Re:Soldiers aren't worth as much.
on
Shuttle Politics
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· Score: 1
Our military is primarily a deterent. By maintaining a strong military, we hope to avoid war.
As is evidenced by the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. The US military is not primarily a deterent. It is a tool for enforcing US self-interests and global control.
The US military by acting essentially alone without bothering with declarations of war or articles of surrender hasn't been a force for defense since 1945.
The later half of this century has been one of the most "peaceful" (with regard to percentage of deaths due to war) in the history of man.
As is evidence by the millions who have died at the hands of Pol Pot, Hutu militia, and others bent on genocide. All the while, the US military is busy "defending" the US against the hordes of Panamanians, Somalis, Afghans, and Nicaraguans.
"Our military is primarily a deterent". Ha. Like drinking Drano is mostly a purgative.
It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them. -- Alfred Adler - CreationLTD
The Aliens mod for Doom was THE first game since I starting playing computer games in 1979 that truly had me leaping out of my chair in fright.
"Whatever you're going to do, do it fast" and then watching as the distance end of the massive hangar fill with aliens rushing towards me, emptying my large stock of ammo, realizing it was no good, and then having to flee pell mell for my cyberlife.
"Watch those corners", laughing nervously at the suggestion, inching around the corner, and getting leapt on by aliens and face-huggers. In the dark. Truly terrifying!
I think saying "revolution by the people" discredits you completely. There was a revolution, but it was by the extremeists.
Oh well then, I guess the American revolution was started by "extremeists" as well considering 20% percent of the colonists actively opposed independence, and probably an equal number were passively loyal, and a further 30% couldn't have cared less.
Of course it can as long as the people willing it don't feel the heat of the tyranny. The Germans willed the Nazi party which treated good patriotic Germans and allies well while inflicting hideous torture and death on all others.
Well considering the rhetoric coming from the US armed forces of "war crimes" (i.e. Iraqis not playing to the rules) and how America feels about the death penalty, I don't see this as a particularly remote possibility.
- CreationLTD
Re:ABC cuts gore from injured child's Iraq war pho
on
4l-j4z333ra 0wn3d
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· Score: 1
War didn't solve Nazi occupation. Stopping it did. And I hate to tell you, the Nazis started the war. So by your reasoning it was good thing the Nazis started World War II because it lead to their downfall.
And I suppose King George III declaring war on the thirteen colonies pretty much solved England's problems with the the revolutionaries.
And Saddam's waging war on Kuwait solved his problems too. And invading Afghanistan solved the USSRs problems, and North Korea declaring war on South Korea solved their problems.
I shake my head in wonder at the almost total ignorance of history exhibited by people who claim to have studied it or who tell others to go read a history book.
- CreationLTD
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.
George Orwell - "1984"
Your statement seems to assume we have 1,000 bombers lined up in the air carpet bombing the countryside.
What a bizarre statement. You talk about being realistic yet you make this wild assertion. Did you not pay ANY attention in history class?
Let me remind you of when American forces invaded Panama to depose Manuel Noriega (ANOTHER american backed dictator). According to the United Nations the civilian death toll was 500; the Central American Human Rights Defense Commission (CODEHUCA) and the Peace and Justice Service of Panama both claimed between 2,000 to 3000; the Panamanian National Human Rights Commission and an independent inquiry by former Attorney- General Ramsey Clark claimed over 4,000.
To you, it seems, the very likely death of 1000s of Iraqis at the hands of Americans is somehow justified but the 1000s of deaths of Iraqis by Saddam is not.
Either that or you are hopelessly and dangerously ignorant or naive.
-CreationLTD
"Our bombs are smarter than the average American. At least they can find Kuwait. "
I believe that not fighting this war would strengthen Al-Queda. Some of the constant rhetoric that we hear from Bin Laden every time he makes an appearance is that we (Americans) are weak cowards. Proving to him that we indeed are not willing to fight for what we think is right would be a much greater recruiting tool than showing recruits pictures of the kinds of bombs that we will be using against them. Both Iraq and Al-Queda would be emboldened by our non-action.
It is obvious that your pitiful recollection of events doesn't even extend back more than a year. You recently bombed Afghanistan to pieces showing them all but one of the pictures of the kinds of bombs you would use against them. So you proved beyond a shadow of a doubt you are willing to fight Al-Queda whether or not civilians got in the way. Anyone joining Al-Queda now knows beyond a shadow of a doubt what America will do against them. The ONLY thing this war will do for Al-Queda is increase the available pool of desperate, incensed, and displaced men and women ready to give up their lives (those ruined by the US) to inflict death and destruction on Americans and those that aid them.
