I have one from the previous generation, no head rest and the mounts between the back and the seat look slightly different. But the lumbar support is awesome on this chair, and it has held up flawlessly over the last year and a half I've been using it at work. I couldn't find it on Office Max's web site though, so you'll probably have to track it down in store. Just tell the associates that you are looking for a mid backed mesh chair with adjustable lumbar support, that should get ya pointed in the right place. Other big features: Adjustable height arm rests, tilt, tilt torsion, and height. I wouldn't even consider a chair that didn't have those options.
Sounds like a scope issue. Microsoft apps are designed to look for resources/references closer first, then further as needed.
For example, if IE needs to use mm.dll it will first look in the working folder, if it doesn't find it there, if will check the system's path variable and see if it can find the library in any of those folders.
In this specific case, if you are running Safari, it can auto download a new file, say, 'mm.dll' to your desktop. Safari doesn't care about it, BUT, the next time you start IE from the desktop (a shortcut on the desk top, not the quick launch or start menu), it treats the desktop folder as the working folder, and seeing that nice and shiny new mm.dll in it's working folder it doesn't bother to check the system's path variable to pull the real mm.dll out of the system32 folder.
At least, that would be my assumption of how this is happening.
When the government (or anyone else) starts forcefully taking away that property, that right is being violated.
No, that's called Taxation. It's why you have Representation in the Government. If you don't like the Government's taxation of you, contact your house and senate members and lobby them to introduce new legislation or vote on legislation that better suits your desires. This is a common practice most of us here in America call "Democracy", you might want to try it some time.
I'm just saying that such taxation is only justified if it is voluntary.
I can see that argument, but it only has to be voluntary by society as a whole, not by each and every individual. Individuals have the option to not pay US taxes and to not enjoy the benefits the US government offers. That options is called "To Leave". If you live in the US, even if you don't go to any form of educational center (as even private schools receive federal aide), ever use a road, or a side walk, or build anything, or drink the tap water... you are enjoying the benefits of taxation. You might not agree with all of the taxation, but you are enjoying a lot of your neighbor's hard earned income every day.
2. Competition among private services gives private companies an incentive to provide the best possible service at the lowest price. Because there is only one provider for a public service (and no competing providers are permitted to exist), there is no incentive for public services to provide the best service or the cheapest service.
Contracts for everything except corrupt war profiteering contracts in the government are handled through a bidding process. I'm sure there are plenty of examples of corruption out side of Iraq as well, but the roads you drive on are not built by State employees, they are being built by construction companies that won the bidding process for the contract to build the road.
If road construction were privatized and no longer received federal/state funding, who would pay the construction companies to build the roads? If you lived in a suburb you might be able to get a couple of your neighbors to chip in and pave your road (thus taxing yourself) but seeing as how none of you are likely contractors you would be hard pressed to negotiate a fair contract. Especially if we continue down the road of de-regulation. And what about Jim Bob the dairy farmer who lives on a farm 25 miles from the closest major city. He needs to have big rigs pulling in every day to keep the milk flowing. There is no way a dairy farmer is going to be able to afford the cost of maintaining 25 miles of an improved road to support semi traffic. So what's your big idea? Toll booths at every single drive way and intersection where a road changes ownership? Talk about absurd...
Do you think you will have any control over your personal records (medical, financial, etc) under a system where an entity backed by force is controlling the service that is utilizing those records? You would be incorrect to assume that.
Do you think you have any control over your personal records now? Especially medical? I'll give you a hint, the 'P' in HIPAA stands for "Portability" not privacy or protection. And as that privacy continues to erode and more and more studies link hereditary traits to higher health care costs, Insurance companies are going to look to slamming some people with significantly higher premiums or to deny them coverage all together. By switching to a socialized health care plan, you spread the risk far wider than any single insurance company ever could and can run an over all lower average premium rate. Not only that, but you scratch the 45 million un-insured people list. With a fully socialized plan you can significantly reduce overall spending by early detection and reducing unnecessary emergency room trips. That is one of the things I'm not so excited about with Obama, both Clinton and Edwards had much better plans for health care reform IMO.
I have a buddy with a newer WRX (I think an '05). And there's no way I'd fit in the back seat, and even in the front I have to kick the back angle down or I bump my head. But I'm a bit oddly built. 6' tall, but my height is all in my torso, so my sitting height is way more and an average 6' tall person. I have the Golf's seats adjusted to the lowest ride height, and the Fiero's custom seats are still a bit high for me.
Dropping the suspension on the Lotus would be impractical. It already sits ~3" off the ground, if you soften the springs even a hair and drive it down a city road you'll wind up ripping up the under carriage. My fiero is an '88 with the 2nd gen "lotus inspired" suspension. It's a PITA to get and keep the front end aligned, but man, when it's dialed in you can push it hard and deep into the corners.
The Loremo looks like a cool idea, but it appears to be a long way from a drivable product. The Aptera on the other hand, is (hopefully) going into full production this year in California. If I can keep the Fiero held together for another 2-3 years, I should be able to pick up a new Aptera here shortly after paying off the Golf.
