In your prior post, you were trying to demonstrate that America is not far off from becoming a totalitarian state similar to the Soviet Union or Communist China, unless I am seriously misreading your statements.
Actually, I am arguing there are strong similarities to esp. Italy and Germany during the early days of the totalitarian regimes there. Both came forth from democratic systems where checks and balances failed.
The regimes in communist China and the USSR are yet another story, but they do not compare well at all since both places had totalitarian governments before their revolutions.
A democracy turning into a permanent 'socialist dictatorship' by popular vote has yet to happen.
Of course, you cite the fact that the American Government spies on its own people, likely thinking of the various programs specifically targeted at international activites amongst potential terrorists, like the recently leaked Terrorist Financial Tracking Program, or the program for wiretapping suspected terrorists. This is hardly spying on the general populace, despite what the mainstream media might try to categorize it as.
I pointed at this specifically as an example of an attempt to not apply checks and balances. I am not judging it on if it is a valid and justified means to fight terrorism. I have an opinion on that but that is really irrelevant for the discussion.
Pointing out other precursors to totalitarian regimes, such as redistribution of wealth, is hardly a strawman argument, it's an example of a weakness in your position which indicates many European countries, where punitive taxes are the norm, suffer similar precursor tendencies toward totalitarianism.
It is really a strawman argument. Your assertion is simply not true. There is no example of an established democracy turning itself into a socialist dictatorship. There is however a long string of failed attempts at this. You may want to look at the history of central and eastern Europe in the time between the 2 world wars. There is simply no example of a social democracy that redistributes its wealth turning into a socialist dictatorship. There are quite some examples however of a totalitarian regime that keeps its population poor and uneducated being overthrown by people promissing redistribution of wealth, free healthcare and education and such. Those are two different situations that you seem to be confusing.
If you wish to retract your current assertion that America is in danger of falling into a totalitarian regime, very well, I accept.
Rather, as long as people keep paying attention the danger is small. Turn a blind eye to the flaws of the system and the danger becomes rather huge.
Finally, your statement regarding revolutionaries, "I have yet to see an example of a rebel group not being able to obtain weaponery due to laws, as if they would care about those laws to begin with," is in direct contradiction to your statement that an armed population is of no danger to the government.
No it is not. An armed population like for example the one of the USA is maybe a slightly more serious threat then an unarmed one, but the difference is hardly relevant when compared to what the USA government has at its disposal.
A rebel group that has any serious chance will first of all obtain better weaponery, and second, it will have to make good use of asymetrical warfare. An armed population at best is a small help in starting this. External sources of heavier weaponery are usually a much bigger help in this.
An example -- According to the mainstream meadia, and in the opinion of many leftists, small arms and improvised devices are wreaking havoc on the US military. This directly contradicts your assertion that an armed population does not threaten a government.
No it does not, unless that armed population implies that most people have mines, grenade launchers, mortars and the like at their disposal. What it means is that rebels that make good and
Yes but we were initially discussing how a new(?) concept should be released by a government department to it's people/etc, not whether all counties respect patent laws.
Then why argue that public domain is international? Either the outside world is important or it is not. You can't bring it into the discussion when it comes in handy and ignore it otherwise however.
While in some countries patents may not be respected, in many other nations cross-border patents and liscensing are respected as is the concept of public domian. So if the taxpayers of a nation are solely to get a benefit then the concept should not be freely available to the world in general through public domain.
Aha?
Last time I checked, obtaining a patent in the USA does not make it enforcable in say the EU or Japan or such. You have to obtain a seperate patent in those places.
It rather seems that patents are really mostly a national afair and cross border validity is the exception, not the rule.
Also, seeing how a patent is a privilege granted by government on behalf of society to an inventor, it is silly to expect that the USA government for example can grant that privilege on behalf of the Brittish people, since the USA government does not represent them.
Or do you wish to see the government have a pre-defined patent (and/or copyright) liscense that all taxpayers of a nation are able to use all the government's efforts and results without further cost?
