Thanks for the advice. I guess I have a few thoughts on the matter:
1. I trust the National Review the way I believe opinions become facts if you CAPITALIZE them.
Well, I don't know how much you have to trust National Review. But their website publishes a wide range of authors, and it seems to me that what really matters in this case is any individual author's command of the facts.
As it is, Adler's pieces are quite well informed and generally insightful. I don't know that it's necessary to "trust" him as much as it is to counter his facts with more relevant, pertinent facts of your own.
In fact, you might like to read a fascinating exchange Alder has with current environmental media-darling Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kennedy had a hyperbolic, hyperventilating piece about Bush in Rolling Stone. Adler wrote a piece pointing out that many things in Kennedy's article were misleading or flat-out wrong. In response, Kennedy wrote a letter about it to National Review. Adler responded by noting that, in his letter, Kennedy didn't actually refute a single one of his (Adler's) points.
2. I don't know what sort of "environmental metric" you're talking about, whether measuring laws, executive actions, or physical attributes of the environment.
I was talking about the latter, but while we're on the subject, let's note the former as well. As Adler (and Easterbrook, FTM) note, Bush has made some decisions some environmentalists don't like. But as they also note, Bush is in a no-win situation, because he gets absolutely NO credit for other decisions that one would normally expect an environmentalist to applaud. Easterbrook, himself an environmentalist, has noted that this indiscriminate Bush-bashing is not only dishonorable, but an extremely unwise political strategy.
3. If the latter, note that the environment is an extreme lagging indicator.
I don't disagree with this. But then again, a few thoughts:
a) Does the "lagging indicator" theory get Bush any credit when applied to his pro-environment decisions? I mean, surely it works both ways?
b) On problem with this theory is that you can apply it to *anything*. All sorts of nonsensical enviromental predictions were made in the 1970s and 80s, for example (Paul Weyrich, I'm looking your way); can the now-discredit authors just say the environment is lagging, and is sure to catch up to their theories any day now?
4. If the former, perhaps you could provide a better citation?... Bush's most egregious actions have been mostly internal to the Executive Branch...
Sorry, but I don't see any of these actions -- even waves of bureaucrats "resigning in protest" -- crippling the environment. As Adler notes, federal laws governing clean air, water and so on remain in effect. The trends all continue to be positive; it just defies belief to think Bush could undermine that by reshuffling a few bureaucrats -- even if those bureaucrats are dedicated environmentalists.
And I actually provided a pretty good example of an issue constantly used to bash Bush -- the Kyoto accords. Bush has done the exact same thing Clinton did -- declined to submit it for ratfication -- but the difference is, Bush gets piloried for it.
5. Don't read what you like, read what you hate. You'll learn more.
a) First, assuming you know anything about my reading habits from a single Slashdot post is kid-level stuff. Come on.
b) Your last thought is a little hard to square with your first.
c) I would no doubt read The Nation and Mother Jones more often if they would stick to *legitimate* Bush-bashing, and not make me filter out all the *stupid* Bush-bashing.
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the matter...
One, I think your statement about stem cell research is a bit overheated (I am cautious on this point, because I admittedly don't know a lot about the issue.) My impression is that Bush sought a compromise, and settled on banning the creation of any new fetal stem cell lines, NOT that he "barred the funding of promising biological research." I could be wrong on this though.
Two: The bit about "communities across the country... forcing schools to teach 'creationism' in biology courses" is WAY overheated. I mean, come on, you're talking about less than a handful of crackpot communities across the nation. Don't let your alarmism get in the way of accurately perceiving reality.
Actually, the number one FACT you won't generally get from the general media is a simple one: Under the last few presidents nearly every environmental metric (in the U.S. at least) has improved, and under the current president, they have... continued to improve.
Kyoto is a great example. Sure, Bush has rejected the Kyoto protocols, as written. So did the Clinton Administration, and so did the entire U.S. Senate -- Democrats included.
Here's a suggestion. Do a web search for articles by Jonathan Adler (quite of few will be found on National Review's web site). Here's a good one for starters: The Erosion That Isn't.
Money quote: The League of Conservation Voters and Natural Resources Defense Council, among others, have published lengthy reports purporting to document the anti-environmental record of the current administration. Yet the charges do not hold up under scrutiny. Despite the heated rhetoric, the administration has made no significant changes to the basic environmental laws. The federal standards governing air quality, water pollution, and endangered species remain in place, and there is no proposal to do otherwise.
Another good source is The New Republic's Gregg Easterbrook. A moderate Dem and Bush critic, he nevertheless produces pretty balanced articles on the Bush administration's environmental efforts. He is harshly critical about some things, but also points out a lot of the lies the environmental lobby likes to recycle (no pun intended) about Bush.
Sad because no one has mentioned Steven Seagal's "On Deadly Ground."
See, I believe what separates the creme de la creme here from the other merely godawful movies is that the truly bad ones make you ANGRY. You should sit there in the theater (or on the couch, or whatever) and feel like the director and producers have unzipped their pants and pissed on you in their total lack of respect for you. You should get the distinct impression that the studio execs who greenlighted it hate you and/or think you're an idiot.
So, Plan Nine didn't make me ANGRY. Manos didn't make me ANGRY. Howard the Duck made my wife ANGRY, but I never saw it so I can't comment. Evidently Battlefield Earth made a lot of people angry, but come on: No film is more insulting than "On Deadly Ground."
