I had no idea who Tom Lantos was before this, but I decided to investigate. Turned out he voted to block China's Most Favored Nation status in 1997, and again in 1998, and in 1999, against the wishes of a Democratic president. He also voted against the 2000 bill giving China permanent MFN status.
So, allegations of hypocrisy are misplaced in this particular instance.
What scares me is that approximately half the voting public agrees with him [...]
That's actually not true, for several reasons.
Firstly, most Americans don't vote, so it's hard to say whether they really agree with him.
Secondly, if you take the small number who voted for Bush, and actually ask them for their opinions on various issues, you find out something interesting: Bush supporters disagree with him on many major issues.
So the interesting question is: since most Bush voters are in favor of abortion, against the war in Iraq, in favor of reducing the deficit, and so on, why do they vote for Bush?
The answer is simple. It's also the single most important thing to understand about US politics, in my view. Here it is:
Most Americans who vote, don't vote on the basis of issues. Instead, they vote on the basis of which guy they like the most.
That's what the Democrats keep getting horribly, horribly wrong. They picked John Kerry, who nobody particularly liked as a person, even in his own party--a guy with the personality of a sack of wet sand, who spoke like a schoolteacher. They picked Al Gore, of the robotic demeanour and irritated sighs, and teamed him with Lieberman in case his displayed personality wasn't already enough to repel voters. They'll probably pick Hillary Clinton too.
What's even more odd is that once he had lost, Al Gore suddenly started displaying a personality and a sense of humor. So apparently the powers that control the DNC have this idea that pressing candidates into acting "presidential" (i.e. dull as all hell) is a good thing.
Meanwhile, the Republicans field a guy who has learned to convincingly fake a friendly Texas accent, and act dumber than he is. (e.g. the recent clowning when he couldn't get a door open.) It doesn't matter that he's from the exact same educated upper-class background as Kerry; he's learned to put on a persona that seems friendly and likeable to average people, and that's why he got elected.
Note that I'm not saying this is a good thing. It's actually pretty awful, because the best outcome is likely to be that White House policy is effectively random over time, depending on what the beliefs are of the guy who randomly happens to have the nicest personality. The worst possible outcome, of course, is that someone appears who is a raving fascist, but is a master showman who can appear to be a likeable man of the people. We all know how that turns out.
Meticulously document how much of a barrier the IT department is to productivity, and why you don't get things done. Keep a record of every e-mail, and make sure all communication is at least repeated in summary by e-mail, so you have proof. Present the evidence to senior management when they ask why things haven't happened.
Ultimately if the management chain doesn't see it as a problem, then it's not. Or rather, it's not a problem you will ever be able to do anything about. So once you have that documentary proof, by all means sit and read Slashdot or twiddle your thumbs while you wait for IT to do their jobs. Or even better, use the time to experiment, learn, and gain skills.
Within a group of voluntary cooperation, both parties in any transaction profit from the transaction.
The problem is that those with the most capital tend to profit the most. So left unchecked, over time all the capital gets sucked into the hands of a relatively small percentage of the population, and the others get to be serfs.
Basically, capital is power, and power tends to concentrate if left unchecked.
Communities do better with voluntary cooperation (the free market) than through coercion and force and freedoms lost.
I'm not aware of any communities that don't rely on coercion. Economic coercion is the cornerstone of US society; it's the explanation for how the crappiest jobs can also often be the worst paid. If your choice is "take a McJob or live in a cardboard box", it's farcical to pretend that that isn't coercion.
I think if you relied less on TV news for your information, you might have a more accurate view of the ACLU.
For example, the ACLU of Texas recently worked with the NRA to ban consent searches, which police were using as an excuse to (amongst other things) trawl white guys' vehicles for guns.
I don't know how it is now, but in the 1990s in Russia I got shouted at for taking a photograph above ground level. That used to be prohibited, along with taking photographs of bridges.
Photography in St Petersburg is noticably restricted when you can't include bridges in the shot...
I'm not a planespotter, but when I found myself booked on a flight on a tiny two-propeller plane I was amused, and wanted to take a photo. So I did, as I was crossing the tarmac to get on board the plane.
Some bag thrower started yelling. It didn't register for a while that he was yelling at me, telling me I wasn't allowed to take a photo of the plane.
This was a great example of stupid security. First off, I was about to get on board the plane, so I was going to have every opportunity to explore it and take notes at leisure. Secondly, the airport had an observation deck, which was where I had just come from. The plane was in plain sight from the departure lounge, where anyone with a camera could have snapped a photo.