In short yes.
I see no reason why government should also be running an enterprise that participates as a provider on the free market, especially since government is also the one to protect that same market and has regulatory powers there.
Now, something like this might be implemented like a firewall (as a controlled port between the systems) but it would be much more effective if it was imbedded in the whole document handeling and transfer software from the ground up. It's the difference between having a firewall, and having all applications exposed to the network be secure.
I disagree.
First of all, the classification and handling of secure information should not depend on indications by the source unless those would result in a higher clasification then the information would have by default. This basicly means that whatever system decides on if information can be passed between 2 networks must be able to decide on this independently.
Second, the more components are needed for implementing a single security measure the bigger the chance on failure of that measure. It is better to create multiple independent layers of security then a single complex one.
To witness, as you point out yourself, the solution you describe requires all network applications to be secure. An independent gateway/firewall solution does not depend on that.
So, while it is a very good idea to have classification and secure handling of documents in your document handling and transfer, but that in no way is a replacement for having a gateway/firewall between networks that can independently classify information and handle it properly.
But public domain is international.... so "all companies" would not have to have any participation in a nation (thus pay no taxes) to use the concept produced by any government department.
Public domain is as international as a patent. If another country does not recognize your patents then companies there can use them without license already.
Patent it and then license the patent to whoever wants it for a reasonable amount to collect money to offset the developement costs. Money then goes towards developing more new technology. (Although currently they do this and it goes back into the general fund)
The basic problem with this approach is that initially their funding comes from tax money. Tax money should not be used to run an enterprice, it should be used to create 'value' for tax payers. This is more directly accomplished by reducing the cost of technology then by allowing government departments to use tax money for generating profits.
Also, using tax money to create products (a patent that can be licensed to others is for this purpose considered a 'product' as well) for the 'free market' directly conflicts with the governments task to keep that market free, it makes the government a party with a huge unfair advantage.
Yes, and redistribution of wealth (socialism) is also key to many totalitarian regimes...
Yep, todays governments in places like Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and many others are totalitarian indeed...
but we will conveniently ignore the welfare state some people want to turn us into...
See above. Not to mention that 'they are worse' is a strawman argument.
Totalitarian regimes also attempt to disarm their population so they are not a threat to the regime, another goal of some far left Americans I might add.
Ah yes, go tell the population of the former Soviet Union, Poland, Romania and many other former eastern block states that their revolutions cannot have taken place because they were disarmed by their totalitarian governments.
Back in its day the right to bear arms made a lot of sense to limit a potentially tyranic government. Today, any government can afford weaponery so far beyond what civilians have that that argument no longer makes any sense.
Luckily it turns out there are other ways for a population to deal with a tyranic government that do not depend on weaponery at all.
Also, I have yet to see an example of a rebel group not being able to obtain weaponery due to laws, as if they would care about those laws to begin with.
I tend to have more hope in the American people. The structure of our government and military prevent any one person from amassing that power.
So did in theory the system of the Weimar republic in Germany. The problem is that no system is perfect, and blind belief in your system just makes you ignore its failures, hence it increases the likelyhood of those failures being exploited without you noticing untill it is too late.
If you truly believe the American system is so corrupt, I pity you, and invite you to move to a more "perfect" socialist European country.
I have lived in the USA, enjoyed my time there, and may return there someday when the climate there changes for the better. Right now I live in a what you call a socialist European country and I can assure you that I have more freedom of thought and movement and less government, and esp. less people telling me what to do and not do then I had while living in the USA. Oh, I lived in Austin Texas btw.
I think you are the only one that sees it *as* a concern for the united states. As is mentioned every time the black evil of government owning patents comes up, it acts to prevent others from patenting it and making loads of money off tax-payer funded research.
There is no need to apply for a patent to achieve that. You do however need to publish your invention in a way that is publicly available and can be dated reliably. Prior art will do fine as long as the PTO can find it easily.
