And FYI, alot of European countries have engineered their own sattelites and do work in space. (there's the international spacestation as well, remember?)
I was referring to manned space flight and "piggy backing" was referring to ESA folks getting there via the US and Russians.
"Have you noticed that the countries with socialized medicine and minimal military are not in space, or they largely piggy back on the former?"
Have you noticed a rather large launch complex in South America, and space probes orbiting the Moon, Venus, and Mars? Have you even glanced at the ESA's upcoming mision roster? You'll have to to better than that if you want to troll around here.
I guess you didn't realize I was referring to manned spaceflight. I thought "piggy backing" would have made that clear, my bad.
The countries with the largest militaries have also tended to have the best rocket scientists.
Close, the countries with the better militaries tend to have the rocket scientists. I'll refer back to Heinlein's quote about the second-best military and point out all the German rocket scientists who worked for the US and Russians after WW2.;-)
Have you noticed that the countries with the largest militaries are the one's with the most capable space programs? Have you noticed that the countries with socialized medicine and minimal military are not in space, or they largely piggy back on the former? I think things are a bit more complex than you suggest. Now I'm all for greatly increasing NASA's funding, but getting rid of the Pentagon will do more harm to NASA than good. The place to cut the budget is all the damn pork projects that do nothing other than get incumbants re-elected. Some of these are in the Pentagon, but many are outside of it. Pork is one of the few things conservatives and liberals agree on.
"The most expensive thing in the world is a second-best military establishment, good but not good enough to win."
Robert A. Heinlein
Everyone with half a brain who was following international news ought to have known that there were no WMDs, or at least no significant WMDs, left. I certainly did - I believed at the time exactly what time has shown.
A broken clock is correct twice a day. Saying that inspectors had proven there was no WMD is proving a negative, flawed logic. The question was not "does he have it", the question was "did he get rid of it". It might be more convenient to just read and respond to http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=197817&cid=162 23091.
... but it was so extremely obvious that Saddam wasn't in bed with Osama, I have no idea how anybody could swallow that nonsense
Perhaps they are a little more knowledgable than you and understand that Al Queda is not the totality of terrorism. Saddam supported and trained terrorist, and provided refuge for terrorists who had murdered Americans.
... and that they could find no evidence that he had WMDs... So it wasn't "rational", it was a decision made by disregarding available factual reports from informed people, and going entirely with gut instinct and speculation.
Your logic is flawed. You are effectively arguing that inspectors had proven a negative, that WMD did not exist. The question is not "does he have it", the question is "did he get rid of it". It might be more convenient to just read and respond to http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=197817&cid=162 23091.
"There is an argument for saying the war was a mistake, but irrational, no."
As others have already pointed out, even at the time of the decision there was no solid information to support this, only veiled hints about incriminating intelligence. But that intelligence could not lead the weapons inspectors to a shred of proof of the existence of those WMD, so even at the time it was not rational to place too much weight on it.
It was universally accepted that he had WMD, he actually used it on the Kurds. The cease fire for the first Gulf War *required* him to get rid of it under UN supervision. He *refused* to do so, all he had to do was let inspectors watch as he disposed of it. Given this the question is not "does he have it", the question is "did he get rid of it". The inspectors could not prove the later, all we had was Saddam's word for it. It was rational to assume he still had it, i.e. err on the side of caution. Which is what you want to do when estimating the capabilities of an enemy, *especially* in a post 9/11 world where you get crucified for underestimating capabilities.
Moreover, it was very suspicious that during the discussion the arguments to go to war changed (WMD, Al Quada, dispose an evil dictator were all used), but the remedy was always the same: war.
Not really. You confuse the motivation for going to war with what to sell the international community. WMD, dictator, terrorist support, ongoing attacks on Amercans, failure to comply with cease fire, etc were all valid motivations. WMD was focused on because that was the easy sell.
I say that whether Iraq had WMD is moot. Let's say he had a nuke. He certainly couldn't have had many by any estimation. How the hell is he going to get it here?
