"If there was a way to kick only those students out, I'd be all for it."
I know a really good guy that wanted to teach elementery school in the inner city (Winston-Salem, NC). The school he worked at was heavily minority with poor parental involvement. He told me one time that he was told by his principal that they couldn't expell or suspend any more black kids because the school board said they had expelled too many already.
You can kick out disruptive and unrully kids but you have to be politically correct about it.
"I have NO CHOICE but to either not attend, or allow myself to be extorted by TicketMaster."
So you do have a choice then.
I have been to events where the "ticket" was something I printed off myself and then was scanned at the door. In years past, Ticketmaster had the infrastructure to sell tickets all over the country but now with the Internet, anyone could setup a website to sell tickets.
I don't go to many events but I will tell you something I always hated about Ticket master was that the tickets would go on sell at the same time all over the country. I was 5th in line at a Ticketmaster outlet in the city where the event was and by the time I got to the front of the line, sold out. I know what happend was that the scalpers bought up all the tickets by being first in line a thousand miles away.
"You can buy Coke in any store you walk into" Probibly I should have said that if Coke was only sold at Piggly Wiggly and you hated them, you could buy Pepsi elsewhere.
"however, you may only see your favorite band at the one venue they are performing at." Then the choice is to pay the price or not. Ticketmaster doesn't and never had a Monopoly on all Entertainment. I don't think this compares to the Standard Oil monopoly or even to Microsoft.
I would say it could be said that Ticketmaster has a lot of power in the pre-internet days because they had the distribution network but whats stopping anyone from setting up something on the Internet now? I have been to events where you just bring the ticket printed out from a web page.
"So it is not how capitalist works, but rather how a monopoly exploits the absence of capitalism."
Ticketmaster has to compete with the other Ticket vendors for the contract to sell the product (Concert tickets for example). If you don't like buying from them or think the concert is too expensive then you can go to somone elses concert, go to a movie or whatever(There are other entertainment venues that are completing for your entertainment dollars). They have a Monopoly on that particular concert ticket about as much as Coke has a Monopoly to sell Coke (I can always buy pepsi but I really like Coke more).
"Why bother interviewing the reporter to find out his anon source? just look up his call records for the last couple of weeks and they can find out for themselves."
The USA today story that started all this was somwhat flawed. They claimed that Verison, Bellsouth and AT&T were handing over all these phone records. Verison and Bellsouth have now denied that they were ever asked by the NSA for this stuff so that just leaves AT&T but all they say is that they assist the govt. within the law and wouldn't comment on the NSA charges.
This kind of reminds me of the US embassy in Moscow that was built using Russan labor. The building was so riddled with listening devices that it couldn't be used.
"It's just a shame the we don't build all systems that have human life in the line with that much redunancy."
When dealing with combat systems, there are always these kind of trade offs I guess. The A-10 could afford the weight of all that armor and redundancy because it's a jet it mostly has to rely on it's speed (Slow compaired to most jets)to avoid getting hit. A good compairison would be to the Apache which as a helocopter can't carry as much weight so it has less armor and weapons but since it can hover, it can hide behind terrain and use it's IR targeting Do-dads or even let another chopper or even ground spotter do the targeting.
In any case, as far as combat systems go, I would be worried about the vulnerabilities that relying on wireless would open up vs. a weight savings but what if that savings made a combat aircraft easier to maintain with better uptime and allowed for more fuel capacity or larger bomb loads?
"If we were smart we would pull a brazil and start producing more corn to use as ethanol. They will be oil-independent by next year."
I have read that some of the clearing of the rainforest in South America is done in order to turn the land into farm land. I wonder if some of that deforestation is done in order to farm sugarcane for use in Fuel production.
"Except that they have other routes to try for their economy. We need China more then China needs us, in every field."
This line of reasoning brings up some questions: Where is China going to sell all the stuff the US buys from them now? Where is the USA going to buy all the stuff China sells it now?
I am not sure where China is going to find a better or even equivilant market while there are lots of contries that will fall all over themselves to manufacture stuff that the US doesn't want to manufacture for itself.
"It's the equivalent of going to check-cashing places at taking out a whole bunch of short-term loans because fuck it, you'll be out of office anyway by the time they are due."
