Germany and Japan were the aggressors and their citizenry knew and accepted it. Subsequently their defeat came to be seen by most of their populace as in some ways justified. This is certainly not the case with the current wars, particularly Iraq which was started based on blatant lies, and with Muslims (Arabs in particular) who have a very long history of being victims of various Western aggressors, culminating in establishment of the state Israel without any consent of the locals and with massive US backing. Add to it constant US meddling in affairs of all nations in the region, complete with CIA backed coups etc.
I actually agree with you on the whole "War founded on lies" bit. We never should have gone into Iraq in the first place, but we're there now, and have been for some time. It's now a question of how to make the best of it.
Laying down you arms and playing ball with whoever it is that's running stuff now has historically been a pretty mixed bag. You'd have as good a chance of being genocided as you did getting absorbed into whatever empire was doing the conquering at the moment. In the past few decades however, rolling over and playing ball with the West has been a pretty good strategy for every country that tried it.
Basically, life sucks pretty hard in non-industrialized countries, but continuously fighting and blowing stuff up makes it suck harder whereas working to build a better country will eventually reap huge rewards.
All of the major participants in WWII were on similar technological, industrial and societal level. This resulted in the aid offered by the US to be of acceptable kind to their populace. Also the Marshall plan was accomplished mostly by hiring locals in direct contrast to the activities in Iraq and Afghanistan where most of the "aid" is making its way into pockets of pan-national corporations who bring in foreign workers/mercenaries and what not to accomplish the woefully mismanaged, corrupt and totally ineffective "reconstruction" (the amount of clean water and electricity available to an average citizen actually deteriorated in Iraq as compared with the Saddam regime). The only projects that are a "success" in Iraq are those directly serving the US military and other Imperial institutions in establishment of permanent presence (such as permanent bases for the 50,000 permanent occupation troops and the massive multi-thousand-people "embassies" in fortified zones). This is of course not lost on the locals.
As I said earlier, the main reason massive public works projects aren't successful in Iraq and Afghanistan is because they keep getting blown up! The reason military projects are a success is because they are being built in areas too heavily fortified to be the target of attacks.
Don't get me wrong war profiteering and mismanagement by corporations responsible for the reconstruction is also at fault, but it's not as one-dimensional as you're making it out to be.
Religious issues
I'm a bad person to comment on religion, my muslim friends are as offended by my atheism as my christian friends. It really doesn't matter whose invisible friend has bigger balls.
Nevertheless, Towards the beginning of the war (occupation? Whatever you want to call it) we were bending over backwards to accommodate religious and cultural concerns. No porn, alcohol, etc. Most people dealing directly with the locals got language classes (we weren't required to become fluent, but there was additional pay if you did), proselytizing was forbidden, etc.
Women had all kinds of special restrictions while in country ranging from "no contact to locals" to "not allowed to be drivers." Some people were even rumor-mongering about forcing women to stay covered up. All this got cancelled pretty quickly once we realized how stupid it was.
Overall though, there are plenty of Muslims who peacefully coexist with the west, and religious warfare is an excuse people use to convince the fanatics to throw their lives away.
A big hinderance in this is that Insurgents think blowing up beneficial civilian projects (Roads, wires, power plants) is the best way to convince the US forces to leave, since Insurgent forces assaulting military targets generally just results in dead insurgents.
If they'd just stop shooting at us and actually, y'know, help out in reconstructing their country, things would be a hell of a lot better, and we wouldn't need attack helicopters shooting down anyone who even resembles a threat.
Because that worked out well for Germany and Japan.
So in accordance with this "logic", if I decide to rob you and so I proceed to your house wherein I blow away your kids and wife and then torture you for the location of your safe, but I am careful to call the whole thing "war on Internet users who call themselves sumdumass", this makes it all right then, no? After all "shit happens in war"!
Is the very definition of insane troll logic.
You seem to think that the UN has moral authority over wars, and that a war might somehow be acceptable if the Security Council were to authorize one.
