Organic food tends to be better because it is more expensive. People that are willing to pay a premium for health or environmental reasons also tend to be willing to pay a premium for quality. So I would say that generally organic food *is* better than "conventional" food (especially stuff like pre-packaged foods). But if you find a store that sells conventional food of the same quality as most organic food, you can get it good and cheap. It's the best of both worlds (at least for those of us that think organic food is a crock). If you live in the Southwest I can't recommend Sunflower Farmer's Market highly enough. Great produce, great meat, high quality, low prices, it's a cool little grocery store.
Ditto on the D.C. beltway. I don't understand people who slowdown for bridges or curves. It's not going to kill you to take the curve at 65mph. That's why the sign says 65 - because it was designed for high-speed travel. (duh)
I work at a ski resort in Utah and we often have tourists who come from flat states and get absolutely terrified of driving in the mountains. Even on a road that is in good shape during the summer, they will often go 10-15 miles an hour under the speed limit (which is only 40) because they are anxious. That would be just fine, but they don't turn off the side of the road and let normal traffic past.
Just because there are mountain peaks near you doesn't mean physics no longer applies. You're not suddenly going to lose traction and fly off the road. And if you're doing 40 mph up a 6% grade on a dry asphalt road you can stop almost immediately. Very frustrating since driving up that road is my commute.
Just because there are issues with nuclear (and despite your strawman, nobody with knowledge of the subject thinks there isn't) doesn't mean it isn't the most effective and clean option we have to meet our energy needs. How much do you have to spend to clean up a decommissioned coal plant? How many environmental cleanups and Superfund sites are from coal power plants and their waste?
IMHO one of the main reasons the big four record industry goes through such dramatic slumps is because they do not pursue hardcore music fans. They make so much money off of blockbuster albums that they ignore building up a diverse portfolio of talented musicians that are consistently profitable but will never sell millions of records. They only market and promote music that teenagers or preteens like, or bands that are already famous. Everything else they pretty much leave alone. Even though very few artists can sell above 100,000 let alone a million, their business model relies on the albums that sell 500,000 or 2 million. It does not take into account artists that are selling 10-20,000 albums.
The "Wal-Mart" music fan is fickle. They're not going to come into the store every week to make a new purchase. They might purchase 2 or 3 albums a year. When they get interested in something else, they might stop listening to your music or pirate it instead. The hardcore fans are what keep records stores and record companies in business when the masses are doing something else.
90% of the new music hardcore music fans and critics listen to and talk about is released on independent labels. Most innovation and originality comes out of bands on independent labels. Independents are doing better financially than they ever have, and are taking market share (although still very small compared to the majors). The major labels have more or less completely stopped releasing classical music, bluegrass, folk, jazz, gospel, soul, or anything else with a small but loyal customer base. With the current strategy they occasionally get the Pussycat Dolls or Taylor Swift, where they spend a tiny amount recording an album and make millions. But when they miss with the blockbusters they get in trouble because the custoemrs they rely on the most have absolutely no loyalty.
Add to that the fact that they treat even their best-selling artists like crap (see Radiohead with EMI or Trent Reznor with Universal) and it's no wonder they have trouble making money. If they want to cut costs they should fire their terrible management and hire people that understand digital distribution, customer service, and basic human decency at a fraction of the cost of the current management.
Working- and lower-class people in the US have diets dominated by heavy starches, red meat, high fructose corn syrup, and heavy food additives. The middle and upper classes, especially on the coasts, have diets dominated by fresh vegetables and seafood, and usually can afford the time and energy to go to the gym, etc..
Can we please stop splitting the US up this way? Whether or not you live next to an ocean has no correlation with obesity, education, income, poverty, or anything else.
Here is a map of adult overweight/obesity rates by state. Here is a map showing the rate of childhood overweight/obesity rates. The trends seem to be regional, with the West and Northwest having the lowest rates and the Midwest and South having the highest. Notice that Colorado and Utah have lower obesity rates than New York, California, or Washington. Your first point about income level is closer to the truth, but as thesemaps show, it is not even close to a direct correlation. Many more factors are involved.
At least with an original movie, even if it is a total bomb there is room for original thought, even if it is a lousy thought.
