Do you often accuse three allies of the United States with aiding an enemy? You wouldn't happen to have... oh, say a source to cite for this, would you?
Russia's an ally? I must have missed that one. They aren't an enemy (maybe) any longer but, ally? When did we sign the mutual defense pact? I must have missed the press release.
Of course, reading my own definition, this would justify Afghans and Iraqis seeking to expel the Americans and the British, just as it justified the French Resistance in WW2, and the American Colonists in the 1770s.
Except the former Afghan Government supported an individual who slaughtered 3,000 Americans in cold blood and refused to hand him over. I'm not going to touch the can of worms that Iraq is in a debate around here, but Afghanistan? What did you think would happen when they refused to hand over Bin Ladin? We'd ask them again and say "pretty please"? They ought to consider themselves lucky that Kabul didn't disappear in a blinding flash and a mushroom cloud. That's what can happen when you attack a nuclear armed state.
Your comparing the French Resistance to Nazi Germany to the Taliban insurgency? WTF is wrong with this picture?
The Chinese are creating this new and dangerous precedent, and they could find this backfire on them. We do not stop Chinese and Russian spy satelites from flying over US territory and interests. We do not blind them either. The most that we do is try to hide what they are trying to look at. With this course of action, the Chinese have opened themselves up to similar actionsby us that otherwise would not have happened.
We don't stop them but don't bet on we don't blind them. Back in the good ole days of the Cold War our Navy regularly jammed Soviet radar ocean reconnaissance satellites. If the Navy was doing it then you'd be a fool to think the Air Force isn't doing it now.
Course there's a huge difference between using a laser or a jammer to try and blind a satellite -- and shooting it down. I honestly don't see why this a big deal. They try to blind us -- we build countermeasures. They build counter-countermeasures. This is the game that nation-states play.
As does alot of the world not in the united states but still grounded under it's definition of right and wrong is why can't a foreign self governing nation control its own airspace and space space
Because there's no such concept as "space space"?
If I built a spy satellite and orbitted it over the united states I would be a terrorist and bombed in seconds.
Obviously. I recall all those times we bombed Japan, Israel, Russia and France over their spy satellites....
What worries me is that the us has elected a complete moron for president, a retard with a red button is scary. (If said red button is not just a toy button that makes a beeping sound and the retard smile)
Well, I've voted for GWB twice, holding my nose somewhat both times. I don't really think we're badly off today, so perhaps that's just something you and I will have to agree to disagree on. To elaborate a bit: I think that being in Iraq is a strategic move against Iran, and therefore think it's probably a good place to be. Whatever justification (or lack thereof) the Bush adminstration provides is irrelevant to me. I don't care if GWB had good reasons to invade Iraq; I thought there were good reasons, so I did (and do) support it.
Then I guess we will have to agree to disagree. I think the Bush team obsessed about Iraq from day one and would have used any excuse they could have to invaded. History may make me eat those words -- only time will tell for sure. Clinton was also accused of "obsessing" about somebody (Bin Ladin) and I think in hindsight he was vindicated. Perhaps Bush will be as well. With my current knowledge I do not support Iraq.
As regarding McCain-Feingold, I must strongly disagree: (advertisement) money IS free speech - remember, freedom of the press belongs to he who owns the press. Fundamentally, the idea that no candidate shall be mentioned by name in any advertisement within two months of an election is bullshit - the news media are free to continue to do so in whatever fashion they wish, so why shouldn't everyone else? It's an artificial limitation that believes in the myth that the press consists of people who have no political views. Members of the press do have political views. And that's OK by me - I just don't think we ought to grant them the sole authority to express political views in the two months before an election.
I said I took issue with the advertising limitations. So I agreed with you on that. It is bullshit to limit what you can say about somebody two months before the election. But I still don't think money == free speech. Do you really think that allowing people and cooperation's to make unlimited donations to campaigns is a good idea? If so then we'll have to agree to disagree on that.
Oh, man, I was with you there for a while... just tell me that while you admire McCain you don't approve of him.
