In the words of Ben Franklin, "they that give up essential liberty to obtain temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Whenever I hear this quote, I have to wonder which essential liberity he was talking about. Because he might have been discussing the virtues of maintaining a minstress over a wife. He was quite the lady's man.
Maybe someone else can find that quote of his with him talking about the virtues of having an older mistress over a younger mistress. Classic stuff...
Are there book rental fees at this school? I have a real issue with the book rental fees at the property tax funded public schools in my area. Parents are paying book purchase price rental fees on new to eight year old books every year (most books are probably around six years old.) At these prices, the kids should be getting new books and they should get to keep them at the end of the year
I salute your dedication to the cause, but was this a reply to my post, or did you accidently reply to the wrong one?
So much of this entire overall topic seems non-sequetor... Am I the only one that didn't get happy pills? Gimme damn it!
Charter schools aren't just any corporation. They receive taxpayer money to do a job usually performed by government bodies (public schools) and are therefore acting as an arm of government. So yeah, I'd say this is a First Amendment issue.
Maybe I'm missing something, but since went does accepting money from the government allow libel and slander to become protected by the First Amendement?
Whether or not Charter Schools (or any other corporations for that matter) have in fact accepted money from the government has little relevancy to free speech issues.
This is a little harsh, I think. First of all, the judge isn't saying "I believe that the wiretap target is guilty, therefore I authorize the wiretap." You don't have to be presumed guilty for a warrant to be necessary--there just has to be some indication that you may be guilty, the purpose of the warrant being to find out for sure.
If it's a normal criminal warrents. But if it's a FISA warrant, by law (Foreign Intelligence Surveilance Act of 1978 + minor USA PATRIOT Act changes) they only need to show that you have "some connection" to a terrorism or counterintelligence investigation. A FISA judge is then REQUIRED to provide them with the warrant.
Actually I'd like to see a point by point comparison between the Survivor Show and the 2004 Presidential Election. I bet the content is actually pretty similar.
"I would say that if the reforms would happen that the UN would benefit greatlly from their own military force. The problem there only is that the question is: Where would you stage them? How would you make certain that they really only answer to the council?"
More importantly, how would they fund such a force? Without the power to tax, maintaining a standing army is impossible. Currently the UN infastructure is paid for by donor nations as stipulated in its charter. As such, without a totally new charter, providing an enforcement unit over which the UN officals have full command is impossible.
"Yes, one has to reserve the force as the last resort, and that means if there is sufficent evidence then one can prepare to defend onself, but the moment you attack first you lose any moral grouind you may have."
We may agree on the origins of WWII, but here we find a major point of contention.
One of the basic tenants of "Enlightenment" government was that citizens bind themselves to an authority with the understanding that this authority would protect them against all others. This is always tempered by prevailing moral positions, but underlying all of this is the authority's "duty" to provide this protection.
Clausewitz during Bismarck's time was right, the ability to make war is an extension of foreign policy. Diplomacy and warmaking are stepchildren of the same mother.
Since it has been impossible to shake the policy implication of Iraq, as a specific example, I'll follow your lead and utilize this conflict rather than say the Russo-Japanesse War or others.
US armed conflict with Iraq has continued without break under three administrations since its inception in the early 1990s. The nature of that armed conflict has changed during this time, but Iraq has been considered a belligerant nation since then, and treated as such.
While I will grant that international sanctions do appear to have sufficiently dilluted Saddam's capacity to produce many types of destructive arms, there was no Memorandum of Understanding or Peace involved in the conflicts. The nature of Saddam as a belligerent did not change, and arguably never changed.
In retrospect however, we must also consider the corruption now found in the few legitimate trade channels (Oil-for-Food, etc) that were likely counterproductive in regard to these sanctions. Ironically, it was probably this funding that found its way into the pockets of the "con-men" who bilked millions out of Saddam for "weapons research". While this research was happening largely only on paper, it was this information that was intercepted by French, Russian and Isreali signal intelligence. They in turn passed it over to Bush-43 as credible threat information after it was learned that Saddam's intelligence unit was planning attacks on American soil (as the sole actor or as a facilitator we will never know).
