20yrs ago Garret would have won a debate on the environment against any politician.
Agree, I reckon he is busting a foof-foo valve on the inside if he doesn't get to say something soon he will probably die of cancer. All up I think the initial liberal attack on his song lyrics should have been countered with a swift kick up the "Well ladies and gentlemen this demonstrates that Mr Howard is prepared to make an attack on the free speech of all australians" - but the discipline the labor party is demonstrating in this campaign is staggering - they are nothing if determined to resist such an opportunity.
records should be audited transparently and then destroyed.
An interesting idea, can you elaborate? What if they were paid enough so that it no longer mattered to have corporate sponsors, I think buying politicians is what is ruining the political process all over the world, it would be a novel idea if the politicians worked for their constituents instead of the highest bidder, for once.
but like the US, this country and the overwhelming majority of people in it are easy to enjoy until the subject of politics meets a drunken BBQ.
You'd be welcome at my BBQ, I'm sick of these apathetic fuckers - and I'd rather have a conversation with some meat in it. All it takes is to have a little knowledge to be able to make more informed choices, problem is most people want, like sheep, to be led. In many ways I think a lot of America's founding fathers lessons apply to us, especially the on about "Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom". Still I guess most people would rather be comfortable than free.
It is ironic to me that much of the same sentiment that thwarted the nuclear power industry back in the 80's is partially responsible for reviving it.
But only very very partially, the reality is far from that.
The Public Utilities Holding Company Act (PUHCA) was, somewhat covertly, repealed in the 2005 Energy Bill and passed by the senate in July 2005. PUCHA was put into law in 1935 to stop a re-occurance of the 1929 stock market crash, because during the '20's utility companies became cash cows for energy tycoons who set up complex holding companies to milk income from ratepayers (like ma and pa Tilley) to fuel speculative investment. The stock market crash of 1929 destroyed the holding companies, devastated ratepayers and investors alike. PUCHA was designed to outlaw these structures and protect the American economy from a repeat of the circumstances that led to the events of 1929.
With limited oversight under the new laws the scene is set for consortium's to form those structures again, and how can any regulatory body, with limited staff have the capability to understand - much less control - the books of a huge conglomerate? Of course, it's the oil companies that are best positioned to benefit from the change in these laws. Anyone care to imagine what the future of renewable energy will be like if the Oil companies have a monopoly on energy utilities as well. It would make MicroSoft's monopoly look innocuous by comparison as the NRC will not allow challenges based on the need for the electricity or disposal of the waste.
Public participation or intevention is excluded because the reactor design is "approved", the procuring company get's half a billion dollars worth of subsidies even if they do nothing and a 1.8 cent per kilowatt hour tax credit if they do, truly a lose lose situation for all American taxpayers. The reality is if the Nuclear power industry was forced to cover it's own liability it would cease to exist and the hope of it operating without subsidies is totally unrealistic.
So who are you subsidising?
One is the Nustart Consortium consists of Excelon, Etergy, Constellation Energy Group, Duke Energy Group, EDF International, Electricite de France (as Florida Power and Light) Progress Energy, Southern, Tenessee Valley Authority, GE and Westinghouse.
For a country built upon the principles of economic pragmatism and unadulterated capitalism, how have such dubious investment's been forced upon it with barely a whisper of debate? It's clearly contrary to the interests of both sides of the political spectrum, so how can America, of all countries, continue to justify this form of corporate welfare?
For more information, have a look at this article .
~
alternative nuclear technologies (ie, pebble-bed reactors)
No, not really PBMR's just introduce a new can of worms. We are talking about a graphite moderated reactor here, like Chernobyl! But because we are talking about lower core sizes and lower temperature the theory is the traditional solid American concrete and steel containment building, which makes up a large proportion of the capital and energetic costs are eliminated. In reality a PBMR introduces the same structural design flaws that Chernobyl had. Even the NRC calls this a "Major Safety Tradeoff".
Logistical concerns include;
In a production facility how do you make the millions to billions of fuel kernels without imperfections.
When the reactor is ageing, how do you prevent air entering the system and igniting the kernels?
How do you prevent radioactive helium leaking from the system?
PBMR produce deadlier wastes than PWR's.
I think your statement about decentralised sources makes much more sense, especially since micro-solar and management doesn't have the systemic in-efficiencies that large scale production does and although we will be dependant on centralised sources for some time HDR seems to have the capability to address base load issues typically used to tout coal and nuclear.