But it wasn't against the TOS at the time of the event, that's the whole point. If it had been, that would have been a different matter. And I offered to delete the comment if the TOS was corrected to prohibit it.
They'll kill your account any time they dislike what you post. Paid member, lifetime member, whatever. No right of appeal, your accuser and judge remain anonymous, no compromise allowed.
I'm sure you're aware that Ron Paul was a Libertarian. He jumped to the Republican Party because he felt he could accomplish more change within the party than from an external third party.
And look how successful he's been. Bill of Rights shredded, torture, wars based on lies, disappearances, illegal wiretapping... and in Texas, where he sits, record numbers of death sentences.
Still, the Republican party keeps trying to get rid of him, so he must be doing something right.
Let me third that. I've posted stuff which is very political (e.g. list of countries the US has attacked since WW II), and not been accused of non-NPOV.
The much more common flip side of this is the limousine liberal who loudly demands higher taxes on "the rich", but pays only the minimum required by law [...] I think that it cost John Kerry a lot of votes when it was discovered that he and his idle billionaire wife were paying taxes at a rate of 15%, thanks to clever lawyering [...]
That's exactly the point. It's entirely reasonable for people like me to demand higher taxes for the rich while only paying the minimum required by law, because the rich end up paying less tax than anyone else, measured against their total income. And Kerry's a big taxpayer compared to (say) Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corporation pays 8%; or Pepsi, which has often paid 0% tax. Frankly, a straight percentage tax on all income would be far more progressive than what we have now.
Why is it so important to tell everyone and organize around it.
The point is to organize a guild so you can enjoy the game without having bigots call you a fag all the time. That's exactly the behavior that keeps me away from online gaming.
As a matter of fact, I do everything I can to avoid buying Chinese-made goods. Given two alternatives, I'll check the labels and pick the one not made in China, even if it's more expensive. Nice try though.
Slashdot Mirror
I had no idea who Tom Lantos was before this, but I decided to investigate. Turned out he voted to block China's Most Favored Nation status in 1997, and again in 1998, and in 1999, against the wishes of a Democratic president. He also voted against the 2000 bill giving China permanent MFN status.
So, allegations of hypocrisy are misplaced in this particular instance.
That's actually not true, for several reasons.
Firstly, most Americans don't vote, so it's hard to say whether they really agree with him.
Secondly, if you take the small number who voted for Bush, and actually ask them for their opinions on various issues, you find out something interesting: Bush supporters disagree with him on many major issues.
So the interesting question is: since most Bush voters are in favor of abortion, against the war in Iraq, in favor of reducing the deficit, and so on, why do they vote for Bush?
The answer is simple. It's also the single most important thing to understand about US politics, in my view. Here it is:
That's what the Democrats keep getting horribly, horribly wrong. They picked John Kerry, who nobody particularly liked as a person, even in his own party--a guy with the personality of a sack of wet sand, who spoke like a schoolteacher. They picked Al Gore, of the robotic demeanour and irritated sighs, and teamed him with Lieberman in case his displayed personality wasn't already enough to repel voters. They'll probably pick Hillary Clinton too.
What's even more odd is that once he had lost, Al Gore suddenly started displaying a personality and a sense of humor. So apparently the powers that control the DNC have this idea that pressing candidates into acting "presidential" (i.e. dull as all hell) is a good thing.
Meanwhile, the Republicans field a guy who has learned to convincingly fake a friendly Texas accent, and act dumber than he is. (e.g. the recent clowning when he couldn't get a door open.) It doesn't matter that he's from the exact same educated upper-class background as Kerry; he's learned to put on a persona that seems friendly and likeable to average people, and that's why he got elected.
Note that I'm not saying this is a good thing. It's actually pretty awful, because the best outcome is likely to be that White House policy is effectively random over time, depending on what the beliefs are of the guy who randomly happens to have the nicest personality. The worst possible outcome, of course, is that someone appears who is a raving fascist, but is a master showman who can appear to be a likeable man of the people. We all know how that turns out.
Meticulously document how much of a barrier the IT department is to productivity, and why you don't get things done. Keep a record of every e-mail, and make sure all communication is at least repeated in summary by e-mail, so you have proof. Present the evidence to senior management when they ask why things haven't happened.
