Just goes to show that proprietary software is on its way out. Microsoft and Apple are birds of the same feather. If MS wasn't the juggernaut that it is, then that role would be taken up by Apple, same difference. Linux and the BSDs, on the other hand, are community-driven. As long as there are people willing to put their sweat in for no immediate gratification, we will all reap the benefits as a whole, without the corporate bullshit. I say don't worry about Microsoft or Apple. They are the past. Linux, BSD and Free Software is the future. Look to that future.
The university is in the wrong here, and dreadfully so. At my uni, most classes make use of "Blackboard" web apps, which include a discussion board which students make use of constantly on homework assignments. Requests to walk through a certain question or explain the answer in detail are perfectly normal, and sometimes the professor him or herself is the one to provide the needed information.
The Facebook "wall" is in essence no more than this type of discussion board. It simply provides another method for students to help each other study. Does this university's administration think that meatspace homework study groups don't work out the answers communally? Give me a break.
What a great idea. And those perfectly intelligent children who are born into poor or working class families that cannot afford to attend an "Ivy League" elementary school, or even any school at all in a world of only private K-12 education? Let them all flip burgers and wait on the rest of us simply because their parents had to spend money keeping them alive and had nothing left to pay for a proper education, right?
Class disparity is already a huge problem in the United States. What you are proposing would increase it even more so and result in millions of children being denied even an elementary education. You see no problem with that?
We already have private schools for children of parents who can afford them and want to segregate their children from the rest of the population for whatever reason. Proposing to abolish public education because of an issue like this is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Simply fix the issue. Proposing that we bulldoze the entire building because a few windows are broken is simply ignorant.
... good luck if you ever want to use wireless with that Ubuntu computer...
Are you kidding me? Since at least Ubuntu 6.06 LTS, I have not had a problem with wireless, and this is not based on an experience with just one computer. Two desktops and a laptop with internal 802.11a/b/g have all worked fine. In fact, I am using the wireless on my laptop with Kubuntu 7.04 to post this comment.
While there may be a some wireless adapters which might still need NDIS Wrapper, the vast majority now have adequate drivers. You are vastly overstating the issue, either way. This was a problem three years ago. Now it has largely been taken care of.
To expand on my last comment, I just noticed that Organic Valley has put an article up on their website detailing their opposition to this FDA ruling. If anyone is interested, here is the link.
I am not a shill. I am simply attempting to point to a viable alternative for those of us who, for one reason or another, still make use of dairy products, but are also quite concerned with both the welfare of the animals and of the humans who benefit from what those animals provide.
Unfortunately, vegetarians aren't necessarily exempt from this.
If you are an ovo-lacto vegetarian (no meat at all, but haven't given up eggs and dairy) like me, then you need to be concerned. Potentially any dairy will now be able to use cloned cows to produce their milk and butter, which they can then sell to us without revealing that fact. I am already very concerned regarding what dairies I purchase from, simply due to my views on animal rights, but this will add yet another variable to the situation. I recommend that you not blow this off as something that will not affect you.
For the record, I currently buy what milk I do use from Organic Valley, an American organic coop owned and operated by the small family farms that make it up. They are quite open regarding their methods and the treatment of their animals, so I feel at least relatively satisfied in that respect.
Being that I am a working musician, I know exactly how much I put into every song that my band creates. It is a different type of "labor," however. It is a labor of love. If we (I am assuming from your signature that you are also a musician) ceased to receive any form of monetary compensation for the work that we do, would you still do it? If your answer to that question is in the negative, then you are not playing music for the right reasons, and I suggest you quit.
I do not play music for monetary gain. It is an outlet. Other people identify with our art, and that makes me happy. If they would like to pay the five bucks to see us live and purchase a shirt or something, then that is even better. I am intelligent enough to realize, however, that I need a day job. The fact that I am a musician does not entitle me to anything. It simply means that I have chosen music as an avenue for my creativity. I do not invest my time and talent into what I create in order to make money, and in my view no musician should, because that is not what it is about. I suppose you feel differently, and I respect that, but it does not change my stance on the matter.
