I'm right with you. A friend lost her son in Iraq. I may not know what it's like there but I've seen the effects here.
The world is messed up and most people care more about themselves than others. Rampant materialism has led to the belief that we 'choose our own meaning' when that really leads to no meaning whatsoever.
As much as people wish there was some "higher nobility to humanity capable of dealing with the troubles of the world if we only set our minds to it, etc."--- the sad reality is that there just isn't. When I came back from Afghanistan, people were interested in what I saw, but only in the most general way. Very few wanted to hear about the horrible things I saw, like interpreters I worked with having their families attacked, or being killed themselves for cooperating with us. Those that claimed to be interested in that stuff pretty much just used it as a springboard to launch into abstract political rants (both lefties and righties!). I've come to realize that not being able to easily take on the suffering of other "third hand" like that is actually a human survival trait. People can only barely handle the tragedies in their own lives, much less bear the burden of every tragedy the damned news media pushes in their face. I say let them have their lives of quiet desperation if they choose.
I know what you mean. Here I am stationed in Iraq, I've got people going out every day who are possibly going to get really killed. We find explosives, get shot at, you name it. It's all VERY real. But there are enough people who are so totally insulated from this sort of thing that the EVE Online game is vastly more important to them.
On the other hand, this should spur someone from Darfur to post about the genocide there. Or one of the congo nations where life is so horrible.
I slogged through two tours in Afghanistan. It was five years ago, and I still don't really like to see news much. After 8 years of Army service deployed four times to such wonderful places (e.g. Bosnia), I feel like I've used up my capacity for dealing with brutal realities. I think it's good that some people have their silly little games to occupy them. Most people can't handle the shit you and I have had to see.
This has already been torn down by order of local authorities as of Jan 30th. They didn't even care that it was built with the help of orphans
The issue was that it was erected on the grounds of a state-run orphanage. Officials determined that overt political statements ought not be on government property.
And you wonder why conservatives don't like Ayers?
I hadn't before, but I am wondering now.. what is it about small schools, social justice, equity and community that conservatives dislike?
Nothing per se, but they object to the politics of the kind of person who would say that. Those are the classic pillars of the 60's progressive, who wants to tax the holy fuck out of the rich and give it back to the exploited masses. It's communism lite. You still find it in academia quite a bit.
...after the following sentence in the first paragraph:
[...] our vision of small schools was closely connected with issues of social justice, equity, and community.
And you wonder why conservatives don't like Ayers?
Nobody who's sensible about education likes that kind of shit. Social justice, equity, and community are entirely peripheral to the process of education.... unless you're trying to "educate" kids to be little pinko commie idealists with a flawed view of reality.
We're talking about natural language communication here, not a programming language. Words and phrases have meaning that are not necessarily the sum of their individual parts, there is context involved that guides the necessary interpretation of both sides.
This is only true if you're talking about conversational language. Your rant fails to recognize the difference between a Presidential speech and a conversation on the subway. In an on the fly conversation it's not unreasonable to allow room for context and interpretation. Political speeches, however, are written beforehand and proofread extensively. The wording of phrases is agonized over. You really think that a phrase such as "we can close down Gitmo" was written by a Washington speechwriter with the intent to say "we will close down Gitmo"? Absolutely fucking NOT. Political speeches are written that way intentionally. They're designed to convey an intent, but not make any concrete promises.
Not with the degree of accuracy necessary to actually differentiate deception, excitement, stress, mental effort, concentration, hesitation, anger, love and lust. At most, they really gauge "more emotional" and "less emotional", and the claim that it can be directly correlated with what's being spoken at the time is specious.
Just to clarify: these are so-called
"voice stress analyzers", not polygraphs.
The latter are capable of producing enough data that a trained person can catch many lies
Even the accuracy of polygraphs is highly questionable. The false positive rate is too high to genuinely say they "catch" anyone under any reasonable definition. I'd have a pretty good chance of catching the 10 liars in a group of 50 if I just selected all the people who looked uncomfortable during questioning. That wouldn't make my method valid. Polygraphy only works by scaring people into telling the truth. It's nothing more than theater.