Or onto an ocean based facility. I've always wondered about using orbital solar energy with transmission systems such as the one you describe to produce hydrogen AND if the efficiency could be increased if combined with reflected orbital sunlight(?). I think Microwave transmission of power is something that occurs in countries like Canada, although the transmission efficiency over 90,000 times the distance remains a factor, potentially offset by having more production/transmission capability in space.
Of course the initial investment would have to include a space elevator to transport the mass, which of course could also be used to transport "waste" plutonium into space and used in any of the valid nuclear engine designs to secure space based resources to produce more space power facilities. Concentrated nuclear isotopes really have no place in our biosphere, especially because of their cumulative effects in the food chain, but as a fuel for space craft outside of our gravity well I can't really think of a better use - especially if we can solve the waste problems of the nuclear industry in our generation.
Of course there is the standard, and completely valid, argument that nano fibres (the final of 15 technological advancements since the conceptualisation of the S.E) long enough to produce the ribbon has not been perfected. I don't doubt that this is something that can be achieved if the full resources of our scientific establishment were focused on it, possibly more achievable (considering legal time frames) than opening the patent treasure chests of oil companies, we sting house or G E.
It's overcoming challenges such as those that will determine whether we are at the beginning or end of history.
I worked with one, it's not pleasant, especially for people not equipped to deal with the manipulation that inevitably occurs. If you don't have the self-confidence to deal with them, well basically - your fucked.
I think they are referred to as Organisational Psychopaths.
A little more pragmatic analysis of China's endgame is totally appropriate as the psyche of the Chinese Military complex is a frightening thing indeed. There should be little assumptions made about their intentions, we simply don't know anything more than they want us to know, but face saving, oh yeah. An American attempt to secure more military funding in the same way Soviet era Military capability was overstated is as likely as a genuine button pushing exercise by the Chinese to posture their military capabilities.
There is much talk about American military and economic capability but nothing about the Chinese capability. In my own country it is known that there is a minimum of 1000 operatives installed, it would be interesting to discover how many Chinese operatives are installed in the commercial areas of the American military i.e Lockheed or Boeing etc.
Sure they gave up intel by surfacing in the middle of American exercises, but it begs the question of how many other Chinese subs didn't actually surface.
And good party is good! Blowing off steam acts as a social lubricant and builds teams when people are working on tough projects. Work hard, play hard - wowsers in companies aren't good for moral, they don't understand that people with an outlet might actually enjoy coming to work and make less mistakes.
All up it's probably a good investment compared to the potential for screw-ups, after all warm bodies aren't machines. We can agree on somethings, eh:-)
Certain rights cannot be signed away, this could be one of these instances YMMV, agreements like this frankly look coercive, the implication is - if you don't sign you'll get fired.
They can't force you to sign anything, but they might lean on you. Don't forget it's a contract, and a contract has two or more sides, if you don't like a clause strike it from the contract with the pen you are asked to sign it with, simply put, as you read it draw a pen through what you don't agree with. If you think a clause is reasonable i.e. "You will not take company ideas and sell them to our competitors", leave it in there.
Sometimes management will recognise that you have a business sense about you that could be of value and be more prepared to trust you more as you are less likely to sign away company advantages if you are signing things on behalf of the company. Point it out, if they don't recognise you as an asset for that reason start looking for a new job immediately. Until you find a new job, forget to sign it, loose the document, if confronted tell them you aren't comfortable signing it and would prefer to seek legal advice, on their time - like they say at the poker table "after 10 minutes if you can't pick the patsy - leave - your the patsy".
How is this OT if I am pointing out an open source alternative to SF (i.e this is not an advertisment) that by-passes the possibility of phishing for data?
Moderation without investigation is frustration - maybe some safes force people are scared that people will spread the word that there is a free alternative to their product that doesn't own your business data or charge you for the priveledge of accessing it.
Did I say suprisingly good in comparison, let me rephrase that...
SugarCRM KICKS SALESFORCE ASS
Maybe that will show up on googles next robot of slashdot. Of course I may just think that paying for someone else to own your data and allow it to be accessed by fraudsters, lose it in database backup failures, charge you an unexpected extra fee for exceeding your storage capacity or charge you extra for do additional marketing on your client base is dumb, but that's just me.
It's just I think that Open Source makes Software As A Service (or SAAS if you like trendy little acronyms that mean nothing) is redundant or Owned with a capital P, especially when SugarCRM does 80% or more of what SF does for no charge. So let me re-iterate, if you are considering a SF purchase...
SugarCRM KICKS SALESFORCE ASS
Disclaimer: I am in no way associated with SugarCRM in any way!