I'm a big fan of Bio Diesel. Not from Soy though, we just can't get the volume we need. But bio-reactors and algae ponds, now there is a viable option! And WVO is a great way to have a non-petrol option right now. My TDI is still under the factory warranty, so I'm holding off on the WVO conversion and running anything over B20, but with the recent change to ULSD fuel, I've been trying to fill up on B5 to get some of the lubricity back.
I should have clarified. The Fiero isn't the lightest car ever. But compared to a 3800lbs Grand Prix, it's a veritable feather weight. Same with the Civic and Sentra, although both of those cars scored lower on safety tests in the 80's.
Subaru also produces some really nice light cars. Given the targeted use and performance numbers, the two cars aren't that big of a stretch. I mean, honestly, when was the last time you made someone sit in the back seat of your Impreza? It's not exactly designed for heavy use... unless you are carrying midgets or children.
The Lotus is a car I love. But getting your curb weight down into the 1600 range means a lot of sacrifices, including a fair bit of crumple zones. Although the protective features in modern Lotus still makes them a very attractive car. And as much as I wish I was a 20 year old stud again, the Fiero has hard suspention, riding in a Lotus is similar, only instead of being abusing to drive on the open roads of Wisconsin, it's more like a constant flogging of your kidneys. If I had a 10 minute commute, maybe, but the Lotus really belongs on a track, not on a daily commute or in stop and go traffic.
The Fiero's space frame and modular panel system is really a cool design. From 84-87 (and a lot of the 88 parts too) they scavenged parts from other lines. I don't remember the specifics anymore, but almost every part on the 1st gen Fieros was taken from the bin of another line. Engines, cradles, suspension, breaks, etc... GM was making the Fiero as cheap as possible. Not exactly the best design for function, but it kept the price down and got a product to market.
I'm actually a follower of Aptera's new 3-wheeler. I can live with 0-60 in under 10 seconds for 100+ MPG.
Good enough to car pool my neighbor and I on a 60 mile round trip commute. Sure, it's not going to haul 8 people, go rock crawling, haul sheets of 4'x8' plywood, or tow the horse trailer, thus the reason that I also have a Golf TDI, an '87 dodge raider, and a '97 F250 super duty. A car is a tool and I use the best tool for the job. I'm not going to use a nail gun to help my latest IVR application, and I'm not going to use nUnit to fix a squeaky stair.
-Would you be willing to crash test it vs a Suburban?
I'd prefer not to, I'm rather fond of driving it. But I feel no less secure in it than in any other car from the same generation. I'd much rather crash while driving it than driving the other cars I've owned from the 80's. My '06 Golf has air bags, but structurally it performs no better than the Fiero in a front impact./shrug.
-Where do you put your children?
I put him in a car seat certified for his weight with a 5-point safety harness and seat latching mechanism. Since I don't have air bags there is no major threat to having him in a "front" seat, and with the Fiero's ample crumple zones and space-frame construction, the likelihood of him being injured in that seat is about the same as his spot in the back seat of the '06 VW Golf.
I'd actually be tempted to take the hit in an Aptera. The front end crumple zone and cross member would likely fold under, pushing the roll cage and cockpit up and over the front of the oncoming car. Sure, the Aptera would get destroyed, and I would get knocked around pretty good, but with a solid seatbelt and well designed airbags, the odds of survival are probably not to bad.
Vehicles with roll cages and space frames have quite consistently out performed uni-body cars for passenger safety.
Actually, VW/Audi's new automatic tranny, the DSG (Dual Shift Gate) is only slightly heavier than a traditional manual tranny and is more efficient.
It uses 2 clutches, a split fly wheel (inner and outer), and two input shafts. It can always keep 2 gears engaged with only 1 clutch engaged. Up-shifting takes a tiny fraction of a second as the two clutches switch states and the newly disengaged input shaft engages the next gear to be shifted into. Down shifts can take a hair longer, but are still in the sub-second range.
The down side though is that you can't (currently) feed it much over 250 ft-lbs of torque since the surface area on the flywheel is split between two clutches, you'll slip the clutch in no time with too much power and weight. But for a commuter car that isn't going to be taking a tuned engine and hard launches, the DSG is an amazing piece of engineering.
The '84 Pontiac Fiero had a curb weight of under 2600 lbs.
-safe
The '84-'88 Pontiac Fiero was the 2nd safest new car in crashes in the US according to government crash testing.
-cheap
The '84 Pontiac Fiero was marketed as a relatively low end commuter car.
True the Fiero was plagued by bad iron, mediocre management, and a royal frown from the GM suits. But at 27/40 MPG for a commuter car from the 80's. Even running the 2.8l v-6, 175 foot-pounds of torque is enough to get a 2600lbs car moving faster than most cars in its price range off the line.
I'm not saying we should compromise on anything, I'm saying that there should be two sides to every action. With out any opposition, the congress becomes nothing but a yes-man to the Presidant.
We can have two (or more) political parties argueing over states rights. Some demanding that slavery is wrong and that no one should be able to hold another in bondadge, some saying that it is wrong but it is a matter for states to resolve, some who don't care but see the economic disparity that could develope between exploitive and non-exploitive work forces in different states, and heck, even some that argue for slavery.
