And nobody would be able to predict what happens when it comes into force. We only know what won't happen : -> it won't make medicare or medicaid cheaper (according to CBO and common sense) -> it cannot be paid with 10 times the amount of money allocated to it (according, again, to CBO and common sense) -> it won't allow companies to continue doing medical research like they do today. Perhaps - perhaps - an alternative model will work, but then again, perhaps not -> it won't cover the (currently) uninsured -> it will change medical delivery from money-based to ration-based (govt. decides who does - and who does not - get medical care, and is not accountable to anyone - not even to congress. This bill means that whether you get a pacemaker is decided by (a person appointed by) Obama, with no recourse for any person), the famous "death panel"
Dude, everything we have is from nature. Our food, our clothing, our oil, our raw materials, our bodies and minds are nature. "Nature" is us and we are it.
Only in the sense that we have the same atoms. Of course thinking in terms of atoms would mean you're essentially the same as adolf hitler, or horseshit, no ?
Your ancestors didn't ride on dragons? Wah! They rode on horses, donkeys, mules, camels, elephants, dogsleds -- almost anything strong enough to carry a human being. Why do you feel so put out by "Gaia"?
Hello ? Flying dragons, man ! Flying dragons. Donkeys do NOT compare to flying dragons, I'm sure you can appreciate that. And also, where are the animal toasters ?
Where are you getting this from? What in the world is a natural religion?
For example the native indian "religion". Generally any ideology/culture that's pre-agriculture, and their immediate successors is considered a natural religion. Of course, definitions vary.
Who nearly exterminated the Apaches for their land ? Surely it was the "oppressive whites", right ? Well no, it was the Commanches. Of course the Apaches only got that land by warring with another tribe that they exterminated, and we don't even know the name of, just a few images.
Another Indian nation, the Erie nation was exterminated. They lived somewhere near northeast california and large areas to the east of that. They were killed. Every last man, woman and child (the children were famously eaten. Some of those children have been autopsied, hundreds of years after the fact, and guess what was found ? They were alive when the initial bitemarks were made. They were eaten alive. An open question is whether they made their parents watch, like the muslim prophet did when he did the same to a certain tribe that dared to leave him. Of course that gives us some idea as to how Indians dealt with that history, as you can ask any muslim how they deal with it. You see, according to muslims, those acts were not just morally okay, but "holy", unassailable, for they were direct commands from allah, and that even if other muslims repeat that behavior it would not be judged morally wrong. That is, of course, what a religion is, at heart : a definition of what is morally right and morally wroing (and everything in between). There is no "universal" morality, no matter how strongly Baha'is and assorted "noble savage" fantasts believe in it. I'm quite sure you'd find the same sort of justifications amongst members of native american tribes. The type of muslim excuse "mohamed was not a paedophilic rapist, that's a dirty word. Of course, yes, he did fuck a 9 (or 7) year old girl against her will, had intercourse with slaves and had them beaten before and afterwards, and so on. But that was all morally right, and so he was not a paedophile, nor a rapist. That sort of statement).
The same happened to the Huron nation, though the Huron children died from getting their skulls smashed in by a club, and were only eaten afterwards. Surely only white males could have done something like this ? Though one gets suspicious. Eating children, after all, doesn't sound all that Christian, now does it ? Not that anyone claims the conquistadores were very devoted Christians, but even for them this goes very very far, doesn't it ? And of course, you'd be right to doubt : it was the Iroqois (they're called "victims" nowadays)
This is incidentally something they (the Iroquois) tried to do to dozens of European settlements, and they succeeded in doing this at least twice, and probably at least a few of the "disappeared" settlements met this fate too.
I know it is extremely politically incorrect and even racist to tell the history of many peoples, like the native Americans or the muslims. But what is one to do when the truth has become racist, and people demand it to be replaced or suppressed ? I believe in ignoring idiotic sensibilities in favor of the truth.
That's like saying Einstein had 2 lab assistants, not just Einstein.
When writing special and general relativity Einstein used these resources : 1) Pencil (not even a pen) 2) Paper
So they're not in fact equal. Your statement is a lie (factually incorrect).
And lots of people play the offensive game against botnets. Just ask a few ircops. It doesn't last, and it attracts ddoses like hell. If I was this guy's ISP, I'd be pissed.
Constantly selling things allows for pareto-efficiency Wealth production and retention necessitates Nash equilibrium
The problem with Nash equilibrium is the utter impossibility to improve one's own situation without destroying another's livelihood (which is the very definition of the concept)
If you think about it, this is an obvious property of any "wealth retention" society. Any society without yearly economic growth will cuase this. If no new wealth is constantly produced the only way to procure wealth is to steal it from someone else. Yes steal. After all, prices have long been set in stone in such a society for obvious reasons, and nobody willingly trades anything.
The problem is once any form of wealth acquisition is basically equal to theft, what moral imperative is there to not rape ? It's the exact same thing as getting paid at the end of the month is for you, after all. And while you'd obviously be right that one year of fixed-state economy won't turn all men into rapists. However, "in the long term", it will. The same will happen to murder and so on. Eventually a sort-of balance between mafia-like associations will result, though not without regular outburst of violence.
First of all, the obvious : Nice graphics, of course, though still not quite out of the "uncanny valley", where I'd want them to be. A nice evolutionary step, but certainly not something that won't be surpassed next month (year). It's a bit like those old Disney movies like fantasia "pushing the boundaries of animation". Great looking, but easily surpassed.
Imho the movie is massively anti-technology and pro-"magic". Magic in a sort of a mythological "natural religion" kind of way, and of course conveniently leaving out anything even remotely resembling an actual natural religion (just one example : all natural religions mandate (yes mandate) intra-religious wars between families, individuals and villages, or various combinations of that. Of course, deadly competition between inhabitants of the same place is a physical necessity in any non-agricultural religion, due to the massive inflexibility, unpredictability and unreliability of food sources, and the (natural) inability of a species to do birth control, resulting in exponentially increasing populations that regularly get "adjusted" by a famine or some such, a subject conveniently skipped over in the movie).
Before you ask, flying dragons, and other magical servile creatures seemlingly bread to replace everything from a helicopter to a toast maker do not count as "technology" in my mind. I do not find this strange at all. Nature has provided us with far less than it has provided these aliens. It seems gaia didn't love us from the start... my ancestors never rode on flying dragons.
Another thing I find quite funny is the location of that village and that tree. What energy source would they have ? Given the extreme "coincidental" location they have, one would think it... just might be those very same minerals. This would mean, of course, that all that "native" stuff is just "plundering" exactly the mineral source as the humans want. If that wasn't the case, imagine just how "unlucky" those natives must have been to build exactly there. But, of course, keeping mountains floating in the air is just so much more important than keeping humans alive (after all, the movie dialog makes clear that following any course of action other than acquiring those "unobtanium" minerals would result in massive casualties on earth. Of course you'd think that sort of urgency would make people appoint a military commander who is actually capable of dispatching multiple ships, or realize that a space-faring human race probably has options of using orbital bombardment, or even just sending one of those probes to make a *tiny* course correction on a meteor. Problem solved. The aliens obviously have no hope at all of repulsing any form of long-distance attack, whether that's missiles, ray weapons or even meteors).
Given the reaction on other blogs this review will loosen quite a few feelings. Apparently it hits close to home for quite a few people. Great stuff for discussions.
