I doubt that the world would benefit from everybody being happy all the time. Happiness is in the path, not the destination. You should do things that make you happy, instead of just be happy and idle.
Now I am not saying we should just follow the Republicans just because they are happier with the way thing are/were because they are ignoring a lot of serious problems. But in terms of happiness Republicans are happier on the average then Democrats.
I saw a documentary about happiness a few weeks ago. In it, an American doctor confirmed exactly that: Republicans are far happier than Democrats, because they believe the world is good as it is and nothing is worth changing.
You are right. Why should we bother to use computers? Nobody else is capable of calculating the time of day looking at the sky and scratching numbers on a slate?
Yeah, sure. A bunch of thugs was enough to overthrow an incredibly rich and armed ruling elite, creating one of the most significant events in history.
I find it funny that the naysayers are always trying to falsify history by downplaying revolutions they find objectionable. I often hear "experts" saying that the Republican revolution of 1910 in my country was done by a few thugs against the will of the majority of the people, which is absolutely false. The Monarchy was completely failed and extremely unpopular, and the masses participated heavily in the overthrow. But the Catholic Church and the far-right haven't gotten over it yet, so they try to brainwash people. Now, the same guys are doing the same about the 1974 revolution that has overthrown a fascist dictatorship, saying it was just a military coup.
So, what do you consider a grass-roots revolution? The extinction of dinosaurs?
I doubt these protestors have the sophistication or the awareness to see through the bullshit and understand what they're actually opposing. Unfortunately, they are likely to be useful idiots, pawns on someone's great chessboard. That's generally the problem when you have blind, stupid, unfocused rage that lacks understanding and a strong sense of constructive purpose. That's why (in terms of Establishment priorities) it's okay to give them so much media attention. It's little more than a way to get the "troublemakers" to identify themselves and be arrested or otherwised put through the system.
So, what do you suggest? It's not enough just to put down the protesters. At the very least, they're doing something.
You Americans always reply the same thing over and over. However, your percentage of entrepreneurs is not higher than in the other developed countries. Typical case of "do as I say, not as I do". This is just an empty mantra repeated over and over, the greatest excuse for workers to plunge into inaction every time their rights are being trampled. "Oh, my health insurance raised the price so much that I can no longer afford it. Society is perfect the way it is, so there must be something wrong with me. I'll have to get a third job to make a living. Serves me right for being a lazy bastard!".
I'm a great engineer, I suck at businesses. The times I tried it, all I got was working as a slave for a bunch of indisciplined and lazy employees, only to be ripped off by some psychopathic partner. Why should I cease to be useful to society in something I can do really well, just to suck in something I can't do? The world loses a good engineer and gains a failed business man.
"Green" means a bunch of different things, according to the country in Europe you're referring to. Example: Here in Portugal, the Green party always runs in coalition with the communist party and, because of that, they always have two deputy seats granted in the Parliament. In Germany, the Green party has made coalitions with the right-wing.
Software patents are abhorrent and should be abolished. This kind of news is like reporting the latest tactic moves on mob activities, or new cool ways of cooking kittens.
So, what's the effect of this virus? Are the drones actually bombing some enemy's army, instead of the usual innocent civilians in wedding parties in Pakistan?
So, the big governments failed because they gave the banks what they wanted to screw us over? If the governments were any strong they would stand up to the banks, wouldn't they? And your solution is even less government?
Don't you get it? In spite what all the free-market looneys have been preaching for decades, a weak State does not spend less money. Precisely the opposite. A weak State falls easy prey to the big economic powers, and these use it to funnel more money from the people into their pockets. Meanwhile, they get tax cuts and deregulation so they can make even more money.
All these problems started when Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher instituted the "small government is good government" bullshit as the new mantra for economic policy.
The current crisis was caused by big government and looks increasingly likely to take down big government throughout the West. Yet the solution is apparently more and bigger government?
Dude, how can you free-market right-wingers spin everything around so much that you dare to make these claims, contradicting the most blatant reality? Do you take courses on bullshit?
The Germans, thanks to their wonderful big government, are facing a choice between massively increasing taxes to bail out the rest of the Euro zone or seeing the Euro and probably the EU collapse around them?
The current crisis was caused by big government and looks increasingly likely to take down big government throughout the West. Yet the solution is apparently more and bigger government?
The Euro zone is struggling, not because of fat governments, but because of pampered, bloated, useless and parasitical banks that suck dry everything they touch.
The European Central Bank (your Fed) loans money at 1,75% interest rate and then the banks loan it to countries at whatever tax rate is the ultimate fashion at the moment: 5%, 7%, 20%, it even reached 100% for Greece some time ago. The biggest problem with governments is that they aren't big enough to crush these parasites against the ground.
Let's face it, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy could stop this nonsense in a few days, if they wanted to. But they don't work for their citizens, they work for the banks. And don't even try to hide it.
Slashdot Mirror
pick_time_period = 1000 years?
As a compatriot of the European Commission Head José Barroso, I can confirm this. Please, please, let him stay in Brussels...
France lost WWII??? Didn't you mean Italy, instead?
I doubt that the world would benefit from everybody being happy all the time. Happiness is in the path, not the destination. You should do things that make you happy, instead of just be happy and idle.
