I can't say it better than uqbar. A vote for Nader is not a vote to elect him president - not in my wildest dream. A vote for Nader is a vote to:
1) Force the issues dearest to the left back onto political discussion;
2) Promote a healthy democratic environment in which third party candidates can proved serious choices to the voters. On this issue, I also find the work of Pat Buchanan on the right commentable;
3) Yeah.. The last desperate measure to draw the democratic party back to the left:).
Political calculus will be involved. In the States that are safely Gore, why not vote for Nader.
And yes, I am totally aware of the situation of the Supreme Court. But another important issue is also at stake - the health of democracy. The duopoly of the Democratic and Republican Parties is stiffling. If the Green could get 5% vote and thus Federal funding for election, this would be a big boost to democracy in our political system.
He may be a liberal - actually, he can be just a libertarian. But Government intervention is not the main theme of his letter.
What he keep saying is that a redistribution of wealth *in the form of inheritance tax* is necessary to the stabilization of American capitalism. Abolishing it will only change distribution of wealth and power into a pyrimad that will utterly destablize our society.
Please notice that redistribution of wealth is not the same strawman as the big (scary) Federal government.
So, you should have argued:
/sarcasm
The whole piece is just an rehash of the old class-warfare rhetoric - which the author did admit. As proven in the *good* old communist model, the liberal idea of robbing the wealthies to enrich the lazies does not work. Market capitalism has provided equal opportunities to both of the riches and the poors. Any excessive taxation is an infringement of personal liberty
*sarcasm/
Hate people who can't get their soundbites right.:P
Fear of diverting public education funding into private institution has always been a central reason for the camp against school voucher. Nobody is against parental choices but money must come from somewhere. Whethet you agree with this argument of course is another matter.
What he's suggesting is that having school vouchers will move public money into private religious educational institutions, which are usually religious. His tone may be too argumentative and he may not have all his assertions factually supported but I don't have any problem reading the meanings.
Sorry. I think it's you who resort to name-calling rather than trying to engage into an intelligent discussion.
The original article asked about the "War on Drug", rather than the legality of drug usage. The recent "War on Drug" relies on heavy-handed arrest and putting a lot of people in jail. Even if you believe that drug usage should be illegal, this is NOT the only way to stop it. Critics of the "War on Drug" usually suggest that "treatment" and "rehabituation" are more effective and economical methods.
Some additional information. When I graduated, I had to signed some kind of agreement with UMI to have them microfilm my thesis - not sure, but I might also have signed over my copyright too. So, that's probably how the company get the permission to sell all the theses.
First, some clarification of my standpoints. I'm not trying to speak for the Chinese Government. I'm from Hong Kong and I don't really care whether Taiwan go independent or not. But it's nice to list some facts for the basis of some *offtopic* discussion.
Taiwan independency is a nice thought (or bad, depending on your position). But sorry, it's neither a fact nor de facto reality.
1) Politically: you can actually count the number of nations recognizing Taiwan as an independent nation with two hands. Yes, Taiwan is a famous and economically important place but so do Silicon Valley, Los Angelos and North Ireland, etc.
2) Legally: in both of the Constitution of Taiwan (Republic of China) and Mainland China, the status of Taiwan is still a province of "China". Recently, a Taiwanese merchant broke *Taiwan* law in Mainland China. The Taiwanese Highest Court rules that his behavior in the mainland was still under the jurisdiction of Taiwan court since the mainland is legally considered a part of Republic of China (i.e. Taiwan Government).
3) Diplomatically: up until last negotiation between the Mainland and Taiwan Governments, they both agreed on the principle of "One China". The newly elected President is still ambiguous on this point. He has never rejected the "One China" principle due to domestic (yes, some Taiwanese reject outright independency, at least for security reason) and international pressure, even though he was extremely pro-independency ten to twenty years ago.
You can regard (1) to (3) as outdated historical remnant or political compromise on the side of Taiwan Government but well, reality is reality. Taiwan is not legally and politically independent (yet).
4) Historically: if my memory is right, Taiwan was first occupied by Dutch. And it was taken over by a Ming general, using the island as a base as their rebellion against the Qing (babbarian) Government about two hundred years ago. Next, it was occupied by the Japanese. And later (1950) retaken by the KMT (the ruling party of the Republic of China at that time) as the base against the Communist government. So, is Taiwan historically a part of China? Similar to most region of China, it's not a question with a clear cut answer.
