I think that's exactly what Phoenix is. Everyone I've introduced to Phoenix has adopted it, including a few non-techies in their late-40s. Pop-up blocking/whitelisting and tabbed browsing are "killer" features, and IE will eventually adopt them or face a serious reduction in usage.
The Mozilla suite is great and all, but, IMO, the primary benefit of the project is as a codebase for other projects, such as Phoenix, Camino, Minotaur/Thunderbird, etc.
I ALMOST completely agree with you. The coalition needs to tread very lightly during the rebuilding phase. They need to respect the Iraqi people and their culture. They should not, as you say, leave behind a void or another horrible regime. I agree that doing this right is difficult, but where we disagree is that it's not worth trying.
The key, in my opinion, is doing what is right for the Iraqi people. If they come out of this with a more liberal regime, real freedom, and an appreciation for the people who helped them get there, it will be a turning point in the Middle East.
I do not support "occupying" Iraq. Occupation is a relic of the Cold War. It serves no useful purpose in today's world. America needs to invade, remove the threat, help the good people of Iraq to organize a constitutional government, and leave, with the promise of assistance if they ask for it.
Saddam was only contained when 300,000 troops surrounded him, a move which Germany denounced. It is not feasible to leave so many troops permanently in the Gulf and in the Mediterranean.
If Germany's military cannot contribute, that is fine. But that is a poor excuse for opposing American action.
I fully appreciate Germany's hesitation to enter into a war, given its history. But people in Iraq are suffering, and have for 25 years. Surely the people of Iraq deserve an honest stab at freedom and self-determination.
Agreed on a few points. I do support the liberation of North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iran. I would add Zimbabwe. But different means for different situations. The North Koreans are trying to provoke us, and are playing a game of nuclear blackmail. In this situation, diplomatic pressure from all sides, as well as sanctions, is, in my opinion the best way to procede.
In Saudi Arabia and Egypt, I believe incremental reform is working, if slowly. In Iran, 70% of the population is under 30, and will revolt in the next decade for want of better fundemental rights. Of course we ought to support this revolution. Zimbabwe is more similar to Iraq. Mugabe and his cronies should be removed immediatly, by force if necessary, although I do not think it would require a full scale invasion.
I do hope the American government follows through in Iraq. It would be much easier to do so if people would give it the benefit of the doubt.
Well, I am not Iraqi, nor could I ever claim that I speak for all Iraqis, but, in my judgment, your Iraqi is atypical.
Obviously, neither of us can "prove" the other wrong, but I will offer you an alternative Iraqi perspective. An Iraqi ex-pat named Mohammed recently called into the Bryan Suits radio talk show (based in Seattle), and debated Andrea Buffa, a representative of the group "United for Peace and Justice." You can download the mp3 here.
I thought it was very convincing, although, as I've already pointed out, it's just one man.
I can't speak for the administration, since I am not in it. But for what it's worth, I think the war is worth supporting for the humanitarian reasons alone. In my opinion, the fact that Saddam compensates the families of suicide bombers and makes no effort to stop terrorist activity in Iraq is icing on the cake.
I did not intend to convey that the humanitarian gain is the only reason to depose Saddam. In fact, I confess that I support it for many reasons. However, I find the humanitarian justification extremely difficult to refute, and any additional justifications do not take away from it.
You are right to distrust power. But don't let the Iraqi people suffer because of this.
As a German, surely you must agree that dictators are monsters and should be removed, by force if necessary. Germany is a powerful country in its own right, and if it distrusts American power or intentions, why not join the coalition to remove Saddam? Your leaders would see first-hand that the American motivation is not to abuse power or gain materially.
It is not right to react in a knee-jerk manner against America just because you have (again, rightly) a distrust of power. Innocent until proven guilty, please.
You and I are in complete agreement that supporting tyrants in the past was an awful idea. I could not agree with you more. But do you think it is right for Iraq to suffer today because of the mistakes of previous administrations trying to deal with different threats? If you don't see it that way, I can't make you, but please be assured that I am sincere in my arguments.
