Yeah, I do realize it is a right wing news organization, however it was the only place I could find which had the data for that time period all together in one article.
If an unbiased news sources existed I would be happy to quote them but there isn't one that I know of. And the current ones don't want to confuse us with little things like "facts" and "statistics". Much better to stand there and yell at each other over and over until we start to believe them.
As you can see if you look at them the ones at NASA only go back to 97, but from 97-03 match up, so I am assuming they aren't lying about the nubmers up until 96. Any more info you want you will need to learn how to use google yourself.:-)
> Conservatives love killing off all parts of government not associated with the military or law enforcement.
Well there is certainly military value in space, so that point is moot. Also the NASA budget DECREASED under Clinton a number of times and was actually lower when he left office than when he started( and this doesn't include inflation either) and this was during the prime years of the dot-com boom too where the government was rolling in money. Bush is INCREASING the total budget. Data is below:
1993 $14.309 billion, existing NASA budget when Clinton took office;
1994 $14.568 billion, $259 million increase, first Clinton budget;
1995 $13.853 billion, $715 million decrease;
1996 $13.885 billion, $32 million increase;
1997 $13.709 billion, $176 million decrease;
1998 $13.648 billion, $61 million decrease;
1999 $13.654 billion, $6 million increase;
2000 $13.601 billion, $53 million decrease;
2001 $14.253 billion, $652 million increase;
2002 $14.892 billion, $639 million increase, first Bush budget;
2003 $15.000 billion, $108 million increase (estimated);
2004 $15.469 billion, $469 million increase (proposed);
>and this new program simply isn't viable
Why? Not that I agree or disagree but this is a pretty sweeping statement to claim without backup. Which parts of the Moon and Mars plans are not viable? What do you like about the Hubble, and ISS which you would like spared? Give us details, not generalized Bush bashing.
So here is the math on that one:
45,000 miles = 45K/3K or 15 scheduled oil changes skipped.
1 oil change = $20-35 depending on where you live.
15 * $20 = $300
15 * $35 = $525
Unless you are telling us it costs LESS than $300-535 to repair all the damage you did I think your roomate might have been right about that. Also as someone else noted, most new cars suggest every 5K, not every 3K. Just my opinion tho.
My wife's car gets regular oil changes ever 5K or so and is still running strong at 258K miles. Total investment in oil over that time period: about $1500(here dollars). LESS than the cost of 1 new engine(V6 Maxima).
>Well, the transmission, because it's right next to the oil. They don't want some oil guy accidentally draining the the trans fluid
Good God! I hope the person changing the oil can tell the difference between the oil pan and the transmission. I see your point, but couldn't they have gotten the same results by simply using a different non-standard sized or shaped plug for the tranny fluid? Like a square that you couldn't use a socket on, but could still uncrew using common tools, rather than having to buy a proprietary part?
Agreed. I had to read over parts of this email 2-3 times to figure out WTF he was talking about. Of course I am not familiar with the subject matter like the sender and receiver are but still. A typo or two is one thing but this has crossed the line into the garbled, repetitive crap.
Me too. As soon as I can get a house, and the wife has a couple little-uns I want to start restoring old cars. Engines have always fascinated me. I wouldn't want to do it full time but as a hobby it sounds like a lot of fun. Actually I had a 78 Trans-Am for a while and it was a blast to spend 4-5 hours under the car replacing shocks, or a fuel pump on a weekend. Now with the great aftermarket parts available you can make most of those old cars better than they were when they came off the line!
>Do you really consider 10->13% as "much better performance"?
In anything where you compare speed 13% is a big difference. Imagine if Deion Sanders had only been able to run a 4.4 40 instead of a 3.8, he would be at best an "decent" CB? Imagine if you can cut processing on huge data sets down from 5 days to a little over 4( so you can actually do something with the data on Friday before you leave). Or so you can buy 1 less machine to do the same work and save a good chunk of money.
It it was 1-2% I might agree with you, but 10-13% is pretty significant.
Not that any of that diminishes you though. Sounds like you did some top notch work on that DB. I certainly wish we had someone with your DB knowledge here.
They are using traversing a tree as an example of something that IS recursive and were wondering if you had written other programs which didn't lend themselves quite so easily to a recursive approach.