5) Culturally: With a country as large and culturally diversify as China. Taiwan is as culturally similar to other part of China as places like Shanghai, Hong Kong. Yes, what you read in the States is inaccurate, Chinese culture is NOT a homegenous culture; for example, we don't all do TaiChi. Regional difference can be very pronounced.
6) Morally: Freedom and self-determination are nice ideas. Nevertheless, I don't really think that the freedom to have your own country is commonly listed as high as other rights speech, religion...
I'm not trying to take a stand in China Trading issue here. But using pork barrel to exchange for votes is not new in politics. It happened during the passage of NAFTA and probably during numerous other occasions. It's not a pretty scene but it is a part of politics and democracy.
Sorry to burst everybody's bubble;). And thanks for benwb's link.
As one other slashdotter has pointed out. Electroporation is just a way to deliver substance into the cell. A shock to the cells can open up some pores on the cell membrane and make the cell take up larger molecules. These researchers invented a new technique to improve the precision of electroporation and drug delivery, which is cool but it really doesn't have much to do with the brain.
The best that you can do with this technology in the brain is to implant it and you may be able to stimulate a few neurons at will. Well, but scientists have already been able to do thing like that for more half a century.
Neural implants are fun to read in science fictions. But we're probably have more than half a century from such technologies. The largest obstacle is we don't really know what's happening in the brain yet. Much more research is needed.
So, write tp your congressmen and ask them to increase funding to basic researches:) - oh, yes, I'm in the business of studying the brain;).
I've checked the original press elease from UC berkeley. It seems to be about putting a cell on a chip and controlling its membrane potential (voltage) with electronic circuits. It probably has nothing to do with cybernetic control or neural implants (yet). The following are quotes from the press release:
"UC Berkeley's bionic chip took three years to build using silicon microfabrication technology. It is transparent, so it can be studied by microscope, and measures about one hundredth of an inch across. The much tinier cell, which measures about 20 microns across, or one thousandth of an inch, is not visible to the naked eye. It sits in a hole in the center of the chip and is kept alive with an infusion of nutrients."
"Cell membranes allow certain materials in and keep others out depending on the needs of the cell. The bionic chip can open and close a cell membrane in milliseconds, allowing for a very precise control never before possible. Once in place in the circuit, the cells themselves are considered bionic since they can be operated in this way by computer control."
Send him a letter or better yet, write a public letter to newspaper where people can read it. So that you can help stop using rape victims as political sound bite. Not that you will actually stop him but at least you can make other politicians think more before they say thing.
My advisor is in Yale with 30+ years tenure. He earned only around $100 K and that's considered quite high in our school.
However, the problem is not the professors. It's those younger scientists. The chance of getting full tenure is very slim nowaday.. And your salary will remain below $40K for more than ten year after PhD graduation, with no job security. And if you don't get professorship after ten year, your whole future is almost basically gone. Most institutes have a tendency of biasing against older scientists when they are recruiting faculty.
$40 K is not that bad if you are comparing it with the majority of the society. But if you compare the salary and prospect with alternatives in industry, IT or some business consulting firms (who are activiely recruiting PhD graduate). Pure scientific research can really look like stupid career path.
No, I didn't do it. But if I had moderation point and I hadn't put any article on, I might have done it mysekf. It is frustrating to see all the trolls (and unfortunately, some semi-intelligent posts) on the other side. So, what the heck! Let's see something opposite got moderated up - just for the fun of it:P.
Politically incorrect in the sense that it's messing around with intricate relatioship between two other "countries"; and that it hurts the feelings of a lot of people.
It's almost like us saying that we support the independency of North Ireland and deplore every act of the British Government in the North Ireland as an act to supress the Irish people.
Somehow Slashdot has a tendency to squeeze in anything related to Taiwan. And all the racist remarks whenever any articles related to China is posted.. It's such an enjoyment.
Seriously, is there a way to kill any stories which have the word "China" in? Sorry, I'm tired of hearing all the senseless ramblings from those hardly know anything about China. It's more painful than the last time I heard racist slurs thrown at me on the street (in the US). At least, I could assume those individuals are semi-intelligent.
No. Red Flag is a real Chinese linux distribution. Check out their home page . IMHO, they drawn some cute Tux too:). And yes, you need to set up your computer for Chinese to read it correctly;).
And if you're interested in Chinese Linux, you should also check out some other distributions such as Bluepoint .
