And in eastern Canada, hydro-electricity is generating above 80% of our needs, even generating electricity for the north-eastern USA states in some cases.
Here in Seattle, we're at almost 89% via hydro, nuclear at over 5.6%, and wind at over 3.4%. We're like at 2% or so (at least as of 2008) for coal & natural gas combined; that's well beyond what even I had thought for our area.
Compete with oil? I'm going to guess that they mean with coal, as oil is rarely used as a fuel for power generating stations. Coal and natural gas, yeah, oil - not so much. In the U.S., anyway, only around 1% is generated by petroleum, whereas coal is about 45% and natural gas is about 23%.
I'm not especially a fan of either pot or hookers, but it seems like the system you've described is working well in Amsterdam. Unless I'm missing something, society hasn't collapsed or been taken over by hooligans. I could understand the reluctance if no one else had tried it, but come on. The experiment is working.
Well, they've decriminalized pot, not legalized it, but that doesn't get them any tax money to help on enforcement, which is kinda silly. Prostitution, however, IS legal and taxed there.
The problem is that since we in the U.S. haven't legalized it, we have to deal with all the health and crime effects (of both pot and prostitution). They're happening now, even though they're illegal, so if we legalize it (not just decriminalize), we can improve the situation, since we'll never get rid of either.
It's like the gays in the military argument - they're ALREADY serving, and it's not a problem.
It depends on what you think the strategy is. If you think the idea is to root out terrorists, you're living in a fantasy land. The real point is to funnel as much money to defense contractors and allow other companies access to oil and other mineral rights. Endless war is a great business model.
I wouldn't be so sure about the "No economic woes" part. Most of those billions of dollars go to defense contractors and military personnel, it's not like the money just evaporates.
You know what, a great deal of that money DOES just evaporate. And winds up in offshore accounts of defense contractors and politicians they bribe.
One could argue that (at least in the sort term) it would be better to divert defense budgets to other projects inside the US like building nuclear power plants or a better electric grid. Or you could cut Medicare spending by 50% and let the problem of expensive health care take care of itself.
I'd say that investments in infrastructure are one of the best ways to spend the public's money. And you can cut Medicare, but that would not help things. Investing in universal health care would save money in the medium term, and save LOTS in the long term.
Easy to say, much harder to do. Those troops stationed around the world aren't there solely for the sake of the US. Germany, Japan, South Korea and many others might piss and moan about American presence but the simple fact is that if the US suddenly decided to pull out there would be massive uproar.
Yes, they ARE there soley for the sake of the US. Those are our forward bases to extend our power around the world. I don't believe we need to be an empire. I don't believe we can _afford_ to be an empire. We're not going to outspend China like we did with Russia. We're on the other end of that equation this time. China plays a much longer game than we do.
Germany surrendered in May 1945, the US is still there. Japan surrendered in August 1945, the US is still there. Korean cease fire started in July 1953, the US is still there.
Sure about that? In 2009, defense accounted for 23% of the federal budget.
Yep. Half of that is about $400 billion dollars. That would be way more than a shot in the arm for the economy. And once you start paying down the debt, then the interest on said debt goes down, too. And keep in mind those are 'official' numbers, which are widely known to be complete and utter bullshit (in that they're lower than what is reported).
More easy ideas: stop it with the 'war on drugs': it's an abject failure, and is ridiculously expensive. Legalize and tax marijuana the same as alcohol. You then get: tax money for the sales of marijuana (and more money from the increased sales of junk food, most likely:), billions less spent on the war on drugs, and billions less spent incarcerating marijuana users and marijuana-only dealers. By legalizing marijuana, you'll also take a great deal of power away from the drug cartels, and reduce violence.
right because a bunch on unemployed soldiers would totally save the economy.
Unemployed soldiers are cheaper than soldiers in foreign countries where we have to ship all supplies and equipment to. LOTS cheaper. Plus a lot less of them get killed if they're over here.
This probably just means we can now devote more of those troops to Afghanistan. *sigh*
I wonder how much we're spending on all those troops in Germany, South Korea and Japan? Bring all the troops home from everywhere, cut the military budget in half, and we'd have no economic woes, and still have a gigantic military.
I don't have much hope for the Hollywood movie. Probably turn Blomkvist into some kind of James Bond figure.
I'm not convinced of that, as the guy doing it is David Fincher, who also made Fight Club and Se7en. I've seen all three Swedish movies, and the third one had some serious problems. I'd like to see a more faithful adaptation of the books. Honestly, the books are way better than even the Swedish movies since you can know what's going through the girl's head. She's a very interesting character, and the main reason why the books are so great, but you can barely understand what's going on with her just by watching the movies. Rumor has it Ellen Page is the leading candidate for Fincher's remake, and she would definitely be my first choice. She seems a lot more like the character described in the books than how they made up Noomi Rapace for the Swedish movies, though she did do an excellent job.