If the government ever starts trying to restrict people from using government-owned patents, they have stepped beyond their bounds and are accountable to us, the people. This is the primary difference between the United States and the regimes you mentioned -- those regimes had no accountability to their people as they are/were totalitarian in nature.
I'm sorry but you seem somewhat ignorant on how such totalitarian systems come to be. The current US government does in fact have quite a lot in common with the early days of those totalitarian systems that arose out of corrupted democracies. If you don't believe me, take a look at how it attempts to not be held accountable for controversial things like spying on its own citizens.
As soon as you let a government gain too much power over its people, you have set the conditions for a totalitatian government that cannot easily be stopped by 'the people'. If you believe the USA is invulnerable to that then you are very seriously mistaken.
Uh... So if the US develops the H-bomb, you should be allowed access to the IP?
Keeping a military secret for the purpose of national security does not and never did require a patent.
Rather, patenting the H-bomb would mean publicly documenting its workings in exchange for temporary exclusive rights. If anything, this would make it easier for outsiders to also create a H bomb.
There's no commercial analogue for that. Shareholders do not automatically get licences to the IP held by their company.
But then, companies aren't public services. Last time I looked, the military can invest huge amounts of money without ever making any kind of proffit simply because their purpose is defense, not making a proffit.
So it is entirely reasonable that different rules apply.
Then why not allow government departments that invest their time and effort to have the privilege of patents and subsequent liscenses as well?
Patents exist to promote novel and usefull inventions. The method behind this is granting exclusive rights for a limited amount of time to the inventor so (s)he can compensate for investment and make a buck from the invention.
The granting of exclusive rights is how society 'pays' the inventor for his efford and investment.
In the case of a government department however society already payed the inventor for both. The investment comes from tax money, and so does the salary of the inventor.
There is no reason for society to pay twice for the same thing.
Do you beleive that all companies should just be able to take a government department's work in a particular field and use it without having to pay for it?
As long as they pay taxes they already payed for it.
Quick question for you to answer so that I may better respond to you concern -- Do you believe that individuals and companies have the privilege of patents and subsequent licensing?
At this moment they have that privilege indeed (and I agree with calling it a privilege)
3) The patent becomes public domain, and the military never has to worry about being sued over licensing issues from someone else developing the technology.
Seeing how this is being payed for by tax dollars, option 3 is really the only acceptable option.
if it's in the public domain there is no control on it but if it's patented and licensed then their is a measure of control.
Sorry, I don't buy that argument unless you can also explain why exactly the government should have such control. Also, as ITAR and similar treaties show, it is quite possible to have control in specific cases where national or international security becomes a concern.
Some government non-exclusive licenses are based primarily on proper (and/or limited) usage of the device/concept rather on straight monetary gain.
Ah yes.. the government gets to decide what is 'proper use'..
2) Being able to license the technology to non-Navy industries. I.e., medical applications. This justification at least seems, albeit distasteful.
Research payed for by tax dollars should be available to the public without this kind of barrier. Distasteful doesn't come anywhere near describing this.
So if someone in the Navy really did have a novel idea, it's not hard to imagine that they might want to get it patented, just as a defensive measure.
Seeing how tax dollars are paying for that, there are only 2 reasonable options for the navy:
- Don't patent it, but ensure there is enough documentation to easily show 'prior art' in case someone else patents it - Patent it and give every tax payer a license to use the patent.
SO called 'content filters' are not exactly new either. Checkpoint (among others) can sell you a very nice one, and has been able to for quite some time
I mean, what, then, constitutes a terrorist? When the americans revolted against their english 'oppressors', weren't they terrorists too? Weren't many of the countries and people who liberated themselves in fact terrorists?
yes, and that is exactly what they are being called by their opponents usually.
The notion that any side when waging war does not commit attrocities towards civilians is misplaced, so that can't really be a measure to decide neither. What's left?
Attrocities towards civilians can make for war crimes, but in themselves they do not make for terrorism.
Terrorist as used today is mostly a label used to stip the 'hunamity' from people it is applied to, so that any action against them can be justified without having to mind annoying things like basic human rights.