I mean, how about the scene in the bar where SS kicks some oil worker's butt, then another one, just some guy at the bar, says something like "Don't fuck with oil workers!" and attacks him? Just as an excuse so SS can kick EVERYONE'S butt! I mean, since when do oil workers have such awesome solidarity that they'd attack a Kung Fu master to salvage the honor of their brothers, especially since by then it was too late to save Oil Worker #1 from getting his ass kicked anyway? If I was in a bar kicking some veterinarian's ass, would some other vet say "Don't fuck with veterinarians!" and jump on me?! It's ludicrous!
And that's just the smallest example. How about when the evil corporate guys with hair-trigger tempers machine gun all the Eskimos. Yeah, massacring half a village would be easy to cover up! Or when SS dynamites the refinery, killing countless janitors, cooks, technicians, etc in addition to a handful of evil corporate suits and their assassin friends. WTF!?!? I WANT ANSWERS!!
Whew, sorry about that. But it just goes to prove that a truly awful film has to make you ANGRY, and it should be a lingering, burning anger that only grows over time.
I've always thought this would be the holy grail of home computing. I just want to sit on the couch and websurf while my wife reads or watches TV.
The killer hardware app would be a relatively inexpensive accessory (under $500) that would let me do that. I don't want to have to buy a whole new computer -- I don't need a laptop, and if I wanted to get any serious work done, I could always just go over to my desk and use my desktop.
Now, my question. I've seen others bring up the possibility of exactly such a wireless, touch-screen monitor. When that happens, replies seem to fall into two categories:
*Either: "It can't be done -- moving pixels requires a huge amount of bandwith, more than can be provided wirelessly,"
* Or "Viewsonic already sells these as "smart monitors."
Well, which is it? Viewsonic does seem to be selling them, although they are very expensive. Is there a technical reason someone can't take a 15-inch LCD screen, slap an inexpensive, non-pressure-sensitive overlay on it, add a standard wi-fi card, and sell a million jillion of them? And if so, how did Viewsonic overcome it?
I have a question for you. I like to read slashdot, but I'm not a computer whiz, so I hope this isn't a stupid question.
I work for a public institution. We have 100-200 photos we would like to publish to the web, so the other members of our institution can access them via a standard web browser. So far so good -- there are lots of programs that do this.
But what we need is for our other members to be able to *search* for keywords (or choose them from a list) and have the resulting photos appear. I know a lot of stock photo agencies do this via big, expensive databases, but are there any simple, inexpensive applications that would let us do it?
Maybe this would be a good "Ask Slashdot" question.
The wall might bring some short term relief but it can not be a long term solution...
Yes, but when by "short term relief" you mean "fewer civilians blown apart by bombs wrapped in nails and scrap metal," well, that's pretty darn relieving.
Yeah, that's definitely true, and I thought of it while typing my comment. But an RFID-aware pet door, set to unlock only when the chip is *very* close, would still be a big improvement over existing doors.
Yes, I know about the magnetic approach. But it seems to me like an RFID approach would be better and more reliable. Also there is the fact that many pets (again, AFIAK) already have RFID chips implanted in them.
It's my understanding that a common practice these days is to have microships (which I assume to be RFID tags) injected under the skin of pets, so lost pets can be identified even if they're not wearing collars.
I think a good idea would be to make pet doors that can "learn" to unlock only when certain RFID tags are within 4 or five feet. You could set it for the pets you own, and other pets (and/or other critters) wouldn't be able to get in.
Also, if your pets didn't have the chips implanted, you could just get a chip on a collar.
Others in this thread have noted what nonsense this sort of stuff is -- about some wonderful free-speech utopia that existed before this repressive regime came into absolute power -- so I won't beat it to death.
I just wonder about your assertations. There are a ton of them in your post, with basically zero facts to back them up. You don't even say why "P"BS should have been receiving government funding at all. I wonder what percentage of PBS' viewership is composed of these inner city kids who seem to depend on it so much. I also wonder about the part where you assert the fanatics and freaks "used the money to increase funding to their personal religious projects." Really? Which ones? How much money? What were their ties to these projects?
Surely, you can back all this up, right? I mean, no one would just spew out a whole bunch of unsupported nonsense on SlashDot, would they?
Look, I can't believe I'm wasting time with this, but I'm a masochist, so here goes.
The RSF report is LUDICROUS. Why was the U.S. "modded down?" Because, it says, the "US army's responsibility in the death of several reporters during the war in Iraq constitute unacceptable behaviour"
Those reporters were covering a WAR in a WAR ZONE. It's tragic that they were killed, but that WAR -- it is the physical manifestation of chaos theory. Those casualties, while tragic, simply have no relationship to "press freedom," unless you can show a meaningful correlation between press casualties and how critical or supportive the reporters in question were of the U.S. NO ONE, not even RSF, has shown anything like this.
Since I'm preaching to the deaf here, I'll close with a few quick points. First, how many conquering countries in world history helped the conquered people set up independent media outlets? Sure, they do have restrictions. They cannot advocate violence, or agitate for the return of the old regime, and... and... that's it! It may not seem like much to you, but it is an ASTONISHING development by historical standards. Somehow, RSF seems to have missed this.
