Some what apropos of your censure: The recent thinning of the field in presidential politics has caused me to change my sig. Because of your criticism, you're the first person who get's to see the change. The last one was too wordy, and lead to some misunderstandings. This one is (I hope) a better summary of my position.
Now, for some reason, I fear you won't agree with the sentiments prescribed therein. Ignoring that for a moment, I hope I was able to clean up the grammar a bit. The 120 character limit is a bit constricting.
"Anything that's not front-paged isn't available through the RSS feed."
I don't think this is correct. I just loaded the Science page.rss feed. Just click on the science section, and click "rss" link at the bottom of the Science page.
I don't know if viewing the "slashdot" rss feed and then the "slashdot - science" rss feed counts as 2 refreshes for the "banned from RSS" rule. At this point, I've only had an RSS reader for about 10 minutes. Still not banned from/.!
Thanks for the link. I don't suppose there'se a way to see that site in English? I don't know the Appleseed backstory, and I'd be interested to find out.
The trailer is exciting. A lot of stunning images.
What is this? That battle of the.sigs? One wacko, who thinks that there are things (like national defense) that are more important than party affiliation, is being called names by another wacko, who posts on Slashdot and yet claims he is living under an officially totalitarian government.
I doubt there's much of a point in responding to you, but you might be interested to know there's something besides swell-chested patriotism informing my hesitation toward voting Democrat. I only get one vote next November, and only two real choices. I'm not an automaton who is blindly going to vote for the Democrats (it would be fairly Totalitarian of them to expect that). The Democrats have to convince me their going to do something about defence before I consider their nominee a valid choice. And the Clintonian policing doesn't count as a valid defense (he was the one at the wheel when the terrorists organized their attack, remember?). The Democrats haven't been talking much about that recently, they've been talking about things like "corporate welfare" and "National Guard duty" and crap that I find a lot less important. I'm going to keep asking for a good defense until I hear of it, and if I don't, I'm taking my vote to Bush.
I don't like a lot of things that Bush has done. But, he's not responsible in any significant way for the terrorist attacks--that's your tinfoil hat talking. And, weeding out the corruption in the House of Saud is tricky business. I can understand how that would take longer than 3 years to do. I'm not terribly happy about the slow progress, but I'm not sure it can be done any faster than it's been going.
I agree with you that having a simulator that "allows them to get the feel for social environments" can only be a good thing. But it seems that this is an expensive way to go about it. Why model the whole Earth? It seems that all you really need are good models for how people act ("all you need", nice understatement), and an accurate geography of big cities that the U.S. army might be involved in the near future. The important things from the army planning point of view are: people & crowds in hostile environments, and urban geography.
That being said, you need to model are Tehran, Damascus, etc. and the type of people who live there. You don't need a model of the entire Earth. You don't need to know how the Scots are going to react to U.S. invasion. Because there are a lot of places that U.S. military is never going to be involved in the forseeable future.
"The whole Earth" idea is probably either a spin that the BBC used in order to make the news exciting, or something that the There wanted to put forward to advertise it's cool software. Come to think of it--definitely advertising on There's part. They'd be fools not to advertise the project this way. It's not technically false, they just won't ever get funding to do the whole Earth.
I doubt this model will ever get more detailed than two-dozen cities. That's plenty hard enough.
From what I heard, the lead architect of the Norway project was assigned to Africa for this version of Earth. His fjord-garnished vision should give that continent a nice baroque feel.
Although geologists will have some trouble explaining fjords without glaciers...
I would have voted for the old Joe Lieberman, but although I'm from Ohio, I doubt you'll get me to vote for Kucinich. I've never agreed with Kucinich's stance on Iraq. I'll be happy when the soldiers return, but they need to be there long enough to secure the election and provide security until the Iraqi police force and army are trained enough to provide security to Iraq.
Sorry, but I don't think you're going to convince me that he's a good choice:-). I never looked seriously at his policy, so thanks for the link. But I don't agree with his statement on Iraq and after reading his10 points for bringing back the troops from Iraq, I don't agree with any of them (I would agree with 7 and 8, but since the rest don't apply, they won't happen either). He trusts the U.N. a lot more than I do.
Thanks for the suggestion, tho. I figure the Democratic candidate will eventually start discussing the general war on terror (not just Iraq/WMD, but the whole strategy), and when they do, I'll be able to judge (and change my sig.).