I've framed the origins of this conflict in this way because I believe it has several extremely relevent aspects to it. Namely - (1) Saddam's administration was classified as a belligerant by the US, (2) Saddam was believed to have and proported to have capacity to project covert force, (3) numerous allies presented "intelligence" that indicated that Saddam was actively seeking opportunity to exercise that capacity directly against the US, and (4) Saddam insistance on remaining non-compliant with weapons inspectors dilluted any hope that non-warhawk US administration members had of resolving this without bloodshed.
Most of my account I don't believe is controvesial. However, how one moves from these four points to action or remaining inactive depends on your world view and your stake in the threat assessment process.
For the French for example, Saddam had not directly threatened them. To the contrary, he had signed several major oil leases with them. They actually had much to lose if Saddam's administration was toppled because those leases would disappear in a cloud of smoke along with the
"The Stalingrad Battle lasted 200 days and nights..."
Also keep in mind that July 17, 1942 wasn't the first time Stalingrad was attacked. It was only the beginning of a military offensive within the context of a larger campaign.
With the grandparent's opinion, the significance of Bush's National Missile Defense Network and analog air- and space-based counterparts have a more prophetic purpose. Right or wrong, he isn't alone in sharing this viewpoint. Missile Defense technology could introduce the post-post-MAD age. Such a development has been long predicted, even if the technology isn't a proven fact today.
Germany pretended that the poles attacked Germany first, this gave them the "moral reason" to invade poland."
Actually as I understand it, most historians view the causal beginning of WWII as being attributed to the failure of Britian and France to respond to the violations of the Lacarno Pact and the Treaty of Versaille. Specificially though Hitler's seizure of Czech land (an autonomous region setup by the Treaty of Versaille), but also due to the British concession of their 3/5ths "commonwealth" fleet allowance which ensured Hitler's trajectory. But Hitler had to have his Lebensraum, and the later invasion of Poland was an extension of this goal originally initiated in Czech territory.
The UN has never been more than a convenient place for diplomates to address each other as a sitting body (everyone in a common place). When it was ostensibly under the League of Nations charter (as created after WWI), many wished to give it an enforcement capacity. It was this inate interferance in local sovereignty that spelled its downfall. And for the UN, ironically it is its lack of such capacity that renders it uncapable of dealing effectively with with security issues.
"I do not believe that any country has the right to launch a pre-emptive war, because on a moral ground a pre-emtive war isn't anymore justified than an aggression war."
I'm not sure why you insist on couching this in moral terms. Taking a moral position is nice, but when faced with imminant threat, it is often an afterthought.
Am I correct in understanding your opinion to be that, one does not have the right to attack another country until one has been physically attacked?
"I'm finding better deals and less hassle through online stores anyway."
Specifically the store manager needs to be sacked for not handling this in a more diplomatic fashion. Unless this guy represented a threat to the people in the store (someone being accused of counterfeiting $2 bills doesn't initially strike me as being a violent threat), the store manager should have asked the police officer and the man to come to the manager's office. This stuff should always be conducted in a more private setting, but at the least away from other customers.
This is the type of manager that would allow a warrant enforcement officer to serve a warrant on a cashiers on the floor while that cashier is working the till. Way to build customer and employee confidence jackass.
Identical numbers is believable, for a simple copying setup, but sequential? Whatever mechanism a counterfeiter has to add serial numbers to the unnumbered bills coming off the copier/printer, making it a non-repeating psuedo-random sequence, or simply adding 4357 instead of 1 for each cycle, is trivial.
We can count out professional criminals (intelligent and organized) since there is no economy of scale for counterfeiting $2 bills.
That said, the rest of the criminal gene pool for this type of activity is probably too stupid to even think of using a "non-repeating pseudo-random sequence".
These are the type of people that buy a soda with their own credit card just prior to committing armed robbery in the very same store. As a cheap source of comedy, however, stupid criminals do serve a greater purpose in society.
So does that mean that Country X doesn't have a right to preempt an attack by invasion?
I specifically provided the example as such so it would not be confused with any of the currently ongoing conflicts. Additionally, the question has nothing to do with non-state actors (e.g. transnational terrorists) only with actors within the scope of sovereign governments.
