My best friend from high school had a kid at 19 with no insurance. They made out just fine. I don't know how because I never really asked, but it's not like they had the kid in their bath tub. They went to a doctor and everything.
The point is that people with no insurance and no disposable income seem to have kids in this country every day. When someone has a kid outside a hospital, it makes the news (or a movie if done in a Walmart). These same people get sick and injured just like everyone with insurance and yet, they all seem to get comparable care.
So, please, stop acting like no money=no medical care. I honestly don't know if you know it or not, but that's pure BS. Your wife would not be dead without government health care. She may have had to stiff a few doctors, but in the US, it is against the law to flat out turn someone away simply because they have no insurance.
Oh, and unlike Canada, our non-citizens get care absolutely free.
Where do you live? I'm in San Diego and I have to schedule a urologist appointment 5 weeks in advance, with insurance. In the last 3 years I have had surgery to repair detached retinas for a little over $12k and tonsils removed for a little over $7k, both without insurance.
Texas. I don't know if that says something about being in a "Red" State. When I was in Michigan, the appointments were about a month out for check ups. I never had to go in for anything major so I don't know about urgent care there.
. People complain about 2-week waits in the UK for elective non-life threatening procedures, while in the US somone in my family had to wait 6-8 weeks for an angiogram after failing an EKG and having acute symptoms of heart trouble, and another waited 5 weeks for an appointment with a neurologist after having what may have been a mild embolism, complete with excruciating headache and shockingly low body temperature.
I had an eye issue. Photophobia and it felt like something was in my eye. I went to a clinic to have them check it out. They found what looked like a corneal ulcer, a condition that could lead to blindness if the conditions are right. I had to wait for an hour to see an eye doctor.
My mother went to a doctor about a pain in her jaw when she walked in the morning. She had to schedule her appointment a week in advance as it was not an emergency, just jaw pain. During her appointment, the doctor suspected that the issue was heart related. She had to wait 30 minutes to see the cardiologist and another two days have the procedure to put the stints in. It probably took so long because the cardiologist is one of the best in the country.
My daughter was recurring sinus issues. We had to schedule our doctor's appointment three days in advance. When surgery was required, we had to wait an entire week before they could perform the operation at the Children's hospital.
I'm not saying that everyone has the same long wait times I had around the country. Some areas may be better than others. I'm also certain that our wait times would have been even longer if were not for the diligence of our doctors, who we take the time to build a relationship with, or our own persistence, some of those hour waits could have been days.
Note: I'm in the US. I did not have insurance when I had the eye issue. It cost me about $200 total. My mother has her own insurance. My child was covered under my current, employee provided health insurance.
With few exceptions the Chinese are working in conditions of one sort or another which would be illegal here, even if they are not literal slaves literally being whipped
In a communist economy, the population are slaves. Literal whips are replaced by the Type 56 and threats to your family.
Errr, how sanctions are exactly pushing for war? Trading embargos are much less cruel tool, and more effective one (it destroyed Sadam, by the way)
Sorry, but no. The US military destroyed Saddam. All the sanctions did was keep Saddam from rebuilding his military and kill about million kids due to preventable diseases and make life for the general population absolutely miserable. Sure, the UN sanctions allowed for medicines, but Saddam skirted them, substituting banned goods in crates labeled "medicine". Saddam would be in power today if the US military had not acted. Sanctions don't work. They just torture the general population. See also N. Korea.
In fact, Republicans calling for blood for a year or so and call Obama pussy on Iran.
Strange. I have not heard too much of that. Surprising for an election year. I do hear a lot of Democrats calling Republicans warmongers and saying things like Republicans "want to go to Crusade and fulfill prophecies about Armageddon", even though there has never EVER been a case where the US defeated another country in war and converted them to Christianity. Don't let facts get in the way of your preconceived perceptions.
They actually don't care about sanctions, they think it's never gonna work...
They won't.
... they just want to go to Crusade and fulfill prophecies about Armageddon.
Now you are just making stuff up. I've never heard of a Republican calling for war to bring on the end of times. If that were the case, Republicans would start by calling for a "mark" on foreheads and hands that would be required to buy stuff.
There is virtually nothing a tablet computer is going to do that can't be done with some combination of pen, paper, and an overhead
Well, copy and paste for one. Send in homework from anywhere at any time. Get feedback from anywhere/any time. Ask questions anywhere/any time. I could go on, but you get the idea.
As for your comment, you could say the same thing about the ball point pen vs quill and ink. "There is virtually nothing a ball point pen is going to do that can't be done with some combination of ink, quill, and a candle."
