That is a remarkably short-sighted opinion. You need only take a look back at our own history to see that the premise of your argument, that Capitalism and Technology cause poverty, is false just on the face of it.
Capitalism and technology together have ALWAYS created a better standard of living and improved conditions for all. From an agrarian society, Capitalism and Technology took us into the Industrial Revolution, which brought mechanized farming. Mechanized farming removed the need to have a large "plantation" with hundreds of hired hands. (no slaves anymore by that time) The hired hands were fired. Oh no! Thousands lost their jobs! Capitalism and technology are HORRIBLE!
But wait! Those fired farm workers moved to the city, and got jobs in factories and all the new industries that the Industrial revolution created. Their standard of living improved. Many single men that couldn't afford to get married could now not only get married but get an nice apartment to live in. More children were born, who grew up, got educated and added to the labor force. Families moved out to the suburbs. Many started their own companies which grew and hired people, thus adding to the overall wealth of the country. And on and on and on..
I could go on, but you should be able to see the point by now. Capitalism and Technology gave us PROGRESS. They gave us the standard of living we now enjoy.
It was not until we got AWAY from Capitalism and started growing government to ridiculous levels, thus making it more difficult and expensive to do business here in America, that companies started moving overseas in earnest. We need to get back to our Capitalistic roots and use Capitalism to harness Technology to give us the bright future we all want.
As a parent of a child with L4 Spina Bifida I have to agree with you.
I would MUCH rather see these guys working on neuro-spinal implants that would allow my baby girl's frayed spinal cord to be properly connected to all it's end points. Or on bio-engineering cellular lattices that would do the same thing. They should be focused on FIXING the problems, not going around them with silly solutions that cause more problems in the long run.
I want my baby to walk on her own two feet. Not be shuttled around on some contraption. They already have those, they are called Wheelchairs. DBC is absolutely right. These kids need therapy and medical intervention. Not a silly toy to ride around on.
Please explain how a device that is directly connected to the truck frame can be lowered below that frame and still maintain the function of said device?
Just to be clear, if one "lowers" the bumpers, even with a triangular frame brace, one is basically removing them as far as safety goes. Bumpers are designed to absorb force, but need a firm backing on the truck frame or they will simply tear off in an accident, creating a wedge under the truck nose that would drive it up even HIGHER over a vehicle it was striking.
Lowering the bumpers would be far MORE dangerous, not less. (Which, incidentally, is why it is illegal in many states to modify the bumpers beyond changing the covering material, or replacing them with an appropriately rated bumper.)
And due to the increased costs of automobiles (in part due to increased CAFE standards mandating ever more complex and expensive re-engineering of said automobiles) Renting an automobile for common and everyday "trips to the store" is ridiculously expensive and un-economical.
You are NOT going to stop people from wanting the biggest safest and most flexible vehicle they can afford. And forcing cars to be ever more expensive, thus forcing people into ever smaller and less safe cars through government interference in the market is not only stupid policy, but pretty much the definition of "evil".
I drive a Jeep Liberty myself. It gets a whole 17 MPG highway. Why do I have it? I could justify myself by saying that I regularly carry large loads with it. But I don't feel the need to justify myself. I drive it because I love having an SUV, I like the way it drives, and I really enjoy being able to do just about anything (Including forays into off-road exploring) that I want or need with it. It's not the best SUV ever or even the best Jeep ever and absolutely has some compromises that I wish it didn't have, but it's mine and I enjoy having it. I would be very upset if I wasn't able to get it or something like it because of some stupid unrealistic government standard based on Eco-Religion ideology rather than market forces.
In other words: Keep your nanny state fingers off of my SUV.
- The originator of the Thermiosol scare was a British doctor. The entire scare started there and continues, despite the complete debunking of his bogus study. There are anti-vaxxers all over Western society in part because of this one doctor.