You are one very angry person first of all. Second, I was not talking about a top of the line PC. I was saying what you can get for a reasonable price which can play most games. So it's loud, put it under your damn desk. Buy a GF4 then, it's even cheaper. Spend some of the extra hundred to get an Asus board instead of a Shuttle(the.1% speed difference might make a difference). Half a gig of RAM may be a little low but not that much. Intel is overpriced and I wouldn't buy one(the one you mention you can get on PW for $169 BTW). You don't need two HDD, and even if you did I wouldn't buy West. Dig. And I didn't include the case because I already have one. I swear you are like a walking example of how advertising really does work. Always need the biggest, fastest, best no matter what the cost. Shop around, compare and you will save some BIG money. And if something costs twice as much and gives you a 5% performance increase it's probably not worth the $.
I am an avid gamer as are most of my friends and not a single one has a system even close to what you describe yet somehow we all survive just fine.
Pricewatch prices:
1 shuttle mobo for an Athlon XP w\ audio/LAN - $54
1 Athlon XP 2700 - $92
1/2GB Stick of PC3200 RAM - $59
1 GeForce FX 5900 128MB - $183
Total: $397( 100 dollars below target(for my budget) so you could improve on some stuff too, or get a new HDD, etc. ).
I don't consider that "extremely out of date parts". Of course it is not the best of everything but it will certainly play most games. I also checked emachines and they have a complete system, celeron 2.4, 256MB ram, etc for $399, which is also more than enough to play most games if you don't want to build your own.
Also I used to work at a company which is listed on pricewatch and my brother-in-law's best friend still does. I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about when you call them "shady", as both of the companies we worked for were good small companies with hundreds of satisfied customers. In fact I have built 4 computers from parts purchased exclusively from dealers on pricewatch with no problems.
>Why don't you base your claims on current consoles relative to current PC specs, rather than specualting about the cost of next-gen consoles and PCs specced to play years-old games.
Maybe because there are no current consoles. Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube are all a few years old. If you want to compare those to a new PC there is absolutely no comparison. A new PC's graphics are SO much better you might as well compare a P3 to a SNES. The next generation of consoles released this coming year will compete directly with PCs like the one I just described, so why is that not fair to bring up how much they cost? If you want to be conservative assume that the PSX will cost what a PS2 did new($300), but Sony has already said the PSX will be more expensive.
>A good gaming rig for playing new games runs a bare minimum of $1500
If you just go to Fry's and pay whatever they charge(which is WAY to much) and always buy the best(which isn't usually your best price point) of course it's expensive. But if you take some time, do the research and work yourself you can save a TON of money. The most I ever spent on a system is about $1300 back in 2000 or so, but that included a new monitor, HDD, CD Burner, Fancy case, etc.
>>Console games are only going up
>New games were $50 at least as far back as the NES days. They still are today.
I actually meant the gaming systems, not the software. My bad. And the consoles ARE going up, they used to sell initially for $200, and are now starting at $300, and as I said the PSX is going to be $400+. PC prices are falling and are projected to be low for the forseeable future.
You are forgetting the PC prices have plummeted. You can get a decent bare bones system for $400 that can play many games, plus you can use it for a variety of other things as well. In fact I am going to update my PC soon and I have alloted about $500 and that will make it a VERY fast PC(new mobo, graphics card, cpu and ram). Console games are only going up. I think the PSX is going to retail for around $400-500. Games are cheaper for PCs too. If you could really get all that stuff you claim for the price of a PC you got majorly ripped off when you got your PC. Here is a tip for you next time around: www.pricewatch.com.
Eventually PCs and consoles may actually merge, but right now the consoles look more like they are interested in merging with a DVD player/Tivo type thing than with a PC. PCs will probably maintain their hardcore gamer market for a while still, especially with HL2 and Doom3 coming out this year.
10 Billion is "portable and console hardware, software and accessories".
1 Billion is "PC game software industry".
It goes on to say "The driving force in sales was led by the console software and portable game software categories, which saw a record breaking $5.8 billion".
It is still much larger, I'm just pointing out you are comparing apples to oranges at first. Plus they are lumping portable game software into that also, even in the $5.8B number.
I used the GTA version of the Ferrari Boxster, can't remember the game name. It's the convertible. It took me a few tries to find out where to park the car, but after that I won it immediately. To OP: You can park right across from the police station in case you are wondering.
