I have trouble understanding how that is even Sci-Fi at all. I mean sure, if the guy was in a coma and his consciousness was somehow transferred to a t-rex and the story proceeded from there, ok fine. In it's current form it's not even fantasy let alone Sci-Fi.
The president is authorized to negotiate treaties, they're just not binding until ratified by the Senate. A variety of presidents, both Republican and Democrat, have negotiated treaties that failed to be ratified by the Senate. What we have so far isn't even an unratified treaty, it's just a framework agreement of things that might go in a treaty that is still to be negotiated.
Existing sanctions weren't really keeping them from developing a bomb, so that really left us four choices:
1) Ignore the situation until they get around to having a bomb.
2) Attempt to increase sanctions, even though many international partners probably won't play ball, in the hope that they'll suffer an internal revolt.
3) Military action, either bombing or an invasion. The goal being to either destroy their facilities or overthrow their regime.
4) Negotiation, in order to delay their efforts, re-integrate them into the international community and influence their regime using soft power to change the attitudes of their citizens and leadership over time.
One is stupid, two probably won't work since everyone wants Iran's oil and several countries will ignore the sanctions while many more will refuse to increase them. Nearly 74% of Americans favor stopping Iran from getting nuclear weapons however only 29% support direct military action in order to prevent it, at the same time 56% support easing of some sanctions in return for restrictions & inspections of Iran's nuclear program even if that doesn't end it completely. It seems to me that the president is following the will of the people quite accurately.
I'm pro-military and I served in Marines. I have no problem with military intervention if that becomes necessary but it's stupid to go that route without at least trying to negotiate our way out of the problem first. Sure, we could flatten them if we were willing to pay the price but that sort of action isn't free in dollars or lives.
The medical community does a great job of handling acute emergency care for obvious maladies. On the other hand they do a truly terrible job of promoting health, early detection and preventing serious illness from occurring. Patients with more data will be in a position to do a much better job. Sure, there may be some false alarms or misreading of symptoms but overall the net benefit is going to be massively positive.
I've done construction, it's dangerous, backbreaking, often uncomfortable, thankless work, which is why even the entry level jobs pay more than serving fries at McDonalds. If we can find ways to make it safer I'm all for it. In the meantime we seem to have gotten seriously off topic.
Well, compared to Gaddafi we are the good guys. Frankly, I'm hard pressed to name a major nation that is better. Sure, there are a couple of smaller ones that are nice, Finland for example, but of major powers I'm drawing a blank.
Discrimination is discrimination. It can't be half discrimination.
Of course it is, but it's not quite that straightforward. We allow many kinds of discrimination and prevent some. We also try to protect freedom of association and freedom of religion. Sometimes those three things conflict and we end up with a situation where supporting one thing decreases support of the others and so decisions have to be made about where to draw the line. Previously the line was all in favor of those against same sex marriage, recently things have shifted the other direction, as a society we'll have to figure out how to balance things fairly. Perhaps the right place to draw the line is zero tolerance, perhaps it's not, I'm sure there will be plenty of debate about it going forward just as there has been about things like racism and affirmative action.
I'm not saying that it's not do-able. But that doesn't mean to say it's "straightforward".
I was suggesting that it didn't require any new scientific discoveries and that our current technology could be adapted to the task. It's an engineering and construction problem certainly but not out of reach.
Banana Republics? How about every society we've ever had. Some times we dress it up in fancier clothing (Republics) and sometimes not so much (Feudalism). I'm no sure it's even possible to design a society that doesn't start out or end up this way shortly thereafter without altering the human genome.
Sure, employers want experience, from the stack of people who are left after they've performed the degree sort and tossed all the non-degree people in the round file.
Ending the NSA would compromise our ability to prevent terrorism.
There are plenty of other people who don't like us and are much more dangerous than terrorists. I may be unhappy with the way the NSA has been acting and I think some changes should be made but what you're suggesting is just reckless.