I disagree with you here. There are plenty of original movies that don't have a single original thought, and many remakes are more creative and interesting than the source material. I find it ironic that you claim the Batman reboot is successful because it goes back to the darkness of the source material, because that source material was itself a reboot. Batman before Frank Miller and Alan Moore in the 80's was not very dark or even "serious" material.
Certainly the history of a movie/comic/whatever series dictates a lot of what can be done with a remake (i.e. the Fantastic Four could never be made into a dark movie) but there is still plenty of room to be creative.
What really matters is if there are talented people involved trying to make a movie interesting and thoughtful. Whether you have an original idea or an existing idea is mostly irrelevant. Year One was as thoroughly mediocre and half-assed as Land of the Lost, so what does it matter that one was based on an old TV show?
Sadly I think it is because nobody in Hollywood has had an original idea in ages. I mean, with the exception of the Batman reset can you think of any remakes that didn't suck the big wet titty?
Many of the greatest movies of all time have been remakes. The Magnificent Seven, The Maltese Falcon, Gone With the Wind, and The Thin Red Line all come to mind but I'm sure there are others. The Thing is one of the greatest horror movies of all time and it's a remake. Most horror and sci-fi movies of any quality are at least "influenced" by older movies, and are usually blatant knockoffs.
Some recent remakes have been pretty good but unspectacular: 3:10 to Yuma, Dawn of the Dead, Ocean's Eleven, Disturbia, The Ring, Sweeney Todd.
And then there are movies based on books. The Godfather, All Quiet on the Western Front, Schindler's List, Wizard of Oz, Psycho, Blade Runner, etc. are all based on novels. Movies like Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, or Once Upon a Time in the West are technically original, but are more or less the chopped up and reassembled forms of dozens of different movies.
Basically, Hollywood has always done this, and it's always been a mixed bag. Do I wish they would have put more effort and made something better than My Bloody Valentine 3D or Bewitched? Sure, but it's not like they would make another Citizen Kane with that money instead.
Originality is overrated. Quality movies are quality movies, no matter where the idea comes from.
Do you really think the reason voice actors get paid as much as they do is because they are recognizable? What have you been smoking? Even for the most recognizable actors in the most recognizable shows (say Hank Azaria, Trey Parker, Seth McFarlane, Billy West, etc.) 99% of the people who watch the show couldn't even tell you the name of the actor or what voices they do. I doubt they would be bothered if the studio brought in a replica voice.
Voice acting is extremely difficult, and some of these people are absolute masters of the craft. They definitely deserve what small amount of acclaim they receive.
And FYI, most writers have a lot of respect the voice actors. The Simpsons team refused to go back to work after the studio lowballed the voice actors, and forced Fox to raise their salaries. The writers know how important the actors are.
How hard would it be to write an algorithm to cut and paste the correct words (picking the correct word inflection based on word placement in the sentence/context - presumably there are angry, happy, elated, monotone versions of most words, and the sound files can be edited to convincingly make them sound in context) together?
Very, very hard. Synthesized voices are absolutely horrible at capturing proper inflection and tone. They can't even get a customer service menu to sound remotely human, let alone get the timing and creativity needed for good comedy.
A lot of times the voice actor is recast because those running the shows didn't like the voice in the first place. Other times they just don't care enough to bother.
I'm pretty sure most people don't notice anyway. I was watching Family Guy one time with a bunch of guys that were all "big fans" who had seen every episode and half didn't even know they changed the voice of Meg after the first season.
Usually everyone does it. Kids that don't do it in some places might be chastised (and have been in the past) but nobody's actually required to do it. It's more of a social thing, such as how you are supposed to face and salute the flag when the national anthem is played. I'm sure it seems strange to someone who's not from here, but it sounds a lot creepier than it actually is.
Full text of the pledge of allegiance: "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
The US is a much more openly patriotic country than European countries, for better or worse. It's part jingoism, part honest patriotism, and partly a way to indoctrinate new immigrants. The pledge of allegiance was created around the same time as many of our national myths (Paul Revere, Thanksgiving, etc.), and was part of a conscious effort to create a universal American culture that could be easily taught to the growing and increasingly diverse American population.
There is nothing in the act itself that suggests a hate crime (any more than someone knocking over a 7-11 with a sikh cashier is likely to be a hate crime against sikhs).
