Why not just make a third license with exactly the same terms as the GPL, but which requires that every user fork over one penny for use of the program to the FSF at some point before January 1, 3000 A.D.?
In this case distribution isn't 'free' since there is a real cost involved, even if that cost is delayed. Companies use the idea of 'delayed costs' all the time in accounting; why can't common citizens do the same?
Better yet, have one person buy the program and then relicense it under the actual GPL. You can do the same with the exempted BSD license and I doubt MS could do a damned thing about it.
(Well, actually, I don't doubt that. They've obviously bought Bush and through him the DOJ, so they can probably do just about any damned thing they like, with Federal marshals to back them.)
What this goes to show is that anti-trust settlements, nominally intended to redress wrongs made against the people, aren't actually used to benefit the people wronged. So MS can cut a deal to give goodies to other companies, but fuck the citizenry, and all those nasty communist types who use open source; where the DOJ is concerned they don't count!
I don't know about that, but if you're a 'writer' (even if you don't manage to sell anything) you can claim every bloody piece of equipment even remotely related to your computer as a deduction or business expense. If you write about 'technology' then you can do the same for just about anything that at some point requires electricity to operate. If you also review 'computer games' then those too become deductible.
Become a writer. Submit an article or two a year to some magazine, no matter how bad they are (hey! Even John Katz gets published so who knows?). Buy toys and use them to lower your taxes. Have fun.:-)
Although I favor Apache over IIS for obvious reasons, I also favor GUI interfaces over manually editing config files. When I was young (oh so long ago...) we did that not because it was cool, or because it made us 'ubergeeks', but because *we didn't have any friggin' choice*.
Now we do. Modifying config files is fine; being able to modify multiple files quickly and easily via a GUI interface is even better. I'll take the GUI tools because I'm old and I don't care what any youngin' fresh out of college thinks about me and my quest for the quickest, laziest alternative. I know that someday he too will be old and lazy and looking for the easy road, and then he'll understand.
I still use Apache (laziness aside, it's the better product hands-down), but yeah, I'd *really* like a set of Tools For the Braindead(TM). I'm sure there are a number of Apache administrators who've had the same thought at one time or another, at least in the over-30 crowd.
It could also be that boys were "significantly more annoyed" (whatever that means - break it down for me, won't you Neilsen?) by any page which didn't include a picture of a naked woman or screenshots from a computer game. But given the methodology (or rather lack thereof) in the paper we wouldn't really know.
The fact that most web sites which show pictures of naked women or screen shots of computer games aren't particularly verbose would only be incidental.
Of course, given the age of the boys the second example might only be worthy of consideration until they hit the age of 11 or 12. And in the case of the typical Slashdot reader this generalization might extend well beyond this age.
"I am the automated performance monitor for Slashdot. My job is to keep average moderation rates at a high level, so that users can consistently count on Slashdot to help them stay informed on 'Stuff that matters.'
"I noticed that at some point in the recent past you had the temerity to mod up what's known as "the post of doom" (link not provided here, of course). When I see results like this, I significantly reduce the rate at which you can modify comments so you can make changes in your behavior to improve the meaningfulness of your moderation. In your case this means that you're well and truly fucked, and will never be allowed to moderate on Slashdot again. Ever.
Yada yada yada. Nah, it has nothing to do with indignation. Rather, you're just scared shitless that your neighbor is as much a whacked-out loon as you are and might decide to blow your head off some day.
The thing is, it most likely will never happen. And according to the FBI, if your neighbor *does* decide to kill you (and I could sympathize, if he has to listen to your insane drivel all day) then there's a 90% chance he'll use something other than a gun to do it.
I said keep privacy, the right to bare arms however, we should decide how much privacy, what weapons we wish to make legal, etc
And here's the rub: you don't get to decide. The states don't get to decide. Compliance with the Constitution is not a voluntary act.