Unfortunately, wishing something to be true does not make it true. So read it and be man enough to accept the truth for what it is. (And by the way the "no consequences for the man" in Judaism comes from the rules of proof, like in Sharia, not from the toraic law itself. Technically a Jewish man can be stoned for fucking a woman, however, the testimony of that woman is not enough to prove that man did it. In fact 2 (innocent) adult Jewish males must testify that they saw the accused do it with their own eyes, and you can evaluate for yourself how likely a man is to rape a woman with 2 valid non-accomplices as witnesses. That the woman had sex can be proven, by contrast, either by a doctor (hymen), or by pregnancy. Either is sufficient for stoning her. In practice even being accused of rape will obviously have social consequences, and the family is to be reimbursed for the death of the woman)
And please don't start with the "technicalities of your own personal interpretation of faith" idiocy. Yes, obviously you don't accept Sanhedrin judgements, nor do you accept Beth Din judgements (no Jew does in the 21st century, it's just not possible). Nevertheless, if you were to take Sanhedrin and Beth Din judgements out of Judaism, there would be nothing left. In reality you only selectively apply your religion to your life, ironically following Christian judgements the vast majority of the time.
And before you say it's not true, let's hear your plans for following the (Judaic) commandment to burn non-Jewish cities ? I'm not accusing you of planning terrorism, just pointing out that doing so is mandatory for all Jews, of all denominations. I do NOT claim any Jew is actually doing this, in fact I claim the reverse (and if any Jew does decide to do this he'll be rightfully called a dangerous nutcase, and treated as such).
I submit that if you claim that you do not accept such things as moral, then one of these is true : you're not, in fact, a Jew, or what you call "Judaism" is not at all the same thing as what was called Judaism even 150 years ago, specifically it is not the ideology that received God's blessing so very long ago, even by your own Jewish standards.
And of course, you're right that the same goes for other faiths. Take muslims. Did you know one sharia law states that muslims who choose to live anywhere except in land controlled exclusively by the caliph should be massacred ? Just so you know, there is no such land, and yes, according to at least one sharia court that means muslims should massacre eachother until there is a clear caliph with a clear territory.
Even Buddhism prescribes some form of death penalty for people having intercourse with people of different faiths. Once again women are more harshly dealt with than men.
Superior talent for moving boxes ? You're kidding right ? And not just in this specific instance... The large majority of jobs are low-skilled, low-productivity and very low margin jobs, even in IT.
You want better conditions for these people ? Lower the cost of labor so this work can be done with more people, without increasing costs too much. Obviously if you increase costs per employee like you suggest (and force people to accept conditions they may or may not care about, e.g. Any student I know would much rather have a short, very intensive (even little to no lunch break), and better paid work) than the conditions you force on them.
Otherwise you're simply forcing companies to destroy jobs that are below a certain productivity. Since the bulk of employment is at the very low skill (and productivity) level any raise in minimum productivity (minimum wage = minimum productivity for obvious reasons) will cause staggering numbers of layoffs. Raising minimum productivity by 5% would certainly kill over 20%-30% of jobs, nationwide.
That's how it works, you know. A company hires a person, at cost X, and then makes that person do work of value Y to society, which is then sold for price Z, which correlates very strongly with Y (in a free market society). Obviously unless Z >> X (significantly larger) that person will be fired.
Before you say "we'll simply outlaw firing people" so you know one of two things will fire these people : -> the company's (or government's) good sense -> the company's (or government's) bankrupty
And if printing more money is your solution to that, you might want to look at countries like Zimbabwe.
The solution ? Make sure a better life becomes possible at a lower wage. Of course that means lowering costs, and increasing choice. Increasing choice, both for employers and employees. The more competition there is in the labor market, at both sides of the equation, the better life will be in America.
Labor listens to the laws of supply & demand just like everyone else. Ideally taxes should be limited at the level that say 98% of supply is utilized. Needless to say, they're seriously above that level for the moment, and Obama's done nothing but raise them. Granted, some (even a lot) of the cost raise was entirely not Obama's fault, but at his paygrade that's no excuse. Obama's not some box mover, who only gets judged on mistakes and targets, he has to perform massively better than status-quo (govt. doing nothing at all). He's spent trillion(s ?) while making the situation worse than his own predictions of what would happen if they didn't do anything at all.
Actually the reverse is probably true. A human generation lasts 20 years. A microbial generation lasts anywhere from 2 seconds to 2 hours, depending on the species. This allows them to find new chemical pathways to digest all sorts of chemicals, and secreting stuff we can digest.
Even though there are massive advantages to having a big body, fast adaptation to new chemicals is not one of those advantages. You'd need a couple ten thousand generations at the very least to learn to digest a new molecule, and certainly millions of them for the tougher ones. There haven't even been 3000 generations since civilization began, and there's been fewer than 100 generations that have known about chemistry (and barely 2 or 3 that have had to deal with chemically prepared food). So we've evolved to support bacteria in our colon that massively expand the number of chemicals that we can digest, and that evolve much, much faster than we do (it's what Darwin's "useless organ", the appendix, is for).
So chances are that we need those bacteria (or at least, one of them, the trouble is telling which one) more than ever.
Of course, we could fix this by (slowly) switching entirely to chemically prepared food, or by massively lowering the number of humans alive, and forcing a number of people to live under "native" conditions. Then trading some food with them (but not much), and other than that prevent any contact at all with those populations.
Since we all know how Americans are responding to the fact that some people only have emergency health care (apparently only illegal aliens), any proposition to force millions of people to live in between snakes, monkeys and tons of poisonous plants without any kind of health care (giving a paper cut a 30% mortality rate due to what's called "cold fire", not that they'll have paper at all though) are not going to collect a lot of steam, no matter how "natural" that way of life is. I seriously doubt that forcing a population into a situation that gives them an expected lifespan of 25 years is going to work.
And obviously, since so many idiots seem hell-bent on defending their fantasy version of "natural lifestyles", they will vigorously attack anything that shows people anything remotely resembling a real natural lifestyle. They might even use violence due to the "fundamental unfairness" that nature obviously will apply to these "natives". Also, these natives, if history is any guide, will attack and kill one another. Genocides will be something that occurs every few years (if we're lucky once per decade), and I seriously doubt these natives will give any more rights to women than any other barbarian tribe ever did. Hell the treatment women get in native tribes makes bin laden look like Don Juan. Not that the treatment of men is so very much better.
You do realize that that view is just about as universal as an idea can get ?
Christianity - yep, you cannot marry outside of your creed. Consequence for acting non-racist : non-recognition of the marriage. Biggest consequences relate to inheritance and the rights of the children of such a marriage. In practice : no consequences. Hinduism - yep, one cannot marry outside of creed. Worse you cannot marry out of your caste, and your partner needs to have near-identical skin color (no white boy black girl or reverse). Some versions accept the right of the more "arian" men to fuck (but not marry) non-arian women outside of marriage. Consequences for not acting racist : for the woman - being buried alive or set on fire. For the man : banishment. In practice : in rural settings, this actually happens. Judaism - yep, you cannot marry outside of your creed. Conseqences for acting non-racist : stoning to death for a woman, if necessary after carrying the resulting pregnancy full term. Consequences for a man : nothing (or a monetary sum if there is reason to assume the woman was raped - generally this sum is quite easily granted the family of the woman). That's theoretically. In practice : consequences are banishment from the family. Islam - yep, you cannot marry outside of creed (but male muslims can capture and fuck as many non-muslim women as they want). Consequences for acting non-racist : theoretically : stoning to death for both man and woman. In practice, death for the woman is widely practiced. Death for the man extremely rarely
Oh and to top it all off, there's a good argument about atheists too. There are many, many views on this amongst atheists. But the largest group of atheists, soviet and chinese communists generally considered this treason, generally resulting in violence against the couple involved.
