The ruling does not universally allow employers to ban any and all off-duty interaction. It made a specific ruling, in its capacity of administering the National Labor Relations Act, that Guardsmark's ban on in-uniform, but off duty, fraternization ("dating or becoming overly friendly with") with clients and coworkers. The critical and key aspect of the ruling was that it allowed for the prevention of such inappropriate fraternization while in Guardsmark uniform. The NLRB ruling further stated that care must be taken such that this ruling is not misapplied as to have a "chilling" effect on employee's rights under Section 7 of the the Act.
The actual order is:
ORDER The Respondent, Guardsmark, LLC, its officers, agents, suc-cessors, and assigns, shall 1. Cease and desist from (a) Maintaining or enforcing a handbook provision prohibit-ing employees from registering complaints regarding their wages, hours, or conditions of employment with Guardsmarks' clients. (b) In any like or related manner interfering with, restraining, or coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed them by Section 7 of the Act. 2. Take the following affirmative action which is necessary to effectuate the purposes of the Act. (a) Within 21 days after receipt of this decision advise its employees, nationwide, that the handbook provision regarding registering complaints with clients is not to be understood as limiting the right of employees to engage in activities protected by the National Labor Relations Act. (b) At a time when the employee handbook is to be revised or reissued, either delete the handbook provision prohibiting employees from registering complaints with clients, or modify the said language so that it does not prohibit activities protected by the National Labor Relations Act. (c) Within 14 days after service by the Region, post at its San Francisco, California office copies of the attached notice marked "Appendix."6 Copies of the notice, on forms provided by the Regional Director for Region 20, after being duly signed by Respondent's representative, shall be posted immediately upon receipt thereof, and shall remain posted by Respondent for 60 consecutive days thereafter, in conspicuous places, in-cluding all places where notices to employees are customarily posted. Reasonable steps shall be taken by the Respondent to ensure that the notices are not altered, defaced, or covered by any other material. (d) Within 21 days after service by the Regional Office, file with the Regional Director for Region 20 a sworn certification of a responsible official on a form provided by the Region at-testing to the steps that the Respondent has taken to comply.
Click sensors are indeed INSIDE the mouse, but not on the surface of the mouse. The mouse body must still physically be depressed to actuate the sensor. Regardless of whether it is a microswitch or a capacitive sensor, the effect is the same: the mouse must be depressed, a threshold must be crossed, a click is audibly heard and the corresponding action occurs.
Yes, but that's still not "touch sensitive". The submission makes it appear as if the *surface* of the mouse is touch sensitive, which would be a nightmare. It isn't. The mouse body physically moves, and the sensors - whether they're capacitive or microswitches - still need to be actuated at some threshold. The behavior shouldn't be any different than a conventional mouse (insofar as it has a uniform shell, as Apple's current mouse does). As to the effects, I can't imagine there would be no way to turn them off, but I have been surprised before...
First of all, the scroll ball is not a "nipple" or an IBM ThinkPad-style eraserhead. It's a scroll ball. Its behavior probably has some intelligence such that there is a reasonably high threshold that has to be crossed before it will start scrolling diagonal or sideways when used for conventional vertical scrolling. Anyone arguing for less functionality here (e.g., vertical-only scrolling - which, frankly, you can probably program the damned thing to do - looks foolish). In fact, upon using it, most people will wonder why in the hell it took Apple - AGAIN - to innovate in something as simple as a mouse.
Second, it is NOT "touch sensitive"! There are real, physical microswitches that have an audible and tactile feature when clicked, just like any other mouse. The mouse body rocks when depressed in a particular direction, and the appropriate button is clicked. I haven't used this mouse yet, but knowing Apple's second-to-none engineering and industrial design, and with knowledge of Apple's current similar Pro Mouse, it will be very unlikely that you can "accidentally" click, or click the wrong button. Or, to but it another way: it would be just as likely as it is on any other mouse. And no, it won't accidentally click if you rest your palm on the mouse. The bottom half of the mouse doesn't respond (or, more accurately, the mouse responds less and less to the same pressure as the point the pressure is applied moves further away from the optimal locations).
Third, yes, it's not wireless. Woo. Expect a Bluetooth version soon.
Fourth, if you think it's ugly, don't buy it. Use any of the other extremely numerous USB and Bluetooth mice you've always been able to use.
By making the rockets from shuttle parts, the new plan would draw on the shuttle's existing network of thousands of contractors and technologies, in theory speeding its completion and lowering its price.
I fail to see how anyone needs to be a "critical thinker" to understand the Washington Post may have made an error. I searched for the Senate report on pre-war intelligence, and came up with that article, among others. I missed the sidebar. Since I linked it in my own post, I obviously wasn't trying to hide anything.
Please accept this revised post:
That depends. Is your wife a CIA agent?
If she were, apparently she'd either directly or indirectly approve trips to Africa for me, her husband, to disprove what she would call "crazy reports" of Iraq trying to buy uranium from Africa.
Also, how am I a "right wing zealot"? Incorrectly quoting an article that still has the incorrect quote in it, and missing a sidebar?
It doesn't change the appearance of impropriety of recommending, and then having your own workgroup send, your husband to investigate what you prejudicially call a "crazy report". Here, let's see if you're a "left wing zealot": if you see no impropriety there, I imagine you also defended DeLay's wife working for his campaign in what by all accounts was a perfectly professional capacity?
Well, I don't defend either: they BOTH have unacceptable appearances of impropriety, regardless of whether there is any ACTUAL impropriety. This is why we work to avoid such things.
And I didn't vote for Bush, and actually voted for more Democratic/Liberal candidates (including Feingold, the only Senator not to vote for PATRIOT) in the last major elections, but thanks for your concern of my well being as a "right wing zealot".
My original post was intended to be one just as short as the one humorously asking "Is your wife a CIA agent?"
I'm not backpedaling; I personally believe that she had significant involvement in Wilson being sent to Africa, and that she had an opinion of the initial report that was prejudicial.
