How does that undermine anything I said? The fellow took a comment I made about artificial sugar and caffeine and started talking about calorie intake.
Diet soda has no calories. So he was basically just trolling. The various stereotypical anti american comments were fairly typical of his argument. And when I responded to his bullshit in detail he basically evaded because he isn't able to actually have a conversation. He just knows how to make some dumb insults to piss people off. Well, I am annoyed by him but not mad. I responded to him and he ran away like the intellectual coward and lackwit he always was... that is all.
Are you telling me that if I spent all day burning calories by working out and maintained eating what I currently eat while not excersing, I would not lose weight?
Not only would I lose weight but I'd need to eat a good deal more or I'd actually start to starve.
Laws of fucking thermodynamics call bullshit on this argument.
People that I find more informed on this issue are body builders. I don't know if you've talked to any of those people but they are a neutritional gold mine. Not because I think what they do to their bodies is healthy or desirable but because they have a better idea of what leads to what then either you or I. They have a whole culture and information pool sourced from the collective experimentation of their entire population.
Now, do body builders eat fewer carbs than the average person? No. They do very carefully monitor their intake of EVERYTHING. That includes protein, carbs, and various vitamins. They literally measure out their meals by the gram in precise amounts of everything. Go to a body builder nutrition store and look at those big jars of powdered everything.
From what I've gleaned from those guys, you have to balance all these things out to suit your ACTIVITY and your goals. If you want to build lots of muscle, they recommend lots of protein and they even say that consuming actual meat is better if your goal is to get bigger. So just big slabs of steak. But of course you need to exercise while you do that and your exercise needs to be focused on encouraging that muscle growth. So cardio for example is less useful in that situation then lots of weight training.
Now, as to your BBC study... I repeat... Egyptians and Romans... oh and the chinese and japanese with their rice.
How much rice do the Japanese eat? Isn't that a major part of their diet since always? And how fat are they? What fatty thing are the Japanese eating that is in your opinion making them thin?
See, the incurious nature of your position is something that bothers me. These statements are made without any attempt to connect them to anything else and it makes me suspicious that its just more medical bullshit.
Actually that was your argument. You blamed all hunger in the world and the obvious incompetence at the root of most of it on the US.
Now, you may not wish to maintain that argument, but then you're going to have to limit your argument to specific countries and specify what the US did to create famine in those societies.
Absent that, your position is so vague that you're effectively blaming us for everything and that is obvious not sustainable.
So. Limit and specify or concede.
Those are your options. Make a falsifiable argument like a rational educated human being or you will have not made a sustainable argument.
First you seem reasonable and intelligent. That's refreshing. Congratulations I am also reasonable and intelligent. Lets see if we can have a spirited discussion on this issue.:)
As to people eating fewer carbohydrates way back when... you do realize that the modern world was built by carbohydrates?
Staple crops.
Wheat, Rice, Maze, Potatoes, even Poi (Polynesians liked this stuff on their little island paradises... completely gross. Like eating paste.)... no major culture rose without a staple crop.
So your argument is that past generations didn't eat so many carbs? The Egyptians were huge fans of it. They drank a thick beer like drink as the energy drink of the ancient world. Full of carbs. Were the Egyptians fat?
What about the Romans? One of the big things the Romans offered anyone that lived in Rome was free flour. And they offered because Egypt's tribute to Rome was regular shipments of wheat. That wheat was then ground into flour in huge water powered flour mills in the heart of Rome. Water from the aqueducts was run through water wheels to turn mill stones to turn out huge amounts of flour. This flour was given to the people at no cost as a kind of ancient welfare. As you'd imagine , the Romans ate a LOT of wheat in any form you can think of because the flour was literally free to the common people.
Were the ancient Roman's fat? They'd have to have been because they were consuming a lot of simple carbs. No?
As to your reading... All of that just sounds like you've made up your mind. Can we have a discussion for the sake of argument? Is it possible for me to propose alternative theories and have them be listened to with an open mind?
You tell me. What sort of evidence would you like to see?