I didn't say I approve of him. If he runs there's zero chance he'll get my vote short of the Democrats nominating Adolf Hitler. I disagree with him on a huge number of issues ranging from his pro-life views to his economic views to his support for Iraq. I do have a huge amount of respect for him though. His service in Vietnam, his opposition to our treatment of prisoners and the fact that he's generally outspoken and not afraid to stand up to the leadership of his own party are things to be admired.
I would have voted for Al Gore anyway but can you honestly say that we'd be as bad off as we are today if McCain had beaten Bush for the Republican nomination and had defeated Gore?
McCain-Feingold is a travesty against free speech, and it makes me think very very ill of two otherwise intelligent, honorable men.
What parts do you find to be a travesty? I take issue with the limits on advertising but I have no problem with the limits on donations to political parties or candidates. Money != free speech, IMHO and unless we find a way to stop our politicians from being bought off then I see more of the same for the next few decades.
Deserve? I can't answer that. But I can explain why they do get it. It's essentially guilt. We stood by and let 6 million Jews be slaughtered. We aren't planning on abandoning the safe haven we helped create to prevent such genocide from reoccurring. I can't explain why they "deserve" it, as that seems to be a subjective measure that everyone may come to a different valid personal opinion
Stood by? The last time I checked something around 182,000 Americans died fighting in the European theater. If you want to point fingers at our crappy immigration policy before the war then by all means do so -- but the Allies didn't find out the scale or the horrors of the Holocaust until it was too late to do anything about it. Once it was discovered the Allies decided the best way to end it was to win the war as quickly as possible.
And we didn't "create" that "safe haven". The UN did after the British decided that they wanted out of Palestine. Why is it our job to give them unquestioning support? Has it dawned on anybody that the reason half the Muslim world hates our guts is because the shrapnel in Palestinian living rooms says "Lockheed Martin" on it? I'm not advocating abandoning Israel to the wolves but we don't need to be so one sided in our support of them.
but I hope I helped answer with one of the reasons they do receive disproportionate support.
In my opinion they receive disproportionate support because of Israeli lobby in the US Congress. Beyond that it's probably cultural too -- it's easier for most Americans to identify with the Jews then it is for us to identify with Muslims. But you can't deny the fact that it's one of the leading causes of "John Q. Arab" hating our guts and until we win him over the extremists will still have ample recruits to draw from.
You do realize what irony and sarcasim are, right?
I was pointing out that the Democrats raised taxes (without any Republican support) giving us a budget surplus and almost an entire decade of growth and boom.
Deterrence failed? That explains the massive all out war fought between NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
a failure as an attack weapon
Seemed to be pretty effective the one time we decided to use them.
failure at defense in general
See previous comment regarding NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
In fact, the only person who would want to use it is a madman
I agree. But if the madman has it and you don't then what happens? The madman won't use it if he knows that he will perish afterwards. Hence deterrence.
Note that I'm not only not a liberal I've voted Republican every election since I was 18. I believe that a strong Conventional military is more than enough deterrent to ensure world peace.
I'm a liberal with conservative leanings on foreign policy and I've never voted for a Republican in a national election. Republicans like to waive the flag but with a few honorable exceptions (McCain, Warner, Graham) most of them are Chickenhawks with no idea of what it means to serve.
We could not have responded to UBL and Afghanistan without a conventional force that was large enough to do the job while still leaving enough unallocated forces to deal with at least one other interloper.
As far as I'm concerned our conventional force failed to do the job because it was too busy getting ready for our little adventure in Iraq and not busy enough trying to capture or kill the people who murdered 3,000 Americans in cold blood. I blame that on the civilian leadership and not the military -- but don't you dare suggest that we "did the job" in Afghanistan while that bastard is still a free man.
Are you seriously suggesting that we abandon our support of Israel, or that we give equivalent support to Israel's enemies?
I'm suggesting that our one-sided blind support of Israel is one of the leading reasons why we will never be able to "win the hearts and minds" of the common man on the street in the Middle East. You do realize that if we were able to do that then the support for extremists like OBL and Hamas would dry up, right?