As for the UN resolutions: I have news for you: neither UN resolutions, nor WMD were the reasons for going into Iraq. The problem is, the reasons are a lot more complicated than play well in sound bites. If we had found large caches of WMD in Iraq, as I fully believe we thought we would find, would that vindicate our effort, even if it's still not the "real" reason we went to Iraq? I think that NOT finding large amounts of WMD, given the hundreds of tons that are known to be unaccounted for, was a great surprise to us. But it was never the primary reason we went to Iraq in the first place, though it was presented as such initially. And before you ask if I'm really ok with the administration lying about the reasons, then, consider that we could never present the full foreign policy landscape in an understandable, accurate way, regarding any given situation on the planet, for easy and quick digestion by the American people. So while WMD was stressed in speeches, and it was by far the easiest material case to attempt to make to the UN (since many member nations, too, believed Iraq to be in continuing possession of WMD), the real reasons are a more broad strategy of change in the mideast. It's a multi-faceted approach about exerting our influence, militarily when necessary, to encourage and/or install free or quasi-free governments in the mideast, friendly with the West, in an attempt to kill radicalism over the next few decades rather than let it grow and take hold for the next couple centuries, possibly with devastating consequences.
For my most recent post (from today, actually) on this, see here.
Yes, and you probably know from my previous posts, we didn't go into something like Saudi Arabia because, first of all, as you say, they're our official allies. Second, we didn't really have a motivation to go after the government of Saudi Arabia, given that their relationship with us with regard to oil pricing controls and energy supplies is very important to our economic well-being.
I must take issue, however, with you saying that we "changed" who was responsible for 9/11. We didn't at all. It was stated ad nauseum by all manner of government and media that the majority of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi, that bin Laden himself is Saudi, that many of the extremely militant Islamic radical movements and members were created in Saudi Arabia, etc. We never changed that, and in my estimation, that was never downplayed. (And for the ridiculously high percentages of people in some surveys who apparently thought Saddam and/or Iraq were responsibly for 9/11, well, I have no explanation. It has been repeated thousands of times that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi and that bin Laden is Saudi in all manner of print and television news media, and the administration has never said anything different. It tried to tie Iraq to Al Qaeda for a while, but NEVER said that Iraq was responsible for or involved in any major way in 9/11.)
As to Iraq's secular nature, as I said, that's exactly why it was picked opposed to others: it would have the least chance of a radical Islamic uprising from within. Indeed, that has proven to be true. What we didn't bargain for is a major Islamic uprising from without, with foreign fighters from everyplace but Iraq.
I would also take issue that Iraq is "increasingly fundamentalist" or that it will grow to be an oppressive state. That would run counter to the very reasons we started this in the first place.
And as to explaining Iraq as a response to 9/11, I did just that. You might not agree with it, or might think it was a horribly wrongheaded idea, but that's exactly why they did it. Without 9/11, we wouldn't even be in Iraq right now. And yes, the idea was, as you say, to topple the problem regimes in the area, preferably with the help of internal reformers. Those reformers DO exist, but their forces are outnumbered by those who fear the US is on a mission to exterminate Islam and expand the Jewish empire (both untrue). So we have reactions like we have in Iran, and yes, the plan as laid out was planned to go much more smoothly. It has not gone smoothly at all in this area, but in order for it to work, we need to redouble our efforts, not give up. A side note: this isn't about "Israel's" enemies, as you phrase it. This is about OUR enemies. That many of them are also Israel's enemies is incidental. You might be stunned to hear me say that, but I don't misunderstand the situation. This isn't about Israel. This is about us, and freedom and democracy here, AND in the mideast - in places like Israel, but in the Arab and Persian states too. What if the US stopped supporting Israel and exited the mideast entirely? How long would Israel be for this world? Would the genocide of the Jews set well with those who are so quick to condemn any US support of Israel?
You're absolutely right. Because if I were going to assasinate Bush, I'd turn up wearing an anti-US t-shirt and waving a placard.
...
1. I didn't know we were only talking about Bush.
2. You'd better believe that if an assassin, or anyone else who wishes to cause the greatest disturbance, property damage, etc., would absolutely love to integrate into a huge mob of people with as-direct-as-possible access to the meeting buildings, travel routes, etc.
Further, I said "indirectly". Wilson's wife most certainly had a hand in offering up his name. That she called the Niger report "crazy", and then her own husband went to investigate said claims, raises what we call a conflict of interest. An appearance of impropriety, in the same vein as concerns raise about DeLay having his spouse work on his campaign. There may not actually be any impropriety in either case; it is the appearance that is critically important.
Why do you think Plame is involved in this in the first place? It wasn't because the administration wanted to "get back at" Wilson by vindictively ruining his the career of his wife who is completely unrelated to the events; the whole reason she was ever an issue is precisely BECAUSE she was working in this specific area at the CIA and had a hand in offering/suggesting/promoting/etc. her husband for an investigative trip on this very topic. Even DailyKos in its "debunking" story acknowledges her involvement. The administration wanted to use this appearance of impropriety to discredit Wilson's claims.
Let me just reiterate: the whole reason Plame's name came up was because of the direct and close involvement of her husband here with her own workgroup and her own specific area of work; if she was a CIA operative working on, say, signals intelligence for the Indian subcontinent, her name never would have come up.
I'm not saying it was right. What I am saying is that it wasn't just random pettiness. If Wilson's wife had nothing to do with this at all, her name would never have come up, no matter who mentioned it first. But it was her own workgroup in the CIA who sent her husband to Africa to investigate this "crazy report" (her words). If you can't see a conflict there (but do in the case of DeLay, for example), you've got partisan blinders on.
But in answer to your question, it seems examples abound where exercising free speech in public results in negative and undesirable attention from the government, thus making it fair to say that yes, freenet might be in some circumstances a useful tool for avoiding such things. I provide that link simply because it was the most recent example in a story on, well, slashdot.
You might be surprised that I disagree that your example proves anything.
Does unlimited free speech and movement trump the safety of elected officials/dignitaries/world leaders/etc.?
I say, no, it doesn't.
You know damned well that there are some people in those groups who want to do more than just talk.
And note you say "peaceably" assemble. Some of these assemblies are hardly peaceable, and claiming the police always incite any unrest is a copout, and false somewhere from some to most of the time.