Except that the perpetrator of the crime was a well-known white supremacist who had a long history of violent crime and published anti-semitic and neo-nazi literature, including denial of the holocaust. He had served prison time in the past for attempted attack on a federal building, and his views and motivations for that attack (based largely on his neo-nazi racist views) were widely published by him. I saw reports, although I don't know if they were true, that he had expressed interest in performing a racially motivated killing before he died.
That's not to suggest that I support the separate classification of hate crimes. Murder is illegal, assault is illegal, intimidation and harrassment are illegal, and conspiracy to commit those crimes are illegal. To advocate a separate category of crimes based largely on the perpetrator's political or racial views seems ridiculous. But under the common definition of a hate crime, this certainly fits.
If you want to say he should be apologized to more than any other persecuted gay person because he was somehow more useful to the government than the others, that also doesn't make any sense.
It does, though. I don't think anyone would suggest that the UK government apologize to Turing and Turing alone, but singling him out as a symbol of the terrible things done to homosexuals at the time isn't unfair. His torture and eventual suicide have become symbolic for what hideously repressive things were done to homosexuals back then, at least to the small percentage of people who know and care of such things.
Remember, society is all about symbolism and people care about symbolic gestures very much. Alan Turing wouldn't be the first person to be made into a symbol of repression. Rosa Parks wasn't the first black woman told to move to the front of the bus, but it wasn't unfair to single her out and give her a state funeral. Nelson Mandela wasn't the only black leader imprisoned in South Africa, but he was the symbol of apartheid and elected to be president in 1994. Muhammad Ali wasn't the only draft dodger to be stripped of his livelihood and publicly ridiculed, but his was the case that went to the US Supreme Court.
I'm stating that if something was thought to of been legal, no matter how they reached that conclusion, they were getting a legal tap even though later they found it to be illegal.
That's absolutely, completely wrong. So very, very, very, very, very wrong. Whether or not you *believe* something to be illegal has no effect on whether it *is* legal, even if you're the president. And even if they acted in good faith, they can't use that defense because they didn't have a proper inquiry as to the legality of the wiretapping program.
And all the secrecy was because it was a secret program. You don't real go around asking everyone if this secrete program is legal, then it wouldn't be a secret anymore.
Bullshit. We're not talking about asking Joe Schmoe's public practice for legal advice. We're talking about the highest-ranking government officials here. You can ask the Justice Department and Attorney General to review the legality of a program, that's their job, and they're just as trustworthy as the administration or intelligence agencies that ran the programs.
Looks like the administration didn't check their blindspot as well as you think. It appears that the wiretapping program was approved in the same way most decisions in the administration were approved. They made their decisions, then cherrypicked the evidence and strongarmed those that disagreed with those decisions.
From the linked article:
The investigation stopped short of assessing whether the wiretapping program broke the law that required the Justice Department to get a court-ordered warrant before it could wiretap Americans' communications. But the report did find that legal reviews were often short-circuited or kept to such a small number of officials in the government that adequate review could not be conducted.
For instance, the report said that John Yoo, a lawyer in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, gave the White House his first legal opinion endorsing the wiretapping in November 2001, weeks after the program had already begun, and that his boss, Jay Bybee, was not even aware of the program.
Moreover, John Ashcroft, attorney general at the time, gave his legal authorization to the program for the first two-and-a-half years based on a "misimpression" of what activities the N.S.A. was actually conducting. The legal problems led to a showdown at Mr. Ashcroft's hospital room in March 2004, when top Justice Department officials refused to sign off on the legality of the program and threatened to resign.
Nonetheless, the report said, the White House allowed the program to continue the program by having Mr. Ashcroft's successor as attorney general, Alberto R. Gonzales, sign the authorization.
FYI, they don't believe they're eating his flesh symbolically. They think they are actually eating his body and drinking his blood. Literally. Even though it's just a cracker and some wine.
We're not talking about different notions of justice and social harmony here. They don't have to have the same government and society as us, but everyone should be guaranteed basic human dignities such as freedom of speech, press, religion, assembly, protest, fair trial, petition, etc. I am pretty impressed with the progress China has made in the last 30 years, but that doesn't mean they don't deserve criticism. But plenty of countries have gone through hard times and the ravages of war without turning into totalitarian states.
Just look at what they are doing in Xinjiang right now. They repress Uiger culture and language, while forbidding Muslims from worshiping freely. The Han ethnic group has been encouraged to migrate in and are given preference for jobs. They are systematically destroying a culture. That is racial and cultural oppression, not "different notions about justice."
