If you weren't simply mindlessly spreading fud, you would have looked at who sponsored the bill--and why. It's just FUD, in the very sense of the word--spreading fear, uncertainty, and dismay (or trying to).
Secondly, the military is not having a hard time meeting their numbers, in fact units which have seen combat have far and away the highest retention and rates around.
As the previous said, there is absolutely NO one who wants a draft.
By that logic no one should be allowed to buy land, we would just rent it from the governemtn (I hate saying this, but AFAIK, this is how it was done in Soviet Russia). Do you want to rent your land?
My point about AQ Khan's delivery of Dutch/German nuke tech to Pakistan, then Libya, North Korea and Iran is to an answer you denial of that path: "Pakistan got nuke technology from China". Point taken.
I dispute that. They actually found Chinese language documents wrt nuke tech in Libya. Google for Pakistan and China--they have a history of cooperation. For that matter I personally am rather shocked that Musharraf has held onto power as long as he has. He's done an absolutely tremendous job of clamping down on radicals--admittedly he's been motivated primarily by the fact that they would kill him first, if they had the chance. Right now is one of the few times in the past 50 years that Pakistan has legitimately held direct control of the tribal areas in the Northwest Frontier Province. Those areas are difficult to control, and have traditionally been more or less autonomous. That Pakhtun peoples (with about a million variant spellings) were faimed warriors in the British period, and the Brits got their noses bloodied up there on more than one occasion--absolutely disasterous rout and slaughter on a retreat from Kabul for instance. In light of the geopolitical-religious realities on the ground in Pakistan and AFghanistan, I think things could hardly be going much better. That's not to say that there isn't room for improvement, but I see the situation improving rapidly. THat's just my opinion, if you were curious.
I'm ignoring your example of "more secure" W2K3, because it's irrelevant. I'm not claiming Microsoft hasn't produced any security since Gates' directive. I'm claiming that they haven't produced enough, while applying resources to new features instead, despite that directive. Unless you're going to blame that on some kind of mutiny, doing one when the Boss clearly said they "should" do the other, it's clear that Microsoft rhetoric and actions diverge to suit Microsoft, as usual. I note that you haven't conceded that argument, despite examples of "Improved Experiences" features of XP/SP2 that also illustrate that doublethink, despite your claims to the contrary.
Ok, I'll go back and illustrate why I complete discounted your attempted argument. You are angry they "improved wireless support" and ignored security. Incorrect, sp2 features WPA security feature. Windows Meida Player 9--offers additional security features (check out the preferences screen, you'll see what I mean) and was already available separately from SP2. I believe even DX has some security enhancements, at least with managed code. Then we have popup blocker. Query to open/save/run with warning for every exe. Builtin activated GOOD firewall. DCOM security settings. The only thing I can think of that CAN'T be considered a security enhancement is the Bluetooth additions you mention. I utterly fail to see the point of your argument that MSFT is adding features when they should be enhancing security, and even *if* I accepted your premise, I've just illustrated (and with the example of Win2k3) that you're simply factually wrong.
I realize I'm debating someone who has totally bought into "the program". I'm not as interested in convincing you - I don't have a chance against your professors. I'm more interested in where you'll go from there, what job you expect to fill. And where your classmates will apply their education and worldview.
I'm really curious as to what program I've bought into! Because for one thing, if you think a single MES/Islam/History/heck, any academic professor is pro-Iraq war, you would be wrong, so I don't think I've bought into that program. (Likewise I agree with few of my classmates...on an offtopic note if you're curious, I would probably be considered pro-Palestinian). Likewise they don't really teach us much about Microsoft in school, and for that matter every server system I maintain runs FreeBSD, so I'm not sure what program I've bought into there either. But hey, whatever floats your boat.
You're a grad student of Middle Eastern Studies, but you don't know that Kerry voted for a bill authorizing the president "force necessary to protect American security", when faced with official statements from the White House that Iraq had WMDs, probably nukes, that they could "launch in 45 minutes", and that "the smoking gun could have to be a mushroom cloud"? That the invasion was therefore not necessary, that it was therefore unauthorized? Are you just mistaken?
So it's ok for Kerry to believe this, but not ok for the president to believe it? What exactly evidence do you have that the president DIDN'T believe these same reports?
And you STILL haven't responded to my point about SP2 and Win2k3 being largely unaffected. So I'm just going to give up on that, you're just too eager to crucify microsoft for whatever reason.
I don't know what they teach in MES these days, but you'd probably be intrigued by the career of Pakistani AQ Khan, whose state laboratory developed technology he stole from his German and Dutch employers in Europe, then exported to North Korea, Libya and Iran.
Yes, the point being...?