The biggest problem I have with modern statistics is that they conflate entirely different lifestyles and suggest that the only change was diet. This ignores changes in exercise etc.
As to heart disease etc... I question the accuracy of statistics going back in time. What is more the human body rapidly starts having all sorts of problems after the prime mating and reproductive phase in the life cycle. Pass the 30s or so and everything starts to have problems because evolution stops caring about you. You're just running on inertia at that point.
And to that point, there are some people that can eat cheeseburgers every day and smoke a pack of cigarettes and be very healthy into their 90s. This has been studied. And their DNA has been studied. What they found was that people that seem to be able to do this don't have any one special gene but rather they don't have a lot of genes which generally make us unhealthy. Most people have some of those genes but some people have none of them. Those with literally none of them can abuse their bodies horribly and suffer no consequences from it.
This is the 21st century... this is slashdot... Yes, I am suggesting the genetic engineering diet. Fuck GMO food, I want to GMO me.
As to your silly belief that the United States invented hunger or incompetence... no. There were wars, famines, plagues, and death long before the old US of A was but a sparkle in the American eye.
Does the US do things on occasion that might make a country less stable then it was already? Sure... comes with taking any role in anything. The Germans had a hard time feeding themselves for awhile after we bombed them into oblivion during the world wars.
With very few exceptions, our actions in such matters are not ones we feel any moral responsibility for...
The most recent issue with Iraq would be an exception to that. But even then, the people that live in these countries must take some responsibility for their own governance or how can they be credited with responsibility when things go well?
Take South Korea which the US had some hand in making the prosperous society it is today. Are the South Koreans responsible for any of their good fortune or is everything they have the responsibility of the US? They would I am sure protest the suggestion that their years of hard work bore no relevance to their current success.
Well dear one, that is a double edged sword is it not? If those that do well are responsible for their good fortune then those that do poorly are responsible as well.
And since we're actually talking about Africa more than anything else because that's where the really impressive famines are... what war or destabilizing action would you like to lay at our feet that caused their little problem? I'd love to hear the logic of it. And keep in mind, you're talking to someone that is logical. Too many people can't even form rational thoughts. Just a warning... try to actually try to think. Otherwise this will be boring for me. And we can't have that.
As to assuming facts, shut up. What food was like in the US in the 50s and 60s is a matter of record, you miserable little weasel. Open a cook book from the time. Do you own an American cook book from the 1950s? I do. Have you ever been to an American restaurant that hasn't changed its menu since the 1950s? I have. Do you have any American grand parents that can tell you in detail what the food was at the time? I do.
So kindly sit down, put this bib on, and enjoy this bucket of deep fried dicks. American food prior to the obesity issue was if anything a good deal heavier than it is today because the lighter food was a response to people getting self conscious about their weight. So they started cutting down on fat and sugar. Mostly fat.
What do you think Americans were eating 60 years ago? Wheatgerm? Try bacon, eggs, toast, big wedges of butter, cream... etc.
You guys are fun. So arrogant and so ignorant... all in the same package.
For thousands of years having a country full of well fed people was considered something to brag about.
Look at the world and you'll find lots of places where they're struggling to so much as feed themselves. And a fair number of the ones that can feed themselves only do so with food aid from countries like my own.
What is more, most of the countries that like to call the US fat, are statistically right behind us. The English and the Germans for example are right there with us.
So whatever. The obesity issue is largely caused by a lack of exercise. We used to move around more and we're more sedentary now.
And before you tell me it is the food, do you have any fucking idea how greasy food used to be in the 50s and 60s? And yet the obesity thing is happening now and not then. What changed? People moved around then. Played sports, went on walks... stuff. We're both sitting down on our asses having this conversation and that is something Americans didn't do way back when.
In any case... kindly restrict your comments to something topical instead of trying to pass off idiotic slights against other nations as somehow being a health issue.
Precisely... but seriously... if it were a problem... there would noticeable effects in the medical literature and population. From the sweetener there is nothing but supposition. From the caffeine... quite a bit of medical data.
