I just went to look at the Fox News site, thinking I might reply to this in an intelligent manner. But no, that would be a waste of time. For fuck's sake. If you can't spot the problem on your own, no one is ever going to be able to point it out for you in a way you understand, because you're retarded.
Nice to see everyone can agree on this... but where the hell were all of you five years ago? Hell, even four years ago. The guy's not suddenly more of a douche now. Seems like most of the crazy bullshit was pulled off during his first term - Iraq, spying, torture, Patriot Act, No Child Left Behind, Enron, etc etc etc. And only NOW he's worthy of impeachment? For what, high gas prices?
In 2004, half of America voted for a guy who did nothing right and everything wrong. They chose to continue down the path of complete fucked-upedness. I say, you wanted it, you got it, bitches. The Republicans, the Limbaugh fans, the Christian wackos, they all had everything they ever wanted - blind control of Congress, the Supreme Court, an executive who felt he was above the law and could do whatever he felt like - yeah, how that'd work out for ya? Me, I won't forget all the bullshit and vitriol those people put us through, and how everything they believed in ended up in failure and ruins. But where are all these people now? Give them a little impeachment filing that goes nowhere, and that's it? These people were chock-full of evil. C'mon, what ever happened to being tarred and feathered?
Oh, sorry, I'll just go put on my flag lapel pin... carry on, nothing to see here...
But it makes sense - they've got the most hated woman in America as their frontrunner, might as well get PR from the most hated company.
All the Democrats have to do to win this election is prop up a reasonably well-spoken middle-aged white guy with good hair, and it's done. Any schmuck'll do. I like how they're determined to make it a challenge, though. I wouldn't be surprised if the ticket ends up being Rosie O'Donnell and OJ Simpson. Whatever it takes, I'm confident the Dems will figure a way to lose.
Wrong. I'm an American who's lived in a third-world country for nearly three years now. Of course there are lots of differences, but still plenty to compare.
You're right, I COULD have done those things. But congratulations, now that you've done it, I'm sure you've changed the original poster's mind and raised the art of discourse for him to new, inspiring levels. He'll walk away from your post a changed man, brother. Good for you, you've done your part to save the world today. Although you only refuted a few of the claims and provided no references, still - well done, sir./Golf clap
Of course, another way of looking at it is: you just completely wasted your time. Why should the original poster listen to you at all? Who are you? Are you on the tee-vee? Do you have your own show? Do you wear a bow tie? See, the difference between you and me is, for some reason, you think you're entering into a rational discussion, during which you can possibly change them, and by extension the world, for the better... me, that's never once been my experience, not EVER NEVER EVER NEVER. Many Americans these days are not equipped for rational discussion and debate. You're not going to change the mind of a person who only sees you as the enemy. What are you, some kind of queer liberal? Why do you hate America? Are you for the terrorists? What, now that you've explained the reality behind two of the original poster's flawed assertions, you think he's gonna start thinking more analytically and reading better on his own? No, chances are he's just going to attack you, and just get stupider and stupider in defending his own ignorance. Maybe not. It's always possible that he might be brighter than that. But in my experience, the odds are heavily against him.
Like my daddy told me before the current Iraqi clusterfuck... I was having an excellent discussion with my cousin, who's a MidEast CIA analyst, and my old man walked up and noticed we were talking about the upcoming war and blurted out, "if you're not in favor of the war, there's something wrong with you!" My cousin and I just nodded and tried to shoo him away as quickly as possible. You see, the ADULTS were trying to have a conversation. And that's not to particularly disparage the old man - he was just doing what millions of other Americans were doing at the time. But, what, I suppose you would sit him down and spend a few hours walking him through the whole thing? If you ever tried that, I think you would realize that at least 9 times out of 10, you'd only be wasting your time and unnecessarily inflating your own blood pressure and stress levels.
I tried that via email with a college professor uncle - we had a debate, of sorts, which consisted of me neatly and academically explaining the situation before the Iraq war and why it was a bad idea, and I successfully knocked down each and every one of his arguments. He even acknowledged that fact. So did he change his mind at the end? Hell, no. Didn't change a thing. It's not about being rational or logical or even factual... these people are True Believers (paging Eric Hoffer). Normally, I'd say they're as worthy of your scorn and pity as Mormons, but when it's regular, bright people getting caught up in the shitstorm, you gotta go bigger scale and ask, what's the real problem here?
I mean, almost half of Americans who voted in 2004 voted for Dubya... despite the fact that the man's administration did absolutely nothing well. You couldn't point to anything the guy did and go, that there's a success. On any scale you care to measure, that administration was a disaster. But you couldn't talk half of America out of voting for the guy. How is such a thing possible?
So you see, me, I only hope to fuck that people like the original poster never frequent the bars I go to, and if they do, my only goal is to see them either cry, soil themselves, leave angry, or otherwise debase themselves for my petty, cruel amusement. But that's me, I'm a douche... you go ahead and keep patiently working with them, slugger. Good luck with that. I admire the optimism, I really do, but I'm too old and pissed-off to join you.
