The irony here is that, just like robbery or any other crime, if a strong enough negative reinforcement for the crime is enforced, the number of attempts will be drastically cut down. Just enforce the damn law, consistently and regularly, and people would stop committing the crime as often for fear of getting caught!
This is why rape is not common in our society (at least not as common as it used to be, by far): we have DNA evidence, modern forensics, and (usually) very agressive investigative agents who nip it in the bud ASAP. This is why, in states which have allowed citizens to carry concealed weapons and where there are "make my day" laws, there are lower incidences of predatory crime in general (burglary, robbery, muggings, etc.) - the intended victim is legally allowed to protect themselves and their property. This is why people tend to not speed on certain sections of road - because the cops are frequently sitting there with speed traps.
Exactly what I was thinking. Five days time, a vehicle untraceable to him, and evidence plant - just in case they found the body or some shred tracing to him. Pin it on the guy with the shitty car.
that's because the police aren't there to 'serve and protect' anymore. there is no more officer friendly. they're there to put the body in the bag, write you traffic tickets, and - in general - keep the citizenry under control. that's why things like pot and hookers are illegal and heavily prosecuted; the government wants to maintain its grasp on mind altering substances and physical pleasure (media and pharmacuticals).
Sounds crazy and 1984, but it makes sense to my tired mind...
I hate to be a hater, but... you're in Maryland, what'd you expect? Maryland cops are almost as bad as the DC cops in terms of inneptitude and corruption. Between the high violent crime rates in both DC and Maryland, the police haven't got the time or motivation to deal with a seemingly petty offence - in comparision - like a stolen laptop from a company.
No, it's not right. But it's the way it is. You should fight it, though - but you won't likely get results. Still, trying to get a response is akin to helping someone when they're being raped - it might be against your interests of self-preservation, but you couldn't live with yourself if you stood by and let the injustice and abuse of power go unquestioned.
I don't know much about nukes (except they're not generally a good source of nutrition), but I do know that a cold environment with a warm source - or vice versa - will result in a great deal of condensation, frost, and potential hardware problems.
Why would you want to subject the computers themselves to potentially hostile environments? there are dozens if not hundreds of solutions out there which would meet this need. I personally know a guy who writes software to control and monitor temperature sensors placed in grain elevators. as far as I know the technology would work just fine in a freezer (though its targeted for an outdoor grain elevator - not much of a difference i nterms of hostility). it communicates with the servers over shortwave band (iirc).
Sounds to me like someone who has a vendetta against ESR or some of the views he holds (about firearms, I imagine) saw this quote of his, took it, and ran as far as they thought they could go with it - hoping to smear his name and generally give him a bloody lip. OP needs to learn how to read, or detatch said ability from his emotionally driven hoplophobia.
- Loud/disruptive Pakistani woman - going back and forth between the bathroom - somehow managed to acquire a screwdriver and was threatening people with it
It sounds to me like she was part of a test run scenario. IE, "what will be their response if a woman does this?"
You're right. We should've just admitted what it is from the beginning: an ideological war with the proponents of Islam pitting themselves against all that they see as evil (the idealogy of the Western world - personal freedom of choice and liberty, women's suffrage, etc.).
Short term? They probably don't expect us to leave.
Medium term (say, the next 5-10 years)? They probably expect to reach that goal - of the US withdrawling a significant, if not ajority, of its interests in the middle east.
Long term (a generation or two)? I imagine they expect to have killed most of us off by then - or converted us.
And, clearly, heckling old ladies and frequent flying Asian or European businessmen is an appropriate way to find such terrorists in a croud.
We really, really need to start using the profiling methods that the British do; namely, scrutinize every passenger via an 'interrogator'. If the person checks out (ie, they're not cagey, answer clearly, and genreally behave as anyone going for a flight would), they get through.
And, fwiw, I suspect your situation is quite plauseable and unfortunately likely at one point or another. The only caveat I can think of is that C4 isn't all that readily acquirable - though if you've got connections, anyhting is available, I imagine.
They attempt blowing shit up because it causes terror. Not because of their small numbers - because their numbers are not small. Even at a small fraction of the whole Muslim world population (which, I might add, is probably being generous), you still have a hell of a lot of people. Consider: the people that ascribe to Islam compose 20% to 30% of the world's population (depending on who you ask). If there's only 1 radical out of 1,000 Muslims, that's still 1.6 billion "radicals" (or half that, if women can't be considered radicals).