... then where are the junkies going to get their fix?
I've been drinking diet soda since... always. A lot of it. And I'm hardly alone. If this stuff actually did anything... we'd have a fucking epidemic.
We don't... and as to the supposed addictive qualities of it... if it were addictive, I would know. Personally. The caffeine withdrawals are quite noticeable for me. I didn't have any soda for 24 hours the other day and I literally started getting splitting headaches... and I felt like I wanted to die.
I am one of those people that if I am out of soda at 2 AM... I will go to the store to buy more. Right then. So... I am quite literally addicted to caffeine.
I go cold turkey on it every so often. It takes about two weeks for the physical symptoms to cool off but then you get all sorts of behavioral issues. Low energy... apathy... depression. Yeah. Basically you just feel shitty and tired. I went three months without any caffeine not long ago and for the whole three months I felt shitty and tired. So I said "fuck this" and now I'm back on the caffeine.
So... that's a thing. If you want to talk about health concerns etc then lets talk about Caffeine. That stuff is probably worthy of some stiffer regulation.
But that won't happen because the fucking hipster fake as shit issues people never go after anything they personally enjoy. They're all in their coffee shops pretending to not be watching cat videos and writing little things about how soda is evil.
Well, the caffeine in soda is an issue. But so is the caffeine in coffee.
But the artificial sweetener? Go fuck yourself with a rake. I don't really care, there are several alternative sweeteners that they'll just use instead. Whatever. I really couldn't give a shit. There are some bullshit sweeteners that taste wrong but most of them are fine.
I'm more irritated than anything else... mostly because this is a bullshit issue.
Whatever, they're stupid. That's the point. And despite that they were cited as being the solution to everything for years. Years.
You say they're dumb on every level? Okay, but that's not what the media was saying about them.
Personally, I'm a fan of biofuels. They're carbon neutral. And not the stupid algae idea. You can biofuel from any combustible hydrocarbon. Basically you just cook whatever it is in an oxygen starved environment and it gives off fumes that are quite flammable. Those fumes can be cleaned and refined into several different fuel types. You get something like natural gas, you get something like tar, and you get varying quantities of everything in between including a gasoline analog.
And again, carbon neutral. You can make biofuels out of fucking garbage... grass clippings... saw dust... field dross of any kind. And the ash can be returned as an excellent non-toxic organic fertilizer.
Literally not at all. Every day I'm told about some new bit of wizbang tech that is going to solve all our problems and it never goes into production.
Remember hydrogen cars? They even built a hydrogen gas station near where I live. Cool right?... not really... basically no cars use it, the station is not economical, and I believe they may have only built one of these fucking things on the entire planet. So if you know where the only hydrogen fueling station is on planet earth, its not far from where I live.
So you're holding up the idea of running things through people in canada as a good thing but saying it is bad when US congressman try to do it in the US?
What is more, the constitution is quite clear that treaties are to be ratified by congress. As such, while the president may negotiate on behalf of the American people, the agreements are not binding unless ratified.
For example, Bill Clinton wanted to sign the Kyoto Treaty and Congress refused to ratify it. The result was that the agreement was not binding on the US government.
So your US civics are shotty.
As to you not saying anything about corruption, then we're having different conversations. You might as well start talking about rare insects or your favorite recipe for cookies.
Okay, so it sounds like you're saying running things through more than one person is a bad idea and we should just have the power concentrated in as few hands as possible.
Why have a senate or a congress than? Just have an elected dictator.
As to shutting down the government, congress has a right to make laws and set the budget. If they feel their laws are being ignored or their budgets are being ignored they have an obligation to try and get their power respected.
For someone that has such a high regard for the rights of the executive to make foreign policy, you don't seem to respect the legislature's right to make law or fiscal policy. Why is that?
Anyway, it sounds like this is going no where and you're getting erratic. So... please either make more sense or I'll bid you good day.
