Actually, my mom knew von Braun when she was a girl. After her father died in '52 she spent a lot of time living with her uncle and his family. He was an Air Force colonel involved with rocket research and was something of a liason between the Air Force and captured German rocket scientists. She said they were over at his house pretty regularly and that she personally liked von Braun, for what that's worth; that he used to do little magic tricks with coins for her and her cousins.
More to the point, however, I think the problem is the loss of ARCADES. Dave and Busters just doesn't do it as far as economy goes (very expensive) and I don't know how many of those charming, cigarette burn covered arcades are still around.
I grew up in Hampton Beach, New Hampshire from '72 to '84 and that place was - and still is - Arcade Heaven; at least a half-dozen of the places ranging in size from small to cavernous as you walk along the boardwalk. Lots of pinball machines, too. If pinballs are gasping for air these days, no one's bothered telling the arcades in Hampton Beach, or the people I always see playing the things when I drive up there during the summer.
I will be eternally grateful for Nirvana for finally driving tired boomer 'classic rock' from the non-classic rock radio in the early 1990s.
Ten years ago I'd have agreed with you, but in retrospect a lot of that stuff at least had character, even if I'd heard "Whole Lotta Love" and "Behind Blue Eyes" about a thousand times apiece. I know it sounds like something a boring old fart would say, but one lame mook rock/nü metal band sounds pretty much like the next to me. Twenty-five minutes into a set of chunka-chunka down-tuned guitars backing up ennui coming from a 23-year-old and suddenly "More Than a Feeling" starts sounding pretty good.
ummmmm.... can anyone name a rock superstar who plays the ukelele??? Tiny tim???
George Harrison was a big collector of ukeleles; particularly Gibsons and Martins. He frequently gave them to friends as gifts. I'm told that on his recent tour Paul McCartney regularly performed "Something" on ukelele as a tribute to Harrison. Seems to me that Brian May played some ukelele on a few of the mid-'70s Queen records, too.
Don't be fooled by Falun Gong. They hide behind their sham-of-a-religion to promote an overthrow of the current government. Their leader is a coward and a phony who should be dragged out and shot.
Let's hear it for President Jiang Zemin, everyone! Give him a big hand! Isn't he great?
The Simpsons encountered this with the 'Behind The Laughter' episode. Every prank the Simpsons pulled up to that point was within a defined reality of The Simpsons being a 'real' cartoon family. That episode f*cked it all up.
Actually, my take on that episode was that it shouldn't be assumed to be in the rest of the series' continuity any more than the annual Halloween episodes are, or the spinoff episode was. It was just a funny episode that stood alone outside of the show's regular continuity.
In an interview on NPR a couple of years back, Harry Shearer argued that the episode that actually wrecked the show's continuity was the one in which Principal Skinner was revealed to actually be Armand Tanzarian, a teenaged hood who had joined the army during Vietnam and was taken under the wing of the real Seymour Skinner, who was assumed to have been killed in action. Shearer was livid with the show's writers, who basically ejected eight seasons of character development in one fell swoop.
So do these things have plots? Frustrated panda housewife seduces studly panda electrician? Two pandas getting it on in the locker room after a steamy workout at the gym? Girl panda-on-girl panda action? Is there bow-chicka-bow-wow background music?
If they're good, they can get a record contract and get on the air too.
Quantity and quality aren't necessarily the same thing.
The music industry spends a lot of money finding (or making) what people want.
Actually, considering that more than 90% of major label releases lose money, and that the record industry as a whole has been on a downward sales slide for the last couple of years, a more accurate statement would be to say that the music industry spends a lot of money finding/making what people don't want.
Hilarious. Payola used to at least buy you a hit. Now all it does is get your foot in the door. For a quarter-mil you buy the chance to have a hit. At least Alan Freed gave you an honest hit for your money.
So, many tech savvy fans equals lower sales. Why do you imagine O Brother Where are thou seemed like a golden calf?
Actually, in spite of the fact that "O Brother" has sold 5.5 million copies (biggest country album of 2002 by a long shot), country radio has stonewalled on it; the reason being is that their suspicion is that the vast majority of people buying it aren't regular country listeners, but are instead Volvo-drivin', brie-eatin' dilettantes who *are*, in fact, tech-savvy. The same people who made "The Buena Vista Social Club" a big hit a few years previously, in other words.
Americans (well, for the sake of argument, I assume you cant speak for _all_ of them, so lets say you) conclude that treasuries with multi-coloured currency 'cant decide on a colour'?
Actually, I said "it just looks like their treasuries couldn't make up their damn minds." There's a difference between perception and stating something as a fact.
And I know I'm the hundredth person to point this out, but what about blind people?
Maybe it's an obvious question, but how would changing the color of the bill help them?
Keeee-rist, doesn't the government have anything better to do? I'd argue that one of the reasons why people - albeit subconsciously - regard the dollar as highly as they do is because of its monochromatic appearance. Because of that it looks solid. Sturdy. Foreign currencies might be more festive, but to be honest, to us Americans it just looks like their treasuries couldn't make up their damn minds, which is not a big confidence builder.
And I know I'm about the hundredth person to mention it, but how hard is it to look at the corner of the goddamn bill?
In any event, Congress will never go along with it. The treasury department has been trying to switch over to dollar coins for years, but Congress just laughs at them and beats them up for their lunch money whenever it comes up.
It's certainly an interesting story. In spite of being an incredibly stupid thing to do, the kid definitely earned his geek merit badge with his little stunt. "You installed Linux on your PS2? Hey, that's great - I built a breeder reactor out of old watches."
Still, it's an old story. Maybe it's just a slow news day, but how is this particularly newsworthy?
FWIW, my dad flew the FB-111 from '72 to '84 and loved the plane. It definitely ate up spare parts, but it carried a large payload, had legs to spare, and was probably the fastest low-level bomber in the world by a comfortable margin. I'm pretty sure the Air Force retired the last of its Aardvarks (EF-111s) four years ago, though the Aussies still operate about 35 of them, in three different versions.
The -141 would have revolutionized the capability of the Kiev VTOL carriers, which run Yak-38s
Well, ran Yak-38s, anyway. The last of the Kievs, the Admiral Gorshkov, is reportedly going to be bought by India and heavily modified to fly MiG-29Ks, but the other three are all long since retired; probably sold for scrap by now.
