The hypocricy of these people never ceases to amaze. They are gung ho for small goverment and no regulation when it comes to pollution, extraction, destruction, corruption raping the land and raping the worker but Jesus Forfend there should be SEX anywhere. Then its CRIMINAL!!! Asshats.
The short and sweet answer is to roll back each and every policy decision and safeguard gutting revision the Bush administration has implemented. He has systematically filled every beaurocratic niche with people who have dedicated their lives to dismantling those beaurocracies - Timber and cattle and big oil people in Interior and the BLM, Anti-science freaks in NASA and the Department of Education to name but two.
He has also made inroads into destroying the first amendment's anti establishment clause with his faith based initiatives - 2.1 BILLION of our tax dollars have ben diverted from proven, trusted NGOs and gone to far right christian evangelicals who use the money to prosletize their narrow version of christianity.
So, right there we can start by saying reinsert professionals into the beaurocracies, reverse the givaways to corporations that pollute, and stop funding the fundies so they can brainwash more unwitting, helpless people. That's a start.
Up until about 6 months ago when our phone company dropped support for our phone hardware and voicemail system it lived on an OS/2 box. It just ran and ran and ran... I think I had to touch it maybe twice in 6 six years, other than for adding/changing/deleting users in the voice mail system that is. It was like a Showtime Rotisserie - set it and forget it! Wheeee!!!
There was a time when the written word didn't require pictures to convey meaning. Those of you who may have picked up a book in which the only picture was perhaps a dust jacket photo of the author might remember this time. It existed somewhere between children's story books and your first email or BBS smilie.
If you recall correctly this time included entire words, spelled correctly, and typically some sort of punctuation which would separate the sentences into what many teachers used to call "complete thoughts." Sometimes the author would use a rhetorical device ( some early rhetorical devices ran at only 33MHz!) with funny old Latin names like "praeter itio," which I won't mention.
Sometimes authors used nice techniques called Irony, Satire and Sarcasm (an ascending tri-colon). What seems odd to us about these techniques today is that the words that the author used conveyed the meaning. Certainly there were thickies that didn't quite "get it" when Irony would smack them accross the noggin, but that's precisely because they were thick. One despairs that even the cunning and naughty MrWinky, the Cheeky Monkey, could not raise the intellect of the thick to a level of ironic awareness.
And so it is with our little friend Sarcasm. It is often proclaimed quite loudly that sarcasm is difficult to parse from the written word, and so we should make our intent plain by adding MrWinky, or perhaps even a MrRazz to make double-extra super sure that the target of the sarcastic remark is "in the know."
WARNING: the following statement is inregard to American English, which in my Ignorance is the only language I am able to speak and write. It is not in any way, shape or form meant to impugne any other language spoken here. END OF WARNING.
The English Language is rich: it has evolved over centuries, borrowing from, stealing from and swallowing wholesale entire other languages. It is a Monster of a language. We have at least two ways of naming absolutely everything, dependent upon from which root language you care to select the name. We have so many ways of saying the same thing that it seems we cannot help but stumble accross a way to convey what we mean with only the words. And yet...
OFFICIAL NOTE: the following does not fall under the above WARNING. That bit is over.
And yet, we have become so careless, so self absorbed and in such a hurry to get our two cents in; such a blasted, egomaniacal rush, that we ignore the meaning of what others write. We do not take the time to digest the written word. We do not allow ourselves the opportunity to read what the other guy has written, so busy are we in our sweat to "respond" to our nemesis, that we now require a little helper to convey the meaning for us. It seems the symbols we all agreed upon to convey our meanings are too difficult to decipher.
The ugly truth is that the helpers do not help. They diminish our capacity to communicate effectively with one another. They are frauds. The writer tosses off a smilie because he is worried the reader won't understand the written word. The reader tosses away the smilie because the writer didn't really mean it.
The writer should take the time to write what he means. The reader should take the time to understand. Smilies do nothing to enhance our discourse.
are due to increased awareness of the disease, better screening and more money available for social programs that address it.
20 years ago it was very rare to find programs specifically designed for children with autism. 15 years ago the parents of children with autism began to organize and push for programs and funding. As parents, doctors, school administrators and legislators became more aware of autism the funding blossomed (well, as far as that can happen for social programs) and many more children were diagnosed with it. There has also been a huge increase in the number of Asberger's syndrome cases as well as the catch-all PDD-NOS: Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified, which is diagnostic speak for "well, the kid ain't right, but he don't fit none of the other molds."
The classic, Kanner's Austism as diagnosed with the childhood autism rating scale and other tools is still very rare. There is a tendancy to fit kids into whatever diagnoses are sexy and have funding at the time. I worked with plenty of kids who didn't fit the classic diagnosis of autism, but because the district had a nice chunk of money to spend, otherwise "vanilla" developmentally disabled kids would get an autism or PDD-NOS tag so they could get funded.