It depends. Are these magical, self-cloning car stereos and GPS devices? No? Then your argument holds no water. It is not even a question of apples to oranges. At least those are both fruit. Copying and stealing are completely different. As much as I do not want to explain this yet again, I will. When you steal my car stereo, you have deprived me of it. I must then purchase, at my own cost, a new one. When you copy my entire music library, there is no deprivation involved. I still have my music library, and you now have an identical reproduction of it.
Once you realize the differences here, the situation becomes a purely moral one. Is it ethical to share what you have with others, if doing so deprives you of nothing? What about the corporate music industry? Is it ethical to deny these major labels a profit on something which can be so easily reproduced with such a miniscule amount of labor?
Musicians, on the other hand, are different. They are the ones who create the art. Even so, however, that does not mean that the creation of this art fits the established definition of "labor." Any musician who plays or sings for the love of it, which is as it should be, does not view what they do as labor. Creating music is not the same as an eight hour day in the cube farm. It is not a chore. It is something done out of love and often necessity. You could compare it in some ways to why Open Source and Free Software developers do what they do. It is like an addiction.
Still, artists should be compensated accordingly for their live performances, and donations in exchange for copies of their recordings would also be nice, though not necessary. The issue is that musicians are regular people as well. They should not be treated as some sort of royalty and end up millionaires. They should be able to bring in enough from their music to support themselves, of course, but twenty cars, four mansions and a private jet is absolutely ludicrous. Also, what most major artists make is a drop in the bucket when compared to what the music executives take. Food for thought, that.
To wrap it all into a neat little bundle: Cheap recording equipment, along with peer to peer and other technologies made possible by the ubiquity of the Internet, should be utilized to cut out middle-men completely. The antiquated music industry should be completely destroyed and replaced with a system that allows free copying and trading of music. Artists would become popular by, what a novel idea, the people deciding whether or not to listen to them. They would support themselves via live performances, merchandise if applicable, and donations from fans.
Buisinessmen should not have control over an art-form.
Hillary Clinton is about as far from a socialist as possible. I have no idea why people trumpet this baseless notion. She is part of the capitalist status-quo, just as the rest of the "popular" candidates are. Her proposed "health care" plan, which is the only part of her platform that I imagine one could even attempt to call "socialistic" (though all of the main candidates have or will have something similar), would do absolutely nothing to combat the broken private system. True socialist change would involve placing the health insurance and pharmaceutical giants under public ownership, where they would be conducted as a public trust under democratic control of the workers. That is socialism. Creating a "safety net" or a "welfare state" is not socialism. Those are simply policies meant to keep the populace complacent, nothing more.
Also, I believe that if she were truly socialist, she would receive much less than she does in "campaign contributions" (read: legalized bribes) from corporations. Anecdotally, regarding her "health care" plan, if it would really make any profound difference in the current system, then why is she currently the number one recipient of contributions from both the HMO Industry and the Health Professionals Industry for the 2007-2008 election cycle?
I am not a liberal. I am a socialist, and I am not paranoid. Thankfully, it has not fallen to the point that I should feel worried about my safety because of my political and economic views. That is not to say that it will not get to that point, however. It certainly seems that it will, and sooner rather than later, unfortunately.
... didn't realise I was being so selfish when I preferred my life and the lives of everyone around me...
You did not frame your original post in this context. If one were to weigh the options and choose to sacrifice their rights in order for, say, their family to survive, it would be a much harder issue to confront. On one hand, they sacrifice their freedoms, along with those of their family, for continued survival of not just them but those around them. On the other hand, without inherent rights such as life, liberty and so on, would you consider they and their family to really be alive? Or would they be simply existing?
Whatever you and your moderators-for-hire say.
I am sorry if you feel otherwise, but your position is in fact the very definition of passivity. Simply conforming for an increasingly totalitarian government and going on about your life is not quite my idea of being "active" with regard to the situation.