Now, back to my original point... was the original poster a bright young person warped by the media he consumed while growing up, or just an adult retard? I prefer to think the former. Isn't this the real problem we should be tackling?
Refuting what points? We can argue politics, but there's no arguing gibberish. It's like arguing with no-moon-landing conspiracy nuts... what would be the point of arguing from a rational standpoint when the other person has a faith-based one? My point is simply this: I suspect this is what it looks like when a person is brought up by the likes of Coulter, Hannity, Limbaugh, and O'Reilly... where does this go from here? I'm creeped out, personally. We could argue politics when I was in high school, like old-fashioned left-vs-right debates about big ideas, both sides reasonably well-informed from reasonably reliable sources... what is there now? Asshats vs. anti-asshats, while all the reasonable people just roll their eyes? I'm genuinely curious. The political culture of the last 15 years must have filtered down...
Sweet Jesus, does this guy get news from anywhere that doesn't somehow involve the word "Fox?" I've never seen anyone so thoroughly misinformed about practically everything, and so unable to engage in critical thinking or debate. It's kind of impressive, actually. I wonder if this is what happens when people grow up listening to right-wing talk-radio. I thought about that the first time I heard Limbaugh in the early 90s... 15 years later, you get people walking around who've had that sort of nonsensical bombast drilled into their head from an early age, like Catholicism. It's gotta screw a person up.
I was given an old P3-750 Vaio laptop to use while traveling, and as much as I hate everything about Sony and their products, you can't very well argue with free and lightweight. But this POS has turned out to be an even bigger POS than I imagined it would be. God, I hate Sony.
And great, now I'm just waiting for the keyboard to melt through - it really is just a cheap plastic that lays over the CPU heatsink. That'll be perfect. I've already had to replace the hard drive and the power connector. One of the speakers is dead. The touchpad just stopped working a few weeks ago. The CPU fan used to kick on for fifteen seconds out of every thirty, which was incredibly irritating just normally, but then when the fan bearings started to give out, the screeching would damn near make your ears bleed.
I couldn't afford to replace it, even if parts were available in South America, so I just yanked the CPU fan and set it to run at 600mhz. It doesn't get very hot to the touch, but I'm sure it ain't good. It's been running this way for many months now, and so far no keyboard burnthrough... but gee, it has just started spontaneously switching off. Sweet.
Anybody know of any decent IT gigs in Latin America? I need to make some dough and pick up a real computer before this one finally croaks for good.
On the bright side, more news of Sony products fucking up just makes me happy. I've always hated them. Die, Sony, die!
Well, not the Arab name thing, exactly. But I sent money to a girlfriend in Colombia once via Western Union, and it got blocked because her name was similar to a name on a terrorist block list. Sometime last year, I downloaded a list of people on some US government watch list (can't remember where it came from, but I think it was linked from/.), and sure enough, someone with a similar name is on it.
What sucks is, I couldn't get any info from Western Union at all. I sent the money for her to buy a plane ticket, so it was fairly time-critical. I told her the control number and she went to Western Union to get the money, but they said the control number wasn't valid and there wasn't any money for her. She thought I was jerking her around. I spent about two hours on the phone with Western Union trying to figure out where my money went - it just disappeared into a black hole and it took that long to find someone who knew what was going on and how to fix it, and even they couldn't or wouldn't explain what exactly happened.
I'll agree with this. Airbus software is terrifying. I strongly prefer to not fly Airbus if I can avoid it - it's like Microsoft Airplane ME.
Sometimes people don't believe me, but I was on an Airbus redeye one night that had so many problems with the software, they spent 5 hours just trying to leave the gate. They rebooted the entire plane twice, backed away and returned to the gate three times... it was an amazing thing to watch. Even better, because by the end, I was the only passenger on the plane.
Originally, they announced at 11PM that they had to get a new de-icing valve for the airplane, and they MIGHT have one installed by 3AM, and anyone who wanted to wait was welcome to, or they offered everyone a new flight at 8AM. I'm a nightowl anyway, so I stuck around. There were only a few other people who did.
When we boarded at 3AM, there were already mechanics with laptops in the cockpit. I wanted to check out how the mechanics worked, but they weren't anxious to have me hovering over their shoulders. Everything they did, though, was with laptops. They kept swearing it was fixed, then they'd close the door, and then they'd have to return for yet another computer glitch. Gradually the few other passengers got spooked and got off the plane.
A stewardess asked me if I was nervous about the plane... I said, nah, I have little regard for my personal safety anyway. And being the only passenger felt pretty damn cool... much better than an overcrowded 8AM flight with screaming babies, that's for sure. I spent a lot of time hanging out talking with the pilot, who was a great guy.
But then, one glitch involved some kind of flap warning light. This was pre-9/11, and the pilot left the cockpit door open while I sat in the first seat in first class. We started to back away from the gate and the flap light came on. He yelled back to me, whaddaya think, Kirk, we need flaps? I said nah, screw it, we're light anyway, let's just go. The flight crew were running out of time and anxious to get in the air before they timed out... but they pulled back up to the gate and got the mechanics onboard again.
