While I agree that the man was unarmed, he acted in a suspicious and dangerous way because of his mental illness. The Air Marshals acted in accordance with their training. They're not mental health professionals. They don't have x-ray vision, and they don't have any knowledge about what was in his backpack, so when he says "I have a bomb," they believed him, and acted in a way to protect themselves and the civilians on the plane and in the terminal. It is unfortunate, but I wouldn't hold that example up as a violation of "due process."
Tune in to the cam in front of Downing Street 10, and as soon as Tony goes for a walk, tape it. Tape everything he does, including the times when he picks his nose, then sell that tape as "The Blair watch project".
Uhm, doesn't the media pretty much already do this? He is the Prime Minister.
Different suggestion: Tape the friends and family of important members of Parliment. Their kids. Their spouses. Their lovers and their doctors and their barbers. Blame the Parliment for their kids reckless behavior, laugh at them for being embarassed by their spouses, and shame them with the rest. Tape their reactions and show it to their family and friends, and then see what happens. Even if they manage to get past their own feelings about being placed under surveilence, they'll no doubt get an earful from those around them.
Adding another 500 people (assuming that's the number of people who actually bother to watch the show for hours on end) who don't know what to be looking for is only going to add to the number of false calls that the police already receive.
One of my family members works at a 911 call-center, in a midwest state, outside a fairly large city. He periodically gets 911 emergency calls that go like this:
Caller: There's a [derogatory term for a person of Middle Eastern decent] walkin' past the Conoco gas station at the corner here! Send the Cops and the National Guard, quick! Operator: Sir, what is he doing? Caller: He's walking past the store. He's got a black backpack, wearing jeans and a t-shirt, he's got short hair, and looks like he's about 15 or 16. Operator (noticing that the time/location/description fit for someone walking home from school): Sir, is he doing anything? Anything suspicious or threatening? Caller: He's walking past the gas station and across the street. Operator: Sir, is this an emergency? Caller: Son, don't you know we're at war here!?!
"Wealth envy" my ass. If I bought the Consitution and a Monet painting for $20 a piece, and then decided to use them as kindling for my next barbeque, people wouldn't be deriding me for "wealth envy." While there would be a number of people defnding my right to soak the things in lighter fluid and light 'em up, saying something like "he bought them, it's his property, and his right to do whatever he wants with his property," there would also be a number of pretty pissed off people as well. I would wager that more people would be upset because the world would have something stolen from them that has value, historical significance, and importance beyond the $20 I paid. Similarly, the hybrid bear had value over $45,000 that the hunter paid for the right to kill it. I'm not saying that he can't legally kill it, it was certainly within his right to do so, but it is unfortunate that this was the decision he made.
If you're so proud of yourself for not killing animals
Clearly you didn't stop to read very far into the previous post. He said "I'm probably one of the more pro-hunting folk around here; I grew up eating deer and gamebirds shot by my father, and have a bunch of respect for people who know how to turn a shotgun shell or rifle bullet into dinner." The original poster is not upset because someone shot an animal, but because one person took away something that was more valuable to many other people.
According to the article, the hunter, Jim Martell, paid his Inuit guide about $45,450 for the privilege of hunting polar bears. I don't know about you, I think that a live, in-the-wild, polar-grizzly hybrid is worth more than $45,450. Forget that the hunter is wealthy, he robbed everyone from biology researchers to National Geographic documentarians to the general public.
I amend my previous statement. But like many users, I was holding out for a "it just works" solution. I find that Tapioca has "won the race" (at least for me) to incorporate VoIP functionality. To my knowledge, more popular IM clients have not managed to do this. Gaim has been working on incorporating this since October, and it's still not going to get done until after the 2.0 release, which has been in beta for about 6 months. Psi is a little closer, but requires some compiling to complete, as does the plugin for Kopete. Tapioca has debian/ubuntu packages and Fedora/Suse/Mandriva rpms ready to go.
After I posted my remark, I started doing some more digging around again. I did run across Psi, and was going to examine it further, but it some source compiling. Kopete appears to have similiar functions available to connect with a Psi client, but it requires svn access and more compiling. While looking further, I checked out Tapioca which had simple instructions to get it going (and a number of packages for whatever linux distrobution you use). It installed, it runs, now I just need one of my friends to test it on.;)
Right now, I'm seeing a number of different posts saying "so what? Gtalk is just jabber, and it already works with eleventy-hundred other IM programs. Just use Gaim or Kopete or something to connect." The point that is interesting to me is that the Gtalk client, and specifically the VOIP component of the Gtalk client will be ported to Linux. Currently, if you want VOIP, you have to use the Windows client. Please, Google, get this done, and make it possible for other IM clients to use the VOIP as well. Gaim and Kopete have been taking forever to get this functionality into their clients.
