The US hasn't had a terrorist attack since the anthrax fiasco in late 2001.
Well, I'm not sure that's saying much. The worldwide stat is more impressive. The U.S. didn't have many terrorist attacks (on the homeland) before 9/11 either, and the latest one was by an American citizen. (The anthrax scare may have also been by an American citizen).
Until we have a few more years worth of data I wouldn't be so convinced the U.S. has made a dent in overall terrorism events. After all, crime statistics within our country follow a rise and fall pattern on their own and some politician is always trying to take the credit/place the blame for it.
You might be interested in reading John Perkins' "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" in order to understand that investment in poor foreign countries is really more like extortion.
Dr. Michael Savage [michaelsavage.com] noted on his New Year's Eve radio program that some religious clerics believe that the tsunami was God's vengeance against the prostitutes of Thailand and the Muslims of the affected areas.
Any news yet of another natural disaster sent to wipe out the fathers who sold their children into prostitution in the first place or the American tourists who fly to Thailand to have sex with children?
It's a pretty libertarian stance, but if you look at cable TV it's been effective, as cable channels aren't regulated like broadcast stations are.
I find myself sort of agreeing with you. I agree philosophically even though I know that it means there will be little left for me to watch. I certainly don't think Sex and the City is quality and I have absolutely no desire to watch a show about a family of sociopathic criminals. But in the end it's really a moot point since I gave up TV in 1991.
I disagree because TV is over the public airwaves and I think we have some kind of obligation to children (during appropriate hours) to keep things sane. Yes, they will eventually find out that people aren't that great, but that's no way to raise a kid. It's popular around here to make fun of "But what about the children?" but I think there are plenty of times when you have to do exactly that. For a healthy society at least. With cable you have the option of not paying for it, but with regular TV it comes in free to whoever has a set. The access is way different.
Yes, I realize this is OT, but I want to point out the inaccuracy of your sig, just in case someone is foolish enough to believe it.
I cannot find any document that states AI ever pushed for a cease fire between the CPN and the government. I did, however, find this:
Imperialist politicians and intelligence agencies, parroted by their media, repeatedly attempt to portray the Maoists of Nepal as "terrorists". But facts on the ground show just who are the real "terrorists". Human rights groups like Amnesty International that tend to oppose revolutionary and reactionary violence alike are not known for sympathizing with armed insurrections like that in Nepal. Yet report after report from these groups show an incontrovertible truth: that the waves of violence inflicted on the masses come from one side - the reactionary state. The latest report from Amnesty International (October 2003) documents hundreds of cases where the RNA has "disappeared" people, many of whom are thought to have been killed in custody. Thousands have been the victims of "arbitrary arrests and detentions", often under laws that Amnesty describes as "in clear breach of the Constitution, as well as international treaties to which Nepal is a state party". One typical procedure used by the police is to arrest people under the Terrorism Act for the maximum allowable 90 days, release them and then before they can even leave the jail area re-arrest them again! Amnesty reports that of 1,000 people detained under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Ordinance enacted in April 2002, not a single person has ever been presented to a judicial authority. At the same time, the report acknowledges that "support for the ideologies expressed by the CPN(M) has surfaced from the most economically and socially deprived areas of Nepal". (Amnesty International, "Widespread -disappearances' in the context of armed conflict", AI Index: ASA 31/045/2003)
(take from here, a pro CPN site. Which I think gives credence to the second sentence.)
Amnesty International's official stance is to take no sides and simply to oppose human rights abuses wherever they occur. That includes rebels as well as governments. You seem to have some problem with that, which makes me curious. Usually people who don't want to be held accountable for human rights abuses are the ones who hate human rights groups the most.
I guess by that you mean that today's typical fare of violent shoot-'em-up videogames are not crap, which I guess is purely a matter of taste. I'd still rate movies as way higher on my to-do list than most video games, and both are actually way down the list from other activities.