I'm not saying that this tablet thing is a good idea, and I certainly agree that kids should learn to research and write the old fashioned way, but don't eliminate technology because the old way is "good enough". Kids should know how to use a calculator, but they should also know how to do long division with pencil and paper. Kids should be able to count back change when the register breaks. But that doesn't mean you should ban the calculator and the register. You teach both.
I say that the idiots who cry about judicial activism are asking for a system where we don't have the protections of common law.
I don't think you understand what us idiots call "activist judges". An activist judge is one who uses his/her own opinion to base rulings on instead of the law. For example, Prop 8 in California was passed by a majority of Californians, but was struck down by a judge citing "The evidence shows conclusively that moral and religious views form the only basis for a belief that same-sex couples are different from opposite-sex couples". I use this as an example because there is nothing in either the US or California Constitutions that say a law may not be based on moral and/or religious views. There is, however a federal law, the Defense of Marriage Act that bans gay marriage. This is an "activist judge" because he used his personal views to strike down a law. In addition, he effectively made gay marriage legal, which was illegal even before Prop 8 passed, even though no law had been passed by the state legislature nor signed by the governor allowing it. This judge literally made law all by himself, even though he has absolutely no authority to do so.
Now, I'm not passing judgement on gay marriage. Personally, I don't care. I was simply using this as an example. There are many others out there where judges will make policy from the bench, by passing both the legislative and executive branches of government. Judges may not create law. Their job is to JUDGE laws passed by a local, state, or federal governments.
Intel took x86 to workstations and supercomputers killing many RISC processors in the process. It'll be fun to see them pull it off again against ARM.
No, it wouldn't. RISC is a superior instruction set. x86 only beat RISC because it was really the only game in town if you want to run Windows, which every non-mac user did. At the time, the desktop was king and made Intel lots and lots of money, which they used to beef up their server offerings. Now we are stuck with x86 with RISC being used only in "closed" architectures like smart phones, consoles and big-iron servers.
I like competition. I'd rather see ARM make gobs of money of designing chips that everyone can improve on than Intel make gobs and more gobs of money selling desktop, server and mobile chips that only they may design, produce and sell.
The final processor line that Intel makes will be the one they are producing when they become the only game in town.
Yeah, because all of us can provide for a family complete with children, set aside a room and fill it theater equipment, afford a hobby of restoring classic vehicles, including the garage space and equipment needed to do so, and not only travel the country, but take multiple dream vacations to Europe.... all on 30 hours of work per week. It's quite easy, actually, but it requires that you be born of really rich parents or do one of those jobs that no one ever ever wants to do, like cleaning shit out from underneath trailer homes years after their sewage pipe burst or removing dead, half rotted bodies found in an extended stay hotel or apartment.
Sorry, dude, but here in the real world, normal people can't afford to take European vacations, build theater rooms and restore classic motorcycles on a 60-hr work week, much less half of that without a rich spouse, in-laws, parents, or other windfall such as a frivolous lawsuit.
And not all "suits" drive cars they can't afford or live in manufactured, triple wide mansions.
That was the dumbest remark possible - as the other poster indicated - and this anonymous poster we all know he'll stay one. Another "it" masturbating to the sound of it's own voice. Ayn Rand was a sociopath, who profited from the system she detested, and hypocrits one and all.
From Ayn Rand's Wiki page:
Rand advocated reason as the only means of acquiring knowledge and rejected all forms of faith and religion. She supported rational egoism and rejected ethical altruism. In politics, she condemned the initiation of force as immoral and opposed all forms of collectivism and statism, instead supporting laissez-faire capitalism, which she believed was the only social system that protected individual rights. She promoted romantic realism in art. She was sharply critical of most other philosophers and philosophical traditions.
She was a capitalist. The system she detested was communism. Being a capitalist and making a profit is the exact opposite of being hypocritical. The two kinda go hand in hand. Now when a raging liberal makes a nice profit, that's being hypocritical. Learn your definitions first.
You might want to learn a few facts about a person before you go around calling them names like "sociopath". When you are that passionate about something you are so ignorant about it really just makes you out to be a jackass.
Well it worked a few thousand years. If it does not work at your place it would be interesting ti figure: why?
And for thousands of years, farmers relied on their crops to eat and didn't have to go to a job for eight hours a day. They had plenty of time to chase off mocking birds and squash bugs. I have a job so I don't have that luxury.
About the rst of your comment I can not say much as it is very likely focused on your local environment.
True. This type of gardening may work in the north east or plain states. I live in Texas. It don't work here. Like I said, I tried it for years and did tons of research.