Finally, this whole stupid thread is a crock. In the U.S., you can legally say or write whatever you want. What few restrictions there are -- things like community standards for obscenity, not broadcasting the departure schedule for troopships, advocating immediate and specific violence, etc -- are subject to EXTREMELY NARROW restrictions with the burden of proof on the government. None of that is changing, all your Ashcroft hallucinations notwithstanding.
Except, of course, that the current era is by far the least censorious -- and most permissive -- this country has ever seen, in its history, ever.
When exactly was the "once" that we had a "nice democratic republic"? The 1970s? The 50s? The 20s? 1776?
Pop quiz -- Here are few notable historical Americans. After each one, tell me whether you think they would or would not have approved of YOUR idea of what public expression should be like. Ready? Here we go: Martin Luther King Jr. Thomas Jefferson Abraham Lincoln George Washington Carver WEB DuBois Franklin D. Roosevelt Harriet Tubman Benjamin Franklin etc etc etc
Not to be too harsh on you. Actually, I feel more sorry for all the kiddies who thought this was "insightful."
One of the Firefox help pages (I'm sorry, but i don't have time to find it -- I'm sure you can if you look around a little) has some text that you paste into one of the config files. After that, whenever your cursor is above a link that opens in a new window, it changes to a little crosshair. And whenever it hovers above a javascript link, it changes too, to a little four-pointed arrow thingie.
I don't disagree with any of this. I just think GG's left-hand pane makes it extraordinarily easy to glance at it and see exactly where you are at in the thread. That doesn't mean that you couldn't still filter messages by score, etc.
Alaska Jack
I wish Slashdot would emulate Google Groups' UI
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· Score: 5, Insightful
One thing I've always admired is Google Groups' user interface -- the pane along the left-hand side makes it very clear where you are at in navigating a thread.
Contrast this to Slashdot, where navigating the comments threads can be very confusing. I wish Slashdot could be re-written to something similar to GG. Anyone know the correct address for submitting this kind of suggestion?
(Or, on the other hand, any good reason/. is better the way it is?)
Bush is mostly responsible on two counts; 1, for cutting back on federal funding for local emergency staff- police, EMS and fire all have been hit hard in almost every town throughout the US.
"cutting back on FEDERAL funding for LOCAL emergency staff"
While you were smugly typing in your oh-so-wise critique of Bush, did it ever even occur to you how inane this is? It's the central frickin' principal of federalist government, you idiot!
Also, as far as the Guard and Reserve go, did it ever occur to you that this would happen, and has, WHENEVER Guardsmen and/or reservist are activated? Including World War II? Would you have said "It's all Roosevelt's fault?" I mean, really, what would you suggest, telling policemen and emergency responders that they can't serve in the Ready Reserve? Vice versa? Disbanding the reserves?
Sorry to go ballistic, but it's not too far off to say that people like you are what's wrong with this country. You have no clue (or just don't care) about the principles of limited and local government on which this country was founded. You just want more, more, more from an increasingly centralized, monolithic government.
Maybe I can throw something in here that most people don't realize: Every surviving account of democracy in ancient Greece is harshly critical of it. Greek democracy didn't have some of the features we take for granted -- for example, separation of judicial and legislative powers, or protection of minorities. In practice it often amounted to what was basically mob rule, and Greek critics of time wrote very perceptive accounts of how easily the mob could be swayed one way or the other.
I bring this up when I hear people say that founders of the U.S. constitution instituted a republic, as opposed to a pure democracy, because a democracy would have been too difficult given the limitations of the time. This is true, of course, but it's also true that the founders wouldn't have implemented a true democracy even if it had been feasible. The founders felt that a republic would be *better* than a pure democracy. The genius of the American experiment was the way they tried to blend aspects of oligarchy and democracy together in a way that ameliorated the worst aspects of each of those two systems (tyranny vs. mob rule).
It's obvious you put a great deal of time and thought into this reply. Now I need you to do something for me. Take a deep breath, clear your mind a little, and calmly re-read my previous post.
Saying that giving schools more money won't help is the most inaccurate, irresponsible statement I've ever heard.
Well then it's a good thing I didn't say that -- at least, not in the blanket sort of way your statement implies. Of course there are many situations where schools need and deserve more money. My fairly obvious point was simply that this is not always the case: There *is* a point of diminishing returns, after which you begin wasting money that could more efficiently be directed elsewhere.
Not to belabor the point (which, as I said, has been extensively documented elsewhere), but if we pumped so much money into our schools that the only thing left to spend it on was solid gold bathroom fixtures, do you really think that would be an improvement over, say, solid silver fixtures? Of course not.
Put another way, I freely invite you to send me one instance -- *one lousy instance* -- of a school district saying, "No thanks, we have enough money to give our students a good education." If you can't find one, would you then maintain that no school district in the history of American education has ever been adequately funded? Of course not.
what teachers generally want most is to be able to teach their students effectively.
Absolutely. But what teachers' unions want is the same thing every other union wants -- to secure the best possible contract terms for its members. As I said, oftentimes the interests of the students and the interests of the teachers coincide -- as, for example, in maintaining clean, safe schools. But not always.
But there are many things that money can help, especially in places where there is very little of it. There are plenty of schools, often in inner cities, where the textbooks are 30 years old, the buildings aren't up to code, and the teachers are uncertified and far too scarce. Money can obviously help fix these problems! Being able to hire really qualified teachers and buy new textbooks will improve the quality of education quite a lot.