"Terrorists" are fundamentally different from a Western combatant. We don't kill women and children, intentionally to reach our demands. In fact, we have self-imposed rules (both culturally and individually) which prevent and deter such things. They, on the other hand, will use their own young children and women as human shields (Mogadeshu, Somolia) or, in this recent case, as transporters for volatile chemicals for bombs onto planes they intend to blow up.
As for them eventually being unsuccessful, I suggest you go study history. I regret to inform you that, if they keep up their current behaviors - even at the meager rate that they have been - and we keep up our's, they will have defeated us (that is, destroyed us culturally and economically) before you or I have the chance to die of old age.
(And not only do they get their motivation from their religion, they get their motivation from defeat - they see it as a sign of progress, as sick as it is. If you understood Islam, that might make sense, but otherwise, it's pretty crazy sounding.)
Because terrorizing people is more effective than irritation in getting people to do what you want?
My personal theory is that this "20 planes go boom" scenario wasn't a truly sincere attack. I think three other things are all more likely:
1) It was a diversion for a larger, more elaborate attack, so that our intelligence agency would be distracted. While schmucks carry out half-assed plans, the real opperators are going undetected. 2) They're trying to disrupt our public transit as much impossible (leading to people driving personal vehicles more = higher gas prices = more money in the pockets of their supporters) and/or they're trying to erode our civil and personal liberties. 3) "The government" did it for political reasons to keep the sheeple cowed. Elections are coming up.
It's pretty much impossible - while techincally feasable - to do what has been described as being planned, on a plane. It just wouldn't work, and at worst, the terrorist would probably cause a small explosion killing himself in the bathroom or suffocate (which would also be a "best case" scenario, of course).
Now, bombing a subway or some other situation where the binary agent has already been mixed would be plenty possible. It'd still be dangerous to the carrier (ie, volatile), but the explosives could be mixed in a relatively safe a
Here is a fairly through analysis by some chemistry-oriented guys. In short, they were either bloody idiots, or they never really intended on blowing up the planes but to do something else.
(My guess: it was either a diversion to distract our intel guys while they plan something eles - wihch is bigger in scope - or they're mainly just trying to inconvenience us and put us into a panic gridlock.)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this more like sites competing via popularity for given ads than advertisers bidding on ads?
It seems to me that this might potentially increase the revenue brought to sites via advertisement. (It certainly wouldn't result in a decrease in the number of ads - they're already there, why take 'em off?)
Still... if they found out that, indeed, he wasn't the one responsible for the downloading (as another person demonstrated) it's possible they needed to win the case for some covert reason (maybe their backers would cut funding if they had a certain number of 'losses' or what have you, or they were on thin ice with a judge). If that were the case, it would be a lot easier and cheaper in the long run to have the guy rubbed out so he can't give testemony on his own behalf, proving his innocience.
Not that having to prove your innocience is a particularly revulsive idea, or anything.
Ok, I can, at a base level, understand the RIAA's interest in persuing this.
Now, what interest does the court have to do this? They had to hear the RIAA's case before the extension. Why the fuck did they allow it? This should've been dismissed - with prejudice. This sadly illustrates who the courts are working for these days.
I can't stand neocons, and I can't stand leftists/communists (which is where the Democrat party is swiftly heading). However, I've got roughly the same amount of contempt for the Rand Libertarians - the Anarchist Libertarians.
I'm a Jeffersonian, I guess. For lack of a better term. I'm against abuse of power, regardless of the form it holds.
Is it just me, or does this kayak look a hell of a lot like a Viking longboat?
Viking longboats were well known for being fast, sleek in the water, and capable of traversing the shallowest of waterways - kinda like what a kayak is intended to do.
I personally wouldn't be surprised in the least bit if he copied the general design of a longboat while making it slightly more streamlined and rounded on the topside.
You know, I have to think, instead of assuming that men are bad/evil/whatever in regards to men searching on information on how to kill their wives, that something is seriously wrong with the social and legal institution of marriage for this to be any sort of significant occurance.