And can we stop with the 5000 year old civilization nonsense? It's not like they've been stable for that whole time period. And only in retrospect can the vast array of civilizations that existed in that area of East Asia over the last 5000 years ago be called Chinese. They've had empires rise and collapse, gained and lost vast swaths of territory, been invaded and conquered multiple times, had entire systems of governments collapse, religions appear, spread, and disappear. They aren't any more or less stable than any other ancient civilization, they just started earlier.
Spending time talking to people in Azeroth is not as socially healthy as talking to people face to face. It's healthier than spending time in front of a tv or book.
You need pretty big qualifiers if you are going to make those statements and expect anyone to take you seriously.
I don't think you're right. I imagine that most people that stay home do so with their family and friends (the physically proximate kind), much like it's always been. I'm a young person and everybody I know is constantly on facebook, IM/chat, dating sites, etc. and we still go out and meet up constantly. The internet for our generation is a tool that facilitates physical interaction, not inhibits it.
As for the people with social problems, these things have always existed. The internet may be an outlet for people who experience social problems, but I think it's a stretch to say that it can cause social anxiety and the like. I would have to see some pretty solid evidence supporting that before I would believe it.
Use and profit are positively correlated up to a certain point, after which the increased cost of bandwidth and licensing are no longer offset by increased revenue. Pandora has determined that happens after forty hours a month. I would imagine this has to do with Pandora's revenue coming at least partly from purchases or click-throughs, as the profitability from that would diminish the longer a user listened to Pandora. It also probably means that advertising on the main page is sold per user, per page view, or at a flat rate rather than being based on listening/viewing time.
A somewhat useful analogy would be the Neflix business model, where customers become unprofitable if they fully utilize the service (although major differences exist of course). It's difficult to know the exact details of their business model without hearing from somebody inside the company, however.
Modern democracy may be based on Judeo-Christian principles. But so were monarchies, dictatorships, theocracies, feudal states, slave states, apartheid states, genocidal states, etc.
As much as I dislike religion (I don't think I need to go into why), it is a powerful force for good as well as evil. Just as any human institution can be a powerful force for good or evil. Equal amounts of good and evil are done by the religious and non-religious alike.
Speaking as an armchair theologian, AFAIK there isn't any belief of early Christianity that can't be directly correlated with a pagan religious tradition, whether it be from the Greek and Thracian culture or various "Middle Eastern" religions/folklores. Early Christianity can easily be viewed as a synthesis of Judaism and pagan religion/folklore.
Co-option and synthesis has been a major theme of Christianity from the very beginning through modern times. St. Augustine's writings were heavily influenced by the Manichean religion he followed as a younger man. The Catholic Church, when evangelizing around the world, consciously co-opted aspects of pagan religions in order to convert the pagans to Christianity. Common examples in our society would be Christmas, Easter, the Virgin of Guadalupe, etc. Some of the major dogmatic changes the Catholic Church underwent in the early 2nd millennium were caused mainly by the rediscovery and synthesis of pre-Christian ideas (most famously Aristotle), which led to the Renaissance and Reformation.
It's a silly question to ask what is left of early Christianity after removing Paul's personal theology. Since he wrote the earliest dogma that has survived and been accepted into modern Christianity, and later authors (such as those that wrote the gospels) almost certainly read his writings, his letters (from our perspective) can be viewed as the beginnings of Christianity. Paul's version of Christianity is the earliest version that we know. Unless we find writings earlier than Paul's (unlikely) the epistles are the furthest we can look back, and anything else is just extrapolating and generalizing about pre-Christian influence on the religion.
Yes, with the current arsenal the US and Russia have now, we could more or less destroy human civilization. If we only had a couple dozen warheads, it would still be enough to produce deterrence and military superiority, but not enough to turn every major city of the world into a parking lot.
In case you did not know, the massive nuclear buildup by the US in the 1950's and 1960's was largely based on incomplete intelligence and a great deal of incompetence by the Eisenhower and (much less so) the Kennedy administrations. Although McNamara recognized that the US had a large advantage in both nuclear warheads and delivery systems, he still continued the massive buildup in nuclear weapons started by Eisenhower and pushed the idea of mutually assured destruction. It led to the greatest period of nuclear tension we ever had, and almost led us to nuclear war.