Slight compromises possible, but by and large, someone gets what they want, and someone doesn't. And those decisions are made by the people who have been elected by the people to represent the people. If the people want slavery to end, and their elected party doesn't, then the people will vote for a party that does.
I do not think that these parties should get together and compromise so that slavery is only leagel on every second tuesday or some other completely absurd agreement. But I do think that if any one of them were allowed to make the decision solely by themselves, the US would be in a far worse place than it is now.
I do not believe that the US would be any better served by a Democrat Presidant and Congress than it would be a Republican party, or even an 'independant' group (although the idea of a unified independant political party is quite humorous). I would love to see MORE political groups with more clearly defined political differences, not this BS the media drums up to build ratings.
So we should have ONLY the anti-slavery (Centralized control) or the slavery (states rights) party? And that 1 party should control everything out right? If we went entirely with the anti-slavery political group, states rights would be completely eroded (even more so than they already have) and the president/legislature would have significantly more power as we would tip closer to a Unitarian executive or dictatorship over time. Had we gone the other way, irreconcilable differences (ie: Slavery) would continue to tear the states apart and the country would have likely split, possible a number of times.
So yes, even in the slavery issue, if you look at the political powers acting upon the issue, it is a balance between the two that is needed.
That is also one of the primary reason's I'm not entirely keen on a Dem congress AND president. Right now IMO the President has too much power. For the last 30 years the congress has been losing ground as the Presidents (both republican and Democrat) have chipped away more and more power. Bush is just a symptom of the underlying problem of excess powers in the executive branch. The best solution is either a president with enough foresight to think about the future of the government, possible future leaders of our nation, and the balls to sign off some of those excessive powers. Sure it's great that they pledge not to use signing statements, but the current candidates pledge won't prevent their future abuse again. I'd be hard pressed to imagine much of any of the current possibilities as willing to forgo power for the future of the country.
With out that, the best option is a politically opposed Executive and Legislative branch where there will at least be some oversight going back and forth (like making sure a country is REALY a threat before invading... dur) and some limitation of abuse.
Okay, so the bill would have explicitly prevented the CIA from using harsh interrogation techniques. It would force them to abide by the same limitations that the military follows. That hardly makes them a branch of the military. Hell, they could just photo copy the Military version and apply that as a new bill, but that would require maintenance, review, and oversight on two seperate standards. Using the same standard, especially when the two groups are often intertwined in their affairs over seas just makes sense.
So McCain is against Waterboarding, but the CIA is free to continue using it because the current administration doesn't agree that it is torture. And a lot of other techniques are in the gray area as well. Hell there was a leaked document earlier this spring in which an aide wrote that crushing a child's testicles infront of his parents could be a justifyable interogation technique. Which, so long as the White House says that's not torture, the CIA is free to do.
To blindly say "I oppose torture" but then to pass up an oppertunity to DO SOMETHING about it says significantly more about McCains character than the pandering he does.
Also, I never said McCain was FOR toture, I said he flip-floped on it and that he is manipulated. He personally may be very much opposed to it, but he is going to toe the party line to get republic and right wing votes, while pandering to the left to pull in the independants and liberals.
I also claim no knowledge of McCain's offspring, I have never seen any proof the Obama was Muslim, or any of the other completely bogus claims being made on either side of the isle.
Lesser of two evils my friend. Do we vote to rob Peter to pay Paul enough to scrape by, or do we vote to rob Peter to pay for the incarseration of Paul?
Either way, society as a whole has a responsibilty for its members continued existance and not just Paul's. If Paul shoots Peter and takes his wallet, society has failed in its responsibility to Peter, and in order to limit any further failures, Paul would be locked up entirely at our cost. If through programs like welfare, unemployment insurance, public education, etc... we can reduce the chance that Paul will shoot Peter, and thus reduce the chance that Paul will be locked up for the rest of his life. Not only does this improve the society as a whole, but it also reduces the overall cost to each individual member of the society.
A penny spent is a pound saved. Although with the current exchange rate it's more like 1/2 a pound.
Correction: McCain WAS the most anti-torture candidate. Until he had the oppertunity to vote against allowing the CIA to use "harsh interrogation techniques" that meet the UN's definition of torture. At which point he toed the party line, and voted to allow the CIA to waterboard and use other combinations of intense questioning methods.
And that is McCain's weak spot. He spent the late 90's and early 2000's building up a GREAT maveric image, heck, John Kerry talked to him about a VP seat in the 2004 election! But since then, McCain has flip flopped on almost every stance he took out of line with the Republican party. Campaign finance reform, Gay marrage, Torture, even the war he has been pretty fishie on.
John McCain from 1999 would have been a great option instead of Bush. John McCain from 2003 would have been a great option instead of Bush. But at this point, he is so manipulated and has gone back on so many of his 'maveric' stances, that he's losing the independant voters and me along with them.
You are telling me that any of those three have voting records that compare at all to Rus Feingold?
Hell, between Hillary and Barack, the only major difference in their voting history is the war on Iraq. That 1 vote is the only thing keeping Hillary from also being labeled as "The most liberal Senator" yet I haven't heard a peep about the right wing media calling her a liberal zealot.
