No, what they were arguing was that by excluding certain groups from the ban (such as charities and political groups) the ban is effectively endorsing some speech while regulating other speech based on its content, which is arguably a violation of the 1st ammendment. Had Congress merely been willing to ban charities and political groups as well, we wouldn't have to deal with all this legal stuff surrounding the list.
"Is this the same government that instituted the Patriot Act?"
The Denver-based appeals court? Not even close.
You see we in the United States have this thing called the seperation of powers. The legislative branches of the government has the right to write laws and then the courts have the right to strike them down if they violate something stated in the Constitution (and not just if the ACLU doesn't like it).
Such chips make it more difficult for hackers to steal information from the user's machine.
And don't give me any shit about how since the article already mentions the upsides the summary can ignore them. We all already know how many/. readers fail to RTFA.
Dismissing an entire technology just because it could be used for un-/. purposes is not generally considered conducive to a good discussion. In fact, it really is no different from the RIAA bashing all p2p related technologies just because they could be used for piracy (in fact if anything it is probably worse, as p2p has a track record for being used to promote piracy).
And how is 5% any less arbitrary? After all I believe in this election at least it would still keep out all the 3rd parties currently in existence as none are currently polling at 5%.
They can say whatever they want to say, but that doesn't mean anyone really wants to listen to it.
There has to be a cut off somewhere. Otherwise think of all the candidates that would be on the stage. Along with the Greens and Libertarians, you would also have the Constitution Party, the Natural Law Party, Reform Party, and a whole shitload of others including the Communists, Prohibitionists, Nazis (I know a certain troll who would love them), etc. In fact, anyone with a cause could start up their own party and demand a right to stand on that stage.
Really? Why? What has Linus done? He started work on a new operating system, yes. But now that system (and all of the software around it) is supported by the community, not one person.
Agreed. This just looks downright ugly. I use Kontact which is no eye candy itself (I'm hoping to move to thunderbird once it gets a little further developed), but at least it doesn't look as bad as this.
...would be fine for me if they were only to port it to Linux. I discovered a lot of new artists through their service when it first came out, though they sort of went downhill when Yahoo bought them.
" Dude, what Sonia Gandhi did is her own business. Listening to her inner voice and standing down is a damn noble act "
LOL. Yeah and the only reason Tenet resigned was to be with his family. Regardless of her reasons, it was widely seen as an act responding to threats from the ruling party and was very unpopular with more than a few people.
Point is, no nation of sufficient size can operate a democracy with no controversy involved in the elections.
"...that won admiration from even her critics."
Well duh, of course her critics were happy with her resigning.
"Sonia Ghandi won the last election in India and then voluntarily chose to step down and nominated a Sikh to replace her."
...which pissed off a number of people who had voted for Ghandi, not Singh. Imagine if John Kerry were elected but before he took office resigned from pressure from the Christian right and put in place Joe Lieberman. Do you honestly think no one in the US would be upset about such a move?
"With less than 100% of the counties reporting, I will agree that there is statistical error in estimating the complete result. However, once results were in from all precincts, the number announced by Kathleen Harris was 307."
So you believe there was no statistical error in the 307 count? Or the 930 count? Interesting. You are probably the only person I know who thinks that.
Of course that doesn't make you right. There is error in any election, your ignorance does not change that.
"Absentee ballots on the 18th put Bush ahead in Florida by 930 votes. There is no "most likely" here; we know what happened."
In hindsight, yes we can know that. At the time (which is the relevant viewpoint in which to view this) it was merely believed that absentee votes would help Bush.
"Incidentally, as the population that doesn't vote doesn't matter,"
Well I'm sure that they appreciate that. Regardless, do you still for some reason maintain that every American who attempted to vote in the 2000 election had their vote included in the election total? I ask again, what rock were you hiding under during the election?
"Initially, the first results that Florida announced on Friday, the 10th of November had Bush leading by only 327 votes."
Actually the initial counts, the day after the election, the difference was closer to 2000. After which we were waiting for absentee ballots, which would most likely raise Bush's total more than Gore's.
Regardless, even if the difference were in the hundreds, if the election were as perfect as you seem to believe it is when you are discussing the popular vote totals, it shouldn't matter. Remember "Seriously, in an election, you have 100% of the population being surveyed. Hence, there is no such thing as "statistical significance.""?
"And how exactly do you perceive the electoral system to run? If you vote, you are part of the population sample. If you don't vote, you are not part of the population sample."
You clearly said population, not population sample.
Add to that there are always problems with elections. Votes getting lost, fraud happening, etc. No, its not as bad as it used to be, but it is still there.
"As to your second uninformed opinion, Gore was arguing that out of the 5,963,110 counted in Florida, that there is the potential for enough error to account for the 537 vote difference."
Not initially. Seriously, where were you during the 2000 election that you didn't hear about this stuff?
Considering it was I who was using the word, I think I can say with some certainity that the correct usage of the word was what was origionally meant. Thus his accusation that I was wrong is without merit.
"
The day we start deciding presidents based on chance is a sad day indeed."