So which is it based on SoCal or NorCal? I'm assuming SoCal. Honestly I would be scared to play a game which attempts to recreate semi-realistic missions through the Bay Area's underground scene. I never played GTA1 so I don't know where that was based.
I think you have it backwards. The live auctions allow you to "preview" the stuff a few days before and you can use this time to look for deals, such as a PC with a second HDD or something labeled with 256MB, but has 1GB. Then you can bid on them at the auction and come out with some good deals.
Online auctions you never even get to see the stuff, unless you are in the area and can go preview it, like I said. You have no idea what condition it is in, etc. I used to work for a company where that was our business model. Preview auctions, buy, tear out all of the goodies, sell the parts for 2x the price of the original item.
I think people assume you are trolling because you are stating opinion as fact, eg:
> Some facts:
>1. There is nothing wrong with homosexuality in today's society. Anyone who says otherwise is a dinosaur and will soon perish.
Any time someone says their opinion is fact without any type of justification, research, links, articles, studies, etc. most people just assume they are zealots. It doesn't matter which side of the isle you are on either.
>It's not my fault that people will only give you some "spect" these days if you throw the profanity around.
This isn't true at all. You watch too much sensationalist TV. Name calling is so much easier for you, than actually doing research or just admitting you believe in something but have no scientific or logical basis for it(which is fine, but call it like it is, don't resort to empty rhetoric). In fact when I have a discussion with someone and they resort to name calling, using cheap shot jokes in the arguements, etc. I assume they don't have anything else useful to say and I have won the argument.
>People used to Americanize their names when they came to this country, though I thought that those days were fortunately gone.
These days are by no means gone, and it has nothing to do with racism BTW. I has to do with Americans not being able to pronounce some names. The people coming here are doing us a favor, by making it easier for us to spell and pronounce their names. Likewise if you moved to China you would be wise to pick a "Chinese name" to use their since a string of our characters together means nothing to them.
>I'd feel like I was wasting my vote if I DID vote for any of those.
I hear people echo this sentiment all the time however I disagree and I'll explain why. Let's take the Demos for instance. Every four years, unless they have an incumbent president, they need to come up with a batch of new candidates for president, such as we have now. They will pick a variety of people and whoever has the strongest support will run for president. All this sounds well and good but the problem really is that people will decide to follow them even if they don't agree with their policies too much, just because they think it is better than having a Repub in the while house.
The Demos party's candidate may win and they may not but either way their reluctant supporters LOOSE. They candidate didn't represent them, and honestly doesn't give a crap about them at all. And the next time they put people up for election they will put up people with the same ideas as the last batch.
As an example, many Conservatives are really pissed at Bush, but next election they will vote for him anyway just because they always vote Repub. That doesn't help anything b/c they next election cycle the Repubs will put up more people with platforms and positions similar to Bush(because he did well the last time).
Our votes are the way we tell politicians and parties what we think and what we care about. THEY WILL NOT CHANGE unless they see their "numbers" erroding. If you give your vote to Bush or Kerry you are pretty much signing off on their stance on things, which is usually moderation. You may not see the changes in the short term(meaning you may loose the current election) but long term your party will have to adjust it's position to bring you and others back in.
It is for that reason I am voting Libertarian. I have no illusions that Libertarians will win but if enough of us eat away at the two main parties support base eventually they will have to change their platforms to "bring us back into the fold". So vote for what you believe in, it is the only way democracy will work, and we will all be better off for it.
>Are you saying that we should base our society on domination by force of any one who gets in our way?
I never said anything about domination. I was pointing out that a society which cannot fight to defend itself and it's interests will be eliminated by one who can. We don't need to conquer the world, we just need to make sure that other countries aren't taking advantage of us, our people and our resources, so we don't loose what we have like the Semai did.
>responsible for their loss because they didn't "develop"? I thought that the fault lies with the external influence.
Responsibility and fault are things we argue about when we live in a secure world, in our heated/AC, homes with 2.5 kids, 2 cars in the driveway, and all the food and drink we can stuff down our throats. Let me ask you this: If suddenly we allowed anyone who wanted to, to immigrate to the US, our country would be flooded with people. Now imagine that you need a job to feed you and your family and can't find one. Is it your fault? Is is their fault for wanting a job, and coming here? Neither, it's no ones fault. Their are a limited supply of resources and we compete for them. Choosing not to compete is a sure way to loose them. When you are going to a job interview, you are attempting to take resources away from the other applicants as surely as getting in a fist fight over the berry bush I used in my original message. We just sugar-coat the whole process so it so it doesn't look like that, plus in our land of plenty the jobs(resources) are easy to come by.