The conflict in the Ulster provinces of the United Kingdom have a root cause in the Irish etnnic minority wanting to dominate and suppress the non-Irish ethnic majority. There's even an element of imperialism too: some Irish support this non-Irish land being forcibly annexed to Ireland. It is a little misleading to call the area "northern Ireland": it is the north of the island of Ireland, but is not part of the nation of Ireland at all.
So tell me, how did Ulster become a province of the UK?
You see, history is full of talk about the brittish empire, there is no such talk about a Irish empire, rather, there are some stretches of history that show a Brittish occupied Ireland. If you'd study those specific times, yoiu'd start getting a clue about how there used to be an extremely good reasons for the Irish to not want to be ruled by Brits.
Yes, that's what happened. Go read a history book.
Oh, I like reading them, but no need in this case.
Its mostly that the religious conflicts that consumed substantial parts of Europe in the 1600s never really ended in Northern Ireland, and yes, that conflict was brought to Ireland by protestants.
Most of Hamas' militant activities are "seemingly terrorist" because they are terrorist. Other than that, no arguments with your post.
According to most definitions of terrorism that I am aware of, yes. So were the people from IRA, PKK, ETA, but also those whom started the American revolution, those fighting in the French (and other European) resistance during world war 2, and many others.
If they actually get called terrorists depends on the person talking about them.
The differences is idealogies I think. Islam idealogy is very explicit about what to do with nonbelievers (kill them).
Some parts of the Quran do, and some forbid it. Pick whichever you like.
Christian idealogy forbids murder and does not endorse war. If a government declares war on another government, it does not have the explicit backing of the Bible; however it would have the explicit backing of the Quran (if it were a Muslim state).
The old testament is part of the bible, however, it is also recognized as a holy text and explicitly refered in the Quran. Muslims refer to Alah as the god of Abraham, just like Christans and Jews do. All three of them share the 10 commandmends and the 'thou shall not kill'. So murder is forbidden in all three based on the exact same bit of text.
This is the same old testament that talks about war, killing off entire tribes, rules for slavery and so on.
In all three cases you can come to almost any conclusion you like by selective reading of their religious texts.
That being said, the Islam faith inherently declares war on non-believers. Why the US government keeps saying "it's not a war on Islam" is beyond me; Islam has declared war on the US, we should defend ourselves.
You may have noticed muslims blowing up other muslims in this place called Iraq. You might even have noticed from that that there are actually some different groups within the muslim world and that they are not a unity. It is beyond me how you can fail to notice that and treat them as a single group with a single opinion.
The palestinians elected a brutal terrorist organization to power, which has the destruction of Israel written into it's charter.
Actually, they voted into power a bunch of people who were actually providing with things like basic healthcare, education and so on where very few others are. Yes, those are the same people who launch missiles into Israel and so on. What you should realize however is that quite a few people voted against being occupied by Israel, most voted for the only party whom ever provided them with some tangable enhancements to their life. Very few actually voted for Hamas to vote for the destruction of Israel.
As you may have noticed, Hamas is under substantial preasure to actually recognize Israel, and part of that preasure is comming from those same people who voted them into power.
Or, to make it short, you give an extremely simplistic picture of Hamas and the people who voted for them. What you do is like saying all Americans are war mongering christian fundamentalists because their ruling party which they democratically elected. Ah, you didn't know what you would be getting? That is because you didn't look.... Don't know abotu you but I personally find that reasoning to be a clear sign of utter lack of thought.
So instead of fucking with people - 99.999% of whom have nothing to do with terrorism - spend it on the infrastructure that minimizes the damage.
It makes the country stronger instead of turning it into a state of panic, that simple fact alone counters terrorism better then any amount of military action and senseless monitoring and checking will ever do.
Slashdot Mirror
In your prior post, you were trying to demonstrate that America is not far off from becoming a totalitarian state similar to the Soviet Union or Communist China, unless I am seriously misreading your statements.