The blind loyality that some people think we should give Israel makes me sick. From the people that advocate we pardon Jonathan Pollard to the people that turn a blind eye to the USS Liberty attack. How about the fact that a lot of the military technology we share with Israel instantly winds up being sold to China? Ever stop to think about that? The Israelis look out after themselves -- I can't say as I blame them -- they are surrounded by 800,000,000 people that want them dead -- but explain to me why they deserve our unquestioning support? Alliances are supposed to be bilateral. What exactly do we get out of this besides contempt from the Muslim world?
America's superpower status has given the world an enormously long and productive period of near-peace. Do not assume that the present peace, or that the safety you presently enjoy while travelling abroad, exists independently of our large military. The only thing anybody respects is superior power.
Did I advocate dismantling our armed forces? I don't recall doing that. Most of my family has served. I understand the importance of our national defense. I question the dollar amount of our investment, how we spend that money (a Nimitz or a B-2 won't prevent another 9/11 -- human intelligence will) and our foreign policy in general.
Except in order to ensure our safety you need to be willing to use those nucular warheads. And we all know the likelihood of that. So our enemies do *just enough* damage to inflict pain, but not incur the wrath of a full nucular response.
So with conventional weapons, however, you now have a way of responding without a full-out nuclear response.
And we need 13 CVBGs and 24 B-2s to respond to, what exactly? Terrorism? No other nation-state is going to attack the United States. The nuclear deterrent seems to be pretty effective when dealing with them. And terrorism can be solved by a combination of better security, human intelligence, and *gasp* addressing the underlying issues that make us unpopular with "John Q. Public" in the Muslim World. Like our one-sided support of Israel and our past transgressions with supporting ruthless dictatorships.
None of those things can be addressed with more M-1 tanks, Nimitz class carriers or F-22s.
It sucks. It sucks BAD. Militaries are the most contemptible organizations on the planet, followed shortly thereafter by police. But they're necessary, at least until we can develop a virus that exlusively kills jackasses.
Don't worry, I'm sure the military (in coordination with Lockheed Martin and Boeing) is working on just such a virus as we speak. Oh, wait.....
Of course, some folks and even some nation-states occasionally decide "Eh, the Americans were probably kidding about actually using that whole military machine thing". Hiya, Saddam, tell me: how did that invasion of Kuwait go for you again?
Saddam only decided we were 'kidding' about actually using that 'whole military thing' because we told him we didn't care about Kuwait!
Actually, there's a fair amount of evidence that the Russians never did have intentions beyond holding the WarPac line, and the main reason for their massive arms spend was an utter refusal to fight the Great Patriotic War again. I don't follow it terribly closely, but just as the US would claim it never intended to start a war, the Russians can quite plausibly make the same claim.
There's also a fair amount of evidence that prior to the Great Patriotic War Stalin was hoping that Nazi Germany and the UK would beat the shit out of each other so that the Soviet Union could pick up the shattered pieces of Western Europe.
You think they would have stopped at Berlin if we hadn't had a few million troops in Europe when Germany surrendered? You are dreaming. Ask Finland or the Baltic States what it was like to be nextdoor to Stalinist Russia.
But not even all of that 3% goes to buying weapons. A sizable chunk of it goes to ship building for the Navy, for example. Another chunk goes to buying ammo.
Last time I checked warships counted as weapons. Or is the Navy building cruiseships?
Don't get me wrong -- I'm not a flower child by any means. But the grandparent has a point even if his numbers are flawed. We spend way too much money on our military. You'd think that the several thousand deliverable nuclear warheads would be enough to ensure our safety......
The budget balanced a while back because both Congress and the President made it happen, not just the president.
Thanks to the Democratic President and Democratic Congress that rammed through a tax increase on the richest Americans without a single Republican vote in support. In fact I think all of the Republicans predicted doom and gloom for the economy. We all know that the 90s were nothing but recession after recession so they must have had a point.
Verizon happily handed over illegal phone records to the NSA; I wouldn't trust them with IP logs either...
It's worth nothing that they have since denied handing over those records. Of course the law allows them to lie about that -- only time will tell what really happened with the NSA deal.