That decision against thermal-imaging cameras is quite silly, wouldn't that mean cops would need a warrant to look through your window?
No. It's based on "expectation of privacy". If you do something in front of a window that's open to the street, there's no real expectation of privacy. If you do something in your windowless bathroom, the expectation is that it won't be seen. If the cops look into your closed up garage, whether they use IR/thermographic imaging, X-rays, sonographic imaging, or a code scanner that opens your garage door, if they do so without a warrant, that crosses the line. Of course if they can convincingly say they thought it was allowed and it was "an honest mistake" when they violated your 4th Amd rights, the supreme court says that's OK.
If by "threw up their hands" you mean "publicly funded and built a massive underground public transit system" and "pushed the adoption of automobiles by adopting increasingly auto-centric laws", then yes, they "threw up their hands".
If you actually knew your history rather than assuming that things then were as things now, you'd know that the public transit system in New York was not built by the government, but by private enterprise looking to make a buck. The move to put it underground was funded by city bonds, but it the elevated train system was already there. Furthermore, "auto-centric" laws came as result of the mass adoption of automobiles by the public at large, not the other way around.
They managed to put a dude on the moon in 8 years.
It was actually 24 years in the making. Kennedy's "we choose to go to the moon" stuff was more a recognition of the advancement of rocket science than a case of "hey, I've got an idea..."
But no I'm sure you're right there was no food crisis. That's why the UN didn't just have a FOOD CRISIS SUMMIT this summer.
There may be a food crisis, but it's not about not enough food being produced, but rather that the hungry do not have access to the surplus. Further, the UN summit was about the predicted food crisis due to global warming, so I'm not sure how that proves any point beyond "experts 100 years ago thought we'd be starving in the near future, and experts still think that today".
For 240 volt operation hot is taken to be one side of the center tap, and neutral the other side
FWIW, it's not called "neutral" when it's a hot second phase. "Neutral" is a term specifically reserved for the ground sink used to complete the path of a single-phase circuit.
The Sectera Edge has numerous security bugs logged against it. I can't understand how the NSA can deem it MORE secure than BB.
The BlackBerry doesn't even approach the level of security necessary for it to be tested for such bugs, much less have them minutely documented. The Sectera Edge may introduce potential vulnerabilities to SIPRNET, but the BlackBerry doesn't even meet them minimu hardware requirements to connect to SIPRNET. Your grasp of the situation is deeply flawed.
I know its not popular here, but if you RTFA and pay attention to other news sources, you'll find out that the NSA has modified Obama's Blackberry to the point that they are satisfied with it. Good enough for me.
Modified the software, that is (probably gave the S/MIME email client a mind-bogglingly big key and one time pad system, or the like). And they may have been "satisfied" with it in the sense that it's approved for the usual upper limit of SECRET, and thus limited probably to emailing his wife and kids. Thing is, no amount of software jiggery will make the device itself pass the TEMPEST and "self destruct on opening" requirements of a SIPRNET rated device like the Sectera GSM phones.
Since Obama is commander in chief of the military, shouldn't he get to say what he's going to use?
He could try, but it would be arguably overstepping his authority. LBJ used to pull crap like that. He ordered to Army and Air Force to change the design of their headgear to a baseball cap based design. Turns out a big Democratic party contributor in Texas owned a baseball cap factory that was having financial trouble. Stuff like that is why the federal government has regulations about how equipment is chosen and procured, rather than leaving it up to the whim of a single official.
Since Obama is commander in chief of the military shouldn't he be able to use the same technology (Blackberry) they use? If our national defense is entrusted to a product why would that not be good enough for the boss?
DoD doesn't use BlackBerry devices for critical C3I functions. In two years of human intelligence collection work in Afghanistan with the US Army, I never once saw a single blackberry in use outside of a few civilian employees. We had our own secure systems for doing our real work.
