I thought Breathed tended to be both more good natured and fairly even handed in poking fun at people. Doonesbury, not quite so much in either respect.
In my experience, stupidity and armament are usually somehow correlated. The stupider someone is, the more he needs to compensate.
There are indeed various flavours of correlation, many of which I doubt you intend to reference:
Stupid thugs intent on rape, robbery, and mayhem that run into armed octogenarians. Antigun nuts. Nutters that think that guns are magic and are capable of turning honest, decent ordinary citizens into thugs, murderers, and thieves.
Do you think it is stupid to protect yourself with a gun from the powerful and violent, or packs of predators?
Women and various flavors of handicapped don't tend to make the best general purpose infantry. Most countries that have tried it end the practice as soon as possible. There are also drawbacks of their employment in some related fields.
These problems were created over a period of years, exacerbated by poor and uneven budgeting, congressional pork and mandates, and red tape. The only way this could have been averted in some fashion would have been if some company had offered for sale:
Robert Byrd Office Robert Byrd Antivirus Robert Byrd Internet Robert Byrd Web Proxy Robert Byrd Total Security
You think you've been proven correct? I'm pretty sure that hasn't happened, quite the opposite. The issue here isn't you not "falling into the mud" but rather avoiding the nitty gritty.
I'm pretty sure that the corporations in question don't control the borders. But of course the government never engages in abuse, does it? Both corporations and government can be abusive, but only one of them seems to raise your ire. I'm against abuse from both.
Disney deserved the smackdown, and so do many other corporations pulling that. But the whole immigration policy of this administration is a mess, a criminal mess in some cases. (I see Sec of Homeland Security has been ordered to appear before a judge in the near future for some 'splanin') I can't imagine them being interested in this issue unless they thought it would cost them votes or donations, or maybe hurt diversity somehow.
I'm content to be the Dean Martin to your Jerry Lewis. Can I get a, "Waaaahhh!!" out of you?
JERUSALEM (AP) — Mitt Romney tried to pull back Sunday from an adviser's suggestion that he favored new American aggression on Iran, distancing himself from comments that the U.S. presidential candidate would "respect" an Israeli decision for unilateral military action to prevent Tehran from gaining nuclear capability.
Hours after the aide previewed Romney's upcoming foreign policy speech in Jerusalem, Romney backpedaled and said, "I'll use my own words and that is I respect the right of Israel to defend itself and we stand with Israel. We're two nations that come together in peace and that want to see Iran being dissuaded from its nuclear folly."
And that is just with Yahoo's coverage from AP. Imagine what even handed reporting would do for the story.
As to the US going to war on Israel's say so, I don't think you quite got that right.
"Perpetual war" driven by business is a load of bull.
Then explain the trillions we pissed away in Iraq and Afghanistan. They went somewhere. Certainly not in the pockets of the Iraquis or you or me. Maj Gen Smedley Butler is laughing at you from beyond the grave.
You have cause and effect backwards. The cause of buying the equipment was needs from the war, the war wasn't created to sell equipment. Afghanistan was a result of the attack on 9/11, remember? Iraq was a result of Saddam's long term actions, evasions, and aggression. Combat and the conditions of war often lead to new requirements since the equipment you have may not be suitable for all environments or every form of combat under every condition.
Frankly I find the idea of anyone throwing Major General Smedley Butler at me as laughable itself. I would be inclined to follow him anywhere on the battlefield, but nowhere near a voting booth. He was among the bravest and most gifted warriors the US has had, but also a political crank of the highest order who even worked to keep the US out of WW2 and associated with Communists. You're a fan, huh?
re: your implication that the rate of equipment replacement is the same in war as it is in peacetime because it will happen "one way or another"
Blatantly, laughably false.
I didn't suggest that, you did. What I suggested is that there are still equipment sales in war and peace, and that is correct. You may recall that the US developed the M1 tank and deployed it in large numbers during peacetime? What about the F16, A10, and F15? The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq didn't produce a new tank, just an armored truck (MRAP) that isn't going to be kept in large numbers due to its specialized application.
Ok, you're just a loonie. I should have known better than attempt rational discussion with you.
If you keep trying you'll probably improve to at least bordering on rational.
"Perpetual war" driven by business is a load of bull. Eisenhower's words, though wise as a warning, only serve to underline the failure of the "MIC" as an explanation for events. All you have to do is look at military spending as a portion of GDP to see that. The long term trend is decline. If the portion of the economy devoted to military spending is in long term decline (which is even sharper if you go back to 1945) then it is hard to argue that the "MIC" is a powerful agenda driving force.