Then the pilot came back and said, OK, now I have a bad feeling about this plane - everything else was just bullshit, but now it's a control surface. Kinda spooky.
I didn't know about the history of Airbus software at the time... but he was right, it's eerie stuff. Still, the few pilots I've talked to say they like flying the Airbus. Just a little nerve-wracking at times. The software does suck.
I almost got to sit up in the cockpit during that flight... the pilot wanted to get me up there, but all the flight crew had to agree it was cool and keep their mouths shut, and one stewardess said no. Dang.
You could ask them just what the hell they mean by "support the troops." The "troops" get free health care, an M-16 and a license to kill - what the hell do they need from you? "Support the troops" is a completely nonsensical bullshit code-phrase which actually means, "if you don't love it when US soldiers go kill little brown people overseas, then you're some kind of terrorist."
Or you could explain how you "support the troops" on an individual basis, in your own way. I can tell you firsthand that some troops are dicks. I fully support them in going to Iraq and getting their limbs blown off. I'm all for it. Send more. As long as you're sending the people who kinda just want to kill other people (cough Pat Tillman cough) off to kill other people who kinda just want to kill people, then you're killing all the right people and opening up better parking spaces for the rest of us [shamelessly ripped off from Doug Stanhope] On the other hand, most troops are decent people, so I support them in remaining in the US with their families, where they can go out for a beer and a hockey game without much chance of getting their limbs blown off.
You could say these things, except anyone who actually uses the phrase "support the troops" is a piece of shit who isn't worth talking to anyway. Ignore them.
You're right, it is a cop-out... and I do feel bad that I'm not there, fighting the good fight, trying to make things better.
On the other hand, I feel better about myself, just not being there. I feel better that I never have to see Fox News ever again. I feel better knowing that even as Dubya spirals the country into the ground and half the people cheer as they go down, I don't have to ride along with them. Hell, I don't even have to pay attention.
Sorry for the cop-out... but I know I'm much happier. Life's too short to tilt at windmills forever.
Bingo. Well said. I have some confidence that somehow, the US will avoid that fate... but the odds don't look especially appealing. And the societal dynamics are even more grim.
OK, now you know of one. And I know a few more where I am. Although it's not entirely fair to say I bailed "because of Mr. Bush's policies." There's several interconnected feelings to it. Like, if the people of the US were actually that fucking retarded to elect that guy in 2004, then there's just no hope for the future of the US. Seems like every trend you care to examine just points downward, and thanks in large part to Dubya and the public response to him, I don't feel good about the country's prospects 10 or 20 or 30 years down the road. Or like, I felt that I lived in such a hypocritical, douchebaggy country, I actually feel better about myself when I'm not there. Or like, I never want to be aware of the existence of Fox News ever, ever again. The fact that I don't want my tax dollars going to support complete insanity is only part of it. You get the idea.
Eh. I liked this debate better back when it was called the Monkey Trial.
I wonder if they'll still be arguing over this BS in another thousand years, or if we'll evolve our way out of this desperate clinging to hokey religions.
AFAIK, no one ever proved that Daniel Dunglas Home was a fraud. Not saying I believe he was the real deal, I'm just saying that perhaps claiming that "EVERY SINGLE EXAMPLE OF IT TO DATE HAS BEEN [proven] FRAUDULENT" may not be accurate. And to call someone a moron when you probably have never even heard of this guy doesn't exactly demonstrate your superior knowledge and intellect on the topic.
Yeah, the ghost attraction thing was there. We didn't do that, but the process of getting to the pool area took us through a bunch of hallways that are part of the ghost attraction. Lots of "spooky" fake cobwebs and such. I dunno, I heard it's actually kinda fun, but we didn't feel like going. Well, officially, anyway. From what I could see in the dark, the pool area doesn't look like it's been significantly messed up. I think they discreetly installed eerie lighting and so on, but it's not like they just ripped out the pool and replaced it with something cheesy.
I believe the engine room is pretty thoroughly closed off. We went everywhere we possibly could in the ship, and didn't manage to get anywhere near the engine room. I know, I wanted to get there, too. Who knows, maybe someone will find the right unlocked door sometime... keep trying!
Anyway, if you ever go back... getting to the pool at night is tricky, like I said. And getting out is even trickier. Just remember the doors are one-way. There's barely any lighting in the pool room at night, so a flashlight would be a good idea. I recommend spending some time just hanging out chatting with the night clerks there... if you seem like a decent sort, who knows, they might give you a bit of a clue about how to do it. Otherwise, just start walking around looking for open doors...
I took my girlfriend to the Queen Mary a few years ago - and man, I don't understand why it's not more popular. We had a fantastic time, and the ship is amazing. I think I paid something like $70/night. I can't recommend it enough.