Once again if this bothers then change the Constitution, through the amendment process, to allow for voluntary compliance. Until then the decision isn't up to you, the states, or the majority.
I would hazard a guess that most of us don't sell our books off even after we read them.
My wife and I have at least $10,000 worth of books on our shelves and we're buying up more as time goes by in an attempt to build an absolutely mind-boggling personal library (just beginning, of course). We're an extreme, mind you, but we don't know a single person who regularly sells off the books they read.
When we buy a loser and decide not to add it to our growing collection, we donate them to the local library. I feel a bit guilty about that - inflicting bad books on others - but I'd feel even more guilty if I threw the thing away.
As for the books we buy they're *all* new unless we can't find a currently in print version. Not to 'support' the industry or any such rot, but simply because we want a mint-condition copy with no torn covers or discolored pages or little hand-written notes in the margins. I think most people not on a very limited budget usually think this way.
Based on this purely anecdotal evidence, I'd hazard a guess that used book sales won't hurt the publishing industry now that Amazon's in the game, just as they haven't done so in the past.
Minivans are passenger vehicles, if you carry a lot of passengers they are a good investment.
Minivans are tangible evidence of the existence of Evil, with a capital 'E'. Everyone who gets behind the wheel of a minivan turns into a homicidal submoron as soon as they put the key in the ignition. Minivans are the tools of Satan.
The new Volkswagen Beetle gets 50mpg and has enoug room in it to carry 5 people, or 2 people and a whole bunch of stuff.
Well, yeah, if you want a car that looks incredibly stupid, I suppose the new VW bug is the way to go. It's no wonder the ads always say they're 'looking for drivers'; anyone with a shred of self-respect would be mortified to be seen in one of those things.
SUVs are an uneccesary, unsightly, blight on the landscape.
Cosmetic surgery is also unnecessary, but certainly not unsightly (unless you're Michael Jackons) and definitely improves the landscape. But that's neither here nor there.
I like SUVs. Alot. I want the option to smash my neighbor's stupid little minivan into so much aluminum and plastic garbage if the rage at the lack of his/her driving skills finally becomes too much to handle. And those bikers! The little shits don't even bother to obey traffic laws: running stop signs, hanging out in the center of the road rather than riding right, and so forth. With an SUV I can hit the accelerator and that idiot biker in his riding-the-short-bus helmet and gay-looking lycra stretch pants will go up and over the hood leaving only a small scratch or two.
Yessirree, SUV's have all sorts of practical uses.
You didn't answer my request. Here it is once again; read slowly if you have trouble parsing English:
"I have seen no empirical evidence whatsoever, published in an accredited, peer-reviewed scientific journal, which supports any detail of the 'creation of the world' as described in the bible. If you have such an article handy, it'd be nice if you posted the particulars so I could look it up in the scientific journal in question."
The cites you give are creationist claptrap that would never be considered for any remotely scientific journal. I wanted something concrete and you gave be blithering, dim-witted propaganda.
How many of those violent crimes would have never happened in the first place without guns involved? What qualifies as having a violent crime "prevented" with guns? These are rhetorical questions. Do not answer them.
You asked, I'll answer as I please. Since you can't prove a negative you'll have to disprove the positive, e.g., the fact that guns were used to prevent crimes and that statistics exist to support this fact, collected by the FBI. As for the qualifications used to determine a 'prevented crime' these are set by the FBI, and if you'd bothered to do a bit of searching you'd be able to see the criteria for yourself.
It's funny that you assume I must believe foolishly in some grand conspiracy about faked statistics 1) without really knowing my stance on guns
I see. So you just posted some shit you don't even believe for what? Kicks? Trolling? Rhetorical; don't bother answering.
while at the same time indicating the the Brady supporters *do* have a conspiracy.
The Brady folks aren't engaged in a conspiracy. They just lie, like fanatics often do, to support their position. I rather doubt they're bright enough to form a conspiracy. Like the anti-choice folks, the issue tends to attract the stupid to their camp.