But... why the fuck do you want to kill the ants? Ants that eat plants? There are only very few speciem of ants that do that (well in fact they don't, they harvest them to breed mushrooms)
Ants protect aphids from the predators that would alleviate the problem. Ants not only protect them, they house them over winter and even move them from plant to plant so they can eat their sweet poo called "honey dew". If you kill the ants, the aphid problem goes away. Like I said, kill the ants, kill the aphids. It's a take off from Heroes', "Save the cheerleader...". The ants around here do nothing but sting my child and me and make gardening miserable. Listen to this ad for Amdro for an accurate description as to how I feel.
Hell, not a single person died from DDT, for example, and it's been banned world wide.
It's not about dying at the moment of exposure, it's about how it affects your body as a whole. DDT has been linked to diabetes and is a neurotoxin, endocrine disruptor, and suspected carcinogen (just to name a few). These things kill people.
First, CITATION NEEDED because I'm calling bullshit. I need something from a real live science source, not Rachel Carson, Green Peace or the Sierra Club. And I need something more than simply "linked to". I want actual cases of real people developing these problems due to exposure to DDT and it must show more deaths than the hundreds of millions caused by the stuff that DDT prevented, like mosquito born illnesses.
Why was DDT banned? Not because it killed people or caused diabetes and is a neurotoxin, endocrine disruptor, and suspected carcinogen. It was banned because it killed birds. That's right, BIRDS. Millions of deaths around the globe that could have been prevented happened to protect BIRDS!!!! All because someone wrote a book called "Silent Spring", after a spring time at a college campus after a massive bird kill that was never linked to DDT.
I think you'll find that disease and insects usually attack the weak and sickly plants, good for them! Who wants to eat the sick and weak? Just toss them into your compost bin and you have the benefit of more organic compost as well as the hardiest fruit and veg to eat.
Actually, the pests in my yard pick the cream of the crop. The mocking birds only eat the ripening tomatoes. The tomato fruit worms only pick the largest tomatoes. The aphids start with the largest leaves and then move the forming leaves and never bother the already browning leaves. The horn worms eat everything.
You are correct in the sense that the healthier plants may outgrow the pest. For example, I used to grow daturas that would attract hundreds of horn worms, but the plant didn't seem to care as it grew enormous leaves faster than the worms could eat them. Tomatoes don't grow that fast.
And sure, I could share my crop with these pests and still have enough to eat. Tomatoes can produce enough tomatoes to keep the mocking birds happy, but that's not why I grow them. Most of the time the mocking birds only peck a few holes in a tomato or only eat half of it. Either way, it's worthless to me. I have plenty of lace wings and lady bugs for the aphids, but ants tend to protect them. The plants survive well enough to reproduce, but who wants to eat aphid infested kale or collard greens? Sure, I can cut off the worm eaten part of the tomato, but, again, I don't want to do that. I've seen worms crawl into a tomato and shit all over the insides. Would you eat that? And horn worms! They will kill a plant before any natural predators even know they are there. I can usually simply pick them off when I see the damage, but a good spray of BT makes that job easier.
I see nothing wrong with using BT for caterpillars and diatomaceous earth for just about everything else. Both products are all natural and completely harmless to humans. Simply throwing a bunch of seeds around the yard and having faith that nature will give me a crop simply doesn't work.
An easy example for aphids is to just plant attractors for things that like to eat aphids. No, this won't kill the population 100% but then again why should it? I can't understand the obsession of the US to kill everything and we're starting to get good evidence that killing everything off is not the good thing to do, e.g., bacteria in the house, mono-culture farming, etc...
You know what attracts predators? Pests! Pests also attract more pests. My plants attract pests. And pests are also attracted to the plants I used to plant to repel pests. For example, I planted marigolds to deter many pests. It may have worked, but it also attracted spider mites. Once they killed the marigolds, they moved on to my tomatoes. I've never had a spider mite problem before this and I've never had one since. I tried borage to repel worms. Didn't work. I planted garlic and onions to repel ants (kill the ants, kill the aphids). I actually saw an ant bed in the very area I was growing my garlic and onions. Sorry, but I've tried "Companion Planting" for years. It simply does not work.
You're no doubt aware that heirloom stuff isn't actually the "natural" food we were "designed" to eat, right?
In fact, heirloom breeds are the product of thousands of generations (plant and animal generations, not human ones) of genetic tinkering in the form of selective breeding.
The main difference between heirloom breeds and the more common stuff grown on most farms today is that the heirloom breeds are those where we stopped the tinkering more than 100 years ago (after thousands of generations), rather than continuing the tinkering till the present (after thousands of generations, plus a hundred or so more)....