No, those "most liberal" reports come from a republican party backed think tank and have consistently redefined their metric just as front runners are coming out that skew the results heavily to who ever is the largest threat. The report is just a political tool used to spread FUD.
Do you want to be forced to pay pennies of your income to help my neighboors, or do you want them to turn to a life of crime to support themselves and wind up in a prison where you will be forced to pay dollars of your income to support them?
Public education, social responsibility, and the empowerment of all will help you more significantly than isolating yourself from society.
I'm not saying we should go all commie or socialist over here, but a balanced struggle between socialist and capitalist (and many other!) points of view in our government is what keeps it healthy. Falling in the trap of a single party (even a dual party like we have now) reduces our government's health.
This should help us keep our name in the spaces that Ruby is now pretty much commanding the buzzword marketshare. They are targeting your mother's basement?
Ruby is interesting and all, but I would hardly call its "buzzword" presence in the private sector "commanding". I don't think I'd even venture so far as to call it "significant".
Sure, R3 may disolve before it can file a civil suit, but I imagine the US goverment will hold together long enough to bring criminal charges against MediaDefender.
DOS attacks are a felony. People go to jail for committing felonies.
R3 can sue, in addition to the criminal charges brought forward by the state, in order to recoup any damages sustained by the attack, but even if they don't, MD still has to face the federal government for breaking the law.
Thank you for answering the question. A truly informative, well thought out, and highly insightful post. I'm sure with your great advice the asker will make great strides in his project. And following along your high standards more technical solutions and products will be introduced to the market.
I would really enjoy to have a debate with you on that topic, but alas, you are an annonymous coward. Post with a name and I will gladly trade points with you.
I would recommend flipping through the data and reports available from the World Health Organization (http://www.who.int/research/en/). I would pull up some specific samples for you, but my net connection is sucking ass this morning. On the linked page though there is a color coded map showing Maternal Mortality Rates. You'll notice that Canada and pretty much all of Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan are all colored Blue indicating less than 10 deaths per 100k. Almost all of these nations provide either socialized health care, or programs in which the government pays for over 50% of the annual medical expenses per capita. The US on the other hand, is colored green, indicating 10-200 deaths per 100k.
It's been a while since I've looked in detail, but IIRC, the US ranks 32nd for over all average healthy life expectancy. Of the 31 countries that beat us in that measure, I believe 26 of them have socialized health care or other programs covering over half of the medical costs. The remaining 5 are privatized, but have a per capita spending that is a fraction of our own.
For the total health care related per capita expenditures in the US, you could pay the medical needs of 2-5 people in many of the other socialized health care countries.
We pay more than anyone else on the planet for our health care, and our healthy life spans are shorter than most developed nations.
Now, this is all a correlation, not necessarily a causation, but given the performance of socialized health care systems for other nations, and the performance of our privatized system here, it would be who of us to investigate implementing a number of those programs here in order to get a grip on our costs and improve our services.
If my web page has hand picked adds on it that I get revenue from for click throughs, and Charter inserts adds into my page that offer similar or competing brands, I, as the website owner, can suffer financially. If Charter inserts adds that my visitors find offensive and they decide against using my service, I can suffer financially. If Charter inserts adds into my website and I have a contractual obligation to provide my users with an advertisement free environment, I could be liable (even if I could pass the buck in court, it would require a significant investment to do so).
If Charter wants to advertise on my website, they can contact me about licensing. To do anything else would be infringing on my rights. Although, I am not a lawyer, I do not know exactly what rights those are, but someone, somewhere has to have run into a similar situation and created some precedence in the US.
But it is certainly possible to create an uncompromiseable botnet. Sure, but for how long? An hour? A day? A week? A Month? A Year?
Disregarding all political and ethical concerns about such a project, looking just at the technical:
1) You have just made a military target for every would be hacker, script kiddie, federally funded cyber opp, etc... in the world to try to crack. Do you think China would just sit there and say "Eh, it's made by the US, it must be uncrackable, so we won't even bother". Of course not, they would set some serious resources aside to crack this thing.
2) WHEN it gets cracked, and it will get cracked, you have just handed off control of your military owned botnet to the attacker. Depending on the nature of the botnet, and its deployment, you may have just handed over access to hardware on your networks.
3) All security is vulnerable given a sufficient amount of time and money, and in this case it's not like people are going to be jumping up and down warning you that your security has been cracked (except perhaps a few MIT guys who are promptly arrested and shipped to GITMO as enemy cyber combatants). The only way to fight against this is constant development and deployment, continuous improvement and rotation ensuring minimal windows for any given attack vector. In addition to the pure strain on your development team such a challenge would present you also have the logistical nightmare of trying to keep all of your infected machines up to date, and the constant risk that every code change represents the opportunity for an untested bug to be released.
This is one huge stinking pile of BAD IDEA. If the military really wants access to such a thing, their best option would be to find an existing bot-net operator out of Russia, or a disgruntled Chinese hacker and purchase attack time off of their bot-nets.
Same reward, lower cost, lower risk, better option.