A short version is this - two brothers hear the command of God to kill the wife and child of their third brother. Are they crazy, or not?
The longer version is that these two brothers are influenced by the history of the Mormon faith they belonged to, where it is "normal" for men to have personal revelations sent to them from God. If they are crazy, then do their beliefs mean that all Mormons are crazy (or crazier;) )? If they're not crazy, does that mean the murders they committed were justified?
I probably fail to describe the book fairly, it's an interesting history of the Mormon faith, crazy religious fundamentalists, and a little slice of psychology. I think it can be applied to Islamic fundamentalists, or fundamentalists in general.
I'm eager to try out the new Ubuntu when it comes out. Will we be able to upgrade to 6, or will we need to do a complete reinstall?
You know that wonderful "apt-get" program you like so much in Ubuntu?
apt-get has you covered:
1. Back up your "/etc/apt/sources.list" file. 2. Edit it with your text-editor of choice, changing all the spots where it says "breezy" to "dapper". 3. Update by typing "sudo apt-get update" and 4. upgrade by typing "sudo apt-get dist-upgrade". Wait for downloads, and all should be good. 4 steps (5 if you count the waiting) to the upgrade process.
The first thing any computer user wants to do is get on the internet. I've got a static IP where I live so I decided to set up the networking. Unfortunately, without a working hostname, there's literally no way to do this. On bootup, gnome suggested I manually edit my/etc/hosts file to include my hostname. After doing this, gnome allowed me to configure my network. (Why can't the installer do this?)
I'm pretty sure the installer already did this... Yeah, right here, on this install guide it shows on the 5th screenshot setting the hostname. I don't think the installer from 5.04 to 5.10 changed at all. (I don't know if that's what you're talking about or if that helps at all at this point, but figured it wouldn't hurt to have the information there.)
I know the guide is beginning to get a bit dated, but I still go back to Unofficial Ubuntu Guide now and then for some quick fixes. There's also the Ubuntu Wiki which has some more up-to-date information. I'm surprised that the sound didn't work out of the box.
Then don't go and Godwin yourself right off the bat by saying "the people on the freenode channels are complete nazis when it comes to "Politically correctness" and "being helpfull"."
The vast majority of Ubuntu people seem to really stick with that "Linux for Human Beings" thing they have plastered on their website. And good for them.
On a slightly different note: when did observing and calling someone out for rude or dumb behavior start getting derided for being bad? Person A: "L0lz, I have this linux problem 'foo', where 'bar' doesn't work and that's teh ghey!" Person B: "Hey, that calling that remark 'gay' wasn't necessary, and wasn't polite. Fix 'bar' by doing 'bleh', and 'foo' should work." Person A:"OMG, STFU, political correctness!"
Another interesting service along similar lines is at www.pandora.com. Input a band or song you like, and it picks something that sounds similar, you vote whether you like it or not, and see where it goes from there.
I bet neither of the two parties with 48% of the vote "got basically everything they wanted."
Are you implying that the 96% of the people didn't get anything they wanted passed? I would think the other two parties got a good number of things that they wanted passed, and the 4% party was able to negotiate for what they wanted.
(A Ridiculous) Example: Party A wants to increase funding for hookers, while decreasing money for beer. Party B wants to increase funding for beer, while decreasing money for hookers. Both A & B lobby the 4% Party to come over to their side, and oppose each other's plan. The 4% Party suggests "Let's increase funding for BOTH by decreasing funding for education!"
All three parties got what they wanted (an increase in funding that supported their interest). Hooray for democracy in action!
(soapbox) And before you set up all of the Democratic Party as being "regulation friendly," excuse me while I point out that Hillary Clinton and Tipper Gore are often found trying to pander to the religious right and the Republican Party in an effort to shed the image of being "crazy leftists." Which they fail at pretty poorly - they look like they're sucking up to the "wrong crowd" in the Republicans, and then can't turn around and look like they have the backbone to stand up for the admirable causes of the left (universal healthcare, anti-war, insert-your-favorite-leftist-cause-here). (/soapbox)
...well, there are some people who are smart and use computers, but either are not observant, or who just consider computers to be "magic" boxes. My dad has been using email and surfing the web for 7 or 8 years, and just discovered over the weekend that email addresses aren't case sensitive.:) It doesn't prevent him from emailing some friends and coworkers, he can still google for information. Similar deal to your client - so don't knock him for not using email. It's for old people anyway.
