I kept re-reading the article over and over again, but I couldn't find the part where the writer was beaten to a bloody pulp, shocked with a cattle prod, and where he had his fingernails pulled out with a pair of pliers. I'll go back and re-read it again because I'm sure it's there...somewhere.
After all, it would be just silly if everyone was so up in arms over the fact that someone was take aside, temporarily restrained, searched, and then allowed to proceed. He wasn't abused. No one beat a confession out of him. He wasn't shot.
I have been selected for a random search when boarding airplanes over the last two years. Each time I thank the screeners, and I am quite enthusiastic about being searched. When the search is done, I thank the screeners again, for I know they're doing something to protect me. They aren't trying to trample my rights, they're trying to keep me alive.
One thing conspicuously missing from the writer's "account" of the search was why he was handcuffed. This kind of thing does not happen to everyone who has a knapsack in the London Underground, but it does happen if you're belligerent when they ask to search you. Of course, if the writer was belligerent or combative towards the police, do you think he'd actually mention that fact? Of course not. That would get in the way of the agenda.
Because when America gets involved it does so only when it benefits America.
I hate to wake you from your self-imposed fantasy, but that is how the world works. You seem to think that your country (whatever that may be) would do things differently if it had the military, economic, and political power current vested in the United States. i have news for you, son, it wouldn't. Powerful nations have been steering world events to their liking since the dawn of humanity. If you don't like it, get off your lazy ass and become a superpower yourself. Then you can impose your value system on everyone else just like you're so desperately trying to do right this very second.
(See other people can be smug and sarcastic too, nice isn't it?)
If you replace "smug" with "stupid" and "sarcastic" with "unrealistic" then yes, it does accurately describe your viewpoints and yes, it is rather nice. It reminds me why I'm glad the U.S. is running things and weak-kneed liberals like yourself are becoming increasingly marginalized around the world. Why don't you go find a nice bastion of Communism like North Korea to settle down in since you so despise Western values?
First, Americans are not 100% philanthropic with the military.
I agree. However, I'd ask you to name me one superpower in the history of humanity that hasn't had this circumstance. Nations of power try to steer things their way. That's the way the world works. Those who are whining about how egregious the U.S. is these days would themselves be steering things their way if they had the power we currently hold.
However, the US did not join the fight because it believed it would benefit the world. Americans only began fighting after the Japanese brought them into it with Pearl Harbor. Was American involvement a good thing? Yes, very much so. Did the Americans join to save the world? No, they joined to save themselves (and in the process everyone else).
At the rist of sounding callous, nobody has yet given me any solid reasoning as to why the United States should care about anyone's priorities other than its own. Now, before the knee-jerkers go into apopletic fits over that statement, understand that the U.S. has a vested interest in fostering good relations with other nations. However, that interest is moderated by our desire to marginalize or intimidate nations that are diametrically opposed to our national goals. There is no such thing as "fair" when it comes to nation vs. nation. Altruism is a lofty goal but has little bearing on reality. To quote Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers:
Anyone who clings to the historically untrue--and thoroughly immoral--doctrine that "violence never settles anything" I would advise to conjure the ghosts of Napoleon Bonaparte and the Duke of Wellington and let them debate it. The ghost of Hitler could referee, and the jury might well be the Dodo, the Great Auk and the Passenger Pigeon. Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and freedom.
To counter that, I'll leave you with a quote from Patton:
Now, I want you to remember... that no bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor, dumb bastard die for his country
True, both quotes are from fiction, but they are very valid in real world events today.
there was an attack on pearl harbor. US entered world war II.
Congratulations on your first "Duh!" Award of the Day!
did anybody come "screaming"? no. but it makes a good story for chest-thumping and for hanging around the neck of any european who criticizes the US.
(sigh) How quickly you forget. Churchill was practically begging the U.S. to step in, as were the French before they did what they did best and surrendered to the Nazi's. The President wanted to step in but was held back by the isolationists in Congress. Instead, we sent military aid in the form of tanks, destroyers, guns, ammunition, and fuel. It was a relatively brazen violation of our neutrality but we got away with it. Only when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor did the isolationists finally wake up and realize that the U.S. must stay involved regularly in world events lest world events forcibly involve us. You obviously are incapable of learning from such recent history.
Let's not forget that Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, Somalia, and Kosovo were all optional wars for the United States; Milosovich and Hussein were not potential Hitlers, and lacked our military power. Why was it necessary for us to get involved?
Why? Let me answer your question with a question: if the doctor discovers a tumor somewhere in your body but he's not sure if it's cancerous or benign, would it not behoove you to have the lump removed rather than just hoping it isn't cancerous?
The parallel here should be obvious, but I'll spell it out for you anyway: you go to war not just for direct reasons but also indirect reasons. You could make the argument that the U.S. is "making an example" out of Iraq, putting other radical regimes on notice. If it gets Libya to give up its WMD program (it has) and it if gets North Korea to embrace the Non-Proliferation Treaty again (it has) and it if gets Saudi Arabia to clamp down on Wahabi extremism (it has, although not to the degree we'd like) and it removes a brutal dictator from power (it has) and it sets the stage for the first functioning Democracy in modern Arab history (in progress)...then is that such a bad thing?
Now some would make the argument of "yes, but you're killing people!" To that I would say, "visit the mass graves in Iraq." People were already dying in Iraq in larger numbers than they are now. War is not a perfect fix, but sometimes it is the practical fix. Despite what some might say, U.S. soldiers do not take pleasure in killing innocent civilians. We want this to be over as soon as possible as well, but we are not going to leave the job halfway done. If you think leaving a war halfway done is a good idea, I suggest you read up on what happened when we did that with Germany at the end of WWI.
Yes, I see the pattern that you got there in the first place. Since WW2, no other nation, heck, not even any whole continent, has started as many wars.
Then you're a bigger fool than I originally took you for. Korea was a U.N. mission, as was Somalia, Kosovo, and Kuwait. We were asked to go in. Vietnam was part of the global fight against Communism, and inasmuch as we didn't prosecute that war to the fullest, ultimately Communism was defeated as a world political force. The ends justify the means.
