See, unlike most people, you are willing to recognize the logical consequences of what you are calling for and accept them, and I respect you for that. Most people who would support gay marriage will draw the line at polygamy (or polyandry or whatever other combination you want to name), but won't be able to defend it. It's either what we have now, or anything goes. I think anything has complicated economic ramifications that we haven't forseen, not the least of which is making it easier to defraud the system.
And, yes, when you get down to it, I am endorsing large-scale rationalized oppression, if you want to put it that way. I find it hard to argue with that since you would not agree with my bases for keeping things the way they are, so once again, put it to a vote. There's no argument I can make that you will accept from what you have said. (I'm not making a criticism, just agreeing to disagree.)
If it gets voted in, well I won't agree with it, but I don't agree with a lot of what our country does.
Technically they shouldn't. However that's covered by the child tax credit. It's not a perfectly consistent setup now, but tinkering with it without understanding the consequences is folly.
Everyone makes this out to be some kind of civil rights issue. Well, I want to marry my sister. Should that be allowed? Medical implications you say? OK, I want to marry my brother. You see, making one change, regardless of its merits, opens the floodgates. I'm not ready to dismantle a fundamental basis of our society to please a small minority.
Put it to a vote. That's the democratic way. If it doesn't pass then deal with it. But don't force through something the majority of the country or its representatives don't want simply because playing by the rules won't work.
Also, even if it does pass, remember the Constitutional ramifications of that, which I've argued elsewhere in the thread. It's a BIG can of worms whose biggest effect will be only to enrich the lawyers.
Yeah, except for those cases where no abortion = one or two dead from complications.
And you're telling me that's why it's legal? Guess again. That situation is very rare, and we all see through the ruse when it's given as a defense of partial-birth abortion.
If carrying a baby to term will kill the mother, how does forcibly destroying the baby's brain inches from birth help her? A Caesarian section is safer for both, but you have this inconvenient live baby at the end of it. What a shame.
Those are tough cases, worth consideration, but probably account for one tenth of one percent of abortions. This is all about denying someone his or her humanity for convenience.
But it does make a difference when I am paying higher taxes and higher insurance premiums because of brand new beneficiaries of the government's largesse. And let's face it, that's what this is all about. No one is stopping anyone from living how they want to live.
No, my point was that there's been far more polygamy in history than gay anything, but no one is taking that idea seriously. However, if gay "marriage" happens then there's no legitimate argument against polygamy being allowed as well. And don't think it won't happen. There are enough fringe Mormon crackpots or people who just want screw with the law that someone will make an issue of this. And let's be clear, the economic, political and social ramifications of any redefinition of marriage are bigger than we can imagine.
Here's the point: No state should have to recognize a marriage by another state if the definition of marriage is suddenly expanded in one state, but rejected in another. However, the constitution requires states to honor all contracts made in other states, so the only way to keep, say, Massachusetts from foisting their definition on say, people in the world (e.g., Kansas, Texas, Georgia, etc) is to amend the Constitution. The Defense of Marriage Act probably won't hold up in court for that reason and probably others.
Now if your state wants to create a gay marriage and it is passed into law by the legislature or referendum then that's fine, but if my state defeats such a law then I don't want my state to have to recognize marriages in your state which are not legal in my state.
See, it's really not so much a religious issue as it is a state's rights issue. The issue is to allow states to define how they want to run themselves (something the 9th and 10th amendments used to do before the interstate commerce clause became syntactically equivalent to "everything") without interferences from other states or from the Federal Government on those issues it is not allowed to control.
It doesn't hurt to know how candidates stand on minor issues. If you plan to vote for Kerry, and Kerry wins, but he comes across with the wrong answer in your mind (e.g., the DCMA is too weak... we should make it illegal to even describe something you saw on TV), then you could immediately make plans to try to change his mind through letters, etc.
No candidate will agree with you 100% unless you are some mindless Kool-Aid drinking sheep (none of those around here?). I haven't RTFA yet, but I'm curious to understand where Bush and Kerry stand on this, although I expect the answers will be painfully vague and short on details from both.