Interestingly enough, I remember reading in Project Orion that one of the engineers involved in the propulsion system was previously involved in building bigger and bigger bombs in the nuclear arms race. With every significant advance he would take out a compass and draw a circle around the various cities in Russia, trying to see if the blast radius would cover the entire city.
He said the impetus to make such bombs was to make them so horrifying they would never be used.
Later in life, he traveled to Moscow and stood in St. Peter's Square, looking at all the people he had targetted in his twenties. What a grim thing to have to live with.
Thanks for what you did in Iraq or Afganistan (I can't tell if you were involved in both or just one).
Freeing the Iraqis from their dictator was one of the best things America has ever done, equal in importance to stopping the Holocaust. I don't know why all American's are not proud of this fact. I am and I don't particularly deserve to be. I know you are, and you should be.
Also, the accuracy of those weapons systems was one of the main reasons we had the political will to go through with the war. For the first time in history, there were no massacres of civilians. Mistakes, yes, but compared to the evil you fought, the mistakes were small. It's an awful calculus to have to make, but it's the truth.
I read somewhere that, in the event of war, all China would have to do to knock out our GPS system, would be to launch payloads of gravel into orbit to take out all the satellites.
It might be ovely simplistic (earth orbit is so sparsely populated that a thousand-fold increase in debris may have no noticable effect). But it has a frightening elegance.
Makes me worried about the time when we are truly dependant on satellite systems. Then those fragile satellites will be a great target for terrorists.
It seems like both of these difficulties (unpredictibility and constant power) could be overcome. The manufacturing process would have involve a training stage, where the neurons would be put through a series of routines until the connections between the neurons were at the correct strength. As for the power interruption, enough backup power supplies and advanced warnings would make this an unlikely event. As long as the chance of power-loss was less than the chance of hard-drive failure, it will be a sellable product.
These are not small problems, but considering how much different neurons are than transistors (G4from128K has an excellent post here in which he goes into a lot more detail than I could attempt) there will be a lot of incentive to solve those problems.
I would be amazed if we could interface manufactured neurons with the brain any time soon. It doesn't seem such a stretch to create an interface with an artificial limb, but getting chips to work with the brain is a seemingly insurmountable challenge.
But, that challenge will keep people employeed in research for years to come....
Having a balloon full of air in your car would require planning for drunk driving, or someone else's help (to fill a balloon with alchohol-free breath), neither of which seem very likely.
But, along the same lines, what about using one of those cans of compressed air that are sold to clean youur computer?
That makes sense. I haven't bothered to learn the system, but I can see how it is useful if you would rather not waste time reading someone whose ideas you find to be mostly noise. The names for each state are odd, but that's not your choice.
As the US presidential race drags into gear, the amount of political chatter on this site is increasing. I wondered about those poor souls who just want to read about technology and don't want to hear all the bickering. I guess careful use of the Friend/Foe system could help tune in the actual on-topic discussions. (On the sig. - I could explain myself, but you expressly don't want to hear it, so I won't.)
On the other hand, I have gone off on people a few times in the past, but I can't find much record of it since my page only shows the last 20+ posts. I could have actively offended you at some point.
Having a comment next to each user would be a helpful addition.
Anyways, sorry to take up your time. The terms "foe/freak" amused me and your post was the first time I noticed it.
I just noticed a brown dot next to your name which introduced me to the concept of "freaks" on Slashdot. It turns out I have a few. The thing is, I can't remember ever talking to you about anything. If you care to respond, I'd be interested to know why you consider me a "foe".
Regardless, have a nice day. I can't see any reason to object to your choice.
On topic: There are definitely parts of the Gnome/KDE GUIs that I would like to use on Windows. I really wish Windows would emulate the multiple-desktop environment that comes standard in Linux GUIs.
I have explained my convictions to you. Now you ask me to defend a lot of accusations, many of which are again based on misinformation, intentional or not. I will do my best, but from the sound of it you have a lot of problems with the U.S.. I cannot hope to cover every aspect of U.S. policy; I cannot hope to defend all of it. One problem with the U.S. is that you only get to choose between two people in a Presidential race. Neither choice is going to be perfect. I disagree with Bush and the Republicans on a lot of things. Not much that you bring up in your current post, though.