When it comes to tomatoes, at lest an heirloom is an open pollinated plant that has been stable for at least 50 years. "Open pollinated" is a plant that pollinates itself most of the time and produces offspring that is the same as the parents. Most people use "open pollinated" and "heirloom" interchangeably and most people have no idea how far the lineage of the tomato they are purchasing goes back.
Your post is correct, but it is highly possible that the GP was using "heirloom" when he meant to say "open pollinated". Also, new breeds are coming out every year. For example, the JD Special C-Tex tomato is cross between two heirlooms, has great characteristics and is now one of the more sought tomatoes for growers. However, it is not an heirloom by definition. Cherokee Sausage is a Cherokee Purple crossed with a "Sausage" tomato. Both heirlooms, but Cherokee sausage is not. So, the tinkering continues.
Also note that different varieties have varying levels of resistance to certain diseases and insects, just like the "man made" ones do. The differences is that we do it a bit faster than evolution (or "unnatural selection").
It was modded down because his post was nothing more than a way to say, "there is no god". His religious views are at best off-topic, at worst his post is completely ignorant. Even if you are strong believer in evolution, it is safe to say that we were "designed" by evolution. When it's cold for long periods of time, species adapt to the cold. When it's wet, species adapt to wet. When a natural occurrence blocks out the sun, species become extremely efficient or live of other forms of energy. We are "designed" by our environment, or God, or space aliens or whatever. Either way, we are designed.
Oh, and you know when all those scientists say that the theory of evolution is no threat religion (and rightly so), well, this asshole proves them wrong. He is the sole reason why religious zealots are doing their best to block evolution from textbooks and the classroom. It's ignorant assholes like him that use evolution as proof that there is no god are the reason for the controversy. The fact that he is now modded "informative" further proves the point.
GM is about inserting genes from etirely different speices, in ways that would be impossible in nature. Or could you think up a way to make a potato and fish breed?
I'm not aware of any plants that have naturally built man-made pesticides into their DNA sequences...
There are no plants at all, GMO or otherwise that have man-made pesticides built into their DNA sequences. We talk a naturally occurring pesticide from one organism and make another organism grow it. BT, for example, produces a completely natural pesticide. Genes from BT are being spliced with corn and other crops that are attacked by caterpillars.
Stop your pro-GM hysteria. Stop your mega-corporate worshiping hysteria. Let me guess, you own Monsanto stock.
Stop your anti-common sense bullshit. Stop your anti-corporate hatred. Educate yourself before someone else shoots down the entire basis for your views and makes you look like an complete and utter ass you green peace tool.
And no, I don't own Monsanto stock. I despise the company.
And dog cow was 100% correct. "[T]he possibility of random genes collecting in other organisms and working together in completely unforeseen ways" happens in nature all the time. It's called evolution. HERE is a perfect example.
Just because those particular batches are safe doesn't lessen the possibility of random genes collecting in other organisms and working together in completely unforeseen ways
I've never seen a label that said that. In large part because farmers aren't able to say that with any certainty. They themselves may not have bought GM seeds, but that doesn't mean that they weren't contaminated by the crops on the next farm over.
If a farmer buys non-GMO seeds, the crop is non-GMO, regardless of what fertilized it. If I have a jalapeno pepper plant that is somehow fertilized by the pollen of a serrano pepper, the jalapeno will be no different than if it pollinated itself. Of course, the offspring will be different, but there will be difference in the fruit itself. So unless a farmer is producing a crop for seed, there should be no concern. Also, hybrid crops will not produce offspring true to the parent anyway in most cases so farmers that grow hybrid plants (almost all do) don't save seed anyway.
Personally, I save and trade open pollinated seeds, so I keep hybrid plants out of my yard. It usually doesn't matter as I only grow tomatoes and tomatoes are almost always self pollinating. But, if my seed were "contaminated" by a patented GMO tomato, I will gladly give all my profits to whoever owns the patent. (I trade seeds for free).
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Somebody is smoking crack.
Relax. It's probably megaBITS. Most people get that confused.
My best friend from high school had a kid at 19 with no insurance. They made out just fine. I don't know how because I never really asked, but it's not like they had the kid in their bath tub. They went to a doctor and everything.
The point is that people with no insurance and no disposable income seem to have kids in this country every day. When someone has a kid outside a hospital, it makes the news (or a movie if done in a Walmart). These same people get sick and injured just like everyone with insurance and yet, they all seem to get comparable care.
