Whoopee, you've got one guy from the Clinton years to write a column supporting Bush's actions. Far more Republicans are outraged.
And given the quotes from the article, there is a world of difference between the President wanting to go beyond the law and actually signing SECRET executive orders to do so. Not to mention inviting the New York Times reporters to the White House and intimidating them not to publish the story. Not to mention when Bush adamantly denied (last year I think) wiretapping anybody's phones or emails without a warrant.
FISA was specifically enacted to prevent the kind of political spying Nixon did on his political opponents. There is absolutely no reason why Bush couldn't have monitored the calls/emails entirely within FISA limits. That argument I've yet to hear any Bush apologist offer. Why couldn't he comply within FISA? He had 72 hours after the fact to report the issue, and this is all sensitive information that remains secret from the public. So why did he need to go beyond this?
This kind of spying is too much power for the government to secretly have, it gives me great trepidation and it should give you great trepidation too. The fact that people like you defend these actions scares me just as much as the spying itself. Would you seriously not mind if say Hillary Clinton spied on purely-domestic emails and phone calls of NRA members and anti-abortion activists?
Ugh, another blind pro-Bush mouthpiece. Spread lies around enough times and they become truths.
Carter and Clinton signed Executive Orders that demanded authorities explicitly comply within the provisions of FISA! Bush's orders have bypassed FISA entirely. Why do you think even many conservative Republican politicians are outraged at Bush? Why did a FISA judge resign in protest of this decision?
Read this piece on Think Progress for more information on how what Bush did went FAR BEYOND the orders signed by Clinton and Carter. Clinton and Carter complied with FISA, Bush violated it extraordinarily.
Nope, I've got Dish (Don't get Dish, they're fucking evil bastards, but that's another story). We have to keep the main box connected by phone. They claim this is so we can order pay per view. Well, we have no desire to watch pay-per-view movies, but they use the box to keep track of what channels we watch. That's why, during installation, the guy begged us to turn the box off when we turn off the TV. He claims it's so the box can upgrade the programming (which it does anyway when it's on), but it's so they can tell we watch CNN cor 30 minutes instead of 10 hours, or whatever.
Just a few days ago I unhooked the phone from the box, because I don't want them spying on us. Everytime I turn on the box now there's a message saying to connect the phone back or pay a $4.99 servicing fee EACH MONTH!
It's not a democracy but a Republic. President is only voted for by the Electoral College, any member of whom can vote for anybody they want. And the all-or-none nature of each state, with representations that don't scale linearly, make it even harder for the REAL will of the people to come through. Eg - A person from Wyoming has 3x the presidential voting power as someone from California.
And the electoral college came about becuase they decided that stupid people shouldn't vote and that an intelligent person should represent their overall preference. Not a democracy, it's a republic.
Do you the ability to process information beyond what Drudge and the Washington Times tell you?
Re-read the executive orders themselves. Clinton's and Carter's executive orders demanded that authorities involved operate directly within the guidelines of FISA. Read the Think Progress article I referenced earlier, it explains exactly how different these cases are. Bush went far beyond the system of checks and balances our forefathers carefully planned for. Bush has pissed off even very conservative Republicans. One of the FISA judges resigned in protest, for crying out loud.
I mean, seriously, how can you defend these actions? Do you think that such invasive spying won't affect you if you're doggedly loyal? Would you not care if Hillary Clinton spied on YOU because you're so pro-Bush?
And I use to wonder why Slashdot got the reputation it has...
Do you at least realize the reputation the Washington Times has?
You made these same claims a few days ago, and they are utter Bullshit! The executive orders signed by Clinton and Carter specifically reference FISA and that authorities granted by those orders are required to abide by FISA!. Bush has bypassed FISA directly. There is no comparison whatsoever between the two cases.
Think Progress has a nice explanation of this, and how Bush went FAR BEYOND anything that any President of the US has done before.
And that begs the question, why do you think so many conservative Republicans are outraged if Clinton had merely done the same thing?
And finally, one last question to demonstrate the right-wing's hypocrisy - if you support Bush spying on Americans without court orders, including non-terror persons like vegans, Would you not mind if Hillary Clinton used the same authority to spy on NRA members, anti-abortion activists, intelligent-design advocates, and anti-gay-marriage people?
If we lose liberties present in The Constitution, The Amendments and The Bill of Rights, have the terrorists won?
I think Patrick Henry's quote is far more apropos, given Republicans say stripping civil liberties are useless if you're dead from a terror attack. What did Patrick Henry claim? Give me Liberty, or give me death!