You seem to have forgotten that nearly half the countries on the planet are a part of the coalition, likely including the one you currently live in.
Actually, that's a pretty awesome conspiracy theory. Julian Assange just goes out and commits some kind of horrible crime, and when the police start investigating it he shouts, "Look! The United States is trying to frame me!"
and, given the clear motive of the US to do so, people around the world believe him!
Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq are all hellholes we failed to walk over armed opposition in.
Current military forces WOULD be reluctant to kill civilians.
Political murders HAVE happened.
-----------------------
Only thing is, military members are moved around quite often (once every 2-4 years or so) between different bases in different areas of the world. This is partially to ensure they're not loyal to their individual commanders or states, but rather to the military as a whole.
If the going story is that they were moved out of the country, why aren't we looking for them? If the threat was enough to go to war over, they should still be a very high priority.
Where were they manufactured? It might be simplistic to move weapons themselves out of the country, but moving manufacturing facilities is a little more difficult, we should have found some kind of evidence - but nothing ever came through.
the actual intelligence reports (which came out after the war was already begun, google it if you're interested) were nowhere near certain, and indicated nowhere near the threat the Bush administration indicated.
I'm in my Junior year of an EE degree, just finished Differential Equations last Spring, so the nightmares of Calculus still haunt me.
Consistently, calculus teachers seem to love assigning more homework than I would have to do for every other class in my schedule, combined. 10-15 problems every night to be collected the next day. They were straight out of the book, so they got incrementally harder as you raised in number, normal calc class stuff.
Except for one teacher, who assigned about 5 problems a week, but they were the hardest problems he could find for the material covered that week. I actually learned about the same amount in both cases, but was not chronically sleep deprived by the second teacher.
Please, for your students sanity, small numbers of very hard problems is better than lots and lots of problems of any difficulty.
Eh, I grew up in Portland, lived in the south for a couple months, and in Germany for three years, during which time I went and toured around the rest of Europe. The biggest difference between Europe and America is that the majority of people don't speak English as their first language.
Yes, there's a mix of political opinions, architectural styles, cultural norms, etc. But once you get exposed to enough of it, people from all over the world start to seem very similar. Wander around the States enough, and any large city starts to seem very similar to any other given large city. Small towns start to become interchangeable, even different countries don't seem so odd once you get past the idiosyncrasies.
All the civilian laws in the world go to hell once you get onto a military base.
If I had to guess, there was probably a restricted area on base only allowing people with clearance to enter. There are all sorts of laws you're breaking if you sneak any kind of wireless transmitter into a place like that.
Why should a person have to save money first before starting a business? There's no compelling reason for that restriction, you just have to make sure that the loans are being written with due dilligence and that the individuals receiving the loan have an actual business plan with contingency plans and a way of making money.
You pretty much answered your own question there, capital is an integral part of most business and contingency plans. Someone who isn't bringing a lot of their own money to the table is not forbidden from starting a business, they merely have a higher bar to pass to demonstrate "due diligence."
Have a near-perfect credit rating and an extremely sound business plan, and it's possible to start a business without using a penny of your own money. Of course, most people with near-perfect credit and capable of making a business plan like that are also believers in saving, so they'll tend to have at least a little money regardless.
Also in Washington, I was driving around with an expired card, but the policy was still valid. Sent in proof of insurance and got stuck with a $60 "administrative fee" is what they called it if I remember correctly.
There wasn't even a hint of my car getting impounded.
Being visible to is one thing. What if he starts offering his site in French as well? What if - prior to the adoption of the Euro - he offered his services available by payment in French Francs? Can you still argue that It's just a site in the UK that is only subject to UK legislation?
Yes.
If the owner of the site decided to start accepting Chinese currency and offering his site in Chinese, he would still not be subject to Chinese laws. There's going to be an arbitrary line drawn either way, and we cannot have a chaotic mishmash where nobody is sure what jurisdiction applies to a website.