When does it become due? China is investing in US Tresuries because they are the best place to put their money.
I would aggree that the US Government has a spending problem and that there is a lot of waste that goes on but we are in no way so beholden to China that we wouldn't deal with Iran just to keep them happy.
"It basically means that we can't do anything they don't like, or they can fuck our economy, or at the very least turn off the money, and we won't find another country to borrow money from."
They would fuck their economy up too.
And you could even say that if they do anything we don't like we could fuck their economy up(and our also) by canceling their dept and making all those US Tresurey notes they hold worthless on the world market.
"The dumbass war in Iraq has drained us entirely of money. "
how do you figure that? The US has GOBs of cash we could spend on lots of worthless crap. Hell, the US economy bearly registers a hickup funding the Iraq war and the HUGE disaster that hit the US gulf coast and all that that caused.
"Without Chinese money we don't have the funds for another war in the Middle East, and we won't have Chinese money if we want to start another war in the Middle East. See the trouble?"
I don't see it. Why do you think China allong with many other Banks (including state owned central banks) are buying US Tresury Notes? The answer is simple and it is NOT to try and get influance over the US. It is because US Tresurys are the safest place to put money and in many cases to help stabilize theit own currency compaired to the Dollar which is the dominant world currency.
It's working pretty good for China so why would they want to screw that up.
"They do. One of the GM employees created the technology, GM used them in the EV1 then sold the patent to Exxon when they retracted the lease of all EV1s and crushed them. See www.dontcrush.com or saveev1"
Looked on the site and found no mention of Exxon at all, not to mention them buying the pattent to NMiH batteries.
I deal with the email here and got a message forwarded to me which my boss got from a user complaining about spam. The message was one of those messages talking up some penny stock that we should buy.
I looked up the the penny stock then shot an email back to my boss letting him know that the particular stock was up 60% from the day before.
"Vehicles really don't offer that much freedom, because freedom is a state of mind rather than a location. "
The US is larger in size than any European contry and many states are larger than most European contries. While Europe is trying to unify now it will be a very long time before Europe is really one big happy culture while in the US, it's not unusual for people to move cross country away from where they grew up.
An example, in my office, of the 6 people that I work closest with, I am from this area (North Carolina) allong with one other, one is from Michigan, One from Iowa, One from New York and One from Florida.
I don't know if that is the case in Eruope because of Cultureal/Language differances between the various contries. Do people frequently move as far from home Europe? If you walk into an office in Paris will you find a lot of people from other European contries who have moved thier families there from Germany/Italy/UK/Spain/ETC.?
Other factors to think about too. The US is Large and spread out so like it or not, in most areas, you just gotta have a decent car even for just around town. Also in Europe the Mass Transit is fairly good even in smallish towns while in the US it is nonexistant in anything smaller than a midsized american city.
A lot more could be discussed compairing the US culture to European and how that effects driving habits but I don't want make this post too long.
Anyone that wants to compare cars can go to edmunds site and compair the "true cost to own" which supposedly includes such things as gas costs and depreciation and what people really pay. http://www.edmunds.com/apps/cto/CTOintroController
The Prius (only one type available) was $.46 per mile while a High end Civic was $.43 and a high end Corolla was $.38. The Insight was $.40 and there was a Scion that ended up at $.36.
My wifes SUV was only $.68 so that makes me feel a lot better. LOL
Slashdot Mirror
"If there was a way to kick only those students out, I'd be all for it."
I know a really good guy that wanted to teach elementery school in the inner city (Winston-Salem, NC). The school he worked at was heavily minority with poor parental involvement. He told me one time that he was told by his principal that they couldn't expell or suspend any more black kids because the school board said they had expelled too many already.
You can kick out disruptive and unrully kids but you have to be politically correct about it.
If that were the case then foreign governments are kinda censoring in the USA.
"I have NO CHOICE but to either not attend, or allow myself to be extorted by TicketMaster."
So you do have a choice then.
I have been to events where the "ticket" was something I printed off myself and then was scanned at the door. In years past, Ticketmaster had the infrastructure to sell tickets all over the country but now with the Internet, anyone could setup a website to sell tickets.