Ultimately if the management chain doesn't see it as a problem, then it's not. Or rather, it's not a problem you will ever be able to do anything about. So once you have that documentary proof, by all means sit and read Slashdot or twiddle your thumbs while you wait for IT to do their jobs. Or even better, use the time to experiment, learn, and gain skills.
The problem is that those with the most capital tend to profit the most. So left unchecked, over time all the capital gets sucked into the hands of a relatively small percentage of the population, and the others get to be serfs.
Basically, capital is power, and power tends to concentrate if left unchecked.
I'm not aware of any communities that don't rely on coercion. Economic coercion is the cornerstone of US society; it's the explanation for how the crappiest jobs can also often be the worst paid. If your choice is "take a McJob or live in a cardboard box", it's farcical to pretend that that isn't coercion.
I hear the Special Edition release will come with a free bottle of fire water, and have a miniature smallpox-infected blanket in each box.
For years now, Ford have been selling cars that partially dismantle themselves...
Well, it's on my blog, along with others, in slightly longer form. I encourage others to spread the meme. Squeezing it into a Slashdot sig was tough.
I think if you relied less on TV news for your information, you might have a more accurate view of the ACLU.
For example, the ACLU of Texas recently worked with the NRA to ban consent searches, which police were using as an excuse to (amongst other things) trawl white guys' vehicles for guns.
The ACLU has also filed lawsuits to preserve people's right to say prayers.
Download "The Power of Nightmares" from archive.org, clips from the video are included in the documentary as I recall.
I don't know how it is now, but in the 1990s in Russia I got shouted at for taking a photograph above ground level. That used to be prohibited, along with taking photographs of bridges.
Photography in St Petersburg is noticably restricted when you can't include bridges in the shot...
I'm not a planespotter, but when I found myself booked on a flight on a tiny two-propeller plane I was amused, and wanted to take a photo. So I did, as I was crossing the tarmac to get on board the plane.
Some bag thrower started yelling. It didn't register for a while that he was yelling at me, telling me I wasn't allowed to take a photo of the plane.
This was a great example of stupid security. First off, I was about to get on board the plane, so I was going to have every opportunity to explore it and take notes at leisure. Secondly, the airport had an observation deck, which was where I had just come from. The plane was in plain sight from the departure lounge, where anyone with a camera could have snapped a photo.
But it wasn't against the TOS at the time of the event, that's the whole point. If it had been, that would have been a different matter. And I offered to delete the comment if the TOS was corrected to prohibit it.
If you select Chinese for the UI, it logs all your e-mail and web browsing and sends a copy to a central server for indexing?
Yeah, Final Fantasy Barbie was a major mis-step. Another thing that can't be helping is the fact that you can't play Final Fantasy XI on current PS2s.
They'll kill your account any time they dislike what you post. Paid member, lifetime member, whatever. No right of appeal, your accuser and judge remain anonymous, no compromise allowed.
*Account is only "lifetime" until they decide they don't like you.
And look how successful he's been. Bill of Rights shredded, torture, wars based on lies, disappearances, illegal wiretapping... and in Texas, where he sits, record numbers of death sentences.
Still, the Republican party keeps trying to get rid of him, so he must be doing something right.
Let me third that. I've posted stuff which is very political (e.g. list of countries the US has attacked since WW II), and not been accused of non-NPOV.
That's exactly the point. It's entirely reasonable for people like me to demand higher taxes for the rich while only paying the minimum required by law, because the rich end up paying less tax than anyone else, measured against their total income. And Kerry's a big taxpayer compared to (say) Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corporation pays 8%; or Pepsi, which has often paid 0% tax. Frankly, a straight percentage tax on all income would be far more progressive than what we have now.
I should rob you at gunpoint and give the money to the poor. I'd be your hero then, wouldn't I?
Or as the put it a few decades ago, "If you don't want to be bashed, get to the back of the bus, you damn uppity negro!"
The point is to organize a guild so you can enjoy the game without having bigots call you a fag all the time. That's exactly the behavior that keeps me away from online gaming.
As a matter of fact, I do everything I can to avoid buying Chinese-made goods. Given two alternatives, I'll check the labels and pick the one not made in China, even if it's more expensive. Nice try though.
Same reason George Lucas shat out Star Wars episode III. Even after episode I, enough people went to see episode II that III was inevitable.
Did the BBC come out in favor of companies doing business in apartheid South Africa? The arguments there were exactly the same.