There's a bunch of stuff in the old testament about how masturbating or wet dreams make you "Unclean"
People waver back and forth over how much that stuff actually counts for the purposes of god hating you - I heard it personally a few times growing up Christian, but I never met anyone who takes it all that seriously.
"THe Military" is not a single entity, it represents Millions of people.
Individuals in the intelligence community are responsible for making sure sensitive information is not leaked.
If sensitive information is leaked, it is their fault.
Lastly, did you read the article? Or even the Summary? What do the words "'comb through' the files to ensure lives are not placed at risk." Mean to you?
1) "those who failed to contain that information" = the military, correct?
Intelligence Troops.
2) "the people whose data was stolen" = the military, correct?
Operational Troops.
Essentially, it is the job of Intelligence personnel to make sure their data is well protected. If it is leaked because it wasn't well protected then it is their fault.
The only actual "Harm" I care about is operational troops who might be killed or injured because of data being leaked. They are the ones I refer to as "victims"
Generally, these are not the same people.
Additionally, this very article is about how Wikileaks is combing the information it has gained to prevent point #4 from being true.
Have you even looked at wikileaks? Operational details, troop movements, and similar information is not the majority of information on there.
An overall truthful reporting of the war is what's being revealed on wikileaks. Far more truthful than conventional media are reporting on in any event.
I'm surprised you mentioned Drivers and business licenses. They exist because regulation of driving and business respectively have proven necessary in the past, and so laws were enacted.
Marriage, similarly, only requires a license if you want the various benefits associated with it.
The only really irritating number to me is the SSN.
Slashdot Mirror
Germany and Japan were the aggressors and their citizenry knew and accepted it. Subsequently their defeat came to be seen by most of their populace as in some ways justified. This is certainly not the case with the current wars, particularly Iraq which was started based on blatant lies, and with Muslims (Arabs in particular) who have a very long history of being victims of various Western aggressors, culminating in establishment of the state Israel without any consent of the locals and with massive US backing. Add to it constant US meddling in affairs of all nations in the region, complete with CIA backed coups etc.
I actually agree with you on the whole "War founded on lies" bit. We never should have gone into Iraq in the first place, but we're there now, and have been for some time. It's now a question of how to make the best of it.
Laying down you arms and playing ball with whoever it is that's running stuff now has historically been a pretty mixed bag. You'd have as good a chance of being genocided as you did getting absorbed into whatever empire was doing the conquering at the moment. In the past few decades however, rolling over and playing ball with the West has been a pretty good strategy for every country that tried it.
Basically, life sucks pretty hard in non-industrialized countries, but continuously fighting and blowing stuff up makes it suck harder whereas working to build a better country will eventually reap huge rewards.
All of the major participants in WWII were on similar technological, industrial and societal level. This resulted in the aid offered by the US to be of acceptable kind to their populace. Also the Marshall plan was accomplished mostly by hiring locals in direct contrast to the activities in Iraq and Afghanistan where most of the "aid" is making its way into pockets of pan-national corporations who bring in foreign workers/mercenaries and what not to accomplish the woefully mismanaged, corrupt and totally ineffective "reconstruction" (the amount of clean water and electricity available to an average citizen actually deteriorated in Iraq as compared with the Saddam regime). The only projects that are a "success" in Iraq are those directly serving the US military and other Imperial institutions in establishment of permanent presence (such as permanent bases for the 50,000 permanent occupation troops and the massive multi-thousand-people "embassies" in fortified zones). This is of course not lost on the locals.
As I said earlier, the main reason massive public works projects aren't successful in Iraq and Afghanistan is because they keep getting blown up! The reason military projects are a success is because they are being built in areas too heavily fortified to be the target of attacks.
Don't get me wrong war profiteering and mismanagement by corporations responsible for the reconstruction is also at fault, but it's not as one-dimensional as you're making it out to be.
Religious issues
I'm a bad person to comment on religion, my muslim friends are as offended by my atheism as my christian friends. It really doesn't matter whose invisible friend has bigger balls.