If nothing else, the delimma (even if it is not strictly realistic by itself) illustrates some of the decisions governments are forced to make when dealing with threat assessment.
"One has the right to defend oneself, but not by invading first."
Lets say you are President of Country X, and your intelligence network says that the President of Country Y is planning to covertly detinate nuclear weapons in your country. You go to Allies A, B, C and D who tell you that their intelligence networks also tell them the same thing.
As with all rational decision making, one is limited to the quantity and quality of the relevant information you have access too. Knowing that intelligence is not always fully accurate, do you invade the country? Or wait til they detinate those nuclear weapons before invading?
"I do not believe that the "preemptive" going to war or killing others is agreeable or just be allowed."
Do you believe one only has the right to self-defense after one has been attacked? Or is there a time at which one can preempt one's enemy and attack first? If so, where is that line?
"The point I was trying to get to was that there always were armed conflictes throughout the history. The situation for the world as a whole has not changed. Thus to argue that the US needs to build up a very strong military force in order to "contain" these events is pretty much a marketing gag by the Whitehouse."
I think we may have a disagreement concerning what type of force >I think the US needs to build up.
As you and several other posters have pointed out, the immediate potential for total warfare seems distant (particularly in a post-MAD world, but even more so after the Cold War).
An effective armed forces needs individuals and units that excel at killing other people. This seems to be an area in which the US has some measure of skill. This is an important part of the military, but I think we already have plenty of capacity for killing as is.
The other function of the armed forces is increasingly to provide training and logistics for native militaries, and to work as a formal security parter (within a coalition) in a given theatre. In this area the US does not have near the capacity that is needed. It needs to easily be doubled or tripled, and since it's a long process to train these type of people it needs to start now.
Still even more forces need to be trained for covert missions. For example, when the US recieved reports France that Saddams intelligence units were planning covert ops in the US, they should have done their own covert operation and assasinated Saddam. Instead they asked the UN to help, and when the UN did nothing, they invaded Iraq which led to far too much needless death.
"Probably true, but why? We need more security? So we can invade some more countries and then rebuild them at great expense?"
To some degree, we are protecting all the Free Trade Agreements we signed in the last 20 years. Some of the signitories do not have need security mechanisms which must be comparible to their economic mechanisms. In many cases, the US (and much of NATO and the UN) is willing to provide at least some of that security support. Maybe it's in the training of a local military, or maybe it's funding via USAID or the World Bank.
The modern world needs the exchange of information and goods that globalization provides. But the inherent conflict that globalization causes requires a strong security model as well. The US is playing a big part in that outside of its immediate sphere of influence, as is much of Europe and Asia.
Ultimately they do it because they believe maintaining free trade and security will lead to more prosperity at home and around the world. A good example of this comes in asking why the US bail out the Brazilian banking system a couple years ago? The US did it because a strong Brazil is a critical trading and security partner in that region of the world.
"The only country right now I see projecting force outside of it's own borders under strange ideas is actually the US, the sabel ratteling that is done by the other countries is (so far) just that. And heck, if the situation would be reverse, so would be the US."
Not only is your premise false, but it undercuts the actions of most of Europe (France, Germany, UK, Denmark, etc) and a number of African countries which are projecting military force in places like Bosnia, the Ivory Coast, Afghanistan, Haiti, Sudan, DRC and a number of other smaller theatres. All of these situations are experiencing the projected force of a formally declared military. And the number of countries projecting force through less formal conduits is far larger.
Although when argued from the qualifier of some vague notion of "strange ideals" I suppose it might be impossible for me to actually discern your point of view.
"Welcome to the world since the end of WorldWar II, where all those small little conflicts happened constantly."
Actually, if you want to express this change in terms of a lack of the potential for 'total' warfare, you really have to look at the reductions after the end of the Cold War as being the real change. Both the scale and nature of the US-Soviet Proxy wars in the 60-80s demostrate them as far removed from the plethera of police actions you see today.
"I have a plan to balance the budget without increasing taxes (and I want your vote). Drastically reduce in size and scope the Military. Unfortunaly no mainstream candidates seem to be advocating this common sense solution but if something isn't done the military will destroy our beloved nation. Remember, the Soviet Union fell with a bank statement, not a napalm atack."