We spent some time at night wandering around the ship, looking for unlocked doors and just trying to explore as much as possible. Pretty cool girlfriend, I have to say. The big ballrooms are kind of spooky at night. Somewhere deep in the ship, I passed by what looked like some kind of utility door and tried the knob. Locked. But as soon as I stepped away from the door, I heard it buzz, like an electronic lock being opened. I stopped and looked around. We were totally alone. I stepped back towards the door and the buzzing stopped. Locked. Pulled my hand away, and it buzzed again. Then I saw the security camera up in the corner. I thought that was pretty cool... instead of security coming to hassle us for trying to infiltrate the ship, they had some fun with us instead. Gotta respect that.
We did eventually find a way to get into the closed pool area at night. That's supposed to be haunted, but it's now a tourist attraction during the day. It took some work to get to it, but it was very cool... very dark and creepy. Unfortunately, my girlfriend freaked out and wanted to leave right away, saying she felt really cold... the best part was, though, that getting into the pool area was a one-way trip. The doors locked behind us. We had to figure another way out, and it wasn't easy.
Anyway, if you're in Los Angeles, go stay on the ship. The museums are good, the food is good, and the atmosphere can't be beat.
My former office was an old Victorian house on a bluff overlooking the waterfront. It was originally built by the mayor of my town, and for twenty years it was the best restaurant in town. The woman who owned my company bought the building, and she had me oversee the extensive renovations to make it into an office. Great work if you can get it. I loved this building. I even got to pick out my own office (naturally, I got a water view - not bad for being the IT geek).
But everyone in town "knew" the house was haunted. I talked to several people who used to work there when it was a restaurant, and one of my friends actually lived in the upstairs part for several months. He told me that one night, he heard a loud crash from the kitchen area downstairs. He started to go down the stairs to investigate, and heard a series of identical smashing noises. When he got to the kitchen, a box of fluorescent bulbs had been opened and smashed all over the place. He said he sometimes heard strange noises and often felt uncomfortable there.
A former waitress told me that several times, she would set down a tray of dishes in one place, turn around, and then when she turned back it would be moved. The former owners told me all kinds of similar ghost stories. Every Halloween the local paper mentions the building as being the most haunted place in town.
One day, a van full of soldiers on leave from a nearby base pulled up. Apparently, they'd seen my office on some TV show about haunted houses, and had come to check it out. I gave 'em the full tour. One woman, as soon as she set foot upstairs, turned around and went outside to wait in the van. Freaked her out, I guess.
Now, geek that I am, I was always the last person to leave the building at night. And very often, I stayed until the wee hours, all alone in the building. And not a damn thing ever happened. No weird sounds, no smashing bulbs, absolutely nothing.
Although I had to admit... I didn't mind going into the scary old basement when I was alone at night, but going upstairs at night used to freak me out something fierce. Dunno why, it was beautiful and well-lit, but damn, it was just creepy. Daytime wasn't so bad, but at night - forget it.
One night, someone forgot to close a back door properly, and the alarm went off late at night. I showed up to deal with the cops. Since a door was open, they insisted on checking out the building. The cop knew the reputation of the building and was a little spooked himself. When we got upstairs he really got nervous - he told me that he just didn't like it up there. He couldn't believe that I'd work in such a spooky place late at night by myself. I'm like, you're a COP. Which of our jobs is more dangerous?
I like to think that we did such a good job restoring the house that the ghosts took off. Or maybe I scared the ghosts off. Who knows. I'm still a little disappointed, though, that nothing ever happened while I was there. I figured if there were strange things going on all the time, I'd set up a bunch of webcams and such... but nope.
Oh yeah, later, I found out that one of the previous owners had passed away in one of the upstairs bedrooms. On the other hand, the first owner died when he fell down the basement steps, and the basement, aside from just being a spooky old basement and crawling with spiders as big as your hand, wasn't nearly as ooky as the upstairs. So go figure.
What most people don't realize is that while Hannibal "Lecter" isn't real, Hannibal "Lechter" certainly is.
Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lechter was the son of the man who started the famous Lechter's kitchen-appliance chain of stores. His name was changed slightly for the "fictional" books, out of respect for such a fine, fine chain of kitchen-appliance outlets.
(I thought we were past the stage in/.'s evolution where we needed to qualify everything, like the lame "sarcasm" tag and such. For fuck's fucking sake. Here's my qualification: "It's A JOKE, you obnoxious pedantic fucking 12-year-old retard.")
No kidding. This is the first really good thing the FBI has done since... um... well... catching Hannibal Lechter?
Nice to know that in this age of busting porno sites and morons like the supposed "dirty bomber" guy and failing to catch real terrorists... the feds can at least bust one spammer. And wasn't Ralsky the guy whose personal information was posted all over Slashdot years ago? OK, OK, I'm not gonna complain that it only took them 3 or 5 or whatever years... at least they did it. So what's that make their ratio of doing something good versus doing something completely pointless and needlessly fucking over innocent people? 1:100,000 or so? Things are looking up!
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I just went to look at the Fox News site, thinking I might reply to this in an intelligent manner. But no, that would be a waste of time. For fuck's sake. If you can't spot the problem on your own, no one is ever going to be able to point it out for you in a way you understand, because you're retarded.