Now I am not saying we should just follow the Republicans just because they are happier with the way thing are/were because they are ignoring a lot of serious problems. But in terms of happiness Republicans are happier on the average then Democrats.
I saw a documentary about happiness a few weeks ago. In it, an American doctor confirmed exactly that: Republicans are far happier than Democrats, because they believe the world is good as it is and nothing is worth changing.
Right now we're too busy burning economists. Astrologists will have to wait their turn, right after TV evangelists.
You are right. Why should we bother to use computers? Nobody else is capable of calculating the time of day looking at the sky and scratching numbers on a slate?
Hell: Where the chefs are British, the police German, the carmakers French, the lovers Swiss, all organized by the Italians.
And the accountants are Greek.
It's nice to see a discussion that's practically Godwyned even before the first post was written.
You need to get laid more.
No, it means "Lose weight now. Ask me how.".
Who will program the machines?
Yeah, sure. A bunch of thugs was enough to overthrow an incredibly rich and armed ruling elite, creating one of the most significant events in history.
I find it funny that the naysayers are always trying to falsify history by downplaying revolutions they find objectionable. I often hear "experts" saying that the Republican revolution of 1910 in my country was done by a few thugs against the will of the majority of the people, which is absolutely false. The Monarchy was completely failed and extremely unpopular, and the masses participated heavily in the overthrow. But the Catholic Church and the far-right haven't gotten over it yet, so they try to brainwash people. Now, the same guys are doing the same about the 1974 revolution that has overthrown a fascist dictatorship, saying it was just a military coup.
So, what do you consider a grass-roots revolution? The extinction of dinosaurs?
I doubt these protestors have the sophistication or the awareness to see through the bullshit and understand what they're actually opposing. Unfortunately, they are likely to be useful idiots, pawns on someone's great chessboard. That's generally the problem when you have blind, stupid, unfocused rage that lacks understanding and a strong sense of constructive purpose. That's why (in terms of Establishment priorities) it's okay to give them so much media attention. It's little more than a way to get the "troublemakers" to identify themselves and be arrested or otherwised put through the system.
So, what do you suggest? It's not enough just to put down the protesters. At the very least, they're doing something.
You Americans always reply the same thing over and over. However, your percentage of entrepreneurs is not higher than in the other developed countries. Typical case of "do as I say, not as I do". This is just an empty mantra repeated over and over, the greatest excuse for workers to plunge into inaction every time their rights are being trampled. "Oh, my health insurance raised the price so much that I can no longer afford it. Society is perfect the way it is, so there must be something wrong with me. I'll have to get a third job to make a living. Serves me right for being a lazy bastard!".
I'm a great engineer, I suck at businesses. The times I tried it, all I got was working as a slave for a bunch of indisciplined and lazy employees, only to be ripped off by some psychopathic partner. Why should I cease to be useful to society in something I can do really well, just to suck in something I can't do? The world loses a good engineer and gains a failed business man.
CDU is a right-wing party.
"Green" means a bunch of different things, according to the country in Europe you're referring to. Example: Here in Portugal, the Green party always runs in coalition with the communist party and, because of that, they always have two deputy seats granted in the Parliament. In Germany, the Green party has made coalitions with the right-wing.
Software patents are abhorrent and should be abolished. This kind of news is like reporting the latest tactic moves on mob activities, or new cool ways of cooking kittens.
So, what's the effect of this virus? Are the drones actually bombing some enemy's army, instead of the usual innocent civilians in wedding parties in Pakistan?
I want some of what you're smoking.
They're probably only 10 people, anyway.
So, the big governments failed because they gave the banks what they wanted to screw us over? If the governments were any strong they would stand up to the banks, wouldn't they? And your solution is even less government?
Don't you get it? In spite what all the free-market looneys have been preaching for decades, a weak State does not spend less money. Precisely the opposite. A weak State falls easy prey to the big economic powers, and these use it to funnel more money from the people into their pockets. Meanwhile, they get tax cuts and deregulation so they can make even more money.
All these problems started when Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher instituted the "small government is good government" bullshit as the new mantra for economic policy.
The current crisis was caused by big government and looks increasingly likely to take down big government throughout the West. Yet the solution is apparently more and bigger government?
Dude, how can you free-market right-wingers spin everything around so much that you dare to make these claims, contradicting the most blatant reality? Do you take courses on bullshit?
The Germans, thanks to their wonderful big government, are facing a choice between massively increasing taxes to bail out the rest of the Euro zone or seeing the Euro and probably the EU collapse around them?
The current crisis was caused by big government and looks increasingly likely to take down big government throughout the West. Yet the solution is apparently more and bigger government?
The Euro zone is struggling, not because of fat governments, but because of pampered, bloated, useless and parasitical banks that suck dry everything they touch.
The European Central Bank (your Fed) loans money at 1,75% interest rate and then the banks loan it to countries at whatever tax rate is the ultimate fashion at the moment: 5%, 7%, 20%, it even reached 100% for Greece some time ago. The biggest problem with governments is that they aren't big enough to crush these parasites against the ground.
Let's face it, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy could stop this nonsense in a few days, if they wanted to. But they don't work for their citizens, they work for the banks. And don't even try to hide it.
Can you blame news media for not wanting to write/broadcast things that 98% of the population won't remember or won't even bother looking at?
Yes, I can. They should get a useful job.