I hope we aren't going back to an environmental 'refridgerator parents' model of autism. It is clearly an inherited disorder (with the exception of certain febrile onsets due to sever infections of the brain).
I should be able to state my views, in a private email, with the expectation that only the person in the recipient field is privy to those views. This is a reasonable expectation under the 4th amendment. Tampering with the USPS is typically a felony because one also expects snail mail to remain private. It doesn't matter if you think privacy is a "modern" concept of freedom. It is in fact one of the basic underpinnings of what we claim as our 'freedoms' in the US. I have no expectation of privacy by posting on this board. Were I to email you though, I would expect that the communication would remain private - at least from some government agency - but then you would probably blab whatever I wrote all over the universe.
Your conflation of freedom of speech and privacy is silly at best. Your contention that the right to privacy is a luxury is appalling. It is a basic right, not a luxury. It is why law enforcement officials have to go through the judiciary to obtain warrants to look in our homes, check our phone records and other private items. I don't know what your real world is like, but if you think privacy is a luxury that can be taken away by the government, I hope I never live in it.
In case you didn't notice, all the good ammendments to the constitution are the ones that limit government powers. The ones that limit the rights of the people (prohibition anyone?) suck. It is also fun to note that so-called small government conservatives are always the ones that want to limit the rights of the people and expand the power of government to meddle in our private affairs - limit who can marry whom? outlaw alcohol?
Privacy is a right, not a priviledge.
Paley's Pocketwatch analogy deserves nothing. It is a false analogy. You begin with the assumption of a mechanical device which we know requires a maker, or in the case of modern watches a team of engineers, fabricators, other machines, and parts that are manufactured and then assembled using tools that are also manufactured. Pre-biotic chemistry requires that the requisite molecular matter be in 'soup' and supplied with energy. The pocketwatch analogy is like saying if you throw all the bits in a bucket they should assemble themselves into a watch. Baloney. Any mechanistic analogies are also useless and misleading, which is why creationists like them. They sound good at first, so they get people who are only partly listening to say "That's a good point." when in reality under any inspection they are vapid and vacuous. Once again it is simply the religious starting with a premise and them twisting what they observe to fit the premise.
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The hypocricy of these people never ceases to amaze. They are gung ho for small goverment and no regulation when it comes to pollution, extraction, destruction, corruption raping the land and raping the worker but Jesus Forfend there should be SEX anywhere. Then its CRIMINAL!!! Asshats.
The short and sweet answer is to roll back each and every policy decision and safeguard gutting revision the Bush administration has implemented. He has systematically filled every beaurocratic niche with people who have dedicated their lives to dismantling those beaurocracies - Timber and cattle and big oil people in Interior and the BLM, Anti-science freaks in NASA and the Department of Education to name but two.
He has also made inroads into destroying the first amendment's anti establishment clause with his faith based initiatives - 2.1 BILLION of our tax dollars have ben diverted from proven, trusted NGOs and gone to far right christian evangelicals who use the money to prosletize their narrow version of christianity.
So, right there we can start by saying reinsert professionals into the beaurocracies, reverse the givaways to corporations that pollute, and stop funding the fundies so they can brainwash more unwitting, helpless people. That's a start.
Up until about 6 months ago when our phone company dropped support for our phone hardware and voicemail system it lived on an OS/2 box. It just ran and ran and ran... I think I had to touch it maybe twice in 6 six years, other than for adding/changing/deleting users in the voice mail system that is. It was like a Showtime Rotisserie - set it and forget it! Wheeee!!!