But if they have evidence to justify such an imprisonment, then what possible excuse can there be for not putting him on trial with it?
That's likely just it: the evidence is manifestly circumstantial, and might not result in the type of punishment sought, or indeed, even a conviction.
It's not against the law to go to Afghanistan and train in terrorist training camps.
It's not against the law to suddenly convert to radical Islam.
While he might have been planning on blowing up buildings in Chicago with radiological dirty bombs, what proof do we have that he would have followed through?
These are all reasonable assertions.
But the more important question is, when does the US, under the auspices of the military, have the power to seize persons who may be intending to cause direct significant harm to the US, but have not yet caused said harm, and may indeed even be US citizens?
If the answer is "never", we may be in philosophical disagreement here.
If she were, apparently she'd either directly or indirectly approve trips to Africa for me, her husband, to disprove what she would call "crazy reports" of Iraq trying to buy uranium from Africa. Which it actually did do[1], by the way.
[1] "According to the former Niger mining minister, Wilson told his CIA contacts, Iraq tried to buy 400 tons of uranium in 1998."
If anyone can give actual provable examples of the US government abridging Constitutionally protected free speech, I'd love to hear it.
(Note: traveling to Afghanistan, training in Taliban camps, and planning to blow up buildings in downtown Chicago with radiological dirty bombs is not "free speech".)
If you're looking for trampling of free speech, you needn't look to the government; you need only look no further than our own academic institutions.
The Power of Nightmares completely misses the point.
It doesn't matter whether an organization by that name specifically exists.
The threat of Panislamic radicalism is very real, and lumping them under a single umbrella is to simplify discussion.
The Wahabbists, the Muslim Brotherhood, "Al Qaeda" - they all want manifestly the same things, the most radical of which is an Islamic theocratic superstate across the whole of the mideast that is the seat of government for the world. Some might say "So what? Who are we to say that they can't have that state, if successful?" Well, people who want to live, that's who. If successful, they would have access to all of the collective resources of the current official governments of the region, including nuclear and other weapons. The collective power this group would possess, and the effects, would be devastating.
The Power of Nightmares is a quite pathetic attempt to claim that, simply, the threat doesn't exist.
Except that the extremely numerous terrorist attacks around the world by fanatical Muslim extremists would disprove that completely.
In short, concentrating on whether or not it's "Al Qaeda", or whether an organization by the self-given name of "Al Qaeda"-proper specifically and strictly exists is utterly and completely missing the point. Lumping them into a group under one term is more than accurate enough to describe Islamic militants who would wish harm on the US and/or West. Individual motives may vary slightly, but the goals and aims are largely the same, and to simply claim they don't exist is to ignorantly attempt to derail the issue.
It's also quite offensive that supposedly-intelligent people literally think that Bush and his "cronies" are the mastermind architects of this, that no threat really exists, and it's nothing but a figment of a bunch of neo-cons' imaginations designed to keep people living in fear under their thumbs.
Let me be clear: you cannot deny that Islamic, and specifically, Panislamic radical terrorism exists. Whether or not the number of people who died on 9/11 or in any other attack is more or less than other innocuous things like car accidents or smoking (as is often stated) is COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT. The point is that we're tackling the threat early, before it does kill significant numbers of people, not only in the US, but around the globe!
In a mindset where the US is the source or cause of all evil in the world, I know it might be difficult to understand this.
You know very well that's not the strategy with Iraq.
The Iraq action was initiated as part of a long-term strategy to change the face of the middle east by changing governments that CAN be changed, and standing up a quasi-democracy in a relatively secular nation.
It was and is a bold and expensive gamble.
This particular strategy was undertaken for exactly the reasons you implicitly state:
The prevailing state of mind in the US did not have the will, even after 9/11, to fight Al Qaeda with the force needed to manifestly eliminate it with great prejudice. This is further complicated by a questionable belief among some neoconservatives that this war can be fought with little or no sacrifice at home.
The problem is not just one of "Al Qaeda" or the Muslim Brotherhood or the Whabbists. It's a problem of Panislamic radicalism, and it's possibly a greater threat than the West has ever faced in modern times. These groups of people, under whatever umbrella you wish to shove them, desire for the creation of an Islamic theocratic superstate in the whole of the mideast, which is the seat of government for the world. Anyone who does not subscribe to their interpretation of Islam will, literally, be subjugated or slaughtered. The mindset in this sect is not much unlike the mindset of some 11th and 12th century Christian Crusaders.
Further remember that, if successful, the Panislamists would then have access to all of the resources of the current official governments of the region. And we all know what that includes.
There are a variety of reasons and conditions that led to this current state of affairs. US and Western foreign policy and interaction with the mideast has certainly played a role, but not an exclusive or even majority one.
Further, remember that the US support of the fighters, many of which became the "Taliban" or "Al Qaeda", was exactly the reason the USSR failed in Afghanistan. Ironically, your own assertion is that the failed fight was the single biggest contributor to the ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union! I'm not sure I agree with that thesis; or, perhaps, it can be reworded:
The single biggest contributor to the ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union was the United States' omnibus policy of opposition to the advance of the Soviet state and ideal on any and all fronts, at all costs, including places like Afghanistan. Certainly our actions and decisions have had consequences. But you cannot discount the defeat of the Soviet Communist empire, which you attribute nearly singly to the war in Afghanistan, which the US supported for that very reason.
So we traded an extremely large and brutal regime with ideals in diametric opposition to those of freedom, liberty, and democracy, in the form of the USSR, for a much smaller insurgency that has taken, in relative numbers, orders of magnitude fewer lives than the Soviet state. Realpolitik may have ultimately been outmoded and dismissed, but it did have its victories.
Now we find ourselves needing a way to speed the mideast toward modernization, along with which we hope comes freedom of speech, expression, press, and a general free flow of information, which we further hope accomplishes two things:
1. Causes the peoples and governments of the mideast to not tolerate the radical Panislamic terrorists within their midst;
2. Creation of states friendly/friendlier by default to Western trade in order to support our continuing need for stable, secure, and reliable sources of energy.