So yes, perhaps you can consider this hateful, but every creed (including "no creed") has a shameful history in this department.
Perhaps there is a game in this. You start out as a member of the varying creeds, and you have to find an "offending" couple through detective work and have to administer the consequences demanded by the relevant creed.
Most of the Bible is fairy tales loosely based on vague occurrences, from some parts of human history, in some parts of the world, transcribed so many times it has about the same amount of truth
Which makes it a much better source than any historical book, which is the same in essence. Except that the people doing the historical transcribing did not have any motivation whatsoever except self-aggrandizement. The authors of the bible at least, as you say, divided their time between teaching and self-promotion, and at least they pretend every now and then that there are more powerful forces in the world than what's between their employer's legs (hint : few women ever had a historical book written). Really you should read the account of even 20th century parliaments about their decisions. Merely finding how comfortable the allies found their alliance with Stalin (ie. not at all comfortable, it's just that all attempts to ally with Hitler had ended in betrayal. Even after several betrayals the English parliament still preferred allying themselves with Hitler) takes reading 10 books at least, and separating the 90% bullshit from the 10% truth in all of them. Revisionism is not something even we "enlightened" have any problems with. Just try to look up how very positive an opinion of this upstart soldier every European nation and Amerca had. Some little disgruntled and maltreated soldier by the name of A. Hitler. Go ahead, try and find out just how "evil" he was thought to be, even in 1941. I guarantee you'll start crying by the time you read the third article about him written in those years.
Or try to look up the "success stories" of the United Nations. Talk about revisionism. Their first mission was in Africa, in a region of Belgian Congo called "Katanga". You'll be vomiting once you hear what the UN managed to accomplish there. Or their missions in the Sahara. Please warn someone, you'll be ready to bomb their New York headquarters after reading the shit they pulled there. And if you read about their involvement in Yugoslavia... well, their headquarters there were bombed many times. And for very good reason. Of course the organisation has totally turned over a new leaf (and, for example, those reports of UN soldiers raping entire villages including the men two years ago in Western Sahara (the uppity "part" of Morocco) were just an accident - never happened before and never will happen again, right ? It's enough to make you think that there might be a grain of truth to what Hezbollah claims UN soldiers pulled in Lebanon) and we should trust them with anything, like judging the behavior of US troops before a "tribunal" created mostly with Saudi money, with a head chosen by Saudis.
Yes the bible is (mostly) not literally true (not even the vatican claims that). Nevertheless, after 200 years of archaeology it is still the most important source from the period it covers. It is far, far more accurate than any book preceding it, and followed it for a millenium and a half at least.
Even now works made by religious researchers (like the Jesuit's catalog of the sky) frequently put the best of databases to shame.
Motivation is everything. And say what you want, but the motivation of religious people frequently far outperforms that of non-religious people.
Wait a second. Christian rock is bad because it doesn't have the macarena ?
Check again... bad ?
Boy, I'd heard tastes differ, but I had no idea.
Given that as little as a century ago a (very) large majority of music was purely religious, I'd take that "tools the 'other side' has used for centuries with a hefty helping of salt).
Most of those "brilliant" themes you refer to being used in songs, imho, sound suspiciously familiar to someone with a decent knowledge of, heh, 16th century music. Very familiar indeed. One regularly recognizes long parts of those symphonies. Using strategic silences for suspense and dramatic effect has been done in operas since before the first letter was written in the bible.
The fact that those themes are repeated is logical in a way, since that old music is still how music is taught even today. Which, honestly, is a good thing. You can't teach someone more than 2 notes or patterns longer than 5 seconds with any recent song.
The "successful music" you refer to is merely the "big mac" version of last centuries' game feast. Yes they take very little time and effort to "enjoy to the fullest" (most take me less than a second to do that), but they're lacking in every single department. They're not satisfying, you cannot listen to them for even the paltry 2 minutes they last, most are rightfully identified as "noise", they're bad for the ear (and for the stomach if played at the "advised" volume), they lack depth, it is a rarity to have any kind of message in there, and... They're "big macs". There's loads of music out there that you can listen to for 2 days continuously and still not be revolted by.
The same way they would be expected to tolerate a country that says outlandish things such as 'worship whom you wish'. They're a country, dude. A duly elected democratic body that just so happens to disagree with our world view. But they still have just as much right to be sovereign as any other nation that exists by means of the law.
Okay, but I feel entitled to the same freedoms as Palestinians. I feel, specifically entitled to (1) fire rockets into palestinian cities. Place bombs aboard their busses and attacking their kindergartens using dozens of heavily armed soldiers. (2) get billions from the U.N. (mostly from America) to "resolve the poverty that's causing the violence") (3) International pressure (and even armies) used against anyone attempting to use any form of military action to make either the bombings or the money stop.
Agreed ?
Re:I guess you could call it a ...
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A Requiem For Saab
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· Score: 0, Troll
Let's hope so. This would be a bit of a sad Christmas present from Obama to all the workers.
The only way Islam, Christianity, and Judaism are going to change is to persuade their followers to join the 21st century and accept reason, not superstition, as the basis for ethics and human affairs.
What theory, based in scientific fact, could be used for this ? Other than "survival of the fittest", of course, which you presumably do not want to see implemented as an ethics standard.
(and no I don't claim that will make us kill eachother. It will recreate a medieval society though, with wars and genocides between families, cities, and countries)
Force, pressure, or coercion is ineffective against religious nuts, whether Muslim, Christian, or Jewish--it just radicalizes you.
Pray tell, how was this done the last time ? How was Christianity made to accept "the 21st century" (human rights) ? You might want to google a few terms : "Robespierre", "Napoleon". I would note that one tactic employed was locking a village inside it's church, and then setting fire to it.
Cute document. Wrong document. Don't let your scolding be disturbed by facts. You see, it is not in force in Palestina. Only the west-bank, superficially, claims to support this document.
The content of this document is too vile to repeat. Suffice to say article seven specifies the purpose of killing all Jews, and states that they will move on to everyone else after that.
Note that the specific statement calling for extermination of Jews is a statement attributed, by all muslims, to the paedophile prophet of the islamic faith.
It goes : "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla ("servant of allah"), there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him".
So theoretically, and this is EXACTLY what Hamas intends this statement to mean is that everyone who "follows" the paedophilic prophet has a religious duty to exterminate Jews (and to subjugate everyone else).
Unfortunately, a careful stufy will tell you this statement, as used by Hamas, is not pulled out of context, nor is it a lie. It is a (relatively central) part of muslim doctrine, of islam.
So the conclusion is that islamic doctrine itself is virulently anti-human rights. And it is also virulently anti-freedom-of-religion.