Oddly enough, I remember reading a technothriller back in the '80s in which a Kiev-class battlegroup fought a Nimitz-class battlegroup to a draw. Can't remember the details, but I think the author gave the -38 a lot more credit than it really deserved.
Of course not. They realised that the government in Taiwan cannot represent the whole of China.
What, it took them 22 years to reach that conclusion? For people who are supposedly pretty smart, they sure are slow learners.
They realised that the legal government of China is the People's Republic of China since 1949.
Hilarious. Listen, Taiwan would still be sitting in the China seat at the UN if Nixon and Kissinger hadn't come up with the idea of cozying up to China as a way of making the Soviets behave. The prospect of a billion or so future consumers buying western products also had a bit to do with it. But don't delude yourself with the notion that the consciences of the members of the UN were bothering them. After five years, maybe. I'd even go with ten years. But the UN ignored the PRC for 22 years because it was convenient to do so. And they've ignored the ROC for the past 31 years because it's similarly convenient to do so.
You are certainly more stupid than I think.
Tsk tsk tsk.... Namecalling again. To quote Molière, "A wise man is superior to any insults which can be put upon him, and the best reply to unseemly behavior is patience and moderation."
When I refer to "International organisations", I definitely refer to UN, WHO, and something like these. They are the organisations that require their members to be a COUNTRY. But for those you've listed, like WTO and IOC, their members need not to be a country.
But that's not what you said, is it now? Your original comment on that was "They are recognised only by 28 countries and not accpted by any international organisations[.]" You didn't qualify the definition of "international organizations." Sidestepping your original line of argument isn't a particularly effective way of conducting a debate.
I'm not sure whether Taiwan will be successful in the future. But I know they failed at the present.
How? Their standard of living is four or five times higher than on the mainland. They have a free press, free elections, freedom of religion, a healthy balance of trade, and are a center of international shipping. Doesn't sound like much of a failure to me. They're not without problems, but I could say the same of the mainland.
And for mainland China, it cannot fail a single second. It is a country with 1.3 billion. Once it collapse, the whole world will suffer. Can you image 1.3 billion people that do not anything to eat? Do USA wanna accept 1.3 billion people in starvation?
How in the world do you reach the conclusion that because I believe that Taiwan is independent (in all of the ways that are important) that I'd like to see China collapse and 1.3 billion people starve? Seriously, look back at what I've written over the past week. Believe me, I am not a fan of the PRC's system of government, but the collapse of China isn't a desirable alternative.
Indonesia is one of the example. It achieved 10 to 12% economical development in the past, but unfortunetely, it is now one of the poorest country in Asia. All thanks to democracy that comes to early.
Heh. Indonesia has a lot of problems, but too much democracy isn't one of them. It'd be more appropriate to link the country's economic problems to corruption, difficulties with their banks, a weak legal system, a huge foreign debt, and a few other problems like assorted secessionist movements. Not to mention the usual problems you'd expect when 230 million people are spread out over 6,000 or so islands.
Let's take Taiwan as an example. More than 75% voted in the presidential election. TRell me what's the number in US. In US, this number is less than 60%, sometimes even less than 50%(in France). Why? because they are "democrazy"!
I'd be the first to agree that low voter turnout is a problem in the US. Opinions as to why vary, though a few of the main theories are as follows: 1) Cynicism. The notion that all politicians are crooks and that things will be about the same no matter who's running things. A variation on this theme is that even if not all politicians are crooks, their handlers and advisors are so dependent on polls and focus groups that the real candidate is never given a chance to emerge. 2) Apathy. The notion that what the politicians are talking about has nothing to do with me, as well as the problem that really charismatic politicians who can inspire a nation the way Kennedy did are either hard to come by or when they do emerge, people are cynical about them (see #1). One of the negative effects of both Watergate and Bill Clinton's presidency on American politics was that it's easier to not get your hopes up than to actually be enthused about a candidate and end up feeling disappointed and betrayed in the end. 3) Disenfranchisement. The feeling on the part of some voters (usually those on the lower rungs of the economic ladder) that their vote really doesn't matter, and, in fact, that there are those in power who would be altogether happier if they didn't vote at all.
There's a certain amount of sour grapes at play in any of these reasons, and particularly in #3: "My guy didn't win, so somehow the system was set up against him." And there might also be some truth to all three reasons.
Go and check the document. That is what it says. It "recovers", which means that PRC IS a legal government since 1949, but due to some reasons the UN did not realise it, and until 1971 they discovered that problem and thus "recover" the seat, and chase out that illegal representative of Chang. As clear as that.
What do you mean "discovered the problem?" You mean they didn't realize until 1971 that something on the order of 800 million people weren't recognized by the UN? C'mon, don't be disingenuous. You're more intelligent than that.
So what you mean is that if China became democratic, Taiwan became one part of China and once it is a communist country, Taiwan is not a part of it.
More or less. Taiwan doesn't take part in the day-to-day affairs of the Chinese government and the reverse is also true.
These organisations are different. They do not require its member to be an independent country. Hong Kong is the member of these organisations as well. Macau is a member of these organisations.
As are also a number of legitimate nations. In any event, you're being evasive. First you say that Taiwan belongs to no international organizations. Then, when given a list of international organizations that Taiwan does belong to, you sidestep the issue by saying that, yes, Taiwan belongs to those organizations, but that they don't count. So which is it?
They will not. Actually they are the best example of how democracy will affect one country's economy when the country is not ready. Just look at their news, there are fights between election candidates everywhere, there are news about illegal political trade everywhere.
Believe it or not, that sort of behavior isn't entirely uncommon in democracies; particularly in relatively young ones like Taiwan. It's unfortunate (though sometimes kind of funny), but not indicative of a country that's falling apart because democracy was introduced too soon.
In the past two years when the new government come to power, they have already used up the money they saved for more than fifty years. The biggest problem for Taiwan is that they have democracy before they have a strong middle class. Their economy will collapse if this kind of situation continues.
I sincerely doubt it. Admittedly, capital flight is something of a problem for the Taiwanese, but I haven't seen anything that would lead one to believe that the country's economy is in danger of imminent collapse because of it. In any event, far poorer countries than Taiwan have made democracy work, and far richer ones have managed to screw it up.