And you might not have heard about the Shia militias run by al Sadr and others, freeing up the southern 2/3 of Iraq for Iranian control.
You are correct, I haven't heard of the upper Iraqi region being outside of coalition control, and I maintain that it's nuts to believe that the coalition, or even the EU, would let Iran invade Iraq.
Or maybe all that reporting about Chalabis collaboration with Iran hasn't made it around the campus.
Again what's the point? Chalabi is discredited and out of the picture.
And only the remains of the "Northern Alliance" think Afghanistan is going well, including propaganda like "power transfers" that have allowed opium production to reach historic levels.
It's true the Taliban did a good job of shutting down the opium trade. It's true the trade is now than it has been recently. I have few doubts that it will get better--Kabul is the best example of the future of Afghanistan, and with every succesful transfer of power such as we saw in Herat (Ismail Khan is one tough SOB) Kabul's authority is growing.
Then again, maybe the "Middle East" ends at the Syrian and Lebanese border with Iraq these days, and it's all Central or SW Asia - not your department.
From Morocco to Kazakhstan;) Personally my focus lies primarily from Turkey to the 'Stans.
*I* have to live in this world, and I won't cede any of it to the Inquisitors in Tehran, especially not on my dime, with my countrymen's blood.
Not sure what you're saying? You won't let Iran's power grow but you aren't willing to fight them? Personally I would put a couple bucks down on an invasion of Iran if Bush is reelected.
You have to be wilfully ignorant or a drudgereport.com reading fool to believe that influence wasn't used to keep Georgie safe in the guard and out of harm's way. Personally, I don't have a problem with it and if I were a wealthy influence-bearing parent looking at the prospect of my flesh and blood getting send overseas to be killed for a stupid war I'd have done the same thing. I say props to the whole family.
You're missing the point. If nothing illegal was done, what's the problem? If the Bush name ALONE kept him out the war, what could or should he have done differently? I don't know.
Why do you right-wing types all have to be so stupid?
Because otherwise leftist elitists would have nobody left to gloat their intelligence over.
Barnes a democrat says he got Bush into the guard, however, as I'm sure you know, his story has changed over the years. His daughter says that he is lying to promote his new book. He himself never claimed that a Bush family member asked him to do it. I see no wrongdoing here.
I'll trust your sources on the national guard stuff--don't have time ATM to fully research.
Bush has had a long-established pattern of not taking responsibility for his actions.
Yes, when he was young. However we see a marked change in Bush years ago. It takes a signifigant amount of willpower to stop drinking alcohol completely the way Bush did after being, by all accounts, a virtual alcoholic. I won't excuse any of Bush's youth--he did many bad things..but I'm happy with the Bush of today.
That's a scary thought. Anything a politician mentions is fair game for lies? As the New York Times concluded, "on close examination, the accounts of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth' prove to be riddled with inconsistencies. In many cases, material offered as proof by these veterans is undercut by official Navy records and the men's own statements."
I made no comment on the Swift Boat Vet's case. They were heavily attacked by the media in fact (possibly not Fox News). I simply said that Kerry made Vietnam an issue...if he had campaigned on his beliefs, on his senate career etc, the Swift Vets would have had no power. I blame Kerry for making this race ridiculously about 30 years ago.
Yes, pretenses he used are NOW shown to be false, but who cares? CIA reports, british intelligence, pentagon sources, etc believed Iraq was a threat and had WMD's.
Does anyone else find it distasteful when a draft dodger calls into question the medals of a war hero?
We are having a purely semantic argument about "lies": I call it a lie when it is not true, whether the liar believes it or not. You call it a "mistake". To me, neither is acceptable from the President when commiting us to war, especially one as gruesome and risky as this one.
Well damn then Senator Kerry is a liar too--he voted for the war as well.
You are falsely projecting an irrelevant logical argument onto my actual claims. Gates said security is always more important than a new feature, yet Microsoft has introduced many new features in the 2.5 years since, without even an equal increase in security - there should have been *no* new features until there was as good security as Microsoft can provide.
Avoiding my point again. SP2 was almost an entirely "featureless" patch. That is to say, the new firewall is both a security enhancer AND a new feature. Still no answer about SP2 and Win2k3.
I won't respond to everything in your last paragraph unless you want me to (genocide--ok, massmurder of Kurds then), increasing the chance for Iran to defeat Iraq--completely ludicrous (and I'm a grad student in middle eastern studies), etc ludicrous, Pakistan got nuke technology from China, Afghanistan is in my estimation proceeding extremely well, see transfer of power in Herat recently, your assessment of Pakistan I find to be not very good either, I won't elaborate unless you want me to. In short, I agree with practically nothing in your last paragraph. But hey, I think it was pretty obvious already that we have a major failure to agree;)
My mistake on all the comments--I tend to type informally online, but ignoring that, I'll just accept that you no longer think highly of the universities I have attended. Fine by me. I completely accept your criticism of my message.