You are trying to utilize a security v. disarmament paradigm in a world that needs security right now. Disarmament only works if it is unilateral, and unfortunately we live in a world that has North Korea, Iran and Venezuela as entities willing to pursue their goals outside of the realm of diplomacy and economic leverage.
Welcome to the year 2005! Limited war and police action is the name of the game, and the U.S. military is frequently the only regional security vendor in many world markets.
You won't see anything but an increase in military funding in the next 10 years, and that's a good thing. Globalization needs strong security controls and safeguards. The U.S. military through its operating centers around the world provides that. The size, scope and nature of the U.S. military is changing. Because the U.S. needs them, the World needs them, and you need them.
If Microsoft is smart, they will use this as an intelligence gathering tool as well.
Once they are found, a big advantage to these lawsuits is the opportunity to actually question these spammers. Under threat of a financially debilitating lawsuit by a powerful company, I'd imagine at least a couple of these spammers will be willing to spill their guts about how they do business and who they learned the trade from.
This is a learned skillset and relatively complicated in terms of number of steps to completion. This kind of intelligence should be a boon for driving security procedures.
Depending on the circumstances, DoJ can always apply for a FISA pen trap and trace warrant. Due to FISA changes by the non-sunsetting sections of Title 2 of the USA PATRIOT Act, the procedural differences between PSTN and "other" communications mediums have pretty much disappeared entirely. Even content warrants under FISA can avail themselves of these changes (which is scary seeing as how what electronic content actually is isn't well defined in law).
Slashdot Mirror
Must be a Republican.
I think the correct term is Capitalist, but I can understand how easy they are to confuse.
How does that take into account the "revisionist" and "post-revisionist" trends in historical research?
In the words of Ben Franklin, "they that give up essential liberty to obtain temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Whenever I hear this quote, I have to wonder which essential liberity he was talking about. Because he might have been discussing the virtues of maintaining a minstress over a wife. He was quite the lady's man.
Maybe someone else can find that quote of his with him talking about the virtues of having an older mistress over a younger mistress. Classic stuff...
It scares me that your post was modded "Insightful" rather than "Funny". Seriously, I'm scared.
Are there book rental fees at this school? I have a real issue with the book rental fees at the property tax funded public schools in my area. Parents are paying book purchase price rental fees on new to eight year old books every year (most books are probably around six years old.) At these prices, the kids should be getting new books and they should get to keep them at the end of the year
I salute your dedication to the cause, but was this a reply to my post, or did you accidently reply to the wrong one?
So much of this entire overall topic seems non-sequetor... Am I the only one that didn't get happy pills? Gimme damn it!
Charter schools aren't just any corporation. They receive taxpayer money to do a job usually performed by government bodies (public schools) and are therefore acting as an arm of government. So yeah, I'd say this is a First Amendment issue.
Maybe I'm missing something, but since went does accepting money from the government allow libel and slander to become protected by the First Amendement?
Whether or not Charter Schools (or any other corporations for that matter) have in fact accepted money from the government has little relevancy to free speech issues.
This is a little harsh, I think. First of all, the judge isn't saying "I believe that the wiretap target is guilty, therefore I authorize the wiretap." You don't have to be presumed guilty for a warrant to be necessary--there just has to be some indication that you may be guilty, the purpose of the warrant being to find out for sure.
If it's a normal criminal warrents. But if it's a FISA warrant, by law (Foreign Intelligence Surveilance Act of 1978 + minor USA PATRIOT Act changes) they only need to show that you have "some connection" to a terrorism or counterintelligence investigation. A FISA judge is then REQUIRED to provide them with the warrant.
Actually I'd like to see a point by point comparison between the Survivor Show and the 2004 Presidential Election. I bet the content is actually pretty similar.
"I would say that if the reforms would happen that the UN would benefit greatlly from their own military force. The problem there only is that the question is: Where would you stage them? How would you make certain that they really only answer to the council?"