Note regarding 2. above: this does NOT imply creation of states that are Western puppets, but rather states with models of free market economies and democracy that will by their very nature be more amenable to trade/export relationships.
Further, I urge anyone reading this to keep in mind that the US economy, and that of Europe, and indeed the global industrialized economy is delicately predicated on the ability to obtain stable and inexpensive suppli
There is nothing remotely having anything to do with Christianity, much less fundamentalist Christianity, anywhere in it. In fact, there's nothing even about politics or religion in it.
And since I know of troll of this nature would probably claim that I "just changed it", please feel free to look at the http://das.doit.wisc.edu/>wayback machine archives of my web page.
Further, this Google comment has nothing to do with Bush, right wing politics, religion, or anything asserted in this troll post. And yes, please do look at my posting history. You'll find that out of my over-1000 posts, probably 5 of them are along the lines of the "before anyone bashes Bush..." variety. They're all also typically highly moderated, meaning they're not trolls or flamebait in the opinion of mods and metamods (because they're generally not). Further, I have not said anything remotely related to evangelism or fundamentalist Christianity, or indeed really Christianity or religion at all except tangentially, in any of my posts, or anywhere else on the web.
So in short, I have no fucking idea what you're talking about.
Searching for "hans island" (both with and without enclosing quotes) returns nothing as described in the summary and articles.
The first hit is an over-2-year-old Maritime Affairs (Canada)articleexplaining why Hans Island is (or should be) Canadian Territory. (Actually an interesting read...)
The second hit is the Wikipedia article.
In fact, the supposed site(s) is nowhere in the first page of hits.
Or the second page.
The news hits refer to Google supposedly having these ads, but that reference is somewhat circular, since I can't find the paid advertisement, banner, or site in question anywhere on Google.
The sponsored (ad) links on the right sidebar include a Web Design ad, and the marginally entertaining:
Hans Island - Dispute Why Worry about Hans Island When What you need is an Ergonomic Chair www.ergo4me.com
A search for "Hans Island is Greenland" returns nothing but...you guessed it, the news articles claiming there's a paid site on Google that says "Hans Island is Greenland." Likewise for "Hans Island is {Canadian|Canada}." Now, I'm not saying the articles are lying (and perhaps Google pulled the ads for some reason), but since this article is exclusively about how the battle for Hans Island is being taken to Google, and is entitled "Politics: Canada and Denmark using Google as Battleground", well, I'd love to see it.
Because I see nothing except someone pimping knockoff ergonomic chairs with eBay-style "searchsquatting".
And, amusingly, as I'm typing this article, I see more paid hits appearing. Google started with one. Then the ergonomic chair ad was added. Now, as I'm about to post, there is a "Hans Island is Canada" link...by vaginainstitute.com, a site apparently dedicated to, erm, researching vaginas.
Defense attorneys will, yes, paint their client in a positive light, however, if they feel that their client is being unfairly persecuted (or want to portray it in that light), they will most definitely play that up. In other words, the lawyer is not downplaying the FBI investigation to put a positive light on it; what she said is almost positively the truth: the FBI is following up on a complaint, as it has to do, and there is nothing more to it. Wired (and slashdot) is trying to make hay of it as one of these "OMG! The big bad jackbooted totalitarian government is going after a noble whistleblower on the part of its corporate minions!!" type stories, except that it's not. She's not even shopping around the story herself.
You're sort of straw-manning here. The problem isn't that Cisco didn't fix the vulnerability in time, the problem is that they didn't tell anyone it was a critical update. That's a far cry from open-sourcing their code or personally explaining how the vulnerability works.
The problem here is that Lynn is claiming this was some kind of end-times doomsday vulnerability, and Cisco claiming it wasn't a big deal.
I'm frankly not inclined to believe either one of them.
We still don't know the EXACT nature of the vulnerability, and I haven't seen any direct evidence that the update should have been identified as critical. I realize that may be a little circular, but the only "evidence" we have of anything is the emotional factor of a respected security researcher quitting his job and nobly going forward with a presentation. While it tugs at the heartstrings and provides for good melodrama, it doesn't do much more. This is a difference of opinion about how Cisco handled a vulnerability. Should Cisco have labeled it critical? Was it really a big deal. Perhaps it was. But you can't assume that the truth is 100% on Lynn's side just as you can't assume such about Cisco. As I said in other posts, the truth is probably somewhere in between.
I am willing to believe, however, that he would not give up a good, paying job and risk his future employment prospects unless he felt that this was a real and serious risk.
How do you know this? That seems to be what everyone is basing their assumptions on the seriousness of the vulnerability on. I'm sorry, but people quit and resign over petty conflicts all the time. Just because this person is a security researcher doesn't make him a martyr, and doesn't necessitate that his resignation was some noble act for the good of the global internet community. You and he may believe that it was, and I'll be willing to consider the possibility that it was as well.
But the real issue here was that Lynn didn't want Cisco to speak at the forum with him, essentially giving its side of the story, instead of a somewhat vague assertion that Cisco's general irresponsibility will someday lead to an exploit bringing the internet to its knees. There is no specific outstanding vulnerability. Merely an assertion that Cisco didn't handle a previous vulnerability, which Lynn alleges was serious (but we don't know that for sure), urgently enough. I'm sorry, but someone quitting their job doesn't lend more credibility to the facts of a claim. The facts themselves, however, would.
Slashdot Mirror
...since the submission is extremely misleading and melodramatic, as usual.
NLRB ruling
The ruling does not universally allow employers to ban any and all off-duty interaction. It made a specific ruling, in its capacity of administering the National Labor Relations Act, that Guardsmark's ban on in-uniform, but off duty, fraternization ("dating or becoming overly friendly with") with clients and coworkers. The critical and key aspect of the ruling was that it allowed for the prevention of such inappropriate fraternization while in Guardsmark uniform. The NLRB ruling further stated that care must be taken such that this ruling is not misapplied as to have a "chilling" effect on employee's rights under Section 7 of the the Act.