And just remember, this was during a time of far greater uncertainty than today. Colonists weren't scared of a terror boogeyman that could pop up . They were more concerned about how a bunch of back-woods colonists in relatively newly-inhabited (from their view) lands could hold their own against the mighty British empire.
They had far more courage sticking up for liberties, and against far greater threats, than the Republicans and Bush-defenders of today that whine about how cowardly it is to cut and run in Iraq (while they're safe over here) but then whore out their civil liberties for the illusion of safety from terrorism.
sure, it's just a 200+ year old quote, and holding it as an absolute truth is fucking idiotic.
But my point was there were people 200+ years ago thinking about the same things that Bush is trying to do now. These people were the real patriots, while our 'safe' and 'secure' country was entirely in limbo because how could a bunch of backwoods colonists hold their own against the British empire?
But anyway, it's interesting to bring up these American founding-father quotes in regards to the current debate, IMHO.
This really isn't anything new. In fact Carter used the Exact same Authority that Bush is using now. That executive order became Executive Order 12333 under Reagan in 1981. Gorelick also stated that Clinton used the same authority.
I should have known, my first reply suggested you got those links from gop.com, but I see they're right at the top of the drudgereport. Nice job, sir, you have truly earned your Republican wings tonight for directly spreading the news from the horse's mouth, and got modded up to +5 to boot. Tip of the hat to you, my fellow patriotic couragious American!
It's ironic, Bush and his supporters are claiming that they are the true patriots, making America safer by exercising these illegal spying operations. He claims to support civil liberties. hmm.
One famous founding father patriot (Patrick Henry) claimed "Give me Liberty or give me death!".
Another famous founding father patriot (Benjamin Franklin) claimed (and this is oft-quoted here on/.) "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
We've strayed quite far from the path of the true patriots of this land.
You are entirely incorrect. You falsely said "In fact Carter used the Exact same Authority that Bush is using now.", which is a far cry from the truth. Did you even read your own link? Or do you just get your information from gop.com?
Here is the final paragraph from that exercise signed by Jimmy Carter:
1-105. Section 2-203 of Executive Order No. 12036 (set out under
section 401 of this title) is amended by inserting the following at
the end of that section: ''Any monitoring which constitutes
electronic surveillance as defined in the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act of 1978 shall be conducted in accordance with that
Act as well as this Order.''.
Bush entirely violated this part. Bush did NOT act in compliance with FISA, he bypassed FISA entirely. He violated the spirit of FISA, which was originally crafted to prevent the kind of spying Nixon did on his political opponents. Bush claimed he only tracked 500 citizens with ties to al queda, his staffers could have easily complied with FISA if his intentions were truly that.
The point is that not a single Republican defender of his actions has given a reason why Bush needed to authorize such illegal spying that he couldn't have done within the limits of FISA. They give vague statements about protecting the country, but that could have been done easily within FISA.
The wiretapping in question was done using broad analysis of a random sampling of phone calls.
Except Bush claimed they only used this to spy on 500 people w/ what he claims were al queda ties. If that were so, they could easily have gotten 500 approvals under FISA.
So if what you're claiming is the reason, then it's an indirect admission from Bush that they were spying on far more than 500 people.
Aren't all electronic circuits three dimensional, since we live in a 3d universe?
Yes and no. One of my research projects involves superconducting nanowires, which are essentially one-dimensional. But wait, you say, these so-called nanowires are really wires with cross-sections of a few nanometers, therefore they're really three-dimensional.
Not really. If you look at the quantum mechanics of the superconductor, or even using the Ginzburg-Landau theory which is phemonological and ignores microscopic quantum mechanics, you find that the electronic quantum wave function doesn't want to vary too quickly. Namely - it costs too much free energy if the wave function changes substantially over a length smaller than a length scale called the Coherence Length. So if we craft a wire with cross-sectional lengths shorter than the coherence length, the wave-function won't vary throughout the cross-section. So there really is only one effective dimension when talking about transport throughout the wire. And that opens all sorts of interesting questions.
So yeah, at a fundamental level, small-enough objects can look purely one or two dimensional if you look at the quantum mechanics. For traditional electronic transport (ie, non-superconducting) you can typically regard things as not having a full dimension if the wavefunctions are 'bound' or 'free'. Namely, do they look like a particle-in-a-box (or harmonic oscillator or other bound potential) with discretely-allowed energy levels, or do they have an effective quasi-continuous band of allowable energy levels? Note that such a reduced dimension can still contribute as a degree of freedom, as represented by a quantum-number n referring to the discrete energy level. But if there aren't quasi-continuous states, it's not really a free dimension in the traditional sense.