Thank you for clarifying. Most of what you say is, on the face of it, true. However, I think you are not considering all relevent facts (or at least possibilities).
UN approval would have increased worldwide popular approval, as you say. I confess that I agree with the loud-mouthed neocons that the UN is irrelevent, for reasons I have already stated as well as others. However, I won't get into that here since this is not specifically what you were referring to. Please note that despite this view, I am not an isolationist.
You are correct in saying that much of the world hate the US. A few points here. First, the United States is a sovereign nation, and provided it acts according to its Constitution, its actions are legitimate, and, to use your word, "credible."
Second, in terms of the morality (or correctness, if you prefer) of the war, does public opinion matter? I believe a calculation needs to be made as to whether it is worth it or not to remove Saddam, and that the result of this analysis should decide our actions. Even if you disagree with my interpretation of the calculation, I hope you would agree that our actions should not be put to a global vote.
Third, while it is true that much of the world has a knee-jerk anti-Americanism, this is not going to change by staying out of Iraq. In addition to being an American, I have citizenship in a leftist third world country, whose government and people are strongly against the war. I can tell you that in this country, people are anti-American because of an EXTREMELY biased media. I am not talking about CBS v. Fox News bias, but blatant propaganda. So this particular nation, with 180M people, is full of knee-jerk anti-Americanists. I think that to get world opinion on the side of America, America is going to have to prove themselves to these countries one nation at a time. Eastern Europe is full of staunch American allies. And soon, Iraq will be one too.
(As an aside, the government of China is against American action, but no one has bothered to ask the people of China. Maybe 1.2 billion oppressed people would favor eliminating global tyrany.)
You are correct that by most measures, the coalition is not as big this time around. But it is still very large. And I don't see how the absence of Libya, Iran, and France hurts our moral standing.
The Australian and British public are strongly anti-war, as you say. They will get the chance to change their government at the polls. I don't see how this reduces the legitimacy of Australian or UK involvement. I still have hopes that when the Aussies and Brits see their troops welcomed and cheered by the Iraqi people, the publics will change their mind, as publics often do.
President Clinton, in 1998, changed the American foreign policy goal in Iraq to "regime change." One might argue that he did this solely to avoid impeachment, but I won't mention this any further than I already have. The reason Clinton didn't inflame "every country on the planet" is that he didn't follow his own policy. He fired off a few missiles as a show, and then left Saddam (and, unrelatedly, bin Laden) to his successor. I think not following a policy you set is a sign of weak leadership.
I certainly hope world opinion comes around. Please don't think that I minimize it. It would be nice if America got some credit in the global community for holding unprecedented power, and using it not for territorial expansion or financial tribute, but for the expansion of freedom and rule of law. But even if the credit never comes, doing the right thing is the most important. I am sorry if we do not agree on what that is.
Fair enough. George III was not nearly as tyrannical as Saddam is (or was, if we've killed him already). But if war to free America from his rule was justified, isn't war ro free people from monsters like Saddam and Robert Mugabe and the Ayatollah even more justified?
I don't want to start a flame-war with you, so please understand that I respect your right to disagree with me.
You say that removing dictators has to be done with some semblance of credibility. I don't know if you are directly referring to the United Nations, but I would ask you to consider what credibility the UN has in removing dictators. In both of the wars which have been UN-sanctioned, Korea and Iraq-91, the UN failed to win a complete victory. Korea, as you know, has still not recovered from the UN's incursion, and a totalitarian regime still exists in the North. The UN coalition left Iraq in 1991 with a tyrant still in power. Whether you are a unilateralist or a multilateralist, surely you would consider that those wanting to liberate the people of Iraq might be better off without the involvement of the UN.
Bush has plenty of "credibility" within the US. 70% of the public (in a recent poll, CNN's I believe) says that the US should not have waited any longer to invade Iraq.