I was actually waiting for your response (which you didn't give) before made my point--here's a little story. Both Bush and Kerry came from privileged households (Kerry moreso than Bush--summerhouses in France, boat trips with President Kennedy, etc). Both went to Yale at roughly the same time. Both are rumored to be in the same secret society there. Bush proceeds to go to Harvard and get his MBA while Kerry goes to...BC law school? Hmm, somewhat odd.. Bush proceeds to be a succesful businessman, Kerry...becomes a politician. And Bush is constantly impugned for being stupid and never had to work for anything etc? I just find the whole thing fishy, especially in the 2004 election. By exactly what criteria is Bush stupid? Stupider than Kerry? Are you smarter than Bush?
and, in direct response to your message--I have seen absolutely 0 evidence that Bush has lied, though I would love for you to correct me. Likewise, I'm not unhappy with the Iraq invasion, I was never personally a big fan of Saddam. I don't see the point in your level of emotional investment in hating bush personally and in attacking his character. THat just seems a very immature line of attack when there are otherwise lucid arguments against the war.
No offense, but your other post that you linked to WAS a troll post, and I'll even be glad to analyze why for you;)
sentence #1 It is completely ridiculous to suggest that the press has spent more time investigating Bush than they did giving free press to the lying SBVT group.On the other hand, Bush has gotten a free pass for
a) Using political connections to get in to the National Guard, when he was far from the best candidate to get in b) Not fulfilling his duty once he was in there c) Lying about his service and claiming he flew with his unit for years
a) You assume some political connections were used? What were they? Who alleges this? Did Bush himself do anything? Do Bush's FATHER do anything? Who is to blame for this. Unsubstantiated FUD. Troll.
b) Not fulfilling his duty...who knows, I'll give you that one.
c) "Lying about his service and claiming he flew with his unit for years" Show me that he didn't fly? Probable troll.
Official National Guard records, including those released by the White House, contradict Bush's statements. Others in the National Guard corroborate the fact that Bush did not fulfill his duty. To this day, Bush has been incapable of naming a single person who saw him in Alabama when he was supposed to be training there. Bush claims he signed up for a unit up north (Connecticut, I think), but he never showed up to that at all.
Guess you haven't been watching the news recently when Staudt and others in the guard and of the guard went on TV. Troll.
The national media ignored Bush's stint with a champaign unit in the National Guard during Vietnam, with small exceptions, during the 2000 campaign. I know many Bush supporters would like to believe otherwise, but it's fact.
It hink the bigger point is "who cares at all?" and if anyone cares, is there any evidence to prove it? There is not, as the extremely poorly forged documents of this last month show, most recently. That's how fast the liberla media jumped on this story once they thought they had something they could run with--did no basic fact checking (re, Staudt) and couldn't even realize that the documents were CLEARLY forged on MS Word.
Then I did a search for "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" and "John Kerry" and "Vietnam" in the past six months. How many hits? 248!
I'll take this slow for you. How many times did Bush say that he should be president because of his experience in the guard? How many times did Bush campaign on ANYTHING he did in his youth? Never. Quite the contrary, Bush is a man reborn and he was not running on his record of 30 years ago. Kerry on the other hand "Reporting for duty!" (DNC) based his entire campaign on his Vietnam experience and rarely faield to mention Vietnam in his speeches. IT's only natural that he comes under attack for this stance.
Is Bush's Vietnam record (or lack of it) relevant to today? To some extent, no. The war was more than 30 years ago. But for a president who calls himself the "war president", who insists he was for the Vietnam war, who started an elective war under false pretenses and shifting reasons, and who is dangerously stretching our military resources, it is important to know what that person was doing when it was their time to serve.
He's a war president because the country went to war, not because he fought in some war 30 years ago. Were Eisenhower or Grant war presidents? No? Roosevelt? Who? Troll. False pretenses? THe pretenses were false only in that the CIA, British intelligence and others dropped the ball. Is there any evidence Bush himself knowingly lied? Troll. And you're absolutely right, it is important to know what did when they were called up to serve--thus the Swift Boat Vets. You can't say it's important and try to suppress them at the same time. Troll yet again.
Does anyone else find it distasteful when a draft dodger calls into question the medals of a war hero?
I know you didn't make the original post to which I replied, but you make the exact same mistakes. A lie is only a lie if you intend to deceive and say something that you don't believe. If Bush, as other reports indicated, and as CIA reports informed, believed that Iraq had WMD's, how is that a lie?