I'm hoping Fincher sets his movies in Sweden - Stockholm is almost like another character in the books, really (especially the second and third books).
People deny evolution. People deny global warming...
People are incredibly good at denying that reality exists, especially when its reality they don't want to comprehend.
You and your "Rounder-Earthers" make me sick! Earth belongs to America, just like it says in the Bible, and we can do anything we want to with it. God won't let the Earth be destroyed, so logic clearly says this is all nonsense.
and the "down with civilization" crowd that would happily use combating climate change as a pretext for setting technology back 500 years.
I don't know about wanting to set back _technology_ 500 years, but some of us would see culling the herd and keeping the technology as a not entirely-bad thing.:)
Two of those titles aren't his original titles. The first one was originally titled, "Men Who Hate Women." The title was so important to Larsson that he had a bit of a battle on his hands to keep it called that. It's a great description of the underlying purpose of the books, and kind of sad that it got changed.
The third was originally called, "The Air Castle That Exploded". I'm glad that one got changed.:)
I _do_ think it was a good marketing strategy to rename them with a common naming scheme, and probably helped bring the books to the attention of more people, which is good. I think once David Fincher's English-language movies come out, the books will experience another rennaisance of popularity. I've read all three and seen all three Swedish movies, and while the first two are quite good and remain pretty faithful to the parts of the books they cover, the third had some serious issues, I thought. The books are quite a bit better than the movies could be because of the nature of Lisbeth (the Girl) is so introverted that you only know what's going on in her head; you can't tell much of anything by just watching her do things in the movies. Also, the books are quite large, so by necessity, they had to cut major parts of the story out.
Just because the iPhone 4 has antenna problems doesn't mean they weren't known about beforehand and dismissed as "not enough to break the reality distortion field".
Not really. Things went downhill much sooner than that. I'd have a much lower UID than I have if I had seen the need for it, but the 'first poster' morons, etc., weren't much yet around, and there wasn't much value to HAVING a Slashdot account until some time after the account system was first implemented.
If your storage medium has to explicitly allow your content then someone is doing it terribly, terribly wrong.
Yeah, they were very stupid about licensing, and that's why, even with, what a year+ lead, HD-DVD died an embarassing death. This is one case where the market really DID decide.
Obama is a socialist. Well, more of a corporatist whore, but certainly embracing socialism and fascism as well. Your diatribe to the contrary doesn't change the fact that he embraces wealth redistribution, state control of private companies, and crony capitalism.
Both a socialist and fascist? Neat trick.
However, the idea that republicans aren't just as bad is pretty laughable.
They are much worse. Much, much worse. But 'much much worse' compared to 'fucking horrible' is not exactly a great situation to be in.
While you easily distracted people on both sides of the aisle defend your 'team', we all get screwed by the same establishment party.
My team? I don't know what 'team' that is. I'm against the party system (of any # of parties) entirely. It's the #1 thing that's strangling this country. The fiscal conservatives can't have any kind of rational discussion because of all the crazies, and the fiscal conservatives are lumped in with the social conservatives (which MOST of this country is NOT). If there was a 'fiscally reasonable, socially mostly-liberal' party, they would win every national election, according to most polling I've seen. The people who call themselves 'fiscally conservative' seem to react more on uneducated gut instinct than actual fact, and seem to still think that 'trickle down economics' works, when it's well-known that it doesn't. Giving tax breaks to the wealthy doesn't work, and that's the only solution the GOP ever puts forth. Both parties are corporatists to the bone, and as far as I can tell, and I really hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, seem to be engaging in a big act that they're different, so that nothing ever actually changes.
The point is the Obama's color has nothing to do with it. People would still dislike him, even if he was as white as Clinton
I am sick and tired of people (like you) playing the racist card. 99% of amercians are color blind and don't give a fuck if the president is white, black, or pink-with-yellow poka dots. Color is irrelevant
You and I may think his color is irrelevant, but you should take a look at some of those tea party signs some time and tell me that 99% of Americans are color blind. That's ridiculous.