No, its the day when neither party is able to have enough power that they can win by 10% of the vote, and thus elections are very competitive. Thats actually a good thing.
"Gore DID win the majority vote."
He won a plurality, not a majority. Do you have such a lack of understanding of simple statistics that I have to explain the difference to you?
"Bush DID win the majority of electoral college points."
Never said otherwise. RTFP.
"Bush ARGUABLY won the majority vote in Florida. "
Nope, plurality again.
"There would have been no reason to feel cheated had there been no controversy in Florida."
Well if you can find a way to count votes in a country with a population of well above a quarter of a billion people with no controversies, you will be eligible for the Nobel peace prize.
"I don't know what cow college you studied math and statistics at but I'd say that a difference of 543,895 votes, or one half percent, is statistically significant."
Do you honestly believe that what went on in Florida was the only scandal in the election? No, there were scandals all over the country. People buying votes, people results called early, "Nader-trader" sites, etc. Counting votes is not an exact science. Thus, one half of a percent, or 500,000 votes, is statistically insignificant.
"If we had a direct popular vote, or if electors were allocated by percentage of votes won in each state rather than the winner take all system Gore would be president today."
So? If our elections were decided by the candidates by a battle to the death Arnold Schwarzenegger would be president. Whats your point?
The 2000 election was not a screwup, it was a coin toss. Neither candidate won a majority of the popular vote in either the nation or in Florida. In fact, in both the differences were statistically insignificant. Half the country wanted Gore, half wanted Bush. There was no way to resolve the issue without one side feeling cheated.
Add to that, the US is a sovereign nation. Europe can monitor the elections all they want, they still can't do shit about it.
Once again, if what you want is three-dimensional characters, I've got a few books for you to read.
Yeah, I know some of the scenes in the extended editions were good, but others just ruined them. I already mentioned the opening scene and the funeral scene, but another that comes to mind is the flashback with Faramir and Boromir before Boromir leaves. That particular scene was not accurate to what the book said and only served to make Faramir look like a whiny little brat, which is very different than how he is portreyed in the books.
Again, an actual director's cut with only the scenes that bring something positive to the movie (or swapping in cut scenes for redundant existing scenes) would be nice, but don't fool yourself into thinking that is what you are buying when you get the extended edition.
What exactly did they add in the extended editions? The first had an extra beginning (with Bilbo reading his book). Did that add anything to the story? No. Did it hurt the story? In my opinion, yes. Two introductions to the Shire (Bilbo's reading and then Frodo and Gandalf) are redundant, and just mean that it just takes forever to get to the actual story. In the second, they added a funeral scene for the King's son (his name escapes me for the moment). It was a nice scene, but did it help the movie? No, in fact it killed the next scene. Instead of cutting from Theoden asking "Where is my son?" straight to the flower rising on his grave (which makes for a very nice emotional cut), it is diluted by the funeral scene. And then there are many other scenes which serve no purpose other than screwing the timing. Cutting those are decisions the editor makes, and for good reasons.
Even on a DVD, these are still movies. And thus they need to take in account needs that the medium require. If you want the full story, turn off the TV, go to your local library, and read the damn books.
If any of the stuff they cut actually made the movie better they would have left it in the theatrical edition. Remember these are not director's cuts where the director is given the freedom to include (or leave out, think Blade Runner) whatever he wants in the film, in this they are just throwing in every cut scene, even if the cut was made for good reasons.
Slashdot Mirror
If you think I conceded anything to you you are sorely mistaken. Its not my fault you were unable to argue your point worth shit.
No, what they were arguing was that by excluding certain groups from the ban (such as charities and political groups) the ban is effectively endorsing some speech while regulating other speech based on its content, which is arguably a violation of the 1st ammendment. Had Congress merely been willing to ban charities and political groups as well, we wouldn't have to deal with all this legal stuff surrounding the list.
The Denver-based appeals court? Not even close.
You see we in the United States have this thing called the seperation of powers. The legislative branches of the government has the right to write laws and then the courts have the right to strike them down if they violate something stated in the Constitution (and not just if the ACLU doesn't like it).
Such chips make it more difficult for hackers to steal information from the user's machine.
And don't give me any shit about how since the article already mentions the upsides the summary can ignore them. We all already know how many /. readers fail to RTFA.
Dismissing an entire technology just because it could be used for un-/. purposes is not generally considered conducive to a good discussion. In fact, it really is no different from the RIAA bashing all p2p related technologies just because they could be used for piracy (in fact if anything it is probably worse, as p2p has a track record for being used to promote piracy).
And how is 5% any less arbitrary? After all I believe in this election at least it would still keep out all the 3rd parties currently in existence as none are currently polling at 5%.
There has to be a cut off somewhere. Otherwise think of all the candidates that would be on the stage. Along with the Greens and Libertarians, you would also have the Constitution Party, the Natural Law Party, Reform Party, and a whole shitload of others including the Communists, Prohibitionists, Nazis (I know a certain troll who would love them), etc. In fact, anyone with a cause could start up their own party and demand a right to stand on that stage.