Really, you should calm down. I'm really not nearly as interested in this as you.
Then demonstrate your disinterest by not posting a reply.
I was only pointing out grey area so that you could perhaps realize that such a grey area exists. My conclusion is that you can't see this.
Riiiiiight. Troll. And I was caught. Silly me.
I was hoping to get across that no matter what you believe, with an inability to listen, you won't be convincing any new people.
Ooooh, trolling again. Good enough to catch me the first time, not nearly good enough to hook me the second. Have fun with the other Billy Goats, boy.
Hanzo, you blithering idiot, I fear that your teachers in school were complete morons. Let me straighten you out on this, boy: *you don't get to decide what parts of the Constitution you'll follow and how you'll follow them*. Fact is, the only power in the land that can do that is the Supreme Court.
Surely you've heard of them? If not, then all you need to know is that *you aren't it*.
The only way to change the Constitution is through the amendment process. No other law supercedes the Constitution. If that bothers you then get off your butt and amend the Constitution, or move to a country where there *is* no Constitution.
What's really amusing is that most illegal software trading doesn't happen over the web - it's too open and too easy to track back to a specific source. The real lion's share of this activity happens over ftp (often through servers set up on hacked computers, especially clueless cable users who leave their systems wide open) and irc.
Ratting out web sites will have little effect on warez trading.
Max
Re:not a very logical idea
on
e-Denounce
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· Score: 2
Because there are people who get a malicious kick out of finding ways to rain on the parade of others. Stuck in small, insignificant lives of their own making, denied the role of Supreme Dictator, they do whatever they can to make others miserable.
Have you never run into twisted little shits like this? They seem to be a dime a dozen where I sit, all eager to fuck with someone else just to prove that they have some meager amount of power - even if it only amounts to tattling on their neighbors. They want to scream "you'll do what the fuck I tell you to! especially if you don't like it!" and have some force with which to back up their evil little threats.
These people are everywhere. I'm a staunchly areligious sort, but they make me think, sometimes, that there actually might be a Satan, and that they are his minions....
I have seen no empirical evidence whatsoever, published in an accredited, peer-reviewed scientific journal, which supports any detail of the 'creation of the world' as described in the bible. If you have such an article handy, it'd be nice if you posted the particulars so I could look it up in the scientific journal in question.
Yeah, so the FBI is "putting a slant" on the information by claiming that at least 200,000 violent crimes a year are prevented by the fact that the intended victims are armed? That's a good one.
And you would trade 1500 accidental deaths for an additional 200,000 to 800,000 violent crimes. If so, your priorities are completely whacked.
Oh, and by the way - the Brady organization, long known for outright lies concerning gun control and crime, are wrong concerning concealed weapons laws. Crime rates tend to be higher in states with strict gun control laws than those without; check out the statistics on both New York and Washington, D.C. (murder capitol of the U.S.) if you think otherwise. The facts here are indisputable and can easily be obtained from sources on the internet.
According to the FBI (again), gun control laws have no effect on the ability of criminals to obtain guns. Criminal possession of firearms has not decreased by any significant amount following the passage of gun control laws no matter which state you decide to use as an example.
Here's a few other little-known facts that the Brady folks seem to have glossed over:
- The fatal firearms accident rate is now at an all-time low, down 82% since the all-time high recorded in 1904. (National Safety Council)
- Since 1930, the number of annual fatal firearms accidents has decreased 56% while the number of privately owned guns has quadrupled and the U.S. population has doubled. (National Center for Health Statistics; National Safety Council; Bureau of the Census; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms)
- Since 1975, fatal firearms accidents among children have decreased 60%. (National Safety Council) Notice that this decline started long before the Brady Bill.
- between 1968-1991, the fatal firearms accident rate dropped 50%, the greatest decline among major accident types. This was also before the Brady Bill. Accident rates have continued decline from 1991 to 2001 with no regard to the Brady Bill whatsoever (National Safety Council).