I don't go to many events but I will tell you something I always hated about Ticket master was that the tickets would go on sell at the same time all over the country. I was 5th in line at a Ticketmaster outlet in the city where the event was and by the time I got to the front of the line, sold out. I know what happend was that the scalpers bought up all the tickets by being first in line a thousand miles away.
"You can buy Coke in any store you walk into"
Probibly I should have said that if Coke was only sold at Piggly Wiggly and you hated them, you could buy Pepsi elsewhere.
"however, you may only see your favorite band at the one venue they are performing at."
Then the choice is to pay the price or not. Ticketmaster doesn't and never had a Monopoly on all Entertainment. I don't think this compares to the Standard Oil monopoly or even to Microsoft.
I would say it could be said that Ticketmaster has a lot of power in the pre-internet days because they had the distribution network but whats stopping anyone from setting up something on the Internet now? I have been to events where you just bring the ticket printed out from a web page.
"So it is not how capitalist works, but rather how a monopoly exploits the absence of capitalism."
Ticketmaster has to compete with the other Ticket vendors for the contract to sell the product (Concert tickets for example). If you don't like buying from them or think the concert is too expensive then you can go to somone elses concert, go to a movie or whatever(There are other entertainment venues that are completing for your entertainment dollars). They have a Monopoly on that particular concert ticket about as much as Coke has a Monopoly to sell Coke (I can always buy pepsi but I really like Coke more).
"Why bother interviewing the reporter to find out his anon source? just look up his call records for the last couple of weeks and they can find out for themselves."
d isplay.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002503697
l /main1633040.shtml
According to this http://editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_
The USA today story that started all this was somwhat flawed. They claimed that Verison, Bellsouth and AT&T were handing over all these phone records. Verison and Bellsouth have now denied that they were ever asked by the NSA for this stuff so that just leaves AT&T but all they say is that they assist the govt. within the law and wouldn't comment on the NSA charges.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/05/18/nationa
Bellsouth demands a retraction and USA Today just says they are going to "take a closer look" into their story.
This kind of reminds me of the US embassy in Moscow that was built using Russan labor. The building was so riddled with listening devices that it couldn't be used.
"It's just a shame the we don't build all systems that have human life in the line with that much redunancy."
When dealing with combat systems, there are always these kind of trade offs I guess. The A-10 could afford the weight of all that armor and redundancy because it's a jet it mostly has to rely on it's speed (Slow compaired to most jets)to avoid getting hit. A good compairison would be to the Apache which as a helocopter can't carry as much weight so it has less armor and weapons but since it can hover, it can hide behind terrain and use it's IR targeting Do-dads or even let another chopper or even ground spotter do the targeting.
In any case, as far as combat systems go, I would be worried about the vulnerabilities that relying on wireless would open up vs. a weight savings but what if that savings made a combat aircraft easier to maintain with better uptime and allowed for more fuel capacity or larger bomb loads?
I guess it's aways a trade off.
I guess the pilot could just take his laptop with him when he went to the bathroom and fly the plane from there.
"correlation does not imply causation".
True but it sure is good for making some scary headlines.
There is alway the chance that it is a chance random occurance. A quick look at Wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_cluster and I found this quote:
"Between 5% to 15% of suspected cancer clusters are statistically significant"
In the event it is something about the environment of the building, jumping on the Cell tower seems kinda knee jerk.
"If we were smart we would pull a brazil and start producing more corn to use as ethanol. They will be oil-independent by next year."
I have read that some of the clearing of the rainforest in South America is done in order to turn the land into farm land. I wonder if some of that deforestation is done in order to farm sugarcane for use in Fuel production.
Really adds a new dimension to the term "tail pipe emissions."
I for one welcome our new cancer resistant rat overlords.
"Plastic Legos began production in 1963, they've had smiley faces on them ever since, Duplo's were introduced in 1967, they have smileys."
Actually, Duplo used the Simley Face.
"Except that they have other routes to try for their economy. We need China more then China needs us, in every field."
This line of reasoning brings up some questions:
Where is China going to sell all the stuff the US buys from them now?
Where is the USA going to buy all the stuff China sells it now?