I'm not sure why the two industries are even being compared. So what if the gaming industry does get bigger? It's still just games. The movies will be around for a long time, especially indie and art films, because they have real stories.
I'm sorry to whoever construed my above post as a troll. I was merely hoping to instigate some introspective thought regarding our inconsistencies of thinking, even among otherwise intelligent people. I think that we are all was less rational than we like to think we are, and that for the most part we simply want what we want when we want it.
If you want to see bigotry and racism in real life, go to a kkk rally.
And if you want to see misogyny and poor taste, read Slashdot. Look, my point was that there is a bit of hypocrisy in screaming about how the FCC is a bunch of fascist prudes for not allowing all the vulgar language and nudity that the typical adolescent would like to see (which many people find offensive), yet modding down another topic that they find offensive.
No, I'm not fond of racism or bigotry, and I would have modded that post down myself had it appeared under another topic, but it's just too funny that with all the rants about free speech going on people fail to see their own hypocrisy when it comes to something they disagree with. You made the statement that the comment was still here, but I will make the point that modding down is the equivalent of shouting down, of trying to drown out that voice. That's not exactly freedom of expression if you are censured for it, is it?
My point here is that everyone seems to be ranting about how the FCC shouldn't be disallowing words like fuck and shit or the showing of nudity, yet when someone uses the word nigger suddenly that's not OK. And I'm fine with part of that since I hate racism, but where are you going to now set the definition of what is acceptable?
I'm still not sure why you condone property theft. Perhaps if Hollywood was viewed as a haven for righties you might feel differently. Otherwise, fairly typical radcon response.
Ironically, some of the world's most celebrated leftists...
You mean like Arnold Schwarzenegger?
If the culture of Hollywood weren't so fundamentally wasteful and profuse...
You mean like Halliburton?
After all how many Hollywood productions would survive in a free market environment like the Internet?
You're not a very good radcon, are you? Hollywood is surviving in a free market already. And I'm surprised that a radcon such as yourself would condone property theft. I suppose it's OK when it's theft of something you don't like.
Hollywood isn't interested in free markets or anything similar.
Ha! Yes, it is. I should have elaborated that we use it for way more than that. It's just that since we have it we tend to try to use it. With some practice, the other guy that works at the studio has dialed in some good curves for the captures and he gets better results than most of the pro places we'd been using for film scanning.
But no, I would not recommend spending ~$18,000 to get a scanning back for your 35mm slides.;-)
I work at a commercial photo studio and when we have to have scans of 35mm slides we do it one of two ways: Mount it in a rig we made and then scan it with a 4x5 scanning back, or send it out. I'd recommend ditching the flatbed scanning and just send them out.
You can probably find a place to do it for around a $1 per slide unless you really need repro quality. You get the images back on a CD and you have none of the hassle and time spent scanning dozens of slides. Of course, if you need to scan hundreds of slides pretty soon it will make sense to invest in a good 35mm film scanner.
...he's spent an awfully long time trying to make the world see things his way...
I think you may be talking about Bill Gates here. Steve Jobs has spent an awfully long time seeing the world to figure out how to make great products.
Also, strong ego is not a bad thing. It does not have to mean "jerk." For instance, I would say Linus Torvalds has a strong ego. He knows the direction he wants to go and he isn't swayed from his goal by just anyone with an opinion. Ego only equates to "jerk" for those individuals who are truly insecure.
The internet has empowered users to bypass the reporter....
I don't think that is such a great thing. Yes, occasionally you may get a great first-hand report from someone who actually went through the experience in question, but more often you simply have to wade through thousands of self-proclaimed experts spouting off about what's currently in the news.
The reporters are generally not the problem. I look forward to listening to what the NPR reporters have researched and put together because they are very sharp people. Going directly to the source may be Democracy at it's finest--and I certainly wouldn't say we shouldn't have that--but in the glut of information we need people to wade through it and help us filter out what's important. The people we feel are doing a good job of this get our patronage, and that's a free market solution for you.