I was referring to historical precendence. Before very recently, not only was there no gay "marriage", but no one even seriously considered it as a concept. So my statement stands.
All it takes is one judge. Let it come to a vote. The problem is that proponents of gay marriage don't want that because they know they'll lose. So they'll get judges to legislate from the bench.
Unless you have some solid proof that more people are harmed by gay marraige than a lack of it
Here's something no one seems to think about. If we find that the "man" and "woman" part of marriage is subject to change, then there is nothing to prevent people from making the same argument to "two".
I've seen an article by a Constitutional scholar (sorry I don't have a reference) that argues that we redefine marriage to include same-sex couples, then nothing can prevent the definition from being modified to include "more than two people."
Are you ready for polygamy? The funny thing is that there is no precedence in Western society for gay marriage, but there is for polygamy. Just look at the Old Testament. Once we redefine marriage, it will be subject to (even more) abuse for economic reasons or for other benefits and will cease to have any real meaning. When marriage becomes meaningless, the family's disintegratation is hastened.
p.s. Abortion is easy: No abortion? One (in theory) harmed. Abortion? One harmed, one dead.
It's what they used to record one of the best concert performances in the last several years.
I've heard mumblings that Neal Morse may yet do another project with Roine Stolt. His second post-SB album "One" with Portnoy, et al comes out on Election Day. What could be a better way to celebrate the end of this horrible, endless campiagn season?!
If any of you/.'ers ever want to hear real grown-up music by real grown-up musicians who can actually write and play, check these guys out.
MS is like my dog, who I've nick-named monopoly, he was promisng to start with then he jumps up to bite me in the ass given any excuse......and now he doesn't do anything useful but sit around and lick his Ballmers.
A friend of mine with many, many years of Microsoft experience with development and a broad range of their server tools and other high-end stuff was in a meeting with the Microsoft rep for his client.
It quickly became apparent that the Microsoft rep wasn't doing too well, since he wasn't giving acceptable answers to a lot of tough questions. Eventually my friend was asked to leave the meeting. Even though everyone felt the same way, it wasn't too politic to refer to MS as "$^%#ing idiots".
That's the thing about MS. Thet are just barely good enough to avoid serious repercussions from their incompetence... so far anyway. They seem to have a knack for screwing up the absolute maximum that allows them to maintain their monopoly... or another way, having just enough monopoly to get away with the huge amount of screw-ups they make.
Oh, well, VS6 is a good product and that's what my world is about.
If the U.N. had done its job, the Iraq war would never have been necessary. Complain all you will about what Bush did in Iraq, it was he who got the inspectors back in. It was he who got a Security Council tto unanimously agree on a resolution that would result in "serious consequences" if broken, and it was Bush who was willing to actually go through with those consequences.
Before Bush came around, the combined moral and political might of the U.N. couldn't even keep inspectors in, or do anything else to enforce any of its meaningless resolutions. Saddam was trying to weasel his way out of sanctions so he could start up his nuclear program again.
If anyone in this country votes based on the endorsement of a non-American, then that person has exercised poor judgement indeed. Iran is probably playing reverse psychology, figuring if they act like want Bush, we'll think they are trying to trick us into doing what they supposedly don't want.
If anyone thinks Iraq would really prefer Bush to Kerry, then he or she hasn't been paying attention. Bush says he will take down Iran if he has too, period, and they know he means it. Kerry made no such comments, and has consistently stated that he will follow the same kind of path that the U.N. has followed in these situations... a united coalition of finger-waggers.
I'm sorry the rest of the world wants Bush out. But the rest of world also wants America weaker and less relevant., because it makes them (France, are you listening?) look less pathetic. We can't let the opinions of the rest of the world dictate what's best for us.
Besides, I would imagine that those countries who weren't coerced or bribed to leave Bush's coalition still support him.
What would happen if 95% of all Americans lived in cities?
That wouldn't change the presidential vote unless these cities were all in the same state (or a small number of states).
Congressional districts within states are broken up roughly in terms of the same population for each. I would assume that this would mean lots of geographically small districts and a few large ones.