Do you have any other frame of reference, any other analytical framework to view the confrontation with the Communist bloc / Warsaw Pact / Soviet Union other than as a selling opportunity for the defense industry? If not I suggest you have a highly deficient view of events.
Mere bombs and tank offensives aren't sources of lasting change. Perhaps you should look into the events of the Allied occupation of Germany following its defeat in WW2. It wasn't completely "trouble free." The difficulties in Iraq and Afghanistan were multiplied by exactly the mindset you seem to have - only do tank battles and bombs, not interested in anything else. You don't always have much say in the wars that are inflicted on you. As to the tolerance of the American people, it was manipulated by the news media with the whole "another grim milestone" narrative. How do you think that would have played out in WW2? The total combat deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan represent a minor battle in WW2, not an epic tragedy.
I'm not surprised about your beliefs about Romney and his advisors given the limited perspective you have about the conflicts in general, and the whole "perpetual war" as business opportunity meme. It is nonsense.
You do realize that it is the government that created, enabled, and permits the situation as is, right? Do you think Obama is responsible for any of the policies of his administration yet? Yes, I'm willing to see some irony here. Obama: "I deplore what has been happening as policy under my administration. We must organize to stop it." It is a relief that the Obama administration can finally find something related to immigration that it doesn't like that might actually benefit the US.
Of course what's even "better" is that many of those same businesses give generously to the sorts of causes that are probably near and dear to your heart, and support Obama.
Interesting, but nonsense. There is little chance we would have had "boots on the ground" in Tehran, but sanctions would probably still be on, and we wouldn't have such a likely disaster of a "deal" with Iran.
"Perpetual war" driven by business is a load of bull. That is just another poor idea to badly explain the world in a way that is not particularly valid but little questioned by the people that repeat it. New equipment is going to be sold for upgrades and replacement one way or another. The world isn't static.
He's only slightly better than W and not the effin' disaster we would have had with Romney.
FTFY.
Events keep proving Romney was right on many policy areas that Obama and his administration has gotten wrong, often repeatedly. I don't know where you get your news from, but maybe you should take in more sources and views. It looks like what you're taking in doesn't cut it.
No, the American Military's treatment of the enlisted isn't fair or honest. They make them commit atrocities in the name of freedom. Then they kill themselves.
No, what actually happens is the vast majority of them fight the war in a law abiding manner under difficult conditions and then people on your end of the political spectrum label most things they do as atrocities regardless of what the facts are. What is worse is that people on your end of the political spectrum have a bad tendency to ignore genuine, even massive atrocities committed by the enemy. And that is before you get to the rejoicing in soldier deaths and suicides, or calls to murder officers. (Time for the revolution?) There was a brief period of sanity there after 9/11, but that faded away long ago.
A lot of them come home and become cops, and you know how that goes... poorly.
Most of them do fine with that, but see my previous answer.
No, we can talk about suicides now, when on average they kill more U.S. soldiers than anything else. You don't think the single most common cause of death amongst our military is worthy of discussion? You would make a shit general.
The suicide rate isn't a particularly useful metric for determining if military action is warranted. If you want to argue that then why not start with something smaller, like ending deaths in bathtubs before doing any more bank robbery investigations. Suicide prevention is a useful topic in terms of taking care of the soldiers, not on military strategy.
You would make a shit general.
I would indeed, specifically a "shit hot" general. Thanks!
However, because of the bloody and intensified war with Nazi Germany, large scale efforts were prevented. -- Soviet atomic bomb project
While the Soviets were engaged in heavy combat against the Germans on the Eastern front there was little opportunity for that. The resource demands in the fight for survival were massive - Nazi Germany was an existential threat to the Soviets. By the time of Hiroshima Germany had been defeated several months prior, resources began to free to pursue other priorities, and the scientific principles were proven to no longer be theory - it was a practical exercise in engineering.
As is your custom you blame the United States while turning a blind eye to the threat posed by the Soviet Union, its imperialism, and its many crimes against humanity.
If you knew anything about nuclear weapons you'd know that the Soviet nuclear weapons program achieved a number of accomplishments that the US never attained, and had it's own pool of talent fully capable of independent accomplishment as well spies in the US program that helped leverage US research for Soviet purposes. They were going to get what they wanted one way or another.
The Soviets and Communism was an extremely dangerous and well armed menace. Can you acknowledge that?
I do, however, fault those that chose to stay after the war and continue working on nukes.