Besides, that's a moot point. I was talking about privacy rights when dealing with private companies. Verizon (or most ISPs) isn't going to turn over my IP logs to another company without a subpeona or valid reason. I seem to recall them spending a lot of money to fight a RIAA subpeona not too long ago.
What a useless article. You mask your IP and use proxies if you want to become *untraceable*. And this guy's crying about how he has to remember his passwords for every site. Bloody lout.
Why bother even masking your IP for most passworded sites? The sites I use that require passwords (i.e: my credit union, credit cards, car loan, electric company, etc) already know who I am.
Heck, why even mask your IP? I'm happy to reject cookies and know that my IP will change in a few days. That's all I need for privacy. Who cares if an outfit (besides my ISP) knows my IP? They can't link it to me without making Verizon DSL turn over records -- and they won't do that unless presented with a court order.
Landline phones in the US used to be rented from your telephone provider.
You are talking to somebody whose Grandmother and Father worked for Ma Bell. I know all about those days!
Yes, you can get a cell phone and manipulate it in the same way that in the old days you could get an "illegal" extra landline phone, but this is rare.
How? VZW won't even activate a phone for you nowadays unless you get it from them. Even a completely unlocked CDMA phone direct from Motorola. If you get the phone from them it's crippled to their network (even if you pay full price for it!).
Anyhow, you are right in your post. But keep in mind that songs for the Chocolate are $1.99 if you pull them right out of the air onto your phone, but 99cents if you buy the songs from your computer and wire them onto the Chocolate.
What if I already have the mp3s? Can I transfer them over for free? My experience with VZW tells me that I probably can't.... but I've been wrong before.
Why cant they just make an iPod phone? 90% of college kids would buy them.
Blame the wireless providers that want their version of lock-in.
Seriously, why don't we have a phone market like Europe? I shouldn't buy my phone from Verizon Wireless -- I should buy my phone at Target and then pick a compatible provider for that phone. No contracts, no provider lock-in.
If we had that sort of market nothing would stop Apple from making a CDMA iPod phone for VZW/Sprint or a GSM iPod phone for T-Mobile/Cingular.
Fat chance in hell the cellular providers give up their device lock-in until regulation forces them to do so.
I know lots of people who started drinking at a very young age, and by the time they're old enough to buy liquor legally (18 here) they're already alcoholics. Is this your solution?
Alcoholism and binge drinking are completely unrelated topics. Binge drinking is done for fun, immaturity, college parties, whatever you want to call it. Alcoholism is a physical dependency that would probably manifest itself regardless of when you started drinking if you are vulnerable to it.
My point was that if booze was legal at 18 and we had a culture that encouraged responsible drinking from a younger age then binge drinking would probably be less of a problem. Alcoholism is a separate issue from that -- and just because somebody else might be vulnerable to alcoholism is no reason to make it harder/illegal for me to enjoy alcohol when I am able to do so without harming anyone or anything besides my own liver.
Besides, how can you justify withholding the right to do something from somebody that is an adult in every other category?
Actually, that argument could be a slippery slope. Consider this: there are at least a few religions that demand human sacrifice (Aztec religion comes to mind, though I'm sure there are others, and I'm pretty sure that sacrifice of at least a few types of living creatures is condoned by the Bible). Are you prepared to strike down laws against murder, on the grounds that they prohibit the free exercise of one's religion? It might even become possible to get any law stricken down by inventing a new religion that demands actions prohibited by said law (which should be a lot easier than deliberately misinterpreting an existing religion)!
How is that a slippery slope? Peyote can't harm anyone but the person who is using it. If they go out and drive under the influence and kill someone then they could be charged under existing laws (much the same way that a Catholic wouldn't get a free pass just because they got drunk at communion).
Human sacrifice by definition harms another. That's why you can't use a freedom of religion argument. And animal sacrifice? I would ask why exactly that should be illegal? If I'm allowed to kill a beef cattle for food then why shouldn't you be allowed to kill it in order to practice your religion?
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Do you often accuse three allies of the United States with aiding an enemy? You wouldn't happen to have ... oh, say a source to cite for this, would you?
