Interesting how you assume that you're right and he's wrong. I don't think he'd be voting in a way that he knows is controversial if he didn't believe in it - and to be honest, I don't buy the 'He's only doing it to prevent the Republicans using it against him' argument. As near as I can tell, he voted the way he did because he felt that was the right decision. Perhaps you should really investigate what the ramifications of passing versus not passing the bill are?
But you're not going to hear me. So many people making so many assumptions.
Reviewing the details of what's being done, though, and I end up with the impression that the people who are voting for this bill are doing it because it's the right thing to do, rather than just because they were told to. Here are the logical steps which may have ended up with a perfectly sane and dutiful Representative deciding to vote in favour of the bill:
The telcos are being whacked by a number of different lawsuits. The only way they can get out of it is if they provide evidence that they believed that they were acting in accordance to the law.
The Bush Administration has classified the documents that the telcos would like to use as proof, and refuses to provide them to the court. Therefore, we have no idea and can have no idea whether the telcos acted in good faith and were the victims of deception (they clearly failed to double check the paperwork, but if one assumes that a fair number of legal requests were coming through at the same time then that could be semi-excusable).
Congressional Democrats could attempt to use this as a lever to get into the Bush Administration's illegal activities. But that could mean dealing significant damage to relatively innocent parties.
So allow the Bush Administration to simply say whether they demanded access and let that be the end of it. While it means that nothing changes in terms of investigating the Adminstration's corruption, it also means that potentially innocent parties can't be punished without access to a fair trial (as a trial where they can't provide the vast bulk of the evidence can't really be fair).
Of course, the Telcos are most likely far from innocent, but everyone deserves a fair trail, even if they're a bunch that everyone loves to hate.
Meh, it's a cut-and-dried anti-trust violation - I'm actually surprised that the ACCC were willing to let it through on the first pass. They're abusing their effective monopoly in one field (online auctions) to increase their market share in another field (money transfer) using bundling.
Monopolies and the abuse thereof destroys the advantages of the capitalist system. Too many people forget how bad things got in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Yeah. Although it is sort of depressing that we can't find the flaws in the theory; I mean, no theory is supposed to last forever - they're always stop-gaps until flaws are identified and we need to find a new one. Where's the fun in a theory that's always right?
I'm know it won't last forever, but with every new experiment there's always the hope that maybe this one will finally reveal a flaw to work on.
Ya know, this is exactly the thing that shits me to tears about the whole greenhouse debate. Those who've been saying that we might want to do something about the greenhouse effect before it's too late have been characterised as leftist loonies who care more about the planet and other animals than humans and human civilisation. In some cases they're right - there is a liberal dose of the usual extremist greenie suspects in the climate change movement - but I really wonder whether those people actually know what they're fighting for. Because, frankly, the stated aims of environmentalists - improving the forests, saving the fuzzy animals, and so on, is actually served by the increasing CO2 in the atmosphere, as plants grow better in richer CO2 atmospheres and that leads to a stronger biosphere all round. By and large, there's very few better things we could have done with our intelligence for the continuance of life on Earth than releasing all of the trapped CO2 back into the atmosphere so that it can be used again.
The only species that are going to really be adversely affected by this sort of change are those who have set up permanent settlements right next to the water and can't easily retreat further inland as the water rises. Or has critical infrastructure that can be easily destroyed by hurricanes and tornadoes as the weather becomes more chaotic. Or relies on things staying the same, year in, year out, just because they have been for the last 200 years. Such a species would really be fucked by this sort of a change. One only hopes they wouldn't be stupid enough to cause it.
We're not doing this for the planet. We're not doing this for the plants, or even the fuzzy animals. We're doing it for us. Because if you look at the cold hard facts, we really don't have any other choices worth a damn.
I'm a moderate rightist, and I approve this message.
Hmm, given your background, do you work procedually with PHP or using OO methods? All of the decent senior positions that I've seen/been involved in have required a high degree of familiarity with OO development (design patterns, etc.). I'm sure there's procedual positions out there, but they're much rarer.
But yes, there is a definite drought of competent PHP developers here. If you've got a half-way decent resume, you'll get an interview for every position you apply for, in my experience.