Of course, the "tame" USSR you mention invaded Poland, invaded Afghanistan, put an iron curtain across almost all of Eastern Europe, and supressed the Baltic states with the military and KGB. Yeah, lots of really nice Russians in that bunch. We've had a guy in our company whose parents smuggled him out of Czecheslovakia decades ago. He remembers what it was like to be under the heel of the Soviets. It was not the picnic you claim it was.
Defining it as being the good guys just because you just got there, shot a bunch of people, secured a puppet government and some fat concessions to USA-based corporations, and left, is like saying that the school bully is really the good guy there because he just beat people up and took their lunch money. Didn't take them into slavery or anything, right?
It's a shame you have to resort to fabrication and absurd hyperbole in order to make your point. It just reinforces the fact that you have no point, only a hatred of America, and you're eager to cling to any idea that bolsters your pre-conceived notions.
The problem is, the US is not; inflated egos aside, let's look at this realistically: the USA is struggling to hold down a relatively small resistance in a tiny and weak and already-battered country like Iraq, do you honestly think the US would have a snowball's chance in hell of asserting a position of dominance/control if it had to go to war with, say, China?
Your lack of understanding of the situation in Iraq is stunning to say the least. I have a much better perspective on this than you might imagine because unlike you, I've actually served a tour in Iraq and returned.
We are not "struggling" to hold down a small resistance in Iraq, you fool. If the U.S. wanted to, we could completely obliterate the entire country, sterilizing it to the point that no human being could inhabit it again for 1,000 years. If we wanted to end the resistance tomorrow, we could bomb every house to rubble, kill every camel, torch every tree, and machine gun anything that moves. We have a military might that is unequaled anywhere on this planet at this time, and no single nation could oppose us should we choose to exercise our military might to the utmost.
But what has the U.S. done with this power? Have we engaged in wars of conquest across the globe? No, we have not. The United States hasn't conquered, occupied, and retained possession of a single piece of territory since the Spanish-American war! We left Europe after WWI, only to return to liberate it again during WWII. Then, having sacrificed the better portion of an entire generation of American young men, we left again without making any territorial claims. We left Germany after helping to rebuild. We left Japan after rebuilding. We left Korea. We left Vietnam. We left Kuwait. We left Somalia and Kosovo. We're going to leave Afghanistan and Iraq, too, when the job is done.
Do you see a pattern here? Probably not because you don't want to, but I'm going to rub your nose in it anyway. To put it succinctly, no nation has every had so much force at its disposal yet used it so sparingly. We could've dominated the world in a way that would've made Hitler and Stalin look like angels, but instead we simply helped where needed then went back home.
The insurgency in Iraq is a direct result of American forces restraining themselves. I and Marines like me put our lives on the line daily during patrols, trying to keep the streets safe, trying to allow the people to see what it's like to be citizens under a democracy instead of subjects under a dictator. I've had friends wounded because we didn't shoot first when we had the chance, so don't you dare even hint that we are "struggling" here. We are not. We are willingly making our jobs more dangerous because our own morals do not allow us to be ruthless. The terrorists are ruthless and amoral, however, but that is the difference between a terrorist and a U.S. Marine. Personally I'd rather have taken a bullet myself than to have accidentally wounded a civilian.
So, please, take your lopsided reasoning elsewhere. You're speaking to someone who knows better that you. If you doubt me, get on a damned plane to Iraq. When you've set foot in the country you claim to know so much about, then you might be entitled to an opinion on things. Until then, you're just piling ignorance on top of ignorance.
Wow, you are really playing the WWII/Cold War card. I try not to take responsibility for things that I did not do. If you feel so personally responsible for the results of WWII then should you not take personal responisbility for slavery and the other crappy things this country has done over the years?
And you're really playing the race-baiting card, aren't you? I will point out that there isn't a single major Western or European nation in existence today that hasn't had slavery in its history. It is a regrettable period of time, a low point for humanity. For you to equate the defeating of Nazi Germany and Communism with slavery is so abhorrent it's absolutely disgusting. How dare you!
The short of it is that the only reason America got involved was not because they were answering some call for help but they themselves became involved.
Check your history a bit more closely. You'll find that the President wanted to get the U.S. involved much earlier. It was the naysaying liberals, the bedwetting isolationists and their minions in Congress, that kept us from getting in earlier. Japan gave the President what he needed most: a reason to go to war that no one would argue with. However, if the shortsighted bastards who were fighting to keep the U.S. out of the war had shut their stupid pie-holes a bit sooner, WWII might've been much shorter and a helluva lot less bloody.
Of course, none of this is lost on the current crop of liberals seeking to undermine the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Not only are they unwilling to learn from history, but they apparently like being doomed to repeat it.
I've served in Iraq already and I'm back from my tour. Things are not nearly as bad there as the media is reporting, and the media seems to be scrupulously avoiding mentioning anything good that is going on there. Yes, there are insurgents. Yes, they are setting off bombs. Yes, they are killing people and making havoc. But they represent a very, very small portion of the population and the area of the country. You'd never know it from the news coverage, but I guess the fact that these damned liberals have never set foot in the country they're so eager to criticize makes them more of an expert than a Marine who's been in country already.
What has China done in the last 50 years or so that would threaten world peace?
Gee, perhaps you're unaware of their involvement in the Korean conflict? Admittedly it is just outside your arbitrary 50-year limit, but to say they've been nothing but good little Chinese people is a gross exaggeration. Oh, and there's that little spat with Taiwan...you know, the island China is threatening to invade if they proclaim independence? Tibet isn't the only country China is putting under its thumb. And while we're on the subject, last I checked there were innumerable "work camps" for political dissidents scattered all throughout China where you just "disappear" to if you don't say the right things and think the right thoughts. And let's not forget the massacre of pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. Just thought I'd jog your faulty memory for a bit since you seem to have an awful selective memory. You appear to only remember the bad things about America and the good things about everyone else. Typical socialist European viewpoint. Next time a Hitler storms the continent and you come screaming for help, don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out of the White House.