Now back to your original question, one very common reduced-dimensional system is a 2DEG (Two-Dimensional Electron Gas), which is utilized in silicon MOSFET devices. So your computer is exploiting such 2-dimensional devices right now under your nose. (Here is a rough description ).
Wal-Mart saves low-income shoppers $50 billion a year by having an efficient supply chain.
Take this quote by Steve Dobbins, the CEO of Carolina Mills, which provides textile supplies. "People ask, 'How can it be bad for things to come into the U.S. cheaply? How can it be bad to have a bargain at Wal-Mart?' Sure, it's held inflation down, and it's great to have bargains," says Dobbins. "But you can't buy anything if you're not employed. We are shopping ourselves out of jobs."
Here's the link .
Why are less people employed?
WMT drives many companies our of business by putting so low a profit margin that companies cannot afford to pay their workers satisfactorily. Hence, millions of American jobs are lost as the suppliers cut costs by moving off-shore. Or cut corners elsewhere by lowering wages and/or reducing health care.
So, hence the generally accepted claim that Americans are putting themselves out of work by shopping at WMT. So you say it's good we're saving $50 billion, but on the other hand we're losing millions of jobs, and important benefits like health-care. Which is worse? And when off-shore products are no longer as cheap to produce (eg when China decides to stop buying American debt), where will we be because most of our manufacturing jobs and plants have moved elsewhere?
Read that link for mor information about companies that got destroyed by WMT. Includes the story of the above company that prospered while he sold products to people producing for WMT, but then when companies moved overseas and underpriced him he couldn't compete even if he didn't pay any of the workers! Similar thing for Vlasic pickles. I saw another similar story on Rubbermaid on a PBS documentary on WMT. The list goes on and on.
But hey, you love WMT because they save money. As long as you can buy a gallon of pickles for $3 who cares if people lose jobs?
So in a way, you're saying that gaining large shares of wealth through both illegal and immoral methods are perfectly acceptable if you donate 60% of the money back to society. Because let's face it, MSFT was basically guilty of antitrust practices and got off relatively scott free. Including events going back before the most recent DOJ proceedings.
But anyway, you bring up an interesting point. If most of that money going to MSFT, and then into Bill's pocket, was from businesses and otherwise would have gone into the pocket of that business's CEO, then it would be better to give directly to the public good. But of course that depends on Bill doing the right thing.
I didn't yet see the Walmart (puke, I feel so dirty after typing that word) high cost of low living movie, they took it out of our theater before we got the chance to go. But for your analogy to work, you should compare the Waltons to Bill Gates, not to WMT directly. You could compare corporate charity of WMT vs MSFT, though.
The thing is, as much as I can't stand MSFT, they at least take care of their employees far better than WMT.
I used to despise MSFT back in the day. I still do, but now I despise companies like WMT far more. MSFT basically drives or out-markets only software companies out of business, while WMT does that to companies in all areas of the consumer product arena. (Note, I cannot stomach writing these company names out, so I refer to their stock ticker instead, which seems to sum up what they're all about.)
See New Orleans, use the mayor or governer as examples.
That is the most ridiculous comparison ever. In NYC, there were two plane attacks against a minor portion of the city. I'm not degrading the attacks, my brother was nearby at the time. But Giulani had completely intact infrastructure. He had firemen, policemen, medical care. He had surrounding cities and states able to contribute help IMMEDIATELY. And the Feds were there in NYC within an hour! Remember the F-16's patrolling the skies shortly thereafter? Not to mention that four of five NYC boroughs were unscathed, and only a small part of Manhattan was attacked. He still had major resources to work with.
NOLA, on the other hand, was COMPLETELY affected. Infrastructures were destroyed or inoperable. They only had cops and medical workers in the hundreds. The surrounding areas couldn't help because they were underwater too. And the feds didn't show up for days!.
Giulani couldn't have done anything better in NOLA than Nagin did, it's amazing how many people don't realize that.
Just to start a my dad vs. your dad war, my dad has a huge collection of Byte magazine, with almost every issue from their inception until somewhere in the mid-80's, when they started to suck. The best part is the cover art, I remember thinking the covers were tripped out when I was around 5 years old.