More importantly, how would they fund such a force? Without the power to tax, maintaining a standing army is impossible. Currently the UN infastructure is paid for by donor nations as stipulated in its charter. As such, without a totally new charter, providing an enforcement unit over which the UN officals have full command is impossible.
"Yes, one has to reserve the force as the last resort, and that means if there is sufficent evidence then one can prepare to defend onself, but the moment you attack first you lose any moral grouind you may have."
We may agree on the origins of WWII, but here we find a major point of contention.
One of the basic tenants of "Enlightenment" government was that citizens bind themselves to an authority with the understanding that this authority would protect them against all others. This is always tempered by prevailing moral positions, but underlying all of this is the authority's "duty" to provide this protection.
Clausewitz during Bismarck's time was right, the ability to make war is an extension of foreign policy. Diplomacy and warmaking are stepchildren of the same mother.
Since it has been impossible to shake the policy implication of Iraq, as a specific example, I'll follow your lead and utilize this conflict rather than say the Russo-Japanesse War or others.
US armed conflict with Iraq has continued without break under three administrations since its inception in the early 1990s. The nature of that armed conflict has changed during this time, but Iraq has been considered a belligerant nation since then, and treated as such.
While I will grant that international sanctions do appear to have sufficiently dilluted Saddam's capacity to produce many types of destructive arms, there was no Memorandum of Understanding or Peace involved in the conflicts. The nature of Saddam as a belligerent did not change, and arguably never changed.
In retrospect however, we must also consider the corruption now found in the few legitimate trade channels (Oil-for-Food, etc) that were likely counterproductive in regard to these sanctions. Ironically, it was probably this funding that found its way into the pockets of the "con-men" who bilked millions out of Saddam for "weapons research". While this research was happening largely only on paper, it was this information that was intercepted by French, Russian and Isreali signal intelligence. They in turn passed it over to Bush-43 as credible threat information after it was learned that Saddam's intelligence unit was planning attacks on American soil (as the sole actor or as a facilitator we will never know).
I've framed the origins of this conflict in this way because I believe it has several extremely relevent aspects to it. Namely - (1) Saddam's administration was classified as a belligerant by the US, (2) Saddam was believed to have and proported to have capacity to project covert force, (3) numerous allies presented "intelligence" that indicated that Saddam was actively seeking opportunity to exercise that capacity directly against the US, and (4) Saddam insistance on remaining non-compliant with weapons inspectors dilluted any hope that non-warhawk US administration members had of resolving this without bloodshed.
Most of my account I don't believe is controvesial. However, how one moves from these four points to action or remaining inactive depends on your world view and your stake in the threat assessment process.
For the French for example, Saddam had not directly threatened them. To the contrary, he had signed several major oil leases with them. They actually had much to lose if Saddam's administration was toppled because those leases would disappear in a cloud of smoke along with the
"The Stalingrad Battle lasted 200 days and nights..."
Also keep in mind that July 17, 1942 wasn't the first time Stalingrad was attacked. It was only the beginning of a military offensive within the context of a larger campaign.
"Why you are a moron."
With the grandparent's opinion, the significance of Bush's National Missile Defense Network and analog air- and space-based counterparts have a more prophetic purpose. Right or wrong, he isn't alone in sharing this viewpoint. Missile Defense technology could introduce the post-post-MAD age. Such a development has been long predicted, even if the technology isn't a proven fact today.
"Do you know how the second world war started?
Germany pretended that the poles attacked Germany first, this gave them the "moral reason" to invade poland."
Actually as I understand it, most historians view the causal beginning of WWII as being attributed to the failure of Britian and France to respond to the violations of the Lacarno Pact and the Treaty of Versaille. Specificially though Hitler's seizure of Czech land (an autonomous region setup by the Treaty of Versaille), but also due to the British concession of their 3/5ths "commonwealth" fleet allowance which ensured Hitler's trajectory. But Hitler had to have his Lebensraum, and the later invasion of Poland was an extension of this goal originally initiated in Czech territory.
The UN has never been more than a convenient place for diplomates to address each other as a sitting body (everyone in a common place). When it was ostensibly under the League of Nations charter (as created after WWI), many wished to give it an enforcement capacity. It was this inate interferance in local sovereignty that spelled its downfall. And for the UN, ironically it is its lack of such capacity that renders it uncapable of dealing effectively with with security issues.