Screw India - you could probably find IT work in Colombia, where you'd have the opportunity to work 60-hour weeks and bring home a whole $400/month.
Yeah, working in developing countries is awesome.
Nice to see everyone can agree on this... but where the hell were all of you five years ago? Hell, even four years ago. The guy's not suddenly more of a douche now. Seems like most of the crazy bullshit was pulled off during his first term - Iraq, spying, torture, Patriot Act, No Child Left Behind, Enron, etc etc etc. And only NOW he's worthy of impeachment? For what, high gas prices?
In 2004, half of America voted for a guy who did nothing right and everything wrong. They chose to continue down the path of complete fucked-upedness. I say, you wanted it, you got it, bitches. The Republicans, the Limbaugh fans, the Christian wackos, they all had everything they ever wanted - blind control of Congress, the Supreme Court, an executive who felt he was above the law and could do whatever he felt like - yeah, how that'd work out for ya? Me, I won't forget all the bullshit and vitriol those people put us through, and how everything they believed in ended up in failure and ruins. But where are all these people now? Give them a little impeachment filing that goes nowhere, and that's it? These people were chock-full of evil. C'mon, what ever happened to being tarred and feathered?
Oh, sorry, I'll just go put on my flag lapel pin... carry on, nothing to see here...
But it makes sense - they've got the most hated woman in America as their frontrunner, might as well get PR from the most hated company.
All the Democrats have to do to win this election is prop up a reasonably well-spoken middle-aged white guy with good hair, and it's done. Any schmuck'll do. I like how they're determined to make it a challenge, though. I wouldn't be surprised if the ticket ends up being Rosie O'Donnell and OJ Simpson. Whatever it takes, I'm confident the Dems will figure a way to lose.
Wrong. I'm an American who's lived in a third-world country for nearly three years now. Of course there are lots of differences, but still plenty to compare.
You're right, I COULD have done those things. But congratulations, now that you've done it, I'm sure you've changed the original poster's mind and raised the art of discourse for him to new, inspiring levels. He'll walk away from your post a changed man, brother. Good for you, you've done your part to save the world today. Although you only refuted a few of the claims and provided no references, still - well done, sir. /Golf clap
Of course, another way of looking at it is: you just completely wasted your time. Why should the original poster listen to you at all? Who are you? Are you on the tee-vee? Do you have your own show? Do you wear a bow tie? See, the difference between you and me is, for some reason, you think you're entering into a rational discussion, during which you can possibly change them, and by extension the world, for the better... me, that's never once been my experience, not EVER NEVER EVER NEVER. Many Americans these days are not equipped for rational discussion and debate. You're not going to change the mind of a person who only sees you as the enemy. What are you, some kind of queer liberal? Why do you hate America? Are you for the terrorists? What, now that you've explained the reality behind two of the original poster's flawed assertions, you think he's gonna start thinking more analytically and reading better on his own? No, chances are he's just going to attack you, and just get stupider and stupider in defending his own ignorance. Maybe not. It's always possible that he might be brighter than that. But in my experience, the odds are heavily against him.
Like my daddy told me before the current Iraqi clusterfuck... I was having an excellent discussion with my cousin, who's a MidEast CIA analyst, and my old man walked up and noticed we were talking about the upcoming war and blurted out, "if you're not in favor of the war, there's something wrong with you!" My cousin and I just nodded and tried to shoo him away as quickly as possible. You see, the ADULTS were trying to have a conversation. And that's not to particularly disparage the old man - he was just doing what millions of other Americans were doing at the time. But, what, I suppose you would sit him down and spend a few hours walking him through the whole thing? If you ever tried that, I think you would realize that at least 9 times out of 10, you'd only be wasting your time and unnecessarily inflating your own blood pressure and stress levels.
I tried that via email with a college professor uncle - we had a debate, of sorts, which consisted of me neatly and academically explaining the situation before the Iraq war and why it was a bad idea, and I successfully knocked down each and every one of his arguments. He even acknowledged that fact. So did he change his mind at the end? Hell, no. Didn't change a thing. It's not about being rational or logical or even factual... these people are True Believers (paging Eric Hoffer). Normally, I'd say they're as worthy of your scorn and pity as Mormons, but when it's regular, bright people getting caught up in the shitstorm, you gotta go bigger scale and ask, what's the real problem here?
I mean, almost half of Americans who voted in 2004 voted for Dubya... despite the fact that the man's administration did absolutely nothing well. You couldn't point to anything the guy did and go, that there's a success. On any scale you care to measure, that administration was a disaster. But you couldn't talk half of America out of voting for the guy. How is such a thing possible?
So you see, me, I only hope to fuck that people like the original poster never frequent the bars I go to, and if they do, my only goal is to see them either cry, soil themselves, leave angry, or otherwise debase themselves for my petty, cruel amusement. But that's me, I'm a douche... you go ahead and keep patiently working with them, slugger. Good luck with that. I admire the optimism, I really do, but I'm too old and pissed-off to join you.