That is terribly naive. He did not have to get it to the US, getting it to the Saudi oil fields could do incredible damage to the West. It would afford an incredible ability for blackmail.
That is quite revisionist, but that is understandable given that the war has become extremely political. There is an argument for saying the war was a mistake, but irrational, no. At the time of the invasion there was a rational belief that Saddam still had WMD. Some in US Intel honestly believed so, others in US Intel were not sure but rationally decided to err on the side of caution, assume he still has it. Saddam was quite successful at making people think he still had them. When he got rid of the WMD that everyone agrees he had, all he had to do was let the UN inspectors watch. He was obligated to. With respect to European governments who were opposing the invasion, they were not viewed as entirely credible given their business relationships, which included support of Saddams WMD program(s).
... but the new war threat against Iran is even more so, particularly because a conventional war would require many more soldiers than the US can reasonably supply, so going nuclear would be `reasonable'.
Only if there is an occupation. The nuclear/military infrastructure could be bombed, special forces could raid key facilities and leave,...
Agreed. The GP was quite revisionist. I recall quite clearly the hatred of Reagan, the labeling of him as an idiot cowboy, a religous nut who will bring about a theocracy,... He was the "antichrist" to the American and European left. I recall the massive protests (as it turns out partly KGB funded, indirectly and covertly through greens and others) at Reagan's plans for modernizing NATO so that it could stand against the Warsaw Pact forces. I recall the horror for the notion that the Soviet state was something to oppose and do away with rather than peacefully coexist with.
In short, for those of you who were not in high school and college during Reagan's years, he was treated and referred to much like Bush Jr. today. However Reagan was a far better public speaker and came off a little better. Hated and reviled by the left much as the right hates and reviles Clinton.
I'm still more worried about that than about what a state with citizens and territory might do with nuclear weapons.
Actually you should worry about some states too, not all states are rational. As much of the US, Soviets, and Chinese disagreed, argued, postured, threatened, and occasionally engaged in conventional combat with each other they were basically rational states. No one was suicidal. No one was expecting divine intervention. You can not say that for some states today, Iran for instance. Some of the current leadership believes that a great apocalyptic holy war is coming, and that God will protect the faithful from the weapons of the infidel. They may only support and encourage some of the crazier terrorists you rightfully worry about, but they share many of the same beliefs. The fact that they act on these beliefs primarily through proxies does not make them much less of a danger.
You are *hurting* the cause. You must apply zero pressure, barely even encourage them, and fully disclose the inconveniences they will face. Unless the motivation for Linux is their own they will most likely have a negative experience as they have to go through re-education and deal with quirks and limitations. Keep in mind that marketing folks have determined that someone with a negative impression is *three* times more likely to share that opinion than someone with a positive impression. Unless they are enthusiastic about installing Linux, not merely accepting your recommendation, you will generating far more bad word of mouth than good word of mouth.
Re-education: Little controversy there, few will argue that Windows users need to learn and re-learn a few things after moving to Linux.
Quirks: To a typical Windows user Linux will seem to have some quirks. Linux has made an awful lot of progress but it still suffers from a "by nerds, for nerds" attitude.
Limitations: They have to understand that their software options will be quite limited. Most of what they see or hear about they can not have. That viable alternatives often exist under Linux does not fully mitigate this. They lose the "network effect" (offline, with friends and family: pooling knowledge to figure out how to do something with the app, sharing tips and techniques, interoperable files,...), they *must* be prepared to be the outsider. You can avoid some of this by running Windows under VMWare or Xen but if they slip back to Windows because it is more convenient or familiar they will not get over the Linux learning curve and wonder why they even have it installed. Games will still be an issue unless you configure the system to dual boot, but that will probably lead them to the "why bother" realization even faster. Please don't post answers to the "why bother" question, I've been dual booting and using Linux for a decade, I know why. It's a question that someone who got talked into Linux will most likely develop. Hell, even if they are curious and ask for Linux to just check it out many will go back to Windows.