... the hell does consumerism have to do with terrorism?
My comment was not addressing consumerism and its relation to terrorism. Rather, it is its relation to passivity in the face of the destruction of true democracy and personal liberty that it was concerned with. Our society's infatuation with conspicuous consumption has lulled its members into a state of complacency that was unheard of in years past. People are increasingly unconcerned with politics and world affairs, so long as they have their high definition plasma televisions to watch football with, their overly-large SUVs, and are comfortably secluded within the walls of suburbia. Your original statement gave that impression.
... did you make a false dichotomy...
The true false dichotomy is between "the terrorists" and the government. The government is here, now. It is here as you step outside of your home, as you drive to work or school, as you sleep at night. "The terrorists" are not. You have less of a chance of being killed by terrorists than you do of winning the lottery. In contrast, the government affects you and your actions, in some way, every day of your life.
When privacy is taken away, it is done so for a reason. I imagine that we have diametrically opposing views as to that reason. While you apparently believe it is to secure citizens from "terrorists," I believe that privacy is being taken away so that, in the future, other rights and freedoms can also be taken away from certain groups within our society.
Regardless of my views, however, I disagree with the "troll" moderation of your original post. It was simply your opinion, and as your signature implies, posts should not be modded down due to differences in opinion.
I am not a "patriot." In fact, I believe that patriotism is akin to religion, and has just about as much worth, which is to say absolutely none.
Regardless, it would appear that you and I have a different view of what being "free" entails, exactly. I am of the opinion that if someone is killed for excercising their intrinsic rights, then they die free, by the simple fact that they have resisted attempted enslavement. I assume that you believe otherwise.
You would rather live a coward than die a free man, then?
Your opinion seems to be that of the majority in this country, and I believe that sentiment has a lot to do with how we have gotten to where we are, collectively. Do not attempt to raise an ideal higher than your personal interests. Just keep being passive. And remember: Consume, consume, consume! No one likes a louse, right?
If all federal funds were cut to my university, I would lose my grants. Being that I do not have a rich mommy and daddy to pay my way, that would mean that I would need a full-time job to go along with my part-time job, just to have any possible chance of paying my tuition in full. Somehow, I think that working 55 hours a week would cut into my GPA a bit.
I don't know exactly what your definition of "liberty" is, but it sounds rather like slavery to me; and if someone needs to work 55 hours a week and somehow balance a course-load along with that in order to be "responsible," then they obviously aren't mature enough in the first place. I certainly have no trouble being responsible, even with my "snout" in the Federal government's "feeding trough," as you put it.
I wonder if this will open up MRIs to those of us who currently cannot have them done. I have a metal-mesh plate in my skull due to an open brain injury, and my doctors repeatedly cautioned that I can never, under any circumstances, undergo an MRI. The electro-magnets are apparently so powerful that they have the ability to rip the plate right out of my head.
So, perhaps now that they've found a way to get around the necessity of humongous electro-magnets, people like me will be able to take on an MRI without fear of a grotesque, horror movie-like death?
It all makes perfect sense when you consider that both major parties are in the pocket of big business. You see, this war may be an atrocity for Iraqi citizens, a lost cause for the military and a supreme embarrassment for the American People, but it means only one thing for corporations: profit. The Iraqi oil industry is being privatised, the electricity (what electricity is available, that is) is being privatised.. I wouldn't doubt one bit if they pull a "Chile" and attempt to privatise the water system at some point in the near future. Iraq is now a neoliberal experiment to see just how much cash can be pulled out of pain and suffering, and it is being backed by both parties, because they both have their hands in the cookie-jar. Frankly, I find it amazing that no one seems to be seeing it, as it's quite brazenly obvious. I've been forced to entertain the notion that maybe it's not that people aren't noticing, but instead that they are simply more concerned with conspicuous consumption. This is the reason that the consumer culture which has plagued our country for the last century was created, I suppose.