I wrote a long reply but Slashdot ate it so you get the short recap. Dole was never president so he didn't get a chance to affect much. Bush Senior did plenty of things that make him sound just like Obama.
That would just mean you're screwing middle class people instead of poor people for the most part by shifting the regression curve. Consumption taxes are bad for anyone who isn't rich. If you're rich on the other hand they're great, after all very little of your money is spent on consumption, it's pretty much all used for investing.
Well, the high numbers of people with both lactose and gluten intolerance suggest it does indeed take a while for everyone to adapt. Yes, we are ominvores and we're pretty well adapted to things like fruits, nuts, berries, leafy vegetables and tubers. Since there aren't a lot of grass eating primates we're less well suited to that but we're getting there. In general, the less processing something requires before we can eat it the less problems we're going to have with it, oats for example are pretty well tolerated.
Maybe, that depends on the total level of wealth. If wealth is so large that scarcity isn't much of an issue then some form of spending power equality might not be a big deal. Prior to that happy state we're probably better off with some form of limited incentive system that rewards those who do more.
Well they certainly weren't eating a lot of cereal grains until pretty recently. Herding is probably about 40k years old, while agriculture is around 10k or so. (we could quibble over a few thousand years or so for each but that's the rough timeline) Depending on how you want to draw the line modern humans have been around for about 100k to 200k years in our current form. Arguably we've spent most of our existence not eating cereal grains.
Hard as it may be for you to believe there are actually people out there who don't like us and mean us harm. Ceasing to watch out for that is incredibly shortsighted.
Slashdot Mirror
I have trouble understanding how that is even Sci-Fi at all. I mean sure, if the guy was in a coma and his consciousness was somehow transferred to a t-rex and the story proceeded from there, ok fine. In it's current form it's not even fantasy let alone Sci-Fi.
Obama can't make treaties with other nations, the Constitution says so.
The president is authorized to negotiate treaties, they're just not binding until ratified by the Senate. A variety of presidents, both Republican and Democrat, have negotiated treaties that failed to be ratified by the Senate. What we have so far isn't even an unratified treaty, it's just a framework agreement of things that might go in a treaty that is still to be negotiated.
Existing sanctions weren't really keeping them from developing a bomb, so that really left us four choices:
1) Ignore the situation until they get around to having a bomb.
2) Attempt to increase sanctions, even though many international partners probably won't play ball, in the hope that they'll suffer an internal revolt.
3) Military action, either bombing or an invasion. The goal being to either destroy their facilities or overthrow their regime.
4) Negotiation, in order to delay their efforts, re-integrate them into the international community and influence their regime using soft power to change the attitudes of their citizens and leadership over time.
One is stupid, two probably won't work since everyone wants Iran's oil and several countries will ignore the sanctions while many more will refuse to increase them. Nearly 74% of Americans favor stopping Iran from getting nuclear weapons however only 29% support direct military action in order to prevent it, at the same time 56% support easing of some sanctions in return for restrictions & inspections of Iran's nuclear program even if that doesn't end it completely. It seems to me that the president is following the will of the people quite accurately.
I'm pro-military and I served in Marines. I have no problem with military intervention if that becomes necessary but it's stupid to go that route without at least trying to negotiate our way out of the problem first. Sure, we could flatten them if we were willing to pay the price but that sort of action isn't free in dollars or lives.
The medical community does a great job of handling acute emergency care for obvious maladies. On the other hand they do a truly terrible job of promoting health, early detection and preventing serious illness from occurring. Patients with more data will be in a position to do a much better job. Sure, there may be some false alarms or misreading of symptoms but overall the net benefit is going to be massively positive.
Intelligence != Knowledge
I've done construction, it's dangerous, backbreaking, often uncomfortable, thankless work, which is why even the entry level jobs pay more than serving fries at McDonalds. If we can find ways to make it safer I'm all for it. In the meantime we seem to have gotten seriously off topic.
Well, compared to Gaddafi we are the good guys. Frankly, I'm hard pressed to name a major nation that is better. Sure, there are a couple of smaller ones that are nice, Finland for example, but of major powers I'm drawing a blank.