I'm not 'playing the racist card' - I'm saying that a large percentage of the right who are foaming at the mouth over Obama are at least partially motivated by his race. A large portion of them are also motivated by his not being a right-wing christian wacko. And a smaller portion of the right are correctly outraged that he is spending a lot of money. But most of them weren't all the vocal about Bush doing the same thing. Or Reagan. And none of them, as far as I can see, realize that some of what Obama is spending is necessitated by the absolute clusterfuck that Bush left behind him. My problems are less with the amount being spent (but that IS very worrying), but that he and Congress (either party) are not putting in ANY accountability on Wall Street or anyone else, to prevent this shit from happening again. Goldman Sachs does the same shit every generation, and gets away with it and comes out smelling like a rose financially every time. That's a business model, not chance, and it's crooked, and both parties take part in it and enable it.
But that doesn't mean that the Republican party isn't fucking chock-full of racists.:)
If there are people in the Republican party that actually ARE for less taxes (on anyone other than the wealthy), smaller government, less government spending, but who aren't racist or homophobes, then they should probably form a new party, because that's not what the Republican party is about, and it's certainly not what the TEA party is about (Republicans and their corporate handlers are in charge of all 'mainstream' TEA party activities, in case you hadn't noticed).
There are legitimate, serious discussions to be had about what 'fiscal responsibility' entails, and what services the government should provide, but you're never going to have them if the representatives of the 'conservative' populace in this country foam at the mouth at the slightest thing that isn't covered in a flag, a cross, and a white hood.
Fixed it for you. Don't know why you had to add all that extraneous stuff. Also keep in mind that Obama has gone back on a bunch of promises (I'd say he's been the worst president for this sort of deception since LBJ or Nixon). I'm sure that being part black and non-crazy has hurt Obama's electoral chances with some voters, but those people never voted for Obama in the first place.
The extraneous stuff was explained further down, which you didn't quote. The reasons for bashing Obama are different for left vs right. The right is bashing him for crazy shit, and the left is bashing him for being way too much like Bush for anyone's liking (though of course the right should be loving this guy's continuation of Bush's policies).
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And in eastern Canada, hydro-electricity is generating above 80% of our needs, even generating electricity for the north-eastern USA states in some cases.
Here in Seattle, we're at almost 89% via hydro, nuclear at over 5.6%, and wind at over 3.4%. We're like at 2% or so (at least as of 2008) for coal & natural gas combined; that's well beyond what even I had thought for our area.
Compete with oil? I'm going to guess that they mean with coal, as oil is rarely used as a fuel for power generating stations. Coal and natural gas, yeah, oil - not so much. In the U.S., anyway, only around 1% is generated by petroleum, whereas coal is about 45% and natural gas is about 23%.
I'm not especially a fan of either pot or hookers, but it seems like the system you've described is working well in Amsterdam. Unless I'm missing something, society hasn't collapsed or been taken over by hooligans. I could understand the reluctance if no one else had tried it, but come on. The experiment is working.
Well, they've decriminalized pot, not legalized it, but that doesn't get them any tax money to help on enforcement, which is kinda silly. Prostitution, however, IS legal and taxed there.
The problem is that since we in the U.S. haven't legalized it, we have to deal with all the health and crime effects (of both pot and prostitution). They're happening now, even though they're illegal, so if we legalize it (not just decriminalize), we can improve the situation, since we'll never get rid of either.
It's like the gays in the military argument - they're ALREADY serving, and it's not a problem.
I'm baffled by our strategy in Afghanistan.
It depends on what you think the strategy is. If you think the idea is to root out terrorists, you're living in a fantasy land. The real point is to funnel as much money to defense contractors and allow other companies access to oil and other mineral rights. Endless war is a great business model.
I wouldn't be so sure about the "No economic woes" part. Most of those billions of dollars go to defense contractors and military personnel, it's not like the money just evaporates.
You know what, a great deal of that money DOES just evaporate. And winds up in offshore accounts of defense contractors and politicians they bribe.
One could argue that (at least in the sort term) it would be better to divert defense budgets to other projects inside the US like building nuclear power plants or a better electric grid. Or you could cut Medicare spending by 50% and let the problem of expensive health care take care of itself.
I'd say that investments in infrastructure are one of the best ways to spend the public's money. And you can cut Medicare, but that would not help things. Investing in universal health care would save money in the medium term, and save LOTS in the long term.
Easy to say, much harder to do. Those troops stationed around the world aren't there solely for the sake of the US. Germany, Japan, South Korea and many others might piss and moan about American presence but the simple fact is that if the US suddenly decided to pull out there would be massive uproar.
Yes, they ARE there soley for the sake of the US. Those are our forward bases to extend our power around the world. I don't believe we need to be an empire. I don't believe we can _afford_ to be an empire. We're not going to outspend China like we did with Russia. We're on the other end of that equation this time. China plays a much longer game than we do.
> Vietnam?
Acording to the MIA conspiracy theorists, yes, the US is indeed still there. Tilling fields, perhaps, but still there.