Yeah, I can certainly certify that PHP developers are insanely in demand here in Melbourne - I've been involved in recruiting for a couple of positions, and it's ridiculously rare to find anyone with a grasp of Computer Science basics, let alone any OO architecture knowledge (if you're looking for a senior). Personal experience says that if you've got a good grasp of the field, you can name your price - I can get pretty close to 6 figures, and I haven't even hit 25 years old yet (with, admittedly, some unusual experience, given I've built and led a team once already).
Uh, November the 11th sort of is an internationally observed day - in most parts of the world it's called Armistice day or Rememberance day, though. Much as I hate to break up the nationalism party, the end of World War I did sort of affect more than just Americans.
Grabrabagelgra. What the hell are they thinking? Yes, extra income for the CSIRO is handy, but they do not put that ahead of the common good - otherwise, what the hells is the point of a publicly funded research organisation?
Grah. While I'm all in favour of having Liberal (Australian right-leaning major party) stints to keep the economy chugging, this country really has been governed by the right too long - all of our public services are becoming too money-obsessed.
Well, all I can say is: good luck. That's one hell of a job to give to a single agency and still allow for the flexibility that the individual departments and agencies require. Should we be expecting a massive, wasteful consultancy project, then?
Uh, if you RTFA, there's an overlay for Google Earth that you need to download to get the most recent satellite pics. Without that, you're not going to be finding any recently crashed planes.
Yeah, this really comes across as slimey geek porn. I'm as sex-starved as the rest of the inhabitants here, but putting something like this up on the front page is just...ew.
If Negroes and Caucasians are truly equal, then we can stop worrying about the ability to vote in any given town. Much like the failed and misguided notion of Reconstruction, to keep track of, and actually worry about, the amount of black vs. white people able to vote in a given town is disingenuous and misleading.
Just in case anyone is interested (and doesn't want to explore the reply tree), the incident described occured in Ondiep, Utrecht, Netherlands, on the 11th of March, 2007. While a quick search reveals that it was broadly reported in blogs, there does appear to be a somewhat disturbing lack of reporting amongst the professional media.
This doesn't sound like too bad an idea. One issue would be maintenence - if the full version and the lite version had to be maintained seperately, it probably wouldn't be worth it. To keep relevent bugfixes and such applicable to both branches, the code would need to be well designed and presumably fairly modular. Any Mozilla developers (or people familiar with the code) around and willing to comment on whether this would be feasible?
Just a slight tangent first off: How can any thinking person define themselves as 'right' or 'left'? Seriously. I'm a trade liberal (i.e. pro-free trade), a commercial operating environment moderate (see Ordoliberalism), and a fiscal conservative. So am I left or right? Or maybe I have a range of opinions on multiple topics which are mine, rather than following whatever 'my crowd' is cheering for. Maybe there is a description out that I fit neatly into, but I certainly don't feel any need to belong to a group, and I certainly will not allow my choices and opinions to be dictated by what other people seem to think is a good idea.
Sorry, just needed to vent. The whole left-right thing pisses me off.
Anyway, I do have to wonder: I assume that you agree that there is a non-zero chance of global warming happening. In fact, it seems reasonable to me that with the vast majority of the scientific community agreeing that it is a danger, it deserves a probability of at least 1-2% - scientists aren't all lying scoundrels exaggerating to get grant money, after all, so there must be some who truly believe the conclusions they've reached. Now, if this is so, it seems to me that a 'right-wing' person would be more if favour of accepting and responding to climate change than a 'left-wing' person. Why? Well, let's look at the two outcomes of acting as if it were a threat.
If it does turn out that the threat is real, by acting we've hopefully prevented a global depression (and don't feed me that 'poor nations will ruin it even if we do something about it' crap. They definitely won't do anything if we in developed nations don't act first, because they have to stay competitive. If we do act, then we can use the usual diplomacy routes (and the associated tools available for globe-scale treaties such as trade embargoes) to get other nations to sign on to the actions because we'll have shown that we can act in good faith).