Even in the extreme case you describe the system is nowhere near unbalanced as you make it out to be,
About 13% of Americans are black, yet they don't have an equal share of representation as white people.
This is only relevant if blacks are inherently different from whites. I don't believe that and I thought our politically correct overlords were trying to teach us all races are equal. I wouldn't vote based on race... I wouldn't even vote based on my religion (which describes me a whole lot more) because I'm Catholic and wouldn't vote for Kerry. Qualities like race, sex or geographic home, hair style, speaking style, or obnoxiousness of a candidate's spouse should not be relevant (I realize they often are). Qualities like political attitudes, philosophical stands, and history of public life (and to a large extent, personal life) should dictate how people will vote. I think the differences in racial politics are really largely based on differences in socioeconomic standing. I would expect middle-class blacks to vote similarly to middle-class whites, and the same for lower- and upper-class people. It just so happens a disproportionate number of blacks are lower in economic standing. If we help all poor people, the blacks will come into parity with other races, and their politics will probably follow suit. I don't see it as a black thing, but as a people thing. But then again I'm a pasty-white computer nerd who understands black culture about as well as I understand ancient Greek. Maybe I'm completely wrong. I just try to see people as people.
However, in answer to your question, if we somehow institutionalize race into our political system we will never rise above racism we are struggling to escape completely from today. It's bad enough as it is because treating people without regard to color isn't good enough any more.
I understand what you are talking about and where you are coming from. But now we are playing Monday morning quarterback based on things they only let the public know. I support a transparent government, but in matters of national security, I can see where we sometimes must have a very limited view of what's going on. If it were just Bush with some kind of weird vendetta, Congress wouldn't have voted to give him the authority to act if Saddam was in material breach of U.N. Resolution 1441. John Kerry voted for that (although to hear him talk now, apparently, he didn't realize what he was doing). To make it even more confusing, Kerry said as recently as this summer that knowing what we know now, he'd have voted that way again. Kerry had called for unilateral action by the U.S. if necessary in the late 90's. That was how almost everyone felt.
I think one of the most positive things Bush accomplished was to get inspectors back in Iraq in early 2003. If you recall they were all kicked out in 1998. Bush placed an artificial deadline on the inspectors' work by saying we needed to go in and kick Saddam out before it got hot, because our troops would be in more danger when the weather was hitting 120 degrees regularly. While that's certainly true, I think it made the timing bad. Another 6 months might have changed a lot of things.
However, regardless of the veracity of the evidence invoked by Bush and his advisors (none of which was really big, and many of which are now shown to be false), if Saddam didn't have any weapon stockpiles, what was he hiding? He kicked inspectors out in '98. When they came back in '03, he and his government completely jerked them around, preventing them from doing their jobs well. In every way, he acted like he was hiding something... to the point of deceiving members of his own government. No one seems to recall how belligerent and defiant he was being in 2003.
Now we know he had no weapons. So why did he put on the big show? What were we supposed to conclude with all the cloak and dagger deception and burying information in tens of thousands of pages of reports?
If the U.N. passed 1441, what did they intend to do to back it up? I'm betting nothing... many of them were on the take from this so-called Oil for Food program. France, who had been bought off, possibly convinced Saddam we would never attack and he could stall and jerk everyone around long enough to finally get sanctions dropped, at which time his clear intention was to get the nuclear program back on track... even if it was further behind than we knew.
I'll be honest, in retrospect, my support for the war isn't as strong as it was last year, although I still support what we are trying to do and support our troops helping the Iraqis prepare to govern themselves. I believe there are long-term and far-reaching effects which will be beneficial to us and people in the Middle East and the world at large for decades to come from two legitimate democracies in Afghanistan and Iraq. In particular, I think this will improve our position with Iran, since it will be surrounded by two democracies. I think Bush should have called for the Iranians to overthrow their dictators, much like Reagan gave vocal and public support to the Polish. If that is possible, all of a sudden a whole lot of Muslim nutjobs have a whole lot less support. No one doubts that Iran is working on the bomb and is close to getting it. With Iraq having a new government, Iran suddenly faces the fact that if they attack it, they are risking trouble from the U.S., which wasn't true in the past.