Oh boy, you really know nothing. Go and check the documentation about accepting PRC. It did not say it "accept", but "recover" the PRC's seat in UN. For your information, it did not say ROC or Taiwan is not a member of UN any more, but "chase out the representative of Chang Kia-shi". So read more history, ok?
You're conveniently avoiding my original point. Again - Taiwan held the China seat at the UN until '71. They were recognized as the legal government of China until that time. In other words, from '49 until '71 China - your China - was in much the same position that Taiwan is in now. And yet it's clear that China didn't vanish into a black hole during that time.
My point is that you're relying far too heavily on this whole UN/legal recognition thing. Nationhood doesn't boil down to a piece of paper with an official seal on it, and nations oftentimes exist in fact before being recognized by the rest of the world. Events don't hold still just so they can be rubber-stamped by a bureaucrat.
You keep avoiding this point, so I'll say it once again: Taiwan's culture has split from China's in a number of ways over the past fifty years. They're capitalist, your country is communist (albeit a heavily modified form of communism). They have a political process with several parties where you have one. They have freedom of religion where the mainland does not. They have a relatively free press while China's is subject to state control. Most importantly, they don't take orders from Beijing. Yes, there are cultural similarities in a number of areas, but one can say the same of the US and Canada. It still doesn't mean that they should be joined at the hip. I'm sure that there's considerable sentiment for reunification, though from what I understand there are few in Taiwan who want to be part of a united China that's communist. So that leaves the status quo and independence as viable options. In any event, the final choice is up to the Taiwanese.
Then they are not independent. No country in this planet became independent even before they have annouced it.
They have a de facto independence since they're certainly not under the control of China. Heck, let Beijing try to order the arrests of a bunch of Falun Gong members and anti-communist rabble-rousers in Taipei. What's that you say? They can't? Case closed.
That's different. You learnt history of Britain like learning a foreign history. But Taiwanese taught their kids in the way that this is their own country's history. That's a major differentce.
Not really. Before independence we were British subjects from 1620 to 1776. British history up to 1776 was also our history, and it was more or less taught to us that way since their prior actions led eventually to the settlement of North America.
So now we come to a conclusion. Taiwan is a "country", but it never annouced independent, the people there refuse to believe they are living in China, but yet call themselvs Chinese. They say that htey are Taiwanese, not Chinese, but yet they are taught with Chinese history text. They are recognised only by 28 countries and not accpted by any international organisations, and yet Taiwan is a country. What an odd country it is!
Taiwan participates in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, the Asian Development Bank, the Central American Bank for Economic Integration, the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the International Olympic Committee, the Wildlife Conservation Law, and the World Trade Organization. They all sure sound like international organizations to me.
An odd country it might be, but a country it is nonetheless. It's one of the world's 20 largest economies and they've built a vibrant, modern society with a standard of living comparable to many European nations. They've earned their place in the sun.
Well, it's the RIAA's job to put a brave face on things; to strut around making speeches about how they're going to go after file-sharing and recordable CDs with a can of whup-ass and generally acting like it's still 1992.
But if you talk to people who are actually working for record labels, they're scared. Two years of negative growth in a row, with this year looking to be no better. They are still paying the RIAA to push that agenda, but that's mainly because they don't have many other ideas. Every technological and legal attempt they've made so far to address those issues has been beaten. Bluster aside, there are few left in the industry who expect file-sharing and CD-burning to go away just because Hilary Rosen makes a few speeches.
I'm very happy to know that you understand that the constitution is written in 1947 for all of China. So that means Taiwan was a part of China at that time, right? So tell me, when did Taiwanese annouce their independence?
They never have, of course. To have done so would have been counterproductive to the nationalists' stated goal of defeating the communists and returning to power on the mainland. The fact remains that the two cultures have diverged a great deal over the past five decades, and they're not going to be growing any closer together in the coming years.
No one recognise it, and the UN did not accept it, means that it is not a LEGAL government.
Does that mean that your country's government wasn't legal until 1971 when the Chinese seat at the UN was taken from Taiwan and given to China? You can't have it both ways.
I admit that those people who was born in Taiwan may not have a memory of China. But don't neglect the power of education.
I don't, but at the same time I think you're placing too much hope there. When I was growing up in New England we were taught British history since we had originally been a British colony and we have that shared history in common. But it's not like any of my classmates were filled with a desire to be reunited with Great Britain.
The same holds true in other countries; Canada with its British and French roots. Latin America with Spanish and Portuguese origins. But an interesting thing happens: cultures split as a result of time and distance. At some point British colonists started thinking of themselves as Americans. At some point Spanish settlers realized they were Mexicans. And something like that has been happening on Taiwan for several years, with native Taiwanese and Chinese refugees (and their children) starting to think of themselves as Taiwanese in a national sense. It doesn't happen all at once, and not everyone starts thinking in those terms (there were considerable numbers of British loyalists even during our war of independence). But as the people who originally came from the mainland die off, reunification is going to seem a lot more abstract to the people on Taiwan: "Reunify with China? Why? I've never even been there. Anyway, what have they ever done for us except fire missiles around the Straits of Taiwan whenever we have an election coming up?"
Oddly enough, China's relationship with Taiwan reminds me a lot of a guy who's just never been able to get over the fact that his ex-wife broke up with him years ago. And he shows up at her house every once in while, yelling stuff up at the window like "I love you! Come back to me! You still love me - I know you do! If you don't come back to me...I'll kill you!" Which is both pathetic and scary at the same time. Trust me, you catch more flies with honey.
So you mean that people are forced to tell lies in a survey?
Not exactly, but people can feel intimidated in that kind of situation depending on how the questions are phrased and who's asking the questions. For example, imagine a poll conducted by, say, a news magazine in which the survey question is this: "Yes or no - Do you favor the creation of a national secret police force which would be answerable only to the President?" It's pretty safe to say that most people would answer "No." On the other hand, imagine that you're called at home by someone who identifies himself as working for the government and are asked this question: "Yes or no - You wouldn't be opposed the creation of a national secret police force which would be answerable only to the President, would you?" Subtly different, yet intimidating.
In any event, I took about a half-dozen statistics courses in college and part of my job has to do with statistical analysis. For that reason I'm always suspicious of surveys unless I know the source, the methodology, the sample size, and the way the questions were phrased. In the case of the independence question, that puts an additional twist on the survey since a threat of war enters into the equation.