In the 1950's the US thought the Soviets were greatly increasing their nuclear arsenal in order to gain first strike capabilities. This was false and not supported by strong intelligence, and many in the Eisenhower administration did not take proper precautions to ensure this was correct. The US initiated a period of nuclear proliferation that was understandably viewed by the Soviets as an attempt to gain first strike capability, and they quickly followed suit with their own nuclear buildup.
Mr. McNamara did not abandon the idea of massive retaliation, he actually advanced it. He said himself said (paraphrasing) that it was pure luck that we did not end up in a nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis. He also continued the ludicrous notion of the domino theory which led to the escalation of the Vietnam War under his command.
Also, (taken from the NY Times book review of his autobiography) he realized relatively early in the Vietnam war that it could not be won by military force, but did not fight for his opinion and didn't take a public stance on that position until the 1990's. He and the Kennedy/Johnson/Nixon administrations destroyed the common trust and confidence in our government, which still has far-reaching consequences today. He oversaw one of the largest expansions of the US military in history, which can be directly traced to our ridiculous defense policy and budget today.
Mr. McNamara was a brilliant man, but he is a symbol of how arrogance and loyalty to authority dragged our country to the brink of destruction. Combined with his (and the rest of the government's) mismanagement of the Vietnam War, Mr. McNamara is certainly not a politician that will be missed by me.
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Organic food tends to be better because it is more expensive. People that are willing to pay a premium for health or environmental reasons also tend to be willing to pay a premium for quality. So I would say that generally organic food *is* better than "conventional" food (especially stuff like pre-packaged foods). But if you find a store that sells conventional food of the same quality as most organic food, you can get it good and cheap. It's the best of both worlds (at least for those of us that think organic food is a crock). If you live in the Southwest I can't recommend Sunflower Farmer's Market highly enough. Great produce, great meat, high quality, low prices, it's a cool little grocery store.
I work at a ski resort in Utah and we often have tourists who come from flat states and get absolutely terrified of driving in the mountains. Even on a road that is in good shape during the summer, they will often go 10-15 miles an hour under the speed limit (which is only 40) because they are anxious. That would be just fine, but they don't turn off the side of the road and let normal traffic past.
Just because there are mountain peaks near you doesn't mean physics no longer applies. You're not suddenly going to lose traction and fly off the road. And if you're doing 40 mph up a 6% grade on a dry asphalt road you can stop almost immediately. Very frustrating since driving up that road is my commute.
Just because there are issues with nuclear (and despite your strawman, nobody with knowledge of the subject thinks there isn't) doesn't mean it isn't the most effective and clean option we have to meet our energy needs. How much do you have to spend to clean up a decommissioned coal plant? How many environmental cleanups and Superfund sites are from coal power plants and their waste?
IMHO one of the main reasons the big four record industry goes through such dramatic slumps is because they do not pursue hardcore music fans. They make so much money off of blockbuster albums that they ignore building up a diverse portfolio of talented musicians that are consistently profitable but will never sell millions of records. They only market and promote music that teenagers or preteens like, or bands that are already famous. Everything else they pretty much leave alone. Even though very few artists can sell above 100,000 let alone a million, their business model relies on the albums that sell 500,000 or 2 million. It does not take into account artists that are selling 10-20,000 albums.
The "Wal-Mart" music fan is fickle. They're not going to come into the store every week to make a new purchase. They might purchase 2 or 3 albums a year. When they get interested in something else, they might stop listening to your music or pirate it instead. The hardcore fans are what keep records stores and record companies in business when the masses are doing something else.
90% of the new music hardcore music fans and critics listen to and talk about is released on independent labels. Most innovation and originality comes out of bands on independent labels. Independents are doing better financially than they ever have, and are taking market share (although still very small compared to the majors). The major labels have more or less completely stopped releasing classical music, bluegrass, folk, jazz, gospel, soul, or anything else with a small but loyal customer base. With the current strategy they occasionally get the Pussycat Dolls or Taylor Swift, where they spend a tiny amount recording an album and make millions. But when they miss with the blockbusters they get in trouble because the custoemrs they rely on the most have absolutely no loyalty.
Add to that the fact that they treat even their best-selling artists like crap (see Radiohead with EMI or Trent Reznor with Universal) and it's no wonder they have trouble making money. If they want to cut costs they should fire their terrible management and hire people that understand digital distribution, customer service, and basic human decency at a fraction of the cost of the current management.