I'm sure you do since you probably would never expect to be among the 100,000,000 people killed by Communist governments and don't appreciate the need and costs to defend a free society. After all, Stalin was going to stop all weapons research after he got the bomb, right?
Once in Hawaii I was taken to see a Buddhist temple. In the temple a man said, "I am going to tell you something that you will never forget." And then he said, "To every man is given the key to the gates of heaven. The same key opens the gates of hell."
And so it is with science. In a way it is a key to the gates of heaven, and the same key opens the gates of hell, and we do not have any instructions as to which is which gate. Shall we throw away the key and never have a way to enter the gates of heaven? Or shall we struggle with the problem of which is the best way to use the key? That is, of course, a very serious question, but I think that we cannot deny the value of the key to the gates of heaven.
Feynman didn't shy away from making religious references as above, or addressing religion as shown below.
Slashdot Mirror
I thought Breathed tended to be both more good natured and fairly even handed in poking fun at people. Doonesbury, not quite so much in either respect.
At night? The only option real option here is to ignore them.
Or use night vision devices, or counter-air drones with sensors. You're a few options short.
If the Royals are doing things that piss people off and thus live in fear of them, then perhaps they should stop doing those things.
Naturally you don't consider Basque separatists or Islamist terrorists, both of which have a history of terrorist attacks in Spain.
In my experience, stupidity and armament are usually somehow correlated. The stupider someone is, the more he needs to compensate.
There are indeed various flavours of correlation, many of which I doubt you intend to reference:
Stupid thugs intent on rape, robbery, and mayhem that run into armed octogenarians.
Antigun nuts.
Nutters that think that guns are magic and are capable of turning honest, decent ordinary citizens into thugs, murderers, and thieves.
Do you think it is stupid to protect yourself with a gun from the powerful and violent, or packs of predators?
Indeed. I find there is much powerful magic in:
#!/bin/ksh or #!/bin/bash or even: cc
In the arcane tongue:
#!/bin/perl
Women and various flavors of handicapped don't tend to make the best general purpose infantry. Most countries that have tried it end the practice as soon as possible. There are also drawbacks of their employment in some related fields.
Your statement seems to be a little confused. Were you on the 57 state tour with the President?
These problems were created over a period of years, exacerbated by poor and uneven budgeting, congressional pork and mandates, and red tape. The only way this could have been averted in some fashion would have been if some company had offered for sale:
Robert Byrd Office
Robert Byrd Antivirus
Robert Byrd Internet
Robert Byrd Web Proxy
Robert Byrd Total Security
Fixing it will likely take years.
I'll ask the same of you.
Report: Iran developing nuclear bombs
Yes indeed, that is a mightly "blip" there.
Defense Spending Since WWII
Not sure why you bothered with those charts.
You think you've been proven correct? I'm pretty sure that hasn't happened, quite the opposite. The issue here isn't you not "falling into the mud" but rather avoiding the nitty gritty.
Thanks gary, good night.
I'm pretty sure that the corporations in question don't control the borders. But of course the government never engages in abuse, does it? Both corporations and government can be abusive, but only one of them seems to raise your ire. I'm against abuse from both.
Disney deserved the smackdown, and so do many other corporations pulling that. But the whole immigration policy of this administration is a mess, a criminal mess in some cases. (I see Sec of Homeland Security has been ordered to appear before a judge in the near future for some 'splanin') I can't imagine them being interested in this issue unless they thought it would cost them votes or donations, or maybe hurt diversity somehow.
I'm content to be the Dean Martin to your Jerry Lewis. Can I get a, "Waaaahhh!!" out of you?
Dan Senor said on Meet The Press that we'd go to war at the behest of Israel if they bothered to ask.
It's one of Bibi's wet dreams. Of course he'd ask.
Did Romney walk it back? No. No he did not. At all. Don't even bother to try to dispute this, it's googleable.
Yes indeed, it is, sadly for you.
In jam, Romney tries not to make new Iran policy
JERUSALEM (AP) — Mitt Romney tried to pull back Sunday from an adviser's suggestion that he favored new American aggression on Iran, distancing himself from comments that the U.S. presidential candidate would "respect" an Israeli decision for unilateral military action to prevent Tehran from gaining nuclear capability.
Hours after the aide previewed Romney's upcoming foreign policy speech in Jerusalem, Romney backpedaled and said, "I'll use my own words and that is I respect the right of Israel to defend itself and we stand with Israel. We're two nations that come together in peace and that want to see Iran being dissuaded from its nuclear folly."
And that is just with Yahoo's coverage from AP. Imagine what even handed reporting would do for the story.