"Those who profess to favor freedom, yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will." - Frederick Douglass
I can't even imagine how long it would take to enumerate the contributions white males have made to the art world. From music [...]all the way forward to the revolutionary Beatles, Rolling Stones, Kurt Cobain
Heh, that reminds me -
Homer: "There's Jimmy Page, the greatest thief of American black music who ever walked the earth."
architecture (Frank Lloyd Wright)
Frank Lloyd Wright was strongly influenced by Japanese art and architecture.
The sheer number of scientific accomplishments credited to white males is incredibly overwhelming in both magnitude and importance.
And they all stood on the shoulders of other men and women to get there. To attribute everything to White Males at their peak is like saying Isaac Newton is the greatest mathematician, without mentioning the influence had Galileo in preceeding him, or Leibniz had on Newton at the same time. It might have the ring of truth to it, but it certainly does not tell the whole story.
Do you have a past history* of being redundant, or do you just like newspeak?;) There is no "reverse" racism; it is racist, or it is not.
And celebration of 1001 Islamic Inventions, black history month, women's history month, gay pride, etc. is not racist/sexist/heterophobic. Here's why:
An excellent definition of racism is: racial prejudice and discrimination supported by institutional power and authority used to the advantage of one race and the disadvantage of other race(s). (replace concepts of race with appropriate concepts of gender, sexual orientation, religion, etc.).
So while you might be able to claim those celebrations and points of useful information as racially (or other -isms) prejudiced, until those groups share equal or greater power with Christian white heterosexual males, they don't meet the same standard as racism.
*yes, I made that redundant remark on purpose. Grammar nazi's have no sense of humor.;)
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While I agree that the man was unarmed, he acted in a suspicious and dangerous way because of his mental illness. The Air Marshals acted in accordance with their training. They're not mental health professionals. They don't have x-ray vision, and they don't have any knowledge about what was in his backpack, so when he says "I have a bomb," they believed him, and acted in a way to protect themselves and the civilians on the plane and in the terminal. It is unfortunate, but I wouldn't hold that example up as a violation of "due process."
CNN article here.
Tune in to the cam in front of Downing Street 10, and as soon as Tony goes for a walk, tape it. Tape everything he does, including the times when he picks his nose, then sell that tape as "The Blair watch project".
Uhm, doesn't the media pretty much already do this? He is the Prime Minister.
Different suggestion: Tape the friends and family of important members of Parliment. Their kids. Their spouses. Their lovers and their doctors and their barbers. Blame the Parliment for their kids reckless behavior, laugh at them for being embarassed by their spouses, and shame them with the rest. Tape their reactions and show it to their family and friends, and then see what happens. Even if they manage to get past their own feelings about being placed under surveilence, they'll no doubt get an earful from those around them.
Adding another 500 people (assuming that's the number of people who actually bother to watch the show for hours on end) who don't know what to be looking for is only going to add to the number of false calls that the police already receive.
One of my family members works at a 911 call-center, in a midwest state, outside a fairly large city. He periodically gets 911 emergency calls that go like this:
Caller: There's a [derogatory term for a person of Middle Eastern decent] walkin' past the Conoco gas station at the corner here! Send the Cops and the National Guard, quick!
Operator: Sir, what is he doing?
Caller: He's walking past the store. He's got a black backpack, wearing jeans and a t-shirt, he's got short hair, and looks like he's about 15 or 16.
Operator (noticing that the time/location/description fit for someone walking home from school): Sir, is he doing anything? Anything suspicious or threatening?
Caller: He's walking past the gas station and across the street.
Operator: Sir, is this an emergency?
Caller: Son, don't you know we're at war here!?!
"Wealth envy" my ass. If I bought the Consitution and a Monet painting for $20 a piece, and then decided to use them as kindling for my next barbeque, people wouldn't be deriding me for "wealth envy." While there would be a number of people defnding my right to soak the things in lighter fluid and light 'em up, saying something like "he bought them, it's his property, and his right to do whatever he wants with his property," there would also be a number of pretty pissed off people as well. I would wager that more people would be upset because the world would have something stolen from them that has value, historical significance, and importance beyond the $20 I paid. Similarly, the hybrid bear had value over $45,000 that the hunter paid for the right to kill it. I'm not saying that he can't legally kill it, it was certainly within his right to do so, but it is unfortunate that this was the decision he made.