- According to the FBI, the murder rate has been dropping almost steadily since 1991. This decline was fairly constant over the last decade and began before the Brady Bill. No spikes in this drop were recorded following the passage of the Brady Bill. So here, clearly the Brady folks are either lying or misrepresenting the facts unless you consider the FBI to be involved in some grand conspiracy to present false statistics to the public.
- almost 70% of small handgun purchases - the kind most often used to deter violent crime - were purchased by women. Since women are more likely to be the targets of criminal activity than men (with the exception of blacks in certain urban areas) there seems to be some connection with arming women and lowering violent crime rates.
There are a great deal more statistics like these that can easily be located on the web. And these statistics aren't open to 'interpretation'; they're real numbers about real accidents, real homicide rates, and real crimes. They are facts. Unless you're willing to subscribe some x-files-like belief that the National Center for Health, the National Safety Council, the ATF, the FBI, and others are all involved in some grand conspiracy to misrepresent the data it's far more likely that the Brady folks and others of their ilk are involved in 'slanting the truth', or outright lying.
Anyone can find this stuff on the internet, with a minimal amount of effort. Rather than let the Brady folks do your thinking for you, I'd suggest getting a hold of the numbers yourself and drawing your own conclusions.
This seems rather apparent: employees have no right to screw off on the company dime. Although self-evident to anyone with half a brain, I still hear people - mainly younger folks fresh out of college and new in the workforce - complain about their 'rights' at work, or assert that without unmonitored internet access they'd somehow be crippled when it comes to 'creativity'.
First off, employees don't have the 'right' to dick around on the web or IM when they should be working. I pay them to work and I define what 'work' is; and that isn't it. Second, if they truly can't function without wasting *my* money goofing off for part of the day, then they need to get a job someplace else. I can and will replace them with someone who isn't hampered in terms of 'creativity' when they actually have to put in eight solid hours of work a day. Especially in this economy, it's damned easy to fire the whining kid and hire someone with an actual worth ethic.
I don't see what the problem is with a company monitoring things like IM. You're at my business, using my equipment - I'll monitor whatever I please in any fashion I desire. If you want to hold private conversations with friends or surf the web, do it at home on your own time.
I'm not suggesting that addicts be abandoned. But in this case *somebody* has to be paying for the computer time and it ain't Johnny since he's too much of a drone to haul his fat ass out of the chair. That 'somebody' should pull the goddamn plug.
Letting Johnny sit at home and use your computer to further his addiction is no different than giving him money so he can go out and buy crack.
Yet another fanatic little college boy who can't argue with the facts, or provide any empirical evidence to support his position. I guess when I posted statistics from the NCH and FBI that was a bit too much for you to handle.
And all that rhetoric! Boy, if this is the best you can do you need to take a speech class or two. At least some basic English. Your response wasn't just pathetic, it was embarrassing.
How often do gun-toting citizens actually defend themselves in a hold-up
According to the FBI 'gun-toting citizens' defend themselves from violent crimes between 200,000 and 800,000 times a year. That's at least 200,00 rapes, robberies and murders that aren't committed because the intended victim was armed.
And then how does that number compare to the number of accidental deaths involving children and guns?
According to the National Center for Health approximately 1500 people died in gun accidents last year. Almost three times this number died in falls (mostly down stores) and eight times this number drowned (mostly during recreational water activities, like swimming in backyard pools).
There ya go. These numbers are all easily obtained online.
Slashdot Mirror
Why not just make a third license with exactly the same terms as the GPL, but which requires that every user fork over one penny for use of the program to the FSF at some point before January 1, 3000 A.D.?
In this case distribution isn't 'free' since there is a real cost involved, even if that cost is delayed. Companies use the idea of 'delayed costs' all the time in accounting; why can't common citizens do the same?