Now, on the other hand, if we act and it turns out to have been all wildly exaggerated and it was actually a case of sunspots (or whatever your pet theory is), what have we actually lost? Well, billions of dollars of costs sunk into more expensive (but cleaner) energy generation and the associated infrastructure. On the other hand, the money we've spent won't exactly have just disappeared - we'd have more renewable energy sources, better energy storage and potentially even better energy transmission. We'd have entirely new industries opened up by the amount of money pouring into such areas as materials technology and power efficiency, and therefore entrepreneurs doing what they do best. We'd be much closer to energy independence, and hopefully that would cut the money flow to some of the world's most violent regimes and cool the flames of war and terror. So what does this paint a picture of? Thriving, vibrant, stable capitalism. Exactly what I would have thought a 'right-winger' would want.
So please, help me understand - what exactly is the problem with acting on this issue?
Did you miss the fact that the entire paragraph is set off as a quote, with the blockquote element, styled like every other quote on this site, with a grey line down the left hand side, preceded by an attribution to somebody called tom_evil?
Hmm, I'm fairly sure that it's not quite so simple, unfortunately. I doubt that it would take much to convince a court that, as an edited contribution of a news (not opinion) piece posted onto the front page of the website, the article would be expected to be considered fact by regular readers of the site. In that case it's as much Slashdot's responsibility as it would be a newspaper company's if one of their news journalists wrote a libellous article and they printed it.
Uh, usually I wouldn't note problems in the summary, but a missing quote mark at the start of the second last sentence makes it seem like Slashdot is the one claiming (as fact) that Exxon causes 150,000 deaths per year, and could easily be grounds for a libel suit. If an editor reads this comment, they may want to fix that.
Darwin's theory of evolution has many components, some of which fall under science (e.g. there is random genetic mutation) and many which fall under metaphysics/religion (e.g. there is a god called survival of the fittest that drives evolution, science is good, good is good, you are right, this is important for humanity, all religions are false).
Hmm, interesting take on the theory - I'd like to get it clarified, if you'd be so kind. My understanding of 'survival of the fittest' is that it's essentially a self-fulfilling chain of logic which goes like this:
There is a species. It is merrily chugging along.
A member of the species is born with a random change - say, a slightly longer neck. Usually these mutants are weak, because it doesn't fit in with the rest of the species' biology. But while it makes the swallowing mechanism more dangerous, this mutation also allows the newcomer to eat higher leaves.
The newcomer eats more food, and is therefore healthier and more active. It beats off its rivals to find a mate.
Now there are more specimens with longer necks to find a mate. Repeat from 2 until all members of the species have longer necks.
Replace longer neck with whatever is applicable - a 2-colour-seeing mutation in a colour-blind species, or legs that bend a slightly different way which prove to be an advantage when living in hilly areas, etc. So, what am I missing? Where is the metaphysics and/or religion needed?
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting how you assume that you're right and he's wrong. I don't think he'd be voting in a way that he knows is controversial if he didn't believe in it - and to be honest, I don't buy the 'He's only doing it to prevent the Republicans using it against him' argument. As near as I can tell, he voted the way he did because he felt that was the right decision. Perhaps you should really investigate what the ramifications of passing versus not passing the bill are?
But you're not going to hear me. So many people making so many assumptions.
Maybe.
Reviewing the details of what's being done, though, and I end up with the impression that the people who are voting for this bill are doing it because it's the right thing to do, rather than just because they were told to. Here are the logical steps which may have ended up with a perfectly sane and dutiful Representative deciding to vote in favour of the bill:
Of course, the Telcos are most likely far from innocent, but everyone deserves a fair trail, even if they're a bunch that everyone loves to hate.
Yeah, it is a bit odd. I can only guess that it's a sponsorship ploy, as news.com.au is News Corp's Australian portal.
Meh, it's a cut-and-dried anti-trust violation - I'm actually surprised that the ACCC were willing to let it through on the first pass. They're abusing their effective monopoly in one field (online auctions) to increase their market share in another field (money transfer) using bundling.
Monopolies and the abuse thereof destroys the advantages of the capitalist system. Too many people forget how bad things got in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Yeah. Although it is sort of depressing that we can't find the flaws in the theory; I mean, no theory is supposed to last forever - they're always stop-gaps until flaws are identified and we need to find a new one. Where's the fun in a theory that's always right?