Nevertheless, Towards the beginning of the war (occupation? Whatever you want to call it) we were bending over backwards to accommodate religious and cultural concerns. No porn, alcohol, etc. Most people dealing directly with the locals got language classes (we weren't required to become fluent, but there was additional pay if you did), proselytizing was forbidden, etc.
Women had all kinds of special restrictions while in country ranging from "no contact to locals" to "not allowed to be drivers." Some people were even rumor-mongering about forcing women to stay covered up. All this got cancelled pretty quickly once we realized how stupid it was.
Overall though, there are plenty of Muslims who peacefully coexist with the west, and religious warfare is an excuse people use to convince the fanatics to throw their lives away.
We are Trying to help stabilize the area too.
A big hinderance in this is that Insurgents think blowing up beneficial civilian projects (Roads, wires, power plants) is the best way to convince the US forces to leave, since Insurgent forces assaulting military targets generally just results in dead insurgents.
If they'd just stop shooting at us and actually, y'know, help out in reconstructing their country, things would be a hell of a lot better, and we wouldn't need attack helicopters shooting down anyone who even resembles a threat.
Because that worked out well for Germany and Japan.
So in accordance with this "logic", if I decide to rob you and so I proceed to your house wherein I blow away your kids and wife and then torture you for the location of your safe, but I am careful to call the whole thing "war on Internet users who call themselves sumdumass", this makes it all right then, no? After all "shit happens in war"!
Is the very definition of insane troll logic.
You seem to think that the UN has moral authority over wars, and that a war might somehow be acceptable if the Security Council were to authorize one.
You seem to have forgotten that nearly half the countries on the planet are a part of the coalition, likely including the one you currently live in.
you've never been in a war zone, have you?
Actually, that's a pretty awesome conspiracy theory. Julian Assange just goes out and commits some kind of horrible crime, and when the police start investigating it he shouts, "Look! The United States is trying to frame me!"
and, given the clear motive of the US to do so, people around the world believe him!
Ask yourself: "Can I change the way things are by complaining about it on slashdot?"
Or better yet, "Can I affect the situation in any way?"
If the answer to both is 'no'
then perhaps you should consider purchasing halliburton stock.
why is this modded troll?
Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq are all hellholes we failed to walk over armed opposition in.
Current military forces WOULD be reluctant to kill civilians.
Political murders HAVE happened.
-----------------------
Only thing is, military members are moved around quite often (once every 2-4 years or so) between different bases in different areas of the world. This is partially to ensure they're not loyal to their individual commanders or states, but rather to the military as a whole.
If the going story is that they were moved out of the country, why aren't we looking for them? If the threat was enough to go to war over, they should still be a very high priority.
Where were they manufactured? It might be simplistic to move weapons themselves out of the country, but moving manufacturing facilities is a little more difficult, we should have found some kind of evidence - but nothing ever came through.
the actual intelligence reports (which came out after the war was already begun, google it if you're interested) were nowhere near certain, and indicated nowhere near the threat the Bush administration indicated.
Eh? Both Republics and Democrats have been pushing this shit. Who the hell is standing against it?
Poor tires? Poor Brakes? These don't contribute to accidents, what?
the same sort of people who seriously think they can get a part of some Nigerian Prince's fortune, or buy penis enlargement.
lots and lots of really hard take-home problems.
I'm in my Junior year of an EE degree, just finished Differential Equations last Spring, so the nightmares of Calculus still haunt me.
Consistently, calculus teachers seem to love assigning more homework than I would have to do for every other class in my schedule, combined. 10-15 problems every night to be collected the next day. They were straight out of the book, so they got incrementally harder as you raised in number, normal calc class stuff.
Except for one teacher, who assigned about 5 problems a week, but they were the hardest problems he could find for the material covered that week. I actually learned about the same amount in both cases, but was not chronically sleep deprived by the second teacher.
Please, for your students sanity, small numbers of very hard problems is better than lots and lots of problems of any difficulty.