Can we please stop splitting the US up this way? Whether or not you live next to an ocean has no correlation with obesity, education, income, poverty, or anything else.
Here is a map of adult overweight/obesity rates by state. Here is a map showing the rate of childhood overweight/obesity rates. The trends seem to be regional, with the West and Northwest having the lowest rates and the Midwest and South having the highest. Notice that Colorado and Utah have lower obesity rates than New York, California, or Washington. Your first point about income level is closer to the truth, but as these maps show, it is not even close to a direct correlation. Many more factors are involved.
I disagree with you here. There are plenty of original movies that don't have a single original thought, and many remakes are more creative and interesting than the source material. I find it ironic that you claim the Batman reboot is successful because it goes back to the darkness of the source material, because that source material was itself a reboot. Batman before Frank Miller and Alan Moore in the 80's was not very dark or even "serious" material.
Certainly the history of a movie/comic/whatever series dictates a lot of what can be done with a remake (i.e. the Fantastic Four could never be made into a dark movie) but there is still plenty of room to be creative.
What really matters is if there are talented people involved trying to make a movie interesting and thoughtful. Whether you have an original idea or an existing idea is mostly irrelevant. Year One was as thoroughly mediocre and half-assed as Land of the Lost, so what does it matter that one was based on an old TV show?
Many of the greatest movies of all time have been remakes. The Magnificent Seven, The Maltese Falcon, Gone With the Wind, and The Thin Red Line all come to mind but I'm sure there are others. The Thing is one of the greatest horror movies of all time and it's a remake. Most horror and sci-fi movies of any quality are at least "influenced" by older movies, and are usually blatant knockoffs.
Some recent remakes have been pretty good but unspectacular: 3:10 to Yuma, Dawn of the Dead, Ocean's Eleven, Disturbia, The Ring, Sweeney Todd.
And then there are movies based on books. The Godfather, All Quiet on the Western Front, Schindler's List, Wizard of Oz, Psycho, Blade Runner, etc. are all based on novels. Movies like Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, or Once Upon a Time in the West are technically original, but are more or less the chopped up and reassembled forms of dozens of different movies.
Basically, Hollywood has always done this, and it's always been a mixed bag. Do I wish they would have put more effort and made something better than My Bloody Valentine 3D or Bewitched? Sure, but it's not like they would make another Citizen Kane with that money instead.
Originality is overrated. Quality movies are quality movies, no matter where the idea comes from.
Do you really think the reason voice actors get paid as much as they do is because they are recognizable? What have you been smoking? Even for the most recognizable actors in the most recognizable shows (say Hank Azaria, Trey Parker, Seth McFarlane, Billy West, etc.) 99% of the people who watch the show couldn't even tell you the name of the actor or what voices they do. I doubt they would be bothered if the studio brought in a replica voice.
Voice acting is extremely difficult, and some of these people are absolute masters of the craft. They definitely deserve what small amount of acclaim they receive.
And FYI, most writers have a lot of respect the voice actors. The Simpsons team refused to go back to work after the studio lowballed the voice actors, and forced Fox to raise their salaries. The writers know how important the actors are.
Very, very hard. Synthesized voices are absolutely horrible at capturing proper inflection and tone. They can't even get a customer service menu to sound remotely human, let alone get the timing and creativity needed for good comedy.
A lot of times the voice actor is recast because those running the shows didn't like the voice in the first place. Other times they just don't care enough to bother.
I'm pretty sure most people don't notice anyway. I was watching Family Guy one time with a bunch of guys that were all "big fans" who had seen every episode and half didn't even know they changed the voice of Meg after the first season.
Usually everyone does it. Kids that don't do it in some places might be chastised (and have been in the past) but nobody's actually required to do it. It's more of a social thing, such as how you are supposed to face and salute the flag when the national anthem is played. I'm sure it seems strange to someone who's not from here, but it sounds a lot creepier than it actually is.
Full text of the pledge of allegiance: "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
The US is a much more openly patriotic country than European countries, for better or worse. It's part jingoism, part honest patriotism, and partly a way to indoctrinate new immigrants. The pledge of allegiance was created around the same time as many of our national myths (Paul Revere, Thanksgiving, etc.), and was part of a conscious effort to create a universal American culture that could be easily taught to the growing and increasingly diverse American population.