Actually, I am arguing there are strong similarities to esp. Italy and Germany during the early days of the totalitarian regimes there. Both came forth from democratic systems where checks and balances failed.
The regimes in communist China and the USSR are yet another story, but they do not compare well at all since both places had totalitarian governments before their revolutions.
A democracy turning into a permanent 'socialist dictatorship' by popular vote has yet to happen.
Of course, you cite the fact that the American Government spies on its own people, likely thinking of the various programs specifically targeted at international activites amongst potential terrorists, like the recently leaked Terrorist Financial Tracking Program, or the program for wiretapping suspected terrorists. This is hardly spying on the general populace, despite what the mainstream media might try to categorize it as.
I pointed at this specifically as an example of an attempt to not apply checks and balances. I am not judging it on if it is a valid and justified means to fight terrorism. I have an opinion on that but that is really irrelevant for the discussion.
Pointing out other precursors to totalitarian regimes, such as redistribution of wealth, is hardly a strawman argument, it's an example of a weakness in your position which indicates many European countries, where punitive taxes are the norm, suffer similar precursor tendencies toward totalitarianism.
It is really a strawman argument. Your assertion is simply not true. There is no example of an established democracy turning itself into a socialist dictatorship. There is however a long string of failed attempts at this. You may want to look at the history of central and eastern Europe in the time between the 2 world wars. There is simply no example of a social democracy that redistributes its wealth turning into a socialist dictatorship. There are quite some examples however of a totalitarian regime that keeps its population poor and uneducated being overthrown by people promissing redistribution of wealth, free healthcare and education and such. Those are two different situations that you seem to be confusing.
If you wish to retract your current assertion that America is in danger of falling into a totalitarian regime, very well, I accept.
Rather, as long as people keep paying attention the danger is small. Turn a blind eye to the flaws of the system and the danger becomes rather huge.
Finally, your statement regarding revolutionaries, "I have yet to see an example of a rebel group not being able to obtain weaponery due to laws, as if they would care about those laws to begin with," is in direct contradiction to your statement that an armed population is of no danger to the government.
No it is not. An armed population like for example the one of the USA is maybe a slightly more serious threat then an unarmed one, but the difference is hardly relevant when compared to what the USA government has at its disposal.
A rebel group that has any serious chance will first of all obtain better weaponery, and second, it will have to make good use of asymetrical warfare. An armed population at best is a small help in starting this. External sources of heavier weaponery are usually a much bigger help in this.
An example -- According to the mainstream meadia, and in the opinion of many leftists, small arms and improvised devices are wreaking havoc on the US military. This directly contradicts your assertion that an armed population does not threaten a government.
No it does not, unless that armed population implies that most people have mines, grenade launchers, mortars and the like at their disposal. What it means is that rebels that make good and
Yes but we were initially discussing how a new(?) concept should be released by a government department to it's people/etc, not whether all counties respect patent laws.
Then why argue that public domain is international? Either the outside world is important or it is not. You can't bring it into the discussion when it comes in handy and ignore it otherwise however.
While in some countries patents may not be respected, in many other nations cross-border patents and liscensing are respected as is the concept of public domian. So if the taxpayers of a nation are solely to get a benefit then the concept should not be freely available to the world in general through public domain.
Aha?
Last time I checked, obtaining a patent in the USA does not make it enforcable in say the EU or Japan or such. You have to obtain a seperate patent in those places.
It rather seems that patents are really mostly a national afair and cross border validity is the exception, not the rule.
Also, seeing how a patent is a privilege granted by government on behalf of society to an inventor, it is silly to expect that the USA government for example can grant that privilege on behalf of the Brittish people, since the USA government does not represent them.
Or do you wish to see the government have a pre-defined patent (and/or copyright) liscense that all taxpayers of a nation are able to use all the government's efforts and results without further cost?
In short yes.
I see no reason why government should also be running an enterprise that participates as a provider on the free market, especially since government is also the one to protect that same market and has regulatory powers there.