Maybe so, but we're not spending money to maintain troops there, so for the purposes of this discussion, the answer is still 'no' for Vietnam.
The US will be there for decades.
Germany surrendered in May 1945, the US is still there.
Japan surrendered in August 1945, the US is still there.
Korean cease fire started in July 1953, the US is still there.
Vietnam?
Sure about that? In 2009, defense accounted for 23% of the federal budget.
Yep. Half of that is about $400 billion dollars. That would be way more than a shot in the arm for the economy. And once you start paying down the debt, then the interest on said debt goes down, too. And keep in mind those are 'official' numbers, which are widely known to be complete and utter bullshit (in that they're lower than what is reported).
More easy ideas: stop it with the 'war on drugs': it's an abject failure, and is ridiculously expensive. Legalize and tax marijuana the same as alcohol. You then get: tax money for the sales of marijuana (and more money from the increased sales of junk food, most likely :), billions less spent on the war on drugs, and billions less spent incarcerating marijuana users and marijuana-only dealers. By legalizing marijuana, you'll also take a great deal of power away from the drug cartels, and reduce violence.
Similar thing for prostitution.
right because a bunch on unemployed soldiers would totally save the economy.
Unemployed soldiers are cheaper than soldiers in foreign countries where we have to ship all supplies and equipment to. LOTS cheaper. Plus a lot less of them get killed if they're over here.
This probably just means we can now devote more of those troops to Afghanistan. *sigh*
I wonder how much we're spending on all those troops in Germany, South Korea and Japan? Bring all the troops home from everywhere, cut the military budget in half, and we'd have no economic woes, and still have a gigantic military.
Come to think that perhaps "House Of Cards" is the English equivalient?
Yeah, that sounds right. "The House of Cards that Exploded" would still be an awkward title, though.
Those interested in "culling the herd" are curiously almost never interested in offing themselves.
I'm not sure why that would be 'curious'...seems pretty straightforward, no?
I don't have much hope for the Hollywood movie. Probably turn Blomkvist into some kind of James Bond figure.
I'm not convinced of that, as the guy doing it is David Fincher, who also made Fight Club and Se7en. I've seen all three Swedish movies, and the third one had some serious problems. I'd like to see a more faithful adaptation of the books. Honestly, the books are way better than even the Swedish movies since you can know what's going through the girl's head. She's a very interesting character, and the main reason why the books are so great, but you can barely understand what's going on with her just by watching the movies. Rumor has it Ellen Page is the leading candidate for Fincher's remake, and she would definitely be my first choice. She seems a lot more like the character described in the books than how they made up Noomi Rapace for the Swedish movies, though she did do an excellent job.
I'm hoping Fincher sets his movies in Sweden - Stockholm is almost like another character in the books, really (especially the second and third books).
Everything is deniable.
I deny your denial, therefor you're wrong!
Oh, wait...
People deny evolution. People deny global warming...
People are incredibly good at denying that reality exists, especially when its reality they don't want to comprehend.
You and your "Rounder-Earthers" make me sick! Earth belongs to America, just like it says in the Bible, and we can do anything we want to with it. God won't let the Earth be destroyed, so logic clearly says this is all nonsense.
and the "down with civilization" crowd that would happily use combating climate change as a pretext for setting technology back 500 years.
I don't know about wanting to set back _technology_ 500 years, but some of us would see culling the herd and keeping the technology as a not entirely-bad thing. :)
The title of his books remind me of
Two of those titles aren't his original titles. The first one was originally titled, "Men Who Hate Women." The title was so important to Larsson that he had a bit of a battle on his hands to keep it called that. It's a great description of the underlying purpose of the books, and kind of sad that it got changed.
The third was originally called, "The Air Castle That Exploded". I'm glad that one got changed. :)
I _do_ think it was a good marketing strategy to rename them with a common naming scheme, and probably helped bring the books to the attention of more people, which is good. I think once David Fincher's English-language movies come out, the books will experience another rennaisance of popularity. I've read all three and seen all three Swedish movies, and while the first two are quite good and remain pretty faithful to the parts of the books they cover, the third had some serious issues, I thought. The books are quite a bit better than the movies could be because of the nature of Lisbeth (the Girl) is so introverted that you only know what's going on in her head; you can't tell much of anything by just watching her do things in the movies. Also, the books are quite large, so by necessity, they had to cut major parts of the story out.
Yes, they're huge books. Read them, anyway.
Maybe their testing isn't, exactly, "exhaustive".