That's better than the $1 per person fine that executives of GM, Firestone, Standard Oil and Philips Petroleum got for being found guilty of conspiracy when they destroyed mass transit systems all around the nation back in the late fifties.
I wonder about the ability of the lens to sustain shock (and not just the kind from bad composition). If you've ever put oil and water in a jar and shaken it you get tiny "bubbles" of oil that don't immediately mix back into the large mass of oil.
Given the jarring hits I've seen some phones take I wonder what that would do to the oil/water barrier. Or perhaps it's just too small with not enough mass to act in the same way as the jar of oil/water analogy.
Modern college kids are exactly the strata of gullible-and-militant fools who are easily led into things like, say, terrorist groups and doomsday cults.
I rather doubt that. I'd say they're more easily led into conspicuous consumption and capitalism.
Right on. I would add to this that the quality of the CCD and the image software makes a huge difference as well. I recently bought a Casio z40 and while I love it for the features the images are not nearly as good as my old Nikon 950. Dark noise, sharpness and "bloom" are all much worse in the 4MP Casio than the 3MP Nikon.
Slashdot Mirror
Be sure to have your credit card and SSN handy so they can verify your complaint.
Well, I'm not sure that's saying much. The worldwide stat is more impressive. The U.S. didn't have many terrorist attacks (on the homeland) before 9/11 either, and the latest one was by an American citizen. (The anthrax scare may have also been by an American citizen).
Until we have a few more years worth of data I wouldn't be so convinced the U.S. has made a dent in overall terrorism events. After all, crime statistics within our country follow a rise and fall pattern on their own and some politician is always trying to take the credit/place the blame for it.
You might be interested in reading John Perkins' "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" in order to understand that investment in poor foreign countries is really more like extortion.
Any news yet of another natural disaster sent to wipe out the fathers who sold their children into prostitution in the first place or the American tourists who fly to Thailand to have sex with children?
I assume you're talking about government human rights abuses here and not the Maoists. I oppose abuses no matter which side you're talking about.
I find myself sort of agreeing with you. I agree philosophically even though I know that it means there will be little left for me to watch. I certainly don't think Sex and the City is quality and I have absolutely no desire to watch a show about a family of sociopathic criminals. But in the end it's really a moot point since I gave up TV in 1991.
I disagree because TV is over the public airwaves and I think we have some kind of obligation to children (during appropriate hours) to keep things sane. Yes, they will eventually find out that people aren't that great, but that's no way to raise a kid. It's popular around here to make fun of "But what about the children?" but I think there are plenty of times when you have to do exactly that. For a healthy society at least. With cable you have the option of not paying for it, but with regular TV it comes in free to whoever has a set. The access is way different.
I cannot find any document that states AI ever pushed for a cease fire between the CPN and the government. I did, however, find this:
(take from here, a pro CPN site. Which I think gives credence to the second sentence.)Amnesty International's official stance is to take no sides and simply to oppose human rights abuses wherever they occur. That includes rebels as well as governments. You seem to have some problem with that, which makes me curious. Usually people who don't want to be held accountable for human rights abuses are the ones who hate human rights groups the most.
I guess by that you mean that today's typical fare of violent shoot-'em-up videogames are not crap, which I guess is purely a matter of taste. I'd still rate movies as way higher on my to-do list than most video games, and both are actually way down the list from other activities.
I'm not sure why the two industries are even being compared. So what if the gaming industry does get bigger? It's still just games. The movies will be around for a long time, especially indie and art films, because they have real stories.
It's a weird comparison.
Clinical studies have already shown plenty of evidence of dopey brains.
I'm sorry to whoever construed my above post as a troll. I was merely hoping to instigate some introspective thought regarding our inconsistencies of thinking, even among otherwise intelligent people. I think that we are all was less rational than we like to think we are, and that for the most part we simply want what we want when we want it.