Now, something like this might be implemented like a firewall (as a controlled port between the systems) but it would be much more effective if it was imbedded in the whole document handeling and transfer software from the ground up. It's the difference between having a firewall, and having all applications exposed to the network be secure.
I disagree.
First of all, the classification and handling of secure information should not depend on indications by the source unless those would result in a higher clasification then the information would have by default. This basicly means that whatever system decides on if information can be passed between 2 networks must be able to decide on this independently.
Second, the more components are needed for implementing a single security measure the bigger the chance on failure of that measure. It is better to create multiple independent layers of security then a single complex one.
To witness, as you point out yourself, the solution you describe requires all network applications to be secure. An independent gateway/firewall solution does not depend on that.
So, while it is a very good idea to have classification and secure handling of documents in your document handling and transfer, but that in no way is a replacement for having a gateway/firewall between networks that can independently classify information and handle it properly.
But public domain is international .... so "all companies" would not have to have any participation in a nation (thus pay no taxes) to use the concept produced by any government department.
Public domain is as international as a patent. If another country does not recognize your patents then companies there can use them without license already.
Do you have a reason for this distaste, or is this just another slashdot kneejerk reaction?
Yes I do. You may want to click on my user page and read some of the other posts I made in this discussion.
Patent it and then license the patent to whoever wants it for a reasonable amount to collect money to offset the developement costs. Money then goes towards developing more new technology. (Although currently they do this and it goes back into the general fund)
The basic problem with this approach is that initially their funding comes from tax money. Tax money should not be used to run an enterprice, it should be used to create 'value' for tax payers. This is more directly accomplished by reducing the cost of technology then by allowing government departments to use tax money for generating profits.
Also, using tax money to create products (a patent that can be licensed to others is for this purpose considered a 'product' as well) for the 'free market' directly conflicts with the governments task to keep that market free, it makes the government a party with a huge unfair advantage.
Yes, and redistribution of wealth (socialism) is also key to many totalitarian regimes...
Yep, todays governments in places like Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and many others are totalitarian indeed...
but we will conveniently ignore the welfare state some people want to turn us into...
See above. Not to mention that 'they are worse' is a strawman argument.
Totalitarian regimes also attempt to disarm their population so they are not a threat to the regime, another goal of some far left Americans I might add.
Ah yes, go tell the population of the former Soviet Union, Poland, Romania and many other former eastern block states that their revolutions cannot have taken place because they were disarmed by their totalitarian governments.
Back in its day the right to bear arms made a lot of sense to limit a potentially tyranic government. Today, any government can afford weaponery so far beyond what civilians have that that argument no longer makes any sense.
Luckily it turns out there are other ways for a population to deal with a tyranic government that do not depend on weaponery at all.
Also, I have yet to see an example of a rebel group not being able to obtain weaponery due to laws, as if they would care about those laws to begin with.
I tend to have more hope in the American people. The structure of our government and military prevent any one person from amassing that power.
So did in theory the system of the Weimar republic in Germany. The problem is that no system is perfect, and blind belief in your system just makes you ignore its failures, hence it increases the likelyhood of those failures being exploited without you noticing untill it is too late.
If you truly believe the American system is so corrupt, I pity you, and invite you to move to a more "perfect" socialist European country.
I have lived in the USA, enjoyed my time there, and may return there someday when the climate there changes for the better. Right now I live in a what you call a socialist European country and I can assure you that I have more freedom of thought and movement and less government, and esp. less people telling me what to do and not do then I had while living in the USA. Oh, I lived in Austin Texas btw.
I think you are the only one that sees it *as* a concern for the united states. As is mentioned every time the black evil of government owning patents comes up, it acts to prevent others from patenting it and making loads of money off tax-payer funded research.
There is no need to apply for a patent to achieve that. You do however need to publish your invention in a way that is publicly available and can be dated reliably. Prior art will do fine as long as the PTO can find it easily.