Either way, from my point of view, Kucinich is the only candidate who is worth anything at all out of the current crop. There is no way in hell that he will get the democratic endorsement, but once the primaries are over with, if he chooses to run independently, he will get my vote. Other than that, I will write in "Thomas Paine" and be done with it.
... Also idealism attached to your real name is great, it caused two of my grandparents to get a government sponsored all expenses paid trip to Siberia and another to die relatively poor...
You should be proud that they actually stood up for what they believed in, despite those consequences. Anonymity is an essential tool in certain situations, but if we were all anonymous, all the time, there would be no change. The work of Thomas Paine and others was done specifically to incite idealistic reaction, which then lead to idealistic action. This type of thing cannot be accomplished if everyone is too afraid to be identified as supporting a cause and to deal with the consequences accordingly. Absolutely nothing would get done.
Anecdotally, I think that anonymity on the internet is, to a small extent, playing a role in my generation's lack of motivation both politically and socially. When you are so used to being able to spout off your opinions without fear of repercussions (just as I am doing right now, ironically), you tend to end up complacent and reluctant, and to avoid confrontation when the same type of situation occurs in meatspace.
I apologize for going somewhat offtopic there, this just kind of relates to what I have been thinking about lately.
Having worked in tech support, I can assure you that you need not be confused. If you take a trip down to your average call center, you will find that the majority of the people who work there are not nerds, do not care about technology, and more often than not know much less than you do about your problem. Most of these people simply want you off of their phone, because you're raising their call time, which ends up in their QA reports.
So don't be confused. The "tech" you spoke with obviously had no clue, and was just trying to keep their call time down. Unfortunately, that's how it works.
The difference being that California wildfires happen every year, almost like clockwork. The hurricane that devistated New Orleans and the coastal regions of Mississippi, while perhaps inevitable, had not occured until that point.
In essence, FEMA is not there to simply help out with expected situations, though that may be part of it. No matter the nobility or necessity, however, it is there, primarily, for unexpected emergencies, and it is simply not doing that job at the moment. Consider the juxtaposition between the rich socialites who have lived in the wildfire-prone region of California for so many years, and the disgustingly poor, predominately black population of New Orleans, who have lived there because their parents lived there, and because they cannot afford to move or live anywhere else. It all boils down to wealth disparity, and who benefits from it. I would encourage everyone to consider that.
Your idea of "formal settings" is humorous to me. I think that anyone should feel quite justified in wearing whatever the hell they feel like wearing to absolutely -any- function or "setting" that they want. Clothes have become some sort of weird gauge for the fundamentalists, both socially and economically, and it's simply an extrapolation of racism and classism. You can wear what you want to wear, my friend, but that doesn't mean that you are rich or successful, nor does it mean that you are poor or stupid. Please understand that.
Here we go with the Ayn Rand objectivist point of view, as always.
"Everyone should be free, as long as they embrace the tenet that their freedom ends where another person's freedom begins.."
"No, wait! That's not actually freedom, you see. People should be free to choose whether or not to allow someone else their freedom.. But in Stallman's world, that's not an option, which means that he's one of those horrible socialists. We don't want socialists in good old reactionary America, now do we?"
Please come to terms with your own argument. It is one thing to critique the GPL. It is quite another to imply that the software movement would be better off without it.
Stallman does not obsess over what he wears. Obviously, you have a problem with that. Feel free to wear your collared shirts and brown loafers, but please, spare the rest of us from your moronic ideal of what a "normal person" should be.
... The man doesn't wear shoes...
And so we should all ridicule him. Fuck his message (which you either don't understand or just hate), he doesn't wear shoes on occasion.
Seems like a solution in search of a problem to me. It might have been useful if it was able to tune-on-demand, to alleviate the pauses between songs during a show, but it doesn't. You still have to stop, flip the switch, and let it do its "auto-tune" thing. So it's really only good for those who are too lazy to adjust their own tuning. And three-thousand bucks just for that is a waste.