I am not sure where China is going to find a better or even equivilant market while there are lots of contries that will fall all over themselves to manufacture stuff that the US doesn't want to manufacture for itself.
"It's the equivalent of going to check-cashing places at taking out a whole bunch of short-term loans because fuck it, you'll be out of office anyway by the time they are due."
When does it become due? China is investing in US Tresuries because they are the best place to put their money.
I would aggree that the US Government has a spending problem and that there is a lot of waste that goes on but we are in no way so beholden to China that we wouldn't deal with Iran just to keep them happy.
"It basically means that we can't do anything they don't like, or they can fuck our economy, or at the very least turn off the money, and we won't find another country to borrow money from."
They would fuck their economy up too.
And you could even say that if they do anything we don't like we could fuck their economy up(and our also) by canceling their dept and making all those US Tresurey notes they hold worthless on the world market.
"The dumbass war in Iraq has drained us entirely of money. "
how do you figure that? The US has GOBs of cash we could spend on lots of worthless crap. Hell, the US economy bearly registers a hickup funding the Iraq war and the HUGE disaster that hit the US gulf coast and all that that caused.
"Without Chinese money we don't have the funds for another war in the Middle East, and we won't have Chinese money if we want to start another war in the Middle East. See the trouble?"
I don't see it. Why do you think China allong with many other Banks (including state owned central banks) are buying US Tresury Notes? The answer is simple and it is NOT to try and get influance over the US. It is because US Tresurys are the safest place to put money and in many cases to help stabilize theit own currency compaired to the Dollar which is the dominant world currency.
It's working pretty good for China so why would they want to screw that up.
"Iran's army includes 350,000 regular soldiers (non-conscript) and 220,000 conscripts"
So any US led coalition better have contigency plans to deal with large numbers of POWs.
"especially since we are in debt to China for 250 billion dollars. "
What difference does that make?
"They do. One of the GM employees created the technology, GM used them in the EV1 then sold the patent to Exxon when they retracted the lease of all EV1s and crushed them. See www.dontcrush.com or saveev1"
Looked on the site and found no mention of Exxon at all, not to mention them buying the pattent to NMiH batteries.
I deal with the email here and got a message forwarded to me which my boss got from a user complaining about spam. The message was one of those messages talking up some penny stock that we should buy.
I looked up the the penny stock then shot an email back to my boss letting him know that the particular stock was up 60% from the day before.
We had a good laugh.
"Vehicles really don't offer that much freedom, because freedom is a state of mind rather than a location. "
The US is larger in size than any European contry and many states are larger than most European contries. While Europe is trying to unify now it will be a very long time before Europe is really one big happy culture while in the US, it's not unusual for people to move cross country away from where they grew up.
An example, in my office, of the 6 people that I work closest with, I am from this area (North Carolina) allong with one other, one is from Michigan, One from Iowa, One from New York and One from Florida.
I don't know if that is the case in Eruope because of Cultureal/Language differances between the various contries. Do people frequently move as far from home Europe? If you walk into an office in Paris will you find a lot of people from other European contries who have moved thier families there from Germany/Italy/UK/Spain/ETC.?
Other factors to think about too. The US is Large and spread out so like it or not, in most areas, you just gotta have a decent car even for just around town. Also in Europe the Mass Transit is fairly good even in smallish towns while in the US it is nonexistant in anything smaller than a midsized american city.
A lot more could be discussed compairing the US culture to European and how that effects driving habits but I don't want make this post too long.
Anyone that wants to compare cars can go to edmunds site and compair the "true cost to own" which supposedly includes such things as gas costs and depreciation and what people really pay. http://www.edmunds.com/apps/cto/CTOintroController
The Prius (only one type available) was $.46 per mile while a High end Civic was $.43 and a high end Corolla was $.38. The Insight was $.40 and there was a Scion that ended up at $.36.
My wifes SUV was only $.68 so that makes me feel a lot better. LOL
"Exxon-Mobil holds the patents to the nickel-metal hydride battery"
I don't think this is the case.
I would love to see a credible link to prove me wrong though.
"It just means you can't toss old batteries in the trash (and yes, they do check occasionally)..."
Every COPS worst nightmare used to be getting busted down to meter maid by the captain but now there is a step lower, Trash Cop.