... and his team laughed at the existing tech infrastructure? Maybe the previous administration got hacked as well or maybe the Russians weren't trying as hard then... but I find it ironic that these people that came in saying they were superior at everything keep proving themselves to be incompetent.
Fuck the politics. Just remember back to when they were dissing the old email server/old it department and look at how much better the new people ran things... aka worse apparently. That's just funny.
On purely nerd principles you have to have a bit of a laugh at the administration's expense. So much hubris.
how many of the tech people obama brought along do you think knew how to defend against state sponsored hacking? I'm guessing zero.
I see in the comments a lot of people are bitter or in denial about it. But you can't stop it. So you might as well make the best of it.
Several things are pushing this...
1. Economics. We're spending more on everything and you can't sustain that. There are also shifts in the tax base and demographics that simply make that less sustainable.
2. Labor force quality. When women were not permitted to take lots of jobs they were basically forced to take what remained. That meant that we had higher quality teachers... typically female... in the system because they couldn't do anything else. More opportunities means we have a brain drain from education. And while some will say "just pay them more" we can't even afford existing rate structures so increasing them isn't viable.
3. Changing education requirements. The student bodies have increasingly diverse needs and the teachers simply can't keep up with it all. Keeping on top of the language differences, on top of all the new elective classes, on top of etc... they just can't. With this we can start teaching real programming to kids that want to learn it without losing money if no one does in any particular school. We can offer language courses in any language in every school. We can start teaching a lot of elective classes that got cut. We can give students access to very high quality science and math teachers.
I could go on but the point is that it is happening. Accept it or stick your head up your ass. I'm not being rude. I'm telling you the Sun is going to rise in the East and set in the West. Accept it or don't.
My point stands that the parliamentary system has corruption as well.
As to this notion of running things through multiple people... you say that like the US doesn't do that already.
We have a congress and a senate and the you can't pass a law unless both agree and then the president can veto it.
Then in the states things often have to go through the state senates and governor's office.
The system used to have more checks and balances but a lot of our anti corruption systems were stripped out in the name of 'democracy'.
For example, the federal senate used to not be elected by the people but instead by the states. This meant that the politics of the senate were very different from the politics of the house. And that meant for something to pass it would have to make sense to the politics of both the senate and the house.
Lots of other checks and balances... again mostly removed over the years for various reasons.
In a real revolution, the distinction between right and left will be meaningless. It isn't logistically viable because most states are somewhat purple... often big cities are blue and literally everything else is red. A war on a right vs left division wouldn't work.
You'd have to have regional disputes between groupings of states. What actually binds large regions together isn't right vs left. It is money and power. Mostly the issue is who gets the money and who gets the power.
So it is less an issue of right versus left and more an issue of who you want to share money and power with...
I don't see how any one incident of corruption proves anything. Do you honestly think that it doesn't exist in your system. You think you have no corruption?
First, how are those dicks coming? Did they get cold because you left them too long? There's plenty more if you need additional helpings.
As to my emotional state... I'm not really offended at all. You just said something that was inaccurate and I went to the trouble to see if there were any validity to your position.
There wasn't. So I informed you that dicks were to be consumed in hearty quantities.
I like the idea you're suggesting and it was actually something that people used to say the US had to some extent. The US was called a "laboratory of democracy" in that we had 50 largely independent governments that could do things in their own ways. And you could judge the success or failure of any given idea just by looking at the before and after data. And you could even see other states doing contrary things and again look at before and after data... and then there would be states that did nothing at all and again you could see before and after data.
So much of it is federal now that there's way to do any of that. It is everyone or no one with no control group.
Slashdot Mirror
How does that undermine anything I said? The fellow took a comment I made about artificial sugar and caffeine and started talking about calorie intake.
Diet soda has no calories. So he was basically just trolling. The various stereotypical anti american comments were fairly typical of his argument. And when I responded to his bullshit in detail he basically evaded because he isn't able to actually have a conversation. He just knows how to make some dumb insults to piss people off. Well, I am annoyed by him but not mad. I responded to him and he ran away like the intellectual coward and lackwit he always was... that is all.