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.made-in-china.com/showroom/chinaqidun/product-detailRqcnsOJvEpky/China-Manager-Chairs-QD-M-002A-.html
I have one from the previous generation, no head rest and the mounts between the back and the seat look slightly different. But the lumbar support is awesome on this chair, and it has held up flawlessly over the last year and a half I've been using it at work. I couldn't find it on Office Max's web site though, so you'll probably have to track it down in store. Just tell the associates that you are looking for a mid backed mesh chair with adjustable lumbar support, that should get ya pointed in the right place. Other big features: Adjustable height arm rests, tilt, tilt torsion, and height. I wouldn't even consider a chair that didn't have those options.
-Rick
Sounds like a scope issue. Microsoft apps are designed to look for resources/references closer first, then further as needed.
For example, if IE needs to use mm.dll it will first look in the working folder, if it doesn't find it there, if will check the system's path variable and see if it can find the library in any of those folders.
In this specific case, if you are running Safari, it can auto download a new file, say, 'mm.dll' to your desktop. Safari doesn't care about it, BUT, the next time you start IE from the desktop (a shortcut on the desk top, not the quick launch or start menu), it treats the desktop folder as the working folder, and seeing that nice and shiny new mm.dll in it's working folder it doesn't bother to check the system's path variable to pull the real mm.dll out of the system32 folder.
At least, that would be my assumption of how this is happening.
-Rick
When the government (or anyone else) starts forcefully taking away that property, that right is being violated.
No, that's called Taxation. It's why you have Representation in the Government. If you don't like the Government's taxation of you, contact your house and senate members and lobby them to introduce new legislation or vote on legislation that better suits your desires. This is a common practice most of us here in America call "Democracy", you might want to try it some time.
I'm just saying that such taxation is only justified if it is voluntary.
I can see that argument, but it only has to be voluntary by society as a whole, not by each and every individual. Individuals have the option to not pay US taxes and to not enjoy the benefits the US government offers. That options is called "To Leave". If you live in the US, even if you don't go to any form of educational center (as even private schools receive federal aide), ever use a road, or a side walk, or build anything, or drink the tap water... you are enjoying the benefits of taxation. You might not agree with all of the taxation, but you are enjoying a lot of your neighbor's hard earned income every day.
2. Competition among private services gives private companies an incentive to provide the best possible service at the lowest price. Because there is only one provider for a public service (and no competing providers are permitted to exist), there is no incentive for public services to provide the best service or the cheapest service.
Contracts for everything except corrupt war profiteering contracts in the government are handled through a bidding process. I'm sure there are plenty of examples of corruption out side of Iraq as well, but the roads you drive on are not built by State employees, they are being built by construction companies that won the bidding process for the contract to build the road.
If road construction were privatized and no longer received federal/state funding, who would pay the construction companies to build the roads? If you lived in a suburb you might be able to get a couple of your neighbors to chip in and pave your road (thus taxing yourself) but seeing as how none of you are likely contractors you would be hard pressed to negotiate a fair contract. Especially if we continue down the road of de-regulation. And what about Jim Bob the dairy farmer who lives on a farm 25 miles from the closest major city. He needs to have big rigs pulling in every day to keep the milk flowing. There is no way a dairy farmer is going to be able to afford the cost of maintaining 25 miles of an improved road to support semi traffic. So what's your big idea? Toll booths at every single drive way and intersection where a road changes ownership? Talk about absurd...
Do you think you will have any control over your personal records (medical, financial, etc) under a system where an entity backed by force is controlling the service that is utilizing those records? You would be incorrect to assume that.
Do you think you have any control over your personal records now? Especially medical? I'll give you a hint, the 'P' in HIPAA stands for "Portability" not privacy or protection. And as that privacy continues to erode and more and more studies link hereditary traits to higher health care costs, Insurance companies are going to look to slamming some people with significantly higher premiums or to deny them coverage all together. By switching to a socialized health care plan, you spread the risk far wider than any single insurance company ever could and can run an over all lower average premium rate. Not only that, but you scratch the 45 million un-insured people list. With a fully socialized plan you can significantly reduce overall spending by early detection and reducing unnecessary emergency room trips. That is one of the things I'm not so excited about with Obama, both Clinton and Edwards had much better plans for health care reform IMO.
I have a buddy with a newer WRX (I think an '05). And there's no way I'd fit in the back seat, and even in the front I have to kick the back angle down or I bump my head. But I'm a bit oddly built. 6' tall, but my height is all in my torso, so my sitting height is way more and an average 6' tall person. I have the Golf's seats adjusted to the lowest ride height, and the Fiero's custom seats are still a bit high for me.
Dropping the suspension on the Lotus would be impractical. It already sits ~3" off the ground, if you soften the springs even a hair and drive it down a city road you'll wind up ripping up the under carriage. My fiero is an '88 with the 2nd gen "lotus inspired" suspension. It's a PITA to get and keep the front end aligned, but man, when it's dialed in you can push it hard and deep into the corners.
The Loremo looks like a cool idea, but it appears to be a long way from a drivable product. The Aptera on the other hand, is (hopefully) going into full production this year in California. If I can keep the Fiero held together for another 2-3 years, I should be able to pick up a new Aptera here shortly after paying off the Golf.