Furthermore, there's one thing here you and your kind seem unable to grasp: China doesn't have to go to war in order to get its way because other countries realize China will not bluff. If the Chinese say they'll invade if somebody doesn't do it the way China wants it done, China will invade. The U.S., on the other hand, has spent the last twenty years showing the world that we do not mean business, we do not back up our words with action, and we love placating dictators and madmen throughout the world just so long as the President doesn't get any bad press on the 6 o'clock news. The argument can be made -- quite convincingly, I might add -- that America's outward lack of resolve contributed to the situation we're now in. After all, how many countries would engage us in a war if they knew we'd nuke their country into a glowing, glassy parking lot? People don't start wars they know they're going to lose, they only start wars they think they can win. The whole "walk softly and carry a big stick" maxim only works if you're actually prepared to use the big stick. Otherwise, you're just making yourself a big, bluffing target.
Ronald Reagan said it best: "of all the wars in my lifetime, none of them came about because America was too strong."
But when you're talking about *world peace*, these things don't really matter (sorry), and the USA are clearly the bigger threat, by far.
Are you speaking Russian today? Or German (unless you're a native German)? No? Then you have the "bigger threat" to world peace to thank for it. No, don't say thank you, you've said quite enough already.
Except there will be an observation gap between the time Hubble goes dark and Webb goes online.
And during that time the universe will be going...where, exactly? It's not like galaxies are suddenly going to disappear after the HST comes down. Sure, we might miss some amazing astronomical event between HST and JWST, but it's worth noting that terrestrial 'scopes have improved dramatically since HST was launched. Observation from Earth is rated by some as good as HST since terrestrial 'scopes have larger mirrors, later technology, and aren't whizzing around a planet at 18,000mph. Sure, the atmosphere blocks certain things (cosmic rays, for instance), but by and large the terrestrial 'scopes can handle things very well between HST and JWST.
Plus, for all its grandure, Webb is not serviceable. We cannot fly up to Webb and install a spiffy new camera.
Seeing as how the JWST is going to be at a LaGrange point quite some distance away from Earth, serviceability would be impractical to begin with. There's no vehicle in our current inventory that can get a human being there, much less return. This is an expected tradeoff, but the benefits of being at L2 as opposed to LEO are significant, especially for the type of observation JWST will be performing.
Compare this with Hubble, which is on its third or fourth camera at this point, each camera bringing a wealth of new data and new capabilities, all for the cost of a camera and a shuttle shot, as opposed to a new 'scope.
You haven't been keeping track of Shuttle launch costs very well lately, have you? For the cost of one or two servicing missions, NASA could've launched a whole new 'scope. Oh, and if you haven't noticed, the Shuttle is in the shop right now and it's questionable whether it'll ever come out of it again. So, even if the JWST was designed for serviceability and even if it was in LEO, it's very likely no service missions could be performed due to lack of Shuttles. Viewed in that light (no pun intended) the JWST looks like a very good successor to HST.
Except that the JWST isn't built, and "sees" things quite differently from hubble.
Very true. The JWST is designed to see further into the infrared than ever before. This is good because (a) dust obscures lot of visible light whereas infrared is less affected and (b) galaxies at the furthest reaches of the universe are speeding away from us rapidly, and the corresponding redshift makes observing them via the JWST preferrable to HST.
JWST might not produce the same pretty pictures as HST, but it will produce as much if not more useful scientific data.
Hey, mr. brilliant... it IS thier hobby! It is NOT thier business.
Hey Mr. Fuckhead-who-can't-spell-worth-a-shit, if it is just a hobby, quit expecting businesses to take it seriously. When Microsoft wins the contract instead of the guy with the hobby, he has only himself -- and people like you -- to blame.
Going back to your "open standards" thought, it would also help to STOP purchasing any software whose main file format is not an open, unencumbered fotmat.
Great idea! Now, the only problem with this pie-in-the-sky idea is that we already have millions of documents in proprietary formats, and that by and large the "open" alternative office suites cannot read these with perfect accuracy. OpenOffice might be good, but it can't handle a lot of the advanced formatting and macro functions built into Word & Excel, and like or not our users require that to get their jobs done.
Now for new software in totally new markets, open formats is quite possible. But we don't have that opportunity very often.
None the less, if your freedom is important, it behooves you to persue a Free software path even if it costs more in the short term. Even if it means inventing a whole new software market.
Only if having closed formats is somehow more expensive, less reliable, etc. Thus far it has not proven to be so. Inconvenient, yes, but it wouldn't cost us any less to purchase an office suite using XML as its document format, nor would it offer us any advantages over our current solutions other than the fact that it's "open." Sorry, we're not evangelists here. If it works well, we're going to keep using it until someone comes up with something that works not just better but significantly better. Right now, all the "open" stuff works significantly worse for us, thus there is no benefit to going open for the sake of going open.
What part of "much less than 1%" can you not understand? Or do you really want me to put a decimal point followed with a ton of zeroes and a single solitary numeral "1" in a post?
If you're using correlation to demonstrate causation you need to demonstrate the linkage as well. Correlation is never enough.
Very well, then. The linkage I propose is a thermonuclear reactor roughly 1,400km in diameter operating roughly 149,597,870km away from Earth which outputs so much energy that even though less than one hundredth of one percent of it actually reaches Earth, it is enough to keep the surface temperature at roughly 300C above absolute zero and is essentially the only significant heat source for our entire planet.
See what happens when you mess with nuclear power right in your celestial back yard?
Of course, there's a massive waste of time, effort and money in the meantime. And who is to say that by the time this "space elevator" comes around and is usable to launch space vehicles, we won't have developed a more efficient, cheap, powerful fuel to launch shuttles?
There are practical limits to how much energy you can extract from chemical propulsion, and we've pretty much reached them. Breaking/forming chemical bonds -- which is what happens when you burn things like kerosene and oxygen, or oxygen and hydrogen -- is an extremely inefficient way to convert mass into energy, with much less than 1% of the mass being so converted. Nuclear fission itself can't even convert 10% of its mass into energy (the usual figure given is around 7%). Even fusion, the reaction that powers thermonuclear warheads and our own sun, has an efficiency of less than 15%.
Now, since efficiency of the mass/energy conversion directly impacts how much fuel you have to carry to get off the ground (higher efficiency=less fuel needed due to higher initial energy density), it's pretty easy to see that chemical propulsion is never going to get us where we need to be. Nuclear propulsion would, but there are a lot of nasty side effects to operating nuclear engines in a biosphere (note: there are some designs that mitigate this, but there's still the issue of accidents).