I am pretty sure that Canada has a real Army and they are not all riding around on horseback looking like Dudley Doright. They are obviously experimenting with some sort of Audio Cerebral Disrupter too if Celine Dion is any indication.
Yes, but the Semai were chased off of their ancestral land by other settlers. Not exactly the best example of something we should base our society on.
"The land of the East Semai was gradually taken over by Malay farmers who displaced the Semai by raiding settlements, slaughtering the men, and taking the younger women and children back to sell as slaves or to use as domestic servants. Slave raids pretty much ended in 1920, but they still live on in the Semai memories and cultural tales. The Semai response was to flee ever farther into the interior, living in smaller groups in inaccessible places. Despite this, most Semai land has now been logged and they have once again been settled into "regroupment villages" by the government. These are put in lands that nobody else wants for the moment. Thus, the land is also incapable of supporting their former way of life (much like the story of the Lakota Sioux). They have lost their former autonomy as the only thing they have left to sell is their labor and selves. Most now work as day laborers or pieceworkers in logging or agricultural plantations; many women now work as prostitutes. These wages do not support the former standard of living they obtained as most Semai are now poorer than before. This is a key point: "development" and "modernization" has created increased poverty among these people. "
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, I do realize it is a right wing news organization, however it was the only place I could find which had the data for that time period all together in one article.
If an unbiased news sources existed I would be happy to quote them but there isn't one that I know of. And the current ones don't want to confuse us with little things like "facts" and "statistics". Much better to stand there and yell at each other over and over until we start to believe them.
-Comedian
OMG I haven't laughed that hard in a while. Thanks for that! :-D
-Comedian
I can give you the article where I got them:
t s
_ Budget_Previous.html
:-)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/835848/pos
I can also give you the URL at NASA where you can look up the old NASA budgets:
http://www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP
As you can see if you look at them the ones at NASA only go back to 97, but from 97-03 match up, so I am assuming they aren't lying about the nubmers up until 96. Any more info you want you will need to learn how to use google yourself.
-Comedian
> Conservatives love killing off all parts of government not associated with the military or law enforcement.
Well there is certainly military value in space, so that point is moot. Also the NASA budget DECREASED under Clinton a number of times and was actually lower when he left office than when he started( and this doesn't include inflation either) and this was during the prime years of the dot-com boom too where the government was rolling in money. Bush is INCREASING the total budget. Data is below:
1993 $14.309 billion, existing NASA budget when Clinton took office;
1994 $14.568 billion, $259 million increase, first Clinton budget;
1995 $13.853 billion, $715 million decrease;
1996 $13.885 billion, $32 million increase;
1997 $13.709 billion, $176 million decrease;
1998 $13.648 billion, $61 million decrease;
1999 $13.654 billion, $6 million increase;
2000 $13.601 billion, $53 million decrease;
2001 $14.253 billion, $652 million increase;
2002 $14.892 billion, $639 million increase, first Bush budget;
2003 $15.000 billion, $108 million increase (estimated);
2004 $15.469 billion, $469 million increase (proposed);
>and this new program simply isn't viable
Why? Not that I agree or disagree but this is a pretty sweeping statement to claim without backup. Which parts of the Moon and Mars plans are not viable? What do you like about the Hubble, and ISS which you would like spared? Give us details, not generalized Bush bashing.
-Comedian
So here is the math on that one:
45,000 miles = 45K/3K or 15 scheduled oil changes skipped.
1 oil change = $20-35 depending on where you live.
15 * $20 = $300
15 * $35 = $525
Unless you are telling us it costs LESS than $300-535 to repair all the damage you did I think your roomate might have been right about that. Also as someone else noted, most new cars suggest every 5K, not every 3K. Just my opinion tho.
My wife's car gets regular oil changes ever 5K or so and is still running strong at 258K miles. Total investment in oil over that time period: about $1500(here dollars). LESS than the cost of 1 new engine(V6 Maxima).