I'm a big fan of Bio Diesel. Not from Soy though, we just can't get the volume we need. But bio-reactors and algae ponds, now there is a viable option! And WVO is a great way to have a non-petrol option right now. My TDI is still under the factory warranty, so I'm holding off on the WVO conversion and running anything over B20, but with the recent change to ULSD fuel, I've been trying to fill up on B5 to get some of the lubricity back.
-Rick
I should have clarified. The Fiero isn't the lightest car ever. But compared to a 3800lbs Grand Prix, it's a veritable feather weight. Same with the Civic and Sentra, although both of those cars scored lower on safety tests in the 80's.
Subaru also produces some really nice light cars. Given the targeted use and performance numbers, the two cars aren't that big of a stretch. I mean, honestly, when was the last time you made someone sit in the back seat of your Impreza? It's not exactly designed for heavy use... unless you are carrying midgets or children.
The Lotus is a car I love. But getting your curb weight down into the 1600 range means a lot of sacrifices, including a fair bit of crumple zones. Although the protective features in modern Lotus still makes them a very attractive car. And as much as I wish I was a 20 year old stud again, the Fiero has hard suspention, riding in a Lotus is similar, only instead of being abusing to drive on the open roads of Wisconsin, it's more like a constant flogging of your kidneys. If I had a 10 minute commute, maybe, but the Lotus really belongs on a track, not on a daily commute or in stop and go traffic.
The Fiero's space frame and modular panel system is really a cool design. From 84-87 (and a lot of the 88 parts too) they scavenged parts from other lines. I don't remember the specifics anymore, but almost every part on the 1st gen Fieros was taken from the bin of another line. Engines, cradles, suspension, breaks, etc... GM was making the Fiero as cheap as possible. Not exactly the best design for function, but it kept the price down and got a product to market.
I'm actually a follower of Aptera's new 3-wheeler. I can live with 0-60 in under 10 seconds for 100+ MPG.
-Rick
-How's that Fiero work out for carpooling?
/shrug.
Good enough to car pool my neighbor and I on a 60 mile round trip commute. Sure, it's not going to haul 8 people, go rock crawling, haul sheets of 4'x8' plywood, or tow the horse trailer, thus the reason that I also have a Golf TDI, an '87 dodge raider, and a '97 F250 super duty. A car is a tool and I use the best tool for the job. I'm not going to use a nail gun to help my latest IVR application, and I'm not going to use nUnit to fix a squeaky stair.
-Would you be willing to crash test it vs a Suburban?
I'd prefer not to, I'm rather fond of driving it. But I feel no less secure in it than in any other car from the same generation. I'd much rather crash while driving it than driving the other cars I've owned from the 80's. My '06 Golf has air bags, but structurally it performs no better than the Fiero in a front impact.
-Where do you put your children?
I put him in a car seat certified for his weight with a 5-point safety harness and seat latching mechanism. Since I don't have air bags there is no major threat to having him in a "front" seat, and with the Fiero's ample crumple zones and space-frame construction, the likelihood of him being injured in that seat is about the same as his spot in the back seat of the '06 VW Golf.
-Rick
I'd actually be tempted to take the hit in an Aptera. The front end crumple zone and cross member would likely fold under, pushing the roll cage and cockpit up and over the front of the oncoming car. Sure, the Aptera would get destroyed, and I would get knocked around pretty good, but with a solid seatbelt and well designed airbags, the odds of survival are probably not to bad.
Vehicles with roll cages and space frames have quite consistently out performed uni-body cars for passenger safety.
-Rick
Actually, VW/Audi's new automatic tranny, the DSG (Dual Shift Gate) is only slightly heavier than a traditional manual tranny and is more efficient.
It uses 2 clutches, a split fly wheel (inner and outer), and two input shafts. It can always keep 2 gears engaged with only 1 clutch engaged. Up-shifting takes a tiny fraction of a second as the two clutches switch states and the newly disengaged input shaft engages the next gear to be shifted into. Down shifts can take a hair longer, but are still in the sub-second range.
The down side though is that you can't (currently) feed it much over 250 ft-lbs of torque since the surface area on the flywheel is split between two clutches, you'll slip the clutch in no time with too much power and weight. But for a commuter car that isn't going to be taking a tuned engine and hard launches, the DSG is an amazing piece of engineering.
-Rick
-light
The '84 Pontiac Fiero had a curb weight of under 2600 lbs.
-safe
The '84-'88 Pontiac Fiero was the 2nd safest new car in crashes in the US according to government crash testing.
-cheap
The '84 Pontiac Fiero was marketed as a relatively low end commuter car.
True the Fiero was plagued by bad iron, mediocre management, and a royal frown from the GM suits. But at 27/40 MPG for a commuter car from the 80's. Even running the 2.8l v-6, 175 foot-pounds of torque is enough to get a 2600lbs car moving faster than most cars in its price range off the line.
-Rick
I'm not saying we should compromise on anything, I'm saying that there should be two sides to every action. With out any opposition, the congress becomes nothing but a yes-man to the Presidant.
We can have two (or more) political parties argueing over states rights. Some demanding that slavery is wrong and that no one should be able to hold another in bondadge, some saying that it is wrong but it is a matter for states to resolve, some who don't care but see the economic disparity that could develope between exploitive and non-exploitive work forces in different states, and heck, even some that argue for slavery.