That's physically impossible.
Are you telling me that if I spent all day burning calories by working out and maintained eating what I currently eat while not excersing, I would not lose weight?
Not only would I lose weight but I'd need to eat a good deal more or I'd actually start to starve.
Laws of fucking thermodynamics call bullshit on this argument.
People that I find more informed on this issue are body builders. I don't know if you've talked to any of those people but they are a neutritional gold mine. Not because I think what they do to their bodies is healthy or desirable but because they have a better idea of what leads to what then either you or I. They have a whole culture and information pool sourced from the collective experimentation of their entire population.
Now, do body builders eat fewer carbs than the average person? No. They do very carefully monitor their intake of EVERYTHING. That includes protein, carbs, and various vitamins. They literally measure out their meals by the gram in precise amounts of everything. Go to a body builder nutrition store and look at those big jars of powdered everything.
From what I've gleaned from those guys, you have to balance all these things out to suit your ACTIVITY and your goals. If you want to build lots of muscle, they recommend lots of protein and they even say that consuming actual meat is better if your goal is to get bigger. So just big slabs of steak. But of course you need to exercise while you do that and your exercise needs to be focused on encouraging that muscle growth. So cardio for example is less useful in that situation then lots of weight training.
Now, as to your BBC study... I repeat... Egyptians and Romans... oh and the chinese and japanese with their rice.
How much rice do the Japanese eat? Isn't that a major part of their diet since always? And how fat are they? What fatty thing are the Japanese eating that is in your opinion making them thin?
See, the incurious nature of your position is something that bothers me. These statements are made without any attempt to connect them to anything else and it makes me suspicious that its just more medical bullshit.
Actually that was your argument. You blamed all hunger in the world and the obvious incompetence at the root of most of it on the US.
Now, you may not wish to maintain that argument, but then you're going to have to limit your argument to specific countries and specify what the US did to create famine in those societies.
Absent that, your position is so vague that you're effectively blaming us for everything and that is obvious not sustainable.
So. Limit and specify or concede.
Those are your options. Make a falsifiable argument like a rational educated human being or you will have not made a sustainable argument.
hmmm... good luck with that.
First you seem reasonable and intelligent. That's refreshing. Congratulations I am also reasonable and intelligent. Lets see if we can have a spirited discussion on this issue. :)
As to people eating fewer carbohydrates way back when... you do realize that the modern world was built by carbohydrates?
Staple crops.
Wheat, Rice, Maze, Potatoes, even Poi (Polynesians liked this stuff on their little island paradises... completely gross. Like eating paste.)... no major culture rose without a staple crop.
So your argument is that past generations didn't eat so many carbs? The Egyptians were huge fans of it. They drank a thick beer like drink as the energy drink of the ancient world. Full of carbs. Were the Egyptians fat?
What about the Romans? One of the big things the Romans offered anyone that lived in Rome was free flour. And they offered because Egypt's tribute to Rome was regular shipments of wheat. That wheat was then ground into flour in huge water powered flour mills in the heart of Rome. Water from the aqueducts was run through water wheels to turn mill stones to turn out huge amounts of flour. This flour was given to the people at no cost as a kind of ancient welfare. As you'd imagine , the Romans ate a LOT of wheat in any form you can think of because the flour was literally free to the common people.
Were the ancient Roman's fat? They'd have to have been because they were consuming a lot of simple carbs. No?
As to your reading... All of that just sounds like you've made up your mind. Can we have a discussion for the sake of argument? Is it possible for me to propose alternative theories and have them be listened to with an open mind?
You tell me. What sort of evidence would you like to see?
The biggest problem I have with modern statistics is that they conflate entirely different lifestyles and suggest that the only change was diet. This ignores changes in exercise etc.
As to heart disease etc... I question the accuracy of statistics going back in time. What is more the human body rapidly starts having all sorts of problems after the prime mating and reproductive phase in the life cycle. Pass the 30s or so and everything starts to have problems because evolution stops caring about you. You're just running on inertia at that point.