Except that the perpetrator of the crime was a well-known white supremacist who had a long history of violent crime and published anti-semitic and neo-nazi literature, including denial of the holocaust. He had served prison time in the past for attempted attack on a federal building, and his views and motivations for that attack (based largely on his neo-nazi racist views) were widely published by him. I saw reports, although I don't know if they were true, that he had expressed interest in performing a racially motivated killing before he died.
That's not to suggest that I support the separate classification of hate crimes. Murder is illegal, assault is illegal, intimidation and harrassment are illegal, and conspiracy to commit those crimes are illegal. To advocate a separate category of crimes based largely on the perpetrator's political or racial views seems ridiculous. But under the common definition of a hate crime, this certainly fits.
It does, though. I don't think anyone would suggest that the UK government apologize to Turing and Turing alone, but singling him out as a symbol of the terrible things done to homosexuals at the time isn't unfair. His torture and eventual suicide have become symbolic for what hideously repressive things were done to homosexuals back then, at least to the small percentage of people who know and care of such things.
Remember, society is all about symbolism and people care about symbolic gestures very much. Alan Turing wouldn't be the first person to be made into a symbol of repression. Rosa Parks wasn't the first black woman told to move to the front of the bus, but it wasn't unfair to single her out and give her a state funeral. Nelson Mandela wasn't the only black leader imprisoned in South Africa, but he was the symbol of apartheid and elected to be president in 1994. Muhammad Ali wasn't the only draft dodger to be stripped of his livelihood and publicly ridiculed, but his was the case that went to the US Supreme Court.
That's absolutely, completely wrong. So very, very, very, very, very wrong. Whether or not you *believe* something to be illegal has no effect on whether it *is* legal, even if you're the president. And even if they acted in good faith, they can't use that defense because they didn't have a proper inquiry as to the legality of the wiretapping program.
Bullshit. We're not talking about asking Joe Schmoe's public practice for legal advice. We're talking about the highest-ranking government officials here. You can ask the Justice Department and Attorney General to review the legality of a program, that's their job, and they're just as trustworthy as the administration or intelligence agencies that ran the programs.
Looks like the administration didn't check their blindspot as well as you think. It appears that the wiretapping program was approved in the same way most decisions in the administration were approved. They made their decisions, then cherrypicked the evidence and strongarmed those that disagreed with those decisions.
From the linked article:
FYI, they don't believe they're eating his flesh symbolically. They think they are actually eating his body and drinking his blood. Literally. Even though it's just a cracker and some wine.
We're not talking about different notions of justice and social harmony here. They don't have to have the same government and society as us, but everyone should be guaranteed basic human dignities such as freedom of speech, press, religion, assembly, protest, fair trial, petition, etc. I am pretty impressed with the progress China has made in the last 30 years, but that doesn't mean they don't deserve criticism. But plenty of countries have gone through hard times and the ravages of war without turning into totalitarian states.
Just look at what they are doing in Xinjiang right now. They repress Uiger culture and language, while forbidding Muslims from worshiping freely. The Han ethnic group has been encouraged to migrate in and are given preference for jobs. They are systematically destroying a culture. That is racial and cultural oppression, not "different notions about justice."
And can we stop with the 5000 year old civilization nonsense? It's not like they've been stable for that whole time period. And only in retrospect can the vast array of civilizations that existed in that area of East Asia over the last 5000 years ago be called Chinese. They've had empires rise and collapse, gained and lost vast swaths of territory, been invaded and conquered multiple times, had entire systems of governments collapse, religions appear, spread, and disappear. They aren't any more or less stable than any other ancient civilization, they just started earlier.
You need pretty big qualifiers if you are going to make those statements and expect anyone to take you seriously.
I don't think you're right. I imagine that most people that stay home do so with their family and friends (the physically proximate kind), much like it's always been. I'm a young person and everybody I know is constantly on facebook, IM/chat, dating sites, etc. and we still go out and meet up constantly. The internet for our generation is a tool that facilitates physical interaction, not inhibits it.
As for the people with social problems, these things have always existed. The internet may be an outlet for people who experience social problems, but I think it's a stretch to say that it can cause social anxiety and the like. I would have to see some pretty solid evidence supporting that before I would believe it.