And if you want to see misogyny and poor taste, read Slashdot. Look, my point was that there is a bit of hypocrisy in screaming about how the FCC is a bunch of fascist prudes for not allowing all the vulgar language and nudity that the typical adolescent would like to see (which many people find offensive), yet modding down another topic that they find offensive.
No, I'm not fond of racism or bigotry, and I would have modded that post down myself had it appeared under another topic, but it's just too funny that with all the rants about free speech going on people fail to see their own hypocrisy when it comes to something they disagree with. You made the statement that the comment was still here, but I will make the point that modding down is the equivalent of shouting down, of trying to drown out that voice. That's not exactly freedom of expression if you are censured for it, is it?
My point here is that everyone seems to be ranting about how the FCC shouldn't be disallowing words like fuck and shit or the showing of nudity, yet when someone uses the word nigger suddenly that's not OK. And I'm fine with part of that since I hate racism, but where are you going to now set the definition of what is acceptable?
The above was modded -1 Troll. Interesting how the rants about freedom of expression only go so far, eh?
I'm still not sure why you condone property theft. Perhaps if Hollywood was viewed as a haven for righties you might feel differently. Otherwise, fairly typical radcon response.
You mean like Arnold Schwarzenegger?
If the culture of Hollywood weren't so fundamentally wasteful and profuse...
You mean like Halliburton?
After all how many Hollywood productions would survive in a free market environment like the Internet?
You're not a very good radcon, are you? Hollywood is surviving in a free market already. And I'm surprised that a radcon such as yourself would condone property theft. I suppose it's OK when it's theft of something you don't like.
Hollywood isn't interested in free markets or anything similar.
No corporation is.
I trust you'll remember that the next time you get hot because someone says something that offends you.
But no, I would not recommend spending ~$18,000 to get a scanning back for your 35mm slides. ;-)
You can probably find a place to do it for around a $1 per slide unless you really need repro quality. You get the images back on a CD and you have none of the hassle and time spent scanning dozens of slides. Of course, if you need to scan hundreds of slides pretty soon it will make sense to invest in a good 35mm film scanner.
I think you may be talking about Bill Gates here. Steve Jobs has spent an awfully long time seeing the world to figure out how to make great products.
Also, strong ego is not a bad thing. It does not have to mean "jerk." For instance, I would say Linus Torvalds has a strong ego. He knows the direction he wants to go and he isn't swayed from his goal by just anyone with an opinion. Ego only equates to "jerk" for those individuals who are truly insecure.
I don't think that is such a great thing. Yes, occasionally you may get a great first-hand report from someone who actually went through the experience in question, but more often you simply have to wade through thousands of self-proclaimed experts spouting off about what's currently in the news.
The reporters are generally not the problem. I look forward to listening to what the NPR reporters have researched and put together because they are very sharp people. Going directly to the source may be Democracy at it's finest--and I certainly wouldn't say we shouldn't have that--but in the glut of information we need people to wade through it and help us filter out what's important. The people we feel are doing a good job of this get our patronage, and that's a free market solution for you.
That's better than the $1 per person fine that executives of GM, Firestone, Standard Oil and Philips Petroleum got for being found guilty of conspiracy when they destroyed mass transit systems all around the nation back in the late fifties.
Given the jarring hits I've seen some phones take I wonder what that would do to the oil/water barrier. Or perhaps it's just too small with not enough mass to act in the same way as the jar of oil/water analogy.
I rather doubt that. I'd say they're more easily led into conspicuous consumption and capitalism.
They may have NPR but XM has Bob Edwards. Bob Edwards rocks. NPR blew it when they let him go.
If I'd known I could get modded up so high for it I would have become a Republican a long time ago....
Right on. I would add to this that the quality of the CCD and the image software makes a huge difference as well. I recently bought a Casio z40 and while I love it for the features the images are not nearly as good as my old Nikon 950. Dark noise, sharpness and "bloom" are all much worse in the 4MP Casio than the 3MP Nikon.