I'm know it won't last forever, but with every new experiment there's always the hope that maybe this one will finally reveal a flaw to work on.
Feel free to read the rest of the post whenever you have time in your clearly busy schedule.
Ya know, this is exactly the thing that shits me to tears about the whole greenhouse debate. Those who've been saying that we might want to do something about the greenhouse effect before it's too late have been characterised as leftist loonies who care more about the planet and other animals than humans and human civilisation. In some cases they're right - there is a liberal dose of the usual extremist greenie suspects in the climate change movement - but I really wonder whether those people actually know what they're fighting for. Because, frankly, the stated aims of environmentalists - improving the forests, saving the fuzzy animals, and so on, is actually served by the increasing CO2 in the atmosphere, as plants grow better in richer CO2 atmospheres and that leads to a stronger biosphere all round. By and large, there's very few better things we could have done with our intelligence for the continuance of life on Earth than releasing all of the trapped CO2 back into the atmosphere so that it can be used again.
The only species that are going to really be adversely affected by this sort of change are those who have set up permanent settlements right next to the water and can't easily retreat further inland as the water rises. Or has critical infrastructure that can be easily destroyed by hurricanes and tornadoes as the weather becomes more chaotic. Or relies on things staying the same, year in, year out, just because they have been for the last 200 years. Such a species would really be fucked by this sort of a change. One only hopes they wouldn't be stupid enough to cause it.
We're not doing this for the planet. We're not doing this for the plants, or even the fuzzy animals. We're doing it for us. Because if you look at the cold hard facts, we really don't have any other choices worth a damn.
I'm a moderate rightist, and I approve this message.
Hmm, given your background, do you work procedually with PHP or using OO methods? All of the decent senior positions that I've seen/been involved in have required a high degree of familiarity with OO development (design patterns, etc.). I'm sure there's procedual positions out there, but they're much rarer.
But yes, there is a definite drought of competent PHP developers here. If you've got a half-way decent resume, you'll get an interview for every position you apply for, in my experience.
Yeah, I can certainly certify that PHP developers are insanely in demand here in Melbourne - I've been involved in recruiting for a couple of positions, and it's ridiculously rare to find anyone with a grasp of Computer Science basics, let alone any OO architecture knowledge (if you're looking for a senior). Personal experience says that if you've got a good grasp of the field, you can name your price - I can get pretty close to 6 figures, and I haven't even hit 25 years old yet (with, admittedly, some unusual experience, given I've built and led a team once already).
Uh, November the 11th sort of is an internationally observed day - in most parts of the world it's called Armistice day or Rememberance day, though. Much as I hate to break up the nationalism party, the end of World War I did sort of affect more than just Americans.
Grabrabagelgra. What the hell are they thinking? Yes, extra income for the CSIRO is handy, but they do not put that ahead of the common good - otherwise, what the hells is the point of a publicly funded research organisation?
Grah. While I'm all in favour of having Liberal (Australian right-leaning major party) stints to keep the economy chugging, this country really has been governed by the right too long - all of our public services are becoming too money-obsessed.
Well, all I can say is: good luck. That's one hell of a job to give to a single agency and still allow for the flexibility that the individual departments and agencies require. Should we be expecting a massive, wasteful consultancy project, then?
Uh, if you RTFA, there's an overlay for Google Earth that you need to download to get the most recent satellite pics. Without that, you're not going to be finding any recently crashed planes.
Because the government is always strong.
On the other hand, let me be the first to say: please don't. At this stage I really am afraid that it'd be posted.
Yeah, this really comes across as slimey geek porn. I'm as sex-starved as the rest of the inhabitants here, but putting something like this up on the front page is just...ew.
If Negroes and Caucasians are truly equal, then we can stop worrying about the ability to vote in any given town. Much like the failed and misguided notion of Reconstruction, to keep track of, and actually worry about, the amount of black vs. white people able to vote in a given town is disingenuous and misleading.
Sometimes, an extra effort really is required.
Interesting.