- Many many people in Britain and the rest of Europe don't buy the AGW bunkum. It doesn't make one "Anti-Science" to disbelieve junk science. NOTE: Not believing in AGW does not mean one rejects the idea that the Earth's climate can or does change. Change is the only constant in the Universe.
So, Is the Earth's climate changing? Youbetcha. It's part of a long period cycle. Are humans causing it? No evidence to support that, so no reason to radically restructure our society to some Communist "Utopia" right now. (Not that Communism would solve AGW anyway. Command economies are far too slow reacting to be able to adjust for even a minor climate change.)
- You are pretty much dead on on the Economic front. Too much "Chicago" or "Frankfurt" school thinking going on right now. Lefties never learn that their policies don't work.
I have to politely disagree with your conclusion. If I may, I would like to expound upon my opinion.
Based on the information available and at least on an individual scale, the average human is roughly as smart or smarter than our ancient ancestors were. Of course, no reliable testing data exists further back than a generation or two, so any commentary on human intelligence positive or negative is somewhat subjective.
However, I think it is fair to say that the issues we are having today with the seeming increase in the number of "stupid" people is not so much an indicator of declining human intelligence, but an artifact of our modern society.
Simply put, the pace of technological and social changes in society is occurring at a faster rate than the average human can keep up with. While we can keep up with the changes in a specific discipline, (say, automobile tech or computers or the like) it is nearly impossible for our brains to process all the changes that are happening at once. We simply can't keep up.
Combine that with a massive increase in the available information (thanks to the Internet) and our ability to make rational risk-assessments becomes more and more compromised.
Now compound that with the fact that western culture, capitalism and medicine have greatly reduced the average western mortality rates, thus allowing our population to increase and the average number of less intelligent and otherwise mentally challenged people to survive and you will have a spike in "stupid behavior".
Really, there are only two ways to deal with this:
1. Government regulated breeding. Only works as well as the regulators running it, and based on the current crop of regulators, I'd not want to bet my society (or my kids) on it. Not to mention the hideous tragedies such tyrannical policies would create.
2. Increased educational focus on logic and reasoning and a "classical" education approach. IE: Logic & Reasoning, Math, Science, History and Arts & Technology as focuses in primary and secondary education.
I personally think that option 2 would be far more effective in the long run than option 1. Far better to equip all of our children of all intelligence levels to be able to handle modern society via clear reasoning and improved risk assessment skills than to attempt the impossible task of breeding perfect people.
It's not about "Metro Apps" and "Metro Hardware" it's about usability and basic ergonomics.
It is simply too much of a PITA for ANYONE, business or home users, to use the Metro interface on a desktop or laptop, even IF they have a touchscreen. (FSM help you if you don't have a touchscreen!) The UI concepts DO NOT WORK with those form factors. And while many people are enjoying tablets and smartphones, there is still a great need for the more traditional form factors if you are doing anything other than multimedia or web consumption.
The "Desktop PC" paradigm in business is not going away any time soon. It is a well known and understood style and ergonomically works very very well. Metro just doesn't work in that paradigm.
I anticipate that we will see Metro and the touchscreen UI concept for Desktops go by the wayside within two years. Win8 will get patched to remove the Metro UI (With Metro Apps running in non-fullscreen windows instead) the Start button and Start menu will return and that will be the end of this abortive experiment in "blended" UIs.
The victim of rape should not be punished. And being forced to birth the child of your rapist is an unimaginably cruel punishment that wouldn't even be fit for a convicted criminal.
Better let the muslim world know. There are parts where the rapist can get off the crime if they marry the person they rape. Though in most cases the girl simply commits suicide.
Doesn't the Bible have the same provision?
Name one "Christian" country where this is law. Here I'll save you the trouble. There aren't any. But I can name SEVERAL "Muslim" countries where it is. (Iran, Saudia Arabia, Indonesia, Bahrain, Syria, there are more.)