Meaning working more for the same pay. Employers would be all for this.
*sigh* I hadn't thought of that yet, just what I need, an even more extended workday.
Discrimination is discrimination. It can't be half discrimination.
Of course it is, but it's not quite that straightforward. We allow many kinds of discrimination and prevent some. We also try to protect freedom of association and freedom of religion. Sometimes those three things conflict and we end up with a situation where supporting one thing decreases support of the others and so decisions have to be made about where to draw the line. Previously the line was all in favor of those against same sex marriage, recently things have shifted the other direction, as a society we'll have to figure out how to balance things fairly. Perhaps the right place to draw the line is zero tolerance, perhaps it's not, I'm sure there will be plenty of debate about it going forward just as there has been about things like racism and affirmative action.
Moonbase-1 will be built on blood (boiled to a powder) and bones.
And that makes it different how? Construction has always been dangerous business.
I'm not saying that it's not do-able. But that doesn't mean to say it's "straightforward".
I was suggesting that it didn't require any new scientific discoveries and that our current technology could be adapted to the task. It's an engineering and construction problem certainly but not out of reach.
Banana Republics? How about every society we've ever had. Some times we dress it up in fancier clothing (Republics) and sometimes not so much (Feudalism). I'm no sure it's even possible to design a society that doesn't start out or end up this way shortly thereafter without altering the human genome.
Sure, employers want experience, from the stack of people who are left after they've performed the degree sort and tossed all the non-degree people in the round file.
The marginal benefit from attending Stanford (#4) over Cornell (#15) or Baylor (#70) is pretty negligible
From a knowledge learned perspective you're likely correct, from a branding perspective you couldn't be more wrong.
I'm actually totally ok with that. It's not that they shouldn't be using GPS, just that they should have to follow the correct steps.
Ending the NSA would compromise our ability to prevent terrorism.
There are plenty of other people who don't like us and are much more dangerous than terrorists. I may be unhappy with the way the NSA has been acting and I think some changes should be made but what you're suggesting is just reckless.
I wrote a long reply but Slashdot ate it so you get the short recap. Dole was never president so he didn't get a chance to affect much. Bush Senior did plenty of things that make him sound just like Obama.
Fair enough, but why should we let homosexuals define societal norms?
The majority do, and nowadays 55% want same sex marriage to be legal.
That would just mean you're screwing middle class people instead of poor people for the most part by shifting the regression curve. Consumption taxes are bad for anyone who isn't rich. If you're rich on the other hand they're great, after all very little of your money is spent on consumption, it's pretty much all used for investing.
Less calories of course but otherwise not as much as you might think, besides you're supposed to be exercising regularly, you do that right?
Well, the high numbers of people with both lactose and gluten intolerance suggest it does indeed take a while for everyone to adapt. Yes, we are ominvores and we're pretty well adapted to things like fruits, nuts, berries, leafy vegetables and tubers. Since there aren't a lot of grass eating primates we're less well suited to that but we're getting there. In general, the less processing something requires before we can eat it the less problems we're going to have with it, oats for example are pretty well tolerated.
Maybe, that depends on the total level of wealth. If wealth is so large that scarcity isn't much of an issue then some form of spending power equality might not be a big deal. Prior to that happy state we're probably better off with some form of limited incentive system that rewards those who do more.
Well they certainly weren't eating a lot of cereal grains until pretty recently. Herding is probably about 40k years old, while agriculture is around 10k or so. (we could quibble over a few thousand years or so for each but that's the rough timeline) Depending on how you want to draw the line modern humans have been around for about 100k to 200k years in our current form. Arguably we've spent most of our existence not eating cereal grains.
Thirty years ago he would have been an establishment republican.
Hard as it may be for you to believe there are actually people out there who don't like us and mean us harm. Ceasing to watch out for that is incredibly shortsighted.
Even people who try to ram the gates of a federal military facility still deserve their right to a fair trial.
If they live through being shot, yes.