Russia's an ally? I must have missed that one. They aren't an enemy (maybe) any longer but, ally? When did we sign the mutual defense pact? I must have missed the press release.
Of course, reading my own definition, this would justify Afghans and Iraqis seeking to expel the Americans and the British, just as it justified the French Resistance in WW2, and the American Colonists in the 1770s.
Except the former Afghan Government supported an individual who slaughtered 3,000 Americans in cold blood and refused to hand him over. I'm not going to touch the can of worms that Iraq is in a debate around here, but Afghanistan? What did you think would happen when they refused to hand over Bin Ladin? We'd ask them again and say "pretty please"? They ought to consider themselves lucky that Kabul didn't disappear in a blinding flash and a mushroom cloud. That's what can happen when you attack a nuclear armed state.
Your comparing the French Resistance to Nazi Germany to the Taliban insurgency? WTF is wrong with this picture?
It surely may sound ironic in the case of China, but : a sovereign nation has a right to privacy.
I'll remember that the next time they try to steal nuclear technology from us.
Software solution? Pffft. The solution is obviously Sharks with Frickin' Lasers on Their Heads.
The Chinese are creating this new and dangerous precedent, and they could find this backfire on them. We do not stop Chinese and Russian spy satelites from flying over US territory and interests. We do not blind them either. The most that we do is try to hide what they are trying to look at. With this course of action, the Chinese have opened themselves up to similar actionsby us that otherwise would not have happened.
We don't stop them but don't bet on we don't blind them. Back in the good ole days of the Cold War our Navy regularly jammed Soviet radar ocean reconnaissance satellites. If the Navy was doing it then you'd be a fool to think the Air Force isn't doing it now.
Course there's a huge difference between using a laser or a jammer to try and blind a satellite -- and shooting it down. I honestly don't see why this a big deal. They try to blind us -- we build countermeasures. They build counter-countermeasures. This is the game that nation-states play.
As does alot of the world not in the united states but still grounded under it's definition of right and wrong is why can't a foreign self governing nation control its own airspace and space space
Because there's no such concept as "space space"?
If I built a spy satellite and orbitted it over the united states I would be a terrorist and bombed in seconds.
Obviously. I recall all those times we bombed Japan, Israel, Russia and France over their spy satellites....
What worries me is that the us has elected a complete moron for president, a retard with a red button is scary. (If said red button is not just a toy button that makes a beeping sound and the retard smile)
That was easy
*duck*
Well, I've voted for GWB twice, holding my nose somewhat both times. I don't really think we're badly off today, so perhaps that's just something you and I will have to agree to disagree on. To elaborate a bit: I think that being in Iraq is a strategic move against Iran, and therefore think it's probably a good place to be. Whatever justification (or lack thereof) the Bush adminstration provides is irrelevant to me. I don't care if GWB had good reasons to invade Iraq; I thought there were good reasons, so I did (and do) support it.
Then I guess we will have to agree to disagree. I think the Bush team obsessed about Iraq from day one and would have used any excuse they could have to invaded. History may make me eat those words -- only time will tell for sure. Clinton was also accused of "obsessing" about somebody (Bin Ladin) and I think in hindsight he was vindicated. Perhaps Bush will be as well. With my current knowledge I do not support Iraq.
As regarding McCain-Feingold, I must strongly disagree: (advertisement) money IS free speech - remember, freedom of the press belongs to he who owns the press. Fundamentally, the idea that no candidate shall be mentioned by name in any advertisement within two months of an election is bullshit - the news media are free to continue to do so in whatever fashion they wish, so why shouldn't everyone else? It's an artificial limitation that believes in the myth that the press consists of people who have no political views. Members of the press do have political views. And that's OK by me - I just don't think we ought to grant them the sole authority to express political views in the two months before an election.
I said I took issue with the advertising limitations. So I agreed with you on that. It is bullshit to limit what you can say about somebody two months before the election. But I still don't think money == free speech. Do you really think that allowing people and cooperation's to make unlimited donations to campaigns is a good idea? If so then we'll have to agree to disagree on that.
Oh, man, I was with you there for a while... just tell me that while you admire McCain you don't approve of him.