As such, I always wonder about the utter stupidity of people who claim allowing islam must be done due to freedom of religion rights. It is equally stupid as saying Stalin's Russia must be allowed to conquer due to freedom of political persuasion. Or that Jews must let themselves be exterminated, because of the freedom of people to have the nazi ideology. Or that we must allow white supremacists to exterminate blacks, after all, not doing so would be impeding their political espression (and the reverse too, for e.g. so-called "black panther" party)
So I ask you this question : since it is a fact that muslim ideology directly calls for the extermination of Jews, do you allow people to act out their muslim faith, or do you prevent religious genocides ?
Do tell. I'm terribly curious. But please stop claiming idiotic absurdities like that freedom of religion allows islam. That's like saying Hitler's extermination camps were right, due to freedom of political persuasion.
At best, it's nothing. At worst, you set off the bomb....
Absolutely right, technically and yet, completely wrong... you see, you forget that by shooting the bomb, you get to choose the time & place of it's detonation. It's not like they shot the laptop while the woman was holding it, 1 meter in front of themselves. They took it off her, ran outside, placed the bag in an open space against a wall and then shot it from behind a shield, with bullets made especially for the purpose (that do, obviously, set off just about any explosive material).
Even if the bullets leave the bomb material in a ready-to-explode state, chances are good they've hit the controlling circuitry denying terrorists the capability of remote detonation. At the very least, they will cause problems once the detonation is spreading through the explosive material, greatly diminishing the power of the blast.
Bombs are not all that powerful. Their purpose is not simply to explode. Their purpose is to explode within at most a few meters of their target, so that they kill, or maim. By shooting the bomb you are preventing the damage intended.
How did they know her cellphone wasn't a bomb? Did they shoot that, too?
The size. An effective bomb has a minimum size and weight. Generally anything lighter and smaller than a pistol can be discounted. Only someone with extensive chemical resources and knowledge will be able to make an effective bomb of realistic size.
Cell phones are only dangerous because they make very good radio detonators.
And let's not forget - the question is ALSO if Hamas has used civilian areas to stage attacks and launch missiles. Fortunately, international law is quite sane on the subject. If Hamas did use civilian structures to stage and execute attacks, Gazans don't get ANY protection under international law.
Anyone is perfectly justified to bomb a rocket launcher. This does not change if that rocket launcher is put in the middle of a UN kindergarden. In trade for protection against attacks, the UN is forced to keep any soldiers involved in any type of attacks out of it's installations.
Furthermore the taking of hostages, the random destruction of property (like with katushya's) and so on are all grave war crimes. When will gazans/hamas/islam (whatever you wish to call the problem) be brought to justice ?
You do realize that hamas, you know, lies. In addition to destroying their own people just for the attempt to kill a few Jews ?
But really : how much of what you read is propaganda, and how much of it is true ? Not that we don't all (including you) know that already, but hey, someone's got to ask the question.
How can you tolerate a country that has "we will kill all jews world-wide" in it's constitution (note they do clarify that if they ever get the Jews they will come after everyone else - you just can't make this up. Unfortunately, it's not a joke)
And btw, yes Hamas stole the election. Unfortunately, they would have won even if they hadn't stolen it according to polls. This existence is what Gazan muslims want, over 60% of them. Of course, the fact that anyone who has anything better to do in his life than killing Jews has long since left is the main cause of that.
The UN has consistently refused to explain why they allow Hamas members to launch rockets from within kindergardens. Doesn't that qualify as material support and general aid to terrorists ?
Would it be possible to design a bombWould it be possible to design a bomb that goes off when shot? That way, you-the-bomber get around the most popular technique for defusing rather easily... that goes off when shot? That way, you-the-bomber get around the most popular technique for defusing rather easily...
You do realize that that's the whole point, right ? Opening the bomb and attempting analysis is what's risky. By putting it in a safe place (against a wall and no roof over it) and then shooting it, you can make it explode safely, without hurting anyone.
The object of defusing a bomb stopped being actually defusing the bomb a long time ago. These days the object of defusing a bomb is to detonate it at a time and place of your choosing, instead of the time and place of the bomber's choosing, as just about every security force in the world has lost too many body parts and lives to defusing attempts.
But the British say the same thing, you know that small country that fought in the same war and that hitler turned his attention to after beating the french?
After is a term that implies actual passage of time. "During" or "before" would be better imho.
But the main issue was the effort to preserve the peace, the effort to acceed to the "reasonable demands" of the "champion of the poor" (that would be Adolf Hitler).
Just to show you how desperate (and mind-boggingly naive and stupid) the attempts to "make peace" with Nazi Germany were. Here's the story of the start of WWII, according to wikipedia:
On 30 August the Polish Navy sent its destroyer flotilla to Britain, executing Operation Peking. On the same day, Marshal of Poland Edward Rydz-migy announced the mobilization of Polish troops. However, he was pressured into revoking the order by the French, who apparently still hoped for a diplomatic settlement, failing to realize that the Germans were fully mobilized and concentrated at the Polish border. On 31 August 1939, Hitler ordered hostilities against Poland to start at 4:45 the next morning. Because of the prior stoppage, Poland managed to mobilize only 70% of its planned forces, and many units were still forming or moving to their designated frontline positions.
Just so you know, the exact event is that the French Foreign minister convinced the Polish ministry of defence to give a demobilization order, 1 hour and 15 minutes after Hitler's attack had started at full strength (after the switch from sabotage operations, false-flag attacks and covert operations into full-scale open warfare, Hitler had already been attacking Poland for weeks covertly, something the French knew). After the war it would be shown that the French foreign ministry was well-informed about the state of German troops, and while they didn't find out about the attack order until about 7 AM, they did not feel the need to inform Poland (again this was done "to preserve the peace", according to archives).
The French believed they could acquiesce to Hitler's demands, and thus avoid a conflict. The reasons are that they really, really did not want to fight. The reasons for that included that at that time, Hitler was the hero, both of French Nazi's and of the French lefties, including socialists and communists, and even (quite large) parts of "center" parties. With the center parties Hitler was mainly seen as a preferable alternative to communism. While the "rightist" party was not convinced, even they found the "alternative" to communism a compelling part of fascist ideology.
Those center politicians saw Hitler as someone who could bring social justice without bringing the well-known disaster that communism was. This was, however only a real argument in the center parties. He was (in 1940) not openly anti-capitalism, he just insisted on "controls" on management and ownership. He was not openly anti-religious (he even attempted to ally himself with the Pope, who refused, and allied himself with the muslim "caliph", who jumped at the chance, Aymin al Husseini of Jerusalem, who would later help him create the SS and the extermination camps, providing sites, food and troops. Yes one of the dirty secrets of WWII is that the islamic religious establishment created several extermination camps, in addition to providing logistical and even military troops to others. The muslims did this, knowing full well what the camps were for (or at least, the upper echelon knew)).
Because no-one fully realized what national socialism stood for, and what Hitler was capable of to achieve his "social justice" (that's what it was about for him). Hitler was not a good speaker, but he did realize one thing : a politician should make speaches that convey little meaning and not discuss policy or make clear statements under any circumstances, because if people don't know your ideology, it allows people who were mortal enemies (religious parties and communists, for example) to both vote for you. He pionieered the "victimhood rhetoric" that is so prevalent today, accusing any and all political opponents of "hating" the poor, muslims (yes
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The beagleboard. Capable of dvi and hdmi output. 256M ram. Linux running on it.
