You're spot on about free speech not being considered an absolute. This is perhaps best exemplified by Bush's infamous curse, "there ought to be limits on freedom". The last several years have demonstrated the US government's general hostility to the free press and free speech. In fact, a constitutional amendment prohibiting certain kinds of free speech failed in the Senate by only one vote! I'd say that the USA is today more hostile to free speech than most of Western Europe and Canada, but maybe that's because I hold it to a higher standard.
Yes, the military follows a different set of rules. So does Singapore. So does China. It's still a restriction of free speech in every case. That doesn't make it wrong necessarily, but we should call it what it is.
I didn't mention Kelo. I addressed the original poster's claim that an executive order is a "balancing action" to be used to overturn a court's decision. You'll notice that the executive order itself has nothing to do with Kelo because it only applies to the federal government.
Actually, the executive branch just gets to appoint justices. It has no veto power over their decisions. When the supreme court tells the federal government to keep its paws off states' rights, the president can't just issue an executive order to undo the decision.
I cite the election results in the US as correlated with NRA membership. As supplementary material, I cite the sharp increase in financial scandals, human rights abuses, concentration of federal power, and disregard for the electorate in the past five and a half years.
You throw around a lot of slogans and a lot of accusations. According to your own definition (point three), the USA is a tyrannical state because private citizens are not allowed to have nuclear weapons, private citizens are bound by the government's laws but not vice versa, and many other cases of asymmetry between the government and a private individual. Next you attempt to measure the benefits of a long-term gun control policy by grabbing a few short-term statistics. Finally, you try to make a connection to Hitler in order to strengthen your point. Not once do you demonstrate how a tyrannical regime is impossible without gun control.
In short, your argument is overgeneralizing, fallacious, exaggerated, and a complete distraction from the main point.
If the employees are given handguns the "nutjob" will bring an uzi. If the employees are given automatic weapons the "nutjob" will bring a bomb. The "nutjobs" will use whatever weapon gives them a sense of power and control. The expectation that giving better weapons to upstanding citizens will reduce violence is, in fact, an illusion. It makes life more dangerous for everyone, especially those who choose not to carry such weapons.
Obviously, a police, bodyguard, or military force needs to be armed particularly well as part of their job. Thus, they are held to higher standards of training, responsibility, and regulation than the general population.
Join the NRA people, before it is too late. The ballot and soap boxes rest firmly atop the cartridge box, lose (or willingly surrender as your case may be) one fundamental Right and eventually you will lose them all.
Guns have done nothing to prevent violations of our fundamental rights. In fact, those who own guns are more likely to let the government get away with worse transgressions. Guns provide nothing but a false sense of security.
They aren't usually hit because (a) they usually employ good security, in all its forms, and (b) because there's hasn't been a REALLY bad piece of malware to hit the fan just yet.
The article argues that good security practices are a result of finding vulnerabilities ("hacking") and a really catastrophic worm would be far more dangerous in the absence of smaller attacks. Claiming that the solution is "real security" flagrantly begs the question.
This isn't about politics. The poster implied that he doesn't like taxes. Fair enough, but we need taxes if we're going to be spending tremendous amounts. Bush Senior was an incredibly big spender, after all. You don't have to be in love with Democrats to know that when you spend like that without increasing revenues you're heading straight into massive debt. Even with the new taxes, the national debt exploded under Bush Sr.
We're talking about different timetables. Inevitable is not the same as imminent. Do you have data that predicts an imminent and sudden drop in temperature? If not then the two climate issues are most likely orthogonal. Or am I not understanding you?
Second, the charts you linked to appear to be irrelevant to our discussion. I thought we both accepted the findings of the panel and were debating the relative merits of controlling versus accelerating global warming.
P.S. Sorry about the confusing use of the term "Ice Age". I'll try to be more precise.
That's a rather simplistic understanding of global warming, isn't it? It's considerably more complex than "stuff gets warmer, water levels rise". This kind of a sudden disruption in climate patterns can cause all sorts of nasty problems, like more intense storms, worse droughts, worse flooding, and damaged ecosystems (which can be quite dangerous to humans). And you think an ice age will come along in the next ten/twenty years and save us? Dream on.
Is there something unclear about the article? Oh right, you didn't read it. Let me summarize it for you. Scientists have determined that global warming is causally linked to human activities. Any other explanations you may have - supposed "cycles", volcanoes, aliens - have been ruled out. Until there's a reason to doubt what the scientific community has known for years, there's only one prudent course of action. If that doesn't fit with your political agenda, change your agenda.