Eh, I grew up in Portland, lived in the south for a couple months, and in Germany for three years, during which time I went and toured around the rest of Europe. The biggest difference between Europe and America is that the majority of people don't speak English as their first language.
Yes, there's a mix of political opinions, architectural styles, cultural norms, etc. But once you get exposed to enough of it, people from all over the world start to seem very similar. Wander around the States enough, and any large city starts to seem very similar to any other given large city. Small towns start to become interchangeable, even different countries don't seem so odd once you get past the idiosyncrasies.
All the civilian laws in the world go to hell once you get onto a military base.
If I had to guess, there was probably a restricted area on base only allowing people with clearance to enter. There are all sorts of laws you're breaking if you sneak any kind of wireless transmitter into a place like that.
Why should a person have to save money first before starting a business? There's no compelling reason for that restriction, you just have to make sure that the loans are being written with due dilligence and that the individuals receiving the loan have an actual business plan with contingency plans and a way of making money.
You pretty much answered your own question there, capital is an integral part of most business and contingency plans. Someone who isn't bringing a lot of their own money to the table is not forbidden from starting a business, they merely have a higher bar to pass to demonstrate "due diligence."
Have a near-perfect credit rating and an extremely sound business plan, and it's possible to start a business without using a penny of your own money. Of course, most people with near-perfect credit and capable of making a business plan like that are also believers in saving, so they'll tend to have at least a little money regardless.
Also in Washington, I was driving around with an expired card, but the policy was still valid. Sent in proof of insurance and got stuck with a $60 "administrative fee" is what they called it if I remember correctly.
There wasn't even a hint of my car getting impounded.
Being visible to is one thing. What if he starts offering his site in French as well? What if - prior to the adoption of the Euro - he offered his services available by payment in French Francs? Can you still argue that It's just a site in the UK that is only subject to UK legislation?
Yes.
If the owner of the site decided to start accepting Chinese currency and offering his site in Chinese, he would still not be subject to Chinese laws. There's going to be an arbitrary line drawn either way, and we cannot have a chaotic mishmash where nobody is sure what jurisdiction applies to a website.
If it goes as far as petting and she's been fairly clear that she don't want to I think you deserve to get the rape stamp.
Emphasis mine.
Go die in a fire.
There's a bunch of stuff in the old testament about how masturbating or wet dreams make you "Unclean"
People waver back and forth over how much that stuff actually counts for the purposes of god hating you - I heard it personally a few times growing up Christian, but I never met anyone who takes it all that seriously.
A lot of people are making the same mistake here.
"THe Military" is not a single entity, it represents Millions of people.
Individuals in the intelligence community are responsible for making sure sensitive information is not leaked.
If sensitive information is leaked, it is their fault.
Lastly, did you read the article? Or even the Summary? What do the words "'comb through' the files to ensure lives are not placed at risk." Mean to you?
1) "those who failed to contain that information" = the military, correct?
Intelligence Troops.
2) "the people whose data was stolen" = the military, correct?
Operational Troops.
Essentially, it is the job of Intelligence personnel to make sure their data is well protected. If it is leaked because it wasn't well protected then it is their fault.
The only actual "Harm" I care about is operational troops who might be killed or injured because of data being leaked. They are the ones I refer to as "victims"
Generally, these are not the same people.
Additionally, this very article is about how Wikileaks is combing the information it has gained to prevent point #4 from being true.
"those who failed to contain that information"
and
"the people whose data was stolen"
Are different groups.
The person divulging the information is generally not also the person getting killed as a result of that information being divulged.
Idiot.
Have you even looked at wikileaks? Operational details, troop movements, and similar information is not the majority of information on there.
An overall truthful reporting of the war is what's being revealed on wikileaks. Far more truthful than conventional media are reporting on in any event.
I'm surprised you mentioned Drivers and business licenses. They exist because regulation of driving and business respectively have proven necessary in the past, and so laws were enacted.
Marriage, similarly, only requires a license if you want the various benefits associated with it.
The only really irritating number to me is the SSN.