The actual order is:
ORDER
The Respondent, Guardsmark, LLC, its officers, agents, suc-cessors, and assigns, shall
1. Cease and desist from
(a) Maintaining or enforcing a handbook provision prohibit-ing employees from registering complaints regarding their wages, hours, or conditions of employment with Guardsmarks' clients.
(b) In any like or related manner interfering with, restraining, or coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed them by Section 7 of the Act.
2. Take the following affirmative action which is necessary to effectuate the purposes of the Act.
(a) Within 21 days after receipt of this decision advise its employees, nationwide, that the handbook provision regarding registering complaints with clients is not to be understood as limiting the right of employees to engage in activities protected by the National Labor Relations Act.
(b) At a time when the employee handbook is to be revised or reissued, either delete the handbook provision prohibiting employees from registering complaints with clients, or modify the said language so that it does not prohibit activities protected by the National Labor Relations Act.
(c) Within 14 days after service by the Region, post at its San Francisco, California office copies of the attached notice marked "Appendix."6 Copies of the notice, on forms provided by the Regional Director for Region 20, after being duly signed by Respondent's representative, shall be posted immediately upon receipt thereof, and shall remain posted by Respondent for 60 consecutive days thereafter, in conspicuous places, in-cluding all places where notices to employees are customarily posted. Reasonable steps shall be taken by the Respondent to ensure that the notices are not altered, defaced, or covered by any other material.
(d) Within 21 days after service by the Regional Office, file with the Regional Director for Region 20 a sworn certification of a responsible official on a form provided by the Region at-testing to the steps that the Respondent has taken to comply.
*Whoosh*
When the iPod first came out, slashdot's commentary after the article submission was:
"No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame."
The iPod then went on to become, well, I'm sure you know.
Click sensors are indeed INSIDE the mouse, but not on the surface of the mouse. The mouse body must still physically be depressed to actuate the sensor. Regardless of whether it is a microswitch or a capacitive sensor, the effect is the same: the mouse must be depressed, a threshold must be crossed, a click is audibly heard and the corresponding action occurs.
Yes, but that's still not "touch sensitive". The submission makes it appear as if the *surface* of the mouse is touch sensitive, which would be a nightmare. It isn't. The mouse body physically moves, and the sensors - whether they're capacitive or microswitches - still need to be actuated at some threshold. The behavior shouldn't be any different than a conventional mouse (insofar as it has a uniform shell, as Apple's current mouse does). As to the effects, I can't imagine there would be no way to turn them off, but I have been surprised before...
First of all, the scroll ball is not a "nipple" or an IBM ThinkPad-style eraserhead. It's a scroll ball. Its behavior probably has some intelligence such that there is a reasonably high threshold that has to be crossed before it will start scrolling diagonal or sideways when used for conventional vertical scrolling. Anyone arguing for less functionality here (e.g., vertical-only scrolling - which, frankly, you can probably program the damned thing to do - looks foolish). In fact, upon using it, most people will wonder why in the hell it took Apple - AGAIN - to innovate in something as simple as a mouse.
Second, it is NOT "touch sensitive"! There are real, physical microswitches that have an audible and tactile feature when clicked, just like any other mouse. The mouse body rocks when depressed in a particular direction, and the appropriate button is clicked. I haven't used this mouse yet, but knowing Apple's second-to-none engineering and industrial design, and with knowledge of Apple's current similar Pro Mouse, it will be very unlikely that you can "accidentally" click, or click the wrong button. Or, to but it another way: it would be just as likely as it is on any other mouse. And no, it won't accidentally click if you rest your palm on the mouse. The bottom half of the mouse doesn't respond (or, more accurately, the mouse responds less and less to the same pressure as the point the pressure is applied moves further away from the optimal locations).
Third, yes, it's not wireless. Woo. Expect a Bluetooth version soon.
Fourth, if you think it's ugly, don't buy it. Use any of the other extremely numerous USB and Bluetooth mice you've always been able to use.
It is not a touch mouse.
As with most stories here, the submission is wrong.
The mouse body rocks, just as Apple's current mouse does. The clicks are audible and tactile, and it is NOT "touch sensitive".
...see this as a bit, er, optimistic?
By making the rockets from shuttle parts, the new plan would draw on the shuttle's existing network of thousands of contractors and technologies, in theory speeding its completion and lowering its price.
Well, I guess they did say "in theory"...
I fail to see how anyone needs to be a "critical thinker" to understand the Washington Post may have made an error. I searched for the Senate report on pre-war intelligence, and came up with that article, among others. I missed the sidebar. Since I linked it in my own post, I obviously wasn't trying to hide anything.
Please accept this revised post:
That depends. Is your wife a CIA agent?
If she were, apparently she'd either directly or indirectly approve trips to Africa for me, her husband, to disprove what she would call "crazy reports" of Iraq trying to buy uranium from Africa.
Also, how am I a "right wing zealot"? Incorrectly quoting an article that still has the incorrect quote in it, and missing a sidebar?
It doesn't change the appearance of impropriety of recommending, and then having your own workgroup send, your husband to investigate what you prejudicially call a "crazy report". Here, let's see if you're a "left wing zealot": if you see no impropriety there, I imagine you also defended DeLay's wife working for his campaign in what by all accounts was a perfectly professional capacity?
Well, I don't defend either: they BOTH have unacceptable appearances of impropriety, regardless of whether there is any ACTUAL impropriety. This is why we work to avoid such things.
And I didn't vote for Bush, and actually voted for more Democratic/Liberal candidates (including Feingold, the only Senator not to vote for PATRIOT) in the last major elections, but thanks for your concern of my well being as a "right wing zealot".
My original post was intended to be one just as short as the one humorously asking "Is your wife a CIA agent?"
I'm not backpedaling; I personally believe that she had significant involvement in Wilson being sent to Africa, and that she had an opinion of the initial report that was prejudicial.
