and the escape of the criminal to continue his 'work.'
Given that on the personal level it is acceptable, legal, and rational, can you not conceive of any instance on the international scale where 'pre-emptive strikes' would be clearly justified?
You believe that Iran has grievences that can be satisfied on conditions acceptable to us, and that the rulers of Iran are interested in settling things calmly if only given the chance. This is a very western view and not a universal human attitude. There are utterly different mindsets out there that you don't seem to understand.
Western societies become great by this basic tenant: mutually agreeable transactions (of any sort- economic, political, etc) make all participants better off. That's my mindset, that's your mindset, that's what makes the west so great. In the middle east we're most often dealing with the "Thar" mentality. I suggest you read up on it and realize there are non-western schools of thought out there.
Anywhich way, I'm sick of the attitude that the US is always wrong, so the US must capitulate or accomodate belligerents. There are well over 100 countries on this planet today, and in any given year, 99.8% of them aren't on the list of "Who might the US blow up next?." Staying off this list doesn't require much.
Maybe Iran should start asking itself "What are all the other countries in the world doing differently to stay out of America's cross hairs? What can we do to change?"
Of course, only the USA/westerners do evil, right? So only we should ever have to change our position- is that what you're getting at?