And nobody would be able to predict what happens when it comes into force. We only know what won't happen :
-> it won't make medicare or medicaid cheaper (according to CBO and common sense)
-> it cannot be paid with 10 times the amount of money allocated to it (according, again, to CBO and common sense)
-> it won't allow companies to continue doing medical research like they do today. Perhaps - perhaps - an alternative model will work, but then again, perhaps not
-> it won't cover the (currently) uninsured
-> it will change medical delivery from money-based to ration-based (govt. decides who does - and who does not - get medical care, and is not accountable to anyone - not even to congress. This bill means that whether you get a pacemaker is decided by (a person appointed by) Obama, with no recourse for any person), the famous "death panel"
Dude, everything we have is from nature. Our food, our clothing, our oil, our raw materials, our bodies and minds are nature. "Nature" is us and we are it.
Only in the sense that we have the same atoms. Of course thinking in terms of atoms would mean you're essentially the same as adolf hitler, or horseshit, no ?
Your ancestors didn't ride on dragons? Wah! They rode on horses, donkeys, mules, camels, elephants, dogsleds -- almost anything strong enough to carry a human being. Why do you feel so put out by "Gaia"?
Hello ? Flying dragons, man ! Flying dragons. Donkeys do NOT compare to flying dragons, I'm sure you can appreciate that. And also, where are the animal toasters ?
Where are you getting this from? What in the world is a natural religion?
For example the native indian "religion". Generally any ideology/culture that's pre-agriculture, and their immediate successors is considered a natural religion. Of course, definitions vary.
Who nearly exterminated the Apaches for their land ? Surely it was the "oppressive whites", right ? Well no, it was the Commanches. Of course the Apaches only got that land by warring with another tribe that they exterminated, and we don't even know the name of, just a few images.
Another Indian nation, the Erie nation was exterminated. They lived somewhere near northeast california and large areas to the east of that. They were killed. Every last man, woman and child (the children were famously eaten. Some of those children have been autopsied, hundreds of years after the fact, and guess what was found ? They were alive when the initial bitemarks were made. They were eaten alive. An open question is whether they made their parents watch, like the muslim prophet did when he did the same to a certain tribe that dared to leave him. Of course that gives us some idea as to how Indians dealt with that history, as you can ask any muslim how they deal with it. You see, according to muslims, those acts were not just morally okay, but "holy", unassailable, for they were direct commands from allah, and that even if other muslims repeat that behavior it would not be judged morally wrong. That is, of course, what a religion is, at heart : a definition of what is morally right and morally wroing (and everything in between). There is no "universal" morality, no matter how strongly Baha'is and assorted "noble savage" fantasts believe in it. I'm quite sure you'd find the same sort of justifications amongst members of native american tribes. The type of muslim excuse "mohamed was not a paedophilic rapist, that's a dirty word. Of course, yes, he did fuck a 9 (or 7) year old girl against her will, had intercourse with slaves and had them beaten before and afterwards, and so on. But that was all morally right, and so he was not a paedophile, nor a rapist. That sort of statement).
The same happened to the Huron nation, though the Huron children died from getting their skulls smashed in by a club, and were only eaten afterwards. Surely only white males could have done something like this ? Though one gets suspicious. Eating children, after all, doesn't sound all that Christian, now does it ? Not that anyone claims the conquistadores were very devoted Christians, but even for them this goes very very far, doesn't it ? And of course, you'd be right to doubt : it was the Iroqois (they're called "victims" nowadays)
This is incidentally something they (the Iroquois) tried to do to dozens of European settlements, and they succeeded in doing this at least twice, and probably at least a few of the "disappeared" settlements met this fate too.
I know it is extremely politically incorrect and even racist to tell the history of many peoples, like the native Americans or the muslims. But what is one to do when the truth has become racist, and people demand it to be replaced or suppressed ? I believe in ignoring idiotic sensibilities in favor of the truth.
All these things pal
That's like saying Einstein had 2 lab assistants, not just Einstein.
When writing special and general relativity Einstein used these resources :
1) Pencil (not even a pen)
2) Paper
So they're not in fact equal. Your statement is a lie (factually incorrect).
And lots of people play the offensive game against botnets. Just ask a few ircops. It doesn't last, and it attracts ddoses like hell. If I was this guy's ISP, I'd be pissed.
Constantly selling things allows for pareto-efficiency
Wealth production and retention necessitates Nash equilibrium
The problem with Nash equilibrium is the utter impossibility to improve one's own situation without destroying another's livelihood (which is the very definition of the concept)
If you think about it, this is an obvious property of any "wealth retention" society. Any society without yearly economic growth will cuase this. If no new wealth is constantly produced the only way to procure wealth is to steal it from someone else. Yes steal. After all, prices have long been set in stone in such a society for obvious reasons, and nobody willingly trades anything.
The problem is once any form of wealth acquisition is basically equal to theft, what moral imperative is there to not rape ? It's the exact same thing as getting paid at the end of the month is for you, after all. And while you'd obviously be right that one year of fixed-state economy won't turn all men into rapists. However, "in the long term", it will. The same will happen to murder and so on. Eventually a sort-of balance between mafia-like associations will result, though not without regular outburst of violence.
First of all, the obvious : Nice graphics, of course, though still not quite out of the "uncanny valley", where I'd want them to be. A nice evolutionary step, but certainly not something that won't be surpassed next month (year). It's a bit like those old Disney movies like fantasia "pushing the boundaries of animation". Great looking, but easily surpassed.
Imho the movie is massively anti-technology and pro-"magic". Magic in a sort of a mythological "natural religion" kind of way, and of course conveniently leaving out anything even remotely resembling an actual natural religion (just one example : all natural religions mandate (yes mandate) intra-religious wars between families, individuals and villages, or various combinations of that. Of course, deadly competition between inhabitants of the same place is a physical necessity in any non-agricultural religion, due to the massive inflexibility, unpredictability and unreliability of food sources, and the (natural) inability of a species to do birth control, resulting in exponentially increasing populations that regularly get "adjusted" by a famine or some such, a subject conveniently skipped over in the movie).
Before you ask, flying dragons, and other magical servile creatures seemlingly bread to replace everything from a helicopter to a toast maker do not count as "technology" in my mind. I do not find this strange at all. Nature has provided us with far less than it has provided these aliens. It seems gaia didn't love us from the start ... my ancestors never rode on flying dragons.
Another thing I find quite funny is the location of that village and that tree. What energy source would they have ? Given the extreme "coincidental" location they have, one would think it ... just might be those very same minerals. This would mean, of course, that all that "native" stuff is just "plundering" exactly the mineral source as the humans want. If that wasn't the case, imagine just how "unlucky" those natives must have been to build exactly there. But, of course, keeping mountains floating in the air is just so much more important than keeping humans alive (after all, the movie dialog makes clear that following any course of action other than acquiring those "unobtanium" minerals would result in massive casualties on earth. Of course you'd think that sort of urgency would make people appoint a military commander who is actually capable of dispatching multiple ships, or realize that a space-faring human race probably has options of using orbital bombardment, or even just sending one of those probes to make a *tiny* course correction on a meteor. Problem solved. The aliens obviously have no hope at all of repulsing any form of long-distance attack, whether that's missiles, ray weapons or even meteors).