So, please, stop acting like no money=no medical care. I honestly don't know if you know it or not, but that's pure BS. Your wife would not be dead without government health care. She may have had to stiff a few doctors, but in the US, it is against the law to flat out turn someone away simply because they have no insurance.
Oh, and unlike Canada, our non-citizens get care absolutely free.
Where do you live? I'm in San Diego and I have to schedule a urologist appointment 5 weeks in advance, with insurance. In the last 3 years I have had surgery to repair detached retinas for a little over $12k and tonsils removed for a little over $7k, both without insurance.
Texas. I don't know if that says something about being in a "Red" State. When I was in Michigan, the appointments were about a month out for check ups. I never had to go in for anything major so I don't know about urgent care there.
except for those dirty Canananadians!
North America is best America!
Don't forget the Mexicans!
It calls itself a horta.
Dammit Jim! I'm a doctor not a brick layer!
. People complain about 2-week waits in the UK for elective non-life threatening procedures, while in the US somone in my family had to wait 6-8 weeks for an angiogram after failing an EKG and having acute symptoms of heart trouble, and another waited 5 weeks for an appointment with a neurologist after having what may have been a mild embolism, complete with excruciating headache and shockingly low body temperature.
I had an eye issue. Photophobia and it felt like something was in my eye. I went to a clinic to have them check it out. They found what looked like a corneal ulcer, a condition that could lead to blindness if the conditions are right. I had to wait for an hour to see an eye doctor.
My mother went to a doctor about a pain in her jaw when she walked in the morning. She had to schedule her appointment a week in advance as it was not an emergency, just jaw pain. During her appointment, the doctor suspected that the issue was heart related. She had to wait 30 minutes to see the cardiologist and another two days have the procedure to put the stints in. It probably took so long because the cardiologist is one of the best in the country.
My daughter was recurring sinus issues. We had to schedule our doctor's appointment three days in advance. When surgery was required, we had to wait an entire week before they could perform the operation at the Children's hospital.
I'm not saying that everyone has the same long wait times I had around the country. Some areas may be better than others. I'm also certain that our wait times would have been even longer if were not for the diligence of our doctors, who we take the time to build a relationship with, or our own persistence, some of those hour waits could have been days.
Note: I'm in the US. I did not have insurance when I had the eye issue. It cost me about $200 total. My mother has her own insurance. My child was covered under my current, employee provided health insurance.
Consider first, everything that you've ever done in front of your dog, and then ask if you really want them being able to talk.
That goes two ways. I've seen my dogs do things they wouldn't want to be public knowledge.
With few exceptions the Chinese are working in conditions of one sort or another which would be illegal here, even if they are not literal slaves literally being whipped
In a communist economy, the population are slaves. Literal whips are replaced by the Type 56 and threats to your family.
As for the rest of your comment, I agree.
Tell Saudi Arabia we won't act against the iranian nuclear program unless they sell us cheaper oil.
Then we will be forced to act against the Iranian nuclear program once Saudi Arabia sells us cheap oil.
Errr, how sanctions are exactly pushing for war? Trading embargos are much less cruel tool, and more effective one (it destroyed Sadam, by the way)
Sorry, but no. The US military destroyed Saddam. All the sanctions did was keep Saddam from rebuilding his military and kill about million kids due to preventable diseases and make life for the general population absolutely miserable. Sure, the UN sanctions allowed for medicines, but Saddam skirted them, substituting banned goods in crates labeled "medicine". Saddam would be in power today if the US military had not acted. Sanctions don't work. They just torture the general population. See also N. Korea.
In fact, Republicans calling for blood for a year or so and call Obama pussy on Iran.
Strange. I have not heard too much of that. Surprising for an election year. I do hear a lot of Democrats calling Republicans warmongers and saying things like Republicans "want to go to Crusade and fulfill prophecies about Armageddon", even though there has never EVER been a case where the US defeated another country in war and converted them to Christianity. Don't let facts get in the way of your preconceived perceptions.
They actually don't care about sanctions, they think it's never gonna work...
They won't.
... they just want to go to Crusade and fulfill prophecies about Armageddon.
Now you are just making stuff up. I've never heard of a Republican calling for war to bring on the end of times. If that were the case, Republicans would start by calling for a "mark" on foreheads and hands that would be required to buy stuff.
There is virtually nothing a tablet computer is going to do that can't be done with some combination of pen, paper, and an overhead
Well, copy and paste for one. Send in homework from anywhere at any time. Get feedback from anywhere/any time. Ask questions anywhere/any time. I could go on, but you get the idea.