Re:Government Software Bans == Bad Thing
on
China Banning Win2k
·
· Score: 1
Could you *please* read the news more *carefully*? It's banning it in the "government" offices. Not banning the Chinese people from using it. The French parliment recently are trying to push for a law endorsing Free software in the government offices. What's wrong with it?!!
Sorry about the last empty message. I've pressed the enter buttons twice too many.
Although I think that it's only my dream, is there a way for etoy to stop etoys using their domain name? Etoys the (evil;) company basically have nothing other than their brand name, i.e., "www.etoys.com". They haven't made any profit yet. They don't have much asset. If they lose this domain, basically, their business is more or less over (and gone with their overpriced stock). I know. Although they also own "www.toys.com", I doubt that it is as famous as the other one.
Do they have something vulnerable behind all those bluffings and posturing?
It's probably none of my business. But when I hear the words like "army is here to protect your freedom and democracry", I can't shut up. In the past century, a military force was required to protect democracry - or maybe we've been convinced to believe so - but now the world is slightly different.
Democracry still has a lot of threats but a foreign enemy is hardly one on the top list. Which country is going to invade the US of A and impose martial law on the country? China? Ha! Ha!
IMHO, among the enemies of democracy are an apathic and misinformed mass, the shallow and uninformative media, the special and business interests who are more or less in control of the government, an bureacracy which is inert to changes (1). Sorry, a top-rated military cannot do a darn thing on these. And, maintaining a healthy democracy is harder than just beating the crap out of every one of your enemies.
I'm not against the military. A well prepared military is *absolutely* essential to protect the *national interest* of the US. But please, national interest is not the same as freedom and democracry.
(1) I don't believe that terrorism is a threat to freedom and democracry. Terrorism *is* a danger to the *US security* and *Americans*. Don't invoke freedom and democracy like some magic words whenever actions against some foreign threats are needed.
It's probably a little bit off-topic but I think that people should know about this. I'm using Vmware and it's a very useful piece of software. Similar to other users, I feel that it worths US$80. There is one "small" problem.
I need to use Chinese but I don't want to change my system due to compatibility and stability reasons. Using a guest Chinese Linux OS is the best way to go. Nevertheless, the guest OS is extremely slow without using the special X-server from Vmware. Since Chinese Linuxes need a modified version of X, the X server from Vmware doesn't work.
It is okay that the X server from Vmware not supporting international encoding. However, the source of the server is NOT open for hacking. I filed an incident suggesting that the source of the X-server should be available since it's probably based heavily on the open-source Xfree86 project and of course, I haven't heard anything from them since then.
P.S. If any people from Vmware is reading this, please correct me if I had made any false claim. It's not my intention to flame sentiment against your company. I just cannot comphrend the reasons for not releasing the source of the server.
Not sure that whether it'll be moderated as off-topic since the discussion seems to be more concerned about China-bashing and China-bashing-bashing...
The translation "God ship" - more appropriately should be as "gods' ship" - misses a subtlty of the name. "Shenzhou" has the same pronounciation as "gods' land", which in Chinese traditionally refer to the land of China. A pretty smart name from Jiang Zemin - the General secretory of CCP (read China:).
P.S. "gods" probably should be small capital because it's not the God as in christian religion.
Thank you for such a romantic picture of China. But actually, though never has reached the scale of 18th, 19th century Europe (who could?:), China did have her share of expansion, mainly during the Han and Tang dynasty. But it's basically accurately that the numerous Chinese dynasties usually directed inwards. Excessive warfare was scorn upon and the emperors were advised to focus on people's livelihood.
The disturbing thing is that recently both countries seem to need an enemy and start to make their own strawman. The Chinese side is easy to understand (for me). The control of the government is weakening and so they need some kind of internal or external threat to legitmatize their power. And the Chinese people have had sensitive national pride since the end of the 19th century.
However, I can't fully understand the American side. If it's only the government, I can comprehend - afterall, you do need some reason to justify all those military spendings. But the perceived threat of China manifests in many differnt ways and is seen in many people, e.g. a new war game I saw in CompUSA featuring the war between USA and China in Kazastan; the numerous trash novels; almost one news item on slashdot everyweek - and the responses written by the readers; the religious hawks; the occasional speech of the (un?;)educated congressmen; yeah, and of course, the pentagon - I don't blam the last one because preparing for the imaginary enemy is their job.