The best proof of Taiwan is not independent come from those pro-independence guys. They held a demonstration as well last month, calling the government to annouce independence. If Taiwan is independence, do the government to annouce it again? It is the best proof that Taiwan is NOT independent because even themselves did not recognise themselves as independent.
Hair-splitting. Taiwan has never formally declared independence, and doing so would require a constitutional amendment. But, in fact, "the best proof" that Taiwan is independent is that it enjoys all the trappings of any other nation; its own laws, its own military, schools, industry, free and regular multi-party elections, and international trade (including WTO membership), none of which answers to China. As a result, Taiwan enjoys a sort of de facto independence.
Lastly about free media. That's the most interesting one. Does free media mean to tell big lies on the newspapers.
Media outlets in the U.S. have the freedom to do that, though that freedom comes with the responsibility of accepting the legal and economic consequences in the case of libel or if the paper is just flat-out making up stories. I'm not going to sit here and tell you that the press in the West is perfect. My biggest complaint is that corporate interests take priority over honest journalism more often than I'd like. But by the same token, an American reporter will likely keep his job even if he questions an official government account of some event. And even if ABC won't do a story that paints Disney in a bad light, the New York Times probably will. The fact that the press isn't government-controlled here means that a story will probably get out eventually, no matter what.
Well, for myself, I've seen many cases that western medias is not reporting the truth, or only half of the truth. The news about Taiwan and mainland is one of them. The plane incident is one. Tiananmen is one. And the attack to our embassy is yet another one.
Well, I doubt that you and I are going to agree on much about those issues. But you seem annoyed about China's treatment from both the U.S. government and the media. Fair enough. But you might want to ask yourself sometime if they might not have a point or two that's worth paying attention to.
I don't want to talk about the plane accident. You know nothing about it at all. Go home and check the newspapers, you fool.
I have. We have a little thing here called a free press. Check into it sometime. And it's interesting to note that you're apparently incapable of discussing the incident without resorting to name-calling.
Just look at the result of their election in 2000, only 39% goes to Chen Shui-bian, who supports independence.
You're confusing the election results of a pro-independence candidate with a referendum on independence itself. They're not the same thing. In any event, I didn't say that a majority of Taiwanese are necessarily pro-independence, but that the vast majority of Taiwanese I've met don't want to reunite with China. There's a difference. Taiwanese are nothing if not practical - they know that an outright declaration of independence would mean war with China within a week. Personally, I suspect that the majority of Taiwanese would choose outright independence if China withdrew the threat of war, but they likely find present status quo - in which Taiwan at least runs their own affairs - acceptable for the time being, though granted, that's based purely on my gut feeling.
Think about it logically for a second. Yes, China and Taiwan have a lot in common - language, history, family ties, etc. I can understand some sentiment for reunification on that level. But as time has passed you've seen two - going on three - generations of people born on Taiwan since the late '40s who have no memory of the mainland; just stories from their parents and grandparents. Maybe they find China intriguing, or maybe they don't. But they have no direct connection with it. And this isn't even taking into account the ethnic Taiwanese who have an even longer history on the island and make up the majority of the island's population.
And incidentally, Shui-bian Chen still won that election.
In a demonstration held last Saturday, 30% of the protesters are undergraduates. They all want to be unified.
Oh please. I can look at any newspaper in the world and find accounts of demonstrations where some group wants something or another. A single demonstration isn't a particularly reliable measuring stick for judging what a population as a whole does or doesn't want.
Only 28 governments recognise it as an independent country(And all of them are very small and poor country)
True as far as it goes. But official recognition isn't terribly important in the grand scheme of things, except maybe as an ego-booster. The U.S. and several other countries refused to recognize the U.S.S.R. until the '30s, but that doesn't mean that the U.S.S.R. didn't exist until then. Or consider the history of recognition of your own country's government, for that matter. What's really important - the things that will make or break a nation-state - are trade relations, banking, investment, and things of that sort. And Taiwan has all of that in spades; none of which is subject to Chinese law.
Incidentally, are you really saying that the diplomatic recognition of a small, poor nation is less valid than that of a big, rich one? Because that's sure how it looks.
and even the constitution of TAiwan does not call Taiwan as a country, but rather a province of China.
Yeah, y'know, I've seen you mention that in several other Slashdot posts, but the constitution of Taiwan is actually the 1947 constitution that was written for all of China, at a time when the nationalists were still running both the mainland and Taiwan. The nationalists simply continued using it after they were forced off the mainland in '49; presumably because they still considered themselves the legitimate government of China. In any event, their constitution has been amended on several occasions since then (all in the 1990s, in fact), and the question of independence would be dealt with similarly. But make no mistake - the Taiwanese constitution is not immutable.
More interestingly, there was a survey conducted last year, and 60% of the citizens in Taiwan even support the "One country, two system".
A poll like this is meaningless at the point of a gun, even putting aside for a moment the fact that you don't attribute a source for the poll, the size of the population sampled, or the statistical margin of error. Withdraw the threat of invasion if Taiwan were to declare independence, then take a poll of that sort and I think you'll see some very different results.
"Brave" isn't exactly the word I'd use. "Careless" is more like it. The guy was hotdogging; like driving two feet behind someone else's bumper - there's no time to react if the person in the other car does something you're not expecting. You can accept it or not, but your pilot would still be alive today if he'd been flying a safe distance away from the American aircraft.
And lastly, don't try to play word games here. We all know that Mr. Bush's "Republic of Taiwan" is referring to an independent country, right? Don't tell me that you don't know, even a three-year old kid kows that!
Frankly, as far as I'm concerned Taiwan is a separate country. They have a different economic system than the mainland, a modern capitalist economy, their own military, free elections, etc. And over the past fifty-plus years they've done well for themselves.
Despite the usual lip service from politicians about the desirability of reunifying China and Taiwan at some future date, the vast majority of Taiwanese I've met - particularly younger Taiwanese - have zero interest in being reunited with mainland China given the political system there. There is absolutely no way China will ever convince Taiwan to reunite except by gunpoint. China would do well to consider why that is.
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Actually, my mom knew von Braun when she was a girl. After her father died in '52 she spent a lot of time living with her uncle and his family. He was an Air Force colonel involved with rocket research and was something of a liason between the Air Force and captured German rocket scientists. She said they were over at his house pretty regularly and that she personally liked von Braun, for what that's worth; that he used to do little magic tricks with coins for her and her cousins.