There is NO moral equivalency between Christianity and Islam. Stop trying to draw a false one.
What confuses me isn't that a large part of americans still favour a private insurance based system. The confusing bit is that there is a majority that supports a single-payer system, but that it is STILL difficult politically.
Then please allow me to clear it up for you;
The truth is that a majority of Americans do not support a single-payer system. Indeed, when the Affordable Care Act was being debated in Congress poll after poll after poll showed sentiment running around 70% against it or any single payer system. There have been a few polls since then that have shown a thin margin of support, but they have all been found to be flawed in one way or another (sampling only in cities, large oversample of Democrats, faulty sample weighting, etc.) In most polls "Obamacare" is still highly unpopular.
RTFA dude (yes, I know, this is/. where nobody RTFAs) The reactor is designed to produce significantly LESS waste than existing designs. the problem is that getting permits for experimental reactors in the US is even harder than getting one for a known reactor design. We have hobbled ourselves in the Nuclear power area, indeed in ALL power areas due to our extreme fear of all things nuclear. (Despite living on a radioactive mostly molten ball with a thin hard crust orbiting around a giant fusion reaction in space as we get bombarded with interstellar radiation.)
No, those plants won't grow properly in our biosphere. Thank goodness too because I really wasn't looking forward to having a beak. Although I wouldn't mind the awesome physique.
Also, the Obama administration attempted to block further Uranium mining (needed to fuel the reactors) despite stating they support nuclear power development.
Not sure what they expect to run the power plants on. Solar-incubated superman clones are rather hard to come by.
Agreed. I really wasn't getting this issue at all.
I haven't used the hosts file to block with for AGES. At work we block with firewall and web filtering. At home I use NoScript and Adblock and firewall blocking.
Glad to see the hosts file get more attention. Too bad that Win8 is so horrible to work with I'll never get to use the improvement in hosts file management.
Would you like that mythical magical transport system powered by Unicorn farts or Pixie dust? Because that's what it's going to take.
There is NO FREE RIDE. Free is a myth, it doesn't exist and never will. Even if we were to have "free" transport provided by the government you would still pay. You would pay in higher taxes on everything else in your life. And in my life, and in everyone else's life, making all of life that much more expensive for everyone.
Stop putting forward communist ideas. They don't work and they hurt people.
Yes, it is true. You just proved it with your own example.
If you haven't done any rail travel lately in the US, please be aware that a train ticket for the normal, slow train costs about as much as a coach class airplane ticket for the same trip.
Let me repeat that for emphasis; A round-trip train ticket from (for example) my hometown of Buffalo NY to Albany NY (a trip my wife has had to take in recent years) on Amtrak (ordinary train) costs almost exactly the same amount (about a 20 dollar difference) as a plane ticket. This is for the same class of ticket and roughly the same amenities (coach seat, no bed, no meal included). The train trip takes about 8 hours, the plane trip about an hour.
So, given that they aren't receiving significantly superior service, why would people want to spend significantly more TIME on a train? Particularly business travelers, who make up the bulk of most continental commercial airline flights in the US today. These are people who want to get to their destination as quickly and safely as possible, get their business done and get home in the same manner. They don't have time to waste riding a train.
Now, with that in mind, remember that passenger trains are LOSING MONEY and being propped up with taxpayer dollars. the Airlines are largely solvent and at least semi-profitable, despite the hits they have taken in recent years.
Train systems cost more to deploy, more to maintain, and more to run than airlines. This is a known fact, and not arguable. They simply have more equipment and material to deal with.
Even if you were able to cut all train travel time in half with "bullet trains" your maintenance costs would go up, the costs for the trains themselves would go up and these super fast trains need special tracks so the upfront cost is immense. And even then airline travel would still be faster, more flexible, and cheaper. The cost for a bullet train ticket in the US would be impossible to make work in the free market. Which is probably why people that put forward these plans ALWAYS do it as a giant government project. Yet another waste of taxpayer money we cannot afford and there is no significant public outcry or political will to do.