If the government ever starts trying to restrict people from using government-owned patents, they have stepped beyond their bounds and are accountable to us, the people. This is the primary difference between the United States and the regimes you mentioned -- those regimes had no accountability to their people as they are/were totalitarian in nature.
I'm sorry but you seem somewhat ignorant on how such totalitarian systems come to be. The current US government does in fact have quite a lot in common with the early days of those totalitarian systems that arose out of corrupted democracies. If you don't believe me, take a look at how it attempts to not be held accountable for controversial things like spying on its own citizens.
As soon as you let a government gain too much power over its people, you have set the conditions for a totalitatian government that cannot easily be stopped by 'the people'. If you believe the USA is invulnerable to that then you are very seriously mistaken.
Uh... So if the US develops the H-bomb, you should be allowed access to the IP?
Keeping a military secret for the purpose of national security does not and never did require a patent.
Rather, patenting the H-bomb would mean publicly documenting its workings in exchange for temporary exclusive rights. If anything, this would make it easier for outsiders to also create a H bomb.
In other words, very bad example.
There's no commercial analogue for that. Shareholders do not automatically get licences to the IP held by their company.
But then, companies aren't public services. Last time I looked, the military can invest huge amounts of money without ever making any kind of proffit simply because their purpose is defense, not making a proffit.
So it is entirely reasonable that different rules apply.
Then why not allow government departments that invest their time and effort to have the privilege of patents and subsequent liscenses as well?
Patents exist to promote novel and usefull inventions. The method behind this is granting exclusive rights for a limited amount of time to the inventor so (s)he can compensate for investment and make a buck from the invention.
The granting of exclusive rights is how society 'pays' the inventor for his efford and investment.
In the case of a government department however society already payed the inventor for both. The investment comes from tax money, and so does the salary of the inventor.
There is no reason for society to pay twice for the same thing.
Do you beleive that all companies should just be able to take a government department's work in a particular field and use it without having to pay for it?
As long as they pay taxes they already payed for it.
Quick question for you to answer so that I may better respond to you concern -- Do you believe that individuals and companies have the privilege of patents and subsequent licensing?
At this moment they have that privilege indeed (and I agree with calling it a privilege)
3) The patent becomes public domain, and the military never has to worry about being sued over licensing issues from someone else developing the technology.
Seeing how this is being payed for by tax dollars, option 3 is really the only acceptable option.
if it's in the public domain there is no control on it but if it's patented and licensed then their is a measure of control.
Sorry, I don't buy that argument unless you can also explain why exactly the government should have such control.
Also, as ITAR and similar treaties show, it is quite possible to have control in specific cases where national or international security becomes a concern.
Some government non-exclusive licenses are based primarily on proper (and/or limited) usage of the device/concept rather on straight monetary gain.
Ah yes.. the government gets to decide what is 'proper use'..
2) Being able to license the technology to non-Navy industries. I.e., medical applications. This justification at least seems, albeit distasteful.
Research payed for by tax dollars should be available to the public without this kind of barrier. Distasteful doesn't come anywhere near describing this.
So if someone in the Navy really did have a novel idea, it's not hard to imagine that they might want to get it patented, just as a defensive measure.
Seeing how tax dollars are paying for that, there are only 2 reasonable options for the navy:
- Don't patent it, but ensure there is enough documentation to easily show 'prior art' in case someone else patents it
- Patent it and give every tax payer a license to use the patent.
SO called 'content filters' are not exactly new either. Checkpoint (among others) can sell you a very nice one, and has been able to for quite some time
I mean, what, then, constitutes a terrorist? When the americans revolted against their english 'oppressors', weren't they terrorists too? Weren't many of the countries and people who liberated themselves in fact terrorists?
yes, and that is exactly what they are being called by their opponents usually.
The notion that any side when waging war does not commit attrocities towards civilians is misplaced, so that can't really be a measure to decide neither. What's left?
Attrocities towards civilians can make for war crimes, but in themselves they do not make for terrorism.