Slight compromises possible, but by and large, someone gets what they want, and someone doesn't. And those decisions are made by the people who have been elected by the people to represent the people. If the people want slavery to end, and their elected party doesn't, then the people will vote for a party that does.
I do not think that these parties should get together and compromise so that slavery is only leagel on every second tuesday or some other completely absurd agreement. But I do think that if any one of them were allowed to make the decision solely by themselves, the US would be in a far worse place than it is now.
I do not believe that the US would be any better served by a Democrat Presidant and Congress than it would be a Republican party, or even an 'independant' group (although the idea of a unified independant political party is quite humorous). I would love to see MORE political groups with more clearly defined political differences, not this BS the media drums up to build ratings.
-Rick
So we should have ONLY the anti-slavery (Centralized control) or the slavery (states rights) party? And that 1 party should control everything out right? If we went entirely with the anti-slavery political group, states rights would be completely eroded (even more so than they already have) and the president/legislature would have significantly more power as we would tip closer to a Unitarian executive or dictatorship over time. Had we gone the other way, irreconcilable differences (ie: Slavery) would continue to tear the states apart and the country would have likely split, possible a number of times.
So yes, even in the slavery issue, if you look at the political powers acting upon the issue, it is a balance between the two that is needed.
That is also one of the primary reason's I'm not entirely keen on a Dem congress AND president. Right now IMO the President has too much power. For the last 30 years the congress has been losing ground as the Presidents (both republican and Democrat) have chipped away more and more power. Bush is just a symptom of the underlying problem of excess powers in the executive branch. The best solution is either a president with enough foresight to think about the future of the government, possible future leaders of our nation, and the balls to sign off some of those excessive powers. Sure it's great that they pledge not to use signing statements, but the current candidates pledge won't prevent their future abuse again. I'd be hard pressed to imagine much of any of the current possibilities as willing to forgo power for the future of the country.
With out that, the best option is a politically opposed Executive and Legislative branch where there will at least be some oversight going back and forth (like making sure a country is REALY a threat before invading... dur) and some limitation of abuse.
-Rick
Okay, so the bill would have explicitly prevented the CIA from using harsh interrogation techniques. It would force them to abide by the same limitations that the military follows. That hardly makes them a branch of the military. Hell, they could just photo copy the Military version and apply that as a new bill, but that would require maintenance, review, and oversight on two seperate standards. Using the same standard, especially when the two groups are often intertwined in their affairs over seas just makes sense.
So McCain is against Waterboarding, but the CIA is free to continue using it because the current administration doesn't agree that it is torture. And a lot of other techniques are in the gray area as well. Hell there was a leaked document earlier this spring in which an aide wrote that crushing a child's testicles infront of his parents could be a justifyable interogation technique. Which, so long as the White House says that's not torture, the CIA is free to do.
To blindly say "I oppose torture" but then to pass up an oppertunity to DO SOMETHING about it says significantly more about McCains character than the pandering he does.
Also, I never said McCain was FOR toture, I said he flip-floped on it and that he is manipulated. He personally may be very much opposed to it, but he is going to toe the party line to get republic and right wing votes, while pandering to the left to pull in the independants and liberals.
I also claim no knowledge of McCain's offspring, I have never seen any proof the Obama was Muslim, or any of the other completely bogus claims being made on either side of the isle.
-Rick
Lesser of two evils my friend. Do we vote to rob Peter to pay Paul enough to scrape by, or do we vote to rob Peter to pay for the incarseration of Paul?
Either way, society as a whole has a responsibilty for its members continued existance and not just Paul's. If Paul shoots Peter and takes his wallet, society has failed in its responsibility to Peter, and in order to limit any further failures, Paul would be locked up entirely at our cost. If through programs like welfare, unemployment insurance, public education, etc... we can reduce the chance that Paul will shoot Peter, and thus reduce the chance that Paul will be locked up for the rest of his life. Not only does this improve the society as a whole, but it also reduces the overall cost to each individual member of the society.
A penny spent is a pound saved. Although with the current exchange rate it's more like 1/2 a pound.
-Rick
Correction: McCain WAS the most anti-torture candidate. Until he had the oppertunity to vote against allowing the CIA to use "harsh interrogation techniques" that meet the UN's definition of torture. At which point he toed the party line, and voted to allow the CIA to waterboard and use other combinations of intense questioning methods.
And that is McCain's weak spot. He spent the late 90's and early 2000's building up a GREAT maveric image, heck, John Kerry talked to him about a VP seat in the 2004 election! But since then, McCain has flip flopped on almost every stance he took out of line with the Republican party. Campaign finance reform, Gay marrage, Torture, even the war he has been pretty fishie on.
John McCain from 1999 would have been a great option instead of Bush. John McCain from 2003 would have been a great option instead of Bush. But at this point, he is so manipulated and has gone back on so many of his 'maveric' stances, that he's losing the independant voters and me along with them.
-Rick
You are telling me that any of those three have voting records that compare at all to Rus Feingold?
Hell, between Hillary and Barack, the only major difference in their voting history is the war on Iraq. That 1 vote is the only thing keeping Hillary from also being labeled as "The most liberal Senator" yet I haven't heard a peep about the right wing media calling her a liberal zealot.