The most you should do is ask them if they have considered Linux? If they are curious go ahead and tell them of the benefits, but be sure tell them about the extra effort they will need to put in and about the downside. Tell them you can install it if they would like, that you personally use it yourself and think it is vastly superior, but that they have to make the call and be willing to accept the extra effort in order to get used to it. Tell them if they do put in the effort they will most likely wish they had done so years ago.
Maybe they dont use Windows software on their computers??
Maybe they just run Windows and MS Office, and maybe internally developed apps. Maybe they do *not* install games and other apps that install driver level copy protection crap, maybe they don't download and run crap off of the internet, etc.
I run WinXP (and Fedora Core 5 and Mac OS X on other boxes) and use MS Office, and keep both patched. I install the occasional retail game, and have a few retail utilities installed, and a few FOSS utilities installed. I browse the web with Firefox. You know what, my system doesn't lock up. Now this system is something I built from good parts. I actually built two systems at the time, mine and one for a nephew. Same parts, a subset of the software mentioned above. Now this other machine is royally screwed up on a regular basis, perhaps it is not MS software or the hardware. Perhaps, just maybe, it is the 12 year old nephew downloading and running everything anyone at school mentions and Dad visiting a bunch of spyware infested poker sites. To be honest I have to mention that this system has been less troublesome since I it switched from Norton to McAffee.
Now does MS deserve a slap or two for allowing the later to happen. Yes, absolutely. However, the former case is also true. Windows boxes used every day can be extremely reliable. If the Maryland folks are just running the software their IS people installed it is plausible their systems are trouble free.
Many People in Business get used to their system working one way. Every single one of my clients in the legal field has at one time or another paid me to replace XP on their system with either 2k or 98.
As one of them recently put it after buying his new computer, "I thought I'd give XP a try since it came installed, but it's all sizzle and no steak. How much will you charge to put 2000 back on it?"
"Many" is a bit of an overstatement. You are describing niche users. These niches existed during previous upgrade cycles and they amounted to noise. XP succeeded despite some people reverting to 2K, 2K succeeded despite some people reverting to NT4 or 9x, etc. These people are offset by those who want the latest, "ooh, shiny", and are absolutely dwarfed by those who stick with whatever the machine left the factory with.
After taking this thing "out of the box", I spent no less than 30 minutes weaving my way through pre-setup wizards and registration dialogs... Macs on the other hand - I have not had any real experience with yet. From what I hear they funciton much better "out of box" - no pre-configuring, no trial craptastic software pre-installed.
You heard wrong. There is registration, there is wizard like tools to setup networking and email, etc. There is also trial software, MS-Office for one.
ETrade offers little RSA dongles and you append the everchanging 6 digit number to your passord. Might be helpful if banks offered this for regular online customers. Well, maybe if emails are delayed by the timeframe the 6 digits are valid.
An option to restrict online access to an IP or subnet would be nice too.
And regardless, you are incorrect. "They", whoever "they" are, may have decided they are at war against us, but untill Congress passes something that says, "A state of war exists between the United States of America and ________________", then we are not at war with "them".
You are confusing a state of war with a declaration of war. The declaration is for the lawyers, the state is more relevant to everyone else. Even President Roosevelt acknowledged that war existed at the time of the attack not at the time of our declaration of war. Note the past tense of "existed" as he asked Congress for the declaration of war: "I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."
It's been determined that not only was Iraq not related to Al Qaeda, members of the administration clearly manipulated intelligence to show that Saddam was, indicating that members of the administration knew that Iraq was not a terrorist target and therefore did not fall beneath the authorization of force.
I'll ignore the very heavy spin of your statement and just concentrate on it's irrelevance.