I don't know much about the Iran-Contra affair. I don't see anything to disagree with in your criticism of that time, but I'm not one to judge. It's actually because of this that I had to admit you might be saying some things that are true. I just don't know enough about it.
But, I have been looking at the Saddam/Iraq issue for some time, because my vote hinges on it.
The U.N. is impotent. There are at least three events in recent history that give evidence to this fact. 1) The U.N.'s inability to stop the genocide in Rawanda 2) The newly discovered Libya-Iran-North Korea-Malaysia-Pakistan (more to come) trade in supposedly banned nuclear technology 3) The U.N.'s inability to agree to overthrow Saddam despite his being in express violation of the peace treaty he signed at the end of the first gulf war. The member nations of the U.N. that are in themselves impotent, do their best to enforce their powerlessness on their more-powerful allies. This was probably a good thing during the Cold War, as we're not all dead now. But now, because the terrorists continue to operate, I am of the belief that inaction is more dangerous than action, and so the U.N. is a hinderance.
Bush did not lie about the weapons of mass distruction in Iraq. He was misinformed, as were the leaders of Europe, as was Clinton before him. Bush made a mistake, but it was a justified mistake. Saddam had WMD before, and he used them, he said he had them still, and he refused to live up to the terms of his surrender (a surrender demanded by the U.N.). There was evidence that his threat was not a bluff, even if the evidence turns out to have been incomplete, and probably pointed to the wrong conclusion, the evidence was still there. That's a mistake, not a lie.
A mistake is bad, but I'd rather have a mistake that ended up doing as much good as it did than be overly cautious and wake up to the news that 340 people died in a gas attack on the New York Subway, or that there's a glassy crater where Atlanta used to be. It's a tough choice, but no one can be expected to have perfect knowledge of all the options, and we're on a tight schedule. The terrorists aren't sleeping.
Your last paragraphs are somewhat disjointed. It's not really a Clinton/Monica thing, because the president wasn't caught lying. There is a similarity in that the president is a very devisive figure and the discussion of guilt/innocence seems to fracture along party lines. It was not a sideshow. Bush tried for months to act through the U.N. through diplomatic means. Only after the U.N. (through the agency of the French) declared it would not act did he resort to force. Saddam was a threat to all countries through his support of terrorists (not al Qaeda particularly). This was public knowledge, including his rewards to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers. Not very many people are surprised that it was a real war and is a difficult occupation. The bigger surprise was that Saddam's army collapsed so quickly. At no time did Bush or any of his cabinet say that this would be anything less than a long and difficult struggle. You cannot find a reputable news source that quotes them as saying otherwise. The rise in opium trading in Afganistan is bad. I have not heard much good news from that country. Recently I read a status report by a U.S. official in that country, and it sounded better than the news I had heard. I don't know if he was just protecting his job,
It's a legitimate fear, but I think the elements in the US that are for business and for keeping our edge technologically will keep the US for banning stem-cell research. There's no way to avoid the fact that stem cells are an enourmous part of the future of medicine.
An example of this is Bush's partial ban on stem cell research. Being fairly religious, he probably wanted to ban it completely, but he just couldn't do it. He had to leave a loop-hole. Bush seems to be at the upper limit of the presidents-with-religious-convictions range. Every few years there will be pressure to open the doors to more research.
It might be true that, when you are older, you want to go to South Korea to get transplants because South Korean hospitals are better at it, but that's just going to be the result of having good competitors. I doubt the US is going to fall completely out of the race.
That was supposed to read "the fight against terror is greater than party affiliation", with a greater-than symbol. I didn't think to preview it. I should have realized that a greater-than symbol is a special character that should be tested to make sure it works right.
My signature is more a condemnation of the Democrats than an endorsement of Bush or the Republicans.
My main worry with the coming election is that most of the Democratic candidates (except for Lieberman, but he's out now) have been saying that Bush's stance of aggressive, unilateral actions against terrorist threats is bad and should be repudiated.
I believe that there is a significant threat from terrorists today, and that threat will continue for some time. At some point, the terrorists will be disorganized and disbanded, and the law of diminishing returns will dictate that further aggressive actions against them will be unprofitable. Until that time, a strong policy, including the threat of decisive military action on our part, is necessary to defeat terrorists.