A space elevator would be entirely electric. The elevator itself would not have to carry its own fuel, nor would it have to generate its own power. Further, if the elevator is built out to a geostationary point, the centrifugal force of the Earth's rotation can give spacecraft an immense velocity -- without needing an ounce of fuel! I've seen figures that say the trip to Mars could be shortened from nine months to perhaps as little as two months. If true, this would make the logistics of a Mars mission far easier to plan for, not to mention exploration of the rest of the outer and inner solar system.
The space elevator also solves the nagging problems of nuclear propulsion, namely that of operating in a biosphere. Nuclear engines operating in space would pollute essentially nothing while at the same time being free of aerodynamic drag or gravity wells. But how do you get that nuclear engine off the ground in the first place? A space elevator!
The idea is just too good not to pursue. Aside from the huge engineering challenges of building such a thing, there are no downsides to it at all.
Problem is, if you stick with option one, which you seem to be saying is your inclination, even though you are not happy with it, I predict that things will not get better, especially if options 2 and 3 did not exist, or cease to exist.
Finally, someone who understands the problem! You see, if the only practical option for much of the business computing world is Option #1 (i.e. the status quo), then Option #2 will eventually cease to exist (Novell is already having huge financial problems, and RedHat isn't exactly swimming in cash either). Option #3 will always be around as long as folks don't mind donating their time, but as I outlined earlier, Option #3 is no option at all.
Going with a mix of options 2 and 3 or even 1, 2 and 3, may cost a bit more initially, but could result in things getting much better down the road.
We already have a mix of all these types of software, but the vast majority is Microsoft because it's the only platform that allows us the freedom to use pretty much any software package on the planet. After all, when it comes to software development, nearly everybody makes a Windows version first and maybe they then get around to making a Mac version. Linux is a distant, distant third, with percentages so low they're not worth even mentioning.
So, can FOSS change this equation? Not if the current crowd keeps running things. As you can see from the overall discussion, even the hint of criticism causing most of these people to deny everything, hurl insults, and generally ignore the elephant in the living room.
What the fuck? Do you really expect to pay nothing and get everything you want?
No, no, no, no, no...you've missed the point entirely. Sit back, take a stress pill, and calm down.
Look, my current options are as follows:
1. Pay through the nose for closed-source commercial software. 2. Pay through the nose for open source commercial software. 3. Use a free but poorly supported OSS solution.
Of all these, #3 is the worst option because a free thing that doesn't work the way I need it to...well, doesn't do what I need it to do. But I've wasted time implementing it, so my net situation is worse off than if I did nothing.
Option #1 is where we've been at for the last 20 years, which is why I'd like to move off of it.
Option #2 is what we're all talking about here, but the problem with folks like Novell, RedHat, etc. is that their pricing is really no better than Microsoft's (I'm talking corporate volume pricing, not retail pricing). In fact, Novell's solutions were actually more expensive than what Microsoft offered us the last time around. Add on top of that the costs and inconvenience of shifting platforms and Option #2 just doesn't make any sense. Thus we're stuck with Option #1, just like we've been stuck for the last 20 years.
If you'd get off your FOSS high horse for a moment you'd realize that I am the market Linux/FOSS so desperately needs to crack in order to displace Microsoft. The discontent with Microsoft is there, but discontent is a long ways from saying the platform is junk. It works, and it allows us to get our jobs done, but it has shortcomings I'd love to get rid of and there's always the issue of price. But if all you're going to offer me, the customer, is "if you don't like it, go write your own" or "hey, quit complaining, you got it for free" then don't be surprised when next year's budget looks suspiciously like last year's budget. Even though I'm willing to pay some of these FOSS developers to write a better app, most of them could care less and many of them don't know how to code professionally.
I'm going to say it again: if you want FOSS to stay largely at the hobbyist level, keep on with the current mode of thinking. You'll never displace Microsoft -- ever -- with that plan, but at least it'll be fun for everybody. If, on the other hand, you really want to change the way software is done in this industry as a whole, you'll see the light and understand that FOSS needs to be taken to the next level in professionalism so it can displace those who have stayed too long in their current positions (i.e. Microsoft).
And since the UT System is part of the Government of the State of Texas, everything I produce is owned by the State. Welcome to Amerika.
If you dislike this arrangement so much, why don't you exercise your right to freedom by quiting such a job and finding one elsewhere that will give you all the salaries and benefits of your current job but without the annoyance of having to adhere to such restrictions.
You have the freedom, but you must first take the responsibility. Welcome to America.
No, I don't criticize them for these comments, because they are free to have their own opinion. If a Slashdot user who really enjoys let's say SugarCRM, wants to go and pimp it up on Slashdot, then good for him.
Let him pimp away then. But the instant he starts whining about how SugarCRM is the best application ever, and that anyone who runs anything other than SugarCRM is a fool, then that person immediately becomes an idiot. Adults understand that there is no universal peg that fits all holes.
Oh, and to finish this comment, it's funny, I don't see you criticizing these enthusiastic users, instead you are criticizing completely different people for not doing something they never promised.
No, I'm not, and if that's what you think then you've grossly misunderstood the entire gist of what I'm saying, probably due to a fanatical knee-jerk reaction to anyone having anything critical to say about FOSS.
Is there, somewhere, a software that I can buy that will satisfy all my needs in IT ?
If you'll stop being disingenous for a moment, you'll see that for specific problems the answer to your question is "yes." The piece of software that satisfies your needs the best is by definition the one you buy.
Because, of course, the server room is not meaningful to "enterprise software".
Again, quit choosing to be stupid here and think and act like an adult. When I said "outside the server room" I meant that FOSS has already proven itself as a useful, perhaps even indispensable part of any enterprise server room. However, desktops usually outnumber servers by over 100-to-1, and desktop software is where most I.T. budgets go. I would like to see that equation change, which is why I'd like to see FOSS step up to the plate and offer Microsoft some real competition in that area. But that will not happen until FOSS figures out that users (and, by proxy, their bosses who actually approve budgets) want polish. Now, you can make the argument that Windows lacks polish, but please try to stay in the present instead of the past. Our XP machines are rock solid and have been for years because we lock them down tightly and have a very structured, secure, organized environment for them to work in. Replicating this same type of environment with an all-FOSS setup would be difficult, time-consuming, and costly. Thus your "FLOSS is, all thing being equal, cheaper and more flexible" statement is false. FOSS is only cheap if you consider your time worthless.