Just in case anyone is interested (and doesn't want to explore the reply tree), the incident described occured in Ondiep, Utrecht, Netherlands, on the 11th of March, 2007. While a quick search reveals that it was broadly reported in blogs, there does appear to be a somewhat disturbing lack of reporting amongst the professional media.
This doesn't sound like too bad an idea. One issue would be maintenence - if the full version and the lite version had to be maintained seperately, it probably wouldn't be worth it. To keep relevent bugfixes and such applicable to both branches, the code would need to be well designed and presumably fairly modular. Any Mozilla developers (or people familiar with the code) around and willing to comment on whether this would be feasible?
You...I...Ow! Brain hurts!
You're either a genius beyond my level of comprehension, or you're freaking nuts. I'm not sure that I'm qualified to say which.
Just a slight tangent first off: How can any thinking person define themselves as 'right' or 'left'? Seriously. I'm a trade liberal (i.e. pro-free trade), a commercial operating environment moderate (see Ordoliberalism), and a fiscal conservative. So am I left or right? Or maybe I have a range of opinions on multiple topics which are mine, rather than following whatever 'my crowd' is cheering for. Maybe there is a description out that I fit neatly into, but I certainly don't feel any need to belong to a group, and I certainly will not allow my choices and opinions to be dictated by what other people seem to think is a good idea.
Sorry, just needed to vent. The whole left-right thing pisses me off.
Anyway, I do have to wonder: I assume that you agree that there is a non-zero chance of global warming happening. In fact, it seems reasonable to me that with the vast majority of the scientific community agreeing that it is a danger, it deserves a probability of at least 1-2% - scientists aren't all lying scoundrels exaggerating to get grant money, after all, so there must be some who truly believe the conclusions they've reached. Now, if this is so, it seems to me that a 'right-wing' person would be more if favour of accepting and responding to climate change than a 'left-wing' person. Why? Well, let's look at the two outcomes of acting as if it were a threat.
If it does turn out that the threat is real, by acting we've hopefully prevented a global depression (and don't feed me that 'poor nations will ruin it even if we do something about it' crap. They definitely won't do anything if we in developed nations don't act first, because they have to stay competitive. If we do act, then we can use the usual diplomacy routes (and the associated tools available for globe-scale treaties such as trade embargoes) to get other nations to sign on to the actions because we'll have shown that we can act in good faith).
Now, on the other hand, if we act and it turns out to have been all wildly exaggerated and it was actually a case of sunspots (or whatever your pet theory is), what have we actually lost? Well, billions of dollars of costs sunk into more expensive (but cleaner) energy generation and the associated infrastructure. On the other hand, the money we've spent won't exactly have just disappeared - we'd have more renewable energy sources, better energy storage and potentially even better energy transmission. We'd have entirely new industries opened up by the amount of money pouring into such areas as materials technology and power efficiency, and therefore entrepreneurs doing what they do best. We'd be much closer to energy independence, and hopefully that would cut the money flow to some of the world's most violent regimes and cool the flames of war and terror. So what does this paint a picture of? Thriving, vibrant, stable capitalism. Exactly what I would have thought a 'right-winger' would want.
So please, help me understand - what exactly is the problem with acting on this issue?
Do you really think that in all that time he hasn't paid more than enough taxes to cover this?
Everyone pays, everyone benefits - if the rich have to pay a bit more and the poor have to pay a bit less, that's the nature of progressive taxation.
Uh, usually I wouldn't note problems in the summary, but a missing quote mark at the start of the second last sentence makes it seem like Slashdot is the one claiming (as fact) that Exxon causes 150,000 deaths per year, and could easily be grounds for a libel suit. If an editor reads this comment, they may want to fix that.
IANAL, though, so I could be wrong.
Hmm, interesting take on the theory - I'd like to get it clarified, if you'd be so kind. My understanding of 'survival of the fittest' is that it's essentially a self-fulfilling chain of logic which goes like this:
Replace longer neck with whatever is applicable - a 2-colour-seeing mutation in a colour-blind species, or legs that bend a slightly different way which prove to be an advantage when living in hilly areas, etc.
So, what am I missing? Where is the metaphysics and/or religion needed?