As for your comment, you could say the same thing about the ball point pen vs quill and ink. "There is virtually nothing a ball point pen is going to do that can't be done with some combination of ink, quill, and a candle."
I'm not saying that this tablet thing is a good idea, and I certainly agree that kids should learn to research and write the old fashioned way, but don't eliminate technology because the old way is "good enough". Kids should know how to use a calculator, but they should also know how to do long division with pencil and paper. Kids should be able to count back change when the register breaks. But that doesn't mean you should ban the calculator and the register. You teach both.
Sorry, I'll get off your lawn now.
Nowhere do I say so.
I say that the idiots who cry about judicial activism are asking for a system where we don't have the protections of common law.
I don't think you understand what us idiots call "activist judges". An activist judge is one who uses his/her own opinion to base rulings on instead of the law. For example, Prop 8 in California was passed by a majority of Californians, but was struck down by a judge citing "The evidence shows conclusively that moral and religious views form the only basis for a belief that same-sex couples are different from opposite-sex couples". I use this as an example because there is nothing in either the US or California Constitutions that say a law may not be based on moral and/or religious views. There is, however a federal law, the Defense of Marriage Act that bans gay marriage. This is an "activist judge" because he used his personal views to strike down a law. In addition, he effectively made gay marriage legal, which was illegal even before Prop 8 passed, even though no law had been passed by the state legislature nor signed by the governor allowing it. This judge literally made law all by himself, even though he has absolutely no authority to do so.
Now, I'm not passing judgement on gay marriage. Personally, I don't care. I was simply using this as an example. There are many others out there where judges will make policy from the bench, by passing both the legislative and executive branches of government. Judges may not create law. Their job is to JUDGE laws passed by a local, state, or federal governments.
Intel took x86 to workstations and supercomputers killing many RISC processors in the process. It'll be fun to see them pull it off again against ARM.
No, it wouldn't. RISC is a superior instruction set. x86 only beat RISC because it was really the only game in town if you want to run Windows, which every non-mac user did. At the time, the desktop was king and made Intel lots and lots of money, which they used to beef up their server offerings. Now we are stuck with x86 with RISC being used only in "closed" architectures like smart phones, consoles and big-iron servers.
I like competition. I'd rather see ARM make gobs of money of designing chips that everyone can improve on than Intel make gobs and more gobs of money selling desktop, server and mobile chips that only they may design, produce and sell.
The final processor line that Intel makes will be the one they are producing when they become the only game in town.
Yeah, because all of us can provide for a family complete with children, set aside a room and fill it theater equipment, afford a hobby of restoring classic vehicles, including the garage space and equipment needed to do so, and not only travel the country, but take multiple dream vacations to Europe.... all on 30 hours of work per week. It's quite easy, actually, but it requires that you be born of really rich parents or do one of those jobs that no one ever ever wants to do, like cleaning shit out from underneath trailer homes years after their sewage pipe burst or removing dead, half rotted bodies found in an extended stay hotel or apartment.
Sorry, dude, but here in the real world, normal people can't afford to take European vacations, build theater rooms and restore classic motorcycles on a 60-hr work week, much less half of that without a rich spouse, in-laws, parents, or other windfall such as a frivolous lawsuit.
And not all "suits" drive cars they can't afford or live in manufactured, triple wide mansions.
You must be a manager.
Probably. And if he is a manager, he is one because he was working for his career, not the weekend.
That was the dumbest remark possible - as the other poster indicated - and this anonymous poster we all know he'll stay one. Another "it" masturbating to the sound of it's own voice. Ayn Rand was a sociopath, who profited from the system she detested, and hypocrits one and all.
From Ayn Rand's Wiki page:
Rand advocated reason as the only means of acquiring knowledge and rejected all forms of faith and religion. She supported rational egoism and rejected ethical altruism. In politics, she condemned the initiation of force as immoral and opposed all forms of collectivism and statism, instead supporting laissez-faire capitalism, which she believed was the only social system that protected individual rights. She promoted romantic realism in art. She was sharply critical of most other philosophers and philosophical traditions.
She was a capitalist. The system she detested was communism. Being a capitalist and making a profit is the exact opposite of being hypocritical. The two kinda go hand in hand. Now when a raging liberal makes a nice profit, that's being hypocritical. Learn your definitions first.
You might want to learn a few facts about a person before you go around calling them names like "sociopath". When you are that passionate about something you are so ignorant about it really just makes you out to be a jackass.
Well it worked a few thousand years. If it does not work at your place it would be interesting ti figure: why?