Despite these issues, I think this war will be viewed differently 20 years from now. At least that is my belief and one of the big reasons why I continue to support President Bush. There's a big picture here that many people don't see and Bush's opponents don't want to acknowledge. We'll see. If in 2024 (or 2005) it turns out I'm completely wrong about this, I'll admit it. From what I understand a lar
If anything, lower hardware prices would increase piracy. If an extra couple hundred million people can suddenly afford computers, wouldn't that just create a huge new market for pirated software?
Can Ballmer even pretend the stuff he's saying makes any sense? He thinks increasing the demand for software among the poor will reduce piracy?
I'm all for cheaper hardware, but when the cost of the software running exceeds the cost of the machine, what do you think is going to happen?
What's he going to say next, if they start charging more for Windows people will think it's more secure? Wait, that could actually happen...
But what about World Population Awareness Week? How can we,as a country, function without World Population Awareness Week?! Won't someone please think of the children? (Or, maybe, _don't_ think of the children?)
Without Kerry's heroic support of this oft-ignored problem, we wouldn't celebrate this wonderful event every year. I've already got my Birth Control tree and am decking it out with condoms, diaphragms and alcohol-free beer.
The problem with the Nugget theory is that while it appeared to be a decomposition of Tyson's theorem, really it was patched together from by-products of disproved formulae and contained very little of Tyson's ideas.
Here's the question I would ask Kerry: Who would be necessary to make this Coalition legitimate?
France? Germany? Russia? China?
He always talks about what he would accomplish, not how he would accomplish it (or in this case, with whom).
BTW, the President of Poland was _really_ pissed off at Kerry after the first debate. Granted he's no Jacques Chirac in terms of relevance (wait, bad example), but I thought foreign leaders loved Kerry. I know the VC did.
You were describing a formula developed by Gwynne(65) and further developed by Sanford(73), and Schneider(77).
Sanders' Equation was:
hAr/(l^An)
where h is Planck's constant, A sub r is the acceleration frame relative to the rotating mass, l is the angular momentum, and A sub n is the acceleration frame normal.
I understand this formula works for 11 dimensions (or "vibratory branes"... often referred to in terms of "hertz and spaces"), but no one besides Sanders seems to understand exactly what they are.
Just like Relativity which has the Special and General versions, this also has two versions, related to General Relativity and M-theory respectively.
These are commonly referred to Regular and Extra Stringy.
You're definitely right about the first debate, but I wasn't watch for who put on a better show. In the second debate he _wouldn't_ name a mistake he made (I've got a hint for him: THAT was a huge mistake). The third debate he might have come off as obnoxious but he was saying what we all feel. Kerry doesn't seem to have any center: His plan for being president is "Beat Bush", and maybe "Suck Up To France"... and massive giveaways for all. I mean every presidential candidate has a Christmas list, but he can't even pretend what he's offering is realistic. So "more of the same" or... we have no idea because he can't deliver on impossible promises (Health care for all children from day 1?) because once you're president, you don't have a another candidate to contradict... how will he decide where he stands? And his VP candidate makes Elmer Gantry seem subdued, but without the integrity.
Bush doesn't do well in a debate. He comes across awkward and unsure. Kerry sucks at giving speeches. He's got the oratory skills of a dead fish. They both excel at the opposite. It's not a reason to vote for someone though.
The debates are bogus anyway, they're really just duelling press conferences, and they become more like that each election. With all those stupid rules, I'm surprised they were even allowed to be on the same stage.
I'd love to see a real knock-down drag out debate with the top 6 candidates or so (Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Whatever-the-hell-Nader-is-this-week, Green and Constitution parties... does the Reform Party still exist?) where anything goes, short of physical violence (although a cage match with leather loin cloths, body oil and folding chairs is a tempting idea).
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See, unlike most people, you are willing to recognize the logical consequences of what you are calling for and accept them, and I respect you for that. Most people who would support gay marriage will draw the line at polygamy (or polyandry or whatever other combination you want to name), but won't be able to defend it. It's either what we have now, or anything goes. I think anything has complicated economic ramifications that we haven't forseen, not the least of which is making it easier to defraud the system.