Better yet, have one person buy the program and then relicense it under the actual GPL. You can do the same with the exempted BSD license and I doubt MS could do a damned thing about it.
(Well, actually, I don't doubt that. They've obviously bought Bush and through him the DOJ, so they can probably do just about any damned thing they like, with Federal marshals to back them.)
Max
What this goes to show is that anti-trust settlements, nominally intended to redress wrongs made against the people, aren't actually used to benefit the people wronged. So MS can cut a deal to give goodies to other companies, but fuck the citizenry, and all those nasty communist types who use open source; where the DOJ is concerned they don't count!
Max
I don't know about that, but if you're a 'writer' (even if you don't manage to sell anything) you can claim every bloody piece of equipment even remotely related to your computer as a deduction or business expense. If you write about 'technology' then you can do the same for just about anything that at some point requires electricity to operate. If you also review 'computer games' then those too become deductible.
:-)
Become a writer. Submit an article or two a year to some magazine, no matter how bad they are (hey! Even John Katz gets published so who knows?). Buy toys and use them to lower your taxes. Have fun.
Max
Although I favor Apache over IIS for obvious reasons, I also favor GUI interfaces over manually editing config files. When I was young (oh so long ago...) we did that not because it was cool, or because it made us 'ubergeeks', but because *we didn't have any friggin' choice*.
Now we do. Modifying config files is fine; being able to modify multiple files quickly and easily via a GUI interface is even better. I'll take the GUI tools because I'm old and I don't care what any youngin' fresh out of college thinks about me and my quest for the quickest, laziest alternative. I know that someday he too will be old and lazy and looking for the easy road, and then he'll understand.
I still use Apache (laziness aside, it's the better product hands-down), but yeah, I'd *really* like a set of Tools For the Braindead(TM). I'm sure there are a number of Apache administrators who've had the same thought at one time or another, at least in the over-30 crowd.
Max
It could also be that boys were "significantly more annoyed" (whatever that means - break it down for me, won't you Neilsen?) by any page which didn't include a picture of a naked woman or screenshots from a computer game. But given the methodology (or rather lack thereof) in the paper we wouldn't really know.
The fact that most web sites which show pictures of naked women or screen shots of computer games aren't particularly verbose would only be incidental.
Of course, given the age of the boys the second example might only be worthy of consideration until they hit the age of 11 or 12. And in the case of the typical Slashdot reader this generalization might extend well beyond this age.
Max
Would this make Google the most expensive whore on the net?
Max
More like:
"Hello."
"I am the automated performance monitor for Slashdot. My job is to keep average moderation rates at a high level, so that users can consistently count on Slashdot to help them stay informed on 'Stuff that matters.'
"I noticed that at some point in the recent past you had the temerity to mod up what's known as "the post of doom" (link not provided here, of course). When I see results like this, I significantly reduce the rate at which you can modify comments so you can make changes in your behavior to improve the meaningfulness of your moderation. In your case this means that you're well and truly fucked, and will never be allowed to moderate on Slashdot again. Ever.
"Have a nice day. Loser."
Max
No, that healthy sex of any kind beats twisted religious zealotry.
Max
Yada yada yada. Nah, it has nothing to do with indignation. Rather, you're just scared shitless that your neighbor is as much a whacked-out loon as you are and might decide to blow your head off some day.
The thing is, it most likely will never happen. And according to the FBI, if your neighbor *does* decide to kill you (and I could sympathize, if he has to listen to your insane drivel all day) then there's a 90% chance he'll use something other than a gun to do it.
Really, that should make you happy.
Max
I said keep privacy, the right to bare arms however, we should decide how much privacy, what weapons we wish to make legal, etc
And here's the rub: you don't get to decide. The states don't get to decide. Compliance with the Constitution is not a voluntary act.
Once again if this bothers then change the Constitution, through the amendment process, to allow for voluntary compliance. Until then the decision isn't up to you, the states, or the majority.