You make an equally foolhardy leap of ill-logic in the first part of your post--there are more windows viruses in 2004 ergo windows is less secure. Where is the logic? There are more people alive in africa in 2004 than in 2000, therefore aids is less of a problem. That's the same logic you just used. Likewise you completely ignored in my post the fact that Windows XP SP2 is signifigantly more secure and less affected than Windows XP pre-SP1 is, you ignored my examples I gave of how and why this is true, and you also ignore Win2k3 server, which is also more secure. That is using facts and knowledge plus method to come to non-insane conclusions.
FWIW, I do not say there were WMD's in Iraq, I never thought that there were, but I just can't, like you seem to be, get pissed off about the removal of a genocidal dictator.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you think that Bush lied about Iraq too?
People, especially on slashdot but often in general, seem to have a very emotionally needy definition of lies. How did Bush lie about prioritizing security now? Is it not true that signifigant number of programmers have been redirected to securing existing product lines (e.g. XP SP2). Is it not true that more secure coding processes, such as compiling with buffer checks are now being used? Is it not true that SP2 and Win2k3 have not been affected by many of the recent problems?
FWIW, the reformat and reinstall is a thing of the past.
Do XP's restore install--it reinstalls the base operating systems (ie, c:\windows) entirely from scratch, but keeps all your apps and doesnt touch c:\documents and settings. This mean you get your desktop and HKEY_CURRENT_USER reg keys...basically everything you want (c:\documents and settings\USER is the same as ~USER on lunix)
No, I said you lived in a world without context, that you were a 12 year old, and that you have no understanding of scale, and I'll add to boot--your priorities are whack, and tinged by a seemingly not insignifigant amount of class jealousy. Then again, everything does seem much more intense and serious in youth and immaturity, so perhaps I am being too harsh..
Apparently your standards are a lot lower then mine.
Yes, see, part of being emotionally mature is not holding other people accountable to rigid standards that we ourselves (indeed, nobody!) could live up to. I have absolutely no right to critical of Bill Gates philanthropic generosity, for example... if I had donated billions, then maybe we could talk.
No, you're incorrect. Yes, some of what bill gates gives away is stock, options, software, computers etc, but a very large portion of it is raw cash. CVF and the bill and melinda gates foundations are hugely endowed for instance, a moment's research would have shown you this.
For example--this very article! Other similar donations have been made to many other schools--my school, Duke has gotten at least 30 mil fromes the Gates, and we still code in gcc and or java;) (and eclipse!)
Aye, you misunderstand me. I don't have a problem with Bill Gates--actually I admire him. I was merely pointing out how puerile and emotionally immature your post was.
As another slashdotter posted, as of 2000, in grants of 20 million and greater, Bill Gates has given over 2 billion dollars. You think that's less than.01% of his "income" ? Tough crowd!
So he is giving a tiny percentage of the money he made using the most slimy and despicable methods known to mankind. I'm not impressed and I suspect his maker will not be either.
Wow, you must live in a world without any context and in which microsoft is the greatest thing that keeps you up at night? god, I wish I lived in your world. Until then I'll continue to live in a world of genocides, murder and terrorism. But have fun in your "I'm 12 and I hate microsoft from my parents basement!" worldview...it won't last as you get older.
In terms of absolute dollars yes, in terms of percentages I bet they gave more.
You can hate on Gates all you want, as is your right, but to simply describe him as "a college dropout with little knowledge of computer science" is not exactly right. He was in fact a very talented coder in his day--I know this isn't the same as a computer scientist, but quite frankly id rather be a coder any day of the tweek.
I guess the tought of a top CS building being named for the top software companies top employee doesn't really rankle me that much.
There's this thing. It's called "only send it to the people who are supposed to see it". It's called, don't leave it on your shared drive on the network.
When we start compensating for the basic mistakes people shouldn't be making, then things are wrong. It's like designing protective noseguards so you don't shove steak knives up there. There's just no need.
Not to mention, in your scenario, some moron VP will probably just print it out to a network printer and leave it sitting there for 45 minutes until he/she can be bothered to pick it up.
Not a security expert or admin I assume... What if the email is sent correctly but intercepted? What if someone else has physical access to the recieving computer?
Security has to account for multiple levels of problems--unforeseen (interception, etc) and unintentional (fat fingers!). What's the point of going all high and noble? Never sent an IM or email to the incorrect person?
Natural economic forces would provide just enough farms to produce just enough food.
Oh? It is a noted phenomenon that no democracy has ever suffered a famine. Ukraine under Stalin, China during the "great leap" forward, Ireland i nthe 19th century, Africa today--all products of over managed economies and unfree economies.