It gives me the impression that many Americans just like war and they want an enemy. Or they want some excitement of warfare over the otherwise boring life. Of course, it's not me to judge the American culture. But the whole phenomenon scares me.
(Sarcastic mode on) Of course, a little bit of animosity is good for economy and science development. Afterall, WWII dragged the world out from the Great Depression according some economists. (off)
But if things went out of hand, a major war occurs between the USA and China could only mean diaster to both countries - if not the whole humanity.
I'm a Chinese and I'm living in the States for eight years... To say that China has been peaceful for thousand of years, of course, is silly. Come on, we're not wimps - cilvilization which is really that peaceful has been wiped out from the surface of the earth a long time ago.
However, please forgive the unsettled feelings of the people from other parts of the world when they look at the whole history of the United States... Ever since the beginning, the United States has been a (hopefully benign) power expanding her sphere of influence throughout the world by warfare and diplomacy. First, it's the settement on the native americans' land. The wars with the Canadian, Mexican during the nineteenth century. The expansion into the west. The two world wars - though you can argue that the United States was on the side of "Good". After that, the Korean war (operation?) - they even thought of nuking China at that time. Vietnam war and other numerous noble or not-so-noble acts during the Cold War. After the collapse of the Soviet, you got the Gulf War and then the bombing of Yugoslavia. Now the United States is the only super power in the world....
Of course, there are indeed reasons to believe that the United States has been behaving relatively more cilivized than most other powers. But come on?! Do you really believe that people in other countries can sleep comfortably on only this belief? Even in the States, it's never been argued that the military might of the nation should be used to defend the interest of the United States. The interest of the States doesn't necessarily agree with the interest of the world, not to mention other countries.
I'm not sure whether you'll follow yours own thread but I'll reply anyway:). I had some similar experience but I would blame that on my hardware. I got some 64M of crappy RAM - stupid me. On another machine, the system behaves much, much better. But as the others have said, try ctrl-alt-backspace, ctrl-alt-del or telnet onto your machine from another computer and kill X.
Slashdot Mirror
Poor guy :)!
:).
I'm in the New England region. So I can (pretty much) vote for Nader without worrying too much about the consquence
I can't say it better than uqbar. A vote for Nader is not a vote to elect him president - not in my wildest dream. A vote for Nader is a vote to:
:).
1) Force the issues dearest to the left back onto political discussion;
2) Promote a healthy democratic environment in which third party candidates can proved serious choices to the voters. On this issue, I also find the work of Pat Buchanan on the right commentable;
3) Yeah.. The last desperate measure to draw the democratic party back to the left
Political calculus will be involved. In the States that are safely Gore, why not vote for Nader.
And yes, I am totally aware of the situation of the Supreme Court. But another important issue is also at stake - the health of democracy. The duopoly of the Democratic and Republican Parties is stiffling. If the Green could get 5% vote and thus Federal funding for election, this would be a big boost to democracy in our political system.
He may be a liberal - actually, he can be just a libertarian. But Government intervention is not the main theme of his letter.
:P
What he keep saying is that a redistribution of wealth *in the form of inheritance tax* is necessary to the stabilization of American capitalism. Abolishing it will only change distribution of wealth and power into a pyrimad that will utterly destablize our society.
Please notice that redistribution of wealth is not the same strawman as the big (scary) Federal government.
So, you should have argued:
/sarcasm
The whole piece is just an rehash of the old class-warfare rhetoric - which the author did admit. As proven in the *good* old communist model, the liberal idea of robbing the wealthies to enrich the lazies does not work. Market capitalism has provided equal opportunities to both of the riches and the poors. Any excessive taxation is an infringement of personal liberty
*sarcasm/
Hate people who can't get their soundbites right.
Fear of diverting public education funding into private institution has always been a central reason for the camp against school voucher. Nobody is against parental choices but money must come from somewhere. Whethet you agree with this argument of course is another matter.
What he's suggesting is that having school vouchers will move public money into private religious educational institutions, which are usually religious. His tone may be too argumentative and he may not have all his assertions factually supported but I don't have any problem reading the meanings.
Sorry. I think it's you who resort to name-calling rather than trying to engage into an intelligent discussion.
The original article asked about the "War on Drug", rather than the legality of drug usage. The recent "War on Drug" relies on heavy-handed arrest and putting a lot of people in jail. Even if you believe that drug usage should be illegal, this is NOT the only way to stop it. Critics of the "War on Drug" usually suggest that "treatment" and "rehabituation" are more effective and economical methods.