Max
I would hazard a guess that most of us don't sell our books off even after we read them.
My wife and I have at least $10,000 worth of books on our shelves and we're buying up more as time goes by in an attempt to build an absolutely mind-boggling personal library (just beginning, of course). We're an extreme, mind you, but we don't know a single person who regularly sells off the books they read.
When we buy a loser and decide not to add it to our growing collection, we donate them to the local library. I feel a bit guilty about that - inflicting bad books on others - but I'd feel even more guilty if I threw the thing away.
As for the books we buy they're *all* new unless we can't find a currently in print version. Not to 'support' the industry or any such rot, but simply because we want a mint-condition copy with no torn covers or discolored pages or little hand-written notes in the margins. I think most people not on a very limited budget usually think this way.
Based on this purely anecdotal evidence, I'd hazard a guess that used book sales won't hurt the publishing industry now that Amazon's in the game, just as they haven't done so in the past.
Max
Why the HELL are they driving a hugeass SUV?
Um...because they can?
Minivans are passenger vehicles, if you carry a lot of passengers they are a good investment.
Minivans are tangible evidence of the existence of Evil, with a capital 'E'. Everyone who gets behind the wheel of a minivan turns into a homicidal submoron as soon as they put the key in the ignition. Minivans are the tools of Satan.
The new Volkswagen Beetle gets 50mpg and has enoug room in it to carry 5 people, or 2 people and a whole bunch of stuff.
Well, yeah, if you want a car that looks incredibly stupid, I suppose the new VW bug is the way to go. It's no wonder the ads always say they're 'looking for drivers'; anyone with a shred of self-respect would be mortified to be seen in one of those things.
SUVs are an uneccesary, unsightly, blight on the landscape.
Cosmetic surgery is also unnecessary, but certainly not unsightly (unless you're Michael Jackons) and definitely improves the landscape. But that's neither here nor there.
I like SUVs. Alot. I want the option to smash my neighbor's stupid little minivan into so much aluminum and plastic garbage if the rage at the lack of his/her driving skills finally becomes too much to handle. And those bikers! The little shits don't even bother to obey traffic laws: running stop signs, hanging out in the center of the road rather than riding right, and so forth. With an SUV I can hit the accelerator and that idiot biker in his riding-the-short-bus helmet and gay-looking lycra stretch pants will go up and over the hood leaving only a small scratch or two.
Yessirree, SUV's have all sorts of practical uses.
Max
wonder how quick it'll be able to happen in real life, since there aren't many ice meteors floating around for us to grab...
Sure there are. Lots and lots of them. The problem is that they're all in the Oort Cloud.
Max
You didn't answer my request. Here it is once again; read slowly if you have trouble parsing English:
"I have seen no empirical evidence whatsoever, published in an accredited, peer-reviewed scientific journal, which supports any detail of the 'creation of the world' as described in the bible. If you have such an article handy, it'd be nice if you posted the particulars so I could look it up in the scientific journal in question."
The cites you give are creationist claptrap that would never be considered for any remotely scientific journal. I wanted something concrete and you gave be blithering, dim-witted propaganda.
Max
How many of those violent crimes would have never happened in the first place without guns involved? What qualifies as having a violent crime "prevented" with guns? These are rhetorical questions. Do not answer them.
You asked, I'll answer as I please. Since you can't prove a negative you'll have to disprove the positive, e.g., the fact that guns were used to prevent crimes and that statistics exist to support this fact, collected by the FBI. As for the qualifications used to determine a 'prevented crime' these are set by the FBI, and if you'd bothered to do a bit of searching you'd be able to see the criteria for yourself.
It's funny that you assume I must believe foolishly in some grand conspiracy about faked statistics 1) without really knowing my stance on guns
I see. So you just posted some shit you don't even believe for what? Kicks? Trolling? Rhetorical; don't bother answering.
while at the same time indicating the the Brady supporters *do* have a conspiracy.