So now the MPAA/RIAA entities think protecting their failing business model should be held above the interests of all business. I still don't understand how a 60 billion dollar a year industry (entertainment) can push around a 600 Billion dollar a year industry (IT) by continuing to lobby for laws that stifle innovation in IT. Now they are so desparate that they are prepared to lobby for laws that open the doors to attacking educational institutions that are suppliers of skilled labour to ALL sectors of industry. Has anyone pointed this out to your congress? As I'm sure they will attempt to do it in my country too.
One day business will start to realise that the desparation of this industry is a threat to commerce, not just music consumers, because one day this industry will be gone and all we will be left with is a legal framework that makes our economies harder to adapt to change.
It's SOP if you are leaving for the companies competitor, or they don't want you around anymore. You can avoid the perp walk by resigning smart, collect your gear and clean up you desk prior to announcing your exit to management. If anyone asks what your doing say your just cleaning up, if you are a messy desk tell em you got tired of looking at the mess. I have actually been fired whilst I had a resignation letter in my top pocket, they drove me home and wanted to search my house!!! It was my first IT job and I had no interest or inclination to take anything, but I immediately learned the value of IT work. By acting like assholes all they did was fund a two week holiday for me and my girlfriend. Perhaps they suspected I was looking around (actually I was headhunted) but it was not by their competitors, but their suppliers.
The point is to always be ready to leave, loyalty to a particular company is not a factor anymore and you would be a fool to believe any company is loyal to you, career advancement should be the key component to any IT practitioner. If a company is stupid enough not to get you to sign a NDA or your fool enough to breach one then how can anyone be surprised that perp walk's happen.
IT people have always been close to the money engines of business, business is just starting to wake up to this. If your management wear suits that are made of 100% cocksucker then they won't expect/understand ethical behaviour, and even if they do they will be on-guard if they are smart business people.
I recently did an comparison between Salseforce and SugarCRM and found Sugar was surprising good in comparison to SF. Plus you have the option of hosting the application in house thus avoiding a 3rd party handling your company data, or being on list of third parties that could be subject to these sorts of scams.
Makes you wonder how long they will last if Johnny boy gets in again, considering what happened to "The Glasshouse" (an extemely hilarious political satire for our us and uk friends, that was "removed" by our government), he wouldn't try it now as I think it would be the nail in this governments coffin.
lock up Alan Jones for inciting the race riots in Cronulla.
Bring it on!! That guys talks the talk, but he balks the walk.
I do support the rule of law and if Howard and Ruddock can ignore the law to enact a political vendetta against one citizen then they are free to do it to the rest of us.
I wonder if the average Aussie even realises this? It's hard to imagine UK or US citizens being treated this way. In essence it's the federal governments way of saying "Fuck you if you don't be a complacent moron, your country won't protect you with the values you were brought up with - even if you are just a dickhead", look at the way the Bali 9 were arrested, the AFP actually called the Indonesian customs police to let them know what was happening instead of letting them arrive in australia and arresting and charging them here. Now they face the death penalty ( I even hear that the parents were the ones that advised the AFP - bet they take sleeping pills now), I mean WTF???, it was stupid what they did, but thats all, young and dumb. In comparison to the harm the organisers of the drug trade do it begs the question of what impact will this make beyond a political statement?
It certainly appears that mean spirited little Johnny wants to make australia a model for the neo-cons at the expense of the Australian People, perhaps he is just Un-Australian;-)
Encryption technology was (still is?) regarded as a "munition", you could (still can?) be charged with treason here in Australia and the US/UK had (have?) similar rules.
It would be an interesting combination considering that amendments to the Anti-tewworism laws in Australia gave the Federal Pol ice, A S I O and A S I S has had the power to examine email, sms and voicemail messages since 2004. Previously the act of intercepting any of these articles required a "inter ception warrant" which was harder to get than a normal warrant.
In some cases it seems to me that these items extreme law are being tested in Australia. Case in point was the original Anti-tewworism laws which seemed to be an exact pre-cursor to British and American A-T legislation. I read the Australian A-T laws and then aspects of the P A T R I O T act and they were frighteningly similar.
I guess the test will be whether these proposed laws for the US includes the capabilities to tap sms and voicemail and by-pass the need for a American style "inter ception warrant".
The only difference is that here in Australia (as opposed to the US and UK) is we don't have a bill of rights, we no longer have access to firearms and our own army has the legal framework available that allows them to point and fire their weapons on legal assemblies of people in australia. All this legislation that seriously eroded the token freedom that Australians possesed were introduced by Dubya.Howard a man who appears to take many of his ideas from Hitler's career. He lies to Aussies so much and has attacked many of the weaker members of our community for his political benefit and I wouldn't be surprised if his relationship with Dubya.Bush is bearing fruit on both sides of the relationship.