I don't disagree with any of this, frankly.
You bring up a specific situation regarding New York and Governor Pataki. I'm sorry, but I can't comment on this either way -- I simply have no knowledge of the facts at hand. It may very well be that he hates schoolchildren and will take every opportunity to put the screws to them -- I just don't know.
PLEASE don't let yourself be brainwashed by those Republicans (and their ilk) who would have you believe that the teachers' union is an evil force that is trying to raise your taxes. You seem to have bought into the idea that every dollar spent on education is a dollar wasted.
Ugh. You seem to have completely missed the point of my previous posts. In plain English, it was: Don't demonize people simply because they reach different conclusions than you. And yet this is exactly what you are doing.
I can oppose affirmative action on grounds other than being a raging racist. I can believe many illegal drugs should be legalized, even though I don't think people should use drugs. And I can oppose the idea of writing school districts giant blank checks without believing that "every dollar spent on education is a dollar wasted."
As I mentioned to Ben Waggoner, yes, I'm sure there are a few people this describes. But your fundamental error is assuming this describes most conservatives, when in fact you are actually discussing a fringe element so statistically insignificant it is not even worth discussing.
Would it surprise you to learn that I work at an institution of public education? Or that I went to a public school, and received a good education? Or that my brother is a teacher? Or that I believe in the value of education every bit as p
Hmmm... I'm a little reluctant to comment on this, since I'm only marginally familiar with Oregon politics. The version I heard (please understand I have no way of knowing if this is accurate or not) is that the proposed tax increase was presented as a way of funding education and public safety. The problem is that people understand that money is fungible, and Oregon already has one of the highest tax burdens in the country. So people who already felt they were highly taxed said "Wait a minute. If we're already highly taxed, what are the taxes we're paying *now* going for? Why agree with the need for education and public safety, but why can't our government pay for those by prioritizing its needs, and cutting less essential programs?"
Look, I emphatically am *not* arguing with you. I'm not saying the above scenario is accurate. I'm simply restating my previous point, which is that it's easy -- but usually wrong -- to demonize people who don't want to shovel money into the burning maw of public education (Cue Mrs. Lovejoy wailing "Won't SOMEONE think of the CHILDREN!").
The only point where I believe you are mistaken is where you say: "There is certainly a large strain of right-wingers... who definitely think that tax cuts are more important than public education, and that providing good comprehensive public education to every child isn't a social goal worth funding."
It is, I believe, correct to say that VERY, VERY FEW "right wingers" -- a microscopic minority -- actually believe this caricature of conservative thought. The vast majority of conservatives are regular people who generally accept that education is one of those things is that is appropriately of government concern.*
Cheers,
- jc
* I almost wrote "appropriately provided by the government." But I think it would be more accurate to say that some conservatives feel that way, and others feel that, generally, the government should simply ensure that the educational needs of kids are being met, whether by providing it itself, or regulating charter schools, or whatever is best in any given situation. But they all feel government should have *some* role.
OK, that's fine; in fact, I agree with pretty much everything you say here.
But I think the key in this case is, so would most conservatives. Like you and I, conservatives (generally speaking, of course) strongly believe in giving kids a good education. Far from "blaming the poor," they simply have a certain set of ideas about how this might be best accomplished -- for example, giving kids and parents the ability to choose their own schools, just as we believe adults should be able to choose which college they want to attend. (Not that one can't argue with this idea. It's just that the idea itself is perfectly arguable without resorting to the idea that conservatives hate kids, blame the poor, etc. As I said, judging by your other posts, you're too smart to swallow that line.)
Ben, I enjoy reading your comments on Slashdot. It seems you've always got something interesting to say.
That's why I was stunned when you said this:
"Probably our biggest failure as a nation is not fully funding schools and enrichment programs in poor areas. Even if conservatives want to blame the poor for being poor, it certainly isn't their kids fault."
You are way too smart for this. A mountain of evidence collected over the past few decades points to the fact that a broken educational system is *not fixed* by shoveling huge amounts of money at it. Just one example: The national leader in spending per student? Washington D.C.
(It reminds me of a wry comment someone once made about, I think, Paul Wellstone. They said that if you scraped together a huge pile of money, labeled it "Education Funding" and set it on fire, he would complain... because the pile wasn't big enough.:^) )
PLEASE don't let yourself be brainwashed by the public school teacher's unions, which react to every suggestion for school reform by accusing their proponents of hating children. Those unions represent one interest: that of teachers. Sometimes those interests will coincide with those of the children they teach, BUT NOT ALWAYS. But they will always try to blur that fact, and make it seem like all they care about is the children.
PS I love teachers. My brother is a teacher. But there is a big difference between an individual teacher, and a teacher's union.
There's no way Google will be able to avoid this
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Google may develop an online currency -- 'Googles,' if you like (http://www.emarketer.com/news/article.php?1002736 ).
Given that dictionary.com defines spot as an informal term for "a piece of paper money worth a specified number of dollars," I suggest there is no way Google will be able to prevent people from calling them "gSpots."
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, we also invented hypersensitivity too. I proudly note you seem to have picked up on it.
- Alaska Jack
Thanks for the advice. I guess I have a few thoughts on the matter:
1. I trust the National Review the way I believe opinions become facts if you CAPITALIZE them.
Well, I don't know how much you have to trust National Review. But their website publishes a wide range of authors, and it seems to me that what really matters in this case is any individual author's command of the facts.