I agree--as I said in another thread, i fear ALL governments. The issue I had is that this thread started with someone blaming the US for everything they didn't like in the EU, which is just nonsense.
Slashdot Mirror
If you weren't simply mindlessly spreading fud, you would have looked at who sponsored the bill--and why. It's just FUD, in the very sense of the word--spreading fear, uncertainty, and dismay (or trying to).
Secondly, the military is not having a hard time meeting their numbers, in fact units which have seen combat have far and away the highest retention and rates around.
As the previous said, there is absolutely NO one who wants a draft.
By that logic no one should be allowed to buy land, we would just rent it from the governemtn (I hate saying this, but AFAIK, this is how it was done in Soviet Russia). Do you want to rent your land?
I dispute that. They actually found Chinese language documents wrt nuke tech in Libya. Google for Pakistan and China--they have a history of cooperation. For that matter I personally am rather shocked that Musharraf has held onto power as long as he has. He's done an absolutely tremendous job of clamping down on radicals--admittedly he's been motivated primarily by the fact that they would kill him first, if they had the chance. Right now is one of the few times in the past 50 years that Pakistan has legitimately held direct control of the tribal areas in the Northwest Frontier Province. Those areas are difficult to control, and have traditionally been more or less autonomous. That Pakhtun peoples (with about a million variant spellings) were faimed warriors in the British period, and the Brits got their noses bloodied up there on more than one occasion--absolutely disasterous rout and slaughter on a retreat from Kabul for instance. In light of the geopolitical-religious realities on the ground in Pakistan and AFghanistan, I think things could hardly be going much better. That's not to say that there isn't room for improvement, but I see the situation improving rapidly. THat's just my opinion, if you were curious.
I'm ignoring your example of "more secure" W2K3, because it's irrelevant. I'm not claiming Microsoft hasn't produced any security since Gates' directive. I'm claiming that they haven't produced enough, while applying resources to new features instead, despite that directive. Unless you're going to blame that on some kind of mutiny, doing one when the Boss clearly said they "should" do the other, it's clear that Microsoft rhetoric and actions diverge to suit Microsoft, as usual. I note that you haven't conceded that argument, despite examples of "Improved Experiences" features of XP/SP2 that also illustrate that doublethink, despite your claims to the contrary.
Ok, I'll go back and illustrate why I complete discounted your attempted argument. You are angry they "improved wireless support" and ignored security. Incorrect, sp2 features WPA security feature. Windows Meida Player 9--offers additional security features (check out the preferences screen, you'll see what I mean) and was already available separately from SP2. I believe even DX has some security enhancements, at least with managed code. Then we have popup blocker. Query to open/save/run with warning for every exe. Builtin activated GOOD firewall. DCOM security settings. The only thing I can think of that CAN'T be considered a security enhancement is the Bluetooth additions you mention. I utterly fail to see the point of your argument that MSFT is adding features when they should be enhancing security, and even *if* I accepted your premise, I've just illustrated (and with the example of Win2k3) that you're simply factually wrong.
I realize I'm debating someone who has totally bought into "the program". I'm not as interested in convincing you - I don't have a chance against your professors. I'm more interested in where you'll go from there, what job you expect to fill. And where your classmates will apply their education and worldview.
I'm really curious as to what program I've bought into! Because for one thing, if you think a single MES/Islam/History/heck, any academic professor is pro-Iraq war, you would be wrong, so I don't think I've bought into that program. (Likewise I agree with few of my classmates...on an offtopic note if you're curious, I would probably be considered pro-Palestinian). Likewise they don't really teach us much about Microsoft in school, and for that matter every server system I maintain runs FreeBSD, so I'm not sure what program I've bought into there either. But hey, whatever floats your boat.
So it's ok for Kerry to believe this, but not ok for the president to believe it? What exactly evidence do you have that the president DIDN'T believe these same reports?
And you STILL haven't responded to my point about SP2 and Win2k3 being largely unaffected. So I'm just going to give up on that, you're just too eager to crucify microsoft for whatever reason.
I don't know what they teach in MES these days, but you'd probably be intrigued by the career of Pakistani AQ Khan, whose state laboratory developed technology he stole from his German and Dutch employers in Europe, then exported to North Korea, Libya and Iran.
Yes, the point being...?
And you might not have heard about the Shia militias run by al Sadr and others, freeing up the southern 2/3 of Iraq for Iranian control.
You are correct, I haven't heard of the upper Iraqi region being outside of coalition control, and I maintain that it's nuts to believe that the coalition, or even the EU, would let Iran invade Iraq.
Or maybe all that reporting about Chalabis collaboration with Iran hasn't made it around the campus.
Again what's the point? Chalabi is discredited and out of the picture.