I didn't say I approve of him. If he runs there's zero chance he'll get my vote short of the Democrats nominating Adolf Hitler. I disagree with him on a huge number of issues ranging from his pro-life views to his economic views to his support for Iraq. I do have a huge amount of respect for him though. His service in Vietnam, his opposition to our treatment of prisoners and the fact that he's generally outspoken and not afraid to stand up to the leadership of his own party are things to be admired.
I would have voted for Al Gore anyway but can you honestly say that we'd be as bad off as we are today if McCain had beaten Bush for the Republican nomination and had defeated Gore?
McCain-Feingold is a travesty against free speech, and it makes me think very very ill of two otherwise intelligent, honorable men.
What parts do you find to be a travesty? I take issue with the limits on advertising but I have no problem with the limits on donations to political parties or candidates. Money != free speech, IMHO and unless we find a way to stop our politicians from being bought off then I see more of the same for the next few decades.
Deserve? I can't answer that. But I can explain why they do get it. It's essentially guilt. We stood by and let 6 million Jews be slaughtered. We aren't planning on abandoning the safe haven we helped create to prevent such genocide from reoccurring. I can't explain why they "deserve" it, as that seems to be a subjective measure that everyone may come to a different valid personal opinion
Stood by? The last time I checked something around 182,000 Americans died fighting in the European theater. If you want to point fingers at our crappy immigration policy before the war then by all means do so -- but the Allies didn't find out the scale or the horrors of the Holocaust until it was too late to do anything about it. Once it was discovered the Allies decided the best way to end it was to win the war as quickly as possible.
And we didn't "create" that "safe haven". The UN did after the British decided that they wanted out of Palestine. Why is it our job to give them unquestioning support? Has it dawned on anybody that the reason half the Muslim world hates our guts is because the shrapnel in Palestinian living rooms says "Lockheed Martin" on it? I'm not advocating abandoning Israel to the wolves but we don't need to be so one sided in our support of them.
but I hope I helped answer with one of the reasons they do receive disproportionate support.
In my opinion they receive disproportionate support because of Israeli lobby in the US Congress. Beyond that it's probably cultural too -- it's easier for most Americans to identify with the Jews then it is for us to identify with Muslims. But you can't deny the fact that it's one of the leading causes of "John Q. Arab" hating our guts and until we win him over the extremists will still have ample recruits to draw from.
You do realize what irony and sarcasim are, right?
I was pointing out that the Democrats raised taxes (without any Republican support) giving us a budget surplus and almost an entire decade of growth and boom.
Its a failure as a deterrent
Deterrence failed? That explains the massive all out war fought between NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
a failure as an attack weapon
Seemed to be pretty effective the one time we decided to use them.
failure at defense in general
See previous comment regarding NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
In fact, the only person who would want to use it is a madman
I agree. But if the madman has it and you don't then what happens? The madman won't use it if he knows that he will perish afterwards. Hence deterrence.
Note that I'm not only not a liberal I've voted Republican every election since I was 18. I believe that a strong Conventional military is more than enough deterrent to ensure world peace.
I'm a liberal with conservative leanings on foreign policy and I've never voted for a Republican in a national election. Republicans like to waive the flag but with a few honorable exceptions (McCain, Warner, Graham) most of them are Chickenhawks with no idea of what it means to serve.
We could not have responded to UBL and Afghanistan without a conventional force that was large enough to do the job while still leaving enough unallocated forces to deal with at least one other interloper.
As far as I'm concerned our conventional force failed to do the job because it was too busy getting ready for our little adventure in Iraq and not busy enough trying to capture or kill the people who murdered 3,000 Americans in cold blood. I blame that on the civilian leadership and not the military -- but don't you dare suggest that we "did the job" in Afghanistan while that bastard is still a free man.
Are you seriously suggesting that we abandon our support of Israel, or that we give equivalent support to Israel's enemies?
I'm suggesting that our one-sided blind support of Israel is one of the leading reasons why we will never be able to "win the hearts and minds" of the common man on the street in the Middle East. You do realize that if we were able to do that then the support for extremists like OBL and Hamas would dry up, right?