Simply put; High Speed Rail is a pipe dream. A stupid, inconvenient and costly pipe dream at that. Unless we have some kind of crazy oil cost spike as in the Atlas Shrugged movie, trains will NEVER be able to compete with air travel. Which is as it should be. I love trains as much as the next person, but they are yesterday's technology. it's time to let them go. We have tomorrow's transport technology to work on.
"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer"?
Otherwise, i can't think of a sane reason beyond that which the first poster has already elaborated on; that Assange and Wikileaks are no friends of freedom and democracy, and in fact are mere haters of the west and unwitting (or perhaps witting) tools of despots and dictators the world over.
Oh quit your whining. It's not Anon's fault that you were stupid enough to sink money into Sony crap.
Mind you, I don't approve of the illegal methods Anon sometimes uses, but I agree with the principle. Sony is a notorious abuser of both the law and their own customers. The sooner they either close down or radically restructure (IE: shareholders fire the CEO, the entire board of directors, most of the upper management and ALL the lawyers for extreme douchbaggery) the better. While there are far worse issues facing us today, Sony is still a boil on the face of the entertainment and gaming industries.
Oh, and just in case it wasn't clear, you were and are a fool for buying any of their products and supporting them. You can still redeem yourself by cancelling your account and taking the financial hit as penance. Or you can wait for Anon to do it for you. Your choice.
Yes. All those "Intelligent" people who made the decision to design Win8 this way because of data collected from the "Windows Experience" system. A system which only the lowest of the low end users ever partake in.
My Technological Luddite in-laws knew to chose "decline" on this when it popped up on their new PC. I shudder to think of the quality of users who's computer interactions informed this design decision.
So yeah. You have fun with your UI designed by Monkey Committee. I'll be sticking with something NOT brain-dead in my dual-boot Win7/Xubuntu laptop.
Heh. Well, I think he gets a pass not just because of his political party, but because everybody pretty much knows about "Gaffes" Biden already
I swear, I get a huge kick out of far leftists claiming that "Tea Party" people want to assassinate the President. Putting aside the fact that comments like that are a form of political Libel, no Tea Party member would ever do that simply because if Obama dies, we get BIDEN as President! That's something NOBODY wants.
So, Props to Obama. He picked the PERFECT running mate.
While I absolutely agree with you, I think the poster you are responding to was talking about the law in relation to minors, not consenting adults. Although I may be wrong.
Yes, because so many of the "Christian" countries of the world actually have that written as law, just like the "Muslim" countries of the world do.
Oh, and let's just ignore that whole "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" business. I mean, that Jesus guy, what a hippie. EVERYBODY knows that the Old Testament is where it's at for Christians. Who cares about all that love and giving and kindness stuff from Christ, amiright?/sarc
You know, if you're going to make false equivalencies, the least you could do is refrain from making such stupid and sloppy ones.
Open up Google Earth, make sure "Airports" is checked in the item visibility pane and zoom in ANYWHERE on the map that isn't a state or federal park, lake or a mountain. You will almost assuredly find a small private airport.
In the Buffalo area (my area) there are at least a dozen if not more small private airports. I know of two of them small enough to not rate a tower, but large enough that a small cargo plane (like an old DC3) could land at them. Load up a DC3 with ANFO (or even TNT) and you could do quite a bit of damage.
That's why the TSA is such an obscene joke. We can't possibly cover every place Terrorists could launch from without becoming a Police State, and even THEN it wouldn't be enough. All the things we have been doing to "fight terrorism" domestically have been about as effective as wearing a condom to a sex orgy at a leper colony.
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That is a remarkably short-sighted opinion. You need only take a look back at our own history to see that the premise of your argument, that Capitalism and Technology cause poverty, is false just on the face of it.