It is true that internationally, Bush has less support than domestically. However, in terms of the number of countries involved, the coalition this time around is larger than the coalition in 1991. Countries like Bulgaria and Poland have contributed small numbers of specialized troops, and I applaud their passage into the community of world nations that will not tolerate totalitarianism.
Most of the countries that oppose us do so not because they feel empathy for the people of Iraq, but because they want to check American power. The truly empathetic action, in my opinion, would be to support the liberation of Iraq. Allowing people to suffer for reasons of national pride strikes me as pathetic and repulsive.
You say the war is already lost, and though I disagree, I cannot prove you wrong. Yet. I can only say that we will find out shortly. If our troops are greeted with celebrations, if within a few months, Iraq's economy is gaining steam and the people have drafted a constition, and if we see a much freer Iraqi people, I hope you will admit that you "misunderestimated" GWB and my fellow neocons. We would welcome your vote.
At least "unsophisticated" Americans like me can spell the word rationale.
God forbid that America might use its power to get rid of fascist dicators. Maybe the real problem is that the elitists in America have forgotten that they owe their freedom to a war against another tyrant, George III. Or maybe that war was "contrived and forced down people's throats" as well?
The Ethernet port on the PowerBook G4 17-inch computer supports Auto-MDIX. It switches between MDI (Medium Dependent Interface) and MDI-X operation automatically, so it can be connected to another device by either a straight-through cable or a cross-over cable.
This attention to detail is why I love Apple hardware. Why don't all computer companies do this?
In your scenario, the ten people represent hundreds of thousands of other people. Why is wrong for them to have more influence than ten guys off the street?
The fact remains, however, that OS X ships with a lot of its ports closed. Windows XP has a lot of them wide open. OS X also has a better security model (it is Unix, after all).
Everyone knows that OS X is not immune from viruses. However, a virus run by an unprivileged user is limited in the amount of damage it can do. Also, the fact that the default firewall configuration is more secure limits the amount of remote exploits. OS X is still more secure than Windows XP, even if it is vulnerable to viruses.
David Hyatt, Chimera's principal developer, said that since he was on sabbatical no new builds were in the works until July. However, the demand for more development was so high, and the rumors were so rampant, that he released a new build this morning. See for yourself. David has denied the rumors repeatedly, and I doubt that Apple will take Chimera and rename it iBrowser or (even better) iBrowse. However, I wouldn't be surprised if it eventually became the default browser and shipped with future versions of the OS.
Commerce has thrived in a "commons" since the first public squares were constructed, and the GPL's share-and-share-alike system creates a commons for software.
GPL software would not be classified as a "commons" good, but rather as a "pure public" good. The term commons refers to goods that are non-excludable, but are rivalrous in consumption. GPL software is not only non-excludable, but also non-rivalrous in consumption. My use of a particular piece of GPL software does not diminish your ability to use it, or raise its price (it may even lower it!). Commons are, to economists, one of the WORST ways to allocate goods. Refer to Garrett Hardin's classic paper "The Tragedy of the Commons" (1968). Hurray for pure public goods!
Also, how deep are the ties between MS and the present Administration? That will make a big difference in how the Gov't treats MS.
Microsoft doesn't really support either party more than the other. They play both sides, as any politically saavy corporation would do. I worked for a summer in party fundraising and I *believe* (don't hold me to it) that Microsoft's dollars go nearly 50-50 to each party. IIRC, Bill Gates himself is a Democrat.
It actually shouldn't be that hard. The Xbox is based on a 733 MHz PIII. I know there is more to getting Linux running on the Xbox than just the processor, but it's a big step out of the way.
Slashdot Mirror
According to the FAQ, it uses Rendezvous (aka ZeroConf) for advertising printer capability and the setup page. Great use of free technology.
How about releasing an IE-killer sometime?
I think that's exactly what Phoenix is. Everyone I've introduced to Phoenix has adopted it, including a few non-techies in their late-40s. Pop-up blocking/whitelisting and tabbed browsing are "killer" features, and IE will eventually adopt them or face a serious reduction in usage.