The U.N. is designed to prevent war, which was good in the case of a war between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., but has proved a hinderance in bringing force to bear on world-threatening dictators like Saddam. So, in order to be aggressive, the U.S. is forced to act without the U.N., in a manner that some have termed unilateral. As September 11th showed, working with the U.N. is not a protection from terrorists.
A lot of your accusations about the Republicans are based on ignorance, lies, or misinformation--Republicans aren't the root of all evil, but there are grains of truth in some of what you said about them and they have made serious mistakes. It doesn't matter, though. There are lots of things that Bush does wrong, but he is saved by one thing: he knows that his fight is just, and he knows that it is necessary. None of the Democratic candidates believe both of those two premises, and until they do, I will not consider voting for them. It would be possible to have a Democratic candidate that would get my vote, the old (pre-Al Gore) Joe Lieberman probably would have gotten it. All a candidate has to do is say "Bush has done the right thing against terrorists so far, but he hasn't done enough. I'll do better." It's that easy to get my consideration.
What scares me is that, in all the general Bush-bashing that goes on, people forget that there are terrorists who are trying to kill us. The central argument of this presidential debate should not be whether or not there were WMDs in Iraq. Sure, the existence of WMDs is important, but it's not of prime importance. The central argument should be how best to pursue and crush the terrorist organizations.
It probably depends on the scope of their deliberations. It looks like they are just working out strategies and plans to get to the Moon--they aren't questioning the general "US in Space" position. I don't think comments about changing the budget to concentrate more on public services will be given much attention. On the other hand, comments suggesting that we use the money to foster private enterprise rather than NASA (or comments to the reverse) will be considered. So, it's a more general topic than just a technical discussion on what rocket design would get us to the moon cheapest/fastest/safest.
Slashdot Mirror
Some what apropos of your censure: The recent thinning of the field in presidential politics has caused me to change my sig. Because of your criticism, you're the first person who get's to see the change. The last one was too wordy, and lead to some misunderstandings. This one is (I hope) a better summary of my position.
Now, for some reason, I fear you won't agree with the sentiments prescribed therein. Ignoring that for a moment, I hope I was able to clean up the grammar a bit. The 120 character limit is a bit constricting.
"Anything that's not front-paged isn't available through the RSS feed."
.rss feed. Just click on the science section, and click "rss" link at the bottom of the Science page.
/.!
I don't think this is correct. I just loaded the Science page
I don't know if viewing the "slashdot" rss feed and then the "slashdot - science" rss feed counts as 2 refreshes for the "banned from RSS" rule. At this point, I've only had an RSS reader for about 10 minutes. Still not banned from
Thanks for the link. I don't suppose there'se a way to see that site in English? I don't know the Appleseed backstory, and I'd be interested to find out.
The trailer is exciting. A lot of stunning images.
Thanks for the link. I didn't understand the magnitude of complexity necessary to get the satellite's path and comet's orbit to match up.
Let's hope that, after all that delicate manuvering, the rendevous works as planned.
It's interesting that the comet's orbit doesn't extend past Jupiter. That's not what I learned about comets growing up.
What is this? That battle of the .sigs? One wacko, who thinks that there are things (like national defense) that are more important than party affiliation, is being called names by another wacko, who posts on Slashdot and yet claims he is living under an officially totalitarian government.
I doubt there's much of a point in responding to you, but you might be interested to know there's something besides swell-chested patriotism informing my hesitation toward voting Democrat. I only get one vote next November, and only two real choices. I'm not an automaton who is blindly going to vote for the Democrats (it would be fairly Totalitarian of them to expect that). The Democrats have to convince me their going to do something about defence before I consider their nominee a valid choice. And the Clintonian policing doesn't count as a valid defense (he was the one at the wheel when the terrorists organized their attack, remember?). The Democrats haven't been talking much about that recently, they've been talking about things like "corporate welfare" and "National Guard duty" and crap that I find a lot less important. I'm going to keep asking for a good defense until I hear of it, and if I don't, I'm taking my vote to Bush.
I don't like a lot of things that Bush has done. But, he's not responsible in any significant way for the terrorist attacks--that's your tinfoil hat talking. And, weeding out the corruption in the House of Saud is tricky business. I can understand how that would take longer than 3 years to do. I'm not terribly happy about the slow progress, but I'm not sure it can be done any faster than it's been going.
The forces keeping [the moon] in balance with the earth are probably enough to absorb a little asteroid collision easily.