I've always wondered why, embryonic stem cell research opponents remain so adamant about creating morally questionable restrictions when embryonic stem cell research shows promise of creating cures. Sure, the possibility of curing paralysis 20 years from now is on the horizon, but how do restrictions help someone who will be paralyzed by then? Or is it that they are more concerned with the politics than with actually producing something beneficial?
Which is it, then? Does each person make up her own mind about the metaphysics of embryos? Or do you arbitrarily decide for everyone else, and get the government to enforce your viewpoint?
The government regulates ownership, humans own their own lives, the unborn are human, therefore the government regulates, supports, and protects their right to life.
So the mother doesn't own her uterus? By getting pregnant, does she cede rights over her body to the government? That's some eminent domain for you! I'd like to know the reasoning that allows the government to seize her body for the purposes of a potential life. As both a moral and an ownership issue, that seems highly questionable.
I am going to hazard a guess that the person who stuck "ye"t in there has lived his or her entire life in a free western country and has little or no understanding of what a police state really is.
The word "yet" in this context implies that the US is not a police state, but could be at some point in the future. It was apparently placed in the article by Paul Graham. I'm going to assume that you didn't read the article and show you the part that's critical of Bush. You may then make the shocking discovery that there are indeed valid criticisms of the man.
"Ironically, of all rich countries the US has lost the most civil liberties recently. But I'm not too worried yet. I'm hoping once the present administration is out, the natural openness of American culture will reassert itself."
It's hardly an exaggeration at all. Many people would literally rather vote for Hitler than Clinton. I personally can't stand the lady and all her pandering to the moralistic crusaders, but I'd vote for her if it would mean even the slightest chance of justice for the american people. Right now, "more of the same" just isn't good enough for this voter.
I'm always surprised when people favor potential life over real life. It has gotten to the point where protecting potential life is a valid excuse for killing real people. Sadly, people often do not realize their mistake until their own children are sacrificed. But hey, it's better to have your children killed than to allow poor people to have abortions, right? *shudder*
In any case, this is a compelling argument against Republicans. Their base will let them get away with *anything* and *everything* as long as they pretend to be against abortion. There is no accountability. Even the Democrats have to be careful to do the right thing now and then, but the Republicans will get votes time and time again no matter what.
World of Warcraft has pushed online game designers away from the fantasy genre.
Can someone with knowledge confirm this? The MMORPG wikipedia entry tells a slightly different story. According to this article, the major non-fantasy MMORPGs were all released after Everquest but before WoW. I have myself played neither of these games, but from what I understand EQ is closer to a genre-defining game. It was followed not only by clones (ultimately including WoW) but by a plethora of non-fantasy games like Anarchy Online, City of Heroes, and Star Wars Galaxies.
Slashdot Mirror
You're spot on about free speech not being considered an absolute. This is perhaps best exemplified by Bush's infamous curse, "there ought to be limits on freedom". The last several years have demonstrated the US government's general hostility to the free press and free speech. In fact, a constitutional amendment prohibiting certain kinds of free speech failed in the Senate by only one vote! I'd say that the USA is today more hostile to free speech than most of Western Europe and Canada, but maybe that's because I hold it to a higher standard.
Yes, the military follows a different set of rules. So does Singapore. So does China. It's still a restriction of free speech in every case. That doesn't make it wrong necessarily, but we should call it what it is.
I didn't mention Kelo. I addressed the original poster's claim that an executive order is a "balancing action" to be used to overturn a court's decision. You'll notice that the executive order itself has nothing to do with Kelo because it only applies to the federal government.
Actually, the executive branch just gets to appoint justices. It has no veto power over their decisions. When the supreme court tells the federal government to keep its paws off states' rights, the president can't just issue an executive order to undo the decision.
I cite the election results in the US as correlated with NRA membership. As supplementary material, I cite the sharp increase in financial scandals, human rights abuses, concentration of federal power, and disregard for the electorate in the past five and a half years.
You throw around a lot of slogans and a lot of accusations. According to your own definition (point three), the USA is a tyrannical state because private citizens are not allowed to have nuclear weapons, private citizens are bound by the government's laws but not vice versa, and many other cases of asymmetry between the government and a private individual. Next you attempt to measure the benefits of a long-term gun control policy by grabbing a few short-term statistics. Finally, you try to make a connection to Hitler in order to strengthen your point. Not once do you demonstrate how a tyrannical regime is impossible without gun control.
In short, your argument is overgeneralizing, fallacious, exaggerated, and a complete distraction from the main point.