Terrorist as used today is mostly a label used to stip the 'hunamity' from people it is applied to, so that any action against them can be justified without having to mind annoying things like basic human rights.
The conflict in the Ulster provinces of the United Kingdom have a root cause in the Irish etnnic minority wanting to dominate and suppress the non-Irish ethnic majority. There's even an element of imperialism too: some Irish support this non-Irish land being forcibly annexed to Ireland. It is a little misleading to call the area "northern Ireland": it is the north of the island of Ireland, but is not part of the nation of Ireland at all.
So tell me, how did Ulster become a province of the UK?
You see, history is full of talk about the brittish empire, there is no such talk about a Irish empire, rather, there are some stretches of history that show a Brittish occupied Ireland. If you'd study those specific times, yoiu'd start getting a clue about how there used to be an extremely good reasons for the Irish to not want to be ruled by Brits.
Yes, that's what happened. Go read a history book.
Oh, I like reading them, but no need in this case.
Its mostly that the religious conflicts that consumed substantial parts of Europe in the 1600s never really ended in Northern Ireland, and yes, that conflict was brought to Ireland by protestants.
Its you who is more deserving of moderator attention I believe. Thanks, that was an informative read even if I already knew part of it.
Most of Hamas' militant activities are "seemingly terrorist" because they are terrorist. Other than that, no arguments with your post.
According to most definitions of terrorism that I am aware of, yes. So were the people from IRA, PKK, ETA, but also those whom started the American revolution, those fighting in the French (and other European) resistance during world war 2, and many others.
If they actually get called terrorists depends on the person talking about them.
The differences is idealogies I think. Islam idealogy is very explicit about what to do with nonbelievers (kill them).
Some parts of the Quran do, and some forbid it. Pick whichever you like.
Christian idealogy forbids murder and does not endorse war. If a government declares war on another government, it does not have the explicit backing of the Bible; however it would have the explicit backing of the Quran (if it were a Muslim state).
The old testament is part of the bible, however, it is also recognized as a holy text and explicitly refered in the Quran. Muslims refer to Alah as the god of Abraham, just like Christans and Jews do. All three of them share the 10 commandmends and the 'thou shall not kill'. So murder is forbidden in all three based on the exact same bit of text.
This is the same old testament that talks about war, killing off entire tribes, rules for slavery and so on.
In all three cases you can come to almost any conclusion you like by selective reading of their religious texts.
That being said, the Islam faith inherently declares war on non-believers. Why the US government keeps saying "it's not a war on Islam" is beyond me; Islam has declared war on the US, we should defend ourselves.
You may have noticed muslims blowing up other muslims in this place called Iraq. You might even have noticed from that that there are actually some different groups within the muslim world and that they are not a unity. It is beyond me how you can fail to notice that and treat them as a single group with a single opinion.
The palestinians elected a brutal terrorist organization to power, which has the destruction of Israel written into it's charter.
Actually, they voted into power a bunch of people who were actually providing with things like basic healthcare, education and so on where very few others are. Yes, those are the same people who launch missiles into Israel and so on. What you should realize however is that quite a few people voted against being occupied by Israel, most voted for the only party whom ever provided them with some tangable enhancements to their life. Very few actually voted for Hamas to vote for the destruction of Israel.
As you may have noticed, Hamas is under substantial preasure to actually recognize Israel, and part of that preasure is comming from those same people who voted them into power.
Or, to make it short, you give an extremely simplistic picture of Hamas and the people who voted for them. What you do is like saying all Americans are war mongering christian fundamentalists because their ruling party which they democratically elected. Ah, you didn't know what you would be getting? That is because you didn't look.... Don't know abotu you but I personally find that reasoning to be a clear sign of utter lack of thought.
So instead of fucking with people - 99.999% of whom have nothing to do with terrorism - spend it on the infrastructure that minimizes the damage.
It makes the country stronger instead of turning it into a state of panic, that simple fact alone counters terrorism better then any amount of military action and senseless monitoring and checking will ever do.