And, yes, when you get down to it, I am endorsing large-scale rationalized oppression, if you want to put it that way. I find it hard to argue with that since you would not agree with my bases for keeping things the way they are, so once again, put it to a vote. There's no argument I can make that you will accept from what you have said. (I'm not making a criticism, just agreeing to disagree.)
If it gets voted in, well I won't agree with it, but I don't agree with a lot of what our country does.
Why should childless couples benefit?
Technically they shouldn't. However that's covered by the child tax credit. It's not a perfectly consistent setup now, but tinkering with it without understanding the consequences is folly.
Everyone makes this out to be some kind of civil rights issue. Well, I want to marry my sister. Should that be allowed? Medical implications you say? OK, I want to marry my brother. You see, making one change, regardless of its merits, opens the floodgates. I'm not ready to dismantle a fundamental basis of our society to please a small minority.
Put it to a vote. That's the democratic way. If it doesn't pass then deal with it. But don't force through something the majority of the country or its representatives don't want simply because playing by the rules won't work.
Also, even if it does pass, remember the Constitutional ramifications of that, which I've argued elsewhere in the thread. It's a BIG can of worms whose biggest effect will be only to enrich the lawyers.
Yeah, except for those cases where no abortion = one or two dead from complications.
And you're telling me that's why it's legal? Guess again. That situation is very rare, and we all see through the ruse when it's given as a defense of partial-birth abortion.
If carrying a baby to term will kill the mother, how does forcibly destroying the baby's brain inches from birth help her? A Caesarian section is safer for both, but you have this inconvenient live baby at the end of it. What a shame.
Those are tough cases, worth consideration, but probably account for one tenth of one percent of abortions. This is all about denying someone his or her humanity for convenience.
But it does make a difference when I am paying higher taxes and higher insurance premiums because of brand new beneficiaries of the government's largesse. And let's face it, that's what this is all about. No one is stopping anyone from living how they want to live.
Really, the swears don't help make your case.
Republicans don't need drugs and porno to have fun.
No, my point was that there's been far more polygamy in history than gay anything, but no one is taking that idea seriously. However, if gay "marriage" happens then there's no legitimate argument against polygamy being allowed as well. And don't think it won't happen. There are enough fringe Mormon crackpots or people who just want screw with the law that someone will make an issue of this. And let's be clear, the economic, political and social ramifications of any redefinition of marriage are bigger than we can imagine.
Here's the point: No state should have to recognize a marriage by another state if the definition of marriage is suddenly expanded in one state, but rejected in another. However, the constitution requires states to honor all contracts made in other states, so the only way to keep, say, Massachusetts from foisting their definition on say, people in the world (e.g., Kansas, Texas, Georgia, etc) is to amend the Constitution. The Defense of Marriage Act probably won't hold up in court for that reason and probably others.
Now if your state wants to create a gay marriage and it is passed into law by the legislature or referendum then that's fine, but if my state defeats such a law then I don't want my state to have to recognize marriages in your state which are not legal in my state.
See, it's really not so much a religious issue as it is a state's rights issue. The issue is to allow states to define how they want to run themselves (something the 9th and 10th amendments used to do before the interstate commerce clause became syntactically equivalent to "everything") without interferences from other states or from the Federal Government on those issues it is not allowed to control.
When was the last time you heard of serious concerns about the authenticity of a video clip?
I heard the last Star Wars movie had acting, but I think it was faked.
It doesn't hurt to know how candidates stand on minor issues. If you plan to vote for Kerry, and Kerry wins, but he comes across with the wrong answer in your mind (e.g., the DCMA is too weak... we should make it illegal to even describe something you saw on TV), then you could immediately make plans to try to change his mind through letters, etc.
No candidate will agree with you 100% unless you are some mindless Kool-Aid drinking sheep (none of those around here?). I haven't RTFA yet, but I'm curious to understand where Bush and Kerry stand on this, although I expect the answers will be painfully vague and short on details from both.