Only a halfwit would suggest Al-Queda had any doubts about America's readiness to inflict death and destruction in its headlong rush to fight terrorism.
- CreationLTD
"The United States has a lot to offer the Third World War" (Ronald Reagan)
To those that say we're invading Iraq to stop Saddam from getting and using weapons of mass destruction, let me remind you of this interesting fact.
The only case of American civilians on American soil being attacked and killed by a "weapon of mass destruction", was with anthrax engineered by American scientists in American labs that was mailed to the post office that delivers MY mail by someone unkown.
A year and a half has past and no one has been caught for that crime.
And now I'm supposed to believe attacking a country that has never attacked us, has no capability to do so, is many leaps of technology away from even threatening Europe let alone America is somehow going to make me safer?
The oft ignored fact that the weapons you keep at home are more likely to kill you than those in the hands of criminals is completely lost on Americans who live in such a climate of self-induced fear and paranoia that they chase after demons that in the end do not pose significant risks to them now or in the future and yet fail to see the real risks right under their noses.
- CreationLTD sick and tired of America invading weaker countries, killing massive number of civilians in order to topple a regime they propped up only a few decades ago (Panama, Afghanistan, Iraq)
Turtledove is certainly among my favorite. His main angle is alternate history (not the kind politicians play) where he creates novels based on how history would turn out should certain key events have turned out differently.
He is prolific, thought provoking, and just plain fun. Amongst his release...
The World At War series Worldwar series American Empire series Ruled Brittania Colonization series
Masses to read there.
Thumbs up as well for George RR Martin and his massive fantasy series Game of Thrones. I like Terry Brooks but his books have steadily shrunk in size and frequency. Even so his Shannara, Landover, and Knight of the Word series are great fun.
One of the previous posts said that Lightwave is very easy to learn. That has to been someone who hacks code for a living. For the rest of the world, Lightwave is as far from easy-to-learn as Pluto is from the Sun.
Having worked with Lightwave for a couple of years now (am currently working with it to create traffic accident recreations), I have to say without any hesitation that Lightwave is the biggest pain in the behind of ANY program I've ever used.
Lightwave has no semblance of a GUI that people come to expect from an application. On the Mac it disobeys virtually every human interface guideline put out by Apple. People will tell you that it's done that way to create cross-platform conformity but no other company I know plays that game. I find it just as easy to use Photoshop on a Mac as on a PC yet I don't have to learn bizarre alternate keystrokes to use it like you do in Lightwave.
Every single step you take in Lightwave requires a major effort and there is very little that is intuitive. Eventually you learn these idiosyncrasies or you spend a fair amount of time changing things to make them work properly.
Lightwave's inability to undo a large percentage of its commands, its hideous learning curve, its instability, its poor Shockwave3D export capability, its absolutely pathetic network rendering system, and many other issues make it a VERY poor choice especially for Macintosh based systems.
Even NewTek's website is a pain. Message boards are poorly designed and finding answers takes longer than it should.
So why am I using it? My company won't buy me Maya since it is too expensive and 3D Max is not available for the Mac (right now I'm stuck with a Mac).
As great as galleries are, they don't show you how much effort it takes to create them.
So if you have a PC or something other than a Mac I strongly recommend you choose something other than Lightwave.
It's actually the Victorian era that was responsible for America's current sexual repression/confusion. The concepts of being prim and proper, clothed to the hilt, and hiding all bits of tantalizing flesh can be squarely placed at the Victorians feet.
Puritans often get the blame and their name is synonymous with sexual repression but look at some of the writings of the Victorian era about women's proper conduct and you'll see exactly whose to blame.
I think the Romans used that line of thought on the Christians. Following that train of thought the only ones who should have continued practicing Christianity were the cruel, wealthy, or desperate.
"Mmmm... Lions, tigers, and bears. Oh my!.... Maybe Zeus isn't such a bad idea after all."
China and other countries stop the open-air burning of toxic stuff like computer motherboards
Just as soon as the USA and other first world countries stop dumping them in China's lap in the first place.
Citizens living in poverty outside the USA refrain from constant sexual intercourse when they know perfectly well they can't even feed themselves
Citizens living in poverty outside the USA have constant sexual intercourse in order to make enough children to help them eke a bare minimum life out of whatever miserable piece of land they happen to live on.