The Mozilla suite is great and all, but, IMO, the primary benefit of the project is as a codebase for other projects, such as Phoenix, Camino, Minotaur/Thunderbird, etc.
I ALMOST completely agree with you. The coalition needs to tread very lightly during the rebuilding phase. They need to respect the Iraqi people and their culture. They should not, as you say, leave behind a void or another horrible regime. I agree that doing this right is difficult, but where we disagree is that it's not worth trying.
The key, in my opinion, is doing what is right for the Iraqi people. If they come out of this with a more liberal regime, real freedom, and an appreciation for the people who helped them get there, it will be a turning point in the Middle East.
I do not support "occupying" Iraq. Occupation is a relic of the Cold War. It serves no useful purpose in today's world. America needs to invade, remove the threat, help the good people of Iraq to organize a constitutional government, and leave, with the promise of assistance if they ask for it.
Saddam was only contained when 300,000 troops surrounded him, a move which Germany denounced. It is not feasible to leave so many troops permanently in the Gulf and in the Mediterranean.
If Germany's military cannot contribute, that is fine. But that is a poor excuse for opposing American action.
I fully appreciate Germany's hesitation to enter into a war, given its history. But people in Iraq are suffering, and have for 25 years. Surely the people of Iraq deserve an honest stab at freedom and self-determination.
Agreed on a few points. I do support the liberation of North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Iran. I would add Zimbabwe. But different means for different situations. The North Koreans are trying to provoke us, and are playing a game of nuclear blackmail. In this situation, diplomatic pressure from all sides, as well as sanctions, is, in my opinion the best way to procede.
In Saudi Arabia and Egypt, I believe incremental reform is working, if slowly. In Iran, 70% of the population is under 30, and will revolt in the next decade for want of better fundemental rights. Of course we ought to support this revolution. Zimbabwe is more similar to Iraq. Mugabe and his cronies should be removed immediatly, by force if necessary, although I do not think it would require a full scale invasion.
I do hope the American government follows through in Iraq. It would be much easier to do so if people would give it the benefit of the doubt.
Well, I am not Iraqi, nor could I ever claim that I speak for all Iraqis, but, in my judgment, your Iraqi is atypical.
Obviously, neither of us can "prove" the other wrong, but I will offer you an alternative Iraqi perspective. An Iraqi ex-pat named Mohammed recently called into the Bryan Suits radio talk show (based in Seattle), and debated Andrea Buffa, a representative of the group "United for Peace and Justice." You can download the mp3 here.
I thought it was very convincing, although, as I've already pointed out, it's just one man.
I can't speak for the administration, since I am not in it. But for what it's worth, I think the war is worth supporting for the humanitarian reasons alone. In my opinion, the fact that Saddam compensates the families of suicide bombers and makes no effort to stop terrorist activity in Iraq is icing on the cake.
I did not intend to convey that the humanitarian gain is the only reason to depose Saddam. In fact, I confess that I support it for many reasons. However, I find the humanitarian justification extremely difficult to refute, and any additional justifications do not take away from it.
You are right to distrust power. But don't let the Iraqi people suffer because of this.
As a German, surely you must agree that dictators are monsters and should be removed, by force if necessary. Germany is a powerful country in its own right, and if it distrusts American power or intentions, why not join the coalition to remove Saddam? Your leaders would see first-hand that the American motivation is not to abuse power or gain materially.
It is not right to react in a knee-jerk manner against America just because you have (again, rightly) a distrust of power. Innocent until proven guilty, please.
You and I are in complete agreement that supporting tyrants in the past was an awful idea. I could not agree with you more. But do you think it is right for Iraq to suffer today because of the mistakes of previous administrations trying to deal with different threats? If you don't see it that way, I can't make you, but please be assured that I am sincere in my arguments.