Capitalism and technology together have ALWAYS created a better standard of living and improved conditions for all. From an agrarian society, Capitalism and Technology took us into the Industrial Revolution, which brought mechanized farming. Mechanized farming removed the need to have a large "plantation" with hundreds of hired hands. (no slaves anymore by that time) The hired hands were fired. Oh no! Thousands lost their jobs! Capitalism and technology are HORRIBLE!
But wait! Those fired farm workers moved to the city, and got jobs in factories and all the new industries that the Industrial revolution created. Their standard of living improved. Many single men that couldn't afford to get married could now not only get married but get an nice apartment to live in. More children were born, who grew up, got educated and added to the labor force. Families moved out to the suburbs. Many started their own companies which grew and hired people, thus adding to the overall wealth of the country. And on and on and on..
I could go on, but you should be able to see the point by now. Capitalism and Technology gave us PROGRESS. They gave us the standard of living we now enjoy.
It was not until we got AWAY from Capitalism and started growing government to ridiculous levels, thus making it more difficult and expensive to do business here in America, that companies started moving overseas in earnest. We need to get back to our Capitalistic roots and use Capitalism to harness Technology to give us the bright future we all want.
The question is, who do you fear more, Google or FSB?
I'll have to give that some thought.
Hmmm....
Google: Might sell my personal data to annoying advertisers or cancel an account if I upset them.
FSB: Polonium poisoning.
Seems obvious to me.
As a parent of a child with L4 Spina Bifida I have to agree with you.
I would MUCH rather see these guys working on neuro-spinal implants that would allow my baby girl's frayed spinal cord to be properly connected to all it's end points. Or on bio-engineering cellular lattices that would do the same thing. They should be focused on FIXING the problems, not going around them with silly solutions that cause more problems in the long run.
I want my baby to walk on her own two feet. Not be shuttled around on some contraption. They already have those, they are called Wheelchairs. DBC is absolutely right. These kids need therapy and medical intervention. Not a silly toy to ride around on.
Lower the bumpers? Did you really just type that?
Please explain how a device that is directly connected to the truck frame can be lowered below that frame and still maintain the function of said device?
Just to be clear, if one "lowers" the bumpers, even with a triangular frame brace, one is basically removing them as far as safety goes. Bumpers are designed to absorb force, but need a firm backing on the truck frame or they will simply tear off in an accident, creating a wedge under the truck nose that would drive it up even HIGHER over a vehicle it was striking.
Lowering the bumpers would be far MORE dangerous, not less. (Which, incidentally, is why it is illegal in many states to modify the bumpers beyond changing the covering material, or replacing them with an appropriately rated bumper.)
And due to the increased costs of automobiles (in part due to increased CAFE standards mandating ever more complex and expensive re-engineering of said automobiles) Renting an automobile for common and everyday "trips to the store" is ridiculously expensive and un-economical.
You are NOT going to stop people from wanting the biggest safest and most flexible vehicle they can afford. And forcing cars to be ever more expensive, thus forcing people into ever smaller and less safe cars through government interference in the market is not only stupid policy, but pretty much the definition of "evil".
I drive a Jeep Liberty myself. It gets a whole 17 MPG highway. Why do I have it? I could justify myself by saying that I regularly carry large loads with it. But I don't feel the need to justify myself. I drive it because I love having an SUV, I like the way it drives, and I really enjoy being able to do just about anything (Including forays into off-road exploring) that I want or need with it. It's not the best SUV ever or even the best Jeep ever and absolutely has some compromises that I wish it didn't have, but it's mine and I enjoy having it. I would be very upset if I wasn't able to get it or something like it because of some stupid unrealistic government standard based on Eco-Religion ideology rather than market forces.
In other words: Keep your nanny state fingers off of my SUV.
Just so you know;
- The originator of the Thermiosol scare was a British doctor. The entire scare started there and continues, despite the complete debunking of his bogus study. There are anti-vaxxers all over Western society in part because of this one doctor.