They don't do it for sheer amusement unlike most citizens in USA.
-
"These people, they speak what they do not know"
-
>>>
A ball is droped onto the pavement.
Why was the ball dropped?
Evolutionist: Because gravity pulled it to the ground. Period.
Intellegent design: Because somebody wanted to let it go to allow gravity to pull it to the ground.
A apple rests under an apple tree.
Evolutionist: Gravity exerted a force on the apple which eventually caused it to break free from the limb which held it and it fall towards the ground where it eventually came to rest.
Intelligent design: The apple was yanked from the tree by someone and placed on the ground.
- Roland Combes
God is dead - Fred
Fred is dead - God
1) Look up Sinosauropteryx. Might answer your question better.
"How do you reduce the bone density... while strictly following the criteria of 'most fit to survive'?"
Take bats for instance. They fly. They have no feathers. How did they reduce bone density enough to fly? Well, just look at "flying" squirrels. These squirrels can glide from tree to tree with ease. They don't fly. In a few hundred thousand years when the earth is nice and hot and the squirrels loose most of the fur, they will glide even further. Some will discover that flapping helps them glide further. Some with slightly thinner bones will reach the critical weight at which they can actual flap and fly away. Eventually real flying hairless squirrels will fill the skies. God help us all!
2) Your logic is flawed if you think 4 sets of "hands" is superior to 2 sets of hands and 2 sets of feet. Strong legs and strong balancing ability removes the need for the hands to be involved in locomotion (other than minor balancing adjustments) and frees it up to do far more important things (e.g. throwing spear at large animals, cultivating ground, etc).
Less adept but stronger, streamlined toes are much more important and useful than weaker, dexterous toes.
If you lived in Europe you could get one of these. Unfortunately those of us stuck in the backwaters of the civilized world there's not a whole lot of choice.
http://www.thesmart.co.uk/
All these guys running around saying hydrogen fuel is the answer are nuts! Anyone besides me remember the Hindenberg????? It doesn't make sense to deploy a fuel even MORE explosive and harder to handle than gasoline?
It might be worth checking the more recent investigations into the Hindenburg disaster. They conclude that the Hindenburg's demise WAS NOT a result of a hydrogen explosion but an incendiary burning of thermite-like compound used to coat the canvas attached to the framework which was ignited by static electricity. The hydrogen sacs blew up after the fire began.
Hydrogen has been given a bad rap because of the Hindenburg explosion. We didn't give up on cruise ships just because the "unsinkable" Titanic opened it bowels on an iceberg. Neither should we go around panicking about how dangerous hydrogen is compared to a far more fatal fuel like petroleum.
Slashdot Mirror
Our military is primarily a deterent. By maintaining a strong military, we hope to avoid war.
As is evidenced by the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. The US military is not primarily a deterent. It is a tool for enforcing US self-interests and global control.
The US military by acting essentially alone without bothering with declarations of war or articles of surrender hasn't been a force for defense since 1945.
The later half of this century has been one of the most "peaceful" (with regard to percentage of deaths due to war) in the history of man.
As is evidence by the millions who have died at the hands of Pol Pot, Hutu militia, and others bent on genocide. All the while, the US military is busy "defending" the US against the hordes of Panamanians, Somalis, Afghans, and Nicaraguans.
"Our military is primarily a deterent". Ha. Like drinking Drano is mostly a purgative.
It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them. -- Alfred Adler
- CreationLTD
"Whatever you're going to do, do it fast" and then watching as the distance end of the massive hangar fill with aliens rushing towards me, emptying my large stock of ammo, realizing it was no good, and then having to flee pell mell for my cyberlife.
"Watch those corners", laughing nervously at the suggestion, inching around the corner, and getting leapt on by aliens and face-huggers. In the dark. Truly terrifying!
- CreationLTD
Oh well then, I guess the American revolution was started by "extremeists" as well considering 20% percent of the colonists actively opposed independence, and probably an equal number were passively loyal, and a further 30% couldn't have cared less.
History link 1
History link 2
- CreationLTD
Of course it can as long as the people willing it don't feel the heat of the tyranny. The Germans willed the Nazi party which treated good patriotic Germans and allies well while inflicting hideous torture and death on all others.
- CreationLTD
Well considering the rhetoric coming from the US armed forces of "war crimes" (i.e. Iraqis not playing to the rules) and how America feels about the death penalty, I don't see this as a particularly remote possibility.