Thank you for clarifying. Most of what you say is, on the face of it, true. However, I think you are not considering all relevent facts (or at least possibilities).
UN approval would have increased worldwide popular approval, as you say. I confess that I agree with the loud-mouthed neocons that the UN is irrelevent, for reasons I have already stated as well as others. However, I won't get into that here since this is not specifically what you were referring to. Please note that despite this view, I am not an isolationist.
You are correct in saying that much of the world hate the US. A few points here. First, the United States is a sovereign nation, and provided it acts according to its Constitution, its actions are legitimate, and, to use your word, "credible."
Second, in terms of the morality (or correctness, if you prefer) of the war, does public opinion matter? I believe a calculation needs to be made as to whether it is worth it or not to remove Saddam, and that the result of this analysis should decide our actions. Even if you disagree with my interpretation of the calculation, I hope you would agree that our actions should not be put to a global vote.
Third, while it is true that much of the world has a knee-jerk anti-Americanism, this is not going to change by staying out of Iraq. In addition to being an American, I have citizenship in a leftist third world country, whose government and people are strongly against the war. I can tell you that in this country, people are anti-American because of an EXTREMELY biased media. I am not talking about CBS v. Fox News bias, but blatant propaganda. So this particular nation, with 180M people, is full of knee-jerk anti-Americanists. I think that to get world opinion on the side of America, America is going to have to prove themselves to these countries one nation at a time. Eastern Europe is full of staunch American allies. And soon, Iraq will be one too.
(As an aside, the government of China is against American action, but no one has bothered to ask the people of China. Maybe 1.2 billion oppressed people would favor eliminating global tyrany.)
You are correct that by most measures, the coalition is not as big this time around. But it is still very large. And I don't see how the absence of Libya, Iran, and France hurts our moral standing.
The Australian and British public are strongly anti-war, as you say. They will get the chance to change their government at the polls. I don't see how this reduces the legitimacy of Australian or UK involvement. I still have hopes that when the Aussies and Brits see their troops welcomed and cheered by the Iraqi people, the publics will change their mind, as publics often do.
President Clinton, in 1998, changed the American foreign policy goal in Iraq to "regime change." One might argue that he did this solely to avoid impeachment, but I won't mention this any further than I already have. The reason Clinton didn't inflame "every country on the planet" is that he didn't follow his own policy. He fired off a few missiles as a show, and then left Saddam (and, unrelatedly, bin Laden) to his successor. I think not following a policy you set is a sign of weak leadership.
I certainly hope world opinion comes around. Please don't think that I minimize it. It would be nice if America got some credit in the global community for holding unprecedented power, and using it not for territorial expansion or financial tribute, but for the expansion of freedom and rule of law. But even if the credit never comes, doing the right thing is the most important. I am sorry if we do not agree on what that is.
Fair enough. George III was not nearly as tyrannical as Saddam is (or was, if we've killed him already). But if war to free America from his rule was justified, isn't war ro free people from monsters like Saddam and Robert Mugabe and the Ayatollah even more justified?
I don't want to start a flame-war with you, so please understand that I respect your right to disagree with me.
You say that removing dictators has to be done with some semblance of credibility. I don't know if you are directly referring to the United Nations, but I would ask you to consider what credibility the UN has in removing dictators. In both of the wars which have been UN-sanctioned, Korea and Iraq-91, the UN failed to win a complete victory. Korea, as you know, has still not recovered from the UN's incursion, and a totalitarian regime still exists in the North. The UN coalition left Iraq in 1991 with a tyrant still in power. Whether you are a unilateralist or a multilateralist, surely you would consider that those wanting to liberate the people of Iraq might be better off without the involvement of the UN.
Bush has plenty of "credibility" within the US. 70% of the public (in a recent poll, CNN's I believe) says that the US should not have waited any longer to invade Iraq.
It is true that internationally, Bush has less support than domestically. However, in terms of the number of countries involved, the coalition this time around is larger than the coalition in 1991. Countries like Bulgaria and Poland have contributed small numbers of specialized troops, and I applaud their passage into the community of world nations that will not tolerate totalitarianism.