As it is, Adler's pieces are quite well informed and generally insightful. I don't know that it's necessary to "trust" him as much as it is to counter his facts with more relevant, pertinent facts of your own.
In fact, you might like to read a fascinating exchange Alder has with current environmental media-darling Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Kennedy had a hyperbolic, hyperventilating piece about Bush in Rolling Stone. Adler wrote a piece pointing out that many things in Kennedy's article were misleading or flat-out wrong. In response, Kennedy wrote a letter about it to National Review. Adler responded by noting that, in his letter, Kennedy didn't actually refute a single one of his (Adler's) points.
2. I don't know what sort of "environmental metric" you're talking about, whether measuring laws, executive actions, or physical attributes of the environment.
I was talking about the latter, but while we're on the subject, let's note the former as well. As Adler (and Easterbrook, FTM) note, Bush has made some decisions some environmentalists don't like. But as they also note, Bush is in a no-win situation, because he gets absolutely NO credit for other decisions that one would normally expect an environmentalist to applaud. Easterbrook, himself an environmentalist, has noted that this indiscriminate Bush-bashing is not only dishonorable, but an extremely unwise political strategy.
3. If the latter, note that the environment is an extreme lagging indicator.
I don't disagree with this. But then again, a few thoughts:
a) Does the "lagging indicator" theory get Bush any credit when applied to his pro-environment decisions? I mean, surely it works both ways?
b) On problem with this theory is that you can apply it to *anything*. All sorts of nonsensical enviromental predictions were made in the 1970s and 80s, for example (Paul Weyrich, I'm looking your way); can the now-discredit authors just say the environment is lagging, and is sure to catch up to their theories any day now?
4. If the former, perhaps you could provide a better citation? ... Bush's most egregious actions have been mostly internal to the Executive Branch ...
Sorry, but I don't see any of these actions -- even waves of bureaucrats "resigning in protest" -- crippling the environment. As Adler notes, federal laws governing clean air, water and so on remain in effect. The trends all continue to be positive; it just defies belief to think Bush could undermine that by reshuffling a few bureaucrats -- even if those bureaucrats are dedicated environmentalists.
And I actually provided a pretty good example of an issue constantly used to bash Bush -- the Kyoto accords. Bush has done the exact same thing Clinton did -- declined to submit it for ratfication -- but the difference is, Bush gets piloried for it.
5. Don't read what you like, read what you hate. You'll learn more.
a) First, assuming you know anything about my reading habits from a single Slashdot post is kid-level stuff. Come on.
b) Your last thought is a little hard to square with your first.
c) I would no doubt read The Nation and Mother Jones more often if they would stick to *legitimate* Bush-bashing, and not make me filter out all the *stupid* Bush-bashing.
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the matter ...
- Alaska Jack
Just two observations:
... forcing schools to teach 'creationism' in biology courses" is WAY overheated. I mean, come on, you're talking about less than a handful of crackpot communities across the nation. Don't let your alarmism get in the way of accurately perceiving reality.
One, I think your statement about stem cell research is a bit overheated (I am cautious on this point, because I admittedly don't know a lot about the issue.) My impression is that Bush sought a compromise, and settled on banning the creation of any new fetal stem cell lines, NOT that he "barred the funding of promising biological research." I could be wrong on this though.
Two: The bit about "communities across the country
Alaska Jack
Actually, the number one FACT you won't generally get from the general media is a simple one: Under the last few presidents nearly every environmental metric (in the U.S. at least) has improved, and under the current president, they have ... continued to improve.
Kyoto is a great example. Sure, Bush has rejected the Kyoto protocols, as written. So did the Clinton Administration, and so did the entire U.S. Senate -- Democrats included.
Here's a suggestion. Do a web search for articles by Jonathan Adler (quite of few will be found on National Review's web site). Here's a good one for starters: The Erosion That Isn't.
Money quote: The League of Conservation Voters and Natural Resources Defense Council, among others, have published lengthy reports purporting to document the anti-environmental record of the current administration. Yet the charges do not hold up under scrutiny. Despite the heated rhetoric, the administration has made no significant changes to the basic environmental laws. The federal standards governing air quality, water pollution, and endangered species remain in place, and there is no proposal to do otherwise.
Another good source is The New Republic's Gregg Easterbrook. A moderate Dem and Bush critic, he nevertheless produces pretty balanced articles on the Bush administration's environmental efforts. He is harshly critical about some things, but also points out a lot of the lies the environmental lobby likes to recycle (no pun intended) about Bush.
Hope this helps.
Alaska Jack
Sad because no one has mentioned Steven Seagal's "On Deadly Ground."
See, I believe what separates the creme de la creme here from the other merely godawful movies is that the truly bad ones make you ANGRY. You should sit there in the theater (or on the couch, or whatever) and feel like the director and producers have unzipped their pants and pissed on you in their total lack of respect for you. You should get the distinct impression that the studio execs who greenlighted it hate you and/or think you're an idiot.
So, Plan Nine didn't make me ANGRY. Manos didn't make me ANGRY. Howard the Duck made my wife ANGRY, but I never saw it so I can't comment. Evidently Battlefield Earth made a lot of people angry, but come on: No film is more insulting than "On Deadly Ground."