The Brady folks aren't engaged in a conspiracy. They just lie, like fanatics often do, to support their position. I rather doubt they're bright enough to form a conspiracy. Like the anti-choice folks, the issue tends to attract the stupid to their camp.
Really, you should calm down. I'm really not nearly as interested in this as you.
Then demonstrate your disinterest by not posting a reply.
I was only pointing out grey area so that you could perhaps realize that such a grey area exists. My conclusion is that you can't see this.
Riiiiiight. Troll. And I was caught. Silly me.
I was hoping to get across that no matter what you believe, with an inability to listen, you won't be convincing any new people.
Ooooh, trolling again. Good enough to catch me the first time, not nearly good enough to hook me the second. Have fun with the other Billy Goats, boy.
Max
Jesus H. Christ, Napoleon. Time for your meds. Really. I'm goddamn glad you aren't in a position of power.
Max
Hanzo, you blithering idiot, I fear that your teachers in school were complete morons. Let me straighten you out on this, boy: *you don't get to decide what parts of the Constitution you'll follow and how you'll follow them*. Fact is, the only power in the land that can do that is the Supreme Court.
Surely you've heard of them? If not, then all you need to know is that *you aren't it*.
The only way to change the Constitution is through the amendment process. No other law supercedes the Constitution. If that bothers you then get off your butt and amend the Constitution, or move to a country where there *is* no Constitution.
Max
What's really amusing is that most illegal software trading doesn't happen over the web - it's too open and too easy to track back to a specific source. The real lion's share of this activity happens over ftp (often through servers set up on hacked computers, especially clueless cable users who leave their systems wide open) and irc.
Ratting out web sites will have little effect on warez trading.
Max
Because there are people who get a malicious kick out of finding ways to rain on the parade of others. Stuck in small, insignificant lives of their own making, denied the role of Supreme Dictator, they do whatever they can to make others miserable.
Have you never run into twisted little shits like this? They seem to be a dime a dozen where I sit, all eager to fuck with someone else just to prove that they have some meager amount of power - even if it only amounts to tattling on their neighbors. They want to scream "you'll do what the fuck I tell you to! especially if you don't like it!" and have some force with which to back up their evil little threats.
These people are everywhere. I'm a staunchly areligious sort, but they make me think, sometimes, that there actually might be a Satan, and that they are his minions....
Max
I have seen no empirical evidence whatsoever, published in an accredited, peer-reviewed scientific journal, which supports any detail of the 'creation of the world' as described in the bible. If you have such an article handy, it'd be nice if you posted the particulars so I could look it up in the scientific journal in question.
Max
Yeah, so the FBI is "putting a slant" on the information by claiming that at least 200,000 violent crimes a year are prevented by the fact that the intended victims are armed? That's a good one.
And you would trade 1500 accidental deaths for an additional 200,000 to 800,000 violent crimes. If so, your priorities are completely whacked.
Oh, and by the way - the Brady organization, long known for outright lies concerning gun control and crime, are wrong concerning concealed weapons laws. Crime rates tend to be higher in states with strict gun control laws than those without; check out the statistics on both New York and Washington, D.C. (murder capitol of the U.S.) if you think otherwise. The facts here are indisputable and can easily be obtained from sources on the internet.
According to the FBI (again), gun control laws have no effect on the ability of criminals to obtain guns. Criminal possession of firearms has not decreased by any significant amount following the passage of gun control laws no matter which state you decide to use as an example.
Here's a few other little-known facts that the Brady folks seem to have glossed over:
- The fatal firearms accident rate is now at an all-time low, down 82% since the all-time high recorded in 1904. (National Safety Council)
- Since 1930, the number of annual fatal firearms accidents has decreased 56% while the number of privately owned guns has quadrupled and the U.S. population has doubled. (National Center for Health Statistics; National Safety Council; Bureau of the Census; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms)
- Since 1975, fatal firearms accidents among children have decreased 60%. (National Safety Council) Notice that this decline started long before the Brady Bill.