The legitimacy of the invasion is immaterial to the legitimacy of our current presence. Radical Islam may not have had a significant presense in Iraq at the time of the invasion, but they have been drawn there by the invasion and do have a major presence now. That is the only relevant issue now. Iraq is *now* a legitimate front on the war on terror. Radical Islam is hoping to repeat Afghanistan, drive a super power out, force a radical Islamic government on the people, continue their war on the west... It is nearly universally agreed that the west's ignoring of Afghanistan once the Russians left was a tragic mistake. Leaving Afghanistan or Iraq today, before a sustainable representative government of some sort is established, would be a similar mistake with consequences in the future.
What are you stupid or something? The Constitution explicitly states that the US may be considered "at war" if and only if Congress declares it!
There are various definitions of "war", you are fixating on the lawyer's view. I am using the more practical and realistic view, the soldiers view, and also President Roosevelt's view (explained below). Perhaps you missed the GP's use of the terms "Korean War", "Vietnam War", "Gulf War", etc. That would be what some people would call context. I'd be careful tossing around the word "stupid", it is not sticking to who you had expected.
This, you may note, is why even though Japan declared war on the US a few hours before Pearl Harbor, the US also declared war on Japan a short time after.
I think you should read not skim you history textbook. Even President Roosevelt acknowledged that war existed at the time of the attack not at the time of our declaration of war. Note the past tense of "existed" as he asked Congress for the declaration of war: "I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."
Even if I concede that we are at war, who is the enemy?
The radical Islamic movement that believes they are at war with us and are actively working to conduct attacks.
How do we decide when it's over? A war on "terrorism" is not well defined - you can always say there may be someone plotting something that falls under that term.
When that movement is so small and so marginalized that it is like other groups, often cults, that are more appropriately a local law enforcement problem. Bombings will happen, but Oklahoma City is a law enforcement problem, 9/11 is a war.
We have not had a "terrorist" atrack on the US in 5 years. Where is this war you speak of?
Radical Islam attacked the World Trade Center on February 26, 1993 and September 11, 2001. That is about 8.5 years. Madrid was attacked July 7, 2004, London on July 7, 2005. Did you miss the British thwarting an attempt to blow up multiple airlines last month?
Iraq? That's "peace keeping", not war any more.
Radical Islam may not have had a significant presense in Iraq at the time of the invasion, but they have been drawn there by the invasion and do have a major presence now. That is the only relevant issue now. Iraq is *now* a legitimate front on the war on terror. Radical Islam is hoping to repeat Afghanistan, drive a super power out, force a radical Islamic government on the people, continue their war on the west... It is nearly universally agreed that the west's ignoring of Afghanistan once the Russians left was a tragic mistake. Leaving Afghanistan or Iraq today, before a sustainable representative government of some sort is established, would be a similar mistake with consequences in the future.
By the way, are you aware that the Korean "War," Vietnam "War," Gulf "War," and Gulf "War" II are all similarly fake? The last time the US was actually at war, FDR was President!
And as one of the posters above pointed out, the enemy declared war first. You only need one side to decide that a war has begun. Radical Islam has made that decision.
Regarding Linux. Many years ago I believe someone was quoted as saying it does not make business sense, that they just do it because they think it is cool to do so.
Those are some powerful arguments but wouldn't you need a revenue breakdown of licenses vs retail sales, not game development philosophy to say what the focus is? Sure programmers and artists are *thinking* games, not licenses, but what is paying the bills? Regarding the bit about id increasing it's focus on it franchises, could that be a strategy dictated by increased competition on the engine licensing side?
Paper ballots with an 'X' or filled in bubble are machine readable. They have been used in the US for decades. They are human readable as a backup. It is just that after the 2000 election everyone jumped on a mindless computerized bandwagon. Ironically I voted using an experimental computerized system in 2000, but prior to that we had fill-in-the-bubble scantron like ballots.
I like computers, but they are not for everything.
Slashdot Mirror
And FYI, alot of European countries have engineered their own sattelites and do work in space. (there's the international spacestation as well, remember?)