Now, back to my original point... was the original poster a bright young person warped by the media he consumed while growing up, or just an adult retard? I prefer to think the former. Isn't this the real problem we should be tackling?
Refuting what points? We can argue politics, but there's no arguing gibberish. It's like arguing with no-moon-landing conspiracy nuts... what would be the point of arguing from a rational standpoint when the other person has a faith-based one? My point is simply this: I suspect this is what it looks like when a person is brought up by the likes of Coulter, Hannity, Limbaugh, and O'Reilly... where does this go from here? I'm creeped out, personally. We could argue politics when I was in high school, like old-fashioned left-vs-right debates about big ideas, both sides reasonably well-informed from reasonably reliable sources... what is there now? Asshats vs. anti-asshats, while all the reasonable people just roll their eyes? I'm genuinely curious. The political culture of the last 15 years must have filtered down...
Sweet Jesus, does this guy get news from anywhere that doesn't somehow involve the word "Fox?" I've never seen anyone so thoroughly misinformed about practically everything, and so unable to engage in critical thinking or debate. It's kind of impressive, actually. I wonder if this is what happens when people grow up listening to right-wing talk-radio. I thought about that the first time I heard Limbaugh in the early 90s... 15 years later, you get people walking around who've had that sort of nonsensical bombast drilled into their head from an early age, like Catholicism. It's gotta screw a person up.
I was given an old P3-750 Vaio laptop to use while traveling, and as much as I hate everything about Sony and their products, you can't very well argue with free and lightweight. But this POS has turned out to be an even bigger POS than I imagined it would be. God, I hate Sony.
And great, now I'm just waiting for the keyboard to melt through - it really is just a cheap plastic that lays over the CPU heatsink. That'll be perfect. I've already had to replace the hard drive and the power connector. One of the speakers is dead. The touchpad just stopped working a few weeks ago. The CPU fan used to kick on for fifteen seconds out of every thirty, which was incredibly irritating just normally, but then when the fan bearings started to give out, the screeching would damn near make your ears bleed.
I couldn't afford to replace it, even if parts were available in South America, so I just yanked the CPU fan and set it to run at 600mhz. It doesn't get very hot to the touch, but I'm sure it ain't good. It's been running this way for many months now, and so far no keyboard burnthrough... but gee, it has just started spontaneously switching off. Sweet.
Anybody know of any decent IT gigs in Latin America? I need to make some dough and pick up a real computer before this one finally croaks for good.
On the bright side, more news of Sony products fucking up just makes me happy. I've always hated them. Die, Sony, die!
Well, not the Arab name thing, exactly. But I sent money to a girlfriend in Colombia once via Western Union, and it got blocked because her name was similar to a name on a terrorist block list. Sometime last year, I downloaded a list of people on some US government watch list (can't remember where it came from, but I think it was linked from /.), and sure enough, someone with a similar name is on it.
What sucks is, I couldn't get any info from Western Union at all. I sent the money for her to buy a plane ticket, so it was fairly time-critical. I told her the control number and she went to Western Union to get the money, but they said the control number wasn't valid and there wasn't any money for her. She thought I was jerking her around. I spent about two hours on the phone with Western Union trying to figure out where my money went - it just disappeared into a black hole and it took that long to find someone who knew what was going on and how to fix it, and even they couldn't or wouldn't explain what exactly happened.
Western Union blows.
I'll agree with this. Airbus software is terrifying. I strongly prefer to not fly Airbus if I can avoid it - it's like Microsoft Airplane ME.
Sometimes people don't believe me, but I was on an Airbus redeye one night that had so many problems with the software, they spent 5 hours just trying to leave the gate. They rebooted the entire plane twice, backed away and returned to the gate three times... it was an amazing thing to watch. Even better, because by the end, I was the only passenger on the plane.
Originally, they announced at 11PM that they had to get a new de-icing valve for the airplane, and they MIGHT have one installed by 3AM, and anyone who wanted to wait was welcome to, or they offered everyone a new flight at 8AM. I'm a nightowl anyway, so I stuck around. There were only a few other people who did.
When we boarded at 3AM, there were already mechanics with laptops in the cockpit. I wanted to check out how the mechanics worked, but they weren't anxious to have me hovering over their shoulders. Everything they did, though, was with laptops. They kept swearing it was fixed, then they'd close the door, and then they'd have to return for yet another computer glitch. Gradually the few other passengers got spooked and got off the plane.
A stewardess asked me if I was nervous about the plane... I said, nah, I have little regard for my personal safety anyway. And being the only passenger felt pretty damn cool... much better than an overcrowded 8AM flight with screaming babies, that's for sure. I spent a lot of time hanging out talking with the pilot, who was a great guy.
But then, one glitch involved some kind of flap warning light. This was pre-9/11, and the pilot left the cockpit door open while I sat in the first seat in first class. We started to back away from the gate and the flap light came on. He yelled back to me, whaddaya think, Kirk, we need flaps? I said nah, screw it, we're light anyway, let's just go. The flight crew were running out of time and anxious to get in the air before they timed out... but they pulled back up to the gate and got the mechanics onboard again.