Slashdot Mirror
Thanks for your well considered thoughts!!!
Umm, I guess I just want to see the fake photos???? Even though I know your right!!!
any chance of a high res photo of the appollo landing sites so we can put the kooky's to bed?
The Public Utilities Holding Company Act (PUHCA) was, somewhat covertly, repealed in the 2005 Energy Bill and passed by the senate in July 2005. PUCHA was put into law in 1935 to stop a re-occurance of the 1929 stock market crash, because during the '20's utility companies became cash cows for energy tycoons who set up complex holding companies to milk income from ratepayers (like ma and pa Tilley) to fuel speculative investment. The stock market crash of 1929 destroyed the holding companies, devastated ratepayers and investors alike. PUCHA was designed to outlaw these structures and protect the American economy from a repeat of the circumstances that led to the events of 1929.
With limited oversight under the new laws the scene is set for consortium's to form those structures again, and how can any regulatory body, with limited staff have the capability to understand - much less control - the books of a huge conglomerate? Of course, it's the oil companies that are best positioned to benefit from the change in these laws. Anyone care to imagine what the future of renewable energy will be like if the Oil companies have a monopoly on energy utilities as well. It would make MicroSoft's monopoly look innocuous by comparison as the NRC will not allow challenges based on the need for the electricity or disposal of the waste.
Public participation or intevention is excluded because the reactor design is "approved", the procuring company get's half a billion dollars worth of subsidies even if they do nothing and a 1.8 cent per kilowatt hour tax credit if they do, truly a lose lose situation for all American taxpayers. The reality is if the Nuclear power industry was forced to cover it's own liability it would cease to exist and the hope of it operating without subsidies is totally unrealistic.
So who are you subsidising?
One is the Nustart Consortium consists of Excelon, Etergy, Constellation Energy Group, Duke Energy Group, EDF International, Electricite de France (as Florida Power and Light) Progress Energy, Southern, Tenessee Valley Authority, GE and Westinghouse.
For a country built upon the principles of economic pragmatism and unadulterated capitalism, how have such dubious investment's been forced upon it with barely a whisper of debate? It's clearly contrary to the interests of both sides of the political spectrum, so how can America, of all countries, continue to justify this form of corporate welfare?
For more information, have a look at this article . ~
They don't accept corporate funding as part of their policy, possibly a good choice for the senate.
Logistical concerns include;
In a production facility how do you make the millions to billions of fuel kernels without imperfections.
When the reactor is ageing, how do you prevent air entering the system and igniting the kernels?
How do you prevent radioactive helium leaking from the system?
PBMR produce deadlier wastes than PWR's.
I think your statement about decentralised sources makes much more sense, especially since micro-solar and management doesn't have the systemic in-efficiencies that large scale production does and although we will be dependant on centralised sources for some time HDR seems to have the capability to address base load issues typically used to tout coal and nuclear.
Of course the initial investment would have to include a space elevator to transport the mass, which of course could also be used to transport "waste" plutonium into space and used in any of the valid nuclear engine designs to secure space based resources to produce more space power facilities. Concentrated nuclear isotopes really have no place in our biosphere, especially because of their cumulative effects in the food chain, but as a fuel for space craft outside of our gravity well I can't really think of a better use - especially if we can solve the waste problems of the nuclear industry in our generation.
Of course there is the standard, and completely valid, argument that nano fibres (the final of 15 technological advancements since the conceptualisation of the S.E) long enough to produce the ribbon has not been perfected. I don't doubt that this is something that can be achieved if the full resources of our scientific establishment were focused on it, possibly more achievable (considering legal time frames) than opening the patent treasure chests of oil companies, we sting house or G E.
It's overcoming challenges such as those that will determine whether we are at the beginning or end of history.
If it was *.* they would just be replacing there own stuff, I think they want more
I think they are referred to as Organisational Psychopaths.
A little more pragmatic analysis of China's endgame is totally appropriate as the psyche of the Chinese Military complex is a frightening thing indeed. There should be little assumptions made about their intentions, we simply don't know anything more than they want us to know, but face saving, oh yeah. An American attempt to secure more military funding in the same way Soviet era Military capability was overstated is as likely as a genuine button pushing exercise by the Chinese to posture their military capabilities.