I was referring to manned space flight and "piggy backing" was referring to ESA folks getting there via the US and Russians.
"Have you noticed that the countries with socialized medicine and minimal military are not in space, or they largely piggy back on the former?"
Have you noticed a rather large launch complex in South America, and space probes orbiting the Moon, Venus, and Mars? Have you even glanced at the ESA's upcoming mision roster? You'll have to to better than that if you want to troll around here.
I guess you didn't realize I was referring to manned spaceflight. I thought "piggy backing" would have made that clear, my bad.
"Have you noticed that the countries with socialized medicine and minimal military are not in space, or they largely piggy back on the former?"
Why, no, I can't say I have.
Sorry, but Ariane's satellite launch capabilities don't count. Come back when they get into the manned spaceflight business.
The countries with the largest militaries have also tended to have the best rocket scientists.
;-)
Close, the countries with the better militaries tend to have the rocket scientists. I'll refer back to Heinlein's quote about the second-best military and point out all the German rocket scientists who worked for the US and Russians after WW2.
Have you noticed that the countries with the largest militaries are the one's with the most capable space programs? Have you noticed that the countries with socialized medicine and minimal military are not in space, or they largely piggy back on the former? I think things are a bit more complex than you suggest. Now I'm all for greatly increasing NASA's funding, but getting rid of the Pentagon will do more harm to NASA than good. The place to cut the budget is all the damn pork projects that do nothing other than get incumbants re-elected. Some of these are in the Pentagon, but many are outside of it. Pork is one of the few things conservatives and liberals agree on.
"The most expensive thing in the world is a second-best military establishment, good but not good enough to win."
Robert A. Heinlein
Everyone with half a brain who was following international news ought to have known that there were no WMDs, or at least no significant WMDs, left. I certainly did - I believed at the time exactly what time has shown.
2 23091.
... but it was so extremely obvious that Saddam wasn't in bed with Osama, I have no idea how anybody could swallow that nonsense
A broken clock is correct twice a day. Saying that inspectors had proven there was no WMD is proving a negative, flawed logic. The question was not "does he have it", the question was "did he get rid of it". It might be more convenient to just read and respond to http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=197817&cid=16
Perhaps they are a little more knowledgable than you and understand that Al Queda is not the totality of terrorism. Saddam supported and trained terrorist, and provided refuge for terrorists who had murdered Americans.
... and that they could find no evidence that he had WMDs ... So it wasn't "rational", it was a decision made by disregarding available factual reports from informed people, and going entirely with gut instinct and speculation.
2 23091.
Your logic is flawed. You are effectively arguing that inspectors had proven a negative, that WMD did not exist. The question is not "does he have it", the question is "did he get rid of it". It might be more convenient to just read and respond to http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=197817&cid=16
"There is an argument for saying the war was a mistake, but irrational, no."
As others have already pointed out, even at the time of the decision there was no solid information to support this, only veiled hints about incriminating intelligence. But that intelligence could not lead the weapons inspectors to a shred of proof of the existence of those WMD, so even at the time it was not rational to place too much weight on it.
It was universally accepted that he had WMD, he actually used it on the Kurds. The cease fire for the first Gulf War *required* him to get rid of it under UN supervision. He *refused* to do so, all he had to do was let inspectors watch as he disposed of it. Given this the question is not "does he have it", the question is "did he get rid of it". The inspectors could not prove the later, all we had was Saddam's word for it. It was rational to assume he still had it, i.e. err on the side of caution. Which is what you want to do when estimating the capabilities of an enemy, *especially* in a post 9/11 world where you get crucified for underestimating capabilities.
Moreover, it was very suspicious that during the discussion the arguments to go to war changed (WMD, Al Quada, dispose an evil dictator were all used), but the remedy was always the same: war.
Not really. You confuse the motivation for going to war with what to sell the international community. WMD, dictator, terrorist support, ongoing attacks on Amercans, failure to comply with cease fire, etc were all valid motivations. WMD was focused on because that was the easy sell.