More to the point, however, I think the problem is the loss of ARCADES. Dave and Busters just doesn't do it as far as economy goes (very expensive) and I don't know how many of those charming, cigarette burn covered arcades are still around.
I grew up in Hampton Beach, New Hampshire from '72 to '84 and that place was - and still is - Arcade Heaven; at least a half-dozen of the places ranging in size from small to cavernous as you walk along the boardwalk. Lots of pinball machines, too. If pinballs are gasping for air these days, no one's bothered telling the arcades in Hampton Beach, or the people I always see playing the things when I drive up there during the summer.
I will be eternally grateful for Nirvana for finally driving tired boomer 'classic rock' from the non-classic rock radio in the early 1990s.
Ten years ago I'd have agreed with you, but in retrospect a lot of that stuff at least had character, even if I'd heard "Whole Lotta Love" and "Behind Blue Eyes" about a thousand times apiece. I know it sounds like something a boring old fart would say, but one lame mook rock/nü metal band sounds pretty much like the next to me. Twenty-five minutes into a set of chunka-chunka down-tuned guitars backing up ennui coming from a 23-year-old and suddenly "More Than a Feeling" starts sounding pretty good.
ummmmm.... can anyone name a rock superstar who plays the ukelele??? Tiny tim???
George Harrison was a big collector of ukeleles; particularly Gibsons and Martins. He frequently gave them to friends as gifts. I'm told that on his recent tour Paul McCartney regularly performed "Something" on ukelele as a tribute to Harrison. Seems to me that Brian May played some ukelele on a few of the mid-'70s Queen records, too.
Don't be fooled by Falun Gong. They hide behind their sham-of-a-religion to promote an overthrow of the current government. Their leader is a coward and a phony who should be dragged out and shot.
Let's hear it for President Jiang Zemin, everyone! Give him a big hand! Isn't he great?
The Simpsons encountered this with the 'Behind The Laughter' episode. Every prank the Simpsons pulled up to that point was within a defined reality of The Simpsons being a 'real' cartoon family. That episode f*cked it all up.
Actually, my take on that episode was that it shouldn't be assumed to be in the rest of the series' continuity any more than the annual Halloween episodes are, or the spinoff episode was. It was just a funny episode that stood alone outside of the show's regular continuity.
In an interview on NPR a couple of years back, Harry Shearer argued that the episode that actually wrecked the show's continuity was the one in which Principal Skinner was revealed to actually be Armand Tanzarian, a teenaged hood who had joined the army during Vietnam and was taken under the wing of the real Seymour Skinner, who was assumed to have been killed in action. Shearer was livid with the show's writers, who basically ejected eight seasons of character development in one fell swoop.
So do these things have plots? Frustrated panda housewife seduces studly panda electrician? Two pandas getting it on in the locker room after a steamy workout at the gym? Girl panda-on-girl panda action? Is there bow-chicka-bow-wow background music?
If they're good, they can get a record contract and get on the air too.
Quantity and quality aren't necessarily the same thing.
The music industry spends a lot of money finding (or making) what people want.
Actually, considering that more than 90% of major label releases lose money, and that the record industry as a whole has been on a downward sales slide for the last couple of years, a more accurate statement would be to say that the music industry spends a lot of money finding/making what people don't want.
Hilarious. Payola used to at least buy you a hit. Now all it does is get your foot in the door. For a quarter-mil you buy the chance to have a hit. At least Alan Freed gave you an honest hit for your money.
So, many tech savvy fans equals lower sales. Why do you imagine O Brother Where are thou seemed like a golden calf?
Actually, in spite of the fact that "O Brother" has sold 5.5 million copies (biggest country album of 2002 by a long shot), country radio has stonewalled on it; the reason being is that their suspicion is that the vast majority of people buying it aren't regular country listeners, but are instead Volvo-drivin', brie-eatin' dilettantes who *are*, in fact, tech-savvy. The same people who made "The Buena Vista Social Club" a big hit a few years previously, in other words.
Americans (well, for the sake of argument, I assume you cant speak for _all_ of them, so lets say you) conclude that treasuries with multi-coloured currency 'cant decide on a colour'?
Actually, I said "it just looks like their treasuries couldn't make up their damn minds." There's a difference between perception and stating something as a fact.
And I know I'm the hundredth person to point this out, but what about blind people?
Maybe it's an obvious question, but how would changing the color of the bill help them?
Keeee-rist, doesn't the government have anything better to do? I'd argue that one of the reasons why people - albeit subconsciously - regard the dollar as highly as they do is because of its monochromatic appearance. Because of that it looks solid. Sturdy. Foreign currencies might be more festive, but to be honest, to us Americans it just looks like their treasuries couldn't make up their damn minds, which is not a big confidence builder.
And I know I'm about the hundredth person to mention it, but how hard is it to look at the corner of the goddamn bill?
In any event, Congress will never go along with it. The treasury department has been trying to switch over to dollar coins for years, but Congress just laughs at them and beats them up for their lunch money whenever it comes up.
So does this mean that now we'll be calling Bell Lab "Meucci Lab" instead? Will we be referring to the Baby Bells as "Mini Meuccis?"
It's certainly an interesting story. In spite of being an incredibly stupid thing to do, the kid definitely earned his geek merit badge with his little stunt. "You installed Linux on your PS2? Hey, that's great - I built a breeder reactor out of old watches."
Still, it's an old story. Maybe it's just a slow news day, but how is this particularly newsworthy?
FWIW, my dad flew the FB-111 from '72 to '84 and loved the plane. It definitely ate up spare parts, but it carried a large payload, had legs to spare, and was probably the fastest low-level bomber in the world by a comfortable margin. I'm pretty sure the Air Force retired the last of its Aardvarks (EF-111s) four years ago, though the Aussies still operate about 35 of them, in three different versions.
The -141 would have revolutionized the capability of the Kiev VTOL carriers, which run Yak-38s
Well, ran Yak-38s, anyway. The last of the Kievs, the Admiral Gorshkov, is reportedly going to be bought by India and heavily modified to fly MiG-29Ks, but the other three are all long since retired; probably sold for scrap by now.