What I would commend Obama for is if he refused to use the Sectera because he felt it was an overpriced piece of equipment that provides no more inherent security than the Blackberry.
Why would you commend him for doing something based on false beliefs? Blackberry devices are rated for classified information up to SECRET via S/MIME implemented in software. Dealing with TOP SECRET information requires a purpose-built device that complies with a number of hardware security regs. An off the shelf BlackBerry doesn't meet these.
I stopped watching the West Wing after I came to the conclusion that they were never going to portray a Republican as anything other than the villain (except of course when the Republican was doing what the President wanted.)
And when he broke ranks and went with the pres, he was portrayed as a hero who'd lost his way until an epiphany returned him to "sanity". It was pretty disgusting. I stopped paying attention after the only interesting character played by a decent actor (Rob Lowe) left, but I was already pretty annoyed with the absurdity of it by then. Unfortunately, my wife continued to watch, so I was forced to endure such things as the "secret military shuttle" and other such jaw-dropping idiocy. Terrible show. Even my wife, a life-long "progressive", got sick of the candy-coated Hollywood lefty writing by the end.
I think it's probably priced in the "if you have to ask..." range.
General Dynamics isn't known for building with "economy" in mind. The Sectera line is a pretty hard core integrated secure communications system. It includes everything from data terminals to hardline phones to wireless.
No, they don't...but if they get a call from the new president saying "gosh, I'd love to use a Blackberry, giving you rocking publicity, if only it could be nice and secure..." I have a feeling they'll work closely with the secret service on getting it right,
It isn't that simple. The DoD uses the blackberry, but their security compliance regs require only software S/MIME compliance. Presidential-grade security has more stringent regs, doubtless specifying hardware requirements.
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I'm right with you. A friend lost her son in Iraq. I may not know what it's like there but I've seen the effects here. The world is messed up and most people care more about themselves than others. Rampant materialism has led to the belief that we 'choose our own meaning' when that really leads to no meaning whatsoever.
As much as people wish there was some "higher nobility to humanity capable of dealing with the troubles of the world if we only set our minds to it, etc."--- the sad reality is that there just isn't. When I came back from Afghanistan, people were interested in what I saw, but only in the most general way. Very few wanted to hear about the horrible things I saw, like interpreters I worked with having their families attacked, or being killed themselves for cooperating with us. Those that claimed to be interested in that stuff pretty much just used it as a springboard to launch into abstract political rants (both lefties and righties!). I've come to realize that not being able to easily take on the suffering of other "third hand" like that is actually a human survival trait. People can only barely handle the tragedies in their own lives, much less bear the burden of every tragedy the damned news media pushes in their face. I say let them have their lives of quiet desperation if they choose.
I know what you mean. Here I am stationed in Iraq, I've got people going out every day who are possibly going to get really killed. We find explosives, get shot at, you name it. It's all VERY real. But there are enough people who are so totally insulated from this sort of thing that the EVE Online game is vastly more important to them.
On the other hand, this should spur someone from Darfur to post about the genocide there. Or one of the congo nations where life is so horrible.
I slogged through two tours in Afghanistan. It was five years ago, and I still don't really like to see news much. After 8 years of Army service deployed four times to such wonderful places (e.g. Bosnia), I feel like I've used up my capacity for dealing with brutal realities. I think it's good that some people have their silly little games to occupy them. Most people can't handle the shit you and I have had to see.
RTFA. It was uploaded in september. The requests for takedown were in november.
This has already been torn down by order of local authorities as of Jan 30th. They didn't even care that it was built with the help of orphans
The issue was that it was erected on the grounds of a state-run orphanage. Officials determined that overt political statements ought not be on government property.
And you wonder why conservatives don't like Ayers?
I hadn't before, but I am wondering now.. what is it about small schools, social justice, equity and community that conservatives dislike?