;)
There is a large body of evidence to prove your hypothesis correct.
cf. "Craters"
I agree with you that having a simulator that "allows them to get the feel for social environments" can only be a good thing. But it seems that this is an expensive way to go about it. Why model the whole Earth? It seems that all you really need are good models for how people act ("all you need", nice understatement), and an accurate geography of big cities that the U.S. army might be involved in the near future. The important things from the army planning point of view are: people & crowds in hostile environments, and urban geography.
That being said, you need to model are Tehran, Damascus, etc. and the type of people who live there. You don't need a model of the entire Earth. You don't need to know how the Scots are going to react to U.S. invasion. Because there are a lot of places that U.S. military is never going to be involved in the forseeable future.
"The whole Earth" idea is probably either a spin that the BBC used in order to make the news exciting, or something that the There wanted to put forward to advertise it's cool software. Come to think of it--definitely advertising on There's part. They'd be fools not to advertise the project this way. It's not technically false, they just won't ever get funding to do the whole Earth.
I doubt this model will ever get more detailed than two-dozen cities. That's plenty hard enough.
From what I heard, the lead architect of the Norway project was assigned to Africa for this version of Earth. His fjord-garnished vision should give that continent a nice baroque feel.
Although geologists will have some trouble explaining fjords without glaciers...
I would have voted for the old Joe Lieberman, but although I'm from Ohio, I doubt you'll get me to vote for Kucinich. I've never agreed with Kucinich's stance on Iraq. I'll be happy when the soldiers return, but they need to be there long enough to secure the election and provide security until the Iraqi police force and army are trained enough to provide security to Iraq.
:-). I never looked seriously at his policy, so thanks for the link. But I don't agree with his statement on Iraq and after reading his10 points for bringing back the troops from Iraq, I don't agree with any of them (I would agree with 7 and 8, but since the rest don't apply, they won't happen either). He trusts the U.N. a lot more than I do.
Sorry, but I don't think you're going to convince me that he's a good choice
Thanks for the suggestion, tho. I figure the Democratic candidate will eventually start discussing the general war on terror (not just Iraq/WMD, but the whole strategy), and when they do, I'll be able to judge (and change my sig.).
Interestingly enough, I remember reading in Project Orion that one of the engineers involved in the propulsion system was previously involved in building bigger and bigger bombs in the nuclear arms race. With every significant advance he would take out a compass and draw a circle around the various cities in Russia, trying to see if the blast radius would cover the entire city.
He said the impetus to make such bombs was to make them so horrifying they would never be used.
Later in life, he traveled to Moscow and stood in St. Peter's Square, looking at all the people he had targetted in his twenties. What a grim thing to have to live with.
Thanks for what you did in Iraq or Afganistan (I can't tell if you were involved in both or just one).
Freeing the Iraqis from their dictator was one of the best things America has ever done, equal in importance to stopping the Holocaust. I don't know why all American's are not proud of this fact. I am and I don't particularly deserve to be. I know you are, and you should be.
Also, the accuracy of those weapons systems was one of the main reasons we had the political will to go through with the war. For the first time in history, there were no massacres of civilians. Mistakes, yes, but compared to the evil you fought, the mistakes were small. It's an awful calculus to have to make, but it's the truth.
I read somewhere that, in the event of war, all China would have to do to knock out our GPS system, would be to launch payloads of gravel into orbit to take out all the satellites.
It might be ovely simplistic (earth orbit is so sparsely populated that a thousand-fold increase in debris may have no noticable effect). But it has a frightening elegance.
Makes me worried about the time when we are truly dependant on satellite systems. Then those fragile satellites will be a great target for terrorists.
"Tell me which view is better: choice 1 or choice 2?"
"Um..."
It seems like both of these difficulties (unpredictibility and constant power) could be overcome. The manufacturing process would have involve a training stage, where the neurons would be put through a series of routines until the connections between the neurons were at the correct strength. As for the power interruption, enough backup power supplies and advanced warnings would make this an unlikely event. As long as the chance of power-loss was less than the chance of hard-drive failure, it will be a sellable product.
These are not small problems, but considering how much different neurons are than transistors (G4from128K has an excellent post here in which he goes into a lot more detail than I could attempt) there will be a lot of incentive to solve those problems.