"I do not believe that any country has the right to launch a pre-emptive war, because on a moral ground a pre-emtive war isn't anymore justified than an aggression war."
I'm not sure why you insist on couching this in moral terms. Taking a moral position is nice, but when faced with imminant threat, it is often an afterthought.
Am I correct in understanding your opinion to be that, one does not have the right to attack another country until one has been physically attacked?
"I'm finding better deals and less hassle through online stores anyway."
Specifically the store manager needs to be sacked for not handling this in a more diplomatic fashion. Unless this guy represented a threat to the people in the store (someone being accused of counterfeiting $2 bills doesn't initially strike me as being a violent threat), the store manager should have asked the police officer and the man to come to the manager's office. This stuff should always be conducted in a more private setting, but at the least away from other customers.
This is the type of manager that would allow a warrant enforcement officer to serve a warrant on a cashiers on the floor while that cashier is working the till. Way to build customer and employee confidence jackass.
Identical numbers is believable, for a simple copying setup, but sequential? Whatever mechanism a counterfeiter has to add serial numbers to the unnumbered bills coming off the copier/printer, making it a non-repeating psuedo-random sequence, or simply adding 4357 instead of 1 for each cycle, is trivial.
We can count out professional criminals (intelligent and organized) since there is no economy of scale for counterfeiting $2 bills.
That said, the rest of the criminal gene pool for this type of activity is probably too stupid to even think of using a "non-repeating pseudo-random sequence".
These are the type of people that buy a soda with their own credit card just prior to committing armed robbery in the very same store. As a cheap source of comedy, however, stupid criminals do serve a greater purpose in society.
So does that mean that Country X doesn't have a right to preempt an attack by invasion?
I specifically provided the example as such so it would not be confused with any of the currently ongoing conflicts. Additionally, the question has nothing to do with non-state actors (e.g. transnational terrorists) only with actors within the scope of sovereign governments.
If nothing else, the delimma (even if it is not strictly realistic by itself) illustrates some of the decisions governments are forced to make when dealing with threat assessment.
"One has the right to defend oneself, but not by invading first."
Lets say you are President of Country X, and your intelligence network says that the President of Country Y is planning to covertly detinate nuclear weapons in your country. You go to Allies A, B, C and D who tell you that their intelligence networks also tell them the same thing.
As with all rational decision making, one is limited to the quantity and quality of the relevant information you have access too. Knowing that intelligence is not always fully accurate, do you invade the country? Or wait til they detinate those nuclear weapons before invading?
"I do not believe that the "preemptive" going to war or killing others is agreeable or just be allowed."
Do you believe one only has the right to self-defense after one has been attacked? Or is there a time at which one can preempt one's enemy and attack first? If so, where is that line?
"The point I was trying to get to was that there always were armed conflictes throughout the history. The situation for the world as a whole has not changed. Thus to argue that the US needs to build up a very strong military force in order to "contain" these events is pretty much a marketing gag by the Whitehouse."
I think we may have a disagreement concerning what type of force >I think the US needs to build up.
As you and several other posters have pointed out, the immediate potential for total warfare seems distant (particularly in a post-MAD world, but even more so after the Cold War).
An effective armed forces needs individuals and units that excel at killing other people. This seems to be an area in which the US has some measure of skill. This is an important part of the military, but I think we already have plenty of capacity for killing as is.
The other function of the armed forces is increasingly to provide training and logistics for native militaries, and to work as a formal security parter (within a coalition) in a given theatre. In this area the US does not have near the capacity that is needed. It needs to easily be doubled or tripled, and since it's a long process to train these type of people it needs to start now.
Still even more forces need to be trained for covert missions. For example, when the US recieved reports France that Saddams intelligence units were planning covert ops in the US, they should have done their own covert operation and assasinated Saddam. Instead they asked the UN to help, and when the UN did nothing, they invaded Iraq which led to far too much needless death.
"Probably true, but why? We need more security? So we can invade some more countries and then rebuild them at great expense?"