Nothing per se, but they object to the politics of the kind of person who would say that. Those are the classic pillars of the 60's progressive, who wants to tax the holy fuck out of the rich and give it back to the exploited masses. It's communism lite. You still find it in academia quite a bit.
...after the following sentence in the first paragraph:
And you wonder why conservatives don't like Ayers?
Nobody who's sensible about education likes that kind of shit. Social justice, equity, and community are entirely peripheral to the process of education.... unless you're trying to "educate" kids to be little pinko commie idealists with a flawed view of reality.
We're talking about natural language communication here, not a programming language. Words and phrases have meaning that are not necessarily the sum of their individual parts, there is context involved that guides the necessary interpretation of both sides.
This is only true if you're talking about conversational language. Your rant fails to recognize the difference between a Presidential speech and a conversation on the subway. In an on the fly conversation it's not unreasonable to allow room for context and interpretation. Political speeches, however, are written beforehand and proofread extensively. The wording of phrases is agonized over. You really think that a phrase such as "we can close down Gitmo" was written by a Washington speechwriter with the intent to say "we will close down Gitmo"? Absolutely fucking NOT. Political speeches are written that way intentionally. They're designed to convey an intent, but not make any concrete promises.
Not with the degree of accuracy necessary to actually differentiate deception, excitement, stress, mental effort, concentration, hesitation, anger, love and lust. At most, they really gauge "more emotional" and "less emotional", and the claim that it can be directly correlated with what's being spoken at the time is specious.
Just to clarify: these are so-called "voice stress analyzers", not polygraphs. The latter are capable of producing enough data that a trained person can catch many lies
Even the accuracy of polygraphs is highly questionable. The false positive rate is too high to genuinely say they "catch" anyone under any reasonable definition. I'd have a pretty good chance of catching the 10 liars in a group of 50 if I just selected all the people who looked uncomfortable during questioning. That wouldn't make my method valid. Polygraphy only works by scaring people into telling the truth. It's nothing more than theater.
Personally: I wouldn't download a car.
I wouldn't either, but I think I might steal a policeman's helmet...
As others have noted, the DMCA safe harbor provisions create a legal situation that's essentially identical to common carrier status.
That decision against thermal-imaging cameras is quite silly, wouldn't that mean cops would need a warrant to look through your window?
No. It's based on "expectation of privacy". If you do something in front of a window that's open to the street, there's no real expectation of privacy. If you do something in your windowless bathroom, the expectation is that it won't be seen. If the cops look into your closed up garage, whether they use IR/thermographic imaging, X-rays, sonographic imaging, or a code scanner that opens your garage door, if they do so without a warrant, that crosses the line. Of course if they can convincingly say they thought it was allowed and it was "an honest mistake" when they violated your 4th Amd rights, the supreme court says that's OK.
If by "threw up their hands" you mean "publicly funded and built a massive underground public transit system" and "pushed the adoption of automobiles by adopting increasingly auto-centric laws", then yes, they "threw up their hands".
If you actually knew your history rather than assuming that things then were as things now, you'd know that the public transit system in New York was not built by the government, but by private enterprise looking to make a buck. The move to put it underground was funded by city bonds, but it the elevated train system was already there. Furthermore, "auto-centric" laws came as result of the mass adoption of automobiles by the public at large, not the other way around.
They managed to put a dude on the moon in 8 years.
It was actually 24 years in the making. Kennedy's "we choose to go to the moon" stuff was more a recognition of the advancement of rocket science than a case of "hey, I've got an idea..."
But no I'm sure you're right there was no food crisis. That's why the UN didn't just have a FOOD CRISIS SUMMIT this summer.
There may be a food crisis, but it's not about not enough food being produced, but rather that the hungry do not have access to the surplus. Further, the UN summit was about the predicted food crisis due to global warming, so I'm not sure how that proves any point beyond "experts 100 years ago thought we'd be starving in the near future, and experts still think that today".