As for the UN resolutions: I have news for you: neither UN resolutions, nor WMD were the reasons for going into Iraq. The problem is, the reasons are a lot more complicated than play well in sound bites. If we had found large caches of WMD in Iraq, as I fully believe we thought we would find, would that vindicate our effort, even if it's still not the "real" reason we went to Iraq? I think that NOT finding large amounts of WMD, given the hundreds of tons that are known to be unaccounted for, was a great surprise to us. But it was never the primary reason we went to Iraq in the first place, though it was presented as such initially. And before you ask if I'm really ok with the administration lying about the reasons, then, consider that we could never present the full foreign policy landscape in an understandable, accurate way, regarding any given situation on the planet, for easy and quick digestion by the American people. So while WMD was stressed in speeches, and it was by far the easiest material case to attempt to make to the UN (since many member nations, too, believed Iraq to be in continuing possession of WMD), the real reasons are a more broad strategy of change in the mideast. It's a multi-faceted approach about exerting our influence, militarily when necessary, to encourage and/or install free or quasi-free governments in the mideast, friendly with the West, in an attempt to kill radicalism over the next few decades rather than let it grow and take hold for the next couple centuries, possibly with devastating consequences.
For my most recent post (from today, actually) on this, see here.
Just a couple of points:
Yes, and you probably know from my previous posts, we didn't go into something like Saudi Arabia because, first of all, as you say, they're our official allies. Second, we didn't really have a motivation to go after the government of Saudi Arabia, given that their relationship with us with regard to oil pricing controls and energy supplies is very important to our economic well-being.
I must take issue, however, with you saying that we "changed" who was responsible for 9/11. We didn't at all. It was stated ad nauseum by all manner of government and media that the majority of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi, that bin Laden himself is Saudi, that many of the extremely militant Islamic radical movements and members were created in Saudi Arabia, etc. We never changed that, and in my estimation, that was never downplayed. (And for the ridiculously high percentages of people in some surveys who apparently thought Saddam and/or Iraq were responsibly for 9/11, well, I have no explanation. It has been repeated thousands of times that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi and that bin Laden is Saudi in all manner of print and television news media, and the administration has never said anything different. It tried to tie Iraq to Al Qaeda for a while, but NEVER said that Iraq was responsible for or involved in any major way in 9/11.)
As to Iraq's secular nature, as I said, that's exactly why it was picked opposed to others: it would have the least chance of a radical Islamic uprising from within. Indeed, that has proven to be true. What we didn't bargain for is a major Islamic uprising from without, with foreign fighters from everyplace but Iraq.
I would also take issue that Iraq is "increasingly fundamentalist" or that it will grow to be an oppressive state. That would run counter to the very reasons we started this in the first place.
And as to explaining Iraq as a response to 9/11, I did just that. You might not agree with it, or might think it was a horribly wrongheaded idea, but that's exactly why they did it. Without 9/11, we wouldn't even be in Iraq right now. And yes, the idea was, as you say, to topple the problem regimes in the area, preferably with the help of internal reformers. Those reformers DO exist, but their forces are outnumbered by those who fear the US is on a mission to exterminate Islam and expand the Jewish empire (both untrue). So we have reactions like we have in Iran, and yes, the plan as laid out was planned to go much more smoothly. It has not gone smoothly at all in this area, but in order for it to work, we need to redouble our efforts, not give up. A side note: this isn't about "Israel's" enemies, as you phrase it. This is about OUR enemies. That many of them are also Israel's enemies is incidental. You might be stunned to hear me say that, but I don't misunderstand the situation. This isn't about Israel. This is about us, and freedom and democracy here, AND in the mideast - in places like Israel, but in the Arab and Persian states too. What if the US stopped supporting Israel and exited the mideast entirely? How long would Israel be for this world? Would the genocide of the Jews set well with those who are so quick to condemn any US support of Israel?
...
1. I didn't know we were only talking about Bush.
2. You'd better believe that if an assassin, or anyone else who wishes to cause the greatest disturbance, property damage, etc., would absolutely love to integrate into a huge mob of people with as-direct-as-possible access to the meeting buildings, travel routes, etc.
No, actually, they're not untrue.
And 1998 was mid-sanctions, long after the end of the Gulf War.
This has no bearing on 2002 and 2003 specifcally, granted, but the point remains.
I also didn't say that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear program.
What I do know was that Iraq was in continuing and egregious violation of numerous binding and in-force Chapter VII UN Security Council resolutions, so whether or not Iraq attempted to purchase uranium again after 1998 is irrelevant.
Further, I said "indirectly". Wilson's wife most certainly had a hand in offering up his name. That she called the Niger report "crazy", and then her own husband went to investigate said claims, raises what we call a conflict of interest. An appearance of impropriety, in the same vein as concerns raise about DeLay having his spouse work on his campaign. There may not actually be any impropriety in either case; it is the appearance that is critically important.
Why do you think Plame is involved in this in the first place? It wasn't because the administration wanted to "get back at" Wilson by vindictively ruining his the career of his wife who is completely unrelated to the events; the whole reason she was ever an issue is precisely BECAUSE she was working in this specific area at the CIA and had a hand in offering/suggesting/promoting/etc. her husband for an investigative trip on this very topic. Even DailyKos in its "debunking" story acknowledges her involvement. The administration wanted to use this appearance of impropriety to discredit Wilson's claims.
Let me just reiterate: the whole reason Plame's name came up was because of the direct and close involvement of her husband here with her own workgroup and her own specific area of work; if she was a CIA operative working on, say, signals intelligence for the Indian subcontinent, her name never would have come up.
I'm not saying it was right. What I am saying is that it wasn't just random pettiness. If Wilson's wife had nothing to do with this at all, her name would never have come up, no matter who mentioned it first. But it was her own workgroup in the CIA who sent her husband to Africa to investigate this "crazy report" (her words). If you can't see a conflict there (but do in the case of DeLay, for example), you've got partisan blinders on.
But in answer to your question, it seems examples abound where exercising free speech in public results in negative and undesirable attention from the government, thus making it fair to say that yes, freenet might be in some circumstances a useful tool for avoiding such things. I provide that link simply because it was the most recent example in a story on, well, slashdot.
You might be surprised that I disagree that your example proves anything.
My thoughts on that topic.
Does unlimited free speech and movement trump the safety of elected officials/dignitaries/world leaders/etc.?
I say, no, it doesn't.