There is much talk about American military and economic capability but nothing about the Chinese capability. In my own country it is known that there is a minimum of 1000 operatives installed, it would be interesting to discover how many Chinese operatives are installed in the commercial areas of the American military i.e Lockheed or Boeing etc.
Sure they gave up intel by surfacing in the middle of American exercises, but it begs the question of how many other Chinese subs didn't actually surface.
I actually have switch two on a machine I use for audio recording because Mollys can be grown ups too!
Stupid people are so ingenious.
All up it's probably a good investment compared to the potential for screw-ups, after all warm bodies aren't machines. We can agree on somethings, eh :-)
Certain rights cannot be signed away, this could be one of these instances YMMV, agreements like this frankly look coercive, the implication is - if you don't sign you'll get fired.
They can't force you to sign anything, but they might lean on you. Don't forget it's a contract, and a contract has two or more sides, if you don't like a clause strike it from the contract with the pen you are asked to sign it with, simply put, as you read it draw a pen through what you don't agree with. If you think a clause is reasonable i.e. "You will not take company ideas and sell them to our competitors", leave it in there.
Sometimes management will recognise that you have a business sense about you that could be of value and be more prepared to trust you more as you are less likely to sign away company advantages if you are signing things on behalf of the company. Point it out, if they don't recognise you as an asset for that reason start looking for a new job immediately. Until you find a new job, forget to sign it, loose the document, if confronted tell them you aren't comfortable signing it and would prefer to seek legal advice, on their time - like they say at the poker table "after 10 minutes if you can't pick the patsy - leave - your the patsy".
SugarCRM KICKS SALESFORCE ASS
because it will be interesting if I get modded down again, just for saying...
SugarCRM KICKS SALESFORCE ASS
But I can always just continue to re-post the same comment.
Disclaimer: I am in no way associated with SugarCRM in any way!
Moderation without investigation is frustration - maybe some safes force people are scared that people will spread the word that there is a free alternative to their product that doesn't own your business data or charge you for the priveledge of accessing it.
Did I say suprisingly good in comparison, let me rephrase that...
SugarCRM KICKS SALESFORCE ASS
Maybe that will show up on googles next robot of slashdot. Of course I may just think that paying for someone else to own your data and allow it to be accessed by fraudsters, lose it in database backup failures, charge you an unexpected extra fee for exceeding your storage capacity or charge you extra for do additional marketing on your client base is dumb, but that's just me.
It's just I think that Open Source makes Software As A Service (or SAAS if you like trendy little acronyms that mean nothing) is redundant or Owned with a capital P, especially when SugarCRM does 80% or more of what SF does for no charge. So let me re-iterate, if you are considering a SF purchase...
SugarCRM KICKS SALESFORCE ASS
Disclaimer: I am in no way associated with SugarCRM in any way!
One day business will start to realise that the desparation of this industry is a threat to commerce, not just music consumers, because one day this industry will be gone and all we will be left with is a legal framework that makes our economies harder to adapt to change.
The point is to always be ready to leave, loyalty to a particular company is not a factor anymore and you would be a fool to believe any company is loyal to you, career advancement should be the key component to any IT practitioner. If a company is stupid enough not to get you to sign a NDA or your fool enough to breach one then how can anyone be surprised that perp walk's happen.
IT people have always been close to the money engines of business, business is just starting to wake up to this. If your management wear suits that are made of 100% cocksucker then they won't expect/understand ethical behaviour, and even if they do they will be on-guard if they are smart business people.
It certainly appears that mean spirited little Johnny wants to make australia a model for the neo-cons at the expense of the Australian People, perhaps he is just Un-Australian ;-)
Thanks for your well considered comments.
In some cases it seems to me that these items extreme law are being tested in Australia. Case in point was the original Anti-tewworism laws which seemed to be an exact pre-cursor to British and American A-T legislation. I read the Australian A-T laws and then aspects of the P A T R I O T act and they were frighteningly similar. I guess the test will be whether these proposed laws for the US includes the capabilities to tap sms and voicemail and by-pass the need for a American style "inter ception warrant".
The only difference is that here in Australia (as opposed to the US and UK) is we don't have a bill of rights, we no longer have access to firearms and our own army has the legal framework available that allows them to point and fire their weapons on legal assemblies of people in australia. All this legislation that seriously eroded the token freedom that Australians possesed were introduced by Dubya.Howard a man who appears to take many of his ideas from Hitler's career. He lies to Aussies so much and has attacked many of the weaker members of our community for his political benefit and I wouldn't be surprised if his relationship with Dubya.Bush is bearing fruit on both sides of the relationship.