The blind loyality that some people think we should give Israel makes me sick. From the people that advocate we pardon Jonathan Pollard to the people that turn a blind eye to the USS Liberty attack. How about the fact that a lot of the military technology we share with Israel instantly winds up being sold to China? Ever stop to think about that? The Israelis look out after themselves -- I can't say as I blame them -- they are surrounded by 800,000,000 people that want them dead -- but explain to me why they deserve our unquestioning support? Alliances are supposed to be bilateral. What exactly do we get out of this besides contempt from the Muslim world?
America's superpower status has given the world an enormously long and productive period of near-peace. Do not assume that the present peace, or that the safety you presently enjoy while travelling abroad, exists independently of our large military. The only thing anybody respects is superior power.
Did I advocate dismantling our armed forces? I don't recall doing that. Most of my family has served. I understand the importance of our national defense. I question the dollar amount of our investment, how we spend that money (a Nimitz or a B-2 won't prevent another 9/11 -- human intelligence will) and our foreign policy in general.
Except in order to ensure our safety you need to be willing to use those nucular warheads. And we all know the likelihood of that. So our enemies do *just enough* damage to inflict pain, but not incur the wrath of a full nucular response.
So with conventional weapons, however, you now have a way of responding without a full-out nuclear response.
And we need 13 CVBGs and 24 B-2s to respond to, what exactly? Terrorism? No other nation-state is going to attack the United States. The nuclear deterrent seems to be pretty effective when dealing with them. And terrorism can be solved by a combination of better security, human intelligence, and *gasp* addressing the underlying issues that make us unpopular with "John Q. Public" in the Muslim World. Like our one-sided support of Israel and our past transgressions with supporting ruthless dictatorships.
None of those things can be addressed with more M-1 tanks, Nimitz class carriers or F-22s.
BTW: It's nuclear Mr. President.
It sucks. It sucks BAD. Militaries are the most contemptible organizations on the planet, followed shortly thereafter by police. But they're necessary, at least until we can develop a virus that exlusively kills jackasses.
Don't worry, I'm sure the military (in coordination with Lockheed Martin and Boeing) is working on just such a virus as we speak. Oh, wait.....
Of course, some folks and even some nation-states occasionally decide "Eh, the Americans were probably kidding about actually using that whole military machine thing". Hiya, Saddam, tell me: how did that invasion of Kuwait go for you again?
Saddam only decided we were 'kidding' about actually using that 'whole military thing' because we told him we didn't care about Kuwait!
Actually, there's a fair amount of evidence that the Russians never did have intentions beyond holding the WarPac line, and the main reason for their massive arms spend was an utter refusal to fight the Great Patriotic War again. I don't follow it terribly closely, but just as the US would claim it never intended to start a war, the Russians can quite plausibly make the same claim.
There's also a fair amount of evidence that prior to the Great Patriotic War Stalin was hoping that Nazi Germany and the UK would beat the shit out of each other so that the Soviet Union could pick up the shattered pieces of Western Europe.
You think they would have stopped at Berlin if we hadn't had a few million troops in Europe when Germany surrendered? You are dreaming. Ask Finland or the Baltic States what it was like to be nextdoor to Stalinist Russia.
But not even all of that 3% goes to buying weapons. A sizable chunk of it goes to ship building for the Navy, for example. Another chunk goes to buying ammo.
Last time I checked warships counted as weapons. Or is the Navy building cruiseships?
Don't get me wrong -- I'm not a flower child by any means. But the grandparent has a point even if his numbers are flawed. We spend way too much money on our military. You'd think that the several thousand deliverable nuclear warheads would be enough to ensure our safety......
The budget balanced a while back because both Congress and the President made it happen, not just the president.
Thanks to the Democratic President and Democratic Congress that rammed through a tax increase on the richest Americans without a single Republican vote in support. In fact I think all of the Republicans predicted doom and gloom for the economy. We all know that the 90s were nothing but recession after recession so they must have had a point.
Verizon happily handed over illegal phone records to the NSA; I wouldn't trust them with IP logs either...