Anyway, he's had these mags taking up space in our basement, the butt of many jokes about how useful they are, etc. One day about 5 years ago my brother and I read some online article somewhere about writing a Go computer player, and it referenced a Byte magazine. We were really excited, FINALLY a chance to justify keeping that collection all these years. We run down to the basement, and lo and behold, that particular issue, from the late 70's, IIRC, was absent. He's only missing a handful of issues in this nearly-continuous block, and the one time we could have used them it ironically failed.
Okay, thanks for the clarification. One batch of donuts being ordered for Anonymous Coward, please pick up at your local donut store. You are anonymous, therefore so is the donut store. If your local store doesn't have it, then go to the next nearest store. Repeat until you either get your donuts, run out of stores, or grow tired of traveling just for some free donuts.
NASA doesn't do sub-orbital launches, and therefore any similar launch by NASA would cost a lot more in terms of $ and safety.
Totally wrong, NASA has an entire facility ( Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia) devoted exclusively to sub-orbital launches. I launched a balloon w/ telescope payload (went up to 20 miles altitude) from there back in the mid-90's. They also launch rockets and all other sorts of sub-orbital payloads, and research suborbital spacecraft from there as well.
Yeah, my brother said the same thing and I'm not quite sure why. I mean, Berkshire Hathaway is a whole investment company, and I'd bet dollars to donuts that Buffet's not doing all the analysis of his value-investing method, but has teams of quants and analysts doing nearly all of the hard work. So they probably have a good idea of his investment strategies all these years and I don't see why they wouldn't be able to continue with his methods.
But by and large HFCS doesn't cause weight gain, and claims to the contrary aren't borne about by statistics.
Please let me know about such a study, preferrably not funded by groups with pro-corn interests.
My current opinion is formed because the argument by the corn-growers is a saner one than that born about by the anti-HFCS crowd,
The anti-HFCS crowd doesn't have potential millions of billions of dollars to risk losing. Similarly the anti-HFCS crowd can't afford millions of dollars for astroturf studies. Not saying the pro-corn groups are astroturfing, but with that much money at stake I wouldn't doubt it at all.
Did you actually track your caloric intake, or just avoid HFCS products?
No, as I said before I wasn't trying to diet or anything, I just wanted to cut HFCS out of my diet. I didn't even think I'd lose weight at all. After a few months, on two occasions, people asked me if I was dieting because it looked like I had lost weight. I didn't believe them, but sure enough I did lose 10-15 pounds.
And another thing that is mentioned is that HFCS inhibits the full feeling. So if the weight loss was due to me not eating enough calories, that's still a correlation because it means my appetite was further suppressed by avoiding HFCS products.
So, DID you contact the individual bottling company near you?
Yup, they never got back to me. Probably don't have the PR resources that the main Coca-Cola company does, and didn't want to waste their time with me, who they probably thought was a troublemaker and not a serious customer.
HFCS is a liquid at room temperature, which gives a cost savings all of its own on top of the corn subsidy.
I wonder if most Americans would be willing to pay 3% more on their manufactured food products if it would have a significant chance of helping them lose weight. After all, Americans spend hundreds of dollars on exercise equipment and gym memberships already.
My girlfriend and I primarily shop at Trader Joes, and then split the other shopping at either the local supermarket or Whole Foods. The TJ's is only 15 minutes away, so it's not too inconvenient.
I find the cereals there pretty good, at least from what I remember from supermarket cereals. They also have good juices, what we primarily get is the lemonades and limeades. Actually, most of what I drink at home now is watered-down lemonade or limeade, usually 2/3 water and 1/3 the *ade. So that helps too in reducing calories, but still getting a hint of something tasteful. After drinking this watered-down for a few weeks, the full-strength lemonades feel like drinking battery acid (not that I've done that, mind you).
The primary things I get from TJ's to replace the HFCS items from the supermarket are cereal, juices/drinks, and cookies. Just doing those substitutions for a few months is how I lost some weight.
I would also buy their ready-to-go lunches (eg the chinese, mexican, or indian foods), which are about $3, and much cheaper than buying lunch at the cafeteria at school, but not sure if that lunch would have HFCS. But that definitely helps on the budget. And yes, I was just talking yesterday about how some of their cheeses (eg Yarlsburg) is cheaper than the identical brand sold in the supermarket.
One thing to NOTE - many of the bread items at TJ's DO have HFCS, and I was pretty shocked and somewhat let down to see this. Hopefully this doesn't signal a trend that they'll follow with other items. So make sure you read the labels. But that's another common area for HFCS - it's a 'browner' for bread items, so many things like pizza dough can have it for that nice golden-brown color.