To some degree, we are protecting all the Free Trade Agreements we signed in the last 20 years. Some of the signitories do not have need security mechanisms which must be comparible to their economic mechanisms. In many cases, the US (and much of NATO and the UN) is willing to provide at least some of that security support. Maybe it's in the training of a local military, or maybe it's funding via USAID or the World Bank.
The modern world needs the exchange of information and goods that globalization provides. But the inherent conflict that globalization causes requires a strong security model as well. The US is playing a big part in that outside of its immediate sphere of influence, as is much of Europe and Asia.
Ultimately they do it because they believe maintaining free trade and security will lead to more prosperity at home and around the world. A good example of this comes in asking why the US bail out the Brazilian banking system a couple years ago? The US did it because a strong Brazil is a critical trading and security partner in that region of the world.
"The only country right now I see projecting force outside of it's own borders under strange ideas is actually the US, the sabel ratteling that is done by the other countries is (so far) just that. And heck, if the situation would be reverse, so would be the US."
Not only is your premise false, but it undercuts the actions of most of Europe (France, Germany, UK, Denmark, etc) and a number of African countries which are projecting military force in places like Bosnia, the Ivory Coast, Afghanistan, Haiti, Sudan, DRC and a number of other smaller theatres. All of these situations are experiencing the projected force of a formally declared military. And the number of countries projecting force through less formal conduits is far larger.
Although when argued from the qualifier of some vague notion of "strange ideals" I suppose it might be impossible for me to actually discern your point of view.
"Welcome to the world since the end of WorldWar II, where all those small little conflicts happened constantly."
Actually, if you want to express this change in terms of a lack of the potential for 'total' warfare, you really have to look at the reductions after the end of the Cold War as being the real change. Both the scale and nature of the US-Soviet Proxy wars in the 60-80s demostrate them as far removed from the plethera of police actions you see today.
"I have a plan to balance the budget without increasing taxes (and I want your vote). Drastically reduce in size and scope the Military. Unfortunaly no mainstream candidates seem to be advocating this common sense solution but if something isn't done the military will destroy our beloved nation. Remember, the Soviet Union fell with a bank statement, not a napalm atack."
You are trying to utilize a security v. disarmament paradigm in a world that needs security right now. Disarmament only works if it is unilateral, and unfortunately we live in a world that has North Korea, Iran and Venezuela as entities willing to pursue their goals outside of the realm of diplomacy and economic leverage.
Welcome to the year 2005! Limited war and police action is the name of the game, and the U.S. military is frequently the only regional security vendor in many world markets.
You won't see anything but an increase in military funding in the next 10 years, and that's a good thing. Globalization needs strong security controls and safeguards. The U.S. military through its operating centers around the world provides that. The size, scope and nature of the U.S. military is changing. Because the U.S. needs them, the World needs them, and you need them.
who are you masked grammer nazi? who are you? so much mystery...
An Ode to my personal Spelling Nazi:
I come in the night
A mask I hold tight
A word I will spew
To spoil your two
I hope to cause pain
For me that be gain
My advice I give free
Because noone pays me
Will you provide a reply
This troll waits by and by
Pay attention to me!
Cuz a Spelling Nazi I be!
If Microsoft is smart, they will use this as an intelligence gathering tool as well.
Once they are found, a big advantage to these lawsuits is the opportunity to actually question these spammers. Under threat of a financially debilitating lawsuit by a powerful company, I'd imagine at least a couple of these spammers will be willing to spill their guts about how they do business and who they learned the trade from.
This is a learned skillset and relatively complicated in terms of number of steps to completion. This kind of intelligence should be a boon for driving security procedures.
Let me guess, Bush writes all the speeding tickets and breaks up all the underage beer parties in your town too doesn't he?
Maybe you should take a civic's course while you are in school still...
Depending on the circumstances, DoJ can always apply for a FISA pen trap and trace warrant. Due to FISA changes by the non-sunsetting sections of Title 2 of the USA PATRIOT Act, the procedural differences between PSTN and "other" communications mediums have pretty much disappeared entirely. Even content warrants under FISA can avail themselves of these changes (which is scary seeing as how what electronic content actually is isn't well defined in law).