Slashdot Mirror
Just goes to show that proprietary software is on its way out. Microsoft and Apple are birds of the same feather. If MS wasn't the juggernaut that it is, then that role would be taken up by Apple, same difference. Linux and the BSDs, on the other hand, are community-driven. As long as there are people willing to put their sweat in for no immediate gratification, we will all reap the benefits as a whole, without the corporate bullshit. I say don't worry about Microsoft or Apple. They are the past. Linux, BSD and Free Software is the future. Look to that future.
The university is in the wrong here, and dreadfully so. At my uni, most classes make use of "Blackboard" web apps, which include a discussion board which students make use of constantly on homework assignments. Requests to walk through a certain question or explain the answer in detail are perfectly normal, and sometimes the professor him or herself is the one to provide the needed information.
The Facebook "wall" is in essence no more than this type of discussion board. It simply provides another method for students to help each other study. Does this university's administration think that meatspace homework study groups don't work out the answers communally? Give me a break.
What a great idea. And those perfectly intelligent children who are born into poor or working class families that cannot afford to attend an "Ivy League" elementary school, or even any school at all in a world of only private K-12 education? Let them all flip burgers and wait on the rest of us simply because their parents had to spend money keeping them alive and had nothing left to pay for a proper education, right?
Class disparity is already a huge problem in the United States. What you are proposing would increase it even more so and result in millions of children being denied even an elementary education. You see no problem with that?
We already have private schools for children of parents who can afford them and want to segregate their children from the rest of the population for whatever reason. Proposing to abolish public education because of an issue like this is throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Simply fix the issue. Proposing that we bulldoze the entire building because a few windows are broken is simply ignorant.
... good luck if you ever want to use wireless with that Ubuntu computer...
Are you kidding me? Since at least Ubuntu 6.06 LTS, I have not had a problem with wireless, and this is not based on an experience with just one computer. Two desktops and a laptop with internal 802.11a/b/g have all worked fine. In fact, I am using the wireless on my laptop with Kubuntu 7.04 to post this comment.
While there may be a some wireless adapters which might still need NDIS Wrapper, the vast majority now have adequate drivers. You are vastly overstating the issue, either way. This was a problem three years ago. Now it has largely been taken care of.
To expand on my last comment, I just noticed that Organic Valley has put an article up on their website detailing their opposition to this FDA ruling. If anyone is interested, here is the link.
I am not a shill. I am simply attempting to point to a viable alternative for those of us who, for one reason or another, still make use of dairy products, but are also quite concerned with both the welfare of the animals and of the humans who benefit from what those animals provide.
Unfortunately, vegetarians aren't necessarily exempt from this.
If you are an ovo-lacto vegetarian (no meat at all, but haven't given up eggs and dairy) like me, then you need to be concerned. Potentially any dairy will now be able to use cloned cows to produce their milk and butter, which they can then sell to us without revealing that fact. I am already very concerned regarding what dairies I purchase from, simply due to my views on animal rights, but this will add yet another variable to the situation. I recommend that you not blow this off as something that will not affect you.
For the record, I currently buy what milk I do use from Organic Valley, an American organic coop owned and operated by the small family farms that make it up. They are quite open regarding their methods and the treatment of their animals, so I feel at least relatively satisfied in that respect.
Being that I am a working musician, I know exactly how much I put into every song that my band creates. It is a different type of "labor," however. It is a labor of love. If we (I am assuming from your signature that you are also a musician) ceased to receive any form of monetary compensation for the work that we do, would you still do it? If your answer to that question is in the negative, then you are not playing music for the right reasons, and I suggest you quit.
I do not play music for monetary gain. It is an outlet. Other people identify with our art, and that makes me happy. If they would like to pay the five bucks to see us live and purchase a shirt or something, then that is even better. I am intelligent enough to realize, however, that I need a day job. The fact that I am a musician does not entitle me to anything. It simply means that I have chosen music as an avenue for my creativity. I do not invest my time and talent into what I create in order to make money, and in my view no musician should, because that is not what it is about. I suppose you feel differently, and I respect that, but it does not change my stance on the matter.