If it weren't for the restrictive laws on marriage for men, and how often (ie, pretty much every single time) a man gets seriously fucked in the divorce proceedings, I think there'd be a negligible number of such searches. Consider:
Option 1: Kill wife, and if caught, maybe end up with a strict sentence. If not cuaght, scotch free. if caught and a light sentence, you get all your shit back after your term and parole. (say, 50/50 chance of getting your life back, eventually, all told, if you're "careful") Option 2: Live with a harpy indefinately, until one of you die (possibly with the thought in the back of your mind, "is she going to kill me in my sleep?"), with every moment of your life a misery; meanwhile, she's spending your hard-earned money on shoes. or, get a divorce and lose everything, and end up paying a large amount of your income for the forseeable future.
Women can (and often do) walk away from marriage with no reprecussions, kids or no. I've seen it several times, and I've never heard of a wife paying child support. On the other hand, I know a guy that's burdened with 50% of his income as child support and lost his house, boat, car, and 10 years of savings (from prior to the marriage, which lasted 6 months).
A more representative Democratic viewpoint on character is this: character matters, but it's complex. Good people do bad things some times. Democrats believe in mitigating circumstances and allowances for human weakness.
Exactly.
In other words, Democrats believe in moral equivilancy. Who are we to judge someone else's choices? Your "bad" might be someone else's "good", and therefore, we need to respect all decisions.
And that is precisely what was meant when a "republican" says "Democrats don't think character matters". How could character mean anything at all if someone doesn't have the disgression to say, "that's definitively wrong, I won't do it", instead deciding "well, that might be wrong for a prole, but not for me; besides, right and wrong is decided by political opinion trend, and it changes by the hour"?
No, they've spent the money to make it clear that oil isn't the culprit for global warming.
I know, I know, "how could that be? then wehere is the warming coming from?" you think as your brain struggles up against the frail walls of your skull.
Repeat after me: we are on a planet with much more complex, powerful forces than the burning of petrolium underneath it's crust. it also happens to circle a star which puts out more energy in a day than has been consumed by the human race, ever.
Slashdot Mirror
The irony here is that, just like robbery or any other crime, if a strong enough negative reinforcement for the crime is enforced, the number of attempts will be drastically cut down. Just enforce the damn law, consistently and regularly, and people would stop committing the crime as often for fear of getting caught!
This is why rape is not common in our society (at least not as common as it used to be, by far): we have DNA evidence, modern forensics, and (usually) very agressive investigative agents who nip it in the bud ASAP. This is why, in states which have allowed citizens to carry concealed weapons and where there are "make my day" laws, there are lower incidences of predatory crime in general (burglary, robbery, muggings, etc.) - the intended victim is legally allowed to protect themselves and their property. This is why people tend to not speed on certain sections of road - because the cops are frequently sitting there with speed traps.
Exactly what I was thinking. Five days time, a vehicle untraceable to him, and evidence plant - just in case they found the body or some shred tracing to him. Pin it on the guy with the shitty car.
that's because the police aren't there to 'serve and protect' anymore. there is no more officer friendly. they're there to put the body in the bag, write you traffic tickets, and - in general - keep the citizenry under control. that's why things like pot and hookers are illegal and heavily prosecuted; the government wants to maintain its grasp on mind altering substances and physical pleasure (media and pharmacuticals).
Sounds crazy and 1984, but it makes sense to my tired mind...
I hate to be a hater, but... you're in Maryland, what'd you expect? Maryland cops are almost as bad as the DC cops in terms of inneptitude and corruption. Between the high violent crime rates in both DC and Maryland, the police haven't got the time or motivation to deal with a seemingly petty offence - in comparision - like a stolen laptop from a company.
No, it's not right. But it's the way it is. You should fight it, though - but you won't likely get results. Still, trying to get a response is akin to helping someone when they're being raped - it might be against your interests of self-preservation, but you couldn't live with yourself if you stood by and let the injustice and abuse of power go unquestioned.
I don't know much about nukes (except they're not generally a good source of nutrition), but I do know that a cold environment with a warm source - or vice versa - will result in a great deal of condensation, frost, and potential hardware problems.
Why would you want to subject the computers themselves to potentially hostile environments? there are dozens if not hundreds of solutions out there which would meet this need. I personally know a guy who writes software to control and monitor temperature sensors placed in grain elevators. as far as I know the technology would work just fine in a freezer (though its targeted for an outdoor grain elevator - not much of a difference i nterms of hostility). it communicates with the servers over shortwave band (iirc).