For 240 volt operation hot is taken to be one side of the center tap, and neutral the other side
FWIW, it's not called "neutral" when it's a hot second phase. "Neutral" is a term specifically reserved for the ground sink used to complete the path of a single-phase circuit.
The Sectera Edge has numerous security bugs logged against it. I can't understand how the NSA can deem it MORE secure than BB.
The BlackBerry doesn't even approach the level of security necessary for it to be tested for such bugs, much less have them minutely documented. The Sectera Edge may introduce potential vulnerabilities to SIPRNET, but the BlackBerry doesn't even meet them minimu hardware requirements to connect to SIPRNET. Your grasp of the situation is deeply flawed.
I know its not popular here, but if you RTFA and pay attention to other news sources, you'll find out that the NSA has modified Obama's Blackberry to the point that they are satisfied with it. Good enough for me.
Modified the software, that is (probably gave the S/MIME email client a mind-bogglingly big key and one time pad system, or the like). And they may have been "satisfied" with it in the sense that it's approved for the usual upper limit of SECRET, and thus limited probably to emailing his wife and kids. Thing is, no amount of software jiggery will make the device itself pass the TEMPEST and "self destruct on opening" requirements of a SIPRNET rated device like the Sectera GSM phones.
KRUSTY: Sex Cauldron? I thought they shut that place down.
Since Obama is commander in chief of the military, shouldn't he get to say what he's going to use?
He could try, but it would be arguably overstepping his authority. LBJ used to pull crap like that. He ordered to Army and Air Force to change the design of their headgear to a baseball cap based design. Turns out a big Democratic party contributor in Texas owned a baseball cap factory that was having financial trouble. Stuff like that is why the federal government has regulations about how equipment is chosen and procured, rather than leaving it up to the whim of a single official.
Since Obama is commander in chief of the military shouldn't he be able to use the same technology (Blackberry) they use? If our national defense is entrusted to a product why would that not be good enough for the boss?
DoD doesn't use BlackBerry devices for critical C3I functions. In two years of human intelligence collection work in Afghanistan with the US Army, I never once saw a single blackberry in use outside of a few civilian employees. We had our own secure systems for doing our real work.
What I would commend Obama for is if he refused to use the Sectera because he felt it was an overpriced piece of equipment that provides no more inherent security than the Blackberry.
Why would you commend him for doing something based on false beliefs? Blackberry devices are rated for classified information up to SECRET via S/MIME implemented in software. Dealing with TOP SECRET information requires a purpose-built device that complies with a number of hardware security regs. An off the shelf BlackBerry doesn't meet these.
I stopped watching the West Wing after I came to the conclusion that they were never going to portray a Republican as anything other than the villain (except of course when the Republican was doing what the President wanted.)
And when he broke ranks and went with the pres, he was portrayed as a hero who'd lost his way until an epiphany returned him to "sanity". It was pretty disgusting. I stopped paying attention after the only interesting character played by a decent actor (Rob Lowe) left, but I was already pretty annoyed with the absurdity of it by then. Unfortunately, my wife continued to watch, so I was forced to endure such things as the "secret military shuttle" and other such jaw-dropping idiocy. Terrible show. Even my wife, a life-long "progressive", got sick of the candy-coated Hollywood lefty writing by the end.
Anybody know what the Sectera costs?
I think it's probably priced in the "if you have to ask..." range. General Dynamics isn't known for building with "economy" in mind. The Sectera line is a pretty hard core integrated secure communications system. It includes everything from data terminals to hardline phones to wireless.
The government doesn't control RIM
No, they don't...but if they get a call from the new president saying "gosh, I'd love to use a Blackberry, giving you rocking publicity, if only it could be nice and secure..." I have a feeling they'll work closely with the secret service on getting it right,
It isn't that simple. The DoD uses the blackberry, but their security compliance regs require only software S/MIME compliance. Presidential-grade security has more stringent regs, doubtless specifying hardware requirements.