If the TJ's are far from you, try buying in bulk, you'll save gas money too. We go about once a week, sometimes once in two weeks, and usually buy many boxes of cereal, many bottles of juice and lemonade, etc. We find their dairy products to also be of good quality and decent price.
But anyway, before sounding too much like a commercial for TJ's, just try to avoid HFCS as much as you can for a few months and see what happens. Before the 'diet' I would drink soda and iced tea with lunch, both with HFCS. I'd drink cranberry juice cocktail or grape juice (supermarket brands WITH HFCS) at home. I'd also nosh on cookies and other sweet snacks with HFCS, etc. Cut that crap out and replace with healthy non-HFCS alternatives and you should hopefully lose some pounds and feel better. But you don't have to go cold-turkey with sweets, just choose carefully what you're putting through your body.
What after all is the problem with just using sugar from sugarbeets?
As noted elsewhere, including your post, the subsidies and political power the corn farmers have.
Also shows that farmers should all be rounded up and shot.
No, they just cannot grow fat on government subsidies, and expect to keep producing a product because it's the status quo. I think we've tried the HFCS thing, it's failing, stop the subsidy of HFCS.
Additionally, corn might be a good candidate for biofuel, so if the farmers are absolutely dependent on their subsidies, switch over to corn-based fuels. That way the farmers still get their money, but feel better about contributing to a more worthwhile cause than the obesity of USA. Of course now the oil companies will have something to say about this switch.
Slashdot Mirror
And given the quotes from the article, there is a world of difference between the President wanting to go beyond the law and actually signing SECRET executive orders to do so. Not to mention inviting the New York Times reporters to the White House and intimidating them not to publish the story. Not to mention when Bush adamantly denied (last year I think) wiretapping anybody's phones or emails without a warrant.
FISA was specifically enacted to prevent the kind of political spying Nixon did on his political opponents. There is absolutely no reason why Bush couldn't have monitored the calls/emails entirely within FISA limits. That argument I've yet to hear any Bush apologist offer. Why couldn't he comply within FISA? He had 72 hours after the fact to report the issue, and this is all sensitive information that remains secret from the public. So why did he need to go beyond this?
This kind of spying is too much power for the government to secretly have, it gives me great trepidation and it should give you great trepidation too. The fact that people like you defend these actions scares me just as much as the spying itself. Would you seriously not mind if say Hillary Clinton spied on purely-domestic emails and phone calls of NRA members and anti-abortion activists?
Carter and Clinton signed Executive Orders that demanded authorities explicitly comply within the provisions of FISA! Bush's orders have bypassed FISA entirely. Why do you think even many conservative Republican politicians are outraged at Bush? Why did a FISA judge resign in protest of this decision?
Read this piece on Think Progress for more information on how what Bush did went FAR BEYOND the orders signed by Clinton and Carter. Clinton and Carter complied with FISA, Bush violated it extraordinarily.
Just a few days ago I unhooked the phone from the box, because I don't want them spying on us. Everytime I turn on the box now there's a message saying to connect the phone back or pay a $4.99 servicing fee EACH MONTH!
Dish are fucking evil.
And the electoral college came about becuase they decided that stupid people shouldn't vote and that an intelligent person should represent their overall preference. Not a democracy, it's a republic.
Re-read the executive orders themselves. Clinton's and Carter's executive orders demanded that authorities involved operate directly within the guidelines of FISA. Read the Think Progress article I referenced earlier, it explains exactly how different these cases are. Bush went far beyond the system of checks and balances our forefathers carefully planned for. Bush has pissed off even very conservative Republicans. One of the FISA judges resigned in protest, for crying out loud.
I mean, seriously, how can you defend these actions? Do you think that such invasive spying won't affect you if you're doggedly loyal? Would you not care if Hillary Clinton spied on YOU because you're so pro-Bush?
And I use to wonder why Slashdot got the reputation it has...
Do you at least realize the reputation the Washington Times has?
You made these same claims a few days ago, and they are utter Bullshit! The executive orders signed by Clinton and Carter specifically reference FISA and that authorities granted by those orders are required to abide by FISA!. Bush has bypassed FISA directly. There is no comparison whatsoever between the two cases.
Think Progress has a nice explanation of this, and how Bush went FAR BEYOND anything that any President of the US has done before.
And that begs the question, why do you think so many conservative Republicans are outraged if Clinton had merely done the same thing?
And finally, one last question to demonstrate the right-wing's hypocrisy - if you support Bush spying on Americans without court orders, including non-terror persons like vegans, Would you not mind if Hillary Clinton used the same authority to spy on NRA members, anti-abortion activists, intelligent-design advocates, and anti-gay-marriage people?