And to that point, there are some people that can eat cheeseburgers every day and smoke a pack of cigarettes and be very healthy into their 90s. This has been studied. And their DNA has been studied. What they found was that people that seem to be able to do this don't have any one special gene but rather they don't have a lot of genes which generally make us unhealthy. Most people have some of those genes but some people have none of them. Those with literally none of them can abuse their bodies horribly and suffer no consequences from it.
This is the 21st century... this is slashdot... Yes, I am suggesting the genetic engineering diet. Fuck GMO food, I want to GMO me.
As to your silly belief that the United States invented hunger or incompetence... no. There were wars, famines, plagues, and death long before the old US of A was but a sparkle in the American eye.
Does the US do things on occasion that might make a country less stable then it was already? Sure... comes with taking any role in anything. The Germans had a hard time feeding themselves for awhile after we bombed them into oblivion during the world wars.
With very few exceptions, our actions in such matters are not ones we feel any moral responsibility for...
The most recent issue with Iraq would be an exception to that. But even then, the people that live in these countries must take some responsibility for their own governance or how can they be credited with responsibility when things go well?
Take South Korea which the US had some hand in making the prosperous society it is today. Are the South Koreans responsible for any of their good fortune or is everything they have the responsibility of the US? They would I am sure protest the suggestion that their years of hard work bore no relevance to their current success.
Well dear one, that is a double edged sword is it not? If those that do well are responsible for their good fortune then those that do poorly are responsible as well.
And since we're actually talking about Africa more than anything else because that's where the really impressive famines are... what war or destabilizing action would you like to lay at our feet that caused their little problem? I'd love to hear the logic of it. And keep in mind, you're talking to someone that is logical. Too many people can't even form rational thoughts. Just a warning... try to actually try to think. Otherwise this will be boring for me. And we can't have that.
As to assuming facts, shut up. What food was like in the US in the 50s and 60s is a matter of record, you miserable little weasel. Open a cook book from the time. Do you own an American cook book from the 1950s? I do. Have you ever been to an American restaurant that hasn't changed its menu since the 1950s? I have. Do you have any American grand parents that can tell you in detail what the food was at the time? I do.
So kindly sit down, put this bib on, and enjoy this bucket of deep fried dicks. American food prior to the obesity issue was if anything a good deal heavier than it is today because the lighter food was a response to people getting self conscious about their weight. So they started cutting down on fat and sugar. Mostly fat.
What do you think Americans were eating 60 years ago? Wheatgerm? Try bacon, eggs, toast, big wedges of butter, cream... etc.
You guys are fun. So arrogant and so ignorant... all in the same package.
For thousands of years having a country full of well fed people was considered something to brag about.
Look at the world and you'll find lots of places where they're struggling to so much as feed themselves. And a fair number of the ones that can feed themselves only do so with food aid from countries like my own.
What is more, most of the countries that like to call the US fat, are statistically right behind us. The English and the Germans for example are right there with us.
So whatever. The obesity issue is largely caused by a lack of exercise. We used to move around more and we're more sedentary now.
And before you tell me it is the food, do you have any fucking idea how greasy food used to be in the 50s and 60s? And yet the obesity thing is happening now and not then. What changed? People moved around then. Played sports, went on walks... stuff. We're both sitting down on our asses having this conversation and that is something Americans didn't do way back when.
In any case... kindly restrict your comments to something topical instead of trying to pass off idiotic slights against other nations as somehow being a health issue.
Precisely... but seriously... if it were a problem... there would noticeable effects in the medical literature and population. From the sweetener there is nothing but supposition. From the caffeine... quite a bit of medical data.
... then where are the junkies going to get their fix?
I've been drinking diet soda since... always. A lot of it. And I'm hardly alone. If this stuff actually did anything... we'd have a fucking epidemic.
We don't... and as to the supposed addictive qualities of it... if it were addictive, I would know. Personally. The caffeine withdrawals are quite noticeable for me. I didn't have any soda for 24 hours the other day and I literally started getting splitting headaches... and I felt like I wanted to die.