- Many many people in Britain and the rest of Europe don't buy the AGW bunkum. It doesn't make one "Anti-Science" to disbelieve junk science. NOTE: Not believing in AGW does not mean one rejects the idea that the Earth's climate can or does change. Change is the only constant in the Universe.
So, Is the Earth's climate changing? Youbetcha. It's part of a long period cycle. Are humans causing it? No evidence to support that, so no reason to radically restructure our society to some Communist "Utopia" right now. (Not that Communism would solve AGW anyway. Command economies are far too slow reacting to be able to adjust for even a minor climate change.)
- You are pretty much dead on on the Economic front. Too much "Chicago" or "Frankfurt" school thinking going on right now. Lefties never learn that their policies don't work.
I have to politely disagree with your conclusion. If I may, I would like to expound upon my opinion.
Based on the information available and at least on an individual scale, the average human is roughly as smart or smarter than our ancient ancestors were. Of course, no reliable testing data exists further back than a generation or two, so any commentary on human intelligence positive or negative is somewhat subjective.
However, I think it is fair to say that the issues we are having today with the seeming increase in the number of "stupid" people is not so much an indicator of declining human intelligence, but an artifact of our modern society.
Simply put, the pace of technological and social changes in society is occurring at a faster rate than the average human can keep up with. While we can keep up with the changes in a specific discipline, (say, automobile tech or computers or the like) it is nearly impossible for our brains to process all the changes that are happening at once. We simply can't keep up.
Combine that with a massive increase in the available information (thanks to the Internet) and our ability to make rational risk-assessments becomes more and more compromised.
Now compound that with the fact that western culture, capitalism and medicine have greatly reduced the average western mortality rates, thus allowing our population to increase and the average number of less intelligent and otherwise mentally challenged people to survive and you will have a spike in "stupid behavior".
Really, there are only two ways to deal with this:
1. Government regulated breeding. Only works as well as the regulators running it, and based on the current crop of regulators, I'd not want to bet my society (or my kids) on it. Not to mention the hideous tragedies such tyrannical policies would create.
2. Increased educational focus on logic and reasoning and a "classical" education approach. IE: Logic & Reasoning, Math, Science, History and Arts & Technology as focuses in primary and secondary education.
I personally think that option 2 would be far more effective in the long run than option 1. Far better to equip all of our children of all intelligence levels to be able to handle modern society via clear reasoning and improved risk assessment skills than to attempt the impossible task of breeding perfect people.
It's not about "Metro Apps" and "Metro Hardware" it's about usability and basic ergonomics.
It is simply too much of a PITA for ANYONE, business or home users, to use the Metro interface on a desktop or laptop, even IF they have a touchscreen. (FSM help you if you don't have a touchscreen!) The UI concepts DO NOT WORK with those form factors. And while many people are enjoying tablets and smartphones, there is still a great need for the more traditional form factors if you are doing anything other than multimedia or web consumption.
The "Desktop PC" paradigm in business is not going away any time soon. It is a well known and understood style and ergonomically works very very well. Metro just doesn't work in that paradigm.
I anticipate that we will see Metro and the touchscreen UI concept for Desktops go by the wayside within two years. Win8 will get patched to remove the Metro UI (With Metro Apps running in non-fullscreen windows instead) the Start button and Start menu will return and that will be the end of this abortive experiment in "blended" UIs.
The victim of rape should not be punished. And being forced to birth the child of your rapist is an unimaginably cruel punishment that wouldn't even be fit for a convicted criminal.
Better let the muslim world know. There are parts where the rapist can get off the crime if they marry the person they rape. Though in most cases the girl simply commits suicide.
Doesn't the Bible have the same provision?
Name one "Christian" country where this is law.
Here I'll save you the trouble. There aren't any. But I can name SEVERAL "Muslim" countries where it is. (Iran, Saudia Arabia, Indonesia, Bahrain, Syria, there are more.)