I think Patrick Henry's quote is far more apropos, given Republicans say stripping civil liberties are useless if you're dead from a terror attack. What did Patrick Henry claim? Give me Liberty, or give me death!
And just remember, this was during a time of far greater uncertainty than today. Colonists weren't scared of a terror boogeyman that could pop up . They were more concerned about how a bunch of back-woods colonists in relatively newly-inhabited (from their view) lands could hold their own against the mighty British empire.
They had far more courage sticking up for liberties, and against far greater threats, than the Republicans and Bush-defenders of today that whine about how cowardly it is to cut and run in Iraq (while they're safe over here) but then whore out their civil liberties for the illusion of safety from terrorism.
But my point was there were people 200+ years ago thinking about the same things that Bush is trying to do now. These people were the real patriots, while our 'safe' and 'secure' country was entirely in limbo because how could a bunch of backwoods colonists hold their own against the British empire?
But anyway, it's interesting to bring up these American founding-father quotes in regards to the current debate, IMHO.
than I can give is over here at Think Progress.
I should have known, my first reply suggested you got those links from gop.com, but I see they're right at the top of the drudgereport. Nice job, sir, you have truly earned your Republican wings tonight for directly spreading the news from the horse's mouth, and got modded up to +5 to boot. Tip of the hat to you, my fellow patriotic couragious American!
One famous founding father patriot (Patrick Henry) claimed "Give me Liberty or give me death!".
Another famous founding father patriot (Benjamin Franklin) claimed (and this is oft-quoted here on /.) "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
We've strayed quite far from the path of the true patriots of this land.
Here is the final paragraph from that exercise signed by Jimmy Carter:
1-105. Section 2-203 of Executive Order No. 12036 (set out under section 401 of this title) is amended by inserting the following at the end of that section: ''Any monitoring which constitutes electronic surveillance as defined in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 shall be conducted in accordance with that Act as well as this Order.''.
Bush entirely violated this part. Bush did NOT act in compliance with FISA, he bypassed FISA entirely. He violated the spirit of FISA, which was originally crafted to prevent the kind of spying Nixon did on his political opponents. Bush claimed he only tracked 500 citizens with ties to al queda, his staffers could have easily complied with FISA if his intentions were truly that.
The point is that not a single Republican defender of his actions has given a reason why Bush needed to authorize such illegal spying that he couldn't have done within the limits of FISA. They give vague statements about protecting the country, but that could have been done easily within FISA.
Except Bush claimed they only used this to spy on 500 people w/ what he claims were al queda ties. If that were so, they could easily have gotten 500 approvals under FISA.
So if what you're claiming is the reason, then it's an indirect admission from Bush that they were spying on far more than 500 people.
Yes and no. One of my research projects involves superconducting nanowires, which are essentially one-dimensional. But wait, you say, these so-called nanowires are really wires with cross-sections of a few nanometers, therefore they're really three-dimensional.
Not really. If you look at the quantum mechanics of the superconductor, or even using the Ginzburg-Landau theory which is phemonological and ignores microscopic quantum mechanics, you find that the electronic quantum wave function doesn't want to vary too quickly. Namely - it costs too much free energy if the wave function changes substantially over a length smaller than a length scale called the Coherence Length. So if we craft a wire with cross-sectional lengths shorter than the coherence length, the wave-function won't vary throughout the cross-section. So there really is only one effective dimension when talking about transport throughout the wire. And that opens all sorts of interesting questions.
So yeah, at a fundamental level, small-enough objects can look purely one or two dimensional if you look at the quantum mechanics. For traditional electronic transport (ie, non-superconducting) you can typically regard things as not having a full dimension if the wavefunctions are 'bound' or 'free'. Namely, do they look like a particle-in-a-box (or harmonic oscillator or other bound potential) with discretely-allowed energy levels, or do they have an effective quasi-continuous band of allowable energy levels? Note that such a reduced dimension can still contribute as a degree of freedom, as represented by a quantum-number n referring to the discrete energy level. But if there aren't quasi-continuous states, it's not really a free dimension in the traditional sense.
Now back to your original question, one very common reduced-dimensional system is a 2DEG (Two-Dimensional Electron Gas), which is utilized in silicon MOSFET devices. So your computer is exploiting such 2-dimensional devices right now under your nose. (Here is a rough description ).