Really? Why? What has Linus done? He started work on a new operating system, yes. But now that system (and all of the software around it) is supported by the community, not one person.
This is slashdot. No one here is interested in real news if they get to make fun of Gates instead.
And yes developers, appearance matters.
...would be fine for me if they were only to port it to Linux. I discovered a lot of new artists through their service when it first came out, though they sort of went downhill when Yahoo bought them.
LOL. Yeah and the only reason Tenet resigned was to be with his family. Regardless of her reasons, it was widely seen as an act responding to threats from the ruling party and was very unpopular with more than a few people.
Point is, no nation of sufficient size can operate a democracy with no controversy involved in the elections.
"...that won admiration from even her critics."
Well duh, of course her critics were happy with her resigning.
I believe many in India who voted for Sonia Ghandi in their last election may feel otherwise.
So you believe there was no statistical error in the 307 count? Or the 930 count? Interesting. You are probably the only person I know who thinks that.
Of course that doesn't make you right. There is error in any election, your ignorance does not change that.
"Absentee ballots on the 18th put Bush ahead in Florida by 930 votes. There is no "most likely" here; we know what happened."
In hindsight, yes we can know that. At the time (which is the relevant viewpoint in which to view this) it was merely believed that absentee votes would help Bush.
Well I'm sure that they appreciate that. Regardless, do you still for some reason maintain that every American who attempted to vote in the 2000 election had their vote included in the election total? I ask again, what rock were you hiding under during the election?
"Initially, the first results that Florida announced on Friday, the 10th of November had Bush leading by only 327 votes."
Actually the initial counts, the day after the election, the difference was closer to 2000. After which we were waiting for absentee ballots, which would most likely raise Bush's total more than Gore's.
Regardless, even if the difference were in the hundreds, if the election were as perfect as you seem to believe it is when you are discussing the popular vote totals, it shouldn't matter. Remember "Seriously, in an election, you have 100% of the population being surveyed. Hence, there is no such thing as "statistical significance.""?
Except for the fact that the sale of votes in the United States is illegal.
You clearly said population, not population sample.
Add to that there are always problems with elections. Votes getting lost, fraud happening, etc. No, its not as bad as it used to be, but it is still there.
"As to your second uninformed opinion, Gore was arguing that out of the 5,963,110 counted in Florida, that there is the potential for enough error to account for the 537 vote difference."
Not initially. Seriously, where were you during the 2000 election that you didn't hear about this stuff?
Considering it was I who was using the word, I think I can say with some certainity that the correct usage of the word was what was origionally meant. Thus his accusation that I was wrong is without merit.
May I assume this post was intended as sarcasm? Or do you really have that little of an understanding of the electoral system?
"Unless you seriously are arguing that procedural error accounts for the half a million more votes that were cast for Al Gore than for GW Bush."
It could have, yes. Since you were seemingly living under a rock in 2000, Gore was basically arguing that is what happened in Florida.
No, its the day when neither party is able to have enough power that they can win by 10% of the vote, and thus elections are very competitive. Thats actually a good thing.
"Gore DID win the majority vote."
He won a plurality, not a majority. Do you have such a lack of understanding of simple statistics that I have to explain the difference to you?
"Bush DID win the majority of electoral college points."
Never said otherwise. RTFP.
"Bush ARGUABLY won the majority vote in Florida. "
Nope, plurality again.
"There would have been no reason to feel cheated had there been no controversy in Florida."
Well if you can find a way to count votes in a country with a population of well above a quarter of a billion people with no controversies, you will be eligible for the Nobel peace prize.
Do you honestly believe that what went on in Florida was the only scandal in the election? No, there were scandals all over the country. People buying votes, people results called early, "Nader-trader" sites, etc. Counting votes is not an exact science. Thus, one half of a percent, or 500,000 votes, is statistically insignificant.
"If we had a direct popular vote, or if electors were allocated by percentage of votes won in each state rather than the winner take all system Gore would be president today."
So? If our elections were decided by the candidates by a battle to the death Arnold Schwarzenegger would be president. Whats your point?
Add to that, the US is a sovereign nation. Europe can monitor the elections all they want, they still can't do shit about it.
Yeah, I know some of the scenes in the extended editions were good, but others just ruined them. I already mentioned the opening scene and the funeral scene, but another that comes to mind is the flashback with Faramir and Boromir before Boromir leaves. That particular scene was not accurate to what the book said and only served to make Faramir look like a whiny little brat, which is very different than how he is portreyed in the books.
Again, an actual director's cut with only the scenes that bring something positive to the movie (or swapping in cut scenes for redundant existing scenes) would be nice, but don't fool yourself into thinking that is what you are buying when you get the extended edition.
Even on a DVD, these are still movies. And thus they need to take in account needs that the medium require. If you want the full story, turn off the TV, go to your local library, and read the damn books.
If any of the stuff they cut actually made the movie better they would have left it in the theatrical edition. Remember these are not director's cuts where the director is given the freedom to include (or leave out, think Blade Runner) whatever he wants in the film, in this they are just throwing in every cut scene, even if the cut was made for good reasons.