And for thousands of years, farmers relied on their crops to eat and didn't have to go to a job for eight hours a day. They had plenty of time to chase off mocking birds and squash bugs. I have a job so I don't have that luxury.
About the rst of your comment I can not say much as it is very likely focused on your local environment.
True. This type of gardening may work in the north east or plain states. I live in Texas. It don't work here. Like I said, I tried it for years and did tons of research.
But ... why the fuck do you want to kill the ants?
Ants that eat plants? There are only very few speciem of ants that do that (well in fact they don't, they harvest them to breed mushrooms)
Ants protect aphids from the predators that would alleviate the problem. Ants not only protect them, they house them over winter and even move them from plant to plant so they can eat their sweet poo called "honey dew". If you kill the ants, the aphid problem goes away. Like I said, kill the ants, kill the aphids. It's a take off from Heroes', "Save the cheerleader...". The ants around here do nothing but sting my child and me and make gardening miserable. Listen to this ad for Amdro for an accurate description as to how I feel.
Hell, not a single person died from DDT, for example, and it's been banned world wide.
It's not about dying at the moment of exposure, it's about how it affects your body as a whole. DDT has been linked to diabetes and is a neurotoxin, endocrine disruptor, and suspected carcinogen (just to name a few). These things kill people.
First, CITATION NEEDED because I'm calling bullshit. I need something from a real live science source, not Rachel Carson, Green Peace or the Sierra Club. And I need something more than simply "linked to". I want actual cases of real people developing these problems due to exposure to DDT and it must show more deaths than the hundreds of millions caused by the stuff that DDT prevented, like mosquito born illnesses.
Why was DDT banned? Not because it killed people or caused diabetes and is a neurotoxin, endocrine disruptor, and suspected carcinogen. It was banned because it killed birds. That's right, BIRDS. Millions of deaths around the globe that could have been prevented happened to protect BIRDS!!!! All because someone wrote a book called "Silent Spring", after a spring time at a college campus after a massive bird kill that was never linked to DDT.
I think you'll find that disease and insects usually attack the weak and sickly plants, good for them! Who wants to eat the sick and weak? Just toss them into your compost bin and you have the benefit of more organic compost as well as the hardiest fruit and veg to eat.
Actually, the pests in my yard pick the cream of the crop. The mocking birds only eat the ripening tomatoes. The tomato fruit worms only pick the largest tomatoes. The aphids start with the largest leaves and then move the forming leaves and never bother the already browning leaves. The horn worms eat everything.
You are correct in the sense that the healthier plants may outgrow the pest. For example, I used to grow daturas that would attract hundreds of horn worms, but the plant didn't seem to care as it grew enormous leaves faster than the worms could eat them. Tomatoes don't grow that fast.
And sure, I could share my crop with these pests and still have enough to eat. Tomatoes can produce enough tomatoes to keep the mocking birds happy, but that's not why I grow them. Most of the time the mocking birds only peck a few holes in a tomato or only eat half of it. Either way, it's worthless to me. I have plenty of lace wings and lady bugs for the aphids, but ants tend to protect them. The plants survive well enough to reproduce, but who wants to eat aphid infested kale or collard greens? Sure, I can cut off the worm eaten part of the tomato, but, again, I don't want to do that. I've seen worms crawl into a tomato and shit all over the insides. Would you eat that? And horn worms! They will kill a plant before any natural predators even know they are there. I can usually simply pick them off when I see the damage, but a good spray of BT makes that job easier.
I see nothing wrong with using BT for caterpillars and diatomaceous earth for just about everything else. Both products are all natural and completely harmless to humans. Simply throwing a bunch of seeds around the yard and having faith that nature will give me a crop simply doesn't work.
An easy example for aphids is to just plant attractors for things that like to eat aphids. No, this won't kill the population 100% but then again why should it? I can't understand the obsession of the US to kill everything and we're starting to get good evidence that killing everything off is not the good thing to do, e.g., bacteria in the house, mono-culture farming, etc...
You know what attracts predators? Pests! Pests also attract more pests. My plants attract pests. And pests are also attracted to the plants I used to plant to repel pests. For example, I planted marigolds to deter many pests. It may have worked, but it also attracted spider mites. Once they killed the marigolds, they moved on to my tomatoes. I've never had a spider mite problem before this and I've never had one since. I tried borage to repel worms. Didn't work. I planted garlic and onions to repel ants (kill the ants, kill the aphids). I actually saw an ant bed in the very area I was growing my garlic and onions. Sorry, but I've tried "Companion Planting" for years. It simply does not work.
You're no doubt aware that heirloom stuff isn't actually the "natural" food we were "designed" to eat, right?