I would be amazed if we could interface manufactured neurons with the brain any time soon. It doesn't seem such a stretch to create an interface with an artificial limb, but getting chips to work with the brain is a seemingly insurmountable challenge.
But, that challenge will keep people employeed in research for years to come....
Wouldn't a balloon full of air serve as a "hack"?
Having a balloon full of air in your car would require planning for drunk driving, or someone else's help (to fill a balloon with alchohol-free breath), neither of which seem very likely.
But, along the same lines, what about using one of those cans of compressed air that are sold to clean youur computer?
That makes sense. I haven't bothered to learn the system, but I can see how it is useful if you would rather not waste time reading someone whose ideas you find to be mostly noise. The names for each state are odd, but that's not your choice.
As the US presidential race drags into gear, the amount of political chatter on this site is increasing. I wondered about those poor souls who just want to read about technology and don't want to hear all the bickering. I guess careful use of the Friend/Foe system could help tune in the actual on-topic discussions. (On the sig. - I could explain myself, but you expressly don't want to hear it, so I won't.)
On the other hand, I have gone off on people a few times in the past, but I can't find much record of it since my page only shows the last 20+ posts. I could have actively offended you at some point.
Having a comment next to each user would be a helpful addition.
Anyways, sorry to take up your time. The terms "foe/freak" amused me and your post was the first time I noticed it.
I just noticed a brown dot next to your name which introduced me to the concept of "freaks" on Slashdot. It turns out I have a few. The thing is, I can't remember ever talking to you about anything. If you care to respond, I'd be interested to know why you consider me a "foe".
Regardless, have a nice day. I can't see any reason to object to your choice.
On topic: There are definitely parts of the Gnome/KDE GUIs that I would like to use on Windows. I really wish Windows would emulate the multiple-desktop environment that comes standard in Linux GUIs.
I have explained my convictions to you. Now you ask me to defend a lot of accusations, many of which are again based on misinformation, intentional or not. I will do my best, but from the sound of it you have a lot of problems with the U.S.. I cannot hope to cover every aspect of U.S. policy; I cannot hope to defend all of it. One problem with the U.S. is that you only get to choose between two people in a Presidential race. Neither choice is going to be perfect. I disagree with Bush and the Republicans on a lot of things. Not much that you bring up in your current post, though.
I don't know much about the Iran-Contra affair. I don't see anything to disagree with in your criticism of that time, but I'm not one to judge. It's actually because of this that I had to admit you might be saying some things that are true. I just don't know enough about it.
But, I have been looking at the Saddam/Iraq issue for some time, because my vote hinges on it.
The U.N. is impotent. There are at least three events in recent history that give evidence to this fact. 1) The U.N.'s inability to stop the genocide in Rawanda 2) The newly discovered Libya-Iran-North Korea-Malaysia-Pakistan (more to come) trade in supposedly banned nuclear technology 3) The U.N.'s inability to agree to overthrow Saddam despite his being in express violation of the peace treaty he signed at the end of the first gulf war. The member nations of the U.N. that are in themselves impotent, do their best to enforce their powerlessness on their more-powerful allies. This was probably a good thing during the Cold War, as we're not all dead now. But now, because the terrorists continue to operate, I am of the belief that inaction is more dangerous than action, and so the U.N. is a hinderance.
Bush did not lie about the weapons of mass distruction in Iraq. He was misinformed, as were the leaders of Europe, as was Clinton before him. Bush made a mistake, but it was a justified mistake. Saddam had WMD before, and he used them, he said he had them still, and he refused to live up to the terms of his surrender (a surrender demanded by the U.N.). There was evidence that his threat was not a bluff, even if the evidence turns out to have been incomplete, and probably pointed to the wrong conclusion, the evidence was still there. That's a mistake, not a lie.
A mistake is bad, but I'd rather have a mistake that ended up doing as much good as it did than be overly cautious and wake up to the news that 340 people died in a gas attack on the New York Subway, or that there's a glassy crater where Atlanta used to be. It's a tough choice, but no one can be expected to have perfect knowledge of all the options, and we're on a tight schedule. The terrorists aren't sleeping.
Your last paragraphs are somewhat disjointed.
It's not really a Clinton/Monica thing, because the president wasn't caught lying. There is a similarity in that the president is a very devisive figure and the discussion of guilt/innocence seems to fracture along party lines.