No, those "most liberal" reports come from a republican party backed think tank and have consistently redefined their metric just as front runners are coming out that skew the results heavily to who ever is the largest threat. The report is just a political tool used to spread FUD.
-Rick
Do you want to be forced to pay pennies of your income to help my neighboors, or do you want them to turn to a life of crime to support themselves and wind up in a prison where you will be forced to pay dollars of your income to support them?
Public education, social responsibility, and the empowerment of all will help you more significantly than isolating yourself from society.
I'm not saying we should go all commie or socialist over here, but a balanced struggle between socialist and capitalist (and many other!) points of view in our government is what keeps it healthy. Falling in the trap of a single party (even a dual party like we have now) reduces our government's health.
-Rick
Ruby is interesting and all, but I would hardly call its "buzzword" presence in the private sector "commanding". I don't think I'd even venture so far as to call it "significant".
-Rick
Your post just reminded me of my all time favorite t-shirt slogan from the Onion:
"Your favorite band sucks."
-Rick
Sure, R3 may disolve before it can file a civil suit, but I imagine the US goverment will hold together long enough to bring criminal charges against MediaDefender.
DOS attacks are a felony. People go to jail for committing felonies.
R3 can sue, in addition to the criminal charges brought forward by the state, in order to recoup any damages sustained by the attack, but even if they don't, MD still has to face the federal government for breaking the law.
-Rick
Thank you for answering the question. A truly informative, well thought out, and highly insightful post. I'm sure with your great advice the asker will make great strides in his project. And following along your high standards more technical solutions and products will be introduced to the market.
Thank you,
-Rick
At first I thought the thieves who had stolen his identity were suing lifelock under his name.
Now THAT would have been grand.
-Rick
I would really enjoy to have a debate with you on that topic, but alas, you are an annonymous coward. Post with a name and I will gladly trade points with you.
-Rick
I would recommend flipping through the data and reports available from the World Health Organization (http://www.who.int/research/en/). I would pull up some specific samples for you, but my net connection is sucking ass this morning. On the linked page though there is a color coded map showing Maternal Mortality Rates. You'll notice that Canada and pretty much all of Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan are all colored Blue indicating less than 10 deaths per 100k. Almost all of these nations provide either socialized health care, or programs in which the government pays for over 50% of the annual medical expenses per capita. The US on the other hand, is colored green, indicating 10-200 deaths per 100k.
It's been a while since I've looked in detail, but IIRC, the US ranks 32nd for over all average healthy life expectancy. Of the 31 countries that beat us in that measure, I believe 26 of them have socialized health care or other programs covering over half of the medical costs. The remaining 5 are privatized, but have a per capita spending that is a fraction of our own.
For the total health care related per capita expenditures in the US, you could pay the medical needs of 2-5 people in many of the other socialized health care countries.
We pay more than anyone else on the planet for our health care, and our healthy life spans are shorter than most developed nations.
Now, this is all a correlation, not necessarily a causation, but given the performance of socialized health care systems for other nations, and the performance of our privatized system here, it would be who of us to investigate implementing a number of those programs here in order to get a grip on our costs and improve our services.
-Rick
If my web page has hand picked adds on it that I get revenue from for click throughs, and Charter inserts adds into my page that offer similar or competing brands, I, as the website owner, can suffer financially. If Charter inserts adds that my visitors find offensive and they decide against using my service, I can suffer financially. If Charter inserts adds into my website and I have a contractual obligation to provide my users with an advertisement free environment, I could be liable (even if I could pass the buck in court, it would require a significant investment to do so).
If Charter wants to advertise on my website, they can contact me about licensing. To do anything else would be infringing on my rights. Although, I am not a lawyer, I do not know exactly what rights those are, but someone, somewhere has to have run into a similar situation and created some precedence in the US.
-Rick
Disregarding all political and ethical concerns about such a project, looking just at the technical:
1) You have just made a military target for every would be hacker, script kiddie, federally funded cyber opp, etc... in the world to try to crack. Do you think China would just sit there and say "Eh, it's made by the US, it must be uncrackable, so we won't even bother". Of course not, they would set some serious resources aside to crack this thing.
2) WHEN it gets cracked, and it will get cracked, you have just handed off control of your military owned botnet to the attacker. Depending on the nature of the botnet, and its deployment, you may have just handed over access to hardware on your networks.
3) All security is vulnerable given a sufficient amount of time and money, and in this case it's not like people are going to be jumping up and down warning you that your security has been cracked (except perhaps a few MIT guys who are promptly arrested and shipped to GITMO as enemy cyber combatants). The only way to fight against this is constant development and deployment, continuous improvement and rotation ensuring minimal windows for any given attack vector. In addition to the pure strain on your development team such a challenge would present you also have the logistical nightmare of trying to keep all of your infected machines up to date, and the constant risk that every code change represents the opportunity for an untested bug to be released.
This is one huge stinking pile of BAD IDEA. If the military really wants access to such a thing, their best option would be to find an existing bot-net operator out of Russia, or a disgruntled Chinese hacker and purchase attack time off of their bot-nets.
Same reward, lower cost, lower risk, better option.
-Rick