I say that whether Iraq had WMD is moot. Let's say he had a nuke. He certainly couldn't have had many by any estimation. How the hell is he going to get it here?
That is terribly naive. He did not have to get it to the US, getting it to the Saudi oil fields could do incredible damage to the West. It would afford an incredible ability for blackmail.
The second Iraq war was already irrational, ...
... but the new war threat against Iran is even more so, particularly because a conventional war would require many more soldiers than the US can reasonably supply, so going nuclear would be `reasonable'.
...
That is quite revisionist, but that is understandable given that the war has become extremely political. There is an argument for saying the war was a mistake, but irrational, no. At the time of the invasion there was a rational belief that Saddam still had WMD. Some in US Intel honestly believed so, others in US Intel were not sure but rationally decided to err on the side of caution, assume he still has it. Saddam was quite successful at making people think he still had them. When he got rid of the WMD that everyone agrees he had, all he had to do was let the UN inspectors watch. He was obligated to. With respect to European governments who were opposing the invasion, they were not viewed as entirely credible given their business relationships, which included support of Saddams WMD program(s).
Only if there is an occupation. The nuclear/military infrastructure could be bombed, special forces could raid key facilities and leave,
Agreed. The GP was quite revisionist. I recall quite clearly the hatred of Reagan, the labeling of him as an idiot cowboy, a religous nut who will bring about a theocracy, ... He was the "antichrist" to the American and European left. I recall the massive protests (as it turns out partly KGB funded, indirectly and covertly through greens and others) at Reagan's plans for modernizing NATO so that it could stand against the Warsaw Pact forces. I recall the horror for the notion that the Soviet state was something to oppose and do away with rather than peacefully coexist with.
In short, for those of you who were not in high school and college during Reagan's years, he was treated and referred to much like Bush Jr. today. However Reagan was a far better public speaker and came off a little better. Hated and reviled by the left much as the right hates and reviles Clinton.
I'm still more worried about that than about what a state with citizens and territory might do with nuclear weapons.
Actually you should worry about some states too, not all states are rational. As much of the US, Soviets, and Chinese disagreed, argued, postured, threatened, and occasionally engaged in conventional combat with each other they were basically rational states. No one was suicidal. No one was expecting divine intervention. You can not say that for some states today, Iran for instance. Some of the current leadership believes that a great apocalyptic holy war is coming, and that God will protect the faithful from the weapons of the infidel. They may only support and encourage some of the crazier terrorists you rightfully worry about, but they share many of the same beliefs. The fact that they act on these beliefs primarily through proxies does not make them much less of a danger.
You are *hurting* the cause. You must apply zero pressure, barely even encourage them, and fully disclose the inconveniences they will face. Unless the motivation for Linux is their own they will most likely have a negative experience as they have to go through re-education and deal with quirks and limitations. Keep in mind that marketing folks have determined that someone with a negative impression is *three* times more likely to share that opinion than someone with a positive impression. Unless they are enthusiastic about installing Linux, not merely accepting your recommendation, you will generating far more bad word of mouth than good word of mouth.
...), they *must* be prepared to be the outsider. You can avoid some of this by running Windows under VMWare or Xen but if they slip back to Windows because it is more convenient or familiar they will not get over the Linux learning curve and wonder why they even have it installed. Games will still be an issue unless you configure the system to dual boot, but that will probably lead them to the "why bother" realization even faster. Please don't post answers to the "why bother" question, I've been dual booting and using Linux for a decade, I know why. It's a question that someone who got talked into Linux will most likely develop. Hell, even if they are curious and ask for Linux to just check it out many will go back to Windows.
Re-education: Little controversy there, few will argue that Windows users need to learn and re-learn a few things after moving to Linux.
Quirks: To a typical Windows user Linux will seem to have some quirks. Linux has made an awful lot of progress but it still suffers from a "by nerds, for nerds" attitude.