Slashdot Mirror
I kept re-reading the article over and over again, but I couldn't find the part where the writer was beaten to a bloody pulp, shocked with a cattle prod, and where he had his fingernails pulled out with a pair of pliers. I'll go back and re-read it again because I'm sure it's there...somewhere.
After all, it would be just silly if everyone was so up in arms over the fact that someone was take aside, temporarily restrained, searched, and then allowed to proceed. He wasn't abused. No one beat a confession out of him. He wasn't shot.
I have been selected for a random search when boarding airplanes over the last two years. Each time I thank the screeners, and I am quite enthusiastic about being searched. When the search is done, I thank the screeners again, for I know they're doing something to protect me. They aren't trying to trample my rights, they're trying to keep me alive.
One thing conspicuously missing from the writer's "account" of the search was why he was handcuffed. This kind of thing does not happen to everyone who has a knapsack in the London Underground, but it does happen if you're belligerent when they ask to search you. Of course, if the writer was belligerent or combative towards the police, do you think he'd actually mention that fact? Of course not. That would get in the way of the agenda.
Because when America gets involved it does so only when it benefits America.
I hate to wake you from your self-imposed fantasy, but that is how the world works. You seem to think that your country (whatever that may be) would do things differently if it had the military, economic, and political power current vested in the United States. i have news for you, son, it wouldn't. Powerful nations have been steering world events to their liking since the dawn of humanity. If you don't like it, get off your lazy ass and become a superpower yourself. Then you can impose your value system on everyone else just like you're so desperately trying to do right this very second.
(See other people can be smug and sarcastic too, nice isn't it?)
If you replace "smug" with "stupid" and "sarcastic" with "unrealistic" then yes, it does accurately describe your viewpoints and yes, it is rather nice. It reminds me why I'm glad the U.S. is running things and weak-kneed liberals like yourself are becoming increasingly marginalized around the world. Why don't you go find a nice bastion of Communism like North Korea to settle down in since you so despise Western values?
I agree. However, I'd ask you to name me one superpower in the history of humanity that hasn't had this circumstance. Nations of power try to steer things their way. That's the way the world works. Those who are whining about how egregious the U.S. is these days would themselves be steering things their way if they had the power we currently hold.
However, the US did not join the fight because it believed it would benefit the world. Americans only began fighting after the Japanese brought them into it with Pearl Harbor. Was American involvement a good thing? Yes, very much so. Did the Americans join to save the world? No, they joined to save themselves (and in the process everyone else).
At the rist of sounding callous, nobody has yet given me any solid reasoning as to why the United States should care about anyone's priorities other than its own. Now, before the knee-jerkers go into apopletic fits over that statement, understand that the U.S. has a vested interest in fostering good relations with other nations. However, that interest is moderated by our desire to marginalize or intimidate nations that are diametrically opposed to our national goals. There is no such thing as "fair" when it comes to nation vs. nation. Altruism is a lofty goal but has little bearing on reality. To quote Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers:To counter that, I'll leave you with a quote from Patton:True, both quotes are from fiction, but they are very valid in real world events today.
there was an attack on pearl harbor. US entered world war II.
Congratulations on your first "Duh!" Award of the Day!
did anybody come "screaming"? no. but it makes a good story for chest-thumping and for hanging around the neck of any european who criticizes the US.
(sigh) How quickly you forget. Churchill was practically begging the U.S. to step in, as were the French before they did what they did best and surrendered to the Nazi's. The President wanted to step in but was held back by the isolationists in Congress. Instead, we sent military aid in the form of tanks, destroyers, guns, ammunition, and fuel. It was a relatively brazen violation of our neutrality but we got away with it. Only when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor did the isolationists finally wake up and realize that the U.S. must stay involved regularly in world events lest world events forcibly involve us. You obviously are incapable of learning from such recent history.
Let's not forget that Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf War, Somalia, and Kosovo were all optional wars for the United States; Milosovich and Hussein were not potential Hitlers, and lacked our military power. Why was it necessary for us to get involved?
Why? Let me answer your question with a question: if the doctor discovers a tumor somewhere in your body but he's not sure if it's cancerous or benign, would it not behoove you to have the lump removed rather than just hoping it isn't cancerous?
The parallel here should be obvious, but I'll spell it out for you anyway: you go to war not just for direct reasons but also indirect reasons. You could make the argument that the U.S. is "making an example" out of Iraq, putting other radical regimes on notice. If it gets Libya to give up its WMD program (it has) and it if gets North Korea to embrace the Non-Proliferation Treaty again (it has) and it if gets Saudi Arabia to clamp down on Wahabi extremism (it has, although not to the degree we'd like) and it removes a brutal dictator from power (it has) and it sets the stage for the first functioning Democracy in modern Arab history (in progress)...then is that such a bad thing?
Now some would make the argument of "yes, but you're killing people!" To that I would say, "visit the mass graves in Iraq." People were already dying in Iraq in larger numbers than they are now. War is not a perfect fix, but sometimes it is the practical fix. Despite what some might say, U.S. soldiers do not take pleasure in killing innocent civilians. We want this to be over as soon as possible as well, but we are not going to leave the job halfway done. If you think leaving a war halfway done is a good idea, I suggest you read up on what happened when we did that with Germany at the end of WWI.
Yes, I see the pattern that you got there in the first place. Since WW2, no other nation, heck, not even any whole continent, has started as many wars.
Then you're a bigger fool than I originally took you for. Korea was a U.N. mission, as was Somalia, Kosovo, and Kuwait. We were asked to go in. Vietnam was part of the global fight against Communism, and inasmuch as we didn't prosecute that war to the fullest, ultimately Communism was defeated as a world political force. The ends justify the means.
Of course, the "tame" USSR you mention invaded Poland, invaded Afghanistan, put an iron curtain across almost all of Eastern Europe, and supressed the Baltic states with the military and KGB. Yeah, lots of really nice Russians in that bunch. We've had a guy in our company whose parents smuggled him out of Czecheslovakia decades ago. He remembers what it was like to be under the heel of the Soviets. It was not the picnic you claim it was.
Defining it as being the good guys just because you just got there, shot a bunch of people, secured a puppet government and some fat concessions to USA-based corporations, and left, is like saying that the school bully is really the good guy there because he just beat people up and took their lunch money. Didn't take them into slavery or anything, right?