There was a time when the written word didn't require pictures to convey meaning. Those of you who may have picked up a book in which the only picture was perhaps a dust jacket photo of the author might remember this time. It existed somewhere between children's story books and your first email or BBS smilie. If you recall correctly this time included entire words, spelled correctly, and typically some sort of punctuation which would separate the sentences into what many teachers used to call "complete thoughts." Sometimes the author would use a rhetorical device ( some early rhetorical devices ran at only 33MHz!) with funny old Latin names like "praeter itio," which I won't mention. Sometimes authors used nice techniques called Irony, Satire and Sarcasm (an ascending tri-colon). What seems odd to us about these techniques today is that the words that the author used conveyed the meaning. Certainly there were thickies that didn't quite "get it" when Irony would smack them accross the noggin, but that's precisely because they were thick. One despairs that even the cunning and naughty MrWinky, the Cheeky Monkey, could not raise the intellect of the thick to a level of ironic awareness. And so it is with our little friend Sarcasm. It is often proclaimed quite loudly that sarcasm is difficult to parse from the written word, and so we should make our intent plain by adding MrWinky, or perhaps even a MrRazz to make double-extra super sure that the target of the sarcastic remark is "in the know." WARNING: the following statement is inregard to American English, which in my Ignorance is the only language I am able to speak and write. It is not in any way, shape or form meant to impugne any other language spoken here. END OF WARNING. The English Language is rich: it has evolved over centuries, borrowing from, stealing from and swallowing wholesale entire other languages. It is a Monster of a language. We have at least two ways of naming absolutely everything, dependent upon from which root language you care to select the name. We have so many ways of saying the same thing that it seems we cannot help but stumble accross a way to convey what we mean with only the words. And yet... OFFICIAL NOTE: the following does not fall under the above WARNING. That bit is over. And yet, we have become so careless, so self absorbed and in such a hurry to get our two cents in; such a blasted, egomaniacal rush, that we ignore the meaning of what others write. We do not take the time to digest the written word. We do not allow ourselves the opportunity to read what the other guy has written, so busy are we in our sweat to "respond" to our nemesis, that we now require a little helper to convey the meaning for us. It seems the symbols we all agreed upon to convey our meanings are too difficult to decipher. The ugly truth is that the helpers do not help. They diminish our capacity to communicate effectively with one another. They are frauds. The writer tosses off a smilie because he is worried the reader won't understand the written word. The reader tosses away the smilie because the writer didn't really mean it. The writer should take the time to write what he means. The reader should take the time to understand. Smilies do nothing to enhance our discourse.
It's funny, those IDers from the Discovery Institute are doing everything they promised, except for actually doing any real science at all.
are due to increased awareness of the disease, better screening and more money available for social programs that address it.
20 years ago it was very rare to find programs specifically designed for children with autism. 15 years ago the parents of children with autism began to organize and push for programs and funding. As parents, doctors, school administrators and legislators became more aware of autism the funding blossomed (well, as far as that can happen for social programs) and many more children were diagnosed with it. There has also been a huge increase in the number of Asberger's syndrome cases as well as the catch-all PDD-NOS: Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified, which is diagnostic speak for "well, the kid ain't right, but he don't fit none of the other molds."
The classic, Kanner's Austism as diagnosed with the childhood autism rating scale and other tools is still very rare. There is a tendancy to fit kids into whatever diagnoses are sexy and have funding at the time. I worked with plenty of kids who didn't fit the classic diagnosis of autism, but because the district had a nice chunk of money to spend, otherwise "vanilla" developmentally disabled kids would get an autism or PDD-NOS tag so they could get funded.
I hope we aren't going back to an environmental 'refridgerator parents' model of autism. It is clearly an inherited disorder (with the exception of certain febrile onsets due to sever infections of the brain).
I should be able to state my views, in a private email, with the expectation that only the person in the recipient field is privy to those views. This is a reasonable expectation under the 4th amendment. Tampering with the USPS is typically a felony because one also expects snail mail to remain private. It doesn't matter if you think privacy is a "modern" concept of freedom. It is in fact one of the basic underpinnings of what we claim as our 'freedoms' in the US. I have no expectation of privacy by posting on this board. Were I to email you though, I would expect that the communication would remain private - at least from some government agency - but then you would probably blab whatever I wrote all over the universe. Your conflation of freedom of speech and privacy is silly at best. Your contention that the right to privacy is a luxury is appalling. It is a basic right, not a luxury. It is why law enforcement officials have to go through the judiciary to obtain warrants to look in our homes, check our phone records and other private items. I don't know what your real world is like, but if you think privacy is a luxury that can be taken away by the government, I hope I never live in it. In case you didn't notice, all the good ammendments to the constitution are the ones that limit government powers. The ones that limit the rights of the people (prohibition anyone?) suck. It is also fun to note that so-called small government conservatives are always the ones that want to limit the rights of the people and expand the power of government to meddle in our private affairs - limit who can marry whom? outlaw alcohol? Privacy is a right, not a priviledge.
Paley's Pocketwatch analogy deserves nothing. It is a false analogy. You begin with the assumption of a mechanical device which we know requires a maker, or in the case of modern watches a team of engineers, fabricators, other machines, and parts that are manufactured and then assembled using tools that are also manufactured. Pre-biotic chemistry requires that the requisite molecular matter be in 'soup' and supplied with energy. The pocketwatch analogy is like saying if you throw all the bits in a bucket they should assemble themselves into a watch. Baloney. Any mechanistic analogies are also useless and misleading, which is why creationists like them. They sound good at first, so they get people who are only partly listening to say "That's a good point." when in reality under any inspection they are vapid and vacuous. Once again it is simply the religious starting with a premise and them twisting what they observe to fit the premise.