-Comedian
>Well, the transmission, because it's right next to the oil. They don't want some oil guy accidentally draining the the trans fluid
Good God! I hope the person changing the oil can tell the difference between the oil pan and the transmission. I see your point, but couldn't they have gotten the same results by simply using a different non-standard sized or shaped plug for the tranny fluid? Like a square that you couldn't use a socket on, but could still uncrew using common tools, rather than having to buy a proprietary part?
-Comedian
Someone mod parent up please. Actual _useful_ information on slashdot! I didn't know this at all so I for one am glad I read this article.
-Comedian
Agreed. I had to read over parts of this email 2-3 times to figure out WTF he was talking about. Of course I am not familiar with the subject matter like the sender and receiver are but still. A typo or two is one thing but this has crossed the line into the garbled, repetitive crap.
-Comedian
Me too. As soon as I can get a house, and the wife has a couple little-uns I want to start restoring old cars. Engines have always fascinated me. I wouldn't want to do it full time but as a hobby it sounds like a lot of fun. Actually I had a 78 Trans-Am for a while and it was a blast to spend 4-5 hours under the car replacing shocks, or a fuel pump on a weekend. Now with the great aftermarket parts available you can make most of those old cars better than they were when they came off the line!
-Comedian
>Do you really consider 10->13% as "much better performance"?
In anything where you compare speed 13% is a big difference. Imagine if Deion Sanders had only been able to run a 4.4 40 instead of a 3.8, he would be at best an "decent" CB? Imagine if you can cut processing on huge data sets down from 5 days to a little over 4( so you can actually do something with the data on Friday before you leave). Or so you can buy 1 less machine to do the same work and save a good chunk of money.
It it was 1-2% I might agree with you, but 10-13% is pretty significant.
Not that any of that diminishes you though. Sounds like you did some top notch work on that DB. I certainly wish we had someone with your DB knowledge here.
-Comedian
It could definately be a bad batch or it could also be a bad mobo mixed with a Homer Simpson moment.
*Installs CPU*
*Turns on PC*
ZAP!! *Sparks fly*
"Doouu CPU is bad"
*Install CPU*
*Turns on PC*
ZAP!! *Sparks fly*
"Doouu CPU is bad"
etc, etc, etc.
-Comedian
They are using traversing a tree as an example of something that IS recursive and were wondering if you had written other programs which didn't lend themselves quite so easily to a recursive approach.
-Comedian
You are one very angry person first of all. Second, I was not talking about a top of the line PC. I was saying what you can get for a reasonable price which can play most games. So it's loud, put it under your damn desk. Buy a GF4 then, it's even cheaper. Spend some of the extra hundred to get an Asus board instead of a Shuttle(the .1% speed difference might make a difference). Half a gig of RAM may be a little low but not that much. Intel is overpriced and I wouldn't buy one(the one you mention you can get on PW for $169 BTW). You don't need two HDD, and even if you did I wouldn't buy West. Dig. And I didn't include the case because I already have one. I swear you are like a walking example of how advertising really does work. Always need the biggest, fastest, best no matter what the cost. Shop around, compare and you will save some BIG money. And if something costs twice as much and gives you a 5% performance increase it's probably not worth the $.
I am an avid gamer as are most of my friends and not a single one has a system even close to what you describe yet somehow we all survive just fine.
-Comedian
Pricewatch prices: 1 shuttle mobo for an Athlon XP w\ audio/LAN - $54
1 Athlon XP 2700 - $92
1/2GB Stick of PC3200 RAM - $59
1 GeForce FX 5900 128MB - $183
Total: $397( 100 dollars below target(for my budget) so you could improve on some stuff too, or get a new HDD, etc. ).
I don't consider that "extremely out of date parts". Of course it is not the best of everything but it will certainly play most games. I also checked emachines and they have a complete system, celeron 2.4, 256MB ram, etc for $399, which is also more than enough to play most games if you don't want to build your own.
Also I used to work at a company which is listed on pricewatch and my brother-in-law's best friend still does. I don't think you have any idea what you are talking about when you call them "shady", as both of the companies we worked for were good small companies with hundreds of satisfied customers. In fact I have built 4 computers from parts purchased exclusively from dealers on pricewatch with no problems.