It depends. Are these magical, self-cloning car stereos and GPS devices? No? Then your argument holds no water. It is not even a question of apples to oranges. At least those are both fruit. Copying and stealing are completely different. As much as I do not want to explain this yet again, I will. When you steal my car stereo, you have deprived me of it. I must then purchase, at my own cost, a new one. When you copy my entire music library, there is no deprivation involved. I still have my music library, and you now have an identical reproduction of it.
Once you realize the differences here, the situation becomes a purely moral one. Is it ethical to share what you have with others, if doing so deprives you of nothing? What about the corporate music industry? Is it ethical to deny these major labels a profit on something which can be so easily reproduced with such a miniscule amount of labor?
Musicians, on the other hand, are different. They are the ones who create the art. Even so, however, that does not mean that the creation of this art fits the established definition of "labor." Any musician who plays or sings for the love of it, which is as it should be, does not view what they do as labor. Creating music is not the same as an eight hour day in the cube farm. It is not a chore. It is something done out of love and often necessity. You could compare it in some ways to why Open Source and Free Software developers do what they do. It is like an addiction.
Still, artists should be compensated accordingly for their live performances, and donations in exchange for copies of their recordings would also be nice, though not necessary. The issue is that musicians are regular people as well. They should not be treated as some sort of royalty and end up millionaires. They should be able to bring in enough from their music to support themselves, of course, but twenty cars, four mansions and a private jet is absolutely ludicrous. Also, what most major artists make is a drop in the bucket when compared to what the music executives take. Food for thought, that.
To wrap it all into a neat little bundle: Cheap recording equipment, along with peer to peer and other technologies made possible by the ubiquity of the Internet, should be utilized to cut out middle-men completely. The antiquated music industry should be completely destroyed and replaced with a system that allows free copying and trading of music. Artists would become popular by, what a novel idea, the people deciding whether or not to listen to them. They would support themselves via live performances, merchandise if applicable, and donations from fans.
Buisinessmen should not have control over an art-form.
And the United States should do the same. I'm sure that you simply left that part out mistakenly, right? Right.
Hillary Clinton is about as far from a socialist as possible. I have no idea why people trumpet this baseless notion. She is part of the capitalist status-quo, just as the rest of the "popular" candidates are. Her proposed "health care" plan, which is the only part of her platform that I imagine one could even attempt to call "socialistic" (though all of the main candidates have or will have something similar), would do absolutely nothing to combat the broken private system. True socialist change would involve placing the health insurance and pharmaceutical giants under public ownership, where they would be conducted as a public trust under democratic control of the workers. That is socialism. Creating a "safety net" or a "welfare state" is not socialism. Those are simply policies meant to keep the populace complacent, nothing more.
Also, I believe that if she were truly socialist, she would receive much less than she does in "campaign contributions" (read: legalized bribes) from corporations. Anecdotally, regarding her "health care" plan, if it would really make any profound difference in the current system, then why is she currently the number one recipient of contributions from both the HMO Industry and the Health Professionals Industry for the 2007-2008 election cycle?
... coming from a paranoid liberal!
... didn't realise I was being so selfish when I preferred my life and the lives of everyone around me ...
... the hell does consumerism have to do with terrorism?
... did you make a false dichotomy ...
I am not a liberal. I am a socialist, and I am not paranoid. Thankfully, it has not fallen to the point that I should feel worried about my safety because of my political and economic views. That is not to say that it will not get to that point, however. It certainly seems that it will, and sooner rather than later, unfortunately.
You did not frame your original post in this context. If one were to weigh the options and choose to sacrifice their rights in order for, say, their family to survive, it would be a much harder issue to confront. On one hand, they sacrifice their freedoms, along with those of their family, for continued survival of not just them but those around them. On the other hand, without inherent rights such as life, liberty and so on, would you consider they and their family to really be alive? Or would they be simply existing?
Whatever you and your moderators-for-hire say.
I am sorry if you feel otherwise, but your position is in fact the very definition of passivity. Simply conforming for an increasingly totalitarian government and going on about your life is not quite my idea of being "active" with regard to the situation.