And only the remains of the "Northern Alliance" think Afghanistan is going well, including propaganda like "power transfers" that have allowed opium production to reach historic levels.
It's true the Taliban did a good job of shutting down the opium trade. It's true the trade is now than it has been recently. I have few doubts that it will get better--Kabul is the best example of the future of Afghanistan, and with every succesful transfer of power such as we saw in Herat (Ismail Khan is one tough SOB) Kabul's authority is growing.
Then again, maybe the "Middle East" ends at the Syrian and Lebanese border with Iraq these days, and it's all Central or SW Asia - not your department.
;) Personally my focus lies primarily from Turkey to the 'Stans.
From Morocco to Kazakhstan
*I* have to live in this world, and I won't cede any of it to the Inquisitors in Tehran, especially not on my dime, with my countrymen's blood.
Not sure what you're saying? You won't let Iran's power grow but you aren't willing to fight them? Personally I would put a couple bucks down on an invasion of Iran if Bush is reelected.
bwahahha, the irony..now it's happening to me! (50% overrated?! gasp)
You have to be wilfully ignorant or a drudgereport.com reading fool to believe that influence wasn't used to keep Georgie safe in the guard and out of harm's way. Personally, I don't have a problem with it and if I were a wealthy influence-bearing parent looking at the prospect of my flesh and blood getting send overseas to be killed for a stupid war I'd have done the same thing. I say props to the whole family.
You're missing the point. If nothing illegal was done, what's the problem? If the Bush name ALONE kept him out the war, what could or should he have done differently? I don't know.
Why do you right-wing types all have to be so stupid?
Because otherwise leftist elitists would have nobody left to gloat their intelligence over.
Barnes a democrat says he got Bush into the guard, however, as I'm sure you know, his story has changed over the years. His daughter says that he is lying to promote his new book. He himself never claimed that a Bush family member asked him to do it. I see no wrongdoing here.
I'll trust your sources on the national guard stuff--don't have time ATM to fully research.
Bush has had a long-established pattern of not taking responsibility for his actions.
Yes, when he was young. However we see a marked change in Bush years ago. It takes a signifigant amount of willpower to stop drinking alcohol completely the way Bush did after being, by all accounts, a virtual alcoholic. I won't excuse any of Bush's youth--he did many bad things..but I'm happy with the Bush of today.
That's a scary thought. Anything a politician mentions is fair game for lies? As the New York Times concluded, "on close examination, the accounts of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth' prove to be riddled with inconsistencies. In many cases, material offered as proof by these veterans is undercut by official Navy records and the men's own statements."
I made no comment on the Swift Boat Vet's case. They were heavily attacked by the media in fact (possibly not Fox News). I simply said that Kerry made Vietnam an issue...if he had campaigned on his beliefs, on his senate career etc, the Swift Vets would have had no power. I blame Kerry for making this race ridiculously about 30 years ago.
Yes, pretenses he used are NOW shown to be false, but who cares? CIA reports, british intelligence, pentagon sources, etc believed Iraq was a threat and had WMD's.
Does anyone else find it distasteful when a draft dodger calls into question the medals of a war hero?
That makes you a troll, tried and true.
We are having a purely semantic argument about "lies": I call it a lie when it is not true, whether the liar believes it or not. You call it a "mistake". To me, neither is acceptable from the President when commiting us to war, especially one as gruesome and risky as this one.
;)
Well damn then Senator Kerry is a liar too--he voted for the war as well.
You are falsely projecting an irrelevant logical argument onto my actual claims. Gates said security is always more important than a new feature, yet Microsoft has introduced many new features in the 2.5 years since, without even an equal increase in security - there should have been *no* new features until there was as good security as Microsoft can provide.
Avoiding my point again. SP2 was almost an entirely "featureless" patch. That is to say, the new firewall is both a security enhancer AND a new feature. Still no answer about SP2 and Win2k3.
I won't respond to everything in your last paragraph unless you want me to (genocide--ok, massmurder of Kurds then), increasing the chance for Iran to defeat Iraq--completely ludicrous (and I'm a grad student in middle eastern studies), etc ludicrous, Pakistan got nuke technology from China, Afghanistan is in my estimation proceeding extremely well, see transfer of power in Herat recently, your assessment of Pakistan I find to be not very good either, I won't elaborate unless you want me to. In short, I agree with practically nothing in your last paragraph. But hey, I think it was pretty obvious already that we have a major failure to agree
My mistake on all the comments--I tend to type informally online, but ignoring that, I'll just accept that you no longer think highly of the universities I have attended. Fine by me. I completely accept your criticism of my message.