Most of the countries that oppose us do so not because they feel empathy for the people of Iraq, but because they want to check American power. The truly empathetic action, in my opinion, would be to support the liberation of Iraq. Allowing people to suffer for reasons of national pride strikes me as pathetic and repulsive.
You say the war is already lost, and though I disagree, I cannot prove you wrong. Yet. I can only say that we will find out shortly. If our troops are greeted with celebrations, if within a few months, Iraq's economy is gaining steam and the people have drafted a constition, and if we see a much freer Iraqi people, I hope you will admit that you "misunderestimated" GWB and my fellow neocons. We would welcome your vote.
At least "unsophisticated" Americans like me can spell the word rationale.
God forbid that America might use its power to get rid of fascist dicators. Maybe the real problem is that the elitists in America have forgotten that they owe their freedom to a war against another tyrant, George III. Or maybe that war was "contrived and forced down people's throats" as well?
This is not new for the Powerbook, but...
The Ethernet port on the PowerBook G4 17-inch computer supports Auto-MDIX. It switches between MDI (Medium Dependent Interface) and MDI-X operation automatically, so it can be connected to another device by either a straight-through cable or a cross-over cable.
This attention to detail is why I love Apple hardware. Why don't all computer companies do this?
Actually, the iTrip is pretty innovative in that it gets its power directly from the iPod. You don't need to stock up on AAs.
like Browser.app
In your scenario, the ten people represent hundreds of thousands of other people. Why is wrong for them to have more influence than ten guys off the street?
In the eyes of government, the will of the corporation has long outweighed the will of the people.
This is stupid (sorry for being blunt). A corporation is a group of people.
The fact remains, however, that OS X ships with a lot of its ports closed. Windows XP has a lot of them wide open. OS X also has a better security model (it is Unix, after all).
Everyone knows that OS X is not immune from viruses. However, a virus run by an unprivileged user is limited in the amount of damage it can do. Also, the fact that the default firewall configuration is more secure limits the amount of remote exploits. OS X is still more secure than Windows XP, even if it is vulnerable to viruses.
David Hyatt, Chimera's principal developer, said that since he was on sabbatical no new builds were in the works until July. However, the demand for more development was so high, and the rumors were so rampant, that he released a new build this morning. See for yourself. David has denied the rumors repeatedly, and I doubt that Apple will take Chimera and rename it iBrowser or (even better) iBrowse. However, I wouldn't be surprised if it eventually became the default browser and shipped with future versions of the OS.
Commerce has thrived in a "commons" since the first public squares were constructed, and the GPL's share-and-share-alike system creates a commons for software.
GPL software would not be classified as a "commons" good, but rather as a "pure public" good. The term commons refers to goods that are non-excludable, but are rivalrous in consumption. GPL software is not only non-excludable, but also non-rivalrous in consumption. My use of a particular piece of GPL software does not diminish your ability to use it, or raise its price (it may even lower it!). Commons are, to economists, one of the WORST ways to allocate goods. Refer to Garrett Hardin's classic paper "The Tragedy of the Commons" (1968). Hurray for pure public goods!
What country do you live in that doesn't allow ADULT stem-cell research? Go ahead, do the research yourself in your garage...it's legal.
Also, how deep are the ties between MS and the present Administration? That will make a big difference in how the Gov't treats MS.
Microsoft doesn't really support either party more than the other. They play both sides, as any politically saavy corporation would do. I worked for a summer in party fundraising and I *believe* (don't hold me to it) that Microsoft's dollars go nearly 50-50 to each party. IIRC, Bill Gates himself is a Democrat.
Google lists 2800. I guess their lawyers are going to be busy...
It actually shouldn't be that hard. The Xbox is based on a 733 MHz PIII. I know there is more to getting Linux running on the Xbox than just the processor, but it's a big step out of the way.