Some additional information. When I graduated, I had to signed some kind of agreement with UMI to have them microfilm my thesis - not sure, but I might also have signed over my copyright too. So, that's probably how the company get the permission to sell all the theses.
First, some clarification of my standpoints. I'm not trying to speak for the Chinese Government. I'm from Hong Kong and I don't really care whether Taiwan go independent or not. But it's nice to list some facts for the basis of some *offtopic* discussion.
Taiwan independency is a nice thought (or bad, depending on your position). But sorry, it's neither a fact nor de facto reality.
1) Politically: you can actually count the number of nations recognizing Taiwan as an independent nation with two hands. Yes, Taiwan is a famous and economically important place but so do Silicon Valley, Los Angelos and North Ireland, etc.
2) Legally: in both of the Constitution of Taiwan (Republic of China) and Mainland China, the status of Taiwan is still a province of "China". Recently, a Taiwanese merchant broke *Taiwan* law in Mainland China. The Taiwanese Highest Court rules that his behavior in the mainland was still under the jurisdiction of Taiwan court since the mainland is legally considered a part of Republic of China (i.e. Taiwan Government).
3) Diplomatically: up until last negotiation between the Mainland and Taiwan Governments, they both agreed on the principle of "One China". The newly elected President is still ambiguous on this point. He has never rejected the "One China" principle due to domestic (yes, some Taiwanese reject outright independency, at least for security reason) and international pressure, even though he was extremely pro-independency ten to twenty years ago.
You can regard (1) to (3) as outdated historical remnant or political compromise on the side of Taiwan Government but well, reality is reality. Taiwan is not legally and politically independent (yet).
4) Historically: if my memory is right, Taiwan was first occupied by Dutch. And it was taken over by a Ming general, using the island as a base as their rebellion against the Qing (babbarian) Government about two hundred years ago. Next, it was occupied by the Japanese. And later (1950) retaken by the KMT (the ruling party of the Republic of China at that time) as the base against the Communist government. So, is Taiwan historically a part of China? Similar to most region of China, it's not a question with a clear cut answer.
5) Culturally: With a country as large and culturally diversify as China. Taiwan is as culturally similar to other part of China as places like Shanghai, Hong Kong. Yes, what you read in the States is inaccurate, Chinese culture is NOT a homegenous culture; for example, we don't all do TaiChi. Regional difference can be very pronounced.
6) Morally: Freedom and self-determination are nice ideas. Nevertheless, I don't really think that the freedom to have your own country is commonly listed as high as other rights speech, religion...
I'm not trying to take a stand in China Trading issue here. But using pork barrel to exchange for votes is not new in politics. It happened during the passage of NAFTA and probably during numerous other occasions. It's not a pretty scene but it is a part of politics and democracy.
What's so funny about laughing at a misused word by a foreigner?
Sorry to burst everybody's bubble ;). And thanks for benwb's link.
:) - oh, yes, I'm in the business of studying the brain ;).
As one other slashdotter has pointed out. Electroporation is just a way to deliver substance into the cell. A shock to the cells can open up some pores on the cell membrane and make the cell take up larger molecules. These researchers invented a new technique to improve the precision of electroporation and drug delivery, which is cool but it really doesn't have much to do with the brain.
The best that you can do with this technology in the brain is to implant it and you may be able to stimulate a few neurons at will. Well, but scientists have already been able to do thing like that for more half a century.
Neural implants are fun to read in science fictions. But we're probably have more than half a century from such technologies. The largest obstacle is we don't really know what's happening in the brain yet. Much more research is needed.
So, write tp your congressmen and ask them to increase funding to basic researches
I've checked the original press elease from UC berkeley. It seems to be about putting a cell on a chip and controlling its membrane potential (voltage) with electronic circuits. It probably has nothing to do with cybernetic control or neural implants (yet). The following are quotes from the press release:
"UC Berkeley's bionic chip took three years to build using silicon microfabrication technology. It is transparent, so it can be studied by microscope, and measures about one hundredth of an inch across. The much tinier cell, which measures about 20 microns across, or one thousandth of an inch, is not visible to the naked eye. It sits in a hole in the center of the chip and is kept alive with an infusion of nutrients."