Take this quote by Steve Dobbins, the CEO of Carolina Mills, which provides textile supplies. "People ask, 'How can it be bad for things to come into the U.S. cheaply? How can it be bad to have a bargain at Wal-Mart?' Sure, it's held inflation down, and it's great to have bargains," says Dobbins. "But you can't buy anything if you're not employed. We are shopping ourselves out of jobs."
Here's the link . Why are less people employed? WMT drives many companies our of business by putting so low a profit margin that companies cannot afford to pay their workers satisfactorily. Hence, millions of American jobs are lost as the suppliers cut costs by moving off-shore. Or cut corners elsewhere by lowering wages and/or reducing health care.
So, hence the generally accepted claim that Americans are putting themselves out of work by shopping at WMT. So you say it's good we're saving $50 billion, but on the other hand we're losing millions of jobs, and important benefits like health-care. Which is worse? And when off-shore products are no longer as cheap to produce (eg when China decides to stop buying American debt), where will we be because most of our manufacturing jobs and plants have moved elsewhere?
Read that link for mor information about companies that got destroyed by WMT. Includes the story of the above company that prospered while he sold products to people producing for WMT, but then when companies moved overseas and underpriced him he couldn't compete even if he didn't pay any of the workers! Similar thing for Vlasic pickles. I saw another similar story on Rubbermaid on a PBS documentary on WMT. The list goes on and on.
But hey, you love WMT because they save money. As long as you can buy a gallon of pickles for $3 who cares if people lose jobs?
But anyway, you bring up an interesting point. If most of that money going to MSFT, and then into Bill's pocket, was from businesses and otherwise would have gone into the pocket of that business's CEO, then it would be better to give directly to the public good. But of course that depends on Bill doing the right thing.
I didn't yet see the Walmart (puke, I feel so dirty after typing that word) high cost of low living movie, they took it out of our theater before we got the chance to go. But for your analogy to work, you should compare the Waltons to Bill Gates, not to WMT directly. You could compare corporate charity of WMT vs MSFT, though. The thing is, as much as I can't stand MSFT, they at least take care of their employees far better than WMT.
I used to despise MSFT back in the day. I still do, but now I despise companies like WMT far more. MSFT basically drives or out-markets only software companies out of business, while WMT does that to companies in all areas of the consumer product arena. (Note, I cannot stomach writing these company names out, so I refer to their stock ticker instead, which seems to sum up what they're all about.)
That is the most ridiculous comparison ever. In NYC, there were two plane attacks against a minor portion of the city. I'm not degrading the attacks, my brother was nearby at the time. But Giulani had completely intact infrastructure. He had firemen, policemen, medical care. He had surrounding cities and states able to contribute help IMMEDIATELY. And the Feds were there in NYC within an hour! Remember the F-16's patrolling the skies shortly thereafter? Not to mention that four of five NYC boroughs were unscathed, and only a small part of Manhattan was attacked. He still had major resources to work with.
NOLA, on the other hand, was COMPLETELY affected. Infrastructures were destroyed or inoperable. They only had cops and medical workers in the hundreds. The surrounding areas couldn't help because they were underwater too. And the feds didn't show up for days!.
Giulani couldn't have done anything better in NOLA than Nagin did, it's amazing how many people don't realize that.
Just to start a my dad vs. your dad war, my dad has a huge collection of Byte magazine, with almost every issue from their inception until somewhere in the mid-80's, when they started to suck. The best part is the cover art, I remember thinking the covers were tripped out when I was around 5 years old.
Anyway, he's had these mags taking up space in our basement, the butt of many jokes about how useful they are, etc. One day about 5 years ago my brother and I read some online article somewhere about writing a Go computer player, and it referenced a Byte magazine. We were really excited, FINALLY a chance to justify keeping that collection all these years. We run down to the basement, and lo and behold, that particular issue, from the late 70's, IIRC, was absent. He's only missing a handful of issues in this nearly-continuous block, and the one time we could have used them it ironically failed.
but i digress...
Okay, thanks for the clarification. One batch of donuts being ordered for Anonymous Coward, please pick up at your local donut store. You are anonymous, therefore so is the donut store. If your local store doesn't have it, then go to the next nearest store. Repeat until you either get your donuts, run out of stores, or grow tired of traveling just for some free donuts.
Totally wrong, NASA has an entire facility ( Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia) devoted exclusively to sub-orbital launches. I launched a balloon w/ telescope payload (went up to 20 miles altitude) from there back in the mid-90's. They also launch rockets and all other sorts of sub-orbital payloads, and research suborbital spacecraft from there as well.