Avatar as a suicide fantasy
Given the reaction on other blogs this review will loosen quite a few feelings. Apparently it hits close to home for quite a few people. Great stuff for discussions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoning
Unfortunately, wishing something to be true does not make it true. So read it and be man enough to accept the truth for what it is. (And by the way the "no consequences for the man" in Judaism comes from the rules of proof, like in Sharia, not from the toraic law itself. Technically a Jewish man can be stoned for fucking a woman, however, the testimony of that woman is not enough to prove that man did it. In fact 2 (innocent) adult Jewish males must testify that they saw the accused do it with their own eyes, and you can evaluate for yourself how likely a man is to rape a woman with 2 valid non-accomplices as witnesses. That the woman had sex can be proven, by contrast, either by a doctor (hymen), or by pregnancy. Either is sufficient for stoning her. In practice even being accused of rape will obviously have social consequences, and the family is to be reimbursed for the death of the woman)
And please don't start with the "technicalities of your own personal interpretation of faith" idiocy. Yes, obviously you don't accept Sanhedrin judgements, nor do you accept Beth Din judgements (no Jew does in the 21st century, it's just not possible). Nevertheless, if you were to take Sanhedrin and Beth Din judgements out of Judaism, there would be nothing left. In reality you only selectively apply your religion to your life, ironically following Christian judgements the vast majority of the time.
And before you say it's not true, let's hear your plans for following the (Judaic) commandment to burn non-Jewish cities ? I'm not accusing you of planning terrorism, just pointing out that doing so is mandatory for all Jews, of all denominations. I do NOT claim any Jew is actually doing this, in fact I claim the reverse (and if any Jew does decide to do this he'll be rightfully called a dangerous nutcase, and treated as such).
I submit that if you claim that you do not accept such things as moral, then one of these is true : you're not, in fact, a Jew, or what you call "Judaism" is not at all the same thing as what was called Judaism even 150 years ago, specifically it is not the ideology that received God's blessing so very long ago, even by your own Jewish standards.
And of course, you're right that the same goes for other faiths. Take muslims. Did you know one sharia law states that muslims who choose to live anywhere except in land controlled exclusively by the caliph should be massacred ? Just so you know, there is no such land, and yes, according to at least one sharia court that means muslims should massacre eachother until there is a clear caliph with a clear territory.
Even Buddhism prescribes some form of death penalty for people having intercourse with people of different faiths. Once again women are more harshly dealt with than men.
"minimum wage = minimum productivity"
Should have been :
minimum wage + tax (sum employer and employee paid taxes, including corporate taxes) = minimum productivity
Whoops.
Superior talent for moving boxes ? You're kidding right ? And not just in this specific instance ... The large majority of jobs are low-skilled, low-productivity and very low margin jobs, even in IT.
You want better conditions for these people ? Lower the cost of labor so this work can be done with more people, without increasing costs too much. Obviously if you increase costs per employee like you suggest (and force people to accept conditions they may or may not care about, e.g. Any student I know would much rather have a short, very intensive (even little to no lunch break), and better paid work) than the conditions you force on them.
Otherwise you're simply forcing companies to destroy jobs that are below a certain productivity. Since the bulk of employment is at the very low skill (and productivity) level any raise in minimum productivity (minimum wage = minimum productivity for obvious reasons) will cause staggering numbers of layoffs. Raising minimum productivity by 5% would certainly kill over 20%-30% of jobs, nationwide.
That's how it works, you know. A company hires a person, at cost X, and then makes that person do work of value Y to society, which is then sold for price Z, which correlates very strongly with Y (in a free market society). Obviously unless Z >> X (significantly larger) that person will be fired.
Before you say "we'll simply outlaw firing people" so you know one of two things will fire these people :
-> the company's (or government's) good sense
-> the company's (or government's) bankrupty
And if printing more money is your solution to that, you might want to look at countries like Zimbabwe.
The solution ? Make sure a better life becomes possible at a lower wage. Of course that means lowering costs, and increasing choice. Increasing choice, both for employers and employees. The more competition there is in the labor market, at both sides of the equation, the better life will be in America.
Labor listens to the laws of supply & demand just like everyone else. Ideally taxes should be limited at the level that say 98% of supply is utilized. Needless to say, they're seriously above that level for the moment, and Obama's done nothing but raise them. Granted, some (even a lot) of the cost raise was entirely not Obama's fault, but at his paygrade that's no excuse. Obama's not some box mover, who only gets judged on mistakes and targets, he has to perform massively better than status-quo (govt. doing nothing at all). He's spent trillion(s ?) while making the situation worse than his own predictions of what would happen if they didn't do anything at all.
Actually the reverse is probably true. A human generation lasts 20 years. A microbial generation lasts anywhere from 2 seconds to 2 hours, depending on the species. This allows them to find new chemical pathways to digest all sorts of chemicals, and secreting stuff we can digest.
Even though there are massive advantages to having a big body, fast adaptation to new chemicals is not one of those advantages. You'd need a couple ten thousand generations at the very least to learn to digest a new molecule, and certainly millions of them for the tougher ones. There haven't even been 3000 generations since civilization began, and there's been fewer than 100 generations that have known about chemistry (and barely 2 or 3 that have had to deal with chemically prepared food). So we've evolved to support bacteria in our colon that massively expand the number of chemicals that we can digest, and that evolve much, much faster than we do (it's what Darwin's "useless organ", the appendix, is for).
So chances are that we need those bacteria (or at least, one of them, the trouble is telling which one) more than ever.
Of course, we could fix this by (slowly) switching entirely to chemically prepared food, or by massively lowering the number of humans alive, and forcing a number of people to live under "native" conditions. Then trading some food with them (but not much), and other than that prevent any contact at all with those populations.
Since we all know how Americans are responding to the fact that some people only have emergency health care (apparently only illegal aliens), any proposition to force millions of people to live in between snakes, monkeys and tons of poisonous plants without any kind of health care (giving a paper cut a 30% mortality rate due to what's called "cold fire", not that they'll have paper at all though) are not going to collect a lot of steam, no matter how "natural" that way of life is. I seriously doubt that forcing a population into a situation that gives them an expected lifespan of 25 years is going to work.
And obviously, since so many idiots seem hell-bent on defending their fantasy version of "natural lifestyles", they will vigorously attack anything that shows people anything remotely resembling a real natural lifestyle. They might even use violence due to the "fundamental unfairness" that nature obviously will apply to these "natives". Also, these natives, if history is any guide, will attack and kill one another. Genocides will be something that occurs every few years (if we're lucky once per decade), and I seriously doubt these natives will give any more rights to women than any other barbarian tribe ever did. Hell the treatment women get in native tribes makes bin laden look like Don Juan. Not that the treatment of men is so very much better.
You do realize that that view is just about as universal as an idea can get ?
Christianity - yep, you cannot marry outside of your creed. Consequence for acting non-racist : non-recognition of the marriage. Biggest consequences relate to inheritance and the rights of the children of such a marriage. In practice : no consequences.
Hinduism - yep, one cannot marry outside of creed. Worse you cannot marry out of your caste, and your partner needs to have near-identical skin color (no white boy black girl or reverse). Some versions accept the right of the more "arian" men to fuck (but not marry) non-arian women outside of marriage. Consequences for not acting racist : for the woman - being buried alive or set on fire. For the man : banishment. In practice : in rural settings, this actually happens.
Judaism - yep, you cannot marry outside of your creed. Conseqences for acting non-racist : stoning to death for a woman, if necessary after carrying the resulting pregnancy full term. Consequences for a man : nothing (or a monetary sum if there is reason to assume the woman was raped - generally this sum is quite easily granted the family of the woman). That's theoretically. In practice : consequences are banishment from the family.