Oddly enough, I remember reading a technothriller back in the '80s in which a Kiev-class battlegroup fought a Nimitz-class battlegroup to a draw. Can't remember the details, but I think the author gave the -38 a lot more credit than it really deserved.
Of course not. They realised that the government in Taiwan cannot represent the whole of China.
What, it took them 22 years to reach that conclusion? For people who are supposedly pretty smart, they sure are slow learners.
They realised that the legal government of China is the People's Republic of China since 1949.
Hilarious. Listen, Taiwan would still be sitting in the China seat at the UN if Nixon and Kissinger hadn't come up with the idea of cozying up to China as a way of making the Soviets behave. The prospect of a billion or so future consumers buying western products also had a bit to do with it. But don't delude yourself with the notion that the consciences of the members of the UN were bothering them. After five years, maybe. I'd even go with ten years. But the UN ignored the PRC for 22 years because it was convenient to do so. And they've ignored the ROC for the past 31 years because it's similarly convenient to do so.
You are certainly more stupid than I think.
Tsk tsk tsk.... Namecalling again. To quote Molière, "A wise man is superior to any insults which can be put upon him, and the best reply to unseemly behavior is patience and moderation."
When I refer to "International organisations", I definitely refer to UN, WHO, and something like these. They are the organisations that require their members to be a COUNTRY. But for those you've listed, like WTO and IOC, their members need not to be a country.
But that's not what you said, is it now? Your original comment on that was "They are recognised only by 28 countries and not accpted by any international organisations[.]" You didn't qualify the definition of "international organizations." Sidestepping your original line of argument isn't a particularly effective way of conducting a debate.
I'm not sure whether Taiwan will be successful in the future. But I know they failed at the present.
How? Their standard of living is four or five times higher than on the mainland. They have a free press, free elections, freedom of religion, a healthy balance of trade, and are a center of international shipping. Doesn't sound like much of a failure to me. They're not without problems, but I could say the same of the mainland.
And for mainland China, it cannot fail a single second. It is a country with 1.3 billion. Once it collapse, the whole world will suffer. Can you image 1.3 billion people that do not anything to eat? Do USA wanna accept 1.3 billion people in starvation?
How in the world do you reach the conclusion that because I believe that Taiwan is independent (in all of the ways that are important) that I'd like to see China collapse and 1.3 billion people starve? Seriously, look back at what I've written over the past week. Believe me, I am not a fan of the PRC's system of government, but the collapse of China isn't a desirable alternative.
Indonesia is one of the example. It achieved 10 to 12% economical development in the past, but unfortunetely, it is now one of the poorest country in Asia. All thanks to democracy that comes to early.
Heh. Indonesia has a lot of problems, but too much democracy isn't one of them. It'd be more appropriate to link the country's economic problems to corruption, difficulties with their banks, a weak legal system, a huge foreign debt, and a few other problems like assorted secessionist movements. Not to mention the usual problems you'd expect when 230 million people are spread out over 6,000 or so islands.
Let's take Taiwan as an example. More than 75% voted in the presidential election. TRell me what's the number in US. In US, this number is less than 60%, sometimes even less than 50%(in France). Why? because they are "democrazy"!
I'd be the first to agree that low voter turnout is a problem in the US. Opinions as to why vary, though a few of the main theories are as follows:
1) Cynicism. The notion that all politicians are crooks and that things will be about the same no matter who's running things. A variation on this theme is that even if not all politicians are crooks, their handlers and advisors are so dependent on polls and focus groups that the real candidate is never given a chance to emerge.
2) Apathy. The notion that what the politicians are talking about has nothing to do with me, as well as the problem that really charismatic politicians who can inspire a nation the way Kennedy did are either hard to come by or when they do emerge, people are cynical about them (see #1). One of the negative effects of both Watergate and Bill Clinton's presidency on American politics was that it's easier to not get your hopes up than to actually be enthused about a candidate and end up feeling disappointed and betrayed in the end.
3) Disenfranchisement. The feeling on the part of some voters (usually those on the lower rungs of the economic ladder) that their vote really doesn't matter, and, in fact, that there are those in power who would be altogether happier if they didn't vote at all.
There's a certain amount of sour grapes at play in any of these reasons, and particularly in #3: "My guy didn't win, so somehow the system was set up against him." And there might also be some truth to all three reasons.
Go and check the document. That is what it says. It "recovers", which means that PRC IS a legal government since 1949, but due to some reasons the UN did not realise it, and until 1971 they discovered that problem and thus "recover" the seat, and chase out that illegal representative of Chang. As clear as that.
What do you mean "discovered the problem?" You mean they didn't realize until 1971 that something on the order of 800 million people weren't recognized by the UN? C'mon, don't be disingenuous. You're more intelligent than that.
So what you mean is that if China became democratic, Taiwan became one part of China and once it is a communist country, Taiwan is not a part of it.
More or less. Taiwan doesn't take part in the day-to-day affairs of the Chinese government and the reverse is also true.
These organisations are different. They do not require its member to be an independent country. Hong Kong is the member of these organisations as well. Macau is a member of these organisations.
As are also a number of legitimate nations. In any event, you're being evasive. First you say that Taiwan belongs to no international organizations. Then, when given a list of international organizations that Taiwan does belong to, you sidestep the issue by saying that, yes, Taiwan belongs to those organizations, but that they don't count. So which is it?
They will not. Actually they are the best example of how democracy will affect one country's economy when the country is not ready. Just look at their news, there are fights between election candidates everywhere, there are news about illegal political trade everywhere.
Believe it or not, that sort of behavior isn't entirely uncommon in democracies; particularly in relatively young ones like Taiwan. It's unfortunate (though sometimes kind of funny), but not indicative of a country that's falling apart because democracy was introduced too soon.
In the past two years when the new government come to power, they have already used up the money they saved for more than fifty years. The biggest problem for Taiwan is that they have democracy before they have a strong middle class. Their economy will collapse if this kind of situation continues.
I sincerely doubt it. Admittedly, capital flight is something of a problem for the Taiwanese, but I haven't seen anything that would lead one to believe that the country's economy is in danger of imminent collapse because of it. In any event, far poorer countries than Taiwan have made democracy work, and far richer ones have managed to screw it up.
If Americans are Astronauts and Russians are Cosmonauts, what are Chinese? Gookanauts?