I was referring to historical precendence. Before very recently, not only was there no gay "marriage", but no one even seriously considered it as a concept. So my statement stands.
There's no push for it.
All it takes is one judge. Let it come to a vote. The problem is that proponents of gay marriage don't want that because they know they'll lose. So they'll get judges to legislate from the bench.
Unless you have some solid proof that more people are harmed by gay marraige than a lack of it
Here's something no one seems to think about. If we find that the "man" and "woman" part of marriage is subject to change, then there is nothing to prevent people from making the same argument to "two".
I've seen an article by a Constitutional scholar (sorry I don't have a reference) that argues that we redefine marriage to include same-sex couples, then nothing can prevent the definition from being modified to include "more than two people."
Are you ready for polygamy? The funny thing is that there is no precedence in Western society for gay marriage, but there is for polygamy. Just look at the Old Testament.
Once we redefine marriage, it will be subject to (even more) abuse for economic reasons or for other benefits and will cease to have any real meaning. When marriage becomes meaningless, the family's disintegratation is hastened.
p.s. Abortion is easy: No abortion? One (in theory) harmed. Abortion? One harmed, one dead.
What does Transatlantic have to do with DVDs?
/.'ers ever want to hear real grown-up music by real grown-up musicians who can actually write and play, check these guys out.
It's what they used to record one of the best concert performances in the last several years.
I've heard mumblings that Neal Morse may yet do another project with Roine Stolt. His second post-SB album "One" with Portnoy, et al comes out on Election Day. What could be a better way to celebrate the end of this horrible, endless campiagn season?!
If any of you
MS is like my dog, who I've nick-named monopoly, he was promisng to start with then he jumps up to bite me in the ass given any excuse... ...and now he doesn't do anything useful but sit around and lick his Ballmers.
A friend of mine with many, many years of Microsoft experience with development and a broad range of their server tools and other high-end stuff was in a meeting with the Microsoft rep for his client.
It quickly became apparent that the Microsoft rep wasn't doing too well, since he wasn't giving acceptable answers to a lot of tough questions. Eventually my friend was asked to leave the meeting. Even though everyone felt the same way, it wasn't too politic to refer to MS as "$^%#ing idiots".
That's the thing about MS. Thet are just barely good enough to avoid serious repercussions from their incompetence... so far anyway. They seem to have a knack for screwing up the absolute maximum that allows them to maintain their monopoly... or another way, having just enough monopoly to get away with the huge amount of screw-ups they make.
Oh, well, VS6 is a good product and that's what my world is about.
If the U.N. had done its job, the Iraq war would never have been necessary. Complain all you will about what Bush did in Iraq, it was he who got the inspectors back in. It was he who got a Security Council tto unanimously agree on a resolution that would result in "serious consequences" if broken, and it was Bush who was willing to actually go through with those consequences.
Before Bush came around, the combined moral and political might of the U.N. couldn't even keep inspectors in, or do anything else to enforce any of its meaningless resolutions. Saddam was trying to weasel his way out of sanctions so he could start up his nuclear program again.
And Yassir Arafat has endorsed Kerry.
If anyone in this country votes based on the endorsement of a non-American, then that person has exercised poor judgement indeed. Iran is probably playing reverse psychology, figuring if they act like want Bush, we'll think they are trying to trick us into doing what they supposedly don't want.
If anyone thinks Iraq would really prefer Bush to Kerry, then he or she hasn't been paying attention. Bush says he will take down Iran if he has too, period, and they know he means it. Kerry made no such comments, and has consistently stated that he will follow the same kind of path that the U.N. has followed in these situations... a united coalition of finger-waggers.
I'm sorry the rest of the world wants Bush out. But the rest of world also wants America weaker and less relevant., because it makes them (France, are you listening?) look less pathetic. We can't let the opinions of the rest of the world dictate what's best for us.
Besides, I would imagine that those countries who weren't coerced or bribed to leave Bush's coalition still support him.
What would happen if 95% of all Americans lived in cities?
That wouldn't change the presidential vote unless these cities were all in the same state (or a small number of states).