It's a shame you have to resort to fabrication and absurd hyperbole in order to make your point. It just reinforces the fact that you have no point, only a hatred of America, and you're eager to cling to any idea that bolsters your pre-conceived notions.
The problem is, the US is not; inflated egos aside, let's look at this realistically: the USA is struggling to hold down a relatively small resistance in a tiny and weak and already-battered country like Iraq, do you honestly think the US would have a snowball's chance in hell of asserting a position of dominance/control if it had to go to war with, say, China?
Your lack of understanding of the situation in Iraq is stunning to say the least. I have a much better perspective on this than you might imagine because unlike you, I've actually served a tour in Iraq and returned.
We are not "struggling" to hold down a small resistance in Iraq, you fool. If the U.S. wanted to, we could completely obliterate the entire country, sterilizing it to the point that no human being could inhabit it again for 1,000 years. If we wanted to end the resistance tomorrow, we could bomb every house to rubble, kill every camel, torch every tree, and machine gun anything that moves. We have a military might that is unequaled anywhere on this planet at this time, and no single nation could oppose us should we choose to exercise our military might to the utmost.
But what has the U.S. done with this power? Have we engaged in wars of conquest across the globe? No, we have not. The United States hasn't conquered, occupied, and retained possession of a single piece of territory since the Spanish-American war! We left Europe after WWI, only to return to liberate it again during WWII. Then, having sacrificed the better portion of an entire generation of American young men, we left again without making any territorial claims. We left Germany after helping to rebuild. We left Japan after rebuilding. We left Korea. We left Vietnam. We left Kuwait. We left Somalia and Kosovo. We're going to leave Afghanistan and Iraq, too, when the job is done.
Do you see a pattern here? Probably not because you don't want to, but I'm going to rub your nose in it anyway. To put it succinctly, no nation has every had so much force at its disposal yet used it so sparingly. We could've dominated the world in a way that would've made Hitler and Stalin look like angels, but instead we simply helped where needed then went back home.
The insurgency in Iraq is a direct result of American forces restraining themselves. I and Marines like me put our lives on the line daily during patrols, trying to keep the streets safe, trying to allow the people to see what it's like to be citizens under a democracy instead of subjects under a dictator. I've had friends wounded because we didn't shoot first when we had the chance, so don't you dare even hint that we are "struggling" here. We are not. We are willingly making our jobs more dangerous because our own morals do not allow us to be ruthless. The terrorists are ruthless and amoral, however, but that is the difference between a terrorist and a U.S. Marine. Personally I'd rather have taken a bullet myself than to have accidentally wounded a civilian.
So, please, take your lopsided reasoning elsewhere. You're speaking to someone who knows better that you. If you doubt me, get on a damned plane to Iraq. When you've set foot in the country you claim to know so much about, then you might be entitled to an opinion on things. Until then, you're just piling ignorance on top of ignorance.
Wow, you are really playing the WWII/Cold War card. I try not to take responsibility for things that I did not do. If you feel so personally responsible for the results of WWII then should you not take personal responisbility for slavery and the other crappy things this country has done over the years?
And you're really playing the race-baiting card, aren't you? I will point out that there isn't a single major Western or European nation in existence today that hasn't had slavery in its history. It is a regrettable period of time, a low point for humanity. For you to equate the defeating of Nazi Germany and Communism with slavery is so abhorrent it's absolutely disgusting. How dare you!
The short of it is that the only reason America got involved was not because they were answering some call for help but they themselves became involved.
Check your history a bit more closely. You'll find that the President wanted to get the U.S. involved much earlier. It was the naysaying liberals, the bedwetting isolationists and their minions in Congress, that kept us from getting in earlier. Japan gave the President what he needed most: a reason to go to war that no one would argue with. However, if the shortsighted bastards who were fighting to keep the U.S. out of the war had shut their stupid pie-holes a bit sooner, WWII might've been much shorter and a helluva lot less bloody.
Of course, none of this is lost on the current crop of liberals seeking to undermine the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Not only are they unwilling to learn from history, but they apparently like being doomed to repeat it.
I've served in Iraq already and I'm back from my tour. Things are not nearly as bad there as the media is reporting, and the media seems to be scrupulously avoiding mentioning anything good that is going on there. Yes, there are insurgents. Yes, they are setting off bombs. Yes, they are killing people and making havoc. But they represent a very, very small portion of the population and the area of the country. You'd never know it from the news coverage, but I guess the fact that these damned liberals have never set foot in the country they're so eager to criticize makes them more of an expert than a Marine who's been in country already.
What has China done in the last 50 years or so that would threaten world peace?
Gee, perhaps you're unaware of their involvement in the Korean conflict? Admittedly it is just outside your arbitrary 50-year limit, but to say they've been nothing but good little Chinese people is a gross exaggeration. Oh, and there's that little spat with Taiwan...you know, the island China is threatening to invade if they proclaim independence? Tibet isn't the only country China is putting under its thumb. And while we're on the subject, last I checked there were innumerable "work camps" for political dissidents scattered all throughout China where you just "disappear" to if you don't say the right things and think the right thoughts. And let's not forget the massacre of pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. Just thought I'd jog your faulty memory for a bit since you seem to have an awful selective memory. You appear to only remember the bad things about America and the good things about everyone else. Typical socialist European viewpoint. Next time a Hitler storms the continent and you come screaming for help, don't let the door hit you in the ass on your way out of the White House.
Furthermore, there's one thing here you and your kind seem unable to grasp: China doesn't have to go to war in order to get its way because other countries realize China will not bluff. If the Chinese say they'll invade if somebody doesn't do it the way China wants it done, China will invade. The U.S., on the other hand, has spent the last twenty years showing the world that we do not mean business, we do not back up our words with action, and we love placating dictators and madmen throughout the world just so long as the President doesn't get any bad press on the 6 o'clock news. The argument can be made -- quite convincingly, I might add -- that America's outward lack of resolve contributed to the situation we're now in. After all, how many countries would engage us in a war if they knew we'd nuke their country into a glowing, glassy parking lot? People don't start wars they know they're going to lose, they only start wars they think they can win. The whole "walk softly and carry a big stick" maxim only works if you're actually prepared to use the big stick. Otherwise, you're just making yourself a big, bluffing target.