Yeah, my brother said the same thing and I'm not quite sure why. I mean, Berkshire Hathaway is a whole investment company, and I'd bet dollars to donuts that Buffet's not doing all the analysis of his value-investing method, but has teams of quants and analysts doing nearly all of the hard work. So they probably have a good idea of his investment strategies all these years and I don't see why they wouldn't be able to continue with his methods.
Please let me know about such a study, preferrably not funded by groups with pro-corn interests.
My current opinion is formed because the argument by the corn-growers is a saner one than that born about by the anti-HFCS crowd,
The anti-HFCS crowd doesn't have potential millions of billions of dollars to risk losing. Similarly the anti-HFCS crowd can't afford millions of dollars for astroturf studies. Not saying the pro-corn groups are astroturfing, but with that much money at stake I wouldn't doubt it at all.
No, as I said before I wasn't trying to diet or anything, I just wanted to cut HFCS out of my diet. I didn't even think I'd lose weight at all. After a few months, on two occasions, people asked me if I was dieting because it looked like I had lost weight. I didn't believe them, but sure enough I did lose 10-15 pounds.
And another thing that is mentioned is that HFCS inhibits the full feeling. So if the weight loss was due to me not eating enough calories, that's still a correlation because it means my appetite was further suppressed by avoiding HFCS products.
So, DID you contact the individual bottling company near you?
Yup, they never got back to me. Probably don't have the PR resources that the main Coca-Cola company does, and didn't want to waste their time with me, who they probably thought was a troublemaker and not a serious customer.
HFCS is a liquid at room temperature, which gives a cost savings all of its own on top of the corn subsidy.
I wonder if most Americans would be willing to pay 3% more on their manufactured food products if it would have a significant chance of helping them lose weight. After all, Americans spend hundreds of dollars on exercise equipment and gym memberships already.
I find the cereals there pretty good, at least from what I remember from supermarket cereals. They also have good juices, what we primarily get is the lemonades and limeades. Actually, most of what I drink at home now is watered-down lemonade or limeade, usually 2/3 water and 1/3 the *ade. So that helps too in reducing calories, but still getting a hint of something tasteful. After drinking this watered-down for a few weeks, the full-strength lemonades feel like drinking battery acid (not that I've done that, mind you).
The primary things I get from TJ's to replace the HFCS items from the supermarket are cereal, juices/drinks, and cookies. Just doing those substitutions for a few months is how I lost some weight. I would also buy their ready-to-go lunches (eg the chinese, mexican, or indian foods), which are about $3, and much cheaper than buying lunch at the cafeteria at school, but not sure if that lunch would have HFCS. But that definitely helps on the budget. And yes, I was just talking yesterday about how some of their cheeses (eg Yarlsburg) is cheaper than the identical brand sold in the supermarket.
One thing to NOTE - many of the bread items at TJ's DO have HFCS, and I was pretty shocked and somewhat let down to see this. Hopefully this doesn't signal a trend that they'll follow with other items. So make sure you read the labels. But that's another common area for HFCS - it's a 'browner' for bread items, so many things like pizza dough can have it for that nice golden-brown color.
If the TJ's are far from you, try buying in bulk, you'll save gas money too. We go about once a week, sometimes once in two weeks, and usually buy many boxes of cereal, many bottles of juice and lemonade, etc. We find their dairy products to also be of good quality and decent price.
But anyway, before sounding too much like a commercial for TJ's, just try to avoid HFCS as much as you can for a few months and see what happens. Before the 'diet' I would drink soda and iced tea with lunch, both with HFCS. I'd drink cranberry juice cocktail or grape juice (supermarket brands WITH HFCS) at home. I'd also nosh on cookies and other sweet snacks with HFCS, etc. Cut that crap out and replace with healthy non-HFCS alternatives and you should hopefully lose some pounds and feel better. But you don't have to go cold-turkey with sweets, just choose carefully what you're putting through your body.
As noted elsewhere, including your post, the subsidies and political power the corn farmers have.
Also shows that farmers should all be rounded up and shot.
No, they just cannot grow fat on government subsidies, and expect to keep producing a product because it's the status quo. I think we've tried the HFCS thing, it's failing, stop the subsidy of HFCS.
Additionally, corn might be a good candidate for biofuel, so if the farmers are absolutely dependent on their subsidies, switch over to corn-based fuels. That way the farmers still get their money, but feel better about contributing to a more worthwhile cause than the obesity of USA. Of course now the oil companies will have something to say about this switch.