If you're so proud of yourself for not killing animals
Clearly you didn't stop to read very far into the previous post. He said "I'm probably one of the more pro-hunting folk around here; I grew up eating deer and gamebirds shot by my father, and have a bunch of respect for people who know how to turn a shotgun shell or rifle bullet into dinner." The original poster is not upset because someone shot an animal, but because one person took away something that was more valuable to many other people.
According to the article, the hunter, Jim Martell, paid his Inuit guide about $45,450 for the privilege of hunting polar bears. I don't know about you, I think that a live, in-the-wild, polar-grizzly hybrid is worth more than $45,450. Forget that the hunter is wealthy, he robbed everyone from biology researchers to National Geographic documentarians to the general public.
I amend my previous statement. But like many users, I was holding out for a "it just works" solution. I find that Tapioca has "won the race" (at least for me) to incorporate VoIP functionality. To my knowledge, more popular IM clients have not managed to do this. Gaim has been working on incorporating this since October, and it's still not going to get done until after the 2.0 release, which has been in beta for about 6 months. Psi is a little closer, but requires some compiling to complete, as does the plugin for Kopete. Tapioca has debian/ubuntu packages and Fedora/Suse/Mandriva rpms ready to go.
After I posted my remark, I started doing some more digging around again. I did run across Psi, and was going to examine it further, but it some source compiling. Kopete appears to have similiar functions available to connect with a Psi client, but it requires svn access and more compiling. While looking further, I checked out Tapioca which had simple instructions to get it going (and a number of packages for whatever linux distrobution you use). It installed, it runs, now I just need one of my friends to test it on. ;)
Right now, I'm seeing a number of different posts saying "so what? Gtalk is just jabber, and it already works with eleventy-hundred other IM programs. Just use Gaim or Kopete or something to connect." The point that is interesting to me is that the Gtalk client, and specifically the VOIP component of the Gtalk client will be ported to Linux. Currently, if you want VOIP, you have to use the Windows client. Please, Google, get this done, and make it possible for other IM clients to use the VOIP as well. Gaim and Kopete have been taking forever to get this functionality into their clients.
This is getting into off-topic territory, but have you read Under The Banner of Heaven?
;) )? If they're not crazy, does that mean the murders they committed were justified?
A short version is this - two brothers hear the command of God to kill the wife and child of their third brother. Are they crazy, or not?
The longer version is that these two brothers are influenced by the history of the Mormon faith they belonged to, where it is "normal" for men to have personal revelations sent to them from God. If they are crazy, then do their beliefs mean that all Mormons are crazy (or crazier
I probably fail to describe the book fairly, it's an interesting history of the Mormon faith, crazy religious fundamentalists, and a little slice of psychology. I think it can be applied to Islamic fundamentalists, or fundamentalists in general.
I look forward to learning how to kill you soon!
Names have everything to do with how popular a format becomes. "Betamax" or "VHS"?
Nevermind that absolutely obscure music format, MP3.
Nice. I'll have to remember to use that in the future.
I'm eager to try out the new Ubuntu when it comes out. Will we be able to upgrade to 6, or will we need to do a complete reinstall?
You know that wonderful "apt-get" program you like so much in Ubuntu?
apt-get has you covered:
1. Back up your "/etc/apt/sources.list" file. 2. Edit it with your text-editor of choice, changing all the spots where it says "breezy" to "dapper". 3. Update by typing "sudo apt-get update" and 4. upgrade by typing "sudo apt-get dist-upgrade". Wait for downloads, and all should be good. 4 steps (5 if you count the waiting) to the upgrade process.
The first thing any computer user wants to do is get on the internet. I've got a static IP where I live so I decided to set up the networking. Unfortunately, without a working hostname, there's literally no way to do this. On bootup, gnome suggested I manually edit my /etc/hosts file to include my hostname. After doing this, gnome allowed me to configure my network. (Why can't the installer do this?)
I'm pretty sure the installer already did this... Yeah, right here, on this install guide it shows on the 5th screenshot setting the hostname. I don't think the installer from 5.04 to 5.10 changed at all. (I don't know if that's what you're talking about or if that helps at all at this point, but figured it wouldn't hurt to have the information there.)
I know the guide is beginning to get a bit dated, but I still go back to Unofficial Ubuntu Guide now and then for some quick fixes. There's also the Ubuntu Wiki which has some more up-to-date information. I'm surprised that the sound didn't work out of the box.
Don't mod me down as flamebait right away.