My comment was not addressing consumerism and its relation to terrorism. Rather, it is its relation to passivity in the face of the destruction of true democracy and personal liberty that it was concerned with. Our society's infatuation with conspicuous consumption has lulled its members into a state of complacency that was unheard of in years past. People are increasingly unconcerned with politics and world affairs, so long as they have their high definition plasma televisions to watch football with, their overly-large SUVs, and are comfortably secluded within the walls of suburbia. Your original statement gave that impression.
The true false dichotomy is between "the terrorists" and the government. The government is here, now. It is here as you step outside of your home, as you drive to work or school, as you sleep at night. "The terrorists" are not. You have less of a chance of being killed by terrorists than you do of winning the lottery. In contrast, the government affects you and your actions, in some way, every day of your life.
When privacy is taken away, it is done so for a reason. I imagine that we have diametrically opposing views as to that reason. While you apparently believe it is to secure citizens from "terrorists," I believe that privacy is being taken away so that, in the future, other rights and freedoms can also be taken away from certain groups within our society.
Regardless of my views, however, I disagree with the "troll" moderation of your original post. It was simply your opinion, and as your signature implies, posts should not be modded down due to differences in opinion.
I am not a "patriot." In fact, I believe that patriotism is akin to religion, and has just about as much worth, which is to say absolutely none.
Regardless, it would appear that you and I have a different view of what being "free" entails, exactly. I am of the opinion that if someone is killed for excercising their intrinsic rights, then they die free, by the simple fact that they have resisted attempted enslavement. I assume that you believe otherwise.
You would rather live a coward than die a free man, then?
Your opinion seems to be that of the majority in this country, and I believe that sentiment has a lot to do with how we have gotten to where we are, collectively. Do not attempt to raise an ideal higher than your personal interests. Just keep being passive. And remember: Consume, consume, consume! No one likes a louse, right?
If all federal funds were cut to my university, I would lose my grants. Being that I do not have a rich mommy and daddy to pay my way, that would mean that I would need a full-time job to go along with my part-time job, just to have any possible chance of paying my tuition in full. Somehow, I think that working 55 hours a week would cut into my GPA a bit.
I don't know exactly what your definition of "liberty" is, but it sounds rather like slavery to me; and if someone needs to work 55 hours a week and somehow balance a course-load along with that in order to be "responsible," then they obviously aren't mature enough in the first place. I certainly have no trouble being responsible, even with my "snout" in the Federal government's "feeding trough," as you put it.
I wonder if this will open up MRIs to those of us who currently cannot have them done. I have a metal-mesh plate in my skull due to an open brain injury, and my doctors repeatedly cautioned that I can never, under any circumstances, undergo an MRI. The electro-magnets are apparently so powerful that they have the ability to rip the plate right out of my head.
So, perhaps now that they've found a way to get around the necessity of humongous electro-magnets, people like me will be able to take on an MRI without fear of a grotesque, horror movie-like death?
It all makes perfect sense when you consider that both major parties are in the pocket of big business. You see, this war may be an atrocity for Iraqi citizens, a lost cause for the military and a supreme embarrassment for the American People, but it means only one thing for corporations: profit. The Iraqi oil industry is being privatised, the electricity (what electricity is available, that is) is being privatised.. I wouldn't doubt one bit if they pull a "Chile" and attempt to privatise the water system at some point in the near future. Iraq is now a neoliberal experiment to see just how much cash can be pulled out of pain and suffering, and it is being backed by both parties, because they both have their hands in the cookie-jar. Frankly, I find it amazing that no one seems to be seeing it, as it's quite brazenly obvious. I've been forced to entertain the notion that maybe it's not that people aren't noticing, but instead that they are simply more concerned with conspicuous consumption. This is the reason that the consumer culture which has plagued our country for the last century was created, I suppose.