You know damned well that there are some people in those groups who want to do more than just talk.
And note you say "peaceably" assemble. Some of these assemblies are hardly peaceable, and claiming the police always incite any unrest is a copout, and false somewhere from some to most of the time.
Good to know.
...
I think I should have perhaps said "currently", or even "remotely recently".
But if they have evidence to justify such an imprisonment, then what possible excuse can there be for not putting him on trial with it?
That's likely just it: the evidence is manifestly circumstantial, and might not result in the type of punishment sought, or indeed, even a conviction.
It's not against the law to go to Afghanistan and train in terrorist training camps.
It's not against the law to suddenly convert to radical Islam.
While he might have been planning on blowing up buildings in Chicago with radiological dirty bombs, what proof do we have that he would have followed through?
These are all reasonable assertions.
But the more important question is, when does the US, under the auspices of the military, have the power to seize persons who may be intending to cause direct significant harm to the US, but have not yet caused said harm, and may indeed even be US citizens?
If the answer is "never", we may be in philosophical disagreement here.
That depends. Is your wife a CIA agent?
If she were, apparently she'd either directly or indirectly approve trips to Africa for me, her husband, to disprove what she would call "crazy reports" of Iraq trying to buy uranium from Africa. Which it actually did do[1], by the way.
[1] "According to the former Niger mining minister, Wilson told his CIA contacts, Iraq tried to buy 400 tons of uranium in 1998."
"The classic use for Freenet would be for a group of political dissidents in China, or even in the United States."
Yeah.
Because the United States and China are so similar when it comes to oppressing free speech and jailing political dissidents. It's clearly impossible in the US to criticize the government, or even have imagery of the president with a bullet hole in his head on the tob banner of your web site.
If anyone can give actual provable examples of the US government abridging Constitutionally protected free speech, I'd love to hear it.
(Note: traveling to Afghanistan, training in Taliban camps, and planning to blow up buildings in downtown Chicago with radiological dirty bombs is not "free speech".)
If you're looking for trampling of free speech, you needn't look to the government; you need only look no further than our own academic institutions.
The Power of Nightmares completely misses the point.
It doesn't matter whether an organization by that name specifically exists.
The threat of Panislamic radicalism is very real, and lumping them under a single umbrella is to simplify discussion.
The Wahabbists, the Muslim Brotherhood, "Al Qaeda" - they all want manifestly the same things, the most radical of which is an Islamic theocratic superstate across the whole of the mideast that is the seat of government for the world. Some might say "So what? Who are we to say that they can't have that state, if successful?" Well, people who want to live, that's who. If successful, they would have access to all of the collective resources of the current official governments of the region, including nuclear and other weapons. The collective power this group would possess, and the effects, would be devastating.
The Power of Nightmares is a quite pathetic attempt to claim that, simply, the threat doesn't exist.
Except that the extremely numerous terrorist attacks around the world by fanatical Muslim extremists would disprove that completely.
In short, concentrating on whether or not it's "Al Qaeda", or whether an organization by the self-given name of "Al Qaeda"-proper specifically and strictly exists is utterly and completely missing the point. Lumping them into a group under one term is more than accurate enough to describe Islamic militants who would wish harm on the US and/or West. Individual motives may vary slightly, but the goals and aims are largely the same, and to simply claim they don't exist is to ignorantly attempt to derail the issue.
It's also quite offensive that supposedly-intelligent people literally think that Bush and his "cronies" are the mastermind architects of this, that no threat really exists, and it's nothing but a figment of a bunch of neo-cons' imaginations designed to keep people living in fear under their thumbs.
Let me be clear: you cannot deny that Islamic, and specifically, Panislamic radical terrorism exists. Whether or not the number of people who died on 9/11 or in any other attack is more or less than other innocuous things like car accidents or smoking (as is often stated) is COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT. The point is that we're tackling the threat early, before it does kill significant numbers of people, not only in the US, but around the globe!
In a mindset where the US is the source or cause of all evil in the world, I know it might be difficult to understand this.
demachina,
You know very well that's not the strategy with Iraq.
The Iraq action was initiated as part of a long-term strategy to change the face of the middle east by changing governments that CAN be changed, and standing up a quasi-democracy in a relatively secular nation.
It was and is a bold and expensive gamble.
This particular strategy was undertaken for exactly the reasons you implicitly state:
The prevailing state of mind in the US did not have the will, even after 9/11, to fight Al Qaeda with the force needed to manifestly eliminate it with great prejudice. This is further complicated by a questionable belief among some neoconservatives that this war can be fought with little or no sacrifice at home.
The problem is not just one of "Al Qaeda" or the Muslim Brotherhood or the Whabbists. It's a problem of Panislamic radicalism, and it's possibly a greater threat than the West has ever faced in modern times. These groups of people, under whatever umbrella you wish to shove them, desire for the creation of an Islamic theocratic superstate in the whole of the mideast, which is the seat of government for the world. Anyone who does not subscribe to their interpretation of Islam will, literally, be subjugated or slaughtered. The mindset in this sect is not much unlike the mindset of some 11th and 12th century Christian Crusaders.
Further remember that, if successful, the Panislamists would then have access to all of the resources of the current official governments of the region. And we all know what that includes.
There are a variety of reasons and conditions that led to this current state of affairs. US and Western foreign policy and interaction with the mideast has certainly played a role, but not an exclusive or even majority one.
Further, remember that the US support of the fighters, many of which became the "Taliban" or "Al Qaeda", was exactly the reason the USSR failed in Afghanistan. Ironically, your own assertion is that the failed fight was the single biggest contributor to the ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union! I'm not sure I agree with that thesis; or, perhaps, it can be reworded:
The single biggest contributor to the ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union was the United States' omnibus policy of opposition to the advance of the Soviet state and ideal on any and all fronts, at all costs, including places like Afghanistan. Certainly our actions and decisions have had consequences. But you cannot discount the defeat of the Soviet Communist empire, which you attribute nearly singly to the war in Afghanistan, which the US supported for that very reason.