Then the pilot came back and said, OK, now I have a bad feeling about this plane - everything else was just bullshit, but now it's a control surface. Kinda spooky.
I didn't know about the history of Airbus software at the time... but he was right, it's eerie stuff. Still, the few pilots I've talked to say they like flying the Airbus. Just a little nerve-wracking at times. The software does suck.
I almost got to sit up in the cockpit during that flight... the pilot wanted to get me up there, but all the flight crew had to agree it was cool and keep their mouths shut, and one stewardess said no. Dang.
You could ask them just what the hell they mean by "support the troops." The "troops" get free health care, an M-16 and a license to kill - what the hell do they need from you? "Support the troops" is a completely nonsensical bullshit code-phrase which actually means, "if you don't love it when US soldiers go kill little brown people overseas, then you're some kind of terrorist."
Or you could explain how you "support the troops" on an individual basis, in your own way. I can tell you firsthand that some troops are dicks. I fully support them in going to Iraq and getting their limbs blown off. I'm all for it. Send more. As long as you're sending the people who kinda just want to kill other people (cough Pat Tillman cough) off to kill other people who kinda just want to kill people, then you're killing all the right people and opening up better parking spaces for the rest of us [shamelessly ripped off from Doug Stanhope] On the other hand, most troops are decent people, so I support them in remaining in the US with their families, where they can go out for a beer and a hockey game without much chance of getting their limbs blown off.
You could say these things, except anyone who actually uses the phrase "support the troops" is a piece of shit who isn't worth talking to anyway. Ignore them.
You're right, it is a cop-out... and I do feel bad that I'm not there, fighting the good fight, trying to make things better.
On the other hand, I feel better about myself, just not being there. I feel better that I never have to see Fox News ever again. I feel better knowing that even as Dubya spirals the country into the ground and half the people cheer as they go down, I don't have to ride along with them. Hell, I don't even have to pay attention.
Sorry for the cop-out... but I know I'm much happier. Life's too short to tilt at windmills forever.
Bingo. Well said. I have some confidence that somehow, the US will avoid that fate... but the odds don't look especially appealing. And the societal dynamics are even more grim.
OK, now you know of one. And I know a few more where I am. Although it's not entirely fair to say I bailed "because of Mr. Bush's policies." There's several interconnected feelings to it. Like, if the people of the US were actually that fucking retarded to elect that guy in 2004, then there's just no hope for the future of the US. Seems like every trend you care to examine just points downward, and thanks in large part to Dubya and the public response to him, I don't feel good about the country's prospects 10 or 20 or 30 years down the road. Or like, I felt that I lived in such a hypocritical, douchebaggy country, I actually feel better about myself when I'm not there. Or like, I never want to be aware of the existence of Fox News ever, ever again. The fact that I don't want my tax dollars going to support complete insanity is only part of it. You get the idea.
Eh. I liked this debate better back when it was called the Monkey Trial.
I wonder if they'll still be arguing over this BS in another thousand years, or if we'll evolve our way out of this desperate clinging to hokey religions.
AFAIK, no one ever proved that Daniel Dunglas Home was a fraud. Not saying I believe he was the real deal, I'm just saying that perhaps claiming that "EVERY SINGLE EXAMPLE OF IT TO DATE HAS BEEN [proven] FRAUDULENT" may not be accurate. And to call someone a moron when you probably have never even heard of this guy doesn't exactly demonstrate your superior knowledge and intellect on the topic.
Yeah, the ghost attraction thing was there. We didn't do that, but the process of getting to the pool area took us through a bunch of hallways that are part of the ghost attraction. Lots of "spooky" fake cobwebs and such. I dunno, I heard it's actually kinda fun, but we didn't feel like going. Well, officially, anyway. From what I could see in the dark, the pool area doesn't look like it's been significantly messed up. I think they discreetly installed eerie lighting and so on, but it's not like they just ripped out the pool and replaced it with something cheesy.
I believe the engine room is pretty thoroughly closed off. We went everywhere we possibly could in the ship, and didn't manage to get anywhere near the engine room. I know, I wanted to get there, too. Who knows, maybe someone will find the right unlocked door sometime... keep trying!
Anyway, if you ever go back... getting to the pool at night is tricky, like I said. And getting out is even trickier. Just remember the doors are one-way. There's barely any lighting in the pool room at night, so a flashlight would be a good idea. I recommend spending some time just hanging out chatting with the night clerks there... if you seem like a decent sort, who knows, they might give you a bit of a clue about how to do it. Otherwise, just start walking around looking for open doors...
I took my girlfriend to the Queen Mary a few years ago - and man, I don't understand why it's not more popular. We had a fantastic time, and the ship is amazing. I think I paid something like $70/night. I can't recommend it enough.