- CreationLTD
And I suppose King George III declaring war on the thirteen colonies pretty much solved England's problems with the the revolutionaries.
And Saddam's waging war on Kuwait solved his problems too. And invading Afghanistan solved the USSRs problems, and North Korea declaring war on South Korea solved their problems.
I shake my head in wonder at the almost total ignorance of history exhibited by people who claim to have studied it or who tell others to go read a history book.
- CreationLTD
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. George Orwell - "1984"
What a bizarre statement. You talk about being realistic yet you make this wild assertion. Did you not pay ANY attention in history class?
Let me remind you of when American forces invaded Panama to depose Manuel Noriega (ANOTHER american backed dictator). According to the United Nations the civilian death toll was 500; the Central American Human Rights Defense Commission (CODEHUCA) and the Peace and Justice Service of Panama both claimed between 2,000 to 3000; the Panamanian National Human Rights Commission and an independent inquiry by former Attorney- General Ramsey Clark claimed over 4,000. To you, it seems, the very likely death of 1000s of Iraqis at the hands of Americans is somehow justified but the 1000s of deaths of Iraqis by Saddam is not.
Either that or you are hopelessly and dangerously ignorant or naive.
-CreationLTD
"Our bombs are smarter than the average American. At least they can find Kuwait. "
It is obvious that your pitiful recollection of events doesn't even extend back more than a year. You recently bombed Afghanistan to pieces showing them all but one of the pictures of the kinds of bombs you would use against them. So you proved beyond a shadow of a doubt you are willing to fight Al-Queda whether or not civilians got in the way. Anyone joining Al-Queda now knows beyond a shadow of a doubt what America will do against them. The ONLY thing this war will do for Al-Queda is increase the available pool of desperate, incensed, and displaced men and women ready to give up their lives (those ruined by the US) to inflict death and destruction on Americans and those that aid them.
Only a halfwit would suggest Al-Queda had any doubts about America's readiness to inflict death and destruction in its headlong rush to fight terrorism.
- CreationLTD
"The United States has a lot to offer the Third World War" (Ronald Reagan)
To those that say we're invading Iraq to stop Saddam from getting and using weapons of mass destruction, let me remind you of this interesting fact.
The only case of American civilians on American soil being attacked and killed by a "weapon of mass destruction", was with anthrax engineered by American scientists in American labs that was mailed to the post office that delivers MY mail by someone unkown.
A year and a half has past and no one has been caught for that crime.
And now I'm supposed to believe attacking a country that has never attacked us, has no capability to do so, is many leaps of technology away from even threatening Europe let alone America is somehow going to make me safer?
The oft ignored fact that the weapons you keep at home are more likely to kill you than those in the hands of criminals is completely lost on Americans who live in such a climate of self-induced fear and paranoia that they chase after demons that in the end do not pose significant risks to them now or in the future and yet fail to see the real risks right under their noses.
- CreationLTD
sick and tired of America invading weaker countries, killing massive number of civilians in order to topple a regime they propped up only a few decades ago (Panama, Afghanistan, Iraq)
... This message was abducted by the crop circle making aliens and, after extensive body cavity probing, returned to the wrong area.
Pigs... in ... Space!
Turtledove is certainly among my favorite. His main angle is alternate history (not the kind politicians play) where he creates novels based on how history would turn out should certain key events have turned out differently.
He is prolific, thought provoking, and just plain fun. Amongst his release...
The World At War series
Worldwar series
American Empire series
Ruled Brittania
Colonization series
Masses to read there.
Thumbs up as well for George RR Martin and his massive fantasy series Game of Thrones. I like Terry Brooks but his books have steadily shrunk in size and frequency. Even so his Shannara, Landover, and Knight of the Word series are great fun.
- CreationLTD
Having worked with Lightwave for a couple of years now (am currently working with it to create traffic accident recreations), I have to say without any hesitation that Lightwave is the biggest pain in the behind of ANY program I've ever used.
Lightwave has no semblance of a GUI that people come to expect from an application. On the Mac it disobeys virtually every human interface guideline put out by Apple. People will tell you that it's done that way to create cross-platform conformity but no other company I know plays that game. I find it just as easy to use Photoshop on a Mac as on a PC yet I don't have to learn bizarre alternate keystrokes to use it like you do in Lightwave.
Every single step you take in Lightwave requires a major effort and there is very little that is intuitive. Eventually you learn these idiosyncrasies or you spend a fair amount of time changing things to make them work properly.