Congressional districts within states are broken up roughly in terms of the same population for each. I would assume that this would mean lots of geographically small districts and a few large ones.
Even in the extreme case you describe the system is nowhere near unbalanced as you make it out to be,
About 13% of Americans are black, yet they don't have an equal share of representation as white people.
This is only relevant if blacks are inherently different from whites. I don't believe that and I thought our politically correct overlords were trying to teach us all races are equal. I wouldn't vote based on race... I wouldn't even vote based on my religion (which describes me a whole lot more) because I'm Catholic and wouldn't vote for Kerry. Qualities like race, sex or geographic home, hair style, speaking style, or obnoxiousness of a candidate's spouse should not be relevant (I realize they often are). Qualities like political attitudes, philosophical stands, and history of public life (and to a large extent, personal life) should dictate how people will vote. I think the differences in racial politics are really largely based on differences in socioeconomic standing. I would expect middle-class blacks to vote similarly to middle-class whites, and the same for lower- and upper-class people. It just so happens a disproportionate number of blacks are lower in economic standing. If we help all poor people, the blacks will come into parity with other races, and their politics will probably follow suit. I don't see it as a black thing, but as a people thing. But then again I'm a pasty-white computer nerd who understands black culture about as well as I understand ancient Greek. Maybe I'm completely wrong. I just try to see people as people.
However, in answer to your question, if we somehow institutionalize race into our political system we will never rise above racism we are struggling to escape completely from today. It's bad enough as it is because treating people without regard to color isn't good enough any more.
khasim:
I understand what you are talking about and where you are coming from. But now we are playing Monday morning quarterback based on things they only let the public know.
I support a transparent government, but in matters of national security, I can see where we sometimes must have a very limited view of what's going on. If it were just Bush with some kind of weird vendetta, Congress wouldn't have voted to give him the authority to act if Saddam was in material breach of U.N. Resolution 1441. John Kerry voted for that (although to hear him talk now, apparently, he didn't realize what he was doing). To make it even more confusing, Kerry said as recently as this summer that knowing what we know now, he'd have voted that way again. Kerry had called for unilateral action by the U.S. if necessary in the late 90's. That was how almost everyone felt.
I think one of the most positive things Bush accomplished was to get inspectors back in Iraq in early 2003. If you recall they were all kicked out in 1998. Bush placed an artificial deadline on the inspectors' work by saying we needed to go in and kick Saddam out before it got hot, because our troops would be in more danger when the weather was hitting 120 degrees regularly. While that's certainly true, I think it made the timing bad. Another 6 months might have changed a lot of things.
However, regardless of the veracity of the evidence invoked by Bush and his advisors (none of which was really big, and many of which are now shown to be false), if Saddam didn't have any weapon stockpiles, what was he hiding? He kicked inspectors out in '98. When they came back in '03, he and his government completely jerked them around, preventing them from doing their jobs well. In every way, he acted like he was hiding something... to the point of deceiving members of his own government. No one seems to recall how belligerent and defiant he was being in 2003.
Now we know he had no weapons. So why did he put on the big show? What were we supposed to conclude with all the cloak and dagger deception and burying information in tens of thousands of pages of reports?
If the U.N. passed 1441, what did they intend to do to back it up? I'm betting nothing... many of them were on the take from this so-called Oil for Food program. France, who had been bought off, possibly convinced Saddam we would never attack and he could stall and jerk everyone around long enough to finally get sanctions dropped, at which time his clear intention was to get the nuclear program back on track... even if it was further behind than we knew.
I'll be honest, in retrospect, my support for the war isn't as strong as it was last year, although I still support what we are trying to do and support our troops helping the Iraqis prepare to govern themselves. I believe there are long-term and far-reaching effects which will be beneficial to us and people in the Middle East and the world at large for decades to come from two legitimate democracies in Afghanistan and Iraq. In particular, I think this will improve our position with Iran, since it will be surrounded by two democracies. I think Bush should have called for the Iranians to overthrow their dictators, much like Reagan gave vocal and public support to the Polish. If that is possible, all of a sudden a whole lot of Muslim nutjobs have a whole lot less support. No one doubts that Iran is working on the bomb and is close to getting it. With Iraq having a new government, Iran suddenly faces the fact that if they attack it, they are risking trouble from the U.S., which wasn't true in the past.