Sounds to me like someone who has a vendetta against ESR or some of the views he holds (about firearms, I imagine) saw this quote of his, took it, and ran as far as they thought they could go with it - hoping to smear his name and generally give him a bloody lip. OP needs to learn how to read, or detatch said ability from his emotionally driven hoplophobia.
Let's piece it together...
- Loud/disruptive Pakistani woman
- going back and forth between the bathroom
- somehow managed to acquire a screwdriver and was threatening people with it
It sounds to me like she was part of a test run scenario. IE, "what will be their response if a woman does this?"
You're right. We should've just admitted what it is from the beginning: an ideological war with the proponents of Islam pitting themselves against all that they see as evil (the idealogy of the Western world - personal freedom of choice and liberty, women's suffrage, etc.).
Short term? They probably don't expect us to leave.
Medium term (say, the next 5-10 years)? They probably expect to reach that goal - of the US withdrawling a significant, if not ajority, of its interests in the middle east.
Long term (a generation or two)? I imagine they expect to have killed most of us off by then - or converted us.
And, clearly, heckling old ladies and frequent flying Asian or European businessmen is an appropriate way to find such terrorists in a croud.
We really, really need to start using the profiling methods that the British do; namely, scrutinize every passenger via an 'interrogator'. If the person checks out (ie, they're not cagey, answer clearly, and genreally behave as anyone going for a flight would), they get through.
And, fwiw, I suspect your situation is quite plauseable and unfortunately likely at one point or another. The only caveat I can think of is that C4 isn't all that readily acquirable - though if you've got connections, anyhting is available, I imagine.
Uh, no.
They attempt blowing shit up because it causes terror. Not because of their small numbers - because their numbers are not small. Even at a small fraction of the whole Muslim world population (which, I might add, is probably being generous), you still have a hell of a lot of people. Consider: the people that ascribe to Islam compose 20% to 30% of the world's population (depending on who you ask). If there's only 1 radical out of 1,000 Muslims, that's still 1.6 billion "radicals" (or half that, if women can't be considered radicals).
"Terrorists" are fundamentally different from a Western combatant. We don't kill women and children, intentionally to reach our demands. In fact, we have self-imposed rules (both culturally and individually) which prevent and deter such things. They, on the other hand, will use their own young children and women as human shields (Mogadeshu, Somolia) or, in this recent case, as transporters for volatile chemicals for bombs onto planes they intend to blow up.
As for them eventually being unsuccessful, I suggest you go study history. I regret to inform you that, if they keep up their current behaviors - even at the meager rate that they have been - and we keep up our's, they will have defeated us (that is, destroyed us culturally and economically) before you or I have the chance to die of old age.
(And not only do they get their motivation from their religion, they get their motivation from defeat - they see it as a sign of progress, as sick as it is. If you understood Islam, that might make sense, but otherwise, it's pretty crazy sounding.)
Consider yourself invited to my little corner of the web where we talk about such things quite a bit.
Because terrorizing people is more effective than irritation in getting people to do what you want?
My personal theory is that this "20 planes go boom" scenario wasn't a truly sincere attack. I think three other things are all more likely:
1) It was a diversion for a larger, more elaborate attack, so that our intelligence agency would be distracted. While schmucks carry out half-assed plans, the real opperators are going undetected.
2) They're trying to disrupt our public transit as much impossible (leading to people driving personal vehicles more = higher gas prices = more money in the pockets of their supporters) and/or they're trying to erode our civil and personal liberties.
3) "The government" did it for political reasons to keep the sheeple cowed. Elections are coming up.
It's pretty much impossible - while techincally feasable - to do what has been described as being planned, on a plane. It just wouldn't work, and at worst, the terrorist would probably cause a small explosion killing himself in the bathroom or suffocate (which would also be a "best case" scenario, of course).
Now, bombing a subway or some other situation where the binary agent has already been mixed would be plenty possible. It'd still be dangerous to the carrier (ie, volatile), but the explosives could be mixed in a relatively safe a
Here is a fairly through analysis by some chemistry-oriented guys. In short, they were either bloody idiots, or they never really intended on blowing up the planes but to do something else.