I mean, how about the scene in the bar where SS kicks some oil worker's butt, then another one, just some guy at the bar, says something like "Don't fuck with oil workers!" and attacks him? Just as an excuse so SS can kick EVERYONE'S butt! I mean, since when do oil workers have such awesome solidarity that they'd attack a Kung Fu master to salvage the honor of their brothers, especially since by then it was too late to save Oil Worker #1 from getting his ass kicked anyway? If I was in a bar kicking some veterinarian's ass, would some other vet say "Don't fuck with veterinarians!" and jump on me?! It's ludicrous!
And that's just the smallest example. How about when the evil corporate guys with hair-trigger tempers machine gun all the Eskimos. Yeah, massacring half a village would be easy to cover up! Or when SS dynamites the refinery, killing countless janitors, cooks, technicians, etc in addition to a handful of evil corporate suits and their assassin friends. WTF!?!? I WANT ANSWERS!!
Whew, sorry about that. But it just goes to prove that a truly awful film has to make you ANGRY, and it should be a lingering, burning anger that only grows over time.
- Alaska Jack
I've always thought this would be the holy grail of home computing. I just want to sit on the couch and websurf while my wife reads or watches TV.
The killer hardware app would be a relatively inexpensive accessory (under $500) that would let me do that. I don't want to have to buy a whole new computer -- I don't need a laptop, and if I wanted to get any serious work done, I could always just go over to my desk and use my desktop.
Now, my question. I've seen others bring up the possibility of exactly such a wireless, touch-screen monitor. When that happens, replies seem to fall into two categories:
*Either: "It can't be done -- moving pixels requires a huge amount of bandwith, more than can be provided wirelessly,"
* Or "Viewsonic already sells these as "smart monitors."
Well, which is it? Viewsonic does seem to be selling them, although they are very expensive. Is there a technical reason someone can't take a 15-inch LCD screen, slap an inexpensive, non-pressure-sensitive overlay on it, add a standard wi-fi card, and sell a million jillion of them? And if so, how did Viewsonic overcome it?
A dumb non-computer guy wants to know.
- Alaska Jack
I have a question for you. I like to read slashdot, but I'm not a computer whiz, so I hope this isn't a stupid question.
I work for a public institution. We have 100-200 photos we would like to publish to the web, so the other members of our institution can access them via a standard web browser. So far so good -- there are lots of programs that do this.
But what we need is for our other members to be able to *search* for keywords (or choose them from a list) and have the resulting photos appear. I know a lot of stock photo agencies do this via big, expensive databases, but are there any simple, inexpensive applications that would let us do it?
Maybe this would be a good "Ask Slashdot" question.
The wall might bring some short term relief but it can not be a long term solution ...
Yes, but when by "short term relief" you mean "fewer civilians blown apart by bombs wrapped in nails and scrap metal," well, that's pretty darn relieving.
- Alaska Jack
Yeah, that's definitely true, and I thought of it while typing my comment. But an RFID-aware pet door, set to unlock only when the chip is *very* close, would still be a big improvement over existing doors.
- AJ
Yes, I know about the magnetic approach. But it seems to me like an RFID approach would be better and more reliable. Also there is the fact that many pets (again, AFIAK) already have RFID chips implanted in them.
- jc
It's my understanding that a common practice these days is to have microships (which I assume to be RFID tags) injected under the skin of pets, so lost pets can be identified even if they're not wearing collars.
I think a good idea would be to make pet doors that can "learn" to unlock only when certain RFID tags are within 4 or five feet. You could set it for the pets you own, and other pets (and/or other critters) wouldn't be able to get in.
Also, if your pets didn't have the chips implanted, you could just get a chip on a collar.
Alaska Jack
Others in this thread have noted what nonsense this sort of stuff is -- about some wonderful free-speech utopia that existed before this repressive regime came into absolute power -- so I won't beat it to death.
I just wonder about your assertations. There are a ton of them in your post, with basically zero facts to back them up. You don't even say why "P"BS should have been receiving government funding at all. I wonder what percentage of PBS' viewership is composed of these inner city kids who seem to depend on it so much. I also wonder about the part where you assert the fanatics and freaks "used the money to increase funding to their personal religious projects." Really? Which ones? How much money? What were their ties to these projects?
Surely, you can back all this up, right? I mean, no one would just spew out a whole bunch of unsupported nonsense on SlashDot, would they?
- Alaska Jack
It also doesn't say "Freedom of speech except for screaming 'FIRE!' in a crowded theater." But most of us still think it's a good idea.
- Alaska Jack
Oh fer the love of Pete.
Look, I can't believe I'm wasting time with this, but I'm a masochist, so here goes.
The RSF report is LUDICROUS. Why was the U.S. "modded down?" Because, it says, the "US army's responsibility in the death of several reporters during the war in Iraq constitute unacceptable behaviour"
Those reporters were covering a WAR in a WAR ZONE. It's tragic that they were killed, but that WAR -- it is the physical manifestation of chaos theory. Those casualties, while tragic, simply have no relationship to "press freedom," unless you can show a meaningful correlation between press casualties and how critical or supportive the reporters in question were of the U.S. NO ONE, not even RSF, has shown anything like this.
Since I'm preaching to the deaf here, I'll close with a few quick points. First, how many conquering countries in world history helped the conquered people set up independent media outlets? Sure, they do have restrictions. They cannot advocate violence, or agitate for the return of the old regime, and... and... that's it! It may not seem like much to you, but it is an ASTONISHING development by historical standards. Somehow, RSF seems to have missed this.