It was not a sideshow. Bush tried for months to act through the U.N. through diplomatic means. Only after the U.N. (through the agency of the French) declared it would not act did he resort to force.
Saddam was a threat to all countries through his support of terrorists (not al Qaeda particularly). This was public knowledge, including his rewards to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.
Not very many people are surprised that it was a real war and is a difficult occupation. The bigger surprise was that Saddam's army collapsed so quickly. At no time did Bush or any of his cabinet say that this would be anything less than a long and difficult struggle. You cannot find a reputable news source that quotes them as saying otherwise.
The rise in opium trading in Afganistan is bad. I have not heard much good news from that country. Recently I read a status report by a U.S. official in that country, and it sounded better than the news I had heard. I don't know if he was just protecting his job,
It's a legitimate fear, but I think the elements in the US that are for business and for keeping our edge technologically will keep the US for banning stem-cell research. There's no way to avoid the fact that stem cells are an enourmous part of the future of medicine.
An example of this is Bush's partial ban on stem cell research. Being fairly religious, he probably wanted to ban it completely, but he just couldn't do it. He had to leave a loop-hole. Bush seems to be at the upper limit of the presidents-with-religious-convictions range. Every few years there will be pressure to open the doors to more research.
It might be true that, when you are older, you want to go to South Korea to get transplants because South Korean hospitals are better at it, but that's just going to be the result of having good competitors. I doubt the US is going to fall completely out of the race.
Can't say for sure, tho.
That was supposed to read "the fight against terror is greater than party affiliation", with a greater-than symbol. I didn't think to preview it. I should have realized that a greater-than symbol is a special character that should be tested to make sure it works right.
My signature is more a condemnation of the Democrats than an endorsement of Bush or the Republicans.
My main worry with the coming election is that most of the Democratic candidates (except for Lieberman, but he's out now) have been saying that Bush's stance of aggressive, unilateral actions against terrorist threats is bad and should be repudiated.
I believe that there is a significant threat from terrorists today, and that threat will continue for some time. At some point, the terrorists will be disorganized and disbanded, and the law of diminishing returns will dictate that further aggressive actions against them will be unprofitable. Until that time, a strong policy, including the threat of decisive military action on our part, is necessary to defeat terrorists.
The U.N. is designed to prevent war, which was good in the case of a war between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., but has proved a hinderance in bringing force to bear on world-threatening dictators like Saddam. So, in order to be aggressive, the U.S. is forced to act without the U.N., in a manner that some have termed unilateral. As September 11th showed, working with the U.N. is not a protection from terrorists.
A lot of your accusations about the Republicans are based on ignorance, lies, or misinformation--Republicans aren't the root of all evil, but there are grains of truth in some of what you said about them and they have made serious mistakes. It doesn't matter, though. There are lots of things that Bush does wrong, but he is saved by one thing: he knows that his fight is just, and he knows that it is necessary. None of the Democratic candidates believe both of those two premises, and until they do, I will not consider voting for them. It would be possible to have a Democratic candidate that would get my vote, the old (pre-Al Gore) Joe Lieberman probably would have gotten it. All a candidate has to do is say "Bush has done the right thing against terrorists so far, but he hasn't done enough. I'll do better." It's that easy to get my consideration.
What scares me is that, in all the general Bush-bashing that goes on, people forget that there are terrorists who are trying to kill us. The central argument of this presidential debate should not be whether or not there were WMDs in Iraq. Sure, the existence of WMDs is important, but it's not of prime importance. The central argument should be how best to pursue and crush the terrorist organizations.
Please ignore. This is just a test of some issues I'm having posting to /. with Firefox.
This post is just a test of something to do with posting to /. and using Firefox.
It probably depends on the scope of their deliberations. It looks like they are just working out strategies and plans to get to the Moon--they aren't questioning the general "US in Space" position. I don't think comments about changing the budget to concentrate more on public services will be given much attention. On the other hand, comments suggesting that we use the money to foster private enterprise rather than NASA (or comments to the reverse) will be considered. So, it's a more general topic than just a technical discussion on what rocket design would get us to the moon cheapest/fastest/safest.
Listening to the public is the essence of democracy. They didn't say they would blindly follow the suggestions, just listen.
The best thing you can hope for in a government is a smart guy who will listen to advice and then make his own decision.
(I thought this was posted once already, but now I can't see it in the thread. Sorry if this is a dupe.)