So we traded an extremely large and brutal regime with ideals in diametric opposition to those of freedom, liberty, and democracy, in the form of the USSR, for a much smaller insurgency that has taken, in relative numbers, orders of magnitude fewer lives than the Soviet state. Realpolitik may have ultimately been outmoded and dismissed, but it did have its victories.
Now we find ourselves needing a way to speed the mideast toward modernization, along with which we hope comes freedom of speech, expression, press, and a general free flow of information, which we further hope accomplishes two things:
1. Causes the peoples and governments of the mideast to not tolerate the radical Panislamic terrorists within their midst;
2. Creation of states friendly/friendlier by default to Western trade in order to support our continuing need for stable, secure, and reliable sources of energy.
Note regarding 2. above: this does NOT imply creation of states that are Western puppets, but rather states with models of free market economies and democracy that will by their very nature be more amenable to trade/export relationships.
Further, I urge anyone reading this to keep in mind that the US economy, and that of Europe, and indeed the global industrialized economy is delicately predicated on the ability to obtain stable and inexpensive suppli
Wow.
I think you've trolled me before, but anyone is welcome to look at my web page:
http://das.doit.wisc.edu/
There is nothing remotely having anything to do with Christianity, much less fundamentalist Christianity, anywhere in it. In fact, there's nothing even about politics or religion in it.
And since I know of troll of this nature would probably claim that I "just changed it", please feel free to look at the http://das.doit.wisc.edu/>wayback machine archives of my web page.
Further, this Google comment has nothing to do with Bush, right wing politics, religion, or anything asserted in this troll post. And yes, please do look at my posting history. You'll find that out of my over-1000 posts, probably 5 of them are along the lines of the "before anyone bashes Bush..." variety. They're all also typically highly moderated, meaning they're not trolls or flamebait in the opinion of mods and metamods (because they're generally not). Further, I have not said anything remotely related to evangelism or fundamentalist Christianity, or indeed really Christianity or religion at all except tangentially, in any of my posts, or anywhere else on the web.
So in short, I have no fucking idea what you're talking about.
Searching for "hans island" (both with and without enclosing quotes) returns nothing as described in the summary and articles.
The first hit is an over-2-year-old Maritime Affairs (Canada) articleexplaining why Hans Island is (or should be) Canadian Territory. (Actually an interesting read...)
The second hit is the Wikipedia article.
In fact, the supposed site(s) is nowhere in the first page of hits.
Or the second page.
The news hits refer to Google supposedly having these ads, but that reference is somewhat circular, since I can't find the paid advertisement, banner, or site in question anywhere on Google.
The sponsored (ad) links on the right sidebar include a Web Design ad, and the marginally entertaining:
Hans Island - Dispute
Why Worry about Hans Island When
What you need is an Ergonomic Chair
www.ergo4me.com
A search for "Hans Island is Greenland" returns nothing but...you guessed it, the news articles claiming there's a paid site on Google that says "Hans Island is Greenland." Likewise for "Hans Island is {Canadian|Canada}." Now, I'm not saying the articles are lying (and perhaps Google pulled the ads for some reason), but since this article is exclusively about how the battle for Hans Island is being taken to Google, and is entitled "Politics: Canada and Denmark using Google as Battleground", well, I'd love to see it.
Because I see nothing except someone pimping knockoff ergonomic chairs with eBay-style "searchsquatting".
And, amusingly, as I'm typing this article, I see more paid hits appearing. Google started with one. Then the ergonomic chair ad was added. Now, as I'm about to post, there is a "Hans Island is Canada" link...by vaginainstitute.com, a site apparently dedicated to, erm, researching vaginas.
Sorry, but that's not right.
Defense attorneys will, yes, paint their client in a positive light, however, if they feel that their client is being unfairly persecuted (or want to portray it in that light), they will most definitely play that up. In other words, the lawyer is not downplaying the FBI investigation to put a positive light on it; what she said is almost positively the truth: the FBI is following up on a complaint, as it has to do, and there is nothing more to it. Wired (and slashdot) is trying to make hay of it as one of these "OMG! The big bad jackbooted totalitarian government is going after a noble whistleblower on the part of its corporate minions!!" type stories, except that it's not. She's not even shopping around the story herself.
You're sort of straw-manning here. The problem isn't that Cisco didn't fix the vulnerability in time, the problem is that they didn't tell anyone it was a critical update. That's a far cry from open-sourcing their code or personally explaining how the vulnerability works.
The problem here is that Lynn is claiming this was some kind of end-times doomsday vulnerability, and Cisco claiming it wasn't a big deal.
I'm frankly not inclined to believe either one of them.
We still don't know the EXACT nature of the vulnerability, and I haven't seen any direct evidence that the update should have been identified as critical. I realize that may be a little circular, but the only "evidence" we have of anything is the emotional factor of a respected security researcher quitting his job and nobly going forward with a presentation. While it tugs at the heartstrings and provides for good melodrama, it doesn't do much more. This is a difference of opinion about how Cisco handled a vulnerability. Should Cisco have labeled it critical? Was it really a big deal. Perhaps it was. But you can't assume that the truth is 100% on Lynn's side just as you can't assume such about Cisco. As I said in other posts, the truth is probably somewhere in between.
I am willing to believe, however, that he would not give up a good, paying job and risk his future employment prospects unless he felt that this was a real and serious risk.
How do you know this? That seems to be what everyone is basing their assumptions on the seriousness of the vulnerability on. I'm sorry, but people quit and resign over petty conflicts all the time. Just because this person is a security researcher doesn't make him a martyr, and doesn't necessitate that his resignation was some noble act for the good of the global internet community. You and he may believe that it was, and I'll be willing to consider the possibility that it was as well.
But the real issue here was that Lynn didn't want Cisco to speak at the forum with him, essentially giving its side of the story, instead of a somewhat vague assertion that Cisco's general irresponsibility will someday lead to an exploit bringing the internet to its knees. There is no specific outstanding vulnerability. Merely an assertion that Cisco didn't handle a previous vulnerability, which Lynn alleges was serious (but we don't know that for sure), urgently enough. I'm sorry, but someone quitting their job doesn't lend more credibility to the facts of a claim. The facts themselves, however, would.