I was actually waiting for your response (which you didn't give) before made my point--here's a little story. Both Bush and Kerry came from privileged households (Kerry moreso than Bush--summerhouses in France, boat trips with President Kennedy, etc). Both went to Yale at roughly the same time. Both are rumored to be in the same secret society there. Bush proceeds to go to Harvard and get his MBA while Kerry goes to...BC law school? Hmm, somewhat odd.. Bush proceeds to be a succesful businessman, Kerry...becomes a politician. And Bush is constantly impugned for being stupid and never had to work for anything etc? I just find the whole thing fishy, especially in the 2004 election. By exactly what criteria is Bush stupid? Stupider than Kerry? Are you smarter than Bush?
and, in direct response to your message--I have seen absolutely 0 evidence that Bush has lied, though I would love for you to correct me. Likewise, I'm not unhappy with the Iraq invasion, I was never personally a big fan of Saddam. I don't see the point in your level of emotional investment in hating bush personally and in attacking his character. THat just seems a very immature line of attack when there are otherwise lucid arguments against the war.
No offense, but your other post that you linked to WAS a troll post, and I'll even be glad to analyze why for you ;)
;)
sentence #1 It is completely ridiculous to suggest that the press has spent more time investigating Bush than they did giving free press to the lying SBVT group.On the other hand, Bush has gotten a free pass for
a) Using political connections to get in to the National Guard, when he was far from the best candidate to get in
b) Not fulfilling his duty once he was in there
c) Lying about his service and claiming he flew with his unit for years
a) You assume some political connections were used? What were they? Who alleges this? Did Bush himself do anything? Do Bush's FATHER do anything? Who is to blame for this. Unsubstantiated FUD. Troll.
b) Not fulfilling his duty...who knows, I'll give you that one.
c) "Lying about his service and claiming he flew with his unit for years" Show me that he didn't fly? Probable troll.
Official National Guard records, including those released by the White House, contradict Bush's statements. Others in the National Guard corroborate the fact that Bush did not fulfill his duty. To this day, Bush has been incapable of naming a single person who saw him in Alabama when he was supposed to be training there. Bush claims he signed up for a unit up north (Connecticut, I think), but he never showed up to that at all.
Guess you haven't been watching the news recently when Staudt and others in the guard and of the guard went on TV. Troll.
The national media ignored Bush's stint with a champaign unit in the National Guard during Vietnam, with small exceptions, during the 2000 campaign. I know many Bush supporters would like to believe otherwise, but it's fact.
It hink the bigger point is "who cares at all?" and if anyone cares, is there any evidence to prove it? There is not, as the extremely poorly forged documents of this last month show, most recently. That's how fast the liberla media jumped on this story once they thought they had something they could run with--did no basic fact checking (re, Staudt) and couldn't even realize that the documents were CLEARLY forged on MS Word.
Then I did a search for "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" and "John Kerry" and "Vietnam" in the past six months. How many hits? 248!
I'll take this slow for you. How many times did Bush say that he should be president because of his experience in the guard? How many times did Bush campaign on ANYTHING he did in his youth? Never. Quite the contrary, Bush is a man reborn and he was not running on his record of 30 years ago. Kerry on the other hand "Reporting for duty!" (DNC) based his entire campaign on his Vietnam experience and rarely faield to mention Vietnam in his speeches. IT's only natural that he comes under attack for this stance.
Is Bush's Vietnam record (or lack of it) relevant to today? To some extent, no. The war was more than 30 years ago. But for a president who calls himself the "war president", who insists he was for the Vietnam war, who started an elective war under false pretenses and shifting reasons, and who is dangerously stretching our military resources, it is important to know what that person was doing when it was their time to serve.
He's a war president because the country went to war, not because he fought in some war 30 years ago. Were Eisenhower or Grant war presidents? No? Roosevelt? Who? Troll. False pretenses? THe pretenses were false only in that the CIA, British intelligence and others dropped the ball. Is there any evidence Bush himself knowingly lied? Troll. And you're absolutely right, it is important to know what did when they were called up to serve--thus the Swift Boat Vets. You can't say it's important and try to suppress them at the same time. Troll yet again.
Does anyone else find it distasteful when a draft dodger calls into question the medals of a war hero?
and that is why you were trolling (lies!)
I know you didn't make the original post to which I replied, but you make the exact same mistakes. A lie is only a lie if you intend to deceive and say something that you don't believe. If Bush, as other reports indicated, and as CIA reports informed, believed that Iraq had WMD's, how is that a lie?