Use and profit are positively correlated up to a certain point, after which the increased cost of bandwidth and licensing are no longer offset by increased revenue. Pandora has determined that happens after forty hours a month. I would imagine this has to do with Pandora's revenue coming at least partly from purchases or click-throughs, as the profitability from that would diminish the longer a user listened to Pandora. It also probably means that advertising on the main page is sold per user, per page view, or at a flat rate rather than being based on listening/viewing time.
A somewhat useful analogy would be the Neflix business model, where customers become unprofitable if they fully utilize the service (although major differences exist of course). It's difficult to know the exact details of their business model without hearing from somebody inside the company, however.
Modern democracy may be based on Judeo-Christian principles. But so were monarchies, dictatorships, theocracies, feudal states, slave states, apartheid states, genocidal states, etc.
As much as I dislike religion (I don't think I need to go into why), it is a powerful force for good as well as evil. Just as any human institution can be a powerful force for good or evil. Equal amounts of good and evil are done by the religious and non-religious alike.
Speaking as an armchair theologian, AFAIK there isn't any belief of early Christianity that can't be directly correlated with a pagan religious tradition, whether it be from the Greek and Thracian culture or various "Middle Eastern" religions/folklores. Early Christianity can easily be viewed as a synthesis of Judaism and pagan religion/folklore.
Co-option and synthesis has been a major theme of Christianity from the very beginning through modern times. St. Augustine's writings were heavily influenced by the Manichean religion he followed as a younger man. The Catholic Church, when evangelizing around the world, consciously co-opted aspects of pagan religions in order to convert the pagans to Christianity. Common examples in our society would be Christmas, Easter, the Virgin of Guadalupe, etc. Some of the major dogmatic changes the Catholic Church underwent in the early 2nd millennium were caused mainly by the rediscovery and synthesis of pre-Christian ideas (most famously Aristotle), which led to the Renaissance and Reformation.
It's a silly question to ask what is left of early Christianity after removing Paul's personal theology. Since he wrote the earliest dogma that has survived and been accepted into modern Christianity, and later authors (such as those that wrote the gospels) almost certainly read his writings, his letters (from our perspective) can be viewed as the beginnings of Christianity. Paul's version of Christianity is the earliest version that we know. Unless we find writings earlier than Paul's (unlikely) the epistles are the furthest we can look back, and anything else is just extrapolating and generalizing about pre-Christian influence on the religion.
Yes, with the current arsenal the US and Russia have now, we could more or less destroy human civilization. If we only had a couple dozen warheads, it would still be enough to produce deterrence and military superiority, but not enough to turn every major city of the world into a parking lot.
In case you did not know, the massive nuclear buildup by the US in the 1950's and 1960's was largely based on incomplete intelligence and a great deal of incompetence by the Eisenhower and (much less so) the Kennedy administrations. Although McNamara recognized that the US had a large advantage in both nuclear warheads and delivery systems, he still continued the massive buildup in nuclear weapons started by Eisenhower and pushed the idea of mutually assured destruction. It led to the greatest period of nuclear tension we ever had, and almost led us to nuclear war.
In the 1950's the US thought the Soviets were greatly increasing their nuclear arsenal in order to gain first strike capabilities. This was false and not supported by strong intelligence, and many in the Eisenhower administration did not take proper precautions to ensure this was correct. The US initiated a period of nuclear proliferation that was understandably viewed by the Soviets as an attempt to gain first strike capability, and they quickly followed suit with their own nuclear buildup.
Mr. McNamara did not abandon the idea of massive retaliation, he actually advanced it. He said himself said (paraphrasing) that it was pure luck that we did not end up in a nuclear war during the Cuban missile crisis. He also continued the ludicrous notion of the domino theory which led to the escalation of the Vietnam War under his command.
Also, (taken from the NY Times book review of his autobiography) he realized relatively early in the Vietnam war that it could not be won by military force, but did not fight for his opinion and didn't take a public stance on that position until the 1990's. He and the Kennedy/Johnson/Nixon administrations destroyed the common trust and confidence in our government, which still has far-reaching consequences today. He oversaw one of the largest expansions of the US military in history, which can be directly traced to our ridiculous defense policy and budget today.
Mr. McNamara was a brilliant man, but he is a symbol of how arrogance and loyalty to authority dragged our country to the brink of destruction. Combined with his (and the rest of the government's) mismanagement of the Vietnam War, Mr. McNamara is certainly not a politician that will be missed by me.