Despite these issues, I think this war will be viewed differently 20 years from now. At least that is my belief and one of the big reasons why I continue to support President Bush. There's a big picture here that many people don't see and Bush's opponents don't want to acknowledge. We'll see. If in 2024 (or 2005) it turns out I'm completely wrong about this, I'll admit it. From what I understand a lar
What's MS going to do when Google integrates an OS as their service...
Buy Google.
If anything, lower hardware prices would increase piracy. If an extra couple hundred million people can suddenly afford computers, wouldn't that just create a huge new market for pirated software?
Can Ballmer even pretend the stuff he's saying makes any sense? He thinks increasing the demand for software among the poor will reduce piracy?
I'm all for cheaper hardware, but when the cost of the software running exceeds the cost of the machine, what do you think is going to happen?
What's he going to say next, if they start charging more for Windows people will think it's more secure? Wait, that could actually happen...
But what about World Population Awareness Week? How can we,as a country, function without World Population Awareness Week?! Won't someone please think of the children? (Or, maybe, _don't_ think of the children?)
Without Kerry's heroic support of this oft-ignored problem, we wouldn't celebrate this wonderful event every year. I've already got my Birth Control tree and am decking it out with condoms, diaphragms and alcohol-free beer.
The problem with the Nugget theory is that while it appeared to be a decomposition of Tyson's theorem, really it was patched together from by-products of disproved formulae and contained very little of Tyson's ideas.
Here's the question I would ask Kerry: Who would be necessary to make this Coalition legitimate?
France? Germany? Russia? China?
He always talks about what he would accomplish, not how he would accomplish it (or in this case, with whom).
BTW, the President of Poland was _really_ pissed off at Kerry after the first debate. Granted he's no Jacques Chirac in terms of relevance (wait, bad example), but I thought foreign leaders loved Kerry. I know the VC did.
Sanders developed a corollary for this saying:
f-r/e^d
You were describing a formula developed by Gwynne(65) and further developed by Sanford(73), and Schneider(77).
Sanders' Equation was:
hAr/(l^An)
where h is Planck's constant, A sub r is the acceleration frame relative to the rotating mass, l is the angular momentum, and A sub n is the acceleration frame normal.
I understand this formula works for 11 dimensions (or "vibratory branes"... often referred to in terms of "hertz and spaces"), but no one besides Sanders seems to understand exactly what they are.
Just like Relativity which has the Special and General versions, this also has two versions, related to General Relativity and M-theory respectively.
These are commonly referred to Regular and Extra Stringy.
You're definitely right about the first debate, but I wasn't watch for who put on a better show. In the second debate he _wouldn't_ name a mistake he made (I've got a hint for him: THAT was a huge mistake). The third debate he might have come off as obnoxious but he was saying what we all feel. Kerry doesn't seem to have any center: His plan for being president is "Beat Bush", and maybe "Suck Up To France"... and massive giveaways for all. I mean every presidential candidate has a Christmas list, but he can't even pretend what he's offering is realistic. So "more of the same" or... we have no idea because he can't deliver on impossible promises (Health care for all children from day 1?) because once you're president, you don't have a another candidate to contradict... how will he decide where he stands? And his VP candidate makes Elmer Gantry seem subdued, but without the integrity.
Bush doesn't do well in a debate. He comes across awkward and unsure. Kerry sucks at giving speeches. He's got the oratory skills of a dead fish. They both excel at the opposite. It's not a reason to vote for someone though.
The debates are bogus anyway, they're really just duelling press conferences, and they become more like that each election. With all those stupid rules, I'm surprised they were even allowed to be on the same stage.
I'd love to see a real knock-down drag out debate with the top 6 candidates or so (Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Whatever-the-hell-Nader-is-this-week, Green and Constitution parties... does the Reform Party still exist?) where anything goes, short of physical violence (although a cage match with leather loin cloths, body oil and folding chairs is a tempting idea).