There is NO moral equivalency between Christianity and Islam. Stop trying to draw a false one.
Then please allow me to clear it up for you;
The truth is that a majority of Americans do not support a single-payer system. Indeed, when the Affordable Care Act was being debated in Congress poll after poll after poll showed sentiment running around 70% against it or any single payer system. There have been a few polls since then that have shown a thin margin of support, but they have all been found to be flawed in one way or another (sampling only in cities, large oversample of Democrats, faulty sample weighting, etc.) In most polls "Obamacare" is still highly unpopular.
RTFA dude (yes, I know, this is /. where nobody RTFAs) The reactor is designed to produce significantly LESS waste than existing designs. the problem is that getting permits for experimental reactors in the US is even harder than getting one for a known reactor design. We have hobbled ourselves in the Nuclear power area, indeed in ALL power areas due to our extreme fear of all things nuclear. (Despite living on a radioactive mostly molten ball with a thin hard crust orbiting around a giant fusion reaction in space as we get bombarded with interstellar radiation.)
No, those plants won't grow properly in our biosphere. Thank goodness too because I really wasn't looking forward to having a beak. Although I wouldn't mind the awesome physique.
Pretty much This.
Also, the Obama administration attempted to block further Uranium mining (needed to fuel the reactors) despite stating they support nuclear power development.
Not sure what they expect to run the power plants on. Solar-incubated superman clones are rather hard to come by.
Agreed. I really wasn't getting this issue at all.
I haven't used the hosts file to block with for AGES. At work we block with firewall and web filtering. At home I use NoScript and Adblock and firewall blocking.
Glad to see the hosts file get more attention. Too bad that Win8 is so horrible to work with I'll never get to use the improvement in hosts file management.
Would you like that mythical magical transport system powered by Unicorn farts or Pixie dust? Because that's what it's going to take.
There is NO FREE RIDE. Free is a myth, it doesn't exist and never will. Even if we were to have "free" transport provided by the government you would still pay. You would pay in higher taxes on everything else in your life. And in my life, and in everyone else's life, making all of life that much more expensive for everyone.
Stop putting forward communist ideas. They don't work and they hurt people.
That's simply not true.
Yes, it is true. You just proved it with your own example.
If you haven't done any rail travel lately in the US, please be aware that a train ticket for the normal, slow train costs about as much as a coach class airplane ticket for the same trip.
Let me repeat that for emphasis; A round-trip train ticket from (for example) my hometown of Buffalo NY to Albany NY (a trip my wife has had to take in recent years) on Amtrak (ordinary train) costs almost exactly the same amount (about a 20 dollar difference) as a plane ticket. This is for the same class of ticket and roughly the same amenities (coach seat, no bed, no meal included). The train trip takes about 8 hours, the plane trip about an hour.
So, given that they aren't receiving significantly superior service, why would people want to spend significantly more TIME on a train? Particularly business travelers, who make up the bulk of most continental commercial airline flights in the US today. These are people who want to get to their destination as quickly and safely as possible, get their business done and get home in the same manner. They don't have time to waste riding a train.
Now, with that in mind, remember that passenger trains are LOSING MONEY and being propped up with taxpayer dollars. the Airlines are largely solvent and at least semi-profitable, despite the hits they have taken in recent years.
Train systems cost more to deploy, more to maintain, and more to run than airlines. This is a known fact, and not arguable. They simply have more equipment and material to deal with.
Even if you were able to cut all train travel time in half with "bullet trains" your maintenance costs would go up, the costs for the trains themselves would go up and these super fast trains need special tracks so the upfront cost is immense. And even then airline travel would still be faster, more flexible, and cheaper. The cost for a bullet train ticket in the US would be impossible to make work in the free market. Which is probably why people that put forward these plans ALWAYS do it as a giant government project. Yet another waste of taxpayer money we cannot afford and there is no significant public outcry or political will to do.