(My guess: it was either a diversion to distract our intel guys while they plan something eles - wihch is bigger in scope - or they're mainly just trying to inconvenience us and put us into a panic gridlock.)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this more like sites competing via popularity for given ads than advertisers bidding on ads?
It seems to me that this might potentially increase the revenue brought to sites via advertisement. (It certainly wouldn't result in a decrease in the number of ads - they're already there, why take 'em off?)
It's possible, but I doubt it.
Still... if they found out that, indeed, he wasn't the one responsible for the downloading (as another person demonstrated) it's possible they needed to win the case for some covert reason (maybe their backers would cut funding if they had a certain number of 'losses' or what have you, or they were on thin ice with a judge). If that were the case, it would be a lot easier and cheaper in the long run to have the guy rubbed out so he can't give testemony on his own behalf, proving his innocience.
Not that having to prove your innocience is a particularly revulsive idea, or anything.
My guess is that it had more to do with wanting to allow time to have the father's estate distributed amongst his children than to allow for grieving.
Ok, I can, at a base level, understand the RIAA's interest in persuing this.
Now, what interest does the court have to do this? They had to hear the RIAA's case before the extension. Why the fuck did they allow it? This should've been dismissed - with prejudice. This sadly illustrates who the courts are working for these days.
Here here!
I can't stand neocons, and I can't stand leftists/communists (which is where the Democrat party is swiftly heading). However, I've got roughly the same amount of contempt for the Rand Libertarians - the Anarchist Libertarians.
I'm a Jeffersonian, I guess. For lack of a better term. I'm against abuse of power, regardless of the form it holds.
Is it just me, or does this kayak look a hell of a lot like a Viking longboat?
Viking longboats were well known for being fast, sleek in the water, and capable of traversing the shallowest of waterways - kinda like what a kayak is intended to do.
I personally wouldn't be surprised in the least bit if he copied the general design of a longboat while making it slightly more streamlined and rounded on the topside.
What? Name one Libertarian that has done that.
You know, I have to think, instead of assuming that men are bad/evil/whatever in regards to men searching on information on how to kill their wives, that something is seriously wrong with the social and legal institution of marriage for this to be any sort of significant occurance.
If it weren't for the restrictive laws on marriage for men, and how often (ie, pretty much every single time) a man gets seriously fucked in the divorce proceedings, I think there'd be a negligible number of such searches. Consider:
Option 1: Kill wife, and if caught, maybe end up with a strict sentence. If not cuaght, scotch free. if caught and a light sentence, you get all your shit back after your term and parole. (say, 50/50 chance of getting your life back, eventually, all told, if you're "careful")
Option 2: Live with a harpy indefinately, until one of you die (possibly with the thought in the back of your mind, "is she going to kill me in my sleep?"), with every moment of your life a misery; meanwhile, she's spending your hard-earned money on shoes. or, get a divorce and lose everything, and end up paying a large amount of your income for the forseeable future.
Women can (and often do) walk away from marriage with no reprecussions, kids or no. I've seen it several times, and I've never heard of a wife paying child support. On the other hand, I know a guy that's burdened with 50% of his income as child support and lost his house, boat, car, and 10 years of savings (from prior to the marriage, which lasted 6 months).
A more representative Democratic viewpoint on character is this: character matters, but it's complex. Good people do bad things some times. Democrats believe in mitigating circumstances and allowances for human weakness.
Exactly.
In other words, Democrats believe in moral equivilancy. Who are we to judge someone else's choices? Your "bad" might be someone else's "good", and therefore, we need to respect all decisions.
And that is precisely what was meant when a "republican" says "Democrats don't think character matters". How could character mean anything at all if someone doesn't have the disgression to say, "that's definitively wrong, I won't do it", instead deciding "well, that might be wrong for a prole, but not for me; besides, right and wrong is decided by political opinion trend, and it changes by the hour"?
No, they've spent the money to make it clear that oil isn't the culprit for global warming.
I know, I know, "how could that be? then wehere is the warming coming from?" you think as your brain struggles up against the frail walls of your skull.
Repeat after me: we are on a planet with much more complex, powerful forces than the burning of petrolium underneath it's crust. it also happens to circle a star which puts out more energy in a day than has been consumed by the human race, ever.