>Why don't you base your claims on current consoles relative to current PC specs, rather than specualting about the cost of next-gen consoles and PCs specced to play years-old games.
Maybe because there are no current consoles. Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube are all a few years old. If you want to compare those to a new PC there is absolutely no comparison. A new PC's graphics are SO much better you might as well compare a P3 to a SNES. The next generation of consoles released this coming year will compete directly with PCs like the one I just described, so why is that not fair to bring up how much they cost? If you want to be conservative assume that the PSX will cost what a PS2 did new($300), but Sony has already said the PSX will be more expensive.
>A good gaming rig for playing new games runs a bare minimum of $1500
If you just go to Fry's and pay whatever they charge(which is WAY to much) and always buy the best(which isn't usually your best price point) of course it's expensive. But if you take some time, do the research and work yourself you can save a TON of money. The most I ever spent on a system is about $1300 back in 2000 or so, but that included a new monitor, HDD, CD Burner, Fancy case, etc.
>>Console games are only going up
>New games were $50 at least as far back as the NES days. They still are today.
I actually meant the gaming systems, not the software. My bad. And the consoles ARE going up, they used to sell initially for $200, and are now starting at $300, and as I said the PSX is going to be $400+. PC prices are falling and are projected to be low for the forseeable future.
-Comedian
You are forgetting the PC prices have plummeted. You can get a decent bare bones system for $400 that can play many games, plus you can use it for a variety of other things as well. In fact I am going to update my PC soon and I have alloted about $500 and that will make it a VERY fast PC(new mobo, graphics card, cpu and ram). Console games are only going up. I think the PSX is going to retail for around $400-500. Games are cheaper for PCs too. If you could really get all that stuff you claim for the price of a PC you got majorly ripped off when you got your PC. Here is a tip for you next time around: www.pricewatch.com.
Eventually PCs and consoles may actually merge, but right now the consoles look more like they are interested in merging with a DVD player/Tivo type thing than with a PC. PCs will probably maintain their hardcore gamer market for a while still, especially with HL2 and Doom3 coming out this year.
-Comedian
10 Billion is "portable and console hardware, software and accessories".
1 Billion is "PC game software industry".
It goes on to say "The driving force in sales was led by the console software and portable game software categories, which saw a record breaking $5.8 billion".
It is still much larger, I'm just pointing out you are comparing apples to oranges at first. Plus they are lumping portable game software into that also, even in the $5.8B number.
-Comedian
I used the GTA version of the Ferrari Boxster, can't remember the game name. It's the convertible. It took me a few tries to find out where to park the car, but after that I won it immediately. To OP: You can park right across from the police station in case you are wondering.
-Comedian
So which is it based on SoCal or NorCal? I'm assuming SoCal. Honestly I would be scared to play a game which attempts to recreate semi-realistic missions through the Bay Area's underground scene. I never played GTA1 so I don't know where that was based.
-Comedian
I think you have it backwards. The live auctions allow you to "preview" the stuff a few days before and you can use this time to look for deals, such as a PC with a second HDD or something labeled with 256MB, but has 1GB. Then you can bid on them at the auction and come out with some good deals.
Online auctions you never even get to see the stuff, unless you are in the area and can go preview it, like I said. You have no idea what condition it is in, etc. I used to work for a company where that was our business model. Preview auctions, buy, tear out all of the goodies, sell the parts for 2x the price of the original item.
-Comedian
I think people assume you are trolling because you are stating opinion as fact, eg:
> Some facts:
>1. There is nothing wrong with homosexuality in today's society. Anyone who says otherwise is a dinosaur and will soon perish.
Any time someone says their opinion is fact without any type of justification, research, links, articles, studies, etc. most people just assume they are zealots. It doesn't matter which side of the isle you are on either.
>It's not my fault that people will only give you some "spect" these days if you throw the profanity around.
This isn't true at all. You watch too much sensationalist TV. Name calling is so much easier for you, than actually doing research or just admitting you believe in something but have no scientific or logical basis for it(which is fine, but call it like it is, don't resort to empty rhetoric). In fact when I have a discussion with someone and they resort to name calling, using cheap shot jokes in the arguements, etc. I assume they don't have anything else useful to say and I have won the argument.
-Comedian
>People used to Americanize their names when they came to this country, though I thought that those days were fortunately gone.