- between 1968-1991, the fatal firearms accident rate dropped 50%, the greatest decline among major accident types. This was also before the Brady Bill. Accident rates have continued decline from 1991 to 2001 with no regard to the Brady Bill whatsoever (National Safety Council).
- According to the FBI, the murder rate has been dropping almost steadily since 1991. This decline was fairly constant over the last decade and began before the Brady Bill. No spikes in this drop were recorded following the passage of the Brady Bill. So here, clearly the Brady folks are either lying or misrepresenting the facts unless you consider the FBI to be involved in some grand conspiracy to present false statistics to the public.
- almost 70% of small handgun purchases - the kind most often used to deter violent crime - were purchased by women. Since women are more likely to be the targets of criminal activity than men (with the exception of blacks in certain urban areas) there seems to be some connection with arming women and lowering violent crime rates.
There are a great deal more statistics like these that can easily be located on the web. And these statistics aren't open to 'interpretation'; they're real numbers about real accidents, real homicide rates, and real crimes. They are facts. Unless you're willing to subscribe some x-files-like belief that the National Center for Health, the National Safety Council, the ATF, the FBI, and others are all involved in some grand conspiracy to misrepresent the data it's far more likely that the Brady folks and others of their ilk are involved in 'slanting the truth', or outright lying.
Anyone can find this stuff on the internet, with a minimal amount of effort. Rather than let the Brady folks do your thinking for you, I'd suggest getting a hold of the numbers yourself and drawing your own conclusions.
Max
This seems rather apparent: employees have no right to screw off on the company dime. Although self-evident to anyone with half a brain, I still hear people - mainly younger folks fresh out of college and new in the workforce - complain about their 'rights' at work, or assert that without unmonitored internet access they'd somehow be crippled when it comes to 'creativity'.
First off, employees don't have the 'right' to dick around on the web or IM when they should be working. I pay them to work and I define what 'work' is; and that isn't it. Second, if they truly can't function without wasting *my* money goofing off for part of the day, then they need to get a job someplace else. I can and will replace them with someone who isn't hampered in terms of 'creativity' when they actually have to put in eight solid hours of work a day. Especially in this economy, it's damned easy to fire the whining kid and hire someone with an actual worth ethic.
I don't see what the problem is with a company monitoring things like IM. You're at my business, using my equipment - I'll monitor whatever I please in any fashion I desire. If you want to hold private conversations with friends or surf the web, do it at home on your own time.
Max
I'm not suggesting that addicts be abandoned. But in this case *somebody* has to be paying for the computer time and it ain't Johnny since he's too much of a drone to haul his fat ass out of the chair. That 'somebody' should pull the goddamn plug.
Letting Johnny sit at home and use your computer to further his addiction is no different than giving him money so he can go out and buy crack.
Max
Yet another fanatic little college boy who can't argue with the facts, or provide any empirical evidence to support his position. I guess when I posted statistics from the NCH and FBI that was a bit too much for you to handle.
And all that rhetoric! Boy, if this is the best you can do you need to take a speech class or two. At least some basic English. Your response wasn't just pathetic, it was embarrassing.
Max
How often do gun-toting citizens actually defend themselves in a hold-up
According to the FBI 'gun-toting citizens' defend themselves from violent crimes between 200,000 and 800,000 times a year. That's at least 200,00 rapes, robberies and murders that aren't committed because the intended victim was armed.
And then how does that number compare to the number of accidental deaths involving children and guns?
According to the National Center for Health approximately 1500 people died in gun accidents last year. Almost three times this number died in falls (mostly down stores) and eight times this number drowned (mostly during recreational water activities, like swimming in backyard pools).
There ya go. These numbers are all easily obtained online.
Max