Their prefered term is Taikonauts.
Read story here.
Oh boy, you really know nothing. Go and check the documentation about accepting PRC. It did not say it "accept", but "recover" the PRC's seat in UN. For your information, it did not say ROC or Taiwan is not a member of UN any more, but "chase out the representative of Chang Kia-shi". So read more history, ok?
You're conveniently avoiding my original point. Again - Taiwan held the China seat at the UN until '71. They were recognized as the legal government of China until that time. In other words, from '49 until '71 China - your China - was in much the same position that Taiwan is in now. And yet it's clear that China didn't vanish into a black hole during that time.
My point is that you're relying far too heavily on this whole UN/legal recognition thing. Nationhood doesn't boil down to a piece of paper with an official seal on it, and nations oftentimes exist in fact before being recognized by the rest of the world. Events don't hold still just so they can be rubber-stamped by a bureaucrat.
You keep avoiding this point, so I'll say it once again: Taiwan's culture has split from China's in a number of ways over the past fifty years. They're capitalist, your country is communist (albeit a heavily modified form of communism). They have a political process with several parties where you have one. They have freedom of religion where the mainland does not. They have a relatively free press while China's is subject to state control. Most importantly, they don't take orders from Beijing. Yes, there are cultural similarities in a number of areas, but one can say the same of the US and Canada. It still doesn't mean that they should be joined at the hip. I'm sure that there's considerable sentiment for reunification, though from what I understand there are few in Taiwan who want to be part of a united China that's communist. So that leaves the status quo and independence as viable options. In any event, the final choice is up to the Taiwanese.
Then they are not independent. No country in this planet became independent even before they have annouced it.
They have a de facto independence since they're certainly not under the control of China. Heck, let Beijing try to order the arrests of a bunch of Falun Gong members and anti-communist rabble-rousers in Taipei. What's that you say? They can't? Case closed.
That's different. You learnt history of Britain like learning a foreign history. But Taiwanese taught their kids in the way that this is their own country's history. That's a major differentce.
Not really. Before independence we were British subjects from 1620 to 1776. British history up to 1776 was also our history, and it was more or less taught to us that way since their prior actions led eventually to the settlement of North America.
So now we come to a conclusion. Taiwan is a "country", but it never annouced independent, the people there refuse to believe they are living in China, but yet call themselvs Chinese. They say that htey are Taiwanese, not Chinese, but yet they are taught with Chinese history text. They are recognised only by 28 countries and not accpted by any international organisations, and yet Taiwan is a country. What an odd country it is!
Taiwan participates in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, the Asian Development Bank, the Central American Bank for Economic Integration, the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the International Olympic Committee, the Wildlife Conservation Law, and the World Trade Organization. They all sure sound like international organizations to me.
An odd country it might be, but a country it is nonetheless. It's one of the world's 20 largest economies and they've built a vibrant, modern society with a standard of living comparable to many European nations. They've earned their place in the sun.
Well, it's the RIAA's job to put a brave face on things; to strut around making speeches about how they're going to go after file-sharing and recordable CDs with a can of whup-ass and generally acting like it's still 1992.
But if you talk to people who are actually working for record labels, they're scared. Two years of negative growth in a row, with this year looking to be no better. They are still paying the RIAA to push that agenda, but that's mainly because they don't have many other ideas. Every technological and legal attempt they've made so far to address those issues has been beaten. Bluster aside, there are few left in the industry who expect file-sharing and CD-burning to go away just because Hilary Rosen makes a few speeches.
I'm very happy to know that you understand that the constitution is written in 1947 for all of China. So that means Taiwan was a part of China at that time, right? So tell me, when did Taiwanese annouce their independence?
They never have, of course. To have done so would have been counterproductive to the nationalists' stated goal of defeating the communists and returning to power on the mainland. The fact remains that the two cultures have diverged a great deal over the past five decades, and they're not going to be growing any closer together in the coming years.
No one recognise it, and the UN did not accept it, means that it is not a LEGAL government.
Does that mean that your country's government wasn't legal until 1971 when the Chinese seat at the UN was taken from Taiwan and given to China? You can't have it both ways.
I admit that those people who was born in Taiwan may not have a memory of China. But don't neglect the power of education.
I don't, but at the same time I think you're placing too much hope there. When I was growing up in New England we were taught British history since we had originally been a British colony and we have that shared history in common. But it's not like any of my classmates were filled with a desire to be reunited with Great Britain.
The same holds true in other countries; Canada with its British and French roots. Latin America with Spanish and Portuguese origins. But an interesting thing happens: cultures split as a result of time and distance. At some point British colonists started thinking of themselves as Americans. At some point Spanish settlers realized they were Mexicans. And something like that has been happening on Taiwan for several years, with native Taiwanese and Chinese refugees (and their children) starting to think of themselves as Taiwanese in a national sense. It doesn't happen all at once, and not everyone starts thinking in those terms (there were considerable numbers of British loyalists even during our war of independence). But as the people who originally came from the mainland die off, reunification is going to seem a lot more abstract to the people on Taiwan: "Reunify with China? Why? I've never even been there. Anyway, what have they ever done for us except fire missiles around the Straits of Taiwan whenever we have an election coming up?"
Oddly enough, China's relationship with Taiwan reminds me a lot of a guy who's just never been able to get over the fact that his ex-wife broke up with him years ago. And he shows up at her house every once in while, yelling stuff up at the window like "I love you! Come back to me! You still love me - I know you do! If you don't come back to me...I'll kill you!" Which is both pathetic and scary at the same time. Trust me, you catch more flies with honey.
So you mean that people are forced to tell lies in a survey?
Not exactly, but people can feel intimidated in that kind of situation depending on how the questions are phrased and who's asking the questions. For example, imagine a poll conducted by, say, a news magazine in which the survey question is this: "Yes or no - Do you favor the creation of a national secret police force which would be answerable only to the President?" It's pretty safe to say that most people would answer "No." On the other hand, imagine that you're called at home by someone who identifies himself as working for the government and are asked this question: "Yes or no - You wouldn't be opposed the creation of a national secret police force which would be answerable only to the President, would you?" Subtly different, yet intimidating.