Islam - yep, you cannot marry outside of creed (but male muslims can capture and fuck as many non-muslim women as they want). Consequences for acting non-racist : theoretically : stoning to death for both man and woman. In practice, death for the woman is widely practiced. Death for the man extremely rarely
Oh and to top it all off, there's a good argument about atheists too. There are many, many views on this amongst atheists. But the largest group of atheists, soviet and chinese communists generally considered this treason, generally resulting in violence against the couple involved.
So yes, perhaps you can consider this hateful, but every creed (including "no creed") has a shameful history in this department.
Perhaps there is a game in this. You start out as a member of the varying creeds, and you have to find an "offending" couple through detective work and have to administer the consequences demanded by the relevant creed.
Most of the Bible is fairy tales loosely based on vague occurrences, from some parts of human history, in some parts of the world, transcribed so many times it has about the same amount of truth
Which makes it a much better source than any historical book, which is the same in essence. Except that the people doing the historical transcribing did not have any motivation whatsoever except self-aggrandizement. The authors of the bible at least, as you say, divided their time between teaching and self-promotion, and at least they pretend every now and then that there are more powerful forces in the world than what's between their employer's legs (hint : few women ever had a historical book written). Really you should read the account of even 20th century parliaments about their decisions. Merely finding how comfortable the allies found their alliance with Stalin (ie. not at all comfortable, it's just that all attempts to ally with Hitler had ended in betrayal. Even after several betrayals the English parliament still preferred allying themselves with Hitler) takes reading 10 books at least, and separating the 90% bullshit from the 10% truth in all of them. Revisionism is not something even we "enlightened" have any problems with. Just try to look up how very positive an opinion of this upstart soldier every European nation and Amerca had. Some little disgruntled and maltreated soldier by the name of A. Hitler. Go ahead, try and find out just how "evil" he was thought to be, even in 1941. I guarantee you'll start crying by the time you read the third article about him written in those years.
Or try to look up the "success stories" of the United Nations. Talk about revisionism. Their first mission was in Africa, in a region of Belgian Congo called "Katanga". You'll be vomiting once you hear what the UN managed to accomplish there. Or their missions in the Sahara. Please warn someone, you'll be ready to bomb their New York headquarters after reading the shit they pulled there. And if you read about their involvement in Yugoslavia ... well, their headquarters there were bombed many times. And for very good reason. Of course the organisation has totally turned over a new leaf (and, for example, those reports of UN soldiers raping entire villages including the men two years ago in Western Sahara (the uppity "part" of Morocco) were just an accident - never happened before and never will happen again, right ? It's enough to make you think that there might be a grain of truth to what Hezbollah claims UN soldiers pulled in Lebanon) and we should trust them with anything, like judging the behavior of US troops before a "tribunal" created mostly with Saudi money, with a head chosen by Saudis.
Yes the bible is (mostly) not literally true (not even the vatican claims that). Nevertheless, after 200 years of archaeology it is still the most important source from the period it covers. It is far, far more accurate than any book preceding it, and followed it for a millenium and a half at least.
Even now works made by religious researchers (like the Jesuit's catalog of the sky) frequently put the best of databases to shame.
Motivation is everything. And say what you want, but the motivation of religious people frequently far outperforms that of non-religious people.
Wait a second. Christian rock is bad because it doesn't have the macarena ?
Check again ... bad ?
Boy, I'd heard tastes differ, but I had no idea.
Given that as little as a century ago a (very) large majority of music was purely religious, I'd take that "tools the 'other side' has used for centuries with a hefty helping of salt).
Most of those "brilliant" themes you refer to being used in songs, imho, sound suspiciously familiar to someone with a decent knowledge of, heh, 16th century music. Very familiar indeed. One regularly recognizes long parts of those symphonies. Using strategic silences for suspense and dramatic effect has been done in operas since before the first letter was written in the bible.
The fact that those themes are repeated is logical in a way, since that old music is still how music is taught even today. Which, honestly, is a good thing. You can't teach someone more than 2 notes or patterns longer than 5 seconds with any recent song.
The "successful music" you refer to is merely the "big mac" version of last centuries' game feast. Yes they take very little time and effort to "enjoy to the fullest" (most take me less than a second to do that), but they're lacking in every single department. They're not satisfying, you cannot listen to them for even the paltry 2 minutes they last, most are rightfully identified as "noise", they're bad for the ear (and for the stomach if played at the "advised" volume), they lack depth, it is a rarity to have any kind of message in there, and ... They're "big macs". There's loads of music out there that you can listen to for 2 days continuously and still not be revolted by.
The same way they would be expected to tolerate a country that says outlandish things such as 'worship whom you wish'. They're a country, dude. A duly elected democratic body that just so happens to disagree with our world view. But they still have just as much right to be sovereign as any other nation that exists by means of the law.
Okay, but I feel entitled to the same freedoms as Palestinians. I feel, specifically entitled to
(1) fire rockets into palestinian cities. Place bombs aboard their busses and attacking their kindergartens using dozens of heavily armed soldiers.
(2) get billions from the U.N. (mostly from America) to "resolve the poverty that's causing the violence")
(3) International pressure (and even armies) used against anyone attempting to use any form of military action to make either the bombings or the money stop.
Agreed ?
Let's hope so. This would be a bit of a sad Christmas present from Obama to all the workers.
The only way Islam, Christianity, and Judaism are going to change is to persuade their followers to join the 21st century and accept reason, not superstition, as the basis for ethics and human affairs.
What theory, based in scientific fact, could be used for this ? Other than "survival of the fittest", of course, which you presumably do not want to see implemented as an ethics standard.
(and no I don't claim that will make us kill eachother. It will recreate a medieval society though, with wars and genocides between families, cities, and countries)
Force, pressure, or coercion is ineffective against religious nuts, whether Muslim, Christian, or Jewish--it just radicalizes you.
Pray tell, how was this done the last time ? How was Christianity made to accept "the 21st century" (human rights) ? You might want to google a few terms : "Robespierre", "Napoleon". I would note that one tactic employed was locking a village inside it's church, and then setting fire to it.
Cute document. Wrong document. Don't let your scolding be disturbed by facts. You see, it is not in force in Palestina. Only the west-bank, superficially, claims to support this document.
The real constitution of Gaza is this document : the Hamas Charter
The content of this document is too vile to repeat. Suffice to say article seven specifies the purpose of killing all Jews, and states that they will move on to everyone else after that.
Note that the specific statement calling for extermination of Jews is a statement attributed, by all muslims, to the paedophile prophet of the islamic faith.
It goes : "The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla ("servant of allah"), there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him".
So theoretically, and this is EXACTLY what Hamas intends this statement to mean is that everyone who "follows" the paedophilic prophet has a religious duty to exterminate Jews (and to subjugate everyone else).
Unfortunately, a careful stufy will tell you this statement, as used by Hamas, is not pulled out of context, nor is it a lie. It is a (relatively central) part of muslim doctrine, of islam.
So the conclusion is that islamic doctrine itself is virulently anti-human rights. And it is also virulently anti-freedom-of-religion.