Ronald Reagan said it best: "of all the wars in my lifetime, none of them came about because America was too strong."
But when you're talking about *world peace*, these things don't really matter (sorry), and the USA are clearly the bigger threat, by far.
Are you speaking Russian today? Or German (unless you're a native German)? No? Then you have the "bigger threat" to world peace to thank for it. No, don't say thank you, you've said quite enough already.
Except there will be an observation gap between the time Hubble goes dark and Webb goes online.
And during that time the universe will be going...where, exactly? It's not like galaxies are suddenly going to disappear after the HST comes down. Sure, we might miss some amazing astronomical event between HST and JWST, but it's worth noting that terrestrial 'scopes have improved dramatically since HST was launched. Observation from Earth is rated by some as good as HST since terrestrial 'scopes have larger mirrors, later technology, and aren't whizzing around a planet at 18,000mph. Sure, the atmosphere blocks certain things (cosmic rays, for instance), but by and large the terrestrial 'scopes can handle things very well between HST and JWST.
Plus, for all its grandure, Webb is not serviceable. We cannot fly up to Webb and install a spiffy new camera.
Seeing as how the JWST is going to be at a LaGrange point quite some distance away from Earth, serviceability would be impractical to begin with. There's no vehicle in our current inventory that can get a human being there, much less return. This is an expected tradeoff, but the benefits of being at L2 as opposed to LEO are significant, especially for the type of observation JWST will be performing.
Compare this with Hubble, which is on its third or fourth camera at this point, each camera bringing a wealth of new data and new capabilities, all for the cost of a camera and a shuttle shot, as opposed to a new 'scope.
You haven't been keeping track of Shuttle launch costs very well lately, have you? For the cost of one or two servicing missions, NASA could've launched a whole new 'scope. Oh, and if you haven't noticed, the Shuttle is in the shop right now and it's questionable whether it'll ever come out of it again. So, even if the JWST was designed for serviceability and even if it was in LEO, it's very likely no service missions could be performed due to lack of Shuttles. Viewed in that light (no pun intended) the JWST looks like a very good successor to HST.
Except that the JWST isn't built, and "sees" things quite differently from hubble.
Very true. The JWST is designed to see further into the infrared than ever before. This is good because (a) dust obscures lot of visible light whereas infrared is less affected and (b) galaxies at the furthest reaches of the universe are speeding away from us rapidly, and the corresponding redshift makes observing them via the JWST preferrable to HST.
JWST might not produce the same pretty pictures as HST, but it will produce as much if not more useful scientific data.
Hey, mr. brilliant... it IS thier hobby! It is NOT thier business.
Hey Mr. Fuckhead-who-can't-spell-worth-a-shit, if it is just a hobby, quit expecting businesses to take it seriously. When Microsoft wins the contract instead of the guy with the hobby, he has only himself -- and people like you -- to blame.
Obi-Wan Kenobi: "That eye is our last hope"
Yoda: "No, there is another."
Going back to your "open standards" thought, it would also help to STOP purchasing any software whose main file format is not an open, unencumbered fotmat.
Great idea! Now, the only problem with this pie-in-the-sky idea is that we already have millions of documents in proprietary formats, and that by and large the "open" alternative office suites cannot read these with perfect accuracy. OpenOffice might be good, but it can't handle a lot of the advanced formatting and macro functions built into Word & Excel, and like or not our users require that to get their jobs done.
Now for new software in totally new markets, open formats is quite possible. But we don't have that opportunity very often.
None the less, if your freedom is important, it behooves you to persue a Free software path even if it costs more in the short term. Even if it means inventing a whole new software market.
Only if having closed formats is somehow more expensive, less reliable, etc. Thus far it has not proven to be so. Inconvenient, yes, but it wouldn't cost us any less to purchase an office suite using XML as its document format, nor would it offer us any advantages over our current solutions other than the fact that it's "open." Sorry, we're not evangelists here. If it works well, we're going to keep using it until someone comes up with something that works not just better but significantly better. Right now, all the "open" stuff works significantly worse for us, thus there is no benefit to going open for the sake of going open.
Evangelism has no place in an ROI study.
What part of "much less than 1%" can you not understand? Or do you really want me to put a decimal point followed with a ton of zeroes and a single solitary numeral "1" in a post?
Damned typos. That should read the sun is roughly 1.4x10^6km in diameter.
If you're using correlation to demonstrate causation you need to demonstrate the linkage as well. Correlation is never enough.
Very well, then. The linkage I propose is a thermonuclear reactor roughly 1,400km in diameter operating roughly 149,597,870km away from Earth which outputs so much energy that even though less than one hundredth of one percent of it actually reaches Earth, it is enough to keep the surface temperature at roughly 300C above absolute zero and is essentially the only significant heat source for our entire planet.
See what happens when you mess with nuclear power right in your celestial back yard?
Of course, there's a massive waste of time, effort and money in the meantime. And who is to say that by the time this "space elevator" comes around and is usable to launch space vehicles, we won't have developed a more efficient, cheap, powerful fuel to launch shuttles?
There are practical limits to how much energy you can extract from chemical propulsion, and we've pretty much reached them. Breaking/forming chemical bonds -- which is what happens when you burn things like kerosene and oxygen, or oxygen and hydrogen -- is an extremely inefficient way to convert mass into energy, with much less than 1% of the mass being so converted. Nuclear fission itself can't even convert 10% of its mass into energy (the usual figure given is around 7%). Even fusion, the reaction that powers thermonuclear warheads and our own sun, has an efficiency of less than 15%.
Now, since efficiency of the mass/energy conversion directly impacts how much fuel you have to carry to get off the ground (higher efficiency=less fuel needed due to higher initial energy density), it's pretty easy to see that chemical propulsion is never going to get us where we need to be. Nuclear propulsion would, but there are a lot of nasty side effects to operating nuclear engines in a biosphere (note: there are some designs that mitigate this, but there's still the issue of accidents).
A space elevator would be entirely electric. The elevator itself would not have to carry its own fuel, nor would it have to generate its own power. Further, if the elevator is built out to a geostationary point, the centrifugal force of the Earth's rotation can give spacecraft an immense velocity -- without needing an ounce of fuel! I've seen figures that say the trip to Mars could be shortened from nine months to perhaps as little as two months. If true, this would make the logistics of a Mars mission far easier to plan for, not to mention exploration of the rest of the outer and inner solar system.