If the employees are given handguns the "nutjob" will bring an uzi. If the employees are given automatic weapons the "nutjob" will bring a bomb. The "nutjobs" will use whatever weapon gives them a sense of power and control. The expectation that giving better weapons to upstanding citizens will reduce violence is, in fact, an illusion. It makes life more dangerous for everyone, especially those who choose not to carry such weapons.
Obviously, a police, bodyguard, or military force needs to be armed particularly well as part of their job. Thus, they are held to higher standards of training, responsibility, and regulation than the general population.
This isn't about politics. The poster implied that he doesn't like taxes. Fair enough, but we need taxes if we're going to be spending tremendous amounts. Bush Senior was an incredibly big spender, after all. You don't have to be in love with Democrats to know that when you spend like that without increasing revenues you're heading straight into massive debt. Even with the new taxes, the national debt exploded under Bush Sr.
So you and your friends are all huge fans of large federal debt?
We're talking about different timetables. Inevitable is not the same as imminent. Do you have data that predicts an imminent and sudden drop in temperature? If not then the two climate issues are most likely orthogonal. Or am I not understanding you?
Second, the charts you linked to appear to be irrelevant to our discussion. I thought we both accepted the findings of the panel and were debating the relative merits of controlling versus accelerating global warming.
P.S. Sorry about the confusing use of the term "Ice Age". I'll try to be more precise.
That's a rather simplistic understanding of global warming, isn't it? It's considerably more complex than "stuff gets warmer, water levels rise". This kind of a sudden disruption in climate patterns can cause all sorts of nasty problems, like more intense storms, worse droughts, worse flooding, and damaged ecosystems (which can be quite dangerous to humans). And you think an ice age will come along in the next ten/twenty years and save us? Dream on.
Is there something unclear about the article? Oh right, you didn't read it. Let me summarize it for you. Scientists have determined that global warming is causally linked to human activities. Any other explanations you may have - supposed "cycles", volcanoes, aliens - have been ruled out. Until there's a reason to doubt what the scientific community has known for years, there's only one prudent course of action. If that doesn't fit with your political agenda, change your agenda.
I've always wondered why, embryonic stem cell research opponents remain so adamant about creating morally questionable restrictions when embryonic stem cell research shows promise of creating cures. Sure, the possibility of curing paralysis 20 years from now is on the horizon, but how do restrictions help someone who will be paralyzed by then? Or is it that they are more concerned with the politics than with actually producing something beneficial?
Which is it, then? Does each person make up her own mind about the metaphysics of embryos? Or do you arbitrarily decide for everyone else, and get the government to enforce your viewpoint?
I am going to hazard a guess that the person who stuck "ye"t in there has lived his or her entire life in a free western country and has little or no understanding of what a police state really is.
The word "yet" in this context implies that the US is not a police state, but could be at some point in the future. It was apparently placed in the article by Paul Graham. I'm going to assume that you didn't read the article and show you the part that's critical of Bush. You may then make the shocking discovery that there are indeed valid criticisms of the man.
"Ironically, of all rich countries the US has lost the most civil liberties recently. But I'm not too worried yet. I'm hoping once the present administration is out, the natural openness of American culture will reassert itself."
That's only a slight exaggeration.
It's hardly an exaggeration at all. Many people would literally rather vote for Hitler than Clinton. I personally can't stand the lady and all her pandering to the moralistic crusaders, but I'd vote for her if it would mean even the slightest chance of justice for the american people. Right now, "more of the same" just isn't good enough for this voter.
I'm always surprised when people favor potential life over real life. It has gotten to the point where protecting potential life is a valid excuse for killing real people. Sadly, people often do not realize their mistake until their own children are sacrificed. But hey, it's better to have your children killed than to allow poor people to have abortions, right? *shudder*
In any case, this is a compelling argument against Republicans. Their base will let them get away with *anything* and *everything* as long as they pretend to be against abortion. There is no accountability. Even the Democrats have to be careful to do the right thing now and then, but the Republicans will get votes time and time again no matter what.
World of Warcraft has pushed online game designers away from the fantasy genre.
Can someone with knowledge confirm this? The MMORPG wikipedia entry tells a slightly different story. According to this article, the major non-fantasy MMORPGs were all released after Everquest but before WoW. I have myself played neither of these games, but from what I understand EQ is closer to a genre-defining game. It was followed not only by clones (ultimately including WoW) but by a plethora of non-fantasy games like Anarchy Online, City of Heroes, and Star Wars Galaxies.
They can afford to go to MIT, so I'd imagine that these gadgets are just a drop in the bucket to them.