Lightwave's inability to undo a large percentage of its commands, its hideous learning curve, its instability, its poor Shockwave3D export capability, its absolutely pathetic network rendering system, and many other issues make it a VERY poor choice especially for Macintosh based systems.
Even NewTek's website is a pain. Message boards are poorly designed and finding answers takes longer than it should.
So why am I using it? My company won't buy me Maya since it is too expensive and 3D Max is not available for the Mac (right now I'm stuck with a Mac).
As great as galleries are, they don't show you how much effort it takes to create them.
So if you have a PC or something other than a Mac I strongly recommend you choose something other than Lightwave.
Puritans often get the blame and their name is synonymous with sexual repression but look at some of the writings of the Victorian era about women's proper conduct and you'll see exactly whose to blame.
More sex please, we're British
"Mmmm... Lions, tigers, and bears. Oh my!.... Maybe Zeus isn't such a bad idea after all."
A government that makes it harder for you to engage in potentially harmful activities ...
A government that throws you in jail for engaging in potentially harmful activities.
- "Well, at least you can admit you're a Republican. That's the first step to recovery."
A government that makes it harder for you to get your illegal substances ...
A government that throws you in jail for life for getting your illegal substances.
- "Well, at least you can admit you're a Republican. That's the first step to recovery."
Just as soon as the USA and other first world countries stop dumping them in China's lap in the first place.
Citizens living in poverty outside the USA refrain from constant sexual intercourse when they know perfectly well they can't even feed themselves
Citizens living in poverty outside the USA have constant sexual intercourse in order to make enough children to help them eke a bare minimum life out of whatever miserable piece of land they happen to live on.
They don't do it for sheer amusement unlike most citizens in USA.
- "These people, they speak what they do not know" -
>>> A ball is droped onto the pavement. Why was the ball dropped? Evolutionist: Because gravity pulled it to the ground. Period. Intellegent design: Because somebody wanted to let it go to allow gravity to pull it to the ground. A apple rests under an apple tree. Evolutionist: Gravity exerted a force on the apple which eventually caused it to break free from the limb which held it and it fall towards the ground where it eventually came to rest. Intelligent design: The apple was yanked from the tree by someone and placed on the ground. - Roland Combes God is dead - Fred Fred is dead - God
"How do you reduce the bone density ... while strictly following the criteria of 'most fit to survive'?"
Take bats for instance. They fly. They have no feathers. How did they reduce bone density enough to fly? Well, just look at "flying" squirrels. These squirrels can glide from tree to tree with ease. They don't fly. In a few hundred thousand years when the earth is nice and hot and the squirrels loose most of the fur, they will glide even further. Some will discover that flapping helps them glide further. Some with slightly thinner bones will reach the critical weight at which they can actual flap and fly away. Eventually real flying hairless squirrels will fill the skies. God help us all!
2) Your logic is flawed if you think 4 sets of "hands" is superior to 2 sets of hands and 2 sets of feet. Strong legs and strong balancing ability removes the need for the hands to be involved in locomotion (other than minor balancing adjustments) and frees it up to do far more important things (e.g. throwing spear at large animals, cultivating ground, etc).
Less adept but stronger, streamlined toes are much more important and useful than weaker, dexterous toes.
- Roland Combes
4. Bride of PinBot.. Sexist & a good play...
Damn straight. Nothing like playing her in a crowded arcade. SHE'S ALIVE! SHE"S ALIVE!
If you lived in Europe you could get one of these. Unfortunately those of us stuck in the backwaters of the civilized world there's not a whole lot of choice. http://www.thesmart.co.uk/
All these guys running around saying hydrogen fuel is the answer are nuts! Anyone besides me remember the Hindenberg????? It doesn't make sense to deploy a fuel even MORE explosive and harder to handle than gasoline?
It might be worth checking the more recent investigations into the Hindenburg disaster. They conclude that the Hindenburg's demise WAS NOT a result of a hydrogen explosion but an incendiary burning of thermite-like compound used to coat the canvas attached to the framework which was ignited by static electricity. The hydrogen sacs blew up after the fire began.
Hydrogen has been given a bad rap because of the Hindenburg explosion. We didn't give up on cruise ships just because the "unsinkable" Titanic opened it bowels on an iceberg. Neither should we go around panicking about how dangerous hydrogen is compared to a far more fatal fuel like petroleum.
creationLtd