Just because the iPhone 4 has antenna problems doesn't mean they weren't known about beforehand and dismissed as "not enough to break the reality distortion field".
nah, things went downhill about the 50k mark... ;)
Not really. Things went downhill much sooner than that. I'd have a much lower UID than I have if I had seen the need for it, but the 'first poster' morons, etc., weren't much yet around, and there wasn't much value to HAVING a Slashdot account until some time after the account system was first implemented.
If your storage medium has to explicitly allow your content then someone is doing it terribly, terribly wrong.
Yeah, they were very stupid about licensing, and that's why, even with, what a year+ lead, HD-DVD died an embarassing death. This is one case where the market really DID decide.
The only reason HD-DVD didn't take off was Not enough repeated letters in the name to be catchy. This time they'll try HHDVVDDBVD.
The reason HD-DVD didn't take off was because they didn't allow porn.
Obama is a socialist. Well, more of a corporatist whore, but certainly embracing socialism and fascism as well. Your diatribe to the contrary doesn't change the fact that he embraces wealth redistribution, state control of private companies, and crony capitalism.
Both a socialist and fascist? Neat trick.
However, the idea that republicans aren't just as bad is pretty laughable.
They are much worse. Much, much worse. But 'much much worse' compared to 'fucking horrible' is not exactly a great situation to be in.
While you easily distracted people on both sides of the aisle defend your 'team', we all get screwed by the same establishment party.
My team? I don't know what 'team' that is. I'm against the party system (of any # of parties) entirely. It's the #1 thing that's strangling this country. The fiscal conservatives can't have any kind of rational discussion because of all the crazies, and the fiscal conservatives are lumped in with the social conservatives (which MOST of this country is NOT). If there was a 'fiscally reasonable, socially mostly-liberal' party, they would win every national election, according to most polling I've seen. The people who call themselves 'fiscally conservative' seem to react more on uneducated gut instinct than actual fact, and seem to still think that 'trickle down economics' works, when it's well-known that it doesn't. Giving tax breaks to the wealthy doesn't work, and that's the only solution the GOP ever puts forth. Both parties are corporatists to the bone, and as far as I can tell, and I really hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, seem to be engaging in a big act that they're different, so that nothing ever actually changes.
The point is the Obama's color has nothing to do with it. People would still dislike him, even if he was as white as Clinton
I am sick and tired of people (like you) playing the racist card. 99% of amercians are color blind and don't give a fuck if the president is white, black, or pink-with-yellow poka dots. Color is irrelevant
You and I may think his color is irrelevant, but you should take a look at some of those tea party signs some time and tell me that 99% of Americans are color blind. That's ridiculous.
I'm not 'playing the racist card' - I'm saying that a large percentage of the right who are foaming at the mouth over Obama are at least partially motivated by his race. A large portion of them are also motivated by his not being a right-wing christian wacko. And a smaller portion of the right are correctly outraged that he is spending a lot of money. But most of them weren't all the vocal about Bush doing the same thing. Or Reagan. And none of them, as far as I can see, realize that some of what Obama is spending is necessitated by the absolute clusterfuck that Bush left behind him. My problems are less with the amount being spent (but that IS very worrying), but that he and Congress (either party) are not putting in ANY accountability on Wall Street or anyone else, to prevent this shit from happening again. Goldman Sachs does the same shit every generation, and gets away with it and comes out smelling like a rose financially every time. That's a business model, not chance, and it's crooked, and both parties take part in it and enable it.
But that doesn't mean that the Republican party isn't fucking chock-full of racists. :)
If there are people in the Republican party that actually ARE for less taxes (on anyone other than the wealthy), smaller government, less government spending, but who aren't racist or homophobes, then they should probably form a new party, because that's not what the Republican party is about, and it's certainly not what the TEA party is about (Republicans and their corporate handlers are in charge of all 'mainstream' TEA party activities, in case you hadn't noticed).
There are legitimate, serious discussions to be had about what 'fiscal responsibility' entails, and what services the government should provide, but you're never going to have them if the representatives of the 'conservative' populace in this country foam at the mouth at the slightest thing that isn't covered in a flag, a cross, and a white hood.
Fixed it for you. Don't know why you had to add all that extraneous stuff. Also keep in mind that Obama has gone back on a bunch of promises (I'd say he's been the worst president for this sort of deception since LBJ or Nixon). I'm sure that being part black and non-crazy has hurt Obama's electoral chances with some voters, but those people never voted for Obama in the first place.
The extraneous stuff was explained further down, which you didn't quote. The reasons for bashing Obama are different for left vs right. The right is bashing him for crazy shit, and the left is bashing him for being way too much like Bush for anyone's liking (though of course the right should be loving this guy's continuation of Bush's policies).