Limitations: They have to understand that their software options will be quite limited. Most of what they see or hear about they can not have. That viable alternatives often exist under Linux does not fully mitigate this. They lose the "network effect" (offline, with friends and family: pooling knowledge to figure out how to do something with the app, sharing tips and techniques, interoperable files,
The most you should do is ask them if they have considered Linux? If they are curious go ahead and tell them of the benefits, but be sure tell them about the extra effort they will need to put in and about the downside. Tell them you can install it if they would like, that you personally use it yourself and think it is vastly superior, but that they have to make the call and be willing to accept the extra effort in order to get used to it. Tell them if they do put in the effort they will most likely wish they had done so years ago.
Maybe they dont use Windows software on their computers??
Maybe they just run Windows and MS Office, and maybe internally developed apps. Maybe they do *not* install games and other apps that install driver level copy protection crap, maybe they don't download and run crap off of the internet, etc.
I run WinXP (and Fedora Core 5 and Mac OS X on other boxes) and use MS Office, and keep both patched. I install the occasional retail game, and have a few retail utilities installed, and a few FOSS utilities installed. I browse the web with Firefox. You know what, my system doesn't lock up. Now this system is something I built from good parts. I actually built two systems at the time, mine and one for a nephew. Same parts, a subset of the software mentioned above. Now this other machine is royally screwed up on a regular basis, perhaps it is not MS software or the hardware. Perhaps, just maybe, it is the 12 year old nephew downloading and running everything anyone at school mentions and Dad visiting a bunch of spyware infested poker sites. To be honest I have to mention that this system has been less troublesome since I it switched from Norton to McAffee.
Now does MS deserve a slap or two for allowing the later to happen. Yes, absolutely. However, the former case is also true. Windows boxes used every day can be extremely reliable. If the Maryland folks are just running the software their IS people installed it is plausible their systems are trouble free.
Many People in Business get used to their system working one way. Every single one of my clients in the legal field has at one time or another paid me to replace XP on their system with either 2k or 98. As one of them recently put it after buying his new computer, "I thought I'd give XP a try since it came installed, but it's all sizzle and no steak. How much will you charge to put 2000 back on it?"
"Many" is a bit of an overstatement. You are describing niche users. These niches existed during previous upgrade cycles and they amounted to noise. XP succeeded despite some people reverting to 2K, 2K succeeded despite some people reverting to NT4 or 9x, etc. These people are offset by those who want the latest, "ooh, shiny", and are absolutely dwarfed by those who stick with whatever the machine left the factory with.
After taking this thing "out of the box", I spent no less than 30 minutes weaving my way through pre-setup wizards and registration dialogs ... Macs on the other hand - I have not had any real experience with yet. From what I hear they funciton much better "out of box" - no pre-configuring, no trial craptastic software pre-installed.
You heard wrong. There is registration, there is wizard like tools to setup networking and email, etc. There is also trial software, MS-Office for one.
ETrade offers little RSA dongles and you append the everchanging 6 digit number to your passord. Might be helpful if banks offered this for regular online customers. Well, maybe if emails are delayed by the timeframe the 6 digits are valid.
An option to restrict online access to an IP or subnet would be nice too.
And regardless, you are incorrect. "They", whoever "they" are, may have decided they are at war against us, but untill Congress passes something that says, "A state of war exists between the United States of America and ________________", then we are not at war with "them".
You are confusing a state of war with a declaration of war. The declaration is for the lawyers, the state is more relevant to everyone else. Even President Roosevelt acknowledged that war existed at the time of the attack not at the time of our declaration of war. Note the past tense of "existed" as he asked Congress for the declaration of war: "I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."
It's been determined that not only was Iraq not related to Al Qaeda, members of the administration clearly manipulated intelligence to show that Saddam was, indicating that members of the administration knew that Iraq was not a terrorist target and therefore did not fall beneath the authorization of force.