"Cell membranes allow certain materials in and keep others out depending on the needs of the cell. The bionic chip can open and close a cell membrane in milliseconds, allowing for a very precise control never before possible. Once in place in the circuit, the cells themselves are considered bionic since they can be operated in this way by computer control."
I am serious.
Send him a letter or better yet, write a public letter to newspaper where people can read it. So that you can help stop using rape victims as political sound bite. Not that you will actually stop him but at least you can make other politicians think more before they say thing.
Which school?
My advisor is in Yale with 30+ years tenure. He earned only around $100 K and that's considered quite high in our school.
However, the problem is not the professors. It's those younger scientists. The chance of getting full tenure is very slim nowaday.. And your salary will remain below $40K for more than ten year after PhD graduation, with no job security. And if you don't get professorship after ten year, your whole future is almost basically gone. Most institutes have a tendency of biasing against older scientists when they are recruiting faculty.
$40 K is not that bad if you are comparing it with the majority of the society. But if you compare the salary and prospect with alternatives in industry, IT or some business consulting firms (who are activiely recruiting PhD graduate). Pure scientific research can really look like stupid career path.
No, I didn't do it. But if I had moderation point and I hadn't put any article on, I might have done it mysekf. It is frustrating to see all the trolls (and unfortunately, some semi-intelligent posts) on the other side. So, what the heck! Let's see something opposite got moderated up - just for the fun of it :P.
Politically incorrect in the sense that it's messing around with intricate relatioship between two other "countries"; and that it hurts the feelings of a lot of people.
It's almost like us saying that we support the independency of North Ireland and deplore every act of the British Government in the North Ireland as an act to supress the Irish people.
Is it that hard to understand?
Memory -> Taiwan -> Taiwan Earthquake
Chip -> Taiwan -> Taiwan Security Enhancement Act
Somehow Slashdot has a tendency to squeeze in anything related to Taiwan. And all the racist remarks whenever any articles related to China is posted.. It's such an enjoyment.
Seriously, is there a way to kill any stories which have the word "China" in? Sorry, I'm tired of hearing all the senseless ramblings from those hardly know anything about China. It's more painful than the last time I heard racist slurs thrown at me on the street (in the US). At least, I could assume those individuals are semi-intelligent.
No. Red Flag is a real Chinese linux distribution. Check out their home page . IMHO, they drawn some cute Tux too :). And yes, you need to set up your computer for Chinese to read it correctly ;).
And if you're interested in Chinese Linux, you should also check out some other distributions such as Bluepoint .
Could you *please* read the news more *carefully*? It's banning it in the "government" offices. Not banning the Chinese people from using it. The French parliment recently are trying to push for a law endorsing Free software in the government offices. What's wrong with it?!!
Sorry about the last empty message. I've pressed the enter buttons twice too many.
;) company basically have nothing other than their brand name, i.e., "www.etoys.com". They haven't made any profit yet. They don't have much asset. If they lose this domain, basically, their business is more or less over (and gone with their overpriced stock). I know. Although they also own "www.toys.com", I doubt that it is as famous as the other one.
Although I think that it's only my dream, is there a way for etoy to stop etoys using their domain name? Etoys the (evil
Do they have something vulnerable behind all those bluffings and posturing?
It's probably none of my business. But when I hear the words like "army is here to protect your freedom and democracry", I can't shut up. In the past century, a military force was required to protect democracry - or maybe we've been convinced to believe so - but now the world is slightly different.
Democracry still has a lot of threats but a foreign enemy is hardly one on the top list. Which country is going to invade the US of A and impose martial law on the country? China? Ha! Ha!
IMHO, among the enemies of democracy are an apathic and misinformed mass, the shallow and uninformative media, the special and business interests who are more or less in control of the government, an bureacracy which is inert to changes (1). Sorry, a top-rated military cannot do a darn thing on these. And, maintaining a healthy democracy is harder than just beating the crap out of every one of your enemies.
I'm not against the military. A well prepared military is *absolutely* essential to protect the *national interest* of the US. But please, national interest is not the same as freedom and democracry.
(1) I don't believe that terrorism is a threat to freedom and democracry. Terrorism *is* a danger to the *US security* and *Americans*. Don't invoke freedom and democracy like some magic words whenever actions against some foreign threats are needed.
It's probably a little bit off-topic but I think that people should know about this. I'm using Vmware and it's a very useful piece of software. Similar to other users, I feel that it worths US$80. There is one "small" problem.