As to the US going to war on Israel's say so, I don't think you quite got that right.
"Perpetual war" driven by business is a load of bull.
Then explain the trillions we pissed away in Iraq and Afghanistan. They went somewhere. Certainly not in the pockets of the Iraquis or you or me. Maj Gen Smedley Butler is laughing at you from beyond the grave.
You have cause and effect backwards. The cause of buying the equipment was needs from the war, the war wasn't created to sell equipment. Afghanistan was a result of the attack on 9/11, remember? Iraq was a result of Saddam's long term actions, evasions, and aggression. Combat and the conditions of war often lead to new requirements since the equipment you have may not be suitable for all environments or every form of combat under every condition.
Frankly I find the idea of anyone throwing Major General Smedley Butler at me as laughable itself. I would be inclined to follow him anywhere on the battlefield, but nowhere near a voting booth. He was among the bravest and most gifted warriors the US has had, but also a political crank of the highest order who even worked to keep the US out of WW2 and associated with Communists. You're a fan, huh?
re: your implication that the rate of equipment replacement is the same in war as it is in peacetime because it will happen "one way or another"
Blatantly, laughably false.
I didn't suggest that, you did. What I suggested is that there are still equipment sales in war and peace, and that is correct. You may recall that the US developed the M1 tank and deployed it in large numbers during peacetime? What about the F16, A10, and F15? The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq didn't produce a new tank, just an armored truck (MRAP) that isn't going to be kept in large numbers due to its specialized application.
Ok, you're just a loonie. I should have known better than attempt rational discussion with you.
If you keep trying you'll probably improve to at least bordering on rational.
"Perpetual war" driven by business is a load of bull. Eisenhower's words, though wise as a warning, only serve to underline the failure of the "MIC" as an explanation for events. All you have to do is look at military spending as a portion of GDP to see that. The long term trend is decline. If the portion of the economy devoted to military spending is in long term decline (which is even sharper if you go back to 1945) then it is hard to argue that the "MIC" is a powerful agenda driving force.
Do you have any other frame of reference, any other analytical framework to view the confrontation with the Communist bloc / Warsaw Pact / Soviet Union other than as a selling opportunity for the defense industry? If not I suggest you have a highly deficient view of events.
Mere bombs and tank offensives aren't sources of lasting change. Perhaps you should look into the events of the Allied occupation of Germany following its defeat in WW2. It wasn't completely "trouble free." The difficulties in Iraq and Afghanistan were multiplied by exactly the mindset you seem to have - only do tank battles and bombs, not interested in anything else. You don't always have much say in the wars that are inflicted on you. As to the tolerance of the American people, it was manipulated by the news media with the whole "another grim milestone" narrative. How do you think that would have played out in WW2? The total combat deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan represent a minor battle in WW2, not an epic tragedy.
I'm not surprised about your beliefs about Romney and his advisors given the limited perspective you have about the conflicts in general, and the whole "perpetual war" as business opportunity meme. It is nonsense.
You do realize that it is the government that created, enabled, and permits the situation as is, right? Do you think Obama is responsible for any of the policies of his administration yet? Yes, I'm willing to see some irony here. Obama: "I deplore what has been happening as policy under my administration. We must organize to stop it." It is a relief that the Obama administration can finally find something related to immigration that it doesn't like that might actually benefit the US.
Of course what's even "better" is that many of those same businesses give generously to the sorts of causes that are probably near and dear to your heart, and support Obama.
Interesting, but nonsense. There is little chance we would have had "boots on the ground" in Tehran, but sanctions would probably still be on, and we wouldn't have such a likely disaster of a "deal" with Iran.
"Perpetual war" driven by business is a load of bull. That is just another poor idea to badly explain the world in a way that is not particularly valid but little questioned by the people that repeat it. New equipment is going to be sold for upgrades and replacement one way or another. The world isn't static.
[rant]
He's only slightly better than W and not the effin' disaster we would have had with Romney.
FTFY.
Events keep proving Romney was right on many policy areas that Obama and his administration has gotten wrong, often repeatedly. I don't know where you get your news from, but maybe you should take in more sources and views. It looks like what you're taking in doesn't cut it.
No, the American Military's treatment of the enlisted isn't fair or honest. They make them commit atrocities in the name of freedom. Then they kill themselves.