As such, I always wonder about the utter stupidity of people who claim allowing islam must be done due to freedom of religion rights. It is equally stupid as saying Stalin's Russia must be allowed to conquer due to freedom of political persuasion. Or that Jews must let themselves be exterminated, because of the freedom of people to have the nazi ideology. Or that we must allow white supremacists to exterminate blacks, after all, not doing so would be impeding their political espression (and the reverse too, for e.g. so-called "black panther" party)
So I ask you this question : since it is a fact that muslim ideology directly calls for the extermination of Jews, do you allow people to act out their muslim faith, or do you prevent religious genocides ?
Do tell. I'm terribly curious. But please stop claiming idiotic absurdities like that freedom of religion allows islam. That's like saying Hitler's extermination camps were right, due to freedom of political persuasion.
At best, it's nothing. At worst, you set off the bomb....
Absolutely right, technically and yet, completely wrong ... you see, you forget that by shooting the bomb, you get to choose the time & place of it's detonation. It's not like they shot the laptop while the woman was holding it, 1 meter in front of themselves. They took it off her, ran outside, placed the bag in an open space against a wall and then shot it from behind a shield, with bullets made especially for the purpose (that do, obviously, set off just about any explosive material).
Even if the bullets leave the bomb material in a ready-to-explode state, chances are good they've hit the controlling circuitry denying terrorists the capability of remote detonation. At the very least, they will cause problems once the detonation is spreading through the explosive material, greatly diminishing the power of the blast.
Bombs are not all that powerful. Their purpose is not simply to explode. Their purpose is to explode within at most a few meters of their target, so that they kill, or maim. By shooting the bomb you are preventing the damage intended.
How did they know her cellphone wasn't a bomb? Did they shoot that, too?
The size. An effective bomb has a minimum size and weight. Generally anything lighter and smaller than a pistol can be discounted. Only someone with extensive chemical resources and knowledge will be able to make an effective bomb of realistic size.
Cell phones are only dangerous because they make very good radio detonators.
And let's not forget - the question is ALSO if Hamas has used civilian areas to stage attacks and launch missiles. Fortunately, international law is quite sane on the subject. If Hamas did use civilian structures to stage and execute attacks, Gazans don't get ANY protection under international law.
Anyone is perfectly justified to bomb a rocket launcher. This does not change if that rocket launcher is put in the middle of a UN kindergarden. In trade for protection against attacks, the UN is forced to keep any soldiers involved in any type of attacks out of it's installations.
Furthermore the taking of hostages, the random destruction of property (like with katushya's) and so on are all grave war crimes. When will gazans/hamas/islam (whatever you wish to call the problem) be brought to justice ?
You do realize that hamas, you know, lies. In addition to destroying their own people just for the attempt to kill a few Jews ?
But really : how much of what you read is propaganda, and how much of it is true ? Not that we don't all (including you) know that already, but hey, someone's got to ask the question.
Here are 2 pictures of a Gazan farm, built by Jews, that was given to Hamas :
before it was given to hamas
1 year later
(that's a weapons smuggling tunnel)
How can you tolerate a country that has "we will kill all jews world-wide" in it's constitution (note they do clarify that if they ever get the Jews they will come after everyone else - you just can't make this up. Unfortunately, it's not a joke)
And btw, yes Hamas stole the election. Unfortunately, they would have won even if they hadn't stolen it according to polls. This existence is what Gazan muslims want, over 60% of them. Of course, the fact that anyone who has anything better to do in his life than killing Jews has long since left is the main cause of that.
Exactly.
The UN has consistently refused to explain why they allow Hamas members to launch rockets from within kindergardens. Doesn't that qualify as material support and general aid to terrorists ?
Would it be possible to design a bombWould it be possible to design a bomb that goes off when shot? That way, you-the-bomber get around the most popular technique for defusing rather easily... that goes off when shot? That way, you-the-bomber get around the most popular technique for defusing rather easily...
You do realize that that's the whole point, right ? Opening the bomb and attempting analysis is what's risky. By putting it in a safe place (against a wall and no roof over it) and then shooting it, you can make it explode safely, without hurting anyone.
The object of defusing a bomb stopped being actually defusing the bomb a long time ago. These days the object of defusing a bomb is to detonate it at a time and place of your choosing, instead of the time and place of the bomber's choosing, as just about every security force in the world has lost too many body parts and lives to defusing attempts.
But the British say the same thing, you know that small country that fought in the same war and that hitler turned his attention to after beating the french?
After is a term that implies actual passage of time. "During" or "before" would be better imho.
But the main issue was the effort to preserve the peace, the effort to acceed to the "reasonable demands" of the "champion of the poor" (that would be Adolf Hitler).
Just to show you how desperate (and mind-boggingly naive and stupid) the attempts to "make peace" with Nazi Germany were. Here's the story of the start of WWII, according to wikipedia :
On 30 August the Polish Navy sent its destroyer flotilla to Britain, executing Operation Peking. On the same day, Marshal of Poland Edward Rydz-migy announced the mobilization of Polish troops. However, he was pressured into revoking the order by the French, who apparently still hoped for a diplomatic settlement, failing to realize that the Germans were fully mobilized and concentrated at the Polish border. On 31 August 1939, Hitler ordered hostilities against Poland to start at 4:45 the next morning. Because of the prior stoppage, Poland managed to mobilize only 70% of its planned forces, and many units were still forming or moving to their designated frontline positions.
Just so you know, the exact event is that the French Foreign minister convinced the Polish ministry of defence to give a demobilization order, 1 hour and 15 minutes after Hitler's attack had started at full strength (after the switch from sabotage operations, false-flag attacks and covert operations into full-scale open warfare, Hitler had already been attacking Poland for weeks covertly, something the French knew). After the war it would be shown that the French foreign ministry was well-informed about the state of German troops, and while they didn't find out about the attack order until about 7 AM, they did not feel the need to inform Poland (again this was done "to preserve the peace", according to archives).
The French believed they could acquiesce to Hitler's demands, and thus avoid a conflict. The reasons are that they really, really did not want to fight. The reasons for that included that at that time, Hitler was the hero, both of French Nazi's and of the French lefties, including socialists and communists, and even (quite large) parts of "center" parties. With the center parties Hitler was mainly seen as a preferable alternative to communism. While the "rightist" party was not convinced, even they found the "alternative" to communism a compelling part of fascist ideology.
Those center politicians saw Hitler as someone who could bring social justice without bringing the well-known disaster that communism was. This was, however only a real argument in the center parties. He was (in 1940) not openly anti-capitalism, he just insisted on "controls" on management and ownership. He was not openly anti-religious (he even attempted to ally himself with the Pope, who refused, and allied himself with the muslim "caliph", who jumped at the chance, Aymin al Husseini of Jerusalem, who would later help him create the SS and the extermination camps, providing sites, food and troops. Yes one of the dirty secrets of WWII is that the islamic religious establishment created several extermination camps, in addition to providing logistical and even military troops to others. The muslims did this, knowing full well what the camps were for (or at least, the upper echelon knew)).
Because no-one fully realized what national socialism stood for, and what Hitler was capable of to achieve his "social justice" (that's what it was about for him). Hitler was not a good speaker, but he did realize one thing : a politician should make speaches that convey little meaning and not discuss policy or make clear statements under any circumstances, because if people don't know your ideology, it allows people who were mortal enemies (religious parties and communists, for example) to both vote for you. He pionieered the "victimhood rhetoric" that is so prevalent today, accusing any and all political opponents of "hating" the poor, muslims (yes