In fact, heirloom breeds are the product of thousands of generations (plant and animal generations, not human ones) of genetic tinkering in the form of selective breeding.
The main difference between heirloom breeds and the more common stuff grown on most farms today is that the heirloom breeds are those where we stopped the tinkering more than 100 years ago (after thousands of generations), rather than continuing the tinkering till the present (after thousands of generations, plus a hundred or so more)....
When it comes to tomatoes, at lest an heirloom is an open pollinated plant that has been stable for at least 50 years. "Open pollinated" is a plant that pollinates itself most of the time and produces offspring that is the same as the parents. Most people use "open pollinated" and "heirloom" interchangeably and most people have no idea how far the lineage of the tomato they are purchasing goes back.
Your post is correct, but it is highly possible that the GP was using "heirloom" when he meant to say "open pollinated". Also, new breeds are coming out every year. For example, the JD Special C-Tex tomato is cross between two heirlooms, has great characteristics and is now one of the more sought tomatoes for growers. However, it is not an heirloom by definition. Cherokee Sausage is a Cherokee Purple crossed with a "Sausage" tomato. Both heirlooms, but Cherokee sausage is not. So, the tinkering continues.
Also note that different varieties have varying levels of resistance to certain diseases and insects, just like the "man made" ones do. The differences is that we do it a bit faster than evolution (or "unnatural selection").
We weren't designed at all, mind you.
Why on earth was this modded down?
It was modded down because his post was nothing more than a way to say, "there is no god". His religious views are at best off-topic, at worst his post is completely ignorant. Even if you are strong believer in evolution, it is safe to say that we were "designed" by evolution. When it's cold for long periods of time, species adapt to the cold. When it's wet, species adapt to wet. When a natural occurrence blocks out the sun, species become extremely efficient or live of other forms of energy. We are "designed" by our environment, or God, or space aliens or whatever. Either way, we are designed.
Oh, and you know when all those scientists say that the theory of evolution is no threat religion (and rightly so), well, this asshole proves them wrong. He is the sole reason why religious zealots are doing their best to block evolution from textbooks and the classroom. It's ignorant assholes like him that use evolution as proof that there is no god are the reason for the controversy. The fact that he is now modded "informative" further proves the point.
GM is about inserting genes from etirely different speices, in ways that would be impossible in nature. Or could you think up a way to make a potato and fish breed?
You mean like crossing a human with a virus?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/12/science/12paleo.html?pagewanted=all
What lab did this?
I'm not aware of any plants that have naturally built man-made pesticides into their DNA sequences...
There are no plants at all, GMO or otherwise that have man-made pesticides built into their DNA sequences. We talk a naturally occurring pesticide from one organism and make another organism grow it. BT, for example, produces a completely natural pesticide. Genes from BT are being spliced with corn and other crops that are attacked by caterpillars.
Stop your pro-GM hysteria. Stop your mega-corporate worshiping hysteria. Let me guess, you own Monsanto stock.
Stop your anti-common sense bullshit. Stop your anti-corporate hatred. Educate yourself before someone else shoots down the entire basis for your views and makes you look like an complete and utter ass you green peace tool.
And no, I don't own Monsanto stock. I despise the company.
And dog cow was 100% correct. "[T]he possibility of random genes collecting in other organisms and working together in completely unforeseen ways" happens in nature all the time. It's called evolution. HERE is a perfect example.
Just because those particular batches are safe doesn't lessen the possibility of random genes collecting in other organisms and working together in completely unforeseen ways
You mean like evolution?
I've never seen a label that said that. In large part because farmers aren't able to say that with any certainty. They themselves may not have bought GM seeds, but that doesn't mean that they weren't contaminated by the crops on the next farm over.
If a farmer buys non-GMO seeds, the crop is non-GMO, regardless of what fertilized it. If I have a jalapeno pepper plant that is somehow fertilized by the pollen of a serrano pepper, the jalapeno will be no different than if it pollinated itself. Of course, the offspring will be different, but there will be difference in the fruit itself. So unless a farmer is producing a crop for seed, there should be no concern. Also, hybrid crops will not produce offspring true to the parent anyway in most cases so farmers that grow hybrid plants (almost all do) don't save seed anyway.
Personally, I save and trade open pollinated seeds, so I keep hybrid plants out of my yard. It usually doesn't matter as I only grow tomatoes and tomatoes are almost always self pollinating. But, if my seed were "contaminated" by a patented GMO tomato, I will gladly give all my profits to whoever owns the patent. (I trade seeds for free).