Simply put; High Speed Rail is a pipe dream. A stupid, inconvenient and costly pipe dream at that. Unless we have some kind of crazy oil cost spike as in the Atlas Shrugged movie, trains will NEVER be able to compete with air travel. Which is as it should be. I love trains as much as the next person, but they are yesterday's technology. it's time to let them go. We have tomorrow's transport technology to work on.
While there may be a few color differences, one iron and silicate planet is likely to look much like another when there is no vegetation covering.
"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer"?
Otherwise, i can't think of a sane reason beyond that which the first poster has already elaborated on; that Assange and Wikileaks are no friends of freedom and democracy, and in fact are mere haters of the west and unwitting (or perhaps witting) tools of despots and dictators the world over.
Oh quit your whining. It's not Anon's fault that you were stupid enough to sink money into Sony crap.
Mind you, I don't approve of the illegal methods Anon sometimes uses, but I agree with the principle. Sony is a notorious abuser of both the law and their own customers. The sooner they either close down or radically restructure (IE: shareholders fire the CEO, the entire board of directors, most of the upper management and ALL the lawyers for extreme douchbaggery) the better. While there are far worse issues facing us today, Sony is still a boil on the face of the entertainment and gaming industries.
Oh, and just in case it wasn't clear, you were and are a fool for buying any of their products and supporting them. You can still redeem yourself by cancelling your account and taking the financial hit as penance. Or you can wait for Anon to do it for you. Your choice.
Yes. All those "Intelligent" people who made the decision to design Win8 this way because of data collected from the "Windows Experience" system. A system which only the lowest of the low end users ever partake in.
My Technological Luddite in-laws knew to chose "decline" on this when it popped up on their new PC. I shudder to think of the quality of users who's computer interactions informed this design decision.
So yeah. You have fun with your UI designed by Monkey Committee. I'll be sticking with something NOT brain-dead in my dual-boot Win7/Xubuntu laptop.
Heh. Well, I think he gets a pass not just because of his political party, but because everybody pretty much knows about "Gaffes" Biden already
I swear, I get a huge kick out of far leftists claiming that "Tea Party" people want to assassinate the President. Putting aside the fact that comments like that are a form of political Libel, no Tea Party member would ever do that simply because if Obama dies, we get BIDEN as President! That's something NOBODY wants.
So, Props to Obama. He picked the PERFECT running mate.
While I absolutely agree with you, I think the poster you are responding to was talking about the law in relation to minors, not consenting adults. Although I may be wrong.
Yes, because so many of the "Christian" countries of the world actually have that written as law, just like the "Muslim" countries of the world do.
Oh, and let's just ignore that whole "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" business. I mean, that Jesus guy, what a hippie. EVERYBODY knows that the Old Testament is where it's at for Christians. Who cares about all that love and giving and kindness stuff from Christ, amiright? /sarc
You know, if you're going to make false equivalencies, the least you could do is refrain from making such stupid and sloppy ones.
Except that this is the UN. Freaking NOBODY voted for these people. Just goes to show you; Nothing is more tyrannical than rule by Bureaucrat.
No Kidding are there lots of them.
Open up Google Earth, make sure "Airports" is checked in the item visibility pane and zoom in ANYWHERE on the map that isn't a state or federal park, lake or a mountain. You will almost assuredly find a small private airport.
In the Buffalo area (my area) there are at least a dozen if not more small private airports. I know of two of them small enough to not rate a tower, but large enough that a small cargo plane (like an old DC3) could land at them. Load up a DC3 with ANFO (or even TNT) and you could do quite a bit of damage.
That's why the TSA is such an obscene joke. We can't possibly cover every place Terrorists could launch from without becoming a Police State, and even THEN it wouldn't be enough. All the things we have been doing to "fight terrorism" domestically have been about as effective as wearing a condom to a sex orgy at a leper colony.