I am one of those people that if I am out of soda at 2 AM... I will go to the store to buy more. Right then. So... I am quite literally addicted to caffeine.
I go cold turkey on it every so often. It takes about two weeks for the physical symptoms to cool off but then you get all sorts of behavioral issues. Low energy... apathy... depression. Yeah. Basically you just feel shitty and tired. I went three months without any caffeine not long ago and for the whole three months I felt shitty and tired. So I said "fuck this" and now I'm back on the caffeine.
So... that's a thing. If you want to talk about health concerns etc then lets talk about Caffeine. That stuff is probably worthy of some stiffer regulation.
But that won't happen because the fucking hipster fake as shit issues people never go after anything they personally enjoy. They're all in their coffee shops pretending to not be watching cat videos and writing little things about how soda is evil.
Well, the caffeine in soda is an issue. But so is the caffeine in coffee.
But the artificial sweetener? Go fuck yourself with a rake. I don't really care, there are several alternative sweeteners that they'll just use instead. Whatever. I really couldn't give a shit. There are some bullshit sweeteners that taste wrong but most of them are fine.
I'm more irritated than anything else... mostly because this is a bullshit issue.
You're joking but someone is actually is going to be shameless enough to make that argument.
And my eyes shall roll like slot machine tumblers.
Whatever, they're stupid. That's the point. And despite that they were cited as being the solution to everything for years. Years.
You say they're dumb on every level? Okay, but that's not what the media was saying about them.
Personally, I'm a fan of biofuels. They're carbon neutral. And not the stupid algae idea. You can biofuel from any combustible hydrocarbon. Basically you just cook whatever it is in an oxygen starved environment and it gives off fumes that are quite flammable. Those fumes can be cleaned and refined into several different fuel types. You get something like natural gas, you get something like tar, and you get varying quantities of everything in between including a gasoline analog.
And again, carbon neutral. You can make biofuels out of fucking garbage... grass clippings... saw dust... field dross of any kind. And the ash can be returned as an excellent non-toxic organic fertilizer.
So there you go. That is my green fuel solution.
Literally not at all. Every day I'm told about some new bit of wizbang tech that is going to solve all our problems and it never goes into production.
Remember hydrogen cars? They even built a hydrogen gas station near where I live. Cool right?... not really... basically no cars use it, the station is not economical, and I believe they may have only built one of these fucking things on the entire planet. So if you know where the only hydrogen fueling station is on planet earth, its not far from where I live.
So you're holding up the idea of running things through people in canada as a good thing but saying it is bad when US congressman try to do it in the US?
What is more, the constitution is quite clear that treaties are to be ratified by congress. As such, while the president may negotiate on behalf of the American people, the agreements are not binding unless ratified.
For example, Bill Clinton wanted to sign the Kyoto Treaty and Congress refused to ratify it. The result was that the agreement was not binding on the US government.
So your US civics are shotty.
As to you not saying anything about corruption, then we're having different conversations. You might as well start talking about rare insects or your favorite recipe for cookies.
Okay, so it sounds like you're saying running things through more than one person is a bad idea and we should just have the power concentrated in as few hands as possible.
Why have a senate or a congress than? Just have an elected dictator.
As to shutting down the government, congress has a right to make laws and set the budget. If they feel their laws are being ignored or their budgets are being ignored they have an obligation to try and get their power respected.
For someone that has such a high regard for the rights of the executive to make foreign policy, you don't seem to respect the legislature's right to make law or fiscal policy. Why is that?
Anyway, it sounds like this is going no where and you're getting erratic. So... please either make more sense or I'll bid you good day.
In this case, I don't think so... I can't speak to every situation but on the case of the email... sounds like they were inferior.
... and his team laughed at the existing tech infrastructure? Maybe the previous administration got hacked as well or maybe the Russians weren't trying as hard then... but I find it ironic that these people that came in saying they were superior at everything keep proving themselves to be incompetent.