No, what actually happens is the vast majority of them fight the war in a law abiding manner under difficult conditions and then people on your end of the political spectrum label most things they do as atrocities regardless of what the facts are. What is worse is that people on your end of the political spectrum have a bad tendency to ignore genuine, even massive atrocities committed by the enemy. And that is before you get to the rejoicing in soldier deaths and suicides, or calls to murder officers. (Time for the revolution?) There was a brief period of sanity there after 9/11, but that faded away long ago.
A lot of them come home and become cops, and you know how that goes... poorly.
Most of them do fine with that, but see my previous answer.
No, we can talk about suicides now, when on average they kill more U.S. soldiers than anything else. You don't think the single most common cause of death amongst our military is worthy of discussion? You would make a shit general.
The suicide rate isn't a particularly useful metric for determining if military action is warranted. If you want to argue that then why not start with something smaller, like ending deaths in bathtubs before doing any more bank robbery investigations. Suicide prevention is a useful topic in terms of taking care of the soldiers, not on military strategy.
You would make a shit general.
I would indeed, specifically a "shit hot" general. Thanks!
I clicked on a "firehose" link and the most recent story was "YouTube's ready to select a winner" from March 2013.
But the "help us select the next story" link was ok, as was directly entering Slashdot.org/recent.
Good luck with the restore / clean up / troubleshooting. That's not a fun way to spend a weekend.
All right! Nobody moves, or the storage gets it! .... Help me! Help me! .... Shut down! ..... Won't somebody help that bad drive?!
The reboot is near.
You seem to have missed a key sentence:
However, because of the bloody and intensified war with Nazi Germany, large scale efforts were prevented. -- Soviet atomic bomb project
While the Soviets were engaged in heavy combat against the Germans on the Eastern front there was little opportunity for that. The resource demands in the fight for survival were massive - Nazi Germany was an existential threat to the Soviets. By the time of Hiroshima Germany had been defeated several months prior, resources began to free to pursue other priorities, and the scientific principles were proven to no longer be theory - it was a practical exercise in engineering.
As is your custom you blame the United States while turning a blind eye to the threat posed by the Soviet Union, its imperialism, and its many crimes against humanity.
The problem is you frequently pull stuff out of your ass to defend you believing in God,...
Where in that post do I discuss anything related to that?
The problem is you frequently pull stuff out of your ass .... how Snowden killed a bunch of people, and so forth.
Where in that post do I discuss anything related to that?
Because of that, no one can possibly take you seriously.
So you are once again making a completely off-topic complaint in replying to a post I made. And you want to be taken seriously?
You are so eager to shit on the face of reality in order to bolster your personal beliefs. You are the very picture of an irrational person.
I see you practice irony .... unintentionally.
If you knew anything about nuclear weapons you'd know that the Soviet nuclear weapons program achieved a number of accomplishments that the US never attained, and had it's own pool of talent fully capable of independent accomplishment as well spies in the US program that helped leverage US research for Soviet purposes. They were going to get what they wanted one way or another.
The Soviets and Communism was an extremely dangerous and well armed menace. Can you acknowledge that?
Aug. 20, 1953: Soviets Say, 'We've Got the H-Bomb, Too'
Case closed: The Rosenbergs were Soviet spies
Feel free to indicate what you think is wrong, with some citations of your own.
I do, however, fault those that chose to stay after the war and continue working on nukes.
I'm sure you do since you probably would never expect to be among the 100,000,000 people killed by Communist governments and don't appreciate the need and costs to defend a free society. After all, Stalin was going to stop all weapons research after he got the bomb, right?
The Soviet Story
You should look into what happened to "the old Bolsheviks" sometime. Left politics wasn't any protection.
That every man has the keys to heaven, and those same keys open hell. Paraphrasing, hope I didn't butcher it.
Feynman was quoting someone, probably a Buddhist.
The Meaning of It All - Thoughts of a Citizen Scientist, By RICHARD P. FEYNMAN
Once in Hawaii I was taken to see a Buddhist temple. In the temple a man said, "I am going to tell you something that you will never forget." And then he said, "To every man is given the key to the gates of heaven. The same key opens the gates of hell."
And so it is with science. In a way it is a key to the gates of heaven, and the same key opens the gates of hell, and we do not have any instructions as to which is which gate. Shall we throw away the key and never have a way to enter the gates of heaven? Or shall we struggle with the problem of which is the best way to use the key? That is, of course, a very serious question, but I think that we cannot deny the value of the key to the gates of heaven.
Feynman didn't shy away from making religious references as above, or addressing religion as shown below.
THE RELATION OF SCIENCE AND RELIGION - Some fresh observations on an old problem, by RICHARD P. FEYNMAN
I'm installing this thing right away!
You probably have room right next to SELinux