... It is nearly universally agreed that the west's ignoring of Afghanistan once the Russians left was a tragic mistake. Leaving Afghanistan or Iraq today, before a sustainable representative government of some sort is established, would be a similar mistake with consequences in the future.
I'll ignore the very heavy spin of your statement and just concentrate on it's irrelevance.
The legitimacy of the invasion is immaterial to the legitimacy of our current presence. Radical Islam may not have had a significant presense in Iraq at the time of the invasion, but they have been drawn there by the invasion and do have a major presence now. That is the only relevant issue now. Iraq is *now* a legitimate front on the war on terror. Radical Islam is hoping to repeat Afghanistan, drive a super power out, force a radical Islamic government on the people, continue their war on the west
What are you stupid or something? The Constitution explicitly states that the US may be considered "at war" if and only if Congress declares it!
There are various definitions of "war", you are fixating on the lawyer's view. I am using the more practical and realistic view, the soldiers view, and also President Roosevelt's view (explained below). Perhaps you missed the GP's use of the terms "Korean War", "Vietnam War", "Gulf War", etc. That would be what some people would call context. I'd be careful tossing around the word "stupid", it is not sticking to who you had expected.
This, you may note, is why even though Japan declared war on the US a few hours before Pearl Harbor, the US also declared war on Japan a short time after.
I think you should read not skim you history textbook. Even President Roosevelt acknowledged that war existed at the time of the attack not at the time of our declaration of war. Note the past tense of "existed" as he asked Congress for the declaration of war: "I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December 7, 1941, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."
Even if I concede that we are at war, who is the enemy?
... It is nearly universally agreed that the west's ignoring of Afghanistan once the Russians left was a tragic mistake. Leaving Afghanistan or Iraq today, before a sustainable representative government of some sort is established, would be a similar mistake with consequences in the future.
The radical Islamic movement that believes they are at war with us and are actively working to conduct attacks.
How do we decide when it's over? A war on "terrorism" is not well defined - you can always say there may be someone plotting something that falls under that term.
When that movement is so small and so marginalized that it is like other groups, often cults, that are more appropriately a local law enforcement problem. Bombings will happen, but Oklahoma City is a law enforcement problem, 9/11 is a war.
We have not had a "terrorist" atrack on the US in 5 years. Where is this war you speak of?
Radical Islam attacked the World Trade Center on February 26, 1993 and September 11, 2001. That is about 8.5 years. Madrid was attacked July 7, 2004, London on July 7, 2005. Did you miss the British thwarting an attempt to blow up multiple airlines last month?
Iraq? That's "peace keeping", not war any more.
Radical Islam may not have had a significant presense in Iraq at the time of the invasion, but they have been drawn there by the invasion and do have a major presence now. That is the only relevant issue now. Iraq is *now* a legitimate front on the war on terror. Radical Islam is hoping to repeat Afghanistan, drive a super power out, force a radical Islamic government on the people, continue their war on the west
By the way, are you aware that the Korean "War," Vietnam "War," Gulf "War," and Gulf "War" II are all similarly fake? The last time the US was actually at war, FDR was President!
And as one of the posters above pointed out, the enemy declared war first. You only need one side to decide that a war has begun. Radical Islam has made that decision.
Regarding Linux. Many years ago I believe someone was quoted as saying it does not make business sense, that they just do it because they think it is cool to do so.
Those are some powerful arguments but wouldn't you need a revenue breakdown of licenses vs retail sales, not game development philosophy to say what the focus is? Sure programmers and artists are *thinking* games, not licenses, but what is paying the bills? Regarding the bit about id increasing it's focus on it franchises, could that be a strategy dictated by increased competition on the engine licensing side?
Paper ballots with an 'X' or filled in bubble are machine readable. They have been used in the US for decades. They are human readable as a backup. It is just that after the 2000 election everyone jumped on a mindless computerized bandwagon. Ironically I voted using an experimental computerized system in 2000, but prior to that we had fill-in-the-bubble scantron like ballots.
I like computers, but they are not for everything.