It's worth nothing that they have since denied handing over those records. Of course the law allows them to lie about that -- only time will tell what really happened with the NSA deal.
Besides, that's a moot point. I was talking about privacy rights when dealing with private companies. Verizon (or most ISPs) isn't going to turn over my IP logs to another company without a subpeona or valid reason. I seem to recall them spending a lot of money to fight a RIAA subpeona not too long ago.
What a useless article. You mask your IP and use proxies if you want to become *untraceable*. And this guy's crying about how he has to remember his passwords for every site. Bloody lout.
Why bother even masking your IP for most passworded sites? The sites I use that require passwords (i.e: my credit union, credit cards, car loan, electric company, etc) already know who I am.
Heck, why even mask your IP? I'm happy to reject cookies and know that my IP will change in a few days. That's all I need for privacy. Who cares if an outfit (besides my ISP) knows my IP? They can't link it to me without making Verizon DSL turn over records -- and they won't do that unless presented with a court order.
Landline phones in the US used to be rented from your telephone provider.
You are talking to somebody whose Grandmother and Father worked for Ma Bell. I know all about those days!
Yes, you can get a cell phone and manipulate it in the same way that in the old days you could get an "illegal" extra landline phone, but this is rare.
How? VZW won't even activate a phone for you nowadays unless you get it from them. Even a completely unlocked CDMA phone direct from Motorola. If you get the phone from them it's crippled to their network (even if you pay full price for it!).
Anyhow, you are right in your post. But keep in mind that songs for the Chocolate are $1.99 if you pull them right out of the air onto your phone, but 99cents if you buy the songs from your computer and wire them onto the Chocolate.
What if I already have the mp3s? Can I transfer them over for free? My experience with VZW tells me that I probably can't.... but I've been wrong before.
Why cant they just make an iPod phone? 90% of college kids would buy them.
Blame the wireless providers that want their version of lock-in.
Seriously, why don't we have a phone market like Europe? I shouldn't buy my phone from Verizon Wireless -- I should buy my phone at Target and then pick a compatible provider for that phone. No contracts, no provider lock-in.
If we had that sort of market nothing would stop Apple from making a CDMA iPod phone for VZW/Sprint or a GSM iPod phone for T-Mobile/Cingular.
Fat chance in hell the cellular providers give up their device lock-in until regulation forces them to do so.
I know lots of people who started drinking at a very young age, and by the time they're old enough to buy liquor legally (18 here) they're already alcoholics. Is this your solution?
Alcoholism and binge drinking are completely unrelated topics. Binge drinking is done for fun, immaturity, college parties, whatever you want to call it. Alcoholism is a physical dependency that would probably manifest itself regardless of when you started drinking if you are vulnerable to it.
My point was that if booze was legal at 18 and we had a culture that encouraged responsible drinking from a younger age then binge drinking would probably be less of a problem. Alcoholism is a separate issue from that -- and just because somebody else might be vulnerable to alcoholism is no reason to make it harder/illegal for me to enjoy alcohol when I am able to do so without harming anyone or anything besides my own liver.
Besides, how can you justify withholding the right to do something from somebody that is an adult in every other category?
Actually, that argument could be a slippery slope. Consider this: there are at least a few religions that demand human sacrifice (Aztec religion comes to mind, though I'm sure there are others, and I'm pretty sure that sacrifice of at least a few types of living creatures is condoned by the Bible). Are you prepared to strike down laws against murder, on the grounds that they prohibit the free exercise of one's religion? It might even become possible to get any law stricken down by inventing a new religion that demands actions prohibited by said law (which should be a lot easier than deliberately misinterpreting an existing religion)!
How is that a slippery slope? Peyote can't harm anyone but the person who is using it. If they go out and drive under the influence and kill someone then they could be charged under existing laws (much the same way that a Catholic wouldn't get a free pass just because they got drunk at communion).
Human sacrifice by definition harms another. That's why you can't use a freedom of religion argument. And animal sacrifice? I would ask why exactly that should be illegal? If I'm allowed to kill a beef cattle for food then why shouldn't you be allowed to kill it in order to practice your religion?