Fuck the politics. Just remember back to when they were dissing the old email server/old it department and look at how much better the new people ran things... aka worse apparently. That's just funny.
On purely nerd principles you have to have a bit of a laugh at the administration's expense. So much hubris.
how many of the tech people obama brought along do you think knew how to defend against state sponsored hacking? I'm guessing zero.
I see in the comments a lot of people are bitter or in denial about it. But you can't stop it. So you might as well make the best of it.
Several things are pushing this...
1. Economics. We're spending more on everything and you can't sustain that. There are also shifts in the tax base and demographics that simply make that less sustainable.
2. Labor force quality. When women were not permitted to take lots of jobs they were basically forced to take what remained. That meant that we had higher quality teachers... typically female... in the system because they couldn't do anything else. More opportunities means we have a brain drain from education. And while some will say "just pay them more" we can't even afford existing rate structures so increasing them isn't viable.
3. Changing education requirements. The student bodies have increasingly diverse needs and the teachers simply can't keep up with it all. Keeping on top of the language differences, on top of all the new elective classes, on top of etc... they just can't. With this we can start teaching real programming to kids that want to learn it without losing money if no one does in any particular school. We can offer language courses in any language in every school. We can start teaching a lot of elective classes that got cut. We can give students access to very high quality science and math teachers.
I could go on but the point is that it is happening. Accept it or stick your head up your ass. I'm not being rude. I'm telling you the Sun is going to rise in the East and set in the West. Accept it or don't.
My point stands that the parliamentary system has corruption as well.
As to this notion of running things through multiple people... you say that like the US doesn't do that already.
We have a congress and a senate and the you can't pass a law unless both agree and then the president can veto it.
Then in the states things often have to go through the state senates and governor's office.
The system used to have more checks and balances but a lot of our anti corruption systems were stripped out in the name of 'democracy'.
For example, the federal senate used to not be elected by the people but instead by the states. This meant that the politics of the senate were very different from the politics of the house. And that meant for something to pass it would have to make sense to the politics of both the senate and the house.
Lots of other checks and balances... again mostly removed over the years for various reasons.
Now you're changing your argument. You said everything I said was a bumper sticker. You did not say anything I said was inaccurate.
Case closed. Enjoy your bucket of dicks. ;)
In a real revolution, the distinction between right and left will be meaningless. It isn't logistically viable because most states are somewhat purple... often big cities are blue and literally everything else is red. A war on a right vs left division wouldn't work.
You'd have to have regional disputes between groupings of states. What actually binds large regions together isn't right vs left. It is money and power. Mostly the issue is who gets the money and who gets the power.
So it is less an issue of right versus left and more an issue of who you want to share money and power with...
I don't see how any one incident of corruption proves anything. Do you honestly think that it doesn't exist in your system. You think you have no corruption?
http://www.thestar.com/news/ca...
Found that in about 5 seconds of looking.
First, how are those dicks coming? Did they get cold because you left them too long? There's plenty more if you need additional helpings.
As to my emotional state... I'm not really offended at all. You just said something that was inaccurate and I went to the trouble to see if there were any validity to your position.
There wasn't. So I informed you that dicks were to be consumed in hearty quantities.
Eat up. :)
I like the idea you're suggesting and it was actually something that people used to say the US had to some extent. The US was called a "laboratory of democracy" in that we had 50 largely independent governments that could do things in their own ways. And you could judge the success or failure of any given idea just by looking at the before and after data. And you could even see other states doing contrary things and again look at before and after data... and then there would be states that did nothing at all and again you could see before and after data.
So much of it is federal now that there's way to do any of that. It is everyone or no one with no control group.
I just searched to see if I could buy any of those as stickers... none exist anywhere according to google.
Thus I conclude that you must eat at least one bucket of dicks to repent.
You may use your condiment of choice.
I've never seen any of those as bumper stickers in my life.
What is more, the repetition was to make clear the logical distinction of it because it sounds like something else that is completely different.
Hey, Bingo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...