Finally, this whole stupid thread is a crock. In the U.S., you can legally say or write whatever you want. What few restrictions there are -- things like community standards for obscenity, not broadcasting the departure schedule for troopships, advocating immediate and specific violence, etc -- are subject to EXTREMELY NARROW restrictions with the burden of proof on the government. None of that is changing, all your Ashcroft hallucinations notwithstanding.
Oh, yes absolutely, this is +5, Insightful.
Except, of course, that the current era is by far the least censorious -- and most permissive -- this country has ever seen, in its history, ever.
When exactly was the "once" that we had a "nice democratic republic"? The 1970s? The 50s? The 20s? 1776?
Pop quiz -- Here are few notable historical Americans. After each one, tell me whether you think they would or would not have approved of YOUR idea of what public expression should be like. Ready? Here we go:
Martin Luther King Jr.
Thomas Jefferson
Abraham Lincoln
George Washington Carver
WEB DuBois
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Harriet Tubman
Benjamin Franklin
etc etc etc
Not to be too harsh on you. Actually, I feel more sorry for all the kiddies who thought this was "insightful."
-Alaska Jack
One of the Firefox help pages (I'm sorry, but i don't have time to find it -- I'm sure you can if you look around a little) has some text that you paste into one of the config files. After that, whenever your cursor is above a link that opens in a new window, it changes to a little crosshair. And whenever it hovers above a javascript link, it changes too, to a little four-pointed arrow thingie.
Absolutely essential, IMO.
I don't disagree with any of this. I just think GG's left-hand pane makes it extraordinarily easy to glance at it and see exactly where you are at in the thread. That doesn't mean that you couldn't still filter messages by score, etc.
Alaska Jack
One thing I've always admired is Google Groups' user interface -- the pane along the left-hand side makes it very clear where you are at in navigating a thread.
/. is better the way it is?)
Contrast this to Slashdot, where navigating the comments threads can be very confusing. I wish Slashdot could be re-written to something similar to GG. Anyone know the correct address for submitting this kind of suggestion?
(Or, on the other hand, any good reason
- Alaska Jack
You have GOT to be shitting me.
Bush is mostly responsible on two counts; 1, for cutting back on federal funding for local emergency staff- police, EMS and fire all have been hit hard in almost every town throughout the US.
"cutting back on FEDERAL funding for LOCAL emergency staff"
While you were smugly typing in your oh-so-wise critique of Bush, did it ever even occur to you how inane this is? It's the central frickin' principal of federalist government, you idiot!
Also, as far as the Guard and Reserve go, did it ever occur to you that this would happen, and has, WHENEVER Guardsmen and/or reservist are activated? Including World War II? Would you have said "It's all Roosevelt's fault?" I mean, really, what would you suggest, telling policemen and emergency responders that they can't serve in the Ready Reserve? Vice versa? Disbanding the reserves?
Sorry to go ballistic, but it's not too far off to say that people like you are what's wrong with this country. You have no clue (or just don't care) about the principles of limited and local government on which this country was founded. You just want more, more, more from an increasingly centralized, monolithic government.
Maybe I can throw something in here that most people don't realize: Every surviving account of democracy in ancient Greece is harshly critical of it. Greek democracy didn't have some of the features we take for granted -- for example, separation of judicial and legislative powers, or protection of minorities. In practice it often amounted to what was basically mob rule, and Greek critics of time wrote very perceptive accounts of how easily the mob could be swayed one way or the other.
I bring this up when I hear people say that founders of the U.S. constitution instituted a republic, as opposed to a pure democracy, because a democracy would have been too difficult given the limitations of the time. This is true, of course, but it's also true that the founders wouldn't have implemented a true democracy even if it had been feasible. The founders felt that a republic would be *better* than a pure democracy. The genius of the American experiment was the way they tried to blend aspects of oligarchy and democracy together in a way that ameliorated the worst aspects of each of those two systems (tyranny vs. mob rule).
Dan -
It's obvious you put a great deal of time and thought into this reply. Now I need you to do something for me. Take a deep breath, clear your mind a little, and calmly re-read my previous post.
Saying that giving schools more money won't help is the most inaccurate, irresponsible statement I've ever heard.
Well then it's a good thing I didn't say that -- at least, not in the blanket sort of way your statement implies. Of course there are many situations where schools need and deserve more money. My fairly obvious point was simply that this is not always the case: There *is* a point of diminishing returns, after which you begin wasting money that could more efficiently be directed elsewhere.
Not to belabor the point (which, as I said, has been extensively documented elsewhere), but if we pumped so much money into our schools that the only thing left to spend it on was solid gold bathroom fixtures, do you really think that would be an improvement over, say, solid silver fixtures? Of course not.
Put another way, I freely invite you to send me one instance -- *one lousy instance* -- of a school district saying, "No thanks, we have enough money to give our students a good education." If you can't find one, would you then maintain that no school district in the history of American education has ever been adequately funded? Of course not.
what teachers generally want most is to be able to teach their students effectively.
Absolutely. But what teachers' unions want is the same thing every other union wants -- to secure the best possible contract terms for its members. As I said, oftentimes the interests of the students and the interests of the teachers coincide -- as, for example, in maintaining clean, safe schools. But not always.