You make an equally foolhardy leap of ill-logic in the first part of your post--there are more windows viruses in 2004 ergo windows is less secure. Where is the logic? There are more people alive in africa in 2004 than in 2000, therefore aids is less of a problem. That's the same logic you just used. Likewise you completely ignored in my post the fact that Windows XP SP2 is signifigantly more secure and less affected than Windows XP pre-SP1 is, you ignored my examples I gave of how and why this is true, and you also ignore Win2k3 server, which is also more secure. That is using facts and knowledge plus method to come to non-insane conclusions.
FWIW, I do not say there were WMD's in Iraq, I never thought that there were, but I just can't, like you seem to be, get pissed off about the removal of a genocidal dictator.
What univeresity did you go to? Or, if you're a teenager (possible considering your intensity and (ill)logic), nevermind, I rest my point.
The second appearance of Bush should be s/Bush/Gates :-p But you knew that.
People who say "what was the point?" generally got the point but are just too shocked to admit it.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you think that Bush lied about Iraq too?
People, especially on slashdot but often in general, seem to have a very emotionally needy definition of lies. How did Bush lie about prioritizing security now? Is it not true that signifigant number of programmers have been redirected to securing existing product lines (e.g. XP SP2). Is it not true that more secure coding processes, such as compiling with buffer checks are now being used? Is it not true that SP2 and Win2k3 have not been affected by many of the recent problems?
So I ask you, where is the lie?
I like spelling it lunix, ala somethingawful. Like the Jeffk Lunix cartoon with a cameo by cliffy b ;) (ill dig up link if you want--its funny;)
FWIW, the reformat and reinstall is a thing of the past.
Do XP's restore install--it reinstalls the base operating systems (ie, c:\windows) entirely from scratch, but keeps all your apps and doesnt touch c:\documents and settings. This mean you get your desktop and HKEY_CURRENT_USER reg keys...basically everything you want (c:\documents and settings\USER is the same as ~USER on lunix)
Apparently your standards are a lot lower then mine.
Yes, see, part of being emotionally mature is not holding other people accountable to rigid standards that we ourselves (indeed, nobody!) could live up to. I have absolutely no right to critical of Bill Gates philanthropic generosity, for example... if I had donated billions, then maybe we could talk.
No, you're incorrect. Yes, some of what bill gates gives away is stock, options, software, computers etc, but a very large portion of it is raw cash. CVF and the bill and melinda gates foundations are hugely endowed for instance, a moment's research would have shown you this.
;) (and eclipse!)
For example--this very article! Other similar donations have been made to many other schools--my school, Duke has gotten at least 30 mil fromes the Gates, and we still code in gcc and or java
Aye, you misunderstand me. I don't have a problem with Bill Gates--actually I admire him. I was merely pointing out how puerile and emotionally immature your post was.
.01% of his "income" ? Tough crowd!
As another slashdotter posted, as of 2000, in grants of 20 million and greater, Bill Gates has given over 2 billion dollars. You think that's less than
So he is giving a tiny percentage of the money he made using the most slimy and despicable methods known to mankind. I'm not impressed and I suspect his maker will not be either.
Wow, you must live in a world without any context and in which microsoft is the greatest thing that keeps you up at night? god, I wish I lived in your world. Until then I'll continue to live in a world of genocides, murder and terrorism. But have fun in your "I'm 12 and I hate microsoft from my parents basement!" worldview...it won't last as you get older.
In terms of absolute dollars yes, in terms of percentages I bet they gave more.
Highly unlikely.
I guess the tought of a top CS building being named for the top software companies top employee doesn't really rankle me that much.
It's OED as I stated earlier in the thread, and I can't link to it because their website is pay only. Italic symbolizes a quotation ;)
and you still dont understand the definition of pirate..amazing.
There's this thing. It's called "only send it to the people who are supposed to see it". It's called, don't leave it on your shared drive on the network.
When we start compensating for the basic mistakes people shouldn't be making, then things are wrong. It's like designing protective noseguards so you don't shove steak knives up there. There's just no need.
Not to mention, in your scenario, some moron VP will probably just print it out to a network printer and leave it sitting there for 45 minutes until he/she can be bothered to pick it up.
Not a security expert or admin I assume... What if the email is sent correctly but intercepted? What if someone else has physical access to the recieving computer?
Security has to account for multiple levels of problems--unforeseen (interception, etc) and unintentional (fat fingers!). What's the point of going all high and noble? Never sent an IM or email to the incorrect person?
Natural economic forces would provide just enough farms to produce just enough food.
Oh? It is a noted phenomenon that no democracy has ever suffered a famine. Ukraine under Stalin, China during the "great leap" forward, Ireland i nthe 19th century, Africa today--all products of over managed economies and unfree economies.
I agree--as I said in another thread, i fear ALL governments. The issue I had is that this thread started with someone blaming the US for everything they didn't like in the EU, which is just nonsense.