Then don't go and Godwin yourself right off the bat by saying "the people on the freenode channels are complete nazis when it comes to "Politically correctness" and "being helpfull"."
The vast majority of Ubuntu people seem to really stick with that "Linux for Human Beings" thing they have plastered on their website. And good for them.
On a slightly different note: when did observing and calling someone out for rude or dumb behavior start getting derided for being bad?
Person A: "L0lz, I have this linux problem 'foo', where 'bar' doesn't work and that's teh ghey!"
Person B: "Hey, that calling that remark 'gay' wasn't necessary, and wasn't polite. Fix 'bar' by doing 'bleh', and 'foo' should work."
Person A:"OMG, STFU, political correctness!"
Another interesting service along similar lines is at www.pandora.com. Input a band or song you like, and it picks something that sounds similar, you vote whether you like it or not, and see where it goes from there.
Be a patriot: Murder a Republican.
;)
Nice rant, and funny sig.
I bet neither of the two parties with 48% of the vote "got basically everything they wanted."
Are you implying that the 96% of the people didn't get anything they wanted passed? I would think the other two parties got a good number of things that they wanted passed, and the 4% party was able to negotiate for what they wanted.
(A Ridiculous) Example:
Party A wants to increase funding for hookers, while decreasing money for beer.
Party B wants to increase funding for beer, while decreasing money for hookers.
Both A & B lobby the 4% Party to come over to their side, and oppose each other's plan. The 4% Party suggests "Let's increase funding for BOTH by decreasing funding for education!"
All three parties got what they wanted (an increase in funding that supported their interest). Hooray for democracy in action!
Since I didn't know you were referring to the Child Online Protection Act and the Communications Decency Act I figured I'd share.
(soapbox)
And before you set up all of the Democratic Party as being "regulation friendly," excuse me while I point out that Hillary Clinton and Tipper Gore are often found trying to pander to the religious right and the Republican Party in an effort to shed the image of being "crazy leftists." Which they fail at pretty poorly - they look like they're sucking up to the "wrong crowd" in the Republicans, and then can't turn around and look like they have the backbone to stand up for the admirable causes of the left (universal healthcare, anti-war, insert-your-favorite-leftist-cause-here).
(/soapbox)
...well, there are some people who are smart and use computers, but either are not observant, or who just consider computers to be "magic" boxes. My dad has been using email and surfing the web for 7 or 8 years, and just discovered over the weekend that email addresses aren't case sensitive. :) It doesn't prevent him from emailing some friends and coworkers, he can still google for information. Similar deal to your client - so don't knock him for not using email. It's for old people anyway.
I think I speak for geeks everywhere when I say that I just can't wait to see a younger, whinier Luke Skywalker.
I think I speak for geeks everywhere when I say "NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!"
=)
Sorry, that's not "fun fun fun" it's vandalism.
Sounds like you are unfamiliar with the history of Civil Disobedience.
"Those who profess to favor freedom, yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will." - Frederick Douglass
I can't even imagine how long it would take to enumerate the contributions white males have made to the art world. From music [...]all the way forward to the revolutionary Beatles, Rolling Stones, Kurt Cobain
Heh, that reminds me -
Homer: "There's Jimmy Page, the greatest thief of American black music who ever walked the earth."
architecture (Frank Lloyd Wright)
Frank Lloyd Wright was strongly influenced by Japanese art and architecture.
The sheer number of scientific accomplishments credited to white males is incredibly overwhelming in both magnitude and importance.
And they all stood on the shoulders of other men and women to get there. To attribute everything to White Males at their peak is like saying Isaac Newton is the greatest mathematician, without mentioning the influence had Galileo in preceeding him, or Leibniz had on Newton at the same time. It might have the ring of truth to it, but it certainly does not tell the whole story.
It's like reverse racism
;) There is no "reverse" racism; it is racist, or it is not.
;)
Grammar: Using words. Get it right already.
Do you have a past history* of being redundant, or do you just like newspeak?
And celebration of 1001 Islamic Inventions, black history month, women's history month, gay pride, etc. is not racist/sexist/heterophobic. Here's why:
An excellent definition of racism is: racial prejudice and discrimination supported by institutional power and authority used to the advantage of one race and the disadvantage of other race(s). (replace concepts of race with appropriate concepts of gender, sexual orientation, religion, etc.).
So while you might be able to claim those celebrations and points of useful information as racially (or other -isms) prejudiced, until those groups share equal or greater power with Christian white heterosexual males, they don't meet the same standard as racism.
*yes, I made that redundant remark on purpose. Grammar nazi's have no sense of humor.