But there are many things that money can help, especially in places where there is very little of it. There are plenty of schools, often in inner cities, where the textbooks are 30 years old, the buildings aren't up to code, and the teachers are uncertified and far too scarce. Money can obviously help fix these problems! Being able to hire really qualified teachers and buy new textbooks will improve the quality of education quite a lot.
I don't disagree with any of this, frankly.
You bring up a specific situation regarding New York and Governor Pataki. I'm sorry, but I can't comment on this either way -- I simply have no knowledge of the facts at hand. It may very well be that he hates schoolchildren and will take every opportunity to put the screws to them -- I just don't know.
PLEASE don't let yourself be brainwashed by those Republicans (and their ilk) who would have you believe that the teachers' union is an evil force that is trying to raise your taxes. You seem to have bought into the idea that every dollar spent on education is a dollar wasted.
Ugh. You seem to have completely missed the point of my previous posts. In plain English, it was: Don't demonize people simply because they reach different conclusions than you. And yet this is exactly what you are doing.
I can oppose affirmative action on grounds other than being a raging racist. I can believe many illegal drugs should be legalized, even though I don't think people should use drugs. And I can oppose the idea of writing school districts giant blank checks without believing that "every dollar spent on education is a dollar wasted."
As I mentioned to Ben Waggoner, yes, I'm sure there are a few people this describes. But your fundamental error is assuming this describes most conservatives, when in fact you are actually discussing a fringe element so statistically insignificant it is not even worth discussing.
Would it surprise you to learn that I work at an institution of public education? Or that I went to a public school, and received a good education? Or that my brother is a teacher? Or that I believe in the value of education every bit as p
Hmmm... I'm a little reluctant to comment on this, since I'm only marginally familiar with Oregon politics. The version I heard (please understand I have no way of knowing if this is accurate or not) is that the proposed tax increase was presented as a way of funding education and public safety. The problem is that people understand that money is fungible, and Oregon already has one of the highest tax burdens in the country. So people who already felt they were highly taxed said "Wait a minute. If we're already highly taxed, what are the taxes we're paying *now* going for? Why agree with the need for education and public safety, but why can't our government pay for those by prioritizing its needs, and cutting less essential programs?"
... who definitely think that tax cuts are more important than public education, and that providing good comprehensive public education to every child isn't a social goal worth funding."
Look, I emphatically am *not* arguing with you. I'm not saying the above scenario is accurate. I'm simply restating my previous point, which is that it's easy -- but usually wrong -- to demonize people who don't want to shovel money into the burning maw of public education (Cue Mrs. Lovejoy wailing "Won't SOMEONE think of the CHILDREN!").
The only point where I believe you are mistaken is where you say: "There is certainly a large strain of right-wingers
It is, I believe, correct to say that VERY, VERY FEW "right wingers" -- a microscopic minority -- actually believe this caricature of conservative thought. The vast majority of conservatives are regular people who generally accept that education is one of those things is that is appropriately of government concern.*
Cheers,
- jc
* I almost wrote "appropriately provided by the government." But I think it would be more accurate to say that some conservatives feel that way, and others feel that, generally, the government should simply ensure that the educational needs of kids are being met, whether by providing it itself, or regulating charter schools, or whatever is best in any given situation. But they all feel government should have *some* role.
Whew! I really went on way too long there.
OK, that's fine; in fact, I agree with pretty much everything you say here.
But I think the key in this case is, so would most conservatives. Like you and I, conservatives (generally speaking, of course) strongly believe in giving kids a good education. Far from "blaming the poor," they simply have a certain set of ideas about how this might be best accomplished -- for example, giving kids and parents the ability to choose their own schools, just as we believe adults should be able to choose which college they want to attend. (Not that one can't argue with this idea. It's just that the idea itself is perfectly arguable without resorting to the idea that conservatives hate kids, blame the poor, etc. As I said, judging by your other posts, you're too smart to swallow that line.)
Cheers, and keep up the good work.
- AJ
Ben, I enjoy reading your comments on Slashdot. It seems you've always got something interesting to say.
... because the pile wasn't big enough. :^) )
That's why I was stunned when you said this:
"Probably our biggest failure as a nation is not fully funding schools and enrichment programs in poor areas. Even if conservatives want to blame the poor for being poor, it certainly isn't their kids fault."
You are way too smart for this. A mountain of evidence collected over the past few decades points to the fact that a broken educational system is *not fixed* by shoveling huge amounts of money at it. Just one example: The national leader in spending per student? Washington D.C.
(It reminds me of a wry comment someone once made about, I think, Paul Wellstone. They said that if you scraped together a huge pile of money, labeled it "Education Funding" and set it on fire, he would complain
PLEASE don't let yourself be brainwashed by the public school teacher's unions, which react to every suggestion for school reform by accusing their proponents of hating children. Those unions represent one interest: that of teachers. Sometimes those interests will coincide with those of the children they teach, BUT NOT ALWAYS. But they will always try to blur that fact, and make it seem like all they care about is the children.
PS I love teachers. My brother is a teacher. But there is a big difference between an individual teacher, and a teacher's union.
Google may develop an online currency -- 'Googles,' if you like (http://www.emarketer.com/news/article.php?1002736 ).
Given that dictionary.com defines spot as an informal term for "a piece of paper money worth a specified number of dollars," I suggest there is no way Google will be able to prevent people from calling them "gSpots."