I need to use Chinese but I don't want to change my system due to compatibility and stability reasons. Using a guest Chinese Linux OS is the best way to go. Nevertheless, the guest OS is extremely slow without using the special X-server from Vmware. Since Chinese Linuxes need a modified version of X, the X server from Vmware doesn't work.
It is okay that the X server from Vmware not supporting international encoding. However, the source of the server is NOT open for hacking. I filed an incident suggesting that the source of the X-server should be available since it's probably based heavily on the open-source Xfree86 project and of course, I haven't heard anything from them since then.
P.S. If any people from Vmware is reading this, please correct me if I had made any false claim. It's not my intention to flame sentiment against your company. I just cannot comphrend the reasons for not releasing the source of the server.
Not sure that whether it'll be moderated as off-topic since the discussion seems to be more concerned about China-bashing and China-bashing-bashing...
:).
The translation "God ship" - more appropriately should be as "gods' ship" - misses a subtlty of the name. "Shenzhou" has the same pronounciation as "gods' land", which in Chinese traditionally refer to the land of China. A pretty smart name from Jiang Zemin - the General secretory of CCP (read China
P.S. "gods" probably should be small capital because it's not the God as in christian religion.
Thank you for such a romantic picture of China. But actually, though never has reached the scale of 18th, 19th century Europe (who could? :), China did have her share of expansion, mainly during the Han and Tang dynasty. But it's basically accurately that the numerous Chinese dynasties usually directed inwards. Excessive warfare was scorn upon and the emperors were advised to focus on people's livelihood.
;)educated congressmen; yeah, and of course, the pentagon - I don't blam the last one because preparing for the imaginary enemy is their job.
The disturbing thing is that recently both countries seem to need an enemy and start to make their own strawman. The Chinese side is easy to understand (for me). The control of the government is weakening and so they need some kind of internal or external threat to legitmatize their power. And the Chinese people have had sensitive national pride since the end of the 19th century.
However, I can't fully understand the American side. If it's only the government, I can comprehend - afterall, you do need some reason to justify all those military spendings. But the perceived threat of China manifests in many differnt ways and is seen in many people, e.g. a new war game I saw in CompUSA featuring the war between USA and China in Kazastan; the numerous trash novels; almost one news item on slashdot everyweek - and the responses written by the readers; the religious hawks; the occasional speech of the (un?
It gives me the impression that many Americans just like war and they want an enemy. Or they want some excitement of warfare over the otherwise boring life. Of course, it's not me to judge the American culture. But the whole phenomenon scares me.
(Sarcastic mode on) Of course, a little bit of animosity is good for economy and science development. Afterall, WWII dragged the world out from the Great Depression according some economists. (off)
But if things went out of hand, a major war occurs between the USA and China could only mean diaster to both countries - if not the whole humanity.
I'm a Chinese and I'm living in the States for eight years... To say that China has been peaceful for thousand of years, of course, is silly. Come on, we're not wimps - cilvilization which is really that peaceful has been wiped out from the surface of the earth a long time ago.
However, please forgive the unsettled feelings of the people from other parts of the world when they look at the whole history of the United States... Ever since the beginning, the United States has been a (hopefully benign) power expanding her sphere of influence throughout the world by warfare and diplomacy. First, it's the settement on the native americans' land. The wars with the Canadian, Mexican during the nineteenth century. The expansion into the west. The two world wars - though you can argue that the United States was on the side of "Good". After that, the Korean war (operation?) - they even thought of nuking China at that time. Vietnam war and other numerous noble or not-so-noble acts during the Cold War. After the collapse of the Soviet, you got the Gulf War and then the bombing of Yugoslavia. Now the United States is the only super power in the world....
Of course, there are indeed reasons to believe that the United States has been behaving relatively more cilivized than most other powers. But come on?! Do you really believe that people in other countries can sleep comfortably on only this belief? Even in the States, it's never been argued that the military might of the nation should be used to defend the interest of the United States. The interest of the States doesn't necessarily agree with the interest of the world, not to mention other countries.
I'm not sure whether you'll follow yours own thread but I'll reply anyway :). I had some similar experience but I would blame that on my hardware. I got some 64M of crappy RAM - stupid me. On another machine, the system behaves much, much better. But as the others have said, try ctrl-alt-backspace, ctrl-alt-del or telnet onto your machine from another computer and kill X.