These days are by no means gone, and it has nothing to do with racism BTW. I has to do with Americans not being able to pronounce some names. The people coming here are doing us a favor, by making it easier for us to spell and pronounce their names. Likewise if you moved to China you would be wise to pick a "Chinese name" to use their since a string of our characters together means nothing to them.
-Comedian
>I'd feel like I was wasting my vote if I DID vote for any of those.
I hear people echo this sentiment all the time however I disagree and I'll explain why. Let's take the Demos for instance. Every four years, unless they have an incumbent president, they need to come up with a batch of new candidates for president, such as we have now. They will pick a variety of people and whoever has the strongest support will run for president. All this sounds well and good but the problem really is that people will decide to follow them even if they don't agree with their policies too much, just because they think it is better than having a Repub in the while house.
The Demos party's candidate may win and they may not but either way their reluctant supporters LOOSE. They candidate didn't represent them, and honestly doesn't give a crap about them at all. And the next time they put people up for election they will put up people with the same ideas as the last batch.
As an example, many Conservatives are really pissed at Bush, but next election they will vote for him anyway just because they always vote Repub. That doesn't help anything b/c they next election cycle the Repubs will put up more people with platforms and positions similar to Bush(because he did well the last time).
Our votes are the way we tell politicians and parties what we think and what we care about. THEY WILL NOT CHANGE unless they see their "numbers" erroding. If you give your vote to Bush or Kerry you are pretty much signing off on their stance on things, which is usually moderation. You may not see the changes in the short term(meaning you may loose the current election) but long term your party will have to adjust it's position to bring you and others back in.
It is for that reason I am voting Libertarian. I have no illusions that Libertarians will win but if enough of us eat away at the two main parties support base eventually they will have to change their platforms to "bring us back into the fold". So vote for what you believe in, it is the only way democracy will work, and we will all be better off for it.
-Comedian
>Are you saying that we should base our society on domination by force of any one who gets in our way?
I never said anything about domination. I was pointing out that a society which cannot fight to defend itself and it's interests will be eliminated by one who can. We don't need to conquer the world, we just need to make sure that other countries aren't taking advantage of us, our people and our resources, so we don't loose what we have like the Semai did.
>responsible for their loss because they didn't "develop"? I thought that the fault lies with the external influence.
Responsibility and fault are things we argue about when we live in a secure world, in our heated/AC, homes with 2.5 kids, 2 cars in the driveway, and all the food and drink we can stuff down our throats. Let me ask you this: If suddenly we allowed anyone who wanted to, to immigrate to the US, our country would be flooded with people. Now imagine that you need a job to feed you and your family and can't find one. Is it your fault? Is is their fault for wanting a job, and coming here? Neither, it's no ones fault. Their are a limited supply of resources and we compete for them. Choosing not to compete is a sure way to loose them. When you are going to a job interview, you are attempting to take resources away from the other applicants as surely as getting in a fist fight over the berry bush I used in my original message. We just sugar-coat the whole process so it so it doesn't look like that, plus in our land of plenty the jobs(resources) are easy to come by.
-Comedian
I am pretty sure that Canada has a real Army and they are not all riding around on horseback looking like Dudley Doright. They are obviously experimenting with some sort of Audio Cerebral Disrupter too if Celine Dion is any indication.
-Comedian
Yes, but the Semai were chased off of their ancestral land by other settlers. Not exactly the best example of something we should base our society on.
"The land of the East Semai was gradually taken over by Malay farmers who displaced the Semai by raiding settlements, slaughtering the men, and taking the younger women and children back to sell as slaves or to use as domestic servants. Slave raids pretty much ended in 1920, but they still live on in the Semai memories and cultural tales. The Semai response was to flee ever farther into the interior, living in smaller groups in inaccessible places. Despite this, most Semai land has now been logged and they have once again been settled into "regroupment villages" by the government. These are put in lands that nobody else wants for the moment. Thus, the land is also incapable of supporting their former way of life (much like the story of the Lakota Sioux). They have lost their former autonomy as the only thing they have left to sell is their labor and selves. Most now work as day laborers or pieceworkers in logging or agricultural plantations; many women now work as prostitutes. These wages do not support the former standard of living they obtained as most Semai are now poorer than before. This is a key point: "development" and "modernization" has created increased poverty among these people. "
-Comedian