The space elevator also solves the nagging problems of nuclear propulsion, namely that of operating in a biosphere. Nuclear engines operating in space would pollute essentially nothing while at the same time being free of aerodynamic drag or gravity wells. But how do you get that nuclear engine off the ground in the first place? A space elevator!
The idea is just too good not to pursue. Aside from the huge engineering challenges of building such a thing, there are no downsides to it at all.
Problem is, if you stick with option one, which you seem to be saying is your inclination, even though you are not happy with it, I predict that things will not get better, especially if options 2 and 3 did not exist, or cease to exist.
Finally, someone who understands the problem! You see, if the only practical option for much of the business computing world is Option #1 (i.e. the status quo), then Option #2 will eventually cease to exist (Novell is already having huge financial problems, and RedHat isn't exactly swimming in cash either). Option #3 will always be around as long as folks don't mind donating their time, but as I outlined earlier, Option #3 is no option at all.
Going with a mix of options 2 and 3 or even 1, 2 and 3, may cost a bit more initially, but could result in things getting much better down the road.
We already have a mix of all these types of software, but the vast majority is Microsoft because it's the only platform that allows us the freedom to use pretty much any software package on the planet. After all, when it comes to software development, nearly everybody makes a Windows version first and maybe they then get around to making a Mac version. Linux is a distant, distant third, with percentages so low they're not worth even mentioning.
So, can FOSS change this equation? Not if the current crowd keeps running things. As you can see from the overall discussion, even the hint of criticism causing most of these people to deny everything, hurl insults, and generally ignore the elephant in the living room.
What the fuck? Do you really expect to pay nothing and get everything you want?
No, no, no, no, no...you've missed the point entirely. Sit back, take a stress pill, and calm down.
Look, my current options are as follows:
1. Pay through the nose for closed-source commercial software.
2. Pay through the nose for open source commercial software.
3. Use a free but poorly supported OSS solution.
Of all these, #3 is the worst option because a free thing that doesn't work the way I need it to...well, doesn't do what I need it to do. But I've wasted time implementing it, so my net situation is worse off than if I did nothing.
Option #1 is where we've been at for the last 20 years, which is why I'd like to move off of it.
Option #2 is what we're all talking about here, but the problem with folks like Novell, RedHat, etc. is that their pricing is really no better than Microsoft's (I'm talking corporate volume pricing, not retail pricing). In fact, Novell's solutions were actually more expensive than what Microsoft offered us the last time around. Add on top of that the costs and inconvenience of shifting platforms and Option #2 just doesn't make any sense. Thus we're stuck with Option #1, just like we've been stuck for the last 20 years.
If you'd get off your FOSS high horse for a moment you'd realize that I am the market Linux/FOSS so desperately needs to crack in order to displace Microsoft. The discontent with Microsoft is there, but discontent is a long ways from saying the platform is junk. It works, and it allows us to get our jobs done, but it has shortcomings I'd love to get rid of and there's always the issue of price. But if all you're going to offer me, the customer, is "if you don't like it, go write your own" or "hey, quit complaining, you got it for free" then don't be surprised when next year's budget looks suspiciously like last year's budget. Even though I'm willing to pay some of these FOSS developers to write a better app, most of them could care less and many of them don't know how to code professionally.
I'm going to say it again: if you want FOSS to stay largely at the hobbyist level, keep on with the current mode of thinking. You'll never displace Microsoft -- ever -- with that plan, but at least it'll be fun for everybody. If, on the other hand, you really want to change the way software is done in this industry as a whole, you'll see the light and understand that FOSS needs to be taken to the next level in professionalism so it can displace those who have stayed too long in their current positions (i.e. Microsoft).
And since the UT System is part of the Government of the State of Texas, everything I produce is owned by the State. Welcome to Amerika.
If you dislike this arrangement so much, why don't you exercise your right to freedom by quiting such a job and finding one elsewhere that will give you all the salaries and benefits of your current job but without the annoyance of having to adhere to such restrictions.
You have the freedom, but you must first take the responsibility. Welcome to America.
No, I don't criticize them for these comments, because they are free to have their own opinion. If a Slashdot user who really enjoys let's say SugarCRM, wants to go and pimp it up on Slashdot, then good for him.
Let him pimp away then. But the instant he starts whining about how SugarCRM is the best application ever, and that anyone who runs anything other than SugarCRM is a fool, then that person immediately becomes an idiot. Adults understand that there is no universal peg that fits all holes.
Oh, and to finish this comment, it's funny, I don't see you criticizing these enthusiastic users, instead you are criticizing completely different people for not doing something they never promised.
No, I'm not, and if that's what you think then you've grossly misunderstood the entire gist of what I'm saying, probably due to a fanatical knee-jerk reaction to anyone having anything critical to say about FOSS.
I see you're throwing in the towel. Good. I was getting tired of pointing out your numerous logical failings in this discussion.
Is there, somewhere, a software that I can buy that will satisfy all my needs in IT ?
If you'll stop being disingenous for a moment, you'll see that for specific problems the answer to your question is "yes." The piece of software that satisfies your needs the best is by definition the one you buy.
Because, of course, the server room is not meaningful to "enterprise software".
Again, quit choosing to be stupid here and think and act like an adult. When I said "outside the server room" I meant that FOSS has already proven itself as a useful, perhaps even indispensable part of any enterprise server room. However, desktops usually outnumber servers by over 100-to-1, and desktop software is where most I.T. budgets go. I would like to see that equation change, which is why I'd like to see FOSS step up to the plate and offer Microsoft some real competition in that area. But that will not happen until FOSS figures out that users (and, by proxy, their bosses who actually approve budgets) want polish. Now, you can make the argument that Windows lacks polish, but please try to stay in the present instead of the past. Our XP machines are rock solid and have been for years because we lock them down tightly and have a very structured, secure, organized environment for them to work in. Replicating this same type of environment with an all-FOSS setup would be difficult, time-consuming, and costly. Thus your "FLOSS is, all thing being equal, cheaper and more flexible" statement is false. FOSS is only cheap if you consider your time worthless.