Either way, from my point of view, Kucinich is the only candidate who is worth anything at all out of the current crop. There is no way in hell that he will get the democratic endorsement, but once the primaries are over with, if he chooses to run independently, he will get my vote. Other than that, I will write in "Thomas Paine" and be done with it.
... Also idealism attached to your real name is great, it caused two of my grandparents to get a government sponsored all expenses paid trip to Siberia and another to die relatively poor ...
You should be proud that they actually stood up for what they believed in, despite those consequences. Anonymity is an essential tool in certain situations, but if we were all anonymous, all the time, there would be no change. The work of Thomas Paine and others was done specifically to incite idealistic reaction, which then lead to idealistic action. This type of thing cannot be accomplished if everyone is too afraid to be identified as supporting a cause and to deal with the consequences accordingly. Absolutely nothing would get done.
Anecdotally, I think that anonymity on the internet is, to a small extent, playing a role in my generation's lack of motivation both politically and socially. When you are so used to being able to spout off your opinions without fear of repercussions (just as I am doing right now, ironically), you tend to end up complacent and reluctant, and to avoid confrontation when the same type of situation occurs in meatspace.
I apologize for going somewhat offtopic there, this just kind of relates to what I have been thinking about lately.
Having worked in tech support, I can assure you that you need not be confused. If you take a trip down to your average call center, you will find that the majority of the people who work there are not nerds, do not care about technology, and more often than not know much less than you do about your problem. Most of these people simply want you off of their phone, because you're raising their call time, which ends up in their QA reports.
So don't be confused. The "tech" you spoke with obviously had no clue, and was just trying to keep their call time down. Unfortunately, that's how it works.
The difference being that California wildfires happen every year, almost like clockwork. The hurricane that devistated New Orleans and the coastal regions of Mississippi, while perhaps inevitable, had not occured until that point.
In essence, FEMA is not there to simply help out with expected situations, though that may be part of it. No matter the nobility or necessity, however, it is there, primarily, for unexpected emergencies, and it is simply not doing that job at the moment. Consider the juxtaposition between the rich socialites who have lived in the wildfire-prone region of California for so many years, and the disgustingly poor, predominately black population of New Orleans, who have lived there because their parents lived there, and because they cannot afford to move or live anywhere else. It all boils down to wealth disparity, and who benefits from it. I would encourage everyone to consider that.
You're assuming that managers are actually needed..
Your idea of "formal settings" is humorous to me. I think that anyone should feel quite justified in wearing whatever the hell they feel like wearing to absolutely -any- function or "setting" that they want. Clothes have become some sort of weird gauge for the fundamentalists, both socially and economically, and it's simply an extrapolation of racism and classism. You can wear what you want to wear, my friend, but that doesn't mean that you are rich or successful, nor does it mean that you are poor or stupid. Please understand that.
Here we go with the Ayn Rand objectivist point of view, as always.
"Everyone should be free, as long as they embrace the tenet that their freedom ends where another person's freedom begins.."
"No, wait! That's not actually freedom, you see. People should be free to choose whether or not to allow someone else their freedom.. But in Stallman's world, that's not an option, which means that he's one of those horrible socialists. We don't want socialists in good old reactionary America, now do we?"
Please come to terms with your own argument. It is one thing to critique the GPL. It is quite another to imply that the software movement would be better off without it.
Stallman does not obsess over what he wears. Obviously, you have a problem with that. Feel free to wear your collared shirts and brown loafers, but please, spare the rest of us from your moronic ideal of what a "normal person" should be.
... The man doesn't wear shoes ...
And so we should all ridicule him. Fuck his message (which you either don't understand or just hate), he doesn't wear shoes on occasion.
Excuse me, I think that the sky may be falling.
Seems like a solution in search of a problem to me. It might have been useful if it was able to tune-on-demand, to alleviate the pauses between songs during a show, but it doesn't. You still have to stop, flip the switch, and let it do its "auto-tune" thing. So it's really only good for those who are too lazy to adjust their own tuning. And three-thousand bucks just for that is a waste.
So you play as a woman in MMORPGs because you are a homophobe? That's a bit ironic.