In any event, I took about a half-dozen statistics courses in college and part of my job has to do with statistical analysis. For that reason I'm always suspicious of surveys unless I know the source, the methodology, the sample size, and the way the questions were phrased. In the case of the independence question, that puts an additional twist on the survey since a threat of war enters into the equation.
The best proof of Taiwan is not independent come from those pro-independence guys. They held a demonstration as well last month, calling the government to annouce independence. If Taiwan is independence, do the government to annouce it again? It is the best proof that Taiwan is NOT independent because even themselves did not recognise themselves as independent.
Hair-splitting. Taiwan has never formally declared independence, and doing so would require a constitutional amendment. But, in fact, "the best proof" that Taiwan is independent is that it enjoys all the trappings of any other nation; its own laws, its own military, schools, industry, free and regular multi-party elections, and international trade (including WTO membership), none of which answers to China. As a result, Taiwan enjoys a sort of de facto independence.
Lastly about free media. That's the most interesting one. Does free media mean to tell big lies on the newspapers.
Media outlets in the U.S. have the freedom to do that, though that freedom comes with the responsibility of accepting the legal and economic consequences in the case of libel or if the paper is just flat-out making up stories. I'm not going to sit here and tell you that the press in the West is perfect. My biggest complaint is that corporate interests take priority over honest journalism more often than I'd like. But by the same token, an American reporter will likely keep his job even if he questions an official government account of some event. And even if ABC won't do a story that paints Disney in a bad light, the New York Times probably will. The fact that the press isn't government-controlled here means that a story will probably get out eventually, no matter what.
Well, for myself, I've seen many cases that western medias is not reporting the truth, or only half of the truth. The news about Taiwan and mainland is one of them. The plane incident is one. Tiananmen is one. And the attack to our embassy is yet another one.
Well, I doubt that you and I are going to agree on much about those issues. But you seem annoyed about China's treatment from both the U.S. government and the media. Fair enough. But you might want to ask yourself sometime if they might not have a point or two that's worth paying attention to.
I don't want to talk about the plane accident. You know nothing about it at all. Go home and check the newspapers, you fool.
I have. We have a little thing here called a free press. Check into it sometime. And it's interesting to note that you're apparently incapable of discussing the incident without resorting to name-calling.
Just look at the result of their election in 2000, only 39% goes to Chen Shui-bian, who supports independence.
You're confusing the election results of a pro-independence candidate with a referendum on independence itself. They're not the same thing. In any event, I didn't say that a majority of Taiwanese are necessarily pro-independence, but that the vast majority of Taiwanese I've met don't want to reunite with China. There's a difference. Taiwanese are nothing if not practical - they know that an outright declaration of independence would mean war with China within a week. Personally, I suspect that the majority of Taiwanese would choose outright independence if China withdrew the threat of war, but they likely find present status quo - in which Taiwan at least runs their own affairs - acceptable for the time being, though granted, that's based purely on my gut feeling.
Think about it logically for a second. Yes, China and Taiwan have a lot in common - language, history, family ties, etc. I can understand some sentiment for reunification on that level. But as time has passed you've seen two - going on three - generations of people born on Taiwan since the late '40s who have no memory of the mainland; just stories from their parents and grandparents. Maybe they find China intriguing, or maybe they don't. But they have no direct connection with it. And this isn't even taking into account the ethnic Taiwanese who have an even longer history on the island and make up the majority of the island's population.
And incidentally, Shui-bian Chen still won that election.
In a demonstration held last Saturday, 30% of the protesters are undergraduates. They all want to be unified.
Oh please. I can look at any newspaper in the world and find accounts of demonstrations where some group wants something or another. A single demonstration isn't a particularly reliable measuring stick for judging what a population as a whole does or doesn't want.
Only 28 governments recognise it as an independent country(And all of them are very small and poor country)
True as far as it goes. But official recognition isn't terribly important in the grand scheme of things, except maybe as an ego-booster. The U.S. and several other countries refused to recognize the U.S.S.R. until the '30s, but that doesn't mean that the U.S.S.R. didn't exist until then. Or consider the history of recognition of your own country's government, for that matter. What's really important - the things that will make or break a nation-state - are trade relations, banking, investment, and things of that sort. And Taiwan has all of that in spades; none of which is subject to Chinese law.
Incidentally, are you really saying that the diplomatic recognition of a small, poor nation is less valid than that of a big, rich one? Because that's sure how it looks.
and even the constitution of TAiwan does not call Taiwan as a country, but rather a province of China.
Yeah, y'know, I've seen you mention that in several other Slashdot posts, but the constitution of Taiwan is actually the 1947 constitution that was written for all of China, at a time when the nationalists were still running both the mainland and Taiwan. The nationalists simply continued using it after they were forced off the mainland in '49; presumably because they still considered themselves the legitimate government of China. In any event, their constitution has been amended on several occasions since then (all in the 1990s, in fact), and the question of independence would be dealt with similarly. But make no mistake - the Taiwanese constitution is not immutable.
More interestingly, there was a survey conducted last year, and 60% of the citizens in Taiwan even support the "One country, two system".
A poll like this is meaningless at the point of a gun, even putting aside for a moment the fact that you don't attribute a source for the poll, the size of the population sampled, or the statistical margin of error. Withdraw the threat of invasion if Taiwan were to declare independence, then take a poll of that sort and I think you'll see some very different results.
Oh, we forced it to land?
Yes. Get used to it.
But one brave Chinese did!
"Brave" isn't exactly the word I'd use. "Careless" is more like it. The guy was hotdogging; like driving two feet behind someone else's bumper - there's no time to react if the person in the other car does something you're not expecting. You can accept it or not, but your pilot would still be alive today if he'd been flying a safe distance away from the American aircraft.
And lastly, don't try to play word games here. We all know that Mr. Bush's "Republic of Taiwan" is referring to an independent country, right? Don't tell me that you don't know, even a three-year old kid kows that!
Frankly, as far as I'm concerned Taiwan is a separate country. They have a different economic system than the mainland, a modern capitalist economy, their own military, free elections, etc. And over the past fifty-plus years they've done well for themselves.
Despite the usual lip service from politicians about the desirability of reunifying China and Taiwan at some future date, the vast majority of Taiwanese I've met - particularly younger Taiwanese - have zero interest in being reunited with mainland China given the political system there. There is absolutely no way China will ever convince Taiwan to reunite except by gunpoint. China would do well to consider why that is.