We spent some time at night wandering around the ship, looking for unlocked doors and just trying to explore as much as possible. Pretty cool girlfriend, I have to say. The big ballrooms are kind of spooky at night. Somewhere deep in the ship, I passed by what looked like some kind of utility door and tried the knob. Locked. But as soon as I stepped away from the door, I heard it buzz, like an electronic lock being opened. I stopped and looked around. We were totally alone. I stepped back towards the door and the buzzing stopped. Locked. Pulled my hand away, and it buzzed again. Then I saw the security camera up in the corner. I thought that was pretty cool... instead of security coming to hassle us for trying to infiltrate the ship, they had some fun with us instead. Gotta respect that.
We did eventually find a way to get into the closed pool area at night. That's supposed to be haunted, but it's now a tourist attraction during the day. It took some work to get to it, but it was very cool... very dark and creepy. Unfortunately, my girlfriend freaked out and wanted to leave right away, saying she felt really cold... the best part was, though, that getting into the pool area was a one-way trip. The doors locked behind us. We had to figure another way out, and it wasn't easy.
Anyway, if you're in Los Angeles, go stay on the ship. The museums are good, the food is good, and the atmosphere can't be beat.
My former office was an old Victorian house on a bluff overlooking the waterfront. It was originally built by the mayor of my town, and for twenty years it was the best restaurant in town. The woman who owned my company bought the building, and she had me oversee the extensive renovations to make it into an office. Great work if you can get it. I loved this building. I even got to pick out my own office (naturally, I got a water view - not bad for being the IT geek).
But everyone in town "knew" the house was haunted. I talked to several people who used to work there when it was a restaurant, and one of my friends actually lived in the upstairs part for several months. He told me that one night, he heard a loud crash from the kitchen area downstairs. He started to go down the stairs to investigate, and heard a series of identical smashing noises. When he got to the kitchen, a box of fluorescent bulbs had been opened and smashed all over the place. He said he sometimes heard strange noises and often felt uncomfortable there.
A former waitress told me that several times, she would set down a tray of dishes in one place, turn around, and then when she turned back it would be moved. The former owners told me all kinds of similar ghost stories. Every Halloween the local paper mentions the building as being the most haunted place in town.
One day, a van full of soldiers on leave from a nearby base pulled up. Apparently, they'd seen my office on some TV show about haunted houses, and had come to check it out. I gave 'em the full tour. One woman, as soon as she set foot upstairs, turned around and went outside to wait in the van. Freaked her out, I guess.
Now, geek that I am, I was always the last person to leave the building at night. And very often, I stayed until the wee hours, all alone in the building. And not a damn thing ever happened. No weird sounds, no smashing bulbs, absolutely nothing.
Although I had to admit... I didn't mind going into the scary old basement when I was alone at night, but going upstairs at night used to freak me out something fierce. Dunno why, it was beautiful and well-lit, but damn, it was just creepy. Daytime wasn't so bad, but at night - forget it.
One night, someone forgot to close a back door properly, and the alarm went off late at night. I showed up to deal with the cops. Since a door was open, they insisted on checking out the building. The cop knew the reputation of the building and was a little spooked himself. When we got upstairs he really got nervous - he told me that he just didn't like it up there. He couldn't believe that I'd work in such a spooky place late at night by myself. I'm like, you're a COP. Which of our jobs is more dangerous?
I like to think that we did such a good job restoring the house that the ghosts took off. Or maybe I scared the ghosts off. Who knows. I'm still a little disappointed, though, that nothing ever happened while I was there. I figured if there were strange things going on all the time, I'd set up a bunch of webcams and such... but nope.
Oh yeah, later, I found out that one of the previous owners had passed away in one of the upstairs bedrooms. On the other hand, the first owner died when he fell down the basement steps, and the basement, aside from just being a spooky old basement and crawling with spiders as big as your hand, wasn't nearly as ooky as the upstairs. So go figure.
Whatever happened to the Oqo? Split the difference between a PDA and an ultraportable laptop... doesn't sound so bad to me.
(hello, pedantic nitwits - it's a joke)
What most people don't realize is that while Hannibal "Lecter" isn't real, Hannibal "Lechter" certainly is.
Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lechter was the son of the man who started the famous Lechter's kitchen-appliance chain of stores. His name was changed slightly for the "fictional" books, out of respect for such a fine, fine chain of kitchen-appliance outlets.
True story. Look it up.
Says you. Jerkface.
/.'s evolution where we needed to qualify everything, like the lame "sarcasm" tag and such. For fuck's fucking sake. Here's my qualification: "It's A JOKE, you obnoxious pedantic fucking 12-year-old retard.")
(I thought we were past the stage in
No kidding. This is the first really good thing the FBI has done since... um... well... catching Hannibal Lechter?
Nice to know that in this age of busting porno sites and morons like the supposed "dirty bomber" guy and failing to catch real terrorists... the feds can at least bust one spammer. And wasn't Ralsky the guy whose personal information was posted all over Slashdot years ago? OK, OK, I'm not gonna complain that it only took them 3 or 5 or whatever years... at least they did it. So what's that make their ratio of doing something good versus doing something completely pointless and needlessly fucking over innocent people? 1:100,000 or so? Things are looking up!